Springtime for Atlantis – Part Two

[cait]

 Springtime for Atlantis – Part Two

 

Fortunately, the nursing staff was more than happy to come up and change the baby’s thrown together diapers and feed the baby.  They found some clothes, somewhere, and John didn’t want to meet whoever had brought along baby clothes as their luxury item.

“What a good girl,” Nurse Bramsley crooned, as she picked the baby up to feed her a bottle.  John busied himself refolding Rodney’s socks so that he wouldn’t be asked if he wanted a turn.

“She just does not cry.” Nurse Bramsley smiled over at Rodney.  “What’s her name?” 

Rodney’s fingers stilled on the keyboard, and he looked frantically over at John.

“Um?”

Bramsley’s eyebrows went up past her hairline, John winced – he was pretty sure she’d had kids at one point who had died – most people on the Atlantis expedition either were social retards, or had death in the family. 

“Thanks Teyla,” Rodney’s voice was relieved as he clicked off his comm.  “Her name’s Nora.”

Bramsley’s smile was thin lipped.  “There you go, Nora,” she said with emphasis, burping the baby.

She handed the baby back to John.  Nora blinked at him, and threw up all over his shirt.

Brampton laughed merrily. “Have fun with your Daddies, Nora!”

John had to sit down and concentrate very hard on not standing up and running after her.  Nora was heavy in his arms.

“We need to get out of here,” John said to Rodney, who was hunched over the laptop.

“God yes,” Rodney said, not even looking up. “Get her out of here, I’m busy.”

John was stung, but he swung out of the room without even trying to close the door one handed.

He went down to the mess, and Rodney was right, it was incredibly far away.  It took twice the time to walk down there, because every single person he passed had to stop and chuck the baby under her chin or coo over her blue eyes and tiny hands. 

Nora didn’t smile at any of them, she just stared and submitted to their patting hands. 

“I know, buddy,” John said to her after they had escaped a horde of clucking Marines, “I wouldn’t like it either.”

Nora threw up on him.

John sighed.  “I would probably do that too.”

 

*

 

John was planning to sit alone in the mess, but that plan was derailed almost immediately when it turned out that he needed one hand to grab food, and one hand to hold the tray and one hand to hold Nora.  He was going to slink over to a table and pretend he hadn’t been hungry, but Ronon saw him and came up to look at the baby.

John passed the baby over willingly, and once he had filled his tray he stuffed extra food in his pocket for Rodney.

When they sat down at Ronon’s table, Ronon started matter of factly undressing Nora.  John thought he should say something, but he hadn’t eaten since he’d got home from the baby planet yesterday and he really didn’t want to have to eat everything one handed.

“She is right.” Ronon said with evident relief, once he had examined her every limb.  “I was worried the Gods might have punished her.”

John nodded.  As was often the case with Ronon, it seemed to be the best thing to do.  And that way he wouldn’t have to stop eating.

Ronon held her up so that she was eye level with him.  “I am your godfather.  I will protect you.”

“Gee, thanks Ronon.” John was touched.  It was nice to have the support of his team.

Ronon held Nora to face John.  “I’ll find her a good husband.”

John choked a little on his sandwich.  “Not yet, though.” He didn’t even want to think of the fact that soon she would start walking.

“Yeah,” agreed Ronon. “There’s a new group of Marines coming on the Daedelus.  We should wait to test them.”

“Uh,” said John eloquently.

“It’s my duty,” Ronon said, examining her bellybutton. “To find her a proper husband before it’s too late.”

“When exactly is it too late?” John said, frantically stuffing his food into his mouth so he could finish this conversation.

“It’s better to do it soon,” Ronon said ominously, and passing Nora back to John, he stood to leave.

“Besides,” said Ronon, his face melting into an entirely different kind of smile than John was used too from him, “she's really pretty.”

John smiled weakly, and Nora, predictably, threw up on him as soon as Ronon’s back was turned.

Shooting dirty looks at anyone who might approach worked well for a while, even though John heard more than one version of ‘Aw, he’s bonding with her.’  Nora was staring intently at Lorne and Cadman, who were eating together alone at a table across the mess. 

Lorne had his arm around Cadman, and John widened his eyes as Lorne leaned over to kiss her on the mouth.

Nora made a gurgling noise, and John looked down, surprised.

Which was a mistake, because a second later, people were screaming and Lorne was pinned under the table.

John ran over, trying to get around the people that were clustered around Lorne and the table.  Cadman wasn’t crying, but her face was white as she and a few others tried to pull the table off of Lorne.

“John! The baby!” someone said, but there was so much chatter that he couldn’t tell who it was.

Nora was red faced and crying so hard that veins were popping out, but her eyes were still fixed on Lorne unwaveringly. John patted her head and turned her around so she was facing his chest.

John heard a bang and then a thud and then Lorne yelling, “Fuck, fuck” but it was okay because the table had come off.

“What happened?” John grabbed hold of one of the Marines who had been pulling the table off of Lorne.

“I don’t know, sir,” Owen said, watching a stretcher carrying Lorne go passed them, “the table just flew up to the ceiling and came down hard, on top of Lorne. We tried pulling it off but we couldn’t – and those things are light!”

That was true; they got moved practically every night for one function or another.

“But it was like something was holding it down over Lorne.  It was weird, sir.”

John looked at Owen, who still had sweat on him from the exertion.  “Good thing Cadman got out of the way in time, or we’d have two men down.”

Owen shook his head.  “It went straight for Lorne, swooped out of the way so it wouldn’t hit Cadman.”  Owen looked at him questioningly.  “What do you think it was?”

John looked down at Nora, who was staring placidly at Owen’s ear.  “I don’t know.  But we’d better find out.”

 

*

 

No sooner than he’d gotten back to his quarters did Stackhouse swing by with Elvira to take Nora on a playdate.

“They can get to know each other!”  Stackhouse took one of Elvira’s tentacles and waved it towards Nora. John handed her over, and Stackhouse slipped her into the baby holster he had strapped to his front.  Elvira went into the baby backpack, and with a cheerful wave, Stackhouse was off.

“Thank God,” John said as the door swung shut.  “Something weird happened at the mess-“

“Oh who cares,” Rodney said, sliding to his knees and fiddling with John’s fly.  “Elvira is a terrible name,”

John’s fly opened easily and he groaned as Rodney mouthed his boxers

“Do you think he named the baby after Lorne?” Rodney’s voice was muffled.

John didn’t really know what Rodney was talking about, because Rodney had freed him from his boxers and was licking a broad stroke up the underside of his cock.

“You know.” Rodney looked up at John under his eyelashes. “Lorne’s first name is Evan.”  Every word was a cool puff of breath and –

“You think they’re together?  You think they do this?” and Rodney’s mouth was wet hot tight sliding down not quite far enough and was Rodney actually looking for an answer to his question?

“Not together,” John choked out, bucking forward.

“How d’you know?” And now John knew that Rodney was teasing him, taking him into his mouth just a bit, a swirl of the tongue over the head and release.

“Because Lorne’s with Laura Cadman.”  Would Rodney forgive him if he just grabbed his head and fucked his mouth? 

Rodney rocked back on his heels with a shocked expression.  “No!”

“Rodney!” There was a little bit of a whine in his voice, but John couldn’t help it.

Rodney put a hand of John’s dick, but didn’t move it.  John bucked into his hand, trying to get Rodney to do anything but kneel there with a slowly darkening expression.

“They’re on the same team!”  He twisted his hand up John’s cock and John groaned with relief.  They were getting somewhere at least.

Rodney looked up at John with irritation.  “Don’t you see!  You just don’t date someone on your team.”

“Rodney,” John ground out, because Rodney’s hand had stopped moving, and this was getting old, fast.  “We’re on the same team.”

“Oh,” Rodney said, shrugging his shoulders, “that’s different.”  But when John grabbed his head, he opened his mouth and sucked hard and John was almost there –

“John! Rodney!” Elizabeth’s voice came over the intercom. 

Rodney stood up quickly, wiping his mouth as he said, “Elizabeth? Yes?”

John groaned, and then really hoped the mike hadn’t picked it up. “I’m here too, Elizabeth.”

“Nora got a little messy,” Elizabeth said. “You need to come down and bring her a change of clothes.”

Rodney rolled his eyes and mouthed, ‘Leader of Atlantis?’ at John.

John put his hand up to his head, looking mournfully at Rodney’s mouth.

“Rodney?” Elizabeth continued. “They’re also sending down a team to check to see if there was an environmental disturbance in the mess.”

“What?”  Rodney was sticking his bare feet into his shoes. “Why would they be checking that?”

“There was an incident with Major Lorne – didn’t John tell you?”

“No, he did not.” Rodney shot a look of irritation over at John. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

Rodney was halfway out the door when he turned back.

“Baby clothes.” He grabbed something pink, and headed out without even a look at John, who was standing cock in hand, considering whether he should walk over the wall to bang his head against it.  He was never going to get laid again.

 

*

 

By the time John was able to tuck himself back in again and head downstairs, Rodney had left with the maintenance crew, and Stackhouse had taken Nora to play with some Athosian babies on the mainland.

After doing a brief check in the gateroom –“All systems normal and all teams accounted for, sir” – he wandered down to the med bay to see how Lorne was doing.

“He’s going to be all right,” Cadman said, fidgeting a bit.  She was sitting in the waiting area. “He’s actually not that hurt – they’re just testing for brain waves or something that might have made the table fly at him.”

“Well this is Atlantis,” John said wryly.  “But I didn’t think Lorne had any suicidal tendencies.”

Cadman laughed a little, but she sounded tired.  “Thanks for coming down here to check on him, sir.  I’ll tell him.”

“Rodney’s down looking at the environmental controls,” John offered.  “We’ll find out what happened.”

Cadman stifled a scream.

John stared bug-eyed at her, she was looking past his shoulder, but before he could turn around she pulled him into a hug, hard and fast.

Oh God.  He was going to have to find another 2ic.  There had never been a braver, more loyal, artistic soldier. He was going to have to get rid of all the tables in Atlantis.

“It’ll be okay, John,” Laura whispered into his ear. “She’s a strong girl, you’ll see, she’ll be all right.”

What?  John pulled away from her in confusion.  She was making sad faces at something behind his back.  He turned around.

Nora was laying placidly on a stretcher, in a pink thing with a bunny on it – seriously, John thought, who had brought that to Atlantis? – not crying at all, but with a large bug biting on to her arm.

‘Well, at least I know she’s mine,’ John thought wildly as he ran over to her.

He got to the stretcher, and people jumped aside for him, patting him on the back.  He looked down at his baby – his baby- and she was just lying there, looking straight up at the ceiling.

“Oh my God,” John breathed. “Did the bug make her mentally retarded?  Rodney’s gonna freak.”

Stackhouse, who had been apologizing behind him, jumped over.  “No, don’t worry,” he said frantically, “she was like that the whole time.”

Come to think of it, she was.

Nora made a gurgling sound, and John prepared to rip that fucking bug in half if he had too.

But just then the sprinklers went off.   John tried to angle himself to shield Nora, but she squirmed out of his way and never stopped looking up at the ceiling. 

The bug was making a hissing noise as water droplets fell on it, and it was turning black and rolling up into a ball.  It dropped off in John’s hands as soon as he touched it. 

John knelt down, wiping the water out of his eyes. The med staff were running around in a panic, trying to cover up patients and protect instruments.  John looked at the tiny mark on Nora’s arm, and touched it with his finger.  Her eyes slid over to meet his, and just as they did, the water turned itself off. 

John narrowed his eyes at the baby. She stared right back and kicked her leg into his jugular.

Ow.  And then black.

 

*

 

Rodney was sitting on the bed looking at him when he woke up.

“The baby knocked you out?” 

John nodded.

“Moron.  She weighs less than a watermelon!  She’s smaller than your arm!”

John sadly looked at his face in the mirror across the room.  He had a purple bruise on his forehead and a big red mark on his neck. 

“Rodney,” he croaked, “I think the baby is evil.”

“I’d ask if you were high,” Rodney said, “but I have your meds right here.”

It hurt to speak, but this was important.  “She turned on the sprinklers.”

“I’m sure,” Rodney said, grabbing John’s mouth and holding it open as he stuffed pills inside. “I’m sure she held a match up to the fire alarm, when she has difficulty holding up her own head.”

John swallowed obediently, hissing as the pills went down his throat.

He was starting to get dizzy again, and he was having trouble keeping his eyes open, but he had to warn Rodney.  “She turned the sprinklers on with her mind.”

Rodney’s laughter was the last thing he heard before he went to sleep.

 

*

 

When John’s eyes opened again, Rodney was still sitting on the bed.

“Rodney,” John’s heart was melting, and even though he still hurt like a motherfucker, he felt himself starting to smile. “Have you been here the whole time?”

“No,” Rodney said, looking at him like an idiot.  “I’m a very busy man.”

John’s heart hardened back up again.  Time for another evil baby discussion. 

“John,” Rodney said very seriously. “I think you’re right.”

And this was unexpected.

“I think the baby is evil.”

 

*

 

It turned out that Elizabeth had called Rodney down to sit with the baby, even though Rodney had tried to argue that there was no way Nora could have bad memories of negligent parenting until she was at least three.

So Rodney had gone to get his lunch and sat down beside Nora with a laptop, trying to work out what had caused the mess room incident.

She was lying there, staring at Rodney, who, in an effort to give her a head start over Elvira or any of the Athosian babies, was explaining the inaccuracies in Stephen Hawking’s new theory. 

When suddenly on the other side of the room, a light had switched on, grabbing Nora’s attention.  She had stared at the light for a while –

And as soon as she switched her attention to the ceiling, all of the lights had gone out.  Nora looked at him, and started making noises, so Rodney leaned over and picked her up.

Rodney had gone over to the control panel, and as soon as he put Nora down on top of it, all the machines had gone haywire. Rodney snatched Nora up – she was making crying noises and staring at the control panel, and the whole control panel exploded in to flames.

He’d rushed in to the opposite room, but it was completely quiet.  Lorne was sitting on the bed, and a couple of the nurses were drinking coffee in the corner. 

As soon as Rodney walked through the door, Nora had started screaming.  And then the scalpels had started flying. 

All around the room, like they were being controlled by wires, they were coming at Lorne and the nurses.  Syringes were arching fluid across the room and driving toward the nurses.  And standing in the middle of the chaos, absolutely safe from the bedpans flying and the beds shaking was Rodney and Nora, who was crying, but with her eyes wide open and waving her hands around the room.

And then a scalpel had turned around and had flown straight at Rodney’s head. Rodney had tried to duck out of the way, but the scalpel had followed him.  So he grabbed the Carson’s memorial plaque off of the wall to shield Nora and himself, but he had accidentally hit Nora on the side of the head, and Nora had started screaming so hard her eyes finally shut.  The scalpel had hit Carson’s picture, right between the eyes, but everything else had fallen to the ground.

 

*

 

“Is everyone okay?” John asked, not really knowing what to say about his demon spawn.

Rodney nodded.  “Nobody got hurt, luckily enough.”

“Huh.” John looked around. “Where’s the baby?”

“The nurses kept her overnight.”  Rodney looked chagrined.  “I hit her on the head with a picture of my best friend.”

“He was not your best friend,” John said, irritated.  A birth always took the sting away from a death, or so his Gran had told him.  “And it was a good thing you whacked her, or you’d be dead.”

 

*

 

John had to lead the quarterly physical the next morning, since Lorne was in the infirmary, and even though he kept up a strenuous pace, the Marines still managed to yell ‘fat family man’ at him whenever he slowed for a second.

It was a nice day, so he’d taken his group outside onto the pier for the final round of calisthenics, and John stopped thinking about Nora and flying scalpels and demon babies for a little while, only concentrating on the movement of his body. 

Until the everybody started cheering and waving, which, John thought, they should have been too tired to do.

“Hey, Princess!”

“Hey, Sweetheart!”

It was worse than that one time at the Academy when some very important person’s daughter had walked across the lawn in her bikini. 

John turned around to find out who was flashing the Marines this time, because he’d thought they’d stomped that out months ago.

It was Nora, and she wasn’t topless, which John was thankful for.  He didn’t want to sit through a lecture from Elizabeth on the importance of raising girls to be respectful of their bodies.  She was wearing a pink sunhat and she was staring straight at John, scowling at him from under the brim.

“She says hi to daddy,” John heard the woman who was minding her – he thought she was an anthropologist, named Sara Something -  call down to them.  “Say hi to daddy, Nora!”

Sara was waving Nora’s pudgy arm at them, Nora was glowering, staring down at the hollering Marines.

“Looks like she’s got a bit of McKay in here, don’t you think?”  Cadman had broken ranks – John had to admit it, everyone had broken ranks – and she swung her arm casually around Lorne’s shoulders. 

“She doesn’t talk near-“ And John had to steady himself on his feet.  Was he really that tired?

But then it happened again, and harder.  Cadman fell down, arms and legs akimbo; John knelt down to see if she was okay.  And it probably saved his life, because a huge part of the railing had broken off and had careened over to where his head had been.

Pieces of the balcony were tearing up and being thrown around, crashing back down so hard that they crumbled.  John could hear screams and could barely breathe for the dust particles that had filled the air.  Anyone who could was jumping into the perfectly still ocean or was dragging injured into the city.  John looked up to the balcony.  Sara was still there, yelling into her com, and Nora was staring down at the wreckage, screaming. 

“Cadman!” John grabbed her arm; she looked up at him, shocked.  “Laura! Are you okay!”

She nodded.  “D’you need help?” 

They had to shout to hear each other over the ruckus.

“No,” he yelled, “Go get Nora.”

Cadman, her face streaked with dust, nodded and ran into the city. 

John turned, and ducking flying rubble, rushed to the nearest wounded, and started pulling concrete off of him.

It all went quiet, suddenly, but John didn’t notice it right away.  When he turned around, the balcony was empty.  He nodded to himself, and went to go coordinate the rescue efforts.

 

*

 

No dead, eight wounded, and two teams of scientists that had no idea what had happened. 

Rodney’s face was white when John told him what had happened.  They insisted Nora spend another night in the infirmary.

 

*

 

John lay awake in bed that night, Rodney snuffling beside him, and thought about his mom holding his hand as she walked him to school, of his dad coaching his little league team, and of the time he had stayed in the hospital overnight and had felt safe with the knowledge that his dad was asleep in the chair next to his bed, even though he would be groaning about his neck in the morning, and that his mom was lying half off the bed beside him, even in sleep careful not to touch his IV.

The next morning, he walked past the infirmary without even looking through the windows, and into Elizabeth’s office. 

“Hey Elizabeth.”  John shifted uncomfortably at the door. “We need to talk.”

“What?” Elizabeth looked up from where she was sitting making notes on some mission reviews.  John squinted – were those hearts?

“I-“ He had never been good at this.  Rodney always talked enough for the two of them.  “I don’t think this is right.”

Elizabeth exhaled and pulled her hand across her eyes.  “I know, John.”

This was going to be easier than he’d thought. 

“I just don’t know what to do,” Elizabeth continued.  “I really like him.”

No.  Nora was definitely a girl.  John thought.  He’d checked.

“He kissed me, and I just can’t stop thinking about him.”  Elizabeth really looked upset, and she leaned across the desk to John.  “Do you think he likes me?”

“Um, yes?” John wasn’t quite sure who it was, but he did not want to think of Elizabeth kissing anybody, ever.

“I thought so!” Elizabeth said triumphantly, smiling so wide John could see her gums. “And it doesn’t matter that I’m technically his boss, because he doesn’t report to me and I have nothing to do with how the science department is run.”

John nodded encouragingly; girlfriends had always said he was a good listener.

“But I thought that –“  Elizabeth looked at John and checked herself, “she was my friend!  And soon as I told her that we were forming a meaningful and equal relationship, she went after him, that slut.”

Elizabeth glowered at John.  “What is it with men and big breasts.”

She was looking at John like she expected him to have an answer. John crossed his arms.  Even the military sent him Out magazine.  She wasn’t getting anything that could be used against him at the next staff meeting.

“I know,” Elizabeth said firmly, “I’m being silly.  I am the leader of Atlantis and a sexual woman.  I’ve slept with half the men on this base and could have the rest.”

She smiled kindly at John.  “Except for Rodney of course.”

John smiled weakly back.

“Now, John.” Elizabeth picked up her papers and shuffled them so that John could no longer see her doodles.  “I’m sure this isn’t just a social call.”

“I need-“ John licked his lips. “I think I need to give the baby up.”

“Oh,” Elizabeth said, reaching across the table to grab John’s hand. “Oh John.”

And this was why John couldn’t take part in locker room jokes about Elizabeth.  She looked just like his mom.

“I don’t know what else to do,” John said, swallowing the lump in his throat, and it wasn’t the baby, it was that Elizabeth was looking at him with that kind of sympathy.

I think the baby is evil, he thought, but he said, “I want her to have a good home with proper parents.”

Elizabeth’s eyes were moist.  “Do you really feel that way, John?  If you want, we can make it work.  Nora will always know she’s loved.”

“I just don’t…” John trailed off, not wanting to tell Elizabeth that he thought Nora would kill her in her sleep if given the opportunity.  “I just think it’s right.”

Elizabeth patted his hand.  “We’ll find a nice couple, John.  I’ll take care of it.”

John stood up, barely believing he was getting away with this.  “Thanks, Elizabeth.”

“Go spend time with Nora, John.”  Elizabeth’s voice was soft. “Take the day off.”

John fled.

 Part Three Here