breaks the waves of sea and air (stargate atlantis | elizabeth, kate, teyla, laura)

[fiachairecht]

breaks the waves of sea and air. stargate atlantis, elizabeth & kate & teyla & laura. five questions the women of atlantis have for the ocean, and five maybe-answers. 1.4k words, rated t. for mlravenwrites in everywoman 2017

Elizabeth finds the balcony in what feels a moment out of time, when the stars seem impossibly bright and she feels the remnants of her older self's ashes clinging to her like a second skin.

By rights she shouldn't have found it at all, tucked away in an unexplored part of the city far off the transporter network, so far that any of the Marines would probably have a heart attack if they knew where she was. Still Elizabeth feels safer in these halls than she thinks she could ever feel with every soldier on the base at her back.

Atlantis watched her sleep for ten thousand years, she thinks. It would hardly watch her die now.

Elizabeth walks, eyes shut and breath even, and feels the change in the air as she draws closer to an outside wall. When she opens her eyes she thinks, for a moment, that she's stepped out onto the water's surface: all around her is ocean.

And then she looks down, sees the balcony's glass floor not quite moving with the waves beneath it and, oh, Elizabeth thinks, this is what I was meant to find.

She's not sure how long she stays the first night, half-asleep to the half-imagined rocking of the sea. The wind bites through her uniform jacket, cold like life, each moment pinning her down, down, closer to the city. She couldn't move if she wanted to. She's not sure she remembers how to want that.

The sun breaks the horizon in a flare of colours, each one magnified a thousandfold as it touches the water. Elizabeth stands on unsteady feet, and does not move to shield her eyes.

Is this it? she asks, voice early-morning rough. Is this where I'm meant to stay?

Sea foam sprays across her face as the next wave breaks high on the railing. Elizabeth licks her lips and tastes salt, tastes home.

 

*

 

She tells Kate about the balcony.

She almost doesn't, the idea of having a place all her own is too nice a thought not to sit with for a while. It's quiet there, only the ocean and the birds and the soft hum of the city's generators that she hadn't guessed reached so far out.

But Elizabeth and Kate have a deal: Elizabeth goes to sessions to set an example for the rest of the expedition, and in return Kate doesn't venture into personal topics unless Elizabeth goes there first. So they talk about academia, about new planets in the most general terms. They talk about Atlantis, this strange more-than-city and the enclosing sprawl.

"Would you take me?" Kate asks. "Not officially," she adds quickly as Elizabeth's brow furrows. "Just ... as a friend. A colleauge, even."

Friends. An expedition this size, on a city this size ... perhaps it's inevitable. "Alright," she says. "But you're bringing the tea."

"Of course," Kate smiles.

She's not smiling a week later when they make their way through winding half-lit corridors, too focused on the patterns on the walls.

"Incredible," she murmurs, trailing her hand along the glass. "This isn't on any of the official expedition maps, is it? I never would have guessed the walls came so far down here."

"I may have forgotten to upload them," Elizabeth admits. "If there's ever a need, of course, but for now..."

"I understand," Kate says, and Elizabeth finds to her surprise when she turns to meet her eyes that she believes her entirely.

They stand in silence on the balcony. There's little to say, faced with the enormity of the world in front of them.

The moment is broken by Kate gasping in surprise when she looks down to see the ocean under them. "Careful," Elizabeth murmurs, one hand on Kate's wrist to settle her.

"I'm okay," Kate says, flushed in the sea air. "I was just ... reminded of something."

"The ocean's good for that," Elizabeth smiles wryly. "Sometimes too good."

Kate sighs. "It's common—" She cuts herself off, shaking her head. "Sorry. That was going to be work talk."

They both laugh slightly at that, and fall back to companionable silence. Their radios are quiet, almost eerily so, and perhaps it is that which gives Elizabeth the confidence to ask, "We're going to be enough for them, aren't we?"

She doesn't meet Kate's eyes, and Kate doesn't look at her when she says simply, "Yes."

The press of the wind in Elizabeth's hair, and the brush of Kate's fingers against hers, feel like belief.

 

*

 

Kate brings Teyla to the balcony when the nightmares start. After her first trip there she had understood why Elizabeth had wanted to keep it to herself, but this ... this is Teyla and she needs help.

"A change of scenery often helps with nightmares," she says, trying not to think of the absurdity of standing in Teyla's doorway with an armful of blankets. "It can't hurt, Teyla. Worst that happens is we have a girl's night with some tea."

Teyla sighs. "It is a luxury, to be able to move anywhere for sleep and think that means less harm can come to you."

Kate isn't sure if she's supposed to respond to that, but fortunately Teyla continues before she has a chance to decide what to say. "Very well, then. I will come with you."

Teyla's steps are too assured as she moves down unfamiliar corridors. Kate watches, a half-step behind like the waves chase the high tide mark, and breathes in time with Teyla's steps.

Teyla doesn't look much soothed by the time they're settled side by side on the blankets, and Kate can hear her heartbeat, quick-faster than a human's yet somehow nearly indistinguishable from the tide.

"What would you say," Teyla begins slowly, reluctantly, "If I told you that I did not believe we were alone in this city?"

And as the water beats more urgently against the pylons, Kate hears it chant beware, beware, beware.

 

*

 

Teyla orders Lieutenant Cadman to accompany her to the balcony for the first time after a training session that spent too long on a knife edge of going horribly wrong.

"You're unfocused, Lieutenant," she says, brisk but not unkind as she wipes down their bantu sticks. "I believe if I can see you work through the forms in an area free from associations with your teammates and their bad habits, we may begin to make more progress."

Cadman runs a hand through her hair and sighs. "By teammates you mean John."

"I was not going to say it so bluntly," Teyla admits. "Nevertheless, please come with me."

Their meetings become about more than practise so easily Teyla hardly notices. She is not used to this sort of friendship that comes easily, without the burdern of constant protection offworld, the treacherous waters of compatible leaderships, or the too-easy slip into a therapist's voice. Teyla comes to cherish these sessions as much as she cherises the woman — Laura — that she shares them with.

The day Laura kisses her, Teyla kisses back with mingled affection and confusion.

"Are we," she starts. Pauses, clears her throat. "Are we courting, then, Laura?"

Laura shrugs. "Doesn't have to be so official if you don't want it," she smiles.

Teyla does not think she wants official at all, but the sea breeze smells of cinnamon and dynamite just like Laura, and she knows she wants to kiss her again.

 

*

 

Laura takes Elizabeth for walks, after the doctors clear her nanite-free new body for excursions around the city. They're odd affairs, Elizabeth gaunt and silent, Laura feeling like a fool as she rattles off things she's not sure Elizabeth still knows.

The fifth day, when Elizabeth still hasn't said a word, Laura walks them to the balcony.

Elizabeth stops halfway through the doorway. "Oh," she says, and Laura thinks her heart might shatter to dust with joy. "Oh, we would—"

She loses her words after that, but runs to the edge more free than Laura has ever seen her.

"I know something about having to be in someone else's head," Laura offers quietly. "I would come here to think. It's a good place for it, and I thought—" She places her hand on Elizabeth's shoulder, aware that she's babbling. Elizabeth leans into the touch with a sigh.

"Thank you," she says, so quietly Laura almost could have imagined it.

But Elizabeth's eyes are bright and limitless as the sea in front of them, and Laura thinks it must be enough for now.