This is my first attempt at writing anything, been putting a lot of work into just trying to make the canon history line up! Hopefully you'll all like it, please review with any comments!
It's also been pointed out that this story shares many similarities with AlexanderD's "A New Dawn", this is totally accidental and me and him have talked about it and he's given me his seal of approval, so to speak.
City of Atlantis, now residing in the Pacific Ocean, 3 weeks after the battle of the superhive
"Sheppard!" Rodney McKay called as he chased after John Sheppard down one of Atlantis' very busy corridors
"What is it Rodney?" Sheppard asked as Rodney caught up to him
"I've been going over the logs from the battle with the super hive and, well I've found something odd"
"What do you mean by odd? Odd like Carson having a higher Chair Interface Aptitude than you?"
Ignoring his quip Rodney said "I found a signal, Atlantis tried to send a message as soon as it established its location"
Stopping and turning to face Rodney, John asked "A message? To who?"
"That's the thing, at first it didn't list a location so I had to do some digging and it gave me some old coordinates, like pre stellar drift coordinates, after I factored in the nearly 9 million years of stellar drift, I got something I wasn't expecting, Mars."
Atlantis, 4 months later
Sheppard turned as he heard the balcony door opening and inwardly sighed when he noticed Rodney stood there, tablet in hand, smiling at him.
"Ah! There you are!" Rodney started as he moved to join John, who had turned back around, looking out at the ocean, "enjoying the view?"
"I was just thinking about what it would be like if we'd moved the city to the outpost in Antartica" he replied
"Ah yeah it'd be cold, I'm not good with the cold, when I was 7 we had a particularly cold winter back home and…"
"Rodney," John cut him off, "Why were you looking for me?"
"Looking for… yeah, the briefing is about to start" he replied snapping his fingers as he turned back to the door into the control room of the Lost City with Sheppard close behind. Arriving in the conference room moments later John nodded in greeting at his assembled team along with the current leader of the City of Atlantis, Mr Richard Woolsey.
Standing by the TV screen in the room armed with his tablet McKay started the briefing; "As you all know nearly 5 months ago Atlantis arrived at Earth and thanks to a stroke of brilliance from me helped in destroying the wraith super hive. A few weeks after this I was searching in the logs from the battle to check we'd caught all the damaged systems, and found that Atlantis had attempted to send a message to Mars after it had established its location. You'll also know that the new Mars base built to investigate this message and just who the recipient was supposed to be was completed last week," pressing a button on his tablet the screen changed from the standard Atlantis screen saver to an image of the Mars base, "with all of our 304s currently out of system and them needing me to look over their results so far, we are heading out there in a jumper. I swear if you want a job done you've got to do it yourself!" when he looked back over at Sheppard he realized he was getting the 'not now' eyes he quickly sat back down.
Woolsey pitched in with, "you're on a simple mission to Gale base with a bit of work for McKay, I thought you'd like to stretch your legs a bit. Go prep, you leave at 13:00, now if you'll excuse me I have some paperwork to be doing" and with that Woolsey stood up and left the conference room, with Sheppard and AR-1 following close behind.
Jumper 4, en route to Gale Base, Mars
McKay sat in the co-pilot seat tapping away on his tablet as the Jumper began its entry into the atmosphere of Mars, flying over the Martian landscape heading towards the Gale Crater and Gale Base within.
"That's a big mountain," Ronon said noting Aeolis Mons in the distance
"Good observation Chewie" Sheppard said just as the Jumper chimed and a notice appeared on the screen, Sheppard turned to McKay saying, "I'm not in control anymore, we're on auto"
McKay stared at the notice on the screen before saying "it says we're going in for docking, an Ancient facility by the looks of this message, 'Subomortis', that's the name"
"Well what do I do?" an irritated Sheppard asked
"Oh of course I'm the one that has to know what to do! It's always me I mean what..."
"Rodney! Not the time!" Sheppard interjected
"Nothing, there's nothing we can do! Aren't you curious as to what this facility is? Whatever it is it's been hidden on our doorstep the entire time!" said McKay getting excited.
The Jumper soared over the Gale Crater, over Gale Base and the awaiting scientists inside and towards the centre of the crater. McKay sat checking sensors to find out where exactly the facility was and noted the Jumper's current flight path, "We're heading to the side of Aeolis Mons... The mountain must have formed around the facility!" He said, astonished
Sheppard pondered this for a moment whilst stubbornly trying the controls before asking "But how are we going to get in then? If the mountains covering the entrance won't we..."
"Oh god I didn't think of that, this is bad this is very very bad!" McKay interrupted and began frantically tapping on his tablet and the Jumper control panel
"Rodney, could we not use the drone weapons to blast a hole in the side of the mountain?" Teyla suggested,
"Hmm, maybe, I'd need to find the precise location of the entrance and see how thick the rock is, don't want to destroy the door or damage the facility, if I can just…" McKay said trailing off into mumbles
"Work fast Rodney," John said as he watched the mountain looming ever closer, Sheppard tried opening the weapons pods, "Rodney weapon pods won't open!"
"What? Oh no no no, it must be part of the autopilot procedure. I can't disable it I need more time!"
"Rodney! Calm down what do we do?" As the jumper initiated final docking procedures on its approach to the side of the mountain
"I don't know! We can't do anything!" As the jumper carried on without any knowledge of the impending doom rapidly approaching, the team inside all looked on worriedly; Rodney tapping away on his tablet and the control panel and Sheppard trying to tug the controls to move the Jumper. Then instead of crashing into the side of the mountain, the Jumper passed straight through it and into a large bay with other Jumpers on landing pads dotted around. Lost for words, the team stared out at the bay they now found themselves in,
"Rodney, what happened?" Sheppard asked after what felt like an eternity
Rodney checked out the sensors, "It was a hologram, the side of the mountain must be a hologram, maybe the entire thing! Sensors indicate breathable atmosphere, energy readings increasing, facility must be powering up to our presence"
As the Jumper came in to land in the centre of the bay Sheppard turned and said "Rodney send a message to Gale telling them what happened and where we are; Teyla, Ronon get ready, we're going exploring!"
Opening the rear hatch the four members of AR-1 stepped out into this newly discovered facility. "Rodney, any ideas as to what this place is?"
"Not yet, we'll have to try and find a control room or terminal so I can interface with the database"
Sheppard nodded and turned to Ronon and Teyla, "Alright move out, that looks like a door over there" he stated, moving towards the door to explore the facility.
Inside Ancient facility Subomortis, Aeolis Mons, Mars
AR-1 advanced down a typical ancient hallway, identical to the one on the floor above, and the one above that. So far, they'd found nothing but quarters and empty storage rooms. Rodney led the way with an ancient scanner in hand,
"Anyone want to place any bets yet?" Sheppard ventured
"It is definitely an ancient facility, Colonel Sheppard" Teyla stated
"Yeah and it's pretty big so far" he replied
"Scans don't even cover the whole facility, it's huge! It might extend below the crater surface!" Rodney said excitedly
"Any ideas where the control room will be Rodney?" Sheppard asked
"I think... Aha! Down here" Rodney said as he turned down a corridor that ended in a dead end with a singular door and a control pad next to it, "just give me a minute... The doors locked, I've got to override the lock should only take a minute" McKay said as he pulled his tablet from the Velcro on his back and connected it to the control pad; Sheppard, Ronon and Teyla stepped back from the door checking their surroundings before facing the door in anticipation. Moments later the doors slid open revealing a transporter booth much like the ones on Atlantis, stepping in a button lit up with another unlit button above it, after the team had all stepped inside McKay pressed the lit up bottom button, when he did this the doors slid shut and the booth began its descent. Moments later the opposite side of the booth opened and the room beyond lit up, revealing a large diamond shaped control room, with an identical door directly opposite them. Work stations lined the walls on the sides of both sets of doors, leaving blank corners at the ends. A large raised dais was situated in the centre of the room between the doors with some consoles arranged upon it. Rodney immediately went to this central dais and interfaced his tablet with it, whilst the rest of the team looked around the room.
"Aha! Here we go here we go this is what we want," Rodney said, more to himself than to anyone else as he pressed a button on the console and a faint noise could be heard as the facility began powering up, at the same time the blank walls on either side of the room started to retract revealing a massive chamber situated beneath the control room stretching in all directions.
Sheppard whistled as he stepped up to the windows, "Rodney, where are we?"
Staring in disbelief at the size of the chamber Rodney replied, "We must be under the crater, this place might be the size of the crater!"
"Under the crater? But how is that possible?" Teyla asked
"I'm not sure, maybe the Ancients dug out under the crater or they might have created the crater itself!" said McKay as he began to check the logs for the facility
"So Rodney, know what it is yet?" Sheppard asked looking over at his friend
"Just a second," he started before looking up directly at Sheppard, "it's... a shipyard"
"An Ancient shipyard?" Sheppard asked in disbelief, "What can it build?"
"Logs indicate 12 Jumpers and 2 Auroras, one's in an early production state, very early, like barely even started, the other's nearly complete"
"Why would the Ancients leave a nearly complete ship?" Teyla asked
"Maybe they were in a hurry" Ronon interjected
"Can we finish them?" Sheppard asked
"I think so, not exactly sure how they build things here though... Let me look, aha! I've found a subroutine for what that I think will start up the shipyard" with an accepting chime from the console Rodney activated the subroutine, seconds later a hologram appeared in front of Rodney, it resolved into a tall smiling man with short blonde hair and blue eyes dressed in typical ancient clothing
"Greetings, I am the Subomortis facility Artificial Intelligence, how may I be of assistance?"
"Rodney, what did you do?"
"Nothing! I just activated the facility's systems!"
"How may I be of assistance?" the A.I. repeated
All members of AR-1 exchanged unsure glances, with their previous experiences with Artificial Intelligences in the form of the Asurans they were unsure how to proceed with this particular Intelligence
"So um, what is your purpose?" Rodney ventured
"I am the operational manager for Subomortis, I provide information regarding the status of my facilities systems and help users in the running of these systems"
"Right okay then, what can you build?"
"This facility is capable of the construction of any such craft that it is instructed to build, assuming sufficient information is provided."
"Okay... How does it build ships?"
"This facility utilises microscopic devices to mold matter into the desired objects and structures. Raw materials are provided from mining operations at other facilities and transferred here by automated vessels."
"Microscopic devices? Nanites?!" McKay said, shocked and the entire team bristled at the revelation
"Correct, nanites have been used as the main construction method in all Alterran facilities since..." the A.I. paused and cocked its head to the side quizzically "there appears to be a data corruption in my systems, starting diagnostics, I will return shortly" it said before the hologram fizzled out
The team looked at each other in shock for a few moments before Sheppard broke the silence, "Rodney, I'm not sure I like the sound of this, an A.I. controlling nanites?"
"Yeah, me neither" Rodney replied
"See if you can access communications, send a message to Earth telling them what we've found." Sheppard instructed
Jack O'Neill's bedroom, Minnesota
A white glow filled the room whilst Jack slept soundly in his bed. The source of the glow floated at the side of Jack's bed before taking on a glowing humanoid form and then dimming, as the white glow faded away leaving a lone grey figure stood looking upon O'Neill. Then all of a sudden on his bed side table his phone lit up and started to vibrate and ring, followed almost immediately by his pager beeping causing Jack to stir from his sleep, as this happened, the Asgard stepped back from the bed but Jack's keen senses alerted him to something moving and his eyes shot open and he stared at where moments ago, the Asgard had been standing
"What the..." he mumbled, trying to figure out what he'd just seen, before reaching over to answer his phone that was still ringing "What?!" he exclaimed at the other person on the phone
"Sir," came the reply, "Sorry for waking you but we've got an urgent message from AR-1 on Mars, they never reached Gale Base but they found something, it's an Ancient shipyard sir"
Jack's eyes widened at this revelation