Chapter 14 Hello Jason
Well, we knew they were coming; at least now we know when" Weir said, "That's something" John said, "That's something?" McKay asked.
"It means there's still time, Rodney. There's no reason to panic..yet" John said, "Where there is time, there is hope" Teyla said.
"Agreed. So recommendations?" Weir said, "Other than panic?" Beckett asked, "Other than panic, yes" Weir said.
"I realise this might no be cool,but we should considr M7G-677" Ford said, "As a possible evacuation site?" Weir asked.
"No, Ma'am. I'm suggesting we take their ZeePM" Ford repiled, "Their only means of protection from the Wraith? A planet populated mostly by children" I said.
"He rasies a vaild point. We've already established that the ZedPM is nearly depleted, but it could be of some limited use to us" McKay said.
"You asked for suggestions. It's a matter of survival" Ford said, "I see. Well, we're not quite there yet, and as long as I'm in charge, we will never be there" Weir repiled.
"I agree, Doctor Weir. If this is to be our end, it is best we face it with both dignity and honour" Teyla said.
"To that end, I actually have an idea, in addition to panic" McKay said, "Let's hear it" John repiled.
"it's really a long shot, but I think it's,uh,most likely worth the effort. Of course, it will mostly be my effort, so" McKay said.
"What is it?" I asked, "I think we can send a message back to Earth through the Stargate" McKay repiled.
"Excuse me?" Beckett asked, "I thought we didn't have enough power" Weir said.
"Not to send a person, no. We'd never be able to maintain the wormhole long enough. But I think if we were able to tie together all of our power-generating capabilites, we might and I emphasise might, be able to establish a wormhole long enough to send a message" McKay said.
"How much time are we talking about?" John asked, "well, approximately,uh, one point thre seconds, give or take" McKay repiled.
"That's not much time" Beckett said,"Time enough to say, "SOS"!" Ford said.
"Don't be so analouge! One point three seconds is more than enough time to send a message if it's in the form of a high compression data burst. Now, I helped refine the encoding for the US Air Force a few years back. Colonel Carter should be able to, uh, decipher it on the other side" McKay said.
"You're suggesting this now?" I asked, "Because it probably won't work, and there;s a very good chance it could overload our naqahdah generators in the process" McKay repiled.
"Well, then we take the risk! No power, we won't have a chance in hell!" John said.
"There are three Wraith hive ships on the way, Major! Desperate times call for desperate measures. Besides, I spent the last few days working out ways of minimsing the risk" McKay repiled.
"Assuming it's possible, how much infomation could we send?" Weir asked, "Everything. I mean, uh, mission reports from all the snior staff, uh, a ton of stuff on Atlantis, things we've learned in Pegasus" McKay repiled.
"All that, one second?" Ford asked, "One point three" John said.
"See, you joke, but if i can finesse the compression ratios, you'll be looking for things to add" McKay said.
"Do it" Weir repiled, "doing it." McKay said getting up and leaves the room.
Me, Weir, John, and Teyla were looking at the long distance scanners. "They don't seem threatening as dots on the screen, do they?" Weir asked.
"Which is why we need to do recon and see what we're up against first hand" John said.
"How?" Weir asked, "I've been tracking their progress. The Wraith ships apparently go in and out of hyperspace periodically, either because their hyperspace technology is limited" I said.
"Or they're stopping to feed along the way" John said, "The point is, the pattern is predictable. I can guess with some certainty that they'll be making stops, here, here and here" I said pointing to the places on the screen.
"Even so those ships are light years away. How do you expect to reach them in a Puddlejumper?" Weir asked.
"We fly to a Stargate em route that Alex thinks they're gonna drop out of hyperspace and we watch 'em pass by" John repiled, "That's good" Weir said.
"Well, I have my moments. Teyla and I were just deciding which planet to go to" John said, "I am familiar with the people of this world. Their Stargate is in the open and so accessible by ship" Teyla said.
"And you think you can remain undetected by the Wraith as they go by your position?" Weir asked, " Stealth mode. They won't even know we're there" John repiled.
"Ok, go. Get what intel you can and get back before Rodney sends his message. I need the both of you here" Weir said, 'Won't even stop at te duty free" John repiled.
John headed off and I went back to our room, I didn't really know how to deal with what was going on. I must have been sitting there for at least an hour because Weir radioed me asking me to come to the conference room.
"Alright, we have our city specs, mission reports and tactical assessments all raedy to do. What else?" Weir asked,"Well, I've included a ton of data that we've been able to decipher from the Ancient database" McKay repiled.
"Really? That is incredible!" Weir said, "Well, the algorithm I've devised is extraordinarily effcient, yes" McKay said.
"Oh please!" I said, "It must be, in order to fit all that data inot one point three seconds" Weir said.
"Point three seconds, actually" McKay said, "We have a whole extra second to fill?" Weir asked, "Mmm. A whole extra one, yes" McKay repiled.
"Is it enough to include personal messages?" Weir asked, "Uh,sure, I mean, several housr of video. Much more if it was strictly audio" McKay repiled.
"I think it'd do wonders for morale, especially now" Weir said, "I could tell my grandma what i've been up to all this time" Ford said.
"Well, if your grandmother had security clearance, yes, you could! But for now you can tell her that you're well and that you miss her" Weir said.
"This is all very charming, but, um, I have work to do, shouldn't I, uh..?" McKay said walking away, "Lieutenant, maybe you'd like to handle this? Give everybody a few minutes on camera to send a personal message to their loved ones" Weir said.
"I'd love to, Ma'am" Ford repiled,"Off you go!" Weir said. I went off to go get some lunch after I had gotta lunch, I went to find Ford. I saw Ford coming out of the infirmary, "Yo, Ford" I said running up to him.
"Oh hey alex, what's up?" he asked, "Nothing, do you know when I'm going to recond my video" I said, "now, if you want to" Ford asked. I nodded and looked at Rodney coming up to us.
"Lieutenant Ford" he said, "Ah, are you ready to record your message? you'll have to wait until alex is done" Ford said.
"Already done. Actually, I think the liberty of doing mine in private. Now, it may require some, uh, editing." McKay repiled, "Editing?" Ford asked.
"Yeah, I, uh, I went on a bit. Actually, I used the entire tape" McKay repiled, "you talked for an hour?" I asked, "YOu see, I found it rather therapeutic, actually. Now, I'm fairly confident I've come up with several valuable insights, in fact I'm sure of it, but, uh, I've only slept six hours in the last few days, so, um" McKay said.
"Who's it for?" Ford asked, "Humanity in general; my sister..look I don't expect you to cut it down to just a few minutes. I mean, there is gold in here- so just make sure mine's last and that way, if it gets cut off, fine, but if the gate holds the conection a few extra milliseconds, then we won't have wasted the time" McKay repiled.
"Well, I'll look forward to it" Ford siad,"Well, enjoy" McKay said walking off, "Gold!" Ford said laughing.
I started laughing, and we walked off to go tape my video, I sat down on mine and John's bed, "Ok, do you want me to leave?" Ford asked, "No, you can stay" I said, "Ok, well talk whenever you ready" Ford said.
"Hey dad, Hey Jason, I can't believe how long it has been since I've talked to you guys. I'm doing well, Dad hopefully you understand why I just left and didn't say anything about where I was going or what I was going to be doing. I love you guys, can't wait until I get back, and get to see the little Jasons running around annoying the crap out of you Jason" I said.
I started crying and Ford turned off the camara and sat next to me. I just laid back and tried to go to sleep. I woke up when John radioed me telling me to get my ass to the conference room.
"Are our guests comfortably settled in?" Weir asked, "Yes" Teyla repiled, "Good. so tell me:how bad is it?" Weir asked.
"Bad. Each hive ship acts like a carrier group with cruisers and hundreds of Darts escorting it. Gordin's downloading the sensor readings right now" John said.
"I have never witnessed a culling that took so many" Teyla said, "We saved a few, that's worth something" John said, Rodney came up looking at us. I smiled down at John and hugged Teyla, they went through a lot today and I didn't want them to think they were alone.
"Rodney, are we ready to sned our message?" Weir asked, "When you are" McKay said quietly, "Ok" Weir repiled.
"Lieutenant Ford is just finished recording the personal messages from all the team members. If you'd like" Weir said, "I'm good" John repiled.
"OK. Well then, along with a short note of my own, I took the libety of recording messages to the faimlies of the people we've lost" Weir said.
"It's a good idea" John repiled, "But there's one in particular, I thought maybe you'd like to do yourself" Weir said, I already knew who she was talking about. John went with Ford to go recond the message for Colonel Sumner, and I went back to our room so I could think or sleep which ever one I could do.
I coldn't believe everything that had happened that day, the fact that we were about to go against something that big. I was sleeping when John woke me up saying Beckett needed to see me. I kissed John on the cheek and ran off to the infirmary.
"What's up?" I asked walking in, "Well, your blood work came back from the other day, and well I found some DNA that well shouldn't be in there" Beckett repiled, "What?" I asked.
"Different kind of DNA, one that isn't Human" Beckett repiled, "How can I have some DNA that no one knew was there. I've had other blood work done" I said. Beckett siad that it was most likely something to do with the ATA gene. I wasn't so sure, I was pretty sure the ATA gene didn't show up at alien DNA.