Rating: PG-13
Characters: Weir/Sheppard and Rodney/Elizabeth
Summary: In the silence Elizabeth watches his face, see's something surfacing, cresting in the shadows.
Authors Note: I can't thank runonmoonlight enough for her help. She painstakingly beta'ed this fic over text messages for a few hours last night, giving me honest, real advice. She's got the fastest texting hands in Canada EVER. Also, thanks to snarkymcsnarker, who is my grammar woman! Thanks girls!
as my heart runs empty now i realize
what i want would never surface otherwise
hold on to all my hope, and my faith.
-
The awareness is instant; it overcomes her when she wakes to the world again.
Elizabeth can hear them inside, falling in with the rhythm of her steady beating heart that thumps, thumps against her unbroken chest. It makes her wonder if she could feel them too, impossibly small, moving inside if she sits still enough.
"What have you done?" She asks, body tingling and heavy with new muscles and bones that do not belong to her.
No one answers and she stares at John, the quicksilver movement of his hand to his weapon. Her body tenses, muscles contracting without thought. Mistrust feathers his steps towards her but Rodney's face is all relief, as open and turbulent as the ocean they have left behind. "Elizabeth." Her name sounds strange, foreign on his tongue. Needful in a way she sees in the grasping of his hands against the stale curl of air in the room.
She knows then he was the one to bring her back.
-
The report to Earth is sparse, carefully edited and sent out before Elizabeth is released from quarantine.
There are only a handful of people who know what really happened, what Rodney did and the fierceness of their loyalty and unquestioned silence should be a comfort to the festering uncertainty Elizabeth feels inside but it leaves her cold with worry instead.
-
Her return to duty is smooth, slowed only by the city's perception of her injuries.
Their relief she understands and takes with a genial smile. It is the easy acceptance by John that stirs something shadowy within. He holds her gaze and he speaks to her like before, like nothing has happened. His smile is familiar, pacifying and the first time they fight over a decision she feels a thrill, feels whole. Her eyes are bright, fierce enough that she almost misses the slow coil of uncertainty and mistrust inside him.
The surprise that catches on her face steels something in his.
"Elizabeth." John says and she recognizes the hard edge of his voice. She remembers Koya's dead men and the efficiency of the man before her.
She waits for meaningless words but there is only the crashing silence that pulls her under. When she surfaces, cold and scared, he is gone.
-
The balcony is familiar, something unchanged even though the ocean she has called home is light-years away.
Elizabeth can feel her history here, settled in the grooves of the banister. She can see with clarity every decision, every mistake that had led her here. She feels no regret though, just the cold press of space burning in her lungs.
-
Rodney surprises her inside her room.
"I let myself in," he starts, shifting and fidgeting under the cold flare of blue in her eyes.
"They said you were brain dead," he begins, fingers curling in on themselves in a warn display as his words tumble out quick and jagged. "And I know, I mean, you can't….you can't ascend if you're brain dead. I thought," and now he falters, eyes falling away from the fierce expression that makes her face feel tight. "It's not… you deserved that chance."
She had a speech for him, for this moment but the anger that bubbles inside is the first clean emotion she's felt in weeks and it crawls out of her in cold, oily words.
"Get. Out."
He flinches, and she remembers the Arcturus project and the ugly feel of his selfishness.
She remembers the dead.
-
She dreams of the city's submersion and her skin knitting together again, bones regrowing under the thunderclap of a thousand tiny machines. She dreams of division too, the clean line her return has brought between Sheppard and Rodney. The answers she needs crumbles in her hands, dissolves in the ocean before she can capture it.
She wakes with the salty sea air bitter on her tongue and the humid warmth of the ocean slick against her skin. She knows what she must do.
-
John says nothing when she joins the mission.
Teyla's silent support is a relief and her warmth encompassing, a gentle reminder of before. It lingers over Elizabeth until John shatters it with his tight, clipped words and eyes that never rest on her.
Rodney's speaks only to her, gaze searching as he lays out his plans and the hopes that they will carry. It is risky, foolhardy what they attempt but Atlantis is stranded, dying a slow death that Elizabeth see's inside John.
-
"We won't make it," Ronon says and Elizabeth can taste her own blood, dried and cracked on the smooth skin of her lips.
She stares at Rodney's wide, panicked eyes. "We have to try," she replies and when the others turn into the woods, towards the jumper she waits, bids her time.
Sheppard comes quick, slipping with ease and practice from the tunnel, his face red with blood and sweat. His features are hard and stark in the shadow of the city.
"We have the ZPM?" His asks, voice tight and clipped. It soothes her, prepares her for what she is about to do.
"Yes."
In the silence Elizabeth watches his face, see's something surfacing, cresting in the shadows.
She knows he won't try to stop her.
"Tell Rodney," she asks, faltering for the first time as she feels the intensity of her own regret laid bare. "Tell him I appreciate the chance."
She reaches out for Sheppard on impulse then and when their fingers brush his eyes start to hers, wild and open in a way that sucks the breath harshly from her chest. She sees too much and even the hard press of his mouth against hers, the taste of his desperation and fear, cannot take back what she knows now.
She pulls away, throat constricting with all she can't say. There are no words that he will understand, only actions and so she turns from him then, muscles stretching with relief as she runs runs towards the destiny Rodney gave her the moment he brought her back.