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Title: Memory
Author: Ky (Venom_69)
Fandom: Atlantis
Category: Post-ep. Angst. Romance.
Pairing: John/Elizabeth.
Rating:
Mature People.
Summary: Set after “The Real World.” Based on spoilers and speculation.
Archive: My site.
Anywhere else, sure, just let me know where so I can come visit.
Disclaimer: Don’t own them, never will. Promise
to put them back in the state I found them. Song’s not mine either. That belongs to Barbra Streisand.
Author’s
notes: Written after a conversation with my beautiful girl, Vale. This was supposed to be smut, but I just couldn’t
work it in to this particular fic.
Date: 13/07/06
Copyright © to Venom, 2006
***
Memory, all alone in
the moonlight
I can dream of the old days
Life was beautiful then
I remember the time I knew what happiness was
Let
the memory live again
***
"Never back down." He tells her seriously, patting her hand as he leaves the infirmary.
Elizabeth
stares at the white sheets for what feels like a lifetime, waiting until the Doctor – Carson, apparently – tells
her that she is free to leave and re-familiarise herself with the city.
He pats her hand too, calls her ‘love’
and says her office is a good place to start.
Memory.
A man angrily punches the glass window in her office
and it shatters into tiny pieces. Soilders move in, ready to protect and defend her. She waves them away.
She is not
frightened.
It’s going to start getting dark soon and Elizabeth has been sitting in her office for God only
knows how long. Hours ago, she opened a game of solitaire and stared at it for a while. She opened a few files, but didn’t
have any more luck with them, either.
Eventually, she gives up.
Memory.
Another man asks her if she’s
working late. She shows him the game on her screen and they both smile.
John’s words still swirl around her
mind, his soft voice dancing like tendrils of comfort through her over-worked brain, but they aren’t enough to chase
away the shadows that move through her office and her mind.
Stop it, Elizabeth, she tells her self sternly.
You stopped believing in the Boogie Man years ago.
But it doesn’t help.
She still jumps when a
new shadow moves across the walls or floor – the people walking past her office must think her mad – and she still
questions everything.
Is this real?
Am I crazy?
Were they right?
Elizabeth
doesn’t know exactly which ‘they’ she is referring too – Carson or Dr. Fletcher – but the only
thing that she knows for certain right now is that she doesn’t really trust anything that she knows for certain.
Memory.
The
man that punched her office window passes her a cloth bag. Wishes her happy birthday. He gives her a ceramic pot.
It
sits on her desk.
She has to get out of here.
When she is back in her room – or at least back in
the room that they tell her she sleeps in – she can let her confusion show and re-examine everything she owns as though
she were a stranger. She can look over any personal possessions that she finds with wondrous eyes without fear of judgement.
She walks with renewed vigour at that prospect.
"Never back down." The mantra repeats over and over as she gets
closer and closer to her haven.
The details of her life in Atlantis are sketchy at best. The details of a – supposedly
– fabricated life on Earth are fresh in her mind. She remembers the painful phone call that she received, the sound
of a kind man’s voice telling her that her fiancé had died.
She remembers their home, their life.
Memory.
“I’ve
met someone, Elizabeth.”
She doesn’t turn around, but she has to blink several times before her eyes are
completely clear.
She is sad, sorry, but there is a part of her that wants to respond, “So have I.”
Carson
tells her a little of her ‘real’ life, but only when she probes.
What does she do? Lead the expedition.
Where does she sleep? She has quarters in the West Wing.
Is she alone? Not exactly.
But he doesn’t
elaborate on ‘not exactly’ and no one else seems to know anything.
She can hear voices down the corridor.
One of them is male, arrogant.
Memory.
There is a man next to her, yelling to another man that holds a gun.
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not but I am an extremely arrogant man who thinks that all of his plans
will work!”
She knows that they will be saved. She knows that there is someone else here in the city that will
save them and she trusts him to do so.
The name ‘McKay’ comes into her head and she smiles a little
in triumph before ducking through the first room that opens.
***
He’s worried about her.
John doesn’t
understand a thing she’s been through – none of them do – but he’s worried about her.
Watching
her, when she was unconscious, her eyes fluttering rapidly behind closed lids, he had wondered what she was seeing. Was the
world that she created in darkness a better place to be? Was that why she hadn't woken when Carson said there was nothing
really stopping her but her own mind?
She spoke a little of what she experienced, enough to convey her confusion and
discontent. But when she looked at him, clearly unable to recall who he was, John knew without a shadow of a doubt that whatever
kind of fantasy world she'd created had not been a pleasant one.
Now he doesn’t really want to know what she
saw.
He’s been sitting on his bed for the past 5 hours, attempting to read page 256. It’s only when he
tries to read the same sentence for the umpteenth time that he thinks he should just go and see her. There’s a temptation
to call her on the radio, but aside from the fact that anyone could hear them, John’s not sure that she even remembers
how they work.
Sigh.
When his door opens without a knock, John looks up in surprise to see the object of his
thoughts standing in the entrance to his room. Elizabeth appears equally surprised.
Memory.
He is walking
towards her. Greenery surrounds them. He is not wearing his uniform, his clothes are casual and she thinks of a farmer. There
is something else though…
“The beard is interesting.” She tells him, smiling.
“I’m
sorry, I didn’t realize…”
“It’s OK.”
“I heard McKay’s voice
and I didn’t want to…”
“Liz, it’s fine.”
A delicate eyebrow rises. “Liz?”
“Elizabeth.”
He amends with a flush. “How are you?”
“Good. You?”
John ignores her question and stares
at her intently. “How are you really?”
”Memory.
She is being held, tightly, being pulled
backwards. She’s frightened. John is across the room, aiming his weapon.
“You will hurt Doctor Weir.”
Her captor taunts.
John doesn’t blink. “I’m not aiming at her.”
“I’m
going crazy.” She admits quietly, her breath coming out in a rush. “I’m questioning everything. Is that
really what I want for lunch or did one of the Doctors in my mind tell me that’s what I want? Do I wear the red shirt
or is it blue I’m supposed to be in? Do I live in the East or the West wing? I’m going crazy!”
“Of
all the people here,” John replies just as quietly, folding his book closed and rising, moving to stand before her.
“You are the least crazy.”
“Then why am I jumping at shadows? It’s like being a small child
again and waiting for the Boogie Man to pop out from under the bed and get you. I don’t know what’s real; I don’t
know what I trust.” Elizabeth sighs, rubbing a hand across her forehead.
“Didn’t you once tell me
to trust what you feel?”
“I don’t even know what I feel anymore.” Elizabeth replies sadly.
She doesn’t really remember telling him that, she's not even sure she knows his surname.
Memory.
She
remembers that she likes to sleep in boxer shorts with little grey aliens on them. They are too big for her, but they make
her feel comforted.
The same boxer shorts that are neatly folded on the end of his bed, strangely...
"What
are you?"
John blinks, seemingly unfazed by the question. "Human."
"I mean to me?"
Ah. "A lot of things."
"Such
as?"
"I'm your friend. Your standing Thursday lunch date. Your second in command. Your military leader...." He pauses,
unsure of himself.
Memory.
She is lying in a bed, naked under the warm blankets. There are arms firmly around
her stomach, a solid body behind her own, pressed against her back. The smooth skin pushes against her steadily as the owner
of the chest breathes in and out.
She feels safe.
"My lover?" Elizabeth offers, her expression neutral.
His
voice is quiet, eyes downcast. "Yes."
So, she thinks, This is what they meant by 'not exactly.' “Why
didn't you tell me?"
"Because you've been through a lot in the last week. You didn't need to feel pressured from me
for... anything."
"That's sweet." She smiles, a little. "Are you always like that?"
John flashes her a lop-sided
little smirk. "Yeah."
Memory.
She is pacing, agitated. Her thoughts are chaotic and restless, she is unsure.
“We
don’t have to keep doing this, you know.” John tells her.
His words are sincere, but she sees the sadness
in his eyes and the thought of not being with him scares her more than the thought of people finding out. “Yes,”
She replies firmly. “We do.”
“How long?” She asks.
“Almost a year.”
Memory.
She
is looking under the bed. Searching, her eyes dart across the empty space. “I know it has to be here somewhere!”
A
hand taps her on the butt. “Stop trying to ruin the surprise Liz, you only have to wait another few weeks.”
“Do
I live here?”
“Not officially.”
”Memory.
“Are we going to tell them?”
She asks quietly.
The waves are crashing against the sand. They are not in the city, she knows, but on the mainland.
Athosians pass by them occasionally, but don’t appear to notice the lovers. He is leaning against a tree, arms around
her as she rests between his legs, watching the golden sunset.
“That’s up to you.”
“I
like having you to myself.” She admits.
“I can live with that.
It’s the strangest question,
but… “Are they mine?” She asks, nodding towards the boxer shorts.
John smiles and she feels a little
flutter somewhere low in her belly. “No… but you like to tell me that possession is nine tenths of the law.”
”Memory.
“Aren’t
they mine?” He asks. The amusement in his eyes is clear.
“They were.”
He tries to argue, but
she has ways of making him forget.
“What happens now?”
“I don’t know.” John
admits honestly, gesturing for her to follow him as he returns to his place on the bed.
Elizabeth is unsure at first.
It’s likely that she’s been in this bed hundreds of times before, but it was different then.
She was different
then.
”Memory.
They are lying in bed, bodies entwined. She is fighting to catch her breath, still shuddering
and panting as his fingertips trace soothing patterns across her back. “You OK?” He asks.
She imagines
other men asking that. She imagines their smugness, their arrogance and haughtiness, their ego-laced inflections. She doesn’t
hear any of it in his voice. “Let’s never get out of bed.”
“Works for me.”
She
sits.
“You could talk about it… if you like.” He offers.
“I’m not sure where to
start.”
John takes her hand gently. “Just tell me whatever comes to mind.”
”Memory.
She
arrives home.
It’s been a long, stressful day and all she wants to do is curl up with her boyfriend, a book
in her hand and her dog nearby.
Opening the door, she sees the living room bathed in candlelight. The dining room
table is set with their good china, soft tablecloth, flowers, more candles. Soft music plays, instrumental, but she can’t
hear it over the pounding of her heart.
There stands her boyfriend.
He smiles at her, waits until she is standing
before him, and bends down to rest on one knee, looking up at her.
Elizabeth remembers being proposed too. She
remembers saying yes and she remembers the meal that they shared afterwards, how they danced, made love.
But she can’t
quite remember his face. His features, usually so distinctive, are distorting in her mind, morphing into the features of the
man that sits beside her.
Quietly, as the sun sets outside of the window, she tells John about the memory while he
strokes her hand.
”Memory.
She is shocked, numb. “You OK?” He asks.
How can she
be? She wonders. The answer is honest. “No.”
“You will be.” He tells her firmly, taking her
hand as they turn and run.
She will be OK.
***
End.
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