The Empty Room
A/N: Very quick one-shot, sorry if there are errors. I'll get around to editing it later. =] This was inspired when I was listening to Sara Barielles 'Gravity' and the first line on the song just carried on into this story!
Disclaimer: I do not own the Stargate franchaise or John Sheppard.
---
'Something always brings me back to you.' He yelled to the empty room. 'I don't what it is, and I don't know why. But I do know that I can never stay away from you. And it scares the shit out of me Elizabeth.' He grabbed a pillow and ripped it open. 'I DON'T wanna feel this way.'
'I don't wanna fall in love.' Feathers burst free and scattered across the room, floating gracefully to the ground. And with their descent he felt his reluctance drift away. 'Elizabeth...' he whispered and caught his reflection in the mirror. His face was pale and drawn, dark circles lined his eyes and his eyes hosted the look of a lost man.
But he did. He had. He was in love with her. And he didn't know why the hell he was; only that he was.
His hair was an unruly mess, more so than usual. He didn't care.
'Don't you understand how hard this is?' he screamed in frustration. Silence ensued and he waited, as if he expected the empty room to answer back. The chance of him receiving an answer was just about as likely as actually admitting his feelings to Elizabeth. She could never know, simply because she wasn't allowed to know and he wasn't about to compromise her position. He would have rather died for her 1000 times over than risk her job, and that only proved how intensified his feelings were and that only made it so much harder to restrain himself. It was all one big vicious circle; and it was too late.
The man in the mirror was not himself; it could not have been farther from his usual self. He was channelling all of his strength right now into just stopping all his emotions from bursting into his expression. There was love, anger, fear, frustration, passion, lust, annoyance, affection; and most foolishly... hope.
He couldn't stop himself from visiting her office, joining her on the balcony, or sharing her cake in the mess hall. They seemed such natural innocent pleasures, stolen moments together. He teased her, comforted her when need be and she responded with a witty comment or a friendly smirk. In short, their exchanges were excellently disguised flirting patterns. He didn't think that his feelings were entirely one-sided; he knew that in Atlantis he was her closest friend. He just didn't realise how much that 'friendship' meant to her. Wasn't sure if she meant it in the same way he did.
In a burst of anger he grasped a small wooden chair and flung it across the room. It wasn't Lantian, obviously, it was from earth. He had many small possessions from his home planet scattered around his quarters, made it seem less sterile. He moaned and collapsed back onto his bed, causing a few feathers to rise into the air again.
When was it? When had he realised; that what he felt for Elizabeth was a great deal more than respect? It must have been a little under three months. He couldn't remember anything but agony since then. Would it really jeopardise her job, if she just knew? Nothing had to stem from a confession; as much as he wished it to. He understood that maybe they both had more important things to do right now. But if she knew it would lift a considerable weight off his shoulders.
Selfish or not, he couldn't go on like this. He would just see her, talk to her; that always made things better at first. He leapt up from the bed and opened the doors. The best place to start would be the control room. He jogged from his quarters into the central tower at a hurried pace. He could barely remember her smile now. But then again, no-one really had much to smile about these days, with the threat of death almost constantly at their doorstop. But the laughter had stopped for a different reason.
He spotted Rodney working away on his tablet as he entered the control room and swiftly made his way to greet him. 'Rodney.'
The shorter man looked up and seemed surprised to see his co-worker standing there. 'Uh- hi, Sheppard, you–uh feeling well I take it?'
'I'm fine,' he replied and then scanned the control room again, 'Where's Elizabeth?'
Rodney set the tablet down on a surface and muttered under his breath, 'Not again,'
'She's not here.' He said as softly as he could manage.
'Well I know that,' John replied, 'Where is she?'
'What do you mean where is she, we don't know!'
Anger began to build up in John and he fixed Rodney with an annoyed glare. 'Well find her. I need to talk to her.'
And as he began to walk away a persistent voice called him back.
'Wait Sheppard, you don't get it. She's gone. The Asurans planet, we had to leave her on the planet. There was no choice.'
It all came rushing back in a second. The pain was almost too much to handle. 'There's always a choice Rodney.'
'Hey, I wasn't there alright.'
He collapsed into a chair and whispered in a hoarse voice, 'When?'
Rodney hesitated before answering. 'About three months.'
She would never know, he couldn't tell her. Her job wasn't the problem any longer.
And suddenly he knew why her office was always empty, why the balcony was always cold and why the mess hall never served cake.
Most of all he knew why he had been talking to an empty room.
She was gone.
And he was too late.
---
A/N: When I started this I was actually going in a completely different direction, and was going to make it into a happy ending. But I was typing something totally different to what I was thinking!
Basically I wanted to make usually very calm and composed Sheppard freak out about something, like Mitchell did when he was stuck on that ship for years. I might end up adding a bit more detailed emotion at the end, but for now, tell me what you think! R&R please =]