Chapter Text
WARNING
This is NOT my usual cuddly fairytale fic! However, Romance is inevitable!
There are dark themes in this, but the violence and nastiness mainly happens off-stage. John owns Rodney, who disgraced himself five years ago and nearly caused the deaths of members of SG1. Rodney has been a slave belonging to the International Committee that runs the SGC for five years and has never known the security and protection of having an actual owner.
Prologue
When disgraced pilot, Major John Sheppard sat in the control chair in the ancient base in Antarctica, it made a number of people very happy.
It meant that Dr Carson Beckett had a wonderful excuse to escape and avoid ever having to sit in the bloody thing again. He hated Ancient technology that wasn’t for medical use, as it wasn’t always obvious what each item did and anyway, with the mental part of the control, it meant that anything that went wrong would be his fault. He hated it when things went wrong.
It meant that Dr Beckett would never have to sit in that damned chair again and therefore would be unlikely to launch any more rogue drones at unsuspecting Generals; a concept that General Jack O’Neill could seriously get behind. If it hadn’t been for the fancy flying of that Major, he would have been an ex-General by now.
It meant that Carson would never have to sit in that, zatracený chair again! Dr Radek Zelenka had run out of bribes, arguments and threats to use to get his medical friend to the control room. The last time he had sent the genius slave Ego to fetch him, carrying a message that informed Carson that Ego would be whipped if Carson refused to come. It was underhand and sneaky given that Zelenka knew of Carson’s soft heart and abolitionist tendencies, but Radek had been desperate… until Major Sheppard had taken the seat and made it glow, producing working holograms of solar systems with a mere thought.
****
General O’Neill’s Quarters, Antarctica.
“Danny?”
General O’Neill checked to see if his bed-mate was still awake.
Dr Daniel Jackson O’Neill (Lib) stirred and turned to look at his Patron in the low level lighting of their shared room at the Ancient base.
“Yeah?” he responded sleepily.
“How can I persuade Sheppard to go to Atlantis?”
Jack might have been Daniel’s Master once, and now be able to demand his loyalty as his Patron, but he had waited over a week before daring to discuss this with his freedman. Daniel was still furious that Jack had refused permission for him to go as a part of the Atlantis expedition.
“Why wouldn’t he want to?”
“Not everyone is as excited by this as you!” Jack laughed. “Anyway, he doesn’t want to be a walking light-switch.”
Jack actually understood this. As an ATA gene holder and gold-plated, dimmer enabled, bells and whistles light-switch himself, he could see where the Major was coming from, but he could also see how necessary Sheppard was to the expedition. If he didn’t go, then they were left with Beckett…
“He refused?”
“Not exactly,” Jack admitted. “He just seemed reluctant. I told him that if he didn’t want to go, then I didn’t want him, but Elizabeth needs him.”
“How’s Beckett’s research going?”
“I thought you’d know more about that than me. As far as I can guess it’ll take a few more weeks.”
Daniel smiled at Jack’s downplaying of his own intelligence. “Imagine if we could all use the technology,” he commented wistfully.
“We just need to offer Sheppard something… I don’t know. Money is pointless; he doesn’t spend what he earns as it is. He loves flying, but I can’t guarantee that there will be anything for him to fly out there. Hell! I can’t even guarantee there’ll be anything but gruesome death out there!”
They were silent for a moment as they each reflected. Daniel thought back to the only time he had met the Major, and remembered the chair.
Actually, Daniel had not been watching the show; exciting though it was. He had been distracted by his friend Rod… Ego.
It was criminal that such a thing should have happened to Dr Rodney McKay, astrophysicist, engineer, genius and arrogance personified. Daniel had been born a slave in the senatorial Jackson family, who had sent him to be educated, allowed him to work with the Military on the Stargate program and finally sold him to Jack O’Neill’s personal ownership eight years ago. He had therefore been able to go on missions with his Master and his team, providing invaluable help with his brilliance in the fields of languages, anthropology and archaeology, and eventually being freed. Not that that really made much difference. He now lived with Jack and didn’t actually have to obey him… well, not all the time anyway… not that he’d been that good at it when he was Jack’s slave…
Rodney, however, was a genius astrophysicist who had, in spite of Daniel’s lowly status, always treated Daniel with the respect his doctorate deserved. He wasn’t as rude to Daniel (except perhaps with regard to the dubious value of his chosen specialist subjects) as he was with everyone else and had never had Daniel punished for anything. In fact, Rodney had even defended him on several occasions, hating the way that people would happily blame slaves for their own shortcomings.
Rodney, however, had made two monumental errors. He had come up with a plan that could, possibly, have accidentally caused the deaths of Teal’c and Jack, although it hadn’t in the end. He had also hit on Major Sam Carter, calling her ‘Blondie’ of all things!
Being socially imbecilic and yet having an (admittedly deserved) ego the size of a galaxy, meant that Rodney had not made many friends and there was no one to speak up for him at his trial in front of the International Committee. In fact there were many people, mainly scientists, queuing up to denounce him and speak against him. Dr Kavanaugh had been one of the most vocal, but there were plenty of others too.
McKay’s family had not responded to his appeal and only Carson Beckett had spoken for his friend. It was nowhere near enough and Rodney had been sent to Siberia, enslaved by the IC, name changed in a cruel nod to his genius.
Actually, Rodney had not let this change in his status get in the way of his work and research on all things Ancient, especially Stargate and wormhole workings and naquadah, but, on his return to the US, Daniel saw a vastly different character to the bombastic, arrogant genius who had been sent away.
Now there was only submission and silence where there had been life, brilliance, endless chatter and enthusiasm. Rodney was still the cleverest man in his many fields, (he felt safe saying this, with Sam being a woman!) that Daniel had ever encountered, outstripping Zelenka and pretty much all the other physicists and engineers in their own fields, but now there didn’t seem to be anything other than Physics and Engineering in the man. Daniel would even have welcomed a snarky comment about the pointlessness of so-called sciences such as anthropology from him, but that was over and gone now.
It was now Daniel’s turn to defend Rodney and he had done his best to save him from the beatings and abuse that he fell afoul of, due mainly to the way Rodney had treated people in his free days. Daniel had always agreed with Rodney’s estimation of his fellow scientists, although he would never have had the courage to say it so directly! Unfortunately there were a lot of people here who remembered Dr McKay and Daniel knew that he was having a hard time. He never said anything, but he often walked with a limp, or flinched at a touch, or a voice, that told its own story. He no longer bristled at people’s stupidity or flew into a passionate argument that corrected everyone’s errors and left his audience shaking, and Daniel kind of missed that.
“Jack?” he cried suddenly, causing his Patron to start out of a doze.
“Wha…?”
“Why not give Sheppard a slave? A personal one.”
“A wha…? Slave?” Jack queried, a bit incoherently.
“He’s alone right?” Daniel insisted. “He’s got the gene and he has no family or friends.”
“He’s not partnered with anyone, no.” Jack sounded as though he was coming back on-line now. “Why a slave?”
“It seems to be something that most soldiers enjoy.”
“Well, yeah!” Daniel could hear his Patron’s leer even if he couldn’t see it.
“Jack!” he admonished.
“Hey!” Jack sniggered. “You started it! I’m not too keen on picking up a slave for an officer… that’s really…”
“Well, offer one to Sheppard.”
“Why would he want one? If he wanted one, he’d have one already.”
“Rodney.”
“Who? Daniel… what are you…?”
“Rodney McKay. You know… Ego?”
“The one who molested Carter?” Jack’s voice rose and he turned over to face his lover.
“He didn’t molest her,” Daniel’s tone was angry now, “he asked her out. If I hadn’t been a slave at the time I would have testified for him at his trial. He was…”
“Yes…” Jack pulled him close and kissed his freedman to shut him up. As usual, it worked. “I know how you feel about slavery and I agree, but why suggest a slave and why that one?”
“Rodney was broken in Russia, Jack. He’s being regularly… abused and beaten. He always used to defend me, but I don’t have the power to help him now.”
“Yeah,” Jack agreed, but Daniel carried on anyway. He was Rodney’s champion now and he had an argument armed and ready to use.
“I saw him looking at Sheppard in the chair. At first I thought he was looking at the show… as we all were. It was Rodney… Ego who told him to visualise where we were and up popped the Milky Way! But, Jack, he wasn’t watching the revolving planets, he only had eyes for Sheppard. He was instantly attracted!”
“Fine, but how do you know that Sheppard would be interested? I mean it’s Sheppard we want to bribe and Ego’s not the easiest man to get on with. We don’t even know if Sheppard’s into guys.”
“He doesn’t have to be a sex slave, Jack. Rodney’s…”
“Ego,” Jack insisted on the slave’s official name.
“Rodney…” Daniel disagreed, “is a fantastic physicist and he would be invaluable to anyone out there in Atlantis. He can help Sheppard to use the technology. With Sheppard’s gene and Rodney’s intelligence, they would be a formidable team. Anything is better than leaving them in the hands of Kavanaugh!” His enthusiasm was causing his voice to get louder, so Jack kissed him again.
“Let me think. We’ll need to get Elizabeth’s agreement.”
According to John Sheppard’s file and psych reports, Sheppard was, what Jack privately called, a White Knight. He thought nothing of risking his own life to rescue… well, anyone. His famous black mark had come about because he had disobeyed direct orders in order to rescue a friend… a friend who had been DOA in the end.
His notes questioned whether or not the man had a death wish, or if, perhaps, he was devoid of brains. Jack knew from talking to the man, and seeing him act under pressure, that intelligence was not one of the Major’s deficiencies, but this didn’t answer the question.
Sheppard was undoubtedly a formidable pilot. He had saved the general’s life with consummate skill… Didn’t the man deserve better?
“He deserves better than Ego,” Jack decided. “It’s a good idea, Danny, but there are plenty of better rewards around…”
“Rodney’s learnt submission the hard way,” Daniel disputed quietly. “He’s broken. He will obey, instinctively, any instruction that Sheppard will give him. He’s a genuine genius. Jack, please think about it? You haven’t seen…”
“Hey! Don’t get upset about it,” Jack soothed.
“He didn’t deserve to be made a slave,” Daniel pouted.
Jack pulled Daniel closer to him and kissed his forehead, thinking hard.
“Perhaps it will give Sheppard someone to protect? A good cause?” Jack suggested eventually and felt his freedman’s smile against his shoulder. “Perhaps you qualify as a genius too?”
“Yes Master,” Daniel agreed, maybe a little smugly.
***
Slave Hall, Antarctica Base
“4921!” The computerised voice intoned, and Ego, né Rodney McKay, sighed. He had managed to eat over half of the MRE, before it had been claimed by one of the slaves who regularly tormented him in their enclosed dormitory. He had no way of fighting back and now he wouldn’t even be able to go and beg for a pudding.
He hated being a slave. Worse was being a slave who belonged to the State. It meant that there was no one he could appeal to, no one to care if he lived or died… or was raped or beaten for nothing. Even those who belonged to the Militia had a commander they could go to, and a vague chance that someone might decide to help; after all, a dead or wounded slave was of no use to anyone. If he hadn’t had the world of Science to immerse himself in, he would have given up and died years ago.
Ego vaguely wondered, as he presented himself at the scanner-gate to be beeped through, who was going to beat him, or rape him now. Perhaps there would be the added bonus of humiliation to go through first? Who knew? Not that it mattered. He rarely looked into people’s faces these days and he had learned that if he just accepted it placidly, then, approximately 61% of the time, by his calculations, they would lose interest and move on.
The Marine waiting outside the lock-up wasn’t familiar, but he didn’t have time to look as the leather leash was attached to his standard issue chain collar. He just lowered his eyes and followed the tug where ever it was going to take him.
He recited pi to himself. He had calculated a few more places recently, while enduring a beating, and he kept the knowledge to himself, as though it were a bargaining piece… a secret… something that he could possess when he owned nothing. If he could manage disassociation again, it would make the ordeal survivable.
Ego was astonished therefore, to find himself in an office. He had expected the barracks, or a private room, but this one was the General’s room. Perhaps it was Daniel who had called for him? Daniel was one of the few people left in the world who knew his real name and treated him as though he were more than a walking computer, or whore and convenient boredom-reliever.
He knelt properly and waited.
“There you are!” The General announced as the leash was handed to someone and the Marine left the room. “He’s yours.”
“Sir?”
Ego risked a peep up through his eyelashes and registered that there was an Air Force officer seated opposite Daniel’s General. His heart almost stopped beating when he saw that it was the gorgeous ATA gene pilot with the messy hair.
“This is the slave we are offering you.”
Major John Sheppard looked down at the slave and could see nothing of the man. He had thinning, light hair that curled in places, but beyond that he could see nothing. All he knew was what the General had told him of the man’s history. His commander had also strongly hinted that John would be doing this slave a favour if he agreed to take him.
“And you say he would be my personal property?”
Ego hadn’t heard the officer’s voice before, but it was soft and drawling. Was he being… sold? Even in his head, his thoughts hesitated.
“That’s right. He belongs to the IC right now, but we have the go ahead to purchase him for you.”
There was a small silence, during which Ego’s blood ceased to move around his body and he began to lose feeling in his arms. He was perhaps on the verge of a panic attack because… he could have a Master… a real Master…!
“Look up please,” Sheppard commanded softly and Ego looked up into his prospective owner’s face… and almost sobbed. He was amazing. That hair and the eyes… and he was looking… almost kind… sympathetic…
Ego mentally kicked himself for daring to believe. It was never going to happen. He castigated himself viciously for allowing something as moronic as hope to spring up and he fought to stop the tears from falling. Pain rarely moved him to tears now, but apparently soft hazel eyes could break him.
John Sheppard looked down at the desperate face, with the astonishingly blue eyes that were filling with tears. The poor creature wasn’t the type who would ever be bought for his beauty, but there was something attractive about the mouth that slanted down on the left side, the even shaped face and the strong chin.
That face was evidently capable of a full range of expressions, as John deciphered, in quick succession, hope, fear, despair and then, finally, resignation, and he remembered what the General had said about this man. When free, this slave had been brutally honest and brilliant, until the incident that had turned him into this miserable creature, and now he was broken and almost beyond hope.
As the slave’s gaze lowered in misery, John made up his mind. He turned to speak to the General, but his words were cut off. The General was already holding out his fountain pen and grinning.
“Sign here… and here… and here,” O’Neill took the pen back. “Take these copies to the M.S.R.O. and they’ll retag him. Then you’ve got a week’s leave, as we discussed before. Report back for training by 1200 on the 29th and there’ll be more information for you then. Remember that you will need to tie up all the loose ends.”
“Yes Sir,” John grinned and stood.
“My freedman has known your new slave for a long time. He’s trouble, but he really is a genius.”
“Yes Sir, thank you.” John saluted, the more respectful version, and then, on being given the permission to leave, he reached for the door. His new slave rose to his feet and stood behind him, blue eyes shining in fear and hope. John smiled and then preceded the slave, trying not to tug on the leash.
***
POV skips between John and Rodney.
Major John Sheppard’s quarters, Antarctica Base
In John’s allocated room, he dropped the leash and turned around to look at his new possession, only to find that the slave had gone to his knees as soon as the door closed. He was wearing the orange jump suit with sandals and the chain around his neck that was standard issue for all convict slaves who had not been sold into the private sector. It was supposedly so that the slave could not run away, but even if he had had proper boots and full snow gear, there was no way anyone could have run away in Antarctica!
The tag that would normally have dangled from the ugly chain had been cut off just half an hour ago and the slave and his new Master had been warned to stay close to each other until John could get a new tag, or replace the chain with his own collar.
At the Military Slave Registration Office they had re-registered Ego’s number and microchip. They had also registered the fact that 6003985SG-COL4921 was now personally owned. They had handed John a pack, which contained, along with the slave’s file, a load of leaflets designed to help him as a new slave-owner. There was the slave’s medical history including vaccinations, childhood illnesses, official punishments and allergies. There was also a temporary passport addendum, so that the slave could travel with his Master until John got his passport updated.
The slave briefly looked up at his Master, and then placed his head on the floor in the traditional pose.
“No… hey! Get up!” The slave raised himself to his knees. John sighed and sat down on his bed. “Look… sit down… over there!”
The slave looked up in astonishment, glanced at the indicated chair and then looked directly at the man who apparently owned him.
“Master?”
John shivered. He had never been addressed as a slave’s Master. He had never really thought about slave ownership. He had been raised in a military family who had never owned the staff who washed, cooked and cleaned for them, and in his adult life, John hadn’t ever had a permanent enough base for home and staff ownership. Even his brief flirtation with marriage hadn’t lasted long enough for households.
“Sit on the chair, please.”
The slave got up and crept over to the chair, sitting on the edge… it wasn’t exactly a hanging offence (there were plenty of those already), but it was regarded as a privilege reserved for free people only.
John watched helplessly, as the slave began to breathe with difficulty, slowly turning a deep and interesting pink as the panic attack took hold.
“Oh crap!” John slipped to the slave’s side as he tipped himself off the chair, shaking. “Look, I’m sorry…” He rubbed the slave’s back in what he hoped was a comforting manner. “I’ve never been a Master before. I mean… crap!”
“I’m sorry, Master…” the terrified man managed eventually. “I… I’m sorry.”
“Hey… it’s OK. Really, calm down.” The slave’s colour returned gradually to pale pink and John sat back, leaning against his bed, hand still on his new possession’s shoulder.
Ego was embarrassed and miserable now. He had just proved that he was a nightmare to keep and fully expected to be taken back. He shuffled back to his more standard kneeling position and waited, resigned. One blissful hour of hope, dashed because he was such a mess.
“Tell me your name.”
“Ego, Master,” he whispered his hated slave name.
“No, I mean your real name; the one your mother called you.”
Ego snorted and answered truthfully before he had even thought about it, the pain always there. “She called me ‘You’ or ‘Boy’.”
John’s heart flipped and he squeezed the slave’s shoulder in surprise at fleeting glimpse he had just caught of this man’s past.
“Look up at me, please. I mean… I mean the name that you call yourself… when you are alone… in your thoughts.”
The eyes filled, yet again, with tears that were hastily controlled and then the answer was pushed out, as though it took effort.
“R…Rodney, Master.”
“Hm… it’s a good name for you… I think I shall name you Rodney.” John placed a finger under Rodney’s chin, trying to stop him from lowering his gaze again. “I’m Major John Sheppard, USAF and you have been bought from the IC as a kind of bribe to make me go to Atlantis. I’d have agreed to go anyway… my career is down the toilet and I have no ties here, so what the hell? Look, I’ve never owned a slave before and I’m not big on reading leaflets,” he pushed the bundle of glossy paper into the waste bin, “so, let’s just see what happens, OK?”
“You… you’re not going to send me back, Master?”
“Nope!” He smirked and then he put his earnest face back on, “unless you want to go back?”
“No!” Rodney replied quickly. “No… please?”
“Well, you’d better go and get your stuff. I’m moving out in the morning. I’ve got to go and let my apartment in California and… well, they gave me a week.” John realised that the slave was looking up at him questioningly. “Yeah?”
“Stuff, Master?”
“Yeah, personal stuff, I dunno, pictures, clothes, crap like that.”
“I’m a slave. We don’t have stuff,” Rodney pointed out dryly, in his best ‘you’re an idiot’ voice, and then realised that he had just done it again. One day he would learn to keep his mouth shut.
“I noticed,” John drawled with a big grin. He patted the shoulder that he hadn’t quite let go of yet and then saw Rodney’s astonishment. “What?”
“You’re… you’re not going to punish me?”
“What for?” John asked, startled.
“I…. Lack of respect?” Rodney suggested quietly.
“Is that a kink of yours then? Do you wanna be punished?”
“No! I… I just…” Rodney ran out of words.
“You must have something to collect. Family photos? Letters?”
“Nothing, Master.”
“Clothes?” Rodney shook his head. He wore uniforms, provided by the base and made in luminous orange, ‘one size fits none’ cotton.
“Toiletries?”
“It’s all provided, Master. Shampoo, soap, chewy tooth-cleaner things, they are all in dispensers.”
“Personal stuff? Photos? Anything?”
Rodney had kept a photo of his cat for nearly the whole time in Russia, but it had been taken from him eventually; ripped to shreds in front of his eyes while the soldiers laughed.
John saw the emotion rise up again and he patted his slave’s shoulder as it seemed to help.
“Rodney, I took you, because you looked like you needed rescuing. You’re… you’re safe now.”
Rodney really wanted to believe that. He really wanted to feel that he had at last fallen on his feet, that his new Master would respect him and allow him to have… something… anything. He knew that his Master would want sex soon and that would hurt, but it would just be his Master claiming what was his, rather than the habitual abuse for the amusement of a bunch of bored soldiers. He had already been given his name back, and that was worth any pain, but ‘safe’ was more than he could ever expect. He had felt safe when he was free and a respected physicist, but that was a huge joke! He would never feel safe ever again.
John watched all the emotions flit across his slave’s face. John was good at empathy and, when he paid attention, he read facial expressions easily too. Rodney was easy to read and John knew that there would be much to talk about when they were more comfortable with each other. Rodney was his responsibility now and John had a new mission in life. He vowed that he would do all he could to make Rodney feel safe.
His first move was to undo the leash. He dropped it on the bed as he stood and then announced that they were going to the Commissary.
“And Rodney, that whole kneeling thing? In private… knock it off, OK?”
“Yes Master,” Rodney agreed, although he wasn’t sure how he would manage it.