"You must be Argrose." Elizabeth entered the room with as much confidence and authority as she could manage, which was a whole lot more than she felt.
"Yes." The man's tone was bored. "Are you the one in charge?"
"I am. I'm Dr. Weir." Elizabeth met his bored look with grim determination.
"Have you discovered that you cannot get passed my code yet?"
"We have our scientists working on it."
"You wouldn't be here unless you thought you couldn't do it any time in the near future." Argrose pointed out.
"Maybe." Elizabeth waited a moment, when Argrose said nothing she continued. "We are prepared to let you go in exchange for that code." There it was, her bargain. It was reasonable too, she only hoped Argrose would agree.
"As long as I can leave with the sack of my things, intact." His terms.
"You have a deal." Elizabeth turned and walked from the room slowly. That wasn't so bad, was it?
"Rodney, why is the screen black? Its been that way for at least an hour." Carson said, leaning on the back of his chair.
"He must've been stunned. We'll start seeing something once he wakes up." Rodney replied like he was explaining something to a five year-old.
As if on cue from Rodney's words, the screen gradually faded from black to blurry purple to a sideways wraith holding cell.
John moaned as he tried to push himself of the cold organic floor. Failing at that he simply rolled over.
"Hurts?" Came a voice beside him.
John rolled his eyes left to see Atlantis. "Hurts." He confirmed. A little more awake now, he pushed himself into a sitting position and leaned gratefully against the wall. "So torture next?"
"I'm am still slowing them but it will not do you much good when the torture comes."
"Escape plan?" John raised his eyebrows.
Atlantis smiled. "That would be wise."
"Okie dokie, Plan A. Why don't you just pop out of here, pop back over there, and open the door."
Atlantis raised her eyebrows and turned to look at him, an amused look on her face.
"What?" John drawled innocently. "Might as well take advantage while we can."
Atlantis' face broke into a small grin, she shook her head and disappeared.
Wish I could do that in real life. John thought to himself.
Maybe one day you will. Atlantis responded to his thought, then appeared outside the cell. Atlantis reached into her boot and pulled out a knife, proceeding to slice through the thick sin.
By the time she had opened it John was over the effects of the stunner and slipped gratefully through the web door. "Weapons."
"This way." Atlantis led the way down the halls, and up the stairs. She kept a careful eye out while John memorized the lefts and rights for Plan B, just in case. "This is the room."
John picked up one of the larger stunners while Atlantis took one of the smaller ones.
"What I wouldn't give for a P-90 right now." John muttered.
Atlantis smiled, "You are aware that this is a computer program. The computer could simply place more wraith wherever it wanted."
"Yeah but its a fair computer."
Atlantis didn't answer but headed for the door.
"Right?"
Atlantis stayed silent.
"This is bad." John muttered.
"Carson, how is John holding up." Elizabeth asked, approaching the doctor and his patient.
"He's fine for the moment." Carson sounded considerably relieved that it was the case. "So far his body hasn't reacted to the obvious physical exertion he is experiencing in the virtual environment. Nor the stunner blast. Hopefully it will stay that way."
"Rodney, Argrose has agreed to give us the access code in exchange for his freedom. Can you get by that or shall I carry through."
Rodney gave an exaggerated sigh. "I haven't been able to make heads or tails of this mess. There are tons more viruses and safeguards for this than there was for the entire rest of the program." Rodney looked despondently at his laptop.
Elizabeth turned to the screen. John was following a dark blonde, almost brown, haired woman down wraith hallways. "Who is she?" Elizabeth asked, turning her head slightly but not letting her eyes leave the screen.
"Hmm?" Rodney looked up, confused. "Oh her, we have no idea. She could be programmed into the system to teach whoever is in there, or could simply be another obstacle. I haven't really looked into because I've been to busy trying to crack the code." Rodney emphasized the last sentence by pointing at his laptop. "Not that its helping much." He muttered.
Elizabeth nodded, "I guess we are letting him go. Hopefully he won't cause us to much trouble in the future."
Atlantis leaned over past the corner to see a group of wraith drones. Instead of whispering and possibly alerting the wraith, Atlantis spoke to John mentally, glad at that moment that she could. There is a group of four drones headed our way.
John peeked out from his own corner, standing directly behind Atlantis. There's two coming this way.
Atlantis looked at the hallway straight across from her position. She could get there in a literal blink of an eye but John needed to get there too. There wasn't going to be an easy way out of this one.
We're gonna have to take out chances.
John knew that there was pretty much a 99% chance that a stunner blast him, but that wouldn't stop him from trying. He fired the stunner as fast as it could go. Two of the wraith went down before John received his own blast, out of the corner of his eye John saw Atlantis fall and if he'd have had time to think about it he would have been surprised.
Lorne stared at his tray of food without seeing it. He was distracted, not thinking about Colonel Sheppard or Argrose. He couldn't seem to concentrate on any one thing. Lorne gave up on his food and decided a jog to the east pier would clear his mind.
When he'd reached the edge of the pier Lorne admired the sky and resisted the urge to go paint it. He turned to see the spires of Atlantis piercing the soft blue while the puffy snow-colored clouds floated in contrast.
Lorne frowned, what was that? A clear, barely visible, sphere originating from the control tower expanded quickly. It reached to outer buildings a couple hundred feet away from him and dissipated.
When the remnants hit him he stumbled. "This is Lorne, Dr. Weir please respond."
Silence met Lorne's call. "This is Major Lorne, someone please respond." No one answered.
Lorne started back at a quick jog. We are in serious trouble.
Please tell me if you like it! It may not seem like much when you write it but it really helps me keeps going. :)