Fic: A Second Too Late [SGA] [Shep Whumpage] [Episode tag]
Chapters: 6/6
Rating: T
Genre: Hurt/Comfort
Spoilers: Doppelganger
WARNING! THIS FIC CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE PLOT OF EPISODE 4X04 DOPPELGANGER!!
It's done. Finally! Hurrah! :D
A Second Too Late
Rodney came back to himself with a jolt and a moment of blankness as his brain caught up to the transition from dream world to real world.
“He’s crashing!”
Keller’s shout snapped him out of the daze and memory came flooding back; Sheppard in blood-stained scrubs, huddled brokenly on the floor as the entity gloated threateningly over him, the relief as his plan had worked and the electric shock had stunned and weakened the creature, John climbing determinedly to his feet and dragging the entity towards the gate, almost throwing the thing through the active event horizon… and John lying crumpled on the gate room floor, cradled in Rodney’s arms, his eyes open but unseeing, his face pale and bloodless, his white scrubs stained increasingly red.
Rodney lifted his head from the pillow in a panic, twisting around to look across at Sheppard’s infirmary bed, only to see it being wheeled hurriedly out of the room, Keller kneeling astride it with her elbows locked, pumping rhythmically at John’s chest, hazmat-suited medics running alongside holding up bags of blood and IV fluid. The bed rattled as it was rolled through the door and swung sharply around the corner and before Rodney had a chance to move or react, or even to ask if Sheppard was going to be okay, the bed and its occupant were gone from view.
Adrenalin reduced his aches and pains, the soreness in his chest, to mere background noise and Rodney struggled to push himself into a sitting position on the gurney; a faint glow caught his eye and he twisted his head around to see Zelenka carefully disconnecting the containment unit in which sat a bright, shining crystal. The entity. Back where it came from. Unable to harm anyone else. Thanks to Sheppard. He shuddered; the dream still felt vivid and real, he could still feel the pulse of Sheppard’s blood seeping hotly through his hands. He shivered, reminding himself it hadn’t been real. But still, he couldn’t shake a distant feeling of surprise when he looked down at his hands and found them clean and pale, not stained with red.
“McKay? How are you doing?”
He looked up at Carter as he clambered inelegantly from the gurney, pulling the pads and wires from his temples, ignoring the protestations of the remaining medics.
“I’m going to the infirmary,” he answered shortly. Sam stood alone in the observation room, the window beside her empty; Rodney knew Teyla and Ronon would have headed straight for the infirmary themselves as soon as they’d seen he was alright.
“McKay, you were in cardiac arrest not half an hour ago...” Sam’s protest was weary, half-hearted, as though she knew full well he’d dismiss it but felt she should try anyway. Rodney knew that, in his position, if it were say Teal’c or Daniel fighting for life, she’d be halfway to the infirmary already. He also knew she’d be right behind him on the way to check on Sheppard.
Teyla and Ronon met him outside the infirmary, the Satedan clapping him on the back in wordless acknowledgement, Teyla’s hand warm and soft on his arm, her eyes saying more than words ever could as she greeted him quietly, “Rodney.”
“How is he?” The adrenalin was fading now and the aches and pain were returning with a vengeance; he was surprised to find that his voice shook a little.
“They have taken him into surgery.” It was Teyla who answered but the non-committal phrasing had come straight from Keller, he was sure. He settled himself heavily into one of the chairs that had been left permanently set up outside the infirmary, Teyla arranging herself gracefully on the seat beside him as they settled in for what he knew was going to be a long and painful wait. Ronon, restless as ever, leaned against the wall. The tall ex-Runner wasn’t good at waiting and Rodney knew he wouldn’t sit down until he knew that Sheppard was going to be okay. If Sheppard was going to be okay. Please god, let Sheppard be okay. They’d lost too many already.
*****
He surfaced out of a warm, muffled numbness to the sound of low, murmured voices. He couldn’t make out the words but the sounds were somehow familiar, somehow comforting. He floated for a while, letting the voices wash over him.
He didn’t know how long he drifted but after a time the voices became clearer, words starting to filter through.
“Did you see that?”
“I… am not certain. To what do you refer?”
“He moved! His finger twitched. I’m sure of it!”
“I didn’t see anything move.”
“Well, he moved! You saw it, didn’t you, Teyla?”
Teyla. The name was familiar too. He knew that name…
“I do not believe so. I am sorry, Rodney. Perhaps you were mistaken, we are all tired…”
Rodney. He knew that name too. Rodney was…
The comfortable numbness was fading now, memory starting to filter back, and he felt a tightness in his chest as he remembered seeing Rodney’s body, jerking hopelessly on a gurney before laying still… so still. Rodney was dead. But then he wasn’t. Was he? He’d been in the gate room. But that had been a dream. But the isolation room had been a dream too… hadn’t it? What was real and what was dream - the lines were blurred and confusing. Was this real?
“There! See! His eyelids fluttered. He definitely moved! He’s waking up!”
“Rodney…”
Waking up? Was he still dreaming then? Would the voices fade if he opened his eyes? He didn’t want to voices to go, didn’t want to be alone again. If Rodney was alive only in dreams, then he’d rather keep dreaming. He tried to let himself drift again, to slip back into the easy numbness, but the numbness wouldn’t come… instead the world got sharper; he became aware of beeps and hissing behind the voices, a sterile, antiseptic scene to the air, and a low, muted ache in his stomach, a heavy leadenness to his body.
He frowned, wanting the numbness back, wanting the dream to continue.
“McKay’s right. He moved. He’s waking up.”
“John? Can you hear me, John?”
The voice was soft and warm and familiar and he wanted so much for it to be real but it was a dream, just a dream, and the dream was slipping away from him. He groaned in protest but no sound came out, his throat working soundlessly.
“Ronon, get Keller!”
Rodney. No, Rodney was dead. But then he came back…
“Colonel Sheppard? Can you open your eyes for me, Colonel?”
Dr Keller. She blamed him for Rodney’s death. She’d stood and watched him bleed… no, that was a dream. Wasn’t it? But his stomach hurt, so that wasn’t a dream…
"Colonel? I need you to wake up now, John.”
Ngh. Fingers tapping on his cheek. It felt real. He moaned, tried to move his head away from the touch; the fingers followed, tapping again gently. Why would he dream that? His head was spinning, his thoughts jumbled, and the heavy lassitude of his body was slowly developing into a generalised, all-over ache. He didn’t think he’d dream that.
“Come on, Sheppard. Stop being such a drama queen and just wake up already.”
“Rodney!”
The voices were so familiar; the acerbic impatience of McKay, the gently chiding reproof of Teyla. They were comforting, reassuring, and he wanted more than anything to hang on to that reassurance.
Opening his eyes seemed to take far more energy than it should. It took him several attempts.
“Hey,” He found Keller leaning over him, a gentle smile on her face. “Welcome back, Colonel.”
He blinked drowsily, his breath misting inside an oxygen mask. He remembered an unsmiling Keller, her gaze accusing, and he frowned uncertainly. This Keller’s smile faded, morphing into concern, “How are you feeling?” she queried anxiously. “Do you have any pain?”
His mouth felt dry, his tongue thick and clumsy. He swallowed and tried to lick some moisture back into his lips. Keller’s eyes were drawn to the movement and she nodded briefly. “Let me get you some ice chips,” she murmured as she leaned back, disappearing from his field of vision.
A light touch on his arm, a small, warm hand laid gently on his bare skin, and he rolled his head sluggishly to find his team clustered around the bed; all of them - Teyla, Ronon… and McKay.
Teyla’s hand squeezed his arm lightly, her relieved smile lighting up her face. “It is good to see you awake, John,” she smiled. She looked tired, he realised. They all did, their eyes hollow, their faces drawn. He looked up at McKay and saw the evidence of fatigue in the scientist’s washed-out complexion, the dark shadows under his eyes. A memory surfaced of McKay yet paler still, white and motionless, limp and cold on a gurney. John shuddered and squeezed his eyes shut, willing the memory away. It hadn’t been real. Had it? Suddenly he was scared that when he opened his eyes, Rodney would be gone, that this would be the dream and he’d wake up to find himself back in the nightmare; only the nightmare would be real.
“John?” Teyla’s voice was coloured with concern, her hand squeezing his arm.
“What’s wrong with him?” John breathed shallowly, fear tightening his chest as he remembered the disgust in Ronon’s voice as he’d blamed him for McKay’s death. But McKay wasn’t dead… he’d been in the gate room and he was here now… and he’d been cold and dead on a gurney…
“Move.”
Rodney’s voice was demanding, but not unkind, and suddenly the warmth of Teyla’s hand was gone from his arm, only to be replaced by a bigger hand, the skin cooler, picking up John’s hand, fingers wrapping around to grip firmly.
“Hey.” Rodney’s voice was very near now, almost whispering in John’s ear. “I’m not dead. I mean it, Sheppard. This is real and I’m not dead and we won, that thing is gone for good.”
John breathed in shakily, wanting to believe that more than anything…
McKay’s hand squeezed his - it felt so real, so very real - and some of the usual arrogance and sharp edge crept back into his voice as told John, “And if you ever do something that stupid again, I’ll… well, I’m not coming in to save you next time, that’s for sure. I told you right at the start that it was a stupid idea but no, Mr “It’s-just-a-flesh-wound” knows better and ends up haemorrhaging all over the isolation room and…”
John couldn’t help smiling woozily as McKay’s acerbic litany of complaint increased in pitch and tempo as the scientist got increasingly worked up, the sound more familiar, more reassuring than any comforting platitudes. John had long since stopped listening to the actual content of the tirade as he opened his eyes to see Ronon and Teyla grinning tolerantly down at him. This was real. This was definitely real. McKay had warmed to his theme and it took him a moment or two to notice that John was awake and at least vaguely alert; his rant trailing off suddenly with an affronted, “Oh”. John tried not to laugh as Rodney looked uncomfortable for a moment and then seemed to belatedly realise that he was still holding John’s hand, dropping it as though it had scalded him.
John had a suspicion the smile on his face was rather goofy but he couldn’t bring himself to care and besides he figured he could blame it on the drugs. He was pretty certain he was on some fairly good drugs; his head still felt like it was stuffed with cotton wool and he felt oddly detached from his body, his limbs too heavy to even think about moving, the gentle ache in his stomach only a memory of the sharp pains he remembered all too clearly from before.
“Here you go, Colonel.” Keller returned with a cup of ice chips, leaning over him once more to gently lift the mask from his face, letting it hang down under his chin as she carefully slipped a thin sliver of ice between his lips. The ice melted deliciously in his mouth, cool water trickling down his parched throat. He swallowed, licking his lips, and Keller slowly fed him another couple of chips before setting the cup aside and, to his chagrin, settling the oxygen mask back over his face. He thought vaguely about lifting a hand to remove it but was surprised to find his arm didn’t want to move; he could barely lift it an inch and it felt like it weighed a ton. He looked down at the offending limb in annoyance and was surprised to find it festooned with IVs, wrapped in tape and topped off with a pulse-ox meter. He rolled his head woozily, taking a moment to get a proper look at himself; the white scrubs were gone, replaced by one of the dreaded, open-backed gowns, and, much as he hated the gowns, he couldn’t say he was sorry to see the back of the scrubs. The memory of the deep crimson stain across the white fabric, and the accompanying pain, had him struggling to lift his head from the pillow to peer down at his stomach. It was hidden under starched infirmary sheets and the effort of lifting his head was such that he couldn’t hold it for more than a few seconds. He let it flop back to the pillow with a sigh and found himself suddenly struggling to keep his eyes open, a bone-weary fatigue washing over him.
He drifted woozily for a few moments, only half listening to the murmur of voices around him, as Keller fussed around the bed, checking readings and fiddling with tubes and wires.
“Is he okay?” Rodney’s voice was unusually subdued.
Having a vested interest in the answer himself, John made an effort to shake off the lethargy and pay attention.
“He’s just tired, Rodney,” Keller explained. “It’s not surprising after what he’s been through.”
What had he been through, John wondered vaguely. His memories were jumbled, confusing. McKay’s death, his fight with the entity… none of that had been real. He realised belatedly that he had no idea what had happened, or even how much time had passed, between his first entering McKay’s dream and waking up here in the infirmary.
He blinked drowsily, trying to clear his head, and tried to ask Keller for an explanation but his voice came out surprisingly weak, the oxygen mask muffling his words. He tried again to lift his arm and had even less success.
“Dr Keller…” Teyla, bless her heart, was quick to notice his frustration. She smiled down at him encouragingly as Keller leaned over and carefully removed the oxygen mask.
“How are you feeling, Colonel?” she asked gently.
He swallowed, tried to clear his throat, but his voice still came out a cracked and hoarse whisper. “I’m good.”
He was vaguely aware of Rodney rolling his eyes in disgust.
“What happened?” he asked Keller.
Keller’s face was grave. “You had some complications with your abdominal wound, Colonel,” she informed him. “It would appear you somehow tore some stitches and you were bleeding internally…”
He shook his head sluggishly, frowning in confusion. “That… was dream…” he mumbled.
“I’m afraid not, Colonel.” Keller glanced over at Rodney as she told John, “I can’t speak to what you saw in your dream, but the complications you experienced were very real.” A flicker of regret passed over her face as she admitted, “We weren’t able to get you into surgery without risking exposing the rest of the base to the entity… by the time Dr McKay’s idea to remove the entity was successful, you’d lost a significant amount of blood and had gone into cardiac arrest...”
He could hear the hint of self-recrimination in her voice and he made an effort to catch and hold her gaze, to put as much conviction as he could into the husky croak of his voice as he told her seriously, “You did the right thing, doc.”
Keller’s mouth twisted noncommittally but some of the tension eased from her shoulders. “Lucky for us, you’re pretty stubborn,” she smiled ruefully. “It was touch and go for a while there, and you’re gonna be keeping us company here in the infirmary for some time…” Her lips quirked at his automatic groan of protest. “…but you’ve come through the surgery well and you should make a full recovery. What you need most right now is lots of rest and absolutely no exertion of any kind.”
She looked around sternly at his team with that comment and, predictably, McKay took immediate offence, demanding, “And what’s that supposed to mean?!”
“Exactly what it sounds like,” Keller countered. “No PDA, no paperwork, no mission briefings, no situation updates, absolutely no radio.” She included John in her comprehensive glare, adding, “No matter how much he begs, threatens or blackmails.”
John really didn’t feel that was fair; he’d only used blackmail once and that had been on Kavanaugh… who’d had no reason to be in the infirmary at the time anyway and had snuck in under a flimsy pretext solely to smirk at what he’d considered to be John’s misfortune.
McKay was already arguing his own innocence and placing any blame squarely on John’s shoulders, Teyla rolling her eyes when she thought no-one was looking, and Ronon was simply grinning, his arms crossed over his chest, his hip propped casually against the foot of John’s bed. It was all so familiar and comforting and John felt an odd kind of warmth well up deep inside him. In that cold, dark place in his soul from which the entity had pulled out and paraded his deepest fears, something shifted, and those fears seemed a little less scary, a little easier to bear, when he had his friends around him.
A yawn took him by surprise and he found himself jerking out of a half-doze to the sound of Keller trying to persuade his team to leave him to get some rest.
“Nno,” he mumbled. “Stay? Please?” Complete sentences were more than he could manage right now but Keller seemed to get the point just fine.
“Okay,” she conceded. “They can stay and keep you company. But you need to rest, Colonel. No staying awake all hours talking.”
“Notgnbeprblem…” he slurred, already hovering on the edge of sleep. He struggled to keep his eyes open long enough to watch his team settle back into their seats beside his bed, their faces worn but happy, smiling warmly down at him as he blinked heavily. His body felt warm and numb, Keller’s drugs masking any discomfort, leaving him feeling just generally exhausted. He drifted into sleep to background of low conversation amongst his friends overlaid by Keller’s announcement that she was going to go and inform Colonel Carter that he had awoken.
*****
Teyla wasn’t entirely surprised when her seemingly aimless wandering brought her eventually to the doors to the infirmary. She looked at her watch and hesitated a moment, wondering if she should just go back to her room; it was late, the middle of this planet’s night cycle, and she really should be asleep. Yet somehow, this night, her comfortable bed with its traditional Athosian blankets was not a comforting prospect.
The recent days’ events weighed heavily on her mind, as she knew they did for her team also. She, Ronon and Rodney had spent several hours in the infirmary, watching John sleep, before Dr Keller had finally insisted they all return to their quarters and get some rest. In those long hours, their desultory, muted conversation had covered many subjects… and yet, like a Bhraga returning each season to the hunting grounds of its forebears, had kept coming back to the subject of dreams, of the nightmares the entity had dredged from their subconscious to torture them with. She had listened with an ache in her heart to Rodney’s descriptions of what he had seen of John’s dream and had haltingly recounted the terror of her own experience, had shuddered at Ronon’s depiction of a city abandoned and soulless and struggled to understand Rodney’s attempts to explain what a clown was. Once or twice, as they spoke quietly, John had shifted in his bed, his eyes opening suddenly, his breath shallow and fast, and she knew that he too was remembering, reliving those dreams. He’d been drowsy still, but anxious, his eyes searching out their familiar faces before the tension would relax from his body and let him slide back into healing sleep. For a while after once such awakening, she had sat with her hand wrapped around his, wordlessly providing the reassurance he sought even as he slumbered.
Alone in her quarters, in the dark of night, she found herself craving that same reassurance. With a rueful sigh, she waved her hand over the sensor and the infirmary doors slid open with a soft hum. The main room was dimly lit, the lighting turned down low, monitors and readouts glowing in the semi-darkness. John’s bed was at the back of the room, in a secluded corner away from the bustle of the main thoroughfare and she trod softly past the two or three occupied beds in the main part of the infirmary.
She was not overly surprised to find John awake, despite the late hour, the glow from the monitors reflected in heavy-lidded eyes. He looked somehow lost and alone, his eyes dark in a face pale and drawn, his body, usually so full of energy and vitality, swaddled in thick blankets, wires and tubes snaking to and from the bed. A tired smile spread across his face as she came into view. The chairs they had arranged around his bed as they had sat waiting for him to awaken, to know that he would be alright this time, were still scattered nearby and she pulled one to her, setting it comfortably beside the bed.
“Couldn’t sleep,” she said simply as she sat down, leaning forward to take his hand in hers.
“Yeah, me too,” he whispered, his voice still hoarse and weak.
They sat like that, in companionable silence, for a while, John’s hand warm in hers, his eyes growing progressively drowsy. She was finally starting to feel sleepy herself when the infirmary doors hummed open and, a moment later, Rodney appeared, munching on a power bar as he too pulled up a chair.
“Thought I'd have a little snack before I...” he began to explain, gesturing with the half-eaten snack bar.
“Yeah,” Sheppard interrupted drowsily. “We couldn't sleep either.”
Rodney was still eating his power bar when Ronon spun a chair the wrong way round and straddled it, the rangy Satedan not feeling the need for explanations, and Teyla was aware of a certain tension relaxing from John’s body, a drowsy smile growing on his face as his team got comfortable. He was nearly asleep when Dr Keller and Colonel Carter arrived, the two women exchanging muted greetings with the team, Dr Keller taking a moment to check the monitors and note her findings before also arranging a chair beside Colonel Sheppard’s bed.
The atmosphere in their little corner of the infirmary was subdued, people talking seldom, conversing only in whispers, and Teyla felt the fatigue of recent days catching up to her, her body telling her it needed rest. John’s hand felt limp in hers and she looked across to find him comfortably asleep, a slight smile on his lips. As she watched tiredly, her friends slowly settled themselves more comfortably into their chairs, the conversation slowly petering out as, one by one, they dozed off, Rodney slumped forward, his head resting on folded arms on the mattress of Sheppard’s bed, Ronon stretched out on his chair, his long legs crossed at the ankle, his head tipped back, dreadlocks dangling. Even Colonel Carter and Dr Keller eventually succumbed to sleep, the Colonel’s head tipped forward onto her chest, Dr Keller curled sideways on her seat, one leg tucked up under her.
Surrounded by his team, by his family, John Sheppard slept peacefully. Teyla sat for a moment, her eyes growing heavy with sleep, and watched her friends breathe slowly in and out, their bodies relaxed, the nightmares, for now, a thing of the past. Finally, John’s hand still warm in hers, she allowed herself to slide more comfortably into the chair and, with a sigh, let her eyes drift closed. This time, sleep was quick to come.
Fin
Rating: T
Genre: Hurt/Comfort
Spoilers: Doppelganger
WARNING! THIS FIC CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE PLOT OF EPISODE 4X04 DOPPELGANGER!!
It's done. Finally! Hurrah! :D
A Second Too Late
Rodney came back to himself with a jolt and a moment of blankness as his brain caught up to the transition from dream world to real world.
“He’s crashing!”
Keller’s shout snapped him out of the daze and memory came flooding back; Sheppard in blood-stained scrubs, huddled brokenly on the floor as the entity gloated threateningly over him, the relief as his plan had worked and the electric shock had stunned and weakened the creature, John climbing determinedly to his feet and dragging the entity towards the gate, almost throwing the thing through the active event horizon… and John lying crumpled on the gate room floor, cradled in Rodney’s arms, his eyes open but unseeing, his face pale and bloodless, his white scrubs stained increasingly red.
Rodney lifted his head from the pillow in a panic, twisting around to look across at Sheppard’s infirmary bed, only to see it being wheeled hurriedly out of the room, Keller kneeling astride it with her elbows locked, pumping rhythmically at John’s chest, hazmat-suited medics running alongside holding up bags of blood and IV fluid. The bed rattled as it was rolled through the door and swung sharply around the corner and before Rodney had a chance to move or react, or even to ask if Sheppard was going to be okay, the bed and its occupant were gone from view.
Adrenalin reduced his aches and pains, the soreness in his chest, to mere background noise and Rodney struggled to push himself into a sitting position on the gurney; a faint glow caught his eye and he twisted his head around to see Zelenka carefully disconnecting the containment unit in which sat a bright, shining crystal. The entity. Back where it came from. Unable to harm anyone else. Thanks to Sheppard. He shuddered; the dream still felt vivid and real, he could still feel the pulse of Sheppard’s blood seeping hotly through his hands. He shivered, reminding himself it hadn’t been real. But still, he couldn’t shake a distant feeling of surprise when he looked down at his hands and found them clean and pale, not stained with red.
“McKay? How are you doing?”
He looked up at Carter as he clambered inelegantly from the gurney, pulling the pads and wires from his temples, ignoring the protestations of the remaining medics.
“I’m going to the infirmary,” he answered shortly. Sam stood alone in the observation room, the window beside her empty; Rodney knew Teyla and Ronon would have headed straight for the infirmary themselves as soon as they’d seen he was alright.
“McKay, you were in cardiac arrest not half an hour ago...” Sam’s protest was weary, half-hearted, as though she knew full well he’d dismiss it but felt she should try anyway. Rodney knew that, in his position, if it were say Teal’c or Daniel fighting for life, she’d be halfway to the infirmary already. He also knew she’d be right behind him on the way to check on Sheppard.
Teyla and Ronon met him outside the infirmary, the Satedan clapping him on the back in wordless acknowledgement, Teyla’s hand warm and soft on his arm, her eyes saying more than words ever could as she greeted him quietly, “Rodney.”
“How is he?” The adrenalin was fading now and the aches and pain were returning with a vengeance; he was surprised to find that his voice shook a little.
“They have taken him into surgery.” It was Teyla who answered but the non-committal phrasing had come straight from Keller, he was sure. He settled himself heavily into one of the chairs that had been left permanently set up outside the infirmary, Teyla arranging herself gracefully on the seat beside him as they settled in for what he knew was going to be a long and painful wait. Ronon, restless as ever, leaned against the wall. The tall ex-Runner wasn’t good at waiting and Rodney knew he wouldn’t sit down until he knew that Sheppard was going to be okay. If Sheppard was going to be okay. Please god, let Sheppard be okay. They’d lost too many already.
*****
He surfaced out of a warm, muffled numbness to the sound of low, murmured voices. He couldn’t make out the words but the sounds were somehow familiar, somehow comforting. He floated for a while, letting the voices wash over him.
He didn’t know how long he drifted but after a time the voices became clearer, words starting to filter through.
“Did you see that?”
“I… am not certain. To what do you refer?”
“He moved! His finger twitched. I’m sure of it!”
“I didn’t see anything move.”
“Well, he moved! You saw it, didn’t you, Teyla?”
Teyla. The name was familiar too. He knew that name…
“I do not believe so. I am sorry, Rodney. Perhaps you were mistaken, we are all tired…”
Rodney. He knew that name too. Rodney was…
The comfortable numbness was fading now, memory starting to filter back, and he felt a tightness in his chest as he remembered seeing Rodney’s body, jerking hopelessly on a gurney before laying still… so still. Rodney was dead. But then he wasn’t. Was he? He’d been in the gate room. But that had been a dream. But the isolation room had been a dream too… hadn’t it? What was real and what was dream - the lines were blurred and confusing. Was this real?
“There! See! His eyelids fluttered. He definitely moved! He’s waking up!”
“Rodney…”
Waking up? Was he still dreaming then? Would the voices fade if he opened his eyes? He didn’t want to voices to go, didn’t want to be alone again. If Rodney was alive only in dreams, then he’d rather keep dreaming. He tried to let himself drift again, to slip back into the easy numbness, but the numbness wouldn’t come… instead the world got sharper; he became aware of beeps and hissing behind the voices, a sterile, antiseptic scene to the air, and a low, muted ache in his stomach, a heavy leadenness to his body.
He frowned, wanting the numbness back, wanting the dream to continue.
“McKay’s right. He moved. He’s waking up.”
“John? Can you hear me, John?”
The voice was soft and warm and familiar and he wanted so much for it to be real but it was a dream, just a dream, and the dream was slipping away from him. He groaned in protest but no sound came out, his throat working soundlessly.
“Ronon, get Keller!”
Rodney. No, Rodney was dead. But then he came back…
“Colonel Sheppard? Can you open your eyes for me, Colonel?”
Dr Keller. She blamed him for Rodney’s death. She’d stood and watched him bleed… no, that was a dream. Wasn’t it? But his stomach hurt, so that wasn’t a dream…
"Colonel? I need you to wake up now, John.”
Ngh. Fingers tapping on his cheek. It felt real. He moaned, tried to move his head away from the touch; the fingers followed, tapping again gently. Why would he dream that? His head was spinning, his thoughts jumbled, and the heavy lassitude of his body was slowly developing into a generalised, all-over ache. He didn’t think he’d dream that.
“Come on, Sheppard. Stop being such a drama queen and just wake up already.”
“Rodney!”
The voices were so familiar; the acerbic impatience of McKay, the gently chiding reproof of Teyla. They were comforting, reassuring, and he wanted more than anything to hang on to that reassurance.
Opening his eyes seemed to take far more energy than it should. It took him several attempts.
“Hey,” He found Keller leaning over him, a gentle smile on her face. “Welcome back, Colonel.”
He blinked drowsily, his breath misting inside an oxygen mask. He remembered an unsmiling Keller, her gaze accusing, and he frowned uncertainly. This Keller’s smile faded, morphing into concern, “How are you feeling?” she queried anxiously. “Do you have any pain?”
His mouth felt dry, his tongue thick and clumsy. He swallowed and tried to lick some moisture back into his lips. Keller’s eyes were drawn to the movement and she nodded briefly. “Let me get you some ice chips,” she murmured as she leaned back, disappearing from his field of vision.
A light touch on his arm, a small, warm hand laid gently on his bare skin, and he rolled his head sluggishly to find his team clustered around the bed; all of them - Teyla, Ronon… and McKay.
Teyla’s hand squeezed his arm lightly, her relieved smile lighting up her face. “It is good to see you awake, John,” she smiled. She looked tired, he realised. They all did, their eyes hollow, their faces drawn. He looked up at McKay and saw the evidence of fatigue in the scientist’s washed-out complexion, the dark shadows under his eyes. A memory surfaced of McKay yet paler still, white and motionless, limp and cold on a gurney. John shuddered and squeezed his eyes shut, willing the memory away. It hadn’t been real. Had it? Suddenly he was scared that when he opened his eyes, Rodney would be gone, that this would be the dream and he’d wake up to find himself back in the nightmare; only the nightmare would be real.
“John?” Teyla’s voice was coloured with concern, her hand squeezing his arm.
“What’s wrong with him?” John breathed shallowly, fear tightening his chest as he remembered the disgust in Ronon’s voice as he’d blamed him for McKay’s death. But McKay wasn’t dead… he’d been in the gate room and he was here now… and he’d been cold and dead on a gurney…
“Move.”
Rodney’s voice was demanding, but not unkind, and suddenly the warmth of Teyla’s hand was gone from his arm, only to be replaced by a bigger hand, the skin cooler, picking up John’s hand, fingers wrapping around to grip firmly.
“Hey.” Rodney’s voice was very near now, almost whispering in John’s ear. “I’m not dead. I mean it, Sheppard. This is real and I’m not dead and we won, that thing is gone for good.”
John breathed in shakily, wanting to believe that more than anything…
McKay’s hand squeezed his - it felt so real, so very real - and some of the usual arrogance and sharp edge crept back into his voice as told John, “And if you ever do something that stupid again, I’ll… well, I’m not coming in to save you next time, that’s for sure. I told you right at the start that it was a stupid idea but no, Mr “It’s-just-a-flesh-wound” knows better and ends up haemorrhaging all over the isolation room and…”
John couldn’t help smiling woozily as McKay’s acerbic litany of complaint increased in pitch and tempo as the scientist got increasingly worked up, the sound more familiar, more reassuring than any comforting platitudes. John had long since stopped listening to the actual content of the tirade as he opened his eyes to see Ronon and Teyla grinning tolerantly down at him. This was real. This was definitely real. McKay had warmed to his theme and it took him a moment or two to notice that John was awake and at least vaguely alert; his rant trailing off suddenly with an affronted, “Oh”. John tried not to laugh as Rodney looked uncomfortable for a moment and then seemed to belatedly realise that he was still holding John’s hand, dropping it as though it had scalded him.
John had a suspicion the smile on his face was rather goofy but he couldn’t bring himself to care and besides he figured he could blame it on the drugs. He was pretty certain he was on some fairly good drugs; his head still felt like it was stuffed with cotton wool and he felt oddly detached from his body, his limbs too heavy to even think about moving, the gentle ache in his stomach only a memory of the sharp pains he remembered all too clearly from before.
“Here you go, Colonel.” Keller returned with a cup of ice chips, leaning over him once more to gently lift the mask from his face, letting it hang down under his chin as she carefully slipped a thin sliver of ice between his lips. The ice melted deliciously in his mouth, cool water trickling down his parched throat. He swallowed, licking his lips, and Keller slowly fed him another couple of chips before setting the cup aside and, to his chagrin, settling the oxygen mask back over his face. He thought vaguely about lifting a hand to remove it but was surprised to find his arm didn’t want to move; he could barely lift it an inch and it felt like it weighed a ton. He looked down at the offending limb in annoyance and was surprised to find it festooned with IVs, wrapped in tape and topped off with a pulse-ox meter. He rolled his head woozily, taking a moment to get a proper look at himself; the white scrubs were gone, replaced by one of the dreaded, open-backed gowns, and, much as he hated the gowns, he couldn’t say he was sorry to see the back of the scrubs. The memory of the deep crimson stain across the white fabric, and the accompanying pain, had him struggling to lift his head from the pillow to peer down at his stomach. It was hidden under starched infirmary sheets and the effort of lifting his head was such that he couldn’t hold it for more than a few seconds. He let it flop back to the pillow with a sigh and found himself suddenly struggling to keep his eyes open, a bone-weary fatigue washing over him.
He drifted woozily for a few moments, only half listening to the murmur of voices around him, as Keller fussed around the bed, checking readings and fiddling with tubes and wires.
“Is he okay?” Rodney’s voice was unusually subdued.
Having a vested interest in the answer himself, John made an effort to shake off the lethargy and pay attention.
“He’s just tired, Rodney,” Keller explained. “It’s not surprising after what he’s been through.”
What had he been through, John wondered vaguely. His memories were jumbled, confusing. McKay’s death, his fight with the entity… none of that had been real. He realised belatedly that he had no idea what had happened, or even how much time had passed, between his first entering McKay’s dream and waking up here in the infirmary.
He blinked drowsily, trying to clear his head, and tried to ask Keller for an explanation but his voice came out surprisingly weak, the oxygen mask muffling his words. He tried again to lift his arm and had even less success.
“Dr Keller…” Teyla, bless her heart, was quick to notice his frustration. She smiled down at him encouragingly as Keller leaned over and carefully removed the oxygen mask.
“How are you feeling, Colonel?” she asked gently.
He swallowed, tried to clear his throat, but his voice still came out a cracked and hoarse whisper. “I’m good.”
He was vaguely aware of Rodney rolling his eyes in disgust.
“What happened?” he asked Keller.
Keller’s face was grave. “You had some complications with your abdominal wound, Colonel,” she informed him. “It would appear you somehow tore some stitches and you were bleeding internally…”
He shook his head sluggishly, frowning in confusion. “That… was dream…” he mumbled.
“I’m afraid not, Colonel.” Keller glanced over at Rodney as she told John, “I can’t speak to what you saw in your dream, but the complications you experienced were very real.” A flicker of regret passed over her face as she admitted, “We weren’t able to get you into surgery without risking exposing the rest of the base to the entity… by the time Dr McKay’s idea to remove the entity was successful, you’d lost a significant amount of blood and had gone into cardiac arrest...”
He could hear the hint of self-recrimination in her voice and he made an effort to catch and hold her gaze, to put as much conviction as he could into the husky croak of his voice as he told her seriously, “You did the right thing, doc.”
Keller’s mouth twisted noncommittally but some of the tension eased from her shoulders. “Lucky for us, you’re pretty stubborn,” she smiled ruefully. “It was touch and go for a while there, and you’re gonna be keeping us company here in the infirmary for some time…” Her lips quirked at his automatic groan of protest. “…but you’ve come through the surgery well and you should make a full recovery. What you need most right now is lots of rest and absolutely no exertion of any kind.”
She looked around sternly at his team with that comment and, predictably, McKay took immediate offence, demanding, “And what’s that supposed to mean?!”
“Exactly what it sounds like,” Keller countered. “No PDA, no paperwork, no mission briefings, no situation updates, absolutely no radio.” She included John in her comprehensive glare, adding, “No matter how much he begs, threatens or blackmails.”
John really didn’t feel that was fair; he’d only used blackmail once and that had been on Kavanaugh… who’d had no reason to be in the infirmary at the time anyway and had snuck in under a flimsy pretext solely to smirk at what he’d considered to be John’s misfortune.
McKay was already arguing his own innocence and placing any blame squarely on John’s shoulders, Teyla rolling her eyes when she thought no-one was looking, and Ronon was simply grinning, his arms crossed over his chest, his hip propped casually against the foot of John’s bed. It was all so familiar and comforting and John felt an odd kind of warmth well up deep inside him. In that cold, dark place in his soul from which the entity had pulled out and paraded his deepest fears, something shifted, and those fears seemed a little less scary, a little easier to bear, when he had his friends around him.
A yawn took him by surprise and he found himself jerking out of a half-doze to the sound of Keller trying to persuade his team to leave him to get some rest.
“Nno,” he mumbled. “Stay? Please?” Complete sentences were more than he could manage right now but Keller seemed to get the point just fine.
“Okay,” she conceded. “They can stay and keep you company. But you need to rest, Colonel. No staying awake all hours talking.”
“Notgnbeprblem…” he slurred, already hovering on the edge of sleep. He struggled to keep his eyes open long enough to watch his team settle back into their seats beside his bed, their faces worn but happy, smiling warmly down at him as he blinked heavily. His body felt warm and numb, Keller’s drugs masking any discomfort, leaving him feeling just generally exhausted. He drifted into sleep to background of low conversation amongst his friends overlaid by Keller’s announcement that she was going to go and inform Colonel Carter that he had awoken.
*****
Teyla wasn’t entirely surprised when her seemingly aimless wandering brought her eventually to the doors to the infirmary. She looked at her watch and hesitated a moment, wondering if she should just go back to her room; it was late, the middle of this planet’s night cycle, and she really should be asleep. Yet somehow, this night, her comfortable bed with its traditional Athosian blankets was not a comforting prospect.
The recent days’ events weighed heavily on her mind, as she knew they did for her team also. She, Ronon and Rodney had spent several hours in the infirmary, watching John sleep, before Dr Keller had finally insisted they all return to their quarters and get some rest. In those long hours, their desultory, muted conversation had covered many subjects… and yet, like a Bhraga returning each season to the hunting grounds of its forebears, had kept coming back to the subject of dreams, of the nightmares the entity had dredged from their subconscious to torture them with. She had listened with an ache in her heart to Rodney’s descriptions of what he had seen of John’s dream and had haltingly recounted the terror of her own experience, had shuddered at Ronon’s depiction of a city abandoned and soulless and struggled to understand Rodney’s attempts to explain what a clown was. Once or twice, as they spoke quietly, John had shifted in his bed, his eyes opening suddenly, his breath shallow and fast, and she knew that he too was remembering, reliving those dreams. He’d been drowsy still, but anxious, his eyes searching out their familiar faces before the tension would relax from his body and let him slide back into healing sleep. For a while after once such awakening, she had sat with her hand wrapped around his, wordlessly providing the reassurance he sought even as he slumbered.
Alone in her quarters, in the dark of night, she found herself craving that same reassurance. With a rueful sigh, she waved her hand over the sensor and the infirmary doors slid open with a soft hum. The main room was dimly lit, the lighting turned down low, monitors and readouts glowing in the semi-darkness. John’s bed was at the back of the room, in a secluded corner away from the bustle of the main thoroughfare and she trod softly past the two or three occupied beds in the main part of the infirmary.
She was not overly surprised to find John awake, despite the late hour, the glow from the monitors reflected in heavy-lidded eyes. He looked somehow lost and alone, his eyes dark in a face pale and drawn, his body, usually so full of energy and vitality, swaddled in thick blankets, wires and tubes snaking to and from the bed. A tired smile spread across his face as she came into view. The chairs they had arranged around his bed as they had sat waiting for him to awaken, to know that he would be alright this time, were still scattered nearby and she pulled one to her, setting it comfortably beside the bed.
“Couldn’t sleep,” she said simply as she sat down, leaning forward to take his hand in hers.
“Yeah, me too,” he whispered, his voice still hoarse and weak.
They sat like that, in companionable silence, for a while, John’s hand warm in hers, his eyes growing progressively drowsy. She was finally starting to feel sleepy herself when the infirmary doors hummed open and, a moment later, Rodney appeared, munching on a power bar as he too pulled up a chair.
“Thought I'd have a little snack before I...” he began to explain, gesturing with the half-eaten snack bar.
“Yeah,” Sheppard interrupted drowsily. “We couldn't sleep either.”
Rodney was still eating his power bar when Ronon spun a chair the wrong way round and straddled it, the rangy Satedan not feeling the need for explanations, and Teyla was aware of a certain tension relaxing from John’s body, a drowsy smile growing on his face as his team got comfortable. He was nearly asleep when Dr Keller and Colonel Carter arrived, the two women exchanging muted greetings with the team, Dr Keller taking a moment to check the monitors and note her findings before also arranging a chair beside Colonel Sheppard’s bed.
The atmosphere in their little corner of the infirmary was subdued, people talking seldom, conversing only in whispers, and Teyla felt the fatigue of recent days catching up to her, her body telling her it needed rest. John’s hand felt limp in hers and she looked across to find him comfortably asleep, a slight smile on his lips. As she watched tiredly, her friends slowly settled themselves more comfortably into their chairs, the conversation slowly petering out as, one by one, they dozed off, Rodney slumped forward, his head resting on folded arms on the mattress of Sheppard’s bed, Ronon stretched out on his chair, his long legs crossed at the ankle, his head tipped back, dreadlocks dangling. Even Colonel Carter and Dr Keller eventually succumbed to sleep, the Colonel’s head tipped forward onto her chest, Dr Keller curled sideways on her seat, one leg tucked up under her.
Surrounded by his team, by his family, John Sheppard slept peacefully. Teyla sat for a moment, her eyes growing heavy with sleep, and watched her friends breathe slowly in and out, their bodies relaxed, the nightmares, for now, a thing of the past. Finally, John’s hand still warm in hers, she allowed herself to slide more comfortably into the chair and, with a sigh, let her eyes drift closed. This time, sleep was quick to come.
Fin