Spontaneous Group Hugging
Title: Spontaneous Group Hugging
Author: Kriadydragon (Stealth Dragon)
Rating: PG, Gen
Characters: Teyla, Sheppard, Team.
Warnings: Chilliness and group hugging
Summary: A discussion with
friendshipper and various requests made over the past few weeks had instilled in me a desire to write a hypothermia fic.
Spontaneous Group Hugging
Teyla felt Murphy a wise man and his law of anything that can go wrong will go wrong inexplicably sound. Rodney could argue against it and it's lack of scientific bases all he wanted. Life did not always wish to bow to measurements, theorems, and cold hard fact. It adhered to nothing save for the pains and wonders of the unexpected. It did not always allow for certainties, good or bad.
It did, however, allow for hope.
The blizzard decided to escalate to wild and whipping, spitting snow that stung, when Colonel Sheppard fell through the ice. One moment he was there, the next vanished with a short-lived cry of alarm. The sudden unexpectedness of it shocked and terrified Teyla more than what she realized had just happened. There was a second, a mere heart-beat long moment, of hesitation before reality collided and she burst forward into a panicked run.
“Colonel Sheppard!”
Ronon beat her to the dark patch in the ice, sliding to a stop on his knees to plunge his long arm into the water, followed by the second arm. Teyla slid up behind him grabbing the end of his coat to keep him from going in. Rodney came up behind her, grabbing bother arms to prevent the same. Water gurgled and splashed, thick as mud, slush like wet crystals trying to seal the patch back up. Ronon snarled in defiance against the pain of the cold Teyla knew he must be feeling.
Please, no, she silently prayed. Please, do not let this happen. Not now that I have them back. Who she prayed to she did not know. Whoever would listen, she supposed, hoped. Life had altered her. In a mere handful of years the loyalty she had only ever felt for her people had stretched to encompass strangers, and she had thanked the Ancestors for it since. Then life had turned the coming of the Ancestors into a thing of sorrow. In little more than a day, she had lost half of what she had come love like her own people.
Then got it back. Only to lose it once more? She could not, not again. She would not. If she had to, she would dive in after John herself...
“I've got him!”
Teyla started nearly letting go of Ronon's coat. Together they pulled, digging their heels into slick ice. Sheppard's body slid boneless as a gutted fish from the lake onto the frozen surface. Once cleared, they surrounded him, moving as one hauling him to his feet. He was alert, if one could call the drunken roll of half-lidded eyes and incoherent muttering alert. He was shivering hard, his lips blue around the edges.
“We need to get him inside!” Rodney barked over the whistle of the wind. They were already dragging him away from the lake, back the way they had come. The snow was growing thicker but not before they had caught a spectral glimpse of the mountains that bordered the north only.
“I saw a hut that was still intact,” Ronon replied.
They pressed in close to Sheppard to block out some of the wind. The thickening carpet of snow made the going methodical, even painful knowing what was at stake, pushing numb and tired limbs past individual endurance. The wind slapped them with sharp snow and cold worming its way through gaps in their collars and sleeves. Each breath sucked moisture from tender membranes, cold going in to become like fire on reaching the lungs. They ducked against the wind turning their faces away to protect their fragile eyes.
Teyla could not feel her own face.
They almost passed the dead village with its long abandoned huts of wood and stone. They angled, nearly toppling, toward the one Ronon had spoke of, the only one still retaining a roof and walls. The Satedan kicked at the door that gave with a crack of splintered wood. Inside the cold was no weaker. It was, however, far more tolerable.
“We need to hurry,” Rodney said, detaching to begin closing the feeble shutters, stuffing scraps of rotten, discarded cloth into the gaps. Ronon helped Teyla ease Sheppard to the floor in front of the plain square hearth, then moved about the room smashing furniture: a table, chair, and what must have been a bed.
He tossed an old, ragged blanket Teyla's way. “Start getting his clothes off.”
Teyla replied with a curt nod. They all knew the procedure. Carson had taught them well. Or, as Rodney had put it, “hammered it into their skulls.” Teyla peeled off John's coat as Ronon tossed the broken pieces of furniture into the hearth. She paused long enough to hand him her laser. One shot and flames writhed fast to start licking up the dried wood like a starving predator. Ronon and Rodney, their tasks complete, joined Teyla in stripping Sheppard.
Ronon and Teyla struggled peeling Sheppard's sweater from his goose-fleshed body. Rodney handled the pants with a rather sneering look of discomfort on his face. He pulled the old blanket over John's legs before beginning. Teyla could not be sure if it was to lessen the discomfort for Rodney or to allow Sheppard some dignity. Either way, it was something she had to approve of. Sheppard had the odd quirk of abashment when it came to being exposed, always ensuring total privacy when having to change in the infirmary. It seemed such an out of place attitude for one with a body both slender and athletic, but it was Sheppard's quirk. And who was she to begrudge him of it?
Rodney laid the soaked pants out to the side to dry, then wrapped the blanket tighter around Sheppard's waist ensuring complete coverage. He pulled one thermal blanket from his vest that he handed to Ronon, who shook it out and wrapped it around Sheppard's pale, shaking shoulders.
“I do not know if this is enough,” Teyla said. She was tempted, sorely tempted, to rub John's chest and help generate warmth. Except Carson had told them not to as it would only further damage the skin. It was the chest, he said, that needed to be warmed first. Warming his hands and feet would push the cold to his core, possibly doing damage to the heart, leading to death.
Ronon handed Sheppard to Teyla for her to take most of the colonel's weight as he stripped out of his own coat and sweater down to the loose, sleeveless shirt beneath.
Rodney balked. “Oh, gosh, please tell me you're not doing what I think you're doing. I'm all for warming Sheppard by any means possible but I think skin on skin contact should be reserved as a last resort...”
“McKay,” Ronon growled with a heavy-lidded glare. He took Sheppard into his arms, pulling him tight to his chest. “Got more silver blankets?”
“I do,” Teyla said, pulling out two packets. Rodney added the second of his packets.
Ronon nodded. “Open 'em up. Get them around yourself and move in close.”
Teyla understood what Ronon was up to. She removed her vest, coat and thicker sweater until she was down to her long-sleeved undershirt she sometimes wore to spar in on chilly mornings. She swung the silver blanket onto her shoulder before scooting forward to wrap her arms around John. Ronon adjusted the blanket across both his and Teyla's back.
Rodney blinked with incomprehension at first until the light of understanding sparked in his eyes. His face contorted in a mild grimace of displeasure.
“Oh, group hug. Of course. Isn't that just... nice.”
“Just do it, McKay,” Ronon said
Rodney's lip curled as he removed his coat before scooting in with a lot of hesitation. “Putting it that way does not help.” He pulled the thermal blanket over his shoulder, then reluctantly, rather clumsily, leaned forward sliding one arm behind Sheppard's back and the other across his blanket-covered stomach. It took a little longer for him to actually press his arm against John. Ronon tugged at the silver blanket until it was wrapped around them both.
“Yeah,” McKay sardonically gritted. “This is comfortable.”
Teyla smiled. Touching was Rodney's quirk. She suspected it was more something he was not used to rather than something he merely disliked, or both. Teyla always made certain to respect the unspoken wish.
Teyla rested her chin on Sheppard's shoulder, letting her warm breath cascade around his long neck. His head was tilted back resting against Ronon's collarbone, his pale throat exposed for her to see the rapid motion of a small spot of skin at his pulse-point. Muscles shivered beneath flesh like seismic ripples strong enough to tap Teyla's teeth soundlessly. John's fluttery heart tapped light and wild against her arm across his chest. His breath was just as fast, as fluttery, pumping his lungs. She pressed her palm into his ribs, to feel their constant motion trying to keep in time with his heart.
She preferred this. If the bad must truly befall others rather than herself, then let it befall where she could see it, feel it, do something about it. Tangible pain in the here and now rather than the hesitant pain of wondering about friends divided by distances too great for her to number. Placating assurances to bring temporary peace to the mind could not be called hope. This, here, now - the feel of cool quaking skin, a heart beat and moving chest; seeing the motion of John's throat and the flutter of his pulse; the smell of old cloth and three scents distinct for each man; and three separate tenors of gentle breathing: bass, loud and quick - this made for better hope. So much was possible when one was where they could make the possible happen.
It made her feel better, plain and simple.
“We should probably contact Atlantis,” Rodney said. “Tell them to bring a jumper.”
“When the blizzard dies down,” Ronon said. “You'd just get lost and die out there.”
Rodney visibly paled and swallowed. “Good point.”
Ronon grinned. It was his quirk, using such simple logic against Rodney to hide that he was merely trying to protect him. To hide that he considered Rodney a friend. Or perhaps he was hiding nothing, it was simply his way. Teyla found it amusing, but said nothing of it as there was no reason to.
--------------------------------------------
Teyla awoke, not realizing she had fallen asleep. She blinked bleary eyes clear to red embers glowing beneath a pile of ash. The heart beating against her arm had slowed, the breathing with it nice and even. Teyla rolled her head on the cool shoulder until she was back to resting her chin on it. Both Ronon and Rodney were also asleep, Ronon with his head dipped forward and Rodney with his cheek pressed into the Satedan's shoulder, mouth open, snores rough yet surprisingly soft.
Except for the snoring, everything was quiet.
Teyla extricated herself from the huddle, pulling the silver blanket from her shoulders to tuck around John. She went to the window on the left wall, pulling a wad of cloth from a gap to peer out.
Everything was milk white and just as smooth. No blizzard, no wind, only pristine blue sky and the deeper blue mountains white-capped in the distance. Teyla smiled, then hurried to pull on her warmer clothes and coat. Outside the snow was knee high but so fine and light it took barely any effort to wade through. The gate was not far, just to the end of the village, snow piled within the symbolic indentions. There, Teyla dialed, made her request for a jumper so that Sheppard did not have to endure any more cold, then waded back. The jumper would be here, Elizabeth had said, in ten minutes.
Inside, the others continued to sleep. Teyla stirred the fire, adding more wood until another blaze was born. She removed her coat to return to the huddle, waiting with one arm around Ronon, clasping Rodney's hand resting on Sheppard's thigh, and her cheek resting on John's shoulder.
She preferred this: the here, now, and being in it - good or bad - with no distances in between. It was a quirk of hers.
The End
Author: Kriadydragon (Stealth Dragon)
Rating: PG, Gen
Characters: Teyla, Sheppard, Team.
Warnings: Chilliness and group hugging
Summary: A discussion with
friendshipper and various requests made over the past few weeks had instilled in me a desire to write a hypothermia fic.
Spontaneous Group Hugging
Teyla felt Murphy a wise man and his law of anything that can go wrong will go wrong inexplicably sound. Rodney could argue against it and it's lack of scientific bases all he wanted. Life did not always wish to bow to measurements, theorems, and cold hard fact. It adhered to nothing save for the pains and wonders of the unexpected. It did not always allow for certainties, good or bad.
It did, however, allow for hope.
The blizzard decided to escalate to wild and whipping, spitting snow that stung, when Colonel Sheppard fell through the ice. One moment he was there, the next vanished with a short-lived cry of alarm. The sudden unexpectedness of it shocked and terrified Teyla more than what she realized had just happened. There was a second, a mere heart-beat long moment, of hesitation before reality collided and she burst forward into a panicked run.
“Colonel Sheppard!”
Ronon beat her to the dark patch in the ice, sliding to a stop on his knees to plunge his long arm into the water, followed by the second arm. Teyla slid up behind him grabbing the end of his coat to keep him from going in. Rodney came up behind her, grabbing bother arms to prevent the same. Water gurgled and splashed, thick as mud, slush like wet crystals trying to seal the patch back up. Ronon snarled in defiance against the pain of the cold Teyla knew he must be feeling.
Please, no, she silently prayed. Please, do not let this happen. Not now that I have them back. Who she prayed to she did not know. Whoever would listen, she supposed, hoped. Life had altered her. In a mere handful of years the loyalty she had only ever felt for her people had stretched to encompass strangers, and she had thanked the Ancestors for it since. Then life had turned the coming of the Ancestors into a thing of sorrow. In little more than a day, she had lost half of what she had come love like her own people.
Then got it back. Only to lose it once more? She could not, not again. She would not. If she had to, she would dive in after John herself...
“I've got him!”
Teyla started nearly letting go of Ronon's coat. Together they pulled, digging their heels into slick ice. Sheppard's body slid boneless as a gutted fish from the lake onto the frozen surface. Once cleared, they surrounded him, moving as one hauling him to his feet. He was alert, if one could call the drunken roll of half-lidded eyes and incoherent muttering alert. He was shivering hard, his lips blue around the edges.
“We need to get him inside!” Rodney barked over the whistle of the wind. They were already dragging him away from the lake, back the way they had come. The snow was growing thicker but not before they had caught a spectral glimpse of the mountains that bordered the north only.
“I saw a hut that was still intact,” Ronon replied.
They pressed in close to Sheppard to block out some of the wind. The thickening carpet of snow made the going methodical, even painful knowing what was at stake, pushing numb and tired limbs past individual endurance. The wind slapped them with sharp snow and cold worming its way through gaps in their collars and sleeves. Each breath sucked moisture from tender membranes, cold going in to become like fire on reaching the lungs. They ducked against the wind turning their faces away to protect their fragile eyes.
Teyla could not feel her own face.
They almost passed the dead village with its long abandoned huts of wood and stone. They angled, nearly toppling, toward the one Ronon had spoke of, the only one still retaining a roof and walls. The Satedan kicked at the door that gave with a crack of splintered wood. Inside the cold was no weaker. It was, however, far more tolerable.
“We need to hurry,” Rodney said, detaching to begin closing the feeble shutters, stuffing scraps of rotten, discarded cloth into the gaps. Ronon helped Teyla ease Sheppard to the floor in front of the plain square hearth, then moved about the room smashing furniture: a table, chair, and what must have been a bed.
He tossed an old, ragged blanket Teyla's way. “Start getting his clothes off.”
Teyla replied with a curt nod. They all knew the procedure. Carson had taught them well. Or, as Rodney had put it, “hammered it into their skulls.” Teyla peeled off John's coat as Ronon tossed the broken pieces of furniture into the hearth. She paused long enough to hand him her laser. One shot and flames writhed fast to start licking up the dried wood like a starving predator. Ronon and Rodney, their tasks complete, joined Teyla in stripping Sheppard.
Ronon and Teyla struggled peeling Sheppard's sweater from his goose-fleshed body. Rodney handled the pants with a rather sneering look of discomfort on his face. He pulled the old blanket over John's legs before beginning. Teyla could not be sure if it was to lessen the discomfort for Rodney or to allow Sheppard some dignity. Either way, it was something she had to approve of. Sheppard had the odd quirk of abashment when it came to being exposed, always ensuring total privacy when having to change in the infirmary. It seemed such an out of place attitude for one with a body both slender and athletic, but it was Sheppard's quirk. And who was she to begrudge him of it?
Rodney laid the soaked pants out to the side to dry, then wrapped the blanket tighter around Sheppard's waist ensuring complete coverage. He pulled one thermal blanket from his vest that he handed to Ronon, who shook it out and wrapped it around Sheppard's pale, shaking shoulders.
“I do not know if this is enough,” Teyla said. She was tempted, sorely tempted, to rub John's chest and help generate warmth. Except Carson had told them not to as it would only further damage the skin. It was the chest, he said, that needed to be warmed first. Warming his hands and feet would push the cold to his core, possibly doing damage to the heart, leading to death.
Ronon handed Sheppard to Teyla for her to take most of the colonel's weight as he stripped out of his own coat and sweater down to the loose, sleeveless shirt beneath.
Rodney balked. “Oh, gosh, please tell me you're not doing what I think you're doing. I'm all for warming Sheppard by any means possible but I think skin on skin contact should be reserved as a last resort...”
“McKay,” Ronon growled with a heavy-lidded glare. He took Sheppard into his arms, pulling him tight to his chest. “Got more silver blankets?”
“I do,” Teyla said, pulling out two packets. Rodney added the second of his packets.
Ronon nodded. “Open 'em up. Get them around yourself and move in close.”
Teyla understood what Ronon was up to. She removed her vest, coat and thicker sweater until she was down to her long-sleeved undershirt she sometimes wore to spar in on chilly mornings. She swung the silver blanket onto her shoulder before scooting forward to wrap her arms around John. Ronon adjusted the blanket across both his and Teyla's back.
Rodney blinked with incomprehension at first until the light of understanding sparked in his eyes. His face contorted in a mild grimace of displeasure.
“Oh, group hug. Of course. Isn't that just... nice.”
“Just do it, McKay,” Ronon said
Rodney's lip curled as he removed his coat before scooting in with a lot of hesitation. “Putting it that way does not help.” He pulled the thermal blanket over his shoulder, then reluctantly, rather clumsily, leaned forward sliding one arm behind Sheppard's back and the other across his blanket-covered stomach. It took a little longer for him to actually press his arm against John. Ronon tugged at the silver blanket until it was wrapped around them both.
“Yeah,” McKay sardonically gritted. “This is comfortable.”
Teyla smiled. Touching was Rodney's quirk. She suspected it was more something he was not used to rather than something he merely disliked, or both. Teyla always made certain to respect the unspoken wish.
Teyla rested her chin on Sheppard's shoulder, letting her warm breath cascade around his long neck. His head was tilted back resting against Ronon's collarbone, his pale throat exposed for her to see the rapid motion of a small spot of skin at his pulse-point. Muscles shivered beneath flesh like seismic ripples strong enough to tap Teyla's teeth soundlessly. John's fluttery heart tapped light and wild against her arm across his chest. His breath was just as fast, as fluttery, pumping his lungs. She pressed her palm into his ribs, to feel their constant motion trying to keep in time with his heart.
She preferred this. If the bad must truly befall others rather than herself, then let it befall where she could see it, feel it, do something about it. Tangible pain in the here and now rather than the hesitant pain of wondering about friends divided by distances too great for her to number. Placating assurances to bring temporary peace to the mind could not be called hope. This, here, now - the feel of cool quaking skin, a heart beat and moving chest; seeing the motion of John's throat and the flutter of his pulse; the smell of old cloth and three scents distinct for each man; and three separate tenors of gentle breathing: bass, loud and quick - this made for better hope. So much was possible when one was where they could make the possible happen.
It made her feel better, plain and simple.
“We should probably contact Atlantis,” Rodney said. “Tell them to bring a jumper.”
“When the blizzard dies down,” Ronon said. “You'd just get lost and die out there.”
Rodney visibly paled and swallowed. “Good point.”
Ronon grinned. It was his quirk, using such simple logic against Rodney to hide that he was merely trying to protect him. To hide that he considered Rodney a friend. Or perhaps he was hiding nothing, it was simply his way. Teyla found it amusing, but said nothing of it as there was no reason to.
--------------------------------------------
Teyla awoke, not realizing she had fallen asleep. She blinked bleary eyes clear to red embers glowing beneath a pile of ash. The heart beating against her arm had slowed, the breathing with it nice and even. Teyla rolled her head on the cool shoulder until she was back to resting her chin on it. Both Ronon and Rodney were also asleep, Ronon with his head dipped forward and Rodney with his cheek pressed into the Satedan's shoulder, mouth open, snores rough yet surprisingly soft.
Except for the snoring, everything was quiet.
Teyla extricated herself from the huddle, pulling the silver blanket from her shoulders to tuck around John. She went to the window on the left wall, pulling a wad of cloth from a gap to peer out.
Everything was milk white and just as smooth. No blizzard, no wind, only pristine blue sky and the deeper blue mountains white-capped in the distance. Teyla smiled, then hurried to pull on her warmer clothes and coat. Outside the snow was knee high but so fine and light it took barely any effort to wade through. The gate was not far, just to the end of the village, snow piled within the symbolic indentions. There, Teyla dialed, made her request for a jumper so that Sheppard did not have to endure any more cold, then waded back. The jumper would be here, Elizabeth had said, in ten minutes.
Inside, the others continued to sleep. Teyla stirred the fire, adding more wood until another blaze was born. She removed her coat to return to the huddle, waiting with one arm around Ronon, clasping Rodney's hand resting on Sheppard's thigh, and her cheek resting on John's shoulder.
She preferred this: the here, now, and being in it - good or bad - with no distances in between. It was a quirk of hers.
The End