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John’s pretty sure he might die. Which, for all they’ve been through, really shouldn’t be that unusual. If anything, he should feel this way more often. But something’s different this time and John knows it.
He and Rodney had been separated from the rest of the team a while ago. It was supposed to have been a simple reconnaissance mission. Check out the planet, meet the locals, and go home. Unfortunately, they had managed to miss the fact that, just beyond the gate, the planet was crawling with Wraith. One kidnapping (and daring escape) later, he and Rodney are in the woods, trying to find their way to the gate.
He’s somewhat confident that Ronon and Teyla are fine. He’d ordered everyone back through the gate the second he’d realized their mistake and seen them step through before the stunner had hit him. He’s not actually sure how or why Rodney never made it through the gate with the rest of the team, but, when it comes down to it, he’s ultimately glad to have him here. Breaking out of the Wraith facility wouldn’t have been as easy without whatever Rodney had done to their systems. If John’s being honest, this has been kind of a cake walk as far as being abducted goes. He’s dealt with worse. For that exact reason, he’s really not sure why he feels so on edge.
It hits him all at once as they’re trekking through the forest. Fear. He knows, logically, that there is nothing to be afraid of in this specific moment. The worst of it is over. They’ve escaped their captors and are on their way home. What/Whoever may be at the gate waiting for them won’t stop them. They never do. Either way, help will be coming if they need it; Ronon and Teyla would never leave them behind.
So then, why does it feel like the world is about to crash down on him?
He’s felt this before. Never with company and never while offworld. One moment he is confidently guiding Rodney through the forest and the next he is in free fall. It is getting harder to breath and his hands are shaking as he holds his gun. He continues walking.
It’s hard to explain what it is, this deep sense of wrongness. Like something terrible is going to happen. He needs to get it together, to get them out of here, but each moment that passes he feels himself slip a little more.
“Do you have any idea where you’re going?” Rodney asks him, but John’s mouth is dry and he knows any response he gives will come out shaky and uncertain, so he tries to make a noise that conveys annoyance. He hopes Rodney gets the hint. “Oh God, we’re gonna die out here,” Rodney declares dramatically, and for once John can’t help but feel like he agrees. He’s feeling a bit dramatic himself, at the moment.
It’s getting harder and harder to maintain coherent thoughts as the panic starts to truly set in. Turn left. Go straight. Don’t let McKay notice what’s happening to you. Avoid that branch. Take a right and act natural.
“Hey, I think someone’s coming,” he hears Rodney say, but he can’t really focus. He’s trying , but it feels like the whole world is going fuzzy. A distant part of him understands how screwed he is if there are Wraith coming and he’s not even paying attention, but the rest of him is too far gone to care. “Sheppard!” Rodney whisper-shouts, and John turns to look at him. Rodney seems to take a moment to study him before making a face that John isn’t clear-headed enough to decode, sighing, and saying something along the lines of “do I seriously have to do everything myself?” before he’s pulling John by the arm and into the cover of some tall bushes. Once they’re sufficiently out of sight, he sits and pats the ground in front of him for John to join him. Unsure what else to do, John complies. They hear a few Wraith soldiers go by, but they don’t seem to notice the two men hiding.
John still feels like he can barely breathe. He knows he’s still shaking and he knows that Rodney can see that he’s still shaking and if he weren’t so freaked out maybe his brain would have the decency to be embarrassed rather than just petrified.
Rodney looks him up and down and John can see his eyes widen before he says “Oh,” looks away, furrows his brow for a moment, and then locks eyes with John.
“John, I need you to listen to me,” Rodney tells him. John’s not sure he can listen to anything, right now. He can barely even hear Rodney over the sound of his own definitely erratic heartbeat, but he doesn’t have many other options, so he nods. “Okay, good.” He goes quiet for a moment, thinking. “Right, okay, I need you to breathe. You do remember how to breathe, yes?”
“What?” John manages to say, but his voice doesn’t sound like his own.
“I- Look, just close your eyes, okay?” John can’t think of a worse idea than closing his eyes while there are Wraith out there looking for them. This sentiment must show on his face, because the next thing Rodney says is “It’ll be fine.” John knows Rodney well enough by now to know that he probably believes they’ll be fine just as much as John feels fine, which is to say not at all. He must look pretty damn shaken up if Rodney’s decided to lie to him.
“You seriously need to calm down or we’re…” He trails off, and John thinks he hears him mumble something like ‘not helping, McKay’ under his breath before he tries again. “Can you just-” he starts, clearly frustrated and then settles on “Just do as I say, alright?” It comes off a little more like a desperate plea than a command, but John gets the point. Plus, Rodney’s right, at least about the calming down part. As he is right now, John’s only going to get them both killed. Reluctantly, he closes his eyes.
“Finally,” Rodney says, exasperated. “Now, I need you to focus on my voice.” John nods. That’s definitely something he can do. With his vision gone, he’s pretty sure Rodney’s voice is the only thing tethering him to reality right now, and he’s not about to let that go.
“Okay. Now you and I are going to take some deep breaths. Got it?”
It’s funny how easy it is to forget that, despite all his bitching and whining, Rodney is the head of his own department. He knows how to give orders. Now, John’s not so sure he likes taking orders from Rodney, but at least taking orders is something he knows how to do. He nods.
Rodney promptly launches into a needlessly wordy explanation of how to breathe deeply, or so John thinks. His thoughts are still racing a mile a minute and he’s forgotten the instructions almost as soon as he receives them. Whatever. He’s never been good at the part where he’s supposed to follow his orders, anyway.
He figures it out eventually, though. Rodney talks to him the whole time, probably even too much, though John is grateful to have him giving instructions. He’d never admit it out loud, but it helps to hear Rodney’s voice.
John’s not sure how much time has passed by the time Rodney asks him to open his eyes, but he finds he doesn’t have the energy to care. He sees the relief hit Rodney before he even registers it himself. He doesn’t feel good by any means, but his breathing is significantly less frantic and it no longer feels like he’s about to die. He supposes that’s good enough for now.
The first thing he does upon regaining his composure is check their surroundings for Wraith. It’s honestly a miracle they haven’t been caught, especially considering they haven’t exactly been quiet. John carefully gets up and takes a look around the area, spotting nothing. He supposes they must know that he and Rodney are headed for the gate, anyway, and are planning to stop them there, rather than waste the manpower chasing them through the forest. John’s certainly not complaining about being left alone for a while.
When he returns to their hiding spot behind the bush, Rodney is still looking at him, with an expression that tells John he’s not out of the woods yet. Literally or metaphorically. He seems…concerned. Genuinely concerned, like he really does care if John is alright, maybe even beyond just for the sake of getting off this planet alive. It makes John feel fuzzy in a way he’s not sure he’s comfortable with. If these were normal circumstances, he might laugh, or crack a joke at Rodney’s expense to ease the tension, but he’s not sure he can muster up the will to do either of those things right now. Maybe it’s the fact he’s still disoriented, or maybe it’s the fact that Rodney did technically just save him, from both the Wraith and himself , but all John can actually think is that, just now, even in the face of danger, Rodney was someone he could rely on. For just a moment, Rodney even seemed kind of cool.
The sentiment is squashed as soon as he speaks
“Thank God!” He exclaims a little too loudly before panicking and looking to see if he alerted any Wraith to their presence. Fortunately, they’re in the clear. “You seriously had me freaked out there for a second.” John thinks it’s pretty ironic that Rodney gets to say he was freaked out, considering how John has felt for the past however long it’s been, but he decides to let it slide. “How- Are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Rodney,” he says, and he thinks he mostly means it. “Thanks,” he says a little quieter, and definitely means it.
“You’re very welcome,” Rodney says, clearly proud of himself. John notices the way his cheeks flush, the way they always do when someone expresses genuine appreciation for something he’s done. “I mean, what kind of man would I be if I had just left you like that?” John smiles softly, only half-listening to Rodney go on about how much of a saint he is or whatever before the weight of his words sink in. ‘Like that.’ With the urgent threat of Nothing in Particular gone, John realizes just how vulnerable of a position Rodney has just seen him in. And it’s hardly the worst position Rodney’s ever witnessed him in, but something about this is different. He was scared . More than he’s ever allowed himself to be in front of Rodney, even throughout all of their misadventures as a team.
He tunes back into Rodney’s rambling when he hears his name.
“-did you really think you could just pretend everything was fine? I have eyes, John, I know what a panic attack looks like-”
John’s thoughts grind to a halt before he starts backtracking, ignoring the fact that Rodney is still talking. Panic attack? No, it couldn’t be. This was just another one of John’s Sudden Bouts of Existential Dread. He’s been having those for months now. That’s- That can’t be what this is. Panic attacks only happen to people who are struggling with anxiety, don’t they? John’s not- He doesn’t have that problem. Unsure how to explain to Rodney just how wrong he is, the only thing that manages to come out of John’s mouth is
“What?” Rodney looks at him for a moment, probably trying to figure out where in his rambling John got lost. “Panic attacks, Rodney. I don’t- I don’t have panic attacks.” Rodney’s eyes widen for a moment before his expression turns into one irritatingly like pity.
“You have no idea, do you?”
“Excuse me?” John asks, incredulous. The nerve of this guy, he swears.
“How many times has this happened to you?” John doesn’t know what to say. He’s honestly not sure. “Okay, fine, then let me list off some symptoms for you. Let me know if anything sounds familiar, hm?” He condescends, clearly just as irritated with John as John is with him. “Shakiness, excessive sweating, general sense of dread, feeling like something terrible is going to happen, a desire to ‘escape’, increased heart rate, trouble concentrating-”
“Okay, okay, I get it.”
“And?” And, okay, so maybe John has been having panic attacks, but he is not about to give Rodney the satisfaction of a ‘maybe you were right’ so, instead, he changes the subject.
“And, what exactly do you expect me to do about it?” He asks, hoping he sounds more annoyed than nervous.
“Have you tried talking to someone?” John can’t think of anything he’d rather do less.
“Rodney, I can’t tell anyone about this. And you can’t, either.”
“And why exactly is that, Colonel ?” Rodney scoffs
“I almost got us killed today, Rodney.”
“Oh don’t be so dramatic. We were- It was fine.” He doesn’t sound convinced, himself.
“Rodney, there were Wraith coming and I didn’t even notice . If someone finds out about this, they’re gonna consider me unfit for active duty. I’ll get taken off the team.” Rodney seems to chew on this for a moment before puffing his chest out a little and declaring
“Well, I won’t let that happen. And neither would Ronon or Teyla…I don’t think.” John gives him a look that he hopes conveys ‘You’re missing the point’. Rodney continues anyway. “Look, I know what it’s like to freak out like that. To not know when it’s gonna happen next. You don’t deserve to…Actually,” he backtracks “this isn’t even about what happens to you. It’s about what happens to m- us . As a team. And I’d rather have Panic Attack Sheppard leading us than some- some wannabe. I mean, who would they even replace you with? Lorne?” He fake shudders and John snorts, momentarily distracted from his concerns by Rodney’s theatrics. This seems to remind Rodney that he is indirectly giving John a compliment, so he follows up with “Don’t let it get to your head. I only want you around because you’re better than the alternative.”
“Sure.” John rolls his eyes.
“I’m not kidding, though. I bet there’s not a single person on Atlantis who wouldn’t fight to avoid you getting removed from the expedition except, like, maybe Kavanagh.” Rodney scowls.
“Yeah, he’d probably love to see that,” John agrees, laughing a little. Rodney’s right, though. There are plenty of people who would have his back if someone tried to use this against him, it’s just…hard. He wasn’t trained to talk about his feelings and, if he’s being honest, he’d rather not start now. But he can’t go on like this, not if it’s going to put his team at risk. He sighs. This is a problem for another time. For now, they should really be getting home. “Alright, whaddya say we get out of here?”
“Oh thank God, I thought you’d never ask.”
As if on cue, the signature sound of Ronon’s blaster can be heard from a distance, along with Teyla calling their names. The two men exchange a look.
“Look, I won’t tell them, but you really should-
“I’ll think about it.”
“Oh you are just-”
“Thanks for having my back, McKay.”
“Right, well..” Rodney responds, bashful, and John can swear he hears him whisper “You’ve always got mine.”