They had almost arrived at the brig when McKay asked them to fall back. One of these days, John wanted things to go according to plan. It would be a nice change of pace.
He made it back to the jumper with Teyla, Ronon, Beckett, and Weir in record time.
Carter was waiting for them outside the jumper.
"I had to shoot Niam."
John nodded, not completely surprised it had come to that. It would've been good if the plan had worked, but they could be adaptable.
"O'Neill and Woolsey?" Carter asked as they turned to enter the ship.
"One of them got a hell of a lot of shots off before they were captured." He thought about the bullets scattered on the floor, the nearby boots and fatigue shirt. There were wet footprints on the ground, but no blood. At least there hadn't been any blood. "We didn't make it to the brig before we turned back, but they went in that direction."
"Okay." She took a deep breath and nodded. "Okay."
If she was anything like him, she was already thinking about potential enemy engagement strategies to get them to that holding cell. They would need some sort of a distraction now that they couldn't freeze the Replicators. It would have to be a big one.
They'd probably have to blow something up.
John crouched down in front of the pile of Replicator blocks, grabbed a handful, and then let them fall back to the floor of the jumper. He still found it weird that something so deadly could be made up of these small, seemingly harmless, parts.
"He just came to life?" Weir asked.
"They must have got to O'Neill and Woolsey," Ronon concluded.
John considered the possibility.
"O'Neill would've never given us away."
Of course, as sure as he was about General O'Neill, John was well aware that Richard Woolsey might not have been able to hold out during interrogation.
He was suddenly very glad that he'd been guarded and brief in any discussions of their plans. It had mainly been because he didn't want the Replicators to pick up on their radio signals, but it helped in this situation too.
"Obviously their minds were probed," Teyla said.
Yes, he admitted to himself. Teyla was probably right. John wished that he could have kept more details from O'Neill and Woolsey, but he hadn't been able to think of an alternate option when they discovered that they were trapped underwater in a leaking ship.
Maybe Colonel Carter would have done better if she were the one in change. John looked over at her. He wasn't sure what he expected - anger or disappointment, perhaps - but instead she looked at him with unwavering support.
"Well, they know we're here and how we got in."
"Which is how they were able to reactivate Niam," McKay pointed out, "which pretty much screws Plan A."
John wasn't entirely clear how knowing they were in the underwater jumper bay led to the Replicators finding out about Niam and being able to reactivate him, but they didn't have enough time for him to go around questioning McKay's logic.
"We have more bad news," Carter said. "The Daedalus is much closer than we thought. I'll have to review the sensor data to get specifics, but we've got hours, not days, to pull this off."
Calling that bad news was an understatement, especially when McKay's Replicator plan just fell through. John had planned to have them all out of here days before the Daedalus could arrive.
"I thought Elizabeth told us the Daedalus was at least three days away," Teyla said, glancing at Weir, who nodded.
"Aye, that's what General Landry told us in the briefing," Beckett replied.
John wondered, with suspicion, if General Landry had been less than upfront with them about the timeline so they wouldn't be quick enough to stop the Daedalus from nuking Atlantis if they got it in their heads to defy orders, or if someone had given the General incorrect intel.
Either way, he was more glad than ever that they had left the SGC as fast as they had. It was the only reason they had a chance in hell of stopping the destruction of the city and completing their rescue mission.
Their chance of success was lower than they thought it was twenty minutes ago, but he knew that they could still manage to figure something out. They'd been in worse situations before and still made it out alive.
"We can't waste time on why the Daedalus ETA was wrong," he said, as much for himself as for the others. "We need to brainstorm our next option."
Beckett spoke next.
"Could you activate the freezing program another way?"
McKay shook his head.
"No. I need to load the program directly into a Replicator and spread it that way."
"And that's not possible?" he asked.
McKay opened his mouth, but Carter answered.
"The likelihood that we can get one of them alone and capture it without destroying it, and then be able to get close enough to upload the program without it killing one of us...well, let's just say that plan would have to be an absolute last resort. I don't think we have the equipment and time to pull it off in a safe way. It wouldn't be easy, if it was at all possible."
Of course. The backup plans were never simple. No freezing the Replicators.
"All right, so that plan's out the window," Weir said with a crisp, authoritative tone. "We need another one."
Ronon lifted and looked at his ARG.
"Well, these weapons blow them apart, right? I say we just start killing `em."
Another shake of McKay's head.
"Well, normally I would share your run-and-gun enthusiasm, but these weapons are only gonna work for so long before they manage to identify the frequency they use to disrupt the bonds that hold the Replicators together."
"What'd he say?" Ronon asked.
John took it upon himself to answer.
"They build up an immunity."
"Exactly," McKay confirmed. "Look, the freezing plan would have worked because they would be unable to communicate with each other while we were blasting them, but the more we shoot, the greater the likelihood these weapons are gonna become ineffective."
He heard Colonel Carter utter a curse under her breath.
"The lab that we took these from, I was working on a version that randomly generated new frequencies," she admitted. "We knew this was a problem, but it was so far down the priority list that we didn't have the time and resources to figure out the solution. I should have spent more time working on it."
She was second-guessing decisions that had probably been made months ago by people far above her. John wondered if that was a typical thing for her or if it was because she was a little too personally involved on this one, whatever she meant by that.
"Hey, you can't change the past," he said.
Carter gave him a look and he remembered where they both worked.
"You can't change the past right now," he corrected. "So let's focus on alternatives."
"Okay," Weir asked, "so what are our options?"
Ronon looked at Weir.
"I just gave you one."
Well, it was an option. He had to give Ronon that. However, as much as he wanted to shoot Replicators too, that plan wouldn't get them very far. All the Replicators would be immune and then they'd be screwed.
"We'll call that…Plan B."
"Anyone for a Plan C?" Weir asked, sounding like an auctioneer asking for bids.
McKay snapped his fingers. "C-4. How much do we have?"
John thought about the inventory of supplies on the jumper.
"A bunch. Why?"
"Well, it's desperate…"
"Well, so are we," Weir reminded them.
"Desperate and running out of time," Carter added.
McKay looked around at everyone in the jumper. "We need to split into groups."
Okay, so far they were on the same page. He just hoped McKay would be able to pull a rabbit out of the proverbial hat.
"I was gonna suggest that anyway. Why? What are you thinking?"
"If we're gonna destroy these guys using Replicator disruptors, we have to hit them all at once," McKay explained. "We'll probably only get a dozen or so shots off before they manage to figure out the frequency."
A dozen or so shots when they knew there were hundreds of Replicators roaming the city. Even if the Replicators were all in the same spot, those would be tough shots to make. If it were even possible to shoot that many Replicators at one time. They'd have to knock them down like dominos.
"So, what," he asked, "you gonna get 'em all to stand in one place at the same time?"
He supposed it could work, but they'd have a hell of a time herding Replicators together without getting captured themselves.
"Clever, yes," McKay allowed with a sarcastic tone that John didn't appreciate. "Or we could figure out a way to send one massive blast through the city. Look, follow me."
"One massive blast," Carter repeated quietly, a grin spreading across her face.
It looked like she understood where McKay was going with this one and also thought it could work.
Carter looked over at him. "Let's go."
John motioned for everyone to follow Rodney.
"If this insane idea of yours works," he overheard her tell McKay as they headed out, "you might have to admit that you've become a bit of an artist with this stuff too."
John had no idea what she was referencing, but it sounded like a compliment.
"Of course it's going to work."
Based on McKay's gruff response, he either didn't take it that way or didn't notice that she meant the remark positively.
John hoped that McKay's plan worked. The idea of making this rescue mission a success is starting to feel a little more far-fetched than it did even when they were on Earth and he could feel the heavy weight of leadership pressing down on him.
He had two unsanctioned rescue missions before this one. Only one of them was a success. The way he figured it, he had a fifty-fifty record of getting people out alive in these types of situations. Those odds weren't nearly as good as he'd like.
Which way was this third rescue going to fall?
He hoped they could still save the day and that his average would increase, but it was no guarantee.
John wanted his city back, but more than that, he wanted all of his people to make it out alive.
They were running through letters for backup plans fast. At what letter would the ideas give out? Plan E? Plan F?
He just had to hope that McKay's current idea worked.
When they got to the first door, John indicated that Teyla and Ronon should take the lead while he and Carter covered the back.
"Where are we going?" Ronon asked.
McKay opened his mouth to respond.
"Closest shield emitter," Carter said before looking over to McKay. "Right?"
In that moment, McKay seemed like he would have given anything to be able to disagree with her.
"Yes," he finally said. "This way."
The closest shield emitter was only a three minute walk away.
"Atlantis has ten of these emitters with which it creates the city's shields," McKay explained. "So, if we can interface the crystals from the disrupter weapons with those of the shield emitters, we should be able to trigger a massive anti-Replicator wave throughout the city."
Okay, it was all starting to make sense now. Plan C was a step up from the last one, as long as they were able to make it to all ten emitters. After the one McKay was showing them now, there were nine others. He looked around. If this had been an all-military team he would have been tempted to give everyone their own assignments individually, but he didn't trust letting people like Beckett, Weir, and McKay go out there on their own. Nine emitters would split well into three groups with three emitters each.
"Okay, that's where splitting into teams comes in," he said aloud.
"Exactly," McKay said. "Now, I need to show you how to do this, so listen carefully. You slide out the crystal tray, you take the crystal from the Replicator weapon, you place it in the third slot from the right. Third symbol from the left activates the crystal tray. Clear on that? Great."
He demonstrated the process of replacing the crystal and activating the tray as he talked.
"They are bound to find one of our groups working on the shield emitters," Teyla pointed out as they started to walk back to the jumper.
"I already thought of that," McKay answered. "That's what the C-4's for."
"We blow them up?" Ronon asked. He looked pleased with the idea.
McKay shook his head.
"No. We feed them misinformation."
Carter nodded. "We make them think that the C-4 is our only plan. That way, they'll only be looking for that and hopefully miss the crystals we're going to swap out."
"Exactly!"
John nodded. "Seems like a good plan, but do we have enough of the crystals?"
"We brought twelve ARGs with us," Beckett said. "That's all that would fit in the duffle bags."
That would only leave them with two functional weapons. It wasn't enough.
"There should be four more in the cargo hold," Carter mentioned. "The jumper we took was geared up for a mission."
John let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. "Okay, six we can work with."
It wasn't ideal, but it would be manageable.
"Who isn't getting a weapon?" Beckett asked. "There are seven of us."
He hated making these types of choices.
"Everybody gets a weapon. We only have six ARGs, but we still have other guns."
Carter stepped forward. "I'll do it."
She cast a look at Beckett and he wondered if she was volunteering because Beckett gave up his tac vest for her back at the SGC.
John wasn't sure if he should let her do this. She was the one who was trained. It would be more worthwhile to the mission for her to have the ARG than to give one to the doctor.
"After all," Carter added, "we're not supposed to be using them anyway, right?"
He couldn't fault her logic, so he gave her the go ahead to arm herself with a P90 anyway. Projectile weapons weren't as good with the Replicators as ARGs, but they still slowed them down.
"How are we going to feed the misinformation to the Replicators?" Teyla asked.
John watched the expressions shift on McKay and Carter's faces. He looked guilty and she looked like the idea pained her.
"Through O'Neill and Woolsey," McKay admitted.
"We're going to have to fake a jailbreak and leave them in there, knowing that they'll be tortured for information again."
The silence to Carter's response was deafening.
"Isn't there another way?" Weir asked.
Carter sighed.
"I really wish there was. We can't risk the Replicators figuring anything out until all of the crystals have been swapped out. And then we have to slow them down with the idea of the C-4. If they interrogate General O'Neill and Richard Woolsey, they'll only learn whatever information we feed them. If they interrogate any of us, they'd find out the whole plan. We have to redirect their attention just long enough for this plan to work."
"We can't exactly leave them the misleading information in a note," McKay added. "This is our best option."
Beckett spoke up.
"We're still going to be able to break them out, right?"
McKay nodded. "If all goes according to plan."
John tried not to think about how they'd been going through plans more quickly than usual during this mission.
"All right," he said, holding up an ARG, "Once you guys have made all your alterations, avoid using your shiny new toys even if that means getting caught, okay?"
Most of the group nodded, but Ronon frowned.
"I still wish we could just shoot them."
John looked at his friend and teammate with a sympathetic expression. He wished they could just shoot the hell out of the Replicators too.
"Maybe next time."