Chapter 25 - Assistance
Note: this took longer to write than I expected. Midnight has arrived!
As the wormhole automatically disengaged, Teal'c examined the remains of RepliCarter's arm. A pile of individual replicator cells were scattered on the floor, along with an intact hand. "Colonel Carter, the replicator does not appear to have entirely escaped." He held up the hand for her to examine.
Sam looked to see what the Jaffa was holding and recoiled when she realised what it was. "That's... disturbing." She half expected it to try grabbing her by the neck. "She must have deactivated the cells she left behind, to prevent me from studying them, but something seems to have interrupted the process. Perhaps because the stargate shut down."
"I am uncertain whether that was the case," said Teal'c, who hadn't seen precisely when the disintegration stopped.
Sam's radio clicked twice. "Hang on to that, Teal'c. I need to see what's up with Cynthia." She hurried out of the gate-room, leaving Teal'c warily holding RepliCarter's hand.
"Careful, it's dark in here and there's live wires," Cynthia warned when she heard footsteps approaching. "What's happening? The camera's are still down."
"She escaped, but we still have a hand intact."
"A... hand?"
"Teal'c had her by the arm, so she detached it and tried deactivating the cells. Most of them did, but the hand stayed together."
"Great, that means my plan worked in time!" Cynthia exclaimed.
"What did you do?"
"Patched her code when she interfaced with the computer to shut down the lights. It altered an error handler that runs when an invalid subspace signal is received."
"Altered it how?"
"Just a minor change that sends it into an infinite loop. Any replicator cell that runs that code will basically freeze in its current state. Sneaky, huh?"
"It sure is. What about the rest of her body? And why are wires connected to the light socket?"
"Sorry about that, I had to find power to run the communicator somehow."
Sam nodded. "If it works, it works. I'd just rather you turned if off now that it's done it's job."
Cynthia obliged by turning off the light-switch and pulling the wires loose. "I just hope the cells don't automatically reboot themselves now that the signal has been removed," she mused as she replaced the light-bulb.
A panicked expression crossed her mother's face just as Teal'c was heard shouting, "Colonel Carter!" She sprinted back to gate room to find the Jaffa holding a silver ball with a rather disconcerted expression.
"Is that the... hand?"
"Indeed." Teal'c looked like he feared it might explode.
Cynthia strolled into the gate room, wearing a cheeky grin. "Did I mention that I made the error handler alter the startup code to attract nearby cells with moderate force and do nothing else?"
"No, you didn't mention that," Sam replied disapprovingly.
"Oops." Cynthia obviously wasn't really sorry. "I assume the same thing happened to RepliCarter once she left the wormhole."
"We can only hope. But she didn't leave any way for us to determine where she went."
"We should inform O'Neill and recall medical staff to assist the injured," suggested Teal'c, putting first things first.
"You dial, and I'll restore full power to the base," Sam ordered. "Cynthia, take the replicator ball from Teal'c and stay in my sight."
Cynthia did as she was told, though she would have preferred to return to her 'lab' and test out her new acquisition. Sam rebooted the dialling computer and made sure nothing had been done to it while Teal'c checked on the wounded. Once she had declared it safe, he dialled the SGC and Sam set about fixing the rest of the base power. The communications systems were still down, so Teal'c sent through his IDC before speaking speaking through his radio. "O'Neill, it is I."
"Teal'c. What's going on?"
"Things have calmed down. Fifth's ship was destroyed and the replicator in the form of Colonel Carter seems to have been deactivated."
"So you got the satellite up and found a way to make it work again? Good work."
"That is not what occurred. Fifth in fact had no defence against the disruptor weapon. We were lead to believe he did so that the replicator in the form..."
"Bug-girl," Jack told him.
"Bug-girl pretended to be finding a way to combat Fifth's cipher, when she was in fact creating one of her own. Fifth, believing we thought our weapon to be ineffective, and expecting to receive the cipher, approached the planet. At this point, Bug-girl fired the satellite upon his ship destroying him. She then attempted to flee this base, slightly injuring several airmen. Before she could make a 'clean getaway', Cynthia succeeded in rendering her inert. Most of Bug-girl's body was able to travel through the stargate, but Cynthia believes it will have been rendered inoperable."
"You mean she betrayed everyone?"
"Indeed."
"I'm not really surprised. Now I get to tell Danny that Oma was wrong. Are Carter and Cynthia alright?"
"Colonel Carter was once knocked to the floor, while Cynthia remained secluded. They are currently restoring power to the base. Rather, Colonel Carter is, while Cynthia is remaining in her sight at all times." At that point, the control console lit up and video communication became possible. Teal'c moved into the correct location for this.
"Ahh, there you are, in one piece too. If you shut the gate down, I can send the alpha site people back through so the wounded can be seen to properly." The general saw a couple of blonde heads pop up behind Teal'c. "Ahh, Sam and Cynthia. Good to see you're both alright." In fact he was extremely relieved and impatient for them to return. "I'll send the 'alpha staff' back to you now, and then you can get back here and tell Thor what happened."
"We could do with my reversal program right about now," Cynthia chimed in.
"You're not touching our dialling computers without Sam around to look at every... byte," Jack told her. She looked disappointed.
"Shutting down the wormhole. See you soon, Sir." Sam entered the appropriate command and waited for Jack – or Walter, to be precise – to return the call. As the alpha site personnel began to return, she heard several metallic thumps behind her. "What was that?"
Cynthia picked up three metallic balls she'd dropped and let them collapse back into one blob. "Juggling isn't as easy as it looks," she declared.
Sam shook her head in bemusement at the girl's antics. "Give that to me. It's dangerous."
The teen reluctantly handed over the substance. "Can I go back to my laptop until we're ready to leave?"
Sam considered the matter. "I should be ready to leave in about twenty minutes, so I guess you might as well make use of the time. Just no live wires this time, okay?"
"No live wires. I promise." Cynthia skipped back to the room she'd been assigned and began restoring the Tok'ra communicator back to it's original configuration. Once it was working normally, she pulled a small shiny blob out of her pocket.
Half an hour later, at the SGC, Jack watched as a MALP was sent back to the planet Bug-girl had first contacted them from. Sam had a hunch she might have landed a ship on that planet, so it might be where she had fled to. Currently, both Sam and Cynthia were in the infirmary, being cleared form their trip off-world. Jack had decided to wait until they'd been cleared and fed before contacting Thor, as it would be best if the three of them explained the situation together. Teal'c had already been cleared.
"MALP is on its way," Walter called. "Receiving telemetry. It's light now... but no signs of replicator presence."
"Set it to record and we'll check up on it before sending someone to bring it back in an hour," Jack ordered. It was disappointing that nothing had been found, but he figured the replicator was smart enough not to contact them from the same planet as she'd left her ship.
After an hour and a half, SG-1 (and Cynthia) had finished debriefing. Daniel was returned to his infirmary bed somewhat annoyed that he'd been used as part of a replicator trap. Teal'c had retired to his room to meditate.
Jack activated the communication stone Thor had left him. "Hey, Thor, it's Jack O'Neill here. If you can spare some time to talk, we'd like to thank you for that satellite – it was quite useful – and ask for some help in finding the remaining replicators. And there's someone I'd like you to meet."
"Now what?" Cynthia asked.
"Now we wait. He might come through the 'gate, or perhaps he has his ship in the area already, in which case he'll either beam himself down or beam us... up," Jack finished, finding himself no longer where he'd been when he started the sentence. "Hey, Thor buddy!"
"Greetings, Jack O'Neill and Samantha Carter. It is good to see that you were not harmed by the replicator known as Fifth. But who is the third?"
"I'm Cynthia," the girl answered shyly. "It's nice to meet you, Thor."
"You greatly resemble both O'Neill and Carter," Thor observed.
Cynthia nodded. "They're my parents."
"That is most interesting. I was not aware that they had offspring, especially of such an age."
"Neither was I, until recently. But that's not why we're here. Fifth was destroyed by the disruptor, and Cynthia thinks the replicator double of Sam has been deactivated, but we don't know where she is," Jack explained.
"How was the replicator deactivated?" Thor queried.
"I altered the code of the replicator cells so that now they do nothing apart from stick to each other, though the rest of their programming is still intact, just unreachable."
"Interesting. How were you able to achieve this state?" Cynthia gave a detailed explanation of how she'd succeeded in 'hacking' the replicators, causing her father to look completely lost. "If you are able to provide me with some of the disabled material, I should be able to use their subspace link to locate all the other replicators," Thor offered, after considering the matter.
"I left it at the alpha site for safe keeping," Sam told the grey alien.
"Excellent. We can be there in a few minutes."
After a short trip, the replicator material that had formerly been a hand was now on Thor's ship. "I see what you did here. It is quite effective in stopping the replicators from doing anything to change their situation. I can reprogram a few to locate the rest, and since these are immune to the disruptor, it should be possible to analyse them to make it work against any remaining replicator cells or blocks."
"If there are any active replicators, will they be able to find us?" Sam asked.
"Since these are active, it will make no difference. A problem would only arise if I allowed these cells to receive arbitrary information from the subspace link and incorporate it into their programming."
"Alright, let's see how many bugs are left," Jack encouraged.
Soon Thor had a map of the galaxy showing where the replicators were located. "Apart from the cells, here, they are all on one planet. There is a sphere of human form replicator cells in front of the stargate, and a large sphere of replicator blocks about two of your miles distant. It's mass appears to be equivalent to that of a small replicator ship."
"It looks like the ship was affected by your 'virus'," Sam noted to Cynthia. "How is that possible?"
Cynthia shrugged. "Perhaps RepliCarter spread it to the others through the link?"
"Of course! It must have been sent as she was sending them the anti-disruptor cipher."
Thor nodded in agreement. "In this case, it will be easy to rid ourselves of the remaining threat. But while the ship's computer searches for a useful modulation program, I have a request to make."
"Ask away," Jack told his friend.
"As I have mentioned previously, the Asgard race cannot survive much longer with our current duplication techniques. We had hoped you would provide a solution, O'Neill, but you were not quite advanced enough."
"Yeah, I've heard all this. Wait... are you suggesting that Cynthia might be the 'missing link' to solve your cloning problem?"
"That is what I wish to find out, with your permissions."
"Uhh... I don't think so. I don't want any clones made of my daughter."
"I have no such intention. I merely wish to study her genetic structure in order to find what we are missing. Cynthia would experience no discomfort."
"I'm still not exactly hot about the idea."
"What of Colonel Carter?"
"I'm not too keen on it myself, but I think it should be up to Cynthia," Sam answered.
"There is no compulsion. You owe the Asgard nothing and we will think no less of you if you choose not to allow this. I only ask for a chance to save my race from extinction."
"When you put it that way... what do you think, Cynthia?" Jack asked.
Cynthia smiled. "I really don't mind helping in this way, but I can only agree under one condition."
Sam was nearly afraid to ask. "What's that?"
Cynthia's answer was a single word. "Atlantis."