Author's Note: Well, the hiatus has finally ended. At least for the most part. This five months I definitely needed to take a breather, in part from work and in part from writing this story. I understood it in July when I suddenly noticed that I was desperately trying to finish the story as soon as possible. The feeling that I may be done with it if I wrote just ten more hasty chapters in the next two months. You know, the feeling that I would finally be free from the story if I did that. Of course, this would have been a grave mistake, wouldn't it? Both feeling like that and messing up the story at the finish line. After many years in which more than a million words have been written, to end it all in such a haste, it would definitely have left a bad taste. So, my conclusion to this problem of mine was that I needed a longer period in which I'm doing other things I like. I then remembered that I like reading stories too. I couldn't leave my job, there are bills that unfortunately come every month and that need to be paid, but in this five months, I at least read others' stories to my heart's content. I now rather need a break from reading.
Well, as mentioned earlier, the break from writing is finally over and now's the time to finish the story, the right way. In a way in which I'll be satisfied with the result, as well as the readers. I can't say that I'm back at full capacity or that there will be a fixed schedule of a new chapter coming out every week, but I'm writing again and this chapter is proof of that. I still have a lot of thinking to do on how to close the many still open threads or how the SGA's expansion into the unknown will proceed, but I'm definitely thinking about it and writing about it accordingly. This chapter should answer many questions on how the story will proceed. I'm also reading my own story again in order to refresh my memory. So, all in all, chapters should start coming out with some regularity with the beginning of 2018.
I'll try to do the same with the other story, the BSG spin-off, but no promises, though. For now, this story takes focus. The other comes after that.
Well, as always, thanks to my beta and hope you'll enjoy reading this chapter.
Who would have thought that one day there would be a new moon orbiting Jupiter?
This was the question Weir was mulling over while walking through one of the almost endless number of corridors inside the massive Starbase One, the by now almost fully completed station currently floating in geosynchronous orbit above the artificial island, Terrania. The station was big, so big that she was glad there were teleportation booths in almost every corner in order to diminish the otherwise gargantuan amount of walking one would have to do in order to get anywhere.
Making a left turn, she smiled, understanding that she'd finally reached her intended destination. She stopped in front of the already opened door leading into Jack's office. A quick glance inside and she saw Jack and Sam informally talking among themselves. She knocked on the door's frame, making her presence known. "Hello. Am I disturbing?"
Jack was the one to wave for her to enter. "Come in, come in!"
She did, walking toward the only still unoccupied armchair in front of Jack's desk. She sat, inquisitively scrutinizing first Jack, then Sam, only to go back to scrutinizing Jack's face again.
"Well?" She asked impatiently.
"Dr. Weir, are you in some kind of rush or something?" Jack asked.
"No, I'm not. It's just that… I am not called to the principal's office very often. Especially not with such urgency conveyed in the message I received," Weir said, with only a hint of worry.
"That's it! Being called the principal is the final straw! I'm changing jobs," Jack stated.
"You're not in trouble, 'Lizbeth. Far from it," Sam added while giving Jack a glare. She then turned focusing on her. "Let me ask you something before we explain in detail why you're here. Tell me, how's life on Atlantis?"
"It's fine, why do you ask?" Weir said, not having the slightest clue where this was going. The last time she felt like this was when she was ordered to deposit her butt in the oval office by no other than, at the time, President Hayes.
"Really?" Jack asked. "Is that how you would describe your life there? Just… it's fine!"
"Well, yes, I would… for the most part that is," Weir added, frowning. She was unsure of how to describe how she felt.
"Ah-ha! Now explain what that 'for the most part' meant," Jack instructed sharply.
She took a deep breath, thinking about how to best explain it. "I must admit that… ever since we retreated from interfering in the affairs of the other human residents in the Pegasus galaxy, my job has become a rather tedious one. Most of my days consist of doing tiresome administrative errands directed towards optimizing the workload of the endless number of scientists currently living on Asura."
"Am I correct then in assuming that your current job is a far cry from, let's say, what your dream job is?" Jack asked.
"Regrettably, I'd have to agree with that, yes," Weir added, somberly.
"Would you like another one then?" Jack asked.
"Another what?" Weir asked, still not sure.
"Don't play difficult with me! That's my prerogative. Just ask Sam over here," Jack said, and she saw Sam nodding in full agreement with his statement. "Job, Dr. Weir. I meant a new job."
"I think it would have to depend on the job offer, I guess."
"Well, as you must have heard by now, we have a new moon orbiting Jupiter. The Furling sphere is here and it will stay here until we are ready to deploy it. The SGA is going to use the sphere to make long jumps to certain locations where we will be deploying supergates. Supergates that our ships will later use to travel distances too big to be crossed even with the fastest hyperdrive currently in our possession or in the possession of our allies. Through some data that has been recovered from Liam's ship, we've learned that he had made contact with many races that he later conscripted to fight on our side in this wretched war. Your job - if you choose to accept it - will be to serve as a diplomat and work on cementing whatever deal Liam has made with them while traveling aboard one of the first ships we will send through. Also-" Jack began but was cut short.
"I accept!" Weir replied vehemently.
"Elizabeth, don't answer before you know everything. You must first realize how dangerous it will be to go so far out and with little to no support from home. No matter what we do, logistics at such distances will be a nightmare," Sam added.
"I accept!" she replied, again.
"You won't have the kind of protection you're accustomed to by now," Sam added.
"I acc… wait! What does that mean exactly?" Maybe it was better to stop repeating the same words like a parrot and actually listen to what Sam is trying to tell her, and her overexcited state be damned.
"Show her," Sam added while looking at Jack.
Jack began pushing some buttons on his tablet. Soon, a hologram popped into existence above his desk. "Since you will be on a diplomatic mission, we can't send you aboard one of our battlecruisers like it had first been planned. There were notes Liam left on his ship suggesting some races may not like meeting new people in scenarios in which they don't have enough fingers to count all of the various weapon emplacements our ships have… no matter how many fingers the aliens have. We need to send a, let's say, more diplomatic crew - and ship - than what we mere brutes from the military, with our big honking space guns mentality, are accustomed to," Jack concluded while putting a smile. It was like watching a shark smile just before it ate you.
Meanwhile, the hologram had successfully coalesced into the form of a ship she had never seen before. From the overall form, she unmistakably identified its origin as one of their own. A Terran ship through and through. She liked it too, much more than the remainder of their ship classes in their ever-growing flotilla. She couldn't see any weapon emplacements on the hull and the ship overall looked much smoother than any other that she knew. The predominantly white color of the hull was also a refreshing change from the dull dark-grey color of the other ships in the Terran Space Navy. The bow was much wider, clearly influenced by Asgard design, and it seemed less tall somehow, or maybe it only looked that way because it was wider, she wasn't sure. In any case, it seemed they were making floors more spacious with this particular class. "Nice looking ship."
"This is our light cruiser class of ships. Something it couldn't exactly be called a new design either since we came up with it a year and a half ago but because of the war with the Vargas other ships simply got precedence to be built over it," Sam explained.
She liked the ship very much, but she couldn't fathom why they were calling it a light cruiser. "I'm sorry, I'm not all that knowledgeable about our ships and their classes, but why are you calling this ship a light cruiser when, as far as I can tell, it is almost two hundred meters longer than our heavy cruisers? At least if am reading this data correctly while remembering the specs of the Damocles."
"That's because the 'light' part in light cruiser doesn't denote its size, but rather how armed and armored the ship is," Sam answered. "Yes, the ship's tonnage is considerably greater than that of our heavy cruisers and it also has a larger crew needed to operate it properly, even larger than that of our battlecruisers. However, weapons, armor, shield, and of course even power generation systems are fewer and much weaker than what you'd find on a heavy cruiser. Also, the light cruiser greatly favors comfort. It was envisioned for the ship to be able to go on voyages that can last for years without ever having the need to dock or resupply. Because of it, reliability and ease of maintainability needed to take precedence over high performance. The designers also envisioned the ship to have comfortable rooms for the crew to maybe have their whole families join them on longer journeys, large entertainment holo-rooms, even a daycare if there are young children aboard. Even though I think that's a little too much. Anyway, most of all, the ship needs entire areas separated from the rest to be used by the potential dignitaries from any number of different races who are to be given every comfort our current technology allows for."
"But, regrettably, all this must come at the expense of weapons, shields, a thicker armor plating, and so on and so on," Jack added.
"It doesn't have shields?" Weir asked.
"Of course it has shields," Sam said with the standard don't-be-stupid expression on her face. She probably deserved it too for having asked such a question. "For example, our latest battlecruisers have the seventh-generation shielding system. The light cruiser Illustrious, the ship you'll be taking on your mission, has a somewhat modified fifth-generation shielding, which, although with a much less complex protective energy matrix than that of our battlecruisers, it's more energy efficient. Something very important on a ship that doesn't have the same energy reserves as our other ships. It has weapons, of course, but only the light plasma lances, a modest number of two hundred Mark III drones, just in case, and only three torpedo tubes, two on the front and one astern. All weapons have been meticulously hidden and can't be easily detected until the moment when they are deployed. The armor plating isn't the same as the one meshed with Neutronium stripes or even having the MDE system installed. No Aegis, no Ignis either. The initially planned reactors have been swapped with the new pulse reactors but even they are fewer in number than even what we have installed on a heavy cruiser, much less how many we have and how stronger those installed on our battlecruisers are. Most components were dialed down, thinking more in terms of longevity and ease of maintenance instead of top performance like what we need on our other military ships. I'm also sure that, once the war is over, this type of ship will become predominant in our fleet because of all of its positive qualities."
"In short, I wouldn't take the ship into a serious battle if I were you. That said, I am also confident that its shield is strong enough to give you enough time to skedaddle if the situation goes FUBAR. Hell! There were times when we thought of the Daedalus-class ships as almost indestructible and this light cruiser you're getting, the Illustrious, has a shield at least three times stronger than that class of ships ever had! I am confident you'll be fine with the Illustrious on your own. However, just to make sure, you'll be given a small pack of wolves in the form of three Defiants to shadow you under stealth, so if shit hits the fan, they are there to run interference. You'll also have one light support ship with you. You'll need it in order to haul the Defiants when traveling between galaxies since they don't have an intergalactic hyperdrive, and for carrying additional supplies or for performing larger repairs if something happens," Jack explained.
"I'll take it!" Weir said all excited. She was going back to being a diplomat, what she liked doing the most.
"You will have Woolsey by your side, and the captain of the ship, James Warren – I assure you he's a good captain, and you'll like him as a person too – who'll be in charge of the hard decisions when lives are at stake. However, overall you're in charge of the mission, how it will proceed, and when it might be a good thing to back down."
"Why Woolsey?" she asked, uncertain of why having two diplomats on a single mission.
"Are you going to explain to her why?" Jack asked Sam.
"Because there are races who'd probably rather deal with a male than a female of a species, or vice versa, so we need both on any diplomatic ship," Sam said, raising her hand clearly to forestall any complaint coming from her. "I know, I know, but we are not here to teach alien races around the universe about equality between sexes. We need allies to fight the Vargas and we need them badly. Therefore, we will have to adapt."
"And frankly, I don't think that we even have the right to impose our moral codes on alien races many hundreds of millions of light years away from our galaxy that may very well be millions of years older than we are," Jack added.
"Point taken. Making friends comes first, even if I have to keep my principles bolted deep down," Weir said. She didn't like it, but during her time in the Pegasus galaxy she understood and accepted many things the idealistic her from before she had joined the Atlantis Expedition wouldn't have so easily out of principle. First, the universe was much bigger than Earth, which meant imposing their principles on others in their galaxy or further out in the entirety of the universe was above simply being arrogant. That was even truer when nonhuman races were a concern. Who knows, maybe a race has their males completely useless, even more so than what was the case with humans, and only useful when it came to making the next generation of their species. That could easily require them to be a Matriarchal society.
Who were they to try to impose equality in such a society?
Second, a balance between pragmatism and idealism must be found. Too much of one or the other tended to give negative results. If she had clung to the naïve notion that everything can be solved through peaceful negotiation or that there was always a solution that benefitted both sides, she would have made many mistakes that could have possibly cost many lives in the Pegasus galaxy. Instead, she began adopting a different type of diplomacy. She called it gunslinger diplomacy. Be good, listen to all sides, but when they show to be unreasonable, show them who's the fastest draw in the galaxy. And for that, she had Shepard by her side. Speaking of which…
"What about Shepard? In these last few years, I saw him wither more than that poor cactus he has in his office and that he has stopped tending a very long time ago. I haven't seen him in a week or so either."
"He's easing in his new command of a battle group slated to depart for hostile territory when the time comes. He's currently performing drills in the Haven System," Jack explained.
"Battlegroup?" Weir asked, puzzled.
"Yes, he'll be the admiral in charge of the flagship, the battlecruiser Restless, four heavy cruisers, fifteen Defiants, two of the new assault carriers filled to the brim with smaller spacecraft, and a heavy support ship that among other things has the ability to dock many smaller ships like the Defiants and tow them to neighboring galaxies. He's going on the front line, Elizabeth. Almost at the same time as you," Jack explained.
"Doing what? Fighting the Vargas?" Weir asked.
"Not yet. For now, we are going to wage a little of asymmetric type warfare against an enemy that is much more numerous than we are. For that, we have two types of battlegroups. One type, among other ships, has dreadnoughts in it and their job will be to destroy or take control of the Vargas space stations by any means necessary. Those big things protecting the anomalies. Our idea is to close or take control of as many Vargas routes as we can and disrupt their logistics while simultaneously using the Furling Sphere for deploying as many supergates as we can. The dreadnoughts will do great in destroying the stations from a distance if the commander deems there's no way of taking control of them.
"The second type of battlegroup is the one Sheppard belongs to. Their job will be to seek races the Vargas have enslaved and possibly find a way to free them. However, if they are bent on doing the Vargas bidding on their own free volition, then we go weapons hot and we take them out."
"Isn't Shepard's battlegroup too small for that type of task?" Weir asked, a little worried. "I mean, he has twenty warships in total if we don't count the carriers and the heavy support ship, and most of them are Defiants. The smallest warships we have. I get that the new ships are powerful, but still, twenty ships against an entire race that's working for the Vargas seems like a little too few, in my opinion."
"That's the point of guerrilla warfare. Dr. Weir, we are not going there to have a fair fight in the sense of lets all get-together, our forces on one side, your forces on the other, and let's slug it out," Jack began explaining. "What we do is, we find undefended targets, smaller groups of ships, planets with less than optimal defenses, or we plainly sneak in with our awesome cloaks active and dump a quantum bomb on whatever we want to be erased in endless cleansing fires. In guerrilla warfare, if the commanding officer can't answer the simple question - what overwhelming advantage do we have against today's target? - then that day there's no mission to be had. Period."
"Bombing? Bombing what exactly?" Weir asked. A quantum bomb worked on the same principle as the unsuccessful first test with the Arcturus reactor. Sudden creation of a lot of exotic particles during the process of extracting zero-point energy from our own space-time.
Bad, very bad.
Jack sighed, looking annoyed "Dr. Weir, if a race is committing genocide on behalf of the Vargas of their own volition - with no type of coercion, technological or otherwise, whatsoever - then the gloves are coming off. Which means, at best we nuke them back into the Stone Age. At worst, extinction level event, and they are gone! We aren't going to be needlessly cruel, but those Hunters, for example, will soon have a knife made of chipped stone as the most sophisticated weapon their society can produce and it will be that way for the conceivable future, I guarantee you that. And they should be glad we are not cracking their planets like watermelons!
"Both your ship and battlegroups like Sheppard's will have scientists - ours, Edenian and Asgard - to troubleshoot anything the Vargas might have done to races to make them submissive or in your case to aid you in your diplomatic endeavors. You will also be going with a newly minted Alterra named Loran, and Freyr from the Asgard as representatives of the other two races in our Alliance. We are still trying to find out if the Nox are sending somebody, though. Maybe on your ship, but on Sheppard's, not a chance."
"I'm happy to hear that I won't be alone," Weir added.
"You are? Thought you'd be annoyed," Jack asked.
"Not at all. Frankly, I wasn't sure why the Alterra and Asgard have agreed to let us lead the diplomatic missions. I thought the Alterra would have taken the reins on that one for sure."
"I think the main reason is that they have a convoluted way of thinking in which the older races must teach the younger ones on how to do things and there's no better way than to let us do things ourselves… while under their unobtrusive supervision, of course. It seems that the fact that the situation is precarious and that a screw up can cause massive damage to the war effort isn't phasing them in the slightest," Jack explained, clearly showing how he didn't understand their reasoning, not completely anyway.
And he was one of them.
"It also looks like we are the only one in the Alliance who thought of building ships meant for diplomacy. The Asgard O'Neill and Valhalla look ten times more menacing than how they looked three years ago, and the Edenians are bent on using at least five improved Echelon-AI-ships to go with each crewed ship as escorts, and those distinctly look like very big weapons and nothing else. Something to do with the fact that there are more than a hundred times fewer Edenians than there are Terrans. We can afford a military comprised of 80 million people in a heartbeat, which is our planned one percent of our population. The Edenians have around fifty million people total."
"As far as I know, every newly minted Alterra gets the Repository of Knowledge downloaded into their brain, which means they are better to have with you than having any database, no matter how intelligently categorized and complete it is. Having an Asgard is also great if quick and logical thinking is needed," Weir explained. And if she could deal with the likes of McKay, having an Alterra and an Asgard, maybe even a Nox if they decide to join, would be a walk in the park. Maybe even pleasant.
"Agreed. Having them is welcomed," Jack said. "Well, this is, I think, all for now. You'll now get all the pertinent data the Alterra were able to retrieve from Liam's ship regarding the races you'll be meeting. I think the first race you'll be meeting is the Aklarian Dominion, some two hundred million light years from here. It is the closest potential ally that Liam met. Don't know as much as I'd like about them, though. Also, I'm not sure when the Sphere will be getting on its way, but with its incredible jump drive it could reach the Aklarian region of space and be deploying a supergate there in less than ten days, easy. Which means you could be asked to deploy in as few as fifteen days."
"It is not a problem. I'm ready now for that matter. I am a little curious about Liam and the Sphere, though. I haven't heard much. Being in Pegasus and all," Weir asked. No gossip, innuendoes, or random tidbits of data. Nothing like that had reached Pegasus in regard to the recently acquired Furling Sphere.
"Not much is known at this point. To answer your first concern, we have no clue what happened to Liam except that it must have been bad. At the barest, he has been separated from his ship, which effectively flags him as MIA. At the worst… well, let's not go there yet," Jack said, clearly not liking where his thoughts went for a moment. "The Sphere. A big, fat unknown! The Furling AI doesn't have a clue where his people went. Some twenty thousand years ago, the Sphere was finally constructed, at which point a Furling's consciousness - Hunahpu I think the name of the chosen Furling was – was stored in the memory banks of the massive construct. Unfortunately, it seems that Hunahpu was scrubbed of his knowledge of anything related to the plans the Furlings might have for themselves, probably for security reasons. The only things he knows are the last few moments before the transfer of consciousness had been performed and a vague recollection that the Furling were moving further away from our region of space with the prototype sphere."
"Prototype sphere?" Weir asked.
"Yes. Apparently, the Furling created another sphere first. A considerably smaller one meant as a testing bed for some of the technologies they later installed in the larger one. The sphere we have here, currently parked as one additional moon in orbit around Jupiter, has a radius of around 1,800 kilometers. The prototype sphere had one of only 450 kilometers. Still, it appears that it had the same ability to predict exit jump points, which makes these two spheres the only two constructs in existence that we know of capable of jumping such ludicrous distances safely without ending inside an asteroid or larger celestial body by mistake. It isn't even all that strange if you think about it since the other sphere is filled with a species capable of predicting the future," Jack concluded, scratching his head. He was digressing a little. "Anyway, all races in our alliance are going through the sphere but it will take some time before we learn everything the sphere holds. Of some note, though, we did find a massive hangar filled with some special type of ships."
"What kind of special ships?" Weir asked. Jack had put a strange face, one that he wouldn't have put if it were about big honking spaceships with planet blowing weapons stacked on their hulls. She wasn't seeing any drooling either.
"I would call them seed ships. Inspection of one has shown that the ship is nothing more than a missile with a hyperdrive astern and a heavily reinforced bow. We surmised that those ships could enter the Iota hyperband and the reinforced bow allows them to reach higher speeds even without having to deploy a heavy shield to protect against high-speed impacts with the omnipresent exotic particles. This allows the ships to travel at an appreciable portion of the speed of light, hyperspace relative, of course, making them extremely fast. Their narrow profile and overall small size help too," Jack said.
"You didn't say why you call them seed ships."
"Supergates," Jack said. "We would probably come to the same solution, eventually, but the Furling beat us to it. Their idea is for the Sphere to travel for hundreds of millions of light years, there to deploy a supergate, and then launch seed ships with the task of deploying additional supergates in a hundred or so million light years radius wherever it is needed. With each deployed supergate they can get support through it. They are still slower than the Sphere, but a seed ship traveling through the iota hyper-band at near the speed of light can cross a hundred million light years in a little over one month. In short, the ships are massive hyper-missiles."
"It seems smart. Each deployed supergate then allows instant resupplying from the Milky Way galaxy," Weir said thoughtfully.
"Close, but not completely true," Sam added.
"Why not?" Weir asked.
"The supergates have a maximum range of seven hundred million light-years."
"Why? I thought a black hole is capable of providing whatever power is needed."
"It is, with plenty left," Sam confirmed. "The problem is in the components unable to survive the flux of so much energy coursing through them. Even a normal gate is at its limits when we are dealing with such vast distances. We've seen it when we dialed Destiny. A supergate, on the other hand, needs several orders of magnitude as much energy to create a super-wormhole. Transferring a stream that represents a person or transferring a stream of a hundred million tons heavy ship, it isn't the same thing either."
"In short, above seven hundred million light-years, you risk blowing a fuse during the initial creation of the super-wormhole or even worse, half through the transfer and reintegration process of a ship," Jack surmised. "Frankly, I would say that connecting to the Destiny was risky too. I saw how that gate was sparking while connected to the other end a few billion light-years away. The higher exit velocity our people experienced tells me that the gate was at its limits. Can you imagine an entire ship suddenly exiting at a much higher exit velocity even before the inertial dampeners could react?"
"It is true that we are talking about powers only found in black holes," Sam said. "Not many systems can work with such overwhelming energy sources."
"And distances that still feel ridiculous to be even mentioned," Weir added. "I still can't wrap my mind around the notion of traveling millions of light-years in a heartbeat. Does this also explain why the Vargas don't use supergates, but rather their strange anomalies?"
"We have no idea how those anomalies work or what distances can be crossed, but they do have many advantages over using a supergate. They seem capable of swallowing as big a ship as it can be. Ships tens of kilometers or entire fleets can travel through it with no apparent limitations. Or the need for a black hole nearby as a power source. They have some other way of supplying the needed energy and it also seems that anomalies don't need as much power as gates do, which is strange," Sam said.
"On the other hand, one anomaly connects two fixed points in the universe. You can't dial a different destination like with a gate. If they could do that, this war would have already been lost a long time ago," Jack said.
"Right," Weir said, for the first time realizing how such a change in technology could easily upset the balance of power. If any anomaly could deliver whatever needed to any other anomaly in the known universe, their struggle would have been over a long time ago. It was good that, apparently, the universe had some limitations on what was possible and what wasn't.
"Some work Liam has done suggests that making an anomaly is incredibly difficult and not something the Vargas can do anytime they want. It may take decades to fix and stabilize a wormhole. It is probably the reason why there aren't so many of them, relatively speaking, of course," Sam explained. "There are plenty already, but if easier to build, the Vargas would have placed one in each galaxy they went to, of that I'm certain."
Weir listened to what Sam has explained, but frankly, part of her brain was already thinking of the mission ahead of her. "So, the Aklarian Dominion is my first candidate for becoming an ally in this war."
"I can tell you even now the little we know from the fragments we have recovered, which isn't much. We think Hunahpu will be able to recover more from Liam's ship, but it will take some more time," Jack began explaining. "Anyway, the first thing that you need to learn stems from their name."
"Aklarians?" Weir asked, not understanding.
"No, the other word," Jack said, looking annoyed.
It was true. She should have thought about it immediately. The connotation it gives. "Dominion."
"Yes, Dominion," Jack repeated the word. "It appears the Aklarians are a race that subjugates other races who are living in their ever-growing territory. And it is already a very vast territory at that."
"How vast?" Weir asked. She didn't particularly like what she was hearing.
"Their core spans across seven galaxies. If we include their fringes, we are talking about around forty galaxies in total."
Her jaw had just dropped by an inch. "How big are they?"
"From the data Liam sent, it seems there are around six trillion Aklarians and half that over in subjugated races," Jack answered.
It was difficult to imagine such a number of sentient beings. On the other hand, the Goa'uld and the Wraith took care of any overpopulation problem on a galactic scale in their immediate neighborhood pretty well. "They have subjugated trillions of people?"
"Yes, but it's not as bad as you think. It's not great either, but it appears their philosophy is to incorporate other races into their dominion since they believe to be best suited to lead," Jack added.
"Sure, but inside a Dominion in which the one doing the dominating are the Aklarians, there has to be discrimination against other races. You can't tell me there isn't any," Weir spat back, frustration starting to well inside of her.
"It's not all bad, but, sure, it's not all good either. Of course there's discrimination. From what we've gathered so far, it seems that no individual from another race can accuse an Aklarian of any wrongdoing if said individual doesn't have an Aklarian sponsor. From the notes Liam left, using such a method to right a wrong is also double-edged. If the individual seeks an Aklarian sponsor, even if they later win in court against the Aklarian that wronged them, they still end up indebted to their new sponsor. In truth, it's a no-win situation," Jack explained. "This is the worst about the Aklarians that we were able to find out thus far. The good thing is that, since the Aklarians think of themselves as the enlightened ones who are there to show other lesser races how to progress, the interaction between Aklarian individuals and those of other races is rare. After establishing some rules and laws the other races in their Dominion must abide by, the Aklarians mostly leave them alone and have minimal or no interaction at all with them."
"Still, I can't see us seeing eye to eye with them, much less the Alterra being able to. And by that I mean Liam too who had met them already," Weir said.
"We don't know exactly, but from the tone of his notes when he talks about the Aklarians, he doesn't like them very much either. However, there are two reasons why he thinks we should form an alliance with them."
"Which are?"
"First, the Aklarians have a navy of around 200,000 ships, with a good portion of them capable of intergalactic travel. And second, the Vargas already tried to take them out and failed."
"200,000 ships!" Weir shouted. "Well, with so many, I guess even the Vargas would think twice before invading."
"No, that's not the reason," Jack said.
"It isn't?"
"The real reason is that the Aklarians have developed a device capable of creating distortions in our space-time, and it works across incredibly vast distances. They have placed countless such devices across their galaxies that are creating regions impossible to travel both in normal space or hyperspace. A ship is simply tossed out of hyperspace, violently - as Liam has attested - and then you find yourself stranded in a region where the laws of physics don't function quite the way they should be working. They were able to create countless such mazes in their galaxies that only they know how to traverse without getting stuck. And they can reconfigure those mazes with little effort, which gives them a massive home-field advantage. After the Vargas sustained heavy losses while trying to map their galaxies, the Aklarians spent that time further preparing. Eventually, the Vargas must have decided to leave those galaxies alone as, overall, inconsequential to them. Too much effort for very little gain when compared to the vastness of the known universe. The way of protecting themselves also precludes the Aklarian from being able to expand their territory too quickly."
"It makes sense," Weir added. "Making mazes with boundaries made of distorted space-time on a galactic scale can't be easy."
"No, it can't," Jack added before continuing with the explanation. "This is why Liam wants to befriend them even though he knows that long-term friendship isn't gonna happen. He even promised to give them gate technology as a bonus."
"He did?" Weir said. "I get Liam's wish for the Aklarians to join the war, but still, giving a race that likes to dominate other races and has expansionistic tendencies gate technology isn't what I'd have expected from Liam."
"Sam and I had the same reaction when we first heard. However, Aenea explained something that we missed noticing, or rather, something that we didn't even know," Jack said, smiling wickedly.
"Which is?" Weir asked.
"Will you explain? You're better at this stuff," Jack asked Sam.
"Liam promised to give the Aklarians the theory behind the inner workings of the gates, but there's something that if you don't know makes it difficult to use them. It is probably the main reason why not many races develop gate technology. In short, the energy expenditure is too great for such a system to be of any use," Sam began explaining.
"I don't get it. We used the gate every day without any trouble. True, the electric bill in Cheyenne Mountain was substantial, but far from prohibitive. What am I missing here?" Weir inquired.
"The 36 minutes limit is the key. In order for a gate to guarantee the integrity of the reconstituted matter, matter transported from one gate to the other, normally the Phi subspace band needs to be used. The problem here is that the Phi band is a very high subspace band and over great distances, it needs massive amounts of energy to work. Because of it, the Alterra devised a trick. A gate uses a lower band, the Tau subspace band, for transfer of the stream of dematerialized matter, while the Phi band is only used to transfer control and correction data that ensures perfect reconstitution of matter at the receiving end. The problem is that, after 36 minutes, the two created subspace tunnels - let's call them the tau and phi tunnels - go completely out of sync. At that point, the gate must switch from using the Tau band for the transfer of the dematerialized matter to the higher Phi band, which results in a massive bump in power consumption. We know from experience that after 36 minutes, we need a ZPM or a similar power source to keep the gate open even if it is to connect gates located in the same galaxy."
"Huh, I never actually thought about why there was a 36 minutes limit. I just thought it was a safety feature to close the connection after 36 minutes," Weir said.
"There isn't any such feature. We know from experience that if additional power is added to the gate – from a black hole or explosion - the connection will not shut down on its own. This is proof enough that there is no such safety feature."
Weir was nodding in understanding. "So, this means that the basic theory Liam promised to the Aklarians is worth nothing."
"Almost nothing, yes," Sam agreed. "They might still be able to create a gate used for shorter distances, but the energy consumption, if used on a wider scale, could bankrupt them."
"Liam is tricking them. Good for him," Weir smiled. "Better than the thought of him giving such advanced technology to the likes of the Aklarians."
"He also agreed for the installation of two supergates. One in their central galaxy and another in the farthest galaxy in their domain. They are having some trouble there with some indigenous aliens and their hyperdrives are also slower than ours. It takes too much time to bring reinforcements. He told them that the supergate tech isn't his to give and that the true owners of the technology are not ready to share the theory behind it with others but are ready to lend the finished products if he asked. With this, he had limited what he gives them for their cooperation in the oncoming war with the Vargas," Sam concluded.
"Unfortunately, we don't know much more than that. There's also the initial report that suggests their initial meet, Liam's and of the Aklarians, didn't go so well. Frankly, Liam believes the reason the Aklarians decided to make contact was that they understood that he was able to detect the anomalous regions and even escape from one by using a small jump drive that he built on his ship just for the purpose. They probably think that it is better to be on friendly terms with someone who can negate their most effective defense than to antagonize him. They didn't know, though, that Liam couldn't detect the anomalies from more than a few light-days away, which had forced him to travel at a much slower speed than usual. He didn't tell them that, so we are not telling them that either. Got that?" Jack asked sternly.
"Keep the seepage of important information to a minimum. Got it," Weir responded, smiling. There was no way she would give anything to the likes of the Aklarians.
However benevolent their Dominion might seem, it was still that. A Dominion. One in which rules were imposed on other races and one in which equality didn't exist where the Aklarians were concerned. Jack was right. There was very little information and she didn't want to be prejudiced against the Aklarians before she even met them and then made her own opinion of what kind of people they were. However, her hopes of having an amicable relationship with them were almost nonexistent. In her educated opinion, the Aklarians wanted to gain as much as possible from their interaction and they were the kind that would do whatever it takes to accomplish that. In the same way, she, Jack, and Sam had already understood Liam's initial conclusion that long-term friendship or an alliance with the Aklarians is impossible because of some major philosophical differences. The Aklarians would most certainly have come to the same conclusion.
Which meant, the moment their mutual interest, which was the defeat of the Vargas, was gone, the Aklarians and the Second Great Alliance would be at each other's throat. She was sure of it. Thankfully, the Aklarians were more than 200 million light years distant, and they had even slower hyperdrives, which meant there wasn't much reason to worry about a war against them. At least not in the conceivable future.
"Your first job is to make contact with them, sign a deal for their cooperation in the war against the Vargas, and to oversee the installation of the two supergates, which by the time you get there will already have been deployed by the Sphere. They will probably ask you to test them by traveling between the two galaxies and to be given the necessary protocols to dial the supergates," Jack explained.
"Yes, you mentioned a race they are fighting in that other galaxy. Are we really helping the Aklarians subjugate another race?"
"Dr. Weir, there are worse races than the Aklarians out there. No matter how bad the Aklarians sound with their Dominion, they are actually doing something good too. Who the Aklarians are fighting, they are calling them the Scourge. A nomadic race that over the eons had spread across countless galaxies, even from galaxies outside of the Aklarian region of influence. They don't even know where they are originating from. All we know about the Scourge is that they lay waste wherever they go and then when they are finally done, they simply move on to the next target. Believe it or not, they use massive hollowed asteroids to travel. Even when traveling to a neighboring galaxy."
"How can they move an asteroid weighing what's probably countless millions of tons across intergalactic distances? The mere idea of accelerating such an asteroid, be it in normal space or hyperspace, is inconceivable to me."
"They don't need to accelerate it by much because they don't care how long it takes to travel to another galaxy. You need to think of it more like, for example, together with our Solar system, our planet Earth traveling through space. You don't care how fast Earth's moving or where it will end up in a decade or a century because the daily routine on our planet isn't influenced by it. The same way the Scourge are living their lives inside massive asteroids while traveling, maybe for years, decades, or maybe even centuries across the void between galaxies while in hyperspace. As far as they can tell, the Aklarians think the Scourge has been around for millions of years. The Scourge has been detected in multiple galaxies by the Aklarians. Those separated groups were at a completely different technological level from each other, which would indicate that a long time has passed since they last communicated."
"Do we know something else about this Scourge except that they are bad?" she asked.
"No, nothing. Even if there is something in the databanks on Liam's ship, it hasn't been recovered yet. Most of what was recovered were audio logs Liam recorded, but there are no attached files, like videos or images. Not of the Scourge and not of the Aklarians. Unfortunately, recovering data from crystals that are containing it inside quantum lattices isn't easy and if you rush the process, it could damage the crystals and cost you everything that was on them. I think you'll have to be the one to ask the Aklarians for more information on the Scourge, Dr. Weir," Jack explained.
"Not a problem, but I'm unsure if there's a point in meddling into this Scourge race. We have enough to worry about with the Vargas. I also wouldn't want to sidetrack any talks with the Aklarians. I would like to keep the discussion short and to the point, all with the sole purpose of enlisting them in our war against the Vargas," Weir replied. From what she'd heard up until now, the Aklarians were not against asking for advancements in return for their cooperation. Further talks could give them strange ideas, maybe even decide to reevaluate what they had already gained with Liam and ask for more. Especially since Liam, the one who initiated the talks wasn't going to be there. In her opinion, she needed to keep the talks to a minimum and as concise as possible.
"Normally, I would have agreed with you in a heartbeat, Dr. Weir – the less we talk with the Aklarians, the better. That is if it wasn't for the little fact that the Scourge seems to be originating from a region of space located somewhere between us and the Aklarian Dominion. If we assume that, as a nomadic race in search for new resources, the Scourge is probably spreading in all directions. Then, there is a good chance of them traveling our way as well. We also don't know for how long they have been at it, which means that they could still be a hundred million light years away from us, or they could already be inside our Local Group. You may not know this, but we have plans to travel to each of the 54 galaxies in our Local Group, put supergates in all of them and then do some exploring and monitoring of our immediate neighborhood. It's not a short-term plan, but we would still like to know if we have to worry about some Scourge or other race coming our way, or maybe already being somewhere near us.
"Only recently I found out that a race called the K'lar, which are the archenemies of the Asgard located in some nearby satellite galaxy to Ida, are still very much alive and kicking. The reason why they don't venture outside of their galaxy is that, during the Asgard-K'lar war, the Alterrans intervened and the K'lar are still psychologically scarred from the experience. It seems the Alterrans can turn into pretty ugly monsters if pushed, at least that's what I got from Thor's stories. In short, for their treachery, the Alterrans scared the living crap out of the K'lar and as punishment they were turned back into their Stone Age and explicitly forbidden to ever venture outside of their small satellite galaxy. Something they hadn't done in more than five million years, probably only because they didn't know there were no Alterrans around for a very long time, at least until recently," Jack explained. He seemed frustrated. Probably because nobody informed him about this until recently. She completely understood how he felt.
It was strange to her to hear Jack speak of the Alterrans as if they were something foreign, or alien. He was one of them and based on how Jack is, she could clearly see that Alterrans too if pushed could turn into pretty ugly creatures, the same way as humans could. In the end, Jack's conversion into an Alterran hasn't diminished his fascination with big guns, the same as his willingness to use them… if pushed. If nothing else, his resolve and convictions have been crystalized ever since the transformation. At least, that was her opinion of the man. "I knew a little about the K'lar because Thor spoke about them when we were discussing what to do with the rogue Vanir, but I too didn't know they were still alive and much less they could pose a threat to us."
"They could be, but they are also not very important right now," Jack said, clearly understanding they were veering off topic. "Anyway, if you could get enough information from the Aklarians in order for us to be able to make a predictive model of the Scourge's possible point of origin and their spreading pattern through the universe, that would be great!"
"Are we planning on expanding our domain into neighboring galaxies?" she asked. They retreated from the affairs of the Pegasus galaxy pretty quickly. In her opinion, there wasn't much point in spreading into other galaxies. There was no lack of habitable planets in the Milky Way. So, why were they talking about visiting all other galaxies in the Local Group?
"Not really," Jack began explaining. "We plant a supergate and a jump station in each, which is all the galaxies in a ten million light years diameter, in order to be able to deploy quickly if needed. I think that's the bare minimum of neighboring galaxies we need to have under observation in order to be sure there won't be any surprises anywhere near us. Besides that, we do some exploration in each of them to see if there's something of interest, but that's it. As far as colonization goes, we don't have any big plans. Right now we are talking about maybe colonizing one planet in the other two largest galaxies besides the Milky Way, the Andromeda, and Triangulum galaxies. However, the war against the Vargas takes precedence over all this and many other plans."
"Other plans? I see the council has been busy with ideas?" she asked. She felt a little left out, with her job of babysitting the horde of scientists on Asura that she didn't find all that satisfying.
"You have no idea," Jack replied, for some reason looking straight at Sam disapprovingly.
"What? It's not a bad idea," Sam replied, clearly talking about something she did not know.
"Maybe," Jack responded, a little peeved. "I just don't see the point in doing it."
"The point of doing what?" she asked. She was fed up with feeling clueless.
Jack turned. "A few scientists have gotten in their heads the idea of terraforming Mars. And this scientist over here thinks it's a great idea!"
"Well, I wouldn't mind having a second habitable planet in our Solar system. Wouldn't you?" she replied quickly.
"I would too, but do you know what it entails to make Mars livable?" Jack asked.
"Bringing air?" Weir asked. Honestly, she had no clue.
"Yeah. That too," Jack said, but the way he did was clearly implying that that was only the tip of the iceberg. "Mars has only 10.7% the mass and a gravity of 38% compared to those of Earth, which is simply too little. For humans to evolve healthy on a planet, even after Genesis, we need at least 55%-60% of Earth's gravity. Less than that and people would have trouble growing up, and traveling to other planets that have a normal earthlike gravity would become a complete nightmare for them. So, the idea is to collect a few moons, like Io and Ganymede, and redirect them toward Mars. There's talk of taking Mercury too or part of it at least, but there's some opposition to that plan. While we are desperately attempting to increase the mass of Mars, we also slowly move the planet closer to Earth. They want Mars to trail Earth on a slightly wider course around the Sun, some half a light minute from Earth, no more. This would also bring the planet closer to the Sun, which would begin warming it up. This would be a multi-decade project, even with the use of time dilation fields to speed the changes on Mars. Do you get the picture now of what kind of project this would be?"
She now began to understand. They were talking about moving massive celestial objects in the Solar system. She had no clue on how they were even thinking of moving Io from Jupiter's orbit to Mars. And then somehow combine them without causing some cataclysmic reaction on the planet. Ganymede, she knew, also possessed a metallic core, which probably meant that they were planning to use it to give Mars a stronger magnetic field, if they could find a way to transfer said core inside of Mars, of course. Again, she had no clue on how the scientists were planning on actually doing it. Mars also would need a completely different atmosphere in addition to a much thicker one to make the planet livable. Oxygen wouldn't be the biggest problem either, Earth has around 70% of nitrogen present in its atmosphere, while Mars had very little of it. "I think I understand why you're not very enthusiastic about the idea."
"Of course I'm not! We have so many habitable planets in our galaxy alone, all ready to be colonized whenever we want! Mars also has no valuable materials that would make the planet somewhat more appealing!" Jack replied, frustrated. "Why would we ever contemplate terraforming Mars, I have no idea whatsoever."
"It's because it would be a second habitable planet inside our Solar system. The system where the first world is," Sam retorted.
"Well, from the number of people that are relocating to some of our other planets, that means much less than what you think," Jack spat back.
It was true, and she could barely believe how many people were deciding to leave Earth for some of the other planets in the newly formed Terran Federation. Terra Nova and Haven were the premium destinations right now. Asura not so much. It was in another galaxy after all, which apparently was a little too distant for some people. Xi'an, the Chinese colony that gained independence during the Aschen Plague incident was the preferred destination for people emigrating from China. Now that the Jump Station was becoming operational, the number of people able to leave Earth would only increase and would do so drastically. "At first, it sounds like a great idea to have another habitable planet in our Solar system. But, if somebody asked me directly if I wanted to set roots on a terraformed planet with only half or so of Earth's gravity and with probably many other not very appealing characteristics, I would probably have to say no thank you. I would prefer to stay on Earth or maybe choose a planet like Terra Nova. From what I read about it, the planet's climate is amazing. Perfect for retirement in another two hundred or so years. From the way you look, Jack, you might start thinking about a prolonged vacation on Terra Nova. It would probably do you some good. Are you having trouble dealing with all the paperwork?"
"It's not the paperwork that is killing me, but the last few times I suddenly found myself some hundred or so years in the past. Even if I went on vacation, as you've suggested on Terra Nova, I would still time-jump without any warning back on Earth," Jack explained. "Last time it was the twenties. I spent two days chasing that Shrike guy who somehow always leaves the moment I'm getting close. And that's not even the worst part."
"What's the worst part?" she asked.
"The worst part is that with this deranged time traveling business, I'm traveling into the past fully aware that I'd fail because from the historical evidence we know the Shrike Cult has existed for more than two hundred years!" Jack shouted, clearly frustrated.
"You can't succeed in catching him in the twenties if history shows he has existed prior to that point," Weir surmised. "That should definitely get you depresses."
"And I'm even more pissed that every time I'm going back - God damn! - I'm always half naked!" Jack added, now suddenly sounding very angry. "I woke up yesterday because I was feeling a sudden chill on my back, not understanding why. Of course I felt chilly! I woke up in the middle of an unknown street, in 1921… in the middle of January! I only had my undershirt on me for cryin' out loud!"
She was looking at Jack's exasperated expression, only to notice Sam who was barely able to keep a straight face. In her humble opinion, that was pretty mean of her. Although, she too was having a little trouble keeping from laughing. She made a small cough in order to compose herself. "I sympathize Jack. I really do."
"Gah! Enough about this or I'll get depressed in addition to already feeling completely drained. I think we don't have anything else to talk about either, do we?" Jack asked clearly waiting to see if anyone else had something to add.
"Well, I do have one question," she said.
Sam was faster to ask. "Which is?"
"What are the predictions?"
"Predictions?" Sam asked back.
"For the war. The timetable, and the predicted chances of winning it."
Jack and Sam were looking at each other. Jack was the one to respond. "First, you must understand how little we know of what awaits us out there."
"I know we don't know as much as we'd like, but still, with what we know now about the Vargas and their minions, at least those that we've already fought, you must have come to some conclusions on how this war will proceed. And since you're planning on going on the offensive, you must believe that we at least have a chance of surviving what's to come."
"Yes, we did make some predictions and plans, of course, and we do believe we have a shot at winning," Jack began. "If we look at the Vargas alone, we think that we definitely have a shot at them. Mind you, we don't have their exact numbers and we still believe that in a straight slugging match, they would have such superior numbers that they could easily negate any technological edge we may have acquired with the last few techs researched and developed with the help from the ascended knowledge found in the Clava Thessara Infinitas. Knowledge, we believe, the Vargas do not have. However, if we don't seek direct confrontation unless in a favorable position, we could slowly take them down. It takes a lot of time for the Vargas to build their ships because of that armor of theirs, which means they can't replenish their losses so easily." Jack made a pause, before counting in a more somber tone.
"Unfortunately, the Vargas are not the only problem. In addition to having to deal with countless galaxies in the entirety of the freaking universe, which by the way will make our logistics a total nightmare, we have to deal with an unknown number of subjugated races of unknown capabilities and sizes. It is enough to look at the races that came here and the problems we are having. The Crabs and Hunters are predominantly races meant to fight on the ground, so not much of a problem in space battles. Yet, we are still unable to clear them from even one of the planets they have infested. The Reapers are even worse and definitely a bigger problem in space battles. They are multiplying like a virus and we have no clue on how to stop them. I'm also certain that the Vargas have more minions out there that are more powerful than what we are seeing here and our current warships are all predominantly tailored to fight the Vargas. The Aegis system uses too much power to be used against normal weapons, the same as the QDBs that need to be calibrated for each separate type of armor or shielding system, which isn't always easy to do if the enemy is new to us or if they know how to cycle their shield's modulation or composition. This means that our battlecruisers are not the doomsday weapon some in our Council or Parliament think they are. Not if we have to use them against some other enemy besides the Vargas that uses some advanced technologies we know nothing about."
"I still think that if we can deal with the Vargas, then we will be able to deal with all or most of the Vargas minions. In one way or another," Sam added, confident in the statement.
"I think that too, however, there are those who think that the Vargas are not at the top of the food chain, but more like caretakers for others. To me, they look like machines built by others. They don't seem to have free will and they haven't evolved by an iota in what has probably been a billion or so years. I think the biggest challenge will be when we find who the real masters of those we thought were at the top truly are. From all we know, we could be dealing with another ascended race like the Ori pulling the strings, or maybe even worse. We know that not all ascended beings are the same or that they have achieved the same level after ascending. All this could mean the Vargas might not be our biggest problem," Jack said.
"From the autopsies of the various Vargas and from the observation of the one recently caught alive, most scientists are more and more convinced that the Vargas fill the role of servants or, as Jack said, caretakers. Much, much better than that of masters as initially thought," Sam interjected.
"That's a truly troubling thought," she added pensively. "What about a timetable?"
"Until we learn of a way of hitting them where it truly hurts, the only thing we can do is to disrupt their logistics by closing their anomalies and by taking their minions out. Free those that have been coerced, remove those that have joined willingly. How much damage this will do to them we have no clue, but we think it will take five to ten years to see even the barest of noticeable progress. Hopefully, by then, we will also have a lot of allies and a much better plan on how to end the war. In five years' time, the SGA's Navy is planning to grow to around 50,000 warships, not counting corvettes and fighters, even after taking into account the losses our predicted model tells us we will inevitably sustain. Thankfully, the Asgard use very few people to man their ships and the Edinians are building as many AI-driven Echelon warships as support to their manned ones. Because, if not, their small population would quickly become a crippling factor for us. We can't expect for any of them to have more than five million people in their respective Navies. Meanwhile, if we conscript even five percent of our people, we can easily enlist four hundred million people in our military. For now, we are planning to have one percent of our population enlisted in the military, which means close to 80 million people, But, as our ships and supporting infrastructure, like stations, shipyards, bases, mining outpost, and so on are getting more numerous, there will also be a need to increase the number of people in the military further. With the next batch coming online this month, we will have two hundred and fifty shipyards each with an average of four slips of different sizes for building different classes of ships simultaneously orbiting Pax, the planet given to us by Argos in the Clava Thessara Infinitas. And that's only shipyards in orbit of the planet that I'm talking about. The additional supporting infrastructure on the ground is even more impressive."
"Yeah, I would have never thought that we would turn into such a militaristic race the moment we venture into space," she contemplated at loud. It was all the Goa'uld's fault, she decided. If they weren't there when Earth discovered how to use the Stargate, their exploration of the galaxy would have been much more tranquil.
"Not to worry 'Lizbeth. There is a reason why almost 90% of our military assets are in the Clava Thessara Infinitas besides, of course, that of being in a secure place," Sam began explaining.
"Which is?" she asked, now very much interested.
"It's because the entire Second Great Alliance has agreed to close the Clava Thessara Infinitas for good, the very instant the war with the Vargas is over. Inside, all our excess military assets, as well as access to the ascended knowledge, would be closed until the day it is needed again," Sam explained. "Which, hopefully, would be never."
She was pensive for a moment. "I get the closing of the Clava Thessara Infinitas with all the excess military asset, but, why closing access to the ascended knowledge?"
"Because many are starting to think that we are incapable of inventing anything on our own if we don't have some readily available database to immediately give us the answers we seek. There is also the problem that when you follow the knowledge done by others, you tend to miss the same things the initial researcher had also missed. We will still have access to the ancient database from Atlantis and what the Asgard gave us, but even those will mostly be used for reasons of researching their respective race's pasts in order to learn from their good and bad choices and hopefully prevent us from making the bad ones. After the war is over, we are also switching to more humanitarian types of research, and we want for our scientists to make discoveries worthy of getting them the Nobel Prize. No scientist who simply looked at the answers in some database could ever get a Noble Prize. Or any prize for that matter," Sam answered.
"Also, after the war is over, anyone even thinking of researching some new type of weapon gets canned on the spot. Even I am fed up with the kind of research we are doing now. And if I'm fed up, then it is definitely time to switch focus, and to do so ASAP!" Jack said, pausing for a moment. "However, all this is not very important to you and for your next mission right now. Your job is to get us as many allies as you can and to stay alive while doing so. Leave everything else related to the war effort to the rest of us, all right?"
"Agreed," she said while getting up. "Well, I think it is time for me to leave you two alone to do your work, or for you Jack to maybe go get some rest. How long has it been since you slept?"
"48 hours! Ha! That's nothing for an Alterran!"
"Sure, sure. Somehow your half closed eyes are telling a completely different story," she retorted.
"I'm trying to get him to go to sleep, but he keeps repeating – 'No time, no time'. I stopped suggesting after the fifth time," Sam said.
"Well, I bet if left alone in his office, he'll fall asleep inside ten minutes," Weir said, now ready to leave. "I hope we will see each other at least one more time before I leave."
"That's a given," Sam said. "Three days from now, Adria, Vala and I have some plans to go down on Earth. You could join us for a girls' night out."
She turned and began walking out of the office. "See you in three days then."
It was time for her to start a new adventure. One as exciting as the Atlantis expedition was at the very beginning.
With a smile on her face, Elizabeth went to prepare with all due haste.
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