Work Text:
Today is a bad day that cannot stop getting worse, as far as Kavanagh is concerned.
Granted, the start was good. McKay gone on a mission? Less annoyance all around. Maybe he would be able to get more work done on his part of the project without McKay’s numerous (and lengthy) interruptions to say out loud whatever so-called brilliant idea that popped into his head. Or story about that one time he and Major Carter…
We get it, dude. You're the smartest guy in the Pegasus and Milky Way galaxies combined. And you have a hard-on for Major Carter because she’s hot and she’s almost as smart as you. Please, just shut. The fuck. Up. And let us work.
But then Dr. Beckett had to come and interrupt simulations for a stupid shot.
Yes, in hindsight, Kavanagh knew it had been a mistake to put his name on the list of volunteers for the gene therapy that might give him the ability to use all the Ancient tech lying around. He blames it now on a moment of lunacy, of caving in to peer pressure after watching Major Sheppard throw McKay off a balcony.
He can't lie, though, that the thought of how potentially convenient it would be to have the gene – for his own research projects – had been a deciding factor in the caving process. That would be why Kavanagh is now in the middle of the conference room with an ache in his leg and an ache in his head from the alarm that won't shut off-
Except it is literally shut off now and has been for a while now, and is now just an endless loop in his brain.
Not exactly helpful when you're squabbling over the best way to retract a drive pod and get the jumper stuck in the Stargate home again with the other two smartest scientists in their department. He’s not counting the Czech diva, Zelenka, because fucking off to go play with a jumper during a crisis is not the brightest move.
Even if Dr. Weir seems to think so right now.
Zelenka just thinks he is too good to come to the conference room with everyone else. He has to go straight to the jumper bay with his research team at his heels like he is the second coming of Christ. Fiddling around with a jumper is not going to be the key to be solving this issue when they have so little time.
Also not helpful is the tiny twinge of resentment Kavanagh has towards McKay right now. McKay would be the one to get himself into a situation like this, with everything set up for him to be the hero of the day.
It might not be a pattern yet, but Kavanagh can see it emerging anyway.
Two for two? Someday it will be a three for three, then a four for four…
The idea just doesn't sit well in Kavanagh’s stomach.
All of that together makes it nearly impossible for Kavanagh to think positively about anything right now. The one bright spot is that if something happens to McKay, at least there is a chance someone slightly less obnoxious will lead the science team. Thank god for potential small favors.
Maybe it's because of all the negativity in the air that Kavanagh sees the potential problem first.
Damage to the jumper is, of course, how the drive pod failed to retract properly. How much time have they spent as part of the SGC putting pieces of Ancient tech it receives here and there under the microscope and through its paces? Every moment they aren't working on how to save the galaxy from one emergency or another.
Ancient tech has some redundancies (what system doesn't?), but unless there's damage, it's absolutely unnecessary to tweak it. In a perfect state, it is the perfect operating system. Interrupt it, though…
An interruption is where they're at now, too, because the front half of the jumper is inside the event horizon. Cockpit controls are interrupted…
His fingers stray along a schematic from the cockpit to the main drive as his mind starts running the calculations. If McKay triggers the wrong pathway… Oh, shit.
Oh, shit…
Explosion.
He has to say something. NOW.