Word Count: 1000

To say that Colonel John Sheppard was pissed was an understatement. He was downright furious. It wasn't bad enough that he'd been forced to stay on a boring, bug infested planet for three days with a bunch of geeks, noooo. It had to be a boring, bug infested planet with some kinda of scorpion looking thing with nasty venom. Just one of the little bastards had gotten him and that was all it had taken.

He and Sergeant Mendoza had been helping one of the geeks move a few large pieces of Ancient equipment. Apparently the scorpion-like creature had been hiding or sleeping, whatever, behind the last piece. The sucker had attacked him and within two minutes, maybe three, his left hand had swollen to about three times its normal size. Freaking thing left a hole in the back of his hand the size of a nickel!

To make matters worse, when he'd jerked his hand back to escape another sting, the geek had panicked and jumped back, bumping into John and causing him to fall and break his arm. He'd been forced to split up his team, leaving Lieutenant Phillips and Sergeant Killinger to round up the scientists, and their equipment, while he and Sergeant Pool made their way back to the 'gate. Three-quarters of the way there, Pool, who was a good four inches shorter and sixty pounds lighter, had to support most of his CO's weight. By the time they made it back, John had been sweating profusely and could barely stand.

So now, instead of enjoying his downtown playing golf, he was stuck in the infirmary. Because of the swelling, his broken arm couldn't be put into a cast yet. That, his still slightly elevated temperature and the fact that he was still on the anti-venom treatment Beckett had concocted, led to the Scottish doctor insisting that he remain in the infirmary for at least two days. Glancing at his watch, John saw that he still had twelve hours to go, give or take a few minutes.

Plenty enough time to finish plotting his revenge.

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Rodney fumed when he opened his laptop and saw that his screensaver had been changed from the hot chick on Star Trek: The Next Generation to bouncing lemons. He logged in and found that his background had been changed as well. The very cute picture of his cat had been replaced with a picture of a lemon tree. Cursing under his breath, he went in and changed the settings back. That done, he stood and made his way over to the small cooler he kept under one of the lab tables for drinks. He opened the lid and looked inside.

"Son of-a-bitch!" He yelled. All of his iced coffee drinks and sodas had been replaced with lemonade and iced tea with lemon. Frantically, he made his way to a small bin somewhat hidden at the backend of the lab were he kept his secret stash of candy bars and other assorted goodies. "No, no, no!" All of his candy bars and snack cakes had also been replaced. Instead of Hershey's bars and Snickers, he found lemon flavored power bars. His cakes and cookies had been replaced with cupcakes with lemon and orange crème filling, lemon cream cookies, pies with lemon filling, and orange and lemon lollypops.

Instantly, he knew who'd done it. There was only one man on the entire expedition who could pull it off, even being one handed at the time. Beckett had released him several hours earlier; he'd had plenty of time. Sure enough, when he looked up he saw the culprit leaning against the doorframe. Rodney watched as Sheppard stood up straight, grimacing a little and clutching his wounded arm which was resting in its sling, and entered the lab.

"What's the matter, Rodney?" He asked with mock concern, playing the innocent act very well. "I heard you yelling clear down the hall."

"Like you don't know!" Glowering at his treacherous friend, he asked, "Are you trying to kill me? What if I'd grabbed one of them and eaten it without looking at the label first? I could have had an allergic reaction and wound up in the infirmary, or worse. Or, what if I happened to be working on something very important and couldn't leave my lab, or had somehow gotten stuck in here? I could have gone into hypoglycemic shock and died!

Sheppard just shook his head and smiled. "Wouldn't have happened. You always check the label before you open anything. You're anal like that. Besides, you're over exaggerating. Again. Worse case scenario, you'd have gotten a rash."

Rodney crossed his arms, knowing but not caring that he looked very much like a petulant schoolboy. "And why does my lab smell lemony?"

"Oh, that? We have a new maintenance man, just arrived yesterday actually. I made sure to inform him of how much you love the smell of lemons. Told him make sure he used lots of that citrus scented cleaning stuff when he cleaned the labs this morning." Sheppard grinned his "cat that ate the canary" grin. Then he turned to leave the lab. When he'd reached the door, he turned back and addressed Rodney again. "Oh, by the way, next time you want to pull another stunt like that geek's paradise, bug planet again," he paused, an evil grin spreading across his face, "you might want to reconsider." That said, he whistled as he practically skipped out of the room and down the hall.

Rodney stared after him, considered plotting his revenge then changed his mind. It was one thing to piss off a military man with big guns that couldn't be used against you. It was another thing entirely to piss off a military man with combat training and who happened to be a brilliant strategist.

Knowing he'd gotten off easy compared to what Sheppard was capable of, he wisely decided to, as the saying went, leave well enough alone.

THE END