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the-wandering-whumper · 3 years

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Did I write a Stargate Atlantis/Short Circuit crossover in the year of our Lord 2022? Why, yes. Yes I did.

Ficlet under the cut

He heard them long before they knocked. A group of nervous feet, scientists by the sound of them. They whispered outside his door, apparently trying to decide who should knock before someone finally did. It was tentative at first, as though the owner of those knuckles half hoped he wouldn’t answer.

John Sheppard discarded his tattered copy of War and Peace he’d been reading and pulled himself up from the bed. He was half asleep, his hair no doubt sticking out at odd angles as he tried to rub the sleepiness from his eyes. He waved a hand in front of the door’s sensor and it slid open easily. Outside in the hall was a gaggle of scientists, most of them from engineering.

“Colonel Sheppard,” one of them greeted him. Judging by the encouraging nudge he got from his comrades, this must have been the one bold enough to knock.

John leveled him with a serious gaze. “Yes?” Inside he was all smiles. It amused him to no end that some of the scientists on Atlantis still kind of feared him.

“We were all just wondering,” their leader began. John was pretty sure his name was Patterson. “If you’ve opened it yet.”

John blinked, entirely at a loss as to what the man could possibly mean. “You’re gonna have to help me out here, guys. Opened what yet?”

“Oh,” Patterson said, glancing down at his feet and toeing at a tile. One of the other scientists nudged him again. “It’s just that… well, the Daedalus arrived last night with the latest supplies from Earth.”

John folded his arms across his chest. “I’m aware.”

“And we noticed your crate in with the rest of the mail.”

Every eye turned to John in an instant, but he was still confused as hell. “What crate?”

Patterson’s face fell. Clearly, he and his fellow scientists had been expecting a different reaction from John. He wanted to remind them all that sometimes it took a bit for the quartermaster to go through all the supplies that came over from Earth on the Daedalus, though the guy was extremely good at getting to the mail first. In fact, there was probably a slip of paper in the inbox on his desk alerting him to the fact that a crate was waiting for him down in the small room off the jumper bay they had turned into a miniature mailroom.

John narrowed his eyes. “Why are you all so interested in it anyway?”

“Well, it’s from SPECK,” Patterson replied.

“SPECK?” John repeated.

“You know, SPECK Robotics. Only the most successful robotics company in the world.”

John knew exactly what SPECK was - and his curiosity was instantly piqued - but he wasn’t about to show the scientists as much.

“It’s from them,” Patterson continued.

“And you all want to know what it is they sent me,” All the heads around him nodded in unison.

“It’s a rather large crate, sir.”

“Well, I hate to disappoint you all, but I really have…”

“You ordered something from SPECK??” an indignant voice called out from down the hall and John looked over just as Rodney rounded a corner. McKay elbowed his way through the gathered crowd and pushed Patterson unceremoniously to the side. The engineer looked about ready to punch Rodney in the face for the slight. “What in the hell did you order? It’s all anyone's been talking about this morning!”

“Get in here,” John said angrily, pulling the astrophysicist into the room by his collar. “And as for the rest of you, don’t you have jobs to do?”

John let his door woosh shut on a thought, cutting off the scientists’ exclamations of disappointment.

“What the hell, Sheppard!” Rodney growled, shoving John’s hands away once the door was finally closed. “What was that for? I just ironed this shirt!”

John put a finger up to his lips and listened at the door. The sound of footfalls and mumbled conversation was, thankfully, moving off. They were leaving.

“What the hell is going on?” Rodney demanded.

“I have a package, apparently.”

“And a fairly large one. Or so I’ve heard,” Rodney said, his eyes glinting for a fraction of a second as John’s head snapped up. “It’s down in the jumper bay. But you still haven’t answered my question. What did you order from SPECK?”

“I didn’t order anything,” John said, exasperated. “That’s what I keep trying to tell everyone.”

Rodney’s face fell just as Patterson’s had. “Oh.”

Fully awake at this point, John began pulling on his boots. There was no helping it now, he was going to have to go down to the jumper bay and see what in the hell the company had sent him.

“You really have no idea what it could be?” Rodney tried again.

John signed. “None whatsoever.”

————

There were several scientists circling the crate when John and Rodney arrived down in the jumper bay 15 minutes or so later. While Rodney dealt with the gawkers, John tracked down the quartermaster so he could sign for the package. The Sergeant was very happy to see him. Apparently, a lot of people (mainly scientists) had been pestering him about the crate and it’s contents as soon as they’d unloaded it. The sooner John got it out of his jumper bay, the angry Marine informed him, the better.

When John returned, Rodney was already holding a crowbar.

“Easy there, killer,” he laughed, circling the crate and looking for the label. When he finally found it, he was pleased to see it contained much more than just the shipping information. There was a thick packet of paper folded up behind the label. Fishing his pocket knife out of his BDUs, John sliced into the clear plastic film affixing the packet to one side of the crate. He unfolded the papers to reveal a photocopied newspaper article on top. It was an obituary, he realized upon closer inspection.

“Why on earth would someone send you the obituary for Newton Crosby?” Rodney asked. He’d come up behind John and was reading over his shoulder. John ignored him and flipped to the next page in the packet. It was a short handwritten note penned in a familiar and elegant hand.

They both wanted this. He’ll be safer with you.

- Cheryl

Oh boy, John thought to himself. Things were about to get very interesting.

“Cheryl…” Rodney read aloud. “Not Cheryl… Crosby, right? Not the CEO of SPECK Robotics…”

John looked over his shoulder at Rodney but said nothing.

“I don’t believe it!” Rodney exclaimed, throwing up his hands. “Were you going to tell me you were on a first-name basis with one of the most successful businesswomen of our time? Or was I just supposed to find out by reading your mail?”

“It’s… complicated,” John finally said after a beat.

“Then uncomplicate it for me,” Rodney demanded.

John took a moment to choose his next words carefully. “My unit did some field testing of some of their tech during one of my tours. Crosby came out for some of it and brought Cheryl along with him. We stayed in touch after.”

“I bet you did,” Rodney mumbled under his breath, snatching the papers out of John’s hand.

“I can’t open this here,” John blurted out, suddenly very nervous. If the crate contained what he thought it contained then they needed to do this carefully, for their own safety as much as for the protection of what was inside. John’s only consolation was Cheryl’s words. They both wanted this.

“Can you have someone move this to one of your secure labs? I need to make a few calls.”

Rodney was looking up at him like he was nuts. “Sure, but… you’re really not going to open it?”

“Not yet,” John said over his shoulder, already on his way out of the bay. “And I mean it, Rodney. A secure lab. And no one goes near that thing until I get back. That’s an order.” Those words would hardly mean a thing to McKay, but John used them so rarely that he hoped the scientist would at least acknowledge he meant business this time.

———

When John finally joined Rodney in the lab they had commandeered to store the crate, he was just as clueless as he had been when he left the bay. His calls to Cheryl had gone unanswered, though he’d left messages for her at the office and even at the ranch in Montana. He was still wrestling with what they should do next when Rodney practically bowled him over as soon as he was through the door.

“This is amazing! Why didn’t you tell me?”

John grabbed the papers Rodney was waving under his nose away from the scientist angrily. “Because, Rodney,” he fumed, “most of its classified. And don’t you know it’s illegal to read other people’s mail?”

Rodney waved him off. “This is incredible. Extraordinary! I mean… the implications alone… the applications….”

“Woah, slow down, Rodney. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here,” John warned. He pulled up a stool to one of the empty lab tables and began rifling through the papers. The farther he read the wider his eyes got. What had Crosby and Stephanie been thinking?

“Exactly what Cheryl had written,” his brain supplied. “That he’ll be safer here with you.”

John looked over at Rodney who was practically vibrating with excitement on the other side of the table. He’d somehow gotten a hold of a crowbar again. “So, can we open it now?”

John sighed heavily. There was no longer any reason to keep stalling that he could see. The packet of info Cheryl had sent along with the crate explained it all. It was clear it was time.

“Alright, Rodney. Just… be careful.”

Rodney bounded over to the crate like a kid coming down the stairs at Christmas. He had a gleam in his eye as he used the crowbar to pry the front panel away from the sides. It fell open onto the floor as soon as it was free of the nails holding it in place. The inside was stuffed to the brim with protective padding and it was impossible to see what was inside.

Rodney huffed his displeasure and began clawing at the foam, throwing wads of it over his shoulder as he dug.

A kid at Christmas indeed.

John sat back and watched him do it until Rodney had pulled enough of the padding away that the two men could finally see what was inside. “Well I’ll be damned.”

The robot looked exactly like the kind of machine you’d expect to see built in the 80s. The design was crude and boxy, like it would be perfectly capable of playing a Betamax tape if you asked it nicely enough. Rodney seemed disappointed at first, but John knew, as soon as he reconnected the wires Cheryl advised they had disconnected so Number 5 could be unconscious during transport and pressed a few buttons, McKay would be back to that kid at Christmas in no time.

John stepped forward and removed the last of the packaging from around the robot’s head. He opened an access panel, reconnected the necessary wires, punched the large red button below the robot's main terminal, and stepped back. Lights flashed and the whirl of machinery could be heard before the closed metal flaps covering the robot's eyes began to flutter. They had always reminded John of butterfly wings.

Number 5’s eyes opened, the iris focused on his face and John smiled. “Welcome back.”

Rodney must have jumped three feet into the air when the robot suddenly started rolling out of the crate and into the light of the lab. 10 years had passed since John had last seen Number 5 and the robot still looked the same. Same hardware, same tech. No upgrades. Just the same old Number 5.

So far, the robot hadn’t said a word, and John worried for a second that he had been damaged during transport somehow. Those worries were proven unfounded a moment later when Number 5 opened his arms wide and finally spoke. “John Sheppard.”

Rodney’s mouth was hanging open beside him. John decided a little more shock couldn’t hurt the scientist and stepped up to the robot. He threw his arms around Number 5’s neck and hugged him. It was just as awkward as it always had been, thanks to the robot's design, but they managed it.

“I’m so sorry about Newton,” he said when they finally broke apart. “And Stephanie. I would have been there for the funerals if I could have gotten back to Earth.”

“We know,” Number 5 said, his head falling. The robot was very obviously still grieving the loss of his friends and had no trouble conveying that, despite his rudimentary design.

“I’m glad you’re here, though,” John said to change the subject. “Cheryl told me all about the hair-brained plan you and Crosby came up with.”

Number Five chuckled, the line of lights that made up his mouth curling onto a smile. “The kids weren’t too happy with the idea, but I couldn’t stay at that ranch. I couldn’t spend the rest of eternity hidden away and alone. Not without them. This seemed like the best option.”

John nodded knowingly. Number 5’s voice still sounded computerized but there was no denying how human his voice patterns sounded these days. When John had first met him, he still sounded very much like a robot.

“Ahem.” Rodney cleared his throat and John nearly startled. He’d completely forgotten the scientist was even there.

“Oh shit! Where are my manners? Dr. Rodney McKay, meet Johnny Five.”

John stepped aside and was barely able to contain his amusement at the look on his friend’s face.

Rodney did his best to school his features and stepped forward. Robot and scientist shook hands.

“Pleased to meet you Mr. Five,” Rodney said formally. “Welcome to Atlantis.”

Oh yeah, kid at Christmas.

Fin.

(Let me know if you want me to keep going. I have ideas and this has the potential to be a rather fun series.)

#will anyone read it?#no #no they will not #my writing #stargate atlantis #john sheppard #rodney mckay #angst #long post #tried to do a read more on mobile #I’ll fix it when I’m on desktop after work

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