Title: Mr. Bean Summary: Revenge is a dish best served cold /with cream and sugar.
Category: Humor
Spoilers: Uh...The show exists? There's references to a fic I wrote called Morning.
Pairing: None, unless McKay/Coffee counts. :3
As the sun set on yet another day in Atlantis, John Sheppard sat outside on the balcony, admiring the glow on the unending expanse of waves. At the same time, he plotted.
He had yet to get back at Dr. McKay for his ridiculous slip of the tongue two weeks prior. The incident had left him on uncertain footing with Teyla and Elizabeth, and it had taken him a good week or so of charm before things had started to cool down. In any case, John had vowed revenge but hadn't gotten any farther than that.
"Care for some company?"
He turned around to meet Dr. Weir's amused expression. She strode up to him with two steaming mugs and offered him one, which he accepted gladly.
"Is this a trick question?" he replied semi-guardedly. There were some days where he wasn't sure if she had forgiven him completely for his alleged transgression. She seemed to sense this and chuckled.
"You can relax, John. I'm not going to eat you."
"Well, that's a relief. Cheers, then!" he said without skipping a beat. They clanged their mugs together ceremoniously before both taking a sip. To John's surprise, Elizabeth's drink of choice wasn't the strong, black, coffee that he had been expecting.
"What's this?" he asked her.
"Athosian tea. Teyla offered me some the last time I was on the mainland. It's not a bad replacement for coffee," she explained.
"You've given up coffee?" Elizabeth shot him a look.
"Deliberately. We don't have an infinite supply of it, so I figured I'd let other people drink it."
"That's awfully generous of you."
She snorted in response. "Hardly. I just want to put off seeing Rodney go through withdrawl symptoms for as long as possible."
Elizabeth paused here to let John spit out whatever snarky comment he was thinking of, but it never came. She eyed her companion curiously at this at frowned. He looked like he had realised that tomorrow was Christmas or something.
"Was it something I said?" she pried, causing John to snap out of his reverie.
"N-no! Not really. I just...remembered...something...I have to go now..." he pieced together slowly, lifting his mug in salute once more.
"Thanks for the tea! I'll put my mug back in the mess hall!" he called to her as he made a hasty exit.
Elizabeth probably knew he was up to something, he admitted to himself as he made his way to the mess, but that didn't matter. He had to make the necessary arrangements while the mess was still open. This was going to require him to use up the last of his most precious currency for bribery, but he decided it was well worth the price.
It was time to offer people popcorn.
Later that night, there was an urgent call at Lieutenant Ford's quarters.
"Ford! Open up!" someone hissed.
"Huh? Major Shep- What the!" A great amount of scuffling ensued.
"Sir, what is all of this?"
"Sssshhh! I need to stash this here."
"Huh? Is this the city's-"
"Yes. I'm getting back at McKay." Something was shoved to the back of the room.
"So why are you putting this here? I don't want to-"
"Because my room is the first place he'll check. He won't think of looking in here."
"I don't know sir..."
"Come on! It only needs to stay here until tomorrow morning. Please?"
"No one else is going to be effected by this?"
"Nope, just the good old scientist."
"Oh...kay..."
"Great! I owe you one."
Ford knew he would regret it even then, but was too tired to protest any further at the time.
The next morning, Dr. Rodney McKay, lead scientist of the Atlantis expedition, first successful recipient of the ATA gene injection, representative for Canada in the Pegasus Galaxy, the same McKay who had been kissed by Colonel Samantha Cater (and had lived!), strutted to the mess hall for his rightfully deserved first cup of coffee.
"Good morning!" Rodney bellowed cheerily to the team member assigned to the mess that day, "One nice hot black one, please."
"Sorry Dr. McKay," he replied apologetically, "I just poured the last one."
"So...what's stopping you from making another pot?" Rodney asked impatiently.
"Because there's no more coffee. Our supply ran out."
"What!" his cry echoed through the room. That made no sense! McKay was certain of that; he had personally done an inventory check on their coffee supplies last week, and was positive that they had enough for at least another few months! Something was horribly, horribly wrong!
He sprinted at full speed to the stock room where he knew the coffee was kept, and practically fell over when he looked inside. Everything appeared to be there, but there was an empty spot where the coffee boxes had been. Rodney's heart sank.
"That's impossible..." he kept repeating, "impossible!"
Storming back to the mess, he got back in line and pondered his next move, still reeling over in confusion.
"But why is all the coffee gone!"
"Something wrong, McKay?"
On the verge of panic, the scientist whirled around to see Sheppard appear, casually sipping a cup of coffee. Using his powers of deduction, McKay quickly put two and two together.
"You!" McKay exclaimed, pointing at him angrily. "You did this!"
"Did what? Are you okay?" Sheppard replied innocently, taking a long sip of his drink. "It's such a shame you missed the last pot of coffee."
McKay clenched his teeth, making a noise John thought sounded like nails grating on a chalkboard. Before either could react, however, Aiden entered the comissary, his arms ladden with the missing coffee boxes.
"Is it okay if I pout these...back...uh...?" he trailed off, realising what he had just done. Rodney looked like he was going to explode.
"You were in on this?" McKay spluttered.
"No! I just...oh damn..."
In a corner of the room, Elizabeth sighed to herself and drank the last of her tea. She stood up to intervene before things got worse while muttering to herself.
"One of these days, I'm gonna show them how to properly play pranks..."