Disclaimer: No, I don't own Cybertron. Although, that would be pretty neat.

Chapter 10

"I'm already here, Lucas. There's nothing. No one." Brody was getting frustrated with this game of cat and mouse. This was the third room he had checked, and it appeared that the Ensign's estimate of "only a few places" in which someone could mess up the Bridge's systems had expanded into half a dozen. "What happened to just a couple rooms?"

"You've covered those already," Wolenczak stated hotly. He was just as frustrated.

There were only x-number of places someone could tamper with the entire Bridge system from, unnoticed and out of the way. Places you had to have a certain security level to get into. The Bridge, like he told Captain Hudson, was one of them. Wolenczak's own quarters was another. Engineering. The once science deck.

Hudson could kick the scientific contingent off the boat, but he couldn't erase the sections specifically designed for them.

"You'll have to run through them again, then," Lucas continued after a moment. On the Bridge, chaos still ensued, and he wasn't sure he could keep his focus for that much longer. At least with the alarm off, it was easier to concentrate. But a boat with messed up systems was one that was dead in the water. Useless. Defenseless.

Vulnerable.

And they'd already had one near fatal Bridge attack.

"We don't have time for that!" Brody hissed. "We—"

"Hold on." Lucas' station chirped and he ran his fingers over the screen, following the lines of code. He'd programmed a tracking macro to find and show on his screen the virus when the program found it. It looked like whoever was behind all of this was still writing the damned thing. Lucas smiled. "Gotcha. Lieutenant, head toward my quarters. Looks like someone's trying to frame Tony and I." He grabbed his PAL, seeing Piccolo's concerned glance in his peripheral vision. "Captain, I think we've got 'em. I'm going to start working on the virus now." He put the radio down and looked toward his roommate. "Your posters are probably fine. Stop worrying."

Tony laughed and sauntered off the Bridge.

"Carter!"

Sam's head snapped up in surprise at the sound of Jack's voice and stood to attention.

"Yes sir!"

"At ease, jeez, Major," he said, waving her down and gesturing toward her seat. "Took you long enough to respond."

"I didn't…"

"Three times."

She grimaced. "Sorry, sir."

"It's fine," he said. "What do you have?"

Sam grimaced again. "An approximate time we could be going back. Nothing definite… right now we'd be showing up earlier rather than after we left for…"

"P3C-225," Jack supplied.

Major Carter smirked. "Yeah, P3C-225."

"And what's so wrong with that? If we don't go…"

"Well, yeah, but I'm more afraid of what will happen if we get back too early. If we arrive back in our time after we 'gate to P3C-225—"

"Cybertron from now on, Major."

Carter looked frustrated for a moment but then conceded to the nickname. "Yes, sir, if we get back in our time after we got to… Cybertron, then there will be less of a risk."

"Risk, Carter?"

"Cybertron?"

The new voice in the conversation caught them off guard. It was Commander Ford, standing in the doorway.

"Yeah, Cybertron, you know? Transformers? Nothing?"

"Colonel…"

"Yeah… sure," Ford said, turning his attention to the Major. "Any progress?"

"Yes, actually. I've narrowed down the field we need to be looking in, but I'll need the Ensign for further calculations." She looked to him. "He's a real bright kid, Commander. You guys are lucky."

Ford nodded. "He is."

"Where is he?"

"Trying to fix the Bridge systems. Last I heard they were working on the virus itself. As soon as we're up and running again, he's all yours, Major."

Sam nodded but Jack was more curious. "What's wrong with the Bridge?"

The Commander shook his head. "Someone, somewhere on board, got each station to flip to another one, and then has them continuing to do so. Lucas is on it but…"

"But?" Jack pressed.

"They think they know who did it. They're bringing him in now."

Colonel O'Neill stood. "Then let's go."

"No. It's an inside job, seaQuest personnel only. Sorry, Colonel."

"How do you know it doesn't have to do with us?" Jack pressed.

"If it did, they would have come after us, sir," Sam said. "Not the Bridge of a UEO flagship."

"Alaron fought her way onto it," he countered.

"Because the entire team was there."

Jack's jaw clamped together, sliding one way just the littlest bit. "Fine."

Commander Ford left the two alone again, and it was only after he left that Jack made one final request to Major Carter.

"Can you tap into their security system?"

Her eyebrows rose. "Sir?"

"Can you. Tap into. Their. Security. System?"

"Probably but—"

"Good," he said, standing. "Do it."

"I thought we trusted them," she said, concerned.

"We do," he amended. "I just don't like being kept at arms' length when this is obviously involving us. How often do you think this sub gets hacked… for lack of a better phrase? It's as secure as the SGC."

Sam nodded. "I'll look into it, sir."

"Excellent," he said, doing his Burns imitation. "I'm going to check on Teal'c." And with that he left.

"Sure you are, sir," she said, shaking her head. "Sure you are."

By the time Ford made it to Lucas and Piccolo's quarters after visiting the Colonel and the Major, Captain Hudson had already joined Brody and the group surrounding the handcuffed scientist.

"Who is he?" Ford asked.

"He claims to be Doctor Allen Carter," Brody answered him.

"But?" Ford said, shrugging.

"There hasn't been a science contingent on here since the seaQuest made her reappearance," the Captain replied.

"He came aboard a week before we discovered the stargate three weeks ago, when we were at dry-dock for a resupply" Lucas said, as he appeared on the vidlink in his own quarters. He was still on the Bridge, monitoring the work being done on the virus but felt like adding in his two-cents.

"That was a quick trip, Ensign. They were in and out in three hours while we were docked for supplies," Hudson said, irritated.

"Yeah, and it looks like he was signed out as he left, Captain," Wolenczak added. "But that doesn't mean he actually left… obviously."

"Don't 'obviously' me, Ensign. Find out what the hell he's doing here."

"I did that, sir. According to this, he hasn't always gone by the name Doctor Allen Carter. It's an add-on sanctioned by…" Lucas laughed once, not really amused at all. "Section Seven… and it looks as if by extension, the UEO also granted it."

Hudson put a clamp down on his rising anger, breathing deeply once before looking at the Doctor. "Who are you, really?"

"Where is SG-1?" The Doctor asked.

"I don't think you understand how this works," Hudson said to him. "I've had too many things happen on this boat lately. Who the hell are you?"

"Agent Carl Bent, NID/Section Seven."

The Captain spun on the vidlink screen. "Get that, Ensign?"

Lucas nodded. "Yeah, searching now." Typing sounds could be heard through the vidlink.

"Good." He turned back to Bent.

"But it's not what you think!" Bent argued. I'm not working with her!"

"Her?"

"Alaron."

Hudson's eyebrow raised. "Who's Alaron?"

"The Goa'uld, you moron!"

"I never said anything about a Goa'uld…"

"But thank you for confirming the Colonel's suspicions that this is, in fact, about his team," Ford said, pissed. "Should I inform him, Captain?"

Hudson rolled his eyes. "He probably already knows. Ensign?"

Lucas looked up from his computer and into the vidlink, "Nothing yet, sir. Aside from confirmation that he was involved with the NID and later Section Seven."

"What are you doing here?" Brody asked Bent.

Bent sighed. "I came to make things right, to make what my organization did right… I'm here to kill SG-1, before she can."

"Well they're quite the popular bunch, aren't they?"

"Why are you here to kill SG-1?" Hudson questioned.

"To make things right," Bent said sincerely.

It only angered Captain Hudson more. "To make what right?"

"The past."

"What past!" Hudson shouted. "Why are you here? What is your purpose? Stop giving me three-word answers."

"Is it really them? Is it really SG-1?"

"Yes."

"Then they've reappeared too late. That's what I'm here to correct. They need to go."

"Why!"

"To clean up the NID's mess, that's why!" Bent blurted out, wishing he'd kept his cool the second the words made it past his lips. Way to go. Just tell them everything, why don't'cha?

"What… mess?" Ford asked.

"They sent the team of Marines with SG-1," Lucas said over the vidlink, his eyes wide as he read off something.

"Ensign?"

"The Marines were commissioned by the NID for some reason… the money I sent to Section Seven was used for a project called Storm. Looks like Mycroft never stopped his ways after all."

"What do you mean?" Hudson asked.

"He was working as a double-agent for a while, pretending to be soldiers superiors. He told us at Node 3 what really happened. Looks like his last order was to get someone, me, I guess, to send money to the Section Seven account so that they could build Project Storm."

"Which is?" Ford asked.

"A time travelling device, built from Ancient tech," Carter said, joining them in Wolenczak and Piccolo's quarters, Jack in tow. "I'm right, aren't I?" she asked of Agent Bent.

"Oh, Daniel's just going to love that," Jack said.

"Hammond, too," Sam agreed.

"But why?" Hudson asked Bent.

"SG-1's search for the San Graal was taking too long. Planet after planet was being taken by the Ori," Bent explained truthfully. "Every extra terrestrial ally we had was falling to Origin."

"So what? You make a time travel device to do what?"

"When SG-1 went missing, it set us even farther back in the war with the Ori than we already were. While the war did end, it came at the cost of years wasted and millions of lives taken. It wasn't worth it. Section Seven put Project Storm into action. It took them years to figure out what they'd do and years to implement. But once things happened at Node 3 with the money…"

"They were able to get people to volunteer for the job by paying them off," Jack finished for him.

"What exactly was the device?" Sam asked Lucas through the vidlink screen.

"It doesn't say and I can't find it anywhere. All I've got is that that's where the money went to. Anything else, you'd have to ask him," he said, gesturing toward Bent.

"So what?" Jack asked. "You pay off a bunch of Marines owned by Section Seven to jump a wormhole into the past, land themselves on an SG-team, get them through the stargate with SG-1 and what… hope you'll help us… them… whatever… find the weapon earlier?"

"Yes," Bent said simply.

"So what happened to muck up your plan then?"

"The Marines got in the way… or so it appears," was all Bent said. But then he looked at Jack and his eyebrows furrowed. "You're Jack O'Neill."

"Yeah… so?"

Bent's eyes widened. "You weren't…"

Jack's eyebrows rose. "Weren't what, buddy?"

"You're not the same SG-1 that went missing on that mission were you?" Bent said, almost to ask.

"No."

Bent paled.

"Yeah," Lucas said through the vidlink. "You almost killed the team your Section was trying to save."

"But because 'we' came back…" Sam started. "You were the one who stole the footage weren't you?"

"Carter?"

Bent nodded.

"Sir… with all the issues we've had with the NID in the past, it's not so hard to imagine them being able to get into Cheyenne Mountain, take what they needed to cover up their mess, and move on. They probably didn't even know what hit them."

"It still doesn't solve the issue of what actually happened to SG-1," Hudson pointed out, glancing to Bent for answers.

"That, Captain, I do not know. I really don't know what happened on that mission. The Marine who survived long enough to resign fell off the face of the Earth. We don't know what happened to him."

"Sounds like the truth, sir," Ford muttered in Hudson's general direction.

"I'll take that into consideration, Commander. Brody, get this man to the brig… but don't let him anywhere near the Goa'uld."

"Yes sir."