Work Text:
Usually when John was on death's door, it was urgent. A suicide mission, a decision made in a split second, drunk on adrenaline. But right now, he has time to contemplate shit. The last time he had time (so much time) Michael's complex had caved in on him and there was rebar in his gut. Plus, he thought McKay was dead. There was no reason to confess to a guy you loved him if he was dead.
McKay is not dead this time. He's fiddling with the DHD, looking stricken and pale. If John bleeds out from his wounds, which he definitely will if Rodney doesn't get the gate working again, it will be McKay's fault he dies. John could blame the half horse half sabertooth tiger responsible for mauling him, but that seems unfair. It's much easier to blame Rodney. Rodney who he loves, in spite of his better judgment. Rodney, who has no fucking clue John loves him. Likely because he thinks John has better judgment.
"How's it going?" he grits out, staring at Rodney as he rearranges crystals and drips sweat. There's a roll of soft flesh looking sweet and padded under the cotton of his shirt. John is always noticing his gut, thinking about biting it or grinding off on it, but he tries not to let himself look too long. But he's absolutely dying right now, so who cares.
Rodney says nothing. He just winces—bad sign. He loves to go on and on. John adjusts himself, feels his body coming apart in seven different places, at least. The sabertooth horse-tiger had some serious claws. And hooves.
He drips into the dirt, like Rodney's sweat. The world shudders. So does he. John is very, very cold. Too cold. "McKay?" he says, voice mostly gurgle. "Not doing so good over here."
Rodney looks at him, all giant blue eyes, wide with fear. "Well stop moving!" he yelps. "And talking. I'm almost—it's almost—" and then he returns to his work, teeth grit resolutely and a line through his brow. John has spent enough time just studying Rodney and the stuff he does to know the DHD situation is not almost anything. He, however, is almost dead.
Nothing new. He's like, always almost dead. Rodney, too. They've almost died at least ten times each. Occupational hazard— every time it happens, John thinks about telling him. Oh by the way, before I go throw myself into a fiery inferno, I've been super hopelessly and stupidly in love with you basically forever. Sorry. Then he'd run off, and save the day. Or else, die. Convenient way to not face the consequences of admitting his folly.
The thing that always stops him is how selfish it is. Rodney left burdened with the knowledge their whole friendship was weird if John dies, their whole friendship made even weirder if he survives. Just not worth it. He's thought about telling Rodney when he's on his deathbed, too, but that hardly seems fair. Hey, before you die— yeah. John wouldn't do that to him. There was no point. What bad news to send someone into the afterlife with.
But right now, it's feeling increasingly tempting. He doesn't care about burdening Rodney, in this moment. It's Rodney's fault the gate is busted. Plus, Rodney isn't dating Jennifer Keller anymore, John wouldn't be ruining any existing relationship if he dropped this bomb. No collateral damage.
He stretches his legs out, and groans. It really hurts. Rodney's head snaps up. "I said stop moving, Sheppard, Jesus, you're like. Barely held together by shreds, you cannot afford to move, or make noises and break my focus, I am so close to—"
"No you're not," John hisses. "You're no closer than you were ten minutes ago."
"Because you keep moaning and groaning and scaring the shit out of me!" Rodney scolds. He might say something else, too, John isn't sure because he's sort of falling asleep. When he's not feeling agonizing pain, he's almost comfy. Warm, floaty. His eyes flutter closed, and suddenly Rodney is right there next to him, even warmer than the warm floaty feeling. His hands are on John's face, clammy and slapping him, which, rude. "Oh my god, Sheppard? Sheppard?!" he says shrilly. "Stay with me."
John blinks. The stars are so fucking bright on his planet. They burn to look at. "I'm with you," he says. "Just. Sleepy."
"I need you to not be sleepy, ok?" Rodney says, the absolute picture of panic. A blurry picture, because John can't see straight. "Just a little bit longer, ok?"
"You know what would keep me awake right now?" John slurs, beside himself, half certain he's dead already or that this is some bad stupid dream where he can do whatever he wants. "Making out," he announces.
Rodney rolls his eyes. "Well sorry, I am fresh out of hot alien women for you to make out with, so you're going to have to stay awake without that incentive."
"No. I meant,"J ohn says, with much effort. Each time his voice rattles through his torso he feels like his ribs are gonna fall out, loose teeth in a punched mouth. "Make out with you."
Rodney looks at him for a long time, eyes narrowed, expression incredulous. "Ok, I know that thing was shaking you a lot, did you also like, hit your head? Are you concussed?! Because you just said—hey! Stop moving!"
John reaches for Rodney's neck to drag him down. Asking politely for a kiss didn't work, he has to demonstrate. But instead of working how he wants to, his hand just sort of bonks against Rodney's chest uselessly before falling into his own blood soaked lap. "In my head, this always goes differently," he mumbles. "I don't talk first. I just do it. Just kiss you. You never expect it, you never kiss me back. Then I say I love you like Princess Leia, and you say what?? not at all like Han Solo. Then I die."
Rodney is just looking at John, helpless. Mouth like a decked fish's, eyes like twin ponds of the cleanest water. His gaze keeps darting helplessly back to the still extremely nonfunctional DHD, like if he just fixes it none of this will be happening. He won't have to bear the burden of John's inappropriate no longer secret feelings. Well, fuck it. John's been carrying it around for ages. It's Rodney's turn.
"I can't do it," John says. "Kiss you, i mean. So you'll have to kiss me, ok? No one will even know. You don't have to mean it, you can just do it because…god. Because you fucking owe me, Rodney. For…everything."
Their eyes meet. Rodney's skidding over Johns's, searching them so desperately for an explanation. "Just do it," John says. "Please. I'm dying, you know it, just. Please."
There's a pitiful sound that comes out of Rodney, somewhere deep in his throat. It's like a dog with separation anxiety whining at the door. Like this is really paining him, and yeah, well, think about how much it's paining John. "Rodney—"
"Ok. Fine, But when you survive this and remember what you demanded while delirious you cannot blame me or be mad, ok?!" and then, like a miracle, he's cupping John's face, so gently. He's leaning down. He presses their mouths together. He's a really good kisser, like John knew he would be, and John starts crying into it, both of their lips wet, salty. John's teeth start chattering and Rodney pulls away, looking at him like he's never looked at him before. John bleeds, his eyes leak down his chin, mingle with the blood drenching his collar.
Then, a jumper uncloaks. Lorne's voice patches through their radios, staticky, concerned. John can't make out what he says—he's too busy passing out.
He comes to in the infirmary, patched up like Frankenstein's monster, immobile in bandages and hooked up to machines. Their new head of medicine, the no-nonsense Dr. Patel, is looking down at him sternly, like it's his fault that sabertooth horse came for him. "You're very lucky, Colonel Sheppard," she says. Then she injects something into a tube, and he's gone again.
Next time he wakes up, Rodney's asleep on his thigh. He reaches for him, tries to push him off, shake him, but instead his hand just lands on his very soft, very thin hair. Rodney stirs, but doesn't wake up. John can't move his hand, whatever minimal energy he had used up entirely in the feat of landing here in the first place, which is embarrassing. So he just lies there with his IV hand on Rodney's skull, for every sick person and Dr. Patel to see. He realizes with horror he's intubated. There's a fucking tube down his throat. He blinks uselessly, then manages with much effort to squeeze the back of Rodney's neck, scruffing him like a dog.
Finally, he wakes up. There's a drool spot on John's sheets and his face is creased and one eye is all squinty and he looks like fucking hell, and John thinks about that kiss he managed to wheedle out of him back on the planet. He wonders if it really happened. if it did happen, if it counts, or if it will be discarded in Rodney's memory, brushed away like a coerced confession, not fit for use in court.
"You're—he's—I—" Rodney sputters. Then, "Dr. Patel! Sheppard—"
the world blurs, painful and too bright like the stars on the sabertooth horse planet. Time passes. Time with not enough Rodney and way too many latex fingers prodding him and flashlights in his eyeballs. But at least someone yanks the tube out of his throat. He hacks, drools, coughs until he almost throws up. It sucks until they give him some pain medication and a mild sedative, and he's feeling pretty fucking amazing by the time Rodney comes back.
"Hi," he says awkwardly, waving from the foot of the bed where he hovers like he's scared to get closer. "They tell me you're, well. That you're ok. Might be awhile before you're healed enough to go off world and you should probably take a whole year of sparring with Ronon, but you'll be out of bed in a few days."
"Awesome," John says, extremely high. Rodney is soft around the edges, almost frilly like the Virgin Mary embroidery his grandmother had framed in the parlor. He knows he should ease into this discussion, but he's far too blasted out of his mind and anxious to know how badly he fucked things up to wait it out. So, without further fanfare he blurts, "Did we—-uh. On the planet. I sort of remember—"
Rodney turns very red, looking nervously over his shoulder before closing the privacy curtain around John's bed and shuffling closer. "About that," he says. "You um. Might not recall, as you were clearly out of your mind, but I did tell you that if I did it, you couldn't get mad at me."
"I'm not mad at you," John says. "And I wasn't out of my mind. Or, I was, but not—I knew what I was doing. I sure am out of my mind now. What is this stuff? Morphine?"
Rodney reaches for the IV stand and checks the bag. "Ah—Demerol," he says. "The good stuff."
"Sweet," John says. Then, because he's got to, because he can't not: "I'm really sorry about—you know. It. In my defense, I thought I was gonna die. I thought we wouldn't have to have this conversation."
Rodney takes a deep breath. "For the record, I am extremely relieved you're not dead," he says quickly. "For reasons including but not limited to the fact we are…having this conversation. As painful and weird as it is." Then, before John can get a word in edgewise, he interjects, "So, you said—you know, while you were lolling around bleeding and scaring me half to death—you said, and I quote, because I have a sonically photographic memory, 'In my head, this always goes differently.' Always, implying it wasn't like, a spur of the moment thing, but something you'd thought about before."
"Yeah," John admits, letting the Demerol do the talking. "Like all the time. Every time I almost die. Or that you almost die."
"You…think about passionately tongue kissing me so hard I forget about the DHD I'm trying to repair in order to save your life?" Rodney asks in a hush, leaning in, standing so very close to the head of John's bed John can smell his aftershave.
"To be fair, I think about passionately tongue kissing you all the time," he explains. "In a sort of, never- gonna-happen, wouldn't-it-be-cool-if-way. But I think about actually doing it mostly when we're in mortal peril. Which is a lot. More than the average person, anyway."
Rodney nods rapidly like a bobblehead on a dune buggy's dashboard, visibly calculating. "I'm sorry, I'm just trying to—there are a lot of sticking points. Namely— you're gay?"
"Hey, you're not supposed to ask," John says, adjusting in bed and then immediately regretting it, since every new seam running through his stitched up body screams in protest. "But. Yeah. Obviously."
Rodney looks about ready to explode. "Ok, I find that very hard to believe, but even if— why me?! You could have whoever you want! You could passionately tongue kiss, like, Brad Pitt! George Clooney! Or Ronon, for god's sake, there's no reason at all—"
"Rodney. Look—I couldn't, but even if I could, it doesn't matter, because I don't want to, I want you. Because I love you," John says, finally, very grateful he can't feel anything but the medical grade heroin coursing through his veins. "I know it's not logical. It doesn't make sense. Trust me, I've been over it. But it's not going anywhere, so, here we are."
"Well excuse me," Rodney sniffs, remembering his arrogance suddenly, visibly offended John thinks loving him makes no sense. "You make it sound like you have bad taste."
"I dunno, you're trying really hard talk me out of it," he says. "Plus, it's not like you love me back."
"That's there you're wrong!" Rodney hisses. "Now, mind you, I never would have been so presumptuous or like, done something about it, I had that shit locked up in a ten digit combination safe in the absolute concrete recesses of my psyche. I think it would have taken—yes, well, it would have taken you bleeding out and begging me to kiss you like a crazy person in order to actually admit to myself how badly I wanted to, but, well. As you said. Here we are."
John blinks at him. Maybe it's the painkillers dulling the horrors, but this is pretty anti-climactic. He's spent to many years building it up in his head, desperately fearing he would lose access to Rodney's friendship if he ever found out how he felt that he never even imagined what it might be like if his feelings were…reciprocated. He can't even process it. He makes jokes when he can't process stuff. "Wow. I'm that good a kisser? Even like, eviscerated? I tunneled into the concrete recesses to your ten digit combination safe with one kiss?"
"When you put it like that you make it sound dirty," Rodney complains, grimacing.
"I meant it dirty," John admits, studying Rodney, who is squirming and very red. "Hey, look at me. I love you. That means I want to have sex with you. If you're freaking out, I need to know now."
"Shh!" Rodney says, putting his hand over John's mouth. Presumably to silence him, but they're sort of talking about sex so instead it's just really hot. John goes slack under the pressure, makes a noise against Rodney's palm, eyes going hazy. Rodney hangs over him panting, staring at him, unmistakably flabbergasted. "Yes,I am freaking out," he says. "But not in the way you think I am. I just don't want to get—you know—-aroused, in the infirmary, especially not when you're still hurt and I can't do anything about it yet without feeling like I'm taking advantage of you!"
John very slowly, hopefully seductively licks Rodney's lifeline, tracing it with the tip of his tongue. It has the desired effect, which is Rodney gasping and snatching his hand back, scandalized and flushed. "I give you permission to take advantage of me," John says. "Promise."
"Oh my god. I have always wondered how women survived having your seductive powers actually aimed at them, because it's dizzying just being in the periphery, but you are lethal! You are so mean! We're surrounded by sick and sleeping people!" he snaps. "Not to mention Dr. Patel, who would kill us, I don't think she takes the Hippocratic oath that seriously."
"I love you," John slurs, because he does, and somehow he can say it without the world ending.
"You are so high," Rodney says fondly, pacing and blustering and adjusting his erection with failed discretion. John feels pretty damn smug about that.
"Yeah, but that has nothing to do with me loving you. Just being able to say it," he explains, reaching out, swiping uselessly at Rodney's arm. "Hey, I'll be good. I'll take a raincheck for you taking advantage of me. Just don't stand so far away."
Rodney risks skittering closer, takes John's hand (this time the one without the IV) and squeezes it between both of his own. "This is crazy," he says. "You're crazy. I love you too, just so you know, it's admittedly very hard to say because I am not mainlining the good stuff," he says quickly, wincing, thumb pressing into John's wrist, right where the blood thrums. "But it's the truth. Um, get better soon, please?"
"Yeah, ok. If you kiss me," John says, using what little strength he has to tug Rodney down.
"In the infirmary?!" Rodney urgently whispers, dipping down anyway, freeing one of his hands so he can run it through John's hair, cup his jaw, thumb over his mouth. "God you are so infuriatingly irresistible, my brain is screaming at me but my body—"
"Tell your brain to shut up," John says, licking his lips, and incidentally, Rodney's thumb.
And this kiss is just as good, just as hot and messy and right, but even better because John's not bleeding out. Pain medication is a far superior mind altering substance than blood loss and carpe diem, he thinks. He can't wait to kiss Rodney when he's not under the influence of something.
"You can't be mad at me," Rodney whimpers, pulling back. "When you're weaned off the demerol and realize what we've done."
"Ok," John says, very unmotivated to stop and talk.
"You asked me, ok? You said you loved me."
"I do love you," John hisses, biting Rodney's mouth because it's right there and he won't fucking shut up.
"Sure. Right. Ok, if you insist. We'll see," Rodney says, before pitching back in, all heat and tongue and yeah, that's more like it. And his body hurts, his head is muzzy, and his hands won't do what he wants them to do, but hey. It's a hell of a lot better than dying, John thinks.