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whositmcwhatsit · 2 months

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Glimmers of Dawn

AN: This is a belated birthday present for one of my favourite people @ellie-24. I have been promising her a BDE fic for months and this is the beginning of one at least? As our guy once said: "I hope you like it. It doesn't make much difference."

“This is crazy! Are you sure we’re allowed?”

Steve rolled his eyes at her like he did this every day, like it was nothing. But if it was nothing, he would not have suggested it.

_______________________________________________________

Aurora had been sliding on her denim jacket at the bar, ready to go home to Johnny Carson and the dried out meatloaf that her mother had been cooking when she had ducked home after work to change. She had already given in to Joanne’s plea to stay for another round and that had left her with nothing but a numb butt from sitting perched on the bar stool while she watched her friend flirt with the tall, shaggy-haired guy at the pool table. Now the guy was draped over Jo’s back as she giggled and lined up a shot, pretending to miscue so that he could ‘correct’ her.

Aurora gave Jo a little wave to get her attention over the heavy rock playing over the tinny speakers and then thumbed towards the door, making the phone and time gestures to let her know she would call her later.

“You’re not leaving so soon?” asked one of the other guys playing pool. He was tall too, and broad shouldered but athletic looking with it and had a mustache to go with this long brown hair.

“Yeah, it’s getting late and I got things to do in the morning,” Aurora said apologetically. “It was nice meeting you though… Steve, wasn’t it?”

“I can’t talk you into one last, teeny tiny drink?” She paused, considering. The thought of the meatloaf wasn’t exactly appetizing and it wouldn’t be the first time she showed up on a Sunday morning to take her grandmother to church on a whisper of sleep. She relented, but then the bartender reminded Steve that he had called last orders ten minutes ago and no amount of wheedling or good natured threats could change his mind.

“Forget it, man!” called the guy who was currently taking a break from inspecting Jo’s tonsils. “Let’s just go up to the house.”

“Naw, you sure? The Boss-”

“Won’t even know anything about it. He ain’t come down in three days, man, in more ways ‘n’ one.”

Aurora frowned questioningly at Joanne, who shrugged back as the two men worked it out, and suddenly they were leaving the bar.

“So, where exactly are we going?” Aurora asked, as she and Steve followed Jo and Dave, his name turned out to be, into the parking lot. She could feel Steve nervously eyeing her as they watched Dave sling his arm casually around Jo’s shoulders and stick his tongue in her ear. She had already prepared a sharp elbow in the ribs in case Steve got the same idea.

“Uh, the place where I work has a pool room and a bar.”

“You work in a bar?” She was trying to figure out why he was being so cagey. Wondering if maybe he was embarrassed, but that didn’t make sense if he was going to take her there.

“No, it ain’t… It ain’t a bar.”

Even as she was climbing past the folded seat into the back of Dave’s Datsun, Aurora was having second thoughts. The cool night air had cleared her buzzing head and chased off the last of the energy powering her limbs after a full day of work. She started preparing her speech for when they got to where they were going, so she could call a cab and head home, with or without Joanne.

‘Look, it’s nothing personal’, she would say. ‘I just had a really long day.’

And then the Datsun turned right on the highway at the gates of Graceland.

“What are you-?!” Aurora gripped the headrest of the driver’s seat in front. “Are you kidding? God, I don't have time for this.”

Fooling around and trying to break into Elvis Presley’s house was for kids and tourists. If these guys thought it was going to impress her, she would be glad to correct them.

The gates opened.

“Are you sure we’re allowed?” she asked again, staring at the lights ahead and trying not to catch the eyes of the smattering of people standing outside the gates even at this hour.

Someone was sure to realise that they were not supposed to be there and they would be stopped. She wondered if the security guards really did have guns like the stories said. All sorts of crazies probably wanted to try and hurt a huge star like Elvis; there could be FBI snipers in the trees.

“It’s okay,” Steve said finally, though his tight jaw didn’t exactly make him seem convincing.

The way that Dave shushed Joanne when she was laughing and squealing with excitement about seeing inside Elvis’ house also didn’t fill Aurora with a huge amount of confidence.

It seemed deathly quiet and still as they went in the back. Aurora thought there should have been music, maybe ‘Hound Dog’ playing on a jukebox like they were stepping into one of his movies. Her aunt Phyllis would be green with envy that she was there.

The guys crowded them in so it was hard to see exactly where ‘there’ was. Muted lighting, stairs, a lot of wood, and then a… a tent?

“So, where's Elvis?!” Joanne asked, as they took in the busy pleated material sweeping out from the ceiling and draping down the walls surrounding the pool table.

It made Aurora feel like she was trapped in her bed covers. She took in a strangled breath to reassure herself that she still could. Meanwhile, Joanne bent at the waist to check under the pool table- God, how much had she had to drink?!- as if Elvis could be lying in wait under there.

“You think he'd sing ‘Don't be Cruel’ for me? That was my favorite when I was little.”

“He's probably sick of singing it,” Aurora told her, grabbing Jo's arm and shoving her sideways onto a sofa before she broke something and the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll had them in court for millions of dollars.

Their secret out in the open, the guys seemed eager to tell them about their jobs and all the dangers and intrigue it entailed. It wasn’t all fetching and carrying, they assured the girls, there were some real bad guys out there who wanted to get a shot at Elvis and they were the reason that these bad motherfuckers had never got their shot.

“You know a head honcho of the FBI said Elvis has better protection than the President,” Dave remarked, just before he potted the cue ball and swore under his breath.

“Yeah? You ever meet the President?” Joanne asked, rolling her eyes at Aurora behind her hands.

“No… No, the Boss did, though, more than one.”

“Must’ve been when you weren’t on duty,” Joanne murmured. “Seriously, where is he, your boss? Isn’t he home? He’s gotta be home if you’re here, right?”

“He likes to relax upstairs after he gets back from a tour,” Dave mumbled, racking up the pool table. “Things can get pretty intense.”

“I bet,” Joanne giggled. “All those mamas and grannies throwing their girdles at him.”

“Jo!” Aurora elbowed her and flashed an apologetic smile at the two guys.. “Sorry, a little beer on an empty stomach goes straight to her head. Can we maybe get some water?”

The guys exchanged looks again, and Steve sighed and shrugged, glancing up at a camera with a little red light on it that Aurora hadn’t noticed before.

“Sure, no problem. Follow me.” Aurora nodded and smiled, glancing back over her shoulder to watch Dave drop down into her space beside Joanne on the sofa.

“I’m sorry about Jo. She just gets over excited, she doesn’t mean nothing by it.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Steve replied as they climbed the stairs. “You hungry? They can make pretty much anything you want in the kitchen.”

Aurora followed him into a sleek, modern kitchen, all patterns and walnut. It was like walking around a maze. She had no idea where she had come from, nor where she was going, but she was vibrating with amazement that she had finally made it inside the house on the hill.

The next time she drove past on the way to the mall she would be able to imagine what was going on inside. She could think of about fifteen customers at the salon whose toes would curl with jealousy when she told them.

There were two ladies in the kitchen, their pale matching uniforms, the only plain, unpatterned material Aurora had seen in the house so far, were stark against their skin. Aurora could feel her cheeks burning, waiting for them to point out that she shouldn’t be there and call security, but they barely paid her any mind.

Imagine having people whose job it was to just sit in your kitchen waiting for you to want a snack at one am! Aurora did catch one of the ladies glancing at her, her face unreadable, but her thoughts not impossible to imagine. She knew she was out of place, there but for the grace of Steve in her cut off jean shorts and her thrift store spaghetti strap blouse, staring starry-eyed at the glimmering glass or maybe crystal in the glass-fronted cupboards as sizzling sounds started coming from the stove. She could feel herself getting smaller, tucking in her edges and minding her manners, making less of herself so that she would be less of a blight.

“Well, what do we have here?”

The voice was soft and unmistakable, whether it was on the radio, in movie theaters, or in a strange kitchen in the middle of the night.

Everyone immediately whipped around to look, but Aurora’s brain instead made her freeze on the kitchen stool. It told her that she couldn’t turn and face Elvis Presley with her mouth full. For some reason that seemed the ultimate violation.

So, she chewed and chewed the suddenly vulcanized bread as the seconds stretched into decades. Finally, when it had become too weird, she tried to force the ball of dough down her throat and ended up almost choking, swilling it down with a frantic gulp of water.

“Steve, son, if you’re gonna sneak pretty girls into my house at least don’t try and kill ‘em in my kitchen. It’s, uh, bad for business.”

A warm weight rested on her shoulder and squeezed as she looked up through watery eyes at Elvis Presley, up close in person. Her brain couldn’t take it all in at once, just fragments like the black hair, the sideburns, the gold aviator sunglasses, the smile… Even with her airway clear, Aurora was not exactly breathing.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” She watched the familiar pillowy lips move as the words filled her ears, not completely in sync. His hand on her shoulder, his cologne in her nose, it was a fully immersive experience and she had already been finding it hard enough to comprehend standing in his kitchen.

“Yeah, it went down the wrong way,” she heard someone say, and it kind of sounded like her.

“Well, honey, looking at that ugly mug over there was always gonna give you indigestion. Nothing personal, Steve, you just got that look-” He laughed a little to himself. “Liable to give this young lady heartburn or something, you know.”

Steve stood awkwardly on his other side like he was trying to gauge the mood, trying to figure out whether it was time for an explanation or an apology, and Aurora was trying to feel bad for him, but all she could feel was Elvis’ hand still on her shoulder, and the sleeve of his jacket brushing against her skin. There was pressure there, like he was leaning on her a little, and she tried to stay still when her pounding heart was telling her to try and run.

“What’s your name, darlin’?” He pulled off his sunglasses and stumbled back a little, pretending that the low lighting of the kitchen was blinding, rubbing his slightly puffy eyes, before they narrowed as they fixed on her. Then it was Aurora who felt like squinting, trying to take it all in.

“I’m Aurora,” she said. Then, for some reason she thought it might make things better somehow if she added, “You have a lovely home.” As if she was an invited guest coming over for iced tea on the porch. She was such an idiot.

“Well, thank you, Aurora. Aurora, is that right?”

Her name was a little unwieldy in his mouth, like he couldn’t quite get his tongue around it. Her face burst into flames as soon as she thought about his tongue.

Luckily, he didn’t seem to notice, seeing as he was turning to berate Steve a little more, pointing out that at least she had some manners, unlike some people.

Elvis had gray in his sideburns, Aurora noticed, as her muscles stiffened in the tense atmosphere and she was unable to look away. It made sense, he had been about her age when he first got famous, and that had been… a while. But it was still weird to think about Elvis going gray. She couldn’t picture him as an old man. In fact, the idea made her a little sad. But then the alternative would be worse.

“Child,” he intoned suddenly, interrupting whatever he had been saying to put Steve in his place, and turning back to her with a twinkle in his eye, “you have gotta lower the beams on those pretty eyes of yours, they are practically melting my face off!”

And that, more than the gray roots and the stumbling over her name, helped Aurora’s perspective click back into focus. The fancy furniture and the maids and the cooks and the Elvis-ness of him had turned her head for a while, made her feel off kilter, but she knew this dance very well..

“Well, it’s not like I can help it when you’re standing so close to me!” she retorted playfully. “You’re not made of glass you know!”

The crooked smile crept across his face like the tide coming in and she felt herself slipping beneath the waves, drowning.

“You got some nerve, honey, I’ll give you that,” he said, shaking his head. “How ‘bout you finish eating my food and I’ll give you a real tour of this old place?”

“Look, if it means so much to you, you can have the rest of the sandwich,” she said, her careful, watchful eyes belying her teasing, irreverent tone. She knew she was in dangerous territory, her mama would have hissed a warning and cuffed her across the back of the head for being so rude, but the light that glittered in his heavy lidded eyes when she gave him some sass was too enticing to ignore. She didn’t think that too many people dared to tease Elvis Presley and that made her feel a little bad for him.

In response, he gently ‘snatched’ the glass of water she was clutching and turned it until his luscious lips were in the same place hers had been, taking a sip. She somehow froze while also melting at the same time at the glittering challenge in his gaze and the faint twitch of his eyebrow. In that moment, she realized that she had vastly miscalculated how evenly matched they were in this battle.

Luckily, she was rescued by Joanne, who had found her way upstairs and came reeling slightly into the kitchen, clutching Aurora’s jacket, and mumbling that she wanted to go home. She got as far as knocking into Aurora’s back before- and Aurora was never going to let her forget it- she shrieked:

“Oh Elvis! Oh shit!”

Without context, it would have been impossible to tell whether she had caught sight of Elvis or a mouse running across the floor. What made it funnier was the complete non-reaction of Elvis himself, and the way that he locked eyes with Aurora for a long second, as if to say, ‘See what I have to deal with?’

Then he was introducing himself to Joanne, shaking her limp hand and saying he was pleased to meet her like it was all prearranged and they hadn’t effectively broken into his house in the middle of the night.

Oh Elvis, oh shit, Aurora’s brain said helpfully, Elvis Presley is a nice guy.

Sitting in his kitchen, trying to hold a loud, flailing Joanne with one arm and not failing to notice how uncomfortable Dave and Steve looked, Aurora began to feel grimy. It was one thing to take a peek at how the other half live, to get a glimpse of a rarefied existence, but it was another thing to barge in, do questionable things on the couch and make yourself a sandwich. The goldilocks giddiness had soured into shame.

“So, um,” she began as she stepped backwards over her stool like the world’s clumsiest cowgirl, “we’re really sorry for trespassing…” She still couldn’t bring herself to say his name out loud. “And we should probably get going.”

“Well now, wait a damn minute, honey, I promised you a tour, and by God, that’s what you’re gonna get!” This time, she didn’t giggle on cue.

Aurora wasn’t clever, but she was smart. She might not have read fancy long books, but she knew people and she knew men, best of all. Her mama made sure of that, because she didn’t want her to end up the same way, fooled by some good looking lying man who looked good in a fancy borrowed suit.

It occurred to her, as she watched Dave and Steve share yet another long look, that this could all be some elaborate trick. It wasn’t like she and Joanne had asked the guys to bring them to Graceland, hadn’t twisted their arms, hadn’t even known they worked there before they brought it up. And the two guys had barely debated it before they were all suddenly getting into the cars.

What if it was a set-up? What if Dave and Steve did this regularly, went out trolling for girls to bring back for their boss? What if she had walked into some weird situation straight out of the Hollywood gossip magazines?

“I have to get home,” she said, fumbling for excuses, “I gotta get up early to take my grandma to church and I have a couple of clients after that.”

“Clients?” She didn’t understand his strange tone, but she simmered under his appraising eye, and instinctively held her jacket in front of her like it could transform into a pair of baggy pants.

“She’s a hairdresser, she cuts hair,” Steve said sulkily, defensively.

It felt like there were twelve different conversations going on in fifty different languages and it was too late and Aurora was too tired to deal with it all. It had been a fun adventure, but now it was time to go home.

“Well, you know, I've been needing a haircut myself,” Elvis remarked with a strange, sly grin on his face, looking at Steve, who was irritably shuffling his feet against the carpet. “What do you say, honey?”

“Your hair looks fine,” she replied, before turning to Steve and raising her eyebrows in a silent plea.

“No, really, if it gets any longer I’ll start looking like one of those weirdo freaks this one listens to,” Elvis joked, nodding towards Dave with his Led Zeppelin t-shirt stretched tight across his chest. “Nice guys, but complete weirdos, man.”

Aurora was pretty sure that nobody was about to get Elvis Presley and the guys from Led Zeppelin mixed up, but saying so would have taken her over that line from light teasing to downright unkindness that she would never cross.

“I’m sorry, I haven’t got my kit with me and I’m so tired, I don’t think I should be trusted with scissors.”

“I’ll go start the car,” Steve said, turning towards the kitchen door.

“No! Now, hold up, man, nobody’s going nowhere ‘til I say so. S’cuse me for a minute, ladies, I think I need to have a word here with these so-called employees of mine.” Elvis’ tone was aggravated, like he was working hard to keep it even, behaving for company.

Joanne and Aurora looked at one another, shrugged, and stepped past the door that led down to the basement and found themselves in the red carpeted foyer, looking towards the front door. They listened carefully, but could only hear murmuring from back in the kitchen.

Joanne squeezed her arm and pulled a triumphant face, hissing, “Fucking Elvis, man!”

“Shh, they might hear you.” Aurora occupied herself with staring up at the chandelier, watching the way the light was reflected back on the glass walls. She couldn’t imagine living in a house that had a chandelier. She wondered if Elvis ever marveled on it since he had grown up just as poor as her, maybe even more so.

“You think he thought we were call girls?” Joanne asked, moving to lean against the staircase and resting her head on the banisters. She yawned wide enough to show the fillings

in her back teeth. “When you said ‘clients’ they all got this weird look. Maybe he wants you to cut his hair to test your story.”

“I ain’t cutting anyone’s hair, I’m dead on my feet,�� Aurora grumbled.

“Not even if he offers you a thousand dollars?”

“Well, maybe for a thousand dollars.” She sleepily contemplated what she would spend a thousand dollars on. She wondered how much a chandelier cost.

“Hell, for a thousand dollars I’d pretend to be the call girl!” They both snorted and giggled, before sighing into the still peace of the foyer.

“He looks a little different from the movies though,” Joanne observed. “He’s got… heavier.”

“Yeah,” Aurora conceded with a shrug. “Still Elvis though.” She giggled. “‘Oh Elvis! Oh Shit!’”

“Shut up!” Joanne groaned, donking her head against one of the banisters. “I bet you didn’t come out with anything deep or profound when you saw him.”

Aurora’s throat was still a little sore from where she had forced a fistful of bread through it while choking, but she kept that to herself.

Finally, Dave shuffled out to let them know they could return from exile and led them back into an empty kitchen. When he spoke, he sounded annoyed and Aurora wondered if he had got a ticking off from Elvis too. Maybe it hadn’t been a set up after all.

“C’mon.” He nodded towards a set of the stairs that curled up round a wall in the corner of the room.

“Where?” she countered.

“Look, just cut his fucking hair a little, all right? Pretend if you have to, we’ll be heading out on tour soon and he’ll have his hairdresser do it properly then anyway.”

Aurora looked at the staircase and thought about getting back into the Datsun and going home. She thought about telling the ladies at the salon about her weekend, the way they would say, ‘And what happened then?!’ And she would have to finish her surreal recount with, ‘Then I chickened out and went home.’

That would be a lame ending to the story.

And so she found herself leaning in front of Elvis Presley, examining his wet bangs as she ran them through the comb, scissors clutched in hand, standing in the most outrageously opulent bathroom she had ever seen.

“You shouldn’t wrinkle your forehead like that, you know, honey,” he observed, his breath tickling the column of her throat. “You’ll look old before your time.”

Her frown shifted from one of concentration to intense control, trying to stop herself from shivering because it felt like he was murmuring into her ear.

“My face does what it wants,” she replied finally, snipping the tiniest fragment of an inch. “I don’t have too much of a say in it. Keeps me honest, otherwise who knows what I’d be doing instead of cutting hair day and, apparently night now too.”

They had negotiated down to just trimming the bangs, and now that she was confronted with his mass of fine hair, she was grateful. Everyone knew that half the teen population back in the day had flipped their lids when they cut off Elvis’ hair in the army. Aurora didn’t want to become the target of those same women today, stronger, smarter, and old enough to own handguns.

“What would you be instead, if you could choose?” She made the mistake of looking at his face when he asked. It was a trap. Framed by dark, weary shadows, the murky blue of his eyes had all but swallowed up the pupil and it felt like they were looking at something within her, somewhere she didn’t even want to let people know existed.

“I don’t know. If you ask my memaw, there are only a few careers a girl can have with a name like mine. I picked the most respectable. There we go, all done.”

“What kind of name is Aurora anyway?” Searching, his damn eyes were searching and she couldn’t seem to distract him.

“I don’t exactly think we should be making fun of people’s names, Elvis. Especially not when some of us are holding scissors.” He snorted and laughed to himself. It sounded so young and silly that she knew it was real.

“Aurora means dawn or light. You know the Northern Lights? Those squiggly colorful lights up in the North Pole? Their real name is Aurora Borealis. And you know, Sleeping Beauty’s name was Aurora.”

It was the well worn explanation she had been trotting out since she was knee high to a cricket, not that it ever made any difference to the bemused, baffled or disdainful faces of the gangs of kids or customers at her father’s store that demanded she explain herself.

She caught sight of Elvis’ reflection studying her, but not in the way that he had been before, the way that men often studied her, appraising and pricing her up like her daddy did with cans of soup. No, this was a different kind of look.

“Dawn,” he murmured, his gaze seeming to look past her. “Sleeping…Beauty… Might be something to this…” His eyes seemed to click back into focus and he smiled at her, that crooked smirk that everyone in the world imagined in their head when someone said the name Elvis Presley. “It’s pretty, sweetheart, I was just kiddin’.”

When she followed him out of the bathroom, he mumbled, “Think fast!” And before she could even decipher his words, she was catching the tiger statue he had tossed at her. It was heavy enough it could have probably cracked her skull if she hadn’t caught it.

“Whoa, was the haircut that bad that you had to try and kill me?!”

“No, honey, it was fine, but it’s like you, you see.” She could tell something corny was coming from the silly little grin and the way he paused to laugh at himself. “It’s a roarer.” She groaned, but giggled as he laughed, his brows knitted together in a pained acknowledgement of how corny he had been.

“Woo, well, it’s lucky you’re pretty,” Aurora replied, doing what she thought was a damn fine impression of her grandma, who always said it like it was.

When Elvis snorted a little, but didn’t say anything else, she wondered if she had caught him off guard and made him a little bashful. She made a show of giving the ceramic tiger a scritch under the chin like it was a pussy cat and then went to hand it back.

“No, no,” he replied, waving his hand. “It’s yours, honey, you caught it. Them’s the rules.”

“Well, thank you… You know, it puts a whole new perspective on those folks you gave cars to. They probably belong in a circus.” He didn’t reply, just sat down on his bed and shuffled back against the pillows, picking up one of the books that lay strewn across the comforter.

Not knowing quite what she was supposed to do, she petted the tiger under her arm and started edging towards the door. If she couldn’t make a glamorous exit, she could at least minimize the awkwardness of it.

“Hey, you know…” Her eyes fixed on him as she did her little side shuffle, she saw him glance up from his book and his expression go from open to frowning. “Where you goin’?”

I thought we were… I thought you were waiting for me to leave.” He shook his head, looking slightly irritated, and then patted the bed heavily by his legs.

Aurora thought of Steve waiting downstairs and then shrugged, walking over to the bed. You didn’t ignore an Elvis for a Steve. She perched on the edge of his bed and watched as he rooted around on his nightstand, sliding on a pair of gold framed glasses and shooting her a sheepish look.

“The lightning of the Word will illumine the abysses.

New, new, new ones, beautiful ones, sensitive ones,

Exalted ones, will be assembled.

The Teacher has entrusted thee to manifest Him.” He read it like poetry or scripture and it sounded dramatic and lovely to Aurora’s ears, but then he stopped and he looked at her like she was supposed to do or say something. It was like standing at the front of the class on book report day with nothing in her hands. Her face burned all the way back to her ears.

“You ever heard anything like that before, honey?” he asked finally, his eyes back to scanning the text, leaving her to writhe in her ignorance and humiliation.

“No, I don’t think so.” She looked longingly at the black padded door standing open and then down at her tanned toes, half submerged in the thick red shag pile carpet as if her sandals weren’t even there. “I was never too good in school.”

“School,” he muttered, shaking his head. “You don’t learn nothing worth knowing in school. I mean no disrespect to the teachers, but-” He sighed loudly. “You know most people use but one percent of their brains, one percent! Just focussing on the Mickey Mouse shit, uh, workin’ and paying the bills and having a good time, coveting their fuckin’ neighbor’s whatever… Never knowing what’s really important.”

Aurora stared at him as he continued his diatribe, a little impressed at how he weaved in foulmouthed quotes from the Bible. Nobody was going to believe this was how she spent her Saturday night.

“I’ve been studying all this a long time, it takes discipline and dedication. Honey, why don’t you come on up here and get comfortable?” He gestured to the space beside him on the pillows, the space usually occupied by glamorous models and beauty queens, one of whom was beaming with fierce intensity at her from a framed picture on the dark wood unit against the wall.

“Um, can I bring Muffin?” He lifted an eyebrow and she tilted the tiger she still had tucked into her hip. “I named him Muffin.”

“Well, I was talking to Muffin anyhow, but I guess he can bring you.” He shook his head, his cheekbones brimming as he smirked and watched her shuck her sandals and clamber up gracelessly from the bottom of the bed. “You’re kinda silly.” He leant forward and gave her a lightning fast kiss on the lips, just warm and wet and gone. “I like that.”

And then he read to her, for over an hour. Sleepily leaning against the pillow, Aurora slid her finger underneath the stretchy strap of her watch as it was pressing into her skin. Her eyes caught sight of the time and she pushed herself up, feeling a little dazed and dizzy.

Having sunk back into his pillows too, Elvis was still reading, his voice barely above a whisper and he didn’t seem to notice her sitting up. Tentatively, she reached out and touched his arm and then said his name. It took him a beat or two to register the interruption.

“It’s getting really late,” she said apologetically. “I think I should go find Steve, he’s my ride home.”

“Aw, honey, he went, he’s gone.”

Aurora smiled anxiously, not sure if he was joking. “He better not be. It’s a long walk back to my house.”

“I’ll have someone take you home, don’t worry about that,” he murmured, his words slipping and sliding together.

“Well, It’s getting pretty late,” she said again.

He lowered his book and went to say something, but seemingly changed his mind. Instead, he reached over with a grunt and picked up the phone, gruffly asking who was on duty. Aurora busied herself with slipping back into her shoes and hefting Muffin back onto her hip.

Elvis put down the receiver of the red phone and climbed off the bed.

“I’d like to see you again, if that’s okay with you?” The way he said it was oddly formal and solemn, a complete contrast to the way he had teasingly beckoned her onto his bed earlier. It threw her enough that she forgot to be overwhelmed.

“Sure!” She cringed inwardly at how high pitched her voice sounded and tried to clear her throat discreetly.

“Let me take down your number and I'll call you.”

Elvis rifled through the contents of his nightstand and snatched up a pen and then, with a shrug, opened the front cover of his book.

It was about then that Aurora's brain caught up with the situation and her hand shook as she reached for the pen and scrawled ‘Aurora + Muffin’ alongside her number on the inside cover of his book. When she handed it back, he teased her by turning the book upside as he squinted at it.

“What is this, hieroglyphics?!”

And Aurora laughed goodnaturedly, even though she had been teased her whole time at school for her poor penmanship and inability to improve it. She laughed even though, as a rule, she never let anyone get away with making fun of the things she couldn’t change. Something about him defused all those defenses designed to detonate on a hair trigger.

Aurora felt Elvis follow her to the bedroom door without seeing him. It was a weird feeling, like wearing a heavy cape made of ice. She was almost afraid to check in case it all evaporated like a dream and she woke up in her pilling pink blankets and worn rosebud sheets.

The heavy, warm hand that came to rest on her shoulder was a surprise and a reassurance then, as she felt him turn her. She took a step back, since he was that much taller and they were standing so close together that she was face to face with the dip at the base of his throat, able with microscopic clarity to see the way his golden chest hair curled behind the thick gold chain he was wearing with the strange symbol that looked to her eyes like a musical note with extra parts.

“Um, sorry,” she murmured, looking away, even though he had been the one to crowd her. He smiled softly, angling his head and pressing his soft full lips against hers. She jolted, almost choking again, and saved herself by grabbing hold of him, clutching at his waist, thick but firm, with her free hand and pressing in against him. His lips were soft and lush, like no other man’s she had kissed before. They tickled and teased, and sent shivers that spread down her spine and radiated through her body.

When his tongue first brushed and then slid against hers, she let out a little whine that had him huffing a laugh and drawing back, his hand cradling her jaw.

“You sure you gotta go, baby?” he asked softly in that low, intimate voice that made her legs quiver. “We could just sleep, you know. I wouldn’t- I wouldn’t try anything.”

“I trust you,” she replied, though she wasn’t sure she did. “It’s me I don’t trust.” Which was one hundred percent true.

He pulled her in again by her chin, but she still wasn’t ready as they both exhaled in playful frustration. She nibbled on his ripe bottom lip even as she was pulling away.

Aurora made it to the outer door that led to the stairs before he called her back.

“Hey Tiger!” She let her shoulders and face slump with indignation as she realized she had answered to the silly name. “We’re going to see each other again, sweetheart.” She smiled at the previously unimaginable picture she was walking away from- Elvis Presley framed by the light in a doorway, his hair rumpled and tousled (her fault) and his mouth wet and swollen (even more her fault). “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find.”

“Sure.” Frowning a little through her smile, she nodded and turned back to the stairs. Was he talking about himself or was he talking about her? Maybe he was talking about Muffin. She hefted the tiger a little higher under her arm and clumped down the stairs, blearily opening the front door to greet the dawn.

@thatbanditqueen, @vintageshanny, @be-my-ally @lookingforrainbows, @from-memphis-with-love, @peskybedtime

#elvis presley #big daddy elvis #elvis x oc #elvis fanfic #elvis fanfiction #70s elvis #whositmcwhatsit #elvis presley fanfiction

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texasdreamer01 · 21 days

Text

Atlantis Expedition: Science Division Departments

"Many of the scientists on Atlantis are organised into departments, each with their own department head. Dr. Rodney McKay was head of the Science and Research Division which most likely meant he was in charge of all of the science departments. Dr. Radek Zelenka was also the head of his own department. The various science departments on Atlantis are:

> Physics

» Astrophysics

> Biology

» Microbiology

» Astrobiology

> Oceanography

> Botany

> Medicine

> Anthropology

(SGA: "Remnants", "Grace Under Pressure", "Suspicion")"

From <https://stargate.fandom.com/wiki/Atlantis_expedition#Departments>

---

As I'm working my way through worldbuilding headcanons on the expedition, I figured I ought to start with the science division first. Above is my starting point: the canonical information at hand, to flesh out and give it some real-world reliability.

When I looked at it again, I realized it was, to put it politely, ill-thought-out crap that was only looked upon when the writers needed some random scientist around for episode material.

So, what considerations would an expedition like this actually need to take into account when hiring people?

At the very bare bones of it is "how many people can I fit through a wormhole in twenty or twenty-five minutes, plus supplies?". I went back and forth, prevaricated for a bit, and settled on 200 people if you really want to hoof it.

(Why 20-25 minutes? It's SGC's first stable-ish wormhole to another galaxy that's powered by a ZPM. They don't even know how much of a success that would be, or if they're just shoving people into a glorified shredder. Gotta pick and choose who you're maybe putting through the billion-dollar shredder. Y'know. Just in case.)

My initial rough estimations were about an even split between scientific and military personnel, which I kept on hand as napkin math to sanity check myself. This would be approximately 150 scientists.

What departments would there be, and how would it be divided? Who makes the priorities, and why?

The canon data is a mess, and as I worked through things, canon kept getting folded and refolded into different configurations because there's two competing priorities: the IOA/SGC, and Rodney's approach to pragmatism.

What was everyone expecting to see on the other side of that wormhole? Definitely not a city ship sunk into the ground of an ocean, and definitely not isolated from others (the Athosians were an unexpected godsend that kicked off the reason to have a plot in the first place). Whatever the IOA or SGC had in mind will quickly get thrown out the window, but needs must, and the departments were likely arranged long before the shipping manifest was decided.

I poked around the uniforms, because everyone is colour-coded, and there's five sections:

> Red (civilian, leader) - Worn by Dr. Elizabeth Weir, Teyla Emmagan, Colonel Samantha Carter and Richard Woolsey.

> Blue/dark blue or purple (scientist) - Worn by Dr. Meredith Rodney McKay and Dr. Radek Zelenka.

> Yellow (medical) - Worn by Dr. Carson Beckett and Dr. Jennifer Keller.

> Black (military) - Worn by Lt. Colonel John Sheppard and Major Evan Lorne.

> Green (technician) - Worn by Chuck and Amelia Banks.

This information is listed in both the "List of Atlantis personnel" and "Atlantis expedition uniform" pages on SGCommand.

Thus far that gets me two and a half departments in my hand: Scientist, Medical, and Technician (that's the half).

What would the SGC and IOA want the expedition to prioritize? Technology, and lots of it. This means that, probably, there's going to be more engineers than you can shake a stick at, and not a lot of pure sciences. Remember, it cost money to fire up the gate, and flinging people into another galaxy is an unfathomable amount of (international, at this point) taxpayer funds. You're going to want as much applied science as possible, and as much overlap in disciplines as possible.

(Unfortunately this does leave little room for error, so anyone that dies is capable of leaving a hole in potential research.)

Therefore, how would a top-down order of technological research look like? My assumption was this:

> Engineering of the city of Atlantis itself

» ZPMs, auxiliary and/or complementary power sources

» Materials and material manufacturing

» Design specs of different technologies (jumpers, yes, but also anti-grav, shields, climate controls)

> Biological sciences

» ATA gene therapies

» Whatever the Ancients were working on regarding ascension

⇛ Helpful with the Ori once Atlantis is informed of that issue

To wit, neither addendum on the biological sciences bullet point is pertinent at the time of department formation, as Carson invented the ATA gene therapy after arriving in Atlantis, and the Ori weren't an issue for a similar reason.

Ergo, all non-biological engineering fields would have had higher billing, and thus more of them hired. The only exception would be medical, and I'm sure the SGC had the forethought to bully the IOA into its relevancy and make sure that department was as fully-stocked as they could manage.

Now what about practical considerations? Plans are nice and all, but rarely survive contact with reality, so some adjustment might be needed. This, I believe, the SGC considered, given their own history of needing to rapidly adjust on the fly.

Rodney, as Chief Science Officer (CSO), would be the one to not only make these kinds of decisions, but also to listen to the head of the expedition as to what needed to be prioritized. As the show has demonstrated, there can be a significant amount of shuffling around of employees based on the needs of a minute, and hour, a week, a month - for an indefinite amount of time? Basics are what gets the job done.

So what things would Rodney need to consider, or be directed to consider by Elizabeth?

> Oh shit this can sink

» Rodney's main work - keeping the ZPM working and get as many new ones as possible

> Oh shit everything's so far away

» Rodney's other main work - making sure the gate works as ordered

> Oh shit we're in another galaxy

» Food

⇛ Getting, keeping, preserving, maybe the occasional growing

» Utilities

⇛ Luckily they don't have to pay for it lol

⇛ But also oh shit lighting, water, sewage, air filtration, general life support

⟹ Rodney's third main work

⟹ This poor guy

» Medicine

⇛ Rodney delegates the hell out of this

⇛ Good luck making potions, guys!

» Bullets

⇛ Also other things the military needs

⇛ Fun times re-inventing the wheel I mean gunpowder

⇛ Good work for bored soldiers, and possibly also any scientist Rodney puts in time-out

» Clothes

⇛ Ha, thread

⇛ Also needles

⇛ Experiments in sewing machine making

⟹ Watch the fingers

⇛ How to replace fabric?

⇛ Off-duty clothes

⇛ Also medical clothing (scrubs for staff, patients)

» Miscellaneous

⇛ Entertainment, I guess

Internal monologue included because I think it's funny.

Anyway.

While Rodney's spending his days with Benny Hill music playing in the background trying to get all of those priorities done on top of actually delegating work and doing whatever else Elizabeth (and John) want him to do, other people actually need to have some work to get done. So what are they doing?

It depends on who already does what, frankly. So in the above combined interests (amount of people that can fit through an intergalactic wormhole, competing IOA/SGC interests, realities of living in Atlantis), I'm proposing this set-up (commentary included):

Medical Sciences Department

Head: Carson Beckett (later, Jennifer Keller, later, whomever)

Contains: Surgery, psychiatry, physical therapy

Function: Maintaining health of expedition members

Examples of function: surgeries, medical prescriptions, recuperation from injuries, mental stability

Personnel quantity: 1 (Head) + 10 (surgical team) + 5 (nurses) + 1 (psych) + 1 (phys. therapy) + 1 (anesthesiologist) = 19 total

A/N: Nurses have training in medications and physical therapy, surgical team also doubles as general practitioners.

Life Sciences Department

Head: OC

Contains: Earth biologists, bio- & biochemical engineers, astro/xeno-biologists, botany, environmental chemistry, zoology, microbiology

Function: Auxiliary to Medical Department needs

Examples of function: pharmaceutical synthesis, analysis of unknown species, biological database creation, gene therapies (pharmaceutical adjacent)

Personnel quantity: 1 (Head) + 2 (Earth biologists) + 2 (bioE & biochemE) + 1 (astro/xenobio) + 1 (botany) + 1 (envchem) + 1 (zoo) + 2 (microbio) = 11

A/N: Both biologists also have training/specialization in genetics/gene mapping (assists both Carson and Katie), some input in requesting gate missions based on in-house needs.

Field Sciences Department

Head: OC

Contains: Linguistics, historical geography, cartography, ethnography, sociology, oceanography, hydrology, atmospheric physics, planetary physics

Function: Research pool for gate teams and any assigned missions

Examples of function: Preservation of refugee cultures, scouting for trade planets, analysis of back-up sites for establishment

Personnel quantity: 1 (Head) + 3 (linguistics) + 1 (histgeo) + 1 (cart) + 1 (ethno) + 1 (socio) + 1 (oceano) + 1 (hydro) + 1 (atmophys) + 1 (planphys) = 12

A/N: SGC duplicate all shoved into one department, mostly ignored in-house but their brains are picked for background dossiers when it comes to mission planning. Linguists trained in xenolinguistics, from the SGC, can cover the various anthro fields if necessary, also various training in structural linguistics. Main scientist pulls for gate team assignments, if something critical isn't needed (i.e. Ancient technology).

Applied Sciences Department

Head: Rodney McKay (or perhaps Radek Zelenka?)

Contains: Electrical/technical engineering, nuclear physics, civil engineering, astrophysics, laser/optical, chemical engineering

Function: Study, synthesis, and adaptations of Ancient technology

Examples of function: ZPM analysis with intent to duplicate, experimental duplications of Ancient technology materials, study of gate physics and construction with intent to duplicate, study and experimental duplication of other Ancient technologies (i.e. hyperdrives, cloaks, weapons, etc)

Personnel quantity: 1 (Head) + 3 (electreng) + 6 (techeng/gate techs) + 1 (nucphys) + 1 (astrophy) + 1 (LZ/opt) + 3 (chemeng) = 16

A/N: The people Rodney are yelling at most often, because mistakes mean kablooey. Also a lot of the people running around in an emergency. 1 nuclear physicist because Rodney pulls a lot of intellectual weight, and same with the astrophysicist and laser/optical person (mostly they're there as on-paper hires and back-ups/assistants for him for his own research).

Gate Technicians

Head: ??? Joint custody

Contains: Gate technicians

Functions: Auxiliary to Applied Sciences Department, interacts with the gate and the gate only

Examples of function: dialing, searching database for addresses, maintaining mission logs and planets visited, basic repair and maintenance of the gate, technical drawings as required by others

Personnel quantity: Chuck, idk +5 for full shift overlaps = 6 total (listed in Applied Sciences department as techeng/gate techs)

A/N: Technically nerds but are active duty, probably loans from SGC (maybe also Russia because of the DHD debacle?).

Gate technicians are, although folded into the Applied Sciences department, listed separately in order to better articulate their duties (and the fact that they get the green shirts). Shout-out to @spurious for enabling the idea that gate techs would do technical drawings 😁

Sum Total of Science Division Personnel

Medical: 19

Life Sciences: 11

Field Sciences: 12

Applied Sciences: 16

Total total: 19 + 11 + 12 + 16 = 58

This isn't anywhere close to my initial estimate of 150, but I think it adequately covers all the preconceived and actual responsibilities that the science division would need to handle in the expedition. Possibly I might update these numbers as I develop this headcanon further, but that would end up in a new post.

Further elaboration on headcanons about each department will be in their own posts, with links updated here as they're posted for ease of reference.

Science Department Breakdown Posts

Medical Department (posted 14 May 2024)

#stargate #stargate atlantis #atlantis expedition #sga fandom headcanon #mine #long post

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