Stargate: Homeworld: The Longest Journey
By Dave Lister
Disclaimer: Stargate: Atlantis is owned by MGM, Homeworld is owned by Sierra. All I own is a Copy of Cataclysm. So Sierra's got all they're going to get from me.
Feedback: Please! I can't make it better if you don't tell me how.
'The Longest Journey begins with a single (mis)step'
Chapter One
Imperial Palace
Planet Taiidan
"WHAT?! They are how close?!" The Taiidan Emperor roared.
"They are at the inhibitor, Your Excellence." A rather nervous defense Minister said with a not so small amount of fear.
"Get out!"
The now panicking Minister all but sprinted from the room and once he reached the corridor he did sprint as if his life depended on it, and in his mind it did.
"Warmaster!"
"Sir?" the grizzled old Warmaster, looking completely nonplussed.
"Send the 3rd and 7th fleets to intercept them at the inhibitor, and ready my ship for immediate travel to Hiigara!"
"Sir?" this last command breaking through the warmasters calm a fraction.
"I wish to face them myself." A sinister grin on his lips.
"As you command."
3rd Fleet staging area
Unknown system
The third fleet had gathered just inside jump range of the Exile fleet and was merely waiting for 7th fleet to be in position.
The comm. tech of the 3rd fleet flagship turned from her board to address the Admiral "incoming signal, sir, it's the 7th fleet"
The Admiral nodded in acknowledgement. "Are they ready?" he didn't need to ask, but prudence had taught him to be thorough.
"Yes sir"
"Very well, signal the fleet, sound the one minute jump siren"
Outside the ship, a heavy cruiser, on her own able to take down a mothership class vessel (given time), another two like her, a dozen destroyers, normal and missile both and nearly three hundred and fifty assorted frigates plus almost 2000 fighters and corvette's and the carriers to house them and construct more made ready to jump.
"All ships report ready, Admiral"
"Very Good, Commence attack!"
0.4 LY from Hiigara
The Exile Fleet, the entire remaining race, numbering barely 2 million souls, all that now exist of what was a planet with a population of over a Billion sat in the system working on removing the latest obstruction on their Journey to Hiigara, Home. The Planet they had called their home for nearly 4000 years, Kharak, was now lifeless having been scorched in retaliation for the development of hyperspace ability, which was in violation of a long forgotten treaty, forgotten by them but not by the ruthless Taiidan emperor who ordered the attack and whom they had been in conflict with almost continuously as they made their way to their true home. Unbeknownst to them, events were unfolding which would see the exiles ending up further from Hiigara than ever before.
Now having been ambushed by the biggest concentration of ships to date, far more than they would be able to handle, the Exile fleet was busy just trying to get out of the system alive.
"All ships, this is Fleet Command, all fighters and corvettes are to attempt to dock with a carrier or the Mothership, all vessels massing frigate or above are to make a tactical jump to within minimum safe jump distance, emergency hyperspace in three minutes."
Blade Squadron "Blades of Saajuk"
Squad leader Shin'ra looked at his link to the Mothership's sensors to calculate where to dock, he realized that he and his wing had moved too far from the bulk of the fleet, he also caught sight of his fuel readouts, there was not enough time or fuel to get to a carrier and he had lost his support frigate to a daring corvette raid some minutes ago, resigned to the fact that no matter how hard he tried he wasn't going to be leaving with the fleet he contacted the rest of his squad.
"Alright Blade's, we are near bingo for fuel and too far from the fleet to get out with them, so what we have to do is buy the Mothership the time it needs to get away safely, so lets give those Taiidani bastards hell!"
A dozen war cries erupted over the COM channel once he finished and he knew that they would all fight with their dying breath.
Fleet intelligence control 'pit'
"Sir, there are several ships that won't be able to get to jump range in time." A Lieutenant at the Scanners reported.
"Which Ships?" asked Gelan Naabal, the Chief Fleet Intelligence Officer.
"Sir, the Blades of Saajuk fighter squad and a pair of assault frigates that were chasing an enemy carrier"
"Did they get it?"
"Just now sir, but one took damage to her engines, she's barley making 1/4 of normal thrust sir, plus her hyperdrive took hits as well, and the other frigate refuses to leave the damaged one."
The officer closed his eyes for a moment giving up a silent prayer for the ones that would be left behind. To die at the hands of the Taiidan. Or worse, to live at the hands of the Taiidan.
"Understood. Release their scuttling codes, tell them to use them at their discretion. Time to jump?"
"Ninety seconds, Sir." this from a junior engineer in the main area of the command deck.
Just then the deck rocked from an external impact of some considerable force, forcing anyone standing to grab a handhold or be tossed to the deck.
"Energy spike in the hyperspace control systems!" shouted the engineer who was starting to panic. "It's developing a runaway reaction!"
"Shut it down! Now!"
"I can't sir, systems aren't responding!"
"Bridge to Engineering, Report?" Gelan barked into the intraship comm.
The sound that first greeted his ears was that of emergency sirens and sparking conduits, and then the rather strained voice of the chief engineer could be heard.
"We took a hit near the hyperspace wave generators and they're building up too much of a charge, if we don't jump NOW! We may never come out when we do."
"Understood, Bridge out, Fleet command, emergency jump, now!" He said to Karen S'jet, the young scientist who had devised a system to handle most of the functions of the ship, a Bio-neural interface, She was the interface, bonded to the ship in the most intimate of ways.
Outside, ships stopped firing and focused all their energy on their hyperspace cores which were linked with the farjumper core in the Mothership, then before each ship capable of doing so a window into the largely unexplained realm of hyperspace formed then each ship was swallowed by the window they had generated. With the farjumper core overloaded with an excess of energy far more than needed overpowered the Inhibitor, causing it to explode, wiping out the bulk of the Taiidani fleet, then the hyperspace 'tunnel' drilled towards and then past Hiigara and out towards the other side of the galaxy and beyond.
Blades of Saajuk Squadron
The squad leader noted the departure of the Fleet, then turned back to his ship scanners, while nowhere near as detailed as with the tie-in to the mothership and the advanced sensors array it was good enough to pick out a likely target within range, an enemy missile destroyer which had temporarily expended all of it's stores and was waiting for it's internal factory, a much simplified version of the systems in the carriers and mothership, to make more. He tagged it on scanners then flipped open the com.
"Ok Blades, the Mothership has jumped out so now it's our turn to do what we can with what little we still have, there are two of our assault frigates five minutes away, however we don't have enough fuel to get to them and as you are no doubt aware it's more than a little hot out here, I want all fighters to converge on and destroy targets Tango-1 through Tango-4. Get to it Blades!"
It suddenly struck him as Ironic that he and his squad were the only remaining flight that had seen Kharak as it was after the bombardment by the Taiidan, and now bathed in the light of their homeworlds sun, they would die not knowing if it really was there or not.
Mothership
Position: indeterminable
Heading: Unknown
"Let me get this straight, we're stuck in hyperspace?" Commander Naabal asked.
"That's partly correct, sir. The hyperdrive was overcharged before we initiated our last jump, an attempt to compensate for the dampening field and when that fighter crashed into the hull it damaged some of the control systems, including the Anomaly Interrupt System, had it been charged any more we would be stuck forever, as it is the hyperdrive won't discharge enough energy to enable a manual shutdown while we are still within our galaxy, at best guess we would end up here" 'Here' being a point roughly 25,000 Light Years from the far side of the closest galaxy. "Every time it cycles it loses some of its power, the rest feeds back into the system" The engineer from Kith Liihra explained. "Another problem we've discovered, due to the disappearance of a few ships that the tunnel generated by the hyperspace drive will collapse slightly every time the system cycles, any ships that are in the area of collapse will either be destroyed or they will simply drop back into real space, and no sir the ships can't maneuver while in jump space, however once it reaches the average diameter for a standard jump it'll maintain that size and most ships are within this range"
"What do you mean 'ships have disappeared'?"
"One of the research modules that was detached from the others for some volatile materials testing and a half dozen frigates and a destroyer escorting it, the only good news", the engineer explained hurriedly "is that the larger the aggregate mass of the object or objects passing through the hyperspace/real space interface in an uncontrolled manner like this, the higher the chance of coming out intact"
"How high a chance for the research module?"
"They were testing a very rare superdense material that the scientists believe maybe the key to a different type of FTL travel and possible applications for weapons and power systems, there were even rumors of it being powerful enough to allow ships as small as an Arrow scout to jump to hyperspace, because the material is so dense they massed about the same as a group of ships twice their size"
"Numbers man!" Gelan almost roared.
"Roughly 69%"
"Which ships after that" The Commander said slightly afraid of the answer.
"In the third event, The Avatar, her escort group and the Vigilance and most of her escort, sir" this from a junior FI Lt.
"A CARRIER, our prototype Heavy Cruiser and over a dozen frigates and destroyers?" This said with a slightly higher voice than normal, for the normally calm, collected FI officer it was practically a squeak. "How many fighters docked with Vigilance?"
"Two squads of fighters and the 6th salvage and repair group, sir" one of the bridge officers chimed in.
"Some ships won't be so lucky however"
"Explain!" Gelan barked.
"In the third collapse in addition to the Avatar/Vigilance group, there are at least 5 frigates, each either separate or paired that will only have at best 14% chance of surviving."
"Damn! What sort of chance does The Avatar group have?"
"About 82%, Commander"
"Do we have fleet comms?"
"Yes, sir" the tech at comm. replied.
"Is there a Somtaaw Priestess aboard?"
"Yes, sir"
"Get her in touch with the frigates then the Avatars group."
"Understood, sir, I'll see to it personally"
"Very good, but may I ask why?"
"I have... family on the Azura, Sir" One of the frigates he knew, The intonation and hesitation made Gelan Realize that it might not be family the young tech had on the Azura, but rather a lover.
"...I see, set up the call then take the rest of the shift off."
"Commander?" The bridge bunny looked up with surprise.
"You look like you could use it Lieutenant," he said softly so only she could hear.
"Yes sir, thank you sir." anyone looking could see tears welling in her eyes for a moment...
Seeker side story - Teaser
50,000 LY from last position.
Independence combat group.
The research vessel Seeker, the Destroyer Independence and the ships immediately surrounding them when they jumped from the inhibitor came crashing back to real space with all the grace of a sack of potatoes, Immediately two ships started to drift having been further from the center of the group than the others causing damage to the ships power systems, life support mercifully still on solid state power backups, a third however was not so lucky, while the power systems on the two listing vessels were only damaged the systems on the third, older ship, were completely disrupted, including the fusion reactors magnetic containment system, the other ships were almost instantly bathed in the brief light of a mini star as the ship and it's 75 crew immolated violently.
Mothership
Engineering briefing room
Ten days after Jump insertion.
"Chief, how far are we traveling between cycles?" Commander Naabal asked as he sat in the rather Spartan briefing room. "And how many cycles will there be before we can shut it down?"
"Well..."the chief began, thinking." It was about 72 hours after we jumped that it first cycled, and the guys up in sensors are telling me that would be roughly 50,000 light-years in galactic space, but projections show we'll travel faster in the intergalactic spaces, and I estimate that it'll be 3 maybe 4 cycles before manual control can be achieved and normal jump exit be made possible, also that first cycle was shorter then the others will be so we'll travel further between them now, also the time will also have been increased."
"What do you mean, chief, why is this happening?"
"Unknown sir, possibly due to battle damage, but projections show that the distance increase is roughly 65,000 LY, we passed into the void between galaxies about 5 days ago and we'll just reach the next by the third cycle, which will be in 4 days or so, one cycle in the void in about 6 hours, no ships in that one, thank Saajuk for small mercies, the third in the near side of the galaxy then one near the core then we'll have lost enough energy for manual shutdown by the time we reach the estimated area worked out by the guys in Nav, also due to gravitational effects our course has developed a slight parabola, that will become more or less profound in the next galaxy depending on proximity to large gravitational phenomena."
"So, we'll probably never see Hiigara?" Gelan asked in an almost dead voice, shock setting in at the realization that they would end up so very far from that which they were so very close.
"No, not us or our children, maybe, just maybe their children."
"Ok, thanks chief" He rose stiffly, not looking forward to explaining it to the ships in the fleet.
Four Days Later
Edge of approaching Galaxy
Unknown system
Three large ships gathered in the system waiting for the smaller cruisers and fighters to return from the 'Supply Run' to the occupied planet in this system prior to wiping out the resistance that had risen almost out of nowhere.
Suddenly all the ships in the system could detect something similar to a hyperspace passage and exit, however one of the larger ships and the cruisers nestled in her flanks, for protection and longer range travel than they alone could achieve, were too close to one of the exit apertures whereupon two large missiles which were formally 125,000 ton frigates slammed into the side of the ship both amidships and at the rear, causing a chain reaction to ripple through the ships attached causing them to explode as well, damaging the cruisers of the other two vessels and indeed the vessels themselves and completely annihilating hundreds of fighters that were swarming around all three super ships. Another hulk collided with a pair of cruisers en route to the planet causing a somewhat smaller explosion than that caused by the other ships, but still taking out the cruisers and a dozen or so fighters. The other former ships consumed themselves uselessly in the vacuum between the two of them only managing to damage a handful of ships.
Elsewhere in the system nearly two dozen hyperspace windows split space and pulled back to reveal the biggest ship since the mothership, the Avatar heavy cruiser, over a million tonnes of force projection, a carrier within which were berthed nearly 30 fighters and an even dozen corvettes, and 3/4 of the frigates and destroyers usually dispatched to guard the two most valuable ships in the group the other ships having accounted for themselves on the other side of the system.
The leader of the ships in this system was furious, having lost one of his best ships and those next to it, without even firing a shot or even knowing who would dare challenge their might, the enemy they fought he considered and almost immediately dismissed, which left a new threat, one they had never seen before, a foe that couldn't even be identified by the debris because the ships had blown up so spectacularly that there was little bigger than a hand span to be found. However he knew to not stay too long when they had a known enemy to crush.
Mothership command deck
Same time
Commander Naabal stood facing the window with his hands clasped behind his back.
"They're gone, sir" his aide said discreetly
"The frigates?" he said turning only his head slightly.
"Yes"
"And the Avatar?"
"Gone, sir"
"Understood, Carry on" he muttered then returned his gaze to the window.
Avatar Bridge
Unknown system
Captain Soban immediately noticed that they and the ships around them had transitioned and called for a systems check. Each section reported either all clear or only slight injuries or damage, nothing that would affect them for more than an hour or two.
"Nav, what is our position?"
"We appear to be near the LaGrange point for the fourth planet in this system." Captain Soban nodded to himself as he digested this information.
"Sensors, what's out there?" He then asked.
"We are picking up several explosions on the far side of the system, possibly the rest of our escort; however one of the explosions indicates that we may not be alone in this system."
"Very good, Contact Vigilance tell them to scramble fighters and start construction of a probe then a resource collector." Soban could order the carrier to do this as being the commander of a heavy cruiser required him to hold the rank of Commodore, which gave him command of all personnel and vessels in the combat group.
"Aye Sir!" The Non-com at Comms replied crisply.
"And when the probe is done send it to the area of the explosions plus 2 above the plane." He ordered this because he had seen others fight a space battle, which by it's nature had no sense of up or down, as if all combat would take place in two dimensions only instead of three, which against someone trained to think and fight in 3D, as he was, usually ended up with them either dead or captured.
"Contact the other captains and put them through to my office in conference. Commander S'jet you have the bridge!"
"Sir." Four voices responded, three he anticipated, in confirmation of his orders, one he did not, it was slightly tense with an edginess that He'd learnt to associate with his senior Scan tech. He turned to look at the man. Without having to say a word the tech gave his report
"We are detecting several ships approaching, a cruiser and 15 or so fighters, as far as we can tell they have weapons charged, our fighters are responding."
"Battle stations!"
A moment later the main lights went out, replaced by the red lights indicative of battlestations.
"All sections answering battle stations, Sir!"
"Order our fighters to engage the enemy fighters, get the Salvage 'vettes on that cruiser and prepare boarding teams"
"Capture or Defense, Sir?" The Security Chief asked.
"Both, Lt. Comdr., Just in case, we have no idea about their abilities...yet. Order the Delphi to fire once it is in range of the fighters, then the Orpheus to do the same."
"They'll never know what hit 'em."
The Delphi, one of two missile destroyers in the group of ships crept forward, not that 3/4 of a million tons of ship could creep, acquired lock on roughly half the enemy fighters and fired all thirty-two missiles in rapid fire mode which launched a missile from one of the four launchers every .2 seconds until they were exhausted then slipped back to the cover of the bulk of the fleet. Most of the targeted fighters didn't survive past the first few impacts and those that did were cut apart by the remaining volley only one ship survived this frontal assault but not without significant damage. It would be bought aboard the carrier for later analysis.
The Orpheus performed almost the same maneuver as the Delphi and had much the same result, only slightly more destructive with none of the fighters targeted surviving to close range and the rest being picked off most handily by the escorting light craft.
"Sir, the Vigilance reports probe construction complete."
"Very well, launch it towards the planet"
Outside, the small delicate looking device lit off its single burn engine and burned towards the fourth planet.
Moments later.
"Sir, we're receiving telemetry from the probe"
Turning to the Scanner station, the Captain moved the few short steps in that direction. "Analysis?"
"There appears to be an object in near orbit of the planet that, according to sensors is made of the same material that was being studied by Seeker"
"Confirm that!"
"Readings confirmed object is 84% match according to probes sensor systems, although a closer scan would be required for full analysis, strangely it appears to be formed into a ring large enough for a Scout or defender to fit through, just, also there are indications of 3 power systems on the ring."
"Any activity near it?" the captain asked, almost leaning over the scanner tech to get a better look at the screen.
"Most of the cruisers appear to be docking with the larger ships as well as the majority of the fighters, the rest are coming for us. Energy increase in targets detected! It's reading as being similar to our hyperspace systems but its signature is different to ours. Several fighters on attack vectors approaching the probe!"
On the other side of the system the fighters fired their main energy weapons, these struck the probe dead on as the probe was only a single burn unit, unable to move once deployed, however previous experience had taught the Kushan people that keeping an eye on the enemy as long as possible tended to keep you alive, so following this philosophy the Exiles had redesigned the probes to carry extra layers of ablative armor, which in this instance vaporized on contact, as per design, dissipating the energy of subsequent shots in that area for a brief moment, the result of which was that one of the fighters, planning on flying through the rapidly cooling debris from the explosion ended up colliding at significant velocity to drive the long arm of the probe into the ship's cockpit before both exploded.
"Ha!" the senior scan tech said, slightly impressed by the result. "We lost the probe, sir, as expected, but the probe managed to technically score a kill before that" he reported, chuckling slightly.
"How?" queried the XO, perplexed as to how a remote-sensing device could technically score a Kill.
"It appears that they weren't expecting the probe to have that extra armor on it, which meant it survived the first volley of fire, and one of the fighters collided with it."
"Nice, What about the larger ships?" The Captain asked, a slight note of mirth in his voice for a moment, then sobering trying to get the conversation back to what was important.
"It looks as if they jumped into whatever type of FTL they use, they're gone for now, Sir."
"Very well, Nav, set your course to the co-ordinates that sensors will feed you and engage."
Soban considered the state of available resources on an auxiliary screen then contacted the Vigilance himself. "Ah captain, it's been a while hasn't it?"
"Indeed it has, Captain" replied Captain Samir Paktu. "How can I help?"
"I need three things, first I need you to start a resource collector, ASAP." he paused as Paktu spoke to someone off camera. "Secondly, I need to borrow one of your docking bays for some research and reverse engineering, within a few hours, and will need it for some time. And lastly we need a research ship"
"It'll be done, Captain"
"Very good, stand by for a fleet wide transmission. Soban Out."
Soban stepped away from the Aux terminal and proceeded to the center chair, and sat down in it.
"Lieutenant, put me on fleet wide." he waited a moment, and then at a nod from the Lt. he went on. "Attention all Kushan forces, as you are no doubt aware we have encountered a hostile force, the enemy has retreated, however that may only be temporary, we are cut off from the mothership and any immediate reinforcement, so it's vital that all ships maintain constant vigilance, I am ordering one fighter group to be on CAP at all times, the coming weeks will be hard on us all but we must stand as one, Good Luck, Soban out." that finished he indicated that the channel be cut then turned to commander S'jet, who was standing next to his chair and slightly behind. "Commander ready a shuttle to take me to the Vigilance, I want to take a closer look at our enemy and that object we detected."
"Yes Sir, shuttle should be ready in an hour or two."
"No need to rush it'll still be 11 hours before I need it"
Ten Hours later
Near orbit of fourth planet
Three Salvage Corvettes slowly approached the ring hanging in space, each one centered over a power module with their energy suppressors on as they had tried to move it previously but it appeared that the power systems also contained some sort of very efficient station keeping system that resisted the attempts to relocate it, as the corvettes locked on and started to move towards the nearby carrier there was still some resistance from the ring, not enough to stop them though, however after moving several hundred meter's the ring stopped fighting the movement and just sat inert between the tractor systems of the 'vettes. Once inside the Carrier it was released from the corvettes and was moved by the carrier's internal tractor units into the docking bay that would be its home for the next little while. Also being bought in was the heavily damaged fighter, meanwhile outside the captured cruiser was being bought near the external combat airlock which lead directly to the security barracks where two squads of elite troops, experts in 'Hostile Takeovers' were waiting in their hardened space armor and armed with the latest in personal weapons, with frangible rounds that would fall apart before they could penetrate a bulkhead or the hull but would still disable anyone shot with them.
Briefing Room
City of the Ancients 'Atlantis'
Same Time
SGA-1 The Premier team for the Atlantis expedition, Dr Elizabeth Weir, the leader of the people gathered to explore the city and Dr Radek Zalenka were all gathered in the briefing room to discuss the impending wraith attack, Only Dr Rodney McKay was absent, busy working on the compression algorithms for the messages being prepared for transmission back to Earth. The display on the wall currently linked with the long-range sensors, showing three large pulsating dots to indicate ships, Weir was the first to speak, "They don't seem threatening as dots on the screen, do they?"
"Which is why we need to do recon and see what we're up against first hand." replied Major John Sheppard.
"How?"
"I've been tracking their progress. The Wraith ships apparently go in and out of hyperspace periodically - either because their hyperspace technology is limited..." Dr Zalenka paused to let everyone continue that line of thought in their heads.
"... Or they're stopping to feed along the way." Sheppard said, voicing that uneasy thought.
"The point is, the pattern is predictable. I can guess with some certainty that they'll be making stops" Zalenka indicates on the screen. "Here, here and here."
"Even so, those ships are light years away. How do you expect to reach them in a Puddlejumper?" Weir questioned.
Sheppard replied slightly smug, despite the threat to their very lives. "We fly to a Stargate en route that Zalenka thinks they're gonna drop out of hyperspace near and we watch 'em pass by."
Weir nodded in approval. "That's good."
"Well, I have my moments. Ford and I were just deciding which gate to dial."
"And you think you can remain undetected by the Wraith as they go by your position?"
"Stealth mode. They won't even know we're there."
"OK. Go. Get what Intel you can and get back - before Rodney sends his message. I need the three of you here. Lt. Ford have someone cover for you."
"Yes, Ma'am" Replied the young, almost boyish Lt.
"Won't even stop at the duty free." Sheppard, Teyla and Ford head off.
Two Hours later
In the Gateroom, the Stargate activates with its customary whoosh. The ceiling above the Gate irises open and the Puddlejumper lowers into position. Elizabeth is in the Control Room and speaks into the radio.
"On the off-chance you decide to take the Wraith ships on yourself, Major, I am hereby ordering you not to."
Sheppard's reply could be heard over the comm. systems speakers. "Believe me, you don't have to."
"Still..."
"... Don't take on an alien armada single-handed. Understood!"
The Jumper then accelerates through the Stargate. What awaited them on the other side was not what they had expected.
Back in the conference room the display changed as the scans from the system no longer revealed the presence of the Wraith, instead marking several large shapes with several Ancient letters, which had anyone been there to see it and able to read it, would have been translated as 'Unknown Contact'
Observation Deck overlooking isolated frigate bay #1
Moments before.
Captain Soban looked down on the activity taking place below as some of the scientists assigned to the yet to be built research vessel pored over the ring and it's unusual construction, the majority of the object was made of the same material as that which seeker was researching at the time of the emergency jump, however there were indications that there was other material within the device, as evidenced by the fact that there were 32 squares arrayed around the side of the device facing the rest of the room, what these were for was still unknown.
Suddenly several squares lit up running around the ring stopping on one of the squares in line with one of the smaller designs on the face of it, which lit showing a number of dots connected by lines and a humming could be heard emanating from it, also the power/maneuver modules lit up lifting the gate off the deck to hover between floor and ceiling and the walls to either side, simultaneously the bridge called down to the observation deck and reported an energy buildup in the ring, another sequence chased it's way around the dial before settling on a position opposite the other sigil already lit.
Soban reached for the intercom and ordered all the personnel in the large space to evacuate as the third light group locked in. another four followed in quick secession, as the seventh stopped at the top of the ring the Officer on Watch was practically screaming about a massive energy spike. What appeared to be an explosion of water seemingly leapt from nowhere and settled back to a rippling surface inside the ring, Soban noticed that several sensing devices placed in front of the gate were destroyed be the outwash of the activation.
A moment later a ship started to emerge from the water like membrane, he could see that it was moving too fast to stop before hitting the far wall, however before he could finish the thought of calling for the damage control teams the craft had emerged completely and stopped, apparently whoever built the ship had lightning responses in mind during construction, it was also indicative of superior inertia control technology, he knew that none of the Kushan ships of equivalent size could stop in that short a distance from the apparent velocity that this new ship had, not without killing it's occupants anyway. While a portion of his mind noted these facts the greater part of his thoughts stopped the call for damage control and placed a call to security instead. Soban then called two of the crew with some training in diplomacy and first contact, and then proceeded down to the entrance to the cavernous bay as the event horizon evaporated.
Inside Jumper
Rather than seeing the black of space and the shapes of the Wraith hive ships and Darts as they expected, and had encountered previously, Major Sheppard, Lieutenant Ford and Teyla were confronted by what appeared to be a docking bay that, by the look of some of the equipment arrayed before them, had been converted to a research lab, however the more immediate concern was the obvious turrets and other weapons being pointed in their direction. "I think, Sir, that maybe we should put the ship down gently before these people get trigger happy" Ford said, with a hint of sarcasm.
"Your advice is duly noted Lieutenant" John Sheppard immediately started to lower the ship to the deck. Once done, Sheppard, with a thought, shutdown all systems, then he considered a possible problem, "Let's just hope we can understand them, and that they're friendly" at that the panel on the left bulkhead opened and an Atlantean version of a PADD slid into place, John picked it out of it's chute and noted that it had different systems installed on it than the usual life signs detector, this appeared to be geared for communication of some sort, logic saying to him that this was a universal translator. 'Damn, this ship thinks of everything' he thought to himself. Deciding that heavy weapons might be detrimental to their efforts at first contact, Sheppard and Ford left their P90's in the secure locker and moved to the rear of the small craft as the ramp descended to the deck they were confronted with nearly a dozen armoured figures all with weapons not… quite pointing in their direction and behind this rather formidable screen stood a man that, to the two military types, exuded an aura of command that almost bought them to attention just from being in the same room as him. Teyla was also scrutinizing the man and saw something she had seen briefly in Colonel Sumner and in Sheppard, Dr Weir and even in her own face on occasion, the look that spoke of great responsibility and great loss, the look of a Warrior who had to send people he knew to their deaths. He then stepped forward and greeted them.
"Greetings, My name is Captain Darius Soban of the Kushan heavy cruiser Avatar. And you are?"
"Major John Sheppard, USAF, this is Lt. Ford and Teyla" Sheppard replied, indicating his team as he introduced them.
"Might I inquire" Soban began. "What is that?" gesturing towards the gate. "And where did you come from?"
"Well normally I'd get Rodney to explain this but he's not here" this more to himself than to anyone else. "It's a Stargate, basically it generates a stable wormhole from one point in space to another, provided of course there's a gate at the other end." Several of the scientists who had returned to the bay heard this and an almost orgasmic look entered their eyes. "And we came from Atlantis. And just curious, where are we, 'cause this ain't what we were expecting."
"Perhaps if we remove ourselves to a briefing room so we can conduct this conversation in comfort?"
"Of course, lead on." John said, making a sweeping gesture towards the door that Soban had entered through, then reached up to touch the external control panel and thought 'Lock', The ramp on the Jumper closed then an unmistakable 'Snick' could be heard, followed by low groans from the scientists who were anticipating the chance to look around the inside of such an amazing ship upon the realization that the opportunity would be denied them. For now. Smirking at the scientists upon hearing the grumbling's, Sheppard moved to join his team.
Vigilance briefing room.
Everyone having been seated, including Captain Paktu of Vigilance who had arrived just as the group was exiting the bay, the discussion began anew. "You say you came from a place called Atlantis, correct? May I ask you to indicate its location on our charts?" Soban asked, indicating the semi complete map of the galaxy displayed on a screen on one of the walls.
"Well, I'm not actually sure where it is in the galaxy, you see-" Sheppard's explanation was interrupted by the Atlantean padd which beeped and upon withdrawing it saw that it had a map indicating both the location of the planet where the city was and the current system. "However, my Padd seems to know where it is." Sheppard finished smoothly, showing the map to Soban.
"Curious, Do you mind if I...?"Soban said, pointing first to the Padd and then the map on screen.
"Sure, go ahead, while you're doing that, may I ask again, where are we? And where did you come from anyway?"
Captain Paktu spoke up at this point. "You are on board the Carrier Vigilance in orbit of the planet the...uh, Stargate was in orbit of. We are from another galaxy, we came to be here due to an engine malfunction"
Ford looked confused for a moment, then voiced a question to address the confusion. "Vigilance? I thought this was the Avatar?"
"No no no, the Avatar is out there" The captain said, touching a control and pointing out the now de-polarized windows at the 2nd biggest ship they had ever seen.
What lay out the window was only dwarfed by a Wraith Hive ship in size and from the rather large turrets on it Sheppard and Ford both came to the conclusion that it was a ship not merely designed for combat but Bred for it.
"The Avatar class heavy cruiser, First of her class, Pride of the fleet, Biggest ship since the mothership. Four nose mounted, turreted heavy ion cannons, four super mass driver turrets, able to fire rounds almost as large as one of those frigates, and numerous smaller CIWS turrets for dealing with those pesky fighters, enough fire power to destroy every other ship in this combat group." Soban spoke up from beside the screen.
A vacant, dreamy look entered Sheppard and Ford's eyes, and had they not been in such a serious position they would probably have been drooling.
"Would you mind explaining why you came to this system and explain your comment about not expecting us to be here?" Soban asked turning away from the screen.
"Well, we were going to conduct some recon of our enemies, whom we believed to be due in this system, so we could asses the forces we would have to face." John explained, shaking off the shock of the Avatars armament.
"Enemies? They wouldn't have ships like this would they?" Captain Paktu asked pulling up images of various wraith ships.
"As a matter of fact, they do. You've met?"
"We had a small… altercation, yes."
"How many ships did you lose?"
"We only lost one unmanned probe and only light damage on a few of our ships from the main group, we lost four frigates from the outer guard, but that was more a result of how we arrived"
"And the Wraith?"
"Wraith? Oh... the enemy?" A nod. "They lost nearly 100 fighters, 2 dozen cruisers and one of these ships." indicating the Hive ship.
"You took out a Hive ship without losses? How?"
"Two of our outer guard ships collided with it as they translated back to real space"
"Sorry to hear that."
"Yes, Most unfortunate, however, as I said, because of how we arrived the crews of those ships would not have survived anyway and were probably already dead, better to take your enemies with you than leave them to get to your friends after your gone." A strained silence settled on the room for a few moments, one broken by a call from the bridge.
"Bridge to Captain." Captain Paktu opened the channel.
"Go ahead."
"Sir, sensors have detected several enemy fighters closing at very high speed...they have penetrated the outer perimeter and are in amongst our ships, we are unable to engage for fear of hitting our own vessels, we are launching fighters but they'll take a few minutes, please advise, Sir?"
"Ah, perhaps we can help?" Sheppard said raising his hand.
"Standby." The captain released the button then turned to address Sheppard. "How can you help us? Unless you have some way of calling off those ships, I can't see that there's much you can do." Sheppard had a look on his face that said 'indulge me. "Very well, what do you need?"
"I need that, out there." pointing out the windows overlooking the Jumper, then pointing out the windows out into space.
"Fine, your Lieutenant Ford can fly it, and…." That was as far as he got before being interrupted by two voices.
"I can't.."
"He can't" both men paused, then the Major began again. "Lieutenant Ford does not have the... 'Ability' to fly that ship."
"It seems like a simple enough ship, I'm sure one of my pilots could handle it."
"It's not a matter of skills, but one of genetics, That 'Simple Ship' can only be operated by someone who has a very rare gene that only one in several thousand people on our Homeworld have, I happen to be one of them."
"I see..." The way the captain said that indicated that in fact he didn't see, but refused to argue further, at this time. "Very well, do what you can" he then called down to the isolation bay ordering everybody to secure their equipment then head for the exits. Sheppard gave a quick nod to Soban and Paktu, a meaningful look to Ford and Teyla then following a guard ran for the jumper.
Atlantis
Ten minutes earlier
"Peter, what do you mean it wont engage?" Wier Asked Atlantis's Primary Ops officer.
"That's what I mean Dr Wier, every time we try to dial the gate the first six chevrons lock but the seventh won't engage, we've dialed other gates and they've worked. When it doesn't engage the gate diagnostics throw up a message and I think I can take a guess as to what it says."
"And…?"
"I believe it's being overridden by something at the other end, I'd say it's the jumper, as you know the gates here in Pegasus are a lot more advanced than the ones back home, it's possible the jumper is too close to the gate, and is stopping the wormhole from engaging."
"You mean it's engaged?"
"Essentially, yes"
"Options?"
"Keep trying and hope Major Sheppard moves the jumper away from the gate."
"Very well, keep trying and inform me the moment it engages." "Yes, Dr."
Outer Space
Moments Later
Sheppard cleared the carrier and immediately deployed both the drive pods and weapon pods, going into rather aggressive evasive maneuvers to avoid being shot by the flitting Darts, when he had a free second he called up the ships inventory with a thought he saw the figures he knew corresponded with the number of 'squids' on board, the little weapons that almost killed him back on earth. 'Just over a dozen, great' he thought. 'How many of them?' another figure flashed onto the HUD. 'And here I am faced with half as many again of 'them' ' just as he thought of this he saw four fighters take up positions slightly ahead of him above and below the corners of the ship and another four forward of them. Sheppard concentrated on sending a squid shaped gift to as many wraith as he had them to send against as they came into view. From the pods at the back of the ship between twelve and fourteen yellow streaks emerged and homed in, faithfully, on their assigned targets dodging nimbly around the Kushan fighters flitting through the area. All the targeted Darts blew up rather spectacularly. 'Well, that's my good deed done for the day, just give me a beer and I'll be fine' unfortunately the jumper didn't supply John with the much desired beverage. So he sighed, calling to Vigilance that he'd done what he could and was headed back in. As he approached the carrier again his fighter 'escort' peeled off to take care of the few he'd missed.
Vigilance research bay.
Shortly after the departure of Jumper one.
Teyla and Ford were watching as the fight unfolded on screen, when a siren sounded in the bay where the stargate was located. Suddenly the gate came to life again, then Ford's radio crackled. /Atlantis base to Major Sheppard, come in? /
/Atlantis, This is Ford, the Major is… unavailable at the moment/ turning to look at the captains Ford asks "Would the signal we're using propagate outside the ship?" After a moment they shake their heads in the negative.
/Define 'unavailable', Lt.? /
/We've run into some people that have run into the wraith, the Major is assisting against a small group of darts in the jumper, Teyla and myself are on board one of these peoples ships, so is the gate. /
/I'm coming through Lt./
Ford spoke quickly. /Dr Wier I don't think that'd be a good idea right now/
Wier responded to this sounding a little annoyed at being told what to do by someone under her command. /And why would that be, Mr Ford? /
/Well, the gate is at least four feet off the floor/
A pause /Very well, Have Major Sheppard contact me as soon as he gets back, and get him to park the jumper a little further from the gate than last time/
/Yes, Doctor, Ford Out. / With that the wormhole again ceased to be.
Atlantis briefing room
"Radek, slow down and tell me again." Elizabeth Wier was saying trying to calm the over excitable, and almost babbling Czech Scientist, Rodney looked on amused.
"OK, Here are the readings as they were at the briefing before Major Sheppard left, right?" Zalenka said pulling up the image.
Wier nodded. "This is what happened after we left the room." The static picture started moving, showing the flaring of one of the hive ships which then disappeared, the hyperspacing of the other two, the arrival of another fleet and the briefest glimpse of a larger group of ships, almost as ghosts on the images just before the destruction of the Hive ship.
"Why didn't we see this earlier?"
"Well, as advanced as Atlantis is it can't perceive events at long ranges in real time without a relay, a jumper and an active gate would have given us a near instantaneous feed"
"When did this happen?"
"I estimate between ten and fourteen hours before we received it, however there is a greater concern," another image showed on screen, showing half a dozen or so Hive ships, two marked as being the two that jumped out of the earlier scene. "This is a near live feed from a system a lot closer than before, the two from earlier started screaming as soon as they emerged from hyperspace, the others have responded."
"What do you mean 'Near live'?"
"We are looking at a live image of events at least three to four hours old, and we are starting to pick up a few more ships headed for this rendezvous, I think they'll start coming for us the day after tomorrow, if we're lucky the day after that at the latest."
Rodney took over at this point. "There may be some good news, we've detected an unpowered defensive satellite on the far side of the system, according to the database it can take down a hive ship at a shot, all it needs is a power supply"
"Does it need a ZPM?"
"NO, that's the beauty of it, it's power needs can be easily met by one of our Naquadah reactors, a few hours flight in a jumper and it'll be ready and waiting for when 'they'" a gesture to the screen "Get here."
"Do it! And take Peter with you"
"Elizabeth, you know I can't fly a jumper." Both remembered when McKay nearly crashed the jumper the one time he was in the pilot's seat, and he hadn't even gotten out of the hanger!
Mothership engine room.
Two days after the disappearance of Vigilance
"Sir, Significant drop in power output to the hyperdrive! Estimate at least 48 hours before manual interrupts will work." One of the techs monitoring the hyperdrive systems said somewhat excitedly and also slightly loudly as everyone currently in the room broke into cheers and yells, The chief engineer let this go on for a minute then spoke up.
"Alright folks! Good news indeed, however we still need to bleed off the energy once we drop to real space, I want options on my desk in one hour. Move it!"
The Chief finished his speech then went to his office to share the news with the bridge before the gossip mills got it there first, the chief swore that if the mothership could travel at 'the speed of gossip' they would be home in hours not centuries.
An hour later the chief was going over the options brought to the table by his staff, and as he went over them only one was a truly feasible option. "You propose feeding the remaining energy into the PDA system and finish the heavy cruiser in record time?"
"Yes, Sir, all the interior systems, the superstructure and outer hull are complete as is nearly half the armor, overcharging the PDA will allow us to lay the remaining armor, a full ammo load plus extra and maybe a second layer of armor as well."
"Very well, this is your plan, you take the lead on it" The chief said, handing the data chit with the plan on it back to the engineer who came up with the plan.
"Yes sir!" The engineer taking the chip and heading for the manufacturing decks to speak with the construction foreman about the necessary modifications to the needed systems to be able to handle the amounts of power involved.
Vigilance Briefing Room.
Ford and Teyla were sitting in the Briefing room waiting for Major Sheppard, watching the goings on in the room and below as scientists poured over the gate and what readings they had on the jumper, and the scans coming in from the battle still taking place outside. Several people had been called down to the room carrying what looked like maps and had been consulting them and the Atlantean padd which was still showing the position of Atlantis when several things happened at once: the doors on the far end of the bay below opened allowing the small cylindrical form of the Atlantean scout ship into the bay, the gate started dialing again, causing scientists to scramble away from the gate again and the two captains turned to face their guests with a surprised look on their faces.
Captain Soban spoke first. "Are you certain this is accurate?" indicating the PADD.
Ford responded "well, everything else we've seen from this technology has been correct, I don't see why the information wouldn't be right now, why?" that was as far as the discussion got before they noticed the activation of the gate again.
/Lt. Ford, this is Dr Wier, has Major Sheppard returned from his 'errand' yet?/ as Ford was reaching for his radio it crackled again and Sheppard answered himself.
/Yes Elizabeth, I'm back. /
/John, what did I tell you about finding trouble? / Wier sounded half-joking, half-serious.
/Not too? / Came the reply from the major.
/Yes, I did. Is it safe to come through Major? /
/Yes, but I wouldn't walk through if I were you. The gate…/
/I'm aware of the current status of the gate Major, there is a Jumper being readied now, I'll come through in a few minutes. Wier out./
The predominant thought running through John's head when the conversation finished was something along the lines of 'oh boy!' unknowingly echoing the thoughts of his subordinate who had heard every word. He set his jumper down just inside the bay allowing enough room for the other jumper to come through and land without risking a collision, exited the craft, locking it again and following his waiting escort to the observation deck above where an interesting scene was about to unfold.
Several Minutes later a second jumper slid quietly through the gate and set down next to it's sister craft, a moment later the door opened and Dr Elizabeth Wier descended from the vessel and followed the guide/guard out of the bay.
"I don't think you two are going to enjoy this conversation." Captain Paktu observed to Sheppard and Ford.
"Oh, Why is that?"
"The last time I saw that look on a woman's face, I ended up sleeping on the couch for a month."
Before anyone could comment, the door hissed open again, admitting Dr Wier.
"O…kay. Anyway, This is Dr Elizabeth Wier, Head of the Atlantis Expedition. Elizabeth, this is Captain Paktu, commander of this rather nice ship we're on and Captain Soban, who commands the ship with the, as Colonel O'niell would say, 'Big honkin' space guns'"
"Nice to meet you, Captains." Elizabeth said.
"Likewise. Tell me Dr, would you permit a few of my technicians travel to your 'city'?"
"May I ask why?"
"Certainly, as we explained to your subordinates, we are part of a larger fleet and we have just computed where they will transition from Hyperspace and it turns out it's very close to where your maps indicate 'Atlantis' is located. If we had a comms team in place when they revert to real space we can effect a minimal time lag communication."
"A fleet? How many ships would you be talking about? And what types of ships?" Elizabeth had a small glint of hope in her eye at the thought of a fleet.
"At last count? About 25-30 frigates, 7 or 8 destroyers, two carriers, not counting Vigilance, one captured superdreadnaught, not too sure on fighters and corvettes and the mothership of course, I also think there is a second Avatar class due for completion?" This last directed at his fellow captain who confirmed with a nod.
"Mothership?"
"The mothership is a bit of everything, construction facilities, ore processing, cryo storage, where most of what is left of our people sleep and command for the fleet as a whole." Captain Soban explained, pulling up a schematic of the mothership different sections lighting up as he mentioned them.
"Wait, I've seen that ship before, on our long range scans of this system. Do you have an image of the fleet?"
"Yes, the computers should have something… ah, here this was recorded just before we jumped." Soban pulled up an image nearly identical to the one from the scanners.
"Wait, If the Mothership built this ship and the Avatar How big is that thing?" Ford Asked
"Well,…" Darius began, pulling up a comparison chart and with a few extra bits of data it flashed up on screen, showing the mothership, the Avatar, a carrier, the gate and a jumper as well as a wraith Hive ship for good measure. "as you can see the Mothership is the biggest thing we have encountered, although not the largest that we know about, It weighs in at about 10 million tons."
"And this Mothership of yours is going to be arriving near Atlantis soon?"
"If you consider fifty or so lightyears close, then yes." Captain Soban said, as if 50-60 lightyears was a walk in the park.
"Oh." Wier responded flatly, hope fading at getting some form of help with the Wraith.
"That's not to say she can't get to you, the hyperdrives on the Mothership can get her there in a few hours once they know where to go. Although, if the second Avatar class is as close to completion as I think it is, they'll have to wait for it to finish before jumping out again."
"Why is that?" Ford asked.
"once construction reaches a certain point the arrays are committed to finishing whatever is in the queue, overriding drive control, it was close to that point when we were forced to jump, unfortunately construction is suspended during hyperspace because both systems use massive amounts of energy and in order to do both requires more power than we can generate and still be able to move the ms at anything faster than sublight, and by the time the hyperdrive recharges it'll be past that point anyway" Samir Paktu explained, more familiar with PDA operations than his superior officer.
"Oh, how long would it take to finish the ship?"
"Well, when the Avatar was built it took nearly two days from the same point, however because of lessons learnt since it should only take about a day to complete, then several hours for shakedown and final tuning. I'd say no more than two days."
Dr Wier was silent for a moment, then spoke "Captains, I would like to return to Atlantis to discuss this with Major Sheppard and my Science staff, would we be able to return in a few hours?"
Darius answered. "Of course, If I might make a request, I would like to see this city of yours?"
Wier and Sheppard shared a glance, then with a barely perceptible shrug they agreed. "OK, we should be ready to leave in a few minutes, would it be possible to get the gate put back outside, it would make it easier to travel to and fro."
"Certainly, I'll arrange it immediately."
Wier and Soban with his security boarded her puddle-jumper while Sheppard, Ford, Teyla and a comms team loaded their equipment onto the other.
/Do you want to call, Elizabeth? Or should I?/ Sheppard asked as he started his ship.
/I'll handle it, Major./ Wier responded. The gate dialed, almost.
/ you sure you don't want me to do it Dr?/
/There is nothing wrong with the gate major, someone is using ours, the thing is I ordered no gate travel until we returned. I'll try again./ Just as the outbound sequence started it was overridden by an incoming wormhole.
/Bates to Dr Wier, Bates to Major Sheppard, Come in please. /
/Go ahead, Sergeant./
/Sir, you really need to get back here, we've just received a company of marines sir, through the gate, sir… they're from Earth. And they say The Deadelus will be here in 2 days. /
/….Understood sergeant. Disengage the gate and we will come through immediately, have doctor Beckett meet us in the jumper bay, Wier out./
Atlantis 'gateroom'
"Clear the Deck, Right Now! We have two jumpers inbound, I want this area clear as of two minutes ago!"
Shouted Bates as the marine company that had just arrived scrambled to get there gear away from the gate and the two alteran scout vessels that would crush it before they realized what they'd hit.