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Underwater AU
McShep | 1072 words | G | AU-gust 2022
When they arrive in Atlantis the city doesn’t rise, but the shield doesn’t fail. They’re stuck at the bottom of the ocean. John’s not feeling it. At all. Rodney to the rescue.
More and more, John spends time here. It’s one of the few places in Atlantis where the ceiling is made of windows, so it’s the only place he can look up, up, up…
It’s an atrium, or would be, if the room was in use.
It’s not.
There are large, empty planters— places where life should flourish, but doesn’t. Hasn’t. Not for thousands of years. Life needs light. Nothing new can grow, not without the sun, which can’t reach this deep, but is somewhere up there, and so far out of reach. The room is an empty vessel without the sun, without life. Scraggly branches, ten thousand years dead, mock the room’s purpose. Uncleared, unimportant, with the room not in use.
John chokes off a laugh. Or is it a sob?
Utterly useless.
Maybe someone will find him here 10,000 years hence, scraggly bones, with as little purpose as the room they find him in.
Head tilted back against the edge of the couch, he stares at where the sky should be, where the water is instead. He feels the crushing weight of it against his bones, shield be damned, until his ribs, his lungs ache with it. He can’t breathe, air coming in ragged gasps.
He’s never told anyone where he goes, sometimes only coming back to the little pocket of the city they inhabit if the radio chirps. If he notices. It doesn’t chirp often.
Then there’s Rodney.
“Major, I have been looking for you everywhere in this godforsaken tomb of a city. I know you’re off shift but most of us keep our radioes on. Emergencies? Ever heard of those? Do I need to put a little bell on you? Subcutaneous transmitter? Or a—”
Apparently all it takes to shut up one Motormouth McKay is one Air Force Major staring into the abyss, barely breathing.
After that, Rodney comes to the atrium often.
“Chess?”
“Raid Zelenka’s coffee stash?”
“Cards?”
“I hear Roberts’ set up something that resembles bowling.”
It’s always hard to move at first, to shift the weight of the sea off him, but he does because he knows, after the first time, how vocally and stubbornly Rodney will insist if he doesn’t.
“Yeah, bowling, sure.”
*
This room isn’t any better than the atrium. There’s no view of the fathomless ocean that envelops them but it’s no less oppressive. The steady ache in his bones deepens.
“What do you want, McKay?”
John’s only been here once, months ago, when Rodney had first asked him to turn on one of funny, near-cylindrical ships. Military officer or glorified light-switch, he’s not sure which anymore. As Rodney babbles out an explanation, John finds it hard to follow. He’s trapped in a pocket of memory he’s tried hard to box up and away…
The ship opening up for him in a way nothing else in Atlantis has. A spaceship. It wants to be flown. It wants John to be the one to do it. It’s been suffocating, needing to break free into the atmosphere and beyond. The whole galaxy used to be open to it, and now… John knows without knowing that it’s something he can do, same as walking, as breathing. He’s the ship, the ship is him, the things they could do together.
But they don’t.
Grounded.
Permanently.
“Major!”
John blinks.
“You haven’t taken in a single word of my brilliance, have you?”
“Uh…”
“This is what happens when you pull miracles out of your ass every day. Everyone gets used to it. You are all witnessing genius and you can’t even see it anymore. I can’t believe—”
“Rodney!”
“Fine, fine.” Rodney crosses his arms, looks put upon. He pauses a moment for dramatic effect. “This.” He points at one of the ships. “It swims now.”
John blinks again. He can’t mean…
“For a race who made their city submergible you would think they would have figured out how to turn their ships into submarines, but no. Oh no. They left that up to one Genius Rodney McKay. Weeks of work. Weeks! Time I will—”
John can’t breathe. “Will it…” he can’t even say it. He just can’t.
Rodney’s voice goes soft. “Yeah, John. It will. All the way up to the surface.”
Something loosens and tightens in John all at the same time.
“Or, well, it makes it in 98% of the simulations which I’ll have you know is—”
Something breaks free.
His arms are around Rodney and they’re staggering back, all but crashing into the ship behind him because John has thrown himself forward, crushing Rodney to him. This… this… He buries his face into the heat of Rodney’s neck. Words build up, too many of them, scraping his throat raw. He gets two of them out, barely. “Thank you.”
Then Rodney is finally holding him back, broad hands scorching him through his t-shirt. He lets out a self-deprecating chuckle and pats him on the back. “It hasn’t worked yet.”
John tightens his hold, stays buried, emotions pinging around him wildly out of control, after being held tight for too long. “It doesn’t matter. God, Rodney, it doesn’t matter. You tried.”
“I did.”
For you.
He doesn’t say it, but John hears it, knows it. This isn’t one of Atlantis’ ongoing projects, though it clearly should have been. Rodney’s done this. On the side. For him.
When he pulls back, with more reluctance than he has ever pulled back from a hug, neither of them comment on the wetness he’s wiping away.
John feels his lips quirk up into a smile. “Wanna go for a ride?”
“In that tin can of death? Are you insane? Are you aware of how much pressure there is at this depth? 98% probability of success still means 2% chance—”
Without letting himself think, John grabs Rodney’s hand and tugs so that they’re pressed close again. His turns his smile into a pout. “Pretty please?”
“Oh for! Don’t look at me like that.” Rodney throws up his free hand. “This is going to be a thing, isn’t it? You do that with your mouth and I give in.”
“Is that a yes?”
Rodney sighs, trying but failing to look put upon. “The first of many I’m sure.”
When they break the surface of the water the steady aching pressure turns into a lightness, his bones going hollow and bird-like. When John looks up, up, up… there’s nothing but endless blue.
He’s home.
Free.
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