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This was not how I’d envisioned spending this day.
“‘Friendly natives,’ ” I mimicked, sing-song, and hoisted my burden a little higher. “‘Tropical planet, easy mission—what could go wrong?’ I’d just like to go on the record as saying those are the stupidest words in the English language.”
“Sure, long as you…keep walking,” a voice slurred in my ear.
Said voice belonged to the real source of my grievances, moving only through the uncoordinated shuffle we euphemistically pretended was walking. In actuality, I was dragging him along with a desperate grip on his waist and arm. For the stick figure that was Sheppard, he carried a surprising amount of heft. Or rather, I carried, because as I mentioned, he wasn’t doing a very good job.
I didn’t even have the worst share. Ahead of me, Ford was hurrying along with an entirely unconscious Teyla slung over his shoulder, a task I both envied and shuddered at. One staggering major was enough for me to handle.
Probably too much, in truth. He was slipping again and, cursing, I adjusted my grip once more. “I’ve seen you in the showers—you’re nothing but skin stretched over bone. What do you do, eat ball bearings for breakfast? Sift iron fillings into your hair? Although that weed patch would add a few pounds in itself,” I added contemplatively, an effect I was afraid was totally ruined by my panting for breath.
“You look…in the showers?”
I huffed at that. “Don’t flatter yourself—it’s just hard not to notice a human Q-tip. I, on the other hand—”
“—woulda gotten lef’ behind…’f you’d been shot. Too heavy.”
I just rolled my eyes, not the least bit offended. The jab would’ve been a lot more biting if Sheppard hadn’t already carried me out of bad situations at least twice when I was in no shape to walk, not to mention that he’d whittled fifteen pounds off me those last few months with an inhuman workout regimen I secretly suspected had been designed as torture for the enemy. And then there was the simple fact that even if I hadn’t been irreplaceable and the closest thing either of us had to a best friend, Major Sheppard didn’t leave his people behind. Period. It only seemed fair to return the favor, even if I gave myself a hernia doing so.
“McKay…”
I glanced over, saw the drooping eyelids, and gave him a shake. “Oh, no, you’re not going to pass out on me now. Falling asleep on a planet full of cannibals is a bad thing. You’ll probably wake up in a stewpot as the main course. Although considering how skinny you are, maybe they’d just use you for broth.”
His brow furrowed. “Doesn’…make sense.”
“Yes, well, a lot doesn’t make sense today. Like why no one figured out earlier what the natives meant by having us for dinner, or why they drug their main courses.” I wouldn’t have minded finding out—purely as an academic matter, of course—why they also needed to do it so bloodily. The coated dart the major had pulled incredulously from his side had been as wide as my pinkie, which left a considerable hole to leak body fluids from onto both of us. Teyla, with her smaller body mass and a dart in the neck, had succumbed almost immediately, but John had merely been reduced to a narcotized heap with all the steadiness of a two-legged tripod. And I fully intended to keep him at least that stable because I was not about to carry him halfway across the planet.
“Could be poison,” he said with unusual clarity. Unfortunately, that was the last sentence I wanted to hear with any kind of clarity.
My face hardened. “It’s not poison,” I said firmly. “Poisoning their food wouldn’t make sense and even cannibals aren’t immune to logic. It’s some sort of narcotic to keep you from climbing out of the pot while they’re stirring it.” Besides, I refused to believe it was death I was staving off by keeping us moving, instead of a less immediately fatal capture by the natives. We just had to get to the gate and then Carson would fix them, the same way I was expected to fix everything else in the city. He only had to worry about the people end, so who had the harder job? I glanced ahead at Ford, who still seemed to be moving more effortlessly than I. “How’s Teyla?” I called.
“Still breathing,” he called back over his non-occupied shoulder. “I think she’s just out.”
One tiny bit of good news in what was turning out to be a new record in bad days. “There, see?” I turned back to Sheppard.
His eyes were closing again. We stumbled, his head coming up in a myclonic jerk, and I had to grab frantically to keep both of us from falling.
“Major! A little help here!” My back was threatening to spasm from all the awkward weight it bore, and that was the least of my problems.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, the word so numb as to give me no comfort at all. “ ‘M just…”
“Tired, I know, and I’m very sorry to be cutting into your beauty sleep here but I need you to concentrate for me. We just have a few more minutes to go.” I really, really hoped so anyway, because there was still no gate in sight, and all the jolting had started the bleeding again. There hadn’t been time to even slap a pressure bandage on it, and I could feel the warm wetness soaking through my jacket and shirt. Definitely not good.
Had I mentioned what a truly awful day I was having?
“He’s still bleeding—we need to stop soon so I can wrap it,” I called to Ford again.
“Teyla is, too, but we can’t stop here. Maybe those rocks ahead.”
I had to squint to see them, between the cloudiness of my vision from lack of oxygen and the sweat running into my eyes, but I assumed the grey clusters ahead were our goal. Sure. Piece of cake. What was dragging twice my body weight another few tenths of a mile?
Considering the options, nothing at all.
I pulled John’s arm a little more tightly over my shoulder, found a belt loop to snag my other hand in, and determined not to hyperventilate, I kept going. We kept going.
My legs were nearly as rubbery as his by the time I more or less dropped us both into the shelter of the rocks. I sensed Ford laying Teyla down a little more gently, the show-off, but couldn’t hear them over the roaring in my ears. I would take more seriously every bit of exercise the major told me to do. I probably still wouldn’t do them, but I would give them very serious consideration.
Sheppard’s eyelids fluttered, which I figured was better than nothing as I pawed through the one pack we had left between us. “I’m going to remember this the next time you complain I’m not alert,” I said idly as I looked. No time for antiseptics and he’d already been drugged plenty, but…there. I pulled out a pressure bandage and reached under him to loop it around his waist with rusty, exhausted effort. “Lying down on the job, Major—I really expected better.”
His glare didn’t lose much for being heavy-lidded, but it did surprise me. I hadn’t thought he was still that with me. “I’m here. Listen, McKay—”
And because nothing good comes from a statement that starts like that, I quickly talked over him. “We’re almost at the gate, Major, just…” I looked to the lieutenant to fill in the blank.
He glanced up from his own first-aid efforts. “About a half mile, sir.”
“Half-a-mile. Just enough time to prepare for whatever Carson has in mind for you. You know how he loves blood tests.”
“McKay.” A solid drag on my sleeve shut me up, but not without a tremor of fear. “Leave me here.”
My panic subsided into actual amusement. “That’s the best you can come up with?” I scoffed. “ ‘Leave me here’? Are you sure your last name isn’t ‘Wayne’?”
He wasn’t amused. In fact, the darkness that slid into his eyes made me swallow hard. “This isn’t a movie—you don’t leave me here, they’ll…” His strength flagged and he shut his eyes for a moment. My hand found his shoulder without any guidance from me. “I can’t feel my legs anymore. You can’t carry me. You go too slow and…they’ll pick you off.” His hand, tangled in my sleeve, shook with his determination. “I’m not losing you, too, McKay.”
I didn’t need to be a psychologist, or even good at reading people, to know I’d just stumbled onto the heart of the matter. Which was a good thing because I am not good at reading people, even John sometimes, and I probably never would have found it on my own. “Me too?” I asked quietly, very deliberately missing the point. “So we’re also giving up on Teyla?”
He blanched at that, his head rolling to one side to bring Teyla and Ford into sight. The lieutenant was watching us, no doubt ready to jump in with his own protest when needed but for now just listening in stony silence.
John cursed under his breath. “You know what I—”
“Yes,” I said coldly, because after all the stumbling and fear and muscle strain, I was finally starting to get angry. “I do know what you mean.” I pulled the bandage tight, brutally ignoring his grunt of pain, and tied it off. “You’re tired of losing people. We should put that on your tombstone: He gave his life so he wouldn’t lose anyone else. There’s just one problem with that, Major.” I pulled his arm over my shoulders again, gritted my teeth, and pushed up. “I don’t like losing friends, either, and I’m actually in a position to do something about it.”
Ford followed my lead, Teyla over one shoulder again, his weapon out as he scanned for pursuit. I could hear the yells now in the distance.
Sheppard hadn’t been completely honest: his feet could still shuffle against the scrabbly ground, making some effort to walk. Thank God, because I really wasn’t sure how I would have carried him more than a few feet, even if Ford would have traded me teammates. As it was, I gave John no choice, setting off with weary but unflagging steps toward our goal.
“Uh, Dr. McKay?” Ford waited until I scowled over at him. “It’s this way, sir,” he pointed to the left.
Fine, unflagging steps toward that goal.
John’s head bobbed with every lurching step, fingers sometimes clamped on my shoulder, other times loose and sliding off if not for my clenching hold. He was losing the fight, despite the adrenalin that had to be running through him, despite my questions and complaints and occasional yells. I thought the movement would keep him awake—wasn’t that what they did to OD cases? I thought I’d seen that in a movie somewhere. But for all I knew, I was just circulating the drug faster through him, because this really wasn’t working.
Then, with the top of the gate just coming into sight over the crest of a hill, his legs gave out completely. We both fell to our knees.
Ford turned to look back, even as I grabbed a handful of Sheppard’s vest and shook. “Get up,” I spat.
“Rod…” His neck wobbled, his unfocused gaze not even near to meeting mine.
“No! This is not how it’s going to end!” I could hear the natives behind us even through the pounding of my heart and rush of blood in my ears. I shook him again. “Do you hear me? I am not leaving you here for their first ever Air Force cookout. You are not doing this to me, you selfish…” I sputtered, nothing I came up with seeming strong enough. “I am really sick of losing people, so either you come with me or we’re staying here together.”
Even half-unconscious, he was mad, I could see it. I couldn’t have cared less. Maybe he’d rather die than have someone else die on him, but nobility was never completely altruistic, and in this case it came with a massive blindspot. Had he even once thought about those he was leaving behind?
I yanked him to his feet none-too-gently, and was only mildly surprised when he gritted his teeth and stiffened his legs, and silently started moving with me again. Anger could be a powerful source of energy if applied correctly, and I was fine with it aimed at me as long as it did its job. He could write up a nice letter of censure for my file later, when he was back home and safe.
Then I didn’t think much about anything at all except the poisoned darts that had started whizzing by my head, the uneven terrain and even more uneven gait that threatened to trip us again with every step, and the labored breathing that wasn’t my own.
And then we were stepping through the gate to safety.
We just stood there for a minute, Ford easing Teyla down from his shoulder and into his arms, my arm protectively around the major, his head lolling against my chest, well and truly out of it now. Gurneys appeared, and they relieved us of our unconscious teammates.
Suddenly feeling a little wobbly myself, I plopped down right there in the gate room.
“Rodney?” Elizabeth approached, a worried question in her eyes.
I waved her off. “I’m okay, just…” Tired, in ways that made that word seem totally inadequate.
“Why don’t you go see Carson, too,” she suggested gently, and waited for my nod. Then she stepped aside to talk to Ford, but I could still feel the weight of her gaze.
I left when I couldn’t take it any longer, and when my legs felt strong enough to hold me again.
But I didn’t go to the infirmary.
Carson called down with the news that the drug was indeed just a strong sedative and would wear off on its own after a good rest. The need to go see how John and Teyla were doing eased with that assurance, so I kept at my task, only slipping into the darkened infirmary hours later to see the evidence for myself.
Everyone was asleep. I stood there watching them uncertainly for a moment, not even trying to identify the various feelings beside relief that crowded my chest, then turned to leave as silently as I’d come.
“McKay.”
I stopped at the drowsy voice, looked back. “Go back to sleep, Major.”
“Oh, so now it’s okay?”
I wasn’t really in the mood to be baited, just stared at him blankly.
“You know I was right back on the planet.” Deceptive, that tone, conversational but dead serious.
“Let me see, how many ways can I say ‘no’?” I answered just as mildly.
“If it’s the choice between one life or two—”
“It wasn’t. It was choosing between one certain death or two possible ones.”
His mouth twisted but he didn’t argue. Sheppard was many things but he wasn’t a hypocrite.
And I had realized something that afternoon, during that long stagger home and the hours since. Sheppard wasn’t a hypocrite because he truly hadn’t thought he was taking off on anyone. The records I’d spent the last hours going through confirmed that: people left John, not the other way around. It had explained a lot of things, like why our one ATA gene-endowed team member so often risked leaving us in a lurch with useless Jumpers and no leadership. He’d come to the city to escape responsibility and instead had found more than he’d ever expected: how was that for enough irony to choke a horse?
Then again, speaking of hypocrites, was my story all that different?
I hesitated. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired. Heavy. Kinda high, actually.”
Despite myself, my lips curved at that. “I believe that means I win any argument by intellectual default.”
“You think too much, Rodney,” he said sleepily, head dropping back to the pillow.
Or, sometimes, not enough. I’d missed something right under my nose all this time. No man was left behind, whether we were talking about geography or this whole complicated friendship thing. I was learning the lesson in ways I don’t think Major Sheppard had ever intended.
I pulled up a chair, dropping into it gratefully, just starting to feel the strains and bruises of the day. “Occupational hazard,” I quipped. “Just like you shooting everything.”
“Hey, now, that’s not fair,” he complained with closed eyes. “Sometimes I blow ’em up.”
I snorted softly. “Go to sleep, Major. The violence can wait until tomorrow.”
He made some noncommittal sound, already dozing.
I knew better than to think the topic of that afternoon was closed; he’d given in way too easily, no doubt helped by enough drugs in his system to, in Carson’s quaint words, “smash a herd of sheep.” If you ask me, the wrong person was on drugs. But as much as I still didn’t understand, if and when the topic came up again, I was ready at least to defend this choice.
If and when.
The End