Rodney was exactly where John expected to find him: in his lab arguing (though strangely good-naturedly) with Colonel Carter. John raised his eyebrows. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything."

Rodney took a surprised step back, almost tripping over a stool. Carter reached a hand out to steady him.

"Easy now, Casanova," John said with a wink. So it was a little cruel, but after two days trapped with Charlie Chaplin and the Eastern European remake of the Odd Couple, John wasn't in the mood for pleasantries.

Carter blushed. Well, this was interesting. John grinned. Plenty of ammo to tease Rodney with later. "So, Rodney, wanna go grab some pizza and genuine earth beer from that place Ford kept lamenting about? We can gloat in the next data burst."

"Sorry, Colonel, but unlike some people, I have actual work to do."

Rodney's voice was harsh. Ooops, maybe John shouldn't have teased him. He had been carrying a serious torch for Colonel Carter. Oh well . . . he'd submit eventually. He always did. John advanced, stepping right up into Rodney's personal space, as usual. "C'mon, McKay, all work and no play makes Rodney a cranky boy."

"I'm always a cranky boy, Colonel."

"Oh, sorry, must've slipped my mind." John reached out to tug on Rodney's arm. "Seriously. Then we can rent the third Star Wars prequel. I can't believe we didn't think to do it earlier."

"Puh-lease. I heard the dialogue sucks and it's half-baked."

"Since when do people watch Star Wars for the dialogue?"

"What do you watch it for?"

"Fast planes. Hot women."

"Typical," Rodney grumbled. "I have . . . well, there's a very hot woman right here." Carter blushed further but surprisingly didn't say anything. "And fascinating Ancient technology that could actually go about a thousand times faster than George Lucas' best wet dream, so you'll excuse me if I . . ."

"Faster . . ." John knew he was getting that glazed look in his eyes and he didn't care. "So when do I get to fly it?"

"Never, if you don't stop pestering me."

"Well, I suppose I can wait an extra night . . ."

"What part of 'I'm busy' do you not understand? Take Zelenka. Do a little team bonding like all those nights you dragged me away from possibly life saving . . ."

"I've had enough team bonding for this lifetime," John grumbled.

"Out," Rodney said.

"Colonel Carter, you wouldn't want to join us, would you? Rodney really needs to get a life, you know. Maybe if I bring you along he'll follow. Dog . . . bone . . . ya know."

Carter just smiled. "Sorry, Colonel, but I can't really kick Rodney out of the lab when I was planning to stay myself."

"Geeks," John murmured under his breath as he gave up the battle for lost. Rodney had never resisted him before . . . with enough needling.

John didn't end up at Dominicos, but at a sports bar nursing a nice cold Corona instead. As much as he loved his 'Hail Mary' game, it was good to get caught up on the new stats. And USC had just trounced Texas, which at least put a smile on his face, even if it was strained.

Something was missing. Maybe they'd changed the ingredients in Corona while he was away. He ordered a Coors just to make sure.

They showed an amazing pass by Freeman (USC's new up-and-coming star) and John couldn't help jumping out of his seat a little. God, he'd missed football. Nice, vicarious action, nobody in danger of getting the life sucked out of them - only losing a couple million admittedly scarce brain cells.

"You a Trojan?" a low but distinctly female voice enquired from behind him. John grinned. There were some other things he'd missed about Earth.

He turned slowly, casually leaning back. "That depends . . . would you have a drink with me if I was?"

The owner of the voice smiled, full lips pursed, low-cut black tank-top showing just enough. Slim hips, not too much makeup, and brilliant hazel eyes. Yep, he definitely missed some things about Earth.

"Oh, I think I might forgive you, but only if you play nice," she winked, sliding onto the stool beside him, nudging it subtly closer.

"I don't know . . . sometimes I can be a pretty naughty boy." He signaled the bartender to bring another round without even a second thought. This was a familiar routine. Like riding a bicycle . . . .

"Natasha," she slid a slim hand into his, her handshake firm, "UCLA, class of '95."

"John," he grinned, "US Air Force Academy, '91."

She raised her eyebrows. "An officer?"

"And a gentleman, I hope."

"Always did have a soft spot for a man in uniform."

"Damn, forgot mine at home," John looked down at the black turtleneck he knew looked damn good on him. She wasn’t going to complain.

Her eyes raked over his body. "I think this'll do, though you'll have to promise to show me the uniform later."

"I think that can be arranged."

They fell in to quiet conversation. Natasha worked as a full time counselor at an after school day camp. She was attractive and funny, and despite her university allegiances, incredibly knowledgeable about football and all things athletic.

John had to finally confess that he'd been stationed somewhere remote for the past three years and that he didn't know much about the current stats. They both agreed that it was a crime and Natasha was more than happy to inform him, and her commentary had him laughing like he hadn't since he'd received his transfer orders back to Earth.

"So, John . . . god, I don't usually do this. But would you like to continue this conversation somewhere more private?"

John looked from her toned shoulders to her wide smile and God yes, he wanted to continue this somewhere more private, because hey, he was a guy and it'd been a while since he'd had a chance at fun, innocent, innocuous, casual sex with a beautiful woman.

He looked down at his watch. 11:45, damn. "I'd love to. Trust me, I'd really love to, but I've gotta be back by midnight."

"Or you'll turn into a pumpkin?"

He laughed. "Worse: a lieutenant."

She giggled. "Well . . ."

"Hey, wait. I've got tickets to the game tomorrow. You interested?"

She smiled. "You need to ask?" She scribbled her number down on a napkin, looking at him expectantly.

Oh yeah, he was supposed to leave her his number . . . it'd been a while since he'd given out anything but a gate address. "Um . . . I actually don't have a phone right now. But if you just dial NORAD and ask for Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard, someone should patch you through."

"All this time I've been talking to a Colonel?" She sounded incredulous.

"You're not regretting it, are you?"

"Not in the least."

She left him with a kiss on the cheek and a slap on the ass, though he didn't jump theatrically the way he normally did when Rodney did that to him.

He was grinning like an idiot when he got back to his room (just in time) but he couldn't help but feel just a little bit empty - it was too normal, too everyday. It just wasn't right.

Beer did taste a lot better when enjoyed along with football and a beautiful woman on his arm. Colorado wasn’t so great this year, but it didn’t really matter. All he cared about was the open air and the fans chanting and yelling around him – so many people. There were few crowds in Pegasus. A stadium full of people like this would be a buffet laid out for an easy culling. He stiffened at the thought, turning around to look over his shoulder and jostling Natasha from where she had curled against him, legs tucked up against the cold inside her oversized fan sweatshirt.

She looked up at him adoringly. “Whatcha looking for?”

“I don’t know,” the response was so automatic it startled him. Secrecy came too naturally to him. But the distance was as familiar as a homespun quilt. He drew it around himself even as he pulled Natasha closer.

After the game he dropped her at her house. They made out for about five minutes on her front porch. It was five minutes of full lips and slim hips cradled in his hands as she wrapped a long leg around him. “Come inside,” she asked plaintively, her lips wide and eyes bright. “If we stay here much longer, the neighbors will talk.”

He looked down at his watch. He was supposed to meet Rodney tonight, and he still had to stop by the video store on his way. Was a fifteen minute fuck really doing this girl justice? She knew more about football than he did – definitely not.

“Sorry. I gotta go. But I’d love to . . . I want to . . . when can I see you again?”

Her smile was radiant. “As soon as you want.”

“Great.” He gripped her hand. “Tomorrow, then?”

She laughed, deep and throaty, as he kissed her cheek and hurried towards the car.

John tossed the DVD and caught it as he walked down the corridor, whistling. Finally. He'd had to needle him for more than two weeks, but Rodney had submitted. They were watching Star Wars. Just the two of them, buddy buddy. If it weren't for the dank corridors and the familiar smell of mold and actual coffee that seemed to permeate the place, John could almost kid himself into thinking this was Atlantis. Except they probably wouldn't be necking on the couch as they watched like they did with Atlantis' all-too-familiar film library.

He entered the lab to another familiar site: Rodney slumped asleep on a lab bench, drooling. He shook his head ruefully. When Rodney crashed, he crashed hard. "So I have to haul your sorry ass back to guest quarters again . . . well, forget paying me in turkey sandwiches, Superman. You're going to have to wine and dine me for this one."

John practically jumped out of his socks from the motion in the corner. Whenever Rodney was asleep in the lab back on Atlantis, it was generally empty. Nobody wanted to be there when Rodney woke up with a crick in his neck and out for blood - the nearest blood he could find.

"Jesus, Colonel Carter, what are you doing here this late?"

"Working." She gave him a small smile, trying far too hard to look innocent.

"Uh-huh."

She turned the laptop she'd been staring at around to reveal a familiar interface - lines and lines of data, the DHD protocol.

"Weren't staring forlornly at sleeping beauty there?" he asked, raising his eyebrows playfully.

"Actually, I don't really know what to do. I tried to get him to get up and go to his quarters, but . . . if he wasn't snoring, I'd think he was dead." She shrugged helplessly.

"Ah, that's Rodney for you - sleeps only two or three hours a night for a week or two and then crashes hard for about twenty, to be woken only by drugs or a bucket of ice water." Or maybe a blowjob, but John sure as hell wasn't going to say that out loud.

Carter smirked. "After he complained about learning to stay up without coffee, I bet him I could go without it longer."

Rodney could go more than two days without coffee. How in the hell had Carter outlasted him? She didn't even have circles beneath her light blue eyes. John didn't let himself think about how engaging those eyes were, or about the firm skin, or the cute pixie-cut hair. Regardless of what she thought about him, this was Rodney's girl. He'd staked his claim long ago, and John wasn't the kind of guy that would even think about stepping on his best friend's toes like that. Instead of stepping closer and using his most boyish smirk, John just asked. "So how'd you do it?"

"Mini espresso machine. Walter keeps it hidden in the third filing cabinet on the left in the archive room next to the Gate Room, in case of emergency." She smirked conspiratorially.

"Ah. I'll keep that in mind."

"So, what brings you to the labs this late, Colonel?" she asked gently.

"Was finally going to drag Rodney off to watch Star Wars."

"After two weeks?"

"He's busy. Too important to every project here, despite the fact that you've managed without him for years." He didn't know why he suddenly sounded so defensive.

Carter nodded, but she wasn't frowning her disapproval like most did when they got their first dose of Rodney's gigantic ego. "He takes everything personally."

"I know. The number of times I had to bodily drag him from the lab . . ." often only subdued by some strategic groping.

"But I can be the same way sometimes." Carter laughed. She had a nice smile. And she was obviously smart. Rodney's type, and kinda John's too. "These past few weeks have been a little too much like looking in a mirror. And when we first met, I thought he was my polar opposite, sort of an arch nemesis." She wrinkled her nose a little, laughing.

Rodney’d probably be proud that the great Colonel Carter thought so highly of him that she’d consider him a nemesis. Though he was sure there were some things he’d rather be . . . "And now?"

"He's changed a lot."

John couldn't help the sigh. "He's had to." They'd been through so much, and though the sarcastic quips and the venomous tongue lashings hadn't decreased in the slightest, it became apparent to pretty much everyone that they were oftentimes done in everyone's best interest (it was still up for debate whether or not Rodney was aware of that when he was cursing the incompetence of scientist X, the idiots who built this device, the glowy assholes and their mutant descendents, or the universe at large. John bet not.).

They stood there for a second watching Rodney sleep. It was awkward. But then, as though sensing their stares, Rodney shifted a little and whimpered. John was there in a second. This was familiar - one of the trappings of home he'd rather forgo here in this galaxy. The nightmares didn't leave even when they left the Wraith far behind; John could attest to that. And now, he couldn't even wake up to nuzzle closer to another warm body to ease the chill he felt every time he dreamt about desiccated bodies and people running from bright white beams and gaunt blue faces with the skin stretched all wrong.

"John," Rodney whispered. It was a familiar whisper. It was like this that first time heard Rodney utter his name - like this, in the middle of the night. Before that, Rodney'd even called him 'Sheppard' during orgasm. That had been unnerving. But ever after waking from the first nightmare, in private, he'd been 'John.'

John placed a comforting hand on Rodney's back, hyperaware of Carter hovering nervously, eyeing the door. "Shhh . . . I'm here. I'm okay."

"'Kay," Rodney mumbled sleepily and promptly started snoring again.

John looked up at Carter, who returned his gaze calculatingly. "Surprisingly, he listens really well in his sleep," he said, to lighten the mood, another one of his charming deflections.

But he could practically see her thoughts swirling, dark beneath those light tufts of so-called 'dumb blonde' hair. "What happened?"

He felt strange, almost violated, as though she was looking in on something terribly private, despite the fact that she must've read about it already in the reports.

"You read about our first trip to investigate the ancient satellite?" John's report had been dry, the utmost in military formality. Rodney's had been so dense with technobabble that even Zelenka admitted to not have understood all of it.

"It was bad." Carter already knew it had been bad. John had read a hundred reports of hers with the same clinical distance, too artificial to be anything other than a cover-up of the emotion of the actual experience.

"First we saw what was left of Abrams. You can see a lot of bodies drained by the Wraith and learn to stomach it. You can see it in photographs. But seeing someone who they've left alive . . . ." Colonel Sumner's face twisted in agony, the dull pleading in his eyes . . . . "You'd have to be there. Rodney was with Gall for three hours while he panicked and wasted away, while I went up against the Wraith and he had to wait for news by radio, knowing that if I didn't come back he'd be next. He had to see Gall blow his brains out before he could come to help me. And then . . . he went up against a Wraith that I couldn't kill with a grenade and a P90 with only two clips and a handgun. If the cavalry hadn't come when it did . . . if Gaul hadn't shot himself . . . Rodney would've seen me die like I did Colonel Sumner."

But Rodney did. Wasn't that the awful truth? He saw John, eyes glazed and pleading, nothing more than a dead husk of translucent skin. Because Rodney had a big brain, able to render possible outcomes in a billion brilliant pixels, and you didn't even need a big brain for nightmares when you'd seen what they'd seen. John himself was proof of that.

Carter's look was just melancholy enough to be appropriate, but there was something shining in her eyes. Maybe John had seen it before once or twice - like hope, only softer, viewed through layer upon layer of the finest silk. Her cheeks were flushed and her smile almost timid - so different from the fierce warrior and scientist he pictured from the reports and all Rodney's ramblings. "Nothing but a handgun?"

John shook his head. "Didn't have a chance in hell of stopping it, but he came for me anyway. Geeks aren't supposed to be that brave."

Carter scowled at him.

"Civilians," he amended, and she looked only slightly mollified.

"It's just so hard thinking about him like that. I mean, when we met I thought he was a cowardly, weaselly, lecherous, pigheaded, chauvinistic asshole with an ego big enough to generate its own gravitational field."

John smiled. "That sounds about right. He's all those things on the surface, but that's just to hide the fact that he's a good guy underneath."

"You're really good friends?" She sounded incredulous.

"The best." He smiled. Who would've thought? But Rodney had a way of getting to you. It was slow and steady and never ever direct, but it happened. "Don't tell him I said so, ego the size of the moon and all, but he's one of the bravest, most honorable and caring people I know." So he'd put in a good word. Rodney sure could use the help when it came to the ladies. With John he could be so sweet it was almost romantic (in a totally masculine way, of course) but with a woman it was like he found the worst possible thing he could say, stuttered it vaguely, waved his hands and did the awkward dance. John felt sorry for him sometimes.

Carter just nodded, looking inscrutable.

"Well, I should get him to bed. He'll be impossible to deal with if he wakes up with a crick in his neck," John said, stepping forward.

"No, it's okay. I'll take care of it." He highly doubted Carter, no matter how butch she wanted to pretend to be, could heft the two hundred pounds of brilliance that was Rodney McKay. "You know, if you're really dying to watch Star Wars, go knock on Teal'c's door. He can recite it word for word. You'll make yourself a fast friend."

"The big guy with the tattoo?" John tried to keep his voice from squeaking. Teal'c was just a little frightening - did he never smile?

"That's the one. Big fan."

"You wouldn't want to come join us?"

"Naw, work . . ." She gestured at the abandoned laptop, but when John walked out to find the guy that looked way too much like that linebacker that had dislocated John's shoulder in high school, he didn't hear the telltale patter of a keyboard behind him. Instead, when he turned, he saw Carter just standing there, watching Rodney sleep.

"Well, my work here is done," John mumbled with a smile, though he couldn't help this strange feeling in the pit of his stomach. Probably just butterflies. After all, Rus Moorson had dislocated his shoulder fucking him hard against the wall of the locker-room shower, not in the rush for the end zone.

John strolled into the lab casually. Finally, a few days downtime after yet another three days of sitting around with his team of formerly-communist malcontents, learning Russian and staring at the ubiquitous pine trees of the Milky Way. God, he missed the ocean. And he missed Rodney. But, of course, Rodney wasn’t here, just two arguing scientists, one short and fat and the other looking dull-eyed and sleepless to the point of zombiehood.

Scientists. What were they arguing about this time? The short fat one looked nervous, but highly intimidating. He’d put his bets on him for the prize, especially getting all up in the other guy’s face like that. Fate of the world, he’d bet on the angry one. But maybe he was biased by seeing Rodney bully his team into saving the day one too many times.

“There’s no way Picard was a better captain than Kirk.” So not the fate of the world, then. “‘Make it so . . .’ What’s that? Kirk had balls. It’s like comparing Elton John to Jack O’Neill.”

“And Kirk was a reckless womanizer with absolutely no respect for proper rules and protocols.” Hmmm . . . he’d heard this argument before. Man, he loved geeks.

“I always preferred Sisko myself,” John said with a smug grin.

Both the funny little scientists whirled around to face him, both starting their objections at the same time.

“Oh, come on. Baseball is not a metaphor for anything and everything in life . . .”

“And then leaving that hot a wife to go off with some stupid prophets who’d screwed them over more than enough times . . .”

“Yeah, but he had a cool ship,” John said with a smile. “It went invisible.”

The two geeks looked like they didn’t know what to say to that. It was the look Rodney got when he meant ‘you’re so stupid I’m not even going to dignify that with a response.’ Then the tall sleepless one’s eyes seemed to open even wider. “Colonel Sheppard?”

“Yeah, that’s me. And you are?”

“Jay Felger,” the scientist reached out and eagerly (a bit too eagerly) shook his hand. “And this is Combs.”

The fat one nodded and shook hands as well, fumbling with his glasses. “It’s an honor.” So, apparently he had a bit of a fanclub.

“Nice to meet you, too.” John was enjoying this way too much.

“Is there anything we can do for you, Colonel?” Felger asked politely.

“Naw, I just came down here looking for Rodney. You guys seen him?”

“He’s out having coffee with Colonel Carter,” Felger said resentfully. “I don’t see why. All she’s had to say about him for years is how he’s such an arrogant asshole she doesn’t want to even think about him and suddenly he waltzes in here and sweeps her off her feet when there are . . . a good many very dedicated nice men on this base, who’d gladly . . .” Rodney and Carter were together? Sure, he saw it in the works, but it stung that Rodney wouldn’t have told him about it.

“God, Jay, the Colonel doesn’t want to hear about your infantile crush on Carter.”

“Come on, Simon, it’s not like you haven’t spanked the monkey to thoughts of Carter before . . .”

John smiled, amused. “Now, now, boys. I don’t know exactly how it was before, but I can assure you that Rodney’s a good guy.”

“Really?” They both looked at him, dumbfounded.

“An arrogant asshole, too.” Especially with members of his staff. “But he grows on you.”

“So, the two of you are really friends?” Felger squeaked.

“Told you so,” Combs said, under his breath.

“Yeah. Is it so hard to believe that a genius like him could get along with a dumb grunt like me?” It had been a sticking point in their relationship.

“No, no, nothing like that, Colonel.” Felger seemed almost horrified at the possible insult. “It’s just that you’re . . . well, you’re Colonel Sheppard, and McKay’s . . . a geeky, arrogant hypochondriac, and he’s not all that nice, either. It’s hard to see why you’d like spending time with him.”

John shrugged. “Like I said, he grows on you. And besides, I like geeks.”

Felger and Combs looked even more shocked by that.

Time to change the subject – the fat one’s surprised look was frankly rather frightening. “Hey, what’re you guys doing down here in his lab anyhow?”

They seemed to shrink into themselves, embarrassed and guilty. John grinned. This should be good.

“Nothing.”

“Really?” Didn’t need black ops training for this one.

“It’s just that he’s so secretive and stingy with his research . . .”

“ . . . and it doesn’t help that he has the gene and can’t be bothered to come over and lend us a hand when we ask . . .”

“. . . and with Dr. Beckett having resigned from the program and all the military gene carriers on Atlantis . . . it’s so hard to get anything done . . .”

John raised his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay, just a little harmless inter-departmental espionage, perfectly understandable.” Rodney was a great friend, but he sure was a bastard when it came to the running of the lab. “But you don’t think that maybe you should’ve been a bit more . . . stealthy, about it?” They were practically shouting in their heated discussion of Star Trek, after all.

“The best place to hide is the light of day,” Combs stuttered. Felger blushed.

“Unless your opponent has eyes,” John amended, though he knew that wasn’t strictly true. Felger and Combs’ strategy wouldn’t have worked on a Wraith hive ship, nonetheless. “If you guys wanted someone to just stop by and initialize something, you could’ve just asked, you know.”

“You?”

“Sure. I do have an off-world team to run, but if it’s just a matter of a couple of minutes, I’d be glad to.”

“Wow . . . well . . . um . . . thanks, Colonel, we’ll be sure to . . .”

And then they heard loud laughing from the corridor, footsteps approaching the door.

“Quick, duck!” Combs yelled.

Felger dragged John to the ground behind the lab bench, despite the fact that he had absolutely no reason not to be there.

He was about to protest when the door opened and he heard Samantha Carter’s airy chuckle. “God, Rodney, I can’t believe you said that! The poor waiter!”

“Yeah, well, he would’ve been even more upset if I’d gone into anaphylactic shock!” John knew he should stand up right now and save them all a hell of a lot more embarrassment later, but he couldn’t, not while hearing Rodney and Carter flirt like this. It was voyeuristic and wrong, but he couldn’t help it. He wanted to know if Felger and Combs were right and there really was something going on between them. He wanted to know if Rodney really hadn’t told him about it.

“Still, that was just cruel . . .”

“Told you,” Felger whispered to Combs.

“Oh come on, Sam, you were barely hiding the giggle.”

“Remind me to never get on your bad side, Rodney.”

“Oh . . . oh . . . I really don’t think that’s going to happen.” Nervous and stuttery. God, Rodney really was horrible with the opposite sex. He and John had been perfectly natural, but put Rodney in the same room as a woman he was attracted to and it was like watching someone get their teeth pulled.

“I don’t know - we’ve gotten into some pretty good arguments before. What was it you called me? A dumb blonde?”

“Um . . . well . . . if I remember correctly, it was in the context of how . . . attractive . . . I find blondes.”

Carter laughed again. “I’m glad.”

A few footsteps.

“And do you still find them attractive?”

Rodney’s voice, almost a squeak: “Definitely.”

“Good.”

And then a thump and damn, if that wasn’t the sound of two people . . .

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Felger whispered.

“Shhh . . .” Combs hissed. Of course, he hissed really loudly.

The kissing sounds had stopped, and the next thing John knew, he was looking down the barrel of Colonel Carter’s sidearm.

He raised his hands. Felger seemed to have fainted. Combs at least looked as embarrassed as John felt.

“John?” Rodney said from behind Carter.

“Yeah,” he replied sheepishly.

“What are you doing here?”

“Um . . .”

Luckily, Combs had the decency to fess up and bail him out, sort of. “We were here looking for one of the devices that you wouldn’t let us test earlier. Colonel Sheppard was going to help us turn it on.”

Rodney seemed to have gone from shocked to embarrassed to pissed off all in the space of a few seconds. It would’ve been a medical miracle, if John hadn’t seen him do it a thousand times before. “God, I’m stuck with a bunch of incompetent, sneaky imbeciles for staff! When I say that we should wait for proper testing parameters, I don’t mean go find Colonel Sheppard, who -no offense, John- couldn’t tell a potentially dangerous ancient device from a pinball machine and drag him off to your lab to try and test the thing without telling anybody.”

“And I thought you just hadn’t learned to share,” John said, trying to quell Rodney’s ire. He looked truly worried, concerned, in that frighteningly honest way that always freaked John out way more that the rambling panic-attacks ever could.

“Yeah, because you believed these paranoid nincompoops over me.” Rodney seemed truly hurt. John’d have to apologize later.

“Well, you seemed a little too into your ‘lord of the lab domain’ thing, Rodney. I know how you get.”

“And it works, doesn’t it?” Well, John’d have to give him that. “If this is some sort of revenge out of separation anxiety . . .” Rodney stopped, probably realizing that he might be giving too much of their former relationship away, though he wasn’t.

“Don’t think too highly of yourself. I was only trying to help these guys out.”

“Well, next time, Colonel, leave your good intentions and their handbasket at home.” Then he rounded on Felger (now fully conscious) and Combs. “And the two of you, I might be a bastard sometimes, but it’s only because if I’m not, people get careless, and when people get careless, people get killed.” The fierceness in his voice left no doubt in all their minds that Rodney’d seen it, and that he blamed himself for it. John wanted to reach out for the thousandth time, and hold him, tell him that it wasn’t his fault, but he couldn’t do that – maybe in a galaxy far far away, but not here, not now. “And when I said, ‘proper testing parameters’ I meant that I was going to ask Colonel Sheppard to come do the tests tomorrow when we were all well-rested and had time to cool down. Jesus, what does a man need to do to get a little respect around here?”

Judging by the look on Felger and Combs and especially Carter’s faces, Rodney’d already done it. John smiled.

“What’re you all still doing here?” Rodney barked, completely ignoring the fact that they’d all overheard him and Carter making out. Felger and Combs nearly tripped over each other trying to scramble up and run out.

John took his time standing. “I’m sorry,” he said sincerely.

Rodney gave him one of his small, disappointed half-smiles. “I know.” And maybe there was a little bit of an apology in that too.

John went out drinking with Felger and Combs and their long discussion of the relative merits of the new Star Wars movie kept him from thinking too long and hard about his new knowledge of Rodney and Carter together. He’d have plenty of time to dwell later.

The first time he fucked Natasha it was afternoon and the sky was blue and bright. There was nothing remarkable about it, just another nice long screw in a long line of incredible fucks. She was agile and athletic, muscles toned in that graceful feminine way that he'd seen in Teyla, though never like this.

It was probably on their twelfth time, fucking in the afternoon, because at night he had duties and other things like that, that she cuddled close, playing with his chest hair in that infuriating way that all women instinctively seemed to know just to piss him off, and asked. "Why don't you get your own place?"

She knew he had the money. He'd told her so after he’d bought that really hot custom Porsche convertible. Rodney had said, ‘What, so you’re having a mid-life crisis now?’ Natasha had loved it.

"I . . ." Well, there wasn't a real good reason why not, was there? No more of this rushing off at night, no more afternoon post-sex siestas wasting the day away. It would be normal, like being on stand-down. He'd have a place. He'd be domestic. It had a certain kind of appeal, to the same part of him that liked turkey sandwiches and apple pie and college football and women with dangling earrings and bright smiles that knew how to use conjunctions properly. "I don't know, Tash, maybe I should."

She grinned a wide lazy grin, brown hair matted and all over the place as she nuzzled her nose into the crick of his neck. "You definitely should. Unless I can visit you on base."

"Classified. Besides, who cares about Deep Space Radar Telemetry?"

"It's your job. With your friends." That gave him pause. The delicate nibbles on his neck were suddenly cloying. So this was it. This was the beginning of where it stopped being fun and started being a commitment. This was when they started getting jealous and possessive and manipulative, and even if sometimes the sex got even better, it made him wonder if it was worth it.

"Nothing special. I go where I'm assigned." That was a lie, a lie as big as 'deep space radar telemetry,' but it didn't matter because even if she could know the truth, he doubted he'd tell her. Life on Atlantis and life on Earth were separate; they always had been. Not even Rodney knew much more of the scant details of his past, and John liked it that way. He always had a fallback option.

"Okay," she said, sounding just a little disappointed. She hid it well, and that was something he could appreciate. "So, ready for another round?" She moved to straddle him casually.

He wasn't ready, but he didn't want to talk more either so he nodded and kissed her deep.