Written for the rare pairings ficathon and just getting around to posting it here. Tis Radek/Miko. And nope, don't own them.

Building Safety Nets Under My Feet

Radek had spent years honing the ability to obfuscate all of his phobias. Not that he thought of them as phobias, he was just a man who could calculate odds rapidly in his head and was thus more aware of all of the dangers of the universe. So no, not phobias - just rational expectations based on logic. Unlike the rather vocal Dr. McKay, Radek simply kept all of his thoughts and fears wrapped in little packages and stuffed in a safe place, where he and no one else could see them. At least that was what he thought.

Before she approached him, Radek had no particular memory of Miko. She was simply an extra viola in the orchestra of scientists that McKay conducted and Radek was concertmaster. A long time ago, Radek had played the violin in the town orchestra, and as his fingers lithely danced out the ripples of the Moldau, he understood that while the conductor controlled the direction of the piece, it was to the concertmaster that everyone tuned their instruments. Miko was just an extra viola to him, vital and yet oddly superfluous; then she snapped a string when she handed him a cup of near-coffee and simply stated, "You never go near the balconies – I think I know why."

Radek sipped his coffee, attempting to ignore her comment, "Did you rerun the models of the power experiment?"

They had been working on eking out every molecule of power from the generators now that the Wraith were on the way. He may not know her as Miko the person, but he was perfectly aware of her as an engineering mastermind.

She nudged her glasses a bit further up her nose, her eyes furrowed in quizzically manner. "Yes, I think I know why. I will run the experiments again, Sir", she said, performing a half bow before slipping out of the room.

Radek stared at the space she left behind, torn between thinking he had imagined her statement and wondering if she was one of the many breaking under the pressure of the coming battle with the Wraith. He then realized she had left him a gift, a Twinkie, quite possibly the last in the city. Radek sighed as the cake squished between his teeth; of course the country that had built the most nuclear weapons would have made snack cakes that could withstand nuclear winter. Miko may be one of those going crazy, but she was the good kind of crazy.

As the Hive ships grew closer, and he and Rodney were laced with more drugs than binging college freshmen, Radek found he was constantly looking for even the slightest glimpse of Miko. She seemed to be everywhere, fetching coffee and water, whacking at power generators with wrenches, and learning how to load and fire a P-90. He saw how Miko approached everything with a simple sense of humor, one that probably kept her sane as the world crumbled around them. He was intrigued for there was something profoundly brave about getting the great cosmic joke. And the more Radek saw, the more he wanted to watch her.

Occasionally, he would catch her watching him as well, and it was the same look she would get before she attacked a piece of machinery while wearing her pink tool belt. Somehow, after she had ripped the parts out and shoved them back in, the machines always worked better. In fact, she was one of the few Rodney let venture out on her own to handle Ancient technology, he claimed it was due to her "hello kitty intuition". There was a fierceness in her expression when she looked at Radek, one that in a different time and different place he would have known was interest.

Then the Hive ships arrived, it was over, Atlantis was still there – they had won.

Rodney went back to the world of constant flowing coffee rivers and feather mattresses while Radek was left in charge of exploring a city that throbbed with the arrival of a ZPM. He pretended to be insanely jealous of his boss, but after Rodney and the rest of the head cats left, the mice began to scamper and dance and play with their new shiny toys.

While exploring parts of the City now accessible due to the ZPM with Major Lorne, and Miko that Radek's first conversation with her came flashing back. A door hiding long buried treasuries slid open and the three found themselves on a balcony overlooking a vast enclosed space reminiscent of sport stadiums on Earth. Major Lorne and Miko rushed to the edge to take it all in while Radek slowly stepped back into the safety of the hallway; it was perfectly logical to assume that after 10,000 years the door might malfunction and need someone close by to fix it.

"Holy shit, it's Thunderdome!" exclaimed Major Lorne as he leaned over the railing as far as he could.

Miko stepped onto the bottom railing to hoist herself up higher and twisted a bit to see the extent of the ceiling. Her foot suddenly slipped and Radek watched as the Major wrapped an arm around her tiny waist to steady her.

"Easy there, Ma'am." Lorne smiled his Playgirl toothy grin at her and Radek felt something clinch in his gut. Miko returned the Major's smile as she stepped down; when she saw Radek still in the doorway, the smile faltered as he slipped further into the hallway and out of their line of sight. Standing alone in the hallway, Radek felt the remains of hastily eaten lunch turn over in his stomach. He was an idiot - why would any woman choose a short balding scientist over a young, muscular solider? And there were plenty of them in Atlantis.

The next morning, the memory of Miko in Lorne's arms still burned into his retinas, he found a post-it note stuck to his laptop. It said, "There is light out of the darkness." Radek resisted the immediate urge to roll his eyes at the triteness of it all, but then realized the post-it note was pink and the handwriting decidedly female. Miko.

He looked for her in the lab and saw her bent over a work table, explaining the schematics of the city to Lorne. Radek glanced back at the note. Maybe not Miko, probably a misplaced note. He crumbled the paper and stuffed it into his pocket.

That evening, as everyone else slipped off to their quarters, Radek stayed to ensure that everything was up to the exacting standards of Rodney. The Daedalus was due back in the next 24 hours, bringing new supplies, new staff, and the city's leadership. He was so wrapped up in preparing the reports on everything new they had found that it took him a moment to realize he wasn't alone. He spun in his chair while reaching for the wrench kept under the desk for just this occasion, and saw Miko standing there.

Radek dropped the wrench and asked the most logical question, "Why are you here?"

"To see you, of course," Miko replied, her forehead furrowed by confusion.

"I assumed you would still be going over things with Major Lorne." Radek folded his arms in front of him, and then uncrossed them when he realized his homage to his boss. He winced slightly as his brain went back over the admission of jealousy that slipped out with his previous statement.

Miko stood there blinking for a moment then asked, "Major Lorne? Why would I…." She rolled her eyes as she caught Radek's implication and walked forward to whap him in the arm with the heel of her hand. "Baka," she said.

Radek didn't speak Japanese, but he knew enough about body language to know he had just been called an idiot. He also knew enough about his own body as it reacted to the warmth of Miko's hand on his arm and the smile on her lips.

Taking a deep breath, he asked, "There is a light out of the darkness? Perhaps a Japanese saying?" He glanced down to meet her eyes, his heart beating rapidly. He mentally rapped his knuckles for reacting like a school boy.

"No, a promise. Come, please," she indicated the door with her head and turned, assuming correctly that Radek would follow her. He had heard the gene carriers mention how Atlantis seemed to go to sleep and he could envision it as even the areas silent from lack of a presence became even more eerily still. He wanted to ask her where they were going, but he had no desire to interrupt the peaceful feeling that settled over them.

Finally, she turned and looked at him, head tilted in a quizzical manner. "You have a fear of heights, correct?"

"No," Radek replied.

"Yes."

"Ne."

He knew Miko didn't know Czech, but she recognized the tone; she stopped in the middle of the hallway and gave him the universal female look of "stop being a stupid man."

"I do not fear heights, I simply find them…uncomfortable," Radek responded after a few moments of silence.

She smirked a bit at his response and continued to lead him through the corridors, into areas of the city he had not yet seen. She finally entered one of the transporters and selected a section of the city that seemed rather…high. When the transporter doors slide open, he found them atop a tower on the far corner of the city, with a balcony encircling the entire room. Miko stepped out, but Radek refused to budge, wondering how in the world he had thought she was a gentle, kind, beautiful woman when clearly she was cruel and borderline sadistic. He pushed the button to return him to safer ground but the doors refused to close.

"I programmed the transporter to stay here for 30 minutes, Radek." Humor laced her voice as he glared at her; yes, definitely sadistic. "Please, if you are truly uncomfortable, we will return. But we are alone in another galaxy and I think we will all need to jump into nightmares soon," she said, her voice sliding into something more wistful, compelling Radek to move of the transporter and towards her.

The room they were in was small; it was only a few steps to the wall of opaque glass doors that led onto a balcony that Radek knew would tower over the entire city. Even within the confines of the room, just the knowledge of where he was caused his breath to go shallow and his heart to tighten in his chest. He fought against the rising panic in his gut and used tricks he had taught himself when conscripted into the Czechoslovakian Army and had to tackle obstacle courses or be punished. Slowly his breathing and heart rate returned to normal, and when he opened his eyes, Miko had moved a little closer to him, her hand resting on the door panel.

"I hate guns," she said. "I always have, since my father told me stories of the War and how a love of the gun lead to our country's dishonor. But I learned to use them when the Wraith were coming. I hoped to not fire it, but I did." She shifted a bit on her feet, her fingers lightly tapping on the glass and she flinched when Radek moved into her peripheral vision. "I grew up listening to tales of the Oni, a Japanese demon from our mythology. I've feared them since my brother told me they lived in the river by our house and would steal me from my home. I refused to go outside and play for weeks. I had nightmares about them for many years." Miko paused to look Radek directly in the eye and with a firmer voice said, "The Wraith are worse. I used something I hate to fight something I fear more."

Miko shifted her hand to press on the panel and the doors slid open. A cool breeze, tangy with the smell of salt water, brushed past Radek. She smiled at him, a grin that wrinkled her nose and eyes, he felt his heart flutter again and smiled at her in return. The tightness in his chest eased just a bit.

"So now we are back to you, Radek. Being so far from the earth makes you uncomfortable," she paused as they both grinned at the absurdity of the statement. Everyone was a bit uncomfortable being so far from Earth.

She began again, "Being so far from the ground makes you uncomfortable. You will have to overcome this as your job will not let you hide in the lab forever. So come, no one is here, the moons are hidden so you cannot see the end. And if you cannot see it, it will be harder to fear it."

Miko stepped through the doorway, her hand firmly wrapped around Radek's wrist and forcibly moved him into the dark night. He stood on the balcony, fingers tight on the rail, trying to remember that in the dark night, he couldn't see how far up he was. He knew he was perfectly safe here, that the Ancients were known for construction that lasted for tens of thousands of years. He just had to forget the fact that the construction always seemed to break at the least inconvenient time. Instead, he focused on the fact Miko was standing next to him, close enough he could feel the heat from her body.

"Still uncomfortable, Radek?" Her voice rippled through the air, a pebble in the pond. He nodded his head a bit, and her hand, smooth and warm, slipped over his. "The railings are not enough to hold onto?" He shook his head, eyes still forward, refusing to look down, down, down to the never-ending ocean. "Then perhaps you should hold onto me."

Miko slipped underneath his arms, leaning her body against him, and peeled his hands off the railing, locking them with hers and rested gently on the soft rise of her belly. Radek inhaled deeply again and instead of smelling his own fear and frustration, he smelled strawberries, coffee, machine grease, and Miko. He wrapped his arms more tightly around her and pulled her flush with his body. He could sense her smile as she rested her head against his shoulder.

"Look, the sun is rising. Look down, the patterns on the water are unlike any you will see on Earth."

Radek, feeling grounded and yet higher than he had in a long time, glanced down from their perch near the tip of the City and gasped at the play of colors on Atlantis and the water made by the rising sun. Oranges blended with blues, merged with purples, and tumbled into white as Atlantis stretched her spires towards the sun.

"It is hard to be afraid of something so beautiful," Miko said.

"Was not fear – uncomfortableness," he joked, planting a kiss on the tip of her ear. He could feel her responding chuckle as she turned and pulled him down for a kiss that eliminated any remaining traces of fear.