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"Long Road Home" vignette
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atlantis_fan requested a post-Long Road Home vignette. I mulled over an idea while lying in bed this morning, and when I got up, this is what I wrote. It's a little bit cute and a little bit sad.
The sheep were Teyla's idea.
John's savings were starting to run low, and of all of them -- Teyla, Ronon, Melena and their two kids -- he was the only one who could legally work. Rodney didn't count, since he was only occasionally there.
Teyla had been trying to talk him into sheep for over a year. The ranch was already set up to raise animals; they'd hardly have to do anything. She said that the sheep would feed themselves on the grass in the high pastures, and then she and Melena could spin the wool into cloth to sell to tourists.
John had waved a hand at the rocks. "What tourists? There aren't any within a hundred miles of here."
"Your country is full of tourists. They must be somewhere."
Ultimately he figured it would probably come to nothing, but Teyla had talked Ronon and Melena around to her side, and he figured that going along with it was the path of least resistance. Besides, when he thought about it, he started thinking it sounded like fun. He'd never really been anywhere near a farm as a kid. Now he owned one. Teyla and Melena kept a vegetable garden, and they had a couple of cats -- strays that Rodney had picked up in D.C. and brought back with him -- but otherwise, they probably did need some more livestock to give the place that suitable Texan ambiance.
Like most simple ideas, it turned out to be complicated. The ancient fencing around the pastures was sagging and falling down. He and Ronon and Teyla spent countless hours replacing and repairing fence posts in the scorching sun, re-stringing rusty barbed wire and trying not to pick up tetanus. Then John got a couple of books on animal husbandry and discovered how many things could kill sheep.
"Damn things die if you look at 'em funny!"
Teyla leaned over his shoulder, reading. She had picked up written English as if born to it; the only thing that still seemed to give her trouble was the occasional spoken contraction. "Only your American sheep," she informed him proudly. "In my village, the flocks lived off the land for months at a time. They were only rounded up to be sheared. They did not need your antibiotics and vaccinations and special feed supplements and such."
"Yes, but American sheep is what we're going to have to get."
It also turned out that no one for hundreds of miles around them raised sheep. There seemed to be quite a few cattle ranches, but sheep? Not so much. John ended up having to drive to the city to find someone who could sell him a few lambs.
Still, it was worth it for the look on Teyla's face when he and Ronon showed up with a dozen feces-smeared lambs huddled in the back of the truck.
Half of them died immediately, largely through their caretakers' inexperience. They lost one to coyotes, two in a rainstorm when the flock became separated, one that escaped through a hole in the fence and was never seen again, and so forth. But the others thrived, and John discovered that he really liked this.
Sitting on a sun-warmed rock overlooking the pasture and watching the half-grown animals graze, he wondered what Rodney would have to say about it the next time he showed up. Rodney could never seem to resist the lure of D.C. and whatever it was he did for the government there. He'd vanish for months and eventually turn up back at the ranch, broken in ways John could never quite pin down. Then he'd stay until his eyes started to lose that lost look, and he'd be gone again.
It had been almost a year this time, John realized, the longest he'd ever been gone. If he didn't show up soon, it might be necessary to go up to D.C. and drag him down here. When Rodney stayed away for a long time, it was like he lost a little bit of whatever made him Rodney -- the quick humor, the flashes of compassion that showed when you expected them least. He rebounded slowly while staying at the ranch, but a little more slowly every time he came.
It was time to get him back.
John wandered back to the house. There were a stack of postcards propped on a windowsill that Melena had picked up in town. None of them had anyone to write to, but she had liked the pictures. There weren't any with sheep, so John picked out one that showed a rolling landscape of red hills, and, on the back, scribbled down the address of the mail drop that Rodney had given them in D.C.
He didn't write much. There was no need. "R- Got sheep? J." Rodney could never resist a puzzle.
atlantis_fan requested a post-Long Road Home vignette. I mulled over an idea while lying in bed this morning, and when I got up, this is what I wrote. It's a little bit cute and a little bit sad.The sheep were Teyla's idea.
John's savings were starting to run low, and of all of them -- Teyla, Ronon, Melena and their two kids -- he was the only one who could legally work. Rodney didn't count, since he was only occasionally there.
Teyla had been trying to talk him into sheep for over a year. The ranch was already set up to raise animals; they'd hardly have to do anything. She said that the sheep would feed themselves on the grass in the high pastures, and then she and Melena could spin the wool into cloth to sell to tourists.
John had waved a hand at the rocks. "What tourists? There aren't any within a hundred miles of here."
"Your country is full of tourists. They must be somewhere."
Ultimately he figured it would probably come to nothing, but Teyla had talked Ronon and Melena around to her side, and he figured that going along with it was the path of least resistance. Besides, when he thought about it, he started thinking it sounded like fun. He'd never really been anywhere near a farm as a kid. Now he owned one. Teyla and Melena kept a vegetable garden, and they had a couple of cats -- strays that Rodney had picked up in D.C. and brought back with him -- but otherwise, they probably did need some more livestock to give the place that suitable Texan ambiance.
Like most simple ideas, it turned out to be complicated. The ancient fencing around the pastures was sagging and falling down. He and Ronon and Teyla spent countless hours replacing and repairing fence posts in the scorching sun, re-stringing rusty barbed wire and trying not to pick up tetanus. Then John got a couple of books on animal husbandry and discovered how many things could kill sheep.
"Damn things die if you look at 'em funny!"
Teyla leaned over his shoulder, reading. She had picked up written English as if born to it; the only thing that still seemed to give her trouble was the occasional spoken contraction. "Only your American sheep," she informed him proudly. "In my village, the flocks lived off the land for months at a time. They were only rounded up to be sheared. They did not need your antibiotics and vaccinations and special feed supplements and such."
"Yes, but American sheep is what we're going to have to get."
It also turned out that no one for hundreds of miles around them raised sheep. There seemed to be quite a few cattle ranches, but sheep? Not so much. John ended up having to drive to the city to find someone who could sell him a few lambs.
Still, it was worth it for the look on Teyla's face when he and Ronon showed up with a dozen feces-smeared lambs huddled in the back of the truck.
Half of them died immediately, largely through their caretakers' inexperience. They lost one to coyotes, two in a rainstorm when the flock became separated, one that escaped through a hole in the fence and was never seen again, and so forth. But the others thrived, and John discovered that he really liked this.
Sitting on a sun-warmed rock overlooking the pasture and watching the half-grown animals graze, he wondered what Rodney would have to say about it the next time he showed up. Rodney could never seem to resist the lure of D.C. and whatever it was he did for the government there. He'd vanish for months and eventually turn up back at the ranch, broken in ways John could never quite pin down. Then he'd stay until his eyes started to lose that lost look, and he'd be gone again.
It had been almost a year this time, John realized, the longest he'd ever been gone. If he didn't show up soon, it might be necessary to go up to D.C. and drag him down here. When Rodney stayed away for a long time, it was like he lost a little bit of whatever made him Rodney -- the quick humor, the flashes of compassion that showed when you expected them least. He rebounded slowly while staying at the ranch, but a little more slowly every time he came.
It was time to get him back.
John wandered back to the house. There were a stack of postcards propped on a windowsill that Melena had picked up in town. None of them had anyone to write to, but she had liked the pictures. There weren't any with sheep, so John picked out one that showed a rolling landscape of red hills, and, on the back, scribbled down the address of the mail drop that Rodney had given them in D.C.
He didn't write much. There was no need. "R- Got sheep? J." Rodney could never resist a puzzle.
no subject
*laughs* I've got everybody worried about poor Rodney! I guess the idea that I was working with here is that he can't give up the lure of science (I mean, really, can you see Rodney being happy on a farm?) and the government keeps dangling large sums of money and private labs and cutting-edge technology in front of him -- but what they have him doing, when he's working for them, is building WMDs and the like. And he has major, major problems with the ethics of it. John, of course, doesn't know all the details.
That's the backstory.
Now what they have to do is get him to STOP.
And I kinda want to write more too ... I just love the idea of all of them living on a ranch in the middle of nowhere.
no subject
And I kinda want to write more too ... I just love the idea of all of them living on a ranch in the middle of nowhere.
Please!!!! and I'm sure there's a university somewhere nearby that's in need of someone with Rodney's knowlage! *nods*
no subject
And another part of the problem is that, being Rodney, he won't ask for help or tell them what's going on.
Now I've got myself feeling sorry for the poor guy....
no subject
Seriously though I think you have the perfect set up here for it being fixed (or at least starting too) - he's been gone the longest he's ever been and they might need to go get him so I can see this being the turning point. And he doesn't have to tell them everything - they can just figure out that what ever he's doing needs to stop... or something...