In the morning, as he was about to sleep for no more than three hours, Carson decided it was best to skip the team altogether. When he tried to be positive and kind during the visit, even though he still hadn't had a morning cup of coffee, he was sure of his decision.
Todd betrayed the whole team. After a single demonstration and reading the manual, he was able to brilliantly control the device the man needed a course for and work quickly, precisely, and with such confidence in every elegant movement that Carson still didn't tend to half-control what he was doing. This allowed him to concentrate fully on his work, more than when he had the whole team at his disposal - well, not quite. It was hard, at least from time to time, not to take a long look at Todd and watch his slender, sharp-clawed fingers move between the tubes. It was fascinating and disturbing on many levels. Nevertheless, he managed to do more of his own work than with the team.
In addition, the presence of the Wraith at the base made nervousness to the corridors as thick as honey. He awoke to her this morning, pouring out of everyone he met in the hallway or in the dining room and straining him. He always tended to try to help every time he felt someone's pain or just discomfort. He just couldn't do it differently. And if they were large, sharp surges of someone's fear or pain, they could whip him to forty hours of wakefulness, nursing, and surgery. When it was such a dense tension as now… He had nowhere to direct energy.
Taken into thinking about the mood in the city, he turned the corner and stopped.
Todd stood in front of the lab, surrounded by four Marines. The Wraith looked impatient.
"Ah, finally, Dr. Beckett," he said uncomfortably, his voice low and almost hissing. willingness and probably not the ability to let me into the lab. And you're late. "
Tact certainly wasn't Todd's strength.
"Good morning to you, too," he greeted not only Wraith, but the Marines, at least he nodded at. Carson wasn't about to lose his good manners, even with only half a cup of coffee. "I was on a visit," he explained why the alleged delay. He was pretty sure that last night — actually early this morning, he said he couldn't come to the lab until nine o'clock.
"I don't know the word," he growled, not so irritated, but in a low voice, Todd, who had just passed him to get to the lab door.
His hand raised to the lock, he turned to him and raised his eyebrows a little confused and, above all, questioningly.
"Visit," the wraith said intermittently. It must have been the first time he had heard and said the word.
"I see!" He finished the movement, changed the lock from orange to green for a moment, then back, and the door opened. Carson came in. "A visit is a daily visit to a doctor for all the patients he has in the inpatient department. Do you have a word for something like that?" he asked curiously.
Todd came in unanswered and walked past Carson straight to the computers, which he turned on one by one. Wraith didn't seem to want to answer. He frowned a little at his back, because it was polite, if not to answer, to at least say he didn't intend to answer, but what could be done… He turned to one of the Marines — Barner — who came in after Todd.
"Can you please report to Dr. Weir that we're in the lab and getting to work."
"Sure, sir." Barner nodded and picked up the radio.
At that moment, he turned his attention to the devices and began to turn them on one by one. Centrifuge, microscopes, distillation apparatus, thermal
"We don't have patients."
He turned sharply as the voice came from behind him and close enough. Surprisingly, he found that Todd kept his usual distance of at least a meter and a half from him. As he got closer, albeit unintentionally, the Marines became nervous and began toying with their weapons, which mainly distracted Carson. The Wraith barely noticed.
"Sorry..?" he blinked before the words came to him, "Oh sure, you don't have an infirmary or a patient, because your wounds heal on their own and in a very short time."
"Yes, most of them." Todd nodded. "The ones that don't either kill us or share our life energy and help the other heal," he continued, very openly and seriously, so that Carson listened intently. "That's something that worries me. If our research is successful, how will the transition to the fixed side affect our ability to heal?"
"I've been thinking about that, too," he admitted, and Todd commented on his words by tilting his head to the side and the rush of serious curiosity he had wiped off his whole being. It was cold in his hands. He seldom felt anything so intense; pain from patients with broken bones and crushed ones brought to the emergency room; the icy horror of those to whom he told that they had the last months of life left; relieving loved ones by announcing to them that their loved ones will live a long and contented life; happy family when it brought the good news of a new life. Big, strong and important emotions, never something as ordinary as curiosity.
"And what did you come up with?" Wraith asked impatiently, taking that the wave of his curiosity dissipated as quickly as it appeared.
He knocked quickly.
"I want to try to maintain Wraith's regenerative potential," he said in the first place, which Todd acknowledged with a small nod and a kind of softer expression on his face. "I'm not and I can't be sure if it will be the same as it is now, but it will certainly be many times larger than the human one."
"Without life force, a large amount of other energy will be needed."
"Sure. And here, I hope, we'll ensure the full functionality of the digestive tract. Here's some data," he said, quickly reaching for the table where he had his tablet. He looked for research into the digestive juices of a fresh corpse of a Wraith soldier, which he happened to reach barely a month and a half ago. He found the results encouraging because they outlined a solution to the food problem. "You can look here." He handed the tablet to Todd, who took it with a slight raise of his eyebrows and looked at him.
"At the last opportunity, I specifically focused on the digestive tract. Its functionality is reduced, but you know that, however," he stressed by tapping on the edge of the tablet, "it's the digestive tract of predators with highly effective digestive enzymes, especially if they are sufficiently concentrated. I think that in addition to the fleshy parts of prey and bones, the gastric acid of the Wraith is also able to digest keratin and chitin, and even etches a variety of metals, glass and some artificial polymers. the potential for truly efficient and almost waste-free digestion. You only need to eat enough to maintain your regenerative abilities. "
"Eat," Todd repeated the word, as if unfamiliar to him, staring thoughtfully at the tablet. Then he looked up at Carson and handed him the tablet back. "Feed animal carcasses."
"Well, we usually call it steaks," he joked, a small smile on his face, hoping it was too much.
However, Wrait grinned and let out a snarling sigh that almost sounded like laughter.
"Look," Carson said seriously, "there are more than ten times as many planets with an animal population as they are populated, and the animals are multiplying much faster. That's and there will be enough food for all of you."
"I realize that, and that's why I'm here, but the idea is too curious for me," Todd chose the word carefully, turning his hands palms up. "Animals have never been useful to us. They can be fed when needed and keep us alive, but they don't provide the nutrition we need. It's like…" he hesitated slightly, then raised his left hand a little higher, "a bite of moldy crust. bread and a ten-course feast. " He raised his right hand. "Wraith forced to feed animals is still a starving Wraith. And starvation deprives us of our civility. So you understand, Dr. Beckett," he said as something very important, "that the idea of feeding animals is not easy for me to accept."
He couldn't help but remember John's narrative and report describing a starving Wraith, this Wraith who had saved him and eventually returned his life. In particular, the narrative was very colorful, describing thin bones on the bone itself, on which stretched thin skin and a face that looked like a "Halloween skeleton, and these are otherwise Wraiths quite like cheap horror." These were signs of malnutrition in humans and, in the Wraith, as they seemed.
Todd's fingers were very slender and long, still elongated claws of dark color, but there were no bones on them, and his face, though full of sharp edges and angles and pale to green, did not look unhealthy. At least what he could judge and compare with his experience with people.
The fact was, when Todd talked about starvation, he knew very well what he was saying. He knew it firsthand. A well-known sense of awareness prompted him to speak:
"That's why you're here. You're sincerely afraid that your people will starve one day. And because you know it yourself, so—"
"Or it's just a way to find out something about your defense," Todd interrupted coldly.
"No, that's not it," he said confidently.
The Wraith just tilted his head to the side, his face unreadable and sounding completely flat. Carson was honestly a little nervous, not because of the threat, but because he wasn't used to feeling anything. Then Todd simply turned and returned wordlessly to the computers, leaving him stunned.
The rest of the day, until two in the morning, was almost silent. Until he needed something from Todd, he almost didn't know he was there, and when he tried to catch a glimpse of him for a moment, as if he always escaped him. Somewhere at the other end of the lab, in the corner, in the shade next to the sample refrigerator… He was almost certain that the Wraith was testing his mind manipulation on him, so he was very pleased to recognize that it was time to rest.
As Carson lay down that evening, he wondered if he should apologize to the Wraith commander this morning.
°° O °°
He had just finished the sixth day of the Wraith's stay and had done without incident. That was damn suspicious, and John was getting more and more nervous with each passing hour.
Yeah, the Wraith were in locked rooms from the windows, from which all the electronics and furniture were removed, except for the bed, so they were actually cells, but they were still not the super ancient ones they had at their disposal. And a second time, everyone had their own neat little piece of paradise, but with their telepathic abilities, no one could be sure. They didn't seem to be planning anything, but the soldiers just lay on the bed for most of the night and sat on it during the days unless they were needed in the lab. And Todd was in the lab during the day and wandering around the room like a ghost for the night, for the few hours he let Carson sleep. No, seriously, he walked from corner to corner, stopping each time and standing still for decades, then moved back to the bed and sat on it. He lay on it for a while, but did not sleep because his eyes were open and fixed on the ceiling. Watching recordings from his room was like watching Paranormal Activities in full HD quality.
Scary. And even scarier was what Todd was up to.
John picked up his tablet from the bedside table and tossed it on the bed.
Being a military commander of Atlantis had its advantages, such as access to this clever modern thing and especially the folder "Don't you dare open it, you idiots, until you have your job done. PS: You will never have that!" which hid a whole range of classic computer games, from solitaire, through checkers, chess and poker, to Had. Just heavenly mana, if one needed to stop thinking about the Wraith sitting in their cells politely called 'Rooms'.
He started playing solitaire, and just as he was in the middle of the third game, his tablet beeped and announced an incoming video call. With a quick glance into the year, he checked that one o'clock in the morning was approaching. As so, everyone knew he was awake at night, but unless it was a Wraith attack or some other catastrophe, they didn't disturb him. It wasn't an attack, he was sure of that, but it certainly couldn't be a good thing.
He answered the call and knew immediately that he was not wrong.
Todd's face stared at him from unnaturally close proximity. How the hell did he get in touch ?! Even a video connection ?! And from where?! It was unrecognizable, because there was nothing to see except the Wraith face — and the disgustingly large air vents he didn't like to find inside were deep blue-green.
"John Sheppard?" the Wraith stretched questioningly and quite lightly, as if he were just conversing.
He was silent, staring at him as he tried to reach discreetly on his walkie-talkie to warn the Marines to guard Todd. And he hoped, with bitter anger born on his floor, that they were still alive. If not, he rips the Wraith's head off and throws it into the windshield of the nearest hive.
"I hear your breath and recognize it. I know you're there, even though I can't see you."
He wasn't sure if Todd was lying to him, but it didn't really matter. How lightly and conversationally Wraith said it simply upset him. He reached for the radio.
"Lorne! Pete! Check the prisoners!"
"It wasn't necessary," were Todd's last words before the door slammed and then Lorna's screams to put down what he was holding right away. and with his hands upstairs he retreated into the room.
Whatever the Wraith was calling, he really dropped it, and something swayed from side to side, turning the whole room into smudges. It swayed, but gradually slowed to the point, so John had a good, albeit slightly inverted, view of Todd with his hands up and Lorna with Pete.
"Hey, Lieutenant, here!" he called because it seemed that the call was transmitting sound in both directions.
"Sir…?" Lorne asked, a little confused, but he could see him approaching the camera thing and lifting it while still holding his weapon.
"Yeah, here," he replied, throwing his feet out of bed. "I'm coming to you," he added, setting down his tablet and picking up nine from the bedside table.
He made his way to Todd's room with a trot in record time, determined to simply empty the magazine into the Wraith. Damn Wraith! They should never have left them so loose. They were to lock them all down in the cells, lead Todd to the lab in handcuffs, and not take them off until he needed to. But Elizabeth wanted to show goodwill and something. They had a long debate about it - so Elizabeth talked a lot about how impossible it is to fight their possibilities against, for example, only half of the Beehives, and perhaps only a sham cooperation with one or two is simply necessary. With the utmost care. Paranoid as Rodney, just such a collaboration. And Teyla surprisingly echoed her, saying that her people would fight when needed, but the peaceful journey was always better (Teyla ?! Really ?! The two had to braid their hair into the night and spin this plan, otherwise he didn't see it).
And because he resignedly acknowledged some of the reasons, they ended up here, with Todd, who can happily call whoever he wants and who knows what else.
Hmm, maybe he deserved half the tray for himself…?
When he arrived at the room, of course, he did not fulfill his threat, just raised his weapon and entered the room warily. He assessed the situation with a quick glance. It didn't look serious, Todd stood perfectly still in the middle of the room, his hands raised only to shoulder level before above his head, looking tense amused. Lorne and Pete aimed a P-90 at him. The situation was secure and calm, so he allowed himself to look around the rest of the room.
Something was swinging against the wall to John's right. At first glance, he didn't recognize it, but at the second, it was their security camera, disheveled into components connected together with a speaker and hung in the perimeter of the city itself, which shone behind a half-covered panel. From such a godless massacre on electronics, Rodney gets out.
"What is it," he pointed to the remnants of the camera, "is it?"
"I wanted to contact you, John Sheppard, and because here," Todd waved his hands casually and very slowly around him (everyone in the room got nervous anyway), "there's no communicator or walkie-talkie, so I had to find an alternative solution."
"Yeah, sure, and on that occasion, you tried to send a signal to your hive," he growled.
"You know I could tell them my location at any time."
Well, he had to admit it was true.
"If you wanted to talk to me, you could just ask Lieutenant Lorna to call me."
"I wasn't sure if he would hear me."
John gripped the pistol a little tighter and gritted his teeth. From the innocence of the Wraith's appearance, he was pretty sure he was just provoking. It was a game. A game that two could play.
"Okay, I'm here now. Tell me what you want before we take you to the cell."
"I'd like a lot of things, but I'd settle for dinner to begin with," Todd replied with all seriousness, but he didn't move or signal a move.
Still, John tensed and measured him carefully. Wraith's body was relaxed, his shoulders slumped, his head slightly tilted, his eyes narrowed, his fingers supple… There was no sign of an impending attack in his posture, which only meant…
"Are you kidding me?" he half asked.
"Yes."
He deserved a bullet to the knee for a one-word laconic answer. Instead, John just nodded at the door.
"We're going to the cell. And hope McKay can't find anything in Atlantis' systems, because you could easily sit in our basement for a few years," he added emphatically, which may not have been a good idea.
He couldn't say for sure, but he thought Todd's features hardened. Oh yeah, John, it must have reminded him of the Genius Prison where he had been for years or maybe decades.
"I need to get to the lab. That was why I called you," Wraith explained, this time without a loose tone, but at the same time he walked slowly to the door.
"No way."
"I have a theory. I want to test it."
"Forget it. You're just going to the cell."
"Then call Dr. Beckett."
"He's asleep. I won't wake him for you."
Todd stopped literally an inch, in a way one would not be able to. At one moment he was walking slowly, and at another he was like a motionless statue. John raised his weapon, Lorne and Pete did just a second later. The Wraith remained motionless. It took too long for him to turn slowly, his hands outstretched toward them. He'd seen the gesture so many times before, so he didn't doubt what it meant. It was like: hey, you little people, I don't want to hurt you. Ice mushrooms.
"Then give me at least some of your portable computer consoles," Todd asked very emphatically. This time there was a warning in his voice and attitude.
"After what you just showed?" he asked teasingly, successfully ignoring Todd's displeasure. "Are you kidding me again? No way."
Todd let out a frustrated snort that turned into a throaty growl, rolled his eyes, and muttered something. It was remotely similar to words, full of creaking and hissing sounds, but at the same time a little familiar. What did the pretty brunette with the big ones who worked for linguists say? And yeah, something about the Wraith language being actually a modified ancient dialect. He didn't listen to her much, she was wearing a pink cardigan and John was just thinking about how great it would be if ATA gave him ancient telekinetic capabilities and he could one top button slowly…
"I have an idea. I need to write it down before it disappears. Give me a piece of paper and something to write on," Todd asked impatiently, breaking through John's pleasant thoughts in exactly the same tone that Rodney often bothered him. In the tone of a scientist in full brain work who either did not have the time or resources to release excess pressure from the brain. Rodney often put down his food, grabbed a napkin, pulled a pen without a lid from his pocket, and began scraping ideas on the napkin.
It was interesting and a little funny that the wraith had similar brain problems to Rodney and the rest of the brilliant family. And sad too. He was always very sympathetic to Rodney.
"OK," he sighed, looking toward Lorne. "Does anyone have a pad and a pen?"
He didn't have to ask twice, Lorne did have the pad with him, and he immediately, reluctantly, albeit exactly as unspoken, pulled his vest from his pocket and handed it slowly to John. He picked it up and reached for Todd just as slowly. Wraith raised his eyebrows slightly, but took the block, which looked tiny in his hand. Hell, he never really realized that Wraith's hands were so huge. And with a pen, it was no better than with block. It was small, thin, and fragile-looking in Todd's fingers.
It was incredibly comical to watch the Wraith with a block carefully, with the tips of sharp claws turning the first page described to get to the next one. When he tried to write a pen, but hadn't opened it before, it was simply priceless. Especially when he pursed his lips angrily and growled at the pen as if he might intimidate her.
Honestly, John had a lot to do to keep from laughing, and according to the slight suffocating noises behind him, Lorne and Pete were alike. In the end, it was Lorne who took pity on Todd.
"You have to squeeze it hoře up there… there's such a bug."
Todd just glanced at Lorn before squeezing the top of the pen. She clicked and Wraith ran it over the top of the page. Everything seemed to work out as it should, as he snorted and began to write. He wrote really fast, though he held the pen awkwardly between two fingers.
"It will take long?" John asked after a moment.
This time he earned a look, then Todd just turned and walked to the elevators in an absolutely orderly manner while still writing.
John wasn't so surprised that Todd was working together. He was perhaps the calmest Wraith he had known, perhaps competing with a large number of people here at the base. But that often seemed more dangerous. It was impossible to guess what was going on in his head, maybe right now. He didn't say a single real word all the way, he just wrote, sometimes sketched, and there was a deep hum from his chest. And between… well, not so much his eyebrows as the bulging skin above his eyes, a clearly visible focused groove formed. It was as if he was completely immersed in what he was writing and did not break away from it, even as John called for reinforcements, he directed other soldiers to the rest of the Wraith's rooms and interrupted Rodney at midnight snack, asking him to go and look at the circuits in Todd's room. started computer diagnostics.
They finally reached the cells. He opened one of them and Todd entered it calmly. As soon as he was outside the door, he turned to him and reached out with a block in which he described several pages along the way.
"Give it to Beckett."
He carefully took the block from him and backed out of the cell. Only when he was outside, the bars receded, and the force field was activated, did he allow himself to lower his weapon and look at the pad. He recognized the symbols on it immediately, though he did not understand them.
"It's ancient." It was not a question, just a surprised statement.
"Yes," Todd agreed. "I don't know your writing well enough to describe complicated biochemical patterns, but Dr. Beckett is proficient enough in ancient language to understand.
"I had no idea you could do it so well," he pointed to the densely described pages of the block.
"It was easier to learn their language than to wait to see if they dared to communicate with ours."
"But isn't your language actually ancient?" he asked, thinking about it a moment ago. Todd didn't move, kept his eyes on him, and remained silent. A clear message saying a big 'no'. "Ah, so it's telepathy?" he asked another question, just out of curiosity, and again he received no other answer than a stare. "All right, you don't want to answer. I understand. Feel free to keep your big Wraith secret." He threw up his hands and grinned. Next was the look of two yellow eyes with a thin, cat doll, and the unnerving silence that lifted the hairs on John's neck and arms. An old, starving dog. Very old. "It's hard to believe you really met them," he slipped before realizing what he meant.
This time, Todd's expression shifted and slipped into a slightly amused.
"He met and tasted," he replied with utter carelessness, as if he were really talking only about what he had for breakfast the day before.
"I didn't need to know," John snapped, his hair standing guard like pheasants in front of the general. He had to change the subject: "I'll give it to Beckett in the morning."
"It would be best to give it to him now," Todd said. "He will want to continue research immediately."
"I don't know if there's any research at all," John replied, raising his eyebrows significantly. "Didn't you think it would just work out for you? You and your men will be in jail from now on. No more comfortable rooms."
"Such a delay in research is unnecessary, especially when you know my time here is limited," Todd growled slightly angrily, but rather so friendly, certainly no real anger. "If you're not interested in continuing, just let us go."
He wanted to smirk and inform the Wraith that there would be no departure, but he bit his words because he remembered exactly that Elizabeth had promised. Free departure to the address of your choice. And he was pretty sure she'd keep her promise if it came to light that Todd had done nothing more than a minor fracture. It was strange and completely against rational thinking, but he was ninety percent sure that Todd had done nothing.
So yeah, he had to forgive the threat of imprisonment, but he could stab Wraith.
"So it wasn't a joke that you could only stay here for a while?"
"I can last a long time without feeding, but my me say good manners get worse with hunger. I don't want to give the Wraith a bad name." He glared at his yellow eyes.
"A worse name for the Wraith you can't do in this galaxy, "he snapped mockingly, but the corners twitched in a real smile. He threw a small bait, and Todd made a big catch of it, of course.
Perhaps because he was amused by their exchange of insults, or simply because he had mercy for obsessed scientists, he decided to wake Carson. Well, he decided to force someone else to wake him while he stayed safe here at the cells.
The door opened and a whole platoon of Marines brought the other two Wraith inside. The soldiers did not defend themselves, completely calm and obediently, like sheep, each went to his cell and stood in the middle. It wasn't the first time he'd thought they had even less life than anyone he'd ever seen.
He looked away from them and looked at Todd, who was watching him intently and expressionlessly, ignoring his men. He measured the strength of his gaze with the Wraith for a moment before turning to the first Marine he had on hand and sending him with a pad to Beckett.
After the Marine's departure, time stretched. The room was full of people, but no one needed to speak in front of the three Wraith, though it was possible that only one understood them.
John looked at his watch for the third time. It only took a few minutes, but it seemed long and it could have been even longer. Carson could be annoyed when someone woke him up in the middle of the night for something other than a serious medical emergency. Ronon and I drank a few beers once and then played 'ring and run.' While the sleepy Rodney with a lying face was funny and Zelenka was cursing in Czech literally hilarious, Becket's calm 'I know who you are' was really scary. Especially when he added a nice warning to John's hangover at breakfast that if it was repeated, colonoscopy would become the standard procedure for returning through the gate.
He imagined what Carson would look like, so he was surprised that the door opened and Beckett burst in. He was wearing plaid terry pajamas and waving a notebook.
"If it worked, it could reduce mutations in the incubated retrovirus by up to ninety-three percent. This would then double the production of usable retrovirus…."
"More than double," Todd corrected him, all his attention shifting exclusively to him as Beckett entered the room. As if in a single moment he had completely released John. If it weren't ridiculous, he would feel a little overlooked and jealous.
"We should try it now," Carson said firmly.
"As you can see, Dr. Beckett," Todd gestured to the side with his hands in one slow and unnaturally smooth gesture, "I'm a little imprisoned."
Becket turned to John:
"Couldn't you let him go? Just for a few hours."
"He broke into our computer network…"
"Only communication," Todd said, but John ignored him.
"… And who knows what he was doing there."
"I originally wanted to contact you, Dr. Beckett, but unfortunately I found Sheppard's room first."
He shot Wraith a look he didn't notice, of course, and continued to stare intently at Carson. A moment ago, Todd said something else. He lied either before or now, and he probably didn't care that people didn't have the memory of aquarium fish.
"What a big escort — maybe handcuffs," and he'd stay away from all the computers, "Carson suggested, with only a small dissatisfied growl from the cell." It's a big step in our research, "he said, very accurate, it's mainly the Wraith concept of biochemistry that I haven't fully absorbed yet. I can do it myself, but with its help it will be easier and faster. "
"It's not just me."
"Sure. Does Dr. Weir already know about this?"
"I was just going to see her. I had to secure them all first."
"I see. I'll go with you and we'll talk about it," Carson concluded firmly, looking down at the notebooks and turning on his heel with a frown.
John had no objections, in fact he was a little glad he wouldn't be the only one waking Elizabeth, so he went to see the doctor. As he turned away, they noticed Wraith's gaze. The way he measured Carson literally from head to toe, his eyes a little narrowed, like a predator aiming for its prey.
"Hey! Hey! Eyes here!" Todd shouted. He took the time to turn slowly to him and tilt his head slightly to the side in a silent question. "Dr. Beckett is not your midnight snack. Is that clear?"
Todd didn't answer verbally, of course, only the sugar corner and slits along his nose stretched out as if he'd sucked in air. Then he snorted and just turned his back. That was the end of their conversation.