TEAM PLAY: black sheep, "Baa Baa Black Sheep"
Title: Baa Baa Black Sheep
Author: curia_regis
Team: Play
Prompt: black sheep
Pairing(s): McKay/Sheppard
Rating: G
Warnings: Crackish
Notes: Thank you so much to djin7 for the beta. Without her help, this fic would have been taken over by chatty!John. *g* Any remaining mistakes are entirely my own fault. ♥ Thank you also to danceswithgary for being a great Team Captain and doing a quick read-through of the fic as well.
Summary: Rodney accidentally turns himself into a sheep after playing with a mysterious Ancient device. Sheppard takes it upon himself to help Rodney.
Once you've read the story, please take a moment to vote in the poll below. Ratings go from 1 (low) to 9 (high), so all you need to do is enter a single number in that range into each text entry box. You'll be able to see the Prompt and Team (Genre) information in the header above.
More details about the voting procedure can be found here.
**
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Rodney was feeling odd; he'd been feeling rather warm all morning.
That was just his luck; he was probably going to come down with some sort of deadly disease only known to the Pegasus Galaxy before lunchtime. His hands were itchy and it felt as though he had a really thick wool coat on, but when he looked down, he was just wearing his normal clothes.
"Excuse me!" Rodney snapped as he pushed past a couple of scientists who seemed to be just standing around. "Some of us have work to do."
One of the scientists stared at him.
Rodney felt a surge of irritation flow through him. He considered telling the man off, but he was late already to the daily briefing; it just wasn't worth the effort. As Rodney rounded the corner to the main meeting room, he wiped the back of his hand over his forehead. He was sweating. "Yes, yes," he said irritably as he entered the room and sat down. "I know I'm late."
Sheppard stared at him.
Rodney ignored Sheppard. Lately, the man had been giving him some rather odd looks. Rodney assumed Sheppard was bored; the last few weeks had been remarkably quiet with nary a Wraith attack, invasion nor virus infestation. Rodney had found it relaxing; he used it to take the opportunity to catch up on some light reading and to examine some of the Ancient devices that he never seemed to get around to playing with. But Sheppard seemed to take it as a personal affront that nobody was attacking them.
Teyla coughed. "Rodney," she began in her best talking-to-small-frightened-animals voice, "are you feeling normal?"
"Of course not," Rodney burst out.
Teyla looked relieved.
Rodney shot an accusatory look at Sheppard. "I think I'm coming down with that flu he had last week."
"It was a cold, not the flu," Sheppard said, wearily. This was the tenth time they had rehashed this conversation. "Anyway, this isn't about my cold. It's about what's on your face."
"What do you mean?" Rodney demanded, alarmed, quickly lifting his hands to run them over his face. His eyes seemed normal. His nose seemed normal. His mouth seemed normal. His chin seemed... Rodney's fingers froze. Just what was that on his chin? He tugged at it.
"It looks like fur," Ronon said helpfully.
"Yes, thank you," Rodney snapped. "I can tell that it's fur." It felt odd. It was definitely not hair, but springier than fur, actually. Still, Rodney wasn't going to quibble about minutiae when there was a fur-like substance growing out of his face! He could feel sweat beginning to trickle down his temples. Damn, it was hot in the room. "Why is there fur on my face?"
Elizabeth looked concerned. "What have you been working on, Rodney?"
"More like tinkering with," Sheppard muttered. Rodney kicked him, and Sheppard gave him a wounded look.
"I wasn't tinkering," Rodney said as he crossed his arms over his chest. Half a second later, he uncrossed them and shrugged off his jacket. It was terribly warm. "I was attempting to establish whether one of the devices we found in one of the previously flooded areas of the city could be used to fight the Wraith."
"So?" Ronon asked.
Rodney pursed his lips. "I think we have a more pressing matter," he pointed out. "Like why I'm growing fur out of my chin."
Elizabeth looked thoughtful. "Rodney, I remember you telling me about this device you were experimenting with. Didn't you say that it was used to sequence livestock DNA?"
Rodney's heart sank and made friends with his boots. "Oh, crap," he muttered.
-^-
Over the course of the day, more and more fur began to sprout in odd places. At first, Rodney just looked like he was spouting a black smudge of a goatee on his chin, but by afternoon, he had what appeared to be huge, curly beard.
"This is ridiculous," Rodney complained as Carson jabbed yet another needle into his arm. He had already been scanned by almost every single Ancient device that Carson could operate, and the man still wanted to take his blood?
"We need to run the bloodwork to rule out contagion, amongst other things, Rodney," Carson explained patiently for the tenth time.
"Can't be contagious," Sheppard piped up. "We're all fine. Only our resident genius was dumb enough to play around with yet another unknown Ancient device." He poked Rodney in the shoulder.
Rodney glared up at him. His teeth were beginning to feel strange, almost as though they were getting too big for his mouth. He wanted to bare his teeth and growl, but that didn't seem like an appropriate reaction for the situation. "Can I go now? Don't you have enough of my blood?" Rodney had never really paid much attention to the lower sciences like medicine, but what felt like ten vials of his blood seemed excessive. Leeches, the lot of them.
Carson patted him on the shoulder. "You should go to your quarters and rest."
"I'm going to go back to that Ancient device and fix whatever it did to me," Rodney said. He was about to get up off the bed, when Sheppard stepped in front of him, blocking his escape. "I'm guessing Elizabeth told you to keep an eye on me?"
Sheppard nodded. His lips were twitching with amusement as he gestured for Rodney to get up. "Yep. Have to keep an eye on you 'til Carson's got more information."
"We believe that whatever is causing the outward changes may also affect your mind," Carson explained quickly.
"There is nothing wrong with my mind," Rodney snapped as he followed Sheppard out of the room. "I might be turning into some sort of animal, but my mind is perfectly fine!"
-^-
"This," Rodney said as he looked down at his new body, "was not my fault." He would have gesticulated wildly, but he no longer had hands. His new limbs seemed decidedly unsuited to gesticulating, although Rodney suspected that they may quite good at tap dancing. That is if he ever got used to walking with hooves.
Sheppard looked like he was trying very hard not to laugh.
"It's not funny!" Rodney muttered.
"It is, actually," Sheppard pointed out, snickering. "You're a sheep."
Rodney rolled his eyes and then looked down at his hooves. "Gee, you're kidding," he said sarcastically. And as an afterthought, Rodney added, "Baaa."
Sheppard snorted. "I think you have a little too much wool between your ears, Rodney."
Rodney was ready to snap back with something equally droll, but then he tilted his head and considered it. His mind did feel a bit fuzzy. For that matter, so did his body - primarily because it was covered with black wool. "Huh. Not just between my ears, looks like." Rodney sniffed. He'd never liked sheep. They were creepy and smelled funny. "And if you start singing that stupid nursery rhyme, I'm going to bite you."
Sheppard leaned over and ruffled his fur. There was an irritating smirk on his face. "You're just the black sheep of the Atlantis family."
Rodney resisted the urge to ram into a wall. Which was more disturbing than he cared to admit, because he really, really wanted to put his head down and charge. "Just how long have you been waiting to make that joke?" he demanded. "As lame as it is."
Sheppard looked wounded. "It's funny!" he said. "Also, since lunch time." The grin was back.
"We need to fix this," Rodney bleated as he followed Sheppard down a corridor. A few confrontations earlier in the day that had netted at least one set of babbling tears and perhaps two incidents of histrionics involving marines had convinced Rodney it was better to follow Sheppard and let him explain: yes, that the black sheep was indeed Dr. Rodney McKay, and yes, he could talk. Cadman's joke about Sheppard being Dr. Doolittle was pretty funny, though.
"Hey, at least Elizabeth lifted the quarantine," Sheppard pointed out. "Now you can try to figure out what you did wrong."
"What I did wrong?" Rodney exploded.
Sheppard stared at him. "Come on, Rodney. Why would the Ancients build a machine to turn people into sheep?"
Rodney shrugged. Or at least, he tried to shrug. "Who knows?" he asked. "This could be one step in the process of ascension!"
Sheppard raised an eyebrow.
Rodney had to admit it was farfetched at best. "Perhaps this was a spy project," he continued. "After all, livestock would blend in perfectly in the environment. If this was deliberate, then maybe there'll be an obvious off switch."
"Spy sheep?" Sheppard repeated dubiously.
"Oh shut up," Rodney told him.
-^-
A few hours later, Rodney was positive that the Ancients were definitely not experimenting with spy sheep. Nor was the device used for ascension. Apparently, it was a veterinary version of a DNA re-sequencer, to help heal livestock. Carson was quite fascinated by it, naturally.
Rodney was just frustrated. "It shouldn't have done anything to me!" Rodney exclaimed as he kicked the console. He'd even attempted to use the ascension machine that had nearly killed him to try to get his DNA back in order, but it hadn't worked. Rodney was beginning to get desperate.
Sheppard made a non-committal sound.
"The device must be broken," Rodney said decisively. "All I did was pull up the instructions. The screen flared for a second and then it went back to the main window. That must have been when it changed my DNA."
"No bright light? No swirling vortex?" Sheppard almost sounded disappointed.
"I would have noticed that," Rodney snapped. "Look, I only spent a few minutes checking the status of it when I powered it up. Nothing unusual happened."
"Then maybe Elizabeth was wrong about the translations? Carson's tests are still out, it could be something else." Sheppard was trying to reassure him, he knew.
"There's nothing else I've been near that could cause this," Rodney sighed. He looked down at the ground and fought the urge to just slump down. He wasn't yet sure how he could sit with this body and he didn't want to have to call the marines to help him get up again. "Not unless you've ever heard of spontaneous ovination?" Rodney trailed off.
John said nothing.
Rodney sighed again. "I didn't think so."
Sheppard reached over and patted Rodney on the shoulder. Rodney looked up in surprise. "Don't worry, Rodney. You'll figure it out. You always do. Want me to call Radek in for some help?"
Rodney shook his head emphatically. "No, no. You're right - of course I'll figure it out." His stomach grumbled but Rodney ignored it. He was going to figure this out before he needed to eat. There was no way he was going to eat what sheep normally ate.
-^-
Sheppard held out some grass and Rodney absentmindedly ate it out of his hands. For the past few hours, his stomach had been grumbling so much that Rodney put aside his original misgivings about grass. In fact, it was looking quite deliciously green and droopy in Sheppard's hands as Rodney munched.
"There's a bowl, y'know," Sheppard pointed out.
Rodney swallowed. "Yes, but this is easier," he said. "I don't need to bend over this way." Plus, Rodney didn't want to admit that his back hurt whenever he tried to eat out of the bowl. He didn't know how ordinary sheep did it. Maybe they never got sore backs.
Sheppard looked thoughtful. "This almost feels like having a pet. I could scratch you behind your ears."
"That's for cats."
"Throw you a stick?"
"Dogs," Rodney told him.
Sheppard offered out the pale green grass stems again. "More grass, then?"
"Baaa," Rodney muttered. After a second, he leaned over and ate more of the grass.
-^-
"Why are you helping me, anyway?" Rodney burst out. It had been over a day and every time he turned around - a surprisingly laborious process that took him at least ten seconds - he saw Sheppard there behind him. "Look, you must have other things to do."
Sheppard looked away.
"Go back to work," Rodney told him. "I can do this myself." He wasn't that sure he could do it by himself, but he didn't particularly want Sheppard hovering. This condition was beyond embarrassing.
"You know what they say," Sheppard said lightly. "All work and no play makes John a dull boy."
"Jack," Rodney said. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."
Sheppard waved a hand. Rodney couldn't help but feel oddly jealous of Sheppard's hands. Perhaps it was because he no longer had any. "Whatever, Rodney," Sheppard said. He leaned over and ruffled Rodney's wool. "You're a valuable member of my team."
Rodney suddenly felt rather warm. Maybe the heating had been cranked up. "Right now I'm more of a team mascot," Rodney grumbled.
Sheppard grinned. "You can be our mascot for the next Atlantis football match."
Rodney shook his head emphatically. "No way," he said. "Last time I went to one of those, I almost got a concussion. It's dangerous!"
Sheppard coughed.
"Well, I would have gotten a concussion if the ball had hit me," Rodney said defensively. "It came really close to my head. In fact, I could have been killed. People could easily die from being hit on the head!" He tried to wave his hands to emphasise his point, but instead, his hooves skidded on the ground. Rodney looked up at Sheppard once he had regained his balance. Sheppard's presence was making him feel uncomfortable. "You don't have to be here. I can fix this by myself."
"Elizabeth gave me time off to help you on this."
"You haven't been that helpful so far," Rodney grumbled. He was suddenly feeling really warm, again. "All you've been doing is standing there making snarky comments."
Sheppard raised an eyebrow.
"And ruffling my wool," Rodney continued. A sudden thought occurred to him and he laughed. Well, bleated. "Sometimes I wonder if you don't like Rodney-the-sheep better than Rodney-the-man."
Sheppard was silent, but his eyes narrowed.
Rodney's mind seemed to be racing. He stared up at Sheppard. "You mean that's true?" he demanded. "Do you find it amusing that I'm a sheep? Is this all some sort of... game to you?"
"It's not a game," Sheppard said. His face was suddenly tight and closed and Rodney thought he could detect a flash of hurt in his eyes.
But Rodney couldn't seem to stop himself - once he'd got going, his mouth seemed to run away from him as though it was attached to an X302 while his brain was pottering behind on an ordinary biplane. "This is all just a game, some amusement for you!" Rodney insisted. "Why else would you be here?"
"Moral support? To help you?" Sheppard suggested, very quietly.
Rodney shook his head. "Ronon and Teyla were here for moral support earlier. You've... you've just been following me around ever since this happened. It's like you're enjoying this or something! It's not funny that I'm a sheep! Don't think that I can't hear everybody laughing about it in the mess. They all think it's some sort of huge joke. But I thought you were my friend."
Sheppard sighed. "You're an idiot sometimes, McKay."
"Yes, yes," Rodney said. "Idiot Rodney who played around with the wrong Ancient machine and wasn't lucky enough to turn himself into a super genius this time." Rodney's stomach churned. "I know what people are saying." He watched as Sheppard shook his head and turned around to walk towards the door. "And now you're leaving," Rodney blurted out.
"I am," Sheppard agreed. The door slid open in front of him, but he paused before turning back around. "Sometimes, you're not as smart as you think."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Rodney demanded. "Are you trying to say you did this to me on purpose?"
Sheppard stared at Rodney as if he'd never seen him before. "No," he said coldly. "But maybe, did it ever cross your mind that I'm here because I like you? You. Not Rodney-the-sheep. Just Rodney."
Rodney's mouth dropped open. He wasn't sure what open-mouthed astonishment looked like now that he had a sheep's body, but usually, that particular facial expression looked particularly idiotic on his human body. "You what?"
"You heard me," Sheppard snapped. He turned on his heel, walked out the door and down the hallway towards the mess. Rodney simply watched as the door shut behind Sheppard.
-^-
Rodney wasn't surprised when Sheppard didn't come back from lunch. He was relieved in a way - he wasn't sure he could have faced Sheppard in his current state. His mind was still whirling with what Sheppard had told him. Sheppard liked him? Well, of course, he knew that Sheppard was his friend. They'd been through too much not to be friends. But Sheppard liked him? Rodney felt a warm tingling feeling slide through him, but he ignored it. He'd been feeling it ever since he turned into a sheep. It was the damn wool. It was just too warm.
John Sheppard was an attractive man, and Rodney would be lying to himself if he said he'd never noticed that. But Sheppard had always been a ladies' man. He couldn't be attracted to Rodney, could he? Rodney, in all his middle-aged glory, with his thinning hair. What was attractive about that?
Rodney's stomach fluttered. It had been so long since he'd dated anyone; his mind helpfully provided him with images of himself and Sheppard taking their friendship to that next level. A natural progression, Rodney realised with surprise.
Rodney had always felt a spark between them, but he'd never dreamed that he was not alone in feeling that way. But now, with Sheppard's words, those ideas were emerging out to the forefront of his mind like a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis.
-^-
"Um," Rodney said hesitantly when Sheppard walked back into the room a couple of hours later. "Thanks for coming back. I made some progress while you were gone, but I had difficulty pushing some of the buttons."
"They don't make hoof-friendly keyboards?" Sheppard deadpanned.
"Very funny. No," Rodney said. "Look... about before. I'm... sorry."
Sheppard shrugged. "Forget about it." From the tone of his voice, it was obvious that he wanted the entire thing completely erased from both of their memories. "We need to focus on getting you back into human form."
Rodney looked up. "And after that?"
"Things will go back to normal."
Rodney would have bit his bottom lip, but he was positive that his huge teeth would have completely chewed through it. "Does that have to happen?"
Sheppard stared at him. "I would have thought you'd want to turn back into a human."
"Not that," Rodney said quickly. "But the 'going back to normal' part."
"What're you trying to say?"John asked, quietly.
"Maybe we could go ... out?" Rodney asked. "After I'm human again, of course. For dinner?"
Sheppard gave him a long look. "Maybe."
Rodney could feel his heart pounding. That wasn't exactly a promise, but he suspected that was the closest he was going to get. A maybe was actually pretty positive. Sheppard must really like him. "Maybe coming to the football match won't be that bad."
Sheppard raised an eyebrow.
"Not as your mascot, of course," Rodney said quickly. "But I'll come and watch you guys play."
A small smile appeared on Sheppard's face.
-^-
"It's a bloody puzzling thing, Rodney," Carson said. "Your DNA is that of a sheep. Period. In other words, lad, you've no human DNA left - y'shouldn't be able to speak, let alone study Ancient devices. I can't explain it."
Rodney briefly reflected on how horrifying it would be if he could no longer speak. "But I can talk. That doesn't make any sense."
"Exactly," Carson mused, tapping his finger against his chin.
There was a niggling thought at the back of Rodney's mind. It was almost as though there was something obvious he was forgetting, but he couldn't seem to place his hooves on it. Rodney asked, "You couldn't find any viruses or bacteria that could have caused this?"
Carson nodded.
"Yet, I can still speak!" Rodney repeated. He was the biggest idiot. He knew how to fix the problem now, and it was ridiculously easy.
-^-
"Yes, I'm a sheep," Rodney said irritably as he passed yet another open-mouthed technician in the hallway. "Baaa baaa black sheep. That kind of sheep. And yes, I can talk. Any other questions?"
The technician shook his head. "None, whatsoever," he mumbled, looking scared.
"Good," Rodney snapped as he clip-clopped his way down towards the meeting room. He had finally hit upon a solution for the problem and he was mentally kicking himself that it had taken him so long. In fact, it was so obvious that even Zelenka should have suggested it by now.
Rodney blamed the fact that Sheppard had been distracting him.
"Rodney!" Elizabeth exclaimed as she looked up. She looked like she was hiding a smile. "Can I help you?"
"My DNA was definitely changed. The results just came back from Carson. Therefore, the Ancient ascension device should have worked to fix me. But it didn't." Rodney tried to look smug, but it didn't seem to work. He gave up. "I'm obviously a sheep. So, the question is: why can I still speak?" he continued in exasperation. "Sheep can't talk!"
Everyone looked at him blankly. "Go on," Sheppard said, raising an eyebrow.
"I need both the DNA from the livestock device as well as my original DNA," Rodney explained. "We didn't use the Ascension machine correctly. It needs something extra to work with."
"I told you that yesterday!" Zelenka burst out from the other side of the table.
Rodney stared at him. Had Zelenka suggested that? He certainly didn't remember, but he had been rather distracted by Sheppard. "I was focussing on other avenues while we waited on the medical results. I needed to make sure that the device had actually altered my DNA."
Zelenka coughed, looking exasperated. "Směšné! You've become a sheep, Rodney! Of course your DNA is altered to that of sheep!" Zelenka let out a string of insults in Czech, or at least that what it sounded like. Rodney could never tell.
Rodney fought to keep a dignified expression on his face. He'd never seen a dignified expression on a sheep's face before, but if anybody could do it, he could. "Well, yes, but now we know for sure. Carson gave me the confirmation half an hour ago."
Of course, it was only the recent results that had given the idea to Rodney, but he definitely wasn't going to mention that to Zelenka.
Elizabeth's lips twitched. "Well, it's good to know that we'll have Rodney back in human form again very shortly."
Rodney looked over to where Sheppard was sitting. "Very good," he said.
His mind suddenly pictured getting Sheppard alone once he was back to himself, and the images came fast and furious. Rodney forced himself to look away, back towards Radek. He certainly didn't want to get an erection while he was a sheep. There was no way he could hide it. "Look, unless you have anything better to do..."
With a sigh, Zelenka stood up. "I come and set it up for you."
-^-
Rodney looked up and down his body. Everything looked intact. He wouldn't know until he had a chance to inspect everything in front of a mirror, but it all felt right. "I think my mind might have been affected slightly while I was a sheep," he said with a frown. "I should have figured out that solution sooner - it shouldn't have taken me a day and a half."
There was a flicker of something in Sheppard's eyes. "Wool between your ears?" he murmured.
Zelenka muttered angrily, but then he smirked. "Of course, if you had figured it out earlier, then we would not all have precious memory of you as talking sheep, yes?" Snickering, he gathered up his tools.
Rodney closed his eyes. "Don't remind me."
When he opened his eyes again, Zelenka had left the room. Looking quickly around, Rodney realised that he was alone with Sheppard, who was looking distinctly uncomfortable.
"I'm going, too," Sheppard said abruptly. "I should get back to work."
Rodney took a deep breath and reached out to grab Sheppard by the arm. "Don't go," he managed to get out.
Sheppard stopped and turned around slowly. "You said your mind had been affected," he pointed out. "You don't have to do this."
Rodney hesitated. Sheppard was giving him a way out. He could walk away from this and everything could be back the way it was before. But Rodney realised that he didn't want their relationship back the way it was, he wanted to give this a shot.
"I do want to do this," he said quietly.
Sheppard lifted an eyebrow.
"After all, you owe me dinner," Rodney said with a grin.
A small smile blossomed over Sheppard's face. "MREs it is then," he said cheerfully. "Or, I wonder if they're serving lamb?"
Rodney punched him in the arm.
The End
**
Poll
Author: curia_regis
Team: Play
Prompt: black sheep
Pairing(s): McKay/Sheppard
Rating: G
Warnings: Crackish
Notes: Thank you so much to djin7 for the beta. Without her help, this fic would have been taken over by chatty!John. *g* Any remaining mistakes are entirely my own fault. ♥ Thank you also to danceswithgary for being a great Team Captain and doing a quick read-through of the fic as well.
Summary: Rodney accidentally turns himself into a sheep after playing with a mysterious Ancient device. Sheppard takes it upon himself to help Rodney.
Once you've read the story, please take a moment to vote in the poll below. Ratings go from 1 (low) to 9 (high), so all you need to do is enter a single number in that range into each text entry box. You'll be able to see the Prompt and Team (Genre) information in the header above.
More details about the voting procedure can be found here.
**
Baa Baa Black Sheep
Rodney was feeling odd; he'd been feeling rather warm all morning.
That was just his luck; he was probably going to come down with some sort of deadly disease only known to the Pegasus Galaxy before lunchtime. His hands were itchy and it felt as though he had a really thick wool coat on, but when he looked down, he was just wearing his normal clothes.
"Excuse me!" Rodney snapped as he pushed past a couple of scientists who seemed to be just standing around. "Some of us have work to do."
One of the scientists stared at him.
Rodney felt a surge of irritation flow through him. He considered telling the man off, but he was late already to the daily briefing; it just wasn't worth the effort. As Rodney rounded the corner to the main meeting room, he wiped the back of his hand over his forehead. He was sweating. "Yes, yes," he said irritably as he entered the room and sat down. "I know I'm late."
Sheppard stared at him.
Rodney ignored Sheppard. Lately, the man had been giving him some rather odd looks. Rodney assumed Sheppard was bored; the last few weeks had been remarkably quiet with nary a Wraith attack, invasion nor virus infestation. Rodney had found it relaxing; he used it to take the opportunity to catch up on some light reading and to examine some of the Ancient devices that he never seemed to get around to playing with. But Sheppard seemed to take it as a personal affront that nobody was attacking them.
Teyla coughed. "Rodney," she began in her best talking-to-small-frightened-animals voice, "are you feeling normal?"
"Of course not," Rodney burst out.
Teyla looked relieved.
Rodney shot an accusatory look at Sheppard. "I think I'm coming down with that flu he had last week."
"It was a cold, not the flu," Sheppard said, wearily. This was the tenth time they had rehashed this conversation. "Anyway, this isn't about my cold. It's about what's on your face."
"What do you mean?" Rodney demanded, alarmed, quickly lifting his hands to run them over his face. His eyes seemed normal. His nose seemed normal. His mouth seemed normal. His chin seemed... Rodney's fingers froze. Just what was that on his chin? He tugged at it.
"It looks like fur," Ronon said helpfully.
"Yes, thank you," Rodney snapped. "I can tell that it's fur." It felt odd. It was definitely not hair, but springier than fur, actually. Still, Rodney wasn't going to quibble about minutiae when there was a fur-like substance growing out of his face! He could feel sweat beginning to trickle down his temples. Damn, it was hot in the room. "Why is there fur on my face?"
Elizabeth looked concerned. "What have you been working on, Rodney?"
"More like tinkering with," Sheppard muttered. Rodney kicked him, and Sheppard gave him a wounded look.
"I wasn't tinkering," Rodney said as he crossed his arms over his chest. Half a second later, he uncrossed them and shrugged off his jacket. It was terribly warm. "I was attempting to establish whether one of the devices we found in one of the previously flooded areas of the city could be used to fight the Wraith."
"So?" Ronon asked.
Rodney pursed his lips. "I think we have a more pressing matter," he pointed out. "Like why I'm growing fur out of my chin."
Elizabeth looked thoughtful. "Rodney, I remember you telling me about this device you were experimenting with. Didn't you say that it was used to sequence livestock DNA?"
Rodney's heart sank and made friends with his boots. "Oh, crap," he muttered.
-^-
Over the course of the day, more and more fur began to sprout in odd places. At first, Rodney just looked like he was spouting a black smudge of a goatee on his chin, but by afternoon, he had what appeared to be huge, curly beard.
"This is ridiculous," Rodney complained as Carson jabbed yet another needle into his arm. He had already been scanned by almost every single Ancient device that Carson could operate, and the man still wanted to take his blood?
"We need to run the bloodwork to rule out contagion, amongst other things, Rodney," Carson explained patiently for the tenth time.
"Can't be contagious," Sheppard piped up. "We're all fine. Only our resident genius was dumb enough to play around with yet another unknown Ancient device." He poked Rodney in the shoulder.
Rodney glared up at him. His teeth were beginning to feel strange, almost as though they were getting too big for his mouth. He wanted to bare his teeth and growl, but that didn't seem like an appropriate reaction for the situation. "Can I go now? Don't you have enough of my blood?" Rodney had never really paid much attention to the lower sciences like medicine, but what felt like ten vials of his blood seemed excessive. Leeches, the lot of them.
Carson patted him on the shoulder. "You should go to your quarters and rest."
"I'm going to go back to that Ancient device and fix whatever it did to me," Rodney said. He was about to get up off the bed, when Sheppard stepped in front of him, blocking his escape. "I'm guessing Elizabeth told you to keep an eye on me?"
Sheppard nodded. His lips were twitching with amusement as he gestured for Rodney to get up. "Yep. Have to keep an eye on you 'til Carson's got more information."
"We believe that whatever is causing the outward changes may also affect your mind," Carson explained quickly.
"There is nothing wrong with my mind," Rodney snapped as he followed Sheppard out of the room. "I might be turning into some sort of animal, but my mind is perfectly fine!"
-^-
"This," Rodney said as he looked down at his new body, "was not my fault." He would have gesticulated wildly, but he no longer had hands. His new limbs seemed decidedly unsuited to gesticulating, although Rodney suspected that they may quite good at tap dancing. That is if he ever got used to walking with hooves.
Sheppard looked like he was trying very hard not to laugh.
"It's not funny!" Rodney muttered.
"It is, actually," Sheppard pointed out, snickering. "You're a sheep."
Rodney rolled his eyes and then looked down at his hooves. "Gee, you're kidding," he said sarcastically. And as an afterthought, Rodney added, "Baaa."
Sheppard snorted. "I think you have a little too much wool between your ears, Rodney."
Rodney was ready to snap back with something equally droll, but then he tilted his head and considered it. His mind did feel a bit fuzzy. For that matter, so did his body - primarily because it was covered with black wool. "Huh. Not just between my ears, looks like." Rodney sniffed. He'd never liked sheep. They were creepy and smelled funny. "And if you start singing that stupid nursery rhyme, I'm going to bite you."
Sheppard leaned over and ruffled his fur. There was an irritating smirk on his face. "You're just the black sheep of the Atlantis family."
Rodney resisted the urge to ram into a wall. Which was more disturbing than he cared to admit, because he really, really wanted to put his head down and charge. "Just how long have you been waiting to make that joke?" he demanded. "As lame as it is."
Sheppard looked wounded. "It's funny!" he said. "Also, since lunch time." The grin was back.
"We need to fix this," Rodney bleated as he followed Sheppard down a corridor. A few confrontations earlier in the day that had netted at least one set of babbling tears and perhaps two incidents of histrionics involving marines had convinced Rodney it was better to follow Sheppard and let him explain: yes, that the black sheep was indeed Dr. Rodney McKay, and yes, he could talk. Cadman's joke about Sheppard being Dr. Doolittle was pretty funny, though.
"Hey, at least Elizabeth lifted the quarantine," Sheppard pointed out. "Now you can try to figure out what you did wrong."
"What I did wrong?" Rodney exploded.
Sheppard stared at him. "Come on, Rodney. Why would the Ancients build a machine to turn people into sheep?"
Rodney shrugged. Or at least, he tried to shrug. "Who knows?" he asked. "This could be one step in the process of ascension!"
Sheppard raised an eyebrow.
Rodney had to admit it was farfetched at best. "Perhaps this was a spy project," he continued. "After all, livestock would blend in perfectly in the environment. If this was deliberate, then maybe there'll be an obvious off switch."
"Spy sheep?" Sheppard repeated dubiously.
"Oh shut up," Rodney told him.
-^-
A few hours later, Rodney was positive that the Ancients were definitely not experimenting with spy sheep. Nor was the device used for ascension. Apparently, it was a veterinary version of a DNA re-sequencer, to help heal livestock. Carson was quite fascinated by it, naturally.
Rodney was just frustrated. "It shouldn't have done anything to me!" Rodney exclaimed as he kicked the console. He'd even attempted to use the ascension machine that had nearly killed him to try to get his DNA back in order, but it hadn't worked. Rodney was beginning to get desperate.
Sheppard made a non-committal sound.
"The device must be broken," Rodney said decisively. "All I did was pull up the instructions. The screen flared for a second and then it went back to the main window. That must have been when it changed my DNA."
"No bright light? No swirling vortex?" Sheppard almost sounded disappointed.
"I would have noticed that," Rodney snapped. "Look, I only spent a few minutes checking the status of it when I powered it up. Nothing unusual happened."
"Then maybe Elizabeth was wrong about the translations? Carson's tests are still out, it could be something else." Sheppard was trying to reassure him, he knew.
"There's nothing else I've been near that could cause this," Rodney sighed. He looked down at the ground and fought the urge to just slump down. He wasn't yet sure how he could sit with this body and he didn't want to have to call the marines to help him get up again. "Not unless you've ever heard of spontaneous ovination?" Rodney trailed off.
John said nothing.
Rodney sighed again. "I didn't think so."
Sheppard reached over and patted Rodney on the shoulder. Rodney looked up in surprise. "Don't worry, Rodney. You'll figure it out. You always do. Want me to call Radek in for some help?"
Rodney shook his head emphatically. "No, no. You're right - of course I'll figure it out." His stomach grumbled but Rodney ignored it. He was going to figure this out before he needed to eat. There was no way he was going to eat what sheep normally ate.
-^-
Sheppard held out some grass and Rodney absentmindedly ate it out of his hands. For the past few hours, his stomach had been grumbling so much that Rodney put aside his original misgivings about grass. In fact, it was looking quite deliciously green and droopy in Sheppard's hands as Rodney munched.
"There's a bowl, y'know," Sheppard pointed out.
Rodney swallowed. "Yes, but this is easier," he said. "I don't need to bend over this way." Plus, Rodney didn't want to admit that his back hurt whenever he tried to eat out of the bowl. He didn't know how ordinary sheep did it. Maybe they never got sore backs.
Sheppard looked thoughtful. "This almost feels like having a pet. I could scratch you behind your ears."
"That's for cats."
"Throw you a stick?"
"Dogs," Rodney told him.
Sheppard offered out the pale green grass stems again. "More grass, then?"
"Baaa," Rodney muttered. After a second, he leaned over and ate more of the grass.
-^-
"Why are you helping me, anyway?" Rodney burst out. It had been over a day and every time he turned around - a surprisingly laborious process that took him at least ten seconds - he saw Sheppard there behind him. "Look, you must have other things to do."
Sheppard looked away.
"Go back to work," Rodney told him. "I can do this myself." He wasn't that sure he could do it by himself, but he didn't particularly want Sheppard hovering. This condition was beyond embarrassing.
"You know what they say," Sheppard said lightly. "All work and no play makes John a dull boy."
"Jack," Rodney said. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."
Sheppard waved a hand. Rodney couldn't help but feel oddly jealous of Sheppard's hands. Perhaps it was because he no longer had any. "Whatever, Rodney," Sheppard said. He leaned over and ruffled Rodney's wool. "You're a valuable member of my team."
Rodney suddenly felt rather warm. Maybe the heating had been cranked up. "Right now I'm more of a team mascot," Rodney grumbled.
Sheppard grinned. "You can be our mascot for the next Atlantis football match."
Rodney shook his head emphatically. "No way," he said. "Last time I went to one of those, I almost got a concussion. It's dangerous!"
Sheppard coughed.
"Well, I would have gotten a concussion if the ball had hit me," Rodney said defensively. "It came really close to my head. In fact, I could have been killed. People could easily die from being hit on the head!" He tried to wave his hands to emphasise his point, but instead, his hooves skidded on the ground. Rodney looked up at Sheppard once he had regained his balance. Sheppard's presence was making him feel uncomfortable. "You don't have to be here. I can fix this by myself."
"Elizabeth gave me time off to help you on this."
"You haven't been that helpful so far," Rodney grumbled. He was suddenly feeling really warm, again. "All you've been doing is standing there making snarky comments."
Sheppard raised an eyebrow.
"And ruffling my wool," Rodney continued. A sudden thought occurred to him and he laughed. Well, bleated. "Sometimes I wonder if you don't like Rodney-the-sheep better than Rodney-the-man."
Sheppard was silent, but his eyes narrowed.
Rodney's mind seemed to be racing. He stared up at Sheppard. "You mean that's true?" he demanded. "Do you find it amusing that I'm a sheep? Is this all some sort of... game to you?"
"It's not a game," Sheppard said. His face was suddenly tight and closed and Rodney thought he could detect a flash of hurt in his eyes.
But Rodney couldn't seem to stop himself - once he'd got going, his mouth seemed to run away from him as though it was attached to an X302 while his brain was pottering behind on an ordinary biplane. "This is all just a game, some amusement for you!" Rodney insisted. "Why else would you be here?"
"Moral support? To help you?" Sheppard suggested, very quietly.
Rodney shook his head. "Ronon and Teyla were here for moral support earlier. You've... you've just been following me around ever since this happened. It's like you're enjoying this or something! It's not funny that I'm a sheep! Don't think that I can't hear everybody laughing about it in the mess. They all think it's some sort of huge joke. But I thought you were my friend."
Sheppard sighed. "You're an idiot sometimes, McKay."
"Yes, yes," Rodney said. "Idiot Rodney who played around with the wrong Ancient machine and wasn't lucky enough to turn himself into a super genius this time." Rodney's stomach churned. "I know what people are saying." He watched as Sheppard shook his head and turned around to walk towards the door. "And now you're leaving," Rodney blurted out.
"I am," Sheppard agreed. The door slid open in front of him, but he paused before turning back around. "Sometimes, you're not as smart as you think."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Rodney demanded. "Are you trying to say you did this to me on purpose?"
Sheppard stared at Rodney as if he'd never seen him before. "No," he said coldly. "But maybe, did it ever cross your mind that I'm here because I like you? You. Not Rodney-the-sheep. Just Rodney."
Rodney's mouth dropped open. He wasn't sure what open-mouthed astonishment looked like now that he had a sheep's body, but usually, that particular facial expression looked particularly idiotic on his human body. "You what?"
"You heard me," Sheppard snapped. He turned on his heel, walked out the door and down the hallway towards the mess. Rodney simply watched as the door shut behind Sheppard.
-^-
Rodney wasn't surprised when Sheppard didn't come back from lunch. He was relieved in a way - he wasn't sure he could have faced Sheppard in his current state. His mind was still whirling with what Sheppard had told him. Sheppard liked him? Well, of course, he knew that Sheppard was his friend. They'd been through too much not to be friends. But Sheppard liked him? Rodney felt a warm tingling feeling slide through him, but he ignored it. He'd been feeling it ever since he turned into a sheep. It was the damn wool. It was just too warm.
John Sheppard was an attractive man, and Rodney would be lying to himself if he said he'd never noticed that. But Sheppard had always been a ladies' man. He couldn't be attracted to Rodney, could he? Rodney, in all his middle-aged glory, with his thinning hair. What was attractive about that?
Rodney's stomach fluttered. It had been so long since he'd dated anyone; his mind helpfully provided him with images of himself and Sheppard taking their friendship to that next level. A natural progression, Rodney realised with surprise.
Rodney had always felt a spark between them, but he'd never dreamed that he was not alone in feeling that way. But now, with Sheppard's words, those ideas were emerging out to the forefront of his mind like a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis.
-^-
"Um," Rodney said hesitantly when Sheppard walked back into the room a couple of hours later. "Thanks for coming back. I made some progress while you were gone, but I had difficulty pushing some of the buttons."
"They don't make hoof-friendly keyboards?" Sheppard deadpanned.
"Very funny. No," Rodney said. "Look... about before. I'm... sorry."
Sheppard shrugged. "Forget about it." From the tone of his voice, it was obvious that he wanted the entire thing completely erased from both of their memories. "We need to focus on getting you back into human form."
Rodney looked up. "And after that?"
"Things will go back to normal."
Rodney would have bit his bottom lip, but he was positive that his huge teeth would have completely chewed through it. "Does that have to happen?"
Sheppard stared at him. "I would have thought you'd want to turn back into a human."
"Not that," Rodney said quickly. "But the 'going back to normal' part."
"What're you trying to say?"John asked, quietly.
"Maybe we could go ... out?" Rodney asked. "After I'm human again, of course. For dinner?"
Sheppard gave him a long look. "Maybe."
Rodney could feel his heart pounding. That wasn't exactly a promise, but he suspected that was the closest he was going to get. A maybe was actually pretty positive. Sheppard must really like him. "Maybe coming to the football match won't be that bad."
Sheppard raised an eyebrow.
"Not as your mascot, of course," Rodney said quickly. "But I'll come and watch you guys play."
A small smile appeared on Sheppard's face.
-^-
"It's a bloody puzzling thing, Rodney," Carson said. "Your DNA is that of a sheep. Period. In other words, lad, you've no human DNA left - y'shouldn't be able to speak, let alone study Ancient devices. I can't explain it."
Rodney briefly reflected on how horrifying it would be if he could no longer speak. "But I can talk. That doesn't make any sense."
"Exactly," Carson mused, tapping his finger against his chin.
There was a niggling thought at the back of Rodney's mind. It was almost as though there was something obvious he was forgetting, but he couldn't seem to place his hooves on it. Rodney asked, "You couldn't find any viruses or bacteria that could have caused this?"
Carson nodded.
"Yet, I can still speak!" Rodney repeated. He was the biggest idiot. He knew how to fix the problem now, and it was ridiculously easy.
-^-
"Yes, I'm a sheep," Rodney said irritably as he passed yet another open-mouthed technician in the hallway. "Baaa baaa black sheep. That kind of sheep. And yes, I can talk. Any other questions?"
The technician shook his head. "None, whatsoever," he mumbled, looking scared.
"Good," Rodney snapped as he clip-clopped his way down towards the meeting room. He had finally hit upon a solution for the problem and he was mentally kicking himself that it had taken him so long. In fact, it was so obvious that even Zelenka should have suggested it by now.
Rodney blamed the fact that Sheppard had been distracting him.
"Rodney!" Elizabeth exclaimed as she looked up. She looked like she was hiding a smile. "Can I help you?"
"My DNA was definitely changed. The results just came back from Carson. Therefore, the Ancient ascension device should have worked to fix me. But it didn't." Rodney tried to look smug, but it didn't seem to work. He gave up. "I'm obviously a sheep. So, the question is: why can I still speak?" he continued in exasperation. "Sheep can't talk!"
Everyone looked at him blankly. "Go on," Sheppard said, raising an eyebrow.
"I need both the DNA from the livestock device as well as my original DNA," Rodney explained. "We didn't use the Ascension machine correctly. It needs something extra to work with."
"I told you that yesterday!" Zelenka burst out from the other side of the table.
Rodney stared at him. Had Zelenka suggested that? He certainly didn't remember, but he had been rather distracted by Sheppard. "I was focussing on other avenues while we waited on the medical results. I needed to make sure that the device had actually altered my DNA."
Zelenka coughed, looking exasperated. "Směšné! You've become a sheep, Rodney! Of course your DNA is altered to that of sheep!" Zelenka let out a string of insults in Czech, or at least that what it sounded like. Rodney could never tell.
Rodney fought to keep a dignified expression on his face. He'd never seen a dignified expression on a sheep's face before, but if anybody could do it, he could. "Well, yes, but now we know for sure. Carson gave me the confirmation half an hour ago."
Of course, it was only the recent results that had given the idea to Rodney, but he definitely wasn't going to mention that to Zelenka.
Elizabeth's lips twitched. "Well, it's good to know that we'll have Rodney back in human form again very shortly."
Rodney looked over to where Sheppard was sitting. "Very good," he said.
His mind suddenly pictured getting Sheppard alone once he was back to himself, and the images came fast and furious. Rodney forced himself to look away, back towards Radek. He certainly didn't want to get an erection while he was a sheep. There was no way he could hide it. "Look, unless you have anything better to do..."
With a sigh, Zelenka stood up. "I come and set it up for you."
-^-
Rodney looked up and down his body. Everything looked intact. He wouldn't know until he had a chance to inspect everything in front of a mirror, but it all felt right. "I think my mind might have been affected slightly while I was a sheep," he said with a frown. "I should have figured out that solution sooner - it shouldn't have taken me a day and a half."
There was a flicker of something in Sheppard's eyes. "Wool between your ears?" he murmured.
Zelenka muttered angrily, but then he smirked. "Of course, if you had figured it out earlier, then we would not all have precious memory of you as talking sheep, yes?" Snickering, he gathered up his tools.
Rodney closed his eyes. "Don't remind me."
When he opened his eyes again, Zelenka had left the room. Looking quickly around, Rodney realised that he was alone with Sheppard, who was looking distinctly uncomfortable.
"I'm going, too," Sheppard said abruptly. "I should get back to work."
Rodney took a deep breath and reached out to grab Sheppard by the arm. "Don't go," he managed to get out.
Sheppard stopped and turned around slowly. "You said your mind had been affected," he pointed out. "You don't have to do this."
Rodney hesitated. Sheppard was giving him a way out. He could walk away from this and everything could be back the way it was before. But Rodney realised that he didn't want their relationship back the way it was, he wanted to give this a shot.
"I do want to do this," he said quietly.
Sheppard lifted an eyebrow.
"After all, you owe me dinner," Rodney said with a grin.
A small smile blossomed over Sheppard's face. "MREs it is then," he said cheerfully. "Or, I wonder if they're serving lamb?"
Rodney punched him in the arm.
The End
**
Poll