Rodney sat on one side of the conference room table, listening as Sheppard and Teyla told Elizabeth what had happened on Athos.
"Thanks to Teyla, we were able to get back to the 'gate before the Wraith knew we were on the planet," Sheppard said.
"And you have no idea why the Wraith arrived when they did or what they intended to do?" Elizabeth asked.
John grimaced and shook his head. "Not really, no."
"It's a big planet," Rodney said. "Maybe their arrival had nothing to do with us."
"Explain," Elizabeth said.
Rodney glanced from Elizabeth to Teyla and swallowed. "Oh, umm, it was just, umm, something I've been thinking about."
"So spit it out," Ronon said.
Rodney glared across the table at Dex, then took a deep breath. If he was right, and he knew he was right, he was reasonably sure Teyla would not like what he said next.
"How often would you say the Wraith culled Athos?" he asked Teyla and leant his arms on the table in front of him.
"Recently? Every ten to fifteen years. Sometimes less."
Rodney nodded. "More often than most worlds we've visited, wouldn't you say?"
"Rodney, what are you saying?" Elizabeth asked.
"I'm saying it doesn't make sense," Rodney replied. "Think about it. The Wraith culled Athos every few years, but other planets like that redwood forest planet or Lurra haven't seen a Wraith in hundreds of years. Why?"
Teyla shook her head. "I do not understand. They are Wraith."
"Yes, yes, yes," Rodney said with a frustrated hand wave. "The Wraith cull people. We know."
"Rodney," Sheppard growled.
Rodney glanced at John, saw the stern expression on his face, and blew out a breath as he reined in his impatience. "What if they were there for something other than just culling your people?"
"Like what?" Ronon asked with a scowl.
"Resources!" Rodney exclaimed and threw his hands in the air. "The Wraith need more to survive than just people to feed on. Their ships, their technology, even though it's different from anything on Earth or what the Ancients built, they still need raw materials to manufacture it."
"So you think the Wraith were there to, what, mine something from the planet?" Sheppard asked.
"Why not?" Rodney retorted. "It makes sense. Why would they keep coming back so often? The Wraith aren't stupid. They know if they wipe out a planet's population, they wipe out their food source."
Teyla clasped her hands on the table, and Rodney noticed her knuckles were white. "You are proposing that for generations the Wraith culled my people -"
"As a cover for what they were really there for, yes," Rodney replied. "I'm sorry, but it's possible."
Sheppard glanced from Rodney to Teyla, then over at Elizabeth. "Rodney might be right -"
"Might be?" Rodney retorted.
John glared at him then turned back to Weir. "The Wraith didn't seem at all interested in scouting the planet or looking for stragglers. All of the darts were heading in the same general direction. Other than some token resistance at the 'gate, they didn't try that hard to stop us."
Elizabeth nodded and glanced at Rodney. "If the Wraith are returning to specific planets to collect resources, is this something we can use to track their movements?"
Rodney shrugged. "Hard to say. There's no way to know what minerals they were after on Athos. If we had records of what planets the Wraith tended to cull more frequently, then maybe we could come up with some sort of predictive algorithm based on mineral scans of those planets. But we don't have enough information."
Elizabeth nodded. "In that case, I think any further trips to Athos are off-limits. For now," she added as Teyla started to argue. "What about the safety of Atlantis?" Elizabeth asked Rodney. "The Wraith saw the jumper. Will they be able to figure out you dialled the city?"
Rodney shook his head. "We've been using the story for months that there were a few survivors from the attack on the city. All the Wraith know now is that those survivors also have a jumper. Since the ship was in control of the dialling sequence, not the DHD on the ground, the Wraith have no way to track the address we dialled."
"Good," Elizabeth said and made a few notes on the computer.
Rodney glanced at Teyla sitting across from him. He couldn't read anything in her closed expression, but he noticed her hands clenched on the table in front of her, and she wouldn't meet Rodney's gaze.
"Teyla -" he started to say, but Teyla spoke over him.
"Doctor Weir," Teyla said, "we brought several items back from Athos with us. I would like to take them out to the mainland and return them to my people."
Rodney glanced at John, and Sheppard shook his head.
"I can take you," Sheppard offered. "If we're done here," he glanced over at Elizabeth with a raised eyebrow, "we can go now."
"I think that's everything," Elizabeth replied.
The meeting broke up, and Rodney headed to the mess hall. He had known his idea of why the Wraith returned to Athos so often would hurt Teyla. It was one big reason why he hadn't said anything since he first started to consider it months ago. But it was also the only explanation he could think of that explained the frequency of their visits to the planet.
And it explained why the Wraith hadn't done more to prevent their escape, he added to himself as he walked into the mess hall. They were busy with something else.
He pinched the bridge of his nose and poured coffee into a cup. "Maybe Sheppard will be able to explain it better," he muttered as he headed down to his lab.
He turned the lights on and saw Radek had left the computer from their aborted shield test on his work table along with a note. Rodney set the cup on the end of the work table and picked up the note.
M,
I checked the emitters after you left.
One shows damage to the housing.
I ran diagnostics, and the computers recorded an issue with emitter output.
The shield did not disperse energy as expected.
Calibration error?
Z
"It's not a calibration problem," Rodney muttered as he crumpled up the note and tossed it in the wastebasket next to his desk. "You're reading the data wrong." He glared at the wall separating his lab from Zelenka's. "If you want something done," he grumbled under his breath as he booted up the computer.
He pulled up the data from the 'test' and scanned through the various readings the computer recorded when Dex had shot the shield. And then he read through it again.
"Damn," he muttered with a sideways glance at the wall between the two lab spaces. He sat down and studied the data again.
The computer had recorded a definite thinning of the shield strength around each of the emitters after Ronon's test shot. Not unexpected, but he thought he had compensated for that in the programming.
"So was it the emitter design or something in the software?" he wondered as he scooped up the computer and headed for the silo.
He walked into the silo a few minutes later and groaned when he saw the damaged emitter lying on the work table.
"Great," he muttered. "Hopefully, all Conan did was damage the housing. If the crystal core was blown out as well …" Rodney shook his head and pulled a stool over to the work table.
A few hours later, Rodney had the damaged emitter in pieces on the work table, examining the tube of power crystals inside the housing. It wasn't quite the same as the mini-transformer he had found on Rivis, but it was close enough for his prototype design. He pulled another crystal out of the tube, checked it for damage, and looked up when the door behind him opened.
"Hey, McKay," John called as he entered the room. "Oh," he added and stopped a meter or so away. "Something went wrong with the test?"
Rodney looked up with a grunt. "You could say that. Ronon damaged one of the emitters when he shot at the shield the other day."
"How?"
"Still working on that." Rodney glanced up at Sheppard and hesitated. "So, umm, how mad at me is she?"
"Who? Teyla?"
Rodney glowered up at Sheppard. "Of course, Teyla. Who else would I mean?"
"Well, knowing you, there could be any number of people mad at you at any given time," John replied with a grin.
"Funny."
"Teyla is fine," John replied. "She was angry about what the Wraith had done to her people, not at you for suggesting why."
Rodney nodded and turned his attention back to the emitter.
"If Ronon was able to do that much damage, I guess that means it was a good test," John said and sat down on another stool.
Rodney looked up with a scowl. "Did you come down here for a reason, or did you just want to make unhelpful comments?"
"I kind of need your help with something," John replied.
"What sort of something?" Rodney asked as he went back to checking the power crystals.
Thankfully, none of the crystals appeared to be damaged, and it didn't look like there was any other damage to the wiring that would indicate a short.
So what caused the shield to fail? Something in the program, maybe?
"Teyla said something while we were on Athos," John said, but Rodney wasn't paying attention. Instead, he reached for the computer he'd brought from his lab. He'd need to figure out exactly how the shield program had failed if he wanted to fix it.
"Do you remember finding a book in one of the tents the other day?" John asked.
Rodney pored through the data again. "No, that can't be right," he muttered. "We would have seen something in the simulations."
Not only had the computer recorded a significant drop in the shield's protective energy after Ronon shot it, but the data also showed the shield integrity surrounding the emitters was low even before Dex had fired.
"Rodney?" John said.
Rodney pinched his lip as he realised what must have happened. Both he and Zelenka had been monitoring the shield as a whole. With all the flickering and drop-outs, neither of them had noticed the lower energy field around the emitters themselves.
He turned back to the emitter and saw Sheppard watching him.
"What?" Rodney asked as he picked up one of the power crystals.
John sighed and crossed his arms over his chest. "Did you find a book in one of the tents yesterday?"
"Book?" he muttered, turning the crystal over in his hand.
It didn't appear to be damaged, he realised. That still left the question of why the emitter hadn't worked as expected. He set the crystal aside and picked up a screwdriver.
"Yes, Rodney. A book. Kind of small. It would fit in the palm of your hand. Teyla said you started to ask her what it was about."
Rodney looked up from the emitter. "Oh, that book." He shrugged and went back to his study of the device. "Teyla said something about an Athosian writing it when they still lived in that city."
"That's the one," John said.
He could reconfigure the power modulator. That might be enough to compensate for the lower field strength around the emitters. He'd still need to rework the shield program, too, to ensure the difference in the shield strength didn't affect the overall harmonics. The math bloomed in his head, and Roney reached for the computer.
John pulled the computer out of reach. "Rodney, are you listening to anything I've said?"
Rodney scowled at Sheppard. "You asked if I found an old book. I did. What has that got to do with you needing help?"
John bent forward with his elbows resting on his knees. "Teyla is afraid her people are losing their past. I'm hoping there's something you can do with that book to show her that's not true."
Rodney crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head. "What do you want me to do? I don't speak Old Athosian or whatever they call their language. And more to the point, the book is on the mainland now. It was with all of the other stuff we brought back with us."
"No, it's not," John replied and pulled a familiar-looking book out of his jacket pocket. "I talked to Halling after Teyla gave him the book. I explained what I wanted to do, and he agreed it would be a good idea."
"You still haven't explained to me what you want to do."
John set the book on the end of the work table. "You have a whole team of people whose job it is to translate stuff."
"Yes, important things, like the Ancient database and anything else that might help us defeat the Wraith," Rodney retorted.
"This is important, too," John told him, his expression serious.
Rodney stared at him for a moment, then gave in. "Fine," he said. "I'll have Chaudhri go through it and see what he can do."
"I don't just want it translated," John said, and Rodney flung up his hands in frustration.
"Will you make up your mind?" Rodney retorted with an impatient glare. "If you don't want the book translated, why are you down here asking for favors?"
"This is about more than just knowing what the book says," John replied. "Can Doctor Chaudhri, I don't know, make some sort of translation key? Some way the Athosians can relearn their language and teach it to others?"
Rodney picked up the book and turned it over in his hands. "I don't know. Maybe," he muttered more to himself than to John as a new idea formed in his mind.
If Teyla was concerned about keeping the past alive for her people, there was something else he could do besides translating one old book. He'd need to talk to some people, but it could work …
"What?" John asked.
"Hmm?" Rodney looked up from the book. "Nothing," he replied and set the book to one side. "I'll talk to Chaudhri about making some sort of guide for the Athosians."
"Thanks," John said and stood.
Rodney grunted and went back to studying the emitter.
~*~*~*~ SGA ~*~*~*~
Rodney was back in the silo the following day, working on his upgraded shield idea. He had reworked the power crystals and the modulators in each of the emitters. Now it was just a matter of reconfiguring the shield program to account for the different harmonics. The trick would be balancing the shield's strength to increase the protective barrier near the emitters themselves but not creating other weak spots in the energy field.
He sat hunched over the computer on the table, working on the updated program code, when he heard the door behind him open.
"Rodney?" Zelenka called from the hallway. "Are you down here?"
Rodney glanced behind him as Radek entered the room and walked over to the work table. "I assume you're here with an update on the jumper repairs?" he asked and held out his hand for the tablet computer Radek carried.
"Nothing too serious," Radek said as Rodney read over the report. "Luckily, the Wraith only had hand-held weapons. If you had encountered any darts … ."
Zelenka let the sentence hang, and Rodney grimaced, remembering Sheppard's comment that the Wraith didn't try very hard to stop them. If there had been a dart nearby, chances were he wouldn't be here now to worry about the status of repairs.
"The Wraith damaged a few of the systems on the drive pods, but we should be able to make those repairs in a few days," Radek finished.
Rodney nodded and handed back the computer. "Good. We can't afford to lose any more ships. Which reminds me, where are you with the repairs to Jumper Six."
Zelenka pushed up his glasses and clutched the computer in his hand. "I spoke to Doctor DeCampo. Her team should have Jumper Six ready for flight tests in another month."
"Your idea for the repairs better work," Rodney replied. "We've wasted months waiting for the materials from Earth."
"I'm sure it will be fine."
Rodney grunted and turned back to the computer on the work table. "In that case, you can be the one inside the jumper when we're ready to test it."
"Oh, umm," Radek stammered, and Rodney smiled to himself.
Radek glared in return and asked, "Have you figured out what caused the calibration error in the emitters?"
"It wasn't a calibration problem," Rodney replied. Radek quirked an eyebrow, and Rodney added, "Not entirely anyway. I think I have the power systems in the emitters fixed. Now it's just a matter of reconfiguring the shield program."
"If you adjust the field -" Radek stopped speaking.
"Yes? And?" Rodney retorted. He looked up and saw Zelenka holding the book Sheppard had left on the work table. "Do you mind?" he asked with a glare.
"What is this?" Radek asked as he opened the book.
"Something Sheppard wants translated," Rodney replied.
"It is not in the Ancient script."
"So? What's that got to do with anything?"
"I merely assumed it was a similar situation to the books you brought back from Mendar." Radek looked up, and Rodney gave him a suspicious glance.
"We might have another problem," he remembered John telling him a few months ago. "Zelenka might be close to figuring out about the link."
Rodney snatched the book out of Radek's hands. "It's Athosian. Sheppard wants it translated for Teyla." He dropped the book on the table, ignoring the startled look Zelenka gave him.
"Rodney …" Zelenka started to say, but Rodney interrupted him with a scowl, almost daring him to finish what he wanted to say.
"Did you plan to help me remount these emitters or not?" Rodney asked in an attempt to deflect Zelenka's curiosity. He wasn't ready to discuss the link with anyone else and hoped Radek would drop the subject.
Radek frowned, then blew out a breath and nodded. "What do you need me to do?"
Rodney eyed him a moment longer, then stood and looked around the room. "Where did …" he muttered and spotted the ladder in the corner of the room. He dragged the ladder over to the nearest tripod and pointed to the emitters on the table.
"I've realigned the power crystals in a different configuration. That should give us the needed power for the new shield design."
Radek studied the computer screen and nodded. "Yes, yes. I see. You are thinking to increase the shield energy around each of the emitters?"
"Something like that," Rodney replied as he climbed the ladder.
"It will be difficult to balance the energy output in such a way as there are no weak points in the rest of the field."
"Already thought of that," Rodney told him. "Which is why I'm rewriting the shield program. Now hand me one of the emitters."
Radek muttered something under his breath that Rodney didn't understand, then picked up one of the bulky emitters with a grunt and passed it up to Rodney.
Rodney twisted around on the ladder and took the device in an awkward grip. He was in the process of turning back to the tripod when he heard his name over the radio.
"Sheppard to McKay."
"Oh, now what?" he grumbled, and the ladder shook as he tried to reach for his earpiece and not drop the emitter. "Whoa," he yelped and gripped the top of the ladder in his free hand.
"Careful," Radek said.
"Yes, thanks for that," Rodney retorted.
He glanced down and saw Zelenka bracing the ladder with both hands as he looked up at Rodney with a concerned expression. Rodney adjusted his grip on the emitter, made sure of his balance on the ladder, and reached up to his ear.
"McKay."
"Elizabeth wants us in the conference room," Sheppard said. "Looks like we might have a mission."
Rodney glanced at the emitter in his hands and then at the empty tripods. "I'm never going to get this new design tested," he muttered to himself.
"What was that?" Sheppard asked.
"Nothing," Rodney replied loud enough for the radio to pick up and climbed down the ladder. "I'll be right there."
He tapped off the radio and shoved the emitter into Radek's arms. "Here," he said and turned toward the door. "I'll be back to finish this later."
He walked into the conference room a few minutes later and sat down next to Teyla.
"Now that we're all here," Elizabeth said as she passed Rodney a file folder, "The 'gate team found information on P2X-306 in the Ancient database and sent a MALP to investigate."
"Anything of interest in the database?" Sheppard asked.
"Not really," Elizabeth replied. "Basic information on the planet itself, temperate climate with a short day cycle -"
"This is the planet with the mining operation," Rodney interrupted as he read the report in the file.
"Mining operation?" Sheppard asked.
"Hmm, yes," Rodney replied, looking up from the file. "Radek told me about it before," he glanced at Teyla, "umm, before we went to the mainland. From what he could get from the database, the Ancients had extensive mining operations on the planet at one time."
"Telemetry from the MALP shows the planet is inhabited," Elizabeth said, "so it may be possible to set up some sort of trade agreement with the people living there now."
"For what?" Rodney asked. "The Ancients probably mined anything of value thousands of years ago."
"That's what you're going to find out," Elizabeth replied.
Sheppard paged through his folder. "Teyla? Ronon? Either of you been to this planet before?"
"The planet does not look familiar to me, Colonel," Teyla replied.
"Sateda traded with a few mining planets," Ronon added. "Never heard of this one."
John nodded and closed his folder. "What are we offering in trade?"
"Medical supplies, manpower," Elizabeth replied.
"According to Halling, the harvest was plentiful as well," Teyla added. "We can also offer grain and tava beans."
Elizabeth nodded. "Good." She looked around the table and added, "The planet has a short day cycle, only fifteen hours, and the 'gate is in darkness now. It should be light again in a couple of hours."
"Then we'll head out in two hours," John replied and stood.
"Good luck," Elizabeth said as Rodney followed Ronon and Teyla out of the conference room.