Two Birds, Two Stones
Chapter 18
In Translation
"Aeryn."
He coaxes, uses the placating tone she hates as it always means something worse is happening, something more uncontrollable than the tumbling landscape of her nightmare. Presses his nose tightly against her cheek as she rouses in another frelling white room, greeted by beyond blinding fake light.
The stars.
What did her star look like again?
A fraction of her wants to protest the blatant placation of him petting a hand over the back of her head, but the majority of her fights that it is soothing her, and her constant chest repetitions settle.
"S'okay, Baby," mumbles as he continues nuzzling into her.
She brings her hand to cradle the side of his face, closing her eyes into the sensation of him, of his breath hot against her skin—noting for the first time in almost a week that she doesn't feel ill at the temperature. "What happened?"
"English." His grin grows against her cheek. He taps a kiss to her skin and bows back so they can view one another as they converse. How he knows these things comfort her is still shocking. He tucks a piece of hair out of her face, keeping his smile tight, fake, for show, and she knows something larger is conspiring. "You're speaking English again, that's good."
"When was I—" Pushes herself to sit up in the flat cot, but the weight of her own body crashing down on her left side hits her hard as a fist, knocking the air from her lungs and drying the words in her mouth.
"Easy. Easy."
Again placating.
Reaching around her to the metal frame of the bed and snapping something in place, pushing the top of her body into a sitting position along with the mattress. His hand touches the side of her face again, gritty, calloused fingertips over her cheek and she longs to be back in her dream before it curdled. To be aboard Moya with him, Deke, and—
"Does that feel okay?"
She doesn't answer him, doesn't look into the softness of his eyes because there is no pinch. There is no pressure. Swallows, narrowing her eyes over the dull ache in her side, shifts her thighs to stir up some movement, hoping with a hollow chest to feel something, to feel anything, any sign.
But there is nothing.
There is only emptiness.
"Is that okay, Baby?"
The quaking in her chest grows larger with each inhalation, the inability to find something so previously plaguing, so forced to the background, so suddenly there and then just as quickly whisked away. The same emptiness she felt on Katratzi under the malice hand of Scarrans, under heat rays and mind-altering drugs.
The pain, the fear, and one prayer.
"Aeryn, breathe." It's a command, his hand gripping hard on her shoulder, his face pushing itself into her vision as it clears from the white beyond him. Her fingers twitch at her side in memorandum, phantom pains striking through them, a greater pain than giving birth, a greater fear than carrying a body that was just inside hers, protected and safe, on the outside, a mewling newborn ensconced against her chest in a warzone.
"Talk to me."
An explosion, one she predicted in some sense, the sibilant sound of escaping air, her constant griping of the heat being excessive and the human's refusal to correct the situation, the temperature, the exchange.
Her sacrifice once again, her, a piece of her, paused but living, was living, ceased living.
"Aeryn, say anything."
His fingers slip between hers as they grasp blindly at the air, still twitching, still seeking to find herself between galaxies, between wars, between families.
His exhale is palpable, hot, sticky, full of concern and his left eye twitches as he scratches at the back of his head.
Aeryn. Hurt?
The Sebacean is basic, his accent is horrible, but she can make out the words because he knows his vernacular in English. Sebacean itself is an abstract language with words holding meaning only in specific conversational context, as a militaristic race it makes pertinent knowledge harder to cultivate for enemy forces.
But the Sebacean itself is calming, grounding, placating. Her mother tongue not spoken to her under friendly pretenses without the aid of translator microbes in over a solar cycle.
Not since Crais.
Aeryn. Hurt. Side.
Side?
He tries to translate the word, to calculate meaning specific to them. With her uninjured arm, she takes his hand, and places it delicately against her side, the largeness of it engulfing, the warmth oddly offering relief as she sighs into his touch.
Side. Hurt?
Yes.
His thumb strokes over the t-shirt, over the multiple wires she's now noticed are running from her body, attached to what appears to be a screen depicting a parabolic graph and a readout of numbers which she assesses equate to her basic functions.
Female. Want. Test.
Her mouth sours as she slants her head, unsure of what she heard. His frelling accent is so thick.
Repeat.
Female. Want. Test.
Shakes her head, pressing his hand into her side tighter as she shifts her weight again and the pain flares up, gripping into her lungs. "Just speak English, John."
His huff is meant to be jovial; she knows it is, but it's more of a scoff. They're both growing so tired here. So old and pained. "The doctor wants to do a scan."
"No scans."
"Not a full one." His hand replaces under her arm and helps shift her so her injured flank is raised. "Just a scan of here." Fingers curve around her side again and she feels the disconnection within herself, not just the lack of pinch and pressure, but the broken pieces. "To make sure there's no internal damage."
"No sc—"
"Aeryn." The caress of her cheek is so tender, meant to distract, meant to settle, of course meant to placate, but his expression betrays him, and no longer does he keep the genial visage of her joking husband. His eyes are shimmering, hiding, and he doesn't know—couldn't—but he does. "For me."
Cannot give him affirmation, but can not turn away from his broken composition, injury not withstanding, his timidness is problematic, doing the opposite of placating her, riling her up in panic. But his thumb strums across her cheek again and his eyes cycle down to her abdomen, grief twitching his lips, wetting his eyes, and he throws his gaze to the dozens of numbers on the monitor, watching her parabolic waves, free thumb hooking into his lower lip. "For me."
She submits to the scan, just the scan of her area of impact, offering him what little solace she can. Lays on her side as the female doctor with the hardened face holds a portable device apparently shooting rays into her body in order to show a simulation of her internals.
When John questions the doctor about it, she says it's technology from the ass guards.
After a few minutes the doctor sighs, pausing the device. "You've broken two ribs and cracked a third, but I'm not seeing anything indicative of internal damage."
John breathes out in relief, hot against her fingers fanning within his own. He places a brief kiss against her palm, and his expression hasn't changed, still bothered and disjointed. "Should we ask her to scan and see?"
Respects him too much to play stupid on the subject. Doesn't know how he found out—perhaps her in lapse of heat delirium—but she owes him at least a dialogue. "It would be too small to see."
Yet he still holds her hand, keeps her in his grasp, unlike last time when he pushed her away for refusing to hold a conversation until he refused it as well. Dire circumstances change reactions. They're all they have here, and they have apparent ample time in which to discuss the conception and termination of their second child.
"Can you see on a cellular level with that thing?"
"Not yet. Colonel Carter is working with Doctor Lee to make modifications that can assess medical issues on a cellular level but—"
"That doesn't help." His grip becomes tighter as his words grow more emotional, less stoic.
"Can we—" She shifts, her body aching from remaining stagnant, with the weight of her all on one side, but also to see if she can distract him as he did with her, his gentle caresses versus the pain visible on her face when her ribs contract with movement.
He helps settle her back against a pillow he's placed behind her which alleviates the pressure in her side by creating a different stance and weight distribution.
Finally, she manages to hiss out, "can we have a moment alone please?"
The doctor nods, slipping out of the room, and shutting the door soundlessly behind her.
John is still leaning over her, adjusting the pillow, and she notes the injury on his shoulder for the first time. A gash deep within his skin blanketed by a clear gel which she assumes aids in reconstruction of skin and cleanliness of the wound. Her fingers drag over it, and his shoulders tense, not in pain, but because she's tickled him.
"Your shoulder."
"It's fine."
"Are you in pain?"
"No."
"Did you—"
Aeryn.
Her name in Sebacean stops further physical or conversational prodding. He ducks his head beside hers, his nose pressed into his cheek as he inhales deeply, his skin growing hot, trembling and she can tell he's fighting to keep his broken pieces together as she is.
"I only knew for two days." Pets the back of his neck as she speaks words that spoil in her mouth and numb her tongue. Staring at the monitor, the same parabolic process, the same scaling numbers.
"When?"
"The day you were cleared for duty—"
"No." Shakes his head, pulling back from her touch, his eyes red and she holds his gaze out of respect, but it harms her to witness him like this, to know she is the sole cause. "When could we—with Deke we haven't really been getting much handsy time—"
"Except in the shower, and in the tub, and in the bed and—"
"Here?" Pulls further from her, a single tear streak down his cheek reflects in the white light, among the metal and screens. "It happened here?!"
"I'm sorry, I should have—"
"No. I mean—it doesn't really matter now." Settles again, sitting on the side of the bed, his hand on her thigh warming through the sheet and blanket. "It's just—that's quick."
"It happens quick, John."
He grins, rueful, collecting her hand again, playing with her fingers. "No, I mean quick to know."
Removes her hand from his, not in malice, but folds down the blankets to touch where the pinch originated, where all she feels is empty. "I suppose I recognize the feeling now."
Leaning forward, he places a chaste kiss against her forehead, re-establishing his love for her in a simple gesture, reinforcing that he is present and comprehending and overtly worried. His hand drops, at first covering hers, then the sliver of free skin. "Does it hurt—"
And like depressing a button or toggling a switch, the pinch, the pressure, returns to the same spot, a spark igniting a flame, the warmth of his hand awakening. She scrambles up the bed, the pain flaring in her side paling compared to the thumping of her heart, the beeping of the monitor.
"What?" Retracts his hand as if he's burnt, reaching to help her fully sit up, his words jumbling and falling from his mouth. "Are you okay. What—"
"It's back."
"What's back."
Snatches his drifting hand, trying to find the origin of what he thinks is her pain, and places it back against the sliver of her skin. "They're back."
Wants to know if he's even bothered looking for her.
Doesn't know if he has, or if he even cares anymore.
Doesn't know what she did wrong.
He's a leader—the team leader—and she simply followed his lead, his hands, his lips, the comfort of his warm body undulating against her, his intent growing tantalizingly hard, and she never tires of seeing the physical manifestation of her effect on men.
He grew upset at her unchaste nature, yet he must have known. After all, she was a God of sex for decades. Did he think she remained chaste then? Did he think she's spent three and a half years tucked away under a mountain like a fictional princess—his moniker of choice for her—and not engage in extra curricular activities?
She has desires, needs, and quite frankly, her choice of pastimes dwindles once the members of SG-1 return to their homes. There are only so many programs available on the television, only so many magazines she can read and reread, only so many shopping sprees she can entertain herself with online before Daniel cancels his credit card.
Three and a half years and her opinion, her ideas are just starting to be taken seriously.
Among a team of seasoned and decorated heroes, military personnel, warriors, and intellects, she felt—feels—invisible, overlooked and malnourished. So instead she flourishes in the physical contact, under the hands and lips and other body parts, of willing privates eager to please her, to give her a run for her money—and her breath—between the sheets.
Regardless of what he thinks of her or doesn't—although he must find her some modicum of attractive to kiss her, in that manner and for that long before letting his strict rearing seize control again—they're going to need to work together, in other ways instead of between the sheets, in order to find a way back.
As much as she likes it here, bonding with the other residences of Mayo, enjoying seeing the stars up close once again, the freedom that empty space has to offer, the vastness in comparison to the same gray walls and the same concrete flooring, this is not home.
No matter how rewarding it is to care for a child that she did not birth, but has her eyes, knowing he finds safety and solace in her arms, knowing that he doesn't judge her for her years spent as Qetesh, or the list of air force privates she's been entangled with, or the fact that after three years, she still has to reroute her brain not to snatch pretty items or con naïve people.
Knowing that if she raised him, she would be able to explain her entire part of the story, and perhaps someone would finally fully understand plight after plight that's befallen her and let her know that she's not horrible, that she has to do the things she does in order to survive because no one has ever taken care of her before without wanting payment or without having an ulterior motive.
No—this could never be her home.
She hasn't seen Mitchell in what she believes has been half a day, which wouldn't mean anything to her, nor be out of the ordinary were they back on Earth, but he's taken the batch of ointment and her burns are starting to get more inflamed and tightening up her movements again with intermittent bursts of hot pain.
Came to Chiana's room to seek out the old woman, whose intentions appear to be altruistic in nature, yet she knows she would feel more comfortable if Mitchell had accompanied her. What's troubling is, she's afraid if she actually managed to find him on this enormous ship, and implored that she only wanted the ointment, or that she was a little trepidacious of approaching the old woman, he would accuse her of lying and their relationship would fall into greater shambles.
She stays put beside Chiana with Deke noisily sucking from the green food pouch, grunting every because he feeds too fast. She adjusts the child in her lap, so he doesn't choke, then glances to her unconscious companion, whose side and neck have been patched up. She remains still underneath a metallic blanket, and completely uninvolved in the one-sided conversation they're having.
"I still can't believe he actually took the ointment." Shakes her head in disapproval, partly for emphasis in just how disappointed she is in the Colonel. There's only a beeping attached to a three-dimensional graph of what she assumes are Chiana's vitals, chiming in on her monologue.
When she folds over the top of the pouch pushing more food into Deke's mouth, he grunts again, his expression souring, and as she readjusts him, a portion of the skin on her back splits open, feeling much like the dryness that plagues her hands when they gate to a tundra planet. Her skin used to be beautiful, rich, soft, free of most scars and stains, yet even before the shot started masticating her skin, if she looks closely enough, she can still make out the jagged white lines of stretch marks across her navel.
"What's worst is, he prides himself on being so chivalrous—offering me modesty while rubbing the ointment into my side, sleeping on the couch instead of his own bed when we visited his lovely parents—but he took the bloody ointment with him, when he's aware the injuries I sustained are far worse than—"
"She can not hear you." The old woman startles her, shuffling through the doorway, chewing on what looks to be a bootlace.
"I don't think that matters, no one listens to me very much anyway." Settles herself, limiting her movements as she retrieves the pouch from Deke's weakening suction, and tosses it to the floor for one of the horseshoe crabs to deal with.
"No, you misunderstand me." The old woman has a little hustle, a little jig in her step as she takes a quick glance at Chiana's vitals and then turns to her, the bootlace hanging from between her lips. "She has been fed many narcotics in order to keep her sedated during the healing process. Nebari have resilient skin but it needs to heal in the correct manner."
"Speaking of—" she stands carefully, keeping her back as straight as possible to not stretch the skin lest more of it break. "Would you happen to have any more of that ointment?"
"Hmmm." The old woman twirls the lace around her finger, tugging it down before ripping a chunk off and chewing it harshly, wildly. With a mouth full of black fabric torn into tiny pieces, she speaks, "I just gave a large jar to the colonel, after you returned from Valdun—"
"Yes, but he seems to have sequestered it."
"I'm sorry." The old woman's face takes on an expression, like she knows the sordid details of their fondling session, and the bitter words spoken afterwards. "But the concoction needs to sit for almost a solar cycle to be potent enough to deal with this level of injury."
As the old woman speaks, as if perfectly timed, a scalding pain flares up in the arm underneath Deke, causing her to fumble, but not drop the baby. The old woman moves close, as close as she was during their debacle in the kitchen, but her arms gently take Deke, he remains calm as she flips him against her chest, using on hand to cradle his bottom and one hand to trace the blemishes on her arm. "That seems painful."
"It is."
"Can you not simply ask the colonel to borrow the salve? He presents himself as a—"
"I know how he presents himself," she snaps, immediately trying to hide that she's losing motion of her arm, more ashamed at what she now has to explain. "He no longer cares about—"
"Ah." Noranti hushes her, raising an index finger in the air, and then as Deke fusses, uses her hand to clap against his back to burp him. "I've seen the way Crichton observes Aeryn and I've seen the way the colonel observes you. There is no identifiable difference."
Shakes her head, turning away intent on retrieving the fur blanket she brought with her because the ship is always so cold, and returning to her room to hopefully fall asleep and awake with a jar of ointment within arm's reach. "The only reason Mitchell observes me at all is to make sure I'm not mucking up—"
But Noranti tips her chin up, not restraining her in anyway, merely to bring her gaze to see the validity in her words. "There is no difference."
"Well, if this is how Crichton treats his wife, it's no wonder they're arguing all—"
"You haven't trusted my words in the past." Noranti steps to the side, leaving the door to the room free. "But I plead with you to listen now. Just approach him, he will not turn you away."
She doesn't know why she listens.
Shouldn't really, but perhaps everything she's been through has mottled her perception of things..
Sure enough, he's standing next to the table in the command room, one arm crossed over his chest, the other with his hand pitched up underneath his chin, nodding to himself. Despite their falling out, despite their argument and the harsh words he spoke to her so quickly they had to be true, she smiles, because she can see him trying to work out a problem he knows nothing about.
His extent with the device goes as far as him lobbing it into the oncoming kawoosh in order to bring her and Daniel home safely. Has never inserted stones, or brainstormed how to remove them, has never been himself in someone else's body and this innocence, combined with his need to formulate a plan, his need to be the hero, even to a consort such as her, is still endearing.
"You know, you actually have to put the stone into the slot in order to activate the device." Doesn't know why she chooses gentle ribbing as her way of interacting with him. Perhaps if she chooses not to acknowledge her trampled feelings, then he can forget about the way he treated her, and they can continue on as if nothing happened until he does it again.
It's generally the way her and Daniel's relationship works—friends until she becomes too irritating, or he speaks too harsh of words, and then they separate for a day, only to meet up at the regular time the next day, chatty, pithy, as if nothing happened. It's not the healthiest way to be treated by someone, but in her history with men, it is more than acceptable.
"What do you want, Vala?"
But apparently Colonel Mitchell remains a man scorned, although she's still unsure what exactly she did wrong. Usually the remedy for this is to cut straight to her point, use as few words as possible in order to garner what information she wants from him.
"I came looking for the salve—"
"I left it for you," he interrupts, his attention not turning away from the device. He may even turn himself more away from her as an abrupt way to end the conversation, which he seems to have a creative flair for.
"No—" stretches the word because she can't stretch her arm to reach out and just slap him—only once, just to stick him back in this reality where, yes, they have been stuck on Mayo for a week caring for a baby and dwindling crew members, but also have incurred acid burns on portions of their bodies. "I looked and it wasn't in the room when I woke—"
"I left it there, Vala—"
"But it isn't—"
"Why would I be standing here with my shoulder on fire if I didn't leave it for—" he snarls at her, whipping around on the spot, his eyebrows hard and his face very red.
Only the moment he sees her, it wipes clean, vacant for less than a second and then falls into the classic concerned colonel he's always played. "You're bleeding."
"I know."
Only she doesn't know the extent of it, knew she cracked the skin on her back open, but there's a rivulet of blood, thankfully small, ribboning down her arm.
Without asking, the modesty used up, he tugs the blanket from her back, ignoring her protesting gasp, and sort of pushes her head forward so he can assess the damage. "Mitchell, what—"
"Get back to the room." Marches by her, though his stride is wider, more anxious than his normal air force gait. She watches him disappear, confused as to what is happening, and where he is going, the muscles in her arm seizing back to her chest and half of the blanket dropping from her back.
After less than a second he reappears in the door, wrenching her around the wrist.
"Vala, I said—"
Unfortunately, he chose the incapacitated hand.
She hollers in pain, similar to the way he did when he was first shot.
The feel of solid muscle being forced forward, the acid on flesh burning and rotting. Immediately, he withdraws his hand, eyes wide, and then his fingers start trembling at her reaction.
She wants to shout at him, let him know he should remember that's her severely debilitated arm by now, that he's an idiot, but all she manages is a shaky gasp.
Expects him to yell, to tell her that she should've taken care of her own injury hours ago—she tried, there was no ointment, there was nothing she could do, even conquered her fear of Noranti, of him, in order to help herself, but all she did was fail, all he did was hurt her more, whether it was intentional or not.
But his hands slide around her cheeks, holding her head up from where she's doubled over, panting from pain. "I'm sorry," speaks it directly to her, staring her straight in the eyes. Again, she wants to protest this apology or unexpected intimacy is not helping her pain, but she finds her breath calming as she feels his exhalations against her skin. "I'm really sorry."
Before she can answer or communicate in anyway, before she can voice what she feels is allowable and what is not concerning intimacy and her body since the last time she gave him an inch he ran a mile which is always appreciated—but then he switched just as quickly to demonizing her—he hefts her in his arms, her bad arm, her bad side tucked into his chest so that his fingers don't pierce or bruise the already delicate skin.
It's weird and surprising, but on the third bounce of his gait, they're halfway down the hall. She shifts against him, the wetness in her back, the laceration in her skin being aggravated with his steps, and he adjusts her, the same way she adjusts Deke, so calming, so carefully.
Must lose consciousness or her attention span for a moment, because when she wakes, she's on her side in their bed, peppermint wafting through her nose, and a different blanket—not her preferred one—tucked up around her chest.
He's sitting on the bed beside her, stretching her bad arm, massaging the muscles, his brows knit as he works earnestly in the silence.
"It doesn't hurt any longer."
Must startle him because his hands freeze before he returns her arm gently to her chest. "I just wanted to make sure."
"Well, you've done a bang-up job." She shifts to reclining on her back, ensuring the blanket is kept in place for his sake, and hers—she doesn't need another lecture. "I currently have no pain."
He nods, his mouth tight, the face he makes when he wants to interject something, to ask something, to say something, but can't bring himself to do it for some reason, a face he doesn't make that often, and usually only to General Landry.
He starts to raise from the bed, and she can see by the collar of his shirt, he's applied more salve to himself. "I'll leave you to sleep it off."
She watches him leave, the door and privacy curtain engaged in his wake, and can't explain why she wanted to ask him to stay.