TEAM WORK: fast and loose, "Any Technology Sufficiently Advanced"
Title: Any Technology Sufficiently Advanced
Author: soleta
Team: Work
Prompt: fast and loose
Pairing(s): McKay/Sheppard
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: death of non-canon characters
Summary: At nineteen, John thought he knew what was possible and what wasn't. If magic was real, what else was he missing?
Notes: A week ago I saw The Sorcerer's Apprentice, came home, and wrote a thousand words of this story. I hope you enjoy it. The title is from the famous Arthur C. Clarke quote - Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Beta: kisahawklin
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**
The door burst open in a shower of fragments moving so fast they leave motion trails across John's vision before he instinctively shielded his face. He was moving towards the Incantatum before he even opened his eyes, leaving his Master to face the intruders; he almost turned back, but the damn book was more important. He'd had that drilled into his head more than once, and he knew what would happen to him if he ignored a direct order.
It took John only a moment to slap the book, shrinking it to the thickness of his finger, which was essential if he was going to be able to pick it up at all. He could hear spells crackle and explode behind him, and John was readying the only offensive spell he knew even as he spun around, the book folding itself up in his other hand -
There were more sorcerers faced off against his Master than he'd ever seen before, making the odds something approaching insane. McKay shuffled a little in his spot in the circle, in the middle of the room between John and his Master, and threw a look at John that was clearly a silent demand for help. John rolled his eyes and jerked his head at a spot next to him - seriously, why so many smart people were so stupid was completely beyond him - and stuffed the now-tiny Incantatum in his pocket, freeing his right hand up to expand the plasma spell he held chained in his palm. McKay backed up and tried to hide behind John. It didn't work exactly like he planned.
One of the anonymous sorcerers stepped forward, her hands in casting position. "You know why we're here. Give up the spell."
"Rumors to the contrary, I'm not insane," his Master replied, his voice calmer than the set of his back. He looked down the line of sorcerers before pausing on a man near the end. "Guillaume. It's been a long time."
The man stepped forward and lowered the hood of his jacket, revealing a long face and fever-bright eyes capped by blazing red hair. He looked like an insane monk. "Not long enough, to be honest," Guillaume said. "I was hoping you'd blow yourself up one of these days. Now we have to do it for you. Have you no manners?"
"That reminds me," his Master said, a smile in his voice. "I forgot your welcoming present." His right foot slid back a fraction of an inch towards John, who had only been waiting for a sign, any sign; he loosed his plasma ball at Guilliame as his Master raised an arm in front of him and one behind. He cast a spell from either hand, the hand behind him producing a gust of wind that flung John and McKay into the air and sent them flying towards the back door. The hand before him cast an exploding spell John had never seen before, sending the sorcerers scattering for cover. "Go!" his Master yelled, opening the back door before they slammed right into it. They flew through the doorway and it closed behind them.
John gritted his teeth and grabbed McKay's wrist to avoid losing him in mid-air. Levitation was the first thing he'd tried when he got his ring. It was still his favorite spell. He could do this. Clear your mind, focus your energy, controlled release - and they were flying. John took just a second to savor the feeling of space, of unlimited space and possibilities, the freedom to explore them, and the pure speed before he brought them down on the rooftop across the way. "Stay down," he hissed at McKay, pushing him behind an air-conditioning unit.
"What are you doing?" McKay hissed back. "They're going to kill you!"
"They'll have to go through me to get to him," John said, standing and preparing to cross the gap between the buildings again. "I can't just leave him - I won't."
McKay was definitely panicking at this point. "This is not the time for half-baked heroics!"
"I happen to think it's the perfect time!" John shouted and jumped off the roof. It only took a split-second of applied force to fling himself at the fire escape of the apartment they'd just left. He caught it with his stomach and clung to the rail while gasping for the breath that had just abandoned him and trying to peer in the window. He could only see the trails of bright spell-fire crisscrossing the room; he thought his Master was to the left, but it was hard to be sure. John used his ring to jet to the next window to the left, which was the apartment's tiny bathroom. He clambered in through the window and cracked the door into the main room, building up a plasma ball in his right hand as he peered around the edge of the door.
The main room looked like a bomb had gone off, which wasn't far wrong. His Master was taking cover behind a pile of furniture while he held off the massed sorcerers with walls of fire and a few animated creatures they kept around for emergencies and this definitely qualified.
"I thought I sent you away," his Master growled as John slid behind the barrier next to him.
"Yeah, well," John said, shrugging. He poked his head over what used to be their couch to fire off his throttled plasma ball, exploding the TV and showering the faceless horde with sparks and sharp debris. "I heard you were throwing a party without me." He ducked to avoid three fireballs, one shattered lynx defender, two plasma balls, and - "Was that acid?" John asked as it began burning a hole in the floor.
"Guillaume prefers it. John," his Master said urgently, gripping John's shoulder, forcing John to look at him. "It's important that you stay with McKay. You know that."
"What are you going to do, throw me out a window again?" John stared at him, incredulous, until he noticed someone coming up on their position. The resulting flurry of spells drove her back, but not for long. "We have to get out of here. Now."
"Go," his Master replied, his hands busy caging something so bright that John had to look away. He heard shuffling and looked back to see his Master stand, his face thrown into bizarre light and shadow by the pure energy crackling in his hands. He didn't need to move - they couldn't seem to touch him. John swallows. "Go, John," his Master repeated gently, took a deep breath, and blew. John closed his eyes as the strangest feeling washed over him and when it cleared and he opened his eyes again, he was on the rooftop next to McKay.
"You just appeared out of midair," McKay said blankly, looking up at John.
John swore. "That happens sometimes," he said, his voice tight as he collected the focus to send himself back to the fire escape. There was no way he was leaving his Master, no way in hell, and fuck anyone who expected him to -
The building across the way exploded in a fury of light and colors and large pieces of masonry, sending John flying backward and slamming into the stairwell access. Something crack in that internal way that meant it was his own bones he heard breaking, and for a moment he couldn't breathe. McKay landed ten feet in front of him, and only quick thinking on McKay's part prevented the airborne air-conditioning unit that had been their cover from taking his head off.
Laying face-down on the roof, John took a deep breath before he made the effort to stand up, and the sharp, stabbing pain when he inhaled told him that he had at least one broken rib. He knew they had to move, and fast - it wasn't likely that his Master had incapacitated more than a few of their enemies, and the cops were undoubtedly on their way.
John pushed himself up, fighting his way through the sharpest pains, and looked across the roof at the shell of their apartment. Most of the top half was missing, but John could see bodies in the debris. He limped over to McKay and, wincing, knelt by his side. "We have to go, McKay." He awkwardly felt for a pulse.
McKay flailed at him. "Go 'way," he slurred into the concrete. "Sleep."
"Sleep here and you're dead, you idiot," John said, whacking him on the head. "They're going to be coming for us. For you." He registered something shiny a few inches from McKay's head. He picked it up and when he realized what it was, he nearly dropped it again. He'd know his Master's ring anywhere. Anywhere. The ring chose its heir, always. The first part had worked, and here was the proof. He pushed away the prickling behind his eyes and slid the ring into his pocket. He'd think about it later.
"Fuck," McKay muttered and slowly started to pick himself up. "This is all your fault, isn't it. I sincerely wish I'd never met you."
John suppressed a groan as he made himself get back to his feet. "Believe me, the feeling is mutual."
---
John wasn't up to using magic to steal a car, but it turned out he was capable of making them look less like homeless people and more like college students, which was good enough to get them on the city bus toward the hospital.
John had two broken ribs, some codeine, and a brand new alias to his name when they left. "I can't believe they don't even tape your ribs anymore," McKay said. He was more or less unhurt, according to the doctor, and dying according to himself.
"I don't care," John said, leaning his head against the windows of the bus. He did care, because it hurt to breathe, but talking to McKay about anything required more patience than John currently possessed. "Do you know somewhere we can crash for tonight?"
"We can go back to my apartment. My roommate won't mind."
John thought about that for a minute. It was probably a bad idea, but he was having a hard time thinking of a way anyone could get McKay's name out of the detritus of his apartment. All the important information, including the spell, was in the Incantatum. They had to sleep somewhere.
He couldn't help thinking that his brain was a little too fuzzy to make decisions like this.
"Fine," he said, closing his eyes. "But we're leaving tomorrow. They'll be swarming the city by nightfall, and it's not out of the question that someone could be able to trace us."
McKay started asking questions that John promptly tuned out as he let himself succumb to the haze of exhaustion that was clouding his brain. His dreams were full of shadowy figures, creeping terrors, and the sickening sway of the bus. McKay woke him to transfer buses at the city center onto a newer bus, but instead of sleeping again John stared out the window trying to remember every hint of advice his Master had ever dropped into random conversations. Had he seen this situation coming, or had he seen The Karate Kid too many times? John would never know.
They got off the bus close to a decrepit four-story apartment building that McKay claimed as home. There was no elevator, but McKay lived on the second floor, so John made it up the stairs with a minimum of embarrassing noises as McKay unlocked the door and yanked him inside.
The apartment was incongruously beautiful on the inside; someone had refinished the hardwood floors and painted the walls cool colors. It felt like open space, which was one of John's favorite things.
A cop was sitting in an armchair in the middle of the room. She was reading a newspaper and ignoring them, so John hobbled over to the couch and crashed. On second glance, when his eyes weren't distracted by the overwhelming blue of the uniform, she was gorgeous and warm and open, even buttoned down and restrained with her hair slicked back under the cap. John relaxed a little; he could work with that kind of person.
"Hi, Teyla!" McKay said, dropping his keys by the door and heading for an opening in the wall further into the apartment.
"Good afternoon, Rodney," the goddess said without looking up, and her voice matched the rest of her. "Who is your friend?"
McKay stuck his head back through the opening. "This is my roommate, Teyla Emmagan. Teyla, this is... " He trailed off, then made a face. "Someone whose name I have temporarily forgotten." He withdrew back into what John decided must be the kitchen, leaving John to introduce himself.
"I'm John Sheppard," he said lamely. "McKay and I go to the same school."
"You met on campus, then?" she asked, still engrossed in her newspaper.
"Er," John said. "Yes." Technically.
"Rodney doesn't usually bring them home," Teyla said, finally folding and closing the newspaper. She looked up and pinned him with cool eyes. "Don't hurt him." She didn't need an or; she was quite a capable or all on her own.
"I was really just hoping to crash on the couch," John protested. "I'm not - we're not - "
Teyla laughed. "Sorry," she said. "I just assumed." She rose gracefully and went into the kitchen for a minute; John heard laughter before she came back out. "It's my shift," she explained as she pulled on her boots. "I'm a beat cop downtown. I'll try to be quiet when I come back in." And then Teyla was gone out the front door like a whirlwind.
"I think it's time for a few questions while you're too tired to run away and too hungry to sleep," McKay said, sitting down across from him with a plate of sandwiches.
John rolled his eyes. "You're bribing me with sandwiches?"
"Are you going to get up and make your own?" John couldn't help but wince when he thought about it. "That's what I thought," McKay said, smug. "Then yes, I am. Question one: do we really go to the same school?"
"Yeah," John said reluctantly. "I'm an undergrad."
"Huh," McKay said. "That's strange." He paused, and before John could ask him what was strange, he sat forward. "This one is actually worth a sandwich. Who were they and why are they trying to kill us?"
John chewed on his cheek for a minute. McKay really did have a right to know why people were trying to kill him, but the full issue with all its implications were more than he wanted to get into right now, and he needed to check his Master's notes in the Incantatum. "Two sandwiches. And I get one now."
"Only if you promise not to fall asleep in the middle," McKay grumbled, but handed one over. John checked the contents - ham and cheese - and wolfed it down. He hadn't realized quite how hungry he was.
Once he'd finished, he put his feet up on the table in front of him and sighed. "All right, how much did you believe of what my Master told you when you agreed to this shit?"
McKay laughed. "That's easy. Nothing, until he showed me a few tricks. I mean, I could probably reproduce most of what he did, but not without equipment at the drop of a hat."
"Yeah," John said. "Me too." He'd been convinced by the one trick it was impossible to reproduce - his Master had shown him flight, true flight without jets and engines and rocket ships, and John wanted in. It was that simple. In that instant the Air Force had been forgotten; magic was the future, as far as John was concerned. In that decision he had found so many things his life had been missing - a true mentor, a sense and a source of wonder, maybe even a future. Some of those things were gone, but he was determined to fight for the rest. He wouldn't let anyone else take them away from him, and he'd fight to make sure McKay had the same chance.
"Look," John said. "Right now, everyone is hunting us. The cops are processing bodies in my old apartment. It's not going to take them long to figure out that mine isn't one of them."
"My roommate is a cop," McKay said, completely unnecessarily.
John shook his head. "She's a beat cop, not a detective. They'll put out an APB tomorrow when the medical examiner gets through the rest of the bodies and none of them match my dental records. By that time we'll be long gone."
"So why aren't we leaving now?" McKay argued. "We should get a head start."
John tried to shove the heels of his palms into his eye sockets. "I am not a goddamn robot," he said angrily. "I need food, rest, and to be completely still for the next twelve hours so my ribs won't kill me in my sleep. Unless you have a helicopter or the cash to buy one, we are staying right here."
McKay got a thoughtful look in his eye. "All right," he said, still seemingly a thousand miles away. "Don't think you're dodging that question. Who are they?"
"In sorcerer circles, you're either a good guy or a bad guy," John explained. "They have stupid names, but basically either you follow in the Merlin tradition or the Morgana tradition. Merlin is the good guy and Morgana is the bad guy; they spent their entire lives fighting each other. The sorcerers they trained carried on the fight, and it continues to this day."
"What's the difference?" McKay asked intently. He was different when he was getting his answers instead of more questions; quieter, maybe, focused.
"The good guys are less interested in taking over the world with zombies and more interested in saving lives." John smirked. It wasn't exactly the way his Master had explained it to him, but he thought the comparison was pretty good.
"I'm pretty sure I saw this movie," McKay said, disapproval written all over his face.
"Anyway," John continued, "The sorcerers that were in the apartment were the Merlin guys."
McKay sat back and frowned. "But - I thought you guys were the Merlin guys."
"We are." John swore. "I am. We were. Shit. Look, just because we're all on the side of not taking over the world doesn't mean that everyone agrees on everything," he said, desperate that McKay understand. "They were angry because of the experiment we were running. It messes with their idea of our society, and it could expose our world to the average guy on the street, and - we're threatening to take away everything that makes them special, and nobody ever appreciates that."
McKay took a minute to think about that. John watched the flickering expressions on his face, looking for understanding and determination, hoping not to see rage or bitterness. The play of his thoughts across his face was strangely appealing, and John found himself trying to anticipate what would come next, and trying to guess why it wasn't what he thought it would be. He was so absorbed in searching McKay's face that he was caught off guard when he was handed another sandwich.
"Thanks," John says through a mouthful of ham and cheese. "For making the sandwiches, I mean." He pinned his eyes to the wall behind McKay. He was hoping to keep this sort of professional - his Master had kept a gentle space between them most of the time, in a way that hadn't hurt him at all but made him finally understand why that guy wrote a poem about good fences after two years of undergraduate English. John wasn't his Master, and never will be, but he's hoping he learned something other than a couple of levitation spells.
McKay cleared his throat a little, and John looked back at him. "Are the Morgana people going to be after us, too?" he asked, a little nervous.
"Like white on rice," John confirmed with a ghastly smile.
McKay closed his eyes. "Thank you for that," he said through gritted teeth, then sighed. "Fuck."
"I wish I could tell you that you weren't involved," John said. "But you are, and you'll always be involved now. You let him do the spell, and that changed your life. Permanently."
"But nobody explained this to me," McKay argued. "Fucking informed consent, haven't you ever heard of it?"
John shook his head. "You didn't ask if there were side effects or why we insisted on complete secrecy. You were too busy grabbing hold of what you thought was a great bargain. Sorry, McKay. You're one of us now." He smirked. "Besides, you can't exactly give it back. Try sieving out your brain."
"Very funny," McKay said with a dirty look. "Tomorrow you're teaching me magic." He got up, leaving the plate of sandwiches on the table, and left the room without a backward glance. John sighed - he'd sort of been hoping for a blanket or something, but he'd survive. He took off his shirt and glanced at his ring to focus his attention, then visualized the air molecules arranging themselves into a sort of protective, hardened cover around his torso. He knew from experience that it wasn't a great shield in combat, but it was dense and very effective at limiting movement if applied directly to the skin. After that, it was easy enough to mold it into a form that allowed expansion and contraction but didn't allow any sideways movement or shearing, allowing for breathing alone. When he was done, he let his hands fall to his sides, suddenly exhausted. With most of his movement suppressed, John got as comfortable as the couch allowed before he quickly fell asleep.
The sun woke him late the next morning. The first thing he did was dissolve the field around his torso. The second thing he would do, John decided, would have to be a shower, or whatever he could scrounge that resembled one. He quickly found the bathroom down the hall and gave himself a sponge bath in the sink, which at least got the explosion debris off. When he was done, he was at least presentable. He felt a lot better after his much-needed rest, so it was a simple matter to repair his clothing a little and clean them with magic.
Out in the hall, John had two options: back to the kitchen and the couch, which he felt oddly possessive of, or to the right down the hallway, which contained two closed doors. John edged down the hallway a little to listen at the door closer to him; it was silent, until from behind him McKay said, "I wouldn't go in there if I were you. Last time I did she said she'd arrest me for trespassing."
"Jesus, McKay," John said, turning. "Warn a guy."
McKay frowned. "What? I just did."
John sighed. "Is there food?" he asked, then eyed McKay's crumpled, stained t-shirt and faded jogging shorts. "Food that's not deadly?"
McKay looked down at himself, then looked back at John, highly insulted. "Fuck you. Get your own breakfast." He turned and marched off down the hall, grumbling. John couldn't help it; he laughed.
John followed him into the kitchen, where McKay had breakfast in bags from a deli he said was local. He also had a shiny metal briefcase. "What's that?" he asked, serving himself sausages.
McKay smirked. "I landed a job with an apparatus of the United States government. They wanted me badly enough to pay a rather hefty signing bonus." He bit off a piece of English muffin. "I called the downtown branch of my bank while you were sleeping. They had enough cash on hand to give me a half of what I asked for, which is probably good enough right now." McKay reached down, snagged the briefcase, and laid it down on the table between them. He opened the latches and spun the case around to face John.
John swallowed. He had never seen that much cash in his entire life. Not even his father carried it around like this. "A hundred thousand dollars," McKay said, smug. "I am the brightest mind of my generation, after all. And they wanted my new encryption theory rather badly."
"So you put the screws to them?" John finally looked up. "Jesus, McKay."
"It's Rodney," McKay said, obviously annoyed. He slammed down his coffee mug, scraped his chair back, and went into the fridge. John wasn't sure what he'd done - he'd only met the guy three days ago, and the situation was a little weird. He opened his mouth only to close it again when nothing came to mind, and then McKay was coming back with milk. "Look," he said, pouring a little into his coffee. "I've been thinking, they don't know who I am, right?"
"Right," John said. "Everything about anything is right here in my Incantatum."
"That's your spell book, right?" McKay went on before John could answer, so he figured it wasn't actually a question. "Anyway, the job offer I accepted is in DC. If they don't know about me..." He trailed off and looked at John hopefully. "I'd get my own lab, I could work on the magic shit after hours. And to be honest, they're paying an obscene amount of money. I could probably afford to support a fugitive."
"You're talking about living in DC?" John was having a hard time wrapping his brain around the idea; he was stuck on the idea of needing to keep on the move.
"You'll teach me magic, and I'll figure out how it works in actual science," McKay continued, clearly not listening to a word John said. He was off somewhere else, judging by the glint in his eye.
"McKay!" John said loudly.
McKay blinked, startled. He looked at John. "What?"
"I have to tell you something," John said, squirming a little inside. "I'm not - I haven't been studying magic as long as you think I have."
"How long have you been studying magic?" McKay asked, frowning.
"About a month."
"Oh." McKay slumped a little in his chair. John could practically see him deflate.
"But I think I can teach myself," he said quickly, offering an olive branch. "And then I could teach you. I'd just be a month ahead of you." It wasn't what he had been planning on saying, but McKay's expression had unexpectedly tugged on his heartstrings, and he hadn't been able to resist.
"That could work," McKay said thoughtfully. He narrowed his eyes at John, who was getting whiplash at the abrupt moodswings. "What's your GPA?"
"Er," John said. "3.8, why?"
"I refuse to learn from an idiot," McKay said, practically sticking his nose in the air, and John didn't stop laughing for nearly a minute while McKay rolled his eyes and finished his breakfast.
When he recovered, John dug in to the rest of the food on his plate; in the middle of a heavenly sausage, he remembered something. "Last night, you said something about it being strange that we go to the same school," John said. "What did you mean?"
McKay scrubbed his face with one hand indecisively, then sighed. "I meant that it was strange, because I think I would have noticed you."
Oh. "Oh," John said blankly.
"It's just a thing, I swear," McKay babbled. "You just - I have a type, that's all, and you have certain physical things in common with that type, and that's it, I don't mean to make you uncomfortable. Fuck. I'm sorry, I'll never mention it again - "
"Shut up, Rodney," John interrupted, and Rodney closed his mouth, his eyes wide. It occurred then to John that he'd never called Rodney by his first name before, and it felt weirdly intimate, but it was too late to take it back, and anyway, he didn't really want to. John put that thought aside to examine later. "I have something for you," he said, changing the topic abruptly. John reached into his pocket and closed his hand around his Master's ring. He pulled it out and set the tiny statue on the table between them.
In its unlocked state, the ring was a beautifully detailed golden lion sitting on his haunches with ruby chips for eyes, an inch and a half high from the top of its mane to the tip of its tail. Between its paws rested a spherical ruby, about the size of his fingertip.
Rodney raised an eyebrow, but when John continued to look at him impassively, leaned forward to examine it. "It's beautiful, but I'm not really a fan of knick-knacks," he said, sitting back in his chair.
"Touch it," John said.
Rodney hesitated, but leaned forward again and rested one long finger on the lion's head; for a moment nothing happened, and John's heart sunk into his chest; he had no idea where to get another talisman, or how to make them, and Rodney absolutely had to be trained if he was going to survive.
Then the lion bent down and bit the ruby, picking it up in its mouth, before leaping forward onto Rodney's hand; somehow it insinuated itself between Rodney's fingers. It came to rest on his middle finger, then wrapped its body around until the tail ended up beneath its own chin. It closed its eyes and solidified until it was just a ring again.
"Jesus," Rodney said, eyes wide. John slumped a little in relief. "What the hell was that?"
"First lesson," John said, leaning back in his chair. "No ring, no magic." He showed Rodney his ring, which was identical to Rodney's. "They're magical talismans. You have to send the spell through them. I don't know how they work," he said hastily, fending off the fascinated questions he could already see forming in Rodney's brain. "I just know that they do."
"Magic rings," Rodney said, staring at the matching lions on their hands. "Okay. Fine." He gingerly tugged at his ring, as if he were afraid it wouldn't move; John could see the faint surprise on his face when it came away easily. He examined the ring, turning it over and over in his hands, rubbed his thumb over the ruby in the lion's jaws. "Where did you get this?"
John folded his arms over his chest and slouched. "It was my Master's."
Rodney's head came up sharply. "How did you get it? How did it survive the explosion?"
"The rings choose their next master when their previous master dies," John explained. He was struggling to keep away the grief, but Rodney deserved an answer. "I don't know how, but I found it lying next to your head after the explosion."
"It chose me," Rodney murmured, turning the ring over and over again in his hands. "Okay," he said suddenly, slipping the ring back on his middle finger. "I'll leave Teyla some cash." He looked up at John and smirked. "Shall we?"
John couldn't help but grin back, dropping his arms from their defensive position and straightening up in his chair. It wouldn't be such a bad life, looking for other people whose brain could handle the weight and terrible power of the magic he and Rodney could give them. It wouldn't be fun, learning magic as fast as he could to keep ahead of the other sorcerers, teaching Rodney in his spare time, but they'd make it. "Let's go."
**
Poll
Author: soleta
Team: Work
Prompt: fast and loose
Pairing(s): McKay/Sheppard
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: death of non-canon characters
Summary: At nineteen, John thought he knew what was possible and what wasn't. If magic was real, what else was he missing?
Notes: A week ago I saw The Sorcerer's Apprentice, came home, and wrote a thousand words of this story. I hope you enjoy it. The title is from the famous Arthur C. Clarke quote - Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Beta: kisahawklin
Once you've read the story, please take a moment to vote in the poll below. Ratings go from 1 (low) to 9 (high), so all you need to do is enter a single number in that range into each text entry box. You'll be able to see the Prompt and Team (Genre) information in the header above.
More details about the voting procedure can be found here.
**
The door burst open in a shower of fragments moving so fast they leave motion trails across John's vision before he instinctively shielded his face. He was moving towards the Incantatum before he even opened his eyes, leaving his Master to face the intruders; he almost turned back, but the damn book was more important. He'd had that drilled into his head more than once, and he knew what would happen to him if he ignored a direct order.
It took John only a moment to slap the book, shrinking it to the thickness of his finger, which was essential if he was going to be able to pick it up at all. He could hear spells crackle and explode behind him, and John was readying the only offensive spell he knew even as he spun around, the book folding itself up in his other hand -
There were more sorcerers faced off against his Master than he'd ever seen before, making the odds something approaching insane. McKay shuffled a little in his spot in the circle, in the middle of the room between John and his Master, and threw a look at John that was clearly a silent demand for help. John rolled his eyes and jerked his head at a spot next to him - seriously, why so many smart people were so stupid was completely beyond him - and stuffed the now-tiny Incantatum in his pocket, freeing his right hand up to expand the plasma spell he held chained in his palm. McKay backed up and tried to hide behind John. It didn't work exactly like he planned.
One of the anonymous sorcerers stepped forward, her hands in casting position. "You know why we're here. Give up the spell."
"Rumors to the contrary, I'm not insane," his Master replied, his voice calmer than the set of his back. He looked down the line of sorcerers before pausing on a man near the end. "Guillaume. It's been a long time."
The man stepped forward and lowered the hood of his jacket, revealing a long face and fever-bright eyes capped by blazing red hair. He looked like an insane monk. "Not long enough, to be honest," Guillaume said. "I was hoping you'd blow yourself up one of these days. Now we have to do it for you. Have you no manners?"
"That reminds me," his Master said, a smile in his voice. "I forgot your welcoming present." His right foot slid back a fraction of an inch towards John, who had only been waiting for a sign, any sign; he loosed his plasma ball at Guilliame as his Master raised an arm in front of him and one behind. He cast a spell from either hand, the hand behind him producing a gust of wind that flung John and McKay into the air and sent them flying towards the back door. The hand before him cast an exploding spell John had never seen before, sending the sorcerers scattering for cover. "Go!" his Master yelled, opening the back door before they slammed right into it. They flew through the doorway and it closed behind them.
John gritted his teeth and grabbed McKay's wrist to avoid losing him in mid-air. Levitation was the first thing he'd tried when he got his ring. It was still his favorite spell. He could do this. Clear your mind, focus your energy, controlled release - and they were flying. John took just a second to savor the feeling of space, of unlimited space and possibilities, the freedom to explore them, and the pure speed before he brought them down on the rooftop across the way. "Stay down," he hissed at McKay, pushing him behind an air-conditioning unit.
"What are you doing?" McKay hissed back. "They're going to kill you!"
"They'll have to go through me to get to him," John said, standing and preparing to cross the gap between the buildings again. "I can't just leave him - I won't."
McKay was definitely panicking at this point. "This is not the time for half-baked heroics!"
"I happen to think it's the perfect time!" John shouted and jumped off the roof. It only took a split-second of applied force to fling himself at the fire escape of the apartment they'd just left. He caught it with his stomach and clung to the rail while gasping for the breath that had just abandoned him and trying to peer in the window. He could only see the trails of bright spell-fire crisscrossing the room; he thought his Master was to the left, but it was hard to be sure. John used his ring to jet to the next window to the left, which was the apartment's tiny bathroom. He clambered in through the window and cracked the door into the main room, building up a plasma ball in his right hand as he peered around the edge of the door.
The main room looked like a bomb had gone off, which wasn't far wrong. His Master was taking cover behind a pile of furniture while he held off the massed sorcerers with walls of fire and a few animated creatures they kept around for emergencies and this definitely qualified.
"I thought I sent you away," his Master growled as John slid behind the barrier next to him.
"Yeah, well," John said, shrugging. He poked his head over what used to be their couch to fire off his throttled plasma ball, exploding the TV and showering the faceless horde with sparks and sharp debris. "I heard you were throwing a party without me." He ducked to avoid three fireballs, one shattered lynx defender, two plasma balls, and - "Was that acid?" John asked as it began burning a hole in the floor.
"Guillaume prefers it. John," his Master said urgently, gripping John's shoulder, forcing John to look at him. "It's important that you stay with McKay. You know that."
"What are you going to do, throw me out a window again?" John stared at him, incredulous, until he noticed someone coming up on their position. The resulting flurry of spells drove her back, but not for long. "We have to get out of here. Now."
"Go," his Master replied, his hands busy caging something so bright that John had to look away. He heard shuffling and looked back to see his Master stand, his face thrown into bizarre light and shadow by the pure energy crackling in his hands. He didn't need to move - they couldn't seem to touch him. John swallows. "Go, John," his Master repeated gently, took a deep breath, and blew. John closed his eyes as the strangest feeling washed over him and when it cleared and he opened his eyes again, he was on the rooftop next to McKay.
"You just appeared out of midair," McKay said blankly, looking up at John.
John swore. "That happens sometimes," he said, his voice tight as he collected the focus to send himself back to the fire escape. There was no way he was leaving his Master, no way in hell, and fuck anyone who expected him to -
The building across the way exploded in a fury of light and colors and large pieces of masonry, sending John flying backward and slamming into the stairwell access. Something crack in that internal way that meant it was his own bones he heard breaking, and for a moment he couldn't breathe. McKay landed ten feet in front of him, and only quick thinking on McKay's part prevented the airborne air-conditioning unit that had been their cover from taking his head off.
Laying face-down on the roof, John took a deep breath before he made the effort to stand up, and the sharp, stabbing pain when he inhaled told him that he had at least one broken rib. He knew they had to move, and fast - it wasn't likely that his Master had incapacitated more than a few of their enemies, and the cops were undoubtedly on their way.
John pushed himself up, fighting his way through the sharpest pains, and looked across the roof at the shell of their apartment. Most of the top half was missing, but John could see bodies in the debris. He limped over to McKay and, wincing, knelt by his side. "We have to go, McKay." He awkwardly felt for a pulse.
McKay flailed at him. "Go 'way," he slurred into the concrete. "Sleep."
"Sleep here and you're dead, you idiot," John said, whacking him on the head. "They're going to be coming for us. For you." He registered something shiny a few inches from McKay's head. He picked it up and when he realized what it was, he nearly dropped it again. He'd know his Master's ring anywhere. Anywhere. The ring chose its heir, always. The first part had worked, and here was the proof. He pushed away the prickling behind his eyes and slid the ring into his pocket. He'd think about it later.
"Fuck," McKay muttered and slowly started to pick himself up. "This is all your fault, isn't it. I sincerely wish I'd never met you."
John suppressed a groan as he made himself get back to his feet. "Believe me, the feeling is mutual."
---
John wasn't up to using magic to steal a car, but it turned out he was capable of making them look less like homeless people and more like college students, which was good enough to get them on the city bus toward the hospital.
John had two broken ribs, some codeine, and a brand new alias to his name when they left. "I can't believe they don't even tape your ribs anymore," McKay said. He was more or less unhurt, according to the doctor, and dying according to himself.
"I don't care," John said, leaning his head against the windows of the bus. He did care, because it hurt to breathe, but talking to McKay about anything required more patience than John currently possessed. "Do you know somewhere we can crash for tonight?"
"We can go back to my apartment. My roommate won't mind."
John thought about that for a minute. It was probably a bad idea, but he was having a hard time thinking of a way anyone could get McKay's name out of the detritus of his apartment. All the important information, including the spell, was in the Incantatum. They had to sleep somewhere.
He couldn't help thinking that his brain was a little too fuzzy to make decisions like this.
"Fine," he said, closing his eyes. "But we're leaving tomorrow. They'll be swarming the city by nightfall, and it's not out of the question that someone could be able to trace us."
McKay started asking questions that John promptly tuned out as he let himself succumb to the haze of exhaustion that was clouding his brain. His dreams were full of shadowy figures, creeping terrors, and the sickening sway of the bus. McKay woke him to transfer buses at the city center onto a newer bus, but instead of sleeping again John stared out the window trying to remember every hint of advice his Master had ever dropped into random conversations. Had he seen this situation coming, or had he seen The Karate Kid too many times? John would never know.
They got off the bus close to a decrepit four-story apartment building that McKay claimed as home. There was no elevator, but McKay lived on the second floor, so John made it up the stairs with a minimum of embarrassing noises as McKay unlocked the door and yanked him inside.
The apartment was incongruously beautiful on the inside; someone had refinished the hardwood floors and painted the walls cool colors. It felt like open space, which was one of John's favorite things.
A cop was sitting in an armchair in the middle of the room. She was reading a newspaper and ignoring them, so John hobbled over to the couch and crashed. On second glance, when his eyes weren't distracted by the overwhelming blue of the uniform, she was gorgeous and warm and open, even buttoned down and restrained with her hair slicked back under the cap. John relaxed a little; he could work with that kind of person.
"Hi, Teyla!" McKay said, dropping his keys by the door and heading for an opening in the wall further into the apartment.
"Good afternoon, Rodney," the goddess said without looking up, and her voice matched the rest of her. "Who is your friend?"
McKay stuck his head back through the opening. "This is my roommate, Teyla Emmagan. Teyla, this is... " He trailed off, then made a face. "Someone whose name I have temporarily forgotten." He withdrew back into what John decided must be the kitchen, leaving John to introduce himself.
"I'm John Sheppard," he said lamely. "McKay and I go to the same school."
"You met on campus, then?" she asked, still engrossed in her newspaper.
"Er," John said. "Yes." Technically.
"Rodney doesn't usually bring them home," Teyla said, finally folding and closing the newspaper. She looked up and pinned him with cool eyes. "Don't hurt him." She didn't need an or; she was quite a capable or all on her own.
"I was really just hoping to crash on the couch," John protested. "I'm not - we're not - "
Teyla laughed. "Sorry," she said. "I just assumed." She rose gracefully and went into the kitchen for a minute; John heard laughter before she came back out. "It's my shift," she explained as she pulled on her boots. "I'm a beat cop downtown. I'll try to be quiet when I come back in." And then Teyla was gone out the front door like a whirlwind.
"I think it's time for a few questions while you're too tired to run away and too hungry to sleep," McKay said, sitting down across from him with a plate of sandwiches.
John rolled his eyes. "You're bribing me with sandwiches?"
"Are you going to get up and make your own?" John couldn't help but wince when he thought about it. "That's what I thought," McKay said, smug. "Then yes, I am. Question one: do we really go to the same school?"
"Yeah," John said reluctantly. "I'm an undergrad."
"Huh," McKay said. "That's strange." He paused, and before John could ask him what was strange, he sat forward. "This one is actually worth a sandwich. Who were they and why are they trying to kill us?"
John chewed on his cheek for a minute. McKay really did have a right to know why people were trying to kill him, but the full issue with all its implications were more than he wanted to get into right now, and he needed to check his Master's notes in the Incantatum. "Two sandwiches. And I get one now."
"Only if you promise not to fall asleep in the middle," McKay grumbled, but handed one over. John checked the contents - ham and cheese - and wolfed it down. He hadn't realized quite how hungry he was.
Once he'd finished, he put his feet up on the table in front of him and sighed. "All right, how much did you believe of what my Master told you when you agreed to this shit?"
McKay laughed. "That's easy. Nothing, until he showed me a few tricks. I mean, I could probably reproduce most of what he did, but not without equipment at the drop of a hat."
"Yeah," John said. "Me too." He'd been convinced by the one trick it was impossible to reproduce - his Master had shown him flight, true flight without jets and engines and rocket ships, and John wanted in. It was that simple. In that instant the Air Force had been forgotten; magic was the future, as far as John was concerned. In that decision he had found so many things his life had been missing - a true mentor, a sense and a source of wonder, maybe even a future. Some of those things were gone, but he was determined to fight for the rest. He wouldn't let anyone else take them away from him, and he'd fight to make sure McKay had the same chance.
"Look," John said. "Right now, everyone is hunting us. The cops are processing bodies in my old apartment. It's not going to take them long to figure out that mine isn't one of them."
"My roommate is a cop," McKay said, completely unnecessarily.
John shook his head. "She's a beat cop, not a detective. They'll put out an APB tomorrow when the medical examiner gets through the rest of the bodies and none of them match my dental records. By that time we'll be long gone."
"So why aren't we leaving now?" McKay argued. "We should get a head start."
John tried to shove the heels of his palms into his eye sockets. "I am not a goddamn robot," he said angrily. "I need food, rest, and to be completely still for the next twelve hours so my ribs won't kill me in my sleep. Unless you have a helicopter or the cash to buy one, we are staying right here."
McKay got a thoughtful look in his eye. "All right," he said, still seemingly a thousand miles away. "Don't think you're dodging that question. Who are they?"
"In sorcerer circles, you're either a good guy or a bad guy," John explained. "They have stupid names, but basically either you follow in the Merlin tradition or the Morgana tradition. Merlin is the good guy and Morgana is the bad guy; they spent their entire lives fighting each other. The sorcerers they trained carried on the fight, and it continues to this day."
"What's the difference?" McKay asked intently. He was different when he was getting his answers instead of more questions; quieter, maybe, focused.
"The good guys are less interested in taking over the world with zombies and more interested in saving lives." John smirked. It wasn't exactly the way his Master had explained it to him, but he thought the comparison was pretty good.
"I'm pretty sure I saw this movie," McKay said, disapproval written all over his face.
"Anyway," John continued, "The sorcerers that were in the apartment were the Merlin guys."
McKay sat back and frowned. "But - I thought you guys were the Merlin guys."
"We are." John swore. "I am. We were. Shit. Look, just because we're all on the side of not taking over the world doesn't mean that everyone agrees on everything," he said, desperate that McKay understand. "They were angry because of the experiment we were running. It messes with their idea of our society, and it could expose our world to the average guy on the street, and - we're threatening to take away everything that makes them special, and nobody ever appreciates that."
McKay took a minute to think about that. John watched the flickering expressions on his face, looking for understanding and determination, hoping not to see rage or bitterness. The play of his thoughts across his face was strangely appealing, and John found himself trying to anticipate what would come next, and trying to guess why it wasn't what he thought it would be. He was so absorbed in searching McKay's face that he was caught off guard when he was handed another sandwich.
"Thanks," John says through a mouthful of ham and cheese. "For making the sandwiches, I mean." He pinned his eyes to the wall behind McKay. He was hoping to keep this sort of professional - his Master had kept a gentle space between them most of the time, in a way that hadn't hurt him at all but made him finally understand why that guy wrote a poem about good fences after two years of undergraduate English. John wasn't his Master, and never will be, but he's hoping he learned something other than a couple of levitation spells.
McKay cleared his throat a little, and John looked back at him. "Are the Morgana people going to be after us, too?" he asked, a little nervous.
"Like white on rice," John confirmed with a ghastly smile.
McKay closed his eyes. "Thank you for that," he said through gritted teeth, then sighed. "Fuck."
"I wish I could tell you that you weren't involved," John said. "But you are, and you'll always be involved now. You let him do the spell, and that changed your life. Permanently."
"But nobody explained this to me," McKay argued. "Fucking informed consent, haven't you ever heard of it?"
John shook his head. "You didn't ask if there were side effects or why we insisted on complete secrecy. You were too busy grabbing hold of what you thought was a great bargain. Sorry, McKay. You're one of us now." He smirked. "Besides, you can't exactly give it back. Try sieving out your brain."
"Very funny," McKay said with a dirty look. "Tomorrow you're teaching me magic." He got up, leaving the plate of sandwiches on the table, and left the room without a backward glance. John sighed - he'd sort of been hoping for a blanket or something, but he'd survive. He took off his shirt and glanced at his ring to focus his attention, then visualized the air molecules arranging themselves into a sort of protective, hardened cover around his torso. He knew from experience that it wasn't a great shield in combat, but it was dense and very effective at limiting movement if applied directly to the skin. After that, it was easy enough to mold it into a form that allowed expansion and contraction but didn't allow any sideways movement or shearing, allowing for breathing alone. When he was done, he let his hands fall to his sides, suddenly exhausted. With most of his movement suppressed, John got as comfortable as the couch allowed before he quickly fell asleep.
The sun woke him late the next morning. The first thing he did was dissolve the field around his torso. The second thing he would do, John decided, would have to be a shower, or whatever he could scrounge that resembled one. He quickly found the bathroom down the hall and gave himself a sponge bath in the sink, which at least got the explosion debris off. When he was done, he was at least presentable. He felt a lot better after his much-needed rest, so it was a simple matter to repair his clothing a little and clean them with magic.
Out in the hall, John had two options: back to the kitchen and the couch, which he felt oddly possessive of, or to the right down the hallway, which contained two closed doors. John edged down the hallway a little to listen at the door closer to him; it was silent, until from behind him McKay said, "I wouldn't go in there if I were you. Last time I did she said she'd arrest me for trespassing."
"Jesus, McKay," John said, turning. "Warn a guy."
McKay frowned. "What? I just did."
John sighed. "Is there food?" he asked, then eyed McKay's crumpled, stained t-shirt and faded jogging shorts. "Food that's not deadly?"
McKay looked down at himself, then looked back at John, highly insulted. "Fuck you. Get your own breakfast." He turned and marched off down the hall, grumbling. John couldn't help it; he laughed.
John followed him into the kitchen, where McKay had breakfast in bags from a deli he said was local. He also had a shiny metal briefcase. "What's that?" he asked, serving himself sausages.
McKay smirked. "I landed a job with an apparatus of the United States government. They wanted me badly enough to pay a rather hefty signing bonus." He bit off a piece of English muffin. "I called the downtown branch of my bank while you were sleeping. They had enough cash on hand to give me a half of what I asked for, which is probably good enough right now." McKay reached down, snagged the briefcase, and laid it down on the table between them. He opened the latches and spun the case around to face John.
John swallowed. He had never seen that much cash in his entire life. Not even his father carried it around like this. "A hundred thousand dollars," McKay said, smug. "I am the brightest mind of my generation, after all. And they wanted my new encryption theory rather badly."
"So you put the screws to them?" John finally looked up. "Jesus, McKay."
"It's Rodney," McKay said, obviously annoyed. He slammed down his coffee mug, scraped his chair back, and went into the fridge. John wasn't sure what he'd done - he'd only met the guy three days ago, and the situation was a little weird. He opened his mouth only to close it again when nothing came to mind, and then McKay was coming back with milk. "Look," he said, pouring a little into his coffee. "I've been thinking, they don't know who I am, right?"
"Right," John said. "Everything about anything is right here in my Incantatum."
"That's your spell book, right?" McKay went on before John could answer, so he figured it wasn't actually a question. "Anyway, the job offer I accepted is in DC. If they don't know about me..." He trailed off and looked at John hopefully. "I'd get my own lab, I could work on the magic shit after hours. And to be honest, they're paying an obscene amount of money. I could probably afford to support a fugitive."
"You're talking about living in DC?" John was having a hard time wrapping his brain around the idea; he was stuck on the idea of needing to keep on the move.
"You'll teach me magic, and I'll figure out how it works in actual science," McKay continued, clearly not listening to a word John said. He was off somewhere else, judging by the glint in his eye.
"McKay!" John said loudly.
McKay blinked, startled. He looked at John. "What?"
"I have to tell you something," John said, squirming a little inside. "I'm not - I haven't been studying magic as long as you think I have."
"How long have you been studying magic?" McKay asked, frowning.
"About a month."
"Oh." McKay slumped a little in his chair. John could practically see him deflate.
"But I think I can teach myself," he said quickly, offering an olive branch. "And then I could teach you. I'd just be a month ahead of you." It wasn't what he had been planning on saying, but McKay's expression had unexpectedly tugged on his heartstrings, and he hadn't been able to resist.
"That could work," McKay said thoughtfully. He narrowed his eyes at John, who was getting whiplash at the abrupt moodswings. "What's your GPA?"
"Er," John said. "3.8, why?"
"I refuse to learn from an idiot," McKay said, practically sticking his nose in the air, and John didn't stop laughing for nearly a minute while McKay rolled his eyes and finished his breakfast.
When he recovered, John dug in to the rest of the food on his plate; in the middle of a heavenly sausage, he remembered something. "Last night, you said something about it being strange that we go to the same school," John said. "What did you mean?"
McKay scrubbed his face with one hand indecisively, then sighed. "I meant that it was strange, because I think I would have noticed you."
Oh. "Oh," John said blankly.
"It's just a thing, I swear," McKay babbled. "You just - I have a type, that's all, and you have certain physical things in common with that type, and that's it, I don't mean to make you uncomfortable. Fuck. I'm sorry, I'll never mention it again - "
"Shut up, Rodney," John interrupted, and Rodney closed his mouth, his eyes wide. It occurred then to John that he'd never called Rodney by his first name before, and it felt weirdly intimate, but it was too late to take it back, and anyway, he didn't really want to. John put that thought aside to examine later. "I have something for you," he said, changing the topic abruptly. John reached into his pocket and closed his hand around his Master's ring. He pulled it out and set the tiny statue on the table between them.
In its unlocked state, the ring was a beautifully detailed golden lion sitting on his haunches with ruby chips for eyes, an inch and a half high from the top of its mane to the tip of its tail. Between its paws rested a spherical ruby, about the size of his fingertip.
Rodney raised an eyebrow, but when John continued to look at him impassively, leaned forward to examine it. "It's beautiful, but I'm not really a fan of knick-knacks," he said, sitting back in his chair.
"Touch it," John said.
Rodney hesitated, but leaned forward again and rested one long finger on the lion's head; for a moment nothing happened, and John's heart sunk into his chest; he had no idea where to get another talisman, or how to make them, and Rodney absolutely had to be trained if he was going to survive.
Then the lion bent down and bit the ruby, picking it up in its mouth, before leaping forward onto Rodney's hand; somehow it insinuated itself between Rodney's fingers. It came to rest on his middle finger, then wrapped its body around until the tail ended up beneath its own chin. It closed its eyes and solidified until it was just a ring again.
"Jesus," Rodney said, eyes wide. John slumped a little in relief. "What the hell was that?"
"First lesson," John said, leaning back in his chair. "No ring, no magic." He showed Rodney his ring, which was identical to Rodney's. "They're magical talismans. You have to send the spell through them. I don't know how they work," he said hastily, fending off the fascinated questions he could already see forming in Rodney's brain. "I just know that they do."
"Magic rings," Rodney said, staring at the matching lions on their hands. "Okay. Fine." He gingerly tugged at his ring, as if he were afraid it wouldn't move; John could see the faint surprise on his face when it came away easily. He examined the ring, turning it over and over in his hands, rubbed his thumb over the ruby in the lion's jaws. "Where did you get this?"
John folded his arms over his chest and slouched. "It was my Master's."
Rodney's head came up sharply. "How did you get it? How did it survive the explosion?"
"The rings choose their next master when their previous master dies," John explained. He was struggling to keep away the grief, but Rodney deserved an answer. "I don't know how, but I found it lying next to your head after the explosion."
"It chose me," Rodney murmured, turning the ring over and over again in his hands. "Okay," he said suddenly, slipping the ring back on his middle finger. "I'll leave Teyla some cash." He looked up at John and smirked. "Shall we?"
John couldn't help but grin back, dropping his arms from their defensive position and straightening up in his chair. It wouldn't be such a bad life, looking for other people whose brain could handle the weight and terrible power of the magic he and Rodney could give them. It wouldn't be fun, learning magic as fast as he could to keep ahead of the other sorcerers, teaching Rodney in his spare time, but they'd make it. "Let's go."
**
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