John shuddered awake after a long, unpleasant dream about being in the jumper when the bomb went off--seeing his own bones, his skin melting away, feeling himself fall apart--and he stared at the door for a long minute, rolled back over, and fell asleep again.

Just after closing his eyes again, he saw Ford shooting Elizabeth, Beckett, Rodney, as they tried to stop him, his darkened eye glittering, looking nothing like Ford at all.

And then it was John shooting Everett, who said "thank you" through the blood spilling from his mouth.

And then Teyla being eaten by a Wraith, and John couldn't reach his P-90, couldn't do anything but watch her age, her expression serene and forgiving, and completely unnatural.

And then the ZPM glowing between Rodney's eager hands, bright beyond belief, exploding suddenly and taking Rodney and everything around him with it.

And then Elizabeth saying names, dozens of names, not crying even a little, while Atlantis itself fell apart around her, even the sea around it angry and dark like it had been the night of the storm.

She’d been the last person he’d spoken to; she’d ordered him to get some rest (along with pretty much everyone else in the city), but really, that wasn’t going to happen. Anyway, he was feeling better. Not less tired, exactly, but somehow more awake, and definitely too jittery to sleep. After using the bathroom attached to his quarters, he walked shakily to the door with an idea of going to the kitchen--though the idea of food was making him kind of queasy right now.

There was something weird outside his door. Not normal-for-Atlantis weird, which usually meant dead arms moving by themselves, or Teyla’s jewelry turning out to be evil--this particular sight was weird because it was normal for *Earth.* What it looked like was a wicker basket filled with what *really* looked like chocolate chip cookies. Bemused, John picked one up and examined it from all angles, but it remained reassuringly cookie-like, so he took a bite and forced himself to swallow.

Oh, yeah. That was real chocolate. He shut his eyes again for a moment, savoring the taste, spending three seconds feeling like a real human being. It felt weird, so he scooped up the basket and headed down to the control room. The light was slanting in as he entered, like it was sunset or sunrise, though he had no idea which, or even how many days had passed, and it was almost empty of people, except for the new control guy who was almost-dozing lightly over one of the lit panels. He didn't even notice John come in, or blink when he turned to leave a second later, struck with a sudden inspiration.

The halls were completely silent, almost in a creepy way--like he was the only person in the whole city who was really awake. Or alive. He wove his way through piles of crates and finally caught sight of Rodney, who was playing with the shield controls and muttering happily to himself, crouched under the table that half-circled the ZPM platform.

"Hey." He plunked the cookies down next to Rodney and watched his head jerk up with almost comical swiftness.

"What? Oh, you're awake. Good, good. Are those--" He took a cookie and ate half of it in one bite, closing his eyes in pleasure. "Oh, *yes.* That's very, very good."

Sitting down next to him, John told himself firmly that he was not getting at all turned on by the orgasmic moans of a guy who now had crumbs spread over his chin and his shirt. "Help yourself, by the way," he said dryly, as Rodney dove into his third cookie, still moaning with chocolate-induced bliss.

"Like you didn't know I was going to eat them the second you set them down. God, where did you *get* these? They taste homemade."

"Someone baked them for me, I guess." John snatched a cookie and started eating it, taking slow, pointedly neat bites and chewing each one thoroughly. He felt that it was important to set an example, though god knew Rodney would never notice.

"*Made* them for you?" Rodney said with an indignant squawk. "What makes you so special?"

"I was figuring it was a sort of thank you, or something," John said, feeling more defensive than usual because he honestly had no idea where the cookies had come from. He’d assumed that they weren’t poisoned sabotage cookies, because really, that would just be insane overkill at this point.

"For what, saving the city? Oh, please. I did just as much work as you did. I mean, the sheer amount of sleep lost, the hours of toil--who did more to save the city than me? Why don't I get cookies? I should get a, a *parade* after everyone wakes up again." He finished up with a firm nod, still chewing briskly through the whole speech.

John hoped the smile on his face didn't look as real as it was. He was really, really happy that one thing on Atlantis, at least, seemed to be exactly the same. "I'll see what I can do."

"Thank you," Rodney sniffed.

"You did good, Rodney," John said, "I mean it."

"Well, thank you again." Rodney smiled his little pleased smile, like he appreciated that John had finally noticed and commended Rodney’s obvious perfection. "All I ask, really. And--cookies. Cookies would be nice," he said, like John didn't just bring him a dozen of the damn things.

“You’re welcome. Why aren’t you asleep, by the by?”

“I slept for over thirty-six hours, actually. Woke up about two hours ago and thought I’d, uh, start looking more closely at the ZPM. Everyone on a normal schedule is still asleep--it’s only five A.M. and Elizabeth told everyone to rest as long as they wanted.” He was speaking with a speed that indicated that he’d had at least three cups of coffee already, in addition to the chocolate he was currently inhaling. “You look exhausted, Major,” he said critically. “Why aren’t you still in bed?”

“I look fine!” John said, affronted. “I’ve slept all I need to for now, thanks.”

“Right.” Rodney stopped eating for a second to give him a long, steady look that said, very clearly, “you are a terrible liar, but as long as you’re not putting my life in danger it’s none of my business if you act like an idiot.” The idiot part was especially clear.

“I’m fine.”

“So you said. Look, I’m as worried about Ford as you are, but there really isn’t much we can do until we’ve recovered ourselves here, and that includes you. I’m sure you’d love to go haring off on another brilliant suicide mission, but I’m afraid we actually have some higher priorities right now, like, oh, fixing the city so that people don’t start walking through doors and straight into the ocean,” Rodney said, making a plane-crashing movement with one empty hand, graceless and blunt.

Shifting onto his other hip, John glared at him. “I know that, Rodney, but it doesn’t actually make it any easier for me to sleep at night. Or—how many nights has it been?”

Rodney tilted his head, relaxing the jut of his jaw. “Two, I think. I don’t actually remember going to *bed,* per se. I have a fuzzy recollection of Zelenka giggling about something, and the next thing I knew I was asleep on the floor of my room. Nowhere near my bed, even.”

"Yeah, people get weird on no sleep," John observed. He was feeling a weird kinship with Rodney, the same one they normally had, intensified by the quiet in the rest of the city, his lack of rest. "Elizabeth actually hugged me," he said, wanting to see Rodney's reaction. He still wasn't quite sure what to think about it himself. “She seemed really happy to see me.”

Rolling his eyes, Rodney leaned back on his elbows. "Incomprehensible, really."

“Thanks, Rodney. You know, a little gratitude might--”

"Actually," Rodney said, his eyes lidded low like he was savoring the last cookie, "everyone was pretty. You know. Happy about that."

"They were, huh?" John met Rodney's eyes as he looked up. "Everyone?"

Rodney's gaze was almost blank, almost thoughtful, except for the irritated glint that meant he knew John was teasing him. "Yes, I'd say just about everyone, at last count."

"How about that," John said, not really knowing what else there was to say. The quiet that had spread over Atlantis flooded into their conversation for a moment, while John smiled awkwardly, too happy to be smooth, and Rodney kept his face expressionless. "Hey," John said finally, putting a hand to his mouth, "you got a little--"

"Oh, right," Rodney said, straightening and rubbing with determination at the wrong side of his mouth. "Did I get it?"

Laughing, John reached, without even thinking about it, for the chocolate smudge at the corner of Rodney's lip. And stopped, because there was a strange look on Rodney's face, the dawning awareness of impending danger that John was so familiar with, the one that set off "oh shit" warning bells in his own head.

Okay, that was a bad idea, he said to himself, not for the first time, and withdrew his hand, carefully not watching as Rodney scrubbed the smear off his face, shoulders bowed slightly away from John, his hands dropping into stillness at his sides. This was why he didn’t usually touch Rodney—it made things complicated. It helped that neither of them were exactly touchy people.

"Sorry," John said, and Rodney flinched, one knee drawing up a little, reflexively, into himself. There was no sound but the soft rush of their breathing, even John’s own head empty of any kind of coherent thought. Rodney’s mouth, too, was oddly motionless, quiet. It sounded wrong.

Taking a deep breath that stuttered in his lungs, John lifted his hand again, and placed it firmly against Rodney's cheek. He waited until Rodney looked at his face again and leaned in to brush their lips together.

Which was scary, but he'd done scarier things. Many of them an hour ago in his sleep.

Rodney froze up and John felt him gasp, for the couple of seconds it took for Rodney to get with the program. Then his hands had flown up to grip John's arm, the back of his neck, and Rodney was licking him like he still tasted of chocolate, which he probably did. They both did.

John bit down on Rodney's upper lip and he moaned, clutching John's arm so tightly that it almost hurt, so that John shifted in his grip a little, moving his hand down to rub Rodney's shoulder in a way he hoped was soothing.

"Sorry, sorry," Rodney mumbled against his lips, jerking his hand back into a loose circle. He swept his tongue around John's mouth a few more times, and when John returned the favor the tone of his voice as he said things like “yes, good, yes, right” was so shocked and happy that John had to pull back to see his face: the wet mess of his mouth, his wide eyes.

Immediately Rodney began to babble, which John appreciated: much less freaky than the complete silence of a minute before. "You're--I didn't know you were--huh.” John could feel the hot blast of each word against his mouth. “Well. I, uh, haven't actually kissed a guy since I was in grad school, James Miller--he really hated being called Jim for some reason, anyway--"

"Rodney!"

"Yes. Right." Rodney looked utterly open, completely distracted, all his emotions plain on his face: anxiety, excitement, confusion, arousal. Like he'd never been hurt or shot down before--no, not like that. Like he had been and expected it to happen again, and didn't care. It made it hard for John to breathe deep, seeing him like that, wondering what was showing on his own face.

He looked away, over the top of the table to the nearest window. “Hey, the sun’s up.”

“That it is,” Rodney said, cautiously accepting John's change of subject.

John smiled at him, but it didn’t quite feel like his usual smile. “There’s—stuff. Things we need to do.”

“Find Ford.” Standing, Rodney began slowly kneading his right hand with the fingers of his left.

John stood next to him, stretching into Rodney’s space. He’d never really noticed how close he and Rodney stood before just this second, but it was okay. Kind of nice. He was still feeling really damn tired, though. “And fix the city, yeah.”

“And everything will be juuust fine.” Rodney’s superior little smile was back, though he was still carefully avoiding touching John. “Why does *that* sound like a complete lie, hm?”

“Because you’re a terrible liar, Rodney. You’ve gotta sell it better than that.”

Rodney cleared his throat with the pomp of someone about to address the U.N. “Right. Yes. The Wraith will be defeated, and, and Ford will come home after discovering the planet of the overgrown java forest, the ZPM will turn out to magically make everyone on the science team almost but not quite as brilliant as me, and someday—we’ll do this again without the awkward silence part. ‘Cause the other part, I liked.”

“Sounds like a plan,” John said, smile feeling a lot more real now.

“Really?” Rodney sounded surprised, a little breathless, probably from the length of his glorious lie.

“Yes. Really,” John said with almost genuine confidence, and let his hand brush Rodney’s as they walked back to the control room.