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sga_flashficAuthor:
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comanche_riderCharacters: Sheppard
Rating: G
Genre/Pairing: Past + Future fic. John/Atlantis, John/Jumper
Spoliers: Not that I know of.
Summary: Sometimes he thinks of himself as being like the ice, a brother shunned from the warmth of the sun, but even he doesn’t want to be that cold.
Author's notes: First time posting anything here. Mainly written at 9 PM, and no beta, so all mistakes are mine, including the 'WTF' atmosphere of the whole thing. I'll be over here hiding in the corner. XD
He remembers the taste of Chartreuse, bitter with citrus and with a peppermint undertone, like an early Christmas morning. The sky here is that color, rising high over the ice and arching dark where the sun barely shines. White ice, but with a cerulean sheen that many didn’t notice. He thinks it’s beautiful, because it reminds him of home - of October afternoons spent gazing at wispy autumn clouds and dreaming of flight.
It’s freezing here, he’s never doubted that. He thinks of the cold in colors, too. But the cold here transcends the simple whiteness most people perceive when they think of cold. Here it’s straight on to the burn of frostbite, purple to red to black, the ebony black of the night sky, but without the stars or the ice or the glaciers rising on the horizon. Before, the cold was just a bother. Now it was a danger, fingers scrambling to get in through the cracks at night, the dull moan of pipes close to splitting. The others dealt with it; he respects it, respects it for the protection it is, because everyone else has to get through it to get to him.
Sometimes he thinks of himself as being like the ice, a brother shunned from the warmth of the sun, but even he doesn’t want to be that cold. If he was, then they’d have all the more reason to shun him.
He doesn’t regret what he did. He doesn’t regret his exile. He does regret that he didn’t get them out alive, but that’s something he only thinks about late at night, when he’s distracting himself from the blizzard outside. In between Johnny Cash songs he replays that moment in his head, but he never does it differently. There was nothing else to do.
They say the cold can make you see things. He once thought he could make a quick trip outside his cabin without more than a light sweater on. When they talked of hallucinations, they never talked of this, of gleaming spires rising from the ice, windows sparkling, scintillating brilliantly in the half light. This time, it didn’t feel like home – home was a place you went to for comfort, left when you wanted to taste something else – it felt like a place where you would always want to be, where nothing could touch you but at the same time you could feel every molecule you’d ever dreamt of feeling.
He blinks and it’s gone, and he feels empty, until he goes back inside and warms up, humming Ring of Fire. The cold and regret don’t grip him that night. He sleeps and dreams of flying cities and chartreuse skies.
~~~~*~~~~
He remembers the feel of the cold wind on his face, biting at his cheeks, small bits of dry, hard snow lodged in his pores. He imagines he can feel it now as turbulence shakes him, the atmosphere resisting entrance. He knows he’s broken it when it’s just a dull tremble, and outside stained glass the shield no longer burns with friction. Stretched out before the earth, he descends, whiteness coming up to meet him, spires trembling and cargo – human beings, precious cargo – hanging on for dear life. He’s disconnected from them now, he’s in the city and the city is in him. The city’s always been in him.
They’re coming home, but he doesn’t think about that. He savors this moment, the city tugging at his very soul. She wants him to stay, to take her place, wants him to wait thousands of years while his spires freeze and human kind forgets him, until the next voyagers come and the process begins again. He knows that if he does, he won’t be alone.
People are yelling in his ear, but he’s no longer listening, because the ice is getting closer and he can already feel the chill in the air, sky rising up around him and locking him in, stars fading away. To the others it’s more of a crash, but to him it’s a dull thud as his hyper drives sink into the ice. He’s had worse.
His windows are almost instantly frosted, but the cold is welcome, and he embraces it – it can’t hurt him anymore. His back arches – his piers groan – he gasps – he sinks into the ice and stops with a final metallic hiss. The body – not his, now foreign and strange – goes limp in his chair. He powers down, and she (Atlantis, sister, mother, friend, he’s not sure what she is anymore) guides him to sleep.
He dreams of cool silence, of bodies moving (always moving, always circulating), and he feels their horror and sadness. He wants to tell them its better this way, but he’s isolated. Maybe it’s just the never-ending cover of snow around him, but he feels colder now, now that he can feel time moving at a different pace. He’d never realized before, just how short human lives were. The gene is almost absent in the next group, but he opens his doors wide. She doesn’t like this. She wants only her own, wants another John – she’s not the same, not anymore, now that she knows every part of his presence. He thinks he knows how the Ancients left her so easily.
~~~~*~~~~
He remembers his first big blizzard, lasting through a long Antarctic night, remembers being stuck in his chopper for hours, shivering. They’d known it was coming, but not gotten back fast enough. Sometimes he can still hear the slow crackle of the windows icing over, visibility going from clear and bright to zero in seconds. He remembers his teeth chattering as he frantically tried to keep his hands and feet warm.
He remembers wishing he could be high above it, out of the storm, like he is now. His drive pods retract, and he waits high above the Earth. Atlantis calls to him, but he ignores her, because he loves her, yes, but he loves flying more. And if anyone saw a pilot-less Jumper over the ice – well, it wouldn’t be the first time (or the last).
“Joy is not in things; it is in us.”
-Richard Wagner
begin as you mean to go on
Date: 2008-01-22 09:59 pm (UTC)Re: begin as you mean to go on
Date: 2008-01-22 10:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-23 03:52 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-23 04:31 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-24 07:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-01-24 07:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-04 07:13 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-02-04 07:49 pm (UTC)I'm glad you liked it, anyway. XD
(no subject)
Date: 2008-07-15 05:03 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-07-15 05:12 am (UTC)