Secrets

Chapter Twelve Christmas in October

John came into the gateroom just as the wormhole died. On the floor four or five people were maneuvering wheeled pallets away from the Stargate — ten or twelve pallets with probably a few hundred pounds apiece of shipping containers on them. There was even a bunch of big cardboard boxes, not standard at all. Sheppard scratched his head. “What’s all that?” he asked Miko Kusanagi, who was running some kind of test on the upper gateroom boards.

“The SGC has sent through personal items and baggage that was intended for Daedalus day after tomorrow,” she replied, looking up from her screen happily. “There was no point in holding it since they can open a wormhole, and Daedalus has little space.” Miko looked at the pile of pallets with satisfaction. “Besides, much of that is personal items that are low priority, but we will be happy to get.”

“I’ll say,” John said. The number of people ordering warm winter clothes was pretty big. He’d had a look at Radek’s LL Bean catalog himself.

Somehow in the last few years Radek had become the king of mail order. He had dozens of catalogs for everything from gloves and hats to electronics to much more personal items. He was also the only authorized Tupperware representative in the Pegasus Galaxy. If you needed it, whatever it was, from brand new movies on DVD to fleecy long johns, Radek could get it for you for cost plus a very affordable handling fee, less than you’d pay for shipping on Earth.

“I think three of the pallets are Dr. Zelenka’s,” Miko said as though she’d read his thought. “What did you get this time?”

“Ski gloves, a couple of movies, electric razor, some personal items. You?”

“Two fleece Henleys since the gateroom is always freezing,” Miko said promptly. “Wrap around sunglasses because the glare is terrible when I have my team out on the hull of the Hammond. Thermal check socks.” She blushed. “And a set of flannel sheets.”

“I wish I’d thought of the flannel sheets,” John said. Toasty, toasty flannel, perfect for cold mornings.

“Dr. Zelenka has the catalogs,” Miko said brightly, as though a happy thought had struck her. “I am sure there are new catalogs with the filled orders.”

“Yeah,” John said, looking down over the gateroom floor. Radek was down there, of course, bustling around sorting boxes. It looked like about half the stuff was consigned to him, everything labeled ‘Sgt. Walter Harriman, NORAD.’ Radek and Walter had this long time deal about stuff getting mailed to Walter who sent it on. UPS must think Walter was some kind of crazy. “I’m going to mosey down there and see what he’s got.”

Radek was loading boxes from Amazon onto a handcart with the able assistance of Sgt. Pollard, who straightened up when he saw John. “Colonel.”

“As you were,” John said offhandedly. “Got my stuff, Radek?”

“Yours, and two hundred other people’s,” Radek said, his glasses slipping down his nose. “And you will have to wait until it is sorted. You know I cannot let people just take things. I must check what we have against the order forms I sent in so that everyone gets their proper items.”

“I know.” John put his hands in his pockets. “So Miko doesn’t get Ronon’s socks.” He looked at the six big boxes being stacked on the floor. “Is a bunch of this stuff yours, Pollard?”

“Yes, sir.” Pollard looked at the boxes in a proprietary way. “$1,800 worth of Tupperware. Halling will be glad to see this. I’ve been promising him it was coming for weeks and he was getting testy.”

John blinked. “You bought the Athosians $1,800 worth of Tupperware?”

“It’s ideal,” Pollard said. “Lightweight, air tight, almost indestructible. And plastic’s worth an arm and a leg as trade goods. I told Halling this was the best there was, and he’ll be very happy with it.”

“Ok.” John scratched his head. He vaguely remembered his mom having a Tupperware party. He associated it more with suburbs than with pastoral nomads, but if Halling wanted Tupperware he could have Tupperware.

Radek was digging in one of the boxes and came up with a smile. “I can give you this,” he said, “As there is no doubt who it is for.” It was a little blue snowsuit.

John took the snowsuit and a couple of other boxes for Teyla by the infirmary. Just because she was still stuck didn’t mean she shouldn’t have the pleasure of Christmas in October. Nobody had been expecting their stuff for weeks, and a general air of good humor was prevailing.

Well, it had been prevailing for him. They had Rodney back. And Teyla was home. Everybody was under one roof and more or less themselves, or at least was going to be.

Teyla was propped up in one of the beds in the front room, the curtains undrawn. Her skin looked almost normal except for the healing scars from the plastic surgery, a little more ragged than last time. Carson didn’t seem to do as fine work as Keller had. But at least her skin had lost its green tint and vaguely shiny gloss. She was frowning over an expensive e reader, but looked up with a smile when he came in. “John!”

“Hey.” He put her packages down on the foot of the bed. “The SGC sent through a bunch of personal orders.” He held it up. “Torren’s snowsuit.”

Teyla reached for it, feeling the thick down lining. “That should be very warm. Yes, that is exactly what I wanted. And snaps to let the legs out as he grows.”

John gestured to the e reader on her lap. “Who’s is that?”

“Sam’s. She said I could borrow it while I am in the infirmary. I am reading a very sad book about a pilot and a young girl who are in a plane crash in your Rocky Mountains in bad weather. It happened a long time ago, I think from the things they use.”

John turned the reader around and glanced at it. “Ernest Gann’s The Aviator? Damn, that is a sad one. You’d like some of his other books better.”

“Sam said I should probably not start with the one where the entire cast commits suicide.”

John put the e reader down. “Masada? That’s been unfortunately relevant. Doesn’t Sam have anything cheerful on there?”

Teyla looked amused. “Asks the man who is still reading War and Peace.”

“Hey, Andrei is finally dead. I’ve got to be getting near the end.” John grinned. “How’s Rodney?”

“I do not know.” Teyla’s smile disappeared. “He is in the isolation room, and Marie just tells me that he is fine. Dr. Keller has been there most of the morning since Carson went to get some sleep.”

“How’s Keller?”

“She is well, as much as I can tell.” Teyla shook her head. “John, you have been fed upon and restored. How did you feel?”

“Sore. Shaky. But otherwise ok.” The worry in her eyes was the mirror of his own. “And Jeannie?”

“Jeannie has been in there the entire time,” Teyla said. She moved, winced. “They will not let me get up yet because it has been less than twenty four hours, though Carson said before he went off duty that I could try some real food at lunch. I do not think he will keep me here past tomorrow if I do not have complications, though he said I must have several days off duty but I could rest in my quarters.”

“That’s good,” John said. Plastic surgery was still surgery, for all that it wasn’t usually critical. And she hadn’t eaten anything more solid than pureed bananas in a month.

“I am afraid I have lost strength and muscle tone,” Teyla said ruefully.

“You’ll get it back.” He put his hand on her shoulder, just a quick squeeze. “You’ll be fine.”

“Yes, I will.” Teyla smiled up at him. “Will you please check on Rodney? I cannot go myself, and I too will feel better when I know what passes with him.”

“Yeah,” John said, and left her reading depressing books on Sam’s reader as he headed to the isolation chamber.

The isolation room was further back, away from the rest of the medical spaces, and there was a Marine on duty by the door. But a Marine with a chair and a desk, and his P90 in reach but not in hand: a good call, John thought, and returned the smart salute. He recognized Trueblood from the first days of the expedition, somebody who knew just how valuable McKay really was — knew who McKay was, at the core. You couldn’t blame the new guys, they hadn’t seen Rodney at his best, hadn’t seen how he’d changed, hadn’t been there for all the times he’d saved the city. All they’d known was the Wraith, the traitor who’d killed their friends.

“How’s it going?” he asked, keeping his voice down, and Trueblood answered in the same low tones.

“Looks like progress to me, sir. Dr. McKay’s looking a lot more like his old self.”

“That’s good to hear,” John said.

Trueblood nodded. “Yes, sir. It’s good to have him back.”

“Yes, it is,” John said. Message received: the old hands were keeping an eye on things. “Anyone with him?”

“Mrs. Miller,” Trueblood said, barely glancing at his screen. “And Dr. Keller.”

Crap. John nodded as though that was good news, and said, “Any chance I can see him for a few minutes?”

“I’ll check, sir,” Trueblood said, and touched his radio. “Dr. Keller? Colonel Sheppard is here to see Dr. McKay.”

John couldn’t hear the answer, but a moment later the door opened.

“Colonel,” Keller said. She looked worn out still, John thought, which he supposed wasn’t surprising, considering Rodney had had to feed on her. It had taken him a couple of weeks to feel normal after the whole thing with Kolya, and that had been with Todd restoring him. Even with the retrovirus to protect her, Keller had to have had a pretty hard time of it.

“I just want to see how he’s doing,” John said. “I promise not to upset him or bring him lemons or anything.”

Immediately, he wished he’d been less flip, but Keller gave him a tired smile. “One positive result from all of this seems to be that Rodney’s allergies are considerably less severe.” She looked back at the locked door, the smile fading. “He’s — you know, he’s making very good progress, considering. We may be able to try him on some solid food in a day or two.”

A hungry McKay was not a pleasant thing. John swallowed the words, managed a nod. “How are you doing, Doc?”

She blinked, as though that was the last thing she’d expected to hear. “I–I’m good, thank you. Fine.”

She didn’t look it, her eyes bloodshot and her shoulders drooping, but John nodded as though he believed her. “Glad to hear it.”

Keller nodded back, almost briskly. “You can see him — in fact, if you could get Mrs. Miller to take a break, that probably wouldn’t be a bad thing. But not for long. He still tires easily.”

And it’s probably not a good thing that she’s calling her more-or-less sister-in-law “Mrs. Miller,” but maybe that was just that she was in formal, medical mode. John nodded. “I’ll do what I can, Doc. And thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” she answered, and turned to her own work station, settling herself in front of the Ancient machines. Trueblood ran his key through the door’s lock, and John pulled open the heavy door.

Jeannie Miller was sitting in a relatively comfortable-looking chair that had to have been dragged down from the residential levels, a ball of blue yarn on her lap and a handful of dangerously pointed purple sticks in her hands. Double-pointed needles, John identified, after a moment, remembering his grandmother knitting ski hats that Dave had refused to wear and he’d been embarrassed by and worn anyway. It looked like a sock, or maybe a mitten, and she looked up and put a finger to her lips. John glanced at the bed, letting the door close softly behind him.

Rodney was drowsing again, propped up on what looked like a ridiculous number of pillows, though John supposed that the points he’d grown on his back might not be entirely gone yet. Otherwise, though, he looked a lot more human than the last time, his skin sallow, his veins no longer dark against his skin, his nails shrunk to normal, though they were still black. There was a fuzz of hair on his chin, and starting back on his arms, and John wondered if it would be white, too, to match the hair on his head. Carson had said the new growth might come in dark, which would look — well, pretty funny, if it happened.

Jeannie was staring at him as though she wanted him to leave, and John came quietly around the end of the bed. He thought he recognized the yarn and needles as something one of the scientists had traded for, guessed Jeannie hadn’t come to Atlantis with her knitting bag in hand.

“How are you?” he asked, softly, and she sighed and smiled.

“I’m all right. And they tell me Meredith will be.”

That came out more like a question than he thought she had intended, and John gave her his most reassuring smile. “Beckett and Keller are good. If they say he’ll be all right, he will be.”

Jeannie looked down at the sock on her needles. “They also say there’s a chance — a fairly large chance — that he’s never going to be completely himself again. That he’ll always look a little — Wraith-like.”

John nodded. “Yeah.”

“And what then?” Jeannie held up the sock. “I’ve been told I can’t actually bring these socks home with me, because the wool — well, it isn’t wool, it’s some alien goat-spider thing, and nobody wants to have to explain it. What’s going to happen to Meredith if he doesn’t change completely?”

John paused, but he owed her an honest answer. “I don’t know. I hope it won’t come to that.”

“That he might have to stay here.”

“Yes.”

Jeannie looked down at the sock again, folded the needles together and began rolling the fabric around it. John thought there were tears on her eyelashes, but her voice was steady.

“Thank you for telling me the truth.”

There wasn’t a good answer to that, either, and John just nodded. “Do you want me to stay with him for a bit? You could get a sandwich or something.”

Jeannie nodded. “Yes. That would probably be good.” She looked up at the darkened observation lounge. “I’ve been sleeping there since Dr. Beckett moved him in here. Just in case he needed company.”

And to keep anyone else out, John thought. “Rodney must appreciate that.”

As though the name had awakened him, Rodney shifted on his pillows, eyes opening. Human eyes, John saw with relief, not the slit-pupilled Wraith eyes, and not greeny-gold, but gray. And annoyed, which was also a step toward normal.

“Do you mind? I was asleep.”

“I’m going to get some dinner,” Jeannie said. “I’ll be back later.”

She signaled for Trueblood to open the door, and was gone without another word. Rodney closed his mouth over something he was going to say, and scowled up at John.

“What do you want?”

“Hi, Rodney, how are you?” John said, cheerfully. “Hi, Sheppard, it was nice of you to stop by. I’m feeling — how are you feeling, Rodney?”

“Crappy,” Rodney said, but he looked more relaxed. He tugged a pillow into a new position, sat up slightly. “My back itches — who knew that reabsorbing bone would not only be painful, but itchy? And I’m starving. Unfortunately, the only thing I can eat is broth — and I hope I never see another chicken again in my life — and even that has, well, unpredictable results that you probably don’t want to hear in any detail.”

“You’re right,” John said.

“My digestion either doesn’t work, or it works too well, and I’m not particularly happy with either one —”

“I said I didn’t want to know the details,” John said.

Rodney grinned in spite of himself. “Well, you’re sounding normal, anyway.”

“So are you.”

“Thank you,” Rodney said, then stopped. “Wait — no, never mind, it’s not worth pursuing.” He paused, his expression slowly sobering. “How bad is it?”

John cocked his head. “How bad is what?”

“My situation.” Rodney gave his old, wry smile. “I’m not exactly unaware of what I did, and I’m not expecting the IOA or the military to accept that I didn’t know who I was or why I shouldn’t help people I thought were kin —”

“They do understand that,” John said. “It happens.”

“Oh, come on!”

“Well, OK, not like this, I grant you,” John said. “Not very often. But everyone knows, everyone understands, that you weren’t yourself. Literally, in this case. It wasn’t you.”

There was a little pause. “But it was me,” Rodney said, softly. “That’s the problem. It was me — and for once I say this with all humility — because I was the only person who could do this. Who could attack Atlantis like that. It’s my responsibility.”

“I know,” John said. He remembered with sudden clarity standing in the door of the transporter chamber after Rodney’s experiment with the Ancient weapon had destroyed half a solar system, Rodney apologizing not just for being wrong, but for betraying his trust. That seemed so much simpler, and such a very long time ago.

“I’ll make it right,” Rodney said. “I’ll — I have to. You know that.”

“I know,” John said again. “Look, Rodney, you’re — as soon as you’re well enough, you’re back on the team. We need you.”

He wasn’t sure he had the right to make that promise, but the sudden relief, the gratitude on Rodney’s face, made it worthwhile.

“Yes, well,” Rodney said. “Of course you do.”

“I’m not supposed to tire you out,” John said. “But I’m glad to see you’re — not so green.”

“Very funny,” Rodney said. “John —”

John paused, his hand on the door.

“Thank you,” Rodney said, and John nodded.

“Any time.”