A/N: WOWZA! A month! That's gotta be some sort of really crappy record for me. My apologies for taking so freakin' long! As usual, thanks a ton for the reviews!
STATUS: TBC
RATING: K+
SUMMARY: Nightmares have begun to plague Rodney's dreams. What happens when they start to merge with real life?
SPOILERS: Nada
DISCLAIMER: Everything Stargate Atlantis related is property of MGM. I own nothing.
x x x
A few days had passed since Rodney's nightmare about the Wraith, but unfortunately it hadn't been the last. Before the dreams had happened every few days, but now they were occurring nightly and even during the power naps that he could grab in the labs or mess hall. Incidentally, he stopped napping in public places after having a 'bit of a fit', as Carson called it, during the lunch hour the day before.
People were starting to get worried, and Rodney himself was at the top of the list. And although he had been 'advised' by Elizabeth to go to Heightmeyer, he maintained the reasoning that he was simply tired and perhaps a little stressed out. Everything was fine, thank you very much.
"Rodney? Is late, yes? Perhaps you should call it a night."
Hunched over the rectangular Ancient device he had been working on for a few days now, Rodney just waved an absent hand to the Czech behind him, mumbling something or other in reply.
Radek sighed.
"Rodney, Carson said he would poke me with very big needle if I did not get you to bed like good boy. So go? Please? Before he radios, yes?"
"No. Busy, Radek. I'll go in a bit. Just tell him I already left. You can lie, right?"
"About as well as pigeon can fly in rainstorm."
"What?" Rodney straightened up and blinked before pursing his lips in annoyance. "Right. Well as amusing as your folksy sayings are, some of us have actual work to do. So go away now. Shoo!" Hands waved around once again before the scientist was turning back to the device.
Radek sighed from behind him.
"Well if you're not going to leave, at least tell me what you're slaving over."
"That would be the problem," the Canadian grumbled as he spun away from the metal table to glare at Radek. "I have no idea what it does!"
Zelenka ignored the fierce look, knowing it was directed more at the elusive device then him. Walking over, he peered down at the thing, taking in its rectangular shape. It appeared to have no buttons or controls of any sort, but there were faint lines on the back, indicating the grooves of a panel. The front, or what he assumed to be, had a darker coloured glass inlayed about two inches in from each side, similar to a screen.
"You have not been able to turn it on then? There appears to be a screen..."
"Oh, well spotted, Radek," Rodney said sarcastically. "You get a gold star. No, I haven't been able to turn it on! I even got the Colonel to try days ago when it was first found."
"In the South pier labs, yes? The unused ones?"
"Mmhm," came an affirmative hum. "Those are the ones. Unfortunately the Ancients, as usual, failed to mention whatever this is in their database. Colour me surprised."
Radek chuckled and nudged his slipping glasses back up his nose.
"Well, then I suggest you leave it for now and start fresh tomorrow. New day, yes?"
Rodney stared at the smaller man suspiciously before his lips twitched.
"Big needle, huh?"
"Indeed. Very big. Please to go now."
"Going, going..."
x x x
"So how are those dreams of yours treating you?"
It was the next day, just after the lunch hour, and Rodney and John were on the South Pier having another look around the abandoned labs. They weren't in a state of disrepair or anything, just unused and not fully explored. It was one of those places in Atlantis that scientists and military alike wandered around just for something to do or to seem busy.
Yesterday, before getting kicked out of his own lab, John had coerced Rodney into spilling the beans about his dreams and oddly enough, Rodney had found it far too easy to get it all off his chest. As expected, the Colonel had taken it all in stride, agreeing with the scientist that he was just stressed out and tired. John had had his fair share of nightmares after all. He could understand the fear of losing friends, being alone, having the life sucked out of you by alien vampire creatures. Who couldn't in the Pegasus Galaxy?
Rodney let out a huff of breath, eyes locked on the Life Signs Detector as they made their way down the hallway, their pace unhurried.
"About as well as a punch in the face from Kavanagh. I had another one last night. Woke up on the floor." He winced, rubbing his lower back. "That probably gave me irreparable back damage. Not to mention wrecking havoc on my sleep cycle."
John snorted, hands resting on the butt of his strapped on P-90.
"Sleep cycle? You barely have a routine, let alone a cycle. You do look a little peaky though." He wiggled his fingers in front of his own face in demonstration.
"Peaky? Have you been talking to Carson lately?"
A shrug. "He just wanted to know how you were doing."
Stopping in his tracks, Rodney scowled and lowered the Life Signs Detector.
"So everyone's been talking about me behind my back, is that it?"
John raised his eyebrows. Leave it to McKay to blow things out of proportion.
"Hardly everyone. Relax, would you? People are just worried about you, that's all."
"People? As in ev—"
"People," John stressed, interrupting the scientist. "As in your friends who happen to be your team mates and doctor and who also happen to be concerned about you. Now chill out! I think you're passing your stress onto me."
"Like that's possible," Rodney snorted, raising the Life Signs Detector once again. A few minutes of silence passed before the scientist asked rather smugly, "So you're concerned for me, huh?"
John rolled his eyes, lips curving.
"Yes, Rodney. Now stop preening and find me something cool to play with."
"Well, I have been following this energy signature for the last ten minutes," Rodney said with a smug smile. "I was going to tell you after you finished declaring your—totally platonic—love for me."
"You're a piece of work, McKay." Resisting the urge to smack the scientist up the back of his head, John chuckled and asked, "So where's this energy signature of yours? And what is it?"
Rodney 'hmm'ed thoughtfully, his eyes glued to the Life Signs Detector as they navigated the halls.
"Its location is pretty close by actually. Looks like it's coming from one of the labs nearer to the pier. As for what it is, I have no idea. It's rather strong though..." Which made him slightly uneasy, truth be told. "I don't want to compare it to a ZedPM, but..." He frowned, lips pressing together.
John's eyebrows disappeared above his hairline.
"There's a ZPM here?"
"I said compare, Colonel. Weren't you listening? It's not a ZedPM. There's no way. You were there when we scanned the city for them, remember? There was nothing. This can't be right..." Yet there it was, a brightly lit circle pulsing enigmatically on the screen.
"Well we should check it out anyways," John stated, giving the butt of his P-90 a pat. "Lead on, McKay."
Rodney's frown deepened, but he headed forwards anyways. Even though it all felt completely wrong, the possibility of a ZedPM was too good of a lure to keep him away.
As they moved deeper into dank corridors of the South pier labs, the energy signature on the screen grew threateningly brighter. Rodney's hand clutched the device, eyes wide and disbelieving.
"This...this can't be happening," he squawked as he came to an abrupt stop in the centre of the hall. The light from John's P-90 cast shadows on the walls as the Colonel leaned over Rodney's shoulder to peer at the screen.
"What can't be happening?" he asked with a frown, not seeing anything out of the ordinary on the Detector. The screen was glowing its normal 'happy Atlantis' pale blue with their two life signs pulsing. But there was no energy signature. "Rodney...there's nothing—"
"Whatever it is is growing to enormous proportions! It's like seven ZedPMs all overloading at once!" Rodney's baby blues were blown wide as he slapped his earpiece and snapped, "Zelenka, where the hell is all that energy coming from?!"
John ignored Radek's confused, "What?" on the radio as he grabbed the scientist's shoulders and gave him a firm shake. "Rodney, there's nothing there. There's no energy—"
"We need to evacuate, Colonel," Rodney interrupted as he shook the other man's hands off him, limbs practically shaking from the sudden onslaught of panic. "Now! The explosion could rip apart the planet! Everyone needs to get through the Stargate—Maybe there's a way I can—but if the device is—I don't even know what—" He suddenly snapped his fingers, somehow manoeuvring around the Life Signs Detector. "The lab. I need to get to the lab."
The Colonel tried to follow McKay's fast flowing thoughts, but before he had a chance to even double check the Detector to make sure there was absolutely nothing there, Rodney was off running.
"What the—McKay! Get your ass back here!" John yelled while clipping his P-90 to his vest and taking off after the scientist. His boots pounded along the floor, eyes locked on Rodney's back. Who knew the Canadian could run so fast?
"Colonel, is everything alright? What energy was Rodney talking about?"
When Elizabeth's voice crackled in John's earpiece, the man drawled out through huffs, "No, everything's not alright. McKay's freaking out down here! Seeing things—" He sped around the corner and spotted Rodney skidding into an unused lab. "—he's convinced there's some energy signature, some device that's about to explode and kill us all."
There was a pause on the other end before Elizabeth replied tersely, "And you're sure there's nothing about to explode and kill us all, right?"
"Pretty darn sure, yeah."
"What do you mean he's seeing things, Colonel?" came Carson's tense brogue.
"I mean that he's seeing things! He's absolutely positive he sees some building energy signature on the Life Signs Detector. I took a look and didn't see a damned thing. Now hold on a sec..."
Slowing down to a jog, John headed into the lab to see Rodney hunched over a consol, hands flying.
"Rodney? Buddy? How about you come over here for a second?" Sheppard suggested, still hovering near the doorway. He didn't want to spook the man, just in case.
"Can't you see I'm busy trying to prevent our untimely doom here, Colonel?" Rodney snapped back, his eyes constantly moving from the consol to the display screen hanging directly above it.
John raised his eyebrows, his own gaze sweeping over the lab. Every piece of equipment was dark since no power was being directed towards that part of the city. Why waste the energy if the area was unused? But there was Rodney, fingers moving over the crystals, eyes reading nonexistent information. If it hadn't been so serious, John would have found it amusing.
"I know you are, but I really need to talk to you," he coaxed, all the while listening to the chatter going on in his ear piece.
"Colonel, I'm on my way down with a team. Don't let him do anything harmful," Carson said, the doctor already huffing as he assumedly made waves for the nearest transporter.
"Ronon and I are coming as well, John. We will be there soon," Teyla added, her voice tense but calm.
John didn't reply to either one of them, but felt relief all the same. His eyes stayed locked on Rodney who was still moving around furiously, panicked but determined. The Colonel opened his mouth to try and persuade Rodney to come out into the hall, but the scientist suddenly stopped moving, his body as still as if it were carved from stone.
"Did you hear that?" he whispered.
Unsure of how to reply, John just shook his head slowly. He hadn't heard a damn thing.
"It sounded like...clicking. Like something metal clicking," Rodney added, voice still lowered while his baby blues flickered around. The pair fell into silence. John watched uneasily, eyebrows together in a frown as Rodney trembled minutely, the scientist's head twitching this way and that every time he 'heard' a sound. "There must be hundreds of them..."
"Of what..." asked Sheppard quietly, hands gripping the butt of his P-90 despite his knowledge that nothing was there.
Rodney shook his head, looking slightly confused under all the fear.
"They sound like—but that's not possible...they can't be all the way out here..."
"What can't be out here?" John stressed, halfway to calling a security team just in case.
Another tremble ran through Rodney, his face pale as he looked to the Colonel.
"Bugs," he uttered, eyes wide. "Replicator bugs."
x x x
TBC...
A/N: I think it's a safe assumption that Rodney has come in contact with those damn bugs at least once during his time at Area 51 and the SGC.