Science Geeks

by Kylie Lee

URL: http://www.area52hkh.net/ask/klee/sgeeks.php
Summary: Not supplied

"Does it work?" Sheppard asked.

McKay barely shot him a glance. "Gosh, let's see, we've had it maybe, what, five minutes?"

"Too early to tell," Zelenka translated. He spoke without looking up. He got that way when he was focused: he was incapable of noticing things around him. Unlike McKay, he even forgot to eat. "More time."

"Give us fifteen minutes to do a simple power check," McKay said. He patted the ZPM. "It was nice work, wasn't it?"

"Very nice," Sheppard agreed. "Too bad about the pot. I'll be back in five." He pointed at McKay and left.

"It's really a very exciting story," McKay told Zelenka, who was gazing at the stripped end of a blue wire with deep abstraction. McKay noticed that Zelenka had had to tape his glasses to keep them together. He'd used a tiny twist of silver duct tape. "The ZPM was placed inside a piece of pottery and buried. The locals had--"

"Clip, please," Zelenka interrupted.

"Oh, sorry. Here." McKay handed him a clip. "The locals had no idea what was inside. They had it on display in a kind of rite-of-the-ancestors kind of thing. It has a latent power signature, of course, which Major Sheppard was able to track, and he was negotiating with the locals to actually buy it. Can you believe it? We could have bought a zed-PM disguised as a pot for the equivalent of a handful of beads."

Zelenka didn't look up. McKay knew Zelenka, though. He wasn't much of a multitasker, but he could listen and work at the same time, and McKay had the perverse need to share his heroic exploits with his friend--although admittedly, Zelenka was unlikely to really care one way or the other, unless the heroic exploit resulted in some new intellectual breakthrough in his field of study, which was currently wave-particle physics and its relationship to Gate wormholes. McKay couldn't share his excitement at his near-death experiences, the getting shot at, with Sheppard or Teyla Emmagan or anyone else, because they had all been there, and he'd get to tell the story to Elizabeth Weir in about an hour, at the briefing, if Sheppard didn't keep interrupting him and telling him to get to the point. The good thing about Zelenka was that he wouldn't interrupt him and tell him to get to the point. He'd interrupt him and ask for a clip or something.

McKay rattled on. "But before we could close the deal, some bad guys, rivals of the locals, stopped by and there was some shooting and looting. Turns out Teyla knows the rivals. They'd come through the Gate. And they were pissed off, I mean angry, because one of their women had run off with a local guy. They wanted some kind of payment to make it all right, and only the zed-PM pot would do--well, that and a bunch of food. So they took the pot, the food, and the happy couple, and dialed up the Gate."

McKay watched Zelenka's hands as they moved confidently through the complex task of connecting the ZPM to a power source. Without breaking the cadence of his story, he handed Zelenka a needle-nosed pliers at just the right moment. Zelenka took it without comment, as if he always expected required instruments to magically appear before him, but he hesitated before he deployed them, brow furrowed in concentration or puzzlement.

"We followed them through, of course, but they suspected us of being spies for the locals, so they threw us in a cave until Teyla could talk them around. We must have been in there ten hours or so. That's when the negotiations really began. The pot had some symbols on it that were sacred to them, so we had to relate ourselves to the religious iconography to indicate we were worthy of the pot. Teyla really outdid herself. She should study literature. She can see symbols in anything. She almost had me convinced."

McKay paused and held the ZPM steady while Zelenka seated the transformer. He removed his hands while Zelenka flipped a switch to test the ZPM's power.

Zelenka exhaled sharply in disappointment and said something in Czech. "Nothing. No power."

McKay squinted at the ZPM. Now he saw why Zelenka had hesitated. "This one is different than the ones we've seen before," he said.

Zelenka nodded and pointed. "Here. And here."

"Okay, this is clearly the capacitator. So this--I think this is the output." McKay leaned over. "If that's the output, you've wired it wrong. Here, give me those."

Zelenka willingly moved aside as McKay took the pliers. "What is the end?" he asked.

McKay removed the ZPM from the cradle. "The end of what?" he asked.

"Your story."

"Oh." McKay had been building to a narrative climax, but now he found the ZPM far more interesting than attempting to impress a scientist with his heroics. "Teyla traded Athosian blankets for the pot and we came home," he said. "I guess they really value the blankets."

"Beautiful handcrafting," Zelenka agreed.

"Really? I hadn't noticed." McKay bent over the ZPM. "We had to break the pot."

"Too bad."

"Not really. Interesting to the archaeological types, no doubt, but it just wasn't that pretty. We got pictures of it, of course." McKay set his hands on either side of the ZPM and braced himself against the table. Something had just struck him. "Wait, wait, wait. Remember when we did that survey out in the 'burbs? When we looked for tech?"

Zelenka blinked at him inquiringly.

"There was a device in one of the rooms that reminds of the way this zed-PM is configured. In fact, I wonder whether this is a zed-PM at all. Sure, it looks like a zed-PM, but it worries me that we can't just plug and play. To use this one, we'd need to construct an interface, which would result in power or heat loss, that kind of thing." Such an interface might be more than inefficient. It could also be dangerous, considering the amount of power stored in a ZPM.

"Is prototype?" Zelenka wondered. "Or old?"

"Exactly. Or maybe just another--another brand or something. Or maybe it's for a particular kind of use. Maybe it's portable, or designed to work with equipment on board a ship. Or maybe the power output is different in some useful way."

McKay swung around when he heard a sharp rap at the door. Sheppard was right on time. "Gentlemen, give me good news," Sheppard said, sticking his head through the door. "We're out some mighty fine Athosian blankets, you know."

"We've hit a snag," McKay said.

Sheppard entered the room. "I so don't want to hear that," he said. When McKay started to explain, he held up his hands. "No technobabble," he said. "Does it have juice?"

"One moment," Zelenka said. "Rodney, here." He indicated the ZPM, and McKay undid and then reattached the output as Zelenka handled the interface. A twist and a firm reseating of the device, and they were done.

"Okay, hit it," McKay said, stepping back, and Zelenka flipped the switch. The unit they'd attached sparked, then lit up. "Yes, juice. But snag." He was definitely spending too much time around Zelenka. He was actually starting to talk like him--minimalistically, in broken English. He'd have a Czech accent before he knew it. "It's not really a zed-PM."

"It was on Elizabeth's list of planets with ZPMs," Sheppard pointed out.

"True. And a very good point. But it's not like the other zed-PMs I've seen. I need to study it. And I need to visit the suburbs to find a piece of equipment I saw when we did the survey."

Sheppard watched Zelenka start to dismantle the device. "Fine--if you wear a biohazard suit. I'll have Dr. Beckett figure out a way to clear you and the equipment before you even try to get back into the city."

McKay said, "You don't understand. I'm bringing the zed-PM to the equipment. When I use the term 'equipment,' I don't mean something like this." He indicated the device he and Zelenka had jury-rigged. "It's not portable. It's built into the wall. I can't remove it. But it's got an interface that looks like it might accept this configuration. Look, it's in my notes. I took video of it. It should be no problem to find."

"What does this device do?"

"Beats me. I'll just turn it on and find out."

"McKay--"

"Kidding. I'm kidding."

Sheppard sighed. "Let's run it by Elizabeth. I'll see you at the briefing."

Zelenka handed McKay the ZPM as Sheppard left. It was faintly warm. "Kavanagh, Persson, Lewis, Song, and me," he said.

It was just the team McKay would have chosen. He disliked Kavanagh, but the man was smart and did good work. "I was thinking four, not six," he said. "Not to mention, we may be gone a few days. Aren't you working on that big project with Chen?"

Zelenka shrugged. "It can wait," he said. "This interests me more. Six for three shifts."

"I'll let you know when Elizabeth approves it." McKay held up the ZPM. "Thanks."

"You're welcome," Zelenka said, and he turned aside and began putting away tools, his mind already somewhere else.

"Well, I'll just head on up, then," McKay said, feeling oddly let down. He hadn't expected Zelenka to jump up and down with joy when he got back from his five-day trip, but this was ridiculous. Zelenka was probably ready to make a breakthrough on the project he and Chen were working on. Even as they had checked the ZPM's power signature, Zelenka's keen mind had probably been running complex mathematical equations about wave theory and its relationship to wormholes.

"Yes, you go to important meeting," Zelenka said. "But shave first."

McKay turned. "What?" He couldn't remember Zelenka ever making a personal remark like that before. He was usually all about work, or math-genius games on the level of prime-not prime, or amusing anecdotes about chess theory.

Zelenka indicated his own chin. As usual, he looked like he needed a shave and a haircut. "You must shave. Unless you wish to emulate Dr. Beckett?"

"No, stubble is not my look," McKay said. Beckett seemed to use a special razor that left a shadow of a beard. McKay suppressed the urge to sarcastically note that Beckett had clearly lent it to Zelenka. "If I even have a look. Do I have a look?"

"Clean," Zelenka said.

Clean? He probably meant clean-cut. Then McKay was struck by a horrible thought. "So that means I should shower too?"

"Yes," Zelenka said. "Good idea. Very good idea."

"I'll go do that. Thanks for your help."

McKay paused in the hallway, still holding the ZPM. He lifted one arm and sniffed. Damn. He hadn't even noticed how bad he smelled. The problem with spending two days living in a cave was that he had gotten used to how he, and everybody else, smelled. And here he'd been standing right next to Zelenka, trying to impress him with his heroic story, just to make Zelenka look at him as someone other than his geeky scientist pal, just to try to break through that air of abstraction and make Zelenka focus on something that was not insanely arcane, just for two seconds.

He'd succeeded, all right. Zelenka had certainly noticed something not arcane: McKay, smelling horrible.

McKay sighed and headed for the elevator. He really, really needed to get cleaned up.

***

"That's the last of it," Kavanagh said, setting down a box of ration bars. "How long did you say we were going to be here?"

"Four days, tops," McKay said. "Whoa, Radek, no, no, no. Put that over there, by that door."

Zelenka altered course and set the computer equipment down where McKay had indicated.

"Dr. McKay, do you have everything?" Weir's voice asked through his earpiece.

McKay pressed it to activate it. "Yes. The elevator works fine. Tell Lieutenant Ford thanks for his help." They'd taken to calling the antimatter devices that beamed people from one place to another "elevators," although Sheppard had pushed for "turbolifts." Ford had stacked in supplies and equipment and sent them on, and they'd unloaded everything.

"Will do. Please check in once a day. Dr. Beckett has requested two hours' notice for your return, so he can set up a decontamination area outside the center of the city. And once again I register objection about your decision to forego the biocontainment suits."

"Understood. McKay out." McKay deactivated his earpiece and looked around. He'd won the biosuit battle, but only because he'd promised to focus: they were going straight to the room he'd pegged, which had already been established as clear, with no side trips. It was not a general recon mission but a targeted strike: figure out how the ZPM worked and what the role of the equipment that interfaced with it was. They simply couldn't manipulate tools through the biosuits. "Okay. We can leave some of the stuff here and come back if we need it. That way, we won't have to haul everything back if this ends up taking twenty minutes."

"How far is the room with the equipment?" Kavanagh asked.

"According to my videotape, forty-two doors that way." McKay pointed.

"And this was the closest elevator?" Persson asked in her soft British accent. The tall Swede shoved a cargo container to the side to clear the corridor.

"Strangely, yes. It's not really that far."

"It is when one must carry," Zelenka pointed out.

"We only need to carry the equipment all the way there," McKay said patiently. "That's why I stacked all the computer and imaging equipment over there. The food and camping equipment stays. According to my notes, there are living quarters halfway between this elevator--" he pointed--"and that lab." He pivoted to point the other direction. "So we have to commute to work what, a half-mile?"

"Maybe we can find something that rolls," Lewis put in. She pointed. "We could stack things on top of the medical imager and push it."

"Good idea. Okay. Team assignments. Dr. Zelenka is with me. Dr. Kavanagh, you're with Dr. Song. And ladies, you two are a team." McKay knew that he should have divided up the two ZPM experts among the teams: it would make most sense for him to lead one team and Zelenka the other, but he couldn't bear the thought of working with either Kavanagh, who talked too much, or with Song, who talked too little. He and Zelenka had excellent rapport, and he anticipated that their genius, when combined, would prove unstoppable. The rest were there to do the tedious, yet necessary, grunt work--not that he'd be foolish enough to say that out loud. "We live and work in pairs, and we work in eight-hour shifts. Dr. Zelenka, I'd like to put you in charge of the computer equipment."

Zelenka nodded, his round glasses glinting in the half-light.

"Dr. Kavanagh, if you could assess our needs and make equipment assignments for carrying stuff to the site, that would be very helpful."

Kavanagh perked up. He hadn't looked happy at being assigned to Song, who spoke very little English and who was also very shy. "Sure," he said.

"Dr. Zelenka, can I see you for a minute?"

McKay drew Zelenka aside as Kavanagh started organizing equipment. "I have something for you," he said.

"Yes?" Zelenka said.

McKay dug through a zippered pocket on his backpack. "Wait a second...here." He displayed a tiny vial. "It's an eyeglasses repair kit," he told Zelenka, handing it to him. "It has tiny little screws and a tiny little screwdriver. You can get them in places like drugstores or airports. I thought they were kind of neat, so I bought a bunch. Anyway. That one's for you."

Zelenka looked surprised. "Is very kind," he said.

"I noticed that your glasses were broken. The duct tape. Here, we can fix it now. I have a flashlight."

McKay pulled out his flashlight and flicked it on as Zelenka unscrewed the vial and shook its contents into his hand. He stuck a screw in his lips, gave McKay the screwdriver, and returned the rest of the screws to their container. He took his glasses off and picked off the duct tape, and as McKay held the light steady, Zelenka, who was clearly near-sighted, inserted the tiny screw, then wound it with his fingertips. McKay noticed that he kept his nails short and neatly trimmed.

"Screwdriver now," Zelenka said, looking up. "To tighten."

McKay was suddenly aware that he was standing too close. He edged back. "Here." McKay handed him the screwdriver.

"No, no, come back," Zelenka ordered as he applied the tool. "You take light away."

"Oh, sorry." McKay stepped close. "Better?"

"Better." Zelenka twisted carefully. "I smudge glass," he fretted, leaning toward the light. His arm brushed McKay's, and suddenly, they were standing with their sides pressed together, both stooped over Zelenka's glasses. McKay felt a rush of warmth, as though his entire body was blushing. "Hold light steady," Zelenka said, a little sharply, and McKay forced himself to stand calmly. He had no idea why he was reacting this way to Zelenka. He had spent countless hours with the man and had never flinched when they touched. "There. Am done." Zelenka pulled at his shirt, untucking it from his pants, and McKay caught a glimpse of Zelenka's stomach as Zelenka used his shirttail to wipe the glass clean. The light clearly outlined pale skin and hair, and McKay found he couldn't rip his eyes away. He clutched the flashlight because the urge to reach out and gently touch was almost too much to bear, and with it came sick realization. Zelenka dropped his shirt and put his glasses on. "Is good?" Zelenka asked, spreading his hands in inquiry.

"Is good," McKay lied, looking into Zelenka's earnest face. "Come on, let's let Kavanagh put us to work. You know how he loves to be in charge."

Friends, he thought desperately as Kavanagh handed him wads of neatly tied cords to fit into his backpack. They were just good friends. He did not need to get a crush on his very good--and, as far as he could tell from their few conversations about their personal lives, straight--friend. It was too late to unassign teams. They'd be working closely for hours on end and sharing a room.

It had happened again: first Samantha Carter, and now this. He kept falling for the smart, geeky, cute ones. At least Carter had sensed their sexual tension, even though she'd naturally been too professional to do anything about it. Zelenka, being Zelenka, would remain oblivious until his dying day--and of course, the last thing he wanted to do was freak out Zelenka, and embarrass himself, by approaching him.

It was going to be a long mission.

***

"No, no, no, no, no," McKay said, overlapping Zelenka, who was saying, "Right here, yes, here," and interspersing it with rapid-fire Czech that sounded like he was calling McKay something extremely uncomplimentary. Their voices rose until McKay shut up and stepped back. Zelenka fell silent a second later and glared at McKay.

"We're not getting anywhere," McKay said.

Zelenka took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. When he looked at McKay, McKay was struck by their clarity and their color, a kind of in-between gray-blue. Now, instead of looking mad, Zelenka just looked tired. "Is been two days," Zelenka said. "Again I ask, what does it do? We image, we play with wires, we switch around crystals, and still we do not know." He put his glasses back on.

"Okay, look. Look here." Zelenka came over unwillingly when McKay backed up his request with a gesture. He obviously did not want to be convinced that his theory was wrong and McKay's was right. McKay pointed. "This is obviously where the zed-PM goes. We all agree on that, even Kavanagh. But see here. It's clear that the power routes into this dead end."

Zelenka hunched slightly and moved in. They gazed at the innards of the machine in silence, shoulder to shoulder, and McKay was reminded of the moment when he and Zelenka had been pressed together in the hallway, repairing Zelenka's glasses.

"Wait," Zelenka said, his face sharpening in concentration. McKay pulled his attention away from Zelenka's lips. He'd been noticing Zelenka's lips for the past two days--Zelenka's whole face, really, as it darkened in frustration or lit up when he was struck by an idea. "See, this goes behind here, so."

McKay checked it out. "Can that conduct power?" he asked doubtfully.

"Is ceramic?" Zelenka theorized. He shoved aside a toolbox at his feet so he could get closer, then reached in. "Ah. Good. Yes. Hold this up," he commanded, pushing up an element that McKay hadn't realized was hinged. McKay had to lean into Zelenka's back to reach it. "Is too heavy?"

"Uh, no. I'm fine," McKay said, suddenly aware that his entire body was pressed into Zelenka's. He could feel Zelenka's every breath. He stared at the brush of too-long hair at Zelenka's neck and tried not to smell him. If he smelled him, that faintly clean scent of shampoo and soap underlain by the heavier aroma of Zelenka himself, then he couldn't be responsible for his response, which was, oh god, the stirrings of an erection. McKay frantically began taking pi to as many decimal places as he could. He couldn't step back because he'd have to let go of the hinged piece of equipment, which would slam down and probably crush Zelenka's hand.

"Up more," Zelenka ordered, his body shifting against McKay's.

For a long, horrible moment, McKay panicked, until he realized he'd taken it the wrong way and that Zelenka simply wanted the hinged piece to be lifted further up. Zelenka hadn't noticed anything amiss. But to lift the equipment up more, he'd have to step even closer to the wall to get leverage.

"I don't--I don't think it will go up any farther," McKay stuttered.

"Just a little more," Zelenka said, peering up, incredibly focused, and McKay took a deep breath. He was fine. He was in control--he was mostly in control. He took a step forward, braced his arm, and shoved the piece as high as he could.

"That's as high as I can get it without standing on something," McKay said as Zelenka twisted sideways. It gave McKay a view of Zelenka's chest. Zelenka wore the usual Atlantis-issue soft blue shirt with the slight V in the neck, and his chest hair curled above the fabric, emphasizing the hollow of his throat. McKay had to stop breathing, because it was all so close: his hair--those eyes--lips--face--nose--stubble--and suddenly pi wasn't long enough. It had too few digits.

"Aha!" Zelenka exclaimed in triumph, and he turned his back to McKay again, backing up right into McKay's erection. He froze. McKay briefly shut his eyes. "Oh," Zelenka said in a much different tone of voice.

"Uh--" McKay began, just as a new voice said, "You two ready to let us take over? Oh, am I interrupting something? You guys okay? Do you need some help?"

"Great timing, Dr. Kavanagh," McKay said sincerely. "Dr. Zelenka just found this, um, this--"

"Circuit pathway," Zelenka supplied, and to McKay's utter shock, Zelenka leaned his ass into McKay's groin as he fiddled with something on the wall. McKay's reaction was visceral and automatic: he was fully hard in an instant. He was also having trouble breathing.

"Yes, uh, a, a circuit pathway," McKay repeated. "You and Dr. Song are just the people to take it from here."

Kavanagh had come over to see what they were doing. "Huh. I didn't know that hinged." He ducked his head so he could see under it. "Okay, yes. You can let it down now. I see how to remove the piece." He turned. "Dr. Song?"

McKay had to step into Zelenka so he could release the lock on his elbow joint and lower the piece of equipment. He wasn't sure what had happened, why Zelenka had leaned into him, but he was taking perverse pleasure in touching Zelenka so intimately right under Kavanagh's nose, because Zelenka couldn't say or do anything about it. But simultaneously, he was not looking forward to the conversation that he and Zelenka were going to have to have, or his admission in words to what his body had already revealed: that he was inappropriately attracted to a colleague, and worse, one who was, at least for the moment, under his command. The very thing that he'd feared would happen when he first realized his attraction would come about: he and Zelenka's working relationship was going to change.

He needed time to think. He definitely needed time to think.

"Dr. Zelenka, if you could just show Dr. Kavanagh and Dr. Song where we were," he babbled. "My, uh, my blood sugar is just about to crash. I'm going to get something to eat."

"You okay, Dr. McKay?" Kavanagh asked, looking concerned.

"Fine, fine, just fine," McKay said. "Just a little, uh, shaky. This may be the breakthrough we needed to figure out what this does."

"That would be nice," Kavanagh agreed. "I'm on the verge of saying we should just plug in the ZPM and see what the heck it does." He smiled to show he was kidding.

"Dr. Weir does not agree," Zelenka said. "Rodney, I must talk with you when you are done eating. I had a thought."

"Yes, yes, of course," McKay said. Dread and the desire for immediate escape warred with the idea of getting it over with. "I'll be in the room."

He left as Zelenka began debriefing Kavanagh and Song. He thought briefly of making a supply run--it would take a minimum of twenty minutes to get to the elevator and back, and he could stretch it out to an hour if he dawdled--but they didn't actually need any supplies, unless you counted a shortage of peanut butter-flavored power bars instead of the usual fake chocolate-flavored ones.

He grabbed the last peanut butter bar and a bottle of water from the crate stashed in the hallway. Crew quarters were a quick, brisk walk away, and McKay ate and drank as he walked, barely tasting. He tried to figure out what he should say to cast himself in the best possible light, but he couldn't think of anything. Then there was Zelenka's step back, right into McKay, and he had no idea what to think about that. When he arrived at the room he shared, as per protocol, with Zelenka, he hadn't come to any conclusions. He kicked off his shoes and sat on his bed. Both the beds--they had dragged one in from another room--were unmade, and their stuff was strewn all over the place.

"Science geeks," McKay muttered, suddenly overcome with disgust. He got back up and started to straighten the room. He made both beds, folded clothes, hid the dirty-clothes bag in the bathroom, and tidied up. He was just making a stack of data DVDs when Zelenka walked in.

"Dr. McKay," Zelenka said. He had stopped just inside the door. Now he looked around the neat room. "Is everything all right? You feel okay?"

"Fine," McKay said. He looked at the data disks. None of them was labeled. He had no idea which were his and which were Zelenka's. He'd just hopelessly confused them by picking them all up. "Damn it." He tossed the disks in the open duffel bag at the foot of his bed. His heart had started to pound when he'd heard the door. He turned and took in Zelenka, and nope, nothing had changed about how he felt. If anything, the brief physical contact had simply intensified it. "You know what?"

"What?" Zelenka looked apprehensive, as though he suspected McKay was going to rant.

"Just--oh, hell."

He crossed the room and grabbed Zelenka's head between his heads. Zelenka didn't try to pull away. McKay took a good, long look at him, and just as Zelenka was about to speak, he leaned in and kissed him hard. He felt Zelenka resist, which he'd expected, and he immediately let go and stepped back.

"That's pretty much how I feel about you," McKay said.

"Rodney."

"Just so you know," McKay added.

"Rodney."

"Because I think by now you've figured it out."

"Yes, I figure it out," Zelenka said. "Now you figure it out."

He approached McKay and gently touched his lower lip. McKay didn't move, because Zelenka's eyes were fixed on his mouth with a look that McKay recognized as total concentration. The touch feathered up, traced his lips, then trailed along his cheek to his ear. McKay found he was having trouble remembering to breathe. Zelenka cupped his hand around McKay's neck, his thumb playing in front of his ear, a whisper of sensation, incredibly intimate, and Zelenka was so near, so very near, and then Zelenka's mouth touched his softly. He felt Zelenka's tongue delicately lick, and McKay opened his mouth at the invitation, and just like that, they were kissing, a proper kiss, more than just pressure. It was pressure and touch and tongues and teeth and taste overlain with a sly sweetness, an asking and an answering, and this time, when McKay pulled Zelenka close, Zelenka let him, because he'd said what he wanted to say.

They wound their arms around each other, and McKay felt Zelenka's body slide against his, wiry and soft at the same time. One of his hands wandered under Zelenka's blue shirt, and he stroked the curve of Zelenka's back, feeling the prickle of hair and the warmth of skin. With skin-to-skin touch, the kiss escalated in intensity, moving from sweet exploration to hard desperation. Zelenka's hands cupped his ass and pulled him close, and McKay felt the warmth and hardness of Zelenka's groin. When Zelenka took a step, then another, McKay obediently backed up, until they were at one of the neatly made beds, and Zelenka let go of him long enough for him to sit on it. Zelenka took off his glasses, and McKay tugged Zelenka onto the bed with him, and this was much better, McKay thought confusedly, with legs twined together and hands free to explore--it was much, much better, because once he'd tugged off Zelenka's shirt, he could trail his lips down from that tempting mouth, down to his neck, his collarbone, he could feel the coarse chest hair against his cheek, he could take Zelenka's nipple in his mouth and play with it, and the noise Zelenka made him want to do that again, and again, so he did. Zelenka plucked at his shirt, untucking it, and he got it off, and Zelenka touched his arm, his shoulder, his chest, sending sparks through his body. He kept returning to Zelenka's mouth. He hadn't properly appreciated it until now, but then again, he hadn't known how giving it could be.

He'd spent the last two days studiously trying to not watch Zelenka, but now he realized, as Zelenka moaned and rubbed against him, not-quite-blue eyes dark with desire, mouth tender and bruised-looking from their kisses, that he'd been doing nothing but watch him, had done nothing but observe the way Zelenka moved his head when he talked, the way he gestured, and especially the way he could focus with absolute intensity on something to the exclusion of all else. McKay had just never imagined that he'd be the focus of that attention, because he'd never thought, not really, that Zelenka would reciprocate. He'd never been so incredibly happy to be wrong.

"We stop?" Zelenka asked, a question in his eyes. His hands were on McKay's fly. He was breathing hard.

"Oh, god, no," McKay said. "No stopping. Please. No stopping."

"Good," Zelenka said, and he started unbuttoning.

They got their pants off with only a minor struggle, and then they were in each other's arms again, only now McKay could feel Zelenka's hard length against his stomach, could feel Zelenka's thighs move under his hands as McKay touched. Then Zelenka's lips were on his again, and he could only open his mouth and let Zelenka's taste fill it. When Zelenka took him in his hand and started to stroke, he couldn't breathe, because this on top of everything else was definitely, definitely too much. He put his hand up to Zelenka's cheek to tell him he had to slow down when he felt something hot press against his cock, and he realized Zelenka was now stroking both of them at once, rubbing them together. He moaned.

Zelenka must have sensed his desperation, because, sweating, hair messy, he stopped kissing him and pressed their foreheads together. That helped. Without Zelenka's taste, he retreated from the edge of orgasm. They stayed that way for a few minutes, breathing in gasps, Zelenka teasing them both, stroking their lengths, squeezing, running his fingertips across the heads of their cocks, until it built up again, more insistent this time, and McKay touched Zelenka's mouth to warn him that it was going to be too much.

Zelenka sucked his finger into his mouth, and McKay leaned in for a kiss. Tongues, finger, mouths, and Zelenka's touch, Zelenka's body pressing against his--it overwhelmed him. The knife's edge of ecstasy blossomed into a surge of heat and desire, and he thrust into Zelenka's hand, feeling the pleasure pulse again and again. He was dimly aware of Zelenka voicing his own delight, of Zelenka's body straining and shaking against his, and when he could breathe again, when he was aware of something other than the surge of coming, they were clinging together, panting.

"Oh, god," McKay said. "Oh, god, that felt good. That felt incredibly good." He touched the semen on his stomach and chest. "I think it's clear that we both thought that that felt incredibly good."

"Yes. Very good," Zelenka said. He smiled. McKay smiled back, because when they were working, he rarely got to see Zelenka smile. Zelenka half-closed his eyes and kissed him, and McKay realized that Zelenka really, really liked to kiss. He could get behind that, he decided. Kissing Zelenka was a lot of fun. "I did not think it would go so fast, when I kissed you," Zelenka admitted. "I did not know how strong it would be between us."

McKay realized that Zelenka was apologizing. He found this ironic, considering the thoughts he'd been having about Zelenka for the past few days. "Fast is good," he said. "Fast is very good."

"Mmm. Yes."

McKay let Zelenka kiss him some more. He felt incredibly content, relieved, and relaxed. He didn't think they'd be leaving the bed anytime soon.

"Yes?" McKay asked when Zelenka pulled back.

"The flat ceramic interface behind the hinged component," Zelenka began.

"I've been thinking about that too," McKay said, because he suddenly realized that he had. In the background, his mind had still been working, turning over new data. "Do you think it will carry a zed-PM-level charge?"

"I do not," Zelenka said. He sat up and put on his glasses. His eyes were sparkling. "This is why."

As Zelenka sat cross-legged, launching into an explanation of what he thought the interface did, McKay leaned back on the bed so he could get a better view of Zelenka.

Ah, yes. Science geeks.

McKay couldn't stop smiling.