Reminder:
"This is spoken English."
"This is spoken Czech."
This is a thought.

Last time: Continuing the fun (begun in 117... and 61-62). Meanwhile, I can't believe it's been 130 chapters and well over 375k words.

Chapter 130. I Lost Track.

"Hello."

Anna squinted toward the chair where Radek usually sat, surprised to find him in the mid-morning sun with a stylus poised to write. She looked outside, just to check that her clock hadn't somehow been very off when she'd looked at it a few minutes ago. "Hi."

Anna crossed the room as Radek rose—less stiff and careful than he had been last week. Then she realized she was watching not because she was worried—though that had been a near-constant state since she'd heard that his lung could somehow collapse again on its own—but because she was confused.

"Is everything okay? Shouldn't you be at the lab?"

"I took today off." While Anna stifled a yawn and swayed toward the coffee maker, Radek watched, apparently amused. Anna didn't get the chance to object before he asked, "Do you always get up this late?"

"I don't." It was more of a snap than she'd intended, and apparently more than he intended, as well. "I stayed up late trying to work out the Daedalus problem Rodney gave me." And, since he would be back this afternoon, she thought it would be impressive if she could have figured it out by the time he was settled back in his lab gushing over the tech advancements from Taranis.

It didn't work out that way.

"I didn't mean anything by it." Radek raised his hands and took half of a step back. "Would you like to go to breakfast? Chocolate-chip pancakes."

Anna paused, her hand resting on the kettle. "It's ten-thirty. Haven't we missed breakfast?"

Radek shrugged. "I asked them to save us some."

For a long moment, she glared. He stared back. It was September, so it wasn't her birthday. It wasn't his. It was also neither of their name days. She'd lost the rest of the summer worrying over Radek and wondering what would happen with the Wraith in their midst. But none of that had anything to do with why he might have taken the day off, at least she hoped not.

"Have I missed something?"

Radek chuckled, and shook his head. "Go get dressed. I'll make your tea."

"Right… pancakes."

"Pancakes."

By the time Anna emerged from her room, this time fully dressed in civilian clothes instead of her plaid flannel pajamas, Radek was ready with a cup of tea. He negotiated the handle into her palm and then gestured toward the door. "After you."

Anna sighed and took a sip of her tea as she walked out into the bright hallway. "Alright, but I'll figure out which alien has possessed you eventually."

With a laugh, Radek followed her. "Excuse me?"

"You took the day off, for one thing."

"Yes. And?"

"You never take the day off. It's not your birthday, and you might not even take the day off for that." She gave him a pointed look, and he only responded with a small shrug. "It's not my birthday. It's not a holiday. But there's chocolate chip pancakes."

"Wait, wait. Everyone likes chocolate chip pancakes, don't they?"

"I'm supposed to believe it's a coincidence?"

Radek chuckled. "Believe what you want. Maybe it's someone else's birthday and they requested it."

"That doesn't explain why you have the day off."

"No. I guess it doesn't…"

The rest of the walk was quiet as Anna ran through as many holidays as she could remember that might have been in September. The only thing coming to mind was Statehood Day, but that wasn't for another week… or two. She didn't know what day it was today, which might have helped figure out what holiday it was.

Anna paused as they walked into the empty mess hall. As Radek promised, there was a hot plate with a piece of paper attached to it that said "for Zelenka." There was also syrup in three varieties and whipped cream so, obviously, it was a special day. "Is it special?"

"I said 'maybe.' If it is special, you'll figure it out." Radek set aside the lid on the hotplate and distributed the six pancakes between two plates. He gave one to her and grinned. "Sit down. You look like you might pull a muscle from thinking so hard."

With a huff, Anna snatched the plate from him, took the blueberry-flavored syrup and whipped cream, and sat. He sat across from her, still grinning stupidly.

"Are you going to be this annoying all day?"

"Sorry."

Radek didn't get to say anything else, even though it looked like he was going to, because Elizabeth spoke from the doorway behind Anna.

"Fancy meeting you two here…" she said with a smile when Anna looked over her shoulder.

"Now I know there's something…" Anna muttered, glancing up at him for a moment before going back to slicing up her pancakes.

Radek shook his head and folded one of his pancakes in half over a pat of whipped cream, turning it into a chocolate-chip-pancake-and-whipped-cream taco. He really was a genius… "I don't know what you're talking about." He smiled up at Elizabeth as she sat next to Anna. "Yes, it is good to see you, too. How is everything?"

"Nothing to report," Elizabeth said with a shrug. "Negotiations are going well."

"Glad to hear it," Radek said.

"What are your plans for today?"

Anna looked up when she realized that Elizabeth had asked a question and Radek hadn't answered. Both of them were looking at her. "Why are you asking me? I wasn't the one so excited to get out the door for pancakes this morning. It's his day off."

"You should have the day off, too, miláčku," Radek said. "It's September and you still haven't had summer vacation."

And here she was thinking nobody had noticed… Well, adults didn't get summer vacation, either. It was somehow a contrivance of the school year, an inverted holdover of the olden days of near-universal agricultural work.

"It's perfect because Rodney isn't here," he added with a wink.

Anna couldn't help but smile. If he was so intent on having a good day, well… Anna supposed she could put aside all her great plans for the day—studying, taking a nap, snacking on whatever cookies and crackers she stashed in her room, and drinking copious amounts of tea—for whatever his plans were. "Alright, alright. I'll play along. And I'll guess what day it is before dinner."

"Oh, you don't know?" Elizabeth sounded surprised, and Anna frowned at her.

"She'll get it," Radek said with a smile.

"Elizabeth knows?"

"So do you." Radek made a second whipped cream pancake taco. "So what do you want to do today while you think about it? The city is yours."

"Which reminds me." Elizabeth tapped the table between herself and Radek. "Jumper 4 is clear for you to use. If you want." She gave Anna a significant glance. "Sheppard and Lorne both say you're ready as long as you promise to fly with no distractions."

"That's the first thing, then!" Anna shoved a probably-too-big piece of pancake into her mouth, adding, "And then we can practice shooting, and maybe some chess."

"Slow down. You have all day."

"All the more reason to get started."

Besides, she knew she would be spending at least some of the day trying to figure out what in the world today was. Maybe it was the first day of school… but, no, he wouldn't do that, not when she hadn't really even had a last day of school. He might not even know what the first day of school was. Maybe she would just take a longer winter break.

Radek sighed and looked at Elizabeth. "Major Lorne said that, did he?"

Elizabeth nodded with a bright smile. "He did."

"He and I need to have a talk when he gets back."

#

"See? It's very easy." The back of the puddle jumper lowered as she said it. Anna rubbed her hands together and then ran them over the puddle jumper's inert controls.

"Well, you make it look that way," Radek agreed with a nod. He didn't get up.

In fact, he was very comfortable. Contrary to everything he'd thought about his daughter piloting a vehicle with him in the passenger seat, he'd never been more relaxed as a puddle jumper passenger. Because, of course, she was good at it. Evan said she was, Sheppard agreed, and, well… he might not have had the gene, but she had some of his. He wouldn't have been good at this, but he knew she would be.

Anna looked very pleased with his pronouncement. "Shooting now?"

"If that's what you want."

"You should practice. You are going back to Lorne's team when he comes back, aren't you?"

He didn't mean to sigh. He hadn't thought about it, not as thoroughly as he thought he should. Carson said it would be a solid six to eight weeks before he felt completely normal again… whatever that meant. He saw Anna sit down, though he hadn't realized she'd stood.

"Are you okay?" she asked quietly.

"Yes. Sorry, I just hadn't thought about whether I would be going back to the team." He looked at her, smiling for her brow knit up in concern. "I suppose it isn't really up to me. If they decide Lorne's team does need a scientist and I'm assigned, then I will."

"But you don't want to?"

Asking the hard questions, of course. He didn't mind; sometimes it seemed like she was the only one on Atlantis who did. The internally hard questions, anyway. Everyone else had their own brand of tough questions. Some near unanswerable. But those were more because he didn't know—the questions Anna asked that he didn't know the answer to were because he hadn't looked.

Radek shrugged. "I'm not sure."

She was quiet, her hands in her lap as she twisted her fingers together in what Radek took to be an indication of indecision. Her shoulders were drawn up, and her lips twitched with words he could only imagine were struggling to get out.

And when she spoke, the question wasn't really what he expected. "Are you afraid?"

It was a fair question. He figured it would be reasonable to be afraid. And he was. It was more-or-less a constant state, even if it rarely came to the top of his mind. Instead, it was in the background, a deep and soft hum underneath everything. Interestingly, it hadn't become oppressive during his stint in Genii prison… he knew what he was afraid of, and it wasn't that. And he wasn't going to tell her what it was, either.

Still, it probably paid to be honest. It gave reasonable expectations for her. He was afraid, though that was rarely what guided his actions; Evan struggled under the oppressive knowledge that he wasn't and could never live up to his own expectations, but he would continue and improve; Rodney was a jerk, still, if he looked hard enough he could find a little heart buried in there somewhere. People were complicated. It was best to just be complicated rather than try to show something else, especially to someone who shared about seventeen out of twenty-one meals with him over the course of a week.

"Sometimes," he said, and hoped that was something of the truth he'd intended to tell rather than sounding like a deflection. "But that's not usually what I make decisions for. I wouldn't be here if I did that."

Anna sighed.

"Oh…" He slid to the edge of his chair and reached for her hands. She gave them to him without even a look. "Oh, but are you afraid?"

She nodded, ever so slightly. "Sometimes," she whispered. "I don't want you to change anything because I am; I like to be here, and I like to know you're doing exciting things because it makes me think maybe I can, too, someday…" she added hastily, looking up once she'd finished. She shrugged a little. "But, yes, sometimes I am."

"I'm sorry…" And there wasn't much he could do about it. He wondered if, like him, she'd been this way before Atlantis. Before spaceships. Before leaving home, before losing everything, before winning everything. "I wish I could help with that, but… unfortunately, I don't know how."

Her smile was small, but it sparked her eyes. "I don't want you to. I'll figure it out."

"But you shouldn't have to figure it out alone. Do you want to talk about it?"

Anna shrugged. "Maybe."

The silence that followed was hardly cheering or helpful. Radek wondered if he was supposed to guess. "It's not about what happened to me, is it?"

She turned her eyes up to meet his. Even if it wasn't all of it, it was some of it. "I know I'd stay with Rodney if something happened to you. But knowing that doesn't make it any better."

Of course, it didn't. Her staying with Rodney wasn't for her… well, it was, obviously. He thought it would be best at one point and he probably still did think that if he bothered to pause and remind himself of that. Still, for the most part, the arrangement felt more like it was for Radek. He would worry about her until the day he died—knowing she would be taken care of and happy enough took some of that worry away.

"I think I'm… I don't know what to do. What if I made a mistake? What if we should have gone back? At some point, I—what if we have to leave? What would we do?"

He hadn't thought about that, either. Asking all the hard questions today. Not exactly what he'd planned. "I suppose we'd go back home. I would probably have a contract to finish, but then we could go back to Brno." She didn't look happy about that, but he supposed he wouldn't be, either, if it came to that. "We'd figure it out."

She nodded.

It occurred to Radek that may not be what was worrying her—not entirely. Because she was sixteen and a half. Her birthday was soon. He'd blink and she'd be done with high school. She couldn't stay here forever. She'd have to leave. And, he hoped, she'd want to. There wasn't much in terms of post-secondary education on Atlantis. He knew without any hesitation that she could get into any school she wanted, but that was back on Earth. And what would Radek do then? He'd been fine in a separate galaxy when Anna was safe at home with her mother—the social distance hurt less if he was physically far away. But if she was on Earth, living and learning and growing up and he could have been there, but he wasn't? Did he want to be here if she was potentially accessible on another planet in another galaxy?

He'd figure it out.

"Let's not borrow trouble, yes?" he said, patting his fingers on the back of her hand. "You don't have to worry about leaving Atlantis for a while."

She smiled at him, and he knew she was probably thinking the same thing he was. Shorter than you think.

"Let's go shoot something." Radek stood with a smile, and she followed.

It really was too early to be borrowing trouble. But today was a stark reminder that this year really had flown by. Anna would be eighteen before he thought to take his next breath. He didn't know where he'd be, then, but he hoped it would be something a little like this… work he loved and Anna close enough that he could reach her once a year or so…

#

Anna's contemplations of the future were mostly nonsense. At least, that was what she told herself. She didn't want to borrow trouble by dwelling on Radek's dubious safety, but there were distinct benefits of having him here over Rodney. Anna knew without having to wonder whether the advice he gave her was born from his wanting her to be happy, not smart or respected or successful because he had something to prove to the world. She was sure Rodney's help wouldn't come from a similar place, no matter how well-intentioned.

And she did need advice. It had occurred to her a few days ago, as a new school year dawned on Earth and she was keeping a faster pace than she had been on Earth, that she'd be ready for college by the end of this school year with a few exceptions… mostly in the English grammar and writing areas. She suspected she would need tutoring for that for the rest of her life. At least, compared to her excellence in math and science. She wanted to be called doktorka Zelenková someday, though, and that meant she would have to go back to Earth someday.

He'd probably understand that, too.

But if she went back to Earth as soon as she was ready, she'd miss a lot. Atlantis, of course. Iskaan, naturally. The puddle jumpers, and all the things she could only learn here. And… she'd miss her dad, too. That was part of growing up, but his work came with the very real possibility she could leave and never see him again.

And, of course, Radek would be too practical in his assessment of that situation, because what else could he be? Of course, he could die. That was always possible no matter where he was or what he was doing, and no amount of promises on his part was going to change that.

So in the hallway, for what must have seemed like no reason at all, she leaned into him for a hug.

Radek stopped walking, apparently confused, but he wrapped his arms around her anyway and didn't say anything for a few seconds. "Are you sure you're okay?" he asked finally.

Anna was sure she wasn't, but maybe she would tomorrow. "Yes."

He didn't believe her, and neither did she, but he accepted the answer in silence. At the moment, she appreciated that. She let go, and they turned into the shooting range nearest the 'gate room in the Central Tower. There was little to do on Atlantis as distracting as this.

The shooting range was as busy as normal, but Anna recognized a familiar voice among the others: Coughlin, standing at a rack of weapons next to a man in a military uniform. His flag shoulder was turned away, but she heard Coughlin speaking English, so it wasn't one of his German friends.

Coughlin apparently spotted Radek when they came in, gave his companion a light tap on the arm before pointing. Then Coughlin called, "Hey, Doc! Come here for a second?"

Anna followed Radek; she imagined following Coughlin's orders didn't have to be habit. He was commanding enough to pull the entire room off of what they were doing. As she did, Coughlin's companion turned and smiled at them.

He was young, Anna guessed still in his early twenties, with a shaved head and bright brown eyes. He showed his teeth when he smiled, and he said, "Hello, Doctor Zelenka. It's nice to finally meet you when I've heard so much about you."

"Very good," Anna heard Radek mutter under his breath. She smiled up at him as he recovered a pleasant expression and offered a hand for a handshake. "I don't think I want to know what stories Coughlin's been telling…"

"Only the good ones," Coughlin said with a wink, leaving it ambiguous whether good meant flattering or funny. "Doc, this is Lieutenant Edward Rivers, newly assigned to Lorne's recon team. Rivers, Doctor Zelenka. Or, affectionately, Radar."

Rivers chuckled. "Radar?"

"M*A*S*H." Radek waved that away, and if Rivers knew what that meant he made no indication. Radek interrupted any further comments on the so-called "good stories" by putting his hand on Anna's shoulder. "This is my daughter, Anna."

Rivers turned his attention to Anna, she thought, politely and with a nod of acknowledgement or familiarity. "Of course. Nice to meet you, too, Anna." When he extended his hand for a handshake, Anna noticed the British flag patch on his uniform.

"Nice to meet you, Lieutenant." His grip was strong, but his hands were smoother than she expected.

"Eddy's fine." His intense eye-contact made her think that, perhaps, permission to use the nickname was intended for her alone. At least in this little group of his colleagues plus one.

Anna smiled, and he smiled back. Since she was now thinking about it, she didn't remember Coughlin's first name, though she must have known it at some point… He didn't offer the same, and the next thing she noticed outside of Eddy letting go of her hands but not her eyes was Radek squeezing her shoulder.

Taking a deep breath, Anna looked up at Radek. He was staring at her, apparently deeply confused about something but also slightly amused.

A moment later, the expression was gone and Radek was looking at Coughlin. "Thank you for introducing me. I haven't heard anything about my assignment to Lorne's team, but…"

"Yeah, I haven't heard that, either." Coughlin interrupted, but looked at him like Radek was divulging a secret he didn't want told. "Good luck with your practice, Doc."

"I'll need it…" Radek muttered as he turned toward the rack of weaponry.

Anna wanted to say something about his not necessarily needing the luck, but a little bit here and there wouldn't hurt anything. He needed to stock up again after almost-dying.

It definitely didn't work like that.

Smiling a little to herself, she picked up one of the pistols, looked at it, and handed it Radek. She picked up one of her own. "The game is called Horse. Any hit outside the center of the target gets you a letter until you spell 'horse.' That's when you lose."

"Why not elephant?" Radek wondered.

Anna grinned. "Do you want to be here all day?"

Radek shrugged. "Do you?"

"We have to play chess, yet."

"Oh, I see. In that case, why not kůn?"

"That would be Pig. Same game but shorter," Anna offered, since that was the only contest she ever had with Sheppard anymore. They walked to the nearest open lane. "After practice, more letters are just… annoying."

"Prase a kůn? The same, but backwards."

"Alright, alright, stop stalling and shoot."

Radek took a shot, and the hole in the paper target at the end of the lane was just slightly off the center ring. He looked at her with a grin. "That's a P, then?"

Anna still wasn't sure what game they were playing, but she didn't ask or guess. Instead, she took aim and collected her first (and, she hoped, only) letter. She was wrong about how distracting it could be, even though it was loud. Maybe this was a bad idea, after all…

#

Radek had no doubt she'd let him win their game of Pig—the longer Czech version and not the three-letter English version. Either that or she was more distracted than he wanted to give credit for. The uncharacteristic quiet over lunch practically proved it. Still, it was delicious and he'd probably eaten a little too much.

"You know, I really think the whole city could use a vacation," he said as they climbed the stairs.

They were going to play chess. He was surprised, because that was more his thing than hers… even though she was very good at it. A whole school career of chess club came with plenty of strategy and experience.

To his surprise, Anna chuckled. "You know, I think you're right. But can you imagine? What would have to happen for these people to take a vacation?"

"Maybe if they're ordered to take vacation."

"You think?"

"We could test it. I do know the boss."

Anna giggled, and Radek tried to laugh, too… A tightness pulling at the inside of his ribs stopped him. From just about everything, for just a moment. Pausing on the stair, he tried to take a deep breath that didn't quite come. Take a step that wasn't quite there. "One moment…" he wheezed, and tried to ignore Anna looking at him in terror long enough to get his breath back.

"Are you okay?" She slid closer, wrapping an arm around him as she half-led, half-dragged him up the two remaining steps to the landing. The next second her hand was at her ear. "This is Anna Zelenková. Medical emergency in, um…" She looked up, apparently trying to figure out how to locate them between two levels.

Radek touched his earpiece. "Disregard that, medical. No emergency."

The next second, Carson was in both of their ears. "Are you sure? I don't mind coming to check."

"I'm sure. I overdid it only a little bit." He seized onto the railing and slowly let himself down to the floor. "We're fine. Thank you, Carson."

"Alright. Call if you need."

The nearly imperceptible buzz when the earpiece was active cut off, and he was alone again with the distinct impression that he was suffocating… kind of. Not really. The mild panic stopped when Carson responded faster than Anna could put a coherent sentence together, he realized breathing was just a bit harder. Not impossible. He could breathe, it just hurt a bit.

"What if it's collapsed again?" Anna whispered.

He leaned back against the wall underneath the railing just above his head. If he sat a little straighter, his head would easily rub up underneath it. "It's not."

"How do you know?"

"I know how it feels to have a collapsed lung. And, you know, it's better than other times. Give me a—"

"This happened before?" Anna almost shrieked, but it was still mostly a whisper. "Where was I?"

Instead of answering, he looked at her. Her eyes were glazed and she was gripping his fingers so tightly it competed for his attention with the pain in his chest. She blinked, belligerently wiping the tears on the back of her free hand and sucking in a broken breath as she did.

Something in Radek's chest hurt, and he was pretty sure it wasn't his lung after all. "Anna, what's wrong?"

"What if I was wrong? What if something happens to you because I wanted to stay on Atlantis so bad?" She sobbed into her wrist, shaking her head. "What if—"

"Anna, please." Pleased to find he could sigh without too much trouble or pain, Radek pulled her closer with her hand closed on his own like a vice. "Come here. You don't have to cry." That probably wasn't the thing to say…

He found himself wishing, rather inexplicably, that Eliška were here. She would have understood this, or at least been more comfortable with it. Maybe she remembered what it was like to be sixteen. He wasn't sure he did… seeing a big world looming with dangerous and exciting possibility and knowing inside he was too small to understand it even if he was the smartest person he knew… His little hometown, little home-country, little home-world shrank with every passing year.

Anna wiped her eyes with her jacket collar and shook her head. She apologized, but he didn't acknowledge it. There wasn't anything to apologize for.

"I'm afraid you think you have more control over the way things go than you do." That wasn't exactly what he wanted to say, since it sounded more condescending than what he'd been doing for. "And I don't mean… you wanted us to stay on Atlantis, but so did I. And I would have stayed here if you were on Earth with your mother."

"But not if I wanted to go back to Earth?"

"Well, maybe not," Radek allowed with a small nod. "Hard to tell. But my decisions will not be your fault... and you'll make lots of decisions in your life, and a lot of them aren't going to turn out the way you think." Though, to be fair, most decisions didn't come with the explicit possibility of someone dying.

That was for him to worry about.

Though, to be fair, he worried about things that weren't his, too. He'd worry about her future, what she'd do. Where she'd get her degrees, which jobs she'd take, who she'd marry or if she did. Despite his own failure in that area, he still hoped she did…

"What is this about?" he asked, not sure if he'd get an answer. At least, not the one he wanted. She had been morose for what felt like months now, definitely since his return from the dead and maybe even before. "Because I don't think it's just… well." He put his hand on his chest, above the scar that bothered him probably more than it should have. It was an annoying reminder of mortality whenever he put a shirt on. Thoughts too deep for early in the morning. "It's something else. Or at least something also."

The past month or two had been rough, so it could have been anything. She'd faced her own mortality, he'd faced his. She was still young, and her perspective on death was unfairly developed for her age.

"I'm just scared…" she whispered. She pressed her hands together and rested them on top of his.

And nothing he said would change what she was scared of. He nodded, patted her arm, and looked up at the ceiling. He was well enough to stand now, well enough that breathing was as difficult as it was on a regular basis, but there was something disarming about sitting on the floor. He doubted she'd have made that confession if they were still shooting for pigs and horses.

"What is today, anyway?" she asked a moment later, glancing up.

"Oh… one year ago today I picked you up at the airport in Denver." He shrugged, figuring there was no reason to keep the secret anymore. Especially since his not-a-medical-emergency might have cut the rest of the day short. "Kind of like a birthday."

Anna finally smiled a little, and nodded. "Any excuse for chocolate-chip pancakes?"

He chuckled. "Exactly."

He might have said more, but suddenly Rodney chattered in his ear. "This is McKay. Zelenka, where are you?"

"I'm, uh…" Radek looked around. It was his turn to be mystified about where they were. Was this level twenty-two-and-a-half? "Central Tower," he started, but didn't get to finish.

"Anna's with you, right?"

Looking at Anna, as if to make sure she was, in fact, with him, he felt his brow twist in confusion and heart shudder with worry. "Yes, she's here. Why? Is everything okay?"

"Oh, yeah, you know, just Michael is running through the base trying to escape." Rodney paused, seeming to think about what he said. Or else giving Radek a chance to respond. Or stand up. "I don't know where he thinks he's going. Ronon's after him, so—anyways, you'd better come to the lab, you know, just to be safe."

"We're on our way." Radek put his feet under him and held a hand out for Anna to take it—though, in retrospect, he wasn't sure why. He expected one of them would be hurrying and the other one would be dragged along behind. "Let's go to the lab, darling."

"What's wrong?"

"Turns out the human might actually be a Wraith, after all."

"I hate it when I'm right…" Rodney sighed in his ear.

"It was originally Teyla, wasn't it?" Radek wondered, only to keep his mind off the rest of the half-flight of stairs he had to climb. Anyways, he did remember Rodney telling Radek what Teyla thought of the situation. She wasn't friendly to the idea, either. "We'll see you in a few minutes," Radek said before Rodney could object that, no, he could be right all the time without any help at all, thank you.

"Okay, just stick to the main corridors and don't go anywhere near the infirmary. I'm locking the place down as soon as you get here so pick up the pace."

"Thank you." The buzz went dead again, and Radek and Anna climbed the stairs.

"Shouldn't we go home?" Anna asked.

"Aren't we?" It was a joke, and he gave her a grin to make sure she knew it. Because, honestly, it almost wasn't a joke some days.

Anna's smile almost broke through her past tears for a laugh, but not quite. "Good point. I can show you what I've been doing with the chip room if we get stuck for a few hours."

"I'd like that."

Radek and Anna spent an hour and a half locked in Rodney's lab with him and the rest of his staff unfortunate enough to be working there when the alert went out. Rodney gave them an update on his trip to Taranis, though there wasn't much to say, and kept them updated on what was going on with Michael that he apparently heard through Sheppard. One of the soldiers was killed.

They made it back to their quarters without any more excitement. Dinner was quiet and they played chess. Anna won the first one, but she scolded him for letting her. Radek won the next handily, but he didn't scold her when she didn't want to play anymore because of it.

"Is there anything else you wanted to do?" he asked when the room was pink with the sunset. "Since the day is almost over."

Anna glanced out the window. "Actually, can we?"

She didn't give Radek a chance to answer before she ran off to her room. It wasn't too long before she made it back out with her violin. She waited for him to follow all the way to the deserted control room. By some stroke of fortune, Chuck was sitting there with his sketchbook.

"Anna, Doctor Z. What are you two doing here?" He looked between them.

"I was hoping I could play in the 'gate room. Would that be okay?" Anna asked.

Chuck grinned. "Why not? Pull up a chair." He glanced at Radek before he turned to a new page in his sketchbook.

Anna cantered down the stairs to the Stargate. Radek made it to the balcony just in time to see her reach the bottom of the stairs and stand just beyond the wide circle on the floor. Tossing her hair aside, she placed the instrument under her chin and raised her bow.

"What are you going to play?" Radek called at her from the balcony.

He could see Anna smile. "I don't know. Maybe something new."

Radek leaned on the railing overlooking the Stargate next to Chuck while Anna played. He didn't know what it was, but it was lovely. Chuck's sketch that he'd given him forever ago didn't quite do the real thing justice, but it was pretty close. And he liked having it sitting on his desk.

"Good day?" Chuck asked.

Radek nodded, but didn't say anything else. Chuck went back to his chair, leaving Radek alone with his thoughts and the haunting sounds of a lively violin.

It had really been a year… His little girl was sixteen and a half, and he was creeping up on forty. It might have been time for a midlife crisis, but he'd already had enough of crisis. His mind wandered over the beginnings of the algorithm Rodney shared with him a few days ago—not that he needed help, of course. He never needed help. At least, he'd never admit it even if he did. But it was an interesting idea, and they both liked interesting ideas. Turned out they had more in common when it came to things they liked than Radek gave credit.

The song filled the 'gateroom, a melody he only recognized because he'd heard Anna hum it before. He could have hummed along, but he just listened until the end.

Anna lowered her bow and looked up at him. "Any requests?"

He shook his head. She couldn't stop time or stop growing up, at least not using her violin. Radek couldn't think of anything he possibly could have wanted.

Next time: We don't speak the same language, but we're learning.