Requisite Items by liketheriver (5.01 Search and Rescue)
Okay, I'm going to kick things off here... don't leave me hanging, people! *G*
Title: Requisite Items
Author: liketheriver
Pairing: None (Gen)
Rating: T.
Word count: ~2800
Warning: None
Spoilers: Several things from late Season 4 plus Search and Rescue
Author Notes: I like to think of this as a follow up to my fic Thanks for the Memories, which was a missing scene for The Last Man... this just takes place a few days later. Special thanks as always to Koschka for the beta.
Summary: Not all requisite items can be ordered from Earth
Requisite Items
by liketheriver
I hate paperwork. Kind of ironic seeing that I’ve spent most of my career working in a system that seems to worship forms identified by alphanumeric designator. But that’s me… Dr. Rodney McKay, astrophysicist extraordinaire, savior of galaxies, slave to red tape. You can’t get a spool of CDs without genuflecting before the administrative shrine of government bureaucracy and offering up a document in triplicate that had been signed and dated by four levels of command. Which is why I usually delegate it to someone on my staff to complete. Sure there are things like mission reports that I can’t exactly push off onto Radek to do, but I’ve had found that by plagiarizing most of Sheppard’s reports and changing a few words here and there I can save a ton of time. And to be honest, Sheppard’s reports really do sound a lot better than mine seeing as the man seems to catch more of the whole picture as opposed to my own fuzzy recollections that are often limited to desperately running for my life and hoping like hell the bad guys are lousy shots. But seeing as Sheppard is still sleeping off the anesthetic from his surgery, he can’t really help out with the requisition paperwork I’m completing now. GSA part number? Where the hell am I supposed to find that? Receipt inspection required? It’s not like I’m trying to buy a reactor core here.
“Hey.”
The groggy voice has me looking up from the electronic pad in my lap to see hazel eyes trying to focus on me. “Hey, how’re you feeling? Need any pain meds or anything?”
John waves a sloppy hand before letting it flop back on the bed. “Nah, I’m good. Keller evidently hooked me up with the good stuff. Best I’ve felt in months.”
I snort at the confession before turning back to my tablet. “Care to share any with me?”
“Sure, hook yourself up… I’ve got plenty to spare.” The slightly goofy grin readily attests to the truth of Sheppard’s words.
“Maybe later, after I finish up with this.”
The grin transmutes into a confused frown. “What’re you doing, anyway?”
“Requisition worksheet,” I grumble before making an offer. “Do you need anything? How about a replacement shirt for the one that you got a hole in today?” I try to cover the shudder at the thought of how much worse that injury could have been by asking, “What size do you wear? They don’t have emaciated as an option.”
“You’re offering to fill out a requisition worksheet for me?” he asks in surprise.
“No use both of us suffering unduly if I can ease your burdens.”
“Thought you had released your burdens,” he reminds me, his eyes drifting to half mast.
“Yeah, well, I had a whole set of new ones dumped on me recently that I’m still dealing with.”
Funny thing is, the one person who had done the most to help me release those burdens during the ascend or die ordeal was the same person to add a whole new set of them by simply vanishing for a couple of weeks only to show back up and promptly get himself buried under a goddamn building then run around on Michael’s cruiser looking like death eating a soda cracker without the luxury of the snack foods.
In a lot of ways, I kind of miss the old days when I just really didn’t care. I mean, sure, I cared if someone lived or died, I’m not a totally heartless prick. But they were just that… someone. Some amorphous concept of a person who walked in the door every day and only stood out if they irritated me some way. And if they didn’t walk through that door one day? Well, I contributed to the flowers for the funeral and waited until someone else walked through the door in their place. But over the past four years I’d replaced those amorphous forms with faces, coworkers with friends, and I’d looked over my shoulder enough times to see one of those friendly faces covering my ass that when I looked back and didn’t see anything but an empty gate I felt the gut punch of fear and dread fill me. That’s when I realized throwing a few bucks in the collection and signing a communal sympathy card wasn’t going to cut it anymore when it came to most people on the expedition. And for others, it didn’t come close to scratching the surface.
First it had been Teyla who didn’t come back through the gate, and then Sheppard. With Teyla we at least knew Michael had her and with that came the hope that he had a plan for her and that meant we had a little time. But with John he was just gone… now you see him, now you don’t. No reason, no explanation, and nobody to blame except myself for not being able to figure out why the hell he wasn’t there anymore. And then a day and a half ago he showed up again. The gate activated and poof! Out popped one grit-coated lieutenant colonel… dusty and dirty and alive, he was fucking alive, and standing there in the gateroom with a data crystal containing the answers to everything. Talk about the proverbial answer to your prayers. We’d barely had time to process what he’d told us… hell, I’d barely had time to come to terms with him still being there period, before he was nearly dead again.
So, yeah, those burdens are still weighing on my shoulders despite the fact that I am sitting next to his bed in the infirmary discussing purchase requisitions.
Letting his eyes slide all the way closed, Sheppard tells me, “Well, you can let them go now. You’ve done more than your fair share.”
I bark a laugh at his comment that has him opening his eyes again and demanding, “What?”
“You’re kidding, right? The man who wasn’t satisfied with simply being the walking wounded? No, you had to be the running, shooting, Dart flying wounded instead.”
“I had to see it through to the end,” he defends.
“Well, for a while there I thought you planned to do that literally.”
“You would have done the same,” he informs me without a shade of doubt. “Hell, you already did.” When I furrow my brow and wonder if Keller dosed up with a little too much of the good stuff and it’s affecting his memory, John tells me again, “You did good, Rodney.”
“So you already told me.” And I had done good; I’d delivered a baby for Pete’s sake. Not bad for a man who’s only experience with babies up until this point had been limited to the Baby Ruth variety.
He gives a small shake of his head. “I mean more than just with the kid.”
I realize he’s talking about the other Rodney, the one from the time line John started out in the day before yesterday before jumping to this one after a fifty thousand years detour into the future. He hasn’t told me much, just that the holographic image of me was old and wore bad sweaters and had never given up finding a solution for sending Sheppard back to a time where he could fix the damage Michael had done… would have done. Would have done− it’s an odd phrase. Usually it’s the sort of thing that is tinged with regret, as in I wish I would have gone fishing with Carson that day. But this time it’s a positive outcome, disaster averted, the day is saved. Which is why I find it so unnerving to see the flicker of regret that passes over Sheppard’s face whenever he brings it up with me.
“Oh, well, that,” I try to dismiss, not sure my psyche could handle what my curiosity wants to know about my other future. “All in a day’s work… or lifetime’s, as the case may be. I’m sure you’ll find some way to thank me properly… an embossed certificate, medal of commendation, name your first born after me seeing as bringing a child into the world evidently isn’t enough for that.”
His mouth quirk at my lament. “Where is Teyla anyway?”
“I was helping her fill out requisition paperwork for a few things when the baby got hungry. She was going to… you know…” My hands flicker toward my chest. “So I figured I’d come in here for a while until she’s done.”
Sheppard raises his eyebrows in mock surprise. “You passed up a chance to see Teyla’s breasts?”
“I have seen more of Teyla than I had ever cared to see in my life, thank you very much. I’ve been scarred for life. The least she could have done is name her child after me.”
“I’ve never heard anyone claim PTSD from witnessing child birth, Rodney.”
“More like PVSD. Seriously, Sheppard, I think my sex life may be over.”
John’s lips curled more. “Did I miss something while I was gone those two weeks? Like your sex life actually starting?”
“Oh, ha ha. Very funny. Just because Sam doesn’t have to douse me with a spray bottle for trying to hump every female that comes into sight like some people who shall remain nameless… even though certain babies evidently won’t remain so… doesn’t mean I don’t have a healthy sex life. Until now anyway.”
“Maybe you can order one,” John suggests with exaggerated innocence. “See if you can pick up a sense of humor while you’re at it. I’ll foot the bill.”
With a sigh I toss the electronic tablet onto the bed beside his leg. “I’d probably have more luck finding that on the stupid GSA schedule than diapers and umbrella stroller.”
“Why are you even filling out a requisition form? You hate doing paperwork.”
I shrug even though it is the truth. “I told you, I needed to order something for myself and I figured I’d check and see if anyone else needed anything while I was at it.”
“Uh huh. It wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that the Athosians have the equivalent of godparents would it?”
I blink and try my best to look innocent. “Really? I had no idea such a thing existed in their culture.” Of course, that pretense goes out the window when I realize I might have competition. “Why? Does Ronon have the inside track? He does, doesn’t he? Sure, I’m up to my elbows in baby goop, not mention I think she might have broken one of my fingers, and she yelled at me several times while I was trying to keep her mind off of things with some very interesting stories. It was a very stressful experience.”
“Sorry you had to go through that on your own, Rodney. I guess me and Ronon had it easy sneaking past a bunch of hybrids to blow the hyperdrive.”
“Exactly!” I agree readily. “And all Ronon did was show up and lug her and the baby around. Nothing more than a glorified pack mule.”
A pack mule who had done a lot to keep me sane and focused over the past two weeks, refusing to let me give up on trying to find out what had happened to Sheppard, and doing it in only the way Ronon could… by threatening to kick my ass six ways to Sunday if I didn’t figure it out. And to think Ronon wanted me to convince John to stay with the Jumper instead of going onto Michael’s cruiser, nudging me into saying something even though it was obvious that Sheppard wasn’t going to succumb to the bluntness of Satedan negotiations much less my subtle suggestions.
“You know,” I continue with my rant… er, logical argument. “I could have carried her just as easily as he did… except for my back has been bothering me lately. I think I may have slipped a disk and being buried by a building didn’t help matters, that’s for sure. And of course I needed to monitor the data from Michael’s cruiser… but if push had come to shove I could have done it.”
“I’m sure you could have,” Sheppard patronizes before adding, “And all Teyla did was lay there and give birth. Kind of rude of her to interrupt your work delivering her kid while all she did was bitch and yell at you.”
I try to frown at his remarks. “You are such an ass. I have no idea why I actually missed you while you were gone.” But it’s hard to be too pissed at him when I finally have back the familiar the give and take that defines our typical conversation.
“Awww, McKay, I’m touched. Does that mean you plan to name your kid after me, too?”
Sheppard’s condescending grin has me rolling my eyes. “You wish.”
“Come on, Rodney, I’m going for a trifecta here. I’m pretty sure I can convince Ronon to name his firstborn after me, too, if I can get you on board. You know, make it a team bonding thing.”
I raise a disbelieving eyebrow. “And what if Ronon’s firstborn child is girl?”
“Then I think you have a real shot at getting him to go with Meredith.”
My frown just grows as Sheppard’s smile does the same. “Well, if you’re done emasculating me, I have a purchase requisition to complete.”
When I take up the pad again and start scrolling once more through the catalog of choices for the necessary item numbers, John asks again, “Seriously, you hate filling out this sort of paperwork. Why didn’t you just have one of your many minions do it for you instead?”
Okay, here’s the deal. And it’s taken me a while to realize this, but some things in life really are requisite items. There’s only so long you can go without doing laundry before you run out of boxer shorts. And as much of a pain in the ass as it is to haul your basketful of dirty clothes to the laundry room and wash them, it really is a necessity of life. Same for my nine millimeter. I despise cleaning the damn thing, but I’ve learned that it could be the difference between life and death for me or my team. A functioning sidearm, clean underwear, both try my patience at times and, sure, I suppose I could find a way to manage without either one. But I really don’t want to ever have to find out if that’s truly the case, because life is easier with those items, better, and in my book, that makes them a requirement.
Kind of like a field jacket: OPS JACKET, POLY COTTON, RIPSTOP, BLACK. Finally finding the item on the list of choices for the form, I click it.
The same goes for the baby I wrapped in the coat I’m replacing and his mother, whose smile of joy and relief at first holding her son was something only I had the privilege of seeing. It may not be the tribute of a namesake, but it’s close. Damn close. Apparently it’s going to have to be close enough seeing as another pain in the ass requisite item in my life got that honor. I get a jacket soaked in various bodily fluids and that smug bastard gets the name. I ask you, where is the justice in the universe? Where?
I confirm the field on the requisition form is filled in properly before looking back up at Sheppard. He’s studying me closely, trying to figure out exactly what’s driving me to go against the normal McKay course of action and what exactly it means that I am. It’s an odd sensation knowing someone is interested in me as more than the resident genius. Odd, but not bad. Not bad at all. In fact, it’s enough to remind me how much the scales of universal justice have been tipping in my favor over the past couple of days.
“Honestly,” I confess, “this time, I don’t mind filling it out myself.”
There’s no item description for BEST FRIEND, SNARKY, BAD HAIR. But that’s okay, seeing as I’m not currently in need of one of those.
When his eyes narrow suspiciously at how I’m telling the truth about being fine with doing the paperwork I change the subject. “So, who gets the honor of being the namesake of your firstborn child?”
“Well, I was thinking it should be someone incredibly smart and caring and whose theories have saved us time and time again.” When I smile happily, he clarifies, “But Einstein Sheppard just seemed a little pretentious. So I figured, why ruin a good thing and decided to go with John, too. Team tradition, after all.”
What the hell is it with requisite items being such a pain in the ass anyway?
The End
.
Title: Requisite Items
Author: liketheriver
Pairing: None (Gen)
Rating: T.
Word count: ~2800
Warning: None
Spoilers: Several things from late Season 4 plus Search and Rescue
Author Notes: I like to think of this as a follow up to my fic Thanks for the Memories, which was a missing scene for The Last Man... this just takes place a few days later. Special thanks as always to Koschka for the beta.
Summary: Not all requisite items can be ordered from Earth
Requisite Items
by liketheriver
I hate paperwork. Kind of ironic seeing that I’ve spent most of my career working in a system that seems to worship forms identified by alphanumeric designator. But that’s me… Dr. Rodney McKay, astrophysicist extraordinaire, savior of galaxies, slave to red tape. You can’t get a spool of CDs without genuflecting before the administrative shrine of government bureaucracy and offering up a document in triplicate that had been signed and dated by four levels of command. Which is why I usually delegate it to someone on my staff to complete. Sure there are things like mission reports that I can’t exactly push off onto Radek to do, but I’ve had found that by plagiarizing most of Sheppard’s reports and changing a few words here and there I can save a ton of time. And to be honest, Sheppard’s reports really do sound a lot better than mine seeing as the man seems to catch more of the whole picture as opposed to my own fuzzy recollections that are often limited to desperately running for my life and hoping like hell the bad guys are lousy shots. But seeing as Sheppard is still sleeping off the anesthetic from his surgery, he can’t really help out with the requisition paperwork I’m completing now. GSA part number? Where the hell am I supposed to find that? Receipt inspection required? It’s not like I’m trying to buy a reactor core here.
“Hey.”
The groggy voice has me looking up from the electronic pad in my lap to see hazel eyes trying to focus on me. “Hey, how’re you feeling? Need any pain meds or anything?”
John waves a sloppy hand before letting it flop back on the bed. “Nah, I’m good. Keller evidently hooked me up with the good stuff. Best I’ve felt in months.”
I snort at the confession before turning back to my tablet. “Care to share any with me?”
“Sure, hook yourself up… I’ve got plenty to spare.” The slightly goofy grin readily attests to the truth of Sheppard’s words.
“Maybe later, after I finish up with this.”
The grin transmutes into a confused frown. “What’re you doing, anyway?”
“Requisition worksheet,” I grumble before making an offer. “Do you need anything? How about a replacement shirt for the one that you got a hole in today?” I try to cover the shudder at the thought of how much worse that injury could have been by asking, “What size do you wear? They don’t have emaciated as an option.”
“You’re offering to fill out a requisition worksheet for me?” he asks in surprise.
“No use both of us suffering unduly if I can ease your burdens.”
“Thought you had released your burdens,” he reminds me, his eyes drifting to half mast.
“Yeah, well, I had a whole set of new ones dumped on me recently that I’m still dealing with.”
Funny thing is, the one person who had done the most to help me release those burdens during the ascend or die ordeal was the same person to add a whole new set of them by simply vanishing for a couple of weeks only to show back up and promptly get himself buried under a goddamn building then run around on Michael’s cruiser looking like death eating a soda cracker without the luxury of the snack foods.
In a lot of ways, I kind of miss the old days when I just really didn’t care. I mean, sure, I cared if someone lived or died, I’m not a totally heartless prick. But they were just that… someone. Some amorphous concept of a person who walked in the door every day and only stood out if they irritated me some way. And if they didn’t walk through that door one day? Well, I contributed to the flowers for the funeral and waited until someone else walked through the door in their place. But over the past four years I’d replaced those amorphous forms with faces, coworkers with friends, and I’d looked over my shoulder enough times to see one of those friendly faces covering my ass that when I looked back and didn’t see anything but an empty gate I felt the gut punch of fear and dread fill me. That’s when I realized throwing a few bucks in the collection and signing a communal sympathy card wasn’t going to cut it anymore when it came to most people on the expedition. And for others, it didn’t come close to scratching the surface.
First it had been Teyla who didn’t come back through the gate, and then Sheppard. With Teyla we at least knew Michael had her and with that came the hope that he had a plan for her and that meant we had a little time. But with John he was just gone… now you see him, now you don’t. No reason, no explanation, and nobody to blame except myself for not being able to figure out why the hell he wasn’t there anymore. And then a day and a half ago he showed up again. The gate activated and poof! Out popped one grit-coated lieutenant colonel… dusty and dirty and alive, he was fucking alive, and standing there in the gateroom with a data crystal containing the answers to everything. Talk about the proverbial answer to your prayers. We’d barely had time to process what he’d told us… hell, I’d barely had time to come to terms with him still being there period, before he was nearly dead again.
So, yeah, those burdens are still weighing on my shoulders despite the fact that I am sitting next to his bed in the infirmary discussing purchase requisitions.
Letting his eyes slide all the way closed, Sheppard tells me, “Well, you can let them go now. You’ve done more than your fair share.”
I bark a laugh at his comment that has him opening his eyes again and demanding, “What?”
“You’re kidding, right? The man who wasn’t satisfied with simply being the walking wounded? No, you had to be the running, shooting, Dart flying wounded instead.”
“I had to see it through to the end,” he defends.
“Well, for a while there I thought you planned to do that literally.”
“You would have done the same,” he informs me without a shade of doubt. “Hell, you already did.” When I furrow my brow and wonder if Keller dosed up with a little too much of the good stuff and it’s affecting his memory, John tells me again, “You did good, Rodney.”
“So you already told me.” And I had done good; I’d delivered a baby for Pete’s sake. Not bad for a man who’s only experience with babies up until this point had been limited to the Baby Ruth variety.
He gives a small shake of his head. “I mean more than just with the kid.”
I realize he’s talking about the other Rodney, the one from the time line John started out in the day before yesterday before jumping to this one after a fifty thousand years detour into the future. He hasn’t told me much, just that the holographic image of me was old and wore bad sweaters and had never given up finding a solution for sending Sheppard back to a time where he could fix the damage Michael had done… would have done. Would have done− it’s an odd phrase. Usually it’s the sort of thing that is tinged with regret, as in I wish I would have gone fishing with Carson that day. But this time it’s a positive outcome, disaster averted, the day is saved. Which is why I find it so unnerving to see the flicker of regret that passes over Sheppard’s face whenever he brings it up with me.
“Oh, well, that,” I try to dismiss, not sure my psyche could handle what my curiosity wants to know about my other future. “All in a day’s work… or lifetime’s, as the case may be. I’m sure you’ll find some way to thank me properly… an embossed certificate, medal of commendation, name your first born after me seeing as bringing a child into the world evidently isn’t enough for that.”
His mouth quirk at my lament. “Where is Teyla anyway?”
“I was helping her fill out requisition paperwork for a few things when the baby got hungry. She was going to… you know…” My hands flicker toward my chest. “So I figured I’d come in here for a while until she’s done.”
Sheppard raises his eyebrows in mock surprise. “You passed up a chance to see Teyla’s breasts?”
“I have seen more of Teyla than I had ever cared to see in my life, thank you very much. I’ve been scarred for life. The least she could have done is name her child after me.”
“I’ve never heard anyone claim PTSD from witnessing child birth, Rodney.”
“More like PVSD. Seriously, Sheppard, I think my sex life may be over.”
John’s lips curled more. “Did I miss something while I was gone those two weeks? Like your sex life actually starting?”
“Oh, ha ha. Very funny. Just because Sam doesn’t have to douse me with a spray bottle for trying to hump every female that comes into sight like some people who shall remain nameless… even though certain babies evidently won’t remain so… doesn’t mean I don’t have a healthy sex life. Until now anyway.”
“Maybe you can order one,” John suggests with exaggerated innocence. “See if you can pick up a sense of humor while you’re at it. I’ll foot the bill.”
With a sigh I toss the electronic tablet onto the bed beside his leg. “I’d probably have more luck finding that on the stupid GSA schedule than diapers and umbrella stroller.”
“Why are you even filling out a requisition form? You hate doing paperwork.”
I shrug even though it is the truth. “I told you, I needed to order something for myself and I figured I’d check and see if anyone else needed anything while I was at it.”
“Uh huh. It wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that the Athosians have the equivalent of godparents would it?”
I blink and try my best to look innocent. “Really? I had no idea such a thing existed in their culture.” Of course, that pretense goes out the window when I realize I might have competition. “Why? Does Ronon have the inside track? He does, doesn’t he? Sure, I’m up to my elbows in baby goop, not mention I think she might have broken one of my fingers, and she yelled at me several times while I was trying to keep her mind off of things with some very interesting stories. It was a very stressful experience.”
“Sorry you had to go through that on your own, Rodney. I guess me and Ronon had it easy sneaking past a bunch of hybrids to blow the hyperdrive.”
“Exactly!” I agree readily. “And all Ronon did was show up and lug her and the baby around. Nothing more than a glorified pack mule.”
A pack mule who had done a lot to keep me sane and focused over the past two weeks, refusing to let me give up on trying to find out what had happened to Sheppard, and doing it in only the way Ronon could… by threatening to kick my ass six ways to Sunday if I didn’t figure it out. And to think Ronon wanted me to convince John to stay with the Jumper instead of going onto Michael’s cruiser, nudging me into saying something even though it was obvious that Sheppard wasn’t going to succumb to the bluntness of Satedan negotiations much less my subtle suggestions.
“You know,” I continue with my rant… er, logical argument. “I could have carried her just as easily as he did… except for my back has been bothering me lately. I think I may have slipped a disk and being buried by a building didn’t help matters, that’s for sure. And of course I needed to monitor the data from Michael’s cruiser… but if push had come to shove I could have done it.”
“I’m sure you could have,” Sheppard patronizes before adding, “And all Teyla did was lay there and give birth. Kind of rude of her to interrupt your work delivering her kid while all she did was bitch and yell at you.”
I try to frown at his remarks. “You are such an ass. I have no idea why I actually missed you while you were gone.” But it’s hard to be too pissed at him when I finally have back the familiar the give and take that defines our typical conversation.
“Awww, McKay, I’m touched. Does that mean you plan to name your kid after me, too?”
Sheppard’s condescending grin has me rolling my eyes. “You wish.”
“Come on, Rodney, I’m going for a trifecta here. I’m pretty sure I can convince Ronon to name his firstborn after me, too, if I can get you on board. You know, make it a team bonding thing.”
I raise a disbelieving eyebrow. “And what if Ronon’s firstborn child is girl?”
“Then I think you have a real shot at getting him to go with Meredith.”
My frown just grows as Sheppard’s smile does the same. “Well, if you’re done emasculating me, I have a purchase requisition to complete.”
When I take up the pad again and start scrolling once more through the catalog of choices for the necessary item numbers, John asks again, “Seriously, you hate filling out this sort of paperwork. Why didn’t you just have one of your many minions do it for you instead?”
Okay, here’s the deal. And it’s taken me a while to realize this, but some things in life really are requisite items. There’s only so long you can go without doing laundry before you run out of boxer shorts. And as much of a pain in the ass as it is to haul your basketful of dirty clothes to the laundry room and wash them, it really is a necessity of life. Same for my nine millimeter. I despise cleaning the damn thing, but I’ve learned that it could be the difference between life and death for me or my team. A functioning sidearm, clean underwear, both try my patience at times and, sure, I suppose I could find a way to manage without either one. But I really don’t want to ever have to find out if that’s truly the case, because life is easier with those items, better, and in my book, that makes them a requirement.
Kind of like a field jacket: OPS JACKET, POLY COTTON, RIPSTOP, BLACK. Finally finding the item on the list of choices for the form, I click it.
The same goes for the baby I wrapped in the coat I’m replacing and his mother, whose smile of joy and relief at first holding her son was something only I had the privilege of seeing. It may not be the tribute of a namesake, but it’s close. Damn close. Apparently it’s going to have to be close enough seeing as another pain in the ass requisite item in my life got that honor. I get a jacket soaked in various bodily fluids and that smug bastard gets the name. I ask you, where is the justice in the universe? Where?
I confirm the field on the requisition form is filled in properly before looking back up at Sheppard. He’s studying me closely, trying to figure out exactly what’s driving me to go against the normal McKay course of action and what exactly it means that I am. It’s an odd sensation knowing someone is interested in me as more than the resident genius. Odd, but not bad. Not bad at all. In fact, it’s enough to remind me how much the scales of universal justice have been tipping in my favor over the past couple of days.
“Honestly,” I confess, “this time, I don’t mind filling it out myself.”
There’s no item description for BEST FRIEND, SNARKY, BAD HAIR. But that’s okay, seeing as I’m not currently in need of one of those.
When his eyes narrow suspiciously at how I’m telling the truth about being fine with doing the paperwork I change the subject. “So, who gets the honor of being the namesake of your firstborn child?”
“Well, I was thinking it should be someone incredibly smart and caring and whose theories have saved us time and time again.” When I smile happily, he clarifies, “But Einstein Sheppard just seemed a little pretentious. So I figured, why ruin a good thing and decided to go with John, too. Team tradition, after all.”
What the hell is it with requisite items being such a pain in the ass anyway?
The End
.