A Soldier's Dream
Hey, I wrote for the Siege III tag challenge. :)
This is just a small piece I put together. It's not all that well tied together or coherent, but hey, it's something!
Title: A Soldier's Dream
Author: Tazmy
Character: McKay
Description: There are some things that only a soldier can understand.
Rodney slept for two days straight, dreaming the dreams only a soldier could understand. He woke up every few hours convinced a Wraith was at his feet, that he needed to be doing something to save everyone, or that Ford was starting at him with his creepy black eye. When he could take it no more, and despite feeling as tired as when he had fallen asleep, Rodney emerged from his bed, rubbing his eyes vigorously.
He’d always dreamed of being a hero, as the one who saved the day, and over the past year he’d fallen too easily into the role. No one ever told him how hard it was to actually live through such things. He’d always suspected, always known that such was not the life for him, and yet he found himself living it day by day. He’d been taken hostage numerous times, his brains had saved lives, and he’d shown courage he never knew he had. Now he’d faced Wraith and sleeplessness all to save the family he loved, and what did he have to show for it all but weariness?
Being a hero wasn’t fun. It wasn’t glamorous. It just was.
And he was a hero among heroes. Sheppard had been willing to risk his life. Many soldiers had fallen. The scientists that remained had taken up arms to defend their home. Until now it was a choice fate had made for them, one that could not be denied.
But things had changed.
Rodney shook away the images of Wraith feeding on him, misfiring guns, and general panic. So many bad dreams it was hard to determine what had really happened and what hadn’t.
Glancing in the mirror, he saw a gray face that was somehow his own. Black circles decorated his eyes as a badge of courage against the Siege. Had he gained some new wrinkles? Did he always look this scared? Had they really won? Could he really still be alive?
The Daedalus was in orbit, he realized. A starship capable of taking him home and away from all of this. Where no Wraith could touch him. Where everyday wasn’t a new struggle to survive-to save others. He was so very tired and maybe it was time to rest for real-for a while.
He wandered away from his quarters, shrugging off the weariness. The corridors were bustling with people coming to and fro, repairing this and that, cleaning up blood stains, and getting all the numerous things done that had to be done, even as they all recovered. Even as they all learned to breathe again.
He felt his hands shaking and didn’t know if it was from fear or hunger. Probably both. Did he have PTSD? Could anyone live through this and not? Why was his heart beating so fast?
He realized he hadn’t spoken any of this aloud, and that scared him. He talked to drive off fears. He talked to comfort himself. And, yes, he talked because he loved the sound of his own voice. Silence was deafening. Silence was haunting. Silence was… Silence was strangely what he needed. He doubted he could speak right now even if he wanted to. His brain was clouded with the dreams and thoughts. He had to keep reminding himself that he was okay, there was no pressure right now to do anything but rest. Rest, ha! As if anyone could rest after that. He might never truly rest again.
He had dreamed the dreams of soldiers, the type only they could understand, but he understood them and lived them and… Did that make him a soldier? Dared he escape this place before he fell deeper?
“Rodney?” Radek called from behind him.
Rodney whirled around, noticing for the first time that he had wandered to his lab and was absently working on an experiment. When had that happened? He said nothing as he saw Radek’s worried gaze, mirrored in the many other faces that watched him from their lab stations.
“Are you okay?”
Silence. For the first time in his life he had embraced it and he found it hard to let it go now, but it was time to do so.
“Yes, of course, why wouldn’t I be?” He turned back to the experiment not wanting the others to see his weariness and the new wrinkles that had come along for the ride.
“You have been here for ten minutes and not said a word. It was making many of us nervous. Are you sure you-“
“I said I’m fine,” he snapped back, holding to some semblance of normalcy. “You!” he shouted to the many gazing faces, “Get back to work. You supposedly have prestigious degrees so go do something with them other than act moronic.”
It wasn’t his best snap them into working moment, but it was enough to put a smile on Radek’s face, and to make Rodney feel a bit better as well. Sure, his hands were still shaking, but there was something comforting in seeing a friend-in knowing he had friends.
Unable to concentrate on work, Rodney left the lab after only a few hours. He ate what food he could scavenge among the chaos, not relishing in the tastes that had once given him so much pleasure. If he closed his eyes, he could still hear the gunfire. He wondered if it was real, and so he tuned into his acute senses, convincing himself of the silence.
Rodney had read of veterans that returned home changed men. How some could never escape their dreams, how memories tormented them, and how nothing was ever the same again. He didn’t want that to be true for him. He didn’t want to never have a pleasant wraith-free dream again. He didn’t want to be sent home if it was found he was suffering-even if it was for the best. He knew it was too early to have such thoughts, but they nagged at him nevertheless. PTSD was the most terrifying disease Rodney could think of because it meant not just suffering, but losing everything that was dear to him-his mind, his job, his life.
After another few days of endless dreams, he finally visited Kate, only to find a line of twenty in front of him. Many of them were scientists, but just as many were soldiers. Some were still shaking, some look haunted, others just looked happy to be alive. Though Rodney didn’t know most of their names, he felt a bond with them that was stronger than it had ever been before. The bond of trauma and battle-of survival.
Kate didn’t give him a straight diagnosis, but kept him talking for fifty minutes. Or had Rodney just started rambling and she hadn’t bothered to stop him?
“I have terrible dreams,” he told her, “and I don’t think they’ll ever go away. They’re the, uh, dreams that I always figured soldiers had to live with, but that’s ridiculous because I’m not a soldier.”
“Are you so sure?” she asked, because she knew the truth just as well as Rodney did. Only soldiers could understand the dreams he had had, and he understood them all too well.
He returned to earth with prescription sleep aids and a list of candidates to fulfill the positions left open by scientists that had fallen or had decided not to return. During the interviews he had to keep himself from telling them to turn around and run away, that it wasn’t worth it to return. Then he had to ask himself why he was staying.
Because it is home.
He returned to Atlantis with the new recruits who gazed at the place with wonder and awe. There was somehow pleasure in watching them react, knowing he had done the same not too long before-even if it felt like forever ago. He still felt the same awe overtake him more often than not.
It was why he had stayed. Atlantis had drastically changed his life both for the bad and the good, but he could not imagine a life without her technological beauty and the family he found here.
“Do you dream?” Rodney had found himself asking John one day. He rocked on his heels before finding the nerve to ask. When the words finally came, he spoke them casually as he feigned interest in an experiment he was running.
“Of course. Last night there was this hot--”
“Not just normal dreams. I mean, do you, do you…” They never had conversations like this one, the kind that admitted there were problems in the world, that their lives weren’t just some entertaining games with cool toys. John hated talking about feelings and Rodney respected that, if only because he felt the same way. But the dreams hadn’t stopped. They wouldn’t stop. “Do you dream of the Wraith?”
John looked uncomfortable at first, but then his face grew somber. “Yeah. I suspect we all do.”
“Does it ever get to be too much?”
John stared hard at him, maybe checking if his friend had been driven mad, and Rodney’s not sure he hadn’t. After a moment’s pause, John answered, “Every day, but it’s worth it.”
Rodney changed the subject then to Puddlejumpers and new found Ancients toys. To superheroes and games and anything else that made everything that much easier to deal with. It wasn’t until he returned to his quarters, turning the prescription bottle over in his hand, that he sat down on the bed and thought more about the nightmares and soldiers and family. He thought of why he was here and what he had lost, what he had gained. Then, comforted by Atlantis’s silent hum, he fell into a dreamless sleep.
This is just a small piece I put together. It's not all that well tied together or coherent, but hey, it's something!
Title: A Soldier's Dream
Author: Tazmy
Character: McKay
Description: There are some things that only a soldier can understand.
Rodney slept for two days straight, dreaming the dreams only a soldier could understand. He woke up every few hours convinced a Wraith was at his feet, that he needed to be doing something to save everyone, or that Ford was starting at him with his creepy black eye. When he could take it no more, and despite feeling as tired as when he had fallen asleep, Rodney emerged from his bed, rubbing his eyes vigorously.
He’d always dreamed of being a hero, as the one who saved the day, and over the past year he’d fallen too easily into the role. No one ever told him how hard it was to actually live through such things. He’d always suspected, always known that such was not the life for him, and yet he found himself living it day by day. He’d been taken hostage numerous times, his brains had saved lives, and he’d shown courage he never knew he had. Now he’d faced Wraith and sleeplessness all to save the family he loved, and what did he have to show for it all but weariness?
Being a hero wasn’t fun. It wasn’t glamorous. It just was.
And he was a hero among heroes. Sheppard had been willing to risk his life. Many soldiers had fallen. The scientists that remained had taken up arms to defend their home. Until now it was a choice fate had made for them, one that could not be denied.
But things had changed.
Rodney shook away the images of Wraith feeding on him, misfiring guns, and general panic. So many bad dreams it was hard to determine what had really happened and what hadn’t.
Glancing in the mirror, he saw a gray face that was somehow his own. Black circles decorated his eyes as a badge of courage against the Siege. Had he gained some new wrinkles? Did he always look this scared? Had they really won? Could he really still be alive?
The Daedalus was in orbit, he realized. A starship capable of taking him home and away from all of this. Where no Wraith could touch him. Where everyday wasn’t a new struggle to survive-to save others. He was so very tired and maybe it was time to rest for real-for a while.
He wandered away from his quarters, shrugging off the weariness. The corridors were bustling with people coming to and fro, repairing this and that, cleaning up blood stains, and getting all the numerous things done that had to be done, even as they all recovered. Even as they all learned to breathe again.
He felt his hands shaking and didn’t know if it was from fear or hunger. Probably both. Did he have PTSD? Could anyone live through this and not? Why was his heart beating so fast?
He realized he hadn’t spoken any of this aloud, and that scared him. He talked to drive off fears. He talked to comfort himself. And, yes, he talked because he loved the sound of his own voice. Silence was deafening. Silence was haunting. Silence was… Silence was strangely what he needed. He doubted he could speak right now even if he wanted to. His brain was clouded with the dreams and thoughts. He had to keep reminding himself that he was okay, there was no pressure right now to do anything but rest. Rest, ha! As if anyone could rest after that. He might never truly rest again.
He had dreamed the dreams of soldiers, the type only they could understand, but he understood them and lived them and… Did that make him a soldier? Dared he escape this place before he fell deeper?
“Rodney?” Radek called from behind him.
Rodney whirled around, noticing for the first time that he had wandered to his lab and was absently working on an experiment. When had that happened? He said nothing as he saw Radek’s worried gaze, mirrored in the many other faces that watched him from their lab stations.
“Are you okay?”
Silence. For the first time in his life he had embraced it and he found it hard to let it go now, but it was time to do so.
“Yes, of course, why wouldn’t I be?” He turned back to the experiment not wanting the others to see his weariness and the new wrinkles that had come along for the ride.
“You have been here for ten minutes and not said a word. It was making many of us nervous. Are you sure you-“
“I said I’m fine,” he snapped back, holding to some semblance of normalcy. “You!” he shouted to the many gazing faces, “Get back to work. You supposedly have prestigious degrees so go do something with them other than act moronic.”
It wasn’t his best snap them into working moment, but it was enough to put a smile on Radek’s face, and to make Rodney feel a bit better as well. Sure, his hands were still shaking, but there was something comforting in seeing a friend-in knowing he had friends.
Unable to concentrate on work, Rodney left the lab after only a few hours. He ate what food he could scavenge among the chaos, not relishing in the tastes that had once given him so much pleasure. If he closed his eyes, he could still hear the gunfire. He wondered if it was real, and so he tuned into his acute senses, convincing himself of the silence.
Rodney had read of veterans that returned home changed men. How some could never escape their dreams, how memories tormented them, and how nothing was ever the same again. He didn’t want that to be true for him. He didn’t want to never have a pleasant wraith-free dream again. He didn’t want to be sent home if it was found he was suffering-even if it was for the best. He knew it was too early to have such thoughts, but they nagged at him nevertheless. PTSD was the most terrifying disease Rodney could think of because it meant not just suffering, but losing everything that was dear to him-his mind, his job, his life.
After another few days of endless dreams, he finally visited Kate, only to find a line of twenty in front of him. Many of them were scientists, but just as many were soldiers. Some were still shaking, some look haunted, others just looked happy to be alive. Though Rodney didn’t know most of their names, he felt a bond with them that was stronger than it had ever been before. The bond of trauma and battle-of survival.
Kate didn’t give him a straight diagnosis, but kept him talking for fifty minutes. Or had Rodney just started rambling and she hadn’t bothered to stop him?
“I have terrible dreams,” he told her, “and I don’t think they’ll ever go away. They’re the, uh, dreams that I always figured soldiers had to live with, but that’s ridiculous because I’m not a soldier.”
“Are you so sure?” she asked, because she knew the truth just as well as Rodney did. Only soldiers could understand the dreams he had had, and he understood them all too well.
He returned to earth with prescription sleep aids and a list of candidates to fulfill the positions left open by scientists that had fallen or had decided not to return. During the interviews he had to keep himself from telling them to turn around and run away, that it wasn’t worth it to return. Then he had to ask himself why he was staying.
Because it is home.
He returned to Atlantis with the new recruits who gazed at the place with wonder and awe. There was somehow pleasure in watching them react, knowing he had done the same not too long before-even if it felt like forever ago. He still felt the same awe overtake him more often than not.
It was why he had stayed. Atlantis had drastically changed his life both for the bad and the good, but he could not imagine a life without her technological beauty and the family he found here.
“Do you dream?” Rodney had found himself asking John one day. He rocked on his heels before finding the nerve to ask. When the words finally came, he spoke them casually as he feigned interest in an experiment he was running.
“Of course. Last night there was this hot--”
“Not just normal dreams. I mean, do you, do you…” They never had conversations like this one, the kind that admitted there were problems in the world, that their lives weren’t just some entertaining games with cool toys. John hated talking about feelings and Rodney respected that, if only because he felt the same way. But the dreams hadn’t stopped. They wouldn’t stop. “Do you dream of the Wraith?”
John looked uncomfortable at first, but then his face grew somber. “Yeah. I suspect we all do.”
“Does it ever get to be too much?”
John stared hard at him, maybe checking if his friend had been driven mad, and Rodney’s not sure he hadn’t. After a moment’s pause, John answered, “Every day, but it’s worth it.”
Rodney changed the subject then to Puddlejumpers and new found Ancients toys. To superheroes and games and anything else that made everything that much easier to deal with. It wasn’t until he returned to his quarters, turning the prescription bottle over in his hand, that he sat down on the bed and thought more about the nightmares and soldiers and family. He thought of why he was here and what he had lost, what he had gained. Then, comforted by Atlantis’s silent hum, he fell into a dreamless sleep.