Real Heroes do Cry
by
Stealth Dragon
Rating K+
Disclaimer: Me no own. Me sad.
Synopsis: The definition of a hero is... A little bit of a Wayfarers tag but I think it can also stand on its own, so you don't need to have read Wayfarers to understand this.
SGA
"Quarelen of Athos was said to have skin like stone able to repel the effects of a wraith stunner. He walked through stunning blasts like they were water, and removed the head of every wraith, all one hundred of them -"
"And he was six and a half feet tall with blue eyes, long blond hair, and bulging biceps," Rodney jumped in. "Am I right?"
Ronon tilted his chin toward the movie screen. "Like that guy?"
Rodney hummed. "I would say barbarian-boy is more honey blond, wouldn't you?"
Ronon shrugged and spread his fingers toward Teyla in an invitation to continue.
"I do not know what Quarelen looked like," she said, then added with a smirk, "though Charrin was partial to him having long dark hair and brown eyes."
"Scraping the bottom of the barrel in trying for originality," Rodney replied, " but still nice to hear that some stereotypes don't extend to other galaxies after all..." his blue eyes went wide in sudden horror at the advancing scene on the screen. "Oh, gosh, I think that guy's about to get thirty lashes. Hey Sheppard..." he leaned forward around Teyla, all ready to warn the Colonel, only to snap his jaw shut and narrow his eyes. "He's asleep again."
Teyla smiled. "I am aware, Rodney." She adjusted John's head into a more comfortable position on her shoulder, then tugged the blanket up to his jaw, tucking it tighter around him afterwards to fill in gaps where the air might bleed through.
Rodney dropped back against the couch. He cringed with a wince and gently pressed his hand against his arm through the night-blue sling. "The man needs caffeine."
"The man can't have caffeine," Ronon said without taking his eyes off the screen. "Not until he's done with the medication." The barbarian man – Teyla did not think it was that Conan person as it was not the same man from the other two movies – was cutting down enemies with a broad-sword that made every muscle ripple with every lift of it. Ronon's eyes glittered in admiration and a lot of envy. His shoulder may have been healed enough for him to be free of a sling, but not enough to allow him to build up his strength the way he wanted. He could barely hold his blaster for long periods before his hand would start to shake.
Teyla wondered if their choice of movie had been a good idea.
"My mother used to tell me stories," Ronon said, "Of Kyderet the Shadow King who sold his soul to the three-headed Goddess Devra for a means protect his people from the wraith. She made it so that he never tired. He didn't even have to sleep. And because he didn't sleep, he didn't dream. The ancestors of my people used to believe the wraith found you through your dreams."
"Which, I'm betting, made for an entire planet of insomniacs," said McKay in that voice that said he was right without needing it confirmed.
Rather than take offense, Ronon smiled and shrugged. It could not be denied that it was a peculiar and counterproductive belief, but then most of the fear-born legends were. Sometimes, fear could feel eternal, tangible, heavy and suffocating until a person would cling to even farcical illusions if it meant being able to see an end. A life-line, Sheppard or Rodney would call it, tying one to hope.
"We told you about Hercules," Rodney said.
Teyla nodded. "Dr. Hasaan has the entire series. I have watched a few."
"Saw the cartoon one," Ronon said, dead-panned with a heavy lidded glare that let them know just what he'd thought of it. The cartoons with singing and dancing had yet to sit well with him, the ones made by Disney especially. Teyla did not blame him. They were as odd as some legends.
"No, not that Hercules. Well, kind of. I mean the series did kind of, sort of, barely adhere to the actual legends. I refuse to even acknowledge the Disney version. Hercules was the son of Zeus and ridiculously strong because of it. Then there's Achilles-"
"Guy with the weak ankles," Ronon said. He had a fondness for stories and, after learning earth's English lettering system, had taken to reading many of earth's myths and legends.
"Yes," Rodney vapidly replied, "the guy with the weak ankles."
"What of Xena?" Teyla had to ask. The warrior woman, to her, was like the cartoon Hercules to Ronon. Perhaps she would have thought more of her had the creators of that show not made her fighting moves so... false.
"A fantasy," Rodney said. "Every computer Geek's and feminist's dream." His easy indifference would have hidden the truth had Teyla not caught Rodney one day walking out of Dr. Hasaan's room with one of the box-sets of DVDs under his arm. "But she was not an actual legend."
"And Batman?" asked Ronon.
A wistful smile spread on Rodney's pale face. His hand went back to his injured arm, rubbing it. "Modern day legend. Yes, I know, he wasn't real, but neither was Hercules. Give it a few more centuries and every school kid all over the world will be reading the Adventures of Batman right alongside The Iliad, you mark my words. Brains over brawn I always say. I mean, yes, he had brawn, but it was his brain that got him out of trouble." His smile became strained as though it pained him to hold, his hand gripping the edge of the sling tightly, cording tendons and paling his knuckles. "Yep, he could get out of anything with that genius of his. Sucks that he isn't real."
Rodney's hand started to shake, extending into his arm. When Ronon placed his hand on the scientist's hunched shoulder, giving it a careful squeeze, the shaking stopped. In the movie, the barbarian-man had defeated the army and was now facing the monster. Muscles bulged and rippled beneath tan skin as the man swung the sword in an outward arch that cut clean through the armored neck of the beast.
Next to Teyla, John coughed harshly until his lungs emptied deflating his chest. He sucked in a ragged breath, then shuddered and moaned. Teyla wriggled her arm pinned between her and John free, brushing her knuckles against two layers of cloth and protruding ribs. She slid her hand across his upper back and backbone, side to side then up and down over the quaking remnant of muscles until he finally stilled. Sheppard's hero (she could never recall his name, only that it rhymed) was a man who performed tasks that defied death. For some of John's people, death was an enemy that could never be beaten but could be spited, and John's hero did just that. At least, that is how Teyla had interpreted it. This "stunt-man" occupation sounded more fool-hardy than brave, in her opinion. She would have told John as much, but had not felt right about belittling a man he admired.
The barbarian man had won. The monster was dead, as was the evil king/sorcerer/what ever he was. Barbarian gathered the princess into his large arms and pressed his lips to hers in a passionate kiss.
Rodney's own lip lifted in a sneer. "Like that ever really happens." He left it at that, not even looking Sheppard's way to push for implications.
The movie faded to black and the credits climbed up the screen accompanying a sudden blast of theme music louder than the movie had been. All three of them jumped and John sucked in a sharp breath. Teyla looked down at him to see moisture glittering between his eyelashes.
"Did it wake him?"
Teyla shifted her gaze to Rodney's face, hallow and sickly in the poor light from the screen. Not that it looked any better in the brighter light. His worry exaggerated it. His concern always did make him seem so vulnerable, fragile, capable of fading should his worry prove legitimate.
Teyla looked back at John and the single bead of moisture that had finally escaped his eye to rest on the sharp point of his cheekbone. She wiped it away with her thumb before the others could notice. "He is fine."
Rodney sighed dejectedly. "He's going to have to wake up, anyways."
Teyla nodded. Waking John was a delicate matter what with his fragile dreams that didn't take much or long to turn against him. Teyla was better at it, Ronon and Rodney had said as much more than once, which was why she always sat next to him. Brushing his hair back from his forehead, Teyla spoke softly until he stirred and fluttered heavy eyelids.
"Movie over?" he whispered, lifting his unsteady head.
"Yes, thank goodness," Rodney answered. "And trust me when I say you were better off sleeping through it. Anyone besides me hungry?"
Sheppard rubbed the side of his thin face. "Not really."
"You will be once you get moving," Ronon said. He stood, keeping his arm tucked against his stomach to steady it. He helped Rodney to his feet, then aided Teyla in getting John up, keeping him steady with a hand on his chest until he found his balance. Teyla arranged the blanket over John's back since he was always cold within the first few minutes of being awake.
"What was that movie about, anyways?" John asked.
Rodney arched his back in a stretch, moaning contentedly. "Oh, you know: Guy with ridiculously large muscles fights evil king, evil monster, and gets the super-model princess dressed in an armor and gown ensemble designed by Victoria Secret. Like I said, you were better of sleeping through it."
McKay led the way from the rec-room, with Ronon following then Teyla and John. Teyla slid her arm across Sheppard's bony shoulders to keep the blanket in place and him balanced. Along with being cold on waking, he also tended to be a little disoriented.
"Think they'll ever be legends about heroes not so damn larger than life with everything going for them?" Rodney asked.
John stifled a yawn before answering, "I've always been of the opinion that all heroes start out as way less than what the legends made them into."
"So why make them big, bad, and impossible?"
"Makes the stories more interesting," Ronon replied.
"Yes, at the price of never knowing who the hero really was." Rodney sighed. "Kind of makes it hard to recognize what a hero is."
"The hero's the guy who does what needs to be done," said John, "and would do it again without a second thought."
Teyla gave his thin shoulder a gentle squeeze, feeling sharp bone and the puckered skin of scars through the blanket and sweater. She liked that definition.
The End
A/N: The movie used was not a real movie. Any movie resembling it probably isn't a coincidence because it is pretty generic. Apologies to the fans of Disney, Hercules, and Xena. I was not picking on these shows because I dislike them, they were simply innocent victims of the plot.