Title: As Time Goes By
Rating: G
Pairing: None
Disclaimer: All of it belongs to someone else.
Notes: Post-Siege II, but glossed over whatever happened after. For the sga_flashfic '38 Minutes' challenge.
Summary: Power restored, higher functions online (hello, stream of consciousness)

The Mark-II is a jumble of metal and wires and potential high explosives shoved into an out of the way corner of the chair room as John comes in at a dead run. One hiveship destroyed by the satellite (thank you, Peter), one destroyed by the nuke (the nervous breakdown over how close that one had been was being postponed until after the current catastrophe, but it was going to be a really spectacular one), one left to go (the last enemy in a dogfight is always the best pilot, the one who's survived long enough to learn your tricks). There was another wave of darts inbound, more than they could possibly handle with their losses (the only people he knows are still alive are the ones he passed as he ran, none of which were Teyla or Ford or Weir or McKay, four more things he can't afford to think about at the moment), but Daedalus is here, the cavalry sweeping in fashionably late with trumpet fare and weapons' fire that still isn't enough to turn the tide on its own, and all he can think about right now is getting his ass in that chair by the time they plug in the ZPM.

He makes it, beats them to it, has two incredibly long seconds (one, Mis-si-ssi-ppi, one. two, Mis-si-ssi-ppi, two) to come up with a million things that could have gone wrong because they should be there by now. Then the lights come on, the chair reclines, and Atlantis is happy to see him.

Power restored, higher functions online, she tells him. She supplies him quicker than instantly with the fact (that both Earth's scientists and its science fiction writers are amusingly far off track in their conception of Artificial Intelligence) that his brain is handling her data feed (a combination of the Ancient database, her current sensor data, and the stored logs of everything since their arrival that she's been unable to properly process before this point) by directing the most important streams of information straight into his memory while her lower-priority communications are interpreted as speech. So he already knows that the shield is up and capable of lasting for 1,794.359 years at current energy consumption levels, that she has a lovely array of both defensive and offensive options available for him to choose from, and that a crosspatch of her internal sensors with his visual cortex has pinpointed the locations of Teyla (vital signs elevated but within tolerable ranges) and Ford (hit by a Wraith stunner, no immediate danger) and Weir (speaking with the Daedalus over her radio, would he like to listen in?) and McKay (moving very rapidly along the shortest path from the ZPM to the chair room).

She sincerely apologizes for her inability to provide a turkey sandwich at this time (and the absolutely merciless sarcasm in her mental voice is the final proof that the Ancients truly were a higher form of life, and one more thing he knows already is that this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship).