Part Ten

'Zelenka, this is Weir, please tell me you have some good news.'

'We are making some progress,' Zelenka's voice responded in her ear. 'We have restored power to some areas but we are still unable to access the last section.'

'Why not?'

'The power relays have to work in sequence otherwise everything blows. This whole area requires major work to bring it up to our requirements, but all we are trying to do at the moment is release those who are currently trapped.'

'How much longer do you think it'll take?'

'I am not sure. Two, maybe three hours.'

'Very well, let me know if the situation changes.' Elizabeth turned to Dr Beckett who was waiting to find out the latest. 'He's not going to like this,' she said to him, referring to Sheppard.

'No, and he hasn't really been resting at all. He is more tired than he's willing to admit, I'm afraid I'm going to have to do something about it.' Beckett pulled a face then got up to leave, stopping off at the infirmary briefly before continuing to John's quarters.

Entering without knocking, Beckett found the colonel pacing up and down the room restlessly.

'Don't you know how to knock?' John snapped at him as he went to sit on the bed. 'Any news?'

As Beckett hesitated, John stopped in his tracks. 'What is it?' His eyes narrowed as he asked the question.

'There's been a wee hiccup,' Beckett said at last, trying to figure out the best way to break the news.

'What kind of hiccup?'

'Mya was seen in one of the labs being used for storage. Major Lorne followed her but right after he went in the power failed in that section and a short time ago the doors automatically sealed off. There have been problems with the power relays there all day.'

'Get Zelenka on it then,' John bit out.

'He's already working on it,' Elizabeth, arriving at that moment, told him. 'We'll get them out of there as soon as we can.'

'What kind of timescale are we looking at?' John had the feeling he wasn't being told everything.

'Dr Zelenka estimates another two to three hours.'

'That's not good enough. What about the Daedalus? Can't they use the transporters?'

'We're considering that option,' Elizabeth told him, 'but the Daedalus isn't due back for another couple of hours. When it gets here…'

'There must be something I can do,' John scowled at Elizabeth, not giving her chance to finish. 'I'm going…'

'We've been through this before, Colonel,' Beckett's voice interrupted John's rant. 'You are not fit enough to go anywhere.' Carson was busy sizing up John's condition, noting the grey pallor of his skin and the shadows under his eyes.

'There's nothing wrong with me.' John's irritability was another indication of his physical state. 'You released me from the infirmary didn't you?'

'Yes, on the condition that you returned to your quarters and rested,' Carson reminded him. 'And I'm beginning to think I made the wrong decision. I'm sorry, Colonel, but I'm going to have to ask you to return to the infirmary where I can keep an eye on you.'

'I'm not going anywhere,' John insisted. 'I need to be…'

'You need to be in the infirmary and getting some proper rest.' Beckett's voice was uncompromising.

'And I suppose you're going to make me?'

'If I have to, yes.'

'I'd like to see you try.'

'John, you need to co-operate,' Elizabeth took a hand. 'I understand how you feel, but you're helping no-one if you refuse to return to the infirmary.'

'You mean you'll get some of my own men to escort me if I won't go? I am their superior officer, in case you hadn't noticed.'

'And I am the chief medical officer and will relieve you of duty if I have to.' Beckett paused to allow the information to sink in. 'I'd rather not do that, but if you won't come willingly you'll leave me no choice.'

John glared at the other man for a few moments before getting slowly to his feet. The altercation had taken more out of him than he realised however and Beckett was only just in time to catch him and guide him back to the bed before he passed out.

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'How is he?' John could hear Elizabeth's voice somewhere nearby.

'Exhausted,' Carson's voice replied. 'He should be fine after a few hours sleep.'

'I'm fine now,' John opened his eyes to find himself back in the infirmary. 'At least I would be if I weren't here.'

'You are not fine,' Carson told him mildly. 'In case you don't remember, you passed out from exhaustion when we were in your quarters.'

'Oh that,' John tried to dismiss the incident. 'Probably just low blood sugar. Honestly, there's nothing wrong with me. Besides, I don't feel like sleeping right now.'

'You're blood sugar is just fine, Colonel,' Beckett spoke firmly. 'You're blood pressure and pulse, however, are not. And this,' he gave John a shot of something in his arm, 'will help you sleep.'

'But what if…' John's eyes were beginning to grow heavy but he still fought to keep them open.

'It's only something to help you relax, we can wake you quite easily if we need to. Believe me, you'll feel much better after this.'

'That's what you say,' John mumbled, trying to protest further but found it far too much effort now and allowed sleep to overtake him.

'Well that went better than I expected,' Beckett smiled sourly at Elizabeth.

'I'll let you know as soon as we hear anything more,' Elizabeth told him before she departed to find out what progress Dr Zelenka and his team had made.

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Lorne knelt down in front of Mya, placing his hands on her shoulders and looking into her face as he spoke. 'Do you trust me?' Mya nodded slowly, her eyes filling with tears. 'We're going to be fine, some of our best people will be working on getting us out of here.'

The events of the last few days were too much for Mya and the kind words from Lorne made it impossible for her to hold back any longer. Throwing her arms around his neck, Mya burst into tears, clinging to him for reassurance. Remaining where he was, Lorne pulled Mya into a hug, rubbing her back soothingly until the crying eased and he loosened his hold on her and, calling on his experiences with his sister's kids, Lorne set about making the time pass as quickly as possible for both of them.

It wasn't easy – many of the ideas he came up with were dependent on all parties speaking and since he had found her Mya had said nothing at all, and before that she had only really talked to Colonel Sheppard. Instead, he resorted to trying to recall some of the stories his nephews enjoyed, figuring that if he didn't get them quite right, Mya wouldn't know the difference.

Fortunately he seemed to have hit on a successful formula. He sat with his back against a wall, his legs stretched out in front of him, Mya beside him still clutching her teddy tightly. As soon as he began to relate the first story, one of Aesop's fables - The Tortoise and The Hare - he knew he had her attention. As the story unfolded, Lorne learnt to read the puzzled expressions on her face as he referred to animals and other things she had never come across before, having to figure out a way of describing them so that she would understand and enjoy the story all the more.

As soon as he finished The Tortoise and The Hare, Mya prodded his arm and looked up at him expectantly, waiting for him to start another story. Racking his brain, he decided on another fable, this time The Goose With The Golden Eggs. By the time he had finished this one, Mya had made herself comfortable, nudging her way underneath his arm until she was leaning comfortably against him and he only realised she had fallen asleep when she made no move when he finished the story.

Resting his head back against the wall, he closed his eyes briefly and considered the situation. They had been trapped in this room for nearly an hour now and there was still no indication of the power returning and he could hear no evidence that anyone was on the other side of the door trying to get them out, although he was certain that Dr Zelenka and his team would be working frantically to remedy the situation.

Still, it was worth trying the radio again, just in case. 'Lorne to Zelenka. Lorne to Weir. Lorne to anyone who can hear me.' It was no use, the only thing he could hear was the gentle hiss that told him the radio wasn't getting through the force field shielding the door. Shrugging his shoulders, he figured he may as well follow Mya's example and get some rest while he had the opportunity.

He had just closed his eyes when he felt Mya shiver as she slept, snuggling closer to him to try and warm herself up. Moving as little as possible, he shrugged his vest off, followed by his jacket which he wrapped around Mya, the jacket almost large enough to act as a blanket.

As Mya settled back down, Lorne found himself starting to drift off to sleep when the significance of the change in air temperature brought him fully awake in an instant. Carefully shifting Mya away from him, he got to his feet and did a circuit of the room, frowning as he returned to his starting point.

The air was definitely cooler in here than it was earlier, the drop in temperature radiating from the walls on the far side of the room, the ones that were on the outside of the building. It was the middle of winter, and if he wasn't mistaken, the temperature was going to drop even further and he had no time to lose in making preparations if they were to be stuck here for much longer.

'This is Lorne. I don't know if anyone can hear me but I'm trapped in here with Mya. We're both fine at the moment but the temperature is beginning to drop and it's going to get pretty damn cold in here before too long. I'd really appreciate it if someone could do something about getting us out of here.'

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'Dr Weir to the control room.' Elizabeth got the message as she was finishing lunch, noting the urgency in the technician's voice that had her hurrying to the control room as quickly as she could move.

'What have you got?' Elizabeth asked as soon as she arrived, seeing the anxious looks on the faces of those present.

'A short time ago we received a message from Major Lorne,' Sergeant Read reported. 'It was pretty garbled, but you can make out most of it.'

'Let's hear it then,' Elizabeth spoke impatiently, knowing Lorne was their only connection tothat part of the city.

'There's something else, ma'am,' Read continued. 'The sensors in that area came on line briefly, but long enough for us to see that the environmental controls are off-line in that section.'

Elizabeth swallowed, then got her emotions back under control as she nodded to Read to replay the message from Lorne.

'…Lorne. I don't know…can hear…trapped…Mya. We're both fine…temperature…to drop…damn cold …out of here.'

Elizabeth nodded as she got the gist of the message. 'Get Dr Beckett up here right away,' she said to Read. 'Also, contact the Daedalus and let them know what's happening. I need them back as soon as they can get here.' Read didn't respond as he set about carrying out Elizabeth's orders.

'Zelenka, this is Weir. I need you to step things up – we've just discovered the environmental controls in the last section are off-line. They don't have much time in there.'

'Understood. Zelenka out.'

Elizabeth turned to Beckett as he arrived in time to hear her speaking to Zelenka. 'Did you get that?' Beckett nodded. 'What can we expect?'

'Hypothermia most likely if they're in there for long,' Beckett rapidly ran through the potential problems in his mind. 'Confusion, rapid loss of body temperature and drowsiness. Major Lorne should be ok for a few hours, Mya will probably develop the symptoms more quickly. Lorne should be able to remain alert enough to make some attempt to keep themselves warm.'

'Dr Weir, we have big problem,' Zelenka's voice sounded panicked.

'Go ahead.'

'We cannot fix the power relays quickly enough. Every time we repair one, another one fails. And…'

'And what?' Elizabeth's anxiety levels went right up as she heard Zelenka swear in Czech.

'The room Major Lorne is in used to be science lab. It has failsafe in case of accident, that is why forcefield around room,' Zelenka's English became more broken as he tried to get the words out quickly enough. 'I believe that next stage will be for vacuum to be created to eliminate harmful substance.'

There was a pause while Elizabeth and Beckett absorbed this information. 'Do we know how long before that happens?'

'It should have happened already, but system is malfunctioning and may not happen at all. We are attempting to bypass failsafes and shut the program down.'

'I see. Is there anythingwe can do to help?'

'I'm afraid not. Zelenka out.'

Sergeant Read, waiting for Elizabeth to finish her conversation with Zelenka, spoke up. 'Ma'am, the Daedalus will be here within half an hour. They made better time than expected thanks to some modifications Hermiod made to the hyperdrive engines.'

'That's the first bit of good news I've had all day,' Elizabeth smiled tensely, knowing she wouldn't be able to relax until Lorne and Mya were safely out of that lab.

'Should we let Colonel Sheppard know?' Beckett said, half to himself.

'Is he still asleep?' Elizabeth asked.

'He was when I left, though I'd expect the sedative to begin wearing off sometime in the next hour.'

'Then perhaps we should wait until he wakes himself. Hopefully by then this will all be over.'

'You know he's going to be pretty mad when he finds out we kept this from him,' Beckett raised his eyebrows at Elizabeth.

'Yes, but there'll be nothing he can do about it, the same as there's nothing he can do now and that would be even harder for him to bear – at least this way we can stop him from worrying himself into an early grave.'

'Aye, I see your point, but I wouldn't want to be in your shoes when he does find out.'

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'Atlantis, this is Daedalus, we're just coming into transport range now.' As soon as Elizabeth heard Colonel Caldwell's voice she breathed a sigh of relief. Waiting patiently to hear that Lorne and Mya had been retrieved, she felt sick when she heard Caldwell's next transmission. 'We've got eleven members of the Atlantis team, but we've not been able to get a lock on Lorne and the girl.'

'What's the problem Colonel?' Elizabeth kept her voice calm and unemotional in spite of how she was really feeling.

'There's some kind of shielding around the section they're in and we can't get through it. Hermiod is trying to modify the transporter, I'll update you as soon as we've got anything. Caldwell out.'

Elizabeth took a few deep breaths before making the decision to go to where Zelenka and his team were working to see first-hand what was going on, hoping this would help her get a handle on the whole situation. As she went, she received an update from Beckett on the status of the people the Daedalus had retrieved.

'They're all fine, thankfully,' Carson's voice reassured her. 'But they haven't had any contact with Major Lorne since the compartment sealed itself off.'

'That's one less thing to worry about,' Elizabeth acknowledged the information, not surprised when Beckett turned the discussion around to herself.

'What are you doing right now?'

'I'm on my way to see Dr Zelenka.' Elizabeth almost knew what was coming next.

'You should get some rest,' Beckett's voice was gentle. 'You'll be no good to anybody if you collapse with exhaustion.'

'I'll rest when this is over,' Elizabeth was firm in her decision, fairly certain that Beckett already knew what she was going to say. 'You know we have to get them out of there as soon as possible.'

'Aye, I know,' Beckett sighed, knowing full well the risk to Lorne and Mya. 'Colonel Sheppard will be waking soon, what should I tell him?'

'The truth. He needs to know and hopefully we'll have good news by the time he does wake up. Weir out.'

Zelenka looked up as he became aware of Elizabeth's presence but continued what he was doing, talking as he worked.

'We are making progress,' he told her, his fingers flying over the keyboard, calling out occasional directions to some of his staff. 'We have disabled the device that creates vacuum.'

'Well that's good news.'

'We think,' Zelenka added, frowning.

'What do you mean, you think?'

'It is hard to know for certain as readings keep fluctuating, but I am fairly confident that cold is now the only problem.'

'And that is a very big problem if we don't get them out of there quickly – do you know how cold it is outside?'

Zelenka stared at her for a moment before responding. 'Very cold I imagine.'

'It's 23, Major Lorne and Mya are most likely severely affected by hypothermia and it's only going to get worse as the sun sets.'

'I am aware of this and we work as fast as we can. I think soon we can find a way to shut off the forcefield so Daedalus can transport them.'

'What kind of timescale are we looking at?'

'Not long, maybe one hour.'

'Very well, keep me posted.' Elizabeth, frustrated at the continuing delays with rescuing the two trapped people, made her way back to the main part of the city, stopping off at the infirmary as she did so, well aware that Dr Beckett would have his hands more than full with Colonel Sheppard once he found out what was happening. Her instincts were correct – she could hear his voice when she was still some distance from the infirmary.

'Why the hell am I only finding out about this now?' Sheppard shouted.

'Because there was nothing you could do about it,' Beckett's voice was sounding strained as he tried to remain patient. 'You were exhausted and needed to rest.' There was a pause, then Beckett spoke again. 'Where do you think you're going?'

'I'm going to find out what's taking so long.'

'Son, I really don't think that's a good idea.'

'You know something, doc,' John's voice was hard and unforgiving. 'I don't care what you think. One of my best men and a child who I am responsible for are in danger of dying of hypothermia and I am not going to sit around and…'

'Colonel.' Elizabeth's voice broke in, stopping John in mid-rant. 'How are you feeling?'

'How am I feeling? How do you think I'm feeling? Everyone's been keeping things from me, how is that supposed to make me feel?'

'Still tired?' Elizabeth asked innocently, taking the wind from his sails as John focussed his thoughts enough to respond.

'No, I'm fine, which is just as well seeing as no-one else seems to be doing anything about getting Lorne and Mya out of that freezer they're stuck in.'

'I see. And you think that the rest of us have been sitting around waiting for you to feel well enough to sort it all out yourself?'

'Well, no, but…'

'John, I know how you feel,' Elizabeth breathed a silent prayer that at least he was behaving more reasonably now. 'It's how we're all feeling, but all we can do is wait until we're needed, and that applies especially to you.'

'What's that supposed to mean?'

'Mya is going to need you when we get her out of there, I know she's allowed some of us to be with her but it's you she's bonded with.' Elizabeth could see John was beginning to look uncomfortable with what she was saying and pressed home her advantage. 'While you were in the infirmary, the only time she really showed any interest was when she knew she was coming to see you and you're the only one she's talked to.'

'But she thinks I'm dead.'

'Yes she does,' Beckett spoke up. 'And the fact that she ran away should show you how important you are to her. We'll sort everything out once they're out of there but in the meantime, you need to rest.'

'But I've been resting. I'd rather…'

'Colonel, as soon as Dr Zelenka's been able to lower the shielding, the Daedalus is going to transport Major Lorne and Mya straight to the infirmary. You're better off staying right where you are.'

John glared at Elizabeth as he realised he had been out-manoeuvred but obediently lay down under the watchful eye of Dr Beckett.

'You're both evil.' John muttered as he closed his eyes, ignoring them as they took their leave.

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To be continued…

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