Pray The Lord My Soul To Keep by soapbox_solo38 (F**king Freezing Challenge)
He honestly can’t say how it happened; after all, he had only been freezing his ass off and ready to suggest they pile the flammable objects in the middle of the lab before letting a tech set them on fire. The blue-tinged faces of the few Atlantis personnel around him had been more worrying than the fact that he couldn’t feel his fingers anymore and his teeth had long since stopped chattering; if Carson were in the room, John had known he’d be getting an earful about hypothermia and shock in the doctor’s thickening Scottish accent. But the doc had been in another section of the freezing city, and he had needed to focus on the situation at hand. That had been, at the moment, staring at Rodney and keeping himself from asking if the others in the general area had found their way to the lab yet.
And then the astrophysicist had had one of his “Aha! I’m a genius!” moments and triumphantly informed them that he had gotten heat back into a nearby room.
Beyond the point of feeling the cold, John had wrenched open the doors with a thought and led the handful of equally numbed people into a blessedly hot room. For a moment he had considered setting up an adjustment period, letting them get gradually used to being warm and scheduling radio calls to whoever was in their limited range…
Then his ragged nerves had registered the almost foreign sensation of being anything other than cold, and the others had come in behind him, and an overpowering relief kept rolling over him as he shucked off unnecessary layers and, hitting the floor in a t-shirt and pants, simply absorbed the heat.
From there, he can only conclude, things simply happened; the fact that anyone else would’ve called it “going downhill” and the Atlantis contingent merely accepted it said more than anything else about what the galaxy had done to them.
Somehow, the identity of the instigator and the appropriateness of the situation aside, Sheppard now found himself in a loose pile of limbs and torsos, the comforting sense of being loved and cared for surrounding him like a blanket. A few quiet murmurs make their way through the room, the speakers careful not to disturb those who lay curled up or sprawled out with their eyes closed, but for the most part a gentle hush compromised of breathes and sighs fills what would have otherwise been silence.
He blinks, surprised and acutely aware of Chuck’s bony shoulder pressing into his back. Teyla’s arms and head draped over his legs effectively prevent him from getting up, but there is no one sleeping on his hands and he half-turns enough to push the young technician to the side. Then, shifting so his left foot will be included in his circulation, he settles back into his original napping position and laughs softly.
“What?” Elizabeth asks, amusement in her voice.
“This is exactly the kind of thing we’re not supposed to do,” he tells her, breathing in the clean scent of her skin anyway. Although he can’t see her face, he knows she grins, and the even rhythm of her ribcage rising and falling resumes, lulling him to sleep even as Rodney’s low grumble about Zelenka’s snoring drifts through the warm air.
And then the astrophysicist had had one of his “Aha! I’m a genius!” moments and triumphantly informed them that he had gotten heat back into a nearby room.
Beyond the point of feeling the cold, John had wrenched open the doors with a thought and led the handful of equally numbed people into a blessedly hot room. For a moment he had considered setting up an adjustment period, letting them get gradually used to being warm and scheduling radio calls to whoever was in their limited range…
Then his ragged nerves had registered the almost foreign sensation of being anything other than cold, and the others had come in behind him, and an overpowering relief kept rolling over him as he shucked off unnecessary layers and, hitting the floor in a t-shirt and pants, simply absorbed the heat.
From there, he can only conclude, things simply happened; the fact that anyone else would’ve called it “going downhill” and the Atlantis contingent merely accepted it said more than anything else about what the galaxy had done to them.
Somehow, the identity of the instigator and the appropriateness of the situation aside, Sheppard now found himself in a loose pile of limbs and torsos, the comforting sense of being loved and cared for surrounding him like a blanket. A few quiet murmurs make their way through the room, the speakers careful not to disturb those who lay curled up or sprawled out with their eyes closed, but for the most part a gentle hush compromised of breathes and sighs fills what would have otherwise been silence.
He blinks, surprised and acutely aware of Chuck’s bony shoulder pressing into his back. Teyla’s arms and head draped over his legs effectively prevent him from getting up, but there is no one sleeping on his hands and he half-turns enough to push the young technician to the side. Then, shifting so his left foot will be included in his circulation, he settles back into his original napping position and laughs softly.
“What?” Elizabeth asks, amusement in her voice.
“This is exactly the kind of thing we’re not supposed to do,” he tells her, breathing in the clean scent of her skin anyway. Although he can’t see her face, he knows she grins, and the even rhythm of her ribcage rising and falling resumes, lulling him to sleep even as Rodney’s low grumble about Zelenka’s snoring drifts through the warm air.