A/N: Pt. 2 of 3. Sorry for the delay, blame it on the damn mistletoe
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't make any money from my "borrowing" of these beloved characters.
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John took a deep breath as he looked at Elizabeth out on her balcony. He could see her shaking from where he stood. His heart began to beat even faster. He could leave, he briefly considered. Give her more time to calm down. He imagined her knuckles were white from the grasp she had on the balcony railing. Taking another deep breath he couldn't shake the feeling that he deserved this, he owed her the right to vent her rage upon him. They had all pushed her into it. McKay, Caldwell, himself, she'd known the test would happen no matter what she wanted. She'd been backed into saving face by approving it without force. But he couldn't pretend it had been without extreme pressure.
He saw her shaking still as he grew closer. So many things that needed to be said froze on the tip of his tongue as he remembered the taste of her kiss, remembered the feel of her arms woven tightly around him. The heat began to finally fade away from his body, replaced quickly with a painful chill. She'd finally given him a chance to let him love her and he blew it. Blew it with an explosion the size of a solar system. A dark pit began to coil in the pit of his stomach as he realized their first kiss was probably going to be their last. But she'd let them go. How was she going to blame it all on them, they may have pushed her but she said yes. Unless she'd been looking for an excuse to walk away from him.
"Just go ahead Elizabeth. We all fucked up, disappointed you and your illusions of a perfect universe. To hell with that, life is messy and unpredictable and no matter how hard you may wish otherwise it will never be a fairy tale." John knew he was pushing her further over the edge, but he no longer gave a damn.
She took a step back, her back striking the balcony rail with a thud. She didn't seem to even notice. She averted her head to the side as he moved forward. "John. I need you to go. I thought I could do this, but shit, I can't think with you around me." She was whispering now, almost as though trying to force her voice from yelling.
"Elizabeth…" He brushed his hand across her cheek but she turned the other way. He brought both hands up, cupping her chin towards him.
"John…you…need…to…go. Now!" Her voice had grown louder with each word and when he faltered, she shoved against his shoulders giving herself room to move away.
"Damn it Elizabeth, what are you doing!" John moved around grabbing her shoulders twisting her back around to face him. "You can't just kiss me like you did yesterday and then try to throw me out like I'm no one today. We need to talk about Doranda."
Elizabeth brought her arms up between Johns before pushing his hands outwards and freeing herself from their grip on her shoulders. "I don't want to talk about Doranda John. Why don't you understand that I can't talk to you right now?"
She turned away from him again moving back to the railing of the balcony. He caught her wrist as her hands smoothed her curls away from her eyes. He tugged her back around again. "Christ Elizabeth, I'm not doing this with you. You feel guilty, you feel like your focus was split. To hell with that. You are too damn hard on yourself."
John took a deep breath waiting, but Elizabeth remained stubbornly locked in silence. "Don't punish me for what you did to McKay. No one in Atlantis missed you screaming at him tonight, and you know he didn't deserve that. It's our job to protect McKay from himself and we failed. You know once the military on Earth got wind of this they would have made us proceed with testing. More people than I could have evacuated would have been there. You saved lives by letting him try."
"I almost got you both killed." She whispered.
"Elizabeth you kissed me yesterday, you came to find me tonight. You didn't have to see me at all, god knows I wasn't about to come looking for you. Finish what you started Elizabeth! Is this over? Because if so I want to hear you say it. I deserve to hear you say it." His voice had emerged in a deep angry tone, one he could never have imagined using with Elizabeth before.
But something was coursing through his veins now, like her anger had somehow rubbed off on him. But it was more than anger. It was mixing turbulently with the intense feelings he held for the woman before him, washing over him and leaving him reeling from the powerful aftershocks. He could almost taste her kiss; he could still smell the intoxicating aroma hinting about her neck. Her body was twisting away from him as he moved to pull her around to face him. She wiped again at the hair splaying against her face and he took the opportunity to snatch her hand. She swatted at him gently, and then more forcefully as he persisted.
"Damn it John, why won't you go away? I'm pissed; I don't want to say…" Elizabeth broke free and John followed her to the side railing of the balcony.
"Look at me Elizabeth!" He was beginning to feel like a wild animal as he pawed at her, pulling at her, willing her to yield. He just wanted to see her face, needed to see her eyes. "Don't want to say what Elizabeth? Convenient isn't it that I managed to piss you off so soon. Gives you the perfect excuse to change your mind about us."
She chose that moment to turn her head back to him. As he hair fell away revealing her face, John sucked in his breath when he saw her. Tears. Not hair. She'd been brushing tears away from her face. And her eyes glistened like he'd never seen them before as the tears danced upon her still furious eyes.
He held his breath as she moved forward and-"Ow! You kicked me!" John gingerly bent over to rub his throbbing knee.
"Why will you never do anything I ask? I just didn't want to say something I wouldn't regret John. Why didn't you leave?" Elizabeth moved forward again before John could straighten himself and she shoved hard against his shoulders.
John teetered off balance falling the short distance to the floor. He looked up at her wanting to reach out to her so badly, but not wanting to push her further. Though his timing sucked, he couldn't stop the laughter bubbling through his chest from escaping. Elizabeth Weir had just kicked his shin. He had a random flashback to grade school and a little brunette with the longest curly hair. He never could resist pulling it.
Elizabeth bent over him, her anger softening as a concerned look flashed over her eyes. He reached up to touch a curling tendril of hair dancing down towards him. She smacked his hand away. "Looks like you'll live."
He grabbed her hand as it pulled back, grasped the small of her back and pulled her firmly down towards him.
"John stop it!"
He could hear her tone lighten as if she was trying to suppress her own laughter now. Didn't mean she still wasn't mad he quickly found. Elizabeth fought like hell to escape his grasp. His continuing laughter was clearly not helping her mood. She made a last ditch effort to twist away and John turned with her, pinning her now with her back to the floor as his body stretched over hers.
He looked down at her tear dampened face that was still fighting to control the corners of her lips threatening to turn upward. His laughter fell flat as their eyes found each others. Elizabeth's body stilled as they stared into each other's eyes.
"Elizabeth, I'm not going anywhere. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. Don't waste your beautiful pout trying to force me to do anything different." He said, somewhat shocked to hear the words almost flawlessly escape his mouth. Maybe all that emotional stuff wasn't so hard after all, if you had the right person.
She was still focused on his eyes, searching intently to her unasked questions. He could still feel the heat pooling off her body and almost see her struggle to relinquish her safety net of anger.
"You came looking for me tonight Elizabeth-"
She rolled away from him. The tears had all but dried from her face, but her eyes bespoke a different story. They looked anguished. He moved quickly to his knees but she moved away again standing briskly before turning her back to him.
"If I can't control the expedition, I have no right to be here. Maybe I never did. That is one of the few mistakes I have the power to correct." Elizabeth's voice was quaking.
"Don't." Fear gripped John's heart as he watched Elizabeth's frighteningly still body. "Elizabeth I know what you are thinking, you can't, I won't allow it!" John stood up behind her. The second his fingertips brushed her shoulder she was moving.
"I can't stop you from trying to stop me. I obviously can't make you do anything. But at some point, I have to take a stand. And I have to do so before I allow anyone else to get killed under my watch. If you won't leave, I will." She slipped out the doorway and John could only watch in shock.
A/N: Again, this is part 2 of 3. Sorry for any grammatical errors, this was edited quickly and without beta. Forgive me