Fic: Something the Lord Made
Title: Something the Lord Made
Author: Melyanna
Rating: PG
Characters: Teyla, Ronon
Summary: Six months after the nuclear accident, Teyla and Ronon make a difficult decision in the face of overwhelming anti-mutant prejudice.
Notes: This is my first offering in this AU, so be gentle. ;) Many thanks to irony_rocks for the quick beta. The title is shamelessly stolen from a movie about Alfred Blalock and Vivien Thomas, which starred Alan Rickman and Mos Def, respectively.
The house seemed smaller to Teyla now than it had when she was a child. Admittedly, the ability to walk from room to room without fussing with doors probably aided in its seeming shrinkage. But she was living in her Aunt Charin's house along with her cousin Ronon now. The situation was hardly ideal, but after the accident, after they'd both lost their jobs, they'd had little choice in the matter.
Something about the harsh afternoon light filtering into the living room through lace curtains reminded Teyla of a song her father had loved. The air was stagnant and heavy, oppressively hot. Leaning back in her chair, she picked up a piece of paper and absently fanned herself. She tried to think of other things, but the reason she was at home in the middle of a hot spring day was never far from her mind, no matter how hard she tried.
When Ronon walked in the front door, Teyla knew what the outcome of his errand was. He slammed the door closed, but not quite hard enough to mask his swearing. Teyla winced. He didn't reserve that kind of language for special occasions, but it definitely wasn't a good sign now.
He didn't have to explain it, but when he came in the living room he did anyway. "State's not helping anyone," he announced. "They're refusing to help any of us until the feds say something about it."
Teyla did her best not to sigh while Ronon flopped down on the couch, arms over his chest and eyes fixed on nothing. Sometimes it seemed like the entire history of oppression could be summed up in what he had just said. The powerless would continue to be powerless unless political might and moral decency happened to coincide. But Teyla did not think the mutants had time for bureaucracy and equivocation.
Mutants everywhere were losing their jobs, their families, their homes. With that went all hope of security of any sense, even without the more... active kinds of persecution.
There were also stories of beatings, of murders, of rapes. Teyla believed them all.
She shook her head. "Surely there is something we can still do," she said. "Some avenue we have not thought of." Ronon glared at her, but her cousin had never been able to intimidate her out of speaking her mind. She got to her feet. "Our family was respected before the accident, Ronon. That must count for something."
"It doesn't," he replied sullenly. "And it's not just us that's affected, Teyla. It's our whole family. Everyone knows by now what we are. How long do you think it'll be before people start shunning them too, just because they're related to us?"
"You didn't used to be such a cynic, Ronon," Teyla said as she left the room.
"I used to have a job," he called after her.
She headed to the kitchen and got herself a glass of water, trying to calm herself down. Unfortunately there was a lot of truth to what her cousin was saying. They couldn't get work anymore. Everyone in their immediate area knew who they were related to, and it was probably just a matter of time before they started to feel the squeeze too. After all, there were even reports of children being kicked out of public schools because their parents had been affected by the accident, even though the children themselves showed no signs. So far, Teyla and Ronon's family had been accepting of the mutations, but what would happen once society turned its back on them too?
Teyla gulped down the water, fingering the cross that hung around her neck. She didn't want to think about it.
When she opened her eyes, Ronon was standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame. "You know what I heard the other day?" he asked rhetorically. "There are mutants getting turned away for confession and communion."
Teyla stared at him hard. He knew that was most likely to get her angry, but she didn't think he was lying to her. She set the glass down next to the sink. "What are you saying we should do, Ronon?" she asked. "Move somewhere else, change our names, pretend I can't walk through walls and you can't bend steel with your bare hands?"
His expression turned cold. "We can't hide. They already know about us," he said. "They're going to start marking us all soon. Branding us like we're slaves."
The thought sent a chill down her spine, but she tried to remain impassive. "Then what do you want us to do, Ronon?" she asked again.
"I know someone," he said, pushing off the door frame and coming into the room. "He'll give us jobs. Our... powers are actually an advantage for him."
It took Teyla only a moment to realize what he was suggesting. "No," she replied, shaking her head. "No, Ronon, I will not turn to something illegal just to-"
"Just to what?" he interrupted. "Just to feed yourself? To feed Aunt Charin? To help our family when they start to suffer because of us?"
"Ronon," she said, stepping toward him, "this is a gift. I won't abuse this."
"A gift?" he said. "You've got to be kidding me. Who do you think gave this to us?" She didn't answer him, just kept looking at him, and Ronon turned away, incredulous. "Teyla, this was that incompetent fool's doing, not God's."
"You know we can't always understand His will," Teyla pressed. "I refuse to believe that God abandoned us to this. And I won't use the work of God to become a petty thief."
"Thieves have been forgiven before," Ronon pointed out.
"Ronon."
He came up to her and cupped her face, towering over her. "I was a Marine, Teyla. I have dignity and honor and all that too. I don't want to do this any more than you do," he said. "But we don't have a choice. We can't just sit around and hope for the best. Even if the government decides to help us, that's not going to keep people from hating us."
Much as she didn't want to admit it, he was right. They were still going to face the same prejudices even if the government did step in. Still, she hated the idea. "It isn't right," she protested weakly.
"You can walk through walls, Teyla," he said. "That isn't right either."
She pulled away from him then, feeling cold. "On one condition," she said, hoping to preserve some semblance of honor in all of this. "If we end up with more than we need, we give the rest away."
Ronon shrugged. "As long as I don't have to wear tights."
Narrowing her eyes, Teyla slapped his arm, but she offered no more protests. Instead, she went about the rest of her day trying to make sense of how they'd gotten this far away from their real lives.
It had been six months since the accident at the nuclear plant, and six months since the public had started hearing strange reports of people developing odd abilities. Teyla had thought nothing of it, until she and some of her friends from the cross-country track team had been racing each other from the fieldhouse to the locker room one afternoon. She'd beaten them in handily, but when she turned to look back at them in triumph, she saw that the doors had already closed behind her. She opened them to find her friends staring at her in horror. She hadn't pushed the doors open. She had run through them.
Over the next twelve hours, she felt like she'd aged twelve years. The principal had heard about it the next day and called her into his office to ask her to leave the school for a while - "for your protection," he'd said. Despite the condescension in his voice, Teyla had detected fear in him. At that point no one knew the full extent of her bizarre ability, and already people feared her for it.
Six weeks later she'd stood before the school board and listened to them tell her that she was a distraction and a risk and could not continue to attend public school. Even if she and her family had been able to afford private school, there probably wasn't one that would have accepted her, not anymore.
Teyla got a bitter taste in her mouth when she remembered the news reports. She'd been the first student kicked out of a school. None of the reports mentioned that she'd had a near-perfect GPA and was a star track runner. Now she was just a high school dropout and, to most people, a one-woman freak show.
Her father and her cousin had started showing signs of mutation then too. Ronon had been kicked out of the Marine Corps just a few weeks earlier. Her father... Her father, with his remarkable gift for public speaking and persuasion, had been a city councilman. But when he'd tried to defend the rights of those affected by the accident, it had come out that he too was a mutant, and someone had shot him.
Bullets would have passed through Teyla without leaving a mark. They would have bounced off Ronon like pebbles. Her father could read emotions of even the most seasoned actor, something Teyla could only hear whispers of.
He could not stop bullets.
His funeral had been a small, private affair, as the family had feared for their safety. That fear hadn't kept Teyla away, nor kept her from crying. She could understand why people were afraid of the mutants, but she couldn't understand the hate. Many times in the last six months she'd thought of Job, losing everything he had in a test of faith, and she wondered now when her test would be over.
The evening sweltered as much as the day did, but around midnight a breeze blew in the open window of Teyla's room. She was almost ready for bed when there came a knock at the door. "Come in," she said.
Ronon entered, which was not surprising. "Listen," he said, closing the door, "I want to apologize. I was pushing you kind of hard."
"Much as I hate to admit this, Ronon, you were right," she replied. "At some point we have to help ourselves."
He nodded, but still seemed bothered. "Aunt Charin won't like it."
"I know," Teyla said. "I had had that thought myself. Perhaps we should... conceal the nature of this work from her, and simply tell her we have found an employer willing to overlook our gifts."
"She'll figure it out eventually," he replied.
Teyla smiled ruefully. "Yes, she will."
There was an awkward silence, and then Ronon added, "You still think this is a gift."
"This is who I am, Ronon," she replied. "I don't know any other way."
He turned toward the door. "Well, if you figure out why God would want this to happen, you'll let me know, right?"
Teyla waited for him to look at her again before she answered. "If I figure it out," she said, "I think you'll probably know too."
Author: Melyanna
Rating: PG
Characters: Teyla, Ronon
Summary: Six months after the nuclear accident, Teyla and Ronon make a difficult decision in the face of overwhelming anti-mutant prejudice.
Notes: This is my first offering in this AU, so be gentle. ;) Many thanks to irony_rocks for the quick beta. The title is shamelessly stolen from a movie about Alfred Blalock and Vivien Thomas, which starred Alan Rickman and Mos Def, respectively.
The house seemed smaller to Teyla now than it had when she was a child. Admittedly, the ability to walk from room to room without fussing with doors probably aided in its seeming shrinkage. But she was living in her Aunt Charin's house along with her cousin Ronon now. The situation was hardly ideal, but after the accident, after they'd both lost their jobs, they'd had little choice in the matter.
Something about the harsh afternoon light filtering into the living room through lace curtains reminded Teyla of a song her father had loved. The air was stagnant and heavy, oppressively hot. Leaning back in her chair, she picked up a piece of paper and absently fanned herself. She tried to think of other things, but the reason she was at home in the middle of a hot spring day was never far from her mind, no matter how hard she tried.
When Ronon walked in the front door, Teyla knew what the outcome of his errand was. He slammed the door closed, but not quite hard enough to mask his swearing. Teyla winced. He didn't reserve that kind of language for special occasions, but it definitely wasn't a good sign now.
He didn't have to explain it, but when he came in the living room he did anyway. "State's not helping anyone," he announced. "They're refusing to help any of us until the feds say something about it."
Teyla did her best not to sigh while Ronon flopped down on the couch, arms over his chest and eyes fixed on nothing. Sometimes it seemed like the entire history of oppression could be summed up in what he had just said. The powerless would continue to be powerless unless political might and moral decency happened to coincide. But Teyla did not think the mutants had time for bureaucracy and equivocation.
Mutants everywhere were losing their jobs, their families, their homes. With that went all hope of security of any sense, even without the more... active kinds of persecution.
There were also stories of beatings, of murders, of rapes. Teyla believed them all.
She shook her head. "Surely there is something we can still do," she said. "Some avenue we have not thought of." Ronon glared at her, but her cousin had never been able to intimidate her out of speaking her mind. She got to her feet. "Our family was respected before the accident, Ronon. That must count for something."
"It doesn't," he replied sullenly. "And it's not just us that's affected, Teyla. It's our whole family. Everyone knows by now what we are. How long do you think it'll be before people start shunning them too, just because they're related to us?"
"You didn't used to be such a cynic, Ronon," Teyla said as she left the room.
"I used to have a job," he called after her.
She headed to the kitchen and got herself a glass of water, trying to calm herself down. Unfortunately there was a lot of truth to what her cousin was saying. They couldn't get work anymore. Everyone in their immediate area knew who they were related to, and it was probably just a matter of time before they started to feel the squeeze too. After all, there were even reports of children being kicked out of public schools because their parents had been affected by the accident, even though the children themselves showed no signs. So far, Teyla and Ronon's family had been accepting of the mutations, but what would happen once society turned its back on them too?
Teyla gulped down the water, fingering the cross that hung around her neck. She didn't want to think about it.
When she opened her eyes, Ronon was standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame. "You know what I heard the other day?" he asked rhetorically. "There are mutants getting turned away for confession and communion."
Teyla stared at him hard. He knew that was most likely to get her angry, but she didn't think he was lying to her. She set the glass down next to the sink. "What are you saying we should do, Ronon?" she asked. "Move somewhere else, change our names, pretend I can't walk through walls and you can't bend steel with your bare hands?"
His expression turned cold. "We can't hide. They already know about us," he said. "They're going to start marking us all soon. Branding us like we're slaves."
The thought sent a chill down her spine, but she tried to remain impassive. "Then what do you want us to do, Ronon?" she asked again.
"I know someone," he said, pushing off the door frame and coming into the room. "He'll give us jobs. Our... powers are actually an advantage for him."
It took Teyla only a moment to realize what he was suggesting. "No," she replied, shaking her head. "No, Ronon, I will not turn to something illegal just to-"
"Just to what?" he interrupted. "Just to feed yourself? To feed Aunt Charin? To help our family when they start to suffer because of us?"
"Ronon," she said, stepping toward him, "this is a gift. I won't abuse this."
"A gift?" he said. "You've got to be kidding me. Who do you think gave this to us?" She didn't answer him, just kept looking at him, and Ronon turned away, incredulous. "Teyla, this was that incompetent fool's doing, not God's."
"You know we can't always understand His will," Teyla pressed. "I refuse to believe that God abandoned us to this. And I won't use the work of God to become a petty thief."
"Thieves have been forgiven before," Ronon pointed out.
"Ronon."
He came up to her and cupped her face, towering over her. "I was a Marine, Teyla. I have dignity and honor and all that too. I don't want to do this any more than you do," he said. "But we don't have a choice. We can't just sit around and hope for the best. Even if the government decides to help us, that's not going to keep people from hating us."
Much as she didn't want to admit it, he was right. They were still going to face the same prejudices even if the government did step in. Still, she hated the idea. "It isn't right," she protested weakly.
"You can walk through walls, Teyla," he said. "That isn't right either."
She pulled away from him then, feeling cold. "On one condition," she said, hoping to preserve some semblance of honor in all of this. "If we end up with more than we need, we give the rest away."
Ronon shrugged. "As long as I don't have to wear tights."
Narrowing her eyes, Teyla slapped his arm, but she offered no more protests. Instead, she went about the rest of her day trying to make sense of how they'd gotten this far away from their real lives.
It had been six months since the accident at the nuclear plant, and six months since the public had started hearing strange reports of people developing odd abilities. Teyla had thought nothing of it, until she and some of her friends from the cross-country track team had been racing each other from the fieldhouse to the locker room one afternoon. She'd beaten them in handily, but when she turned to look back at them in triumph, she saw that the doors had already closed behind her. She opened them to find her friends staring at her in horror. She hadn't pushed the doors open. She had run through them.
Over the next twelve hours, she felt like she'd aged twelve years. The principal had heard about it the next day and called her into his office to ask her to leave the school for a while - "for your protection," he'd said. Despite the condescension in his voice, Teyla had detected fear in him. At that point no one knew the full extent of her bizarre ability, and already people feared her for it.
Six weeks later she'd stood before the school board and listened to them tell her that she was a distraction and a risk and could not continue to attend public school. Even if she and her family had been able to afford private school, there probably wasn't one that would have accepted her, not anymore.
Teyla got a bitter taste in her mouth when she remembered the news reports. She'd been the first student kicked out of a school. None of the reports mentioned that she'd had a near-perfect GPA and was a star track runner. Now she was just a high school dropout and, to most people, a one-woman freak show.
Her father and her cousin had started showing signs of mutation then too. Ronon had been kicked out of the Marine Corps just a few weeks earlier. Her father... Her father, with his remarkable gift for public speaking and persuasion, had been a city councilman. But when he'd tried to defend the rights of those affected by the accident, it had come out that he too was a mutant, and someone had shot him.
Bullets would have passed through Teyla without leaving a mark. They would have bounced off Ronon like pebbles. Her father could read emotions of even the most seasoned actor, something Teyla could only hear whispers of.
He could not stop bullets.
His funeral had been a small, private affair, as the family had feared for their safety. That fear hadn't kept Teyla away, nor kept her from crying. She could understand why people were afraid of the mutants, but she couldn't understand the hate. Many times in the last six months she'd thought of Job, losing everything he had in a test of faith, and she wondered now when her test would be over.
The evening sweltered as much as the day did, but around midnight a breeze blew in the open window of Teyla's room. She was almost ready for bed when there came a knock at the door. "Come in," she said.
Ronon entered, which was not surprising. "Listen," he said, closing the door, "I want to apologize. I was pushing you kind of hard."
"Much as I hate to admit this, Ronon, you were right," she replied. "At some point we have to help ourselves."
He nodded, but still seemed bothered. "Aunt Charin won't like it."
"I know," Teyla said. "I had had that thought myself. Perhaps we should... conceal the nature of this work from her, and simply tell her we have found an employer willing to overlook our gifts."
"She'll figure it out eventually," he replied.
Teyla smiled ruefully. "Yes, she will."
There was an awkward silence, and then Ronon added, "You still think this is a gift."
"This is who I am, Ronon," she replied. "I don't know any other way."
He turned toward the door. "Well, if you figure out why God would want this to happen, you'll let me know, right?"
Teyla waited for him to look at her again before she answered. "If I figure it out," she said, "I think you'll probably know too."