Title: Worms…Worms…Everywhere a Worm

Author: stella_pegasi

Rating: K+

Spoilers: None

Summary: The team gates to a planet where they expected a warm welcome; they certainly didn't expect what they found. Team only. Minor language. Complete.

Disclaimer: I do not own them; I would have treated them better.

Notes: Please forgive any mistakes regarding physics or mechanics; I am thankful they call this fiction. I was inspired to write this when I saw the movie that is mentioned in the story again over the past weekend; loved that movie as well. Hope you enjoy.

Worms…Worms…Everywhere a Worm

"Rodney, just fix the damn thing."

"Sheppard, I'm trying but these things take time."

"We don't have time, fix it."

Dr. Rodney McKay was sweating; he had pulled off his black jacket and t-shirt and put his TAC vest back on over his bare chest, tying his t-shirt around his head. He was still miserable but he was not going without his vest, not after what just happened to them.

They were on this mission as a result of information found in the Ancient database pertaining to a planet located in a solar system near the center of the Pegasus Galaxy. According to the entry, the Ancients had visited this planet on numerous occasions, describing its inhabitants as warm and hospitable. After some of the galaxy's populations that the current residents of Atlantis had dealt with in the past few years, "warm and hospitable" was an inviting description.

The Ancient database mentioned that a research outpost had been placed on the planet to study a very interesting mineral that was abundant there. The mineral appeared to have very similar properties to the crystal that was the foundation of Ancient technology but seemed to have a much stronger structure. While the Ancients indicated that they were curious to learn more about the crystal which could potentially prove more reliable, the research team had yet to find any other entries about it in the database. Rodney used this information, along with the possibility of finding a ZPM, to convince Richard Woolsey, Director of the Atlantis Expedition and Lt. Colonel John Sheppard, military leader of Atlantis, to approve a mission to the planet.

Now, he was sorry he had been so persuasive about visiting this "lovely" world.

It was hot; extremely hot. The environmental monitoring program on his notebook registered the temperature at 117° F and not a drop of humidity. It was early in the morning on the planet; he hated to think what the temperature would be mid-day. He was already feeling every single solid degree of it.

"Damn it, it's hot!" He yelled to no one and everyone at the same time.

Sheppard was drenched in sweat and that sweat was covered in fine, sharp, grains of sand; his normally spiky dark hair was plastered to his skull and was falling down onto his forehead. He had taken a black bandana that he always carried and tied it around his head, trying to keep the sweat out of his eyes but it was so soaked that it was not helping. With Rodney's declaration that it was hot, Sheppard turned toward the scientist who was currently in the only shade for miles; underneath the DHD, trying to fix it.

"But it's a dry heat, Rodney."

"Oh, sure, Sheppard, sarcasm is so appropriate right now."

A rough, deep voice joined in, "McKay if you don't get that thing fixed, being hot will be the least of your problems." McKay took a quick glance at the large Satedan who was glaring at him. He turned back to the open panel on the DHD pedestal and kept working.

Ronon Dex and Teyla Emmagan, the other two members of the colonel's team, were standing a few feet away from Sheppard, having taken up a perimeter along the edge of the stone platform that the gate and the DHD sat on. Other than the gate and platform, all they could see for miles was desert; hot, sandy, arid desert. It appeared they were alone; alone, that is, with exception of some very large, worm like creatures that had taken a great interest in them.

They had gated to the planet only about 40 minutes before. Expecting a friendly, welcoming planet, they found instead a dry, hot, desolate landscape. As they waited for Rodney to determine what was going on other than the obvious fact that the planet had dried up, there was a popping noise, some sparks flew and they all turned toward the DHD.

"Rodney? What just happened?" Sheppard asked, looking more than a bit concerned.

"How do I…let me look." A perturbed McKay bent down and pulled off the panel that covered the crystal chamber. His waiting teams members cringed when they heard the words they never liked to hear from the scientist.

"Oh, no."

"Rodney? What?" Sheppard was getting annoyed.

"We are so screwed; one of the crystals is really cracked, maybe because of the constant heat on this god-forsaken planet. I don't know if I can fix it." With that, he sat down dejectedly on the platform and put his head in his hands.

"Well, fix it, so we can get out of here. In case you haven't noticed Rodney, it's hot."

"I would fix it if I could, Sheppard. I don't think I can."

Teyla realized that the two men, who were already very uncomfortable from the heat, were heading toward a shouting match and she walked between them. "Rodney, perhaps you just need to take a moment to think about the problem. Can you scan the area to see if there are any buildings or shelters that we could get to? If so, maybe we could wait for Atlantis to dial in and send a jumper for us." Her quiet, soft voice defused the moment.

Sheppard looked at her and nodded, "Good thinking, Teyla. Rodney, do it." He had put his sunglasses on but the intense glare from the relentless sunlight hitting the sand wasn't keeping him from squinting; shelter would be nice.

Rodney sighed and scanned the area to see if he could locate any structures that could provide shelter. After a few moments, he shook his head, "There is nothing, absolutely nothing out there. The database said that there was a very large city located around the gate; we speculated that the gate might actually be in the center of the city. If it was, then this sand must have buried the city and all that's left is the gate which was apparently quite elevated. I guess we're about 10,000 years too late."

"Care to speculate what happened here?" Sheppard was pulling out a bandana as he asked his teammate. "Global warming?"

"You think, colonel? How the hell am I suppose to know what happened here without more data?"

Sheppard shot him a glare and simply replied, "Get to work, Rodney. The quicker you get this thing fixed, the quicker we can get home."

McKay started to turn around when he noticed some activity on his environmental sensor program. Rodney had rigged a wireless receiver to pick up weather and environmental data on his notebook when they were off-world; he was tired of surprises. "Uhhhh…Sheppard? We have a problem here."

"What?" Sheppard quickly walked over to the scientist while hearing the sound of Ronon's weapon powering up.

"There are several very large spikes of energy coming toward us from the south; they are registering on the tremor sensor. Some are less than a half a mile away and they are moving very quickly." Rodney's voice was agitated and his hands were shaking as he pointed to the area.

"What are they?" Sheppard raised his P-90 and joined Ronon and Teyla as they faced toward the direction that Rodney had indicated.

"What am I, the answer man for everything? I don't know but activating the gate must have attracted them. We're going to find out soon, there are four spikes getting really close." Rodney grabbed his P-09 and held on as tight as he could.

Looking toward the south, they could see what appeared to be a sand storm racing across the desert toward them. As the 'storm' approached, they felt the sting of fine, sharp grains of sand hitting their skin with increasing intensity until the storm was almost upon them and the sand started to clear. As visibility improved, they came face to face with four large worm-like creatures that rose up out of the desert and took aim on the team standing exposed on the stone dais.

For the next few minutes, the air was filled with the sound of P-90 gunfire, Ronon's blaster, and roars coming from the 'worms'. One by one, the large creatures dropped as the weapons did their job.

The four teammates took a few seconds to catch their breath. Finally, Ronon spoke, "What the hell are those things?"

Sheppard was trying to spit the sand out of his mouth but he mumbled, "Bait for some very large fish." He took a step off the platform, sinking into sand that almost covered his boots, and hesitantly began walking toward the nearest creature. Ronon joined him; motioning for Teyla to stay with Rodney.

Sheppard stopped about five feet from the worm and turned back to Rodney. "You said there are more?" Rodney shook his head in the affirmative. "How close are they?"

Looking at the sensors, he replied, "There are about nine more on the sensors and from how fast they are heading this way, we have about 25 minutes."

"OK, get to work Rodney; we need to get out of here. We expended a lot of bullets to take out four of them; I don't think we have enough ordnance to take out nine more."

Sheppard and Ronon walked up to the dead creature and Sheppard tapped it tenuously with his boot. "Geez that is one ugly worm."

The creature was the color of the sand with skin that was extremely rough and ridged; its mouth full of short, sharp, pointed teeth that looked deadly. The head was about the size of a large garbage can and it smelled about as pleasant. The body disappeared into the sand leaving approximately eight feet of the worm-like creature above the surface. They couldn't tell how long it actually was but from how far they reached out of the sand when they attacked, they were pretty long.

Sheppard took a video camera out of a pocket on his TAC vest and began to record the creatures and the surrounding area, including the gate. He took some close-ups of the creature and then turned to Teyla, "Hey, you have any of those collection vials that the biologists wanted us to take on missions? Might as well get some samples and make them happy while we are waiting for our illustrious scientist to work his mojo." Rodney sent Sheppard a not so nice gesture.

Yes, colonel, I do." Teyla started to leave the platform but Sheppard stopped her, "No, Ronon will come get them."

Ronon looked over at Sheppard and raised his eyebrows. "Hey, Chewie, it makes no sense for her to get all this sand in her boots." Ronon chuckled at the always protective colonel and went to retrieve the vials from Teyla.

"Rodney?"

"What now, Sheppard? I'm trying to work here."

"Status, please."

"The gate is broken and we are about to be eaten by the cousins of the worms we just killed. That enough of an update for you?"

Sheppard started to reply but Ronon was quicker, he powered his weapon and said, "McKay."

"Threaten me all you want, Conan; it's not going to change anything. There are still nine creatures coming toward us and they will be here in about 20 minutes. Now leave me alone, I am trying to save us for the millionth time."

Sheppard took the vials from Ronon and used the largest one to take a sample of the sand. He then took a sample of the deep purple blood that was seeping out of the wounds. He started to use his Ka-Bar to cut a piece of flesh and pry out a tooth when he realized he really didn't want that purple stuff on his knife.

He looked at Ronon with a grimace on his face, "Got a spare knife, buddy? Really don't want to use mine on this thing."

Ronon laughed at Sheppard as he pulled a small knife out of his dreadlocks and handed it to the colonel. When finished, Sheppard handed the knife back to Ronon who stuck it into the sand to clean the blood off and then slipped it back into his hair. Sheppard shuddered, watching Ronon with a disgusted look on his face.

"Sheppard, didn't we see some movie that had big worms like this in it? I liked that movie." Ronon was still grinning.

"Yeah, we did; it was called Tremors and I liked it as well. Operative word being liked; not any longer, not as much fun when they are real." They joined Rodney and Teyla and waited for Rodney to save the day.

Sheppard was getting antsy; the clock was ticking and he was pretty certain that they were dead if Rodney couldn't get the DHD repaired. As he drank too warm water from his canteen, he watched Rodney who was working feverishly to fix it. He figured the heat from Rodney's brain processing that fast had probably raised the ambient temperature a couple of degrees. Something was nagging at him and he decided to risk interrupting the scientist.

"McKay, how's it going?" He dropped to one knee next to Rodney.

Rodney sighed, "Not good, this cracked crystal will not carry the current forward and I have no way to bypass it. I have to find some extra crystals and keep them with me for times like this. If there are more times like these, that is."

"Rodney, I was thinking about what you said in the mission review about this planet; that there is crystal here that is like the crystal the Ancients used, right?"

Rodney shrugged, "Yeah, but how is that going to help us?" Then his eyes widened and he snapped his fingers, jumped up and ran to the edge of the platform.

Sheppard ran the few steps after him. "Rodney, tell me what you are thinking."

"What I am thinking, flyboy, is if this sand contains enough of the crystal material that the database mentioned and if Ronon's blaster is hot enough to melt this sand to form a sheet, we might be able to go home. It won't be perfect and it might not work but it worth trying." He knelt down and started grabbing handfuls of sand and piling it up on the platform.

"See, the problem is that I can't get the power to pass through the cracked crystal to engage the gate; the crack is too big and it's not conducting power through to the next crystal which is the last one in the sequence. Just putting a piece of metal to conduct power across won't work; the crystal could be inert but it still needs to be whole for even that to work. If I can get enough conductivity by placing a sheet of melted sand that contains crystal across the cracked crystal, then the power might get through. Genius." He continued to pile up the sand.

"You're welcome, Rodney."

McKay glanced up at Sheppard, "Yeah, yeah, Mr. Could Have Been Mensa," he paused, "you did good." Those last words were accompanied by a smile. Sheppard smiled back.

Rodney had gathered about a six inch mound of sand on the stone platform and he motioned for Ronon to bring his weapon over.

"Just aim at the center of the pile; we only need a thin sheet of solid sand about three inches square."

Teyla, who was monitoring the energy spikes heading toward the gate, informed the others that the worms would be on them in about five minutes. Ronon fired his weapon over and over at the pile of sand.

After about 30 seconds, Rodney stopped Ronon and checked the progress, it wasn't enough; Ronon fired again. Rodney stopped him after another 45 seconds and squealed with delight when he saw the results.

Sheppard cocked his head and teased the chief scientist, "Rodney, did you just squeal?"

"Colonel, even your snarkiness cannot upset me; I see a cold shower in my future." With that he raced back to the DHD and began to work.

"Colonel, they are nearby." Teyla pointed to the south. "I can see the sand storm."

"Take positions. Rodney, keep working." Sheppard, Ronon, and Teyla formed a shield in front of Rodney and waited.

They were prepared for the shower of sand this time but that didn't stop it from being any less painful. Sheppard yelled at his teammates to choose their shots. They had taken out three of the worms, one had knocked Teyla down and almost grabbed her but Ronon got to her first and shoved her behind him. Things were getting pretty dicey and Sheppard was getting concerned they weren't going to be able to hold off all of the worms. Then through the gunfire, they could hear the familiar sound of a gate symbol being pressed.

Rodney yelled, "Get down, I'm activating the gate! I'll send my IDC, run as soon as you can!"

As the three teammates dropped onto the stone, Sheppard saw a big worm rise out of the sand and head directly for the DHD and Rodney. He raised his weapon to take it out when he heard the familiar swoosh of the event horizon. The worm never had a chance, its momentum caused it to overshoot the DHD and it was caught in the plume created by the event horizon when the gate was activated. When the event horizon settled, half of a worm lay across the dais and Dr. Rodney McKay was covered in dark purple blood.

Sheppard yelled for Teyla and Ronon to go and he grabbed Rodney by the arm, a very slick arm. "Come on, genius. Purple's a good color for you." Together, they ran through the gate.

The end.