Huge bronze-colored buildings, pearly-white towers, and golden sky scrapers stretching toward the sky, vertical cities in the distance that made up the skyline, and four other cities she can look down upon in the distance, and glowing golden clouds surrounding the entire thing. With all the running around she's been doing lately, she never got around to appreciating the very city she inhabited.
Terra Nova let out a satisfied sigh. She just wanted to enjoy the view but she had to report for duty. She walked up to the ark behind her. The arks were the furling's, a doorway that linked to points in space. She punched in the destination into the touch pad in the wall next to the doorway. The sliding doors then opened, revealing the control room on the other side. She was across the entire city, but the ark had connected the two buildings together through space. There wasn't even a wormhole. It was as if they were adjacent rooms, and she walked right on through.
She was still in her pink T-shirt and jeans but she could quickly get changed once she got her assignment.
"Incoming wormhole! Sealing barrier."
Nova heard those words echo across the gate room as the familiar blue wormhole filled the silver stargate. The gate room was filled with the heavy stomping as soldiers flooded into the chamber, taking up defensive positions. A shimmering beam of light passed over the stargate, a massive stone slab materializing over the wormhole.
For Major Terra Nova, this was just a regular part of her day. The stargate was opening once more to let a team back home. But this time, it was not her team that was returning. She jogged up the stairs into the control room, the heart of stargate operations. It was from here the iconic piece of alien technology was operated. It was also here General William Mercer, leader of their expedition, was. She watched the old man walk up to Donavan, curious what the news was.
"We're getting the Dusk Rider's IDC," Donavan reported.
"Raise the barrier," Mercer immediately ordered.
The Dusk Riders. Close friends of not just her but her entire team. Their return did not comfort Nova. The Dusk Riders weren't supposed to report in for another hour which meant something went wrong. She watched as the shimmering beam of light appeared again, sweeping over the stone slab and dematerializing it, the shimmering blue wormhole exposed to the open air again.
She walked up to the edge of the balcony, staring at the glimmering wormhole, listening to its familiar warble.
Suddenly, a spear flew from the wormhole, hitting the gate room floor with a clatter. Immediately, the guards in the room readied their rifles, prepared to gun down any enemy that came through the gate.
Even from the control room, Nova recognized the design of the spear.
"General, it's skadrum!" Nova yelled.
"What, the teddy-bears?!" Donavan asked.
Nova had to scoff at the label 'teddy bear'. These things were as far from teddy bears as an alien could get.
There was a loud yell as Dannick suddenly leapt through the gate, skidding to a halt in the middle of the gate room, Ruger pistol in hand.
"They're right behind me!" Dannick yelled. Nova couldn't tell if he meant the Dusk Riders of the skadrum.
A moment later, McFree came barreling through the wormhole, diving to the floor as an orange bolt of energy streaked past him. Several of the soldiers dove for cover as the shot hit the wall and exploded in a shower of sparks.
"Jenny and Umar are on their way!" he yelled, glancing worriedly at the gate.
"Dusk Rider, move back behind the line," Mercer boomed from the control room, his voice almost impossibly loud for someone his age. Upon command, Dannick and McFree quickly scurried behind the black and yellow warning tape on the floor.
Finally, Hailey and Umar leapt through the gate leaping over the line as another spear flew out of the gate.
"Lock it up!" Umar roared.
"Activate the tacs," Mercer ordered. "Seal the barrier."
Donavan obeyed immediately. And good thing to. The skadrum came through the gate, a massive hunched humanoid ball of black fur, its rabid red eyes peering through its thick coat. It had just come through the shimmering puddle when a storm of crimson bolts of energy descended from the ceiling; the tacs in the ceiling opening fire, perforating the beast. It soon fell but not before it managed to fire the crossbow in its paws.
"Commander!" Hailey yelled. Nova had just barely blinked but the next thing she knew, there was an arrow in Umar's stomach.
"Medical team to the gate room," Donavan called through the speakers.
The pounding of things hitting the barrier echoed through the room but it was safe. Nova rushed down the stairs to Umar's side. She and Hailey helped the man to his knees. He reached over to yank the arrow out but Hailey immediately seized his arm.
"Do that and you'll end up pulling out your own organs," she said. Umar gave an irritated groan as the medics rushed in. The next hours minutes were a blur as the medics moved Umar to the operation room. She and Hailey watched as the doctors removed the arrow, carefully cutting it in half and gently removing the front end through the exit wound. They put the arrow on a tray to be taken to be studied while Umar was stitched up and rolled way to the infirmary.
And Umar's reaction to all this?
"How in the hell are you smiling?" Nova asked in front of his hospital bed.
"Men tend to be happy when they survive getting shot," the Nigerian Wing Commander replied casually.
"Maybe. But men tend to be much happier when they don't get shot at all."
Umar gave a chuckle at Nova's statement, but had to stop himself as he clung to his wound in pain.
"Damn skadrum," he cursed as he laid back down.
"Didn't you guys run into them before?" Hailey asked Nova.
"Once, on a routine mission," Terra Nova answered. "As it turns out, having an entire society of warriors doesn't really get you far as a civilization. All their weapons that aren't swords and spears were stolen. Corin says they've been in a dark age for several decades and would probably have gone extinct by this point if they didn't have the stargate and a very high reproductive rate."
"You mean we just got chased off a planet by a bunch of horny space Care Bears," Hailey said flatly, thinking of the bear-like beasts.
"We survived so there's no need to hold a grudge," Umar said. "Major Hailey, Doctor Dannick and McFree were here earlier and I chose to give them the rest of the day off. You may do the same."
"Thanks, Commander, but I think I'll stay on active duty," Hailey said. "I actually want to be part of this next mission."
"Next mission?" Nova repeated, looking at Hailey and Umar curiously. "What are you guys talking about?"
Nova remembered that her team was not the flagship team of the Millennium Expedition. The Dusk Riders were. But, if something should happen and the Dusk Riders can't, it falls to Wolf Pack to do it in their place. Umar was about to explain the new task but Hailey cut him off.
"You'll be debriefed soon enough," she said, patting Nova on the back. "Don't want to ruin the surprise."
"You still have to request General Mercer attach you to Wolf Pack," Umar reminded Hailey. Umar then looked past the two women. He made a quick gesture and the two of them glanced behind them, spotting the guards at the entrance to the infirmary. Wolf Pack was being called.
-.-
"Let me get this straight," Chen muttered in a flat tone. "So you found an alien artifact…had no idea what it does…and you just decide to turn it on?!"
Felger tried to stutter out an explanation, glancing at the marble obelisk, its blue veins of energy pulsating like it had a heartbeat.
"I didn't have no idea what it was," Felger stuttered out, glancing at the pearly white spire, which was barely the height of a desk. "The archaeologists said the writing on it says 'rain shield', and I know how important it is to keep the equipment dry."
Chen looked around the base camp set up. They were there digging up alien artifacts and needed to keep the excavation site as dry as possible. They had brought along tarps and other things in case it ever started raining. And they learned in the first two days how badly the downpour could get. Lately, however, it never did. A lot of lightning. A lot of thunder. But no rain.
"Felger, look at that thing," Chen groaned, pointing to the shimmering blue sphere of energy at the top of the spire. "Who's supposed to get shielded from rain with that? The ants?"
Felger tried to stutter out an explanation but didn't know what to say about the fist-size bubble.
"Felger," Chen barked impatiently. "Turn the rain shield off before we all die of alien radiation poisoning or something."
With a disappointed sigh, Felger reached over and pressed on a golden dome on the side of the obelisk, the glowing orb of energy at the top vanishing. Chen gave a satisfied nod and was about to walk away when, suddenly, a wall of rain came plummeting from the sky.
"Rain shield on, rain shield on!" Chen yelled as he and Felger made a mad dash for the artifact. They both pressed the golden dome, the blue bubble reforming and, after a few seconds, the rain stopped.
They both looked at the shield in shock, the device that had single handedly stopped the rain. Chen glanced at Felger, who had a smile as if to say 'I told you so'.
Chen could only sigh at the man's antics. He certainly has come a long way from the complete screw up he was before. Still, he had a long way to go. They were mostly keeping him out of the way and taking advantage of his ideas. But it would be a while before was ready to do work on his own.
"Doctor Chen," a voice called out, catching the two's attention. They both spotted a man running up to them. "Doctor Chen. General Mercer's calling you back to Millennium."
"Did he say why?" Chen called back in annoyance. "Really getting sick of just being hauled around everywhere lately."
"No, he only said to get you back to Millennium," the man said. Chen grumbled to himself. He was likely off on another science expedition with some other team of know-nothing-know-it-alls.
"Alright, I'll get my stuff," Chen huffed. He had just begun to walk away when Felger called out to him.
"What should do in the meantime?"
"Find something easy to do!" Chen called back. "Then wait for me to come back and do it for you."
-.-
"Left hall, Corin! Left hall!"
"I got the front door covered."
"Bomber!"
In the grand city of Millennium, people have found plenty of ways to pass the time. For Charles Martin and Corin Nevec, they had settled themselves in a lounge, the loud clacking of their game controller as loud as the game they were playing.
Suddenly, Charles through his hands up in frustration. Not long after, Corin did the same, the words 'FAILURE' flashing on their screens.
"Hey," Corin said, giving Martin a nudge with his elbow. "I thought you had the left hall covered."
"I did," Martin grumbled in exaggerated annoyance.
"You miss your shots?"
"No. I was so accurate I hit the stair rails in front of them." The explanation had Corin laughing. "Gah, I'm picking someone else; playing sniper sucks," Martin said, picking up the controller. "I'll try Thermite. You switching classes?"
"Nah, I'll stick with Fuze."
They had both picked up their controllers when a knock at the doorway caught their attention.
"Lieutenant Martin," the guard said at the door way said. "Professor Nevec. You're both being summoned."
-.-
Nova rushed through the ark as its doors opened to the conference room.
"Sorry I'm late," she panted, jogging through. Normally she was one of the first ones here. But, from the looks of it, she had taken too long changing into her uniform and everyone had beaten her by at least ten minutes. Soren was in the corner of the conference room, his arms crossed and leaned against a wall. Jennifer Hailey was standing around the U-shaped conference table, waiting for instructions. Steven Chen and Kara Osborn were sitting on one side of the table while Charles Martin and Samanya Arcturus were sitting on the other. It was obvious all of them were called on short notice. Samanya still wore her white dress shirt with blue skirt. Kara Osborn was still in her lab coat and Soren was in the black trench coat he was always seen in now.
"Hey, you're not the only one late," Corin Nevec remarked, walking up to Nova. "You know what the General wants us for?" Nova could only shrug.
"Some big mission," she remarked, scanning the room. "Originally the Dusk Rider's were going to take it up Umar got hurt."
"Is he ok?" Corin asked worriedly.
"Yeah, he just took an arrow to the gut. He'll be back on his feet in two days. We're supposed to take their mission."
"Couldn't Jennifer just take charge?"
Nova just shrugged at this question.
"Must be something big," she said. "He even called Soren and Arcturus."
Nova looked at the two alien additions to the expedition. Corin and Arcturus may have been human but Soren clearly wasn't. Short, stocky, no hair on his body except for his mustache, all fierri looked like humanoids with their heads fused to their body. While Corin was their resident cultural expert, Arcturus and Soren were combat specialists.
"If he's called those two then it's probably some sort of combat operation," Corin concluded, putting his hand to his chin.
"It wouldn't be only combat," Nova said. "You're an archaeologist. General Mercer wouldn't call you if it was a purely combat operation."
Nova looked around again, watching Martin chat it up with Arcturus.
"Looks like Sam's made herself at home here," Nova remarked, giving Corin a light nudge. Corin smirked at the observation. Martin's mouth was running along with his exaggerated hand gestures. But Samanya Arcturus wasn't the chatty type. But Corin knew she enjoyed Martin's company and listened attentively. They were about to continue talking when the sound of the ark door opening caught everyone's attention.
The conference room was right next to the control room. This was a busy place so the ark doors was a common sound. It could've been a technician. It could've been a guard. It could've been another member who was summoned by General Mercer. But, somehow everyone knew that the sound of the ark doors was the sound of the arrival of General Mercer himself.
The aging man paused at the entryway, his large mustache twitching as he examined the room.
"So we're all here," he said calmly, walking to his position at the opposite end of the U-shaped table. Nova watched him carefully as he placed a stack of folders on the table.
"Ladies and gentlemen," General Mercer said loudly, setting up the laptop in his arms on the table. "At 0800 yesterday, we detected a sub-space transmission coming from an empty quadrant of space. We have been able to successfully identify it as the distress beacon for the FF 305 Typhon." Mercer clicked a remote and the crystal screen behind him filled with color until a familiar ship appeared on screen.
Immediately all the faces in the room lit up. The only ones that didn't were Corin, Soren, and Samanya. And Mercer could see that. All three of them were the aliens who never been to Earth.
"Major Hailey and Doctor Chen helped construct the Typhon," Mercer said. "Perhaps they would like to explain."
Hailey and Chen exchanged glances obviously somewhat bewildered at suddenly being placed on the stand.
"Well, Earth's had two classes of starship," Hailey explained. "We've had the outdated BC-303 and its successor, the BC-304. Something we realized while exploring the galaxy is that every new enemy we make is more powerful than the last. And we also faced the issue that we were always outnumbered. The Typhon was the response to that. It's more lightly armored but-"
"Lightly armored?" Martin exclaimed. "How light?"
"Well…" Hailey began, her voice trailing off.
"Let's just say the Prometheus could survive more of a pounding," Chen said. "Shields are also weaker."
"How weak?" Nova asked. She may have served on the Typhon for a mission but she didn't know the ship's specifications.
Chen made a gesture as if to say to refer to his previous analogy.
"You're kidding…" Nova said, her jaw dropped. She expected the next ships to be even bigger and badder than the one before, not weaker.
"Look," Hailey said, taking over. "She might not be as hardy as the previous models but her weapons are state of the art."
Hailey got up from her chair and went over to the laptop on the table. Mercer slid back and let Hailey do her thing as Chen took over explaining.
"The Typhon's a stealth frigate. Unfortunately, stealth in space boarders on impossible and even with our magical reality-warping cloaking device there are still some things we needed to patch. The only time we've managed to cloak something as large and energy-producing as a starship was with a ZPM. The Typhon is smaller in size so it's easier to extend a cloaking field around. Its smaller size also means it uses less energy and when it goes into stealth mode its crew turns off non-critical systems to further reduce its energy signature and lessen stuff for the cloak to mask."
"I also designed the Hephaestus core," Hailey spoke up. "Once activated, it acts like a heat sink. It absorbs all the heat from the engine so it minimizes the Typhon's energy emissions. In the past, races with Ancient technology have been able to detect cloaked ships by increasing the sensitivity of the sensors to pick up any residual energy signatures leaking through. With the Hephaestus core, we can completely mask it."
"For a period of time, at least," Chen added. "The Hephaestus Core can only absorb a certain amount of heat before we have to turn it off. Then we start glowing like a halogen bulb since we have to release all the built up heat. We also created an armament of torpedoes just so it can fight while cloaked."
"Torpedoes," Martin repeated. "You mean missiles."
Hailey gave a weak chuckle at Martin's reaction.
"It's a terminology gimmick," Hailey explained. "In atmosphere, torpedoes are self-propelled submerged guided munitions."
"She means the difference between a missile and a torpedo is the first one flies through air and the other goes through water," Chen translated bluntly.
"For space combat, we, or rather 'they' since I'm not on the team anymore, were talking about using the term missile to describe self-propelled guided munitions with accelerations higher than an average ship and torpedo to describe ones with accelerations on par with the average ship."
"You mean they go slower?" Martin asked with a dropped jaw, his disappointment obvious for all to hear.
"The original intention was to have cloaks for each missile so it can fire them while cloaked. Unfortunately, it was not economically feasible to make so many cloaks. So, we tried to do it the old-fashioned way." She clicked the remote again and the diagram of a missile, or rather torpedo, appeared on screen. "It's slower because we're using cold gas propulsion which isn't as efficient, but it does take away most of the heat that it would generate. And we don't need it to be invisible to the naked eye, just invisible to their sensors. The MKII cloaking device is much cheaper to make will mask the rest of its heat and EM."
"Fascinating presentation, Major," Mercer said flatly. "But perhaps we can get back to the mission briefing."
Hailey gave a nervous "oh yeah", as she quickly clicked the remote to show several schematics showed up on the screen including the ship's floor plan. Away from the torpedoes and back to the ship itself.
"And you said you detected its distress signal?" Nova asked.
"One of the original intentions for the Typhon was to send it to assist the Millennium Expedition," Mercer explained. "Atlantis had the Daedalus. We would have the Typhon. It is apparent they have succeeded in delivering the ship but it appears they have run into trouble. Either the crew have been incapacitated or their hyperdrive is down. Either way, we must lend them assistance."
"General Mercer," Arcturus spoke up, her posture composed as usual. "Could you bring up the star map of the region of space where the signal originated?"
Mercer gave Hailey a nod and she quickly typed something into the computer. A moment later, an image of the galaxy map appeared on the screen. It wasn't any special to anyone who wasn't familiar with how to read the specifics of galaxy maps. It just showed some dots representing stars, random lines, and labels around some of the points.
"Oh boy," Corin sighed upon seeing the map. Even Arcturus's face stiffened.
"That's on the edge of Damacan space," Arcturus said sternly.
"Another superpower?" Martin asked.
"Not really," Corin explained. "A while back, the Harvesters began expanding its territory. All nations in its path evacuated its citizens. The Damacans had to evacuate all of their planets and relocated their entire civilization to that system. What the Damacans didn't know was that the system technically belonged to the Vorg Dominion. The Vorg had miscalculated the Harvester's expansion and evacuated their outlying systems. As you can imagine, it didn't go well when the Vorg came back and found their system settled by the Damacans."
"Can't they just share the planet?" Nova asked.
"The place is overpopulated. There is no way to share."
"How does this relate to us?" Hailey asked.
"The Damacans and the Vorg have been at war for over a hundred years. Around fifty years ago, a new leadership came into power. New leadership meant to policies. They quadrupled their military size and developed a no-outsiders policy."
"Meaning?" Martin asked.
"Meaning they will destroy any foreign ships that enter their territory," Hailey translated sternly. "Rendering the Typhon assistance in that location will be dangerous."
"You said they were on the edge, right?" Nova spoke up. "Can we just fly it past the edge before helping?"
"Won't help much," Arcturus said. "The other side of the edge is the what we call the Null Zone. It's unclaimed space patrolled by pirates, home to spacefaring animals, and competed for by multiple nations."
"A no man's land," Martin muttered to himself upon hearing the description.
"You can decide your course of action after you reach the ship," Mercer said impatiently.
"Yeah, about that," Chen spoke up. "Are we supposed to just fly ourselves over there or something? Cuz the ships kinda in the middle of nowhere. Like, are all of us supposed to grab a dragonfly?"
"That is already covered," Mercer said, clicking the remote again. An image of a ship appeared on screen, a roughly box-shaped body with large forward swept wings by the cockpit, and a pair of pylons at the back forming the tail with tilt-engines attached to either one at the side.
"The fierri call it a Sleipnir-class utility ship," Mercer said. "It's the latest technology that's come out of their Valgrind Operations. Among its capabilities include assault, scouting, logistics, and transport. It was made specifically to be able to travel through the stargate."
"General," Lieutenant Martin spoke up. "That thing is way too big to fit through the stargate."
Mercer made no response. He simply clicked the remote and a video of the ship appeared on the screen, a video that showed the wings of the ship folding down into its body and its engines being retracted beneath the pylons that held it. It wasn't pretty but the resulting ship was now roughly the sie of a puddle jumper.
"We've identified a space gate relatively close to the Typhon," Mercer continued explaining. "The fierri agreed to help transport us to the Typhon so long as we share any technical knowledge about the ship afterwards."
"Then it's decided," Nova said. "Wolf Pack will go help repair the Typhon with Major Jennifer Hailey."
"That decision is not up to you," Mercer reminded Nova, his eyes narrowing. "Nevertheless, I have agreed to let Major Hailey join you on this operation accompanied by Stavig and Arcturus." Nova gave Mercer a confused look. Having Corin come along despite not having any technical skill made sense. He was still part of Wolf Pack. But she couldn't figure out why he would have Soren and Samanya join them. Those two were only called for the toughest combat missions.
"Any questions?" Mercer asked. Nova had more than a few but she chose to stay silent. When no one spoke up, Mercer gave the order. "Dismissed."
Stargate Millennium
The locker rooms were filled with activity for the next fifteen minutes as her team and their entourage prepared for the mission. Nova quickly got geared up and walked outside the locker rooms. The two were right across from each other so she was able wait outside both of them.
She watched as people filed out of the locker rooms, dressed in their black BDU's.
"Psst," Nova hissed to Chen as he left the locker rooms. He looked at her in confusion. They both still needed to grab their weapons from the armory.
"What is it, Terra?" he asked back. Nova looked around to make sure no one was in earshot. Arcturus and Martin had already passed by. But she still needed to call over a few more people.
"Hailey," Nova hissed as the second-in-command of the Dusk Riders came out of the locker rooms. She looked at Terra in confusion, then at Chen for answers but he could only shrug.
"Hey, guys," Nova whispered. "Did, Mercer talk to you about anything before this?"
Hailey and Chen all shook their heads.
"So I'm not the only ones who found that strange," Hailey said. "Like, I knew he had a mission but General Mercer shouldn't have been able to make some of the decisions like that without consulting the Department Heads. He'd have to call for a meeting."
"You think he had it without our knowledge?" Chen suggested
"He didn't," Nova whispered. "I was watching Twilight with Louvisa and Charlie for the past four hours."
Chen felt his face sag.
"What?" Nova asked when she saw Chen's expression.
"You like Twilight?" he coughed. "I'm glad you're dropping your emo loner streak but…Twilight?!"
"I…think it's cute."
"You think it's cute…" Chen repeated, blinking several times. "I think I lost all respect for you…"
"Back on topic," Hailey interrupted. "Doctor Chen, do you know if Doctor Osborn was called to any meeting."
"No," Chen said, shaking his head. "I asked her before we went to the locker rooms."
"What's he playing at?" Hailey muttered. "Technically he has the authority to make decisions like this but he's never done it before. He always consulted the Department Heads."
Nova exchanged glances with all her friends. The image of the old man's eyes glowing flashed in her mind. It had been a while since Mercer's nature had been an issue. They thought they had left this whole conspiracy theory thing behind.
"Oi!" a voice shouted down the hall. The four of them looked in the direction of the voice to see Kara Osborn waving her hand. "You lot gonna come or what?"
-.-
Eight people. Wolf Pack plus Hailey, Doctor Osborn, Soren, and Arcturus.
The Valgrind Operations room on the fierri homeworld was packed. The guards with their rifles and round shields stood down once they confirmed it was an ally that came through. That left eight people and a team of guards packed into the chamber. Soren was wearing the metal fierri scout armor, a metal curiass with greaves and gauntlets, with a black long coat over it. Arcturus was back in her Aurox armor, a full-body plate armor with a dark navy-blue long coat. The only thing she was missing was her helmet.
"Major Nova!" Crux greeted, jogging into the room. "Major Hailey. Good to see you two again." It was good seeing a familiar face, especially in a new location. Only Hailey and Chen had gone back to Valken and been in Valgrind Operations, so the polished gray chamber with golden glowing orbs attached to the walls and overhanging control room was new to her.
"Hey, it's the pinkies again," Iado called out, appearing from the crowd of Valken Royal Guards and joining his superior officer.
"Iado will join you in helping you reach your ship," Crux explained. "As per our agreement, you are to share any technical knowledge on the ship afterwards."
Nova exchanged glances with Hailey. They both knew Mercer likely made this arrangement. They didn't have any problems with it but they would've preferred to be let in on it.
"Is there an issue?" Crux asked upon seeing Nova's and Hailey's expressions.
"No, it's fine," Nova answered. "Is your ship ready?"
"Ready and waiting," Iado said. "Here, this way."
Nova and Hailey both nodded.
"Wolf Pack, roll out!" Nova called.
They all filed out of the room behind Crux and Iado. Soren was one of the last to follow. He just watched as everyone else filed out.
"Hey," Corin said, putting a hand on Soren's shoulder. "You ok with this?"
Soren just glanced at Corin, the same stiff expression on his face he always had.
"This place holds nothing but bad memories," Soren said. "It means nothing to me now." Corin looked at Soren skeptically. The brooding man simply walked away. Corin sighed and finally followed.
-.-
The walk was not a long one. The group took the stairs up a few levels to a large chamber above the gate room.
"Here she is," Crux announced as they stepped in. One by one, the lights came on, the warm glow filling the chamber, pulling back the curtains that covered the blue marble ship inside. Its wings were retracted and folded downward and its engines had been pulled back under its tail so now it was the height and width of a puddle jumper but still longer. Though, it looked the like the crew had gotten a little fancy and took the liberty of painting a mouth with sharp teeth on red eyes around the cockpit, which made Nova think of the head of a dragon or some other monster. The chair the pilot would sit in was attached to the 'bottom jaw', and the mouth would close, lifting the pilot into the cockpit.
Looking around, it looked like there were four others in bays around the chamber, all ready to take on passengers.
"We've been using these for expeditions through space gates," Iado explained. "We'll transport you out to the Typhon and you guys can help them."
Everyone stared up at the ship. It was certainly more impressive up close.
"Bloody sweet," Martin muttered, immediately stepping out to examine the ship, his expression not much different than a kid laying eyes on a real-life dinosaur. "What sort of guns does this thing have?!"
"Sleipnir-class ships are utility craft designed to fill several roles rather than be dedicated to just one," Crux explained. "They aren't meant for fighting but they do carry twin god-slayer cannons and apocrypha rockets."
"And what do those do?" Chen asked keenly, now looking around as if he was trying to find where the weapons were.
"Well, let's just put it this way," Iado laughed. "We used the god-slayer cannons once, trying to cover a ground team from a jungle tyrant. We got a very long talk about deforestation."
"Regardless," Crux interrupted. "The round trip will nearly expend the Alfa's power supply. Once you are on board, it will need to return back to the gate."
"Across Damacan space," Arcturus remarked crossing her arms. "Would it not be prudent to have the ship dock inside the Typhon?"
"The Typhon doesn't have any dedicated hangar bays," Hailey explained. "I guess we could squeeze it into the cargo hold but that's just about it."
"We'll see," Iado said with a smile. "We'll show your ours if you show us yours."
-.-
"Command, this is starship Alfa, requesting permission to launch."
"Affirmative, Alfa. Stargate dialing sequence completed. Opening bay doors."
The ceiling to the gate room began to retract. Metal slid against metal as the door was pulled back, a large ship hovering in the air. The ship began to descend, slowly lowering itself. Dust on the ground was kicked up by the vertical engines holding the ship up, the push weak enough that the ship slowly drifted downward until it was barely above the ground, right in front of the stargate. Its tilt engines couldn't rotate to help it hover while it was retracted but it still could act as rear thrusters, humming with power, flaring up as the ship prepared for launch. The fierri in the control room watched the ship, going through everything to make sure everything was ready.
"Command, this is Alfa. We are ready for launch."
"Confirmed. Alfa, you are clear for launch."
The engines on the ship fired, the vessel plunging into the shimmering event horizon of the gate and vanishing through it, a thick cloud of dust kicked up behind it.
-.-
There was a reason it was called the void of space. Out in the middle of nowhere, there was nothing. The black canvas was sprinkled with tiny white points, the stars so far away that the only modicum of light that could be seen were these tiny dots. The glow of the active gate was overshadowed by the glow of the planet and its sun in the distance.
Faster than a man can blink, a shuttle streaked through the gate and into the distance. The moment it cleared the gate, its wings extended and its engines slid back into place. Inside, its occupants were all sitting around the compartments of the ship. Some were sitting on the chairs lining the walls. Others were just leaning against the walls. Chen was even sitting against the wall.
"So…now what?" Kara asked, looking around.
"Now we wait," Hailey said. "This was the closest solar system to the Typhon but it's still a good distance away."
"There's no such thing as maximum velocity in space," one of the fierri pilots said.
"Light speed!" Martin called out. The fierri pilot paused to rethink his statement.
"You don't have to worry about a maximum velocity in space," the pilot corrected. "Unlike atmospheric travel, we don't have any air resistance to slow us down so we can just keep accelerating."
"We're just going to set a course for the ship and keep accelerating," Iado explained. "But it's still going to be a while before we reach it."
"So sit tight and make yourselves comfy," the pilot added. "This is going to take a while."
-.-
Speed was constantly picking up, but with the inertial dampeners nothing could be felt. The pilots maintained their course while the occupants lounged around. Arcturus had gone to the back of ship and gotten on her knees to meditate. Soren leaned against one of the walls, his arms crossed and his eyes closed. Chen and Hailey slept in the chairs, leaning against each other. Osborn was up by the cockpit, eagerly talking with the pilots. Martin was still on the floor, snoozing away with Corin sleeping in the chair next to him, actually using his sleeping form as a foot rest.
The only one up and about was Nova, who was pacing from the back to the front of the ship.
"We there yet?" she asked. She looked up toward the cockpit when she got no response. The pilots and Doctor Osborn were still chatting.
"So you're telling me it actually grows out of a decapitated body?"
"I'm telling ya, I saw it happen. I blew its head off and the next thing I knew, the body had this weird tentacle growing out of its stump!"
Nova cleared her throat loudly, finally getting the attention of Osborn and the pilot.
"Oh, hey Nova," Kara greeted cheerfully.
"I hope I'm not interrupting," Terra said
"Nah. We were just talking about the Spore Infection. It makes the thing Lieutenant Martin calls the 'space zombie'."
"Wait, I know this one," Nova interrupted. "Martin talks about it all the time. It's called the…" Nova paused, snapping her fingers as she tried to recall the conversation. "It's a…it's the cordy-something."
"You're thinking cordyceps," Kara Osborn said, filling in the blanks. "They may behave similarly but cordyceps can only infect specific species of insects. Spore would have to be drastically different biologically in order to infect complex organisms. Did you know that in the later stages of infection, hyphae will actually grow out of the open wounds?"
Nova gave Osborn a disturbed look.
"Fascinating…" the Major said unenthusiastically. "Are we there yet?"
"Oh, funny you should ask that," the pilot said. He punched a few buttons and a screen appeared on the HUD. "You should wake the others up. We'll be there in a few minutes."
Nova nodded. She looked down and spotted Iado sitting against the wall, fast asleep.
"Hey," Nova hissed, gently nudging him with her foot. He groaned as he woke up, looking up at Nova in annoyance.
"We're here?" he mumbled.
"We're here," she said. Iado mumbled as he rose to his feet. He reached over and took a metal round shield off the wall.
"Well, guess we better wake everyone up," Iado said. Nova took a step forward to do just that but Iado cut her off. "Allow me." Iado took a step forward, pulling his sword from its sheath before clanging his sword against the metal shield. Nova had to cover her ears as the entire cabin was filled with metal bangs that echoed and reverberated through the ship, rippling across her skin and vibrating her ear drum. Soren and Arcturus both calmly opened their eyes but everyone else jumped up in shock. Hailey bolted up so quickly Chen was practically thrown to the floor. Corin leapt up, running face first into Martin.
At the front, Iado was snickering in amusement. Nova and Osborn both looked at him in disapproval.
"I am assuming that we are here," Arcturus spoke up. The alien warrior spoke with the same level-headedness she always did but Nova could still sense her agitation from the wake up call.
"That we are," the pilot announced.
-.-
Out in the cold of space, there was no light. There was nothing to illuminate anything in it. The only light now came from the spotlights on the Alfa.
"There she is," Hailey muttered as the vessel came into view, the lights peeling back the darkness of the massive figure in front of them. Everyone was crowded at the front, trying to sneak a peek at the ship, a looming mechanical behemoth so big that spotlights could only illuminate small parts of the ship at a time.
"It's a lot smaller than I hoped," Osborn muttered. The FF-305 may have been huge in comparison to them, but it was only a fraction of the size of the BC-304. It was the same general shape as its predecessors but it was two thirds the length, the neck of the ship was considerably shorter, and it lacked the hangars the 304's had.
The fierri pilot reached forward and pressed a button.
"Typhon, this is fierri ship Alfa receiving your distress signal and arriving to render aid. Requesting permission to board. Over."
Nothing.
"Typhon do you copy?"
"Here," Hailey said, leaning forward. "Typhon, this is Major Jennifer Hailey. The fierri are our allies. I have arrived with Major Nova and Wolf Pack. Please, respond."
Hailey paused, but there was no response. Iado and the pilot looked at her in confusion and she could only shrug.
"What now?" Nova asked Hailey.
"Well, whatever you do, do it fast," the pilot said. "We're approaching our Point of no return. We've expended almost half our energy getting here," the pilot explained. "If we stay here too long, I'm going to have trouble getting back to the space gate in a timely fashion."
"Hey, can you do a quick scan of the ship?" Hailey asked, still eyeing the Typhon. The fierri pilot nodded, punching in a command. He paused for a minute, looking over the result. Nova and Hailey could both see the confused look on his face.
"What is it?" Martin asked, walking up to the front of the ship.
"We've been trying to make contact with the Typhon but they aren't responding," Hailey explained.
"Here's something else," the pilot remarked. "Shields are down. Ship's barely giving off any energy signatures. And…there are no life signs on board."
Hailey and Nova exchanged glances at this.
"Explains why they aren't talking," Hailey remarked. "Well, Nova. What are your orders?" Terra Nova looked at Hailey in surprise, not expecting this question. Hailey wasn't on Wolf Pack. She was the same rank. Hell, if anything, Nova would've considered Hailey superior. But, looking at Jennifer Hailey's face, Terra could tell she wasn't asking as a military officer. She was asking as a friend.
"We need to board and investigate," Nova said. "How do we get on board?" She had hoped they could just bring the ship into the cargo bay but that was going to be a problem if there wasn't anybody on board to open the bay doors for them.
"The ring platform," a voice suggested. They all turned around, spotting Arcturus near the back. "There is a ring platform near the back of the ship where I was meditating."
They didn't notice it before but now that Arcturus mentioned it, they could see the unmistakable engraving in the floor where the rings would rise from. Nova looked at Hailey for confirmation.
"The Typhon has a set of rings," Hailey said. "I say me and a team ring over to clear the ship."
"How about my Wolf Pack gets ringed over to check everything out first. We'll clear the ship, make sure nothing's wrong. Then we can radio you."
"Alright. We'll be ready."
"Wolf Pack," Nova called out, heading for the back of the ship. On cue, Martin, Chen, and Corin followed their leader to the back of the ship.
"Sam, what are you doing?" Martin asked when he saw Arcturus follow them.
"I believe it is best that I assist you clear the ship," Arcturus explained. "It is apparent that something is wrong. I will accompany you to make sure that nothing dangerous on the ship."
Martin looked at Nova, who could only shrug.
"C'mon," she said. She didn't really think they needed Arcturus. The ship should be empty. But Nova remembered reading SG mission reports of supposedly empty ships being secretly filled with enemy soldiers. Having a heavy hitter like Arcturus would be a massive help in that case.
"Ready?!" the pilot called back as the team stood in the center of the platform.
"Ready!" Nova called back.
"Good luck," the pilot called. With the press of a button, the ring platform activated. The engraving in the floor retracted and five silver rings emerged from the floor. Nova watched as the stack of rings walled in the five of them, halting in midair. She could see Hailey, Osborn, and Soren from between the rings, waiting outside. There was a brilliant flash that consumed the world around them, like a waterfall of liquid light. As the glow died down, the world around them had changed. They were no longer on the Alfa. Dull gray walls, concrete floors, long dim corridors, they were on the Typhon.
The rings descended into the floor, the engraving sliding back into place.
Immediately Nova could tell something was off. It felt like she was out of breath. She tried to inhale, but it felt like she was always a breath short. It seemed like the rest of her team could feel it too judging from their loud and heavy breathing. The only one that seemed to be unaffected was Samanya Arcturus.
"Air's thin," Arcturus remarked, looking around the corridor in interest. "Life support must be damaged. It'll be uncomfortable but survivable."
"Uncomfortable," Chen repeated. "Annoying's more like it." He reached into his pouch and quickly pulled out a scanner. "No toxins or foreign particles detected."
"Oi, Corin," Martin spoke up when he saw his friend nearly keeling over.
"I'm fine," Corin wheezed. Corin cleared his and stood back up and looked around. "Where do we go from here?"
"Bridge," Nova said. "Give me a second." Nova reached down and picked up her radio. "Hailey," she said through it. "Air's thin but other than that, it's ok. Go ahead and ring over then send the pilot back to the gate as fast as possible before the Damacans decide to snoop around."
"Roger that, Nova," Hailey said through the radio.
"What about us, Major?" Martin asked, gently rocking back and forth eagerly.
"We head to the bridge, see if we can find any records on what happened," Nova said.
"Great, so where would that be?" Chen grumbled, looking around. "We supposed to just wander until we find it?"
"Don't worry," Nova said, slapping Chen across the back. "Worked Typhon once. Bridge is that way." Without another word, she headed down the dark hall she pointed at.
-.-
The bridge was exactly how she remembered it. Unlike the bridges of the 303 of 304, the bridge of the 305 was in the center of the ship, a semi-spherical chamber with computers and monitors lining the wall. At the center of the room was a slightly elevated circular platform where the captain would stand.
"Every room's empty," Corin remarked, using his flashlight to scan the bridge. "It's like everyone on the ship disappeared." He figured the rest of his friends weren't scared. After all, why would they be afraid of the dark? But Corin knew there were more than a few things in this galaxy that would justify that fear. The only question was were any of those things responsible for what happened to the ship?
"You think everyone abandoned ship?" Martin suggested, looking at the individual controls consoles, the flashlights casting looming shadows over the walls.
"You didn't see it then?" Chen asked, getting on a computer console.
"See what?"
"The escape pods. They're all here."
"So if they didn't leave the ship…" Nova muttered. "Where did they go?"
While the rest of the team examined the bridge, Chen was busy at the computer. The glow from the computer monitor added to the flashlights as he began reading the information.
"Sublight offline," Chen read. "Hyperdrive offline. Shields offline. Weapons offline. Power's out in half the ship. Life support is…" Chen's voice trailed off.
"Steven?" Nova asked curiously when she heard Chen fall silent.
"Life support's been recalibrated," Chen explained. "Air's not thin because life support was damaged. It's been set this low."
"Can you fix it?" Nova asked.
"I'm locked out of the computers. I can read the data but it won't let me input any commands."
"Dead Space," Martin muttered.
"What?" Corin asked.
"It's a video game. On board a derelict ship infested with flesh-eating necromorphs, undead space monsters hiding in the vents, it's a constant struggle for survival."
Martin jumped up in shock at the sound of a loud metallic clatter. He aimed his ion rifle in the direction of the clatter, a vent shaft.
"Ventilation's off," Arcturus said, tapping her metal gauntlet against the ventilation with a loud clang. She looked at Martin, who held the most bewildered expression on his face. "What?"
"Martin, you have that ion rifle set to minimum yield, right?" Nova asked.
"Yeah, why?"
"Close quarters. If there is something on this ship, I don't want you blowing us up…or blowing a hole in the side of the ship." Nova looked at Chen. "Any progress?"
"None," Chen said. "I'm completely locked out." Steven pressed his fingers to his grow in irritation. He had hoped for a simple mission. Why couldn't anything be routine any more?
"Well, hopefully the others are having more luck," Nova sighed.
-.-
"So this is the highly sophisticated, state of the art ship?" Soren asked in a rather unamused tone as led Osborn through the empty halls of Typhon.
"Don't look at me," Kara remarked. "All our other ships are way bigger than this." Doctor Osborn had never officially served on a 304 before but she has traveled in them. And if she had to be honest, she actually enjoyed how nauseatingly complicated the hallways were and how easy it was to get lost in them. But Typhon's smaller size meant no more labyrinths of halls.
"Bigger isn't always better," Hailey remarked. "Bigger ships are bigger targets and pricier losses. I mean, the Alliance had the capability of make planet-sized warships but it would be a waste of resources with how destructive their weapons are. We thought we'd take a page from their book."
"Still strange we went smaller instead of bigger," Osborn said with a shrug, glancing out the window into space.
"You seem unusually solemn about this," Soren remarked. "I thought the prospect of traveling on any ship would be exciting for you."
"Maybe under less serious circumstances. Right now, I'm worried about what happened to the crew. Ah, here we are."
Soren, Hailey, and Osborn all walked into the ship's infirmary, a small room with about a half a dozen hospital beds lining the walls and computer monitors above them. There were two computers at the far end of the room and Kara went straight for them.
"What are you looking for?" Hailey called out as Osborn went to work.
"Hopefully answers," Osborn said, scanning the computer screen. "I'm hoping the reason no life signs were detected is because they did something to mask them."
"Like what?"
"Like stasis. If they did bring stasis pods, they would make a record of it the medical records." Osborn sighed in annoyance. "But nothing."
"What do you mean?" Soren asked, looking at the computer monitor. "What is that?"
On the computer monitor was a text document, blocks of texts already scrawled aCross it.
"It's just a medical journal entry," Kara sighed. "The ship's medical officer just writing about known diseases back in the Milky Way. It's not complete though. It was as if whoever was writing it just dropped what they were doing and left."
"It seems that is what everyone on the ship did," Hailey observed. "Will you two be find staying here?"
Osborn looked at Hailey curiously. It sounded like she intended on wandering off on her own.
"Where will you go?" Soren asked before Kara could.
"Engine room. Maybe one of their computers can tell me what's going on."
"Isn't it dangerous wandering off like that?" Osborn asked. She felt safe being with Soren, a trained killer, and Hailey, one of the SGC's top soldiers. While she still felt protected if it was just Soren, she could not help but question the wisdom of splitting up.
"I don't think it'll hurt," Hailey said. "Don't worry. I'll be back in a jiffy." Without another word, Hailey proceeded down the hall and out of sight.
-.-
The Typhon's engine core, a spinning cylinder surrounded by field-emitting dishes to keep the thing in balance. Hailey was one of the builders of the Typhon. Chen may have involved but he was limited to designing the computer systems and helping Colonel Carter run simulations. Hailey helped conceive much of the design. So seeing her baby like this was almost heartbreaking. She had hoped to see it set sail with a full and eager crew, ready to brave the unknown. Instead, it was a dead husk and its crew missing.
"Alright," she muttered to herself, pulling out a chair and taking a seat. Her fingers flew aCross the keyboard, accessing the files. But the moment she tried, ERROR flashed on screen. She tried again, trying to access engine controls.
ERROR.
She tried to access data logs.
ERROR.
Hailey put her hand to her head and sighed. She might have been able to do something if she could just access the files. But she couldn't. She was stuck. She was beginning to understand the pressure of being Samantha Carter.
Even before she learned of the stargate, she was always compared to the great Samantha Carter. Then she had Cater as her mentor. She wasn't the only one. Carter had plenty of pupils including Terra Nova. But there was a difference. Jennifer knew Terra always felt inferior, always asking herself what Carter would do in a situation. But Hailey and Carter had done enough together that she knew what the living legend would do. It meant no more disappointed looks but it also meant everyone expected her to just know the solution. She knew the rest of the team secretly expected her to figure out the scientific conundrum. But she was as stumped as the rest of them.
"Son of a…" Hailey muttered as ERROR flashed on the screen again. She was also beginning to understand Chen's short temper when it came to computers. She cracked her knuckles and prepared to hack. "You are not getting to me," she muttered. "I will hack you wide open and there's nothing you can do to stop me." She had placed her hands on the keyboard, ready to get to work. Then, the lights suddenly went out, plunging the room in to darkness.
"Oh, what now?"
-.-
In the infirmary, Osborn was scanning the shelves for clues when the lights in the infirmary went out.
"Oh, bloody hell," she muttered.
-.-
On the bridge, Chen was still work on the computer when all the lights on the bridge turned off.
"Ah, bugger," Martin growled.
A moment later, a few weak lights flicked on. It was dim but they could see.
"Chen?" Nova asked slowly. Steven Chen looked around the bridge curiously.
"Stealth mode's been engaged," he murmured.
"Stealth mode?" Corin asked. "We're cloaked?"
"Not quite. The Typhon's stealth is a three-part system. Cloaks makes us go invisible and masks energy signatures but Alliance sensors are sensitive enough to still pick things up. The Hephaestus core absorbs all energy so nothing can be detected but it can only hold so much. Stealth mode is a power setting that turns off non-essential systems so we can keep the core running longer. Kitchen, cargo bay, air lock, they're all completely shut off. Lights are dimmed. Life support runs on a lower setting."
"Wait, wait, wait," Martin stuttered. "Air's thin enough the way it is!"
"Air pressure's not affected. Mostly temperature."
"So everything's ok then?" Nova asked.
"Technically…no. I never activated stealth mode. It just kinda did it by itself. This whole ship's wacked. The reason the air's so thin is because the life-supports been set that way." Chen clicked his radio. "Hey, Hailey. What's your status?"
Hailey's voice came crackling back through the radio.
"I'm in the engine room. I'm trying to go through the computers."
"Wait a minute," Chen stuttered. "You just left Kara with Soren alone?"
"She'll be fine," Hailey said. "I doubt Soren's going to try anything."
Chen grumbled in irritation. It was true. Soren couldn't afford to pull anything. But it didn't make Steven feel better.
"Hey, Jennifer, you activate stealth mode?"
"No, I thought you did."
Chen paused at this statement, his eyes narrowing in suspicion.
"Computer glitch?" Corin suggested.
"Add that to the list of glitches this thing's been having," Chen muttered. "Half the controls are unresponsive. Things are happening on their own. And for some reason, over fifty percent of the ship's memory is full!" He turned and went back to work. While Chen typed away, Nova turned to her two alien cohorts.
"Corin, Arcturus," she called out. "Any thoughts?"
Corin could only shrug.
"Space pirates…" he suggested. "Maybe? Like, they might take the crew, but why would they leave the ship?"
"It's also the location," Arcturus said, slowly walking the room, examining the environment for clues. "We're at the edge of Damacan space. A particularly bold band of space pirates may target a ship in their territory but it is unlikely. Then it is as Professor Nevec stated: why did they leave the ship behind?"
"But…" Martin said. "Mate, I can read your expression. What's on your mind?"
Corin gave an exasperated sigh.
"I don't know how things are in your galaxy but in our galaxy, space isn't completely dead. There are…more than a few things that could kill everyone on an unsuspecting ship."
"True, but none of them can do it without doing damage," Arcturus pointed out.
"We should double check anyways," Nova concluded. "Martin, you and Arcturus go clear the rest of the ship."
"Sounds good," Martin said, slinging his rifle over his shoulder. "C'mon, Sam."
-.-
Between the dark halls and the occasional creaks that echoed through the ship, Martin was getting creeped out.
He slowly walked through what looked like the torpedo room. The place was a lot more cramped than the rest of the ship. It was a decent sized triangular room with what looked like six metal tubes lining the walls facing the front. There were monitors all along the walls, some active, some dormant.
"Not quite the coziest place on the ship," Martin remarked.
"It's still quite a remarkable feat of engineering," Arcturus remarked. Martin just shrugged at this statement. "You don't seem convinced."
"I mean, it's cool," he said with another shrug. "The one before it was bigger."
"Smaller ships are often more efficient warships," Arcturus explained, examining the tubes. "They are often cheaper so they can be constructed in larger number. They tend to be faster, more maneuverable, and more difficult to hit."
"Bigger is usually better."
"Perhaps you would like to put that to the test with a sparring match?" Samanya asked in an almost mocking tone. Martin instantly knew he probably hit the one spot he should avoid when it came to Samanya Arcturus: her warrior's pride. Arcturus may have been shorter than him but her sheer speed, strength, and skill left no doubt in his mind that a sparring match would only end one way.
"I'm good," he answered. He was about to say something else but a loud crackle of static made him jump in shock, raising his rifle to fight whatever it was. The only one that didn't panic was Arcturus, who looked at one of the monitors hanging off the walls that has come to life.
The faces of Hailey, Chen, and Osborn filled the screen, their respective teams and the rooms they were in in the background.
"I thought I'd turn on internal communication," Hailey explained. "Did I scare you?"
"Oh, rack off!" he retorted. His attitude suddenly did a complete 180 when he saw the room she was in. "Bloody hell, where are you?"
The room Hailey was in was as cramped as all the others. But what caught his eye was the spinning glowing blue cylinder behind her.
"I'm in the engine room," she said. "That's the drive core behind me."
"It looks bloody cool!"
Arcturus gave an amused friendly smile before walking past him. Her smile soon vanished as she realized something while staring at the Torpedo tubes.
"Major Hailey, Doctor Chen," she said.
"Hey, how come you say her name first?" Chen pouted.
"Knock it off, Steve," Hailey interrupted. "What do you want, Arcturus?"
"Martin and I are in the what appears to be the weapons room," Arcturus explained. "Do you know how many torpedoes this ship carries?"
"I'm still on my way to the engine room," Hailey explained. "Steve, you got anything."
"Give me a moment," Chen said. Arcturus waited for a bit in silence as Chen did his thing. "Alright, according to the schematics it can hold a maximum of seventy-five torpedoes. Why?"
"I have a monitor here displaying the number of torpedoes. It displays seventy-five."
"Meaning?" Martin asked.
"Meaning they didn't fire a single shot," Hailey said. "Whatever happened, they didn't fight it."
"Or couldn't," Chen added.
Arcturus exchanged glances with Martin. She was about to say something when the entire room seemed to shift. A thunderous metallic boom rattled the ship while she and Martin nearly toppled to the floor.
"What the bloody hell was that?!" Martin exclaimed.
-.-
"Chen, what's happening?!" Nova exclaimed, grabbing a computer console for support. Chen's hands were flying aCross the keyboard.
"Hold on."
"Steven, what's happening?" Kara asked, another boom rocking the ship.
"Hang on!"
"Doctor Chen, what is happening?!" Soren barked.
"Oh, for crying out loud! Give me some time to figure that out!" Chen's hands flew aCross the keyboard until he pulled up the cans. "I'm looking at the sensors! I don't see anything!"
"Then what's going kaboom?!" Martin barked.
"Hold on!" Chen growled in annoyance. "I'm putting more juice into the sensors."
There was a crackle on the com screen as Hailey face appeared and joined the conversation.
"Hey, Nova, who're your friends?" she remarked as the ship rocked again.
"Uh…just some people we met at a party," Nova said with an awkward laugh.
"Ah, they seem nice."
"Now is not the time, ladies!" Chen snapped. "Hold on, I think I got it."
Nova and Corin both looked up at the array of monitors on the walls as Chen continued working. Diagrams showed up, large black screens with the ship at its center, the empty black spaced divided into sections by a thin-lined grid. Chen continued pounding the keyboard behind Nova. She didn't know what he was doing but judging that the grid seemed to shrink before being replaced by another resized grid, she could only assume he was zooming out. Finally, a blip appeared at the edge of the screen.
"Hey, look at this!" Chen called out triumphantly. An image of a ship appeared on the screen, a long but sleek gray ship with what looked like three large prongs facing toward the front, prongs that that made up half the length of the ship.
"I recognize it," Arcturus said, looking at her screen. "It's a Damacan siege cruiser."
"I've never seen a ship with a weapons range that large before," Hailey remarked worriedly, also watching the ship.
"Forget weapons range!" Chen exclaimed. "Damn thing was out of our sensor range!" Chen and Hailey both knew battles in space usually took place at absurd ranges, normally several hundred to several thousand kilometers and sensor ranges were even longer. But this thing was out of range of all of it.
"It's the Damacan combat doctrine," Arcturus explained. "Grids of siege cruisers fire in designated patterns to destroy ships at long range. That entire ship is a single giant cannon."
"So we're fighting a giant friggin' space gun!"
"Sounds like it has a lot of vulnerabilities," Martin remarked.
"It does. That is why it is usually escorted."
"Yea, I'm picking up two smaller ships right next to it," Chen reported, bringing up an image of two other ships, large blocky ships with four blockier engines on its rear.
"Damacan trimmens," Arcturus reported. "If we want to fight the siege cruiser we need to face the gunships."
"Without the engines, we aren't doing much of anything," Chen snapped.
"Good thing we're in the engine room then," Hailey remarked. "Steve I'm going to manually start the engines. You should be able to control it from there."
"I don't know how to fly this rust bucket!"
"You made the user interface!"
"Knowing how to make the ship move and being remotely good at it are two completely different things!"
"Well, you have plenty of space to experiment since there's nothing to crash into."
"Crashing is the last thing I'm worried about!"
"Chen!" Nova snapped. Chen grumbled in annoyance. Well, at least he didn't have to worry about being blamed if they blow up. He quickly did his work and pulled up the navigation computer.
"Waiting on you, Jen," he said.
"Engines online," she reported. "Punch it!"
Chen did just that, literally. He jammed the button that started the engine. Even with the inertial dampeners, everyone could feel the ship lurch as it began to move.
"I'm steering us away," Chen said.
-.-
The engines of the ship came to life, the glow in the exhaust glowing like a small sun. The Typhon began to move, taking off into the distance as a fireball erupted next to the ship, the searing white hot inferno licking the vessel with its flames. Another blast rocked the ship, the concussive wave hurling the ship aCross space.
The entire galaxy of Caldwell 70 was a hub of the Alliance thousands of years ago. Their technology was left behind everywhere and just about everyone in the galaxy wanted to get their hands on it. The Ror'char and the Quinterans may have been ahead in the tech race but they weren't the only runners. The Damacans once found ancient blueprints on how to construct drones, explosive projectiles coated in a field of energy that let them burn through any shielding or matter. They never did find a way to stabilize the energy as a field so, instead, they chose to release the energy in a single powerful explosion.
-.-
Chen instinctively looked up at the ceiling as another boom creaked the ship. The blast was further in the distance but it was still there.
"Hailey, this isn't working," Chen said.
"You sure you're flying away from them?"
"Yes, Hailey. I'm sure I'm flying away from them!"
There was a pause as Hailey took a moment to think. She wasn't trained to fly the ship but she still knew how it worked. If there was something in the systems that could help them, she would know about it.
"Alright, let me try something," she said. "And…now!"
Chen's grip on the console tightened as he waited for whatever Hailey was doing to kick in. He waited the saving grace.
But nothing happened.
"Well, what'd you do?" Chen barked. "Nothing happened."
"Sounds like something happened to me," Hailey mocked. Chen was about to retort but Corin spoke up.
"Steven," he remarked. "The explosions stopped."
Chen and Nova fell silent, listening to the hum of the ship. Sure enough, the explosions that had rocked it had ceased. The only sound left was the gentle hum of the engines.
"I activated the Hephaestus Core," Hailey explained. "I figured at this distance they're probably relying on their passive sensors to detect us."
"You know if they increase the sensitivity of their active sensors we'll be back to square one," Chen bluntly pointed out.
"Well, it should take a few minutes for them to realize what's going on. In the meantime, can you meet me in engineering. I think I know what's going on."
Corin and Nova let out sighs of relief. They weren't any closer to solving the problem but at least they now had time to.
For Corin, he actually felt unusually calm. Being afraid during a firefight was not the act of a coward, and Corin Nevec detested violence. Whenever violence broke out, he was often left hiding while his friends dealt with the fight and was left pumped full of adrenaline afterwards. His body was still pumped with adrenaline from the battle they just survived, but Corin could not help but feel a bit calmer now that the muffled sounds of cannon fire in space instead of gunshots a few meters away.
"I'm on my way down," Chen said through the speaker. He punched in a few commands before standing up and leaving.
"What about the ship?" Nova asked, she and Corin walking after him.
"We're the in the middle of space and we already have some velocity. I don't need to keep the sublight on. We can just drift through space."
"You know what Hailey found?" Corin asked.
"I might. I just hope I'm wrong."
-.-
Under normal circumstances, Corin would've loved to just stare at the glowing engine core, which looked like a liquid rainbow rising into the ceiling of its containment chamber. But they weren't here to admire the beauty of the core.
"Jen," Chen called out as he entered the room. "You got something for me?"
The Typhon's engineering room wasn't much different than the engineering of the 304's. No point in changing what's not broken. Three curved computer consoles were situated in a circle with a few more on the walls. A large screen was displayed at the front of the room in case anyone had something to show.
"Steve, take a look at this," Hailey remarked. With the flick of a switch, a long block of code filled the screen. Chen grumbled at the prospect of having to comb a segment of code but he read it anyways. It took a few moments but Nova watched as his frustration seemed to melt, giving way to concern.
"How'd you find this?" he asked stiffly.
"Both of us were locked out of the controls. The only way I could manually control the engine was by worming my way into the computer. But the only reason I was able to do that was because something else had wormed in for me."
"Were you able to trace it upstream?"
"Already done."
"Uh…guys…" Nova remarked. "Non-computer-nerds here."
"It's a virus," Hailey explained. Instantly the remark spurred reaction. Nova put her hand to her head and sighed while Corin had the most confused look on his face.
"You're kidding," he coughed. "You mean you guys got a third virus?"
"Third?" Chen repeated. "I thought there was only one other one was on the Daedalus."
"I read a mission report that the SGC got infected by a virus once through the MALP."
"Might as well believe him," Nova commented. "He's read all the SG mission reports."
Corin threw his hands up, shaking his head. He wasn't a computer geek but he knew enough.
"Seems like you guys are need of an anti-virus," he remarked.
"We do!" Hailey stuttered out. "The only reason the Wraith virus penetrated the Daedalus systems was because it kept changing itself until it could get through. And the SGC didn't think it had to protect its own MALP telemetry."
"Well, what's the excuse this time?" Nova exclaimed.
"Hang on," Chen grumbled, typing over Hailey's shoulder. Finally, he stopped typing. And his face sagged. "What…the…hell…" he managed to stutter. "Jen, you seeing this?!"
"I see it," she said. "I just don't believe it."
Nova cleared her throat, reminding the two that they were still in the room.
"It's an exception statement," Chen said. "The reason the anti-virus didn't catch the virus…is because it's been reprogrammed to overlook it." Chen's hands flew across the keyboard, practically slamming on the keys as he worked. "They've all been reprogrammed! All our security systems have been reprogrammed to ignore the virus."
"How do you know it's ignoring the virus?" Hailey asked.
"Well, do you recognize this tag?"
"Wait, back up," Corin stuttered. "So you're telling me someone hacked us, installed a virus, and rewrote all the software to ignore the virus?"
"No, that wouldn't make sense," Hailey said. "If you had enough control of the system that you could rewrite its security, why bother installing the virus?"
"Depends on the situation," Chen said. "Spyware…sabotage…"
"Yeah, but if it was the Lucian Alliance, why not just change the ship's systems? Blow up the ship while it was still in the Milky Way. Same with the Ror'char, the Quinterans…maybe a band of space pirates but why would they leave the ship?"
"I'm not saying I know the answer. I'm just saying there are reasons to plant a virus after hacking into a computer system."
"Could the virus have rewritten the security software?" Corin asked.
"It's technically not a rewrite," Chen explained. "All security software have the ability to add exceptions in case it doesn't like new software. But that still doesn't make sense. It'd be a lot easier to just make a virus that the security would miss entirely instead of one that rewrites it."
"Alright, I get it!" Nova snapped. She knew as a leader she had to take in as much information as possible. But this was just making her head hurt. "So a computer virus is responsible for the state of the ship. But what about the crew?"
She looked around to see if anyone had answers, but all she got was blank stares. The ship was still empty and the escape pods were still there.
"Your guess is as good as mine," Chen sighed, shaking his head. "We need to focus on clearing the virus from the ship's systems first. Then we can see what we can salvage to use to find out what happened to the crew."
"Well, that's the easy part," Hailey scoffed. "Shut down the computer's system, clear the active memory, then restore it with the backup."
"That's what the Daedalus and the SGC did when they got a virus," Corin recited.
"It's the most effective way to clear any virus," Chen added. "It's almost like getting a new computer."
"Hey, Hailey, do you need Steven for this?" Nova asked. She knew how important getting the ship back in working order was but she wanted Chen in position to start digging for information the moment everything was back online.
Hailey looked at the computer, then back at Nova.
"It's a simple task," Jennifer replied. "I can handle."
"I'll take my team back to the bridge," Nova said. "We should get back in touch with Osborn and Martin and stand by in case we run into trouble."
Without another word, Wolf Pack turned and left the room. Chen, Corin, and Nova left down the hall, the engine room disappearing behind the corner.
"Hard to believe it," Nova said as they made their way down the hall. "Brand new ship and it's already in trouble." Nova had faith Hailey could get this task done by herself. It's what she does. With any luck, Hailey could have the ship back in working order, they can find the crew, then they can be on their way. Nice, easy mission.
"You already served on this once, right?" Corin asked.
"Yeah. Operation Typhon. It was nearly destroyed then too. The girl's been through tough times."
It was a while back but Nova still remembered running away from ashrak through the halls of the Typhon, demons from the Shadow's Hand. The ship was finally repaired and even got a few upgrades but now it was broken again.
"Would've been cool to see the ship at her prime," Corin remarked, folding his arms behind his head as he strolled down the corridor.
"I know Martin was disappointed. He was hoping for a something bigger."
"I'll take the smaller laser over the catapult any day."
"You'd take neither. You hate guns!"
The two laughed at their conversation, only then realizing there was someone not joining in.
"Steven!" Nova called out. "You've been quiet. You ok?"
Chen didn't really say anything. It was obvious he was too lost in thought. Corin reached over and gave Chen's ear a gentle flick. Chen practically jumped out of his skin in shock. When he finally realized it was nothing dangerous, he looked over in surprise.
"What was that for?!" he barked.
"Sorry, just looked like you were out of it," Corin chuckled.
"Steven…" Nova remarked. "You ok?'
"No, I've just been thinking," Chen murmured. "The virus is responsible for everything on the ship. Is it possible it could explain what happened to the crew?"
"Probably. But what does that have to do with anything?"
"Well, we speculate that the virus is responsible for everything happening on the ship."
"The unresponsive systems, the life support settings..." Corin recited.
"You think the virus killed everyone?" Nova asked. "Even if it's not an AI, it could be programmed to kill everyone on the ship."
"How can you kill everyone on a space ship?"
"Plenty of ways," Chen scoffed, the trio walking down a short flight of stairs. "Uh, turn off life support, maximize gravity, turn off inertial dampeners, pick one."
"But you don't think that's what happened," Nova said.
"No. The virus set the life support to a very specific setting. If it was programmed to kill, we would've been its next victims. Not to mention, all the ways to kill someone on a space ship are messy and there isn't a trace of anyone anywhere."
"It's a real shame," Corin remarked. "Traveling on space ships is supposed to be awesome."
"Yeah, I can only imagine how terrified they all got when the life support started going down."
It was only then Chen stopped in his tracks. Nova and Corin kept walking for a few seconds but then realized he had trailed behind.
"Chen…" Nova said.
"Just thinking," Chen said. "If you were on board the ship when life support started failing, what would you do?"
"Escape pods," Corin immediately answered. "I mean, it'd probably look like they're about to vent all their atmosphere so the best idea's to abandon ship."
"Out in the middle of nowhere in a tin can without a hyperdrive, you just prolong your own death."
"Stasis pods," Nova suggested. "Set the emergency beacon and jump into a stasis pod."
"The crew did half of that. But there're no stasis pods, even in the cargo bay. I mean the only way to maybe save yourself then. Chen paused, his face sagging as realization dawned on him. "Aw, crap."
"What is it?" Nova asked upon seeing Chen's panicked look. He didn't answer. He turned around and bolted, practically tripping up the stairs but immediately leaping back to his feet before sprinting down the hall. Nova and Corin could only take off behind him.
"Hailey!" he yelled as loudly as he could. "Hailey, stop! Hailey, don't wipe the memory!"
-.-
In engineering, Hailey had finally finished with the preparations. Wipe the system, then restore it with the backup. Should be easy. With any luck, the worst the ship's had to face would be behind it.
Hailey began typing. She gave a heavy sigh, ready to restart every system on the Typhon. She reached down to press the enter key when a sharp voice made her jump.
"HAILEY, STOP!"
Jennifer Hailey nearly fell out of her chair at the sudden panicked call of her name.
From the floor, she turned to look as Chen stumbled onto the bridge, his entire body wracked with sweat from the sprint. It took a few more moments but Nova and Corin soon stumbled in behind him.
Hailey looked at Terra, but only got a confused shrug.
"Jeez, you nearly gave me a heart attack," Hailey huffed. "What is it?" After taking several more deep breaths, he finally explained.
"The Makhai," he panted.
"Ok…what about them?"
"In order to preserve their civilization, they use their transport technology to save everything to a buffer, turn everything into data and save it to a computer."
"Don't the wraith do the same thing?" Nova added
"Pretty much. And something similar was done when the Stargate Council attacked Millennium. They use the transport technology to preserve life forms."
"Ok, so what?" Hailey asked.
"Well, think about it. Your ship drops out of hyperspace in the middle of nowhere. The computers systems start going off one by one, life support's flickering, and the atmosphere's being vented. What goes through your brain?"
"The ship's coming apart at the seams," Nova answered.
"Exactly! There's no planet for you to beam your crew to. You can't use the escape pods unless you want to end up stranded in the middle of nowhere."
"Wait, are you saying the crew used the Asgard transporter to save themselves to the ship's hard drive?!" Hailey exclaimed.
"That's exactly what I'm saying! They activate their subspace beacon then save themselves to the hard drive. You purge the systems, you kill them!"
-.-
Nova stared up at the computer monitor. Most of them on the bridge were off but Chen had left one on, one that showed the space in front of the ship as it cruised through the void. Nova stared at the monitor, admiring the specs of light that were stars and planets in the distance.
"Enjoying the view?" Corin Nevec asked from behind her.
"Yeah. It's one thing I miss about Apollo: windows to look at the stars."
"Windows are structural weaknesses," Corin stated in an almost robotic tone. Nova looked at her subordinate in confusion, knowing he was referencing something but unable to tell what.
"Martin show you a new movie or something?"
"Video game," Corin corrected. "Everyone's ready in the cargo bay, by the way."
Nova nodded and followed Nevec out. The cargo bay was at the bottom of the neck of the ship, a large cement room filled with crates and boxes. It was obvious they had intended to help restock the expedition. As the two of them walked in, she could hear everyone inside.
"Hey, we got new laser guns!" Martin exclaimed, shuffling through the boxes, lifting a new X699 from the box. Immediately, Hailey walked over to compare the model she had to the new one. She remembered the bulky and awkward handlebar-looking thing the x699 used to be compared to the sleek rifle reminiscent of the Mx4 Storm that it was now.
Hailey held up her rifle next to the new model, her rifle customized with alien technology they had stumbled aCross in Caldwell 70 and the phrase 'bad-ass blonde' engraved in the stock.
"I like mine better," she said, shouldering her modified rifle.
The sound of Corin and Nova's footsteps caught everyone's attention.
"Well, at least the air seems to be getting better," Nova remarked as she stepped up to a large crate they were using as a table.
"I detached the life support systems from the computer network," Hailey explained, stepping up to the box. "The only way to adjust life support now is manually. We're lucky the virus hadn't infected that system yet."
"So, where does that leave us?" Arcturus asked.
"Well, we can't take full control of the ship without purging the virus. And we can't purge the virus with the crew saved to the ship's memory. And we can't beam them back out because of the virus."
"So, is there anything we can do?" Nova asked.
"Can't we just remove the memory crystal holding the crew before we wipe the systems?" Corin suggested.
"It's not that simple," Chen sighed. "The virus works like ransomware. It's encrypted our systems. Everything, including the memory, has been encrypted. I need to decrypt everything to get it working again."
"How long will that take?" Nova asked.
"Damned if I know. Could take hours. Could take years. These things were made to be not decrypted."
"I'll help you with the decryption," Hailey said. She looked at Nova. "Shall we?"
It took a moment for Nova to realize Hailey was asking her permission.
"Why you asking me? We're the same rank."
Hailey chuckled at Nova's response before finally leaving the room, everyone else following. Nova was about to join, but she noticed Chen was staying behind.
"Steven," she said, noticing the stern expression on his face. "You ok?"
Chen was silent for a moment, clearly unsure whether or not to say anything.
"I took a look at the malware code," he said. He held up his hands as if he was going to try to explain but not sure how. "All machines, when you get down to it, rely on binary for computing at its most basic level."
"Ok…" Nova said, not sure where this was going.
"Programs are like finger prints. For any program there are nearly infinite ways to write and structure it. So programmers usually have their own personal ways of creating code."
"Steven, what are you getting at?"
Chen glanced at the doorway as if he wanted to make sure no one was eavesdropping on them.
"The malware code…it was run through a compiler."
"Steven, c'mon! You hate techno-babble. Just say you what you want to say."
"The code was written in Goa'uld!"
Nova froze at this statement. For a moment, she thought she heard him wrong.
"What did you say?" she asked slowly, dreading the answer she was going to get.
"The code for the malware was originally written in a Goa'uld programming language. Then it was compiled into assembly language compatible with our computers and installed on our systems."
"So you're telling me…the Goa'uld planted a virus in our ship…" Nova breathed.
"No. You remember that fingerprint comment I made. I was only able to decompile a fraction of the code but I recognized the structure. The encryption software is new but the virus's structure is identical to ones used by the Tok'ra."
Nova felt her blood chill.
"You're sure…" she finally managed to choke out. "Maybe surviving member of the Trust?"
"When I was first recruited for the SGC, I was trained by studying Goa'uld and Tok'ra programming languages," Chen explained. "One of the programs I got a chance to look at was one the Tok'ra would use to sabotage Goa'uld motherships. The malware was practically copied and pasted."
"So…you're saying…"
"That's right," Chen said. "All evidence points that this virus was planted by the Tok'ra."
Nova gave a stiff sigh. Things had just gotten a lot more complicated. Her mind wandered back to the IOA…the Tok'ra…General Mercer…Am-heh.
"We always knew that stuff would come back to bite us in the ass one day," she sighed.
"But what do we do with this? The virus the Tok'ra originally created was designed to destroy the ship: overload the hyperdrives or set off the self-destruct. This thing was designed to only disable the ship."
Nova put her hand to her forehead. She was the leader. It was up to her to make a decision. But she didn't know what to decide. All she knew was that they needed more information.
"Alright, we'll put this on the backburner for now," she said. "Right now, we need to save this ship."
A/N: Hey guys. Sorry for the delay. Work has been stacking up on me. Here's the next ep. As you can tell, the over arching story is about to get heated. This ep will get a chance to show new Tau'ri technology and how they make use of old ones. I hope it's to you're liking. Please review and enjoy. I also would like to thank taleanaomi for helping me write this.
