Maritima, by Teaphile

Title: Maritima
Author: teaphile
Category: Gen, Humour
Rating: G
Summary: It wasn’t the first time they’d lost track of Rodney McKay, and Elizabeth figured it certainly wouldn’t be the last.
Spoilers: None. Set vaguely post-The Seige 2
Notes: This is my first SGA fic. I welcome any and all criticism, especially if you can help me find a better title.

Maritima

It wasn’t the first time they’d lost track of Rodney McKay, and Elizabeth figured it certainly wouldn’t be the last. Atlantis was largely unexplored, but even the parts that had been deemed safe were so vast that team members could go for days without seeing each other if they really wanted to. Of course, human nature being what it was, no one wanted to.

Especially not Rodney McKay. Elizabeth remembered with amusement the day she’d realized, back in Antarctica, that despite his antisocial behaviours—his sharp tongue and tendency to bristle like a threatened cat when confronted—McKay was unable to not be in the centre of the action. Where there was a crowd, one could find McKay, if not directing the action then commenting on it frequently and at unseemly volume.

Which is why it was strange that he wasn’t here, in the mess hall, during the final round of the First Great Earth/Athosian Penebra Competition. The Athosian card game had caught on quickly amongst the Atlanteans, culminating in what had turned out to be an exciting series of games. Currently the Athosian team was winning, but Elizabeth was sure her people would pull ahead when the time came.

At the moment, though, she was a little worried. Sure, she’d lost Rodney before, but he usually answered his comm after a few tries, bitching about being interrupted. This time he was either purposefully ignoring hails or something was wrong. She really wasn’t betting on the first. She was just waiting for Major Sheppard to arrive—and there he was, entering the room now—before they set out on a quiet little search and rescue mission.

The two of them easily found McKay in a room on Pier Three. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor, jacket off, back towards them, and was working on something with such concentration that he didn’t even notice the door opening. Now that Elizabeth thought about it, she’d seen a little dot in this room before, on the lifesigns monitor in the control room. She’d just never bothered to find out who was spending so much time here over the past month.

She glanced over at John, who had a small but evil smile on his face. “He’s sewing,” he whispered to her. She looked more closely at Rodney, who indeed was sewing, a large piece of what looked like canvas draped over his lap. Before she could respond, John had tiptoed up behind Rodney and crouched down to his level.

Elizabeth was torn between watching and restraining John. In the end, she let him be.

“McKay!”

Rodney’s arms flew up in the air and Elizabeth could have sworn she saw his rear end leave the floor. Just as quickly as he’d jumped he rolled over and started gagging, spitting something out on to the floor. He leveled a glare at John, who seemed far too pleased with himself. “Not funny, Major,” Rodney said, pulling himself up. “I had a needle in my mouth.”

John backed up to minimum safe distance, still grinning.

“I could have swallowed that needle, you know. It could have pierced my esophagus. I could be bleeding internally, right now.” He advanced on John, who had clearly decided to stand his ground. “Worse, I could have inhaled it. I have no idea what a needle would do to lung tissue, but I’m sure Carson could fill us both in. Let’s go see him, shall we?”

“Beckett’s at the tournament. Where you should be,” John answered calmly.

A puzzled frown creased Rodney’s brow. “Why would I be there? I don’t even care for Penebra. Or any card game, for that matter. And why are you here?”

“But I saw you playing against Teyla the other day. And I’m here because Elizabeth,” he waved a hand in her direction, “asked me to come with her to search for you when you didn’t respond.”

Rodney obviously hadn’t noticed her presence, but he nodded as if he had. “Elizabeth.” He turned back to John. “That was a matter of honour. I didn’t enjoy it at all. Can I get back to my sewing now?”

John looked like he was about to acquiesce, but Elizabeth had to know. “What exactly are you sewing, Rodney? It looks too big to be clothing.”

Rodney snorted. “Like I care about clothing.” He gestured broadly around the room. “Look at the walls.”

Elizabeth did, and saw large flat shapes that she’d thought were decorations. Now she began to wonder. “Surfboards?”

Rodney’s face lit up. “Better. Windsurfers.” He went over to a stacked pile in the corner and pulled out a large frame. “The sails must have disintegrated millennia ago—either that or they’re hidden somewhere I haven’t been yet—but the frames and boards are fine. All I have to do is make new sails.”

“So that’s what you’ve been working on in your spare time for the past month.”

“Yup.” He sat back down and fished out his materials again.

John sat beside him. “You windsurf?”

Holding the fabric up closer to his eyes, Rodney began to sew again. “Does that surprise you, Major?”

John frowned. “A little, yes.”

“Why, because you think I’m not athletic?”

Fascinated, Elizabeth joined them on the floor, making a triangle.

John shrugged. “I guess. I haven’t really thought about it.”

Rodney set down his sewing again. “In the way that the software on a computer won’t run properly if the hardware isn’t up to spec, the brain doesn’t work efficiently unless the body is taken care of.”

“But you don’t work out at all.”

“Not here I don’t, because I get enough exercise running around this place.” He picked up his sewing and started again, working tight, neat stitches into the fabric. “Back in school it was easy to just sit at a desk all day. We needed something to do, so a bunch of us took up windsurfing. In the summer we’d head out to the lake. Spring and fall we took vacations to wherever the wind was blowing. Winter. Now, winter was a problem.” He nodded absently, getting lost in his work again.

“Why windsurfing?”

Rodney shrugged. “I think we were studying fluid mechanics at the time. Air flow over a curved surface. It made sense at the time.”

“Rodney,” Elizabeth began, “where did you learn to sew?”

“Oh, I got Carson to teach me. He’s happy that I have a ‘hobby’. I keep telling him that machines are my hobby as well as my profession, but he just looks at me.” Rodney’s face scrunched up in thought. “Like he’s completely flummoxed that I love my job or something.” He shook his head.

“Huh,” was John’s contribution. “So, when can we take her out?”

Rodney blinked at him. “Take her out? We?”

“Sure! You are going to give lessons, aren’t you?”

“Of course, Major,” Rodney said primly. “Pick up a needle and start sewing and you can be my first student.”

John did just that, to Rodney’s evident surprise. What surprised him even more was when Elizabeth lifted another corner of the cloth triangle and added her own stitches down the hem.

“Et tu, Brute,” Rodney asked snidely.

Elizabeth just smiled back at him sweetly. “There’s an Ancient holiday coming up in two weeks, a celebration of the sea. I thought we could all take part. This seems like the perfect addition.” She ignored the glare he shot at her and continued sewing.

John nodded. “Sounds like fun. You want to hold it here or on the mainland?”

Elizabeth glanced up at him. “I hadn’t decided. It would be nice to open up one of these piers, now that we know how they work. Retract the roof and the walls and have a nice little dock.”

“But,” John replied, raising a finger. “Sand.”

“I know. I just can’t see how we could move that many people to the mainland and still have time for a celebration.”

Rodney cut in. “We could always move the sand here. Outfit a couple of the jumpers with crates, send out some marines with shovels and bring the beach back.”

“I’m sure the marines will thank you for suggesting that,” John spit back at him.

“Hm.” Rodney shrugged. “Not my problem.”

“I’ll be sure to tell them that.”

“Yet I notice that you’re not arguing about it being their job,” Rodney said smugly. “One wonders what they’d think if they heard about that.”

*

The three of them, over the next two weeks, managed to make two more sails, but Elizabeth felt they’d gained far more than just a few metres of hemmed cloth. They were essentially the command team, but the three had never had a chance to really bond as a group. Somehow, though, they all managed to appear there at the same time, off and on. Sure, there were days when one or two had to be somewhere; once, both men were stranded on the other side of the Stargate overnight and Elizabeth had spent her time in the control room instead of indulging in time off. They were busy people with responsibilities, and Elizabeth was just coming to realize how much the entire team had to rely on them and each other. She was pleased, then, that she and McKay and Sheppard had something to bind them other than their positions. She already mourned the day this venture—and the quiet month that allowed it—would be over.

As near as they could calculate it, the sea festival fell within this week, and Elizabeth had arbitrarily chosen a day. Shifts were shortened so everyone could attend for the maximum amount of time. One of the officers had drafted water polo teams, rotation to be determined later. The sand was brought in, deck chairs laid out, canopies devised, and swimsuits deemed optional. Dr. Giardino would tend bar, mixing up Athosian booze with the local pulpy fruits from the mainland.

McKay’s windsurfers were ready, leaning in a neat row along the side of the pier not dedicated to water polo. Rodney himself was complaining about the cold water and lack of wetsuits. Dr. Zelenka and John were doing their best to ignore or pacify him in turns.

“You’ll warm up as soon as you hit the water, McKay,” John commented with little patience.

“Besides,” came Zelenka’s voice, “You are wearing as much clothing as you can wear and not drown from the weight.”

“Oh, you two are so helpful.”

Elizabeth could hear the shrug in Sheppard’s voice. “Hey, this was your idea.”

Elizabeth claimed a deck chair near them and opened her book. It was her turn again for the library copy of Jane Austen’s Emma and she didn’t want to have to give it up before she finished it this time. She kept one ear on the drama at that side of the pier, though, not wanting to miss anything.

She managed to become so engrossed in the book that she missed the cause of the splash from that direction, although she felt the resulting drops hit her bare thighs.

“Oh, that’s not good,” Carson muttered from somewhere on her right.

She looked and saw exactly what she expected to see. Rodney in the water, wheezing melodramatically, John brushing imaginary dirt from his hands, Zelenka with his arms crossed over his chest.

“I am going to kill you both, dead, dead, dead. As soon as I defrost.” Rodney paused. “Sheppard, give me your hand.”

John just smiled. “Not on your life am I going to fall for that.”

Rodney mumbled something Elizabeth couldn’t hear, but her lip-reading was good enough to distinguish the word ‘bastard’ in there. She was going to pretend she didn’t see that other word.

Finally taking pity, Zelenka reached down to help Rodney back on to the pier. On dry land again, Rodney straightened his shoulders and politely thanked Zelenka, aiming the comment in John’s direction. He then whipped off his soaked T-shirt and threw it—with surprising accuracy for sopping cloth—at John’s head. Engulfed, John laughed. He then pulled the shirt off his head and started twirling the cloth menacingly, twisting it up tightly.

Rodney’s eyes widened. “No. Oh, no.” He backed away, but not quickly enough to dodge the stinging slap to his chest. “Ow.” He looked down at the red mark on his sternum. “Hey!”

“Someday they really will kill each other,” Carson commented quietly.

Elizabeth’s residual grin didn’t fade. “Then at least you won’t have to patch them up again.”

Zelenka, having abandoned the battlefield, took position on Carson’s other side. “I will kill them both. Death by slivovice. Two such WASPs will never know what hit them.”

Elizabeth raised an eyebrow at him. “Is that the plum stuff? Tastes like heaven, burns like hell?”

Zelenka nodded. “Exactly.”

Both men were in the water now, and Rodney had one of his boards in reach. John was treading water, watching as Rodney hauled up the sail and tried to catch what little wind there was. Elizabeth had just turned back to her book when she heard another splash, followed by John’s hysterical laughter.

“I thought you knew how to do this,” he called out to a floundering Rodney.

Rodney grabbed the board before it floated away and pulled himself halfway up. “I said I know how. I didn’t say I was any good at it,” he responded acidly. “Let’s see you try it.”

John just waved a hand in the air casually. “Nah. I’m not that interested.”

Rodney drew back in surprise. “Then why did you help?”

“Seemed like a good idea at the time?” John shrugged. “I don’t know. I just wanted to.”

“Hey, Elizabeth,” Rodney called out. “How ‘bout you?”

Putting her book down, she stood. “Sure, why not?” The sand was warm under her bare feet, but it didn’t reach the edge of the pier, lest it wash away. The cold metal of the city came as a shock. She ignored it as she dove neatly into the sea water.

She gasped as she came up for air. The water was cold; she should have tried a dock start, but she hadn’t been sure the wind was strong enough. She grabbed one of the other windsurfers, as John had joined Rodney in using the first as a flotation device. They were both watching her. Elizabeth prayed fervently that she hadn’t forgotten what little she’d learned. She ducked under the sail, grabbed the crossbar, planted her feet firmly on the board, and let the blessedly sudden gust of wind haul her up by the sail.

“Oh, now that’s just…,” Rodney cut himself off as she glided slowly past the two men. “You didn’t say anything about knowing how to sail.”

“I’ve led a privileged and varied life, Rodney,” she called back, floundering for a second as the wind changed direction. “There’s not much I haven’t tried.” As luck would have it, the wind gave out completely at that point and she fought to stay upright. She lost, crashing into the water again. Holding the sail out of the water with both hands, she frog-kicked backwards to join the men.

They were both smiling at her with what she thought might be pride. “I need to stretch the canvas tighter, don’t I,” Rodney asked.

“I think so. Try wetting it first, then stretching it. Let it dry on the frame. Like artists do.”

Rodney bobbled his head about. Elizabeth thought it was endearing. Apparently, so did John. “Sure. Because I know what artists do.”

“That would be why I told you.” Her legs were starting to tire. “Now, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I’m going back to my book.” She climbed out and hauled her board out after her. “Good try, Rodney.”

“Thanks, Mom,” he replied facetiously.

She chuckled and made her way back to her chair, where Carson was snoring and Zelenka had stolen her book. She decided right then to leave the beach where it was.

END