![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
squidgiepdx posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
sga_saturdayTITLE: Doing Their Duty; or, You Can’t Spell Parrish Without Pariah
AUTHORS: ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
squidgiepdx and elderwitty
FANDOM: Stargate: Atlantis
PAIRINGS: Lorne/Parrish, McKay/Sheppard
CHARACTERS: Lorne, Parrish, Dr. Kiang, McKay, Sheppard, Ronon, Katie Brown, Elizabeth, Teyla, Carson
PROMPT: For SGA Saturday: pariah
WARNINGS: OMG, we cracked again. I mean SERIOUSLY cracked.
WORDS: 1823
NOTE: This takes place in Season Number Two. :grin:
NOTE: THE SEQUEL: Sincere apologies to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. You'll understand.
~*~*~
David Parrish thoroughly enjoyed being treated like a god after bringing the edible plant he discovered on PX-L4X back to Atlantis. After too few days, however, that adoration dried up. Now, every disdainful look sent his way makes him feel like a pariah.
He watches Rodney (who had nearly hoisted Parrish on his shoulders to parade him around the city after the announcement) stride out of the lab, presumably heading to the infirmary to consult Carson about his situation. Again. As Rodney passes, his eyes cut to slits and David would swear that the physicist growls at him.
Six Days Earlier
Parrish had looked forward to the outing to PX-L4X. Just Dr. Deborah Kiang, their Marine escorts, and him on a six-day mission to catalogue and evaluate plants as possible protein replacements. Even with supplies coming on the Daedalus, meat was becoming more of a special occasion item than an everyday one.
The trip seemed routine, with very few new specimens identified, none of which seemed that promising. On the last morning of the excursion, they made their way through a densely forested area while heading back to the gate. It didn’t take long to notice the fragrance permeating the area. David was so deep in thought about it that he nearly missed Kiang’s query.
“Hey. You smell that?” Deborah asked, nudging him with her elbow to ensure she had his full attention.
“What?” he asked, focusing on his teammate.
“That smell,” she clarified, waving a hand through the perfume surrounding them.
David closed his eyes, leaned his head back, and breathed deeply through his nose. There is a hint of something decadent in the air, but he can’t quite place it. “What do you think it is?” he asks the group.
The general consensus was evenly split; half thought it smelled of a rich dark chocolate, while the other half considered it to be more coffee-like. They followed the scent until they came upon a thorny bush, ripe with deep purple berries. “This seems to be them,” David announced. He watched his botanist partner as she scanned the plant with a modified lifesigns detector. “Getting anything?”
“Nothing toxic,” she responded, glancing up from the device. “You wanna grab some of these to take back?”
David tossed a Duh! look at her before pulling out the specimen bags. After collecting berries, leaves, thorns, and part of a branch, he stuffed the entire collection into his pack with the rest of the samples they’d collected over the week. “Man,” he exclaimed, inhaling deeply, “I could stay here all week!”
“Come on, Parrish,” Corporal Rady called, pulling David back to reality. “We’re due back on Atlantis in an hour.
~*~*~
As he crossed the event horizon, Parrish caught his partner’s eye. “Welcome back,” Evan called.
David smiled back until Lorne was pushed aside by Rodney McKay, stumbling as he forced his way to the railing. “What is that smell?” McKay demanded. It figures McKay would be the first to sniff out the plant.
“That’s the berry of a plant we found, McKay,” he replied as Rodney quickly made his way down the stairs. In a bid to forestall being manhandled (or even tackled), he pulled the specimens out of his pack, loosing even more of the aroma. “The natives near the gate call them Noh’muanto. They say that it is edible, but that they don’t particularly care for it.”
“Savages,” Rodney snorted while reaching for the bag. “You mind if I, uh...” he belatedly asked as his greedy hand groped toward the delectable smelling bits of fauna.
Elizabeth Weir called down from the balcony, “Rodney, how about we let Dr. Beckett run some tests, and see if the botanical chemists okay it before you start in on them?”
Rodney started like a kid caught with his hand in a cookie jar. “Fine,” he grumbled dejectedly.
Weir took a noticeably deep breath before smiling at the away team. “Good work, people,” she congratulated. As she headed back into her office Rodney went for the fruit again.
“Careful of the-” is all Parrish got out before Rodney jerked his hand back with a large thorn stuck in one finger. Rodney swore and pulled the thorn out, but went right back to digging in the bag, albeit more cautiously. This time he managed to safely retrieve one of the plum-colored berries.
“You did say they’re non-toxic, right?” Rodney asked. At Parrish’s nod, Rodney popped the berry into his mouth, savoring the delicious flavor, making delicate mewling sounds that nobody should use in public. David wondered if McKay makes the same noises when he’s with Sheppard, alone in their room.
As Parrish put the sample back and headed toward the Botany department, he noticed Rodney dropping into perfect step with him. “Doctor...” he hesitated, not sure of the physicist’s motivations.
“Oh, I am not missing this, Parrish,” Rodney assured him. David stopped mid-stride, prompting Rodney to put a hand on his shoulder and push him along. “Well come on, then!” he exhorted, aiming them at the infirmary to get Carson’s blessing to use the fruit.
~*~*~
“Anyone seen Rodney?” John wondered aloud as Teyla, Ronon, and he picked up their trays. “It’s not like him to miss a meal.” When his companions offered noncommittal answers (Teyla shaking her head and Ronon grunting), John keyed his radio. “Sheppard to McKay.”
“Meet me in the gate room, Colonel,” Rodney replied. “We need to go off-world for a few hours.”
John threw a look of confusion at his team. “Teyla and Ronon are with me in the mess, Rodney. We don’t have another mission scheduled until next week.”
“This is important, John.” Sheppard abandoned his tray and jogged out of the mess, radioing, “I’m on my way, Rodney.” He arrived in the gate room to find McKay clutching a large Athosian basket and beaming at him, surrounded by half of the Botany department.
~*~*~
For two days following the inclusion of the native berries in the food supply (they were quite versatile, from beverages to desserts to between-meal snacks), suggesting that the mood on Atlantis was elevated would have been an understatement. People were nearly intoxicated with the new sweet. Rodney, in particular, waxed poetic about them to anyone who would stand still long enough, even having to be dissuaded from doing so during a staff meeting.
Carson was first to notice the situation. As he inventoried medication usage for the week, he noticed a sharp uptick in requests for digestives, specifically laxatives. Curiously, it’d started with Rodney, who complained that he felt “sluggish”. Rodney was so embarrassed about talking about his bathroom habits that it took Carson fifteen minutes to realize that the description applied to his bowels, not his body.
On day four, the proverbial shit hit the fan. Or, rather – it didn’t.
Before the introduction of the Noh’muanto berries (which were quickly nicknamed No Movement berries), Carson hadn’t realized that there were so many euphemisms for going to the bathroom. Typically, the soldiers had the most colorful complaints.
“I tried to drop the kids off at the pool, but they didn’t want to go.”
“I went to the library, but there weren’t any books.”
“My butt shuttle won’t launch.”
“I’ve only been able to moon the Tidy Bowl Man, not drown him.”
“I can't make any grunt sculptures.”
The best phrase didn’t come from a soldier, however. No, a scientist took that honor. Carson actually laughed aloud - increasing his own intestinal discomfort - when Katie Brown pulled him aside to ask if he could help her negotiate the release of the chocolate hostages.
“That’s it,” he exclaimed. “The berries have to go.” Everyone on the expedition knew it, but no one wanted to give in to the awful truth. Especially Rodney.
~*~*~
The morning of the fifth day found the leadership team conferring with Drs. Parrish and Kiang. Carson dejectedly finished up his presentation on the long-term effects of the Noh’muantos with, “...so it’s my judgment that the berries have to go. I’ll be sending the data to Earth so they can research possible new medications. Elizabeth?”
Weir scanned the room, specifically eyeing Rodney who was hovering over a pile of the fruit. “I tend to agree, Carson,” she said, steadfastly ignoring the noises coming from the afflicted bowels around the room. (It had been decided by silent agreement that personal niceties would take a back seat to personal comfort. Also, after the chili feast in the Mess the night before, that every available window on Atlantis would be open.) “Rodney,” she said sternly. “They’ve got to go.”
“Oh, come on!” Rodney pleaded, only to be silenced by an odor drifting towards him from his right. “Sheppard!”
The Colonel tossed an innocent look at his partner. “What?”
Before he could betray his guilt by laughing, Ronon’s cry of “Butt trumpet!” cleared the room in three seconds flat.
Today
The afternoon of the sixth day, twenty-four hours after the last berry is cleaned out of the kitchen stores and gated (along with Rodney's stash) to the Genii homeworld along with a note reading For Commander Cowen, with gratitude - Manara, things appear to be moving right along, both citywide and on a more personal basis, as evidenced by the number of people absent from their workstations. Hoping to avoid confrontation, Parrish passes quickly through the communal lab (popular due to a wealth of adjacent bathrooms), ignoring the glare a departing Rodney shoots him. He gets to his workstation and tries to settle in.
Immersed in work on the other plants from PX-L4X, ignoring those around him as best he can, he barely registers the comments of the scientists around him. Kavanaugh, however, is making more noise than Rodney ever could with his whining about repeated trips to the bathroom. “What are you complaining about?” snaps an unusually aggressive Miko. “Everyone was affected.”
Kavanaugh clutches his stomach, cursing the queasy feeling that’s overtaking his insides again. “My last week here and this has to happen. I - I, just...” As he watches the interaction between Miko and Kavanaugh, David sees Rodney reenter the lab.
“What?” Miko asks snippily, clearly annoyed.
Stretching to his full, weaselly height and straightening his glasses, Kavanaugh proclaims, “I have a dream that I will be remembered here for the quality of my work, rather than the contents of my colon.”
Miko nearly drops the ancient device she’s holding. She gently deposits it on her workspace before leaning over and smacking Kavanaugh in the head.
“Amen!” Rodney declares, having heard the blasphemous paraphrasing. He nods to Zelenka, who swiftly dope-slaps Kavanaugh again for good measure. As Rodney approaches the cringing scientist, he asks, “You want in on this, Parrish?” before he smacks the ponytailed scientist a bit harder than the previous two.
“No, but thanks.” David smiles. The pariah label has clearly passed from him back to Kavanaugh. Life on Atlantis has officially returned to normal.
end
ps. Mods? We need author tags, please!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:00 pm (UTC)Too funny.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:44 pm (UTC)the mail won't leave the post office?
::dies::
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:00 pm (UTC)inbox
Date: 2011-07-09 07:18 am (UTC)That would be My outbox is clogged.
C'mon.
;P
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 05:47 pm (UTC)I am seriously concerned about you...I've never contemplated metaphors for that situation!! LOL...this was pure crack...and hilarious!!
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:51 pm (UTC)I can just imagine the conversation that was held developing some of those... umm... creative descriptions.
Very funny!
no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-09 12:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-09 04:58 am (UTC)Hahahaha! Gah, and I can't even say anything about cracking up. But if I could, well then, I did. Fun story! :D
no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-09 12:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:22 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-09 10:57 pm (UTC)Bathroom humor FTW!
no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-10 06:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-11 02:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-11 03:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-05-20 11:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-05-21 12:27 am (UTC)