Trying By Kriadydragon (Scars Challenge)

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Title: Trying
Author: Kriadydragon
Rating: PG, gen
Character: John Sheppard
Spoilers: Common Ground and a few season two episodes.
Synopsis: Character study and mental scarring - John has some trust issues, but he's trying not to.

A/N: I'm reusing the "Sheppard's dad had PTSS" past. I just really like that potential past.

Trying

John's dad had tried, he gives him credit for that. The promises made that the next place they moved to would be better were sixty/forty at best; good and mediocre or just plain bad. Sheppard was smart enough even at the tender age of five to know that the broken promises were because his dad was just attempting to make him feel better, give him hope.

Mr. Sheppard hit an abrupt limit after Mrs. Sheppard's coma-inducing car-wreck. He'd come across as too cheerful, too confident, shoving hope into ten-year-old John's face. When she died without any need for plugs to be pulled, John approached any promise made by his father like it would bite him.

John had tried, though. Even if he didn't believe everything that came out of his father's mouth, he had least offered a smile, just to pretend he did. He'd been dumb enough to buy into the one promise that he thought was a given: that they still had each other. Then child services carted John off to his grandparent's because of a psychological illness caused by a war that his father was no longer fighting, but sometimes still thought he was. A war John was too young to fight but nearly killed by anyway via the scars it had left on his father's sanity.

John didn't blame his dad. He loved his dad, but didn't hold to his grandfather's promise of one day being with his father again.

His dad died a year later in a drunk-driving accident.

---------------------------

Sheppard was pretty sure he was spiting fate, or at least the majority of people who had bad-mouthed his father, when he joined the Air-force, because he could have settled for being an airline pilot. He'd even contemplated (more as a joke, really) piloting flight tours over the Grand Canyon. The fact remained that he loved flying, and didn't care how he went about taking himself to the skies.

He was a captain when he was first shot down. His co-pilot, Eddie, was the kind of guy who was everyone's buddy, like the popular kid in Highschool. He was a man who knew all the best jokes, the best movies, the right things to say. He was raunchy, a flirt, a bad influence on everyone as well as being everyone's big brother, promising to watch over them. So it was easy to assume him the type to have a completely cool head under pressure.

When the chopper went down after the tail was hit, John was pinned, smashed between the controls and the chair. Eddie panicked, kept yelling at John to stop all his moaning, whimpering, and pleads for help. Then he took off running at the sharp echo of weapon's-fire. Took off and left John to die. Except John didn't die. The gun fire was the cavalry coming to the rescue. They found John, stabilized him, whisked him away to safety and slapped him back together.

Eddie came to visit him and apologize. John was too weak to slug him in the face, so settled on flashing the middle finger, which was the only limb not splinted or in a cast.

------------------------------

Sheppard was pretty sure that it was the crash that had been the final straw for Angie. He blames himself for not being there more, not talking more, giving her the attention she needed – not trying harder. He'd taken her presence and support for granted and kept her awake at nights both worrying about him and hating him for making her worry. He still wishes she'd been the one to ask for a divorce first instead of finding peace of mind in another man's arms. John could have handled that. At least, he was pretty sure he could have. Sheppard sucked at marriage, but he vowed that should he ever marry again he would never do to the next Mrs. Sheppard what Angie had done to him. Split limbs and a crushed ribcage hadn't hurt as bad as the day Angie had decided to be honest with him.

---------------------------------

When John was a Major, he'd been put under the command of a man who was an ass and an idiot. The mission no CO would send a man into, Lt. Colonel Miller did while he hung back to bark orders from the safety of the command center. The other officers had told him it was a bad idea. John had told him it was a bad idea, even laying out the strategic flaws in plain English, using a map of the terrain as a visual. At the first hysterical relay of Alpha team being pinned under enemy fire, Miller gave the mission up for lost. John, pissed, didn't care and disobeyed a direct order for the first time in his life.

He kept his rank but got a pay-cut and new digs in the coldest place on earth. But at least he still got to fly. He chuckled often whenever he started to wonder if he should have just taken a job in flying tours.

Sheppard never thought about flying tours again after sitting in an alien chair, then being hurled across the universe to another galaxy.

----------------------------

Because it's something new, something special, something that has flipped his reality, he wants it to be different, so he tries. Except he's not sure if he knows how to try anymore. He disobeys Weir's orders without a second thought or any remorse until he's promoted to Lt. Colonel, knowing full-well the woman he disobeyed was the reason for the new rank. He's given an opportunity to trust when McKay asks him to. John's not really mad even after nearly getting blown into atoms by a super weapon. But he can't help thinking about his dad during his mom's coma years, Eddie screaming at him to shut up before running away, and his former wife telling him she's been seeing another man. He lingers on these same memories when he's supposed to be meditating with the rest of the people of the Cloister. It's so tempting, so much easier, to simply lock trust away rather than hand it out. Less painful, like covering a scab to keep from picking at it and making it worse.

But he's trying.

He's allied himself with a wraith, for crying out loud; putting his life, literally, into its hands.

And he's rewarded for it, made young again.

He says his people will find them.

They do, eventually, even if they are a little late.

John doesn't think twice about trusting Teyla or Ronon. McKay's ego is something to be wary of, but John figures that if he didn't really trust McKay – honestly had no faith in him – then he wouldn't have gotten into that pod on the Aurora, or say out loud life-saving and impossible plans only McKay can pull off.

So John is trying, and he's pretty sure he's getting better at it.

Comments

[gemmi999.livejournal.com]

Hi. Interesting fic. = ]

I liked a lot of it, thought it was strong and could be worked on to make it even stronger. The last section especially was moving, with John learning how to trust all over again and realizing its a process. The last sentence capped it off perfectly as well.

There are a few problem areas, though. The first section seems to flitter between who's telling the story. It's clearly John's voice, but he would never refer to his parents as Mr. and Mrs. Sheppard. I understand that their names aren't known, and you probably didn't want to give them made up names. That paragraph, through, detracts and almost makes me want to stop reading (which would be horrible and awful and beyond stupid because the last section is just so...wonderful).

I like how you explain the orders thing, especially how John relates it to Elizabeth. I liked how you made his scar this emotional/instinctual response to never trust people, and how despite it being this formidable scar, its slowly breaking down. You nailed that so beautifully.

And I liked the past you gave him. I never think about John's past, and you gave him this history that you can see him stumbling along in.

Seriously.

There are some gramatical mistakes, but nothing too big. Just have a beta check on your comma usage, or go through yourself and question the use of each and every one.

Thanks for sharing. I look forward to reading more of your work. = ]

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thanks for your input. I'll probably be changing that problem area later. I was actually having trouble with it from the start.

Until John has an actual past to go by, I'm taking advantage of all the possibilities of why he is the way he is. Especially since there's a good chance the show will probably do something cliche.

[leesa_perrie]

Really liked this story - thought the background you gave John was well thought out, and loved the last bit, especially the last line. Sometimes it's easy for a McKay-centric fan like me to forget that Sheppard has trust issues as well. Thanks for the reminder!

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thanks for reading.

[wildcat88.livejournal.com]

Really nice. His hesitancy to trust comes through very well. I especially like how "he's pretty sure he's getting better at it."

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

[blackpapertiger.livejournal.com]

Nice. Good background for Sheppard, and works very well with everything that we see him do. I'm actually very fond of your dad with PTSS history, it's interesting and really works with the character. The ending was a nice sharp jab as well.

The one thing I would say, is that if you've got a story so tightly in John's perspective, you might want to have him only refer to himself as John. I'm not sure it's a necessary change, but it would probably improve the feeling of John's voice... if that makes sense.

Otherwise, I really liked it a lot, your concepts are solid, and it does sound like John, just kind of wandering his way through his life, trying to do his best. Good job!

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

I like your suggestion. The interesting thing about this story is that when I first thought it up, I considered it being told from someone else's perspective, like someone telling his biography. So my mindset kept dwelling on that while writing this. I'm also not used to this style of writing as I prefer deeper descriptions to painting a quick verbal picture.