[Open/Closed] There is life outside your apartment...

[doubledoctornocitrus]

Who: Rodney McKay (doubledoctornocitrus) & Annie Walker (smithsonian), & TJ Johansen (stargatemedic), & Felicity Smoak (alergictonuts), & Ianto Jones (torchwoodteaboy), & Various/Open
What: November Catchall
When: Various dates in November
Where: Olympia
Warning(s): Rodney is basically his own warning. I'm sorry.



Evening, Olympia (Closed to Annie Walker)

"You!"


Apropos of Nothing (Closed to Felicity)

Are you planetside?

Do you have a roommate?


Re: Your Destiny. (Closed to TJ)

This time, Rodney avails himself of the tools he's given, and looks up 'Tamara Johansen' in the little social media applet that's been treating him surprisingly well. With her as a medic, he should have figured she'd work in a clinic, and it's convenient that she's actually in Olympia. And, well, it's also convenient that the clinic is in Olympia as well, because he's stopped off at the...healers(????) once or maybe twice and if Beckett had practiced mystic bullshit, this planet's idea of the medical arts is beyond the pale.

Regardless. Rodney shows up at TJ's work with a smile and asks for her specifically.


A Stopped Clock (Closed to Ianto)

Whereas Rodney had, prior to his discussion with John, resolved to be Nice(tm) to Ianto, the discussion had had the surprise side-effect of forcing him to realize he actually needed to make an effort. Conveniently, the cafe-like place within which the discussion took place has pretty good coffee, which is as good an offering as any. And...honestly...Rodney has next-to-no clue what Ianto is actually like or would actually like.

Which probably wasn't good, considering the whole vague hand-gesture-y situation.

Armed with cafe coffee not made by someone whose optimal brew was 'nearly caustic with pesticide levels of caffeine', Rodney attempts to hunt Ianto down using his vague recollections of things that weren't his work and were also people-related, all while nervously trying not to admit to himself that it's important to not fuck up this actual human relationship. It's not even his relationship, which is somehow worse, because if he fucks up then it's not him who is going to be suffering the most.

And so, Ianto, Rodney comes bearing one (1) gift.


Making a Racket (Open -- Thesean Starter Housing)

Rodney keeps odd hours, even considering that they're on new planet and sometimes it can take a while for daily circadian rhythms to synchronize with diurnal cycles. Which means he's up in the middle of the night and there's crackling noises and flickering light coming from beneath his door as he does the Mad Science thing. He's bound and determined to learn how to make this world's technology for himself--and then try and apply a bit of his own know-how to it. But to do that, he's gotta break some eggs. So speak.

It's just very, very late and the apartments aren't very far apart.


Wildcard (Open -- Anywhere)


[Poke me for a custom starter elsewise! I'll match brackets or prose. Plx plot with me. :D]

Comments

[stargatemedic]

"Bigger than most people believed and it didn't stop once we were on board the ship."

That? That's a huge side of bitterness coming through. "But Atlantis had been on Earth for about six months, from what I remember, before we were forced off Icarus. The base went up in 2007 and we evacuated in October of 2009."

She narrows her eyes. "Why do you want to know?"

[doubledoctornocitrus]

"Well," Rodney says to her bitter words, slightly nonplussed, and he doesn't immediately answer her when she asks why he wants to know. But she's giving him new information about projects he'd just started to become invested in and it's hard to be appropriately commiserating. The timeline thing he can answer, though. "Ah, no. I hadn't been on Earth nearly that long. Maybe a month or two. Because I feel like I would have known of Icarus—you know we really shouldn't have named it Icarus. In hindsight, that's like christening one of of the X-304s the Space Titanic or some such nonsense."

He's not quite avoiding her question, but it does take him a minute to swallow down the ready answer: because he wants to know. He still can't quite meet her eyes, but there's a certainty in his voice when he says, more quietly than he usually speaks, "Because if I ask know, I won't need to ask again. And I'll know what to avoid, because that's."

And then he meets her eyes. "Did the Destiny become home like Atlantis did for us?"

[stargatemedic]

Rodney's refusal to meet her eyes gives her sense of impending doom. There's something he wants to know and she knows for a fact that she doesn't want to answer whatever it is he thinks he wants to ask. It dawns on her that she should never have agreed to this and she inhales deeply in an attempt to stifle the urge to tell him to mind his own business. He's not military and she doesn't owe him a thing.

"Avoid? We're here. There's nothing to avoid, except the Lucien Alliance. Definitely avoid them." It's a little sarcastic, but that's the level of irritation she's working on, so when he plows forward, she blinks at his question, then looks down, shaking her head once before answering.

When she looks up at him, her eyes are a little dull. "The Destiny was," and she stops because it's not his fault that he's jumping into things he doesn't know about. "It wasn't searched. We had no MALP. All we knew was that it had air. We were able to save almost eighty people, less than half that had any survival skills. Most of them had never been through a 'gate before. They were civilians. We didn't get to leave the ship, we had no control over the ship. We had no supplies. We got to take very, very little with us." She took a breath. "And there was a pregnant woman on board."

[doubledoctornocitrus]

"Duly noted. Avoiding the Lucien Alliance." Rodney's words are matter-of-fact. Because she's volunteering information, regardless of how sarcastic it is. He's almost more at home in contentious conversations than in the ones that he's been having with people who never knew him as McKay of the SGC. The ground is familiar, the sense of push and shove vastly more comfortable.

And TJ's answer is why he's asking now. "A nightmare," Rodney says. But what he really means is 'a challenge' and 'an opportunity.' Even so, nightmare fits. Because he remembers that first year of Atlantis. They'd gone knowing it was possibly a one-way trip, and all of them had volunteered. Prepared. Everything different except for the looming sense of impending doom. TJ's speaking of the kind of civilians that would have been needed to make Icarus run...

Because he knows words of sympathy sound like he's lying, and badly, he offers only, "I'm sorry." He's not sure if he should comfort her or try and get through this to the details. And the last detail especially, he has no idea what to do with. Still, he takes a stab at relating. "An out of control ship must have been terrifying, especially for the civilians."

[stargatemedic]

"We made it work because we had to. But you have to understand, Rodney," no fancy titles, okay, "the Destiny didn't run on our time. It refueled in stars and jumped when it wanted to. We visited random planets, but we couldn't stay. We gathered what we could when we could, but the people on the ship weren't just civilians, they were mostly diplomats and scientists." No offense. "A few people from the IOA. A kid that'd been lifted from his bedroom."

She shakes her head. "I know you want to know more, but it's not something I can talk about. We were flying in the opposite direction, a billion miles from Earth. We were never, ever getting home."

Rodney, you and Colonel Sheppard are home to TJ.

"I'm sure we'll talk again sometime." She stands and pats his shoulder as she goes."

[doubledoctornocitrus]

Rodney feels vaguely ill at her recitation. Worse than a nightmare, then. Scrabbling at survival. She hadn't signed up for it, had been going the wrong direction when she'd already decided she was done with the whole program in the first place. He sees the shape of it now, and it's a bleak image. He's not immune to suffering, despite how much he wants to know more than the tantalizing details she's dropped about this Destiny they'd been stranded on, and so he lapses into a disquiet silence, watching her face with a frown.

When she gets up to go, he doesn't try to stop her. "Yeah. We'll. I'll. Bring you lunch."

Like he'd tried to do this time and failed. At least he knew why he failed. Pretty obvious, even to him. And so he watches her go.

And when she's gone, he eats her sandwich, too.