Here's the next chapter for you all, questions will be answered and others will be asked. Note: Sergeant Major Richards is the property of DaniWilder, so thanks for letting me borrow him.

I intend to look at all reviews and try to clear up any questions you may have, so if you have any stick them in your reviews and i will try to answer them without giving the game away at the start of each new chapter.

As some of you may have guessed there will eventually be new ships being built. The tricky part is coming up with appropriate names which is very important, so if you have any suggestions send them in and the best will become the names for the new BC - 305 class ships.

Review Responses

Shadows-of-Realm: The Weir was designed to be like a moving fortress and so their base containing all the things they would need to survive in a potentially hostile galaxy, hence the name Pegasus-class. Hopefully Atlantis will return, don't think for a moment the game will take being seperated from the city lying down.

DaniWilder: Thank you and I am glad you allowed me to borrow Richards. Don't worry about Ronon and Amelia, i am a kind author.

The void

Between all the galaxies of the universe there was the void, empty space lacking the background of millions of stars that may have actually blinked out of existence a long time ago. Instead the background was filled by the galaxies of the universe with the two brightest of which, and so the nearest to this particular part of the universe, being the Milky Way and the Pegasus galaxies.

In this empty patch of space a hyperspace window opened and spat out the massive bulk of the Weir. Her deceleration thrusters kicked in automatically as she exited the window and she came to a sudden stop, unfelt by the crew due to her inertial dampeners. As she came to a halt the energy that had been powering the hyperdrive was rerouted to the currently empty main hanger, an area of the ship nicknamed by the crew as the forge deck. As the capacitors were filled to maximum the industrial beams activated and fired their beams to points predetermined by the design schematics currently loaded into the manufacturing program. In this case the program was loaded with the design schematics for the new Midway II-class station.

It had been as far back as the destruction of the original Midway that people, who mostly consisted of the key personnel of the Atlantis expedition, had been pushing to get the station rebuilt. Unfortunately with attention so focused on upgrading the fleet with Asgard weaponry and building additional ships and outposts the plans for the new station had been put on the back burner. Of course the main reason that the politicians of the IOA used to not authorise the building of the new station was the fact that it would require a ship to spend a large amount of time in the void while construction teams were at work. This meant that a ship that would otherwise be in the Pegasus galaxy fighting the wraith would be spending large amounts of time in the void. Now however they didn't have that problem as the Weir was capable of building the entire station on its forge deck in a week's time.

Given the opportunity they had been given the designers had pushed the design constraints they had to the very limit, and given that the method of construction was industrial beams the design constraints were very generous. The Midway II-class station was almost incomparable to its predecessor, the original had been designed to transfer supplies and allow a few personnel to make the trip between galaxies easily. This new one was on a whole other level entirely, the most obvious of which being the size. The station was over 600 metres long, over 200 metres wide and almost 150 metres high. This seemed an unnecessary size for a station designed to ease gate travel between galaxies, but that was what made the station so different from its predecessor as it was designed as a base between galaxies.

The station did contain the same gate room as the first Midway, only this time both gates would have a shield and an iris as back-up in the case of lack of available power, and it had quarters for crewman, although in this case a lot more crewman, but that was where the similarities ended. To start with the station was powered by six neutrino ion generators. This unparalleled number was to allow the station to perform its primary function of acting as a bridge between two galaxies. With the power provided by these generators the station was able to establish a connection to any stargate in either galaxy without the use of additional gates as relay points. Of course the individual Pegasus and Milky Way gates had had their macros altered to only connect to gates from their respective galaxies. The advantage of such a set up was that you could now transmit a signal through the open wormhole to guarantee the person coming through was a friendly. That way if the wraith or anyone else tried to make a surprise visit they would be met by either a closed iris or a shield if they failed to transmit a valid IDC.

But these generators were not only needed for powering the stargates, as they also provided power to the stations defences. The simplest addition was a shield that was capable of holding twice the charge of that of a Pegasus-class ship when adequate power was supplied affording some protection until support arrived. However in the event those reinforcements were unavailable the station was also equipped with its own weapon systems. These came in the form of sixteen double barrelled railguns, four ion cannon turrets and two APB's on each of the top and underside of the station, with an additional four ICT's and two APB's running along both lengths of the station to cover all the angles. As a precautionary measure the station also had four fighter hanger bays of a similar size to those on a Daedalus-class ship, with two on each length of the station all of which were placed in the middle of the station. The station was also capable of acting as a berth for four battle cruisers as it had four sealable hanger bays, with two situated at each of the long ends of the station. All of these hangers were located more towards what would be called the underside of the station.

With the available power and the necessary resources in storage construction of the station would take a week, which boiled down to being stuck floating between galaxies for a week. When they were soaring through hyperspace the crew of a ship usually had relatively light duties, after all there is only so much you can do when half the ships systems are pretty much unusable due to being in hyperspace, but since they were not in hyperspace they had to find something to do. Thankfully the command crew were not ignorant of how tedious it is manning stations that aren't going to come into play in the space between galaxies and the fact that staring at a blank sensor screen for hours on end will eventually cause peoples brains to shut down almost entirely. So they had thought of some ways to keep the crew busy and so duty shifts were shortened, with the personnel changing over regularly. During these shifts personnel were running checks on all ships systems to see how the ship had faired after travelling so far so fast. Admittedly this wasn't really necessary but at the very least it kept the crew occupied and as the week went past it showed that any worries about the effects of pumping so much energy into the hyperdrive had been for nought.

Of course some people, mainly the science and medical staff, were taking the opportunity to work on a few pet projects while they were undisturbed, one of which was hopefully about to bear fruit.

Weir – Stasis Room

With a soft hiss of escaping gas the lid of the stasis pod lid open and the wraith inside regained consciousness. He slowly sat up from the tilted bed of the pod, blinking his eyes to clear the tiredness in them as he did so, and looked around, taking in the people before him. Before him was Sheppard, a tall middle aged marine with slightly greying hair with a P90 in his hands and at the ready and Ronon, who had his energy pistol in hand and, no doubt, set to kill.

After spending large numbers of years of his existence in hibernation he had come to know the tell tale signs that his body gave him that signified how long he had been unconscious, not that he would tell the humans, the most usual sign being hunger. As such his body was telling him that he could not have been out for more than a couple of days which meant one of three things; they were not anywhere near the Pegasus galaxy yet and the humans had brought him out of stasis very prematurely, the stasis pod had slowed down his hunger more than he had thought or that they were in Pegasus and the humans had some truly advanced power generators at their disposal to give their hyperdrive the energy they required to make such a trip. Out of the three the second was rather unlikely, as even the stasis pod on Atlantis had only slowed his hunger by so much and it was unlikely he would have been placed in a more advanced version later rather than sooner. Of course either or both of options one and two being true was perfectly plausible, however if both were true then that would mean that he had been deliberately taken out of stasis for some unknown reason. It also begged the question of what they were doing at this unknown location. Sheppard had promised to feed him but the idea that they would willing give him a person to eat was almost laughable, during his first stay with them the only time he had eaten was when that man had sacrificed himself to save his dying daughter. However that did leave some possible reasons as to why he was currently walking around what he assumed to be a ship.

"Sheppard why am I awake?" he asked. Any answer might shed some light on the situation, and besides Sheppard would expect him to ask questions anyway so he had nothing to lose by asking the most obvious.

Sheppard looked at him with a smirk like he was laughing at some private joke.

"We're going to feed you Todd."

"Oh really," he replied with a hint of sarcasm.

"Yes really."

He was beginning to get tired of these games. One of the side effects of hunger was that his patience tended to wear a little thin.

"So who is dying?" He could play along a little longer.

Sheppard looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "Who said anyone is dying?"

Todd gave him a grin of his own. "Come now Sheppard you and I both know that the last time I had a human to eat while I was your guest it was only so that I could help save the mans child."

"Yeah well this time no one is dying so we don't need your help to save anyone."

By now they had come to a door which Todd could only assume was their destination given that Ronon had stepped in front of him to stop him from continuing down the corridor. Sheppard reached into his pocket and pulled out what he vaguely recognised as what the humans referred to as an apple. Or was it a pear? When your only source of food is the very life force of humans you tend not to take a note of what the different foods the locals are eating. Even the food consumed by wraith worshippers was gathered by the worshippers themselves. Sheppard tossed the mystery fruit to him which he caught easily despite his restraints.

"Sheppard what is this?" he asked.

"That is food for you to eat. The only kind of food you'll get to eat."

His voice took on a particularly low and distinctly angry tone as he replied.

"Sheppard you know full well that I cannot eat this. You are condemning me to starvation."

"Sure you can. You can chew it, swallow it and even digest it so what's the problem?"

"The problem is that I cannot gain any nutrients from it as my body does not produce the necessary enzymes, as you well know."

"So basically what your saying is that if we could get your body to produce the enzymes you would be all for it and would happily eat the food we give you."

"Yes," he grudgingly admitted

"Then why don't we fix that problem right now."

It was then that Todd realised he walked right into their trap. Hunger and no small amount of anger had blinded him to their seemingly obvious intentions. Not for the first time he cursed the treacherous Wraith that had betrayed him before he even got a chance to feed again. The process used to heal him had left him greatly weakened, and despite the appearance of fortitude he tried to project to others he knew that if he did not feed soon then his body would begin to fail like it had before. The humans might think that it was act in an attempt to get something to eat, but the truth was that his body was as close to failing as it had been when he first met Sheppard in that dingy prison. But despite this fact he was reluctant to let them experiment on him considering the past attempts. Admittedly he could not blame the humans as he had stolen an untested cure and applied it without the knowledge of how to counter any ill effects but he still bore some resentment towards them.

Inside the medical lab were both Doctor McKay's along with Doctor Beckett. Rodney had spent the better part of the last few days connecting the two large disc shaped devices that were attached to both the floor and ceiling to the consoles in the room, while the two physicians confirmed that they were receiving the correct readings. The device was actually the DNA altering machine that had been recovered from Anubis's lab some years ago after they had dealt with what could be called his son. Ever since then the technicians at Area 51 had been working alongside a team of linguists and physicians in an attempt to study the device and eventually modify it. The linguists were needed as the base language used in the device readouts was ancient and so they were working on translating it to English. The physicians were needed so that they could confirm what the linguists were apparently translating by connecting the words to the pictures and making sure they matched what information they had about the test substances.

That work had since been completed and the machine now made a very useful analyzer when it came to determining unique genetic traits as well as active genes. It also made it a lot easier to test to see if an individual had the ancient gene.

The door to the lab slid open and through it stepped Ronon and Sheppard followed by Todd and finally the tall marine that Todd did not know the name of. To the outsider having a lone marine cover the backs of two men against a hungry Wraith would be a bad call, fortunately however that particular marine was Sergeant Major Richards. Richards was one of those people that were not in the spotlight but were nevertheless there in the background keeping an eye on people and had been with the expedition since day one. Over the last few days the ships regular crewmen had been asking expedition members if the Sergeant Major was the same "Master Gunny" Richards they had heard about, to which the answer was yes. The man was greatly respected by those who knew him, and the fact he wasn't actually a commissioned officer only increased their respect once they found out this was because he had always wanted to be in the fight helping his fellow Marines. But despite being one of the silent protectors of Atlantis and the expedition members what really impressed people was the fact the guy could spar with Ronon on an even level. That fact alone really got peoples attention, especially the Marines who had sparred against Ronon at least once. As such there were a lot of people who would consider going down to the lab, with popcorn, on the off chance that Todd actually tried something.

Eventually they had all filed into the room, with Ronon and Richards stationed in front of the door. Todd begrudgingly stepped onto the pedestal, although not without some reluctance. While Carson was finishing connecting up a drip that was connected to a device similar to a morphine machine Todd decided it was about time he tried to get some answers.

"What are you going to do to me?" He glanced at the vile connected to the dosing machine which contained a very familiar looking liquid and growled. "That had better not be that wretched cure."

Hunger was clearly having an effect on him as he was usually able to keep his emotions under control. Of course it probably had a lot to do with the fact that he was about to undergo experimentation by these humans, and that the last time that had happened he had been looking at a painful death and even more painful healing process.

Jennifer who had been working at the machines main console hit a button before turning round and speaking.

"Actually it is," she said.

"WHAT!" A bright light was emanating from the discs and Todd found himself frozen in place, unable to move.

In response to the aggressive outburst both Richards and Ronon raised their respective weapons and pointed them squarely at the Wraiths head. Supposedly the machine would paralyze anyone it was being used on, but that particular trait had never been tested on a Wraith and neither of them was taking the chance.

"Will you calm down for a minute while I direct your attention to the two glowing discs above and below you," said Rodney, stepping between the angry Wraith and his wife.

Todd snarled for a moment before regaining his composure as both Richards and Ronon lowered their weapons at Sheppard's signal.

"Explain."

Jennifer stepped past her husband so she was once again facing Todd.

"The device, which is holding you in place, is an Ancient DNA altering machine. We intend to use it and the gene therapy in combination with one another," said Jennifer.

"Or more specifically we use the DNA machine and then we give you the gene therapy," added Carson.

"And just what part of my DNA are you planning to alter?" asked Todd.

"We intend to remove the part of your DNA that equates to the feeding organ in your hand," said Jennifer.

"Why?" asked Todd. This change of strategy had piqued his curiosity.

"From our research, and the knowledge we have gathered about your species, we learned a little about your life cycle. An important fact being that wraith are capable of eating food before they reach a certain period in their life cycle, what might be called your races puberty."

"How did you come by this information?" asked Todd.

"From a young Wraith we encountered some years ago who was, for a certain amount of time, able to eat food like we would before eventually succumbing to hunger," said Carson. Of course she had not actually been able to properly eat as was eventually proven but since she had gained some partial nutrition before the full hunger set in it gave them something to go on. Some events are of course best left in the past, but you never know which ones might come back and actually do you a favour. It seems that in this case that had been one of the latter.

"We did use that as the basis for the gene therapy in the hopes that we could reactivate the digestive system but that obviously failed," said Jennifer.

"Yes I remember how badly it failed," said Todd.

"Anyway we realised that the problem was that the feeding organs continued presence caused your cancer. Once the feeding organ reaches its fully developed state it appears to completely suppress the digestive system and effectively switches off enzyme production which is crucial to nutrient absorption. While the gene therapy was designed to suppress the feeding organ our scans showed that it only in fact healed over the feeding slit in your hand rather than suppress the organ itself. Since the organ was still active it was competing with your digestive system for dominance, so it was attempting to shut the cells down. But since they were active your regenerative abilities interpreted this as the cells being damaged and attempted to replace them and they grew out of control. Now we can't simply cut it out or your regeneration abilities will simply replace it and we will be back to square one. But if we use the machine to remove the feeding organ DNA then we can use the gene therapy and reactivate your digestive system without it causing the cancer as a side effect."

To Todd, despite his lack of expertise in the field of medicine, this all seemed perfectly rational thinking.

"How will you know which parts of my DNA to remove? I would prefer not to use the trial and error method," said Todd.

"We compared your DNA samples with and without the gene therapy. Using this machine we were able to determine that the feeding organ DNA was successfully targeted but reactivated almost immediately. Thankfully the device was able to record which DNA strands were deactivated and so we know what to target," said Jennifer.

"What about my other abilities?" asked Todd.

"Eat your vegetables like a good lad and you should stay nice and healthy," said Carson.

"What my colleague is trying to say is that if you eat enough food and get enough nutrients you should be able to regenerate just as well as you do now. Since your longevity is tied into your regeneration it should remain unchanged, once again provided you get enough food. Oh and since your telepathy is purely mental based there is no reason that should be affected in the least bit," said Jennifer.

Given his options Todd could only come to the conclusion that this was the lesser of two evils. If it was a choice between death and a little genetic alteration then it was no choice at all for a survivor like him.

"Alright I accept," he said.

"Well now that he's on board with it let's get started," said Sheppard. There were times when Todd would have liked nothing better than to slap the arrogant smirk off of Sheppard's face, and this was one of them.

Jennifer moved back to the main control console. The task itself was fairly easy to execute. The machine had been pre-programmed to target and remove the unwanted DNA strands, in this case those of the feeding organ. Once this was done they would then dose him with the gene therapy which would reactivate his immune system. To minimize the risk of failure they needed to confirm that the DNA had been completely removed before they gave him the gene therapy, but they wouldn't wait long as it was safer to give him the gene therapy sooner rather than later.

"I'm activating the machine now," said Jennifer. "DNA strands have been targeted. Carson, stand by to administer the gene therapy."

"Standing by, just say the word," said Carson, who was standing beside the dosing machine.

"DNA strands are being removed."

Todd's face was a picture of turmoil. She didn't need to say it, he could feel it happening. He could feel the organ disintegrating out of existence and it wasn't exactly pleasant. It felt strange, not painful, but somehow not right. It was like a part of him was missing and he didn't mean the organ, it was almost like his body knew that it had been robbed of his ability to attain sustenance.

Jennifer's words came quickly. "DNA strands have been completely removed. Carson, do it."

"Applying gene therapy," said Carson. He pressed a button on the machine, which had already been set to administer the maximum dose, and the entire vial flooded into Todd's system.

Suddenly the feeling of wrongness disappeared as his digestive system reactivated and he could once more he could gain sustenance. He could feel parts of his body that he had not felt in thousands of years since they had shut themselves down. His organs were not the only things to change, as even though he could not see it he could feel the feeding slit on his hand knitting itself shut just as it had before. But this time he was not struck by pain, a sure sign that there were no side effects.

"The procedure is complete," said Jennifer. "I'm turning off the device."

As the machine shut down the light vanished and Todd found he was able to move again. Sheppard stepped forward and undid the manacles, while Richards and Ronon kept their weapons raised in case he tried anything, revealing the lack of a feeding slit on Todd's hand. At his signal that the procedure had worked they lowered their weapons.

"Congratulations Doctors the operation was a complete success," he said before turning back to Todd. "Now time to get you some food. So if you'll follow your designated escorts they will direct you to the mess hall."

By the time the procedure had been completed so had the construction of the space station. Construction crews had already completed the work on the generators and they had been installed along with the two stargates they had picked up from the SGC, which had been reprogrammed accordingly. Also the fighter hangers were filled to capacity by fighters built and assembled on the Weir. The station was now floating in the void having moved out of the hanger of the Weir under the power of its own thrusters.

They had already run a systems test that had included dialling the SGC to inform them of the completion of the station. Now the SGC had dialled to the station for the very first time and the personnel that would man the station were pouring through the open stargate.

As the last of the personnel and supplies filled the station the Weir turned towards the Pegasus galaxy. Meanwhile Todd was in the mess hall tucking into a three course meal consisting of chicken soup, steak and chips with corn on the cob on the side and chocolate fudge cake with vanilla ice cream while Ronon and Richards kept a watchful eye on him and anyone near him. Just before she entered hyperspace, as the ship turned about, Todd was treated to an excellent view through the window of the newly completed Midway II-class station Valley Forge.