Damage Control
#5 of The
by Setcheti
I was as relieved as anyone when the incomin’ traveler alarm went off…but I didn’t go down to the gateroom to see what was goin’ on. I haven’t been leavin’ the lab much lately, not since Hoff, and I knew that if they needed a medical team they’d call for one.
So I was bloody well surprised when they all came troopin’ into the infirmary wantin’ me to check them over. They were all five tryin’ to tell me what had happened at once, and I finally had to shout them down. “All right, shut up all of ye! I can’t figure it out if you all talk at once, now can I?” That worked, but now nobody’s talkin’, wonderful. I point at Ford, he’s the most succinct of the bunch. “You, tell me what’s happened.”
He swallows. “Apparently as soon as Dr. Weir came through the Gate we were all knocked unconscious – by the mist aliens, because every time someone uses the Gate it kills some of them, and if we’d dialed Earth we’d have killed millions. So they created these alternate realities for us – the mist aliens – inside our own minds, but the major was able to mess with his for some reason and General Hammond – I mean a mist alien who made himself look like the general – tried to tell us they were going to keep us there until we died, but Dr. Weir convinced him to let us go and we promised not to ever go back again.”
Holy crap. I ignore the noises Sheppard’s makin’ about the boy namin’ things again. “You all have been unconscious on the planet’s surface for the past twenty hours?” I don’t wait for them to finish noddin’ before I’m yellin’ for my team. “Everyone grab a bed and stay there!” They all do it, none of them a bit reluctantly so I know they can’t be feelin’ any too good at the moment. Rodney’s movin’ slower than the others, and he’s rubbin’ his head; I move him where I want him to be and sit him down myself. “Did you hit your head when you fell? Let me see.”
“I don’t think I did, there’s no bump and I’m not bleeding.” No, there’s not and he isn’t, so that’s one good thing. “I just have the headache from Hell.”
“Do any of the rest of you have a headache?” No one does. I think fast. Sheppard was able to disrupt the illusory environment…but he doesn’t have a headache, because he’s sittin’ over there shakin’ his head and lookin’ disgusted at Rodney. I’ll deal with that in a minute. First things first. Melissa, one of my P.A.’s, is hoverin’ right at my shoulder, so I start givin’ orders. “They all need water, and then I want a full workup on everybody before you give them anythin’ to eat – except for Dr. McKay, get him one of those nutrient-replacement drinks right away.”
That inspires a complaint. “Hey, why does he get to eat?” Ford wants to know.
“Because I don’t want him keelin’ over,” I snap back. Time to lay this one to rest; Rodney tells everyone he’s got low blood sugar, but that’s not exactly his problem. “He’s got a higher metabolism than the rest of you, he only needs four or five hours of sleep a day but he has to eat more often to compensate.”
Sheppard doesn’t look like he’s buyin’ that. “I thought people with a high metabolism were skinny,” he smirks. “Rodney doesn’t exactly fit that description.”
I can see the others agreein’ with that, and it doesn’t make me any too happy at the moment. “Rodney, take off a few layers.” He gives me a look like I just pointed a gun at him and asked him to dance. I don’t give in. “I can’t check you over through two shirts and a jacket. Do it.”
He still doesn’t like it, but he shrugs out of his jacket and then peels off his long-sleeved shirt so he’s only wearin’ his t-shirt, which is just a bit tight on him. Melissa’s back with the nutrient drink – bloody nasty things, but Rodney absolutely loves them so I have to keep them locked up where he can’t get at them – and once he has that he’s not so upset. I go ahead and start Melissa takin’ his vitals. “The rest of you need to take off your jackets too. And as you can see, he’s not overweight,” I point out. “Out of shape, yes – because until recently he did most of his work in a lab and not in the field. I’m out of shape myself for the same reason. And the last time I saw you professionally, Major, you didn’t exactly have a set of six-pack abs to be braggin’ about your own self.”
“Sometimes I don’t have time to get down to the gym…” Sheppard’s blushin’, though, and the others are laughin’ at him, so that’s one problem taken care of. Now on to the next.
I go over to the major, standin’ out of the way of the tech who’s takin’ his blood. “Now I want you to tell me exactly how you were able to disrupt the illusory environment, anythin’ you can remember.”
He takes a drink of water, leans back and starts thinkin’. “I don’t think I was consciously trying to disrupt it, I could just tell something wasn’t right. General Hammond retired years ago, but I didn’t think of that until a lot later – but it was him being so nice to me that got me wondering. He let Teyla leave the base with me, he gave us a staff car and a driver…that isn’t normal.”
“Sometimes for the SGC it was,” comes from Ford. “But now that I think about it, I should have realized that it was weird General O’Neill wasn’t there.”
“So should I,” adds Weir.
“I was there when
“And I should have thought something was wrong when they said the Asgaard were helping them,” Rodney contributes. He’s already talkin’ faster, good. “Not to mention when all the documents they kept giving me were pure gibberish.”
“Gibberish? As in total nonsense, just a hodgepodge of letters and symbols?” I ask him. He nods, and I slap my forehead. “Of course. Melissa, Dr. McKay needs 300 milligrams of ibuprofen, and we’ll need to do some scans to make sure they didn’t scramble anythin’ inside his head…”
“Hey, now he gets drugs, that really isn’t fair.” Sheppard backs down a bit when I turn back to him, though. “You’re spoiling him, he’ll just whine more now.”
“He was smarter than your mist aliens.” That even gets a reaction from Rodney. “No, I’m serious. They were in all your heads, apparently, but they couldn’t keep up with him so he was seein’ things show up in gibberish. And that’s why he’s got a headache and the rest of you don’t – partially, anyway. I’m bettin’ the rest of it’s got to do with his control of the ATA gene I gave him.”
I hear a snigger from Weir and turn to frown at her, but she just smiles. “Oh, you mean that psychological component that keeps him from controlling it properly?”
The woman’s got no shame. I know Rodney can be bloody well irritatin’, but that’s no call for them to pick on him all the time – and I’m also glad to see that Teyla is frownin’ now, she’s not findin’ it funny any more. “Rodney, shut up,” I tell the man before his mouth gets more than halfway open. “Yes, there is a mental component to usin’ the gene, but I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s my fault you haven’t got full access to it, not yours.” I turn back to Weir. “In effect, what I did by givin’ it to him was to hook up hardware in his system without givin’ him software to run it with – everythin’s workin’, but he’s havin’ to apply it hit and miss.”
“But Major Sheppard can use his…”
“That’s because he was born with it pre-installed.” I hope my puttin’ it in Rodney-terms is goin’ to help him understand, maybe help all of them understand. “He’s got the software already, don’t you see? McKay’s got the ability to do what he does, but he’s goin’ to have to learn how to do it all on his own.”
“I am learning.” A bit defensive, but that’s just Rodney. “Some things are just…taking longer than others. I did finally figure out the personal shield.”
“Yeah, you did.” Sheppard isn’t needlin’ him now. To hear him tell it that incident scared him half to death, turnin’ around just in time to see Rodney walk down into the middle of that energy-suckin’ black monster and disappear…and then reappear a few minutes later unconscious on the gateroom floor with his personal shield completely drained of power. “You haven’t ever gotten it working again, though.”
Rodney smirks at him. “You’re just jealous because it won’t work for anyone but me. When it’s working, that is.”
“Yeah, when it’s
working,” Sheppard tosses back at him. They’re playin’
now, which is what I wanted to see – between he and Sheppard, anyway. I don’t think
A problem I’m not goin’ to be solvin’ today, I’ve got other things to worry about – things like five people that were layin’ unconscious on an alien planet for twenty hours and one of them that’s got symptoms the others don’t have – just because I think I’ve figured out why he’s got them doesn’t mean I don’t still need to check him over twice to make sure.
I might check them all twice, for that same reason.