A/N: Written around the beginning of season 4. Thanks for reading!
Atlantis is different. Radek doesn't think it can ever be the same.
He knows Colonel Carter is a level-headed, fiercely loyal commander who will lead the human race to victory if anybody can. He's been told so many times (though never by Rodney), and he believes it. He has faith in her abilities and what she can bring to the table. But she will never be Dr. Weir.
He knows he cannot bring back Dr. Beckett. Trips to the infirmary seem a little less bright without his cheerful brogue echoing off the stone walls. He can only hope that his friend is in a better place. Sometimes he thinks of going fishing.
Every newfound absence seems to strip away a small piece of Atlantis. Dr. Heightmeyer's untimely death casts an eerie shadow over the hall by her quarters. Katie Brown went back to Earth — and ach, had Rodney suffered — and the lovely Lieutenant Cadman was gone as well. Peter Grodin, for whom he had developed a great respect, had made the ultimate sacrifice years before. And if he stretches his memory, he thinks he can still hear Ford's boyish laughter on a quiet Saturday night.
Even the very planet they lived on had been lost, now marked by a vast, empty ocean where the city once stood.
As time progresses, it seems faces grow more haggard and lined, eyes less bright and youthful, cutting retorts more quick to slip out. It has been only a few years, but he has noticed the change in himself — his unruly hair even less cooperative than before, his eyes late at night dull behind his glasses, his smile a bit less quick to surface. He has seen it in Rodney, who has gained a few more pounds than he admits; in Colonel Sheppard, whose stubble doesn't quite cover the fine wrinkles beginning to mar his cheeks; and even in Teyla, whose gaze is hard and cold when she believes she is alone. He sees it in the city, which tries to repair itself but cannot quite become the gleaming city of the Ancients once again.
He tells himself he is exaggerating. That time is just passing and his friends are getting older. But he knows in his heart that war and death take a toll on men's hearts and bodies.
But Atlantis is a beacon of hope for the Pegasus galaxy, a small, faint glow for the ravaged civilizations so like herself. And sometimes, when the teams return through the gate unharmed and their triumph is celebrated, he catches a glimpse of that hope.
As long as he has strength left, he knows he will work to keep it aglow.