SGA WIP: Our Own Reality. 10/?. John/Rodney.
31,058/70,000. I re-wrote bits of the outline but haven't fully integrated it into the old one. I did change the estimate to 70,000. Might be less if the later chapters are shorter. I should also note that I'm back to work now after a week of vacation, so chapters will most likely be shorter. This one certainly is with under 2000 words.
In this chapter: Things are actually getting better.
This is set at the beginning of season 5. The fic will be John/Rodney, NC-17, and include a warning for ( skip) behavior that is technically sexual harassment (though I hope you'll understand John).
Our Own Reality 10/?
Picking Rodney up for lunch actually turned out be bringing lunch to the lab. Rodney was surprised to see Sheppard arrive armed with two filled trays.
"I figured you'd be busy," John said, pushing the trays onto Rodney's desk. "And you mentioned you found something out about the jumper controls." He smiled eagerly.
Rodney could only smirk. "I said maybe."
"When you say maybe, it means 'Yes, but don't hassle me every five seconds.'" John pulled a chair over to Rodney's desk and sat down on it. "Show me."
Rodney was tempted to say, 'For someone you've just met you know me very well,' but he didn't want to push it. If this worked for Sheppard, Rodney would be okay.
As they ate, he starting explaining about the notes that they'd found that might enable them to create something like a semi-autopilot. If it worked the it would take more crude mental commands and would use them to plot out a precise path. It would be entirely useless for Sheppard, of course, who had the jumpers at his beck and call, but for less skilled pilots, e.g. in emergency situations, it could be useful and eventually it might allow them to build an interface to manually enter those crude commands, enabling even non-gene carriers to fly them.
It was all just an idea at the moment, but Sheppard was already thinking about the practical uses.
"We wouldn't have to send teams with pilots on missions to known trade partners just because the settlement is too far to go by foot."
"Although those missions can be nice," Rodney said. Minimal chance of being attacked, plus no walking. What was not to love?
"I'd just like to have the option. It doesn't mean we'll never take on of those missions again. Plus such control would be cool for other things. I could probably watch a DVD while with them," John said, eyes glowing at the idea.
"You could do that now, and no, I'm not going to build a DVD player into the jumpers," Rodney said.
"Awww, Rodney," John pouted.
"The last thing I need is being stuck in a puddlejumper ride and forced to watch one of your stupid football games or the documentaries about Earth that Teyla finds so fascinating."
John made a face. "That could be ..."
"Even more boring than watching space flow by," Rodney finished for him.
"All right. But the idea with the controls is nice. Keep me posted on that, will you?" John said, getting up from his chair.
"It's not exactly priority number one," Rodney warned him.
"I know, I know. Just give it a priority above the 'will never get done' threshold, okay?"
"Yeah, yeah," Rodney said.
John looked at the screen once more, then turned to Rodney.
Rodney knew this look. What came next was the self-satisfied grin that would be followed by an encouraging slap on his shoulder, and then John would saunter out with an easy spring in his step.
Two of those three things actually happened. John did grin self-satisfied and he did leave with a spring in his step. But he didn't put his hand on Rodney's shoulder or arm.
As Rodney watched John walk out of the lab, he suddenly remembered that they were starting new. He hadn't even noticed, so caught up was he with food and explaining the jumper controls.
He supposed it was a very good sign. Of course, discussing the puddlejumpers made it easy to distract them both, but their whole lunch had felt pretty natural.
Although now that Rodney thought about it, John had kept a certain amount of physical distance between them. So often in the past he'd had John leaning in so close that they were touching each other as Rodney showed him something on screen. Today there'd been a healthy distance between them at all times.
Rodney would chalk it up to them having to eat, but they'd been done sooner than Rodney's little presentation had ended and when John had stood up, there'd been no reason for him not to do what Rodney had expected. Except for the reason that Rodney could no longer expect this from John because despite appearances he wasn't quite his old friend.
It was the right direction however. So Rodney was going to just hang in there, treating John like he'd always treated him, pretty much from the beginning, and hope that John would respond in kind, even if he did it as a "new" friend.
~~
John was ready to call his strategy a success.
They weren't quite yet at a place where things were natural between them, but that was okay. And maybe that was just John.
He still took a minute every time he went to see McKay to do a little mental chant consisting of, "He's not the guy on TV," and, "You're not in love with him." Although it felt less absurd every time he did it, and John had the hope that sooner or later, he wouldn't have to do it at all because he would simply be in a mental place where McKay simply was McKay, his buddy.
On their next mission, John felt as relaxed as he hadn't been in a long time. He let McKay go on about his incompetent underlings and threw in a few snide remarks, earning a glare or two which he returned with grin.
It was nice. It was how they-the other John and Rodney-had started way back then.
John also noticed that Rodney had lost almost all of the anxiety he'd displayed during their rough patch. There were still moments, few and far between, where he'd give John a strange look, but overall they were okay.
John would go so far as to say that they were friends again.
They were another mission when John noticed the strap on McKay's notebook coming loose. "McKay, your notebook's flirting with gravity."
"What?" Rodney said turning around.
"Your notebook is about to kiss the ground," John said.
"What the hell are you-"
John rolled his eyes and said, "The strap on your notebook is coming loose."
McKay stopped and looked around. John walked past him and when Rodney still didn't seem to see it, he pointed at it. "There! You're not usually this slow when it comes to your precious equipment," John commented, waiting for Rodney to finally adjust the strap, but he only looked at John in that peculiar way again. "What?" John asked.
Rodney pointed wildly with his finger and frowned at John. "What was that supposed to be?"
"I was just pointing out that your notebook was about to hit the ground. But next time I can ignore it if that's what you'd prefer." John was slightly irritated because he had no idea what the problem here was.
"I thank you for taking the time to inform me, but that wasn't what I meant," McKay said.
"What did you mean?" John asked. He honestly had no idea.
"I meant the pointing," Rodney said.
"Well, you didn't seem to get it," John said.
"But why didn't you just-" In that moment, Ronon, who'd stopped before, waiting for them along with Teyla, pulled and fixed the strap on McKay's shoulder. "That exactly," Rodney finished. "Thank you for making my point-and the strap thing."
John blinked. "I wasn't aware that you couldn't fix it yourself," John said, still not getting what the hell they were discussing here.
McKay looked over to Ronon and Teyla then took John's arm to pull him aside. John took a few steps back. "See? This is exactly what I'm talking about."
John had to think for a second what he'd done. He'd only wanted to get out of Rodney's way. Oh.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Teyla, gesturing to Ronon and they started slowly going on without him and McKay. John didn't think that a mission was the ideal place to talk, but they still had a bit to go until they reached the village, and Rodney had a point.
John wasn't consciously aware of it all the time, but somewhere along with his "You're not in love with him" chant, there'd been the "Don't get too close to him" chant.
Physical closeness was one the most noticeable difference between them and the John and Rodney in the recordings. It was a mostly unconscious expression of how close they'd become. Additionally, being physically close held the temptation of forgetting and just reaching out because despite his little chants and relative success in distancing himself from that life, John didn't quite trust himself yet not to forget that they weren't the same people as those on screen.
So he'd had two good reasons why he'd avoided close physical contact to Rodney, and he hadn't thought that it would be a problem. Honestly, he hadn't thought Rodney would even notice. It wasn't as if they'd been all over each other at all times before John's experience in the machine. But obviously, the distance John kept now was noticeable.
"I'm sorry," John said.
"No need to be. You can just stop," Rodney said, sounding slightly frustrated. "I mean now that we're 'new' friends and all, maybe I should make it explicit that I have no problem with touching." To illustrate he poked John in the chest.
"Hey," John said, poking back.
"Thank you," Rodney said. "I'm not asking for hugs or anything-I don't think even the Ancients could build such a powerful machine," John glared at him, before Rodney went on. "But I happen to know that you do in fact touch people, because I looked for it the last couple of days."
John flushed slightly. McKay had observed him? John had to admit he wasn't even that surprised. And at least this explained the occasional strange looks.
McKay starting walking again, catching up to Ronon and Teyla. "If you don't treat me any differently than everyone I'll be fine. I don't expect more. Deal?"
Still walking on, McKay didn't really leave him a chance to discuss this other than grabbing and stopping him. "Deal," John conceded. Then he clapped Rodney on the shoulder. "Buddy."
Rodney snorted. John let go and they walked on.
"You okay?" Ronon called from ahead of them.
"We're fine," Rodney said. "Sheppard's giving up the McKay buffer after I kindly asked him."
Teyla raised an eyebrow at them.
"We can even walk in touching distance now," Rodney said, gesturing at the indeed negligible space between them.
"Awww, McKay. Didn't know you were looking for human contact," Ronon said.
Then he came close and pulled Rodney into a tight hug until Rodney could only gasp, "Help me. Conan the Barbarian is trying to kill me."
John just lightly slapped his back and went on.
Yep. Things were definitely on their way to being like they used to be.
In this chapter: Things are actually getting better.
This is set at the beginning of season 5. The fic will be John/Rodney, NC-17, and include a warning for ( skip) behavior that is technically sexual harassment (though I hope you'll understand John).
Our Own Reality 10/?
Picking Rodney up for lunch actually turned out be bringing lunch to the lab. Rodney was surprised to see Sheppard arrive armed with two filled trays.
"I figured you'd be busy," John said, pushing the trays onto Rodney's desk. "And you mentioned you found something out about the jumper controls." He smiled eagerly.
Rodney could only smirk. "I said maybe."
"When you say maybe, it means 'Yes, but don't hassle me every five seconds.'" John pulled a chair over to Rodney's desk and sat down on it. "Show me."
Rodney was tempted to say, 'For someone you've just met you know me very well,' but he didn't want to push it. If this worked for Sheppard, Rodney would be okay.
As they ate, he starting explaining about the notes that they'd found that might enable them to create something like a semi-autopilot. If it worked the it would take more crude mental commands and would use them to plot out a precise path. It would be entirely useless for Sheppard, of course, who had the jumpers at his beck and call, but for less skilled pilots, e.g. in emergency situations, it could be useful and eventually it might allow them to build an interface to manually enter those crude commands, enabling even non-gene carriers to fly them.
It was all just an idea at the moment, but Sheppard was already thinking about the practical uses.
"We wouldn't have to send teams with pilots on missions to known trade partners just because the settlement is too far to go by foot."
"Although those missions can be nice," Rodney said. Minimal chance of being attacked, plus no walking. What was not to love?
"I'd just like to have the option. It doesn't mean we'll never take on of those missions again. Plus such control would be cool for other things. I could probably watch a DVD while with them," John said, eyes glowing at the idea.
"You could do that now, and no, I'm not going to build a DVD player into the jumpers," Rodney said.
"Awww, Rodney," John pouted.
"The last thing I need is being stuck in a puddlejumper ride and forced to watch one of your stupid football games or the documentaries about Earth that Teyla finds so fascinating."
John made a face. "That could be ..."
"Even more boring than watching space flow by," Rodney finished for him.
"All right. But the idea with the controls is nice. Keep me posted on that, will you?" John said, getting up from his chair.
"It's not exactly priority number one," Rodney warned him.
"I know, I know. Just give it a priority above the 'will never get done' threshold, okay?"
"Yeah, yeah," Rodney said.
John looked at the screen once more, then turned to Rodney.
Rodney knew this look. What came next was the self-satisfied grin that would be followed by an encouraging slap on his shoulder, and then John would saunter out with an easy spring in his step.
Two of those three things actually happened. John did grin self-satisfied and he did leave with a spring in his step. But he didn't put his hand on Rodney's shoulder or arm.
As Rodney watched John walk out of the lab, he suddenly remembered that they were starting new. He hadn't even noticed, so caught up was he with food and explaining the jumper controls.
He supposed it was a very good sign. Of course, discussing the puddlejumpers made it easy to distract them both, but their whole lunch had felt pretty natural.
Although now that Rodney thought about it, John had kept a certain amount of physical distance between them. So often in the past he'd had John leaning in so close that they were touching each other as Rodney showed him something on screen. Today there'd been a healthy distance between them at all times.
Rodney would chalk it up to them having to eat, but they'd been done sooner than Rodney's little presentation had ended and when John had stood up, there'd been no reason for him not to do what Rodney had expected. Except for the reason that Rodney could no longer expect this from John because despite appearances he wasn't quite his old friend.
It was the right direction however. So Rodney was going to just hang in there, treating John like he'd always treated him, pretty much from the beginning, and hope that John would respond in kind, even if he did it as a "new" friend.
~~
John was ready to call his strategy a success.
They weren't quite yet at a place where things were natural between them, but that was okay. And maybe that was just John.
He still took a minute every time he went to see McKay to do a little mental chant consisting of, "He's not the guy on TV," and, "You're not in love with him." Although it felt less absurd every time he did it, and John had the hope that sooner or later, he wouldn't have to do it at all because he would simply be in a mental place where McKay simply was McKay, his buddy.
On their next mission, John felt as relaxed as he hadn't been in a long time. He let McKay go on about his incompetent underlings and threw in a few snide remarks, earning a glare or two which he returned with grin.
It was nice. It was how they-the other John and Rodney-had started way back then.
John also noticed that Rodney had lost almost all of the anxiety he'd displayed during their rough patch. There were still moments, few and far between, where he'd give John a strange look, but overall they were okay.
John would go so far as to say that they were friends again.
They were another mission when John noticed the strap on McKay's notebook coming loose. "McKay, your notebook's flirting with gravity."
"What?" Rodney said turning around.
"Your notebook is about to kiss the ground," John said.
"What the hell are you-"
John rolled his eyes and said, "The strap on your notebook is coming loose."
McKay stopped and looked around. John walked past him and when Rodney still didn't seem to see it, he pointed at it. "There! You're not usually this slow when it comes to your precious equipment," John commented, waiting for Rodney to finally adjust the strap, but he only looked at John in that peculiar way again. "What?" John asked.
Rodney pointed wildly with his finger and frowned at John. "What was that supposed to be?"
"I was just pointing out that your notebook was about to hit the ground. But next time I can ignore it if that's what you'd prefer." John was slightly irritated because he had no idea what the problem here was.
"I thank you for taking the time to inform me, but that wasn't what I meant," McKay said.
"What did you mean?" John asked. He honestly had no idea.
"I meant the pointing," Rodney said.
"Well, you didn't seem to get it," John said.
"But why didn't you just-" In that moment, Ronon, who'd stopped before, waiting for them along with Teyla, pulled and fixed the strap on McKay's shoulder. "That exactly," Rodney finished. "Thank you for making my point-and the strap thing."
John blinked. "I wasn't aware that you couldn't fix it yourself," John said, still not getting what the hell they were discussing here.
McKay looked over to Ronon and Teyla then took John's arm to pull him aside. John took a few steps back. "See? This is exactly what I'm talking about."
John had to think for a second what he'd done. He'd only wanted to get out of Rodney's way. Oh.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Teyla, gesturing to Ronon and they started slowly going on without him and McKay. John didn't think that a mission was the ideal place to talk, but they still had a bit to go until they reached the village, and Rodney had a point.
John wasn't consciously aware of it all the time, but somewhere along with his "You're not in love with him" chant, there'd been the "Don't get too close to him" chant.
Physical closeness was one the most noticeable difference between them and the John and Rodney in the recordings. It was a mostly unconscious expression of how close they'd become. Additionally, being physically close held the temptation of forgetting and just reaching out because despite his little chants and relative success in distancing himself from that life, John didn't quite trust himself yet not to forget that they weren't the same people as those on screen.
So he'd had two good reasons why he'd avoided close physical contact to Rodney, and he hadn't thought that it would be a problem. Honestly, he hadn't thought Rodney would even notice. It wasn't as if they'd been all over each other at all times before John's experience in the machine. But obviously, the distance John kept now was noticeable.
"I'm sorry," John said.
"No need to be. You can just stop," Rodney said, sounding slightly frustrated. "I mean now that we're 'new' friends and all, maybe I should make it explicit that I have no problem with touching." To illustrate he poked John in the chest.
"Hey," John said, poking back.
"Thank you," Rodney said. "I'm not asking for hugs or anything-I don't think even the Ancients could build such a powerful machine," John glared at him, before Rodney went on. "But I happen to know that you do in fact touch people, because I looked for it the last couple of days."
John flushed slightly. McKay had observed him? John had to admit he wasn't even that surprised. And at least this explained the occasional strange looks.
McKay starting walking again, catching up to Ronon and Teyla. "If you don't treat me any differently than everyone I'll be fine. I don't expect more. Deal?"
Still walking on, McKay didn't really leave him a chance to discuss this other than grabbing and stopping him. "Deal," John conceded. Then he clapped Rodney on the shoulder. "Buddy."
Rodney snorted. John let go and they walked on.
"You okay?" Ronon called from ahead of them.
"We're fine," Rodney said. "Sheppard's giving up the McKay buffer after I kindly asked him."
Teyla raised an eyebrow at them.
"We can even walk in touching distance now," Rodney said, gesturing at the indeed negligible space between them.
"Awww, McKay. Didn't know you were looking for human contact," Ronon said.
Then he came close and pulled Rodney into a tight hug until Rodney could only gasp, "Help me. Conan the Barbarian is trying to kill me."
John just lightly slapped his back and went on.
Yep. Things were definitely on their way to being like they used to be.