Chapter 22 - In Someone Else's Shoes

The Jumper shuddered and pitched as Stackhouse tried to shake the Wraith dart shadowing them. Zelenka wasn't sure which was more nerve wracking, the Wraith dart or Major Sheppard's running litany of what the younger man should be doing.

"Bank left! Bank left!" Sheppard snapped as Stackhouse cut right and then Zelenka's stomach did a very unhappy somersault as the Jumper went a number of different directions that he was sure the designers never intended it to go.

He flipped open his laptop and quickly hooked it into the Jumper's systems accessing just what kind of damage they were taking. He frowned at the reading he got and his fingers flew across the keyboard as he worked to reroute power to the damaged systems.

Zelenka's respect for Rodney and Major Sheppard and the rest of his team was steadily growing with this trip. He knew Rodney was prone to over exaggeration, but from this short trip he was inclined to believe a great deal more of what the other man had told him of his trips through the Stargate.

"How the heck did they know the defensive grid was down?" Sheppard demanded to noone in particular, but Teyla answered him.

"Perhaps it muffled one of their homing devices as did the shield on Karis' world."

"No," he said. "Both devices were crushed in their landing. We saw that at the crash site."

Zelenka looked up. "Both?" he asked. "Are you sure there were not more of them?"

Sheppard looked back at him. "What do you mean?"

Zelenka didn't answer him, but looked at Teyla. "Do you know how many Wraith one of the Darts holds?"

She shook her head. "I do not."

"See," the Czech engineer said. "We do not know for fact that there were only two Wraith."

Sheppard groaned and the Jumper shook again.

"Stackhouse, turn us around," he said, powering up the weapons system. "We got to get rid of these guys so Zelenka can get that grid up and we can get out of here."

The Jumper swooped and dove in a tight spiral, coming back around. Sheppard trained their weapons on the closest of the pair of Darts coming at them and fired. A drone shot out of the Jumper tracking the lead dart. Zelenka watched Sheppard as he concentrated, leading the drone with his mind. The drone impacted with the Dart in an impressive conflagration.

"Bogie ten o'clock," Stackhouse announced, taking the Jumper through another set of dips and rolls. Zelenka tried to watch, but his stomach proceeded to do a few flip-flops and rolls on its own and he swallowed hard and stared at his laptop screen to keep it under control.

Teyla glanced over at him. "Doctor Zelenka, are you unwell?" she asked.

"I am fine," he lied abysmally.

"Is the motion of the Jumper making you unwell?" she asked and he wished she would keep her voice down.

Sheppard fired another drone taking out the other Dart and then looked back at him. "You don't look so good, Doctor Zelenka."

Stackhouse glanced back as well. "Getting Jumper sick?" he asked. "Wildon's doing that all the time. Teyla, there's a small paper bag stuck in front pocket of my pack. Can you get that for Doctor Zelenka?"

"I am fine!" he insisted.

"I think there's some Dramamine in my pack," Sheppard said helpfully. "I started carrying it for McKay, but he didn't need it."

"I will be fine. Thank you for your concern, now leave me alone," Zelenka said testily.

Teyla shot Sheppard a look and smiled. He just shook his head and sat back. "Good thing we didn't bring both him and McKay."

Zelenka sighed. He wished they had brought Rodney. He was much more suited to this than he was. Zelenka realized he had greatly underestimated the Canadian's abilities.

The rest of their short trip went without incident, but Sheppard kept a close eye on the sensors for any more trace of where the Wraith Darts had come from. Stackhouse had suggested they may have 'gated in as they had seen others do in the past, but Zelenka noted that Sheppard seemed skeptical of that suggestion.

The walk from the landing site until ruins was a short one. The natives Teyla had described from the briefing were waiting for them.

"Major Sheppard," an older man in the native rustic dress hurried to greet them. "There have been more of the demon's chariots!"

Sheppard nodded. "I know, Calib. We got them. Was anyone hurt?" he asked.

Calib shook his head. "No, they arrived shortly before you did."

"Did you see where they came from?"

The man pointed above their heads. "From the sky, as legend said they do."

Sheppard sighed. "Great." He turned back to Zelenka. "Doctor, we're going to need that defense grid up A.S.A.P."

He nodded. "Where is the device Doctor Beckett found?"

Teyla exchanged a glance with Sheppard and she motioned for him to come with her. "We found an entry into the chamber this way."

Zelenka had to jog to keep up with the Athosian as she wove her way through the woods and to what appeared to be a cave. As they stepped through the opening, he realized it wasn't a cave, it was an antechamber.

"This is where we found Doctor Beckett and Doctor McKay," she told him. She pointed at the frame of a large door. "Major Sheppard was able to open this door."

Zelenka nodded and stepped forward, placing his palm on the panel and clearing his mind and then concentrating on opening it. It hissed open and dank, musty air rolled out of the opening.

He started forward, systems starting up as he entered. He marvel a moment how the systems were nearly identical to those on Atlantis. He walked over to the control panel, activating it and then he stopped to fish his laptop top out of his backpack. He fished out his wires and went about interfacing the two pieces of technology. He glanced at Teyla and she had seated herself by the entrance, watching him.

"This will take a while," he told her.

"I am to remain with you," Teyla told him. "Major Sheppard does not wish us to get separates like the last time."

He looked back at the readouts starting to scroll across the screen of his laptop. "Understandable," he said a bit distractedly. He started to access the translation program to convert the readings to a form he could understand.

The console was an auxiliary control for the defensive systems. From what he could decipher, the main part of the device was underground, but the sensors showed that the corridors leading down to it had caved in at some point. There was no way they were going to get to the main control areas without major earthmovers, but they didn't have those on Atlantis and he very much doubted the native had anything larger than plows and shovels.

He muttered softly to himself as he tried to make sense out of the energy reading he was getting. He heard a sound behind him and started to turn when a bright flash of light shot across the room and enveloped Teyla. She jerked and dropped to the ground. He whirled to see what had to be a Wraith facing him, a long spear like device in its hands pointed directly at him and before he could move, light shot out of it and slammed him back into the console and oblivion.