Jump Chain Gothic 4 - Atlantis
Part 17
Taranis. Pegasus Galaxy
This planet was a former colony of the Lanteans, as evidenced by the outpost left behind, which had a dialing device like the one used in Atlantis, and it possessed a shield which was being powered by geothermal energy, which was far too advanced to have been made by the local humans.
I knew this because the natives had added their own touches to the place, it quickly became clear that while they were much more advanced that other humans in this galaxy, they weren't sophisticated enough to have built any a geothermal power plant. Which wasn't to say that they were primitive, just no advanced enough to care for this outpost.
During the War with the Wraith, the outpost on Taranis served as a drydock for the Ancient fleet, with one Aurora-class warship, the Hippaforalkus, being left behind after the Lanteans fled back to Earth. Yet again proving that the Ancients were terrible at cleaning up after themselves.
Taranis was currently populated by humans, who at some point in their history began to study the Lantean technology left behind, and even with their limited understanding they were able to us the shield to protect themselves from the Wraith. For some reason the Wraith didn't decide to commit the resources needed to destroy the outpost.
In the show the shield's over use of geothermal energy caused the dormant super volcano the base was in to become active. The Atlantis expedition came to Taranis, and helped most of the people escape, but the Stargate was destroyed, and a massive dust cloud emerged from the volcano, rendering the planet uninhabitable for several centuries.
As of yet that happened as by dumb luck the Taranis were discovered by my group sooner than the Atlantis expedition due to having been running a long range scan. We'd picked up elevated energy readings coming from this planet and had found this outpost. We'd diverted course with no real evidence to suggest we'd find something as important as this place.
We'd also scanned the Ancient vessel, and even from orbit we'd able to download some of its logs. According to the record, around 10,000 years ago, the Hippaforalkus suffered damage from battling the Wraith, and was berthed in a subterranean hangar on Taranis.
It was never fully repaired, however, and remained in the hangar after the Ancient's outpost on Taranis was evacuated near the conclusion of the Lantean-Wraith war.
Thousands of years later, the native Taranians discovered the ship but they lacked the scientific knowledge to repair it or the Ancient Technology Activation gene to operate it.
We transported down to the planet Taranis the day after we first made contact, and while they weren't yet having problems with their shield, they were signs of future issues. Even I could tell that I was no scientist. The mild tremor that started mere seconds after we beamed down into the outpost was a bit clue.
"Hello I'm Captain Gothic" I said as I introduced my away team "This is my science officer Seven of Nine, my escort Cameron, and my engineer Tali'Zorah".
As normal I'd left Miranda on board the ship as it wasn't a good idea to leave it unmanned.
"My name is Chancellor Lycus" said the older male as he indicated the very attractive female beside him "and this is our chief scientist Norina".
"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance," I greeted.
"Are you going to be the one to repair our shields," asked Norina.
She sounded very eager.
"Seven of Nine and Tali'Zorah will do what they can, if you wouldn't mind showing them to the control centre" I requested.
While we had gotten here before the super volcano started going off there might not be much we could do about it. Maybe the Ancients or the Asgard had some sort of technology that could handle this situation, but it was beyond my team's capabilities.
"Yes of course," Norina replied before going off with my science officer and chief engineer.
Once the ladies were gone Cameron and I were left alone with the Chancellor.
"Would you like a tour of the facility," asked Lycus.
There was something I wanted to see.
"Our scans show that you have an Ancestor ship docked in the lower levels" I told the leader of this world "The Ancestors have returned to Atlantis, and they may wish to reclaim the ship".
It was there's and I had no need of it. Even I could take it I had nowhere to put it and I didn't have a crew for it.
"Yes, yes of course," agreed the Chancellor
Soon he was leading the rest of my team towards the main hangar, and noted that he was avoiding any passageways that collapsed during the tremors that routinely shook the outpost in recent times. This was different than in the show, I didn't think the place had looked so bad in the canon timeline.
"Will the Ancestor claim their ship soon?" asked Lycus.
Given that they didn't really have the numbers to crew it they might not. However they may wish to have the ship dismantled so it couldn't be misused. I was somewhat worried that Tauri might discover the vessel, and come to take it, I was sure they'd find away to claim the vessel. Best that they never knew it was here,
"I can't say" I told the Chancellor "But if you'll allow my people to inspect the vessel and ensure that it's been taken care of I can promise a reward".
Now that got the man excited, however he kept himself under control.
"Reward?" he asked.
I nodded.
"Of course the Ancestors wouldn't take back their ship and leave you nothing in return, not after all the generations your people have safeguarded it" I promised "What would you like? Gold, jewels, weapons?".
(Line Break)
Taranis. Pegasus Galaxy.
After giving the Ancient warship a quick looking over I returned to the outposts control room to see how the work was progressing. At this point they were still running diagnostics.
While they did that I went over to a panel that was dormant and brought it online. Which got Norina's attention very quickly.
"How did you do that?" she wished to know.
"The Ancestors safe guarded most of their technology using a special gene, something that is their DNA, its like a key" I explained "Some humans have this key because some of the Ancestors had children with humans. The key can be passed on children. I have that gene and I can give it to people".
Now she was smiling at me.
"Are you a scientist as well?" she asked.
That was an interesting question.
"I have some understand of advanced technology" I informed the woman.
She moved closer.
"I am sure I can learn a great deal from you Gothic. Perhaps I could study under you," suggested Norina.
Her tone of voice let me know that she intended to be under me in more ways than one. I didn't understand her attraction to me. I could only guess that she mistakenly believed I was an Ancestor, and had become something akin to starstruck.
Or maybe it was just perks and body mods combined with how impressed she was by my ability to control Ancient tech.
"I'm sure there are a few things I can teach you, in fact we begin today if you like" I said to the woman "Of course if you really want to study and understand Ancient technology you'd be better off joining my crew. A few months on board my vessel and your understanding of technology will be greatly expanded".
To aid in that I could give her the gene and 'evolve' her mind just enough that learning how Ancient tech working became easier. That would be a good payment for a few months spent as part of my crew. Assuming she could find ways to make herself useful.
"Good, now let's see what is going on here," I muttered as I began reading the systems before me "We should check the power levels".
The level of energy being drawn upon had rapidly increased rather recently.
"You activated the shield, and put in on full about a year ago," I stated more than asked.
"Yes when the outposts' long range sensors detected the increase in Wraith activity. The Chancellor ordered it immediately. Is that a problem," Norina asked in concern.
Well that didn't explain why the power requirements for the shield had jumped up last just days ago, before going down again. As for the volcano issue. I could explain that once I had more information.
"What happened a few days ago?" I asked "Did something happen to the outpost".
Norina seemed surprised that I enquired about this.
"The shield was fired upon by an unknown ship" she told me "It attempted to bring down our shield, but then stopped and left a short time later".
I brought up a hologram of the planet and saw a ship belonging to the aliens who had attacked Atlantis. It had fired upon this outpost.
"One of their smaller craft landed outside the shield and four of the aliens entered the outpost" I was told "Fortunately our people stayed out of their way so only a few of our security personnel were killed, and three of the aliens were trapped under debris during a quake. Their craft left without the remaining alien trying to recover them".
The aliens must have realised that this outpost would be gone in a matter of weeks so had decided to leave it alone. I didn't know why they'd sent a team here, and I didn't think I ever would. Their actions were odd to me.
"Did you recover their bodies or any of their technology?" I asked.
It was an effort to hide how eager I sounded. But I think the Chancellor, who had joined our conversation picked up on it.
"Yes" said the Chancellor "Why do you wish to know?".
In truth I had a few reasons, mostly they involved wanting to study the alien remains and technology much like X-Com would, so that we could combat the alien menace. We knew so little about these aliens and that lack of information left us a great disadvantage.
"Chancellor I would like to buy anything you recovered from those aliens, bodies, weapons, armour, anything" I told the leader of this world "I'll pay any price you wish".
I was impressed by how quickly the man recovered from that bit of news and how well he was able to remain focused. Perhaps I should not have let him know how badly I wanted those samples, but it was too important not to give into any demands he had.
"First we must repair the shield" he insisted "Then we can discuss trade".
I liked that he saw to his people's safety over the chance to acquire riches.
"Well here's the bad news" I said "It won't happen immediately, but in a few weeks this planet will cease to be capable of supporting life"
I then proceeded to explain that the outpost was built on a super volcano in order to make use of the abundant geothermal energy to power the shield. The system was not designed to be used at full power for a year straight.
Because it had been that meant the pressure in the magma chamber below had increased enough that the volcano would soon blow; a forty mile wide volcano which would erupt and throw up a dust cloud which would blot out the sun.
Had the aliens not attack the volcano wouldn't have erupted for a few months, but the aliens had destabilised things even more.
"What volcano?" Lycus demanded to know "I see no volcano".
That's because he was standing in it.
"I think it will easier to see from orbit" I said.
With that I ordered Miranda to beam us up to the ship.
(Line Break)
Taranis. Pegasus Galaxy.
"Then we must soon begin evacuation…but where will we go," wondered the Chancellor "the ring of the Ancestors hasn't worked for months".
In canon the Chancellor would have been suspicious of Elizabeth Weir's motives. Being told the planet would no longer support life right after disclosing the existence of the Aurora class ship, later renamed the Orion, could make a leader suspicious like that. But that wasn't a concern here since he'd seen that I had the means to simply take what I wanted.
Plus he'd seen that I had my own ship, and he'd seen the outpost from orbit. Once he had the idea of it being in a massive volcano wasn't so odd.
Luckily we had weeks before the planet was rendered uninhabitable. It would have been more, however the unknown aliens had taxed the shields when firing on the outpost, which accelerated the problem.
"There are plenty of planets we can set you up on in the galaxy, even if you want a world to yourselves that's possible" I told the man as he sat down behind his desk "Or even a different galaxy if you wish. My ship has the ability to supply you a lot of resources that can help you rebuild".
I had more to say.
"As for the evacuation" I said next "Well you have weeks, so I suggest you tell your people to pack up what they can and prepare for a journey. We should be able to move all your people and a lot of your property within in the next weeks" I said.
Norina then asked the Chancellor if she could join my crew for a time so as to get a chance to study our advanced technology.
"Of course," agreed Lycus immediately "You should leave as soon as you can, and I hope you return with knowledge to share with your people".
This was Norina requested my aid in moving her stuff to my ship. Which involved going to her quarters. As soon as we were behind closed doors the mood changed.
"Gothic perhaps I could learn more than just science from you," Norina asked nervously as she unzipped the front of her outfit.
Some time was spent as I admired her form as she slipped off her clothes before me to reveal a firm body which looked very nice indeed.
"I would like that very much," I answered with a grin while slipping my own clothes off.
This wasn't unexpected for me, but I hadn't thought she'd move this quickly. Still I wasn't going to refuse an offer of sex from an attractive woman.
(Line Break)
Atlantis. Pegasus Galaxy.
While the Ancients had taken over running of the city, they had given over some room to the Tauri expedition, which was being allowed to stay, only in a much reduced capacity. Despite this they were still attempting to explore the Pegasus galaxy and to recover advanced technology for Earth's use. Only it wasn't going so well.
"So what do we know?" Weir asked to Shepard.
John Shepard had just returned from a mission which involved taking the Earthship Odyssey to a world which had once been inhabited by the Ancients.
"When we got there we saw one of those big O'Neill ships" Shepard reported "It called us up and told us to leave, which we did, after scanning the planet as much as we could".
The Asgard seemed to have a number of operations going on in this galaxy and no one from Earth had much of an idea of what was going on. The Asgard were being tight lipped about everything.
"And what did you find?" Weir asked.
This time Mckay spoke
"Nothing much, I analyzed the data, but the only thing that we know for sure is that the destroyed Wraith ships in orbit are old, as in war with Ancients old, so it wasn't the Asgard who kicked the crap out of them".
Weir, who had very recently been sent back to the city-ship known as Atlantis by the IOA, found this very odd.
"As far as we know the Asgard have never show any interest in this galaxy, but now it seems as if they were everywhere" Weir mused "They must be working with the Ancients to recover as much of the technology they left behind as possible".
Which they couldn't really argue against as it did belong to the Ancients.
"Mckay, did you find anything else on the database?" Weir wondered.
At least they had been allowed limited access to the Ancient database.
"Not much, only that it was an outpost were research was being done and…"
Before he could continue the doors of the room opened to allow Colonel Caldwell to enter.
"How was your trip?" enquired Weir.
Since the Tauri couldn't use Atlantis as a base of operations while exploring the galaxy, it was either the Daedalus or the Odyssey doing all the work. Mostly this involved the Daedalus shipping supplies from Earth to the Pegasus galaxy for the Tauri base in this galaxy, which wasn't fully up and running yet. Since the gates were still shut down there was little point having a base from which to explore.
"Boring as always, I couldn't bring everything from the list of supplies, but I brought the majority" he said before taking a seat. "I did manage to talk to the IOA, who finally got an answer from the Asgard, they told me that the Asgard will be dealing with some technology too advanced for us".
This news was not taken well.
"That's stupid! There's nothing too advance for us, at least once we have studied it" Mckay said.
In this time line he hadn't blown up a solar system.
"And what's IOA's opinion about all this?" Weir wondered.
She was worried that soon they'd all be recalled to Earth, and that their efforts in this galaxy would be for nought.
"They're divided on this" Caldwell said "Some countries want us to look for more technology in this galaxy before the Asgard find it, while others agree that there is some technology that is too advance for us, and well, they are pretty happy with what we already have, so they don't see the need to venture to other galaxies. General O'Neill at Stargate Command pointed out there is still a lot of our own galaxy left to explore, and that the money could be better spent building more of our new fighters and upgrading our ships".
Weir frowned and intertwined her fingers as she lamented the fact that her expedition really wasn't going well.
(Line Break)
Aurora-class Warship. Pegasus Galaxy.
My ship had returned to orbiting Atlantis as the city-ship needed protection and I had no desire to see the last of the Ancients on this plane of existence be slaughtered, not when I'd gone to all that trouble to recover them.
Not long after my ship entered orbit Thor called ahead to let me know that he would be beaming on board, which he did a few seconds later. Thankfully I was fully dressed and on the bridge at this point.
"We have located the Alterran outpost with a human population living nearby" Thor said, getting right down to business "As you informed us overuse of the outpost's energy source created a chain reaction that will end with the eruption of a supervolcano"
No surprises there, but it had seemed wise to get a second opinion just in case. I'd feel really stupid if we evacuated the planet and then found out the super volcano could be made dormant again with the use of some fancy Ancient or Asgard tech.
"Is there something that you can do to help them?" I asked.
While I had a plan in place the Asgard were a race that could get shit done very quickly and with good results.
"It has already be done" Thor informed me "It seems that the super volcano will erupt before we can stop it, so the population was evacuated to a planet in the Ida galaxy, in exchange they offered us the ship and the outpost".
Guess I must been more convincing about the dangers than I'd thought.
"The Atlantis Council has decided to... I believe the human term to be 'stripping for parts', the Ancients have taken over the outpost and are taking what they can before the volcano explodes" Thor told me "I am sure they would welcome your aid in that work and grant you some time to study the outpost if you wish".
That was smart as while Atlantis had to have some industrial capacity that didn't mean they knew how to use it as the remaining Ancients were the crew of warships not scientists and engineers. Merlin was a scientist, but he was just one man, and he leading the Lateans, so he was a busy person.
As such they would need to get replacement parts from somewhere, and while there was another city-ship in this galaxy that was one most buried and unstable. The outpost would hold together for a few more weeks, that was more than enough time to get the good stuff onto ships.
If time allowed I might take my companions back there, but there was plenty of other Ancient technology to study. Seven had more tech than she knew what do with.
"We will be taking the ship back to our homeworld for study" Thor let me know "This will involve dismantling the craft".
This was when Doctor Keller, who I didn't see much of as she always seemed to be busy working on something down in sickbay, entered the bridge.
"Gothic, I just finished my autopsy of the first alien body we got from the people on Taranis" she informed us.
This was good news as we still knew so little about these aliens, such as where they originated from and if they were ever at war with the Wraith or how they had concealed themselves from them Wraith long enough to progress to the technological level they were currently at.
What little we did know was that they possess a number of powerful ships that don't quite match up to Ancient or Asgard warship, but could surpass those of other races.
In the show this unknown species was encountered in an alternate reality, where they were attacking Atlantis. The alternate Daedalus was able to disable their ship before they jumped to the next reality. However, at least four of those aliens boarded the ship after one of their Fighters crashed with the Daedalus, those encountered were eventually killed.
The Daedalus later returned to the same reality and encountered the ship again, still disabled. The Daedalus had suffered heavy damage from fighting the ship's fighters but was later saved by the Atlantis expedition of that universe who helped destroy the alien fighters using their F-302 fighter-interceptors. It was unknown what happened to the battleship after the Daedalus jumped away but perhaps it was destroyed by the F-302s.
"Well for starters they share a resemblance to the Wraith, mostly the teeth and facial structure, this not just a resemblance" she said "They are very closely related to the Wraith. I'd say that they developed very differently, but have the same origins".
I wasn't that surprised, and while it was hard to tell I didn't think Thor was either. Something about those aliens had made me think they could be an alternate version of the Wraith.
"There also related to humans" the doctor was now saying "More so than the Wraith, they have a functioning digestive system, and no feeding organ on their hands, so they must eat normal food. They do share the Wraith's healing ability to an extent, but I think it would be diminished".
The aliens seemed tough in the show, but that might be because of their armour and cybernetic implants.
"They have some sort of synthetic implant in the left side of their skull" Keller told us next "I cut it out and gave it to Seven for study, there are more implants I can take out, and while I haven't learned that much about their biology just yet they seem to have a weakness to bright lights. I think they might live underground, perhaps that's how they hid from the Wraith".
At this point it seemed as if she had nothing else to say.
"Thank you Doctor" I said "Let me know when you learn more. In the meantime feel free to share what information you have gathered with your people on Atlantis".
The other bodies I'd already handed over to the Asgard and to the Ancients, and at some point I was sure we'd compared notes. I didn't think that the aliens would be a threat to Earth, but just in case they were it would be best to share at least some information about them. I'd also share data with Atlantis, Earth, the Asgard and even the Travellers if I could find them again, on the technology of the aliens, once I had some to share, With this in mind I pressed a button on my chair and contacted Seven of Nine.
"Anything to report on the alien's technology?" I asked.
Seven soon responded.
"I have made some discovers about their hand held weapons" she informed us "These aliens carry a type of grenade that when activated explodes unleashing a great amount of heat. It is some form of plasma grenade. I also have studied one of their pistols. It is similar to the type of disruptor weapons used by the Klingons".
Now that was odd. Most races in this universe either used projectile weapons like Earth guns or some form of plasma weaponry. There were some exceptions to this rule like Wraith stunners and Goa'uld zat guns, but disruptors were something else. I knew that they were effective against organic targets so perhaps they'd been creating as something to use against the Wraith.
"I have no more information at this time" Seven told me.
Then she hung up.
"We'll get back to you with more information on these unknown aliens later" I told Thor.
Without a word he beamed out. People seemed to be a hurry today.
