Title: Dynamics

Author: Whistler84

Rating: PG. Spoilers: None, kinda. Disclaimer: Don’t own Stargate: Atlantis.

Summary: Five ways Elizabeth Weir and John Sheppard get together. Ranging from fluffy to dark. Elizabeth’s POV.

Dedicated to my friend, Alex, who wanted something poetic and romantic.

—

A wise man once said, “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it. Always.”

Ghandi. The quote was from Ghandi.

Elizabeth focuses on that for a second. She has no idea why she’s thinking about this obscure quote right now, but she is. God, she feels so drained. She can’t think. Except she can, in a twisted sort of way. Even dazed and in six types of turmoil, Elizabeth’s mind has a way of working overtime. She knows five different languages, six including Ancient, and sometimes when she’s really exhausted or upset, they start to blend together and mingle, forming jumbled trains of thought that would make no sense to anyone but her.

She’s vaguely aware that what’s happening right now. She must still be in shock. She knows her minds in denial. She knows she’s trying to distract herself from the horrible truth of the moment. That’s why she standing there thinking about famous quotes and abstract meaning-of-life stuff.

That’s fine with her. At least for now. It helps to keep her mind off of . .

A wise man once said, her mind automatically refocuses, “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it. Always.”

Bitterly, emotions temporarily override her normally rational thoughts and Elizabeth can’t help but think, after so many years of putting so much personal stock in such types of words, how much complete and utter bullshit that statement may be.

It’s uncharacteristic of her in every way to think such things.

Ghandi had actually been an idol to her growing up, and yes, she’s well aware of how strange it was for a 14 year old American Girl from Idaho to have a small skinny Indian man dressed in modest garbs as her role model, but even at that age, she had been fascinated by the notion of non-violent revolution. She eventually resolved at the wise age of 16, when the other girls she knew were thinking of nothing but fashion and boys, to eventually embody that slogan where ever she went. It drove her through grad school, got her through four years of swimming with sharks in Washington, gave her focus during international peace negotiations, reaffirmed her resolve in the face of stubborn military men, and comforted her through five years of traveling abroad to the most war-torn and oppressed regions of the world. It gave her the strength she needed to stand against those that would call themselves “realists.”

But after today, she suddenly doesn’t feel that strong anymore.

The Wraith have ruled this galaxy for thousands of years, she thinks. If Ghandi was so damn wise for his time, why aren’t his pearls of wisdom ringing true right now? Why haven’t the Wraith fallen? It’s not the first time she’s thought these abstract thoughts before, but it’s the first time she’s felt a total sense of desperation and fear in its wake.

Wake. Aftermath. Funeral.

She would need to make arraignments for the funeral tomorrow, Elizabeth thinks dimly.

Suddenly numb with disbelief, she knees give way and, fortunately enough, she lands on the edge of her bed instead of as a heap on the floor. How dignified would that be? Doctor Elizabeth Weir, the epitome of control, the image of responsibility, the pinnacle of determination and resolve, crying like a little girl. If only the faction of the military that had so vocally opposed her when she had been chosen to lead this expedition could see her now. She’d bet they’d laugh and point and say they knew she couldn’t handle the stress all along.

Damn, her illusion of control is slipping, she realizes.

She’s starting to crack, her usual rational self sinking faster than quick-sand. She can’t let it slip, not yet. Because then she’ll be crying, and that can’t happen. She needs to maintain control, to be professional. Yes, she was dealt a blow, but she needed to compartmentalize it. She needed to distance herself and maintain the focus that was required at all times of a person in her position. Her mind quickly looks for another distraction, but words of wisdom aren’t doing the job anymore.

She’s suddenly crying, dammit! And there seems to be nothing she can do to make it stop. Her calm facade is completely shattered within seconds, and in the small corner of her mind that still thinking (because there’s always a part of her mind that’s thinking), she’s silently impressed that she made it this far without breaking down.

Suddenly, she’s remembering his face and his smile, and the fact that she’ll never see either again cuts through her like a knife. It’s a type of anguish she’s never previously experienced. Yes, she’s lost people before. Too many people, but . . . it was different this time. Because it was him. She finds herself focusing on the sound of his name, and the way his hair defied gravity sometimes. She remembers the incidental touches they shared and the lingering sensation they would leave on her skin. She focuses on his eyes, and thinks about their last conversation together. She’s remembering the way they stood side by side in so many situations, from the calm moments on the balcony to the tense moments where life and death hung in the balance of their decisions.

Alone, in the dark of her own room, she weeps. And, she thinks (again, always thinking), she will remain that way forever. The burden of command was now hers and hers alone. But the grief she feels isn’t for that. It’s for a different type of loneliness that stems from a place in her heart. Sorrow and desperation threaten to overwhelm her, and for the following indiscernible amount of time, it succeeds. Until, that is, a knock at the door attracts her attention.

She hiccups and wipes her face and takes a moment to pull herself together before she answers the door. Imagine her shock when she sees the face of a dead man on the other side, confusion etching his face that could only possibly mirror a fraction of the turmoil and disarray she’s suddenly feeling.

“Uh, Elizabeth,” John begins, looking bewildered, “I don’t mean to sound over dramatic here, but I’m pretty sure something strange is going on in Atlantis. More than usual. People are acting weird around me.”

In the face of his ever-so-incisive proclamation, Elizabeth stares at him, jaw dropping in what she knows is a most undignified and un-Weir-like manner, and then does something she’s never been known to do before. She stops thinking. Automatic, as if her high-speed brain, full of jumbled messes of incoherent thoughts, just stop. Like a switch had been flipped somewhere. In all her life, she can’t ever once remember that happening before.

She just completely stops thinking.

And then there’s utter silence . . .

Because she’s kissing him.

- End Part One