SGA fic: "A Different Kind Of Normal" - R[John/Teyla]
TITLE: A Different Kind Of Normal
AUTHOR: Tielan
SUMMARY: John hates the scrabbling feel of a Wraith Queen in his mind, eking out his thoughts, forcing down his resistance, dancing him like a puppet to her will.
RATING: R
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, making no money
WARNINGS: implied BDSM
NOTES: Written for het_idcrack and Stargate Atlantis prompt #5. John/Teyla -- John is taken prisoner by a hostile hive and Teyla has to go undercover as a Wraith Queen to rescue him, claiming him as her human. John likes this rather more than he wants to. Unbeta'd, because I can't find someone to beta my stuff who has the time/inclination to be critical. If you do, let me know, please. I haven't had a steady beta since my primary beta drifted out of SGA fandom 5 years ago.
A Different Kind Of Normal
John hates the scrabbling feel of a Wraith Queen in his mind, eking out his thoughts, forcing down his resistance, dancing him like a puppet to her will.
That's what he tells Heightmeyer the first time, after facing the Queen whose Hive they tried to infiltrate during the fiasco with Ford and the enzyme. And Heightmeyer nods and makes notes, earnest and interested as she ekes the details of the mission out of him. Her report indicates that Colonel Sheppard is competent to carry out his duties as the military leader of Atlantis, and that's all that matters to John.
He doesn't tell anyone about the nights. They don't have to know.
--
The second time, John can't sleep for the memory of the ancient Wraith Queen's cat-slit eyes watching him, willing him, commanding him with unblinking power. He thinks of the way his heart squeezed in his chest as though a great fist surrounded it. He thinks of that mind, ancient and terrible, like steel fingers around his will, forcing him to back away from the console.
In the communal bunking space, it's only him and Teyla and Ronon, and the other two are sleeping, unaware of the catch of his breath.
It's hot under the blanket, hazy and warm, and he adjusts himself again and again, never quite touching, always teasing. Tension heightens, winding him like a guitar string on a tuning peg, until the ache is sharp as a razor and his teeth leave marks in his lip to keep from crying out.
It would be easier to jerk himself off in the bathrooms.
That's not what he wants. It's not what he needs.
--
John keeps his eyes on the horizon, his hands gripping his P-90 harder than they should.
If he doesn't, he might end up staring at Teyla as she drifts through the landscape, looking incongrouous in her disguise as a Wraith Queen with her P-90 held loosely by her chest as though there's no reason for concern.
Maybe there isn't any reason for a Wraith Queen to be concerned; maybe she can sense that.
She's not a Queen, he reminds himself for the umpteenth time. There are moments when it's hard to remember - and yet, whatever she is, John knows she's still Teyla. And you're staring again, John. For fuck's sake, stop it!
She pauses in her roaming across this interim planet that they've stopped at so Rodney can check the 'jumper over for any tracking devices Todd might have left with them. Her shoulders are straight and square, her head tilted as though she's listening. Then her face turns towards John, unerring as steel to a magnet.
Except that she's the magnet, and John's the helpless steel.
From nearly twenty yards away, she pins him like a lepidopterist pins a butterfly for study.
It feels like forever before she turns away, and when she does, John's collar is damp with sweat and his trousers are tight.
--
Drones shove him down to his knees before the thrones, and John grimaces as pain blossoms along his knees. Then he freezes.
Thrones, plural.
Two thrones, two Queens. Two to try where one alone failed. Two of them rummaging around in his head, peeling back his insides like he'd peel an apple, leaving him bare and ripe for the first bite that will lead them to the juicy fruit of Atlantis and through Atlantis, to Earth.
Fear shudders through him, and determination. He won't give it up easily - whatever comes, he'll fight it.
But there's something else, too.
In spite of the chill of the hiveship, in spite of the icy thought that he could betray Atlantis with a couple of Queens rummaging around in his head, a hot flush steals across his skin. It's a physiological reaction, like adrenaline, like nausea; John can't help it.
It's not the Queens; it's not the Wraith; it's what they do to him.
It's what a part of him wants - craves - and which he can't get anywhere else.
And God, how many kinds of sick does that make him?
"As you can see, he has been well-kept." The melodious voice of the Queen who captured him slithers through the room, through his belly, through his balls. "We have not touched him."
"Your consideration for my property is great," says a new voice, cool and light, resonant with meaning.
John's head jerks up and the eyes he meets are cat-slit gold in Teyla's face, seated in the throne, as though she has a perfect right to be here, watching him with lazy eyes. As though she owns him.
"Yes," she says, and the bite in her voice is like cold fingers traced gently down his spine. "I am here to collect you. You have caused me a great inconvenience."
His mouth is dry as dust as he stares at her, his heart pounding in his chest, his blood throbbing in his balls. "I..."
Teyla cuts across him, sharp and cold as the edge of a knife. "Your excuses will wait - as will the accounting your Queen requires."
And just like that he's dismissed. Cut off and left to wait while Teyla exchanges sword-words with the other Queen.
John's gaze drifts away and meets Todd's sidewise smile over Teyla's shoulder.
--
"There is a part of us that yearns to submit."
The breath hisses out of John as he turns to face the Wraith standing at the 'door' of what's been designated his rooms. "Ever heard of knocking?"
"Such courtesies are not needful among Wraith, Sheppard. There are other means of making oneself known." The pale head inclines. "In more ways than one."
John wants to ask what the hell the Wraith is talking about, but he doesn't dare.
"You feel it, the same as I. Perhaps more powerfully. You know her as your own kind, after all."
Denial rises in his throat, sticks there as he looks at the tall, angular Wraith whose lips curl at the corners - the faintest smirk of an unlikely kinship. But if he can't refute what Todd's saying, he doesn't have to confirm it either. "How long before we reach the meeting point?"
"Two days. You are comfortable?"
"It's not the Ritz-Carlton but it'll do." John glances around at the hive chamber, the cool air, the way everything feels slightly organic - like it might go 'blomp' at any moment. He's not comfortable, but it's better than the prison where he spent the last week, waiting for death or interrogation and wondering why neither came. "Thanks for the rescue, by the way."
Todd makes a noise that's probably a Wraith snort of amusement. "You should thank the Queen. It was her idea and her implementation."
Through his distraction with Todd's term 'the Queen', John thinks of walking into Teyla's chambers sans knock, thinks of her sitting across from him, watching him, her skin the wrong colour, her face the wrong shape, but the look in her eyes pure Teyla - the fit of her disguise settling around her like a chameleon's new skin.
He shivers again, and it's not with cold.
--
When he opens the door, Teyla's standing outside.
"May I come in?"
The formality seems strange. She's been in here many times before - both with the others and without, talking, eating dinner, watching TV, debating ideas and thoughts, concepts that are foreign to him, to her, to all of them. She's never been uncomfortable. Not like this.
"Sure."
He steps back to let her come in and then, as she strides into the middle of the room, wishes he'd made her say her piece outside. Keller might have reversed the cosmetic changes that made Teyla look like a Wraith Queen, but Teyla hasn't shed the behaviour yet. She moves with the confidence of a Wraith Queen on a hiveship: everything belongs to her, is due to her...submits to her.
Her saunter leaves his mouth dry and he moistens his lips. John hasn't had time to take care of himself yet - away from the hiveship, away from her overwhelming presence as a Wraith Queen, away from Todd and his too-knowing gaze - so even just watching her walk is hell.
He hides it by asking, "Everything back to normal?"
"There are some aches, but otherwise no complaints." Her quirk of the lips is distracted - and distracting. "You?"
John shrugs, forcing himself to nonchalance. "I've been checked out. They won't be sure until the bloodwork comes back tomorrow, but everything seems okay." Teyla doesn't seem to be listening, which is unlike her, and while he could wait for her to get to whatever's bothering her, he's not in much of a mood. "What brings you here?"
Teyla is staring at his desk, a faint furrow between her brows. It's a moment before she turns. "You do, John."
And the look in her eyes slams his heart into his throat.
You feel it, the same as I. Perhaps more powerfully. You know her as your own kind, after all.
"Kneel," she says.
It's a murmur, nothing else, and John's on his knees before he realises there's nothing forcing him down.
He's on his knees of his own volition. His mind is his own, with none of the subtle pressure in his head as his will is subverted to the Queen. He's on his knees by the door, with Teyla leaning against his desk watching him with questioning eyes.
"How long have you known this?"
John doesn't know what 'this' is - his reaction to Wraith Queens, or his desire to be down on his knees with someone he trusts? Either way, the answer's the same, forced through dry lips and a dry throat, even if she's not the one forcing him to speak.
"For a while. Teyla... I..."
He wants to explain himself - that it's not this, or, rather, not just this. He wants to explain that he's not sick, or some kind of a Wraith-worshipper when it comes to the Queens - which she shouldn't think because it's a Teyla-thing to know without him having to say - but it niggles at him that she might.
Now that he's here, down on the floor, he wants it off his chest and out in the open. He wants to be honest - he always has - but the words won't come; old fears catching at the words in his throat before he can get them out.
"There is nothing wrong with this, John."
It shakes him, the calm in her voice anchoring her words and he looks away, looks down. In his memory, the thready panic of another voice replays over with bitter intensity.
What's wrong with you, John? Or...or is it me?
It wasn't Nancy. It wasn't ever Nancy - at least, not just her. But he couldn't explain what it was - not without opening himself up to a void that he already knew could never be filled by his then-wife.
And this is Teyla, with whom he has a lot more at stake - friendship, an alliance, trust...
There is nothing wrong with this, John.
Laughter chokes in his throat, bitter as salt. "Tell that to the shrinks, Teyla! It's not normal for a guy like me to want...to want..."
"To want to be told what to do? To wish to let go of the burden of authority? To desire submission to someone else's will?" Her eyes hold his as he nods, shame weighing in his gut like cement. "Why can this not be a different kind of normal, John?"
The thready note in her voice isn't quite laughter, isn't quite grief. John can't think what it is when she's watching him, when his blood is gathering in his cock, when his muscles are straining against invisible bonds. He can't see how he's going to get out of this with her respect - after all, there's nothing holding him in place but Teyla's eyes.
"Is that what you want, John?"
A direct question, one he can't evade. "Yes."
Teyla crosses the room, swift sharp bootsteps that resonate in every straining muscle in his body as she draws close. She moves around behind him, and although he should turn his head to follow her, he doesn't.
Her hand skims across his hair, and the jolting caress breaks him into a damp sweat. "Say it. Tell me you want to submit."
He closes his eyes to shut out the room, but he can't shut out the way her fingers stir his hair down his nape, the heat of her body behind his, the edge in her voice. He can't shut out the way he responds to her - to Teyla, to the Queen in her, to this woman who knows him too well and not well enough.
The silence goes too long for her patience. Her fingers clench in his hair, tugging his head back, baring his throat. "John? Tell me what you want."
Desire is sharp as a knife, sharp as her voice, cutting through the cords of his will. John can breathe, but he can't swallow, and his neck muscles strain as she slides her free hand down the column of his throat. When he forces his eyes open, her face is inverted above his as she gazes down, the long trailing curtains of her hair framing eyes, cheekbones, nose, lips...
It's not her, it's him.
Him and his own screwed-upness - the screwed-upness of him, and his relationships, and the way he thinks of his screwed-upness.
"I want..." John begins and stops, starts again. He will answer this. He'll say it out loud. This isn't a revelation to Teyla, she already knows. It's not her acceptance he needs, it's his own. A different kind of normal. "I want to give in. To you."
In the moment after the words are spoken, it's as though everything holds its breath, waiting for her response. John's chest feels tight and his throat tense as he watches for her reaction.
Then she smiles - soft, but with a touch of steel, and a quiver runs through him like an orgasm.
Teyla bends down and her lips brush across his cheekbone and down his jaw to his mouth. John tilts his head back and gives himself over to the kiss: the tight clench of her fingers in his hair, the fingers stirring down his pecs, and the way her mouth possesses him, demanding his acquiescence.
When her lips lift from his with a nip of teeth that stings his swollen mouth, her breath comes rough, too.
"I said your Queen would require an accounting of you, John," she murmurs, lashes lifting over eyes that are dark now but which were golden then - human and Wraith both, seeing, knowing, and accepting. "Consider this your accounting."
Later, sprawled on sheets damp with his sweat with Teyla spreadeagled on top of him, her fingers hard on his wrists, John lies utterly satiated and completely at rest, and considers the bill very well-paid.
- fin -
AUTHOR: Tielan
SUMMARY: John hates the scrabbling feel of a Wraith Queen in his mind, eking out his thoughts, forcing down his resistance, dancing him like a puppet to her will.
RATING: R
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, making no money
WARNINGS: implied BDSM
NOTES: Written for het_idcrack and Stargate Atlantis prompt #5. John/Teyla -- John is taken prisoner by a hostile hive and Teyla has to go undercover as a Wraith Queen to rescue him, claiming him as her human. John likes this rather more than he wants to. Unbeta'd, because I can't find someone to beta my stuff who has the time/inclination to be critical. If you do, let me know, please. I haven't had a steady beta since my primary beta drifted out of SGA fandom 5 years ago.
A Different Kind Of Normal
John hates the scrabbling feel of a Wraith Queen in his mind, eking out his thoughts, forcing down his resistance, dancing him like a puppet to her will.
That's what he tells Heightmeyer the first time, after facing the Queen whose Hive they tried to infiltrate during the fiasco with Ford and the enzyme. And Heightmeyer nods and makes notes, earnest and interested as she ekes the details of the mission out of him. Her report indicates that Colonel Sheppard is competent to carry out his duties as the military leader of Atlantis, and that's all that matters to John.
He doesn't tell anyone about the nights. They don't have to know.
--
The second time, John can't sleep for the memory of the ancient Wraith Queen's cat-slit eyes watching him, willing him, commanding him with unblinking power. He thinks of the way his heart squeezed in his chest as though a great fist surrounded it. He thinks of that mind, ancient and terrible, like steel fingers around his will, forcing him to back away from the console.
In the communal bunking space, it's only him and Teyla and Ronon, and the other two are sleeping, unaware of the catch of his breath.
It's hot under the blanket, hazy and warm, and he adjusts himself again and again, never quite touching, always teasing. Tension heightens, winding him like a guitar string on a tuning peg, until the ache is sharp as a razor and his teeth leave marks in his lip to keep from crying out.
It would be easier to jerk himself off in the bathrooms.
That's not what he wants. It's not what he needs.
--
John keeps his eyes on the horizon, his hands gripping his P-90 harder than they should.
If he doesn't, he might end up staring at Teyla as she drifts through the landscape, looking incongrouous in her disguise as a Wraith Queen with her P-90 held loosely by her chest as though there's no reason for concern.
Maybe there isn't any reason for a Wraith Queen to be concerned; maybe she can sense that.
She's not a Queen, he reminds himself for the umpteenth time. There are moments when it's hard to remember - and yet, whatever she is, John knows she's still Teyla. And you're staring again, John. For fuck's sake, stop it!
She pauses in her roaming across this interim planet that they've stopped at so Rodney can check the 'jumper over for any tracking devices Todd might have left with them. Her shoulders are straight and square, her head tilted as though she's listening. Then her face turns towards John, unerring as steel to a magnet.
Except that she's the magnet, and John's the helpless steel.
From nearly twenty yards away, she pins him like a lepidopterist pins a butterfly for study.
It feels like forever before she turns away, and when she does, John's collar is damp with sweat and his trousers are tight.
--
Drones shove him down to his knees before the thrones, and John grimaces as pain blossoms along his knees. Then he freezes.
Thrones, plural.
Two thrones, two Queens. Two to try where one alone failed. Two of them rummaging around in his head, peeling back his insides like he'd peel an apple, leaving him bare and ripe for the first bite that will lead them to the juicy fruit of Atlantis and through Atlantis, to Earth.
Fear shudders through him, and determination. He won't give it up easily - whatever comes, he'll fight it.
But there's something else, too.
In spite of the chill of the hiveship, in spite of the icy thought that he could betray Atlantis with a couple of Queens rummaging around in his head, a hot flush steals across his skin. It's a physiological reaction, like adrenaline, like nausea; John can't help it.
It's not the Queens; it's not the Wraith; it's what they do to him.
It's what a part of him wants - craves - and which he can't get anywhere else.
And God, how many kinds of sick does that make him?
"As you can see, he has been well-kept." The melodious voice of the Queen who captured him slithers through the room, through his belly, through his balls. "We have not touched him."
"Your consideration for my property is great," says a new voice, cool and light, resonant with meaning.
John's head jerks up and the eyes he meets are cat-slit gold in Teyla's face, seated in the throne, as though she has a perfect right to be here, watching him with lazy eyes. As though she owns him.
"Yes," she says, and the bite in her voice is like cold fingers traced gently down his spine. "I am here to collect you. You have caused me a great inconvenience."
His mouth is dry as dust as he stares at her, his heart pounding in his chest, his blood throbbing in his balls. "I..."
Teyla cuts across him, sharp and cold as the edge of a knife. "Your excuses will wait - as will the accounting your Queen requires."
And just like that he's dismissed. Cut off and left to wait while Teyla exchanges sword-words with the other Queen.
John's gaze drifts away and meets Todd's sidewise smile over Teyla's shoulder.
--
"There is a part of us that yearns to submit."
The breath hisses out of John as he turns to face the Wraith standing at the 'door' of what's been designated his rooms. "Ever heard of knocking?"
"Such courtesies are not needful among Wraith, Sheppard. There are other means of making oneself known." The pale head inclines. "In more ways than one."
John wants to ask what the hell the Wraith is talking about, but he doesn't dare.
"You feel it, the same as I. Perhaps more powerfully. You know her as your own kind, after all."
Denial rises in his throat, sticks there as he looks at the tall, angular Wraith whose lips curl at the corners - the faintest smirk of an unlikely kinship. But if he can't refute what Todd's saying, he doesn't have to confirm it either. "How long before we reach the meeting point?"
"Two days. You are comfortable?"
"It's not the Ritz-Carlton but it'll do." John glances around at the hive chamber, the cool air, the way everything feels slightly organic - like it might go 'blomp' at any moment. He's not comfortable, but it's better than the prison where he spent the last week, waiting for death or interrogation and wondering why neither came. "Thanks for the rescue, by the way."
Todd makes a noise that's probably a Wraith snort of amusement. "You should thank the Queen. It was her idea and her implementation."
Through his distraction with Todd's term 'the Queen', John thinks of walking into Teyla's chambers sans knock, thinks of her sitting across from him, watching him, her skin the wrong colour, her face the wrong shape, but the look in her eyes pure Teyla - the fit of her disguise settling around her like a chameleon's new skin.
He shivers again, and it's not with cold.
--
When he opens the door, Teyla's standing outside.
"May I come in?"
The formality seems strange. She's been in here many times before - both with the others and without, talking, eating dinner, watching TV, debating ideas and thoughts, concepts that are foreign to him, to her, to all of them. She's never been uncomfortable. Not like this.
"Sure."
He steps back to let her come in and then, as she strides into the middle of the room, wishes he'd made her say her piece outside. Keller might have reversed the cosmetic changes that made Teyla look like a Wraith Queen, but Teyla hasn't shed the behaviour yet. She moves with the confidence of a Wraith Queen on a hiveship: everything belongs to her, is due to her...submits to her.
Her saunter leaves his mouth dry and he moistens his lips. John hasn't had time to take care of himself yet - away from the hiveship, away from her overwhelming presence as a Wraith Queen, away from Todd and his too-knowing gaze - so even just watching her walk is hell.
He hides it by asking, "Everything back to normal?"
"There are some aches, but otherwise no complaints." Her quirk of the lips is distracted - and distracting. "You?"
John shrugs, forcing himself to nonchalance. "I've been checked out. They won't be sure until the bloodwork comes back tomorrow, but everything seems okay." Teyla doesn't seem to be listening, which is unlike her, and while he could wait for her to get to whatever's bothering her, he's not in much of a mood. "What brings you here?"
Teyla is staring at his desk, a faint furrow between her brows. It's a moment before she turns. "You do, John."
And the look in her eyes slams his heart into his throat.
You feel it, the same as I. Perhaps more powerfully. You know her as your own kind, after all.
"Kneel," she says.
It's a murmur, nothing else, and John's on his knees before he realises there's nothing forcing him down.
He's on his knees of his own volition. His mind is his own, with none of the subtle pressure in his head as his will is subverted to the Queen. He's on his knees by the door, with Teyla leaning against his desk watching him with questioning eyes.
"How long have you known this?"
John doesn't know what 'this' is - his reaction to Wraith Queens, or his desire to be down on his knees with someone he trusts? Either way, the answer's the same, forced through dry lips and a dry throat, even if she's not the one forcing him to speak.
"For a while. Teyla... I..."
He wants to explain himself - that it's not this, or, rather, not just this. He wants to explain that he's not sick, or some kind of a Wraith-worshipper when it comes to the Queens - which she shouldn't think because it's a Teyla-thing to know without him having to say - but it niggles at him that she might.
Now that he's here, down on the floor, he wants it off his chest and out in the open. He wants to be honest - he always has - but the words won't come; old fears catching at the words in his throat before he can get them out.
"There is nothing wrong with this, John."
It shakes him, the calm in her voice anchoring her words and he looks away, looks down. In his memory, the thready panic of another voice replays over with bitter intensity.
What's wrong with you, John? Or...or is it me?
It wasn't Nancy. It wasn't ever Nancy - at least, not just her. But he couldn't explain what it was - not without opening himself up to a void that he already knew could never be filled by his then-wife.
And this is Teyla, with whom he has a lot more at stake - friendship, an alliance, trust...
There is nothing wrong with this, John.
Laughter chokes in his throat, bitter as salt. "Tell that to the shrinks, Teyla! It's not normal for a guy like me to want...to want..."
"To want to be told what to do? To wish to let go of the burden of authority? To desire submission to someone else's will?" Her eyes hold his as he nods, shame weighing in his gut like cement. "Why can this not be a different kind of normal, John?"
The thready note in her voice isn't quite laughter, isn't quite grief. John can't think what it is when she's watching him, when his blood is gathering in his cock, when his muscles are straining against invisible bonds. He can't see how he's going to get out of this with her respect - after all, there's nothing holding him in place but Teyla's eyes.
"Is that what you want, John?"
A direct question, one he can't evade. "Yes."
Teyla crosses the room, swift sharp bootsteps that resonate in every straining muscle in his body as she draws close. She moves around behind him, and although he should turn his head to follow her, he doesn't.
Her hand skims across his hair, and the jolting caress breaks him into a damp sweat. "Say it. Tell me you want to submit."
He closes his eyes to shut out the room, but he can't shut out the way her fingers stir his hair down his nape, the heat of her body behind his, the edge in her voice. He can't shut out the way he responds to her - to Teyla, to the Queen in her, to this woman who knows him too well and not well enough.
The silence goes too long for her patience. Her fingers clench in his hair, tugging his head back, baring his throat. "John? Tell me what you want."
Desire is sharp as a knife, sharp as her voice, cutting through the cords of his will. John can breathe, but he can't swallow, and his neck muscles strain as she slides her free hand down the column of his throat. When he forces his eyes open, her face is inverted above his as she gazes down, the long trailing curtains of her hair framing eyes, cheekbones, nose, lips...
It's not her, it's him.
Him and his own screwed-upness - the screwed-upness of him, and his relationships, and the way he thinks of his screwed-upness.
"I want..." John begins and stops, starts again. He will answer this. He'll say it out loud. This isn't a revelation to Teyla, she already knows. It's not her acceptance he needs, it's his own. A different kind of normal. "I want to give in. To you."
In the moment after the words are spoken, it's as though everything holds its breath, waiting for her response. John's chest feels tight and his throat tense as he watches for her reaction.
Then she smiles - soft, but with a touch of steel, and a quiver runs through him like an orgasm.
Teyla bends down and her lips brush across his cheekbone and down his jaw to his mouth. John tilts his head back and gives himself over to the kiss: the tight clench of her fingers in his hair, the fingers stirring down his pecs, and the way her mouth possesses him, demanding his acquiescence.
When her lips lift from his with a nip of teeth that stings his swollen mouth, her breath comes rough, too.
"I said your Queen would require an accounting of you, John," she murmurs, lashes lifting over eyes that are dark now but which were golden then - human and Wraith both, seeing, knowing, and accepting. "Consider this your accounting."
Later, sprawled on sheets damp with his sweat with Teyla spreadeagled on top of him, her fingers hard on his wrists, John lies utterly satiated and completely at rest, and considers the bill very well-paid.
- fin -