Rosencranz and Gildenstern

Fanfiction
Title:	Rosencranz and Gildenstern
Author(s):	Wintertime
Date(s):	April 2006
Length:
Genre:	gen
Fandom:	Stargate Atlantis
External Links:	online here
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

Rosencranz and Gildenstern is a Stargate Atlantis story by Wintertime.

Reactions and Reviews

Why this must be read: This is a 'what if' AU, where one slight change is made to aired canon, and the story cascades down from there. The actual mechanics of the change is done as a slow reveal, which is one of my favorite story structures. So we start with events already in progress, and have to pick up the background as the story goes along, making this part mystery and part horror, and a study in the unlikely friendship between McKay and Ford.

This was beautiful even while it hurt to read, specially McKay losing pieces of what he most valued in himself. I don't see this Ford very much, an such an unreliable narrator, I have to figure if his idea of a vengeful-unrelenting Sheppard is to be trusted.

This was quite good--plausible and told in great images (over-ripe peaches and dead meat. Sheppard rising from the sea and cutting them down, Rodney injecting himself like he would with an Epipen). The Rosencrantz & Guildenstern nod was perfect as was the Radiohead lyric.

This is just brilliant. I love my angst, and this is just great wodges of it! :) Although, it scares me as to what really happened on that planet. Plague? Are Ford and Rodney even more doomed than they think?

I've actually had little daydreams of Rodney getting addicted and joining up with Ford. The doomed partnership of it all is just too beautiful. When I read the part about the broken restraint on Rodney's wrist, all I could think of was "God, he's killed Carson" I don't know why my brain went there, but it did. Especially when Rodney says that blowing up the solar system was no longer the worst thing that he's done. I do eventually want to see them get caught. I wonder if they could ever recover, not just from the drug itself but from all the things they've done while on it.

This was rather supremely creepy -- all the descriptions of rot and decay and overripe fruit evoking the decay of these people, who and what they once were. I loved that you maintained Ford as the unreliable narrator -- the lies he knows he tells, his perceptions/misperceptions, and the things he simply can't remember. And yeah, the bit with Rodney not being able to work his equations made me bite my lip. Gorgeously dark.

This story physically hurts. I can imagine no worse ever being done to Rodney then the loss of his mind. And the image of Sheppard killing Rodney with kindness evokes such an "Of Mice and Men "feeling that is just made me cry like baby yet yearn for him to put this Rodney out of his misery as well.

Beautiful, haunting writing all around. (Your Ford is perfect too. Damaged with still a glimmer of that sweet young guy he used to be)

Thank you so much for writing this.

This was lovely -- pathetic (in how the word is supposed to be used) and dark. Rodney broken is a vivid picture, but Ford as the guide... it's his peace with his fallen state that serves as such a strong contrast.

I love this -- how McKay and Ford find reconciliation in their brokenness. It's heart-breaking, but in a lot more redemptive for Ford than the canon. I, of course, long for a happy ending, but this is a beautiful and haunting gem. I read it this morning and my mind just keeps skipping back to it. One quibble -- if an Atlantis team had been there recently, would there have been trees right in front of the gate for the kawoosh to take out (as much as I love that image)?

I never feedbacked when I read this the first time, but I just wanted to tell you that this fic really haunted me after I read it months ago, to the point that I just spent four hours searching for it to bookmark it. McKay saying, "Damage done," everything that implied. Sheppard hunting after them. This Ford POV really works for me. An amazing story that I'm doing a paltry job at expressing my appreciation for, but I did really really like it.