CHOOSING HIS TEAM by Tipper
CHAPTER SIX: THE ROTOR
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"No!" Sheppard yelled, "Bates! Get it open!"
"The panel outside here isn't working," the sergeant replied over the radio. "Sir, it's glaring red at me."
"McKay?" Sheppard looked back at the scientist, but McKay was wide-eyed and not moving. "McKay!"
The scientist jumped a little, and looked back at the major. His eyes were completely panic-filled.
"McKay, calm down!" Sheppard snapped, "I need you thinking, not gaping!" Interestingly, the shout seemed to galvanize the scientist. Suddenly McKay was moving, sliding far enough along the wall to reach the major's shoulder and start prodding him towards the closed doorway. "What are you doing?" Sheppard demanded angrily—he hated being prodded.
"Trying to get the hell out of here, Major," McKay replied, his voice shaky despite the snap. "What do you think I'm doing? Now move to the door!"
"But we have to help them!"
"From here? How? We need to get out of here before we get splattered against the walls!"
"What?"
"It's a centrifuge, Major. A giant centrifuge. If it starts spinning while we're in here, it'll crush—"
"We can't leave!"
"Maybe you can't..." McKay said, nudging the Major more forcefully towards the only exit. "Head that way, maybe I can jimmy—"
"We're all getting out of here," Sheppard hissed, glaring at the scientist. "You just have to figure out how."
McKay stared back at him, trading glare for glare, but at least the panic was gone, replaced with, interestingly enough, annoyance. Then, Sheppard saw something almost click within McKay's blue eyes and the scientist looked past him, at the lights near the door that Ford had seen earlier, and Sheppard turned to see what he was looking at. Right now, two were lit up red, one yellow, and the fourth of six was now flashing yellow. It didn't look like anything opened near them but...
"Fine!" McKay snapped, "At least move a foot in that direction, towards those lights in the wall."
"What are they?" Sheppard asked. They reminded Sheppard of lights on a washing machine, each becoming lit as the machine ran through the cycles, and if McKay was right about the room, the last was the "spin cycle." The Major chuckled at the bad joke, vaguely thankful he didn't say it out loud when he saw McKay glaring at him again.
"Power. Now move! Grodin!" McKay looked down, focusing on the floor. Sheppard heard someone reply over the radio, and McKay started talking fast—very fast—demanding Grodin locate the room's control panel—something on the inside—and then the ensuing fight as Grodin insisted there may not be anything inside the room that could help them. McKay's subsequent argument about the Atlantians not being stupid enough to create a room with no exit rang true with Sheppard, but he had to admit, he couldn't see any lines indicating a panel that opened in the wall. The area McKay indicated looked like just part of the wall, with holes in it for the lights to be visible through.
He started shifting slowly towards the lights, McKay following him. It still didn't look like a panel, even when he was right on top of it. He stopped when he was on the far side of the horizontal line of lights, McKay on the other, watching the scientist's eyes as they examined the seemingly seamless patch of wall.
Sheppard looked back at Ford, just in time to see the young man adjusting his hold on Halling. The tall Athosian helped a little, but otherwise didn't do much except stare disconsolately at the water he could see glistening in the distance down below.
"Ford, you okay?" Sheppard called out.
"Yeah," the lieutenant grunted a little, but otherwise actually smiled albeit tiredly. "I'm not doing much except holding myself up. The rope and vest are doing most of the work."
The major nodded, "I can see that; again, nice job. Halling? What about you?"
"My leg is in great pain," the Athosian replied curtly, not looking up, "and I am very tired."
"I can imagine," Sheppard gamely offered his own smile, "Well, hang on just a little longer. I'm sure McKay here will get us—" He was interrupted as the wall shifted again, and the floor made another undulation, opening the hole up further. They didn't have much time. He glanced down at the fourth light.
Steady yellow. The second to last light started flashing blue. Part of him was surprised it wasn't green—what, was he sentimental for traffic lights now? Or maybe a Nascar race...
Sheppard turned his head back towards the closed door, listening to the sounds of someone hammering on the outside. The soldiers were trying to break the door down.
"Bates," he snapped into his radio, "That's not going to help! Get a blowtorch! Operations will have one—check with Sergeant Sanchez. He'll have tools. In fact, tell him what's happened and get him down here!"
"Yes sir," Bates replied over the radio, and, simultaneously, the banging on the door stopped.
"Grodin!" McKay snapped into his own radio, one hand resting on the wall above the lights. "I need you to find the opening to the control panel NOW!" A pause, then McKay actually made a noise like "harrumph" to whatever Grodin replied. Sheppard blinked. People actually "harrumphed?"
"Sir," Bates called over the phone, "Sanchez is on his way down. He'll be here in a few minutes."
"Tell him to hurry, Bates!"
"Yes sir!"
"Damn it, Peter," McKay spat, looking more and more pissed off, "What the hell are you doing? Taking a smoke break? This thing has to open! Now, OPEN IT!"
Sheppard heard Grodin's exclaimed reply "Got something!" over McKay's radio at the same time the room moved again...and the major lost his balance as the wall shifted. The jerk was so sudden, Sheppard didn't even notice that his feet were no longer touching solid ground, only the sudden, bizarre sensation of weightlessness as he fell backwards away from the wall, a shout of fear bursting from his lips. He registered Ford shouting, "Sir!" loudly, but he couldn't seem to do anything to stop the backwards plunge, arms reaching instinctively forward to catch at anything that might stop him...
Then a sudden grip on his wrist, and someone was holding on to him.
He gasped, the world returning to right way up, and he reached out, fingers scrabbling at the arm that held him up. His head lifted, and he found McKay hanging onto him, the scientist's face pinched as he struggled to hold onto Sheppard. McKay was partially crouched, still with his toes on the sliver of flat floor, one hand hanging onto Sheppard, the other up and gripping the edges of an open control panel. The muscles bulged in McKay's neck above the blue collar, straining against the weight.
"Some help here?" the scientist grunted out.
Sheppard nodded, pressing his hands on the flat part of the floor and pushing up...finally getting his feet under him. Pulling himself up, his own hands found the edges of the same open panel McKay was holding onto, thanking whoever designed this place that there were edges to hang onto.
He turned and looked behind him...the hole in the floor was three feet wide now. He would have hit the sloping floor and slid right out that hole...
"Shit," he breathed, unable to take his eyes from the glittering ocean far, far below.
"Yeah, well," McKay breathed next to him, looking a little dazed himself, "You have Peter Grodin to thank for that one, Major. He opened this just in time. I wouldn't have been able to hold on to you otherwise."
Sheppard looked over at the scientist, but McKay wasn't meeting his eyes. It was almost as if the scientist didn't realize he'd just saved his life...or that the scientist's instinct to grab for him would have sent them both plunging to their deaths if that panel hadn't opened. Either that, or he didn't want to admit it.
"Thanks," he said.
McKay just nodded quickly, head bobbing uncomfortably. Then the scientist was looking inside the small control panel at the crystals that had formed the six lights. Two were red, two yellow, one now steady blue and...Reaching in, he was about to start fiddling with the crystal matrix inside when the last light which had been flashing blue suddenly steadied.
"Oh dear," the scientist noted softly.
The floor undulated one last time, then snapped shut...and the room began to spin.
"Aw shit!" Sheppard yelled, feeling the floor spinning away from him under his feet. McKay yelped, and the two of them lost their footing completely.
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"Hang on!" McKay yelled, fingers gripping the edges of the panel, even as his feet were being swept sideways as the floor. "The force will soon press us to the walls, and..."
"And what?" Sheppard yelled, his own fingers turning white as he tightened his own grip. "Crush us?"
McKay grunted, feeling the pressure building already against his spine, "Yeah."
In the center, Halling and Ford felt like they were in the center of a vacuum, barely moving as the walls blurred around them. Both closed their eyes at the sickening sensation and held on to each other.
"McKay!" Sheppard gasped, feeling the air being pushed from his lungs.
The scientist responded with a grunt, and tried to pull himself up to see more into the panel spinning with them. His arm shook as he tried to lift it, the limb feeling suddenly like it weighed two tons. His head started to throb at the increasing pressure inside his skull, his eyes beginning to water because of the pain.
Sheppard watched through slitted eyes, fighting the same effects of the pressure on his body. McKay's movements were slow...too slow...
They'd die before the scientist could figure this out.
Using all the strength he could muster, he pulled the beretta from his thigh and lifted the gun up to point at the panel.
McKay saw him out of the corner of his eye, his mouth opening to say "NO!" but all sound was lost as Sheppard aimed the pistol.
All McKay had time to do was pull away and close his eyes as Sheppard fired.
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The gun fired three times, the impact of the bullets increased by the force driving them into the panel, and the whole thing erupted in a spectacular explosion of sparks and fire.
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TBC
A/N - The Rotor was an amusement park ride that used to be at Riverside Park in Massachusetts (now Six Flags New England). I don't know if it's still there, but it was very, very cool. It was a cylindrical metal container with a metal floor, and was basically a giant centrifuge. Everyone chose a bit of wall, then it started to spin. Not long after it began, you were stuck to the wall by the centrifugal force, and they'd drop the floor away, leaving you hanging onto nothing. Then it slowed, and you slid down to the floor now three feet or so below--wedgies galore. LOL! I'm not sure how it ended up in this story, but...well...write what you now, eh? And since I know nothing about science, space, wormholes, physics...I can at least create a deadly amusement park ride!
A/N 2 – thanks for the reviews everyone! And how funny on the Star Wars reference! I never even thought about that! Somewhere in the back of my mind, eh? LOL! You do a heart good!