thefrogg | Fic: One Way Ticket to Nowhere (SGA, Rodney/Ronon)

Okay, I need another challenge like I need another hole in the head. But.

Title: One Way Ticket to Nowhere
Author:

frogg
Beta: Anonymous
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis
Pairing: Rodney/Ronon
Rating: FRT-13
Disclaimer: I don't own them. Damnit.
Challenge:

wtf27
Prompt: Wings

Thick, viscous fluid drenched Rodney, drowning the sounds of the firefight going on around him. Broken glass embedded itself in his skin, needles of pain punctuating Ronon's roar a moment later.

The lab went dark.

~~~

"Rodney, you're going to be uncomfortable for a few days. That's--"

"Carson, it itches. It itches and itches and it's driving me insane, I can't concentrate, and it's not like I can tinker with anything--" Rodney held up his bandaged hands as if for inspection.

"All right, all right, Rodney." Carson sighed in exasperation. "Let's have a look, shall we?"

"Thank god." Much subdued, Rodney slumped in temporary relief, awkwardly tugging at his shirt.

~~~

"So, how are we doing this morning?"

"It itches, what did you think was going to happen?" Rodney groused.

"It could be worse, you know. You could be turning into--"

Rodney cut Carson off. "A bug. Yes, I know. I suppose I should be thanking someone for small miracles."

"Well, they look good, from what I can tell." Carson gingerly touched the growths on Rodney's back, feeling the wrinkled sheathes shift beneath his fingers. "A few more days and the skin should just, well. I'll want you back here for observation when that happens."

"I'm not a guinea pig."

"No, but you are my patient, and we have no idea whether or not you'll be able to shed that skin without help."

Rodney just muttered under his breath.

~~~

"Rodney?"

Rodney looked up from the table.

Teyla smiled ruefully. "We brought you lunch." She held out her tray so Rodney could take one of the plates.

"Oh, good, good. I'm starving, I just--" He crossed his arms over his chest and rubbed his sides, staring at the lunches the rest of his team slid onto the table.

"We get it, McKay," Ronon said as he set two pudding cups in front of Rodney.

"At least it'll be over soon," John added. "They can't get that much bigger, can they?"

"How should I know?" Rodney answered, voice dull and flat as he stole a fork from John's tray. "The only other person I've ever known who grew wings - sort of - was you." He hunched over his food, trying to ignore the way his friends' sympathy bordered on pity.

~~~

"Rodney, you need to be in infirmary. I know you are hurting," Zelenka insisted, gently pushing at Rodney's shoulders. "You should not be in lab now."

"No, I'm fine, really. I mean, why wouldn't I be fine, it's not like I don't normally have ten pounds of dead weight hanging off my shoulderblades, after all, is it?" He licked his lips nervously, tasting sweat and fear. "I'll just, just have an aspirin or two." The sound of cloth tearing, the sudden wet and cold along the left side of his back, stopped him mid-turn.

"Tebe blbec." Zelenka muttered, then tapped his radio. "Carson--yes, in main lab. Now. I will try--hurry."

~~~

"Rodney?"

A whine of pain escaped him, barely audible over a tangled monologue of orders and encouragement.

Carson carefully peeled away a section of dead skin, strands of mucus strung between membrane and pulsing wing-stump.

Rodney flinched as metal tongs brushed his skin again, nearly pulling his wrists free of Ronon's grasp. Gasping for breath, he buried his tear-stained face in the pillow.

"How close is he, doc?"

Rodney never heard the answer to Ronon's question.

~~~

*zzzzzzz*

Rodney swatted irritably at whatever was making the noise, wanting nothing more than to bury his nose in Ronon's neck and go back to sleep.

*zzzzzzz*

"Rodney?"

The buzzing stopped. "Um." Lifting his head from Ronon's shoulder, Rodney blinked in bewilderment. "How long--"

"Little more than eighteen hours," Ronon rumbled; Rodney could feel the vibrations through his chest. "Carson said you were pretty wiped out. Also said you'd need to eat." He reached over to the bedside table and snagged an MRE. "Here."

Taking it gingerly, Rodney blinked some more before opening it. "So...?"

Ronon shrugged beneath him.

"What do they look like?"

"Big, flat soap bubbles."

~~~

"Hey, Rodney."

He half turned from the balcony. "Hi."

"You're a hard man to track down these days," John said, voice gentle and even.

"Yeah, well, I don't particularly like being stared at like--" Rodney stopped, remembering too late.

"--a bug?" John finished for him.

Rodney's wings buzzed for a moment, then slid against each other unhappily. They glinted in the fading sunset, casting tiny rainbows against the flat grey of Atlantis. "I, ah. Didn't--"

"It's okay. Don't worry about it."

"No, it's not, I mean, I just have the wings, you almost--"

"Rodney."

Rodney lifted his chin defiantly.

"Carson told me they'll have to come off in a week or so."

"Yeah, so?"

"So? You went through all that, and you don't get to fly, or anything. I may have turned into a bug, but there were things about it that weren't exactly horrible." John's gaze flickered between Rodney and the sunset bleeding into the ocean. "There are things I miss, that's all," he added when Rodney failed to respond.

Rodney's wings buzzed again, a sharp *brap* *brap* of denial. "What, you want to form the Ex-Bug Support Group or something?"

John shrugged. "If that's what you need."

Rodney's laughter petered to an awkward halt. "There were other vats there, weren't there? In the lab?"

"Yeah."

"After--after Carson." He couldn't say it. "We could go back and try a different one. Maybe grow some wings I could fly with..."

John only gave him a sad smile in reply.

~~~the end~~~

Tebe blbec. = You idiot.