Sparky Advent Fic - Holiday Observations
Something weird was going on. And it wasn’t just the cheese ball decorations Elizabeth had okayed going up everywhere in the City or the cheerful holiday music softly-and annoyingly-playing through the halls. It wasn’t even the fact that this evening, a few days before his paid time off, the consoles were gushing electricity like sparklers or that two Wraith Hive ships were parked not but a few solar systems off. No, it wasn’t any of that. That was normal, even expected. But tonight, something had happened that made Rodney McKay pretty sure something very weird was going on, even for Atlantis.
His reasons for thinking so were thus: Rodney considered himself a pretty observant man. His entire job hinged on his powers of observation and analysis. Since he was very good at his job, he was, ergo, pretty observant. And what he had observed this night was one John Sheppard hustling up the steps to the Atlantis control room with his jacket zipped all the way up to his neck. That was very much out of the ordinary. Even further, it was just downright odd. Which led Rodney, observer extraordinaire that he was, to the invariable conclusion that something very weird was going on.
Sheppard didn’t seem to notice anything weird. He hustled up to Rodney, looking over the control panels. “What’s wrong? Is it the Hives?”
"You cold?” he asked, as the Colonel scanned the equipment.
“Huh?”
Rodney gestured to the jacket. He’d have to play this right, to figure out the truth.
John threw a sideways glance at Rodney, mouth pursed. “What. This?” The colonel gestured to his attire. “This is how I always wear this.”
Back to those powers of observation. Rodney had known Sheppard for a few years now and did not recall once when he had zipped his jacket up to his chin. At least, not more than a few times. In fact, his favorite stance-du-jour was with his hips cocked, hands planted on them, splaying out his open jacket so all the alien women they were sure to encounter could take in his manly-though in Rodney’s opinion awfully skinny-form.
But far be it from Rodney to say that.
“No, you don’t.” He said instead. Simple was better.
The colonel’s expression shifted from nonchalant to perturbed. “Yes, I do, McKay.”
“No, you don’t. You hate that jacket, and you especially hate zipping that jacket.”
“I do not.” Sheppard attempted to plant his hands on his hips, but finding it nearly impossible to stand upright with arms akimbo in a fully zipped Atlantis regulation jacket, opted to cross his arms in front of his chest instead. “Don’t.”
Rodney frowned. “Do.”
John’s eyes were starting to narrow in a dangerous fashion. “Do not.”
“What’s going on, boys?” The authoritative voice of Elizabeth Weir rose from behind them, and she strode towards the monitor, one eyebrow raised. She had her jacket zipped, too, but that was almost completely normal for her.
“I was just questioning Colonel Fancypants here about his uniform.”
Elizabeth eyed John up and down, noting the zipper. “What…?”
Her question was cut off by an intimidating glare from Sheppard. She looked at him for a moment, her mouth quirking a little bit, then smiled oddly and turned back to Rodney. “I mean, what’s with the summons? Why did you call us all out of bed in the middle of the night?”
Rodney looked at her incredulously. “You mean you don’t notice…?” He waved his hand in front of John, whose expression was growing more and more murderous.
“What I notice is that someone radioed in an emergency, and there doesn’t really appear to be an emergency,” she said authoritatively, looking over the quiet control room and speaking in a tone of voice that brooked no further discussion of anything else. “What’s going on, Rodney?”
Rodney shook his head and given the strength of Sheppard’s still focused glare, opted to move beyond the jacket. Though it was still weird.
He gestured to the control panel. “They’re fritzing.”
Elizabeth’s eyebrow rose slowly. “Fritzing.”
He nodded, eyes wide. “Seriously fritzing.”
Sheppard tried once again to cross his arms, failed, and opted instead to lean casually against the console. “What do you mean fritzing? They’re not doing anything at the moment.”
Elizabeth scanned the relatively quiet machines and returned to staring at Rodney with a perturbed look. “Rodney, there’s nothing going on.”
“No-look-they were fritzing. Look, look.” He moved a few feet to the left and pointed out a portion of the console that had a slight singe mark. Both Sheppard and Weir leaned in, their faces so close they were almost touching. They happened to notice that fact simultaneously, which caused them both to quickly jerk back.
Rodney had to work really hard to avoid smiling at their apparent inability to assess proximity. No point in pointing out how inobservant they were being at the moment.
Elizabeth walked quickly to the other side of the console. “I don’t see anything.”
“There’s a burn mark-right there!” Rodney pointed it out, at which point Elizabeth squinted.
“Oh, I see it now.”
“Well, I don’t,” said John. “And since you don’t seem to have a problem here that requires military oversight, I’m going to go back to bed.”
“Hold on,” Rodney said, forcing him to pause mid-stride. “Even if it looks small, these consoles never, never EVER fritz. The fact that they did means something’s very wrong. What if something happens? You might need to do…whatever…it is you do when we have to evacuate.”
Sheppard turned back around, mouth in a tight line. “Evacuate? Because of one little burn mark?”
“Well I wouldn’t mention it other than that’s what you did last time, so, yeah.”
“Last time the Southern pier turned into an inferno because a Wraith Hive fired on us and blew up a portion of the power grid.”
“And what’s to say it won’t happen again?”
“What caused it?” asked Elizabeth, crossing her arms and ending the argument. “Maybe if we can figure out the problem we can resolve it-and take the Colonel up on his suggestion to return to bed.”
“Separately,” John noted.
Rodney made a face. Why on earth would any of them want to go to bed together?
Best not ask that aloud. He opted instead to poke at one of the communications buttons. “I’m not sure. When they started fritzing, Radek went to check the Zed PM room.” Rodney tapped his finger on the console, and as Elizabeth and Sheppard exchanged uncertain glances, he took the opportunity to look at the colonel once more. Whatever Elizabeth said, it was certainly not normal that he had his jacket that way, and it certainly did brook further discussion, considering the host of issues that might be the cause of it. Mutation? Was he turning into a Wraith bug again? Skin Rash? Or maybe he’d gained a few pounds?
Nah, that was too good a thought, though perhaps not an uncommon one around the holidays. The problem was, not even holiday food seemed to tempt the Colonel to pudginess.
Rodney’s hand had subconsciously risen to his own middle, and he threw it behind his back angrily.
Teyla and Ronon had finally found their way up to the control room, which was a welcome distraction from the weirdness of Sheppard’s wardrobe choice and Elizabeth’s apparent inability to notice.
With his arms crossed, Ronon used that brusque alien personality of his to ask the single most intelligent question Rodney had ever heard him ask in the whole course of his time on Atlantis:
“What’s up with the jacket?”
Sheppard’s gaze broke away from Elizabeth and turned towards him slowly, his expression morphing from slight irritation to anger. “Would everyone stop asking about the jacket? What’s it matter how I wear the jacket? Maybe this is the way I want to wear the jacket! Maybe I’ve decided I prefer it this way!”
“Watch out!” shouted one of the techs behind him. They were so caught by surprise, Rodney barely had time to backpedal as a power surge flooded through the console, setting all the buttons to sparking and lighting up the control room in a shower of dazzling electricity.
“Fire!” said another of the technicians, pointing to Rodney’s left arm. Flames had, indeed, caught on a portion of Rodney’s supposedly fireproof jacket, and he lifted his arm, frantically trying to shake the flames off as the rest of the technicians scrambled quickly for the fire extinguishers.
My arm…my arm is going to burn off, and how in the world am I supposed to spend the holidays with Jeannie and Maddie if I can only use one arm? I won’t be able to feed myself! All that wasted fruitcake!
Something was wrapping around the flames, tamping them out quickly. From behind him, another of the technicians was using a fire extinguisher on another console, and Elizabeth was shouting orders about rerouting power.
“Sorry, sorry,” said the voice of Zelenka over the radio. “I attempted to correct the power distribution problem and apparently overcompensated.”
“Overcompensated?!” barked Rodney. “You almost toasted me like a marshmallow!”
“It would take quite a lot of electricity to toast your marshmallow,” replied Zelenka calmly through the com. “But I am sorry just the same.”
“Can you prevent it from happening again, Radek?” asked Elizabeth.
“Yes-apparently the problem was initiated by the additional power strain caused by the electric Christmas lights now lining the Tower. I have redistributed accordingly and it should not happen again, though I will check all systems to make sure they are corrected.”
“Thanks. Just radio when everything’s back to normal.”
“I do not think that will be for a while,” observed Teyla. She was staring just behind Rodney with very wide eyes, her mouth pursed in an expression that wavered somewhere between amused and surprised.
Rodney turned slowly, glancing at Sheppard, who was standing at his side, his Atlantis jacket now fully unzipped and off and wrapped around Rodney’s injured arm. But it was what had been under the jacket that had caught everyone else off guard.
He was wearing a shirt-a red shirt.
Not just red, but tight. Super tight-which honestly worked for Sheppard, given his skinny form. But it still looked unusual just the same. No, not unusual. Weird. The long sleeves barely reached his wrists, and the waist was short for him, forcing him to show a little of those crazy abs all the female scientists were always offhandedly commenting about.
“Did you get promoted?” Rodney choked out. It was the best he could do with his mind so boggled.
Elizabeth was staring at the Colonel in horror, her mouth partly open. Teyla still wore the surprised look and Ronon-well, Ronon looked like he always did, though he did manage a curt smile at the sight.
“Hope he didn’t,” said the Satedan. “It’s not really his color.”
Sheppard crossed his arms, which forced the sleeves of the shirt up a little. “Rodney called in an emergency-it was dark, I didn’t want to bother to turn on the light and I couldn’t see what I was grabbing to put on,” he said.
Rodney’s thoughts were slowly reorganizing themselves. Slowly. “Yeah, but everything you wear is black. So how is it you ended up with a red shirt?”
John unwrapped the jacket from Rodney’s arm, shaking it out once, and put it back on, burn marks and all. “Well, um…”
“I believe I can answer that,” said Teyla, suddenly smiling brilliantly, and aiming that megawatt grin right at Rodney. “I remembered you had mentioned that for the holidays, red was a prominent color for the figure you call ‘Santa’. I had expressed a desire for the children of Athos to see this figure and John volunteered.”
John snapped his fingers. “Yep. Santa. She needed Santa. This was for Santa.”
“Santa?” Rodney frowned as he examined his arm. No apparent burns. “Well to be honest, I think you got a few things wrong. No offense,” he said to Teyla.
“What do you mean?” asked Teyla.
“Well, for one thing, Santa is an old, pudgy guy, with a ‘little round belly that shook when he laughed like a bowl full of jelly’. Sheppard doesn’t really qualify for that. He doesn’t have a belly like…like-”
“Yours?” Ronon asked.
“Ha ha.” Rodney said, glaring at him. “Very funny. Secondly, Santa’s suit is woolly, red, and edged with white fluffy stuff. It’s not spandex. I’d say whoever got you that had their Christmas mythology mixed up.”
“That is too bad. The children will be disappointed,” said Teyla. “If John’s version of Santa is not as you described.”
The Colonel shrugged. “I have a solution. Since McKay’s better at this, I volunteer him to be the Athosian Santa.”
Teyla turned towards him, her eyebrows lifted in expectation, as Sheppard watched him smugly.
“I don’t think I can,” Rodney hedged. “I am leaving for Earth in a week, and there’s so much to do-”
“No, I think it’s an excellent idea,” said Elizabeth with a grin. “I’m sure I can find time in your schedule to let you play Santa for the Athosian children. It’s such a good cause.”
“Hold on, how did this go from being an innocent observation of slightly confused holiday tradition to a ‘Rodney volunteers as Santa’ project?” Rodney held up an arm. “I am not playing Santa. I mean, beyond the obvious priorities problem and the fact that I’m injured with severe burns, there’s a ton of logistical issues. For one thing, we don’t have a real Santa costume, and I’m sorry, but I’m not wearing what he’s wearing, it looks like one of Elizabeth’s shirts.”
Elizabeth suddenly choked, her hand at her mouth, and turned away from them.
“What? No offense, but you have to admit it’s kinda small even for him.”
“Believe me,” said Sheppard, through gritted teeth. “I will find a way to make it so that you are a perfect Santa.” His face was a little flushed, which was what he got from wearing his jacket zipped all the way up. “Button nose and all.”
“That wasn’t Santa, that was Frosty,” said Rodney. “Corn cob pipe, button nose.”
“Whatever. We have any red velvet lying around? A lot of it?”
“I’m sure we can find some somewhere,” said Elizabeth. “There are any number of our allies who would love to see Rodney dressed as a jolly fat man.”
“I bet even Caldwell will help,” said Ronon.
“The kids will be so disappointed if you do not,” said Teyla, her tone pleading and her lips softly pursed. Her eyes flickered towards Elizabeth and her smile grew a little. “You are so well liked among my people, and they so very much respect your intelligence, I know they would really much prefer to see you perform as Santa.”
Rodney frowned. He really didn’t mind the kids of Athos. It may be a nice treat for them, especially if it was done properly. “Well…if I have to do this, Zelenka has to come as an elf.”
“I do not think so,” said Radek, through the com.
“Oh yes, yes you are. If I have to, you have to, especially since the conduit thing was your fault.”
“I did not hook up the Christmas lights. I believe last week it was you who told everyone that this would not cause any kind of a power problem, and if it did, you would give up your coffee rations for a month.”
As Elizabeth crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, Rodney lifted his finger with as much of a grin as he could muster. Time for a change of subject. “You know, I bet we could find a way to turn a Jumper into a sleigh.”
“Great…you guys brainstorm,” Sheppard waved his hands around, “and I’m going to change.”
“Make sure you end up in the right closet,” said Ronon. John whirled around, gave him a glare, but kept walking.
“I bet those kids on that planet of the children would like to know about Santa, too,” said Teyla. All brownie points Rodney had just given her for her recent compliments flew out the window.
“Hold on-”
Elizabeth walked over to him. “Just remember, it’s for the children, Rodney.” She nodded goodbye to Teyla and Ronon, with a silent ‘thank you’ for their help-if you could call it that, considering they’d pretty much done nothing.
As she got done seeing them off, he sighed. “Do I really have to do this?”
“It’s for a good cause, Rodney,” she said, wrapping an arm around him and squeezing. “And since you apparently know how to do it best, I think it’s a good idea.”
“Right.” As she released him, his eyes darted towards her neckline, where her jacket had gone a little askew.
“Are you wearing a black shirt?”
Her eyebrow arched and she crossed her arms. “Keep walking, jolly fat man, before I add a Wraith Hive to that visitation list.”
Rodney made a face as she walked away, glanced down at his arm and sighed. “The people I work with are weird.”
Well, at least Zelenka’s fix had set the consoles back to normal. Should give him enough time to go grab those candy cane striped pants he kept at the bottom of his trunk for emergencies. They ought to fit Carson, and he would make a fantastic elf.
~FINIS~