Solvation: [3/3]
[part ii]
[iii]
The day that Brendon remembers his fifth grade teacher - “Mr. Appleton! He wore sweater-vests and jelly bracelets and I was totally going to marry him when I grew up!” - is the day a single hive ship shows up on their long-range radar scans.
“This is not good,” Zelenka says, pushing his glasses up his nose. “They should not know we are still here.”
“Well,” Sheppard says, hands on his hips, “either we didn’t get the thing-a-ma-jig in time-”
“Thing-a-ma-jig?” McKay cuts in, half his face scrunched up in disgusted disbelief.
“-or they plucked the information right out of Urie’s brain,” Sheppard goes on, ignoring McKay. “What are the chances that they want their pet back?”
“You think they’re after Urie?” McKay asks, incredulous.
“Hey, one hive ship.” Sheppard shrugs. “It’s a possibility.”
Spencer isn’t exactly sure what they’re saying, but he doesn’t want to interrupt the colonel.
Brendon says, “Wait, what?” though, and they all turn towards him, hovering behind Chuck’s control console. He’s got wide, panicky eyes.
McKay flaps a hand. “You were implanted with a chip; your mind was wiped clean; logically they were keeping you as a pet, Urie,” he says.
“I was. I was microchipped?” Brendon asks, and Spencer clenches his hands into fists, because, hey, that information would have been nice to have weeks ago.
They’d fucking tagged him, and if they hadn’t rescued Brendon, he’d be one of those freaky Wraith worshippers, and he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t have remembered them at all, ever, and that thought is fucking frightening.
“How long until it arrives,” Weir asks, and Zelenka taps the screen.
“Five days,” he says. “Maybe sooner.”
*
Brendon is totally not scared of Ronon Dex. “I’m not scared of you,” he says with this great conviction in his voice, and Ronon arches a furry eyebrow.
“Good,” he says. His voice is all gruff and deep, and Brendon’s stomach does a nervous somersault.
He’s not sure why Dex is there standing in the doorway of his quarters. Dex has barely said two words to him - unless manly grunts are considered words - and Brendon doesn’t get the impression they were all that close before he lost his memory.
And then suddenly Dex is whipping off his leather tunic and hey, hey! He’s got great muscles and all, but Brendon’s pretty sure Spencer’ll kill him if this goes where Brendon thinks it’s going.
“Um.” Brendon takes a step backwards, hands up. “What are you-”
“Beckett did a good job,” Dex says, turning away, shaking his dreads aside. “The scar’s mostly from my own attempts.”
“Oh,” Brendon breathes. Dex has a dark, puckered mark high on his back. “Is that-?”
“Wraith,” Dex says.
Brendon reaches out a tentative hand then yanks his arm back before he can touch the skin.
Dex shoots an amused look over his shoulder, a half-grin on his mouth. “You can touch it,” he offers.
Brendon shakes his head. “No, that’s. It’s okay,” Brendon says. He really doesn’t want to touch it. He can’t even reach his own - he’d tried, twisting in front of the mirror - so he doesn’t want to touch Dex’s. “So you were, uh, a pet?”
Dex grunts, drops his tunic. The curve of his lips turns feral. “More like big game,” he says, and at Brendon’s blank look - what? - he goes on with, “They tagged me, set me loose, then tried to kill me.”
Brendon’s eyes widen. “Oh. That’s, um. Sorry?”
Dex laughs, a short bark, and he punches Brendon’s shoulder lightly. Which isn’t all that light for Brendon, and he staggers a little, catches himself on the back of his desk chair.
He feels a smile twitch across his lips, though, and then he thinks, wait, and scrabbles at the hem of his shirt. “Do you want to-?” he asks, because fairs fair, and Dex had shown him his.
Dex says, “If you want,” and Brendon knows it’s because Dex is doing this for him. Dex’s scar is years old from the looks of it, and it’s probably not something he’ll ever forget, no, but Brendon doesn’t think he goes around flashing his hurt for his own peace of mind. This is for Brendon.
Brendon doesn’t have to, but he pulls his shirt up anyway, turns his back to Dex.
Dex says, “Not bad,” and Brendon doesn’t know if he means it doesn’t look bad, or if the scar is suitably impressive. He finds he’d be okay with either, honestly.
Dex doesn’t touch him, and Brendon never would have told him not to, but he’s glad. He thinks of Spencer, of Spencer’s softly callused fingers, and he wants those hands telling him it’s okay, not Dex’s.
They share a look when Brendon faces him again, though. Brendon thinks, wow, and, cool, and hey, I’m bonding with Ronon Dex!
He can’t wait to tell Spencer.
*
Growing up, Gerard had always wanted a hamster. He’d begged his grandmother for one, and he’d never gotten it, and then he’d realized that he couldn’t even keep track of his brother, so how the hell was he supposed to take care of this little animal; a tiny fuzzy body that would depend on him for everything? Of course, that revelation had come during the fucked-up period of his life, and he’d been mostly drunk and sobbing like a giant fucking baby, and that’s in the past now, so he can totally take care of the little mousey thing Frank had given him.
The thing with Brendon is fucking with his mind a little, though. “Do you think Craig likes his cage?” he asks Frank. Craig looks like a naked mole rat, except he has soft cream fur and isn’t blind.
“It’s a fucking awesome cage, Gee,” Frank says absently.
“No, I mean.” Gerard kicks up his feet. He’s on his stomach on his bed, watching Craig munch on Cheeto crumbs, and, okay. It’s a pretty kick-ass cage, that’s true. Pete had helped him make it - Gerard’s an excellent engineer, but Pete’s kind of brilliant at making things out of practically nothing - and it has all sorts of cool levels and tubes that wind around half of his room. “Do you think he’s happy?”
Frank looks up from his book - his actual book, the one he’s been writing for the better part of a year on alien marine invertebrates, and that’s just so cool - and says, “He’s not unhappy,” because he knows better than to patronize Gerard. It’s one of Gerard’s favorite things about him.
“But. You could argue that Brendon wouldn’t have been unhappy, either,” Gerard points out.
Frank nods slowly. He puts down his manuscript - seriously, his manuscript, how awesome is that? Sometimes Gerard thinks he’s more excited about the book than Frank is, although it’s not like he can publish it anytime soon - and moves over to the bed. “Okay,” Frank says. “We can let him go, if you want.”
Gerard’s heart beats a little faster. The thing is, he doesn’t want to give Craig up, and that’s kind of bad, right? But Craig is super healthy and his coat shines, and Gerard is doing the greatest job ever taking care of him, and that’s new. That’s different and nice.
Gerard says, thoughtfully, “He’s sort of domesticated now, though.” Craig hops on Gerard’s palm to be petted and sits by his bowl every morning, waiting for food, and what if he’s forgotten how to forage?
Frank smiles at him, digs an elbow into his side. “You’re so the best at taking care of him, Gee,” he says cheekily, and Gerard says, “Fuck off,” with an affectionate grin.
*
“Patrick,” Pete says. “Patrick, if you were ever kidnapped by Wraith I’d totally rescue you.”
Patrick arches an eyebrow. Pete kind of wants to lick it. “I never go off-world, Pete,” he says.
“Still. If it ever happens, you can depend on me.” Pete would be so good at rescuing Patrick. Except for the part where he’d have to hold a gun. He’d sort of failed most of his field tests. “Only if Sheppard would let me go, though,” he amends. “Which he probably wouldn’t, since I’m a scientist, and I accidentally shot Saporta that one time, but it’s the thought that counts, right?”
Patrick stares at him.
“I’m serious,” Pete insists. He thinks maybe Patrick doesn’t believe him, but he’d do fucking anything for Patrick, he really would. Patrick is his best friend in the whole entire world, in all the galaxies.
“Okay,” Patrick finally says. “Thanks.” He smiles a small Patrick smile, and it’s pretty awesome. His cheeks are pink.
Pete tugs on the brim of Patrick’s hat. “See,” he says. “We’re easy.”
“Dude,” he slaps Pete’s hand away, ducks his head, “speak for yourself.”
*
Jon hears the soft rustle of fabric, the slight hitch of breath, and he spins, catches the front of William’s shirt and pins him up against the corridor wall in one smooth motion.
William grins this huge grin down at him. “Point to you, Jonny Walker,” he says, hands up and out in surrender. Jon isn’t fooled. William is a sneaky fucker, and he’s been hanging around Saporta a lot lately.
Jon glances up and down the hallway cautiously before letting him go, because William isn’t above bringing in help to get the drop on him. When he doesn’t spot anyone, though, he flashes William a smile and steps back, smoothing the wrinkles in William’s away science uniform.
“Got a mission?” he asks. William isn’t on a team, but his skills are in high demand. He’s awesome with C4.
“Back to M45,” William says cheerfully, tugging on the hem of his jacket. Jon knows the mining planet is a favorite of William’s. “We’re blowing up the north face this time. I’m hoping to find dinosaurs.”
“Dinosaurs,” Jon echoes. He shakes his head, amused.
“Mayhap a handy ZPM, too, you never know. Oh, oh, and listen.” William grabs his arm, face schooled as serious as he’s capable of. Which isn’t much, but it’s the effort that he puts into it that has Jon’s ears perking up. “I heard about Urie, poor lamb.”
Jon blinks. “Okay.”
“Yes,” he says, nodding. “Truly horrifying.” He cocks his head, flipping his hair over his shoulder. “Although kind of cool when you think about it.”
“When you think about it.”
“Jon Walker, think.” William holds up a finger, presses it into the center of Jon’s forehead. “The biggest bad-asses in the galaxy want Urie as a pet.”
William’s eyes turn dreamy, and Jon’s pretty sure he’s imagining lying around on satin pillows, being handfed chocolate kisses, and, okay, Jon’s not gonna knock the image, except the hands that would be feeding him are clawed and have a soul-sucking mouth in the middle of one palm. It takes away from the whimsy, honestly.
“Okay,” Jon says. “I don’t think I’m going to tell Brendon that.”
William shrugs. “Whatever you fancy, my friend. I’m off to the armory.”
*
Impending Wraith invasions should probably have meant the halt of all off-world activity, except William and Travis have had this trip off-world planned for weeks, and there’s the small matter of a rumored ZPM. Preliminary energy readings had been promising, so it wasn’t as if the mission wasn’t very important. That was William’s winning argument, at any rate.
They hadn’t been expecting any complications.
William never dwells on the unpleasant, though. He’s a great supporter of good things, so perhaps the mission to M45 isn’t going quite as smoothly as he’d hoped, but there are brighter sides to focus on.
“How can you be smiling, dude?” Travis asks, and William holds up a finger.
He holds up a finger and pauses dramatically, long enough that he sees a smile twitch at the edges of Travie’s mouth, too, and then he says, “I fished my wish.”
The adorable Corporal Wheeler rolls his eyes. Or at least William thinks he rolls his eyes since it’s dim where they’re hiding. He senses Wheeler’s silent sarcastic disbelief. William’s excellent like that.
There’s a screech and then a huge shadow passes over the grassy field spread out in front of them.
Asher snaps her gum, shifts the P-90 in her hands. “Can we shoot it down?”
Kennerty scratches the back of his neck, squints out into the sunlight. “I think it had babies.”
“Seriously, you and your dinosaurs, Billy,” Travis says, shaking his head.
William had been hoping for bones, but the pterodactyl is almost as good. Almost, of course, because the geological find surrounding alien dinosaur bones would have been fascinating, and now they just have a giant leathery bird intent on eating them.
“I don’t see how we could have missed this fucker the last time we were here,” Wheeler says. He’s inching towards the mouth of the cave on his knees, one hand flat along the rough wall. He tips his face out into the sun, and the pterodactyl screams again, swooping so low its talons drag into the ground, spinning up clumps of grass and dirt. Wheeler jerks back with a curse.
William grins even more brightly and asks, “Well, Sergeant?” to Kennerty, because this is not William’s problem. Getting them safely back to the ‘gate falls squarely on the military contingent of their little team, no matter the fact that it’s probably William’s fault the thing is even awake. Or Travie’s. He’s not taking all the blame here, not when Travis had been recording all those hieroglyphics for Patrick, his voice echoing in the underground caverns.
Granted, William was the one who’d poked it with a stick.
“We’ll miss a radio check-in at 1300,” Kennerty says. “We miss two, they’ll send someone through after us.”
“Who will immediately get eaten by Pterry here,” William adds cheerfully.
Asher smacks the back of his head, and that isn’t nice at all - she’s mussed his hair! - and William mentally crosses her off his list of military grunts he’d like to get horizontal with. She has spectacular breasts, but a bad attitude and lethal aim. Or perhaps not exactly a bad attitude but certainly an unfortunate one aimed at all of William’s important parts. For sexing.
And then Kennerty’s radio crackles, and he starts slightly but taps his ear and says, “This is Sergeant Kennerty, over,” and Captain Gabe nearly hoots back, “Jee-sus, Mike, what the hell is going on here?”
*
Maja is all legs, and William can appreciate that. He also appreciates the way she’d probably eat him if he got overly handsy - she’s very particular with who she lets in her personal space - so he sticks to leers and lip-licking and hopes one day all of his prettiness will lure her closer.
“This is cozy,” William says, and from the other side of Maja, Captain Gabe gives him one of his huge, evil grins and asks, “So we got a plan?”
Gabe’s team had been dispatched before they’d even missed check-in, mainly because Nolan had gotten overexcited about the readouts Travis had sent back through to Patrick a few hours earlier, so now there’s nine of them wedged in the little cave, that rat bastard Lacey puffing away at a cigarette, Nolan blinking at them behind coke-bottle glasses, datapad hugged to his chest, gorgeous Maja taunting William with her perfect, BDU encased ass, and Captain Gabe with a gash on his arm that seems to have made Pterry more irate than she had been, scent of blood thick and metallic as it steadily seeps through the hasty bandage Asher had wrapped around it.
“Wait until Atlantis tries to hail us,” Kennerty says.
Wheeler - who is seriously adorable, William has always thought so, and he can’t imagine him in the Marines, really, but he’s got the patches to prove it - rubs a hand over his chin. “You sure we can’t just blast it?”
“Fuck, yeah, we can,” Gabe says, but Kennerty just stresses, “Babies.”
Maja cocks her head and asks curiously, “So you would like there to be more of these monsters?”
“I just.” Kennerty waves a hand. “Whatever, my mission. No killing the giant flying dinosaur, okay?”
Gabe can technically overrule Kennerty, but he only shrugs, tugs the cigarette out of Lacey’s mouth and sucks it down to the fiery orange end.
*
One of the arguably good things to come out of Sergeant Bryar and Brendon’s capture and subsequent rescue from the Wraith is a pretty awesome camaraderie that’s spouted between Jon’s team and Toro’s.
Somehow, it’s fallen to Jon and Spencer to join forces with Toro and Bryar whenever they’re gearing up for a rescue mission. So when Sheppard tells Toro to get a team together, Spencer and Jon just wordlessly show up, thigh-holsters already strapped on and P-90s slung over their chests.
They’ve got nine men trapped on M45, four of them scientists, one of them William, and Jon’s got a soft spot for William, it’s true. William isn’t quite as accident prone as Brendon - he’s had more experience going off-world from his years at the SGC, at least, and Jon’s seen him in action - but that doesn’t stop Jon from worrying.
“Holy shit,” Bryar says in a hush when they crest the first hill.
There’s a huge bird-thing circling the valley, wings sharp and bony, head jutting out like a hammer’s, only really, really pointy. Jon’s just glad they’d thought to lug a couple AT-4s through the ‘gate.
Toro whistles almost soundlessly, and the four of them duck into some brush, lowering their bellies to the rocky ground.
“It’s big, but they’re not helpless,” Bryar points out right away, and Toro nods.
Spencer catches on and scowls. “We leave it alive, then,” he says, and Jon’s not a fan of taking lives needlessly, but he’d been looking forward to shooting that thing out of the sky. AT-4s are sort of awesome to use.
They decide on a distraction through almost silent signals - and it’s nice, Jon thinks, to have that kind of relationship outside his own team - relaying it as best they can and just as quietly to Kennerty and Saporta, and then Toro’s sliding down the hill, gravel spitting out from his heels, P-90 pointing directly up, bandana slipped down around his neck, freeing his curls in an afro to rival Joe’s, loud hollers pulling the animal’s attention across the valley from the trapped teams.
Toro runs for a separate set of caves, skidding in between rocks and ducking whenever the bird - dinosaur? William’s mind is an eerie place, really - gets too close, and Jon thinks they’re really fucking lucky it doesn’t breathe fire. And then he thinks that he shouldn’t think that because with their luck, seriously.
Afterwards, after Toro finds a trail winding away from the valley, loops back around with this triumphant grin, he says, “Hey, look what I found,” with something that looks suspiciously like a ZPM tucked under his arm like a football. “Did they normally just leave these things lying around in random caves?”
And when they’re sprinting towards the Stargate, a haphazard, panting group, scientists herded protectively in the middle, Dr. Ivarsson says to Toro, between one breath and the next, “You were magnificent,” and Jon almost laughs himself silly in relief after they spill back into the Atlantis ‘gate room.
*
Miss Maja has soft hands and sharp nails, and Brendon sighs under the attention as she pets his head. He’s lying across her lap in the common lounge, head resting on the armrest, a pillow wedged between her thighs and his torso - she’s kind of bony, really - and he’s got a killer migraine, and they’re watching Frank’s documentary on Elephant seals. Miss Maja says it always makes him feel better.
Frank’s got this fun, manic energy onscreen so Brendon thinks she’s probably telling the truth. It’s hard to judge with Miss Maja. She doesn’t have a very open face, and lately Brendon’s been relying on the kindness of strangers.
She trails a finger down his cheek and says, “You’re thinking too hard, darling.”
Brendon hasn’t seen Spencer in a full day and a half. It’s a little hard to avoid someone on Atlantis, but Spencer’s been off-world with Toro’s team - again, and maybe Brendon’s a little jealous; with Ryan and Brendon out of commission, Jon and Spencer have been going on a lot of missions with Toro and Bryar, sometimes Miss Maja, too, and Captain Saporta sort of freaks Brendon out, but whatever. If Spencer really, really wants to not see Brendon, well. It’s certainly possible. “Do you know where Spencer is?” he asks.
“Spencer’s here,” Spencer says, suddenly looming in front of him like Brendon willed him there with the power of his mind, and he seems tired. Really, really tired, but Brendon’s still totally happy to see him.
Spencer shoots Miss Maja an unreadable look, and she laughs. Brendon can feel it along his back.
“Bed?” Brendon asks, reaching a hand out and Spencer only hesitates a moment before taking it, pulling Brendon to his feet.
Miss Maja pats his ass. “Good night, Mr. Brendon,” she says, mocking laughter still in her voice.
Brendon catches her grin over his shoulder, though, a surprisingly soft one, and he grins back.
When they step out into the hallway, Spencer drops Brendon’s hand, and Brendon totally understands, he does. He hooks his thumbs into his belt loops and follows Spencer onto a transporter.
Spencer sighs and closes his eyes, leaning back against the wall.
“Were you avoiding me?” Brendon asks, and it comes out almost in a whisper, even though he hadn’t meant for it to.
Spencer cracks open one eye, brow arched, then opens the other one, too, just as the transporter doors slide back on themselves, revealing the corridor outside Spencer’s quarters. “No,” Spencer says, and Brendon believes him, because Spencer has his bitchy face on, and when Spencer lies to Brendon he always smiles. He isn’t always lying when he smiles, but the other way around, yes.
And hey. Hey, Brendon totally just remembered that! “I remember how you lie,” Brendon says, snapping his fingers, which in immediate retrospect was probably not the best thing to say.
Spencer purses his lips. “Okay,” he says, then spins around to stalk down to his room, and Brendon rolls his eyes.
“Spencer, wait, I mean. I remember that.” And Spencer’s the one who’d told him that any little memory that came back to him was good, back when he’d gotten a jarring mental flash of Pete’s dick. Apparently, Pete had pissed Zelenka off and some of his very private files had flooded the entire Atlantis database.
Spencer pauses, shoulders tight. “You-”
“I remember how you lie to me,” Brendon repeats softly, and suddenly he remembers more, like the vision of Spencer’s smile had wedged a crack into his brain, spilling out all these secrets, and he remembers watching Spencer sleep; night after night for months, like some creepy stalker, only. Only it was because he hadn’t been able to close his own eyes, couldn’t stop his body from vibrating, a mess of nerves and happiness, and he hadn’t wanted to disturb Spencer, so peaceful and slack and soft. Soft like he never is during the day.
He remembers the almost stifling pressure in his chest; he remembers and he feels it, like he’s been kind of feeling it for weeks, only it’d been dampened by everything he hadn’t known, and wow. “Okay, wow,” he says, eyes wide on Spencer’s face. “I’m in love with you.”
*
When the Wraith hive ship gets within hailing distance, the Daedalus is still two days out.
“We have a fully functioning ZPM,” McKay says, tapping away at his handheld datapad. He’s grinning, just a little, since he’d nearly died of rapture - there’d apparently been some squealing involved, and hyperventilating, and there’s a rumor he hugged Cadman - “If we need to, we can hold the shield for hundreds of years.”
“Or until Colonel Caldwell gets here.”
McKay gives Sheppard a scowl. “Yes, or until the Daedalus arrives.”
Sheppard rocks back on his feet, hands on his hips. “I still say they want Urie.” He cocks a finger at Brendon. “It’s sort of a compliment.”
Spencer can feel Brendon tense up next to him, though, and Spencer agrees. Compliment or not, it’s still fucking scary.
Weir has a pinched look on her face that says maybe she agrees, too.
“We could just destroy them with the chair,” Sheppard suggests.
McKay brightens behind him, eyes lit, and he says, “Elizabeth, we don’t have much of choice here. They know where Atlantis is. If the Daedalus doesn’t arrive in time to-”
“Dr. Weir, Colonel Sheppard, sir,” Chuck says, and everyone turns to look at him, hovering over his console. “There’s an incoming transmission from the Wraith ship. Should I open up radio communication?”
Weir nods, and a voice almost immediately rasps, “You have something of ours.”
“They actually came for Urie?” McKay asks, incredulous.
Sheppard shoots McKay a frown, then asks, “Do you expect us to believe you came all this way for that?”
There’s a pause. Then, “He has an amusing mind.”
“The transmitter was destroyed,” Weir says, her hands curled over the back of a chair, white-knuckled. “He’s not yours anymore.”
“If he ever was,” Sheppard mutters, and the Wraith laughs, says, “Human bodies are so fragile, so soft. How do you know that is all that was done to him?”
“We’re pretty advanced,” Sheppard says dryly, but McKay starts eyeing Brendon warily, like he’s carrying some sort of Wraith disease. “Cut it out, Rodney,” Sheppard hisses.
“Give us the human.” The voice is harder now, less amused.
“Not gonna happen,” Sheppard says tightly.
“Give him to us or we will destroy you.”
“Can they do that?” Brendon asks. He’s antsy, can’t stop shifting.
Spencer clamps a hand on the back of his neck. “No,” he says, but he’s not completely sure about that. He slips his hand away and folds his fingers into a tight fist but moves closer so their shoulders are nearly brushing. Brendon needs the support, and somehow that’s more important than any impression they might be giving.
Hell, Spencer needs the support, too, and god. God, Brendon’s revelation the day before had rocked him even though he’d known. He’d known because Brendon isn’t subtle, doesn’t know the meaning of the word, and for months before the Wraith incident he’d been staring at Spencer with this total dreamy expression, like he’d been imagining babies and puppies and picket fences in Canada, and he’d hum under his breath and maybe Spencer had never really acknowledged it, but it’d always been there.
Spencer isn’t sure he knows how to say the words back to him, but that doesn’t make the feeling any less real.
“They’re bluffing,” McKay says.
“You’re bluffing,” Sheppard echoes. “If you were going to attack, you’d have brought a hell of a lot more friends.”
Brendon is making squeaky sounds next to Spencer, his breathing harsh.
McKay glares over at him and asks, “Should Urie even be here for this?”
Spencer takes the hint and grabs Brendon’s arm - it’s for the best, to get him out of there - and Weir leans in as he passes, stops him with arched eyebrows.
She quietly says, “Escort Dr. Urie down to the infirmary, please. Have Dr. Beckett run another full-body scan on him.”
*
Gerard is pretending to run diagnostics on puddlejumper four - Sheppard calls her Sheena, and she’s being temperamental and keeps burning the tips of Gerard’s fingers; he’s got bandages on his thumbs, even - but really he’s eavesdropping on Dr. Zelenka.
“No. No, Rodney, we have not finished testing the ZPM-well, I suppose, yes, but we have no idea how it will function. Yes, that could work if you-only there is a-of course, do you think I’m-if Colonel Sheppard is willing to-I will not owe you peanut M&Ms for-three minutes with the shield dropped, maybe less if we-Yes, yes, and then we can-it is ridiculous, but if you believe-”
The problem with eavesdropping on Dr. Zelenka when he’s talking to Dr. McKay, of course, is that rarely anything made sense. It’s even harder to parse when he can only hear one half of the conversation.
Gerard ducks inside the jumper, switches to one of the little used science channels and taps his comm. link. “Pete, you there?”
“Y’ello.” Pete’s voice is almost a whisper.
“You anywhere near the control room?”
“I’m hiding behind Chuck. Dude, this is awesome.”
Only Pete would think a Wraith threat was awesome. “Do you know what’s going on?”
“They said they’d attack us if we didn’t give them back Urie,” Pete says in a hush. “I think we’re going to attack first?”
“The chair,” Gerard says. The Ancient chair, the one that Sheppard can turn on with his mind, control the entire city through. They’re going to power it up and send a few drones their way.
“Man, how cool would it be if the Daedalus showed up now?” Pete asks, and Pete’s like him, they hardly ever travel off-world, but even Gerard seems to have more of a survival instinct than Pete.
“This isn’t some kind of video game, Pete,” Gerard says.
Pete’s silent for a weighted moment. Then he says, “Hey, hey, I gotta get my jollies where I can, right?” and his voice is considerably more subdued.
Gerard sighs. Pete’s more right than wrong, actually. Their lives are so bizarre.
*
The Daedalus hasn’t shown. The Daedalus hasn’t swooped in for a last minute rescue, and John finds himself down in the chair room, Rodney hooked up to its base with a monitor, because they needed to blow the shit out of that hive ship, before it told any of its buddies that Atlantis is actually still standing. If it hasn’t already.
In the chair, hands pressed into the controls, John feels the entire city under his skin, pulsing along his synapses, pushing into his brain. Easy now, he thinks, and then everything goes blank. That. Isn’t supposed to happen.
“Rodney.”
“I know, hang on, I’m not-”
“There’s no power, Rodney,” John growls, thinks on on on on. “Don’t tell me the whole city’s out.”
“The whole city isn’t out,” Rodney says, and John pops his eyes open, glances down at Rodney.
Rodney waves a hand without looking up from his datapad. “I know.”
“That’s great,” John says, mouth tight. “Now fix it.”
“Oh, of course, sure, I’ll just snap my fingers and-”
“Rodney.”
“Hang on,” Rodney says, taps his finger to his radio. “Radek. Run diagnostic on-yes, yes, there’s something-no, don’t send. Don’t send Wentz, are you-”
“Rodney,” John says.
Rodney holds up a finger. “Just a minute, Colonel. Radek, Radek, don’t you dare-”
“Dr. McKay,” Wentz says, bounding into the chair room, huffing, a gaggle of lesser scientists at his heels. “I think it’s the ZPM, the new one, we’ll have to reroute-”
“All power through the generators, hoping against hope we have enough juice to last long enough to launch an attack, get that online, do it now, you imbecile, oh my god, I’m finishing Wentz’s sentences-”
“Rodney,” John says, reaching out to slap the back of his head.
“I can do this, I can so do this, Dr. McKay. Give me five minutes,” Wentz says, ducking back out of the room, and Rodney yells after him, “You have two,” then mutters, “Hell, hell, we’re all going to die,” as his fingers fly over the screen.
*
Gerard races after Pete, scooting into the transporter right before it slams shut, huffing, and he’d quick smoking, like, years before, but he thinks maybe he needs to keep in better health, maybe jog a little with the Butcher in the mornings or something - he blocks out the little voice in the back of his head that’s laughing kind of hysterically at this - because his lungs feel like they’re going to burst.
“Second level,” Gerard gasps, and Pete nods, presses two fingers against the destination corridor on the map, and the doors are opening again before Gerard can even catch his breath. Fuck. He really, really needs to get in shape.
Pete sprints, and by the time Gerard slip-slides into the room, Pete’s already got the ZPM out of its slot.
“Wow, this thing is fucked,” Pete says, gingerly holding the ZPM. He sniffs it tentatively, and Gerard resists the urge to knock it out of his arms, because less than two minutes; they don’t have time to dick around.
Pete places it aside, pats the top absently. “Now we know why it was just lying around in a cave, seriously.”
“Pete, Pete, we have,” Gerard flicks a glance at his watch, “a minute and a half to get this rerouted. Let’s-”
“Concentrate, right,” he cracks his knuckles, “I’m totally great at concentrating, Gerard, just-”
“I’ve got it.” Gerard pries off the generator casing, dives into the mess of wires and crystals, Pete less than a half-step behind. “We need to connect everything through-”
“Ow, fuck, shit, no, no, don’t worry,” Pete hisses, fingers parsing out wires, Gerard’s working in tandem, their shoulders touching, “I’m fine, just get that other crystal-”
“It’s in, I heard it click, Pete-”
“I’ve got it, just flip that-”
“Other way, other way,” Gerard yelps, and Pete bites out, “This way, we need to make sure it communicates with all of them. There, there-”
“Fuck, do you think that worked?” Gerard asks, settling back on his heels, swiping his hands, damp with sweat, over his pants.
“We’ll know in a second,” Pete says, grinning manically at him. “It’ll be totally worth losing a few layers of skin, dude. We can even lord it all over McKay, right?”
Gerard doesn’t disagree, but he rubs his forehead and radios Dr. McKay, tells him they’ve done what they could do, and McKay just grunts in his ear, cuts off in the middle of yelling, “Sheppard, Atlantis better be murmuring sweet nothings in your head right now or-”
Gerard grins. He shakes his head, and then an explosion ripples out, the reverberations in the floor so subtle they might have gone unnoticed if he hadn’t been anticipating them.
“Thank fuck,” Pete says, and, “Dude, we totally saved the day. We’re motherfucking heroes.”
*
Joe’s not exactly hiding, but he’s totally hanging out in the hydroponics lab, behind some twining lianas and a row of squash, back against a wall of sweet corn, legs folded up.
He likes the hydroponics lab. The recycled air of Atlantis is so perfect and dry, and sometimes he just needs the wet warmth, the thick scent of flowering vegetables. It’s different, without the dirt, but it’s close enough, and he’ll take any comfort he can get.
He hears a distant explosion, then another, and his hands tighten over a thin vine. Joe isn’t stoned since he’s still on working hours, and Joe is not a complete degenerate. Also, Bob totally hid his latest stash. Bob is the devil.
“Thought I’d find you here,” Bob says. He’s standing in front of Joe, hands behind his back.
Joe frowns up at him. “I’m a nervous wreck, Bob,” he says. “I’m like McKay and Gerard without coffee. Combined.”
Bob arches an unsympathetic eyebrow. Seriously, he is so mean. “Combined, huh? That’s pretty tough.”
“Bob, Bob, dude, what do you want?” Joe asks desperately, because they’ve got a Wraith hive ship hovering in their orbit, and Joe has no pot, none at all, and that is so very wrong the entirety of the Pegasus galaxy is likely to implode. Or something.
“It’s a gateway drug, you know,” Bob says, and he looks like he’s having way too much fun with this.
“To what? Seriously, I could die tomorrow,” Joe says, because it’s true. “Nanobots could take over my brain, I could get shot by a fucking arrow off-world, I could get eaten by Wraith, Bob, and you’re worried about a little marijuana?”
Bob frowns. “You’re taking all the fun out of blackmail, Trohman.”
Joe brightens. “Blackmail?”
Bob reaches down, curls a big hand into the front of Joe’s shirt and pulls him to his feet. He’s not quite grinning, but his mouth is certainly threatening to. “I want you to visit PX1-300 with me.”
Joe blinks. “That. That little girl,” Joe says slowly. Bob wants Joe to visit that little girl with him, the girl they rescued from the Wraith, and, okay, maybe it’s a team thing, but it probably isn’t, not if he’s taken this round about way of asking him to go.
Bob doesn’t say anything, just gives him that same, steady look, hand still gripping his shirt, and Joe finally shrugs. He presses a palm flat against Bob’s chest and says, “Okay.”
*
Brendon’s never been scared of small spaces before, but the dark tube surrounding him has him breathing hard, fingernails biting into his palm. It’s just as likely to be the Wraith, though, than the scanner; the thought that something could be wrong with him, something that the Wraith had done to him, other than mess with his memory.
Distantly, he hears Spencer’s voice, hears William, for some reason, and it sounds like he’s singing This Christmas, and then somebody squeezes his left foot, thumb pressing into the sole.
There’s a hum and a flash of soft light, and then the scanner’s sliding open, folding back on itself.
“There now, not so hard, Dr. Urie, was it?” Carson says, smiling. He pats Brendon’s hand.
William looms up behind him. “It’s entirely possible, dear Urie, that you’re pregnant with my love-oof, Smith, watch your viciously pointy elbows or I’ll set that rat bastard Lacey on you.”
Carson sighs. “Dr. Beckett-”
“No relation,” William and Brendon chorus, and it’s weird, having all these little details, memories unfold in tiny bits and pieces. Brendon thinks maybe he’s almost got all of it back now.
William lights up. “Finally,” he says. “Maybe now I can win all my caramel bars back.”
“Why are you here, Beckett?” Spencer asks, eyes narrowed.
“To sing lullabies to all the needy children, Smith. To spread joy through my wondrous voice, to celebrate Christmas upon the highest mount-”
“It’s February,” Brendon says.
“Ah-ha!” He jabs a finger at him. “Good show, Urie. Good show.”
“Dr. Beckett,” Carson says, curling a hand around William’s arm and steering him away from Brendon’s bed. “Please go back to your own bed and stay there, lad. I swear I’d think there’s more wrong with you than that knock to your noggin if I hadn’t witnessed last month’s karaoke night.”
Brendon thinks he hears William say, “Gabe,” and, “fighting sticks,” and, “ninja prowess,” as their voices fade farther away.
And then he’s looking up at Spencer, and Spencer’s catching his hand in a tight grip, and Brendon’s a little surprised by that. He glances around, because anyone could see them. “Spencer, you can’t-”
“It’s fine,” Spencer says. He shrugs. “It’s fine, okay?”
“Um.” Brendon bites his lip, looks down at their linked fingers. Slowly, tentatively, Brendon rubs his thumb along Spencer’s skin.
He hears Spencer’s breath hitch and tries to pull his hand away, but Spencer just holds on harder, squeezes until maybe it hurts a little.
“Ow,” Brendon whispers.
Spencer’s grip instantly lightens. “Shit, sorry,” he says. “Sorry, Brendon. I’m.” He stares down into Brendon’s eyes. He stares into Brendon’s eyes and it’s awesome, it’s so awesome, because Spencer doesn’t have to say anything at all, and Brendon knows exactly what he’s telling him.
*
“Patrick. Hey, Patrick.” Pete catches both of Patrick’s arms, right above his elbows, and Patrick drops all his very important papers in the middle of the corridor.
“Pete-”
“Did you hear? I saved you from possible Wraith destruction,” Pete crows, shaking him a little. Patrick can see all his teeth. “Me. Pete. I’m awesome.”
Patrick snorts. “Okay. That’s great, can you-” Patrick cuts off with a yelp as Pete sort of tackles him, and Patrick loses his footing, slipping on his spilled manila folders, and they both go down. Hard. Patrick’s pretty sure he’s broken his tailbone.
Pete sprawls over him, though, still grinning. “I deserve kisses, Patrick,” he says.
“You do,” Patrick says slowly, fighting off a smile of his own.
Pete nods. “I burned my fingers a little, too.” He waggles his hand in front of Patrick’s face, fingertips red and raw, and Patrick frowns, grabs his wrist.
“They’re starting to blister, Pete,” Patrick says. “You should be at the infirmary.”
Pete wriggles until his legs fall open on either side of Patrick’s hips. His eyes are huge when Patrick glances up at him, teeth digging into his lower lip.
“Hurt?” Patrick asks softly.
“Not anymore,” Pete says, and then he twists his wrist, skims his fingers down the slope of Patrick’s nose, hisses and grimaces as their skin touches.
Patrick murmurs, “Dumbass.”
“Totally,” Pete says, and then, “I’m going to kiss you now,” and, “Marry me?” and Patrick’s laughing when Pete mashes their mouths together.
Patrick sputters, flails his hands behind Pete’s back, because he always figured Pete had more finesse than this, more game, but then Pete pulls back so his upper lip is just resting between Patrick’s.
He whispers, “Patrick,” and Patrick feels it all the way down to his toes.
*
“No one knew about the chip,” Ritter mumbles around a spoonful of reconstituted mashed potatoes. He swallows. “Patient confidentiality.”
“Brendon didn’t know, either,” Ryan points out.
“Brendon thought we were all pulling an elaborately huge joke,” Ritter says. “Sheppard and Weir knew for security reasons, obviously. And McKay, of course, since he’s the one who took the thing apart. I’m just saying,” Ritter shrugs, “Smith should think twice before going on a rampage.”
Ryan rolls his eyes, and Jon snickers. He can’t picture Spencer going on a rampage. He’s way too collected for that, but silent, deadly revenge is not out of the question. He occasionally reminds Jon of Zelenka.
Ryan elbows him in the side.
Jon shoots him his best you really want to start with me? look, and Ryan flushes. Jon’s beginning to really love when Ryan flushes. He knows exactly what it means, now, and enjoys all of the ways he can color Ryan’s cheeks.
Across from them, Ritter’s grinning stupidly, and when Jon catches his eye, he ducks his head and laughs, big hand wrapping around the back of his neck.
And then Brendon declares, “I’m one hundred percent Wraith mutation free,” clattering his tray on the table. “Wraith are big fat liars.” He’s smiling so wide his lips are thinned and he looks sort of manically gleeful. Spencer seems only slightly more reserved standing behind him, eyes nearly twinkling, and that’s a fucking novelty right there.
“Good to hear,” Jon says.
“It is. It is indeed good news, Sergeant Jon Walker,” Brendon says. “And,” he sits down next to Ritter, “Dex is going to let me play with his gun later.”
Ritter laughs again, then claps a hand over his mouth and watches Spencer with the slightest tinge of fear in his eyes, but Spencer just shakes his head.
“I don’t know, Urie,” Spencer says. There’s a grin at the corner of his lips, just barely hiding. “Dex’s gun might be too much for you to handle.”
“Are you implying something, Lieutenant?” Brendon asks, brows peaked over his nose.
“Okay, can we leave the thinly veiled innuendo for someplace less public?” Ryan asks, but he’s smiling, too, and under the table Jon squeezes a hand over his thigh.
*
Ray’s a little bewildered when Dr. Ivarsson interrupts his lunch.
She curves her red lips up and cocks a hip. “Major Toro,” she says, flashing bright white teeth, and Ray’s instantly wary.
He’s heard stories about Ivarsson. Mostly from Dr. McKay, but the rumor about her eating her partners after mating sounds strangely accurate when faced with what Ray’s sure is a predatory smile.
It’s pretty awesome, actually.
“Dr. Ivarsson,” Ray says, nodding.
She tilts her head slightly, runs a hand over her neck, through her hair. “Please. Call me Maja.”
So castoffstarter sent this back and said, “this part doesn’t fit, either rework it or take it out,” and I wrote another seven pages in order to justify keeping it in. The justification could be entirely in my head, but whatever. And then she said something like, “Wow, this climax sucks,” and it did, so I took it out and gave you Pete and Gerard, motherfucking heroes. The climax probably still sucks, but Pete and Gerard, dudes. Motherfucking heroes.
This is also an SGA AU as well as a crossover - any canon after Ronon joined Team Sheppard was basically ignored.
Also: count the fandom tropes! Dudes, I sort of went a little crazy.
I sincerely hope this was worth the wait. I had too much fun writing it, and I kind of settled down in this world and sprawled out. Maybe rolled around a little. Arched into it a bit, gave it sweet kisses and pets. You know. Normal stuff.
Now continue the adventure with Enthalpy!!
[iii]
The day that Brendon remembers his fifth grade teacher - “Mr. Appleton! He wore sweater-vests and jelly bracelets and I was totally going to marry him when I grew up!” - is the day a single hive ship shows up on their long-range radar scans.
“This is not good,” Zelenka says, pushing his glasses up his nose. “They should not know we are still here.”
“Well,” Sheppard says, hands on his hips, “either we didn’t get the thing-a-ma-jig in time-”
“Thing-a-ma-jig?” McKay cuts in, half his face scrunched up in disgusted disbelief.
“-or they plucked the information right out of Urie’s brain,” Sheppard goes on, ignoring McKay. “What are the chances that they want their pet back?”
“You think they’re after Urie?” McKay asks, incredulous.
“Hey, one hive ship.” Sheppard shrugs. “It’s a possibility.”
Spencer isn’t exactly sure what they’re saying, but he doesn’t want to interrupt the colonel.
Brendon says, “Wait, what?” though, and they all turn towards him, hovering behind Chuck’s control console. He’s got wide, panicky eyes.
McKay flaps a hand. “You were implanted with a chip; your mind was wiped clean; logically they were keeping you as a pet, Urie,” he says.
“I was. I was microchipped?” Brendon asks, and Spencer clenches his hands into fists, because, hey, that information would have been nice to have weeks ago.
They’d fucking tagged him, and if they hadn’t rescued Brendon, he’d be one of those freaky Wraith worshippers, and he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t have remembered them at all, ever, and that thought is fucking frightening.
“How long until it arrives,” Weir asks, and Zelenka taps the screen.
“Five days,” he says. “Maybe sooner.”
*
Brendon is totally not scared of Ronon Dex. “I’m not scared of you,” he says with this great conviction in his voice, and Ronon arches a furry eyebrow.
“Good,” he says. His voice is all gruff and deep, and Brendon’s stomach does a nervous somersault.
He’s not sure why Dex is there standing in the doorway of his quarters. Dex has barely said two words to him - unless manly grunts are considered words - and Brendon doesn’t get the impression they were all that close before he lost his memory.
And then suddenly Dex is whipping off his leather tunic and hey, hey! He’s got great muscles and all, but Brendon’s pretty sure Spencer’ll kill him if this goes where Brendon thinks it’s going.
“Um.” Brendon takes a step backwards, hands up. “What are you-”
“Beckett did a good job,” Dex says, turning away, shaking his dreads aside. “The scar’s mostly from my own attempts.”
“Oh,” Brendon breathes. Dex has a dark, puckered mark high on his back. “Is that-?”
“Wraith,” Dex says.
Brendon reaches out a tentative hand then yanks his arm back before he can touch the skin.
Dex shoots an amused look over his shoulder, a half-grin on his mouth. “You can touch it,” he offers.
Brendon shakes his head. “No, that’s. It’s okay,” Brendon says. He really doesn’t want to touch it. He can’t even reach his own - he’d tried, twisting in front of the mirror - so he doesn’t want to touch Dex’s. “So you were, uh, a pet?”
Dex grunts, drops his tunic. The curve of his lips turns feral. “More like big game,” he says, and at Brendon’s blank look - what? - he goes on with, “They tagged me, set me loose, then tried to kill me.”
Brendon’s eyes widen. “Oh. That’s, um. Sorry?”
Dex laughs, a short bark, and he punches Brendon’s shoulder lightly. Which isn’t all that light for Brendon, and he staggers a little, catches himself on the back of his desk chair.
He feels a smile twitch across his lips, though, and then he thinks, wait, and scrabbles at the hem of his shirt. “Do you want to-?” he asks, because fairs fair, and Dex had shown him his.
Dex says, “If you want,” and Brendon knows it’s because Dex is doing this for him. Dex’s scar is years old from the looks of it, and it’s probably not something he’ll ever forget, no, but Brendon doesn’t think he goes around flashing his hurt for his own peace of mind. This is for Brendon.
Brendon doesn’t have to, but he pulls his shirt up anyway, turns his back to Dex.
Dex says, “Not bad,” and Brendon doesn’t know if he means it doesn’t look bad, or if the scar is suitably impressive. He finds he’d be okay with either, honestly.
Dex doesn’t touch him, and Brendon never would have told him not to, but he’s glad. He thinks of Spencer, of Spencer’s softly callused fingers, and he wants those hands telling him it’s okay, not Dex’s.
They share a look when Brendon faces him again, though. Brendon thinks, wow, and, cool, and hey, I’m bonding with Ronon Dex!
He can’t wait to tell Spencer.
*
Growing up, Gerard had always wanted a hamster. He’d begged his grandmother for one, and he’d never gotten it, and then he’d realized that he couldn’t even keep track of his brother, so how the hell was he supposed to take care of this little animal; a tiny fuzzy body that would depend on him for everything? Of course, that revelation had come during the fucked-up period of his life, and he’d been mostly drunk and sobbing like a giant fucking baby, and that’s in the past now, so he can totally take care of the little mousey thing Frank had given him.
The thing with Brendon is fucking with his mind a little, though. “Do you think Craig likes his cage?” he asks Frank. Craig looks like a naked mole rat, except he has soft cream fur and isn’t blind.
“It’s a fucking awesome cage, Gee,” Frank says absently.
“No, I mean.” Gerard kicks up his feet. He’s on his stomach on his bed, watching Craig munch on Cheeto crumbs, and, okay. It’s a pretty kick-ass cage, that’s true. Pete had helped him make it - Gerard’s an excellent engineer, but Pete’s kind of brilliant at making things out of practically nothing - and it has all sorts of cool levels and tubes that wind around half of his room. “Do you think he’s happy?”
Frank looks up from his book - his actual book, the one he’s been writing for the better part of a year on alien marine invertebrates, and that’s just so cool - and says, “He’s not unhappy,” because he knows better than to patronize Gerard. It’s one of Gerard’s favorite things about him.
“But. You could argue that Brendon wouldn’t have been unhappy, either,” Gerard points out.
Frank nods slowly. He puts down his manuscript - seriously, his manuscript, how awesome is that? Sometimes Gerard thinks he’s more excited about the book than Frank is, although it’s not like he can publish it anytime soon - and moves over to the bed. “Okay,” Frank says. “We can let him go, if you want.”
Gerard’s heart beats a little faster. The thing is, he doesn’t want to give Craig up, and that’s kind of bad, right? But Craig is super healthy and his coat shines, and Gerard is doing the greatest job ever taking care of him, and that’s new. That’s different and nice.
Gerard says, thoughtfully, “He’s sort of domesticated now, though.” Craig hops on Gerard’s palm to be petted and sits by his bowl every morning, waiting for food, and what if he’s forgotten how to forage?
Frank smiles at him, digs an elbow into his side. “You’re so the best at taking care of him, Gee,” he says cheekily, and Gerard says, “Fuck off,” with an affectionate grin.
*
“Patrick,” Pete says. “Patrick, if you were ever kidnapped by Wraith I’d totally rescue you.”
Patrick arches an eyebrow. Pete kind of wants to lick it. “I never go off-world, Pete,” he says.
“Still. If it ever happens, you can depend on me.” Pete would be so good at rescuing Patrick. Except for the part where he’d have to hold a gun. He’d sort of failed most of his field tests. “Only if Sheppard would let me go, though,” he amends. “Which he probably wouldn’t, since I’m a scientist, and I accidentally shot Saporta that one time, but it’s the thought that counts, right?”
Patrick stares at him.
“I’m serious,” Pete insists. He thinks maybe Patrick doesn’t believe him, but he’d do fucking anything for Patrick, he really would. Patrick is his best friend in the whole entire world, in all the galaxies.
“Okay,” Patrick finally says. “Thanks.” He smiles a small Patrick smile, and it’s pretty awesome. His cheeks are pink.
Pete tugs on the brim of Patrick’s hat. “See,” he says. “We’re easy.”
“Dude,” he slaps Pete’s hand away, ducks his head, “speak for yourself.”
*
Jon hears the soft rustle of fabric, the slight hitch of breath, and he spins, catches the front of William’s shirt and pins him up against the corridor wall in one smooth motion.
William grins this huge grin down at him. “Point to you, Jonny Walker,” he says, hands up and out in surrender. Jon isn’t fooled. William is a sneaky fucker, and he’s been hanging around Saporta a lot lately.
Jon glances up and down the hallway cautiously before letting him go, because William isn’t above bringing in help to get the drop on him. When he doesn’t spot anyone, though, he flashes William a smile and steps back, smoothing the wrinkles in William’s away science uniform.
“Got a mission?” he asks. William isn’t on a team, but his skills are in high demand. He’s awesome with C4.
“Back to M45,” William says cheerfully, tugging on the hem of his jacket. Jon knows the mining planet is a favorite of William’s. “We’re blowing up the north face this time. I’m hoping to find dinosaurs.”
“Dinosaurs,” Jon echoes. He shakes his head, amused.
“Mayhap a handy ZPM, too, you never know. Oh, oh, and listen.” William grabs his arm, face schooled as serious as he’s capable of. Which isn’t much, but it’s the effort that he puts into it that has Jon’s ears perking up. “I heard about Urie, poor lamb.”
Jon blinks. “Okay.”
“Yes,” he says, nodding. “Truly horrifying.” He cocks his head, flipping his hair over his shoulder. “Although kind of cool when you think about it.”
“When you think about it.”
“Jon Walker, think.” William holds up a finger, presses it into the center of Jon’s forehead. “The biggest bad-asses in the galaxy want Urie as a pet.”
William’s eyes turn dreamy, and Jon’s pretty sure he’s imagining lying around on satin pillows, being handfed chocolate kisses, and, okay, Jon’s not gonna knock the image, except the hands that would be feeding him are clawed and have a soul-sucking mouth in the middle of one palm. It takes away from the whimsy, honestly.
“Okay,” Jon says. “I don’t think I’m going to tell Brendon that.”
William shrugs. “Whatever you fancy, my friend. I’m off to the armory.”
*
Impending Wraith invasions should probably have meant the halt of all off-world activity, except William and Travis have had this trip off-world planned for weeks, and there’s the small matter of a rumored ZPM. Preliminary energy readings had been promising, so it wasn’t as if the mission wasn’t very important. That was William’s winning argument, at any rate.
They hadn’t been expecting any complications.
William never dwells on the unpleasant, though. He’s a great supporter of good things, so perhaps the mission to M45 isn’t going quite as smoothly as he’d hoped, but there are brighter sides to focus on.
“How can you be smiling, dude?” Travis asks, and William holds up a finger.
He holds up a finger and pauses dramatically, long enough that he sees a smile twitch at the edges of Travie’s mouth, too, and then he says, “I fished my wish.”
The adorable Corporal Wheeler rolls his eyes. Or at least William thinks he rolls his eyes since it’s dim where they’re hiding. He senses Wheeler’s silent sarcastic disbelief. William’s excellent like that.
There’s a screech and then a huge shadow passes over the grassy field spread out in front of them.
Asher snaps her gum, shifts the P-90 in her hands. “Can we shoot it down?”
Kennerty scratches the back of his neck, squints out into the sunlight. “I think it had babies.”
“Seriously, you and your dinosaurs, Billy,” Travis says, shaking his head.
William had been hoping for bones, but the pterodactyl is almost as good. Almost, of course, because the geological find surrounding alien dinosaur bones would have been fascinating, and now they just have a giant leathery bird intent on eating them.
“I don’t see how we could have missed this fucker the last time we were here,” Wheeler says. He’s inching towards the mouth of the cave on his knees, one hand flat along the rough wall. He tips his face out into the sun, and the pterodactyl screams again, swooping so low its talons drag into the ground, spinning up clumps of grass and dirt. Wheeler jerks back with a curse.
William grins even more brightly and asks, “Well, Sergeant?” to Kennerty, because this is not William’s problem. Getting them safely back to the ‘gate falls squarely on the military contingent of their little team, no matter the fact that it’s probably William’s fault the thing is even awake. Or Travie’s. He’s not taking all the blame here, not when Travis had been recording all those hieroglyphics for Patrick, his voice echoing in the underground caverns.
Granted, William was the one who’d poked it with a stick.
“We’ll miss a radio check-in at 1300,” Kennerty says. “We miss two, they’ll send someone through after us.”
“Who will immediately get eaten by Pterry here,” William adds cheerfully.
Asher smacks the back of his head, and that isn’t nice at all - she’s mussed his hair! - and William mentally crosses her off his list of military grunts he’d like to get horizontal with. She has spectacular breasts, but a bad attitude and lethal aim. Or perhaps not exactly a bad attitude but certainly an unfortunate one aimed at all of William’s important parts. For sexing.
And then Kennerty’s radio crackles, and he starts slightly but taps his ear and says, “This is Sergeant Kennerty, over,” and Captain Gabe nearly hoots back, “Jee-sus, Mike, what the hell is going on here?”
*
Maja is all legs, and William can appreciate that. He also appreciates the way she’d probably eat him if he got overly handsy - she’s very particular with who she lets in her personal space - so he sticks to leers and lip-licking and hopes one day all of his prettiness will lure her closer.
“This is cozy,” William says, and from the other side of Maja, Captain Gabe gives him one of his huge, evil grins and asks, “So we got a plan?”
Gabe’s team had been dispatched before they’d even missed check-in, mainly because Nolan had gotten overexcited about the readouts Travis had sent back through to Patrick a few hours earlier, so now there’s nine of them wedged in the little cave, that rat bastard Lacey puffing away at a cigarette, Nolan blinking at them behind coke-bottle glasses, datapad hugged to his chest, gorgeous Maja taunting William with her perfect, BDU encased ass, and Captain Gabe with a gash on his arm that seems to have made Pterry more irate than she had been, scent of blood thick and metallic as it steadily seeps through the hasty bandage Asher had wrapped around it.
“Wait until Atlantis tries to hail us,” Kennerty says.
Wheeler - who is seriously adorable, William has always thought so, and he can’t imagine him in the Marines, really, but he’s got the patches to prove it - rubs a hand over his chin. “You sure we can’t just blast it?”
“Fuck, yeah, we can,” Gabe says, but Kennerty just stresses, “Babies.”
Maja cocks her head and asks curiously, “So you would like there to be more of these monsters?”
“I just.” Kennerty waves a hand. “Whatever, my mission. No killing the giant flying dinosaur, okay?”
Gabe can technically overrule Kennerty, but he only shrugs, tugs the cigarette out of Lacey’s mouth and sucks it down to the fiery orange end.
*
One of the arguably good things to come out of Sergeant Bryar and Brendon’s capture and subsequent rescue from the Wraith is a pretty awesome camaraderie that’s spouted between Jon’s team and Toro’s.
Somehow, it’s fallen to Jon and Spencer to join forces with Toro and Bryar whenever they’re gearing up for a rescue mission. So when Sheppard tells Toro to get a team together, Spencer and Jon just wordlessly show up, thigh-holsters already strapped on and P-90s slung over their chests.
They’ve got nine men trapped on M45, four of them scientists, one of them William, and Jon’s got a soft spot for William, it’s true. William isn’t quite as accident prone as Brendon - he’s had more experience going off-world from his years at the SGC, at least, and Jon’s seen him in action - but that doesn’t stop Jon from worrying.
“Holy shit,” Bryar says in a hush when they crest the first hill.
There’s a huge bird-thing circling the valley, wings sharp and bony, head jutting out like a hammer’s, only really, really pointy. Jon’s just glad they’d thought to lug a couple AT-4s through the ‘gate.
Toro whistles almost soundlessly, and the four of them duck into some brush, lowering their bellies to the rocky ground.
“It’s big, but they’re not helpless,” Bryar points out right away, and Toro nods.
Spencer catches on and scowls. “We leave it alive, then,” he says, and Jon’s not a fan of taking lives needlessly, but he’d been looking forward to shooting that thing out of the sky. AT-4s are sort of awesome to use.
They decide on a distraction through almost silent signals - and it’s nice, Jon thinks, to have that kind of relationship outside his own team - relaying it as best they can and just as quietly to Kennerty and Saporta, and then Toro’s sliding down the hill, gravel spitting out from his heels, P-90 pointing directly up, bandana slipped down around his neck, freeing his curls in an afro to rival Joe’s, loud hollers pulling the animal’s attention across the valley from the trapped teams.
Toro runs for a separate set of caves, skidding in between rocks and ducking whenever the bird - dinosaur? William’s mind is an eerie place, really - gets too close, and Jon thinks they’re really fucking lucky it doesn’t breathe fire. And then he thinks that he shouldn’t think that because with their luck, seriously.
Afterwards, after Toro finds a trail winding away from the valley, loops back around with this triumphant grin, he says, “Hey, look what I found,” with something that looks suspiciously like a ZPM tucked under his arm like a football. “Did they normally just leave these things lying around in random caves?”
And when they’re sprinting towards the Stargate, a haphazard, panting group, scientists herded protectively in the middle, Dr. Ivarsson says to Toro, between one breath and the next, “You were magnificent,” and Jon almost laughs himself silly in relief after they spill back into the Atlantis ‘gate room.
*
Miss Maja has soft hands and sharp nails, and Brendon sighs under the attention as she pets his head. He’s lying across her lap in the common lounge, head resting on the armrest, a pillow wedged between her thighs and his torso - she’s kind of bony, really - and he’s got a killer migraine, and they’re watching Frank’s documentary on Elephant seals. Miss Maja says it always makes him feel better.
Frank’s got this fun, manic energy onscreen so Brendon thinks she’s probably telling the truth. It’s hard to judge with Miss Maja. She doesn’t have a very open face, and lately Brendon’s been relying on the kindness of strangers.
She trails a finger down his cheek and says, “You’re thinking too hard, darling.”
Brendon hasn’t seen Spencer in a full day and a half. It’s a little hard to avoid someone on Atlantis, but Spencer’s been off-world with Toro’s team - again, and maybe Brendon’s a little jealous; with Ryan and Brendon out of commission, Jon and Spencer have been going on a lot of missions with Toro and Bryar, sometimes Miss Maja, too, and Captain Saporta sort of freaks Brendon out, but whatever. If Spencer really, really wants to not see Brendon, well. It’s certainly possible. “Do you know where Spencer is?” he asks.
“Spencer’s here,” Spencer says, suddenly looming in front of him like Brendon willed him there with the power of his mind, and he seems tired. Really, really tired, but Brendon’s still totally happy to see him.
Spencer shoots Miss Maja an unreadable look, and she laughs. Brendon can feel it along his back.
“Bed?” Brendon asks, reaching a hand out and Spencer only hesitates a moment before taking it, pulling Brendon to his feet.
Miss Maja pats his ass. “Good night, Mr. Brendon,” she says, mocking laughter still in her voice.
Brendon catches her grin over his shoulder, though, a surprisingly soft one, and he grins back.
When they step out into the hallway, Spencer drops Brendon’s hand, and Brendon totally understands, he does. He hooks his thumbs into his belt loops and follows Spencer onto a transporter.
Spencer sighs and closes his eyes, leaning back against the wall.
“Were you avoiding me?” Brendon asks, and it comes out almost in a whisper, even though he hadn’t meant for it to.
Spencer cracks open one eye, brow arched, then opens the other one, too, just as the transporter doors slide back on themselves, revealing the corridor outside Spencer’s quarters. “No,” Spencer says, and Brendon believes him, because Spencer has his bitchy face on, and when Spencer lies to Brendon he always smiles. He isn’t always lying when he smiles, but the other way around, yes.
And hey. Hey, Brendon totally just remembered that! “I remember how you lie,” Brendon says, snapping his fingers, which in immediate retrospect was probably not the best thing to say.
Spencer purses his lips. “Okay,” he says, then spins around to stalk down to his room, and Brendon rolls his eyes.
“Spencer, wait, I mean. I remember that.” And Spencer’s the one who’d told him that any little memory that came back to him was good, back when he’d gotten a jarring mental flash of Pete’s dick. Apparently, Pete had pissed Zelenka off and some of his very private files had flooded the entire Atlantis database.
Spencer pauses, shoulders tight. “You-”
“I remember how you lie to me,” Brendon repeats softly, and suddenly he remembers more, like the vision of Spencer’s smile had wedged a crack into his brain, spilling out all these secrets, and he remembers watching Spencer sleep; night after night for months, like some creepy stalker, only. Only it was because he hadn’t been able to close his own eyes, couldn’t stop his body from vibrating, a mess of nerves and happiness, and he hadn’t wanted to disturb Spencer, so peaceful and slack and soft. Soft like he never is during the day.
He remembers the almost stifling pressure in his chest; he remembers and he feels it, like he’s been kind of feeling it for weeks, only it’d been dampened by everything he hadn’t known, and wow. “Okay, wow,” he says, eyes wide on Spencer’s face. “I’m in love with you.”
*
When the Wraith hive ship gets within hailing distance, the Daedalus is still two days out.
“We have a fully functioning ZPM,” McKay says, tapping away at his handheld datapad. He’s grinning, just a little, since he’d nearly died of rapture - there’d apparently been some squealing involved, and hyperventilating, and there’s a rumor he hugged Cadman - “If we need to, we can hold the shield for hundreds of years.”
“Or until Colonel Caldwell gets here.”
McKay gives Sheppard a scowl. “Yes, or until the Daedalus arrives.”
Sheppard rocks back on his feet, hands on his hips. “I still say they want Urie.” He cocks a finger at Brendon. “It’s sort of a compliment.”
Spencer can feel Brendon tense up next to him, though, and Spencer agrees. Compliment or not, it’s still fucking scary.
Weir has a pinched look on her face that says maybe she agrees, too.
“We could just destroy them with the chair,” Sheppard suggests.
McKay brightens behind him, eyes lit, and he says, “Elizabeth, we don’t have much of choice here. They know where Atlantis is. If the Daedalus doesn’t arrive in time to-”
“Dr. Weir, Colonel Sheppard, sir,” Chuck says, and everyone turns to look at him, hovering over his console. “There’s an incoming transmission from the Wraith ship. Should I open up radio communication?”
Weir nods, and a voice almost immediately rasps, “You have something of ours.”
“They actually came for Urie?” McKay asks, incredulous.
Sheppard shoots McKay a frown, then asks, “Do you expect us to believe you came all this way for that?”
There’s a pause. Then, “He has an amusing mind.”
“The transmitter was destroyed,” Weir says, her hands curled over the back of a chair, white-knuckled. “He’s not yours anymore.”
“If he ever was,” Sheppard mutters, and the Wraith laughs, says, “Human bodies are so fragile, so soft. How do you know that is all that was done to him?”
“We’re pretty advanced,” Sheppard says dryly, but McKay starts eyeing Brendon warily, like he’s carrying some sort of Wraith disease. “Cut it out, Rodney,” Sheppard hisses.
“Give us the human.” The voice is harder now, less amused.
“Not gonna happen,” Sheppard says tightly.
“Give him to us or we will destroy you.”
“Can they do that?” Brendon asks. He’s antsy, can’t stop shifting.
Spencer clamps a hand on the back of his neck. “No,” he says, but he’s not completely sure about that. He slips his hand away and folds his fingers into a tight fist but moves closer so their shoulders are nearly brushing. Brendon needs the support, and somehow that’s more important than any impression they might be giving.
Hell, Spencer needs the support, too, and god. God, Brendon’s revelation the day before had rocked him even though he’d known. He’d known because Brendon isn’t subtle, doesn’t know the meaning of the word, and for months before the Wraith incident he’d been staring at Spencer with this total dreamy expression, like he’d been imagining babies and puppies and picket fences in Canada, and he’d hum under his breath and maybe Spencer had never really acknowledged it, but it’d always been there.
Spencer isn’t sure he knows how to say the words back to him, but that doesn’t make the feeling any less real.
“They’re bluffing,” McKay says.
“You’re bluffing,” Sheppard echoes. “If you were going to attack, you’d have brought a hell of a lot more friends.”
Brendon is making squeaky sounds next to Spencer, his breathing harsh.
McKay glares over at him and asks, “Should Urie even be here for this?”
Spencer takes the hint and grabs Brendon’s arm - it’s for the best, to get him out of there - and Weir leans in as he passes, stops him with arched eyebrows.
She quietly says, “Escort Dr. Urie down to the infirmary, please. Have Dr. Beckett run another full-body scan on him.”
*
Gerard is pretending to run diagnostics on puddlejumper four - Sheppard calls her Sheena, and she’s being temperamental and keeps burning the tips of Gerard’s fingers; he’s got bandages on his thumbs, even - but really he’s eavesdropping on Dr. Zelenka.
“No. No, Rodney, we have not finished testing the ZPM-well, I suppose, yes, but we have no idea how it will function. Yes, that could work if you-only there is a-of course, do you think I’m-if Colonel Sheppard is willing to-I will not owe you peanut M&Ms for-three minutes with the shield dropped, maybe less if we-Yes, yes, and then we can-it is ridiculous, but if you believe-”
The problem with eavesdropping on Dr. Zelenka when he’s talking to Dr. McKay, of course, is that rarely anything made sense. It’s even harder to parse when he can only hear one half of the conversation.
Gerard ducks inside the jumper, switches to one of the little used science channels and taps his comm. link. “Pete, you there?”
“Y’ello.” Pete’s voice is almost a whisper.
“You anywhere near the control room?”
“I’m hiding behind Chuck. Dude, this is awesome.”
Only Pete would think a Wraith threat was awesome. “Do you know what’s going on?”
“They said they’d attack us if we didn’t give them back Urie,” Pete says in a hush. “I think we’re going to attack first?”
“The chair,” Gerard says. The Ancient chair, the one that Sheppard can turn on with his mind, control the entire city through. They’re going to power it up and send a few drones their way.
“Man, how cool would it be if the Daedalus showed up now?” Pete asks, and Pete’s like him, they hardly ever travel off-world, but even Gerard seems to have more of a survival instinct than Pete.
“This isn’t some kind of video game, Pete,” Gerard says.
Pete’s silent for a weighted moment. Then he says, “Hey, hey, I gotta get my jollies where I can, right?” and his voice is considerably more subdued.
Gerard sighs. Pete’s more right than wrong, actually. Their lives are so bizarre.
*
The Daedalus hasn’t shown. The Daedalus hasn’t swooped in for a last minute rescue, and John finds himself down in the chair room, Rodney hooked up to its base with a monitor, because they needed to blow the shit out of that hive ship, before it told any of its buddies that Atlantis is actually still standing. If it hasn’t already.
In the chair, hands pressed into the controls, John feels the entire city under his skin, pulsing along his synapses, pushing into his brain. Easy now, he thinks, and then everything goes blank. That. Isn’t supposed to happen.
“Rodney.”
“I know, hang on, I’m not-”
“There’s no power, Rodney,” John growls, thinks on on on on. “Don’t tell me the whole city’s out.”
“The whole city isn’t out,” Rodney says, and John pops his eyes open, glances down at Rodney.
Rodney waves a hand without looking up from his datapad. “I know.”
“That’s great,” John says, mouth tight. “Now fix it.”
“Oh, of course, sure, I’ll just snap my fingers and-”
“Rodney.”
“Hang on,” Rodney says, taps his finger to his radio. “Radek. Run diagnostic on-yes, yes, there’s something-no, don’t send. Don’t send Wentz, are you-”
“Rodney,” John says.
Rodney holds up a finger. “Just a minute, Colonel. Radek, Radek, don’t you dare-”
“Dr. McKay,” Wentz says, bounding into the chair room, huffing, a gaggle of lesser scientists at his heels. “I think it’s the ZPM, the new one, we’ll have to reroute-”
“All power through the generators, hoping against hope we have enough juice to last long enough to launch an attack, get that online, do it now, you imbecile, oh my god, I’m finishing Wentz’s sentences-”
“Rodney,” John says, reaching out to slap the back of his head.
“I can do this, I can so do this, Dr. McKay. Give me five minutes,” Wentz says, ducking back out of the room, and Rodney yells after him, “You have two,” then mutters, “Hell, hell, we’re all going to die,” as his fingers fly over the screen.
*
Gerard races after Pete, scooting into the transporter right before it slams shut, huffing, and he’d quick smoking, like, years before, but he thinks maybe he needs to keep in better health, maybe jog a little with the Butcher in the mornings or something - he blocks out the little voice in the back of his head that’s laughing kind of hysterically at this - because his lungs feel like they’re going to burst.
“Second level,” Gerard gasps, and Pete nods, presses two fingers against the destination corridor on the map, and the doors are opening again before Gerard can even catch his breath. Fuck. He really, really needs to get in shape.
Pete sprints, and by the time Gerard slip-slides into the room, Pete’s already got the ZPM out of its slot.
“Wow, this thing is fucked,” Pete says, gingerly holding the ZPM. He sniffs it tentatively, and Gerard resists the urge to knock it out of his arms, because less than two minutes; they don’t have time to dick around.
Pete places it aside, pats the top absently. “Now we know why it was just lying around in a cave, seriously.”
“Pete, Pete, we have,” Gerard flicks a glance at his watch, “a minute and a half to get this rerouted. Let’s-”
“Concentrate, right,” he cracks his knuckles, “I’m totally great at concentrating, Gerard, just-”
“I’ve got it.” Gerard pries off the generator casing, dives into the mess of wires and crystals, Pete less than a half-step behind. “We need to connect everything through-”
“Ow, fuck, shit, no, no, don’t worry,” Pete hisses, fingers parsing out wires, Gerard’s working in tandem, their shoulders touching, “I’m fine, just get that other crystal-”
“It’s in, I heard it click, Pete-”
“I’ve got it, just flip that-”
“Other way, other way,” Gerard yelps, and Pete bites out, “This way, we need to make sure it communicates with all of them. There, there-”
“Fuck, do you think that worked?” Gerard asks, settling back on his heels, swiping his hands, damp with sweat, over his pants.
“We’ll know in a second,” Pete says, grinning manically at him. “It’ll be totally worth losing a few layers of skin, dude. We can even lord it all over McKay, right?”
Gerard doesn’t disagree, but he rubs his forehead and radios Dr. McKay, tells him they’ve done what they could do, and McKay just grunts in his ear, cuts off in the middle of yelling, “Sheppard, Atlantis better be murmuring sweet nothings in your head right now or-”
Gerard grins. He shakes his head, and then an explosion ripples out, the reverberations in the floor so subtle they might have gone unnoticed if he hadn’t been anticipating them.
“Thank fuck,” Pete says, and, “Dude, we totally saved the day. We’re motherfucking heroes.”
*
Joe’s not exactly hiding, but he’s totally hanging out in the hydroponics lab, behind some twining lianas and a row of squash, back against a wall of sweet corn, legs folded up.
He likes the hydroponics lab. The recycled air of Atlantis is so perfect and dry, and sometimes he just needs the wet warmth, the thick scent of flowering vegetables. It’s different, without the dirt, but it’s close enough, and he’ll take any comfort he can get.
He hears a distant explosion, then another, and his hands tighten over a thin vine. Joe isn’t stoned since he’s still on working hours, and Joe is not a complete degenerate. Also, Bob totally hid his latest stash. Bob is the devil.
“Thought I’d find you here,” Bob says. He’s standing in front of Joe, hands behind his back.
Joe frowns up at him. “I’m a nervous wreck, Bob,” he says. “I’m like McKay and Gerard without coffee. Combined.”
Bob arches an unsympathetic eyebrow. Seriously, he is so mean. “Combined, huh? That’s pretty tough.”
“Bob, Bob, dude, what do you want?” Joe asks desperately, because they’ve got a Wraith hive ship hovering in their orbit, and Joe has no pot, none at all, and that is so very wrong the entirety of the Pegasus galaxy is likely to implode. Or something.
“It’s a gateway drug, you know,” Bob says, and he looks like he’s having way too much fun with this.
“To what? Seriously, I could die tomorrow,” Joe says, because it’s true. “Nanobots could take over my brain, I could get shot by a fucking arrow off-world, I could get eaten by Wraith, Bob, and you’re worried about a little marijuana?”
Bob frowns. “You’re taking all the fun out of blackmail, Trohman.”
Joe brightens. “Blackmail?”
Bob reaches down, curls a big hand into the front of Joe’s shirt and pulls him to his feet. He’s not quite grinning, but his mouth is certainly threatening to. “I want you to visit PX1-300 with me.”
Joe blinks. “That. That little girl,” Joe says slowly. Bob wants Joe to visit that little girl with him, the girl they rescued from the Wraith, and, okay, maybe it’s a team thing, but it probably isn’t, not if he’s taken this round about way of asking him to go.
Bob doesn’t say anything, just gives him that same, steady look, hand still gripping his shirt, and Joe finally shrugs. He presses a palm flat against Bob’s chest and says, “Okay.”
*
Brendon’s never been scared of small spaces before, but the dark tube surrounding him has him breathing hard, fingernails biting into his palm. It’s just as likely to be the Wraith, though, than the scanner; the thought that something could be wrong with him, something that the Wraith had done to him, other than mess with his memory.
Distantly, he hears Spencer’s voice, hears William, for some reason, and it sounds like he’s singing This Christmas, and then somebody squeezes his left foot, thumb pressing into the sole.
There’s a hum and a flash of soft light, and then the scanner’s sliding open, folding back on itself.
“There now, not so hard, Dr. Urie, was it?” Carson says, smiling. He pats Brendon’s hand.
William looms up behind him. “It’s entirely possible, dear Urie, that you’re pregnant with my love-oof, Smith, watch your viciously pointy elbows or I’ll set that rat bastard Lacey on you.”
Carson sighs. “Dr. Beckett-”
“No relation,” William and Brendon chorus, and it’s weird, having all these little details, memories unfold in tiny bits and pieces. Brendon thinks maybe he’s almost got all of it back now.
William lights up. “Finally,” he says. “Maybe now I can win all my caramel bars back.”
“Why are you here, Beckett?” Spencer asks, eyes narrowed.
“To sing lullabies to all the needy children, Smith. To spread joy through my wondrous voice, to celebrate Christmas upon the highest mount-”
“It’s February,” Brendon says.
“Ah-ha!” He jabs a finger at him. “Good show, Urie. Good show.”
“Dr. Beckett,” Carson says, curling a hand around William’s arm and steering him away from Brendon’s bed. “Please go back to your own bed and stay there, lad. I swear I’d think there’s more wrong with you than that knock to your noggin if I hadn’t witnessed last month’s karaoke night.”
Brendon thinks he hears William say, “Gabe,” and, “fighting sticks,” and, “ninja prowess,” as their voices fade farther away.
And then he’s looking up at Spencer, and Spencer’s catching his hand in a tight grip, and Brendon’s a little surprised by that. He glances around, because anyone could see them. “Spencer, you can’t-”
“It’s fine,” Spencer says. He shrugs. “It’s fine, okay?”
“Um.” Brendon bites his lip, looks down at their linked fingers. Slowly, tentatively, Brendon rubs his thumb along Spencer’s skin.
He hears Spencer’s breath hitch and tries to pull his hand away, but Spencer just holds on harder, squeezes until maybe it hurts a little.
“Ow,” Brendon whispers.
Spencer’s grip instantly lightens. “Shit, sorry,” he says. “Sorry, Brendon. I’m.” He stares down into Brendon’s eyes. He stares into Brendon’s eyes and it’s awesome, it’s so awesome, because Spencer doesn’t have to say anything at all, and Brendon knows exactly what he’s telling him.
*
“Patrick. Hey, Patrick.” Pete catches both of Patrick’s arms, right above his elbows, and Patrick drops all his very important papers in the middle of the corridor.
“Pete-”
“Did you hear? I saved you from possible Wraith destruction,” Pete crows, shaking him a little. Patrick can see all his teeth. “Me. Pete. I’m awesome.”
Patrick snorts. “Okay. That’s great, can you-” Patrick cuts off with a yelp as Pete sort of tackles him, and Patrick loses his footing, slipping on his spilled manila folders, and they both go down. Hard. Patrick’s pretty sure he’s broken his tailbone.
Pete sprawls over him, though, still grinning. “I deserve kisses, Patrick,” he says.
“You do,” Patrick says slowly, fighting off a smile of his own.
Pete nods. “I burned my fingers a little, too.” He waggles his hand in front of Patrick’s face, fingertips red and raw, and Patrick frowns, grabs his wrist.
“They’re starting to blister, Pete,” Patrick says. “You should be at the infirmary.”
Pete wriggles until his legs fall open on either side of Patrick’s hips. His eyes are huge when Patrick glances up at him, teeth digging into his lower lip.
“Hurt?” Patrick asks softly.
“Not anymore,” Pete says, and then he twists his wrist, skims his fingers down the slope of Patrick’s nose, hisses and grimaces as their skin touches.
Patrick murmurs, “Dumbass.”
“Totally,” Pete says, and then, “I’m going to kiss you now,” and, “Marry me?” and Patrick’s laughing when Pete mashes their mouths together.
Patrick sputters, flails his hands behind Pete’s back, because he always figured Pete had more finesse than this, more game, but then Pete pulls back so his upper lip is just resting between Patrick’s.
He whispers, “Patrick,” and Patrick feels it all the way down to his toes.
*
“No one knew about the chip,” Ritter mumbles around a spoonful of reconstituted mashed potatoes. He swallows. “Patient confidentiality.”
“Brendon didn’t know, either,” Ryan points out.
“Brendon thought we were all pulling an elaborately huge joke,” Ritter says. “Sheppard and Weir knew for security reasons, obviously. And McKay, of course, since he’s the one who took the thing apart. I’m just saying,” Ritter shrugs, “Smith should think twice before going on a rampage.”
Ryan rolls his eyes, and Jon snickers. He can’t picture Spencer going on a rampage. He’s way too collected for that, but silent, deadly revenge is not out of the question. He occasionally reminds Jon of Zelenka.
Ryan elbows him in the side.
Jon shoots him his best you really want to start with me? look, and Ryan flushes. Jon’s beginning to really love when Ryan flushes. He knows exactly what it means, now, and enjoys all of the ways he can color Ryan’s cheeks.
Across from them, Ritter’s grinning stupidly, and when Jon catches his eye, he ducks his head and laughs, big hand wrapping around the back of his neck.
And then Brendon declares, “I’m one hundred percent Wraith mutation free,” clattering his tray on the table. “Wraith are big fat liars.” He’s smiling so wide his lips are thinned and he looks sort of manically gleeful. Spencer seems only slightly more reserved standing behind him, eyes nearly twinkling, and that’s a fucking novelty right there.
“Good to hear,” Jon says.
“It is. It is indeed good news, Sergeant Jon Walker,” Brendon says. “And,” he sits down next to Ritter, “Dex is going to let me play with his gun later.”
Ritter laughs again, then claps a hand over his mouth and watches Spencer with the slightest tinge of fear in his eyes, but Spencer just shakes his head.
“I don’t know, Urie,” Spencer says. There’s a grin at the corner of his lips, just barely hiding. “Dex’s gun might be too much for you to handle.”
“Are you implying something, Lieutenant?” Brendon asks, brows peaked over his nose.
“Okay, can we leave the thinly veiled innuendo for someplace less public?” Ryan asks, but he’s smiling, too, and under the table Jon squeezes a hand over his thigh.
*
Ray’s a little bewildered when Dr. Ivarsson interrupts his lunch.
She curves her red lips up and cocks a hip. “Major Toro,” she says, flashing bright white teeth, and Ray’s instantly wary.
He’s heard stories about Ivarsson. Mostly from Dr. McKay, but the rumor about her eating her partners after mating sounds strangely accurate when faced with what Ray’s sure is a predatory smile.
It’s pretty awesome, actually.
“Dr. Ivarsson,” Ray says, nodding.
She tilts her head slightly, runs a hand over her neck, through her hair. “Please. Call me Maja.”
So castoffstarter sent this back and said, “this part doesn’t fit, either rework it or take it out,” and I wrote another seven pages in order to justify keeping it in. The justification could be entirely in my head, but whatever. And then she said something like, “Wow, this climax sucks,” and it did, so I took it out and gave you Pete and Gerard, motherfucking heroes. The climax probably still sucks, but Pete and Gerard, dudes. Motherfucking heroes.
This is also an SGA AU as well as a crossover - any canon after Ronon joined Team Sheppard was basically ignored.
Also: count the fandom tropes! Dudes, I sort of went a little crazy.
I sincerely hope this was worth the wait. I had too much fun writing it, and I kind of settled down in this world and sprawled out. Maybe rolled around a little. Arched into it a bit, gave it sweet kisses and pets. You know. Normal stuff.
Now continue the adventure with Enthalpy!!