SGA fic: An Experiment in Captivity
Genre: Gen. Mainly Rodney HC/angst with a bit of team.
Rating: PG13
Words: 5654
Summary: Rodney trapped in a room. Set in early Season 3.
Rodney woke up on the floor. This had happened a few times before in his life, but when he searched through his memories, he didn't remember getting drunk the night before or anything much at all as to how he got where he was.
His limbs ached and his head throbbed and the tingle in all his nerves told him something fearful. "I got stunned?"
He groaned as he stretched out and rolled over onto his back. Closing his eyes with his brow furrowed he said, "I don't remember getting stunned."
After a few minutes, the tingling and soreness dissipated and he was able to open his eyes and look around. He hummed in confusion as he sat up and found that he was inside typical Lantean living quarters. There was a single bed, table and bedside table, bathroom door and entry door. The only things missing were windows and any kind of personal furnishings. The lights in the room were on normally so he could at least see what he was doing and he was in yesterday's uniform which was odd.
"Maybe I went home the wrong way last night?" Rodney theorised as he stood up and held his head. He sighed as he went over to the front door and when it didn't open automatically, he swiped his hand over the crystals. There wasn't even a negative beep as the door remained firmly closed. "Okay, still not a problem," Rodney said, feeling the first stirrings of panic forming in his chest. He tried the bridging trick and pried off the whole panel and poked around inside but nothing worked. There was no power getting to the mechanism.
Rodney reached up to tap his radio but it was missing. "Okay, maybe that is a problem." He checked his pockets and found an epipen, tube of glucose tablets (he pulled a face at that) and small toolkit.
"Let's see what I have to work with in here," Rodney said to himself to quell the rising fear. He did a full inventory of the room and bathroom. There was a half litre bottle of water in one of the drawers, but nothing else. There was no water to the shower or sink but the toilet in the bathroom worked, "Damned Ancient efficiency," Rodney grumbled as the air operated suction device cycled but would give him no water. "I'm already thirsty!"
Rodney went to the drawer and pulled out the water bottle, placing it reverently on the table. When he opened it, the seal cracked and he took a small swig. "Just enough to stave off dehydration while I get out of here," he said. Talking to himself calmed him a little, but not much. He took a few deep breaths and held his chest as he sat on the bed with his eyes closed. His nerves didn't form into a full blown panic attack but it was close. "There are still things to try," he said to himself and frowned as his hand brushed against something hard through his shirt.
Rodney unzipped his jacket and felt at his t shirt in the middle of his chest. "What's this?" He lifted the shirt and found a smooth circle of metal stuck to his skin. It was about 5cm in diameter and dark purple in colour. It hurt when he tried to pull it off, making him cough and wince as blood welled up around it and trickled down his chest. "Just another thing to add to the list of mysteries," Rodney said sadly. Deciding there was nothing he could do about it, he lowered his shirt and zipped the jacket up again, shuddering at the sensation of the device biting into his sternum.
Rodney got his small toolkit out and eyed the walls of the room pensively. "You can't trap a genius."
xxx
Sheppard sat in the mess hall with Ronon and Teyla at lunchtime, munching a sandwich.
"Where's McKay?" Ronon asked. He'd already finished his lunch and was eyeing what was left of Sheppard's.
"Don't know. Haven't seen him since yesterday," John replied. It wasn't that unusual for Rodney not to join them.
"Perhaps he has got wrapped up in an experiment and will be by later," Teyla said.
"Probably," John replied, then took another bite of his sandwich.
xxx
Rodney's empty stomach was aching. "I know," he said as he glanced at his wrist, but his watch had been removed. "Great." Rodney huffed as his insides growled in hunger. "Not only are my internal organs starting to digest themselves, but I don't even know how long I've been here!" He felt a little dizzy so sat on the bed and pressed a hand against the pain in his middle. Sipping some more of the precious water helped a little, but not much. The bottle was already a third empty.
Rodney got up and went to the wall again where he had pulled off every accessible panel and poked around with the small screwdriver, but nothing had any power. "Except..." he looked up at the lights in the ceiling and narrowed his eyes.
xxx
Sheppard, Teyla and Ronon sat together at dinner in the mess hall. Rodney still hadn't put in an appearance and John frowned at the empty chair at their table. Ronon caught him looking and said, "Must be a hell of an experiment."
John sighed and tapped his radio, "Sheppard to McKay."
There was no answer.
"Perhaps he is in a shielded area or can't respond at present," Teyla said but her eyes betrayed the worry.
John activated his radio again, "Sheppard to Zelenka."
"Go ahead, Colonel."
"Have you seen Rodney today?"
There was the sound of something falling over and hastily muffled Czech swearing. Radek switched back to English, sounding slightly flustered, "No I haven't but I've been busy fixing faulty wiring. He's probably in the main lab."
"Okay, thanks." John cut the connection and frowned. He finished his dinner and sat there with Ronon and Teyla discussing their last mission for over an hour until the mess hall was nearly empty. At 8.30pm he started getting really worried.
"He might have had his dinner sent down," Teyla said.
"Something doesn't feel right," John replied. "Zelenka's probably right, but I'm going down to the labs to check." John pushed his chair back as he stood up. "I'll see you later."
xxx
Rodney was standing on the bed trying not to electrocute himself as he stuck his fingers in the light housing, when the main door to the room opened. He was so surprised, he nearly fell over. "What's going on?" He called out into the darkness revealed by the open door. He jumped off the bed and backed into the wall furthest from the door and peered out.
A female voice spoke next to him, making him jump. "McKay."
"Who's there?" Rodney asked in wide eyed terror.
The air in front of him shimmered and a woman appeared. She was aiming a stunner at his chest with her right hand and her left hand held a small device. Rodney's eyes initially focused on the weapon, but then moved to the device. "Is that a personal cloak?"
The woman leered at him and pocketed the device, then pulled out a knife instead.
"Oh, that's mature," Rodney ground out. "Was it you that put me in here?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"You'll see."
The woman was slim with blonde hair drawn back into a ponytail and wore a science uniform. Rodney might have found her attractive if she hadn't been glaring at him and threatening him with a knife and stunner. Rodney frowned and starting getting angry. "Tell me what you want or let me go!" Rodney held up his hands, "Or just let me go, that's preferable than being locked up in this room. I'm hungry, by the way. You know I have hypoglycaemia?"
"Of course."
Rodney searched his mind for the fighting skills Teyla, Ronon and John had taught him, thinking of his team gave him the strength he needed to lunge at the woman for the stunner. He cursed his stupidity as he heard the all too familiar sound of the stunner discharging and it rendered him unconscious before he hit the floor.
xxx
John checked all round the labs and the few scientists who were still there that late said they hadn't seen Rodney all day. Now he was starting to get really worried. Rodney wasn't in his quarters either and nothing looked out of place.
"Sheppard to Zelenka."
"I'm a little busy, Colonel," came the flustered reply.
"Sorry to bother you, but I can't find Rodney and no one's seen him all day."
"I'm not his keeper, he's probably in the labs."
"No. He isn't. Can you meet me in the control room?"
Radek's voice had sobered when he responded. "I'll be right there."
A few minutes later, John was hovering behind Radek while he ran some scans on his computer. "Anything?"
"It is very difficult without knowing what I'm looking for. He is not responding to radio, but he might be in shielded area. No one has seen him all day but he might just be working on a project and not want interruptions." Radek glared pointedly at John.
"What about life signs?"
Radek looked back at the map of Atlantis on his laptop. "I'll do a check." He pushed his glasses up his nose and typed some commands. "Hmm. All are accounted for except one life sign."
"Rodney?"
"They don't have name tags, but again, this still doesn't rule out him working in a shielded area."
"I don't know," John said. "I don't like not knowing where he is. What if he's injured and can't call for help?" John didn't voice out loud the other possibility. It was time he called in some help. "Sheppard to Dr. Weir. Sorry to call you so late. Rodney seems to be missing."
xxx
The scientist watched the display on her laptop as a video of the room played. McKay was waking from his slumber and boy was he going to be unhappy.
She made some notes in her file as she studied his reactions and smiled. The experiment was going well. McKay was such a perfect test specimen. It was a shame it had involved travelling to another galaxy before she had found someone like him. Luckily there were no pesky ethics to get around, unlike on Earth where her proposal had been repeatedly denied.
She briefly glanced at the bloodied knife on the table next to her before her eyes went back to the screen to see what McKay was going to do.
xxx
Rodney woke up on the floor. "Not again," he groaned at the tingling sensation throughout his body. As the numbness receded, there was an increasing pain in his right arm. He sat up and pushed up the sleeve of his jacket, wincing as he uncovered a nasty cut on his forearm. It wasn't particularly deep, and had stopped bleeding until he'd disturbed it by pulling the material off the wound.
He gritted his teeth and looked around for something to use as a bandage, but there was nothing. With great difficulty and with much agony, he got his jacket off. The flesh around the cut was red and angry. "Great, it's going to be a race to see what finishes me first: dehydration, starvation or infection!"
Coughing at his dry throat, Rodney stood up on shaky legs and made his way over to the water bottle sitting on the table. It hadn't been topped up and he took a couple of gulps, finding it difficult to restrain himself to drink it all. His hands were shaking too and he felt light headed and weak as he thumped down onto the bed heavily. "I didn't lose that much blood, did I?" he asked the empty air as he glanced at the floor. There was only a small smear there. "Not enough for hypovolemic shock." Rodney shut his eyes and sighed in annoyance. "Hypoglycaemia." He fished the glucose tablets out of his pocket. "My brain's getting more and more scrambled the longer I'm trapped here." He looked up angrily and shouted, "Is this what you want? Watch me suffer?! Starve me to death until I'm no good for anything?" He looked down and closed his eyes in misery as he lowered his voice, "Now I'm going crazy, shouting at walls."
The glucose tablet tasted disgusting, just as he knew it would, and his stomach tried to revolt at the abuse, but he managed to keep it down.
The hunger and fear and repeated bouts of stunned unconsciousness had exhausted Rodney and he lay down on the bed after his meagre meal and soon fell asleep.
xxx
The search parties reported in at 3am. Rodney was nowhere to be found.
"Are we sure he's still on Atlantis?" Dr. Weir asked the people gathered in the briefing room.
"The last time anyone saw him was now over 24 hours ago," Sheppard said. "The gate has been activated four times since then."
"I want the search expanded to those addresses and to start questioning the teams that went offworld," Weir said.
xxx
The scientist slept, although it was difficult to do when she was this excited. The movement alarm sounded a couple of times during the night and she watched as Rodney twitched and rolled over, mumbling in his sleep. She smiled and made some more notes in her file.
She would have to remember to feed him tomorrow if she intended him to last for the duration of the experiment.
xxx
Rodney could barely move the next time he woke up. All his energy reserves had been sapped and he feared that if he tried to pry the wires out of the lights again to route to the door controls, that he would fall and injure himself. He didn't like the idea of lying on the floor with a broken leg without being able to call for painkillers.
When the door opened again, it was desperation that drove Rodney to get up and run towards it. It wasn't enough though, as he couldn't get past the invisible barrier that slammed into his chest and made him fall backwards onto the floor. He rolled over and got up for another charge but a stun bolt shot out from the empty air in front of him and he screwed his eyes tightly closed and tensed up as he expected the numbness to wash over his body again. He was surprised when he remained standing.
"Try that again and the next shot won't miss," the female scientist said from the air.
"Did you pull the legs off spiders when you were small?" Rodney asked hotly, alarmed as his voice cracked at the dryness of his throat.
An MRE and a couple of powerbars materialised on the table and Rodney's dry mouth tried to water at the sight. Another bottle of water also appeared, then the door closed.
Rodney wove his way over to the food and grasped the MRE in trembling hands. The adrenaline that had flooded his system in the attempted escape was now leaving and he felt so tired. He ate as much of the MRE as he could. He'd finished the last mouthful of water from the first bottle a while ago and made a start on the second before he collapsed onto the bed again, totally spent.
xxx
The scientist waited until Rodney was asleep before she walked over to him. He had assumed she'd left the room when the door closed! Her case study notes were going to be interesting when she wrote them up later.
He snored softly and drooled a little as he slept and she eyed him with disgust. His jacket lay discarded on the floor and his right arm looked puffy, red and sore where she'd cut it. She shot him in the chest with the stunner and deactivated the cloak. Taking the knife from her pocket, she set to work on his left arm in punishment for his second escape attempt. She'd have to do something about his legs if he tried again.
xxx
The two planets the gate teams had visited since Rodney had gone missing were dead ends. One was a barren moon devoid of life that had been surveyed, and the people on the other planet hadn't seen Rodney and scans from orbit didn't show his subcutaneous tracking device either.
Careful questioning of the teams that had been offworld didn't reveal anything, so Elizabeth decided to start interviewing everyone to see if anyone knew anything.
"We will find him," Teyla said as she squeezed John's forearm reassuringly.
John felt the weight of worry over his heart turn to icy fear. "But will he be alive when we do?"
xxx
The scientist observed curiously as the people of Atlantis scurried about like hounds trying to scent a fox as they looked for McKay. It was an interesting development in her experiment and she was so distracted in typing up her notes that she forgot to feed McKay that evening. She'd heard that a human could survive for up to a week without food, so wasn't that worried. Her computer beeped a few times in the night but it was only the monitoring device warning her that McKay's heart rate was a little high. The third time it happened, she turned off the beeper to stop it interrupting her sleep.
xxx
Rodney woke up to the foul taste of a glucose tablet in his mouth.
"You can't die yet," a woman said soothingly. "My experiment isn't over."
At first, Rodney felt comforted, then his sugar starved brain woke up a little at the glucose he'd been fed and terror gripped his heart. He pushed himself off the bed and stood. His legs had the consistency of jello and his aching head made the room spin around him.
"What do you want?" Rodney croaked.
"You."
The woman didn't have the cloak activated this time, but still held the stunner and the knife. Rodney glanced at the door but it was closed now. The woman must have something with her that could open it. All that Rodney had to do was get past the stunner and knife and overpower her then he'd be free. His brain kicked into overdrive and he feigned weakness as he held his head and staggered a little. It wasn't difficult to pretend and it achieved his goal of making her move closer to him in concern. This lab rat was not going to cooperate, he thought, as he quickly lunged at her, knocking the stunner from her hand.
She looked at him in surprise, but he bet her expression wasn't as surprised as his, as she buried the knife up to the hilt in his stomach.
xxx
The scientist quickly walked away from the room where McKay was hidden. Her mouth was dry and her hands shook a little as she went. What the hell did McKay think he was doing, attacking her like that?! What did he expect her to do? Her mind flashed back to the last thing she saw as she'd left the room - McKay on the floor, his body curled around the hilt of the knife sticking out of him as he trembled and gasped in pain and ineffectually clutched himself at the site of the stab wound.
What was she going to do now? Her experiment was ruined. It was unlikely she'd ever find a test subject like McKay again and she'd left her stunner in the room in her panic to get away from him. And she didn't think she'd have the guts to go back and retrieve the wraith monitoring device either. She needed to cut the connection to the room when she got back to her quarters and finish typing up her notes. Her conclusion would have to wait until the next time.
She was so lost in her thoughts that she didn't notice Colonel Sheppard standing in the corridor outside her quarters until she was right at the door.
"Dr. Harvey."
She glanced up at him in surprise. "Colonel."
He was leaning on the wall nonchalantly. "You missed your interview."
She frowned. McKay had driven her to distraction. "Sorry, Colonel, I've been wrapped up in an experiment. I must've lost track of the time. Let me just freshen up and I'll be right with you." She swiped her hand over the door control. Like a striking cobra, Sheppard grabbed her wrist.
"Hey!"
Sheppard turned her right hand over and baulked at the rusty brown coloured stain on her hand. Cursed McKay bleeding all over her! Wasn't it enough that he'd wrecked her experiment? Now she'd got his revolting bodily fluids all over her.
"Is that blood?" Sheppard asked as his face paled, then grew stern as he shook her arm. "Where's Rodney? What've you done to him?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. That's machine oil from my lab work."
"What kind of psychologist works on machines? If it's just machine oil, then I'm sure you won't mind me taking you to Dr. Beckett to get it analysed."
"I'd rather not," she said.
"I'm not asking," Sheppard replied, keeping a firm hold on her wrist. He watched her dangerously as he tapped his radio. "Sheppard to Lorne. Send a forensic team down to search Dr. Harvey's quarters. I'm taking her into custody."
"You can't search my quarters without a warrant!" she protested as Sheppard clicked handcuffs around her wrists and pushed her towards the transporter.
"This isn't Earth."
xxx
Sheppard returned to the infirmary to hear the results of Carson's analysis. Dr. Harvey was now secured in the brig and hadn't said a word since Sheppard had caught her.
"I just finished analysing it," Carson said as he studied the screen of his computer. "Thank goodness for the Ancients and their medical equipment."
"And?"
"It's definitely blood." He visibly swallowed, and while the visualisation of the sample remained on the left side of the screen, he drew up a list of personnel on the right side and scrolled down to Rodney's name. He hit enter and held his breath while the comparison ran. Even Sheppard could see it was a match before the computer confirmed it.
"You've got to find him," Carson said. "She's hurt him and he might not have much time."
"I know," Sheppard said. "Radek's tracing a video feed from her quarters."
"I'll have my team standing by."
xxx
"I've found the source," Radek said after way too much time for Sheppard's liking. Radek transferred the map from his laptop onto the large screen in the control room. "It's coming from this location on the West Pier but it must be shielded."
Sheppard memorised the coordinates and radioed Ronon, Teyla and Carson's team to meet them at the nearest transporter.
xxx
It was pitch black in the corridor leading to the source of the video feed. Sheppard was apprehensive as he shone his flashlight down the corridor and went first with Ronon and Teyla. Radek was behind and Carson and two other medical staff waited with a gurney and bags of equipment at the back.
"No life signs," Sheppard said as he glanced at his detector.
"That does not mean anything," Teyla said softly. "The internal sensors would have found him."
"This area is shielded," Radek confirmed.
"What are all these rooms?" Ronon asked, as they passed door after door at short intervals along both sides of the corridor.
"I believe they are living quarters," Radek said. They came to a door that looked exactly like all the others. Radek stopped and pointed to it. "This one." He plugged his tablet into the door control and siphoned some power to it. The door clicked open and light flooded out.
Sheppard pushed Radek back and went into the room with Ronon and Teyla, all with their guns raised and ready. The sudden bright light was dazzling but Sheppard endured it without flinching to ensure the room was safe, then he found Rodney lying totally still on the floor.
"Clear!" he called out as Teyla and Ronon stood back and allowed Carson and his team access.
"He's alive," Carson said as his team swiftly assessed Rodney's condition, inserting IV lines into both of his arms (Sheppard tried to ignore it when they said they had difficulty finding the veins) and wrapping a bandage around the object protruding from his midsection. An oxygen mask went over Rodney's grubby face as he was lifted up and rushed away on the gurney.
Sheppard watched numbly as all the fear and ceaseless energy required for the frantic searching over the past couple of days left him in a rush and left him physically and emotionally exhausted.
Radek was still standing out in the corridor and watching them with a shocked expression. Sheppard took a breath and lowered his gun. Ronon and Teyla relaxed too.
He turned to Radek and kept his voice neutral as he spoke. "I want a forensic team to analyse this room and figure out everything that woman did to Rodney."
The moment they made it out of the shielded area, Sheppard called for a team of marines to secure the room, then updated Elizabeth before making his way to the infirmary with Teyla and Ronon.
xxx
"She damn nearly killed him," Carson said a few hours later as he regarded Rodney's team and Elizabeth where they had waited in the infirmary for news. "His blood sugar was so low he was practically comatose, not to mention dehydration and infection from cuts on both of his arms."
Sheppard frowned. He'd been so relieved to finally find the wayward scientist, he hadn't noticed those.
"But he'd been stabbed in the abdomen too. If we hadn't found him when we had..."
"Will he be all right?" Teyla asked.
"Barring complications, he should make a good recovery. But he's not out of the woods yet and I can only speak for the physical side of what he's been through."
"He'll have all the support he needs to recover," Elizabeth said.
"Oh and there was some kind of device stuck on his chest," Carson added, rubbing his forehead. "The spikes had gone right into his sternum, we had a struggle removing it. I've given it to Radek to see if he can figure out what it is."
Sheppard shared a dark look with the other people gathered.
xxx
Rodney was unconscious for several days after his ordeal. After the fever broke and he fully woke up, he lay there quietly trying to process what had happened and that somehow he'd survived long enough to be found and rescued. Sheppard sat with him and respected his silence.
His stomach wound hurt despite Carson's fine needlework and his arms were terribly sore where gauze was wrapped around them. When he pressed his middle, he felt thick bandages wrapped around his torso and winced.
"Why?" he eventually asked after Carson had checked on him and made comforting pleased sounds as he topped up the painkillers.
Sheppard looked up from his handheld games machine and said, "Radek found her notes. Something about an experiment in human endurance."
"Did I pass?"
"The conclusion part was blank, but you're alive so I'd say you did."
"Hmm." Rodney looked away pensively.
xxx
Rodney was discharged a few days later with a walking stick and strict orders to take it easy. The first thing he did was hobble back to his quarters, intending to have a quick nap before heading down to the labs.
He lay on the bed staring at the ceiling for a few minutes and felt his heart rate increasing and breaths starting to become gasps as his mind cast him back to the room where he'd been trapped. It had been so similar to his own quarters he couldn't stand it.
Rodney soon left his room and leaned heavily on the wall just outside his door to catch his breath. Deciding a nap was bust, he went straight to the labs to see what havoc had been wrought while he'd been missing.
Wheezing in discomfort as he leant heavily on the walking stick probably wasn't a good way to return to work, but he quickly composed himself and sat at a spare laptop.
Rodney woke up a while later, with his head pillowed on his arms where he still sat at the lab desk. Someone had draped a blanket over him and he gritted his teeth at the pull of his stitches as he sat up.
His staff were carefully ignoring him and he preferred that to the pity he'd get if they were to talk to him. Although someone had clearly taken pity on him to give him the blanket.
xxx
"It's a wraith device," John said in the mess hall at dinner.
Rodney was eating bread and soup and had a pot of jello ready for desert to ease the pressure on his healing digestive system. Ronon and Teyla also sat with them.
"Oh?" Rodney said as he stopped spooning down the soup for a moment.
"That thing she put on your chest."
"Oh."
"With Carson's help and looking at the data on Dr. Harvey's computer, they figured out it's some kind of life monitoring device usually found in a wraith cocoon. It's normally interfaced with a wraith ship, but it'd been adapted."
Rodney put his spoon down and pushed away his tray at the memory of the helpless horror he'd felt finding the device attached to him. He clutched his belly as his stomach rolled and nausea engulfed him. "I need to see Carson," he said as he quickly got up and fled as fast as his injuries would allow.
He ignored the calls of those behind him.
xxx
Not knowing where else to go and having lied about going to Carson, Rodney returned to his quarters. It was now the early evening and nearly dark outside, so not completely unreasonable for him to call it a night and sleep through until tomorrow.
But he lay there and sleep never found him. Every time he dozed and skirted the edge of real sleep, he woke with a jolt as he thought he saw a shadow passing through his room. It held a knife and he couldn't escape.
After several hours, he finally gave up and left his room.
xxx
Rodney woke up in the middle of the night with his face mushed into a laptop keyboard in the control room. The same blanket he'd left behind in the lab was covering him again as he blinked sleepily.
"Radek tells me," a man said, making Rodney jump, "that laptops don't make good pillows."
"Sheppard," Rodney said as he spun around in his chair and faced the Colonel perching on the console behind him. He grasped a handful of blanket. "Was this you?"
Sheppard remained silent.
"I don't need you following me around," Rodney said as he spun back to face the laptop and grimaced.
"Have you spoken to Heightmeyer?"
Rodney frowned angrily. "Every day since I woke up. Fat lot of good that's done. I've gained a few more things to add to my ever increasing list of phobias."
"What she did to you was horrible. And I feel terrible it took us so long to find you."
Rodney pressed his fingers into the cut on his right arm and smiled savagely at the pain as it distracted him from the difficult words and the emotions coursing through him.
"But you're going to have to sleep in your quarters eventually, so I've got a solution."
Rodney lowered his trembling hand and turned around.
"Teyla and Ronon helped," Sheppard said offhand. He slid off the console and stood up. "Come with me."
Rodney followed him more out of curiosity than anything. Instead of going towards Rodney's quarters, John took him to another section of the central tower and approached a door. He waved his hand over the sensor and went in, beckoning Rodney to follow when he remained standing in the corridor uncertainly.
Rodney stepped inside the room and gasped. It was a large semi-circular room and the entire curved side was comprised of floor to ceiling glass windows. White net curtains had been pulled back and although it was dark outside, Rodney could make out a balcony that followed the curve of the glass windows.
"We found it while you were napping in the infirmary and moved all your stuff in this evening."
Rodney's eyes tracked around the room and took in the bed, table, wardrobe and drawer unit. His laptop was on the table and his certificates had been hung on the only solid wall forming the flat part of the semi-circle. There was a door next to the entrance that led into the bathroom. Instead of the usual dull brown of the rest of the city, the room was painted white.
"It's amazing," Rodney said. "The penthouse suite!"
"We're hoping you'll be able to get some sleep here as it's so different."
"So how much is it going to cost me?" Rodney asked.
Sheppard grinned. "If you're asking, you can't afford it."
"What about you, are there any others like it?"
Sheppard sighed. "Teyla already called dibs on the only other one we found. Something about 'meditating in the open air' and you know Ronon doesn't care where he sleeps as long as he's hugging his gun."
Rodney lay on the bed, only intending to test its softness on his back, but before he knew it, his eyes were drifting closed and he soon fell asleep.
Sheppard stayed for a while, covering Rodney with the blanket once more and watching over him. When he was certain that Rodney was definitely asleep and hadn't twitched wide awake once, he left his friend to his well needed slumber.