SGA FIC: What Happens On Atlantis (Is For Keeps)
Title: What Happens on Atlantis (Is For Keeps)
Fandom: SGA
Pairing: John/Rodney
Rating: NC-17
Summary: The "and then John and Rodney went home and worked things out and had sex" conclusion to my story What Happens On Telarus.
Notes: If you haven't read the other story, let me sum up: Aliens make them do it in a virtual reality extravaganza, only the VR gives them temporary amnesia so they don't realize they're them. Later when they get their memories back, it's very embarrassing. Then this story happens.
What Happens On Atlantis (Is For Keeps)
by Lenore
The jumper ride home was uncomfortably silent. The fact that this didn't come as any shock to Rodney made it no less annoying. His every attempt to clear the air with Sheppard was met with a death glare before he managed so much as, "I really think--" Even when he tried making casual conversation, relaying the sensor readings or observing that the nearby nebula was the same shape as Oklahoma, Sheppard continued to stare into the empty reaches of space, hands gripping the controls, as if they were fighting for their lives on a crowded freeway at rush hour.
"Fine, have it your way," Rodney grumpily conceded.
Only a three-hour trip back to Atlantis, and yet it was officially the longest jumper ride of his life.
After they landed Sheppard deigned to speak at last, "Look, let's just hit the high points in the briefing. No details, okay?"
Rodney did his best to look mortally offended, which was not much of a challenge. "Really, Colonel? Because I always look forward to an opportunity to tell my boss what a big hit I was as the impotent simpleton in alien-produced porn."
Sheppard flinched at the p-word. "Just so we understand each other."
He curtly took hold of two of the cases carrying the ZPMs, leaving the last for Rodney, and headed off to Elizabeth's office at a brisk military clip.
Rodney followed, disgruntled. Because, honestly, why was Sheppard acting so persecuted? They'd both been made fools of, and if you asked Rodney, being the hot sex god fool beat playing the fool fool any day. Plus, there was the little matter of the banquet to consider. Sure, Sheppard had suffered through as many impertinent questions, but at least he hadn't been fighting to protect his virtue the whole time. Merda might have been less snaggle-toothed in real life, but she was just as grabby.
Elizabeth was on her feet, looking cautiously optimistic, when they stepped into her office. "So how did it go?"
They set the cases down on her desk and opened them in answer, and the slightly crazy glint in Elizabeth's eyes made Rodney wonder if that was how he looked in the same circumstances. If so, he might be just a little afraid of himself.
Elizabeth's expression returned quickly enough to the levelheaded caution he was more used to seeing from her. "And what exactly did we have to promise in return for all this?"
"Oh, just to," Rodney flailed, "share our talents with them."
Elizabeth's forehead did that puckered worry thing.
Sheppard smoothly interjected, "Our acting talents. Their culture seems to be organized around storytelling, and having offworlders in their productions is like a big thrill for them."
"Big thrill," Rodney confirmed.
Then he flashed back to all the knowing stares directed his way at the banquet and promptly blushed.
He cleared his throat. "Um, that is to say, they didn't mind that we were amateurs."
But this only brought to mind raunchy Internet spam, naughty housewives share their secret seXXX tapes!!!, which really didn't help matters.
Sheppard shot him a look that practically screamed, just shut up already!
"Well," Elizabeth said uncertainly, "it sounds as if it was very-- interesting."
Sheppard nodded. "A real cross-cultural exchange. So, how about we go put these ZPM's to good use?"
He smiled at Rodney with such casual nonchalance, as if nothing had actually happened, that Rodney was beginning to feel unnerved by the sheer depths of Sheppard's ability to dissemble.
In fact, he was so busy sorting through all their various encounters over the years, looking for evidence that things might not have been as they appeared, that he didn't realize straight away that both Sheppard and Elizabeth were expecting him to answer. Finally, Sheppard elbowed him.
"Oh, uh-- yes! Of course. I'll, uh, get right on that." He was starting to sweat, he could feel it.
Sheppard took the initiative and closed up the ZPM cases and hustled Rodney out of the office. He didn't say a word all the way to the lab, but the way he walked was surly, at least this was Rodney's opinion.
He glared at Sheppard. "Oh, fine then, Colonel. Be pissed that I'm not the natural born liar that you apparently are. I plead guilty to having an honest nature."
Sheppard settled the ZPMs onto Rodney's workbench. "I don't want to talk about this ever again," he said under his breath.
Rodney waved his hand, distracted, the excitement of three fully charged ZPMs at his disposal sinking in at last. "I plan to forget all about it. In fact, I don't even remember why we're having this conversation."
Sheppard scrutinized him, and nodded, as if finally satisfied that Rodney wasn't an utter blabbing fool. "Well," he said, shifting his weight awkwardly, "I guess I'll see you later then."
"Yes, yes. Later." Rodney had already pulled out a piece of paper and was busy making a list of all the things he could do with his ZPMs. Then he had to prioritize it, and by the time he finally glanced up, Sheppard was long gone.
It was a little odd to him that the Colonel was taking the whole thing so hard. Freaking out was usually his territory. Still, he figured once they got back into their usual routine everything would be fine, and they really would forget all about it.
He went back to his ZPM schemes without so much as a stray shuddery thought about Merda.
***
Rodney hit the first pothole in his plan to relegate what happened on Telarus to the furthest reaches of his memory when he woke in the middle of the night, hard and panting from a dream of Sheppard on that huge, white bed with that filmy little nothing pushed up around his hips, and Rodney-- God, the things Rodney was doing to him.
"Shit!" he muttered, as he jerked off with swift, sharp turns of his wrist.
He figured it was the most practical way to banish the pictures from his head, but even after he'd come all over his belly and lay staring up at the ceiling, he could still see Sheppard, the long lines of his body, the seductive tilt of his hips as he sensually sprawled against silk-covered pillows.
Rodney took a deep breath and let it out heavily. So. More of a problem than he'd anticipated.
Although it wasn't until the next morning at the senior staff meeting that he understood the full extent of the difficulty when it became clear that Sheppard was so not getting with the back-to-normal program. After two years, their weekly powwows had become as predictable as a glacier, if not quite as interesting, the same issues, same alliances, same everything, right down to where everyone sat, Sheppard and Rodney always next to each other. Today, though, Sheppard made a point to take a chair as far from Rodney as he could possibly get at the modest-sized conference table, a move that escaped exactly no one's notice. Afterwards, Elizabeth shot them a sharp look that said, whatever it is, work it out like the grownups I know you can occasionally pretend to be.
Of course, this would have been far easier to accomplish if Sheppard hadn't taken to using every black ops trick he knew to avoid Rodney. Atlantis was hardly a bustling metropolis with all of two hundred people living there, and odds were that Rodney would eventually run into him, somewhere, sometime. So it was a true testament to Sheppard's determination that Rodney never did, not at the mess hall or the gym, not even in the corridors.
If they weren't forced together for work, Rodney might have concluded that Lt. Colonel John Sheppard had been a figment of his imagination all along. Even on missions Sheppard acted like a stranger, a by-the-book formality to their every exchange now. In a fit of curiosity mixed with pique, Rodney began trying to be annoying, rather than just accidentally stumbling onto it, as a kind of experiment to see how far he could push before the Colonel snapped out of his automaton routine. If the dark looks from Ronon and Teyla were any indication, he managed to hit new heights on the insufferability meter, but Sheppard barely seemed to notice he was alive. Rodney couldn't get so much as a caustic comeback out of him, even when he called him Captain Kirk and insulted his hair.
For a good week, Rodney's response to this ridiculousness was a haughty, fine, be that way!. Then he started to miss Sheppard. Their regularly scheduled meet-up at the firing range came and went. Rodney had scored the entire Matrix trilogy the last time the Daedalus had been in port, but not having Sheppard to watch it with him, to smile in bemusement as he tore the science apart, took the shine off.
The last straw was an eavesdropped conversation between Lorne and Parrish.
"Hey, you want to hang out after dinner?" Parrish asked.
"Can't," Lorne said. "The Colonel asked me to help him check out a new part of the city."
"Where's McKay? Isn't that their thing? Going exploring together."
Lorne shrugged. "Apparently they're in a snit."
Rodney seethed all the way back to his quarters, where he paced in a highly agitated fashion for a good half hour, concocting various plans to restore the Colonel to some measure of good sense, everything from desensitization training to surreptitious electroshock, until he finally threw up his hands and said out loud, "Fuck that!" And stormed off.
He knocked at the Colonel's door, no answer, not that he was fooled by this. One of the many, many good things about being him was that he had access to all the city's more sensitive systems, including the internal sensors. He knew for a fact that Sheppard was in his quarters. He opened the control panel, tinkered, and the doors handily slid open.
Sheppard stood in the middle of the room, arms crossed over his chest, wearing his I know where to bury the body expression. "Privacy, Rodney. Ever heard of the concept?"
"Cowardice, Colonel. Does that sound familiar?" Sheppard's face darkened threateningly, but Rodney was far too worked up to care. "If you hadn't been cravenly avoiding me, I wouldn't have had to break in. You have no one to blame but yourself."
"I haven't been avoid--"
Rodney cut him off, "Please. I'm not even going to dignify that by listening to it. You know you've been treating me like a leper ever since we got back from Telarus, and I'm sick of it. It's rare that anyone puts up with me for more than, oh, fifteen minutes, and you've managed to hang in there for two years, and I absolutely refuse to have this friendship fall apart over something I wasn't even responsible for! So stop punishing me!"
"I'm not."
"Are too!" Rodney insisted loudly.
Sheppard looked kind of guilty, and then he turned away to stare out the window. "Doesn't it bother you even a little bit what they did?"
Rodney let out his breath. "Yes! It sucked, okay? They made laughing stocks out of us for their own amusement. Bad aliens. But it's over."
Sheppard whirled around. "They put us in a situation specifically so we'd have sex, and then they watched. Doesn't that make you feel--" He waved his hand. "Violated, or something?"
Rodney stared at him, perplexed. "Not really. I mean, embarrassed? Sure. But--" He froze, as an explanation for Sheppard's anger started to crystallize. "Is that the problem? Because I didn't mind the sex. That's why you're so pissed at me?" He threw up his hands. "Well, I'm sorry! It was sex, and it was you, and, sue me, it was hot. I'm sorry the bad aliens tricked you into sleeping with someone you wouldn't ordinarily look twice at, but I really can't help it if it was one of the more spectacular blowjobs of my life. So couldn't you be a sport about it, and just let me have that, and stop treating me like a communicable disease already?"
Sheppard was shaking his head. "You've got it all wrong."
"Fine," Rodney sputtered furiously. "Be an ass about it. I'm sorry the experience was so traumatizing for you."
Sheppard leaned in, his eyes glittering, as if he had something to be angry about. "Just shut up, okay?"
Rodney poked a finger into his chest. "No! I won't--"
So Sheppard shut him up with his mouth. Some seconds ticked by before Rodney could actually process the fact that John was kissing him. He couldn't honestly make any sense of it, but he clung to Sheppard just the same, hands fisted in his shirt, kissing back frantically. For the first time in his life, he considered the possibility that understanding might be overrated.
Sheppard pressed his face hotly against Rodney's neck. "Told you that you had it wrong."
He did something with his tongue to a spot behind Rodney's ear, a hot button he didn't even know he had, and Rodney shuddered at the unexpected pleasure of it. Sheppard shifted, pressing their mouths together again, the kiss so deep and long and searching that when he pulled back at last they were both panting.
"Doing this or not, that was our decision," John said with quiet force. "And it's private, and they had no right to take that from us."
Rodney frowned. It almost sounded like--
"Wait," he said, feeling like he couldn't keep up, a very unfamiliar feeling, "so you've thought about this before?"
John stared at him like he was crazy. "Only since the day we met. God, you really can be stupid sometimes."
"Oh, very nice, Colonel. Just--" But Rodney's outrage was quickly submerged by sensation, John's body long and hot and hard, pressed against him in the most tantalizing places, broad hands moving restlessly all over him. Rodney had to admit, however grudgingly, that if this possibility had always been on the table then maybe he was a tad…shortsighted.
"I still don't see why you've been pissed at me."
John took Rodney's face between his hands, thumb stroking along his cheek, as he whispered kisses over his mouth. "It wasn't you. Just-- every time I saw you, it reminded me that the first time I had sex with you was with a roomful of demented alien soap opera fans watching and yucking it up. And that-- just made me want to go back to Telarus and show them a thing or two about reality. Not to mention manners. And the only way I could keep myself from causing an intergalactic incident was just to put some distance there for a while."
"That's really--" Sappy was the word that came to mind, but then he took in Sheppard's expression, earnest and tender and slightly wounded. "Hey, forget about them." He touched John's hair, fluttered soft kisses over his face. "It's just us now."
Apparently these were the magic words, because the next thing Rodney knew, he was pushed up against the wall, Sheppard's weight pressed against him, the best thing ever. Of course, he soon had to revise that opinion when Sheppard sank to the floor and opened his pants and went down on him, because that…now that was truly the best thing ever. John was less controlled than before, with more dirty enthusiasm, his green eyes bright with lust, staring up at Rodney as he mouthed the head of his dick.
John, and Rodney knew it this time, and that alone was almost unbearably hot.
"You can fuck me if you want," Rodney said shakily, surprising even himself.
John pulled off his dick with a half strangled little noise. "Jesus, Rodney. Not if you keep saying things like that!" He got to his feet and took Rodney's hand and pulled him over to the bed. "Get this off." He shoved at Rodney's shirt to get it out of his way.
"Yes, yes, good."
Rodney did his best to help, and just managed to slow down progress, and finally John batted his hands away. It took some doing, but eventually they got naked. They lay down, and kissed and touched until they were both shaking, and then John reached into the bedside drawer.
Sex with men had always been a pragmatic thing for Rodney, mutual handjobs to break up the monotony in Siberia, an arrangement regarding blowjobs with his grad school roommate. Getting fucked had never figured into the equation. John settled him onto his side, and Rodney couldn't help tensing at the first, slick touch of his fingers.
John rubbed a hand over his hip. "You sure?"
Rodney nodded, but John didn't immediately believe him, and he added, "Please."
So John did, excruciatingly slowly, with great care, and then Rodney had to revise his estimation once more, because this really, really was the best thing ever, John pressed against his back, every filament in his body bright with pleasure, the throb of his own pulse huge and significant.
It didn't last nearly long enough, because nothing that good ever could, and still Rodney was almost weak with satisfaction afterwards, half splayed over John, his breathing slowly returning to normal. His world seemed to make the most pristine sense, and Sheppard had been a part of that for far longer than this one night, and Rodney never wanted it to be any other way.
"Don't do that again," he said quietly against John's ribs.
"Well, not soon anyway," John joked.
Rodney pinched him.
"Ow!"
"You know what I mean." Rodney lifted his head to scowl.
John met his gaze with a look that was almost chastened. "Okay. I won't. Promise."
Rodney settled back down, and then it occurred to him that letting John off too easily might not actually be in his best interest.
He threaded their fingers together. "Of course, you realize I will expect you to make amends for asking Major Lorne to go exploring with you. That's our thing. Even Parrish is smart enough to realize that."
John brushed a kiss to his temple, and Rodney could feel his smile on his skin. "Don't you think I might have, you know, already made it up to you?"
Rodney harrumphed, "I believe we both got something out of that."
John laughed. "Okay, okay, what can I do?"
Rodney smiled. "I'll let you know."
John's arms closed around his shoulders. Rodney closed his eyes and wondered if the Athosians might have some ideas where he could get his hands on a filmy little nothing the right size to fit an Air Force colonel.