Fic: Things Left Behind
Title: Things Left Behind
Author: lemonbella
Rating: Gen
Warning Post-deathfic
Summary "If he were able he'd have told her the real story, infinitely more telling of Rodney's character than the fabrication, if a little less brave."
Things Left Behind
Carson's the one who has to tell them all, and he does it in clipped tones, with sympathetic eyes. He pats John's shoulder, hugs Elizabeth and sits Radek down with a glass of water. When they've all gone, he spends forty five minutes trying to wash the memory of blood from his hands.
He passes all of his surgical duties to Mandelsson and tells Elizabeth it’s a necessary part of a well-overdue restructuring of the medical staff. Over the next few days she continues to disagree, until she sees his hands shake when he's called to an emergency in the control room. Elizabeth puts in her own suggestions for restructuring the next day and assigns Carson to focus on the retrovirus research. Elizabeth tells Caldwell that it's temporary. Carson tells Heightmeyer that it's not.
He dumps Laura three weeks to the day and when she asks him why, he can't find the words to explain that it's because she once spoke with Rodney's voice.
Four months later, Carson leaves the Atlantis programme for good, continuing to research the gene therapy applications for the SGC.
Two weeks after his return he tracks down Jeannie McKay and meets her in a coffee shop in central Toronto. They talk for an hour, skirting around the subject, frustrated by secrecy and Jeannie's stubborn insistence that she's not as stupid as the SGC appear to think she is. She'd been told of the importance of Rodney's work when they delivered the notification of his death, but Carson can see that Rodney wasn't the only McKay blessed with insatiable curiosity.
Carson tells her Rodney died saving a bunch of kids and he makes it sound as good and brave and believable as he can. He's not sure if Jeannie does believe it, but he can see she knows that Rodney was more than just her little brother.
If he were able he'd have told her the real story, infinitely more telling of Rodney's character than the fabrication, if a little less brave. He'd have told her about every mission and every near-death experience, every time Rodney enabled all of them to cheat death. He'd have told her that this last occasion was just time catching up with them all, fate taking what was long owed. But to tell her that he'd have to tell her of the blood and the screaming and the promises and reassurances he'd made to a dying friend
that, when it came down to it, his surgical skills couldn’t live up to.
~~~
Ronon doesn't know how to react in the immediate aftermath. He isn’t allowed to go back and avenge the death when that would've been the only useful response. He doesn't understand why Dr Weir makes them stand down from off-world missions, and keeps telling them they need time to mourn. Ronon doesn't succeed in biting his tongue about the weakness and futility of it all.
It's Dr Weir who finds him in the mess late at night staring at the glasses of blue Jello. She sits with him in silence for a long time and then shares four servings. He's eternally grateful that she doesn't ever make him admit that she was right.
In the decades to come Ronon stays on in Atlantis. He remains long after most of the initial personnel have returned to Earth, even though his reactions have slowed and the urge to stop running is a constant presence. McKay's name is on the list of all those he has lost and he recites it from memory whenever he feels weariness and age take precedence over his anger.
~~~
After she announces Rodney's death to the city, Elizabeth asks Caldwell to oversee the return of the off-world teams. She then walks to her quarters, sits down on the bed and prays for the first time in seventeen years. Afterwards, she still feels as hollow as before, so she walks back to the control room and resumes command.
The memorial service contains no prayers or hymns, Rodney's posthumous scorn too loud to even consider it, but a series of anecdotes from scientists and marines have her laughing and crying in equal measure and it's the closest she's had to spiritual strength in a long, long time.
A decade later, in the middle of a negotiation for Earth, the ambassador from P3X-542 tells her that the effects of their enemy's plague ravaged three quarters of their solar system. Elizabeth corrects it to 'five sixths' before she realises it and then collapses into a fit of laughter. When she recovers, she apologises and tells everyone that it's not an exact science.
~~~
John takes a 'jumper out as soon as they leave the infirmary and tells the control room he's going to the mainland. He hovers out over the ocean, letting his mind wander anywhere but the present. The 'jumper submerges itself on an unconscious command and he's a thousand feet under before he hears Elizabeth's voice over the radio telling him that Rodney's not down there.
Over the next few weeks, the only thing John lets himself think about is how he and Rodney never got to finish their argument. John had been providing counterpoint to Rodney's insistence that military solutions throughout history were all variations of point and shoot, when someone had pointed and shot. John stops dead in the middle of inventory when he realises that Rodney died proving himself right.
Their first mission back, a blonde official from some royal court tries to seduce him and it isn’t until after the de-briefing, when he's showering in his quarters, that John realises it's Rodney's voice he's been hearing in his head all afternoon. The next day, he signs the official mission report Captain Kirk because it seems like the right thing to do.
Eighteen months later, John flies a puddle-jumper into the middle of three hive ships and detonates his payload. He doesn't say goodbye to anyone but his last thought is how utterly pissed Rodney would be that their defences haven't progressed at all.
~~~
The city is so quiet and sombre in the weeks following Dr McKay's death that it reminds Teyla of the cullings of her childhood. It's confusing at first how the loss of one man can rival the death of entire families, entire generations, and Teyla wants to scream into the subdued atmosphere that this isn’t the worse that she's seen. But then she meets Sheppard's eyes one evening in the gym and she knows that quantity doesn't factor into it at all.
To everyone's surprise, two years later when defences have finally been devised and installed, Teyla chooses to return with her people to Athos. She settles quickly back into the leadership of her people and only has the time to think of Atlantis once every three months when she waits by the Stargate for their routine check-in.
Her first son, born a year after her return, is the first in the settlement to know what a prime number is.
~~~
After three hours sat alone in the dark of his lab, Radek stands up, opens his laptop and sends a rude e-mail to Kavanagh for no apparent reason. He works for forty eight hours straight, raiding Dr Vogel's pastry stash to avoid leaving the lab. He agrees to go and get some sleep after Miko politely reminds him that even Rodney left for food.
Radek's handed de facto control of the science department after the memorial service. He spends the next few weeks explaining to Elizabeth that it wasn't just Rodney's expertise that ran the department but his presence, and that isn’t something he ever claimed to rival. In the end she gets angry with him and says that maybe life will be easier for the scientists now Rodney isn't around. He comforts her when she cries and tells her that Rodney would've been the first to admit that.
It takes fifteen years for the Atlantis programme to be declassified, and when it is Radek publishes a backlog of research. Some of it is authored solely by him, some with colleagues from Atlantis but the one that gets all the attention is co-authored with Rodney. The only change Radek makes to the manuscript is to put his own name first, because even seventeen years later he still refuses to lose that argument. When the research earns Radek the Nobel Prize, he doesn't write an acceptance speech. Rodney would have wanted to do all the talking.
~end~
Author: lemonbella
Rating: Gen
Warning Post-deathfic
Summary "If he were able he'd have told her the real story, infinitely more telling of Rodney's character than the fabrication, if a little less brave."
Things Left Behind
Carson's the one who has to tell them all, and he does it in clipped tones, with sympathetic eyes. He pats John's shoulder, hugs Elizabeth and sits Radek down with a glass of water. When they've all gone, he spends forty five minutes trying to wash the memory of blood from his hands.
He passes all of his surgical duties to Mandelsson and tells Elizabeth it’s a necessary part of a well-overdue restructuring of the medical staff. Over the next few days she continues to disagree, until she sees his hands shake when he's called to an emergency in the control room. Elizabeth puts in her own suggestions for restructuring the next day and assigns Carson to focus on the retrovirus research. Elizabeth tells Caldwell that it's temporary. Carson tells Heightmeyer that it's not.
He dumps Laura three weeks to the day and when she asks him why, he can't find the words to explain that it's because she once spoke with Rodney's voice.
Four months later, Carson leaves the Atlantis programme for good, continuing to research the gene therapy applications for the SGC.
Two weeks after his return he tracks down Jeannie McKay and meets her in a coffee shop in central Toronto. They talk for an hour, skirting around the subject, frustrated by secrecy and Jeannie's stubborn insistence that she's not as stupid as the SGC appear to think she is. She'd been told of the importance of Rodney's work when they delivered the notification of his death, but Carson can see that Rodney wasn't the only McKay blessed with insatiable curiosity.
Carson tells her Rodney died saving a bunch of kids and he makes it sound as good and brave and believable as he can. He's not sure if Jeannie does believe it, but he can see she knows that Rodney was more than just her little brother.
If he were able he'd have told her the real story, infinitely more telling of Rodney's character than the fabrication, if a little less brave. He'd have told her about every mission and every near-death experience, every time Rodney enabled all of them to cheat death. He'd have told her that this last occasion was just time catching up with them all, fate taking what was long owed. But to tell her that he'd have to tell her of the blood and the screaming and the promises and reassurances he'd made to a dying friend
that, when it came down to it, his surgical skills couldn’t live up to.
~~~
Ronon doesn't know how to react in the immediate aftermath. He isn’t allowed to go back and avenge the death when that would've been the only useful response. He doesn't understand why Dr Weir makes them stand down from off-world missions, and keeps telling them they need time to mourn. Ronon doesn't succeed in biting his tongue about the weakness and futility of it all.
It's Dr Weir who finds him in the mess late at night staring at the glasses of blue Jello. She sits with him in silence for a long time and then shares four servings. He's eternally grateful that she doesn't ever make him admit that she was right.
In the decades to come Ronon stays on in Atlantis. He remains long after most of the initial personnel have returned to Earth, even though his reactions have slowed and the urge to stop running is a constant presence. McKay's name is on the list of all those he has lost and he recites it from memory whenever he feels weariness and age take precedence over his anger.
~~~
After she announces Rodney's death to the city, Elizabeth asks Caldwell to oversee the return of the off-world teams. She then walks to her quarters, sits down on the bed and prays for the first time in seventeen years. Afterwards, she still feels as hollow as before, so she walks back to the control room and resumes command.
The memorial service contains no prayers or hymns, Rodney's posthumous scorn too loud to even consider it, but a series of anecdotes from scientists and marines have her laughing and crying in equal measure and it's the closest she's had to spiritual strength in a long, long time.
A decade later, in the middle of a negotiation for Earth, the ambassador from P3X-542 tells her that the effects of their enemy's plague ravaged three quarters of their solar system. Elizabeth corrects it to 'five sixths' before she realises it and then collapses into a fit of laughter. When she recovers, she apologises and tells everyone that it's not an exact science.
~~~
John takes a 'jumper out as soon as they leave the infirmary and tells the control room he's going to the mainland. He hovers out over the ocean, letting his mind wander anywhere but the present. The 'jumper submerges itself on an unconscious command and he's a thousand feet under before he hears Elizabeth's voice over the radio telling him that Rodney's not down there.
Over the next few weeks, the only thing John lets himself think about is how he and Rodney never got to finish their argument. John had been providing counterpoint to Rodney's insistence that military solutions throughout history were all variations of point and shoot, when someone had pointed and shot. John stops dead in the middle of inventory when he realises that Rodney died proving himself right.
Their first mission back, a blonde official from some royal court tries to seduce him and it isn’t until after the de-briefing, when he's showering in his quarters, that John realises it's Rodney's voice he's been hearing in his head all afternoon. The next day, he signs the official mission report Captain Kirk because it seems like the right thing to do.
Eighteen months later, John flies a puddle-jumper into the middle of three hive ships and detonates his payload. He doesn't say goodbye to anyone but his last thought is how utterly pissed Rodney would be that their defences haven't progressed at all.
~~~
The city is so quiet and sombre in the weeks following Dr McKay's death that it reminds Teyla of the cullings of her childhood. It's confusing at first how the loss of one man can rival the death of entire families, entire generations, and Teyla wants to scream into the subdued atmosphere that this isn’t the worse that she's seen. But then she meets Sheppard's eyes one evening in the gym and she knows that quantity doesn't factor into it at all.
To everyone's surprise, two years later when defences have finally been devised and installed, Teyla chooses to return with her people to Athos. She settles quickly back into the leadership of her people and only has the time to think of Atlantis once every three months when she waits by the Stargate for their routine check-in.
Her first son, born a year after her return, is the first in the settlement to know what a prime number is.
~~~
After three hours sat alone in the dark of his lab, Radek stands up, opens his laptop and sends a rude e-mail to Kavanagh for no apparent reason. He works for forty eight hours straight, raiding Dr Vogel's pastry stash to avoid leaving the lab. He agrees to go and get some sleep after Miko politely reminds him that even Rodney left for food.
Radek's handed de facto control of the science department after the memorial service. He spends the next few weeks explaining to Elizabeth that it wasn't just Rodney's expertise that ran the department but his presence, and that isn’t something he ever claimed to rival. In the end she gets angry with him and says that maybe life will be easier for the scientists now Rodney isn't around. He comforts her when she cries and tells her that Rodney would've been the first to admit that.
It takes fifteen years for the Atlantis programme to be declassified, and when it is Radek publishes a backlog of research. Some of it is authored solely by him, some with colleagues from Atlantis but the one that gets all the attention is co-authored with Rodney. The only change Radek makes to the manuscript is to put his own name first, because even seventeen years later he still refuses to lose that argument. When the research earns Radek the Nobel Prize, he doesn't write an acceptance speech. Rodney would have wanted to do all the talking.
~end~