Understudy

Author: Cheryl W.

Summary: Police Detective John Sheppard joins the Atlantis team, but thinks it's not him they really want, it's the other John, the hero John, Ronon's BFF, McKay's idol. Figures that, the sooner they realize he's not him, the better off they'll all be. No Slash.

Author's Notes: This is set in the alternate universe of the "Vegas" episode. I have little one shots planned that I hope are entertaining. And none of these characters are from the show's universe, all from alternate universes. (And I'm not abandoning my other story SGA "Tinderbox" by any means, will continue to post that as I write it. I was just was in the mood to share this tidbit this week)

Now on with the story….

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Chapter 1: Fate

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In the middle of the episode, McKay makes a call….

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After an hour of debating with himself, Rodney made the call he didn't know if he should. "Don't get excited but….I just met John Sheppard. He's a police detective." Could have sworn there was a sharp inhale at the news, just like he was sure he was imagining the excitement in the man's tone, because this man didn't do excited. No matter that he himself had started the conversation telling the other man to not get "excited."

"You told me I couldn't contact him," Ronon shot back, trying to sound angry and not like his heart was racing in something like happy anticipation.

McKay did his irritated sigh thing over the radio. "Yes, I know but he really found us. Well, actually he found a wraith here on Earth."

Every nerve Ronon owned tensed at the revelation and he growled at his team leader, "Did he get into it with the Wraith? Is he hurt?! You explained everything to him, right?"

"He's not cleared for that information and he wouldn't sign the non-disclosure," Rodney replied, wanted to drag this out and make it more a big deal that he had broken protocol, read John Sheppard in against every mandate they had in place. Crap, he couldn't even tell his sister he even worked for the Air Force, let alone dealt with the stargate and aliens.

But instead of waiting for Rodney's big reveal of his stunningly brave disobedience, Ronon was nearly shouting at him. "Are you telling me he doesn't know the danger he's in?! What the Wraith are capable of?! You better not have cut him loose. Is he still at Area 51?!" hope there and McKay knew Ronon would beam himself down there if he said Sheppard was still in the interrogation room.

"Contrary to popular belief, we don't kidnap people and hold them without cause."

Ronon growled out what Rodney had come to know as a Satedan curse. "Why'd you let him go! If he finds the Wraith again and doesn't understand what he's up against!"

McKay cut across the Satedan's rant. "Calm down. I broke protocol and briefed him on the Wraith, even gave him the 5 cent tour and let him see our resident Wraith."

Ronon slumped against the Daedalus wall in relief. Sheppard wasn't out there blind, had some idea what his enemy was capable of. It wasn't the best news but it was better than Sheppard thinking he was merely chasing down a human. "I want to talk to him."

Rodney snorted. "Right, of course you do. But …" here McKay's voice turned something it hardly ever was with Ronon: soft…" he's not your Sheppard, you get that right? He's not even like the other Sheppard I met. He's…not to burst your bubble, but he's kind of a screw up."

"A screw up that found the wraith you and all of Stargate Command couldn't," Ronon challengingly shot back, instantly defending this Sheppard before he'd ever met him.

"Maybe that's karma," Rodney said aloud what had been running through his head since Woosley came and said a Police Detective named John Sheppard was working on a case with what sounded like leftovers from a Wraith feeding.

Ronon called it something else. "It's fate. He's meant to be with us, be a part of defeating the Wraith."

"Don't go getting sentimental," McKay scolded, though he himself had already gone down that road what with him telling Sheppard everything.

But Ronon, instead of being angry at McKay's comeback, of trying to deny it, he hoarsely confessed, "You just told me you met my best friend who I lost a year and half ago. And you don't think I should feel something?!"

McKay was quickly trying to head off a train wreck. "No, not your best friend! Weren't you listening?! I just said he's very different!"

"I don't care. I still want to meet him."

Rodney caustically retorted, "I'm a little busy to arrange a play date for you."

Ronon punched the wall in frustration before he rested his head against it, felt like he was again on a precipice of falling apart or being remade. That was the knack of John Sheppard, he either broke you…or saved you. Had done both to Ronon. Saved him when he befriended him….and broke him when he died. And part of him knew he should run as far away as he could from this Sheppard, to not let things go the way they had before. That it was better to not meet with John Sheppard than to get attached, to …to lose him all over again. He didn't think he could bear that.

He could almost hear his John Sheppard chuckling in his ear, cajoling him. "What, the big bad Satedan's afraid of a little human connection? Doesn't know how to get in touch with his feminine side, well buck up, Chewie. You're not a runner on your own anymore and that means letting people get to know you, big guy."

Ronon knew he wasn't wrong with what his John would say to do, not to mention his own heart was aching to see even a glimmer of his friend again in this alternate reality's John. His voice was choked, nearly beseeching when he spoke again. "Rodney, don't….don't let anything happen to him."

Crap but Rodney had to swallow down his own emotions at hearing Ronon's. He covered it up by more bragging than confessing a moment later, "I put a tracker on him. Well, on his car."

"Thank you," Ronon gratefully replied cutting the connection then he slumped down to sit on the ground, back resting against the wall. Knew he was opening himself up to more heartbreak but ….his John, and this John, they were worth it. He trusted that with every fiber of his soul.

A few moments later, Teyla found him in that position, ran to his side, urgently demanding, "Ronon, are you ill? Hurt? Should I get you to the infirmary?" But she startled when he raised his eyes to hers and she saw the mixture of emotions in his features. "What has happened?"

"McKay met this world's John Sheppard today," Ronon announced and he couldn't help but chuckle in joy. "Leave it up to Sheppard to track down a wraith that the whole Stargate program couldn't find."

"He knows of the Wraith?" Teyla asked with a raised eyebrow of surprise.

Ronon gave an amused smirk. "Nope, Rodney said he's a police detective….guess he chased down the Wraith through a case of his."

"That is…astounding. Does he know…" she began but Ronon was already answering her.

"McKay briefed him, apparently without permission."

That information took a moment for Teyla to process. "That does not sound like Dr. McKay. He is very…what do they say, by the book."

"Yeah, Sheppard tends to bring the rebellious out in everyone," he said with a smirk and an arch of his eyebrow, racalling how many times his Sheppard used his full watt charm to get someone straight-laced to go a bit rogue.

"Will you meet him? This Sheppard?" Teyla asked hesitantly, wasn't sure that was the best thing for her Satedan friend.

"Course I will. It's what I've wanted since I stepped into your universe." Ronon couldn't believe she had to wonder at that! Every day he missed his friend's presence…and if this Sheppard was even 50% like his Sheppard…

"Yes, I remember," Teyla recalled with a smirk. "You demanded to speak to only Colonel John Sheppard…who none of us knew."

"Yeah, and the IOA wouldn't let me find him either," Ronon bitterly recalled, had paced the halls of Stargate Command the first time he was one Earth, aching to find his friend…no, the alternate universe version of his friend.

Teyla had sensed Ronon's frustration and sadness at not having that man in his life here even when she barely knew him. "But now he has found you, well, has found Stargate Command and Rodney."

Ronon smiled. "Fate, that's what I told McKay it was." But then he sobered, got that far away tone of remembrance Teyla had heard so many times before from him. "I wondered about that all the time, me meeting John…my John..." If he was meant to have a John Sheppard in his life? If he could get that gift again? Or maybe he only got one shot at the greatest friendship he'd ever known and he had destroyed it by trusting the wrong person. And this universe was punishing him all over again. That he had lost one Sheppard and wasn't worthy to get another shot to be with even a likeness of his friend.

"If you were supposed to have a John Sheppard in your life, if your original meeting was…fate?" Ronon nodded in agreement to her insight. Teyla treaded carefully with her next words, knowing they could reopen Ronon's barely scabbed over wounds. "My people believe that the people in our lives are a blessing."

"He was. Without him…" he broke off, rubbed his hand down his face, couldn't bear to finish that sentence, 'And without me, he'd still be alive.' Kept that pain to himself, that guilt, that shame.

Teyla put her hand on his shoulder. "I know your sorrow is great but this…it is good news, yes?"

Ronon silently nodded, knew the good of the situation and the bad. "Rodney says….he's different than…"

"Yes, I expect him to be. Just like I am different and Rodney is different than your own. But that…it did not stop us from…becoming friends." But even as she gave herself that label, Teyla hoped she was not stepping over a line calling them friends.

Ronon swallowed because, in his universe, Teyla and Rodney weren't just his friends, they were his family. His brother, his sister. Wondered if this John could only offer him a pale shadow of the bond that his John had given freely, if he could endure the difference but knew he wanted the chance to find that out all the same. "Well, he's not so different that he can't find the greatest threat out there and face off with it."

Teyla smiled. "Yes, by your stories, that is a trait of your John. And of this one, too. I look forward to meeting him."

"Me too," and he had forgotten what it was like…to hope, to want something so badly, to allow himself to feel. That was the gift his friend had given him, not just freedom from a life of being a Wraith's pet runner, but to live again, to love others again, to have a home and a family to call his own. Suddenly he knew it was wrong that he had shunned those things since John's death, had not LET this McKay, this Teyla get close to him, that the fault was his that they were simply friends and not family. It was a dishonor to his best friend's life to shun the gifts he had bestowed on him.

'Gifts I will honor again, Sheppard. I'll do better…just….be there somewhere in this other Sheppard, let some part of him recognize what we once had, that we were meant to be brothers, in any and every universe we meet in.' Either way, he wasn't walking away, would risk it all, his heart, his soul to get even just the chance to have a version of John Sheppard back in his life again.

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TBC

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Thanks for reading and I hope there's some interest in hearing more from this universe.

Have a great day!

Cheryl W.