This is a sequel to my stories In the Long Ago and Strong as Death, set a few years on. It has a very different atmosphere from those two. It was intended to be their reward for everything they'd suffered in the previous stories, but, as has been pointed out to me, I'm not sure either Colby or Lorne would regard some of what happens as any sort of a reward!
Paddling in a Halcyon Sea
"What's this?" John took the heavy cream envelope from Lorne as if it might bite him. It turned out he was right to be suspicious as, when he opened it, he found it held a piece of equally heavy cream card inviting him and a guest to the wedding of one Evan Lorne and one Colby Granger.
"Major?" He didn't add what's the meaning of this because his tone of voice said it all.
"It's traditional for you to be there as my CO," the traitorous bastard replied with a smirk.
"Oh it is, is it?"
"In fact, sir," Lorne continued, "if my dad weren't available, it would be traditional for you to give me away."
John was not falling for that. Except for the fact that Lorne did seem to know both the written and unwritten regs inside out and backwards.
"But your dad's going to be there, right?"
"So far as I know, Colonel."
"Good. That's – good," John said, and watched Lorne leave the room, wondering just how his XO managed to give the impression even from behind that he was enjoying this whole situation way too much.
John glanced back down at the invitation he was still holding. He didn't know when he'd gone from flat-out panic at the thought of turning up to anything resembling a wedding to being almost resigned to attending and simply relieved this one wasn't going to be as bad as it could have been.
"Donnie, you're sure you've got our present?"
"Yes, Dad," Don replied for the ninth time as he expertly threaded them through the traffic on the freeway. Forgetting to take Aunt Irene's present to her seventieth birthday party had really kind of traumatised his dad.
"What, pray tell, do you get an FBI Agent and an Air Force Major for their wedding present?" Larry asked from the back seat of Don's SUV. "Megan refuses to share with me just what our gift will be, but I was somewhat exercised as to what might be welcome."
"A dinner service and pot-holders," Don replied, sounding less than enchanted.
"You can never have too many pot-holders," his dad replied. "If you cooked, you'd know that. And could you please keep an eye on the speed limit?"
"I don't think Colby cooks," Don said rebelliously.
"But Evan might. One of them has to."
Don shrugged. "There's always takeout."
"Donnie, this is marriage – this is the rest of their lives. They're not going to be eating takeout when they're in their fifties."
Don, having just had a rather significant birthday, decided to shut up and concentrate on getting them to the small, independently-owned hotel that apparently Evan's sister had picked out for this whole shebang.
"Speed limit, Don," his dad said again.
Don sighed. Even if they did have to go and get married, at least Colby and Evan wouldn't be producing kids they could torture for the rest of their lives.
"You think Lorne'll have good eats?"
"I am sure Major Lorne will have taken into consideration all of his guests' requirements," Teyla replied, watching Torren happily playing with the puzzle John had given him, as they waited in the hotel lobby for the rest of the Atlantis party to show.
Ronon felt better at that response. It wasn't that he didn't want to stand up with Lorne, it was just that sometimes the whole Earth thing still left him feeling exposed, with everyone assuming reference points that he and Teyla lacked. At least the prospect of good food helped.
Laura rapped on the door to apartment 21B. It was opened immediately by a sharp-eyed lady in her eighties who was dressed in a dove grey suit and a pink blouse, with pearls at her neck, and a very fetching hat finishing off the ensemble.
"Mrs Clark, I'm Captain Laura Cadman," Laura said with a smile. "I'm your ride to Major Lorne's wedding."
"You're late," Mrs Clark informed her. "Colby said you'd be here at one o'clock sharp."
"Sorry," Laura said, determinedly maintaining her smile. "Traffic was bad." She left out the part where she really wasn't used to driving in traffic any more, and also the part about her sudden plans to disembowel Evan's new husband for inviting this harridan.
"It can't be helped, I suppose," Mrs Clark said as she locked her apartment door behind her. "Just make sure we're in good time for the ceremony."
"Yes, ma'am," Laura replied. Oh, this was going to be so much fun.
"Evan's Air Force, right?" Nikki asked Liz who was currently navigating past a fender-bender that had held up traffic enough that it threatened to make them late.
"Uh-huh," Liz agreed absently.
"Reckon there'll be any cute Air Force officers there?"
Liz sounded her horn at the asshole in the pick-up truck in front of them.
"Guess so," she said, returning the asshole's gesticulations with interest.
"Okay then," Nikki said, smoothing her rather gorgeous green silk dress down her thighs as far as it would go, which wasn't actually all that far, being as short as it was. "They can't all be gay, can they?"
"Charlie would have to give you the odds on that," Liz said. "I'm guessing probably not."
"Cool," Nikki said. "We nearly there yet?"
"I cannot believe you've dragged me here for this. Do you have any idea of the work I could be doing – "
"Rodney."
John was a little unnerved by the way silence fell after he'd said Rodney's name only once. He would have to remember to wear his dress blues more often because Rodney had been so much less trouble ever since he'd gotten dressed in them in their hotel room an hour before. They weren't staying at the hotel the wedding was being held at; John had felt that doing that would be a bit claustrophobic, so they'd booked one about a half mile away.
"Well I could," Rodney said, in a last sort of defiant gasp than reminded John of a firework that had almost, but not quite, extinguished.
"If I have to go through this, you do too," John said.
"But he's one of yourMarines," Rodney sputtered back into indignant life.
"Air Force," John said wearily. "And this wasn't my idea."
And just maybe the whole wedding-phobia thing showed in his face for an instant because firework Rodney stopped sputtering and instead smoothed the uniform over John's tense shoulders, pausing to admire the result in the full-length mirror on the wardrobe door.
"Let's do this," John said after a minute, feeling about as enthusiastic as he did when faced with SGC's latest bureaucratic missive.
"So you serve with Evan?" Mrs Clark ascertained as Laura navigated the freeway.
"Yes."
"That's good," Mrs Clark said surprisingly. "Back in my day we had to take auxiliary roles."
Laura glanced in her mirror then overtook the stupid SUV going at precisely 55 mph that had some old guy in the front passenger seat gesticulating at the dark-haired driver to slow down.
"You served?" Laura asked, and was treated to a harrumphing noise from the elderly lady sitting beside her.
"Everyone did back then," she said. "We all had different ways, some in uniform and some not. I was a WASP."
Laura blinked. Holy shit. But before she could get a word in edgeways Mrs Clark was continuing, "That's how I met my husband, you know. He was a pilot too."
"Hence the connection with Major Lorne?" Laura surmised.
"Good heavens, no. The first time I met that young man he was taking out Colby's trash. Good thing too. I seem to remember it smelled terrible." Mrs Clark paused for a moment. "He had nice arms, though," she mused, and Laura nearly drove off the road.