Down to You by mousewitchy [Reviews - 27]
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Category: Slash Pairings > McKay/Sheppard
Characters: Carson Beckett, John Sheppard, Other, Radek Zelenka, Rodney McKay
Rating: NC-17
Genres: AU - Alternate Universe, Drama, Episode Related, First Time, Romance
Warnings: Adult themes
Series: None
Word count: 34019; Completed: Yes
Summary: Some things are more important than appearances.
A/N: Many, many heartfelt thanks to Wickdzoot and kageygirl for beta, brainstorms, and occasional hand-holding. Thanks to Gateworld, who provided the transcript of "Letters from Pegasus" I've quoted from. And lastly, thank you to Panera Bread Company, for feeding and watering me while I forced this story onto paper.
Action on Atlantis begins at the end of Seige II, but this is AU as of the airing of Seige III.
steady as it comes
right down
to you
I've said it all
so maybe we're a Bliss
of another kind
--Tori Amos, "Bliss"
Intuition is not a concrete thing, but the sum of a lifetime's worth of knowledge divided by triumph, multiplied by fear and taken to the power of a thousand minor failures, of opportunities missed and dreams unrealized. Add to this the weight of connections never made, hundreds of perceptions unrelated to observations long-ago forgotten and dismissed, and factor in that indefinable something that made you think, once, that you really could do anything. This is how the totality of human experience at that cosmic craps game that is life steps up to the table, runs a few quick calculations, and tells you that your luck has run out and you're due to roll snake-eyes right about now.
This is that feeling, the kind that sends you running with your youngest from doctor to doctor until you find the one who believes you when you say there's something wrong with your baby, makes you beg your husband to cancel his 8 am flight even though he laughs and calls you superstitious; this is the feeling of wrongness that makes you hire a private detective to watch your husband in his off-hours. This is the kind of sudden gut-wrenching my-brother-is-dying-my-brother-needs-a-doctor panic that can wake you from a sound sleep even at 3 o'clock in the morning.
Intuition hasn't been kind to Jeannie McKay-Grant, hasn't told her one good thing in the forty-some-odd years she's been alive. She's very familiar with that feeling.
Too familiar, which is why she doesn't bother to second-guess it when she finds herself out of bed at some ungodly hour of the morning, just checks both of the kids' rooms and sits down to dial every number she can ever remember having for Rodney. When all she does is wake 5 or 6 angry strangers and one amorous drunk, she grits her teeth and starts calling relatives.
Almost exactly one hour later, Senator Good-for-nothing rolls over in bed and reaches for his wife, then sits up and mumbles, "Jeann', wha's goin'?"
"I know, I know it's late and I'm sorry. But I can't find him, I can't find him anywhere, and--something's wrong, dammit. I just know it." She's still talking, like she hasn't even heard him and Richard groans and falls back against the pillows.
"Jeannie, he's fine. I'm sure he's fine, it was probably just a bad dream and can we please come back to bed?" he ventures a few minutes later, and "Fuck, it's four o'clock in the goddamn morning and you're looking for that loser? Come back to bed. Please?"
It's four in the morning and Jeannie can't find her little brother, and when Richard whines he sounds just like her two-year-old daughter. "Thanks anyway," she says into the phone, and "Yes, I'm sure Richard can do something. In fact," Jeannie smiles, and it's her Why,-so-nice-to-meet-you smile, the one she's learned to use at the parties and charity balls Richard insists on taking her to, full of good ol' boys and good ol' girls with perfect teeth and sweaty palms and closets full of skeletons. This is the smile she uses when she knows their secrets, and them all unaware. "I'm sure he'll do something, because I have pictures of him fucking the president's niece. Good night, Uncle Steve."
"What?" Richard squawks, and Jeannie ignores him.
Walking to the dresser is plumbing depths she thought she'd forgotten she ever had, but she thinks she's finally learned the lesson her mother never did. There are some things, she thinks as she opens the top drawer and reaches for the plain manila envelope beneath the mounds of satin lingerie, underthings lacy and delicate like the woman she knows her husband thinks she is. There are some things more important than appearances, she thinks and wonders at the raw and simple freedom that flows through her as she throws the packet on the bed so the pictures spill across the comforter, original sin laid out there in glorious pornographic technicolor across the surface of her seemingly-perfect life.
It feels to Jeannie almost as if the world slows to a crawl as first confusion, then shock, embarrassment, and finally god-help-her guilt register on Richard's face. He looks nothing like he should, only remorseful like a puppy she caught pissing on the living room rug--regretting that she caught him, nothing else--and Jeannie doesn't even feel angry as she drops the portable phone on the pillow next to him. She feels powerful and triumphant; it's like a revelation, this feeling that she's finally figured it out, figured everything out. She's in control now, because she doesn't care at all anymore how this looks from the outside, and one small corner of her mind asks in awe and disbelief if this is really how Rodney feels all the time.
*
The phone landed with a solid thump on the pictures nearest Richard, and Jeannie looked down into the pale and horrified face of her soon-to-be-ex-husband.
"Find my brother," she said, voice steely with resolve and something like disdain, "And I won't make this public or messy. Most of these may be too racy for the American tabloids, but don't think I won't find some that aren't. I'm sure there are plenty of people out there willing to sell their souls for pictures like these."
When he didn't move, she threw his planner down next to the telephone and bent to gather the photos. "I'd start now, if I were you," Jeannie added as she fastened the envelope and held it up for him to see. "Because I'll be keeping these until you do."
She could hear him dialing as she moved through the hallway, and laughed humorlessly to herself as she walked down the stairs. It really wasn't all that funny she supposed, and then remembered how Rodney had given her detailed instructions on how to blow up a car when her first boyfriend left her for the cute blonde at the gas station. When she saw him again--and she would, she thought stubbornly--she'd have to make sure Rodney knew that she was the only one who drove the Blazer.
*
Jeannie's mother's favorite cookie used to be lemon meringues. Jeannie was always a Pecan Sandies girl, herself, and Rodney--well, even once he got old enough to have a favorite cookie, Rodney wasn't all that discriminating. He loved anything with chocolate.
It had been love at first Oreo, and Jeannie had the pictures to prove it.
She'd found them packed securely away in a shoebox in the attic a few years ago, when Mum died. God only knew why Mum had kept them, unless she'd forgotten they were there--she probably had, considering how old they were and the sheer volume of dust covering the box.
They showed a happy, chocolate-smeared baby grinning madly and waving the soggy remains of a half-eaten Oreo cookie at the camera. In most of them, a middle-aged fortysomething woman with long auburn hair and bright blue eyes was crouched next to the high chair, sometimes beaming at the person holding the camera and sometimes tickling the baby and smiling at him, instead.
Sometimes Jeannie still wondered if Rodney had ever seen these pictures, incontrovertible proof that their mother hadn't always been the cold and angry woman he had known. It was the smile on Julia McKay's face, not the date scrawled across the backs of the photos, that told Jeannie when they were taken; the date only marked them as probably the last pictures taken before everything in the McKay house got so fucked up.
It happened on Jeannie's birthday; she turned seven the same day her brother died the first time.
Julia McKay was at her wits' end trying (and failing) to pick up after Jeannie's backyard birthday party and keep Rodney, who'd just learned to walk, from stealing leftover bits of cake, chewing on the wrapping paper, or falling into the pool while trying to throw said gift wrap in the water. After the third frantic dash and "Rodney, no!" when she turned around to find her 13-month-old balanced precariously at the edge of the pool trying to shake a stubborn piece of scotch-taped wrapping paper loose of his thumb, Julia gave up entirely. Practically seething with frustration and cursing her absent husband, she deposited the itinerant toddler inside the house and shut the sliding glass door.
"Be good," she pleaded. "If you're good, I'll take you swimming later and we'll both get in the water. Okay?"
Thwarted, Rodney scowled and wandered back into the kitchen. There was an entire cabinet of Tupperware in there, and it was calling his name.
Sighing, Julia brushed sweat-soaked hair out of her face and looked around for her daughter.
"Jeannie! Get out of that tree and come help me clean this up before your father gets home!"
"But, Mum--"
"Jeannie." The set of her mother's face and the warning growl in her voice told Jeannie that, birthday or not, playtime was over. Resignedly, she scrambled down from where she'd been guiltily watching her harried mother and set to work.
"Mum?" Something was wrong. Jeannie dropped the trash bag she was holding and looked around, frowning. Nothing looked out of place, but all at once her chest was tight and suddenly in spite of the humid late-summer heat, Jeannie was freezing. "Mum, where's Rodney?" As soon as she said it, she knew with abrupt and perfect clarity why she was shivering and terrified when she should have been warm under the afternoon sun.
"What? Oh, honey, he's inside. He was futzing around by the pool again, and I didn't want him to fall in." She gestured vaguely at the door. "Why? Jeannie?"
Jeannie was already almost at the door, because her little brother wasn't and he should have been. Rodney was worse than a cat that way, really; he couldn't stand a closed door, always wanted on the other side, especially if he could see you through it. He should have been there pressed up against the glass and looking miserable, begging someone to come and let him out.
She couldn't say why, but that he wasn't suddenly scared her more than she thought possible. Jeannie didn't think you could be this scared at seven; fear like that was for grown-ups. Behind her, she heard her mother call out and scramble to follow.
Jeannie hit the door at a run, grabbed the handle and flung all her body weight sideways to open the heavy door, squeezing through the crack she made. Inside, it was eerily cool and quiet; the soft mechanical hum of the fan made everything sound mundane and peaceful, painful contrast to the rapid frenzied panic that threatened to eat her up inside. It was so damned quiet that Jeannie nearly burst into tears right there--sometimes the only way to find Rodney was to listen for him, he always made noise everywhere he went and the house was far too big to find him quickly once he'd figured the stairs out. Trembling, Jeannie closed her eyes and listened, holding her breath and thinking desperately that, of all the times to listen to their mother and finally be quiet, why did he have to pick now?
Nothing, nothing until her mother came in the door behind her, perplexed and out of breath, and then Jeannie heard someone coughing in the kitchen.
"Oh my God," breathed Julia, and she was pushing past Jeannie.
Except coughing was really the wrong word to describe it; it sounded more like a cross between choking and crying and the hiccups, and Jeannie thought it was perhaps the most frightening sound her baby brother had ever made--scarier even than the time when he was really still a baby and he cried so hard his face turned red and there was this long godawful moment where he wasn't screaming but he wasn't breathing, either.
Her mother was on her knees in front of Rodney when Jeannie got to the kitchen, and she was crying and asking him what he'd eaten. Rodney choked and pointed to the pantry where the open box of cookies sat there on the bottom shelf like an accusation, and Julia was on the phone and then she was out the door with Rodney, just like that. Jeannie ran after her but she was too short, she wasn't fast enough, and by the time she got to the front door the car was pulling out of the driveway and it was gone.
No one came home for hours, though her father did call to make sure Jeannie had locked all the doors and ask if she wanted the neighbors to come sit with her. Jeannie dutifully let the answering machine pick up before she did and told him that yes, she had locked the doors and no, she didn't need anyone to come over. When she asked about Rodney, he told her it had been a close thing but her little brother would be fine and that they'd all be home soon. With a chill, Jeannie wondered what exactly close meant.
It had taken her almost an hour and a half to clean the backyard by herself, and when her grandparents called to wish her happy birthday she let the machine take it After that, she waited in the dark by the phone and tried not to think about what might not have happened if she hadn't climbed the tree and ignored her mother.
The lock turning in the front door was thunderous after hours of silence in the dark. Her mother was pale and shaky, and Rodney was tear-streaked, wide awake and jittery; alternately squirming and whining and staring off into space. His left arm was clutched close to his chest and thick with bandages, and when Jeannie tried to look at it he turned it away and pulled at the gauze.
"Rodney, no." Julia frowned, and tried to grab the bandaged arm. Rodney squawked and tried to jerk it away.
"Julia. Julie, it's okay. He can't pull it off, and he'll figure it out." The good doctor Andrew McKay stepped in and rubbed Julia's shoulders. Then he walked over and hugged Jeannie hard. "Hey, beanie. How are you? I'd have thought you'd be watching TV or something." Her father's face was lined with exhaustion, eyes rimmed with red, and that wasn't right at all. Fathers weren't supposed to cry.
"I was worried." Jeannie swallowed hard and willed herself not to cry, stepped up and stroked Rodney's back. She forced a smile and held his good hand. "Hi, Rodney, how are you?"
"Hi," he said, and bumped his head against Julia's shoulder. He sniffled and showed her his bad arm, contriving to look as put-upon and pathetic as possible.
"Does it hurt?"
"Uh-huh. Ouch." Rodney nodded. "Off," he said decisively.
Jeannie looked up at her father, who shook his head. "Sorry," she said, "But I think it needs to stay on for a while."
"Yes. Yes, it does. And Jeannie, I think it's time for bed. It's been a long day for all of us." He checked his watch and looked at the stairs as if he wanted to be the one climbing them and going to bed.
"Okay. G'night Mum, 'night Rodney. Good night, Daddy." Her mother leaned down and kissed her on the forehead, her father ruffled her hair, and Rodney sullenly muttered something that sounded like 'night'.
As she walked upstairs, she heard her father ask, "How did he get to the pantry anyway? He's barely a year old, for Chrissakes. He can't open doors yet."
She barely heard her mother's answer but it didn't really matter what her mother said, because the only thing she meant was my fault, my fault, my fault.
That night, before she turned off the light, Jeannie paused and looked at the night-light in the corner. Long ago, when she'd first gotten her own real room and bed, her mum had told her it would keep her safe at night from the closet-monster Jeannie was sure existed. Closet-monsters, she'd explained, were as scared of the light as Jeannie was of the dark. The night-light had been maintained for the four years since without question, but suddenly it seemed silly to be afraid of the dark after she'd seen something to really be afraid of, something that scared even her parents. Now she'd thought she'd found something to really be afraid of, and all the nebulous and half-dreamed shadow-creatures of childhood couldn't hold a candle to the real and too-adult monster that was death. This, she thought as she unplugged the night-light, could be what growing up felt like.
The box of lemon meringues was gone in the morning, and when Jeannie asked about it her mother laughed unsteadily and told her that she liked Oreos better anyway. But Jeannie didn't miss the fearful way her mother glanced at the cupboard, or the way she suddenly clutched Rodney so tightly that he squawked at her in annoyance and waved a fistful of breakfast threateningly at her before ignoring her again for the pastry.
"Hi," he said absently to Jeannie as she sat down to her cereal, and Jeannie waved and giggled at him as he chewed his on his fingers along with the bite of pastry he'd stuffed in his mouth. Rodney didn't look any worse for wear except for the gauze along his forearm but her mum was still drawn and pale, and looked as though she hadn't slept well and wouldn't ever again. Maybe, Jeannie thought, that was the difference between grown-ups and kids; kids were scared of things grown-ups knew didn't exist, and grown-ups were afraid of the things children didn't know enough to understand. She thought of the lie in her mother's eyes a moment before, and wondered if being a grown-up meant learning to lie, and pretending to believe the lies others told.
Jeannie felt older already.
*
The big mistake most people made when they thought about family was thinking of it as a shield. Family, Jeannie thought, especially close family, was less like a shield and more like a sword--a double-edged sword, granted, but a sword. As with any other weapon, it was just as likely to wound the bearer when handled clumsily or with inexperience. In the hands of a master, however, handled with the respect due a weapon of its caliber, the necessary awareness of the sharpest edges; of momentum and balance, that seeming-slow and ponderous weight that guides the killing stroke deep into the unguarded and unsuspecting flesh and out again, sticky and sated but still hungry—in the hands of a master, family was a weapon capable of confounding the most foolproof defense.
The trick to it was that if you didn't wield them, the lessons of your childhood would wield you—no matter how securely you thought you hid them, or how deeply they were buried. If you locked them away and ignored them, you'd wake one day to find them next to you in bed, taking you for granted and sleeping with the interns; hurting you. Take up the sword, though, take control and remember the things your parents didn't mean to teach you, and somewhere in the thrust-parry-riposte you found that the old hurts and patterns of your youth stopped having power over you.
Thrust, strike out and step forward—know your footwork, put the other on the defensive, and watch them move right where you want them. Parry and block--know your vulnerabilities, those sore spots and insecurities your mother made in you so long ago, accept the hurt and your opponent scores only the lightest of touches—keep pushing, don't flinch back and you've got them. Guard--read the enemy's defense, see the holes they can't and the fight is over with hardly a blow struck.
Armed, but unarmored, and the tired weight of age and baggage disappears. Speed and maneuverability were the greatest of advantages in family and politics; to be where the opponent's blow is not, and to strike from where they least expect it. These were the things that won the day, and they were born of an awareness and determination Jeannie hadn't thought she'd had in decades.
After almost nine months, the divorce was nearly a sure thing and most of the conflict was down to poses and posturing; sidelong glances full of suspicion and a fear that told her she had almost won. A sword merely worn was still one that was used, after all, and Jeannie was magnanimous and kept hers sheathed, letting the fact that it was there at all speak volumes. Dozens of important people in dozens of important places scrambled to find her brother while she sat sipping coffee on her back porch, rushed to keep her quiet because they knew she had their number but not if she would really tell.
It would've been funny, except that every time she looked at the pre-dawn Colorado sky there was a feeling like the one where the world narrows down to just that shade of blue painted on a little boy's lips when he can't breathe and he's dying; it's a feeling Jeannie knew all too well, and it hadn't left her much room to feel anything else in the last nine months.
Not for the first time, she wondered what Rodney would think if he could see her now. They hadn't really spoken in the few months before he left to his "classified location", and not very often even in the years before that; somehow the years between them, and Rodney's not-unjustified loathing of all things family had conspired with Jeannie's nearly twenty years of marriage to an American politician and made them little more than perfect strangers to each other. Still, he was her brother--she was the one who'd rescued Rodney from the endless hours in that damn playpen (and who the hell used a playpen to keep track of a two-year-old all day, anyway?), Jeannie was the one who snuck in his room to read to him when he was sick, who helped him learn to read, whose room he snuck into when he had nightmares, who'd screamed and screamed when Rodney was five until Mum and Dad stopped fighting long enough to notice he'd been stung by a bee.
There were some ties that never broke no matter how they were stretched, and Jeannie could only cross her fingers and pray this one had survived. If it hadn't, she had only herself and the fact that she'd married a man so much like their father to blame. So exactly like their father, in fact, that by the time Michael was born a year and a half ago Jeannie could have been a perfect carbon copy of her mother.
Perfect, in that when Richard had been so blatantly disapproving of Rodney, Jeannie had just gritted her teeth and said nothing; and when their third child Michael died a year after he was born and Richard had patted her hand and told her condescendingly that maybe she should consider tubal ligation because, of course, congenital heart conditions didn't come from his side of the family—Jeannie hadn't said anything at all, except that she'd think about it.
Jeannie had made her mother's mistakes, all right, the least of which wasn't letting Richard imply that it was her fault that Michael got sick, or insinuate for years and years that she was the reason he fucked around. She learned a lot from Julia over the years--like how to tell when a man's eye wanders, or that having the extra baby he wants would keep him at home. The biggest thing Jeannie thought she'd learned, however, was how to store all that anger up inside and keep it warm.
The best thing her mother ever taught her, Julia hadn't even meant to teach. Jeannie learned a lot from her mother, yes; but she believed she learned more from Julia's mistakes. The most important of those things was how to use all that accumulated and thrice-warmed anger, and to use it on a deserving target. Jeannie hadn't done a lot that she was proud of but she was proudest that she did love Missy (and had loved Michael), even if she hadn't been thrilled at first about a second (or third) child. Jeannie never took her husband's mistakes out on her babies, because she'd finally woken up to take them out on Richard.
It wasn't until the car full of government-issue men in full military dress pulled up in her driveway to give her the video they said was from Rodney that Jeannie realized she'd forgotten one very important thing.
*
"Jeannie? This is your brother, Rodney. . . obviously. I wanna s-say, um. . . I wanna say something. Uh. . . family is important. I-I've come to realise that. . ."
*
When Jeannie was twelve, she was suspended from school for punching a male classmate over a tasteless remark about her lack of cleavage.
She'd been listening at her parents' bedroom door when the argument devolved (as they all did, eventually) into a screaming match about Dad's latest secretary, and so she'd decided to go downstairs and watch some TV until they either decided or forgot about her punishment. As she moved further away from the shouting upstairs she froze, abruptly realizing two crucial facts--one, that in all the fuss about Jeannie no one had thought to check on what Rodney was doing; and two, the deafening series of crashes coming from the kitchen was probably him.
Tearing down the stairs, Jeannie burst into the kitchen to find her six-year-old brother standing on the counter and dropping dish after dish to die in itty-bitty pieces on the floor.
"Rodney!" she hissed, horrified. That was Mum's best china. "What are you doing?"
Rodney looked up at her, beamed proudly and pointed at the table where one of Mum's self-help books sat open on the table.
"Andrew Cohen says that giving up one's most prized possessions is the way to true happiness," he said matter-of-factly, and gleefully broke the butter dish. "I am making Mum happy."
*
". . . I really do wish you the best, you know, and I'm sorry we weren't closer. Perhaps, um. . . if by chance I make it out of this, perhaps one day we can be, and I would like that."
*
Nobody ever really wants what they think they do.
There was a note attached to the video, next to the assurances from General O'Neill, and it was in Richard's handwriting: 'Are you happy now?'
The answer was most definitely no.
*
John Sheppard was expecting to die, which was the only reason he allowed himself to give thought to his having decidedly non-regulation feelings for his very brilliant, very male co-worker. Former co-worker, he amended as the hive ship loomed monstrous and large in the viewscreen and what little courage he had left took up residence in his stomach with his heart, where it roiled unpleasantly and plotted its imminent escape. Funny, how when he'd climbed the stairs out of the control room he'd thought he was lucky not to be leaving loose ends behind. Only now it seemed he had, and a big one--the one who'd built the bomb that was going to kill him.
The jumper was on autopilot, and he couldn't bear to watch the monstrosity in front of him get any closer so he turned away in his seat and put his head in his hands, resolutely ignoring the burning in his eyes. Bile was rising in his throat and he took quick, shallow breaths and fought it; it seemed really stupid to spend his last moments puking his guts out because he'd suddenly realized that he'd walked out on the best thing he'd never had with nothing more meaningful than "So long, Rodney," and he was never, ever going to be able to go back and fix that.
The one thing John had to be grateful for was that he'd known; if nothing else he'd known before he died, even if Rodney hadn't. As he blinked he caught a glimpse of the nuke and thought of how Rodney must feel, knowing he'd built it and that it was going to kill John, and it gave him a pang of regret so tangible it actually hurt.
Hell, he thought, they were his last moments--soon, he'd be so much debris and then no one would know and John sure as hell wouldn't be there to care if they did--and emptied his stomach into the corner, wishing he'd needed to do more than put the jumper on auto-pilot so he'd have something to do besides sit and wait to die.
The key drawback to using a craft that flew on mental instruction to stage a kamikaze mission was that sometimes it began to listen to the insistent McKay-voice-of-doom screaming in that distant recess of your mind that this was a really, really bad idea. Another was that, unlike the twin distractions of gunfire and combat, which gave you something to focus on instead of thinking, the gravid and silent womb of space only encouraged contemplation of things you couldn't afford to think about on a suicide mission.
Breathing deeply, John turned back and checked the sensors. It was almost time, he thought, and it was almost a relief as he angled the ass-end of the jumper toward the hive ship. That way, the impact of the jumper and the nuclear blast would be nearly simultaneous. Remote detonator in hand, John looked out at the stars for the last time and waited.
Then the jumper struck the hive ship, and over the shriek of tortured metal and the thin whistle of decompression, he thought he heard something garbled come over the radio.
"John--" It could have been Elizabeth, but he didn't wait to find out because after that one word the radio died with the shielding and John closed his eyes and hit the trigger as the whole world dissolved into fire and light.
A second later, John landed face-first with a thump and a groan on a hard, metal floor. What with the recent homosexual epiphany followed by the close-range nuclear blast, John felt he was justifiably alarmed when he rolled over to find an imposing man in military uniform—a colonel, by the birds on his shoulders—looming over him and frowning.
Hey, he thought crossly, I wasn't that bad.
Or maybe he said it, because there was laughter in what he supposed was the bridge of the Daedalus and Elizabeth's voice came over the radio--"Oh God, John. John."--and he could've sworn he heard Rodney stalk out of the control room in Atlantis from all the way out in space.
*
General Jack O'Neill had spent the last nine months hearing about the woman and the hell she'd been raising in D.C., but he'd never actually met the wife of their most esteemed Senator Grant. He'd seen grown men--one of them, on one notable occasion, Paul Davis--cross themselves at the mere mention of her name. Still, everything that came out of Washington was an exaggeration at best and an outright lie at worst so Jack had never really worried that she'd come to visit him.
He should have, he reflected, when Teal'c informed him that she was waiting just outside his office doors to see him. Clearly, he'd forgotten what the great secret sisterhood of military wives was capable of. Damn.
"Well, tell her no!" said Jack, and Teal'c shifted.
"I have," he said slowly, "She is. . . quite formidable." And, Good Lord, was Teal'c impressed?
Stupefied, Jack stared. Teal'c stood unmoving, hands clasped behind his back, gazing expressionlessly at a spot somewhere above and behind his head. Jack glared suspiciously until Teal'c said, "O'Neill?"
"Fine," he said, leaning back in the chair and deciding he must have imagined the hint of a smile in the Jaffa's voice. No one impressed Teal'c, damn it, because that would just be way too creepy. "Let her in, then."
Jack hadn't ever met the woman or seen her in pictures, but after everything he'd heard he'd imagined she was some ugly, myopic old creature--horrifically scarred or deformed or something. When the five-foot-seven redhead with the belligerent tone and bright blue eyes burst in, he thought to himself that she wasn't exactly what he'd expected. And, wow, he noted distantly, she had really great legs for a senator's wife.
He sure as hell hadn't expected her to be gorgeous, or half this terrifying.
There was some resemblance to her brother there--the strident tone, hands that followed the words, and words that moved at the speed of light--except Jack had always thought McKay the younger seemed to be made up entirely of nervous energy and arrogance, and in that his sister was entirely unlike him.
She was the embodiment of the stereotypical Scottish temper (and there was an awful lot of Scots and Scots-Irish blood in Canada, he reminded himself), all vengeance and anger and wronged virtue. He could practically see the woman with a claymore, storming the British and demanding to know what they'd done with her brother.
"Ma'am," he tried to interrupt, putting his hands up in a gesture he hoped looked conciliatory, "Ma'am, if we could just calm down a moment--"
It seemed to just piss her off more.
"Calm down!" she spat. "Calm down! General, have you even seen this? Do you even know my brother?" She was waving the video--McKay's message home. "I have been calm. I have been patient! I want to know what the hell you people have been doing to my baby brother, and so help me God if you don't-"
"Jack?" That was Daniel, Jack saw, being completely oblivious as usual and poking his head into the office. Didn't he see the madwoman in front of the desk brandishing McKay's message like a weapon? Of course he didn't, because he had his nose buried in what was apparently a very interesting stack of paperwork. "What happened to lunch? I thought we had lunch today. Oh," he said when he looked up, and seemed embarrassed, "Uh. Sorry, um. General. I didn't realize you were, uh, busy. I'll, uh, talk to you later. Then."
McKay's sister had stopped shouting and was watching Daniel with the same kind of focus he'd seen Carter use on new technology.
But she was quiet for the moment, and Jack chose to seize the opportunity to head off the coming tirade.
"Mrs. Grant, I--"
"McKay," she said, and seated herself with all the aplomb and dignity of a senator's wife. Very suddenly, she was calm and for some reason, it was even more unnerving. "Ms. McKay, General. Richard may not have signed the papers yet, but believe me, there will be a divorce."
Jack didn't doubt it for a second. The woman oozed confidence and capability. He took a deep breath and tried again.
"Ms. McKay, I understand you must be worried about your brother--"
This time Jack cut himself off, because she was looking around his office and not even paying attention to him.
"General." She broke off the examination with the same suddenness she'd abandoned her anger earlier and smiled, but it was more like a baring of teeth. "How do you feel about Don't Ask, Don't Tell?
It took Jack a few seconds to process the abrupt change in topic, but when he did his blood froze.
"Excuse me?" How the hell could she know? She couldn't. The woman was insane, she was grasping at straws. That had to be it.
Suddenly Jack was very, very angry. Who the hell did she think she was, anyway? Brother or not, family or not--nothing gave her the right to use the person he cared about, even loved, against him.
"Now, just wait one god-damned minute--" He was working up a real head of steam, had slapped his hands down on the desk and stood up to look down at her with every ounce of intimidation he possessed, when she derailed him again with characteristic McKay abruptness.
"Personally, I think the current policies are outrageous." Her tone was deliberately casual, but her expression was not. "And I'm sure that if the need arose, I could find others who . . . might feel obligated to feel the same."
Jack gaped, open-mouthed. So she wasn't threatening to blackmail him, then. Well, that was a different story altogether.
"Oh. Really?" He sat down and leaned back in his chair, "Forgive me for being skeptical, ma'am, but with all due respect--public policy would seem to be a bit out of your reach."
"Don't Ask, Don't Tell is a policy that just invites exploitation. The government may not actively seek out evidence, but anyone with a grudge is given the perfect opportunity to get someone discharged or court-martialed." She smiled, and this time it was genuine. "Policy is difficult to change, General, but it isn't so hard to make sure certain persons are ignored, or that certain evidence is never brought to light."
"You sound like an NID agent. You know that, Ms. McKay?" Jack flashed what he thought was his most charming smile, and she laughed.
"Jeannie," she said. "Call me Jeannie, please, and I'm not yet willing to go to quite those lengths. I will, however, do everything in my power to help a friend--as I'm sure you're aware."
"I had heard," Jack said.
"If all else fails, I do have contacts in Canada. In the immigration department, actually. And there are some very lucrative positions available there for those with military experience." She smiled again, and Jack grinned back. "You seem like a good man, General. I think we'll make good friends."
"I think we will," he said. Then he stared at the door behind her and frowned. A moment later, he looked at her and said, "Unfortunately, that doesn't change how very much trouble I'd be in for giving you information you want when you don't have the security clearance."
"Oh?" Her voice was back to steely.
"So, I've been thinking." He tapped his chin thoughtfully and put his feet on the desk. "You got a degree in anything, Jeannie?"
"Most trophy wives do," she said drily. "A bachelor's, at least."
"Really." He looked questioningly at her, "Bachelor's?"
"Yes. Pre-med. Why, General?" She'd crossed her arms, but looked more curious than suspicious.
"Well, I figure if we get you the security clearance you need I could give you the information you want." He pinched his nose, frowning. "I suppose if we could get you registered as a nurse . . ."
Her mouth quirked, very much like her brother's did when he felt the person he was talking to was being especially dense. "A nurse? Oh, I don't know." She mock-frowned. "I always kind of had my heart set on being a real doctor. A surgeon, actually. I don't think I'd want to be anything else."
Jack looked at her, raised his eyebrows.
Jeannie laughed. "No matter what my brother tells you, General, I really didn't go to med school just so I could marry a senator and let it go to waste."
"Med school," Jack said and nodded. "We could work with that. How far did you go?"
"All the way, actually. I finished my residency, but I had to give up practice about five years ago," She made a face, "Richard's career, and all. Good thing I kept up with board licensing, because I may be in the job market now. To support the kids." She gestured. "Where, oh where shall I find one?"
"You can start Monday," he said.
"I'll need some time to catch up. I haven't been in practice in years, and no amount of seminars and conventions will make up for that entirely," Jeannie said warningly.
"Yeah, all right, I know your brother, you're a smart woman. You'll manage." He waved a hand dismissively. "You see--here at the SCG, we get some pretty weird injuries, which is why we keep our own doctors in the facility. Our doctors get security clearance so we can keep them briefed on the kinds of things they'll be patching up." He looked at her meaningfully, and leaned forward to shake her hand., "Welcome to the team, Jeannie. Since you're here, I assume you've already had some fairly extensive background checks."
She nodded. "I think they ran every conceivable check when Richard got into office. And since then..." She shrugged. "Well, he's been in office. And they watch."
"Good," said Jack. "Then all you need are the pretty stamps on your file. That should make my job easier. I'll call Hayes and get back to you tomorrow. Hopefully by then, I'll have made everything official, and then I can brief you on your brother's whereabouts."
*
"Her father was a doctor," Daniel said to Jack the next day. "Andrew McKay, up in Ontario. He was pretty well-known, I gather. You know we had three resignations when you announced she'd be working here?"
"Yeah," said Jack. "Makes me wonder what they're hiding."
Daniel's eyebrows shot up. "Didn't you make her promise not to blackmail anybody?"
"Yes. Well," Jack grinned, "except in the interests of the SGC, of course. It's a win-win situation: she gets what she wants, the president gets his man in the SGC, and she makes us look good just by being here."
Daniel was quiet for a moment. "It will look good to have her in the SGC, though--it does make it perfectly clear we have nothing to hide." He frowned. "Except, you know, everything."
"Well, everyone will assume that if there's dirt to be had, she's already got it and used it. That woman could get dirt on Gandhi," Jack said.
"So what are you going to tell them she did to get the job?"
"I'm going to tell them she asked nicely," said Jack. "Besides, she's already got President Hayes half-convinced it was his idea in the first place. I think she's going to be fun. Look--I think even Teal'c likes her."
He motioned towards where Jeannie stood talking up at the Jaffa, then walked over. "Have we told you he's an alien, yet?"
"No." Jeannie grinned, and made a show of looking closely at Teal'c. "Really? I didn't see any tentacles." Shaking her head sadly, she added, "And he seemed like such a nice boy."
Teal'c looked blank.
"Oh, and General--about the support you're sending to Atlantis." She produced a folded Post-It note. "Could you have Stephen give this to my brother when he sees him? It would mean a lot to me."
Jack took the note, read it, and smirked. "Sure, why not? You know Caldwell?"
"Well, mostly just his wife, Ellen," she said. "But I've met Stephen once or twice before." She nodded. "Thank you, General."
She smiled and walked off with the rest of the medical staff to tour the facility.
"You know McKay, right?" Jack passed the note to Daniel and grinned when he choked. "I told you she'd be fun."
*
John found Rodney in the chair room, of all places, tinkering with the Mark II naquadah generator connected to the chair.
"What are you doing?" He realized it came out wrong when Rodney stiffened.
"Good to see you, too, Major." He didn't even look back at John and his hands didn't stop moving, disconnecting and reconnecting wires and making it perfectly clear that Rodney wasn't happy to see him at all.
John sighed and slumped further back against the bulkhead he was leaning on. He hadn't been back an hour, and already this wasn't going well.
Ford and Teyla were gone, taken by the Wraith, and unless the Daedalus could pull another Asgard rabbit out of the proverbial hat they would never, ever get them back--the Wraith were awake this time, all of them, which precluded daring rescue-by-jumper. The Asgard technology adapted to the Daedalus was their only possible hope, and only if they could set the transporters to differentiate the Wraith from everyone else, including Teyla and any other Athosians with the bastardized Wraith gene.
And now he'd just pissed Rodney off.
Although if John was honest with himself, he'd most likely pissed Rodney off a while ago, when he'd left to go pilot the jumper to certain fiery doom. All he'd done just now was to make Rodney madder.
"I just figured you'd be getting things ready for the ZPM, is all." Okay, so it sounded pretty lame. At least it was apologetic.
He hoped.
This time Rodney did glance over his shoulder; glaring at John, who flinched back. "Believe it or not, that happens to be exactly what I'm doing," he said. "Did you ever stop to think what could happen to Ancient technology when it's drawing full power from two power sources, or what most assuredly will happen if we hook a naquadah reactor to the ZPM? Or were you just hoping to see the chair explode, because I'd hate to deprive you of another chance to cheat death and crack jokes afterward." His words were laced with fury and sarcasm, and punctuated by the sound of wires ripping.
"Dammit, Rodney! I--" Suddenly John was just as furious as Rodney sounded. If Rodney would just turn around and look instead of brooding, he'd see that John was as tired and scared as he was. Cracking jokes? Christ, John had been as shocked as everyone else to find himself alive--more so, in fact, considering they'd at least known the Daedalus was out there trying to lock onto him.
Besides, he hadn't been cracking jokes. He hadn't even known he'd said it out loud until people started laughing.
"So long, Major." Rodney's voice was sing-song with irritation. "I haven't slept in nearly four days and I have work to do. Go away. Make yourself useful and bring me some coffee-substitute. Or just go away, period. That would be nice, too."
John saw red at the sound of his own words thrown back at him. He'd known
they were ridiculous as soon as he'd climbed in the jumper. It was a good thing John was as tired as he was, because by the time the angry retort made it from his brain to his mouth, Rodney had gone back to ignoring him, and John could see the way Rodney was wilting with exhaustion.
Rodney reminded John sometimes of one of those Mark II naquadah reactors: it had 600% the power output of your average reactor, but only because it functioned in a constant state of barely-controlled overload. Now, hands trembling and movements make shaky with lack of sleep and an excess of fear, Rodney looked like a generator slowly running out of fuel.
Gritting his teeth, John walked out of the room. He knew he was in the wrong, and finding something hot and caffeinated might just make Rodney feel better enough to let John apologize to him.
Ogres are like onions, he thought resolutely and tried to think where the nearest almost-coffee station was. The labs, he remembered, and turned towards them. They have layers.
The image of himself as Donkey was nearly enough to keep John snickering all the way back.
*
John dropped the mug of almost-coffee as soon as he realized where the explosion he'd just heard had come from.
Summoning energy from God-knew-where, he broke into a run and punched his radio. "Medical team to the chair room, now!"
Please, God, he thought. Don't let them be too late.
*
"It was a stupid mistake," Zelenka was telling Elizabeth over the radio. "Elementary, really. Made by those who are careless or very, very tired. Now we work in twos, so we can double-check each other. Things will not go nearly as quickly, but hopefully . . ."
"Hopefully, this won't happen again," Elizabeth finished wearily. "Doctor, let me know when you get the ZPM in place--Carson tells me we need to dial Earth and ask for more doctors."
"Yes, I believe I have found a way for Earth to dial us, and send people through. And we will dial Earth and tell them," Zelenka sighed. "As soon as we can."
"Thank you." Elizabeth let out a deep breath, looking down at Rodney's still form. John thought she looked as if she aged ten years in the past few days.
John was sitting on a crate next to Rodney's cot. Rodney's condition apparently rated what looked like an abandoned supply closet, but the hallways outside and the rooms surrounding the infirmary were filled to overflowing with the wounded or dying who had nowhere else to be.
Delaying just long enough to beam their people off the hive ship had cost them dearly. They'd gotten their men back, along with a group of Athosians and other humans the Wraith had captured en route, but in the meantime Atlantis had had to hold against two more waves of the Wraith.
As soon as they'd realized just how very many humans were aboard the Wraith ship (and John couldn't help but shiver in remembered horror of the hundreds of corpses they'd found aboard the crashed resupply ship) they'd decided that the Daedalus would take on as many of the captives as would fit. As long as the Daedalus stayed cloaked, the Wraith wouldn't be able to find them and take them back.
Unfortunately, Atlantis had been vulnerable to the Wraith's vengeance when they found their meals missing. The fighting had begun again just after the explosion in the chair room and lasted until after the Daedalus destroyed the last hive ship. Caldwell was on his way back now, with the ZPM and nearly three hundred potential patients.
John himself had only just stumbled into the infirmary to get his arm dressed and check on Rodney, having been helping to eradicate the last of the Wraith presence on Atlantis.
Rodney was swathed in bandages, clammy and pale. The shadows under his eyes seemed a thousand times worse with Rodney this still and drawn, and John this utterly spent.
"How is he?" asked Elizabeth softly. She pulled up a crate.
"I don't know." John didn't look up, couldn't look away. "I just got here. He's--he's really quiet." Then he had to swallow and stop talking because he was so tired he sounded like a kid. Rodney was holding still, shutting up, and that was suddenly the scariest thing in the world, no matter how often John had wished it would happen.
I take it back, he thought wildly. Oh, Jesus. Oh, fuck. Oh, Christ--I take it back! Tentatively, he reached out to touch Rodney's wrist and stopped; Elizabeth was here.
"John?" Elizabeth's voice was still soft, the way you'd talk to a wounded animal. She cocked her head slightly, and looked concerned. "Are you all right?"
Fuck, he probably looked like such a goddamn head case right now. Suddenly frustrated beyond all tolerance, John scrubbed his eyes furiously with his palms. He kept his eyes on Rodney when he spoke.
"He was mad at me. Not just mad, but furious." If he looked closely enough at the bandages, John could almost pick out a pattern. "And I left. To get some of that almost-coffee. I knew how tired he was, how angry, and I left." Shrapnel. Jesus, that was what it looked like--he looked like he'd been hit with shrapnel. "I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. Oh fuck, fuck, fuck, I'm sorry."
John took a deep breath and put his head in his hands for a moment. He closed his eyes, but he could still see Rodney there hurting, maybe dying, and partly because of John's own carelessness. When he raised his head again, he wasn't sure what was showing on his face, in his eyes, but it must have been raw, because Elizabeth's eyes widened and she didn't say anything.
But she scooted her box closer and hugged him, and that helped.
*
Beckett stumbled in a few minutes later and threw himself breathlessly against the closed door, where he sagged, pressing his palms over his eyes and completely oblivious to their presence. When Elizabeth let go of John and tentatively said, "Carson?" the poor man looked as if he'd jumped out of his skin.
"Wha? Oh, Dr. Weir." He slid down to the ground and looked up at her. His eyes were shadowed like Rodney's, only Beckett's looked as if the shadow had crept inside with the sights of the day, leaving them dark and haunted with the visions of the dead and the dying. "You startled me."
"I'm sorry."
"That's all right." He waved a hand negligently, and leaned his head back against the door. "I imagine you'll be asking about Rodney, then. He'll be all right, I think, if they put him in here. If it was serious, he'd be out there where we could see him. Concussion, and some lacerations--I haven't had the time to see to him myself." After a moment, Beckett straightened up and looked at Elizabeth again. "We badly need more people. I know," he continued, holding up a hand, "I know you're trying, but you've got to understand--it's not simply a question of supplies, or people. I'm not a surgeon, Dr. Weir, and very few of us are. We're doing the best we can, but there are men out there who need more than just rudimentary surgery and, frankly, when it comes to that we're just as likely to kill them as not.
"And without the attention they need, they'll be dying anyway. We haven't got the facilities to handle this many--not to mention the supplies or the manpower--and there are more patients on the way. We're desperate." He spread his hands helplessly.
John swallowed, and looked over at Elizabeth who seemed to be searching for something to say. Beckett brushed himself off as he stood again and turned to go back out into the infirmary.
"We will be dialing Earth at the first opportunity," she said, but her voice was too scared to be soothing. "As soon as we've got the ZPM in place."
"I know," Beckett said wearily. "I just hope it's soon enough."
*
The moment Caldwell set foot off the Daedalus, he was very nearly bowled over by a small group of rabid scientists after the ZPM. John and Elizabeth entered the hangar bay just as Zelenka and the rest were pushing out, with Zelenka clutching the ZPM to his chest, and all of them chattering as incoherently as madmen about shielding and dislocation.
"None in sensor range," muttered the one closest to John. "Fully charged! We can do it now, and even move it closer to the mainland."
"No, no, no. Absolutely not. It's too predictable," said his companion. "Away from the mainland, at least a few hundred miles. And anyway, we must disable the mechanism first, before we do anything."
"What will never work?" Elizabeth looked as utterly bewildered as John felt, and not at all happy about it. She looked at John, who shrugged, and they both turned to follow the scientists. "Which mechanism?"
One of the ones at the back looked back at Weir, blinking as if he'd never seen her before. "The fail-safe," he said, like that made perfect sense, and pushed his glasses up his nose. "Or the city will not sink. Obviously."
"What?" said Elizabeth, but the man had already forgotten about them and turned to catch up with his fellows.
"Forget it," said John, and tugged Elizabeth's arm as he put on a burst of speed. "We're not going to get anything coherent out of them until they stop." Damn scientists and their damn hive minds. "They never make sense while they're moving. C'mon."
Colonel Caldwell caught up to them just as they caught up to Zelenka, who was plugging in the ZPM and didn't even look up as they entered the room. Elizabeth spoke just as Caldwell opened his mouth.
"What's this I hear about sinking the city?" she asked.
"It is exactly what the Ancients did to hide their city, Dr. Weir, and now is the time. There are no Wraith ships in range to see it happen, and so Atlantis will simply..." Now Zelenka looked up, and gestured vaguely. "Disappear."
John and Caldwell looked at each other for a moment. "That seems fairly sound," John said slowly. "What else?"
"Is there enough power?" asked Elizabeth.
Zelenka scoffed, "Of course. Three ZPMs lasted for ten thousand years, one after another, providing minimal life-support and full shielding. They--"
"Full shielding?" John said skeptically, and Zelenka waved a hand.
"Yes, yes of course full shielding. To protect the city against unlikely possibility that the Wraith got smart and found Atlantis," he said. "My point is--ten thousand years, Major, which means each ZPM lasted roughly 3,333 years apiece. Sinking the city, moving it sideways, giving full power to shields--" He stroked the ZPM lovingly. "We will all die of old age before this one runs out of power."
"Wait," Elizabeth said sternly and held up a hand. "Moving it sideways? Why, and can we even do that?"
Zelenka snorted disdainfully, sounding just like McKay when they were missing what he thought was an obvious point. "Atlantis was not safe all these years because the Wraith were too stupid to learn how to make ships waterproof," he said. "Atlantis was safe because the Wraith did not know Ancients could sink cities, and so did not think to look under the water. Now, we must sink it and move it, so that even if they do, we will not be where they look. This city can fly! Of course it can sink, and then move." He went back to fiddling with connections.
Elizabeth looked at John, and then Caldwell. Then she nodded. "Okay, but we dial Stargate Command first and figure out a way for them to dial back."
"Yes, yes. That is taken care of. Earth needs just enough power to establish wormhole here for approximately ... 3.5 microseconds. Now that the Atlantis gate has a fully-charged ZPM to power it, it should take over and help power the wormhole. It is not a permanent solution, but it is one that should work for now." Zelenka looked back up at them and sighed. "If it makes you happier, Rodney is the one who figured it out. Me, I read his notes and double-checked the math. It will work."
"Okay," Elizabeth said again. Zelenka nodded to himself and went back to the console he'd been paying attention to. "We'll do that. Then we'll sink the city."
John didn't even think Zelenka saw them leave the room.
*
The first thing Jeannie thought of when she heard the situation on Atlantis was the subway accident that had happened in D.C., just down the street from the hospital where she worked. She'd been stuck there for almost a week, hadn't been able to go home for five days, they were that busy.
They'd routed everyone not involved in the wreck to other hospitals, and still they'd barely had room to work around the injured. She'd never been able to forget what it had been like--hundreds of people, and all of them screaming, moaning, vomiting, dying in the lobbies and the waiting rooms, packed in like rats and practically on top of each other because the doctors couldn't move to save them fast enough.
"You'll want to take anyone who's worked through a subway accident," she told O'Neill. "Train wrecks, 9/11, gang wars, any major disaster like that. We'll need the supplies to set up an OR, and they'll need to start triage right away."
Jeannie was already moving, packing fresh scrubs, socks, surgical texts (because you never knew when they'd come in handy), and coffee (because you couldn't possibly survive a shift like this without it). Around her, the rest of the staff was feverishly doing the same.
"So you're going, then?" said O'Neill, and turned to the chief of the medical staff. "Funny, I don't seem to recall asking her. She's not trained for this."
"Funny," said Jeannie heatedly, and stood up rigid with anger because she knew without knowing how that something was terribly wrong-wrong-wrong, "I don't recall giving you a choice."
"She does have experience in these situations, General," Dr. Bishop said. "She just needs to be familiarized with our protocols."
"I did my internship in Washington D.C.," Jeannie said stiffly. "And worked there for nearly five years after. I know what it's like. You'll need every body you can get--and I'm a surgeon, which means you need me even more."
"You've never been through the Stargate," O'Neill pointed out patiently, and suddenly Jeannie realized he was testing her.
"General," she said, and tried to sound reasonable, "I've never been to Bulgaria, either. Or sailed by boat. Would either of those things make me less effective as a surgeon?"
O'Neill thought for a moment, then nodded. "I'll have someone drill you in protocols. You'll probably be there for at least a few days," he warned.
"Thank you." Jeannie turned back to the bag she was packing, and hefted it onto her back. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to call Richard and make sure he picks up the kids."
*
Thirty minutes later, she'd been drilled to the end of her patience on the radio, narrowly avoided being packed into one of the boxes full of medical supplies, been re-briefed on the situation in Atlantis with the rest of the staff, and finally lined up behind the Marines in front of the Stargate.
By then, she'd had the chance to work up a good adrenaline buzz in anticipation of the job ahead. Intellectually, Jeannie knew there was little sense in getting ahead of their most vital supplies; but her fingers still itched and every second's delay seemed an eternity when she thought of the people dying on the other side of that damn metal ring.
She refused to wonder if one of them was Rodney.
She didn't have the time to worry, didn't have the time to panic, so she deliberately did not notice the sensation of falling through the Stargate, or the way the entire alien city she stepped out into trembled, rumbled, and then suddenly shook violently, all the way down to its foundations. Instead, Jeannie braced herself and waited until the world held still.
Then, she grabbed the first man she saw in military uniform (he had really weird hair, she noticed, and how much shit had he caught from Rodney for that?), cutting off his redundant announcement that the city had sunk, and demanded to know where the infirmary was.
He pointed and she ran, trusting the rest of them to follow.
*
Elizabeth had made dialing Earth their very first priority, so no one had even started work on deactivating the fail-safe until after they'd contacted the SGC to impress upon General O'Neill the desperation of their situation. Once that was done, the hallways were suddenly crawling with scientists trying frantically to secure everything important before the shakedown started.
But someone forgot to tell Beckett--or any of the medical staff, really--who treated the entire city to an ass-ripping of epic proportions via intercom. Fortunately, most of what little of the tirade that wasn't rendered entirely unintelligible by the man's brogue was mercifully drowned out by the rumble of Atlantis on its way down. What little he heard was enough to make John question everything he'd thought about the good doctor. He didn't even know that was anatomically possible.
Then he thought of the patients crowding the halls of Atlantis, and wondered how many of them hadn't been secured before the bone-jarring descent. Shit, he thought feelingly.
When it was over, he looked up to find that the first shipment of doctors had come through the gate. "Sorry about that," he had time to say. "That was--"
A vaguely familiar woman in blue scrubs at head of the group cut him off when she marched forward and grabbed the front of his shirt. "Never mind that!" she shouted. "Tell me where the infirmary is!"
Startled, John simply pointed; the woman let go and sprinted down the hallway. Tired as he was, he barely managed to keep up with her long enough to make sure she took the right turns.
As they approached the infirmary, the hum of background noise began to get steadily louder. When they began to grow especially close, John could hear that it really wasn't background noise at all but the cries of all the wounded who hadn't been fastened down when the world shifted beneath them.
"Good Lord! You didn't even wait to secure the patients? Of all the god-damned, idiotic things--" said the woman next to him, and put on a burst of speed as she began to read John the same riot act Beckett had broadcast to the city minutes earlier.
"Whoa! Not my fault," he panted. "You talk to Dr. Zelenka about that." That is, John thought angrily, if I don't get to him first.
"Zelenka? Right. Oh my God," she breathed as they turned the last corner. Abruptly, she stopped and turned to John with wide blue eyes. "We're going to need more supplies than they're planning to send—more stretchers, blankets, drugs, everything. In fact, you need to get back there and tell General O'Neill the only thing he doesn't need to triple is the patients!" she shouted over the noise, and strode in to start barking orders at the nurses and Marines who had come with her.
A second later, she looked back and saw him. "Now!" she shouted. "Tell him we need all that as of yesterday! Go!"
Without thinking, John turned around and went back the way he came. The funny thing was, he thought once he'd relayed the woman's message to Elizabeth, that she reminded him of someone, someone important. He just couldn't think who.
*
The next hours seemed to fly by too fast for Jeannie. There were too many patients, too many wounded, and though it seemed she was up to her elbows in blood the whole time, it wasn't enough to save everyone.
Men died when doctors were slow or clumsy; and it was an unfortunate fact that doctors were only human, no matter how they might wish otherwise, and humans got sloppy after so much adrenaline and so little rest. So men died because their doctors weren't fast enough, and now also because they weren't heedful enough.
It was enough to make Jeannie curse, and she did. She cursed the fact that she was only one person, that she needed to sleep, needed to eat; cursed the fact that the Wraith existed at all, that she wasn't ten years younger, that her hands started to shake after almost two days of nearly non-stop surgery. Most of all, she cursed the fact that the men she was operating on still died sometimes in spite of everything she tried.
*
Soon after the doctors arrived, there wasn't much left for John to do. Caldwell took control of the Marines, having the freshest explore more of Atlantis to secure living quarters for the nearly 300 refugees and military personnel they'd brought. He'd also relieved John and the rest of the personnel who had been standing duty for the better part of the past three days to eat, shower, and sleep--not necessarily in that order. Some, whom John had taught to fly the jumpers, flew the healthiest refugees out to the mainland. Others escorted the most desperate medical cases through the Stargate to Earth.
Meanwhile, John was left at loose ends. Once he'd showered and eaten, he'd wandered back to Rodney's closet to sleep there, where he could make sure Rodney was still alive.
Sleep was a misnomer, he decided as he woke from another truly gruesome nightmare of fire and light and the sound of metal screaming. About a half-second later, as he stood up to stretch, John realized that the screaming hadn't come from the nightmare, but from the infirmary outside the closet door.
"John?" Elizabeth's voice came over the radio he'd thankfully forgotten to take off. "Major Sheppard, what's going on down there?"
"I don't know yet, Doctor Weir," he said, "But I'm checking it out."
As he opened the door, creeping out of the supply closet (and the symbolism of that wasn't lost on him, no sir), he moved out into one of the medical labs adjoining the infirmary proper and from there into the infirmary itself. There, he saw one of the refugees holding the medical staff up with a P90 probably taken from the Marine lying unconscious on the floor at her feet.
The woman--who looked to be Genii from the clothes, John realized, and cursed under his breath--was standing next to a child, who was choking, and she was shouting hysterically at the doctors ducking behind tables and the Marines shouting back at her. The Marines, he noticed, were also holding guns and pointing them at her.
The shouting grew in volume and intensity as he made his report to Elizabeth, until suddenly one of the doctors stood up from behind a table and howled for silence.
"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" The doctor was a woman, too, John noticed, the same one who'd grabbed him in the control room. She had longish auburn hair tied loosely back, and she looked roughly as frazzled as the Genii woman. She held both hands up, palms out, and took a tentative step towards the woman with the gun. "Put that gun down, soldier. She isn't going to shoot me," she said to Stackhouse, but didn't take her eyes off the Genii woman.
Stackhouse glanced over at John, who had come into the room just beside him, "Major?" he asked softly.
"Put that damn gun down now, soldier, before I shoot you myself!" The doctor actually spared a glance in John's direction, eyes flashing. John looked at Beckett, who was nodding frantically at him, then nodded at Stackhouse, who lowered the gun slowly. "She's not going to shoot anyone. She's just scared, because that's her child there, isn't it?" Her voice was pitched low, soothing, and all traces of anger had melted away. She was looking steadily at the Genii woman, who nodded fearfully.
"You must be very frightened," the doctor continued, moving slowly towards the woman. "I understand that."
"How?" demanded the woman angrily, tightening her hold on the weapon. "How could you even begin to understand?" Her voice was rising in pitch again, but the doctor didn't flinch back; she slowed, but didn't stop moving forward.
"I have children," she said, keeping eye contact and swallowing hard. "My youngest son died a year ago, and I would have done anything to save him. Anything, including threatening the doctors with guns if I had thought it would help."
The Genii woman seemed to relax a little, posture drooping.
"But it won't," the doctor continued--and she was almost across the room, John noticed, almost close enough to reach out and grab the P90. "Somebody gave him a shot, didn't they? And that's when he started choking, wasn't it?" When the woman nodded, she continued, and glanced over at Beckett meaningfully. "He's having an allergic reaction, one we didn't expect." Beckett looked struck for a moment, then nodded and began moving towards the cabinet that held the drugs. "He can't breathe because he's in something we call anaphylactic shock, but he'll live if we can stop it quickly. And we can. But, lady, we cannot help you if you do not put down the gun."
The last words were spoken fiercely, desperately, and the doctor looked away from the child long enough to look beseechingly at the woman, who looked back for one lengthy frozen moment.
"He is Genii, and you would still treat him?" she asked.
"Yes," answered Beckett and the red-headed doctor immediately, and the Genii woman moved abruptly, thrusting the P90 forward into the other woman's hands.
"Please," she said, and her voice was suddenly thick with tears. "Help him."
The tension in the room dissolved as Beckett sprang forward and stuck the boy in the thigh with a needle. The boy, who couldn't have been more than ten and who had been turning a frightening shade of blue, suddenly choked again and gasped in a breath. Eyes wide and brimming with tears, he reached out for his mother as color began to return to his face.
John let out a breath himself, as he walked forward to retrieve the P90 from the doctor. The Genii woman was weeping with relief as she held her son's hand. The redhead looked meaningfully behind John at Stackhouse
"Major," she said forcefully. "This woman is not to be harmed. Understood?"
"Yes," he said and looked back at Stackhouse, and damn if the woman didn't really remind him of someone. She looked at him, silently begging him to agree, and John glanced at the boy still coughing on the stretcher and wondered what he would have done if it had been Rodney there, dying, in an alien place. "Understood." Desperation did funny things to people. And the Genii woman had surrendered, after all, the moment she'd realized they weren't going to let her son die.
"Good," said the doctor, and all but ran past him out of the room.
*
Jeannie stumbled through the first door she saw that didn't lead to more patients and promptly squatted down and put her head between her knees. I will not be sick, she thought stubbornly. I will not be sick all over someone's office.
The door whooshed open a few seconds later, but she almost didn't notice until whoever it was squatted down in front of her and put a hand on the back of her neck, covering hers.
"Hello, there." It was a man, and his voice was soft and he spoke with the same lovely accent she'd heard over the radios as she'd first stepped onto this godforsaken city. "Are you all right?"
"Yes," Jeannie said, willing her voice to sound saner than she felt. "I, uh. I did my internship in Washington, D.C. It's just--" She shook her head, searching for the words, "I haven't had to do that since before I had my kids. And..." Shit. She was shaking. "I guess I never had so much to lose, you know? Before. Jesus. I don't think I've ever been that scared. Fuck."
She brought her hands down to cover her face and found herself gathered in and hugged by the nice Scottish doctor who, now that she thought about it, was shaking almost as badly as she was.
She was so scared that she froze for a moment. Then it felt really good to be alive to be hugged at all, and she squeezed back, suddenly desperately thankful to be touching someone who wasn't dying. They stayed like that for several minutes, slumped against each other like tired and broken dolls, and let the reality of their continued existence sink in. She was still shaking, and the doctor reached up wordlessly, snagged the jacket hanging from the office chair, and wrapped it around her.
Jeannie turned her face against a warm and wonderfully alive shoulder, and sniffled wetly. "God," she said, and took a deeper breath. "Oh God."
"Yes," said the doctor--Beckett, was it?--and let out a dry chuckle. "Exactly." And then Jeannie laughed, and so did Dr. Beckett, and suddenly they were both laughing so hard they sounded on the verge of hysterics.
When they eventually wound down, Jeannie didn't let go. Neither did he, and Jeannie was grateful; she'd seen too much death in the last twenty-four hours and come too close to it in the last ten minutes, and at the moment it felt as if holding on was the only thing keeping her sane.
Beckett rubbed her hair meditatively. "That was an incredible thing you did out there." She chuffed thanks into his shirt, and he continued, "How did you know it was anaphylaxis?"
"My brother did that all the time when he was a kid," she said, and settled her head onto his shoulder. "You wouldn't believe how many times he went to the hospital because he ate something we didn't know had lemon in it. Or got stung by a bee. And then, of course, there was the whole incident with the pool, but--What?" she asked, when Beckett stiffened suddenly.
"Oh, nothing," he said, and sounded as if he was trying very hard not to laugh. "You must be Dr. McKay, then. I had wondered why they kept paging him to surgery." He chuckled, and this time it was something real and not so frantic.
It was contagious. Jeannie tried to picture her brother, faced with the prospect of surgery, making the face she'd always thought of as his 'you-want-me-to-eat-what?' face, and dissolved into giggles.
"God help us, should we ever be that desperate," she said breathlessly. "Could you picture that? He'd--oh, God! He--" She was laughing so hard there were tears in her eyes. "Voodoo!" she said helplessly, and they both laughed harder.
"We should probably go back out there," Beckett said a few minutes later, without moving. "If nothing else, we've got to get through there before we can eat or sleep, and I don't know about you but I cannot remember the last time I've eaten."
"Hmmmm," said Jeannie, and yawned. "Neither can I. Think they can spare us long enough to eat, sleep, and--oh, would you know where to find a 'Dr. Zelenka'?"
Beckett looked at her carefully and then smiled, the first genuine one she'd seen on the man since she'd gotten there. "As a matter of fact, I do."
Standing, he grabbed her hands and pulled her up. "Why don't we get something to eat first, and then we'll pay a visit to Dr. Zelenka. All right?"
"Sounds good, Doctor ...?"
"Carson. Call me Carson," he said.
"Carson," she said, and smiled. "Let's go."
*
Once, when Rodney was still very young, their parents had tried to encourage him to go into medicine. Brain surgery, to be precise, because once they'd realized how incredibly smart he was, they'd thought the challenge might appeal to him. Mum had invited a neurosurgeon to dinner, one of Dad's friends.
Rodney had drilled him mercilessly all through dinner on the types of different procedures and their outcomes, and the probability of brain damage. Then, he'd paused thoughtfully over dessert for one long, uncomfortable moment.
"So, basically," he said, and Jeannie could practically feel the anticipation radiating from her father and the palpable smugness from the surgeon, "what you're saying is that no one ever comes out of surgery any smarter, and half the time they actually end up dumber than they started."
Jeannie kicked him under the table, but he ignored her. And he continued, seeming perfectly oblivious to the way their father choked on his food, or the mortified way Mum seemed to shrink in on herself. "I don't see the point--I mean, why take them apart if you can't put them back together better?"
Mum hadn't thrown another dinner party for months, which thrilled Rodney to no end, and Dad hadn't ever tried to interest himself in Rodney's future again, calling the whole evening a complete loss.
The surgeon had been terribly interesting, though.
*
It turned out they didn't have to go far to find Dr. Zelenka. Jeannie and Carson staggered like exhausted drunks down the hallway to the mess, which was blessedly empty and quiet except for one rumpled scientist tapping sleepily away on his laptop.
Carson stopped abruptly. Taking in the expression of barely contained rage on the good doctor's face, Jeannie said, "That would be Dr. Zelenka, then."
He nodded curtly, and Jeannie summoned her very last dregs of energy and drew herself up straight and marched forward to the man responsible for the disaster-upon-the-disaster of a few days ago.
Reaching his table, she looked down at the man and thought of the infirmary after the move; men who'd had wounds reopened or torn further, people who'd died or could still die, or who were condemned to a crippled half-life because their conditions had been too sensitive for them to even be shifted carelessly, much less shaken violently.
She thought of her brother, whom Carson had shown her, whose stitches had ripped and whose concussion was now that much worse.
Anger building, she thought of Richard and his succession of lies and betrayals, and his tacit insistence that she was to blame. Jeannie thought of the run-around she'd gotten for the last nine months, excuses and delays ranging from the flimsy and desperate to deliberate and downright malicious; she thought of how her baby died a year ago, how she'd almost died twenty minutes ago, and when she was finally so furious she could barely contain it she thought of her mother.
Then she gathered up twenty years, nine months, two days and a lifetime's worth of helpless fury, held it like a weapon in her hands, and pointed it at the dangerously negligent scientist in front of her.
Carson looked vaguely impressed when she spoke, stepping back and crossing his arms, lips a tight line. But Zelenka just cocked his head and studied her.
She suddenly felt uncomfortably like a lab specimen. The sensation was so disconcerting that she cut herself off mid-tirade, scowling defensively. "What?"
Zelenka stood and looked at her for another long moment. Then, he spoke.
"Only one man I know of who is capable of so much fury in so very many words, and not even needing to shout." He pushed his glasses up, and held a hand out. "You must be his sister. Jeannie, yes? One moment, and I will set camera to record and then we will find the man you need to speak with. I have already talked to him, of course, but now he is too busy being glad Rodney is not awake to feel anything else."
Baffled, Jeannie shook his hand and glanced at Carson while Zelenka did something to the laptop. Carson shrugged, and kept his arms crossed.
Zelenka walked around the table and towards the door, motioning for Jeannie to follow. "You see," he said, "I recognized importance of warning Dr. Beckett. My mistake is that it was Kavanagh whom I asked to . . ."
Jeannie followed, nodding as he explained, glancing once over her shoulder to make sure Carson was with them.
*
Later that day, John made his way as stealthily as possible down the hallways to the mess. He wasn't really all that hungry, but he'd just barely dodged Heightmeyer for the third time in twelve hours, and he figured that after some of the more blatant and ridiculous measures he'd taken to avoid her, well... ducking under stretchers and very nearly diving off piers weren't exactly shining examples of normalcy. Neither was telling the woman he had to run because he thought he'd left the water on in his quarters.
Come to think of it, John didn't even know if that was actually possible with Ancient technology. He'd have to ask one of the scientists.
The point was, she could hardly fail to get the message, and John figured he should probably start acting as if he retained some semblance of sanity.
It was all about appearances. He figured eating was something sane men did, and thus it was something Kate could hardly find fault with, even if he did it at the Atlantean equivalent of three in the morning. Which he had a good explanation for, actually, as his quarters were currently too full of doctors for John to do anything in them.
Three days, and the medical staff hadn't simply stopped at the infirmary, but invaded every empty and not-so-empty space near it. Including the living quarters, but hey--they had to sleep sometime, and John hadn't the heart to kick them out. They, unlike their fellows slumped in various stages of nervous collapse outside, had found somewhere more comfortable than the hallways to sleep. And they deserved it. After all they'd done they, looked even more tired than he felt.
Besides, they were kind of cute. Like puppies, but with scrubs and stethoscopes.
Peeking in the mess hall, he saw that it was clear except for Zelenka--and did the man ever sleep?--who was frowning at something on his laptop while he guzzled coffee. Real coffee, John realized when he sniffed, wouldn't Rodney be glad and--boy, did that thought make his chest hurt.
He manfully suppressed the wild urge to run back to the closet (and nope, the significance of that was still not lost on him) where Rodney slept, and reassure himself again that Rodney was still alive, still breathing.
Instead, John grabbed a tray and stepped through the line (between the all-hours duty schedules and near-constant emergencies, they really couldn't afford to shut the mess down at all) loading his tray up with real Earth food, deliberately not-thinking of the joygasm Rodney'd have over the chocolate cake they offered him, and walked over to sit with Zelenka.
Socializing, he figured, was also something sane men did, and it wasn't as if Zelenka had the psychological high ground to go running to Heightmeyer or anything. It was a god-given fact that you always looked that much more stable next to the geeks, especially the ones they'd brought to Atlantis. Something about being just that smart seemed to mean you couldn't always function on everyone else's wavelength.
He might even look normal to Zelenka, John thought as he walked, then stopped.
There was a woman asleep on the bench. She was wearing one of the expedition jackets backwards, so it opened across the back, and had stretched out on her stomach so her head was pillowed on the padding of the jacket. One arm was curled around the top of her head and the other hung limply, nearly touching the floor.
She was also the same woman he'd been trying to figure out for the past three days. John stood for a moment, thinking. God, he knew, he just knew he should know her but he couldn't think how.
Then she spoke, and startled him half out of his skin.
"Why, yes, I am sleeping," she said without moving or opening her eyes. "Amazing, that thing you do when you're tired. Or was it not completely obvious, the way I've laid down, closed my eyes, and been very, very quiet? It's nothing nefarious, I promise. Now you can go away and leave me alone, or get me some coffee and pray I don't hurt you for waking me up."
"Uh," said John. That feeling of familiarity was stronger now than ever. "I'm sorry, Doctor. . ." he trailed off expectantly, hoping she'd fill her name in and he wouldn't feel like a complete and total ass a few days from now, when he'd be expected to know her.
"Oh," she said. "So you noticed the scrubs. Nothing gets by you and your astounding powers of observation, does it? Your family must be so proud."
With that, she snuggled deeper into the jacket and set to ignoring him. John could have sworn there was a palpable aura of 'go away' coming off of the woman in waves.
Even more perplexed than before, he looked up to where Zelenka was waving him over.
"Leave the good doctor alone. She is sleeping," he said as John approached, making it sound as if that fact could have possibly escaped him.
"I knew that," John said defensively.
"Hmmmm," Zelenka said skeptically, and tilted the laptop's screen down. "If this is about Kavanagh, he fell. Clumsy man, Kavanagh. Is a tragedy." He eyed John with suspicion.
"Huh?" What in the hell was Zelenka talking about? John shook his head, blindsided. "What happened to Kavanagh?"
"You do not know?" Zelenka relaxed and opened the laptop again. "He, ah, fell. Tripped, more like. Hit his face on the desk. It was nothing, really, mostly cosmetic." He waved a hand dismissively. "And congratulations on promotion, Lieutenant Colonel. Must be great honor, and well-deserved."
"Yeah, uh, thanks." John was absurdly flattered that Zelenka had remembered, even looked away from the computer to say something. Zelenka and Rodney, with everything that had gone on in the past few weeks, not to mention the stimulants and nuclear weapons, had gotten in the habit of disregarding everything that wasn't absolutely essential. "So," he said, waving a fork and trying for casual, "do you know who she is?"
Zelenka stopped whatever he was doing on the laptop and looked at him. "You mean, you do not?"
"Of course I do," John said shiftily, and looked down at the tray. "I was just, you know, wondering if you did."
"Oh, no, no, no," Zelenka shook his head, smiling secretively. "Colonel, if you do not already know, then I could not possibly tell you. Suffice to say, she has torn Kavanagh's ego into tiny little shreds from which he may never recover." His voice was positively gleeful. "It is a thing of greatness, a thing even Rodney has not yet been able to do, and Kavanagh is terribly upset. Destroyed, even, and so he trips and falls." Zelenka motioned with both hands, smacking one onto the other, "Right onto his desk. Very strange angle, mind you, which is how his eye is black."
"Right," John said, grinning. "So, he tripped and hit his face on her fist--"
"His desk."
"His desk, then."
"I was there," said Zelenka solemnly. "As was Dr. Beckett. You go ask him if you do not believe me."
"Which is why you're here," said John, "watching her sleep, when you could be sleeping, yourself."
"She is sleeping the sleep of the righteous," Zelenka said with conviction. "It should not be disturbed. Especially by those who could be . . ."
"Clumsy?" finished John.
"Yes," said Zelenka. "Or possibly concerned."
"Ah," said John, nodding. Zelenka obviously didn't trust this woman, whoever she was, not to tell the truth.
"I wonder who is coming," Zelenka said a moment later, when voices could be heard echoing down the corridor outside the mess hall. John cocked his head and listened.
"Huh. That sounds like--oh, shit!" he said suddenly, shoving his tray at Zelenka and ducking below the table.
"Colonel," Zelenka began, but stopped when John kicked him.
"Shhhhh!" he hissed. "I'm not here!"
Zelenka must have gotten the message, because he settled down and didn't point John out when Dr. Heightmeyer poked her head around the corner looking for him.
"Damn," she said, turning back to the hallway. "It doesn't look like he's in here, either, Elizabeth. I'm telling you . . ." Her voice receded down the corridor as she walked away.
"Colonel Sheppard," Zelenka said to thin air, "are you feeling all right?"
"Yes. Fine. Why?" John peeked hesitantly over the tabletop. All clear. Good.
"You seem..." Zelenka looked carefully at him. "Edgy, is all."
"I'm fine," John said, maybe a little too firmly to be believable, but he'd just blown his camouflage among the geeks all to hell. So much for looking normal. "What? Do I have some kind of twitch or something?" Great, now he sounded petulant. Damn, damn, damn. John stabbed his fork into the chicken roughly.
Zelenka was mercifully silent while John brutalized his dinner for several long minutes, and by then John was so focused on his tray that he didn't even hear Elizabeth approach.
"Dr. Zelenka." She was nearly at the table, "Oh, John?" Elizabeth paused, looked quizzically at him. "I didn't think you'd be here." She raised an eyebrow at him.
"I, uh..." Jesus, he was caught. He was so caught.
"Colonel Sheppard was just sitting down, Dr. Weir," said Zelenka smoothly, and John mentally thanked God for geniuses. They always came in so handy.
"Yes, I just got here." John sat a little straighter, and Elizabeth shook her head.
"Well, that's not why I'm here," Elizabeth said, and sat down. "Dr. Zelenka, I've just spoken with Kavanagh. What's this I hear about Rodney's sister--"
John was just opening his mouth to say something disbelieving, when one of the nurses' voices came over the intercom and paged Dr. McKay to surgery.
He was about to say something even more incredulous, when there was a startled squawk from a couple tables down. The red-haired doctor who'd snapped at him earlier suddenly jumped up like she'd been burned, fought with the jacket for a moment, then flung it away and was running out the doorway at top speed.
"That's who she is?" He turned wide eyes to Zelenka, who nodded. "Damn it, I knew I knew her!" He was still shaking his head when Elizabeth cleared her throat. "Sorry."
"That's all right. As I was saying--Dr. Zelenka, I understand Rodney's sister hit Kavanagh?" Elizabeth looked as if she really wanted Zelenka to tell her how ridiculous she was being.
"Dr. Weir. As you know, I am very concerned about these allegations." Zelenka turned the laptop to face Elizabeth and continued, "Just as Rodney would be. So, I am just now looking at evidence, and I tell you she did not hit Kavanagh. He fell. Security camera never lies."
He tapped the keyboard, and a video began to play across the screen. Kavanagh was at his desk, shuffling paperwork, and three people came into the room: Beckett, Zelenka, and Rodney's sister. Rodney's sister walked right up to the desk--and, wow, John wished Zelenka'd left the volume on, because it looked like Kavanagh was getting the ass-chewing of a lifetime. Kavanagh must've said something unforgivably stupid, because Beckett stiffened and Rodney's sister stepped even closer to the desk.
The video feed suddenly blinked and stuttered, and when it came back Kavanagh was bent over the desk holding his eye and looked to be howling bloody murder, while Beckett stepped forward to help him up and Rodney's sister cradled her hand.
"Dr. Zelenka," began Elizabeth, her expression skeptical.
"Wait," said Zelenka, "This part you listen to." He leaned forward, tapped another key, and John had been right--Kavanagh was howling bloody murder.
"Now calm down, laddie," Dr. Beckett was saying on the tape, but his back was to the camera, so John couldn't see his expression. "That's a nasty fall you've just taken."
"There, you see?" Zelenka said, pausing the video and taking the laptop back. "It was an accident. Terrible, tragic accident, but also terribly embarrassing. Who can blame Kavanagh for wanting it to be different, eh?"
"Dr. Zelenka." Elizabeth was really trying hard to keep a level tone. "There is time missing from the video. What happened to it?"
"I do not know," Zelenka said. "Perhaps it was a small malfunction."
"So what really happened, Doctor? Don't lie to me." Elizabeth leaned forward over the table.
Zelenka sighed, like a man defeated. "All right, the truth? Here is the truth. I am watching them shout at each other, and suddenly there is something in my eyes, yes? So, I am rubbing my eyes when Kavanagh is injured. But Carson is talking about a fall, and so I believe him. After all, why would Carson lie?"
"So why is she holding her fist?" Lesser men had broken under such scrutiny, but Zelenka just kept tapping away on the keyboard.
"I do not know. Maybe she is wanting to hit him."
"But you didn't see."
"No, not exactly. But I was there."
"But there was something in your eyes."
"For a short moment, yes."
Elizabeth sighed. "All right, Dr. Zelenka. I'll let this go for now." She stood up and turned to leave. "But next time I hear from Kavanagh, I'm sending him to you. Frankly, I'm tired of hearing about it." With that, she left.
John leaned forward and snatched the laptop out of Zelenka's hands.
"Give me that," John said, practically bouncing in gleeful anticipation. "I want to watch it with the volume on this time."
*
"Jeannie," Caldwell caught her just as she was coming back on shift. Two hours of sleep, a meal, and nearly a pot and a half of coffee really did wonders.
"Stephen," she said warmly, "What can I do for you? How's your wife?"
"Jeannie, listen. I need to talk to you." Caldwell's face was uncharacteristically drawn, lacking the easy good humor she usually saw there. He drew her into Carson's office, where she'd broken down nearly two days ago. "Something's happened."
*
John was dreaming. He was in the jumper again, he was falling, it was breaking apart, and he knew that this time the Daedalus wasn't going to get there in time. It couldn't catch him. The world exploded in fire and light; and silence, as the air slipped away and John's eardrums burst. His eyes hurt, his lungs hurt, and suddenly he knew Rodney was there next to him. Rodney was dying, too.
Then John felt the abrupt paralysis of the Daedalus transporters, hit the hard metal deck and inhaled the sterile atmosphere of the ship, and he knew they'd only saved him. Rodney was still out there, they'd saved him and forgotten Rodney, Rodney was dying, but before John could say anything, the viewscreen went to bright white as the bomb detonated and everything around it became so much dust.
"John," croaked Rodney, but that wasn't right. Rodney was dead. "John."
"Wha? Huh?" John woke fully and abruptly when someone grabbed his knee and moved it. He looked down to see Rodney still alive and blinking owlishly at him in the dark of the supply closet. "Rodney?" Oh, Christ. Rodney was better than just alive, he was awake. He leaned forward, took the hand that rested on his knee, "Hey. Hey, you're awake. How are you feeling?"
"Like hammered shit," Rodney rasped, and gave a dry sort of cough. "Thirsty. Water, please?"
"Yeah, yeah, of course." John rose and, after a second, remembered to let go of Rodney's hand. "Water? I can do that. I think Dr. Beckett's still asleep, so I'll just. Um, grab a nurse, okay?" John knew he was grinning like an idiot, but he didn't care because there was Rodney, looking like he felt like shit but smiling right back at him.
"Small sips," John cautioned a few minutes later, after bringing ice water and pillows to stack behind Rodney to help him sit up. "The nurse said small sips. They're still pretty damn busy out there, but she said she'd have someone in here in a minute."
"Mmmm. Where am I?" Rodney asked, taking in his surroundings.
"In a supply closet," John answered. "Just off the infirmary. They didn't have anywhere else private and quiet to put you."
"Closet? What happened? Jesus..." Rodney reached out, grabbed John's wrist. "The hive ship--is it still out there? What about--" Rodney's eyes were huge with fear, so John put the cup down and took Rodney's hand in both of his.
"Hey," he said. "Calm down. It's over. There was an explosion in the chair room just after the Daedalus dropped me off. The chair took most of it, but we were pretty worried about you for a while." He stroked his thumb over Rodney's knuckles, felt the nervous play of muscle and tendon as Rodney squeezed convulsively.
"But the hive ship," Rodney insisted. "And the ZPM--"
"The ZPM's in place, Rodney," John said soothingly. "The city's underwater. The Daedalus took care of the last hive ship, but they beamed out a whole load of humans just before they took it out, which is why the infirmary's so full. We had to dial the SGC for more doctors, but it's under control now."
Rodney looked more worried and confused than soothed, so John held the cup up to his lips again and added, "We have chocolate."
He was irrationally pleased to see Rodney's eyes widen mid-sip.
"Real chocolate?" Rodney asked, and his voice was so breathy and pleased that John had to shift and change the topic before Rodney could say anything else with that tone.
"Real chocolate," he said quickly, and nodded. "Shit, I forgot. When the nurse comes, I gotta go get--" He cut himself off. "Um, someone."
"Who?" Rodney asked quizzically.
"Someone." John grinned. "Just someone. Who's been asking about you."
"Major," Rodney said, warningly.
"Not a major anymore, Rodney. Jeez, keep up with the times," John teased. "Or you could just call me John. My friends call me John."
"Oh, yes," said Rodney. "Because I can't count past colonel. Whatever would I do if you got promoted again?"
*
"Death threats?" Jeannie repeated dumbly. This wasn't happening; this couldn't be happening, "Extremist groups?"
"It's not as serious as it sounds, Jeannie," Colonel Caldwell said comfortingly. "But Richard's supported some pretty controversial policy recently--and your divorce isn't solid, yet. Not to mention, it hasn't exactly been a public matter. Family is always a target for these kinds of groups, and after what happened to that federal judge--well, we just want to be cautious."
"Cautious. Oh my God," Jeannie said, and sat down. It was stupid, she knew, but part of her had believed that everything she had to be afraid of was on this side of the gate. "I've got to go be with my kids, Stephen."
"I thought you might," he said. "And they seem to have things pretty well in hand, here, so we were going to be sending some of the staff back today, and I've arranged for you to be in that group. General O'Neill will have someone meet you on the other side, who'll tell you what they're going to be doing next."
"Okay," she said, and stood on numb and shaking legs. "Okay. Oh my God."
Caldwell stepped forward and hugged her, hard. "And if you or the kids need anything at all, you give Ellen a call," he said firmly.
"I will," she said, nodding. "And--thank you."
"Everything is going to be fine," he said. "They're just taking precautions."
"I know." Jeannie's voice broke, and she wiped unsteadily at her eyes. "I know, and thank you."
"It's nothing." Stephen walked her to the door of the office. "Just get done whatever you need to get done, and I'll see you in the gate room in an hour."
*
Jeannie walked blindly out of Dr. Beckett's office, smack into the Air Force officer who'd helped defuse the hostage situation a few days earlier. "Oh, sorry. I'm sorry," she said. "I wasn't looking--"
"Nah, that's all right. I wasn't either." He grinned at her. "But you're just the person I wanted to see. Jeannie, right?" Before she could answer, he'd grabbed her arm and was pulling her with him.
"Colonel Sheppard." Stephen Caldwell stepped out of the office behind her. Sheppard turned around and practically snapped to attention.
"Sir," he said, and belatedly remembered to let go of her arm.
"Is there something you need with Dr. McKay?"
"Actually, yes" Sheppard shifted uncomfortably and looked like Jeannie's son, back when he was five and nearly incapable of standing still. "Sir. Her brother's awake, and I just thought she'd want to know. Because she's been asking about him. You know."
"He is?" Jeannie grabbed Sheppard's arm and waved Caldwell away. "Can I see him?"
"Yeah." Sheppard smiled again. "This way. C'mon."
*
Rodney had always been unpredictable as a child: always into everything, disassembling and reassembling the oddest things, wanting to see how they worked, wanting to see what would happen. You never could guess what he was going to get into next, which was probably the only thing about him you could count on, aside from his irrational loathing of closed doors, his endless fascination with--i.e., determination to drown himself in--the pool, and his undying love for cookies and Tupperware.
As a matter of fact, the McKay household had owned two sets of Tupperware. One for using and one, to Mum's dismay, for Rodney.
Fairly early on, Rodney had decided two things: one, that Tupperware was pretty much the coolest thing ever, and two, that it was his. Nobody touched the Tupperware but him.
If anyone else tried to take it out of the cupboard or, worse, use it for something, he would stop whatever he was doing to wave his little fist threateningly and loudly berate the perpetrator--something Jeannie had always found pretty funny, especially since you could never understand a word of what he was trying to say. And once he'd learned how to walk, he'd haul toddler ass over to where you stood and try to snatch the plasticware back.
As far as Jeannie could tell, Rodney never actually did anything with the stuff except bang it on things and try to drown it in the pool but, by God, that was Rodney's Tupperware and Lord help anyone who tried to tamper with it.
He hoarded the stuff shamelessly from before his first birthday until he was nearly six. One piece, a lid, actually spent months in the crib for no discernible reason except that Rodney wanted it there.
Well, that, and he could use it to make noise when he wanted let out of the crib, or smack you with it when he wanted left in.
*
That doggedly possessive, slightly outraged look Rodney had always worn whenever someone tried to use his Tupperware happened to be exact same expression he wore now.
"I'm so glad to hear you're on a first name basis," Rodney said snidely, crossing his arms and glaring up at her from the cot where he sat. After four days, the infirmary had cleared out some, but not enough to move Rodney out of the supply closet or get him one of those adjustable beds. Instead, it looked like they'd given him a bunch of pillows he could pile up behind himself and lean back against. "I mean, you don't quite qualify as 'alien bimbo', but we've been here long enough you probably still seem like you came from another planet."
"Christ, Rodney!" Jeannie threw her hands up in exasperation. "I haven't been in here two minutes, and already you're looking at me like I just stole your Tupperware! All I said was that he was nice."
"Well, good for you. I'm sure you and John will get along fine." He readjusted his arms and glared at the wall beside her.
My brother is in lots of pain, Jeannie told herself, and gritted her teeth. He is on an enormous amount of pain medication and is not thinking clearly. I will not kill my brother.
"Rodney," she finally grated. "Two things. One, Colonel Sheppard is not Tupperware. You cannot keep him to yourself just to hit stuff with him, or drown him, or whatever arcane things you used it for. Two," she said quellingly as he opened his mouth to speak, "I came here as a doctor, to save lives, and as a sister, to make sure my brother was all right. I did not come here to molest your friends or steal your glory. But if it makes you happy, I won't be nice to anyone."
She must have taken him by surprise, because he crossed and uncrossed his arms without saying anything for a long moment. Then, he shifted and said, "Carson."
"What?" Lord, he must have been hopped up on pain-killers, because he'd finally started making even less sense than before.
"Carson," Rodney said magnanimously. "You can be nice to Carson." He sounded as if he'd much rather not have said it but even so, it was kind of sweet.
"Wow, Rodney," she said. "You think I'm good enough for one of your friends. I'm almost . . . dangerously flattered." Jeannie crossed her arms and leaned back against the wall.
Rodney snorted. "He's a decent guy, your age, and I'd much rather be related to him than Dick." Jeannie rolled her eyes, and Rodney continued. "Besides, Zelenka's carrying a torch for Elizabeth, and Ford's young enough that he could probably be your son. Oh, and if you even so much as touch Kavanagh, I reserve the right to disown you," he added almost as an afterthought.
"Hmmm." Jeannie studied her knuckles, tried to keep the smile out of her voice. "Does it count if I hit him?"
Rodney's eyes widened incredulously. "No. If you hit him, I just might hug you."
"Really?" Jeannie grinned, and pretended to think about it. "So do I have to hit him again, or did the first time count?"
This time she did catch him by surprise, because he dropped his arms and gaped for a second before drawing himself up again in some morphine-tinged semblance of dignity.
"Proof," Rodney said, glaring at the IV as if wondering what kind of dope they had him on. "I want proof."
"I can do that," said Jeannie. "Zelenka says he caught it on video. Although I really wouldn't mind hitting him again."
Rodney's eyes widened again, brows lifting. "What the hell is he doing with video? That Czech bastard! What's he trying to do--send you to jail?" His voice was so full of outrage that Jeannie had to smile again.
"Relax, Rodney. Apparently there's a few seconds missing, and he and Carson have both staunchly maintained that the unlikable piece of shit fell and hit his face on his desk. I'm clean."
Rodney snorted, but didn't say anything more. There followed a long, awkward moment between them. That was probably normal, Jeannie thought, for two people who'd had as little to say to each other for as long as they had, and this still wasn't going half as badly as she'd feared it would.
Then Rodney spoke, and Jeannie realized she was wrong, that things weren't going well at all.
"So, how was the funeral?" he asked carefully, and the question struck home the way only the shots that should never be taken could. Jeannie felt walls come tumbling down in her chest, old hurts come loose to burn white-hot and angry behind her ribs.
That wasn't right, she thought, it had never been Rodney's way to use the things you loved to hurt you. It wasn't right at all, and it was nothing like the brother she remembered, or the brother she'd loved; and that was a betrayal that hurt as much or more than the words he'd just spoken. She felt her eyes burn, and turned away because she couldn't bear to look at Rodney right now.
"It was nice," she said past the furious lump of hurt in her throat, willing her voice level. You should have been there, she thought, but he hadn't been and maybe that said more than she'd thought. "Richard said you were busy." At the time, she'd believed that he'd been busy, had never believed Rodney would willingly blow something like that off, but suddenly she had to wonder how much of her faith in him had been wishful thinking.
"He did?" said Rodney, and he sounded surprised.
That was the best you could do? Jeannie thought furiously. She'd fought her husband and a dozen other politicians to find him--hell, she'd even crossed a galaxy to find him--and this was what he had to say? You missed my son's funeral, she thought, and restrained the foolish urge to kick the wall. You'd never even met him, but he was my son and he deserved something better than that. Dammit, I deserve something better than that.
"I shouldn't have come here," she said, still facing away, and looked at her feet. "But I guess I've seen what I came to see." Her voice was thick--damn her tendency to tears when it came down to family--and she swallowed. "And I should probably be going now."
She walked out the door without giving him a chance to reply. She thought she heard him say something, but that could have been wishful thinking, too; and she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to hear what he had to say, anyway. Not yet.
*
John had just crept back into the supply closet with Rodney when Colonel Caldwell came in and pulled a Post-It note out of his uniform pocket.
"So, you would be Rodney McKay?" he said, and continued when Rodney nodded. "This is for you. I understand you've already spoken with your sister, but--I have my orders."
Caldwell held the note out to Rodney, who reached up to take it, as John rose nervously from the crate. "Right. I'll just, uh, go get--"
"My laptop," Rodney supplied helpfully.
"Yeah, his laptop," John finished quickly, and slid out past Caldwell.
Ten minutes later he was headed back to the infirmary, having fetched the laptop and cheerfully promised Zelenka he'd have Rodney look into that elusive malfunction in the security cameras.
John fully intended to wait a few minutes before trying the closet door, but it opened as he approached and Rodney waved him through.
"Thank you, John. Come in," he said, not really paying attention. "Go on," he said to Caldwell, as John sat down.
Caldwell glanced at John and didn't quite raise an eyebrow. "As I was saying, Dr. McKay, I think you'd find it rather hazardous to suggest that Senator Grant lets your sister do anything. As certain persons in Washington have already found, to their detriment. As for working at the SGC, I gather General O'Neill chose to take her on because she has some--to put it delicately--'political contacts' which may prove useful to the SGC. In addition, her position at the SGC makes it much more difficult for said 'political contacts' to move against her." He paused meaningfully.
Rodney scowled. "Colonel, you're acting like that should mean something else. Stop talking in code and get to the point, please."
John wasn't sure, but he thought he saw Caldwell almost crack a smile.
"All right," Caldwell said. "Dr. McKay, your sister's spent the last nine months blackmailing dozens of politicians, dignitaries, and various other important figures. From what I gather, with the information she had, she could have asked for anything. She asked for you, because nine months ago she had a hunch her baby brother was in trouble and you were nowhere to be found."
Rodney gaped. "You mean, she blackmailed . . ." he trailed off dazedly.
"Half of Washington," Caldwell said, perfectly serious.
"Half of Washington. To send me this?" Rodney waved the Post-It note. "To mail a death threat to the Pegasus Galaxy?"
The note, John saw, read: "What, you thought you could leave the galaxy and I wouldn't find out? You had better be all right, or you are a dead man, Rodney McKay."
This time, Caldwell did smile. "Actually," he said, "her main objective, as I understood it, was to find out where you were, and that you were alive and well. Everything, including her divorce and her employment at the SGC, was a means to that end. There are even, I gather, still some photos of a very--sensitive--nature that Senator Grant will not receive until your safe arrival."
Rodney opened his mouth, then closed it again a second later.
Caldwell continued, "General O'Neill hired her so he could give her the clearance to tell her where you were, and because she is a competent surgeon who has also promised not to blackmail anyone in the future. Except, of course, in the interests of the SGC. Men sleep better at night, knowing that she works there and thinking there's been a deal made. And because important men sleep better, Jeannie's life is that much more secure. Unless, of course, Richard does something even more inexcusably stupid before the divorce is public."
The last was said in a sardonic tone of voice that was completely lost on Rodney, who looked like a kid who couldn't quite believe he'd gotten exactly what he'd wanted for Christmas.
"She blackmailed Richard," Rodney said, almost to himself. He even sounded like a kid who couldn't quite believe he'd gotten exactly what he'd wanted for Christmas. "She's blackmailing him and she's leaving him. I didn't think she had it in her."
"Oh, please," Caldwell said sharply. "My wife and I have known Jeannie for years. Richard's a conniving asshole and he's always been a conniving asshole, but your sister's a good woman. And I will say," he added, "that if you both hadn't let him get between you, you might know that."
Rodney studied his hands, which were busy folding and unfolding the Post-It note, and was uncharacteristically silent. "So," he said a moment later. "Two weeks?"
"Two weeks," Caldwell repeated. "And there will be no blowing yourself up in the meantime. Ellen would kill me and, frankly, I don't want to know what your sister would do to me. And, Colonel," Caldwell nodded to John, "you might think about where you want to spend your leave. I hear it's coming up."
"Yes, sir," John said, and inwardly groaned. The man must have talked to Heightmeyer. Damn her and her sympathetic looks and her persuasive and stalkery ways.
She'd caught up with John yesterday, and he'd babbled nonsense at her for nearly fifteen minutes before he'd realized what he was saying--and who he was saying it to--and bolted. She must have talked to Elizabeth and Carson because they, and now even Caldwell (but not Rodney or Zelenka yet, thank God) treated him as if he was ready to snap at any given moment.
Caldwell left and Rodney sat there for another long moment, fiddling with the note.
"What's wrong?" John asked. "You look like you'd rather run naked on the planet of the Wraith than visit your sister."
"I almost would," Rodney said mournfully. "I think I may have been unforgivably tactless, and now I should probably apologize. If she'll let me."
"I'll go with you," John said, then flushed. "Er, that is, if you want."
"You'll come with me to visit my family," Rodney said slowly, and looked suspicious. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah. I mean, it's not like I'm going to get a choice about leave," John said awkwardly. "And I'd like to go with you. Um. I mean, I wouldn't--I'd rather--uh. It's not like it would be a hardship, or anything."
"Are you feeling okay?" Rodney looked worried and John mentally kicked himself.
"I'm fine," he said defensively. "Seriously, do I have some sort of twitch or something?" So much for camouflage--even the Head Geek saw through him. "No, really. You can tell me."
"No, nothing like that. You just seem kind of--" Rodney cocked his head, studying him. "Edgy, is all."
"I'm fine," John said, and stopped there. Anything more probably counted as whining. He set the laptop gently down on Rodney's legs. "Here. Zelenka wanted you to check the security cameras in Kavanagh's office. Apparently there was a glitch in the system a few days ago."
"Ah." Rodney looked from the note in his hands to the computer on his lap. "Kavanagh's office, eh? Sounds important."
"Oh, yeah." John nodded and scooted his crate closer while Rodney booted up the computer. "Definitely top priority."
John had to call a nurse for more painkillers when Rodney hurt his ribs laughing after they'd found the missing footage and watched it for the third time, but that was okay. Rodney said it was the funniest thing he'd ever seen.
"I could hug her," he told John after having been drugged to the teeth again. "Kavanagh may never recover."
"Hell, Rodney, you might not recover." John hovered awkwardly. Rodney was sprawled back against his pile of pillows, still holding his side and breathing shallowly.
"No, no," Rodney said earnestly. "I feel better already."
"That's the drugs," John pointed out. "You just think you do."
"I do," Rodney insisted, nodding and fixing John with glazed blue eyes. "Laughter is the best medicine."
"Huh, well, I think you've just blown that out of the water," John smirked. They must have given Rodney the good drugs, because he really was stoned. It was kind of cute.
Boneless and languorous, Rodney scrubbed at his face and shifted onto his side, stifling a yawn. "So," he looked up at John, eyes unfocused. "What did Kavanagh do, exactly?"
Rodney's left ear was terribly distracting; the curve of it was still just barely pink from where he'd rubbed it. John wanted to reach out and soothe it, trace the curvature of Rodney's earlobe with his finger. "Well," he said uncomfortably, forcing himself to focus on something else, "it's a long story, but basically...." Rodney had really blue eyes, he noticed. Right now, they were curious and open instead of guarded and angry like they had been five days ago in the chair room. He was forgiven, John thought, and his chest tightened. He must be forgiven, because all the very good drugs in the world couldn't make Rodney forget a grudge he wanted to keep.
"Hello? Atlantis to John?" Rodney reached out and bumped John's knee. "You still there?"
"Yeah, uh, sorry. Kavanagh..." John cleared his throat, ducked his head. "Zelenka put him in charge of coordinating the move with Beckett."
"What? Oh my God." Rodney's eyes widened almost comically. "He didn't tell Carson."
"No, he told him we were moving the city," John said sourly. "He just didn't tell him how or when, so they didn't have the warning to be ready for it. It was an absolute disaster."
"Yes, well. I can imagine," Rodney said angrily, scowling, eyes hard and furious. He tried to sit up. "He needs to be beaten again. You know, until now, he was abrasive but still competent. Now--"
"Hey," said John, forestalling the tirade by taking Rodney's hand. "He's being dealt with. Elizabeth and Caldwell are taking care of it." Rodney's hand was warm and heavy in his, all rough knuckles and soft, smooth palm. John staunchly resisted the impulse to rub his thumb across the inside of Rodney's wrist, down his forearm to the elbow. He wondered what it would feel like, what Rodney would do. "They've already spoken to Carson about the extent of the damage done by the move, and the argument with your sister has been given to Zelenka to deal with."
"And Radek says he fell. He's not going to get off the hook by saying he's been assaulted," Rodney finished, and John saw his eyes soften, felt his hand unclench as he relaxed back into the cot. "Good, although it would be kind of fun if he tried to take it up with me."
"Considering how he's probably responsible for the extra two days you spent unconscious? Ha. I'd like to see that." John snickered. "But only if we can tape it. You know, for posterity. 'See Kavanagh cry.' Maybe we could even get your sister in on it, too. It'd be like bonding." He squeezed Rodney's hand.
Rodney chuckled and looked at him a bit oddly, but didn't move to take his hand back. John figured that was as good a place to start as any, and held on.
*
"I hear they're sending personnel back today," Beckett said, as if Rodney weren't already aware. "I understand you're to be going with them. You'll want to be very, very careful with these stitches, Rodney. They've already ripped once. And mind your concussion, too, I don't want to hear of you hurting your head again." He crouched and started stripping wires and monitors from Rodney's skin while he performed a cursory inspection of the injuries. "That was a pretty nasty knock you took there, already."
"Twice," John said from the doorway. He'd been right about Caldwell and Weir forcing leave on him, so he was leaning next to his and Rodney's bags against the doorjamb, waiting.
Rodney rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes, of course, Carson. Watch my stitches, mind my head. It's not as if I'm going mountain climbing or bungee jumping, or otherwise engaging in the whole plethora of pursuits which promise boatloads of fun and bodily injury. Not when I could be doing something lazy and safe, like eating, sleeping, or watching re-runs on the Sci-Fi channel."
Beckett chuffed. Rodney ignored him.
"I'm staying with my sister, who, as you may or may not have noticed, happens to be a doctor." Rodney used his best scathing tone, which Carson effortlessly ignored.
"That reminds me, Rodney. Why didn't you tell use your sister was a scientist?" he asked conversationally.
"Because she's not," Rodney said tartly. "She's a doctor. Ouch!" He rubbed his arm where Beckett had yanked the IV line out, somewhat less than gently. "That was vicious, Carson. I'm bleeding."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Carson said airily. "There, you're done. Get dressed and get out of here. I don't want to see you for another two weeks."
"I'll miss you, too. Don't sound so sad to see me go," Rodney said darkly, reaching for the clothes John had brought him. "I'm wounded."
"Oh, don't mistake me," Beckett said mock-sadly, resting a hand on Rodney's shoulder. "I'm crushed. It'll be quite the ordeal, the next few weeks. All of those patients, and none of them complain quite like you."
Snickering, John moved aside to let Beckett out and shrugged innocently when Rodney glared at him.
Rodney bitched and moaned about his arm all the way to the control room. "I think I'm still bleeding," he griped, cradling his arm. "Look at this."
John rolled his eyes and kept a straight face. Smiling would only encourage him. "Rodney, you're fine," he drawled. "Chill out. Everybody bleeds a little after an IV."
"No, look at this." Rodney waved his forearm. "This was brutal. Everyone else thinks he's nice." He snorted. "I know better. That man is evil. He has anger management issues. He wasn't even that mean when I told him medicine was voodoo."
"He's in love," John said impishly.
"Huh?" Rodney was flabbergasted.
"I did tell you," John said, "that your sister was the one who helped talk that Genii woman down?"
"My sister? Yes." Rodney looked confused. "But what does she have to do with Carson?"
"If you don't know," John answered, grinning secretively, "then I won't tell you."
Elizabeth greeted them as they entered the control room. "John, Rodney--you're late," she said, and bustled them through to where the Stargate had already been activated. John looked at Rodney, grinned, and stepped through.
Jeannie McKay stood on the other side at the bottom of the ramp: arms crossed, lips thinned into a firm line, and every bit as terrifying as Elizabeth Weir could sometimes be. She was even giving Rodney the evil eye. "You came," she said.
Rodney snorted. "It's not as if I had a choice," he muttered.
"Well," Jeannie said, and surprised Rodney by hugging him. "It's good to see you, too."
John smirked. Here was a woman who obviously spoke Rodney.
"So," Rodney said when she let go. "Did you bring me back for any particular reason, or are we just going to stand here?" He looked around impatiently, catching sight of Colonel Carter as she walked toward him.
John nudged Jeannie, smirking, and cocked his head towards Rodney, "That means, 'Can we go now? I'm hungry. Feed me.'"
"Oh, of course," Jeannie said, nodding sagely. "I speak his language."
"You, too?" John asked in mock surprise.
Pointing at Rodney, who was completely oblivious and engaged in conversation with Carter, Jeannie grinned wickedly. "'It's not nice to see you again,'" she said, sotto voce. "'In fact, it's excruciatingly uncomfortable. Please excuse me while I find myself a pressing reason to be elsewhere.'"
As if on cue, Rodney glanced nervously back at them. John couldn't help it; he burst out laughing. Rodney scowled and turned back to Carter, speaking hurriedly.
"Well," he said, stalking back over to them, "are we ready to go?" He motioned expansively and began walking towards the exit. When John didn't follow immediately, he stopped and heaved an exaggerated sigh.
"This is Earth, Colonel," he snapped., "Colorado, actually. Which means there are plenty of women here to hit on who aren't my sister."
*
As Jeannie watched, the laughter left John Sheppard's face, followed by irritation first, then frustration, and resignation.
Sheppard rolled his eyes. "I'm coming." He put on an air of annoyed good humor as he hurried to catch up, but Jeannie didn't miss the flash of something else that crossed his features before he'd turned fully away.
That something else was what made her frown briefly in puzzlement, then smile as something occurred to her. She studied her brother's back, the set of Rodney's shoulders as Sheppard caught up to him and bumped into him companionably.
"'I'm jealous,'" she said softly, and smiled.
Jeannie had always been good at reading people, and she sometimes wondered why Rodney chose to ignore that. Maybe, she thought, he just didn't want to admit how well Jeannie could read him.
*
"I was not hitting on your sister," John said, irritated, as he caught up to Rodney.
"Oh, really? My mistake. I could have sworn I recognized your 'diplomacy with the natives' routine." Rodney was smirking, taking the sting out of the words.
Well, Rodney had brought it up. "Yes, really," John said amiably. "How do I say this? She's not, um--mysterious--enough."
"Mysterious?" Rodney asked, mock-incredulously. "Ah. You mean 'duplicitous'."
"Mysterious," John insisted. "I like my women mysterious."
"And preferably of another species."
John gritted his teeth. Rodney always won with that. "Glowy," he said. "Non-corporeal."
"Dead," Rodney said smugly. "Dead. Alien. Priestess."
"She was not dead," John ground out, because he'd never thought of it that way before, and--wow, that was really sick. "She was," he groped for words, "ascended."
"Dead!" Rodney sing-songed triumphantly. "She was dead, John. In fact, her body's probably buried somewhere on that planet. She was dead, dead, dead. It's funny," he said conversationally. "I mean, I know objectively that the US military turns out some of the kinkiest bastards around. But I never really would have figured you for what is, essentially--"
"Fine!" John yelped, before Rodney could finish that sentence in public. "She was dead, okay? Just--you couldn't tell. Seriously. Which way are we supposed to be heading, anyway?"
Jeannie appeared on the other side of Rodney, who was snickering and muttering something about pilots and lost. "This way," she said, and steered them to the left. "Steven's waiting out by the car, with the Secret Service men."
"Secret Service?" said Rodney, just as John spoke.
"Steven?" Oh, no, thought John. Bad enough that his new senior officer shared the name but please, oh please, not anyone related to Rodney.
"My oldest," Jeannie answered, and looked at him curiously when he groaned. "And the Secret Service are there because Richard's had some death threats, and the divorce isn't public yet." She kept walking. "This one. C'mon."
Once in the elevator, John elbowed Rodney.
"Ow." Rodney glared at him.
John glared back. "You let me name the Wraith after your nephew?" he hissed.
"Actually, we call him 'Steven' or 'Stevie'," Rodney muttered. "And he's named after my Uncle Steve. So, technically, you named the Wraith after my uncle. Feel better?"
"No," said John, aggrieved. "I don't--I can't believe you."
"You were going to name it after someone, no matter which name you chose," Rodney grumbled. "Did it really matter, anyway? Aside from the fact that you just happened to name it after your new CO, of course."
"Yes, it does," John sulked.
"There are people out there named 'Bob' or 'Robert', you know. Does that bother you?" Rodney didn't wait for an answer. "Although, I'd have to say I would have preferred it if we could have named it 'Richard'."
Jeannie laughed a little at that, and John blushed because he'd forgotten she was in the elevator with them. She regarded Rodney fondly. "What about the other Wraith?" she asked playfully. "What would you have named that one?"
"Andrew," Rodney answered promptly. "After Dad. Obviously. So, how long have you worked at the SGC?" he asked with characteristic abruptness.
Jeannie didn't miss a beat. "Not long. Since you sent that video. Which, by the way, was so unsubtle that even my children knew something was wrong with Uncle Rodney." The elevator opened and they stepped out.
"What?" Rodney said indignantly. "It was subtle. I can do subtle. And it was obviously subtle; it wouldn't have passed the security screening if it hadn't been."
"Subtle? Hah! Maybe for someone who's never met you," Jeannie baited. "Or at least doesn't know you, hardly."
Rodney grumbled something under his breath. "And your kids do? How old are they, again?" he said snidely.
"Thirteen and two-and-a-half. And they've met you before. I'd say that's enough," Jeannie retorted. "Already you're a legend in their young minds."
John snickered. It really did run in the family.
"Just as I should be," Rodney said smugly. He pushed open the door and they emerged into the parking lot.
"Oh, God," John breathed, and halted suddenly. "Look at them!"
"What?" Rodney studied him strangely, but John didn't answer right away. He was too busy staring.
"They're beautiful." John was practically drooling, but he didn't care. "Just--look at them." He sighed happily.
"John," Rodney's voice was very careful, soothing even. It was his let's-not-startle-the-madman voice. "What are you talking about?"
"Cars, Rodney. Cars!" John beamed, gesturing around the parking lot. "As in 'things that can go two hundred miles an hour'!" Another happy sigh. "There's no place like home," he said dreamily.
"Oh, all right," Rodney's voice was sarcastic, but John thought he heard a definite note of relief. "If you say so, Dorothy."
"How can you not be excited?" John demanded. "We haven't seen a real car in months."
Rodney's mouth twitched. "Because they're not that cool, John."
John snorted disdainfully, and barely restrained himself from petting the hood of the red convertible nearest him. "How do you know what's cool anyway? You're a scientist, you're not supposed to know cool when you see it. You're supposed to analyze cool until it goes out of style."
"I think I'm insulted," Rodney said peevishly. "And anyway, I just know. Okay?"
"You do, do you?" Jeannie said, smirking.
Rodney groaned. "Don't you start," he said warningly. "I mean it."
Jeannie just hummed happily, raising her chin in a way that made her look very much like her brother. Rodney seemed torn between embarrassed and amused, and kicked her in the ankle.
John cocked his head questioningly. He was missing something, he just knew it. He caught Jeannie's eye and she winked, grinning as smugly as her brother.
"It's a long story. I'll tell you sometime," she promised.
"No you won't," Rodney threatened. "Or--something. Something bad. I would never hear the end of it. Ever."
"It must be good, then," John said, and smiled to himself. Two weeks. This was going to be fun.
*
Most kids found themselves with at least one ridiculously embarrassing childhood nickname. Poor Rodney had the misfortune of owning two.
The first, he'd gotten when he was very, very young, a result of his remarkable inclination for trouble.
Mum spent so much time racing to rescue Ronnie (as he'd said it, before he'd learned to enunciate his D's) from imminent anaphylaxis, drowning himself in the pool, climbing the bookcases, toppling the vases, and various other acts of mayhem that he'd actually introduced himself to his teacher as "Rodney-no!" on the first day of preschool.
It was Uncle Steve who'd given Rodney the second one, even if it was just a bastardized version of the first.
Years later, when Rodney was seven or eight, he'd learned enough that it was nearly impossible to talk to him like you would a child his age. Every time you told him something you thought he might find interesting, he'd scowl and say, "I know!" with that peculiar mix of exasperation and disdain that only he could use.
One day, Uncle Steve pointed at Rodney after one such rejoinder and said, "That's right, Rodney-knows."
As far as Jeannie knew, Rodney had never quite forgiven them for the no/know puns that had ruthlessly followed him into adulthood, but Jeannie couldn't find it in herself to feel bad about it.
Hell, they were funny.
*
"Hello," the sandy-haired kid greeted them as they approached the minivan, pushed his glasses up his nose, and looked up at John. "Who's he?"
"Hey, Stevie." Jeannie smiled and ruffled his hair. "This is John Sheppard. He's a friend of Rodney's. Any news?"
"Aunt Rosie and Uncle Steve called. She says she's sorry they had to leave town so early, but wants us to call her and tell her if Uncle Rodney's dead. Oh, and she wanted to know when you're going back to Dad." The kid rolled his eyes, and looked vaguely disappointed.
Rodney suddenly looked like a spooked animal. "You called Aunt Rosie?" He looked suspiciously at Jeannie, who made a face of distaste.
"I had to," she said. "The last thing I wanted to do was start pulling strings and then find out one of them knew exactly where you were."
"Jeannie." Rodney's tone was reproving. "Do you think I'd actually tell them anything I wouldn't tell you?"
"Well," Jeannie shrugged, and looked embarrassed. "We haven't exactly been close lately, or anything."
"Besides," Steven piped up, "they went home." He heaved a crestfallen sigh. Rodney looked puzzled, and Steven continued, "I had a bet. Only now she's gone, and now I'll never get that skateboard."
"A bet?" John asked, fascinated in spite of himself. "On your aunt."
"She's actually my great-aunt," Steven explained. "But, yeah. I bet Mum that Uncle Rodney could make Aunt Rosie cuss--"
"Not gonna happen," Jeannie sang out from where she was climbing in the front, and Rodney chuckled as he clambered into the middle seat.
"It was a long shot. Aunt Rosie never cusses," Steven told John confidentially, taking the other middle seat. John climbed in the back, next to the empty car seat. "But I figure if anyone can make her, it's Uncle Rodney. Even Uncle Steve couldn't, and he told us Mum put the 'fun' in 'dysfunctional'." If he wasn't mistaken, there was even a note of admiration in the kid's voice.
Rodney laughed at that, and John thought he saw Jeannie blush in the rearview mirror.
"Steven," she said reprovingly as she turned the ignition.
"What?" Steven was all injured innocence. "It's the truth."
John was drowsing, lulled into sleep by the motion of the van, by the time they stopped a few minutes later. "Whuzzat?" he mumbled, scrubbing at his eyes. He hadn't been in a car for what seemed like ages, had forgotten how comforting it was to be moving, and to feel the movement.
"We stopped at a day-care to pick Missy up," Rodney said, smiling fondly at him. "Next stop is home. Were you sleeping?"
"Maybe," John said evasively, crossing his arms. "Maybe not. What's it to you?"
Rodney smirked. "Nothing, actually. What are you, four?" He cocked his head and studied John for a moment. "You were sleeping, weren't you? It's the hair. I can tell."
"Huh?" Bewildered, John put a hand to his hair. It didn't feel any different. Then he saw Rodney fighting laughter and scowled. "Hey. That's not nice."
That only seemed to set Rodney off more, and now Steven turned in his seat to look from John to Rodney with an expression of puzzlement.
"Nice?" Rodney said, chuckling. "When have I ever been nice?"
John couldn't think of anything to say that didn't sound childish, so he sat quietly until the door of the van opened. Jeannie stood on the other side, holding what had to be Missy.
The toddler regarded him curiously with blue, blue eyes beneath lashes long and dark as Rodney's until she realized John was looking at her, too. Then, she smiled shyly and hid her face in Jeannie's shoulder. "Hi," she said quietly, and turned to peek.
"Sorry, she's usually not this shy," Jeannie said affectionately. "Missy, this is Uncle Rodney, and Uncle Rodney's friend John."
At the mention of Uncle Rodney, Missy turned to stare at Rodney with wide, nervous eyes. She stuck her fingers in her mouth, looked up at Jeannie, and mumbled something urgent and incomprehensible.
Rodney looked vaguely offended and John snickered. "Legend in their young minds, indeed. Rodney, what did you do?"
"Nothing!" Rodney said indignantly, and glared at John. "I haven't even seen her since she was three months old!"
"I told her stories." Steven grinned impishly as Jeannie buckled Missy into the car seat next to John, and then said, "She drew her own conclusions. Oh, and you should ask her what she had for snack today. It's funny."
John looked down at Missy, who beamed up at him and poked him experimentally.
"You should," said Jeannie, "It's funny."
"All right. What did they give you for snack today?" he asked the toddler, whose grin widened mischievously. It was just a little crooked, and reminded him of Rodney.
"Porcupine quills," she said with glee.
John mock-frowned and tickled her a little. "That can't be right," he said. "They can't feed you those. It's illegal."
"Uh-huh." She nodded. "They did," she said solemnly.
"Nuh-uh," John teased. "What'd they really give you, huh?"
"Porcupine quills!" she insisted, giggling madly. "They did!"
John laughed and grinned at Rodney, who looked charmed in spite of himself.
"She's cute," Rodney said to Jeannie, who smiled back at him.
"Thanks," she said. "High praise from He-Who-Has-Vowed-Never-To-Like-Children."
Rodney snorted, and they passed half an hour driving in comfortable silence, except for Missy, who was singing along to the kid music on the radio and making her stuffed bunny dance.
"So, Uncle Rodney," Steven broke the silence abruptly. "Why didn't you come to Michael's funeral?"
John froze, and Rodney turned slowly to look at his nephew. "Excuse me?" he said, but his voice was strange--not hostile, but curiously neutral. Not giving anything away.
"Well?" Steven crossed his arms, and met Rodney's gaze unflinchingly.
"Steven!" Jeannie hissed from the front, and Rodney glanced up at her before turning back at Steven. The tension in the small space seemed to ratchet up another notch and John held very still, wishing he had a stealth setting like the jumpers, and hoping that if he was still enough and quiet enough, they wouldn't notice he was still there.
"I was," Rodney said slowly, seeming to speak more to Jeannie than to Steven, "oh-so-politely invited not to come." Things seemed to loosen a bit, then, and John let out a quiet breath.
Jeannie glanced back at Rodney in the mirror, and Rodney looked steadily back at her. "Oh," she said quietly, almost so quietly John didn't catch it.
"It was Dad, wasn't it, then." Steven's voice was flat, and it was more a statement than a question so Rodney didn't bother to answer. "Well," Steven said decisively a moment later, "that's ten."
"Ten?" Rodney asked.
"Ten uncomfortable questions in public that I owe my father," Stephen said vengefully. "Like 'Dad, why isn't the secretary wearing underwear?' or 'Why do you keep condoms in the office?'" Jeannie made a choking sound up front, and Steven continued, with bitterness, "He thinks 'thirteen' means 'stupid'."
"Well," Rodney said uncomfortably, "he's wrong."
Steven glared suspiciously and Rodney lifted his chin, daring his thirteen-year-old nephew to disagree. Steven settled back into his seat instead.
Just as John was starting to relax, Jeannie spoke. "Rodney," she said haltingly, "I think I owe you--"
"No," Rodney said. "You don't. And if you cry, I'm bailing out of the van, okay?"
"Okay," she answered, but her voice was still suspiciously thick.
*
The next few days were fairly amusing for John as he watched Rodney and Jeannie circle each other like wary animals: Jeannie stalking Rodney stalking Jeannie, John stalking Rodney and Rodney oblivious.
And then came the day that Richard showed up, and everything seemed to change.
It was four days after they'd left Atlantis. John and Rodney had gotten settled in two of the guest rooms upstairs and had mostly been lazing around the house and backyard, enjoying the freedom of not having to be anywhere specific at any given time. Pretty much the only thing they showed up regularly for were mealtimes, and even then Rodney was almost consistently late for breakfast.
John had just breezed into Rodney's room to wake him up for lunch--he'd already slept through breakfast, and Rodney was grumpy enough first thing in the morning that John really didn't want to know what he'd be like if he went straight from waking into some hypoglycemia-induced temper--when the doorbell rang and woke Rodney before John had a chance to.
"Nggghuh. What time is it?" Rodney sat up and blinked sleepily, then narrowed his eyes as he took in the toddler grinning cheerfully in John's arms. "And what are you doing?"
"Nothing. I just thought I ought to wake you in time for lunch, and Missy was wondering where Uncle Rodney had got to," John said slyly. "We weren't going to do anything but wake you up. Perfectly innocent intentions, I promise."
"Huh," Rodney said. "Why do I not believe you? Oh, maybe it's that my niece couldn't care less where I am when she's got you to drag around the house with her."
"Not true," John said huffily. "She likes you. You're the one with the snacks."
"Ah, yes. I buy her dubious affections with snacks." Rodney yawned. "Truly, I am the most loved. How admired I am, for gifts of cookies and potato chips. How cherished." He stood, stretching, and grabbed a few pieces of clothing. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go become the most recently showered as well."
John rolled his eyes, and looked at Missy. "C'mon, lets go find something else to do."
"Bounce!" she said, and pointed at Rodney. John shook his head quickly.
"No," he said, pitching his voice so Rodney wouldn't hear. "I told you, no bouncing if he's already awake."
"I heard that!" Rodney said from the bathroom doorway.
"No, you didn't," John answered. "You just think you did. That's the hypoglycemia talking."
Chuckling, he turned to leave the bedroom but stopped when he heard shouting from downstairs. John frowned and leaned over to put Missy down but she clung tightly to his neck even as he bent to put her down. Instead, he took her with him and went to sit next to Steven at the top of the stairs.
"What's going on?" John asked. The shouting seemed to be coming from the kitchen and, from the sounds of it, it was one hell of an argument.
Steven was frowning resentfully at the closed kitchen door. "It's Dad," he said, not looking at John. "I think he's here to try and convince Mum not to leave him."
Bits of conversation floated up the stairs to them, mostly male and pleading.
"Come on, Jeannie... don't have to do this, it's not public yet ...doesn't look good... my career... pictures... I promise... won't happen again...."
"Yeah, sounds like it's going well," John said, raising both eyebrows as the shouting seemed to double in volume and heat. "Except, no, not so much."
Stevie favored him with a sidewise half-grin. "Yeah, I didn't think it would. Mum's a lot smarter than he thinks. And she's still pretty pissed off, too."
They sat there in silence for another few minutes, and just as John opened his mouth to say something about how maybe they shouldn't be eavesdropping, Rodney came out of the bathroom damp and fully dressed, still rubbing at his hair with the towel.
"What in the hell is going on down there?" Rodney was scowling hard already, but as he listened his frown twisted and deepened. "That sounds like Richard. What the hell is he doing here?" He tossed the towel aside purposefully. "I'm going down there."
"He's here to try and talk Mum out of the divorce again," Steven said. "You probably shouldn't go down there."
The shouting, which had quieted some, suddenly got louder than ever. Rodney crossed his arms and looked at Steven, who shrugged and did his best to sound indifferent. "They fight like this all the time. Not quite so loud, usually, but pretty close."
Rodney's face darkened, and he opened his mouth as if to say something but was cut off by the abrupt silence from the kitchen and the sudden dull smack of fist hitting flesh followed by an unmistakable crack as somebody's skull hit one of the cabinets.
John had thought he'd seen Rodney at his angriest after the thing with Chaya, but apparently the man had hidden reserves of fury, because, compared to this, Rodney had only been mildly annoyed when John had run off alone to "rescue" her. After he'd returned, John had been acutely aware for the first time of just how much broader the other man was, and every bit as conscious of how much it would hurt if Rodney ever chose to hit him.
Now, as before, Rodney's expression spoke volumes. John was uncomfortably sure Rodney wouldn't stop after just one blow.
John stood quickly, gathering Missy up and out of the way as Rodney pushed past them down the stairs, Steven pale and furious and right behind him. John would have followed himself except that Missy squirmed in his grip and turned wide, anxious eyes to him, and he realized abruptly that bringing a two-year-old into the mix was a really bad idea.
Instead, he hurried downstairs and out the front door to where he knew the Secret Service would be watching, and waved his free arm in the universal gesture for help.
A few seconds later, just he'd expected, one of the cars parked inconspicuously down the street pulled up into the driveway and two men stepped out. John sighed a little in relief. Much faster than calling the cops to break up the brawl that would surely have formed by the time they'd arrived.
This way, at least, Richard wouldn't take anyone else to jail with him. Granted, Rodney might never forgive him for breaking it up so soon, but at least he'd be free to never forgive John on Atlantis and not from the dubious privacy of a jail cell.
"What's going on?" the nearest suit asked. "Is Ms. McKay all right?"
"I think the senator got physical with her," John said angrily, shifting Missy's weight on his hip.
John followed them back into the house, where Rodney stood in the door of the kitchen pointedly not-smirking at Richard, who was holding his head and cursing bloody murder while Jeannie told him in no uncertain (and some fairly surprising) terms to get the hell out of her house. Then she noticed the agents as they entered the house, and stiffened.
"Greg," Jeannie said warmly, donning her best diplomatic expression. "Thanks for coming in, but I think we've got things under control here. Senator Grant was just leaving." She regarded her husband meaningfully. "And nobody's going to be making any noise about this. Just, you know how he gets when he's had a few."
"Yes, ma'am," agreed the suit who'd spoken to John outside. If Greg noticed the way Jeannie was struggling not to cradle her right hand, or the way her knuckles were red and swelling, he'd obviously decided not to comment. "Senator?"
Richard had fallen silent the moment Jeannie had addressed the Secret Service agent. He was holding both sides of his face at once, and glared poisonously at Jeannie, but said nothing as he turned on his heel and left the kitchen. Muttering imprecations under his breath, he ignored his son and the two agents and stalked through the living room to where Rodney now held the front door open, practically brimming with self-satisfaction.
John wasn't sure, but he thought he even heard Rodney mutter something along the lines of, "And don't let it hit you too terribly hard on your...."
*
As soon as the door shut behind Richard, Jeannie slumped forward against the kitchen table and let out a deep breath. She held an arm out to hug Steven and kissed the top of his head.
"Stevie, honey," she said, "I'm okay, really. I'm fine, and I'm sorry you saw that. I just need a minute, okay? Could you check on Missy for me? I know she likes John, but you're her big brother and if she's upset I think she'd want you more. Okay?"
"Yeah," Steven nodded, reluctantly letting go. "Did he hit you?"
"No," Jeannie said, shamefaced. "I'm afraid I hit him, honey."
"Oh." Steven looked relieved, and even managed a smile. "All right. I'll go check on Missy then."
The moment the kitchen door swung closed behind Steven, Jeannie fairly fell back into one of the chairs and cradled her bad hand.
"Damn," she hissed in pain and annoyance. She must have hit the son of a bitch a lot harder than she'd thought, because it was really starting to swell. Gingerly uncurling her fingers, Jeannie realized that, pictures or no pictures, she was really profoundly lucky Richard had left without making a scene.
Hell, she might have even broken her hand, though she wouldn't know that until the swelling went down. Swearing, Jeannie stood to open the freezer and found herself pushed gently back down into the chair as Rodney came into the kitchen.
"Hold still," Rodney ordered, rummaging in one of the drawers for a towel. "That looks like it needs ice."
"Really?" Jeannie said dryly, and leaned back in the chair. "I wouldn't have thought of that, funny what they don't teach you in med school. It's like I went for no reason."
"Oh, yes," agreed Rodney, folding ice into a towel. "Almost as if you went so you could marry a rich politician and let it go to waste."
Jeannie set her jaw and glared at him. After a moment, Rodney softened and sighed. Sitting across from her at the table, he set her elbow against the wood and took her hand in both of his, wrapping the ice around it. "I'm sorry," he said. "You didn't deserve that. You just sucker-punched the asshole. How did you get so cool all of a sudden anyway? Because, seriously..." Rodney leaned forward, pitching his voice low and warning. "If you get any cooler, I'm calling in the shrinks. Or looking for the planet full of energy-beings, because I really didn't take good advantage of that opportunity the first time."
Jeannie grinned. O'Neill had let her read the mission reports. "So what would you conjure up for yourself? Some kind of scientific breakthrough? A theory of unification?"
Rodney snorted. "Right. Like I'd need to imagine that. Sooner or later, I'll get those anyway. No...." He paused thoughtfully. "No, I think I'd want a harem."
"A harem?" Jeannie coughed, trying not to laugh, grimacing when her hand twinged. "Anything in the world, and you'd imagine yourself a harem. Are you telling me that your dashing good looks and frighteningly high IQ have failed you?"
"Of course not," Rodney said scornfully. "It's just that I don't have the time go about getting one. You see, I'd have one already, except that every time I try, I have to go save the world or something." He waved a hand dismissively, and Jeannie burst into laughter because, really, there wasn't a way not to laugh at his expression.
"What?" Rodney said, all innocence and wronged virtue, and then suddenly his expression cleared and he regarded her seriously. "What did he say?"
"Huh?" asked Jeannie, startled by the change in topic and reluctant to discuss it.
"Richard," Rodney said gently, holding her gaze. "What did Richard say, that made you hit him?"
"Does it matter?" Jeannie shifted uncomfortably and stared at the refrigerator. "He's full of shit anyway."
"I think it might." Rodney was still looking at her; she could tell even with her head turned. Damn him and his passing association with psychology. He might think most of it was crap and guesswork, but that hadn't stopped him from picking the important bits up in college.
"Fine," Jeannie said sourly, and with some resignation she studied the refrigerator and spoke. "He's refusing to sign the divorce papers. Which, now that I think about it, he might reconsider." Rodney cocked an eyebrow, and she almost smiled. "He was asking me to try and make it work. For the sake of his career, you know, and the sake of the children." Her eyebrows knitted together and her fist clenched again involuntarily. "Ow, shit. Oh."
"That bad?" Rodney said.
"Yes," she said feelingly. "He threatened to tell the kids I didn't want them. That I didn't want Missy, and didn't want Michael."
"Did you?" Rodney asked blandly, face blank.
"No!" she said so forcefully that her fist clenched again, bringing tears to her eyes. "I mean, yes! Yes, of course I wanted them! I love my children. I'd do anything to bring Michael back! Christ, Rodney, what kind of person do you think I am?"
She pulled on her arm, trying to free it, but Rodney moved one hand down to her elbow, bracing it and effectively immobilizing it.
"Hey. Hold still, okay?" Rodney let go of her elbow once she stopped struggling. "I really didn't think he was right, you know. Just, you looked like you felt guilty and I thought it'd do you good to have a chance to deny it, is all."
"Oh," she said, and flushed in embarrassment. "Sorry. Some psychologist you'd make."
"Yes, well, I make up for it by saving the world on a semi-regular basis," Rodney answered, and then softened his voice again. "No one ever accused you of wanting Michael dead, you know." Something occurred to him, and his expression darkened. "Or did he--"
"No, he didn't," Jeannie interrupted. "It's just--sometimes I do feel guilty, you know? I mean, it's not like we have an abundance of heart conditions in our family tree, but--"
"Two of Richard's grandparents died of fatal heart conditions," Rodney said sharply. "Or didn't he tell you?" Jeannie was silent, but she guessed the shock on her face spoke for her. Rodney gritted his teeth for a moment, then continued, "I heard him telling Dad at the wedding. They both died when he was younger, before he married you. Now, while I'm not all that familiar with the different frequencies and incarnations of congenital heart problems, but I do know this guy...."
Jeannie groaned, smiling a little tearfully. "This guy, huh?"
"Yeah," Rodney said deviously. "This guy. At my job. And his specialty happens to be genetics. Maybe you should talk to him sometime."
"Maybe," Jeannie smiled, for real this time. "Thank you."
Rodney snorted. "Don't thank me. Just tell me I can hit him, too, next time."
"That reminds me." Jeannie leaned forward. "I did tell you that the green Blazer and the blue van are off-limits, right? Because I'm the only one who drives them, and I'd hate for you to blow me up by accident."
"Good to know," Rodney said, aiming for nonchalance and ruining it by grinning at her. "I'll have to remember that."
*
Jeannie had met Richard through a mutual friend when she was twenty-two, and married him less than a year later. He'd been twenty-five and military, and full of enough political ambition to instantly endear him to her father, who didn't approve of anything that wouldn't get you money or status or both.
In Richard, he'd seen both, and so had spared no expense for the wedding, and taken every opportunity to remind Rodney just what was expected of him.
Dad had felt about astrophysics then the way Rodney felt about medicine now. Jeannie didn't understand it any more than her father did, but she'd also seen Rodney do her calculus homework for fun when he was twelve, so she figured anything that challenged him would be miles above her level of understanding anyway.
Rodney had been seventeen the day Jeannie got married, seventeen and rail-thin and still dripping with the standard-issue free-floating malice of the terminally misunderstood teenager. But, even taking Dad's ridiculously self-important little lectures into account, Jeannie thought Rodney seemed angrier than usual and decided to corner him at the reception to find out why.
She'd found Rodney leaning against one of the tables, scowling at nothing in particular.
"Hey there," she said companionably, hopping up to sit on the table next to him in her wedding gown. "Why so glum, Ronnie-no? I thought you'd be celebrating." She grinned. "I'm finally getting out of your hair."
"Oh, you know me," Rodney said, bristling a little at his oldest nickname. "Happy, happy, happy."
"Come on, Rodney." Jeannie bumped shoulders with him. "Would it kill you to smile? Wow. Okay, yeah. That's downright frightening. You can stop now. Scowl away."
"Thank you," Rodney said, adjusting his arms and scowling just a little less darkly than before.
Jeannie thought she probably ought to count that a victory, and continued, "So what's wrong? Is it Richard?" Rodney didn't answer. Or even look at her, for that matter, so she tried again. "Don't you like him?" Rodney hadn't yet said anything, good or bad, about his new brother-in-law, so Jeannie had assumed that meant Rodney liked him at least a little bit. Everyone else had. "You don't, do you? Why?" The last came out uncomfortably like a whine.
Rodney attempted an indifferent shrug. "He doesn't like hockey," he said evasively.
Jeannie snorted. "Neither did half the chess club. And you liked them." Rodney shifted and didn't answer. "Rodney, why? Tell me."
"Fine," he said shortly, and glanced sidewise at her. "I'll tell you, but remember--you asked."
"Okay," she said hesitantly. "Yeah, I asked you. So tell."
"All right." Rodney looked away and gritted his teeth. "You're right. I don't like him at all. I think he's an ass, just like Dad. He's going to keep you at home as a trophy wife and show you off to his friends. He'll tell you his career's more important than yours, and he'll never be home. He's going to cheat, and bully you into having his kids. Then, he's going to cheat more and leave you alone at home with the kids you didn't want and you're going to hate him for it."
Jeannie opened her mouth, but Rodney cut her off.
"Here's the catch," he continued bitterly, more bitterly than he should have been at seventeen. "You'll probably never going to realize that. You'll spend most of your life thinking you hate either yourself or the kids--maybe even both--and eventually turn into our mother. So--yes, happy day. Congratulations."
Jeannie could never remember what it had been that she'd started to say when Richard appeared out of the blue, grabbing her waist and pulling her into a kiss. He tasted like alcohol.
"Hey, kiddo. Havin' fun?" he slurred, noticing Rodney and reaching out to ruffle his hair. Rodney growled something resentful that was utterly lost on Richard, who'd already turned back to Jeannie.
"He's not a kid, Richard," Jeannie said sharply, suddenly angry. "He's seventeen. And in college."
"Awww, come on, Jeannie." Richard goosed her, and she pushed him away. Richard chuckled and pulled her closer. "Don't be mad. He's not mad," he said, motioning towards Rodney, who most definitely was mad. "C'mon, it's our wedding. Let's go have some fun." He was whining, and Jeannie had to suppress the irrational urge to smack him for it.
She succeeded, but as Richard dragged her away to meet more of his friends, she couldn't help but glance back over her shoulder at where Rodney perched, hunched over and scowling, on the table like some bad-tempered bird of omen.
What if he's right? she thought, and shivered.
*
Missy calmed right down as soon as Steven came out of the kitchen, though she still stayed fairly close to both of them when John put her down.
The first day they'd gotten here, Missy had decided that, despite the multitude of snacks Rodney'd tried to bribe her with, John was apparently her favorite. Since then, she'd pretty much adopted him as part of the family--in the sense that every so often she'd drop whatever she was doing to take John by the hand and tug him around the house to show him something she thought was cool.
Over the past four days, John had been shown the bird's nest in the tree next to her window, the spot in the pantry where Jeannie hid the Oreos, and the cat, among other things. He'd also been made to sit by the pool and dangle his toes in the water with her, pet the cat, and put his face over the cool air being blown out of the AC vent in the kitchen floor. And every new 'discovery' brought the same triumphant little exclamation and crooked Rodney-grin John had seen dozens of times on Atlantis.
Granted, it was kind of obnoxious to be hijacked mid-task or woken mid-nap, but it was cute and Missy got so excited John didn't have the heart to disappoint her. Besides, it was kind of nice to be woken for something other than a life-threatening emergency. God knew it didn't happen to him enough on Atlantis. Plus, he thought it made Rodney a little jealous--no matter how Rodney denied it, sharing chocolate-covered cheesecake definitely counted as bribery--and that was a bonus.
So it wasn't exactly surprising when Missy abruptly dropped the doll she was fiddling with and stood, chirping urgently and tugging at his hand. Blowing out a breath, John stood.
"All right," he said, only a little half-heartedly. "What are we going to go find, now?"
She pulled him towards the kitchen door, and John hesitated. He knew from experience that, just like her mother and uncle, Missy would raise all hell if you tried to stop her once she was set on 'finding' something. And 'stopping' included anything from slowing down, to picking her up (even if you kept walking in the same direction), to actually trying to divert her.
But Rodney hadn't been in there all that long, and he'd heard Jeannie raise her voice just a few minutes ago, so he figured there was some kind of family scene going on in there, the kind of family scene it wouldn't be polite or smart for John to interrupt.
Cautiously, John tried letting go of Missy's hand. She paused and glared at him, and John winced. She totally looked like Rodney on a tear when she got mad. "Look," he said quietly, "I think your mom and Uncle Rodney are in there talking, okay? Privately."
For a moment, he thought she understood; but then she only grinned more widely. "Ronnie!" she said joyfully, pulling more urgently at John's arm, and he groaned to himself.
John might be the one Missy liked to drag around the house, but at least Rodney had that much--she liked Rodney, all right, liked him enough to barge right in on whatever private and probably extremely important conversation he was having right now and let John take all the blame.
Maybe that could be useful, he thought. If John could only find a way to mention it quickly enough, Rodney would be too pleased that Missy had finally come around to remember to be annoyed with John.
Well, it wasn't much, but it would have to do, John thought as they approached the door. Because it was all he had, and it looked like they were going in.
"You were right, you know," Jeannie was saying. "Just not about all of it."
Rodney was holding what looked to be ice on her hand, and keeping it elevated. "Good," Rodney said. His voice was low, intense, and he didn't appear to notice John and Missy as they walked in. "Because I really didn't want to be. Oh, hello," he said, raising his eyebrows at John. "Can we help you?"
"Um," John said awkwardly, and pointed at Missy with his free hand. "I think she wanted to show me something. Or see you," he added, on a burst of inspiration. "She said your name, even."
"Really?" Rodney looked pleased.
John mentally congratulated himself. He'd short-circuited Rodney's cranky spell before he'd had a chance to really get started.
Missy smiled bashfully at Rodney, then turned and pulled John over to the pantry.
"Snack!" she said, and pointed.
Rodney groaned. "I knew it," he said. "Bribery never works." He glared at John, daring him to comment.
John just grinned sheepishly. "What can I give her?" he asked Jeannie, who pointed to one of the upper cupboards.
"There should be a Ziploc baggie up there," she said, "with Cheerios and some of those little mini-Chips Ahoy. She likes those."
"Okay." John poked around until he found the plastic bag, then fumbled it open. "All right, kiddo," he said, "looks like I've got your munchies."
Missy, who was busily emptying one of the lower cabinets of its Tupperware, ignored him. Rodney was watching her, looking a little thunderstruck.
"You kept those?" Rodney said incredulously, turning his head to look at Jeannie. "I can't believe you kept those. Aren't they something like thirty years out of date?" He motioned towards where Missy was industriously sorting the lids and bottoms to some rule only she knew, because it didn't make any sense to John at first glance
"If I were actually using them, yes." Jeannie smiled. "But I'm not. Missy is." Jeannie's smile grew. "And it's a proven fact that Tupperware makes geniuses."
"It is?" Rodney rolled his eyes and then grinned. "Oh. Of course it is," he said haughtily, as if he'd known the joke all along.
Missy looked up once she'd gotten the Tupperware arranged to her liking and practically glowed when saw the plastic bag in John's hand. Humming happily, she trotted over to where John was standing to take his hand and lead him over to sit down next to the plasticware stacked next to the cabinet.
John settled himself obediently on the linoleum and absently picked up one of the lids, examining it. It was old and yellowing and entirely uninteresting except for the way Rodney was looking at it like it was the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything. Suddenly Missy squawked indignantly and snatched the lid back, startling him.
"Mine!" she said, setting her chin mulishly and clutching the lid to her chest.
"What'd I do?" John asked defensively. Hell, didn't she drag him all the way in here just to show the stuff to him, or was John the one relegated to "snack machine" now? It would certainly explain the way Rodney was snickering smugly at him, shaking his head at John's appeal, apparently unwilling to share the joke.
Well, John thought, Jeannie would, eventually--just like she had before. And if Rodney kept up like this, there was no way in hell John was leaving the whole "Rodney-no" thing alone. It would serve him right.
It was Steven who answered him from the doorway. "You're not supposed to touch it until she gives it to you," Steven advised, only a little smug. "Or she'll thwap you with it. She gets kinda possessive."
"No kidding," John said, feeling unreasonably ruffled that Rodney wouldn't tell him and unable to escape the sneaking suspicion that it was because Rodney was having too much fun laughing at him.
Missy studied John speculatively, then slowly extended the lid to him. John looked at it suspiciously. Rodney snickered harder and John glared at him.
"Now you can touch it," Steven told him. "It's safe."
"If you say so," John muttered, and accepted the offered lid. "Now what do I do with it?"
"You admire it," Jeannie said and damn it, she was snickering, and that goaded Rodney into full-blown laughter. Must've been one helluva joke, John thought resentfully. He hated being left out of these things.
It didn't help that once Missy was satisfied he wasn't going to misuse her lid, she took her bag of snacks and ignored him in favor of the Tupperware. After a moment of almost comically serious deliberation, she selected two of the battered dishes--one medium, one small--and began carefully emptying the cookies and Cheerios into them by handfuls, dividing the portion between them. Then, thoughtfully, she retrieved the bag and put some Cheerios back in. She gave the bag back to John and set the two tubs aside for safekeeping while she put the rest of the plasticware back into the cabinet.
Nobody said anything while she worked; the tension that had gripped through the house for days had suddenly vanished and they all basked in its absence while they watched the toddler do whatever it was she was doing.
Missy finally shut the cabinet door, squatted down beside the two plastic tubs, and considered their contents gravely, before adjusting the amounts of cookies in each of them. Then she handed the small one to John with a stern admonition to "Just hold it, please," and picked the medium one up, hugging it awkwardly to her chest as she carried it carefully across the room.
"Snack, Uncle Ronnie?" she said proudly, holding the dish out to Rodney, who took it and looked oddly touched.
"Thanks," he said softly to Missy, who beamed triumphantly and ambled back to retrieve the smaller dish from John.
"We'-come," Missy said, seating herself on John's knee while she picked over the selection in her dish. Which, John realized, was just small enough for her to grip in one hand. She finally decided on a Cheerio, and tilted her head back to grin proudly at John.
"See? She does like you," John told Rodney in his best I-told-you-so voice, which was actually a fairly accurate imitation of Rodney's. "She probably just figured you already knew where all the cool stuff was and didn't need to be told." Missy made a sound that might have been agreement.
Rodney looked up from his awed examination of the dish to roll his eyes at John before turning to Jeannie. "I still can't believe you kept this," he said.
"Three McKay children have cut their teeth on that Tupperware," she said, smiling. "Four, if you count me. But Missy's the only one who ever got quite as attached to it as you did."
"That's because she's got taste," sniffed Rodney. John grinned, finally getting the joke. "Taste," Rodney said again, and popped a cookie in his mouth.
"Well, at least she's not as violent about it as you were," Jeannie teased, and Rodney rolled his eyes again.
Missy got up and walked over to Rodney, craning her neck to peek into his dish and stealing a cookie.
"Hey," said John, belatedly realizing that he'd been completely left out of snack time. "What am I--chopped liver?
"You have some," Rodney said, pointing. "You just got yours in the bag. Which serves you right, ingrate. Next time, show proper respect for the Tupperware." Missy giggled and Rodney leaned down. "These used to be mine, you know," he said confidentially.
"Yeah," she said offhandedly, giggling harder as John examined the contents of his bag, scowling.
"Look at this," he said, and held the bag up for Rodney to see. "No Tupperware. No cookies, even. Just some castoff Cheerios and a boring plastic bag." He sighed theatrically. "I feel so unloved."
Rodney snorted. "Oh, woe. You poor, misunderstood man. My heart bleeds for you." He paused for a moment. "Okay, yeah. Done now." He crunched another cookie ostentatiously and smirked at John.
"You have no heart," said John. "You are heartless and cruel, taunting me with chocolate-chip cookies when I so obviously have none. I am a broken man, left with nothing but a few lonely Cheerios and a tacky Ziploc bag. How I long for Tupperware. How I yearn for of Chips Ahoy." He rattled the bag forlornly. "You're a cruel man, Rodney McKay. Your blood runs like ice."
Jeannie choked, and Rodney looked at Missy. "What do you think?" She beamed at him and turned to look back at John. So did Rodney.
Two pairs of bright blue eyes regarded John impishly, and two pairs of lips smiled identical crooked Cheshire Cat smiles. Rodney's eyes glinted with mischief, as open and honest as they'd been the day he'd found the personal shield. Looking into them, John felt a sudden desperate motion of his heart, so profound and unexpected that he might have fallen if he hadn't already been sitting down.
Time seemed to slow and stop, the air heavy and rippling like water. Like getting stoned in high school, when the laws of physics seemed to warp out of all recognition until minutes could take hours to pass and the whole day could slip past in an hour. It was like free-fall in slow motion, like being pulled under the surface of the ocean. Suddenly it seemed as if the currents in his world had shifted, and John could do nothing but move with them or be lost to the undertow.
I want you, he almost said to Rodney. I need you. He'd even opened his mouth to speak when Missy sat down in his lap, startling him out of his trance. Rodney was looking at him oddly, eyebrows creased in puzzlement.
Missy held her dish up, obviously offering to share, and John grinned his customary just-your-average-flyboy grin and took some Cheerios, covering his momentary lapse in composure by tossing a few in his mouth. "Thanks, kiddo," he said, smirking at Rodney.
John didn't think it fooled Rodney, not that it ever had, but it at least gave John the distance he needed to ignore the worried frown Rodney shot him.
"Jesus, Jeannie!" Rodney exclaimed, as Jeannie began gingerly unwrapping her hand. "How hard did you hit him? Does that need X-rays?"
"I hope not," she said, grimacing as she flexed it. "But I think I hit him pretty hard, and it's the same hand I hit Kavanagh with the other day." She sounded embarrassed, glancing guiltily over at Steven.
"You hit someone else?" Steven sounded impressed, and Jeannie nodded, flushing.
"He deserved it," Rodney told him. "He made a mistake that hurt and killed a lot of people, and then refused to admit he was the one who'd made it."
"Still," Jeannie said, looking pointedly at Steven. "Whether or not he deserved it doesn't justify what I did. I shouldn't have hit him."
"I know," Steven said, rolling his eyes. "I'm not five."
Jeannie tried unsuccessfully to stifle a smirk, and John coughed. Rodney just glared. "What," he said peevishly, "no clever nicknames for him?"
"Nope," Jeannie said cheerfully. "When he does that, we just call him 'Rodney.'"
Even Missy giggled at that, head tipped back against John's chest. John put his hand on top of her head when Rodney eyed her suspiciously, smoothing her hair and pretending he hadn't just been tickling the baby.
Rodney didn't particularly look like he believed him.
*
John was lost in his own thoughts for the rest of the day. Trying not to think of how close he'd come to outing himself in the kitchen.
Rodney kept sending worried little glances his way, but John was careful enough that Rodney didn't get another opportunity to call him on his odd behavior.
That is, until he woke Rodney up in the middle of the night, stumbling sweaty and shaky and clad in nothing but boxers and a tee shirt, pulse pounding loudly in his ears.
Rodney rolled over in bed, turning towards John in the doorway. "John?" he said sleepily, and sat up. He turned on the lamp and ran a hand through sleep-rumpled hair, standing it on end. "S'wrong?"
"I, uh, had a dream," John said awkwardly, flushing. It had been his worst nightmare to date, even worse than the ones he'd had just after they'd sunk Atlantis, when he'd finally had a chance to sleep again. The panic was already beginning to fade, leaving his limbs shaky and weak, and he suddenly felt foolishly like a child again, six years old and standing at the foot of his parents' bed. "Sorry," he said, but couldn't bring himself to move.
"No, no," Rodney yawned. "S'okay. Come in. Nightmare?"
"Yeah." Feeling like a weight had lifted, John moved to sit on the edge of the bed and shifted, still feeling awkward and ill at ease. Looking worried , Rodney scooted over to make room for him and waited for John to speak.
When John didn't, Rodney did. "Are you all right?" he asked softly, his tone so careful that John suddenly wondered how much Heightmeyer and Weir must have told him.
"I bet you've probably already talked to Heightmeyer," John said, and it came out more surly than he'd meant it. "You probably think I'm cracking up."
"Well, no," Rodney said slowly. "I mean, Elizabeth did talk to me, but that's not why I'm concerned."
So Weir had talked to him, then. John felt a pang of anger. "Really? What'd she say?" He felt more than a little betrayed, replaying the past few days in his head. He'd thought Rodney was having fun, maybe even liked having him around, but suddenly he had to wonder how much of it had been because someone had told Rodney he was losing it. How much had been fake, walking on eggshells around him to keep him from falling apart at the seams. The thought rankled.
"She wanted to know if I'd spoken to you, if you'd said anything to me," Rodney said. "She was worried about you, John."
"So what'd you tell her?" John asked snidely.
"I told her that if you had, it wasn't any of her damn business," Rodney answered sharply. He still sounded irritated with Elizabeth, and John felt a little ashamed. "You can talk to me in confidence, John. You know that."
"Yeah," John said quietly. "I know. I'm sorry. It's just--" He blew out a breath. "I don't know. Maybe I am cracking up," he confessed, turning to look at Rodney.
Rodney eyed him speculatively but didn't say anything, and John suddenly remembered how Rodney had never asked John why he'd been sleeping in the supply closet, never questioned that John didn't have somewhere else to be.
"Come here," Rodney finally said, and threw open the covers, rolling on his side as John crawled in beside him.
John swallowed hard, scooting closer as Rodney squirmed to get comfortable and then moving his hips back after a moment of thought. If Rodney kept that squirming thing up, it'd probably be best to keep a buffer zone between his crotch and Rodney's ass. Still, John obviously possessed no sense of self-preservation because he pressed his chest up against Rodney's back and threw an arm over Rodney's side.
Yeah, he thought when his palm brushed Rodney's stomach, the buffer zone would have definitely been a good idea.
The skin on Rodney's stomach was warm where his shirt had ridden up, and John froze when Rodney stiffened. They both held their breath for a long moment while John rested his forehead against Rodney's hair and prayed Rodney would break first.
To hell with it, he finally thought, and swiped his thumb deliberately across the warm skin just above Rodney's waistband, breathed out in a puff of air against his neck. Rodney hitched in a breath then, and John did, too. Every hair along Rodney's stomach was electric, and John shuddered in sympathy when his breath tickled Rodney's ear.
Trailing light fingers down along the fabric of Rodney's boxers, John slowed to trace the hem as it curved over Rodney's thigh. His fingertips tingled and his breath came sharp and shallow; Rodney was almost panting, trying to hide it, but Rodney hadn't done anything to stop him or to protest, so John continued his tentative explorations.
Every inch of John's body seemed electrified, hypersensitive and aching except for the places where his fingertips and cheek touched Rodney. His skin seemed to resonate with Rodney's muffled gasps until it felt like John was an instrument that was tuned--had always been tuned--specifically to Rodney. It drowned out all conscious thought and left John with nothing but instinct. He was so hard it hurt, and he was desperate to squirm and get some friction, get something; but he refrained from movement, opting instead to squeeze his eyes shut and try to memorize every inch of skin he touched, in case he never got to do this again.
And then he couldn't wait any longer; sucking in a breath, he gritted his teeth and slipped his thumb and forefingers just under the hem of Rodney's boxers, stroking slowly over the inside of his thigh.
They stayed like that for what seemed like eternity, perfectly still and silent except for the sound of their breathing and the slow, small movements of John's fingers where they touched Rodney's skin. The shift of the fabric over Rodney's skin was nearly deafening, its volume matched only by the frantic hammer of John's pulse in his ears.
"John," Rodney finally said, and his voice was strained. "What are you doing?" In spite of the question, he shifted his leg back to give John better access.
"Do you want me to stop?" John asked hoarsely, feeling reckless. He moved his hand up to the area he'd deliberately avoided until now, pressing his palm against Rodney's cock through his boxers.
"Yes!" Rodney hissed. John panicked and let go. "I mean--no!" Rodney reached back, lighting-fast, and snatched John's hand, pressing it back on his erection. "Please. Don't stop."
"Oh," John said, and chuckled, chuffing softly against Rodney's skin in relief. "Okay. I won't." He pressed himself flush against Rodney's body, rolling his hips forward, then licked the back of his ear and squeezed with his hand, drawing a groan from Rodney that went straight to his cock.
"Fuck." Rodney gasped and squirmed again, like he couldn't decide whether to thrust forward against John's hand or back against his hips. "Oh, damn. John."
"Want you," John growled into Rodney's neck. "Want this." Abandoning slow and careful, he rolled, pinning Rodney to the bed and covering Rodney's mouth with his own. Rodney clutched at John's shirt, rucking it up, and John ground down, reveling in the feel of Rodney, warm and alive beneath him. "Oh, God, Rodney. I want you," he said, gasping, and worked his hand into Rodney's boxers, stroking his cock as he tasted the spot just behind Rodney's earlobe. This was what he'd been wanting, even needing, since he'd first aimed that jumper at the hive ship. It was exhilarating, this feeling that he was finally back in the pilot's seat. John had a choice here, wasn't helpless anymore, and that was suddenly the best feeling in the world, even better than flying.
He hadn't been able to keep Rodney from blowing himself up, nearly getting himself killed, hadn't been able to keep him from watching as John nearly died. But he could make Rodney gasp, could make him feel so good, could make him thrust and writhe underneath John. He could make Rodney come with John's name on his lips and, wow, that had to be the best idea ever.
"Yeah," Rodney gasped, "oh, yeah. John." Rodney grabbed the back of John's head, arched up into John's hand and kissed him. John moaned into his mouth and yanked Rodney's shirt up so they were belly to belly, skin to skin.
"Fuck," he moaned, "fuck," Rodney's hand closed around his dick and John nuzzled into Rodney's shoulder and came almost instantly, gasping into Rodney's skin and spilling himself all over Rodney's hand and belly. "Jesus," he said, biting and licking at the juncture of neck and jaw. "Jesus. God, Rodney. I need you. I want you," he said urgently, hand still moving, still jerking Rodney off. " I wanna fuck you."
Rodney made a helpless sort of sound and twisted his hands into John's shirt as he came. John licked Rodney's ear again, coaxing him through the aftershocks and smiling into his skin. "I take it that's a yes," he murmured, and Rodney gave a shaky chuckle.
"Uh. Yes," Rodney said breathlessly, fists still clenching and unclenching in John's shirt. "That would be correct."
"Good." John smiled into Rodney's neck again, tangling his legs with Rodney's and rolling them both onto their sides, snuggling close and kissing him. "I thought it sounded like a good idea. I'm glad I could convince you to feel the same."
Rodney leaned forward and kissed him soundly, sliding his hand down to John's ass and squeezing. "I feel pretty convinced," he told John. "How about you?"
*
John isn't surprised to learn later that Rodney's done this before because, really, who wouldn't have thought that Rodney would have experimented? Experimenting was Rodney's thing.
He fucks Rodney the next night, having overcome every objection Rodney can think of about John's career. "I don't care," is what he's told Rodney again and again, and he honestly doesn't. There isn't anything that they could do to him that wouldn't be worth it just to have this--Rodney curled languorously next to him, full of sleepy, sloppy kisses and lazy post-coital satisfaction--and there isn't anything he wouldn't give to have it again. And for the next week, he's determined to have it as often as possible.
Worrying about what could happen only distracts from what is happening, as far as John's concerned. Besides, John's head is still too full of what almost happened to pay any attention to what will almost certainly happen if they get caught. There's just no room left for doubts and misgivings.
In fact, John doesn't even think about it again until a week later, when he's standing next to Rodney in the control room, in front of the Stargate. Dozens of soldiers boil around them, attending to dozens of different soldier things, and they're a physical reminder to John of the military scrutiny they'll likely face on Atlantis. Still, John can't bring himself to be too concerned. Some things, John thinks to himself, are more important than appearances.
He looks at Rodney next to him, smiling happily as he talks technology with Samantha Carter and clutching an old, worn Tupperware dish full of cookies to his chest like it's something precious.
Rodney, he thinks, must be one of them.
- Text Size +
Category: Slash Pairings > McKay/Sheppard
Characters: Carson Beckett, John Sheppard, Other, Radek Zelenka, Rodney McKay
Rating: NC-17
Genres: AU - Alternate Universe, Drama, Episode Related, First Time, Romance
Warnings: Adult themes
Series: None
Word count: 34019; Completed: Yes
Summary: Some things are more important than appearances.
A/N: Many, many heartfelt thanks to Wickdzoot and kageygirl for beta, brainstorms, and occasional hand-holding. Thanks to Gateworld, who provided the transcript of "Letters from Pegasus" I've quoted from. And lastly, thank you to Panera Bread Company, for feeding and watering me while I forced this story onto paper.
Action on Atlantis begins at the end of Seige II, but this is AU as of the airing of Seige III.
steady as it comes
right down
to you
I've said it all
so maybe we're a Bliss
of another kind
--Tori Amos, "Bliss"
Intuition is not a concrete thing, but the sum of a lifetime's worth of knowledge divided by triumph, multiplied by fear and taken to the power of a thousand minor failures, of opportunities missed and dreams unrealized. Add to this the weight of connections never made, hundreds of perceptions unrelated to observations long-ago forgotten and dismissed, and factor in that indefinable something that made you think, once, that you really could do anything. This is how the totality of human experience at that cosmic craps game that is life steps up to the table, runs a few quick calculations, and tells you that your luck has run out and you're due to roll snake-eyes right about now.
This is that feeling, the kind that sends you running with your youngest from doctor to doctor until you find the one who believes you when you say there's something wrong with your baby, makes you beg your husband to cancel his 8 am flight even though he laughs and calls you superstitious; this is the feeling of wrongness that makes you hire a private detective to watch your husband in his off-hours. This is the kind of sudden gut-wrenching my-brother-is-dying-my-brother-needs-a-doctor panic that can wake you from a sound sleep even at 3 o'clock in the morning.
Intuition hasn't been kind to Jeannie McKay-Grant, hasn't told her one good thing in the forty-some-odd years she's been alive. She's very familiar with that feeling.
Too familiar, which is why she doesn't bother to second-guess it when she finds herself out of bed at some ungodly hour of the morning, just checks both of the kids' rooms and sits down to dial every number she can ever remember having for Rodney. When all she does is wake 5 or 6 angry strangers and one amorous drunk, she grits her teeth and starts calling relatives.
Almost exactly one hour later, Senator Good-for-nothing rolls over in bed and reaches for his wife, then sits up and mumbles, "Jeann', wha's goin'?"
"I know, I know it's late and I'm sorry. But I can't find him, I can't find him anywhere, and--something's wrong, dammit. I just know it." She's still talking, like she hasn't even heard him and Richard groans and falls back against the pillows.
"Jeannie, he's fine. I'm sure he's fine, it was probably just a bad dream and can we please come back to bed?" he ventures a few minutes later, and "Fuck, it's four o'clock in the goddamn morning and you're looking for that loser? Come back to bed. Please?"
It's four in the morning and Jeannie can't find her little brother, and when Richard whines he sounds just like her two-year-old daughter. "Thanks anyway," she says into the phone, and "Yes, I'm sure Richard can do something. In fact," Jeannie smiles, and it's her Why,-so-nice-to-meet-you smile, the one she's learned to use at the parties and charity balls Richard insists on taking her to, full of good ol' boys and good ol' girls with perfect teeth and sweaty palms and closets full of skeletons. This is the smile she uses when she knows their secrets, and them all unaware. "I'm sure he'll do something, because I have pictures of him fucking the president's niece. Good night, Uncle Steve."
"What?" Richard squawks, and Jeannie ignores him.
Walking to the dresser is plumbing depths she thought she'd forgotten she ever had, but she thinks she's finally learned the lesson her mother never did. There are some things, she thinks as she opens the top drawer and reaches for the plain manila envelope beneath the mounds of satin lingerie, underthings lacy and delicate like the woman she knows her husband thinks she is. There are some things more important than appearances, she thinks and wonders at the raw and simple freedom that flows through her as she throws the packet on the bed so the pictures spill across the comforter, original sin laid out there in glorious pornographic technicolor across the surface of her seemingly-perfect life.
It feels to Jeannie almost as if the world slows to a crawl as first confusion, then shock, embarrassment, and finally god-help-her guilt register on Richard's face. He looks nothing like he should, only remorseful like a puppy she caught pissing on the living room rug--regretting that she caught him, nothing else--and Jeannie doesn't even feel angry as she drops the portable phone on the pillow next to him. She feels powerful and triumphant; it's like a revelation, this feeling that she's finally figured it out, figured everything out. She's in control now, because she doesn't care at all anymore how this looks from the outside, and one small corner of her mind asks in awe and disbelief if this is really how Rodney feels all the time.
*
The phone landed with a solid thump on the pictures nearest Richard, and Jeannie looked down into the pale and horrified face of her soon-to-be-ex-husband.
"Find my brother," she said, voice steely with resolve and something like disdain, "And I won't make this public or messy. Most of these may be too racy for the American tabloids, but don't think I won't find some that aren't. I'm sure there are plenty of people out there willing to sell their souls for pictures like these."
When he didn't move, she threw his planner down next to the telephone and bent to gather the photos. "I'd start now, if I were you," Jeannie added as she fastened the envelope and held it up for him to see. "Because I'll be keeping these until you do."
She could hear him dialing as she moved through the hallway, and laughed humorlessly to herself as she walked down the stairs. It really wasn't all that funny she supposed, and then remembered how Rodney had given her detailed instructions on how to blow up a car when her first boyfriend left her for the cute blonde at the gas station. When she saw him again--and she would, she thought stubbornly--she'd have to make sure Rodney knew that she was the only one who drove the Blazer.
*
Jeannie's mother's favorite cookie used to be lemon meringues. Jeannie was always a Pecan Sandies girl, herself, and Rodney--well, even once he got old enough to have a favorite cookie, Rodney wasn't all that discriminating. He loved anything with chocolate.
It had been love at first Oreo, and Jeannie had the pictures to prove it.
She'd found them packed securely away in a shoebox in the attic a few years ago, when Mum died. God only knew why Mum had kept them, unless she'd forgotten they were there--she probably had, considering how old they were and the sheer volume of dust covering the box.
They showed a happy, chocolate-smeared baby grinning madly and waving the soggy remains of a half-eaten Oreo cookie at the camera. In most of them, a middle-aged fortysomething woman with long auburn hair and bright blue eyes was crouched next to the high chair, sometimes beaming at the person holding the camera and sometimes tickling the baby and smiling at him, instead.
Sometimes Jeannie still wondered if Rodney had ever seen these pictures, incontrovertible proof that their mother hadn't always been the cold and angry woman he had known. It was the smile on Julia McKay's face, not the date scrawled across the backs of the photos, that told Jeannie when they were taken; the date only marked them as probably the last pictures taken before everything in the McKay house got so fucked up.
It happened on Jeannie's birthday; she turned seven the same day her brother died the first time.
Julia McKay was at her wits' end trying (and failing) to pick up after Jeannie's backyard birthday party and keep Rodney, who'd just learned to walk, from stealing leftover bits of cake, chewing on the wrapping paper, or falling into the pool while trying to throw said gift wrap in the water. After the third frantic dash and "Rodney, no!" when she turned around to find her 13-month-old balanced precariously at the edge of the pool trying to shake a stubborn piece of scotch-taped wrapping paper loose of his thumb, Julia gave up entirely. Practically seething with frustration and cursing her absent husband, she deposited the itinerant toddler inside the house and shut the sliding glass door.
"Be good," she pleaded. "If you're good, I'll take you swimming later and we'll both get in the water. Okay?"
Thwarted, Rodney scowled and wandered back into the kitchen. There was an entire cabinet of Tupperware in there, and it was calling his name.
Sighing, Julia brushed sweat-soaked hair out of her face and looked around for her daughter.
"Jeannie! Get out of that tree and come help me clean this up before your father gets home!"
"But, Mum--"
"Jeannie." The set of her mother's face and the warning growl in her voice told Jeannie that, birthday or not, playtime was over. Resignedly, she scrambled down from where she'd been guiltily watching her harried mother and set to work.
"Mum?" Something was wrong. Jeannie dropped the trash bag she was holding and looked around, frowning. Nothing looked out of place, but all at once her chest was tight and suddenly in spite of the humid late-summer heat, Jeannie was freezing. "Mum, where's Rodney?" As soon as she said it, she knew with abrupt and perfect clarity why she was shivering and terrified when she should have been warm under the afternoon sun.
"What? Oh, honey, he's inside. He was futzing around by the pool again, and I didn't want him to fall in." She gestured vaguely at the door. "Why? Jeannie?"
Jeannie was already almost at the door, because her little brother wasn't and he should have been. Rodney was worse than a cat that way, really; he couldn't stand a closed door, always wanted on the other side, especially if he could see you through it. He should have been there pressed up against the glass and looking miserable, begging someone to come and let him out.
She couldn't say why, but that he wasn't suddenly scared her more than she thought possible. Jeannie didn't think you could be this scared at seven; fear like that was for grown-ups. Behind her, she heard her mother call out and scramble to follow.
Jeannie hit the door at a run, grabbed the handle and flung all her body weight sideways to open the heavy door, squeezing through the crack she made. Inside, it was eerily cool and quiet; the soft mechanical hum of the fan made everything sound mundane and peaceful, painful contrast to the rapid frenzied panic that threatened to eat her up inside. It was so damned quiet that Jeannie nearly burst into tears right there--sometimes the only way to find Rodney was to listen for him, he always made noise everywhere he went and the house was far too big to find him quickly once he'd figured the stairs out. Trembling, Jeannie closed her eyes and listened, holding her breath and thinking desperately that, of all the times to listen to their mother and finally be quiet, why did he have to pick now?
Nothing, nothing until her mother came in the door behind her, perplexed and out of breath, and then Jeannie heard someone coughing in the kitchen.
"Oh my God," breathed Julia, and she was pushing past Jeannie.
Except coughing was really the wrong word to describe it; it sounded more like a cross between choking and crying and the hiccups, and Jeannie thought it was perhaps the most frightening sound her baby brother had ever made--scarier even than the time when he was really still a baby and he cried so hard his face turned red and there was this long godawful moment where he wasn't screaming but he wasn't breathing, either.
Her mother was on her knees in front of Rodney when Jeannie got to the kitchen, and she was crying and asking him what he'd eaten. Rodney choked and pointed to the pantry where the open box of cookies sat there on the bottom shelf like an accusation, and Julia was on the phone and then she was out the door with Rodney, just like that. Jeannie ran after her but she was too short, she wasn't fast enough, and by the time she got to the front door the car was pulling out of the driveway and it was gone.
No one came home for hours, though her father did call to make sure Jeannie had locked all the doors and ask if she wanted the neighbors to come sit with her. Jeannie dutifully let the answering machine pick up before she did and told him that yes, she had locked the doors and no, she didn't need anyone to come over. When she asked about Rodney, he told her it had been a close thing but her little brother would be fine and that they'd all be home soon. With a chill, Jeannie wondered what exactly close meant.
It had taken her almost an hour and a half to clean the backyard by herself, and when her grandparents called to wish her happy birthday she let the machine take it After that, she waited in the dark by the phone and tried not to think about what might not have happened if she hadn't climbed the tree and ignored her mother.
The lock turning in the front door was thunderous after hours of silence in the dark. Her mother was pale and shaky, and Rodney was tear-streaked, wide awake and jittery; alternately squirming and whining and staring off into space. His left arm was clutched close to his chest and thick with bandages, and when Jeannie tried to look at it he turned it away and pulled at the gauze.
"Rodney, no." Julia frowned, and tried to grab the bandaged arm. Rodney squawked and tried to jerk it away.
"Julia. Julie, it's okay. He can't pull it off, and he'll figure it out." The good doctor Andrew McKay stepped in and rubbed Julia's shoulders. Then he walked over and hugged Jeannie hard. "Hey, beanie. How are you? I'd have thought you'd be watching TV or something." Her father's face was lined with exhaustion, eyes rimmed with red, and that wasn't right at all. Fathers weren't supposed to cry.
"I was worried." Jeannie swallowed hard and willed herself not to cry, stepped up and stroked Rodney's back. She forced a smile and held his good hand. "Hi, Rodney, how are you?"
"Hi," he said, and bumped his head against Julia's shoulder. He sniffled and showed her his bad arm, contriving to look as put-upon and pathetic as possible.
"Does it hurt?"
"Uh-huh. Ouch." Rodney nodded. "Off," he said decisively.
Jeannie looked up at her father, who shook his head. "Sorry," she said, "But I think it needs to stay on for a while."
"Yes. Yes, it does. And Jeannie, I think it's time for bed. It's been a long day for all of us." He checked his watch and looked at the stairs as if he wanted to be the one climbing them and going to bed.
"Okay. G'night Mum, 'night Rodney. Good night, Daddy." Her mother leaned down and kissed her on the forehead, her father ruffled her hair, and Rodney sullenly muttered something that sounded like 'night'.
As she walked upstairs, she heard her father ask, "How did he get to the pantry anyway? He's barely a year old, for Chrissakes. He can't open doors yet."
She barely heard her mother's answer but it didn't really matter what her mother said, because the only thing she meant was my fault, my fault, my fault.
That night, before she turned off the light, Jeannie paused and looked at the night-light in the corner. Long ago, when she'd first gotten her own real room and bed, her mum had told her it would keep her safe at night from the closet-monster Jeannie was sure existed. Closet-monsters, she'd explained, were as scared of the light as Jeannie was of the dark. The night-light had been maintained for the four years since without question, but suddenly it seemed silly to be afraid of the dark after she'd seen something to really be afraid of, something that scared even her parents. Now she'd thought she'd found something to really be afraid of, and all the nebulous and half-dreamed shadow-creatures of childhood couldn't hold a candle to the real and too-adult monster that was death. This, she thought as she unplugged the night-light, could be what growing up felt like.
The box of lemon meringues was gone in the morning, and when Jeannie asked about it her mother laughed unsteadily and told her that she liked Oreos better anyway. But Jeannie didn't miss the fearful way her mother glanced at the cupboard, or the way she suddenly clutched Rodney so tightly that he squawked at her in annoyance and waved a fistful of breakfast threateningly at her before ignoring her again for the pastry.
"Hi," he said absently to Jeannie as she sat down to her cereal, and Jeannie waved and giggled at him as he chewed his on his fingers along with the bite of pastry he'd stuffed in his mouth. Rodney didn't look any worse for wear except for the gauze along his forearm but her mum was still drawn and pale, and looked as though she hadn't slept well and wouldn't ever again. Maybe, Jeannie thought, that was the difference between grown-ups and kids; kids were scared of things grown-ups knew didn't exist, and grown-ups were afraid of the things children didn't know enough to understand. She thought of the lie in her mother's eyes a moment before, and wondered if being a grown-up meant learning to lie, and pretending to believe the lies others told.
Jeannie felt older already.
*
The big mistake most people made when they thought about family was thinking of it as a shield. Family, Jeannie thought, especially close family, was less like a shield and more like a sword--a double-edged sword, granted, but a sword. As with any other weapon, it was just as likely to wound the bearer when handled clumsily or with inexperience. In the hands of a master, however, handled with the respect due a weapon of its caliber, the necessary awareness of the sharpest edges; of momentum and balance, that seeming-slow and ponderous weight that guides the killing stroke deep into the unguarded and unsuspecting flesh and out again, sticky and sated but still hungry—in the hands of a master, family was a weapon capable of confounding the most foolproof defense.
The trick to it was that if you didn't wield them, the lessons of your childhood would wield you—no matter how securely you thought you hid them, or how deeply they were buried. If you locked them away and ignored them, you'd wake one day to find them next to you in bed, taking you for granted and sleeping with the interns; hurting you. Take up the sword, though, take control and remember the things your parents didn't mean to teach you, and somewhere in the thrust-parry-riposte you found that the old hurts and patterns of your youth stopped having power over you.
Thrust, strike out and step forward—know your footwork, put the other on the defensive, and watch them move right where you want them. Parry and block--know your vulnerabilities, those sore spots and insecurities your mother made in you so long ago, accept the hurt and your opponent scores only the lightest of touches—keep pushing, don't flinch back and you've got them. Guard--read the enemy's defense, see the holes they can't and the fight is over with hardly a blow struck.
Armed, but unarmored, and the tired weight of age and baggage disappears. Speed and maneuverability were the greatest of advantages in family and politics; to be where the opponent's blow is not, and to strike from where they least expect it. These were the things that won the day, and they were born of an awareness and determination Jeannie hadn't thought she'd had in decades.
After almost nine months, the divorce was nearly a sure thing and most of the conflict was down to poses and posturing; sidelong glances full of suspicion and a fear that told her she had almost won. A sword merely worn was still one that was used, after all, and Jeannie was magnanimous and kept hers sheathed, letting the fact that it was there at all speak volumes. Dozens of important people in dozens of important places scrambled to find her brother while she sat sipping coffee on her back porch, rushed to keep her quiet because they knew she had their number but not if she would really tell.
It would've been funny, except that every time she looked at the pre-dawn Colorado sky there was a feeling like the one where the world narrows down to just that shade of blue painted on a little boy's lips when he can't breathe and he's dying; it's a feeling Jeannie knew all too well, and it hadn't left her much room to feel anything else in the last nine months.
Not for the first time, she wondered what Rodney would think if he could see her now. They hadn't really spoken in the few months before he left to his "classified location", and not very often even in the years before that; somehow the years between them, and Rodney's not-unjustified loathing of all things family had conspired with Jeannie's nearly twenty years of marriage to an American politician and made them little more than perfect strangers to each other. Still, he was her brother--she was the one who'd rescued Rodney from the endless hours in that damn playpen (and who the hell used a playpen to keep track of a two-year-old all day, anyway?), Jeannie was the one who snuck in his room to read to him when he was sick, who helped him learn to read, whose room he snuck into when he had nightmares, who'd screamed and screamed when Rodney was five until Mum and Dad stopped fighting long enough to notice he'd been stung by a bee.
There were some ties that never broke no matter how they were stretched, and Jeannie could only cross her fingers and pray this one had survived. If it hadn't, she had only herself and the fact that she'd married a man so much like their father to blame. So exactly like their father, in fact, that by the time Michael was born a year and a half ago Jeannie could have been a perfect carbon copy of her mother.
Perfect, in that when Richard had been so blatantly disapproving of Rodney, Jeannie had just gritted her teeth and said nothing; and when their third child Michael died a year after he was born and Richard had patted her hand and told her condescendingly that maybe she should consider tubal ligation because, of course, congenital heart conditions didn't come from his side of the family—Jeannie hadn't said anything at all, except that she'd think about it.
Jeannie had made her mother's mistakes, all right, the least of which wasn't letting Richard imply that it was her fault that Michael got sick, or insinuate for years and years that she was the reason he fucked around. She learned a lot from Julia over the years--like how to tell when a man's eye wanders, or that having the extra baby he wants would keep him at home. The biggest thing Jeannie thought she'd learned, however, was how to store all that anger up inside and keep it warm.
The best thing her mother ever taught her, Julia hadn't even meant to teach. Jeannie learned a lot from her mother, yes; but she believed she learned more from Julia's mistakes. The most important of those things was how to use all that accumulated and thrice-warmed anger, and to use it on a deserving target. Jeannie hadn't done a lot that she was proud of but she was proudest that she did love Missy (and had loved Michael), even if she hadn't been thrilled at first about a second (or third) child. Jeannie never took her husband's mistakes out on her babies, because she'd finally woken up to take them out on Richard.
It wasn't until the car full of government-issue men in full military dress pulled up in her driveway to give her the video they said was from Rodney that Jeannie realized she'd forgotten one very important thing.
*
"Jeannie? This is your brother, Rodney. . . obviously. I wanna s-say, um. . . I wanna say something. Uh. . . family is important. I-I've come to realise that. . ."
*
When Jeannie was twelve, she was suspended from school for punching a male classmate over a tasteless remark about her lack of cleavage.
She'd been listening at her parents' bedroom door when the argument devolved (as they all did, eventually) into a screaming match about Dad's latest secretary, and so she'd decided to go downstairs and watch some TV until they either decided or forgot about her punishment. As she moved further away from the shouting upstairs she froze, abruptly realizing two crucial facts--one, that in all the fuss about Jeannie no one had thought to check on what Rodney was doing; and two, the deafening series of crashes coming from the kitchen was probably him.
Tearing down the stairs, Jeannie burst into the kitchen to find her six-year-old brother standing on the counter and dropping dish after dish to die in itty-bitty pieces on the floor.
"Rodney!" she hissed, horrified. That was Mum's best china. "What are you doing?"
Rodney looked up at her, beamed proudly and pointed at the table where one of Mum's self-help books sat open on the table.
"Andrew Cohen says that giving up one's most prized possessions is the way to true happiness," he said matter-of-factly, and gleefully broke the butter dish. "I am making Mum happy."
*
". . . I really do wish you the best, you know, and I'm sorry we weren't closer. Perhaps, um. . . if by chance I make it out of this, perhaps one day we can be, and I would like that."
*
Nobody ever really wants what they think they do.
There was a note attached to the video, next to the assurances from General O'Neill, and it was in Richard's handwriting: 'Are you happy now?'
The answer was most definitely no.
*
John Sheppard was expecting to die, which was the only reason he allowed himself to give thought to his having decidedly non-regulation feelings for his very brilliant, very male co-worker. Former co-worker, he amended as the hive ship loomed monstrous and large in the viewscreen and what little courage he had left took up residence in his stomach with his heart, where it roiled unpleasantly and plotted its imminent escape. Funny, how when he'd climbed the stairs out of the control room he'd thought he was lucky not to be leaving loose ends behind. Only now it seemed he had, and a big one--the one who'd built the bomb that was going to kill him.
The jumper was on autopilot, and he couldn't bear to watch the monstrosity in front of him get any closer so he turned away in his seat and put his head in his hands, resolutely ignoring the burning in his eyes. Bile was rising in his throat and he took quick, shallow breaths and fought it; it seemed really stupid to spend his last moments puking his guts out because he'd suddenly realized that he'd walked out on the best thing he'd never had with nothing more meaningful than "So long, Rodney," and he was never, ever going to be able to go back and fix that.
The one thing John had to be grateful for was that he'd known; if nothing else he'd known before he died, even if Rodney hadn't. As he blinked he caught a glimpse of the nuke and thought of how Rodney must feel, knowing he'd built it and that it was going to kill John, and it gave him a pang of regret so tangible it actually hurt.
Hell, he thought, they were his last moments--soon, he'd be so much debris and then no one would know and John sure as hell wouldn't be there to care if they did--and emptied his stomach into the corner, wishing he'd needed to do more than put the jumper on auto-pilot so he'd have something to do besides sit and wait to die.
The key drawback to using a craft that flew on mental instruction to stage a kamikaze mission was that sometimes it began to listen to the insistent McKay-voice-of-doom screaming in that distant recess of your mind that this was a really, really bad idea. Another was that, unlike the twin distractions of gunfire and combat, which gave you something to focus on instead of thinking, the gravid and silent womb of space only encouraged contemplation of things you couldn't afford to think about on a suicide mission.
Breathing deeply, John turned back and checked the sensors. It was almost time, he thought, and it was almost a relief as he angled the ass-end of the jumper toward the hive ship. That way, the impact of the jumper and the nuclear blast would be nearly simultaneous. Remote detonator in hand, John looked out at the stars for the last time and waited.
Then the jumper struck the hive ship, and over the shriek of tortured metal and the thin whistle of decompression, he thought he heard something garbled come over the radio.
"John--" It could have been Elizabeth, but he didn't wait to find out because after that one word the radio died with the shielding and John closed his eyes and hit the trigger as the whole world dissolved into fire and light.
A second later, John landed face-first with a thump and a groan on a hard, metal floor. What with the recent homosexual epiphany followed by the close-range nuclear blast, John felt he was justifiably alarmed when he rolled over to find an imposing man in military uniform—a colonel, by the birds on his shoulders—looming over him and frowning.
Hey, he thought crossly, I wasn't that bad.
Or maybe he said it, because there was laughter in what he supposed was the bridge of the Daedalus and Elizabeth's voice came over the radio--"Oh God, John. John."--and he could've sworn he heard Rodney stalk out of the control room in Atlantis from all the way out in space.
*
General Jack O'Neill had spent the last nine months hearing about the woman and the hell she'd been raising in D.C., but he'd never actually met the wife of their most esteemed Senator Grant. He'd seen grown men--one of them, on one notable occasion, Paul Davis--cross themselves at the mere mention of her name. Still, everything that came out of Washington was an exaggeration at best and an outright lie at worst so Jack had never really worried that she'd come to visit him.
He should have, he reflected, when Teal'c informed him that she was waiting just outside his office doors to see him. Clearly, he'd forgotten what the great secret sisterhood of military wives was capable of. Damn.
"Well, tell her no!" said Jack, and Teal'c shifted.
"I have," he said slowly, "She is. . . quite formidable." And, Good Lord, was Teal'c impressed?
Stupefied, Jack stared. Teal'c stood unmoving, hands clasped behind his back, gazing expressionlessly at a spot somewhere above and behind his head. Jack glared suspiciously until Teal'c said, "O'Neill?"
"Fine," he said, leaning back in the chair and deciding he must have imagined the hint of a smile in the Jaffa's voice. No one impressed Teal'c, damn it, because that would just be way too creepy. "Let her in, then."
Jack hadn't ever met the woman or seen her in pictures, but after everything he'd heard he'd imagined she was some ugly, myopic old creature--horrifically scarred or deformed or something. When the five-foot-seven redhead with the belligerent tone and bright blue eyes burst in, he thought to himself that she wasn't exactly what he'd expected. And, wow, he noted distantly, she had really great legs for a senator's wife.
He sure as hell hadn't expected her to be gorgeous, or half this terrifying.
There was some resemblance to her brother there--the strident tone, hands that followed the words, and words that moved at the speed of light--except Jack had always thought McKay the younger seemed to be made up entirely of nervous energy and arrogance, and in that his sister was entirely unlike him.
She was the embodiment of the stereotypical Scottish temper (and there was an awful lot of Scots and Scots-Irish blood in Canada, he reminded himself), all vengeance and anger and wronged virtue. He could practically see the woman with a claymore, storming the British and demanding to know what they'd done with her brother.
"Ma'am," he tried to interrupt, putting his hands up in a gesture he hoped looked conciliatory, "Ma'am, if we could just calm down a moment--"
It seemed to just piss her off more.
"Calm down!" she spat. "Calm down! General, have you even seen this? Do you even know my brother?" She was waving the video--McKay's message home. "I have been calm. I have been patient! I want to know what the hell you people have been doing to my baby brother, and so help me God if you don't-"
"Jack?" That was Daniel, Jack saw, being completely oblivious as usual and poking his head into the office. Didn't he see the madwoman in front of the desk brandishing McKay's message like a weapon? Of course he didn't, because he had his nose buried in what was apparently a very interesting stack of paperwork. "What happened to lunch? I thought we had lunch today. Oh," he said when he looked up, and seemed embarrassed, "Uh. Sorry, um. General. I didn't realize you were, uh, busy. I'll, uh, talk to you later. Then."
McKay's sister had stopped shouting and was watching Daniel with the same kind of focus he'd seen Carter use on new technology.
But she was quiet for the moment, and Jack chose to seize the opportunity to head off the coming tirade.
"Mrs. Grant, I--"
"McKay," she said, and seated herself with all the aplomb and dignity of a senator's wife. Very suddenly, she was calm and for some reason, it was even more unnerving. "Ms. McKay, General. Richard may not have signed the papers yet, but believe me, there will be a divorce."
Jack didn't doubt it for a second. The woman oozed confidence and capability. He took a deep breath and tried again.
"Ms. McKay, I understand you must be worried about your brother--"
This time Jack cut himself off, because she was looking around his office and not even paying attention to him.
"General." She broke off the examination with the same suddenness she'd abandoned her anger earlier and smiled, but it was more like a baring of teeth. "How do you feel about Don't Ask, Don't Tell?
It took Jack a few seconds to process the abrupt change in topic, but when he did his blood froze.
"Excuse me?" How the hell could she know? She couldn't. The woman was insane, she was grasping at straws. That had to be it.
Suddenly Jack was very, very angry. Who the hell did she think she was, anyway? Brother or not, family or not--nothing gave her the right to use the person he cared about, even loved, against him.
"Now, just wait one god-damned minute--" He was working up a real head of steam, had slapped his hands down on the desk and stood up to look down at her with every ounce of intimidation he possessed, when she derailed him again with characteristic McKay abruptness.
"Personally, I think the current policies are outrageous." Her tone was deliberately casual, but her expression was not. "And I'm sure that if the need arose, I could find others who . . . might feel obligated to feel the same."
Jack gaped, open-mouthed. So she wasn't threatening to blackmail him, then. Well, that was a different story altogether.
"Oh. Really?" He sat down and leaned back in his chair, "Forgive me for being skeptical, ma'am, but with all due respect--public policy would seem to be a bit out of your reach."
"Don't Ask, Don't Tell is a policy that just invites exploitation. The government may not actively seek out evidence, but anyone with a grudge is given the perfect opportunity to get someone discharged or court-martialed." She smiled, and this time it was genuine. "Policy is difficult to change, General, but it isn't so hard to make sure certain persons are ignored, or that certain evidence is never brought to light."
"You sound like an NID agent. You know that, Ms. McKay?" Jack flashed what he thought was his most charming smile, and she laughed.
"Jeannie," she said. "Call me Jeannie, please, and I'm not yet willing to go to quite those lengths. I will, however, do everything in my power to help a friend--as I'm sure you're aware."
"I had heard," Jack said.
"If all else fails, I do have contacts in Canada. In the immigration department, actually. And there are some very lucrative positions available there for those with military experience." She smiled again, and Jack grinned back. "You seem like a good man, General. I think we'll make good friends."
"I think we will," he said. Then he stared at the door behind her and frowned. A moment later, he looked at her and said, "Unfortunately, that doesn't change how very much trouble I'd be in for giving you information you want when you don't have the security clearance."
"Oh?" Her voice was back to steely.
"So, I've been thinking." He tapped his chin thoughtfully and put his feet on the desk. "You got a degree in anything, Jeannie?"
"Most trophy wives do," she said drily. "A bachelor's, at least."
"Really." He looked questioningly at her, "Bachelor's?"
"Yes. Pre-med. Why, General?" She'd crossed her arms, but looked more curious than suspicious.
"Well, I figure if we get you the security clearance you need I could give you the information you want." He pinched his nose, frowning. "I suppose if we could get you registered as a nurse . . ."
Her mouth quirked, very much like her brother's did when he felt the person he was talking to was being especially dense. "A nurse? Oh, I don't know." She mock-frowned. "I always kind of had my heart set on being a real doctor. A surgeon, actually. I don't think I'd want to be anything else."
Jack looked at her, raised his eyebrows.
Jeannie laughed. "No matter what my brother tells you, General, I really didn't go to med school just so I could marry a senator and let it go to waste."
"Med school," Jack said and nodded. "We could work with that. How far did you go?"
"All the way, actually. I finished my residency, but I had to give up practice about five years ago," She made a face, "Richard's career, and all. Good thing I kept up with board licensing, because I may be in the job market now. To support the kids." She gestured. "Where, oh where shall I find one?"
"You can start Monday," he said.
"I'll need some time to catch up. I haven't been in practice in years, and no amount of seminars and conventions will make up for that entirely," Jeannie said warningly.
"Yeah, all right, I know your brother, you're a smart woman. You'll manage." He waved a hand dismissively. "You see--here at the SCG, we get some pretty weird injuries, which is why we keep our own doctors in the facility. Our doctors get security clearance so we can keep them briefed on the kinds of things they'll be patching up." He looked at her meaningfully, and leaned forward to shake her hand., "Welcome to the team, Jeannie. Since you're here, I assume you've already had some fairly extensive background checks."
She nodded. "I think they ran every conceivable check when Richard got into office. And since then..." She shrugged. "Well, he's been in office. And they watch."
"Good," said Jack. "Then all you need are the pretty stamps on your file. That should make my job easier. I'll call Hayes and get back to you tomorrow. Hopefully by then, I'll have made everything official, and then I can brief you on your brother's whereabouts."
*
"Her father was a doctor," Daniel said to Jack the next day. "Andrew McKay, up in Ontario. He was pretty well-known, I gather. You know we had three resignations when you announced she'd be working here?"
"Yeah," said Jack. "Makes me wonder what they're hiding."
Daniel's eyebrows shot up. "Didn't you make her promise not to blackmail anybody?"
"Yes. Well," Jack grinned, "except in the interests of the SGC, of course. It's a win-win situation: she gets what she wants, the president gets his man in the SGC, and she makes us look good just by being here."
Daniel was quiet for a moment. "It will look good to have her in the SGC, though--it does make it perfectly clear we have nothing to hide." He frowned. "Except, you know, everything."
"Well, everyone will assume that if there's dirt to be had, she's already got it and used it. That woman could get dirt on Gandhi," Jack said.
"So what are you going to tell them she did to get the job?"
"I'm going to tell them she asked nicely," said Jack. "Besides, she's already got President Hayes half-convinced it was his idea in the first place. I think she's going to be fun. Look--I think even Teal'c likes her."
He motioned towards where Jeannie stood talking up at the Jaffa, then walked over. "Have we told you he's an alien, yet?"
"No." Jeannie grinned, and made a show of looking closely at Teal'c. "Really? I didn't see any tentacles." Shaking her head sadly, she added, "And he seemed like such a nice boy."
Teal'c looked blank.
"Oh, and General--about the support you're sending to Atlantis." She produced a folded Post-It note. "Could you have Stephen give this to my brother when he sees him? It would mean a lot to me."
Jack took the note, read it, and smirked. "Sure, why not? You know Caldwell?"
"Well, mostly just his wife, Ellen," she said. "But I've met Stephen once or twice before." She nodded. "Thank you, General."
She smiled and walked off with the rest of the medical staff to tour the facility.
"You know McKay, right?" Jack passed the note to Daniel and grinned when he choked. "I told you she'd be fun."
*
John found Rodney in the chair room, of all places, tinkering with the Mark II naquadah generator connected to the chair.
"What are you doing?" He realized it came out wrong when Rodney stiffened.
"Good to see you, too, Major." He didn't even look back at John and his hands didn't stop moving, disconnecting and reconnecting wires and making it perfectly clear that Rodney wasn't happy to see him at all.
John sighed and slumped further back against the bulkhead he was leaning on. He hadn't been back an hour, and already this wasn't going well.
Ford and Teyla were gone, taken by the Wraith, and unless the Daedalus could pull another Asgard rabbit out of the proverbial hat they would never, ever get them back--the Wraith were awake this time, all of them, which precluded daring rescue-by-jumper. The Asgard technology adapted to the Daedalus was their only possible hope, and only if they could set the transporters to differentiate the Wraith from everyone else, including Teyla and any other Athosians with the bastardized Wraith gene.
And now he'd just pissed Rodney off.
Although if John was honest with himself, he'd most likely pissed Rodney off a while ago, when he'd left to go pilot the jumper to certain fiery doom. All he'd done just now was to make Rodney madder.
"I just figured you'd be getting things ready for the ZPM, is all." Okay, so it sounded pretty lame. At least it was apologetic.
He hoped.
This time Rodney did glance over his shoulder; glaring at John, who flinched back. "Believe it or not, that happens to be exactly what I'm doing," he said. "Did you ever stop to think what could happen to Ancient technology when it's drawing full power from two power sources, or what most assuredly will happen if we hook a naquadah reactor to the ZPM? Or were you just hoping to see the chair explode, because I'd hate to deprive you of another chance to cheat death and crack jokes afterward." His words were laced with fury and sarcasm, and punctuated by the sound of wires ripping.
"Dammit, Rodney! I--" Suddenly John was just as furious as Rodney sounded. If Rodney would just turn around and look instead of brooding, he'd see that John was as tired and scared as he was. Cracking jokes? Christ, John had been as shocked as everyone else to find himself alive--more so, in fact, considering they'd at least known the Daedalus was out there trying to lock onto him.
Besides, he hadn't been cracking jokes. He hadn't even known he'd said it out loud until people started laughing.
"So long, Major." Rodney's voice was sing-song with irritation. "I haven't slept in nearly four days and I have work to do. Go away. Make yourself useful and bring me some coffee-substitute. Or just go away, period. That would be nice, too."
John saw red at the sound of his own words thrown back at him. He'd known
they were ridiculous as soon as he'd climbed in the jumper. It was a good thing John was as tired as he was, because by the time the angry retort made it from his brain to his mouth, Rodney had gone back to ignoring him, and John could see the way Rodney was wilting with exhaustion.
Rodney reminded John sometimes of one of those Mark II naquadah reactors: it had 600% the power output of your average reactor, but only because it functioned in a constant state of barely-controlled overload. Now, hands trembling and movements make shaky with lack of sleep and an excess of fear, Rodney looked like a generator slowly running out of fuel.
Gritting his teeth, John walked out of the room. He knew he was in the wrong, and finding something hot and caffeinated might just make Rodney feel better enough to let John apologize to him.
Ogres are like onions, he thought resolutely and tried to think where the nearest almost-coffee station was. The labs, he remembered, and turned towards them. They have layers.
The image of himself as Donkey was nearly enough to keep John snickering all the way back.
*
John dropped the mug of almost-coffee as soon as he realized where the explosion he'd just heard had come from.
Summoning energy from God-knew-where, he broke into a run and punched his radio. "Medical team to the chair room, now!"
Please, God, he thought. Don't let them be too late.
*
"It was a stupid mistake," Zelenka was telling Elizabeth over the radio. "Elementary, really. Made by those who are careless or very, very tired. Now we work in twos, so we can double-check each other. Things will not go nearly as quickly, but hopefully . . ."
"Hopefully, this won't happen again," Elizabeth finished wearily. "Doctor, let me know when you get the ZPM in place--Carson tells me we need to dial Earth and ask for more doctors."
"Yes, I believe I have found a way for Earth to dial us, and send people through. And we will dial Earth and tell them," Zelenka sighed. "As soon as we can."
"Thank you." Elizabeth let out a deep breath, looking down at Rodney's still form. John thought she looked as if she aged ten years in the past few days.
John was sitting on a crate next to Rodney's cot. Rodney's condition apparently rated what looked like an abandoned supply closet, but the hallways outside and the rooms surrounding the infirmary were filled to overflowing with the wounded or dying who had nowhere else to be.
Delaying just long enough to beam their people off the hive ship had cost them dearly. They'd gotten their men back, along with a group of Athosians and other humans the Wraith had captured en route, but in the meantime Atlantis had had to hold against two more waves of the Wraith.
As soon as they'd realized just how very many humans were aboard the Wraith ship (and John couldn't help but shiver in remembered horror of the hundreds of corpses they'd found aboard the crashed resupply ship) they'd decided that the Daedalus would take on as many of the captives as would fit. As long as the Daedalus stayed cloaked, the Wraith wouldn't be able to find them and take them back.
Unfortunately, Atlantis had been vulnerable to the Wraith's vengeance when they found their meals missing. The fighting had begun again just after the explosion in the chair room and lasted until after the Daedalus destroyed the last hive ship. Caldwell was on his way back now, with the ZPM and nearly three hundred potential patients.
John himself had only just stumbled into the infirmary to get his arm dressed and check on Rodney, having been helping to eradicate the last of the Wraith presence on Atlantis.
Rodney was swathed in bandages, clammy and pale. The shadows under his eyes seemed a thousand times worse with Rodney this still and drawn, and John this utterly spent.
"How is he?" asked Elizabeth softly. She pulled up a crate.
"I don't know." John didn't look up, couldn't look away. "I just got here. He's--he's really quiet." Then he had to swallow and stop talking because he was so tired he sounded like a kid. Rodney was holding still, shutting up, and that was suddenly the scariest thing in the world, no matter how often John had wished it would happen.
I take it back, he thought wildly. Oh, Jesus. Oh, fuck. Oh, Christ--I take it back! Tentatively, he reached out to touch Rodney's wrist and stopped; Elizabeth was here.
"John?" Elizabeth's voice was still soft, the way you'd talk to a wounded animal. She cocked her head slightly, and looked concerned. "Are you all right?"
Fuck, he probably looked like such a goddamn head case right now. Suddenly frustrated beyond all tolerance, John scrubbed his eyes furiously with his palms. He kept his eyes on Rodney when he spoke.
"He was mad at me. Not just mad, but furious." If he looked closely enough at the bandages, John could almost pick out a pattern. "And I left. To get some of that almost-coffee. I knew how tired he was, how angry, and I left." Shrapnel. Jesus, that was what it looked like--he looked like he'd been hit with shrapnel. "I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. Oh fuck, fuck, fuck, I'm sorry."
John took a deep breath and put his head in his hands for a moment. He closed his eyes, but he could still see Rodney there hurting, maybe dying, and partly because of John's own carelessness. When he raised his head again, he wasn't sure what was showing on his face, in his eyes, but it must have been raw, because Elizabeth's eyes widened and she didn't say anything.
But she scooted her box closer and hugged him, and that helped.
*
Beckett stumbled in a few minutes later and threw himself breathlessly against the closed door, where he sagged, pressing his palms over his eyes and completely oblivious to their presence. When Elizabeth let go of John and tentatively said, "Carson?" the poor man looked as if he'd jumped out of his skin.
"Wha? Oh, Dr. Weir." He slid down to the ground and looked up at her. His eyes were shadowed like Rodney's, only Beckett's looked as if the shadow had crept inside with the sights of the day, leaving them dark and haunted with the visions of the dead and the dying. "You startled me."
"I'm sorry."
"That's all right." He waved a hand negligently, and leaned his head back against the door. "I imagine you'll be asking about Rodney, then. He'll be all right, I think, if they put him in here. If it was serious, he'd be out there where we could see him. Concussion, and some lacerations--I haven't had the time to see to him myself." After a moment, Beckett straightened up and looked at Elizabeth again. "We badly need more people. I know," he continued, holding up a hand, "I know you're trying, but you've got to understand--it's not simply a question of supplies, or people. I'm not a surgeon, Dr. Weir, and very few of us are. We're doing the best we can, but there are men out there who need more than just rudimentary surgery and, frankly, when it comes to that we're just as likely to kill them as not.
"And without the attention they need, they'll be dying anyway. We haven't got the facilities to handle this many--not to mention the supplies or the manpower--and there are more patients on the way. We're desperate." He spread his hands helplessly.
John swallowed, and looked over at Elizabeth who seemed to be searching for something to say. Beckett brushed himself off as he stood again and turned to go back out into the infirmary.
"We will be dialing Earth at the first opportunity," she said, but her voice was too scared to be soothing. "As soon as we've got the ZPM in place."
"I know," Beckett said wearily. "I just hope it's soon enough."
*
The moment Caldwell set foot off the Daedalus, he was very nearly bowled over by a small group of rabid scientists after the ZPM. John and Elizabeth entered the hangar bay just as Zelenka and the rest were pushing out, with Zelenka clutching the ZPM to his chest, and all of them chattering as incoherently as madmen about shielding and dislocation.
"None in sensor range," muttered the one closest to John. "Fully charged! We can do it now, and even move it closer to the mainland."
"No, no, no. Absolutely not. It's too predictable," said his companion. "Away from the mainland, at least a few hundred miles. And anyway, we must disable the mechanism first, before we do anything."
"What will never work?" Elizabeth looked as utterly bewildered as John felt, and not at all happy about it. She looked at John, who shrugged, and they both turned to follow the scientists. "Which mechanism?"
One of the ones at the back looked back at Weir, blinking as if he'd never seen her before. "The fail-safe," he said, like that made perfect sense, and pushed his glasses up his nose. "Or the city will not sink. Obviously."
"What?" said Elizabeth, but the man had already forgotten about them and turned to catch up with his fellows.
"Forget it," said John, and tugged Elizabeth's arm as he put on a burst of speed. "We're not going to get anything coherent out of them until they stop." Damn scientists and their damn hive minds. "They never make sense while they're moving. C'mon."
Colonel Caldwell caught up to them just as they caught up to Zelenka, who was plugging in the ZPM and didn't even look up as they entered the room. Elizabeth spoke just as Caldwell opened his mouth.
"What's this I hear about sinking the city?" she asked.
"It is exactly what the Ancients did to hide their city, Dr. Weir, and now is the time. There are no Wraith ships in range to see it happen, and so Atlantis will simply..." Now Zelenka looked up, and gestured vaguely. "Disappear."
John and Caldwell looked at each other for a moment. "That seems fairly sound," John said slowly. "What else?"
"Is there enough power?" asked Elizabeth.
Zelenka scoffed, "Of course. Three ZPMs lasted for ten thousand years, one after another, providing minimal life-support and full shielding. They--"
"Full shielding?" John said skeptically, and Zelenka waved a hand.
"Yes, yes of course full shielding. To protect the city against unlikely possibility that the Wraith got smart and found Atlantis," he said. "My point is--ten thousand years, Major, which means each ZPM lasted roughly 3,333 years apiece. Sinking the city, moving it sideways, giving full power to shields--" He stroked the ZPM lovingly. "We will all die of old age before this one runs out of power."
"Wait," Elizabeth said sternly and held up a hand. "Moving it sideways? Why, and can we even do that?"
Zelenka snorted disdainfully, sounding just like McKay when they were missing what he thought was an obvious point. "Atlantis was not safe all these years because the Wraith were too stupid to learn how to make ships waterproof," he said. "Atlantis was safe because the Wraith did not know Ancients could sink cities, and so did not think to look under the water. Now, we must sink it and move it, so that even if they do, we will not be where they look. This city can fly! Of course it can sink, and then move." He went back to fiddling with connections.
Elizabeth looked at John, and then Caldwell. Then she nodded. "Okay, but we dial Stargate Command first and figure out a way for them to dial back."
"Yes, yes. That is taken care of. Earth needs just enough power to establish wormhole here for approximately ... 3.5 microseconds. Now that the Atlantis gate has a fully-charged ZPM to power it, it should take over and help power the wormhole. It is not a permanent solution, but it is one that should work for now." Zelenka looked back up at them and sighed. "If it makes you happier, Rodney is the one who figured it out. Me, I read his notes and double-checked the math. It will work."
"Okay," Elizabeth said again. Zelenka nodded to himself and went back to the console he'd been paying attention to. "We'll do that. Then we'll sink the city."
John didn't even think Zelenka saw them leave the room.
*
The first thing Jeannie thought of when she heard the situation on Atlantis was the subway accident that had happened in D.C., just down the street from the hospital where she worked. She'd been stuck there for almost a week, hadn't been able to go home for five days, they were that busy.
They'd routed everyone not involved in the wreck to other hospitals, and still they'd barely had room to work around the injured. She'd never been able to forget what it had been like--hundreds of people, and all of them screaming, moaning, vomiting, dying in the lobbies and the waiting rooms, packed in like rats and practically on top of each other because the doctors couldn't move to save them fast enough.
"You'll want to take anyone who's worked through a subway accident," she told O'Neill. "Train wrecks, 9/11, gang wars, any major disaster like that. We'll need the supplies to set up an OR, and they'll need to start triage right away."
Jeannie was already moving, packing fresh scrubs, socks, surgical texts (because you never knew when they'd come in handy), and coffee (because you couldn't possibly survive a shift like this without it). Around her, the rest of the staff was feverishly doing the same.
"So you're going, then?" said O'Neill, and turned to the chief of the medical staff. "Funny, I don't seem to recall asking her. She's not trained for this."
"Funny," said Jeannie heatedly, and stood up rigid with anger because she knew without knowing how that something was terribly wrong-wrong-wrong, "I don't recall giving you a choice."
"She does have experience in these situations, General," Dr. Bishop said. "She just needs to be familiarized with our protocols."
"I did my internship in Washington D.C.," Jeannie said stiffly. "And worked there for nearly five years after. I know what it's like. You'll need every body you can get--and I'm a surgeon, which means you need me even more."
"You've never been through the Stargate," O'Neill pointed out patiently, and suddenly Jeannie realized he was testing her.
"General," she said, and tried to sound reasonable, "I've never been to Bulgaria, either. Or sailed by boat. Would either of those things make me less effective as a surgeon?"
O'Neill thought for a moment, then nodded. "I'll have someone drill you in protocols. You'll probably be there for at least a few days," he warned.
"Thank you." Jeannie turned back to the bag she was packing, and hefted it onto her back. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to call Richard and make sure he picks up the kids."
*
Thirty minutes later, she'd been drilled to the end of her patience on the radio, narrowly avoided being packed into one of the boxes full of medical supplies, been re-briefed on the situation in Atlantis with the rest of the staff, and finally lined up behind the Marines in front of the Stargate.
By then, she'd had the chance to work up a good adrenaline buzz in anticipation of the job ahead. Intellectually, Jeannie knew there was little sense in getting ahead of their most vital supplies; but her fingers still itched and every second's delay seemed an eternity when she thought of the people dying on the other side of that damn metal ring.
She refused to wonder if one of them was Rodney.
She didn't have the time to worry, didn't have the time to panic, so she deliberately did not notice the sensation of falling through the Stargate, or the way the entire alien city she stepped out into trembled, rumbled, and then suddenly shook violently, all the way down to its foundations. Instead, Jeannie braced herself and waited until the world held still.
Then, she grabbed the first man she saw in military uniform (he had really weird hair, she noticed, and how much shit had he caught from Rodney for that?), cutting off his redundant announcement that the city had sunk, and demanded to know where the infirmary was.
He pointed and she ran, trusting the rest of them to follow.
*
Elizabeth had made dialing Earth their very first priority, so no one had even started work on deactivating the fail-safe until after they'd contacted the SGC to impress upon General O'Neill the desperation of their situation. Once that was done, the hallways were suddenly crawling with scientists trying frantically to secure everything important before the shakedown started.
But someone forgot to tell Beckett--or any of the medical staff, really--who treated the entire city to an ass-ripping of epic proportions via intercom. Fortunately, most of what little of the tirade that wasn't rendered entirely unintelligible by the man's brogue was mercifully drowned out by the rumble of Atlantis on its way down. What little he heard was enough to make John question everything he'd thought about the good doctor. He didn't even know that was anatomically possible.
Then he thought of the patients crowding the halls of Atlantis, and wondered how many of them hadn't been secured before the bone-jarring descent. Shit, he thought feelingly.
When it was over, he looked up to find that the first shipment of doctors had come through the gate. "Sorry about that," he had time to say. "That was--"
A vaguely familiar woman in blue scrubs at head of the group cut him off when she marched forward and grabbed the front of his shirt. "Never mind that!" she shouted. "Tell me where the infirmary is!"
Startled, John simply pointed; the woman let go and sprinted down the hallway. Tired as he was, he barely managed to keep up with her long enough to make sure she took the right turns.
As they approached the infirmary, the hum of background noise began to get steadily louder. When they began to grow especially close, John could hear that it really wasn't background noise at all but the cries of all the wounded who hadn't been fastened down when the world shifted beneath them.
"Good Lord! You didn't even wait to secure the patients? Of all the god-damned, idiotic things--" said the woman next to him, and put on a burst of speed as she began to read John the same riot act Beckett had broadcast to the city minutes earlier.
"Whoa! Not my fault," he panted. "You talk to Dr. Zelenka about that." That is, John thought angrily, if I don't get to him first.
"Zelenka? Right. Oh my God," she breathed as they turned the last corner. Abruptly, she stopped and turned to John with wide blue eyes. "We're going to need more supplies than they're planning to send—more stretchers, blankets, drugs, everything. In fact, you need to get back there and tell General O'Neill the only thing he doesn't need to triple is the patients!" she shouted over the noise, and strode in to start barking orders at the nurses and Marines who had come with her.
A second later, she looked back and saw him. "Now!" she shouted. "Tell him we need all that as of yesterday! Go!"
Without thinking, John turned around and went back the way he came. The funny thing was, he thought once he'd relayed the woman's message to Elizabeth, that she reminded him of someone, someone important. He just couldn't think who.
*
The next hours seemed to fly by too fast for Jeannie. There were too many patients, too many wounded, and though it seemed she was up to her elbows in blood the whole time, it wasn't enough to save everyone.
Men died when doctors were slow or clumsy; and it was an unfortunate fact that doctors were only human, no matter how they might wish otherwise, and humans got sloppy after so much adrenaline and so little rest. So men died because their doctors weren't fast enough, and now also because they weren't heedful enough.
It was enough to make Jeannie curse, and she did. She cursed the fact that she was only one person, that she needed to sleep, needed to eat; cursed the fact that the Wraith existed at all, that she wasn't ten years younger, that her hands started to shake after almost two days of nearly non-stop surgery. Most of all, she cursed the fact that the men she was operating on still died sometimes in spite of everything she tried.
*
Soon after the doctors arrived, there wasn't much left for John to do. Caldwell took control of the Marines, having the freshest explore more of Atlantis to secure living quarters for the nearly 300 refugees and military personnel they'd brought. He'd also relieved John and the rest of the personnel who had been standing duty for the better part of the past three days to eat, shower, and sleep--not necessarily in that order. Some, whom John had taught to fly the jumpers, flew the healthiest refugees out to the mainland. Others escorted the most desperate medical cases through the Stargate to Earth.
Meanwhile, John was left at loose ends. Once he'd showered and eaten, he'd wandered back to Rodney's closet to sleep there, where he could make sure Rodney was still alive.
Sleep was a misnomer, he decided as he woke from another truly gruesome nightmare of fire and light and the sound of metal screaming. About a half-second later, as he stood up to stretch, John realized that the screaming hadn't come from the nightmare, but from the infirmary outside the closet door.
"John?" Elizabeth's voice came over the radio he'd thankfully forgotten to take off. "Major Sheppard, what's going on down there?"
"I don't know yet, Doctor Weir," he said, "But I'm checking it out."
As he opened the door, creeping out of the supply closet (and the symbolism of that wasn't lost on him, no sir), he moved out into one of the medical labs adjoining the infirmary proper and from there into the infirmary itself. There, he saw one of the refugees holding the medical staff up with a P90 probably taken from the Marine lying unconscious on the floor at her feet.
The woman--who looked to be Genii from the clothes, John realized, and cursed under his breath--was standing next to a child, who was choking, and she was shouting hysterically at the doctors ducking behind tables and the Marines shouting back at her. The Marines, he noticed, were also holding guns and pointing them at her.
The shouting grew in volume and intensity as he made his report to Elizabeth, until suddenly one of the doctors stood up from behind a table and howled for silence.
"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" The doctor was a woman, too, John noticed, the same one who'd grabbed him in the control room. She had longish auburn hair tied loosely back, and she looked roughly as frazzled as the Genii woman. She held both hands up, palms out, and took a tentative step towards the woman with the gun. "Put that gun down, soldier. She isn't going to shoot me," she said to Stackhouse, but didn't take her eyes off the Genii woman.
Stackhouse glanced over at John, who had come into the room just beside him, "Major?" he asked softly.
"Put that damn gun down now, soldier, before I shoot you myself!" The doctor actually spared a glance in John's direction, eyes flashing. John looked at Beckett, who was nodding frantically at him, then nodded at Stackhouse, who lowered the gun slowly. "She's not going to shoot anyone. She's just scared, because that's her child there, isn't it?" Her voice was pitched low, soothing, and all traces of anger had melted away. She was looking steadily at the Genii woman, who nodded fearfully.
"You must be very frightened," the doctor continued, moving slowly towards the woman. "I understand that."
"How?" demanded the woman angrily, tightening her hold on the weapon. "How could you even begin to understand?" Her voice was rising in pitch again, but the doctor didn't flinch back; she slowed, but didn't stop moving forward.
"I have children," she said, keeping eye contact and swallowing hard. "My youngest son died a year ago, and I would have done anything to save him. Anything, including threatening the doctors with guns if I had thought it would help."
The Genii woman seemed to relax a little, posture drooping.
"But it won't," the doctor continued--and she was almost across the room, John noticed, almost close enough to reach out and grab the P90. "Somebody gave him a shot, didn't they? And that's when he started choking, wasn't it?" When the woman nodded, she continued, and glanced over at Beckett meaningfully. "He's having an allergic reaction, one we didn't expect." Beckett looked struck for a moment, then nodded and began moving towards the cabinet that held the drugs. "He can't breathe because he's in something we call anaphylactic shock, but he'll live if we can stop it quickly. And we can. But, lady, we cannot help you if you do not put down the gun."
The last words were spoken fiercely, desperately, and the doctor looked away from the child long enough to look beseechingly at the woman, who looked back for one lengthy frozen moment.
"He is Genii, and you would still treat him?" she asked.
"Yes," answered Beckett and the red-headed doctor immediately, and the Genii woman moved abruptly, thrusting the P90 forward into the other woman's hands.
"Please," she said, and her voice was suddenly thick with tears. "Help him."
The tension in the room dissolved as Beckett sprang forward and stuck the boy in the thigh with a needle. The boy, who couldn't have been more than ten and who had been turning a frightening shade of blue, suddenly choked again and gasped in a breath. Eyes wide and brimming with tears, he reached out for his mother as color began to return to his face.
John let out a breath himself, as he walked forward to retrieve the P90 from the doctor. The Genii woman was weeping with relief as she held her son's hand. The redhead looked meaningfully behind John at Stackhouse
"Major," she said forcefully. "This woman is not to be harmed. Understood?"
"Yes," he said and looked back at Stackhouse, and damn if the woman didn't really remind him of someone. She looked at him, silently begging him to agree, and John glanced at the boy still coughing on the stretcher and wondered what he would have done if it had been Rodney there, dying, in an alien place. "Understood." Desperation did funny things to people. And the Genii woman had surrendered, after all, the moment she'd realized they weren't going to let her son die.
"Good," said the doctor, and all but ran past him out of the room.
*
Jeannie stumbled through the first door she saw that didn't lead to more patients and promptly squatted down and put her head between her knees. I will not be sick, she thought stubbornly. I will not be sick all over someone's office.
The door whooshed open a few seconds later, but she almost didn't notice until whoever it was squatted down in front of her and put a hand on the back of her neck, covering hers.
"Hello, there." It was a man, and his voice was soft and he spoke with the same lovely accent she'd heard over the radios as she'd first stepped onto this godforsaken city. "Are you all right?"
"Yes," Jeannie said, willing her voice to sound saner than she felt. "I, uh. I did my internship in Washington, D.C. It's just--" She shook her head, searching for the words, "I haven't had to do that since before I had my kids. And..." Shit. She was shaking. "I guess I never had so much to lose, you know? Before. Jesus. I don't think I've ever been that scared. Fuck."
She brought her hands down to cover her face and found herself gathered in and hugged by the nice Scottish doctor who, now that she thought about it, was shaking almost as badly as she was.
She was so scared that she froze for a moment. Then it felt really good to be alive to be hugged at all, and she squeezed back, suddenly desperately thankful to be touching someone who wasn't dying. They stayed like that for several minutes, slumped against each other like tired and broken dolls, and let the reality of their continued existence sink in. She was still shaking, and the doctor reached up wordlessly, snagged the jacket hanging from the office chair, and wrapped it around her.
Jeannie turned her face against a warm and wonderfully alive shoulder, and sniffled wetly. "God," she said, and took a deeper breath. "Oh God."
"Yes," said the doctor--Beckett, was it?--and let out a dry chuckle. "Exactly." And then Jeannie laughed, and so did Dr. Beckett, and suddenly they were both laughing so hard they sounded on the verge of hysterics.
When they eventually wound down, Jeannie didn't let go. Neither did he, and Jeannie was grateful; she'd seen too much death in the last twenty-four hours and come too close to it in the last ten minutes, and at the moment it felt as if holding on was the only thing keeping her sane.
Beckett rubbed her hair meditatively. "That was an incredible thing you did out there." She chuffed thanks into his shirt, and he continued, "How did you know it was anaphylaxis?"
"My brother did that all the time when he was a kid," she said, and settled her head onto his shoulder. "You wouldn't believe how many times he went to the hospital because he ate something we didn't know had lemon in it. Or got stung by a bee. And then, of course, there was the whole incident with the pool, but--What?" she asked, when Beckett stiffened suddenly.
"Oh, nothing," he said, and sounded as if he was trying very hard not to laugh. "You must be Dr. McKay, then. I had wondered why they kept paging him to surgery." He chuckled, and this time it was something real and not so frantic.
It was contagious. Jeannie tried to picture her brother, faced with the prospect of surgery, making the face she'd always thought of as his 'you-want-me-to-eat-what?' face, and dissolved into giggles.
"God help us, should we ever be that desperate," she said breathlessly. "Could you picture that? He'd--oh, God! He--" She was laughing so hard there were tears in her eyes. "Voodoo!" she said helplessly, and they both laughed harder.
"We should probably go back out there," Beckett said a few minutes later, without moving. "If nothing else, we've got to get through there before we can eat or sleep, and I don't know about you but I cannot remember the last time I've eaten."
"Hmmmm," said Jeannie, and yawned. "Neither can I. Think they can spare us long enough to eat, sleep, and--oh, would you know where to find a 'Dr. Zelenka'?"
Beckett looked at her carefully and then smiled, the first genuine one she'd seen on the man since she'd gotten there. "As a matter of fact, I do."
Standing, he grabbed her hands and pulled her up. "Why don't we get something to eat first, and then we'll pay a visit to Dr. Zelenka. All right?"
"Sounds good, Doctor ...?"
"Carson. Call me Carson," he said.
"Carson," she said, and smiled. "Let's go."
*
Once, when Rodney was still very young, their parents had tried to encourage him to go into medicine. Brain surgery, to be precise, because once they'd realized how incredibly smart he was, they'd thought the challenge might appeal to him. Mum had invited a neurosurgeon to dinner, one of Dad's friends.
Rodney had drilled him mercilessly all through dinner on the types of different procedures and their outcomes, and the probability of brain damage. Then, he'd paused thoughtfully over dessert for one long, uncomfortable moment.
"So, basically," he said, and Jeannie could practically feel the anticipation radiating from her father and the palpable smugness from the surgeon, "what you're saying is that no one ever comes out of surgery any smarter, and half the time they actually end up dumber than they started."
Jeannie kicked him under the table, but he ignored her. And he continued, seeming perfectly oblivious to the way their father choked on his food, or the mortified way Mum seemed to shrink in on herself. "I don't see the point--I mean, why take them apart if you can't put them back together better?"
Mum hadn't thrown another dinner party for months, which thrilled Rodney to no end, and Dad hadn't ever tried to interest himself in Rodney's future again, calling the whole evening a complete loss.
The surgeon had been terribly interesting, though.
*
It turned out they didn't have to go far to find Dr. Zelenka. Jeannie and Carson staggered like exhausted drunks down the hallway to the mess, which was blessedly empty and quiet except for one rumpled scientist tapping sleepily away on his laptop.
Carson stopped abruptly. Taking in the expression of barely contained rage on the good doctor's face, Jeannie said, "That would be Dr. Zelenka, then."
He nodded curtly, and Jeannie summoned her very last dregs of energy and drew herself up straight and marched forward to the man responsible for the disaster-upon-the-disaster of a few days ago.
Reaching his table, she looked down at the man and thought of the infirmary after the move; men who'd had wounds reopened or torn further, people who'd died or could still die, or who were condemned to a crippled half-life because their conditions had been too sensitive for them to even be shifted carelessly, much less shaken violently.
She thought of her brother, whom Carson had shown her, whose stitches had ripped and whose concussion was now that much worse.
Anger building, she thought of Richard and his succession of lies and betrayals, and his tacit insistence that she was to blame. Jeannie thought of the run-around she'd gotten for the last nine months, excuses and delays ranging from the flimsy and desperate to deliberate and downright malicious; she thought of how her baby died a year ago, how she'd almost died twenty minutes ago, and when she was finally so furious she could barely contain it she thought of her mother.
Then she gathered up twenty years, nine months, two days and a lifetime's worth of helpless fury, held it like a weapon in her hands, and pointed it at the dangerously negligent scientist in front of her.
Carson looked vaguely impressed when she spoke, stepping back and crossing his arms, lips a tight line. But Zelenka just cocked his head and studied her.
She suddenly felt uncomfortably like a lab specimen. The sensation was so disconcerting that she cut herself off mid-tirade, scowling defensively. "What?"
Zelenka stood and looked at her for another long moment. Then, he spoke.
"Only one man I know of who is capable of so much fury in so very many words, and not even needing to shout." He pushed his glasses up, and held a hand out. "You must be his sister. Jeannie, yes? One moment, and I will set camera to record and then we will find the man you need to speak with. I have already talked to him, of course, but now he is too busy being glad Rodney is not awake to feel anything else."
Baffled, Jeannie shook his hand and glanced at Carson while Zelenka did something to the laptop. Carson shrugged, and kept his arms crossed.
Zelenka walked around the table and towards the door, motioning for Jeannie to follow. "You see," he said, "I recognized importance of warning Dr. Beckett. My mistake is that it was Kavanagh whom I asked to . . ."
Jeannie followed, nodding as he explained, glancing once over her shoulder to make sure Carson was with them.
*
Later that day, John made his way as stealthily as possible down the hallways to the mess. He wasn't really all that hungry, but he'd just barely dodged Heightmeyer for the third time in twelve hours, and he figured that after some of the more blatant and ridiculous measures he'd taken to avoid her, well... ducking under stretchers and very nearly diving off piers weren't exactly shining examples of normalcy. Neither was telling the woman he had to run because he thought he'd left the water on in his quarters.
Come to think of it, John didn't even know if that was actually possible with Ancient technology. He'd have to ask one of the scientists.
The point was, she could hardly fail to get the message, and John figured he should probably start acting as if he retained some semblance of sanity.
It was all about appearances. He figured eating was something sane men did, and thus it was something Kate could hardly find fault with, even if he did it at the Atlantean equivalent of three in the morning. Which he had a good explanation for, actually, as his quarters were currently too full of doctors for John to do anything in them.
Three days, and the medical staff hadn't simply stopped at the infirmary, but invaded every empty and not-so-empty space near it. Including the living quarters, but hey--they had to sleep sometime, and John hadn't the heart to kick them out. They, unlike their fellows slumped in various stages of nervous collapse outside, had found somewhere more comfortable than the hallways to sleep. And they deserved it. After all they'd done they, looked even more tired than he felt.
Besides, they were kind of cute. Like puppies, but with scrubs and stethoscopes.
Peeking in the mess hall, he saw that it was clear except for Zelenka--and did the man ever sleep?--who was frowning at something on his laptop while he guzzled coffee. Real coffee, John realized when he sniffed, wouldn't Rodney be glad and--boy, did that thought make his chest hurt.
He manfully suppressed the wild urge to run back to the closet (and nope, the significance of that was still not lost on him) where Rodney slept, and reassure himself again that Rodney was still alive, still breathing.
Instead, John grabbed a tray and stepped through the line (between the all-hours duty schedules and near-constant emergencies, they really couldn't afford to shut the mess down at all) loading his tray up with real Earth food, deliberately not-thinking of the joygasm Rodney'd have over the chocolate cake they offered him, and walked over to sit with Zelenka.
Socializing, he figured, was also something sane men did, and it wasn't as if Zelenka had the psychological high ground to go running to Heightmeyer or anything. It was a god-given fact that you always looked that much more stable next to the geeks, especially the ones they'd brought to Atlantis. Something about being just that smart seemed to mean you couldn't always function on everyone else's wavelength.
He might even look normal to Zelenka, John thought as he walked, then stopped.
There was a woman asleep on the bench. She was wearing one of the expedition jackets backwards, so it opened across the back, and had stretched out on her stomach so her head was pillowed on the padding of the jacket. One arm was curled around the top of her head and the other hung limply, nearly touching the floor.
She was also the same woman he'd been trying to figure out for the past three days. John stood for a moment, thinking. God, he knew, he just knew he should know her but he couldn't think how.
Then she spoke, and startled him half out of his skin.
"Why, yes, I am sleeping," she said without moving or opening her eyes. "Amazing, that thing you do when you're tired. Or was it not completely obvious, the way I've laid down, closed my eyes, and been very, very quiet? It's nothing nefarious, I promise. Now you can go away and leave me alone, or get me some coffee and pray I don't hurt you for waking me up."
"Uh," said John. That feeling of familiarity was stronger now than ever. "I'm sorry, Doctor. . ." he trailed off expectantly, hoping she'd fill her name in and he wouldn't feel like a complete and total ass a few days from now, when he'd be expected to know her.
"Oh," she said. "So you noticed the scrubs. Nothing gets by you and your astounding powers of observation, does it? Your family must be so proud."
With that, she snuggled deeper into the jacket and set to ignoring him. John could have sworn there was a palpable aura of 'go away' coming off of the woman in waves.
Even more perplexed than before, he looked up to where Zelenka was waving him over.
"Leave the good doctor alone. She is sleeping," he said as John approached, making it sound as if that fact could have possibly escaped him.
"I knew that," John said defensively.
"Hmmmm," Zelenka said skeptically, and tilted the laptop's screen down. "If this is about Kavanagh, he fell. Clumsy man, Kavanagh. Is a tragedy." He eyed John with suspicion.
"Huh?" What in the hell was Zelenka talking about? John shook his head, blindsided. "What happened to Kavanagh?"
"You do not know?" Zelenka relaxed and opened the laptop again. "He, ah, fell. Tripped, more like. Hit his face on the desk. It was nothing, really, mostly cosmetic." He waved a hand dismissively. "And congratulations on promotion, Lieutenant Colonel. Must be great honor, and well-deserved."
"Yeah, uh, thanks." John was absurdly flattered that Zelenka had remembered, even looked away from the computer to say something. Zelenka and Rodney, with everything that had gone on in the past few weeks, not to mention the stimulants and nuclear weapons, had gotten in the habit of disregarding everything that wasn't absolutely essential. "So," he said, waving a fork and trying for casual, "do you know who she is?"
Zelenka stopped whatever he was doing on the laptop and looked at him. "You mean, you do not?"
"Of course I do," John said shiftily, and looked down at the tray. "I was just, you know, wondering if you did."
"Oh, no, no, no," Zelenka shook his head, smiling secretively. "Colonel, if you do not already know, then I could not possibly tell you. Suffice to say, she has torn Kavanagh's ego into tiny little shreds from which he may never recover." His voice was positively gleeful. "It is a thing of greatness, a thing even Rodney has not yet been able to do, and Kavanagh is terribly upset. Destroyed, even, and so he trips and falls." Zelenka motioned with both hands, smacking one onto the other, "Right onto his desk. Very strange angle, mind you, which is how his eye is black."
"Right," John said, grinning. "So, he tripped and hit his face on her fist--"
"His desk."
"His desk, then."
"I was there," said Zelenka solemnly. "As was Dr. Beckett. You go ask him if you do not believe me."
"Which is why you're here," said John, "watching her sleep, when you could be sleeping, yourself."
"She is sleeping the sleep of the righteous," Zelenka said with conviction. "It should not be disturbed. Especially by those who could be . . ."
"Clumsy?" finished John.
"Yes," said Zelenka. "Or possibly concerned."
"Ah," said John, nodding. Zelenka obviously didn't trust this woman, whoever she was, not to tell the truth.
"I wonder who is coming," Zelenka said a moment later, when voices could be heard echoing down the corridor outside the mess hall. John cocked his head and listened.
"Huh. That sounds like--oh, shit!" he said suddenly, shoving his tray at Zelenka and ducking below the table.
"Colonel," Zelenka began, but stopped when John kicked him.
"Shhhhh!" he hissed. "I'm not here!"
Zelenka must have gotten the message, because he settled down and didn't point John out when Dr. Heightmeyer poked her head around the corner looking for him.
"Damn," she said, turning back to the hallway. "It doesn't look like he's in here, either, Elizabeth. I'm telling you . . ." Her voice receded down the corridor as she walked away.
"Colonel Sheppard," Zelenka said to thin air, "are you feeling all right?"
"Yes. Fine. Why?" John peeked hesitantly over the tabletop. All clear. Good.
"You seem..." Zelenka looked carefully at him. "Edgy, is all."
"I'm fine," John said, maybe a little too firmly to be believable, but he'd just blown his camouflage among the geeks all to hell. So much for looking normal. "What? Do I have some kind of twitch or something?" Great, now he sounded petulant. Damn, damn, damn. John stabbed his fork into the chicken roughly.
Zelenka was mercifully silent while John brutalized his dinner for several long minutes, and by then John was so focused on his tray that he didn't even hear Elizabeth approach.
"Dr. Zelenka." She was nearly at the table, "Oh, John?" Elizabeth paused, looked quizzically at him. "I didn't think you'd be here." She raised an eyebrow at him.
"I, uh..." Jesus, he was caught. He was so caught.
"Colonel Sheppard was just sitting down, Dr. Weir," said Zelenka smoothly, and John mentally thanked God for geniuses. They always came in so handy.
"Yes, I just got here." John sat a little straighter, and Elizabeth shook her head.
"Well, that's not why I'm here," Elizabeth said, and sat down. "Dr. Zelenka, I've just spoken with Kavanagh. What's this I hear about Rodney's sister--"
John was just opening his mouth to say something disbelieving, when one of the nurses' voices came over the intercom and paged Dr. McKay to surgery.
He was about to say something even more incredulous, when there was a startled squawk from a couple tables down. The red-haired doctor who'd snapped at him earlier suddenly jumped up like she'd been burned, fought with the jacket for a moment, then flung it away and was running out the doorway at top speed.
"That's who she is?" He turned wide eyes to Zelenka, who nodded. "Damn it, I knew I knew her!" He was still shaking his head when Elizabeth cleared her throat. "Sorry."
"That's all right. As I was saying--Dr. Zelenka, I understand Rodney's sister hit Kavanagh?" Elizabeth looked as if she really wanted Zelenka to tell her how ridiculous she was being.
"Dr. Weir. As you know, I am very concerned about these allegations." Zelenka turned the laptop to face Elizabeth and continued, "Just as Rodney would be. So, I am just now looking at evidence, and I tell you she did not hit Kavanagh. He fell. Security camera never lies."
He tapped the keyboard, and a video began to play across the screen. Kavanagh was at his desk, shuffling paperwork, and three people came into the room: Beckett, Zelenka, and Rodney's sister. Rodney's sister walked right up to the desk--and, wow, John wished Zelenka'd left the volume on, because it looked like Kavanagh was getting the ass-chewing of a lifetime. Kavanagh must've said something unforgivably stupid, because Beckett stiffened and Rodney's sister stepped even closer to the desk.
The video feed suddenly blinked and stuttered, and when it came back Kavanagh was bent over the desk holding his eye and looked to be howling bloody murder, while Beckett stepped forward to help him up and Rodney's sister cradled her hand.
"Dr. Zelenka," began Elizabeth, her expression skeptical.
"Wait," said Zelenka, "This part you listen to." He leaned forward, tapped another key, and John had been right--Kavanagh was howling bloody murder.
"Now calm down, laddie," Dr. Beckett was saying on the tape, but his back was to the camera, so John couldn't see his expression. "That's a nasty fall you've just taken."
"There, you see?" Zelenka said, pausing the video and taking the laptop back. "It was an accident. Terrible, tragic accident, but also terribly embarrassing. Who can blame Kavanagh for wanting it to be different, eh?"
"Dr. Zelenka." Elizabeth was really trying hard to keep a level tone. "There is time missing from the video. What happened to it?"
"I do not know," Zelenka said. "Perhaps it was a small malfunction."
"So what really happened, Doctor? Don't lie to me." Elizabeth leaned forward over the table.
Zelenka sighed, like a man defeated. "All right, the truth? Here is the truth. I am watching them shout at each other, and suddenly there is something in my eyes, yes? So, I am rubbing my eyes when Kavanagh is injured. But Carson is talking about a fall, and so I believe him. After all, why would Carson lie?"
"So why is she holding her fist?" Lesser men had broken under such scrutiny, but Zelenka just kept tapping away on the keyboard.
"I do not know. Maybe she is wanting to hit him."
"But you didn't see."
"No, not exactly. But I was there."
"But there was something in your eyes."
"For a short moment, yes."
Elizabeth sighed. "All right, Dr. Zelenka. I'll let this go for now." She stood up and turned to leave. "But next time I hear from Kavanagh, I'm sending him to you. Frankly, I'm tired of hearing about it." With that, she left.
John leaned forward and snatched the laptop out of Zelenka's hands.
"Give me that," John said, practically bouncing in gleeful anticipation. "I want to watch it with the volume on this time."
*
"Jeannie," Caldwell caught her just as she was coming back on shift. Two hours of sleep, a meal, and nearly a pot and a half of coffee really did wonders.
"Stephen," she said warmly, "What can I do for you? How's your wife?"
"Jeannie, listen. I need to talk to you." Caldwell's face was uncharacteristically drawn, lacking the easy good humor she usually saw there. He drew her into Carson's office, where she'd broken down nearly two days ago. "Something's happened."
*
John was dreaming. He was in the jumper again, he was falling, it was breaking apart, and he knew that this time the Daedalus wasn't going to get there in time. It couldn't catch him. The world exploded in fire and light; and silence, as the air slipped away and John's eardrums burst. His eyes hurt, his lungs hurt, and suddenly he knew Rodney was there next to him. Rodney was dying, too.
Then John felt the abrupt paralysis of the Daedalus transporters, hit the hard metal deck and inhaled the sterile atmosphere of the ship, and he knew they'd only saved him. Rodney was still out there, they'd saved him and forgotten Rodney, Rodney was dying, but before John could say anything, the viewscreen went to bright white as the bomb detonated and everything around it became so much dust.
"John," croaked Rodney, but that wasn't right. Rodney was dead. "John."
"Wha? Huh?" John woke fully and abruptly when someone grabbed his knee and moved it. He looked down to see Rodney still alive and blinking owlishly at him in the dark of the supply closet. "Rodney?" Oh, Christ. Rodney was better than just alive, he was awake. He leaned forward, took the hand that rested on his knee, "Hey. Hey, you're awake. How are you feeling?"
"Like hammered shit," Rodney rasped, and gave a dry sort of cough. "Thirsty. Water, please?"
"Yeah, yeah, of course." John rose and, after a second, remembered to let go of Rodney's hand. "Water? I can do that. I think Dr. Beckett's still asleep, so I'll just. Um, grab a nurse, okay?" John knew he was grinning like an idiot, but he didn't care because there was Rodney, looking like he felt like shit but smiling right back at him.
"Small sips," John cautioned a few minutes later, after bringing ice water and pillows to stack behind Rodney to help him sit up. "The nurse said small sips. They're still pretty damn busy out there, but she said she'd have someone in here in a minute."
"Mmmm. Where am I?" Rodney asked, taking in his surroundings.
"In a supply closet," John answered. "Just off the infirmary. They didn't have anywhere else private and quiet to put you."
"Closet? What happened? Jesus..." Rodney reached out, grabbed John's wrist. "The hive ship--is it still out there? What about--" Rodney's eyes were huge with fear, so John put the cup down and took Rodney's hand in both of his.
"Hey," he said. "Calm down. It's over. There was an explosion in the chair room just after the Daedalus dropped me off. The chair took most of it, but we were pretty worried about you for a while." He stroked his thumb over Rodney's knuckles, felt the nervous play of muscle and tendon as Rodney squeezed convulsively.
"But the hive ship," Rodney insisted. "And the ZPM--"
"The ZPM's in place, Rodney," John said soothingly. "The city's underwater. The Daedalus took care of the last hive ship, but they beamed out a whole load of humans just before they took it out, which is why the infirmary's so full. We had to dial the SGC for more doctors, but it's under control now."
Rodney looked more worried and confused than soothed, so John held the cup up to his lips again and added, "We have chocolate."
He was irrationally pleased to see Rodney's eyes widen mid-sip.
"Real chocolate?" Rodney asked, and his voice was so breathy and pleased that John had to shift and change the topic before Rodney could say anything else with that tone.
"Real chocolate," he said quickly, and nodded. "Shit, I forgot. When the nurse comes, I gotta go get--" He cut himself off. "Um, someone."
"Who?" Rodney asked quizzically.
"Someone." John grinned. "Just someone. Who's been asking about you."
"Major," Rodney said, warningly.
"Not a major anymore, Rodney. Jeez, keep up with the times," John teased. "Or you could just call me John. My friends call me John."
"Oh, yes," said Rodney. "Because I can't count past colonel. Whatever would I do if you got promoted again?"
*
"Death threats?" Jeannie repeated dumbly. This wasn't happening; this couldn't be happening, "Extremist groups?"
"It's not as serious as it sounds, Jeannie," Colonel Caldwell said comfortingly. "But Richard's supported some pretty controversial policy recently--and your divorce isn't solid, yet. Not to mention, it hasn't exactly been a public matter. Family is always a target for these kinds of groups, and after what happened to that federal judge--well, we just want to be cautious."
"Cautious. Oh my God," Jeannie said, and sat down. It was stupid, she knew, but part of her had believed that everything she had to be afraid of was on this side of the gate. "I've got to go be with my kids, Stephen."
"I thought you might," he said. "And they seem to have things pretty well in hand, here, so we were going to be sending some of the staff back today, and I've arranged for you to be in that group. General O'Neill will have someone meet you on the other side, who'll tell you what they're going to be doing next."
"Okay," she said, and stood on numb and shaking legs. "Okay. Oh my God."
Caldwell stepped forward and hugged her, hard. "And if you or the kids need anything at all, you give Ellen a call," he said firmly.
"I will," she said, nodding. "And--thank you."
"Everything is going to be fine," he said. "They're just taking precautions."
"I know." Jeannie's voice broke, and she wiped unsteadily at her eyes. "I know, and thank you."
"It's nothing." Stephen walked her to the door of the office. "Just get done whatever you need to get done, and I'll see you in the gate room in an hour."
*
Jeannie walked blindly out of Dr. Beckett's office, smack into the Air Force officer who'd helped defuse the hostage situation a few days earlier. "Oh, sorry. I'm sorry," she said. "I wasn't looking--"
"Nah, that's all right. I wasn't either." He grinned at her. "But you're just the person I wanted to see. Jeannie, right?" Before she could answer, he'd grabbed her arm and was pulling her with him.
"Colonel Sheppard." Stephen Caldwell stepped out of the office behind her. Sheppard turned around and practically snapped to attention.
"Sir," he said, and belatedly remembered to let go of her arm.
"Is there something you need with Dr. McKay?"
"Actually, yes" Sheppard shifted uncomfortably and looked like Jeannie's son, back when he was five and nearly incapable of standing still. "Sir. Her brother's awake, and I just thought she'd want to know. Because she's been asking about him. You know."
"He is?" Jeannie grabbed Sheppard's arm and waved Caldwell away. "Can I see him?"
"Yeah." Sheppard smiled again. "This way. C'mon."
*
Rodney had always been unpredictable as a child: always into everything, disassembling and reassembling the oddest things, wanting to see how they worked, wanting to see what would happen. You never could guess what he was going to get into next, which was probably the only thing about him you could count on, aside from his irrational loathing of closed doors, his endless fascination with--i.e., determination to drown himself in--the pool, and his undying love for cookies and Tupperware.
As a matter of fact, the McKay household had owned two sets of Tupperware. One for using and one, to Mum's dismay, for Rodney.
Fairly early on, Rodney had decided two things: one, that Tupperware was pretty much the coolest thing ever, and two, that it was his. Nobody touched the Tupperware but him.
If anyone else tried to take it out of the cupboard or, worse, use it for something, he would stop whatever he was doing to wave his little fist threateningly and loudly berate the perpetrator--something Jeannie had always found pretty funny, especially since you could never understand a word of what he was trying to say. And once he'd learned how to walk, he'd haul toddler ass over to where you stood and try to snatch the plasticware back.
As far as Jeannie could tell, Rodney never actually did anything with the stuff except bang it on things and try to drown it in the pool but, by God, that was Rodney's Tupperware and Lord help anyone who tried to tamper with it.
He hoarded the stuff shamelessly from before his first birthday until he was nearly six. One piece, a lid, actually spent months in the crib for no discernible reason except that Rodney wanted it there.
Well, that, and he could use it to make noise when he wanted let out of the crib, or smack you with it when he wanted left in.
*
That doggedly possessive, slightly outraged look Rodney had always worn whenever someone tried to use his Tupperware happened to be exact same expression he wore now.
"I'm so glad to hear you're on a first name basis," Rodney said snidely, crossing his arms and glaring up at her from the cot where he sat. After four days, the infirmary had cleared out some, but not enough to move Rodney out of the supply closet or get him one of those adjustable beds. Instead, it looked like they'd given him a bunch of pillows he could pile up behind himself and lean back against. "I mean, you don't quite qualify as 'alien bimbo', but we've been here long enough you probably still seem like you came from another planet."
"Christ, Rodney!" Jeannie threw her hands up in exasperation. "I haven't been in here two minutes, and already you're looking at me like I just stole your Tupperware! All I said was that he was nice."
"Well, good for you. I'm sure you and John will get along fine." He readjusted his arms and glared at the wall beside her.
My brother is in lots of pain, Jeannie told herself, and gritted her teeth. He is on an enormous amount of pain medication and is not thinking clearly. I will not kill my brother.
"Rodney," she finally grated. "Two things. One, Colonel Sheppard is not Tupperware. You cannot keep him to yourself just to hit stuff with him, or drown him, or whatever arcane things you used it for. Two," she said quellingly as he opened his mouth to speak, "I came here as a doctor, to save lives, and as a sister, to make sure my brother was all right. I did not come here to molest your friends or steal your glory. But if it makes you happy, I won't be nice to anyone."
She must have taken him by surprise, because he crossed and uncrossed his arms without saying anything for a long moment. Then, he shifted and said, "Carson."
"What?" Lord, he must have been hopped up on pain-killers, because he'd finally started making even less sense than before.
"Carson," Rodney said magnanimously. "You can be nice to Carson." He sounded as if he'd much rather not have said it but even so, it was kind of sweet.
"Wow, Rodney," she said. "You think I'm good enough for one of your friends. I'm almost . . . dangerously flattered." Jeannie crossed her arms and leaned back against the wall.
Rodney snorted. "He's a decent guy, your age, and I'd much rather be related to him than Dick." Jeannie rolled her eyes, and Rodney continued. "Besides, Zelenka's carrying a torch for Elizabeth, and Ford's young enough that he could probably be your son. Oh, and if you even so much as touch Kavanagh, I reserve the right to disown you," he added almost as an afterthought.
"Hmmm." Jeannie studied her knuckles, tried to keep the smile out of her voice. "Does it count if I hit him?"
Rodney's eyes widened incredulously. "No. If you hit him, I just might hug you."
"Really?" Jeannie grinned, and pretended to think about it. "So do I have to hit him again, or did the first time count?"
This time she did catch him by surprise, because he dropped his arms and gaped for a second before drawing himself up again in some morphine-tinged semblance of dignity.
"Proof," Rodney said, glaring at the IV as if wondering what kind of dope they had him on. "I want proof."
"I can do that," said Jeannie. "Zelenka says he caught it on video. Although I really wouldn't mind hitting him again."
Rodney's eyes widened again, brows lifting. "What the hell is he doing with video? That Czech bastard! What's he trying to do--send you to jail?" His voice was so full of outrage that Jeannie had to smile again.
"Relax, Rodney. Apparently there's a few seconds missing, and he and Carson have both staunchly maintained that the unlikable piece of shit fell and hit his face on his desk. I'm clean."
Rodney snorted, but didn't say anything more. There followed a long, awkward moment between them. That was probably normal, Jeannie thought, for two people who'd had as little to say to each other for as long as they had, and this still wasn't going half as badly as she'd feared it would.
Then Rodney spoke, and Jeannie realized she was wrong, that things weren't going well at all.
"So, how was the funeral?" he asked carefully, and the question struck home the way only the shots that should never be taken could. Jeannie felt walls come tumbling down in her chest, old hurts come loose to burn white-hot and angry behind her ribs.
That wasn't right, she thought, it had never been Rodney's way to use the things you loved to hurt you. It wasn't right at all, and it was nothing like the brother she remembered, or the brother she'd loved; and that was a betrayal that hurt as much or more than the words he'd just spoken. She felt her eyes burn, and turned away because she couldn't bear to look at Rodney right now.
"It was nice," she said past the furious lump of hurt in her throat, willing her voice level. You should have been there, she thought, but he hadn't been and maybe that said more than she'd thought. "Richard said you were busy." At the time, she'd believed that he'd been busy, had never believed Rodney would willingly blow something like that off, but suddenly she had to wonder how much of her faith in him had been wishful thinking.
"He did?" said Rodney, and he sounded surprised.
That was the best you could do? Jeannie thought furiously. She'd fought her husband and a dozen other politicians to find him--hell, she'd even crossed a galaxy to find him--and this was what he had to say? You missed my son's funeral, she thought, and restrained the foolish urge to kick the wall. You'd never even met him, but he was my son and he deserved something better than that. Dammit, I deserve something better than that.
"I shouldn't have come here," she said, still facing away, and looked at her feet. "But I guess I've seen what I came to see." Her voice was thick--damn her tendency to tears when it came down to family--and she swallowed. "And I should probably be going now."
She walked out the door without giving him a chance to reply. She thought she heard him say something, but that could have been wishful thinking, too; and she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to hear what he had to say, anyway. Not yet.
*
John had just crept back into the supply closet with Rodney when Colonel Caldwell came in and pulled a Post-It note out of his uniform pocket.
"So, you would be Rodney McKay?" he said, and continued when Rodney nodded. "This is for you. I understand you've already spoken with your sister, but--I have my orders."
Caldwell held the note out to Rodney, who reached up to take it, as John rose nervously from the crate. "Right. I'll just, uh, go get--"
"My laptop," Rodney supplied helpfully.
"Yeah, his laptop," John finished quickly, and slid out past Caldwell.
Ten minutes later he was headed back to the infirmary, having fetched the laptop and cheerfully promised Zelenka he'd have Rodney look into that elusive malfunction in the security cameras.
John fully intended to wait a few minutes before trying the closet door, but it opened as he approached and Rodney waved him through.
"Thank you, John. Come in," he said, not really paying attention. "Go on," he said to Caldwell, as John sat down.
Caldwell glanced at John and didn't quite raise an eyebrow. "As I was saying, Dr. McKay, I think you'd find it rather hazardous to suggest that Senator Grant lets your sister do anything. As certain persons in Washington have already found, to their detriment. As for working at the SGC, I gather General O'Neill chose to take her on because she has some--to put it delicately--'political contacts' which may prove useful to the SGC. In addition, her position at the SGC makes it much more difficult for said 'political contacts' to move against her." He paused meaningfully.
Rodney scowled. "Colonel, you're acting like that should mean something else. Stop talking in code and get to the point, please."
John wasn't sure, but he thought he saw Caldwell almost crack a smile.
"All right," Caldwell said. "Dr. McKay, your sister's spent the last nine months blackmailing dozens of politicians, dignitaries, and various other important figures. From what I gather, with the information she had, she could have asked for anything. She asked for you, because nine months ago she had a hunch her baby brother was in trouble and you were nowhere to be found."
Rodney gaped. "You mean, she blackmailed . . ." he trailed off dazedly.
"Half of Washington," Caldwell said, perfectly serious.
"Half of Washington. To send me this?" Rodney waved the Post-It note. "To mail a death threat to the Pegasus Galaxy?"
The note, John saw, read: "What, you thought you could leave the galaxy and I wouldn't find out? You had better be all right, or you are a dead man, Rodney McKay."
This time, Caldwell did smile. "Actually," he said, "her main objective, as I understood it, was to find out where you were, and that you were alive and well. Everything, including her divorce and her employment at the SGC, was a means to that end. There are even, I gather, still some photos of a very--sensitive--nature that Senator Grant will not receive until your safe arrival."
Rodney opened his mouth, then closed it again a second later.
Caldwell continued, "General O'Neill hired her so he could give her the clearance to tell her where you were, and because she is a competent surgeon who has also promised not to blackmail anyone in the future. Except, of course, in the interests of the SGC. Men sleep better at night, knowing that she works there and thinking there's been a deal made. And because important men sleep better, Jeannie's life is that much more secure. Unless, of course, Richard does something even more inexcusably stupid before the divorce is public."
The last was said in a sardonic tone of voice that was completely lost on Rodney, who looked like a kid who couldn't quite believe he'd gotten exactly what he'd wanted for Christmas.
"She blackmailed Richard," Rodney said, almost to himself. He even sounded like a kid who couldn't quite believe he'd gotten exactly what he'd wanted for Christmas. "She's blackmailing him and she's leaving him. I didn't think she had it in her."
"Oh, please," Caldwell said sharply. "My wife and I have known Jeannie for years. Richard's a conniving asshole and he's always been a conniving asshole, but your sister's a good woman. And I will say," he added, "that if you both hadn't let him get between you, you might know that."
Rodney studied his hands, which were busy folding and unfolding the Post-It note, and was uncharacteristically silent. "So," he said a moment later. "Two weeks?"
"Two weeks," Caldwell repeated. "And there will be no blowing yourself up in the meantime. Ellen would kill me and, frankly, I don't want to know what your sister would do to me. And, Colonel," Caldwell nodded to John, "you might think about where you want to spend your leave. I hear it's coming up."
"Yes, sir," John said, and inwardly groaned. The man must have talked to Heightmeyer. Damn her and her sympathetic looks and her persuasive and stalkery ways.
She'd caught up with John yesterday, and he'd babbled nonsense at her for nearly fifteen minutes before he'd realized what he was saying--and who he was saying it to--and bolted. She must have talked to Elizabeth and Carson because they, and now even Caldwell (but not Rodney or Zelenka yet, thank God) treated him as if he was ready to snap at any given moment.
Caldwell left and Rodney sat there for another long moment, fiddling with the note.
"What's wrong?" John asked. "You look like you'd rather run naked on the planet of the Wraith than visit your sister."
"I almost would," Rodney said mournfully. "I think I may have been unforgivably tactless, and now I should probably apologize. If she'll let me."
"I'll go with you," John said, then flushed. "Er, that is, if you want."
"You'll come with me to visit my family," Rodney said slowly, and looked suspicious. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah. I mean, it's not like I'm going to get a choice about leave," John said awkwardly. "And I'd like to go with you. Um. I mean, I wouldn't--I'd rather--uh. It's not like it would be a hardship, or anything."
"Are you feeling okay?" Rodney looked worried and John mentally kicked himself.
"I'm fine," he said defensively. "Seriously, do I have some sort of twitch or something?" So much for camouflage--even the Head Geek saw through him. "No, really. You can tell me."
"No, nothing like that. You just seem kind of--" Rodney cocked his head, studying him. "Edgy, is all."
"I'm fine," John said, and stopped there. Anything more probably counted as whining. He set the laptop gently down on Rodney's legs. "Here. Zelenka wanted you to check the security cameras in Kavanagh's office. Apparently there was a glitch in the system a few days ago."
"Ah." Rodney looked from the note in his hands to the computer on his lap. "Kavanagh's office, eh? Sounds important."
"Oh, yeah." John nodded and scooted his crate closer while Rodney booted up the computer. "Definitely top priority."
John had to call a nurse for more painkillers when Rodney hurt his ribs laughing after they'd found the missing footage and watched it for the third time, but that was okay. Rodney said it was the funniest thing he'd ever seen.
"I could hug her," he told John after having been drugged to the teeth again. "Kavanagh may never recover."
"Hell, Rodney, you might not recover." John hovered awkwardly. Rodney was sprawled back against his pile of pillows, still holding his side and breathing shallowly.
"No, no," Rodney said earnestly. "I feel better already."
"That's the drugs," John pointed out. "You just think you do."
"I do," Rodney insisted, nodding and fixing John with glazed blue eyes. "Laughter is the best medicine."
"Huh, well, I think you've just blown that out of the water," John smirked. They must have given Rodney the good drugs, because he really was stoned. It was kind of cute.
Boneless and languorous, Rodney scrubbed at his face and shifted onto his side, stifling a yawn. "So," he looked up at John, eyes unfocused. "What did Kavanagh do, exactly?"
Rodney's left ear was terribly distracting; the curve of it was still just barely pink from where he'd rubbed it. John wanted to reach out and soothe it, trace the curvature of Rodney's earlobe with his finger. "Well," he said uncomfortably, forcing himself to focus on something else, "it's a long story, but basically...." Rodney had really blue eyes, he noticed. Right now, they were curious and open instead of guarded and angry like they had been five days ago in the chair room. He was forgiven, John thought, and his chest tightened. He must be forgiven, because all the very good drugs in the world couldn't make Rodney forget a grudge he wanted to keep.
"Hello? Atlantis to John?" Rodney reached out and bumped John's knee. "You still there?"
"Yeah, uh, sorry. Kavanagh..." John cleared his throat, ducked his head. "Zelenka put him in charge of coordinating the move with Beckett."
"What? Oh my God." Rodney's eyes widened almost comically. "He didn't tell Carson."
"No, he told him we were moving the city," John said sourly. "He just didn't tell him how or when, so they didn't have the warning to be ready for it. It was an absolute disaster."
"Yes, well. I can imagine," Rodney said angrily, scowling, eyes hard and furious. He tried to sit up. "He needs to be beaten again. You know, until now, he was abrasive but still competent. Now--"
"Hey," said John, forestalling the tirade by taking Rodney's hand. "He's being dealt with. Elizabeth and Caldwell are taking care of it." Rodney's hand was warm and heavy in his, all rough knuckles and soft, smooth palm. John staunchly resisted the impulse to rub his thumb across the inside of Rodney's wrist, down his forearm to the elbow. He wondered what it would feel like, what Rodney would do. "They've already spoken to Carson about the extent of the damage done by the move, and the argument with your sister has been given to Zelenka to deal with."
"And Radek says he fell. He's not going to get off the hook by saying he's been assaulted," Rodney finished, and John saw his eyes soften, felt his hand unclench as he relaxed back into the cot. "Good, although it would be kind of fun if he tried to take it up with me."
"Considering how he's probably responsible for the extra two days you spent unconscious? Ha. I'd like to see that." John snickered. "But only if we can tape it. You know, for posterity. 'See Kavanagh cry.' Maybe we could even get your sister in on it, too. It'd be like bonding." He squeezed Rodney's hand.
Rodney chuckled and looked at him a bit oddly, but didn't move to take his hand back. John figured that was as good a place to start as any, and held on.
*
"I hear they're sending personnel back today," Beckett said, as if Rodney weren't already aware. "I understand you're to be going with them. You'll want to be very, very careful with these stitches, Rodney. They've already ripped once. And mind your concussion, too, I don't want to hear of you hurting your head again." He crouched and started stripping wires and monitors from Rodney's skin while he performed a cursory inspection of the injuries. "That was a pretty nasty knock you took there, already."
"Twice," John said from the doorway. He'd been right about Caldwell and Weir forcing leave on him, so he was leaning next to his and Rodney's bags against the doorjamb, waiting.
Rodney rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes, of course, Carson. Watch my stitches, mind my head. It's not as if I'm going mountain climbing or bungee jumping, or otherwise engaging in the whole plethora of pursuits which promise boatloads of fun and bodily injury. Not when I could be doing something lazy and safe, like eating, sleeping, or watching re-runs on the Sci-Fi channel."
Beckett chuffed. Rodney ignored him.
"I'm staying with my sister, who, as you may or may not have noticed, happens to be a doctor." Rodney used his best scathing tone, which Carson effortlessly ignored.
"That reminds me, Rodney. Why didn't you tell use your sister was a scientist?" he asked conversationally.
"Because she's not," Rodney said tartly. "She's a doctor. Ouch!" He rubbed his arm where Beckett had yanked the IV line out, somewhat less than gently. "That was vicious, Carson. I'm bleeding."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Carson said airily. "There, you're done. Get dressed and get out of here. I don't want to see you for another two weeks."
"I'll miss you, too. Don't sound so sad to see me go," Rodney said darkly, reaching for the clothes John had brought him. "I'm wounded."
"Oh, don't mistake me," Beckett said mock-sadly, resting a hand on Rodney's shoulder. "I'm crushed. It'll be quite the ordeal, the next few weeks. All of those patients, and none of them complain quite like you."
Snickering, John moved aside to let Beckett out and shrugged innocently when Rodney glared at him.
Rodney bitched and moaned about his arm all the way to the control room. "I think I'm still bleeding," he griped, cradling his arm. "Look at this."
John rolled his eyes and kept a straight face. Smiling would only encourage him. "Rodney, you're fine," he drawled. "Chill out. Everybody bleeds a little after an IV."
"No, look at this." Rodney waved his forearm. "This was brutal. Everyone else thinks he's nice." He snorted. "I know better. That man is evil. He has anger management issues. He wasn't even that mean when I told him medicine was voodoo."
"He's in love," John said impishly.
"Huh?" Rodney was flabbergasted.
"I did tell you," John said, "that your sister was the one who helped talk that Genii woman down?"
"My sister? Yes." Rodney looked confused. "But what does she have to do with Carson?"
"If you don't know," John answered, grinning secretively, "then I won't tell you."
Elizabeth greeted them as they entered the control room. "John, Rodney--you're late," she said, and bustled them through to where the Stargate had already been activated. John looked at Rodney, grinned, and stepped through.
Jeannie McKay stood on the other side at the bottom of the ramp: arms crossed, lips thinned into a firm line, and every bit as terrifying as Elizabeth Weir could sometimes be. She was even giving Rodney the evil eye. "You came," she said.
Rodney snorted. "It's not as if I had a choice," he muttered.
"Well," Jeannie said, and surprised Rodney by hugging him. "It's good to see you, too."
John smirked. Here was a woman who obviously spoke Rodney.
"So," Rodney said when she let go. "Did you bring me back for any particular reason, or are we just going to stand here?" He looked around impatiently, catching sight of Colonel Carter as she walked toward him.
John nudged Jeannie, smirking, and cocked his head towards Rodney, "That means, 'Can we go now? I'm hungry. Feed me.'"
"Oh, of course," Jeannie said, nodding sagely. "I speak his language."
"You, too?" John asked in mock surprise.
Pointing at Rodney, who was completely oblivious and engaged in conversation with Carter, Jeannie grinned wickedly. "'It's not nice to see you again,'" she said, sotto voce. "'In fact, it's excruciatingly uncomfortable. Please excuse me while I find myself a pressing reason to be elsewhere.'"
As if on cue, Rodney glanced nervously back at them. John couldn't help it; he burst out laughing. Rodney scowled and turned back to Carter, speaking hurriedly.
"Well," he said, stalking back over to them, "are we ready to go?" He motioned expansively and began walking towards the exit. When John didn't follow immediately, he stopped and heaved an exaggerated sigh.
"This is Earth, Colonel," he snapped., "Colorado, actually. Which means there are plenty of women here to hit on who aren't my sister."
*
As Jeannie watched, the laughter left John Sheppard's face, followed by irritation first, then frustration, and resignation.
Sheppard rolled his eyes. "I'm coming." He put on an air of annoyed good humor as he hurried to catch up, but Jeannie didn't miss the flash of something else that crossed his features before he'd turned fully away.
That something else was what made her frown briefly in puzzlement, then smile as something occurred to her. She studied her brother's back, the set of Rodney's shoulders as Sheppard caught up to him and bumped into him companionably.
"'I'm jealous,'" she said softly, and smiled.
Jeannie had always been good at reading people, and she sometimes wondered why Rodney chose to ignore that. Maybe, she thought, he just didn't want to admit how well Jeannie could read him.
*
"I was not hitting on your sister," John said, irritated, as he caught up to Rodney.
"Oh, really? My mistake. I could have sworn I recognized your 'diplomacy with the natives' routine." Rodney was smirking, taking the sting out of the words.
Well, Rodney had brought it up. "Yes, really," John said amiably. "How do I say this? She's not, um--mysterious--enough."
"Mysterious?" Rodney asked, mock-incredulously. "Ah. You mean 'duplicitous'."
"Mysterious," John insisted. "I like my women mysterious."
"And preferably of another species."
John gritted his teeth. Rodney always won with that. "Glowy," he said. "Non-corporeal."
"Dead," Rodney said smugly. "Dead. Alien. Priestess."
"She was not dead," John ground out, because he'd never thought of it that way before, and--wow, that was really sick. "She was," he groped for words, "ascended."
"Dead!" Rodney sing-songed triumphantly. "She was dead, John. In fact, her body's probably buried somewhere on that planet. She was dead, dead, dead. It's funny," he said conversationally. "I mean, I know objectively that the US military turns out some of the kinkiest bastards around. But I never really would have figured you for what is, essentially--"
"Fine!" John yelped, before Rodney could finish that sentence in public. "She was dead, okay? Just--you couldn't tell. Seriously. Which way are we supposed to be heading, anyway?"
Jeannie appeared on the other side of Rodney, who was snickering and muttering something about pilots and lost. "This way," she said, and steered them to the left. "Steven's waiting out by the car, with the Secret Service men."
"Secret Service?" said Rodney, just as John spoke.
"Steven?" Oh, no, thought John. Bad enough that his new senior officer shared the name but please, oh please, not anyone related to Rodney.
"My oldest," Jeannie answered, and looked at him curiously when he groaned. "And the Secret Service are there because Richard's had some death threats, and the divorce isn't public yet." She kept walking. "This one. C'mon."
Once in the elevator, John elbowed Rodney.
"Ow." Rodney glared at him.
John glared back. "You let me name the Wraith after your nephew?" he hissed.
"Actually, we call him 'Steven' or 'Stevie'," Rodney muttered. "And he's named after my Uncle Steve. So, technically, you named the Wraith after my uncle. Feel better?"
"No," said John, aggrieved. "I don't--I can't believe you."
"You were going to name it after someone, no matter which name you chose," Rodney grumbled. "Did it really matter, anyway? Aside from the fact that you just happened to name it after your new CO, of course."
"Yes, it does," John sulked.
"There are people out there named 'Bob' or 'Robert', you know. Does that bother you?" Rodney didn't wait for an answer. "Although, I'd have to say I would have preferred it if we could have named it 'Richard'."
Jeannie laughed a little at that, and John blushed because he'd forgotten she was in the elevator with them. She regarded Rodney fondly. "What about the other Wraith?" she asked playfully. "What would you have named that one?"
"Andrew," Rodney answered promptly. "After Dad. Obviously. So, how long have you worked at the SGC?" he asked with characteristic abruptness.
Jeannie didn't miss a beat. "Not long. Since you sent that video. Which, by the way, was so unsubtle that even my children knew something was wrong with Uncle Rodney." The elevator opened and they stepped out.
"What?" Rodney said indignantly. "It was subtle. I can do subtle. And it was obviously subtle; it wouldn't have passed the security screening if it hadn't been."
"Subtle? Hah! Maybe for someone who's never met you," Jeannie baited. "Or at least doesn't know you, hardly."
Rodney grumbled something under his breath. "And your kids do? How old are they, again?" he said snidely.
"Thirteen and two-and-a-half. And they've met you before. I'd say that's enough," Jeannie retorted. "Already you're a legend in their young minds."
John snickered. It really did run in the family.
"Just as I should be," Rodney said smugly. He pushed open the door and they emerged into the parking lot.
"Oh, God," John breathed, and halted suddenly. "Look at them!"
"What?" Rodney studied him strangely, but John didn't answer right away. He was too busy staring.
"They're beautiful." John was practically drooling, but he didn't care. "Just--look at them." He sighed happily.
"John," Rodney's voice was very careful, soothing even. It was his let's-not-startle-the-madman voice. "What are you talking about?"
"Cars, Rodney. Cars!" John beamed, gesturing around the parking lot. "As in 'things that can go two hundred miles an hour'!" Another happy sigh. "There's no place like home," he said dreamily.
"Oh, all right," Rodney's voice was sarcastic, but John thought he heard a definite note of relief. "If you say so, Dorothy."
"How can you not be excited?" John demanded. "We haven't seen a real car in months."
Rodney's mouth twitched. "Because they're not that cool, John."
John snorted disdainfully, and barely restrained himself from petting the hood of the red convertible nearest him. "How do you know what's cool anyway? You're a scientist, you're not supposed to know cool when you see it. You're supposed to analyze cool until it goes out of style."
"I think I'm insulted," Rodney said peevishly. "And anyway, I just know. Okay?"
"You do, do you?" Jeannie said, smirking.
Rodney groaned. "Don't you start," he said warningly. "I mean it."
Jeannie just hummed happily, raising her chin in a way that made her look very much like her brother. Rodney seemed torn between embarrassed and amused, and kicked her in the ankle.
John cocked his head questioningly. He was missing something, he just knew it. He caught Jeannie's eye and she winked, grinning as smugly as her brother.
"It's a long story. I'll tell you sometime," she promised.
"No you won't," Rodney threatened. "Or--something. Something bad. I would never hear the end of it. Ever."
"It must be good, then," John said, and smiled to himself. Two weeks. This was going to be fun.
*
Most kids found themselves with at least one ridiculously embarrassing childhood nickname. Poor Rodney had the misfortune of owning two.
The first, he'd gotten when he was very, very young, a result of his remarkable inclination for trouble.
Mum spent so much time racing to rescue Ronnie (as he'd said it, before he'd learned to enunciate his D's) from imminent anaphylaxis, drowning himself in the pool, climbing the bookcases, toppling the vases, and various other acts of mayhem that he'd actually introduced himself to his teacher as "Rodney-no!" on the first day of preschool.
It was Uncle Steve who'd given Rodney the second one, even if it was just a bastardized version of the first.
Years later, when Rodney was seven or eight, he'd learned enough that it was nearly impossible to talk to him like you would a child his age. Every time you told him something you thought he might find interesting, he'd scowl and say, "I know!" with that peculiar mix of exasperation and disdain that only he could use.
One day, Uncle Steve pointed at Rodney after one such rejoinder and said, "That's right, Rodney-knows."
As far as Jeannie knew, Rodney had never quite forgiven them for the no/know puns that had ruthlessly followed him into adulthood, but Jeannie couldn't find it in herself to feel bad about it.
Hell, they were funny.
*
"Hello," the sandy-haired kid greeted them as they approached the minivan, pushed his glasses up his nose, and looked up at John. "Who's he?"
"Hey, Stevie." Jeannie smiled and ruffled his hair. "This is John Sheppard. He's a friend of Rodney's. Any news?"
"Aunt Rosie and Uncle Steve called. She says she's sorry they had to leave town so early, but wants us to call her and tell her if Uncle Rodney's dead. Oh, and she wanted to know when you're going back to Dad." The kid rolled his eyes, and looked vaguely disappointed.
Rodney suddenly looked like a spooked animal. "You called Aunt Rosie?" He looked suspiciously at Jeannie, who made a face of distaste.
"I had to," she said. "The last thing I wanted to do was start pulling strings and then find out one of them knew exactly where you were."
"Jeannie." Rodney's tone was reproving. "Do you think I'd actually tell them anything I wouldn't tell you?"
"Well," Jeannie shrugged, and looked embarrassed. "We haven't exactly been close lately, or anything."
"Besides," Steven piped up, "they went home." He heaved a crestfallen sigh. Rodney looked puzzled, and Steven continued, "I had a bet. Only now she's gone, and now I'll never get that skateboard."
"A bet?" John asked, fascinated in spite of himself. "On your aunt."
"She's actually my great-aunt," Steven explained. "But, yeah. I bet Mum that Uncle Rodney could make Aunt Rosie cuss--"
"Not gonna happen," Jeannie sang out from where she was climbing in the front, and Rodney chuckled as he clambered into the middle seat.
"It was a long shot. Aunt Rosie never cusses," Steven told John confidentially, taking the other middle seat. John climbed in the back, next to the empty car seat. "But I figure if anyone can make her, it's Uncle Rodney. Even Uncle Steve couldn't, and he told us Mum put the 'fun' in 'dysfunctional'." If he wasn't mistaken, there was even a note of admiration in the kid's voice.
Rodney laughed at that, and John thought he saw Jeannie blush in the rearview mirror.
"Steven," she said reprovingly as she turned the ignition.
"What?" Steven was all injured innocence. "It's the truth."
John was drowsing, lulled into sleep by the motion of the van, by the time they stopped a few minutes later. "Whuzzat?" he mumbled, scrubbing at his eyes. He hadn't been in a car for what seemed like ages, had forgotten how comforting it was to be moving, and to feel the movement.
"We stopped at a day-care to pick Missy up," Rodney said, smiling fondly at him. "Next stop is home. Were you sleeping?"
"Maybe," John said evasively, crossing his arms. "Maybe not. What's it to you?"
Rodney smirked. "Nothing, actually. What are you, four?" He cocked his head and studied John for a moment. "You were sleeping, weren't you? It's the hair. I can tell."
"Huh?" Bewildered, John put a hand to his hair. It didn't feel any different. Then he saw Rodney fighting laughter and scowled. "Hey. That's not nice."
That only seemed to set Rodney off more, and now Steven turned in his seat to look from John to Rodney with an expression of puzzlement.
"Nice?" Rodney said, chuckling. "When have I ever been nice?"
John couldn't think of anything to say that didn't sound childish, so he sat quietly until the door of the van opened. Jeannie stood on the other side, holding what had to be Missy.
The toddler regarded him curiously with blue, blue eyes beneath lashes long and dark as Rodney's until she realized John was looking at her, too. Then, she smiled shyly and hid her face in Jeannie's shoulder. "Hi," she said quietly, and turned to peek.
"Sorry, she's usually not this shy," Jeannie said affectionately. "Missy, this is Uncle Rodney, and Uncle Rodney's friend John."
At the mention of Uncle Rodney, Missy turned to stare at Rodney with wide, nervous eyes. She stuck her fingers in her mouth, looked up at Jeannie, and mumbled something urgent and incomprehensible.
Rodney looked vaguely offended and John snickered. "Legend in their young minds, indeed. Rodney, what did you do?"
"Nothing!" Rodney said indignantly, and glared at John. "I haven't even seen her since she was three months old!"
"I told her stories." Steven grinned impishly as Jeannie buckled Missy into the car seat next to John, and then said, "She drew her own conclusions. Oh, and you should ask her what she had for snack today. It's funny."
John looked down at Missy, who beamed up at him and poked him experimentally.
"You should," said Jeannie, "It's funny."
"All right. What did they give you for snack today?" he asked the toddler, whose grin widened mischievously. It was just a little crooked, and reminded him of Rodney.
"Porcupine quills," she said with glee.
John mock-frowned and tickled her a little. "That can't be right," he said. "They can't feed you those. It's illegal."
"Uh-huh." She nodded. "They did," she said solemnly.
"Nuh-uh," John teased. "What'd they really give you, huh?"
"Porcupine quills!" she insisted, giggling madly. "They did!"
John laughed and grinned at Rodney, who looked charmed in spite of himself.
"She's cute," Rodney said to Jeannie, who smiled back at him.
"Thanks," she said. "High praise from He-Who-Has-Vowed-Never-To-Like-Children."
Rodney snorted, and they passed half an hour driving in comfortable silence, except for Missy, who was singing along to the kid music on the radio and making her stuffed bunny dance.
"So, Uncle Rodney," Steven broke the silence abruptly. "Why didn't you come to Michael's funeral?"
John froze, and Rodney turned slowly to look at his nephew. "Excuse me?" he said, but his voice was strange--not hostile, but curiously neutral. Not giving anything away.
"Well?" Steven crossed his arms, and met Rodney's gaze unflinchingly.
"Steven!" Jeannie hissed from the front, and Rodney glanced up at her before turning back at Steven. The tension in the small space seemed to ratchet up another notch and John held very still, wishing he had a stealth setting like the jumpers, and hoping that if he was still enough and quiet enough, they wouldn't notice he was still there.
"I was," Rodney said slowly, seeming to speak more to Jeannie than to Steven, "oh-so-politely invited not to come." Things seemed to loosen a bit, then, and John let out a quiet breath.
Jeannie glanced back at Rodney in the mirror, and Rodney looked steadily back at her. "Oh," she said quietly, almost so quietly John didn't catch it.
"It was Dad, wasn't it, then." Steven's voice was flat, and it was more a statement than a question so Rodney didn't bother to answer. "Well," Steven said decisively a moment later, "that's ten."
"Ten?" Rodney asked.
"Ten uncomfortable questions in public that I owe my father," Stephen said vengefully. "Like 'Dad, why isn't the secretary wearing underwear?' or 'Why do you keep condoms in the office?'" Jeannie made a choking sound up front, and Steven continued, with bitterness, "He thinks 'thirteen' means 'stupid'."
"Well," Rodney said uncomfortably, "he's wrong."
Steven glared suspiciously and Rodney lifted his chin, daring his thirteen-year-old nephew to disagree. Steven settled back into his seat instead.
Just as John was starting to relax, Jeannie spoke. "Rodney," she said haltingly, "I think I owe you--"
"No," Rodney said. "You don't. And if you cry, I'm bailing out of the van, okay?"
"Okay," she answered, but her voice was still suspiciously thick.
*
The next few days were fairly amusing for John as he watched Rodney and Jeannie circle each other like wary animals: Jeannie stalking Rodney stalking Jeannie, John stalking Rodney and Rodney oblivious.
And then came the day that Richard showed up, and everything seemed to change.
It was four days after they'd left Atlantis. John and Rodney had gotten settled in two of the guest rooms upstairs and had mostly been lazing around the house and backyard, enjoying the freedom of not having to be anywhere specific at any given time. Pretty much the only thing they showed up regularly for were mealtimes, and even then Rodney was almost consistently late for breakfast.
John had just breezed into Rodney's room to wake him up for lunch--he'd already slept through breakfast, and Rodney was grumpy enough first thing in the morning that John really didn't want to know what he'd be like if he went straight from waking into some hypoglycemia-induced temper--when the doorbell rang and woke Rodney before John had a chance to.
"Nggghuh. What time is it?" Rodney sat up and blinked sleepily, then narrowed his eyes as he took in the toddler grinning cheerfully in John's arms. "And what are you doing?"
"Nothing. I just thought I ought to wake you in time for lunch, and Missy was wondering where Uncle Rodney had got to," John said slyly. "We weren't going to do anything but wake you up. Perfectly innocent intentions, I promise."
"Huh," Rodney said. "Why do I not believe you? Oh, maybe it's that my niece couldn't care less where I am when she's got you to drag around the house with her."
"Not true," John said huffily. "She likes you. You're the one with the snacks."
"Ah, yes. I buy her dubious affections with snacks." Rodney yawned. "Truly, I am the most loved. How admired I am, for gifts of cookies and potato chips. How cherished." He stood, stretching, and grabbed a few pieces of clothing. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to go become the most recently showered as well."
John rolled his eyes, and looked at Missy. "C'mon, lets go find something else to do."
"Bounce!" she said, and pointed at Rodney. John shook his head quickly.
"No," he said, pitching his voice so Rodney wouldn't hear. "I told you, no bouncing if he's already awake."
"I heard that!" Rodney said from the bathroom doorway.
"No, you didn't," John answered. "You just think you did. That's the hypoglycemia talking."
Chuckling, he turned to leave the bedroom but stopped when he heard shouting from downstairs. John frowned and leaned over to put Missy down but she clung tightly to his neck even as he bent to put her down. Instead, he took her with him and went to sit next to Steven at the top of the stairs.
"What's going on?" John asked. The shouting seemed to be coming from the kitchen and, from the sounds of it, it was one hell of an argument.
Steven was frowning resentfully at the closed kitchen door. "It's Dad," he said, not looking at John. "I think he's here to try and convince Mum not to leave him."
Bits of conversation floated up the stairs to them, mostly male and pleading.
"Come on, Jeannie... don't have to do this, it's not public yet ...doesn't look good... my career... pictures... I promise... won't happen again...."
"Yeah, sounds like it's going well," John said, raising both eyebrows as the shouting seemed to double in volume and heat. "Except, no, not so much."
Stevie favored him with a sidewise half-grin. "Yeah, I didn't think it would. Mum's a lot smarter than he thinks. And she's still pretty pissed off, too."
They sat there in silence for another few minutes, and just as John opened his mouth to say something about how maybe they shouldn't be eavesdropping, Rodney came out of the bathroom damp and fully dressed, still rubbing at his hair with the towel.
"What in the hell is going on down there?" Rodney was scowling hard already, but as he listened his frown twisted and deepened. "That sounds like Richard. What the hell is he doing here?" He tossed the towel aside purposefully. "I'm going down there."
"He's here to try and talk Mum out of the divorce again," Steven said. "You probably shouldn't go down there."
The shouting, which had quieted some, suddenly got louder than ever. Rodney crossed his arms and looked at Steven, who shrugged and did his best to sound indifferent. "They fight like this all the time. Not quite so loud, usually, but pretty close."
Rodney's face darkened, and he opened his mouth as if to say something but was cut off by the abrupt silence from the kitchen and the sudden dull smack of fist hitting flesh followed by an unmistakable crack as somebody's skull hit one of the cabinets.
John had thought he'd seen Rodney at his angriest after the thing with Chaya, but apparently the man had hidden reserves of fury, because, compared to this, Rodney had only been mildly annoyed when John had run off alone to "rescue" her. After he'd returned, John had been acutely aware for the first time of just how much broader the other man was, and every bit as conscious of how much it would hurt if Rodney ever chose to hit him.
Now, as before, Rodney's expression spoke volumes. John was uncomfortably sure Rodney wouldn't stop after just one blow.
John stood quickly, gathering Missy up and out of the way as Rodney pushed past them down the stairs, Steven pale and furious and right behind him. John would have followed himself except that Missy squirmed in his grip and turned wide, anxious eyes to him, and he realized abruptly that bringing a two-year-old into the mix was a really bad idea.
Instead, he hurried downstairs and out the front door to where he knew the Secret Service would be watching, and waved his free arm in the universal gesture for help.
A few seconds later, just he'd expected, one of the cars parked inconspicuously down the street pulled up into the driveway and two men stepped out. John sighed a little in relief. Much faster than calling the cops to break up the brawl that would surely have formed by the time they'd arrived.
This way, at least, Richard wouldn't take anyone else to jail with him. Granted, Rodney might never forgive him for breaking it up so soon, but at least he'd be free to never forgive John on Atlantis and not from the dubious privacy of a jail cell.
"What's going on?" the nearest suit asked. "Is Ms. McKay all right?"
"I think the senator got physical with her," John said angrily, shifting Missy's weight on his hip.
John followed them back into the house, where Rodney stood in the door of the kitchen pointedly not-smirking at Richard, who was holding his head and cursing bloody murder while Jeannie told him in no uncertain (and some fairly surprising) terms to get the hell out of her house. Then she noticed the agents as they entered the house, and stiffened.
"Greg," Jeannie said warmly, donning her best diplomatic expression. "Thanks for coming in, but I think we've got things under control here. Senator Grant was just leaving." She regarded her husband meaningfully. "And nobody's going to be making any noise about this. Just, you know how he gets when he's had a few."
"Yes, ma'am," agreed the suit who'd spoken to John outside. If Greg noticed the way Jeannie was struggling not to cradle her right hand, or the way her knuckles were red and swelling, he'd obviously decided not to comment. "Senator?"
Richard had fallen silent the moment Jeannie had addressed the Secret Service agent. He was holding both sides of his face at once, and glared poisonously at Jeannie, but said nothing as he turned on his heel and left the kitchen. Muttering imprecations under his breath, he ignored his son and the two agents and stalked through the living room to where Rodney now held the front door open, practically brimming with self-satisfaction.
John wasn't sure, but he thought he even heard Rodney mutter something along the lines of, "And don't let it hit you too terribly hard on your...."
*
As soon as the door shut behind Richard, Jeannie slumped forward against the kitchen table and let out a deep breath. She held an arm out to hug Steven and kissed the top of his head.
"Stevie, honey," she said, "I'm okay, really. I'm fine, and I'm sorry you saw that. I just need a minute, okay? Could you check on Missy for me? I know she likes John, but you're her big brother and if she's upset I think she'd want you more. Okay?"
"Yeah," Steven nodded, reluctantly letting go. "Did he hit you?"
"No," Jeannie said, shamefaced. "I'm afraid I hit him, honey."
"Oh." Steven looked relieved, and even managed a smile. "All right. I'll go check on Missy then."
The moment the kitchen door swung closed behind Steven, Jeannie fairly fell back into one of the chairs and cradled her bad hand.
"Damn," she hissed in pain and annoyance. She must have hit the son of a bitch a lot harder than she'd thought, because it was really starting to swell. Gingerly uncurling her fingers, Jeannie realized that, pictures or no pictures, she was really profoundly lucky Richard had left without making a scene.
Hell, she might have even broken her hand, though she wouldn't know that until the swelling went down. Swearing, Jeannie stood to open the freezer and found herself pushed gently back down into the chair as Rodney came into the kitchen.
"Hold still," Rodney ordered, rummaging in one of the drawers for a towel. "That looks like it needs ice."
"Really?" Jeannie said dryly, and leaned back in the chair. "I wouldn't have thought of that, funny what they don't teach you in med school. It's like I went for no reason."
"Oh, yes," agreed Rodney, folding ice into a towel. "Almost as if you went so you could marry a rich politician and let it go to waste."
Jeannie set her jaw and glared at him. After a moment, Rodney softened and sighed. Sitting across from her at the table, he set her elbow against the wood and took her hand in both of his, wrapping the ice around it. "I'm sorry," he said. "You didn't deserve that. You just sucker-punched the asshole. How did you get so cool all of a sudden anyway? Because, seriously..." Rodney leaned forward, pitching his voice low and warning. "If you get any cooler, I'm calling in the shrinks. Or looking for the planet full of energy-beings, because I really didn't take good advantage of that opportunity the first time."
Jeannie grinned. O'Neill had let her read the mission reports. "So what would you conjure up for yourself? Some kind of scientific breakthrough? A theory of unification?"
Rodney snorted. "Right. Like I'd need to imagine that. Sooner or later, I'll get those anyway. No...." He paused thoughtfully. "No, I think I'd want a harem."
"A harem?" Jeannie coughed, trying not to laugh, grimacing when her hand twinged. "Anything in the world, and you'd imagine yourself a harem. Are you telling me that your dashing good looks and frighteningly high IQ have failed you?"
"Of course not," Rodney said scornfully. "It's just that I don't have the time go about getting one. You see, I'd have one already, except that every time I try, I have to go save the world or something." He waved a hand dismissively, and Jeannie burst into laughter because, really, there wasn't a way not to laugh at his expression.
"What?" Rodney said, all innocence and wronged virtue, and then suddenly his expression cleared and he regarded her seriously. "What did he say?"
"Huh?" asked Jeannie, startled by the change in topic and reluctant to discuss it.
"Richard," Rodney said gently, holding her gaze. "What did Richard say, that made you hit him?"
"Does it matter?" Jeannie shifted uncomfortably and stared at the refrigerator. "He's full of shit anyway."
"I think it might." Rodney was still looking at her; she could tell even with her head turned. Damn him and his passing association with psychology. He might think most of it was crap and guesswork, but that hadn't stopped him from picking the important bits up in college.
"Fine," Jeannie said sourly, and with some resignation she studied the refrigerator and spoke. "He's refusing to sign the divorce papers. Which, now that I think about it, he might reconsider." Rodney cocked an eyebrow, and she almost smiled. "He was asking me to try and make it work. For the sake of his career, you know, and the sake of the children." Her eyebrows knitted together and her fist clenched again involuntarily. "Ow, shit. Oh."
"That bad?" Rodney said.
"Yes," she said feelingly. "He threatened to tell the kids I didn't want them. That I didn't want Missy, and didn't want Michael."
"Did you?" Rodney asked blandly, face blank.
"No!" she said so forcefully that her fist clenched again, bringing tears to her eyes. "I mean, yes! Yes, of course I wanted them! I love my children. I'd do anything to bring Michael back! Christ, Rodney, what kind of person do you think I am?"
She pulled on her arm, trying to free it, but Rodney moved one hand down to her elbow, bracing it and effectively immobilizing it.
"Hey. Hold still, okay?" Rodney let go of her elbow once she stopped struggling. "I really didn't think he was right, you know. Just, you looked like you felt guilty and I thought it'd do you good to have a chance to deny it, is all."
"Oh," she said, and flushed in embarrassment. "Sorry. Some psychologist you'd make."
"Yes, well, I make up for it by saving the world on a semi-regular basis," Rodney answered, and then softened his voice again. "No one ever accused you of wanting Michael dead, you know." Something occurred to him, and his expression darkened. "Or did he--"
"No, he didn't," Jeannie interrupted. "It's just--sometimes I do feel guilty, you know? I mean, it's not like we have an abundance of heart conditions in our family tree, but--"
"Two of Richard's grandparents died of fatal heart conditions," Rodney said sharply. "Or didn't he tell you?" Jeannie was silent, but she guessed the shock on her face spoke for her. Rodney gritted his teeth for a moment, then continued, "I heard him telling Dad at the wedding. They both died when he was younger, before he married you. Now, while I'm not all that familiar with the different frequencies and incarnations of congenital heart problems, but I do know this guy...."
Jeannie groaned, smiling a little tearfully. "This guy, huh?"
"Yeah," Rodney said deviously. "This guy. At my job. And his specialty happens to be genetics. Maybe you should talk to him sometime."
"Maybe," Jeannie smiled, for real this time. "Thank you."
Rodney snorted. "Don't thank me. Just tell me I can hit him, too, next time."
"That reminds me." Jeannie leaned forward. "I did tell you that the green Blazer and the blue van are off-limits, right? Because I'm the only one who drives them, and I'd hate for you to blow me up by accident."
"Good to know," Rodney said, aiming for nonchalance and ruining it by grinning at her. "I'll have to remember that."
*
Jeannie had met Richard through a mutual friend when she was twenty-two, and married him less than a year later. He'd been twenty-five and military, and full of enough political ambition to instantly endear him to her father, who didn't approve of anything that wouldn't get you money or status or both.
In Richard, he'd seen both, and so had spared no expense for the wedding, and taken every opportunity to remind Rodney just what was expected of him.
Dad had felt about astrophysics then the way Rodney felt about medicine now. Jeannie didn't understand it any more than her father did, but she'd also seen Rodney do her calculus homework for fun when he was twelve, so she figured anything that challenged him would be miles above her level of understanding anyway.
Rodney had been seventeen the day Jeannie got married, seventeen and rail-thin and still dripping with the standard-issue free-floating malice of the terminally misunderstood teenager. But, even taking Dad's ridiculously self-important little lectures into account, Jeannie thought Rodney seemed angrier than usual and decided to corner him at the reception to find out why.
She'd found Rodney leaning against one of the tables, scowling at nothing in particular.
"Hey there," she said companionably, hopping up to sit on the table next to him in her wedding gown. "Why so glum, Ronnie-no? I thought you'd be celebrating." She grinned. "I'm finally getting out of your hair."
"Oh, you know me," Rodney said, bristling a little at his oldest nickname. "Happy, happy, happy."
"Come on, Rodney." Jeannie bumped shoulders with him. "Would it kill you to smile? Wow. Okay, yeah. That's downright frightening. You can stop now. Scowl away."
"Thank you," Rodney said, adjusting his arms and scowling just a little less darkly than before.
Jeannie thought she probably ought to count that a victory, and continued, "So what's wrong? Is it Richard?" Rodney didn't answer. Or even look at her, for that matter, so she tried again. "Don't you like him?" Rodney hadn't yet said anything, good or bad, about his new brother-in-law, so Jeannie had assumed that meant Rodney liked him at least a little bit. Everyone else had. "You don't, do you? Why?" The last came out uncomfortably like a whine.
Rodney attempted an indifferent shrug. "He doesn't like hockey," he said evasively.
Jeannie snorted. "Neither did half the chess club. And you liked them." Rodney shifted and didn't answer. "Rodney, why? Tell me."
"Fine," he said shortly, and glanced sidewise at her. "I'll tell you, but remember--you asked."
"Okay," she said hesitantly. "Yeah, I asked you. So tell."
"All right." Rodney looked away and gritted his teeth. "You're right. I don't like him at all. I think he's an ass, just like Dad. He's going to keep you at home as a trophy wife and show you off to his friends. He'll tell you his career's more important than yours, and he'll never be home. He's going to cheat, and bully you into having his kids. Then, he's going to cheat more and leave you alone at home with the kids you didn't want and you're going to hate him for it."
Jeannie opened her mouth, but Rodney cut her off.
"Here's the catch," he continued bitterly, more bitterly than he should have been at seventeen. "You'll probably never going to realize that. You'll spend most of your life thinking you hate either yourself or the kids--maybe even both--and eventually turn into our mother. So--yes, happy day. Congratulations."
Jeannie could never remember what it had been that she'd started to say when Richard appeared out of the blue, grabbing her waist and pulling her into a kiss. He tasted like alcohol.
"Hey, kiddo. Havin' fun?" he slurred, noticing Rodney and reaching out to ruffle his hair. Rodney growled something resentful that was utterly lost on Richard, who'd already turned back to Jeannie.
"He's not a kid, Richard," Jeannie said sharply, suddenly angry. "He's seventeen. And in college."
"Awww, come on, Jeannie." Richard goosed her, and she pushed him away. Richard chuckled and pulled her closer. "Don't be mad. He's not mad," he said, motioning towards Rodney, who most definitely was mad. "C'mon, it's our wedding. Let's go have some fun." He was whining, and Jeannie had to suppress the irrational urge to smack him for it.
She succeeded, but as Richard dragged her away to meet more of his friends, she couldn't help but glance back over her shoulder at where Rodney perched, hunched over and scowling, on the table like some bad-tempered bird of omen.
What if he's right? she thought, and shivered.
*
Missy calmed right down as soon as Steven came out of the kitchen, though she still stayed fairly close to both of them when John put her down.
The first day they'd gotten here, Missy had decided that, despite the multitude of snacks Rodney'd tried to bribe her with, John was apparently her favorite. Since then, she'd pretty much adopted him as part of the family--in the sense that every so often she'd drop whatever she was doing to take John by the hand and tug him around the house to show him something she thought was cool.
Over the past four days, John had been shown the bird's nest in the tree next to her window, the spot in the pantry where Jeannie hid the Oreos, and the cat, among other things. He'd also been made to sit by the pool and dangle his toes in the water with her, pet the cat, and put his face over the cool air being blown out of the AC vent in the kitchen floor. And every new 'discovery' brought the same triumphant little exclamation and crooked Rodney-grin John had seen dozens of times on Atlantis.
Granted, it was kind of obnoxious to be hijacked mid-task or woken mid-nap, but it was cute and Missy got so excited John didn't have the heart to disappoint her. Besides, it was kind of nice to be woken for something other than a life-threatening emergency. God knew it didn't happen to him enough on Atlantis. Plus, he thought it made Rodney a little jealous--no matter how Rodney denied it, sharing chocolate-covered cheesecake definitely counted as bribery--and that was a bonus.
So it wasn't exactly surprising when Missy abruptly dropped the doll she was fiddling with and stood, chirping urgently and tugging at his hand. Blowing out a breath, John stood.
"All right," he said, only a little half-heartedly. "What are we going to go find, now?"
She pulled him towards the kitchen door, and John hesitated. He knew from experience that, just like her mother and uncle, Missy would raise all hell if you tried to stop her once she was set on 'finding' something. And 'stopping' included anything from slowing down, to picking her up (even if you kept walking in the same direction), to actually trying to divert her.
But Rodney hadn't been in there all that long, and he'd heard Jeannie raise her voice just a few minutes ago, so he figured there was some kind of family scene going on in there, the kind of family scene it wouldn't be polite or smart for John to interrupt.
Cautiously, John tried letting go of Missy's hand. She paused and glared at him, and John winced. She totally looked like Rodney on a tear when she got mad. "Look," he said quietly, "I think your mom and Uncle Rodney are in there talking, okay? Privately."
For a moment, he thought she understood; but then she only grinned more widely. "Ronnie!" she said joyfully, pulling more urgently at John's arm, and he groaned to himself.
John might be the one Missy liked to drag around the house, but at least Rodney had that much--she liked Rodney, all right, liked him enough to barge right in on whatever private and probably extremely important conversation he was having right now and let John take all the blame.
Maybe that could be useful, he thought. If John could only find a way to mention it quickly enough, Rodney would be too pleased that Missy had finally come around to remember to be annoyed with John.
Well, it wasn't much, but it would have to do, John thought as they approached the door. Because it was all he had, and it looked like they were going in.
"You were right, you know," Jeannie was saying. "Just not about all of it."
Rodney was holding what looked to be ice on her hand, and keeping it elevated. "Good," Rodney said. His voice was low, intense, and he didn't appear to notice John and Missy as they walked in. "Because I really didn't want to be. Oh, hello," he said, raising his eyebrows at John. "Can we help you?"
"Um," John said awkwardly, and pointed at Missy with his free hand. "I think she wanted to show me something. Or see you," he added, on a burst of inspiration. "She said your name, even."
"Really?" Rodney looked pleased.
John mentally congratulated himself. He'd short-circuited Rodney's cranky spell before he'd had a chance to really get started.
Missy smiled bashfully at Rodney, then turned and pulled John over to the pantry.
"Snack!" she said, and pointed.
Rodney groaned. "I knew it," he said. "Bribery never works." He glared at John, daring him to comment.
John just grinned sheepishly. "What can I give her?" he asked Jeannie, who pointed to one of the upper cupboards.
"There should be a Ziploc baggie up there," she said, "with Cheerios and some of those little mini-Chips Ahoy. She likes those."
"Okay." John poked around until he found the plastic bag, then fumbled it open. "All right, kiddo," he said, "looks like I've got your munchies."
Missy, who was busily emptying one of the lower cabinets of its Tupperware, ignored him. Rodney was watching her, looking a little thunderstruck.
"You kept those?" Rodney said incredulously, turning his head to look at Jeannie. "I can't believe you kept those. Aren't they something like thirty years out of date?" He motioned towards where Missy was industriously sorting the lids and bottoms to some rule only she knew, because it didn't make any sense to John at first glance
"If I were actually using them, yes." Jeannie smiled. "But I'm not. Missy is." Jeannie's smile grew. "And it's a proven fact that Tupperware makes geniuses."
"It is?" Rodney rolled his eyes and then grinned. "Oh. Of course it is," he said haughtily, as if he'd known the joke all along.
Missy looked up once she'd gotten the Tupperware arranged to her liking and practically glowed when saw the plastic bag in John's hand. Humming happily, she trotted over to where John was standing to take his hand and lead him over to sit down next to the plasticware stacked next to the cabinet.
John settled himself obediently on the linoleum and absently picked up one of the lids, examining it. It was old and yellowing and entirely uninteresting except for the way Rodney was looking at it like it was the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything. Suddenly Missy squawked indignantly and snatched the lid back, startling him.
"Mine!" she said, setting her chin mulishly and clutching the lid to her chest.
"What'd I do?" John asked defensively. Hell, didn't she drag him all the way in here just to show the stuff to him, or was John the one relegated to "snack machine" now? It would certainly explain the way Rodney was snickering smugly at him, shaking his head at John's appeal, apparently unwilling to share the joke.
Well, John thought, Jeannie would, eventually--just like she had before. And if Rodney kept up like this, there was no way in hell John was leaving the whole "Rodney-no" thing alone. It would serve him right.
It was Steven who answered him from the doorway. "You're not supposed to touch it until she gives it to you," Steven advised, only a little smug. "Or she'll thwap you with it. She gets kinda possessive."
"No kidding," John said, feeling unreasonably ruffled that Rodney wouldn't tell him and unable to escape the sneaking suspicion that it was because Rodney was having too much fun laughing at him.
Missy studied John speculatively, then slowly extended the lid to him. John looked at it suspiciously. Rodney snickered harder and John glared at him.
"Now you can touch it," Steven told him. "It's safe."
"If you say so," John muttered, and accepted the offered lid. "Now what do I do with it?"
"You admire it," Jeannie said and damn it, she was snickering, and that goaded Rodney into full-blown laughter. Must've been one helluva joke, John thought resentfully. He hated being left out of these things.
It didn't help that once Missy was satisfied he wasn't going to misuse her lid, she took her bag of snacks and ignored him in favor of the Tupperware. After a moment of almost comically serious deliberation, she selected two of the battered dishes--one medium, one small--and began carefully emptying the cookies and Cheerios into them by handfuls, dividing the portion between them. Then, thoughtfully, she retrieved the bag and put some Cheerios back in. She gave the bag back to John and set the two tubs aside for safekeeping while she put the rest of the plasticware back into the cabinet.
Nobody said anything while she worked; the tension that had gripped through the house for days had suddenly vanished and they all basked in its absence while they watched the toddler do whatever it was she was doing.
Missy finally shut the cabinet door, squatted down beside the two plastic tubs, and considered their contents gravely, before adjusting the amounts of cookies in each of them. Then she handed the small one to John with a stern admonition to "Just hold it, please," and picked the medium one up, hugging it awkwardly to her chest as she carried it carefully across the room.
"Snack, Uncle Ronnie?" she said proudly, holding the dish out to Rodney, who took it and looked oddly touched.
"Thanks," he said softly to Missy, who beamed triumphantly and ambled back to retrieve the smaller dish from John.
"We'-come," Missy said, seating herself on John's knee while she picked over the selection in her dish. Which, John realized, was just small enough for her to grip in one hand. She finally decided on a Cheerio, and tilted her head back to grin proudly at John.
"See? She does like you," John told Rodney in his best I-told-you-so voice, which was actually a fairly accurate imitation of Rodney's. "She probably just figured you already knew where all the cool stuff was and didn't need to be told." Missy made a sound that might have been agreement.
Rodney looked up from his awed examination of the dish to roll his eyes at John before turning to Jeannie. "I still can't believe you kept this," he said.
"Three McKay children have cut their teeth on that Tupperware," she said, smiling. "Four, if you count me. But Missy's the only one who ever got quite as attached to it as you did."
"That's because she's got taste," sniffed Rodney. John grinned, finally getting the joke. "Taste," Rodney said again, and popped a cookie in his mouth.
"Well, at least she's not as violent about it as you were," Jeannie teased, and Rodney rolled his eyes again.
Missy got up and walked over to Rodney, craning her neck to peek into his dish and stealing a cookie.
"Hey," said John, belatedly realizing that he'd been completely left out of snack time. "What am I--chopped liver?
"You have some," Rodney said, pointing. "You just got yours in the bag. Which serves you right, ingrate. Next time, show proper respect for the Tupperware." Missy giggled and Rodney leaned down. "These used to be mine, you know," he said confidentially.
"Yeah," she said offhandedly, giggling harder as John examined the contents of his bag, scowling.
"Look at this," he said, and held the bag up for Rodney to see. "No Tupperware. No cookies, even. Just some castoff Cheerios and a boring plastic bag." He sighed theatrically. "I feel so unloved."
Rodney snorted. "Oh, woe. You poor, misunderstood man. My heart bleeds for you." He paused for a moment. "Okay, yeah. Done now." He crunched another cookie ostentatiously and smirked at John.
"You have no heart," said John. "You are heartless and cruel, taunting me with chocolate-chip cookies when I so obviously have none. I am a broken man, left with nothing but a few lonely Cheerios and a tacky Ziploc bag. How I long for Tupperware. How I yearn for of Chips Ahoy." He rattled the bag forlornly. "You're a cruel man, Rodney McKay. Your blood runs like ice."
Jeannie choked, and Rodney looked at Missy. "What do you think?" She beamed at him and turned to look back at John. So did Rodney.
Two pairs of bright blue eyes regarded John impishly, and two pairs of lips smiled identical crooked Cheshire Cat smiles. Rodney's eyes glinted with mischief, as open and honest as they'd been the day he'd found the personal shield. Looking into them, John felt a sudden desperate motion of his heart, so profound and unexpected that he might have fallen if he hadn't already been sitting down.
Time seemed to slow and stop, the air heavy and rippling like water. Like getting stoned in high school, when the laws of physics seemed to warp out of all recognition until minutes could take hours to pass and the whole day could slip past in an hour. It was like free-fall in slow motion, like being pulled under the surface of the ocean. Suddenly it seemed as if the currents in his world had shifted, and John could do nothing but move with them or be lost to the undertow.
I want you, he almost said to Rodney. I need you. He'd even opened his mouth to speak when Missy sat down in his lap, startling him out of his trance. Rodney was looking at him oddly, eyebrows creased in puzzlement.
Missy held her dish up, obviously offering to share, and John grinned his customary just-your-average-flyboy grin and took some Cheerios, covering his momentary lapse in composure by tossing a few in his mouth. "Thanks, kiddo," he said, smirking at Rodney.
John didn't think it fooled Rodney, not that it ever had, but it at least gave John the distance he needed to ignore the worried frown Rodney shot him.
"Jesus, Jeannie!" Rodney exclaimed, as Jeannie began gingerly unwrapping her hand. "How hard did you hit him? Does that need X-rays?"
"I hope not," she said, grimacing as she flexed it. "But I think I hit him pretty hard, and it's the same hand I hit Kavanagh with the other day." She sounded embarrassed, glancing guiltily over at Steven.
"You hit someone else?" Steven sounded impressed, and Jeannie nodded, flushing.
"He deserved it," Rodney told him. "He made a mistake that hurt and killed a lot of people, and then refused to admit he was the one who'd made it."
"Still," Jeannie said, looking pointedly at Steven. "Whether or not he deserved it doesn't justify what I did. I shouldn't have hit him."
"I know," Steven said, rolling his eyes. "I'm not five."
Jeannie tried unsuccessfully to stifle a smirk, and John coughed. Rodney just glared. "What," he said peevishly, "no clever nicknames for him?"
"Nope," Jeannie said cheerfully. "When he does that, we just call him 'Rodney.'"
Even Missy giggled at that, head tipped back against John's chest. John put his hand on top of her head when Rodney eyed her suspiciously, smoothing her hair and pretending he hadn't just been tickling the baby.
Rodney didn't particularly look like he believed him.
*
John was lost in his own thoughts for the rest of the day. Trying not to think of how close he'd come to outing himself in the kitchen.
Rodney kept sending worried little glances his way, but John was careful enough that Rodney didn't get another opportunity to call him on his odd behavior.
That is, until he woke Rodney up in the middle of the night, stumbling sweaty and shaky and clad in nothing but boxers and a tee shirt, pulse pounding loudly in his ears.
Rodney rolled over in bed, turning towards John in the doorway. "John?" he said sleepily, and sat up. He turned on the lamp and ran a hand through sleep-rumpled hair, standing it on end. "S'wrong?"
"I, uh, had a dream," John said awkwardly, flushing. It had been his worst nightmare to date, even worse than the ones he'd had just after they'd sunk Atlantis, when he'd finally had a chance to sleep again. The panic was already beginning to fade, leaving his limbs shaky and weak, and he suddenly felt foolishly like a child again, six years old and standing at the foot of his parents' bed. "Sorry," he said, but couldn't bring himself to move.
"No, no," Rodney yawned. "S'okay. Come in. Nightmare?"
"Yeah." Feeling like a weight had lifted, John moved to sit on the edge of the bed and shifted, still feeling awkward and ill at ease. Looking worried , Rodney scooted over to make room for him and waited for John to speak.
When John didn't, Rodney did. "Are you all right?" he asked softly, his tone so careful that John suddenly wondered how much Heightmeyer and Weir must have told him.
"I bet you've probably already talked to Heightmeyer," John said, and it came out more surly than he'd meant it. "You probably think I'm cracking up."
"Well, no," Rodney said slowly. "I mean, Elizabeth did talk to me, but that's not why I'm concerned."
So Weir had talked to him, then. John felt a pang of anger. "Really? What'd she say?" He felt more than a little betrayed, replaying the past few days in his head. He'd thought Rodney was having fun, maybe even liked having him around, but suddenly he had to wonder how much of it had been because someone had told Rodney he was losing it. How much had been fake, walking on eggshells around him to keep him from falling apart at the seams. The thought rankled.
"She wanted to know if I'd spoken to you, if you'd said anything to me," Rodney said. "She was worried about you, John."
"So what'd you tell her?" John asked snidely.
"I told her that if you had, it wasn't any of her damn business," Rodney answered sharply. He still sounded irritated with Elizabeth, and John felt a little ashamed. "You can talk to me in confidence, John. You know that."
"Yeah," John said quietly. "I know. I'm sorry. It's just--" He blew out a breath. "I don't know. Maybe I am cracking up," he confessed, turning to look at Rodney.
Rodney eyed him speculatively but didn't say anything, and John suddenly remembered how Rodney had never asked John why he'd been sleeping in the supply closet, never questioned that John didn't have somewhere else to be.
"Come here," Rodney finally said, and threw open the covers, rolling on his side as John crawled in beside him.
John swallowed hard, scooting closer as Rodney squirmed to get comfortable and then moving his hips back after a moment of thought. If Rodney kept that squirming thing up, it'd probably be best to keep a buffer zone between his crotch and Rodney's ass. Still, John obviously possessed no sense of self-preservation because he pressed his chest up against Rodney's back and threw an arm over Rodney's side.
Yeah, he thought when his palm brushed Rodney's stomach, the buffer zone would have definitely been a good idea.
The skin on Rodney's stomach was warm where his shirt had ridden up, and John froze when Rodney stiffened. They both held their breath for a long moment while John rested his forehead against Rodney's hair and prayed Rodney would break first.
To hell with it, he finally thought, and swiped his thumb deliberately across the warm skin just above Rodney's waistband, breathed out in a puff of air against his neck. Rodney hitched in a breath then, and John did, too. Every hair along Rodney's stomach was electric, and John shuddered in sympathy when his breath tickled Rodney's ear.
Trailing light fingers down along the fabric of Rodney's boxers, John slowed to trace the hem as it curved over Rodney's thigh. His fingertips tingled and his breath came sharp and shallow; Rodney was almost panting, trying to hide it, but Rodney hadn't done anything to stop him or to protest, so John continued his tentative explorations.
Every inch of John's body seemed electrified, hypersensitive and aching except for the places where his fingertips and cheek touched Rodney. His skin seemed to resonate with Rodney's muffled gasps until it felt like John was an instrument that was tuned--had always been tuned--specifically to Rodney. It drowned out all conscious thought and left John with nothing but instinct. He was so hard it hurt, and he was desperate to squirm and get some friction, get something; but he refrained from movement, opting instead to squeeze his eyes shut and try to memorize every inch of skin he touched, in case he never got to do this again.
And then he couldn't wait any longer; sucking in a breath, he gritted his teeth and slipped his thumb and forefingers just under the hem of Rodney's boxers, stroking slowly over the inside of his thigh.
They stayed like that for what seemed like eternity, perfectly still and silent except for the sound of their breathing and the slow, small movements of John's fingers where they touched Rodney's skin. The shift of the fabric over Rodney's skin was nearly deafening, its volume matched only by the frantic hammer of John's pulse in his ears.
"John," Rodney finally said, and his voice was strained. "What are you doing?" In spite of the question, he shifted his leg back to give John better access.
"Do you want me to stop?" John asked hoarsely, feeling reckless. He moved his hand up to the area he'd deliberately avoided until now, pressing his palm against Rodney's cock through his boxers.
"Yes!" Rodney hissed. John panicked and let go. "I mean--no!" Rodney reached back, lighting-fast, and snatched John's hand, pressing it back on his erection. "Please. Don't stop."
"Oh," John said, and chuckled, chuffing softly against Rodney's skin in relief. "Okay. I won't." He pressed himself flush against Rodney's body, rolling his hips forward, then licked the back of his ear and squeezed with his hand, drawing a groan from Rodney that went straight to his cock.
"Fuck." Rodney gasped and squirmed again, like he couldn't decide whether to thrust forward against John's hand or back against his hips. "Oh, damn. John."
"Want you," John growled into Rodney's neck. "Want this." Abandoning slow and careful, he rolled, pinning Rodney to the bed and covering Rodney's mouth with his own. Rodney clutched at John's shirt, rucking it up, and John ground down, reveling in the feel of Rodney, warm and alive beneath him. "Oh, God, Rodney. I want you," he said, gasping, and worked his hand into Rodney's boxers, stroking his cock as he tasted the spot just behind Rodney's earlobe. This was what he'd been wanting, even needing, since he'd first aimed that jumper at the hive ship. It was exhilarating, this feeling that he was finally back in the pilot's seat. John had a choice here, wasn't helpless anymore, and that was suddenly the best feeling in the world, even better than flying.
He hadn't been able to keep Rodney from blowing himself up, nearly getting himself killed, hadn't been able to keep him from watching as John nearly died. But he could make Rodney gasp, could make him feel so good, could make him thrust and writhe underneath John. He could make Rodney come with John's name on his lips and, wow, that had to be the best idea ever.
"Yeah," Rodney gasped, "oh, yeah. John." Rodney grabbed the back of John's head, arched up into John's hand and kissed him. John moaned into his mouth and yanked Rodney's shirt up so they were belly to belly, skin to skin.
"Fuck," he moaned, "fuck," Rodney's hand closed around his dick and John nuzzled into Rodney's shoulder and came almost instantly, gasping into Rodney's skin and spilling himself all over Rodney's hand and belly. "Jesus," he said, biting and licking at the juncture of neck and jaw. "Jesus. God, Rodney. I need you. I want you," he said urgently, hand still moving, still jerking Rodney off. " I wanna fuck you."
Rodney made a helpless sort of sound and twisted his hands into John's shirt as he came. John licked Rodney's ear again, coaxing him through the aftershocks and smiling into his skin. "I take it that's a yes," he murmured, and Rodney gave a shaky chuckle.
"Uh. Yes," Rodney said breathlessly, fists still clenching and unclenching in John's shirt. "That would be correct."
"Good." John smiled into Rodney's neck again, tangling his legs with Rodney's and rolling them both onto their sides, snuggling close and kissing him. "I thought it sounded like a good idea. I'm glad I could convince you to feel the same."
Rodney leaned forward and kissed him soundly, sliding his hand down to John's ass and squeezing. "I feel pretty convinced," he told John. "How about you?"
*
John isn't surprised to learn later that Rodney's done this before because, really, who wouldn't have thought that Rodney would have experimented? Experimenting was Rodney's thing.
He fucks Rodney the next night, having overcome every objection Rodney can think of about John's career. "I don't care," is what he's told Rodney again and again, and he honestly doesn't. There isn't anything that they could do to him that wouldn't be worth it just to have this--Rodney curled languorously next to him, full of sleepy, sloppy kisses and lazy post-coital satisfaction--and there isn't anything he wouldn't give to have it again. And for the next week, he's determined to have it as often as possible.
Worrying about what could happen only distracts from what is happening, as far as John's concerned. Besides, John's head is still too full of what almost happened to pay any attention to what will almost certainly happen if they get caught. There's just no room left for doubts and misgivings.
In fact, John doesn't even think about it again until a week later, when he's standing next to Rodney in the control room, in front of the Stargate. Dozens of soldiers boil around them, attending to dozens of different soldier things, and they're a physical reminder to John of the military scrutiny they'll likely face on Atlantis. Still, John can't bring himself to be too concerned. Some things, John thinks to himself, are more important than appearances.
He looks at Rodney next to him, smiling happily as he talks technology with Samantha Carter and clutching an old, worn Tupperware dish full of cookies to his chest like it's something precious.
Rodney, he thinks, must be one of them.