sga_santa | Fic: Crash (McKay/Sheppard)

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Title: Crash
Author:

busaikko
Rating: Um. PG.
Pairing: Sheppard/McKay
Summary: Any landing you walk away from is a good one Pinch hit for

kassrachel

"I trust you," John said, surprising himself. He'd thought the silence would have bugged McKay more than him. He liked silence, especially the intense, concentrating silence that accompanied clever plans to save lives. He supposed him cracking first was a psychological effect of the planet the jumper was stranded on. Stretching out from the crash site, as far as the horizon in every direction, there was nothing but low wet moss. The sky overhead was a mottled greyish-orange; the moss was a greyish-pink. It was ugly and desolate, and he and McKay were the only two things on the planet capable of making noise.

They'd made a hell of a lot of noise when they'd arrived. Shouting, and accusing, and whining, and saying things that made John cringe now. He'd made a really, really bad landing. If the planet hadn't been such a Koosh ball, if it had been rock instead of moss. . . John rolled his head carefully to look sidelong at McKay, who didn't realise (because John hadn't told him) that John had honest-to-God thought they were going to die. Their angle of atmospheric entry, their velocity, and the absolute unresponsiveness of the left thrusters had all gone into John's mental calculations. He'd reached a kind of Zen meditation level, fighting the jumper and seeing their impending deaths in every number on the HUD.

Then they hit, and bounced -- twice -- and the world went silent.

The jumpers really ought to have airbags: John had smacked his forehead hard and then been thrown sideways. He managed to get out of the jumper before throwing up everything he'd eaten in the last week, but it had been a near thing. He'd still been shaking with nerves when he'd gone back inside, and that was when he realized -- icing on the cake, really -- that he'd broken his arm. It was just McKay's bad luck that he was the only other person around when all John's demons of failure descended, a regular chorus of Good one, John, can't you do anything right. Well -- bad luck and his habit of speaking every thought uncensored.

The fighting segued into a long silence, in which John got himself under control and felt ashamed (some way to treat your friends, John). Some of the things he'd said were true -- McKay did complain and he wasn't grateful for simple things like being alive and he did think the world revolved around him -- but others were lies, and he'd only said them because he'd wanted to hurt. When he'd said he trusted McKay only as far as he could throw him, McKay had gone pale and rigid with anger -- he probably would have punched John in the head, if he were prone to physical violence and if John hadn't already done a good job of banging himself up pretty well.

"I was just -- " he continued, even though McKay was resolutely not looking at him. "I'm sorry."

"I'll fix the jumper even if you don't grovel," McKay said, and John could see from here the stubborn up-tilt of his chin. "It will go faster if you just sit still and be quiet."

"I trust you with my life," John said, and then frowned. That was too glib. There were probably Hallmark cards that said that, in verse form and with hearts and flowers.

"Colonel," McKay said, with sharp frustration; and God did it drive John nuts when he was slapped in his face with his rank like that. He wondered sometimes if it meant he was interchangeable in McKay's eyes, or if it was simply McKay distancing himself. He wondered how McKay would take to being called Chief Science Officer in conversation. If he noticed, he'd probably smirk, John decided, happy to be up on his pinnacle above the seething masses of mediocrity.

"Are you feeling all right?" McKay asked, actually lowering his tablet and turning his head around to stare. "You don't look all right."

"Christ." John pulled the annoying silver thermal blanket-sheet thing shut so that McKay couldn't see that he was still shaking. "I was scared," he said. "All right? We fell out of the sky, McKay. We should have hit like Humpty Dumpty."

McKay stared for a long, unreadable moment, and then shrugged. "I trust you with my life," he said, standing on his toes to peer into an open ceiling panel as he spoke. "You value me too much to let me go splat. And also?" He reached up into the compartment, and his big, solid fingers are light and sure as he adjusts the crystal array. "Thank you. You seem to have saved me again. Now let me make some token effort at repayment before you go into a coma or whatever drama-queen stunt you're working up to over there." McKay's ears had gone a very unattractive brick-red as he spoke.

"Hey," John said. "Hey. It's just a broken arm. When we get home I'll let you sign my cast."

"And a head injury," McKay said stubbornly. "For all I know you've got a subdural hematoma or brain swelling. You really -- you don't look fine, Colonel, so let me get back to my -- " He finished the sentence with a two handed spiralling gesture, a double helix of frustration that nearly made John grin.

"I'll just be sitting over here, composing my last words," John said, knowing he was being an asshole and completely unable to stop himself. "If I'm dying, the least you could do is stop calling me Colonel."

He'd spent the first eighteen years of his life mouthing off to his mother, who either slapped him in the face or whupped him with whatever was handy. The raw naked pain that bloomed on McKay's face and was wiped away almost instantly, but it still stung him worse than a rolled-up magazine ever had.

He pushed up with his feet, holding his own elbow as the makeshift sling jostled, making him feel sick and dizzy again. He crossed to the storage locker, squatted down, fished out an MRE, and got up, as stiff as an old man.

"Take a break for lunch, McKay," he said, and dangled the bag temptingly. "Mmm, tasty tempeh meatloaf."

"Die," McKay said, narrow-eyed with annoyance, and then his eyes went impossibly wide. John'd known too many good liars to have ever bought the windows of the soul line, but in that moment he read McKay like a book, down to the scribbling in the margins, which read ~~Rodney M. Sheppard~~, ~~John McKay-Sheppard~~, ~~John & Rodney Sheppard McKay~~.

"Do not," McKay said, pointing an Ancient screwdriver at John as if he was threatening McKay's virtue. "Say. A word. Just." He waved, still holding the screwdriver, and John took two steps backwards to keep from getting stabbed. "Sit." A jab at the pilot's seat. "Make me my lunch and I'll eat it -- in a minute when I'm done -- and where's yours?"

John blinked. "I'd just throw it up again."

McKay scowled. "Sit, Mr Head Injury What Head Injury. And -- " he looked straight at the space three inches to the left of John's eyes -- "if you weren't lying and if you have any respect for me at all, you will kindly just never -- never," he repeated with finality. "Why are you still standing? Do you think I want you passing out on me?"

John's headache was making it hard to focus his eyes, much less his brain. He did the only thing he could: he turned, and sat, and didn't try again to break the silence when it rose up like a wall.

After that, things were a little fuzzy. John kept trying to fall asleep, but every time he nodded off McKay was right there, yanking his eyelids up to check his pupil size and asking him questions.

The third time McKay ordered him to do mental long division, John refused. "I'm not concussed, I'm just really, really tired," he said. McKay told him to stop whining and asked him what the square root of 289 was.

John was a little freaked out himself that he didn't remember. For some reason, that seemed more important than the success of the jumper repairs or even Rodney evicting him into the copilot's seat or the radio and the Stargate and the jumper all working perfectly to bring them home.

Carson met them in the jumper bay with a gurney, which was highly embarrassing.

"I'll get you for this," John told McKay, who crossed his arms and looked well pleased with himself.

"Yes, yes, and my little dog, too," Rodney said, smirking and dismissing him with a wave.

It took two days for John to get the reference.

He did not see McKay for either of the days he was confined to the infirmary, but he spent so much time sleeping that he didn't see most of the people who did come by. He was released to his quarters just after dinner, with a brace and a sling and a headache and parts of his body held together with screws, which was something that he just hated to think about. He didn't even have fillings, and now he'd be setting off metal detectors. It was just. . . creepy.

His room was quiet and dim after the bustle of the infirmary. He savoured it for twenty minutes or so, walking around and reacquainting himself with his stuff. He learned that reading printed pages made his head hurt more, and that the Advil he'd been given didn't really make it hurt less. He considered practicing guitar fingerings, decided no, and spent five minutes brushing his teeth. The thrill of being a leftie was wearing off fast. He stared out the window until the desk clock blinked 2100, which was a reasonable bedtime. Getting out of his shirt and undershirt and into his pyjama shirt took ages, and he seriously considered sleeping in his trousers. Except.

He looked down at his boots. Damn.

It took him no time at all to walk down the corridor to the transporter and flash over to the civilian housing. McKay's door was just around the corner. John knocked.

"Come," McKay shouted, and the door slid open automatically. John would have to figure out how McKay did that. It was pretty cool.

McKay was sitting at his desk, and he didn't even turn around, just snapped his fingers impatiently.

"What," he said. John looked back at the door reflexively, as if someone else might have slipped in with him.

"Um," he said, and that made McKay spin around in his chair. His hair was all on end, as if he'd been running his fingers through it. He looked like a duckling, or a kitten, or something else so repulsively cute that McKay would never forgive him if he said so. "You're busy, I'll just," and John half-turned. He felt stupid. He hated feeling stupid.

"Thought you were a minion. You're lucky I didn't take your head off. Are you lost?" McKay asked suspiciously. "Do you remember your name?"

"No," John said, as breathlessly as he could, and turned big eyes on McKay. "But you -- I feel like I've seen you someplace before. Don't tell me. It'll come to me." He tried to snap his fingers: he mimicked the gesture just fine, but it was disconcerting that he didn't have the finger strength to make a noise.

McKay sighed, as if this was just one more burden the universe unfairly asked him to bear. "You're walking the halls of Atlantis half-undressed. You don't usually do that."

John pointed. "I can't get my boots off."

"What are you, two?" McKay glared. "I'm not your valet. It disturbs me that you'd even think so."

John didn't really have an answer to that. McKay had a point; several of them, actually, and they were all sharp. He wondered if it was possible to get this loopy on ibuprofen. Maybe he should just go back to the infirmary. He wasn't dealing well with this at all.

"I'll see you tomorrow, then," he said. "Good night. And thank you for, you know."

McKay shut the laptop with a snap and pointed at the bed. "Go. Sit. I'm strangely touched that you thought of me in your minute of need."

John wondered why McKay had taken to talking to him in orders, as if he were a badly-behaved dog, or maybe a two year old. He went, and sat, and fought off the overwhelming urge to lie down and let consciousness go.

McKay scowled at the bootlaces. The little red-headed nurse had done them up, and he'd got the loops exactly the same size and the dangling ends exactly the same length. There was something very satisfying about watching McKay whip the laces undone and work them loose with rapid, haphazard pulls. John reached out and slid his fingers into the messiness of McKay's hair. It was much softer than he'd imagined, and he could make it lie flat, or stand up, or fall forwards or backwards. It was fun, and sort of addictive. McKay looked up from the matter of bootlaces and boots and sat back on his heels, the temptation of his hair removed out of reach.

"Colonel," McKay said, clearly leading up to a lecture, or possibly a rant.

"John," John said.

"If you tell me that it turns you on to have me literally kneeling at your feet," Rodney started, and John had to laugh.

"I'm falling over, here. You couldn't turn me on with a switch."

"Huh." Rodney pulled off the boots and shoved them under his bed. "Stand up a second." John did, thinking again with the orders, and Rodney reached behind him to turn the bedcovers back, and then dropped John's trousers (well, undid them: they dropped all by themselves). "You didn't bring the matching pants?" McKay asked, plucking at the pyjama shirt with amusement. "I'd love to see the whole striped Sheppard effect. Sit. Can you lie down?"

"Yes," John said, because that was a stupid question. "Oh. Ow. Ow." McKay's pillow was amazingly comfortable. John settled his head and shut his eyes.

"You were a cat in a former life, weren't you?" McKay said.

"'m a good boy," John said, and then blinked his eyes open. He didn't think he meant to say that. He didn't think McKay meant to be caught looking at him like that again, either, so he guessed they were even. He held out his hand. "Come here. Stay." Ha. Now he was the one giving orders.

"What are you on?" McKay said, still smiling.

"Carson only gave me Advil." John patted the bed. "There's room." He tried to smile persuasively, though he was never sure that the expression wasn't really just goofy. "I just want -- "

"Until you fall asleep," McKay said. "The things I put up with from you -- hey, you could issue me a medal." He palmed the lights down low, which was a mercy, and stretched out on his side, his head propped up on one broad palm, the other resting like comfort on John's stomach.

"Night, Rodney," John said, as if they were on another alien planet together, and he was fast asleep before he heard whatever McKay said in reply.

When he woke, sunlight was breaking through the curtains in bright ripples that arched over the walls, and McKay was stroking his cheek. John tried to reach up and touch McKay back, except he'd forgotten that his arm didn't work. He grimaced, and McKay pulled back, his face settling into wariness.

"Hey, don't," John said.

"You," McKay said, sounding angry, "are going to have to tell me what all this means," and he made a shuttling gesture between them. "Because I really don't have a clue."

"I came to you," John said. "I needed -- I want -- " He walked the fingers of his left hand up McKay's arm as far as he could, grabbed a handful of shirt, and pulled McKay down. "This is okay?" he asked, needing to know before he did something that couldn't be undone.

"I -- yes, it's okay, John, it's -- "

But he didn't let McKay finish. He leaned up as best he could and pressed his mouth to McKay's. McKay pushed him back against the pillow and returned the kiss, hesitant and then, with a shiver, like a question, enquiring. John threaded his fingers into that amazing hair again, softness pooled in his palm and softness opening his mouth, light dancing over the bed and warmth pooling wherever they touched, and John touched wherever he could. In the silence -- the good kind of silence -- John hoped McKay heard what he was saying, even though he couldn't say anything at all.

the end