Fic: Five Mission Reports Sheppard's Team Turned In (And One They Didn't) (McKay/Sheppard)
Title: Five mission reports Sheppard’s team turned in (and one they didn’t)
Author: jadesfire2808
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard (pre-slash)
Recipient: Pinch hit for mklutz
Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Summary: Sometimes, things just go wrong.
A/N: The request mentioned liking ‘fandom cliches’. I hope this has enough of them for you.
P4X-171
…strongly recommend returning with a full science team. Although the technology appears to be malfunctioning at present, further investigation should be able to determine whether the device is a true matter converter or simply acts on the minds of its subjects. If it is a matter converter, it would represent a significant new development in our understanding of Ancient technology, since we are at present uncertain as to their methods of food production and manufacturing, not to mention its obvious value to the Expedition…
Sheppard looked up. “Should I be capitalizing ‘expedition’ too?”
“Because clearly that’s the most important feature of Rodney’s report.” Raising an eyebrow, Elizabeth gave Sheppard an expectant look. “He wants to go back.”
“Well, he can’t.”
“John…”
“He can’t.” Sheppard put the tablet on Elizabeth’s desk, scrolling to an earlier part of the report. “You have read this bit, right?”
“Of course.”
“Did you miss the part where we were all turned into animals?”
Unable to hide her smile, Elizabeth ducked her head briefly before looking up again. “You have to admit that it’s a fascinating-“
“Animals. Ronon’s teeth were, like, three inches long. And I don’t even want to talk about the tails.”
“I know, John.” Leaning forwards, Elizabeth ignored his folded arms and slouched posture. “Look, I’m not saying I’m sold on this completely, but Rodney raises some good points.”
“You know that he had six legs, right?”
“Matter transformation,” Elizabeth insisted. “Not being totally reliant on the Daedalus or our trading partners.”
“Teyla looked like a rabbit.”
“John.”
He glared. “I spent four hours of my life covered in fur and resisting the urge to eat my team-mates.”
“So that’s a no?”
“Others might lack my self-control. That’s a no.”
P3M-485
…at which point I instructed Doctor McKay to inform the Romalians the truth. He was reluctant to do so at first, claiming that there were benefits to the deception. However, following the arguments from our fellow team members (Ronon was particularly persuasive) he relented and told the Romalians that we were not, in fact, gods. They received the news with considerable relief, since…
“I can’t believe you,” Rodney hissed as a Marine took his P90.
“We’ve had this conversation. Several times.” And Sheppard wasn’t keen to go over it again in the Atlantis Gateroom.
“What harm would it have done?” Apparently, Rodney wasn’t just going to let this drop.
“You cannot lie to potential allies,” Teyla said.
“I thought that’s what diplomacy was about!” Yelling in the Gateroom was something Elizabeth didn’t usually encourage, and Sheppard saw her hurrying down the stairs towards them.
“What is this?”
Turning to her, Rodney didn’t bother lowering his voice as he went on, “In a fit of moral squeamishness, we may just have thrown away our chances at a ZPM.”
“They may yet give us access to it,” Teyla put in quickly. “And they are much more likely to do so if they know that they can trust us.”
“They thought they could trust us when we were gods!” The last word dropped into an echoing silence. Sheppard was pretty sure that if he looked, he’d see every face in the room turned towards them, most of them with the stunned expression that was on Elizabeth’s face right now.
“You told them you were gods?” she asked, in the quiet, reasonable voice that she saved for when Rodney was being particularly obnoxious.
Shaking his head, Rodney started to struggle out of his tac vest, which fortunately left him unable to gesture. “We didn’t tell them we were, we just didn’t correct them.”
“Not at first.” There was no graceful way out of the situation, but Sheppard wasn’t going to let Rodney make it worse than it already was. “They saw Ronon firing his gun. Since they’ve never seen an energy weapon like it, they assumed that we had come from ‘beyond’ or something like that.”
“And how long before you corrected them?” Elizabeth seemed torn between exasperation and amusement, although judging by the twitching at the corner of her mouth, amusement was winning.
“Just a couple of hours,” Rodney muttered. “And not until after they’d shown us all the Ancient technology that they were still managing to use thanks to,” he paused, finally getting a hand free and waving it for emphasis, “their ZPM.”
“It’s theirs, Rodney,” Sheppard reminded him, feeling the need to get back in control of the situation. “And they said they’d be willing to let us have a look at it. We couldn’t just have taken it, could we?” When Rodney seemed to consider this, Sheppard stepped closer, tilting his head. “Could we?”
“Of course not.” Sighing, Rodney handed his vest and sidearm over to the Marine who’d been waiting for them, and shook his head. “We could have just borrowed it.”
“No, Rodney.” Elizabeth’s nod made it clear that this was her final word on the subject. “Colonel, I’ll look forward to your report.”
As they headed to the infirmary for the post-mission checks, Sheppard heard Rodney muttering behind him.
“Just a few hours, that’s all we’d need, just to see what we’re doing for a change instead of draining the naquadah generators all the time.”
Dropping back so they were side by side, Sheppard shook his head. “Give it a rest, McKay.”
“Fine. But when the hot water goes out in your quarters, you’ll be the first back through the ‘gate.”
“I’ll probably cope. Besides,” Sheppard let himself grin, “it’s against my programming to impersonate a deity.”
McKay’s astonished silence was surprisingly gratifying.
P6R-962
…the local currency is known as the invar, and Teyla was able to sell the contents of hers and my tac vests for a reasonable sum. We then made our way to the market, and began searching for Doctor McKay. Ronon managed to locate the dealer and between us we were able to negotiate a reasonable price that included eight power bars and a life signs detector. Since the LSD won’t work for them, we did not know why they wanted it, but apparently they just liked the colour. It should also be noted that we purchased Doctor McKay for a bargain price, since his owner did not seem keen to haggle for too long, accepting our second lowest offer.
“I can’t believe you let me get sold into slavery.” The litany of complaints was showing no signs of letting up, and Sheppard was sorely tempted to go and join Ronon up ahead.
“Look, I said I was sorry,” he said again. “I had no idea that was going to happen.”
“You sold me.”
“I bought you again, didn’t I?”
“Yes. Well.” McKay sniffed. “I was just surprised you could afford me.”
P87-400
…that McKay put his hand in. Then Sheppard tried to get him out and got stuck too. Teyla told me not to touch them, and tried to find a long stick to get them free. That got stuck to them too. I tried to pull Sheppard off McKay, and I got stuck to them too. Teyla decided that the best thing was just to pick the whole thing up and bring it back through the ring Stargate. Which we did. If McKay hadn’t been such an…
“Thank you.” McKay was shaking out his hands, rubbing his shoulders and generally making his usual amount of fuss. Standing to one side, Sheppard rolled his eyes and examined his own hands.
“Seems to be alright,” he said, giving Ronon a questioning look.
“I’m fine.” It hadn’t been anywhere near the most unpleasant hour of Ronon’s life, but it wasn’t an experience he was keen to repeat. Walking back to Atlantis with his hands stuck to Sheppard’s waist, and Sheppard’s hands stuck to McKay’s shoulders had been pretty embarrassing. Then there had been the two hour wait in the infirmary while the doctors tried to get them free. Ronon knew the shift patterns, and he was fairly sure there had been a lot more people around than there should have been. News seemed to have spread.
But the important thing was that they were free now, McKay holding forth as usual and Teyla having retreated somewhere, probably to let out the laughter that she’d been holding onto ever since the whole farce had begun.
Sheppard was still looking at him. “You sure you’re alright?”
“Yeah.” It wasn’t that Ronon objected to Sheppard’s company, and he could even stand McKay for short periods, if only for the entertainment value, but the last few hours had worn away what little patience he had. “I’m going for a run. You coming?”
Sheppard glanced over to where McKay was demanding a full body scan from a harassed-looking nurse. “Nah,” he said. “I’ll make sure Rodney doesn’t make any heads explode and try and get him out of here before we have an angry mob on our hands.”
Hoping his relief at the prospect of some peace and quiet didn’t show, Ronon nodded and started to jog towards the door. The North Pier would probably do nicely. Behind him, McKay’s voice reached a new pitch, counterpoint to Sheppard’s softer drawl. Maybe, Ronon considered, if he ran hard enough, he could get rid of the urge to hit McKay until he stopped yelling. As he got to the transporter, he let himself grin, shaking his head. Even he couldn’t run for that long.
PQ4-839
…strongly recommend all teams review procedure in this matter. We got lucky…
Even after they knew, the team waited. Ronon leaned against the wall, Sheppard half-sat, half-lounged in an uncomfortable infirmary chair and Teyla sat cross-legged on one of the beds, no longer pretending to meditate. A passing medic told them to go and get some sleep, and they all nodded, none of them making an attempt to move.
At some point, Ronon started to say, “Look, I-“
“Don’t.” Sheppard looked up, shaking his head. “Not your fault.”
“I didn’t know.”
“None of us did,” Teyla assured him. “Fortunately, Colonel Sheppard was able to recognise what was happening and act in time.”
They waited in silence for a while longer, and it was Ronon who broke it again.
“I thought he was making it up.”
“I knew he wasn’t.” Tipping his head back, Sheppard blew out a long breath. “Although I did figure he was exaggerating.”
“We all did. There is no blame here.” Teyla’s tone made it clear that she would accept no arguments. “It was an unfortunate incident and everything is going to be alright. And we are more prepared for the future now.”
“No, we’re not.” Pushing out of his chair, Sheppard disappeared into the main infirmary, leaving Teyla and Ronon to look at each other in confusion. He reappeared a few minutes later, clutching three slim tubes. “This,” he said, holding one up, “is an epipen. You’re not going to like where you have to stick it, but he’ll thank you for it later, I promise.”
“It’s better than watching him suffocate,” Ronon said, taking the offered object.
“What would be even better,” Sheppard said dryly, “would be if we could get him to stop eating random things off-world. Since that’s not likely to happen any time soon, let me show you how to use this.”
PR7-441
…nothing of interest on this planet.
Sheppard let Teyla and Ronon get ahead of them as they walked back to the gate. He was acutely aware that his t-shirt was filthy and his boots seemed to have filled with mud when he wasn’t looking. McKay wasn’t doing much better, and he kept trying to flatten his hair down again. Sheppard had given up on his as a lost cause.
“So,” he said, swallowing hard as McKay jumped a little.
“So.”
Biting his lip, Sheppard tried to work out the best way round this. Eventually, he settled on, “I’m not going to turn in a report on this mission.”
“That’s probably for the best.” McKay was looking straight ahead, or at the forest around them or at the muddy ground. Anywhere but at Sheppard.
“Hey.” Putting an arm out, Sheppard brought them both to a stop. “Look, it doesn’t have to-“
“Of course it does.” Maybe it had been better when McKay wasn’t looking at him, because Sheppard really wasn’t sure he was up to dealing with what he could see in the other man’s eyes. “’Only what’s already there’, remember? The priestess was very…specific…about that.”
“Yeah, I remember. Although things after that are a bit blurred.”
“They gave us drugs, Colonel. What did you expect?”
“Not what happened.”
They stood in silence for a long moment, then Sheppard sighed. “I know you’re a bit freaked, but we’ll just get back to Atlantis and-“ He broke off at the look that passed across McKay’s face. “That’s what’s freaking you? I said I wouldn’t put in a report.”
“Of course not.” Shifting uncomfortably, McKay appeared fascinated by the tree over Sheppard’s right shoulder. “I’m not sure Elizabeth would want to know anything that happened here. And the US Air Force definitely wouldn’t want to know.”
“Right.”
They started walking again, tramping along in what was definitely not a companionable silence. It wasn’t even really silence, since McKay was muttering under his breath.
“…just what’s already there…”
“Would you stop that?”
“It’s just-“
“I know.” Running a hand through his hair, Sheppard took a deep breath. “I know, alright?”
“Alright.”
“Alright.”
There was actual silence this time, just the sound of their feet squelching in the mud. They were within sight of the Stargate when McKay put a hand out, tentatively plucking at Sheppard’s sleeve.
“So. Uh. It was already there?”
The man really picked his moments. “Not now, Rodney,” Sheppard said, glancing to where Teyla and Ronon were waiting for them.
“When?”
Meeting McKay’s eyes, Sheppard raised an eyebrow. “Later.”
“Later? Really later?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Your quarters or mine?”
“Mine.” Sheppard started them walking again, letting himself half-smile. “Your mattress sucks.”
Author: jadesfire2808
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard (pre-slash)
Recipient: Pinch hit for mklutz
Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Summary: Sometimes, things just go wrong.
A/N: The request mentioned liking ‘fandom cliches’. I hope this has enough of them for you.
P4X-171
…strongly recommend returning with a full science team. Although the technology appears to be malfunctioning at present, further investigation should be able to determine whether the device is a true matter converter or simply acts on the minds of its subjects. If it is a matter converter, it would represent a significant new development in our understanding of Ancient technology, since we are at present uncertain as to their methods of food production and manufacturing, not to mention its obvious value to the Expedition…
Sheppard looked up. “Should I be capitalizing ‘expedition’ too?”
“Because clearly that’s the most important feature of Rodney’s report.” Raising an eyebrow, Elizabeth gave Sheppard an expectant look. “He wants to go back.”
“Well, he can’t.”
“John…”
“He can’t.” Sheppard put the tablet on Elizabeth’s desk, scrolling to an earlier part of the report. “You have read this bit, right?”
“Of course.”
“Did you miss the part where we were all turned into animals?”
Unable to hide her smile, Elizabeth ducked her head briefly before looking up again. “You have to admit that it’s a fascinating-“
“Animals. Ronon’s teeth were, like, three inches long. And I don’t even want to talk about the tails.”
“I know, John.” Leaning forwards, Elizabeth ignored his folded arms and slouched posture. “Look, I’m not saying I’m sold on this completely, but Rodney raises some good points.”
“You know that he had six legs, right?”
“Matter transformation,” Elizabeth insisted. “Not being totally reliant on the Daedalus or our trading partners.”
“Teyla looked like a rabbit.”
“John.”
He glared. “I spent four hours of my life covered in fur and resisting the urge to eat my team-mates.”
“So that’s a no?”
“Others might lack my self-control. That’s a no.”
P3M-485
…at which point I instructed Doctor McKay to inform the Romalians the truth. He was reluctant to do so at first, claiming that there were benefits to the deception. However, following the arguments from our fellow team members (Ronon was particularly persuasive) he relented and told the Romalians that we were not, in fact, gods. They received the news with considerable relief, since…
“I can’t believe you,” Rodney hissed as a Marine took his P90.
“We’ve had this conversation. Several times.” And Sheppard wasn’t keen to go over it again in the Atlantis Gateroom.
“What harm would it have done?” Apparently, Rodney wasn’t just going to let this drop.
“You cannot lie to potential allies,” Teyla said.
“I thought that’s what diplomacy was about!” Yelling in the Gateroom was something Elizabeth didn’t usually encourage, and Sheppard saw her hurrying down the stairs towards them.
“What is this?”
Turning to her, Rodney didn’t bother lowering his voice as he went on, “In a fit of moral squeamishness, we may just have thrown away our chances at a ZPM.”
“They may yet give us access to it,” Teyla put in quickly. “And they are much more likely to do so if they know that they can trust us.”
“They thought they could trust us when we were gods!” The last word dropped into an echoing silence. Sheppard was pretty sure that if he looked, he’d see every face in the room turned towards them, most of them with the stunned expression that was on Elizabeth’s face right now.
“You told them you were gods?” she asked, in the quiet, reasonable voice that she saved for when Rodney was being particularly obnoxious.
Shaking his head, Rodney started to struggle out of his tac vest, which fortunately left him unable to gesture. “We didn’t tell them we were, we just didn’t correct them.”
“Not at first.” There was no graceful way out of the situation, but Sheppard wasn’t going to let Rodney make it worse than it already was. “They saw Ronon firing his gun. Since they’ve never seen an energy weapon like it, they assumed that we had come from ‘beyond’ or something like that.”
“And how long before you corrected them?” Elizabeth seemed torn between exasperation and amusement, although judging by the twitching at the corner of her mouth, amusement was winning.
“Just a couple of hours,” Rodney muttered. “And not until after they’d shown us all the Ancient technology that they were still managing to use thanks to,” he paused, finally getting a hand free and waving it for emphasis, “their ZPM.”
“It’s theirs, Rodney,” Sheppard reminded him, feeling the need to get back in control of the situation. “And they said they’d be willing to let us have a look at it. We couldn’t just have taken it, could we?” When Rodney seemed to consider this, Sheppard stepped closer, tilting his head. “Could we?”
“Of course not.” Sighing, Rodney handed his vest and sidearm over to the Marine who’d been waiting for them, and shook his head. “We could have just borrowed it.”
“No, Rodney.” Elizabeth’s nod made it clear that this was her final word on the subject. “Colonel, I’ll look forward to your report.”
As they headed to the infirmary for the post-mission checks, Sheppard heard Rodney muttering behind him.
“Just a few hours, that’s all we’d need, just to see what we’re doing for a change instead of draining the naquadah generators all the time.”
Dropping back so they were side by side, Sheppard shook his head. “Give it a rest, McKay.”
“Fine. But when the hot water goes out in your quarters, you’ll be the first back through the ‘gate.”
“I’ll probably cope. Besides,” Sheppard let himself grin, “it’s against my programming to impersonate a deity.”
McKay’s astonished silence was surprisingly gratifying.
P6R-962
…the local currency is known as the invar, and Teyla was able to sell the contents of hers and my tac vests for a reasonable sum. We then made our way to the market, and began searching for Doctor McKay. Ronon managed to locate the dealer and between us we were able to negotiate a reasonable price that included eight power bars and a life signs detector. Since the LSD won’t work for them, we did not know why they wanted it, but apparently they just liked the colour. It should also be noted that we purchased Doctor McKay for a bargain price, since his owner did not seem keen to haggle for too long, accepting our second lowest offer.
“I can’t believe you let me get sold into slavery.” The litany of complaints was showing no signs of letting up, and Sheppard was sorely tempted to go and join Ronon up ahead.
“Look, I said I was sorry,” he said again. “I had no idea that was going to happen.”
“You sold me.”
“I bought you again, didn’t I?”
“Yes. Well.” McKay sniffed. “I was just surprised you could afford me.”
P87-400
…that McKay put his hand in. Then Sheppard tried to get him out and got stuck too. Teyla told me not to touch them, and tried to find a long stick to get them free. That got stuck to them too. I tried to pull Sheppard off McKay, and I got stuck to them too. Teyla decided that the best thing was just to pick the whole thing up and bring it back through the ring Stargate. Which we did. If McKay hadn’t been such an…
“Thank you.” McKay was shaking out his hands, rubbing his shoulders and generally making his usual amount of fuss. Standing to one side, Sheppard rolled his eyes and examined his own hands.
“Seems to be alright,” he said, giving Ronon a questioning look.
“I’m fine.” It hadn’t been anywhere near the most unpleasant hour of Ronon’s life, but it wasn’t an experience he was keen to repeat. Walking back to Atlantis with his hands stuck to Sheppard’s waist, and Sheppard’s hands stuck to McKay’s shoulders had been pretty embarrassing. Then there had been the two hour wait in the infirmary while the doctors tried to get them free. Ronon knew the shift patterns, and he was fairly sure there had been a lot more people around than there should have been. News seemed to have spread.
But the important thing was that they were free now, McKay holding forth as usual and Teyla having retreated somewhere, probably to let out the laughter that she’d been holding onto ever since the whole farce had begun.
Sheppard was still looking at him. “You sure you’re alright?”
“Yeah.” It wasn’t that Ronon objected to Sheppard’s company, and he could even stand McKay for short periods, if only for the entertainment value, but the last few hours had worn away what little patience he had. “I’m going for a run. You coming?”
Sheppard glanced over to where McKay was demanding a full body scan from a harassed-looking nurse. “Nah,” he said. “I’ll make sure Rodney doesn’t make any heads explode and try and get him out of here before we have an angry mob on our hands.”
Hoping his relief at the prospect of some peace and quiet didn’t show, Ronon nodded and started to jog towards the door. The North Pier would probably do nicely. Behind him, McKay’s voice reached a new pitch, counterpoint to Sheppard’s softer drawl. Maybe, Ronon considered, if he ran hard enough, he could get rid of the urge to hit McKay until he stopped yelling. As he got to the transporter, he let himself grin, shaking his head. Even he couldn’t run for that long.
PQ4-839
…strongly recommend all teams review procedure in this matter. We got lucky…
Even after they knew, the team waited. Ronon leaned against the wall, Sheppard half-sat, half-lounged in an uncomfortable infirmary chair and Teyla sat cross-legged on one of the beds, no longer pretending to meditate. A passing medic told them to go and get some sleep, and they all nodded, none of them making an attempt to move.
At some point, Ronon started to say, “Look, I-“
“Don’t.” Sheppard looked up, shaking his head. “Not your fault.”
“I didn’t know.”
“None of us did,” Teyla assured him. “Fortunately, Colonel Sheppard was able to recognise what was happening and act in time.”
They waited in silence for a while longer, and it was Ronon who broke it again.
“I thought he was making it up.”
“I knew he wasn’t.” Tipping his head back, Sheppard blew out a long breath. “Although I did figure he was exaggerating.”
“We all did. There is no blame here.” Teyla’s tone made it clear that she would accept no arguments. “It was an unfortunate incident and everything is going to be alright. And we are more prepared for the future now.”
“No, we’re not.” Pushing out of his chair, Sheppard disappeared into the main infirmary, leaving Teyla and Ronon to look at each other in confusion. He reappeared a few minutes later, clutching three slim tubes. “This,” he said, holding one up, “is an epipen. You’re not going to like where you have to stick it, but he’ll thank you for it later, I promise.”
“It’s better than watching him suffocate,” Ronon said, taking the offered object.
“What would be even better,” Sheppard said dryly, “would be if we could get him to stop eating random things off-world. Since that’s not likely to happen any time soon, let me show you how to use this.”
PR7-441
…nothing of interest on this planet.
Sheppard let Teyla and Ronon get ahead of them as they walked back to the gate. He was acutely aware that his t-shirt was filthy and his boots seemed to have filled with mud when he wasn’t looking. McKay wasn’t doing much better, and he kept trying to flatten his hair down again. Sheppard had given up on his as a lost cause.
“So,” he said, swallowing hard as McKay jumped a little.
“So.”
Biting his lip, Sheppard tried to work out the best way round this. Eventually, he settled on, “I’m not going to turn in a report on this mission.”
“That’s probably for the best.” McKay was looking straight ahead, or at the forest around them or at the muddy ground. Anywhere but at Sheppard.
“Hey.” Putting an arm out, Sheppard brought them both to a stop. “Look, it doesn’t have to-“
“Of course it does.” Maybe it had been better when McKay wasn’t looking at him, because Sheppard really wasn’t sure he was up to dealing with what he could see in the other man’s eyes. “’Only what’s already there’, remember? The priestess was very…specific…about that.”
“Yeah, I remember. Although things after that are a bit blurred.”
“They gave us drugs, Colonel. What did you expect?”
“Not what happened.”
They stood in silence for a long moment, then Sheppard sighed. “I know you’re a bit freaked, but we’ll just get back to Atlantis and-“ He broke off at the look that passed across McKay’s face. “That’s what’s freaking you? I said I wouldn’t put in a report.”
“Of course not.” Shifting uncomfortably, McKay appeared fascinated by the tree over Sheppard’s right shoulder. “I’m not sure Elizabeth would want to know anything that happened here. And the US Air Force definitely wouldn’t want to know.”
“Right.”
They started walking again, tramping along in what was definitely not a companionable silence. It wasn’t even really silence, since McKay was muttering under his breath.
“…just what’s already there…”
“Would you stop that?”
“It’s just-“
“I know.” Running a hand through his hair, Sheppard took a deep breath. “I know, alright?”
“Alright.”
“Alright.”
There was actual silence this time, just the sound of their feet squelching in the mud. They were within sight of the Stargate when McKay put a hand out, tentatively plucking at Sheppard’s sleeve.
“So. Uh. It was already there?”
The man really picked his moments. “Not now, Rodney,” Sheppard said, glancing to where Teyla and Ronon were waiting for them.
“When?”
Meeting McKay’s eyes, Sheppard raised an eyebrow. “Later.”
“Later? Really later?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Your quarters or mine?”
“Mine.” Sheppard started them walking again, letting himself half-smile. “Your mattress sucks.”