popkin16

Before Squee, I had this semi-incoherent dream that I thought was very interesting. I wrote it out (and fixed it up so it made more sense) and posted it to tumblr. I forgot to post it here.

Detective John Sheppard frowned at the suspect on the other side of the one-way mirror. Big, frightened blue eyes took in the room around him, coming to rest on the chain hooked to his handcuffs that kept him attached to the table. His broad shoulders were slumped. Was his bottom lip trembling? He turned to raise an incredulous eyebrow at Lorne, who shrugged.

“Doctor Rodney McKay,” Lorne reported. He pulled a little notebook from his pocket and consulted it, a frown curving his lips. “Works for Pegasus Tech. His current projects are classified, currently single. No criminal record, other than the occasional speeding ticket. He was caught searching the crime scene and attempted to run.”

“He say why he was there? Or how he slipped past the officers securing the scene?” John asked. He took a step closer to the mirror. In the other room, Doctor McKay’s fidgeting ceased and he went still.

Lorne shook his head and flipped his notebook closed. “He hasn’t said a word since he was grabbed.”

“His hands aren’t bruised,” John murmured. He had no blood splatter on his clothes, and his shoes didn’t match the weird footprints on the floor - no immediate evidence at all that he’d been the one to beat their victim to death. He did, however, have a scrape across one cheekbone and a split lip.

Abruptly, McKay lifted his head, his eyes unerringly meeting John’s. He stared at John, unblinking. The hairs on John’s arms stood up and a chill slid down his spine. Holy fuck, was he looking at John through the one-way mirror? Had he heard them talking? He straightened up and forced himself not to step back. Irritation overrode the irrational fear and John glared at the suspect. It was just a coincidence. He was just unbalanced from the weird fucking crime scene.

“I’m going in,” John snapped, and Lorne indicated he’d stay where he was to watch.

Rodney McKay certainly didn’t look threatening up close. His pale skin spoke to a lack of daily sunlight, and his sturdy body indicated a sedentary lifestyle. His blue eyes were oddly captivating, and John made a point of meeting them head on. McKay had oddly long eyelashes for a man, John noted idly as he took a seat across the table.

“I am Detective John Sheppard,” he began. “I’d like to ask you a couple questions about your presence in my crime scene.”

McKay stared at him a moment, seeming to take this in. Behind John, a fly buzzed. McKay leaned forward slightly, face painfully sincere. “You have to let me go.”

“And why should I do that?” John asked casually. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. McKay blinked and his eyes flickered over John’s chest and arms. John smirked.

“It isn’t safe,” McKay said, which wasn’t an answer. John watched as his pointer finger absently traced a shape over the surface of the table.

“For whom?”

“Me. You. Everybody.”

John tensed. He leaned forward, his voice hard. “Is that a threat, Doctor?”

McKay shook his head slowly. He was staring at the table again, watching his fingers trace shapes. His other hand clenched into a fist. McKay licked his lips. The buzzing of the fly got louder, more annoying. John ignored it as best he could.

“Someone is...coming for me,” he said quietly. He met John’s eyes, looking scared once again. “He’ll tear through all of you to get to me.”

John’s eyes narrowed. “Is this the person who killed Doctor Gaul?”

McKay nodded. He closed his eyes for a brief moment, then opened him. His gaze drifted to a barred window on the far wall. “You can’t stop him.”

“A name, McKay,” John demanded. Another fly joined the first, and John absently swatted at his left ear. Some asshole probably left their lunch out again. People going in and out all day let in all kinds of bugs, which John hated. He let his irritation show, hoped McKay thought it was aimed at him.

The motion seemed to draw McKay’s attention. His gaze darted back to John, to his left ear. His mouth moved, though no words came out. Was the buzzing getting louder? John shook his head.

“Look at me,” He snapped, and tapped his knuckles on the table between them. McKay’s gaze snapped to meet his. “You better start talking or I’ll put you back in a cell with drug dealers and rapists.”

“I’m sorry,” McKay said miserably. “He followed me here. I have to go.”

“You’re not -” going anywhere, John meant to say, but the buzzing was growing in volume, the noise spreading to his right ear. He frowned and looked over his shoulder for the source of the noise. It was way too loud to be flies now. Above him, the lights flickered. McKay’s hands began to move, twisting, drawing shapes in the air, and John watched as McKay’s mouth moved. He couldn’t hear what was being said over the buzzing.

John stood. The flickering of the lights seemed to grow worse as the buzzing increased. The hair on John’s arms and the back of his neck was standing up. He turned toward the door, to go out and demand to know what the hell was going on, but froze. There was something leaking out from under the door. An inky darkness, writhing and slowly spreading, moving less like smoke and more like something alive. John took a step back and nearly fell over his chair.

McKay was standing now too. He shouted something indistinct and jerked his hands down. The chain attached to his handcuff snapped like it was made of cheap plastic and with a twist of his wrists, the handcuffs opened. John’s mouth dropped open. Neither of those things were supposed to be possible.

The darkness had leaked into the room enough to obscure the door now. John moved so the table was between him and the door, and McKay joined him - facing the wrong way. He traced a circle on the brick wall between the two barred windows, the tips of his fingers dark with some sort of sticky residue.

The buzzing was almost painful now, the lights flickering fast enough to bring on a headache. John pulled his gun and aimed it at the black tendrils creeping across the floor. It wisped around two legs of the chair, and with a loud screech, broke it free of its bolts and dragged it closer to the door, until it disappeared into the rapidly spreading darkness.

“McKay,” John shouted, throat dry, his blood feeling like ice in his veins. At a loss for what else to do, he shot at a tendril making its way around the table. The tendril didn’t even flinch in reaction. The other chair was wrenched free and disappeared.

A blast of cool air hit John’s back. McKay grabbed him by the elbow and tugged. John glanced over his shoulder, then did a double take at what he saw. There was a shimmering blue pool on the wall now, round and just slightly taller than John. For a moment, John’s arm sagged, the gun pointing toward the floor right in front of them.

“What the fuck?” John whispered, swaying where he stood. McKay gestured impatiently for him to follow. John turned back to the once ordinary interrogation room. The inky blackness was fast filling the room now, and with it much closer, John caught a better look. It wasn’t like smoke at all - it looked more like millions of tiny...somethings, vibrating and moving as one. Not bugs, John noticed, just millions of tiny balls of nothingness. Like when you stand up too fast and your vision fills with black spots.

Impatient, McKay tugged on his arm once more, gesturing at the portal. When John still didn’t move, McKay violently rolled his eyes and just...walked into the wall, into the blue portal. The lights flickered one more time and went out, leaving the portal as the only source of light in the room. John took a step back, away from the encroaching darkness. The buzzing filled his head, his entire body, making his bones ache.

With no other option, John followed Rodney McKay through the portal.