TEAM ANGST: Fly on the Wall, "Mirror, Mirror"
Title: Mirror, Mirror
Author: blueraccoon ( interview)
Team: Angst
Prompt: Fly on the Wall
Pairing(s): McKay/Sheppard
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: possible non-con
Summary: This was an impossible invasion of privacy.
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**
The mirror had been a present, a gift from the people of P3X-417. They claimed it was a gift from the Ancestors and deserved to be returned to the city. How it had survived ten thousand years without breaking, Elizabeth had no idea. It was fairly large; about two feet tall by three feet wide, surrounded by a frame of swirling metal. Elizabeth thought it was rather pretty, and it was an excellent mirror.
Unfortunately, no one had any idea what it did. It had to do something; when John had touched it, a pulse of light had flashed around the frame and shimmered over the mirror. But all of Rodney and Radek's tests had come back inconclusive. As far as they could tell, it was just a mirror.
So, Elizabeth had taken it and put it in her quarters. It sat on top of her dresser like it belonged there, and it was nice to have a big mirror--not that she really needed one, but the Ancients had been fond of six-inch square bathroom mirrors, and having something bigger was a fun perk.
Today, she most definitely wasn't thinking about her hair as she strode into her quarters, barely keeping herself from throwing her laptop down on the bed. "Of all the stupid, witless--men!" she snarled, so angry she could scarcely see straight. "What were they thinking, managing to completely alienate our allies that way? Oh, right, they weren't." She raked her hands through her hair. "What the hell, John?"
As she spoke, she turned, just in time to see the mirror--change.
It wasn't reflecting her quarters anymore. It was showing her someone else's quarters. Someone's quarters with a set of golf clubs and a--was that a Sudoku book? And--Elizabeth blinked.
"John," she said dumbly, looking into the mirror as John walked into the picture.
Elizabeth sank down on the bed, completely dumbfounded by what she was seeing. But that was John, plain as day, dressed in a plain black t-shirt and BDUs, looking frustrated and upset as he turned to talk to someone--to Rodney, Elizabeth realized, as the other man stepped into sight.
They were obviously arguing about something, gesturing wildly, anger clouding both their faces. Elizabeth had no idea how she'd done this, how she'd somehow made the mirror work, but she knew she shouldn't be watching this. "Off," she said, thinking hard at the mirror, and to her relief the mirror rippled and showed only her own quarters once more.
Would it work for anyone, she wondered? If she--no. This was an impossible invasion of privacy. She couldn't just--she couldn't--"Rodney, how did you miss this?" she asked out loud, but her uncertain look at the mirror showed it quiet and still. She got up, beginning to pace, wondering if she'd actually seen what she thought she'd seen.
Oh, hell. In for a penny. "Radek? Carson?" Elizabeth bit her lip nervously, a habit she'd given up years ago. "Teyla? Ronon?" But the mirror stayed quiet. "John?"
It shimmered and showed her John's quarters again. Elizabeth looked, stumbled back, and sat down hard on the bed, nearly sitting on her laptop.
That was John. And Rodney. And John and Rodney on top of the sheets, naked, kissing passionately, Rodney's broad hands on John's back and John braced on his elbows over Rodney, and as she watched, stunned, John broke away from the kiss and slid down, further, further, and his mouth--his mouth was--
"Off," Elizabeth said weakly. "Off."
Was it her imagination that the mirror took a little longer to go back to normal this time?
She crawled into bed and did not pull the pillow over her head, no matter how much she wanted to.
It wasn't that they were together; she wasn't prejudiced like that. And it wasn't that she'd never wondered about the two of them; they were close friends, and in an atmosphere as...well, small as Atlantis, there were only so many people to choose from, even with access to Earth. Not too many people were willing to spend time with Rodney outside of work. As for John...despite his easy manner and laid-back attitude, he didn't get close to many. Didn't let himself, really. But he and Rodney...
Maybe it was wrong. Maybe the mirror was showing her other realities, something that wasn't really happening here, something that was happening elsewhere. Elizabeth sat up in bed and took a deep breath. She didn't care how wrong it was, she had to know. "John," she said.
The mirror shimmered. John lay on his back in the bed, one arm tucked behind his head, one around Rodney, who curled against him, his head on John's chest and his arm thrown over John's waist. There was the scar from Kolya's knife--well, that could have happened in other realities. But there was the electrical burn he'd gotten two days ago, not quite healed yet, and when she looked at John's arm she saw the scratch he'd suffered from an errant tree branch as they were running back to the gate today. All together it added up to this probably being their reality.
Elizabeth fell back on the bed and pulled the pillow over her face. "Off," she said, muffled by the pillow.
In the morning, she didn't treat them any differently. Years of diplomatic training enabled her to act as thought nothing had changed, but she couldn’t quite keep from looking at them a little more closely, wondering what they'd been arguing about, what she hadn't seen.
They didn't notice her scrutiny, and she forcibly put the thoughts out of her head the rest of the day. She had work to do.
That night, the mirror taunted her with its serenity, its calm surface reflecting her own quarters. Elizabeth pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes. She was not going to invade John's privacy again. She was not. She couldn't. He'd never forgive her if he found out.
And how is he going to find out? a tempting little voice whispered. No one else knew what the mirror did. No one else thought it did anything.
No. This was ridiculous. She couldn't.
Elizabeth fell down on her bed, which conveniently faced the mirror, and groaned. "Oh, John," she said, not even meaning to say it, but she did, and the mirror changed, and Elizabeth once again found herself looking into his quarters, where he and Rodney were talking--talking? Arguing? She couldn't tell.
Rodney looked away from John, his face showing frustration and embarrassment. John sighed--Elizabeth could tell that easily enough--and came over to him, resting his hands on Rodney's shoulders. Rodney still didn't look at him, and John took one hand and grasped Rodney's jaw, turning his head. He said something, and whatever it was made Rodney nod grudgingly.
John smiled, and Rodney's mouth quirked in what was almost a smile, and then John leaned in and his hands were on Rodney's face and Rodney's hands were on John's shoulders and they were kissing hungrily. They broke apart long enough for Rodney to yank off his shirt and John to strip off his t-shirt and then they were falling down on the bed, still kissing, hands all over each other, fumbling with the fastenings of their pants and laces of their boots, and Elizabeth really needed to look away now.
She wasn't a voyeur. She'd never been into that sort of thing. These were her friends, her teammates, and she shouldn't be watching them, and they were both naked now, and Rodney was on his back, and John was kneeling between his legs and his hand was--
Elizabeth squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands to her flaming cheeks, thanking every deity she'd ever read about that there was no sound. "Off," she said desperately. "Off, off, off!"
She fell asleep without looking at the mirror again, but her dreams were full of erotic images she didn't want. She woke up heavy-eyed and groggy, stumbling under the shower and letting the hot water clear her head. "Never again," she promised herself, leaning against the smooth wall of the shower cubicle. "Never, ever again."
"You all right?" John asked when he walked into the conference room.
"What? Yes, I'm fine. Why?" She was speaking too quickly and she knew it, but she couldn't get the image out of her head, of John kneeling over Rodney, naked and hard, his hand reaching back under Rodney, and Rodney pushing up into it, his skin flushed, his mouth half-open, and...Elizabeth reached for her coffee cup and took a sip, noticing her hand was almost trembling.
John studied her for a moment. "Just wondering," he said easily.
Elizabeth put on her best smile. "I'm fine," she said as Rodney walked in. "Morning, Rodney."
He grumbled and took a drink of coffee.
There was a mission that day, a standard first contact one. Elizabeth saw the team off through the gate and went back to her office to go through reports and look at what needed doing next.
In her office, though, she spent more time thinking about what she'd seen in the mirror than anything else, and she found herself wondering how the damn thing worked. The fact that it was able to show her John in his quarters was unsettling enough. Were there cameras she didn't know about all over Atlantis? Elizabeth shuddered at the thought, only too aware of the hypocrisy involved.
But why did it work for John, and no one else? She'd tried other people's names, both with the gene and without, and the only one it had responded to was John. Why?
She thought back, remembering when they'd gotten it through the gate. Lorne's team had been the one to go on the mission. She didn't think the Marines who'd touched the mirror had had the gene. The mirror hadn't done anything until John had touched it.
That had to be it. John's touch must have somehow initialized it, keyed it to focus on him alone. Elizabeth didn't understand the point of a mirror that spied on one person only, but then again, she didn't understand the point of the mirror at all. Maybe it was a flawed design; maybe that was why they'd left it with another people.
She sighed and looked back at her reports. John's team was due to report in in an hour, and she'd better have something done by the time they did.
John's team didn't report in on time. Elizabeth gave it fifteen minutes before finding some pretense to slip away to her quarters. However, when she said John's name, the mirror stayed blank.
It must not work when he wasn't on Atlantis, she realized, going back to her office. Damn. She drummed her fingers against her desk and sighed.
After one hour, Elizabeth told Lorne to get a team and a jumper ready on standby. After two hours, she told them to go in cloaked and report back.
They went through the gate, and there was nothing to do but wait. Lorne's team didn't report in after fifteen minutes, or half an hour, and Elizabeth was not pacing an hour later when the gate activated and they finally got a radio signal. "We've got them," Lorne said. "Have a medical team standing by, Colonel Sheppard's been injured."
"How badly?" Elizabeth asked.
"He'll live," Lorne said with a trace of humor. "Wound to the arm, nothing serious, but it needs attention."
"Thank you, Major. We'll see you soon. Weir out." She tapped her radio and called for a medical team to be sent to the gateroom.
The teams came back, and after Sheppard had been treated she got the full story. It was a common one. A people suspicious of outsiders, wary of technology, and when Sheppard had--inadvertently, as he took pains to point out--activated the one piece of Ancient technology they had among them...it hadn't gone well. They'd been surrounded, cut off from the gate, and had been trying to talk their way out of it when Lorne and his team had shown up. John had been injured in the ensuing fracas, as they'd run back to the jumper and the gate.
"We won't be going back there, then," Elizabeth said.
"Probably not a good idea," John agreed easily.
"All right. Thank you, gentlemen. John, take the rest of the day off." Carson had released him from the infirmary, but he wouldn't be going out on missions until his arm fully healed.
They left, and she went back to her office.
She couldn't help but wonder what Rodney would say to John once they were alone, whether his usual brusque manner would turn into something gentler. Whether he'd--
Elizabeth pressed her fingers to her eyes. This was insane. This was ludicrous. She couldn't--could not do this. She couldn't keep thinking about what she'd seen, what she could still see if she were only to look. Rodney and John were treading in dangerous waters as it was. John's career would be finished. She couldn't do without John.
Would Rodney leave if John left? She didn't want to think about it.
That night, in her quarters, she looked balefully at the mirror. No. She wasn't going to say it. She wasn't going to look. She was not a voyeur, not someone who got her pleasures from spying on two of her teammates and friends.
Elizabeth dropped her head into her hands, sitting on the end of her bed. She needed to have the mirror taken out of her quarters, give some reason why she didn't want it anymore. She'd have a couple of the Marines take it to the junk lab, the one where all the Ancient tech went that they couldn't make work.
Right. She'd do that in the morning.
There was no harm in looking one more time, was there? Just...just a peek? Just one glance?
"John," she whispered, before she could change her mind.
She wasn't surprised to see him with Rodney. They lay in bed, the sheets pulled up around their waists. John's bandaged arm rested against his side, his good arm over Rodney's shoulders, and Rodney had his head against John's good shoulder. It was pretty obvious they were both naked, but what got to Elizabeth was the look of peace on both their faces. Rodney turned his head and pressed a kiss against John's collarbone and John smiled, running his fingers through Rodney's hair.
Elizabeth's stomach clenched and she felt a wave of envy. God, she wanted--not them, not either of them, but what they had. Someone to be with, someone to hold or to hold her, someone she could lie with after sex, she could talk to, as John and Rodney seemed to be doing, softly and idly.
She was sitting on her bed watching two of her friends in an obvious post-coital state and she'd never felt more alone in her life.
She meant to turn it off, but to her surprise, Rodney slipped out of bed. John looked resigned, and Elizabeth glanced away as Rodney pulled on his boxers. John sat up, running his good hand through his hair, and he said something, but Rodney shook his head as he responded. His face was set in a stubborn expression Elizabeth knew only too well. John wasn't going to win this argument.
What she didn't understand was why Rodney was leaving now. It was barely midnight, Atlantis time. Even by the most paranoid clock, they should have plenty of time before they had to separate. Why was Rodney getting dressed and smoothing down his hair now?
He didn't even kiss John, Elizabeth noticed. He just gave John a look full of emotions she couldn't define and left.
Alone in his room, John fell back against the pillows, staring up at the ceiling. He looked annoyed, and resigned. Was he used to this? Elizabeth wondered. Did Rodney leave him often like this? Was this what usually happened between them?
She wasn't even supposed to know about their relationship, let alone be wondering about the details of it. Elizabeth sighed. "Off," she said wearily.
She would have asked someone to take the mirror to the junk lab in the morning, except that the day started with an emergency and went downhill from there, and by the time she got a chance to think about anything other than surviving the day it was time for bed.
"Tomorrow," she promised herself, crawling into bed without even looking at the mirror. "Tomorrow, it'll go away."
But the days went on, and the mirror stayed in Elizabeth's quarters. She couldn't say why she kept it. She knew she shouldn't have it, and no excuses could come up with a plausible reason why it was still there.
It wasn't like she used it.
Much.
It had just become a habit to...check in on them, before bed. To say John's name and see the mirror change and show him, usually in his quarters, sometimes in Rodney's, a couple times in the labs with Rodney or in one of the common rooms. But almost always he was with Rodney.
She saw them talking, saw them curled on John's bed watching something on Rodney's laptop, saw John doing Sudoku puzzles and Rodney typing away on his computer.
After long days or long missions she saw them asleep, limbs tangled together and heads next to each other on the pillow.
Sometimes she saw them making love, but she always shut the mirror off hastily whenever she saw John's mouth on Rodney's skin or Rodney's hands on John's body. She never watched long anyway, but those glimpses made her blush and her stomach clench and it was--
Well. What she was doing was wrong on so many levels she couldn't begin to put a name to them all, and in her more reasonable moments, her saner moments, she despised herself for it. John and Rodney would hate her if they found out, and she knew it, but she wasn't so sure what they'd feel could hold a candle to how she felt about herself.
But she couldn't stop. This faux intimacy, this false sharing of what she didn't have--couldn't have--was as close as she'd come to having anyone in her bed, in her life, since Simon.
She hated them, just a little for it, for the ease they had with each other, the secret closeness no one else knew about. Hated them for having what she couldn't. Hated them for not being alone, for fighting for the covers and dealing with the wet spot and whether John snored or Rodney kicked in his sleep.
She didn't know if either of them did either of those things. It didn't matter. The point was that they had the luxury of finding out about those little annoyances, those pet peeves Elizabeth would have given a great deal to be frustrated about once again. They had each other, and she...
Three weeks after she'd turned the mirror on for the first time, John's team went on a mission that lasted three days. There was an Ancient outpost on P2X-583, or as the people there called it, Vaener. From the looks of it, it had been a possible defensive outpost, a refuge against the Wraith. Rodney took a couple extra scientists to see if they could activate it and use it as one again.
Elizabeth ignored the mirror when she went to bed and told herself she didn't care about sleeping arrangements on Vaener. John and Rodney were professionals. They knew how to behave in the field.
The team reported in regularly, but the prognosis wasn't good, and when they came back Elizabeth only had to look at Rodney's face to know it wasn't going to work.
"It's a power source problem," Rodney said, downing a cup of coffee.
"What's the problem?" Elizabeth asked.
"We don't have the power source." Rodney slumped back in his chair. He looked tired. "Half the equipment there is beyond our knowledge, and just getting it working would take months. And that's with a power source, which we don't have. It needs a ZPM."
"It took you three days to find that out?" she asked, a little surprised.
Rodney gave her an annoyed look. "It took me three days to try and get some of the equipment up and running, to try and see if we could salvage something from the outpost and possibly get it running at partial power, anything. And the answer is that if I had a dedicated team working on nothing but the outpost, with unlimited resources, I might--in a couple of months, and I do say might--be able to get parts of it up to quarter power, but not what we'd need, and it probably wouldn't be stable. So it was a wash."
"If we had a ZPM, and could get it running, what could we expect from it?" Elizabeth asked.
"The outpost could shield several thousand people," Rodney said. "There are living quarters, storage facilities--a lot of it's underground and hard to access, but it's in good repair from what we could tell. It doesn't have much in the way of offensive capability. It looks like this was a place to send the noncombatants, a place for them to bunker down and wait until it was safe for them to return to Atlantis. With a ZPM at full power, it'd be safe for close to a year."
Elizabeth sighed. They could really have used it, but they didn't have a ZPM to spare. "All right," she said. "Thank you."
Rodney nodded brusquely. "I'm going to go find a shower," he said. "The Vaenerians haven't quite mastered indoor plumbing yet."
He left and Elizabeth turned to John. "So much for that hope," she said.
John shrugged. "It was a long shot from the beginning, once we got there and actually saw the place."
"I see," Elizabeth said. "Well, if we ever get another ZPM we can spare, we'll think about going back."
"Right." John grinned easily. "Right up there with the Wraith going away and never bothering us again."
"Wouldn't that be nice," Elizabeth said with a sigh. "Thanks, John."
He nodded. "Sure."
When she went to bed that night, the mirror sat innocently on her dresser, quiet and still. Elizabeth gave it one look and sighed. "No," she said firmly. "I am not--no."
Five minutes later, she sat up in bed. "John," she said with a groan.
She wasn't surprised to see them together, shirtless, John's bed rumpled. Rodney was pacing, John was sitting on the bed. But what did surprise her was that they were apparently arguing about something. Rodney was gesturing, his hands sharp and angry, his face set, and John was giving as good as he got, from the speed at which his mouth was moving and the way he threw up his hands.
John said something, Rodney froze for a moment, and then Rodney began pulling on the rest of his clothes and shoving his feet into his boots. He turned for the door and John scrambled out of bed, grabbing his arm, clearly trying to placate him, but Rodney jerked his arm away and snapped something back, something that made John step back, holding up his hands, looking angry and upset.
Rodney stormed out of the room. A moment later, John began getting dressed, looking like he was going for a run.
"Off," Elizabeth said, feeling profoundly disturbed. She'd seen them argue before, but not this intensely, not this personally, and it made her wonder just what had happened between them on Vaener. Unfortunately, she had no way to find out, not unless they let something slip the next day.
Her sleep was troubled, her dreams restless, and in the morning she woke with the half-baked idea of saying something to John, an idea that lasted until she got into the shower and woke up.
The other plan she had, the one of just watching and mentioning something to them if something seemed off, never got a chance to come to fruition. Rodney stayed in the labs all day, avoiding everyone but Zelenka and the hapless scientists unlucky enough to cross his path, and John kept busy anywhere Rodney wasn't. Elizabeth didn't see them in the same section of Atlantis, let alone the same room, and it was all perfectly logical, all perfectly reasonable, leaving her no way to say anything to anyone.
She went back to her quarters after dinner, more worried than ever. With a sigh, she sat down on the bed and looked at the mirror. "John," she said, almost afraid of what she'd see.
John was alone in his room, either working or staring at a Sudoku book. Rodney wasn't there, and Elizabeth almost turned off the mirror, but a moment later John sat up straight and Rodney walked into the picture.
They looked--wary. That was the only word she could use. They looked wary of each other, as if each didn't quite trust the other. Rodney looked uncertain, John's face was a mask.
She didn't know who moved first, whether it was John getting up or Rodney stepping forward, but a moment later they were locked in an embrace, hands tight on each other's arms, mouths crushed against each other, hard and almost brutal.
It made Elizabeth flinch. She didn't want to see this. She couldn't see this. Watching them when they were making love was bad enough, but this--the way they were almost wrestling with each other, the way John yanked at Rodney's shirt and Rodney shoved at John's pants, the way Rodney pushed John back on the bed--it wasn't tender, or romantic, or even affectionate. This was angry, this was almost violent, and Elizabeth felt a little sick.
"Off," she whispered, but the mirror didn't turn off. It stayed on, showing her every moment, the way John wrestled with Rodney as their clothes got ripped off until John was on top of him, both of them naked, pinning Rodney's wrists into the mattress. It showed her the way Rodney fought to throw him off, the way John held him down.
John kept one hand on Rodney's wrists and grabbed something off his nightstand with the other hand--a tube of some kind--and flipped it open. No. He couldn't--he wasn't going to--Elizabeth watched, unable to look away, horrified.
Rodney was saying something, something Elizabeth couldn't read. It wasn't the word 'no', but she didn't know what it was, and then John pushed into him, and Rodney's head tossed against the pillow and his hands pulled against John's grip on his wrists, the grip that John had switched back to two hands now.
She watched, helpless, as they fucked, as John took Rodney, driving into him, over and over, and Rodney writhed under him, looking for all the world like he was trying to get away, like he didn't want this.
It went on, and on, and then--Elizabeth saw Rodney cry out, his body arch, and he fell back against the bed, panting. A moment later, John froze, his head falling forward.
"Off," Elizabeth tried again, her voice barely audible. "Off."
The mirror shimmered and went blank.
Elizabeth ran into the bathroom and vomited.
She didn't look at the mirror for nearly a week after that. She could barely look at John or Rodney for three days. The day after the--incident--she pled a headache and stayed in her quarters with the lights on low, curled in a ball, shaking, pitifully grateful that there were no emergencies that needed her attention.
Had she really seen that? Had she really seen John--
Rodney hadn't said no. She clung to that. She hadn't seen him say no.
Maybe she'd misinterpreted. She hadn't been able to hear, and maybe...maybe it hadn't been what she'd thought. Maybe--
She had to say something. She couldn't let this slide.
She couldn't say anything.
Elizabeth curled into a tighter ball and pulled the blankets over her head. Rodney hadn't said no, and John--John wasn't like that. John wouldn't do that.
She had to believe that. Somehow.
Five days after the 'incident', John, Ronon, and Teyla went offworld. Rodney stayed behind, claiming he had too much work to do in the labs. Actually, he went on for about five minutes, but Elizabeth tuned him out for most of it.
She sought him out in the lab, after seeing the other three off. He was alone for once, typing madly into a laptop, a mug at his elbow. "Rodney," she said, as casually as she could. "Is everything all right?"
She didn't miss the way his expression just shut down for a moment. "Everything's fine," he said. "If by fine you mean riding herd on a bunch of barely competent scientists while being dragged offworld far too often on missions not nearly worth my time, all while trying to keep a ten thousand year old city afloat and--"
Elizabeth held up a hand. "Not what I meant, Rodney," she said. "You look tired, that's all, and it's not like you to miss a mission."
"Yes, well, they didn't need me on this one," Rodney said brusquely.
"Are you sure everything's all right?"
"Yes, Elizabeth, everything's fine," he said impatiently. "Now if you don't mind, I have work to do, work that is not going to get finished while I stand around discussing my feelings. If I want that, I'll talk to Heightmeyer."
"Right." Elizabeth left him to it and went back to her own work.
John's team got back late that night. No emergencies and no wounded, so Elizabeth decided to save the debriefing for the morning.
On her way to her quarters, she heard what sounded like John and Rodney talking around a corner and slowed down, not wanting to interrupt.
"Could've used you there today, McKay." That was John.
"You did fine without me, Colonel."
"You're on my team. I need you."
"You don't need me," Rodney said, almost bitterly. "You don't need anyone."
"Rodney." There was something different in John's voice now, something softer. "Rodney, that's not fair."
"Truth often isn't," Rodney said, still with that bitter tone in his voice.
"Fine. If that's the way--you know what, no. Damnit, Rodney, you know that's not--"
"Do I?" Rodney asked. "After what you--"
They broke off suddenly, and Elizabeth heard more footsteps. She started walking in the other direction; it'd take her a little longer to get to her quarters, but at least she wouldn't see them.
After what?
She glanced at the mirror that night, but all it showed her was John, alone, tossing restlessly in bed.
John's team went on another mission three days later. Rodney went with them, and Elizabeth spent the whole time they were gone expecting trouble. She hadn't seen them together since their conversation in the hall, either during the day or at night, and both of them seemed a bit more short-tempered than usual as they got ready to go through the gate.
Elizabeth sighed. She had a bad feeling about this.
When the team came back, John and Rodney were arguing at the tops of their lungs. "Well, maybe if you hadn't been so--"
"Me? Excuse me, I'm not the one who--"
"Gentlemen!" Elizabeth broke in. "What is going on here?"
"The Cilastians chose not to trade with us this season," Teyla said, giving John and Rodney an irritated look. "They felt that their resources were thin enough, and that they could not in good conscience trade with a people who did not have peace within their ranks."
"I--what?" Elizabeth asked.
"The Cilastians place a very high value on peace and serenity," Teyla said. "They are a communal people. They felt that we were not sufficiently united enough to merit trading with them, that we had too much discord between ourselves."
The look she gave John and Rodney left no doubt as to where that discord had come from. "I see," Elizabeth said. "If we sent another team, do you think they'd reconsider?"
Teyla shook her head. "I do not think so. Not until next season."
"Thank you. John, Rodney, my office, now." Elizabeth turned on her heel and walked up the stairs, not bothering to look behind her to see if they followed.
Both of them started talking as soon as the door closed. "I don't want to hear it," she said, holding up a hand. "Save the excuses for someone who cares. Thanks to your inability to get along, we've just lost a trading partner for a year. I don't know what is going on between you two--" not really a lie--"but fix it. Now."
Rodney scowled and John's face was set. "Now, gentlemen," Elizabeth said. "Do I have to lock you in a room together? Would you like me to call in Dr. Heightmeyer?"
They turned and left without saying a word.
Elizabeth went back to her quarters and turned on the mirror. At this point, she was angry enough and worried enough that she didn't care whose privacy she was invading.
John and Rodney were in a...storage closet? There wasn't much light, but Elizabeth saw shelves and boxes around them. They were almost pressed chest to chest, glaring at each other. Rodney was talking, gesturing as best he could given the limited space, and from the scowl on John's face, he wasn't happy with whatever Rodney was saying.
John started shaking his head, and Elizabeth saw him say 'No', over and over again. He finally grabbed Rodney's hands and said something else, something that made Rodney stare at him.
Then Rodney tried to punch him, only John had his hands trapped, and Rodney ended up stumbling forward and falling against John.
Had she just seen that right? Had Rodney, of all people, actually tried to hit John? It didn't make sense.
Rodney was struggling, trying to get his hands free. He tripped and fell back, against the shelves, and boxes tumbled down around them, one hitting John in the shoulder. John lost his grip on Rodney's hands and Rodney plowed a fist into John's gut.
While John was bent over, gasping for breath, Rodney said something, and then he left.
Well. That had gone well. Elizabeth sighed and turned the mirror off.
She looked again, later that night, out of a vain hope, and nearly fell over when she saw them together. They were in Rodney's quarters and it didn't look like Rodney was expecting John. He was lying on the bed working, and John stood by the door.
At first, Rodney didn't even look at John. He ignored him completely, focusing on the laptop in front of him. But whatever John was saying eventually wore him down, and Rodney sat up, turning to face him. He sighed and gave John an impatient look, and John crossed the floor, kneeling in front of him.
Rodney said something, and John shook his head, taking Rodney's hands. He kept talking, even over Rodney's protests, and Elizabeth wondered what it was that was so important, because slowly the expression on Rodney's face was changing, from sullen anger to something so guarded Elizabeth couldn't even tell what it was. Rodney said 'No', one of the few words Elizabeth could read, and John nodded.
Abruptly, Rodney pulled away and got up, beginning to pace. Elizabeth chewed her lower lip, worried. What the hell was going on? John turned to look at Rodney, who was apparently ranting--well, at least he was back to normal, Elizabeth supposed.
Rodney pointed at John accusingly. John got to his feet slowly and walked over to Rodney and took his face in both hands, kissing him deeply. Rodney stiffened for a moment, but then he melted into it, his hands coming up to grasp John's arms.
Okay, Elizabeth thought. That looked promising. She ignored the part of her brain that demanded to know since when spying on her teammates' sex lives had become grounds for personnel reviews and looked at the way they were standing, leaning into each other, still deeply involved in the kiss.
She shifted a little on the bed. She should probably turn the mirror off, but she wanted to see more, to make sure. This had gone beyond a habit, it had come perilously close to an addiction, and she couldn't bring herself to stop it.
The kiss finally ended and Rodney looked at John, dazed. John said something to him, something that made Rodney flustered--and then John left.
What? Elizabeth sat bolt upright. Why had he just left? Why was he walking back to his own quarters? What--that couldn't be right, maybe Rodney would come after him?
She left the mirror on all night, but Rodney never came. John slept alone.
The next day, it was obvious something had changed between them. She didn't need the added benefit of the mirror to figure that out. Rodney was distracted in the morning staff meeting, off his game, which was unusual enough, and the first time he looked at John he fumbled his pen.
The second time, he nearly dropped his laptop.
For his part, John seemed nothing more than amused by Rodney's uncharacteristic clumsiness, but he didn't make jokes about it and he didn't stay in Rodney's presence longer than he had to either.
Later that afternoon, Elizabeth was out on one of the exterior walkways, taking a short break and some air. She looked down, at the walkway below her, and saw two figures, one dark-haired and one with lighter brown hair. From the uniforms, and the way they stood, it was obviously John and Rodney, and she was about to go down to see how they were doing when the breeze shifted, carrying their words up to her.
"--shouldn't have said that," Rodney said.
"You want me to lie?" John asked.
"I want you to be honest with me," Rodney said brusquely.
"I am."
"No, you're not," Rodney said.
"Yeah, I am," John said. "You punched me for it, but I'm being honest with you."
"You deserved that," Rodney told him. "You deserved a lot more for that."
"For telling you I--" The wind shifted again, and the rest of John's words were lost, but Elizabeth had heard enough. She was willing to bet she knew what John had said.
For telling you I love you.
It made sense. John told Rodney, who didn't believe him, and all their actions yesterday had been the result of that disbelief and John trying to convince Rodney that he was telling the truth.
The question then became, was John telling the truth? He wasn't the type to talk about his emotions, and in a debate between him and Rodney over who would say the 'L' word first...Elizabeth wouldn't have laid odds on either of them.
So why had he done it? What had he had to gain?
Elizabeth turned around and leaned against the railing. Was John trying to get Rodney to forgive him for what he'd done? Was saying 'I love you' enough of an incentive to forget that?
Rodney hadn't said no. But would John have taken no for an answer anyway? What was the difference between rape and forced consent, and God, why did she have to think about these terms regarding her friends?
What if she'd misinterpreted what she'd seen? What if she was wrong? Was it possible for what she'd seen to be consensual?
Maybe. Maybe she'd read the situation wrong. She wasn't sure. Elizabeth chewed her lip and went back inside, not wanting to take the chance of hearing anything else.
But curiosity, addiction, whatever it was won out over her fear of what she'd see if she turned on the mirror. She sat down on her bed that night and took a deep breath. "John," she said.
John knelt in front of Rodney, his hands on Rodney's hips. Rodney's hands were on the back of John's head and his own head was tilted back, his mouth open. Neither of them was dressed; Elizabeth blushed, her stomach clenching, as she watched John's cheeks hollow, as he bobbed his head.
Rodney's hips jerked and a couple of moments later John raised his head, licking his lips. Rodney's expression was dazed, satiated, and he tugged John to his feet, leaning up to kiss him. They moved over to the bed, still kissing, and fell down on it, tangled in each other. Rodney turned onto his stomach, John kneeling over him, and Elizabeth watched, part turned on, part mortified, and part afraid, as John reached for the tube. The angle was wrong, and she couldn't see everything, just John's wrist as he moved his hand, but she saw Rodney grab for the pillow, a look of pure pleasure on his face, and she saw his hips push back into John's touch.
John shifted; Elizabeth watched, swallowing, as he prepared himself, and then he slid into Rodney slowly, and Rodney's hands clawed at the sheets and John's head fell forward.
This was as...caring, Elizabeth supposed, as the other time had been rough and violent. John moved inside Rodney slowly, rhythmically, one thrust at a time, until Rodney was squirming under him and John was moving harder, not quite as evenly. Rodney suddenly arched up, body bowed back, and Elizabeth saw John shudder and his hips drive into Rodney one last time.
They both collapsed against the bed, panting for breath. Eventually John moved and Rodney rolled over, settling against him. John kissed Rodney's temple, rubbing his back idly.
Elizabeth blew out a breath. Wow. They seemed to have...well, kissed and made up, she supposed?
She wondered if it would hold.
That night she dreamed, her sleep full of images of John and Rodney. She saw Rodney's crooked mouth pressed against John's hip, John's hands sliding over Rodney's chest. She dreamed of the two of them tangled together, of them walking through the halls of Atlantis, talking and laughing, and by the time she woke up she couldn't tell what was dream and what was memory any longer.
She stared balefully at the mirror. If it weren't for the mirror, she wouldn't have this problem. She wouldn't know any of this, she wouldn't be in this position of knowing things she shouldn't, of wanting things she couldn't. If it weren't for the damn mirror, she wouldn't be having erotic dreams about her teammates. She wouldn't know what Rodney looked like when he came or know that John liked to hold Rodney after they made love.
"Oh, John," she said helplessly, and the mirror shimmered and changed.
It was still early morning. The sunlight was just starting to come through the windows, tingeing everything with a watery gray light. Rodney was still sound asleep, tucked against John, with John's arms around him. John stretched a little, waking up; he blinked and looked down at Rodney, and the soft smile on his face made Elizabeth's stomach twist and hurt.
John pressed a kiss to Rodney's tousled hair, and something inside Elizabeth just snapped. She picked up the coffee mug sitting next to her bed and threw it at the mirror with all the force she could muster.
The mirror shattered. Elizabeth stared at the mess, horrified, wondering what she'd just done.
She fell back against the bed and pulled the covers over her head. It was early. She didn't have to get up yet. She could pretend the mirror wasn't broken for a little while still.
The door chime woke her, some time later, and at first she thought she'd overslept. But a glance at the clock showed that it was still early. No one had contacted her over the radio, so...who was at her door? Elizabeth scrambled out of bed, avoiding the shards of the mirror as she walked to the door.
John and Rodney stood there, and it was so unexpected to see them, so completely unexpected, that for a moment Elizabeth just stared at them.
"Can we come in?" John asked after a moment.
"Ah--sure, yeah. What's going on?" Elizabeth moved aside to let them enter. "Be--be careful, there's a bit of a mess."
"That's an understatement," Rodney said, looking around. "What happened?"
"The mirror broke," Elizabeth said.
"I figured that part out," Rodney said with an exasperated glance. "How did it break? Did it turn on and suddenly shatter? Did it--"
"What are you doing here?" Elizabeth asked, interrupting him. She didn't want to talk to the two of them when she was still in her pajamas, not with the shards of the mirror all over her quarters. She didn't want to face them.
She wanted to know why they were there.
"We need to talk to you," John said, glancing at Rodney.
Everything inside Elizabeth went cold. Did they know about the mirror? Had breaking it somehow--"Okay," she said, summoning up her calm from somewhere. "Should we--let's go sit."
Being the leader had its perks. She had a sitting area off the bedroom with a few chairs. Getting to it involved walking through the worst of the mess, so she put on shoes and tried to avoid the biggest shards. She still heard a few crunches as they walked over and sat down and she tried to ignore how ridiculous she felt, sitting in shoes and pajamas with fully-dressed John and Rodney at six in the morning.
"So," she said, wishing they were in her office, the conference room, anywhere but her quarters. "What did you need to talk to me about? And why here, at six in the morning?"
"Well...it's not exactly work related," John said, a little awkwardly. "Which is why we're here, and not in your office. We wanted to catch you before the day started."
This didn't bode well. "Okay," Elizabeth said, hiding her nervousness. "What's going on?"
"We need your help," John said, glancing at Rodney again. "Kind of."
"If it wasn't for the asinine rules of your country's military, we wouldn't," Rodney muttered.
"Rodney," John said warningly.
"What's going on?" Elizabeth asked, trying to pretend like she had no idea.
"We're...Rodney and I....we're together," John said in a rush.
They were coming out to her? Elizabeth blinked as a rush of images of the two of them ran through her head. She hoped they'd attribute the flush in her cheeks to the information. "I see," she said. "And...what do you need me to do about it?"
"Cover for us," John said simply. "If we need it. Elizabeth, if anyone finds out about us, I could end up...it could be bad. We need you to help us out if it ever gets to that point."
She nodded. "I'll help you any way I can, if it comes to it." The guilt inside her was making her stomach churn. She had to say something; she knew she should say something, but...
"So what happened to the mirror?" Rodney asked, clearly impatient and uncomfortable with the conversation. "Did it do something? Did something happen to it and it just overloaded?"
It was the perfect opportunity. She could tell them. She could explain what she'd seen--not all of it, of course, but some of it--and explain how she'd broken the mirror as a result. She could--
They'd never forgive her. They'd be smart enough to figure out the things she wasn't telling them.
Elizabeth looked Rodney in the eye. "No," she said. "I tripped and my mug flew out of my hand and smashed into the mirror. It was an accident."
When they left, John promised to send some people by to clean up the mess the mirror had made. Elizabeth hurried through a shower and scrambled into her clothes and shoes, letting in the Marines on her way to breakfast.
They'd never know. And she'd never be able to watch them again.
It was all for the best, really.
Elizabeth thought that maybe, one day, she'd forget what Rodney looked like when John entered him. One day she'd stop wondering what he sounded like when he came, whether John said Rodney's name or whether he was silent. One day she wouldn't dream about them.
One day she'd stop wondering what had actually happened that night.
One day.
If she told herself that often enough, she might even believe it.
In the meantime, it was another day, and she had work to do. Elizabeth took her seat behind her desk and opened her laptop.
Time to move on.
**
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Author: blueraccoon ( interview)
Team: Angst
Prompt: Fly on the Wall
Pairing(s): McKay/Sheppard
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: possible non-con
Summary: This was an impossible invasion of privacy.
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**
The mirror had been a present, a gift from the people of P3X-417. They claimed it was a gift from the Ancestors and deserved to be returned to the city. How it had survived ten thousand years without breaking, Elizabeth had no idea. It was fairly large; about two feet tall by three feet wide, surrounded by a frame of swirling metal. Elizabeth thought it was rather pretty, and it was an excellent mirror.
Unfortunately, no one had any idea what it did. It had to do something; when John had touched it, a pulse of light had flashed around the frame and shimmered over the mirror. But all of Rodney and Radek's tests had come back inconclusive. As far as they could tell, it was just a mirror.
So, Elizabeth had taken it and put it in her quarters. It sat on top of her dresser like it belonged there, and it was nice to have a big mirror--not that she really needed one, but the Ancients had been fond of six-inch square bathroom mirrors, and having something bigger was a fun perk.
Today, she most definitely wasn't thinking about her hair as she strode into her quarters, barely keeping herself from throwing her laptop down on the bed. "Of all the stupid, witless--men!" she snarled, so angry she could scarcely see straight. "What were they thinking, managing to completely alienate our allies that way? Oh, right, they weren't." She raked her hands through her hair. "What the hell, John?"
As she spoke, she turned, just in time to see the mirror--change.
It wasn't reflecting her quarters anymore. It was showing her someone else's quarters. Someone's quarters with a set of golf clubs and a--was that a Sudoku book? And--Elizabeth blinked.
"John," she said dumbly, looking into the mirror as John walked into the picture.
Elizabeth sank down on the bed, completely dumbfounded by what she was seeing. But that was John, plain as day, dressed in a plain black t-shirt and BDUs, looking frustrated and upset as he turned to talk to someone--to Rodney, Elizabeth realized, as the other man stepped into sight.
They were obviously arguing about something, gesturing wildly, anger clouding both their faces. Elizabeth had no idea how she'd done this, how she'd somehow made the mirror work, but she knew she shouldn't be watching this. "Off," she said, thinking hard at the mirror, and to her relief the mirror rippled and showed only her own quarters once more.
Would it work for anyone, she wondered? If she--no. This was an impossible invasion of privacy. She couldn't just--she couldn't--"Rodney, how did you miss this?" she asked out loud, but her uncertain look at the mirror showed it quiet and still. She got up, beginning to pace, wondering if she'd actually seen what she thought she'd seen.
Oh, hell. In for a penny. "Radek? Carson?" Elizabeth bit her lip nervously, a habit she'd given up years ago. "Teyla? Ronon?" But the mirror stayed quiet. "John?"
It shimmered and showed her John's quarters again. Elizabeth looked, stumbled back, and sat down hard on the bed, nearly sitting on her laptop.
That was John. And Rodney. And John and Rodney on top of the sheets, naked, kissing passionately, Rodney's broad hands on John's back and John braced on his elbows over Rodney, and as she watched, stunned, John broke away from the kiss and slid down, further, further, and his mouth--his mouth was--
"Off," Elizabeth said weakly. "Off."
Was it her imagination that the mirror took a little longer to go back to normal this time?
She crawled into bed and did not pull the pillow over her head, no matter how much she wanted to.
It wasn't that they were together; she wasn't prejudiced like that. And it wasn't that she'd never wondered about the two of them; they were close friends, and in an atmosphere as...well, small as Atlantis, there were only so many people to choose from, even with access to Earth. Not too many people were willing to spend time with Rodney outside of work. As for John...despite his easy manner and laid-back attitude, he didn't get close to many. Didn't let himself, really. But he and Rodney...
Maybe it was wrong. Maybe the mirror was showing her other realities, something that wasn't really happening here, something that was happening elsewhere. Elizabeth sat up in bed and took a deep breath. She didn't care how wrong it was, she had to know. "John," she said.
The mirror shimmered. John lay on his back in the bed, one arm tucked behind his head, one around Rodney, who curled against him, his head on John's chest and his arm thrown over John's waist. There was the scar from Kolya's knife--well, that could have happened in other realities. But there was the electrical burn he'd gotten two days ago, not quite healed yet, and when she looked at John's arm she saw the scratch he'd suffered from an errant tree branch as they were running back to the gate today. All together it added up to this probably being their reality.
Elizabeth fell back on the bed and pulled the pillow over her face. "Off," she said, muffled by the pillow.
In the morning, she didn't treat them any differently. Years of diplomatic training enabled her to act as thought nothing had changed, but she couldn’t quite keep from looking at them a little more closely, wondering what they'd been arguing about, what she hadn't seen.
They didn't notice her scrutiny, and she forcibly put the thoughts out of her head the rest of the day. She had work to do.
That night, the mirror taunted her with its serenity, its calm surface reflecting her own quarters. Elizabeth pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes. She was not going to invade John's privacy again. She was not. She couldn't. He'd never forgive her if he found out.
And how is he going to find out? a tempting little voice whispered. No one else knew what the mirror did. No one else thought it did anything.
No. This was ridiculous. She couldn't.
Elizabeth fell down on her bed, which conveniently faced the mirror, and groaned. "Oh, John," she said, not even meaning to say it, but she did, and the mirror changed, and Elizabeth once again found herself looking into his quarters, where he and Rodney were talking--talking? Arguing? She couldn't tell.
Rodney looked away from John, his face showing frustration and embarrassment. John sighed--Elizabeth could tell that easily enough--and came over to him, resting his hands on Rodney's shoulders. Rodney still didn't look at him, and John took one hand and grasped Rodney's jaw, turning his head. He said something, and whatever it was made Rodney nod grudgingly.
John smiled, and Rodney's mouth quirked in what was almost a smile, and then John leaned in and his hands were on Rodney's face and Rodney's hands were on John's shoulders and they were kissing hungrily. They broke apart long enough for Rodney to yank off his shirt and John to strip off his t-shirt and then they were falling down on the bed, still kissing, hands all over each other, fumbling with the fastenings of their pants and laces of their boots, and Elizabeth really needed to look away now.
She wasn't a voyeur. She'd never been into that sort of thing. These were her friends, her teammates, and she shouldn't be watching them, and they were both naked now, and Rodney was on his back, and John was kneeling between his legs and his hand was--
Elizabeth squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands to her flaming cheeks, thanking every deity she'd ever read about that there was no sound. "Off," she said desperately. "Off, off, off!"
She fell asleep without looking at the mirror again, but her dreams were full of erotic images she didn't want. She woke up heavy-eyed and groggy, stumbling under the shower and letting the hot water clear her head. "Never again," she promised herself, leaning against the smooth wall of the shower cubicle. "Never, ever again."
"You all right?" John asked when he walked into the conference room.
"What? Yes, I'm fine. Why?" She was speaking too quickly and she knew it, but she couldn't get the image out of her head, of John kneeling over Rodney, naked and hard, his hand reaching back under Rodney, and Rodney pushing up into it, his skin flushed, his mouth half-open, and...Elizabeth reached for her coffee cup and took a sip, noticing her hand was almost trembling.
John studied her for a moment. "Just wondering," he said easily.
Elizabeth put on her best smile. "I'm fine," she said as Rodney walked in. "Morning, Rodney."
He grumbled and took a drink of coffee.
There was a mission that day, a standard first contact one. Elizabeth saw the team off through the gate and went back to her office to go through reports and look at what needed doing next.
In her office, though, she spent more time thinking about what she'd seen in the mirror than anything else, and she found herself wondering how the damn thing worked. The fact that it was able to show her John in his quarters was unsettling enough. Were there cameras she didn't know about all over Atlantis? Elizabeth shuddered at the thought, only too aware of the hypocrisy involved.
But why did it work for John, and no one else? She'd tried other people's names, both with the gene and without, and the only one it had responded to was John. Why?
She thought back, remembering when they'd gotten it through the gate. Lorne's team had been the one to go on the mission. She didn't think the Marines who'd touched the mirror had had the gene. The mirror hadn't done anything until John had touched it.
That had to be it. John's touch must have somehow initialized it, keyed it to focus on him alone. Elizabeth didn't understand the point of a mirror that spied on one person only, but then again, she didn't understand the point of the mirror at all. Maybe it was a flawed design; maybe that was why they'd left it with another people.
She sighed and looked back at her reports. John's team was due to report in in an hour, and she'd better have something done by the time they did.
John's team didn't report in on time. Elizabeth gave it fifteen minutes before finding some pretense to slip away to her quarters. However, when she said John's name, the mirror stayed blank.
It must not work when he wasn't on Atlantis, she realized, going back to her office. Damn. She drummed her fingers against her desk and sighed.
After one hour, Elizabeth told Lorne to get a team and a jumper ready on standby. After two hours, she told them to go in cloaked and report back.
They went through the gate, and there was nothing to do but wait. Lorne's team didn't report in after fifteen minutes, or half an hour, and Elizabeth was not pacing an hour later when the gate activated and they finally got a radio signal. "We've got them," Lorne said. "Have a medical team standing by, Colonel Sheppard's been injured."
"How badly?" Elizabeth asked.
"He'll live," Lorne said with a trace of humor. "Wound to the arm, nothing serious, but it needs attention."
"Thank you, Major. We'll see you soon. Weir out." She tapped her radio and called for a medical team to be sent to the gateroom.
The teams came back, and after Sheppard had been treated she got the full story. It was a common one. A people suspicious of outsiders, wary of technology, and when Sheppard had--inadvertently, as he took pains to point out--activated the one piece of Ancient technology they had among them...it hadn't gone well. They'd been surrounded, cut off from the gate, and had been trying to talk their way out of it when Lorne and his team had shown up. John had been injured in the ensuing fracas, as they'd run back to the jumper and the gate.
"We won't be going back there, then," Elizabeth said.
"Probably not a good idea," John agreed easily.
"All right. Thank you, gentlemen. John, take the rest of the day off." Carson had released him from the infirmary, but he wouldn't be going out on missions until his arm fully healed.
They left, and she went back to her office.
She couldn't help but wonder what Rodney would say to John once they were alone, whether his usual brusque manner would turn into something gentler. Whether he'd--
Elizabeth pressed her fingers to her eyes. This was insane. This was ludicrous. She couldn't--could not do this. She couldn't keep thinking about what she'd seen, what she could still see if she were only to look. Rodney and John were treading in dangerous waters as it was. John's career would be finished. She couldn't do without John.
Would Rodney leave if John left? She didn't want to think about it.
That night, in her quarters, she looked balefully at the mirror. No. She wasn't going to say it. She wasn't going to look. She was not a voyeur, not someone who got her pleasures from spying on two of her teammates and friends.
Elizabeth dropped her head into her hands, sitting on the end of her bed. She needed to have the mirror taken out of her quarters, give some reason why she didn't want it anymore. She'd have a couple of the Marines take it to the junk lab, the one where all the Ancient tech went that they couldn't make work.
Right. She'd do that in the morning.
There was no harm in looking one more time, was there? Just...just a peek? Just one glance?
"John," she whispered, before she could change her mind.
She wasn't surprised to see him with Rodney. They lay in bed, the sheets pulled up around their waists. John's bandaged arm rested against his side, his good arm over Rodney's shoulders, and Rodney had his head against John's good shoulder. It was pretty obvious they were both naked, but what got to Elizabeth was the look of peace on both their faces. Rodney turned his head and pressed a kiss against John's collarbone and John smiled, running his fingers through Rodney's hair.
Elizabeth's stomach clenched and she felt a wave of envy. God, she wanted--not them, not either of them, but what they had. Someone to be with, someone to hold or to hold her, someone she could lie with after sex, she could talk to, as John and Rodney seemed to be doing, softly and idly.
She was sitting on her bed watching two of her friends in an obvious post-coital state and she'd never felt more alone in her life.
She meant to turn it off, but to her surprise, Rodney slipped out of bed. John looked resigned, and Elizabeth glanced away as Rodney pulled on his boxers. John sat up, running his good hand through his hair, and he said something, but Rodney shook his head as he responded. His face was set in a stubborn expression Elizabeth knew only too well. John wasn't going to win this argument.
What she didn't understand was why Rodney was leaving now. It was barely midnight, Atlantis time. Even by the most paranoid clock, they should have plenty of time before they had to separate. Why was Rodney getting dressed and smoothing down his hair now?
He didn't even kiss John, Elizabeth noticed. He just gave John a look full of emotions she couldn't define and left.
Alone in his room, John fell back against the pillows, staring up at the ceiling. He looked annoyed, and resigned. Was he used to this? Elizabeth wondered. Did Rodney leave him often like this? Was this what usually happened between them?
She wasn't even supposed to know about their relationship, let alone be wondering about the details of it. Elizabeth sighed. "Off," she said wearily.
She would have asked someone to take the mirror to the junk lab in the morning, except that the day started with an emergency and went downhill from there, and by the time she got a chance to think about anything other than surviving the day it was time for bed.
"Tomorrow," she promised herself, crawling into bed without even looking at the mirror. "Tomorrow, it'll go away."
But the days went on, and the mirror stayed in Elizabeth's quarters. She couldn't say why she kept it. She knew she shouldn't have it, and no excuses could come up with a plausible reason why it was still there.
It wasn't like she used it.
Much.
It had just become a habit to...check in on them, before bed. To say John's name and see the mirror change and show him, usually in his quarters, sometimes in Rodney's, a couple times in the labs with Rodney or in one of the common rooms. But almost always he was with Rodney.
She saw them talking, saw them curled on John's bed watching something on Rodney's laptop, saw John doing Sudoku puzzles and Rodney typing away on his computer.
After long days or long missions she saw them asleep, limbs tangled together and heads next to each other on the pillow.
Sometimes she saw them making love, but she always shut the mirror off hastily whenever she saw John's mouth on Rodney's skin or Rodney's hands on John's body. She never watched long anyway, but those glimpses made her blush and her stomach clench and it was--
Well. What she was doing was wrong on so many levels she couldn't begin to put a name to them all, and in her more reasonable moments, her saner moments, she despised herself for it. John and Rodney would hate her if they found out, and she knew it, but she wasn't so sure what they'd feel could hold a candle to how she felt about herself.
But she couldn't stop. This faux intimacy, this false sharing of what she didn't have--couldn't have--was as close as she'd come to having anyone in her bed, in her life, since Simon.
She hated them, just a little for it, for the ease they had with each other, the secret closeness no one else knew about. Hated them for having what she couldn't. Hated them for not being alone, for fighting for the covers and dealing with the wet spot and whether John snored or Rodney kicked in his sleep.
She didn't know if either of them did either of those things. It didn't matter. The point was that they had the luxury of finding out about those little annoyances, those pet peeves Elizabeth would have given a great deal to be frustrated about once again. They had each other, and she...
Three weeks after she'd turned the mirror on for the first time, John's team went on a mission that lasted three days. There was an Ancient outpost on P2X-583, or as the people there called it, Vaener. From the looks of it, it had been a possible defensive outpost, a refuge against the Wraith. Rodney took a couple extra scientists to see if they could activate it and use it as one again.
Elizabeth ignored the mirror when she went to bed and told herself she didn't care about sleeping arrangements on Vaener. John and Rodney were professionals. They knew how to behave in the field.
The team reported in regularly, but the prognosis wasn't good, and when they came back Elizabeth only had to look at Rodney's face to know it wasn't going to work.
"It's a power source problem," Rodney said, downing a cup of coffee.
"What's the problem?" Elizabeth asked.
"We don't have the power source." Rodney slumped back in his chair. He looked tired. "Half the equipment there is beyond our knowledge, and just getting it working would take months. And that's with a power source, which we don't have. It needs a ZPM."
"It took you three days to find that out?" she asked, a little surprised.
Rodney gave her an annoyed look. "It took me three days to try and get some of the equipment up and running, to try and see if we could salvage something from the outpost and possibly get it running at partial power, anything. And the answer is that if I had a dedicated team working on nothing but the outpost, with unlimited resources, I might--in a couple of months, and I do say might--be able to get parts of it up to quarter power, but not what we'd need, and it probably wouldn't be stable. So it was a wash."
"If we had a ZPM, and could get it running, what could we expect from it?" Elizabeth asked.
"The outpost could shield several thousand people," Rodney said. "There are living quarters, storage facilities--a lot of it's underground and hard to access, but it's in good repair from what we could tell. It doesn't have much in the way of offensive capability. It looks like this was a place to send the noncombatants, a place for them to bunker down and wait until it was safe for them to return to Atlantis. With a ZPM at full power, it'd be safe for close to a year."
Elizabeth sighed. They could really have used it, but they didn't have a ZPM to spare. "All right," she said. "Thank you."
Rodney nodded brusquely. "I'm going to go find a shower," he said. "The Vaenerians haven't quite mastered indoor plumbing yet."
He left and Elizabeth turned to John. "So much for that hope," she said.
John shrugged. "It was a long shot from the beginning, once we got there and actually saw the place."
"I see," Elizabeth said. "Well, if we ever get another ZPM we can spare, we'll think about going back."
"Right." John grinned easily. "Right up there with the Wraith going away and never bothering us again."
"Wouldn't that be nice," Elizabeth said with a sigh. "Thanks, John."
He nodded. "Sure."
When she went to bed that night, the mirror sat innocently on her dresser, quiet and still. Elizabeth gave it one look and sighed. "No," she said firmly. "I am not--no."
Five minutes later, she sat up in bed. "John," she said with a groan.
She wasn't surprised to see them together, shirtless, John's bed rumpled. Rodney was pacing, John was sitting on the bed. But what did surprise her was that they were apparently arguing about something. Rodney was gesturing, his hands sharp and angry, his face set, and John was giving as good as he got, from the speed at which his mouth was moving and the way he threw up his hands.
John said something, Rodney froze for a moment, and then Rodney began pulling on the rest of his clothes and shoving his feet into his boots. He turned for the door and John scrambled out of bed, grabbing his arm, clearly trying to placate him, but Rodney jerked his arm away and snapped something back, something that made John step back, holding up his hands, looking angry and upset.
Rodney stormed out of the room. A moment later, John began getting dressed, looking like he was going for a run.
"Off," Elizabeth said, feeling profoundly disturbed. She'd seen them argue before, but not this intensely, not this personally, and it made her wonder just what had happened between them on Vaener. Unfortunately, she had no way to find out, not unless they let something slip the next day.
Her sleep was troubled, her dreams restless, and in the morning she woke with the half-baked idea of saying something to John, an idea that lasted until she got into the shower and woke up.
The other plan she had, the one of just watching and mentioning something to them if something seemed off, never got a chance to come to fruition. Rodney stayed in the labs all day, avoiding everyone but Zelenka and the hapless scientists unlucky enough to cross his path, and John kept busy anywhere Rodney wasn't. Elizabeth didn't see them in the same section of Atlantis, let alone the same room, and it was all perfectly logical, all perfectly reasonable, leaving her no way to say anything to anyone.
She went back to her quarters after dinner, more worried than ever. With a sigh, she sat down on the bed and looked at the mirror. "John," she said, almost afraid of what she'd see.
John was alone in his room, either working or staring at a Sudoku book. Rodney wasn't there, and Elizabeth almost turned off the mirror, but a moment later John sat up straight and Rodney walked into the picture.
They looked--wary. That was the only word she could use. They looked wary of each other, as if each didn't quite trust the other. Rodney looked uncertain, John's face was a mask.
She didn't know who moved first, whether it was John getting up or Rodney stepping forward, but a moment later they were locked in an embrace, hands tight on each other's arms, mouths crushed against each other, hard and almost brutal.
It made Elizabeth flinch. She didn't want to see this. She couldn't see this. Watching them when they were making love was bad enough, but this--the way they were almost wrestling with each other, the way John yanked at Rodney's shirt and Rodney shoved at John's pants, the way Rodney pushed John back on the bed--it wasn't tender, or romantic, or even affectionate. This was angry, this was almost violent, and Elizabeth felt a little sick.
"Off," she whispered, but the mirror didn't turn off. It stayed on, showing her every moment, the way John wrestled with Rodney as their clothes got ripped off until John was on top of him, both of them naked, pinning Rodney's wrists into the mattress. It showed her the way Rodney fought to throw him off, the way John held him down.
John kept one hand on Rodney's wrists and grabbed something off his nightstand with the other hand--a tube of some kind--and flipped it open. No. He couldn't--he wasn't going to--Elizabeth watched, unable to look away, horrified.
Rodney was saying something, something Elizabeth couldn't read. It wasn't the word 'no', but she didn't know what it was, and then John pushed into him, and Rodney's head tossed against the pillow and his hands pulled against John's grip on his wrists, the grip that John had switched back to two hands now.
She watched, helpless, as they fucked, as John took Rodney, driving into him, over and over, and Rodney writhed under him, looking for all the world like he was trying to get away, like he didn't want this.
It went on, and on, and then--Elizabeth saw Rodney cry out, his body arch, and he fell back against the bed, panting. A moment later, John froze, his head falling forward.
"Off," Elizabeth tried again, her voice barely audible. "Off."
The mirror shimmered and went blank.
Elizabeth ran into the bathroom and vomited.
She didn't look at the mirror for nearly a week after that. She could barely look at John or Rodney for three days. The day after the--incident--she pled a headache and stayed in her quarters with the lights on low, curled in a ball, shaking, pitifully grateful that there were no emergencies that needed her attention.
Had she really seen that? Had she really seen John--
Rodney hadn't said no. She clung to that. She hadn't seen him say no.
Maybe she'd misinterpreted. She hadn't been able to hear, and maybe...maybe it hadn't been what she'd thought. Maybe--
She had to say something. She couldn't let this slide.
She couldn't say anything.
Elizabeth curled into a tighter ball and pulled the blankets over her head. Rodney hadn't said no, and John--John wasn't like that. John wouldn't do that.
She had to believe that. Somehow.
Five days after the 'incident', John, Ronon, and Teyla went offworld. Rodney stayed behind, claiming he had too much work to do in the labs. Actually, he went on for about five minutes, but Elizabeth tuned him out for most of it.
She sought him out in the lab, after seeing the other three off. He was alone for once, typing madly into a laptop, a mug at his elbow. "Rodney," she said, as casually as she could. "Is everything all right?"
She didn't miss the way his expression just shut down for a moment. "Everything's fine," he said. "If by fine you mean riding herd on a bunch of barely competent scientists while being dragged offworld far too often on missions not nearly worth my time, all while trying to keep a ten thousand year old city afloat and--"
Elizabeth held up a hand. "Not what I meant, Rodney," she said. "You look tired, that's all, and it's not like you to miss a mission."
"Yes, well, they didn't need me on this one," Rodney said brusquely.
"Are you sure everything's all right?"
"Yes, Elizabeth, everything's fine," he said impatiently. "Now if you don't mind, I have work to do, work that is not going to get finished while I stand around discussing my feelings. If I want that, I'll talk to Heightmeyer."
"Right." Elizabeth left him to it and went back to her own work.
John's team got back late that night. No emergencies and no wounded, so Elizabeth decided to save the debriefing for the morning.
On her way to her quarters, she heard what sounded like John and Rodney talking around a corner and slowed down, not wanting to interrupt.
"Could've used you there today, McKay." That was John.
"You did fine without me, Colonel."
"You're on my team. I need you."
"You don't need me," Rodney said, almost bitterly. "You don't need anyone."
"Rodney." There was something different in John's voice now, something softer. "Rodney, that's not fair."
"Truth often isn't," Rodney said, still with that bitter tone in his voice.
"Fine. If that's the way--you know what, no. Damnit, Rodney, you know that's not--"
"Do I?" Rodney asked. "After what you--"
They broke off suddenly, and Elizabeth heard more footsteps. She started walking in the other direction; it'd take her a little longer to get to her quarters, but at least she wouldn't see them.
After what?
She glanced at the mirror that night, but all it showed her was John, alone, tossing restlessly in bed.
John's team went on another mission three days later. Rodney went with them, and Elizabeth spent the whole time they were gone expecting trouble. She hadn't seen them together since their conversation in the hall, either during the day or at night, and both of them seemed a bit more short-tempered than usual as they got ready to go through the gate.
Elizabeth sighed. She had a bad feeling about this.
When the team came back, John and Rodney were arguing at the tops of their lungs. "Well, maybe if you hadn't been so--"
"Me? Excuse me, I'm not the one who--"
"Gentlemen!" Elizabeth broke in. "What is going on here?"
"The Cilastians chose not to trade with us this season," Teyla said, giving John and Rodney an irritated look. "They felt that their resources were thin enough, and that they could not in good conscience trade with a people who did not have peace within their ranks."
"I--what?" Elizabeth asked.
"The Cilastians place a very high value on peace and serenity," Teyla said. "They are a communal people. They felt that we were not sufficiently united enough to merit trading with them, that we had too much discord between ourselves."
The look she gave John and Rodney left no doubt as to where that discord had come from. "I see," Elizabeth said. "If we sent another team, do you think they'd reconsider?"
Teyla shook her head. "I do not think so. Not until next season."
"Thank you. John, Rodney, my office, now." Elizabeth turned on her heel and walked up the stairs, not bothering to look behind her to see if they followed.
Both of them started talking as soon as the door closed. "I don't want to hear it," she said, holding up a hand. "Save the excuses for someone who cares. Thanks to your inability to get along, we've just lost a trading partner for a year. I don't know what is going on between you two--" not really a lie--"but fix it. Now."
Rodney scowled and John's face was set. "Now, gentlemen," Elizabeth said. "Do I have to lock you in a room together? Would you like me to call in Dr. Heightmeyer?"
They turned and left without saying a word.
Elizabeth went back to her quarters and turned on the mirror. At this point, she was angry enough and worried enough that she didn't care whose privacy she was invading.
John and Rodney were in a...storage closet? There wasn't much light, but Elizabeth saw shelves and boxes around them. They were almost pressed chest to chest, glaring at each other. Rodney was talking, gesturing as best he could given the limited space, and from the scowl on John's face, he wasn't happy with whatever Rodney was saying.
John started shaking his head, and Elizabeth saw him say 'No', over and over again. He finally grabbed Rodney's hands and said something else, something that made Rodney stare at him.
Then Rodney tried to punch him, only John had his hands trapped, and Rodney ended up stumbling forward and falling against John.
Had she just seen that right? Had Rodney, of all people, actually tried to hit John? It didn't make sense.
Rodney was struggling, trying to get his hands free. He tripped and fell back, against the shelves, and boxes tumbled down around them, one hitting John in the shoulder. John lost his grip on Rodney's hands and Rodney plowed a fist into John's gut.
While John was bent over, gasping for breath, Rodney said something, and then he left.
Well. That had gone well. Elizabeth sighed and turned the mirror off.
She looked again, later that night, out of a vain hope, and nearly fell over when she saw them together. They were in Rodney's quarters and it didn't look like Rodney was expecting John. He was lying on the bed working, and John stood by the door.
At first, Rodney didn't even look at John. He ignored him completely, focusing on the laptop in front of him. But whatever John was saying eventually wore him down, and Rodney sat up, turning to face him. He sighed and gave John an impatient look, and John crossed the floor, kneeling in front of him.
Rodney said something, and John shook his head, taking Rodney's hands. He kept talking, even over Rodney's protests, and Elizabeth wondered what it was that was so important, because slowly the expression on Rodney's face was changing, from sullen anger to something so guarded Elizabeth couldn't even tell what it was. Rodney said 'No', one of the few words Elizabeth could read, and John nodded.
Abruptly, Rodney pulled away and got up, beginning to pace. Elizabeth chewed her lower lip, worried. What the hell was going on? John turned to look at Rodney, who was apparently ranting--well, at least he was back to normal, Elizabeth supposed.
Rodney pointed at John accusingly. John got to his feet slowly and walked over to Rodney and took his face in both hands, kissing him deeply. Rodney stiffened for a moment, but then he melted into it, his hands coming up to grasp John's arms.
Okay, Elizabeth thought. That looked promising. She ignored the part of her brain that demanded to know since when spying on her teammates' sex lives had become grounds for personnel reviews and looked at the way they were standing, leaning into each other, still deeply involved in the kiss.
She shifted a little on the bed. She should probably turn the mirror off, but she wanted to see more, to make sure. This had gone beyond a habit, it had come perilously close to an addiction, and she couldn't bring herself to stop it.
The kiss finally ended and Rodney looked at John, dazed. John said something to him, something that made Rodney flustered--and then John left.
What? Elizabeth sat bolt upright. Why had he just left? Why was he walking back to his own quarters? What--that couldn't be right, maybe Rodney would come after him?
She left the mirror on all night, but Rodney never came. John slept alone.
The next day, it was obvious something had changed between them. She didn't need the added benefit of the mirror to figure that out. Rodney was distracted in the morning staff meeting, off his game, which was unusual enough, and the first time he looked at John he fumbled his pen.
The second time, he nearly dropped his laptop.
For his part, John seemed nothing more than amused by Rodney's uncharacteristic clumsiness, but he didn't make jokes about it and he didn't stay in Rodney's presence longer than he had to either.
Later that afternoon, Elizabeth was out on one of the exterior walkways, taking a short break and some air. She looked down, at the walkway below her, and saw two figures, one dark-haired and one with lighter brown hair. From the uniforms, and the way they stood, it was obviously John and Rodney, and she was about to go down to see how they were doing when the breeze shifted, carrying their words up to her.
"--shouldn't have said that," Rodney said.
"You want me to lie?" John asked.
"I want you to be honest with me," Rodney said brusquely.
"I am."
"No, you're not," Rodney said.
"Yeah, I am," John said. "You punched me for it, but I'm being honest with you."
"You deserved that," Rodney told him. "You deserved a lot more for that."
"For telling you I--" The wind shifted again, and the rest of John's words were lost, but Elizabeth had heard enough. She was willing to bet she knew what John had said.
For telling you I love you.
It made sense. John told Rodney, who didn't believe him, and all their actions yesterday had been the result of that disbelief and John trying to convince Rodney that he was telling the truth.
The question then became, was John telling the truth? He wasn't the type to talk about his emotions, and in a debate between him and Rodney over who would say the 'L' word first...Elizabeth wouldn't have laid odds on either of them.
So why had he done it? What had he had to gain?
Elizabeth turned around and leaned against the railing. Was John trying to get Rodney to forgive him for what he'd done? Was saying 'I love you' enough of an incentive to forget that?
Rodney hadn't said no. But would John have taken no for an answer anyway? What was the difference between rape and forced consent, and God, why did she have to think about these terms regarding her friends?
What if she'd misinterpreted what she'd seen? What if she was wrong? Was it possible for what she'd seen to be consensual?
Maybe. Maybe she'd read the situation wrong. She wasn't sure. Elizabeth chewed her lip and went back inside, not wanting to take the chance of hearing anything else.
But curiosity, addiction, whatever it was won out over her fear of what she'd see if she turned on the mirror. She sat down on her bed that night and took a deep breath. "John," she said.
John knelt in front of Rodney, his hands on Rodney's hips. Rodney's hands were on the back of John's head and his own head was tilted back, his mouth open. Neither of them was dressed; Elizabeth blushed, her stomach clenching, as she watched John's cheeks hollow, as he bobbed his head.
Rodney's hips jerked and a couple of moments later John raised his head, licking his lips. Rodney's expression was dazed, satiated, and he tugged John to his feet, leaning up to kiss him. They moved over to the bed, still kissing, and fell down on it, tangled in each other. Rodney turned onto his stomach, John kneeling over him, and Elizabeth watched, part turned on, part mortified, and part afraid, as John reached for the tube. The angle was wrong, and she couldn't see everything, just John's wrist as he moved his hand, but she saw Rodney grab for the pillow, a look of pure pleasure on his face, and she saw his hips push back into John's touch.
John shifted; Elizabeth watched, swallowing, as he prepared himself, and then he slid into Rodney slowly, and Rodney's hands clawed at the sheets and John's head fell forward.
This was as...caring, Elizabeth supposed, as the other time had been rough and violent. John moved inside Rodney slowly, rhythmically, one thrust at a time, until Rodney was squirming under him and John was moving harder, not quite as evenly. Rodney suddenly arched up, body bowed back, and Elizabeth saw John shudder and his hips drive into Rodney one last time.
They both collapsed against the bed, panting for breath. Eventually John moved and Rodney rolled over, settling against him. John kissed Rodney's temple, rubbing his back idly.
Elizabeth blew out a breath. Wow. They seemed to have...well, kissed and made up, she supposed?
She wondered if it would hold.
That night she dreamed, her sleep full of images of John and Rodney. She saw Rodney's crooked mouth pressed against John's hip, John's hands sliding over Rodney's chest. She dreamed of the two of them tangled together, of them walking through the halls of Atlantis, talking and laughing, and by the time she woke up she couldn't tell what was dream and what was memory any longer.
She stared balefully at the mirror. If it weren't for the mirror, she wouldn't have this problem. She wouldn't know any of this, she wouldn't be in this position of knowing things she shouldn't, of wanting things she couldn't. If it weren't for the damn mirror, she wouldn't be having erotic dreams about her teammates. She wouldn't know what Rodney looked like when he came or know that John liked to hold Rodney after they made love.
"Oh, John," she said helplessly, and the mirror shimmered and changed.
It was still early morning. The sunlight was just starting to come through the windows, tingeing everything with a watery gray light. Rodney was still sound asleep, tucked against John, with John's arms around him. John stretched a little, waking up; he blinked and looked down at Rodney, and the soft smile on his face made Elizabeth's stomach twist and hurt.
John pressed a kiss to Rodney's tousled hair, and something inside Elizabeth just snapped. She picked up the coffee mug sitting next to her bed and threw it at the mirror with all the force she could muster.
The mirror shattered. Elizabeth stared at the mess, horrified, wondering what she'd just done.
She fell back against the bed and pulled the covers over her head. It was early. She didn't have to get up yet. She could pretend the mirror wasn't broken for a little while still.
The door chime woke her, some time later, and at first she thought she'd overslept. But a glance at the clock showed that it was still early. No one had contacted her over the radio, so...who was at her door? Elizabeth scrambled out of bed, avoiding the shards of the mirror as she walked to the door.
John and Rodney stood there, and it was so unexpected to see them, so completely unexpected, that for a moment Elizabeth just stared at them.
"Can we come in?" John asked after a moment.
"Ah--sure, yeah. What's going on?" Elizabeth moved aside to let them enter. "Be--be careful, there's a bit of a mess."
"That's an understatement," Rodney said, looking around. "What happened?"
"The mirror broke," Elizabeth said.
"I figured that part out," Rodney said with an exasperated glance. "How did it break? Did it turn on and suddenly shatter? Did it--"
"What are you doing here?" Elizabeth asked, interrupting him. She didn't want to talk to the two of them when she was still in her pajamas, not with the shards of the mirror all over her quarters. She didn't want to face them.
She wanted to know why they were there.
"We need to talk to you," John said, glancing at Rodney.
Everything inside Elizabeth went cold. Did they know about the mirror? Had breaking it somehow--"Okay," she said, summoning up her calm from somewhere. "Should we--let's go sit."
Being the leader had its perks. She had a sitting area off the bedroom with a few chairs. Getting to it involved walking through the worst of the mess, so she put on shoes and tried to avoid the biggest shards. She still heard a few crunches as they walked over and sat down and she tried to ignore how ridiculous she felt, sitting in shoes and pajamas with fully-dressed John and Rodney at six in the morning.
"So," she said, wishing they were in her office, the conference room, anywhere but her quarters. "What did you need to talk to me about? And why here, at six in the morning?"
"Well...it's not exactly work related," John said, a little awkwardly. "Which is why we're here, and not in your office. We wanted to catch you before the day started."
This didn't bode well. "Okay," Elizabeth said, hiding her nervousness. "What's going on?"
"We need your help," John said, glancing at Rodney again. "Kind of."
"If it wasn't for the asinine rules of your country's military, we wouldn't," Rodney muttered.
"Rodney," John said warningly.
"What's going on?" Elizabeth asked, trying to pretend like she had no idea.
"We're...Rodney and I....we're together," John said in a rush.
They were coming out to her? Elizabeth blinked as a rush of images of the two of them ran through her head. She hoped they'd attribute the flush in her cheeks to the information. "I see," she said. "And...what do you need me to do about it?"
"Cover for us," John said simply. "If we need it. Elizabeth, if anyone finds out about us, I could end up...it could be bad. We need you to help us out if it ever gets to that point."
She nodded. "I'll help you any way I can, if it comes to it." The guilt inside her was making her stomach churn. She had to say something; she knew she should say something, but...
"So what happened to the mirror?" Rodney asked, clearly impatient and uncomfortable with the conversation. "Did it do something? Did something happen to it and it just overloaded?"
It was the perfect opportunity. She could tell them. She could explain what she'd seen--not all of it, of course, but some of it--and explain how she'd broken the mirror as a result. She could--
They'd never forgive her. They'd be smart enough to figure out the things she wasn't telling them.
Elizabeth looked Rodney in the eye. "No," she said. "I tripped and my mug flew out of my hand and smashed into the mirror. It was an accident."
When they left, John promised to send some people by to clean up the mess the mirror had made. Elizabeth hurried through a shower and scrambled into her clothes and shoes, letting in the Marines on her way to breakfast.
They'd never know. And she'd never be able to watch them again.
It was all for the best, really.
Elizabeth thought that maybe, one day, she'd forget what Rodney looked like when John entered him. One day she'd stop wondering what he sounded like when he came, whether John said Rodney's name or whether he was silent. One day she wouldn't dream about them.
One day she'd stop wondering what had actually happened that night.
One day.
If she told herself that often enough, she might even believe it.
In the meantime, it was another day, and she had work to do. Elizabeth took her seat behind her desk and opened her laptop.
Time to move on.
**
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