Work Text:
It had actually been Elizabeth's idea, though some days she still had trouble reconciling that fact with the person she thought herself to be.
It had started after they'd taken Atlantis back from the Genii, after she'd essentially been held hostage and could do nothing but watch as a bullet just narrowly missed her. Much later that night – or very early the next morning, really – she'd found herself explaining to an increasingly confused John Sheppard exactly how they could have sex and not have it interfere with the day-to-day running of the city. He'd made a token resistance, a half-hearted attempt to ask her what was wrong and was she sure, but ultimately he was a man who hadn't had sex in at least six months – or so she assumed, anyway – and who was probably still slightly drunk from the impromptu party they'd thrown at surviving, and in less than half an hour she was naked in his bed with him buried deep inside her.
She'd been vaguely aware that she'd been suffering from some form of post traumatic shock but she couldn't make herself care. Elizabeth had never been that close to death before – or, at least, never been so helpless to do anything to save herself – and she'd been disturbingly numb in the hours following Kolya's death. Being with John had helped.
After an extremely uncomfortable and awkward conversation the following morning, they'd decided to stay with the arrangement: essentially, no-strings-attached sex whenever either of them needed it. She made it clear that she wasn't looking for anything deeper and, if anything, he was being used as a stand-in for Simon. John had said he was fine with that and she'd wondered, briefly, if he was using her as a replacement for someone else.
**
The times they went to each other were sporadic, but there was a sort of pattern to it. Any mission that put John in a near-death situation was guaranteed to drive them together for a night, though he was hard-pressed to predict which one of them would crack first; it was split pretty evenly if she would go to his quarters or if he would make his way to hers. But the human need to reaffirm life ensured they would find each other after the more dangerous missions.
The sex itself was usually rough, frantic, needy; but neither of them ever brought that fact up and neither of them ever indicated that they wanted anything else.
John asked her once, before she snuck out of his quarters and back to her own room an hour before Atlantis woke for the day, why she had chosen him. Why not Grodin, he wondered, or McKay? They both respected her and there was less risk of the personal issues interfering with the professional side of things since neither of the two men was in a leadership position.
"I'm pretty sure Grodin is dating one of the Athosians," she told him, reaching for her clothes, "and Rodney...." She shrugged one shoulder, a little self-consciously he thought. "Rodney seems to have a bit of a crush on me. I didn't want to complicate things."
A number of unexpected emotions hit him as Elizabeth's words sank in: surprise, jealousy... resentment? Before he could figure that one out, he was distracted by Elizabeth's departure and it slipped his mind as he started to get ready for the day.
It was about a week after that conversation that it occurred to him, in the middle of a briefing of all places, that Elizabeth had never, ever called him by name during any of their trysts.
About five minutes after that John realized he'd never called her by name either. And it bothered him.
He wondered what that meant.
**
A month later and Elizabeth was the one facing death once more. One of the teams came back infected with something that, apparently, the Ancients' technology didn't recognize as dangerous and in his delirium, one of the men saw something threatening in Elizabeth and had her pinned to the floor with his hands around her neck before anyone in the control room could react. It took three people to pull him off, and five minutes for her to regain consciousness.
As John was driving into her that night, he realized that while it was anyone's guess which of them would turn to the other when he'd been seriously injured, he was always the one that went to her when she'd been threatened.
He wondered what that meant too.
**
Six months after one of her own people tried to kill her, a little less than a year after she'd ended up in John Sheppard's bed for the first time, Elizabeth found herself outside his quarters yet again barely an hour after his release from the infirmary.
For three hours, he'd been dead. Actually dead. He'd stopped breathing, his heart had stopped beating, there had been no brain activity. And then, for reasons they were still trying to figure out, some piece of Ancient technology that they'd never been able to get working had suddenly activated and the next thing they knew, John was asking for a glass of water. It seemed that being dead made a person thirsty.
He'd been disturbingly energetic only a half-hour or so after he'd awakened, and Carson hadn't been able to keep him in the infirmary for very long because inside of an hour John was as healthy as he'd ever been. Physically, at least; he wouldn't talk about what had happened. But John wasn't thought to be a threat to himself or others and so he was released to quarters.
Which was where Elizabeth now found herself.
She'd barely announced her presence before she found herself backed against a wall just inside John's room, pinned by his body, one of his hands under her shirt and the other coaxing her leg up and over his hip. She moaned, tunnelling her fingers through his hair to bring his mouth more firmly against her own and rubbing herself against his already hard erection.
In short order they were both naked and Elizabeth's legs were wrapped around his waist, John's hands on her ass and his chest flush against hers to support her as he thrust deep.
After, they collapsed on the bed, her back to his chest, their legs tangled together and one of his arms draped over her waist. Something about the darkness and the way they weren't facing each other gave her the courage to ask him if he remembered anything about it, about being dead.
"Not exactly," he said quietly, into the back of her neck. "I have the impression of blackness, and being completely alone, and not being able to move, but I don't actually remember anything."
He shuddered, his arms tightening almost convulsively around her. Elizabeth intertwined her fingers with John's and brought his hand to her mouth, kissing the back of it.
"Elizabeth," he whispered, his voice cracking, and she turned in his arms to face him in the dark.
"I know, John." She leaned up; kissed his forehead, his cheek, his lips. "I know."
They settled more firmly against each other, and Elizabeth trailed her fingers through his hair until John's breathing evened out into sleep. She had a little more trouble finding peace. They'd crossed some sort of line tonight and she couldn't help but wonder what morning would bring. Strangely enough, she was looking forward to this new change.
She wondered what that meant.
--end--