Part Two
Ronon settled against the trunk of one of the towering Sylan trees. There were more broken small branches and green needle-like leaves on the ground than he figured was normal, but he wasn't going to complain. It had been kind of cool to see Sheppard trying to move the little ship with as little damage as possible.
Ronon was sure that with every scrape of branches across the hull, Sheppard was thinking of Woolsey's condition for allowing them to bring the jumper – that the jumper be returned without a scratch. Ronon's experience was that even saying that was asking for trouble, but Woolsey could say what he wanted.
Still, just remembering the way Sheppard had nervously checked out the front of the jumper after they landed was funny. However, it didn't stop the feeling that he could be doing something besides hanging around near a stargate waiting for a monk who probably wasn't coming.
"Where is he?" McKay demanded for the fifth time. And like the other five times, Sheppard answered, "He'll be here. He's only about ten minutes late. This is not a big deal."
"How about there is no one aside from the four of us within LSD range – that would suggest that there's no one even close. Speaking of close – why are we even here? Does anyone else besides me think it's ridiculous that we're essentially here about a missing painting?"
Sheppard didn't respond.
"Hey – maybe we missed him. We probably would have been here sooner if …."
Ronon rolled his eyes away from Sheppard and McKay, already tired of this argument. Teyla stood several paces closer to the forest, keeping watch into the dense area beyond the trees. He saw her forehead crinkle as she winced and closed her eyes for several moments.
He was moving toward her when she opened her eyes and focused on him. "You okay?" he asked softly. Teyla was rarely ever down. For someone so small, she had the constitution of a Satedan rage ox.
"I am fine," she said in response to his question, but Ronon could still see tiny pain lines around her eyes.
"Liar." He called her on it.
"It is just a headache, Ronon," she insisted. "It simply began suddenly. It is already beginning to lessen."
"What's already beginning to lessen?" Sheppard came up behind Teyla. McKay heard the question and came over, too.
"I am fine. It is just a headache." She was beginning to get annoyed at all of them. Ronon figured either the pain was worse than she was letting on or they were being over protective. Or both.
"Rodney has Tylenol and aspirin." Sheppard gestured toward the pack on McKay's back. "Why don't you take a couple? It can't hurt."
"Very well." She gave in and took the paper pouch of pills from McKay while the rest of them looked on.
"Are you our guests from the city of the ancestors?" A heavy female voice sounded behind them. Ronon spun; his hand automatically went to his blaster. He was brought up short by the two individuals behind him.
A stocky woman with iron gray hair was dressed in a rough brown robe belted over a long lighter brown tunic over darker pants. She was accompanied by a slightly younger and thinner man of similar height dressed the same way. They both wore blue-gray stones set in what looked like copper on leather thongs about their necks.
Neither of them looked very dangerous.
"Where did you come from?" McKay demanded in his squeaky scared voice.
The woman looked at McKay as if he wasn't smart enough to be let out alone in the forest before she gestured to the space behind her. "We come from the monastery. Were you not told to expect us?"
"No. I meant— " McKay was ready to argue, but Sheppard cut him off.
"We were." He stepped forward in front of McKay with a welcoming smile. "I am Lt. Colonel John Sheppard, this is my team: Dr. Rodney McKay, Ronon Dex and Teyla Emmagan."
The woman studied Sheppard for several moments before introducing herself. "I am Meltis." "This is Tobar." She gestured toward the man by her side. He kept his eyes lowered and looked uncomfortable.
John nodded at the man who barely looked up. "We've met. Tobar visited Atlantis yesterday."
"Yes." Meltis didn't seem happy about that. "We are very busy with preparations for the Swarm. His absence and your visit were poorly timed."
Ronon saw Sheppard bristle. "It was our understanding that you invited us."
Meltis shot another look toward Tobar before setting her glare on Sheppard. "Monks of Sylan have no need of anything from your people. We are self-sufficient and have been for many, many generations. It is the younger generation that seeks to buck the old ways."
"May I ask," Teyla spoke up, "if you are against our visit, why were you sent to meet us?"
Meltis took a deep breath and pressed her hands together. Her angry expression melted away. "There is a saying on Sylan. He who feels he has the least to learn is the one most desperately in need." She offered Teyla a small, wry smile.
"There is a similar saying among my people." Teyla tilted her head slightly forward with a smile of her own. "Perhaps we can learn from each other?"
Meltis studied them. "Perhaps. For now, our assignment is to escort you to the monastery grounds and that is what we shall do. Come."
Ronon fell in beside Sheppard as McKay and Teyla moved off after the two monks.
He noticed that Meltis moved with surprising stealth and grace through the forest, leaving little evidence of her passing. Tobar, while obviously mimicking her technique, did not do as well. Any practiced tracker would be able to follow him. Ronon's curiosity about the woman increased as they moved deeper into the woods.
~!~
John liked this mission less and less. The last thing he wanted to deal with was being heckled by a bunch of monks who never wanted them there in the first place. Hopefully Teyla would be able to work some of her magic on Meltis. Although, that was going to be pretty hard to do since the older monk was setting a fast pace and didn't seem to be up to talking.
Rodney was having trouble managing his hand held devices and watching his step over the narrow path. Teyla was on top of it though, telling him to be careful on one spot that contained a lot of overgrown tree roots.
John continued his perusal of the surrounding forest. The forest was getting denser. He knew that after a while, it would start to thin again as they drew closer to the meadow he'd seen in the fly-over. The meadow opened into the area occupied by the village. Beyond the village was the monastery.
"What the …?" Rodney stopped suddenly, forcing John to adjust course to keep from plowing into him.
"What is it, McKay?" John moved around to face the still man.
Rodney didn't speak or even look up from the LSD, but kept frantically trying to adjust the display.
"Rodney?" John frowned, and placed a hand on the other man's arm. Something was definitely not right here. Rodney threw the briefest glances to at their monk friends, before two-handedly extending the life signs detector toward John.
"I think … something may be wrong with it," Rodney said. "You should take a look." He tilted his head to one side – the side that the monks were on and pretended to scratch his neck.
John took the LSD. Maybe it would help him make sense of Rodney's behavior. He stared down at the four blinking lights for half a second before what Rodney was getting at registered. He looked back up at Rodney.
Words weren't needed for the conversation they were having. The monks didn't show up on the life signs detector. That didn't bode well. They could have some sort of technology that prevented that. They could be Replicators. They could be … ghosts. They could –
"Take it easy," John said out loud to forestall the panic he saw growing in Rodney's eyes. "This could be … well, anything."
"Is everything okay with your artifact?" Meltis asked, approaching.
"Uh … yeah, it's just … on the fritz," John told her, then handed it back to Rodney. "We might need a few moments to fix it, though."
Her expression changed to one that reminded John of his fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Sumak. "As I have already made clear, there isn't much time. I must deliver you to the monastery so that we can move on with Swarm business. You may fix your device there."
"Oh, it shouldn't take much time at all," he insisted, then to Rodney. "Why don't you take a couple of quick scans – check it out?"
Rodney scrambled through his tac vest for his scanner, while John made eye contact with Ronon and Teyla. They had both moved into good tactical positions, with Teyla's being nearer to Meltis.
"We would not request a few moments if it were not important," she said in the soft reasonable tones that were all Teyla. "I am certain we shall be on our way very soon."
"Yeah, soon," John echoed the sentiment as he continued to hover near Rodney, willing him to hurry up with the results of the scan.
Meltis eyed them with suspicion, but acquiesced. "Very well," she said. "But just for a short while. You do not seem a woman who would presume unnecessarily on our time." Her glare in John and Rodney's direction made it clear that while she might think that of Teyla, she wasn't so sure about her companions.
John might have felt guilty if he wasn't annoyed by the whole mission in general. No one wanted off this world more than he did, and it wasn't just about doing the Coalition's bidding or the jumper's shield or even the fact that swarms were on the way. Something just felt wrong and he couldn't put his finger on it.
Rodney's scanner beeped and his eyes widened. He shared a quick look with John, before speaking to their monk friends. "Those are nice … er ... necklaces you have there. Are they part of your monk …dom?" He gestured toward the dull looking stones tied with leather straps that hung around both their necks.
Meltis frowned, and then touched her stone reverently. "These are sacred objects passed on to us from the Lady. She provides them for our protection."
"Yes, of course," Rodney said with a flat look that almost hid his sarcasm. He was getting better at not - at least obviously - scoffing at the beliefs of others. "Did she happen to give you any other items?"
Meltis eyed him oddly. "Why would you ask such a question?"
"Oh, uh ... because I'm curious by nature. You see, I'm a scientist and I like to learn why things do the things that they do and what -"
"Is it fixed?" John demanded, trying to derail Rodney's runaway train of thought.
"Yes, yes. It's working now. Good to go."
"Good. Ready." John aimed the last toward Meltis. This time, Ronon and Teyla took point. John had a few things he wanted to discuss with Rodney.
~!~
Rodney fell in behind his Pegasus team mates as John walked beside him. "What's going on?" Sheppard asked. "You find anything?"
"Well, they're still not showing up on the LSD, but I'm pretty sure it has more to do with those things around their necks than anything else."
"Why do you say that?" Sheppard asked. Rodney looked at him, realizing that perhaps the situation wasn't as obvious as he thought. "The scanner picked up an energy reading from the both of them - I was able to pinpoint it to those rocks around their necks. It's very similar to some of the signals the Ancients use in their version of wireless tech, but there is an added component that I'll need to study further. I've got the scanner gathering some of the signals I'm picking up. Hopefully that'll be enough to figure it out completely, but the fastest and best—"
"So you need to get your hands on one of those necklace things?" Sheppard asked, interrupting his thoughts mid-stream.
"Exactly."
"They seem rather attached to them," Sheppard observed.
"Yeah. Maybe if we ask nicely."
Sheppard grunted. "I don't think -"
Rodney's hand held sounded a low alarm, and he missed the rest of whatever Sheppard said. An energy reading spiked erratically across the screen of the small device. He stopped to switch the time and resolution scales as the little device was maxed.
"What is it?" Sheppard asked. Before Rodney could begin to formulate a response, he was interrupted by a commotion from up ahead.
"The Lady! She has come!"
The screen was forgotten as he ran after Sheppard around a bend in the trees to see the two monks on their knees. His gaze was drawn upward to the large glowing image of the Ancient hologram woman looking down at them all. Her lips were moving as if she was speaking, but the only sounds were of the gibberish the two monks were muttering.
Rodney stood for several moments and gaped at the sight before him. He thought for a moment that the ghostly form exuded benevolent goodness. A half grin spilled over his face as he observed it. He blinked. What was wrong with him? He was a scientist. He needed to do what scientists did.
Sheppard eased alongside him. "It's just like in the hologram room," he said, his voice at a whisper as if he was going to somehow disturb the thing. Something clicked in Rodney's mind.
"It is just like the hologram room." He dragged his tablet computer out of his pack and connected it to the hand held. While he waited for the equipment to be recognized, he started a communications program which allowed him to combine several inputs and datasets.
He grinned in triumph as the jagged lines of audio overlaid the incoming video signal on his display. Then, suddenly, as quickly as it had appeared, the line flattened to nothing. He looked up to find the hologram had disappeared.
That didn't change their monk friends. They were still bent over on the ground, mumbling words he didn't care to understand. Teyla, still looking a little shell-shocked, moved toward them and placed a hand on their shoulders. "She is gone," she told them.
"She was never here." Rodney felt it was his obligation as a scientist to make the announcement. Teyla looked aghast. Ronon's brows went up and even Sheppard had that look that suggested Rodney had seriously stepped in it. But none of that mattered. He knew he was right, and he meant to tell them what he knew.
Before he could, a blast of stunner light flashed through the forest and struck the skinny guy monk full in the chest. He went down in a flurry of dry leaves.
John saw Ronon swing into action before Tobar hit the ground. His blaster was up and aiming off to the right. John was sure he would hit what he was shooting at. What he wasn't sure of was the depth of the problem.
"How many are out there, McKay?" he yelled, trying to find cover behind some of the larger trees, but stunner blasts were coming from more than one direction and he was forced to move to a less solid place, ducked behind a large fallen log. Teyla and Ronon had found cover and Rodney was crouched down beside him. Meltis was behind a tree off to the right.
He kept firing in the direction of the blasts, not getting a good feeling at the number of blasts that were coming back at him from angled directions. In a short time, they could be surrounded.
"Six … no, twelve … no …."
"Rodney, it's a simple question. How many?"
"Either every bad guy we've ever met has descended on us or something is very wrong here!" Rodney shoved the LSD in his face and John watched in amazement as the number of life signs rapidly increased until the entire screen was glowing with light.
"What the—?"
"Swarm!" Meltis yelled.