The sun rising over what was now Atlantis' East pier woke me up slowly. I was not ready to wake up, not when I would have to explain what had happened last night to the Colonel. The twinges of pain in my back and neck however, made it impossible to get back to sleep.

"It's about time you woke up."

The sound of Sheppard's voice behind me startled me. I stood up, awkwardly, and turned to face him.

"You going to explain, or do I have to make it an order?" He asked as he walked over to me.

"It's a long story, sir."

"I've plenty of time, Colonel. General O'Neill sent Sam and Colonel Mitchell over to run things, while you and I sort this out."

"There's nothing to sort out, Sir. Yes, Abbi's my daughter, I'm sorry I didn't say anything but, well..." I rub the back of my neck, hoping Sheppard will understand.

"It's a long story."

I smile softly; he did understand what I didn't say.

"Yeah."

Sheppard let me go after that, with an order to go get cleaned up, and changed into civvies, and get some breakfast before reporting to the gym.

When I arrived, he was talking to Colonel Carter, and had what looked like a picnic basket at his feet. I stood to the side, waiting patiently for the Colonels to finish speaking. A moment later they did. I was about to salute Colonel Carter, but as I started to move my hand she glared at me.

"I'm sure I haven't been gone long enough that you would have forgotten my rule about saluting me, wouldn't you agree, Colonel?"

I grin and apologise, the Colonel always has hated having anyone on the command staff salute her, and banned us from it within her first week as Commander of Atlantis. Sheppard smirks at me from behind her back.

"Ready to go?" he asks.

"Go where?" I return, my curiosity at what he has planned getting the better of me.

"That would be telling, Lorne. You'll just have to wait and see."

He pauses for a moment before activating his comm.

"Two to beam up, Daedalus."

I soon found myself in the gate room of the SGC. Sheppard, the picnic basket one hand, grabbed my arm, just below the elbow with the other, and dragged me toward the elevator. Once we were safely inside, he let go of my arm, and the button to take us to the top of this shaft. He was grinning still, obviously pleased with himself. It wasn't long before we exited that elevator, and entered the one going to the surface. I took the bait that he was dangling in front of me.

"What's going on, Sir?"

"I told you O'Neill gave us some time off to sort out things out. Officially, we're working through some communications problems that have been occurring since we have returned to Earth. Unofficially, O'Neill thinks we both need a holiday, and this was the only way he could get it for us, without the IOA complaining."

I mutter something about the IOA being more trouble than they're worth and Sheppard just throws a sympathetic smile toward me. We've both had to clean up messes made by the IOA before, and it sure isn't fun. They like to pass the blame off if they can, which, fortunately isn't very often.

Reaching the surface we sign out, and Sheppard heads over to where the cars belonging to the Expedition are stored. He signs his out, and we climb in. As we drive away from the mountain, the warmth of the sun, and the exhaustion that comes from living and working in a place like Atlantis lull me to sleep again.

"Lorne. Lorne, come on. Wake up, we're here. Lorne."

The words only just seem to penetrate the fog that is my mind at the moment. A moment later a hand grasps my shoulder, and gently shakes me.

"Lorne, come on, open up those baby blues of yours."

I groan, my eyes slowly flickering open.

"How long?" I croak, my mouth and throat dry.

Sheppard passes me a bottle of water.

"You've been out for about four hours now."

I open the bottle and take a long drink, the cool water feeling amazing against my parched lips.

"Where are we?" I ask.

"A property that once belonged to my father," A slight shadow passes across his face as he thinks of his father's passing about eighteen months ago, "He left it for me. Dave has a few people looking after it for me."

"Dave's your brother, isn't he?"

"Yep. He's older than me by about four years."

"You're lucky."

"Yeah, I am. You have any family besides Abbi?"

I shrug, not wanting to get into a philosophical debate on what constituted a family. Sheppard takes the gesture the way I wanted him to, and gets out of the car. He pulls a couple of bags out of the back, one of which I recognise to be mine. I climb out of the car before I fall asleep again. Sheppard throws me my bag, which I then swing onto my shoulders. I follow him into the house. A few minutes later he leaves me in my room to get ready for lunch. I lie down on the bed, to test it out and promptly fall asleep.

Sheppard walks down the hall to where he left his second in command only half an hour before. A smile crosses his face as he open the door a fraction and peers inside. His second had passed out again, this time on a bed. He nodded slightly, this had been the only confirmation that he needed to prove that Lorne had desperately needed a break.