SG1/SGA fic: The Cheese Stands Alone (gen Vala, Teyla)
Title: The Cheese Stands Alone
Fandom: SGA/SG1
Pairing: gen, Vala/Teyla plus (SGA) team
Rating: PG-13
Words: 2882
Summary: There is one basketball in Atlantis. And then there's Vala.
Notes: Written for purple_cube in the sg1sga_ficathon . Set in some magical pre-season four universe where Vala just happens to be in Atlantis for absolutely no reason.
Pegasus was a galaxy neither the Goa'uld nor the Ori had any part in.
It was a concept that Vala found endlessly fascinating. That, and the fact that no matter where in the universe humans wound up, there always seemed to be someone scarier and more powerful looking to make trouble.
As if humans didn't make enough trouble for themselves, all on their own.
Still, Vala found life in Atlantis to be rather to her liking. Especially once the Ancient gene settled in to stay.
"I think the important thing to remember," she said, after the fumes had cleared, "Is that I didn't mean to set anything on fire."
"I think you need to find something to do," Elizabeth suggested. Only it was the sort of suggestion that wasn't really a suggestion at all. "Something productive."
"Right," she replied, backing out the door. The first rule of fire-starting: leave the scene of the crime as quickly as possible. "Yes. I'll get right on that."
The very next day, in fact, she talked one of the soldier boys into showing her how to fly a puddle jumper. It didn't take very long - much easier than piloting a Tel'tak. But then she discovered that, regardless of how well she could do it, no one was actually going to let her fly anywhere.
Of course, after the slight fire incident, no one would let her join one of the groups systematically exploring the furthest reaches of the city, either. So at that point, she decided to see if the Ancient research division needed any help - she'd had a fair bit of experience with Ancient things, after all. But there was too much reading and not nearly enough searching for hidden treasure troves for her to really be of any use.
This, incidentally, was something everyone involved could agree upon, and after being unceremoniously evicted from the research lab, she wandered despondently for a while, eventually making her way to the dining hall.
She was bored, and she missed her team. She was a little hungry, too. But mostly, she missed her team.
And there, of course, was her answer.
"No," Sheppard said. He offered her a smile. "Sorry."
She twirled the end of her pigtail around a finger and looked at the other two. "Is that unanimous?"
"I don't mind," Ronon said with a shrug, and gave her the kind of grin that was always so attractive on a man who was, well, extremely attractive to start with.
"Oh, I like him," she said to no one in particular.
At that, the third man at the table sat forward over his tray. "And just what, exactly, would you bring to the team? Any special skills, areas of expertise?"
"You mean, besides my considerable charm and good looks?"
The problem was, none of them seemed to take her suggestion very seriously. Nor did they apparently think 'thievery' was a valid area of expertise.
One out of three wasn't bad, though - she made sure to wink at the large one as she left - and besides, it was a four-person team.
For now.
But Teyla, she decided, was the key. Or, more accurately, her last resort.
Semantics - she'd never been much of one for them. Unless it suited her purposes, of course.
"So, you fight. With the sticks."
"If it is required."
"I've always found a zat gun handy, myself."
Teyla paused, holding the kind of stretch that made Vala wince. "And if you have no gun?"
"Run. Or cry. Wait till they get close enough and kick them in the - somewhere really painful."
"Unfortunately, the Wraith are not very susceptible to such measures."
"Oh. Run?"
"Yes, frequently." Smiling, Teyla added, "'Hand-to-hand', as Colonel Sheppard calls it, is to be avoided - in size and strength, we are at a disadvantage. But it is wise to be prepared."
"But it's more than that for you. It's beautiful, like a dance."
Teyla merely inclined her head the slightest degree in acknowledgement before moving through into another position.
Vala considered a moment longer. "Have you ever tried basketball?"
There was, it turned out, exactly one basketball in the entire city. But, Vala being, as always, very much herself, it didn't take her long to track it down. And then talk a nice woman named Katie into letting her borrow it.
"The Marines play rough," Katie said, hugging the ball against her chest, "They aren't allowed near it anymore."
"We'll be very gentle," Vala promised. "Maybe you'd care to join us?"
"Sorry," came the apology, "I'm working."
"That's what I'm trying to do," Vala muttered as she was leaving, prize in hand. If only people would let her.
"There are other teams," Teyla said, barely even breathing hard as she demonstrated the new dribbling skills she'd acquired with disturbing ease, "More accommodating of reassignments."
She didn't seem to be particularly enthusiastic about Vala's brilliant idea, either.
"I can't just be on any team." Attempting to grab the ball, she only succeeded in batting it over to the other side of the half-court that had been set up by Katie and the other regular players. Jogging over to retrieve it, she picked it up and turned back with a flourish. "I was on SG1. Which, apparently doesn't mean a lot here, but believe me, back where I come from, we were big."
"Are you not afraid this would be a step down?" Teyla arched an eyebrow. "From such a lofty posting as SG1."
"I'm remarkably versatile. If you like, you could think of it as me doing you a favour." She smiled winningly and threw the ball, watching as it arced majestically through the air and then hit the wall several arm-lengths from the hoop.
"You are very gracious," Teyla said, with a smile of her own - rather more wry but still, on the whole, quite winning.
The next day, Vala sighed as she stood at the top of the stairs. Below, Teyla and her team were leaving through the gate on their latest mission.
"I knew I should have brought my Kormac bracelets with me."
"'Kormac bracelets'?" Elizabeth, nearby, was also watching the team disembark.
Vala turned, smile wide and confident. "Goa'uld ceremonial artefacts, almost completely decorative in nature. Are you familiar with Nut, the Egyptian sky goddess?"
Elizabeth, proving that she was a lot smarter than one Daniel Jackson, ignored that entirely. "You know," she said, "The kitchen and maintenance staff can always use an extra set of hands."
"Oh," she adjusted her smile and went for earnest and convincing instead, "My talents go to waste working in the service industry."
Elizabeth's eyes narrowed. "And what, exactly, are these talents, again?"
Needless to say, Vala extracted herself from the conversation as quickly as possible. Why did people keep asking her that, anyway?
It hardly mattered - she had a plan. She knew what she was going to do, she only needed to work out a few of the particulars.
Four of those particulars returned through the gate several hours later, with much drama in the form of weapons fire ricocheting off the walls of the embarkation room.
Vala got there in time to see the shield come up and the wormhole shut off, and wisps of smoke rising from several scorch marks in the lovely Ancient decor. The medical team arrived as she watched, Sheppard and Ronon helping Teyla, who was favouring her leg, onto a gurney. She winced in sympathy. Alien galaxy or not, she would know the burn from an energy weapon anywhere.
If she'd been with them, she could have helped. This was her first thought, but for once chose not to express it out loud - just because she didn't often go in for tact, didn't mean she didn't have any.
She hovered outside the medical area, instead, waiting while Elizabeth and then the boys drifted out one by one, no doubt chased off by those ever-annoying medical personnel. This was something else she knew too well - infirmary, injury, keeping watch by a team mate's bedside.
Finally, the coast was clear.
"I think you need to work on that 'running' thing we discussed," she said once she found Teyla, who was sporting an attractive medical gown with one leg propped up under the sheet. And looking as serene about it as Vala was beginning to think she did everything.
"So it seems."
"But you -"
"Will be fine."
Or possibly not so serene after all. "Let me guess, they say you'll be fine, but are making you stay here anyway, when you'd be much more comfortable in your own room, and not even letting your friends stay to keep you company, while you sit here bored and perfectly fine."
Teyla dropped her head back against the pillow, looking rueful. "Their doctors are the same in any galaxy, I take it."
Lowering her voice, recognising an ally when she found one, she hissed, "It's not just the doctors! They have rules about the strangest things, don't they? I thought it might be different here, your leader is a woman and not one of these military people, either. But no, it's like they insist on making everything so much more complicated than it has to be."
"I think in this case," Teyla conceded, "It is simply that too many visitors may interfere with a patient's rest."
"Oh, was that - did you want me to go? Because I know I seem like the kind of person who can't take a hint, but actually I'm very -"
"So far, you are the only one brave enough to remain so long." She looked pointedly in the direction her previous visitors had disappeared. "You are welcome to stay."
"Then I will."
And she did. For the entire five minutes before a nurse came to check on Teyla, and then proved herself every bit as intimidating as her SGC counterparts. But, Vala reasoned, it was the thought that counted, everyone knew that.
Particularly when it involved setting things on fire.
A few more days passed, and Vala was seated at a table watching a small gathering over by the communal noticeboard, and smiling to herself in a self-satisfied fashion.
After a time, she was conveniently joined by Teyla - not that she'd been waiting for her or anything - who was walking almost normally again. She sat across from Vala with a mug of tea, and after sipping, said casually, "Someone has put up a notice for a basketball tournament."
Vala made an interested face. "Oh?"
"It appears someone has also signed our names to compete together."
"Actually," she admitted, "I did see that. Odd, isn't it? Someone signed Colonel Sheppard and Rodney up, too, which is a pity because, between you and me, I don't think they stand a chance."
Teyla was no longer hiding her amusement. "Shaming your potential team mates in a game of sport will not endear you to them."
"And that would be a pity. No, it's all right, I've had second thoughts about that, anyway."
Now it was Teyla's turn to make an interested face, but before she could ask, they were interrupted.
"Do I look like I play basketball? What were you thinking? Of course, the stupid thing I did there was putting the words 'thinking' and 'you' in the same sentence."
"I told you it wasn't me!"
"Oh, who else would it have been? Since when do you play basketball?"
"I don't. Which is probably why it wasn't me, Rodney."
Bickering, the two men hardly glanced at them as they joined them at the table.
"Or perhaps they will be perfectly happy shaming themselves," Teyla murmured, smiling behind her cup.
Bumping her shoulder against his, she broke into Rodney's monologue on the evils of organised sports. "I could teach you to play, if you like. It's easy. The idea is to get the ball through the metal ring."
But the only thing her attempt at being helpful got her was an extremely sarcastic response.
"Oh, thank you for that scintillating piece of information. Tell me, is it a little ball, or a big ball?"
She gave the question the consideration it deserved, pursing her lips thoughtfully. "Depends what you consider 'big', really."
He shifted slightly. "Yes, well, can we drop the subject of basketball now? I can think of five or six thousand things more relevant to -"
"Hey," Ronon dropped into a seat with a tray heaped high with food. "I need a partner for the basketball tournament." He looked at Sheppard. "You think Lorne would be up for it?"
"You!" Rodney sputtered. "Do you even know what basketball is?"
Ronon shrugged. "I can learn. Is it anything like golf?"
"You can have my place, play with Rodney. I don't do basketball," Sheppard said.
"And I do?"
Ronon's eyes slid over to Rodney and then back. "I think I'll ask Lorne."
"Oh that's very nice. Suddenly I'm back in ninth grade gym class."
Teyla leaned over a little to catch Vala's attention. "You are truly reconsidering becoming a part of this?"
"Only because I've had a better idea. It's a perfectly lovely team, otherwise."
"You don't want to be on our team anymore?" Sheppard actually sounded rather hurt.
She merely shrugged. "I've started to think I should just start my own team instead." Everyone just looked at her. Except Ronon, who was too busy eating. She shrugged. "What? You weren't really ever going to let me join, were you?"
Sheppard hesitated. "Hey, you know what, that's a great idea. I'm sure Elizabeth will really go for it."
Teyla gave him a look, before turning back to Vala. "And who will be the members of your team?"
"Katie Brown, to start with," she responded without missing a beat.
Rodney's head whipped around. "What?"
"Did you know she hardly ever gets to go to other planets? Doesn't seem very fair." That, and it might make up for enlisting the woman's sporting equipment in a competition - one that may or may not involve Marines - without actually consulting her first.
"She's a botanist!"
"She's a scientist. But you're right, I do need someone for the technical side of things, so I was thinking, you know, the strange little man with the hair?"
"Zelenka," Ronon supplied. Clearly, she thought, he was on board with her description.
"And we'll need a fourth, so, oh I don't know, him maybe?" She nodded towards a seemingly random individual passing by their table.
Teyla looked sceptical at this last addition. "Do you also not know his name?"
"No, but he's with the Marines, so he can handle a weapon. And I don't find him in the least attractive."
Sheppard coughed. "That's an interesting set of criteria."
"Well, we're not really supposed to have sex with our fellow team members, are we?"
She wasn't going to make that mistake twice.
"Would you want to?" Rodney blurted out.
She gave him the sort of appraising look a comment like that warranted. "I don't know, handsome, would I?" He sputtered a little, Sheppard giving him an incredulous look, and she took pity on him. "Anyway, as I see it, why set myself up for disappointment? It's always best to keep your options open."
No one seemed to know what to say after that. And then -
"I like her," Ronon said without looking up, and addressing the comment to no one in particular.
She beamed at him nonetheless. Another successful conquest.
The truth was, even if Elizabeth didn't go for her brilliant new idea - which, all things considered, was going to be a hard sell, not that she wasn't always up to that sort of challenge - even then, she didn't really need to be on this team, or any team. She knew what it was to be lonely, and this, right here, wasn't it.
The trouble with these people, these people from Earth and the aliens they adopted, was how easy it was getting used to having them, to care for and rely upon, to care and rely on you in return.
But if there was one thing she was good at, it was starting over.
"So, now that's settled," she nudged Teyla's foot with her own under the table, "Don't you think we should get in a little court-time, you and me, before everyone realises there's one ball in the whole city and we never see it again? If your leg is all right, of course."
Teyla set down her mug. "We will require much practice if we are to succeed," she said gravely. "Much."
Vala grinned saucily. "That's just what I was hoping you'd say."
And they rose as one and Vala linked their arms, and they walked away while the boys watched - which wasn't entirely the point, but that didn't mean she couldn't enjoy it.
Then, suddenly remembering something, she dashed back and leaned over the table towards Sheppard. "What was that man's name, again? You know, the unattractive one. Never mind," she backed away as his expression soured, "I'll find him myself later and ask. I'm sure he's got a wonderful personality!"
"Hey," she heard drifting after them as she rejoined Teyla. "Did she just say there's only one basketball in the city?"
"Oh, we are so going to lose..."