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katespillingvelvet is such a dear that when I said I was too tired to write the treat I had planned for tonight, she said she'd write me a wee drabble and it'd be a guest treat. Which is brilliant! So I then went to bluflamingo and asked her to write spillingvelvet a treat.And I also asked several other sweethearts on my flist/circle to write, and they came through with flying colors. This one's a treat for me as well as for everyone else.
Come on in and play with us! You can leave a ficlet comment with OpenID or anonymously if you don't have a Dreamwidth account (though if you want one, just ask! I will get you an invite - and if you're too shy to ask, try
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dw_codesharing).Happy holidays, everyone. This makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. *snuggles flist/circle*
For easy organization later:
McKay's Mechanical Marvels (SGA, John/Rodney, PG-13)
on 12/8/09 09:42 pm (UTC)~~~
So there's this guy, and he's been standing in front of the shop window for the better part of half an hour, all but pressing his nose to the glass. And, all right, Rodney's creations - he steadfastly refuses to call them 'toys', no matter how hard Jeannie rolls her eyes and tells him to get a life already, "Or a girlfriend, Mer. A girlfriend would be very nice. You know. Normal." Rodney's work is to toys as the Flying City of Atlantis is to a paper plane. Rodney builds devices that make the guys on thinkgeek cry.
Anyway. The guy keeps standing there, staring, and if there wasn't a sheet of glass between him and the merchandise, Rodney would have to check for drool stains. Rodney knows he's good, amazing even, but this is becoming a little disturbing. Granted, the guy is somewhat attractive, with pale eyes and the unkempt-hair-chin-bristle combination Rodney has always associated with the term 'rakish'. But he's keeping away paying customers with his, his lounging about like a thief to be or maybe a Jehova's witness, and clearly this cannot be borne.
Rodney straightens his shoulders, pulls in a breath, and lifts his chin.
Then he remembers that he's not that young anymore and probably can't lift his leg high enough to kick the guy in the gut – he can't throw punches, he might hurt his hands; god, he used to be so bendy - so it would probably be advisable to have back-up standing by. So he gives the guy a withering glare that passes by as unnoticed as all the others so far, stalks over to the phone, and hits the three on speed-dial.
He lets the phone ring once and hangs up. He redials and lets the phone ring twice before he presses the button to disconnect. He rings again, once. Through the window, over the guy's shoulder, he can see the small pasta place across the street. A large brown hand appears in the tiny space that isn't plastered with multi-coloured letters and gives him the finger. Emphatically.
Rodney nods, satisfied. Ronon's got his back.
He straightens again, sniffs once and nods to himself. Then he strides over to the door and yanks it open, Jeannie's silly bells cheering madly. Ah, the sweet sound of impending victory.
He steps onto the sidewalk and opens his mouth to tell the guy exactly what he thinks of loiterers who… loiter… in front of respectable businesses, but the guy actually beats him to the punch.
"Hey," he drawls, and for no reason at all the hairs on Rodney's arms stand up and take notice.
He shivers.
"You work here?" the guy asks, oblivious to Rodney's rebellious follicles or status as the owner of the grandest shop in town, thank you very much. "This stuff looks pretty cool."
The words are dripping from his lips like syrup, thick and slow, and Rodney scowls even as he takes a moment to memorise the curve and dip of aforementioned lips.
"That's because it is, as you so aptly put it, 'cool.'" He snaps his fingers and is rewarded with a raised eyebrow. "McKay's Mechanical Marvels are the most revolutionary developments in their respective fields. They're so far ahead of the," he snorts and forms the appropriate air quotes, "'competition' that they are, in fact, a field of their very own. Hours of research, construction and delicate assembly make each of these little babies as supreme as they are unique and require a steady hand to put together. Not that I would expect any philistine to grasp that."
The guy has raised both eyebrows by now, and is slowly looking Rodney up and down. Rodney thinks this might be the moment to wave Ronon over and have him beat this guy up.
"So," the guy drawls, again, has no one taught him to speak at a pace that is faster than your average caterpillar? "You're good with your hands, huh?"
Rodney blinks at him, more thoroughly derailed than that time with Sam Carter and the orange-flavoured condom and the box of epi-pens.
"You, uh." A thought occurs to him, a wondrous thought, a terrifying thought, "You were looking at the merchandise, right?" The last word comes out in an embarrassingly small voice.
"Maybe." The guy smirks, full lips stretching at the corners, and oh, this is not good for Rodney's blood pressure, not good at all. "Or maybe I was checking out the merchant."
"Really," Rodney says faintly, and this time there is absolutely no mistaking the intent in the guy's grin.
"You look a little pale," the guy says with obviously false concern, "maybe you should lie down."
And oh, okay, all right, that does it. Rodney might not have had any kind of sexual encounter in an embarrassingly long time – since that time with Sam Carter and the orange-flavoured condom and the box of epi-pens, in fact – but will not be cast in the role of fainting virgin. He straightens his back, squares his shoulders and lifts his chin.
"Well, yes, thank you," he all but snaps, satisfied to see the guy do a double-take, "and why don't you come inside so I can show you the Mechanical Marvels I keep in the back room, hmm?"
He turns with a flourish and strides back into his shop, not checking to see if the guy follows him or not. He is Rodney McKay. He is a catch. If the guy is too stupid to see that, he doesn't deserve the mind-blowing sex anyway.
Jeannie's bells ring again.
~~~
Over the next few hours, Rodney learns the following: The guy's name is John and he is alarmingly enraptured with the back room Marvels and also nearly as bendy as Rodney used to be, Ronon will not, in fact, deliver citrus-free lasagne for two across the street, and the Pegasus Power Plug might regrettably need some minor downsizing. He also learns that John isn't all that into one-night stands, but that's all right. Rodney knows he's good, amazing even, and what are a few drool stains on the pillowcase against getting to keep the rakish guy?
Inspired by spillingvelvet and Mitchell's Magical Macaroons (sadly lacking any actual macaroons)
on 12/8/09 09:46 pm (UTC)“You should go to bed,” Cam says, almost before he’s closed the door behind them.
“Only if you’re coming with me.” John tries to leer at Cam, but he’s pretty sure it doesn’t come across, between the stitches and his cracked cheek bone, his black eye and that one missing tooth.
As it turns out, being beaten up then blown up really isn’t good for you.
“You’re in a wheelchair,” Cam says, disapproving, stepping behind it to push John further into Cam’s apartment, even though John’s perfectly capable, his arms being about the only part of him that are still completely functional. More or less. “And probably in too much pain to get it up.”
“Wow, way to make a guy feel wanted,” John grumbles. It’s possible Cam might have a point, since John’s literally counting down the minutes to his next dose of pain killers, but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t like to try.
Every time he closes his eyes, he sees sixteen year old Cam grinning at him with a purple tiger over his shoulder. He hates remembering how close he came to giving up this Cam for that one.
“If I promise to get into bed with you, will you go?” Cam asks. He sounds tired and patient, and John feels guilty all over again for letting himself be talked into recuperating on Earth. He normally fights it harder, so he’s mostly better before Cam sees him, but he wanted to see Cam more than he wanted to spare Cam seeing him, and he was too doped up on pain killers to fight it.
“Will you tell me a story?” he asks, close enough to saying yes. His back hurts from being in the wheelchair too long, and even the soft sweatpants he’s wearing are starting to rub against the mostly healed burns up his left leg. Cam’s bed is wide and cool, soft comforters and softer blankets.
Cam stops pushing, almost at the bedroom doorway, and touches the back of John’s neck. “You could tell me one,” he says, quietly. John wonders what Cam would say if John told him that he nearly died, that apparently his idea of Heaven is Cam and a fair, and that he gave it up so he could be with Cam, so Cam wouldn’t be without him.
Actually, he doesn’t really wonder at all, because he knows Cam. Cam would say something sweet and reassuring and not at all like John’s going crazy, and then tell John that he loves him. It’s almost enough to make John tell him what happened. He’d kind of like to hear that right now.
“I keep forgetting the endings,” he says instead.
Cam’s hand lingers, then draws away slowly. “You can always make it up,” he says.
*
Getting into bed hurts more than it should, and Cam’s face, when he gives in and fetches John’s pain killers, is drawn and worried.
“No macaroons?” John asks, trying for a laugh and getting a weak smile.
“No coconut,” Cam says. “I’ll go shopping later.”
That’s really not a good sign. Macaroons are Cam’s idea of comfort food, and he’s always got ingredients to make them at a moment’s notice. If he’s run out, he’s having a bad few weeks, and now he’s got John’s damaged ass to take care of and worry about as well.
John reaches for Cam’s wrist, pulls hard enough to force him to sit on the edge of the bed. It jolts under the sudden movement, shaking up all John’s aches and pains all over again, but he schools his face clear and says, “I’m fine. You don’t have to worry.”
“You don’t lie very well,” Cam says. He touches the edge of John’s black eye, his fingers cool and light. “I hate this.”
John’s not a big fan of it either, and he knows exactly what it’s like to be in Cam’s shoes. “You promised to come to bed,” he says, because there’s nothing he can say, no promise he can make that will make this better.
“Maybe I should go buy coconut instead,” Cam offers, cracking a slightly stronger smile than before.
“Later,” John says firmly. “I want my story.”
Cam strips down to boxers and t-shirt, climbs under the covers, and lies next to John, not touching him at all. John rolls his eyes, and wriggles closer until Cam gets the hint and carefully pulls John into him, body heat enough to soothe some of John’s pain. Or maybe that’s the pain killers, making everything fuzzy at the edges.
John thinks about asking for a story again, but the quiet’s kind of nice. He can hear Cam’s heart beat and his breathing, and even when he closes his eyes, he knows it’s the right Cam. Something tense inside him starts to relax at the thought, even more when Cam strokes a careful hand down the length of his spine.
“Love you,” John says, before he can over-think himself out of it.
Cam kisses his forehead. “I know,” he says softly. “Love you too.”
And maybe coming here wasn’t the kindest thing John could do to Cam, but lying in Cam’s bed, hearing the words, makes John feel better than anything else has since he woke up.
Snippet :: SGA :: Green Sea 'verse
on 12/8/09 09:52 pm (UTC)The Lighthouse at the End of the World
Rodney puked over the side of the fishing boat taking them and the new lens for the lighthouse to the island before they left the bay. Kanaan quickly turned green and joined him at the rail when they reached the open water of the strait. John and Teyla abandoned them, taking Torren with them to join the captain on the bridge and talk. Teyla because she was interested in whatever they might learn; John because he suspected listening to Rodney and Kanaan might make him sick in sympathy. Ronon stayed on deck to look after them.
The lift and fall and sway of the water felt different enough from the rhythm of the train they rode in across the continent that even John felts off-balance.
"There used to be some fishermen that lived out by the lighthouse, but it's too cold," the captain explained. "Now it's just the keeper. Boats take out fuel for the light and heating -- that's why the fishers left. Nothing on the island to burn."
"It must be lonely," Teyla commented.
John agreed. It seemed like they'd traveled to the end of the world by the time they reached Kauko Bay and now they were sailing beyond it.
Torren gurgled and grabbed at the wheel as the captain steered his boat around a rocky point. "This one seems to be a sailor born," the captain remarked.
Teyla hefted Torren higher in her arms. He was getting too big and heavy for her to keep that up much longer, but wasn't steady enough on his legs to walk. Another reason they needed to find a place to settle.
"He's never been on a boat before," Teyla said.
"A natural then."
"Give him over," John said to Teyla and opened his arms. He was concentrating on bouncing Torren, looking into his face, when Rodney and Kanaan opened the door into the bridge and lurched inside, followed by Ronon.
"Do you see that!?" Rodney demanded.
"See what?" John asked, frowning at him.
Rodney waved at the window of the bridge. "The lighthouse!"
John turned and stared.
The lighthouse was an Ancient tower, the angular lines unmistakable even beneath the scaffolding and stairs the locals had built outside it.
"Ancestor work," the captain said.
"Does it have power?" Rodney demanded.
"No one here has ever found a way inside." The captain scowled at Rodney. "You'll not be wasting your time trying that. You're here to install the new glass."
"Yes, fine, that's not news. But no one said the tower was Ancient," Rodney snapped, staring hungrily as the boat chugged into the small cove at the tower's base.
John felt the same pull. Leaving Atlantis and the jumpers behind had been harder than turning his back on Earth forever. He missed the feel of it around him.
"Perhaps we should not stay on this world after all," Teyla murmured after they were docked and the captain left to oversee the supplies unloaded. One of the sailors climbed the stone steps past the dilapidated boathouse and headed for the only cottage in good repair.
"There's no reason anyone from Atlantis would ever come here," Rodney said. "It's too far from the stargate. It's probably just a shell, anyway."
They were still debating when the sailor came back and told the captain, "Nilts has got the water cough."
"Blast and break," the captain cursed. "We'll have to take him back to town." He turned back to the team and addressed Rodney. "Can you lot install the glass yourselves?"
"Of course," Rodney said.
An hour later, the crate with the new lens was wrestled up the steps and Nilts was half-carried down to the fishing boat. Kanaan and Teyla were tidying the keeper's cottage, while John, Ronon and Rodney contemplated the best way to get the lens up the rickety stairs spiraling up the tower.
"It would be so much easier if we could get inside and use the internal stairs or a transporter," Rodney commented wistfully.
"We'll take Nilts back to town and come back for you," the captain said as he joined them. "Make free with whatever you need."
"Does that include food?" Rodney asked.
"Aye."
John had been studying the tower and found a doorway half hidden beneath the stairs. Without thinking about it, he ducked beneath, pulled off his glove, and set his hand against the cold metal cover over the controls. The cover slid away and a display beneath lit up with a schematic of the tower. John touched his finger to the symbol for the door.
As obliging as Atlantis ever was, the door whooshed open and the interior and exterior of the Ancient tower lit up like Christmas.
He turned back to Rodney and the others, including the fishing boat captain, and grinned.
"Honey," he said, "we're home."
John/Cam, Mudfight. 150 words exactly.
on 12/8/09 10:00 pm (UTC)"Must be rainy season?" John ventures. He hasn't stepped off the gate platform, and so his boots are clean and dry.
Sam and Teal'c step through after them and the gate winks out. Sam looks Cam up and down.
"How do you always manage to get so dirty?" she asks.
Cam squints at her, and tries to shuffle his feet. So much for reliable MALP data. The mud squelches and makes a rude noise.
John snickers and bites his lip. Cam looks at him with a dangerous glint in his eye, and John yelps.
"Don't even think about it!" he jumps behind Teal'c, using him as a Jaffa sheild.
Cam reaches down and scoops up a sloppy handful. "Naw, c'mere, I just wanna talk," he grins and lunges.
A tiny tidbit for you, babe <3
on 12/8/09 10:50 pm (UTC)Rodney looked like he was resisting rolling his eyes. "Jeannie passed it along, don't get all excited."
John opened the plastic bag to find something that resembled a tablet of giant prescription pills. It took him a second to realize it was supposed to be an advent calendar with chocolates in each 'pill capsule', and even less than that to realize Rodney had eaten half of his candy.
"If I call Jeannie, I'm pretty sure she'll tell me you got your own candy, won't she?" John said, tossing the bag on the bed.
Rondey looked genuinely embarrassed for a second. "It was a long flight! I finished mine before we even took off!"
"I'm pretty sure your sister still lives in Toronto, Rodney, not Belgium."
"All right, all right, I admit. Crimes were committed. Reparations will be offered."
"Reparations?"
Rodney smiled in a way that told John they were thinking of the exact same thing and for a change it had nothing to do with saving the city from the disaster-du-jour.
"How about I start by giving you a blow job," Rodney said. "And then fucking you until you forget about the stupid chocolates?"
John smiled as he pulled Rodney in for a kiss. "I'm never going to forget about the chocolates."
Star Trek XI
on 12/9/09 12:42 am (UTC)Maybe it was the hair. Thick dark-blond strands that Leonard’s fingers itched to touch, knowing it was just as soft as it looked. Softer, perhaps.
It could be his skin. Miles and miles of golden skin. Taut. Incredible. Leonard’s mouth couldn’t stop kissing his skin, licking it, tasting it.
Of course, there was his lips. Those flawless cock-sucking lips. Full and pink before he kissed. Swollen and red after. Magnificent either way. Leonard couldn’t get enough of those lips, that wicked tongue. He could drown in that mouth.
Whatever it was, Jim Kirk was an addiction. One that Leonard had no intention of quitting.
no subject
on 12/9/09 03:41 am (UTC)He didn't mind the grey in his hair, it was mostly in his temples and he thought it made him look... distinguished. Dignified. A little like Cary Grant.
But the beard thing, that was bothersome, especially since he had a five o'clock shadow about two hours after shaving. Before he went to bed if he hadn't shaved in the afternoon, the growth was enough to see the grey, in the merciless light of the bathroom.
He fingered his chin and cheek, trying to convince himself it was just an illusion. He didn't mind the scars, those were impressive, made him look rakish. But the grey -- it made him think of Sean Connery, without the toupee. Pretty soon he'd have an all-white beard and his hair would still be mostly dark.
Wasn't there some product that was for dying beards? Or maybe he could just shave twice a day, every day. McKay was always complaining about beard-burn anyway. He could also look into that laser hair removal thingy, get rid of the problem altogether. It might make him look younger, too.
There were lines around his eyes, too, that hadn't been there last year. He knew there were special treatments to get rid of those, but hell, that was just vanity. Harrison Ford got away with the craggy look, why couldn't he?
John leaned in a little closer, turned his face to one side and back. No, he was definitely getting older, there was no doubt about it. It was getting harder and harder to keep up with Ronon on their morning runs, and he couldn't bench-press nearly as much as he used to.
"What are you doing in here? Admiring yourself?"
McKay's voice broke his reverie abruptly and John turned, guilty for having been caught out. But Rodney's voice wasn't as acerbic as his words and his gaze was gentle.
"You think that laser hair removal stuff works on beards?" John asked, rubbing his cheek. "You're always complaining about beard-burn, and I just thought..."
Rodney grinned crookedly. "C'mon to bed, Grizzly Adams. I happen to like you just the way you are."
John smiled a little and turned away from the mirror, turning the light off as he left the room.
no subject
on 12/9/09 05:03 am (UTC)~~
John hates his job. The thought comes as a surprise to him one day as he leans over the edge of a fire escape and watches a couple yelling at each other in the alley. There's a small child, too small and too bundled up in winter clothes and too far away to tell if its a boy or a girl, hiding behind the man's legs.
The surprise isn't so much that his job is unpleasant. His job has remained unchanged for as long as he can remember. If it is unpleasant now, it stands to reason that it has always been unpleasant.
The surprise is that he's thought of it as a job at all, when he's always considered it simply a fact, in the moments he'd found to contemplate. The surprise is amplified in his head when he realizes there are options. There are so many options.
There weren't options yesterday or the day before or the million days before that. John recognizes this for what it is - Free Will - and it scares him, and then the notion that he is scared nearly sends him into a panic. He's circling in a whirlpool of doubt, and emotions threaten to swamp his craft until he forces them down.
It is entirely possible that John is no longer an angel.
~
He looks for the highest point he can reach on foot, and climbs the way he has watched children and sweethearts and people seeking endings or answers climb to the rooftops for generations. He watches the smoke twist from the chimney of a fireplace before it melds into the haze over the city. It's cold, and for the first time he appreciates the layers of clothing he wears as something other than camouflage.
For the first time that he can name, John doesn't feel called to anything, so he sits. It's not so different, but now the wind chills his earlobes where his hat doesn't cover them and he makes good use of the pockets in his heavy coat. As people pass through his unfocused gaze, he can't see into their hearts, and it disconcerts him, like trips to movie theaters used to, and art galleries before that. From the height of the roof, he can't even see the bare hints of emotion on their faces. John sits until the sun sets behind winter clouds, and the streetlights and the glow from shop windows light the world from below. He sits and waits for a hint of the connection that he used to feel in the people who scurry past each other, each turned within himself.
As the temperature continues to drop and the cold air burns his lungs, he sorts through his memory for humans of his acquaintance, with an attention to the passing of time that he's never needed. He's never had to find someone twice before, but with his limited ability to travel, he needs to find someone nearby, someone likely to remember him. He'd like to find someone who doesn't hide his heart and his thoughts behind so many walls. He'd like to find someone who'd smile. The wind sends a torn plastic bag swirling up, and then the clouds send their first attack of snowflakes drifting down past his face, and John tries to unwind hope from his tangle of unfamiliar feelings and picks a destination.
Matthew.
Re: McKay's Mechanical Marvels (SGA, John/Rodney, PG-13)
on 12/9/09 05:07 am (UTC)<33333333333333333333333333333333333333
I love this SO much, and I cannot tell you how much this makes my holidays.
Re: Inspired by spillingvelvet and Mitchell's Magical Macaroons (sadly lacking any actual macaroons)
on 12/9/09 05:08 am (UTC)Re: Inspired by spillingvelvet and Mitchell's Magical Macaroons (sadly lacking any actual macaroons)
on 12/9/09 05:09 am (UTC)Nyawwwwwww! Cam's macaroons need their own fandom.
So exquisitely lovely. *happy sigh*
Re: Snippet :: SGA :: Green Sea 'verse
on 12/9/09 05:11 am (UTC)Thank you so much, sweetheart, this is really really REALLY awesome. :D
Re: John/Cam, Mudfight. 150 words exactly.
on 12/9/09 05:12 am (UTC)This is awesome! MUDFIGHTS FTW! And drabble and a half exactly! Is there a name for that? There should be.
TY SO MUCH, BB, for the fic and the idea, and for being so so lovely. <3
Re: A tiny tidbit for you, babe <3
on 12/9/09 05:14 am (UTC)Of COURSE John's never going to forget about the chocolates, OMG, that is the BEST THING EVAR.
Thank you for doing this bb, I know it was past your bedtime (or should have been, anyway). <3333
Re: Star Trek XI
on 12/9/09 05:16 am (UTC)This is SO AWESOME, BB. Thank you for helping out with my treat - I cannot tell you how good that feels. <3333
Re: McKay's Mechanical Marvels (SGA, John/Rodney, PG-13)
on 12/9/09 05:16 am (UTC)That had me giggling SO HARD.
Love this!!
no subject
on 12/9/09 05:17 am (UTC)ETA: Stupid closing-brackets. *snarls*
Re: John/Cam, Mudfight. 150 words exactly.
on 12/9/09 05:20 am (UTC)Isn't it a drooble? Or is that 200 words? A draffle? I'm just making up nonsense words?
<3
Re: A tiny tidbit for you, babe <3
on 12/9/09 05:23 am (UTC)Re: Snippet :: SGA :: Green Sea 'verse
on 12/9/09 05:25 am (UTC)BTW - the pdf scans worked just dandy and thank you for taking the time. It would have felt weird to not have your stamp on the ending after working so closely on it.
no subject
on 12/9/09 05:29 am (UTC)Teyla's always been so much ... herself, so it's kind of unnerving when she tries to go native.
Halloween's pretty cool. They have a slasher movie marathon and take turns answering the door bell in the Darth Vader mask. Ronon doesn't bother asking the kids who they're supposed to be -- sometimes it's obvious, and he figures he won't have heard of the other costumes anyway -- but it's hilarious to watch McKay and Sheppard ride the sugar rush into full snark and critique all the costumes the second the door shuts. El Dia de los Muertos is better, because most of the time Ronon thinks Earth pretends that death is something that happens to other people. The cemetary Teyla takes him to is full of small alters, offerings, photographs, orange flowers and skeleton fetishes. She has a bag of sugar skulls that she got somewhere, and they trade them to strangers. Torren runs everywhere and Kanaan apologizes to about twenty people for the things he knocks over. No one seems to mind. Thanksgiving is a food orgy, and none of them can really cook but Teyla researches recipes and they do their damnedest. Amelia, in a pretty incisive move, takes custody of the turkey and locks everyone else out of the patio where she's set up the grill, so that Rodney can't poke at it with his stupid quantum thermometer and John can't get the barbeque sauce anywhere near it. Some of the food's pretty good and some of it's not, but Amelia fucking nails the turkey and Lorne has the foresight to just buy his pies from a store, so they all eat themselves semi-comatose and then watch The Incredibles. Ronon does the dishes.
Ronon remembers Christmas celebrations on Atlantis, but the ad-hoc parties were a night and a day there, and as far as he can tell the United States takes a whole month ramping up to it. There's a whole hodgepodge of symbology tacked up in all the public and residential areas, and Teyla keeps looking things up on Wikipedia, but the explanations are rambling and contradictory and Ronon suspects some of them are just made up. The ugly-sweater thing, for one; none of the articles mention hazing, which is only rationale he's prepared to buy. The advertising and the music all get switched over to new stuff, with a lot of fake snow and red and green, and Teyla is having a hell of a time trying to get John and Rodney to explain which of the observances are religious and which are commercial.
A couple of weeks into it, Ronon gets an email from Stein in engineering inviting them all to a latke party.
"Latkes?" he asks.
"They're Jewish food. Fried potato pancakes, traditionally eaten with--" she starts earnestly.
"Stop," he says. "You had me at fried."
So that's how they all end up on the floor of her living room, with plates full of crisp golden cakes covered in apple sauce and sour cream, trying with greasy fingers to spin the little wooden top. "Oh, hey," Rodney says, reaching for the pile of chocolate coins.
Keller smacks his fingers. "That's not gimmel, that's nun,."
"Ow!" Rodney recoils and glares at both her and the top. "Come on, they look practically alike!"
"So when you said anthropology was a 'useless enterprise,' what you really meant was that you are very bad at it," Teyla says soothingly, and spins the top again. "Ooh, hey."
"I still say poker's better," John says, spearing another latke off his plate.
Ronon pops another coin into his mouth; he's a lot better with the top than the rest of them are, so he can afford to burn some of his money early. "Yeah, but you won't let us play strip."
John goes beet red. Next to him, Amelia snorts and casually takes one of the big coins out of Ronon's stack. Ronon never should've explained Satedan courtship property-blending to her, except that he secretly like it when she treats his stuff like hers. Kanaan, covered in applesauce, shoulders Torren and says, "So is this the last winter holiday, other than Christmas?"
"Oh, no," Teyla says earnestly. "There is Kwanzaa, which I am still researching, and then the New Year -- or, several of them, actually, I have not yet mastered the overlapping calendars -- and then a romantic observance early in the second month ..."
Kanaan's smile is glazed, and slipping a little at the edges. "Don't worry, I'll loan you a stunner as a Christmas gift," Ronon says. Teyla throws her napkin at him. John starts laughing and Rodney steals the pot and Keller holds his latkes hostage and negotiates for the return of the stolen merchandise, and Ronon threads his fingers through Amelia's and grins at no one in particular, thinking that really, this is a pretty good way to end the year.
no subject
on 12/9/09 05:37 am (UTC)SO LOVELY. And thank you so much for adding something to this - it means so much to me!
no subject
on 12/9/09 05:46 am (UTC)Thank you so much for writing this for a treat, and making it Ronon and Teyla, and for just being your brilliant self. <33333
Re: John/Cam, Mudfight. 150 words exactly.
on 12/9/09 05:47 am (UTC)Re: Snippet :: SGA :: Green Sea 'verse
on 12/9/09 05:57 am (UTC)Seriously, though, this is so cool! Good, you have such fabulous universes to play in, I'm so jealous!