Fic - It's a WIP so it doesn't even have a title [SGA]
Title: WIP of Sudden onset Wings
Author: Zoe
Fandom: SGA
Pairing: Eventual McShep
Status of WIP: weeeellllll It's been languishing for a while. I need to finish my vampire!John story first and I always have this story in my mind. I don't know if I ever will finish it but it's a pining!John story where DADT has just been repealed and he doesn't just declare his love suddenly. He's John. He.... kind of keeps quietly pining. Until he can't any longer! lol. So I'm using a Fannish Advent as a sort of Amnesty Posting! I was going to post part of my vamp!John story but it's got a long build up and I wasn't sure what part to snip out.
I originally started this story from the prompt "Wings, Sudden Onset" and instead of giving one person wings, I wanted to give all of SGA-1 wings. In my head, I want to call this story Icarus Wept, but I don't know if it will fit until I finish it!
Seeing the science team he’d accompanied to PX5-676 trying to eat their meal in the mess hall, John thought SGA-1 had gotten out pretty lucky.
Apparently the science team couldn’t quite got the hang of eating with their clawed, hoofed, and taloned hands.
He’d detailed what happened in his brief to Woolsey and to Keller in the infirmary. John remembered Rodney tearing a strip a mile wide off one of the bio-chemists for leaning against one of the newly re-routed and slightly unstable (”Are you deaf or just moronic? I said ‘Don’t touch anything’ and you had to use an Ancient console for a hip rest and now for all we know, we’re about to find out how painful it is to be vaporized on a molecular level, so the next time I tell you not to touch anything, I mean ‘don’t fucking touch anything’ and leave the slouching and the leaning to the Colonel’s lanky spine which has far more experience leaning and slouching on things’) consoles Rodney had just re-routed. While McKay was fixated on figuring out where the power surge was likely to bleed out to, the bio-chemist had slowly backed away, step by step, toward the relative safety of his comrades.
So when the Ancient transmorgifier had gone apeshit, the bio-chemist, Kortovsky, ended up like the rest of civilian scientists who had been huddled against one of the corners - genetic mutation of the hands. There was one set of lobster claws, one set of goat hooves, one set of chicken feet, and poor Dr. Stellen ended up with one hand sporting eagle talons and the other with a webbed duck foot.
Being at a different blast radius had left SGA-1 with slightly different problems.
Wings.
Ronon’s wings were totally kick ass. Webbed like bat wings, they stretched out underneath his arms, the soft, slightly rubbery material running from his wrists to his waist. They had sharp pointed edges and were a dull brown grey. Of course, Ronon, being Ronon, wore his new wings like they weren’t completely out of the ordinary and totally freaktastic. No one had said a word about them, not since one of the marines had called him Batman. One of the appendages had whipped out and clocked him soundly in the face, splitting his lip. Ronon had smirked.
“Too bad I can’t control them yet,” he said in his low voice.
And that was the end of that.
He was already back in the gym, teaching combat training lessons and using his wings to knock the shit out of people. He claimed it was just another lesson in how they couldn’t anticipate what they would run into out there, but he told John after one session that mostly he just liked the way they caught the wind when he swung his arm.
Teyla had soft, mottled moth wings that gently swept out from her shoulder blades down to the small of her back. They were patterned intricately with browns, yellows and moss greens blending together gracefully. They folded down like two fans on either side of her spine and made a soft ‘whup’ sound when she flicked them open and shut. She could fan them slowly and create a breeze around her that blew her hair gently. They moved of their own accord during bantos rod practice, fanning out and flapping quietly before pulling up tight against her body when she turned to keep them safe.
For John, Keller deferred to the zoology department, given they didn’t have an Ornithologist in Atlantis, and near as they could figure, John had hummingbird wings. They were small and black, hugged close to his body, and they would vibrate without conscious thought, moving so fast that they couldn't be seen. After two days, he was used to the low level hum they produced when flapping and hardly gave it a second thought. They started just at his shoulder blades and ended before his waist. Stretched out, they barely reached to his elbows. He tried to get a good look at them in the mirror but gave up once he realized they were lamely similar to his hair - dark, spiky and completely unmanageable. Not even the product that he swore he didn’t use in his hair worked to tame the stray feathers that popped up at awkward angles, jutting out in all directions.
“Ow, McKay! Watch it!”
John looked up and saw Rodney working his way through the mess line, pointedly rolling his eyes at the marine behind him that was rubbing his jaw.
“I told you to stay out of their way. They’re six feet high, it’s not like you can miss them.”
“You just punched me in the face with it!”
Another eye roll. “They’re made of feathers. I thought you marines were supposed to be rough and tumble kind of guys. Suck it up, buttercup.” Rodney tightened his grip on his tray and began making his way through the mess hall.
Rodney’s wings measured eight feet in wingspan and even when he tried to pull them in, as he was doing now, they were still massive. Large, dense and powerful, Rodney had a tough time navigating the tight corners of the mess hall with all its tables and people. John watched as Rodney’s wings crept up inches higher, like they were shoulders Rodney was shrugging. The tips of them dragged on the ground and loose feathers would occasionally be coaxed out from the masses and be left on the floor. Rodney also appeared to have some kind of downy under-layer that also worked its way loose and trailed behind him.
John said ‘appeared’ because Rodney was very shy about his wings.
Keller had said ‘belligerent’. The zoology department said ‘hostile.’ Zelenka said it was plain out and out warmongering.
But John still preferred to think of it as shy.
Rodney stopped where he was, about halfway to John and canted his chin onerously. “I can feel you touching them. They’re attached to my back you morons.” He turned around to give the offending scientist an earful, smacking another marine in the face with the broad shoulder of one of the wings.
“They are not for public consumption. They are not for your amusement. I am not some sort of strange teddy bear substitute for your under developed and overly addled brain. Is it that they are new or do you frequently grope people you don’t know because if that’s the case I suggest you find a participant who’s more willing and leave my wings alone.”
John watched as one brave marine was tentatively reaching his hand out to stroke the feathers just as McKay finished his small rant against the scientist.
“Touch them and you’ll be pulling back a bloody stump,” Rodney warned without looking over. The marine pulled his hand back slowly and John tried not to laugh.
Rodney’s wings really were fascinating. (inspiration for Rodney's wings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bengalese_Eagle_Owl.jpg)
Soft cream, browny orange and white intermingled with black spikes made John think of Halloween.
And they looked so soft. Even from a distance, they were begging to be touched. John knew his own feathers were nice, especially when you ran your finger with the grain but Rodney’s feathers… They looked like a down comforter wrapped around the scientist.
Rodney was still grumbling as he finally made his way over to John’s table.
“… grabby proletariat.” He set his tray down with a thunk. “The next time someone touches me I’m filing a complaint. Either that or feeding them into the matter converter chambers.”
“I thought those weren’t working yet.”
“They aren’t. With any luck, it will disperse their unwashed atoms across the mainland. Should at least be good for fertilizing the crops.” Rodney paused and stared over John’s shoulder. “Your wings are vibrating.”
“Huh?” John glanced over quickly and with a conscious thought stilled them. “Oh, they do that.”
Rodney pulled out a chair and carefully adjusted his wings so that they would drape up and over the chair as he sat down. He had to fold them in slightly and then fan them back out again. Once seated, the bottom ends came forward and around his legs, keeping them close to his body and out of the aisles.
Rodney eyeballed him. “At least you can get yours through a shirt. I have to jerry rig clothes.” He gestured with flappy hands at the toga-cum-wrap-cum shirt he was wearing. He’d managed to use some kind of white sheet and wrap it around his torso and wings so that all the skin of his chest was covered, but his arms were still free.
It was sort of a cross between mummy bandages and a straight-jacket.
John shrugged. “You could go shirtless, like Ronon.”
Rodney’s blue eyes leveled with John’s innocent gaze.
“What?” John said. “You’ve been going off-world for years now. You’re fitter than most scientists. So you’re a little pale…”
“I’ve very sensitive skin and some of us don’t tan like you do. I burn, I peel, the cycle repeats. In forty years when they’re cutting off half of your carcinogenic skin, you’ll be wishing you’d used my sunscreen.”
John waved his fork around in a ‘yeah-yeah-yeah’ motion. If he was alive in forty years, any condition he would be in would be a hell of a lot better than dead. “I’m just saying if the sarong-”
“It’s not a sarong.”
“- isn’t comfortable, just go shirtless.”
“What a fantastic idea, Colonel. I can parade about Atlantis without my clothes. The sight of the chief scientist walking around half naked is sure to instill respect and a healthy amount of fear in my underlings. I should have no trouble at all keeping their projects inline and on-time as soon as they see my manly chest.”
John wasn’t sure about the scientists, but the sight of Rodney’s bare chest would motivate him some.
DADT may be no more, but a lifetime of repression and denial was still an essential part of John Sheppard’s makeup. Unlike the government, John couldn’t simply change his mind about how to act. When word first came down about DADT, his original reaction was relief: No more hiding. But that quickly gave away to apprehension and then frustration. The regs had changed, but he hadn’t. He was used to hiding who he was and how he felt, keeping what he wanted at arms length and it didn’t all suddenly change because someone had signed a paper a whole galaxy away.
It was like being trapped inside a house your whole life, and then someone came along and threw open all the doors and windows. Sure, you could go outside now, but you never had and you didn’t exactly know how.
And maybe, outside seemed like it might be a little bit of a scary place to be, although you’d never admit that.
John watched Rodney shovel food into his mouth methodically. It was quick and efficient and so Rodney that it made him smile. Even if he never said anything to Rodney, even if he never said anything to anyone, in this moment, watching Rodney rant about the morons in his department, listening to him wax poetic about how much he loved eggs on toast, and seeing people try to duck and avoid his new wings when the jerked around with fervor and excitement, John thought he might be… happy.
“How do you stand that humming sound?”
“What?” John asked, somewhat startled out of his thoughts.
Rodney waved fork toward John’s wings, which were again vibrating madly, faster than the eye could see. They slowed down as John thought about them.
“I don’t hear it anymore,” John answered with a shrug.
“Well, with any luck, I won’t have to hear it anymore either. Zelenka and I have already been discussing the machine and we’ve got a good idea of where to start when we head back there today.”
“Find anything in the database?”
Rodney’s wings jerked upright. “When have we ever found anything we needed in the database?”
“Point taken.”
His wings started to twitch slightly and John found that even though he was listening to Rodney, he was distracted by the way Rodney’s wings moved.
“But with my considerable assets working on the project, I’m confident that we’ll have a solution.”
Watching Rodney’s wings, John realized something. “You’re nervous about it.”
Rodney’s wings shivered slightly. “I am not.” He forked a few large mouthfuls in and chewed quickly. “I’ve got to get back to the lab and pack up my gear for today.”
John watched him make his way out of the messhall, clipping a few people on the shoulders and feet with his wings and slapping the hands of an over-eager zoologist.
“If we could just get you in the x-ray machine, Dr. McKay,” she began.
“No, no and let me see, no. I submitted to a medical exam for my health, but I will not be poked and prodded by you zookeepers.”
“But your wings aren’t like any thing we’ve seen on earth, they must be from a species here in Pegasus that we’ve not seen yet.”
“Hmm. Let me think about it,” Rodney said quickly and waited for the hope to spring up in her eyes before he continued. “And no. Go run your monkey experiments on someone else.”
“Everyone else has submitted to the x-rays and MRI already.”
“Bully for them. The answer’s still no.”
John thought that when Rodney’s wing hit her in the face with a light ‘whap’ when he turned and left, it wasn’t just by accident this time.
***
“The plant people reported intriguing readings on M34-T6Y.”
John looked up from the data pad that Rodney had dropped with a clatter on the table.
“The plant people?”
Rodney waved his hand. “That one with the blond hair and that other one, with the nose.”
John frowned for a moment. “Are you talking about Drs. Parrish and Kitter?”
Rodney pointed his finger at him with a ‘bingo’ expression. “Yeah, them.” He settled down at the meeting table, taking a moment to adjust his wings. John noticed that they were upright and folded back slightly, like they were waiting for John to answer.
John was suddenly reminded of Bongo, the neighbor’s large mutt from when he was a child. You could tell a lot about Bongo by his ears. It was starting to look like Rodney’s wings are the same.
“I bet they’d love to know that you call them the plant people.”
“It’s not like they’re real doctors.”
“Pretty sure the Botany Department has something to say about that.”
Rodney shrugged. “Then let them say it and go back to eating leaves. Listen, the point is, they’ve been on that planet for a week and they’re further into the forest now and some readings are popping up. Intriguing readings.” Rodney’s wings gave a little shimmy.
“Intriguing readings,” John repeated, picking up the datapad. “I heard you the first time. How intriguing.”
“Ancient outpost intriguing.” The wings vibrated. “We should go.”
“Yeah, in case you forgot, we’ve been grounded until you and Zelenka figure out how to de-wing us. How’s that going by the way?”
Rodney gave an exasperated grunt and slumped in his chair, his wings following suit, the long line of them spanning out in a depressed arc. “Zelenka can handle it. We should check out this other thing.”
Taking in the forlorn line of Rodney’s wings, John leaned forward slightly. “You’re voluntarily turning it over to Zelenka? Just last week you were complaining he was suffering from Czech alcoholic psychosis.”
“He probably is!” Rodney exclaimed, his wings rallying up for a moment. “But it’s just taking the console apart and checking connections and translating the database and I don’t have to be there for that.” Rodney eyed him earnestly, blue eyes boring into his.
John didn’t move and after a moment Rodney slumped again and muttered under his breath.
“What?” John asked, tipping his head forward slightly.
“I said I can’t help them because my wings don’t fit under the console and with a full science team in there, my wings… get in the way,” he finally grit out. “Happy?”
John eyeballs the wings which flattened backward, away from Rodney’s body, like angry dog ears. “They’re a force unto themselves, aren’t they?”
Rodney snatched the datapad back. “Yes, well we can’t all have perky fly-boy wings, can we?”
“My wings are not perky,” John defended. His decidedly non-perky wings start to vibrate with outrage.
Rodney shrugged nonchalantly. “If the feather fits…”
“Fine. You wanna go off-world and find some other old decrepit ancient outpost where I’m sure we’ll finally find device that, for no known reason, sucks our brains out our noses and swaps them? Let’s go.”
Rodney completely ignored John’s sarcastic tone and beams. “Excellent. I’ll get us on the gate schedule for tomorrow.”
***
John wondered if he can simply write up his report as:
Ancient Outposts: 2, SGA-1: 0
At least no one got saddled with any genetically modified appendages this go round, but it’s hell getting the tar-like mud out of his wings. With a thought, the showerhead starts pelting hot water at the delicate appendages and finally the combined pressure and increased temperature seems to be loosening the gunk. Clots of brown and dark green thwock onto the tile below. John wrinkled his nose at them.
If there was anyone on Atlantis that thought being the military leader is glamorous, he’ll show them the sludge that was currently slip-sliding out of his wings.
His wings for crying out loud.
He ducked his head under the spray and worked on the chunks of goop there.
They’d already confirmed the planet didn’t have any sentient life, so they didn’t worry about frantic natives seeing their new appendages and shrieking for the Pegasus equivalent of exorcisms. Frankly, as soon as they stepped through the wormhole and onto the other planet, John had breathed a sigh of relief. They’d been cooped up on Atlantis deciding that first contact missions were too risky with their entire team sprouting wings and it was good to be out in the galaxy again.
They were all wearing slightly modified gear, since no one had been able to get the standard tac-vests over their wings. Ronon settled for double thigh holsters and some kind of belt that Rodney’s eyes had lit up upon seeing.
“He’s got a utility belt,” Rodney hissed as he slung his makeshift backpack over his chest.
“Down boy,” John said. “One of the marines already called him Batman and it didn’t go over well.”
“But utility belt,” Rodney repeated, bouncing on his toes, wings fluttering around his shoulders. “Do you think he’d hit me if I called him der fledermaus?”
John laughed. “I think the gate translator will just sub in ‘Batman’ and we’ll be back at square one.”
Rodney’s wings slumped. “Oh. Right.” He pulled his tablet out and started scanning the area for the energy readings the botanists had reported. “Here we go. Three kilometers into the forest that way.”
Rodney didn’t seem to notice it was his left wing that pointed for him.
Out of all of them, Rodney’s wings were the most anthropomorphic. Ronon’s were like him: silent, strong and slightly deadly. Similarly Teyla’s were graceful, unobtrusive and circumspect.
John’s were not perky. No matter what Rodney said. But his wings were slightly hyperactive and were a little too reminiscent of his hair for his liking.
Rodney’s wings were by far the most active. They moved when he talked - flickering around like his hands. When he thought, they hunched up over his shoulders, focused and intense. When he ranted they flattened down low and menacing, like a big cat getting ready to pounce. And when he was intrigued by readings on his tablet, they perched up high, like satellites taking in readings. John looked over and caught Teyla staring at Rodney’s wings fondly and when she glanced at John, they shared a smile.
Author: Zoe
Fandom: SGA
Pairing: Eventual McShep
Status of WIP: weeeellllll It's been languishing for a while. I need to finish my vampire!John story first and I always have this story in my mind. I don't know if I ever will finish it but it's a pining!John story where DADT has just been repealed and he doesn't just declare his love suddenly. He's John. He.... kind of keeps quietly pining. Until he can't any longer! lol. So I'm using a Fannish Advent as a sort of Amnesty Posting! I was going to post part of my vamp!John story but it's got a long build up and I wasn't sure what part to snip out.
I originally started this story from the prompt "Wings, Sudden Onset" and instead of giving one person wings, I wanted to give all of SGA-1 wings. In my head, I want to call this story Icarus Wept, but I don't know if it will fit until I finish it!
Seeing the science team he’d accompanied to PX5-676 trying to eat their meal in the mess hall, John thought SGA-1 had gotten out pretty lucky.
Apparently the science team couldn’t quite got the hang of eating with their clawed, hoofed, and taloned hands.
He’d detailed what happened in his brief to Woolsey and to Keller in the infirmary. John remembered Rodney tearing a strip a mile wide off one of the bio-chemists for leaning against one of the newly re-routed and slightly unstable (”Are you deaf or just moronic? I said ‘Don’t touch anything’ and you had to use an Ancient console for a hip rest and now for all we know, we’re about to find out how painful it is to be vaporized on a molecular level, so the next time I tell you not to touch anything, I mean ‘don’t fucking touch anything’ and leave the slouching and the leaning to the Colonel’s lanky spine which has far more experience leaning and slouching on things’) consoles Rodney had just re-routed. While McKay was fixated on figuring out where the power surge was likely to bleed out to, the bio-chemist had slowly backed away, step by step, toward the relative safety of his comrades.
So when the Ancient transmorgifier had gone apeshit, the bio-chemist, Kortovsky, ended up like the rest of civilian scientists who had been huddled against one of the corners - genetic mutation of the hands. There was one set of lobster claws, one set of goat hooves, one set of chicken feet, and poor Dr. Stellen ended up with one hand sporting eagle talons and the other with a webbed duck foot.
Being at a different blast radius had left SGA-1 with slightly different problems.
Wings.
Ronon’s wings were totally kick ass. Webbed like bat wings, they stretched out underneath his arms, the soft, slightly rubbery material running from his wrists to his waist. They had sharp pointed edges and were a dull brown grey. Of course, Ronon, being Ronon, wore his new wings like they weren’t completely out of the ordinary and totally freaktastic. No one had said a word about them, not since one of the marines had called him Batman. One of the appendages had whipped out and clocked him soundly in the face, splitting his lip. Ronon had smirked.
“Too bad I can’t control them yet,” he said in his low voice.
And that was the end of that.
He was already back in the gym, teaching combat training lessons and using his wings to knock the shit out of people. He claimed it was just another lesson in how they couldn’t anticipate what they would run into out there, but he told John after one session that mostly he just liked the way they caught the wind when he swung his arm.
Teyla had soft, mottled moth wings that gently swept out from her shoulder blades down to the small of her back. They were patterned intricately with browns, yellows and moss greens blending together gracefully. They folded down like two fans on either side of her spine and made a soft ‘whup’ sound when she flicked them open and shut. She could fan them slowly and create a breeze around her that blew her hair gently. They moved of their own accord during bantos rod practice, fanning out and flapping quietly before pulling up tight against her body when she turned to keep them safe.
For John, Keller deferred to the zoology department, given they didn’t have an Ornithologist in Atlantis, and near as they could figure, John had hummingbird wings. They were small and black, hugged close to his body, and they would vibrate without conscious thought, moving so fast that they couldn't be seen. After two days, he was used to the low level hum they produced when flapping and hardly gave it a second thought. They started just at his shoulder blades and ended before his waist. Stretched out, they barely reached to his elbows. He tried to get a good look at them in the mirror but gave up once he realized they were lamely similar to his hair - dark, spiky and completely unmanageable. Not even the product that he swore he didn’t use in his hair worked to tame the stray feathers that popped up at awkward angles, jutting out in all directions.
“Ow, McKay! Watch it!”
John looked up and saw Rodney working his way through the mess line, pointedly rolling his eyes at the marine behind him that was rubbing his jaw.
“I told you to stay out of their way. They’re six feet high, it’s not like you can miss them.”
“You just punched me in the face with it!”
Another eye roll. “They’re made of feathers. I thought you marines were supposed to be rough and tumble kind of guys. Suck it up, buttercup.” Rodney tightened his grip on his tray and began making his way through the mess hall.
Rodney’s wings measured eight feet in wingspan and even when he tried to pull them in, as he was doing now, they were still massive. Large, dense and powerful, Rodney had a tough time navigating the tight corners of the mess hall with all its tables and people. John watched as Rodney’s wings crept up inches higher, like they were shoulders Rodney was shrugging. The tips of them dragged on the ground and loose feathers would occasionally be coaxed out from the masses and be left on the floor. Rodney also appeared to have some kind of downy under-layer that also worked its way loose and trailed behind him.
John said ‘appeared’ because Rodney was very shy about his wings.
Keller had said ‘belligerent’. The zoology department said ‘hostile.’ Zelenka said it was plain out and out warmongering.
But John still preferred to think of it as shy.
Rodney stopped where he was, about halfway to John and canted his chin onerously. “I can feel you touching them. They’re attached to my back you morons.” He turned around to give the offending scientist an earful, smacking another marine in the face with the broad shoulder of one of the wings.
“They are not for public consumption. They are not for your amusement. I am not some sort of strange teddy bear substitute for your under developed and overly addled brain. Is it that they are new or do you frequently grope people you don’t know because if that’s the case I suggest you find a participant who’s more willing and leave my wings alone.”
John watched as one brave marine was tentatively reaching his hand out to stroke the feathers just as McKay finished his small rant against the scientist.
“Touch them and you’ll be pulling back a bloody stump,” Rodney warned without looking over. The marine pulled his hand back slowly and John tried not to laugh.
Rodney’s wings really were fascinating. (inspiration for Rodney's wings http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bengalese_Eagle_Owl.jpg)
Soft cream, browny orange and white intermingled with black spikes made John think of Halloween.
And they looked so soft. Even from a distance, they were begging to be touched. John knew his own feathers were nice, especially when you ran your finger with the grain but Rodney’s feathers… They looked like a down comforter wrapped around the scientist.
Rodney was still grumbling as he finally made his way over to John’s table.
“… grabby proletariat.” He set his tray down with a thunk. “The next time someone touches me I’m filing a complaint. Either that or feeding them into the matter converter chambers.”
“I thought those weren’t working yet.”
“They aren’t. With any luck, it will disperse their unwashed atoms across the mainland. Should at least be good for fertilizing the crops.” Rodney paused and stared over John’s shoulder. “Your wings are vibrating.”
“Huh?” John glanced over quickly and with a conscious thought stilled them. “Oh, they do that.”
Rodney pulled out a chair and carefully adjusted his wings so that they would drape up and over the chair as he sat down. He had to fold them in slightly and then fan them back out again. Once seated, the bottom ends came forward and around his legs, keeping them close to his body and out of the aisles.
Rodney eyeballed him. “At least you can get yours through a shirt. I have to jerry rig clothes.” He gestured with flappy hands at the toga-cum-wrap-cum shirt he was wearing. He’d managed to use some kind of white sheet and wrap it around his torso and wings so that all the skin of his chest was covered, but his arms were still free.
It was sort of a cross between mummy bandages and a straight-jacket.
John shrugged. “You could go shirtless, like Ronon.”
Rodney’s blue eyes leveled with John’s innocent gaze.
“What?” John said. “You’ve been going off-world for years now. You’re fitter than most scientists. So you’re a little pale…”
“I’ve very sensitive skin and some of us don’t tan like you do. I burn, I peel, the cycle repeats. In forty years when they’re cutting off half of your carcinogenic skin, you’ll be wishing you’d used my sunscreen.”
John waved his fork around in a ‘yeah-yeah-yeah’ motion. If he was alive in forty years, any condition he would be in would be a hell of a lot better than dead. “I’m just saying if the sarong-”
“It’s not a sarong.”
“- isn’t comfortable, just go shirtless.”
“What a fantastic idea, Colonel. I can parade about Atlantis without my clothes. The sight of the chief scientist walking around half naked is sure to instill respect and a healthy amount of fear in my underlings. I should have no trouble at all keeping their projects inline and on-time as soon as they see my manly chest.”
John wasn’t sure about the scientists, but the sight of Rodney’s bare chest would motivate him some.
DADT may be no more, but a lifetime of repression and denial was still an essential part of John Sheppard’s makeup. Unlike the government, John couldn’t simply change his mind about how to act. When word first came down about DADT, his original reaction was relief: No more hiding. But that quickly gave away to apprehension and then frustration. The regs had changed, but he hadn’t. He was used to hiding who he was and how he felt, keeping what he wanted at arms length and it didn’t all suddenly change because someone had signed a paper a whole galaxy away.
It was like being trapped inside a house your whole life, and then someone came along and threw open all the doors and windows. Sure, you could go outside now, but you never had and you didn’t exactly know how.
And maybe, outside seemed like it might be a little bit of a scary place to be, although you’d never admit that.
John watched Rodney shovel food into his mouth methodically. It was quick and efficient and so Rodney that it made him smile. Even if he never said anything to Rodney, even if he never said anything to anyone, in this moment, watching Rodney rant about the morons in his department, listening to him wax poetic about how much he loved eggs on toast, and seeing people try to duck and avoid his new wings when the jerked around with fervor and excitement, John thought he might be… happy.
“How do you stand that humming sound?”
“What?” John asked, somewhat startled out of his thoughts.
Rodney waved fork toward John’s wings, which were again vibrating madly, faster than the eye could see. They slowed down as John thought about them.
“I don’t hear it anymore,” John answered with a shrug.
“Well, with any luck, I won’t have to hear it anymore either. Zelenka and I have already been discussing the machine and we’ve got a good idea of where to start when we head back there today.”
“Find anything in the database?”
Rodney’s wings jerked upright. “When have we ever found anything we needed in the database?”
“Point taken.”
His wings started to twitch slightly and John found that even though he was listening to Rodney, he was distracted by the way Rodney’s wings moved.
“But with my considerable assets working on the project, I’m confident that we’ll have a solution.”
Watching Rodney’s wings, John realized something. “You’re nervous about it.”
Rodney’s wings shivered slightly. “I am not.” He forked a few large mouthfuls in and chewed quickly. “I’ve got to get back to the lab and pack up my gear for today.”
John watched him make his way out of the messhall, clipping a few people on the shoulders and feet with his wings and slapping the hands of an over-eager zoologist.
“If we could just get you in the x-ray machine, Dr. McKay,” she began.
“No, no and let me see, no. I submitted to a medical exam for my health, but I will not be poked and prodded by you zookeepers.”
“But your wings aren’t like any thing we’ve seen on earth, they must be from a species here in Pegasus that we’ve not seen yet.”
“Hmm. Let me think about it,” Rodney said quickly and waited for the hope to spring up in her eyes before he continued. “And no. Go run your monkey experiments on someone else.”
“Everyone else has submitted to the x-rays and MRI already.”
“Bully for them. The answer’s still no.”
John thought that when Rodney’s wing hit her in the face with a light ‘whap’ when he turned and left, it wasn’t just by accident this time.
***
“The plant people reported intriguing readings on M34-T6Y.”
John looked up from the data pad that Rodney had dropped with a clatter on the table.
“The plant people?”
Rodney waved his hand. “That one with the blond hair and that other one, with the nose.”
John frowned for a moment. “Are you talking about Drs. Parrish and Kitter?”
Rodney pointed his finger at him with a ‘bingo’ expression. “Yeah, them.” He settled down at the meeting table, taking a moment to adjust his wings. John noticed that they were upright and folded back slightly, like they were waiting for John to answer.
John was suddenly reminded of Bongo, the neighbor’s large mutt from when he was a child. You could tell a lot about Bongo by his ears. It was starting to look like Rodney’s wings are the same.
“I bet they’d love to know that you call them the plant people.”
“It’s not like they’re real doctors.”
“Pretty sure the Botany Department has something to say about that.”
Rodney shrugged. “Then let them say it and go back to eating leaves. Listen, the point is, they’ve been on that planet for a week and they’re further into the forest now and some readings are popping up. Intriguing readings.” Rodney’s wings gave a little shimmy.
“Intriguing readings,” John repeated, picking up the datapad. “I heard you the first time. How intriguing.”
“Ancient outpost intriguing.” The wings vibrated. “We should go.”
“Yeah, in case you forgot, we’ve been grounded until you and Zelenka figure out how to de-wing us. How’s that going by the way?”
Rodney gave an exasperated grunt and slumped in his chair, his wings following suit, the long line of them spanning out in a depressed arc. “Zelenka can handle it. We should check out this other thing.”
Taking in the forlorn line of Rodney’s wings, John leaned forward slightly. “You’re voluntarily turning it over to Zelenka? Just last week you were complaining he was suffering from Czech alcoholic psychosis.”
“He probably is!” Rodney exclaimed, his wings rallying up for a moment. “But it’s just taking the console apart and checking connections and translating the database and I don’t have to be there for that.” Rodney eyed him earnestly, blue eyes boring into his.
John didn’t move and after a moment Rodney slumped again and muttered under his breath.
“What?” John asked, tipping his head forward slightly.
“I said I can’t help them because my wings don’t fit under the console and with a full science team in there, my wings… get in the way,” he finally grit out. “Happy?”
John eyeballs the wings which flattened backward, away from Rodney’s body, like angry dog ears. “They’re a force unto themselves, aren’t they?”
Rodney snatched the datapad back. “Yes, well we can’t all have perky fly-boy wings, can we?”
“My wings are not perky,” John defended. His decidedly non-perky wings start to vibrate with outrage.
Rodney shrugged nonchalantly. “If the feather fits…”
“Fine. You wanna go off-world and find some other old decrepit ancient outpost where I’m sure we’ll finally find device that, for no known reason, sucks our brains out our noses and swaps them? Let’s go.”
Rodney completely ignored John’s sarcastic tone and beams. “Excellent. I’ll get us on the gate schedule for tomorrow.”
***
John wondered if he can simply write up his report as:
Ancient Outposts: 2, SGA-1: 0
At least no one got saddled with any genetically modified appendages this go round, but it’s hell getting the tar-like mud out of his wings. With a thought, the showerhead starts pelting hot water at the delicate appendages and finally the combined pressure and increased temperature seems to be loosening the gunk. Clots of brown and dark green thwock onto the tile below. John wrinkled his nose at them.
If there was anyone on Atlantis that thought being the military leader is glamorous, he’ll show them the sludge that was currently slip-sliding out of his wings.
His wings for crying out loud.
He ducked his head under the spray and worked on the chunks of goop there.
They’d already confirmed the planet didn’t have any sentient life, so they didn’t worry about frantic natives seeing their new appendages and shrieking for the Pegasus equivalent of exorcisms. Frankly, as soon as they stepped through the wormhole and onto the other planet, John had breathed a sigh of relief. They’d been cooped up on Atlantis deciding that first contact missions were too risky with their entire team sprouting wings and it was good to be out in the galaxy again.
They were all wearing slightly modified gear, since no one had been able to get the standard tac-vests over their wings. Ronon settled for double thigh holsters and some kind of belt that Rodney’s eyes had lit up upon seeing.
“He’s got a utility belt,” Rodney hissed as he slung his makeshift backpack over his chest.
“Down boy,” John said. “One of the marines already called him Batman and it didn’t go over well.”
“But utility belt,” Rodney repeated, bouncing on his toes, wings fluttering around his shoulders. “Do you think he’d hit me if I called him der fledermaus?”
John laughed. “I think the gate translator will just sub in ‘Batman’ and we’ll be back at square one.”
Rodney’s wings slumped. “Oh. Right.” He pulled his tablet out and started scanning the area for the energy readings the botanists had reported. “Here we go. Three kilometers into the forest that way.”
Rodney didn’t seem to notice it was his left wing that pointed for him.
Out of all of them, Rodney’s wings were the most anthropomorphic. Ronon’s were like him: silent, strong and slightly deadly. Similarly Teyla’s were graceful, unobtrusive and circumspect.
John’s were not perky. No matter what Rodney said. But his wings were slightly hyperactive and were a little too reminiscent of his hair for his liking.
Rodney’s wings were by far the most active. They moved when he talked - flickering around like his hands. When he thought, they hunched up over his shoulders, focused and intense. When he ranted they flattened down low and menacing, like a big cat getting ready to pounce. And when he was intrigued by readings on his tablet, they perched up high, like satellites taking in readings. John looked over and caught Teyla staring at Rodney’s wings fondly and when she glanced at John, they shared a smile.