The Strange Encounters of Rodney McKay

by Soledad

Author's Notes:

I decided to finish this story with this chapter. There are a lot more encounters that could be written, but I had to draw a line somewhere, and this is as good a place as any.

I don't remember ever having heard the name of McKay's cat, not in canon anyway. So I chose the easy way out and decided that she doesn't have a proper one.

Just a reminder: I work with an alternate version of Dr. Weir (the one played by the wonderful Jessica Steen), that's why she's called Theresa in all my stories.

Spoilers: Hot Zone, Trinity.

Rated 14+ for cursing.

Chapter 11 – Miko

He'd apologized to everyone. He'd admitted his mistake, although it nearly broke him to admit that he'd been wrong. He'd never been wrong before, not in anything of true scientific importance, not in something that would have someone killed.

He'd endured Theresa's dressing down without as much a word of protest, despite the fact that it had happened publicly, with half of Atlantis' inhabitants watching. His credibility as a genius had suffered considerably, and he had to live with the consequences. Including the fact that Collins was dead, and that his team leader didn't trust him anymore.

"He'll learn to trust you again," Miko said, rubbing his tense shoulders with her strong, warm fingers. "But you'll have to earn his trust back. It won't be easy. Until now, he thought you couldn't make mistakes. Even if he questioned you, he trusted you blindly. That's dangerous. Once blind trust is broken, it's very hard to rebuild it on a more reasonable level."

Nobody knew it better than she. That was a part of her past she hadn't shared with Rodney yet. She wasn't sure that she ever would. She was there to lessen his burden, to add her own to it.

"What if I don't want to fight for his trust?" Rodney said petulantly, but without true venom. Firstly because Miko's clever little fingers felt too good, digging into the aching muscles of his neck and shoulders, and secondly because he was too emotionally exhausted to work himself up to a proper fit.

He'd never felt this empty in his entire life.

"Oh, but you do," Miko replied with a forgiving smile. "He's your hero, after all."

"No, he's not!" Rodney protested. "I don't even like him! He's arrogant and self-centered, and he's a vest-pocket Casanova, a…"

"Hero worship doesn't necessarily require from you to like your hero," Miko interrupted. "What counts is that he's everything you secretly want to be. He's smart – not a genius like you, but much smarter than the average soldier – he's popular… and he can afford to break the rules without severe retribution. Of course you'd like to be like that, too. Who wouldn't?"

Rodney whirled around and glared daggers at her. "I'm not planning to enter a popularity game with James T. Sheppard!"

"Perhaps not, but that's what you're doing all the time," Miko stated calmly. "You want people to recognize your abilities, and you believe that Colonel Sheppard already has what you wish for. He does not."

"What are you talking about? Sure he does! He can do anything and get away with it, unpunished. And he can have anyone as a friend."

"Not anyone," Miko corrected sternly. "He's popular, I'll give you that. But mostly, he's just lucky that his… how did Dr. Zelenka put it? That his cowboy methods haven't caused more damage so far."

"Oh, he did enough damage, I'd say," Rodney said bitterly. "He managed to allow the nanovirus to spread all over Atlantis, just because he wasn't willing to sit on his ass during quarantine, but nobody seems to remember that."

"I do," Miko said. "And I also remember that Dr. Weir wasn't happy. She just didn't have the means for proper retribution. She couldn't court-martial her without the necessary military authority."

"Nor did I see anyone shunning him," Rodney said morosely. "All he needed to do was to destroy a naquadah generator – one of my generators, by the way, which heroic deed cut our energy reserves considerably – and everything was forgotten. Everyone looks at me as I was a leper. I made a mistake, yes, and someone died, yes, and it's all terrible and tragic, but why am I the only one who's not allowed to make mistakes?"

"You are," Miko said soothingly, but Rodney shook her hand from his arm.

"Am I? That cocky flyboy has the cheek to tell me – me, who had saved his sorry ass and this whole goddamn city countless times – that he can't trust me anymore! And all the idiots who haven't got a clue what it means to pull a wonder out of my hat every odd week to solve our energy problems follow him in avoiding me. I'm fucking sorry, too, that Collins died, but I am the one who'll have to live with that, so don't you think that they could perhaps show some understanding and forgive me?"

Miko could see that he was about to work himself into true hysterics, and she knew it wouldn't help him. He needed to admit his grief in order to get over it. He needed to face his insecurity in order to conquer it. Otherwise he'd never be the old Rodney McKay again.

"They will forgive you… in time," she said. "But they need some time first. Try to understand them. You're Rodney McKay, and people were not used to Rodney McKay making mistakes. They're disappointed now, and need to get used to the fact that you're a human being like everyone else. Larger than life, true, but still just a man."

Rodney blinked a few times as if that thought had never occurred to him – probably hadn't, he'd been too deeply submerged into guild and misery in the recent days – then he stole an anxious look at her.

"Are you… are you disappointed, too?" he asked, barely louder than a whisper. Miko shook her head thoughtfully.

"No. But I'm in a unique position. I'm the only one here who's seen you in your moments of weakness."

She took him in her arm, rubbing his back soothingly, until the shaking and the dry sobs decreased.

"Have they all turned against you?" she asked after a while. "Not one of them has forgiven you?"

Rodney, his face still buried in the crook of her neck, gave a sound that was half-sob and half-chuckle.

"None… with the exception of Radek. I've said the… the ugliest things to him, about professional jealousy and all that, and he… He gave me one of those funny looks, you know, over the rim of his glasses, and all he said was: 'I've already told you, McKay – you're not pleasant company when you're like this.' And then he went back to his work as if nothing happened."

Miko nodded, resting her chin on the top of his head.

"Dr. Zelenka is a generous man and a good friend. So, you see, you're not alone. You have him on your side – and you have me. The others will come around, eventually."

"They will?" Rodney's voice was small and frightened like that of a hurt little boy's. She had to smile.

"They will," she promised. "Just give them time."

"And you will stay with me?" he asked, still in that frightened little voice, and it broke her heart to see him so broken, his once so overbearing self-confidence shattered into tiny pieces.

But she couldn't break down, too, not now. He needed her to be strong. One of them had to be, and she'd come to understand a long time ago that – despite his apparent over-confidence in his own genius, despite his bitter sarcasm – Rodney was full of insecurities. Family histories like his could do that to a man.

"Of course I will," she replied calmly, trying to emanate a strength she didn't really feel. But she knew Rodney needed it; needed her to lean on.

"Always?" he asked in that small voice again, and Miko suppressed a sigh. For an arrogant, often rude man, he needed a lot of reassurance, and frightened out of her mind half the time as she was – like practically everyone else in Atlantis – it wasn't always easy for her to be the strong, supporting one.

"As long as you need me," she said simply. Rodney snorted.

"You might very well be in for a lifetime job," he warned.

She tilted her head to take a better look at his face. He looked a little better… less haunted that before, although pain and guilt were still clouding his otherwise so bright eyes.

"I can live with that," she said. He looked up into her eyes, and now there was a wonder in his voice.

"But why would you want to live like that?" he asked, and she knew he honestly didn't understand.

"Because I need you, too," she answered, and scooping up Mrs Kitty, who really needed a proper name, placed her in his arms. "We both do."

The End