A/N: I have another fic in mind (it's amazing how addictive receiving reviews is) but thought I should post one without an original character first, considering there were so manyin my last. For all the Ronon/Keller shippers out there (yay us!), enjoy!
A/N2: This is based on the song Everything by Lifehouse
Disclaimer: Neither Lifehouse nor Stargate: Atlantis belong to me.
Find me here, speak to me
I want to feel you, I need to hear you
You are the light that's leading me
to the place where I find peace again - 'Everything' by Lifehouse
Jennifer had been searching for him for over an hour. He'd been moody lately, more than usual at least, and he kept waking leaving the bed they now shared at all hours of the day and night. She'd tried to get him to talk to her about it but, sometimes with Ronon, it was like trying to get water from a rock.
She'd checked all the usual balconies and piers, his quarters and hers, the gym twice as well as the Mess. He'd been no where, and if anyone had seen him, they weren't saying. She'd finally resorted to calling in a favor in the control room and had one of the techs run a life sign sweep across the city in an attempt to find the man. There had been no way to tell which life signs were which, but she had a feeling that it was the lone blip on the screen, several levels below the surface in the bowels of the city.
The long, dark corridors that probably hadn't seen a sign of life in thousands of years, lit up as she walked into them and dimmed again when she stepped out. She found the echo of her boots on the ground a little disconcerting and fisted her hands in the pockets of her jacket, fidgeting nervously to distract herself from the tension knot in her stomach.
The doors to the room where his signal had been coming from were open, a soft, sparkly white light reflected out into the hallway and she titled her head, wondering what it was.
When she rounded the corner, her breath left her. On her left and right just inside the doorway, there were panels of blinking buttons and switches, but that wasn't the breathtaking part.
The room was spherical in shape and extending out into the middle was a transparent platform. On all the surrounding walls was a moving scale representation of the galaxy. Every star, planet, moon and nebula in Pegasus surrounded her like a 360 degree planetarium. And with the transparent platform beneath her feet, it was almost like flying through space.
She slowly approached Ronon's still form out in the middle of the room, her wide-eyes drinking in every detail.
Ronon turned and watched her approach.
"What is this place?"
He shrugged, "A map I think. I found it when I was out late running one when I first got here."
She glanced at him and smiled, "do you ever sleep?"
Ronon chuckled softly, "I guess some habits are harder to break than others. I'm not too crazy about walls," he said, "sometimes running was the only way I felt like I could breathe."
"Seven years without spent out in the open," she nodded, "I can see that."
She came to stand beside him and they both looked around, watching silently as the planets rotated and revolved in their respective solar systems.
"How did you activate it?"
"It came on by itself, didn't require the Ancient gene."
Jennifer snorted, "Rodney would say that means it's not important."
"Yeah, I know. That's kind of why I like it. No one comes down here."
Jennifer frowned and bit her lip, thinking. This place was like a sanctuary for him, perhaps she was intruding on his privacy by being there. Suddenly feeling out of place, she started back for the door, "I should leave."
Ronon realized almost immediately what she must be thinking and reached out, taking her arm and pulling her back. When her back was fitted snugly against his front he wrapped his arms around her and bent to talk in her ear.
"Stay."
She smiled when she felt him inhale the scent of her hair.
"Can you control what it shows us?"
He shook his head, "you have the gene. Maybe you can."
She thought about it for a moment, and then, closing her eyes, she tried to picture where Atlantis was in the solar system. Almost immediately the stars' positions on the wall changed and directly above them, one planet grew slightly larger than the others and was surrounded with a pulsating glow.
"Wow." Jen whispered in wonder, they both had their heads tipped far back and were watching Atlantis' planet and it's twin moons twirl overhead. Ronon started following stars and constellations along the wall to their right. He pointed to a small, grey planet with three moons.
"That's Sateda."
She followed the direction of his finger and looked at his planet, concentrating on making it bigger and more detailed until it filled nearly half of the round wall in front of them.
"It's beautiful."
Ronon didn't respond, but rewrapped his arm around her and rested his chin on her shoulder.
"Is that why you've been having trouble sleeping lately?" she didn't know exactly why she was whispering, except that it seemed the appropriate thing to do, "memories of Sateda?"
Ronon was quiet for a long time, but she'd grown used to this and waited patiently for him to speak, studying the amazing view around her while she waited.
"It's the beginning of the ninth lunar month on Sateda," he began slowly, quietly, "it's called Rikkon. By then, farmers have harvested their crops and it's when military promotions are announced. When bonding ceremonies are preformed and children born the previous year are given their family names." He trailed off and Jennifer turned slightly, looking at him in the corner of her eye.
"It's a time of celebration."
He nodded.
"And you miss it."
He shrugged, "the first time I've really had a chance to." He looked around the starlit room again.
She stared ahead at the glowing orb that represented Sateda, suddenly understanding the weight Ronon almost always seemed to carry. He'd lost an entire life, a whole planet full of people he cared about and memories he'd made when Sateda was destroyed. The thought of the hundreds of thousands of lives that had been taken there nearly overwhelmed her.
"I can't imagine." She said quietly, biting her lip. She was glad for the darkness of the room that hid the tears burning her eyes.
"Sheppard says you have holidays like that on Earth."
She smiled sadly at his misconception, "No, I mean…I can't imagine losing everything you've lost. A home, a life, a family, a…lover." She faltered with the last words, not sure why they had occurred to her and the way Ronon stiffened made the knot of tension in her stomach tighten.
"I try not to let things I can't change bother me."
She knew this was true, and the reasonable voice in her told her to leave it at that, but she had never been very good at listening to that voice.
"Still, that doesn't mean it doesn't," she shrugged, "or shouldn't," she shook her head, unable to fathom what it must have been like for Ronon all those years ago. What it must be like for him now, "It would bother me."
He unwrapped his arms from around her and spun her to face him. He held her upper arms to keep her close.
"I guess it does, sometimes." He spoke softly and she stared up at him, frozen to her spot by the tenderness in his eyes, "you know what I do in those times?"
She shook her head, unable to quite force the words from her throat.
He reached up and gently pushed a lock of her hair behind her ear, "I look at you."
She was sure her breath caught at that, but if he noticed he didn't say.
"I think about my team and Atlantis and I look at you. You're all I need." He dropped his hand back to her arms, "You're everything."
She didn't move when he bent closer to her and didn't breathe again until after he'd broken off kissing her. Then she wrapped her arms around him tightly, pressing her face into his chest and smiled.
"You're my everything too." She mumbled.
He tightened his arms around her and she indulged in the embrace for a moment more before turning back around, facing the stars and planets that spun and flickered all around them.
"Does anyone else know about this place?"
"Don't think so."
She looked up at him, smiling mischievously, "lets not tell them."
Ronon smiled at her antics, "our secret?"
Jennifer nodded, "our little secret."
He sighed, placing his chin back on her shoulder and looking around. It was the way his arms remained tight about her waist that finally unraveled the knot of tension in her stomach, allowing her to relax and get lost in their galaxy with him.
END