The Others Chapter 1d
Asuras: Replicator shipyard complex
Invisible the jumper hovered steadily over a ramp in the shipyard. With a dull whine the rear hatch lowered and two small figures dropped the short distance to the ground below. The two men swiftly covered the distance to a small sloping ramp leading down into the complex.
As soon as they were out of site, the jumper spun around, its rear hatch swiftly rising into place and rapidly moved off in the direction of the central tower.
The two men skidded to a stop at the bottom of the ramp and turned a 90 ˚ angle to the right before descending yet another sloping ramp to an armoured door. The two conferred momentarily, and then, after shooting a dark look at his companion, the larger man pulled a long barrelled pistol from a holster. Flicking at a switch on the butt, he aimed it at the dead centre of the door and pulled the trigger.
Sheppard hovered the jumper at a height of perhaps 70 metres above the roof of the central tower. He didn't dare yet touchdown above the control room, fearing that the noise would carry through the metal and alert the replicators.
Far below him he could see the hatch where they had dropped off Ronon and McKay, its entrance practically invisible from this altitude. Allowing time for McKay to override any locked doors, and the time to reach the hanger and do his stuff, he guessed they had a wait of perhaps 15 minutes.
He didn't doubt McKay's ability to reach the hanger, or come clean on his promise to power up the ship in time. No, what concerned him most was that they had overlooked something. He knew that it would only take one little misjudgement or false move, and they would all be dead in minutes.
In truth the plan was rather a desperate one, and for it to be successful they had to trust in a lot of guesses and assumptions. Granted most of the time McKay's guesses turned out to be pretty damn accurate, but there were always exceptions. It only took one unpredictable factor, and the plan would turn FURBAR very fast.
As they sat there, waiting for McKay's signal His mind drifted back to that last disastrous mission in Afghanistan, when one error had lead to disaster. His squadron had been ordered to perform a dawn attack on a Mudejhuddin encampment thought to contain a number of Senior Al Qaeda leaders. By all signs it should have been an easy mission; Intel had reported that the encampment was lightly armed, with no significant AAA or SAM presence. The mission brief had detailed a ranged attack by 4 choppers with a fifth in reserve.
Sheppard had flown the reserve chopper, his pylons full of dumb rockets and cluster munitions.
They had flown east through the blackness, reaching the target as dawn broke. However just when they were about to take up their attack positions, their threat receivers had filled with the tones of dozens Surface to Air targeting systems.
The intelligence officer giving the briefing had screwed up. He had correctly assessed that the compound itself would be lightly defended. What he hadn't told them was that scarcely a mile to the southeast of the compound was a highly camouflaged AL Qaeda training camp. Dug into the solid rock, natural gullies and caverns of the landscape, cunningly disguised by CIA trained resistance fighters; it was practically invisible unless you knew it was there.
Unlike the encampment, this camp was defended by dozens of camouflaged triple A and SAM positions. Most of the weapons were Russian, outdated by US standards, but at practically point blank, it didn't make much difference. Silhouetted against the skyline by the rising sun behind them, the four choppers of Sheppard's unit made easy targets.
Per orders Sheppard was hanging back several klicks from the main force, hugging the terrain. With growing horror he heard the panicked radio calls, the frantic messages as the four choppers tried to evade the massed weapons pointed at them. Within minutes 3 of the four choppers had been shot down. The fourth ship managed to limp off west, heavily damaged and trailing smoke.
Sheppard contrary to orders from his Commander had stayed behind to escort the damaged craft. With its engines failing and flight controls damaged the pilot had attempted to nurse his wounded chopper back to friendly territory. Despite his best efforts, he had been forced to ditch over 12 miles behind enemy lines.
Sheppard had hovered overhead for nearly 20 minutes, talking to the downed pilot and crew on the radio. He had called repeatedly for an EVAC chopper, only to be told there were none available.
As the Mudejhuddin forces closed in, he had tried desperately to hold off the enemy, knowing full well how the downed crew would be treated if captured. Low on fuel, his ammo gone, and with heavier units approaching Sheppard had finally been forced to withdraw. As he swung round for one last pass he had seen the crew huddled around the downed chopper, vainly trying to hold off the enemy with rifles.
Raging with anger and his helplessness to help them, he had practically crash landed his chopper on its pad, the turbines running on fumes. To his amazement he had been promoted to Major, and decorated for his heroic defence of the downed crew. Then during the enquiry, he had come face to face once more with the intelligence officer responsible for the screw-up. In front of several high ranking officers, Sheppard had punched the man full in the face.
Unwilling to court-martial a hero, the air force had contented themselves with posting him to Antarctica, his promotion prospects effectively over.
Later it had come out that the intelligence failure was the result of a computer error. Somehow a trainee member of staff had unknowingly erased a number of intelligence reports from sources on the ground in Afghanistan. Among them was a report of a well defended training camp, in the same area as the target encampment.
It was just such a minor error or unpredictable problem that Sheppard feared now. If McKay had under-estimated the number of replicators in the complex, or misjudged the time it would take for them to react. If he had forgotten something or worse if something totally unpredictable yet utterly disastrous occurred, then they had no chance.
In order to enter the complex without setting off any alarms, Ronon had been forced to spend several minutes shooting through the thick alloys of the armoured hatch where they had been dropped off. In a remarkably short period, the red bolts had melted a passable hole in through the metal, allowing first Ronon and then McKay to slip through into the interior passageways of the Shipyard complex.
Reflecting its highly automated status, with little need for much human access save to the ships and the central tower, the complex's internal corridors were remarkably simple to navigate. Keeping to the shadows as much as was possible in the well lit interior, McKay guided Ronon along long corridors and down several stairways, heading direct for the hanger bay.
After perhaps 5 minutes McKay had led Ronon out of a stairwell onto a wide passageway. On either side ran a pair of high tech conveyor belts. Just as McKay had predicted, nothing moved in the corridor save themselves, and the unending stream of materials and equipment being carried towards the hangers. Ronon noted that while the gravity conveyor on the right side was busy carrying materials and equipment, the system on the left was at present powered down.
From time to time the pair jogged past armoured blast doors set into the walls and ceilings. All of them were currently locked open. The corridor was quiet, save for the dull humming of the machinery and the sounds of heavy breathing from McKay, as the scientist attempted to match his companion's speedy pace.
A little while after entering the corridor, the two pulled up for a breather at another vast pair of blast doors. Here the corridor split into two, as did the conveyor system. After snatching a few moments to catch his breath, McKay indicated that they should take the left hand passageway. Due to the powered down conveyor system, this corridor was decidedly quieter. The sounds of their footsteps echoed loudly in the empty corridor, and from time to time neither of them could help check over their shoulders.
After they were perhaps ¼ of the way down this new corridor, Ronon began every hundred metres of so to plant explosive charges. The reasoning for this was simple. With this corridor the only access to the hanger save for the hanger doors themselves, blocking it off would gain them valuable time. Neither of them was foolish enough to believe this would stop the replicators completely. They both knew that even if they blocked it heavily in several places, it would only delay their enemy by a few extra minutes.
They also knew that every extra second they gained meant a greater chance of success. Therefore by the time Ronon deployed his last few blocks of C4, perhaps a little less than half the 2 km long corridor was wired with explosives. It was as Ronon was laying his final charges, placing the blocks of C4 carefully with all the skill and patience of fine craftsman, that Murphy decided to intervene.
It began simply enough. As McKay had already told Sheppard, this particular dreadnaught was still under construction. While the key systems of engines, shields, life support and hyperdrive were operational, there still remained key work to be completed on weapons and many secondary systems.
Thus in itself it was perhaps unsurprising that the gravity conveyer that lined one side of the mined corridor should just then start to power up.
It was however rather unfortunate for the explosive charges lining the walls. Ronon had done a thorough job, the charges were each placed at key points to maximise effectiveness and block the tunnel as thoroughly as possible. Unfortunately, with all the skill of a trained demolition expert, Ronon had placed a number of charges and detonators in locations that would ensure secondary explosions, in this case, on the power systems of the conveyor. He had also placed the charges where they would be least visible, which unfortunately in this case tended to be behind power distributers and capacitors.
The conveyor in itself was a simple piece of machinery, although it required a high technological competency to make it work. It was also safe, reliable and possessed any number of safeguards against failure. It even possessed a system to ensure that if one or more sections of the belt failed, the rest of the system would immediately stop, preventing further damage to the goods being transported.
What the designers had not anticipated was the reaction between the complicated and potentially volatile emitter systems, and a ten pound block of C4 accompanied by a detonator. As the conveyor came online section by section, power was shunted from the direction of the central tower through the emitters. C4 plastic explosive is a notoriously unvolatile substance if stored safely. It can be crushed, shot, even burnt without risk of detonation. What it cannot stand is the explosion of a detonator and extreme heat.
As the power reached the rigged emitters, the detonators and C4 began rapidly to heat up. McKay, reacting with a speed many would not have credited him with, managed to grab hold of Ronon and shove him towards an alcove in the wall. Seconds later with a thunderous detonation first one then another and another detonator exploded, causing the chain reaction of detonations Ronon had meticulously designed. A shockwave of fire and flying metal flew in both directions of the tunnel, added to by the explosion of the charged conveyor's systems, its safeguards destroyed by the C4. Blast doors that had previously been open rapidly slammed shut at both ends of the explosions to contain the firestorm.
Thankfully Ronon and McKay were far enough from the explosions to not be locked in by the automated systems. From within the sealed off section of tunnel the two of them could hear a long and dull rumbling, as sections of the ceiling slowly gave way in a thundering of twisted metal and rocks.
As McKay examined their surroundings, he realised how lucky they had been. By amazing chance the explosions had occurred before power could be shunted to the nearest sections of conveyor to them. This meant that the nearest blocks of C4 to the two of them had not in fact detonated. This was an amazing piece of good fortune, for Ronon had been especially creative in the last 100 metres of the tunnel.
Clearly proud of his own skill with explosives, he had designed an amazingly intricate and unusually large arrangement of C4 blocks around a particularly large power conduit. If that lot had detonated, the two men would likely have not just been killed but vaporised. Exchanging slightly stunned looks at their good fortune, the two men set off at a run towards the end of the tunnel, certain that their presence had been discovered.
Shipyard Control Room
High above in the shipyard complex's control centre, a number of warning lights began to flash on consoles and display screens. The control room was a large circular room, dominated by two central consoles, each with 3 operators, while around the walls were mounted many other consoles and displays, also manned. Despite the vast scale and complexity of the shipyards, there were only 25 replicators actually on site, all of whom were in this one room.
Crossing swiftly to where an operator had signalled for his attention, the site supervisor surveyed the data being displayed. It indicated a major failure in the conveyor system leading to hanger 005. The supervisor was unable to register surprise or irritation, but his consciousness did register something akin to bafflement. The gravity conveyor system was a tried and tested system, with hundreds of built in safeguards. While Lantian technology was not infallible, it very rarely suffered malfunctions or failures.
Bringing up a separate file, the supervisor checked for information on the materials being shipped at the time of the failure. Once again he was baffled, the goods being shipped were inert raw materials, nothing explosive or potentially combustible. What's more they should have barely reached the affected section, whereas according to the information being displayed, the failure extended for several hundred metres further along the corridor.
Unable to access sensor information for that area due to widespread power failure, and well aware of the importance of the project in hanger 005, the supervisor ordered three of his personnel to investigate. Despite their hatred for their biological creators, the replicators in their desire to emulate them had become well aware of the usefulness of a physical investigation, where technology and sensors failed.
Hanger 005
As they ran down the ramp from the tunnel towards the huge bulk of dreadnaught 005, Ronon and McKay couldn't help but stare at the vast shape of the ship. Both had seen the Aurora and Daedalus from close up, but this ship dwarfed both of them. Its unfinished hull shone with bright metal in the lights of the hanger, while its low lengthy shape exuded an aura of menace and power that was hard to ignore.
Its hull looked identical to the schematic Rodney had displayed earlier, only the large weapons emplacements on the flanks, and the numerous point defence systems were absent, but even so the ship looked finished and deadly. It was only when Rodney and Ronon pounded up a ramp into the interior that they saw different. The corridors of the ship were littered with components, crates, consoles and containers, all stacked neatly and ready to be assembled. While the bulk of the ship had been assembled by automated systems, it looked as if they more delicate components were being installed the old fashioned way, by hand. At the entrance port McKay punched in a number of commands into a working console, and with a whirr of machinery all over the hull, docking ports sealed and retracted.
Ronon had to chase after McKay as the scientist, nimbly skirting the piles of parts in the corridors, headed rapidly aft into the bowels of the ship. He caught up with McKay outside the door to a large compartment filled with machinery. McKay had a thoughtful look on his face, before he gestured for Ronon to follow him inside.
Heading towards a large bank of power conduits and computer crystals in the room's centre, Rodney pulled a block of C4 from a pocket and tossed it to Ronon.
"Can you place a charge right there?" McKay pointed at what appeared to Ronon to be a point like any other on the huge bank of machinery. "I need it to be configured for remote detonation. You got a spare detonator after all that back in the tunnel?" the scientist added, apparently as an afterthought.
Ronon gave a grunt "Sure, no problem." He reached over and with surprising gentleness, moulded the explosive into a ledge on the machinery, before inserting a spare remote detonator he had been saving."
Moments later, he was chasing after McKay again. As they pounded through the corridors he couldn't help but wonder at the scientists nimble footing. Usually McKay was one of the clumsiest people he knew. He wondered absently if someone had been giving Rodney dance lessons, then with a small grin on his face, sped up slightly.
McKay had halted at a large bulkhead door and as Ronon caught up, he ran his hand over the glowing blue crystals of the door mechanism.
The door slid open with a hiss, and the pair entered. The room was dark, its consoles and screen powered down. As soon as McKay entered lights began to glow in numerous corners and as the scientist scurried around the room, activating controls and systems, view screens and consoles sprang to life. As the lights came on Ronon realised that they were standing in the heart of the ship, the dreadnaught's bridge.
Like its smaller cousin the Aurora, the dreadnaught possessed large armoured viewports facing forward, though these were smaller and seemingly better armoured. The bridge was smaller two, split between two levels, with two doors opening onto the rear section from opposite sides. The rear section was dominated by what looked like a more modern version of a drone chair, while in forward section, down 3 steps there were scatted numerous consoles and duty stations.
At present McKay was tapped into a console at the rear of the bridge, next to a large screen displaying what looked to Ronon like a table of the ships power levels. McKay continued to tap on his tablet for perhaps a minute, before scanning the screen intently in front of him. The table of power levels had gone, replaced by a numerous lines of ancient.
McKay visibly ran his eyes over the text once more before tapping on his radio. They had until now maintained strict radio silence, uncertain of whether the replicators could track their radio transmissions. Rodney switched on his radio with an audible 'click' then thumbed the transmit button.
"Sheppard, I'm beginning power up 'now'" McKay tapped a key on his tablet. "I estimate we've got 15 minutes until engine ignition." He paused, and then added "Good luck!"
The text on the screen flashed once, before switching to the original display. Through his boots on the deckplates, Ronon could feel a slight vibration, as deep within the hull vast cold reactors were fed power from the one active backup generator. Slowly but steadily, the vast reactors came to life with a low humming noise, and one by one, Ronon saw the power levels on the display begin to rise.
End of part 1D.
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