Making a House a Home by wedjatqi (PG)
Feb. 26th, 2009 04:12 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
asugar.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
stargateficrecRec Category: John Sheppard
Pairing: John Sheppard/Teyla Emmagan, past Kanaan/Teyla Emmagan, Sam Carter/Jack O'Neill
Category: John Sheppard, John Sheppard/Teyla Emmagan, Teyla Emmagan, Alternate universe, Hurt/comfort, John Sheppard & Teyla Emmagan friendship, Sam Carter/Jack O'Neill, Angst
Warning: Mention of pre-fic death of Athosians
Author on LJ: http://wedjatqi.livejournal.com
Author's Website: http://wedjatqi.livejournal.com/28033.html or http://www.fanfiction.net/u/953524/Wedjatqi
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3789845/1/
Why This Must Be Read: Everything wedjatqi writes is incredible and should be read but the writing here is particularly transcendent. In this AU Earth-set story, the SGC is still losing the war with the Ori and the team had to obliterate Atlantis with the Daedalus after saving Woolsey and General O'Neill. While Teyla and Ronon joined the team in trying to save Atlantis from the Replicators as in "The Return," the Wraith destroyed New Athos from orbit. Ronon decides to stay and fight. Teyla, who became literally the last Athosian just as she discovered she was pregnant with Kanaan's son, chooses to come to Earth and raise her child in a world that will never know the Wraith. The others must return to the roles they were shoehorned into when the Ancients kicked them out of Atlantis: John as a SG team leader, Carson at the SGC, Rodney at Area 51. The distance, awkwardness and hurt that colored John and Teyla's season four relationship still exists; John reacted as badly to the news of Teyla's pregnancy in this AU as he did in canon.
Despite everything unspoken between them, John invites Teyla and the infant Torren (Tagan here) to share a house so that she might be allowed to live outside Cheyenne Mountain. Ostensibly they have settled into their new lives but both John and Teyla are in pain and Teyla has chronic insomnia. John is concerned and tries to help her sleep. The author warns at the beginning that the story is "a bit depressing and sullen." I think it is better described as a meditative and hopeful story. John and Teyla (and the reader with them) go through the painful but ultimately redemptive mourning process for everything they've lost. This includes their former closeness, Atlantis, which was the only place John ever felt at home, Teyla's people and the Pegasus galaxy. They begin to accept their loss and heal as they realize what and whom they have left. The language is beautiful and evocative. I've made it sound terribly sad and emotional but there is much humor and warmth, particularly at a SG-1 wedding. John's characterization is very powerful and subtle; everything he cannot say or even let himself think remains unsaid yet is clearly communicated. This is quintessential hurt/comfort; my heart breaks for both John and Teyla every time I reread Making a House a Home but wedjatqi skillfully guides the reader and characters back to a new equilibrium by story end.
A snippet....
Teyla sat up, swung her legs over the side of the bed and stared up at the moonlight streaking through her window. Sighing wearily she propped her chin in her hands, elbows on her cooling legs. She watched the alien moon through the glass and wondered once again whether she would ever truly begin to call this world her home. She had only been on this world for two months, yet it amazed her how even after all these years she still expected to see the stars above Athos when she looked up at night. For several years she had begun to accept the stars above the City of the Ancestors, but it too was now lost. Lost like her people. Well, not all of them. Her eyes moved to her sleeping son. He would be the last of her people.
She stood up in the blue tinted light and walked softly to her son’s crib. As always when she looked down at his beautiful face, her breath caught. When she ever felt depressed or alone, she needed only to look at Tagan’s face and be reminded of the blessing she had received. Reaching in quietly she stroked the soft baby hair that framed his face, his skin so soft and delicate beneath her fingertips. He sighed softly in his sleep and she smiled down at him. So small, yet so full of life. He was a good child, he slept well and seemed contented. Teyla wondered whether he understood on some level the stress she had lived through, that he too had survived. That they were the last of the Athosian people, their home world destroyed twice over and now visitors on an alien world that was now to be their home. They were alone in the universe. Alone.
Annoyed at her downward thoughts she turned gathered up her robe, a blanket and moved to lift Tagan out of his crib. He grumbled slightly in his sleep, but did not stir. She tucked him amongst the blanket, held him close pausing to breathe in his baby smell and headed quietly out of her bedroom.
The house was silent around her as she moved along the landing towards the stairs. This was becoming a regular habit she mused to herself, creeping through the dark house at night sleepless and chilled. Once at the stairs she paused noticing the other bedroom door was open slightly, again as it always was. She moved silently down the stairs, stepping onto each step with well practised ease creating no creak to disturb the house.
Pairing: John Sheppard/Teyla Emmagan, past Kanaan/Teyla Emmagan, Sam Carter/Jack O'Neill
Category: John Sheppard, John Sheppard/Teyla Emmagan, Teyla Emmagan, Alternate universe, Hurt/comfort, John Sheppard & Teyla Emmagan friendship, Sam Carter/Jack O'Neill, Angst
Warning: Mention of pre-fic death of Athosians
Author on LJ: http://wedjatqi.livejournal.com
Author's Website: http://wedjatqi.livejournal.com/28033.html or http://www.fanfiction.net/u/953524/Wedjatqi
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3789845/1/
Why This Must Be Read: Everything wedjatqi writes is incredible and should be read but the writing here is particularly transcendent. In this AU Earth-set story, the SGC is still losing the war with the Ori and the team had to obliterate Atlantis with the Daedalus after saving Woolsey and General O'Neill. While Teyla and Ronon joined the team in trying to save Atlantis from the Replicators as in "The Return," the Wraith destroyed New Athos from orbit. Ronon decides to stay and fight. Teyla, who became literally the last Athosian just as she discovered she was pregnant with Kanaan's son, chooses to come to Earth and raise her child in a world that will never know the Wraith. The others must return to the roles they were shoehorned into when the Ancients kicked them out of Atlantis: John as a SG team leader, Carson at the SGC, Rodney at Area 51. The distance, awkwardness and hurt that colored John and Teyla's season four relationship still exists; John reacted as badly to the news of Teyla's pregnancy in this AU as he did in canon.
Despite everything unspoken between them, John invites Teyla and the infant Torren (Tagan here) to share a house so that she might be allowed to live outside Cheyenne Mountain. Ostensibly they have settled into their new lives but both John and Teyla are in pain and Teyla has chronic insomnia. John is concerned and tries to help her sleep. The author warns at the beginning that the story is "a bit depressing and sullen." I think it is better described as a meditative and hopeful story. John and Teyla (and the reader with them) go through the painful but ultimately redemptive mourning process for everything they've lost. This includes their former closeness, Atlantis, which was the only place John ever felt at home, Teyla's people and the Pegasus galaxy. They begin to accept their loss and heal as they realize what and whom they have left. The language is beautiful and evocative. I've made it sound terribly sad and emotional but there is much humor and warmth, particularly at a SG-1 wedding. John's characterization is very powerful and subtle; everything he cannot say or even let himself think remains unsaid yet is clearly communicated. This is quintessential hurt/comfort; my heart breaks for both John and Teyla every time I reread Making a House a Home but wedjatqi skillfully guides the reader and characters back to a new equilibrium by story end.
A snippet....
Teyla sat up, swung her legs over the side of the bed and stared up at the moonlight streaking through her window. Sighing wearily she propped her chin in her hands, elbows on her cooling legs. She watched the alien moon through the glass and wondered once again whether she would ever truly begin to call this world her home. She had only been on this world for two months, yet it amazed her how even after all these years she still expected to see the stars above Athos when she looked up at night. For several years she had begun to accept the stars above the City of the Ancestors, but it too was now lost. Lost like her people. Well, not all of them. Her eyes moved to her sleeping son. He would be the last of her people.
She stood up in the blue tinted light and walked softly to her son’s crib. As always when she looked down at his beautiful face, her breath caught. When she ever felt depressed or alone, she needed only to look at Tagan’s face and be reminded of the blessing she had received. Reaching in quietly she stroked the soft baby hair that framed his face, his skin so soft and delicate beneath her fingertips. He sighed softly in his sleep and she smiled down at him. So small, yet so full of life. He was a good child, he slept well and seemed contented. Teyla wondered whether he understood on some level the stress she had lived through, that he too had survived. That they were the last of the Athosian people, their home world destroyed twice over and now visitors on an alien world that was now to be their home. They were alone in the universe. Alone.
Annoyed at her downward thoughts she turned gathered up her robe, a blanket and moved to lift Tagan out of his crib. He grumbled slightly in his sleep, but did not stir. She tucked him amongst the blanket, held him close pausing to breathe in his baby smell and headed quietly out of her bedroom.
The house was silent around her as she moved along the landing towards the stairs. This was becoming a regular habit she mused to herself, creeping through the dark house at night sleepless and chilled. Once at the stairs she paused noticing the other bedroom door was open slightly, again as it always was. She moved silently down the stairs, stepping onto each step with well practised ease creating no creak to disturb the house.
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