Exile

by Seleneheart

Evan Lorne does his duty and comes back to Earth.

The sessions with the IOA are seemingly endless. He tells the truth and no more, praying that he isn't betraying Sheppard. He is finally acquitted of any wrong-doing in the Atlantis Uprising, and Lorne tries to settle back into his life on Earth. He is promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and stationed in DC. His capacity is mainly advisory and he pretends that he isn't bored.

He tells himself that he is a Marine, that he was never meant to fly. But he can't adjust to doors that won't open for his touch and machines that don't respond to his thoughts. Earth seems to be missing some essential element, a glitter of sunlight on delicately angled spires perhaps. Washington should be beautiful, a lovely monument to democracy. But white marble seems cold and dead to him after living in a place where sunlight painted colors through stained glass every morning.

The only one to see through his facade is General O'Neill, who takes him flying one weekend in a jet borrowed from the 11th Wing at Bolling Air Force Base.

The General lets him take the controls and while it is a thrill to have the powerful machine at his command, it doesn't soothe the ache inside him. The jet isn't alive the way the puddle jumpers were. He feels like he's lost something that he didn't know he had. He mourns both the knowledge and the loss when they reach the ground. It would have been better if he'd never faced what he's missing.

'You can't go back," O'Neill tells him. 'I can't go back. I gave it up to protect them another way. You did the right thing."

Lorne doesn't know who the General is protecting or what the General thought Lorne was shielding when he refused to kill Sheppard, but the old man has seen a lot of things. O'Neill is perhaps the only man in Washington who has some intimation of what has been lost. Lorne doubts his decision nearly every night, staring out at the stars that are partially occluded by the lights of the city. The ones that he can see . . . Betelgeuse most of the time, and Rigel, look wrong, not in the patterns he expects.

The military hierarchy refuses to let him join an SG team, so he asks to be assigned to an overseas unit, wanting to fight, wanting to matter. He is denied that too and he suspects that the IOA doesn't quite trust him out of plain sight. So instead, a month or so later, he asks for two weeks leave. It is granted along with a generous travel allowance. He doesn't question it, but suspects that General O'Neill is behind it. He is mildly curious how an Air Force general came to have so much influence over affairs in a different military branch, but he supposes that saving the world countless times earns a person a lot of room to meddle.

Home in his bare condominium in Chevy Chase, he stares aimlessly at the patterns of texture on the ceiling, wondering what to do with his free time. He'd thought to lose himself someplace in the tropics, drinking the pain away on a beautiful beach. His own personal margaritaville. But he can still hear the dull boom of the surf in his ears, recorded forever on the inner surfaces of his mind. No swath of white sand with bikini clad natives or any amount of alcohol can blunt his longing.

He pulls out his battered duffle bag, but he can't decide what to put in it. He has the whole world open to him, but no where he wants to go. He shoves his leave papers into one of the outer pockets and pulls up a travel site on his laptop. He types in different destinations, hoping that one will spark his interest. Casablanca . . . Cape Town . . . Sydney . . . Tokyo.

Lorne closes the window, ready to give up, but his fingers hesitate and then he types in another location. He debates with himself, but then quickly reserves tickets for a flight to California.

He calls from the airport. The number had been emailed to him not long after they returned. The professor is in class at the moment, according to his voice mail. Lorne rents an SUV and drives toward campus. Humbolt State isn't that large and he finds the botany department without trouble.

There is a small grove of redwoods at the entrance and a bench. Lorne leans back, staring at endless trunks springing towards the sky. Spires of wood and leaf, just as delicate as those that won't leave his memory.

His phone comes to life, the message he left received and returned.

'I'm outside your building," he responds to the query.

David Parrish hasn't changed. He's almost irrepressibly cheerful and his eyes are full of a happy light when he sees Lorne.

A few beers later at a student hangout and Lorne feels more like himself, like the person he became out in the wilds of the Pegasus Galaxy.

'How are you doing really?" he asks.

Dave smiles mischievously. 'I'm about to burst with everything I can't say. I had a hell of time convincing my department head to let me go ahead and research plant survival under high UV conditions. He didn't think it was possible."

Lorne grins reminiscently. 'And you can't tell him how many new species you discovered and named."

'No." Dave shakes his head, laughing. It had been an on-going joke among the botanists to name new plant species as outrageously as possible.

'How about you?" Dave ask gently.

Evan's fingers worry at the label on his bottle. 'It's different."

Dave reads his need and holds out a hand. Lorne takes it, not caring if he's being watched, just wanting the comfort he knows he'll find in Dave's arms.

Dave's house is in the middle of the forest, on a outcropping of stone. It suits him.

They slide together slowly, neither feeling urgent about it, despite the long months since they'd been together. Lorne cries out against the crook of Dave's neck as he comes.

Later, when he thinks Dave is asleep, he goes to the window looking out over the trees. The sky is clearer here, and he can see more stars. The patterns tease at his mind.

A long lanky form wraps itself around his back and Lorne leans back into Dave's angular body. Fingers trace patterns on his belly.

For all his reckless enthusiasm about plants, Dave can be remarkably patient with Lorne and his long silences.

'I didn't necessarily disagree with Sheppard," Lorne says finally.

They've never talked about this. There wasn't time at first, and then the IOA had collared Lorne and Dave had come to California to pick up where he left off. Before Atlantis.

'I know," Dave says softly against his hair.

'I thought he was choosing exile. And I was choosing home. And duty."

'Yeah. And now?"

'I feel like the exile. Like I'm cut off from everything I valued."

'I came back because I thought that my life was here. On Earth."

In his head, Lorne calculates how many people could possibly be having this conversation, out of the billions on the planet. Thousanths of a percent. It feels like they're in some sort of surreal alternate reality.

Dave pulls him closer, reawakening dick showing interest against Lorne's ass. 'What will you do?"

'Can't go back."

The IOA and the SGC have seen to that. Even if he could sneak into the SGC and put in the dialing sequence, Sheppard will never let anyone back through the gate.

Dave turns him, leaning down to kiss him. 'Gotta go forward."

This is what Lorne doesn't want to accept, but somehow being with Dave makes it easier.

'Yeah."

He lets Dave guide him back to bed and soon he's lost in the pleasure that they create together. He still has this, at least.

The next morning, out on Dave's deck, Lorne sips strong coffee, savoring it while his toes trace patterns in the hair on Dave's thigh.

'What do you suppose they're doing right now?" Dave asks.

Typical scientist question, always with the curiosity. Lorne hasn't wanted to think about them, hoping they aren't dead, wondering how they'll survive both the SGC and the Wraith. But Sheppard always lands on his feet, especially with McKay by his side.

'I think they're trying to win over the galaxy, to find some miracle to get rid of the Wraith."

Evan wonders how the scientists viewed Sheppard, if they admired him. If they understood how much he veered away from the military line. He sees them, Sheppard and his team, in his imagination, still fighting, far from home and trying to save a whole galaxy.

'If anyone could do it, I think Colonel Sheppard could. And his team."

Evan says dryly, 'If they fail, we'll know. The Wraith will be on our doorstep."

'True. What about us . . . we exiles?" Dave takes Evan's words from the night before, continuing the conversation they interrupted to sate the needs of their bodies.

Lorne shrugs. 'We exist, fight as best we can. Knowing what's out there, but knowing that Earth is missing . . . something."

Dave looks pensive then, gazing out over the serried ranks of tall timber falling away from his house, the treetops undulating like waves. 'When you've touched the stars, it's hard to come back down."

'Yeah."

'It must be worse for you, having the gene."

'Atlantis was alive. You know?"

'I think I do."

His voice is full of compassion and Lorne is glad that he came here. Dave gives him peace.

They sit quietly, each wrapped in their own thoughts. Until, with a devilish leer, Dave shifts Lorne's foot to a more interesting location. His hips push up as Lorne clenches his toes.

'How long is your leave?"

'Two weeks."

That gets him a happy grin. 'And you're out here with me?"

Lorne smiles wryly. 'It was here or Tahiti."

'Tahiti, hm? I've never been. Maybe we can go at Spring Break."

Evan doesn't know what to say to that. They've never been more than casual, not on Atlantis, not here. Perhaps he's made a mistake coming here. He hates that he wavers between wanting this and being afraid of it. But he likes spending time with Dave, likes having sex with him.

Maybe it's time he tried something new. Like having a relationship with someone he really cares about. Maybe his life after Atlantis can be happy after all.

So he answers sincerely, 'Sounds like a plan."

Days later on the plane heading east, he knows that the ache of missing Atlantis will never go away, that it will be there like the pain of a phantom limb for the rest of his life. He sacrificed his place in the city of Ancients for the sake of his duty. But Earth has things to offer too and he is satisfied that he made the right choice that day in Weir's office. He closes his eyes and dreams of endless white beaches with Dave warm against him. A smile trickles across his face.

The End

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