Hello folks! I ran into some problems offline, so updating was an impossibility. Here we go again though, I will not give up on this story, I will not leave it unfinished! Thank you for all the lovely reviews! I seriously enjoy reading them! :D
Chapter 17
Carson and Lorne struggled to coordinate the delivery of the stasis pod. Rodney had to look away from the thing. The pod was a long, sleek and white box that made him shiver; it looked too much like a coffin for his comfort. They placed it at the other side of the barn for Rella to work on, then returned to John's bedside.
"Birthing valleys? What birthing valleys?" Carson asked as he checked John over.
"Primus says that the sea in which the Goh originate have underwater valleys where the young are birthed and old disperse," Rodney explained excitedly. "These valleys go on for miles in a circular track on the seafloor. A constantly moving stream of water circulating the entire Goh living area."
Lorne scratched his head and frowned. "Water moving within water? Never heard the likes of it."
"Think of it like a wind tunnel beneath the sea, only it's water. This water is densely packed with nutrients and Primus says it even has powerful regenerative properties."
"For the Goh, perhaps," Carson replied. "I doubt such water would hold anything of benefit for Colonel Sheppard."
"Is it not worth a try?" Rodney said testily. "I mean, it's not as if we have a hundred other ways to help him."
Carson checked on John and said, "Okay, say we go ahead with this. How do we get him to this underwater place and keep him alive? I doubt the water is powerful enough to initiate the growth of gills."
"Oh ha, ha," Rodney replied dryly. "I'm not saying it would be easy, we just need to figure out the details and get him there."
"There are other things to consider, Rodney. If these creatures live on the seafloor as they say, how deep are these valleys? Would the pressure of the depths kill Colonel Sheppard before we even reached the valleys?"
Though Carson wasn't inspiring much confidence, Rodney refused to give up on the idea. "Maybe the valleys aren't as deep as we think. The Goh are small, for all we know their sea is merely a river, or at least, not so deep as to create the crushing pressure you refer to. Also, shallow depths might explain how the Groten seem to be able to harvest them so easily."
"Even so," Carson continued, relentless in his fault-finding. "How do we get him there? How do we submerge him? How do we keep him breathing? Plus, we don't even know where the Goh homeworld is!"
"Ah, but we might know where it is," Rodney said smugly. "Sama already told us they put a Groten in the extraction chair, so, Central City should have information for where the planet is located."
Carson looked to Rella who nodded then raised her communication device to request the information. He then looked to Rodney and sighed. "Even if we find the planet, we've no way of placing him in the water for any length of time in a way that wouldn't harm him. Even if this water is as good as Primus says, I doubt it would be a quick dip in and back out."
Rodney's enthusiasm was waning. He knew Carson wasn't shooting down ideas out of meanness; the doctor was simply unable to inspire hope when none currently existed. But Rodney was sure this plan would work if they could only figure how to carry it out. He looked desperately around himself, eyes wide and anxiety spilling from him in waves he was sure the others could sense.
"The stasis pod," he eventually said. "It can be modified in some way to hold him in the water while sustaining his life." He was clutching at straws but at least it was an idea. No one else seemed to be coming up with anything other than himself and Primus.
Carson remained doubtful, but he nodded to the tablet and said, "What's Primus saying about it all?"
"Nothing much," Rodney said glumly and looked to the tablet. "It's scared to talk in case it needs to eat again. Primus is making sure that all the stuff you're pumping into John is for him and the infants."
"What if we set up some kind of nutrition for it alone to allow it to talk to us better?"
Rodney typed the words into the tablet and they both waited for a reply.
This would be acceptable.
"Maybe it can help us iron out the problems we're worrying over," Carson said with a grin. "I'll get Rella to sort something for Primus while I get the tank fixed up for John." Carson patted Rodney on the shoulder and went to walk away. "Hope is not lost yet, my friend."
Within half an hour of the new infusion being set up, John Sheppard began communicating through the synaptic interface. At first, Rodney was suspicious that it was just Primus, but a few private details released in reply to his queries soon put to bed any more suspicions.
"This is weird," John said.
"You think it's weird? You should be this side of things," Rodney replied.
"How close are we to a solution?"
"Getting there. We're looking into taking you to the Goh planet as Primus thinks it will help."
"What about the others?"
"What others?"
"The Goh in the tanks of the crippled ship? Have you got them to safety yet?"
Rodney snorted with disbelief. "Are you kidding me?! We will be lucky to save you!" he typed.
"What is it?" Lorne asked and moved to get a better view of the tablet in Rodney's hands.
"Sheppard wants us to save all of the Goh! The ones in him and the ones in the Groten ship!"
"Is he having a bloody laugh?" Carson called over.
"No, he's not," Rodney replied.
"I did ask you to try."
"No, you said, save them, not save all of them!"
"Final wish, Rodney. If it can be done, do it."
"I refuse to discuss final wishes, John. We don't have the resources here to do what you ask!"
"Like it or not, Rodney, the chances of my survival are slim. But the Goh can be saved."
"But… why?" Rodney typed angrily.
"Because they are the victims in this. Those tanks hold the last of an entire civilisation, Rodney. If saving them is something we can do, then we should."
Rodney hung his head and sighed. It was bad enough that John was near death, now he wanted them to save the very things killing him. As final wishes went, John couldn't have made a more difficult request. But Rodney felt he had no choice but to carry out this final wish, because it was John asking.
Major Lorne was still staring at the tablet, biting his lower lip and deep in thought. "Maybe we can save them," he finally said.
Rodney huffed with exasperation. "How?!"
"When I dialed in to let Atlantis know we'd found you, Woolsey said he'd sent another two teams behind me. They should arrive soon, so, we now have three Jumpers."
"And? You've not seen the Groten, you've no idea what they're capable of."
"Oh, I saw them, alright. We did a flyby on the way here."
"You can't possibly believe we can take on these creatures?!"
"But we should try," Lorne insisted. "The colonel is right. The Goh are being slaughtered, used in a war as weapons, doc. It's like watching genocide."
"Genocide is the deliberate mass killing of people, but I take your point. What can we do?"
"We can use one Jumper to take Colonel Sheppard, supplies and a team to the Goh planet while the rest of us go and liberate the Goh, if we can," Lorne replied.
Carson stopped working on the stasis pod and rejoined them. He seemed pensive. Rodney thought perhaps it was because it seemed John was giving up hope of coming back to them.
"But who will fly the spare Jumper?" Carson asked. "I'll need to be with Sheppard at all times if we are to save him."
"We'll need you here to fly the Jumper, Doctor Beckett. We can't be rushing into a fight without a medic on our side."
"Yeah, I thought so," he said, and Rodney watched his expression become even sadder. "I guess I have some apologizing to do."
He looked to Rodney and Lorne and shrugged, then he made his way across the barn to Rella.
"What was that about?" Lorn asked.
"I've no idea," Rodney replied and watched Cason leave.
To be continued...