Marozi by Pentapus, commentary by Friendshipper
Title: Marozi
Author: pentapus
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis
Commentator: friendshipper
Original story, without commentary and with header image and notes, can be found here.
This is a very short story -- in fact, the commentary is probably going to be longer than the story itself. But it's a beautiful example of the way that a full story, with a fascinating implied backstory, can be told with so few words. I love how not a word is wasted in this story; it's almost like a prose poem, with every paragraph, every sentence contributing something vital to the whole.
Also, there's no way to intelligently discuss this story without MAJOR SPOILERS throughout for what is really a beautifully crafted ending. If you haven't read this story before, I strongly recommend that you go and do it now, right here, before reading the discussion. It's a very short story and won't take very long.
Done? Okay! Carry on, then!
Rodney has his head down, so it’s not until the toes of his boots are already wet that he looks up and sees the three unwashed, leather-clad people staring at him from the opposite bank. They’re armed--older Genii-make, well-maintained--and as shocked as Rodney to find the uninhabited planet suddenly habited. Rodney says intelligently, “Gah!”
There's such a wonderfully cinematic quality to this opening. This whole story, in fact, is very much a mini-movie to me -- I think it's partly because the language in which the story is told is so vivid and concrete, yet spare and concise; it lets the story run at more-or-less realtime in visual form in the mind's eye. Also, there is a minimum of introspection; for the most part, the story takes place outside the characters' heads, contributing to the scene-from-a-movie effect.
The opening scene is probably the part of the story where I'm most aware of that, though, because I can see the camera angles here, and the way that Pentapus controls what you see, tightening the reader's view down to Rodney's field of vision. He's looking at his feet; then the "camera" follows his gaze as his eyes go up and across to the opposite bank of the stream. None of the surroundings need to be described in any great detail - you know all that you need to know to set the scene in this brief paragraph. And Rodney is the perfect narrator for this scene, because he is just so very Rodney here, with his obliviousness to his surroundings.
The tallest says something to the woman next to him in a dialect of Ancient. The incompatible languages are a nice touch. As well as adding a depth of realism to the story, it also obfuscates the finer details about the strangers -- we can't tell what they're saying to each other, seeing them only through outsiders' eyes. It’s not complimentary. The youngest, a girl of maybe eight, shrugs and shifts her bulky rifle to her back, more trusting than her companions.
Again, I love the economy of detail in this story. You get exactly one sentence describing the girl, and it gives a near-perfect impression of who she is and what her life is like. It's solid, unsentimental, practical -- she carries a gun nearly as big as she is because that's the kind of world she lives in, but she hasn't quite gained the wariness of strangers that the adults have learned.
This is also, again, a bit of a contrast to the canon SGA world, where (with, admittedly, some exceptions) conflicts between humans are generally glossed over in favor of more high-action human/alien conflicts. Here, the traveling family are clearly uncertain what sort of reception they can expect from the well-armed Lanteans. They're not hostile, just understandably wary. The "frontier" feeling (which originally made me fall in love with the SGA universe) is very strong here.
Behind him, Teyla and Sheppard crunch quickly across the ground cover of dead leaves. Teyla lets out a relieved breath when she sees the newcomers. Sheppard’s not so convinced. The woman sees Teyla’s forearm and switches to the trade language, concerned: “You’re injured.” Another interesting touch -- we have no idea what happened to the Lanteans, and aren't really told. I like the feeling that we've been dropped into yet another of their little mishaps without really needing to know exactly what's going on.
“Only kind of,” Sheppard hedges.
“I am well,” Teyla agrees.
“We just--uh, lost the jumper,” Rodney adds, babbling. Teyla makes a decision, dropping her sidearm to point at the ground, touching the Colonel’s elbow. One of the reasons why I love this story so much is the misdirection. It keeps moving along at a fast enough clip that, the first time through, you don't notice who's missing -- who hasn't been mentioned in any of the description.
The girl speaks in the same variant of Ancient, wheedling, though Rodney can’t make out the meaning this time. The unintelligible language also helps with the misdirection, because you (the reader) can't understand what they're saying; no help is coming from that quarter, and wondering about what they're saying adds another little bit of mystery, helping to distract from figuring out the solution to the not-so-obvious central mystery of the story. Whatever it is, the two adults go lax, letting their rifles hang from their shoulder straps. Reluctantly, Sheppard lowers his weapon. Of course, Sheppard's the last one to lower his gun. Jumping back to the world-building for a minute, I think this little mini-standoff says a lot about how much more believable this version of the Pegasus Galaxy is than the one we see on TV, because Sheppard's reactions are pretty consistent what we see on the show; it's just that almost everyone they meet seems to have magically figured out that the heavily armed strangers aren't going to rob or shoot them. It makes sense for both sides to be equally suspicious of each other.
“You here to hunt?” the man asks, like the stand off never happened. He’s enormous--at least in the vertical. The woman lifts a water flask wrapped in a hairy animal skin from the girl’s neck, bending to fill it in the stream. From the sound it makes as she unscrews it, it’s metal, with a plastic cap. The girl stays standing, watching the Lanteans with sharp, dark eyes. Rodney spots a dim glow under her braided hair in the pack over her shoulder--it’s the glow of a pulse weapon.
These are the sort of details that, going back later, I marveled that I didn't tumble to what was going on right off the bat. The clues have been seeded; it's just that, first off, you already think you know what you're looking at, and second, the groundwork is laid in such a way as to not make it immediately obvious. The stranger is big, but lots of people are big; it goes along with the whole intimidating-stranger thing. And the way that he's described is just vague enough that it throws you off that little extra bit -- not tall but "enormous", and since you have no idea who they're talking about, the very first impression is of someone who's wide as well as tall. This is immediately countered with a caveat, but that slightly-misleading (yet not specifically inaccurate) impression is already there. And it's the girl who has the energy weapon; if it was hanging at the hip of the big guy, it'd be a lot harder to miss the allusion. The metal-and-plastic canteen is another nice little nod to the strangers' mixed tech.
“Not so much with the hunting,” Sheppard says, uncomfortable but friendly. The hand hanging by his sidearm keeps curling restlessly.
“Lost your ship,” the man concludes.
“Well--yeah,” Sheppard admits. This little conversation is a great example of the spare perfection of this story -- short, complete and beautifully in character (on both sides). And, again, I really love how we're never told exactly what happened. We don't need to know; it helps underscore the madcap breathlessness of life in the Pegasus Galaxy. Another day, another disaster. They fall into an awkward silence waiting for the woman to finish with her family’s canteens. The man doesn’t help; he’s standing guard. The family are clearly used to working together as a unit, and have done this many times -- the way they casually fall into a certain pattern of behavior without needing to speak or assign duties. The little girl's silence and lack of overt curiosity, again, says a lot about the kind of life she leads.
The woman stands; holds out a hand towards Teyla. Underneath the dirt her skin is pale and smooth, urban. Her two companions are darker, their hair rougher, but they’re the same. “Please, let me,” she says. “I was a healer.”
Still just vague enough that it's obvious enough in retrospect -- it all fits together perfectly -- and it doesn't feel as if any details are being deliberately avoided or obfuscated, but there's nothing obviously identifying.
The before the Wraith at the end of her sentence is understood, and suddenly, Rodney knows what Teyla recognized so easily about these people, as only a native of Pegasus could. They’re the victims of a culling.
Teyla makes the first move, stepping into the stream. She and the other woman touch hands warmly. It’s free of ritual, an instinctual comfort that the two of them have exchanged. Knowing who the woman is, I find this incredibly sweet. It makes sense that they would get along.
“We are going to mourn our dead,” the woman says. “Will you come?”
It isn’t until Teyla says, “Of course,” that Rodney realizes the offer isn’t as strangely invasive as it seems. This is Pegasus. That every traveler carries their own list of dead is assumed. Sad and perfect.
“This way,” the woman says.
The girl, still staring, turns and says something to her father in the other language. He answers her in the trade language looking at Rodney, then Sheppard. “Guess so,” he says wryly. Then the three of them are turning and walking off. A shrug beckons Rodney’s team after. This is another of those places where, looking back after reading to the end of the story, it made me grin for the perfectly in-character nature of the scene.
Rodney shoves himself into Teyla’s space. Sheppard comes down the slope to join them.
“Your participation is unnecessary--” Teyla begins, conciliatory.
“We’ll participate,” Sheppard says, and it’s decided. Rodney tries to imagine who he’ll pray for and thinks of his grandmother--a vague blur of shag carpeting and peanut butter--but not of his parents. Awww, Rodney. And -- this is also a bit of an anchor in time for the period in which the story was written, as well. In current SGA continuity, Rodney definitely has people to mourn: Carson and Elizabeth. Each story that's written is a little snapshot of the show and the fandom at the time, even if it's deliberately set forward or backward in time, even if it's consciously made AU; it still carries the writer's unspoken assumptions about the nature of canon at the time. This one is no different.
Quietly, they follow the small family up a gentle slope, through bare, brittle trees. They cross a ridge and then another, zigzagging as the incline increases, until they reach a break in the trees at a rocky hilltop, drifts of red leaves gathered in stone corners.
The story never specifically has to come out and say "It's autumn." This is amply clear from the carefully chosen details that we receive. Autumn is the perfect time of year for this, with its sharpness and pervasive sense of wistfulness, loss, and oncoming change.
Rodney, Teyla, and Sheppard stand under the gray sky like a triplet of extraneous wheels--third, fourth, and fifth--while their hosts prepare for mourning. And this, of course, is the point where it really becomes obvious that something is wrong. It's not being obfuscated anymore. Where's Ronon? Dead in whatever event left them stranded here? But they don't act like they're grieving, and Rodney didn't mention mourning him. Suddenly we're adrift; we don't know what's going on. The girl sweeps a spot at the crest of the hill free of dirt and leaves while her father disassembles a cairn of smooth stones blocking a hollow in the rock. His wife takes out a brown paper packet tied with string. The paper holds something Rodney mistakes at first for sticks, then for peculiar cigars. More of the family's silent communication, each family member knowing his or her task and performing it. The girl works too. No one sits idle, and the three Lanteans -- whether consciously or not -- are acutely aware of this, standing about uselessly with nothing helpful to do. Even Teyla is in someone else's bailiwick here; though, since the story is nominally from Rodney's viewpoint, it's mostly Rodney's discomfort that is reflected.
It’s not until her husband takes a small stone vessel, chipped with age, from its hiding place that Rodney understands. The healer turns to them, holding out her open hands with the incense sticks laid across them. “Who are you?” she says with a ritualistic rhythm.
Teyla takes one. “I am Teyla Emmagen.” But Teyla knows the ritual.
Then Sheppard, awkwardly: “John Sheppard.” And the others follow suit, in their own way.
Rodney fumbles it, nearly drops it. “Dr. Rodney McKay,” he says, ignoring the look Sheppard shoots him. Sheppard lights their incense with his lighter, and they add them to the bowl now resting in a cleared depression in the stone. The girl crouches over it protectively, proud of her responsibility. Wind picks at her hair. It is probably obvious from reading the commentary that I'm very fond of this character. She's an OC, sparsely described, but there is just enough about her to give a strong impression that she combines traits from both her parents, and that she's a character I would love to get a chance to know on the show itself.
When her mother offers her the incense packet, she says matter-of-factly, “Keller,” as her father hands her a lighter--more pulse technology. I like this other glimpse of their advanced technology. Also, this is another interesting insect-in-amber moment, with the OC's name reflecting a character who had not yet been introduced on the show at that time.
“Killer?” Rodney blurts rudely, then flinches in embarrassment. Sheppard and Teyla are both glaring at him.
“It’s alright,” her mother promises. She reaches out absently to rearrange the lay of the pack and rifle across her daughter’s shoulders. There’s something hard in her voice that wasn’t there before. “The meaning is almost the same. Keller--the one who defeats Kell.”
And this is where all the clues start to tumble together, a cascade going over a hill.
“Oh,” Rodney says, stunned.
Then she’s taking her own incense stick--“Melena Arken”--and arranging it in the bowl.
... and this would be the point where the shoe dropped for good. OH. Here comes that feeling of the whole world tilting and putting itself back together in a different shape.
The father is last. Very patriarchal, Rodney thinks. He lights his stick from his wife’s, staring a long time at her face and his daughter’s. At last, he sets it in the bowl next to the others, saying solemnly, “Ronon Dex.”
And so it all comes together, and, on the first reading, left me gasping -- that perfect feeling of all the pieces fitting at the end with an audible "click"! This is what's off about this universe, what's been off since the beginning, and now it all makes sense.
The line at the end, with Ronon looking into his family's faces, underscores their importance to him -- and hammers home the poignant point that he doesn't have this in our 'verse.
Even the little girl's age is significant, relative to the fall of Sateda -- just another little clue, keeping this story true to our canon 'verse, because Ronon did not have a child in the flashbacks, so she would have been conceived or born right around the time that Melena died in our 'verse. Except, of course, that's the change here -- she didn't die. Is the girl the difference? Did Melena acquiesce to Ronon's insistence on sending her offworld because she was pregnant? We'll never know, of course, but it's interesting to speculate -- and that's part of the beauty of this short story, that it leaves you with all of these questions. Those final paragraphs unfold like a blossom, opening up into an entire universe that is only hinted at.
This is a lovely story, one that has been a favorite of mine, for all its brevity, ever since I first read it, and it was my pleasure to be able to take a closer look at it.
Author: pentapus
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis
Commentator: friendshipper
Original story, without commentary and with header image and notes, can be found here.
This is a very short story -- in fact, the commentary is probably going to be longer than the story itself. But it's a beautiful example of the way that a full story, with a fascinating implied backstory, can be told with so few words. I love how not a word is wasted in this story; it's almost like a prose poem, with every paragraph, every sentence contributing something vital to the whole.
Also, there's no way to intelligently discuss this story without MAJOR SPOILERS throughout for what is really a beautifully crafted ending. If you haven't read this story before, I strongly recommend that you go and do it now, right here, before reading the discussion. It's a very short story and won't take very long.
Done? Okay! Carry on, then!
Rodney has his head down, so it’s not until the toes of his boots are already wet that he looks up and sees the three unwashed, leather-clad people staring at him from the opposite bank. They’re armed--older Genii-make, well-maintained--and as shocked as Rodney to find the uninhabited planet suddenly habited. Rodney says intelligently, “Gah!”
There's such a wonderfully cinematic quality to this opening. This whole story, in fact, is very much a mini-movie to me -- I think it's partly because the language in which the story is told is so vivid and concrete, yet spare and concise; it lets the story run at more-or-less realtime in visual form in the mind's eye. Also, there is a minimum of introspection; for the most part, the story takes place outside the characters' heads, contributing to the scene-from-a-movie effect.
The opening scene is probably the part of the story where I'm most aware of that, though, because I can see the camera angles here, and the way that Pentapus controls what you see, tightening the reader's view down to Rodney's field of vision. He's looking at his feet; then the "camera" follows his gaze as his eyes go up and across to the opposite bank of the stream. None of the surroundings need to be described in any great detail - you know all that you need to know to set the scene in this brief paragraph. And Rodney is the perfect narrator for this scene, because he is just so very Rodney here, with his obliviousness to his surroundings.
The tallest says something to the woman next to him in a dialect of Ancient. The incompatible languages are a nice touch. As well as adding a depth of realism to the story, it also obfuscates the finer details about the strangers -- we can't tell what they're saying to each other, seeing them only through outsiders' eyes. It’s not complimentary. The youngest, a girl of maybe eight, shrugs and shifts her bulky rifle to her back, more trusting than her companions.
Again, I love the economy of detail in this story. You get exactly one sentence describing the girl, and it gives a near-perfect impression of who she is and what her life is like. It's solid, unsentimental, practical -- she carries a gun nearly as big as she is because that's the kind of world she lives in, but she hasn't quite gained the wariness of strangers that the adults have learned.
This is also, again, a bit of a contrast to the canon SGA world, where (with, admittedly, some exceptions) conflicts between humans are generally glossed over in favor of more high-action human/alien conflicts. Here, the traveling family are clearly uncertain what sort of reception they can expect from the well-armed Lanteans. They're not hostile, just understandably wary. The "frontier" feeling (which originally made me fall in love with the SGA universe) is very strong here.
Behind him, Teyla and Sheppard crunch quickly across the ground cover of dead leaves. Teyla lets out a relieved breath when she sees the newcomers. Sheppard’s not so convinced. The woman sees Teyla’s forearm and switches to the trade language, concerned: “You’re injured.” Another interesting touch -- we have no idea what happened to the Lanteans, and aren't really told. I like the feeling that we've been dropped into yet another of their little mishaps without really needing to know exactly what's going on.
“Only kind of,” Sheppard hedges.
“I am well,” Teyla agrees.
“We just--uh, lost the jumper,” Rodney adds, babbling. Teyla makes a decision, dropping her sidearm to point at the ground, touching the Colonel’s elbow. One of the reasons why I love this story so much is the misdirection. It keeps moving along at a fast enough clip that, the first time through, you don't notice who's missing -- who hasn't been mentioned in any of the description.
The girl speaks in the same variant of Ancient, wheedling, though Rodney can’t make out the meaning this time. The unintelligible language also helps with the misdirection, because you (the reader) can't understand what they're saying; no help is coming from that quarter, and wondering about what they're saying adds another little bit of mystery, helping to distract from figuring out the solution to the not-so-obvious central mystery of the story. Whatever it is, the two adults go lax, letting their rifles hang from their shoulder straps. Reluctantly, Sheppard lowers his weapon. Of course, Sheppard's the last one to lower his gun. Jumping back to the world-building for a minute, I think this little mini-standoff says a lot about how much more believable this version of the Pegasus Galaxy is than the one we see on TV, because Sheppard's reactions are pretty consistent what we see on the show; it's just that almost everyone they meet seems to have magically figured out that the heavily armed strangers aren't going to rob or shoot them. It makes sense for both sides to be equally suspicious of each other.
“You here to hunt?” the man asks, like the stand off never happened. He’s enormous--at least in the vertical. The woman lifts a water flask wrapped in a hairy animal skin from the girl’s neck, bending to fill it in the stream. From the sound it makes as she unscrews it, it’s metal, with a plastic cap. The girl stays standing, watching the Lanteans with sharp, dark eyes. Rodney spots a dim glow under her braided hair in the pack over her shoulder--it’s the glow of a pulse weapon.
These are the sort of details that, going back later, I marveled that I didn't tumble to what was going on right off the bat. The clues have been seeded; it's just that, first off, you already think you know what you're looking at, and second, the groundwork is laid in such a way as to not make it immediately obvious. The stranger is big, but lots of people are big; it goes along with the whole intimidating-stranger thing. And the way that he's described is just vague enough that it throws you off that little extra bit -- not tall but "enormous", and since you have no idea who they're talking about, the very first impression is of someone who's wide as well as tall. This is immediately countered with a caveat, but that slightly-misleading (yet not specifically inaccurate) impression is already there. And it's the girl who has the energy weapon; if it was hanging at the hip of the big guy, it'd be a lot harder to miss the allusion. The metal-and-plastic canteen is another nice little nod to the strangers' mixed tech.
“Not so much with the hunting,” Sheppard says, uncomfortable but friendly. The hand hanging by his sidearm keeps curling restlessly.
“Lost your ship,” the man concludes.
“Well--yeah,” Sheppard admits. This little conversation is a great example of the spare perfection of this story -- short, complete and beautifully in character (on both sides). And, again, I really love how we're never told exactly what happened. We don't need to know; it helps underscore the madcap breathlessness of life in the Pegasus Galaxy. Another day, another disaster. They fall into an awkward silence waiting for the woman to finish with her family’s canteens. The man doesn’t help; he’s standing guard. The family are clearly used to working together as a unit, and have done this many times -- the way they casually fall into a certain pattern of behavior without needing to speak or assign duties. The little girl's silence and lack of overt curiosity, again, says a lot about the kind of life she leads.
The woman stands; holds out a hand towards Teyla. Underneath the dirt her skin is pale and smooth, urban. Her two companions are darker, their hair rougher, but they’re the same. “Please, let me,” she says. “I was a healer.”
Still just vague enough that it's obvious enough in retrospect -- it all fits together perfectly -- and it doesn't feel as if any details are being deliberately avoided or obfuscated, but there's nothing obviously identifying.
The before the Wraith at the end of her sentence is understood, and suddenly, Rodney knows what Teyla recognized so easily about these people, as only a native of Pegasus could. They’re the victims of a culling.
Teyla makes the first move, stepping into the stream. She and the other woman touch hands warmly. It’s free of ritual, an instinctual comfort that the two of them have exchanged. Knowing who the woman is, I find this incredibly sweet. It makes sense that they would get along.
“We are going to mourn our dead,” the woman says. “Will you come?”
It isn’t until Teyla says, “Of course,” that Rodney realizes the offer isn’t as strangely invasive as it seems. This is Pegasus. That every traveler carries their own list of dead is assumed. Sad and perfect.
“This way,” the woman says.
The girl, still staring, turns and says something to her father in the other language. He answers her in the trade language looking at Rodney, then Sheppard. “Guess so,” he says wryly. Then the three of them are turning and walking off. A shrug beckons Rodney’s team after. This is another of those places where, looking back after reading to the end of the story, it made me grin for the perfectly in-character nature of the scene.
Rodney shoves himself into Teyla’s space. Sheppard comes down the slope to join them.
“Your participation is unnecessary--” Teyla begins, conciliatory.
“We’ll participate,” Sheppard says, and it’s decided. Rodney tries to imagine who he’ll pray for and thinks of his grandmother--a vague blur of shag carpeting and peanut butter--but not of his parents. Awww, Rodney. And -- this is also a bit of an anchor in time for the period in which the story was written, as well. In current SGA continuity, Rodney definitely has people to mourn: Carson and Elizabeth. Each story that's written is a little snapshot of the show and the fandom at the time, even if it's deliberately set forward or backward in time, even if it's consciously made AU; it still carries the writer's unspoken assumptions about the nature of canon at the time. This one is no different.
Quietly, they follow the small family up a gentle slope, through bare, brittle trees. They cross a ridge and then another, zigzagging as the incline increases, until they reach a break in the trees at a rocky hilltop, drifts of red leaves gathered in stone corners.
The story never specifically has to come out and say "It's autumn." This is amply clear from the carefully chosen details that we receive. Autumn is the perfect time of year for this, with its sharpness and pervasive sense of wistfulness, loss, and oncoming change.
Rodney, Teyla, and Sheppard stand under the gray sky like a triplet of extraneous wheels--third, fourth, and fifth--while their hosts prepare for mourning. And this, of course, is the point where it really becomes obvious that something is wrong. It's not being obfuscated anymore. Where's Ronon? Dead in whatever event left them stranded here? But they don't act like they're grieving, and Rodney didn't mention mourning him. Suddenly we're adrift; we don't know what's going on. The girl sweeps a spot at the crest of the hill free of dirt and leaves while her father disassembles a cairn of smooth stones blocking a hollow in the rock. His wife takes out a brown paper packet tied with string. The paper holds something Rodney mistakes at first for sticks, then for peculiar cigars. More of the family's silent communication, each family member knowing his or her task and performing it. The girl works too. No one sits idle, and the three Lanteans -- whether consciously or not -- are acutely aware of this, standing about uselessly with nothing helpful to do. Even Teyla is in someone else's bailiwick here; though, since the story is nominally from Rodney's viewpoint, it's mostly Rodney's discomfort that is reflected.
It’s not until her husband takes a small stone vessel, chipped with age, from its hiding place that Rodney understands. The healer turns to them, holding out her open hands with the incense sticks laid across them. “Who are you?” she says with a ritualistic rhythm.
Teyla takes one. “I am Teyla Emmagen.” But Teyla knows the ritual.
Then Sheppard, awkwardly: “John Sheppard.” And the others follow suit, in their own way.
Rodney fumbles it, nearly drops it. “Dr. Rodney McKay,” he says, ignoring the look Sheppard shoots him. Sheppard lights their incense with his lighter, and they add them to the bowl now resting in a cleared depression in the stone. The girl crouches over it protectively, proud of her responsibility. Wind picks at her hair. It is probably obvious from reading the commentary that I'm very fond of this character. She's an OC, sparsely described, but there is just enough about her to give a strong impression that she combines traits from both her parents, and that she's a character I would love to get a chance to know on the show itself.
When her mother offers her the incense packet, she says matter-of-factly, “Keller,” as her father hands her a lighter--more pulse technology. I like this other glimpse of their advanced technology. Also, this is another interesting insect-in-amber moment, with the OC's name reflecting a character who had not yet been introduced on the show at that time.
“Killer?” Rodney blurts rudely, then flinches in embarrassment. Sheppard and Teyla are both glaring at him.
“It’s alright,” her mother promises. She reaches out absently to rearrange the lay of the pack and rifle across her daughter’s shoulders. There’s something hard in her voice that wasn’t there before. “The meaning is almost the same. Keller--the one who defeats Kell.”
And this is where all the clues start to tumble together, a cascade going over a hill.
“Oh,” Rodney says, stunned.
Then she’s taking her own incense stick--“Melena Arken”--and arranging it in the bowl.
... and this would be the point where the shoe dropped for good. OH. Here comes that feeling of the whole world tilting and putting itself back together in a different shape.
The father is last. Very patriarchal, Rodney thinks. He lights his stick from his wife’s, staring a long time at her face and his daughter’s. At last, he sets it in the bowl next to the others, saying solemnly, “Ronon Dex.”
And so it all comes together, and, on the first reading, left me gasping -- that perfect feeling of all the pieces fitting at the end with an audible "click"! This is what's off about this universe, what's been off since the beginning, and now it all makes sense.
The line at the end, with Ronon looking into his family's faces, underscores their importance to him -- and hammers home the poignant point that he doesn't have this in our 'verse.
Even the little girl's age is significant, relative to the fall of Sateda -- just another little clue, keeping this story true to our canon 'verse, because Ronon did not have a child in the flashbacks, so she would have been conceived or born right around the time that Melena died in our 'verse. Except, of course, that's the change here -- she didn't die. Is the girl the difference? Did Melena acquiesce to Ronon's insistence on sending her offworld because she was pregnant? We'll never know, of course, but it's interesting to speculate -- and that's part of the beauty of this short story, that it leaves you with all of these questions. Those final paragraphs unfold like a blossom, opening up into an entire universe that is only hinted at.
This is a lovely story, one that has been a favorite of mine, for all its brevity, ever since I first read it, and it was my pleasure to be able to take a closer look at it.