Long Journey Home
Day 2
John woke up with a stiff neck and a sore back. For a moment he wasn't completely certain where he was. The glow of the panels just below his eye level, and the absolute darkness scattered with a few points of light ahead of him, quickly refreshed his memory. He groaned as he tried to stretch his neck, and behind him, through the bulkhead, he heard Rodney shifting on his bench.
He ran his hands over his face, wincing as he felt the stubble growing, as he checked over the controls, making sure they were still on course. They were still headed for the planet with the gate, but they were still a couple of days away.
Behind him he heard the bulkhead open, and Rodney stepped through. He unknowingly repeated John's gesture and expression as he entered. John looked around. Rodney looked exactly as he did yesterday morning. John grinned. Rodney could never grow a beard.
"How are we doing?" Rodney asked.
"We're still on course, but it'll be a couple of days before we got to the gate, if it's still there."
"If?" Rodney echoed, a little worried.
"Well, you never know… How's Ford?"
"I'm not really sure. He's not woken at all, in fact, he's lying exactly as he was when we put him there. Otherwise he seems fine. I just hope he has no internal injuries." Rodney shrugged his inability to do more. He looked out at the stars. "We don't look like we're going that fast."
"We're going as fast as the jumper will safely go. That," he pointed at the brightest star ahead of them, "is where we're headed. According to the database, it's an icy world, but the Ancients had an outpost near the gate. Apparently it was one of the first worlds to fall to the Wraith."
"All that's very interesting, though I doubt we'll be able to do any sight-seeing. Are you sure we can't go any faster?"
"You're the expert. Unless you can do something, we're stuck at this pace."
Rodney grumbled for a moment, then grabbing his data pack and tool kit, he headed for the system control junctions.
"Put me through to Atlantis."
"Aye sir, establishing subspace communications."
Commander Caldwell settled himself in his chair. He didn't like making reports containing failures.
Elizabeth's face appeared on one of the screens.
"Any luck Commander?"
"We've completed the jumps to the furthest predicted arrival point. We have detected no sign of the jumper. We are now going to begin the search pattern along the full corridor, taking into account their likely courses."
"Understood, is their anything else?" Elizabeth hoped there would be some good news.
"I have some good news." Put in Zelenka." We have detected no wreckage or debris from the jumper, and neither have we found any evidence of its destruction. Hermiod and I are working on a way to see if we can detect any remnants of the hyperspace window. Unfortunately, the best person to do that is the very one we are trying to find." Zelenka shrugged. "We can try."
"Do your best, Doctor. Atlantis out." Elizabeth disappeared.
The commander looked at his officers. "Launch the '302s. Let's bring them home."
Rodney came back into the fore section of the jumper and sat down with a dejected thump.
"No luck?" Asked John, who already knew the answer.
"Not a thing. These ships obviously weren't designed for interstellar travel, or any long distance for that matter, except through a gate." He ran his hand over his face again and muttered, "I need a shave."
John looked over to him and grinned. "I wouldn't worry about it. I doubt you could grow a beard if you tried."
"What makes you say that?"
"Rodney, I've seen more hair on a peach. You wouldn't know what a beard was if it bit you on the nose." John stated matter-of-factly, his voice level.
Rodney's wasn't. "Is that so, well, at least I can tell one end of a screwdriver from the other."
"Really?" John raised his voice. "Good for you, but that wouldn't help with facial hair now would it."
"Pah, at least my shoddy piloting didn't get us stranded."
"What! That wasn't my fault!"
"Why not, the only time you've ever dodged a drone was by accident."
"What the hell?" John paused for a minute, wondering how his gentle jibe had escalated into this. "Why the hell are we arguing abut this, it ain't gonna help matters."
"I have no idea." Replied Rodney, a lot calmer now. "I could still grow a beard though." He muttered.
"Couldn't," replied John in an equally low voice.
Movement in the aft section headed off the potential continuation of the argument. Both men stood up hurriedly and went to check on Ford.
He was still lying on his bench, but now he was tossing and turning fitfully. When Rodney tentatively placed his hand on the man's forehead, he gasped at how warm he was. "He must be feverish." Said Rodney, concerned. "He must have an injury we can't see, let alone treat. There's nothing I can do for him. All I know is if we don't get back soon, there's probably not much we can do for him."
"Nothing at all?" John asked.
"Not if the injuries are internal. We can only make him comfortable, and hope he's treatable when we get to Atlantis."
"Do your best." John turned and retook the pilot's seat.
Rodney joined John a little later. "He woke up for a short time. I gave him something for the fever, and then he dropped off again." Rodney shrugged his inability to do more. "Any sign of the search parties?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
"Unfortunately?"
"According to the sensor logs, the Daedalus passed us by last night. They moved past on sublight engines for precisely five minutes, scanning everything within range, and then jumped to hyperspace. Obviously they couldn't detect us with the cloak up."
"Sounds like a search pattern. What way were they headed?"
"Same way we were when we dropped out of hyperspace."
"They'll probably turn back soon and begin a thorough search. That's the way Zelenka works, search as much area as fast as possible, and therefore spend longer looking for things."
John shook his head at the derision in the physicist's voice. "It would have worked, you know."
"They hadn't counted on us being cloaked."
"They tried the radio as well. It's not their fault we both fell asleep instead of leaving someone on watch."
"Hmm." Being proved wrong would not make Rodney doubt his superiority.
A few hours later, Rodney took the controls so that John could get some rest. While he watched the stars, and kept an eye on their course, he tried to estimate the chances of them getting home. The calculations weren't looking good.
Ahead of them a hyperspace window opened, and at first he thought it was the Daedalus, but something was wrong. The ships that emerged showed him why. It was a Wraith fleet.
"John! We have company." Rodney automatically cloaked the jumper and took them on a course that would avoid the bulk of the ships.
One hive ship, and then a second emerged as John took a seat. They were accompanied by several destroyers. A third appeared as he took over the controls.
"What're they up to, I wonder?"
"What way are they headed?" John asked.
"Same way as us, more or less."
"I thought the planet was an ice world. There can't be anyone living there now, and why did they emerge so far from the planet?"
As they watched, numerous darts launched and arranged themselves in a sphere. At the centre lay the jumper.
"Please tell me I'm wrong, but doesn't this look like a net?"
As soon as Rodney said that, the darts began firing in a way that gave the jumper no escape.
"You had to say it, didn't you?" John snapped, as if Rodney was to blame.
"How do they know we're here?"
"Wait, don't touch a thing." John paused, and everything in the jumper went dark. Everything except the cloak shut down. John had his eyes screwed up in concentration. "Quick, find an energy signature that doesn't belong." He said curtly. He had to concentrate every particle of his mind on preventing the jumper from powering up at Rodney's, and particularly his, presence.
Rodney dived for his bag and began searching for his instruments. When he found the right one he then stopped to fiddle with it to make it ignore the cloak generator, and then he began to search.
"Hurry up!" Said John through gritted teeth.
Rodney scanned around and homed in on John's bag. He tipped it over the floor, and practically flinging things over his shoulder, he searched through the stuff. He quickly came across a device that definitely wasn't standard issue.
"I've found it!" He cried, and drew his zat. One shot killed the energy signature, and another made certain.
Outside, the dart's net was closing in on them. John let the jumper fully power up again, and sent it diving towards the nearest gap. It was already too small, far too small.
Briefly, John let the jumper decloak, and he launched every drone they had at the darts, letting the drones spread out in a wide net of their own. He cloaked them immediately after the last drone launched, and watched as a hole formed in the net as darts scattered to avoid the drones. John directed them through the net and on into the night.
Behind them, some of the darts fired randomly at where they thought the jumper was. Most of them were way off target, but a couple connected with the rear of the jumper.
Suddenly the central bulkhead slammed shut and the both men felt the jumper lurch. For a moment, while he threw the jumper around to avoid any more shots, John couldn't quite work out what had happened and why.
Rodney knew instantly. "Ford!" He cried, as he flicked up a rear view on a side screen. Behind them, surrounded by the exploding darts as drones met their target, was a rapidly expanding cloud of debris. In the middle, visible only by the glittering wreckage he blocked, there was the inert form of a man, gently turning with the rest of the items vented from the rear compartment.
A quick scan removed the need to turn back and pick him up. His body didn't show even the faintest of life-signs. As he turned off the display, Rodney closed his eyes in grief. "He's gone."
"What! What happened?"
"The rear hatch must have been damaged and exploded. The whole rear compartment must be open to space. Ford must have died almost instantly."
"We should go back and get him, before the Wraith do." Replied John instantly.
"It's too late." Replied Rodney, remarkably gently. "The Wraith won't be interested in him. We must get to the planet soon, most of our water and all our food is in that debris cloud. We can go and collect his body in the Daedalus after we get back. We can't do anything for him now."
Intensely annoyed by Rodney's sensible arguments, John was half inclined to turn back anyway. However, as he couldn't think of any way of recovering the man's body without killing the both of them, he let the jumper continue on its course.
Cadman dropped the '302 into normal space at her last designated searching point before returning to the Daedalus. As she executed a scan of the system, she hoped that she would find them, and that they would be safe. A handful of readings on her radar caught he attention, and so she went to investigate.
She saw the remnants of the darts first, and wondered at the amount of debris.
"That must have been quite a fight," she muttered to herself.
Her breath caught as she saw the saw amount of debris floating separate from the rest. A quick scan with what sensors the '302 carried showed the worst. As far as she could tell, the composition of the debris matched that of a jumper. As she got closer, she caught sight of the cloud's largest constituent.
Quickly she brought her craft to a stop close to the debris, and hit her lights. They illuminated the back of a man's head. Slowly, as he turned around his centre of gravity, his face came into sight.
Despite herself, she let go of a sigh of relief when she saw it was neither Rodney nor John. She had never been able to form a close relationship with Ford, but she still was sad to see him like that. Then she immediately wondered what had happened to the other two men. She hoped the Wraith hadn't taken them, but that seemed likely.
Reluctantly, she reported what she'd found to the Daedalus, along with her position, and waited for them to arrive.
The Daedalus's hyperspace window, accompanied by several smaller '302 ones, no doubt belong to returning searchers, opened not far from the dart debris. Cadman directed her craft to the launch bay, and when she had landed, headed to the briefing room to report in.
"I've called off the search," started Caldwell when Cadman reported in. "I don't think that there's much chance of a successful search now."
"There's hardly enough debris to say the entire puddle jumper was destroyed." Interrupted Zelenka, who was far from pleased about this surrender. "And we only found Ford."
"There's a good chance they're dead, or worse, taken by the Wraith. Doctor Beckett, how did Ford die?" The commander looked towards the medical doctor who had joined the search.
"As I suspected, it was the sudden, seemingly violent exposure to space, but he also appeared to have a serious concussion and internal injuries that cannae be caused by decompression. They look more like impact injuries, like he had a wee argument with the floor of a jumper. I'd say he had a bumpy journey before he got where he was left."
"That seems to suggest there's little chance of us finding the rest of the team intact."
"Perhaps, but I don't think we can give up just yet." Put in Zelenka, determined to get the search continued.
"As Zelenka say's, there's hardly enough evidence to assume the jumper was destroyed." Added Beckett.
"But you say they experience rapid decompression. I take that as all the evidence I need to make my decision. Your loyalty is admirable, Doctors, but I think we need to face facts. They're gone, and I don't think any searching's going to find them. I'm going to inform Elizabeth of my decision, and head back."
Both Doctors shared an exasperated glance, but before either could summon a reasonable argument, the Commander had gone. Cadman got up, and moved close to Beckett for comfort.
"Bastard," she muttered. To her amazement, both men agreed. Beckett was usually quick to pick her up on such a comment about her superiors. "He's always had it in for Colonel Sheppard, especially when Dr Weir overrode the SGC's opinions to put him in as the Head of Military."
"Perhaps we're hoping to find them too much." Said Beckett quietly, though he didn't really believe what he was saying.
"No, I don't think we've lost Rodney or John just yet." Replied Zelenka confidently. "Perhaps I can see if Hermiod or I can find the engine trails while he is chatting to Dr Weir…" he trailed off as he felt them accelerate to hyperspace, "… or not!" He let out a long string of Russian, and though Cadman didn't understand the specifics, she got the gist of it. She grinned, definitely agreeing with him.
John spent much of the rest of the time at his controls looking sullen, an expression definitely more suited for the other remaining member of the team. Rodney, who couldn't sleep, just sat and watched him out of the corner of his eye. He was very concerned, but unable to think of a way to bring him out of it. Every time he closed his eyes he saw Ford's body gently turning in that debris cloud, so he couldn't imagine what John, who had had a closer friendship with the man, was going through.
"There's nothing we could have done. Even if he had survived the decompression, without the rear section we couldn't have helped him." Rodney said quietly and again quite gently.
"We should never leave a man behind," replied John, his voice expressionless.
"We won't. We'll return with the Daedalus, if they haven't already found him."
"Unless the Wraith took him."
"Why would they be interested in a dead man? They wouldn't be able to get any information from him, and he wouldn't exactly make a good meal."
That typically Rodney comment, blunt as a hammer, didn't particularly comfort John, but he got the point.
Unwilling and unable to sleep, both men sat in silence as their destination slowly became larger.