"I said activate the dorsal turbines, not the ventral heat exchangers," McKay said testily.
Aceso stood at the life support control panel, her eyes closed in concentration. She tried to focus on the system that McKay wanted to turn on, but she couldn't quite connect to a system that matched his description. The hive ship communicated directly with her mind, trying to translate her commands into actions, but the ship simply responded with a vague message that basically translated as 'I have no idea what you want.'
"Are you sure that the system even exists?" Aceso asked McKay.
"Yes I'm…" McKay yelled, his voice raising an octave. He grabbed his tablet computer off the console and showed it to her. "I can see the system right here." He pointed with his finger to the screen where it depicted an array of turbines.
"I can't connect with that system," Aceso explained. She glanced around the control room, trying to see if another console might help them control that malfunctioning life support. Zelenka and one other female technician milled about near the hyperdrive diagnostic controls. Zelenka diverted his attention up to McKay. He shook his head minutely and gave Aceso a sympathetic glance.
Observing her movements, McKay sighed. "No, it's not one of those consoles, it's this one."
"I don't know what to do," she explained, her exasperation growing. "I simply can't detect that system at all."
"It has to be there," McKay complained. "There's nothing else that could explain what's going wrong."
The hive ship's life support system had been operating on emergency backups since they stole it. It proved to be inadequate and inefficient at maintaining the atmosphere inside the enormous ship, and much of the ship now remained too cold to inhabit. Even she found it unbearably chilly when they first landed in the dart bay. It had taken months, but the great hive finally cooled down in the cold ambient temperature of the space above Atlantis.
"There's no circulation Rodney," Zelenka chimed in.
McKay rolled his eyes and turned slowly to Zelenka. "Thank you captain obvious," he sassed. "Just focus on your work, and I'll focus on mine."
"Yes but…"
"Later!" McKay insisted.
Zelenka frowned, shook his head and returned to his station.
"Never mind about the turbines," McKay said, turning around suddenly. "Let's just move onto consolidating the life support power into the control room and call it a day."
Aceso touched the console again, and directed the ship to increase power to their section.
"Woah, woah, STOP!" McKay shouted.
"What are you…" her question died in her throat as the shrill alarm blared.
McKay typed furiously on his tablet. "You just overloaded the power conduits to the emergency…"
A blinding flash of light and a bang sent a piece of the wall collapsing into their compartment in many pieces. Aceso crouched into a ball instinctively, along with Zelenka, and McKay.
"Are you crazy!" McKay shouted. "You almost killed us!"
Zelenka coughed as smoke filled the room.
"I only did what you asked!" Aceso said, standing up and brushing off her clothes. "I didn't…"
"Who the hell taught you to control hive systems? You can't shunt power from the power core directly into a low voltage system!"
"That wasn't what…"
"No, that does it. You have been unhelpful, incompetent to the extreme, and reckless! The only reason I won't throw you out of here right now, is because I need you to shut down the power core to reset this mess you've created."
Her anger and resentment to this irritating man reached a fever pitch. She learned to control hive ship systems as a child, growing up on a hive ship! She didn't know what was wrong with this particular ship, but she couldn't take this anymore.
Without a word, Aceso stood up and aimed to leave through the shut doorway. It opened at her command, letting cold air fill the small space and helping to dissipate the smoke.
"Hey, where are you going?" McKay said.
Her patience had snapped, and she couldn't speak to McKay right now.
"You're not done here yet," McKay griped.
She didn't let him finish his sentence, and instead pushed onward through the hallway and out of the control room.
Her anger felt like justice, but in her heart, she knew that this would have consequences.
"That's right, just walk away," McKay shouted.
McKay grumbled. "Having a wraith around is like having a nightmare looking over your shoulder. A useless nightmare on top of that. I can't believe Woolsey puts up with this." He thought he was being quiet, but his voice still carried.
The words cut deep, so she picked up the pace.
She couldn't fly away from the ship just yet, at least not without stranding Zelenka and McKay's team. They had only brought one jumper, meaning that at best, she would have to wait until the others finished their work.
Ten minutes later, she reached the jumper inside the dark and cold dart bay and went to sit inside. Her mind raced as she sat there in the cold silence, wondering what would happen now.
She felt such a mixture of anger, resentment, but also worry about what would happen to her. Being a department head, McKay could make things hard for her. Her standing in Atlantis felt tenuous sometimes. Most people had accepted her by now, however tentatively.
Aceso didn't feel like she had the latitude to get upset. She was perfectly aware of her own strength and how to control it, but she felt like if she even gave someone an annoyed look, they might take it the wrong way and get scared.
It limited her emotional range, and forced her to contain her feelings rather than express them. Right now, that felt like it was killing her slowly like poison.
It was just so much happening all at once. It remained her goal to re-create the Lantean gene therapy so that wraith could have another option besides feeding. Working with the Atlanteans was a necessary part of that. Right now she felt that without her goal, she would leave Atlantis.
The small team of technicians showed up an hour later. McKay strolled in silently and activated the jumper.
Zelenka glanced nervously between her and McKay, almost anticipating a conflagration to break out. Aceso only sat silently with her own worry. None of the technicians said anything either, with most opting to stare out the windscreen or at the floor.
They arrived back in the Atlantis jumper bay without incident, and McKay stormed off, clearly agitated, but without saying a word.
Zelenka hovered nearby her as she aimed to walk down the steps leading out of the tower. "Can I speak with you for a moment?"
She slowed her pace somewhat. "I don't wish to speak," she informed him, trying to remain polite as her emotions swirled.
"It's important," Zelenka said empathetically.
She stopped and turned to him.
"I'm sorry for how McKay has been acting," he said, clasping his hands together nervously. "He treats everyone this way, especially when he is under strain."
Aceso exhaled. "I understand that," she said. "I still cannot abide by that sort of treatment."
"Yes, well," Zelenka stammered. "I think we should report this to Woolsey."
"Why?" she asked nervously.
"I tried to tell McKay that the circulation turbines had not been installed because the ship isn't completed."
Aceso felt a depressing realization. "So that is why I was unable to sense that system?"
"Yes, sorry," Zelenka said. "I only discovered that after you left. As far as the explosion, McKay removed the power regulator for that compartment to interface his manual helm controls, making an overload more likely. The problem is that he'll tell everyone that it was your fault."
She couldn't control what McKay said about her, but it stung that she might have to defend against the baseless accusations of an egotistical man.
"Does McKay know this?" Aceso asked.
Zelenka nodded. "He does now that I told him, but he won't admit it."
She clutched her hands in anger.
"It'll help if we both file a report." Zelenka said. "Come on."
(0)
McKay stormed into Woolsey's office, throwing the door open forcefully which proceeded to ring like a bell when it impacted the door stop. "What now?" he said expectantly.
Woolsey glanced up from his desk. "Well, I can see we're off to a good start." His tone sounded sarcastic.
McKay didn't have time for whatever Woolsey brought him here for. He already had to finish his inspections of the city's ballast system, in addition to fixing the hive ship's life support system.
"What is it?" McKay asked more softly. He wanted to check his tone, but found it difficult in the maelstrom of stress.
Woolsey pulled out a folder from his desk with the words 'McKay, harassment complaints' written in bold letters.
His confidence diminished to the size of a marble upon seeing that. Still, he wouldn't let anyone tear him down without a fight. If Aceso wanted to complain about him, then two could play that game.
"Today's complaint makes eleven formal complaints against you since you arrived in Atlantis," Woolsey stated matter-of-factly.
"Did our wraith friend conveniently leave out that she nearly blew us up?" McKay countered.
Woolsey glared at him. "No,' Woolsey said calmly. "She told me about that, as did Zelenka."
"Oh, so you're just going to give her a pass again, is that it?"
"If it were actually her fault, I would include that in my report," Woolsey iterated more forcefully. "My concern is that you show a pattern of verbally harassing subordinates and co-workers."
"Everything we do here is dangerous!" McKay argued. "I have to be on top of everyone because the stakes are so high."
Woolsey remained unimpressed. "Zelenka explained that the overload that occurred today aboard the ship was due to you removing a power regulator."
"Oh, he is so missing the point!" Rodney said, fuming. "If Aceso had half a brain, she would have known not to shunt power directly from the power core into the life support system."
"Zelenka said that doing that wouldn't normally cause an overload if the power regulator were installed."
"That's not the point!" Rodney said.
"Then what is?" Woolsey shot back. "Because the way I see it, you made an action that normally would have been safe, become unsafe, and didn't think to inform anyone else."
Woolsey stood up, "Furthermore, you inappropriately yelled at a member of your team and insulted her." He grabbed the file and slammed it open. "That follows a pattern of inappropriate comments and harassment that has been ongoing for years."
"I'm surrounded by incompetent people!" Rodney said. "I can't let my guard down for one second or they could cause some serious damage!"
"These people are the best in two galaxies," Woolsey countered. "They have more education and more experience than a typical Nobel prize ceremony. Now, Zelenka has been gracious enough to overlook your attitude, but I know anecdotally that you treat him the worst of all."
Woolsey sat down again. "I'm going to have to report this to the SGC, who will likely recommend disciplinary action at some point."
McKay deflated at the pronouncement, slumping down into the chair. Confusion dominated his thoughts. "Why is this coming up all of a sudden?"
Woolsey gave him a side eye. "All of a sudden? The case to do something has been building for awhile. In each case, the complainants dropped the arguments after a crisis, or transferred out before anything came of it. But when your attitude extends to verbally abusing a wraith, it seems like there's an urgent need to intervene simply to protect you from yourself."
Crossing his arms, McKay stewed in resentment, but also a little fear. He was so used to working with wraith by now, that he completely forgot just how psychically and physically powerful they were. He realized suddenly that he was really lucky that Aceso was so forgiving.
"In the meantime," Woolsey said. "I recognize that the workload you've been under has likely contributed to this. So I'm removing you from all your current projects."
"What?" McKay said. "No, No, you can't do that."
Woolsey raised a hand. "Actually, I can. Believe it or not, we have other people who can take care of this city's systems. This frees you up to put together an exploratory team for the wraith lab on P6X-757.
McKay scowled. "You mean the abandoned lab where Aceso thinks they stored a DNA alteration device?"
"That's the one," Woolsey confirmed. "Your conflict with her must be resolved, seeing that you need her to get into the facility."
Suddenly, his decision to lose his temper didn't seem like such a good idea anymore. "Well, maybe you should let Zelenka go."
Woolsey shook his head. "Zelenka said he doesn't have enough experience with wraith systems to feel comfortable with it. It needs to be you."
"Shouldn't Beckett be going?" McKay wondered aloud. "He's in charge of this project."
"Technically, Aceso is in charge of this mission," Woolsey said. "This planet is on the list she provided us of facilities that used to belong to her mother. Besides, Dr. Beckett can't safely operate the equipment in a wraith laboratory."
Woolsey stacked his files together neatly and put them in his desk drawer. "I would send him along, but he's off-world right now anyway."
McKay let out a long sigh. He really did sabotage himself by his attitude. Now he had to work directly under Aceso, having just verbally accosted her.
"You and your technicians along with an SG team escort are scheduled to leave Monday at o-seven-thirty," Woolsey said. "I suggest you get some rest, and if possible, try to mend fences."
(0)
The upcoming mission weighed on Aceso's mind, distracting her from the task at hand. The memory had come to her one day in an epiphany. She remembered the base on the world of Vorash that she'd visited a few times as a child with her mother. It was small, but was well protected.
Only a few decades ago, she'd visited it by herself, recovering the field generator that disabled wraith technology. That trip had gone without incident as the field generator was light enough for her to carry by herself to the nearest town, concealed first by a blanket, then by a crate. The rest of the trip, she rode a boat down the river, and then had the generator carried on a cart through the city to the stargate.
Her memories of that place were clouded by time and distraction. She remembered it suddenly only weeks ago, a piece of Lantean technology there in storage that matched the description in the documentation they retrieved from the Lantean's mountainside base. It was a device meant to alter wraith DNA to enable them to continue to consume food into adulthood.
She was so young when she'd been treated with it, that she couldn't remember very well what it looked like. But as she sorted through her memories, she became sure that the device she needed was in that base.
A dark shadow flew under the water near her feet, startling her. She struck out with the spear, catching the silvery fish. She plucked it from the spear tip and placed it in her fishing basket.
A large migration of fish went through this river every second year, and the Athosians took advantage of it with their method of spear fishing.
Men, women, and children all stood in the river, ankle or waist deep, waiting and watching for the movement of the fish along the bottom. The fish were dark and flighty, adhering to the rocky substrate of the river and darting from rock to rock to hide.
To catch one required focus and dedication, something she found that she lacked in this case. She had speared only five while Halling, who fished beside her in waist deep water had caught eight.
Naturally, her thoughts dwelled on her altercation with McKay. She knew that he had been under a great deal of strain, and likely only lashed out because of the workload. She sensed that McKay at heart felt scared and vulnerable when under that sort of pressure. Still, she couldn't excuse his comments and attitude toward her. It struck at her sense of belonging and self-worth, her weakest points.
McKay knew what she feared; that she wasn't truly accepted among these people. Even worse now was that she would be expected to lead a research team that included McKay. She didn't know how she could handle him, seeing how little he respected her.
As the cold water flowed over her feet, she buried her toes into the sand, focusing on her reflection in the water. She had her cloak, but it remained inactive, which showed her true form to everyone.
Her natural skin tones ran a darker hue than other wraith would normally have —a result of her constant time in bright sunlight.
As she gripped the spear, she saw her nails, pigmented a dark black, but trimmed short as they had been the day she arrived first on Irinak. Being of high status, her mother, herself, and her siblings had allowed their nails to grow long as was the custom.
Her very first day of being forced to work with her hands remained a strong memory. The face of the farmer who scoffed and laughed at her for her inability to grip a shovel remained clear even though he had long since died.
She didn't feel the need for long nails, but the memory of why and how she first adopted the habit of trimming them short remained painful.
"Your nails are so long!" the woman said. The farmer's wife gripped her hands and brought her inside their house. She brought a set of clippers out and forced her to sit as she trimmed her once neatly kept nails straight to fingertips. "You need to take better care of yourself from now on."
Her fingertips stung and ached with each cut.
"Why are your nails such an odd color?" she asked.
The holographic cloak wouldn't disguise the trimmed nails as they fell to the ground.
"They've always done that," she lied.
She re-focused on the sensation of the water, not allowing herself to get dragged down that path of re-living old wounds.
A large number of villagers had come down from the main village to participate, and while everyone acted happy, tensions had begun to flare a little. Aceso sensed conflict in the emotional undercurrent of everyone's mind. The lopsided luck people had been experiencing seemed to be random, but some began to whisper that certain spots had more fish than others, and that the people occupying those spots weren't willing to share.
One older woman had been standing at the same spot since early morning, and she had speared eleven fish. Others had only one, or even none in the same time frame.
Aceso had long sensed the situation coming to a flare-up, and just as she felt this, a man with reddish hair and a beard approached the older woman, trudging through the water awkwardly but with purpose.
"You've been standing there all day, move so that I can catch a fish."
"You haven't caught any because you're too slow," the woman shot back. "I need this spot because it's shallow enough for me to stand up."
Halling, ever astute, wandered over to the two arguing. "There's no need for this," Halling said. "We shouldn't argue about such trivial things."
The man glared at Halling. "You have also kept a good spot all to yourself. You're selfish and uncaring for others! I have to feed people as well!"
She could sense annoyance from Halling, but he kept his reaction tempered. "I propose that those who have many fish, should switch spots with those who have fewer. I will give up my spot for you."
"I can't take your spot Halling," the older woman griped. "It's too deep."
"The river's rising too," the young man said. "Only someone tall like you could stand there."
Aceso, seeing that the water only ran as deep as her ankles in this spot, took a few steps over to them. They all regarded her as she approached. "You may have my spot," Aceso offered to the man. "It is shallow."
The man gave her a suspicious look. "Then where will you go, wraith?"
His tone remained gruff, but Aceso remained neutral. "I have other things that I need to do." She took her fish basket and handed it to the man. "This is for your family."
The man contemplated her offer for a second, then bowed lightly. "Thank you," he said, his earlier gruffness defeated.
Aceso walked to the river bank, while Halling followed up the grassy shoreline.
"They can become a bit unruly during the season," Halling said, tying up the lid on his fish basket. "This happens every time."
"The man insulted you," Aceso said.
Halling glanced over his shoulder. "As a leader, I've learned not to take it personally. There's always someone who thinks poorly of you. It is vital to handle such criticisms with grace."
"You are wise." Aceso said.
Halling laughed, "It has been hard earned. My people can be intense, but I have learned that patience and decorum are key to managing them."
She had been taught such lessons as a young woman. Her mother's teachings drifted just out of reach in her subconscious mind.
She forced her wet feet into her socks, then put on her boots and tied her shoelaces.
"Thank you for helping feed the village," Halling said.
"I must help wherever possible," she said. "I am privileged enough to not worry about food."
Halling continued gathering his things together. "Have a fair day."
As she carried her things and went back to the village, her mind turned toward the upcoming mission. Woolsey had given her the option of leading this mission, and she'd accepted. This presented a new challenge that she hadn't prepared for. She was being given leadership over seven scientists, including McKay. Woolsey was sending a four-person SG team to make sure they were safe, so that meant twelve people on the trip.