![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lobelia321TITLE: After Math
AUTHOR: Lobelia;![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lobelia321
FANDOM: Stargate Atlantis
PAIRING: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
RATING: NC-17. 18. Adult. (For language and sexual explicitness.)
LENGTH: 3,345 words.
SPOILERS: 2.07, 'Instinct'; 2.11, 'The Hive'.
SEQUEL: To Ichor.
STYLE: Present tense and terse. The opposite of the ornate style of 'Ichor'.
FORMAT: Plaintext, i.e. asterisked italics. (I print out my fics, and often Word won't recognise html italics and I have to read fic in 'raw' format. So, for the convenience of those who suffer the same frustration, I've left the asterisks in and the italics out. :-)
DISCLAIMER: I do not own the characters nor the Stargate universe. No copyright infringement is intended. This is an amateur story, not posted for profit.
SUMMARY: Rodney watches John going through wraith enzyme withdrawal and remembers what it was like.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I wrote this in June 2006 while I was still in the middle of 'Ichor' and imagining the aftermath. The title came to me first, along with the Rodney pov. It is not finished and never will be. I did not mean to post it but I like it andtehophiliac asked so nicely, :-) So I thought I'd share.
ETA: Or, perhaps, it's not unfinished after all but meant to be a 'snapshot', to usedossier's lovely formulation.
After math
by Lobelia
Rodney sits on a chair next to the bed and looks at John. This is what he sees:
He sees a man with a bushy beard. He sees a man with tangled hair, like a space-age hippy. He sees a man with puffed lips, yellow teeth and sun-ravaged skin, scurf on his scalp and scabs on his feet.
The man is contorted in pain, with manacles around his wrists and ankles that attach him to the infirmary bed. He's screaming through gritted teeth. He's twisting his body up and around, and his head up and around in the opposite direction. His face is red, his pores drip sweat, the veins on his neck pop.
Rodney feels his own guts twist in sympathy. He remembers this.
Rodney remembers:
Lying on this very bed, bound and drugged. Shouting at Carson Beckett: *You're just jealous of me! You pathetic excuse for a doctor in your pathetic excuse for a hospital!* And: *Give me more enzyme! I know you're hiding it!*
*GIVE ME MORE FUCKING ENZYME!*
Rodney had injected himself with a whole 10 ml ampoule of the enzyme. It came straight from a wraith's enzyme pouch into his own veins.
That was once.
He could only imagine what it is like for John now. John was given the enzyme by a wraith direct for months on end. John was fed on by a wraith for months and months. John is thin like a skeleton. When John opens his eyes, he frightens Rodney with his black left eye. John looks like Aidan Ford, only worse. He looks like a vicious, writhing thing from a monster movie.
Rodney remembers:
Writhing on the bed. Twisting on the bed. Begging for enzyme until his voice went hoarse. Weeping, howling, pleading, cursing. A turkey so cold it froze his balls off.
Having mad, confused flashes of thought: *If only I could reach with my hands.* Screaming: *Take the fucking restraints off! Untie me, you fucking bitches!*
This was directed at the nursing staff. He felt horribly embarrassed about it later. He felt so embarrassed that he never apologised. He pretended not to remember.
He remembered, though. Rodney remembers everything.
He looks around. There is nobody here. He sits alone, behind the curtain pulled around John's bed. John is an animal on the sheet.
"Listen," Rodney says. He clears his throat. He knows John can't hear him. John's screams aren't very loud but that is because John is aiming the screams inwards. Rodney can see that this is what John is doing. He can see the teeth biting each other, and he can see the screams dropping down John's throats in convulsed globules. Only groans emerge but Rodney knows that screams reverberate against John's ear drums from the inside.
Rodney clears his throat again. He looks up at the curtain rod. "Listen," he repeats. "I'm going to do something, and it may seem a little unorthodox. I can't tell Carson, and I'm certainly not going to tell the nurses, especially that blonde one, and you'd better not tell anyone, either, when you're better -- which you will be, you will be better. But if you're going through anything like what I went through -- only much worse, I can see that it's much worse -- then, if I remember this rightly, what I'm about to do may bring you some, at least I hope it will, some relief."
He stops and flexes his right hand.
"Not that I know for certain," he adds, as a kind of scientific caveat. "Because nobody actually ever did this for me."
Bestial groans come out of John's twisted mouth. His left eye looks horrible. His right eye looks blank.
"Here goes," Rodney says to himself.
He puts his hand on the sheet over John's belly. John's belly is taut as a drum. The sheet is sodden with sweat.
Rodney moves his hand downwards until the side of his palm bumps against the top of John's erection.
"I knew it." There is a short burst of satisfaction because it is always good to know that you've been right.
John's cock is as taut as his belly.
Rodney presses his palm to the back of John's cock.
John's body stops twisting. It goes stiff as a washboard.
Rodney moves his right hand up and down John's hard cock. It is quite a long cock, as far as Rodney can tell from the feel of it under the sheet. He presses quite hard and he moves quite fast. He braces his left hand against the metal bar of the bed.
He tightens his mouth and looks at the foot of the bed, to where John's bare feet jut out from underneath the sheet.
John's toenails are hard and torn at the edges. His toes flex. His insteps curl up.
The sheet bunches up underneath Rodney's hand. He cups his fingers around the top of John's cock, and the sheet is hot and smeared with semen.
Rodney wipes his hand on the edge of the sheet. He keeps his eyes on the metal bar of the bed, then he looks up.
John's eyes have fallen shut. His mouth has gone limp. His chest moves up and down.
Footsteps sound. The curtain is drawn aside.
"You're still here, Rodney?" Carson Beckett says. "That's very kind of you. Oh, I see, our patient has fallen asleep."
Rodney goes back to his quarters and washes his hands in the basin.
*****
Rodney goes back to the infirmary after breakfast.
The patient has not had a good night. "It's been 36 hours," says Carson Beckett, "and no sign of the withdrawal symptoms easing off. We've administered another dose of sedative but I'm afraid it's a matter of waiting until the enzyme has worked its way through his system. The trouble is we just have no idea how long that will be, exactly. His condition is complicated by the fact that he was being fed on the entire time he was receiving the enzyme. As far as we can tell, the feedings took place so regularly that the feeding wound remained almost permanently open. Here, do you want to see? The wound is covered by only a thin layer of temporary scar tissue. I should say 'wounds' because there is the central feeding wound, and then the five scars left by the wraith's claws. I have no idea how he managed to stay alive or avoid serious infection."
Rodney does not want to see. He averts his eyes. He thinks he might be sick but then he isn't.
"You're going to stay with him a little bit, then, are you, Rodney? That is probably a good idea. It seemed to have a calming effect yesterday. Now, if you'll excuse me, we're analysing some of Colonel Sheppard's blood samples and urine samples."
Rodney doesn't ask whether they discovered any sperm samples.
"I should warn you, Rodney," says Carson Beckett and leans towards him in confidence. "He's getting a little more lucid and that means he's starting to be abusive. It means nothing, of course."
"Carson," says Rodney, "if there is anyone in this city who is aware of that fact, it is me."
"Of course," says Carson Beckett. He draws the curtain and goes away somewhere.
Rodney looks at John.
John twists violently on the bed. His wrists are rubbed raw with chafing at the manacles. Somebody has applied bandages to the wrists but most of them have come off, and one of them seeps blood.
John's head is extended backwards. The crown of his head presses into the mattress. His throat forms a bridge. His Adam's apple spasms.
Rodney sits down on the chair and clears his throat.
"So," he says. "Well."
John's head with its new shiny black eye twists in his direction. "You!" he spits. "I remember you! Get away from me, what do you want?" His hair is plastered to his temples. There are drops of sweat trapped in his beard.
Rodney swallows. "Hello, John," he says.
"Get the fuck out of here," snarls John. "I know what you did, I know what you want."
"No no, you're misunderstanding this," says Rodney. He knows that John can't really hear him.
Rodney remembers:
Not hearing anyone else's voice. Just seeing their lips move. Just registering their presence. Just hearing the blood roar against his own eyeballs.
Rodney looks at the sheet and sees the outline of John's erection. He lifts his hand.
"Get away from me!" yells John. "Don't touch me, you filthy fucking pervert! That's all you ever wanted, catch me bound and tied so you can get your filthy paws on me because that's what you get off on, don't think I don't know it!"
"Will you be quiet," says Rodney, "or someone will come and that'll be the end of that."
"Fuck off!" shouts John.
Someone comes and that is the end of that.
They shoot some sedative up John's arm and he goes back to his usual base state of writhing and groaning.
*****
Rodney goes back to the infirmary after supper.
John's face is red and sweaty. They've changed the sheet; this one has a pattern on it but is already drenched. Someone, it seems, has tried to trim John's beard but given up half-way through. Later, Rodney will find out that it was the blonde nurse, and that John bit her so she swore and dropped the scissors.
John's eyeballs are popping out of his emaciated skull. The black one looks terrifying.
Rodney has done his calculations. John's been strapped to this bed for 47 hours. Rodney himself had to endure this for 24. It nearly killed him.
47 minus 24 is 23. John's been withdrawing from the enzyme for almost double the time that Rodney was.
John's screams are as fresh as if they were yesterday's. He's still swallowing them. His face looks exhausted. The cheeks are sunken.
"Hi, John," says Rodney.
John doesn't reply. He doesn't move his head. His wrists twist against the manacles.
Rodney has done other calculations. John's been gone for 19 months. He was trapped with that wraith on that island on that uninhabited planet for over one-and-a-half years. Rodney remembers Zaddik and Ellia. He remembers how Ellia the wraith had to feed on Zaddik the human, and he remembers how the wild wraith fed on humans from the village, two or three every four months.
Rodney has done the math. He figures that the wraith must have fed on John once every fortnight at least. This means that John was fed on at least 38 times. And that, in turn, means that John has 38 lots of enzymes in him.
Rodney has no idea how much enzyme the wraith injected into John at each feeding, and whether it was more or less than the 10 ml ampoule that Rodney took that time.
He knows for certain, though, that it is a shocking amount of enzyme.
Rodney sits down on the chair and looks at John.
After a while, he stops looking at John because looking at John hurts something inside Rodney.
He puts his hand on John's arm.
John tries to wrench his arm out of the manacle's sockets. He snaps his head round to stare at Rodney. There is foam around his lips.
"Fuck off," John snarls. "Fuck off, you fucking filthy son of a cunt."
Rodney sighs and looks at the curtain rod. "Listen," he says, "I know you're not feeling too well. I've been there myself, well, sort of, and it's not pleasant, I know this, but here's the plan: you shut up and I'll help you out here."
"I don't want you here, you leech, you fuck. Wherever I go, wherever I turn, you are always there, always doing the wrong thing, you pride yourself on being so clever but you are a stuck-up, jumped-up prig of a prick; you're only here because you couldn't make it back on earth, because your fucking science is no good..."
Rodney puts his hand on the sheet on top of John's hard cock.
John bucks up wildly and screams, "You're doing it again, you can't help yourself, take your filthy fucking..."
"Just shut up," says Rodney, gets to his feet, leans across and presses his own mouth to John's screaming mouth.
John immediately thrusts his big wet tongue into Rodney's mouth. His tongue tastes of mould and vomit.
Rodney has a gagging reflex but fights it off. He holds on to the metal bar of the bed with his left hand. With his other hand, he works John's cock hard and fast.
He keeps one eye cocked for intruders.
John makes unearthly sounds at the back of his throat. He bucks up into Rodney's hand. Then he shudders, his tongue goes stiff, and he slumps back limply onto the mattress.
Rodney withdraws. He wipes his hand on the edge of the sheet.
John looks deathly pale, underneath his leather skin. His eyes have fallen shut. Without his black eye visible, he looks a bit more normal.
His breath comes in rasps but it's an even breath.
Rodney looks down at his hands. They are shaking.
He goes back to his own quarters, washes his mouth, brushes his teeth and gargles with mouth wash.
He sits down on the edge of his bed and stares unseeing at the diplomas on his wall.
*****
Rodney goes back to the infirmary after breakfast. It's been 58 hours.
John lies on the bed in a rigid state that would be foetal if he weren't manacled. His chin digs into his chest, his knees are bent as far as they will go, his back is curled up into a wheel.
"Hi," says Rodney. His voice is almost steady.
John looks up. His left eye is black and expressionless. His right eye is white, black and blue; it looks lost and wild.
"I've come to, you know," says Rodney tensely. But John doesn't say anything about being a filthy pervert; he just stares at Rodney like a drunken man.
Rodney sits down on the chair. "Look on it," he says, "as a favour to a friend. Because you know, we are friends, right; you may not remember this now but we are, actually, friends, or were, before you got yourself lost on that planet and had your life sucked out of you in increments; I have no idea what that does to a man but..."
"Fuck off," spits John, but it sounds weary.
"Yes, yes," says Rodney. "I'll be quick."
He looks at the sheet, then he pulls the sheet aside.
They've put a hospital gown on John but it's twisted and rucked up. It's left John's legs and genital area exposed.
Rodney looks at John's thick curly pubic hair, streaked with grey, and at his erect cock and at his angry red balls. Then he looks at the curtain rod and takes a swallow.
"Go on," says John in between harsh breaths, "lick me then, suck me, I know you want to but you'll never be as good as, you'll never do it like, you can never..."
Rodney puts his hand on John's cock.
John's cock feels hot and hard and full of blood.
"Listen," says Rodney, talking fast, "I remember some of what this was like, it was unbearable, an unbearable tightness and dryness, a dreadful tearing and pulling at the inside of me, and the whole time, it sounds bizarre but maybe not so bizarre, I was hard as a plank, like you, in fact. And it would have been a tremendous relief if I'd just been able to touch but, of course, they won't let you do that, they tie you up, and that's a good thing, don't get me wrong. The enzyme makes you strong, nobody knows that better than me, and if I untied you, I know you'd slug me till I went out cold, and then trample across my prone body, no doubt. So I'll have to do this for you, and you know..." He waves his other hand in the air. "Count it as repayment for all the countless times you saved my ass. Well, not countless but the many times..."
"Fuck, Rodney," says John, "just get on with it."
Rodney looks at John.
John has his eyes squeezed shut tight.
"You said my name," says Rodney.
John half-groans.
"You must be getting better," says Rodney. He moves his hand up John's cock, and down again. He lets his hand rest on John's balls. They are hard as nuts.
Then he removes his hand, gets to his feet, leans across and presses his own mouth to John's straining cock.
He places his mouth onto John's cock sideways, his upper lip around one flank of John's cock and his lower lip around the other. He curls his lips around his teeth and grips John's cock with his cushioned incisors. He moves his head from side to side a little.
John makes a grunting sound but he doesn't scream.
Rodney pauses for a moment. He lifts his head. He flexes his right hand.
Then he closes his eyes and puts his lips around John's cock sideways again. He places his right hand around John's balls. His left hand grips the metal bar of the bed. John's arm is in the way; it digs into Rodney's lower abdomen and the manacle bumps against Rodney's thigh.
John's sweaty pubic hair rubs against Rodney's cheek.
Rodney's tongue has retracted to the back of his mouth. It uncurls bit by bit until it hits the back of his teeth. There it stops.
John makes a choking sound somewhere up to Rodney's left.
Rodney pokes his tongue out of the extreme left-hand corner of his own mouth and moves it down along the skin of John's cock, from left to right, until it hits the extreme right-hand corner of his own mouth.
Then he moves it back again, like a windscreen wiper.
Rodney's tongue slithers along through his own saliva. John's cock tastes of sweat and vegemite.
There's a spasm in John's belly, and another one. John's balls harden against Rodney's palm.
Rodney lifts his head and looks at the globules of semen in the hair below John's navel.
He lengthens his gaze and looks at John's foreshortened face.
John's face is contorted. Tears stream down his cheeks. His mouth works soundlessly.
Rodney pushes himself upright, bracing his left hand against the metal bar of the bed. He pushes his hand into his right trouser pocket and pulls out a crunched-up hankie. He looks at John's belly, then he leans up and puts the handkerchief over John's face.
If a man can't wank by himself, and if a man can't cover his tears by himself, then things are pretty bad for that man.
Rodney pulls up the sheet and wipes at John's belly with it. He bends over John's face and presses the hankie gently into John's eyes. A horrible sob rends John's throat.
After a while, John's jaw unclenches and the muscles around his mouth relax.
Rodney removes his hankie. John turns his head away.
Rodney opens his mouth, and shuts it again. He looks down at his hands; they are shaking.
He goes back to his own quarters, sits down on the bed, undoes his fly, reaches into his underpants and strokes himself furiously.
He doesn't come.
Rodney pulls down his trousers and pants, lies back on the bed and tries again.
He doesn't come.
Rodney takes his handkerchief and holds it up. It is damp with sweat. There are two wet patches on it, the width of a pair of eyes apart.
Apparently, the awful black eye can still cry.
Rodney puts his tongue to one of the patches; it tastes of salt.
He drapes the handkerchief over his face. He fits the wet patches into the sockets of his eyes.
He breathes into the fabric.
He comes, breathing in the smell of John's sweat and tears.
***
Original bits © Lobelia.
Written June 2006.
Posted February 2009.
AUTHOR: Lobelia;
lobelia321FANDOM: Stargate Atlantis
PAIRING: Rodney McKay/John Sheppard
RATING: NC-17. 18. Adult. (For language and sexual explicitness.)
LENGTH: 3,345 words.
SPOILERS: 2.07, 'Instinct'; 2.11, 'The Hive'.
SEQUEL: To Ichor.
STYLE: Present tense and terse. The opposite of the ornate style of 'Ichor'.
FORMAT: Plaintext, i.e. asterisked italics. (I print out my fics, and often Word won't recognise html italics and I have to read fic in 'raw' format. So, for the convenience of those who suffer the same frustration, I've left the asterisks in and the italics out. :-)
DISCLAIMER: I do not own the characters nor the Stargate universe. No copyright infringement is intended. This is an amateur story, not posted for profit.
SUMMARY: Rodney watches John going through wraith enzyme withdrawal and remembers what it was like.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I wrote this in June 2006 while I was still in the middle of 'Ichor' and imagining the aftermath. The title came to me first, along with the Rodney pov. It is not finished and never will be. I did not mean to post it but I like it and
tehophiliac asked so nicely, :-) So I thought I'd share.ETA: Or, perhaps, it's not unfinished after all but meant to be a 'snapshot', to use
dossier's lovely formulation.After math
by Lobelia
Rodney sits on a chair next to the bed and looks at John. This is what he sees:
He sees a man with a bushy beard. He sees a man with tangled hair, like a space-age hippy. He sees a man with puffed lips, yellow teeth and sun-ravaged skin, scurf on his scalp and scabs on his feet.
The man is contorted in pain, with manacles around his wrists and ankles that attach him to the infirmary bed. He's screaming through gritted teeth. He's twisting his body up and around, and his head up and around in the opposite direction. His face is red, his pores drip sweat, the veins on his neck pop.
Rodney feels his own guts twist in sympathy. He remembers this.
Rodney remembers:
Lying on this very bed, bound and drugged. Shouting at Carson Beckett: *You're just jealous of me! You pathetic excuse for a doctor in your pathetic excuse for a hospital!* And: *Give me more enzyme! I know you're hiding it!*
*GIVE ME MORE FUCKING ENZYME!*
Rodney had injected himself with a whole 10 ml ampoule of the enzyme. It came straight from a wraith's enzyme pouch into his own veins.
That was once.
He could only imagine what it is like for John now. John was given the enzyme by a wraith direct for months on end. John was fed on by a wraith for months and months. John is thin like a skeleton. When John opens his eyes, he frightens Rodney with his black left eye. John looks like Aidan Ford, only worse. He looks like a vicious, writhing thing from a monster movie.
Rodney remembers:
Writhing on the bed. Twisting on the bed. Begging for enzyme until his voice went hoarse. Weeping, howling, pleading, cursing. A turkey so cold it froze his balls off.
Having mad, confused flashes of thought: *If only I could reach with my hands.* Screaming: *Take the fucking restraints off! Untie me, you fucking bitches!*
This was directed at the nursing staff. He felt horribly embarrassed about it later. He felt so embarrassed that he never apologised. He pretended not to remember.
He remembered, though. Rodney remembers everything.
He looks around. There is nobody here. He sits alone, behind the curtain pulled around John's bed. John is an animal on the sheet.
"Listen," Rodney says. He clears his throat. He knows John can't hear him. John's screams aren't very loud but that is because John is aiming the screams inwards. Rodney can see that this is what John is doing. He can see the teeth biting each other, and he can see the screams dropping down John's throats in convulsed globules. Only groans emerge but Rodney knows that screams reverberate against John's ear drums from the inside.
Rodney clears his throat again. He looks up at the curtain rod. "Listen," he repeats. "I'm going to do something, and it may seem a little unorthodox. I can't tell Carson, and I'm certainly not going to tell the nurses, especially that blonde one, and you'd better not tell anyone, either, when you're better -- which you will be, you will be better. But if you're going through anything like what I went through -- only much worse, I can see that it's much worse -- then, if I remember this rightly, what I'm about to do may bring you some, at least I hope it will, some relief."
He stops and flexes his right hand.
"Not that I know for certain," he adds, as a kind of scientific caveat. "Because nobody actually ever did this for me."
Bestial groans come out of John's twisted mouth. His left eye looks horrible. His right eye looks blank.
"Here goes," Rodney says to himself.
He puts his hand on the sheet over John's belly. John's belly is taut as a drum. The sheet is sodden with sweat.
Rodney moves his hand downwards until the side of his palm bumps against the top of John's erection.
"I knew it." There is a short burst of satisfaction because it is always good to know that you've been right.
John's cock is as taut as his belly.
Rodney presses his palm to the back of John's cock.
John's body stops twisting. It goes stiff as a washboard.
Rodney moves his right hand up and down John's hard cock. It is quite a long cock, as far as Rodney can tell from the feel of it under the sheet. He presses quite hard and he moves quite fast. He braces his left hand against the metal bar of the bed.
He tightens his mouth and looks at the foot of the bed, to where John's bare feet jut out from underneath the sheet.
John's toenails are hard and torn at the edges. His toes flex. His insteps curl up.
The sheet bunches up underneath Rodney's hand. He cups his fingers around the top of John's cock, and the sheet is hot and smeared with semen.
Rodney wipes his hand on the edge of the sheet. He keeps his eyes on the metal bar of the bed, then he looks up.
John's eyes have fallen shut. His mouth has gone limp. His chest moves up and down.
Footsteps sound. The curtain is drawn aside.
"You're still here, Rodney?" Carson Beckett says. "That's very kind of you. Oh, I see, our patient has fallen asleep."
Rodney goes back to his quarters and washes his hands in the basin.
*****
Rodney goes back to the infirmary after breakfast.
The patient has not had a good night. "It's been 36 hours," says Carson Beckett, "and no sign of the withdrawal symptoms easing off. We've administered another dose of sedative but I'm afraid it's a matter of waiting until the enzyme has worked its way through his system. The trouble is we just have no idea how long that will be, exactly. His condition is complicated by the fact that he was being fed on the entire time he was receiving the enzyme. As far as we can tell, the feedings took place so regularly that the feeding wound remained almost permanently open. Here, do you want to see? The wound is covered by only a thin layer of temporary scar tissue. I should say 'wounds' because there is the central feeding wound, and then the five scars left by the wraith's claws. I have no idea how he managed to stay alive or avoid serious infection."
Rodney does not want to see. He averts his eyes. He thinks he might be sick but then he isn't.
"You're going to stay with him a little bit, then, are you, Rodney? That is probably a good idea. It seemed to have a calming effect yesterday. Now, if you'll excuse me, we're analysing some of Colonel Sheppard's blood samples and urine samples."
Rodney doesn't ask whether they discovered any sperm samples.
"I should warn you, Rodney," says Carson Beckett and leans towards him in confidence. "He's getting a little more lucid and that means he's starting to be abusive. It means nothing, of course."
"Carson," says Rodney, "if there is anyone in this city who is aware of that fact, it is me."
"Of course," says Carson Beckett. He draws the curtain and goes away somewhere.
Rodney looks at John.
John twists violently on the bed. His wrists are rubbed raw with chafing at the manacles. Somebody has applied bandages to the wrists but most of them have come off, and one of them seeps blood.
John's head is extended backwards. The crown of his head presses into the mattress. His throat forms a bridge. His Adam's apple spasms.
Rodney sits down on the chair and clears his throat.
"So," he says. "Well."
John's head with its new shiny black eye twists in his direction. "You!" he spits. "I remember you! Get away from me, what do you want?" His hair is plastered to his temples. There are drops of sweat trapped in his beard.
Rodney swallows. "Hello, John," he says.
"Get the fuck out of here," snarls John. "I know what you did, I know what you want."
"No no, you're misunderstanding this," says Rodney. He knows that John can't really hear him.
Rodney remembers:
Not hearing anyone else's voice. Just seeing their lips move. Just registering their presence. Just hearing the blood roar against his own eyeballs.
Rodney looks at the sheet and sees the outline of John's erection. He lifts his hand.
"Get away from me!" yells John. "Don't touch me, you filthy fucking pervert! That's all you ever wanted, catch me bound and tied so you can get your filthy paws on me because that's what you get off on, don't think I don't know it!"
"Will you be quiet," says Rodney, "or someone will come and that'll be the end of that."
"Fuck off!" shouts John.
Someone comes and that is the end of that.
They shoot some sedative up John's arm and he goes back to his usual base state of writhing and groaning.
*****
Rodney goes back to the infirmary after supper.
John's face is red and sweaty. They've changed the sheet; this one has a pattern on it but is already drenched. Someone, it seems, has tried to trim John's beard but given up half-way through. Later, Rodney will find out that it was the blonde nurse, and that John bit her so she swore and dropped the scissors.
John's eyeballs are popping out of his emaciated skull. The black one looks terrifying.
Rodney has done his calculations. John's been strapped to this bed for 47 hours. Rodney himself had to endure this for 24. It nearly killed him.
47 minus 24 is 23. John's been withdrawing from the enzyme for almost double the time that Rodney was.
John's screams are as fresh as if they were yesterday's. He's still swallowing them. His face looks exhausted. The cheeks are sunken.
"Hi, John," says Rodney.
John doesn't reply. He doesn't move his head. His wrists twist against the manacles.
Rodney has done other calculations. John's been gone for 19 months. He was trapped with that wraith on that island on that uninhabited planet for over one-and-a-half years. Rodney remembers Zaddik and Ellia. He remembers how Ellia the wraith had to feed on Zaddik the human, and he remembers how the wild wraith fed on humans from the village, two or three every four months.
Rodney has done the math. He figures that the wraith must have fed on John once every fortnight at least. This means that John was fed on at least 38 times. And that, in turn, means that John has 38 lots of enzymes in him.
Rodney has no idea how much enzyme the wraith injected into John at each feeding, and whether it was more or less than the 10 ml ampoule that Rodney took that time.
He knows for certain, though, that it is a shocking amount of enzyme.
Rodney sits down on the chair and looks at John.
After a while, he stops looking at John because looking at John hurts something inside Rodney.
He puts his hand on John's arm.
John tries to wrench his arm out of the manacle's sockets. He snaps his head round to stare at Rodney. There is foam around his lips.
"Fuck off," John snarls. "Fuck off, you fucking filthy son of a cunt."
Rodney sighs and looks at the curtain rod. "Listen," he says, "I know you're not feeling too well. I've been there myself, well, sort of, and it's not pleasant, I know this, but here's the plan: you shut up and I'll help you out here."
"I don't want you here, you leech, you fuck. Wherever I go, wherever I turn, you are always there, always doing the wrong thing, you pride yourself on being so clever but you are a stuck-up, jumped-up prig of a prick; you're only here because you couldn't make it back on earth, because your fucking science is no good..."
Rodney puts his hand on the sheet on top of John's hard cock.
John bucks up wildly and screams, "You're doing it again, you can't help yourself, take your filthy fucking..."
"Just shut up," says Rodney, gets to his feet, leans across and presses his own mouth to John's screaming mouth.
John immediately thrusts his big wet tongue into Rodney's mouth. His tongue tastes of mould and vomit.
Rodney has a gagging reflex but fights it off. He holds on to the metal bar of the bed with his left hand. With his other hand, he works John's cock hard and fast.
He keeps one eye cocked for intruders.
John makes unearthly sounds at the back of his throat. He bucks up into Rodney's hand. Then he shudders, his tongue goes stiff, and he slumps back limply onto the mattress.
Rodney withdraws. He wipes his hand on the edge of the sheet.
John looks deathly pale, underneath his leather skin. His eyes have fallen shut. Without his black eye visible, he looks a bit more normal.
His breath comes in rasps but it's an even breath.
Rodney looks down at his hands. They are shaking.
He goes back to his own quarters, washes his mouth, brushes his teeth and gargles with mouth wash.
He sits down on the edge of his bed and stares unseeing at the diplomas on his wall.
*****
Rodney goes back to the infirmary after breakfast. It's been 58 hours.
John lies on the bed in a rigid state that would be foetal if he weren't manacled. His chin digs into his chest, his knees are bent as far as they will go, his back is curled up into a wheel.
"Hi," says Rodney. His voice is almost steady.
John looks up. His left eye is black and expressionless. His right eye is white, black and blue; it looks lost and wild.
"I've come to, you know," says Rodney tensely. But John doesn't say anything about being a filthy pervert; he just stares at Rodney like a drunken man.
Rodney sits down on the chair. "Look on it," he says, "as a favour to a friend. Because you know, we are friends, right; you may not remember this now but we are, actually, friends, or were, before you got yourself lost on that planet and had your life sucked out of you in increments; I have no idea what that does to a man but..."
"Fuck off," spits John, but it sounds weary.
"Yes, yes," says Rodney. "I'll be quick."
He looks at the sheet, then he pulls the sheet aside.
They've put a hospital gown on John but it's twisted and rucked up. It's left John's legs and genital area exposed.
Rodney looks at John's thick curly pubic hair, streaked with grey, and at his erect cock and at his angry red balls. Then he looks at the curtain rod and takes a swallow.
"Go on," says John in between harsh breaths, "lick me then, suck me, I know you want to but you'll never be as good as, you'll never do it like, you can never..."
Rodney puts his hand on John's cock.
John's cock feels hot and hard and full of blood.
"Listen," says Rodney, talking fast, "I remember some of what this was like, it was unbearable, an unbearable tightness and dryness, a dreadful tearing and pulling at the inside of me, and the whole time, it sounds bizarre but maybe not so bizarre, I was hard as a plank, like you, in fact. And it would have been a tremendous relief if I'd just been able to touch but, of course, they won't let you do that, they tie you up, and that's a good thing, don't get me wrong. The enzyme makes you strong, nobody knows that better than me, and if I untied you, I know you'd slug me till I went out cold, and then trample across my prone body, no doubt. So I'll have to do this for you, and you know..." He waves his other hand in the air. "Count it as repayment for all the countless times you saved my ass. Well, not countless but the many times..."
"Fuck, Rodney," says John, "just get on with it."
Rodney looks at John.
John has his eyes squeezed shut tight.
"You said my name," says Rodney.
John half-groans.
"You must be getting better," says Rodney. He moves his hand up John's cock, and down again. He lets his hand rest on John's balls. They are hard as nuts.
Then he removes his hand, gets to his feet, leans across and presses his own mouth to John's straining cock.
He places his mouth onto John's cock sideways, his upper lip around one flank of John's cock and his lower lip around the other. He curls his lips around his teeth and grips John's cock with his cushioned incisors. He moves his head from side to side a little.
John makes a grunting sound but he doesn't scream.
Rodney pauses for a moment. He lifts his head. He flexes his right hand.
Then he closes his eyes and puts his lips around John's cock sideways again. He places his right hand around John's balls. His left hand grips the metal bar of the bed. John's arm is in the way; it digs into Rodney's lower abdomen and the manacle bumps against Rodney's thigh.
John's sweaty pubic hair rubs against Rodney's cheek.
Rodney's tongue has retracted to the back of his mouth. It uncurls bit by bit until it hits the back of his teeth. There it stops.
John makes a choking sound somewhere up to Rodney's left.
Rodney pokes his tongue out of the extreme left-hand corner of his own mouth and moves it down along the skin of John's cock, from left to right, until it hits the extreme right-hand corner of his own mouth.
Then he moves it back again, like a windscreen wiper.
Rodney's tongue slithers along through his own saliva. John's cock tastes of sweat and vegemite.
There's a spasm in John's belly, and another one. John's balls harden against Rodney's palm.
Rodney lifts his head and looks at the globules of semen in the hair below John's navel.
He lengthens his gaze and looks at John's foreshortened face.
John's face is contorted. Tears stream down his cheeks. His mouth works soundlessly.
Rodney pushes himself upright, bracing his left hand against the metal bar of the bed. He pushes his hand into his right trouser pocket and pulls out a crunched-up hankie. He looks at John's belly, then he leans up and puts the handkerchief over John's face.
If a man can't wank by himself, and if a man can't cover his tears by himself, then things are pretty bad for that man.
Rodney pulls up the sheet and wipes at John's belly with it. He bends over John's face and presses the hankie gently into John's eyes. A horrible sob rends John's throat.
After a while, John's jaw unclenches and the muscles around his mouth relax.
Rodney removes his hankie. John turns his head away.
Rodney opens his mouth, and shuts it again. He looks down at his hands; they are shaking.
He goes back to his own quarters, sits down on the bed, undoes his fly, reaches into his underpants and strokes himself furiously.
He doesn't come.
Rodney pulls down his trousers and pants, lies back on the bed and tries again.
He doesn't come.
Rodney takes his handkerchief and holds it up. It is damp with sweat. There are two wet patches on it, the width of a pair of eyes apart.
Apparently, the awful black eye can still cry.
Rodney puts his tongue to one of the patches; it tastes of salt.
He drapes the handkerchief over his face. He fits the wet patches into the sockets of his eyes.
He breathes into the fabric.
He comes, breathing in the smell of John's sweat and tears.
***
Original bits © Lobelia.
Written June 2006.
Posted February 2009.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-04 10:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 11:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 05:39 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 11:47 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 06:32 am (UTC)Okay, just..wow. Jeesh, I think I can understand why there may not be any more, that was almost too harsh and raw and open to *read*, I can hardly imagine the headspace you'd need to write it! And it wouldn't be a place I'd want to visit often myself.
That said, this is fantastic! If you ever decided to renew your travel visa, I'd be willing to join you! *g*
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 11:52 pm (UTC)But in a weird way John and the wraith healed each other while I can't imagine Rodney doing any healing for John or vice versa. Maybe also I'd been inside John's head so long on that island, I wanted to stand outside and see him through someone else's eyes for a change.
Thanks again! Your feedback rocks! :-)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 06:33 pm (UTC)But it's still amazing writing.
Thank you.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-05 11:55 pm (UTC)Thank you; you are too kind! :-)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-06 12:15 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-06 11:20 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-06 12:33 am (UTC)I enjoyed both of these stories so much. I am really blown away by how beautifully written, original, and truly gripping they are.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-06 11:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-11 05:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-06 02:40 am (UTC)I'm not too sure that more is necessary; this is a perfect little snapshot of a moment in the aftermath, and wonderfully wretched. :)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-06 11:25 am (UTC)I am very, very happy that you say perhaps no more is necessary. Wow, it had not occurred to me that I could not think of anything more to write because perhaps that's it, that's all there is to it, writing-wise? Thank you!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-13 08:53 pm (UTC)Anyway, I'm sorry! I'll leave my comment now because you really deserve it. <3 And thanks for crediting me for convincing you to post this! xD You really didn't have to but I'm thankful anyway. O.O;;
This story was painful to read- in a very good way. >w< It's heartbreaking and it tugs at me. Even though the style is very different from Ichor (which, if I recalled correctly, you were worried about), it's still sounds amazing and it sucks you in. It's perfect. Poor Rodney, poor John. Both of them are suffering so much.
I love it and hope that, eventually, you'll finish it one day (as unlikely as that may be). Oh, and, I'm curious. Do you intend to write more fanfiction for Stargate Atlantis at some point? :D I'd be interested to see what you come up with. <3
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-19 06:40 pm (UTC)The style is very different, you're right; I deliberately made it very deadpan and frill-less. Because we're in a very different world now. I am not sure I ever will finish this as I just can't imagine what will happen to these two people, and maybe it's up to the readers to figure it out, ultimately...?
At the moment, I'm not writing any fanfic, :-( I miss it but I am giving myself half a year to finish my real-life academic book, and I mustn't get distracted. Except it's like living without sex. I miss it!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-23 01:00 am (UTC)Yes, but I love how different (in style) the fic is. As you said, the other fic has a more dream like quality and this one is harsh reality. It needs to be different because it is different. *laughs* It's perfect though. Well, even if you never finish it, what you've posts almost feels like a conclusion of sorts. It's like one of those books or movies that leave off abruptly to let you interpret it and come to your own conclusion about what happened next. Oh wow, I just finished your next line and you said practically the same thing I did (I read a few sentences, respond to them, and read more of the comment). At least, that's how it feels to me. Of course, should you ever choose to continue, I will definitely be eager to read it. <3
Ohhh, I can completely understand that! The reality and school is much more important then contributing to a fandom. xD It's your life we're talking about, after all. Although, if I were you, I'd keep a spare notebook to write in ideas I'd randomly get for fanfics. Some of the best ideas come to you without meaning to and are lost just as quickly. You could use them when you decide to start writing again. XP
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-23 05:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-24 02:08 am (UTC)And, I'm just being honest. After Math is amazing so, it's only natural, in my opinion. D:
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-16 10:46 pm (UTC)I am stunned and awed and amazed, not only over the glorious detail and intricacies of the stories, but how I was drawn in by John and his ordeal, and then by the wraith's story and culture. This is a work of art that I will read again.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-16 10:51 pm (UTC)But then, Rodney. If anyone could help John, it was Rodney. Too stubborn and arrogant, and so damn generous and full of tough love when it comes to John.
I had hope for John at the end of this part of his story. Hope for both of them.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-19 06:37 pm (UTC)Thanks for reading, hon!! :-)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-02-19 06:34 pm (UTC)