Being Real (Fic - PG - John/Rodney)

[ldyanne.livejournal.com]

Title: Being Real
Author: Lady Anne
Pairing: John/Rodney
Rating: PG
Length: 3,200 words (more or less)
Summary: John is injured and far from home.
Author’s Notes: This is set in the AU where Elizabeth and Carson didn’t die.

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

"I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. But the Skin Horse only smiled.

From The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams

~~~~~~~

John fumbled with his belt, his fingers stiff and uncoordinated, slick with blood. He swore as he tried to get the belt off and his fingers slipped again. It was only a belt, he’s done this hundreds of times, every night in fact. Usually he doesn’t have to think about it. Usually Rodney it was Rodney’s fingers there doing it for him. But not tonight. John’s pretty glad Rodney’s not here. Not now. He’d be yelling something fierce.

Something like, “You just couldn’t do it, could you? One mission where you don’t come back beaten and bruised. That’s all I ask. Just look at you.” But then Rodney would help with his belt and wrap it around the hole in John’s leg with gentle, caring fingers. He’d snug it tight and bandage John’s leg. Then he’d kiss John and they’d make it back to Atlantis. But Rodney’s not here, and John has to do it on his own.

He took a deep breath and tried to calm the shaking of his hands. That was part of the problem, the fact that his hands wouldn’t stop shaking. He let his head fall back against the sturdy wall of the barn that was pretty much the only thing keeping him upright. If the wall weren’t there, John would be on his ass, because his balance was for shit. Most of his weight was balanced precariously on his good leg and all of his weight was leaned against the wall.

It was dark and quiet in the barn. John didn’t know what it was really used for because there weren’t any animals and it didn’t carry even the faintest whiff of animal smell that the farms back on Earth had. It probably wasn’t even a barn, but that’s what it looked like to John with its wooden frame and floor. It even had a loft like a farm he’d worked at when he was a teenager, building character, his father said. John really didn’t mind that he had to get a job that summer when his dad was trying to punish him for being his own person. He’d enjoyed the physical labor, the sense of being able to take care of himself. It had eventually led him to Atlantis, but that was a long, long road. At the moment John just had to get his damn belt off and around his leg to try and get the bleeding under control.

The door of the barn opened spilling in a little light. It was barely lighter outside with the overcast night and a misty rain casting a pall over everything.

“John,” Teyla called softly. He could barely see her in the doorway, but her voice was concerned. “Do you require assistance?”

“I’m good,” he answered automatically.

“John?” He couldn’t see Teyla frown, but he knew it was there just from the tone of her voice. “We must hurry.”

John knew she was right. He fumbled again with the belt. This time he succeeded in getting it unfastened.

“How’s Ronon doing?” John asked Teyla because he thought she expected some sort of answer from him.

“He is leading those who follow us away from here. But I do not know how long he’ll be able to maintain the ruse. You must…”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it the first time, Teyla. I need to hurry. You just keep watch outside and I’ll take care of this. Just… give me a minute or two more.”

“Very well,” she said. And John just knew her lips were pressed together tight in worry. “Please call me if you need any assistance.”

“You’ll be the first to know,” John assured her.

What little light had flowed through the door was gone when Teyla shut it behind her. John was plunged into darkness again. He took a deep breath and another.

This wasn’t the worst wound he’d ever had, and it probably wasn’t the last. He didn’t know why he was shaking so damn much.

“Shock?” The voice in his head that spoke with Rodney’s voice said. “You idiot, you need to get the bleeding stopped and then you need to get back to Atlantis. And don’t die.”

John let a small smile tug at his lips. Back to Atlantis and Rodney, it was a plan.

He finally got the belt around his leg. As he pulled it tight, the pain spiked through him, sharp and bright. He almost lost it then, he felt the world narrow around him and grow grey at the edges. But then the belt was as snug as he could make it. He bit through his lip trying not to cry out. He tasted the sharp metallic taste of copper as the blood slid down his throat. He moaned, afraid that he was going to throw up and really, really not wanting to.

“Colonel Sheppard, this is Atlantis base. Please come in.” The voice in his ear startled him. John almost face planted as he lost his balance. He had the wall to hold him up though and he breathed through the pain until he could speak.

“John, please come in.” Elizabeth’s voice replaced the gate tech’s. John tapped his radio.

“Atlantis, this is Sheppard. Elizabeth, what’s up?” He did his best to keep his tone even and calm, but he really didn’t think he was fooling anyone.

“John, your team is late to check in by about an hour. Is everything alright?” John heard the unspoken question in her voice.

While John didn’t normally like being rescued, he’d make an exception just this once. “Yeah, you might want to have Lorne get a team together,” he answered her. “We’re going to need the back up to get through the gate.”

“They’re already prepared. They’re just standing by for your word.”

“Okay, yeah.” John let his head thunk back against the solid wall. He hadn’t let himself hope that Atlantis would come to their rescue. His team was pretty good at getting out of the messes they got themselves into. Usually it was his team who did the rescuing. Just this once it was nice to let someone else take over the rescuing duties.

“They’re on their way,” Elizabeth told him. “How far are you from the gate?”

John shook his head and then realized she wouldn’t be able to see it. “I don’t know. Pretty far. We ran into a group of Wraith Worshippers who decided we’d be a great gift for their gods and we’ve been running pretty much ever since. I took some fire…”

“What?” Rodney’s voice shrilled in his ear. “How bad is it? Teyla, how bad is it?”

“It is fine, Rodney,” Teyla assured him, her voice calm and even.

“Yeah, Rodney, nothing that a night in the infirmary won’t fix,” John added. Maybe it was the blood loss that made him say it, but he knew the second the words were out of his mouth that they were the exact wrong thing to say.

“A night in the infirmary? You’re admitting you need a night in the infirmary? Elizabeth, Carson needs to go with the rescue team. I think John’s bleeding out.” Rodney’s voice grew a little distant but no less shrill as he turned to address Elizabeth.

John grinned feeling better. Rodney’s voice did that for him.

“Relax, buddy,” he said. “It’s really okay. Although, if you don’t mind, Elizabeth, tell Lorne to hurry because I have a date for bedtime.”

“You’d better not die,” Rodney hissed at him. “Because I’m not explaining to your daughter why her daddy’s not home in time to read her her bedtime story.” John thought it was pretty funny that Rodney stressed ‘your daughter,’ like it would give him more incentive to make it home for her and not just if it were Rodney waiting for him at home. He’d always make it home to Rodney.

The room was whirling around him. John decided it was a pretty good thing that he didn’t have to go much further. “I hate to break it to you, McKay, but I think you’re going to be doing the story duties tonight regardless for *our* daughter.”

“Don’t *our* daughter me,” Rodney spat at him, “I refuse to let you die and leave me alone with two children. Don’t you even dare.”

It still kind of astonished John that he was married with two children.

There was a time in his life when he thought it would never happen. He’d tried with Nancy, he really did. But he could never make himself love her the way she needed to be loved.

Then he’d met Rodney McKay and he’d been content to be Rodney’s friend.

Then DADT had been repealed.

The same day it was announced, Rodney had trapped John in his quarters and nearly kissed the life out of him. He didn’t stop until they were both hard and shaking with need.

It had surprised John because he’d always thought Rodney was straight. When he told Rodney, Rodney had just shook his head and muttered something that sounded like, “It’s a good thing you’re hot, it makes up for your being such an idiot.”

They were married six weeks later.

Elizabeth had beamed as she officiated over their ceremony. Teyla had just looked smug as she stood with Ronon as their witnesses. As if she’d known all along. Ronon had grinned at them both and slapped them on the back. The rest of their friends on Atlantis were no less happy for them.

John wondered sometimes if he wasn’t back on the mist planet living in a world made up in his head, because he was pretty much living his own personal dream life. If you didn’t count the life-sucking aliens, or the bad guys who kept trying to kill them all the time.

“John? John? Come on say something. I’ll read Beth her bedtime story, just don’t die on me please,” it was the pleading tone in Rodney’s voice that brought John back to the present – back to the barn and blood and the pain.

“What?” he croaked out, feeling decidedly worse. He found himself sitting on the floor. He didn’t know how he got there.

“John, are you alright?” Teyla was kneeling next to him, supporting him, checking the belt around his leg.

“Been better,” he answered ruefully, not sure if he was talking to Rodney or Teyla.

“Daddy,” there was another little voice in his ear.

“Beth?” he asked bewildered. John jerked around trying to see if his daughter was in the barn with him. The barn wasn’t a good place for little girls. It wasn’t a good place for Colonels in the United States Air Force either. Seeing Teyla’s concerned face, he realized that Beth wasn’t in the barn, she was back at home on Atlantis. He breathed a sigh of relief at that.

“When are you coming home, daddy?” Beth’s little voice trembled.

“Working on it, baby,” he told her. “In fact, I’ll be there before you know it. Just close your eyes and pretend I’m there reading to you and before you know it, I’ll be there. ‘Kay?”

And John did just that. He leaned his head back against the wall behind him, thankful for its sturdy support and imagined his daughter’s little body tucked against his as he read her one of her books, probably her current favorite – ‘The Velveteen Rabbit.’ She always cried at the end when the bunny was made real.

Although he’d never admit it to anyone, not even Rodney, there was times that John felt like that rabbit and he’d only become real once he arrived in Atlantis. Sometimes he looked into his mirror and saw the scars inflicted by Pegasus and the glints of grey at his temple, but Rodney told him how hot he was and his children looked at him with love and adoration and he knew that the scars and the grey hair didn’t matter to them.

“I would like to meet the nursery magic fairy,” he said to no one in particular.

“What?” a sharp voice said from beside him.

John opened his eyes to find himself in his bed in Atlantis. Rodney was in the bed beside him, his computer in his lap.

For a moment John thought it had all been a dream –running from the wraith worshippers, the wound and the barn. But then he registered the IV in his hand, the bandage around his leg. The pain was there, but it was far distant. Oh, yeah, he was on the really good drugs. He looked over at Rodney who was watching him with wide eyes.

“Hey,” he croaked out.

“Carson said you didn’t have a concussion, but I knew he was wrong,” Rodney turned and retrieved a cup of water from the bedside even as he ranted. He held the cup as he slid a hand under John and helped him sit up a bit so he could drink. “Because I know if you’re talking about nursery magic fairies you have to be concussed.”

John took a drink and then wilted back against the pillows, his strength gone.

“It’s from Beth’s book,” he explained. “The Velveteen Rabbit.”

“I knew that,” Rodney huffed. “I’m trying to teach her about science and math and you’re teaching her about magic.”

John shut his eyes and let Rodney’s voice wash over him.

“What happened?” he asked when Rodney took a breath mid-rant.

Rodney lifted him again and pushed another pillow beneath his head. He fussed a minute with the blankets before he answered, “What do you think happened?” Rodney’s mouth was a solid line, and he wouldn’t meet John’s eyes. He was pissed. That was a new record. Only awake about 2 minutes and Rodney was already pissed at him.

“Don’t know,” he answered honestly. “It’s why I asked.”

“Lorne swooped in and rescued your sorry ass as you were bleeding out on the floor of a barn on some piss-ant planet where they tried to kill you. AGAIN.” Rodney glared at him. “Seriously, John, you can’t die, because I don’t know what I’d do without you.” Rodney went from furious to sorrowfully earnest so fast that John felt dizzy. “I’d be a terrible father without you. I’d make our kids hate me. I’d make them study all the time and wouldn’t let them do any fun stuff. They’d probably grow up and go back to Earth just to spite me, and I just can’t…” Rodney gulped and looked away, but John saw the moisture in his too bright eyes.

“Hey,” John caught his hand, twining their fingers together. “I’m not going anywhere, you’re stuck with me, remember.”

Rodney made a quick swipe of his eyes. He turned back to John, “Damn right. Just don’t… okay? Don’t.” Rodney set the computer on the floor and stretched out next to John. “I don’t want to do this without you.”

“Ditto,” John assured him softly. They lay together, just enjoying their time together. With two kids, it was hard to find time to be alone. And at the moment, they were blissfully, completely alone. Not that John was in any shape to do anything about it. Still, it was nice just to lay next to each other, holding hands.

“How did I get here?” he asked finally.

Rodney snorted. “Surely I don’t have to go into the ‘when a boy and a girl have that special moment’ speech? You’re so totally giving it to your kids by the way.”

John chose to leave that argument for when he had more strength. He squeezed Rodney’s fingers, “No, I mean here. In our room. Shouldn’t I be in the infirmary? Unless… You didn’t go crazy or anything and break me out?” He meant it as a joke, but he could kind of see it happening.

“What?” Rodney stared at him, affronted. “Of course not. One of the teams came back with the Pegasus version of the measles. As nasty for adults as the Pegasus version of the chicken pox, except without the memory loss. Carson thought it would be better if you weren’t exposed to it, so they set you up here.”

Crying from the other room caused them both to start. John moaned as he jostled his leg.

“It’s time for JR’s bottle. You go back to sleep, I’ll take care of it,” Rodney smoothed a hand over John’s forehead and kissed him softly.

John captured his hand and pulled him back for a proper kiss. Rodney moaned a little as the cries from the other room increased in volume, “Don’t start something you can’t finish, Sheppard,” he growled in frustration as he pulled away.

John smirked up at him, “It’s just a promise for later. I’ve got to thank you somehow for nursing me back to health.”

“You’ve got a lot of thanking to do, then,” Rodney informed him. “I’m just going to…” he jerked his thumb in the direction of their crying son.

“Rodney,” John called after him, “bring him back here. Let me feed him.”

“But you’re injured,” Rodney began to protest.

“It’s my leg, McKay. Come on, I want to feed our son.”

Rodney rolled his eyes, but he nodded before he left.

Rodney left the door open behind him. From the bed John could just spy his daughter’s brown curls as she peeked through the open door.

“Hey, Bethy,” he called. She didn’t need any more encouragement. She was across the room and in the bed next to him before he could say anything else.

“Are youse alright, daddy?” she blinked up at him with hazel eyes that reminded him every day of his own. But the rest of her, from her baby-soft brown hair to the way her mouth slanted to the side, was Rodney McKay. He loved her so much.

“I’m fine,” he assured her. Then he ruined it all by wincing when she tried to crawl into his lap. “Well, maybe I’m not fine, fine, but I will be. Why don’t you just lay beside me for now and keep me company?”

She nodded solemnly, tucking herself in next to hm. He was almost asleep again when Rodney returned with JR-John Rodney because they couldn’t agree on which dad to name him after, so they’d gone with both. Rodney still hadn’t forgiven him that John’s name was first. John had insisted just to piss Rodney off.

John roused from his drowsing when he heard the fussing of their son.

“Are you sure?” Rodney asked before handing over the baby and the bottle. Yeah, JR was a McKay through and through, with Rodney’s appetite. He had the bottle in his mouth and half gone by the time Rodney crawled into bed next to them. JR waved his chubby fists in the air, batting at John, his blue eyes blinking up at his fathers sleepily. John had to hand the baby over to Rodney for burping. He didn’t know who was asleep first, John himself or their children.

When he woke again it was dark in the room. One of the windows was open and John could see one of Atlantis’ moons high in the sky. It was full. It filled the room with a magical kind of light. Next to him was his daughter. On the other side of the bed Rodney slept with JR cuddled in next to him.

John lived in a city that he loved, surrounded by the people who loved him. Just like the Velveteen Rabbit, he felt that he finally knew what it felt like to be really real.