aesc: (Default)
aesc ([personal profile] aesc) wrote2007-01-10 09:50 pm

.fic: Scale of Perfection - McKay/Sheppard (PG) 1.1

Scale of Perfection. Companion to [livejournal.com profile] dogeared's lovely Any Other Day. c. 350 words.


When Beckett's Tylenol proves useless, and John's at the point of seriously considering asking Ronon to knock him out, Rodney bursts out with his I have good hands and an offer that isn't so much an offer as it is rambling, hand-punctuated explanation. John agrees, because he knows what Rodney says is true: he's seen those hands trace out technicalities, hysteria, concern, as they coax solutions from thin air. For all that they dart and flicker, they fly steady when it counts, delicate with circuitry and wires when Rodney's piecing together some miracle or other, dialogue of flesh and crystal and metal.

His headache makes standing up feel like going zero-G, the room spinning away into greyness and the pain spiking bright behind his eyes. Movement becomes a study in caution as he turns his chair around and collapses into it, his body tensing because now it expects everything, even Rodney and his magic fingers, to hurt.

Rodney's fingers ghost over his forehead, down his temples, over the vein that feels like it's going to explode, and then there's pressure, so sweet John almost gasps with it, pushing back against that deep, mean hurt. They're callused fingers, knowledgeable fingers, a lifetime of building and typing (and fighting now) in them, and they travel over his temple, through his hair, down his neck to shoulders that have gone taut against the pain. Clever, wonderful, definitely Rodney fingers, moving in patterns that make John grin to think about.

Music, maybe, silent curving of notes up and down the scale, or maybe geometry: concentrics, nautilus curves with their Fibonacci series, Rodney's fingers making fractals, these low, buried hypnotic iterations of pressure. Bows, arcs and whorls that remind John of flying. They overlay pattern and rhythm atop the chaos of pain, smooth, slow, circle circle, returning, smooth slow, another tight curve over John's right temple where the pain refuses to let go, pacing themselves, John realizes hazily when the world smooths away into quiet, to the quiet, rhythmic sigh of the sea.

[identity profile] sheafrotherdon.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 02:55 am (UTC)(link)
Oh. Oh oh, that's so exactly *it* - the way a headache feels, and how competent (and callused and knowledgable) Rodney's fingers would be, and how it would be linked to a thousand thoughts beating underneath Shep's skin.

MMMPH. Between you both, you've finished me off, utterly.

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:02 am (UTC)(link)
the way a headache feels, and

Don't I know it. *pats engraved bottle of Tylenol Extra-Strength*

MMMPH. Between you both, you've finished me off, utterly.

We are killaz!

*hugs*
ext_1718: (Default)

[identity profile] beeej.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:07 am (UTC)(link)
Oh, wow. That's so very beautiful! Fits the other piece so well, and now I really want Rodney's fingers on my head. ;)

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:33 am (UTC)(link)
I really want Rodney's fingers on my head. ;)

*wistful sigh*

[identity profile] dogeared.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:09 am (UTC)(link)
Oh, this is so, SO gorgeous, gosh—lyrical and rhythmic and soothing, and I just love knowing what's going through John's poor aching head, that Rodney's hands fly steady when it counts, and that imagining the patterns makes John grin . . . asdfadlkj *tilts head back and longs for magic fingers*

♥!

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:36 am (UTC)(link)
Whee! ♥

"Any Other Day" was so lovely and visually there, I couldn't help but want to stay in that world in some way. And, you know, obsess over Rodney's hands some more.

And we killed Cate!

[identity profile] dogeared.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:42 am (UTC)(link)
We so did! :D (Also, I realized that I must have totally been subliminally thinking about your "magic fingers" icon, which makes me laugh every time I see it . . . :">)

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 03:49 am (UTC)(link)
(Also, I realized that I must have totally been subliminally thinking about your "magic fingers" icon, which makes me laugh every time I see it . . . :">)

*sporfle!* "Magic Fingers" McKay strikes again!

[identity profile] seratonation.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 04:27 am (UTC)(link)
*flails* that was the perfect companion to any other day. now i want Rodneys hands massaging me. :D

I loved the mention of music along with the science, and how it breaks down in the end (Like the headache :D:D)

beautiful and poetic.

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 04:39 am (UTC)(link)
Thank you so much!

now i want Rodneys hands massaging me.

Who doesn't?! :D

[identity profile] pollitt.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 06:05 am (UTC)(link)
Absolutely beautiful.

The description of the headache and Rodney's hands, the patterns making it all go away.

<3

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 01:34 pm (UTC)(link)
Thanks so much! Rodney is just what I need when one of my headaches comes around *sigh*

[identity profile] insight2.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 07:04 am (UTC)(link)
This is a good companion to [livejournal.com profile] dogeared, I like the way you both end with the sea, after the shells that Rodney's drawn on John.

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-11 01:35 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you :) Her language is absolutely lovely, and the images of the shells and sea were so pervasive, that I tried to keep some of it to tie my fic in a bit more closely with hers.
abbylee: (Default)

[personal profile] abbylee 2007-01-12 08:28 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm usually all about the dialogue and banter, but I can't resist this prettiness. Thanks :)

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-12 10:15 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you :) Sometimes they're nice when they're quiet.

[identity profile] adafrog.livejournal.com 2007-01-13 05:20 pm (UTC)(link)
Wonderfully lyrical. Thanks.

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-13 08:52 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you so much! Glad you liked it :D

[identity profile] ellex42.livejournal.com 2007-01-15 02:40 am (UTC)(link)
Lovely! And I wish someone would come and do that to me - sadly, I always seem to be the massager and not the massagee.

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-15 02:43 am (UTC)(link)
And I wish someone would come and do that to me -

I was just lamenting to [livejournal.com profile] dogeared that I, too, suffer from headaches--but there's no John around to massage my forehead or offer me hot tea/food/comfort :(

All's I have here is my dog, who just looks at me with his, "Yeah, great, you have a headache; well, I'm hungry" look.
watersword: Keira Knightley, in Pride and Prejudice (2007), turning her head away from the viewer, the word "elizabeth" written near (Default)

[personal profile] watersword 2007-01-18 08:36 pm (UTC)(link)
His headache makes standing up feel like going zero-G, the room spinning away into greyness and the pain spiking bright behind his eyes. Movement becomes a study in caution as he turns his chair around and collapses into it, his body tensing because now it expects everything, even Rodney and his magic fingers, to hurt.

Yes. I feel for John so much here. And then the last paragraph makes everything better. Music! And math! As metaphor! *dies*

[identity profile] aesc.livejournal.com 2007-01-18 08:42 pm (UTC)(link)
Thank you kindly!

Music! And math! As metaphor!

I can't carry a tune in a bucket and advanced math for me is balancing my checkbook without a calculator, so the only way I can really relate to them is through metaphor :D

[identity profile] sasha-feather.livejournal.com 2007-12-21 11:57 pm (UTC)(link)
Very vivid and lovely! An accurate pain description, and then the relaxing surcease of pain. Good job!