Late Night Thoughts by Vonnix
Title: Late Night Thoughts
Author: Vonnix on Livejournal, Gremblin on FF.net
Spoilers: a little tiny one for season four.
Characters / Pairings: Samantha Carter, Rodney McKay.
Disclaimer: I don’t own them. I never have owned them. I never will own them. I’m borrowing them! Borrowing them without permission but with every intention of giving them back!
Word count: 531
Notes: I apologize ahead of time if Sam’s out of character at all.
Summary: “She didn't know what had brought her to the lab. Habit, perhaps.”
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It was the middle of the night on Atlantis and Sam couldn't sleep. Her mind wouldn't quiet down long enough to allow herself to fall into the blissful state. So she had gotten back up out of her bed, put on some jeans and a t-shirt along with her standard-issue boots, and started walking. She had no particular destination in mind, just a midnight stroll through the Atlantis corridors to -hopefully- clear her mind.
She didn't know what had brought her to the lab. Habit, perhaps. It had been, at the SGC, the place where she spent the large majority of her time. Sam stood staring at the doorway for a moment before closed her eyes.
She'd walk through it, she told herself, and be back home. She'd sit down at one of the many work tables plugging away the hours that she had been ordered by Jack to 'use to take it easy' by working at one of the countless projects she always had on the go.
Daniel would come into her lab with two cups of coffee and sit with her for a few minutes to drink it and just talk. Ask how her projects were doing, how she's doing, how her brother and his kids were doing. Daniel would leave once they were both done their coffees to return to the countless projects that he himself always had on the go, if not projects then translations.
She'd get a couple of hours alone to herself, just long enough to get back into the groove of working and Teal'c would come in and ask her to come eat with him. She had always been frustrated by the interruptions that her team would make during the rare times to herself that she had. Now she found herself missing them, found herself with too many hours of the day in uninterrupted silence.
She stepped through the door and opened her eyes knowing that what she'd see was the immaculate lab that was kept by Rodney McKay, co-used by Radek Zelenka and sometimes Miko Kusanagi. She wasn't surprised by the borderline obsessive-compulsive cleanliness that was contained within the room, she had seen the state of his bedroom and it was the exact opposite.
Sam was, however, surprised to find Rodney McKay himself hunched over one of his worktables asleep. Hair sleep-tousled, right hand resting on the 'home' keys of his laptop keyboard, left hand acting as a pillow to his head. Someone had stuck a big square of yellow paper that typically had a warning label written on it by Rodney himself. Instead a sign was written in the chicken-scratch printing of Radek Zelenka warning people of something very different. Sam couldn't help the grin that appeared when she got close enough to decipher the message.
“Warning: Sleeping Giant. Do Not Disturb. ”
Then, attached to the larger sign was a post-it note addendum in the curly writing of John Sheppard.
“or face the consequences.”
A knowing grin shifted delicately onto her features as she read the messages. She might not have the team that had somehow become family to her but she still had the friends she had made on Atlantis. She could live with that.