Chapter 15
Elizabeth felt herself drifting in and out of consciousness. Whenever she drifted closer to awareness, she could hear voices. She could never make out what they were saying, but sometimes she could hear who was speaking. Most often, it was Carson she heard, his handsome Scottish brogue a soothing melody lulling her back to sleep. Sometimes it was John she heard, his voice slightly less soothing, but equally as comforting. Sometimes she would hear the two of them speaking together, and once she heard them talking in tones that led her to believe that they were arguing.
At night, when she truly slept, she heard Rodney.
At first, she had thought the others had failed and the man was still trapped inside her head. But as she slept, she soon realized she was dreaming. And when she dreamt of Rodney, she knew she smiled.
Elizabeth lost track of how long she drifted between sleep and wakefulness. Carson's powerful sedatives kept her from waking entirely and so she spent the entire time in the infirmary in a haze. She was dimly aware of people coming and going, of Carson hovering around her bedside checking vitals and other things that Elizabeth couldn't bring herself to really care about. She often heard Teyla, speaking in her gentle voice, and sometimes she could even understand what she was saying. But she was tired—damn Carson's sedatives—and never remembered any of it.
John was there a lot. The few times that Elizabeth had been lucid enough to be considered "awake", it was often nighttime. Of those very few times, she almost always saw Sheppard sitting in a chair between her bed and Rodney's, either sleeping or playing his hand-held game boy. He never noticed she was awake and Elizabeth would never enlighten him. She would just smile and close her eyes and drift back into dreams.
Elizabeth slowly opened her eyes and found herself staring, once again, at the white infirmary ceiling. Strangely, it didn't appear so sterile and unfriendly anymore. Probably from spending too much time here. Elizabeth smiled slightly at the thought—one of her first lucid thoughts in a while.
"Hey, welcome back."
Elizabeth turned her head and found Sheppard lounging in his chair beside her bed, smiling that weird little Sheppard half-grin at her.
"Hey." Elizabeth said, her voice coming out in a dry croak. She cleared her throat and swallowed a few times before she focused on John and frowned. "How long have I been out?"
"Uh…" Sheppard hesitated and raised an eyebrow. "About a month."
Elizabeth's eyes flew wide and she sat up quickly—too quickly—and was forced to fall back against the pillows when the infirmary started to spin dizzyingly. Sheppard was on his feet and at her bedside, looking down at her with obvious concern in his eyes.
"A month?" Elizabeth croaked in alarm. Relieved that she hadn't damn near killed herself, Sheppard nodded and sat back down in his chair.
"Yeah…" he said slowly and he smiled again. "But no worries. I kept things running pretty smoothly while our two most important people were playing Rip Van Winkle. Caldwell was eager to help, but I told him I had everything under control."
The overly calm tone in Sheppard's voice led Elizabeth to believe that there was probably more to it than what he told her, but right now she didn't care. Instead she turned her eyes back to Sheppard.
"Rodney…" she whispered.
"Woke up a few days ago." Sheppard said.
"Is he alright?" Elizabeth asked, beginning to wonder and worry at why the man in question wasn't here.
Sheppard nodded, but Elizabeth noticed the brief hesitation.
"John…" she said, her voice dropping to the deeper tones of "I'm the boss now tell me the truth". Sheppard sighed.
"He's fine, Elizabeth. I swear. Carson wouldn't have let him out if he wasn't."
Well, that much was true. Carson—gentle and soft-spoken—was not against bodily strapping someone into their bed in order to make them stay where he could keep an eye on them.
Rodney McKay was no exception to the rule.
Actually… Rodney McKay was probably why the rule existed.
But then why wasn't he here? She had privately been hoping that if the man wasn't still tied to his bed then it would have been him sitting beside her bedside. The fact that he was missing, while not entirely unexpected, was still slightly unnerving. And extremely disappointing. They had been through a very interesting situation together and they had a lot to talk about.
And he wasn't even here.
"You know Rodney," Sheppard said. "He probably got caught up in his work. You know it's not you."
Elizabeth raised an eyebrow.
"Don't tell me you can hear what I'm thinking." She said, partly in jest and partly in alarm. Sheppard grinned and crossed his arms across his chest. He leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on the edge of Elizabeth's bed so that only the back legs of his chair were supporting him.
"No." he said casually. "But you two were pretty obvious, Elizabeth. I wonder what you two got to talking about in there?" he tapped his temple.
Elizabeth blinked in surprise and fought to keep the dismay off her features.
"E—excuse me?"
"Don't worry." Sheppard grinned. "I'm pretty sure it's just me and Teyla that figured it out."
Elizabeth regarded him calmly a moment before saying, "Because you two are so obvious?"
John had to flail his arms to keep from toppling over backwards. Yanking his feet off Elizabeth's bed, all four legs of the chair landed loudly on the infirmary floor and Sheppard was left looking rather flustered. Recovered from his rather enthusiastic attempt at not falling over, John clasped his hands in front of him and cleared his throat.
"Uh… what? What?"
"Nothing." Elizabeth said innocently. Sheppard cleared his throat again and got to his feet, running a nervous hand through his dark hair.
"Uh… well… never mind what I said. Look, uh, I'm gonna go get Carson… now that you're… you know… awake."
Elizabeth smiled calmly.
"Thank you."
Sheppard nodded awkwardly and turned to hurry away—but ended up getting his legs tangled up in the chair behind him. In his haste to escape he ended up tripping over the piece of frustrating furniture—making quite a racket while he was at it—and his arms flailed wildly as he fought to detach himself without falling flat on his fact. Elizabeth was sorely pressed not to laugh by the time he finally extracted himself and hurried away at something close to a run. He didn't even look back and Elizabeth was very happy he didn't. She probably would have burst out laughing right in his face and that would have hurt his feelings.
When he was out of sight Elizabeth allowed herself a short bout of laughter. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the pillows, relaxing into the soft bed. It wasn't long, though, before she heard footsteps approaching her bed.
"Elizabeth?"
Elizabeth opened her eyes and smiled.
"Hello, Carson."
"Good t' see ye awake, love." Carson smiled broadly as he took her wrist and immediately felt for her pulse. He looked down at his watch. "How did ye sleep?"
"Apparently very well." She responded dryly. Carson chuckled.
"Ye can blame some o' tha' on me, I'm afraid." He said. "I gave ye a wee sedative t' keep ye from completely wakin' t' early. Ye needed ye're rest."
"'Wee' sedative?" Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. "I'd hate to know what a large sedative is in your book, Carson."
Carson grinned and patted Elizabeth's hand before he let it rest on top the sheets again.
"Hopefully ye need ne'er know. Now, how do ye feel about a wee spot t' eat?"
Elizabeth opened her mouth to reply, but her growling stomach beat her to it. She blushed slightly and Carson grinned.
"I'll take tha' as a yes. Wait a moment and I'll get ye somethin'."
"Thank you, Carson." Elizabeth called after him. Carson grinned back at her.
"Think nothin' of it, love."
After a hot meal and a few hours of check-ups, Carson granted Elizabeth a full bill of health and proclaimed her fit to leave the infirmary.
"But I don't want ye goin' right back t' work, ye hear?" he told her. "Sheppard can handle th' city a few more days without ye."
Elizabeth agreed. She hadn't been planning on doing any strenuous activities anyway, but this now gave her the chance to go find Rodney. She hadn't seen him all day and she was getting worried.
After getting her a change of clothes, Carson allowed Elizabeth to go back to her room unescorted. She had entertained the thought of disobeying doctor's orders and going to find Rodney immediately, but she decided she needed a shower first. Fresh clothes did not a clean person make.
After a quick shower, Elizabeth decided to head down to the labs first. Not only did she need to thank Zelenka and the others for executing Rodney's plan, but she suspected that Rodney would also be there. The walk from her rooms to the nearest science labs was not a great distance, but it was certainly more than brisk and it was enough to wake Elizabeth up completely. A walk through her fair city always managed to enliven her and she knew immediately that this had been a better idea then simply going back to bed.
As she had suspected, Zelenka was in the same lab she had last seen him. Testament to how long she had been asleep, however, was the removal of the dart. Suddenly the lab looked much larger and she wondered vaguely what they had done with the hunk of twisted wreckage. She shook her head slightly—she would think about that later.
"Dr. Weir!"
Zelenka, seated at a table across from the door and half-hidden behind his laptop, leaped to his feet when he saw her. He came around the table to stand in front of her.
"You are awake!" he cried happily, then rolled his eyes. "Oh, but of course you are awake. You are standing right in front of me. You are feeling alright?"
Elizabeth smiled at Zelenka's enthusiastic concern.
"I'm feeling just fine, Radek. I came here to thank you for helping me and Rodney. I doubt we could have done it without you, despite what me may have said after he woke up."
Zelenka's eyes widened.
"Rodney is awake, too?" Zelenka muttered something in Czech. "Carson must still have him strapped to a bed if he hasn't made it to the labs already."
Elizabeth frowned.
"Wait… he hasn't been here yet?"
Zelenka looked at her in surprise.
"No." he said. "But I thought you said he just woke up?"
"Colonel Sheppard informed me he had awoken a few days ago. And he hasn't been here?" Elizabeth found that hard to believe.
Zelenka shook his head.
"I have not seen him. I just assumed… this might not be good." He ended lamely. Elizabeth nodded her agreement. Rodney was a horrible patient, as Carson was quick to remind her after every incident that landed him back in the infirmary. He would often stay in bed only as long as he thought was necessary and then be right back at work, pushing himself to the limit until someone had to haul him back because of lack of sleep or low blood sugar or some other ailment common to the over-worked scientist.
Elizabeth tapped her headset.
"Rodney, this is Elizabeth. Are you there?"
No answer. Elizabeth was beginning to get sick of this. She thought they had a bond between them and yet he was constantly avoiding her and running away from her and refusing to talk to her—inside and outside her damned head.
Sharing a worried glance at Zelenka, Weir tapped her headset again.
"Colonel Sheppard, this is Weir."
"Carson says you're not supposed to be working, Elizabeth." Sheppard's voice immediately reprimanded.
"I'm not working." Elizabeth answered automatically. "Can you meet me at the science labs?"
"Uh… sure." Sheppard said uncertainly. "What's this about?"
"I'll tell you when you get here."
"How long ago did you say Rodney woke up?" Elizabeth asked shortly after Sheppard had arrived. He shrugged.
"Uh… I'd say three or four days ago."
Zelenka's eyes widened.
"Three or four days he has not been in the labs? That is not like McKay at all."
Sheppard frowned.
"Wait—he hasn't been here yet?"
"You're surprised?" Elizabeth asked. Sheppard nodded.
"Yeah. I talked to him yesterday. He said he'd been to the labs already, though he sorta glossed over that." Sheppard grimaced. "Guess he wasn't telling the truth… I thought he was just still foggy from not really being… er… himself and then being unconscious for the better part of a month."
"So… what? He's been avoiding everyone since he woke up?" Elizabeth frowned. That did not sound like Rodney at all.
"Well, he never tried to avoid me." Sheppard said. He raised an eyebrow. "Or Katie Brown, weirdly enough. I saw him talking to her once or twice."
Zelenka jerked back in alarm as if he had just been slapped.
"He's spoken to Katie?" he asked in surprise. "She never mentioned it…"
Elizabeth raised an eyebrow.
"I didn't know the two of you talked that often, Radek."
"Oh," Zelenka blushed. "Well, when Rodney never showed up for their first date, I realized he hadn't told her so I went to tell her. And… well…"
Sheppard grinned.
"A lot happens in a month."
Zelenka glared at him and Sheppard looked as if he were about to elaborate, but Elizabeth wasn't in the mood for their games. She cut him off by saying, "but why would Rodney go see her now? To apologize?"
Sheppard shrugged.
"He never told me."
"Well, have you seen him today?" Elizabeth asked. Sheppard shook his head.
"No. I assumed he was back in the labs. Though it looks like I'd be mistaken…"
Elizabeth sighed.
"Okay. We need to find him and figure out what is going on. Zelenka, you stay here in case he actually shows up. Sheppard, see if he's in his quarters. I'm going to go see Katie and see if she knows anything."
The men nodded and Sheppard followed her out of the labs.
"I'll call you if I find him." Sheppard said to her as he jogged past. Elizabeth nodded absently as she followed the hallways to where she knew Katie was currently living, all the while wondering why Rodney would go to the botanist and never once come to see her. She sighed unhappily.
And she thought they had gotten past the hard part.