33. On a Wing and a Prayer

Mer worked at the controls with Haworth talking in his ear like a damn Wraith whisperer. Teyla kept her hand on his shoulder while Ford stood nearby, vibrating with tension. Sheppard stood alone on the other side of the room, cramped and tense as he fought the controls with his whole body, as if he were really into a good game of Halo. The giant Rowan was by the door with Stackhouse, although staring at Mer as if trying to read him.

Mer gave Ford a quick look, causing him to step closer. Mer whispered. “Get over to Sheppard, and give him some backup.”

Ford looked confused. “I can’t fly.”

“I know that, stupid! I mean moral support. Hell, I might mean holding up so he doesn’t fall down. If you haven’t noticed he’s barely able to stand right now. Just get over there.” Mer hissed. Ford frowned and cast a rebellious look at Teyla, who nodded in agreement with Mer.

“We are all in this together, Aiden,” she said softly.

Ford went across the room. He might have said something to Sheppard, but Mer was back to sorting out the intricacies of navigating a behemoth, doomed starship full of suicidal Wraith. Haworth kept talking, explaining that it was still base-10 which made everything make so much more sense, so Mer took a few risks to cut their flight time down.

“Haworth, get over to the environmentals. We may have areas depressurizing already, we can’t have the plasma blow in during entry, we’ll—“

“Got it.” Rowan was already at the console before Mer finished talking. Mer frowned at Haworth, who shrugged and not-very-subtly scooted over to see what the giant alien was doing.

After a moment, Haworth let out a surprised huff. “You can read Wraith.”

“Enough to get by. I’m no scholar, but you said this is environmentals, and I can figure it from there.” The guy said, fiddling with the controls. “They have not breached the outer hull. I am venting bleeding ways to kill those close to the skin; we will lose some of the cocooned.” His voice was firm but there was a still a note of regret.

Mer really had no idea what the hell the guy meant by “bleeding ways,” but he knew the sound of acceptable losses. “Any idea how many people are stashed here?” He asked, redoing the entry math.

Sheppard shouted at him. “Make up your fucking mind, McKay! I’ve got to fly this pig; don’t leave me hanging!”

“We’re twenty minutes out at this rate. You’ve got time to adjust. Deal.”

“About 7,000, best estimate.” Rowan won Mer’s respect by simply ignoring them to answer the question he had been asked.

“Then even if we lose ten percent we’re getting over 6,000 out alive. Focus on that.” Mer tapped the monitor as the doubled checked his numbers and Haworth translated them to verify. “And focus on keeping the integrity. We need a solid hull or we’re burning up.”

Rowan ignored him but Mer didn’t care. Either he could manage it or not, because it wasn’t as if anyone else would do better, and Mer was too busy refiguring on the fly as Sheppard guided them along Mer’s numbers like a damn drunk.

“Sheppard, I can’t make the numbers right enough to compensate for you being sloppy.”

“I swear to God, McKay, I’m going to cut your fucking tongue out.”

“Oh, did I wound the proud Air Force pilot honor? Fly straight you son of a bitch!”

“It’s like surfing a trash can lid over gravel!”

“Excuses!”

Sheppard bared his teeth and leaned into the console controls. “I…will…kick…your ass!”

“Trajectory! Trajectory! And what are you, five? Pulling my pig tails?”

“I’m losing the alignment! Do your fucking job!”

Mer bent over his console and reset the course again. There was a long pause while Sheppard flew it and the ship snapped and crackled with noises that reminded Mer of whenever he popped his back. The ship wasn’t shuddering or twisting or anything that Mer would expect of any kind of normal, human constructed ship under so much stress, but it was still clear from the vibrations they did feel that things were going wrong.

Rowan growled just as Sheppard let out an explosive breath. Mer looked over at him to see Ford literally propping him up, his shoulder jammed in between Sheppard’s shoulder blades, one hand on Sheppard’s hip to keep them both steady.

Mer thought that if they lived through this, the first thing he was going to do was toss Sheppard’s free and easy ass into the shower to wash everyone else off of him.

“Entering atmosphere,” Sheppard ground out.

Mer looked at Teyla, who was still standing at his side. He wanted to say something profound, something worth dying for, but his brain shorted out. “My name is Mer.”

Her head tilted. “Not Rodney?”

“That too. But not really. That’s…official. Only family call me Mer. Hedy…Hedy called me Mer.”

Teyla’s eyes crinkled as she gave him a sad smile. He was sure she did not really understand the intricacies of Earth naming conventions, but she got the idea. The floor bucked under them as she leaned in for the Athosian forehead touching thing. Mer grabbed the console for balance but met her, and they stood like that for a moment before he pulled back to look at the console. There was nothing he could do at that point; entering atmosphere was something that would give an experience pilot nightmares, and while Sheppard was experienced he had not piloted anything in years and never once flown outside of any planet’s atmosphere.

Until then.

Mer looked at his people—Teyla and Ford and Stackhouse and Haworth, and even Sheppard and his huge alien who could read Wraith—and realized he had put his life and the lives of people he genuinely cared about into Sheppard’s hands. It was all down to a man who hated himself more than anyone could ever hate him, who no one trusted and had a habit of letting down everyone who relied on him.

Mer knew he had done the right thing, he just hoped they lived long enough for Sheppard to realize that too.