One Last Idea
TITLE: One Last Idea
AUTHOR: sgafan33
SUMMARY: McKay comes up with one last idea before the Wraith hive ships arrive at Atlantis.
CHARACTERS: Doctor Rodney McKay
RATING: PG
SPOILERS: Presumes you've seen the episodes up to Letters from Pegasus.
BETA'ED: No, all mistakes are mine alone.
FEEDBACK: Please! I need all the help I can get.
DISCLAIMER: 'Stargate Atlantis' and the related characters belong to MGM, Sci-Fi, and Gekko Productions. I am making no money from this entertainment and can't imagine how I could.
Spoiler-ish Notes: First fic ever. First bit of writing anything, really. I just started reading fan fiction (of any sort) about a month after the first 10 episodes of Atlantis aired in the US. I've always avoided spoilers in the past, too, but obsession tends to overwhelm old habits.
I never thought I would write anything myself. I hate to write! I don't write! Not live journals or diaries or whatever. But I got the idea about Rodney's sister after his remarks about her in Hot Zone. "Listen, I have a sister. We're not close. I don't even know how you'd find her. She's the only family I really have, so someone should tell her what happened." What did that mean? It wouldn't get out of my head until I wrote it down. Bizarre really, I never had that happen to me before. This may be my one only idea.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
One Last Idea
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
They were all dead. And he had killed them all.
Rodney was on the balcony near his lab. Pressed into a corner against the back wall, his arms around shaking knees pulled to his chest. His forehead rested against the tops of his knees. He had stumbled out into the night air from his lab after a sudden overwhelming sense of despair had so constricted his breathing; he thought he was going suffocate.
It was his stupid mouth again.
His team had gone to the planet Dagan to look for a ZPM. The locals had their own research team looking for the ZPM too, what they called a Potentia. The Daganian team had made some headway in their search, finding 3 tiles that held clues to its location. He helped them figure out where to look for the remaining tiles and both groups had spent all day digging in the hot sun for the precious artifacts.
At the end of the day, he was making small talk with the head of the Daganian research team, Allina.
"What was it like growing up in the city of the Ancestors, Rodney?"
He had been confused by her question. "Sorry?"
"Atlantis." Allina prompted.
"Oh, no, no, no, no, we didn't... We come from a planet called Earth in an altogether different galaxy. We only just recently made Atlantis our home."
"How recently?"
"A matter of months really."
He hadn't even been bragging about himself. Just making conversation. Sure, he was tired from the day's efforts. He had just stifled a yawn before Allina asked her question. There was that slight fuzzy feeling along the edges of his brain that should have told him his blood sugar was low and he should stop talking before he said something stupid. But that wasn't an excuse. He would have said the same thing if he had been wide awake after a full meal.
Allina knew from his words that his people were not the Ancestors that once lived in the legendary city of Atlantis. It didn't matter that the Dagan ZPM could be used to save Atlantis and its people. Or to save others in the Pegasus Galaxy. All that mattered was that they were not the original inhabitants and they had no claim to the Potentia.
He didn't think Allina was a zealot who would take away the ZPM his team helped her recover. Especially not after they'd risked their lives for it when the Genii were tipped off about their mission and came after the ZPM themselves. That she would fervently believe that it was her people's duty to safeguard the Potentia. Allina was certain the Dagan people would someday obtain a great reward for their efforts in keeping the Potentia for the Ancestors. Rodney was just as certain those Ancestors would never return to her world.
He wasn't thinking at all when he said those words that had sealed their fate.
He was a certified genius and a member of Mensa. He had gained awards for his research and would have accumulated even more of those gold edged pieces of paper, but then most of his work became classified. Yet, he was so incredibly naïve, so stupid when it came to dealing with people.
He had given away the lives of Atlantis in those few words. Given away countless other lives in the Pegasus Galaxy that could have been saved. If only they had the ZPMs to power Atlantis and could somehow figure out a way to defeat the Wraith horror. He may have even doomed the inhabitants of the Milky Way. The Wraith probably knew they were more people out there, somewhere. That there were more worlds for the Wraith to cull.
Teams from Atlantis had desperately traveled to the other addresses the older Elizabeth had written down on the piece of paper he still carried in his pants pocket. M7G-677 was ruled out immediately. They had already been there and its few inhabitants were mainly under 25 years old. The ZPM there was almost depleted although it was enough to protect the small settlements for a time yet. None of the other addresses except Dagan had a viable ZPM, at least not one they could find. The teams were still out looking, but there was little hope. It had been 10,000 years since the older Elizabeth had written down the five 'Gate addresses of outposts with known ZPMs. There had been innumerable cullings by the Wraith in that long time. So many lives lost. So many voices stilled. So many memories faded into the black nothingness of time.
He sadly realized he had cancelled out any of the good the older Elizabeth gave her life to accomplish. Not only was he going to fail the people in 2 galaxies, he even failed someone from a second reality. That must be some kind of tragic record.
In the infinite layers of the multi-universe that had created the second Elizabeth, other Rodneys existed too. Some alternate Rodney had a happy childhood. There was a Rodney who was a concert pianist, moving his audiences with his music. And somewhere, there even existed a Rodney who didn't say those stupid, careless words. One who found some working ZPMs and was able to help save Atlantis from the Wraith.
But he wasn't that Rodney. And in this layer, this reality, he was the one that mattered.
Lifting his head from his knees, he stared out into the night sky. But his eyes didn't see the stars.
The expedition didn't deserve this fate. Certainly not Elizabeth or Carson. Not Sheppard or Ford or Teyla. Not Grodin or Zelenka or any of the other scientists who made the journey in hopes of finding an answer to the problems back home. Even that ass Kavanaugh didn't deserve it, although just barely. Not any of the military that accompanied them. Not Bates or Stackhouse or the other soldiers.
But he had an idea that, while it didn't help in their battle with the Wraith, might give some closure to the men and women so far from home.
Maybe they could send a message back to Earth thru the Stargate. They could send a lot of information within a high compression data burst. A few years ago he helped the Air Force refine the encoding on a compression algorithm.
He allowed himself a small smile. Samantha Carter could figure it out if the message made it thru. She would probably want to decode it herself.
It was going to take all the energy they could muster, the remaining naquadah generators, all the Jumper power systems. It might burn them out. But there was no way the naquadah generators they had left could do anything against the three Wraith hive ships heading their way thru hyperspace. And since there wasn't enough energy to send even one person back to Earth, they might as well get some other use from them.
After all, what did it matter? They were all going to die.
It may take him a few days but he was sure he could figure out how to minimize the risk to their power sources. Then they could send back everything. All the mission reports, all the things they learned about Atlantis and the Pegasus Galaxy in the few months they had been here.
And the personal messages. Especially the personal messages.
Their mission was still classified and the expedition couldn't even tell their loved ones that certain doom was coming in less than 2 weeks and this was the last chance for contact. But he was sure that each person would figure out a way to say goodbye without really saying it.
That was one problem he wasn't going to have to worry about. There wasn't anyone for him to say goodbye to. Not really.
He really should have a message, though. Especially since this whole message thing was his idea. He was the head of the science teams and it would look odd if he didn't say anything.
He straightened his shoulders, leaning back against the balcony wall. Yes, he was head of the science teams. He could record a message for each of the scientists who died here in the Pegasus Galaxy. They hadn't been in Atlantis long yet there were more people from the science teams who had died in this short time than military personnel.
Elizabeth would do the official condolences. She would consider that part of her job as leader of the Atlantis expedition, like the condolences she would be sure to do for the military personnel lost.
But the scientists were his people, part of his team. He had worked with all of them. Abrams and Gaul, who were killed by that lone Wraith on a planet on the other side of the solar system. Johnson, Wagner, Dumais, Petersen, and Hayes, who died from that nanovirus just because they didn't have the ATA gene. He could say something more personal, less formal.
He loosened his grip around his knees and stretched out his legs. Feeling a bit better, he mused about what else he could say.
Maybe he would let Samantha Carter know how he felt about her. Of course it didn't matter to her one bit how he felt about her. She had a boyfriend, maybe she was even married by now. But he wanted to let her know that the dumb blonde thing he said the first time they met was just a joke. It was supposed to have been a compliment, that she defied the stereotype of the dumb blonde. But he had said it with his typical snarky attitude and it had come out all wrong. She didn't give in to her first impulse, clearly burning in her eyes, to slap him hard across the cheek. It wouldn't have been the first time a joke he told a woman resulted in that same reaction. Maybe he'll say something to let her know just how much he respected her. Not that it mattered that there was one more person in the two galaxies that held her in that regard or that having his respect meant anything al all.
A name tickled the back of his mind. Jeannie. He was mildly surprised. He never thought of his sister, although somehow she came into his mind when he thought he was going to die from that nanovirus. He rarely thought of himself as anything other than an only child. The few people who actually wondered about his family assumed he was and he never said anything to dissuade them from the idea.
He didn't know her at all. She had left house she was raised in as soon as she could and never looked back. She was gone before he was born. Her birth was unplanned and unwanted and so was his. His parents never let him forget he was a burden in their lives and he supposed Jeannie had gotten the same from them, maybe even worse. There were no photos of her in the house and he didn't even know what she looked like.
Occasionally he thought about trying to contact her, like when their parents died in the house fire that turned into smoke every memory of his family's existence. He knew his parents hated him, but he still felt the loss. Maybe Jeannie would have wanted to know of their deaths.
But he hadn't known where to start looking for her. He had been barely old enough to be living on his own when the fire happened and, even if he was a genius, searching for missing persons was outside his expertise. His parents had erased all trace of her from their lives, so he had no personal clues to look for.
Besides, she had left that life behind. She wanted to forget her parents and her miserable life with them. All he knew from the overheard screaming matches his mother and father regularly engaged in was that she somehow had found out she had a brother. She didn't make any effort to contact him the years he had lived with their parents. At least he didn't think she did. So it was just easier to let it go. He didn't want to bring back bad memories, for either of them.
He suddenly realized he was luckier than the others here. The other expedition members were going to have to say goodbye to loved ones without having to use the word. Make up sunny remarks when all they wanted to do is blurt out how scared they were and how they wished they could see their families, to look into their eyes and hold them one last time. They couldn't say anything about the wonderful marvels they had discovered here, about the work they had been doing or even the tragedy that was speeding toward them.
But his family was here. Elizabeth. Carson. Sheppard. Ford. Teyla. This was his family, even if they didn't know it themselves. He had taken them into his heart. He would be with his family at the end.
Yes, it had only been a few months since they were all thrown together in this mythical city in another galaxy, and while he barely knew the details of anyone's life, he felt a closeness to these people that he had never experienced before. He was with his family and this was his home.
Standing, he took in a shaky breath. He made his way to the edge of the balcony and laid his hands on the cool railing. Looking out into the darkness, he tried to find the group of stars that marked the direction where the Wraith were making their relentless journey thru hyperspace. A journey that would ultimately end here in Atlantis.
Unable to find the stars, he turned his back on the Wraith and faced the balcony doors. The interior lights filtered thru the door's stained glass inset. His eyes were drawn to the left in the direction of the living areas. Elizabeth, Carson, Sheppard, Ford and Teyla were all asleep in their quarters. At least he hoped they were. Even with the impending doom, they all needed to keep to their routines, to get some much needed rest before the final battle. So he took comfort in keeping to his own personal routine, of being up at all hours.
Glancing at his watch, he decided he could spend a little time checking how much information they had accumulated and how much they could get in the data burst. Maybe see how he could safely interface the Jumpers and the naquadah generators to the Gate.
If they were all going to die, he would at least give everyone a chance to say goodbye. He could do that one small last thing for the people he had condemned to death with his unthinking words. Let them contact their families one last time.
Slowly, he walked towards the balcony doors and they slid open on his approach. Before going in, he placed his hand on the tower wall, feeling the smooth carved surface and marveling at the beauty the Ancients had built into the city. He closed his eyes.
He was going to miss Atlantis. And he was going to miss his family.