Self-Defence Mechanism by cybersyd42
Jun. 2nd, 2009 11:07 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: None
Category: John Sheppard, Rodney McKay, Ronon Dex, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Episode related
Warning: None
Author on LJ: None known
Author's Website: http://www.fanfiction.net/u/744611/cybersyd42 or http://www.cybersyd.ws/
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3787706/1/
Why This Must Be Read: Thanks for joining me for the 32nd (and 33rd) days of May. This is my last late rec and I appreciate your and the mods' patience. In Self-Defence Mechanism, a grieving and peevish Rodney shows up at Jeannie's house for a disastrous visit after Carson's funeral. Sheppard and Ronon arrive to bring him back and end up spending the night. Jeannie can't understand John since she has no context in which to place him and his point of view. However, Jeannie has a way of seeing things that allows she and Sheppard to have some painful conversations about loss, responsibility, how ultimately John can't save everyone and the price he pays for that. It's very sad at times but worth reading just for the scene where the unable-to-sleep John, Ronon and Rodney play Madison's Cha Cha Chicken game with their usual competitiveness.
An excerpt...
The morning passes too quickly for Jeannie’s liking. Maddie sleeps late, exhausted by the events of the previous day, and both Jeannie and John have to stop Ronon from going in and waking her. By the time her daughter rises it is eleven o’clock, and the weather is already hot and muggy. The adults sit outside in what passes for a garden - neither she nor Kaleb are green fingered. They talk about the changes that have taken place on Earth while John and Meredith have been away; music and television and movies, avoiding the thorny topics of politics and war. John asks her for more stories on her brother, but this time Jeannie restrains herself - mostly - in an attempt to protect Mer’s dignity. Ronon talks to Kaleb about Maddie, asking about schooling and playground games and the culture of American children. Mer diverts his attention between the two conversations and his niece, who has not given up her fascination with him.
He crouches by Madison’s sandbox, trying to find the perfect mix of sand and water for castle-building. Jeannie chats to John, but can’t stop her gaze from wandering. There is a sick, acidic feeling building in her stomach, and as the day progresses the feeling gets worse.
“So Lucius gives Elizabeth this ugly thing - some shrivelled up vegetable, with a candle stuck in the top - and she ends up worshipping it as a reverent object. Teyla and Ronon too, as though it’s the most amazing thing they’ve ever seen. Gourds!”
Jeannie laughs, and smiles, and nods in the right places. Usually she would love hearing stories about Atlantis, and the more surreal adventures her brother and his friends have experienced. She feels privileged to be in a position of trust, allowed into the inner sanctum, into a mass conspiracy involving international secrets and alien agendas. But today all she can think of are the stories John isn’t telling her. The ones where people are injured, or killed. The brutal stories of dangers she cannot imagine.
“Apparently Cadman decided to go for a run - without McKay knowing, of course. Just a little run, around the east wing and back, but the way he carried on about it…”
Jeannie wonders if this is how the families of soldiers feel, before their son or daughter are deployed in a war zone. Although at least, if he were in Iraq or Afghanistan, she would know where he was and what dangers he faced. The Pegasus galaxy is a giant unknown quantity and she is terrified if she even begins to think about what might be lurking there.
Pairing: None
Category: John Sheppard, Rodney McKay, Ronon Dex, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Episode related
Warning: None
Author on LJ: None known
Author's Website: http://www.fanfiction.net/u/744611/cybersyd42 or http://www.cybersyd.ws/
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3787706/1/
Why This Must Be Read: Thanks for joining me for the 32nd (and 33rd) days of May. This is my last late rec and I appreciate your and the mods' patience. In Self-Defence Mechanism, a grieving and peevish Rodney shows up at Jeannie's house for a disastrous visit after Carson's funeral. Sheppard and Ronon arrive to bring him back and end up spending the night. Jeannie can't understand John since she has no context in which to place him and his point of view. However, Jeannie has a way of seeing things that allows she and Sheppard to have some painful conversations about loss, responsibility, how ultimately John can't save everyone and the price he pays for that. It's very sad at times but worth reading just for the scene where the unable-to-sleep John, Ronon and Rodney play Madison's Cha Cha Chicken game with their usual competitiveness.
An excerpt...
The morning passes too quickly for Jeannie’s liking. Maddie sleeps late, exhausted by the events of the previous day, and both Jeannie and John have to stop Ronon from going in and waking her. By the time her daughter rises it is eleven o’clock, and the weather is already hot and muggy. The adults sit outside in what passes for a garden - neither she nor Kaleb are green fingered. They talk about the changes that have taken place on Earth while John and Meredith have been away; music and television and movies, avoiding the thorny topics of politics and war. John asks her for more stories on her brother, but this time Jeannie restrains herself - mostly - in an attempt to protect Mer’s dignity. Ronon talks to Kaleb about Maddie, asking about schooling and playground games and the culture of American children. Mer diverts his attention between the two conversations and his niece, who has not given up her fascination with him.
He crouches by Madison’s sandbox, trying to find the perfect mix of sand and water for castle-building. Jeannie chats to John, but can’t stop her gaze from wandering. There is a sick, acidic feeling building in her stomach, and as the day progresses the feeling gets worse.
“So Lucius gives Elizabeth this ugly thing - some shrivelled up vegetable, with a candle stuck in the top - and she ends up worshipping it as a reverent object. Teyla and Ronon too, as though it’s the most amazing thing they’ve ever seen. Gourds!”
Jeannie laughs, and smiles, and nods in the right places. Usually she would love hearing stories about Atlantis, and the more surreal adventures her brother and his friends have experienced. She feels privileged to be in a position of trust, allowed into the inner sanctum, into a mass conspiracy involving international secrets and alien agendas. But today all she can think of are the stories John isn’t telling her. The ones where people are injured, or killed. The brutal stories of dangers she cannot imagine.
“Apparently Cadman decided to go for a run - without McKay knowing, of course. Just a little run, around the east wing and back, but the way he carried on about it…”
Jeannie wonders if this is how the families of soldiers feel, before their son or daughter are deployed in a war zone. Although at least, if he were in Iraq or Afghanistan, she would know where he was and what dangers he faced. The Pegasus galaxy is a giant unknown quantity and she is terrified if she even begins to think about what might be lurking there.
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