A/N: This chapter is a bridge to more action. I hope you like it!
Reviews are welcome!
Chapter 14 – Shocked and a Recovery
Everybody on the bridge of the Asgard vessel raced forward to check on Minos. He had been severely wounded by the explosion, and he was almost covered in small scars and cuts, with larger ones spread out over his whole body.
"I think an Ancient healing device would come in handy now." He said softly as he fainted.
Thor teleported Minos to one of the medical ships in the fleet.
"Will he be okay?" asked Carter to Thor.
"I do not know. But I know that the Ancients could survive harsh injuries, harsher than humans or Goa'uld can. But I am uncertain if even Minos can survive this."
"He is going to be okay." Chimed the captain of the Asgard medical ship in a few minutes later.
"Oh thank god." Carter and Daniel sighed.
"There is no god to thank, only Minos's quick reflexes and the Asgard medical technology." Said the captain.
Daniel thought about explaining that it was only a saying from Earth, but he decided not to bore everyone to death.
"Thor, do we know how it was possible to fire such a continuous beam?" asked Carter.
"No, we do not. The Asgard energy technology is not of a sufficient level to create that much power. I am as stunned by it as you." Thor answered.
"And what caused the explosion?" asked Daniel.
"I am unsure of that too. I did not think a simple hyperdrive explosion could cause such a blast, even from a ship as large as the replicator mothership. I think we must wait for Minos to successfully uncover the riddles around that question."
"Thor." Freyr started. "We must hurry to carry out the plan. I suggest you and the Tauri take one of the O'Neills as your ship, and you transport Minos aboard as soon as possible. Then we must leave immediately for the replicator homeworld."
"The replicators have a homeworld?" asked Daniel
"Yes. That is the planet where we first found the replicators, and where we found the control chair. I do now know how it came here in the Ida galaxy, but it is here. The replicator homeworld is their base. The planet was rich in various minerals such as neutronium and trinium, but the replicators mined all that. There were multiple planets in that solar system once, but they were absorbed by the replicators. All that mass went to producing and replicating replicators. The planet is presumably covered in thousands of miles of replicators, but they are merely dormant."
"Let's hope they stay that way until we can shut them down from the chair." Said O'Neill
"It is highly unlikely that that will happen. It is most likely that you will encounter billions, if not trillions, of replicators in all sizes. That is why we have agreed to let you come on this mission. Your weapons have proved effective in damaging the replicators. You must go there well-armed. The plan is to send you in one of the O'Neill class ships to their planet, and transport you down as soon as we are in range."
"Why not beam us down immediately?" asked Carter.
"Because the replicators have installed an anti-beaming field around the planet. We've found a way to bypass it, but we must be in close range for it to work." Answered Freyr.
"How close is close?" asked O'Neill.
"A hundred miles at most. That means we have to descend into the atmosphere of the planet." Answered Freyr.
"Who will be piloting the ship?" asked O'Neill
"I will." Said Thor. "I have studied Minos's flying style in the battle, and I believe I have been successful in learning why he managed to evade almost every replicator weapon so far."
"Ow and what is that?" asked Minos while he was transported in.
"Minos!" Exclaimed everyone.
"Thank god you're okay!" said Carter.
"I agree with major Carter. It is very lucky that you are 'OK'" said Thor.
"You are vital for the plan to succeed." Added Freyr.
"I have heard your plan." Said Minos. "But what makes you think you have learned my trick to evade enemy weapon fire?" he asked to Thor.
"I believe it is your agility and your ruthless flying style. You make turns sharper that the internal dampeners can soften, thus throwing around everybody on the ship."
"You're partially right." Said Minos. "You're just forgetting one little thing."
"And what is that?" asked Thor.
"Secret of the cook. You'd have to find out yourself. But let us go to the replicator homeworld." Said Minos.
"We must indeed hurry. The replicators are withdrawing all their troops to their homeworld." Said Freyr, as the Asgard fleet jumped into hyperspace.
"I'm curious, Minos," started Carter, "why did the replicator mothership gave off such a huge explosion? It nearly destroyed us, if we hadn't withdrawn far enough in time."
"That was because of their power source. Do you know what the most capable power source in the galaxy is?"
"A zpm?" O'Neill suggested.
"Nope. A black hole. The replicator mothership had a black hole as energy source. That's why I started drilling the ship in that exact location. If you manage to destroy all the systems keeping the replicator mothership into place, then the black hole will explode."
"So that caused the massive explosion?" asked O'Neill. "I thought someone overloaded a zpm-thingie."
"No. Overloading a zpm wouldn't have caused such an explosion. The bulk of the force from the explosion was absorbed by the replicator Mothership itself."
"Absorbed by the replicators?" asked Carter.
"Yes. Absorbed. In a final effort to save themselves, they formed a large sphere around the black hole just before it exploded, and they drained as much power as they could. But they were annihilated, luckily, because they couldn't drain enough power in such a short time."
"So it was no trick of the mind that I saw the replicator ship 'collapsing' in on itself? The replicators were actually moving?" asked Carter.
"Yep. They tried to form a sphere around the black hole, I think."
"May I ask how you survived the explosion?" asked Thor.
"I transported away on the last instant." Answered Minos.
"But you did not arrive here until later. How is that possible? Asgard transporters do not experience any time between the transportation from one point to another." Thor said.
"Let's just say that that only goes for normal conditions, and that the transporter being hit by an large enough explosion is sufficient reason for the transporter to lag a bit." Said Minos.
"Are you going to elaborate that?" asked Thor.
"Nope, I don't wanna bore your head off. But we're almost there." Said Minos.
"How can you tell?" asked Thor. I have not said anything.
"I can sense the chair is close, and I can pretty accurately guess the distance from where we started to the chair. I think we must prepare."
"What would you suggest?" Thor asked.
"As soon as we drop out of hyperspace, reroute all the power available to the shields, sub-light engines and weapons. The fleet forms a wig in front of this ship. Two other O'Neill-class ships go in front, followed by the rest of the O'Neills minus three. This one goes in the middle, just behind the first two O'Neills, and the other two go to the far end of the wig. Bilskirnir-class vessels form the outside of the wig behind the O'Neills, and the cruisers and chariots stay in the middle for suppressive fire and assistance. If any one ship receives too many blows, it switches with one of the ships in the centre. All ships must fire continuously, as much as their energy reserves allow." Minos finished.
"And what about us?" asked O'Neill.
"I'll go prepare myself for battle, you must get your weapons ready, as many as possible, and prepare yourself. Once we can transport to the planet, it will be almost a mile or so to the chair. We cannot transport in closer, because the dampening fields are too strong there." Minos said.
Minos reached in his pocket, and he grabbed a small lump of, seemingly, sugar.
"Is that all the sugar you're gonna need for this?" asked Daniel.
"It's more than you'd think. This small lump contains the equivalent of ten tonnes of sugar. But since that would be a little too much for me to eat, I made it a little bit smaller."
"Ten tonnes? Is so much sugar really necessary?" asked Carter.
"Yep. It's probably only just enough, considering what we're going to do on the planet. I've even brought Excalibur's twin weapon, Durandal."
"Durandal? Charlemagne's sword Durandal? The legendary weapon, said to be indestructible?" Exclaimed Daniel in surprise.
"Yep, the one and only. I let him borrow it for a while."
"You let Charles the great borrow your sword?"
"Yeah. He was a nice guy, and he promised he'd give it back after his death."
"Wait. You said you haven't been on Earth since the year four hundred or so. Charlemagne lived later." Said Jack.
"How did you know that? I though history wasn't your favourite subject?" asked Daniel, surprised by the fact that Jack knew when Charles the great lived.
"Well, I don't know exactly when Charlemagne lived, but I know he lived later than King Arthur. And you said you buried the gate after you left, so how did you come to Earth?"
"I have visited Earth several, well actually quite a lot of times over the course of history, and I have discovered numerous ways to get to Earth, without using the Stargate."
"Such as?" asked O'Neill.
"Ship would be the first to come to mind, but I didn't use it. For the rest I am not going to answer your question because it would spoil all the fun!" Minos said with a grin.
"Fun?" O'Neill asked.
"Yep." Minos answered. "For the fun of discovering something new by yourself."
"I'd have guessed that the last of the Ancients would be a bit... different." said Thor.
"What do you mean different? Different how?" Minos asked.
"Most of the Ancients that we have met as a race, were found to be very serious. An rational, logical race that did not show a natural tendency to 'fun'." Said Thor.
"Like the Vulcans?" said O'Neill.
"Vulcans, sir? I didn't know you were a trekkie." Said Carter.
"Am not. I only know Spock."
"Vulcans?" asked Thor, not knowing what they were.
"The Vulcans are a race from one of the tv-shows on Earth. They are people guided by logic and thought, instead of emotions and impulses. They do not show emotions, though they do have them." Answered Carter.
"Must be a boring race, if they don't have jokes." Said Minos.
"Actually, they were one of the funniest races of the entire show. Purely because of their lack of humour." Said Carter.
"Can't imagine." Said Minos. "But I think you should grab your weapons, we're almost there now."
"Good idea." Said O'Neill as they all got their weapons.