Episode Six- The West Pier- Chapter Six

Posted on August 22, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

Chapter Six

The medieval-styled village bears a striking resemblance to the one Ronon found and killed Kel on, well, if any of the team members had been there with Teyla and Ronon when that had happened. Without that particular point of reference, the team members can only compare it to the planet on which some of them helped Teyla track down a vendor reselling Kanaan’s necklace and other Athosian personal items while the Athosian people were missing. How familiar. Thick stone fortification everywhere beyond the thatched domiciles. Thick, tall wooden beams, the same color as the stone, providing support throughout the city walls. Colorful pennant-shaped party strings dangling from one rooftop to another, from one overhang to the next. Like the town does nothing but hold renaissance fairs all the time. A constant state of festival. The villagers, dressed as though their playing their festival parts, mill around and talk to each other. A jovial array of rich gemstone colors like sapphire, ruby, plum, and emerald in combination with neutrals like beige, cream, brown, and black. Some with hats shaped like deflated chef’s toques, some were berets, and others were caps, just to name a few of the styles.

The obvious nonconformists stand out like sore thumbs, Major Evan Lorne and his team. From what the gray-colored uniformed team can observe as they stroll through the main part of the shopping area, choosing to stop beside one of the vendors touting wares as they’d done with a few handfuls of other vendors’ booths, they’ve most likely stumbled into the typical market day for the village. And the planet’s native people as well as its visitor’s, like Lorne’s team, are enjoying nicely. The team peruses the nearby vendor more intimately as their eyes scan the crowd, aiming to spot who might be the particular villager they’re looking for from the photo material supplied to them by the Gate Team Secretary, the Gate Team Director, and his Deputies. A young man that looks rather conspicuously similar to Kelore from Colonel Sheppard’s team’s tribunal last year. Reported to be his rather aimless and somewhat shiftless younger brother named Adame. Beach bum blonde hair cut short like his prestigious big brother with heartthrob blue eyes and a rakish demeanor to match. He’s the total package of every bad boy quality that a daydreaming girl would fall for in the instant of a roguish grin and charming wink of a single eye. It’s Lorne who spies the aimless, shiftless wonder first.

“Is that our guy,” he asks his team under the covert guise of appearing to be talking about the goods.

One of his other marines, a newbie that had come through the gate the same day Lieutenant Kenmore had, named Schiff casually turns like he’s just lookin’ around. The equally as young as their suspect Atlantis officer that’s temporarily filling the vacancy on Lorne’s team while one of his men is away on paternity leave back on Earth easily spots Adame too. He turns back to his new team leader.

“Yes, Sir.”

Lorne nods, “Good.” It always good to keep the new ones on their toes and on the ball, a little extra on-the-job training.

With that Evan turns to the plump, middle-aged vendor that reminds him of the Pillsbury Doughboy with a bushy mustache whose stall they’re standing in front of, selling wooden trinkets. Evan picks up one of the more common trinkets, a small ebony jewelry box. He looks it over for a moment then holds it up to get the vendor’s attention.

“Eh, uh, how much for this?”

“We do not deal in currency here,” the vendor scolds him gruffly, “We trade.”

Evan again thinks it over for a moment then searches himself for something, anything to trade. And comes up with a few ornately carved Athosian wooden buttons made courtesy of Halling out of one of his pants pockets, never knew when those would prove handy. Lorne holds them out to the annoyed renaissance doughboy.

“Will these do,” the Major asks.

The vendor looks the small offerings over in Lorne’s semi-cupped hand… then takes them.

“For that, yes.”

“Don’t make it too hard for me there,” Evan smiles at him.

“Do you want the box or not?” The man gets testy.

The Major quickly backtracks, “No, no, I do.”

“Then do not complain.”

Lorne shrugs it off and holds up the box again. “Thanks,” he says.

Pillsbury shrugs at him and goes back to trying to beckon other potential buyers with better stuff to trade over to his stall. A lopsided smile returns to Lorne’s face as he turns away from the booth and hands Schiff the box.

“There you go, Schiff, a souvenir of your first offworld mission in the Pegasus Galaxy. Congratulations.”

Lorne, Schiff, and the rest of his team smile, laughing at their newcomer. Reed and Coughlin slap the young man on the back as Evan leads his team further down the main lane towards a reported local ‘watering hole’. As they wind their way through the mix of people, Schiff slips his thumb up under one of his lower front tactical vest pocket flaps and slides his thumb across to open it. The sound of the Velcro strips separating getting lost in din of the throng. The first-time rookie slips his hand discreetly inside the compact canvas pocket and removes a small circular device from it. While his teammates are distracted by the conversation of the approaching easy-going time over a drink until their contact arrives, Schiff plays the spy game by covertly slipping the circular device into the small ebony jewelry box. His smile broadens as his fingertips feel how perfectly the device fits in the box. He closes it and quickly slips it into his pants pocket while his other hand smoothes the vest’s pocket sealed again. Finally paying attention again to his team’s rookie, Reed wraps a muscular arm around the thin kid’s shoulder and begins grandly gesturing towards the bar still up ahead but whose interior volume can plainly be heard spilling out into the street. The team’s second-in-command starts explaining to the junior team member the wonders that are awaiting him in an alien pub.

Except Schiff’s movements weren’t quite as James Bond as he’d thought they were…

Adame Va’lar keenly watches the Lantean team’s progress through the field of habitants and sees the gate team enter the drink house. Right on cue, the young Litiran casually blends into the flow of people and makes his way over to the trinket vendor.

“Good day friend,” the once gruff-voiced vendor greets him with a voice like Pavarotti and all the smiles and good manners he hadn’t given the Lantean soldiers, overflowing with graciousness, “Surely a young man such as yourself has a fine lady to woo somewhere. May I induce you to purchase a lovely necklace for her lovely neck or perhaps a fine pair of earrings to frame her lovely face?”

His sausage-like stubby fingers hold up two dangling pendant earrings so delicately carved that the look more like they’re made out of a fine golden-brown lace rather than wood. Truly a superb specimen of craftsmanship. A fine set. Any woman would be honored to receive those… just not any woman Adame knows is worth that price. The women he knows are usually the more, well… definitely less expensive. His elder brother would say cheap.

Adame, no stranger to this tact of selling and buying, nonchalantly looks over the rest of the eager man’s wares. It’s an impressive array, but he’s interested in what he’s not seeing on the tables of the stall.

“What about those offworlders,” he questions. His fingertips indifferently brushing back and forth over the grain of a large wooden box whose ornamentation comes from the rainbow-like variety of colors it naturally grows in and has been polished to heighten the beauty of. “Did you use those lines on any of them?”

The happy vendor’s demeanor dims, turning disgruntled again.

“Them, they wanted nothing. Just waiting around to meet with a friend of theirs.”

Young Va’lar starts smiling as he continues to feign looking over the vendor’s goods, “Is this friend a woman?”

“No. A man,” the portly man harrumphs. Clearly men giving gifts to women, whether expensive or cheap, is this man’s primary clientele. Men waiting around till their friend shows up so they can get drinks at the bar is not.

“How deeply disappointing for you,” Adame muses.

“Indeed. And they talk too much.”

The playboy Litiran makes his move and puts on an act of finally make his choice of what to buy. He picks up a trinket, the smallest and least expensive of the array, and casually looks it over, “Really? About what?” He gives the simple ring meant for a dainty finger an up-close cursory look over as though to ensure to himself that he really has made up his mind about purchasing it.

“They said they wanted to pass something along to their friend. Another trade perhaps,” the disgruntled man disgustedly holds out Lorne’s buttons to show Adame, “Maybe they give their friends better trades than this. Look at these. How valuable do you think these are?” Not very if the vendor’s sneering at them is anything to go by.

Adame Va’lar looks at the small trio and notices right away the designs of the carvings as uniquely Athosian. He shrugs while tilting his head from left to right as he looks at them, pretending to gauge his appraisal of the little items.

“They look pretty enough,” the enterprising young man comments, “They might appeal to a young woman.”

“But there are only three? How useful is that? What woman do you know wears a garment that requires only three buttons?”

The women I know don’t wear anything that requires buttons of any number…“Tell you what, friend, to make up for the offworlders poor trading habits, I will take those useless buttons off your hands as well as one these,” he puts down the low-cost wooden ring and picks up one of the same carved, small, ebony jewelry boxes that Lorne had.

That gets the vendor’s attentions back to being eager and gleeful, “Oh? And what will you trade for them?”

A good question that Litiran Adame Va’lar already had an answer to before he even came over here, he reaches into his tunic pocket and pulls out a very nice looking carved wooden pendant on an equally fine leather string. It’s not of the same quality as the lacing of the earrings initially offered to him, but it’s as well an elegant example of woodcraft as anything else displayed here. He hands it over to the vendor. The man starts to look it over. Adame makes another feint to seal the deal…

“A fine lady I know of left this behind with me after she slapped my face for some…minor indiscretions,” he laughs.

The vendor smiles. As Adame had guessed, right in the wheelhouse of the man’s usual clientele.

Va’lar continues his own sale, “Perhaps you will have better luck being able to fetch a better price for it than I’ve had trying to find another fine lady to pass it on to.”

The vendor’s smile broadens. Without another word, he hands over the wooden buttons to the playboy. As Adame Va’lar takes his newly purchased goods in hand, the vendor immediately turns, holds up the newly traded pendant, and starts trying to hawk it to the nearest people. Adame smiles as he casually slips away from the vendor’s booth.

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Making New Connections

Posted on August 20, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

I’ve returned from Creation Entertainment’s Chicago Stargate Convention and as so many friends told me to do, I have finally signed up for Facebook.  So if anyone cares, you can find me there under my name Samantha Padilla, which is as unique a name combination as John Smith, so good luck everyone.  When you find me, I’ll be the Hispanic chick in a military dress uniform flanked by two uniformed Jaffa.  See, I gave you a helpful hint.  Hope to meet new readers and fellow writers alike.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Episode Six- The West Pier- Chapter Four and Chapter Five

Posted on August 10, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

(Sorry I missed posting on Friday, I’m getting ready to head to Creation’s final Stargate Convention in Chicago.  Between working two jobs and getting ready and other commitments, it’s been nuts.  So here’s a two-for-one, two chapters of the story in one blog post rather that one chapter per blog post.  Have fun reading and if anybody is going to be at the convention in Chicago, I’ll see you there!)

Chapter Four

Apparently the business of before was just the tip of the potential iceberg. The West Pier hallways are crammed with people to the point where he can’t see the walls except for when the walls height stretches over someone’s head and even then it’s only a foot or two’s glimpse before his eyes’ gaze reached the ceiling. Despite Atlantis’ considerable size and wide corridors, it’s the sheer volume of personnel allocated to this privatized section alone that rendered it cramped looking most of the time. Now it’s claustrophobic. Out of the city’s more than four hundred inhabitants, it seems like all four hundred are working right here despite the actual number being a mere twenty-five. Marty G.’s arms are once again laden, this time overflowing, with stacks of file folders and loose papers not to mention a closed laptop and a computer tablet pressed to his chest as he hurries through the flesh and blood quagmire. All the business before of people zipping from one place to the other across the hallway is gone. Replaced by people running. Up the hallway. Down the hallway. Back and forth. Every cardinal point at once. Grabbing papers from the top or inside of the file cabinetry lining the corridor. Shouting to each other from behind computers in adjacent rooms with their doors constantly propped open. Everyone working on this and running around like the future of the world depends on them… Actually, it does. He comes up to the single fan-style door, it opens at his presence.

 

 

Martin Gero fumblingly slips in sideways into the small West Pier conference room from the afternoon’s meeting. Now let alone is it packed with files and papers and everything else anyone could possibly need to conduct a meeting covering dozens of topics that needed absolute attention, it’s also packed with other personnel. Some of the hallway’s miasma has leaked in. Many of them are the assistants to the senior staff members in here already like Martin Wood, Peter’s assistant, or Ivon Bartok, Rob and Brad’s assistant. They and others zip around the background of the room, delivering things asked for from different rooms or pulled from the file cabinets in the hallway and adding to what’s already been built up for the senior staff’s quick retrieval as they’d left the Operations Center on their urgent way back to this room. Their war room.

The semi-‘round’ table is pretty much hidden from view. The mound of even more files, loose papers, opened laptops, computer tablets, and water bottles covering it indicate the overall shape of the object beneath it. Making the room’s earlier afternoon’s appearance seem downright tidy and unfettered. But that was when the city was in normal operation before a crisis hit and this is how things look when the city is in normal crisis mode. Busy bee time turns into pissed off beehive real quick and it shows.

Peter and Allan and Rob and Brad pace around the very back perimeter of the room, the sides of their bodies brushing against the wall as they continue talking on their radio links. Still getting as much extra information as they possibly can, as much real time and quick time intelligence as they can before coming to the table. As Marty unloads his armful onto the table in front of his usual spot at it, a few of his documents slip away and threaten to float down to the floor. He catches it. Joe, Paul, and Carl, seated once again in their usual chairs, try to sift their way through the quagmire in front of them. It’s hard to tell if they’re succeeding in anything or not.

“What have they got so far,” Marty asks while eying Peter, Allan, Rob, and Brad as they ignore everything and everyone around them as keep prattling on to their individual radio connections.

“Other than Joe and Paul deciding that they like this brand of bottled water,” Carl holds up one of the bottles of water on the table, a regular clear plastic bottle with no design attempt at hip and edgy looking with a light blue label with basic script on it, “over this one,” with his other hand he holds up one of the other water bottles, one with long steep angles of dark blue tinted plastic and a dark blue label with pretty white calligraphic script on it. He’d go on but he honestly believes that the looking over at the two Deputy Gate Teams Directors and telling them to shut up time has passed.

Marty’s deep blue eyes slip over to Joe and Paul.

“You guys actually debated that,” he asks, “Seriously?”

Joe and Paul nod, “Yeah.”

“You should really try that one,” Joe points to the bottle in Carl’s left hand, the basically styled one, “It’s so much better than the other one.”

Martin looks at the two bottles incredulously, he knows his friend is a major foodie, but, “Water is water. There isn’t a difference.”

“Oh, there is a difference,” Paul defends his compatriot, “That one,” he points at the right hand stylized bottle, “tastes really purified—“

“Maybe that’s because it’s purified water,” Carl grumbles sarcastically.

“It’s too purified tasting though,” Paul explains to him, “and that one,” he points at the left hand one, “just tastes really… fresh.” He sounded relieved as he said the word.

Joe agrees whole-heartedly, “He’s right. Go ahead. Try them for yourself.”

He hands one of each of the brands of the spare bottles on the tabletop over to the young Gate Team Secretary and Science Department Liaison. Martin Gero takes the first one, opens it, and takes a sip. Always taught to be polite, he gives the tasting a chance and processes how he likes the taste of the water, swishing it around his mouth a little bit not unlike a wine connoisseur sampling a barrel at a winery or a glass at a restaurant. Then closes that bottle and picks up the other. Again he opens it, takes a sip, and—makes a face. Oh… Oh God… He forces himself to swallow the liquid down in lieu of not having any vessel handy enough to spit it out in and quickly caps the bottle while nodding at Joe and Paul, who’re already nodding.

“You’re right,” Marty accedes. The young man hurriedly opts for a second swig from the first and better, to him, brand.

Paul turns with a smile to Carl, “See.”

Joe seconds, “See.”

As Marty caps his preferred bottle, Carl can’t believe this. He looks away from the three of them and mumbles to himself, “This cannot be happening right now,” he pulls himself away from his personal aside with a roll of his eyes and adds, “They also put in their orders for dinner.”

“I also radioed Akemi and told her I wouldn’t be able to make our dinner date tonight,” Joe adds.

Carl’s head falls back and a frustrated sigh escapes his open mouth, “Really? This is happening. It’s mindboggling that the Wraith haven’t eaten us yet.”

The other three look at him. There was no need for that. But there’s also a healthy dose of suitably censured on their faces. It was an innocent discussion about the merits of certain brands of water that the city gets over others, what’s the problem with that? And the problem is is that at a time like this, this is what they’re choosing to discuss? Really? They concede to Carl’s main point, but, yes, this is what they do during crises like this; the mundane helps.

Carl’s head lifts back up, “Getting back to your original question, we have the basics so far. The bare minimum.”

“Really,” Marty asks disbelievingly.

Oh for the love of… Carl looks away from him and mouths the words silently ‘Please shoot me’. It’s been half an hour of this, hasn’t he suffered enough? Even being fed on by the Wraith taking their sweet time with their meal would have been over by now.

Joe takes a swig of water from his preferred brand and fills in Marty, “Two of the planets are uninhabited with one having both flora and fauna on it and the other having just flora on it.”

Marty finally takes his seat as Paul joins in the conversation, “The other three have the trifecta of being inhabited by humans as well as having flora and fauna on them.”

“Who’s on those planets,” Gate Teams Director Carl Binder and among the eldest of the staff asks. Grateful that the mind numbing Hell of water bottle drinking is over and moving on to things that in his opinion is, oh what are the words he’s looking for, genuinely important.

Rather timely, Peter and Allan break off their individual radio conversations and come back over to the table; Allan sits down while Peter remains standing and opens up his own bottle of water regardless of whatever the brand was, water is water.

“P1W-001 has people who’ve taken in a group of Hoffan plague survivors and on M1W-001 there’s a village of Wraith worshippers,” Peter announces before taking a swig.

“Wraith worshippers? Do we really think this could be something they’ve done,” Gero asks. It sounded unlikely that it’d be them regardless of this afternoon’s reports of the worshippers starting to take terrorist actions in the galaxy.

Allan McCullough keeps tapping away on his laptop, absolutely zoned in on its screen, as he covers the answer to Gero’s questions, “No. The Wraith go around destroying people who’re even remotely technologically advanced like the Satedans or the Hoffans or the Genii or even us for that matter, why would they let anyone no matter how dedicated they seem to be to them be as advanced enough to tinker with the Stargates themselves?”

There’s silence as eyes flit to Allan. The Deputy Chief of Staff presses on, still zeroed intently on his computer screen and oblivious to whatever misgivings or discomfort the others around him are going through at his words. Considering they’re his favorite things to look for, he considers it to be his personal job to point out the twists, the angles. God, he loves those things. While continuing to tap-tap-tap on the sleekly designed black and silver keyboard, “The Wraith managed to break Ronon and turn him into a worshipper and look how long that lasted for them.”

There’s a moment of troubled silence as everyone processes what he’s just said so glibly. Furrowed brows abound, coupled with tightened jawlines with flexing cheek muscles. The cheeks flexing with the mouths beneath them trying to form words or working the sudden anxiety unsuccessfully away. While Allan’s other remarks were going to fester in the first place, that last one is in your face personal history for the entire city. It had scared the crap out of everyone when Ronon had been brought back from that mission to rescue him unconscious and looking like crap. The whispers were immediate that the Wraith had done it to him, brutally tortured him although the guesses at what brutal torture at the hands of the Wraith actually was, until the reality of his teammates’ reports slipped out to the public. It was always hard keeping something that ‘Oh my God’ under wraps no matter how hard they tried to, even under the sort of lockdown treatment they’d given other definitely divisive mission files like that one most assuredly was. Even the whereabouts of the semi-recent mission that had returned them to the Pegasus, the one Woolsey designated, following in Doctor Elizabeth Weir’s footsteps of giving nicknames to mission files, ‘Extinction’ was kept in the most secured lockdown possible in the city.

And so the rumors of brutal Wraith torture went from whispers to outright conversations about the truth in semi-secluded parts of the city and the Mess Hall when people realized that Ronon was brought back unconscious because Teyla had had to stun him three times in order to get him to stop killing one of his oldest and dearest Satedan friends. The rest of his team and Major Lorne came back through the gate with two of Lorne’s men dragging Ronon between the two of them without that Satedan friend, Tyre had stayed behind to raze the Wraith facility that had held Ronon. A final act of devoted and repenting friendship and loyalty. Matters didn’t get any better when nursing staff started talking amongst themselves, and of course were over heard by other Expedition members, about how his horrific detox was making him look so frighteningly sickly. Not that he’d looked fantastic before the detoxing. And, of course, how his detoxing was in fact due to Wraith chemical abuse.

That’s the torture. They’d fed on him to the brink of death then pumped all of the life they had taken from him back in… then fed on him almost to death again then rejuvenated him again. Over and over in a sick loop via the chemical they inject into their victims that enables the victims to endure the feeding process for as long as the Wraith want them to. Chemical abuse. Bouncing back and forth from death to life. All of it to control him. They’d made him one of their own. They had broken Ronon Dex and made him one of their followers. A Wraith worshipper.

Damn, it’d shaken everyone in the city and outside of it. The orders, unknown to the public but known to every man in this room and Richard Woolsey, had come quickly from Earth: if the Ronon they knew could not be recovered from this, then they were supposed to kill him. Kill Ronon Dex. It still wracks their consciences. The fact that Jack O’Neill himself had delivered the orders to them over private signal hadn’t been any relief either. If only the others knew…

In the uncomfortable silence Rob and Brad break off their individual radio conversations and return to the table as well. Both of them sit down.

“PWW-014 and M1W-001 both have previous reports of Genii activity,” Rob reports.

Allan scoffs. Finally stopping his typing and looking over at his bosses, “I think you’ve got bad info on that one.”

Rob shakes his head. He wishes Allan were true.

Peter backs up his fellow Deputy of Chief of Staff, “Seriously, Allan’s right. M1W-001 has Wraith worshippers on it. We already found that out half an hour ago. It was one of the easiest planets to look up on the Ancient database.”

Rob nods. This is why he wishes they were true, “And now it probably has Genii on it too.” The implications can only mean bad things.

Everyone sighs and rolls their eyes. Great, that’s all they needed. The Wraith’s minions getting feistier and the Genii right in there poking the hornet’s nest with a stick. The only thing that’s missing was a little fate kid nicknamed Piggy wearing glasses and they were all set. Great. Peter takes his seat at last as well.

“How can that possibly be,” Joe’s mind struggles to grasp what’s been said, “The two sides hate each other. They’re the complete antithesis of each other.”

Brad leans back in his white swiveling IKEA desk chair, “The Genii are picking the lesser of two evils in their opinion.” It’s a guess but an educated one given their experiences with them over the years and it doesn’t sound good to anyone.

Marty looks at Brad and Rob, “So the Genii are trying to become power brokers? That sounds ridiculous. They’ve sucked at everything else so far, like this is going to turn out any different for them? It’s like smacking your head against a brick wall then wondering how your forehead got bloody then smacking your head against the wall again and wondering the same thing. Eventually shouldn’t you get the hint that it’s smacking your head against the wall that’s making you bleed?”

Succinct in metaphors as always. But…

“They aren’t trying, the Genii are power brokers,” Joe Mallozzi corrects him, “They started out trying to be the most powerful people in the Pegasus with their nuclear bombs built like crap. But we show up with all of our advanced technology and Atlantis and its Ancient technology and blow that part of their plan for galactic domination to Hell. Then they try their hands at behind-the-scenes political intrigue power brokering ala the Tok’ra. First by trying to interfere with Queen Harmony assuming the throne of her planet, which Colonel Sheppard and Doctor McKay but a thorough stop to with Queen Harmony’s help, then with nudging the Pegasus’ newly formed Coalition of Planets into putting us and specifically Colonel Sheppard’s team on trial for basically showing up in this galaxy period, not to mention rigging Kelore’s vote to go against us on said tribunal, which Dick so handily took care of.

“What do they have to lose now? It’s not like the Genii weren’t interested in Ancient technology already. They put out a bounty on a lot of our ATA field people for their Ancient DNA before. And if they could get the blame put on a group of Wraith worshippers or us, then why not mess with the Stargates? How do they lose in that situation? It’s actually perfect for them. Right up their alley.”

Paul runs with his fellow Deputy Gate Team Director’s ball, “Likewise with that reasoning, the Wraith could have worshippers doing this knowing full well that if the worshippers fail, then the Wraith know the worshippers will take their own lives rather than be taken alive or under the misguided delusion that it would be better to hari-kari themselves rather than own up to the disapproval of their masters. And think about this, if the Wraith worshippers succeed, then the Wraith know they’ll kill the worshippers as soon as they return to their hive as a means of tying up loose ends and the worshippers will live under the continuing delusion that they’ll be rewarded when they return to their masters. It’s a win-win for the Wraith.”

The group, except Marty who looks like he’s intensely off in his own personal la-la-land, nods. Seeing the validity of the two opinions.

Peter points at Paul as a further visual aide to his nodding and understanding, “Now that sounds like the Wraith.”

Everyone, again except for Marty still so intensely focused on some unseen distance beyond the obscured table top in front of him, nods again.

Then Martin Gero finally comes out of his concentrated stupor with his thinking’s conclusion, “What if the Genii or the worshippers, and consequently the Wraith, are messing with the Stargates as a means of blaming it on Atlantis?”

He’s met with silence. They hadn’t thought of that yet. With the way they bounce ideas off of each other, it was only a matter of time before the thought would come up, but not this soon in the conversation. He has their rapt attention as he goes on with it.

“It’s not like Atlantis hasn’t been responsible for something like this before. Remember Janus’ Attero device, it killed thousands and Atlantis got the wrap for it by basically everyone. Todd took over the Daedalus because of it and even the Travelers sent someone to yell at us for it.”

Yet another uncomfortable and valid point… Aw crap. It’s looking from a lot more angles than before that Atlantis is going to get the bad rap for this. Someway, somehow, chickens are going to come here to roost and this isn’t even the damn birds’ home! Brad swivels his chair to look at the members of staff sitting behind laptops: Marty, Carl, and Allan.

“What does the Ancient database have on the planets and moon?” Chief of Staff Bradley Wright asks. Even he can hear the sigh in his voice, he’d tried to fight to not let it out of his mouth. Not let his frustrated irritation show… So much for that.

Joe doesn’t hesitate to be the first one to speak regardless of no computer in front of him, “According to the database, the planet we’ve designated P1W-001 has an environment not unlike the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico with a climate to match. The people dress for the hot weather too. They are recorded as being kind and benevolent like the Athosians. Their leader is a man, or was a man named Nahotl, who is, was, both the political and spiritual leader of his people. He led them in prayers to the sun every morning and to the moon every evening.”

“Why’d you hit on the sun and moon thing,” his boss wonders.

“After the Ancients abandoned the Pegasus, the Chuacans turned their reverence for them to the sun and because the Wraith took over after the Ancients left, they also pray to them when it comes to the moon.”

Everyone startles at this.

Allan asks the question, “Does that mean that these people are Wraith worshippers too?”

Paul shakes his head and comes up with the quick recovery, “As far as we’ve been able to gather, praying to both the Ancients and the Wraith is simply a way for them to include what’s going on politically in the galaxy with their nature worship. Nothing more. They don’t actually worship the Wraith, the just use them as an effective analogy.”

Brad nods. Okay, that sounds reasonable. Acceptable. “Anything else?”

Marty G. pipes up, “That’s one of the things our team there is supposed to be getting better information on, whether or not they’re Wraith worshippers, while they’re checking on how the plague survivors are doing and also whether or not the natives need assistance in supplies to help them cope with the survivors being added to their population.”

Brad and Rob nod. Even more reasonable and acceptable.

“What else,” Rob asks.

Joe picks up an opened file in front of him and begins reading from it aloud, continuing with what information on the planets has been recovered from the Ancient database.

“According to the Ancients, the people of M1W-001 have been on the Wraith’s side ever since the war first started. They’ve modeled their society after the Wraith’s, i.e. women dominate the households with one woman in charge of the whole society while the men have a hierarchy of leadership with a few acting like Wraith Commanders on behalf of the women and the rest of the men wearing masks and doing the hard labor like Wraith Drones. In acknowledgement of the potential for hubris in the eyes of the Wraith, the Commanders are simply referred to as Males and the mask wearers are known as Slaves and the women are known as Heirs with the chief woman referred to as the Sovereign. Another hat tip to the Wraith, the women mate and breed with the Slaves solely. With the Sovereign taking the best specimen of the Slaves for herself as well as some of the Males. Think Darwinism with a mix of the best and brightest.

“These people even go so far as to be primarily nocturnal in order to have pale skin and white hair which everyone grows long and keeps straight. Even the women do this, again not to show hubris by way of individual appearance like the Wraith Queens have. They all wear long, dark leather robes except the Slaves, who wear black leather trousers with no shirts. Also in keeping with their aspirations to be Wraith, the people eat primarily meat with little fruits or vegetables or anything else.” He tosses the file back onto the table and looks up at the rest of them.

He finds everyone is staring at him. Slack jaws and dumbfounded expressions. For a moment, Joe’s taken aback at what he’s seeing.

“Wow,” floored, Peter says it all, “The, the, the Ancients were really interested in these people.”

Paul Mullie agrees, nodding sagely, “As far as we can tell from the database, these people, who’ve never given their race a name by the way, they’re waiting for the Wraith to give them one, were the first humans in the Pegasus to side with the Wraith. They literally are the original Wraith worshippers. The very first ones.”

Ka-boom. Every mind in the room is blown. Peter whistles loud and long. Whole new ballgame on that planet, whole new ballgame in this situation now. Their glance over of the planet’s general information had been enough to warrant a cursory investigation by a gate team. Apparently they should have looked at the inhabitant’s information in the Ancient Database as well. Apparently asking for a gate team to be sent there and check them out wasn’t such a good idea. They should have sent a more specialized team in a cloaked jumper or even the Daedalus itself to set up shop in the planet’s orbit and check out the place before they ever thought of letting a gate team set foot on that place. Covert ops specialties of that team aside.

Allan fights the urge to say what W.T.F. actually stands for out loud and instead goes with the far more pertinent, although W.T.F sounds pretty damn pertinent to the situation right now too, but…, “Would the Wraith consider using these worshippers for a move like this since these people have been so devoted to them for so long?”

Paul shrugs, “It’s plausible,” he concedes. In fact he’d been thinking the same thing ever since he’d found the information in the Ancient database. He, Joe, and Marty really dropped the ball on that one. A gate team never should have been sent there, not even a MALP. A ship would have been way better. Way safer. But hindsight is twenty/twenty and doesn’t due a damn bit of good at the moment. Later, yes, but now, no.

“That’s why we sent a team to the moon in the first place,” Martin’s voice comes into the fray soberly and softly, “They’re doing covert surveillance and intelligence gathering. We even got permission for four modified Sodan cloaking devices for this specific reason. Colonel Carter brought them when she came here to pick up Doctor Jackson.” Like Paul had been thinking, covert ops specialties aside…

Okay, let’s head from bad to either really bad or not exactly the worst of the three. Rob asks with a heavy tone, “And what about the last world?”

This time it’s Carl’s turn to speak, he’s been unusually quiet. He reads from his laptop’s screen, “PWW-014 is a human village, somewhat medieval, with numerous large farms outlying the area. Other than that there’s nothing more to tell.” He leans back in his chair, holding a water bottle in his hand.

Rob breathes a sigh of relief. That one’s honestly the best news of all.

Marty G. lifts up one of the files he’d brought in with him, opens it, and starts reading from the top sheet, “We’ve received reports from other worlds who are mutually friendly with us as well as these people that the Genii are starting to bully the planet’s farmers just like they’ve been doing on other worlds. So we sent in a team as a good will gesture to let the farmers know that Atlantis has their backs when it comes to taking on the Genii without us expecting anything from them in return.”

Carl suddenly scoffs. The rest of the staff look at him.

“What’s that for,” Allan asks.

“Oh nothing,” Carl’s lidded frustrations start building up, “We’re just lying to them when we tell them we don’t expect anything from them in return.”

Rob rolls his eyes. “Here we go,” he mutters under his breath.

Carl hears him and that sets him immediately into feisty defensive mode. Like the sharply exploding firecracker intense situations can push him to be.

“What, Robert,” Carl snaps at his boss.

“It is not lying, Carl. We really don’t expect anything from these people in return for protecting them from the Genii.”

Pop!

“Yes we do, Robert,” Carl yells, “We expect them to be on our side when it comes to the Genii in return for us protecting them from the Genii in the first place even though we don’t need these people for anything!”

Marty can’t help reminding Carl, granted timidly like a gazelle easing cautiously away from the pride of lionesses crouching in the savannah grass, “Goodness of our hearts.”

The firecracker can’t be defused until all of its fuel’s been spent.

“‘Goodness of our hearts’,” Carl mocks sardonically and looks like he wants to pitch his water bottle against the wall like a stress ball, “How did the ‘goodness of our hearts’ do for Colonel Sheppard and his team at that trial, huh? How has it done for us ever since we came to this God forsaken galaxy!”

An uncomfortable shush descends over the room. It usually did when Carl Binder blew his top. There were commonly two emotions coursing through the room as eyes looked to one another but not for long: fear, was it possible to speak or move without Carl jumping all over them, or patience, is Carl done yet or not? Either way everyone used it as some moments to gather their nerves. The answer to that last emotional possibility was always answered by how long the quiet goes on.

Brad changes the subject to prevent another string of snaps, crackles, and pops from the human firecracker, “Do we have anything specific about the gate failures themselves?”

Peter shakes his head, his eyes distinctly ignoring Carl, and delivers the bad news, “Radek and the others are working on it, but they should be contacting us with their findings any moment now. Radek believed it should be a simple enough process to sort through given how many of them are working on it.”

Robert turns his chair to their science liaison, “Marty, why don’t you go down to Radek’s lab and see if you can get them to hurry it up a bit.”

Marty nods and starts getting out of his seat when Radek’s voice comes over Rob’s earpiece, “Doctor Zelenka to Mister Cooper.”

Marty freezes in mid-rise. His eyes lock with Rob’s. All eyes focus in on Chief of Staff Robert Cooper as he reaches up and taps his earpiece, “Rob, here Radek. What’ve ya’ got?”

 

Chapter Five

Truth is that during times like this, Richard Woolsey doesn’t know exactly what to do with himself. Well, that’s not really true. He knows exactly what to do. This is a big city with a lot more problems than five Stargates in the network suddenly going dark via some ulterior purpose. There are gate teams offworld, a few of them possibly facing hostile problems…not to mention the problems that have arisen between Atlantis and Earth that he found about only a few hours ago. Dick looks over at his open and operating laptop on his desk. On its sleek streamlined screen are numerous windows of files he’s opened and each and every one are documents from the I.O.A. to him about their issues with his leadership, documents he admits that he’s been trying to ignore.

Their issues with Atlantis’ leadership aren’t anything new, the International Oversight Advisory always had countless issues with the leadership of whoever was in charge Atlantis since the Expedition was first thought of. Richard knew that all too well considering he’d written well more than his fair share of those issue reports before he became the city’s leader, but these are different reports. Usually the I.O.A. members didn’t know the Expedition’s leader personally. Of course there had been Doctor Elizabeth Weir who had been introduced to the Stargate Program through the I.O.A as one of the Advisory’s personnel by one of its then Very Important People, Vice President Robert Kinsey. Granted her introduction was via a power grab from the then Vice President, Mister Kinsey, Richard remembers sourly, had unceremoniously and behind everyone’s backs in the most complete and truest representation of the phrase ‘stabbed in the back’ removed the much beloved and definitely settled General George S. Hammond from command of the Stargate Program and installed Doctor Weir. Her reception had been frosty during the imminent crisis of Anubis attacking the Antarctica outpost looking for the powerful control chair the Ancients had left behind there in his bid to destroy or dominate Earth and its population.

Honestly, it was never viewed as a good move by anyone, not even by the rest of the I.O.A and Doctor Weir herself. The only people who approved of it were Kinsey himself, of course, the hyper-ambitious man would either kiss a baby or shoot it depending on what he perceived to be as the sway of the crowd, and his cronies, the underground illegal and illicit organization that referred to itself simply as the Trust. A privately owned organization of CEOs etcetera that fit perfectly well with Mister Kinsey, power mongering, ruthless, looking out only for themselves and let everyone else go to Hell under the wonderful guise of political patriotism… and whose machinations ultimately ended in Kinsey’s body being taken over by a Goa’uld symbiot. The man’s hideous personality suppressed by an even more hideous personality. He ultimately faced an end that not even he had imagined happening to him… like Elizabeth. One of the most civilian members of the Expedition and the least involved in firefights and exploration, much to her personal objections, had sacrificed herself to the enemy in order to save the lives of the people she commanded. Now that’s real patriotism. No politics, no guise, merely the truest sense of the phrase. Its purest embodiment…

Dick sighs heavily and scans the opening lines of each document. His eyes catch random words, ‘disappointed’… ‘ignorance’… ‘dereliction’, it goes on and on and his brain processes the words’ overall blatancy. He can’t hide in the city any longer. As it stands right now, both of the Expedition’s previous leaders had been on more field missions and had made more face-to-face First Contacts than Richard has. Albeit their tenures, Elizabeth with three years and Colonel Carter with one very eventful year, were… well, he couldn’t exactly say that Colonel Carter’s was longer than his, but… he sighs again. Takes off his glasses and lays them on the desk top beside him and rubs his eyes. The fact of the matter is that—

“Mister Woolsey,” Doctor Radek Zelenka’s thickly accented voice comes over his earpiece.

Richard slips his glasses back on then taps the tiny radio device wrapped around his ear, “Yes, Radek?”

“We have something, Sir.”

“I’ll be right there.”

As his laptop goes to its screensaver of a spinning and rotating Atlantis Expedition logo, Richard Woolsey hurries out of his office.

 

 

Radek’s seated at his work station in his lab with Rob and Brad waiting off to one side of him, standing in front of long wheeled steel table topped with computer screens. Unlike Rodney’s twice as large personal lab, the room’s well lit. Clear light from the ceiling fills the room. Small potted ferns play sentinel on either side of the two doors of the room. Woolsey rushes in through the primary door, his wake rustling the right side fern’s fronds harshly. His eyes fixing instantly on Radek.

“What have you discovered,” he asks while still entering the computer filled room.

Radek says nothing. Instead he turns his chair towards Rob and Brad, deferring to them. Woolsey’s eyes divert too and Robert steps forward.

“Doctor Zelenka and his team traced the pattern of gate failures back to what they are referring to as Gate Zero on the planet designated PWW-014. They further traced the gate infringement back to a test form of a computer virus. Many of the science team as well as Doctor Zelenka recognized the style of coding being used.” Chief of Staff Cooper pauses to make sure the information sinks in as well as for a bit of a brace. “Richard, it was a test run by the Genii on a way of taking control of the entire Pegasus Stargate Network that has resulted in the stranding of three gate teams, two of which are on hostile worlds featuring Wraith worshippers and possibly the Genii themselves.”

Richard continues to absorb the information as Bradley steps forward. Coming up beside fellow Chief of Staff.

“Dick, this was a pre-emptive attack and the main assault is truly going to be a main assault of a magnitude the likes of which this galaxy has only ever known once before… with Janus’ Attero device.”

Richard’s numb eyes travel from the unknown distance the news had taken them to back to Bradley and Robert alone. Suddenly the whole world narrowed down to these two men.

“Sir,” Chief of Staff Wright addresses him formally, something he almost never did, “we have to come up with a proportional and military response.”

Richard stares at him. Brad knew he would, the Chief of Staff’s been doing this job long enough that he can read that expression, that daze of what’s simply referred to as The Burden of Command on any leader’s face no matter what their gender is. It’s the look of not sure what to do and thinking that possibly they’re so far out of their depth they can’t even see the sunlight refracting on the surface anymore. So deep in the dark. Rob sees it too and from his five years of experience as one of the two Chiefs of Staff for the Atlantis Expedition Commander, he knows exactly what to say next.

“Sir,” formality again, “the requisite staff members are already assembling in the main briefing room. We’re prepping it as a War Room now.” Prompt his commander to action.

Woolsey starts nodding, still a little dazed but the fog seems to be lifting, “Good…  That’s good to know.”

*                      *                      *

Late afternoon brings even more intense sunshine to the planet and Atlantis. The Ancient city-ship’s steel gray seems to be an even darker tone and its towers gleam in the sunlight like polished silver. There’ll be migraines for some personnel in those areas, all the reflected light making them squint. The windows, glittering like amber topaz, citrine, crystal, and smoky quartz, are dazzling but can be tolerated only for so long before their beauty is literally painful.

 

 

No one’s squinting in Atlantis’ main briefing room. There are no windows here except for the series of fan doors that are the only way into and out of the small secluded room just off of the Gateroom area. Representing the West Pier staff, Rob and Brad, as well as Colonel Steven Caldwell, Commander of the Daedalus, and Major Evan Lorne, Colonel Sheppard’s stand-in as the primary gate team leader for military situations like this whenever Sheppard’s team is offworld, along with Richard Woolsey and Radek Zelenka are assembled around the long, rectangular, mahogany briefing table. The overhead triangular, inset ceiling lights and the sconces dotting the perimeter of the room spotlight the close quarters and the men, giving it the vibe of a location where shady deals and conspiracies are made and talked of.

Numerous monitors and computers line the back and side walls of the room. Their LCD displays showing countless images of the illicit computer code, the sector of Pegasus space that has pockets of sudden non-communication, and simulations running on a loop of how the code had successful done exactly what it was supposed to do. Robert Cooper, Bradley Wright, and Radek Zelenka have their laptops opened in front of them with files uploaded from the Ancient database on the screens. Already so much has happened in so little time.

“Do we know for sure that it’s the Genii and not the Wraith or any of their worshippers,” Caldwell asks. His deep voice adding to his rigid military presence and making the man come across as abrasive and off-putting, someone not to be messed around with. A demeanor that has always caused problems with many members of this Expedition.

“We know for sure it is the Genii. The Wraith do not use code such as this and we highly doubt that they would allow any of their worshippers the ability to do any of this either,” Radek confirms, not for the first time since he and his team made the discovery.

But Steven Caldwell needs more than just Radek’s good word, “I’m not so sure about that. I seriously doubt that these particular worshippers have been around so long if they weren’t smart or have proven themselves exceptionally loyal and trustworthy to their masters.”

Radek doesn’t waiver in the face of the stern Colonel, “I am certain. It is the Genii. It is the same coding that they use for detonating their nuclear bombs. It has not changed since the last time we worked with them.”

“You’re making my case for me, Doctor,” Caldwell points out, “I highly doubt that the Genii under Ladon Radim’s rule would not have changed their computer coding since giving us that exact same code. It’s not as though we’re the friendliest of elastic alliances with each other and their nuclear bombs were a failure. If the Genii managed to figure out a way to get another one of them, and might I point out that we’re not the only space-faring culture in this galaxy,” an unspoken finger point at the Travelers, maybe not Larrin’s faction, but the Travelers nonetheless, “it wouldn’t be that hard for the Wraith to capture that device especially if it’s a dud and examine it to see who it belonged to.” Worse than his irascible sounding voice and intimidating nature, everything he’s said is completely plausible thus rendering it valid.

“They have not changed their coding because they simply do not have that option. They are not as advanced as we are. It is only because of their struggling for several generations that they attained even the one form of computer coding and that was with the aid of a Wraith computer component. When all of the Wraith awoke, there was neither the time nor the ability through manpower to create new coding even with our help in finishing their first bombs. And, I might also point out, we have never heard reports of the Wraith capturing any of the Genii’s nuclear bombs or of the Genii attempting to deploy more without our involvement,” the Czech scientist objects.

“Yeah, because both the Wraith and the Genii would be so forthcoming about that information if it has happened.”

There’s an uncomfortable pause. More thoughts that will fester in their minds. Caldwell’s gruff and blunt manner’s ruffled feathers again. He can’t help it, it’s the military in him and, aside from Major Lorne, they’re all going to need to get a lot military real soon.

Richard Woolsey sits up straighter and places his arms carefully on the table in front of him, clasping his hands together and coming to his Acting Chief Scientist’s aide. He directs his cool, measuring, brown eyes to the Colonel and the Colonel only, “What do you propose?”

“We go after Ladon Radim himself,” Caldwell doesn’t hesitate.

“What?” Richard can’t believe his ears. Woolsey’s always known Caldwell, both personally and from reports, to be head strong and fiercely aggressive with a penchant for immediate and direct confrontation, but even Richard’s shocked to hear that come out of the man’s mouth.

So are Rob, Brad, and, judging by the pinched expression on his face, Evan Lorne.

This time, however, both Radek and Caldwell lean forward. Clearly what’s coming next is something they’d been discussing before Woolsey, Rob, Brad, and Lorne had made it into the room and is something that quickly puts away the previous tension that had built between them.

Zelenka begins. “We know the Genii predominantly live underground in an extensive bunker.”

Woolsey nods. This he knew and something else about it too. “Isn’t the bunker also shielded,” he asks.

Radek shakes his head, “No. Their experimentation with nuclear technology causes sensor interference due to the excessive radiation, but it does not create or power any actual shielding of any kind around the bunker.”

Robert had been expecting this. It had been one of the ideas on his own mental list of how to deal with the situation, granted it was one of the ideas that he’d designated as last resort, but he’d had yet to confirm the possibility of any of it with Radek. Some of the other scientist in the department but not Radek yet. He chimes in, “The science teams believe that they can work to minimize the interference in order for the Daedalus’s Asgard beaming technology to work.”

Richard still thinks what he’s hearing or at least what he thinks he’s hearing is ridiculous. Suicidal both politically and physically. According to this afternoon’s West Pier briefing, many people in the galaxy already preferred the Genii over the Expedition in the first place, this would most likely push even more as yet to be encountered good opinions towards Radim and his people and against Atlantis. Apparently the Expedition Commander has to be the voice of reason here, “So what? How does that help us? How can we be sure which of the lifesigns the Daedalus’s scans detect is Ladon Radim’s? Let alone where in fact Radim’s office or private living quarters are in the bunker in order to try and get him when he’s in either of those locations. I highly doubt a man such as Ladon Radim would be unintelligent enough or lacking the diplomatic foresight to remain in the same office and quarters that his predecessor Cowen did years ago.”

Point made. Point taken.

“No,” Steven agrees, “I don’t think Ladon Radim’s that dumb either, but there are ways around that problem.”

Woolsey eyes him, “How?”

Brad leans forward. Taking the helm of the informative part of the discussion, he places his arms on the tabletop too and clasps his hands together. “We do have connections to people who know and are friendly with the Genii,” Brad says, “We should use those connections.”

Richard’s chocolate brown eyes narrow at his Chief of Staff, “What exactly do you have in mind, Bradley?”

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Episode Six- The West Pier- Chapter Three

Posted on July 31, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

Chapter Three

Shift change has long since steadied itself out. Everyone’s where the need to be either by choice or the dictates of work. The Operations Center seems both less crowded and much more quiet, it’s a hallucination caused by shift change. There isn’t any less staff working and no less innumerable items to check off the day-to-day To Do List. Gate technician Chuck Campbell and Czech scientist Radek Zelenka, who joined the gate tech shortly after Radek finished his noontime breakfast in the Mess Hall for his next shift of duty as the chief observing scientist in Atlantis’ command center, sit quietly at their consoles. They’re used to each other’s presences in the room. It’s no longer strange to them to find comfort in the click-clacking of the other’s open laptop and the contented gentle hum of their Ancient computer consoles that they’re splitting their attentions between. Finding it odd or distracting in any way quickly went out the door during their first days in the city. Replaced by blind trust in those around you to hold up their end of the bargain while you held up yours with everything you can give it during the crisis of the moment. There were so many more things so more important than getting the hibby-jibbies about another person judging how you did your job over your shoulder or from across the room. Judging yourself went as far out the door as thinking you’re being judged by others, rise to the occasion or don’t. It was always as simple as that.

Chuck monitors the energy readings and power functions from all over the city, keeping a specific eye on the power drain to the ZPM while he sits guard at the Stargate’s DHD console waiting for the gate to suddenly activate and for him to jump into action as the man with all the answers to the abrupt handful of automatic questions that will come his way because of it. Good or bad, it’s his computer, both Earth and Ancient, that’ll know immediately where the incoming wormhole is coming from, if there’s an incoming traveler, whether or not a friendly most likely initiated the activation if there is a traveler or not, who the friendly or foe might be, and why they’re returning either on time or not or invading Atlantis. If it’s invasion, then he’s going to have to do something no civilian ever expects themselves to do, even associated with a semi-military expedition. He’ll have to activate the gate’s defensive iris shield and whoever is riding the wormhole with intent to come to Atlantis against the administration’s will die as millions of tiny molecules splattering against the universe’s most technologically advanced windshield. And Chuck will have killed the person or persons.

Radek, as Rodney’s second-in-command after the Canadian lead scientist leaves on whatever missions the flagship team’s been given, goes over a list of duties that never seems to get any smaller as he sits at his console. Duties that the ‘Great’ Rodney McKay is trying like a madman to absolutely avoid at all cost to himself. Currently Radek’s supposed to be examining the network of known Stargates calling to each other throughout the Pegasus Galaxy, a wide variety with the land based Stargates showing up on his laptop’s screen as green flashing dots and the orbital space gates designated by flashing blue ones. And the questions at the top of the examination’s protocol list: Are all of the gates talking to each other? Updating each other correctly? As Rodney would put it, real blah, blah, blah stuff. The Czech man with the striking follicle similarities to Ludwig von Beethoven sighs. And after this he’s supposed to go down to the underwater jumper bay and, well, do anything down there. It’s been a job that Rodney has been putting off ever since they first discovered that Atlantis even had an underwater jumper bay built into the bottom of it during their third year here. He starts muttering under his breath in his native language, grumbling that if Rodney was anywhere near as great as he thought he was, he would have fixed most of these minute complications himse—

Doctor Radek Zelenka blinks. No, that cannot be. It simply cannot be. The rhythmic ratta-tat-tat of his fingertips on his sleek black computer keyboard comes to an abrupt silence. Můj bože. The typing suddenly picks up again with renewed vigor. No rhythm to it anymore, just trailblazing. He’s hoping against hope that it’s been there all along, that he’d somehow missed it in his musings on how Rodney dodges doing much of the work around here… But no. Ne, ne, ne. Nemožné, Radek gasps as he looks at his laptop’s screen. Startled by what he’s just seen. He blinks a few more times again to desperately make sure it wasn’t a trick, but it’s a false hope.

Chuck glances over at him, “What is it?”

“We have lost five Stargates,” Radek says. However, Doctor Radek Zelenka is not giving up on this. He cannot bring himself to do it. He runs the log that automatically records what he’s been doing back a handful of seconds and watches the replay…  Zatraceně! Yes, yes, regrettably, he had seen it right.

Chuck frowns at him, “What?”

“We have lost five Stargates,” Radek repeats grimly as he keeps his eyes locked on his computer screen. His mind races with all the ideas as to what sort of a solution they’re going to need.

“What do you mean,” Chuck gets out of his chair and walks over to Radek. He looks over his friend’s shoulder down at the computer’s screen.

“Five Stargates have gone down in the network. They are all in the same localized area of the Pegasus.”

The scientist’s blue eyes scan the gridded close up view of the Pegasus Galaxy on his screen, specifically a quadrant of its space where a somewhat large grouping of planets are. Some on the outskirts of the grid still have blue or green indicators flashing showing that their Stargates are still active, space and land alike, but at the core of the grouping are four planets and a moon that have all gone dark. No longer registering Stargate indicators despite the outline of dots being there. The Ancient machinations are simply not lit up.

“Is it just a minor glitch in one of the gate’s systems that could possibly be affecting the other gates in its immediate area,” Chuck tries. It wouldn’t be like as if they haven’t encountered that before. In fact, it was actually a lot less common in this galaxy than the Milky Way. The Wraith help keep the Stargates running as close to tip-top spec as possible, but still, there are some occasional minor malfunctions or technical hiccups that can’t be avoided no matter how attentive you are to maintenance.

Radek shakes his head, having already figured out that that is not the problem, “No. There are numerous failsafes built into the Stargates’ programming as well as into the Stargates themselves by the Ancients to specifically prevent something like this from occurring so as not to strand any people that might be on those worlds.”

“What do you think is going on then?” If it’s not a maintenance issue…

Zelenka looks up at Chuck over the brim of his dark-framed glasses, “I do not know, but whatever it is, it is not something that can happen without outside intervention.”

Chuck knows that look in his friend’s blue eyes and that tone in his voice. He nods then immediately straightens up and taps his earpiece, “Gateroom to Mister Woolsey.”

 

 

During a momentary lull in the West Pier conference room as each man looks for whatever paperwork has what they’re going to discuss next on it, Richard casually reaches up and taps his earpiece, “Woolsey here.”

“Sir, we’ve lost five Stargates,” Chuck tells him.

The paper rustling goes dead silent. Everyone’s froze.

“What,” Woolsey asks, stunned and confused. He hopes he heard that wrong, so very, very wrong.

“Sir, we’ve lost five Stargates,” Chuck repeats with the tone of voice that tells anyone listening that they didn’t imagine what he said. If only Woolsey knew that he had had the same reaction to the news when Radek’d first told him it and if only Woolsey knew that the news didn’t get any less strange when you knew the details as they stood right this very early moment in the day’s crisis.

“We’ll be right there,” Richard tells him. If that’s all anyone can say, then the reality is beyond belief and it’s not as if this belief was any good to begin with. Richard Woolsey breaks the radio link as he stands up and makes for the door. His staff immediately get to their feet and follow.

 

 

Atlantis Expedition Commander Richard Woolsey and his personal staff enter Atlantis’ Operations Center. Despite the immense midday light streaming in through its back wall of nothing but windows overlooking the planet’s ocean vista, this room always seems to be the darkest in the city. Somehow in an eternal state of battle readiness. Built-in war room. The personnel that work this shift sit in their seats at their designated stations, working hard and diligently and adding to the idea of the Rebel forces in the Yavin 4 war room observing the battle going on around the Death Star. One half expected to see Princess Leia’s concerned face illuminated by the glow of the DHD console or something. The fact that the personnel’s already in lock down mode says that there were orders given before Woolsey had even shown up. Another serious sign. No one would preempt the chain of command’s authority like that without due cause. Chuck Campbell immediately turns away from Doctor Zelenka’s station to greet them.

“What happened,” Woolsey demands the instant his feet cross the room’s threshold. His senior staff in toe.

“Radek discovered five Stargates went down in the network, Sir.”

The attention turns to Zelenka.

“There are indications that this is no systems error,” the scientist starts.

“What planets are they?” Woolsey asks as he comes up to stand behind Radek.

Radek turns back to his laptop as the group crowds in.

“P1W-001, M1W-001, PWW-014, P1W-005, and P1W-003,” he answers.

“Three of those planets have gate teams on them right now,” Martin Gero adds as he leans in, staring at the screen.

“I want every bit of information we can get on all five of those worlds and why our teams are on three of them,” Woolsey orders.

The West Pier staff immediately scatter behind him. Tapping their earpieces. Excitedly chattering to the low-ranking personnel that answer to them.

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 14 Comments

Episode Six- The West Pier- Chapter Two

Posted on July 24, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

(It’s my 100th post!  Yea!)

Chapter Two

Quickly walking at a have to get the massive load of daily work done and the day’s already half done pace, Brad Wright goes through one of Atlantis’ hallways with a computer tablet balancing on his forearm on top of a small stack of grey Atlantis file folders. He never looks up as he diligently types away on its smooth glass surface, somehow artfully dodging the other personnel passing through the hallway without losing pace or focus. He comes to a closed bulkhead doorway. Finally he looks up from the tablet, uses his free hand to draw a small acrylic remote kind of like the ones used for the puddle jumpers from his grey uniform pants’ pocket. He aims it at the bulkhead and pushes the built-in button on it. The bulkhead doorway splits open and the fifty-two-year old Canadian enters another hallway that’s even more impossibly crowded and busier than any other more common part of Atlantis. That’s why this is a severely restricted area.

Welcome to the more infamous and restricted part of the West Pier. With the same looking hallways as the one that it just opened up onto. Rust-colored metal walls with matching rust-colored marble floors lending a warm, cozy autumnal tone to the area, especially with it accented by turquoise patina and silvery wall sconces affixed with clear acrylic light slats illuminated with bright white light. While in the other hallways like this, potted ferns decorated some of the corners, not so here. Every piece of possible free space had to be used up by people or file cabinets brought in from Earth or something else far more valuable than decorative flora.

As soon as the bulkhead door closes behind him, Brad Wright taps his earpiece and on a private frequency designated specifically for this area of Atlantis only…

“Rob, this is Brad,” he reports in.

“I’m here and so are Peter, Allan, and Carl,” Robert Cooper’s voice replies over the radio link.

Brad returns to blindly maneuvering perfectly through the hallway. He’s old hand at this, having been with Stargate Command’s Atlantis Expedition since day one with Doctor Elizabeth Weir and serving prior to that in Cheyenne Mountain as well, “And?”

“Both Paul and Joe have radioed in and are—“

Paul and Joe come up on either side of Brad. “Here,” they answer in unison.

Brad smiles without looking up at his two new travelling companions.

“We’ll be there in thirty seconds,” he ends the radio link and addresses his blind remarks to the two men with him, “How has your day been going boys?”

Paul and Joe begin checking their own armfuls of paperwork, Paul answers first.

“I’m getting questions.”

“Who hasn’t,” Brad wonders. It’s one of the numerous rumors racing through the city that hasn’t died away into newer gossip, some of which he found absolutely absurd and some even he hoped might be true.

“But it’s getting to be questions that never end. I can’t eat without people inviting themselves to sit with me and asking the same damn things over and over nonstop. I can’t even pee without some guy coming up next to me anymore and asking me about it for God’s sake.”

“Join the club,” Brad comments drily. He’d actually just come from one of those exceedingly intimate and really uncomfortable exchanges in the public men’s room before going out into the corridor that led to this part of the West Pier.

“It’s gone out of the civilian gossip pool and it’s entering the military one now.”

“Really,” Joe can’t believe that. He hasn’t met up with any of that yet and he hasn’t heard any of the rest of their group mention it before. It’s one thing for the civilians to have gossipy issues with command decisions, that’s common place. It’d be freakish if the civilians anywhere didn’t runneth over at the mouth about stuff they didn’t know about but were only guessing the details, consequences, or whatever else they’ve been left out of the loop on. It’s another for the military personnel to start doing the same thing. A big problem. Cheyenne Mountain’s gossip chain ran primarily around who’s sleeping with who, of particular interest were the interactions between Brigadier General Jack O’Neill, then starting out as a Colonel newly returning from retirement, and Colonel Samantha Carter, then starting out as a Captain who thought she had something to prove for more than just herself but also for her gender as well as anybody of a science background. Much later it became a betting pool on when Doctor Daniel Jackson and Vala Mal Doran would get together. Whoever picked after finally dealing with the Ori, a.k.a. just after the Ark of Truth mission, would be the winner on that one. The betting pool on Jack and Sam’s winner would have to wait a bit longer, the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy didn’t just apply to homosexual relationships it extended to the heterosexual ones that violated the fraternizations policies as well.

“Yes,” Paul goes on, “This morning a marine cut into the Mess line behind me and harassed me all the way through. Then when I finally got the message clear to him and he went away an airman sat down at my table and started in. I walked away from that one.”

“I bet he just wasn’t liking the one you were giving him,” Joe says, “and wasn’t going to let you get away with blowing him off as easily as you have everyone else.”

“It hasn’t been easy with everyone else. That’s my point. I just had to fend off two civilians with the same damn questions in the transporter and the only way they let me out of it was by coming in here where they can’t follow. It’s getting out of hand, Brad.”

“And you don’t think that they think walking away, granted it’s into a highly secured area, isn’t easily escaping telling them what they want to hear?”

Okay, Paul agrees with that, but continues his remarks to Brad, “My point is that we’re going to have to make it official or at least come up with something more official on top of what’s already been said sometime soon.”

“We already have,” Brad answers.

“They’re not buying it,” Paul replies, “Especially the military. We have to make it official. We have to make some part of it official.”

“I’m not pushing him into that,” Brad tells him. Not for the first time. This discussion has been going on for weeks now, ever since it first happened. It’s starting to circle like DuPont. Neither Bradley Wright nor Robert C. Cooper are ever going to push Richard Woolsey to write an official condemning of one of his flagship teams’ members. If he hasn’t done it yet for half of the crap Colonel Sheppard or Doctor McKay have pulled, then he can’t really do it for anybody else on that team. Every military member would cite Sheppard’s behavior as an example of what’s expected of all of the soldiers under his command here in Atlantis.

“I’m saying he’s already been pushed whether you did it or not,” Paul Mullie points out, “Something has to be said.”

“Then he’s already made it official,” Brad repeats. Next topic, please. He’s tired of hearing DuPont circle over and over again like a broken record.

They turn a corner and keep going as other personnel zip from room to room across this new part of the hallway. In a way this stretch always reminds Joe of that one scene in the ’77 STAR WARS movie. It’s so hard not to feel like Artoo Detoo and See Threepio successfully dodging the crisscrossing blaster fire of Princess Leia’s Rebel soldiers and Darth Vader’s invading Imperial Stormtroopers as the gold and white and blue droids scooted from one side of the hallway of her consular ship to the other. But still the two stiff and slow droids managed it and now three fast moving and anything but stiff men do as well, although in this case they’re the blaster bolts and the other personnel are the droids. It still counts in his mind. Different directions involved, but it still counts.

“Not official enough,” Paul won’t let it drop…because he’s tired of basically everyone except these people currently around him not being able to let it drop either. If what was made officially known is good enough in this part of the West Pier, why the hell is it so not nearly anywhere good enough outside of these walls? Honestly, one moment of peace. Please, just one moment of not having to say the same damn thing over and over to every single person he meets.

“I spent the morning with Akemi,” Joe suddenly pipes up. Giving Brad the change of subject he wanted and that Paul was refusing to give him.

The other two men stare at him. Perhaps this wasn’t the subject he wanted to change to, but…

“I mean spent the morning with Akemi.”

They keep staring at him… then Brad faces ahead again.

“Just shoot me,” he says.

Joe smiles as they keep walking.

 

A door opens at the presences behind it and Brad, Paul, and Joe enter into a small secluded conference room. It’s the one of many conference rooms in the lost city where the notorious round conference table that was originally in the main conference room right beside the Operations Center before Woolsey had the cumbersome furniture item moved and replaced in the main conference room by his Earth-made rectangular one. While its replacement is made of mahogany, this one is apparently the Ancient’s idea of modern. Made out of steel piping and frosted glass and underlit with white lighting for an air of almost flashlight under the chin drama feel. Sometimes Peter rested his chin right on top of one of the tabletop’s brighter points and made silly faces or said some line, in total character, from some old school, black and white horror movie. It made for great laughs and Lord knows there were times when this room needed it.

Already seated from right to left, is Carl, still working on his laptop with only a slight lift of his dark eyes to recognize that they’re there, then an empty seat waiting for Brad then Rob, already in his seat, and a central empty seat for Richard Woolsey whenever he gets here. Followed by Peter then next is Allan, both with still drying wet hair, then another two empty seats for Paul and Joe and the last chair is filled by Marty, wide awake and ready to go; cold coffee does a body and mind good… like a slap in the face. Brad, Paul, and Joe break up their single file line they assumed when they entered to take up their vacant seats.

No sooner do they sit down than Richard Woolsey does indeed enter and take his central seat. He used to enter then stand by his chair and give some preamble before sitting down, but it was fifteen days of that daily routine before Rob and Brad, the Chiefs of the Expedition Commander’s staff, pulled the man aside and told him that he needn’t create a sort of pep talk for the day each and every time. After that, Richard simply came in, sat down, and opened the meeting as he felt comfortable with.

“Good afternoon, Gentlemen,” he opens the meeting.

“It certainly has been for Joe,” Paul, one of the two Deputy Gate Team Directors, comments about his fellow Deputy Gate Team Director.

Brad snorts and all other eyes wonder what the joke’s about, but let it slide. They do that often, something that Richard Woolsey found disturbing and extremely unsettling at first, mostly because he thought they were making some covert joke at his expense right in front of him, but he’s grown used to it over his tenure as Atlantis’ new and permanent Administrator and realized that they’re good-naturedly kidding each other rather than belittling him like he’d been expecting them to. Richard was no fool. He knew exactly what people in Atlantis and the Stargate Program at large thought of him. How could he expect anything other than being belittled by inside jokes at his expense?

“What’s the order of the day,” Woolsey begins.

Carl pretends to check one of the papers he’d brought in with him…

“Hell, Hell, oh and what’s this, more Hell,” he replies sarcastically then tosses it back on its half-inch thick stack.

Everyone takes the joke. They’re all too familiar with it and it’s relation to all the trouble that seems to find or follow the Stargate Program. Richard smiles and admires each individual with their own sense of humor. Although none of them know it, it has been something he’s found solace in quite often. Joe writes his Monday reports in the voice of Sesame Street’s Cookie Monster. Again at first, Richard thought he was being mocked and admonished in some way for unceremoniously replacing the beloved Colonel Samantha Carter as Atlantis’ leader, but he quickly realized that that’s just Joe. Sarcasm and wit with a healthy dose of fanboy. Paul seemed to temper the Cookie Monster with his own aptness for dark humor. Finding even the most gruesome horrible horror story movie on movie night to be some sort of side tickler on either its or his own peculiar way. Then there was Brad with his admiration for spoofing everything from the Stargate Program itself to STAR TREK to other science-fiction television shows and his favorite movie of all, The Wizard of Oz. There never seemed to be a single report that came from him that didn’t have some reference like ‘Hail Dorothy’ or mentioned Toto or some other aside. It occurred as often as General O’Neill referenced his beloved Simpsons. And Rob acted as his fellow Chief of Staff’s co-conspirator in the spoofing by throwing Thunderbirds-like marionette television show and zombie apocalypse survival guide references into the mix as well as anecdotes about his heartfelt love and admiration for the sport of golf. Stating quite often that he wished they could figure out a way of playing golf through the Stargate without getting in severe trouble for it both with the I.O.A as well as Stargate Command. Oddly enough, every time the idea got mentioned in front of Jack O’Neill, he’d smile this sort of knowing smile more to himself than anybody else and not let anyone else in on the joke although others have reportedly sworn they’d seen the ghost of a similar such smile tug at one of the corners of Jaffa member of SG-1 Teal’c’s mouth. And it’s that idea that always makes Woolsey smile; if John Sheppard ever heard that, then he’d quickly come up with every way possible to get rid of the driving range he and a handful of the other personnel had made up off one of the city balconies and make Rob’s outlandish dream come true. With Sheppard’s Mensa mind and his determination, he most assuredly could do it. Go much farther than the ‘good ole college’ try, he’d go for the ‘never ever gonna fail’ try that the Stargate Program has had its members turn into a guarantee.

Deputy Chief of Staff Peter DeLuise made fun of everything, always finding humor. Always looking for humor too. Allan, meanwhile, is the more reserved yet still fun-loving of the two Deputies Chief of Staff, balancing Peter’s insanity with his calm at the center of Peter’s wild storm. They make a great pair like Joe and Paul and Robert and Brad. Marty is relatively new to the team, having been around since the Expedition’s second year. Almost immediately he hit it off with the irascible Rodney McKay as well as the rest of the Science Department, finding he had a similar sense of humor to them, dark and sort of macabre, and quickly found an unspoken job title as Science Department Liaison to go along with his official title of Gate Teams Secretary. If there was a scientific problem or research going on in the city that people didn’t know about but were going to eventually find out about, Martin Gero, ‘Marty G.’, was your man with the answers and, in some cases, Rodney McKay’s plan. He speaks their language and translates it for everybody else, making them understand which are the more dire projects and what supplies definitely need to make the resupply list in the extraordinary quantities that they’re being asked for. And then there is Gate Teams Director Carl Binder. Constantly at odds with the world around him, except on days that he labeled his Days of Jubilee in which he sang happy songs to himself and complimented everyone and anything he saw or met to the sudden fear of his having finally gone insane to the people around him. Carl is always the one to point out the dark side to everything. The rain on any sunny day. Ironically, Richard feels the closest to Carl for exactly that reason, for his brutal and consistently negative honesty. ‘Yes Men’ don’t help and neither do ‘No Men’ for that matter, but honest men always do.

Woolsey grimaces, but is grateful, as he turns his attention to Carl, “I take it we have news from the I.O.A?”

Carl leans back in his white and chrome IKEA office chair, getting comfortable, and signaling without a word that this is going to be a long haul discussion rather than just a rapid fire report, “Well, there’s not good, bad, and potentially worse.”

“Surprise me,” Richard says with as much enthusiasm as Carl.

“There’s discussion between the I.O.A., Homeworld Security, and Stargate Command about revealing the Stargate Program to the public,” Carl states.

Dead silence. Both Joe and Paul’s faces are a strange mix of stun and blank. As though somewhere along the way to being completely wide-eyed and slack jawed stunned by what they’ve just heard, their brains actually shut down and froze their expression en route like the screen of a computer when it’s CPU has done the same thing. The men’s eyes are blank, they’re speechless. The lights are on, but the people inside aren’t answering the doors or even bothering to look out the windows. Peter’s eyes are large and when paired with his O-forming mouth, gives the impression of the three holes of a bowling ball. He blinks a few times to take the illusion away but not the look of ‘Oh my God’. Allan looks the calmest out of all of them unless you looked closely at his chest and saw it going up and down at a swift pace. Marty is smiling as though he’s suddenly expecting this to turn into an intergalactic edition of “Punk’d.” His eyes dart around quickly looking for the eavesdropping cameras then he focuses back on Carl and starts scanning his ears and chest for any sign of eavesdropping tiny microphones. Brad and Rob look like they’re waiting. Sitting back like Carl is and waiting. The benefit of old hat experience at this, exposing the Stargate Program has been on the hot list of things to do with said program since year one and Senator Robert Kinsey.

“Exactly,” Carl agrees with what he sees and tries hard not to roll his eyes or make some sarcastic remark. He really has to work hard on that last one though.

“What,” Peter’s not buying it. His face making it clear that he hopes this is some sort of joke. It’s Edvar Munch inspiration turning into the same as Marty G.’s.

“This is serious,” Carl tells him flatly. No humor, no hiding the truth. What you’re hearing is exactly what you’re hearing.

“You can’t be serious?” Peter’s still hoping for an upcoming punch line.

“This is serious.” Carl repeats with sharp certainty. His eye contact with Peter adding the best emphasis of all that there’s no punch line coming any time soon.

“Are we talking about just the Stargate itself and of course Cheyenne Mountain or are we talking about the entire program? Homeworld Security, Earth’s ships, us?” Allan gets down to the details quickly. He likes twists and angles, but this, this is a big twist. And he’s not sure about the angles yet.

“What are they going to do,” Brad asks without betraying the unease he’s feeling. These rumors had been shifting around Cheyenne Mountain the first time then-Senator Robert Kinsey blew the whistle on them to representatives of a handful of allied nations, that was a close one. Really close. If it hadn’t been for Thor beaming into the room and dealing out the Asgard’ ultimatum to Earth’s Powers That Be… the consequences are too innumerable and far too dire to even begin to imagine. And then later when Anubis attacked the then-deeply buried Antarctica outpost and a lot more than just the world’s military satellites picked up the massive fight for the future of the planet. Well, then the public sector joined the fray. Corporations with bank accounts to match their reach and power and to get lobbyists in their pockets and everyone and everything else they could possibly dream of. The globe’s most obnoxious kids in a candy store that rivals the imaginary candyland of Willy Wonka, how do you like them gumballs? “How are they going to do it?”

“That’s all still being debated hotly behind closed doors, but I will tell you that for some of the people involved, this is a done deal.”

“If that’s the bad—“

“That’s not the bad news, that was the ‘not good’ news,” Carl tells Brad, “The bad news is that there are reports of movements happening in the Lucian Alliance. Everyone still doesn’t know what it means or what it’s about, but the movements are simultaneously both subtle and blatant which is unusual for the Lucians because it means the movements are more thought out than they normally do.”

Another cold hush falls across the room. Shock and stun replaced by dread. Every facial muscle that had been slack is now tight on the teetering cusp of potential disaster. They’ve defeated the Goa’uld while supporting the Jaffa Rebellion. They’ve defeated Super Soldiers and condemned Anubis not once, not twice, but three times and the third time was Anubis’s young and nubile clone with all of his elder self’s Ascended supernatural abilities. They’ve defeated the Ori and their ‘Mommy Dearest’-like leader Adria. Just as life was calming into what they hoped it would calm into when they were done fighting all the enemies they were facing up against, humanity’s natural propensity for playing both the Devil and the deep blue Sea rears its ugly head. The Pegasus has its own issues with the Wraith and the Genii and the Hoffan plague still running rampant among its human populations, the Milky Way… the Milky Way deserves a break. At least ten minutes for a cup of coffee without the cup being shot of their hands before, during, or after the first sip. Is that too much to ask?

Rob has to ask this, but he’s dreading it, “And the potentially worse news would be…?”

“We’ll be seeing a lot more of the Daedalus,” Carl answers.

“That’s potentially worse?” Peter asks incredulously with a grin. Again looking as though he’s waiting for the joke’s punch line to hit him. He knows, hell, everyone knows that the Daedalus’ main staff and a lot of her crew and Atlantis’ lead team and some of its other personnel don’t get along. But he didn’t think the animosity was getting to be that bad. Gees.

“We’ll be seeing a lot more of the Daedalus,” Carl explains, “because Stargate Command, Homeworld Security, and the I.O.A. have both the Hammond and the Odyssey running some sort of covert operations in the Milky Way that they’re still not telling us about. Maybe someday but not any day soon. That means they’re leaving the Apollo to defend Earth while the Sun Tzu is getting detailed and,” everyone starts nodding, all of them seeing the writing on the wall and saying it with him, “the Daedalus to cover Atlantis.”

They all accept the pronouncement. If that’s how resources are being divvied up, then that’s how resources are being divvied up, and there’s always knowing that Jack O’Neill, currently in charge of Homeworld Security wouldn’t screw over any part of the Stargate Program whatsoever. So this means that their ability to get new supplies and new personnel is going to be drastically reduced. It also means that the Daedalus and her crew are going to be pushed to their limits for the near future. Limited shore leave, if any at all, and constantly travelling from Earth to Atlantis back to Earth then back to Atlantis again with basically no stopping except for loading and unloading. And God help Atlantis if the city gets into any trouble that definitely requires the Earth battleship when it’s gone, then they are royally screwed. It’s going to be tough times all around. Nothing new, the meeting moves on.

“Next,” Richard Woolsey asks, detecting the start of a migraine infiltrating the space in between his eyebrows.

Marty chimes in, “Field research on M1W-002 is temporarily delayed while the extremely tall birch-like trees on the moon are molting their bark.”

Everyone stares at him.

“Molting,” Richard repeats to confirm whether or not he actually heard that right.

Marty nods vigorously, “Their bark.”

This time it’s Rob’s turn to not believe his ears and have to reconfirm. “Molting,” he asks slowly.

Marty nods vigorously again. “Hm-mmm. Like snakes.”

Everyone looks around the table at each other then…

“Can trees even do that,” Peter asks him. Gesturing the ‘What the Hell’ moment with his hands and a shrug and his whole face exaggerating the question.

“Apparently they can on moons in the Pegasus,” Gero answers then goes on to his next item of business that needed to be covered, “Also, members of Doctor Katie Brown’s Botany Department did manage to get some botanical samples before the moon became restricted. They found and brought back an orchid that Kanaan says has roots that are medicinal as well as leaves and flowers that are edible and its stem is poisonous. Kanaan is working with the team on how to process all parts of the plant properly in order to reap the benefits.”

Woolsey nods. Teyla’s partner and father of her child was proving indispensable to the niche he’s found for himself in the city. His life as a farmer on Athos and New Athos afterward has made him the key person to contact about all sorts of flora they’ve encountered throughout their travels in his native Galaxy. It’s good to know that Kanaan’s on the case, Richard trusts Teyla’s judgment on many things and now his trust in Kanaan is equally as great. As far as Richard can tell from the way Doctor Brown’s group and the Botany Department as a whole act when Kanaan is around and especially when he’s not, the Athosian man is as important to them as Teyla is to Colonel Sheppard’s team. It’s become a pastime of a few of the soldiers and the other civilian personnel to go down to the hydroponics labs when Kanaan is away visiting his people and see Doctor Brown and her staff suddenly acting like they have no idea how to function when he’s not there. They functioned before Kanaan came to the city to stay with his partner and their child, but ever since they’ve forgotten how to do that. Some marines chucklingly refer to the spectacle as ‘chickens with their heads cut off’. Yes, Kanaan is fitting into his new life in Atlantis very well, a life he’s had for a few months shy of Richard’s own start here. Extremely well. The briefing moves on.

This time it’s Joe’s turn to pick up the slack, “Our gate teams are still encountering many more contacts that have better opinions about the Genii than they do us.”

Wow, way to drop a hammer. A not good reaction/look goes around the room. Ooh, that’s bad. Pairs of eyes exchange knowing glances with each other around a semi-circle. Well, isn’t this shaping up to be a lovely afternoon?

“Anything else,” Rob asks on Woolsey’s behalf and wishing he had a knife or a gun to shoot or stab himself with. Maybe he could call in security and tell them to shoot him instead of having to get out of his chair and actually hunt up a weapon for himself. Yeah, he’s going to go with the security team… on the other hand, he could call the team in and have them literally shoot the messengers. So far Carl, Marty, and Joe are on his list. Hey, maybe that’ll make his pain go away.

“The teams are also hearing more and more rumors about Wraith worshippers becoming more and more ‘active’,” Paul answers with bunny ear gesturing on his last word.

And Paul goes on the list as well…

“What does that mean exactly,” Allan asks. Again spotting the approach of twists and angles.

“It means the rumors are saying that the Wraith worshippers are starting to take terrorist actions,” Joe informs them.

Another reaction goes around the room, it’s deceptive in appearance. No one moves, some sigh, but for the most part it’s in their eyes. They don’t react openly, but they feel every moment of what they’ve just heard like they were doing the most semi-amusing death march ever.

Know what, screw the security team. Maybe if Rob puts his head down and runs really really fast into the wall he’ll kill himself that way and everyone else can deal with all the problems of the galaxy. He starts to gauge exactly how fast he’d need to run while rubbing his forehead, already crinkled with stress.

Carl sighs too although he’s less the homicidal or suicidal sort, “And I thought we left Al-Qaeda behind on Earth,” he grumbles.

The nods go around the room. Except no one is cheering on any winners of any sort, they’re simply acknowledging the sheer unadulterated Hell of this all. Well, Carl did begin the meeting by saying that the answer to what’s on their plate for today is Hell, Hell, and more Hell. So far it’s been the Atlantis unholy trinity of restrictions from Earth, trouble from the Genii, and the Wraith—well, at least their worshippers, those at the very least right now. There was never smoke without a fire… or a handy little military device known as a smoke can which emitted the stuff when triggered but never actually held a fire.

The muscles on the back of Woolsey’s neck and shoulders tighten inexorably as he asks with a stifled sigh, “Is there anything else?”

Brad and Rob exchange looks then Brad leans forward. The forecast did call for more showers of fire and sulfur.

“Well, while speaking of contacts, the people Doctor Mackenzie’s studying—“

“The ones Colonel Sheppard was visiting when the Travelers took him,” Peter interrupts for personal confirmation.

“The ones he calls the Mehinako after the similar Xingu tribe in the Amazon Rainforest,” Allan adds on. And showing off a little bit.

Rob nods, “Yes.” He wanted to add hotly that yes, these are one of the few people we’ve met in this galaxy that have been as peacefully kind to us as the Athosians, but holds that back in lieu of the higher priorities about these people at the moment.

“What about them?” Richard Woolsey inquires.

“They informed Sergeant Stackhouse’s team, the last gate team to visit them, that they are the last gate team to visit them and that Doctor Mackenzie will be sent back to Atlantis within a day or two, however long it takes him to pack up his stuff,” Rob breaks the bad news.

The once blank faces suddenly get wide-eyed. Wait a second, we pissed off the nice people? What?! How the hell did this happen?! When did this happen?!

“They are breaking off any and all contact with Atlantis,” Brad clarifies further. It wasn’t his intention to twist the knife, but it had to be done. It’s always the protocol ever since Doctor Weir to tell the details. Everyone had to know everything and then they go from there to try and figure out a way out of this mess.

“Why?” Carl asks, flummoxed. It’s not a common look on his face, usually Carl Binder is the person, aside from the Chiefs of Staff, that is the least baffled by a situation when it arises due to his penchant for expecting the worst all the time.

“They say that they were offended.”

Woolsey stares at Robert and Bradley for a moment before the ability to speak returns to him, “Offended? But Sergeant Stackhouse and I had a great time on our previous visit to them. Everything seemed fine. Everyone was getting along well, there were no incidents as far as I saw.”

Uncomfortable glances go around the room, different than any of those that have passed so far, and Richard Woolsey catches them all, but he doesn’t understand the meaning of the expressions.

“Sir,” Brad begins carefully, obviously trying to be delicate about this although he’s absolutely sure that he’ll fail miserably but trying nonetheless, “It was you.”

“Me?”

“It’s because you’re so reserved,” Rob quickly jumps to Brad’s rescue, “In their culture, to be reserved or conservative is considered offensive. They take it as a sign of deception or deceit. They think you’re hiding something from them and their culture is so open and transparent that, well, it made a bad impression on them coming from our leader. They think we can’t be trusted anymore because of it.”

Oh boy, Carl clears his throat, “Well, since the topic’s already been brought up, Mister Woolsey, the International Oversight Advisory did remark on the lack of First Contact situations involving you. They’re feeling under-represented and they feel that Atlantis is not putting its best foot forward in those situations. Not that the gate teams aren’t appropriately representing the Expedition and it’s intentions, it’s because the I.O.A. doesn’t trust the gate teams to keep to the message the I.O.A. wants to pass along.”

“They don’t think the gate teams can be trusted?” Joe’s fishes knowingly for the truth.

“Yes,” Carl admits, “And I can’t imagine where they’ve gotten that sentiment from considering their previous dealings with the gate teams in Cheyenne Mountain.” Reminders always helped. No one in the Stargate Program, whether on Earth or in the Pegasus Galaxy, liked the International Oversight Advisory and they have no problem showing it to the organization’s face whatsoever. So the I.O.A. isn’t exactly out of line not trusting the gate teams to abide by their rules.

“But still, we haven’t screwed up any First Contacts here,” and almost as immediately as the words leave his mouth, Joe wishes they’d go right back in. Not to mention all the eyes that look at him with the same sentiment behind them: I can’t believe you just said something that stupid. It’s like a press conference that suddenly goes silent when the person at the podium suddenly blurts out something they really shouldn’t have. Like a pride of lions hunching down in the grass, coldly giddy with the anticipation of the target prey abruptly self-exiling themselves away from the rest of the herd.

“Let’s begin shall we,” Carl’s bitter nature takes up the challenge, “There was the Wraith whom we woke up all them. The Genii whom we were supposed to be going on a joint mission with and that’s after we were supposed to be just negotiating for some God damn beans with. Oh and how can we forget the Asurans, human form Replicators made by the Ancients that make the Wraith look like humanity’s best friends!” His voice is all sarcasm taking a nice stroll down memory lane and climbing a hill in volume, getting louder and louder, “All of which were calamitous. For God’s sake, we were put on trial for this. Colonel Sheppard’s team was put on trial for this!”

Silence follows his outburst. His intensity not just scolding Joe but also everyone else in the room.

“Calamitous,” Peter questions the old fashioned word usage after a few moments.

“My word, not theirs.”

“What was their word?” Allan asks.

“Not nearly as nice.”

Peter and Allan swallow hard, normally Carl didn’t sugarcoat things. So if he is… what he’s covering then up had to be really bad even by his standards. And knowing the man’s bitter and malcontent with the world disposition that’s pretty damn bitter and pessimistic.

Richard Woolsey eyes travel around the table. So that’s what the looks meant. To confirm Richard’s suspicions, Marty, Joe, and Paul nod when his gaze meets their and lingers for any length of time. The men were perhaps not agreeing with the I.O.A.’s opinion of Atlantis’ gate teams, but most likely seconding that Richard’s stiffness and his seemingly intentional avoidance of First Contact instances are indeed a problem.

“I…,” Richard doesn’t know where to begin but he realizes that the seconds of his silence ticking away were adding up, “I will take that into consideration and will also be taking any ideas anyone has on how I might be able to rectify the situation.” He hates himself for how political baby-kissing that sounded, but the statement is true and some old habits like how you talk when addressing a courtroom die hard with attorneys, it’s all the years of costly education.

The group nods again around him along with the unanimous verbal acknowledgement of ‘Yes, Sir’. They look down at their briefing folders and other stacks of information and Richard can practically hear the rest of the mental thoughts, they’ll start coming up with any corrective ideas throughout the meeting and jot them down then hand them over to their leader by the end of the meeting or throughout the day as the ideas occur to them. They’re on top of this. And again the briefing moves on.

“And speaking of rumors,” Paul brings up; now’s as good a time as any, “we need to talk about Lieutenant Kenmore.”

All eyes shoot to Mister Mullie but he keeps his eyes focused squarely on Richard’s. Richard’s dark eyes lose focus from alert to this is the last thing he wanted to be talking about, haven’t they already discussed this. He hadn’t wanted to discuss the matter then. Now, with all the other issues so far… why isn’t this problem going away? Oh that’s right, he brought her here.

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Episode Six- The West Pier- Chapter One

Posted on July 18, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

Chapter One

The swirling vortex is luminous with warped cloud-like shafts of Caribbean ocean blues, glacier whites, and even darker hues of blue. It would be similar to traversing the wormhole of the Stargate if you didn’t travel through it in less than a few handfuls of seconds, but chose to slow down and enjoy the ride for a lot longer amount of time beautiful as it is. The Earth ship Daedalus certainly knows how to travel in style as it gracefully sails through hyperspace.

 

 

Brightened by daytime lighting to establish some semblance of normal naval life let alone establish the time change shift between one galaxy and another, Carl Binder, wearing his red triangle-shaped-accented grey Atlantis operations uniform, sits alone and working on a laptop as the pale blue of hyper-travel passes by out the Daedalus’ Mess Hall’s only window. Granted that it’s large and multi-paned, affording a fantastic if limited view of the beauty of hyperspace travel, but the blue light outside doesn’t penetrate beyond the glass itself really; the spot bit of lighting above him more than makes up for it. Even in the totally void of any other life room and surrounded by the simple tables of matte black tops and chrome legs with complimentary chairs and a drink cart beside the closed door into the room, laden with spare bright yellow and shiny chrome cups, two coffee urns for decaf and caf alike and an urn of hot water, and small jars of sugar and powdered milk depending on the drinker’s bent as well as a small metal basket of waiting to be used, single wrapped teabags, Carl can’t help but somehow look tense. His loose fitting, sportswear like uniform can’t dull the impression of tension about him. And he likes it that way. He’s had this uniform since day one of the Atlantis Expedition and he’s not about to hand it in for any of that tighter-fitting fashion statement crap they’re supposed to wear nowadays. He’s known Samantha Carter since she was a Captain and first joined the newly formed SG-1 and honestly believes the more glamorous and stylized uniforms she’d brought with her when she took over command of the Atlantis Expedition for what ended up being a single year was retaliation towards the military for its restrictive and single-minded fashion sense. The others keep trying to get him to wear Carter’s uniform design that Woolsey held on to when he took over for her, but nope. Can’t and won’t do it. His presentation of strict, tense moodiness has always been source material for him to throw people off their guards to the point where they were either immediately on the offense in order to beat him to the punch or act like they’re about to be so incredibly scolded by their principal, their parents, or both when they meet him. And to him that’s the best first impression maker he can possibly have. It’s the automatic ‘Don’t mess with this guy’ thing that always tugs the corner of his tight mouth up into a charismatic half-smile.

A male voice, Colonel Steven Caldwell’s Communication’s Officer Lieutenant Mark Stuart comes over Carl’s earpiece…

“Mister Binder, Colonel Caldwell wanted me to inform you that we are approaching Atlantis and will be dropping out of hyperspace soon. He would like you to return to your cabin in case our drop out is choppy.”

Carl answers his earpiece by touching it then saying, “No.”

“Excuse me, Sir,” the Lieutenant asks, clearly he hadn’t expected that particular reply.

“I said ‘no’,” Carl repeats with no little hint of sing-song sarcasm as he still continues typing on his computer. It was so much easier to work without the up close distraction of the glass salt and pepper shakers. Even typing while keeping his arms in close to his body like he usually does, he always worried he’d bump one of the damn things or they’d come sliding across the table and bump into him or worse, get their irritating particulates into his keyboard and make it difficult for him to press the keys and the computer to make the connection that that was the key he’d pressed. He’d moved them to another table and now only had to contend with the awkward waffled reflection of the grating covering the ceiling.

“Sir, the Colonel—“

“I don’t really think it matters where I am on this ship if it gets choppy when coming out of hyper. If things hit me or I hit them, I promise I will not sue. Now do not contact me again.”

“Don’t you want me to let you know when we land, Sir?”

“Lieutenant, I’m in the Mess Hall. There are windows to one side of the room. Big windows. I can see when we’ve landed let alone will I feel it. Mister Binder out.” Carl breaks the radio connection without further ado and keeps typing. Taking a break only to take out the small packet of honey roasted peanuts from one of his jacket’s pockets that he’d gotten himself back in Cheyenne Mountain’s Mess before beaming onboard the Daedalus in the first place. Thank goodness they were nearing Atlantis, his self imposed rationing of his limited supply of the peanuts was almost at an end; this was the last bag. But he’s always felt that there’s something wrong about traveling without a tiny bag of peanuts with you. He didn’t need a stewardess or steward telling him the ridiculous story of how he has to turn off his cell phone and his computer because somehow things he buys at retail stores will bring down a massive hunk of flying metal that costs millions of dollars to make and decades of science to reasonably perfect for regular operation with a text message or an e-mail. But he does need peanuts. He tears open the bag, pours a few into his palm, empties his palm into his mouth, and munches happily.

*                      *                      *

It’s a typical meal time for whoever’s mealtime it is in Atlantis’ Mess Hall. Once again, hustle and bustle only with a lot more personnel than either the Operations Center had in it or the embarkation floor had around it. It’s hard not to notice that no matter the foot traffic, the rust-colored marble of the flooring inlaid in a wheel and spoke pattern by bands of dark maroon red marble hasn’t been worn through or scuffed, an ironic testament that the Ancients built this place to last. All that dims the floor’s complexion is a thin veil of dust tracked in from offplanet or some other part of the city on the personnel’s boots, sneakers or sandals. For some it’s breakfast before they go onto their shift wherever in the city, for others it’s lunch in the middle of their shift via the quick grabbing of a pre-packaged sandwich, a bottle of water, and banana, orange, or apple from a huge bowl at the end of the buffet line of tables before dashing back to their work, and for still others it’s dinner after coming off their shifts. You could always spot the latter, they were the only ones not rushing to get their food or to get someplace else. They were the ones casually doing everything and wallowing in the fact that they had a moment’s peace to take things slow unlike everyone else.

Sitting at one of the white-topped rectangular card tables is Paul Mullie, eating his lunch consisting of a chicken salad sandwich on white with lettuce and tomato with a side of plain potato chips and a bottle of diet cola. With another Expedition member sitting right across from him with only a bottle of water in between his hands, the other Expedition member, Airman Ben Wilcox, leans over the table way more than he has to to try and have a discreet conversation with Paul. Paul makes a mental note of that, either it’s for show which means that people in the crowd are watching them or that Ben is really eager to get these next few moments all to himself.

“Is it going to happen,” Ben asks urgently. Number two it is, but don’t rule out Number one just yet.

Paul keeps focusing on eating, “No.” Chicken salad is a relative luxury in Atlantis. Usually as soon as anyone finds out that it’s in the Mess, everyone stampedes to get one. Paul lucked out, he was the first to realize that it’s here and snag himself a sandwich before they’re officially discovered and word spreads around the city’s grapevine. Let the stampede commence, who cares, he already got his. The rest of you kids have fun.

“It’s been five weeks,” Ben won’t let it drop.

“And still nothing has happened. Shouldn’t that tell you something?”

“Come on, Paul. Are you honestly telling me that a member of the Expedition’s flagship team going rogue and assassinating the leader of a planet that’s friendly with us isn’t going to get in any trouble at all? Not a peep of reprimand? Nothing?”

“That’s exactly what you heard,” Paul answers while taking a swig of soda. Their eyes lock over the top of the bottle.

“What?”

“Not a peep of reprimand. Nothing,” Paul checks his watch while chewing a last mouthful of sandwich, “And I’ve got a meeting so bye.”

Paul gets up, brushes off some chip crumbs from his grey uniform pants and some more from the bottom few inches of his red, long sleeve, zip-up semi-sweater top, then he takes his bright Easter yellow tray with him as he starts walking away. He notices his new dark-colored hiking-style boots haven’t made a sound on the floor, either he’s broken them in in the month since they arrived on with Earth’s last resupply via the gate which brought the rogue team member of current gossip topic or the floor really is as dusty as it looks. Ben stays behind at the table and calls after him.

“I don’t believe you.”

Paul calls back without looking, “I don’t care.”

He dumps his tray and empty soda bottle in a receptacle near one of the wide and tall room’s many entrances/exits then grabs a bottle of water for himself and the rest of his morning from the drink cart by the garbage can on his way out. He can hear Ben’s chair squeak as he pushes it back to stand up. Paul can picture the visual of the tall thin man wearing black rimmed glasses walking away, the standard military uniform of black BDU pants, black t-shirt, black short sleeve BDU shirt, and black gun belt and empty holster hanging loosely on him. His black combat boots completing the image of a soldier almost exactly like Colonel Sheppard. Just without the senior rank and the messed up hair and wearing eyeglasses with the uncanny ability to never move whatsoever. Paul smiles, bet Radek Zelenka wished he had a pair of those ones.

*                      *                      *

Robert C. Cooper, reading from an opened grey Atlantis Expedition file folder, stands in one of the city transporters as it transports him with one of the Expedition’s newer members of the Medical Department to their selected destination. On the inside of the small cramped, oddly-shaped, copper-toned walled room, there are no lights, no sound, just the feeling of standing in one place waiting for something to happen. And it does, the transporter doors open…  And nobody steps out.

Fifty-year old Doctor Stewart waits, bobbing up and down from the balls of her feet to her heels and back again a few times before she clears her throat loudly. Rob looks up at her.

“You feeling okay,” he asks.

“Yes, I’m fine,” she answers.

Rob nods with an accommodating smile then goes back to reading the file, balancing its spread between his forearm and his opposite hand. Although it wasn’t necessarily out of his purview, fiscal concerns weren’t his cup of tea but a necessary part of his job. He hated having to review budgets, but he was getting good at them and had learned to commit them practically to memory at first glance. Spotting the differences from the last budget review he’d seen instantly. And there are a lot of differences between this budget review and the last one.

After a few more moments with the transporter doors still wide open, the auburn haired woman clears her throat loudly again. Robert ignores her, wow, there are really a lot more differences than last time. She clears her throat again, louder. Robert’s eyes slide over to look at her again, this time suspiciously. The last thing he needs right now is to get sick.

“Are you sure you’re okay,” he asks, “because you keep coughing?”

“I keep coughing as a means of telling you that the transporter’s arrived at your destination,” she answers him, trying to be polite but the edge of terseness comes through in her voice. The minutes on her watch are ticking away and she needs to really get to her destination or she’ll be late for her second grouping of appointments. She’s already going to have to radio someone to see if some go-for somewhere would be able to bring her a tray of lunch.

Robert looks straight ahead as though noticing as well as seeing that for the first time. He quickly tries to recover from the embarrassment.

“Oh, uh, thank you. Really, thank you,” he slaps the grey Atlantis file folder closed as he hurries out of the transporter’s opened doorway, he calls back to her, “Hope you, uh, you have a nice day!”

Patricia smiles back at him, it’s a nice enough facial expression but it’s barely veiling sourness, but being polite, she offers him a little wave and a nod as the transporter doors close between them finally. Then she immediately turns and pushes her destination’s indicator button on the transporter’s back panel’s city map. She turns back around once the computer accepts her request and crosses her arms over the chest of her plump body with a heavy sigh and a roll of her hazel eyes, the side of her pale finger brushes up and down against the tight soft weave of the red and white maple leaf embroidered flag of her country against her bicep. Time is ticking, but thank God Doctor McKay is offworld and not supervising anything today otherwise there’d be a lot more people looking to blow off steam by venting to her. A lot more.

*                      *                      *

Like the hustle and bustle around the city, this room, Atlantis’ second gym, is quite active too. While it’s similarly sized and shaped and more frequently used counterpart is used primarily for sparring matches and hand-to-hand combat training, this gym is a testament to the number of people working and living here and the planet’s culture where they come from. It’s like any other gym back on Earth. Lines of stationary bikes and treadmills to one side of the room with a narrow clear avenue down the center and weight-training equipment stations dotting the other side. Located on either side of the entrance and against the wall at the other end of the central avenue are rolling carts topped with tightly packed rows and columns of water bottles and shelves of folded white towels underneath. Peter DeLuise and Allan McCullough are riding stationary bikes side by side. Two in the middle of an empty row of many.

“So how many questions have you gotten,” Peter asks breathlessly. It’s been awhile since he’s worked out. Work has been pulling him away from the gym more often than he’d like. Well that and frozen gift baskets from his wife and mother back home; Italian food segregated into individual meals, good old fashioned large ones, in lunchbox containers sitting in the mini-fridge in his quarters. He never can resist a taste of home especially when it comes from his mother and his wife. Fantastically beautiful women, both of them.

“More than I care to keep track of,” Allan replies equally as breathless. With his supermodel bone structure and matching physique, Peter always thought working out was easy for the man until now. They’re both killing themselves here. Maybe Allan’s looks are natural, you know, ‘they come from God’ thing.

“Good, me too.” Peter pants.

There’s a pause. The whirring of the stationary bikes keeping up a rigorous pace in the void.

“So how did you answer,” Peter gets the air to break the silence.

“Who says I answered,” Allan asks, finishing with a little airy laugh. Even running out of breath from exertion, his laugh is staccato.

“No one. I was just wondering.”

“Did you answer?”

“Yeah, I told them ‘no’.”

“I told them ‘no’ too.”

“You just said you didn’t answer. ‘No’ is an answer,” Peter points out.

“I didn’t say I didn’t answer,” Allan details. Smiling and ending in another airy, quick fire laugh.

“Yes, you did.”

“No, I didn’t. I said ‘who says I answered’. That’s not saying I didn’t answer, that’s asking you a question.”

“In order to not answer mine.”

“Yeah.”

“So you’re dodging the question.”

“It’s called misdirection. I like misdirection.”

“Hmm,” Peter nods. And they keep pedaling.

A female Expedition member dressed in workout clothes comes up to them, she’s super attractive and sexy too. She’d certainly make Colonel Sheppard and Ronon stop working out or more likely they’d start working out even more to try and impress her. There are rules against fraternizing within the military ranks, but Sheppard was somewhat well known for flirting with the civilian ladies of the Expedition and Ronon, well, he had dated one of them and tried to make a play for Doctor Jennifer Keller.

“Hey, can I ask you guys a question,” she asks as she puts one of her hands on the tops of the bikes’ console and twists her Maxim model figure from side to side playfully to pair well with her equally as playful smile.

“No,” Peter and Allan snap at her in unison.

Flustered and suddenly more than a little spooked by the yell, she freezes. Wide-eyed. Tense in her shoulders. Yanking her hands back from the bikes and lifting them up in surrender. Other people working out nearby look over at them, Peter and Allan ignore the looks and keep biking at their quick pace. The woman abruptly turns and leaves, continuing on down the gap between sides and trying hard to avoid eye contact as she walks away from the two men.

“What time is it,” Peter finally asks after a few more moments spent in silence. They only have a set amount of time they can spare for this before work.

“I don’t know,” Allan answers.

“What do you mean ‘you don’t know’,” Peter looks over at him.

“I mean ‘I don’t know’,” Allan shrugs, “I don’t wear my watch when I workout. I just… go. I don’t really think about the time, I think about other things.”

“What other things,” Peter squints in confusion, returning his gaze straight ahead of him.

“Work things.”

“What work things?”

“Twists, you know, angles.”

“What twists? What angles?”

“Like when gate teams are out. We know what their missions are and we know the information the Ancient database has on the planets, but we’ve changed a lot of things since we’ve gotten here. We’ve woken up all the Wraith and we pissed off the Replicators, not to mention setting both loose in this galaxy again. And those are just the starters. I think about what could possibly go wrong that no one else can possibly imagine going wrong. You know, the twists, the angles. Stuff like that.”

Peter runs a hand through his sweaty hair. It’s short and close cut now, but he’s had it down to his shoulders and even shaved bald once but that was when he was in more physically intimidating shape. He is working out again though, so maybe he’ll shave it again. Who knows? “You do all of that and you never pay attention to the time,” Peter looks over at his friend and co-worker.

“Yeah,” Allan shrugs with another breathy laugh as he keeps pedaling. The sweat dripping from the tips of his matted hair and his temples, his angular features seeming to naturally guide the salt water away from his eyes. “Keeping track of time just seems to be so insignificant by comparison.”

“So no watch?”

“No watch,” Allan agrees with a nod.

Peter can’t believe that. He tries to… but, nope, can’t. Just can’t.

“How can you not wear your watch? Who doesn’t wear their watch when they’re working out?!”

Allan doesn’t see what the so excitable problem is, “You’re wearing your watch. You check the time.”

Well that’s true. Peter starts to check his watch while maintaining his vigorous biking pace, “I can’t believe you don’t wear a watch. I mean seriously who doesn’t wear a watch when they workout?”

“I don’t like wearing my watch when I workout. Like I said, I think about other better things. Besides, it distracts me.”

Peter’s still trying to focus on what the small digits of his watch are saying, he’s bouncing around so much. Finally he has to hold his arm still, maybe the extra control’ll help, but he’s still bouncing vigorously with the keeping up of his fast pace. If he lets down on it for a moment, he’ll never live it down. Allan won’t let him and he’ll make sure everyone else on the job will hear about it too and they won’t let him live it down either. God, he cannot focus on this thing. He tilts his head to his free side to see if that will help…

“Distracts you,” he complains disbelievingly again, “How can it—“

Peter falls off his stationary bike.

Allan keeps going. Keeping up his fantastic pace, he long ago in this city lost the ability to feel when the sweat was trickling down his face. His hair matted it at his hairline to his forehead and the back of his neck and irritatingly behind his ears, but that didn’t hold off the sweat very much. Nowadays it only ever bothered him on the rare occurrence when the saltiness slipped into his eyes. And that’s when he knew to stop working out and go back to actual work, he was sweaty like a pig.

Peter’s voice comes up to him from the floor, “Like that?”

Allan nods, unruffled, “Like that.” He laughs a bit again. Higher pitch than his normal voice and in short ha-ha bursts. Point made.

“Okay.” Then a moment later, “We should go, we’ve got a meeting.”

“Okay,” Allan abruptly stops biking. He hops off the hot piece of exercise equipment and grabs a nearby towel off of the front panel of a treadmill in the row behind his bike. He wipes his drenched face before flinging the white terrycloth around his neck as he heads off for the gym’s locker room. Next a quick shower and an equally as quick change into his duty uniform.

Leaving Peter still on the floor behind him holding onto his arm that’s got his wristwatch on it. See, his pace slowed and now he’s never going to live this down. Allan and everyone in this room will make sure of that.

*                      *                      *

In a set of Atlantis quarters bright with afternoon sunshine beaming through the large window above the bed, even while draped over with white fabric, Joe Mallozzi is zipping up his uniform jacket and giving himself one last check over on his appearance in a full-sized mirror in front of his Ancient armoire. Ever since Samantha Carter took over command of the Atlantis Expedition after the death of Doctor Elizabeth Weir, someone thought they’d switch the Expedition’s far more loose-fitting, workout clothes designed uniforms to these tighter fitting fashionista versions of uniform and Woolsey was keeping the style around. Some personnel still wore the older uniform versions, but that was usually due to either stubbornness for comfort’s sake or they hadn’t gotten around to laundry day yet and the old uniforms were more acceptable than no uniforms. It’s been over two years and he’s still coming to terms with the uniform change.

He’s always cut quite the dash in the many, many semi-loose suits he wore. Like Richard Woolsey he preferred to wear suits, they were more stylish to his way of thinking and gave him the undeniable air of professionalism and respectability that a good suit always conveys. And now… well, now these damn outfits make him rethink the way he looks at every angle simply by how he judged they looked on other Expedition members. Sometimes the look was really really good and others it was a ‘Dear God, go change your clothes’ moment because of how ill fitting it was on them either too tight or too loose, looking like it needed to be cut off or duct taped on. Today his mind is hung up on the fence between ‘just okay’ and ‘Dear God’. He was leaning towards ‘Dear God’, but what was stopping him was the fact that, well, he wasn’t sure any of his old uniforms were clean yet and any of his other new ones were going to fit much better. Trapped between a rock called No Uniform and a hard place.

Behind him is a bed with Akemi, a young, beautiful Japanese woman naked but covered up with the bed sheets, lying on it, watching him. Now the gorgeous woman behind him, she makes this uniform look fantastic each and every time. She has this natural fashionista tact with everything she wears. Women think she looks cute or adorable and men think she looks incredibly attractive. Each and every time, she hits it out of the ballpark. She constantly looked gorgeous in them, every line hit her figure just right and the cut seemed to serve her in all the best ways. God, he wished it would do that for him, but alas…

“Lunch,” Akemi asks in her accented tone of voice that implies lingering tendencies towards broken English.

“Nope,” Joe’s forced to say, “I’ve got a meeting to go to.”

“What meeting,” Akemi asks.

“Senior staff,” Joe replies.

“Can you cancel? Spend rest of the day with me?”

He sees her in the mirror’s reflection pat the empty half of the bed in front of her, where he was before he got up to put on his clothes. Inviting him to stay. And it is sooo inviting.

Joe sighs though, he really really wants to, but, “Nope.”

He refocuses back on his image in the mirror for more final checks although he’s pretty sure now that no matter how he tugs or where he tugs on the bottom hem of his jacket nor how much his hands try to physically flatten down the fabric over his chest and stomach none of it is going to fix how he feels this uniform makes him look.

“Why not?” Her voice sing-songs. Still more invitation to stay even though it’s unintentional. Her voice was always that way. Sweet and smile-inspiring.

“It takes a lot of time and effort to run a mythical city risen from the dead.”

Akemi smiles, “City not dead. Cities don’t die.”

Finally fine with his appearance, or at least figuring that this is as good as it’s going to get and he’s definitely doing laundry sometime tonight, he turns and walks over to her, “By the grace of God and us,” he leans down and kisses her good-bye while simultaneously picking up some files lying on the nightstand by his side of the bed, “And believe me, I’d rather be here with you.”

She smiles again as he heads for the door then stops to tell her…

“I’ll see you tonight maybe for dinner though?”

Akemi starts nodding, “Yes,” she agrees.

Joe leaves their quarters. He sees a few other Expeditions members wearing the newer suits and smiles. Okay, so maybe he still does cut quite the dash, doesn’t he? His pace picks up as he walks off.

*                      *                      *

Surrounded on the floor in one of Atlantis’ labs by files and papers and laptops with a small semi-enclosing arc of dry erase boards with all sorts of mathematical equations all over them behind him and next to the door, it’s like the morning after the geekiest, nerdiest frat party ever, lays Martin ‘Marty G.’ Gero. Young and past out asleep while curled up into a contented adult version of the fetal position, his earpiece is talking while he’s snoring.

“Mister Gero,” Lawerence, one of the science department’s lab assistants says over the radio link.

Snore…

“Mister Gero?”

Some silence then snore…

“Mister Gero.” With warning this time.

Snore, a particularly loud asthmatic bear one…

Lawerence’s sigh can be heard over the radio link then an inhale of breath and, “Marty!”

Martin snaps awake at the shout. Instantly popping up into a wobbly sitting position. His hand automatically tapping his earpiece and his sleep bedraggled voice answering, “Marty Gero here.”

“You have a meeting, Sir,” the assistant’s voice returns to regular volume and tone, just another day on the job in Atlantis.

Marty tries to check his watch, but realizes that he’s not wearing one. He never does, he always to check to see if he’s got one on but he’s never worn one. He looks around the messy floor/ “desk” he’s got around himself, squinting, to see if his cell phone, useless for phone calls but handy for time keeping, is lying around him somewhere, anywhere in this mess. He liked to work on the floor on the odd occasion. Bigger work area. It’s been his work area for the past two weeks. He can’t even remember what his bed feels like…and he’s not entirely sure he accurately remembers where his quarters are, but he’s not going to admit that to anybody until later when he might try to make it back there tonight and will most likely have to radio Lawerence for the directions.

“I, I, d—what time is it,” he finally asks coming up empty on his squinty-eyed search. He turns his eyes upwards to search the walls. He doesn’t ever remember there being any wall clocks in any of the rooms in the city, but, like with his none existent wristwatch, it never stops him from looking to see if there is one there. Well, not true, he’s never been into every single one of the quarters so who knows. There might be some sort of San Diego Chargers lightning bolt wall clock or STAR WARS A New Hope poster one somewhere, bound to be between the rather jock-like military personnel and geek-embracing scientific members. He wouldn’t put it past Colonel Sheppard to have one that looks like the Alien from Alien, maybe it hisses or whatever those things do as an alarm sound. He knows Doctor McKay has a Star Trek themed one that plays the Red Alert sound for its alarm.

“You have five minutes to get there, Sir. Good luck and good morning, well, afternoon.”

Martin nods as Lawerence breaks the radio link between them. Still dazed and confused and not really awake but getting there, Marty’s dark blue eyes abandon the search of the laboratory. Good luck indeed. He smears a hand over his face, ruffling the thick growth of his beard and mustache, and his first coherent thought to himself is ‘Where the hell is the coffee pot?’ Then ‘Please, God, don’t let it be from yesterday.’ And ‘I need to trim my beard sometime soon.’

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Episode Six- The West Pier- Prologue

Posted on July 11, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

Prologue

It’s extraordinary outside. It’s a fantastically beautiful day. Barely any clouds, light blue sky the color of a child’s Crayola crayon, and calm ocean the deep arresting color of Greek cobalt. Everything is looking good. The Lost City of Atlantis risen from the depths has never looked better. Its silver-grey metal towers and piers balancing elegantly like a permanent snowflake for all year long under the passive warmth of the planet’s sunlight. It’s tempting to eat lunch outdoors today, it’s tempting to just walk out onto a balcony and breath in fresh sea air and exhale relaxation. The whole day, the whole outlook is tempting.

 

 

Atlantis’ Gateroom is alive with the hustling, bustling miasma of people down on the embarkation floor as well as around the floor’s perimeter. It’s a monochromatic mix of military as well as civilian personnel, a swirl of gray uniforms with the only punctuation being collarbone lining strips of maroon red, old marker blue, and canary yellow or chest-covering wedges of forest green, black, or pale grey indicating who belongs to what department. People going in and coming out of doorways or hallways. Some of them from the Earth-born Expedition’s first day and others from it’s last few months, every single one knowing what their job is and loving every moment in this fabled city because what’s a better reference on your resume than time spent doing anything in Atlantis.

The active Stargate’s event horizon’s glow undulates over the rust-colored marble floor like light passing through the water of a swimming pool as Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard, United States Air Force, and his team comprising of Athosian leader Teyla Emmagan and Satedan Weapons Specialist Ronon Dex, both native denizens of the Pegasus Galaxy, as well as Canadian Theoretical Astrophysicist Doctor Rodney McKay, and Lieutenant First Class Ursula Kenmore, United States Army, check their gear. Making sure they get themselves appropriately physically ready while standing a couple of handfuls of feet away from the shimmering, waiting wormhole behind them. Ronon Dex standing out the most in his native Satedan clothing of a brown leather trench coat covering his long sleeve linen shirt with fringed V-neckline. As if his height wasn’t enough to make him stick out anyway and it’s only exemplified by his black pants made up of swatches of reptile hides stitched into a patchwork and his sleek black Satedan work boots. His sword, a memento of a long gone friend that was more like a brother, nestled into its thick re-enforced leather scabbard strapped to his back adding even more punctuation to his height. Ronon re-checks the security of his large, heavy blaster pistol before slipping it back into its holster clinging to his thigh and dangling from his gun belt. The over six feet tall Satedan isn’t the only one standing out, Kenmore equally visibly apart from the other’s black uniforms in her khaki green BDUs and cap. The differences exaggerated by the fact that literally in between them are the three other members of their mission group, all three dressed exactly the same in Black BDUs without caps.

Up above them on one of the Operations Center’s balconies overlooking the Gateroom stands Richard Woolsey, casually leaning on the balcony’s railing and looking down at his Expedition’s flagship team and their fifth team member giving their primary weapons a safe and satisfying once over. To say he’s on edge about this would be an understatement his eyes have already notice the distinction of. The troubles between the Colonel and his team with Lieutenant Kenmore and she with all of them have been building. In the reports from their previous mission, some of those team members had been more explicitly forthcoming than he’d ever thought possible. Teyla’s report had been particularly scathing and indicting of Ronon’s behavior on that mission and unusually esteeming of the Lieutenant’s. Colonel Sheppard’s had even made slight, incredibly slight but still, mention of Ronon’s behavior being out of line while simultaneously making no mention of the Lieutenant but referring to her when he had to in his report in somewhat glowing terms. Doctor McKay glossed over all of the apparent friction. And Doctor Daniel Jackson, as Woolsey had expected, had remarked repeatedly in his report on the mission that he had grave concerns about Kenmore’s safety around Ronon Dex when the team went offworld as well as when they stayed in the city… he’d even written, only once but the concern had enough uncomfortable gravity behind it to only be warranted once, that he was also concerned for the welfare of the Lieutenant’s five year-old son. Woolsey had originally thought that that concern was completely out of line considering that there have been some glimmers here and there of hope, like the Colonel’s occasional backing of decisions made by the erstwhile Lieutenant which Ronon was thinking was in much more extravagant numbers on missions than they actually were according to the rest of his team members. But when Woolsey went back and rechecked the mission files, specifically the reports written by the Lieutenant and the recorded reports of Specialist Dex, which came across more as angry rants than actual oral reports detailing the specifics of the mission, Woolsey had to agree with Doctor Jackson, maybe not his exact words but his sentiments. The overall predicament is predominantly grim and grey for their unity. He hopes there will be a change around soon. Maybe this will be the mission in which it happens.

Sheppard, his team, and Kenmore’s eyes expectantly look up at Woolsey. The unanimous signaling from all of the silent gate teams that they’re ready to go whenever he’ll let them. Richard Woolsey looks back into the Operations Center itself, which is as busy as the outskirts of the embarkation floor. People coming and going. For some reason he feels especially bolstered by seeing faces he’s stood side by side with during the city’s most trying times, a few of those crises had not even occurred under his tenure. They’ve been through a lot together, especially bringing Atlantis back to the Pegasus Galaxy. When they re-established contact with Earth, the circumstances they’d suffered in bringing the city back had made Richard’s first message to be a request for two additional therapists immediately, power drain on the Zero Point Modules be damned. Therapists that have been, unfortunately, without a free moment to themselves since they first step foot here, not even their mealtimes belonged to them personally. They were hours spent with their meal trays on their laps as they sat in chairs across from other Atlantis personnel still dealing with the alarming and disturbing events that had re-established Atlantis’ presence in the Pegasus. Recently, Woolsey had even thought about bringing in a therapist for the therapists.

Funny, even during his ruminations, Woolsey’s eyes specifically find Chuck Campbell, one of the Operation Center’s Gate Technicians, at his usual station seated at the DHD console with an opened laptop resting on top of the Ancient computer. And as if sensing the former attorney’s brown gaze on him, Chuck looks over at Woolsey and nods. Woolsey looks back down at the gate team.

“Your team has a go, Colonel Sheppard. Be sure to check back in six hours.”

Sheppard nods without his usual glib retort and the muscles in Woolsey’s shoulders tighten even further. Perhaps the troubles within his flagship team have started early today through Ronon expressing his vociferous opinions about the Lieutenant in the locker room. John Sheppard not making some sort of smart remark about their departure or his expectations on what to expect when they get to the planet they’re going to is not a good sign. Never a good sign. Woolsey holds back a burdened sigh as Sheppard, his team, and Kenmore turn and head for the active Stargate. As they start to leave, however, Richard Woolsey gets another glimmer of hope.

“Put on your sunscreen campers, it’s a shiny day where we’re going,” Colonel Sheppard remarks as he slips on his aviator sunglasses before stepping into the Stargate’s wormhole.

Richard Woolsey smiles as Doctor McKay makes a consternated retort of his own, to the Colonel’s words, “It’s a perfectly shiny day here.”

Then they’re gone. All of them. He hopes the good lasts.

Woolsey turns away from the railing and walks over to Chuck. He stands by the man’s console, both of them focus their attentions on the laptop’s fifteen point four-inch screen. It shows the already through the gate MALP’s camera view of the forest lined field on a sunny planet. It looks like blissful summer compared to Atlantis’ springtime appearance. Dense woods of tall evergreens, tall spindly grass swaying in a breeze. Where Atlantis’ world seemed the ideal island vacation, that world looked the ideal camping trip. The thought crosses Richard Woolsey’s mind that General Jack O’Neill would love to have a cabin there, but only if there was a pond good for fishing nearby; fish in the pond not necessarily a requirement. After a few seconds the backs of Sheppard’s group come into the MALP’s camera view and start spreading out into a trained scouting formation under the practically unnecessary save for protocol’s sake signaling of Colonel Sheppard, each of their concentrations aimed ahead of them into the shadows of the woodland. Heeding his gesturing without seeing it. After another few moments more, Sheppard turns to the MALP’s camera and gives a thumbs-up while nodding. The area and the team are currently clear of any possible hostiles. They’re good to go on.

“Go ahead and shut down the gate,” Richard Woolsey orders, the official indicator that the Colonel’s message was received and acknowledged.

Chuck pushes a button on his console and the gate connection breaks. The peacock iridescent event horizon shatters from the center out and the glowing lights of the Stargate’s chevrons go dark.

With a final glance over at the inactive Stargate, Richard finally lets go of his sigh then says, “Chuck, if anyone needs me or anything happens, I’ll be at the West Pier.”

He nods back, “Yes Sir.”

Richard Woolsey walks out of Operations while everything continues on with business as usual in his wake.

Suddenly it hits Chuck, he smiles, “Hey, he finally got my name right.”

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Episode Six- The West Pier- Front Cover

Posted on July 3, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

“I serve at the pleasure of the Atlantis Expedition Commander.”

new(citywhole)logo1(final)(edit)

It’s a wonderful day, Atlantis’s flagship gate team is out on a routine scouting mission and life in the Lost City of the Ancients goes on as it usually does when they’re not there.

Throughout the day Atlantis Expedition Commander Richard Woolsey along with his senior staff Chiefs of Staff Robert C. Cooper and Brad Wright, Deputy Chiefs of Staff Peter DeLuise and Allan McCullough, Gate Teams Director Carl Binder, Deputy Gate Teams Directors Joe Mallozzi and Paul Mullie, and Gate Teams Secretary Martin Gero as well as Doctor Radek Zelenka, Major Evan Lorne, and Colonel Steven Caldwell deal with an endless supply of problems. From seeing five Stargates go down in the Pegasus Galaxy Stargate Network to First Contacts, Wraith Worshippers, and dealing with the Genii Civil War, all of it has to be dealt with like any other day in the Pegasus Galaxy.  And things go from bad to worse when a Wraith hiveship shows up.

Take an in-depth, behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to keep the legendary city of Atlantis going and the Expedition the myth houses.

Posted in Season Six- Episode Six | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Episode Five- Bloodline- Acknowledgements

Posted on June 27, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

Acknowledgements

To say that this story was a long journey would be an understatement, to date this story tops all other stories in terms of length and just shy of two hundred pages on my word program. Blowing the previously longest story, The Ruins, out of the freakin’ water by over forty pages. Oh my holy! When I started writing this one, I had no idea the trek and endurance trial I was in for, but I’m glad to say it was worth it in my opinion. And so the incredible thank yous begin in chronological order of their occurrence in the story (like usual). For starters, much thanks to actress Brenda McDonald for her portrayal of Teyla Emmagan’s dear friend Charin. When writing this story, for some reason I kept envisioning the character of U’dana with the face of Charin. I felt it would be something to kind of throw Teyla but also make her feelings on this mission more personal than usual. And it turned out spectacularly well. Thanks to Brad Wright as the writer of the Stargate SG-1 film Continuum for the scene in which Daniel gives a pep talk to his alternate self. It seemed the perfect correlation for the part in this story that I referenced it in. The perfect in depth moment of what Daniel cold possibly think about during the personal crisis of the story concept of what would have been Stargate SG-1’s third movie, Stargate Revolution. Revolution’s story concept since its release has become a pretty big controversy among Stargate fans and I couldn’t help but bring that controversy here and try and illustrate how this might affect the characters of the Stargate Universe as much as it affects the fans. Thank you for allowing this to be a possibility. Another thanks goes out to Peter DeLuise for writing Stargate SG-1’s “Affinity”. It was one of the episodes that I believe Daniel would of course think of when trying to come to terms with all the possible ramifications of the story concept for Stargate Revolution. Teal’c living out in the open on Earth was a given reference. Thank you so much for making it possible. In line with that thinking, thanks have to also go out to Joe Mallozzi and Paul Mullie for the Stargate SG-1 tenth season episode “Moment Mori” that I also referenced in that scene. It seemed to have exactly what I was looking for in Daniel’s ruminations about how the world would handle the revelation of Vala along with Teal’c. And also another heartfelt moment that would again show how incorporated Vala has become in SG-1 how her and Daniel’s relationship has evolved, along with more of the revelations that were supposed to come in Revolution. For especially Joe’s blog from which a lot of that information came from, I’m so thankful for your daily writings. More gratitude also goes to Disney’s animated Peter Pan movie for the cannon reference material here, considering I have no clue about firing any sort of siege weapon that could possibly be similar to a cannon and one of the kids at the daycare I worked at was watching this movie, I had an ‘Aha!’ moment. Eternal thanks beyond measure for the save here. I have great appreciation for actress Linda Ko for her Atlantis character as both Doctor Carson Beckett and Doctor Jennifer Keller’s head nurse in the Atlantis Expedition and for her last name which I applied to her character Marie who up until now has had no last name. Incredible thanks to the History Channel’s fantastic television series Ancient Aliens, in particular their Second Season Final Episode “Alien Contacts” which featured the Penniston Code and it’s revelation about Hy-Brasil (spelled in this story in that of the Ancient Irish language rather than the modern one). It was great inspiration, and the starting off point, for this story as well as a terrific story/plot twist. Go for the Ark of the Covenant, which has always been something that’s bugged me since the Ark of Truth SG-1 movie and its Holy Grail storyline for the show’s ninth and tenth seasons, and then get the other Atlantis! Awesome! When writing an Atlantis story, how can anyone pass up the chance to take a shot at Earth’s second mythical Lost City? This story is also grateful to Emilia Clarke for her portrayal of Daenerys Targaryen in HBO’s series Game of Thrones, based off of the book series written by George R.R. Martin, whom the character of the Celtic Horse Goddess Epona is based off of in this story. Ironically enough, when trying to picture in my mind what Epona looked like, I couldn’t help but keep thinking of Dany, kept picturing her in her Dothraki garb. And the more I thought about it, I liked the idea of someone so young being a village Elder… and how that would throw Sheppard and his team. Also thanks go out to the Game of Thrones’ series costumer, Michele Clapton, for the fantastic costumes worn in the series. What a fantastic reference for this story and character in particular. Much thanks to Brad Wright, again, and Robert C. Cooper for their story idea for Stargate Atlantis’ First Season Episode “Hide and Seek”, especially Robert C. Cooper for writing the episode. When I was trying to come up with the best way to introduce the Worm God of Celtic mythology, my research into the description of him kept leading me to think time and again of the energy creature from that very episode. I couldn’t help but think that that would be a totally awesome ‘coming full circle’ sort of a thing to include here. And throwing in the concept that what the Ancients had originally caught and imprisoned was a child form or even infant form of the species the Worm God is. Thank you so much for making that possible in this story and adding new dimensions to it. I am much, much indebted. And a not unrelated thank you to the Special Make-Up Effects man, Chris Walas, who made the Face Melting Ending Scene in George Lucas and Steven Spielberg’s movie Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark possible. When it came to picturing how an eyeball made out of organics and energy would be ripped apart at its very molecular level, I kept visualizing this scene specifically, especially the eyeglasses wearing Nazi. So I figured why not draw on it for inspiration since it already was for me and Sheppard is a big movie buff. Why should the Alien movie be the only movie he references to his friends and teammates? My next thanks, although unadultered reverence would be a better description, goes to Anne McCaffrey and her son Todd, for the Dragonriders of Pern and Dolphins of Pern book series as well as Jody Lynn Nye for her work with Anne McCaffrey and illustrators Todd Cameron Hamilton and James Clouse for the companion to the Dragonriders series and reference book The Dragonlover’s Guide to Pern for the source material of the Weyr and their appearance. And also for the beautiful and tragic story of about a Weyr which I referenced in this story. When my mother first told me this story, tears streamed down her face and, as I listened, tears streamed down mine. The story also reminded me of Elizabeth Weir’s sacrifice and her character’s hardships as leader of the Atlantis Expedition, beautiful and tragic. I willingly admit that the Weir character was never one of my favorites, but the truly honorable and dignified and heroic way off the series as a regular character that she was given is nothing less than one of the most respectable moments in the Atlantis series and arguably in science-fiction as a whole. There’s no disputing its relevance and haunting of the characters of Atlantis’ flagship team and I couldn’t pass on the chance to pay it homage here in as comparable a way. Thank you Anne for the honor. My second to last thanks goes to the incredible Jim Fitzpatrick for his “The Silver Arm” book, the majority of which was the inspiration for this book along with his incomparable illustrations. I continually reference the Silver Arm gauntlet in this story as a beautiful piece of artistry and craftsmanship because that’s what the artwork of your book is to me as well as the wonder of your storytelling. Thank you so much, there aren’t enough words despite the ones I’ve spoken in thanks to you here. The last and most important thanks of all of course goes to my mother, but not for the usual introducing me to writing and always encouraging me in it, no, my thanks are for introducing me to her favorite fantasy/ science-fiction book series The Dragonriders of Pern and for the fact that she gave me my Irish heritage and raised me and continues to raise me in it. Your great knowledge of our bloodline that you personally traced back through historical records that date back almost eight hundred years and required you to wear just shy of full-on Hazmat gear to handle blessed me with the information to do this story and do it as properly and honestly as I possibly can. I am so enamored of your mind and heart and am so honored to be the daughter of a good Irish woman. I hope this story makes you proud… as much as I am proud of you for everything that you are and everything that you do. I am blessed.

Posted in Season Six- Episode Five | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Episode Five- Bloodline- Epilogue

Posted on June 20, 2014 by stargateatlantisseasonsix

Epilogue

Richard Woolsey sits behind his modern, nickel desk in his office. His arms steepled before him, his hands clasped together, and his lips pressed against his knuckles. He pensively gazes down at his desk’s frosted glass top, but he’s not seeing the calendar or the stacks of loose papers and files on it. After a few moments, he exhales through his nose, his breathing becoming audible. Richard lifts his head up enough to pull his lips away from his hands.

“So what is your verdict, Doctor Jackson?”

His eyes finally look up to see Daniel’s eyes looking down at the area of desk top in front of the archeologist. The good doctor sits in one of the former attorney’s cushy, light grey, guest chairs, taking his own moments to think over his answer.

None of SG-1, both past and present membership of the Stargate Program’s flagship team, had liked what had happened to their friend and her son. In fact they had railed against it as much as they possibly could without starting a civil war inside the Stargate Program itself. Teal’c and his mentor Master Bra’tac, who’d become just as fond over the years of Kenmore and her child as Teal’c has, tried to get what remains of the Free Jaffa Nation’s fleet to go to the Pegasus after Urs and Michael, but let alone did the Jaffa High Council say a definitive no to it citing the growing restlessness and power of the still strong and getting even more in charge by the day Lucian Alliance, despite Teal’c and Bra’tac citing Michael as Teal’c’s Godson and therefore in their eyes a Jaffa child being oppressed as well, the High Council was not about to potentially start a war with the Tau’ri. There had also been the little matter of one Brigadier General Jonathan “Jack” O’Neill being so spitting and screaming pissed off throughout the whole of the Pentagon and shouting for a ship to take him to the Pegasus and get Ursula and Michael back that scared the crap out of everyone who knew about the program from Washington D.C. to Cheyenne Mountain. But all of it was to absolutely no avail. The IOA’s power and decree were absolute. But when Woolsey had dialed Earth a few weeks ago with a private message for Daniel and offered the archeologist the chance to come to Atlantis to evaluate Ursula specifically, Daniel had leapt at the opportunity. He hadn’t even let General Hank Landry, the man in charge of Cheyenne Mountain, have the chance to give him the go ahead first.

And then there came what Daniel, and basically everyone else at Cheyenne Mountain, would call ‘the catch’. In their previous mission, Ursula had been the main target of an incursion and Colonel Sheppard, Doctor McKay, and Major Lorne had been taken along for the ride as well. The Ancients, specifically Morgan Le Fay, which Daniel as well as the rest of SG-1 and Stargate Command thought they were done dealing with for the rest of their lives at least, had infiltrated the city and seized the four of them. An ordeal during which, the best Daniel could describe it, Ursula was harassed and abused with the death of her husband Michael and the existence of the Ancient Project Veritas, the project Atlantis’ flagship team had discovered was responsible for her being half-human and half-Ancient. Woolsey had reported that he didn’t know the exact details of the harassment but judged that it had to have been pretty severe considering that neither Sheppard nor Lorne would surrender even so much as a peep about it and even loose mouth Rodney McKay had been keeping tight-lipped about it as well. And Ursula, Woolsey also reported during that private communication, had emotionally shut down. He said it was like she had become numb. She would get this distinct distant look in her eyes, her face would become expressionless, her body would stiffen, and she wouldn’t say anything to anyone, she’d just stare right through them or straight ahead of her. With that, Daniel knew he definitely had to come. He knew those signs well. All too regrettably well.

Colonel Samantha Carter had practically jumped at the chance to bring Daniel here too. Let alone had it been a chance for her to catch up with her old teammate, but the I.O.A had been forcing the SGC to keep Sam and her ship, the General George S. Hammond, expressly away from Atlantis so that none of Ursula’s friends and comrades could possibly get the chance to get her and her son out of the Pegasus Galaxy against the I.O.A’s will, a furtherance of the banning of anyone from the Milky Way ‘rescuing’ Ursula and her son from Atlantis. Replacing the Hammond as one of Atlantis’ standard resupply ships with Colonel Abe Ellis’s vessel, the Apollo. The I.O.A only relented on that unfair policy recently after conducting its own covert investigation in which they learned that Urs is good friends with many of the Apollo’s crew even if she isn’t as friendly with the vessel’s commander. They also found out that she’s such good friends with those crewmen that letting the Apollo near Ursula was just as dangerous as letting the Hammond near her.

Onboard the Hammond, Sam had met up with Daniel in the Mess Hall late one night of their almost two week journey and the two had poured over the Atlantis Expedition’s flagship team mission file Woolsey named “Veritas”. Reading in between the military and civilian lines and getting more and more worried about their friend and her child by the sentence. What wasn’t being said was as important if not more so than what was being said.

“I think she’s got a silver lining here,” Daniel finally says. He goes on, “Ursula has always been especially proud of her Irish heritage. It’s never yielded, never stopped, never lessened. It’s always been there. And now that she’s discovered that that same Irish heritage is the same as her Ancient heritage, you might just be getting exactly what you’re looking for. She might finally be able to accept that she’s half-Ancient and how she got to be half-Ancient.

“Now I’m not saying that she’s already there, but this means a huge step for her. She knows that part of her bloodline well, they’re honorable people. Good people. The thought that they were also Ancients and not just Ancients but the Ancients that had helped keep the Veritas experiment going on Earth won’t change her feelings about being Irish. That will help you.”

Woolsey nods. That’s good, that’s good to know. He was hoping to hear that. Hopefully this isn’t going to be a problem that comes up again.

“So you’re final evaluation is that…?”

“I hate to admit it, but I think being here is good for her as much as it’s good for Atlantis to have a half-Ancient being with them,” Daniel is forced to say.

Woolsey weighs how to say this next, but there’s no better way than plainly, “I know it’s hard for you to say that, I thank you for it though.”

“Don’t thank me. Just, just,” Daniel hadn’t expected this to be this difficult for him to say, but he feels he has to as much as Woolsey did in saying ‘Thank you’, “look after her and Michael okay.”

Woolsey starts nodding. Understanding.

“They’re our family,” Daniel goes on, “ and we feel that—“

“That you’re the only ones that know how to protect each other. To have each other’s backs the best and most able way possible,” Woolsey finishes for him.

Daniel nods too. A gentle smile touches Richard’s lips, making the corners of his mouth rise a little. Daniel’s surprised to see it.

“I know how you feel, Doctor, trust me, I know how you feel.”

Daniel eyes the man and for once sees a reflection in the former attorney’s brown eyes. A familiar one. One Daniel’s seen on every face he’s ever met at Stargate Command. Maybe Rodney and Sheppard were right, Mister Woolsey has changed… Daniel nods again. Yes, the man has changed since they last met. He’s Commander Richard Woolsey, Permanent Administrator of the Atlantis Expedition. He’s one of them now. If Daniel had a glass, he’d toast him. But before Daniel can say ‘Welcome to the club’ in lieu of the toast, his earpiece comes alive with the accented voice of Czech scientist Doctor Radek Zelenka.

“Doctor Jackson, we are ready for you.”

Daniel answers his radio, “Thank you, Doctor Zelenka. I’ll be right there.” The radio link breaks while Daniel keeps his eyes on Woolsey.

“I believe your presence is required, Doctor Jackson,” Woolsey tells him.

Daniel nods again, “Sounds like it. Oh, I should tell you though that you might want to work on your welcome reception for your next guest. Some of your people can be bit… frosty.”

Woolsey starts nodding again, knowing full well that that’s a reference to Ronon Dex, “Yes, I’ll work on putting all our best feet forward. In a way it’s been a blessing that your trip was an unscheduled one. It’s shown me what we could work on before he gets here.”

“Yeah, even though they know me, springing such a surprise guest appearance again might not be a good thing.”

“Yes, I know. I’ve already made Colonel Sheppard well aware of the upcoming visit as well as our upcoming visitor.”

“Good,” Daniel finally gets up and starts to leave. But on the office door’s threshold, he stops and turns back to Woolsey, “Oh, and call me Daniel.”

Richard smiles at him, “Call me Dick.”

Daniel begins smiling as he turns back to the doorway and starts to head out again, “Already do,” he laughs.

Richard takes that information and laughs to himself a little as he goes back to the work of running a city.

 

 

It’s dark down here, it’s always dark down here. The hook lamps don’t make any difference. The eight-foot tall chainlink fence doesn’t help any either. With his hands in his pants pockets, he follows his hears straight through the opened gate, past two-story high stacks of pallets of storage containers, beyond a few rows of these stacks, and up to a pallet of shipped crates and other still duct taped closed, packed boxes… and Lieutenant Ursula Kenmore. Sheppard stops a couple of handfuls of feet away from her and watches her loudly sift through an opened box full of books. He notes the markings of capital letters on the side of the box written in thick black marker:

 

1ST LT. URSULA B. KENMORE

HQ, CMD, 2ND BATTALION

APO: 12012

BOOKS #3

 

His mind automatically translates the lines. Lieutenant First Class, he’ll check her personnel file sometime in the future to see what particular name that her middle initial of ‘B’ pertains to. Headquarters, Cheyenne Mountain Division, and the code for the Atlantis Expedition as Stargate Command’s “2nd Battalion”. Air Force, but most likely Army in the Lieutenant’s case, Post Office and Stargate Command’s numerical designation for Atlantis. One, twenty, twelve. The first, the twentieth, and the twelfth letters of the alphabet being A-T-L, short for Atlantis. John coughs to make his presence known, Kenmore looks up at him.

“Oh, hey Colonel. What are you doing down here?”

“Looking for you actually, Lieutenant.”

She crinkles her face at him, “Why?” She reaches back into the box.

“Rodney says he and Zelenka got the room setup for running scans on the Silver Arm,” Sheppard tells her.

“Oh, okay, I’ll be right there. I’m just picking up some things for Daniel first.” She pulls some books out of the box and sets them aside atop another nearby crate that also bears her thick black markings but reads BOOKS #2 instead as she reorganizes the other books she’s obviously disheveled in her retrieval of the newly pulled ones.

John waits her out by looking around this part of Atlantis’ storage area. Dark green, basically black walls, tiled like the walls of the outer reaches of the piers, like the walls of the hallway he and Rodney drive their RC cars in. Same black floors, lacquered once but time spent under the water for ten thousand years has washed away pretty much all of the high-gloss polish, too. There are sconces here and there, but in such a large dark area, they’re pretty much useless. His eyes travel around at the dozen or so stacks of crates and boxes all around him. His eyes look out beyond those to take in the tons of other stacks leading out of his sight and filling up the rest of the storage area that’s roughly the size of a football field. In fact, when the Expedition first set up shop in Atlantis, he and a handful of other soldiers and civilians had gone to then Expedition Commander Elizabeth Weir and asked her if they could use this room as a football field for playing games. She, in her own polite and well-honed negotiator skills way, read them her own subdued version of the Riot Act and told them to start putting any excess supplies the Expedition had in that room; she capped off the Act by telling them to find someplace else to play, you know whenever they felt they had free time from their apparently none too considerable duties establishing their presence as Atlantis’ new residents. So he and the rest of his football players went back to exploring the city and the much larger Pegasus Galaxy on a regular basis and ended up using one of the balconies of one of the piers as a driving range to practice their golf swings on. John’s current yardage with a driver is four hundred-fifty yards.

John’s eyes keep wandering. He hasn’t ever really been down here since the Expedition returned from Earth to retake up their residence in the city after the Replicators killed the Ancients of the Tria. He knows a lot of the other members of the Expedition have stuff stored down here, but he can’t recall, looking, exactly, still looking around, that he has anything down here anymore. He shakes his head, nope, not that he can immediately recall. He’s always packed light and Nancy got basically everything in the divorce so there wasn’t any baggage to tow around with him other than the emotional and mental stuff. Suddenly the short hairs on the back of his neck rise. He fights off the abrupt shiver. He senses it. The voice. That nasty little voice that had popped up loud and proud in his mind when Kenmore first arrived in the city and apparently it had only gone into hibernation for a little bit until yesterday. It’s not saying anything, just letting him know that it’s there and that there is a part of John that is evidently always going to play Devil’s advocate against himself. What had that alien A.I. that’d made him hallucinate Kolya told him, that John is really good about beating up on himself? Pretty damn good about taking off his own hand about it too back then. He hears the rustling of Kenmore closing the box back up and returns his eyes and attention back to her.

“Okay, ready to go,” she gathers up her set aside books and walks over to him.

He looks down at the books. One is short but two inches thick, it’s cream and dark moss green binding saying The Story of the Irish Race by Seumas MacManus. The second is a couple of inches thick, dull lime green colored, and is called A Treasury of Irish Folklore by, Sheppard has to squint a little, the script is so tiny, Padraic Colum. The last book’s tall, about twelve or eight inches wide. Its binding is black with white writing The Silver Arm, putting it bluntly there, by Jim Fitzpatrick.

Interested, Sheppard reaches out and pinches the half-inch thick between his fingers and pulls, Kenmore lets him take it from her. He looks at the cover. A black framed artistic rendering, somewhat Art Noveau looking of a light grey-skinned warrior on a light grey-skinned horse charging into battle with his sword held high over his head and an awkward triple halo of what looks like starlight around him, emanating from him. Beside his image, written in block capital letters in red are the title words ‘The Silver Arm’.

“That’s Lugh the Il-Dana,” Kenmore supplies as Sheppard keeps looking the cover art over, “Lugh the Shining One.”

“I thought you said that Nuada had the Silver Arm.”

She nods, “He did. But this tells the day when Nuada lost his kingship, when Breas took over, how Nuada got the Silver Arm and his kingship back, and then about how he died at the hands of Crom-Crúach during the Second Battle of Moy Tura and then how Lugh avenged him by fulfilling the prophecy about him killing his own grandfather, Balor.”

Sheppard nods, sounds like every other story he could possibly get about legendary or myth-based families around the world. Hello Oedipus… sort of. And not exactly light reading perhaps either. He opens the book and is immediately impressed by preliminary filler sheets of beautifully ornate Celtic designs. He remembered his mother showing him pictures of the illuminated manuscript the Book of Kells, it’s kind of like this only a lot older and less Art Noveau and more medieval. He turns a few more pages and the book itself automatically opens to a two-page spread image of water crashing in on a golden towered city and smoke rising from the city as black demon-looking things look on from the sky with white eyes, the sky is colored bright red at the bottom of the pages then shifts into dark brown at the top of them. A lone bird, a seagull he thinks, looks to be flying away from the destruction. Inset in the upper left-hand corner of the left page is a white box with black writing in it. Sheppard reads it out loud to himself.

“The golden cities I once loved lay fathoms deep beneath grey seas: the shining towers of Hy-Brasyl, earthly and heavenly Paradise where men walked with gods yet were in accord with the beasts of the forests and mountain wilderness. Time when springtime and harvest were as one; flowers and fruit hung heavy on every bough. Time when hands moved only in grace and giving, eyes smiled, lips spoke of love without shame, bravery without bloodshed,” he finishes, letting the eloquence hang there in the silence. Then he walks straight ahead, back to the crates and boxes Kenmore had been at, he rests the book on the waist-high boxes, and continues flipping through the pages of the Silver Arm book; Kenmore staying by his side the entire time.

The next page he goes to has just a bunch of writing and a part of the writing has the bold type headline of ‘2. THE CONCEPTION OF BREAS AND THE VISION OF CARNÚN’. His mind can’t help but get interested even more at that, the vision part not the conception bit. He turns pages again. This time flipping to a chapter called ‘PART THREE THE RE-INSTATEMENT OF NUADA OF THE SILVER ARM’. He turns the page and the right-side page’s image is of three beautiful women. Three very familiar looking beautiful women—well, at least the central foreground woman is very familiar looking. Kenmore catches his recognition and starts nodding, she points down at the page’s title at its very bottom right corner: Mórrigan of the Badb. The woman looks truly sexy in her sheer bright red flowing gown swirling around her in an apparent alluring dance movement. It’s not like she hadn’t looked as attractive in her rusty brown-red, equally sheer clothes in the stasis pod, it’s that this picture accentuates it very successfully.

“She was hot in her heyday, wasn’t she,” Sheppard asks. Then rethinking that when his next memory is that he and Kenmore shot the woman up and left her body in its Ancient stasis chamber turned coffin in that moment.

“Yeah, she was,” Kenmore says. He detects the sadness in her tone of voice and turns the page again.

Coming to another double-page spread. This one depicting a landscape of star-speckled space with—

“Is that…,” Sheppard trails off pointing down at the picture while lowering his face down a few inches closer to it, not believing his eyes.

“Yep, it’s the plain inside the mountain.”

Sheppard nods, that’s the part he can’t believe, “And that demon-looking guy with the red eyes?”

“I’m not really sure, but I think it’s whoever rules the Other World.”

“And that guy?” He points at the small figure of a man with golden red-hair wearing gold armor and a long flowing red cape, even though he’s pretty sure he knows the answer.

“That’s Nuada. My ancestor.”

Sheppard looks over at her, but she keeps her eyes down on the picture. On Nuada. Sheppard returns his eyes to the book, didn’t look like the picture they’d seen in the book Daniel’d shown them back in U’dana’s village. Although that one was a full page close-up and this one is two pages and a heck of a lot smaller. He turns the page again. For the last time, he promises himself. Flipping past a large chunk of the story… to a double-page spread of a storm-skied field on the edge of a cold-looking stream with a crane standing in it eating a fish staring straight at a couple… having sex. Sheppard gapes. Kenmore smiles, turning her eyes away from the copulating couple. John’s frozen, he’s not sure what to do, and he’s pretty sure that Kenmore’s grin is at his discomforts expense. He’s also finding that he can’t physically close the book he’s so stunned by—

“That would be Dagda the All Father and the Daughter of Indech the King of the Fomor,” Kenmore tells him.

He stares at her, a part of him grateful to be looking somewhere other than a happily screwing couple, “That’s a Fomorian woman?”

She nods at him, “Did you think the women weren’t good looking?”

“Well, yeah,” he admits. The guys were so ugly before the Silver Arm changed them, then they all looked like pretty boys from the covers of romance novels… and they hadn’t actually encountered any women either in combat, in the mountain either, or back in the village again so…

“Well, they are just as beautiful as any of our women,” she points at the picture, at the couple; Please don’t do that, “The King of our Gods thought so.”

Wait, what?! Sheppard stares down at the couple again, “That’s…”

“Yep,” Kenmore nods, “Dagda was Tuatha Dé Danann. King of the gods among us.”

“So you two…”

“Yes, our two cultures had no problems sleeping together. Breeding too, Breas is the result of a Tuatha Dé Danann woman and a Fomor man, remember Elathan, Breas’ father. Her brother actually,” again Kenmore points at the woman straddling the man in ecstasy.

“Wow,” Sheppard says.

A slyly playful grin crosses Kenmore’s face, she bites her lower lip teasingly and bumps the side of his hip with the side of her hip, “Uh-huh. They made love so intensely that it actually burrowed a pit into the ground that remains there to this day on the strand of Eba. It’s called ‘The Bed of the Coupling’.”

Sheppard actually blushes. Kenmore puts him out of his socially awkward misery by reaching out, closing the book for him, and picking the book up and putting it back with the two others in her arms. Sheppard looks at her gratefully, trying to shake off the heated reddening of his cheeks. Kenmore’s grinning at him then turns.

“Come on,” she heads back for the entry gate and Sheppard hurries after her, falling into step beside her.

 

 

They walk into the lab. Ursula immediately heads over to Daniel, stationed at an observation computer, and hands him the books. He looks up at her as he takes them, “Thanks.”

Kenmore smiles and nods as her friend sets the books down beside him and goes back to examining the detailing of the magnified image of the Silver Arm on his computer screen, utterly riveted. She glances at the gauntlet sitting on a table in the middle of the room underneath the stark pouring light of a spotlight as she follows after Sheppard as he makes his way over to another computer console that Doctor McKay’s sitting at with Doctor Jennifer Keller sitting at the computer console on his immediate right. Her computer is set up to register any medical information that the gauntlet could possibly give them. Zelenka, stationed at a computer on McKay’s left, is monitoring any other key scientific information that won’t fit on McKay’s screen. All of them are waiting and watching their screens regardless of the fact that absolutely nothing is going on with the Arm. Clearly, it’s simply fascinating to stare at something that while it’s known to be a powerful device is also something incredibly beautiful to look at. A true example of artistic craftsmanship. Sheppard takes up residence a couple of steps behind Rodney.

“Okay, we’re here. Start her up,” Sheppard gives the order.

As if he needed the soldier’s okay…  “Let’s go people,” Rodney announces.

As he and Zelenka gear up the computers to start scanning and running analysis on the Silver Arm, Kenmore glances over at Sheppard who’s intently watching McKay’s screen. She’s not sure what she’d been expecting of him when he’d accidentally flipped to the sex picture in The Silver Arm, but he’s abruptly ‘Oh Dear God’ was not it. In a way, from all the rumors she’d heard all over the city about his Captain Kirk ways with some of the alien women they’ve met in the Pegasus, she found it extremely cute that he reacted with unadulterated embarrassing shyness. It was sweet of him. She returns her eyes to Zelenka’s computer screen… and casually leans towards Sheppard ever so slightly.

She keeps her voice low, so it’s just for the two of them, “Hey Sheppard.”

He’s riveted by the screen, “What,” he asks absently.

“It’s ‘Slash’.”

He looks at her, confused, “What?”

“The codename for the rumors about…,” she trails off delicately as she discreetly gestures her head at McKay then back at Sheppard, “It’s ‘Slash’.”

Sheppard looks at Rodney, still not sure what the hell Kenmore’s kind of whispering about, then it hits him. Like an electrical shock.

“Oh, oh.” He looks over at her again, confused again but for a whole new reason, “Why—“

“Judging by some of the stories I’ve heard, I don’t want to know. Ev-ver,” she immediately cuts him off with a held up hand and a warningly stern look.

He stares at her. Petrified. He quickly glances around the room. He’s clear. They’re clear. Everyone is really distracted. Great. He leans in really close to her, perhaps closer than he really needs to and trying like crazy to make it look nonchalant which he’s definitely sure he’s totally failing at, and whispers, casually again, “Wh-wh-what have…”

She whispers as quietly back, “One of the new scientists had been told about Slash and she asked around for some of the stories. She was in the Mess Hall with her little table of four other friends. They were just gabbing and, anyways, when she told them about how she found out about Slash, one of her buddies called her ‘You poor innocent victim, you’ and one of her other buddies laughed and agreed that the scientist chick had been set up.”

“And, and what’d she say about the, uh, um, the, uh, stories,” he stammeringly asks, trying to still be discreet while being so conspicuously close to Kenmore and not making any eye contact with her or watching any of the computer screens whatsoever. Just going about business as usual, people. Nothing awkward to see here… or overhear here.

“That they are just so wrong.”

He stares at her. Petrification turning into abject horror in the fraction of a heartbeat.

“Oh, no, it’s not that she has any problem with gay people or gay sex for that matter. It’s just how graphic… some of… the stories… can get.”

His whole body tenses up, “And, and wh-wh-what have you heard?”

She doesn’t even blink, “Graphically hardcore porn even by graphically hardcore porn standards.”

His eyes widen, mouth slackens. Did he actually just hear himself squeak? Wait, was that out loud or just in his own head. Please let that have been in his head and not out loud. No one else has reacted, so yes on the in his head thing. Kenmore nods at him. Understanding, well, at least in some part understanding what he’s feeling. At least she hasn’t squeaked and after all, she’d read part of that stuff apparently to give that sort of description. The stories circulating around Atlantis like some sort of sordid black market underground of typed and stapled together pages traded all over the place. Never staying in one place for very long. Always moving. Oh my God, what are people thinking about my command?

“Mm-hmm, I know,” she says, “I was the one who called her a poor innocent victim.”

Sheppard eyes her for a moment. Opens his mouth to say something when Rodney makes another announcement…

“We’re at full power. Starting the first scan… now.”

A smaller overhead device similar to the scanner that Jennifer uses to scan whole bodies in the Infirmary descends from the ceiling down over the gauntlet, stopping about a foot away from the Ancient arm device. The machine’s grid-patterned green laser glittering on the silver.

“Results are already coming in,” Radek broadcasts, hunching closer to his screen’s readouts.

Everyone leans in to the computer screens around the room to see the data as the overhead device starts moving down the gauntlet.

Posted in Season Six- Episode Five | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment