Disclaimer - MGM/Gekko/Double Secret own them.
A 'Heroes, Part 2' episode addition. Spoilers for 'Prophecy' and 'Heroes, Part 2'.
*shuggles nellie*
*
The infirmary seemed muted ever since she'd gone. Colours were faint, lights were dimmer. When he saw the nurses at work now, they moved almost as if in slow motion. Not when treating a patient - never when treating a patient - but at every other moment they seemed different. Almost as if with each step, they were reminded of why she wasn't there.
Rob wasn't an overly-emotional man (though his wife begged to differ on occasion), but even he felt it as he walked into the infirmary again. It seemed...paler, somehow. The room had never felt so small.
This time, however, he noticed someone else there. They were sitting on the bed furthest away, their back towards him. He'd heard an off-world activation some time ago, but as he hadn't been called to the gate room and no wounded had arrived he assumed everything had been okay.
Maybe he'd been mistaken.
Pulling his hands out of his lab coat pockets, he walked towards the 'patient'. "Can I help you?"
The person's head moved to the left suddenly, and Rob finally got a look at the profile of their face. The hair had changed but he recognised them immediately. Surprised, he paused walking on the other side of the bed. "Mr Quinn."
"Dr Warner," he replied, looking away again, his voice revealingly tight.
It was obvious he'd been crying, and it was just as obvious what he'd been crying about. Rob silently cursed himself for not getting to know him better during his time at the SGC, but then that tended to be his problem most of the time. Certainly he had a decent, even good, bedside manner - it was vital for his job. But he never managed to connect with people. Not the way she had. "Can I...do you need anything?"
Shaking his head, Jonas wiped the back of his right hand across his face. "No, I'm fine. Thank you."
That was one thing Rob did know about him - the unfailing politeness. The ability to be kind to everyone. Trying not to show his discomfort, he gestured towards the exit (a futile gesture as Jonas still wasn't looking at him) and spoke. "I need to get up to date with a few things, but if you need-"
"SG-1 are on a mission."
Rob lowered his hand. "I know."
Jonas shifted on the bed, making it squeak a little, but kept his head lowered. "I...came through to give General Hammond an update with what's happening on Langera. Thought I'd see if I could catch up with the guys. He told me about Dr Fraiser...about Janet...and they weren't here. No one was here."
He had no one to talk to. Rob understood at least that much.
"And don't get me wrong; General Hammond's great, but he's still *General Hammond*. You just can't..."
He understood that, too. "If you want, I could-"
"They didn't even send me a message," Jonas interrupted, "they didn't even send me a message to let me know. They didn't even tell me about the funeral. All this time..." He finally stood up, turning to face Rob, and walked back and forth aimlessly. "I thought I'd finally been accepted by everyone, I truly believed that." His hands started waving around, gesturing. "But then this terrible, *terrible* thing happens and they don't even think to *tell* me?"
Surprised, Rob's mind fought for what to say. He'd never seen Jonas angry before. "I-"
"I'm not expecting to be told about every single time someone dies - the nature of this operation being what it is, that sadly happens all too often. But this was...she was..." He sighed, his hands falling down to his sides, his gaze fixing somewhere on the floor. "I never had to prove myself to her. That doesn't mean I didn't keep trying of course," he chuckled with genuine humour, "but she always told me to stop it. I was never 'that Kelownan traitor', or 'the guy who helped kill Daniel'. With her I was always...me. Just Jonas."
As Rob stood there - wondering what had happened to delete the entire education process from his brain, thus denying him the mental capacity to compose a response - Jonas spoke again.
"Have they asked you?"
Finally, something he could respond to. "Asked me what?"
"How you're doing? How you're coping with it?"
There was only one answer to that. "No." Occasionally he and one of the nurses talked about it, but that wasn't who Jonas meant. "But like you said, too many people die here. You can't expect-"
"I disagree," Jonas interrupted. "Every single person on the base knew her. Every. Single. One. I love SG-1, I really do, but sometimes they can make you feel-"
"Left out?"
"Yeah."
Rob finally had something to say that didn't need thinking about. "I'm not sure I agree. I mean yes, there is some element of that because they *are* SG-1. There are so many stories that follow them. But I see so much grief in what I do, Jonas. I see how it affects people, how they become so completely wrapped up in it. Death is almost always a huge and unexpected change, and I don't think that a single one of them deliberately didn't tell you. They were just...grieving."
Wiping again at his red-rimmed eyes, Jonas seemed...well, not much different if he was going to be completely honest. But this was grief. That and bitterness often went hand in hand.
"So are you the new Chief Medical Officer?"
Surprised at the sudden change in topic, Rob answered nonetheless. "Uh...no. Well, not really. They're arranging a replacement, so I'm covering her duties until they arrive." And maybe it was just him, but it felt like there hadn't been so many injuries lately.
"Oh. I see." Jonas nodded.
Rob suspected he did.
There were two things he could do now. Head off and catch up with some paperwork or...he thought of Janet. "Do you want to get something to drink in the commissary? Maybe have something to eat if you're up to it?"
Blinking, Jonas shrugged. "Sure. Drink would be good. Thanks."
"No problem."
Jonas moved towards him, still blinking moisture out of his eyes. "Dr Warner, isn't it?" he asked, as if only just realising the man he'd been talking to the entire time was almost a complete stranger.
"Rob," he responded, stepping towards the corridor, "call me Rob."
~FINIS