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After Sheppard and his team got back from the "kids" planet, they grabbed a meal in the Mess, and then went their separate ways. Sheppard, unsettled by the events of the day, had decided to try and read. And when that didn't work, he tried to strum a little bit on his guitar, though the only notes that could leave his fingers belonged to one haunted melody or another.
Abandoning his quarters, Sheppard strolled aimlessly down the empty corridors of Atlantis. Something Keras had said to him had struck him, and being alone with himself wasn't helping. So, he decided to seek out company, finding Rodney in his second favorite lab.
"Yes? Yes?" Rodney asks, barely looking up.
John just lazily leans against the workbench, then lazily leans down, putting his chin on his fingers that sat atop the chilly metal surface. "You're as bad as my cat," Rodney says with a wink.
"Yeah, well if ya rub my belly, I'm pretty sure I won't get the claws out," Sheppard drawls.
Rodney glances around, but John knows they're alone, the rest of Atlantis either asleep or working in labs spread throughout the city. "Major?" Rodney asks, his voice quiet. "You sure..."
"Listen," John says as he stands back up. "Markham and Stacks are married now, and Ford helped me redraft International guidelines that take out DADT and a few of the other more archaic rules." He comes to stand next to Rodney, leaning into the man who has come to share his bed more and more as of late. "You know," he begins, then scratches the back of his head.
Everything he's wanted to say, everything he's thought of since leaving Keras back on the planet seems to have escaped him.
"John?" Rodney asks, voice tremulous.
Slowly reaching out for Rodney's hand, John finally starts to speak, though his eyes are fixed on a scratch in the metal surface of the table. "Before I left..." John chances a glance up at Rodney, but then immediately back down to the table. "Before I left, Keras told me that now that he has a life - has a future - and doesn't have to make sure that he provides enough offspring to keep the colony going, that maybe - just maybe - he and Neleus might be able to marry." He again glances at Rodney, whose soulful blue eyes lock onto his. "He said that now that he has a future, he might actually be able to have a life."
John looks down as Rodney slides his fingers between John's, giving him a gentle, reassuring squeeze.
"And... I do, you know," John says, smiling at Rodney, whose mirthful expression beams back at him.
Rodney separates their hands, guiding a gentle finger to John's face. He holds it there, then leans in and claims the gentlest of kisses.
When they finally separate, Rodney takes John's hand back in his, then bumps John's shoulder. "Me, too, John."