Stargate Atlantis fic: the stars must contain us in their burning
Title: the stars must contain us in their burning
Author: Signe
Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Characters: Rodney, John, Ronon, Teyla, Sam, Radek, Evan Lorne, various scientists and a sentient alien sea-creature (with a crush on Rodney)
Rating: G
Word count: 5,193
Notes: Written for artword, but unfortunately my partner was unable to participate, so story only. A huge thank you to out_there for the fantastic beta. ETA: Now with art, thanks to the lovely beet. Check out her art post here, or click on the image below.
the stars must contain us in their burning
We share ninety-eight percent of our genetic code
with rats. Over half with grain. The stars, then,
must contain us somehow in their burning.
-- Jessica Piazza - The Astronomer and the Poet
Rodney first discovers it one night, a bright light out on the water, a rise and fall of sound.
It's a creature, stationary in the water, huge dark eyes turned towards him. Glowing.
For a moment, Rodney thinks it looks right at him. Sings to him.
*
Turns out, Rodney isn't the first to see it. There's a painting hanging in the mess, one of Major Lorne's, a nightscape of Atlantis, and there's a star in the water.
"Is that artistic license?" he asks, stopping by Lorne's table, balancing his lunch tray precariously in one hand while he points with the other.
Lorne looks puzzled. "The light in the water," Rodney elaborates.
"Oh, that. No, I saw it flash up several times while I was painting. I thought it was a reflection at first, but it turns out it was actually a sea creature that lights up-Dr. McNab has been studying it," Lorne says, clearly uninterested in the creature. He takes another spoonful of pudding and gets a blissed out expression on his face. "Man, this is good."
"I see," Rodney says, and refuses to admit that he's disappointed he didn't discover it first. It's only an animal, after all, not his field at all. Something for the zoologists to study. And the pudding does look good.
*
Rodney doesn't jog. He runs, as fast as he can, when he has to, and that is far more often than he'd like. Occasionally he thinks he'd like to stay in his lab, somewhere safe (relatively), somewhere he can work in peace, and never come out. He knows he's lying to himself, though. He knows he's grown addicted to the thrill and discovery of new worlds, that without it, he'd be restless and bored, no matter what he was working on. He blames Sheppard, loudly, but secretly he thinks he's grateful. What he knows for certain is that he doesn't want to be the one on the team who needs rescuing all the time, or the one who holds them up because he can't keep up. So he works out sometimes, running on the treadmill or pushing weights or even on the cross-trainer the Daedalus delivered on its last visit.
But he does not jog. Jogging is for people who enjoy exercise or masochists, and he's neither.
Which is why it's strange that he's jogging along the southern perimeter of the tower when he could be relaxing, doing nothing for a rare hour.
Strange, and unfortunate when Ronon joins him, falling in alongside him after appearing from a side corridor. Rodney drops his pace a fraction, hoping Ronon will get frustrated and run on ahead, but he continues to match pace, even though it must be far slower than his usual running speed.
Rodney is sweating heavily, his tee-shirt (Science helps you prove others are dumb) clinging uncomfortably in all the wrong places. Ronon, on the other hand, looks fresh and cool, muscles rippling without a trace of effort. He's taking two strides for every three of Rodney's. He's annoying, even in his silence.
"What're you doing?" Ronon asks eventually, and Rodney decides his silence was less annoying.
"What does it look like?" he snaps, because it never hurts to go on the offence.
"Looks like you're jogging."
"I don't jog."
"That's why I asked," Ronon says, tone unbearably reasonable.
Rodney doesn't reply, hoping Ronon will take the hint.
Except Ronon is never one to take hints. And Rodney is not normally one to make them. He just doesn't want to admit-even to himself-that he's heading towards the pier where he saw the creature the other evening for no better reason than simply to see it again.
He could change his direction, but he doesn't. He keeps going, Ronon at his side, until they're at the door leading out onto the pier. He's breathless now, hands on his thighs, so Ronon's the one to open the door, slip through silently and hold it open for Rodney.
It's ridiculous, really. He walks to the water's edge, trying to get his breath back, and realizes that there's no reason to expect the creature to be here, just because it's appeared here before. It has the whole ocean to swim in.
So when he sees it, swimming at a distance, straight towards them, jumping up out of the waves like it's excited and joyful, he can't help but smile. He looks away from Ronon, hoping he won't notice.
When he looks back around, Ronon is sitting cross-legged on the pier, looking out at the water. "It reminds me," he starts, and pauses as though he isn't sure how to continue.
"Of Sateda?" Rodney prompts.
Ronon nods. "Of a myth we had, a story nobody really believed but everybody knew."
Rodney sits down beside him, legs dangling over the side of the pier. The creature has stopped a little distance away, and is swimming lazily in circles now. They both watch it while Ronon talks.
"There were a people, called the Caranduu. They loved the sea, and spent so much time in the ocean they eventually made it their home. They changed, over the centuries, becoming a part of the ocean, their arms and legs becoming tentacles for swimming, their skin scaly like a fish." Ronon is telling the story as though he's reciting familiar words. "They were gentle creatures, and there were many predators in the sea, so they learned how to hide, how to blend in and become part of the background. They could change their skin color and their shape, but they never completely forgot their ties to the land. In bad storms, sailors would tell tales of creatures who piloted them to shore, flashing lights to lead the boats into safety."
The creature is changing color as Ronon speaks, a rainbow of hues that show up under the water like it's lit up. Even in the sunlight it's impressive.
"We're a long way from Sateda," Rodney says.
Ronon shrugs. "Yeah," he says. "And it was only a story. It just reminded me, that's all."
"Myths usually come from somewhere. Everyone on Earth thought Atlantis was a myth. And King Arthur and Merlin. Even I did," Rodney admits, though he hates being wrong.
He leans out over the water and the creature swims a little closer. It seems to be looking right at Rodney, the way it did the first time he saw it. And, like the first time, it lifts its head up, right out of the water, and makes a sound, almost a wailing sound, but not sad. Notes, looping and whirling in one continuous strand, and Rodney can't help thinking it almost makes sense.
Which is absurd.
*
The next day is full of stupid errors (other people's) and petty irritations (other people) and Rodney fixing things (as usual). Even Zelenka-who Rodney normally relies on to be reasonably intelligent-is particularly obtuse today. Eventually, Rodney throws up his hands in despair and throws everyone out of the lab.
"Go," he shouts. "I don't care what you do tonight, but try to develop some common sense and at least a little brain power by tomorrow, or I'm just going to send the lot of you back to Earth and ask for some real scientists."
Zelenka raises an eyebrow. "I hope you are not planning on working alone in the lab this evening," he says. "The health and safety-"
"Blah, blah, yes, I know," Rodney interrupts. "The city isn't in danger for once, other from the bumbling idiots who're supposed to be maintaining it, so it won't hurt if we all take an evening off."
Zelenka's eyebrow heads higher, but at least he's wise enough not to answer.
Rodney heads straight for the mess. It's Thursday, which means it's spaghetti and meatballs, and while the source of the meat might be indeterminate and better not questioned, the meatballs are invariably good. Rodney finds his mood lifting just thinking about them.
He gets a generous serving (some of the servers seem to think scientists need less to eat than the military-Rodney has had to send numerous emails pointing out all the ways that idea is wrong) and sits down with the rest of the team. They're already halfway into their food, and in the middle of a conversation which they pause when Rodney joins them.
"What?" he asks, spearing a meatball on his fork and scooping up some sauce with it.
The pause continues and no one seems to want to fill it, but Teyla eventually speaks. "We were discussing the sea creature that has been visiting Atlantis. Ronon was telling us-"
"Telling you what?" Rodney says suspiciously.
"About the Caranduu," Ronon says gruffly, but he doesn't look at Rodney as he says it, and Rodney's certain he said more than that.
Sheppard confirms it. "Seems like the creature's taken quite a shine to you, Rodney," he says, a gleeful smile on the corner of his mouth. "Can't think why."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Rodney retorts, and attacks his spaghetti.
"So it wasn't serenading you yesterday?" John asks.
Rodney doesn't dignify that with a response.
"Dr. McNab says that they've been studying it for some time, and they've yet to hear it make any sound," Teyla says.
As if on cue, Dr. McNab leans over from the next table. "It's true," she says. "We've been trying to determine how it changes color and pattern so rapidly, but we had no idea it was able to create any sort of complex sounds." She turns her chair around and pulls it up next to Rodney. He barely keeps the groan internal. "What can you tell me about the sound it makes?"
Conveniently, Rodney has his mouth full, and gestures as much. He has no intention of rushing his meal just to satisfy the curiosity of a marine biologist, or zoologist, or whatever she is.
"Later," she says. "I'd like to know all about it."
*
She follows through on the threat and corners him on the way out of the mess. Sam is there, and instead of backing him up (important work to do, no time), she says it's important for Rodney to help.
"It clearly has some sort of affinity with you, if it's communicated with you twice, but no one else." Rodney wonders how Sam knows he's heard it twice-Ronon, he guesses. Rodney mentioned it to him, that evening out on the pier. The traitor. "You should go out there, see if it appears again, and maybe this time Sylvia can record it.
Dr. McNab bounces eagerly on her toes like a child at the suggestion, and somehow Rodney finds himself agreeing to it.
He immediately tries to backtrack. "I have very limited time," he says. "I might not be free for days. Weeks, even."
"Tomorrow morning," Sam says. Rodney glares at her, but she ignores him.
*
He hopes for rain, or even an emergency-nothing too bad, just enough to keep him busy-but he wakes up to sun streaming through his window, and he can't pretend that a minor malfunction of one of the puddlejumper's thrusters is important enough to demand his attention. So, for a third time this week, he finds himself heading out towards the south pier. Only this time he has the company of an entire gaggle of biologists.
His remaining hope is that the creature won't appear. He feels inexplicably embarrassed by the whole situation, that this creature is apparently behaving differently with him than with anyone else. At the same time, it's oddly flattering, and that alone is a thought he isn't comfortable having.
It does appear, almost as soon as they arrive. As though it were waiting for them. It swims around slowly, looking up at them, at Rodney in particular, and it seems pleased to see them, though Rodney can't begin to explain why he gets that feeling.
And it sings. Rodney can't deny it-the sound is nothing less than singing, and hearing the recording played back in Dr. McNab's lab later, audio stripped of the background noise, it is even more unmistakable.
Dr. McNab is ecstatic. "There's a definite pattern in the sound. It might well be communicating with us."
"We could use the Ancient translation database from the bio-lab," Dr. Bryce chimes in, and for possibly the first time in his life, Rodney tunes out a scientific conversation.
*
Ronon tells the story of the Caranduu, reluctantly, to assorted marine biologists. Dr. McNab and a long-haired ethologist who introduces himself as Dave-Rodney's never seen him before, and apparently Ronon hasn't either-also spend hours with him, picking through every detail until Ronon is as fed up as Rodney, firing help me looks at Rodney whenever he gets the chance.
Rodney gets roped into the translation-the Ancient translation program needs tweaking, and, as everyone accurately points out, he's the best person to do that. He still thinks it's absurd, though, wasting all this time on the noise made by an animal, and says so repeatedly.
"But what if it's sentient?" Dr Corrigan counters. "Think of all we could learn from it. The history of this planet, maybe-we know so little about it. Who knows what else we could learn. Remember the Flagisalis? We would never have anticipated the solar flare if it hadn't been for them."
Rodney's sick of this argument. Just because a sea creature saved Atlantis once before, doesn't mean it's likely to happen again. It feels as though everyone is enthusiastic apart from Rodney. Even Ronon is, once he's no longer being questioned.
Which is why it's hard for Rodney to understand why he's even more disappointed than anyone else when the translation comes up blank.
*
It's late enough that he doesn't meet anyone in the corridors on his way, yet again, to the south pier. Outside, it's dark, neither of Nova Lantea's larger moons visible yet. It's a blue-black dark that's different from night on Earth in some way Rodney could never put into words, but is certain of none the less. He could never mistake this for Earth, but he thinks of it as home.
He has an idea, and while he's certain of its validity, he wants to test it before he says anything.
So Rodney sits and he waits, and he's about to give it up as a waste of time when he hears a splash, then another. He peers into the water, trying to see something, anything, in the dark. He can't, so he puts his night goggles on, grateful for the last minute decision to swing around the weapons room and pick some up, and there it is, floating a little distance from the pier.
It's silent though, and not coming closer. Typical, the one time he really wants to see it up close, it plays shy. It's been a long day-a typical Atlantis day, with two emergencies that only he was qualified to deal with, and several minor emergencies that he ended up dealing with by default-and he's beginning to regret coming out here. He's tired, and he bashed his leg with the camcorder when he tripped on the stairs and he's got the sort of tickle in his throat that means there was something in the dinner that didn't agree with him. So, all things considered, he'd rather be somewhere else.
But he isn't willing to waste the effort of coming out here, not without at least trying to get the data he wants. Which is why he gets down on his hands and knees, hopes on anything holy that no one else comes out here, and starts talking.
Ben, his cat, always responded to insults. Oy, lazy slob would have him racing towards Rodney, nuzzling his ankles. He'd call him fat fluffball and he'd roll onto his back and present his belly for stroking. He was shameless.
He's about to try the same thing, but hey, gorgeous comes out of his mouth instead, and it feels right. The creature is beautiful-weird, but beautiful, streamlined and smooth, with a flurry of delicate tentacles-so he calls to it softly, beautiful, he calls it. He taps the side of the pier, come on, he says, come here.
And it works. There's a blinding flash, and another, and they look like explosions through the night goggles. Rodney fumbles with the goggles, ripping them off and blinking away involuntary tears. He shakes his head a few moments, tries to focus-has a moment's panic over being blinded, but it's okay, it's only temporary-and by the time he can focus properly, it's there, right beneath him. Rolling around on the surface of the water, changing color as rapidly as it did the first time, glowing with light. And the pattern of sound fits the light, he's sure of that-he might not have the soul of a musician, but he can tell that at least.
He grabs the camcorder and starts recording. His arm goes numb from holding it steady, so he rests it on his lap after a while, holding still as he can. He ignores the cramp in his legs (though he makes a mental note to get more potassium in his diet-maybe he'll request bananas in the next delivery), just keeps on recording until the low battery warning light on the back of the camcorder flashes a final time and it turns off.
He has no idea how long he's been out here-he forgot to check his watch when he arrived-but he's sure he has more than enough material to run through the translator.
He puts the camcorder on the deck and stands up awkwardly, stretching out the kinks in his spine and the aches in his legs. "You'd better be saying something worth this," he says to it, and it reaches up one of its tentacles towards him.
Rodney steps back hurriedly, an auto response. The creature retreats, the colors dimming and Rodney heads back inside, feeling vaguely bad, as though he's kicked a puppy.
*
He doesn't run the translation. He's actually peeved to be heading out on a mission to M2K-314-it's routine, but it's been scheduled for ages, and Rodney can't come up with a better excuse at the next morning's meeting than wanting to be the first to know what the creature is saying. And he isn't going to admit that.
He runs maintenance on the Bereden's simple but surprisingly effective hydroelectric power station, while Teyla trades with them (Rodney's work in exchange for beans and grain) and Sheppard and Ronon get in the way of both of them. He's kept busy enough with some upgrades he's suddenly inspired to make-they'll double the power output from the station without increasing the planet's energy signature or causing any water pollution, and he completely forgets the creature.
Back in the Gate room, he starts to think longingly of a shower. M2K-314 was hot and humid, and the trek back to the gate was almost entirely uphill through steaming jungle, and he probably stinks more than a little. There's no need to debrief from the mission until the morning, so he's free now.
"Want to go play se do tche?" John offers, and that's tempting too. Turns out the Ancients did relax at times after all, and they've finally found the Ancient's version of a games room, in one of the towers they had barely explored until now, and it is good. It's full of the sort of games that take concentration and brain power, and Rodney naturally excels at them-they only discovered the room a week ago, but already Ronon and John are the only two left who'll play against him.
Then he spies Dr. McNab. She's leaning against one of the consoles, talking to Sam, gesturing excitedly, and suddenly showers and games are forgotten.
He heads over.
"Ah, Dr. McKay," she exclaims. "We've been working on the data you recorded for us, and we've run the entire recording, audio and visual, through the translation program now, and you might be interested to know-"
"Yes, just cut to the chase," he interrupts. "Have you translated it yet?"
"Yes," she says, and pauses.
"Well," Rodney says, hands out, impatient.
She shrugs, and looks around as if to gauge who else is around, so Rodney gestures her to hurry up.
"It's a love song," she says. "To you."
*
Rodney's hope that it was a joke or, failing that, that no one else would hear about it, is in vain.
He's heading towards the transporter nearest the command tower when a friendly arm is slung around his shoulder and Sheppard falls into step beside him.
"Congratulations," he says. "I hear you have an admirer. Of the fishy type."
"It isn't a fish," Rodney says, automatically. "It's a sentient, alien sea creature." Then he glares. "How did you hear about it?"
"Dr. McNab told Dr. Zelenka who told Dr. Keller who told Teyla who told me," Sheppard says, reciting the list off with great glee.
"Obviously doctors have big mouths," Rodney retorts. Sheppard just looks at him, mouth twitching in a blatantly poor attempt not to laugh. "What? I can keep a secret, unlike the rest of them. Anyway, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Clearly brains are admired among many cultures and types. Why shouldn't it be attracted to me?" Rodney says defensively.
"I think we should all meet your suitor. Make sure his intentions are honorable."
"That's completely-" Rodney halts. He looks at Sheppard. "His intentions?"
"Oh, hadn't you heard? He's definitely a male, according to Dr. Bryce."
*
Everyone has heard. Rodney has to endure smirks and whispering behind his back and outright laughter. Yet again.
He finds he doesn't care. Whenever he has the time, he goes outside. It doesn't matter whether it's one of the lower balconies, or any of the piers or decks around Atlantis, he only has to wait a while before the creature appears.
He talks to it. To him. It's slow-even hooking up a recorder to his laptop and running a translation in real time, it's still far from instantaneous. Rodney needs to work out how to get the language into the gate language buffer, but until he does, the method works.
Rodney talks through his latest ideas, testing theories out loud, and letting his laptop convert his words to patterns of sound and light. The creature doesn't have any concept of science or mathematics beyond numbers and time and distance, but it doesn't deter Rodney. The creature listens, and Rodney talks, and he's never felt so alive, so alert, so full of ideas.
They've named him. Ultimus. The last of his kind. It's in his song, the first one Rodney recorded, joy at finding Rodney, finding someone to communicate with after so long alone. All the rest of his kind are dead. Dr. McNab had tears in her eyes when she was telling Rodney.
He corners her in her lab one day. He wants to ask her questions-why me?-but he dances uncomfortably around the topic.
She answers anyway. She's astute. "See this passage," she says, pointing to a line in the English translation of one of the many recordings they've made of it. "He says he felt the power of the minds of the people in the floating city." She looks up from the translation. "He must be incredibly sensitive to electromagnetic activity. Far more so than humans-more on a par with our strongest life-signs detectors. But then you'd know more about that than me," she adds.
Dr. McNab is still talking, something about his beta waves and the creature-Ultimus-showing very similar activity, which might account for the attraction, but Rodney's barely listening to her. So it's only later that he recalls her mentioning the creature sending out signals beside light and sound, two different frequencies simultaneously.
*
He finally confesses to Sheppard. He doesn't mean to, but it's early and he's only on his first mug of coffee, and when Sheppard wanders into the lab and pulls up a seat beside him, Rodney starts rambling.
"We were all concentrating on the visible and the audible, and we just didn't notice the other signals," he says, a little ashamed at not picking up on them sooner.
"Other signals?"
"Two signals, different frequencies. At a distance, our brain picks them up and detects the phase differences and uses them to tell us the direction the signal came from. Which we're not really registering, because we can see him, so we know where he is already. But when he gets close enough, the signals integrate, forming an amplitude modulated standing wave-"
"A binaural beat," Sheppard says.
"Yes, exactly." Rodney nods, glad Sheppard's keeping up. He hates explaining things to idiots. "The effect on the brain depends on the frequency. Binaural beats in the delta range can aid sleep, for example."
"What range are these?"
"The beta frequencies, twenty hertz, sometimes higher. And they're stimulating, amazing, in ways I couldn't have imagined. It's-" Rodney tails off, struggling to find the words he needs.
"Are you trying to tell me you're, um, aroused when you're with Ultimus?" Sheppard says eventually, a freaked out expression on his face, motioning his hand in a vague gesture to suggest the sort of arousal he's talking about.
"No. God, no, of course not. No." He's protesting too much, but he doesn't want Sheppard to get the wrong idea. And that is completely the wrong idea. "Just-relaxed yet more aware. I feel stimulated, and-" Rodney waves his hands around, as if he can form the words he need through movement. "I feel-creative. It's like being in the shower and getting inspired to write something-I spend time with Ultimus and I come up with ideas, things I've never considered before. It's as though my brain is, well, working even better than ever. Great just got even better," he says, a little smugly.
"This isn't anything like that DNA resequencer is it? You're not heading towards ascension or something again?" Sheppard asks, hand on Rodney's leg like he's pinning him there. Worry written all over his face.
"No. Nothing like that. I'm just finding the perfect mental state-it's still my brain, no alterations."
"So you've had a tune-up, basically?" Sheppard says.
Rodney snorts, but has to agree. "Not the way I'd put it, but essentially, yes. I'm still practically in my prime," Rodney says, and ignores Sheppard's amused cough, "but I feel like my brain is suddenly ten years younger. Ideas are right there, right on the surface, ready for me to pick up and run with them, and I haven't felt this good in years. Things keep coming together and making sense without any effort."
"So you're saying this is entirely safe, and it's a good thing, and there's nothing to worry about?"
"Absolutely."
"And have you told anyone else?" Sheppard asks.
Rodney shrugs awkwardly. "Not-exactly. But Keller checked me out yesterday, full work up, and I'm fine. Well, aside from a nasty itchy rash on my left buttock that I think came from-"
"I don't need to know about the rash, Rodney."
"Ah, okay, no."
"So, what are you working on, now your brain is ten years younger?" Sheppard asks, and Rodney tells him. He talks for hours, and even though Sheppard doesn't follow half the science Rodney throws at him, he understands enough to ask the right questions, to pick Rodney up when he heads off on a wrong tangent.
He has so much work to do, ideas to follow through on. He's never been so excited.
So happy.
*
Rodney's fully aware that it's still a joke to most of Atlantis, the giant sea creature with a crush on Dr. McKay of all people.
It's a while before he realizes that Sheppard doesn't joke about it any more, and neither do Ronon or Teyla.
He doesn't understand why. Sheppard still mocks him about everything else, as does Ronon. And Teyla still smiles at him indulgently, the same smile she gives the Athosian children, and Rodney as always pretends not to notice.
Their team functions as fluidly as ever.
On P5X-338 they capture a Wraith base. The four of them, out-numbered by ten to one, but Rodney leads them right all the way, and every shot finds its target, and it's only twenty minutes from the moment Rodney starts to work on disabling the security to the moment Ronon high fives him in the central control area, a sea of dead Wraith surrounding them.
On M3C-863 they mount a rescue, two geologists trapped underground, and they're one of the few teams available. It should takes hours, a day even, to get down to them, but Rodney strategizes perfectly and Barker and Shelby are out in under two hours, sore and bruised, but otherwise unharmed.
Maybe the team is functioning even better than usual. Sam is full of praise at every team briefing, and Rodney feels satisfied at the end of each day, the contentment of work well done.
*
The zoologists put their study of Ultimus on the back-burner when Lorne's team discover a planet full of bug-like creatures in larval form. Opinions vary, but there's a strong enough possibility that they might be related to the Wraith for Sam to insist that studying them and their weaknesses become their priority.
Rodney's glad. He prefers to spend time alone with Ultimus, rather than with a cluster of zoologists talking non-stop and interrupting his thinking.
Alone becomes him and Sheppard and Ronon and Teyla. He finds he doesn't mind. Sometimes they're quiet, other times they talk, to each other, to Ultimus.
"May I join you?" Teyla asks Ultimus one evening, and none of them need the translation to recognize the glow of pleasure from him. She slips into the water and swims with him a while, solemnly resting her forehead against his head before climbing back up out of the water.
Ronon is the next to swim with him, and then Sheppard says what the heck, why not? and joins Ronon.
Rodney remembers the last time he was in the ocean, and refuses.
"I've got a scratchy throat," he says. "I'm probably coming down with a cold."
He runs out of excuses eventually. Maybe because he's not trying hard enough to find them, the pull of this strange bond stronger than his fears.
He splutters when he finally jumps in the water, sinking straight under then coming up in a rush. He gets water in his ears and has to shake his head to clear them.
Ultimus is singing a single note. Rodney leans up against the pier and listens to the voice synthesizer on his laptop. "Family," it says, and even though the voice is mechanical and emotionless, Rodney understands.
He nods at Ultimus. "Yes," he says, and waves his hand around to encompass all of them, his team. "Family."
//
An additional wallpaper, a joint effort:
1440x900 | 1024x768
Author: Signe
Fandom: Stargate Atlantis
Characters: Rodney, John, Ronon, Teyla, Sam, Radek, Evan Lorne, various scientists and a sentient alien sea-creature (with a crush on Rodney)
Rating: G
Word count: 5,193
Notes: Written for artword, but unfortunately my partner was unable to participate, so story only. A huge thank you to out_there for the fantastic beta. ETA: Now with art, thanks to the lovely beet. Check out her art post here, or click on the image below.
the stars must contain us in their burning
We share ninety-eight percent of our genetic code
with rats. Over half with grain. The stars, then,
must contain us somehow in their burning.
-- Jessica Piazza - The Astronomer and the Poet
Rodney first discovers it one night, a bright light out on the water, a rise and fall of sound.
It's a creature, stationary in the water, huge dark eyes turned towards him. Glowing.
For a moment, Rodney thinks it looks right at him. Sings to him.
*
Turns out, Rodney isn't the first to see it. There's a painting hanging in the mess, one of Major Lorne's, a nightscape of Atlantis, and there's a star in the water.
"Is that artistic license?" he asks, stopping by Lorne's table, balancing his lunch tray precariously in one hand while he points with the other.
Lorne looks puzzled. "The light in the water," Rodney elaborates.
"Oh, that. No, I saw it flash up several times while I was painting. I thought it was a reflection at first, but it turns out it was actually a sea creature that lights up-Dr. McNab has been studying it," Lorne says, clearly uninterested in the creature. He takes another spoonful of pudding and gets a blissed out expression on his face. "Man, this is good."
"I see," Rodney says, and refuses to admit that he's disappointed he didn't discover it first. It's only an animal, after all, not his field at all. Something for the zoologists to study. And the pudding does look good.
*
Rodney doesn't jog. He runs, as fast as he can, when he has to, and that is far more often than he'd like. Occasionally he thinks he'd like to stay in his lab, somewhere safe (relatively), somewhere he can work in peace, and never come out. He knows he's lying to himself, though. He knows he's grown addicted to the thrill and discovery of new worlds, that without it, he'd be restless and bored, no matter what he was working on. He blames Sheppard, loudly, but secretly he thinks he's grateful. What he knows for certain is that he doesn't want to be the one on the team who needs rescuing all the time, or the one who holds them up because he can't keep up. So he works out sometimes, running on the treadmill or pushing weights or even on the cross-trainer the Daedalus delivered on its last visit.
But he does not jog. Jogging is for people who enjoy exercise or masochists, and he's neither.
Which is why it's strange that he's jogging along the southern perimeter of the tower when he could be relaxing, doing nothing for a rare hour.
Strange, and unfortunate when Ronon joins him, falling in alongside him after appearing from a side corridor. Rodney drops his pace a fraction, hoping Ronon will get frustrated and run on ahead, but he continues to match pace, even though it must be far slower than his usual running speed.
Rodney is sweating heavily, his tee-shirt (Science helps you prove others are dumb) clinging uncomfortably in all the wrong places. Ronon, on the other hand, looks fresh and cool, muscles rippling without a trace of effort. He's taking two strides for every three of Rodney's. He's annoying, even in his silence.
"What're you doing?" Ronon asks eventually, and Rodney decides his silence was less annoying.
"What does it look like?" he snaps, because it never hurts to go on the offence.
"Looks like you're jogging."
"I don't jog."
"That's why I asked," Ronon says, tone unbearably reasonable.
Rodney doesn't reply, hoping Ronon will take the hint.
Except Ronon is never one to take hints. And Rodney is not normally one to make them. He just doesn't want to admit-even to himself-that he's heading towards the pier where he saw the creature the other evening for no better reason than simply to see it again.
He could change his direction, but he doesn't. He keeps going, Ronon at his side, until they're at the door leading out onto the pier. He's breathless now, hands on his thighs, so Ronon's the one to open the door, slip through silently and hold it open for Rodney.
It's ridiculous, really. He walks to the water's edge, trying to get his breath back, and realizes that there's no reason to expect the creature to be here, just because it's appeared here before. It has the whole ocean to swim in.
So when he sees it, swimming at a distance, straight towards them, jumping up out of the waves like it's excited and joyful, he can't help but smile. He looks away from Ronon, hoping he won't notice.
When he looks back around, Ronon is sitting cross-legged on the pier, looking out at the water. "It reminds me," he starts, and pauses as though he isn't sure how to continue.
"Of Sateda?" Rodney prompts.
Ronon nods. "Of a myth we had, a story nobody really believed but everybody knew."
Rodney sits down beside him, legs dangling over the side of the pier. The creature has stopped a little distance away, and is swimming lazily in circles now. They both watch it while Ronon talks.
"There were a people, called the Caranduu. They loved the sea, and spent so much time in the ocean they eventually made it their home. They changed, over the centuries, becoming a part of the ocean, their arms and legs becoming tentacles for swimming, their skin scaly like a fish." Ronon is telling the story as though he's reciting familiar words. "They were gentle creatures, and there were many predators in the sea, so they learned how to hide, how to blend in and become part of the background. They could change their skin color and their shape, but they never completely forgot their ties to the land. In bad storms, sailors would tell tales of creatures who piloted them to shore, flashing lights to lead the boats into safety."
The creature is changing color as Ronon speaks, a rainbow of hues that show up under the water like it's lit up. Even in the sunlight it's impressive.
"We're a long way from Sateda," Rodney says.
Ronon shrugs. "Yeah," he says. "And it was only a story. It just reminded me, that's all."
"Myths usually come from somewhere. Everyone on Earth thought Atlantis was a myth. And King Arthur and Merlin. Even I did," Rodney admits, though he hates being wrong.
He leans out over the water and the creature swims a little closer. It seems to be looking right at Rodney, the way it did the first time he saw it. And, like the first time, it lifts its head up, right out of the water, and makes a sound, almost a wailing sound, but not sad. Notes, looping and whirling in one continuous strand, and Rodney can't help thinking it almost makes sense.
Which is absurd.
*
The next day is full of stupid errors (other people's) and petty irritations (other people) and Rodney fixing things (as usual). Even Zelenka-who Rodney normally relies on to be reasonably intelligent-is particularly obtuse today. Eventually, Rodney throws up his hands in despair and throws everyone out of the lab.
"Go," he shouts. "I don't care what you do tonight, but try to develop some common sense and at least a little brain power by tomorrow, or I'm just going to send the lot of you back to Earth and ask for some real scientists."
Zelenka raises an eyebrow. "I hope you are not planning on working alone in the lab this evening," he says. "The health and safety-"
"Blah, blah, yes, I know," Rodney interrupts. "The city isn't in danger for once, other from the bumbling idiots who're supposed to be maintaining it, so it won't hurt if we all take an evening off."
Zelenka's eyebrow heads higher, but at least he's wise enough not to answer.
Rodney heads straight for the mess. It's Thursday, which means it's spaghetti and meatballs, and while the source of the meat might be indeterminate and better not questioned, the meatballs are invariably good. Rodney finds his mood lifting just thinking about them.
He gets a generous serving (some of the servers seem to think scientists need less to eat than the military-Rodney has had to send numerous emails pointing out all the ways that idea is wrong) and sits down with the rest of the team. They're already halfway into their food, and in the middle of a conversation which they pause when Rodney joins them.
"What?" he asks, spearing a meatball on his fork and scooping up some sauce with it.
The pause continues and no one seems to want to fill it, but Teyla eventually speaks. "We were discussing the sea creature that has been visiting Atlantis. Ronon was telling us-"
"Telling you what?" Rodney says suspiciously.
"About the Caranduu," Ronon says gruffly, but he doesn't look at Rodney as he says it, and Rodney's certain he said more than that.
Sheppard confirms it. "Seems like the creature's taken quite a shine to you, Rodney," he says, a gleeful smile on the corner of his mouth. "Can't think why."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Rodney retorts, and attacks his spaghetti.
"So it wasn't serenading you yesterday?" John asks.
Rodney doesn't dignify that with a response.
"Dr. McNab says that they've been studying it for some time, and they've yet to hear it make any sound," Teyla says.
As if on cue, Dr. McNab leans over from the next table. "It's true," she says. "We've been trying to determine how it changes color and pattern so rapidly, but we had no idea it was able to create any sort of complex sounds." She turns her chair around and pulls it up next to Rodney. He barely keeps the groan internal. "What can you tell me about the sound it makes?"
Conveniently, Rodney has his mouth full, and gestures as much. He has no intention of rushing his meal just to satisfy the curiosity of a marine biologist, or zoologist, or whatever she is.
"Later," she says. "I'd like to know all about it."
*
She follows through on the threat and corners him on the way out of the mess. Sam is there, and instead of backing him up (important work to do, no time), she says it's important for Rodney to help.
"It clearly has some sort of affinity with you, if it's communicated with you twice, but no one else." Rodney wonders how Sam knows he's heard it twice-Ronon, he guesses. Rodney mentioned it to him, that evening out on the pier. The traitor. "You should go out there, see if it appears again, and maybe this time Sylvia can record it.
Dr. McNab bounces eagerly on her toes like a child at the suggestion, and somehow Rodney finds himself agreeing to it.
He immediately tries to backtrack. "I have very limited time," he says. "I might not be free for days. Weeks, even."
"Tomorrow morning," Sam says. Rodney glares at her, but she ignores him.
*
He hopes for rain, or even an emergency-nothing too bad, just enough to keep him busy-but he wakes up to sun streaming through his window, and he can't pretend that a minor malfunction of one of the puddlejumper's thrusters is important enough to demand his attention. So, for a third time this week, he finds himself heading out towards the south pier. Only this time he has the company of an entire gaggle of biologists.
His remaining hope is that the creature won't appear. He feels inexplicably embarrassed by the whole situation, that this creature is apparently behaving differently with him than with anyone else. At the same time, it's oddly flattering, and that alone is a thought he isn't comfortable having.
It does appear, almost as soon as they arrive. As though it were waiting for them. It swims around slowly, looking up at them, at Rodney in particular, and it seems pleased to see them, though Rodney can't begin to explain why he gets that feeling.
And it sings. Rodney can't deny it-the sound is nothing less than singing, and hearing the recording played back in Dr. McNab's lab later, audio stripped of the background noise, it is even more unmistakable.
Dr. McNab is ecstatic. "There's a definite pattern in the sound. It might well be communicating with us."
"We could use the Ancient translation database from the bio-lab," Dr. Bryce chimes in, and for possibly the first time in his life, Rodney tunes out a scientific conversation.
*
Ronon tells the story of the Caranduu, reluctantly, to assorted marine biologists. Dr. McNab and a long-haired ethologist who introduces himself as Dave-Rodney's never seen him before, and apparently Ronon hasn't either-also spend hours with him, picking through every detail until Ronon is as fed up as Rodney, firing help me looks at Rodney whenever he gets the chance.
Rodney gets roped into the translation-the Ancient translation program needs tweaking, and, as everyone accurately points out, he's the best person to do that. He still thinks it's absurd, though, wasting all this time on the noise made by an animal, and says so repeatedly.
"But what if it's sentient?" Dr Corrigan counters. "Think of all we could learn from it. The history of this planet, maybe-we know so little about it. Who knows what else we could learn. Remember the Flagisalis? We would never have anticipated the solar flare if it hadn't been for them."
Rodney's sick of this argument. Just because a sea creature saved Atlantis once before, doesn't mean it's likely to happen again. It feels as though everyone is enthusiastic apart from Rodney. Even Ronon is, once he's no longer being questioned.
Which is why it's hard for Rodney to understand why he's even more disappointed than anyone else when the translation comes up blank.
*
It's late enough that he doesn't meet anyone in the corridors on his way, yet again, to the south pier. Outside, it's dark, neither of Nova Lantea's larger moons visible yet. It's a blue-black dark that's different from night on Earth in some way Rodney could never put into words, but is certain of none the less. He could never mistake this for Earth, but he thinks of it as home.
He has an idea, and while he's certain of its validity, he wants to test it before he says anything.
So Rodney sits and he waits, and he's about to give it up as a waste of time when he hears a splash, then another. He peers into the water, trying to see something, anything, in the dark. He can't, so he puts his night goggles on, grateful for the last minute decision to swing around the weapons room and pick some up, and there it is, floating a little distance from the pier.
It's silent though, and not coming closer. Typical, the one time he really wants to see it up close, it plays shy. It's been a long day-a typical Atlantis day, with two emergencies that only he was qualified to deal with, and several minor emergencies that he ended up dealing with by default-and he's beginning to regret coming out here. He's tired, and he bashed his leg with the camcorder when he tripped on the stairs and he's got the sort of tickle in his throat that means there was something in the dinner that didn't agree with him. So, all things considered, he'd rather be somewhere else.
But he isn't willing to waste the effort of coming out here, not without at least trying to get the data he wants. Which is why he gets down on his hands and knees, hopes on anything holy that no one else comes out here, and starts talking.
Ben, his cat, always responded to insults. Oy, lazy slob would have him racing towards Rodney, nuzzling his ankles. He'd call him fat fluffball and he'd roll onto his back and present his belly for stroking. He was shameless.
He's about to try the same thing, but hey, gorgeous comes out of his mouth instead, and it feels right. The creature is beautiful-weird, but beautiful, streamlined and smooth, with a flurry of delicate tentacles-so he calls to it softly, beautiful, he calls it. He taps the side of the pier, come on, he says, come here.
And it works. There's a blinding flash, and another, and they look like explosions through the night goggles. Rodney fumbles with the goggles, ripping them off and blinking away involuntary tears. He shakes his head a few moments, tries to focus-has a moment's panic over being blinded, but it's okay, it's only temporary-and by the time he can focus properly, it's there, right beneath him. Rolling around on the surface of the water, changing color as rapidly as it did the first time, glowing with light. And the pattern of sound fits the light, he's sure of that-he might not have the soul of a musician, but he can tell that at least.
He grabs the camcorder and starts recording. His arm goes numb from holding it steady, so he rests it on his lap after a while, holding still as he can. He ignores the cramp in his legs (though he makes a mental note to get more potassium in his diet-maybe he'll request bananas in the next delivery), just keeps on recording until the low battery warning light on the back of the camcorder flashes a final time and it turns off.
He has no idea how long he's been out here-he forgot to check his watch when he arrived-but he's sure he has more than enough material to run through the translator.
He puts the camcorder on the deck and stands up awkwardly, stretching out the kinks in his spine and the aches in his legs. "You'd better be saying something worth this," he says to it, and it reaches up one of its tentacles towards him.
Rodney steps back hurriedly, an auto response. The creature retreats, the colors dimming and Rodney heads back inside, feeling vaguely bad, as though he's kicked a puppy.
*
He doesn't run the translation. He's actually peeved to be heading out on a mission to M2K-314-it's routine, but it's been scheduled for ages, and Rodney can't come up with a better excuse at the next morning's meeting than wanting to be the first to know what the creature is saying. And he isn't going to admit that.
He runs maintenance on the Bereden's simple but surprisingly effective hydroelectric power station, while Teyla trades with them (Rodney's work in exchange for beans and grain) and Sheppard and Ronon get in the way of both of them. He's kept busy enough with some upgrades he's suddenly inspired to make-they'll double the power output from the station without increasing the planet's energy signature or causing any water pollution, and he completely forgets the creature.
Back in the Gate room, he starts to think longingly of a shower. M2K-314 was hot and humid, and the trek back to the gate was almost entirely uphill through steaming jungle, and he probably stinks more than a little. There's no need to debrief from the mission until the morning, so he's free now.
"Want to go play se do tche?" John offers, and that's tempting too. Turns out the Ancients did relax at times after all, and they've finally found the Ancient's version of a games room, in one of the towers they had barely explored until now, and it is good. It's full of the sort of games that take concentration and brain power, and Rodney naturally excels at them-they only discovered the room a week ago, but already Ronon and John are the only two left who'll play against him.
Then he spies Dr. McNab. She's leaning against one of the consoles, talking to Sam, gesturing excitedly, and suddenly showers and games are forgotten.
He heads over.
"Ah, Dr. McKay," she exclaims. "We've been working on the data you recorded for us, and we've run the entire recording, audio and visual, through the translation program now, and you might be interested to know-"
"Yes, just cut to the chase," he interrupts. "Have you translated it yet?"
"Yes," she says, and pauses.
"Well," Rodney says, hands out, impatient.
She shrugs, and looks around as if to gauge who else is around, so Rodney gestures her to hurry up.
"It's a love song," she says. "To you."
*
Rodney's hope that it was a joke or, failing that, that no one else would hear about it, is in vain.
He's heading towards the transporter nearest the command tower when a friendly arm is slung around his shoulder and Sheppard falls into step beside him.
"Congratulations," he says. "I hear you have an admirer. Of the fishy type."
"It isn't a fish," Rodney says, automatically. "It's a sentient, alien sea creature." Then he glares. "How did you hear about it?"
"Dr. McNab told Dr. Zelenka who told Dr. Keller who told Teyla who told me," Sheppard says, reciting the list off with great glee.
"Obviously doctors have big mouths," Rodney retorts. Sheppard just looks at him, mouth twitching in a blatantly poor attempt not to laugh. "What? I can keep a secret, unlike the rest of them. Anyway, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Clearly brains are admired among many cultures and types. Why shouldn't it be attracted to me?" Rodney says defensively.
"I think we should all meet your suitor. Make sure his intentions are honorable."
"That's completely-" Rodney halts. He looks at Sheppard. "His intentions?"
"Oh, hadn't you heard? He's definitely a male, according to Dr. Bryce."
*
Everyone has heard. Rodney has to endure smirks and whispering behind his back and outright laughter. Yet again.
He finds he doesn't care. Whenever he has the time, he goes outside. It doesn't matter whether it's one of the lower balconies, or any of the piers or decks around Atlantis, he only has to wait a while before the creature appears.
He talks to it. To him. It's slow-even hooking up a recorder to his laptop and running a translation in real time, it's still far from instantaneous. Rodney needs to work out how to get the language into the gate language buffer, but until he does, the method works.
Rodney talks through his latest ideas, testing theories out loud, and letting his laptop convert his words to patterns of sound and light. The creature doesn't have any concept of science or mathematics beyond numbers and time and distance, but it doesn't deter Rodney. The creature listens, and Rodney talks, and he's never felt so alive, so alert, so full of ideas.
They've named him. Ultimus. The last of his kind. It's in his song, the first one Rodney recorded, joy at finding Rodney, finding someone to communicate with after so long alone. All the rest of his kind are dead. Dr. McNab had tears in her eyes when she was telling Rodney.
He corners her in her lab one day. He wants to ask her questions-why me?-but he dances uncomfortably around the topic.
She answers anyway. She's astute. "See this passage," she says, pointing to a line in the English translation of one of the many recordings they've made of it. "He says he felt the power of the minds of the people in the floating city." She looks up from the translation. "He must be incredibly sensitive to electromagnetic activity. Far more so than humans-more on a par with our strongest life-signs detectors. But then you'd know more about that than me," she adds.
Dr. McNab is still talking, something about his beta waves and the creature-Ultimus-showing very similar activity, which might account for the attraction, but Rodney's barely listening to her. So it's only later that he recalls her mentioning the creature sending out signals beside light and sound, two different frequencies simultaneously.
*
He finally confesses to Sheppard. He doesn't mean to, but it's early and he's only on his first mug of coffee, and when Sheppard wanders into the lab and pulls up a seat beside him, Rodney starts rambling.
"We were all concentrating on the visible and the audible, and we just didn't notice the other signals," he says, a little ashamed at not picking up on them sooner.
"Other signals?"
"Two signals, different frequencies. At a distance, our brain picks them up and detects the phase differences and uses them to tell us the direction the signal came from. Which we're not really registering, because we can see him, so we know where he is already. But when he gets close enough, the signals integrate, forming an amplitude modulated standing wave-"
"A binaural beat," Sheppard says.
"Yes, exactly." Rodney nods, glad Sheppard's keeping up. He hates explaining things to idiots. "The effect on the brain depends on the frequency. Binaural beats in the delta range can aid sleep, for example."
"What range are these?"
"The beta frequencies, twenty hertz, sometimes higher. And they're stimulating, amazing, in ways I couldn't have imagined. It's-" Rodney tails off, struggling to find the words he needs.
"Are you trying to tell me you're, um, aroused when you're with Ultimus?" Sheppard says eventually, a freaked out expression on his face, motioning his hand in a vague gesture to suggest the sort of arousal he's talking about.
"No. God, no, of course not. No." He's protesting too much, but he doesn't want Sheppard to get the wrong idea. And that is completely the wrong idea. "Just-relaxed yet more aware. I feel stimulated, and-" Rodney waves his hands around, as if he can form the words he need through movement. "I feel-creative. It's like being in the shower and getting inspired to write something-I spend time with Ultimus and I come up with ideas, things I've never considered before. It's as though my brain is, well, working even better than ever. Great just got even better," he says, a little smugly.
"This isn't anything like that DNA resequencer is it? You're not heading towards ascension or something again?" Sheppard asks, hand on Rodney's leg like he's pinning him there. Worry written all over his face.
"No. Nothing like that. I'm just finding the perfect mental state-it's still my brain, no alterations."
"So you've had a tune-up, basically?" Sheppard says.
Rodney snorts, but has to agree. "Not the way I'd put it, but essentially, yes. I'm still practically in my prime," Rodney says, and ignores Sheppard's amused cough, "but I feel like my brain is suddenly ten years younger. Ideas are right there, right on the surface, ready for me to pick up and run with them, and I haven't felt this good in years. Things keep coming together and making sense without any effort."
"So you're saying this is entirely safe, and it's a good thing, and there's nothing to worry about?"
"Absolutely."
"And have you told anyone else?" Sheppard asks.
Rodney shrugs awkwardly. "Not-exactly. But Keller checked me out yesterday, full work up, and I'm fine. Well, aside from a nasty itchy rash on my left buttock that I think came from-"
"I don't need to know about the rash, Rodney."
"Ah, okay, no."
"So, what are you working on, now your brain is ten years younger?" Sheppard asks, and Rodney tells him. He talks for hours, and even though Sheppard doesn't follow half the science Rodney throws at him, he understands enough to ask the right questions, to pick Rodney up when he heads off on a wrong tangent.
He has so much work to do, ideas to follow through on. He's never been so excited.
So happy.
*
Rodney's fully aware that it's still a joke to most of Atlantis, the giant sea creature with a crush on Dr. McKay of all people.
It's a while before he realizes that Sheppard doesn't joke about it any more, and neither do Ronon or Teyla.
He doesn't understand why. Sheppard still mocks him about everything else, as does Ronon. And Teyla still smiles at him indulgently, the same smile she gives the Athosian children, and Rodney as always pretends not to notice.
Their team functions as fluidly as ever.
On P5X-338 they capture a Wraith base. The four of them, out-numbered by ten to one, but Rodney leads them right all the way, and every shot finds its target, and it's only twenty minutes from the moment Rodney starts to work on disabling the security to the moment Ronon high fives him in the central control area, a sea of dead Wraith surrounding them.
On M3C-863 they mount a rescue, two geologists trapped underground, and they're one of the few teams available. It should takes hours, a day even, to get down to them, but Rodney strategizes perfectly and Barker and Shelby are out in under two hours, sore and bruised, but otherwise unharmed.
Maybe the team is functioning even better than usual. Sam is full of praise at every team briefing, and Rodney feels satisfied at the end of each day, the contentment of work well done.
*
The zoologists put their study of Ultimus on the back-burner when Lorne's team discover a planet full of bug-like creatures in larval form. Opinions vary, but there's a strong enough possibility that they might be related to the Wraith for Sam to insist that studying them and their weaknesses become their priority.
Rodney's glad. He prefers to spend time alone with Ultimus, rather than with a cluster of zoologists talking non-stop and interrupting his thinking.
Alone becomes him and Sheppard and Ronon and Teyla. He finds he doesn't mind. Sometimes they're quiet, other times they talk, to each other, to Ultimus.
"May I join you?" Teyla asks Ultimus one evening, and none of them need the translation to recognize the glow of pleasure from him. She slips into the water and swims with him a while, solemnly resting her forehead against his head before climbing back up out of the water.
Ronon is the next to swim with him, and then Sheppard says what the heck, why not? and joins Ronon.
Rodney remembers the last time he was in the ocean, and refuses.
"I've got a scratchy throat," he says. "I'm probably coming down with a cold."
He runs out of excuses eventually. Maybe because he's not trying hard enough to find them, the pull of this strange bond stronger than his fears.
He splutters when he finally jumps in the water, sinking straight under then coming up in a rush. He gets water in his ears and has to shake his head to clear them.
Ultimus is singing a single note. Rodney leans up against the pier and listens to the voice synthesizer on his laptop. "Family," it says, and even though the voice is mechanical and emotionless, Rodney understands.
He nods at Ultimus. "Yes," he says, and waves his hand around to encompass all of them, his team. "Family."
//
An additional wallpaper, a joint effort:
1440x900 | 1024x768
