A/N: I'm feeling mighty fine. You all are liking this story, and I saved a baby chicken from getting eaten by my dog. It's all good. Unless the dopey little chicken gets out again.
Ch. 9
Maj's Home
John snapped his eyes open to a sound that wasn't chiming. Long, low, like the trumpeting moan of some massive beast. Even the distance didn't stop the noise from vibrating in his bones.
Alien world, John. Alien beasts.
The howl didn't last long. It rose to the apex then drifted away rather than wind down. John waited, barely breathing, for either an answering call or second attempt. Neither one came. Not even the chimes made noise, or the fire snap. Silence was absolute.
Until he heard a sharp snap that had nothing to do with the fire. The stove was barely glowing with embers. John lifted his heavy head, then struggled to raise his stubborn body upright to lean against the wall. He inched forward, little by little, enough to see out the window. The darkness was like the silence, thick as spilled ink except for the faint serrated outline of the treetops. Nothing to see and nothing left to hear. John eased himself back down onto the bed. He heard another snap, but contributed it to an animal.
SGA
McKay tromped up the blue-carpeted steps leading to the second floor of the inn as an audible representation to what his body was feeling. One did not develop lead feet after excessive hours of trudging through dirty streets at the risk of getting jumped by the dirty inhabitants – one earned them, along with the right to complain about them. Rodney's entire body was one big muscle sore, starting at the feet, spreading, but congregating in the end around his head. It was days like this that made Rodney want to kill Sheppard should they find him alive.
The inn was the equivalent of any cheap roadside motel that could be found on earth, exempting the dirty swimming pool. Although Rodney had to give credit to the motel staff. McKay had witnessed actual laundry being done in a rather 1950s looking laundry room, and the food was palatable. The staff themselves were clean looking, and the 'hop-to-it' type that would do everything and anything to make their guest's stay more comfortable. They also didn't tolerate loitering from the street wanderers. McKay, with Ronon, had caught glimpses of the other temporary lodging establishments – several of which might have actually been brothels. Being on Ioth was like being caught in a dimensional time warp made up of various periods smashed together. Carriages going one way, little cars going the other - if Rodney saw a hippy and a cowboy walking arm and arm down the street, he was going to find a way to sedate himself until this whole nightmare was over.
For the time being, he was content just to crash.
Rodney pulled the metal key card from his pocket on entering the blue-carpeted hall. The room was five doors down, the 'family suite' as Lt. Stewart had called it since the manager had said it was normally used for large groups such as families and off-worlders. Rodney slipped the key card into the electronic lock-box, and the light changed from green to blue. Inside the room were three beds along the wall across from the door, and two on the left. On the right was the door to the bathroom. Teyla, being the only female of the party, and been given her own room next door; the spare room should the family or group be larger than five people, with two extra beds and a connecting door leading to the same bathroom.
Rodney went to his bed, the left hand bed of the three against the wall, and twisted around to drop back-first onto the firm mattress. Obviously, he was the only one in. Ronon, he knew, was getting some food. Teyla, Lorne, and Stewart along with Caul were probably still spreading the word about Sheppard. People usually didn't respond when it came to the question of 'have you seen this man'. But slap in big letters the word 'reward', on the smaller copies of Sheppard's picture, and people get a little more open and a lot more friendly. Anything from weapons to money to medicine was up for grabs. Medical care would be easy enough to pay back, and Rodney actually took down names when it came to that. Ioth currency could be pulled off being that the little metal chips were made of nothing more than nickel. Freakin' nickel! Seems nickel was as rare as gold on Ioth. Rodney had analyzed one of the chips he'd obtained when a kid bought a candy-bar from him. Nickel! Worth five cents on earth, worth fifty bucks on Ioth if it was pure (Rodney's estimate, not an actual figure, but he had seen people buy whole basket loads of groceries for two iron chips, three copper, and one nickel.) If the whole of the Atlantean staff chipped in, then whoever helped them out in getting Shep back was going to be very rich indeed.
The promise of weapons was a front. Yes, it was dishonest making the promise of weapons. Oh, those people would collect, but like with Caul's idiot cousin they wouldn't be getting much except duds. Atlantis did keep promises – to a degree.
Rodney stretched his arms out to either side of himself and arched his back until it pop. With a sigh, he melted into the firm mattress for a moment, then forced himself to remove his boots, tossing them onto the floor when he was done. He dropped back onto the bed and wriggled his freed toes that tingled under the socks from the cool air drying away the sweat. Except it wasn't cool in the room, it was warm, but like his feet knew the difference. The heating unit of the room rattled as it belched out the warm air. Sheppard would have been quite impressed with Rodney's restraint. The physicist wasn't going to gripe about something that most of the Pegasus Galaxy folks didn't have.
Rodney stopped wriggling his toes. He sure as hell wasn't going to complain about something he had that Sheppard very well might not have at this very moment – warmth and shelter. They'd been on this world for three days now and all they had to show for it was a bunch of people sniffing out rewards and thus pointing the 'Lanteans every which way under the sun. 'I saw him go this way, I saw him go over there' blah, blah, blah.
I bet if we told them we were looking for pink elephants they would say their grandpa caught one just the other day but it got away. Greedy bastards.
But they had gotten a few good leads. Not exactly fruitful but at least giving them a destination and helping them spread the news further. There were places where street wanderers could go for a meal, places run by those of a charitable and religious nature. No Sheppard found there. There were abandoned buildings many used for shelter – still no Sheppard. But Teyla kept thinking positive in that the more people they spoke with, the more eyes they had to help with the search. Lorne had come up with the idea for the reward, which gave an incentive for searching.
McKay closed his eyes with a weary exhale. Three days was too long not to have anything to show for it.
" Dr. McKay... Do you read?"
The male voice speaking through the piece in Rodney's ear had him bolting upright with a chill of surprise racing down his spine. He'd gotten quite accustomed to – as well as annoyed by – constantly hearing either Ronon's, Teyla's, Lorne's, or Stewart's voice forever breaking into his thoughts. The voice he heard now was nerve-wracking in its familiarity.
" Uh... Y-yes? Yes. Colonel Caldwell?"
" The same. Just letting you know that we arrived and are maintaining position outside of orbit. By the fact that Dr. Weir hasn't told us to turn around I'm assuming Colonel Sheppard hasn't been located yet."
Rodney scooted backward until he was resting against the wall (the beds being earth-like as much as the motel beds on earth without fancy frames or headboards.)
" Not as such, no. But it's a big city so he's bound to be around here somewhere. Either hiding or rescuing old ladies from muggers. We've gotten local cooperation through the promise of rewards, two of which are easy enough to give and the other we have no intention of honoring. I'd like to explain more but I'm tired and Lorne would do better seeing as how it was his idea to begin with."
" I've already spoken to Major Lorne and he did tell me, but communications had to be cut short since he was in a populated area."
Rodney rubbed his aching face with one hand. He knew he was going to regret telling Caldwell this, but better to get things over with now than endure nagging throughout the rest of the night. " Well, I'm not, so..." he sighed. " Feel free to talk all you want."
" I wasn't calling in for a heart to heart chat, Dr. McKay. I was just apprising you of our arrival should anything occur that would require a quick exit. Even now Hermiod has a lock on your com signals. All you need do is say the word and you're all aboard."
Now that was tempting. Spend the night in the safety of an earth-made ship snacking on an MRE, or enduring another night of taking cautious bites of food because 'citrus' really wasn't in these people's vocabulary (actually Rodney suspected it was, but with a whole other meaning, a meaning associated with some unmentionable body part by the way that old cook woman had gasped and her young assistant had giggled). But guilt didn't let Rodney indulge in the thought for long. Even being just outside the atmosphere of the planet would still be like leaving the planet, which would be like leaving Sheppard behind, even if it was just for one night.
Rodney was just going to have to save such a trip for when things got desperate. Besides, the inn wasn't all that bad, it was just the food that had him edgy.
" Well, so far we're fine," Rodney said. " But we'll keep it in mind."
" Good. The offer also includes if the food or water isn't agreeing with you. That's been Dr. Beckett's chief concern."
Rodney sat up a little straighter. " Carson's here?"
" Wouldn't take no for an answer. Gate travel has been suspended except for Teyla's people, and Beckett insists his staff is competent enough to get on without him, so he came. Speaking of which, he'd like to know if there have been any physical problems that he needs to know about and wanted me to ask you. He'd ask you himself but he's asleep at the moment..."
" Fine, fine, we're all fine. Achy, cranky, sore feet and my back is starting to kill me, but other than that we're all peachy. Even the food's been agreeing with us."
" Then I have no more questions. Caldwell out."
A nice succinct conversation, and Rodney was glad for it. He was tired, tired enough to drop off without dinner, but not dumb enough to. Two minutes after his talk with Caldwell, Ronon entered shoving his own key card back into his pocket with one hand and carrying the meal basket with the other. Rodney hated that basket. For one, the woven wood looked wrong being carried by Ronon, and for another it made the situation feel like they were going on a picnic. Ronon set the basket on the middle bed.
" Some meat, some kind of red vegetable, and something resembling your earth rice but black and spicy," he said.
Rodney maneuvered himself so that he was sitting on the edge of the bed, and Ronon handed him one of the gray ceramic plates stacked on one side of the basket, with the dishes on the other side.
" Spicy I don't mind," Rodney said, " as long as it doesn't come back to haunt me a couple of hours later if you know what I mean."
Ronon grunted. He did indeed know. He set the dishes on the nightstand between the two beds.
" Caldwell contact you?" Ronon asked.
" Yup. We're saved and all that."
Ronon grunted again sounding about as thrilled as Rodney felt. Not that Rodney wasn't grateful to have the Daedalus around, but Caldwell was another matter. Rodney gave it three more days before the Colonel started dropping hints about calling off the search.
" I was thinking," Rodney said as he spooned the black rice onto his plate. " What if... Sheppard isn't in the city anymore? What if he's out in the wilds, maybe at one of those frontier settlements?"
Ronon dropped onto his own bed to start dishing up his own food. " I asked Caul that yesterday. He said Sheppard wouldn't be able to get to any of them unless he had a key card or if someone took him."
Rodney picked up a chunk of grilled meat with his two-pronged fork. " Well what if someone did take him? What if these frontier people are in to slaves and took him as a slave? Or, maybe, he's wandered beyond the city. Caul said there was a forest between the city and the mountains."
Ronon didn't bother using a fork. He just picked up a chunk of meat with his hands and started eating. " You suggesting we look there?"
Rodney shrugged as he picked at the meat with the fork. " I'm suggesting we give it a shot at some point in time."
" We won't find him," Ronon stated before tearing another chunk out of the meat. Rodney let his fork drop onto the plate with a loud clatter.
" And you know this because...?" Rodney wagged his hand to get Ronon to hurry it up with the reply.
" Because he's not stupid. Whatever state he's in, even delirious, he'll know to seek out the gate. It'll be an instinct with him. He'll stick around here, either wandering or asking everyone which way to the ring. And if he's too sick or hurt for even that much, he'll still be around. He wouldn't be able to travel too far for too long. He'd find shelter."
Rodney wanted to argue but already knew it was moot. If the Satedan was right, it wouldn't be the first time. The whole warrior think-alike mindset was something Rodney was gradually – albeit grudgingly – starting to see as being something that might actually hold some sort of psychological merit. Sheppard's and Ronon's differences were day and night until it came to survival. It was so simplistic, the rules of survival – food, shelter, protection. But the means of obtaining those three simple necessities were complicated and diverse; a practical art. An art Rodney had been given a taste of from those missions that had left the team stranded. It was always Sheppard and Ronon heading the fight for survival, and always them finding the ways against all odds of achieving it. They never talked about it except to give instructions, they just did it.
So if Ronon said Sheppard was sticking around the city, then he was.
" We shouldn't discount it, though," Ronon said, breaking Rodney's wandering train of thought.
" Huh?"
Ronon made circular gestures with a strip of meat. " Sheppard heading to the wilds. We should consider it, check out the outskirts and any roads leading away. The weather's cold, dry. If Sheppard left any tracks then they'll be easy to find."
Rodney nodded, feeling slightly hopeful and a little smug that Ronon hadn't dismissed the suggestion for checking out the woods.
" We also need to find a way into the nearby settlements," Ronon said next. " You could be right about him being taken."
Rodney's feeling of pride swelled a little fatter. Only to promptly deflate. " Except... Caul said the settlers are worse when it comes to off-worlders than the city people."
Ronon shrugged indifferently. " So we be worse back." He finished off the meat strip in one bite.
SGA
John lay on his back, staring at the ceiling, and contemplating uncomfortable matters. Maj had undressed him to redress him, and confessed to dunking him in cold water a few times when the fever was bad. So it was logical to conclude that she must have helped him with other personal matters. Or more precisely one particular matter that John needed relief from at this moment. Chances were, some sort of basin might have been used, and Maj's nephew had been present rather than Maj (as if that made it any better). She had said that she had needed her nephew's help in moving John when he needed to be moved.
" You might be skinny, but that doesn't make you a light-weight," she had said. " Except to Gidel, no offense."
Neither Maj nor Gidel were present now, and Sheppard needed to go. He saw nothing that passed as a basin on the floor, which added to his discomfort. Although, it could have been that his fever was so high that he never had liquid in him enough to go to the bathroom to begin with. He went with that, since all other possibilities weren't sitting too well with him.
Ris was in the room, watching John intently as though he were the most wonderful thing in the world. The wingged dino was even wagging its tail. John gave the creature a thoughtful look.
" Don't suppose you could fetch Maj for me?" He was pretty certain he could go to the bathroom on his own. It was getting out of bed he was having a problem with.
Ris made an inquisitive chirping sound, but didn't move. John sighed and threw up his hands in defeat.
" Fine, be that way." He scooted back to slide his upper body along the wall as support. " See if I care," he grunted. When he was upright, he waited a moment to catch his breath, then gritted his teeth as he moved his legs out from beneath the covers. Ris started bobbing his head up and down, chirping. John's arms shook as they supported him, but not as much as his legs when he started hauling himself up by grabbing onto the work table. He leaned against the table with knees locked, then started moving along its edge toward the door. Ris pranced in circles, then trotted out into the middle of the hall where it stopped, turned, and chirped. John's own little lizard cheerleader.
" Yeah, yeah, I'm coming," John said. When he came to the end of the table, he lurched toward the door, stumbling until he caught the frame.
" So this is what it was like to learn how to walk," John mumbled. He reached out to the other side of the door frame and held on as he moved over. On heading out, he kept his shoulder to the wall and slid along it with small, testing steps. Fortunately, all the doors were closed so he didn't have to make any leaps across open thresholds. The only door open was the one he knew had to be his destination. Didn't matter the planet, you don't keep bathroom doors shut unless they're in use.
He reached the door, and held onto the frame when entering. He chuckled softly.
The bathroom was small, with a round metal tub against the far wall that could be closed off by a curtain made of a glossy but woven faded orange cloth, the sink on the right, and the toilet on John's left. Like with everything else on Ioth, the toilet had an old fashion look to it, with a round bowl and the flusher a chain rather than a handle.
John took care of business without shutting the door. He washed his hands and headed out with the initial intent of getting back to bed. Except he didn't want to. His legs shook and his breathing was heavy, but it still felt indescribably good being able to move around. Plus he was curious as to where Maj had gone off to.
If Maj was anyone like Carson, she wasn't going to like what John was about to do. He headed down the hall far enough to get to the stairs with Ris trotting curiously behind. From where John stood, on his unsteady legs, it was a lot of steps to take. He'd never once blinked an eye at any form of heights, but now his heart was skipping with intensifying uncertainty.
Stairs, John, just stupid stairs. Think of 'em as a challenge. If you can handle these suckers, you can handle anything.
" Unless I break my neck," John countered. But he had a stubborn streak to maintain, and he wasn't going to let a stupid flight of stairs get in his way. So he gripped the banister like it was a rope in a game of tug-o-war, leaning back a little as he took each step one at a time. A step creaked, and John winced, but no one stepped into view to find the source of the sound. The going was so painfully slow that John's nerves itched. He attempted to pick up the pace, had his leg buckle, and had to catch the rail to keep from falling. By the time he reached the last step, sweat was pouring down his flanks, his breath was fast and shallow, and he was trembling. But he'd made it, and felt it an accomplishment worthy to smile about. He turned his head to look up at Ris at the top of the stairs.
" That wasn't so bad, was it?"
Ris wagged his tail and chirped.
John looked back, dropped his smile, and exhaled a shaky breath. " All right. Now I need to sit down." He took several unsteady steps forward until he was forced to stumble into the front door or fall on his face. He moved from the door into what he guessed to be the living room, and a somewhat large one at that, taking up the length of the house on that side. It was comfortable looking, with a couch of woven branches and green cushions on the right under a large window, another couch of the same make against the wall under the stairs, a stone fireplace where a pair of very twisty antlers hung with black and white pictures below it on the mantle, and on the left was another window and a small table with some sort of game on top – like chess but with more pieces.
The floorboards were smooth and polished to a glass shine. On the log walls hung paintings of Ioth scenery and what had to be Ioth creatures, plus more black and white photos. John peered in closely at one of the photos by the window. He identified Maj right off, even though she had to be twenty years younger, and beside her, standing in front of the log house, was a young man slightly taller than Maj, with dark wispy hair that stuck up in places. Under his foot was the carcass of an animal, like an antelope the size of an ox with twisty antlers. John smiled. Hunting triumph.
John continued his shuffle to the couch and dropped his knees onto the cushions so he could lean forward for a peek out the window. The panes where his hands were planted fogged up, as did the pane where his breath struck. He saw, to the right, what had to be a barn by the size and the huge doors. Across from Maj's house though not directly was another log house, then another immediately next door to that one. Between Maj's house and the next was something that made John double-take – a telephone pole, or something like it, but with a single wire going from the house across the way to the pole, then onto Maj's house. He recalled Maj having mentioned something about a hydro-electric dam in the area.
It was like being at the Grizzly Adam's commercial camp-site – or commune. The log cabins, with their identical builds of sanded wood and some kind of gray pitch between the chinks – had more of a mass produced feel than something done by the settlers' own two hands. Good incentive for people to come out here – open space and ready made houses. Although it must have been short live since the government had to start forcefully booting people to these places.
Or, on a more darker thread of thought, settlers were dying off by the truck load and needed to be replaced. Sounded about right either way John looked at it. Maj would have to clear the situation up a bit for him.
A small wagon pulled by a brown six-legged lizard clattered over the pact dirt road to move around into the barn. Two men dressed in heavy, fur-lined coats walked casually out from behind the barn, only to vanish between the two houses. A woman in heavy skirts and a furred coat left the house across from Maj's. She glanced in the direction of Maj's home, and must have spotted John because she picked up her pace to move out of sight behind the barn. John winced. Maj was going to be pissed. She hadn't wanted anyone to see him.
Like a kid caught in the wrong, John's instincts screamed at him to get back upstairs. But just the thought of taking those steps again made his body go suddenly lethargic. His little bout of adrenaline had left him, and he was drained. A small rest was in order, then he would try the stairs.
John lowered himself onto the soft, even cushions of the couch, curling into them with the intent of a quick nap. Ris hopped up beside him, circling until the creature curled itself against John's chest, providing a little bit of warmth. John was cold, should have brought a blanket, but too little too late. The moment he closed his eyes, he was out, and forgot all about being cold.
SGA
Maj stomped the dust off her boots on her front porch before entering her house. She didn't abide tracking dirt into her home. She was too old to clean every nook and cranny on a daily basis. When she felt the stomping sufficient, she entered the log house and headed left into the kitchen to set down her food-heavy basket on the table. With a groan, she lowered herself into the old carved chair to remove her boots. It was the simple pleasures that made her day, such as freeing her feet from the heated confines of her boots. She spread her toes, then grabbed brown-hide slippers from under the table and placed them on to keep her feet warm.
" Back to your feet, Maj," she said, and pushed herself up. She started humming as she put away the various food items in her basket. Dried foods in the cupboard, meats in the electrically cooled ice-box, and vegetables in the sink to wash. There was to be more meat stew tonight since it tended to involve most of the foods a body needed. But before she started on it, she had a patient to check.
Maj headed toward the stairs, only to stop with one foot on the first step on catching a small twitch of movement out of the corner of her eye. She turned to face her living room, and stared at John curled up on her couch asleep, Ris with him. Maj put one hand on her hip and shook her head.
" Why you slippery little..."
She chuckled as she continued up the stairs to fetch the quilt off the bed. When she returned, she draped it over John and noticed a mark difference when the muscles of his face eased away the tension lines. Maj shook her head again.
" Silly man. You're fortunate you didn't give out on the stairs and break your neck." She tucked the blanket around John, and Ris poked his small head out to rest it on John's arm. Maj took a step back to eye her handiwork. John was still pale to make the smudges under his eyes and fading bruises darker than they probably really were. But the fact that he had made it downstairs in one piece was the sign of improvement Maj had been hoping to see.
Maj went back into the kitchen and rummaged through her cupboards and pantry for the items needed to make mash. It was a gentle cereal that would be kind on John's deprived digestive system, but solid enough to give his body more nutrients than broth. Normally she wouldn't have jumped to mash until after a few more days on the broth, but if John was going to be insistent about moving around on his own then he was going to need something that would provide him with more energy. She didn't want him losing the little meat he had left on his bones.
Maj combined the mash ingredients into a small pot on the stove and stirred it as it simmered. She added bits of herbs to give it a sweet flavor, and some Niet milk to help strengthen bones. The mash took a while to thicken, which was why she normally didn't make it all that often. She hummed as it boiled and popped.
When one lived a long time alone, one became more sharply attuned to the small changes in their surroundings, from a moved item to the shift in the air caused by the movement of someone else. The soft, near-inaudible creak of a floorboard only confirmed what Maj suspected, and she shifted her position just enough to have John in view out of the corner of her eye without looking directly at him.
John was just outside the kitchen door with one hand against the door-frame for support and the other keeping the quilt around his shoulders. He was wearing that wary look of one contemplating whether or not they could sneak away without being noticed. It was a look she'd caught on Fiel plenty of times to distinguish it for what it was. When it had come to hunting, Fiel never could take no for an answer. It had nearly been the death of him and his father when he'd gotten lost in a blizzard.
Maj grinned. " Might as well come in and sit down before you fall down."
John didn't react with surprise. Instead, he smiled, and shuffled into the kitchen to sit himself down at the table. The blanket slid part way down his arms, and one side of the shirt with it to expose his collarbone and part of the bandages around his chest. Now that John wasn't a risk for spreading any type of disease, Maj was going to have to find him a better shirt, or simply buckle down and mend his. Gidel's old work shirt was giving John a deceptively frail appearance that didn't suit him, even if he was still on the mend.
John adjusted the shirt back onto his shoulder but didn't bother with the blanket. " I got a friend, a doctor – healer – who could use a skill like yours."
" You mean I'm not the only one you don't listen to when it comes to matters of health?"
John rested one arm on the table. " Nope."
" Well that's not very grateful of you," Maj said by way of teasing, but John's expression sobered and he glanced down.
" No, I guess it's not. But I get restless when I lay around too long, bored, and in the case of today desperate." he grimaced slightly. " I really, really had to go."
Maj nodded. " Well, that I can understand. Your little trip downstairs I assume is from being restless?"
John began tapping his finger-tips on the table-top in a way that no sound was produced. " A little. But it was mostly from curiosity getting the better of me."
The mash had thickened. Maj tapped the spoon on the rim of the pot then laid it next to the pot to fetch the bowls from the cupboard beside the sink. " Curiosity's a fine thing as long as you don't give it all the leeway while refusing to acknowledge common sense." She brought two bowls to the stove and spooned the mash in. When she turned with the full bowls in hand, it was in time to catch John's shrug.
" I'm normally only curious when the situation calls for it. I wanted to see your house and something else besides trees from the window."
Maj set one ceramic blue bowl in front of John and her own she set at the other end of the table. Next came drinks of fresh juice from the pitcher in the ice-box, and two ceramic mugs from the cupboard next to it. " Soldier mindset, I take it?"
" A little." Then he smirked. " Plus I was bored."
Maj shook her head with the corner of her mouth quirking upward as she set the mugs down on the table and filled them. " Tell me, Mr. Sheppard. Are you this incorrigible on your own world?"
" I wouldn't say incorrigible, but I do know how to annoy the right people at the right time."
Maj slid the mug of juice down to John, and he caught it with a grin. " And only those who deserve it."
Maj grabbed two spoons from the drawer and sat, stretching forward to hand a spoon to John, and taking note of the small tremor in his hand when he took it.
" Am I one of those who deserves it?" she asked.
John stirred his mash with his spoon. " Well, I haven't known you for very long, but I can already say no. Normally the ones who deserve it are petulant scientists with superiority complexes."
Maj chuckled softly. " Ah, I see." She then pointed her spoon at John. " But let me make this clear to you, young man. You still don't have much strength. I already took you for the type who doesn't liked to be fussed over, but I will not have you wandering the house alone until your strength has increased a few notches. If you wish to move about that's fine, but either to the wash-room and back or accompanied by either myself or Gidel. Never alone."
John gathered some mash onto the tip of his spoon and nodded before taking a bite. " This is good," he said. " Kind of like cinnamon oatmeal."
" Well, I don't know what cinnamon oatmeal is, but I'll still take it as a compliment. Eat as much as you can. It'll give you energy. Then I need to check on your wounds..."
There was a series of muffled thumps coming from behind Maj. She shot a casual glance over her shoulder through the door window to see Gidel stomping his boots clean. The door creaked open and Gidel strode in, rolling his shoulders free of the cold-induced stiffness.
" Gidel, there you are," she said. " I made some mash, so feel free to spoon yourself up some." She looked at John. " John this is my nephew Gidel. He's already met you... in a way."
John lifted his hand in a small wave. " Hey."
Gidel gave John a silent, nonchalant nod in reply, then quickly moved his focus back to Maj. " You'd better get him back up to the room, quick," he said. Maj went rigid, dropping her spoon into the bowl.
" What? Why?"
" Members of the committee are coming."
Maj sagged and rolled her eyes. Irritation peppered her skin like hot needles. " Oh, well that's just lovely. Someone must have seen him through the window."
The color drained from John's face, leaving him white as a corpse. " Oh, crap, sorry. I didn't think anyone would notice that easily."
Maj shook her head and stood. " It's all right, John. It's just that people around here tend to get beyond nosy. Someone saw you in the window, told, and now the committee thinks you're well. Well, we're just going to have to correct them of that assumption. Gidel, help me get John back upstairs."
Gidel moved around the table and took John's arm. John wasn't even given the chance to rise when there came a knock at the door. Maj's shoulders slumped again and she sighed heavily. " All right then. Guess you'll just have to stay where you are. And try not to make any noise."
SGA
A/N: Silly John. It is absolutely true – some days are just not worth getting out of bed for.
