Rodney Talks (John/Rodney - for week #146-148)

[mific.livejournal.com]

Title: Rodney Talks (also on the AO3)
Author:mific
Rating: G
Pairing: John/Rodney (I'm calling it pre-slash, but it could just as easily be friendship if you prefer gen)
Warnings: None
Words: 952
Summary: Sheppard's an enigma, and it's driving Rodney crazy.
Notes: Just a little snippet of Rodney talking, because when I see a prompt for "talk" it's Rodney who comes to mind. I got to thinking about how uncommon it is for fanfic writers to use the 1st person. Yeah, I know it's supposed to be limiting, with the restricted POV, but most of us write 3rd person with a restricted POV anyway, so...Anyway, I thought I'd do a little writing practice in the 1st person. And there's no one more first in their person than Rodney.



-=-=-=-=-=-

Sheppard drives me nuts. I'm sure he thinks he's stable and predictable, but let me tell you, he's all over the place. Not that I get much chance to dwell on it in the occasional microsecond between power grid melt-downs and some water-damaged Ancient science project trying to blow up the south pier. I can't figure Sheppard out, though, and it's annoying – he's a puzzle, and usually that'd be intriguing, but it's not like he's a quasar or something really fascinating. And there's no time – there's never any time.

Take last week's mission to swamp-world, when Sheppard (in full-blown Colonel Bossy mode) made us hike several miles through fetid mud. He said the jumper'd get bogged down if he parked it away from the higher ground near the gate, because obviously he cares more about his precious damn jumpers than my aching legs. By the time we reached the village I was in a foul mood so of course it went from bad to worse and the locals took offense. I mean, come on, how was I supposed to know those cavemen had a thing about people snapping their fingers? Sure, Sheppard said Teyla'd told us on the endless, exhausting (and unnecessary!) trek in from the gate, but that's rank hypocrisy: he never listens to her cultural briefings and I'm damn sure he only found out about that taboo after the exceptionally smelly guards had tied me to a post and locked him and Teyla and Ronon in that hut.

It's not like he gives a damn whether we have to bow three times or turn in a circle before farting, or whatever. He's always peering about for the inevitable ambush on those hikes, too twitchy to take any real notice of anthropology 101. Not that I mind him being twitchy: twitchy's good. Twitchy's his job. It's the random shifts from paranoid twitchiness to yelling I take issue with – okay, okay, maybe not actual yelling, but the furious hissing as they dragged him off was intimidating as hell and I've a good mind to report him to Woolsey for institutional bullying and harassment. On second thoughts, maybe not, thinking about the labs. Bullying and harassment are all that's standing between us and death by morons.

So one second it's all “McKay, for Christ's sake will you pay attention to Teyla!” and then, after Ronon demolishes the rear wall of the hut with his blaster, “McKay, get a move on and stop fussing with your damn wrists!” All I wanted was a little neosporin, because hello: planet mud, and who knew what was in the mud, and I could easily have had abrasions. Easily.

So then there's the running and the screaming, and he's dragging me by my tac-vest, which I've told him before is no help at all! It just pulls me off balance, which was probably why I zigged when I should have zagged and got brained by a rock.

I don't recall the rest of our daring escape – I gather Ronon did a fireman's carry, but I didn't come to until I was back in the infirmary being tortured by Marie with a blood pressure cuff. She always cranks it up until it's amputating my arm, and I tell you, it's excruciating. I'm sure I'll have bruises. Anyway, I fought myself free of her clutches and looked over and there was Sheppard, sacked out in a chair. He was still crusted with mud, slumped on my nice clean bed and snoring his head off. Why the staff indulge him is beyond me – if I tried to hang out in the infirmary covered in alien gloop I'd be banished immediately. Sterile environment, anyone?

I couldn't move my left arm because the idiot had passed out on it and was drooling on the sleeve of my scrubs. Honestly, I know he's a soldier and they're trained to sleep anywhere – although I'm not sure that holds true for pilots, but in some ways he's more infantry these days, with the endless unnecessary forced marches. Anyway, as I was saying, not only did I have a lump on my skull the size of a golf ball – and this is the brain that's keeping the city from sinking so it's no laughing matter – and a splitting headache, and post-traumatic shock from the capture and being tied to a stake and threatened with hand amputation as though I was in some tin-pot Islamic state, not only that, but to top it off I had the big galoot crashed out on my arm and I had to let Marie repeatedly cut off the circulation to my right hand with her endless blood pressure checks. I need that hand to write down brilliant ideas, and for delicate operations crucial to our survival like crystal swapping, programming ZPM simulations and rewiring circuitry, not to mention jerking off.

Anyway, you see what I mean. Sheppard's completely baffling – one minute he's glowering and shoving and hissing and the next he's sleeping on me. And then he stirred and peered up blearily and said “Rodney? That you, buddy? How you feeling?” and he had this goofy little smile that made my chest hurt – although that was probably bruised ribs from the damn guards manhandling me.

So I had to reach over – ow, definitely bruised ribs – and push his head back down and say “I'm fine, go back to sleep you idiot,” and he did. I may have kept my fingers in his hair for a while, but that was just to get the mud out. Really, I have no idea why they let him into the infirmary in that state.


-=-=-=-=-=-

end

Comments

[selenic76.livejournal.com]

♥! Such a wonderful job with the first person Rodney, I bet that's the kind of chatter that goes on in his head even when he's not actually speaking :D And loved the sweet ending! ^_^ Thank you for writing and sharing!