Flight Plan by liketheriver (Fight or Flight challenge)
Title: Flight Plan
Category: Slash/angst.
Word Count: ~3,000
Rating: T
Characters: McKay, Sheppard
Warnings: None
Spoilers: Tag to Lifeline, so big ones there and anything leading up to that.
A/N: Thanks as always to Koschka for the quick beta.
Summary: After every fight, you need to be able to kiss and makeup. John and Rodney are no exception.
Flight Plan
by liketheriver
John Sheppard was used to filing flight plans, every Air Force pilot was. As the officer in charge of an aircraft and mission, you better know where you were going and when and you sure the hell let your crew and support know, as well. And while every pilot did his level best to stick to the flight plan they’d submitted, there was always a chance that it could change. Mechanical problems, redirection from command, rough weather… and it was up to the pilot to make sure he adjusted his course appropriately, staying on target as best he could given the changing parameters around him, and completed his assigned mission to the best of his abilities.
And the same was true for John’s life, as well. Just stay the course as best he could, but be aware of the storm clouds brewing and the rough patches on the horizon.
To say that things had been rough over the past several months would have been an understatement. First there had been the ascension machine and they’d nearly lost McKay. Then a matter of weeks later they had lost Carson. And now Elizabeth was… well, she wasn’t there. Dead, disconnected, assimilated, whatever, the results were the same. Elizabeth just wasn’t there anymore and chances were slim to none that they’d ever get her back. And lying alone in his bed, John was painfully aware that Rodney wasn’t there, either.
Sheppard had been livid with the scientist for what he did to Elizabeth, the risk it presented to the entire expedition, to the city they had been fighting the entire day to save. In the end, what Rodney had accomplished by reactivating the nanites had saved them all. There was no way they could have stolen the ZPM without Weir running interference with the replicators, no way the city would have survived without the ZPM, and no way Elizabeth could have done what she did without Rodney doing what he had… even if it went against John’s direct order.
And that was the real crux of the matter. Lt. Colonel John Sheppard was officially in charge of Atlantis. He was officially in charge of everyone, not just the military, and that included McKay. That was a little odd because he and Rodney had always been on the same footing in the past, the same level playing field, that allowed them to bicker and gripe and occasionally insult and it never really meant anything since each person’s opinion carried the same weight and they both knew it. Now that Sheppard sat a little higher up the chain of command than McKay, John doubted either one of them could admit they were comfortable with the arrangement. Maybe that’s why Rodney hadn’t come by his room that night, the idea of sleeping with the guy giving the orders just didn’t feel right, even when he wasn’t following them. Eventually when someone else assumed command… because someone else would be taking the reins, he had little doubt… things would go back to normal. Or maybe that wasn’t it at all.
Maybe it had been the fight they’d had earlier over the fact that McKay had reactivate the nanites when Sheppard had told him not to do it. And right, wrong, or indifferent, that had really pissed John off, because if was dangerous, because he knew Elizabeth wouldn’t have okayed it, because he had given an order and, goddammit, Rodney had totally ignored it. Sure, if anyone knew what it was like to defy a direct order it was Sheppard, but his insubordination had endangered no one but himself… and, granted, a very expensive piece of military equipment. But multi-million dollar bills to Uncle Sam aside, the only person who would have wound up dead as a result of his actions was him. McKay had put them all at risk. And a downed helicopter paled in comparison to the loss of the City of the Ancients.
So, yeah, he’d laid into McKay, and had used every bit of will power he possessed not to throttle the man when Rodney had lifted his chin, crossed his arms, and refused to deactivate the creatures rebuilding Elizabeth’s damaged and dying body. Seeing her sitting there, whole, both mentally and physically, had had him backtracking a little. Maybe McKay had been right, maybe he’d pulled it off after all and she would be okay. Or maybe Rodney had just made it possible for the Asurians to find them down the road. Elizabeth hadn’t known where they were going to relocate the city, that decision had been made after she left Atlantis, but John couldn’t shake the feeling that this was going to come back and bite them in the ass somewhere down the line. It always did. It always fucking did. One adjustment of the flight plan to avoid one problem always seemed to lead them to another. As good as Sheppard had become at adjusting their course to avoid one obstacle after another, he couldn’t help but wonder if eventually they would just run out of fuel and crash and burn after all.
Because he was getting tired of it. Especially tonight, after the adrenaline drain and the fear and the loss, he was so goddamn tired and yet unable to fall asleep. That’s why he decided he should file another flight plan, a real one this time, take the Jumper up and survey this new world with five moons and giant snakes and one less person than had walked through the gate all those years before.
It was late, but given the repairs that were still ongoing and would be for a while to come, there were lots of people in the control room. Sheppard stopped long enough to get a quick update on the progress, let the gate tech know his plans to take the Jumper once around the new block, then headed into the Jumper bay... where he found McKay.
Rodney was in his experimental Jumper that technically wasn’t experimental any more given that they had proven the hyperdrive did actually work on the craft. Poking his head in the back of the ship, he saw the physicist was alone, studying the readouts on his electronic pad so intently that he didn’t even notice that Sheppard had entered.
“Hey. What are you still doing up?”
Blue eyes shadowed by dark circles regarded him in surprise. “Oh, I just wanted to check a few things, you know, before I turned in.”
McKay sucked at lying. Whenever he was evasive about what he was doing instead of going into a detailed explanation was a sure sign he was trying to hide something. Narrowing his eyes, Sheppard asked warily, “What kind of things?”
“System things.” Rodney dropped his eyes back down to the readouts before mumbling, “Security things.”
“Security things? You think the Jumper is a security risk because we were on the replicator home world?”
“That and the fact that Elizabeth was in here for quite a while and could have easily interfaced with it.” When Rodney refused to look at him, John knew he felt it was a legitimate threat.
With an irritated shift of hips, Sheppard grumbled, “McKay, you swore to me that she wasn’t a risk…”
Rodney raised his voice and his hand to cut John off. “The Jumper has been locked out of the mainframe here in Atlantis ever since we got back. I even manually disconnected the docking mechanisms so that it can’t even draw power to recharge. It is completely isolated and will stay that way until I’m one hundred percent certain there is nothing in the coding that could be a threat to the city.” Lowering his voice back down to its normal range, McKay promised, “You can trust me, Sheppard. I’m not going to screw this one up.”
The way he said it had John’s stomach twisting guiltily. “I trust you, Rodney.” When all he received was rolled eyes in response to his less than convincing declaration, Sheppard shrugged. “I think you just let your emotions cloud your judgment today is all.”
McKay snorted with a shake of his head and didn’t look up from his work. “You know, it’s ironic that Sam Carter was here today. I really think in her mind, I’ll always be the gratingly pessimistic asshole who put technology before humanity. And in yours I’m such a fucking bleeding heart that I jeopardized the entire city to save one person. Opposite ends of the spectrum and I’m screwed either way. I guess the fact that I’ve been attracted to both of you speaks to my rather diverse taste yet ridiculous fascination with Air Force officers.”
John frowned at the mention of Carter but past love interests weren’t important right now… although he couldn’t help but wonder if the colonel’s presence on Atlantis had had something to do with the fact that Rodney wasn’t currently curled up in bed with him.
Rubbing at his neck, John asked hesitantly, “You didn’t actually sleep with her, did you?”
“What? Who? Carter? The woman who had me banished to Siberia? You’re kidding, right?”
“Yeah, I guess that would kind of kill the attraction when someone does something like that to you, huh?”
“Uhm,.. yeah, sure.”
Another evasive answer, with an overly innocent flicker of blue eyes had Sheppard demanding, “Jesus, you still have a thing for her.”
“Not any more,” Rodney assured with a small grin. “Not since I found the opposite, much more amazing, end of the spectrum.”
“Then why are you still here and not…” John gave a quick glance outside the Jumper to make sure no one else was around before finishing more quietly. “… other places?”
McKay seemed genuinely confused. “Because you made it abundantly clear you didn’t approve of certain choices I made today. That didn’t exactly send the message, hey, stop by so we can snuggle later.”
John took a step closer. “Look, I know I got upset about what happened, but your heart was in the right place even if your head wasn’t and I really did mean it when I accepted your apology for the mistake…”
“I didn’t make a mistake,” McKay bristled
Now it was Sheppard’s turn to be confused. “But you said you were sorry. Believe me, I heard you and nearly passed out from shock. That’s twice now that you’ve done that, and I’m not entirely sure, but I think that might be a sign of the Apocalypse.”
“You make it sound like I never apologize.”
“All I’m saying is the first locust I see, I’m out of here.”
“I only apologize when I’m wrong, which, in all honestly, is a rare event. But I was wrong for not involving you more and not keeping you informed of what we were doing. But I won’t apologize for reactivating the nanites and I won’t call it a mistake. I made a mistake when I blew up a solar system. I made a mistake when I didn’t go fishing with Carson. But I didn’t make a mistake with Elizabeth. I saved her life. Granted, the fix is what got her killed in the end, but I saved her from the initial injuries.”
A lot of things started making sense then. Why Rodney was willing to risk so much to save Elizabeth. Why he’d been so defensive and still was. He carried a hell of a lot of guilt over Carson’s death, and letting Elizabeth die when he knew he could stop it probably brought a lot of that self-recrimination to the surface. But Sheppard had a lot of guilt of his own. After all, he was the one who had asked her to go on the mission and promised to watch out for her. And maybe that’s why he was holding out hope that she was still alive.
“You don’t know she’s dead,” John countered.
With a bitter glance up from the tablet in his lap, Rodney mumbled, “For her sake, I hope she is.”
“You don’t mean that.” John could hear the hoarseness in his own voice, the raw wound of his own failure, the denial of the reality behind Rodney’s words.
“I don’t want to mean it,” Rodney confessed quietly, then scrubbed at his face and up into his hair. “Then again I don’t want to fight with you about it anymore, I don’t want to even think about it anymore, and I don’t want to go back to my room by myself. But seeing as we’re still doing the former, I don’t think I’m going to be able to avoid the latter, and that’s just going to lead to the other. So, I guess I’m just going to have to stay here and run yet another diagnostic on the Jumper to confirm yet again there’s no risk to the city.”
“You don’t have to do that.” Reaching out, John smoothed down the fine brown hair that was standing on end.
When John Sheppard had joined the Air Force, he had thought his flight plan was pretty straightforward. He’d fly helicopters like he’d always wanted to do since he had gone to his first air show as a kid and climbed over every inch of a Vietnam era Huey. But then had come Afghanistan and Antarctica and Atlantis, each a modification he had to log to that original flight plan of his life. And then had come McKay, who created more turbulence than John should have been able to handle, who pushed him to his limits, who made life one wild and scary ride… and in the end made every minute of the flight, regardless of stormy weather or blue skies, worth while.
When Rodney looked up at him, John admitted softly, “I don’t want to do any of those things either.”
If anyone could keep him from doing them, it would be McKay.
“Then what do you want to do?”
“I want us to go home and go to bed.”
Who cared if it was just a temporary fix? Who cared if all the problems and worries and pain would be there again in the morning? It was a start, as step in the right goddamn direction and for now, that would do, for both of them.
“That sounds like a much better plan.” A crooked grin cut across Rodney’s face, storm clouds parting to reveal blue eyes, and when he stood and kissed John, the pilot knew that, at least for tonight, there was smooth air ahead.
“I thought you might like it,” Sheppard smirked and kissed him in return.
“Your kissing has improved vastly since this afternoon, by the way.”
John rolled his eyes at the comment aimed at his landing skills. “Given a choice between a leaf kissing the water or me kissing you, which would you rather I excelled at?”
“Point taken.” Leaning in again, Rodney kissed him with a slow play of tongue and lips that had John sighing when he finally, reluctantly pulled away.
“We should go or we’re going to end up having make-up sex here in the Jumper.”
Ignoring the warning, McKay hooked his fingers in Sheppard’s belt loops and tugged him closer. “Make-up sex means never having to say you’re sorry.”
John tilted his head, allowing Rodney better access to his neck, on which the scientist was happily nibbling. “Now, see, that’s the type of apology I prefer… hot, sweaty, and no need to check to see if the oceans are boiling or a plague of frogs has taken over the cafeteria.”
And when McKay’s mouth reached his earlobe, John was just about ready to say screw the bed and the potential that Rodney might hold the seventh seal, and instead push the man against the bulkhead so he could kiss him with the same force with which the city had slammed into their new home sea. But the sound of voices entering the hangar had the two separating and busying themselves with rather useless tasks around the Jumper.
The gate tech Sheppard had spoken with earlier passed by the open hatch with another scientist and raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Colonel Sheppard, I thought you were taking up one of the Jumpers?”
“Yeah, once I thought about it, I decided that maybe it’s a little late for a flight. So, I was just helping Dr. McKay finish up a few things before hitting the hay.”
The tech nodded in agreement. “It’s been a crazy day. A good night’s sleep is sounding better and better.”
Sheppard smiled, gave a friendly nod, then headed out the back hatch with a quick glance over his shoulder at McKay in anticipation of proving the tech’s diagnosis wrong. Because a few hours later, his body was humming with Rodney’s skin warm and slick against his own, his mouth was moving along McKay’s collarbone, his throat, his jaw, Rodney’s hands were pulling him closer, holding him tighter, and John was fucking soaring. He was rising above the chaos and heartache with the help of the one man who truly understood just what they were temporarily leaving behind. He could feel the familiar thrum of the rotors in the beating of Rodney’s heart, hear the wind roaring in his ears when McKay breathed his name, felt the world tilt, fall, drop away below them as they lifted higher and set in a flight plan for that patch of blue in the distance.
Flying like this with Rodney, he had little doubt they’d eventually reach it.
The End
Category: Slash/angst.
Word Count: ~3,000
Rating: T
Characters: McKay, Sheppard
Warnings: None
Spoilers: Tag to Lifeline, so big ones there and anything leading up to that.
A/N: Thanks as always to Koschka for the quick beta.
Summary: After every fight, you need to be able to kiss and makeup. John and Rodney are no exception.
Flight Plan
by liketheriver
John Sheppard was used to filing flight plans, every Air Force pilot was. As the officer in charge of an aircraft and mission, you better know where you were going and when and you sure the hell let your crew and support know, as well. And while every pilot did his level best to stick to the flight plan they’d submitted, there was always a chance that it could change. Mechanical problems, redirection from command, rough weather… and it was up to the pilot to make sure he adjusted his course appropriately, staying on target as best he could given the changing parameters around him, and completed his assigned mission to the best of his abilities.
And the same was true for John’s life, as well. Just stay the course as best he could, but be aware of the storm clouds brewing and the rough patches on the horizon.
To say that things had been rough over the past several months would have been an understatement. First there had been the ascension machine and they’d nearly lost McKay. Then a matter of weeks later they had lost Carson. And now Elizabeth was… well, she wasn’t there. Dead, disconnected, assimilated, whatever, the results were the same. Elizabeth just wasn’t there anymore and chances were slim to none that they’d ever get her back. And lying alone in his bed, John was painfully aware that Rodney wasn’t there, either.
Sheppard had been livid with the scientist for what he did to Elizabeth, the risk it presented to the entire expedition, to the city they had been fighting the entire day to save. In the end, what Rodney had accomplished by reactivating the nanites had saved them all. There was no way they could have stolen the ZPM without Weir running interference with the replicators, no way the city would have survived without the ZPM, and no way Elizabeth could have done what she did without Rodney doing what he had… even if it went against John’s direct order.
And that was the real crux of the matter. Lt. Colonel John Sheppard was officially in charge of Atlantis. He was officially in charge of everyone, not just the military, and that included McKay. That was a little odd because he and Rodney had always been on the same footing in the past, the same level playing field, that allowed them to bicker and gripe and occasionally insult and it never really meant anything since each person’s opinion carried the same weight and they both knew it. Now that Sheppard sat a little higher up the chain of command than McKay, John doubted either one of them could admit they were comfortable with the arrangement. Maybe that’s why Rodney hadn’t come by his room that night, the idea of sleeping with the guy giving the orders just didn’t feel right, even when he wasn’t following them. Eventually when someone else assumed command… because someone else would be taking the reins, he had little doubt… things would go back to normal. Or maybe that wasn’t it at all.
Maybe it had been the fight they’d had earlier over the fact that McKay had reactivate the nanites when Sheppard had told him not to do it. And right, wrong, or indifferent, that had really pissed John off, because if was dangerous, because he knew Elizabeth wouldn’t have okayed it, because he had given an order and, goddammit, Rodney had totally ignored it. Sure, if anyone knew what it was like to defy a direct order it was Sheppard, but his insubordination had endangered no one but himself… and, granted, a very expensive piece of military equipment. But multi-million dollar bills to Uncle Sam aside, the only person who would have wound up dead as a result of his actions was him. McKay had put them all at risk. And a downed helicopter paled in comparison to the loss of the City of the Ancients.
So, yeah, he’d laid into McKay, and had used every bit of will power he possessed not to throttle the man when Rodney had lifted his chin, crossed his arms, and refused to deactivate the creatures rebuilding Elizabeth’s damaged and dying body. Seeing her sitting there, whole, both mentally and physically, had had him backtracking a little. Maybe McKay had been right, maybe he’d pulled it off after all and she would be okay. Or maybe Rodney had just made it possible for the Asurians to find them down the road. Elizabeth hadn’t known where they were going to relocate the city, that decision had been made after she left Atlantis, but John couldn’t shake the feeling that this was going to come back and bite them in the ass somewhere down the line. It always did. It always fucking did. One adjustment of the flight plan to avoid one problem always seemed to lead them to another. As good as Sheppard had become at adjusting their course to avoid one obstacle after another, he couldn’t help but wonder if eventually they would just run out of fuel and crash and burn after all.
Because he was getting tired of it. Especially tonight, after the adrenaline drain and the fear and the loss, he was so goddamn tired and yet unable to fall asleep. That’s why he decided he should file another flight plan, a real one this time, take the Jumper up and survey this new world with five moons and giant snakes and one less person than had walked through the gate all those years before.
It was late, but given the repairs that were still ongoing and would be for a while to come, there were lots of people in the control room. Sheppard stopped long enough to get a quick update on the progress, let the gate tech know his plans to take the Jumper once around the new block, then headed into the Jumper bay... where he found McKay.
Rodney was in his experimental Jumper that technically wasn’t experimental any more given that they had proven the hyperdrive did actually work on the craft. Poking his head in the back of the ship, he saw the physicist was alone, studying the readouts on his electronic pad so intently that he didn’t even notice that Sheppard had entered.
“Hey. What are you still doing up?”
Blue eyes shadowed by dark circles regarded him in surprise. “Oh, I just wanted to check a few things, you know, before I turned in.”
McKay sucked at lying. Whenever he was evasive about what he was doing instead of going into a detailed explanation was a sure sign he was trying to hide something. Narrowing his eyes, Sheppard asked warily, “What kind of things?”
“System things.” Rodney dropped his eyes back down to the readouts before mumbling, “Security things.”
“Security things? You think the Jumper is a security risk because we were on the replicator home world?”
“That and the fact that Elizabeth was in here for quite a while and could have easily interfaced with it.” When Rodney refused to look at him, John knew he felt it was a legitimate threat.
With an irritated shift of hips, Sheppard grumbled, “McKay, you swore to me that she wasn’t a risk…”
Rodney raised his voice and his hand to cut John off. “The Jumper has been locked out of the mainframe here in Atlantis ever since we got back. I even manually disconnected the docking mechanisms so that it can’t even draw power to recharge. It is completely isolated and will stay that way until I’m one hundred percent certain there is nothing in the coding that could be a threat to the city.” Lowering his voice back down to its normal range, McKay promised, “You can trust me, Sheppard. I’m not going to screw this one up.”
The way he said it had John’s stomach twisting guiltily. “I trust you, Rodney.” When all he received was rolled eyes in response to his less than convincing declaration, Sheppard shrugged. “I think you just let your emotions cloud your judgment today is all.”
McKay snorted with a shake of his head and didn’t look up from his work. “You know, it’s ironic that Sam Carter was here today. I really think in her mind, I’ll always be the gratingly pessimistic asshole who put technology before humanity. And in yours I’m such a fucking bleeding heart that I jeopardized the entire city to save one person. Opposite ends of the spectrum and I’m screwed either way. I guess the fact that I’ve been attracted to both of you speaks to my rather diverse taste yet ridiculous fascination with Air Force officers.”
John frowned at the mention of Carter but past love interests weren’t important right now… although he couldn’t help but wonder if the colonel’s presence on Atlantis had had something to do with the fact that Rodney wasn’t currently curled up in bed with him.
Rubbing at his neck, John asked hesitantly, “You didn’t actually sleep with her, did you?”
“What? Who? Carter? The woman who had me banished to Siberia? You’re kidding, right?”
“Yeah, I guess that would kind of kill the attraction when someone does something like that to you, huh?”
“Uhm,.. yeah, sure.”
Another evasive answer, with an overly innocent flicker of blue eyes had Sheppard demanding, “Jesus, you still have a thing for her.”
“Not any more,” Rodney assured with a small grin. “Not since I found the opposite, much more amazing, end of the spectrum.”
“Then why are you still here and not…” John gave a quick glance outside the Jumper to make sure no one else was around before finishing more quietly. “… other places?”
McKay seemed genuinely confused. “Because you made it abundantly clear you didn’t approve of certain choices I made today. That didn’t exactly send the message, hey, stop by so we can snuggle later.”
John took a step closer. “Look, I know I got upset about what happened, but your heart was in the right place even if your head wasn’t and I really did mean it when I accepted your apology for the mistake…”
“I didn’t make a mistake,” McKay bristled
Now it was Sheppard’s turn to be confused. “But you said you were sorry. Believe me, I heard you and nearly passed out from shock. That’s twice now that you’ve done that, and I’m not entirely sure, but I think that might be a sign of the Apocalypse.”
“You make it sound like I never apologize.”
“All I’m saying is the first locust I see, I’m out of here.”
“I only apologize when I’m wrong, which, in all honestly, is a rare event. But I was wrong for not involving you more and not keeping you informed of what we were doing. But I won’t apologize for reactivating the nanites and I won’t call it a mistake. I made a mistake when I blew up a solar system. I made a mistake when I didn’t go fishing with Carson. But I didn’t make a mistake with Elizabeth. I saved her life. Granted, the fix is what got her killed in the end, but I saved her from the initial injuries.”
A lot of things started making sense then. Why Rodney was willing to risk so much to save Elizabeth. Why he’d been so defensive and still was. He carried a hell of a lot of guilt over Carson’s death, and letting Elizabeth die when he knew he could stop it probably brought a lot of that self-recrimination to the surface. But Sheppard had a lot of guilt of his own. After all, he was the one who had asked her to go on the mission and promised to watch out for her. And maybe that’s why he was holding out hope that she was still alive.
“You don’t know she’s dead,” John countered.
With a bitter glance up from the tablet in his lap, Rodney mumbled, “For her sake, I hope she is.”
“You don’t mean that.” John could hear the hoarseness in his own voice, the raw wound of his own failure, the denial of the reality behind Rodney’s words.
“I don’t want to mean it,” Rodney confessed quietly, then scrubbed at his face and up into his hair. “Then again I don’t want to fight with you about it anymore, I don’t want to even think about it anymore, and I don’t want to go back to my room by myself. But seeing as we’re still doing the former, I don’t think I’m going to be able to avoid the latter, and that’s just going to lead to the other. So, I guess I’m just going to have to stay here and run yet another diagnostic on the Jumper to confirm yet again there’s no risk to the city.”
“You don’t have to do that.” Reaching out, John smoothed down the fine brown hair that was standing on end.
When John Sheppard had joined the Air Force, he had thought his flight plan was pretty straightforward. He’d fly helicopters like he’d always wanted to do since he had gone to his first air show as a kid and climbed over every inch of a Vietnam era Huey. But then had come Afghanistan and Antarctica and Atlantis, each a modification he had to log to that original flight plan of his life. And then had come McKay, who created more turbulence than John should have been able to handle, who pushed him to his limits, who made life one wild and scary ride… and in the end made every minute of the flight, regardless of stormy weather or blue skies, worth while.
When Rodney looked up at him, John admitted softly, “I don’t want to do any of those things either.”
If anyone could keep him from doing them, it would be McKay.
“Then what do you want to do?”
“I want us to go home and go to bed.”
Who cared if it was just a temporary fix? Who cared if all the problems and worries and pain would be there again in the morning? It was a start, as step in the right goddamn direction and for now, that would do, for both of them.
“That sounds like a much better plan.” A crooked grin cut across Rodney’s face, storm clouds parting to reveal blue eyes, and when he stood and kissed John, the pilot knew that, at least for tonight, there was smooth air ahead.
“I thought you might like it,” Sheppard smirked and kissed him in return.
“Your kissing has improved vastly since this afternoon, by the way.”
John rolled his eyes at the comment aimed at his landing skills. “Given a choice between a leaf kissing the water or me kissing you, which would you rather I excelled at?”
“Point taken.” Leaning in again, Rodney kissed him with a slow play of tongue and lips that had John sighing when he finally, reluctantly pulled away.
“We should go or we’re going to end up having make-up sex here in the Jumper.”
Ignoring the warning, McKay hooked his fingers in Sheppard’s belt loops and tugged him closer. “Make-up sex means never having to say you’re sorry.”
John tilted his head, allowing Rodney better access to his neck, on which the scientist was happily nibbling. “Now, see, that’s the type of apology I prefer… hot, sweaty, and no need to check to see if the oceans are boiling or a plague of frogs has taken over the cafeteria.”
And when McKay’s mouth reached his earlobe, John was just about ready to say screw the bed and the potential that Rodney might hold the seventh seal, and instead push the man against the bulkhead so he could kiss him with the same force with which the city had slammed into their new home sea. But the sound of voices entering the hangar had the two separating and busying themselves with rather useless tasks around the Jumper.
The gate tech Sheppard had spoken with earlier passed by the open hatch with another scientist and raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Colonel Sheppard, I thought you were taking up one of the Jumpers?”
“Yeah, once I thought about it, I decided that maybe it’s a little late for a flight. So, I was just helping Dr. McKay finish up a few things before hitting the hay.”
The tech nodded in agreement. “It’s been a crazy day. A good night’s sleep is sounding better and better.”
Sheppard smiled, gave a friendly nod, then headed out the back hatch with a quick glance over his shoulder at McKay in anticipation of proving the tech’s diagnosis wrong. Because a few hours later, his body was humming with Rodney’s skin warm and slick against his own, his mouth was moving along McKay’s collarbone, his throat, his jaw, Rodney’s hands were pulling him closer, holding him tighter, and John was fucking soaring. He was rising above the chaos and heartache with the help of the one man who truly understood just what they were temporarily leaving behind. He could feel the familiar thrum of the rotors in the beating of Rodney’s heart, hear the wind roaring in his ears when McKay breathed his name, felt the world tilt, fall, drop away below them as they lifted higher and set in a flight plan for that patch of blue in the distance.
Flying like this with Rodney, he had little doubt they’d eventually reach it.
The End