Somewhere In The Middle
We do not bow our heads; we are Sateda.
We have grown, excelled, lived, loved, become more.
Jennifer notices Ronon Dex when he first arrives in the city – every woman in Atlantis does, after all, if only as a fine physical specimen of humanity.
She finds it a little annoying that the female medical staff speculate about him – more specificallly, that they ask her opinion on the matter.
"He's not my type," she tells Sabina Astor, one of the nursing staff who's helping her mark off the medical inventory they've been sent to check in the storerooms, "and it's none of my business."
Sabina shrugs, amused by Jennifer's deflection. "Methinks the doctor doth protest too much!"
She takes a little teasing for her supposed 'fastidiousness', but ignores it. People move on. And it soon becomes quite clear that Ronon Dex isn't interested in anyone from the expedition apart from Teyla – and whether or not that's sexual is another matter for speculation and one which Jennifer stays well out of.
She deals with Ronon from time to time – when there's a flood of injuries and he's one of them, a sharp word when she finds him trying to climb out of the infirmary bed when he's supposed to be resting. And when he comes in bleeding from a sparring match that doesn't quite go right and she's on duty.
They have nothing in common and little interest in each other...and then the city locks down and traps them together.
After a late dinner, during which Jennifer feels Teyla's eyes on her more than once, they amble back along the hallways of the city.
"Would you—" He hesitates. "I don't know how this goes on Earth. Except what I've seen in movies."
Jennifer thinks of flowers and wine and chocolates and trite platitudes. "Oh, God, no, don't go from the movies." Although, if she thinks about the kinds of movies Sheppard's team ends up watching, then it's actually much worse. "How about you come past the infirmary about lunch time tomorrow?" If things are busy she can send him away; if not, well, Marie has been insisting she should take a proper lunch-break.
Although the teasing afterwards won't be so much fun.
Ronon smiles. "Sounds okay." Behind the dark of his beard, it's a surprisingly gentle smile.
–
Yet not since the ancestors walked upon the gardel shore
have our children watched the skies without tension.
He suggests a walk because he doesn't particularly like sitting still, and there's not really any 'outside' to escape to in Atlantis – at least, no outside that allows them any kind of privacy.
Not that Ronon wants privacy for those reasons. He'd just like to avoid as much teasing as possible. Sheppard in particular seems to enjoy needling him. At least Teyla is more subtle in her allusions.
As for McKay...
"I used to do this sort of thing when I was a kid."
Ronon glances over at Jennifer as they walk down an empty hallway, surprised by the unexpected revelation – out of nowhere. He can imagine her as a child, her face bright with curiosity, and the intelligence that advanced her so far while still so young. "Exploring?"
"There was this empty factory – abandoned. I used to sneak in and do my homework there sometimes."
"Homework?"
The light coming in through the ceiling illuminates the flush on her cheeks. "It was quiet."
There's something not quite right about her answer, but Ronon understands the desire for quiet. "No quiet to be had on the homestead," he offers, remembering the long, hot days and the lessons out in the field – stalking, shooting, hunting, tales. "Too many kids underfoot."
They walk through another set of corridors, much like the last. Two doors, both open and empty rooms – one looks like a lab. They mark it on the map and keep going.
"So where did you go when you didn't want to be disturbed?"
"The forest beyond the fields." Running through them, pushing his limits, seeing how far he could go, how long he could endure. His mouth curves at the memory. "Exploring."
He tells her about the time he stalked his bossy cousin Trinnor until the older boy was quivering with fear, sure it was the Wraith come to eat him.
The Wraith came for Trinnor eventually – the family's steading was one of the first Culled zones when the Wraith arrived.
Ronon shuts that thought away. Jennifer is telling him about the time some kids came in and started mucking about in the unsafe places of the factory – until they heard guard dogs growling and snarling, and one boy fell and broke his leg, and the others ran away screaming.
"You didn't run."
"I wasn't going to leave him to die!" Her disdain is sharp as a knife. "I mean, I didn't know enough to set the leg," she says, studying a set of carvings up high on the corridor walls, "but I kept him calm and still until help came."
"Comfort to the injured?" Ronon asks. That had been the part Melena was good at.
"Actually," she says with a smile that's almost impish, "I told him he was enough of an idiot as it was, and did he want to make it worse and possibly limp for the rest of his days?"
"Did it work?"
"Yep."
He grins back at her, thinking that the smile makes her seem lighter, brighter, as though the sharp steel of her soul shines through her in wry humour and mature mischief.
–
Someday we will live again without fear beneath an open sky.
Jennifer only goes because Caro is stern and Marie is earnest and because the grip on her arm isn't giving way.
"We're not making any headway, and you'll feel better for a rest," Caroline says when she protests. "Even a couple of hours will help."
She waits until the doors have closed on them in the transporter before she lets her temper loose at him. "You know, I'm not impressed by your 'me, Ronon; you, Jennifer' routine!"
"You're a healer. You'll burn yourself out trying." Ronon says, as though that explains everything.
"At least I'm trying!" The doors open and he ushers her out of the transporter. Because she's trying to get her arm free of him, it takes her a moment to realise that they're nowhere near her living quarters – or his. "Where are we going?"
"To change the rhythm." He moves with the certainty of a predator – all long limbs and grace. Not her type. Not her type at all. "You're unbalanced. Too much thinking, not enough movement."
"Better than too much movement without thinking!" Then she wishes she hadn't said that. Rodney sounds like that sometimes – disdainful of the military guys, as though they're not worthy of attention or consideration just because they're not cerebral.
"I'm sorry," she tells him as he drops her arm, leaving her in the middle of the room. "I shouldn't have—"
Her apology is ignored; he goes over to the equipment cupboard and pulls out something that clatters with the music of wood. Jennifer watches in stupefied shock as he holds out a pair of bantos rods to her.
"You take them, you attack me."
"I can't fight you!"
"I'll only be defending," he tells her, and spins the single stick in his left hand with a skill that she can't reproduce with her right.
"And that makes it all better? No!" She heads for the door, intending to put an end to this insanity, but he blocks her way out, and she can't get past him. She contemplates wrestling him, but that would be undignified – and she'd lose anyway. "Ronon!"
"If you attack me for fifteen minutes; then we'll cool down and I'll let you go back to work."
Jennifer eyes him. "Really?"
"Really."
"Fine." She snatches up the rods, and raps him lightly over the head with one – a mere bop, nothing to signify – especially with a head as hard as his!
Ronon winces, but lets her whale on him; doesn't smile at her stupid moves, or her pathetic attacks. He doesn't correct her, or lecture her, or tell her what she's doing wrong. He just lets her come at him again. And again. And again. And some time after the first five minutes, Jennifer forgets that she didn't want this, that she has duties, that she shouldn't be trying to cause injury to someone in her care – even if she's not capable of it, she's trying—
He catches her wrists, ducking her blows without effort and disarming her in a moment.
She's panting, she's tired, her guard is down, and he's big and strong and not her type at all – but he came to get her mind off the problem, to give her an outlet for her frustration – he cared...
Don't make something of this, she thinks to herself, with her hands trapped by his grip on her wrists, large fingers circling her wrists. It's just situational – like the time we were trapped together in the infirmary...
Jennifer's not sure if she rises on her toes first, or if he bends down first.
They meet somewhere in the middle, tentative at first, and then rather more intense than they expect.
We do not bow our heads; we are Sateda.
We have grown, excelled, lived, loved, become more.
Not since the ancestors walked upon the gardel shore
have our children watched the skies without tension.
Someday we will live again without fear beneath an open sky.
fin