He finds Sheppard about a hundred yards up the mountain, sitting on the stump of a rotted out tree, staring up at the sky, and it must be instinct, Rodney thinks, caused by a year of being on John's team, because Rodney finds himself looking up, too. He sees stars, bright against deep blackness, the white of a full moon; it's a normal night sky, one Rodney spent 34 years learning, but John's staring at it like he can see something Rodney can't. Like it's his whole world.

And at this moment maybe it is, Rodney thinks, because John doesn't even turn to look at him as Rodney approaches and Rodney's not being quiet, not trying to be, even though he can, of course, be stealthy when he has to be. Like, say, if there are Genii or Wraith anywhere within a hundred-mile radius.

Since they're on Earth, though, that's really not something that Rodney has to worry about.

Anyway. John doesn't look over at him until Rodney sits down next to him, on a rotting log that was, no doubt, attached to John's stump. Then he looks at Rodney and Rodney expects him to have one eyebrow raised. To say, "McKay? Any particular reason you're out for a moonlit stroll?"

He doesn't expect John to say his name, "Rodney," sounding strangely quiet, stilted. For him to be faced with John's carefully blank face. Nor to feel like he's intruding. To be in the position of needing to explain himself without the benefit of John's prompting, which is the reason he finds himself babbling his explanation: "The sergeant at the, at the entrance, he said that—he said he'd thought he'd seen you come this way. About half an hour ago."

As he looks at John, though, he thinks that it must have been longer, because John is almost huddled in on himself, hands cupping his elbows, resting on his knees, and he's wearing his jacket, yes, but Rodney can still see that he's shivering slightly. He looks cold, and back on Atlantis, Rodney thinks, if they'd been standing out on one of the balconies, Rodney would have reached out to John: a hand on his shoulder, an arm around his waist.

He can't do that here, though; they both agreed that they wouldn't, but he has to lace his fingers together to stop himself.

John stares at him a moment longer, gives him a quick nod—acknowledgement of Rodney's words, or possibly of Rodney's thoughts—then looks back to the stars again. He tips his head back, his eyes go wide, he parts his lips slightly, and his chilled breathing is audible to Rodney's ears.

Back in Atlantis, Rodney thinks as he watches him, he would have tried to talk John out of whatever this mood is. He would have tried to talk him back inside, and he would have started with: 'Are you trying to catch hypothermia, Colonel? Because that would, of course, set a stunning example for your men. For their commander to die of hypothermia in his very own city.'

After a year of knowing John, though, of being on his team, of being more, Rodney's learned to tell when John doesn't want to be pushed. (Which doesn't, of course, mean that he always refrains, but this is one of the nights to do so, he senses.) Instead, he just sits, pulling his own jacket just a little bit more tightly around his body, breathes. Plus, he has to admit that it does feel good, being out here like this after nearly two weeks spent either inside the mountain or inside his hotel room or in a car driving between the two.

It really does feel good. Almost like being back—

"I miss it too, you know," Rodney says after a moment, and as he says the words, he's a little surprised by how much he actually does. The two weeks they've been here have sped by, lost in a haze of crew selection and fast food and catching up on a year's worth of science that Rodney can already see is going to go terribly wrong, but suddenly that urgency is being drained away. Gone already.

He's done, ready, and now—

Now John looks over at Rodney again, his eyes still as serious as before, bright with reflected moonlight. His voice sounds cold-rough in the darkness when he says, "You know how they say you can never go home again? It's true."

He looks away again almost immediately and he sounds so— so un-John-like, broken almost, that Rodney finds himself moving towards him before he can stop himself. Pressing his knee against John's and letting it stay there for a moment, then a moment longer, despite where they are, despite the fact that they promised themselves they wouldn't do this here. He keeps his knee there until John glances back at him again, until he has the chance to say, "I'm afraid I can't agree with you on that, Maj—Colonel."

John opens his mouth to protest, maybe, but Rodney rushes on. "Why? It's not that you can't go home again, it's that 'home' has been known to move. I, personally, like to think that we'll be heading back home in two days. But maybe that's just me."

Rodney watches as John's carefully neutral expression suddenly loosens, as if it's okay for him to relax now that Rodney's admitted to it, too. He says, "No, no. Not just you." He grins briefly, a flash of teeth, and then he's looking back up to the stars.

This time, he's the one to slide towards Rodney. To press not only their knees together, but their elbows, too.