Note: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year everyone. I thought I'd get at least one more chapter in before the end of 2018 (enjoying a very quiet and relaxing Boxing Day to get this one done). I might even try to publish another chapter before 2019, depending on work; I've got to work up to New Year's Day :(, so will see if I have time.
00000
Chapter 23 – The Suspicions
John had never felt so angry.
It was a raging, pure hatred as he paced back and forth, his eyes on the Wraith watching him, predator-like, from behind the two sets of bars.
"Your anger will only weaken you," the Wraith stated.
"I don't think so," John countered as he turned and paced back the other way. His former aches and pains were forgotten under the burning anger and adrenaline that was pumping through his body.
"You realise that they are torturing us both," the Wraith said next, his voice a sort of sing-songy taunt.
"Oh yeah, what'd he do to you?" John demanded at that preposterous idea.
"He stopped me," the Wraith barked back.
"And how is that torture?" John snapped back in return.
"Have you ever known starvation, Sheppard?"
John turned and paced back the other way again, looking away from the nightmare looking back at him.
No wonder the thing sounded stronger – he had taken John's own life to feed himself!
"The few years I took from you are barely enough to keep me alive," the Wraith reported as if that should be any kind of concern to John.
All that pain and all the Wraith had taken was just a few years?!
"That strength I gained from you is already fading," the thing added.
"I really don't give a damn about that," John spat back; except he kind of did. The thing had taken years from him and it apparently wasn't enough; it was already fading?! John was damn sure he wasn't going to let it take anymore.
He turned and paced back across the length of the cell, the movement helpful.
He wanted to hit something.
He wanted to thrust his hand through those bars and-
"You pace in your cell, cursing that I took years from you," the Wraith went on angrily, "while I stand here and curse that I wasn't allowed to take them all from you!"
John stopped and turned to face the Wraith. Damn Kolya putting him in with this thing.
Kolya's words about being sorry for the way John was going to die all made so much more sense now. And not only did Kolya intend to have this thing feed on him until there was nothing left, with Atlantis watching, but he had to sit through the Wraith's complaints about not getting to kill him all in one go!
"We each, in our own way, suffer," the Wraith continued. Why did it keep damn talking? "They are torturing us both."
John rushed at the bars, finally giving into the raging aggression that wanted out. He slammed his hands against the adjoining bars, the reverberation of the impact through his hands deeply satisfying.
"I don't give a damn. Just shut the hell up!" John shouted at the monster.
The Wraith roared back and its feeding hand slammed between two bars.
John pulled his head and upper body back from the bars, his eyes instinctively snapping to the reaching feeding hand that was intended to kill him. He knew what being fed on felt like now, had felt the pain and empty panic of it.
Except, the feeding hand couldn't get through the bars at him, not with that big thick metal gauntlet around the Wraith's hand.
Panting, John still kept his eyes on the gauntleted hand though, watching the green, clawed fingers flexing as if the Wraith was still trying to reach just that little bit further to get at him.
John's heart hammered loud in his chest, vibrating against the inside of the sharp sting of the feeding mark.
The Wraith hissed in clear frustration as it lowered its covered, and temporarily useless, hand. John kept his eyes on the hand until just the green fingers could be seen, wrapping around the rusty bars on the other side.
"These are your last hours, Sheppard," the Wraith said with a deep weirdly purring evil tone. "If you wish to spend them in silence, then so be it."
"No," John said back forcefully, "I'm getting out of here," he told the monster as he turned away, finally giving into every instinct in his body that had been telling him to move well away from the Wraith.
"I've got a life back home," he added, "and I'm damned well going to get back to it." It felt like a powerful promise to shout at a Wraith.
He had to get out of here. Because, clearly he was going to have to do it on his own now.
He reached the far wall across from the watching Wraith, and leant a hand on the cold stone. The adrenaline was wearing off now, leaving his body feeling almost weaker than before.
The important thing was not to panic. And maybe it was best that he sit down for a bit.
He lowered himself slowly towards the floor, aware of how much he needed to use the wall for support.
He would get out of here.
Except, if the Genii had managed to keep a Wraith down here for who knew how long, how hard was it going to be for John to fight his way out of here?
No, Atlantis would find him.
And Teyla was in Atlantis, so that immediately put up the odds of them finding him; didn't it? With Teyla and Si there it meant that Colonel Carter and Rodney had Elite and Alliance resources to help them. So, they'd find him. They could even be up on ground level right now, fighting their way down here to save him.
His backside met the cold floor and he pressed his back against the wall, wishing he didn't feel the shiver of fear turning his stomach.
He was going to survive this.
Except, Kolya had managed to evade the Alliance for all these years. For all his faults, for which John had many listed, Kolya was a good strategist, and that fact was really starting to worry John.
Kolya had to know that the Elite would help rescue him, so did that mean that Kolya had planned for that somehow? Of course he would. If they were deep outside Alliance space, how were the Elite going to get to him? What if there wasn't even a Gate on this planet? Maybe they had brought him in on some stolen ship? Hadn't Seeal said something on the Sythus about how Kolya had been smuggling Alliance tech across the border for his own ships and weapons? He'd worked through Dreamstation at one point. With Iketani...maybe Iketani had given him all sorts of tech, and intel on how to evade the Elite.
And then there'd been that thing the idiot Pranos had said; something about the Alliance and Elite having their own problems right now. What did that mean? Was the Alliance under attack? Was Teyla even still in Atlantis? Maybe she'd been recalled before Pranos had dialled into Atlantis.
She'd come back to help though, right? If she could. Maybe she was off on the some Fleet ship already fighting Wraith.
He rubbed cold fingers against his forehead, and forced himself breathe. The first mistake in any situation like this was to panic. Yeah, like there was any training for facing a vampire monster that had just sucked some of your life out of your chest!
He realised that the Wraith hadn't said anything for a bit, and he glanced up across the silent cell only to see that the creature was still watching him, the overhead lighting shining down across one side of the thing's greeny yellow face. The starburst like tattoo around the Wraith's left eye seemed to make the slit eye within it gleam as it stared at John.
"You're so sure you will escape this place?" The Wraith asked, annoyingly echoing John's own inner fears.
"Yes," John stated back as forcefully as he could. "My people don't leave anybody behind."
Except...people weren't always still alive when rescue arrived...
No, this was stupid defeatist crap; he would get out of here. They would find him. Teyla would get here in time.
Across the cell, the Wraith angled its head, still watching John with those penetrating eyes.
"They'll come for me," John repeated, though it was more for himself than the Wraith now.
The Wraith lifted its chin slightly, its staring really starting to get to John; like that look lions had in documentaries when they spotted some tasty looking prey in the distance.
"I hope you continue to believe that," the Wraith growled through the bars, "the next time I feed."
John looked away from it and its horrific promise. He hated the thing; hated Kolya, and his own damn panicked thoughts.
He was going to get the hell out of here.
He was just tired. He needed to rest for a bit, get his strength back and then work out how to get the hell out of here.
He closed his eyes, shutting off the Wraith's stalking staring, and rested his head back against the cell wall.
He just needed some rest.
"Come on, Teyla," he whispered into the empty silence.
00000
Following the midday meal, and after returning the even larger bellied goat back to the Hydroponics Bay, Seeal had found herself in the most boring afternoon ever created.
She was the only person working in the large empty Project Room, which meant that everyone else was likely helping out with the big important and critically decisive crisis against a magically appearing Hive ship.
While she was sat in here. By herself. Carrying on as normal.
Well, she wasn't entirely alone; there was the ever-present Security representative sat up in the glass-fronted observation room overlooking the front of the Project Room. Today's guard looked as bored as she felt. He had an electronic pad balanced on one knee that he glanced at occasionally, and, each time he did, she had caught herself looking up at him worriedly. Had there been another attack? Was the Hive headed here? Except each time he had simply looked up and away from his pad without any sign of concern. A few times she'd sent him an 'anything new?' look, and he'd started shaking his head at her each time since – nothing new; nothing interesting.
He hadn't looked at his pad for awhile now either, as he had started checking over and cleaning his stunners, working on one at a time. Since that was hardly thrilling to watch for her, she'd had no resort but return her full attention to her computer screens.
Following the project's successful passing of its Elite review, she'd ended up with some new assignments within the project, so at least she had enough to work on. The lack of any colleagues had held up some of the work though, which had revealed how used to working with the rest of the project team she'd become. Even outside of working with her smaller assignment groups within the larger team, much of each day was also spent conferring with other groups. Brainstorming, debating ideas, and working out how to fix an issue had become a larger part of her working day than she had realised, and she found herself rather missing the company.
She glanced across her screens, all of them running various different aspects of her work. She had five different things she was working on today, but even that variety was getting boring considering that something far more interesting was going on elsewhere in the Facility.
She dropped her gaze to one side screen that she'd allocated to show the latest news links on one side and the Facility's Elite real-time list on the other half. Nothing new appeared to be happening out in the Alliance, at least not to the point where the public news links were aware of it. Oneakka's personal beacon still registered as present in the Facility, so he hadn't left to go fight the Hive. So, did that mean that nothing new had happened, or had the Elite and the Military already gotten the Hive? Maybe the Facility remained in shutdown until the all clear was given? Or maybe the Hive just hadn't reappeared again yet?
And she had no chance of finding out the answers to any of these questions anytime soon. Not unless Oneakka was in the canteen later and she could attempt to quiz him again on any details, only he'd been stubbornly close-lipped on any intel on the crisis; annoyingly typical Elite being all honourable and sticking to the rules.
Faint movement registered from the observation room above and she snapped her attention back up to the guard. He was yawning – oh, how thrilling.
He'd finished the mundane cleaning of his weapons and was now leaning his head back against the wall behind his chair, his arms crossing.
His eyes closed.
She frowned up at him.
There was no napping on guard duty!
Honestly, she'd have thought better of Elite security.
She glared up at him, waiting for him to open his eyes at which point she'd give him a pointed look. Except he wasn't opening his eyes.
She shook her head and returned her attention to her screens as one was revealing the final sequencing she'd programmed. Looking over the details, she considered the coding she was working on. She was designing the basics of a strong-walled security defence programme for the potential new computer system, trying to make it something that even she would have trouble hacking into.
At which point something suddenly occurred to her.
She looked back up at the guard, who still had his eyes closed; even with his eyes open, he could only see the backs of her screens. She was a well-known hacker with a slightly shady past and she was alone and unsupervised in a room full of empty workstation computers. She could get up to anything in here, and there was just one guard watching her from a distance who was half asleep?!
She felt instantly insulted.
They might think she couldn't use her computer access to try hacking into the Facility's wider computer system, but they were wrong. Or at least, she wasn't sure if they were, because she hadn't tried. She'd made a promise to Oneakka.
And, she suddenly realised, she hadn't even thought about using this empty room to her advantage until now.
She frowned at herself. When had that happened?!
She was alone in a room full of Elite Military hardware and computer systems that she could investigate and even try to reprogram without any hacking into the wider Facility computer. She could get up to anything! And she hadn't thought to even have an innocent look around the local database?!
When had she started to play by the rules so willingly?
She looked back up at the guard, who was still napping. Would the Elite really just leave her so lazily observed? She'd had a high regard of Edfu and Maja so far in their Joint Security Lead-stewardship of the Facility, but now she had to wonder. Unless...
She considered her own computer screens again. If she were in their place, she'd have put a sensor-net of sorts around her computer login. A computer programme that observed her specific access to any and all computers and that would watch for any suspicious activity. Yes, that sounded like something the Elite would think of; they might say they trusted her enough to employ her, but they wouldn't be so stupid as to leave her alone with all this computer tech. Even Oneakka had made a point of telling her each time he gave her a piece of tech, even if it was a just an electronic pad, that she wasn't to use it to hack into anything. He'd even said several times that he'd put security measures into the tech so she couldn't use it for her own means.
She'd made sure not to point out to him the flaws in that logic, but she suspected that he already knew she could probably get round his controls on the tech. So, maybe his comments were, rather than reminders that she needed to keep to her promise not to hack into anything, but were actually subtle warnings? Had he been telling her not to risk trying? If they had some sensor-net watching everything she did, then that made his constant reminders more meaningful. The work contract she had signed for this job had included a highlighted clause stating that any infraction of Elite rules would mean immediate dismissal. She remembered that clause because she'd joked with Edfu when she'd signed it that 'dismissal' in Elite language probably meant that your body would never be found.
She glanced back up at her sleeping watchman and reconsidered the pad he had been regularly checking; maybe it wasn't just showing updates from the Facility, but also showed what she was working on.
She felt insulted again.
They should trust her enough by now not to watch everything she did; she'd done absolutely nothing wrong since she'd started here at the Facility. But, then someone with her history was more than likely to relapse into bad behaviour after a time.
So...maybe her being left alone in here was actually a test?
She narrowed her eyes up at the guard. Maybe they were taking the opportunity to loosen the rein only to check that she wouldn't break it?
Or, there was the distinct possibility that she was just completely over-thinking it all.
She looked out across the dark computers around her. A year ago she would have practically started salivating at the prospect of such easy access to Elite tech. Even the smallest little thing, like a basic computer programme, could be sold for a vast amount of currency outside the Alliance. It wasn't like she couldn't take a short trip out of Alliance space via a Portal to sell that sort of thing. She already knew the right contacts to use to make such a sale. In fact, the Tile Brothers would probably have offered her almost anything for a stolen Elite programme.
In fact, regardless of any possible sensor-net, just looking at the deep coding of the programmes would be easy for her. She could easily cover what she would do; she'd just make it look like she was using the existing Elite programmes as examples to build newer versions for the new computer. She could then look through all the code and probably remember enough of it to later recreate it on an isolated pad in her quarters. With her own security programmes, she could probably hide it from any sensor scans they might run. Or at least, she could try.
Except, the startling fact for her was that she hadn't even thought about any of this until now. Well, she'd wondered intensely at how she might attempt a basic hack of the Elite computer, because that was pretty much why they had employed her. Here she was trying to design a programme for the Elite that she would struggle to hack. Her being a hacker was part of her life, but it seemed that, somewhere along the way, she'd stopped even looking for opportunities to hack anything. Truthfully, she had probably learnt even more about computer systems in the last months working here with the project team anyway; they were literally geniuses and she had no intention of risking such a good opportunity as this job provided for her.
She had intended to make a fresh start in her life and, it seemed now, that she really did mean it.
It felt slightly disorientating actually. She'd spent so much of her life doing stuff just to survive, which had included hacking to get intel to protect herself and those she had to watch over. Without that role, well, she felt kind a bit empty and useless right now.
Which felt even more so with the big empty room around her. Everyone else was getting to help out, but she was in here by herself.
She had the project work, at least. Except it didn't feel all that thrilling today with no one to talk to and just coding to run.
She looked back up at the guard, who was far too relaxed for his job description, and realised that, the hacking stuff aside, she really missed her former Security Lead role. Oneakka had told her that she had perhaps taken on that career in an effort to control scum criminals as a reaction to her childhood bullying by the Glisi and then growing up on the streets of various planets. She'd learnt to stand up for herself and others, and had turned that into a life purpose. A purpose that she felt she had kind of lost now.
Well, she might not be a Security Lead anymore, but she still wasn't going to allow such an obvious slip of security go by.
She got up from her seat and headed down the aisle between workstations, her eyes up on the guard. He hadn't moved or reacted in any way, so he clearly wasn't watching her even under lowered eyelids.
At the front of the room, she reached the little food station where there was the usual small selection of food and drink for the project team. She picked up one of the empty plastic drinks cups, stepped back and lobbed the cup up towards the overhead observation room's glass front. The cup bounced harmlessly off the tempered glass, but it achieved her aim of startling the guard inside out of his nap.
He shot up from his chair, blinking rapidly, one hand falling onto the top of one stunner.
She took another step back so he could see her better from the steep angle. His eyes had gone immediately to her now empty station and now snapped down to her.
She waited until he met her eyes and then she shook her head at him, showing her disapproval of his sleeping on the job and she pointed up at him. She mouthed 'no sleeping' clearly and slowly, which brought back plenty of memories of trying to keep her former Dreamstation and Lalwani security teams in line. How many times had she caught them napping on a long shift? As the years had passed, they had learnt that she wouldn't let that kind of thing pass. She had had a rule that it was better to ask for brief cover and go take a break than it was to try to force through and end up falling asleep and risking security measures.
This guard's eyes lowered to the floor off to her left where the cup had fallen and she could see him work out that it had been her that had woken him. She walked the short distance to retrieve the cup and looked back up at him.
He gave her a slightly sheepish look and then a nod. Good. He could have cost the Elite some computer tech by taking his eyes off her, either from above or via his pad if he had been observing her computer access.
She moved back to the food station and selected a new cup and filled it from one of the large pots that kept the liquid hot throughout the day. It was an Athosian tea that seemed very popular in the Facility, and had become her hot drink of choice when she was working.
Without looking back up at the guard, she headed back towards her workstation.
She sat back down on her tall and oddly comfortable work chair, and set her tea down on the workstation, only for her eyes to stray to the small data drive lying close by.
She had promised herself that she'd wait until after work hours to listen to the Earth music. She'd clearly not get any work done if she started listening to music from another galaxy!
Still...
She sat back in her chair and considered the small data drive.
The timing of the gift had been very obvious. Oneakka never did anything without a purpose behind it. He'd been pretty clever about what he'd chosen to use as his weapon too. Music from another galaxy was the perfect gift to distract her from the crisis around her. But, maybe, he also understood how much she hated not being able to get involved with the crisis, so maybe the gift had also been intended to appease her; which was really annoying because, regardless of his intentions, the gift had provoked all sorts of stupid little feelings in her.
She frowned at the offending, and desperately appealing, data drive.
It was a gift so well crafted to her, but did that mean that he'd gone out of his way to get the Earth music from Sheppard. Or had it been that Sheppard had been talking about music and that had given Oneakka the idea? Or maybe Oneakka had mentioned her music obsession in that conversation and Sheppard had been the one to offer her music? So maybe it didn't represent anything on Oneakka's part. Or had he thought it up alone?
Okay, she was clearly over-thinking things again, which seemed to be the theme of this afternoon.
The music was simply hers now, and it didn't matter what Oneakka's calculated motivations were, because she had music from another galaxy.
The stupid idiotic feelings could just go and jump off a cliff into freezing water for all she cared.
On impulse, she grabbed up the drive, removed its cover and slid it into the side port of the workstation screen she used for her music when working. She unclipped her portable music device from her hip pocket and connected it up to the screen as well. By the time all was in place, the music had already starting downloading automatically to her music folder on the workstation database, and she tapped it to go through to the portable player.
As it worked away, she glanced back up towards the guard, who was very awake and had selected to pace across the observation room – a far wiser choice considering his boredom.
A light lit up on the side of her portable player, confirming the download as complete. None too eagerly, she removed the player and pressed the earphones into her ears. The small screen showed the new folder of music, which showed the successful download of a long list of new music from the data drive. Sheppard hadn't just given her a few pieces of music.
She lifted a finger to trigger the first song to play, except the Project Room door at the far end of the room suddenly swung open. Seeal snapped her gaze up over the top of her computer screens to see a lone figure stood in the doorway.
Maja.
A sense of dread elbowed out Seeal's former excited anticipation of hearing the new music.
Maja was probably the main person in the Facility who would freak out if she knew Seeal was in here by herself. The woman did not like her, which was understandable considering Maja's position as Joint Security Lead of the Facility. Seeal would probably have been equally unhappy if someone of her own history and skills being allowed to roam Dreamstation by themselves.
Still, it wasn't all that comfortable being on the other end of such aggressive professional focus.
Maja gave a 'come here' motion with one hand from the doorway.
Interesting.
Seeal stood up from her chair, pausing to lock up her computer screens as per protocol. In fact, it felt especially important to make sure Maja saw that. She slid her portable player back into her pocket, tucking the earphones in with it, and headed down the room towards Maja.
Maja glanced away as she waited, looking down at a larger than normal computer pad resting in the curve of her arm – Halling had had one of those in the canteen. However here, Maja's divided attention was probably designed to make it clear that she had more important things to be doing that talk to Seeal.
As Seeal approached the doorway, Maja looked back up towards her. "You're wanted," Maja simply stated and then disappeared into the corridor outside.
"O-kay," Seeal muttered as she followed, stepping out of the Project Room to find that Maja was already a good couple of metres down the corridor. The woman looked back over her shoulder with a frown that said clearly that Seeal was moving too slowly.
Did that mean this was something urgent? Something to do with the crisis maybe? Anticipation returned, kicking out the dread. This was probably to do with her having spotted the similarity between the vanishing Hive's output and the slug robots.
Seeal quickened her steps, eager to find out now. "What's going on?" She asked as she caught up with Maja.
"You have some expertise and you will provide that expertise," Maja instructed, her tone hard and her attention fixed forward. Clearly she wasn't pleased about this. "You understand that this goes against my recommendation," Maja stated without any further preamble.
"I don't doubt that," Seeal replied back just as honestly.
Maja finally looked round at her as they marched at a super fast pace down the corridor. The woman's eyes drilled into Seeal with the skill and confidence of her post. "In this Facility, your opinions only matter as they relate to the fight against the Wraith, plain and simple. Everybody in this Facility is dedicated to that pursuit alone, not to personal gain."
"I've heard this lecture before," Seeal interrupted her, cutting off any more of the Tyoosi-style speech about honour and how she didn't have any. "And I'm not arguing with it. I'm not looking for your, or anyone's, approval."
"I don't care how you feel about things," Maja returned, her eyes on Seeal while still leading them through the Facility without any obvious glances forward. Maja knew this Facility so well that she didn't even need to look where she was going; Seeal could relate to that. "I only care about protecting this Facility and all in it."
"I get that," Seeal agreed.
"You will be going into an Incident Room, where you will be privy to restricted, highly confidential information," Maja stated. "You will not be allowed to access any terminal, console, or database without myself, Edfu, or an Elite present with you. You will not record, alter, or influence anything you see, touch, hear, or smell."
"What about licking something, is that allowed?" Seeal baited her, and instantly wished she hadn't. Maja was doing her job, which was a job Seeal had done herself for years and deeply respected.
"You are not to work by yourself at any time unless you have prior and specific approval to do so," Maja ignored the licking comment, which was a good move on her part. Don't lower yourself to the criminal's level.
Not that Seeal was technically a criminal anymore, but for Maja she was and would always be a potential threat. Seeal would only have thought less of the woman if she didn't think that.
"You will remain in the Incident Room only for as long as you are useful and then you will leave and will not return without a direct invitation from the Elite," Maja continued. "Once you leave the Incident Room, you will not discuss or record anything that you saw, unless specifically instructed to do so by the Elite."
Maja finally stopped outside a large closed door in an area of the Facility that, though close to the project's research sector of the Facility, was still an area Seeal hadn't been before. There were two guards stationed outside the large door, both looking far more alert than the one she had left behind in the Project Room.
"Is that all understood?" Maja demanded, clearly not going to allow Seeal to progress any further without agreement.
Seeal faced her, making direct, but not aggressive, eye contact. "Yes, fully understood."
Maja studied her.
Seeal waited.
She could feel the two guards watching, no doubt taking far too much interest in the exchange.
"I will be watching you, Seeal of Dreamstation," Maja warned, and Seeal believed every word of it.
"I would be surprised if you didn't," Seeal replied.
Maja's eyes narrowed, but she turned towards the large door, which was pulled open by one of the guards. It was a proper hinged door, not an electrically controlled sliding door as used in the rest of the Facility. That was a very telling fact to Seeal. As she followed Maja through the large doorway, she glanced at the door's hinges, noting the impressive thickness of the wall and the door. Despite their size, the large hinges moved silently.
As the door closed behind Seeal and Maja, Seeal noted the various locks and brackets on the inside. There was a large metal beam along the wall beside the door that could clearly be slid across the door and held in place by the big brackets. This door was designed to hold back an army and was clearly a fallback position within the Facility. Interestingly, that fact hadn't been included in the mandatory Facility emergency protocols that Seeal had seen and was tested on weekly. So, this was a room only the Elite used for panic situations, not for the rest of the Facility's staff. Or had it been omitted from only her protocols?
Seeal turned away from the door, and the two new guards stationed inside, and suddenly the door became far less impressive.
The Incident Room was twice the size of the large Project Room, and every piece of wall space was taken up with displays, consoles, communication screens and there was at least one person in front of each. Across the floor, there were large round tables around which more people were gathered, all in deep discussion, arms moving, voices all joining up into a general chorus of constant sound filling the room. This was a war room, with charts, links, voices, and assessments going on everywhere she could see.
Which included Maja's back heading away through the room. Seeal followed quickly, while also taking in as much as she could of the fascinating room around her. As she slid past one particularly large table surrounded by a mass of people, she spied what looked like an actual holographic display moving above the table's surface. She hadn't seen that kind of tech before here. She slowed her steps, peering through the small gaps between those gathered around the display. The holographic image displayed a planetary system, the moons and planets moving around two suns. The holograms were surprisingly stable and the images very clear. She wondered if it was Ancestor tech.
Someone at the table noticed her watching and frowned at her with disapproval. He was a mature military lifer by the looks of it, clearly not Elite, but also someone who was used to people following protocols. She sent him a smile, as if nothing were wrong, and continued on in pursuit of Maja.
Maja was headed off towards the far right corner of the massive room, so Seeal followed, only her attention fell on the far wall ahead. She had never seen so many display screens working together before. The entire far wall was a display! And in the middle of the massive screen, the image of a Wraith Hive ship slowly turned.
Forgetting where she was headed, Seeal just walked slowly towards the massive screen, studying the slow turning Hive. She hadn't seen too many Hive ships before, having faced most Wraith in her life either on foot or when they were in their buzzing fighters flying overhead; however, even she could tell that this Hive didn't look right.
She slowed to a stop below the large display and frowned at the scale reading. Surely Hives weren't normally that big, were they? And this one looked more...lumpy. In fact there was a particularly large lump that appeared close to two labelled engine pods.
A new drive maybe? Was that the new tech that allowed the Hive to jump location undetected? Or some sort of cloaking field generator set near the engines due to its power requirements?
On the right of the Hive was displayed some readings she recognised – those Halling had had on his pad, some of which she had identified as the same as the slug robots and the Seed ship. There was another set of readings displayed below them though. She frowned up at them, moving faintly to the right to look up at them more closely. It looked like some sort of radiation with protons and electromagnetic components, but then some other things she had no idea about. She wasn't all that knowledgeable about particle physics, but that she hadn't seen anything like it before suggested it was something new. Maybe the cloaking field or new drive? There had been some high energy readings in those in the other display that Halling had-
"Seeal?" A voice arrived from her immediate right and she looked round to see Elite Massa stood beside her. He also had baby Aki fast asleep in the sling across his front.
She indicated the large displayed Hive. "They aren't normally that big, are they?" She checked. Maybe the Wraith were using bigger Hives now.
"No," Massa confirmed with a shake of his head, glancing at the display and back to her. Seeal noticed that one of his large dark hands had settled protectively over little Aki' sleeping head.
"Does Aki help with strategy or defence in here?" She asked, jokingly.
Massa smiled. "He's calming," he replied, which seemed a rather telling answer. He glanced off to the right front corner of the room. "They're waiting for you."
Seeal looked towards the indicated corner, which was filled with not only the usual array of consoles and freestanding small tables as elsewhere across the room, but there were clearly more personal tablets and computers here, and those sat around them looked decidedly non-military. There had to be a good twenty plus of them, and most of them were all looking in her direction, until she focused on them and they all immediately looked back to their work. Definitely not military, and judging by the more scruffy clothing and high frowning foreheads, these were the scientists in the room. She even spotted a couple from the project sat towards the back, and she was rather surprised that Ru wasn't in here.
But it was the small group stood waiting for her that drew the rest of her attention, and, among them, a far more familiar face. Oneakka turned from talking with another Elite – who appeared to have an entire robotic leg – and looked towards her, his arms crossing over his brown body armour. Beside him, two of the scientist crowd were looking at her expectantly, and Maja was now nowhere to be seen.
Seeal headed towards them, Massa having stayed back to do whatever he was in charge of in here today.
As she reached them, Oneakka stepped forward slightly and one pale hand lifted towards the male scientist waiting for her. "Seeal," he said without any further greeting, "this is Silvar and Heka," he introduced them.
"Greetings," Silvar said, and Heka echoed it a beat later. Seeal suspected that Silvar, judging by his body language and the way Heka slightly deferred to him, was the dominant one in this corner of the room.
"Hi," Seeal replied.
"We were very fascinated in your finding the link between the organic driven robotic devices and the new technology," Silvar stated with no other formalities.
He'd said 'new' technology, so they hadn't seen what the Wraith were using before now.
"And the Seed Ship," Seeal added.
"Exactly," Silvar smiled, his grin almost manic. "Very interesting link you found."
Seeal looked back towards the large display. "I'm assuming the big extra lump on their hull is something to do with their new tech?"
"Yes," Silvar replied, "that is our assertion as well. Until we have further data to confirm or discredit that assertion."
"And the weird radiation?" She asked, pointing up towards the other readings.
"Emitted by the Hive, but it increases upon the Hive's arrival and departure from its jump points," Silvar supplied, a little smile suggesting she had impressed him again. Was she trying to impress him? Maybe prove her value in this room?
A particular comment registered though. "Jump points? So it's not using a cloaking field?"
"Not that we can tell," Silvar replied. "Are you aware of any technology outside, or inside, our territory that creates anything like what you see up there?"
"None," Seeal confirmed instantly. "Outside the possible new drive pod, why is the Hive so misshapen?" She asked in return.
"We think the hull has been purposefully thickened," Oneakka was the one to answer her this time. She slid her gaze to meet his. She hadn't gotten to listen to any of the music and already here she was included in the crisis. His gift hadn't been needed after all it seemed.
"Bracing it against the forces involved in the new tech?" Seeal guessed.
"And," Heka now entered the conversation, "I supposite that the hull may be thickened to help protect it against the effects of the radiation, which we have identified as damaging to organic matter, particularly over time."
Seeal frowned at that. "But all Wraith tech is organic, isn't it?" She looked back to Oneakka.
He nodded.
"Why would they use something that'll damage their own ship?" She asked.
"Wraith tech heals," Oneakka suggested with a slightly shrug.
"It is likely that they only activate their new tech when they attack, so as not to damage their own systems," Heka suggested.
"And it may be that this new technology is still in the developing and testing phase," Silvar suggested.
That made a little more sense. "Which is why they didn't attack for every long."
"That is our current hypothesis," Silvar supplied.
"They're experimenting," Seeal frowned at that worrying idea. Wraith developing new tech wasn't a nice thing to think about.
"Another theory is that it's very old tech and they're trying to tie it into the Hive's systems," Oneakka added.
"Old tech, like the Elite think happened with that Seed Ship and the slug robots," she recalled.
Oneakka nodded. She could tell that he preferred this theory to the brand new tech idea.
"Neither of those gave off dangerous radiation," she considered. "Are we sure they're the same kind of tech?"
"You're the one who found the link," Silvar smiled at her. "Which is why we have invited you to assist us. We are working at finding a way to disable the new technology." He held forward one of those larger pads which showed various different sets of data. As some of it moved, Seeal realised this was a real-time observation of the work being done around her by the scientists.
They were analysing the new tech's readings in far greater detail, pulling sections of it apart. One part had been identified as purely the usual engine systems, another as parts of weapons discharges. The Elite no doubt had all the usual readings of Hives to work from, so the scientists were trying to isolate specific unknown areas and looking at how to maybe destabilise them with counter frequencies. It was highly technical stuff and not really her area of expertise.
"You were able to counter the hacking abilities of the organic driven robotic devices," Silvar continued.
"Slug robots," Seeal replaced his longwinded description, but she was mostly focused on the lines of data now. "Some of this seems broken up," she noticed.
"The scans you see here and above are actually composites of many filtered and reconstructed sensor readings. The radiation interferes with all types of tech, though we have found some radio and link frequencies that hold up against it, for the most part," Silvar supplied. Seeal was a little shocked at that. The amount of hours and intense work it must have taken to work out the filtering system and patch all these readings together into an understandable and logical whole...
She frowned at the mass of information. "I'm no expert on Wraith tech," she had to admit.
"We have plenty who are," Silvar replied. "But you clearly have a gift for recognising patterns within a mass of data, and you are one of very few who have had direct experience in dealing with the organic...slug robots."
Seeal almost smiled at the scientist's wince at using the very non-technical description.
"Oneakka!" A voice cut over the discussion and Seeal looked round to see Halling heading towards them with a worried frown across his face. She felt Oneakka tensing up near her shoulder before he moved around behind her, heading to meet Haling.
"We have a console free for you to use," Silvar said to Seeal, clearly not interested in the Elite interruption. Seeal looked towards the console just to the left that Silvar indicated.
"Thanks," she smiled, but she quickly looked back round to where Oneakka had met Halling.
"We have another problem," she could hear Halling say. "Teyla has dialled in from Atlantis." Teyla was Elite Emmagan wasn't she? And she was in Atlantis? Were Atlantis under attack from this new Hive as well?
"Someone has taken Sheppard," Halling finished.
Seeal gave up any pretence of not listening in and turned to face the Elite. Sheppard was in trouble?
"Who?" Oneakka demanded, instantly angry at the news.
"Unclear," Halling replied. "They're holding him hostage."
Seeal lowered the pad in her hands, alarmed. Who would dare kidnap someone from Atlantis who was an Elite's husband? Were they crazy?
"Is the Portal still open?" Oneakka asked, moving away with Halling.
"No, it was needed for the first probe prototypes to go through to Deployment Station, but we're-" Halling replied but the rest was lost to Seeal as the two male Elite moved out of earshot.
How were they going to help Sheppard with this crisis going on?
"Staff member Seeal?" Silvar's voice cut through her worries as she watched Oneakka's back disappear into the busy crowd of the Incident Room.
Feeling rather torn, and so very much out of the intelligence loop, she turned back round towards Silvar. He was stood by the console he had indicated was for her. She headed towards him, her eyes returning to the data on the pad in her hand.
"I have set the display to show all the new Hive's readings," Silvar explained as she sat down in the low chair in front of the console with its single screen – her new workstation. "And on this side, the more standard readings we would expect from a Hive, while down here we have included a link to the Seed Ship and slug robot data. Look through it all and if you see anything interesting, even fleeting, inform me. Understood?"
Seeal nodded.
"Good," Silvar smiled and reached for the pad he had given her earlier. She handed it to him and he then turned away, moving onto something else.
Left alone on the console, one clear task assigned to her, she frowned over her shoulder in the direction Oneakka and Halling had gone. She hoped Sheppard was okay.
She might have finally been asked to help with the current crisis, but it sounded like another crisis was happening on the other side of the galaxy. She couldn't help with that, but at least she could now help a little with the Hive issue.
That was helpful enough.
Wasn't it?
000000
It was the third wormhole in from the Alliance in the last hour and a half, but, so far, there had been no real progress on solving who had John.
And it appeared that John's capture was particularly badly timed for the Elite. The Alliance was under attack by a massive Wraith Hive that appeared to have the capability to appear within Alliance space without warning and disappear just as fast. Lives had been lost and a Hive was on the loose inside their borders. It made sense that they couldn't give Atlantis a mass of soldiers, ships and their undivided attention to finding John, but Sam damned well wished that they could.
The Elite appeared willing to help as much as they were able at least, but so far that only comprised providing the tech needed to, hopefully, trace the planet of origin the hostage takers were broadcasting from. In turn, the Elite had actually asked Sam for her help in whether Atlantis had encountered any Wraith tech with the capabilities of their terrorising Hive. Sam had had to report that they had no intel to share, and a search of the Ancient database hadn't heralded anything helpful. Rodney had already found details of the Ancients' theories on how to create a wormhole drive, but it was clear that they hadn't been successful. So, she hadn't been able to provide assistance to the Elite, and they were restricted in what help they could give.
Sam was not liking today.
The event horizon rippled below and two people emerged through the Gate, both pushing a waist-high trolley of tech. Elite and Alliance military tech. It was clear that the two men with the equipment were not Elite and were instead the promised technicians who would help Elites Emmagan and Si connect the tech up to Atlantis' systems. Sam worried on her lip as she watched Sumner meeting the two technicians in the middle of the floor below, overseeing the brief security checks before allowing them up to the Control Room behind Sam.
She just prayed they would be able to get the tech interfaced with the Ancient systems effectively and quickly enough. Part of her desperately wanted to lend a hand, to be able to help solve the puzzle and learn about the new tech, but that wasn't her job today. She had to leave that to Rodney and Radek to work with the two Elite and their technicians.
Elite Si appeared in Sam's view down into the Gate Room, and she watched him jog down the wide staircase to meet the newly arrived technicians.
Sam heard Chuck confirm arrival of the technicians over the radio to the Elite's Facility, and a second later the Gate shutdown. The Elite needed their own Gate as available as possible right now. Idly, Sam wondered how they handled the logistic nightmare of coordinating an area as vast as the Alliance's territory during a crisis. Some days she struggled with just Atlantis.
The balcony railing felt oddly warm in her hands as she watched Sumner and his team checking over the Elite tech, Elite Si at their side. Sam ran her eyes over the tech, seeing cables fixed at the sides, some of which looked already designed to perhaps interface with Ancient tech, but she was too high up to tell for certain. It wasn't her job right now anyway. Not anymore.
As if on cue with that thought, someone stepped up to the railing next to her. She watched Jack's hand settle on the railing close, but not too close, to her own hand, and she looked round at him, feeling desperately grateful that he was here.
Probably more than anyone else here, Jack completely understood everything she had to think about and everything she was feeling about this crisis. He had been stood in her place himself, and, in fact, she had been the one seemingly lost on another planet and held hostage. He also knew about the pressures of having to play the role of calm and in control leader, while inside she had nothing but fears and worries. One of her people was being held and threatened and she had little or nothing yet that would help her save him. Feeling helpless was hardly a new feeling, but she hated it today more than ever.
"Shipment in then, huh?" Jack asked as they looked down into the Gate Room together.
"Hopefully the Elite tech will help us track down the source Gate," Sam nodded. So far, Emmagan and Si hadn't been able to get anything useful from the recording of the dial in from John's kidnappers. The Elite needed their own equipment and there was no promise that they'd be able to get it working before the next dial in.
"You think that's going to work?" Jack asked, sounding doubtful.
"In theory," Sam explained, "by analysing the background of the transmission-"
"The background?" Jack asked.
"Think of it like an audio recording," she explained, "if you filter out the voices, there may be other 'sounds' recorded in the background that can help identify where it was made."
Jack nodded. "So what we're hoping we'll hear people talking in the background or the ocean?" He asked sarcastically, but she understood his point – what could they find in the background that would help when they were dealing with a wormhole, not a telephone call.
"Instead of it being just audio, they're looking for background frequencies that's separate from that produced by a wormhole," Sam explained to him, "and, hopefully, that might help them identify which planet, or region of the galaxy, its coming from."
Jack's expression pinched slightly. "Sounds complicated."
Sam nodded. "And even if they can find evidence in the background, that still has to be recognisable and distinctive enough to pinpoint a planet that the Elite, or we've, been to." Sam really didn't like the odds.
The worst part of that plan was that they might need to wait for the next dial in from the kidnappers to be able to properly analyse the background; and even if the next dial in allowed the Elite to identify the planet of origin, and that Sam could immediately then deploy a rescue team through the Gate, it was still going to be after the Wraith was likely used on John again.
She felt completely useless.
How many times could a Wraith feed on the same person? The kidnapper had said that they knew it took three hours between feedings for their victim to recover enough for another feeding, which meant that people could be fed on multiple times using their 'system'. But how many times? They knew from the case of Ellia feeding on her 'father' that a person could survive a short period of being feed upon, but maybe she had been more careful. The Wraith used on John had clearly not been trying to be gentle.
Even the Elite didn't know a great deal about the Wraith feeding process, which was understandable since their job was to kill the Wraith, not study the tiny detail of the feeding process. So, there was no way to adequately judge how much of John's life had already been taken, and how much a second feeding would cost him. Even if they could save him, but it took too long, then he could return an old man.
Sam let out breath, forcing away the turning worried thoughts. They weren't helping.
Below, Sumner had finished the security checks and the Elite tech was being wheeled towards the staircase.
"It all seems a little coincidental to me," Jack muttered thoughtfully alongside her as they watched Si and a technician lift the first trolley up the stairs. Sumner ordered two Marines to help the other technician carry up the other trolley. "The Alliance gets attacked just when we need their help?"
Sam looked round at him, surprised at the point. "You think this is some elaborate plan on behalf of the Alliance?" Sam asked.
Jack twitched a cheek, which meant he didn't actually believe his theory. "Just seems a coincidence," he added with a one shoulder shrug, "and you know how I feel about those."
She returned his tense smile. "I don't think the Elite are lying about a crisis just so they don't have to help us, but the timing is suspicious. Maybe whoever took John is using the Alliance crisis as a cover."
"Maybe," Jack considered quietly, "or this is actually because of our new contact with the Elite."
Sam turned towards him now, settling one elbow on the railing. "That maybe Sheppard was taken because he's now married to Elite Emmagan?"
"If there are these Ancient worshipper people in the Alliance who think they deserve this city more than us," Jack settled his own elbow along the railing to face her, "taking Sheppard would be a good way to get a lot of attention for their cause."
Sam considered that theory from different angles. "I'm not convinced that makes sense for them," she replied, knowing Jack wouldn't take offence to her disagreeing. "Irritating the Elite at the time when the Alliance needs the Elite the most wouldn't help them gain support."
"Or someone just wants Sheppard out of the equation," he considered.
"My gut still says it's Kolya," Sam admitted. "It fits his MO to take advantage of the Alliance's crisis to grab the Major. And I get the feeling that Elite Emmagan thinks the same."
Jack nodded and then glanced aside into the busy Control Room. Sam could see that Si and his technicians had the trolleys up into the room finally and were rolling them towards where Rodney and Radek were stood with Emmagan ready to start trying to interface the tech.
"Did you see Emmagan's face when she watched the tape?" Jack asked quietly.
"Yes," she replied, meeting Jack's dark bright eyes and everything he was implying with his look. "But, I don't think it's wise for us to go making any assumptions," she attempted.
A faint smile lifted Jack's lips. "I think you and I are uniquely qualified at spotting those kinds of assumptions."
She could hardly disagree with that. She had often wondered how many in the SGC had quietly seen the attraction between her and Jack in all those long years they had worked together in the SGC. Daniel and Teal'c had known for sure, though even they had admitted that they had pretended not to see anything for a long while.
"People can grow very close when they fight alongside each other," Sam pointed out, "but that doesn't mean they all get as close as us."
"Poor bastards," Jack joked with another smile that carefully towed the line of professional and flirtatious.
She allowed herself to smile back briefly before returning to the more serious matters. "Regardless of any 'assumptions', I think Elite Emmagan seems highly motivated to help us get the Major back."
"True," Jack agreed, serious again.
Sam looked back into the Control Room. Rodney, Radek and the Elite technicians were in deep debate at the Ancient console at the back of the room. Off to the right, the IOA reps were engaging in their own personal little debate about something; they'd been doing that for the last hour or so.
"How are things with the IOA team?" Sam asked, glancing back to Jack.
"They keep huddling. You know I hate it when they huddle," he replied.
She had to smile slightly at that. "You do remember that you're part of their team, right?"
Jack winced as if that fact was painful to him. He opened his mouth to say something further, but abruptly the Gate came to life down in the room below.
"Unscheduled off world activation," Chuck announced hurriedly across the room and Sam immediately pushed off the railing and headed towards him, aware of Jack following her.
"Time?" Sam asked as she reached Chuck's side at the Ancient's DHD console.
"We're still 1 hour 6 minutes out from the next target dial in," Chuck replied.
Was it the Elite dialling back in? Had they found something useful? Or was it John's kidnappers dialling in early to threaten them again?
"Or maybe this is their version of three hours," Sam considered out loud, glancing towards Jack on her right and Sumner on the other side of the console. She'd worried about this, but had hoped that the kidnappers had already known how long an Earth hour was from having access to John's watch.
She looked back down to the Ancient DHD where Chuck's hand was hovering over the shield activation button.
The atmosphere in the room around her was tense, with the only voices the distant conversation going on between Rodney and Elite Si at the back of the room. With only one more chevron to lock, Sam looked back towards them.
"Is the tech interfaced?" She asked them.
"Not yet," Radek was the one to answer, as Rodney was mostly hidden down behind one trolleys of Elite tech alongside Si.
"We need far longer," Emmagan added with a tense stern expression, her eyes on the glow emanating up from the Gate Room.
Sam turned back to watch the wormhole form and explode out from the Gate, turning and spiralling forward and then rushing back to form the ridiculously stable event horizon.
Chuck's hand fell instantly and the red glow of the shield shimmered over the Gate.
Chuck turned from the DHD to the main laptop on his right, which was just in front of Sam. She rested one hand on the console and fixed her eyes on the screen. Almost immediately a signal danced across the screen and a voice echoed up from the hidden speakers.
"Atlantis, this is Athos, are you receiving our transmission?" A male voice echoed up to her ears and she could practically feel the collective sigh of relief across the Control Room behind her.
"Confirmed, we are receiving Athos IDC," Chuck read out what Sam could see on the screen.
Sam nodded to Chuck as he opened the com frequency for her.
"Athos, this is Atlantis, we are receiving you," Sam called to the unknown voice.
"This is Lead Guard Vakalis, may I assume this is Colonel Carter?"
"We have video feed as well," Chuck said quietly from her side.
"Put it through," Sam nodded towards the nearby large screen. "Yes, this is Colonel Carter." She remembered the man from her visit to the Athosian Conference; he had been a constant presence near John throughout the visit.
"Greetings, Colonel Carter. May I request to speak with Honoured Elite Emmagan as well?"
The screen came to life ahead of Sam as she stepped up to it and she already saw Emmagan rounding the screen, the warrior stepping into place beside Sam as the recognisable face of Vakalis appeared.
Vakalis' eyes immediately switched to Emmagan. "Honoured Elite," he bowed his head.
"What have you found?" Emmagan asked him.
"I have conferred with the Elite Facility, as well as our contacts in Division and Enforcement," Vakalis began to report, and immediately Sam felt a touch of relief – the Alliance really were helping. "So far, we have been unable to identify any of the Ancestral groups who had professed to reclaim Atlantis who have anywhere near the connections, firepower, and willingness to undertaken the capture of Major Sheppard."
"What of those who issued threats against him?" Emmagan asked, her tone direct and her words clipped.
Emmagan had told them of some threats they had received against John's life, but they had all been dismissed. Unfortunately now that John was something of a public figure in the Alliance, it was inevitable that such threats would be made against him, not that Sam liked it. Nor did she like the fact that they had to rely on the Alliance to ensure the threats were dealt with and were not any real area of concern.
"All those who made the threats have already been arrested and charged by Enforcement," Vakalis reported. "Enforcement are questioning them all further, but so far it seems that none of them had any real plans to follow through in their threats."
Emmagan nodded, seeming unsurprised. She hadn't appeared all that worried about the threats when she had told Sam, nor had Torren when he'd first mentioned that it might happen.
"How can we be certain it isn't a group that hasn't yet been identified by your Enforcement?" Sam asked Vakalis and Emmagan. "A group could be working outside the Alliance."
"It is possible," Emmagan replied to her, "but the reality is that the Ancestor groups are not truly motivated to act against you because of their high regard for the Ancestors. We have previously allowed it to be known, with Major Sheppard's permission, that he carries the Ancestor genetics, and therefore, to them, he is actually a child of the Ancestors."
Sam nodded, understanding now. "Major Sheppard is a descendant of the Ancestors."
"And the Ancestors showed you the way back here to their city," Emmagan added. "These groups are angry that they cannot occupy this city, but at the same time they will not actually attempt to take it in fear that they would be going against the wishes of the Ancestors."
"Could there be a split group, more military minded to take the city?" Sumner asked from Emmagan's left.
"It is possible," Emmagan replied, glancing at Vakalis.
"We have found no evidence of one, other than the primary target former Commander Acastus Kolya," Vakalis supplied. "We already know that he tried to take Atlantis once before and he has attempted to assassinate Major Sheppard. He also has followers who live with him outside our territory who all have the means and training to take Major Sheppard."
"What of the faces in the recording I supplied?" Emmagan asked him.
Vakalis' expression shifted. "That is the most interesting part of the theory. None of them have been found in searches using the military, Enforcement or Division databases. However, we are in agreement that there are many indicators about them that suggest they are Genii." Emmagan nodded. "We know that the Elite and Division have found deletions within the databases that have been tracked back to Iketani' past betrayals. Considering her known past association with Kolya, she may have deleted certain Genii entries from the official databases for him."
Emmagan sighed lightly next to Sam. "Are we able to find out what she deleted?"
"No," Vakalis replied. "There are a few people working on it in the Facility, but they have not been successful. However, they have found references in the Toshka database that he recorded some seemingly dead Genii who have been identified as being with Kolya."
Sam frowned. "Toshka database?"
"Toshka is a criminal who kept a vast amount of blackmailing material in his own personal database. We retrieved it and have been working through it," Emmagan explained and then focused back on Vakalis. "Are there apparent deletions on the Genii' own database? Iketani surely could not have had access to that."
Vakalis gave a pointed frown. "This is where the evidence starts to get interesting, Honoured Elite. The Genii have denied us access to their planetary database."
"What?" Emmagan asked, angrily.
"Due to the Alliance-wide high alert, most planets are on shutdown protocols of non-emergency links and other communications," Vakalis reported. "But it has also come to light that there is a new riot taking place on the Genii homeworld. It is small, but this one is in the First City and Cowen has put everything into lockdown."
"Convenient," Sam muttered and glanced aside to where Jack stood out of view of the conversation with Athos.
"It is also known to us that Kolya is behind much of the civil unrest on the Genii homeworld," Vakalis added.
Sam understood. "He's causing problems on the homeworld to stop his people being identified and make Cowen look weak."
"Cowen will keep denying access to even the Elite if he thinks it will make the Genii look guilty," Emmagan stated, sounding angry. "We'll see if he sticks to that theory once I contact him directly."
"Might I suggest, Honoured Elite," Vakalis replied, "that both Colonel Carter and Leader Torren apply that pressure directly instead. Most will assume that you are within the Elite Facility and we have led even Enforcement and Division to believe the same. It may allow you to strike more effectively if the enemy do not believe any Elite are free to assist in the rescue mission."
"You think there may be Genii informants in Enforcement and Division?" Sam guessed.
"It is best to be cautious," Emmagan replied, but she sounded more thoughtful now. "Is there any new intel on Kolya himself?" She asked Vakalis.
"There is a lot of chatter about him among my contacts," he replied. "All of it is linked to the public disorder on the Genii homeworld. This latest riot started under the guise of protesting against the response to the new Wraith threat, but it has apparently quickly escalated to the usual anti-Cowen propaganda. The talk is that Kolya is driving this more than normal."
"More distractions," Emmagan muttered. "Any actual intel on Kolya's location?"
"None," Vakalis shook his head. "As before, all we have found is talk of his many different small underground bases spread throughout non-Alliance space. There is nothing so far to help us identify any planets, and since it is outside our territory, our information is limited. It is also possible that those who might have been able to quietly advise us on this are on the Genii homeworld and therefore currently unable to communicate with us due to the lockdown."
Yes, the little information that had come to Sam via Torren, suggested that there may be those within the Genii who would be prepared to help them hunt down Kolya.
"Anything else to report?" Emmagan asked.
"Nothing yet, Honoured Elite," Vakalis replied, appearing clearly disappointed that he didn't have anything else. "Leader Torren sends his thoughts again and repeats his regrets that he cannot assist more while Athos is on high alert."
Sam hadn't thought about that – Emmagan's home planet could become a target of the new Hive just as much as any other planet in the Alliance. Sam glanced at Emmagan's profile, but the same professional blankness was all that was visible right now.
"Keep working," Emmagan told Vakalis. "Be prepared to deploy once zero point."
"Already established, Honoured Elite," Vakalis replied with a nod and then his eyes switched to Sam. "To victory in rescuing Major Sheppard."
Sam nodded, "Thank you for your assistance."
"An honour to serve," Vakalis nodded and the screen went dark, and a second later Sam heard the Gate shutdown.
Turning to Emmagan, Sam considered the woman's dark frown. "Zero point?" She asked.
"Major Sheppard's Honour Guard stand ready to be deployed anywhere at any time," Emmagan replied.
"That's good to know," Sam replied as Sumner and Jack moved in towards her, forming a huddle; though Jack seemed okay with these types of huddles. "We can't be absolutely certain, I think it's looking increasingly like it is Kolya who has the Major."
"Which begs the question," Jack considered as he leant against a nearby console, "why hasn't Kolya killed Sheppard – he's tried before."
"Because keeping Major Sheppard alive for now serves him in some other fashion," Emmagan replied, her voice so emotionless that it came across sterner than if she had shouted.
"He can't force us to evac the city when he has only one hostage," Sumner supplied the blunt, but no less true, fact. If someone wanted to effectively threaten Atlantis like that, having one hostage that could be killed as a show of strength wouldn't work, as there was no further leverage for them to use.
"If it is Kolya, then I suspect that this has more to do with the politics back on the Genii homeworld," Emmagan replied. "Cowen is under significant political threat and is very close to losing control of his people," she shared.
Sam realised what Emmagan was saying. "You think Kolya is trying to take his place?"
Emmagan nodded. "He wants revenge for his excommunication and the seat of power that he believes he is now due."
"So he takes John," Sam considered the plan out loud, "threatens us and knows that we'll go to the Elite for help. Meanwhile he stirs up mass riots on the Genii homeworld, knows it will upset Cowen and make him defensive. We suspect Kolya and Cowen then refuses access to their planetary database, which makes him look highly suspicious. Seen as not helping the Elite will cause more unrest and push the Genii to remove him from power?"
"Or even require Enforcement to step in and perhaps even have to declare martial law on the Genii homeworld," Emmagan supplied. "Either way, it would be an effective way of pushing Cowen from power."
"Meanwhile, Kolya gets to kill Sheppard in a painful way that will give him the revenge he's been after these last years," Sumner added the more unsettling detail.
"And as Sheppard doesn't come back, there's no direct evidence that it was Kolya," Jack picked up the theory. "Because Kolya didn't appear in the video, maybe he can blame Cowen somehow."
"And I rejected the Genii' bid for the Political Marriage," Emmagan added, realising that extra element, "Cowen could be seen as taking out revenge on me and my chosen husband."
"Could it be Cowen who is actually behind all this?" Woolsey suddenly asked from behind Sam's left shoulder – she hadn't realised he and the other IOA had approached and were listening in. "What if it's the opposite of your predictions, and he's using Kolya as an excuse or cover for his own actions."
"For what end?" Sumner asked gruffly. "Cowen wants to stay in power, not take out revenge on the Elite and end up in a worse place.
"Either way, if it looks like Kolya and Cowen wins the day over Kolya, then he will regain political and military standing among the Genii. If he ends up helping us," Woolsey added, looking at Sam pointedly.
"We need to get Cowen to help us," she realised looking at Emmagan. "If we tell Cowen that we suspect its Kolya and that he's after the 'throne', as it were, then Cowen could give us all the access we need."
Emmagan's eyes suddenly brightened. Sam recognised that look, because she could feel it too -
Hope.
0000
TBC