"Fuck it," John thought, and made his move. They were already standing too close together; all he had to do was reach out and cup the back of Rodney's neck with one hand.
And then they were kissing. Bodies pressed together. Like they'd been waiting for this kiss for years. Which John had, and apparently Rodney had too.
Not that John had the brain cells to string that thought together; he was too busy feeling Rodney's broad chest pressed against his, reveling in the freedom of having finally gone for it. Like being in freefall for the first time.
Rodney backed him over to the bed and he went down hard, pulling Rodney after him. John whacked his head on the wall, which stung, but when Rodney pulled back to ask if he was okay he yanked Rodney back down because he didn't want to stop for anything in the world. Not now that he had Rodney on top of him, delicious weight pressing him into the mattress.
Rodney's hands scrabbled at his shirt, yanking it up and then palming his pecs. John's nipples hardened obligingly, and Rodney made a pleased sound into John's mouth, pinching one lightly. John's body twisted up into Rodney, into his thighs and his hands and his mouth which was grinning against John's, taking little bites of his lip and his jaw and now his throat. John threw his head back, desperate suddenly for more.
"You like that," Rodney said unnecessarily, and sucked hard, and John shuddered beneath him.
Next thing he knew Rodney was shimmying down his body -- who knew Rodney could shimmy? -- and yanking his trousers open, shoving them roughly down his thighs, and oh God Rodney's mouth was closing over his cock. John couldn't help the strangled groan. It had been way too long, and Rodney was going after him with the same kind of singleminded determination John had seen him apply to everything else he wanted in the Pegasus galaxy. When Rodney added his hands to the picture, John just lost it.
Rodney knelt up over him, but he didn't look smug the way John had imagined he would -- because okay, John could admit to himself that he'd imagined this; he'd imagined it kind of a lot, actually. Rodney just looked giddy. Happy.
"C'mere, I can't reach," John said, and Rodney climbed back over him. They kissed again while John worked his hand into Rodney's pants, and oh, yeah, there: hot and hard and pushing insistently into his palm.
"There's so many things I want to do to you," John murmured into Rodney's ear, and bit the lobe gently, and tightened his hand. Rodney made a surprised noise and came all over John, gasping.
They stayed in a heap for a few minutes, necking and petting each other idly. Felt nice, now that that first orgasm had taken the edge off.
"Wow," Rodney murmured eventually. "I've got to admit, that's not how I imagined that might happen."
"Me neither," John admitted, because if Rodney could own up to having thought about it, he could too.
"I'm almost...kind of sorry our first time is over," Rodney murmured. Then, with what looked like great effort, he pushed himself up an inch or two. "We should clean up," he said, and then collapsed back onto John.
"In a sec," John agreed, and closed his eyes.
John's alarm woke him in his own quarters. He couldn't help grinning -- at his walls, at the room, at the world. He knew he probably should have been panicking, but he just couldn't bring himself to care. His memory was filled with Rodney's body, the little sounds he'd made, the way he'd pushed into John's hand. Jesus, the thought was getting him hard again. And for once he could indulge the fantasy without feeling guilty, because he wasn't fantasizing about someone who didn't reciprocate.
Though as he reached down to take himself in hand, he realized he didn't feel the slight flakiness of dried come on his belly. And actually he didn't remember how he'd gotten home last night.
His good mood evaporated, and his erection along with it. This wasn't real; he'd dreamed it. Son of a bitch. Goddamned Wednesday; today was going to suck. Gritting his teeth, he got up to shower.
"So...about tonight," McKay said, standing over John's breakfast table.
"Tonight?"
"I was thinking Kill Bill, Part 2, if you're game?"
John just blinked.
"Movie night," McKay clarified, looking faintly irritated. "Hello? Atlantis to Colonel Sheppard?"
"That was last night," John said. "We decided to watch Afro Samurai instead." And then I went home and dreamed that I got to jerk you off, he thought.
"Very funny," Rodney said. "Look, if you don't want to watch Kill Bill, that's fine, I'll watch it with Ronon sometime. Whatever; we'll find something. See you tonight around eight?"
"Rodney, it's Wednesday," John said.
"Mmm, no," Rodney said. "Tuesday. Quite manifestly. Are you sure you're okay?"
"Yeah," John said distantly. "Okay, fine. Tonight. We're on."
As Rodney walked away, John looked down at his muffin. He hadn't even registered that it was blueberry again. Huh. Okay, it was Tuesday. He'd just had a very elaborate dream, was all. Fine: Tuesday, paperwork, time to get cracking.
He couldn't shake his weird feeling of déjà vu all over again. The paperwork he had to file was paperwork he could've sworn he'd seen before; the meeting with Sam went exactly the way he'd dreamed it. Even sparring with Ronon was too easy -- as if he anticipated every one of Ronon's moves before Ronon made them.
John took a shower and headed over to Rodney's, lost in thought.
He argued in favor of Afro Samurai (again, he thought, even though he knew that couldn't be true.) They watched the first two episodes and agreed it was worth watching another two next week. And then he stood up to leave, and Rodney stood up with him, and they were standing too close together --
-- and John thought "fuck it" again and kissed him.
This time he slid both hands into Rodney's short, soft hair and pulled them close together. He felt confident this time, sure Rodney would respond -- which was ridiculous, because he'd only dreamed it last night; the dream hadn't been real! -- but Rodney did respond: groaned into his mouth and plastered himself against John like he'd been waiting for this for ever.
They landed on the bed, a tangle of limbs, rubbing against each other. God: it felt so good. But John wanted to slow it down. Last night's orgasm might not have been real, but somehow it took the edge off. He managed to squirm around until he was on top, and then he pulled back, pinning Rodney and pausing to look at him. His kiss-reddened mouth. The way his chest was rising and falling. His strong arms and shoulders, solid under John's hands.
"What," Rodney said, looking up at him. "Something -- wrong?"
"Hell no," John said. "I just...like looking at you." He shrugged one shoulder.
"Really?" Rodney asked, and he sounded honestly curious.
"Yeah," John said fervently.
Rodney flushed a little, but he didn't pull away. "Look all you want," he said, raising his chin a little. The gesture was familiar -- bravado masking fear -- and it broke John's heart open; he bent to kiss Rodney again.
He stripped Rodney's clothes off slowly, touching and kissing every part of his body John could easily reach. It didn't take long before Rodney was trembling beneath his hands, struggling not to come. When Rodney murmured his name -- like the answer to every question Rodney had never quite known how to ask -- John knelt over him and stroked their cocks together, and the sensation of Rodney coming pulled John over the edge.
When John woke up in his own quarters again, alone, he got a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. He got out of bed, opened up his laptop, and stared at the date. "Tues 6:34 AM."
Tuesday again. What the fuck? He paged Rodney.
"What," Rodney said sleepily. "Do you have any idea what time it is?" Then he seemed to realize who he was talking to. "Colonel! What's wrong?"
"Don't panic," John said hastily. "Just -- get to my quarters. Please. I need to talk to you."
"Okay, that's -- fine, give me half an hour, I need a shower," Rodney said, and disconnected.
By the time Rodney arrived John had already gone to the mess hall and back.
"Do you know how little sleep I've gotten? This better be worth it," Rodney said, without preamble, walking right in.
"If we were in a time loop," John said, "how would we break out of it?"
Rodney stared. "I knew I should have stopped for coffee," he said.
There was a pause.
"You can't be serious," Rodney said.
"As a heart attack." John blew out a breath. "Look, just humor me. If we were in a time loop --"
"I can't just answer that!" Rodney's voice was irritable. "There are way too many variables. Who's being affected by the time loop? How long is it lasting? Is everyone aware of it, or just a limited number of players? What's the thing that's looping -- because in science fiction, at least, that's usually the important thing, the crux of the matter, that needs resolution before the time loop can dissolve. Of course, that's in science fiction," and he was really working up a head of steam now, "not real life, which means -- I really have to get a cup of coffee," and he turned as though to walk away.
"Here," John said, and handed him the lidded cup he'd brought back from the mess hall.
Rodney took a long gulp and an expression of beatific serenity crossed his features. "Marry me," he said, looking rapturous.
John couldn't stand it: he lifted the cup out of Rodney's hands, set it on the table, and kissed him.
This time Rodney sputtered for an instant, thrashing a little in his arms, and John had a split second of panic before Rodney apparently changed his mind and kissed him back. Rodney kissed him like he was made of coffee. Rodney's hands were all over him. John made an approving noise into Rodney's mouth and returned the favor.
"Oh, wow," Rodney said, when they broke, both breathing hard. "I... really didn't see that coming," but he was grinning like a loon, and John couldn't help doing the same.
"Yeah, about that," John began, but Rodney was already kissing him again, and his dick was perking up at all the attention, and he lost his train of thought.
John was on his knees reverently unwrapping Rodney like a present, getting ready to suck Rodney into his mouth, when Rodney got that look. Like he'd just thought of an objection, or there was somewhere else he was suddenly supposed to be.
John licked a line up his cock and Rodney bit his own lip, head thunking back into the wall.
"Wasn't there -- something about -- a time loop?" Rodney managed, and it was clearly an effort to make words come out, because right after that he groaned.
John pulled back and grinned up at him as wickedly as he could. "Hold that thought," he said.
"Right," Rodney agreed. As his cock stuttered forward into John's waiting mouth again, Rodney moaned.
It didn't take long to make Rodney come. Which John could have attributed to however long it had been since last time Rodney got laid, though he preferred to credit his own skill instead.
John hauled himself to standing again (resenting, and trying to ignore, the way his knees creaked.) Rodney's tongue fucked John's mouth while his hand went unerringly to John's dick, working him fast and merciless and in a way that made John whimper with gratitude.
Afterwards they collapsed onto John's bed. Rodney's body felt so good; John's body was thrumming. He was going to mention the time loop again. In a second. Really.
On the fourth Tuesday morning, John woke up earlier than he had the three previous times; he had to track Rodney down in his lab. The sun was just rising over the ocean, throwing long bolts of light across the lab floor. The area around Rodney's desk was littered with coffee cups and balled-up pieces of paper, and two whiteboards beside his desk were covered with incomprehensible scrawls.
"Sorry to interrupt," John said.
"Kind of busy," Rodney said absently, still staring at the colums of glowing text moving down his screen.
"It's kind of an emergency," John said, and that got Rodney's attention.
"What? Long-range sensors are supposed to ping me if there's a change in status --"
"It's more...personal than that," John said. Rodney stared at him, and John had to remind himself not to get lost in cataloguing the bags under Rodney's eyes, the crooked slant of his mouth. The way even on zero sleep and too much caffeine Rodney was absurdly, unbelievably attractive to him. Especially now.
"We're caught in a time loop." John held up a hand to forestall Rodney's objections. "You and me. I seem to be the only person who's aware of it. I've lived through Tuesday four times and I'd kind of like to move forward, so -- I need your help."
Rodney just stared at him for a second. "Have we had this conversation before?"
"Once," John said. "But we didn't get to finish it. Things got kind of, um, out of hand."
Rodney was looking at him the way he looked at a puzzle or a particularly foreign piece of Ancient machinery. "'Out of hand' how, exactly?"
John looked away for a second. "Um." He hadn't quite thought this through. "Wekindofhadsex," he said, all in a rush.
"I'm sorry, we -- did you just say 'had sex'?" Rodney looked fascinated.
"Look, I know it sounds crazy," John began.
"Not for any lack of -- okay, we're going to talk about this later," Rodney said. "As soon as we're out of this time loop? This conversation is not over." The momentary amazement in his face had transmuted to intention. It made John's skin prickle all over. He wanted more than anything to reach over and --
John stood up hastily. "Right," he said. "I keep getting -- distracted, so --"
"You do that," Rodney said, and he looked down at his desk. He was smiling a private little smile to himself, like he'd just been handed the best gift in the world. Anticipation was rushing through John's veins with every heartbeat.
"Unbelievable," Rodney said softly.
"Time loop," John reminded him, walking out of the lab. "Focus, McKay!"
"I do my best work when I'm motivated," Rodney yelled back, and John couldn't help his laughter in response.
John was ravenously hungry, but once he finished breakfast his morning felt torturous. Paperwork, Jesus; he'd already done this paperwork three times already! And he kept having to fight the temptation to swing by the lab. See how Rodney was doing.
Hardly an hour had gone by before Rodney showed up.
"There's no sign of a temporal distortion in the city," Rodney said. "As far as Zelenka and I can tell, and no, I don't actually know whether that's something Ancient scanners would pick up, but it seemed worth a try."
"You told Zelenka?!"
"Not the interesting parts," Rodney said, and yep, that was definitely a blush starting.
"Okay," John said, trying hard not to look like he really wanted to jump Rodney's bones.
"Here's the thing, though," Rodney said. "Now that you've, um, mentioned where we're headed, I -- can't stop thinking about it," he said in a rush. "So I thought maybe if we --"
"My quarters," John said, firmly, pushing past Rodney and into the hallway. "We're not doing this in here."
"Where's the nearest transporter?" Rodney's voice was slightly strangled. Just thinking of it -- of how much Rodney wanted it; how good John knew it was going to be -- brought John perilously close to coming in his BDUs.
They lay on John's bed, panting a little, and John busied himself with biting gently at the back of Rodney's neck. His soft cock nestled against the curve of Rodney's ass, which raised all kinds of interesting ideas -- or would have, if there were any way in hell he could get hard again so soon.
"I have to admit," Rodney said, "this is absolutely not how I thought this would happen."
"Me neither," John agreed. "I mean, until the first time."
Something about that seemed familiar. "Hey," he said. "I think we had this conversation the first time."
"Really?" Rodney made a contented noise and pushed back against him.
"You said you were sorry our first time was over," John realized, and pulled away.
"Hey!" Rodney rolled over and looked up at him. "I didn't --"
"The first time," John clarified. It seemed significant, but he couldn't put a finger on why.
"You think I'm...causing this?" Rodney looked skeptical.
"Maybe you subconsciously didn't want our first time to be over," John offered. "'Our first time.' How romantic."
Rodney scowled. "Sue me for being sentimental," he muttered.
"What? No, I -- it's fine," John said, but Rodney didn't look mollified. "It's better than fine, okay? It's -- amazing."
"That's more like it," Rodney said.
"But I have to say, it's getting to be kind of...familiar," John said.
"We've had sex, what, four times in your world?" Rodney looked mortally offended. "And it's already old hat to you?"
"No! I just --" John glared back. "You never remember," he said.
"That's because it's never happened to me before," Rodney reminded him. "I'd kind of like to savor it for a second, here."
"Yeah, but...think what it might be like our second time," John pointed out. "There are things we might not be comfortable doing the first time around..."
Rodney opened his mouth, then closed it again. "If we could break the loop," he asked, finally, "would you --"
"Yes," John said, fast.
Rodney gave him a look that was half exasperation and half desire. "You don't even know what I was going to say."
"Whatever it is," John said recklessly. "Just get us out of this thing."
"Oh my God," Rodney said, jumping out of bed and rummaging on the floor for his underwear.
"What?"
"I have an idea." He snapped his fingers four times, face starting to light up. "Come on!"
John stared at the bronze box in the corner of the lab. "Okay, run that by me again?"
"Ancient database suggested it was some kind of wish-fulfillment device," Zelenka said. "Is possible Rodney triggered some kind of latent temporal vortex within the city." He was looking at the two of them curiously. "I don't expect you will tell me what's been looping?"
"Sorry," John said. "If I told you, and then today didn't repeat..."
"I wouldn't forget," Zelenka agreed, nodding.
"You don't need to know," Rodney said brusquely. "How do I turn it off?"
Zelenka shrugged. "Tell it you got your wish?"
"Oh, for -- that's ridiculous," Rodney said.
"Just touch it," John said, and Rodney went over and placed his hands on the sides of the box. The panels glowed green, then white, then returned to dull bronze again.
John looked at Rodney. Rodney shrugged. Zelenka shrugged.
"Still Tuesday?" John confirmed.
"Yes; we may not know if it worked until tomorrow," Rodney said.
There was a pause. John grinned. "Well, hey, if it's Tuesday, tonight's movie night," he said. It was fun watching Rodney process the implications of that statement; he waited a second to watch it sink in. "See you, McKay," he said, and sauntered toward the door.
"Please, Colonel, be on time for once," Rodney said. It was amazing how his exasperated tone and his about-to-combust-with-anticipation tone sounded so alike.
"I'll bring the popcorn," John said, and -- barely resisting the urge to whistle -- headed out to finish his day.
The End