Part Six: Meanwhile…

Radek Zelenka rubbed gritty sleep from his eyes and pinched the bridge of his prominent nose right where his glasses had made a permanent indentation. He hated being roused in the middle of the night, especially when suffering from a sleep deficit to begin with. Listening to Bryson's anxious voice through his radio headset, he paused in mid-step while attempting to pull on his trousers, so fretfully tired that he couldn't yet move and comprehend at the same time. While his junior colleague paused his hysterical tirade, Zelenka continued to dress, uttering short, mindless blurbs of understanding.

"I see. Hmmm. Interesting."

Bryson babbled on and Zelenka removed his headset and pulled on a clean shirt, clean socks and his shoes. The earpiece lying on the chair hummed louder as Bryson's agitation grew. Radek returned his glasses to their perch on his nose and placed the communication unit back on his ear, pushing his unruly hair out of the way.

"I'll be there presently," he said, unwilling and almost unable to process anything at that very moment. A quick visit to the lav, and he was ready to face this thing, whatever it was.

He had left the lab only three hours ago, having worn himself to exhaustion once again, as he studied yet another marvel of Ancient technology. Still exploring unfamiliar portions of the city, many recon teams were returning with objects of interest or with reports of finding new laboratory areas.

A man like Zelenka, not so different from any of the other members of the science team, could spend the rest of his life in Atlantis and never come to the end of the discovery process. He accepted the fact that some newfound gadget might be dangerous to the ignorant or unenlightened. For all of his years as a scientist, he was a neophyte in many ways. This didn't frighten him for some reason. What made him nervous was the idea that someone else would suffer for something he'd done, as a result of triggering some new thing that he'd thought to be harmless.

Such was his concern the moment Zelenka stumbled into the lab, to see guilt and fear spread all over the face of Dr. Henry Bryson as he held out what came to be known as the Device.

…..

Pushing aside the stickier ethical issues of continuously monitoring the activity of every living thing in Atlantis (and most of the non-living ones, as well), Zelenka had to hand it to the Ancients: They were masters at the art of keeping themselves informed. Late one night not so long ago, he had brought up the city-wide biometric sensors and watched as little glowing dots moved around the detailed map. With so few people awake and moving about, it was easy to follow the life sign paths of these unsuspecting people as they made their ways through halls and rooms. Some of the living quarters held stationary individual dots, obviously someone sleeping, reading or perhaps looking out at the night sky contemplating their place in the universe. Some quarters showed the presence of two dots, and he wondered what might be happening there. On occasion, there were three dots or more. Zelenka never let his mind wander too far in that direction; he was curious, but not a voyeur, and he had no desire to be omniscient.

At this moment, he was reading old scans from a half-hour ago, when McKay had suddenly vanished from under Bryson's small but pointy nose. Since McKay had been in the lab, Zelenka kept his initial focus there. Life sign on. Life sign off. McKay there. McKay not there.

He replayed the moment of the disappearance several times, gulping weak, American-style coffee that most everyone seemed to find acceptable. Radek could barely taste it. At this rate, he'd have to consume an entire pot before even beginning to feel its effects. After reviewing of the sensor data several times, he noticed three rather interesting anomalies.

First, when McKay disappeared, Bryson's life sign appeared to glow brighter momentarily, most likely the device still in his hand activating in some way. Second, on a city-wide scan, at the same vanishing moment, a tiny blip of activity erupted in an area on the northeast pier. This place lay far beyond anywhere as yet explored, for it had been severely damaged while the city was killing itself under water and further plundered many months prior during the storm.

These blips, begging for attention, were not as urgent as the larger problem, evidenced by a third anomaly: The disappearances of four additional life signs, two from sleeping quarters and another two from the infirmary. They, too, were followed at almost the same instant by increased energy readings in both the distant pier and the device.

Zelenka stared at the monitor for a moment, stunned by the silent implication of what it meant that a total of five people were affected by the device while he had been fretting over the one. Suddenly feeling as if he'd recently dry-swallowed six or seven amphetamine tabs, the usually calm and composed scientist moved a shaking hand to his earpiece.

"Zelenka calling the infirmary," he whispered, not willing to further alarm anyone just yet. "Dr. Beckett, this is Radek Zelenka. Do you hear me?"

A life sign is a life sign. If an inanimate object suddenly shows evidence of being a living thing, no matter how briefly… He looked at Bryson animatedly discussing something with Elizabeth Weir, who had just stepped in the doorway. She had obviously heard his call to the infirmary, for she looked past the jittery Bryson, and was eyeing Zelenka intently. Bryson was now moving his arms about rapidly, swinging the device to and fro, caught up in explaining how not-at-fault was to Dr. Weir. Refocusing his scan solely on Bryson, Zelenka noticed that the little dot of life moved synchronously, matching the movement of the device in Bryson's hand. Suddenly aware of how precious it might be, Zelenka stepped up to calm the younger scientist and gently removed the contraption from his grasp.

Bryson turned to him. "It's really not my fault!" he brayed, like a smaller version of Rodney. Funny, the little man took to cowering whenever McKay was present. In the senior scientist's absence, Bryson had taken on all of his colleague's most annoying character traits. Zelenka hoped that Bryson was capable of the mental gymnastics of which McKay was so famous, for the time for that was at hand, as well.

"Dr. Bryson, pull yourself together!" Zelenka commanded, carefully laying the device on a lab table. "No one is blaming you for this. Calm down or you will not be able to think."

"I can think just fine, thank you," Bryson sniffed, offended.

"What do you know so far?" Zelenka shot back.

"The device. It did something to Dr. McKay. I don't know what. I didn't do anything!" He was panting, going pale.

With an eye roll exaggerated by thick eyeglass lenses, Zelenka lead Bryson to a chair and, without pausing, pushed the scientist's head between his knees. "Right. You know nothing. You will pass out and be unconscious and I will send you back to Earth because you waste my time," he said, by way of explanation. Leaning close enough to Bryson's left ear to notice bits of wax clinging to its shell-shaped surface, he intoned, "Better you should close eyes and whisper hello to ass than pass out in front of Dr. Weir. Yes?"

Bryson nodded.

"Take slow, deep breaths. In through nose, out through mouth. Understood?"

Again, a nod.

Leaving the stricken man, Zelenka approached Elizabeth and, speaking calmly but quickly, showed her the city-wide map. "I do not believe that Rodney was the only person affected by the device," he began.

He hated giving Elizabeth bad news