(no subject)

[sgpr_fan]

 I did another fic-one that I am not sure of -it started one way and ended not the way I wanted it to

Title: What Makes a Soldier (for lack of a better title)
Rating: G
Character: Lorne, Ellis
Genre: General
Warnings: none
Disclaimer: I own nothing

Lorne does not like the commander of the Apollo. It has been a long time since someone this arrogant   has been at the SGC, let alone survived. McKay does not count since he is a civilian and despite how irritating he can be, and the fact that when he makes mistakes people are liable to die-he has the right to be arrogant. Colonel Ellis does not.

He cannot figure out why Ellis is here and by extension why the Apollo was given the mission and not the Daedalus.  Ellis and the Apollo have no loyalty to Atlantis or her people; they are there on orders and because of that Ellis’s arrogance causes him not to listen. Lorne knows from experience as any good SGC officer does, that you listen to the scientists even if you do not want to. You listen to the people with experience whoever that might be. Ellis might be career Air Force and he may have clearance to know about the Program but he is not an SG officer.  Ellis would not survive long at the SGC, at least not on an off world team-his attitude would get him and more than likely his team killed. Lorne has seen that happen enough to know that it is not impossible.

When Lorne reports to the Apollo to carry out Sheppard’s orders, his plan that for once everyone agrees is crazy, he wishes that Caldwell and the Daedalus was there instead. He knows that crew, he trusts them. He does not trust Apollo or her captain. The distain Ellis shows for everyone in Atlantis is no more obvious than when he deliberately ignored both Weir and McKay back in the city. The equivalent to that back at the SGC was doing that to Colonel Carter and Doctor Jackson and anyone who deliberately does that has a death wish and often will meet it. It is simply not done and Lorne does not understand why Ellis thinks he can get away with it.

Ellis is a stickler for regulations, apparent in the way his crew acts, and Lorne knows that if Ellis ever got any type of command in Pegasus beyond that of Apollo that people would be in danger. Pegasus is different, it is not the Milky Way and it sure as hell is not Earth. Colonel Caldwell knows this. He too is a stickler for regulations but also accepts that his way is not what is best for Atlantis let alone all of Pegasus.  Caldwell will leave the city to them, even when he thinks they are wrong because he understands that, and because he does not have the experience that those before him have. Ellis does not accept this unspoken thought or rule. He believes that everyone and everything should bend to his orders and to that of his superiors because they want them to. That might work on Earth; it does not however work in the galaxy, either with Pegasus or the Milky Way.

Caldwell, despite how he first arrived in Atlantis and his clashes with Sheppard and Weir, is more a part of Atlantis than Ellis ever will be. Lorne respects Caldwell because he knows that Caldwell respects Sheppard- does not always like him, but respects him and the same can be said for Doctor Weir. Caldwell and by extension the Daedalus and her crew, in turn have been accepted as being part of the city. They will protect her and her inhabitants, already have and with consequences to themselves but without questioning whether or not the need to help.

For that fact alone he wishes that the Daedalus was there. That in the after math and with the loss of Doctor Weir, that Caldwell and his crew  were there to protect the city and her inhabitants, because in their grief and pain and exhaustion they cannot rely on just themselves.  But they have to because they will not rely on the Apollo and her Captain-on people who do not care about them or their loss, only the fact that their plan failed simply because in Ellis mind Weir had no right to sacrifice herself to save her people and she was in fact a danger to them because of it.