Work Text:
Title: - Cowardly Lion
Author: - Katt
E-mail: - kattanon@yahoo.co.uk
Rating: - G
Feedback: - Like it or loathe it let me know
Archive: - I'd be honoured
Disclaimer: - I don't own any of the characters of Stargate Atlantis, and no infringement was intended. The book "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" was written by L. Frank Baum.
Author's Notes: - An episode tag to "Hide and Seek".
Cowardly Lion
""What makes you a coward?" asked Dorothy...
"It's a mystery," replied the Lion. "I suppose I was born that way...I learned that if I roared very loudly every living thing was frightened and got out of my way..."
Staring down at the flashing cursor Rodney found that no matter how hard he tried to concentrate on describing his encounter with the energy being for the expedition's xeno-biologists to drool over his mind kept wandering. Not that being inside the "belly of the beast" hadn't been fascinating but at the time he'd been rather more concerned with surviving, preferably without third degree burns. Finally admitting defeat Rodney flipped the top down on the laptop and put it onto the bedside table.
The infirmary was quiet at this time of night and the light from his bedside lamp provided an oasis of illumination in the desert of half-light and shadows beyond. Seeing the swirling inky black cloud once more in his mind's eye he couldn't help but wonder how long it would be before he would be able to sleep comfortably with the lights off. Suppressing a shudder he lay back on his pillow and turned his mind to consider the issue which was really bothering him - his cowardice.
He knew he wasn't exactly what Grodin and Beckett would no doubt call Captain Courageous. As a child he'd never seen the attraction of taking risks that might get you hurt. He'd never wanted to climb high up into trees, or ride a bike down a flight of steps, or ski down a mountain at sixty miles an hour. He'd always considered any one who did an idiot. Now Major Sheppard, Rodney just bet he'd done all those things and worse and had either come away unscathed, or he'd just laughed off broken bones and been the darling of the school yard regaling his enthralled peers with tales of daring-do.
Nope, Rodney just wasn't a risk taker, but what he hadn't realised was just how transparent his caution was to everyone else, and how much it would sting when other people judge him for it. Dr. Weir's comment as she'd turned away from him in disgust when the shield device had fallen off in the Ancient lab,
"I had a feeling."
Which had been swiftly followed by Major Sheppard's own dismissal of him,
"You might faint again."
Had hurt more than Rodney had imagined possible. His hurried lie about the device running out of power because it wouldn't activate for Sheppard had tasted bitter on his tongue even as he'd been saying it. Normally he'd have ignored them, walked away, pretended not to hear. It wasn't as if he wasn't used to hearing people say some less than flattering things about him. He'd learnt to harden his face, to sneer in derision, to keep everyone at arms length so that when they revealed their true faces he wouldn't be surprised, and most importantly he wouldn't be hurt. So he blustered, and browbeat those around him all the while telling himself he didn't care what anyone thought of him. Yet here on Atlantis he'd been so stung by the low opinion of him that Weir and Sheppard had seemed to share that he'd barely hesitated to risk his own life to try and save them.
Admittedly it had been the only logical plan at the time, but that still didn't explain the way he'd ignored yet another of his top ten rules for life. Firstly, he'd blithely ignored "never volunteer" to come to Pegasus and now "don't risk life and limb" seemed to be redundant too.
The thing that frightened him most though wasn't so much the fact that he could've died, it was the warm feeling that he'd felt when one by one Weir, Teyla, Peter Grodin, Ford and Sheppard had all stopped by the infirmary to check if he was feeling okay. It scared him that he cared about what these people thought of him. It scared him that if he carried on down this road he would be laying himself open to be hurt again.
It seemed that while he might be brave enough to face black energy beings he was still a coward when it came to relationships with others. Pushing away that warm feeling that still lurked inside Rodney closed his eyes and concentrated on re-establishing his barriers before he fell asleep.