Current mood:	accomplished
Current music:	Under Pressure, Queen
Entry tags:	aad, fic, sga

New Fic: Words
For Alyse...

Title: Words
Author: The Moonmoth
Words: ~1,500
Genre: gen
Characters: McKay, Carter, Sheppard
Summary: Even Carter has to have days when the Universe doesn't fit together properly.
Notes: For Alyse Appreciation Day. Big ole beta thanks to kageygirl


Words
by The Moonmoth

***

Sometimes, Rodney ruminates, the Universe can be so staggeringly beautiful, so extraordinarily, mathematically elegant, that when he comes to some new layer of understanding, some new insight into that great big why, it's so perfect he wants to fall to his knees and stare up at the starry sky in wide-eyed reverence. This is not one of those times.

The lab is empty but seems busier than when it was full of people, the hum of computers and equipment left to run overnight somehow overshadowing his uncharacteristically quiet staff today. It's starting to really grate on his nerves, distracting at times, soothing at others, and he narrows his eyes at his work, forcing them to stay open and focus.

His own laptop is sitting neglected at the end of the table under a stack of papers covered in his scribblings. Simpson, his coding goddess, had stared at him like he was some kind of dinosaur when he'd dragged a notebook (an honest-to-God paper one) and pen out of the depths of his desk. It's something of an annoyance that you can't write a program for a problem you don't at least begin to understand. That's beyond even Simpson. She's long gone, anyway, in bed fast asleep like the rest of the sensible people.

It's just something he's been playing around with, anyway, some funky Ancient math from their ZPM work he's been trying to make sense of in his own time, picked up now more from a need to not go back to his room than to be diligent. He'd thought for a while that he might actually be making some progress, but things have gone quite wrong in between then and now. He doesn't want to know what time it is.

But now he's into it, well, he won't be able to sleep until he's done. So Rodney works on through numb fingertips and an aching wrist that aren't used to using a pen anymore, and watches in dismay as his tensors grow higher and higher in rank, his indices becoming more and more unruly.

Not for the first time today, he thinks of Sam Carter. This isn't art, he thinks, staring in disgust at the lines of messy, anarchic algebra. This isn't like those moments of revelation when he thinks he understands what physics is like for her. This is brute force, ugly and inelegant and he can hear Carter laughing at him in his head.

***

Despite spending almost the entire day in the lab, Rodney's somehow seen a lot of Colonel Sheppard. Not really spoken with him, or interacted with him, but those times when Rodney had looked up, Sheppard had often been there. Which was strange, because he'd figured that, after yesterday, Sheppard was bound to be busy.

Transfixed for a moment by the memory of all that blood, Rodney stares unseeing at his hands. Then shaking himself out of it, he stands abruptly and goes around the lab turning off all the computers, slamming down the laptop screens. He knows Miko and Kavanagh are running simulations, but sometimes you have to make sacrifices for the greater good, and the efficiency of Rodney's brain -- as he's sure they would agree -- far outweighs any lesser concerns.

Silence remains elusive, the space in between filled with the heavy sound of his own breathing, and he sits back down and rubs his face, absolutely not feeling guilty for an outburst no one else has even seen.

Now, Sheppard -- you never saw Sheppard regretful. Then again, Rodney had never seen him destroy his colleagues' work in a fit of post-traumatic stress, either. Funny that Rodney has seen him at all today, actually. He'd figured Sheppard would be busy, yes, but interviewing, debriefing, report-writing, not to-ing and fro-ing down the corridor all day, looking in with an expression that wasn't exactly neutral, but wasn't really much more than that.

He'd come in just once, briefly, just Sheppard and Rodney and Zelenka over by the whiteboard. He'd stood on the other side of the desk, peering down at Rodney's math, hands sitting loosely on his hips, and it had struck Rodney how strangely open the gesture was for someone holding so much back.

'I know what the problem is,' Sheppard had said, voice light, and Rodney had put his pen down and stared up at him in disbelief, because they'd both been there when Lorne and Miller had come through the gate dragging the bodies of their teammates.

But, 'Oh really?' was all that escaped his mouth while the rest got stuck in his throat.

Sheppard had nodded at Rodney's notebook, the lines of equations with their symbols and letters and numbers. 'There aren't enough words.' He'd quirked an eyebrow but his face was still all wrong, and before Rodney could snap out a ha ha, Colonel, he'd added, 'Get some sleep, Rodney,' and turned to go, and that was that.

Except that it wasn't, because Rodney isn't in the habit of taking orders in his own lab, and he hadn't been finished yet, anyway. He can't just leave mid-equation. He'd never be able to sleep.

Not long after, Radek had stood and shrugged on his jacket. He'd looked at Rodney as he was leaving, brow crinkled up and eyes very blue behind his glasses.

***

One of the few -- possibly the only -- joys of working in Antarctica had been Sam. Sure, she hadn't actually been there in person a lot of the time, but Rodney was fully capable of appreciating her in more than the physical sense. All the bantering and sexual tension aside, he'd never had a more successful collaboration in the entirety of his career.

He figured it was probably for the best that she'd been called away to Russia on the day they were scheduled to finally leave. A messy, emotional goodbye in the gateroom wasn't what either of them wanted.

They did have their farewell, though. She came to his temporary lab at the SGC, all golden hair, blue eyes, bright smile, biting out snappy retorts about not missing him one bit. He'd just ended up grinning a little dazedly at her, and she'd actually softened at that, reached out and squeezed his arm.

She'd wished him good luck, all the best, blah blah, and then, undoubtedly thinking she was passing on some nugget, she'd told him, 'Stick to your strengths -- stay away from the fieldwork. A glory hound like you, McKay, you won't even notice the danger half the time. Leave it up to the professionals, okay?'

He'd looked at her carefully, wanting to laugh in her face, but for once he saw what she wasn't saying, for once he didn't see anything other than a concern and a fondness he found more offensive than anything she'd ever said to him.

At least he had the satisfaction of knowing she hadn't been right. It hadn't even been his team, had it? Although maybe the shame he feels at being glad of that fact is part of what she meant.

She hadn't been right. He just... he just...

***

'Rodney,' Sheppard drawls, tipping his head with a patronising scorn that makes Rodney scowl into his coffee, 'have you been up all night again?'

Rodney can guess, though, that it's not exactly morning yet. Sheppard might be damp-haired and freshly shaved, his uniform not on long enough yet for it to have achieved its usual lived-in look, but Rodney knows enough about his habits by now to see the fine lines around his eyes that speak of a determination to enter wakefulness rather than any natural return to the land of the conscious.

The scene is almost identical to yesterday -- earlier today? Rodney's feeling a little lost -- Sheppard standing in front of the desk, hands on his hips. But suddenly, Rodney sees it now, like the problem with his math, hiding in plain sight. And it's not like he hadn't known before that Sheppard was shocked and grieving and bleeding too, it's just the reality of seeing it in his face that gives him such a jolt.

He finds that it makes something in him ease a little, because Sheppard's the pilot, the military man, the hero. Sheppard's like Carter, and Rodney's allowed to feel the same way Sheppard does.

Slumping back in his chair, holding his coffee tightly with both hands, Rodney stares blearily up at Sheppard. 'It was worth it,' he says, and Sheppard's eyes fall to the desk where Rodney has finally managed to beat his tensors into submission.

'Still not enough words,' he says.

Rodney waves a hand dismissively. 'You don't need them for this.'

Sheppard nods, moves to sit half on the edge of the desk, and Rodney thinks the lines around his eyes might now be from the faintest of smiles.

Rodney suspects, closing his eyes and letting his coffee rest on his stomach, that even Carter has to have days when the Universe doesn't fit together properly. And he realises he hasn't actually solved anything, but now at least he maybe understands the problem.

When he awakes some hours later to the quiet activity around him, his coffee is stone cold, but on the desk rather than all over his pants, and his uniform jacket is tucked neatly around his shoulders.