Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Atlantis Infirmary

"So, how you holding up?" Jennifer Keller walked into her infirmary to find Jeannie Miller awake for the first time since she underwent an operation to have a bullet removed from her leg. Jeannie wasn't only a patient to Keller; she was also a close friend. Since arriving the year before, McKay's younger sister had befriended a lot of people, but she had grown especially close to Jennifer Keller. No matter how much people try to make you feel welcome, you always feel like the outsider in your first year. Jennifer had been through the same thing not long before Jeannie, so she could relate to her right from the beginning.

Jeannie was happy to see her friend, and the woman who had taken the piece of metal out of her leg not long before. "I've been better… At least the pain's gone though; I feel a lot better than I did a couple of hours ago..."

Jen smiled back at her. "Don't worry; you'll be back on your feet soon. It's never nice being shot, but your first time is always the worst. And hey, at least you only got shot in the leg! Try taking it in the chest!" Jeannie chuckled. She knew that her friend had been through a lot since she had came to Atlantis, but she personally hadn't experienced anything like that before, until now.

"Kaleb and Madison were here before. They only left about 15 ago; I think they went to get something to eat. I doubt they'll be long, and I'm sure they'll be thrilled to see that you're awake." The smile on Jeannie Miller's face grew wider. She couldn't wait to see her husband and daughter again. "I could go and find them if you want, tell them your awake."

"That would be nice. Thanks Jen." With that, Keller turned and walked towards the door. "Oh, Jen?" Jeannie's words caused her to stop and turn swiftly, facing her friend once again. "Is everyone else alright?"

The smile on Jennifer's face disappeared.

Galactica

"What the hell did you think you were doing?" Adama stood facing Kara Thrace, Laura Roslin by his side. "I did not give my permission for you to do that to that woman."

"No sir, you didn't." Kara turned to face Roslin. "But she did. I wouldn't have done it without the permission of you or the President."

A look of shock appeared of Laura Roslin's face. "I sanctioned nothing. Where the hell did you get that idea from?"

Kara stood silent for a moment, before speaking again "Zarek told me that you and the Quorum had…" Roslin quickly cut her off.

"You actually took the word of Tom Zarek before consulting me?" The President trusted Starbuck, and this felt like a punch in the gut to her. "What if they aren't Cylons, Kara? We don't have any actual proof to say they are lying?"

Kara stood silent, looking at the ground, before Admiral Adama spoke. "Find me Tom Zarek, and bring him here right now."

"Yes Sir."

Atlantis

Daniel Jackson was more anxious than he had been since the Ori were around. It wouldn't have been so bad if he had gone with the Hyperion to find his friends, but Sam had left him in charge and this is where she would have wanted him. As much as he loved being on Atlantis, his friends were much more important to him.

Vala Maldoran walked into the room and sat down beside him. She had travelled with Daniel to Atlantis when he had first arrived in 2009 to do his research, after SG-1 disbanded for the second time. He had believed in her even when she hadn't believed in herself, and she didn't think there was anyone she would rather be with than him.

Even though she shared a special bond with Daniel, the rest of the team had also grown very close to her, and since coming to Atlantis she had also become close to John Sheppard and his team. With both Sam and John captured, she felt like a part of her was missing. It wasn't the first time situations like this had happened, but there was always that little voice in the back of her head, wondering whether or not she would see them again.

Neither Daniel nor Vala spoke. They didn't have to.

Galactica

Adama was angry, but Laura Roslin was absolutely furious. "Who the hell do you think you are giving out orders like that?"

"You had no right, Zarek. With decisions like that, either me or the President need to be consulted, preferably both. No matter what you think, you do not have the power to do it yourself"

Tom Zarek stood with a smile on his face, angering the Admiral and the president further. "Oh, I consulted the Quorum first, believe me."

"The Quorum is not the be all and end all of Colonial politics and you know that!" Laura shot back.

"No, but when they agree unanimously on an issue then it is my duty to ensure their wishes are carried out, I knew you would never have approved madam President."

"Yes and there is a reason for that! As far as we are aware there is only one more model of Cylon to be discovered and unless I am mistaken there are two people being held in that brig, neither of them known to be Cylon models. We have no evidence to say they are Cylons, let alone anything concrete!"

Tom enjoyed making Laura angry. There was a time when he thought they could actually work together and be friends, but even he was willing to admit that his thirst for power had destroyed any chance of that. "None of this matters. They killed one of our people and wounded others, that isn't acceptable from anyone, be them robots or otherwise."

"Yes but we shot first, Zarek…" all of a sudden, Laura's face changed, her lips curled into a slight smile. "Or did you forget to mention that little fact to the Quorum when you were trying to convince them to bay for the blood of those prisoners?" Zarek didn't reply. "Oh yes… It's making a lot sense now."

Tom finally spoke. "Madam President, this fleet has been in grave danger ever since we left the 12 Colonies and yes even since we travelled through that wormhole, whether you admit it or not the threat of attack has always been looming over us."

Adama spoke for the first time since the conversation had first started. "We haven't seen a single Cylon since we came through; there is nothing to say that they would just start attacking again now. I am going to speak to the prisoners myself; I personally want to hear them out. You're both welcome to join me, and I think you, Mr. Zarek, owe them an explanation."

"I owe them nothing."

Laura was quick to counter. "Then get the hell out. You may not think you owe them anything, but you definitely owe the Quorum the truth about what happened on that planet down there. Lie to them again, or lie to me again, and believe me when I say that I will find out." With that, Zarek turned to leave, before Laura stopped him once again. "And Zarek… This is far from over."

Hyperion

The BC-304 Hyperion dropped out of hyperspace behind one of the three moons of M1K-773. Cameron Mitchell hoped that would be enough to avoid detection from the large enemy fleet in orbit. Each of Earth's ships now contained at least one Puddle Jumper, the Atlantis expedition found that it occasionally put a bit of a strain on their own operations, but with scientists on Earth working on creating a human version they would soon be fully stocked once again. At times like this, having a Puddle Jumper onboard that could cloak came in very handy, and Cameron knew it. Scientists were still unable to work out how to cloak a BC-304 without using a ZPM, so this was a good alternative for recon missions.

"Are you guys all set to go?" Cameron asked as he walked into one of the Hyperion's hanger bays with Teal'c by his side.

"We sure are." McKay was the first to reply. "Just so I know, if we run into trouble will you…"

"Come save your asses?" Cam answered the question before Rodney had a chance to. "Yeah, I don't see why not." Cam smirked and then turned to O'Neill. "If you two need anything, get straight on the line and we'll jump straight in there."

The General placed his hand on Cameron's shoulder. "I don't doubt it for a second." He turned to Rodney. "Right. Let's get our people back."

Puddle Jumper

Soon after, the Jumper had left the Hyperion and was heading out to the planet, and the fleet of ships above it. "OK, cloak the ship." O'Neill ordered as he looked out of the large front window, staring at the curvature of the large moon.

"Oh believe me I am more than happy to." McKay answered as he made the small vessel disappear. O'Neill had wanted to pilot the Jumper at first but he knew that even if McKay wasn't as good at flying, he was much better at making sense of all the information that the ship's interface provided.

Both men watched the curvature of the moon until the planet came into view, and then a fleet of ships bigger than either of them had seen in a long time. Rodney took the Jumper out of its orbit and off towards the other vessels. "Scanning the ships… Right, I'm starting to get some information through."

"So, what are we up against?" O'Neill asked, interested in knowing the capability of this new race.

"Hmm… I'm quite surprised actually, I wasn't expecting this…"

O'Neill turned to the scientist. "What?"

"Well, it seems the majority of the ships aren't actually capable of combat. There are a few, but it seems only two of them are actually built to fight." McKay concentrated as he received more information.

"Thank god for that." O'Neill replied.

McKay watched the fleet as information regarding each ship was gathered by the Jumper's incredibly advanced technology. "Both of the capital ships are damaged, and neither appears to have shield technology. They seem to use extremely thick armour, but it looks like a lot of it has come away, on one of the ships at least. The two ships are of totally different design… In fact, I'm not even sure if the other ship was made by the same race as the others."

Jack was pleased. "Nice job McKay." He looked out over the ships as the Jumper flew in between them, taking a good look at the designs. Some of them didn't even have any windows, obviously down to the fact that the hulls were so thick.

He didn't think he would want to spend any length of time on one of those, and then thought about how Sam and John must be feeling. "Take us back to the Hyperion. I think I've made my decision."

Galactica's Brig

Admiral Adama, Laura Roslin and Apollo entered the brig, hoping that they would be leaving it with a much better sense of what was going on. John Sheppard and Samantha Carter stood as soon as they saw the figures coming into the room. "If any of you think you're getting in that damn cage with her again you've got another thing coming." John said as the three walked closer.

"I apologise for what happened before." The woman spoke, hoping to diffuse the man's anger slightly. "Kara Thrace had been told to do what she did to you by my vice president, and had been falsely told that I myself had sanctioned those actions. Believe me, I had not." She turned to Sam. "I'm sorry for what happened, and so is Kara. She wanted to come and tell you in person but I didn't think that was such a good idea just yet. I thoroughly intend to make sure that the Vice President pays for what he has done."

John wasn't satisfied. "Why should we believe you? For all we know this is going to be another interrogation. We're not stupid, you don't have to use violence or threats to get information out of someone, and when the information you're trying to get doesn't even exist then…" Sam stopped him before he could finish.

"John, it's alright. I think they're telling the truth." Sam had been in situations like this countless times, and she had learned to recognise whether someone was lying or not. This woman was either sincere or a fantastic liar. Judging by the way she was acting, Sam was inclined to believe the former.

The older of the two men spoke next. "We are. And we also apologize for shooting first, in hindsight we realise that was probably the worst move we could have made. However, after what we've been through, we didn't have much choice." Carter was intrigued. However, she didn't want to turn the questions around to these new people just yet. Hopefully there would be time to find out more later.

The younger man was the next to speak. "You'll understand that we do need to paint a picture here. We need to know who you are. If we hear you're story, we'll be a lot more inclined to believe you. We're not here to force anything out of you. We're here to ask you."

Sam and John both looked at each other, before Sam turned back to the three people in front of her and spoke. "I am Colonel Samantha Carter, and this is Colonel John Sheppard. We are from a planet known as M35-117, or New Lantea." She wasn't prepared to give up the fact that they were from Atlantis, or more importantly Earth. Not yet anyway. "We were on that planet doing research on the outpost that you no doubt noticed, in the base of the mountain."

Roslin smiled. "Thank you. That's a good start. I am President Roslin, and this is Admiral William Adama and his son, Lee Adama. The ship you are aboard is known as the Battlestar Galactica. We were wondering, how did the rest of your people escape the planet?"

Sam and John both shared another look. "Did you not see the Planet's Stargate?" Asked John, wondering how they could have missed something so obvious.

The President looked confused. "What's a Stargate?"

Sam was amazed that they didn't know what a Stargate was, but before she could answer an alarm began blaring and the phone on the brig's wall rang. "If you'll excuse me." Adama walked over to the wall and picked up the phone, he was silent for a moment before speaking. "What do you mean it isn't a Baseship?"