Chapter: 26 - Rodney

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With a thought the Jumper's drive pods flared to life, creating a gentle swell of presence in Rodney's mind. He turned his attention to the laptop and tablet perched on top of the console in front of him and tapped a few controls to bring up the new drive's display. He tapped another button and a vaguely auditable hum joined in with the Jumper's drive pods. Rodney checked both screens twice over, checking every reading individually.

He activated the radio without taking his eyes off the readings. "Jumper Two, how is your drive running?"

"Everything here is in the green, Rodney." Radek replied over the radio. Rodney looked up through the windshield towards Jumper Two parked across the observatory's bay and he could see Radek beside Major Lorne through the front. "We are good to go."

"We're good here too." Rodney replied before he stood up, vacating the pilot seat and slipped into the co-pilot seat, pulling the computer screens around to face his new position. Carson moved into the pilot seat and Rodney felt the subtle shift in that part of his mind that connected with the Jumper as Carson took over the controls.

The IOA had wanted two Jumpers outfitted with the new drive which had taken Rodney ridiculously long to design. They had had to build a new drive similar to the alien drive from the pirate and had had to persuade the Jumper to run with it in tandem with its drive pods. And it was at that point that Rodney had realised how little they actually knew about Jumper drive pods. Sure they had become experts at working with the cloaking device/shield, and they could handle all the power lines and connections inside the Jumpers, but actually understanding how the drive pods worked was still far above their current level of understanding. So they had had to pull apart the Ancient database on the Jumpers and even that had been in enough technical language to keep them busy for a week just to understand it.

Then there were countless safeguards built into the Jumper's drive pods to prevent tampering with its frequencies and only someone with the gene could actually make the necessary changes. It had been beyond frustrating, as whenever they hit a safeguard the Jumper would shut down for at least half an hour and then only someone with the gene could get it up and running again. Clearly these were the lengths the Ancients had gone to preventing any non-Ancients from being able to manipulate the drive pods to get the Jumpers going without the gene. And presumably to prevent others reverse engineering the pods themselves.

It had taken two long months to build the drives, get them working with the Jumper's drive pods and then to test drive them enough to work out the kinks. But finally the day had come and it had been worth all of the sleepless stressful nights and overtime, because they had two working drives and today was the day. Finally.

Rodney watched Carson settle himself into the seat that was usually Sheppard's. Jennifer was back in Atlantis as Carson had been drafted in as resident doctor for this mission. They needed as many people with the ancient gene as possible in case they had further problems with the drive pods and they had to have at least two pilots in each Jumper just in case. They had also been limited down to only six people per Jumper, because they didn't know how much space around the extra drive they might need in the back for their return trip. Rodney was till trying to forget that he had seen the two folded body bags in the supplies Carson had stored in the back.

Rodney looked back over his shoulder past Ronon, who sat looking vaguely bored, to see Colonel Walker and his two tough guys stowing their bags and weapons.

"Can we go please?" Rodney asked impatiently.

Walker looked at him with a half smile. "Sure, we're really to go." He nodded to a space marine in the back of the Jumper who activated the control to close the back hatch, whilst Walker activated his radio. "Flight, this is Jumper One, we are ready to fly." He said with enthusiasm.

"Jumper One this is Flight, acknowledged. Jumper Two status?"

"Flight this is Jumper Two, we are also ready to depart." Lorne's voice reported calmly over the radio.

"Jumpers One and Two we are opening bay doors. Godspeed."

Rodney looked out the front of the Jumper towards the dull metal bay doors that protected the observatory's bay from the vacuum outside. The metal shook and slowly parted revealing the distant anomaly. Carson lifted the Jumper and along with Jumper Two they headed out of the bay towards the gaping mouth of the anomaly. The stars surrounding the anomaly disappeared as the black centre grew larger and Rodney felt his fear rising. He had been so focused on just getting to this point, now he was actually here there was so much more to fear. And he began to have doubts.

What if this had all been a mistake? What if this wasn't the anomaly the pirate had been pulled into and they were in fact going to be crushed to oblivion by a real black hole? Was this some big conspiracy by Atlantis' enemies to wipe out as many of the important people in Atlantis at once? What if it the anomaly only became a doorway sometimes? What if they made it through, but the pocket's dynamics had changed which would prevent them from escaping again? What if they became trapped like John and Teyla? What if the drives just didn't work?

A loud scraping noise echoed through the Jumper and Rodney looked round nervously to see Ronon idly sharpening his long sword with a stone. Ronon ignored his glare and simply looked up briefly towards the approaching anomaly before returning his attention to sharpening his sword. Rodney turned back to the front wincing at the grating noise.

Everyone sat in silence as the blackness approached; the rasping sound of the stone over metal all that could be heard.

What if they made it in there; what would be waiting for them?

What if John and Teyla were already dead and they were flying in to save no one?

What if...?

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TBC