A/N: Rigthy-o, we're back with Season 2 of Stargate Atlantis. I already have a few stories planned (and written) but this time around, I'll tell you right from the start: I accept requests, both episode related and freeform. I can't promise fulfilling all of them because they do have to fit the narrative arc of the season but if I find a way too fit them in, I'll write them. Since I'd like to keep posting chronologically, it would be good to keep track of where I am in the season, episode wise, an maybe post requests for specific episodes a little in advance so that I have time to see if I can fit it in and write it.

Right now, we're at about a week after The Siege Pt. III (so a day after A City Full of Lights) and about nine weeks away from The Intruder. I have two more stories (one written, one planned) for this space of time. The one already written will take place maybe two weeks from now and takes place in Washington D.C., the one planned about two weeks before The Intruder and takes place on the Daedalus. If you have any requests taking place after the story in D.C., it would be a good idea to put them in soon.

This one, for example, was inspired by lalez ;) So, if you want your idea seen written out, drop me a line, PM or review are both fine!

Anyway. Here we go!

Try To See Things My Way

"Turn me inside out and upside down
And try to see things my way
Turn a new page, tear the old one out
And I'll try to see things your way."

Gomez, "How We Operate"

Come to think of it, it's a good thing Reece left early this morning to go back to Earth with the rest of the officers they promoted here and the people who decided to take other offers rather than continue sticking it out here. Honestly can't say I'm faulting them for it.

Anyway, the one good thing about Reece not being here? She can't keep me from doing what I'm about to do now: barge into Evan Lorne's new office – more like maintenance closet – and slam the order I found in my inbox just an hour ago on his desk, accompanied by the words, "You take that back."

Okay, so I could have been a little less aggressive but seriously, even after sleeping on it, it still makes me so very pissed. Which is why his reaction – looking at me mildly annoyed and telling me calmly "Sit down, Tom." – just serves to irritate me even more. Like… who does that?

I can't help giving him a look that's something between startled and annoyed. And contradict him. Because what the fuck? "What, no? Doesn't even take a minute to put him back on the infirmary roster and…"

"Sit. Down." Shit. That's an order. And, as I still have to remind myself, I actually have to obey them now when he gives them. I sit down in the chair opposite from his desk. He looks at me over his laptop and past his second monitor, his business face on. Uh-oh. "Now, listen, because I'm only going to say this once: Dr. Morsberg stays." Hell no. "Out of the infirmary. On your team. Did you get that?"

Nuh-uh, that's absolute bullshit. Can't he see that? "Look, Evan, this is stupid…"

"I had to fend off a very irate Chief of Medicine just last night." So? I just offered you a solution to that? Just take this guy off my team and put him back in the infirmary full-time and we'll all be happier for it. "I am not going to cave in to either of you. Did you get that?"

No, because Beckett's the infirmary guy you have known for like six days and I'm your friend whom you have known for something like fifteen years? And anyway, there's a really good question he really should have an answer to as my commanding officer, "Why me, Evan? Seriously, why don't I get to fucking choose my team mates like everyone else?" Did that sound like whining to you?

Judging from Lorne's face, it did to him, and shit, I might have just made a grave mistake. Evan Lorne hates whiners, and I do, too and fuck. "Because you would have rejected every damn medic who was available."

That's his explanation? I call bullshit. "Oh come…"

"Just like you rejected every damn replacement back at the SGC, for the sole damn reason that they weren't Maureen Reece." That's… not fair. Because that's exactly the argument Laura made in that last big fight we had before she died. She accused me of making life miserable for Reece's replacements because they had one fatal flaw, and that was not being her. She'd been right.

But fuck, I'd rather die than admit that to anyone out loud. "That's not true."

"It is, and you know it, Tom." I hate it when he does that. State something like that without sounding smug or authoritative about it, just calm, no-nonsense, matter-of-fact. As if he knows he's right and doesn't need to prove it. Because he is. "Every fucking one knew it. You're not going to pull that same shit here, just because none of those medics are Laura."

Okay, fine, I'll play along. For now. Just for now. And I do have another pressing question, "But why him? You could have given me every one of the other medics, and it had to be him?"

He shakes his head and the look on his face says pretty much that the only thing that kept him from throwing me out of his office until now is that he's trying to be a professional about it. I've got a bad feeling that the fact that I'm his friend is currently not working to my advantage. His words damn well confirm that, at least, "You don't get to throw a hissy fit about getting issued the one medic in this entire city who actually used to know Laura Greenspan, Tom."

Well. Fuck. I keep forgetting that but yes, Matthias Morsberg used to know Laura Greenspan. Not as long as I have but from all of the rest of my team, he probably knew her the longest. I know that they got to know each other when Laura went through med school at USU in Bethesda, and I know that they kept in touch after that, at least loosely, and maybe they weren't best buddies or anything but yes, he used to know her, longer than Dee or Reece knew her. Shit. I think I might have… possibly messed this up a little?

I take a deep breath and take great care to sound at least marginally contrite when I say, "That's why you gave him to me, isn't it?"

"Yes, Tom." I'm actually not sure if I sounded apologetic enough. Lorne definitely doesn't look like it. "That's why I assigned him to you. And if I hear you whine about it ever again, I'm going to damn well fire you. He stays until I say he leaves."

Okay now, that's definitely a case of unlawful assumption of authority. And hey, suddenly all my apologetic feelings are gone, just like that. "You? Last time I checked, there's still someone you have to answer to."

"Sheppard backs me on this one." That… what? Also, really? Smug? That's the tone he decides to go with?

I give him that dead-pan look Reece seems to have perfected here, with a bit of "oh please" mixed in, too, just for the hell of it. "And you know that how?"

Now leaning back in his chair, his arms crossed in front of his chest, Lorne continues to look smug. What the everloving fuck? "I asked him to."

The hell? "You did what?"

He rolls his eyes, and to the uninitiated, he might look mildly irritated. To people who have known him for a little longer he looks like me getting booted out of his office in the next five minutes isn't actually such an unrealistic option anymore. "I asked my commanding officer to back me on a personnel decision. That's fairly standard, Tom."

Oh come on. "I don't believe this. What is it about this Sheppard guy?" Because seriously, it's like he can walk on water or something. First Reece tells me that she firmly believes that he can make a field promotion stick that doesn't have any legal leg to stand on, now Lorne sounds like he drank the Kool-Aid, too in his first five days here…

"He listens, Tom." Oh, he listens. Well, if that is the case, it's a whole different ballgame, really. Because honestly, listening is so… "He listens and then makes a decision. Like a good commander should. Also, he really seems to hate paperwork. Two things working very much in my favor." Yeah. That sounds more like it.

Also, "I hate you."

"You're welcome." Definitely just two or three mouthy comments from me away from kicking me out of his office.

That still isn't enough to make me shut up. Instead, I hear myself incredulously asking, "For what?"

"Making sure your contingent commander doesn't get to meddle with the make-up of your team." As opposed to his XO, or what? "And a new top-shelf combat medic, too." Oh fuck him. Because he's damn well right again. I didn't really want to but I did take the time to throw a look into Morsberg's personnel jacket and okay, yes, that guy pretty much has the right credentials. Top marks, both academically and in anything military related, the right medical specialties and a staggering ton of cross-training, glowing performance reviews from past superiors, both military and civilian, a few blacked out special ops engagements in his records… Plus, I have already seen him in action and yeah, fuck, he's good. So good that I would have killed to have him on my team, if there hadn't been that tiny little detail of something about him rubbing me really, really wrong. As if there's something about him he's intentionally holding back on… anyway.

He really is a top-shelf combat medic. Which is why the only thing I could tell Lorne at this point is, "I hate you."

That makes Lorne roll his eyes again but I think some of that annoyance is gone? Huh. "Just be glad we decided not to go after you for asking Reece be your XO when she was slated for a team of her own."

Go after me? For doing what every other team leader is allowed to? Go after me for simply choosing my new XO without any interference for a change? Fuck him. Also, it's my turn to be smug now because I know something Command apparently didn't. "She wouldn't have said yes, anyway."

"We thought so, too." Wha… dammit. "That's why she wouldn't have had a choice in the matter."

Okay, so I don't really know this new version of Maureen Reece that well yet but there's this little birdy that tells me that there's one thing I do know. "She would have hated you. Both of you."

Lorne shrugs and is that the ghost of a grin on his face? "It was Dr. Weir's idea, actually."

So what? "She would have hated her, too."

He nods, sagely and I hate it when he does that. Because he's one of the very few people who can actually pull it off even in their thirties without it looking completely stupid. "That's why we decided not to go after you."

So. I know I might have mentioned once or twice that I know that I'm not exactly destined for a star. I do reasonably well with a combat command of a four man team but I'm hopeless at base politics, paperwork or to be honest anything involving a desk or having to play nice with people with higher paygrades than mine. So, not exactly flag grade material. Lorne, on the other hand, always struck me as someone who had the potential to go places, without even having to compromise himself, even back at the Academy. I just didn't think I'd actually get to see this "going places" thing in person. I sigh, hoping it didn't sound too defeated, "You're pretty scary when you're doing this XO thing."

"Thank you." Definitely smug now. At least that tells me he's actually human.

I roll my eyes, though, and rectify something. "It wasn't meant as a compliment."

He just shrugs again and is now veering into "insufferable". "I know." Wow, this guy learned how to take a page out of my book.

So, as not to be redundant, but really, it can't be said often enough, "I really, really hate you."

He doesn't look like he believes me, just rolls his eyes and opens his laptop, muttering slightly exasperated, "As much as I'd like to hear you say that for another ten times, I gotta get back to work but you can continue to give me shit later at lunch."

Oh. Huh. I think that was an invitation? I grin. "With pleasure. Two hours."

Now he finally lets that matter-of-fact sure of himself XO mask slide of for a short moment, burying his face in his hands, mumbling "Better make that three, I got a bad feeling I'll get some more flak from various corners of this city soon."

Well, "Good."

I get a dead-pan look now and an unmistakable order, "Get out of my office, Tom."

Okay, then. Happy to. I get up, giving him a two-finger salute, accompanied by the words, "Yes, sir," and followed by me leaving the office. And then, promptly, just because I'm an asshole like that, opening his office door again and sticking my head in it, calling, "Remember, two hours!"

He does exactly what I expected him to do, and that's, without even looking up from his laptop, flipping me the bird and telling me, in a no-nonsense tone, "Fuck off, Tom."

I don't answer him, just finally leave his office and find myself grinning because thank God. I was honestly getting afraid that the brassification of Evan Lorne has already started but hey, throwing me out of his office with profanity gives me hope that it hasn't happened yet. Don't get me wrong, I think he'll make a great XO, and he'll be great at all other commands he'll no doubt get after this one but okay, yes, I admit it: I got a feeling I need at least a little more time to get used to the fact that the guy I got into a lot of shit with at the Academy and at flight school is now my superior and will not cut me any slack, just because I'm his buddy. I got a bad feeling he might actually go harder on me than on the other team commanders, exactly because I'm his buddy, so as not to look like he's playing favorites. He's that kind of almost disgustingly decent, professional guy.

Still, that'll probably be even harder to get used to than learning to accept that I'm not going to get rid of my new medic in the foreseeable future. But at least now I've got something to do for the next two hours, and yes, it's exactly what you think it is. Someone will have to make sure both my sergeant and my medic will be in peak battle readiness when Reece and the command crew are back with a new contingent. Those torture plans err training routines don't write themselves, and I think I know exactly how I'll go about it…

Damn, it's good to be back in the game. Even with a medic I can't stand. Could be worse, right?