The Long Way Home

Chapter Thirty Seven: So It Begins

What should I do I'm just a little baby
What if the lights go out and maybe
And then the wind just starts to moan
Outside the door he followed me home

Goodnight Moon – Lady Shiva

Cass was stealing the covers, granted that there wasn't much to steal due to the fact they were sleeping in a single bed. She was curled up away from John in the foetal position, the sheets gathered up around her like a child. The light sound of her steady breathing was in his ears as he listened closely. He was lying on his back, his arm drawn up over his head as he stared at the ceiling through the shrouded darkness.

Cass slept like this when she was feeling insecure, John had learned that after their first month together. Her back was pressed against his side and John enjoyed the sensation of having her so close to him. He was still counting down the hours to the attack like a grotesque time bomb. He couldn't switch his mind off, not even for a second as the cogs turned in his brain. He was used to formulating plans and fighting his way out of impossible situations. People relied on him and he was good at taking care of his own, it was how he progressed so quickly through the ranks. It was also his downfall.

The reason he had accepted the position here was because he had wanted to be as far away from the world as possible. He was destructive and damaging to everything he touched, or at least that was what he had been told after he had ignored his Commanding Officer's orders back in Afghanistan. Even though he had saved the lives of the marines that had been stranded John had crash landed his helicopter after taking enemy fire and put the lives of more men at risk.

Cass mumbled incoherently in her sleep as she turned onto her opposite side before she snuggled up against his comforting chest. Her palm came to rest over his heart, her fingertips splayed out across the soft hair. She sighed into his shoulder, that loving contented noise he liked to hear, the one that set his world to rights.

No matter how much he couldn't sleep, being here with Cass was still worth it. Hell was about to fall down upon every single one of their heads and if this was where he spent his final hours then he'd die a happy man.

"You should try and get some sleep." She murmured into his tender skin of his throat, her lips ghosting across his neck.

"Go back to sleep Cassie." John whispered against her forehead.

Cass allowed her nose to trail up the curve of his throat until her lips pressed a kiss to the line of his jaw. Cass's lithe naked legs entwined with his as she stretched along the length of his athletic form. There was a moment of peace, it descended on the two of them like a mist before the sudden crackle of Cass's radio erupted through the air. She groped for it blindly, muttering under her breath before John reached over her slender body and grasped it for her. The gruff message came through over the airwaves, ringing in their ears as they listened closely.

"Doctor Pierce, we need you by Generator One. It's Sergeant Bates, it looks like he's been beaten."

Cass snatched the radio out of John's hand before she scrambled out of bed, searching for her clothes. John was already yanking on his combats as Cass held down the button and spoke into the radio.

"I'm on route with Major Sheppard, get a medical team to meet me at the scene." Cass responded authoritatively, yanking her dark hair out of the collar of her black AC/DC T-shirt.

John was already dressed. Her field kit was grasped tightly in his fist as he swiped his hand over the door panel. Cass was hot on his heels, gripping her comm and affixing it to her ear whilst John talked animately on his. She half listened to the conversation as she removed the hair band from her wrist and drew her hair back away from her face and into a messy bun.