Disclaimer: Nothing copyrighted belongs to yours truly.
Author's Note: Written for Day 07 of the 2021 August Fic-A-Day.
The next morning Buffy went through the gate with AR-2, as their resident botanist had managed to fall face-first into some kind of plant and landed himself in the infirmary due to a sprained wrist. The plant guy, David Parrish, had managed to pass his second evaluation just barely the day before the mission, and this had put him right off the team again until he was both healed and better understood to watch where he was going - even if there was an interesting plant to fawn over.
The rest of the team consisted of Major Evan Lorne and Lieutenants Klaus Coughlin and Dan Reed. They were friendly enough but seemed to have picked up on the distrust between the two expedition leaders and her. Lorne was a little cooler towards her than he had been in the beginning, but he was professional and polite. From what she had managed to gather about him, mainly by using her Slayer-enhanced hearing to eavesdrop in the mess hall, this was how he normally acted.
Truthfully, a lot of people had become wearier of her due to Sheppard and Weir's noticeably colder behavior towards her. No one had been overtly hostile, not even those two, but conversations suddenly tended to die out if someone saw her, topics changed, there were more whispered conversations, and fewer people were willing to just chat with her about whatever. It shouldn't have come as a surprise, these people were close and they were on an outpost, but it still hurt.
Rumor had it the tension was at least partially caused by Dr. Weir failing her evaluation repeatedly, but there were other less serious ones as well. Like Buffy attempting to break them up by trying to seduce Colonel Sheppard (or Dr. Weir). Which would've been funnier if she'd had someone to share it with, especially since her sense of smell told her that the two of them were not actually bumping uglies.
All of this was running through her head as she walked through the Stargate and straight into a Wraith culling. The first thing she heard as she rematerialized on the other side was a high-pitched whine quickly followed by screams and running footsteps. Knowing she was out of her element a little with this particular enemy, she quickly located Major Lorne a short distance from her and followed him in between some of the ever-present trees that nearly always seemed to be close to the Stargate.
Buffy raised an eyebrow once they were semi-secure, "Wraith, I presume?"
"Good guess," Lorne replied in a dry voice. "Let's see if we can make a good impression on these people by helping out." He followed it up with orders that predictably included shooting the space vampires. She didn't mind but managed to maneuver herself and the Major so she ended up in close combat with one of the weirdly greenish humanoid creatures while he was shooting a couple the foot soldiers.
Buffy made a few kicks closely followed by an uppercut while carefully making sure neither of its hands came too close to her person. The dangling automatic weapon around her neck made it a little more difficult than it should have been, but she made due.
He was strong and fast and it was amazing to finally be able to flex her strength and speed without having to worry about breaking her opponent. When a second Wraith joined their fight she might have grinned a little manically. A few minutes later a slightly freaked-out Lorne yelled at her to finish it as they needed to move. A little mournful of losing her fight so soon she unsheathed her military-issue k-bar and stabbed first one and then the other in the head. Mainly because she couldn't remember if there was a specific way to kill them that didn't involve the head, or if it was just more difficult due to armor or something.
Over the next half hour, she killed another five Wraith by herself using the knife while Major Lorne became increasingly wide-eyed when he wasn't busy shooting or doing other things. It felt great, although she needed to get herself a sword. It would make things easier. Maybe Ronon or Teyla knew where she could get one.
By the end of it, Reed had managed to down one of the small spaceships that from what she heard from the locals had come through the gate five minutes before them. Another two escaped back the same way they had arrived.
Major Lorne spoke with the scattered leadership of the planet, which turned out to be called Regia, and a tentative agreement was made for medical aid and possibly other things in exchange for some kind of trade. She tuned it out and enjoyed the endorphins in her system caused by finally being able to fight to the death.
Lorne was professional and kept his attention focused on Marlin, the leader of the Regia, but she kept feeling Coughlin and Reed's eyes on her, appraising her and re-evaluating their impression of her both as a person and as a fighter and teacher. The Major was still acutely aware of her though and she knew it, even if she hadn't been able to hear his heartbeat.
Two long hours later they went back to Atlantis. They quickly went through the post-mission check-up with Dr. Beckett and were all declared healthy and unharmed. Then there was a sitrep with Dr. Weir and as they all prepared to leave, she pretended not to hear Major Lorne ask for a private meeting with her and his Commanding Officer a little later.
Clearly, she wasn't invited and she had to forcefully tell herself not to sneak around or try to eavesdrop to find out what AR-2 had to say about the day's events. Firmly telling herself that this would happen sooner or later and she would just have to deal with the consequences.
She left for the mess and then sat and conversed a little stiltedly with a few of the nurses while trying not to miss Chinese food too much.