sga_flashfic | Documentation Challenge: Atlantis Help Desk, by Dizz

dizzycadence.livejournal.com posting in

Title: Atlantis Help Desk (for the documentation challenge)
Author:

dizzycadence
Gen (*gasp*) with a smidge of profanity and a few spooked scientists.
Wordcount: 2200-ish
Warnings: Um, it's been a long time since I've written anything? Feedback is adored.

Dedicated to every IT monkey who has ever had to hold down the Help Desk. Bless your tortured little hearts.

Extra thanks to

navisx for being my initial beta, which entailed very patiently pointing out every time I had made up a word. Thanks, dude. (Any remaining errors are mine, and feel free to point them out. A girl has to learn somehow.)

Rodney was already three hours and two pots of coffee into his morning when he realized this was going to be a bad day.

“Dr McKay? Come see me in my office, please.” Elizabeth’s voice always flowed like water, but sometime between 2am and second breakfast it had become frosty and sharp.

Icicles are the perfect murder weapon, Rodney thought. Followed by, Coffee. Need more coffee.

He’d walked (run) to Elizabeth’s office from the lab enough times that even on two hours of sleep Rodney managed not to bump into any walls or wayward marines.

When Rodney saw the look on Elizabeth’s face, though, and the extra radio on the desk by her elbow, he suddenly wished he had. Delaying the inevitable was starting to sound really good.

“Rodney.”

“No.”

“Rodney.”

McKay began ticking off points on his fingers.

“I'm too important, I have a pile of almost-as-important work waiting for me in the lab, it's possibly the one thing in this galaxy I am not qualified to do and, oh yeah, I'm completely lacking in interpersonal skills."

“Rodney. It’s your turn. You’re more than qualified, and you of all people should understand the gravity of this undertaking. Until Dr Dobson--”

“Ha! Doctor of magic smoke and IRC chatrooms!”

“—is able to use his hands again, you are it. All other qualified personnel have already done their part, except for you. Dr Zelenka complained a great deal less, I might add.”

“That’s because no one knows when he’s saying, ‘Fuck you!’ in Czech!”

“Dr McKay!”

“Elizabeth…”

“Rodney.”

“….augh.”

--

Rodney’s new radio chirped not more than two seconds after he’d gotten it on, which was, admittedly, when he was already halfway down to the infirmary to get, on Elizabeth’s orders, the details of his sentence.

“Rodney.” A clipped Indian accent came over the line, zero to superior in two syllables or less. Rodney gritted his teeth against the beginnings of a migraine.

“Hello, Elias.”

“I hear our dear Dr Weir has finally convinced you that keeping Atlantis’ computer systems running is a worthwhile endeavor.”

“Yes, well, she bribed me with a pudding snack.” Prick.

“If you care at all about doing your job well, you will meet me in the infirmary in five minutes to go over the necessary procedures I’ve prepared.”

And I can tell you exactly where to stick them, Rodney thought, but the line had already clicked shut.

“Augh!”

Several newly transplanted scientists skittered out of Rodney’s way, wide-eyed with visceral terror.

--

“—and be sure to document all cases and solutions.”

“I’ve seen the Help Desk documentation before, Elias. Don’t tell me you’re expecting the great Canadian novel.”

“Several of the other stand-ins have proved perfectly capable of turning in lucid and, indeed, helpful reports, Dr McKay.” Elias Dobson glared over an elbow as he maneuvered the entire traction apparatus to push his glasses back up his nose.

“Who? Gray wrote one report, ‘It’s all gone pear-shaped,’ and disappeared for two weeks. Libby typed ‘Fish’ four hundred times and fai—passed out.”

“A poor attempt at humor on her part. And Gray got better.”

“Still leaving you oh-for-two on the coherency count, Doctor.”

“Dr Zelenka’s reports were quire readable, I assure you.”

“And in Czech.”

Dobson sighed with all the force of generations of good breeding, and pushed his glasses up his nose again.

“You will be fine, Rodney. You will remember to breathe, you will write me irritating but serviceable reports, you will not terrorize Atlantis staff anymore than their computers already do, and I will rest comfortably in a cloud of painkillers and the knowledge that Atlantis’ core systems are safe in your very capable hands.”

“Oh. Well.”

“And if you do not stop stealing my mashed potatoes, you will get a cast upside the head.”

“Going!”

--

The morning had been quiet so far, with only one break from coffee to berate a pair of botanists for not plugging their laptops into a power source before they went off traipsing through the daisies.

One of the “daisies” had tried to eat Dr Parrish, but still.

Rodney’s radio chirped.

“Atlantis Help Desk, this is Rodney McKay,” he said, checking equations from his latest project with one hand and drinking from an over-sized mug with the other.

There was a pause, a quiet, strangled sort of scream, and the line - *click* - went dead.

Rodney grinned. There’d been a lot of that, too.

--

It hadn’t been a full two minutes before the Help Desk radio beeped again with the enthusiasm and noise level of a sugar-addled toddler.

“Help Desk. Rodney McKay.”

Rodney waited for the screaming.

“Um?”

Oh no…

“Yes?”

"Is this where I call for computer help?"

"Only if spinning around three times in a supply closet under a full moon didn't work."

"Okay. Um. I'm new? From on the Daedelus? And, I got my username and authorization codes and a WEP key for the chemistry wifi? Only, my computer won't turn on."

Rodney took his other hand off the keyboard to pinch the bridge of his nose. Prime numbers. Yes, count the primes. Think of chocolate. Anything but migraines.

"Your computer won't turn on."

"Yeah, um, it won't plug in right?"

McKay lost focus on his data as his eyes crossed.

"My god, are you asking me or telling me?"

"It won't plug in! I tried! The metal... thingy... is the wrong shape!"

"There are two galaxies worth of things that could have meant, but I'm going to make a hazardous assumption here and say you can’t find where the cord goes in the wall."

"Um, I did? Only, it won't go in."

"..."

"Hello?"

"Tell me, where did you get your computer?"

"Oh, there was this really neat computer store in Osaka before the trip to McMurdo and--"

Rodney groaned.

"You are not to touch that poor machine until further notice. You are then to find someone who knows anything about electricity and what kind of voltage they use in Japan. But not Miko, she has better things to do. You will then beg that person forgiveness for intruding upon their time, and have them help figure out what adaptor to order to be shipped on the Daedelus. Until then, you are not to touch anything more live than a light bulb, got it?"

"Okay?"

*click*

Dear Elias,

One of the chemists is suffering from a malfunctioning brain. I have restricted him to equipment without on switches until further notice. You can thank me later.

-McKay.

Rodney settled back into editing equations for a whole five minutes before the radio went off again.

“Atlantis IT,” he growled, “This is Dr McKay, head scientist and destroyer of Wraith.”

“Rodney!” Cadman’s voice was brimming with glee.

“Oh god.”

*click*

McKay buried his face in his hands. Not her. Not now.

When his main radio chirped for attention, Rodney tapped it on with a sigh of relief. Finally, he thought, some real work.

“So they finally got you on Help Desk, huh, McKay? You should have told me. I would’ve sent flowers and an EMP device.”

“Does your witchdoctor boyfriend know you’re giving me aneurysms, Lieutenant?” Rodney manfully resisted the urge to bang his head on the edge of the desk.

“He considers it a perfectly valid use of free time, and would do it himself if he weren’t just going to have to give you the Advil anyway.”

“This is why you never get Christmas cards, Cadman.” Shiny, hard table… so inviting…

“Call me Laura, McKay,” her voice was almost manically cheerful. “I mean, I’ve seen you naked.”

He’d tell Carson he hit his head saving some Athosian children from a poorly placed flight of stairs.

“Do you actually have a computer problem, Lieutenant, or are you just calling to torment me?”

"Ah! Right!" Rodney heard a bit of shuffling in the background, and what sounded suspiciously like a passing marine being relieved of their radio headset. Rodney's second radio chirped.

*tap*

"Can you hear me now?"

"Oh god, it's torture in stereo..." McKay slumped forward in defeat, pinned between a Laura Cadman in each ear.

“Buck up, McKay. At least these things don’t give off feedback.”

"And your computer problem was...?"

"Jesus, Rodney," Laura said brightly, "you'd think you were trying to get rid of me."

"Only once Carson is divested of all scalpels and bone saws, Lieutenant."

"Snap away, Crankypants. I just wanted to let you know that one of the Marines bought a Mac while they were on leave and is having trouble getting on the network, since all we have are Windows and UNIX instructions, and one glimpse of the command line nearly gave him a coronary."

"Oh. Great."

*thumpthumpthump*

It was kind of pressure relieving…

"And, if you'd let me finish, I've got it covered. He might call radio you from the mess in a few minutes, but I'm planning to do the setup manually while he's a lunch. Just a heads up, so you know you don't have to deal with it."

"Goddess," Rodney breathed, head still swimming from the fight with the desk edge.

"Pull the other one, McKay. It's got bells on."

--

Four hours later, and Rodney had never been more ready for Elias Dobson’s obnoxious ass to be up and running things again. Zelenka had snuck him some not-quite-gingerbread from the mess, but Rodney’s mood had gotten progressively more morose as he witnessed what he thought ought to be terminal stupidity from military and science staff alike.

“He thought I deleted it,” McKay said into his umpteenth mug of coffee.

“I minimized it to get to the desktop, and he thought I’d deleted it.”

“Ah. Yes,” said Radek, patting Rodney’s shoulder awkwardly. When McKay just stared blankly into the depths of his beverage, Zelenka grabbed his own remaining portion of dessert and beat a hasty retreat.

“A PhD!” Rodney yelled, waving his mug in vague stabbing motions. “Deleted! AUGH!”

--

Elias,

I don’t know whose ingenious idea it was to set up a computer terminal on the mainland, but I have just spent half an hour on the radio trying to explain a mouse to Halling before some merciful soul finally put Jinto on the line.

You can start feeling better any time now.

-McKay

PS: I bet Simpson could code voice recognition software for you. The ventilation problem in the gym can wait.

--

Not even Colonel Sheppard letting him cheat at digital poker was helping.

J: Look, Rodney, I’d swap places with you, but something tells me you’d find Lorne’s 3 hour report on the agricultural wonders of PX4-86 even more torturous.

McKay scowled at his screen.

R: You don’t understand, Colonel. I’m surrounded by *idiots*.

And he was. The ineptitude he had witnessed today alone was staggering.

J: You’re always surrounded by idiots, buddy.

R: But at least before I was blissfully unaware of it!

--

When one of the newer offworld teams got locked inside their ‘jumper, it was almost a relief. There was yelling, throwing of minor tools, Zelenka swearing in Czech, and fixing of actual, tangible problems.

Practically cathartic.

And so when the tiny female marine hugged Rodney out of pure joy at being released from her incredibly cushy prison, he very nearly hugged her back.

--

*chirp*

“Help Desk, McKay. If this is Matthias again, I still won’t help you get the correct codecs for your porn. My price stands at 20 Snickers.”

“Dr McKay.”

The voice was warm, with an almost audible smile. Rodney sat up so fast he was sure he’d fractured something.

“Elizabeth!”

“Doing well, I trust?”

Rodney rolled his eyes, taking his attention off the incredibly detailed stick figure deaths he’d been drafting for certain Atlantis personnel. He was running out of post-its, anyway.

“Reasonably so. Though I loathe to think of how many breakthroughs I could have accomplished today were I not stuck babysitting the most computer illiterate expedition of all time.”

“Ah,” said Elizabeth. “Speaking of which, I was wondering if you could remind me of the path to the folder for the Athosian tea recipes the anthropologists collected.”

He sputtered a moment, and pulled up his hastily crafted server map.

“It’s… hmmm. \\atlnas\humanities\anthropology\research\food\athos\tea”

“Thank you, Rodney.”

“My pleasure.”

*click*

Rodney sighed and crumpled his post-its into the Ancient wastepaper bin.

It had been little things all day, nothing that really required his massive brainpower to solve. He’d recovered lost email, convinced Miko to switch to OpenOffice, explained to a marine that, yes, fdisk was a really bad idea, trounced John at poker eight times, and rebooted a wireless access point. The only remotely interesting thing had been getting the biology team to shoo Sheppard out while they restarted their equipment so that the Ancient devices their laptops were connected to would actually power down all the way.

He’d hardly done anything to advance even the pathetic field of computer science, let alone the good of Atlantis.

His email dinged, and Rodney brought up his communications desktop.

Rodney,

I have been assured by Elizabeth that you are doing an excellent job, and that I should stop worrying about you breaking something simply to make a point.

Also, your miserable Caltech boyfriend has been visiting the infirmary and inquiring as to my health. My arms are broken, Rodney. They were broken 5 minutes ago, and, five minutes from now, when he asks me again, I am certain they will still be broken.

-Elias Dobson, PhD, Atlantis SyAdmin, MIT professor Emeritus. (As dictated to M. Bellafonte, R.N.)

Rodney memorized the email before deleting it.

--

The night was just about to slide over into unofficial after-hours – and freedom – when the Help Desk radio gave one last hopeful chirp.

“Help Desk, this is McKay. What is your major malfunction?”

“McKay! Do you have any idea how many priority emails I have sent? I have been trying to reach you for over six hours, and my work is vital--“

Rodney munched a powerbar and browsed through his junk mail filter. Yup, twenty seven emails from Kavanaugh, all marked “URGENT.”

“—simply unacceptable level of negligence in the line of important duties—“

Rodney careful peeled the second radio from around his ear, and set it on the desk. It was still ranting weakly.

“—have you know that this will be included in my report for the next databurst. Your behavior is simply not such as is befitting for head scientist of the expedition, and I will be lodging a formal—“

It was rhythmic, almost soothing, really. There was a steady pattern of rise and fall, shrill and shriller.

Rodney leaned back, took a sip of the tea Elizabeth had brought him, and conducted with his pencil.

--END--