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Rating: PG
Character/Pairing: Rodney McKay, OFC
Disclaimer: It's not mine, more's the pity
Summary: Rodney thought he'd left her behind in a hospital room years ago, but when an accident has O'Neill recruiting her not only for the SGC but the Atlantis expedition, can Rodney put the events of the past behind him?
More Rodney McKay Angst, also a crossover with SG1, in that most of the present time stuff happens in the SGC and O'Neill and Daniel Jackson are featured.
Any feedback is appreciated :)
Part 1
To Forgive is the Hardest Trial One Can Face
Part Two
Rodney was seventeen when he realised he was in trouble. He already knew that he was attracted to her, it went without saying; he was a teenage boy and she was hot. But she was his friend, by this time not his only friend, but still his first and best and so he did his best to ignore it.
It was when she was ill, wrapped in a blanket and curled up on her sofa, nose and eyes streaming and throat so sore she couldn’t talk that he knew he was in trouble. Because he still wanted to hold her and kiss her and run his hands through her hair.
* * *Kath spent the entire morning with Daniel in his lab, looking at various artefacts and translating this an that, with Daniel dropping subtle, and not so subtle hints here and there about Atlantis, and how he wished he could go, and how amazing it was.
It was beginning to grate on her nerves when the telephone rang, she was closest and so she picked it up.
“Doctor Jackson’s phone, how can I help you?” she asked.
“Oh, hello. Is Doctor Jackson there? I was wondering if he was free for lunch?” she asked.
“Yes he’s here, I’ll ask him,” she said, before pausing. “Sorry, didn’t catch the name,” she said.
“Elizabeth Weir.” Kath rolled her eyes, obviously.
“Daniel,” she said, he looked up from the book her was reading. “Its Doctor Weir, wondering if your free for lunch?” she asked.
“Oh, yeah sure. Be there in,” he glanced down at his watch, “Ten minutes.” She passed the message along and hung up.
“You want to come?” he asked hopefully.
“No, that’s ok,” she said.
“Are you sure?” he tried again.
“Absolutely.”
* * *Rodney was twenty six when she got married. He even attended and managed to not grimace at all through the entire thing. After all, she looked so happy, and how could he begrudge her that?
Rodney was twenty seven the first time he wanted to kill someone. As he examined the bruise on her cheek he felt rage build in the pit of his stomach. She assured him it was a onetime thing, that it would never happen again, and she was right. But she wasn’t happy.
She began spending more and more time hanging out with him, which was a feat in itself because he was doing a Masters and two PhD’s simultaneously. Apparently she’d been doing the same with Jeannie, which he knew as she had called him because she was worried.
Eventually, he had to call her on it. She’d been sitting on his sofa, staring blankly at the pages of a book for the past hour whilst Rodney worked.
“What’s with you?” he finally blurted. She glanced at him blankly for a moment before the light flickered back momentarily in her eyes. She answered without even trying to evade the issue.
“He’s cheating on me,” she said eventually. When she’d managed to talk him down off the ceiling she explained calmly how she’d found out (a friend of a friend) and how it wasn’t just one girl, but two.
“Why are you still with him then?” he asked, she looked away from him and stared at her hands as she answered.
“Mum’s not well, she probably won’t live out the year and I don’t want to burden her with all my problems. I want her to die happy,” she said, glancing at him.
“I’m pretty sure she’d rather die with you being happy,” he replied.
She smiled sadly and looked at him with watery eyes. It was only then he realised how close they were sitting.
“We should probably do something about that then,” she murmured before leaning in to kiss him.
* * *Rodney McKay was a genius. Patient or good with people he was not. Which was why, after the second interview Elizabeth, Sheppard and Carson had all told him pointedly to keep his mouth shut. Which was also why he had pages upon pages of insults scrawled out in his notepad. He doubted they’d take any of his points seriously, but they might amuse Sheppard in the very least.
When they finally took a break for lunch Rodney headed straight for Colonel Carter’s lab. He should probably answer Jeannie’s missed call, but if it was that important she would have called him more than once. It turned out she wasn’t there, and as Sheppard had followed him down there, they decided to go and get some lunch.
The reason Sam hadn’t been in her lab, it turned out, was because she was eating her lunch. Which worked well for him, and so once they’d grabbed something to eat he dragged Sheppard over to her table. On the way out he passed Elizabeth and Daniel Jackson and threw her a smile. She paused to return it before resuming a conversation about what sounded like a possible new recruit for Atlantis. Great, an archaeologist, he thought before returning his attention to pursuing Sam, who had managed to disappear in the brief moment he’d paused.
He strode purposefully out of the commissary, Sheppard trotting along behind him.
* * *Rodney was thirty when he found out he was going to be a father. She was three months gone and everyone had just assumed it was her husbands, even him, who she’d been having an affair with for going on four years. He’d congratulated her and assumed this had meant the end of them, but everything had remained pretty much the same.
He realised why when she told him. She also told him that when she went home she was going to tell her low-life husband that she was leaving and she wanted a divorce. Rodney shocked himself by hoping this meant what he thought it meant, but by the way she was smiling at him he realised he didn’t have to wish too hard.
When she left he kissed her goodbye, wished her luck and told her to call him if she needed to. When he answered the phone later that evening, he felt that familiar itch to hurt another human being as much as he was capable of.
Instead he drove to the hospital and held her while she mourned the loss of their baby.
When she refused to testify against the man, her husband, who’d pushed her down a flight of stairs and killed their child, he walked away and never turned back.
* * *Kath glanced up when Colonel Carter entered the lab. “You’re not Daniel,” she said, looking a Kath.
“He’s at lunch,” she shrugged as voices drifted down the hall and into the lab. Carter’s eyes widened as she heard them draw nearer.
“Rodney,” someone said in amused exasperation. “Maybe you should consider leaving the woman alone?”
“And why would I want to do that, hmm?” Rodney responded. “This is far too much fun.”
Kath saw Carter role her eyes and steel herself as the men approached; she had a glare firmly set on her face by the time they entered the lab.
“Colonel!” Rodney said as he strode in and towards Carter. “I was wondering if we could continue our discussion on…”
Kath opened her mouth to speak, but found her mouth dry. She saw who she assumed was Colonel Sheppard glance at her curiously before she cleared her throat and all eyes focused on her. She only focused her attention back on one pair.
“Hey Rodney,” she said with a tentative smile and a half wave. She watched with resignation as his jaw dropped and he took a few steps backward.
“I, er,” he pointed behind him with his thumb, still walking backwards. “I’ll just…” he uttered, before escaping.
Colonels Carter and Sheppard looked at her questioningly.
“I guess he had somewhere to be,” she shrugged. Seconds later, Daniel and Doctor Weir entered the room.
“We just bumped into Rodney,” Weir said.
“Yeah, he was behaving stranger than usual,” Daniel added.
“Is there something wrong?” Weir asked.
* * *After five minutes of avoiding the issue spectacularly (if she did say so herself), Kath was saved by the ringing of the phone. It wasn’t that she was embarrassed, or reluctant to share things about her past. It was that Rodney was, and she didn’t want to hurt him anymore than she already had. Which was why she answered the phone with a great deal of relief.
“Daniel Jackson’s phone.”
“Lieutenant,” General O’Neill greeted her. “I don’t suppose Doctor Weir is there?” he asked.
“Yes she is sir, as is Colonel Sheppard,” she informed him, glancing at the two in question who looked on curiously.
“Well, the next interviewee along with Doctor Beckett are waiting for them,” he said lightly.
“I’ll let them know sir.”
“McKay isn’t there as well, is he?” he asked.
“No sir, sorry.”
“Okay then, thanks. Ask Sheppard and Elizabeth to get up here then would you?”
“No problem.”
“Thanks,” he said before hanging up. They all looked at her curiously as she hung up the phone.
“Doctor Beckett is waiting for you to begin the next round of interviews,” she told Sheppard and Weir.
“Crap,” Sheppard muttered as Weir winced. “We’d better go,” he said before they left. Colonel Carter followed soon after muttering something about finally getting some peace and quiet. Daniel was quiet for a moment before speaking.
“You okay?” he asked simply.
“Yeah,” she smiled briefly. He nodded, obviously not convinced.
“So, found anything interesting whilst I was at lunch?”
* * *Rodney was seated next to Carson when Sheppard and Elizabeth entered the room, idly colouring in the margin of his notepad.
“You could have waited Rodney,” Sheppard said as he took his seat. “We were both coming here.” Rodney barely spared him a glance before returning his focus to the notepad.
The next two interviewees were military. Rodney had protested that he only needed to be there to interview those who would be working for him, but Elizabeth had pointed out that they would all have to work with each other.
The first was a Russian, who claimed to have worked with Rodney before when he’d be sent to Russia to work on the naquada generator technology. Rodney had no memory of the man, and told him as such. But, after a glare from Elizabeth, added that the project had gone well and no-one had tried to kill him and that was always a plus.
All in all, Rodney had little to add to the short discussions they had after the next two interviewees left. They had two more to go, with a third pencilled in with a question mark and no name. Rodney wasn’t stupid, it was more than a coincidence that She was here on the base at the same time they were conducting these interviews.
When General O’Neill entered the room after the next interviewee left with a several identical files in his hand, Rodney wasn’t surprised. Elizabeth raised an eyebrow in question.
“She still hasn’t made a decision,” he told them.
“Is this our last mystery candidate we’re talking about?” Carson asked. O’Neill nodded.
“I brought you her file just in case,” he said, and handed one to Sheppard and then Elizabeth.
“Either way we should still talk to her, if she’s right for the expedition we can give her the hard sell,” she smiled. When O’Neill handed Rodney the folder he put it down without looking at it.
“She’s perfect for Atlantis,” he told them. “She’s an expert in a number of different fields, as well as being military.”
“You know this Lieutenant Conners?” Sheppard asked, reading her name from the file.
“You’ve met her as well Colonel,” Rodney said.
“I have?”
“The woman in Doctor Jackson’s lab earlier?” Elizabeth asked, Rodney nodded, twirling his pen between his fingers.
“If you know her, perhaps you can convince her-?” O’Neill began, but stopped as Rodney smiled and shook his head. He hoped he wasn’t the reason she was unsure about joining the expedition, but knew it was pretty likely he was. In which case he was probably the only one who could convince her to go.
The question was whether he would. Whether he could.
“Maybe,” he said noncommittally, and was saved from adding anything else by the arrival of the next interviewee.
* * *Daniel answered the phone the next time it rang, but passed it over to her after a moment.
“So, it looks like they’re almost done in there,” General O’Neill told her. She was silent for a moment. “Katherine?” he asked when she didn’t answer. The use of her first name shocked her into speaking.
“I’m not sure, sir,” she said quietly.
“Elizabeth said you should come down anyway,” he said encouragingly. “As you’re here and all.”
“I-” she stopped, world narrowed down to the sound of her heart beating against the inside of her chest.
“Katherine?”
* * *When O’Neill opened the door, Rodney didn’t feel the rush of relief he expected, but a shocking stab of disappointment, which quickly changed to anxiety when he told them she was on her way after all. He wasn’t sure how to play this at all.
Whilst he was still angry with her for not doing something about her murderous ex-husband, he often felt guilty for leaving her when he did. At the time he’d been filled with rage, at Kathy, at him, and he probably would have done more harm than good if he’d stayed. However, with the perspective of hindsight, at least he would have been there for her, it’s not like she had many other people to lean on. Perhaps if he’d stayed they could have worked past it. Maybe it wouldn’t have been years since they’d last spoken.
He sighed, picked up the pen with which he’d been making notes on the last candidate, and began tapping it against the edge of the desk.
There was a small part of him, he knew, that would always resent her for not pressing charges. The man had killed their child, and she had just let him get away with it. He stopped tapping the pen and began clicking it.
Maybe now was the time to try and reconcile. The hate and anger he’d had back then had dissipated into a lingering sense of resentment and perhaps a little disappointment. They didn’t have to be best friends, colleagues would do for now. And he knew, without a doubt, that she’d be perfect for Atlantis. Any department would be lucky to have her, not that he’d voice that opinion too often.
He stopped the clicking and resumed the tapping.
Rodney could be civil, he knew he could. He just hoped Kathy was willing to try too.
“Rodney,” Carson snapped from his left.
“Hmm?” He looked up to see the three of them all looking at him.
“Could you put down the pen?” Carson asked, with the tone of someone talking a person down off of the ledge of a tall building. “Please?
“Sorry,” Rodney replied, laying the pen down on the folder in front of him.
“Are you okay, Rodney?” Elizabeth asked, looking at him with concern.
“Fine,” he answered as the door opened.
General O’Nell held the door open as Katherine walked in. Doctor Jackson stood just outside the doorway, hand in his pockets, grinning. Kathy gave the Lantian’s a brief smile before turning round and taking O’Neill’s hand of the door handle and shutting it. Rodney spotted her rolling her eyes before she turned back round.
“Sorry for keeping you waiting,” she said hesitantly.
“We weren’t waiting long,” Sheppard smiled at her.
“Please, sit down,” Elizabeth said, indicating the chair placed in front of them.
“Thanks,” she said, doing so. “I’m not exactly dressed for a job interview either, I know,” she said, indicating the base uniform she was wearing.
“Don’t worry about it, I don’t think you were expecting to be here today, were you?” Elizabeth asked.
“Not exactly,” she said, her eyes darting over to glance at Rodney. “No.” If Elizabeth noticed the glance, she ignored it, Carson looked at him curiously though.
“I also hear, that you’re not sure you want to be part of the expedition?” Elizabeth continued.
“That’s correct ma’am,” Kathy agreed. Rodney watched as she sat up straighter and her hands flexed where they were resting on her legs. On the defensive. Elizabeth noticed too.
“I have to say, you’re expertise and military training make you the best candidate we’ve seen all day,” Elizabeth said frankly. “Ironic really,” she said and Kathy smiled. “I understand it must be daunting, travelling to another galaxy, not to mention the enemies we’ve encountered there,” Elizabeth said.
“With all due respect Doctor Weir, while the reports I’ve read on the Wraith aren’t exactly happy bedtime reading,” Kathy said, “That’s not why I…” she trailed off and looked down at her hands.
Rodney watched her for a moment before coming to a decision. “Katherine,” he said. Her head snapped up and she looked at him curiously.
“Rodney?”
“There is absolutely no reason why you shouldn’t accept a position on Atlantis if one is offered to you,” he said.
“There isn’t?” she asked softly, disbelief in her tone.
“There isn’t,” he responded.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes,” he said, letting an ounce of irritation creep into his tone and watching her eyes light up as she heard it.
“It’s-”
“Kath!” he snapped, biting back a smile.
“Sorry,” she said, smiling at him tentatively. He barely caught himself from returning it.
“Right,” he said brusquely, picking up his pen. “Let’s get on with this interview shall we?” he questioned, glancing at Elizabeth. She raised a inquisitive eyebrow at him, before turning back to Kathy. Sheppard was eyeing him suspiciously from the other end of the table.
“You’ve been suspended from active duty because of a recent injury, so any post would have to be a civilian one?” Elizabeth asked.
“That’s correct. It’s only a precaution really, keeping me away from heavy machinery, that sort of thing. Just in case, I’ve been fine so far though,” she smiled.
“That’s good to hear,” Elizabeth nodded.
“What was the nature of the injury again?” Carson asked.
Rodney listened to her explanation, having heard the details from his sister a while ago, feeling a familiar urge to move closer. Protect her.
Rodney smiled, maybe this would be easier than he’d thought.
From:
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I see what you mean now, but I think its worse with McKay tbh. I quite liked season six without Daniel, I mean it wasnt as good as with him, but it was still entertaining. But Atlantis without McKay? Cant even imagine that! But then agen, guess we have to be prepared for possibility, what with the high turnover of cast in SGA
Yes, friend away :)
From:
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Well I don't think we have to worry about losing McKay any time soon.. David loves the job and is a uber geek himself so I don't think he will want to leave the show any time soon. I also don't think they will fire him cos who doesn't love Mckay? and it's not like he would be easy to replace.