Work Text:
Omphalos
na·vel-gaz·ing
n. Slang.
Excessive introspection or concentration on a single issue.
Rodney McKay was worthless at meditation.
He could visualize his happy place just well enough to delay crippling panic, (toes clenched in the soil of a wide, open field), and frequently engaged in satisfying five-fingered fantasies. But navel-gazing in a room full of incense and tinkly bells?
Criminal waste of his time. Criminal.
He knew what there was to know about his navel, thank you. It was an annoying little black hole for sweat, grime, dust and inexplicable lint when off-world. It was politely unassuming at home. It had sustained him very nicely in utero. It had surprised him once or twice when licked by a skillful tongue, but was otherwise entirely predictable.
The natives of this ridiculous galaxy, however...
"Empty your thoughts," one admonished him as he lay glaring up at the patterned ceiling, mostly naked and wild with suppressed fidgeting. He could feel Sheppard smirking to his right.
"I am trying," Rodney bit back, "but your ... giant pointy thing is not helping."
From somewhere beyond his field of vision, Ronon snorted.
"Think of the trade agreement, Dr. McKay." And oh, yes, Teyla could talk, couldn't she. He didn't see her undergoing this humiliating, not to mention painful, rite of passage.
Still. The natives did have puddlejumpers and neither the interest nor the ability to fly them. If their team would only endure this rite and stop in to chat once in awhile, Hippie-Guru World would fork over the ships. And at the rate the Atlantis expedition was burning through the things -
"Just breathe, Rodney." Sheppard patted his hand, his voice weirdly kind. "Relax, and it'll be over before you know it."
"Open your mind," the priest intoned, and waved a sweet, pungent smoke stick over him, and god only knew what allergens he was inhaling.
"Right, right ..." Rodney screwed his eyes shut, clawing resentfully toward inner peace.
For a few moments there was silence, during which he nearly breathed himself into hyperventilation trying to contemplate the 'truth of his inner heartbeat'; then a gong sounded and he flinched as a cool gel (which he hoped like hell was antiseptic) touched his skin.
A gentle hand splayed over his belly, happy little bells tinkling in the distance. He heard Sheppard hiss through his teeth, registered cold, sharp, ow, and must have slipped into manful meditation after all, because when he blinked back in, three faces in varying shades of concern were hanging over him and the priest was gone.
"You okay, buddy?" Sheppard asked, candlelight reflected in the silver-coppery little hoops in his earlobes. "That was a damn big needle."
"I hate you so much."
He grunted miserably as Ronon pulled him up, a bull ring glimmering in his nose. 'To balance rage' they had said, and something about moving his center away from his gut.
Sheppard half-grinned, relaxing against the ceremonial table. "Hey, this is not my fault. And, y'know ... it's kinda cool. We look like pirates, McKay."
Rodney paused to take stock.
"No, you look like pirates. I look like a pole dancer." He gazed sadly down at his inflamed navel, pierced through with a sparkly blue gem - to 'balance his appetites' supposedly, and 'access his inner fire'. Sheppard wouldn't say what the earrings meant, only that he'd flatly refused their first suggested location. (Teyla, looking serenely self-satisfied, had been deemed centered.)
"One of the marine biologists has little dolphin charms for hers. If you ask nicely -"
"Yes, you're a comic genius. Meanwhile, I'm developing blood poisoning. Can we go now?" He gingerly levered himself to his feet, using Ronon as a fulcrum. "I want this removed yesterday, in a sterile environment with good drugs... amnesiacs."
Teyla frowned at him, all arch-browed disapproval. "But the presence of the gem may aid you in meditation, Rodney."
"Getting laid, not so much," Sheppard smirked, sotto voce.
"I think it's pretty," said Ronon, and shrugged when the others stared.
"Look," Rodney spat, voice muffled while he carefully tugged his shirt on. "The universe is my meditation. Equations and probabilities and theories coming together. Solutions on a whiteboard at 3am. That's my Zen. Not inner children and whalesong." He snapped on his gear with vicious little clicks, frowning at Shepherd who was watching him with a weirdly soft little smile.
"...Seriously, can we go? This damned thing is starting to itch and there's a good chance I'm allergic to," he waved a hand, vaguely. "This planet, so."
Sheppard clapped him on the back and shrugged upright, looking roguish with his be-ringed ears, the bastard. "Yeah okay, let's hit the road before they decide we need tattoos, too."
"Oh thank God," Rodney muttered, bee-lining for the door with an 'ow, ow, ow' for every step. He needed a heroic backstory. This was going to leave a permanent mark.