Title: Snow Yeti
Author: Heatherf
Disclaimers: Don't own'em, no money made etc.
Thanks: NT and MegT. Their patience and brilliance with the English language astounds me.
Spoilers: Nope (or I don't think so)
Characters: Team with Beckett
Warnings: English language, grammar, spelling, and other assorted things that just seem so far out of reach. Any words that look made up are…and are mine. All mistakes are mine. Worked on the story mostly while riding the Bike of Doom.
Rating: PG (I'd let Emmit read it)
Summary: A Snow Yeti, a missing team, a rescue. Oh and a Wraith Worshipper too.
Complete: 4/21/07 (but MegT taught me to part it out---but my impatience may lead to a chapter or more a day---who knows)
Part 1:
A sharp gust of wind shot over the open ice. Snow swirled into the air briefly before settling and streaming parallel across the barren ice plain.
Sheppard hunched his heavily coated shoulders, drawing the points of his collarbones in closer together while sucking his chest and abdomen inward and tucking his chin deep to his torso.
Fine, unseen hairs stood and curled back toward the goose bumped skin.
The wind cut through him, needling its way between bright red seams and double and triple stitching. It wound its way around black velcro patches and seeped through heavy zipper teeth. It spread like a reaching cold North Atlantic Ocean wave across his clothing, fingering his skin and stinging him.
It sliced to his core like the sharp bite of glacier run off.
It hurt.
His eyes watered slightly, but remained unfrozen, hidden and protected behind wrap around goggles and tinted specially manufactured 'glass'. Even if each exhale was not blocked and rerouted by humidified neoprene oxygen mask that clung to the majority of his face, the crystallized breath would not be seen in the howling wind that scoured the vast empty ice fields which spread for as far as the eye could see in all directions.
The flap of manufactured fabric competed tirelessly with the drone of constant wind.
Small angulated drifts of blown snow rose sharply above the frozen surface of the vast undulating winter step.
Off in the far distance, a dark wall of overriding glaciers and jutting rock leered far above the ice, creating nothing more than a hint of shadow.
Unobstructed sunlight beat down on his team. Crisp blue skies stretched high overhead, unmarred by passing clouds. Piercing solar light blazed unhindered, glittering off the bare ice, dancing on crystallized particles that whipped about, caught in the torrent of relentless wind.
When the gust gave way, lost its brutal push and settled back to any easy tireless zephyr, Sheppard untucked his chin and glanced down at Ronon.
The big Satedan knelt one knee on the field, running bright red mitten hands over the uneven, wrinkled ice. No blowing sharp slivers of drifting snow marred this section of frozen terra. The sheet of ice they stood upon was dangerously smooth.
No boot prints were discernable in the polarized light created by slightly frosted goggles.
The large spot of orange embedded in the ice was hard to miss. A signal flag, almost.
The colonel recognized it for what it was, frozen blood. The deep maroons and bright reds of unoxygenated and oxygenated blood turned a muted orange in snow and ice. Blood had hit the ice, melting it slightly, dispersing itself and seeping a little less than an inch before freezing. Orange.
"They were here. Someone was injured," Ronon stated peering up from the ice and swiveling his eyes left and right searching for any sign of the others or a potential enemy.
McKay stood just to the side of Sheppard and a half step behind, using the colonel's form as a partial wind block. The life signs detector blinked on and off losing its battle with the bitter cold. Rodney shook it a few times, used a bulky mittened hand to try to adjust settings and shook his head in frustration. The astrophysicist knew better than to expose bare skin to this kind of temperature.
Ice crystals formed and ruptured tissue on a cellular level.
A puddle jumper would have been nice. Jump through the gate, do a little recon, find the others head home. Simple, quick to the point. However, the severe fluctuations in the atmospheric magnetic field of the planet wreaked havoc with Ancient and Earth technologies. Rodney held the near useless life sign's detector in the hopes that during a flip of magnetic resonance the device would work.
Sheppard's casual attempt at understanding the problems related with this planet's atmospheric conditions and technology though bumbling, offered an adequate if not slightly lacking description, that was dripping with imprecision. However, it got the point across. Technology would work about as well as a cell phone in a dead zone. It could possibly pick up an intermittent, unreliable signal. Sheppard's "Can you hear me now?" analogy just about summoned up their troubles in a simpleton's manner.
It was worth trying with a life signs detector. Not so much with a puddle jumper.
"Can we stay airborne now?" would not be good for anyone if they were cruising right along at high speeds and with any type of altitude. Hitting a 'dead spot' would take on a whole new meaning. Technically it wasn't a lack of signal--- not at all---and the explanation had McKay seething. Zelenka, however, grimaced but nodded in agreement though it might have been a little painful. If a puddle jumper were airborne during such a disturbance, the strange unusual magnetic waves would result in technology blinking and shutting down.
Never a good thing. McKay had experienced first hand the puddle jumper's inability to glide or float.
Rodney huffed in frustration. Nothing ever seemed easy in the Pegasus Galaxy. Pegasus apparently didn't get the same handbook on astrophysics as the Milky Way. Very frustrating, very, very frustrating, and inconveniencing.
McKay stowed the instrument and turned his attention to the others.
Teyla seemingly ignored them. Her fine dark features remained hidden under her protective goggles, mixed neoprene oxygen mask and thick fur lined parka hood. The Athosian stood braced against the wind and scanned their immediate area.
"They went that way." Ronon's deep voice sounded tinny over their hidden earpieces. "There are four left."
Dex straightened. The thick quilted material of his bright red winter suit crackled. His boots squeaked in the dry snow as heavy two inch thick tread bit into the unyielding surface of the ice below.
Weapons were kept strapped to heavy outer jackets, but wrapped in their own protective covering, shielding the working mechanisms from the brutal wind that razed the desolate area.
Bulky packs were re-adjusted, chest and waist straps double checked. This trip through the gate herald more survival gear and food as well as weapons.
An off world team was late checking in, by hours.
Nothing good could come of it. The planet was supposed to be uninhabited. The ancients kept minimal data about P3X-423.
The P was for Popsicle, at least to the Colonel's way of thinking. 423 was just a cute way to spell 'ice', though he doubted the Ancients had realized it.
"Let's go," Sheppard ordered. His voice was lost behind the pale yellow neoprene, but rang loudly over earpieces. His boots squealed on the arid ice as he maneuvered around Dex and took point. He shuffled a few feet on the sheer surface until snow once again was underfoot. Each step then landed heavily, crunching through intermittent brittle thin layers of barren powder to precariously grip the rippled frozen ice below.
The group strung into single file.
Wind buffeted them from the side. Parka material was flattened against arms and legs, while fur lined hoods were smeared against unseen hat covered heads. Upper bodies were bent into the wind trying to maintain a true course and fight the constant push of the gale.
As a group, they continued to follow the trail that only Dex seemed to see from any distance.
The sun glared down, reflecting painfully back off the ice. Even through the tinted goggles, eyes still protectively squinted.
The spots of orange slowly morphed into heavier darker drops that splashed wider and drew closer together. The increasing rapidity, in which the large drops strung together, dragged the group along with building foreboding.
Whoever was bleeding was bleeding badly.
Blood on the ice meant skin was either exposed or clothing was saturated. Heat was being lost with the blood and sapped through exposure. Wet clothing offered no protection against the brutal elements.
There was too much blood.
The bleeder would not survive.
Sheppard pushed his team onward, keeping his eyes focused up, only occasionally looking down to notice the increasing crystallization of organic orange.
They stomped through haphazard sharp diagonal sheaves of knee deep snow drifts. They shuffled and slid over sheer surfaces of unmarred wind smoothed ice, and picked their way through fields of rippled, overturned, frozen heaves of water.
The wind gusted. Heavy outer layers became smashed against staggering bodies. Thin linear jets of hurtling snow scoured across the shelf, occasionally masking the ground from knees down.
Bright sun lambasted the area.
Solar warmth remained elusive.
The group trudged on.
Ronon maintained two steps behind Sheppard, his hulking frame appearing even more imposing in the heavy issued SGC gear. McKay plodded close to Dex with Teyla only a step or two behind, bringing up the rear.
"There." Ronon's deep voice pierced the thundering background noise of the relentless wind. He raised a mittened hand and pointed to a dark shape that marred the flattened ice field only a few hundred yards ahead.
Blowing ice and snow muted its edges, obscured its outline.
It simply appeared as a dark blemish in an endless see of blowing white. Nothing more than a rock, perhaps discarded equipment.
The heavy blotches of orange discolored snow dotted in a staggering fashion toward the dark bulk.
Adjusting their direction just a few degrees to the left, Sheppard followed the trail to the black mound in the expanse of unnervingly level white.
Whirls of snow whispered by at ankle height, nipping seams and threatening well-hidden flesh.
The orange drops slowly leached into a single rivulet, gaining width as the group approached the form.
A fattening orange stream, like a bucket with a steady leak; a terminal fissure.
The dark form slowly took on color. Orange. Bright fabricated orange, brighter than the muted shade that marred the ice. SGA-6's off world color. Lieutenant Wilson's team was Orange.
Sheppard's team was red. Flamboyant, 'use me as a target' red, or so Lorne and the others had laughed when SGA-1 was designated 'back up' in-case the primary team ran into trouble.
The dark blip on the ice slowly morphed into shape. One foot looked smaller than other. Less bulky, but both black. Bent, thickly covered legs became distinguishable from the pelvic region, the curled back accentuated itself from the legs and pelvis, and the rolled shoulders appeared slightly broader than the narrowing abdomen.
It had been days ago, when Beckett debriefed the off world team, SGA-6, of the dangers of bitter, arid, high altitude cold. Over steaming mugs of coffee and tea he had reiterated that death could not be declared until bodies were warmed. A simple safety precaution. They had all nodded, all understood and silently promised to heed his advice, which mingled with dire warning. Mistakes could be made when dealing with the severely hypothermic. The warmth of the conference room on Atlantis, with its platter of freshly warmed pastries seemed like a distant memory. A fading fable.
No one had foreseen this, and no one had foreseen Beckett accompanying Lieutenant Wilson off world.
Perhaps the Ancients could have invented an easy to use crystal ball. Or left better notes.
Sheppard mentally shook himself from his introspection and focused on the frozen form before him.
The body rested on its side with its back to SGA-1's approach.
Sheppard led his team forward, slowing his pace. Whoever lay exposed like this was long ago dead. The blackened bare foot was a testament to the brutal cold. The only thing thawing would accomplish would be to unleash the sickly sweet smell of necrotic flesh and death.
The colonel slowed his pace, scanning the horizon with careful eyes. Brilliant sharp daylight reflected back at him, forcing him to squint despite the protective eyewear.
Traps were often best sprung when the enemy's attention was directed elsewhere. Using the injured and the dead was a trick that seemed to bridge two galaxies.
Though here, on this planet of ice and wind, they didn't know who their enemy was, but SGA-1 now recognized an enemy lurked. Someone had been slowly and methodically taken out Lieutenant Wilson's team, one soldier at a time.
This was body number three.
Sheppard dropped into a crouch and carefully approached the form. It was just a body, just like the other two they had found previously this morning. Frozen, colorless and dead through malicious, deliberate acts. One suffered a neat bullet hole to the back of the parka hood, the other a thin slice vertical along the jugular groove and then horizontal across the trachea.
No hint of struggle on either of the marines.
Four were missing. Now only three.
A pair of discarded goggles fluttered a few yards away. The gnarled strap snagged on a jagged piece of ice. The plastic glinted in the harsh sunlight. The colored lens was snapped and cracked, the insulation around the frames torn. The goggle lens flapped and bent in the wind.
The C.B. printed on the black strap left no doubt who lost their protective eyewear.
Sheppard felt his heart lurch and stomach tighten. He swiveled his eyes to the exposed body in front of him, trying to convince himself that the size, the shape, the position were all wrong.
The goggles belonged to C.B, but the corpse in front of him did not belong to the goggles.
He nudged the orange coated body with a foot and cringed inwardly at the feel of trying to roll a boulder.
It was unmalleable, adhered to the ground. Frozen.
The colonel leaned over the corpse, trying to get a glimpse of the face. Blackened bare hands lay curled in front of the hood shrouded features. The colonel inched cautiously around the body.
The wind whistled, rattling the orange coat and teasing the fine fur that rimmed the hood.
The colonel ignored Rodney's whispered, "Carson?" when the astrophysicist spied the discarded broken goggles.
Sheppard knelt, the snow squeaked with the pivot of the ball of his booted foot.
Dex and Teyla and even Rodney searched their surroundings, ready for a potential trap.
With a mittened hand, and firm resolution, Sheppard tried to pull back the hood to expose the face of the dead. The hood remained froze, almost brittle. With a firm snap, he cracked the hood backward. The neoprene oxygen mask remained in place, the goggles crooked, but still seated in their proper place high on the bridge of the nose. The face was masked, protected from the elements. Twisting free from under the mesh of a manmade and natural fiber hat, a shock pale blond, unruly curl of hair waved and danced in the tireless wind.
"It's Wells."
"Thank-God," Rodney's whispered relief was shared but left unspoken. "Not that I wanted…"
"I know, McKay; I know."
"That leaves Dr. Beckett, Corporal Jones and Private McGilly," Teyla uttered softly.
"Looks like Carson tried to treat Wells," Sheppard muttered. He carefully eyed the body, handling it as little as possible. Booby-trapping the dead was an old sick game employed not only by the citizens of Earth, but by the Genii and a few other inhabitants of the Pegasus Galaxy.
"How'd he die?" Ronon asked. He scanned the area all around them. The dead were dead. There was no bringing them back. However, the dead could be useful. They could distract the living, they could be a wealth of information, could expose something about the enemy and they could be used as weapons.
"Looks like an animal attack…something ripped him inside out." Sheppard crinkled back one of the sides of Well's parka and paused.
"And?" Rodney asked, noting the change in demeanor in the colonel. A deadliness had settled over Sheppard. A coldness that would find no match on this planet of ice and wind.
"He's been stabbed. Knife slid up through his ribcage, near his liver….it happened after whatever attacked him."
"You are certain?" Teyla asked. She stopped tracing the horizon and focused her attention on Sheppard.
"Knife mark goes up through the bandages. He was stabbed after Carson dressed the wounds."
"Oh God," McKay muttered.
"Who would do such a thing?" Teyla whispered, shocked, but not terribly surprised by the duplicity of humans in general.
"The Doc is with a killer." Ronon's deep growl seemingly flowed under the howl of wind.
"Or killers," Rodney pointed out.
"Do you think he is aware of his situation?" Teyla asked. She squinted her eyes and stared through the glare of the reflective sunshine.
"I don't know," Sheppard mumbled. He slowly straightened, standing to his full height. The thick parka and snow pants gave him extra bulk. The gear and weapons strapped to his person only added to his size.
Wells had no gear left. He had been stripped of his weapons and dog tags.
Sheppard stared at Beckett's broken and discarded goggles and felt a knot of fear and loathing clutch his gut.
He swept the area with his protected eyes. Nothing but blinding snow for as far as the eye could see.
"The trail heads that way." Ronon pointed again with an outstretched mitten. The others followed his line of sight to the wall of jutting glaciers and erupting ice shelf. Large uneven blocks of grey granite broke up the seamless sea of white.
On Ronon's word, and skill as a tracker, the others trudged toward the raised shadowed line, away from the Gate and the DHD and toward a killer or killers and missing friends.