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helenish said a lot of very important things yesterday in her entry entitled Lube Eyes. These are KEEN SOCIOLOGICAL INSIGHTS, people. Go read them in the original.
However, for my own crafty purposes, I will here restate, freely adapt, plagiarize and embroider upon what she said, because reading her journal caused me to write a comment fic that maybe I will work on some more. And we wouldn’t want to loose track of the research. I may need footnotes later on.
To sum up the salient points:
1) Ronon Dex is very possibly a virgin, deprived of the complicated Setadan coming of age sex-ritual that he should have had because he was captured by the Wraith, and there was never enough time or enough people around for him to find three Guides, and the requisite oils or kinds of rope. He cheats though, because traveling through the galaxy alone is tough enough without still being considered a child, and he laces up the front of his pants the way that the adult Citizens did. Which he learned from watching Kell. Closely. As any soldier should watch his task-master. Nothing abnormal about that.
2) On Sateda Blue Eyed people are kind of rare and considered very beautiful and are usually not quite bright. They are trophy spouses and movie stars. Everyone Ronon knew before Atlantis called blue eyed people Ring-Eyes, because of the color of the water in the Pegasus Stargates. When Ronon first met Rodney McKay(read: saw him caught by the ankle hanging from a tree in a trap Ronon had set), his first thought was, “WOW!”. His second was the Setadan equivalent of “Oh Shit!”, because he was starting to like the Atlanteans, especially the one called Sheppard, and he recognized Rodney’s uniform, and thought to himself that if he had killed or hurt an Atlantean Ring-Eye of such beauty, they’d probably stick the wraith tracking device right back inside him.
2) a) – To this day, Ronon can’t quite take Rodney’s claims of being a genius seriously, because, hello, RING-EYE! But he likes Rodney’s wild gestures and sound of his voice when he talks, and sometimes Ronon likes to watch the way Rodney’s crooked mouth curves down at the corner when he takes it into his pretty little Ring-Eyed-head to be scared of something that’s not dangerous at all, like sunlight or food. (Really! Sunlight! Food! Rodney’s always babbling on about a flavor called citrus and lotion called SPF. How silly is that?)
3) Ronon doesn’t think too much about Rodney’s eyes, or about the fine dark hair on John’s arms and chest which makes a whispery noise against the smooth cotton of his shirt when Ronon turns his back in the locker room so that John can get undressed in decent privacy after they go running together. Ronon also doesn’t use the communal shower in the men’s locker room on Atlantis, because he can’t decide if it would be worse on the days when he and John are the only ones around, or when there is a squad of marines coming off duty all at once, and there is not enough steam in the world to conceal the way that men from the planet Earth all cut their hair so short that the backs of their necks are left all vulnerable and naked, where anyone could just bite them. Or look at them, even, because of course no one would bite them. That would be weird.
4) Ronon is possibly not a virgin, with women at least, because repeated Wraith cullings have caused Setadan society to prize reproduction. Women are encouraged to have as many babies as possible. Men, especially talented, intelligent or strong men, are encouraged to impregnate as many different women as possible, to keep the gene pool healthy. Back in the day, no one really had any hobbies on Sateda. There was too much sex that had to get done.
5) Ronon is a Citizen-Guest of Atlantis now, and he has obligations to fulfill. He trains with John, and reports to Elizabeth, and protects Ring-Eyed McKay, and every night that he doesn’t spend off world, he dutifully beds a new Atlantean woman. He’s glad that they just show up at his quarters or touch his arm in the mess hall, because he was a little shy of having to ask how they worked the schedule out. He did spend seven years Running, and he is embarrassed about forgetting some of the trappings of civilization. After all, the first night, when Ronon awkwardly crossed his wrists above his head (in what he was pretty sure was the right position) and waited for the scientist named Simpson to bind them to the bed in the knot of the Ancestors, she had flushed bright red and had pulled ineffectually at his arms. Ronon was worried that she was angry, and hurriedly started kissing her, without even asking for permission, even though his hands felt big and floppy and stupid and he was worried that he might hurt her.
6) Ronon has seen – with his very own eyes – at least four separate people in Atlantis who are clearly…well, who seem to be…who might very well be…NOT EVER GOING TO MAKE BABIES. It’s wrong is what it is. Just wrong. Every time Ronon sees those two chemists touch each other’s hands in the mess hall, (two rough male hands wrapped around each other) his throat feels tight. When he sees the botanist named Parrish looking at Major Lorne and smiling shyly, Ronon’s chest fills up with air that tastes funny, and he gets a little dizzy with rage. It’s only the scientists, of course, because any soldier who did not fulfill the duties of a Citizen would be long since dead. Sometimes he can’t help but worry though, because Rodney is a scientist too, and he might say something someday that Ronon would have to be angry about.
Of course, even though Rodney is Ring-Eyed, Ronon would turn aside from him. But he wouldn’t want to have to kill Rodney. Maybe Ronon could put his hand over Rodney’s mouth, just to shut him up, instead. He would have to be very careful to catch Rodney at the rare end of sentence, with his mouth closed. Because otherwise, Rodney might accidentally touch the center of Ronon’s palm with his tongue. Which would be disgusting in a way that makes Ronon shiver just to think about it.
7) It’s not just Setada that had a population that’s desperate for growth and new genes. In fact, the ENTIRE PEGASUS GALAXY IS OBSESSED WITH SEX.
…and that led me to the beginning of an unconscionably long comment fic, which I will eventually pull together and post here, possibly titled “Safety –Mandated Circle Jerk”.
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