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trinityofoneYou know, I'm actually in a pretty good mood right now. John? Apparently, not so much.
Anyway, this is for the wonderful and generous![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
z_rayne. It probably was not what you were expecting; I hope you like it anyway.
Title: An Exceedingly Insular Man
Rating: PG
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Length: 575 words
Summary: Don’t project. Don’t connect. Protect.
A/N: Forz_rayne, who over the last month or so has showered me with Hewletty goodness. Her prompt was insular.
An Exceedingly Insular Man
Cold feet. He wakes and it’s like his toes have been dipped in ice. It’s not painful—not like that one brush with frostbite, in the early days of his posting at McMurdo—so he doesn’t let it bother him too much. Takes a hot shower, dons warm socks. By mid-morning, he’s forgotten it.
At bedtime, he takes off his boots, rubs his arches. There’s a sort of dull numbness to them, like he used to get when he sat with his legs curled under him for too long, delicately melding paint and glue and balsa. It feels like the prickles should set in any minute. So under the covers he slides: sleep.
The next morning, the lack of feeling has spread to his ankles. He goes to see Carson. If the Pegasus Galaxy has taught him anything, it’s that you can never be too careful.
There’s nothing wrong with him. Carson still looks worried, but then, Carson looks perpetually worried. John, for his part, decides not to let it frighten him. What’s a little numbness? He’d rather have that than sharp, searing pain any day.
A little less than a week later, Carson stops him as they’re exiting the briefing room. How are your feet doing? he asks. You haven’t been back; I assume it’s not troubling you anymore?
Not a bit, Doc, John says. Technically, it isn’t even a lie.
When he woke up that morning, he couldn’t feel anything below his knees.
It’s not a problem. At first he worries that it could be a danger, on missions: he could get injured and not realize it, threaten the safety of his team. But in actual practice, how can it be anything but an advantage? Better than the best adrenaline rush, the ability to keep going no matter what. He remembers Ronon yanking wood and metal out of his calf with barely a wince; this can be him now, too—able to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and never falter, never even blink.
He panics a little when it reaches his groin. Of all the places to lose feeling... But it’s all still there, everything still works. Quiet, clean, and efficient. Better this way. Less complicated. Less messy.
People have always wanted him for certain things. He can be that now, when the need arises. He can provide everything that is required of him.
Kiss me, Rodney says.
John does. Vaguely, he can remember the feel of the press of lips, the heat of another person’s mouth. He can remember Rodney, and wanting, and not-wanting, and being afraid.
He doesn’t feel any of that now.
Kiss me, Rodney says.
Their mouths meet, connect. His own lips are cold, frosty as the first breath on a chill winter morning. Rodney doesn’t seem to notice. It’s good that he doesn’t notice. If he noticed, he would try to create heat from metal and air; he would say, I will pull you back from this. John’s past the point of wanting to be saved.
Kiss me, Rodney says, and John can hear in his voice all the things he cannot feel with his body: lust and fear and pain...and beneath it all, hope. But John’s closed the lid on that. If he closed his eyes, it would be as if this weren’t happening at all.
His eyelashes flutter, a whisper like butterfly wings, hovering above the encroaching frost.
*************
NOTES:
1. Title from Leonard Michaels, one of those sound bites that seem to exist purely to be quoted as explanatory sentences in dictionary definitions. Still, I quite like it: “He is an exceedingly insular man, so deeply private as to seem inaccessible to the scrutiny of a novelist.”
2. Summary from U2’s Numb. I really like it. *g*
Anyway, this is for the wonderful and generous
z_rayne. It probably was not what you were expecting; I hope you like it anyway.Title: An Exceedingly Insular Man
Rating: PG
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Length: 575 words
Summary: Don’t project. Don’t connect. Protect.
A/N: For
z_rayne, who over the last month or so has showered me with Hewletty goodness. Her prompt was insular.An Exceedingly Insular Man
Cold feet. He wakes and it’s like his toes have been dipped in ice. It’s not painful—not like that one brush with frostbite, in the early days of his posting at McMurdo—so he doesn’t let it bother him too much. Takes a hot shower, dons warm socks. By mid-morning, he’s forgotten it.
At bedtime, he takes off his boots, rubs his arches. There’s a sort of dull numbness to them, like he used to get when he sat with his legs curled under him for too long, delicately melding paint and glue and balsa. It feels like the prickles should set in any minute. So under the covers he slides: sleep.
The next morning, the lack of feeling has spread to his ankles. He goes to see Carson. If the Pegasus Galaxy has taught him anything, it’s that you can never be too careful.
There’s nothing wrong with him. Carson still looks worried, but then, Carson looks perpetually worried. John, for his part, decides not to let it frighten him. What’s a little numbness? He’d rather have that than sharp, searing pain any day.
A little less than a week later, Carson stops him as they’re exiting the briefing room. How are your feet doing? he asks. You haven’t been back; I assume it’s not troubling you anymore?
Not a bit, Doc, John says. Technically, it isn’t even a lie.
When he woke up that morning, he couldn’t feel anything below his knees.
It’s not a problem. At first he worries that it could be a danger, on missions: he could get injured and not realize it, threaten the safety of his team. But in actual practice, how can it be anything but an advantage? Better than the best adrenaline rush, the ability to keep going no matter what. He remembers Ronon yanking wood and metal out of his calf with barely a wince; this can be him now, too—able to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and never falter, never even blink.
He panics a little when it reaches his groin. Of all the places to lose feeling... But it’s all still there, everything still works. Quiet, clean, and efficient. Better this way. Less complicated. Less messy.
People have always wanted him for certain things. He can be that now, when the need arises. He can provide everything that is required of him.
Kiss me, Rodney says.
John does. Vaguely, he can remember the feel of the press of lips, the heat of another person’s mouth. He can remember Rodney, and wanting, and not-wanting, and being afraid.
He doesn’t feel any of that now.
Kiss me, Rodney says.
Their mouths meet, connect. His own lips are cold, frosty as the first breath on a chill winter morning. Rodney doesn’t seem to notice. It’s good that he doesn’t notice. If he noticed, he would try to create heat from metal and air; he would say, I will pull you back from this. John’s past the point of wanting to be saved.
Kiss me, Rodney says, and John can hear in his voice all the things he cannot feel with his body: lust and fear and pain...and beneath it all, hope. But John’s closed the lid on that. If he closed his eyes, it would be as if this weren’t happening at all.
His eyelashes flutter, a whisper like butterfly wings, hovering above the encroaching frost.
*************
NOTES:
1. Title from Leonard Michaels, one of those sound bites that seem to exist purely to be quoted as explanatory sentences in dictionary definitions. Still, I quite like it: “He is an exceedingly insular man, so deeply private as to seem inaccessible to the scrutiny of a novelist.”
2. Summary from U2’s Numb. I really like it. *g*
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 09:25 pm (UTC)Heartbreaking and beautiful. Very nicely done.