Impact plus 17 hours 10 minutes
Radek was still sleeping. Or unconscious. Or something. Unresponsive, anyway. Trying to be a good little physician's assistant, Rodney prodded at the other scientist's hands and feet. They were cool, but not cold. He squeezed one limp hand and held it for a moment before tucking it back inside the blanket. Hey, Radek was asleep; he'd never know.
He sat next to Radek for a while, not really sure why, just watching the quiet activity in the engineering room. His eyes burned from lack of sleep, but he was far too wired to actually drop off. Novak, he noticed, was curled up in a blanket against the wall, with her good hand tucked under her head while the broken one lay against her chest. Hermiod, still bundled in his absurd-looking parka, was working alone, with a single soldier standing near him with a rifle, apparently guarding him from wolves or saboteurs or ... whatever.
Rodney got up and approached. Immediately the soldier lowered the gun and pointed it at Rodney's chest. "Hey!" He raised his hands in the air, startled and indignant.
"I'm sorry, sir. No one is allowed over here."
"Is that Caldwell's command or His Royal Grey Highness there?" Rodney pointed to Hermiod, who gave him a narrow-eyed glance. "Look, there's a lot of work to do and it's absolutely ridiculous to try to do it all on your own, Hermiod."
"I am doing perfectly fine, Dr. McKay, and I do not believe you would be much help at this."
"Oh, really? Your naked little grey ass is on the line as much as ours, you know. I'm not sure how well Asgard deal with cold, but I can't imagine freezing would be too comfortable for you. You know you need my help; you're just too damn stubborn to admit it."
The Asgard tilted his head to one side and regarded McKay with his usual hard-to-read expression. Rodney could actually see Hermiod's breath -- little wisps of steam in the cold. "Perhaps you might assist by holding a light for me."
"It's a start," Rodney muttered, and took a step forward, only to be brought up short when the soldier blocked his path with the rifle.
"I'm sorry. You can't be here, Doctor. This is a secure area."
Hermiod directed his liquid, dark gaze at the young man. "I require his presence for the moment."
The soldier stood firm. "I'm sorry ... er ... sir. I can't do that. I have my orders."
Rodney threw his hands up in the air. "Oh, that's just great! Would you rather freeze to death, Private?"
"Airman, sir."
"What? Oh, who cares? Look, I'm sure when they gave you your orders they didn't mean me. Just give Caldwell a ring and let's get this straightened out. What's your name? I want to know your name, Airman."
The rifle remained threatening, not quite pointed at him but capable of swinging that way at a moment's notice. "It's Airman Bradley, sir. And actually, you were specifically mentioned, sir. None of the scientists are allowed in this area."
Rodney's jaw dropped. "Caldwell, you paranoid son of a bitch ..."
A sudden flurry of activity from across the room interrupted him. There were rapid voices and the high-pitched whine of a portable defibrillator. Rodney spun around, his anger momentarily forgotten as his chest turned to ice. Radek ... But the commotion came from behind the curtain where Sgt. Packee rested.
Radek was awake, his head turning in that direction. "This isn't over," Rodney hissed at Bradley, and crossed the room quickly to sit down beside Zelenka. He wasn't sure why he'd done that, until he saw the fear in the scientist's glazed eyes.
"That'll be me next," Radek whispered hoarsely.
"No it won't. Shut up."
They sat in paralyzed silence, listening to raised voices calling out numbers, instructions, names of various drugs -- the actual words they were using rolled off Rodney in a fog; all that he really understood was the sense of urgency. Carol Ling appeared suddenly from the bottom of the ventilation shaft, sliding out and dropping to the floor with a heavy case of equipment in each hand. Her armed escort scrambled out after her, two soldiers with rifles who were obviously having trouble keeping up with the small but fast-moving woman. Ling didn't bother going around the privacy curtain, just whipped it back. Packee's still body was revealed in a pool of lantern light, with two frightened-looking medics working over her. There was blood on the sheet covering her abdomen. Rodney looked away, meeting Radek's eyes instead.
"Do you know, they think we did it?" Radek asked Rodney, softly.
Elizabeth's words came back to him. Take care of them, Rodney. "So I've heard," he said, just as quietly.
"Is it possible that one of the scientists --"
"No," Rodney snapped.
"Dr. Price --"
"I said no, Radek."
Across the room, the flurry of activity around Sgt. Packee had ceased. The whine of the defibrillator stopped. Ling sat back on her heels, her whole body exuding weariness. "I'm calling it," Rodney heard her say softly. "11:25." As the medic beside her made a note, she laughed softly; there was a brittle edge to it. "It's almost afternoon. I hadn't even noticed. And, you know, it's starting to get light out there."
"How many is that, Doctor?" the medic asked quietly, looking at Packee's body as Ling dragged a sheet across the dead engineer's face.
"Eight." As she said it, she looked over at Rodney -- and the expression on her face chilled him. He knew that the doctor wasn't particularly fond of him, and didn't much care, but he wondered what he'd done to earn the look of pure hatred on her face.
Shooting a sideways glance at Radek, he saw that his friend had also noticed. "Rodney, what did you--?"
"Why does everyone always assume that it's me?" The argument was familiar, comforting -- far better than dwelling on the sheet-draped corpse that was even now being gathered up by silent, subdued medics, on the possibility that one of his people was responsible for it. "You know, there are unpleasant individuals out there who may dislike me for reasons having nothing to do with my --"
"Arrogance and lack of interpersonal skills?"
"Yes, Radek, because you're a poster child for --" Rodney broke off as Zelenka began to cough, a dry hacking sound. It didn't stop; he tried to double over and turned chalk-white as the movement twisted his injured shoulder and put pressure on the embedded steel. The coughing turned into a choking wheeze as he struggled for air. Rodney, terrified, tried to support him without hurting him; as Zelenka sagged into him, gasping for air against his chest, he yelled over his shoulder, "Hey! Ling! Anybody! Some help here!"
There were quick footsteps on the slanting floor, and then firm hands were taking Radek from him, shoving Rodney back. He fell against the wall, and just sat there, hands clenched in his lap, watching as Ling settled Radek firmly but gently back into place, touching his face, his chest. "Radek? Can you hear me? Can you give me a nod?" She tucked her fingers against his neck, glancing at her watch as she counted off heartbeats. Radek's head lolled against her hand.
"Is he going to be--" Rodney began, but Ling stilled him with a look that promised violent death if he didn't shut up.
"What did you do to him?" Ling demanded.
For an instant he was speechless. "Me? What?"
Ling drew a deep breath and seemed to get control of herself. Radek's breathing was smoothing out, and he stirred a little. The two medics had put down Packee's body and hovered nervously, waiting for orders. "Anderson, go outside and get some clean snow -- hard icy snow if you can find it," she told one of them, and then turned back to Radek.
Rodney wasn't finished. "What are you accusing me of? What do you think I did to him? We were just talking and all of a sudden he started coughing and couldn't breathe. Are you out of your mind?"
Ling ignored him completely. Zelenka's eyelids fluttered, and the doctor put her hand against his face. "Radek, can you hear me? Take slow breaths."
Zelenka murmured something in Czech, coughed softly. Then he asked in English, "Am I dying?"
"No," Ling said firmly. "You're simply a bit dehydrated. You haven't had anything to eat or drink by mouth in a number of hours, and your throat's dry and irritated. I'm having one of my people bring in some snow -- ah, thank you, Anderson." The medic handed her a clean cup filled with snow; she offered some of it to Radek. "This should help with that, but be careful -- you don't want to bring your body temperature down too much."
"There is a bottle of water ... somewhere ... Rodney brought me ..." Zelenka tried to work a hand free from the blankets.
Ling put a hand over his, stopping him, and hunted around at the base of the wall. "I found it. I can give you a little of it, Radek, but not much, because I think we are going to have to operate soon." Her lips were a thin line, her face strained. "I'll be honest with you -- the longer you're here, the weaker you get and the more difficult the surgery will be. And I'm getting worried about the circulation in that arm."
"You said earlier that you didn't want to move him, that it would be too dangerous. Do you actually know what you're doing or are you making it up as you go along?" Rodney demanded. The more worried he got, the more obnoxious he got -- he was well aware of this tendency in himself, especially when talking to someone he didn't like much anyway.
"Rodney." Radek's soft voice cut through his anger. "She is only trying to help."
"Ultimately, the decision will be up to you," Ling told Radek. "I don't want to wait too long, though. It's been nearly eighteen hours since the crash, and we're having to face the probability that help is not coming -- at least not anytime soon. No one on Atlantis has any idea where we are. And it's starting to look like the power won't be up soon, either. Radek, if we operate under the current conditions, you may lose your arm or worse. If we wait, your body will continue to get weaker and the surgery will be even more difficult for you."
His head rested back against the wall. "I trust you, Carol. I will do what you think is best."
Ling nodded slowly, a shadow in her eyes. "Then I would like to wait a little longer. Give Hermiod more time to get the power back up, so that we don't have to operate under such primitive conditions. But there will come a time when we can't wait any longer, and it may be the point when you've had as much as you can take and need us to help you. Don't try to push yourself too far, Radek, because you will need to save some of your strength for surgery. Tell us if you need this to be done."
"I will," he whispered.
"I'm going to give you a little more pain medication. I want you to move a little while I do that, flex your legs, that sort of thing."
"Hurts to move."
"I know. But you've been sitting still for a long time. It's getting colder in here, and you need to keep the blood circulating."
She injected his IV port with something -- Rodney wished, for once, that he knew a little more about the pseudoscience of medicine, if only so that he could tell if everything was on the up-and-up -- and then chafed his hand gently until his head settled back against the wall and he fell asleep. Watching this, Rodney felt a strange pang of envy. This was what he couldn't do, what he'd never been able to do -- comfort people. Dr. Ling had the same knack for sick people that Rodney had for machines. As hard and abrasive as the woman could be, she could also soothe pain and fear with a touch or a word. While he'd never want to trade his scientific abilities for anything, especially not for a talent that would bring him into contact with a lot of sick people, Rodney felt acutely aware of his inadequacy at human interaction. He didn't like being bad at anything. He particularly didn't like it when he had to watch a friend suffer because he couldn't do a damn thing, even act sympathetic. It just wasn't in him.
Ling stood up, looked down at Zelenka's sleeping form for a moment, then turned away. Her eyes settled on Rodney, and for a moment she looked as if she was going to say something, but she turned her back and started to walk away.
"Hey!" He scrambled to his feet, pursuing her. "I'm sick of this, you know! I can deal just fine with you not liking me, Doctor -- believe me, it's mutual. But what did you mean, what did I do to him? What kind of person do you think I am?"
Ling stopped and rubbed her hand over her face. When she took it away, she no longer looked angry, but he saw no sympathy anywhere -- her features were like stone. "Dr. McKay, I misspoke. I'm very tired, I just lost a patient, and I was afraid I might be losing another one. I'm still afraid I might lose him."
"You looked like you thought I'd killed him." Rodney tried to laugh, caught between sarcasm and genuine anger. "I'm used to people disliking me, but they don't generally think I'm capable of murder!"
"I misspoke," she repeated. "If you'll excuse me, I have other patients I need to see."
That got his attention. "Elizabeth -- how is she doing? Is she okay?" Caldwell better not have caused her to have a stroke or something.
Ling went completely still for a moment. He saw a strange flash of emotions on her face -- for an instant there was a nearly-homicidal rage in her eyes, but it faded and she just studied him, with a kind of detached, clinical curiosity. "She is in a coma, and probably dying."
"What?" was all he could manage to say. He couldn't have heard right. Elizabeth had been okay. She'd been awake, and talking. He'd left her, and then ...
It was just too much, on top of Radek, on top of everything. The world wavered around him, and the deck suddenly seemed much more steeply tilted than it had been a moment ago. He staggered, and strong hands caught him, eased him down to the floor. Firm pressure on the back of his neck forced his head down between his knees. "Slow breaths," Ling told him.
Rodney realized that he was shaking, trembling so violently that his teeth snapped together. He couldn't understand the sudden, powerful reaction. It was as if everything from the last eighteen hours had caught up to him all at once. Elizabeth was dying, Radek was dying, he was the only person on the ship who could protect a half-dozen scientists from the wrath of vengeance-bent soldiers, and on top of everything, Sheppard wasn't around to save the day. There was only Rodney.
It wasn't as if the weight of the world had never come down on his shoulders before. How many times had he been forced to fix something broken, with only his brains and his nimble fingers standing between a city full of people and certain doom? But he'd never been so out of his element before. Give him a piece of Ancient technology to fix, and he'd be able to do it, even with Wraith breathing down his neck. But ... but this ... "I can't do this."
He didn't realize he'd spoken out loud until Ling's voice said, "Do what?" He could still feel the pressure of her hand on the back of his neck.
"This. Any of this. All of this." Shrugging off her hand, he raised his head, knowing that he must look like hell if half of what he was feeling showed through on his face. "They're dying, Ling. Elizabeth and Radek. I -- I'm watching them slip away by inches, and I can't ... I'd ..."
His hands curled and uncurled on his knees in agitation. He didn't know why he was telling Ling this, of all people. The woman hated his guts. And, well, maybe that was exactly why, because she wouldn't be one iota sympathetic, and right now he just needed to spill out everything that was inside him, all the pain and terror, before it made him sick. The last thing he wanted was to see pity looking back at him; he could deal much better with Ling's stone-cold eyes.
But as usual when he strayed outside logic and rationality into the mushier area of human emotions, he couldn't find the words to say what he needed to express. Everything jumbled up inside him like a log-jam of thoughts and feelings that wouldn't dislodge. "It's my fault," he said, staring at her and feeling like a trapped animal. "Coming out here, it was my idea, you know that? I had this idea ... I thought we could track Wraith in hyperspace, but I needed data ... and I went to Caldwell and talked to him about using the Daedalus for that, and now we're here, and Elizabeth's dying and Radek's dying ... and I can't ..." How did you explain this? "I can't fucking help them," he said, looking away from her and staring at the wall. His trembling was starting to ease, though he still felt ill. "I'm the person who fixes things. That's what I do. And I can't fix this. I caused it and can't fix it. I can't even get near the engines, nobody's allowed back there, and ... they're going to die and I can't do anything to help them."
He combed his hands through his short hair, trying to calm himself down. As his panic attack started to ease, embarrassment began creeping into its place. The only saving grace of the whole breakdown was that Ling hated him enough, for whatever reason, that she'd probably forget most of what he'd said. He hoped. Stealing a peek at her, he saw that she was watching him with eyes that were completely unreadable, but very intense. He tried to grin. "Uh, my blood sugar does weird things when I'm stressed. I babble. Don't pay too much attention to me." He licked his lips and looked up at her. "Do you think -- uh, can I see Elizabeth? So she knows I'm there. I don't know if it would help, but I'd like her to know I'm there."
Ling frowned at him. He still couldn't tell what she was thinking. "I don't think you'd be allowed in," she said. "We're maintaining fairly tight security over the sickbay."
"Since when?" he demanded.
"Since ..." She hesitated, and he got the impression that she was on the verge of saying something but decided not to. "It's hard enough to maintain privacy for our patients without people coming and going. Not to mention the matter of safety. But ... I'll see what I can do."
As she turned to leave, he reached out, grabbing at her leg. "Hey," he said, and she looked back down at him. He felt like a total pathetic fool for asking this, especially since his voice wasn't especially steady right now -- all that smoke earlier, must have been -- and he just knew it was going to break when he spoke ... and sure enough, it did. Stupid betraying voice. "Is she really dying?"
Ling stood looking down at him. Rodney had no idea what he must look like, sitting there on the floor, or what was displayed on his face -- but she had the strangest expression on her face, as if she was seeing him for the first time. "I'm not sure," she said. "Her vital signs are very, very weak. But she seems to be stable at the moment. Of course, she seemed stable before. I'll see if you might be able to sit with her for a little while."
Rodney realized that he was still hanging onto her pants leg, and let go. "Yeah," he said, because he sure as hell wasn't going to say Thanks.
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TBC