New SGA fic! "Down From Mt. Olympus"
Why do I have the feeling that a large portion of my friends list is rolling their eyes and muttering, Not again. Sorry, guys. Just watch the show already! *eg*
Title: Down From Mt. Olympus
Rating: NC-17
Setting: Post-Sanctuary
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Summary: The force is strong with this one.
Down From Mt. Olympus
John likes to think of himself as a people person. He’s good in a crowd, plays well to a room. He’s got the warm laugh, the quirky little smile, and people respond to it. Him.
From the day he entered kindergarten, people wanted to share their Oreos with him, or pick him first for kickball, or invite him over to swim in their pools. In high school he was the kid who could pause for a moment to lean against his locker and immediately have a crowd of people gather ‘round. Even in the Air Force, even after he’d begun to develop a bit of a...reputation, there was always some guy who wanted to slap him on the back.
He’s cool with it.
John learned early on that as long as you keep people looking, they’re never going to bother looking all that closely.
*
If looks could kill, then the one McKay is shooting him would knock him flat, desecrate his corpse, reanimate the whole sticky mess, then do it again, possibly with a sledgehammer. He’s been back for precisely two minutes and forty-six seconds and already he’s aching for the safety and privacy of the puddlejumper. “So nice of you to join us, Major,” McKay says--that’s it, eight words, and then, as John looks around frantically for Elizabeth, McKay inclines his head, like a mobster signalling to his thugs Get ‘im, boys, and Beckett and his team of nurses descend: wolves, sharks, spotting something small and helpless and alone.
John rolls his eyes and allows himself to be poked and prodded like a Thanksgiving turkey; it’s not like it matters, anyway, what they do or what they think. Any of them.
*
He’s not the type to suffer dizzy spells, but he took a couple of pretty hard hits in football practice yesterday, and he thinks at first that maybe that’s it: sound medical reasoning, he’s concussed, he should see the nurse, end of story. Then the room tilts and the tray sways dangerously in his hand, tater tots sliding all over the place, and the annoying girl with the braids and the glasses who was downright begging him to join the student council is suddenly gripping his arm and saying, “John? Should I call Mr. Phelps? John? Are you all right?”
“‘M fine,” he manages, thick-lipped. “Too many nachos.”
“Er, okay,” says the girl, despite the fact that his nachos are clearly untouched on his plate. She giggles nervously and, her civic duty apparently completed for the day, effects a none-too-subtle retreat.
John stands there in the middle of the crowded cafeteria, buffeted by kids competing to consume as many fried potatoes and as much fake cheese product as the scant thirty minutes will allow. If this were a movie, he thinks, now’s the moment when the sound would fade out. Zoom. Close up on his face.
He thinks, If this were a movie.
He’s seen Rebel Without a Cause; he’s seen East of Eden; he gets that teenagers (and, apparently, James Dean in particular) are supposed to be, you know, alienated. It’s perfectly normal, a natural part of growing up.
Still, it doesn’t stop him from looking around and wondering, Who the fuck are these people?
*
Looking around the Gateroom, his thinks, Maybe this is gonna be okay.
They don’t seem like a bad group. Marines, scientists--carefully delineated, differentiated by the colors of their uniforms. Neat, labeled packages. Okay.
Better still, he doesn’t know any of them. Doesn’t have to. He’s only here to be their nifty version of The Clapper; he gets that. So he’ll do it; that, and whatever else is required of him.
Colonel Sumner seems to have it out for him, though. He tells himself it doesn’t matter. After a while, all the different uniforms, all the signs of rank and seniority, of bravery and valor, start to bleed together; Sumner’s just another body, filling out a suit.
*
There’s always a little flare of hope, the first time. Hope: that maybe this time he’ll find something different; that this time, there’ll be something new. There’s certainly plenty of newness here. New shapes and angles; new textures, new flavors; a new desperation, building and burning. Consuming him? Well, not quite.
The body under him arches up off the bed. The mouth under his opens in a moan. He can feel it all, pressed against him: human body, human weight and human scent, solid and tangible and real. This is what’s real. The pair of them, here: arms and legs, fingers and toes; lips and thighs, sharp shoulderblades and notched spines; bones beneath the skin; tender throats; dicks. Not a mirror image, not exactly, but close. Close.
He whispers John’s name, and John can almost see himself the way he sees him: the man in his bed, his lover, his mate.
You and I, we are the same.
Only they’re not.
*
McKay says: I’m sorry, but you gotta believe me when I say there is something about her. I know it’s intangible but I can feel it.
*
He tries to be the bigger man, but McKay makes it difficult. For something like the third time: “I’d avoid the purple ones if I were you, Major. Oh--that’s right. I forgot that you prefer to ignore my advice in favor of biting off more than you can chew.”
Okay, a) is the mess really the place to have this conversation? And b) Jeez-us, that is just petty.
He will not be petty back. He’s resolved. And yet he hears himself say, “I’ve always been told I have a perfectly healthy appetite, actually.” Which is just lame, even with the little eyebrow raise/smirk combo he puts on “appetite.”
He scoops a big portion of the purple-colored root-vegetable-type-thing onto his plate and stomps over to a mostly-empty table where he flings down his tray and collapses into a chair. He feels on edge--has, ever since--ever since he got back; on edge, like he’s just scuffed his feet on the carpet and every nearby metal object is straining for a chance to shock him. He pokes at his food for a moment before realizing that he was expecting McKay to follow him (because when has he ever let an argument drop?); he was braced for it, and yet: no McKay. John peeks over his shoulder, all casual-like, and almost starts when he sees that McKay is still standing there, the line for mystery meat and purple veg trailing past him. He’s holding his tray at an odd angle; his not-potatoes are sliding everywhere.
Then he blinks, once twice, rapid fire, and from across the room John thinks he can see his pupils shrink. Tightening focus.
He walks over to the table. “Wow,” he says, looking at John, looking at John, “I’ve seen the whole ‘alone in a room full of people’ routine, but you--you’ve got it down to an art.”
John’s eyes narrow. He grips his fork, concentrating on that, on stabbing the tines into a gooey purple stalk and shoving the whole mess into his mouth. And wow--McKay was right, he’s tasted week-old ABC gum with better flavor--but he chews, and he swallows, and he looks McKay square in the eye. “Do you have a point?” he asks. “Or is this your idea of small talk?”
McKay’s expression doesn’t change, doesn’t waver. He pushes his tray onto the table and sits down across from John.
“My,” he says, “aren’t you the charming man.”
*
Her palm--warm, slightly damp--connects with his cheek, sharp slap of skin on skin, flesh against flesh and muscle and bone, and yet all he can think is: How cliché.
You asshole, she says. You cold son-of-a-bitch. I thought you were different, but you don’t have a single empathetic bone in your entire body.
He smiles at her. Touches her arm--lightly, just so. Says, “Listen--”
No, you listen! You can’t go around treating people like this, like yours are the only feelings that matter, that are real, that mean anything! I’m a person too, goddammit!
“I never meant--I never wanted to hurt you,” he says.
She sighs. It doesn’t matter what you want, or what you mean, John. Hell, it doesn’t even matter what you do. The feeling behind it... She shakes her head.
“I...” he starts, but there’s nothing he can say.
Then she jerks out of his grasp, or maybe he just lets go.
*
Chaya says: We’re not as different as you think.
*
He would give his life for them. He would.
Certain pieces of chain-of-command logistics may have slipped by him in Basic, but there’s no question that he understands responsibility, understands it very well. He understands duty, too, and to an extent, loyalty; loyalty, and everything it entails. He looks after his men--his people. And here on Atlantis, that means everybody. All of them, everybody: his people.
Not to mention: he likes them. Not all of them, not to the same degree, but in general, yeah. These are people worth looking out for. Worth protecting. He can walk down the hall and feel the smiles directed his way, and he doesn’t even have to feel resentful, or like the grins he shoots back are charitable gifts he’s parceling out in return.
He can relax a little bit, here--in this other galaxy, on this other world. He can lean back on a couch that molds perfectly to fit his back, in a room that lights up upon his entrance, in a city that comes alive under his feet and hands and his barest whisper-thoughts. He can do this, he can kick back and eat popcorn and watch a video with his team. Hail Mary.
He can do it. Just, not for too long.
He guesses he’s like a protective older brother: happy to watch out for his younger sibling and his younger sibling’s friends, just so long as he doesn’t have to spend any time actually getting to know them.
*
“I’m going to figure it out,” McKay tells him. “Just like I figured it out about her.” He gestures with his fork--stabbing, sweeping, conducting a little edible symphony. “I’m extremely stubborn, and surprisingly perceptive for an unrepentant narcissist.”
“That’s right, you’re Mr. Sensitive,” John says. “How could I forget?”
At that, McKay just grins.
*
John had a book of Greek myths as a kid. Illustrated. He liked it first for the pictures and then for the stories of ancient heroes, mortal men who were really the offspring of some seriously slutty gods. He especially liked the story of Heracles, son of Zeus, the strongest man who ever lived; and that of Odysseus, who fought in the Trojan war, then spent ten years sailing around having adventures before returning home. He thought he’d like to sail (to fly) around having adventures, and all without having to worry about being back in time for dinner.
Of course, John’s youthful mind failed to confront certain truths, such as the fact that Odysseus lost all his men, or that Heracles used his inhuman strength to crush his own children between his god-gifted hands. You know: details, little details like that.
John figures he must’ve been a remarkably thick-headed child.
*
“Don’t be stupid,” McKay says, like he thinks it’s something John does on purpose. Which, okay, sometimes it kind of is. But still: “How is it stupid to think I have the right to a little privacy? I mean, I realize that the situation here demands that we all live in each other’s pockets to some extent, but Jesus Christ, McKay--get a hobby!”
“Oh, I doubt any hobby could be as interesting, as frustrating, or as time-consuming as you, Major,” McKay says, obviously enjoying himself far too much. “Besides, it’s my duty as a member of our team to make sure my CO isn’t brainwashed, or infected with alien VD, or just plain mentally unstable. Wouldn’t you agree?”
They’re walking down the hall. John isn’t even 100% sure where they’re going; he’s just trying to think of a creative way to lose the extra appendage he seems to have sprouted. “I don’t think I’m the team member you should be worrying about,” he grinds out.
McKay waves his hand: notion dismissed. “Oh, don’t worry,” he says, “this is at least 90% motivated by self-interest. Your well-being affects my well-being--affects the well-being of all of us. I’m sure you’ve noticed?”
“Thanks for the reminder,” he mutters and--thank Christ--spots Sgt. Bates. “Sergeant!” he shouts, jogging to catch up, flagging down the startled security chief with a wave of his hand. “A word...”
To any ordinary person in McKay’s position, that would be the cue to excuse oneself and go about one’s business--and leave others to theirs. Unfortunately, as John is consistently being taught and re-taught, like a slow child forced to go over the same lesson again and again until he gets it right: there is nothing, absolutely nothing ordinary about Rodney McKay.
*
I can show you, she says. Just close your eyes.
*
The difference between the genetic makeup of a human being and that of a chimpanzee is less than 2%. Our DNA is 98.4% compatible with theirs, which means that chimpanzees are more closely related to humans than they are to bonobos, a smaller, subspecies of chimp. We’re more the same than we are different--by a long shot.
But: what a difference.
*
In the kitchen his mother is crying. John can hear her, even through the closed door, even through the sound of the engine turning over and over, revving, refusing to start.
His father is standing outside the half-open window, leaning with one hand on the hood of the car and the other on the sharp jut of glass. John wants to crank the knob, close the window on his father’s fingers, but he’s not brave (or stupid) enough for that. He thinks his father knows.
“Look what it’s done, your coming here,” the old man says. “Look what you’ve done.”
John stares straight forward, both hands on the wheel. I’m sorry, he wants to say, but he isn’t even sure what he’s supposed to be sorry for.
“Don’t come back,” his father says. “Until you’ve learned how not to make your mother cry, don’t come back.”
“Fine,” John says, and it’s an easy promise, one of the easiest he’s ever had to make.
*
“No,” John says.
“What?” McKay’s eyes are wide faux-innocent, crumbs down his front as he swears, Hand in the cookie jar? Moi? “I haven’t even asked a question yet.”
John sighs, resisting the urge to beat his head against his quarters’ door. “No, I will not tell you what’s wrong with me because nothing is, I’m fine, I’m just the same as I always was. And no, I will not tell you anything about what happened on Proculus, it’s none of your business. And finally--”
“Who said anything about Proculus?” McKay says, pushing past him and flopping down in John’s one and only chair.
“--No, you can’t come in,” John finishes, lamely. The man is a human steamroller.
McKay’s glancing around like he’s just noticed that one of the room’s angles is subtly off. “Have I mentioned that I think your quarters are bigger than mine? Also--” He pokes a large, vase-like object with his foot. “--What’s this?”
“I think it’s a ceremonial urn,” John says, neglecting to mention that he’s ceremonially keeping his dirty underwear in it. “Don’t touch it.”
McKay frowns. “I didn’t get a ceremonial urn”--and my God, is he actually pouting?
“What do you want, McKay?” John asks, sinking onto the edge of the bed and putting his head in his hands.
“Funny you should mention that,” McKay says, and John thinks, Well, crap.
*
The office is very quiet, just him, his parents, his teacher, and the paper on the otherwise empty desk. None of them saying a thing. Only--what’s literally true is not actually true in this case: the paper is screaming at them, in its subdued academic way. He looks from it to the stony-surprised faces of his parents, then to his teacher’s punch-me-in-the-mouth grin. He knows what’s coming. He got a little preview that morning, called to the front of the class. All those eyes on him. And words like: incredible, astounding, prodigy, genius. All those words; all because of a few little numbers.
I’m special, he thinks, but it doesn’t sound as good as he always imagined it would.
*
Chaya says, You’re different.
She says, You’re not like the rest.
She says, You’re better, John.
More than. Better.
*
And once more, with feeling:
There’s always a little flare of hope, the first time. John feels it, like a match lit and held against the wind, feels it flicker and flicker and almost go out, almost but not. Not quite.
McKay kisses him. Rodney kisses him. Not a nice kiss: a forceful, prove-a-point kiss. But it’s good, really good. Rodney grabs him with strong hands, the side of his face and the back of his neck, and he breathes into John’s mouth: life-breath, heat...and anger. John stiffens for a moment in surprise; then he’s clutching handfuls of Rodney’s shirt. They break apart with a gasp. Panting, “Still feel like George Taylor?” Rodney asks.
“First William Shatner and now Charlton Heston,” John says, his brain scattered, functioning on too many levels at once. Snark comes easily, though. “You really don’t think much of me, do you?”
McKay has grabby hands; he pulls John against him. John pushes away before their lips can do more than scrape a second time. “That’s assuming, of course, that you mean the classic ‘60s Sci-Fi character and not the signer of the Declaration of Independence.”
“What?” Rodney blinks several times; John can practically see the gears shifting behind his eyes. “Oh, right. Because we Canadians always make obscure references to American history when we’re trying to seduce someone.”
“Yet Planet of the Apes references are, apparently, par for the course,” John remarks before Rodney shuts him up quite effectively, pushing him backward onto the bed and pinning him there with strong thighs. “Ha,” he says.
So of course, John has to flip him.
McKay makes a breathy sound as he lands on his back; he opens his mouth, clearly about to lodge some sort of protest, but John chooses that moment to grind into him, so that sound becomes breathy, too. “I thought,” says John, “that we agreed I was the dominant species.”
“We’re the same species, you melodramatic oaf,” Rodney says. “Yes, yes--do that.”
John does. “Fine,” he says. “The more genetically advanced, then.”
“It’s not--don’t stop--an advancement! It’s a totally random characteristic! How many times--God, your mouth--do I have to say it?”
John would respond, but said mouth is otherwise occupied.
“Jesus,” Rodney says, a few minutes later, “you’re the only person,” he swirls his tongue around John’s nipple, “I’ve ever met,” his hand coasts down John’s thigh, “who’d take a case of alienation and make the leap to alien.” He wraps his hand around John’s cock. “I hate to break it to you, but you’re a man.” He jacks John slowly, his free hand moving nowhere and everywhere at once until it feels like he’s tying all of John’s nerve-endings together into one central knot. “People are plenty complicated without acquiring self-imposed god complexes. Trust me, I should know.”
John is not silent during all of this. He says, Yes, there and Harder and Dammit, Rodney! Then he says:
“And you--you’re the expert on interpersonal relations?”
“I don’t see you complaining,” Rodney says.
*
We can’t afford these kinds of attachments, she says. Even us, even you and I...
I’ve heard stories of gods who took mortal lovers, he answers. They were always punished, somehow.
Exactly, she says.
*
There’s come all over John chest. Rodney puts his hand in it, draws something that might be part of a mathematical equation, and might be a smiley face. “That’s the other thing,” he says. “People are messy.”
“You hate mess,” John says, sleepy.
Rodney rolls onto his back. Their bodies are pressed close on the narrow bed, and as they’re almost the same height, they run length to length, toes to crown.
Rodney smiles at him, a lazy, wanton smile. “Only sometimes,” he says.
*
“Admit it, you’re a mess,” McKay says. “I mean look at you--your hair is practically flat!”
“I’m fine,” he repeats, his jaw like a steel trap. “Can we just--” And then it’s a clean break. Snap. “Enough already! Go ahead, lecture me! Just do it, say what you want to say and get out!”
Of course, McKay would choose this moment to be completely and utterly calm. He waggles a finger in John’s direction. “Ahh, you think you’re tricky, don’t you?”
“Yes, I’m very tricky,” says John, “I took lessons from Nixon,” and he’s getting to his feet, thinking that if he can’t talk McKay out, at the very least he can push him. This is a mistake. Because McKay stands, too, at exactly the same time, and suddenly, he’s right there, in John’s face, inside the bubble of John’s personal space. And he’s not. Moving.
John swallows. All of a sudden, he feels all too human, and he’s reminded why he hates that: people are vulnerable, people are weak, and he wants nothing of those things. He remembers McKay, invulnerable behind his flickering green shield, and with all the force of a gunshot that never landed, he gets it. He gets it and wham!--his legs are blown out from under him.
McKay catches him by the arm. He reels--just a little bit, barely noticeable--but McKay catches it; there’s very little that McKay doesn’t catch, when he’s paying attention. “What did she say to you?” he asks. “Tell me! What did that--what did she say?”
*
She says: You and I are the same. More than you’ll ever be like them: you’re like me.
And I am always alone.
*
Then, McKay bursts out laughing.
At first, John is too shocked to manage anger or indignation. But he’s working on it. He’s working on it, and while he’s working, McKay doubles over and grips his sides. “I can’t believe you! I can’t believe you fell for that! Not when it is so, so obviously a line!”
“Hey!” John sputters. “You weren’t there! You don’t know--what do you know?”
“I know a cheesy pick-up line when I hear one; hell, I’ve spouted more than a few myself. Come on, she was so obviously trying to get her slutty Ascended self a piece of your skinny Earthboy ass!”
“My ass is not skinny!” John hisses. “Also, Chaya was...demure--yes, that’s the word, demure! I never even saw her naked!”
“Really?” McKay sniffs. There are actual tears running down his face. “You’re serious?” His mouth crumples up in that weird way it does, seemingly defying the law of conservation of matter. “That’s actually kind of sad.”
John clenches his fists. “Thank you, this conversation has been so helpful.” He gets a hand on McKay’s back, starts pushing him toward the door. “See you tomorrow, hopefully not until after I’ve had a really good workout.”
“Wait.” John’s encountered constipated camels that were easier to move than this. “You’re really torn up about this, aren’t you?”
“I’m fine,” John says, but it’s apparently no more convincing than it was the last 3,000 times. “You don’t,” McKay says, staring into his face the way John’s seen him look at a computer displaying a particularly fascinating array of data, “you don’t really believe--oh God, you do! You really think...”
John’s mouth is a firm, thin line. He doesn’t say anything.
“You’re as human as the rest of us, John,” McKay says, in a completely different tone. Soft, almost. “Heck, you’re a leap above some of the Neanderthals we’ve got...” He trails off. “But I guess that’s not the problem.”
John shakes his head.
“Tell me,” McKay insists. “Explain it to me. I’m an excellent listener; people tell me so all the time.”
He almost gets a smile for that.
“Come on,” McKay says, folding his arms over his chest. “I’m not going anywhere until you do.”
John believes him.
He says: “I’ve never...I’ve never really...”
He can see McKay twitch, knows he wants to jump in there and snap, Never what? Played the trumpet? Had sex in a hot tub? Formed a complete sentence? What? But he restrains himself. John both thanks and curses him for that.
He says: “I just wanted to fit in. All my life, but I never really have.”
It’s clear from McKay’s face that he can’t imagine ever wanting to fit in; all his life, he’s clearly worked toward standing out Out OUT. But still he doesn’t say anything.
John says, “I thought I found something, with the flying. Something that I liked, that I could be good at, but without being flashy, without drawing too much attention. But...”
He stops. Draws a breath. Decides: switch tacks, go for metaphor, analogy, the safety of simile. “It’s like...like I’ve found out I’m not Han Solo after all, I’m Luke, and you know what the shitty thing about being Luke Skywalker is?”
The question mark does it; McKay bursts. “Ewoks,” he says, “extended association with.”
That almost trips John up, but he manages to keep going. To let it drive him on, even, so he’s almost surprised at how far he does go, that he actually finishes the thought. “He’s always alone.”
McKay nods--not an agreement nod, an I am only still listening to your pathetic attempts at a logical argument so that I may better rip it to shreds later nod. “Not to mention the fact he totally had his tongue shoved down his sister’s throat.”
“But that’s just it! It’s worse than if I’d been making out with my sister. Instead it’s like I’ve been...making out with a bunch of monkeys.”
McKay’s snort is derision in its pure, distilled form. “Well, then why don’t you go play tonsil hockey with Beckett? Or one of your other little natural gene-buddies.”
John shakes his head. “That’d be like making out with a really smart monkey that’s learned sign language and doesn’t always hurl its shit in public.”
McKay looks at him. Just looks at him: mouth set, a thin line, one corner with a slight twitch to it, like a tick. His eyes are blue and kind of cold, John thinks, realizing for the first time how warm they can be sometimes, when he’s on to something, excited. But now they’re as cool and unforgiving as the ocean before a storm--red sky in the morning--and there’s worlds going on behind them.
“Then what’s this, then?” Rodney asks, and steps forward.
*
You wouldn’t think it to look at him, but there’s something catlike about McKay. Not that he’s all--or any part, really--sensual feline grace, but there’s something. Something in the way he sighs in his sleep, in the way he nudges his head into the crook of John’s shoulder, nuzzles him. Sprawls bonelessly all across the bed. Like he owns the place.
John runs his fingers through the short hair, pets his head. And he smiles to himself, strangely content.
*
Why pretend to be human at all? he asks her.
So that time to time I may walk among the people, never staying too long to get attached to anyone...until I met you.
*
Lots of lonely people keep cats.
*************
Title: Down From Mt. Olympus
Rating: NC-17
Setting: Post-Sanctuary
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Summary: The force is strong with this one.
Down From Mt. Olympus
John likes to think of himself as a people person. He’s good in a crowd, plays well to a room. He’s got the warm laugh, the quirky little smile, and people respond to it. Him.
From the day he entered kindergarten, people wanted to share their Oreos with him, or pick him first for kickball, or invite him over to swim in their pools. In high school he was the kid who could pause for a moment to lean against his locker and immediately have a crowd of people gather ‘round. Even in the Air Force, even after he’d begun to develop a bit of a...reputation, there was always some guy who wanted to slap him on the back.
He’s cool with it.
John learned early on that as long as you keep people looking, they’re never going to bother looking all that closely.
*
If looks could kill, then the one McKay is shooting him would knock him flat, desecrate his corpse, reanimate the whole sticky mess, then do it again, possibly with a sledgehammer. He’s been back for precisely two minutes and forty-six seconds and already he’s aching for the safety and privacy of the puddlejumper. “So nice of you to join us, Major,” McKay says--that’s it, eight words, and then, as John looks around frantically for Elizabeth, McKay inclines his head, like a mobster signalling to his thugs Get ‘im, boys, and Beckett and his team of nurses descend: wolves, sharks, spotting something small and helpless and alone.
John rolls his eyes and allows himself to be poked and prodded like a Thanksgiving turkey; it’s not like it matters, anyway, what they do or what they think. Any of them.
*
He’s not the type to suffer dizzy spells, but he took a couple of pretty hard hits in football practice yesterday, and he thinks at first that maybe that’s it: sound medical reasoning, he’s concussed, he should see the nurse, end of story. Then the room tilts and the tray sways dangerously in his hand, tater tots sliding all over the place, and the annoying girl with the braids and the glasses who was downright begging him to join the student council is suddenly gripping his arm and saying, “John? Should I call Mr. Phelps? John? Are you all right?”
“‘M fine,” he manages, thick-lipped. “Too many nachos.”
“Er, okay,” says the girl, despite the fact that his nachos are clearly untouched on his plate. She giggles nervously and, her civic duty apparently completed for the day, effects a none-too-subtle retreat.
John stands there in the middle of the crowded cafeteria, buffeted by kids competing to consume as many fried potatoes and as much fake cheese product as the scant thirty minutes will allow. If this were a movie, he thinks, now’s the moment when the sound would fade out. Zoom. Close up on his face.
He thinks, If this were a movie.
He’s seen Rebel Without a Cause; he’s seen East of Eden; he gets that teenagers (and, apparently, James Dean in particular) are supposed to be, you know, alienated. It’s perfectly normal, a natural part of growing up.
Still, it doesn’t stop him from looking around and wondering, Who the fuck are these people?
*
Looking around the Gateroom, his thinks, Maybe this is gonna be okay.
They don’t seem like a bad group. Marines, scientists--carefully delineated, differentiated by the colors of their uniforms. Neat, labeled packages. Okay.
Better still, he doesn’t know any of them. Doesn’t have to. He’s only here to be their nifty version of The Clapper; he gets that. So he’ll do it; that, and whatever else is required of him.
Colonel Sumner seems to have it out for him, though. He tells himself it doesn’t matter. After a while, all the different uniforms, all the signs of rank and seniority, of bravery and valor, start to bleed together; Sumner’s just another body, filling out a suit.
*
There’s always a little flare of hope, the first time. Hope: that maybe this time he’ll find something different; that this time, there’ll be something new. There’s certainly plenty of newness here. New shapes and angles; new textures, new flavors; a new desperation, building and burning. Consuming him? Well, not quite.
The body under him arches up off the bed. The mouth under his opens in a moan. He can feel it all, pressed against him: human body, human weight and human scent, solid and tangible and real. This is what’s real. The pair of them, here: arms and legs, fingers and toes; lips and thighs, sharp shoulderblades and notched spines; bones beneath the skin; tender throats; dicks. Not a mirror image, not exactly, but close. Close.
He whispers John’s name, and John can almost see himself the way he sees him: the man in his bed, his lover, his mate.
You and I, we are the same.
Only they’re not.
*
McKay says: I’m sorry, but you gotta believe me when I say there is something about her. I know it’s intangible but I can feel it.
*
He tries to be the bigger man, but McKay makes it difficult. For something like the third time: “I’d avoid the purple ones if I were you, Major. Oh--that’s right. I forgot that you prefer to ignore my advice in favor of biting off more than you can chew.”
Okay, a) is the mess really the place to have this conversation? And b) Jeez-us, that is just petty.
He will not be petty back. He’s resolved. And yet he hears himself say, “I’ve always been told I have a perfectly healthy appetite, actually.” Which is just lame, even with the little eyebrow raise/smirk combo he puts on “appetite.”
He scoops a big portion of the purple-colored root-vegetable-type-thing onto his plate and stomps over to a mostly-empty table where he flings down his tray and collapses into a chair. He feels on edge--has, ever since--ever since he got back; on edge, like he’s just scuffed his feet on the carpet and every nearby metal object is straining for a chance to shock him. He pokes at his food for a moment before realizing that he was expecting McKay to follow him (because when has he ever let an argument drop?); he was braced for it, and yet: no McKay. John peeks over his shoulder, all casual-like, and almost starts when he sees that McKay is still standing there, the line for mystery meat and purple veg trailing past him. He’s holding his tray at an odd angle; his not-potatoes are sliding everywhere.
Then he blinks, once twice, rapid fire, and from across the room John thinks he can see his pupils shrink. Tightening focus.
He walks over to the table. “Wow,” he says, looking at John, looking at John, “I’ve seen the whole ‘alone in a room full of people’ routine, but you--you’ve got it down to an art.”
John’s eyes narrow. He grips his fork, concentrating on that, on stabbing the tines into a gooey purple stalk and shoving the whole mess into his mouth. And wow--McKay was right, he’s tasted week-old ABC gum with better flavor--but he chews, and he swallows, and he looks McKay square in the eye. “Do you have a point?” he asks. “Or is this your idea of small talk?”
McKay’s expression doesn’t change, doesn’t waver. He pushes his tray onto the table and sits down across from John.
“My,” he says, “aren’t you the charming man.”
*
Her palm--warm, slightly damp--connects with his cheek, sharp slap of skin on skin, flesh against flesh and muscle and bone, and yet all he can think is: How cliché.
You asshole, she says. You cold son-of-a-bitch. I thought you were different, but you don’t have a single empathetic bone in your entire body.
He smiles at her. Touches her arm--lightly, just so. Says, “Listen--”
No, you listen! You can’t go around treating people like this, like yours are the only feelings that matter, that are real, that mean anything! I’m a person too, goddammit!
“I never meant--I never wanted to hurt you,” he says.
She sighs. It doesn’t matter what you want, or what you mean, John. Hell, it doesn’t even matter what you do. The feeling behind it... She shakes her head.
“I...” he starts, but there’s nothing he can say.
Then she jerks out of his grasp, or maybe he just lets go.
*
Chaya says: We’re not as different as you think.
*
He would give his life for them. He would.
Certain pieces of chain-of-command logistics may have slipped by him in Basic, but there’s no question that he understands responsibility, understands it very well. He understands duty, too, and to an extent, loyalty; loyalty, and everything it entails. He looks after his men--his people. And here on Atlantis, that means everybody. All of them, everybody: his people.
Not to mention: he likes them. Not all of them, not to the same degree, but in general, yeah. These are people worth looking out for. Worth protecting. He can walk down the hall and feel the smiles directed his way, and he doesn’t even have to feel resentful, or like the grins he shoots back are charitable gifts he’s parceling out in return.
He can relax a little bit, here--in this other galaxy, on this other world. He can lean back on a couch that molds perfectly to fit his back, in a room that lights up upon his entrance, in a city that comes alive under his feet and hands and his barest whisper-thoughts. He can do this, he can kick back and eat popcorn and watch a video with his team. Hail Mary.
He can do it. Just, not for too long.
He guesses he’s like a protective older brother: happy to watch out for his younger sibling and his younger sibling’s friends, just so long as he doesn’t have to spend any time actually getting to know them.
*
“I’m going to figure it out,” McKay tells him. “Just like I figured it out about her.” He gestures with his fork--stabbing, sweeping, conducting a little edible symphony. “I’m extremely stubborn, and surprisingly perceptive for an unrepentant narcissist.”
“That’s right, you’re Mr. Sensitive,” John says. “How could I forget?”
At that, McKay just grins.
*
John had a book of Greek myths as a kid. Illustrated. He liked it first for the pictures and then for the stories of ancient heroes, mortal men who were really the offspring of some seriously slutty gods. He especially liked the story of Heracles, son of Zeus, the strongest man who ever lived; and that of Odysseus, who fought in the Trojan war, then spent ten years sailing around having adventures before returning home. He thought he’d like to sail (to fly) around having adventures, and all without having to worry about being back in time for dinner.
Of course, John’s youthful mind failed to confront certain truths, such as the fact that Odysseus lost all his men, or that Heracles used his inhuman strength to crush his own children between his god-gifted hands. You know: details, little details like that.
John figures he must’ve been a remarkably thick-headed child.
*
“Don’t be stupid,” McKay says, like he thinks it’s something John does on purpose. Which, okay, sometimes it kind of is. But still: “How is it stupid to think I have the right to a little privacy? I mean, I realize that the situation here demands that we all live in each other’s pockets to some extent, but Jesus Christ, McKay--get a hobby!”
“Oh, I doubt any hobby could be as interesting, as frustrating, or as time-consuming as you, Major,” McKay says, obviously enjoying himself far too much. “Besides, it’s my duty as a member of our team to make sure my CO isn’t brainwashed, or infected with alien VD, or just plain mentally unstable. Wouldn’t you agree?”
They’re walking down the hall. John isn’t even 100% sure where they’re going; he’s just trying to think of a creative way to lose the extra appendage he seems to have sprouted. “I don’t think I’m the team member you should be worrying about,” he grinds out.
McKay waves his hand: notion dismissed. “Oh, don’t worry,” he says, “this is at least 90% motivated by self-interest. Your well-being affects my well-being--affects the well-being of all of us. I’m sure you’ve noticed?”
“Thanks for the reminder,” he mutters and--thank Christ--spots Sgt. Bates. “Sergeant!” he shouts, jogging to catch up, flagging down the startled security chief with a wave of his hand. “A word...”
To any ordinary person in McKay’s position, that would be the cue to excuse oneself and go about one’s business--and leave others to theirs. Unfortunately, as John is consistently being taught and re-taught, like a slow child forced to go over the same lesson again and again until he gets it right: there is nothing, absolutely nothing ordinary about Rodney McKay.
*
I can show you, she says. Just close your eyes.
*
The difference between the genetic makeup of a human being and that of a chimpanzee is less than 2%. Our DNA is 98.4% compatible with theirs, which means that chimpanzees are more closely related to humans than they are to bonobos, a smaller, subspecies of chimp. We’re more the same than we are different--by a long shot.
But: what a difference.
*
In the kitchen his mother is crying. John can hear her, even through the closed door, even through the sound of the engine turning over and over, revving, refusing to start.
His father is standing outside the half-open window, leaning with one hand on the hood of the car and the other on the sharp jut of glass. John wants to crank the knob, close the window on his father’s fingers, but he’s not brave (or stupid) enough for that. He thinks his father knows.
“Look what it’s done, your coming here,” the old man says. “Look what you’ve done.”
John stares straight forward, both hands on the wheel. I’m sorry, he wants to say, but he isn’t even sure what he’s supposed to be sorry for.
“Don’t come back,” his father says. “Until you’ve learned how not to make your mother cry, don’t come back.”
“Fine,” John says, and it’s an easy promise, one of the easiest he’s ever had to make.
*
“No,” John says.
“What?” McKay’s eyes are wide faux-innocent, crumbs down his front as he swears, Hand in the cookie jar? Moi? “I haven’t even asked a question yet.”
John sighs, resisting the urge to beat his head against his quarters’ door. “No, I will not tell you what’s wrong with me because nothing is, I’m fine, I’m just the same as I always was. And no, I will not tell you anything about what happened on Proculus, it’s none of your business. And finally--”
“Who said anything about Proculus?” McKay says, pushing past him and flopping down in John’s one and only chair.
“--No, you can’t come in,” John finishes, lamely. The man is a human steamroller.
McKay’s glancing around like he’s just noticed that one of the room’s angles is subtly off. “Have I mentioned that I think your quarters are bigger than mine? Also--” He pokes a large, vase-like object with his foot. “--What’s this?”
“I think it’s a ceremonial urn,” John says, neglecting to mention that he’s ceremonially keeping his dirty underwear in it. “Don’t touch it.”
McKay frowns. “I didn’t get a ceremonial urn”--and my God, is he actually pouting?
“What do you want, McKay?” John asks, sinking onto the edge of the bed and putting his head in his hands.
“Funny you should mention that,” McKay says, and John thinks, Well, crap.
*
The office is very quiet, just him, his parents, his teacher, and the paper on the otherwise empty desk. None of them saying a thing. Only--what’s literally true is not actually true in this case: the paper is screaming at them, in its subdued academic way. He looks from it to the stony-surprised faces of his parents, then to his teacher’s punch-me-in-the-mouth grin. He knows what’s coming. He got a little preview that morning, called to the front of the class. All those eyes on him. And words like: incredible, astounding, prodigy, genius. All those words; all because of a few little numbers.
I’m special, he thinks, but it doesn’t sound as good as he always imagined it would.
*
Chaya says, You’re different.
She says, You’re not like the rest.
She says, You’re better, John.
More than. Better.
*
And once more, with feeling:
There’s always a little flare of hope, the first time. John feels it, like a match lit and held against the wind, feels it flicker and flicker and almost go out, almost but not. Not quite.
McKay kisses him. Rodney kisses him. Not a nice kiss: a forceful, prove-a-point kiss. But it’s good, really good. Rodney grabs him with strong hands, the side of his face and the back of his neck, and he breathes into John’s mouth: life-breath, heat...and anger. John stiffens for a moment in surprise; then he’s clutching handfuls of Rodney’s shirt. They break apart with a gasp. Panting, “Still feel like George Taylor?” Rodney asks.
“First William Shatner and now Charlton Heston,” John says, his brain scattered, functioning on too many levels at once. Snark comes easily, though. “You really don’t think much of me, do you?”
McKay has grabby hands; he pulls John against him. John pushes away before their lips can do more than scrape a second time. “That’s assuming, of course, that you mean the classic ‘60s Sci-Fi character and not the signer of the Declaration of Independence.”
“What?” Rodney blinks several times; John can practically see the gears shifting behind his eyes. “Oh, right. Because we Canadians always make obscure references to American history when we’re trying to seduce someone.”
“Yet Planet of the Apes references are, apparently, par for the course,” John remarks before Rodney shuts him up quite effectively, pushing him backward onto the bed and pinning him there with strong thighs. “Ha,” he says.
So of course, John has to flip him.
McKay makes a breathy sound as he lands on his back; he opens his mouth, clearly about to lodge some sort of protest, but John chooses that moment to grind into him, so that sound becomes breathy, too. “I thought,” says John, “that we agreed I was the dominant species.”
“We’re the same species, you melodramatic oaf,” Rodney says. “Yes, yes--do that.”
John does. “Fine,” he says. “The more genetically advanced, then.”
“It’s not--don’t stop--an advancement! It’s a totally random characteristic! How many times--God, your mouth--do I have to say it?”
John would respond, but said mouth is otherwise occupied.
“Jesus,” Rodney says, a few minutes later, “you’re the only person,” he swirls his tongue around John’s nipple, “I’ve ever met,” his hand coasts down John’s thigh, “who’d take a case of alienation and make the leap to alien.” He wraps his hand around John’s cock. “I hate to break it to you, but you’re a man.” He jacks John slowly, his free hand moving nowhere and everywhere at once until it feels like he’s tying all of John’s nerve-endings together into one central knot. “People are plenty complicated without acquiring self-imposed god complexes. Trust me, I should know.”
John is not silent during all of this. He says, Yes, there and Harder and Dammit, Rodney! Then he says:
“And you--you’re the expert on interpersonal relations?”
“I don’t see you complaining,” Rodney says.
*
We can’t afford these kinds of attachments, she says. Even us, even you and I...
I’ve heard stories of gods who took mortal lovers, he answers. They were always punished, somehow.
Exactly, she says.
*
There’s come all over John chest. Rodney puts his hand in it, draws something that might be part of a mathematical equation, and might be a smiley face. “That’s the other thing,” he says. “People are messy.”
“You hate mess,” John says, sleepy.
Rodney rolls onto his back. Their bodies are pressed close on the narrow bed, and as they’re almost the same height, they run length to length, toes to crown.
Rodney smiles at him, a lazy, wanton smile. “Only sometimes,” he says.
*
“Admit it, you’re a mess,” McKay says. “I mean look at you--your hair is practically flat!”
“I’m fine,” he repeats, his jaw like a steel trap. “Can we just--” And then it’s a clean break. Snap. “Enough already! Go ahead, lecture me! Just do it, say what you want to say and get out!”
Of course, McKay would choose this moment to be completely and utterly calm. He waggles a finger in John’s direction. “Ahh, you think you’re tricky, don’t you?”
“Yes, I’m very tricky,” says John, “I took lessons from Nixon,” and he’s getting to his feet, thinking that if he can’t talk McKay out, at the very least he can push him. This is a mistake. Because McKay stands, too, at exactly the same time, and suddenly, he’s right there, in John’s face, inside the bubble of John’s personal space. And he’s not. Moving.
John swallows. All of a sudden, he feels all too human, and he’s reminded why he hates that: people are vulnerable, people are weak, and he wants nothing of those things. He remembers McKay, invulnerable behind his flickering green shield, and with all the force of a gunshot that never landed, he gets it. He gets it and wham!--his legs are blown out from under him.
McKay catches him by the arm. He reels--just a little bit, barely noticeable--but McKay catches it; there’s very little that McKay doesn’t catch, when he’s paying attention. “What did she say to you?” he asks. “Tell me! What did that--what did she say?”
*
She says: You and I are the same. More than you’ll ever be like them: you’re like me.
And I am always alone.
*
Then, McKay bursts out laughing.
At first, John is too shocked to manage anger or indignation. But he’s working on it. He’s working on it, and while he’s working, McKay doubles over and grips his sides. “I can’t believe you! I can’t believe you fell for that! Not when it is so, so obviously a line!”
“Hey!” John sputters. “You weren’t there! You don’t know--what do you know?”
“I know a cheesy pick-up line when I hear one; hell, I’ve spouted more than a few myself. Come on, she was so obviously trying to get her slutty Ascended self a piece of your skinny Earthboy ass!”
“My ass is not skinny!” John hisses. “Also, Chaya was...demure--yes, that’s the word, demure! I never even saw her naked!”
“Really?” McKay sniffs. There are actual tears running down his face. “You’re serious?” His mouth crumples up in that weird way it does, seemingly defying the law of conservation of matter. “That’s actually kind of sad.”
John clenches his fists. “Thank you, this conversation has been so helpful.” He gets a hand on McKay’s back, starts pushing him toward the door. “See you tomorrow, hopefully not until after I’ve had a really good workout.”
“Wait.” John’s encountered constipated camels that were easier to move than this. “You’re really torn up about this, aren’t you?”
“I’m fine,” John says, but it’s apparently no more convincing than it was the last 3,000 times. “You don’t,” McKay says, staring into his face the way John’s seen him look at a computer displaying a particularly fascinating array of data, “you don’t really believe--oh God, you do! You really think...”
John’s mouth is a firm, thin line. He doesn’t say anything.
“You’re as human as the rest of us, John,” McKay says, in a completely different tone. Soft, almost. “Heck, you’re a leap above some of the Neanderthals we’ve got...” He trails off. “But I guess that’s not the problem.”
John shakes his head.
“Tell me,” McKay insists. “Explain it to me. I’m an excellent listener; people tell me so all the time.”
He almost gets a smile for that.
“Come on,” McKay says, folding his arms over his chest. “I’m not going anywhere until you do.”
John believes him.
He says: “I’ve never...I’ve never really...”
He can see McKay twitch, knows he wants to jump in there and snap, Never what? Played the trumpet? Had sex in a hot tub? Formed a complete sentence? What? But he restrains himself. John both thanks and curses him for that.
He says: “I just wanted to fit in. All my life, but I never really have.”
It’s clear from McKay’s face that he can’t imagine ever wanting to fit in; all his life, he’s clearly worked toward standing out Out OUT. But still he doesn’t say anything.
John says, “I thought I found something, with the flying. Something that I liked, that I could be good at, but without being flashy, without drawing too much attention. But...”
He stops. Draws a breath. Decides: switch tacks, go for metaphor, analogy, the safety of simile. “It’s like...like I’ve found out I’m not Han Solo after all, I’m Luke, and you know what the shitty thing about being Luke Skywalker is?”
The question mark does it; McKay bursts. “Ewoks,” he says, “extended association with.”
That almost trips John up, but he manages to keep going. To let it drive him on, even, so he’s almost surprised at how far he does go, that he actually finishes the thought. “He’s always alone.”
McKay nods--not an agreement nod, an I am only still listening to your pathetic attempts at a logical argument so that I may better rip it to shreds later nod. “Not to mention the fact he totally had his tongue shoved down his sister’s throat.”
“But that’s just it! It’s worse than if I’d been making out with my sister. Instead it’s like I’ve been...making out with a bunch of monkeys.”
McKay’s snort is derision in its pure, distilled form. “Well, then why don’t you go play tonsil hockey with Beckett? Or one of your other little natural gene-buddies.”
John shakes his head. “That’d be like making out with a really smart monkey that’s learned sign language and doesn’t always hurl its shit in public.”
McKay looks at him. Just looks at him: mouth set, a thin line, one corner with a slight twitch to it, like a tick. His eyes are blue and kind of cold, John thinks, realizing for the first time how warm they can be sometimes, when he’s on to something, excited. But now they’re as cool and unforgiving as the ocean before a storm--red sky in the morning--and there’s worlds going on behind them.
“Then what’s this, then?” Rodney asks, and steps forward.
*
You wouldn’t think it to look at him, but there’s something catlike about McKay. Not that he’s all--or any part, really--sensual feline grace, but there’s something. Something in the way he sighs in his sleep, in the way he nudges his head into the crook of John’s shoulder, nuzzles him. Sprawls bonelessly all across the bed. Like he owns the place.
John runs his fingers through the short hair, pets his head. And he smiles to himself, strangely content.
*
Why pretend to be human at all? he asks her.
So that time to time I may walk among the people, never staying too long to get attached to anyone...until I met you.
*
Lots of lonely people keep cats.
*************