OK Computer part 4
They fell asleep in their chairs, open-mouthed and drunk, as the fire burned out. Rodney woke up with a blanket tucked up around his chin and a mound of Ronon snoring nearby. He hauled himself up to his feet, fuzzy-mouthed and hungover. He jerked with pain, and looked down at his wrist: oh, fuck. It was badly swollen and oozing pale fluid, which eww, and Christ, what had he been thinking? He applied another coat of ointment to his skin, and stumbled into the kitchen, where he found Teyla grimly staring down a tantrumy Zina, who'd apparently just flung some mush halfway across the kitchen.
Gotta love the send-up of the romance of getting a tattoo. In some (fairly obvious) ways, this story is wildly, gleefully over-the-top as only space opera can be. In others, it staunchly refuses to indulge. Stephanie Meyer Speranza ain't.
"I'm going back, I think," Rodney said, and watched the emotions flit over Teyla's face: disappointment, sadness, regret. "I had hoped you would stay," she said finally. "I am hoping Ronon will stay, too. Atlantis is not as it was, and I miss you both so much; I miss having you at hand, Rodney," and Rodney closed the space between them, clutching her shoulders and pressing their foreheads together. Hers was warm and smooth.
"I love you," he said. "I'll come back soon. I promise."
"Rodney," Zelenka said, almost comically surprised. "There is no meeting today, is there?" He fumbled for his glasses. "Have I forgotten about-"
"No, no," Rodney said, quickly, "I just came by to," and he was absolutely and totally blank for half a second, and then it came to him, "upload some files for Dr. Kita and her team. I think I-" and the tattoo was throbbing encouragement under his sleeve. "I think I'm nearly done with this project I've been working on."
Zelenka blinked in surprise. "Oh? You have really been working? I mean," he added hastily, looking away, "of course I knew you were working on something big, I just did not expect results at this early-" and Rodney saved them both further embarrassment by uploading his programming notes to the server, and a bit of VR environment code as an example. Hunching over a keyboard, he excluded the John class and yanked the other comments into a file. It wasn't exactly coherent, but he was betting that this was how John had learned to hack himself, so Kita and her team should be fired if they couldn't.
"-much easier once I realized there were three separate programming languages, Mugrar, Bose, and Macari, named for repeating elements here, here, and here," Rodney pointed. "You use them for different things, but they're incredibly flexible and they interlock-god, so beautifully; wait, look," and then Rodney was blissfully scrolling through some lines and marveling at the beauty of the syntax-so clean and supple, once you figured out which arguments belonged to which language-and when he turned around again, he was surprised to find that there were maybe thirty people behind him, crowding the lab and craning around each other's heads to see.
I love Rodney's genuine love for what he does. In a story that spends a fair amount of time undermining him as a romantic lead, that is what makes him sexy. That and his wit.
After he'd fielded all their questions, he got drawn into quite an interesting conversation with a scientist he'd never met before, or couldn't remember having met, named Finch, who was working on computational complexity theory. Finch had been stuck on a problem for four months and had just glimpsed his answer in a random line of Macari code, and after grilling Rodney about the models he'd used for randomness testing, had hopped around and then twirled and pumped his skinny arms up and down.
:-) And suddenly a tiny cameo character feels real as any of them.
It was a nice day, the first one Rodney could remember in a long time. He had dinner in the mess with Zelenka and Kita and Finch and a couple of other people whose names he didn't quite catch, though they had all had nice things to say about him. One in particular kept scribbling frantic notes and muttering, "three! three distinct programming languages!" like he couldn't quite believe the achievement. Zelenka had by now recovered himself, and was saying, quite smugly, "Yes, well, of course, freed from all the annoying problems of bureaucracy with which I am now saddled as Head of Science, Dr. McKay was bound to accomplish great things," and it was funny, but he hadn't thought of them as "great things": it was a ski-lodge, a golf club, a macro for unlimited junk food.
Everyone hung around the mess for dessert, wanting to talk to him, totally fawning over him, and Rodney promised two of the scientists whose names he couldn't remember that he would stop by their labs tomorrow and cast his brilliant eyes over their mediocre projects. And then the party was breaking up. Zelenka punched his shoulder and said, "Welcome back, Rodney," before drifting off, and Rodney had picked up his tray and carried it halfway across the mess hall when he was hit by a wave of grief, because he realized suddenly that he was looking for Sheppard, scanning the room and staring at the tousled backs of heads, trying to filter for Sheppard's posture, that slouch, the casual tilt of an arm that was John eating an apple, and Jesus, McKay, get a grip!
This was a nice day, a real day, this was the real world, and Rodney shoved his tray into the pile waiting to be bussed and took off, with a purposefulness he didn't feel, for his room, before thinking, no, bad idea, and pivoting on his heel. He went back to the lab, his lab, which was abandoned-looking and dusty, and he put up a pot of extremely strong coffee and began clearing up, prioritizing all the work he had abandoned, much of which was totally pointless since they'd developed the Pan-Galactic Garlic Blaster, and okay, really only Sheppard would have laughed at that, because he was lame and in denial about his own geekiness, and so easy that way.
Rodney shoved all the military and defense stuff aside (and Jesus, they'd only gotten that weapon because Sheppard had died for it. They ought to fucking name it after him, like a Winchester or a Colt) and began rummaging through his files. There were a million things he'd meant to work on: everything from the patterns of galaxy evolution to the weakly interacting massive particles that were the probable key to dark matter. He lost himself for a while, and then the words started to blur: The abundance of antimatter fluxes produced in neutralino pair-annihilations depends upon- and he realized he didn't give a shit about neutralino pair-annihilations, and stumbled, zombie-like, to bed.
In the drowsy minute or two before sleep claimed him, Rodney curled his left hand around his tattooed right wrist. He could do this. He'd already done it; the first day was the hardest. He was as brilliant as ever, obviously, and the science team needed him. Science needed him. He had an obligation to humanity, and to future generations.
He lasted four days.
Uh-huh. Love the way the beats fall in that sentence. Punch line delivery relies on rhythm no less in written text than in spoken. This is a neat example of use of space on the page as a stand-in for an oral storyteller's caesura.
John looked hard at him, then kissed him on the mouth, and that was it, game over: he didn't give a good goddamn if John was real or not, because everything outside of this was just negative space. [awesome sentence!] Rodney felt an unexpected surge of joy and started muscling John backwards, toward the bedroom, hands sliding greedily up his hard, lean body. Their mouths broke apart and John was grinning into his face, more white, even teeth than anyone outside of Hollywood had a right to, and then John was roughly cupping his face and kissing him, tongue sliding into Rodney's mouth over and over and over.
"I want," John mumbled [ergo sum?] , as they toppled onto the bed, "oh, Jesus, fuck," and John's hand was sliding into Rodney's fly and groping his cock through his underwear; John's hand was in his underwear, on him. "I want to fuck you, let me fuck you," and they did it hard and fast, John shoving his cock in and muttering, "oh, fuck; yeah," as Rodney shivered and convulsed, sweat stinging his eyes and John's cock hard inside him.
"You owe me a secret," Rodney said, much later, when he could speak. They'd collapsed into a heap of limbs on John's flannel-covered bed. The whole room smelled of sex.
John lay beside him, his warm thigh slung over Rodney's. "Okay," he said amiably, and then his fingers curled around Rodney's wrist. "Hey, is this a tattoo?"
"I was drunk. We all were," and then: "You said when I came back, you'd tell me-"
"I will: anything you want to know. Wow, it's really cool. Did Ronon-?"
"Ronon did mine and Teyla's. I helped him do his. Oh God, I can't decide what to ask; I want to ask everything. 'Why do you wear that stupid wristband?' How could you ever have gotten married?' 'Did you always want to fly? Was that your dream, or-?'"
John was gently tilting Rodney's wrist back and forth. "I want one like this: it's like wind and water and the sky all at once. It reminds me of surfing, or-" He went still, and then said, casually: "You all got them? The whole team?"
Rodney looked at him steadily. "Yes," he said. "We all did," and then, deciding to answer the implied question: "Yes, it was about you. We were remembering you-"
"Not me." John took his hand off Rodney's wrist, moved his leg off Rodney's hip, pulling back into himself and putting space between them. "I told you, I'm not him-"
Rodney rolled on top of him and pinned him with his weight. "You know what?" he demanded, ignoring John's yelp. "Let me tell you a secret: John Sheppard changed my life. Not physics, not Atlantis-though I wish to God it had been physics or Atlantis, because I still have those things. But they're meaningless now, don't you understand? John Sheppard was my friend, and I guess some people have a lot of friends, so it's not that big a deal to them, losing one, but I can't get past it. I've tried, I swear I have, and just-" John was staring up at him, throat working. His eyes were that weird color: pale, like a pond or a stone. "I can't leave you behind."
Gah! More good characterization than you can shake a memory stick at! (thank yew, thank yew, I'll be here all week.) That description is so simple, but so striking. It's neat that John makes Rodney think of nature words there-elemental, atechnological things.
"It's not me," John managed finally; he sounded afraid. "I'm not him. Rodney, I-"
"You're close enough," Rodney said.
By now it's downright frightening.
They fell into a normal routine after that. Ronon had moved to New Athos, so there was no one to force him to exercise, but Rodney dutifully went back to Atlantis whenever the grandfather clock told him it was time to eat or bathe or poke his nose into the labs. John bribed him to do other things (visiting Teyla, getting a haircut, sending a databurst to his sister) with tantalizing bits of information, so that after a while Rodney had quite a collection of secrets: that Sheppard had once dreamed of being a steeplechase jockey; that he and his father had fought nonstop for seven years about him being queer without ever saying the word aloud; that he had finally waved his wife like a white flag, thinking it would bring him closer to his family (it hadn't: it had brought her closer to his family); that he wore a sweatband on his wrist because he sweated a lot.
Hee hee. Sly, charming wink to fandom's obsessive theorizing about our show's every itty bitty detail.
Other than that, they lived together quite happily: played chess and video games, did puzzles, argued about trivia, got drunk. They began to hack the Terrarium competitively, each of them straining to code more outrageous scenarios: herd of giant lizards (Rodney), jetpacks (John), couple of extra planets (Rodney), authentic Texas bar with bad beer and terrible country-western band (John), and as they sat there at the rough wooden table, Rodney wincing and trying not to clamp his hands over his ears as the black-hatted singer warbled about everything he had lost and how unbelievably sad he was, John leaned forward and shouted, over the din, "You know what happens when you play country music backwards, Rodney? You get your car back, you get your wife back, you get your dog back," and Rodney shifted uncomfortably and ordered another beer.
Canny writers use comedy to amplify their tragedy and vice versa. Very Joss Whedon, there.
John sprang the idea on him out of nowhere. "Rodney?" he began offhandedly; he was sitting at the kitchen table with his morning coffee and fidgeting with his cup.
Rodney was sitting across from him with his laptop, doing a last bit of coding. "Hm?"
"Remember how I told you that he, that Sheppard, would never have-" Rodney looked up immediately and gave John his full attention. John's shoulders dropped, but he began again. "That Sheppard would never have started a relationship with you."
"Yes," Rodney said, and had to look away.
"I think maybe I was wrong about that," and John sounded so miserable that Rodney's eyes were drawn back to his face. "Just," and John shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "He didn't know, all right? He never had a clue about this stuff. I mean, he knew he liked you a little more than a friend likes a friend, but he didn't know..." and John boggled and circled a hand to take everything in-the mountain, the beach, the stable of racehorses, the helicopter, the giant lizards-"you know: that you were out of your fucking mind."
Rodney let out a brittle laugh. "He didn't know? I didn't know!"
"So I can't help thinking that maybe things would have been different if he'd known...what I know." John sighed and put his head in his hands. "I mean, maybe he would have taken the chance. But just-it got me thinking," and then he was pushing over a stack of journals with napkins stuck between the pages as bookmarks.
I love the napkins. They're totally extraneous to the forward motion of the plot, but just think about how much adorableness and information about John and his work habits is packed into that one goofy little perfectly-chosen detail.
Rodney frowned at them, then flipped them open and looked at the titles. "Cauchy problem in spacetimes with closed timelike lines," in the Physical Review. "Time machine and self-consistent evolution in problems with self-interaction," in the Physical Review. "Test fields on compact space-times," in the Journal of Mathematical Physics. He felt a little sick. "About?" he asked, though he already knew.
"Time travel," John said, and sat back in his chair.
"You're not serious. You are not serious," but John said that yes, he was serious, because, "We know it's possible, right? SG-1 did it. Elizabeth did it. Birds do it, bees-seriously, Rodney, you're a genius. You can figure it out, I know you can."
"But. But-"
I'm having random thoughts about fandom's-innovations in punctuation. Maybe memory fails, but I don't think I've read a published novel that uses the above construction, even though it's been all over fandom for years now. I'll bet it's a product of our focus on t.v. and movie narratives. Punctuation of yore (i.e., of primarily written narratives) is designed for easy reading, grammatical clarity. We, on the other hand, use every punctuation trick at our disposal, and have zero reservations about inventing new ones, to capture the speech patterns and tics of the actors who play our characters. They're stage directions, almost-reflecting our awareness that in our source media, delivery frequently provides even more information than dialogue. Especially in Slasherville, delivery is paramount.
did John have any idea how maddeningly, incredibly complicated time-travel was? You couldn't mess around with time: it was chaos theory incarnate. Change one thing and you changed everything, "-and Elizabeth only got away with it because there were so few variables; she was literally the only person in a deserted city-"
"Yeah, Rodney-and I'm talking about one man. Actually, I'm talking about two inches: two inches and the bullet misses Sheppard's head, right?" Rodney pushed out of his chair, needing to pace, because Jesus, he couldn't believe they were talking about this: the worst day of his life. "I'm not trying to change all of history, or even stop Sheppard from waking up the Wraith," John said, doggedly tracking him. "That would be complicated, the law of unintended consequences, blah blah. But just-what if that bullet hit his arm?"
Rodney tried to stop his hands from clenching into fists. "Sheppard's death triggered the battle that led to us invading an otherwise obscure tribal armory. We wouldn't have found the goddamned supergarlic otherwise. Don't you get it? That stuff brought peace to two galaxies and happiness to everyone in the fucking universe except me!" and he wanted to snatch the words back as soon as he said them, because he could see the flash of pain in John's eyes, the tightening lines of his mouth as he looked away.
"No, I get it," John said sharply. "Believe me, I get it."
"God. I didn't-John, I don't mean it like that. This isn't about you."
"No. I know it isn't." John's smile was quick and perfunctory. "Look, it's okay. Just, things could be different, that's all. And we've got time on our hands, and-not to speak ill of the dead, but I know a lot more math than Sheppard did. I mean, I don't think he got as much out of Advanced Graph Theory II as you seem to think, but whatever: thanks for the upload."
"His transcript said he got an alpha minus," Rodney said, frowning.
"It was graded on a curve," John explained wryly. "Same semester he started flying F-16s, so I can promise you he wasn't paying much attention. But if you wanted to take a crack at figuring this thing out; well." He shrugged. "I've got some ideas."
"And there you go," McKay 2.0 said tiredly. "That's what happened."
Rodney blinked and straightened just as Sheppard said, "Wait, what? That's-"
McKay flapped his arms, once, like a giant bird in a bathrobe. [*simile love*] "Well, we figured it out! Obviously! Because, hello! Look, I told you this part: I did most of the conceptual work, you did most of the math." He frowned. "John did most of the math. And now we've got to figure out how to provoke a tangent vector with the smallest possible deviation from-" McKay shot a sudden, swift glance at Rodney, then turned back to Sheppard and said, "Actually, can we talk somewhere private? Also, I'm starving; some food would be-"
"Wait just a goddamned second!" Rodney shoved his way between McKay and Sheppard, crossed his arms, and tried to stare himself down. "Did you just say you wanted privacy from me? Are you out of your-is that even possible?"
McKay seemed totally unimpressed and just waved a hand in his face. "Obviously it's possible, or I wouldn't have suggested it. Moreover, it's sensible: letting you in on the plan doubles the risk, even if you are me. This is no time to play favorites! We need to keep temporal interference to a minimum, which means no one but Sheppard should know the precise details. And I've already told you far too much, except..." McKay studied his face, and Rodney felt weirdly unable to withstand his own scrutiny. "Except this is your second chance, too," McKay said. "So don't blow it, all right?"
Rodney turned to Sheppard. "I don't trust this guy as far as I can throw him."
"Oh, Jesus Christ!" Sheppard grabbed his arm, dragged him across the room, and whispered, "Shut up, Rodney; he's you, and he's trying to save my life, okay?"
"Fine, but-why can't I be in on the plan?" Rodney couldn't seem to conceal the whine in his voice. "And seriously, Sheppard: I don't trust him," he said, and stabbed his finger into Sheppard's chest. "He's obviously not rational. He's some mad scientist version of me, a Dr. Frankenstein. He built a goddammed replica of you, pretended it was real, and then had sex with it: he's clearly obsessed with-"
Sheppard's jaw tightened; all at once he turned on his heel and strode over to McKay. "Come on," he said through gritted teeth. "Let's go," and then, "Wait. Take this off." Sheppard tugged at McKay's raggedy bathrobe, then had the gall to grab Rodney's own robe from where it was draped over a chair. He handed it to McKay, who obediently shucked his robe and put on Rodney's. Rodney wanted to stop him from taking it, except it wasn't the robe he was afraid of losing: it was his entire goddamned life.
"That's better," Sheppard said, eying McKay critically. "Keep your head down and walk fast, and hopefully nobody will notice." He turned to Rodney and said, tersely, "Stay here till I get him through the halls," and Rodney was so outraged and terrified that he wasn't able to work up any sort of protest. He watched as Sheppard escorted McKay out, as the door slid shut behind them, and then began to pace in mute frustration.
Fine, yes, he could sort of see McKay's point: if time worked the way they thought it did, then McKay had already told him too much. It was bad enough he knew the parameters of the mission: a warrior culture, a negotiation for armaments, though God knew that described half the missions they went on these days. Still, he didn't know what would be worse: knowing that this was the mission where John Sheppard got killed, or not knowing and trembling in his boots whenever they-
It slammed into him; his mouth flooded with the metallic taste of panic: John Sheppard got killed. He flung out a hand to steady himself, then sat down on the bed. That wasn't hypothetical. That had happened. It was as real as the beat-up bathrobe lying beside him, the beat-up version of himself that had just walked down the hall-and then he let himself hear what McKay had been saying: that Sheppard had been killed, that the team had been devastated, that he hadn't been able to go on.
It was a lot to take in, but Rodney knew then, in his bones, that he was McKay, that McKay was him, that he would do exactly the same. Something inside him would break if John Sheppard were killed, and it was awful to know he carried that fragility inside of him. Worse yet, now Sheppard knew it, too, and that was an unpleasant enough revelation that he had to put his head between his legs, and that's when he saw the drive. Its white corner was peeking out from the bathrobe, and Rodney sat up so fast his head rushed and fizzed. He pulled the flat rectangle out of the bathrobe's inner pocket and turned it over in his hands: just like his, it was his, just older and grimier.
He knew he should leave it alone, but that had always been the problem, hadn't it? He'd made this goddamned thing the center of his world after Sheppard's death. A man liked to think that he was made of stronger stuff than that...but he wasn't. He'd learned that much. Three steps took him to the slot in the wall, and then he shoved the drive in and-
-holy shit, he hadn't expected the cabin's high ceilings, the exposed beams, the manly, "I'm a lumberjack," vibe of the whole place. The fireplace was a huge arch of rough stone, the sofas were covered in red plaid, the wood furniture all looked handmade, and-
Well I guess there's my answer to the "handcraft" question, huh? Rodney works as lovingly with numbers as I do with my bread and my pencils. Okay.
"Rodney?"
-holy shit, and he whirled around fast and nearly fell backwards over the rough-hewn coffee table. John Sheppard was standing there, Rodney recognized that oh-so-familiar sideways tilt of his head-except it wasn't Sheppard, it was nothing like Sheppard at all. The replica was wearing a pink paisley shirt and jeans, and he was carrying a thick stack of journals in his arms. A pad of equations sat on top, and he was awkwardly holding a pen in his hand, having just obviously pulled it from between his teeth.
"You're not Sheppard," Rodney said, and pointed at him accusingly.
The replica sighed. "Yes," he said patiently. "I know." He shifted the journals so he could half-balance them on his hip, and extended a hand to Rodney. "I'm John," he said.
"Oh," Rodney said, somewhat abashed. "Well." He shook John's hand. It didn't feel like Sheppard's hand, though he couldn't explain that. "I didn't mean to-"
"Nah. It's okay. It seems to be a sticking point." John was watching him closely, and Rodney remembered that he wasn't the Rodney McKay this John was expecting.
"I'm Rodney McKay. Not your Rodney McKay. Of course. Ha. No, I'm from the-" He made a frantic, backwards gesture. "Well, actually, technically it's the present, but-"
"Right," John said, saving Rodney from any further imbecilities, but then he shifted awkwardly and added, "I remember you," and Christ, this John been made from the John Sheppard whom Rodney had taken to the porn room not so long ago.
"Oh," Rodney said, temporarily speechless.
"Yeah." John seemed uncharacteristically unguarded; in fact, this John seemed uncharacteristically a lot of things. Calmer, slower. More cerebral, less brittle. Pinker-God, there was so much wrong with that shirt he was wearing. He moved wrong, like Sheppard's tightly wound springs had come uncoiled and lost all their potential energy.
That's a beauty of a metaphor.
And he smelled wrong, not like Sheppard at all-and abruptly Rodney remembered the way McKay had closed his eyes and sniffed at John's ear.
John sidled over to the kitchen table, put down his armload of books, and then said, uneasily, "I'm guessing the time machine worked?"
Rodney blinked. "Yes. Yes, it did. Your McKay's with Sheppard right now, trying to figure out-" John flinched, and Rodney stopped, blinked, rewound what he'd said. It came to him in a giant fireball of insight: "Your McKay's macking on my Sheppard!"
John flinched again, then turned away fast. "I don't know," he said, and went to busy himself in the fridge. "How should I know? Do you want a-"
Rodney had followed him doggedly into the kitchen area and was now standing on his heels. "That's what this is all about, isn't it?" Rodney demanded. "You built him a time machine so he could come back, take his life, take over my life-"
John slammed the refrigerator door. "Well, he can't stay here! Jesus, look at this place: nobody was ever meant to live here. It's not real! It's an entertainment center, it's like the internet, it's just-it's not fair to him. He's alive, he needs-" but Rodney was already turning away, going back into the living room, because of course, Virtual John was in love with McKay, and they were all so fucking screwed.
He let himself collapse on the sofa, which was quite comfortable; his design instincts were obviously good. [snorfle. Rodney McKay, interior decorator.] John came in, handed him a beer, and fell into a nearby armchair with a sigh. He put his feet on the coffee table. He was wearing bright red socks.
"How did you do it?" Rodney asked finally. "The time machine."
John picked at the label of his beer with his fingernail. "It wasn't hard, actually. I think Rodney ended up making the actual machine out of a transporter, but we could have used a culling beam, an Asgard beam: anything that turns people into lossless data. Other than that, it was just theories and number-crunching; sending the data along accurately."
"No offense," Rodney said pointedly, "but there's no way Sheppard knows that much math."
John smiled thinly. "I'm not him," and when Rodney rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers, John shrugged and said, "I got extra math for Christmas. Uploads. Rodney gave me all sorts of-" and then his face changed and he said, "Here, wait, I can show you." He got up, disappeared into the bedroom, and came back holding a tablet. "Rodney's," John said, handing it over, "but you're him, so it should work for you."
Rodney took it and ran his thumb over the genetic keylock. The screen exploded with information, and Rodney, who was not easily impressed, boggled. "Did I-" and yes, okay, McKay had said something about having to learn three new Ancient programming languages to make this VE work, but... "Did I really make all this?"
"Yeah. You did. You-you're pretty incredible, Rodney," and Rodney's head jerked up, because he thought that John's voice had gone a little rough, but John was just sitting there, in his ridiculous shirt, staring down at his hands. "It was-tell him I appreciate it."
Rodney's stomach clenched. "He can't have my life," he protested. "He can't have-"
"Sorry. I can't help you," and John wouldn't meet his eyes.
Rodney yanked the drive out of the wall and saw, to his shock, that it was already dark; the moons of Lantea were gleaming through his window. He stood up unsteadily on prickling legs, and arched his aching back. He could hear Virtual John saying, "No one was meant to live like this," but this wasn't the first time Rodney McKay had used his brains while letting his body rot. There had been graduate school, for instance.
*wince* (I ... heh, actually I had my very own Ronon who hauled me out to the seawall for a run three times a week. Without whom rot.)
McKay 2.0's bathrobe was still draped across his bed, and Rodney steeled his resolve and set out to find Sheppard. He left without quite knowing where he was going, but realized once he hit the transporter where his feet were taking him: down to the lower level room where he and Sheppard hid out to play video games and watch movies. They'd dragged a couple of mattresses down there, too, and some blankets, which hadn't seemed sinister at the time, only for catnaps, but now caused Rodney to break into a run, because he could picture it: Sheppard and McKay, crashed out in a corner, limbs tangled together.
Rodney took the corner so fast he nearly slammed into Sheppard, who was pacing the balcony outside the door and nervously gnawing on a thumbnail. Rodney saw at once that he was too late, because Sheppard's black buttoned-down shirt was unbuttoned to the waist, and he was barefoot: no red socks on display here.
"Oh my God," Rodney said, and Sheppard jerked up guiltily. Rodney was frantically trying to put together language for a speech whose theme was, "For God's Sake, How Pathetic Do You Have To Be To Take Advantage Of A Mad, Sexually Desperate Man From The Future," when Sheppard's face twisted with misery. He looked sick.
"Oh, shut up. Jesus." Sheppard turned to brace himself against the balcony, and Rodney could see his thin rib cage rising and falling through his shirt; wow, he was really freaking out. Rodney's anger evaporated in the face of Sheppard's evident desolation: God, he hadn't even considered things from Sheppard's point of view. Everyone was upset about Sheppard's death, but Sheppard had died, and some part of him was trapped in a hell of Rodney's making. Moreover, Sheppard was an intensely private person, and between them, Rodney and his future self had cracked him open like an egg.
"I'm sorry." Rodney's voice came out strangled. "Sheppard, I'm so-"
Ba-da-boom. The first time Rodney sees John-really unselfishly sees him-comes after he first sees VR John. He's no longer just his friend who's always there.
Sheppard rubbed the back of his head: a curiously childlike gesture. "I don't know what to do," he said. "Rodney. What do I-?"
Rodney's chest tightened. "Didn't he tell you? I thought the whole reason for this-this-rendezvous was for him to tell you how to save your life-"
"He did. That's the-" There was pain in Sheppard's eyes. "How the hell am I supposed to live with this kind of obligation? How can I possibly-"
"You're shitting me, right?" Rodney was actually gaping. "I mean, you-you've saved everyone's life, like a million times-"
Sheppard was already shaking his head as he turned to stare at the water. "This isn't like pushing someone out of the way of a bullet, Rodney. The guy salvaged what was left of me, programmed a replicant, built a time machine-"
Rodney was unbearably thankful that Sheppard didn't seem to think of "the guy" as, well, him. "Right, so...he's nuts, is the lesson I would be taking from that. Just because he's obsessed with you..." Rodney trailed off, because Sheppard's mouth had gone tight and he was shaking his head. "What, he's not obsessed?" Rodney asked incredulously.
"It's not just that. It's more than that." Sheppard's hands were white-knuckled where he gripped the railing. "He knows me, Rodney. I mean, he..." Sheppard's face and neck were tinting pink in a rapidly-spreading flush, "he really, really knows me."
That might be the one thing in the world that Sheppard simultaneously fears and wants more than anything.
Rodney had to shove away the image of all that could mean, tried not to look down at Sheppard's bare chest and feet. Of course McKay had had a John to practice on-
Sheppard was still bent over the railing and not meeting his eyes. "He knew everything already," he said, more to himself than to Rodney. "Things I've never-" and Rodney wanted to grab him and plead, I could know you, too, if you would talk to me.
Oh! Oh, Rodney.
Instead, he thought, pink, and said, desperately, "No, he doesn't. He doesn't know you at all. I've seen the virtual you, and he's nothing like-"
"What?" Sheppard's head came up sharply; that had got his attention. "You-"
"Well, I had to see what he'd built! It's-well, actually, it's pretty brilliant," Rodney admitted, "the house and the environment, and the code's genuinely spectacular, but the other John, he's nothing like you. He's-" and some self-preserving instinct told Rodney that this required extreme tact, because he couldn't say gentler, more articulate, and better at math. Much, much gayer. "He wears a lot of pink," Rodney said finally.
Sheppard's eyebrows flew up. "Pink?" he said, and then, almost musing on the idea: "I like pink, actually-"
This was a nightmare. "Well, I'm sure you would wear a whole other kind of pink than the pink he was wearing," Rodney said quickly. "Believe me: he didn't talk like you or move like you or smell like you. Remember that he was built from a single scan-we're talking highly-compressed data!-which was extrapolated back into a you-shape; that machine was never designed for accuracy. Which is probably why McKay came back: if Virtual John was just like you, he wouldn't need, well-you."
Sheppard was frowning thoughtfully. "Would more data help?"
"What?" Rodney blinked.
"More data," Sheppard repeated, emphasizing the word like Rodney was a moron. "You said he made the virtual-me out of a single scan; would more data help? Because I-" and Sheppard stopped, then lifted his chin defiantly, as if daring Rodney to say a word. "I'll give him more data. If it'll help."
Rodney blinked three times before the genius of the plan sank in. "Yes," Rodney said, snapping his fingers. "Yes, yes, yes, that's brilliant. We'll put you back into the VR, take another scan-" VR John's words suddenly came back to him. "-or, wait, no, we can do better: I'll build a new scanner, something lossless, out of a transporter or a culling beam-" and Sheppard nodded slowly and said, "Okay. Do it."
"Great," Rodney said, and clapped his hands together. "That should provide a rich enough data field to-" but Sheppard had turned away and was moving silently toward the door on bare feet. "Wait," Rodney said, stupidly. "Where are you...?"
Sheppard hesitated, but didn't meet his eyes. "I don't want him to be alone when he wakes up," he said, and then: "Build it, then come get me. I have my radio." The door opened for him and then slid closed behind him. Rodney stood there and stared.
Sheppard is a big, adorable caretaker. And what an interesting contrast: Rodney's growing, but still mostly selfish and worried about Rodney 2.0 taking over his own life and getting dibs on Sheppard. Sheppard, on the other hand, immediately adopted Rodney 2.0 as "somebody I have to take care of, because he is Rodney and ALL UR RODNEYS R BELONG TO ME." Aw, he's so in love.
It didn't take long to build, not once he'd hit upon the idea-fine, Virtual John's idea (but really his own idea that he would someday have anyway)-of cannibalizing a transporter. They'd deliberately set up their game room in an out-of-the-way area, so Rodney just went to the second-nearest transporter and ripped out its key components-the beam, the directional computer, the data storage drive, the cables. He dragged them back to an empty lab across from the game room, and began cobbling them together into a scanner.
Happy example of a fan "nerding about in the machinery," taking screwdriver and pliers to the canon's sci-fi hand-wave technomagic, disassembling, spreading it all over the floor and then thinking of cool, new things to do with it.
The transporter had been built to turn a person into data and forward them on to the next unit, so the actual upload was going to be trivial: a matter of modifying the program to make a copy while leaving the original Sheppard right where he was. He hooked the scanner to a console, then got to work rewriting the code. The test phase went well: he copied a powerbar into the Atlantis mainframe, then his tablet, then a chair.
Then there was the question of where to put the upload. He pushed McKay's flash drive into the console and checked how much space was left. Answer: virtually nothing. The cabin, the beach, the racetrack, those were all props; they were compacted down and took up virtually no room. But John-the simulation of John-filled the whole thing almost to bursting. There was no room to scan the real Sheppard into the drive.
Rodney grabbed his own drive and shoved it into the slot beneath McKay's. It was keyed to his genetic fingerprint, but it was still mostly full of the original owner's programming: the crazy Viking lady, all Halton's beautiful blondes, Samantha, the lesbians, Sheppard with his head thrown back, the girl bent over him, sucking his cock and- Rodney viciously wiped the whole disk clean, because this, this was what would turn him into that crazy Sheppard-stealing freak back there, building a fake John Sheppard because he'd been too pathetic to take his chance with the real one.
Go, Rodney, go!
Okay, fine, that was the easy part: now there was the question of the merge. Technically, it was simple: a controlled merge, merging Sheppard's data into Virtual John's. Rodney felt a little uneasy about that-the simulation was huge, it was-as big as a real person-but he looked in the direction of the game room. McKay wanted Sheppard, that was obvious enough; McKay had come back through time for him. If he couldn't buy McKay off with a high-quality copy, McKay might not let go of the real one.
Once he'd made that decision, the program wasn't hard to write. He'd preserve VR John's memories of the last ten years with McKay, and replace the rest-the personality matrix, the pre-VR memories-with Sheppard's content. McKay would end up with a Sheppard who remembered building a time machine but couldn't, who'd remember wearing pink but wouldn't want to.
Rodney ran a few more tests, then rubbed his eyes. He glanced out the lab's huge circular window: still dark, though the air was just turning that gray color that presaged dawn. It just figured that he'd worked through the night, while Sheppard and McKay- well, he didn't want to think about that. He stared at his tablet and tried not to think about Sheppard's open shirt and bare feet. A pity fuck: that's all it was. McKay had saved Sheppard's life and lost most of his mind, so Sheppard had taken pity on the old guy and what, let him suck his cock, maybe. Jerked him off, maybe. So much for so little, really, and Rodney wondered if McKay saw the compassion in Sheppard's eyes.
He sighed and raised his hand to turn on his radio, then stopped, two fingers resting on his cheekbone. He got up and drifted though the steadily graying light of the corridor to their game room, knowing he was a masochist, but needing to see, needing to know. He slid his hand over the genetic keystrip and the door opened for him: it was coded to open to either him or Sheppard, which seemed pretty ironic now. It was darker inside than out, as the game room had no windows, but Rodney knew where to turn his eyes: to the corner, where they'd piled mattresses and set up the largest monitor they could find.
He'd hoped to be wrong, but he wasn't wrong. They were there, all right, crashed out together on the mattress, and Rodney recognized the languid drape of Sheppard's body before he recognized his own face-down sleep sprawl. He'd thought that McKay would be clinging to Sheppard, and was surprised to see Sheppard's arm curled possessively across McKay's shoulders. He was even more surprised when Sheppard pulled away and rolled silently to his feet; damn, he wouldn't have let himself stare so long if he'd known Sheppard was awake. He was still dressed, at least, and he shoved his bare feet into boots, tucking rather than tying the laces, before following Rodney down the hall to the lab.
Sheppard took in the contraption at a glance and nodded vaguely at the circle Rodney'd drawn on the floor. He looked tired; maybe he hadn't slept either. "Me, there?" Sheppard asked, and went to stand on his mark when Rodney nodded. "You sure this'll work?"
"Yes," Rodney said. "Close your eyes." Sheppard's face grew tense, but he did as Rodney asked, hands tightening into fists at his sides. "Here we go." He pressed the button, and Sheppard was immediately suffused with yellow light. It took in all of him at once, glowing like a halo, then rapidly coalesced into a wide, horizontal beam and scanned him more methodically, moving from the spiky tips of his hair down his face, over his pointy nose, across the rough-bearded skin of his adam's apple, and down and down-shoulders, chest, waist, groin, thighs, shins, boots-before winking out.
Rodney bent over the console to check the data. Boy, there was a lot of it: it barely fit on the scratch drive. He wondered if he should compress it, or do another scan at-
"Did it work?" Sheppard appeared beside him.
"Mm-hm," Rodney replied absently, still absorbed in the problem. "Looks like," and then, muttering almost to himself, "Hope this gives him the incentive to leave."
"What do you mean?" Sheppard shot him a curious glance. "He's not staying."
"Oh?" Rodney's head jerked up, hope swelling. "Really? You don't think so?"
"Of course not," Sheppard looked genuinely surprised. "I mean, the whole point is to disrupt our timeline as little as possible. I'd think having two Rodney McKays around here would be, you know: pretty disruptive." Sheppard rolled his eyes. "Besides, we just worked out a strategy: why do that if he was just going to be here?" Sheppard shook his head. "He's not staying, Rodney."
"I hope you're right," Rodney said, but couldn't help adding: "His John doesn't seem to think so."
Sheppard showed him a thin, tight smile. "Well, then, maybe his John is-"
He stopped; McKay had wandered in from the game room, hair mussed and bathrobe hanging open. He was obviously surprised to see Rodney there. "Oh. Hey. Hi," McKay said. "Sorry, am I-"McKay looked up, at the bits of transporter, and then down, at the hand-drawn circle. "Wait. Are you guys building a time machine?"
Rodney shook his head. "No."
"No, no," Sheppard agreed.
"Though that's a very good guess," Rodney admitted. "Similar principle, actually. It's-"
Sheppard was already moving toward McKay, hands extended. "It's a scanner," he said. "Rodney built it. We thought...well, you said you had trouble building...that is, reconstructing..." Rodney had to look away, and focused on the console; Christ, he couldn't stand Sheppard's awkward sympathy, even though it wasn't directed at him; or whatever: not really. Sheppard's voice went soft, and Rodney hadn't known he could sound like that, all gentle like that. "Look, I want you to have...whatever you need, whatever you need from me," and then he said, all in a rush, "Rodney's taken a scan of me: a better one. I can't fix what's happened to you, but I can help you fix your simulation. Rodney says it's not...well, not much like me, but the new data should..."
"Wait-what?" McKay said, and Rodney immediately jerked around to look at him. He knew that voice: that voice went straight to his lizard brain. "You-you didn't-"
"Let me do this for you," Sheppard said quietly, but he was on the wrong page, and McKay had seized both halves of Sheppard's open shirt before Rodney could get to him.
"No. No, no, no, no-" McKay's voice was strangled, and Rodney could almost feel the panic rising up to choke him. "What did you-you didn't-you erased-"
This is so scary. Not just because of the awfulness of losing John, but because Rodney 2.0 really feels like a loose cannon-dangerous. He's nuts. He might do anything.
Rodney lunged across the room and grabbed at McKay's hands, almost recoiling when he touched his own skin. "He didn't! We didn't!"
McKay was clawing at Sheppard in a way that would've been pathetic if it wasn't for the naked desperation on his face. "If you've hurt him-if you-I'll-"
Sheppard was gaping back at him, too stunned to defend himself. Rodney yanked McKay's hands violently away and said, "We didn't! Jesus! Just calm down, McKay!"
McKay turned wild eyes on Rodney. "God, please, you didn't overwrite him?"
"No," Rodney said hastily, "no, no," though of course he'd been planning to do just that. McKay staggered past Rodney to the console and began typing erratically, hands shaking in a way that Rodney knew all too well. "I uploaded Sheppard to my drive, not yours." He shot a swift, reassuring glance at Sheppard, who was standing there, still looking shocked. "Not your drive; we hadn't transferred the new scan to your drive yet, all right? McKay, listen to me; are you listening?" Rodney wanted to shake him; Rodney didn't want to touch him. "I said we didn't touch the-"
McKay looked up from the console with fish-dead eyes. "He's not there. He's gone."
Rodney frowned. "That's impossible," and then he was pushing McKay aside, pulling up the drive specs and-impossible. There had barely been space; now there was nothing but space. "Impossible," he said again, and switched drives again to check, yes, Sheppard's scan was on the new drive, just like he'd thought. So what the-?
"He's gone." McKay sounded terrifyingly calm, like he might start shooting up a building: a school or a church. "Look," and then McKay flipped a switch on the lab's main console and-
A lot of gray nothing. It was like being in an unimaginably huge warehouse, or an empty soundstage: this was the VE, or at least it had been. Rodney turned slowly, trying and failing to get a sense of dimension. Beside him, McKay didn't seem to be able to focus on anything; he let his legs fold and sat down, cross-legged. The floor had a weird resilience under his feet, almost like leather, and Rodney was reminded of his very first experience with the drive: the cavernous, dank room, the leather floor mats, Come and take your punishments, darling. God, that was a long time-
McKay was crying. It came to him with a sickening internal twist. McKay's hands had come up, fingers crooked and locked, to shield his face, but still, the sounds were audible. Rodney said, hoarsely, "Now, now. None of that." McKay leaned forward, his shoulders curling inward and his head hanging down. "Look. Please. You have to-" and then Rodney went down on the floor beside him, uselessly tugging at his arm.
McKay barely moved, like he had neither energy nor will. "Can't-" he said, hands falling away from his face. His skin was gray and papery, his eyes raw; he was suddenly ancient. "I can't do this again." McKay looked around, bleary and unfocused. "I can't lose him-"
"You won't have to," Rodney said fervently. "We can fix this. It's some kind of mistake!" except oh God, oh God, what if it wasn't, because he was suddenly remembering Virtual John's insistence that Rodney wouldn't survive in the VE and the cool intelligence behind his pale eyes and fuck, fuck, fuck, a guy capable of noble self-sacrifice in one reality was probably more than capable of it in another, and how the hell could any of them have thought that John wasn't John Fucking Sheppard? "Oh God," Rodney said, and it suddenly seemed to him that this situation had John Sheppard's fingerprints all over it.
"What?" McKay demanded, snapping his fingers. "What, what-?"
"Nothing!" Rodney shouted back, having just truly learned what it meant to be beside yourself. "Just," he added a moment later, wincing. "Could John, your John, maybe have-?" and he twirled a finger around to take in the destruction of the universe.
McKay was outraged. "No! No way! There's no way he could, not from inside the-" and then, without pausing, "that rat-fucking, code-hacking bastard!"
"So it's possible?" Rodney pressed, needing the information.
"No, it's not possible, but it's John, so anything's possible." McKay pinched the bridge of his nose, and Rodney knew that headache from his own many, long days on Team Sheppard. "He shouldn't have been able to do this kind of damage; he doesn't have the privileges. I deliberately locked his base code down to root after he tried to give himself wings [Another fandom in-joke and also so John. *glee*] and corrupted himself so badly I-" and Rodney winced again as he remembered John coolly handing him McKay's tablet and getting him to unlock it. "You're him," John had said, "so it should work for you-"
"I, uh, may have inadvertently given him access to-" and ow, Jesus, ow. McKay was beating him about the head, and Rodney yelped, "It's not my fault! He tricked me, gave me your-! It's not my fault you and I are genetically identical-"
"You could have locked it again!" McKay said, taking another swipe at his head.
"You could have set it to self-lock!" and Rodney frantically batted McKay's hands away with both of his. "Don't blame me for your lousy security!"
"Oh, yes: how could I have not built in a firewall against alternate timeline past versions of myself? What was I-okay, wait, look: this is pointless." McKay rubbed his gray-stubbled cheeks. "You're telling me John had root access. Which means he did this on purpose. Rigged up a self-destruct: destroyed everything." McKay smiled bleakly and said: "Shocking, I know, and totally unlike him, but..."
"You don't know that," Rodney objected. "He might have made a mistake, you said-"
"This isn't a mistake; it's a wipe. Deliberate," McKay said tiredly. "Besides, I...I should have known this would happen. He's been wanting me out. Wanting to end it, I guess-"
It was weird to hear that negative voice outside his own head. "-to protect you, you idiot; he was afraid for you. He-" In his head, Virtual John slammed the refrigerator door and said, It's not fair to him. He's alive!, and Rodney abruptly remembered the conclusion he'd come to in the VE. "I think he was in love with you," he said.
"He's not," McKay said with surprising viciousness. "He can't be; he's not real-"
"He's real," Rodney said, and tugged McKay to his feet. "And he's John Sheppard, which means he's a cagey, manipulative bastard under all that hair gel, so let's find out exactly what he did."
On to part 5 (the last)!
Gotta love the send-up of the romance of getting a tattoo. In some (fairly obvious) ways, this story is wildly, gleefully over-the-top as only space opera can be. In others, it staunchly refuses to indulge. Stephanie Meyer Speranza ain't.
"I'm going back, I think," Rodney said, and watched the emotions flit over Teyla's face: disappointment, sadness, regret. "I had hoped you would stay," she said finally. "I am hoping Ronon will stay, too. Atlantis is not as it was, and I miss you both so much; I miss having you at hand, Rodney," and Rodney closed the space between them, clutching her shoulders and pressing their foreheads together. Hers was warm and smooth.
"I love you," he said. "I'll come back soon. I promise."
"Rodney," Zelenka said, almost comically surprised. "There is no meeting today, is there?" He fumbled for his glasses. "Have I forgotten about-"
"No, no," Rodney said, quickly, "I just came by to," and he was absolutely and totally blank for half a second, and then it came to him, "upload some files for Dr. Kita and her team. I think I-" and the tattoo was throbbing encouragement under his sleeve. "I think I'm nearly done with this project I've been working on."
Zelenka blinked in surprise. "Oh? You have really been working? I mean," he added hastily, looking away, "of course I knew you were working on something big, I just did not expect results at this early-" and Rodney saved them both further embarrassment by uploading his programming notes to the server, and a bit of VR environment code as an example. Hunching over a keyboard, he excluded the John class and yanked the other comments into a file. It wasn't exactly coherent, but he was betting that this was how John had learned to hack himself, so Kita and her team should be fired if they couldn't.
"-much easier once I realized there were three separate programming languages, Mugrar, Bose, and Macari, named for repeating elements here, here, and here," Rodney pointed. "You use them for different things, but they're incredibly flexible and they interlock-god, so beautifully; wait, look," and then Rodney was blissfully scrolling through some lines and marveling at the beauty of the syntax-so clean and supple, once you figured out which arguments belonged to which language-and when he turned around again, he was surprised to find that there were maybe thirty people behind him, crowding the lab and craning around each other's heads to see.
I love Rodney's genuine love for what he does. In a story that spends a fair amount of time undermining him as a romantic lead, that is what makes him sexy. That and his wit.
After he'd fielded all their questions, he got drawn into quite an interesting conversation with a scientist he'd never met before, or couldn't remember having met, named Finch, who was working on computational complexity theory. Finch had been stuck on a problem for four months and had just glimpsed his answer in a random line of Macari code, and after grilling Rodney about the models he'd used for randomness testing, had hopped around and then twirled and pumped his skinny arms up and down.
:-) And suddenly a tiny cameo character feels real as any of them.
It was a nice day, the first one Rodney could remember in a long time. He had dinner in the mess with Zelenka and Kita and Finch and a couple of other people whose names he didn't quite catch, though they had all had nice things to say about him. One in particular kept scribbling frantic notes and muttering, "three! three distinct programming languages!" like he couldn't quite believe the achievement. Zelenka had by now recovered himself, and was saying, quite smugly, "Yes, well, of course, freed from all the annoying problems of bureaucracy with which I am now saddled as Head of Science, Dr. McKay was bound to accomplish great things," and it was funny, but he hadn't thought of them as "great things": it was a ski-lodge, a golf club, a macro for unlimited junk food.
Everyone hung around the mess for dessert, wanting to talk to him, totally fawning over him, and Rodney promised two of the scientists whose names he couldn't remember that he would stop by their labs tomorrow and cast his brilliant eyes over their mediocre projects. And then the party was breaking up. Zelenka punched his shoulder and said, "Welcome back, Rodney," before drifting off, and Rodney had picked up his tray and carried it halfway across the mess hall when he was hit by a wave of grief, because he realized suddenly that he was looking for Sheppard, scanning the room and staring at the tousled backs of heads, trying to filter for Sheppard's posture, that slouch, the casual tilt of an arm that was John eating an apple, and Jesus, McKay, get a grip!
This was a nice day, a real day, this was the real world, and Rodney shoved his tray into the pile waiting to be bussed and took off, with a purposefulness he didn't feel, for his room, before thinking, no, bad idea, and pivoting on his heel. He went back to the lab, his lab, which was abandoned-looking and dusty, and he put up a pot of extremely strong coffee and began clearing up, prioritizing all the work he had abandoned, much of which was totally pointless since they'd developed the Pan-Galactic Garlic Blaster, and okay, really only Sheppard would have laughed at that, because he was lame and in denial about his own geekiness, and so easy that way.
Rodney shoved all the military and defense stuff aside (and Jesus, they'd only gotten that weapon because Sheppard had died for it. They ought to fucking name it after him, like a Winchester or a Colt) and began rummaging through his files. There were a million things he'd meant to work on: everything from the patterns of galaxy evolution to the weakly interacting massive particles that were the probable key to dark matter. He lost himself for a while, and then the words started to blur: The abundance of antimatter fluxes produced in neutralino pair-annihilations depends upon- and he realized he didn't give a shit about neutralino pair-annihilations, and stumbled, zombie-like, to bed.
In the drowsy minute or two before sleep claimed him, Rodney curled his left hand around his tattooed right wrist. He could do this. He'd already done it; the first day was the hardest. He was as brilliant as ever, obviously, and the science team needed him. Science needed him. He had an obligation to humanity, and to future generations.
He lasted four days.
Uh-huh. Love the way the beats fall in that sentence. Punch line delivery relies on rhythm no less in written text than in spoken. This is a neat example of use of space on the page as a stand-in for an oral storyteller's caesura.
John looked hard at him, then kissed him on the mouth, and that was it, game over: he didn't give a good goddamn if John was real or not, because everything outside of this was just negative space. [awesome sentence!] Rodney felt an unexpected surge of joy and started muscling John backwards, toward the bedroom, hands sliding greedily up his hard, lean body. Their mouths broke apart and John was grinning into his face, more white, even teeth than anyone outside of Hollywood had a right to, and then John was roughly cupping his face and kissing him, tongue sliding into Rodney's mouth over and over and over.
"I want," John mumbled [ergo sum?] , as they toppled onto the bed, "oh, Jesus, fuck," and John's hand was sliding into Rodney's fly and groping his cock through his underwear; John's hand was in his underwear, on him. "I want to fuck you, let me fuck you," and they did it hard and fast, John shoving his cock in and muttering, "oh, fuck; yeah," as Rodney shivered and convulsed, sweat stinging his eyes and John's cock hard inside him.
"You owe me a secret," Rodney said, much later, when he could speak. They'd collapsed into a heap of limbs on John's flannel-covered bed. The whole room smelled of sex.
John lay beside him, his warm thigh slung over Rodney's. "Okay," he said amiably, and then his fingers curled around Rodney's wrist. "Hey, is this a tattoo?"
"I was drunk. We all were," and then: "You said when I came back, you'd tell me-"
"I will: anything you want to know. Wow, it's really cool. Did Ronon-?"
"Ronon did mine and Teyla's. I helped him do his. Oh God, I can't decide what to ask; I want to ask everything. 'Why do you wear that stupid wristband?' How could you ever have gotten married?' 'Did you always want to fly? Was that your dream, or-?'"
John was gently tilting Rodney's wrist back and forth. "I want one like this: it's like wind and water and the sky all at once. It reminds me of surfing, or-" He went still, and then said, casually: "You all got them? The whole team?"
Rodney looked at him steadily. "Yes," he said. "We all did," and then, deciding to answer the implied question: "Yes, it was about you. We were remembering you-"
"Not me." John took his hand off Rodney's wrist, moved his leg off Rodney's hip, pulling back into himself and putting space between them. "I told you, I'm not him-"
Rodney rolled on top of him and pinned him with his weight. "You know what?" he demanded, ignoring John's yelp. "Let me tell you a secret: John Sheppard changed my life. Not physics, not Atlantis-though I wish to God it had been physics or Atlantis, because I still have those things. But they're meaningless now, don't you understand? John Sheppard was my friend, and I guess some people have a lot of friends, so it's not that big a deal to them, losing one, but I can't get past it. I've tried, I swear I have, and just-" John was staring up at him, throat working. His eyes were that weird color: pale, like a pond or a stone. "I can't leave you behind."
Gah! More good characterization than you can shake a memory stick at! (thank yew, thank yew, I'll be here all week.) That description is so simple, but so striking. It's neat that John makes Rodney think of nature words there-elemental, atechnological things.
"It's not me," John managed finally; he sounded afraid. "I'm not him. Rodney, I-"
"You're close enough," Rodney said.
By now it's downright frightening.
They fell into a normal routine after that. Ronon had moved to New Athos, so there was no one to force him to exercise, but Rodney dutifully went back to Atlantis whenever the grandfather clock told him it was time to eat or bathe or poke his nose into the labs. John bribed him to do other things (visiting Teyla, getting a haircut, sending a databurst to his sister) with tantalizing bits of information, so that after a while Rodney had quite a collection of secrets: that Sheppard had once dreamed of being a steeplechase jockey; that he and his father had fought nonstop for seven years about him being queer without ever saying the word aloud; that he had finally waved his wife like a white flag, thinking it would bring him closer to his family (it hadn't: it had brought her closer to his family); that he wore a sweatband on his wrist because he sweated a lot.
Hee hee. Sly, charming wink to fandom's obsessive theorizing about our show's every itty bitty detail.
Other than that, they lived together quite happily: played chess and video games, did puzzles, argued about trivia, got drunk. They began to hack the Terrarium competitively, each of them straining to code more outrageous scenarios: herd of giant lizards (Rodney), jetpacks (John), couple of extra planets (Rodney), authentic Texas bar with bad beer and terrible country-western band (John), and as they sat there at the rough wooden table, Rodney wincing and trying not to clamp his hands over his ears as the black-hatted singer warbled about everything he had lost and how unbelievably sad he was, John leaned forward and shouted, over the din, "You know what happens when you play country music backwards, Rodney? You get your car back, you get your wife back, you get your dog back," and Rodney shifted uncomfortably and ordered another beer.
Canny writers use comedy to amplify their tragedy and vice versa. Very Joss Whedon, there.
John sprang the idea on him out of nowhere. "Rodney?" he began offhandedly; he was sitting at the kitchen table with his morning coffee and fidgeting with his cup.
Rodney was sitting across from him with his laptop, doing a last bit of coding. "Hm?"
"Remember how I told you that he, that Sheppard, would never have-" Rodney looked up immediately and gave John his full attention. John's shoulders dropped, but he began again. "That Sheppard would never have started a relationship with you."
"Yes," Rodney said, and had to look away.
"I think maybe I was wrong about that," and John sounded so miserable that Rodney's eyes were drawn back to his face. "Just," and John shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "He didn't know, all right? He never had a clue about this stuff. I mean, he knew he liked you a little more than a friend likes a friend, but he didn't know..." and John boggled and circled a hand to take everything in-the mountain, the beach, the stable of racehorses, the helicopter, the giant lizards-"you know: that you were out of your fucking mind."
Rodney let out a brittle laugh. "He didn't know? I didn't know!"
"So I can't help thinking that maybe things would have been different if he'd known...what I know." John sighed and put his head in his hands. "I mean, maybe he would have taken the chance. But just-it got me thinking," and then he was pushing over a stack of journals with napkins stuck between the pages as bookmarks.
I love the napkins. They're totally extraneous to the forward motion of the plot, but just think about how much adorableness and information about John and his work habits is packed into that one goofy little perfectly-chosen detail.
Rodney frowned at them, then flipped them open and looked at the titles. "Cauchy problem in spacetimes with closed timelike lines," in the Physical Review. "Time machine and self-consistent evolution in problems with self-interaction," in the Physical Review. "Test fields on compact space-times," in the Journal of Mathematical Physics. He felt a little sick. "About?" he asked, though he already knew.
"Time travel," John said, and sat back in his chair.
"You're not serious. You are not serious," but John said that yes, he was serious, because, "We know it's possible, right? SG-1 did it. Elizabeth did it. Birds do it, bees-seriously, Rodney, you're a genius. You can figure it out, I know you can."
"But. But-"
I'm having random thoughts about fandom's-innovations in punctuation. Maybe memory fails, but I don't think I've read a published novel that uses the above construction, even though it's been all over fandom for years now. I'll bet it's a product of our focus on t.v. and movie narratives. Punctuation of yore (i.e., of primarily written narratives) is designed for easy reading, grammatical clarity. We, on the other hand, use every punctuation trick at our disposal, and have zero reservations about inventing new ones, to capture the speech patterns and tics of the actors who play our characters. They're stage directions, almost-reflecting our awareness that in our source media, delivery frequently provides even more information than dialogue. Especially in Slasherville, delivery is paramount.
did John have any idea how maddeningly, incredibly complicated time-travel was? You couldn't mess around with time: it was chaos theory incarnate. Change one thing and you changed everything, "-and Elizabeth only got away with it because there were so few variables; she was literally the only person in a deserted city-"
"Yeah, Rodney-and I'm talking about one man. Actually, I'm talking about two inches: two inches and the bullet misses Sheppard's head, right?" Rodney pushed out of his chair, needing to pace, because Jesus, he couldn't believe they were talking about this: the worst day of his life. "I'm not trying to change all of history, or even stop Sheppard from waking up the Wraith," John said, doggedly tracking him. "That would be complicated, the law of unintended consequences, blah blah. But just-what if that bullet hit his arm?"
Rodney tried to stop his hands from clenching into fists. "Sheppard's death triggered the battle that led to us invading an otherwise obscure tribal armory. We wouldn't have found the goddamned supergarlic otherwise. Don't you get it? That stuff brought peace to two galaxies and happiness to everyone in the fucking universe except me!" and he wanted to snatch the words back as soon as he said them, because he could see the flash of pain in John's eyes, the tightening lines of his mouth as he looked away.
"No, I get it," John said sharply. "Believe me, I get it."
"God. I didn't-John, I don't mean it like that. This isn't about you."
"No. I know it isn't." John's smile was quick and perfunctory. "Look, it's okay. Just, things could be different, that's all. And we've got time on our hands, and-not to speak ill of the dead, but I know a lot more math than Sheppard did. I mean, I don't think he got as much out of Advanced Graph Theory II as you seem to think, but whatever: thanks for the upload."
"His transcript said he got an alpha minus," Rodney said, frowning.
"It was graded on a curve," John explained wryly. "Same semester he started flying F-16s, so I can promise you he wasn't paying much attention. But if you wanted to take a crack at figuring this thing out; well." He shrugged. "I've got some ideas."
"And there you go," McKay 2.0 said tiredly. "That's what happened."
Rodney blinked and straightened just as Sheppard said, "Wait, what? That's-"
McKay flapped his arms, once, like a giant bird in a bathrobe. [*simile love*] "Well, we figured it out! Obviously! Because, hello! Look, I told you this part: I did most of the conceptual work, you did most of the math." He frowned. "John did most of the math. And now we've got to figure out how to provoke a tangent vector with the smallest possible deviation from-" McKay shot a sudden, swift glance at Rodney, then turned back to Sheppard and said, "Actually, can we talk somewhere private? Also, I'm starving; some food would be-"
"Wait just a goddamned second!" Rodney shoved his way between McKay and Sheppard, crossed his arms, and tried to stare himself down. "Did you just say you wanted privacy from me? Are you out of your-is that even possible?"
McKay seemed totally unimpressed and just waved a hand in his face. "Obviously it's possible, or I wouldn't have suggested it. Moreover, it's sensible: letting you in on the plan doubles the risk, even if you are me. This is no time to play favorites! We need to keep temporal interference to a minimum, which means no one but Sheppard should know the precise details. And I've already told you far too much, except..." McKay studied his face, and Rodney felt weirdly unable to withstand his own scrutiny. "Except this is your second chance, too," McKay said. "So don't blow it, all right?"
Rodney turned to Sheppard. "I don't trust this guy as far as I can throw him."
"Oh, Jesus Christ!" Sheppard grabbed his arm, dragged him across the room, and whispered, "Shut up, Rodney; he's you, and he's trying to save my life, okay?"
"Fine, but-why can't I be in on the plan?" Rodney couldn't seem to conceal the whine in his voice. "And seriously, Sheppard: I don't trust him," he said, and stabbed his finger into Sheppard's chest. "He's obviously not rational. He's some mad scientist version of me, a Dr. Frankenstein. He built a goddammed replica of you, pretended it was real, and then had sex with it: he's clearly obsessed with-"
Sheppard's jaw tightened; all at once he turned on his heel and strode over to McKay. "Come on," he said through gritted teeth. "Let's go," and then, "Wait. Take this off." Sheppard tugged at McKay's raggedy bathrobe, then had the gall to grab Rodney's own robe from where it was draped over a chair. He handed it to McKay, who obediently shucked his robe and put on Rodney's. Rodney wanted to stop him from taking it, except it wasn't the robe he was afraid of losing: it was his entire goddamned life.
"That's better," Sheppard said, eying McKay critically. "Keep your head down and walk fast, and hopefully nobody will notice." He turned to Rodney and said, tersely, "Stay here till I get him through the halls," and Rodney was so outraged and terrified that he wasn't able to work up any sort of protest. He watched as Sheppard escorted McKay out, as the door slid shut behind them, and then began to pace in mute frustration.
Fine, yes, he could sort of see McKay's point: if time worked the way they thought it did, then McKay had already told him too much. It was bad enough he knew the parameters of the mission: a warrior culture, a negotiation for armaments, though God knew that described half the missions they went on these days. Still, he didn't know what would be worse: knowing that this was the mission where John Sheppard got killed, or not knowing and trembling in his boots whenever they-
It slammed into him; his mouth flooded with the metallic taste of panic: John Sheppard got killed. He flung out a hand to steady himself, then sat down on the bed. That wasn't hypothetical. That had happened. It was as real as the beat-up bathrobe lying beside him, the beat-up version of himself that had just walked down the hall-and then he let himself hear what McKay had been saying: that Sheppard had been killed, that the team had been devastated, that he hadn't been able to go on.
It was a lot to take in, but Rodney knew then, in his bones, that he was McKay, that McKay was him, that he would do exactly the same. Something inside him would break if John Sheppard were killed, and it was awful to know he carried that fragility inside of him. Worse yet, now Sheppard knew it, too, and that was an unpleasant enough revelation that he had to put his head between his legs, and that's when he saw the drive. Its white corner was peeking out from the bathrobe, and Rodney sat up so fast his head rushed and fizzed. He pulled the flat rectangle out of the bathrobe's inner pocket and turned it over in his hands: just like his, it was his, just older and grimier.
He knew he should leave it alone, but that had always been the problem, hadn't it? He'd made this goddamned thing the center of his world after Sheppard's death. A man liked to think that he was made of stronger stuff than that...but he wasn't. He'd learned that much. Three steps took him to the slot in the wall, and then he shoved the drive in and-
-holy shit, he hadn't expected the cabin's high ceilings, the exposed beams, the manly, "I'm a lumberjack," vibe of the whole place. The fireplace was a huge arch of rough stone, the sofas were covered in red plaid, the wood furniture all looked handmade, and-
Well I guess there's my answer to the "handcraft" question, huh? Rodney works as lovingly with numbers as I do with my bread and my pencils. Okay.
"Rodney?"
-holy shit, and he whirled around fast and nearly fell backwards over the rough-hewn coffee table. John Sheppard was standing there, Rodney recognized that oh-so-familiar sideways tilt of his head-except it wasn't Sheppard, it was nothing like Sheppard at all. The replica was wearing a pink paisley shirt and jeans, and he was carrying a thick stack of journals in his arms. A pad of equations sat on top, and he was awkwardly holding a pen in his hand, having just obviously pulled it from between his teeth.
"You're not Sheppard," Rodney said, and pointed at him accusingly.
The replica sighed. "Yes," he said patiently. "I know." He shifted the journals so he could half-balance them on his hip, and extended a hand to Rodney. "I'm John," he said.
"Oh," Rodney said, somewhat abashed. "Well." He shook John's hand. It didn't feel like Sheppard's hand, though he couldn't explain that. "I didn't mean to-"
"Nah. It's okay. It seems to be a sticking point." John was watching him closely, and Rodney remembered that he wasn't the Rodney McKay this John was expecting.
"I'm Rodney McKay. Not your Rodney McKay. Of course. Ha. No, I'm from the-" He made a frantic, backwards gesture. "Well, actually, technically it's the present, but-"
"Right," John said, saving Rodney from any further imbecilities, but then he shifted awkwardly and added, "I remember you," and Christ, this John been made from the John Sheppard whom Rodney had taken to the porn room not so long ago.
"Oh," Rodney said, temporarily speechless.
"Yeah." John seemed uncharacteristically unguarded; in fact, this John seemed uncharacteristically a lot of things. Calmer, slower. More cerebral, less brittle. Pinker-God, there was so much wrong with that shirt he was wearing. He moved wrong, like Sheppard's tightly wound springs had come uncoiled and lost all their potential energy.
That's a beauty of a metaphor.
And he smelled wrong, not like Sheppard at all-and abruptly Rodney remembered the way McKay had closed his eyes and sniffed at John's ear.
John sidled over to the kitchen table, put down his armload of books, and then said, uneasily, "I'm guessing the time machine worked?"
Rodney blinked. "Yes. Yes, it did. Your McKay's with Sheppard right now, trying to figure out-" John flinched, and Rodney stopped, blinked, rewound what he'd said. It came to him in a giant fireball of insight: "Your McKay's macking on my Sheppard!"
John flinched again, then turned away fast. "I don't know," he said, and went to busy himself in the fridge. "How should I know? Do you want a-"
Rodney had followed him doggedly into the kitchen area and was now standing on his heels. "That's what this is all about, isn't it?" Rodney demanded. "You built him a time machine so he could come back, take his life, take over my life-"
John slammed the refrigerator door. "Well, he can't stay here! Jesus, look at this place: nobody was ever meant to live here. It's not real! It's an entertainment center, it's like the internet, it's just-it's not fair to him. He's alive, he needs-" but Rodney was already turning away, going back into the living room, because of course, Virtual John was in love with McKay, and they were all so fucking screwed.
He let himself collapse on the sofa, which was quite comfortable; his design instincts were obviously good. [snorfle. Rodney McKay, interior decorator.] John came in, handed him a beer, and fell into a nearby armchair with a sigh. He put his feet on the coffee table. He was wearing bright red socks.
"How did you do it?" Rodney asked finally. "The time machine."
John picked at the label of his beer with his fingernail. "It wasn't hard, actually. I think Rodney ended up making the actual machine out of a transporter, but we could have used a culling beam, an Asgard beam: anything that turns people into lossless data. Other than that, it was just theories and number-crunching; sending the data along accurately."
"No offense," Rodney said pointedly, "but there's no way Sheppard knows that much math."
John smiled thinly. "I'm not him," and when Rodney rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers, John shrugged and said, "I got extra math for Christmas. Uploads. Rodney gave me all sorts of-" and then his face changed and he said, "Here, wait, I can show you." He got up, disappeared into the bedroom, and came back holding a tablet. "Rodney's," John said, handing it over, "but you're him, so it should work for you."
Rodney took it and ran his thumb over the genetic keylock. The screen exploded with information, and Rodney, who was not easily impressed, boggled. "Did I-" and yes, okay, McKay had said something about having to learn three new Ancient programming languages to make this VE work, but... "Did I really make all this?"
"Yeah. You did. You-you're pretty incredible, Rodney," and Rodney's head jerked up, because he thought that John's voice had gone a little rough, but John was just sitting there, in his ridiculous shirt, staring down at his hands. "It was-tell him I appreciate it."
Rodney's stomach clenched. "He can't have my life," he protested. "He can't have-"
"Sorry. I can't help you," and John wouldn't meet his eyes.
Rodney yanked the drive out of the wall and saw, to his shock, that it was already dark; the moons of Lantea were gleaming through his window. He stood up unsteadily on prickling legs, and arched his aching back. He could hear Virtual John saying, "No one was meant to live like this," but this wasn't the first time Rodney McKay had used his brains while letting his body rot. There had been graduate school, for instance.
*wince* (I ... heh, actually I had my very own Ronon who hauled me out to the seawall for a run three times a week. Without whom rot.)
McKay 2.0's bathrobe was still draped across his bed, and Rodney steeled his resolve and set out to find Sheppard. He left without quite knowing where he was going, but realized once he hit the transporter where his feet were taking him: down to the lower level room where he and Sheppard hid out to play video games and watch movies. They'd dragged a couple of mattresses down there, too, and some blankets, which hadn't seemed sinister at the time, only for catnaps, but now caused Rodney to break into a run, because he could picture it: Sheppard and McKay, crashed out in a corner, limbs tangled together.
Rodney took the corner so fast he nearly slammed into Sheppard, who was pacing the balcony outside the door and nervously gnawing on a thumbnail. Rodney saw at once that he was too late, because Sheppard's black buttoned-down shirt was unbuttoned to the waist, and he was barefoot: no red socks on display here.
"Oh my God," Rodney said, and Sheppard jerked up guiltily. Rodney was frantically trying to put together language for a speech whose theme was, "For God's Sake, How Pathetic Do You Have To Be To Take Advantage Of A Mad, Sexually Desperate Man From The Future," when Sheppard's face twisted with misery. He looked sick.
"Oh, shut up. Jesus." Sheppard turned to brace himself against the balcony, and Rodney could see his thin rib cage rising and falling through his shirt; wow, he was really freaking out. Rodney's anger evaporated in the face of Sheppard's evident desolation: God, he hadn't even considered things from Sheppard's point of view. Everyone was upset about Sheppard's death, but Sheppard had died, and some part of him was trapped in a hell of Rodney's making. Moreover, Sheppard was an intensely private person, and between them, Rodney and his future self had cracked him open like an egg.
"I'm sorry." Rodney's voice came out strangled. "Sheppard, I'm so-"
Ba-da-boom. The first time Rodney sees John-really unselfishly sees him-comes after he first sees VR John. He's no longer just his friend who's always there.
Sheppard rubbed the back of his head: a curiously childlike gesture. "I don't know what to do," he said. "Rodney. What do I-?"
Rodney's chest tightened. "Didn't he tell you? I thought the whole reason for this-this-rendezvous was for him to tell you how to save your life-"
"He did. That's the-" There was pain in Sheppard's eyes. "How the hell am I supposed to live with this kind of obligation? How can I possibly-"
"You're shitting me, right?" Rodney was actually gaping. "I mean, you-you've saved everyone's life, like a million times-"
Sheppard was already shaking his head as he turned to stare at the water. "This isn't like pushing someone out of the way of a bullet, Rodney. The guy salvaged what was left of me, programmed a replicant, built a time machine-"
Rodney was unbearably thankful that Sheppard didn't seem to think of "the guy" as, well, him. "Right, so...he's nuts, is the lesson I would be taking from that. Just because he's obsessed with you..." Rodney trailed off, because Sheppard's mouth had gone tight and he was shaking his head. "What, he's not obsessed?" Rodney asked incredulously.
"It's not just that. It's more than that." Sheppard's hands were white-knuckled where he gripped the railing. "He knows me, Rodney. I mean, he..." Sheppard's face and neck were tinting pink in a rapidly-spreading flush, "he really, really knows me."
That might be the one thing in the world that Sheppard simultaneously fears and wants more than anything.
Rodney had to shove away the image of all that could mean, tried not to look down at Sheppard's bare chest and feet. Of course McKay had had a John to practice on-
Sheppard was still bent over the railing and not meeting his eyes. "He knew everything already," he said, more to himself than to Rodney. "Things I've never-" and Rodney wanted to grab him and plead, I could know you, too, if you would talk to me.
Oh! Oh, Rodney.
Instead, he thought, pink, and said, desperately, "No, he doesn't. He doesn't know you at all. I've seen the virtual you, and he's nothing like-"
"What?" Sheppard's head came up sharply; that had got his attention. "You-"
"Well, I had to see what he'd built! It's-well, actually, it's pretty brilliant," Rodney admitted, "the house and the environment, and the code's genuinely spectacular, but the other John, he's nothing like you. He's-" and some self-preserving instinct told Rodney that this required extreme tact, because he couldn't say gentler, more articulate, and better at math. Much, much gayer. "He wears a lot of pink," Rodney said finally.
Sheppard's eyebrows flew up. "Pink?" he said, and then, almost musing on the idea: "I like pink, actually-"
This was a nightmare. "Well, I'm sure you would wear a whole other kind of pink than the pink he was wearing," Rodney said quickly. "Believe me: he didn't talk like you or move like you or smell like you. Remember that he was built from a single scan-we're talking highly-compressed data!-which was extrapolated back into a you-shape; that machine was never designed for accuracy. Which is probably why McKay came back: if Virtual John was just like you, he wouldn't need, well-you."
Sheppard was frowning thoughtfully. "Would more data help?"
"What?" Rodney blinked.
"More data," Sheppard repeated, emphasizing the word like Rodney was a moron. "You said he made the virtual-me out of a single scan; would more data help? Because I-" and Sheppard stopped, then lifted his chin defiantly, as if daring Rodney to say a word. "I'll give him more data. If it'll help."
Rodney blinked three times before the genius of the plan sank in. "Yes," Rodney said, snapping his fingers. "Yes, yes, yes, that's brilliant. We'll put you back into the VR, take another scan-" VR John's words suddenly came back to him. "-or, wait, no, we can do better: I'll build a new scanner, something lossless, out of a transporter or a culling beam-" and Sheppard nodded slowly and said, "Okay. Do it."
"Great," Rodney said, and clapped his hands together. "That should provide a rich enough data field to-" but Sheppard had turned away and was moving silently toward the door on bare feet. "Wait," Rodney said, stupidly. "Where are you...?"
Sheppard hesitated, but didn't meet his eyes. "I don't want him to be alone when he wakes up," he said, and then: "Build it, then come get me. I have my radio." The door opened for him and then slid closed behind him. Rodney stood there and stared.
Sheppard is a big, adorable caretaker. And what an interesting contrast: Rodney's growing, but still mostly selfish and worried about Rodney 2.0 taking over his own life and getting dibs on Sheppard. Sheppard, on the other hand, immediately adopted Rodney 2.0 as "somebody I have to take care of, because he is Rodney and ALL UR RODNEYS R BELONG TO ME." Aw, he's so in love.
It didn't take long to build, not once he'd hit upon the idea-fine, Virtual John's idea (but really his own idea that he would someday have anyway)-of cannibalizing a transporter. They'd deliberately set up their game room in an out-of-the-way area, so Rodney just went to the second-nearest transporter and ripped out its key components-the beam, the directional computer, the data storage drive, the cables. He dragged them back to an empty lab across from the game room, and began cobbling them together into a scanner.
Happy example of a fan "nerding about in the machinery," taking screwdriver and pliers to the canon's sci-fi hand-wave technomagic, disassembling, spreading it all over the floor and then thinking of cool, new things to do with it.
The transporter had been built to turn a person into data and forward them on to the next unit, so the actual upload was going to be trivial: a matter of modifying the program to make a copy while leaving the original Sheppard right where he was. He hooked the scanner to a console, then got to work rewriting the code. The test phase went well: he copied a powerbar into the Atlantis mainframe, then his tablet, then a chair.
Then there was the question of where to put the upload. He pushed McKay's flash drive into the console and checked how much space was left. Answer: virtually nothing. The cabin, the beach, the racetrack, those were all props; they were compacted down and took up virtually no room. But John-the simulation of John-filled the whole thing almost to bursting. There was no room to scan the real Sheppard into the drive.
Rodney grabbed his own drive and shoved it into the slot beneath McKay's. It was keyed to his genetic fingerprint, but it was still mostly full of the original owner's programming: the crazy Viking lady, all Halton's beautiful blondes, Samantha, the lesbians, Sheppard with his head thrown back, the girl bent over him, sucking his cock and- Rodney viciously wiped the whole disk clean, because this, this was what would turn him into that crazy Sheppard-stealing freak back there, building a fake John Sheppard because he'd been too pathetic to take his chance with the real one.
Go, Rodney, go!
Okay, fine, that was the easy part: now there was the question of the merge. Technically, it was simple: a controlled merge, merging Sheppard's data into Virtual John's. Rodney felt a little uneasy about that-the simulation was huge, it was-as big as a real person-but he looked in the direction of the game room. McKay wanted Sheppard, that was obvious enough; McKay had come back through time for him. If he couldn't buy McKay off with a high-quality copy, McKay might not let go of the real one.
Once he'd made that decision, the program wasn't hard to write. He'd preserve VR John's memories of the last ten years with McKay, and replace the rest-the personality matrix, the pre-VR memories-with Sheppard's content. McKay would end up with a Sheppard who remembered building a time machine but couldn't, who'd remember wearing pink but wouldn't want to.
Rodney ran a few more tests, then rubbed his eyes. He glanced out the lab's huge circular window: still dark, though the air was just turning that gray color that presaged dawn. It just figured that he'd worked through the night, while Sheppard and McKay- well, he didn't want to think about that. He stared at his tablet and tried not to think about Sheppard's open shirt and bare feet. A pity fuck: that's all it was. McKay had saved Sheppard's life and lost most of his mind, so Sheppard had taken pity on the old guy and what, let him suck his cock, maybe. Jerked him off, maybe. So much for so little, really, and Rodney wondered if McKay saw the compassion in Sheppard's eyes.
He sighed and raised his hand to turn on his radio, then stopped, two fingers resting on his cheekbone. He got up and drifted though the steadily graying light of the corridor to their game room, knowing he was a masochist, but needing to see, needing to know. He slid his hand over the genetic keystrip and the door opened for him: it was coded to open to either him or Sheppard, which seemed pretty ironic now. It was darker inside than out, as the game room had no windows, but Rodney knew where to turn his eyes: to the corner, where they'd piled mattresses and set up the largest monitor they could find.
He'd hoped to be wrong, but he wasn't wrong. They were there, all right, crashed out together on the mattress, and Rodney recognized the languid drape of Sheppard's body before he recognized his own face-down sleep sprawl. He'd thought that McKay would be clinging to Sheppard, and was surprised to see Sheppard's arm curled possessively across McKay's shoulders. He was even more surprised when Sheppard pulled away and rolled silently to his feet; damn, he wouldn't have let himself stare so long if he'd known Sheppard was awake. He was still dressed, at least, and he shoved his bare feet into boots, tucking rather than tying the laces, before following Rodney down the hall to the lab.
Sheppard took in the contraption at a glance and nodded vaguely at the circle Rodney'd drawn on the floor. He looked tired; maybe he hadn't slept either. "Me, there?" Sheppard asked, and went to stand on his mark when Rodney nodded. "You sure this'll work?"
"Yes," Rodney said. "Close your eyes." Sheppard's face grew tense, but he did as Rodney asked, hands tightening into fists at his sides. "Here we go." He pressed the button, and Sheppard was immediately suffused with yellow light. It took in all of him at once, glowing like a halo, then rapidly coalesced into a wide, horizontal beam and scanned him more methodically, moving from the spiky tips of his hair down his face, over his pointy nose, across the rough-bearded skin of his adam's apple, and down and down-shoulders, chest, waist, groin, thighs, shins, boots-before winking out.
Rodney bent over the console to check the data. Boy, there was a lot of it: it barely fit on the scratch drive. He wondered if he should compress it, or do another scan at-
"Did it work?" Sheppard appeared beside him.
"Mm-hm," Rodney replied absently, still absorbed in the problem. "Looks like," and then, muttering almost to himself, "Hope this gives him the incentive to leave."
"What do you mean?" Sheppard shot him a curious glance. "He's not staying."
"Oh?" Rodney's head jerked up, hope swelling. "Really? You don't think so?"
"Of course not," Sheppard looked genuinely surprised. "I mean, the whole point is to disrupt our timeline as little as possible. I'd think having two Rodney McKays around here would be, you know: pretty disruptive." Sheppard rolled his eyes. "Besides, we just worked out a strategy: why do that if he was just going to be here?" Sheppard shook his head. "He's not staying, Rodney."
"I hope you're right," Rodney said, but couldn't help adding: "His John doesn't seem to think so."
Sheppard showed him a thin, tight smile. "Well, then, maybe his John is-"
He stopped; McKay had wandered in from the game room, hair mussed and bathrobe hanging open. He was obviously surprised to see Rodney there. "Oh. Hey. Hi," McKay said. "Sorry, am I-"McKay looked up, at the bits of transporter, and then down, at the hand-drawn circle. "Wait. Are you guys building a time machine?"
Rodney shook his head. "No."
"No, no," Sheppard agreed.
"Though that's a very good guess," Rodney admitted. "Similar principle, actually. It's-"
Sheppard was already moving toward McKay, hands extended. "It's a scanner," he said. "Rodney built it. We thought...well, you said you had trouble building...that is, reconstructing..." Rodney had to look away, and focused on the console; Christ, he couldn't stand Sheppard's awkward sympathy, even though it wasn't directed at him; or whatever: not really. Sheppard's voice went soft, and Rodney hadn't known he could sound like that, all gentle like that. "Look, I want you to have...whatever you need, whatever you need from me," and then he said, all in a rush, "Rodney's taken a scan of me: a better one. I can't fix what's happened to you, but I can help you fix your simulation. Rodney says it's not...well, not much like me, but the new data should..."
"Wait-what?" McKay said, and Rodney immediately jerked around to look at him. He knew that voice: that voice went straight to his lizard brain. "You-you didn't-"
"Let me do this for you," Sheppard said quietly, but he was on the wrong page, and McKay had seized both halves of Sheppard's open shirt before Rodney could get to him.
"No. No, no, no, no-" McKay's voice was strangled, and Rodney could almost feel the panic rising up to choke him. "What did you-you didn't-you erased-"
This is so scary. Not just because of the awfulness of losing John, but because Rodney 2.0 really feels like a loose cannon-dangerous. He's nuts. He might do anything.
Rodney lunged across the room and grabbed at McKay's hands, almost recoiling when he touched his own skin. "He didn't! We didn't!"
McKay was clawing at Sheppard in a way that would've been pathetic if it wasn't for the naked desperation on his face. "If you've hurt him-if you-I'll-"
Sheppard was gaping back at him, too stunned to defend himself. Rodney yanked McKay's hands violently away and said, "We didn't! Jesus! Just calm down, McKay!"
McKay turned wild eyes on Rodney. "God, please, you didn't overwrite him?"
"No," Rodney said hastily, "no, no," though of course he'd been planning to do just that. McKay staggered past Rodney to the console and began typing erratically, hands shaking in a way that Rodney knew all too well. "I uploaded Sheppard to my drive, not yours." He shot a swift, reassuring glance at Sheppard, who was standing there, still looking shocked. "Not your drive; we hadn't transferred the new scan to your drive yet, all right? McKay, listen to me; are you listening?" Rodney wanted to shake him; Rodney didn't want to touch him. "I said we didn't touch the-"
McKay looked up from the console with fish-dead eyes. "He's not there. He's gone."
Rodney frowned. "That's impossible," and then he was pushing McKay aside, pulling up the drive specs and-impossible. There had barely been space; now there was nothing but space. "Impossible," he said again, and switched drives again to check, yes, Sheppard's scan was on the new drive, just like he'd thought. So what the-?
"He's gone." McKay sounded terrifyingly calm, like he might start shooting up a building: a school or a church. "Look," and then McKay flipped a switch on the lab's main console and-
A lot of gray nothing. It was like being in an unimaginably huge warehouse, or an empty soundstage: this was the VE, or at least it had been. Rodney turned slowly, trying and failing to get a sense of dimension. Beside him, McKay didn't seem to be able to focus on anything; he let his legs fold and sat down, cross-legged. The floor had a weird resilience under his feet, almost like leather, and Rodney was reminded of his very first experience with the drive: the cavernous, dank room, the leather floor mats, Come and take your punishments, darling. God, that was a long time-
McKay was crying. It came to him with a sickening internal twist. McKay's hands had come up, fingers crooked and locked, to shield his face, but still, the sounds were audible. Rodney said, hoarsely, "Now, now. None of that." McKay leaned forward, his shoulders curling inward and his head hanging down. "Look. Please. You have to-" and then Rodney went down on the floor beside him, uselessly tugging at his arm.
McKay barely moved, like he had neither energy nor will. "Can't-" he said, hands falling away from his face. His skin was gray and papery, his eyes raw; he was suddenly ancient. "I can't do this again." McKay looked around, bleary and unfocused. "I can't lose him-"
"You won't have to," Rodney said fervently. "We can fix this. It's some kind of mistake!" except oh God, oh God, what if it wasn't, because he was suddenly remembering Virtual John's insistence that Rodney wouldn't survive in the VE and the cool intelligence behind his pale eyes and fuck, fuck, fuck, a guy capable of noble self-sacrifice in one reality was probably more than capable of it in another, and how the hell could any of them have thought that John wasn't John Fucking Sheppard? "Oh God," Rodney said, and it suddenly seemed to him that this situation had John Sheppard's fingerprints all over it.
"What?" McKay demanded, snapping his fingers. "What, what-?"
"Nothing!" Rodney shouted back, having just truly learned what it meant to be beside yourself. "Just," he added a moment later, wincing. "Could John, your John, maybe have-?" and he twirled a finger around to take in the destruction of the universe.
McKay was outraged. "No! No way! There's no way he could, not from inside the-" and then, without pausing, "that rat-fucking, code-hacking bastard!"
"So it's possible?" Rodney pressed, needing the information.
"No, it's not possible, but it's John, so anything's possible." McKay pinched the bridge of his nose, and Rodney knew that headache from his own many, long days on Team Sheppard. "He shouldn't have been able to do this kind of damage; he doesn't have the privileges. I deliberately locked his base code down to root after he tried to give himself wings [Another fandom in-joke and also so John. *glee*] and corrupted himself so badly I-" and Rodney winced again as he remembered John coolly handing him McKay's tablet and getting him to unlock it. "You're him," John had said, "so it should work for you-"
"I, uh, may have inadvertently given him access to-" and ow, Jesus, ow. McKay was beating him about the head, and Rodney yelped, "It's not my fault! He tricked me, gave me your-! It's not my fault you and I are genetically identical-"
"You could have locked it again!" McKay said, taking another swipe at his head.
"You could have set it to self-lock!" and Rodney frantically batted McKay's hands away with both of his. "Don't blame me for your lousy security!"
"Oh, yes: how could I have not built in a firewall against alternate timeline past versions of myself? What was I-okay, wait, look: this is pointless." McKay rubbed his gray-stubbled cheeks. "You're telling me John had root access. Which means he did this on purpose. Rigged up a self-destruct: destroyed everything." McKay smiled bleakly and said: "Shocking, I know, and totally unlike him, but..."
"You don't know that," Rodney objected. "He might have made a mistake, you said-"
"This isn't a mistake; it's a wipe. Deliberate," McKay said tiredly. "Besides, I...I should have known this would happen. He's been wanting me out. Wanting to end it, I guess-"
It was weird to hear that negative voice outside his own head. "-to protect you, you idiot; he was afraid for you. He-" In his head, Virtual John slammed the refrigerator door and said, It's not fair to him. He's alive!, and Rodney abruptly remembered the conclusion he'd come to in the VE. "I think he was in love with you," he said.
"He's not," McKay said with surprising viciousness. "He can't be; he's not real-"
"He's real," Rodney said, and tugged McKay to his feet. "And he's John Sheppard, which means he's a cagey, manipulative bastard under all that hair gel, so let's find out exactly what he did."
On to part 5 (the last)!