Hibernation8
John stared at the dilapidated buildings. Dead vines clung stubbornly to the iron spires. Broken masonry proliferated. A chill wind whispered through the ruins. Chasing wisps of misty as they team halted. He stepped next to Moira, gestured with his gun. "There. Through there. Nice and slow now. Life signs?"
"Negative. No energy either." Rodney shook his head. "It's almost a dead world."
"Almost." Teyla tilted her head. Assessing. "I do not sense any Wraith."
"Well, that's a good thing. Let's go, shall we?" Carson began to lead the way into the facility.
"Whoa there, doc. I'll take point. Moira, stay behind me." John led the way. He shone his light across the deserted room. Organic substances clung to the walls. Down a flight of uneven stairs.
The passageways were narrow, tilted at odd angles. The ground was uneven. John paused, shining his light down tunnels that vectored off the main one. They were even narrower. Some stopped in dead ends. He continued. Boots scuffing the ground. It felt odd to him. Almost spongy but it was dry. He halted suddenly. Something had been nagging at the back of his mind. Until the thought surfaced. "This looks like a Wraith ship. Sort of. Well, maybe not a ship but it is definitely...Wraithy."
"Wraithy?" Moira questioned behind him, a smile forming.
"Maybe they felt the need to decorate. Hey, why are all these labs and facilities and other stuff always underground? Did I ever mention how much I hate being underground?" Rodney complained, following Moira.
"Yes, several times, in fact," Teyla noted, causing Carson to snort with amusement.
"Then why do I keep ending up underground? For once can't we have a nice, clean, aboveground laboratory with a pleasant view and airy windows and whoa...faint, I mean very faint energy signature. To the right. Down the creepy passageway." Rodney pointed. Waited.
John nodded. Led the way. His boots were crunching on something and he looked down. Shone his light on hundreds of carcasses of beetles. "Yuck."
"What? What is...oh gross! That is just gross!" Rodney complained.
"There are hundreds of them!" Moira exclaimed, trying to step around them but found it all but impossible.
John smirked, seeing her nimble steps. To no avail. "Good thing you didn't wear your dancing shoes," he jested. Looked from her scowl to canvas the room. "There's not much here."
"The box." Carson was already moving towards the rectangular object on the floor. It appeared broken, battered. Wires protruded.
"What box? Oh...the box," Teyla agreed, moving towards it with the doctor.
"There's a box? Oh, oh, hey, that's the one the Wraith took from the Hoffans," John recognized. "Anything?"
"No. Empty. Inert." Carson peered inside, shrugged.
"And the energy signature is this way, not that way." Rodney pointed again. Waited.
"These bugs appear dessicate. Totally drained of all fluids," Moira noted as she squatted, examining the little bodies.
"What does that mean, exactly?" John asked, moving to stand next to her.
"I have no idea. Carson?"
"Snacks?"
"Yes, yes, I could use a bite of oh. You meant the bugs? For who? For what?" Rodney realized, making a face.
"Renfield. Let's go." John pulled Moira to her feet, led her across the chamber. Into a larger one. "Crap." He hefted his gun, shone the light around. "I thought you said you didn't sense any Wraith, Teyla. Better check that Spidey sense of yours."
"Colonel? I do not understand your comment. I do not sense the..."
Teyla's words faded into the silence. The room was lined with chambers. Chambers full of Wraith. Some were mere skeletal remains. Others retained flesh. Still others appeared to be merely asleep. A faint hum was discernible. Equipment running. As John's light swept along the far wall there was a more disconcerting sight. Chains lined the walls. With skeletons still caught in them. Human skeletons.
"More snacks," John grimly noted. "Doc?"
Carson moved to one of the chambers. Squatted to check the faint panel. "It's barely sustaining this one. Which is odd. They're in hibernation, colonel. That's why Teyla couldn't sense them, and why the life signs detector couldn't either. But this is odd."
"Yeah, I agree. A room full of hibernating Wraith is very odd."
"No, that's not what I meant, John. They can hibernate naturally. Why use stasis pods?"
"They...they're all drones. Look at them! All of them." Moira moved along the wall, examining each pod with her flashlight. The bodies that had flesh were heavily muscled. Most still retained the odd face masks worn by the drone Wraith. A few were askew and revealed horribly distorted, distended features. Blank gazes. Overly large teeth. "Where are the others? The more human ones? I wonder if they all appear this deformed, or if something was done to them."
"At least we know why they were those masks," John noted, catching her arm to draw her away from the pods.
"I'm fine, John!" she flared softly, pulled free to move towards Carson. "Is it possible they were spawned here?"
"Unlikely. There would be more protection because a queen would be in attendance," Teyla noted, moving along the opposite wall. "All are drones here as well."
"It's a drone factory, then?" Rodney asked, stepping round a smashed piece of equipment whose function he could only guess at. "That's just...odd."
"An apparently abandoned one, which is stranger still," Teyla remarked.
"Carson, look at this!" Moira had moved past John to another pod. "There's a liquid being fed into the arm. Here too!"
"Help me get a sample, love."
"Be careful, doc. Whatever you do don't awaken them," John cautioned. He crossed to where the human remains were chained. "There are IV lines here too. Rodney, any more energy readings? Rodney!"
Rodney was staring at the pods of Wraith. "What? Oh. No. Just here...nearly depleted source, whatever it is. And no, not a ZPM. There's nothing here of Ancient design." He stepped around a large pile of dead bugs. "And they were better housekeepers," he muttered.
"Why would the Wraith be hibernating here? In such an undefended location?" Teyla wondered, moving along to examine the pods. "They would never place themselves at risk on a planet like this. Some have already died."
"Maybe they didn't have a choice. More experimentation," John suggested, completing his circuit to stand close to Moira again. "The question is, by whom?"
"Good Lord," Carson whispered, as he analyzed the fluid in his medical kit. "Initial results show this to be some sort of variation of the Hoffan serum."
"The what? But doesn't that kill them?" Rodney asked, joining them.
"Aye, it does, but it's been modified here to..." He met Moira's gaze. "Hibernation."
"Storing metabolism?"
"Gluconeogenesis?"
"With euthermic arousals to–"
"Or even an HIT factor to–"
"Whoa, whoa, you know I hate that shorthand!" John complained. He looked from one to the other. "Explain, in detail, please. Hibernation?"
Carson was shaking his head. "As you know, colonel, hibernation is a state of inactivity and metabolic depression characterized by lower body temperature, slower breathing and a lower metabolic rate. Energy reserves are depleted at a much slower rate."
"Okay, we all know that, but what was that other thing? Gluco-something?"
"Gluconeogenesis," Carson supplied. "It's how hibernating animals get their energy. A biochemical process. A metabolic pathway that generates glucose from non-carbohydrate carbon substrates such as lactate, glycerol and glucogenic amino acids. To keep the animal alive during its deep hibernation."
"And the other? The Eurythmics? I remember them. Sweet dreams are made of these..." He waited, eyes on Moira. "Come on! You remember that?"
"Who am I to disagree?" she quoted with a smile, a shake of her head.
"I travel the world and the seven seas," Rodney chimed in with a smile.
"Everybody's looking for something," Carson supplied the last phrase.
They looked at each other, began in unison, "Some of them want to use you. Some of them want to be used by you. Some of them want to abuse you. Some of them want to be abused."
They laughed for a moment.
Teyla shook her head. "Sometimes you people from Earth are very, very strange."
"That we are," John agreed. "So, where was I? Arousal?" he asked, raising a brow.
Moira sighed. "Euthermic arousal, colonel. Hibernation can be interrupted by sporadic euthermic arousals where in the body temperature is restored to typical levels. Sort of a safety valve, if you will. Sometimes even the animal will briefly awaken before falling back into a hibernation state. As Carson said the gluco–"
"Okay, okay, got it," John surrendered.
"You had to ask," Rodney reminded.
John glanced at him. "That's hilarious coming from you. So," he turned back to Carson and Moira, "significance?"
Carson and Moira eyed each other. "HIT. Has to be."
"For both the Wraith and the prey. Of course! But how?"
"More importantly why? When they can process it naturally?"
"But they are using suspended animation as well?"
"Significance!" John barked. Sighed. "What is HIT?"
"HIT. Hibernation inductor trigger, or hibernation inducement trigger. A substance in the blood of hibernation animals." Carson snapped his fingers, startling Rodney as that was his thing. "Of course! The Hoffan serum, modified, could be an starting point!"
"A starting point for what?" John asked.
"To modify their own hibernation, or to induce hibernation of some sort in their, um, prey," Moira explained, glancing around at the many pods. The chained skeletons. "For an extended period of time. As if, as if they were going on a long journey."
"A long..." John considered. Looked round, grip tightening on the gun. "Or altering their chemistry to be more conducive to certain genes? Proteins?"
"Aye, that could be an affect as well, John." Carson nodded. "I'll need to get some samples to be absolutely sure, though. Moira, help me with this."
"Whoa, whoa! You'll wake them up, Carson!" Rodney objected.
"This one is quite dead, I assure you, Rodney. In fact I'd say they were all going to die. They've been here for who knows how long? Given their natural longevity it could have been thousands of years!"
"The perfect test subjects," Moira noted softly.
"They are all going to die, Carson, have no doubt of that," John assured grimly. "Be quick about it. I don't want any unexpected guests arriving. Moira."
"I'm fine, John." She moved with Carson to another pod. A corpse lay there. Grimacing with sharp, pointed teeth. Glazed eyes staring at nothing. "Rodney, is there any power here?"
He joined her. Scanned the pod. "No. This one is completely depleted."
"Let's do a quick recon. Doctors, work quickly," John decided.
"Aye, colonel. I wasn't about to dally. Moira, the syringe."
"John! Come look at this!" Rodney called, gesturing wildly.
John reluctantly left Moira's side to join the scientist across the room. "What? Whoa." He stared down at a corpse of a female Wraith. Impaled savagely by a Wraith stunner. Long red hair tangled with dead vines and weeds. Clothing all but disintegrated. Skin shrunken over the elongated features. "A keeper. Has to be."
"It appears to have been dead for a very long time," Teyla noted, joining them. "Perhaps there was some disagreement over these...experiments."
"Or someone took over," John said. He glanced round again. Suspicious.
"Not that! Ick! That!" Rodney pointed past the corpse to the dimly flickering equipment. "That is the energy source! It's nearly inert. So you know what I'm thinking."
John and Teyla exchanged a look. "No, actually. Rodney, what are you thinking?"
Rodney sighed. "Isn't it obvious? This power source is independent of a ZPM. This power source is something we haven't encountered before, something unique to this galaxy. Possibly even unique to the Wraith!"
Carson shut the stasis pod. Shook his head. "There's barely enough here for a full analysis. They've been drained dry."
"Like the insects." Moira glanced to where the little corpses littered the floor. Frowned. "Carson...what could be feeding on the life fluids of both creatures? Of any creature? Or, or gathering the fluids for experimentation?"
"I have no idea, love, but I don't want to run into it." Carson moved along the pods. Flinched. "I thought...no, I'm sure they're all dead, or in such deep hibernation that they may never truly awaken. What could have happened here? And why?"
"You're sure?" Moira asked, pausing by another pod to peer at the occupant. The gruesome smile. The malformed face, scarred. One eye bulging. Bald head instead of the long hair of the more evolved, advanced Wraith. Long teeth. She felt a shiver, glanced across the room to where John was standing. Gun in hand as he watched Rodney wrestle a piece of equipment from a broken console.
Carson stepped around the box. To another pod. "Moira. Come look at this."
Moira moved to him. Wincing at the sound of beetles being crushed under her shoes. "What is it, Carson?"
"Not all of the occupants are drones, or even Wraith for that matter."
"What?" Moira neared the pod. Stared. "John. John!" she called.