Not Dead Yet Challenge by elementalv
Title: Stop All The Clocks
Author: elementalv
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Teyla, Ronon, Rodney
Spoilers: Season 4 - Teyla’s arc
Notes: Gen; a bit under 900 words. Also, it kind of gave me the creeps, and I wrote it. Once upon a time, I would have said this tone was unusual for me, but somewhere along the line, I lost my fluff-fu and wandered over to dark!fic territory. Many thanks to candymike and empressvesica for beta duties.
Summary: “Teyla.” Her name sounds more like a curse than anything else, and she supposes she deserves that, given what he’s seen her do over the years.
~*~*~
Teyla has been pregnant for thirteen years, seven months and three days. It’s a measure of how far gone she is that she thinks the prime numbers are significant in any way.
~*~*~
She has tied Rodney to a chair and is quizzing him about the basics of temporal mechanics - with special attention to space-time anomalies other Stargate teams have dealt with - when Ronon calls.
“Hey,” he says. Teyla ignores him for the moment, because Rodney is going through one of his stubborn phases and demanding to know what makes Teyla think she would have even the barest chance of understanding his answer.
She touches her earpiece as she looks at the array of knives before her and says absently, “One moment, Ronon.”
“Ronon?” Rodney draws in a quick breath and says as loudly as possible, “Teyla tied me up in my lab, and she has knives. Get Sheppard!”
“Where’s Sheppard?” Ronon asks.
“John is lying dead in the hallway.” Teyla finally decides on the Kornuth blade. It has a serrated edge with tiny, razor-edge burrs at each tip. All she needs to do is drag it lightly across Rodney’s skin to draw blood and gain his cooperation. If she presses too hard, he’ll have a heart attack and die, a fact Teyla had to learn several times early in her education.
“Huh. That’s a little early, isn’t it?” Ronon says, even as Rodney sputters, “Dead? He’s dead? Oh my god. You’ve gone completely crazy. That’s what really happened to the other Athosians, isn’t it? One of the women in your group went insane during her third trimester and killed them all!”
Teyla ignores him. She’s heard this speech, or a variation of it, at least two thousand times already, though the actual number is probably a great deal higher. Instead, she pulls up the hem of Rodney’s shirt to expose his stomach and slowly drags the knife straight across his belly button. By the time she puts the blade down, he’s babbling about how she can’t kill him, because he hasn’t won his Nobel Prize yet, and anyway, who else will keep everyone in Atlantis alive?
She turns away from him, knowing she has four minutes or so before he winds down enough to ask her what it is she wants. Meanwhile, she taps her earpiece again and asks, “Why did you call me?”
“It’s mid-morning,” he says.
It’s been nearly thirteen years since this began, and he still won’t say more than he needs to. Ordinarily, Teyla approves of Ronon’s reticence, but at the moment, she’s in the mood to hear more of his voice.
“Indeed, it is.”
There’s a pause, then Ronon says, “I’m not dead yet.”
“Apparently not.” There isn’t much that Teyla enjoys about her life these days, but forcing Ronon to communicate is one of the few pleasures remaining to her.
“You always kill me before I wake up.” Ronon sighs when she doesn’t respond. “Come on, Teyla. You promised.”
“I might have need of you tomorrow.”
“You know I’m no good with that kind of thing.” He sounds impatient, which isn’t surprising. Ronon generally prefers to get through the days by being dead, and the only reason he hasn’t killed himself today is because Teyla slipped into his room as he slept and took all his weapons before locking him in.
“True.” It’s unfortunate that Ronon studied poetry before joining Sateda’s military. Had he studied something useful - mathematics at the very least - they might have broken free of this temporal loop long before now. “However, I need you to bring down the machine.”
“Teyla.” Her name sounds more like a curse than anything else, and she supposes she deserves that, given what he’s seen her do over the years. “You’ve never been able to switch it off before. What makes you think it will be any different tomorrow?”
“I know more now than I did then,” she says, her voice clear and certain.
In fact, Teyla does know more now. It’s been an incredibly difficult journey, given that she’s had to force Rodney to continue her education with each reset of the time loop. Despite her recalcitrant instructor, she’s still managed to learn the math and science necessary to understand temporal physics. She would be prouder of this accomplishment were it not for what she has had to do to Rodney over the years in order to achieve it.
“That’s what you said the last ten times.”
“And it was true the last ten times.” Her voice breaks a little at the end. “Please, Ronon.”
“You promised you’d kill me.”
“I have. Many times.” For a moment, she sounds like herself again, like she hasn’t spent almost thirteen years reliving the same three days over and over again, like she hasn’t killed every member of the expedition, including herself, in an effort to escape. She sounds tired and reasonable, and perhaps it’s the hint of sanity that leads Ronon to capitulate.
“Okay. Yeah,” he says on a sigh. “But you’ll kill me right after, if it doesn’t work, won’t you?”
Teyla turns to face Rodney, whose desperate rant stutters to a halt at the sight of her face, and she reassures Ronon gently, saying, “Of course I’ll kill you if it doesn’t work.”
Author: elementalv
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Teyla, Ronon, Rodney
Spoilers: Season 4 - Teyla’s arc
Notes: Gen; a bit under 900 words. Also, it kind of gave me the creeps, and I wrote it. Once upon a time, I would have said this tone was unusual for me, but somewhere along the line, I lost my fluff-fu and wandered over to dark!fic territory. Many thanks to candymike and empressvesica for beta duties.
Summary: “Teyla.” Her name sounds more like a curse than anything else, and she supposes she deserves that, given what he’s seen her do over the years.
~*~*~
Teyla has been pregnant for thirteen years, seven months and three days. It’s a measure of how far gone she is that she thinks the prime numbers are significant in any way.
~*~*~
She has tied Rodney to a chair and is quizzing him about the basics of temporal mechanics - with special attention to space-time anomalies other Stargate teams have dealt with - when Ronon calls.
“Hey,” he says. Teyla ignores him for the moment, because Rodney is going through one of his stubborn phases and demanding to know what makes Teyla think she would have even the barest chance of understanding his answer.
She touches her earpiece as she looks at the array of knives before her and says absently, “One moment, Ronon.”
“Ronon?” Rodney draws in a quick breath and says as loudly as possible, “Teyla tied me up in my lab, and she has knives. Get Sheppard!”
“Where’s Sheppard?” Ronon asks.
“John is lying dead in the hallway.” Teyla finally decides on the Kornuth blade. It has a serrated edge with tiny, razor-edge burrs at each tip. All she needs to do is drag it lightly across Rodney’s skin to draw blood and gain his cooperation. If she presses too hard, he’ll have a heart attack and die, a fact Teyla had to learn several times early in her education.
“Huh. That’s a little early, isn’t it?” Ronon says, even as Rodney sputters, “Dead? He’s dead? Oh my god. You’ve gone completely crazy. That’s what really happened to the other Athosians, isn’t it? One of the women in your group went insane during her third trimester and killed them all!”
Teyla ignores him. She’s heard this speech, or a variation of it, at least two thousand times already, though the actual number is probably a great deal higher. Instead, she pulls up the hem of Rodney’s shirt to expose his stomach and slowly drags the knife straight across his belly button. By the time she puts the blade down, he’s babbling about how she can’t kill him, because he hasn’t won his Nobel Prize yet, and anyway, who else will keep everyone in Atlantis alive?
She turns away from him, knowing she has four minutes or so before he winds down enough to ask her what it is she wants. Meanwhile, she taps her earpiece again and asks, “Why did you call me?”
“It’s mid-morning,” he says.
It’s been nearly thirteen years since this began, and he still won’t say more than he needs to. Ordinarily, Teyla approves of Ronon’s reticence, but at the moment, she’s in the mood to hear more of his voice.
“Indeed, it is.”
There’s a pause, then Ronon says, “I’m not dead yet.”
“Apparently not.” There isn’t much that Teyla enjoys about her life these days, but forcing Ronon to communicate is one of the few pleasures remaining to her.
“You always kill me before I wake up.” Ronon sighs when she doesn’t respond. “Come on, Teyla. You promised.”
“I might have need of you tomorrow.”
“You know I’m no good with that kind of thing.” He sounds impatient, which isn’t surprising. Ronon generally prefers to get through the days by being dead, and the only reason he hasn’t killed himself today is because Teyla slipped into his room as he slept and took all his weapons before locking him in.
“True.” It’s unfortunate that Ronon studied poetry before joining Sateda’s military. Had he studied something useful - mathematics at the very least - they might have broken free of this temporal loop long before now. “However, I need you to bring down the machine.”
“Teyla.” Her name sounds more like a curse than anything else, and she supposes she deserves that, given what he’s seen her do over the years. “You’ve never been able to switch it off before. What makes you think it will be any different tomorrow?”
“I know more now than I did then,” she says, her voice clear and certain.
In fact, Teyla does know more now. It’s been an incredibly difficult journey, given that she’s had to force Rodney to continue her education with each reset of the time loop. Despite her recalcitrant instructor, she’s still managed to learn the math and science necessary to understand temporal physics. She would be prouder of this accomplishment were it not for what she has had to do to Rodney over the years in order to achieve it.
“That’s what you said the last ten times.”
“And it was true the last ten times.” Her voice breaks a little at the end. “Please, Ronon.”
“You promised you’d kill me.”
“I have. Many times.” For a moment, she sounds like herself again, like she hasn’t spent almost thirteen years reliving the same three days over and over again, like she hasn’t killed every member of the expedition, including herself, in an effort to escape. She sounds tired and reasonable, and perhaps it’s the hint of sanity that leads Ronon to capitulate.
“Okay. Yeah,” he says on a sigh. “But you’ll kill me right after, if it doesn’t work, won’t you?”
Teyla turns to face Rodney, whose desperate rant stutters to a halt at the sight of her face, and she reassures Ronon gently, saying, “Of course I’ll kill you if it doesn’t work.”