Kangaroos and the Bees
Title: The Kangaroos and the Bees
Author: Tzzzz
Rating: PG13
Pairing: Sheppard/McKay (series)
Genre: mpreg
Summary: Ronon has questions. Follows Tables Turned, Once There Was a Man Named Holland and Not a Henry.
The Kangaroos and the Bees
"So the reason nobody in this galaxy has the ATA gene is because you have to be pushed out a man's butt to get it?" Ronon asked. The Lanteans just got weirder by the day.
"Well, no," the pretty blond doctor replied. She looked a little like Melina, though Ronon tried not to think about that. "Not exactly. I suppose at some point, chances are that if you have the gene, one of your ancestors was a male carrier, because the chance of getting a recessive passed down ten thousand years without ever being expressed is almost non-existent. The beauty of it is that genes that directly affect the ability to reproduce are the quickest to spread throughout a population and the whole cultural system that arose, at least in Europe, in which inheritance passed according to the person who carried the child ensured that either daughters or male carriers were preferred, and then eventually male carriers were even more preferred, since those with two copies of the z gene will always be able to have a child who can carry on the family name, while xx women only have a 50% chance of producing a female child if they mate with an xy male. And since the ATA gene is on the z chromosome, the cultural desirability of children with the z chromosome means that it stays in the population."
Maybe this Dr. Keller was not so much like Melina. "You really like to talk, don't you?"
She blushed. "No, not really. I just think it's interesting. I mean, Colonel Sheppard is a perfect example. He comes for a noble family. His father was zy and had him with another male carrier, so he ended up with two copies of the gene, meaning he can only carry children, not impregnate a woman or donate for a man. Which is too bad. A lot of women will be very disappointed." Ronon had a laugh at that. A lot of women had already been disappointed by Sheppard. "Your other teammate, Rodney, is an example of a zy. He can gets the best of all worlds - he can carry children or donate or impregnate a woman."
"I'd rather not think about McKay being pregnant, thanks."
"I second that. He's in here almost every day as it is. I don't know how Carson deals with it."
"But you never answered my question. How does it get out?" It wasn't as though there were an abundance of orifices in the human body. Ronon thought it'd be a simple question for the Lanteans to answer.
"You weren't exactly wrong when you said it gets born out of a butt. Though the technical term is cloaca."
"It doesn't get dirty?" Ronon had no idea why he was so interested. He wasn't going to have to do it. But then again, this was something completely different - stranger than the Wraith even.
"No. One of the reasons carriers are allowed to serve in the military right up until they transfer is because the digestive system shuts down about two days before the neonate is expelled. So there's plenty of warning. Then a few hours before labor the channel is flushed out with a naturally produced cleaning agent. The modern practice has been to augment that with an enema."
Ronon grimaced. That was definitely more than he needed to know. "Then what?"
"Then the neonate crawls up the body and into the pouch."
"Pouch?"
"I'm sure you've seen the scar on the colonel's abdomen. When he's gestating it will slowly open up again, and when the neonate is safely inside it will close up to protect the baby until the pouch opens again about six months later, unless of course he decides to give it a pouchmate. After the incubation period, the baby will be able to go in and out until he or she is finished nursing. ZX females have actually increasingly been electing this method as well, since the newborn phase is much easier."
"So it'll come in and out when we're on missions?"
"No. The child is capable of surviving completely outside the pouch about ten and a half months after conception. He can start back on missions as soon as he feels ready, though since he's elected not to incubate, that won't be a problem."
"What does that mean?"
The pretty doctor sighed, looking discouraged for the first time since they'd started talking. "Can we go to my office?"
Ronon nodded, following her easily. He supposed that everything up until now was all common knowledge for the Earthers. He wondered what the big secret was.
"Colonel Sheppard doesn't want a child, so he's not going to let it get to that stage."
"An abortion, you mean?" Ronon knew about that. Doctors on Sateda did them when a woman's health was at risk from a child.
"Not exactly. With carriers that kind of procedure is dangerous. It can lead to hemorrhaging and sterility, among other things. The colonel will bind the pouch slit so that when the neonate is expelled, it has no place to incubate. Historically people have captured and drowned it or punctured its skull with a needle. In some countries they place it in a chamber of sedative gas. But in America the entire transfer must be "natural." There are a lot of people who think that's inhumane, but it may be more humane that raising a child in a home where he or she is not wanted."
"That doesn't seem fair," Ronon replied. In his opinion, if the thing was strong enough to crawl such a long way at that stage in life, it deserved to live.
"It's not, but it's also the right of a carrier to choose whether or not to incubate a child. Carriers have been binding their pouches since the beginning of history. Colonel Sheppard is in a difficult position. I'm not sure he would be allowed to keep a child here without a spouse to support him."
"I'll support him."
"What? Ronon, are you saying that you and Colonel Sheppard--"
"Nah."
"That's right. The dates are wrong. We were on Earth."
"I meant that if they're worried that nobody will help Sheppard care for the kid, then they're wrong. McKay will help. And Teyla. We're a team."
Jennifer sighed. "I'm afraid it's not as simple as that. Under the terms of the Noble Families in Service Agreement, if the colonel doesn't transfer out of an active combat zone then his family is within their lineage rights to challenge custody of the child."
"Better let his family raise it than let it die," Ronon responded.
"The colonel might not see it that way. Besides, six months incubation is still a long time to be off active duty and Colonel Sheppard is close to forty. Carrying is more hazardous to his health at this age."
Ronon nodded, even though he still didn't agree. But then he also doubted that Sheppard would have the will to let his own blood die in the end, considering what the man would do for perfect strangers. More likely he was just upset at himself for getting pregnant in the first place. The Lanteans all had too much guilt for their own good.
"Any other questions?"
"So women can have butt-babies too?"
"Yes, anyone with the z chromosome can carry. In fact, if you have anal sex with a zx female its very important that you use condoms, since hormonal birth control does not effect carriers and they are always fertile. And if you plan to have sex with Colonel Sheppard, I'd advise the same."
"I already told you that Sheppard and I aren't together. I like women."
"Well, if you intend to have anal sex with any carrier, unlike xx females, it's possible to fertilize another egg while they are either gestating or carrying."
"Got it, doc. No butt-sex with your people. I gotta go." He needed to talk to Sheppard.
But then he paused, looking back at Jennifer. "You're not one of those people I have to be careful with are you?"
She blushed. "No."
"Good."
***
"Are you sure you still want to?" Ronon asked. He'd teased Sheppard many times for being a big baby about injuries, but this wasn't about Sheppard. It was about the butt-baby and on Sateda people took babies seriously regardless of where they came from. Even Aren had taken time off of the squadron when she'd had her baby and she was the toughest woman Ronon knew.
"I'm fine Ronon. You don't have to worry about breaking me."
"I break you at least once a week," Ronon argued. Not entirely true, but the Lanteans lived a sheltered life and despite being fit, Sheppard was older than almost everyone in the Satedan army, so Ronon wasn't surprised he couldn't always keep up. He didn't choose follow Sheppard for his fighting skills anyhow. He'd be an idiot if he did.
"Fine," Sheppard practically growled. "No hits to the abdomen, like when I had those cracked ribs. But don't go easy on me."
"Not a problem." Truthfully, Ronon always went a little easy on Sheppard. Not in the speed of his hits or the strength of his defense, but he'd pull his punches often enough. The man didn't need anymore disadvantages in the field and being bruised was definitely a disadvantage. "Don't want to hurt your butt-baby."
Sheppard rolled his eyes, bending down to start his stretch routine. "You talked to Carson?"
"Naw, the new pretty blond one."
"Keller?"
"Yeah."
"She told you to call it a butt-baby?"
Ronon shrugged. "She didn't answer all my questions, though."
"Anything I can answer?"
"What's going to happen?"
"When I go into labor, the neonate will crawl out of--"
"Not that part. What's going to happen to you? Will you go back to your people?" That was the important question, after all. Ronon wasn't sure he could stay in Atlantis without Sheppard. As much as he liked Dr. Weir and even McKay, he didn't trust their decisions the same way he did Sheppard's. The were too soft, too afraid to risk everything when everything needed to be risked, too prone to rely on technology when courage was all they needed.
"I'm not having the kid, so no. I might need to go for a few weeks, but I'll come back."
"I don't believe you."
"What? Ronon, you know how important this mission is to me."
"You won't let it die. And we won't let them send you back to your people," Ronon thought for a second before adding, "unless you want to go."
"Of course I don't want to go!" John stood up from his stretch to try to crowd Ronon. Ronon wasn't intimidated.
"What about the baby's father?"
John sighed, hanging his head and looking defeated for the first time Ronon had ever seen. "He doesn't know. And he's not going to."
"I'd want to know. Maybe he wants the kid."
"He probably does. But that doesn't mean that he should. He has enough of his own problems. I don't want to bother him."
Sheppard was such an idiot. He constantly wanted to sacrifice himself, like the great warriors of legend, and even though that was one of his virtues, it had its downsides. More than once, Ronon had caught Sheppard assuming that others wanted to make those same sacrifices. Sheppard had honor, but he had trouble seeing that other people didn't prioritize that honor as much as he himself did. Sheppard even assumed honor in his enemies when in Pegasus, honor was a luxury few could afford.
"Maybe he wants to be bothered. Even if you don't care about him, you should do him the courtesy." And let him take the child where it would be safe from the Wraith and leave Sheppard in Pegasus for Ronon to follow. It seemed like the most obvious solution to Ronon.
"I do care about him. That's why he can't know. He's doing what he loves and he's doing good in the world - that's why he can't know. He'd throw that all away because he thinks that family comes first."
"Doesn't it?" At first, Ronon had thought that the Lanteans didn't have families the way they did on Sateda. There were no families on Atlantis and both Sheppard and McKay never spoke of theirs. But he'd seen it in their movies, and he'd just learned about the rights of the family to the child of one of their carriers. On Sheppard's planet, the family bloodline was worth everything.
"No."
"Then what does?"
Sheppard gave one of his sick little chuckles, the meaning of which Ronon had never really understood. "The good of the many outweighs the good of the few."
"You don't really believe that." Sheppard put his people first - before enemies, before people of inaction, and before strangers. It was human nature. Sheppard put his family first, just not the family related to him by blood.
"I believe that in this case, I'm doing the right thing." And that was the death-knell of all opposition as far as Sheppard was concerned. Once he decided he was right, there was no moving him.
Ronon was used to being a follower by now. He'd even admit that after seven years on the run he was no longer fit to lead. He needed someone like Sheppard who could at least trick himself into believing in the greater good to thwart Ronon's own desperate rage. But Ronon had a stubborn streak in him too. He'd listen to Sheppard and McKay. He'd even go along with them when they wanted to experiment on a Wraith, but even after seven years without civilization, there were some principles that Ronon still held dear and Sheppard had stumbled into one of them.
If they could all be happy if the father of Sheppard's baby knew, then Ronon would make it happen. Whether or not Sheppard wanted to acknowledge it, he deserved some happiness, needed it even.
So Ronon went off to see the cute doctor. The Lanteans had these strange ideas about medical confidentiality, but the doctors didn't guard their computers the way they should and there were plenty of the McKay-kind of doctors that were scared enough of Ronon to do some digging if he applied the right pressure. Ronon didn't mind applying pressure, for the greater good.
Next: What Rodney Wants
Author: Tzzzz
Rating: PG13
Pairing: Sheppard/McKay (series)
Genre: mpreg
Summary: Ronon has questions. Follows Tables Turned, Once There Was a Man Named Holland and Not a Henry.
The Kangaroos and the Bees
"So the reason nobody in this galaxy has the ATA gene is because you have to be pushed out a man's butt to get it?" Ronon asked. The Lanteans just got weirder by the day.
"Well, no," the pretty blond doctor replied. She looked a little like Melina, though Ronon tried not to think about that. "Not exactly. I suppose at some point, chances are that if you have the gene, one of your ancestors was a male carrier, because the chance of getting a recessive passed down ten thousand years without ever being expressed is almost non-existent. The beauty of it is that genes that directly affect the ability to reproduce are the quickest to spread throughout a population and the whole cultural system that arose, at least in Europe, in which inheritance passed according to the person who carried the child ensured that either daughters or male carriers were preferred, and then eventually male carriers were even more preferred, since those with two copies of the z gene will always be able to have a child who can carry on the family name, while xx women only have a 50% chance of producing a female child if they mate with an xy male. And since the ATA gene is on the z chromosome, the cultural desirability of children with the z chromosome means that it stays in the population."
Maybe this Dr. Keller was not so much like Melina. "You really like to talk, don't you?"
She blushed. "No, not really. I just think it's interesting. I mean, Colonel Sheppard is a perfect example. He comes for a noble family. His father was zy and had him with another male carrier, so he ended up with two copies of the gene, meaning he can only carry children, not impregnate a woman or donate for a man. Which is too bad. A lot of women will be very disappointed." Ronon had a laugh at that. A lot of women had already been disappointed by Sheppard. "Your other teammate, Rodney, is an example of a zy. He can gets the best of all worlds - he can carry children or donate or impregnate a woman."
"I'd rather not think about McKay being pregnant, thanks."
"I second that. He's in here almost every day as it is. I don't know how Carson deals with it."
"But you never answered my question. How does it get out?" It wasn't as though there were an abundance of orifices in the human body. Ronon thought it'd be a simple question for the Lanteans to answer.
"You weren't exactly wrong when you said it gets born out of a butt. Though the technical term is cloaca."
"It doesn't get dirty?" Ronon had no idea why he was so interested. He wasn't going to have to do it. But then again, this was something completely different - stranger than the Wraith even.
"No. One of the reasons carriers are allowed to serve in the military right up until they transfer is because the digestive system shuts down about two days before the neonate is expelled. So there's plenty of warning. Then a few hours before labor the channel is flushed out with a naturally produced cleaning agent. The modern practice has been to augment that with an enema."
Ronon grimaced. That was definitely more than he needed to know. "Then what?"
"Then the neonate crawls up the body and into the pouch."
"Pouch?"
"I'm sure you've seen the scar on the colonel's abdomen. When he's gestating it will slowly open up again, and when the neonate is safely inside it will close up to protect the baby until the pouch opens again about six months later, unless of course he decides to give it a pouchmate. After the incubation period, the baby will be able to go in and out until he or she is finished nursing. ZX females have actually increasingly been electing this method as well, since the newborn phase is much easier."
"So it'll come in and out when we're on missions?"
"No. The child is capable of surviving completely outside the pouch about ten and a half months after conception. He can start back on missions as soon as he feels ready, though since he's elected not to incubate, that won't be a problem."
"What does that mean?"
The pretty doctor sighed, looking discouraged for the first time since they'd started talking. "Can we go to my office?"
Ronon nodded, following her easily. He supposed that everything up until now was all common knowledge for the Earthers. He wondered what the big secret was.
"Colonel Sheppard doesn't want a child, so he's not going to let it get to that stage."
"An abortion, you mean?" Ronon knew about that. Doctors on Sateda did them when a woman's health was at risk from a child.
"Not exactly. With carriers that kind of procedure is dangerous. It can lead to hemorrhaging and sterility, among other things. The colonel will bind the pouch slit so that when the neonate is expelled, it has no place to incubate. Historically people have captured and drowned it or punctured its skull with a needle. In some countries they place it in a chamber of sedative gas. But in America the entire transfer must be "natural." There are a lot of people who think that's inhumane, but it may be more humane that raising a child in a home where he or she is not wanted."
"That doesn't seem fair," Ronon replied. In his opinion, if the thing was strong enough to crawl such a long way at that stage in life, it deserved to live.
"It's not, but it's also the right of a carrier to choose whether or not to incubate a child. Carriers have been binding their pouches since the beginning of history. Colonel Sheppard is in a difficult position. I'm not sure he would be allowed to keep a child here without a spouse to support him."
"I'll support him."
"What? Ronon, are you saying that you and Colonel Sheppard--"
"Nah."
"That's right. The dates are wrong. We were on Earth."
"I meant that if they're worried that nobody will help Sheppard care for the kid, then they're wrong. McKay will help. And Teyla. We're a team."
Jennifer sighed. "I'm afraid it's not as simple as that. Under the terms of the Noble Families in Service Agreement, if the colonel doesn't transfer out of an active combat zone then his family is within their lineage rights to challenge custody of the child."
"Better let his family raise it than let it die," Ronon responded.
"The colonel might not see it that way. Besides, six months incubation is still a long time to be off active duty and Colonel Sheppard is close to forty. Carrying is more hazardous to his health at this age."
Ronon nodded, even though he still didn't agree. But then he also doubted that Sheppard would have the will to let his own blood die in the end, considering what the man would do for perfect strangers. More likely he was just upset at himself for getting pregnant in the first place. The Lanteans all had too much guilt for their own good.
"Any other questions?"
"So women can have butt-babies too?"
"Yes, anyone with the z chromosome can carry. In fact, if you have anal sex with a zx female its very important that you use condoms, since hormonal birth control does not effect carriers and they are always fertile. And if you plan to have sex with Colonel Sheppard, I'd advise the same."
"I already told you that Sheppard and I aren't together. I like women."
"Well, if you intend to have anal sex with any carrier, unlike xx females, it's possible to fertilize another egg while they are either gestating or carrying."
"Got it, doc. No butt-sex with your people. I gotta go." He needed to talk to Sheppard.
But then he paused, looking back at Jennifer. "You're not one of those people I have to be careful with are you?"
She blushed. "No."
"Good."
***
"Are you sure you still want to?" Ronon asked. He'd teased Sheppard many times for being a big baby about injuries, but this wasn't about Sheppard. It was about the butt-baby and on Sateda people took babies seriously regardless of where they came from. Even Aren had taken time off of the squadron when she'd had her baby and she was the toughest woman Ronon knew.
"I'm fine Ronon. You don't have to worry about breaking me."
"I break you at least once a week," Ronon argued. Not entirely true, but the Lanteans lived a sheltered life and despite being fit, Sheppard was older than almost everyone in the Satedan army, so Ronon wasn't surprised he couldn't always keep up. He didn't choose follow Sheppard for his fighting skills anyhow. He'd be an idiot if he did.
"Fine," Sheppard practically growled. "No hits to the abdomen, like when I had those cracked ribs. But don't go easy on me."
"Not a problem." Truthfully, Ronon always went a little easy on Sheppard. Not in the speed of his hits or the strength of his defense, but he'd pull his punches often enough. The man didn't need anymore disadvantages in the field and being bruised was definitely a disadvantage. "Don't want to hurt your butt-baby."
Sheppard rolled his eyes, bending down to start his stretch routine. "You talked to Carson?"
"Naw, the new pretty blond one."
"Keller?"
"Yeah."
"She told you to call it a butt-baby?"
Ronon shrugged. "She didn't answer all my questions, though."
"Anything I can answer?"
"What's going to happen?"
"When I go into labor, the neonate will crawl out of--"
"Not that part. What's going to happen to you? Will you go back to your people?" That was the important question, after all. Ronon wasn't sure he could stay in Atlantis without Sheppard. As much as he liked Dr. Weir and even McKay, he didn't trust their decisions the same way he did Sheppard's. The were too soft, too afraid to risk everything when everything needed to be risked, too prone to rely on technology when courage was all they needed.
"I'm not having the kid, so no. I might need to go for a few weeks, but I'll come back."
"I don't believe you."
"What? Ronon, you know how important this mission is to me."
"You won't let it die. And we won't let them send you back to your people," Ronon thought for a second before adding, "unless you want to go."
"Of course I don't want to go!" John stood up from his stretch to try to crowd Ronon. Ronon wasn't intimidated.
"What about the baby's father?"
John sighed, hanging his head and looking defeated for the first time Ronon had ever seen. "He doesn't know. And he's not going to."
"I'd want to know. Maybe he wants the kid."
"He probably does. But that doesn't mean that he should. He has enough of his own problems. I don't want to bother him."
Sheppard was such an idiot. He constantly wanted to sacrifice himself, like the great warriors of legend, and even though that was one of his virtues, it had its downsides. More than once, Ronon had caught Sheppard assuming that others wanted to make those same sacrifices. Sheppard had honor, but he had trouble seeing that other people didn't prioritize that honor as much as he himself did. Sheppard even assumed honor in his enemies when in Pegasus, honor was a luxury few could afford.
"Maybe he wants to be bothered. Even if you don't care about him, you should do him the courtesy." And let him take the child where it would be safe from the Wraith and leave Sheppard in Pegasus for Ronon to follow. It seemed like the most obvious solution to Ronon.
"I do care about him. That's why he can't know. He's doing what he loves and he's doing good in the world - that's why he can't know. He'd throw that all away because he thinks that family comes first."
"Doesn't it?" At first, Ronon had thought that the Lanteans didn't have families the way they did on Sateda. There were no families on Atlantis and both Sheppard and McKay never spoke of theirs. But he'd seen it in their movies, and he'd just learned about the rights of the family to the child of one of their carriers. On Sheppard's planet, the family bloodline was worth everything.
"No."
"Then what does?"
Sheppard gave one of his sick little chuckles, the meaning of which Ronon had never really understood. "The good of the many outweighs the good of the few."
"You don't really believe that." Sheppard put his people first - before enemies, before people of inaction, and before strangers. It was human nature. Sheppard put his family first, just not the family related to him by blood.
"I believe that in this case, I'm doing the right thing." And that was the death-knell of all opposition as far as Sheppard was concerned. Once he decided he was right, there was no moving him.
Ronon was used to being a follower by now. He'd even admit that after seven years on the run he was no longer fit to lead. He needed someone like Sheppard who could at least trick himself into believing in the greater good to thwart Ronon's own desperate rage. But Ronon had a stubborn streak in him too. He'd listen to Sheppard and McKay. He'd even go along with them when they wanted to experiment on a Wraith, but even after seven years without civilization, there were some principles that Ronon still held dear and Sheppard had stumbled into one of them.
If they could all be happy if the father of Sheppard's baby knew, then Ronon would make it happen. Whether or not Sheppard wanted to acknowledge it, he deserved some happiness, needed it even.
So Ronon went off to see the cute doctor. The Lanteans had these strange ideas about medical confidentiality, but the doctors didn't guard their computers the way they should and there were plenty of the McKay-kind of doctors that were scared enough of Ronon to do some digging if he applied the right pressure. Ronon didn't mind applying pressure, for the greater good.
Next: What Rodney Wants