John paused outside the entrance to the wedding hotel, causing Rodney almost to walk into him.
"You know, Lorne keeps talking about tradition, but he's kidding, right? There's no way I'd have to dance with the bride, is there?"
"Why the hell would you have to do that?" Rodney asked.
"Tradition. Lorne keeps talking about it." John was looking slightly wild about the eyes.
"And you believehim?"
"Excuse me?"
Rodney sighed. At this rate they'd never get to the wedding and he'd end up having a hypoglycaemic episode if he didn't get to the wedding breakfast on time. He gave an encouraging shove to the small of John's back.
"Lorne," he said irritably. "You believe him?"
"You mean to tell me…"
Rodney wasn't sure whether to be alarmed or really rather turned on by the intensity of the gaze John turned on him.
"I think! I mean, I don't know! Don't take my word for it! What do I know anyway about the mating and courtship rituals of Marines? Oh, crap."
The last was muttered as John's figure, looking really rather spectacular in dress blues, disappeared across the hotel lobby, presumably in search of Major Lorne.
It had taken some coordination but Megan and David had managed to get seats together on the flight from DC. Despite living in the same city, it had been quite some time since they'd seen one another and most of the flight was spent catching up, and then on wagering just how hard Colby was going to end up blushing. David put twenty on fire-truck red as he said his vows; Megan went for a more subtle pink that lasted at least a half hour after he'd said them.
Though she was a frequent visitor to LA with Larry still there, she hadn't really kept up with the team since leaving. There just didn't seem to be time in the day for everything as it was, and holding onto old friendships took time and effort.
She was looking forward to seeing them all again, she thought, as she and David got into a cab outside LAX. Don, who'd been her mentor back before things had gone so wrong for her with the Bureau, and Colby, who'd been like that annoying but simultaneously supportive and vulnerable little brother. A little brother who'd surprised her by overturning all the stereotypes and not only coming out as gay but going the whole hog and getting married. She hadn't seen it coming, though she'd realised when she'd opened the invitation that perhaps she should have done; Colby was a bit of a traditionalist after all, and she wouldn't be surprised if those terrible few days when they'd all thought Evan was dead had played some part in this decision of theirs to make things official now they finally could.
She grinned at David, suddenly happy to be back here, and looking forward to a long overdue reunion with her old team.
John was on his somewhat annoyed way across the lobby when he was ambushed by two extremely short people.
"Excuse me, sir, are you Colonel Sheppard?" He looked down to find an excited-looking face turned up toward his.
"Well, that kinda depends on who wants to know," he said.
"It is!" The owner of the little face executed a death grip on John's right pant leg while turning to the slightly taller short person. "It's Uncle Evan's Colonel Sheppard!"
"Cool!" the taller one responded excitedly.
"Which is better, the Raptor or the Tomcat?" The first little face asked him, screwed up in earnestness.
"And is the Spitfire or the Hurricane better? I mean, the Hurricane was the more stable gun platform, but the Spitfire was the Spitfire," the taller one said in tones of utter reverence.
Luckily, before he had time to even begin to answer, a woman with a vaguely familiar-looking face swept into view and gathered both short people against her.
"I'm so sorry," she said. "I'm Nicola, Evan's sister, and these are his nephews. They were so excited to meet you they forgot their manners, didn't you, boys?"
"We said 'excuse me'," the littlest little face said with a pout that was horribly familiar to John. He saw it whenever he failed to complete his paperwork satisfactorily.
"They were fine," he said quickly. "Just asking some questions about aircraft that Uncle Evan will need to help out on answering." Take that, Uncle freaking Evan. Fair was fair. And John wasn't in the least bit petty. Not ever.
By the time he'd introduced himself properly to Nicola, who possessed the same sort of dimples, smile, and eyebrows as her brother, met her husband, and introduced Rodney who'd joined them and was viewing the short people with palpable mistrust, John had almost forgotten about his plans for revenge on his XO. Almost.
Laura called when she was five minutes out from the hotel, as arranged, with the result that Colby was waiting by the entrance when she drew up to let Mrs Clark out. At least she assumed the guy in the suit, a white rosebud in his buttonhole and looking like he was afraid to move for fear of getting a hair out of place, was Colby. That was confirmed when he waved the doorman off and came to help Mrs Clark out himself, giving Laura a quick word of thanks before taking Mrs Clark inside on his arm.
Having had a good look at this Colby guy, she guessed Evan hadn't done too badly for himself, though she wasn't sure how Colby was coping with the whole wedding thing - she'd seen scientists look less nervous when confronted by Wraith. She hoped he wasn't going to do a runner, because she'd hate to get blood on her dress uniform.
Colby took Mrs Clark out into the hotel grounds, where there was a small private garden they were using for the ceremony. He and Evan had managed to stop Nicola getting carried away with stuff like ribbon and doves – he was almostsure that last suggestion hadn't been serious – and Evan's dad had gotten round the issue of flowers by pointing out that the roses in the garden would be in bloom. So it was all pretty much as low key as they'd wanted it, with just a few chairs set out in rows for their close friends and family, and an aisle left down the centre.
There were already a bunch of people there, some of whom Colby recognised and some he didn't. And Evan was there. Evan, who he hadn't been allowed to see all morning because Nicola was bossy as hell and kept muttering darkly about tradition.As soon as Evan saw Colby and Mrs Clark he excused himself from where he was talking to Colby's sister and her husband and came across the lawn to greet Mrs Clark, though he grinned at Colby the whole way over and gave him a swift kiss on the lips before he turned to Mrs Clark.
"You do look handsome, dear," she said. And dear God, she had a gift for understatement. It was the first time Colby had seen Evan in his dress blues and he was lost for words.
"Close your mouth, Granger. You're drooling," a familiar voice said from beside him, and he tore his eyes from Evan just long enough to find Megan standing there.
"Hey," he said, glad to see her again, and handed off Mrs Clark to Evan so he could give Megan a hug, and incidentally move her so that he could do that and still drink in the amazing sight that was Evan Lorne in dress blues.
Megan thumped him in the end, and he realised he was still absently hugging her while looking at Evan. "You're not allowed to jump your fiancé till after the wedding," she said. "That's what the honeymoon's for."
He might have pouted had David not chosen that minute to come and give him a one-armed hug, and he wasn't going to pout in front of David because that just wouldn't be manly.
And then Don and Alan and Larry were there, Alan fussing about where to put their present, and Larry with eyes only for Megan, and Don looking about as relaxed as he did when on a particularly gruelling case. Colby, having once had the experience of driving Alan somewhere, wasn't surprised. He made a mental note to seat Alan next to Roger Bloom during the ceremony to give Don a break. If it meant their wedding descended into fisticuffs, well, Evan was supposed to love him and so would probably forgive him. Eventually.
"Hey," Evan was saying to him, "I'd like to introduce you to my CO."
They taught manners at the Air Force Academy apparently. Who knew? It made sense actually, because it wasn't as if they taught the airheads anything else. But Colby zipped his mouth because he knew this meeting was important to Evan.
Evan took both him and Mrs Clark over and introduced them, and, as befitted another graduate of the Academy of good manners and fresh air, John Sheppard greeted Mrs Clark first.
Her quick eyes took him in with one searching gaze, and then Colby could see it happen, see when her eyes returned with a sort of horrified fascination to the hair that – well, it wasn't exactly regulation, was the best he could find to say about it.
"Are you a servingofficer?" Mrs Clark demanded.
"Yes, ma'am," came back the answer.
"Well," she said. And then after a long pause, "Well."
He thought for Evan's sake he'd better cover the awkwardness and with the usual how do you do's and handshakes everything seemed smoothed over, unlike the Colonel's hair, except that Sheppard was still obviously aware and – thankfully – seemingly amused.
"Colby," Mrs Clark said, "I need you to see me to my seat."
He escorted her to the chair in the front row that they'd reserved for her. Once ensconced, she gestured to him to lean in and asked in not too loud a voice just what in heaven's name had happened to the Air Force since her late husband had shuffled off this mortal coil. "I know things have never been the same since that ridiculous decision to create it as a separate service, but still," she said in tones of outrage. "I've never seen anything like it. And he's a colonel."
"Yes ma'am," Colby said, and, with a heroic effort that Evan better damn well appreciate, declined to join in with her entirely natural condemnation of the Air Force. "But Evan says he's an excellent CO and all the Marines respect the hel- I mean, they respect him enormously."
"If you say so," she said dubiously, but at least she sounded a little more conciliatory toward Colonel Sheppard. She patted Colby's cheek and her voice returned to its usual volume as she said "Now go marry your young man. The two of you have waited quite long enough."
Colby could feel himself turning bright red. From the seat behind Mrs Clark came a hastily muffled "Yes!"from David.
"Not got to the vows yet," Megan said cryptically next to him.
Colby shook his head. Some days he wondered just why all his colleagues, past and present, were so weird.
Despite the traffic hold-up, Liz and Nikki got to the hotel with twenty minutes to spare, time enough for a quick dash to the bathroom for titivating purposes and still get out into the garden and not be quite the last to arrive.
"Wow, Granger's actually scrubbed up okay," Liz said, seeing him escorting a uniformed young woman to a seat.
"Apparently Evan's sister took him suit-shopping on Evan's orders," Don said, wandering up to them. "I have it on good authority that it scarred him for life. You've both scrubbed up pretty good too."
"Gee, thanks for the ringing endorsement, boss," Nikki said, and then her eyes grew wide and her hand closed convulsively on Liz's arm. "Who the hell is that?"
While Liz tried unsuccessfully to unclamp Nikki's fingers, Don grinned. "That," he said, "is Evan's CO, Colonel John Sheppard. Probably best not to hit on the groom's CO till everyone's too drunk to remember, Betancourt."
"Uh-huh," Nikki agreed, not sounding like she was taking in a single word.
Liz sighed. Things that made Nikki such a force to be reckoned with in the field – swift target acquisition, lack of inhibition, and sheer force of will – never seemed to translate quite so well to social settings. Resigning herself to the barnacle now attached to her, they wandered over with Don to the seats, giving a little wave to Colby as he saw them approach.
"Hey, Evan's looking kind of hot today too," Nikki said.
"How the hell did you get anything done in LAPD if you have a uniform fetish?" Don wanted to know.
"Ew. And I cannot believe I just said 'Ew'," Nikki grimaced. "I don't have a uniform fetish, boss; I just have eyes."
"Ain't that the truth," Liz agreed.