Fic: Space Race (Gen, PG13)
Title: Space Race
Author: x_varda_x
Recipient: korilian
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Not mine!
Author's Notes: Set in Season 5. ~8400 words
Summary: A call from across the Pegasus leads to a spaceship that's a bit stuck. Can Rodney drink enough coffee to free it in time before the other denizens of the Pegasus Galaxy's spaceways get their greedy (clawed) hands on it?
Space Race
"Where's it coming from?" Woolsey asked from where he stood behind McKay in the Atlantis Control Room.
Rodney was busy tapping away as the incessant beeping continued unabated. His forehead creased with a slight frown, but he made no other reaction to Woolsey's request.
The leader did not ask again, knowing it was better to let Rodney work rather than to receive a sharp flick from his uncensored tongue. When McKay was finished, he would let everyone know as loudly as possible. And he was the best, so Woolsey had nothing to fear in that respect.
After a long, tense beat, the alarm was silenced and Rodney breathed a sigh of relief. He said, "It's still going, but I'd thought I'd save our ears today."
All was quiet except for the tap tap tapping of McKay's fingers on the keys. The silence stretched out while everyone waited. Was the reason for the alarm good or bad? Were they in danger?
McKay mumbled as he continued to type, "Thank you, Rodney, for your consideration. My ears rejoice."
Woolsey's lips thinned.
Rodney sighed and said, "I already know one thing."
There was a collective intake of breath.
"Whatever caused the alarm to sound its cheery tone in the key of earbleed major is not coming from Atlantis or this solar system." A few more taps. Pause. "In fact..." he snapped his fingers at Chuck who all but fell out of his chair at the sound.
"Map. Screen. Now."
Chuck gave him a tight nod and clicked a few of the keys on the console before him. The display screen in the Control Room shifted to show a map of the Pegasus Galaxy. Rodney sighed heavily and grabbed his laptop. He slid his chair along the floor rapidly and Chuck hastily vacated his current location, frantically using his legs like shunting poles to get out the way before a two chair fatal pileup occurred.
Rodney hit the keys Chuck had been in control of before. A red dot appeared on the map and Rodney said, "It's coming from here."
Woolsey asked, "Is there a gate nearby?"
"Yes."
"Any idea what it is?"
"No. Our magical telescopes and scanners don't go that far. Besides it's a binary star system so the brightness and radiation cause too much interference at this distance."
"So, when do we leave?" Sheppard asked. The man had sidled into the Control Room when all eyes had been entranced by the frantic whirlwind that was McKay on a mission. They had been so enthralled and tense that a Wraith could have crept up on them and no one would've noticed.
Rodney turned around and gave Woolsey such a bare faced hopeful look mingled with slight apprehension that Sheppard grinned back at him and Rodney quickly schooled his features.
Woolsey nodded, "As soon as you're ready. Dr. McKay, if you could do more research into this system from the Ancient database prior to the briefing. Say, in half an hour?"
Sheppard's grin broadened, but Rodney's face became troubled. Rodney said, "That might be too long. It wasn't just a quick phone call across the endless light years. It was a distress call."
Sheppard's grin evaporated. "We need to leave now."
Woolsey nodded. "Agreed."
"It's a space gate," Rodney said as he unplugged his laptop and followed Sheppard down the stairs in the gate room to get geared up. "We'll need a Jumper."
"Really?" Sheppard drawled.
Rodney scowled at him as Sheppard called Ronon and Teyla to meet up with them.
-----
The vacuum around the gate flinched as the Puddle Jumper zipped through the Stargate and cut through its peaceful emptiness. It was a ship on a mission and its occupants took no heed of the disturbance they caused on their passage through the dark depths at the outer edge of the system they had just entered.
"Head for the third and fourth planets orbiting the second sun," Rodney said as he looked down at his computer.
Sheppard brought up the HUD and baulked. "Uh, would that be the yellow or the green or maybe that reddish blue one?"
"This isn't snooker, Colonel." Rodney sighed and pointed at the ones he meant on the display that was a veritable systemic maze of tens of planets all slowly moving around each other in a celestial dance that made Sheppard go cross-eyed.
Teyla smiled as she looked out of the window. "It is beautiful."
Rodney looked up briefly and hummed before burying himself in his data readings once more.
Sheppard grinned and Ronon watched unblinking as the Jumper changed course and more of the multi coloured planets with their associated moons hanging on for the ride went past the viewing window. There were fans of matter rising from some of them where they were passing too close to each other to avoid the gravitational pull. The surfaces of those ones were covered in ferocious storms. The lucky particles that reached highly enough into the atmospheres' of the affected planets caught the beams of light of the two stars and were refracted to show the eyes of those in the Puddle Jumper a rainbow of colours.
"Incredible," Sheppard said despite himself.
"Yes, let's all look at the pretty," Rodney said in annoyance. "Don't forget that if we get within range, this Jumper and all its occupants will become yet another pretty colour smeared across the face of one of these planets. Except without anything sentient to gawp at us."
Sheppard rolled his eyes and shook his head.
Ronon asked, "Found it yet?"
"I already knew roughly where it was before we left.
"The third or fourth planet?" Sheppard said. "That's accurate."
Rodney ignored the jab and said, "I still can't localise it. The gravitational interference is affecting the readings too much."
"Well, which one is it?" Sheppard asked as the two closely aligned planets grew in the window ahead of them.
Rodney frowned in frustration. "I don't know."
"The planets are really big," Ronon said.
"Obviously."
Teyla glanced at Ronon and then looked at Rodney again, although he was still grimacing down at his computer screen. She said, "Is it on one of the planets?"
Rodney's face smoothed for a moment and then he tapped a few buttons. "Of course... I've only been scanning the planets for an outpost or something."
His eyes darted from side to side as he read and analysed the data. He suddenly cried, "Stop stop stop!"
Sheppard flinched and the Jumper, sensing his shock, immediately obeyed with a slight shudder as its speed relative to the moving planets reached zero so that they got no closer.
"What is it?" Sheppard asked, his frame tense and poised ready to shoot down the impending threat that Rodney's voice had commanded.
"Teyla's right," Rodney said, sounding much calmer. "It's not on either of the planets. I'm detecting a metal object between them."
Sheppard grinned and Ronon sat up straighter. Sheppard brought up the HUD and zoomed into the blob of metal Rodney had found. It was just a blip for now and his face lit up, "Space Station? Perhaps one that makes stargates. Or a Puddle Jumper building platform?" He glanced over at Rodney with a smirk, "A ZedPM factory?"
"It'll be you out there in a space suit if you don't be quiet for a minute."
Teyla pursed her lips as Sheppard's smirk only got wider. Ronon folded his arms and slouched in his chair with a bored look to hide his rapturous anticipation of Rodney's findings.
"Ah ha!" Rodney spun his laptop screen around so that they could all see his squiggly doodles like they could understand.
"This is no time for an art class, McKay," Sheppard said.
Rodney frowned, slightly put out. "For those without an appreciation for the finer points of physics, the metal object is a ship. Most likely an Ancient warship like the Tria, Aurora and that Hippo one."
"Hippaforalkus," Teyla corrected.
"Orion," Sheppard said, making Teyla give the back of his head a steady glare.
"Yes," Rodney said. "That was the good news anyway."
"And the bad," Ronon asked, swivelling his chair from side to side.
"The reason for the distress call is that it's in a decaying orbit and almost out of power."
Sheppard grinned and turned back to the controls purposefully. "Well then, let's go and get it."
"No!" Rodney blurted. "No. My calculations reveal that the gravitational anomalies between the planets are too strong, unpredictable and dangerous. There is also a high amount of matter being displaced from the planets to surround the ship. Its shields have activated to protect it, hence the rapid power drain."
"What about remote control?"
"It's not one of our tiny cars!"
John shrugged. "Just an idea."
"Really not helping, unless it's make McKay angry day! Oh, I forgot, that's every day."
Sheppard's grin faded. "And we don't have enough power to go in through the gravity sheer with our shields on."
"Precisely."
"Can't we get more power?" Ronon asked.
Rodney waved his hands in exasperation as his sarcasm kicked up a gear, "I'll just go and turn the power tap on now. One pint or two?!"
"Two," Sheppard said hopefully. "So what now?"
Rodney looked so frustrated. "Now we wait and watch as the power drains to nothing and the ship is torn apart along with all its hidden secrets."
Teyla frowned. "There must be a way. If there is, you will find it, Rodney."
He nodded, "Thanks for the vote of confidence, but that won't be enough to free it in time."
"How long do we have?" Sheppard asked.
Rodney tapped a few buttons and closed his eyes as his lips moved soundlessly. After a moment he said, "Two days, give or take."
"Well then, let's hop to it. Grab your data and hold onto your seats people. Let's get this problem to the combined might of the most intelligent people from Earth. If they can't solve it, no one can."
Rodney scowled back at him, "There's a solution, I just can't see it yet."
Teyla smiled at him. "I am sure it will come to you."
Ronon slouched back in his seat again, a little disappointed. Nothing for him to shoot or maim today.
-----
Rodney stood in the lab, scientists all around. The air was thick with the sound of arguing and incomprehensible physics equations being bandied around that his mind processed as readily as the chocolate bars he consumed when stressed.
He took another bite of the sugary sweetness and spoke thickly, "No no no. That's completely wrong! Unless you want the Jumper to be compressed to the consistency of the piece of paper with your transfer back to Earth on it!"
The scientist nodded in agreement and scurried away to think up some more ideas.
"Rodney?"
"What now?!" he snapped. "I'm busy, can't you see?"
"Busy eating?"
Rodney looked up, "Oh, Sheppard." He looked slightly abashed, "Uh, what can I do for you? Kind of busy here."
"Just came to see how you were getting on."
"Oh just peachy, we're making excellent progress in solving this impossible scenario." He crinkled the empty wrapper of the snack he had just devoured and threw it near the bin. "I ran the calculations of the orbits backwards. It's been well over ten thousand years since these two planets aligned in this way. That's why the orbit of the ship is now decaying. The gravity sheer is too much for it to hold its place above the planet with the other one in such close proximity. We're losing it and there's nothing we can do.
Sheppard held up another bar he had brought with him and waggled it enticingly. "Fuel for scientists."
"You give chocolate in exchange for spaceships now?"
Sheppard smirked.
"Unfortunately, all the chocolate, power bars and bribes in the universe won't help us solve this."
"But it's a start, right?"
Rodney nodded and took the bar. He looked down at it greedily and then took two steps to the nearest cabinet and tucked it inside with a loving flourish. "Maybe later, when one workable idea is churned out of me or anyone in this room."
"No food today then?"
Rodney sighed heavily and shook his head. "Nothing we have so far has a chance of working. Saving this ship is less likely than the combined brain power of all of us being able to work out what makes your hair stand up like that."
Sheppard looked up self consciously and then back at Rodney. "You just need more coffee. Shall I bring a whole pot?"
Rodney couldn't help it as his mouth twitched up a little. "Bring a tanker and a funnel."
Sheppard spun on his heels and then changed his mind as he turned back. "This might not be a good time to say we're on a clock here."
"Already on the clock, Sheppard. Two days, remember."
"Actually, it's more like one."
Rodney gave him a desperate look, but Sheppard had to continue. "We've detected ships on the way to intercept our find. There are three cloaked Jumpers stationed there around the clock to guard it, but I don't think they'll be any use against two Traveller ships and a Wraith Hive when they arrive."
Rodney's face fell into frantic despair that would've been hilarious if the situation had not become so dire. He said, "And the Daedalus is two weeks away."
"So figure it out, McKay. Figure it out or we'll have to be the ones to pull the trigger in case the Wraith or Travellers find a way."
Rodney snorted and his expression shifted to grim determination again. "Those guys will never figure this out. It's like racing a pushbike and a Ferrari."
"That's better. I'll round up some marines and we'll be back later with vital supplies."
Sheppard left with a slight bounce in his step as Rodney's resolve was boosted to higher heights of mania.
-----
Rodney blew off Keller for lunch and made his excuses for team movie night. He even managed to squirm his way out of sparring practice that day. This was far more important after all, and even John had let him off that one when Rodney had sent him on a guilt trip.
"Big, cool spaceship or bruised grumpy scientist who can't free said spaceship?"
Even John had had to concede that one. "Just today though," he warned with violent intentions in his eyes. "After you've come back down to the mortal plane from your caffeine high there's going to be a double session."
Rodney gulped and nodded. "Working now."
-----
When Rodney woke up, the lab was mostly empty. He opened his mouth a little and grimaced at the stale taste on his breath.
"I brought more coffee," a voice said and made him jump and shut his mouth quickly.
"Sheppard," Rodney said. "Where did everyone go?"
"It's 3am. I told them all to sleep for a few hours."
Rodney wiped away the drool and glanced at his watch. What he saw made him start in alarm. "But, but spaceship!"
"I find the best ideas come to me when I'm having a break or in dreams."
Rodney folded his arms with a wince, he must have been sleeping on that one and a good pillow it did not make. He probably had crease marks all over his face and rubbed at his cheek for a moment. "Dreams? How to spike up your hair in six different directions at the same time? How to pull that triple loop de loop in twenty G without compressing yourself into chunky salsa dip? Not useful."
Sheppard shrugged. "Just saying. You should get some sleep too."
"No." He looked down at his computer and switched the screens with a well practiced click of his fingers. He shut his eyes for a moment as he searched for the words. "Too many simulations to program and run. Too many ideas and emails to go through and dismiss."
"Can I help?"
"Maybe you could take me to Keller and have her give me caffeine injections directly into my blood stream?" he asked with a pleading look in his bloodshot, blurry eyes.
"That wouldn't work."
Rodney frowned.
"Your blood's already 100% coffee. If a Wraith fed on you, he'd probably start running and never stop."
"Well, I need something. Time's running out. I can sleep when this is all over."
Sheppard looked at the diagrams scrawled on the whiteboards around the lab. He walked around the brave few people who were still there, sleepily and slowly pressing buttons on the keyboards in front of them and stifling yawns as they gazed into empty coffee cups.
He tilted his head as he admired a particularly inventive swirling symbol that he swore had probably just been invented by the scientists. He shook his head and rolled his eyes. He turned back to Rodney on the other side of the lab as the man gazed at his computer with unfocused eyes and his head lolled.
Sheppard said, "If we can't get to the ship, why don't we bring it to us?"
Rodney snapped awake and shook his head. "No. That was one of our first ideas. There isn't enough power."
"How about blowing something up nearby and letting the ship ride the shockwave out?"
"Not enough power," Rodney said in a singsong voice as he looked back down at his laptop screen intensely.
Sheppard hummed. There had to be a way, he just wasn't seeing it. The Wraith would be there by the afternoon, shortly followed by the Travellers coming from another direction. He really didn't want this ship to turn into scrap metal floating in space like the last few. Who knew what secrets it held? McKay had found that it had been hanging in orbit around the pole of the fourth planet prior to the close encounter with the third. It would've been hidden there from all sensors. Which begged the question, what happened to the crew? Why didn't they break orbit once the danger they were hiding from had passed? Or maybe there had been such constant danger that they had had to wait, but time had run out because now they were all dead. The Ancients, not knowing that their ship was merely hidden, had long since given it up as lost.
Whatever they had on board had cost them their lives. It must have been so important for them and for it to be saved for the distress call to go out when it was close to destruction. Maybe the Ancients hadn't banked on the Wraith picking it up too after all this time. The Travellers were another matter, they used Ancient tech too which was why they had been able to pick it up. John half hoped and half dreaded that one of the ships had Larrin on board. Maybe he could strike up a deal with her.
Right. You hold off the Wraith while we grab the ship. Thanks for your help. Bye. No chance. They wanted the ship too, and would probably go to any lengths to stop the Lanteans from having it.
Sheppard looked over at Rodney again. He looked tired and drawn, probably hadn't been sleeping much in the nights before this new crisis. Not exactly fresh and raring to go, but not completely out yet either. John said, "What about hacking into the ship's computer? If we can't save it, we could at least try to see what they were doing?"
"Already got a team working on that," Rodney said.
John sighed. "Alright, well as I'm being so useful here, I'll leave you to it."
Rodney hummed.
"Get some sleep, McKay."
Rodney nodded. "Later."
Sheppard left the lab feeling slightly deflated. If Rodney had already lost hope, there was little chance of him pulling through for them. Things would get really interesting as the clock ticked down and his mind went into overdrive. It was only in those last few moments when disaster was close that he pulled a miracle out of his ass at the last minute in the past. They would all just have to be patient, but John hated waiting like this. He sighed and went to catch a couple of hours before his morning Jumper guard duty shift started. He already had marines set up on a rota of scientist servitude for the day. It was all he could do, make sure they had plenty of food and coffee and sugar to keep them going and keep the ideas flowing.
He doubted that Rodney would be sleeping tonight though.
-----
"No, it won't work. How many times do I have to tell you?!" Rodney's dulcet tones flowed through the lab like a desert sandstorm scouring everything in its path.
Radek glared at him and muttered darkly in his native tongue.
"Well, that's not very nice," Rodney retorted.
"All you have done is dismiss every idea we have and berate. I have not heard any of your wonderful ideas."
Rodney folded his arms, "I'm still working on it."
"Well, do not let our annoying little interruptions stop you."
Rodney glared, "No. I won't."
This was just what he needed. He was frustrated, they all were, at the lack of progress and arguing only upset everyone. He could not help it, it was just the way he was wired to be so finely tuned to the frequency of sarcasm and belittling when he was annoyed. Too much sugar and caffeine was not calming his nerves either and his hands tremored slightly. He quickly folded his arms again as Radek's eyes shifted. Whether the wily little Czech had seen anything untoward, Rodney could not tell. He glared, spun around on the spot and stalked back to his desk and blessed relief from the inane ideas his team were spouting in his direction with little hopeful looks that he quickly wiped away.
What was he employing these people for? Of course, he had an idea, but it was likely to be a one way trip so he hadn't mentioned it yet, lest one spiky haired Colonel got whiff of it. The man would be so fast through the gate the only thing to mark his passing would be the faint smell of hair gel and burning Jumper drive pods. And a very grumpy and upset Rodney. Who would he exchange snark with if the Colonel finally managed to succeed in what he had been trying several times these past few years? The fabled suicide mission. Rodney swore it was probably some Air Force rule:
Air Force Handbook (for Dummies) Rule 101: Thou shalt partake in at least 3 (three) hopeless missions each year. Only through striving and surviving through these suicidal ordeals shall you be considered to be of high enough calibre to call yourself ‘Air Force.'
Except one day he would eventually be unlucky and end his days as a Wraith snack or a collection of assorted bits floating in space in a Jumper wreckage field.
Rodney grimaced. Not today. It was his stupid idea and Sheppard wouldn't know what to do at the other end anyway. Because flying Jumpers was not good training for tinkering with ten thousand year old derelict spaceship parts.
It was nearly lunchtime. Sheppard was probably wending his way back through the cosmos to return after his guard shift. Rodney did not have a long time to act, so gathered his gear and headed to the door.
Only to be waylaid by Radek. The man must've been watching him instead of his work. Rodney would have to have words with him later.
"Where are you going?"
"To get food," Rodney lied.
Radek's eyebrows rose as he glanced over at Rodney's desk and the piles of sandwiches, chocolate bars and curvy Pegasian fruit yet to be devoured.
Rodney waved at the desk, "I don't like those banana things and there's something distinctly… cardboard… about the sandwiches those jarheads keep bringing us."
Radek smiled, but his eyes did not believe the lies Rodney tried to weave. "I would come with you, but I have many more stupid and useless ideas to work on. Perhaps you could get me one of the Athosian green fruits while you are there. If they have any left."
Rodney grimaced, "A grattlesnot? Uh, you like those things?
At Radek's look Rodney quickly gabbled, "I'll keep an eye out."
"Grattlespark," Radek muttered and shook his head as Rodney snuck out of the lab and into sweet freedom of the corridor beyond.
-----
Rodney found Jumper stealing was the easy part. He had clearly been spending far too long around Sheppard. The influence of being around someone so willing to risk everything for others must have been contagious. Getting through the gate and ignoring the pleas of those who tried to stop him was also easy.
Rodney even found himself grinning as the Jumper shot out the gate at the other end. Was this how John felt when he defied orders? He felt bad, but good because he was so bad.
"Oh, I'm in so much trouble now," Rodney said as he cloaked the Jumper and mentally nudged it towards the two planets trying to kiss each other.
When John hailed him. That was the hard part. Rodney gulped and closed his eyes as he flicked the switch to shut off the comm. This warship was everything to him. If John was right, the secrets hidden onboard were worth a hundred Rodney McKays. Now there was a scary thought.
He opened his eyes again and he was nearly at the threshold of the planetary dust cloud being shoved out into space from the gravity sheer. It would soon be too late to turn back, too late to say goodbye when this whole crazy plan went down the gravity sinkhole.
"Stop, Rodney! Don't do it!"
It was Sheppard! That hair obviously didn't comprise his whole head as Rodney had once thought. There was some brain under those deep roots keeping it firmly in place unlike his. The man had somehow cut through Rodney's radio block and was wailing down the comm at him. Rodney wondered if this was what he sounded like when John was off on one. He hoped not. He was probably worse.
"Stop the Jumper and turn around. There must be another way, you just haven't found it yet."
"And we never will. Certainly not in time before the Wraith get here in an hour."
"Then we'll blow the ship away. They won't have anything to salvage."
"And neither will we." Rodney flipped the cloak to a shield and ploughed the little ship onwards towards his doom.
"To hell with this," John said over the channel.
Rodney watched the HUD, but he was then a little distracted by the particles smushing against the shields and the taps and bangs as larger pieces joined the party. The Jumper rattled and roiled and rolled under the gravity sheer. Rodney's stomach did the same in sympathy and he gritted his teeth against the nausea.
"Way to go, McKay. What a great idea to divert more power to the engines from the inertial dampeners! That's what sick bags are for…"
He wretched over the side of the chair and then sat upright again shakily. "This better be worth it." He watched as the tiny speck of metal became visible for a moment through the window and multi-coloured particle killing shield for a fraction of a second. At least he was heading in the right direction, because the HUD was as fuzzy and fritzy as he felt at the moment.
He calmed the bucking Jumper with the thoughts from his eternally panicked mind and the thing spun and whined back at him angrily. "Oh, shut up, you," he said to the control panel. The engines hissed back at him and the shield crackled and sparked before his eyes as it killed a billion dust particles a second and they screamed at him in their passing.
The warship's Jumper Bay loomed ahead in the next break in the popping, fizzing and tugging war, and Rodney only pulled the nose of the ship up in time on pure mental instinct alone to avoid becoming another metallic feature splattered across the hull. The darkness and silence and lack of gravity pulling was immediate and deafening as the Jumper flew up and then back down in the Bay and thumped into land in the darkness. He checked the power readings - nearly out, just as he had feared. There was going to be no escape on the Jumper.
"Ah, home sweet home," Rodney growled to himself. "And a landing worthy of one of Sheppard's longer and more sordid tales of ‘Any landing you can walk away from…'"
He was still grinning and congratulating himself on his heroic and immense one of a kind in the universe achievement when there was another thump nearby. Outside the ship he was sitting in.
"What now?" he squeaked.
"I said, don't make me come in there and get you," Sheppard drawled over the comm. "But I guess you must have been out of range by then, so I thought I'd relay the message properly."
Rodney rolled his eyes and stood. He limped into the rear compartment. If they ever got out of this, which, of course, they would, he was going to need a serious session of spinal realignment to correct his Puddle Jumper induced slippery disc collection.
Rodney met up with Sheppard outside and the man was already commanding lights to come on and systems to power up with a big grin on his face. It was almost child-like, really, and Rodney wondered whether his own face held the same expression. "Stop turning stuff on," Rodney said. "There's not much power left."
He walked around the Jumpers towards the corridor leading to the main bridge. John trotted along behind him and drew alongside. "So, how are we getting out of this?"
Rodney glanced at him, not really bothering to use the energy expenditure required to pull his muscles into a glare. Sheppard's inane comment was not worth the effort. So he diverted it to his mouth, "I decided that if I waited long enough you would come to rescue me with more useless suggestions I'd already thought up and dismissed yesterday."
"Well I'm just really helpful you know." The grin stayed in place, at least a sarcastic Rodney was a hopeful Rodney. Sheppard activated only the lights needed for them to walk without bumping into walls. The ship shuddered around them and their pace quickened.
Sheppard said, "Because actually being on the ship with the danger very real and the clock ticking down to our destruction and death is a better motivator than sitting in a lab going 'yeah, whatever, let's just give up, it doesn't matter.'"
Rodney said, "I have a plan of course. Brilliant, as usual, but dangerous."
"That's more like it."
-----
They stepped out into the bridge and Rodney went straight to a control panel at the back of the room. John gawped out of the main viewing window at the particles slamming against the larger shield in myriad shades of blue and gold and red.
"If you want something to watch, watch this," Rodney said. He pointed to his computer that was now hooked up to the console. "Make sure the download doesn't stop. I've isolated the data core as opposed to the operating system. Although I'm sure a further copy of ‘drone launch mechanisms of the year' wouldn't go amiss since Radek lost the last one, this is slightly more important." He went to another console and pressed a few buttons, bringing up a display as he muttered, "Bedtime reading about drone launchers, my ass."
Sheppard did as he asked, watching the progress bar on the screen as the hard drive filled with data painstakingly slowly. Rodney zipped from console to console, pressing buttons, turning levers, his movements punctuated by frequent annoyed grunts and half finished curses as he went.
John smiled, even as he had to grab the console to keep from falling at the latest jolt as the ship protested against the gravity sucking it this way and that. He felt totally confident that Rodney would succeed and pull the usual last minute miracle. But even John's resolve faltered for a moment when the ship shook again and the shield fizzled out for a second.
Rodney swore behind him and his console swapping reached new frantic speeds. He snapped his fingers at John, "Is it nearly done yet?"
"Yes."
"Good."
"So, what's the plan then, oh wise one?"
Rodney went to the pilot's console and sat down. "You'd better sit too," Rodney said without turning around.
John headed over and took the captain's chair. "Get us out of here, McKay," he commanded.
"Yes, sir," Rodney called back to him. Then he depressed a button and grabbed his chair armrests. John did likewise as the nose of the ship pitched down towards Planet Four.
"Uh, Rodney?" He shouted above the whine of the engines that had just activated. "Not sure if you noticed, but we're nose diving towards that big rock in front of us?"
"Obviously," he cried back, his voice breaking. "It's all part of the plan. Close your eyes or something."
"To hell with that," John widened his eyes. If McKay had finally lost it and decided to take them out in a blaze of glory and a smoking crater, he was going to meet that death head on. And fight back.
Space dust, gases and planetary pieces pulled from the surface of Four in a dazzling display of interstellar destruction slammed against the shield. John squinted after his eyes began to water and his mind screamed, "Up up up!"
Either the ship obeyed John's mental control or Rodney's incessant need to press buttons, as in that moment it turned and the nose began to edge upwards away from the planet.
Like and eighteen wheeler lorry full of supermarket fruit and veg turning into a tiny loading bay, the Ancient warship turned. John likened it to a thousand ton oil tanker navigating through a coral reef without a rudder. But whichever way he looked at it, it was slow and painful and very hairy.
Rodney clearly thought the same, for he was cussing black and blue at the unresponsive controls and hitting the buttons so hard, John thought they would be permanently depressed.
Slowly but surely, the edge of the planet came into view and the speed of the warship remained constant. No longer plummeting, but using the momentum to skim the atmosphere. The engines whined, the shield kept going on and off like someone forgot to push the plug all the way in. John instinctively leant back in his chair and Rodney did likewise as the ship cut through the air and debris until finally, blessedly, it broke free from the grip that Planets Three and Four had held over it. It emerged into the dark space beyond and for the first time in over ten thousand years it was free to chug along nicely and safely under its own volition.
John whooped in delight and Rodney heaved out a massive sigh of relief. His computer beeped that moment to let them know the download was complete.
"Now all we need is a working hyperdrive and we're laughing," John said.
"There's no comedy today then," Rodney said as his eyes widened at the view from the main window.
There was a large, purplish-bluish blob waiting for them outside the safety margin of the gravity pull. The Wraith Hive loomed like a hand sweeping down to grab them.
John followed his gaze and gulped. "Don't suppose we have any shields left after that birthing experience?"
"Minimal."
"Weapons?"
"I might be able to squeeze out a couple of drones before we're reduced us to our constituent atoms."
"Lorne to Sheppard," the comm activated.
"Go ahead."
"We're cloaked not far from your position. Can you get away? We won't be able to hold them off for long."
John glanced at Rodney and he shook his head hopelessly. "I can perform miracles, but I can't make ZedPM's pop out of thin air, or thick air or any kind of air for that matter."
"That's a negative."
Just as John was about to get up and drag Rodney away, two more ships joined the fray. Two Ancient warships, and they weren't rust buckets like the one John and Rodney were currently on, but shiny and sleek and full of energy and drones. A couple of the glowing yellow weapons shot out towards the Wraith Hive as darts were launched. And...
"Is that a Puddle Jumper?" Rodney asked as he squinted out the window. He ran to the rear console and brought up the sensor screen. "It is! But how did they..."
John shrugged, "Must've found a few. If they can get the warships to work without the gene, I'm sure a Puddle Jumper can't be that hard."
Rodney coughed and spluttered and turned back to the display screen. Sheppard joined him.
"Uh," Rodney grimaced. "Two darts and one of the Traveller Jumpers just landed in the bay."
"They fit?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
The ship shook under the force of a massive impact to the top of it a moment later. Rodney and John were both floored and sparks spat from the consoles around them. Rodney rolled over to his computer and yanked out the cable, zapping his fingers in the process with a wince. He checked the system, grateful to find the data hadn't been fried like his skin.
"Who's firing at us?!" John shouted, pushing himself upright and checking the sensors. "Both of them!"
"I thought they wanted the ship?"
"Apparently not that badly. Unless they're trying to kill the boarding parties from the other side without setting foot onboard."
The lights flickered on and off until only the glow of the weapon fire barrage out in the cold of space flashed through the window to illuminate the scene. John yanked a torch out of his tac vest, Rodney having neither gun nor tac vest about his person and suddenly feeling very vulnerable and stupid for not considering what would happen after he got the ship free from Three and Four. Maybe he hadn't thought he would survive to free it?
"Well, it doesn't look like any of us are going to get much if we win," Rodney said as he studied the control panel before him. The ship rocked and jolted again, "Inertial dampeners are offline."
"Tell me something I don't know," John ground out as he was all but thrown across the room.
"90% of the engines have now been destroyed. Hyperdrive is a total loss. I can't even locate the shield generators any more. I'd say they're vapour now."
"Like we'll be in a minute if we don't get out of here," John said, grabbing Rodney's sleeve and dragging him towards the exit, drawing his gun ready.
"B-b-but…"
"No buts. You got the data, this ship's only so much space dust. Let's go."
Rodney lingered and tugged, but John said, "The fight's already over. We don't have to go down with the ship, it's not ours anyway."
Rodney obliged and yanked himself free as more explosions tore through the outer hull from the drone, Wraith Hive and Dart fire impacts. Piece by piece the ship was being whittled away by the little pecks of weapon's fire and soon there would only be crumbs.
"Sontanra," Rodney said as they left the bridge.
"What?"
"The name of the ship, it's called the Sontanra. It's a type of bird."
Rodney rounded the corner as there was a loud bang and he cried out in shock as the bullet tore through the air and slammed into him.
John cursed and quickly shot the guy a couple of times in the chest. He went down and lay silent and still. Rodney sunk to the floor, clutching his abdomen with a hand that was already bright red and shiny. His eyes were wide, but it didn't look like the pain had registered yet. John watched helplessly as Rodney's face went through a dozen emotions so quickly he could barely keep up with them. Shock and panic faded to confusion and eventually the first signs of pain crinkled the skin around the eyes, spreading to his lips which parted with a gasped outward breath. Upon the next breath he took, all hell broke loose. His eyes closed tightly and he wheezed through his mouth.
"Oh god! I'm shot! We're never going to get off this clapped out banger!"
"Stay with me, Rodney," John called to him as another Traveller rounded the corner and didn't even get a chance to raise his gun before John offed him.
"I'm not sure if I can. There's a bullet in my belly and I'm bleeding out!"
"Then you won't get to find out what secrets the ship contains," John said.
John yanked the life signs detector out of his vest pocket. He found that other than the two of them, there was another dot steady and bright and he said, "Two down, one to go."
"Kind of like us now," Rodney said just before he coughed with a shudder as the ship around them bled out in mutual sympathy for him.
"He's in the Jumper bay waiting for us."
Rodney looked over at his computer that had fallen from his grip as he too had decided that the floor needed to be much closer to him. He held himself tightly, but the blood was still flowing out and soaking through his clothes, turning the blue cloth a deep shade of purple the Wraith would be proud to paint their Hive ships.
For some reason John had always thought Rodney's veins flowed with coffee, so was surprised and more than slightly terrified to find that Rodney's blood was as bright red and garish as everyone else's. It jarred horribly with his pale skin of his hand as it slid from the wound and dripped down. Brilliantly bright, like Rodney himself, but redder and scarier.
"Let's see what he did to you," John said as he knelt down and pushed Rodney's slick hand away. He frowned and then said in a low voice, "I'm sorry, Rodney,"
"Sorry?" Rodney's eyes darted around in terror. "What for?"
"This," he said at the same time as he pressed a bandage down on the wound. Hard.
Rodney twitched and cried out. And John winced in sympathy. Rodney squirmed away from him and without being able to clutch his stomach anymore, he grabbed hold of John's arm and squeezed down in his pain. John grimaced. That was going to bruise, but it was a small price to pay if Rodney lived.
Rodney's eyes were already glazing over. John grabbed his hand and unhooked Rodney's death grip claws from his bicep and held his bloody fingers in his own as he said, "It's okay, let's get out of here."
He hefted Rodney upright and the other man's breath left him in a pained wheeze. "Laptop," Rodney whispered harshly.
"I can't carry both."
"Give me..."
John moved them round and bent down to grab the computer. He handed it to Rodney, who closed his eyes tightly a few times and then proceeded to clamp it down against himself, pressing it on his midriff as though it brought him some comfort. John grabbed Rodney's free hand and pulled his arm over his shoulders to support him and so they began their frantic shuffle back to the Jumper bay.
Rodney got heavier and heavier as they went. Which John found strange as the blood he was losing surely should have been making him lighter?
John watched the last Traveller on the LSD, one device they probably couldn't get to work, for he jumped out on the man and tapped him before he realised his days were over. "There must've been more than three Travellers in the boarding party," John said. "If they want the ship so badly that they go up against a Wraith Hive!" John's question was soon answered when he found a shot up Wraith corpse leaking black blood all over the deck and a fuzzy skeletal husk nearby. He grimaced at it as he entered the Puddle Jumper.
Rodney collapsed into the co-pilot's seat. John jabbed him with a morphine vial and slapped another bandage on the blood soaked one already wrapped around him as the ship outside the Jumper took its final breath and crumbled apart around them.
Rodney's eyes slid shut and his breaths faltered as he slipped unconscious, but at least his face smoothed out and that was small consolation to John - his friend was no longer in pain. Unlike the warship.
The once proud and mighty Sontanra sang its last song as it broke apart and explosions tore through the exposed cabling and conduits. The Jumper zoomed out of the bay into space. Once clear, John cloaked it and flew far, far away from the battle that was ending behind him. The Ancient warship finally exploded, not a big explosion for Rodney had been right about the power being out. More a stuttering spark in the gloom of space that turned it into multiple parts of slowly spinning metal.
A final drone flew at it, and detonated right in the centre, the shockwave passing through the ship and all but vaporising the last of the solid sections. John hadn't seen where that one came from, but wheezing Rodney next to him was a distracting presence pushing him home faster.
"Now to explain to Woolsey how we lost a Jumper and the Ancient warship and Rodney got seriously injured."
The Wraith and Travellers were still having at each other, but that was no longer a pressing issue, so John felt no guilt as he dialled the gate and called in a medical emergency. "You'll be alright, Rodney. Just hang in there."
The laptop, now smeared with blood and with a cracked case sat on the floor of the cockpit between them. John just hoped it had been worth it.
-----
Rodney lay in a bed in the infirmary, bare chested and with so many bandages wrapped around his middle he looked like a giant tortilla. He shifted uncomfortably and then stopped with a small sigh.
"Are you alright, Rodney?" Teyla asked.
He gave her a tight nod. "This bed is so uncomfortable."
"You know it's deliberate," John said. "This way, you get better faster and don't hang around for too long."
Ronon gestured down at Rodney's stomach and said, "I'm impressed you're already awake and coherent. Well, more so than usual."
Rodney grabbed the edge of the sheet and pulled it up to cover himself, he didn't like them staring at him or the huge bandage covering the injuries he had sustained. It was bad enough that he was hurt and now useless, they didn't all have to look at him! He swore Keller and her team of needle threaders had deliberately made it look really bad. Why that was, he didn't know. They kept telling him he'd nearly died and that the bullet had ruptured certain things inside that didn't like to be ruptured. Rodney was so hopped up on morphine and sedatives, it didn't feel that bad, only like he was about to scream all the time from the barely suppressed pain. But he knew the worst was yet to come when they dialled back the good drugs and he had to start moving around again. That was when he'd really start to feel it.
"I got the data," Rodney said in a small voice. "We've already seen Ancient warships and they're nothing on the Daedalus or the Apollo anyway."
John nodded and then his face fell. "Radek said the data is mostly useless. Stuff we already know and places we've already been."
Rodney deflated and his insides twinged unpleasantly, making him twitch and his face twist in an involuntary grimace.
Teyla looked concerned as she said, "But Radek also said that there are three new gate addresses to check."
Rodney's eyes started to droop a little in tiredness as the conversation wore him out. "Hope there's something worthwhile of Keller's wrath at those places..."
"And Woolsey's," John added. "As well as all this." He indicated the bandages and IV line steadily dripping fluids and painkillers into Rodney's now caffeine purged and free veins.
"But even if there isn't," Rodney said, "At least we'll know for sure. Better that than not knowing what was on board I suppose."
John nodded. "When you're feeling better we can go and check out the gate addresses together. Lorne shot the warship with that final drone so that neither the Wraith nor the Travellers will ever get that data."
Rodney sighed and sunk back into the bed, moving a hand up and resting it on the bandages wrapped tightly around his middle. "Let's hope there's something useful on at least one of them."
Ronon said, "Something that was worth you getting all shot up."
Rodney gave him a grim look. "A ZedPM in exchange for my pain sounds fair."
Teyla gave them all a troubled look as she countered, "I think ten ZPMs and the means to make more would still not be enough payment for what you are enduring, Rodney."
John nodded. "What she said."
Rodney gave him a long suffering look. "Well, send a prayer up to that ascended woman you spent six months dating before she turned into a light beam."
"We weren't dating," John protested. "She taught me how to meditate."
Rodney gave him the patented ‘yeah, right' look and lifted his chin. "Oh, sorry. I meant your 'meditation partner.'" He framed it with wiggly quote fingers and even though it made him wince, it was worth it.
John rolled his eyes, but couldn't hide the smirk threatening to break free. He shifted in his chair as Keller came over and shushed them, topping up Rodney's pain meds until his eyes glazed over blissfully and he sunk down into restful, painless sleep with his team watching over him.
Author: x_varda_x
Recipient: korilian
Pairing: Gen
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Not mine!
Author's Notes: Set in Season 5. ~8400 words
Summary: A call from across the Pegasus leads to a spaceship that's a bit stuck. Can Rodney drink enough coffee to free it in time before the other denizens of the Pegasus Galaxy's spaceways get their greedy (clawed) hands on it?
Space Race
"Where's it coming from?" Woolsey asked from where he stood behind McKay in the Atlantis Control Room.
Rodney was busy tapping away as the incessant beeping continued unabated. His forehead creased with a slight frown, but he made no other reaction to Woolsey's request.
The leader did not ask again, knowing it was better to let Rodney work rather than to receive a sharp flick from his uncensored tongue. When McKay was finished, he would let everyone know as loudly as possible. And he was the best, so Woolsey had nothing to fear in that respect.
After a long, tense beat, the alarm was silenced and Rodney breathed a sigh of relief. He said, "It's still going, but I'd thought I'd save our ears today."
All was quiet except for the tap tap tapping of McKay's fingers on the keys. The silence stretched out while everyone waited. Was the reason for the alarm good or bad? Were they in danger?
McKay mumbled as he continued to type, "Thank you, Rodney, for your consideration. My ears rejoice."
Woolsey's lips thinned.
Rodney sighed and said, "I already know one thing."
There was a collective intake of breath.
"Whatever caused the alarm to sound its cheery tone in the key of earbleed major is not coming from Atlantis or this solar system." A few more taps. Pause. "In fact..." he snapped his fingers at Chuck who all but fell out of his chair at the sound.
"Map. Screen. Now."
Chuck gave him a tight nod and clicked a few of the keys on the console before him. The display screen in the Control Room shifted to show a map of the Pegasus Galaxy. Rodney sighed heavily and grabbed his laptop. He slid his chair along the floor rapidly and Chuck hastily vacated his current location, frantically using his legs like shunting poles to get out the way before a two chair fatal pileup occurred.
Rodney hit the keys Chuck had been in control of before. A red dot appeared on the map and Rodney said, "It's coming from here."
Woolsey asked, "Is there a gate nearby?"
"Yes."
"Any idea what it is?"
"No. Our magical telescopes and scanners don't go that far. Besides it's a binary star system so the brightness and radiation cause too much interference at this distance."
"So, when do we leave?" Sheppard asked. The man had sidled into the Control Room when all eyes had been entranced by the frantic whirlwind that was McKay on a mission. They had been so enthralled and tense that a Wraith could have crept up on them and no one would've noticed.
Rodney turned around and gave Woolsey such a bare faced hopeful look mingled with slight apprehension that Sheppard grinned back at him and Rodney quickly schooled his features.
Woolsey nodded, "As soon as you're ready. Dr. McKay, if you could do more research into this system from the Ancient database prior to the briefing. Say, in half an hour?"
Sheppard's grin broadened, but Rodney's face became troubled. Rodney said, "That might be too long. It wasn't just a quick phone call across the endless light years. It was a distress call."
Sheppard's grin evaporated. "We need to leave now."
Woolsey nodded. "Agreed."
"It's a space gate," Rodney said as he unplugged his laptop and followed Sheppard down the stairs in the gate room to get geared up. "We'll need a Jumper."
"Really?" Sheppard drawled.
Rodney scowled at him as Sheppard called Ronon and Teyla to meet up with them.
-----
The vacuum around the gate flinched as the Puddle Jumper zipped through the Stargate and cut through its peaceful emptiness. It was a ship on a mission and its occupants took no heed of the disturbance they caused on their passage through the dark depths at the outer edge of the system they had just entered.
"Head for the third and fourth planets orbiting the second sun," Rodney said as he looked down at his computer.
Sheppard brought up the HUD and baulked. "Uh, would that be the yellow or the green or maybe that reddish blue one?"
"This isn't snooker, Colonel." Rodney sighed and pointed at the ones he meant on the display that was a veritable systemic maze of tens of planets all slowly moving around each other in a celestial dance that made Sheppard go cross-eyed.
Teyla smiled as she looked out of the window. "It is beautiful."
Rodney looked up briefly and hummed before burying himself in his data readings once more.
Sheppard grinned and Ronon watched unblinking as the Jumper changed course and more of the multi coloured planets with their associated moons hanging on for the ride went past the viewing window. There were fans of matter rising from some of them where they were passing too close to each other to avoid the gravitational pull. The surfaces of those ones were covered in ferocious storms. The lucky particles that reached highly enough into the atmospheres' of the affected planets caught the beams of light of the two stars and were refracted to show the eyes of those in the Puddle Jumper a rainbow of colours.
"Incredible," Sheppard said despite himself.
"Yes, let's all look at the pretty," Rodney said in annoyance. "Don't forget that if we get within range, this Jumper and all its occupants will become yet another pretty colour smeared across the face of one of these planets. Except without anything sentient to gawp at us."
Sheppard rolled his eyes and shook his head.
Ronon asked, "Found it yet?"
"I already knew roughly where it was before we left.
"The third or fourth planet?" Sheppard said. "That's accurate."
Rodney ignored the jab and said, "I still can't localise it. The gravitational interference is affecting the readings too much."
"Well, which one is it?" Sheppard asked as the two closely aligned planets grew in the window ahead of them.
Rodney frowned in frustration. "I don't know."
"The planets are really big," Ronon said.
"Obviously."
Teyla glanced at Ronon and then looked at Rodney again, although he was still grimacing down at his computer screen. She said, "Is it on one of the planets?"
Rodney's face smoothed for a moment and then he tapped a few buttons. "Of course... I've only been scanning the planets for an outpost or something."
His eyes darted from side to side as he read and analysed the data. He suddenly cried, "Stop stop stop!"
Sheppard flinched and the Jumper, sensing his shock, immediately obeyed with a slight shudder as its speed relative to the moving planets reached zero so that they got no closer.
"What is it?" Sheppard asked, his frame tense and poised ready to shoot down the impending threat that Rodney's voice had commanded.
"Teyla's right," Rodney said, sounding much calmer. "It's not on either of the planets. I'm detecting a metal object between them."
Sheppard grinned and Ronon sat up straighter. Sheppard brought up the HUD and zoomed into the blob of metal Rodney had found. It was just a blip for now and his face lit up, "Space Station? Perhaps one that makes stargates. Or a Puddle Jumper building platform?" He glanced over at Rodney with a smirk, "A ZedPM factory?"
"It'll be you out there in a space suit if you don't be quiet for a minute."
Teyla pursed her lips as Sheppard's smirk only got wider. Ronon folded his arms and slouched in his chair with a bored look to hide his rapturous anticipation of Rodney's findings.
"Ah ha!" Rodney spun his laptop screen around so that they could all see his squiggly doodles like they could understand.
"This is no time for an art class, McKay," Sheppard said.
Rodney frowned, slightly put out. "For those without an appreciation for the finer points of physics, the metal object is a ship. Most likely an Ancient warship like the Tria, Aurora and that Hippo one."
"Hippaforalkus," Teyla corrected.
"Orion," Sheppard said, making Teyla give the back of his head a steady glare.
"Yes," Rodney said. "That was the good news anyway."
"And the bad," Ronon asked, swivelling his chair from side to side.
"The reason for the distress call is that it's in a decaying orbit and almost out of power."
Sheppard grinned and turned back to the controls purposefully. "Well then, let's go and get it."
"No!" Rodney blurted. "No. My calculations reveal that the gravitational anomalies between the planets are too strong, unpredictable and dangerous. There is also a high amount of matter being displaced from the planets to surround the ship. Its shields have activated to protect it, hence the rapid power drain."
"What about remote control?"
"It's not one of our tiny cars!"
John shrugged. "Just an idea."
"Really not helping, unless it's make McKay angry day! Oh, I forgot, that's every day."
Sheppard's grin faded. "And we don't have enough power to go in through the gravity sheer with our shields on."
"Precisely."
"Can't we get more power?" Ronon asked.
Rodney waved his hands in exasperation as his sarcasm kicked up a gear, "I'll just go and turn the power tap on now. One pint or two?!"
"Two," Sheppard said hopefully. "So what now?"
Rodney looked so frustrated. "Now we wait and watch as the power drains to nothing and the ship is torn apart along with all its hidden secrets."
Teyla frowned. "There must be a way. If there is, you will find it, Rodney."
He nodded, "Thanks for the vote of confidence, but that won't be enough to free it in time."
"How long do we have?" Sheppard asked.
Rodney tapped a few buttons and closed his eyes as his lips moved soundlessly. After a moment he said, "Two days, give or take."
"Well then, let's hop to it. Grab your data and hold onto your seats people. Let's get this problem to the combined might of the most intelligent people from Earth. If they can't solve it, no one can."
Rodney scowled back at him, "There's a solution, I just can't see it yet."
Teyla smiled at him. "I am sure it will come to you."
Ronon slouched back in his seat again, a little disappointed. Nothing for him to shoot or maim today.
-----
Rodney stood in the lab, scientists all around. The air was thick with the sound of arguing and incomprehensible physics equations being bandied around that his mind processed as readily as the chocolate bars he consumed when stressed.
He took another bite of the sugary sweetness and spoke thickly, "No no no. That's completely wrong! Unless you want the Jumper to be compressed to the consistency of the piece of paper with your transfer back to Earth on it!"
The scientist nodded in agreement and scurried away to think up some more ideas.
"Rodney?"
"What now?!" he snapped. "I'm busy, can't you see?"
"Busy eating?"
Rodney looked up, "Oh, Sheppard." He looked slightly abashed, "Uh, what can I do for you? Kind of busy here."
"Just came to see how you were getting on."
"Oh just peachy, we're making excellent progress in solving this impossible scenario." He crinkled the empty wrapper of the snack he had just devoured and threw it near the bin. "I ran the calculations of the orbits backwards. It's been well over ten thousand years since these two planets aligned in this way. That's why the orbit of the ship is now decaying. The gravity sheer is too much for it to hold its place above the planet with the other one in such close proximity. We're losing it and there's nothing we can do.
Sheppard held up another bar he had brought with him and waggled it enticingly. "Fuel for scientists."
"You give chocolate in exchange for spaceships now?"
Sheppard smirked.
"Unfortunately, all the chocolate, power bars and bribes in the universe won't help us solve this."
"But it's a start, right?"
Rodney nodded and took the bar. He looked down at it greedily and then took two steps to the nearest cabinet and tucked it inside with a loving flourish. "Maybe later, when one workable idea is churned out of me or anyone in this room."
"No food today then?"
Rodney sighed heavily and shook his head. "Nothing we have so far has a chance of working. Saving this ship is less likely than the combined brain power of all of us being able to work out what makes your hair stand up like that."
Sheppard looked up self consciously and then back at Rodney. "You just need more coffee. Shall I bring a whole pot?"
Rodney couldn't help it as his mouth twitched up a little. "Bring a tanker and a funnel."
Sheppard spun on his heels and then changed his mind as he turned back. "This might not be a good time to say we're on a clock here."
"Already on the clock, Sheppard. Two days, remember."
"Actually, it's more like one."
Rodney gave him a desperate look, but Sheppard had to continue. "We've detected ships on the way to intercept our find. There are three cloaked Jumpers stationed there around the clock to guard it, but I don't think they'll be any use against two Traveller ships and a Wraith Hive when they arrive."
Rodney's face fell into frantic despair that would've been hilarious if the situation had not become so dire. He said, "And the Daedalus is two weeks away."
"So figure it out, McKay. Figure it out or we'll have to be the ones to pull the trigger in case the Wraith or Travellers find a way."
Rodney snorted and his expression shifted to grim determination again. "Those guys will never figure this out. It's like racing a pushbike and a Ferrari."
"That's better. I'll round up some marines and we'll be back later with vital supplies."
Sheppard left with a slight bounce in his step as Rodney's resolve was boosted to higher heights of mania.
-----
Rodney blew off Keller for lunch and made his excuses for team movie night. He even managed to squirm his way out of sparring practice that day. This was far more important after all, and even John had let him off that one when Rodney had sent him on a guilt trip.
"Big, cool spaceship or bruised grumpy scientist who can't free said spaceship?"
Even John had had to concede that one. "Just today though," he warned with violent intentions in his eyes. "After you've come back down to the mortal plane from your caffeine high there's going to be a double session."
Rodney gulped and nodded. "Working now."
-----
When Rodney woke up, the lab was mostly empty. He opened his mouth a little and grimaced at the stale taste on his breath.
"I brought more coffee," a voice said and made him jump and shut his mouth quickly.
"Sheppard," Rodney said. "Where did everyone go?"
"It's 3am. I told them all to sleep for a few hours."
Rodney wiped away the drool and glanced at his watch. What he saw made him start in alarm. "But, but spaceship!"
"I find the best ideas come to me when I'm having a break or in dreams."
Rodney folded his arms with a wince, he must have been sleeping on that one and a good pillow it did not make. He probably had crease marks all over his face and rubbed at his cheek for a moment. "Dreams? How to spike up your hair in six different directions at the same time? How to pull that triple loop de loop in twenty G without compressing yourself into chunky salsa dip? Not useful."
Sheppard shrugged. "Just saying. You should get some sleep too."
"No." He looked down at his computer and switched the screens with a well practiced click of his fingers. He shut his eyes for a moment as he searched for the words. "Too many simulations to program and run. Too many ideas and emails to go through and dismiss."
"Can I help?"
"Maybe you could take me to Keller and have her give me caffeine injections directly into my blood stream?" he asked with a pleading look in his bloodshot, blurry eyes.
"That wouldn't work."
Rodney frowned.
"Your blood's already 100% coffee. If a Wraith fed on you, he'd probably start running and never stop."
"Well, I need something. Time's running out. I can sleep when this is all over."
Sheppard looked at the diagrams scrawled on the whiteboards around the lab. He walked around the brave few people who were still there, sleepily and slowly pressing buttons on the keyboards in front of them and stifling yawns as they gazed into empty coffee cups.
He tilted his head as he admired a particularly inventive swirling symbol that he swore had probably just been invented by the scientists. He shook his head and rolled his eyes. He turned back to Rodney on the other side of the lab as the man gazed at his computer with unfocused eyes and his head lolled.
Sheppard said, "If we can't get to the ship, why don't we bring it to us?"
Rodney snapped awake and shook his head. "No. That was one of our first ideas. There isn't enough power."
"How about blowing something up nearby and letting the ship ride the shockwave out?"
"Not enough power," Rodney said in a singsong voice as he looked back down at his laptop screen intensely.
Sheppard hummed. There had to be a way, he just wasn't seeing it. The Wraith would be there by the afternoon, shortly followed by the Travellers coming from another direction. He really didn't want this ship to turn into scrap metal floating in space like the last few. Who knew what secrets it held? McKay had found that it had been hanging in orbit around the pole of the fourth planet prior to the close encounter with the third. It would've been hidden there from all sensors. Which begged the question, what happened to the crew? Why didn't they break orbit once the danger they were hiding from had passed? Or maybe there had been such constant danger that they had had to wait, but time had run out because now they were all dead. The Ancients, not knowing that their ship was merely hidden, had long since given it up as lost.
Whatever they had on board had cost them their lives. It must have been so important for them and for it to be saved for the distress call to go out when it was close to destruction. Maybe the Ancients hadn't banked on the Wraith picking it up too after all this time. The Travellers were another matter, they used Ancient tech too which was why they had been able to pick it up. John half hoped and half dreaded that one of the ships had Larrin on board. Maybe he could strike up a deal with her.
Right. You hold off the Wraith while we grab the ship. Thanks for your help. Bye. No chance. They wanted the ship too, and would probably go to any lengths to stop the Lanteans from having it.
Sheppard looked over at Rodney again. He looked tired and drawn, probably hadn't been sleeping much in the nights before this new crisis. Not exactly fresh and raring to go, but not completely out yet either. John said, "What about hacking into the ship's computer? If we can't save it, we could at least try to see what they were doing?"
"Already got a team working on that," Rodney said.
John sighed. "Alright, well as I'm being so useful here, I'll leave you to it."
Rodney hummed.
"Get some sleep, McKay."
Rodney nodded. "Later."
Sheppard left the lab feeling slightly deflated. If Rodney had already lost hope, there was little chance of him pulling through for them. Things would get really interesting as the clock ticked down and his mind went into overdrive. It was only in those last few moments when disaster was close that he pulled a miracle out of his ass at the last minute in the past. They would all just have to be patient, but John hated waiting like this. He sighed and went to catch a couple of hours before his morning Jumper guard duty shift started. He already had marines set up on a rota of scientist servitude for the day. It was all he could do, make sure they had plenty of food and coffee and sugar to keep them going and keep the ideas flowing.
He doubted that Rodney would be sleeping tonight though.
-----
"No, it won't work. How many times do I have to tell you?!" Rodney's dulcet tones flowed through the lab like a desert sandstorm scouring everything in its path.
Radek glared at him and muttered darkly in his native tongue.
"Well, that's not very nice," Rodney retorted.
"All you have done is dismiss every idea we have and berate. I have not heard any of your wonderful ideas."
Rodney folded his arms, "I'm still working on it."
"Well, do not let our annoying little interruptions stop you."
Rodney glared, "No. I won't."
This was just what he needed. He was frustrated, they all were, at the lack of progress and arguing only upset everyone. He could not help it, it was just the way he was wired to be so finely tuned to the frequency of sarcasm and belittling when he was annoyed. Too much sugar and caffeine was not calming his nerves either and his hands tremored slightly. He quickly folded his arms again as Radek's eyes shifted. Whether the wily little Czech had seen anything untoward, Rodney could not tell. He glared, spun around on the spot and stalked back to his desk and blessed relief from the inane ideas his team were spouting in his direction with little hopeful looks that he quickly wiped away.
What was he employing these people for? Of course, he had an idea, but it was likely to be a one way trip so he hadn't mentioned it yet, lest one spiky haired Colonel got whiff of it. The man would be so fast through the gate the only thing to mark his passing would be the faint smell of hair gel and burning Jumper drive pods. And a very grumpy and upset Rodney. Who would he exchange snark with if the Colonel finally managed to succeed in what he had been trying several times these past few years? The fabled suicide mission. Rodney swore it was probably some Air Force rule:
Air Force Handbook (for Dummies) Rule 101: Thou shalt partake in at least 3 (three) hopeless missions each year. Only through striving and surviving through these suicidal ordeals shall you be considered to be of high enough calibre to call yourself ‘Air Force.'
Except one day he would eventually be unlucky and end his days as a Wraith snack or a collection of assorted bits floating in space in a Jumper wreckage field.
Rodney grimaced. Not today. It was his stupid idea and Sheppard wouldn't know what to do at the other end anyway. Because flying Jumpers was not good training for tinkering with ten thousand year old derelict spaceship parts.
It was nearly lunchtime. Sheppard was probably wending his way back through the cosmos to return after his guard shift. Rodney did not have a long time to act, so gathered his gear and headed to the door.
Only to be waylaid by Radek. The man must've been watching him instead of his work. Rodney would have to have words with him later.
"Where are you going?"
"To get food," Rodney lied.
Radek's eyebrows rose as he glanced over at Rodney's desk and the piles of sandwiches, chocolate bars and curvy Pegasian fruit yet to be devoured.
Rodney waved at the desk, "I don't like those banana things and there's something distinctly… cardboard… about the sandwiches those jarheads keep bringing us."
Radek smiled, but his eyes did not believe the lies Rodney tried to weave. "I would come with you, but I have many more stupid and useless ideas to work on. Perhaps you could get me one of the Athosian green fruits while you are there. If they have any left."
Rodney grimaced, "A grattlesnot? Uh, you like those things?
At Radek's look Rodney quickly gabbled, "I'll keep an eye out."
"Grattlespark," Radek muttered and shook his head as Rodney snuck out of the lab and into sweet freedom of the corridor beyond.
-----
Rodney found Jumper stealing was the easy part. He had clearly been spending far too long around Sheppard. The influence of being around someone so willing to risk everything for others must have been contagious. Getting through the gate and ignoring the pleas of those who tried to stop him was also easy.
Rodney even found himself grinning as the Jumper shot out the gate at the other end. Was this how John felt when he defied orders? He felt bad, but good because he was so bad.
"Oh, I'm in so much trouble now," Rodney said as he cloaked the Jumper and mentally nudged it towards the two planets trying to kiss each other.
When John hailed him. That was the hard part. Rodney gulped and closed his eyes as he flicked the switch to shut off the comm. This warship was everything to him. If John was right, the secrets hidden onboard were worth a hundred Rodney McKays. Now there was a scary thought.
He opened his eyes again and he was nearly at the threshold of the planetary dust cloud being shoved out into space from the gravity sheer. It would soon be too late to turn back, too late to say goodbye when this whole crazy plan went down the gravity sinkhole.
"Stop, Rodney! Don't do it!"
It was Sheppard! That hair obviously didn't comprise his whole head as Rodney had once thought. There was some brain under those deep roots keeping it firmly in place unlike his. The man had somehow cut through Rodney's radio block and was wailing down the comm at him. Rodney wondered if this was what he sounded like when John was off on one. He hoped not. He was probably worse.
"Stop the Jumper and turn around. There must be another way, you just haven't found it yet."
"And we never will. Certainly not in time before the Wraith get here in an hour."
"Then we'll blow the ship away. They won't have anything to salvage."
"And neither will we." Rodney flipped the cloak to a shield and ploughed the little ship onwards towards his doom.
"To hell with this," John said over the channel.
Rodney watched the HUD, but he was then a little distracted by the particles smushing against the shields and the taps and bangs as larger pieces joined the party. The Jumper rattled and roiled and rolled under the gravity sheer. Rodney's stomach did the same in sympathy and he gritted his teeth against the nausea.
"Way to go, McKay. What a great idea to divert more power to the engines from the inertial dampeners! That's what sick bags are for…"
He wretched over the side of the chair and then sat upright again shakily. "This better be worth it." He watched as the tiny speck of metal became visible for a moment through the window and multi-coloured particle killing shield for a fraction of a second. At least he was heading in the right direction, because the HUD was as fuzzy and fritzy as he felt at the moment.
He calmed the bucking Jumper with the thoughts from his eternally panicked mind and the thing spun and whined back at him angrily. "Oh, shut up, you," he said to the control panel. The engines hissed back at him and the shield crackled and sparked before his eyes as it killed a billion dust particles a second and they screamed at him in their passing.
The warship's Jumper Bay loomed ahead in the next break in the popping, fizzing and tugging war, and Rodney only pulled the nose of the ship up in time on pure mental instinct alone to avoid becoming another metallic feature splattered across the hull. The darkness and silence and lack of gravity pulling was immediate and deafening as the Jumper flew up and then back down in the Bay and thumped into land in the darkness. He checked the power readings - nearly out, just as he had feared. There was going to be no escape on the Jumper.
"Ah, home sweet home," Rodney growled to himself. "And a landing worthy of one of Sheppard's longer and more sordid tales of ‘Any landing you can walk away from…'"
He was still grinning and congratulating himself on his heroic and immense one of a kind in the universe achievement when there was another thump nearby. Outside the ship he was sitting in.
"What now?" he squeaked.
"I said, don't make me come in there and get you," Sheppard drawled over the comm. "But I guess you must have been out of range by then, so I thought I'd relay the message properly."
Rodney rolled his eyes and stood. He limped into the rear compartment. If they ever got out of this, which, of course, they would, he was going to need a serious session of spinal realignment to correct his Puddle Jumper induced slippery disc collection.
Rodney met up with Sheppard outside and the man was already commanding lights to come on and systems to power up with a big grin on his face. It was almost child-like, really, and Rodney wondered whether his own face held the same expression. "Stop turning stuff on," Rodney said. "There's not much power left."
He walked around the Jumpers towards the corridor leading to the main bridge. John trotted along behind him and drew alongside. "So, how are we getting out of this?"
Rodney glanced at him, not really bothering to use the energy expenditure required to pull his muscles into a glare. Sheppard's inane comment was not worth the effort. So he diverted it to his mouth, "I decided that if I waited long enough you would come to rescue me with more useless suggestions I'd already thought up and dismissed yesterday."
"Well I'm just really helpful you know." The grin stayed in place, at least a sarcastic Rodney was a hopeful Rodney. Sheppard activated only the lights needed for them to walk without bumping into walls. The ship shuddered around them and their pace quickened.
Sheppard said, "Because actually being on the ship with the danger very real and the clock ticking down to our destruction and death is a better motivator than sitting in a lab going 'yeah, whatever, let's just give up, it doesn't matter.'"
Rodney said, "I have a plan of course. Brilliant, as usual, but dangerous."
"That's more like it."
-----
They stepped out into the bridge and Rodney went straight to a control panel at the back of the room. John gawped out of the main viewing window at the particles slamming against the larger shield in myriad shades of blue and gold and red.
"If you want something to watch, watch this," Rodney said. He pointed to his computer that was now hooked up to the console. "Make sure the download doesn't stop. I've isolated the data core as opposed to the operating system. Although I'm sure a further copy of ‘drone launch mechanisms of the year' wouldn't go amiss since Radek lost the last one, this is slightly more important." He went to another console and pressed a few buttons, bringing up a display as he muttered, "Bedtime reading about drone launchers, my ass."
Sheppard did as he asked, watching the progress bar on the screen as the hard drive filled with data painstakingly slowly. Rodney zipped from console to console, pressing buttons, turning levers, his movements punctuated by frequent annoyed grunts and half finished curses as he went.
John smiled, even as he had to grab the console to keep from falling at the latest jolt as the ship protested against the gravity sucking it this way and that. He felt totally confident that Rodney would succeed and pull the usual last minute miracle. But even John's resolve faltered for a moment when the ship shook again and the shield fizzled out for a second.
Rodney swore behind him and his console swapping reached new frantic speeds. He snapped his fingers at John, "Is it nearly done yet?"
"Yes."
"Good."
"So, what's the plan then, oh wise one?"
Rodney went to the pilot's console and sat down. "You'd better sit too," Rodney said without turning around.
John headed over and took the captain's chair. "Get us out of here, McKay," he commanded.
"Yes, sir," Rodney called back to him. Then he depressed a button and grabbed his chair armrests. John did likewise as the nose of the ship pitched down towards Planet Four.
"Uh, Rodney?" He shouted above the whine of the engines that had just activated. "Not sure if you noticed, but we're nose diving towards that big rock in front of us?"
"Obviously," he cried back, his voice breaking. "It's all part of the plan. Close your eyes or something."
"To hell with that," John widened his eyes. If McKay had finally lost it and decided to take them out in a blaze of glory and a smoking crater, he was going to meet that death head on. And fight back.
Space dust, gases and planetary pieces pulled from the surface of Four in a dazzling display of interstellar destruction slammed against the shield. John squinted after his eyes began to water and his mind screamed, "Up up up!"
Either the ship obeyed John's mental control or Rodney's incessant need to press buttons, as in that moment it turned and the nose began to edge upwards away from the planet.
Like and eighteen wheeler lorry full of supermarket fruit and veg turning into a tiny loading bay, the Ancient warship turned. John likened it to a thousand ton oil tanker navigating through a coral reef without a rudder. But whichever way he looked at it, it was slow and painful and very hairy.
Rodney clearly thought the same, for he was cussing black and blue at the unresponsive controls and hitting the buttons so hard, John thought they would be permanently depressed.
Slowly but surely, the edge of the planet came into view and the speed of the warship remained constant. No longer plummeting, but using the momentum to skim the atmosphere. The engines whined, the shield kept going on and off like someone forgot to push the plug all the way in. John instinctively leant back in his chair and Rodney did likewise as the ship cut through the air and debris until finally, blessedly, it broke free from the grip that Planets Three and Four had held over it. It emerged into the dark space beyond and for the first time in over ten thousand years it was free to chug along nicely and safely under its own volition.
John whooped in delight and Rodney heaved out a massive sigh of relief. His computer beeped that moment to let them know the download was complete.
"Now all we need is a working hyperdrive and we're laughing," John said.
"There's no comedy today then," Rodney said as his eyes widened at the view from the main window.
There was a large, purplish-bluish blob waiting for them outside the safety margin of the gravity pull. The Wraith Hive loomed like a hand sweeping down to grab them.
John followed his gaze and gulped. "Don't suppose we have any shields left after that birthing experience?"
"Minimal."
"Weapons?"
"I might be able to squeeze out a couple of drones before we're reduced us to our constituent atoms."
"Lorne to Sheppard," the comm activated.
"Go ahead."
"We're cloaked not far from your position. Can you get away? We won't be able to hold them off for long."
John glanced at Rodney and he shook his head hopelessly. "I can perform miracles, but I can't make ZedPM's pop out of thin air, or thick air or any kind of air for that matter."
"That's a negative."
Just as John was about to get up and drag Rodney away, two more ships joined the fray. Two Ancient warships, and they weren't rust buckets like the one John and Rodney were currently on, but shiny and sleek and full of energy and drones. A couple of the glowing yellow weapons shot out towards the Wraith Hive as darts were launched. And...
"Is that a Puddle Jumper?" Rodney asked as he squinted out the window. He ran to the rear console and brought up the sensor screen. "It is! But how did they..."
John shrugged, "Must've found a few. If they can get the warships to work without the gene, I'm sure a Puddle Jumper can't be that hard."
Rodney coughed and spluttered and turned back to the display screen. Sheppard joined him.
"Uh," Rodney grimaced. "Two darts and one of the Traveller Jumpers just landed in the bay."
"They fit?"
"Unfortunately, yes."
The ship shook under the force of a massive impact to the top of it a moment later. Rodney and John were both floored and sparks spat from the consoles around them. Rodney rolled over to his computer and yanked out the cable, zapping his fingers in the process with a wince. He checked the system, grateful to find the data hadn't been fried like his skin.
"Who's firing at us?!" John shouted, pushing himself upright and checking the sensors. "Both of them!"
"I thought they wanted the ship?"
"Apparently not that badly. Unless they're trying to kill the boarding parties from the other side without setting foot onboard."
The lights flickered on and off until only the glow of the weapon fire barrage out in the cold of space flashed through the window to illuminate the scene. John yanked a torch out of his tac vest, Rodney having neither gun nor tac vest about his person and suddenly feeling very vulnerable and stupid for not considering what would happen after he got the ship free from Three and Four. Maybe he hadn't thought he would survive to free it?
"Well, it doesn't look like any of us are going to get much if we win," Rodney said as he studied the control panel before him. The ship rocked and jolted again, "Inertial dampeners are offline."
"Tell me something I don't know," John ground out as he was all but thrown across the room.
"90% of the engines have now been destroyed. Hyperdrive is a total loss. I can't even locate the shield generators any more. I'd say they're vapour now."
"Like we'll be in a minute if we don't get out of here," John said, grabbing Rodney's sleeve and dragging him towards the exit, drawing his gun ready.
"B-b-but…"
"No buts. You got the data, this ship's only so much space dust. Let's go."
Rodney lingered and tugged, but John said, "The fight's already over. We don't have to go down with the ship, it's not ours anyway."
Rodney obliged and yanked himself free as more explosions tore through the outer hull from the drone, Wraith Hive and Dart fire impacts. Piece by piece the ship was being whittled away by the little pecks of weapon's fire and soon there would only be crumbs.
"Sontanra," Rodney said as they left the bridge.
"What?"
"The name of the ship, it's called the Sontanra. It's a type of bird."
Rodney rounded the corner as there was a loud bang and he cried out in shock as the bullet tore through the air and slammed into him.
John cursed and quickly shot the guy a couple of times in the chest. He went down and lay silent and still. Rodney sunk to the floor, clutching his abdomen with a hand that was already bright red and shiny. His eyes were wide, but it didn't look like the pain had registered yet. John watched helplessly as Rodney's face went through a dozen emotions so quickly he could barely keep up with them. Shock and panic faded to confusion and eventually the first signs of pain crinkled the skin around the eyes, spreading to his lips which parted with a gasped outward breath. Upon the next breath he took, all hell broke loose. His eyes closed tightly and he wheezed through his mouth.
"Oh god! I'm shot! We're never going to get off this clapped out banger!"
"Stay with me, Rodney," John called to him as another Traveller rounded the corner and didn't even get a chance to raise his gun before John offed him.
"I'm not sure if I can. There's a bullet in my belly and I'm bleeding out!"
"Then you won't get to find out what secrets the ship contains," John said.
John yanked the life signs detector out of his vest pocket. He found that other than the two of them, there was another dot steady and bright and he said, "Two down, one to go."
"Kind of like us now," Rodney said just before he coughed with a shudder as the ship around them bled out in mutual sympathy for him.
"He's in the Jumper bay waiting for us."
Rodney looked over at his computer that had fallen from his grip as he too had decided that the floor needed to be much closer to him. He held himself tightly, but the blood was still flowing out and soaking through his clothes, turning the blue cloth a deep shade of purple the Wraith would be proud to paint their Hive ships.
For some reason John had always thought Rodney's veins flowed with coffee, so was surprised and more than slightly terrified to find that Rodney's blood was as bright red and garish as everyone else's. It jarred horribly with his pale skin of his hand as it slid from the wound and dripped down. Brilliantly bright, like Rodney himself, but redder and scarier.
"Let's see what he did to you," John said as he knelt down and pushed Rodney's slick hand away. He frowned and then said in a low voice, "I'm sorry, Rodney,"
"Sorry?" Rodney's eyes darted around in terror. "What for?"
"This," he said at the same time as he pressed a bandage down on the wound. Hard.
Rodney twitched and cried out. And John winced in sympathy. Rodney squirmed away from him and without being able to clutch his stomach anymore, he grabbed hold of John's arm and squeezed down in his pain. John grimaced. That was going to bruise, but it was a small price to pay if Rodney lived.
Rodney's eyes were already glazing over. John grabbed his hand and unhooked Rodney's death grip claws from his bicep and held his bloody fingers in his own as he said, "It's okay, let's get out of here."
He hefted Rodney upright and the other man's breath left him in a pained wheeze. "Laptop," Rodney whispered harshly.
"I can't carry both."
"Give me..."
John moved them round and bent down to grab the computer. He handed it to Rodney, who closed his eyes tightly a few times and then proceeded to clamp it down against himself, pressing it on his midriff as though it brought him some comfort. John grabbed Rodney's free hand and pulled his arm over his shoulders to support him and so they began their frantic shuffle back to the Jumper bay.
Rodney got heavier and heavier as they went. Which John found strange as the blood he was losing surely should have been making him lighter?
John watched the last Traveller on the LSD, one device they probably couldn't get to work, for he jumped out on the man and tapped him before he realised his days were over. "There must've been more than three Travellers in the boarding party," John said. "If they want the ship so badly that they go up against a Wraith Hive!" John's question was soon answered when he found a shot up Wraith corpse leaking black blood all over the deck and a fuzzy skeletal husk nearby. He grimaced at it as he entered the Puddle Jumper.
Rodney collapsed into the co-pilot's seat. John jabbed him with a morphine vial and slapped another bandage on the blood soaked one already wrapped around him as the ship outside the Jumper took its final breath and crumbled apart around them.
Rodney's eyes slid shut and his breaths faltered as he slipped unconscious, but at least his face smoothed out and that was small consolation to John - his friend was no longer in pain. Unlike the warship.
The once proud and mighty Sontanra sang its last song as it broke apart and explosions tore through the exposed cabling and conduits. The Jumper zoomed out of the bay into space. Once clear, John cloaked it and flew far, far away from the battle that was ending behind him. The Ancient warship finally exploded, not a big explosion for Rodney had been right about the power being out. More a stuttering spark in the gloom of space that turned it into multiple parts of slowly spinning metal.
A final drone flew at it, and detonated right in the centre, the shockwave passing through the ship and all but vaporising the last of the solid sections. John hadn't seen where that one came from, but wheezing Rodney next to him was a distracting presence pushing him home faster.
"Now to explain to Woolsey how we lost a Jumper and the Ancient warship and Rodney got seriously injured."
The Wraith and Travellers were still having at each other, but that was no longer a pressing issue, so John felt no guilt as he dialled the gate and called in a medical emergency. "You'll be alright, Rodney. Just hang in there."
The laptop, now smeared with blood and with a cracked case sat on the floor of the cockpit between them. John just hoped it had been worth it.
-----
Rodney lay in a bed in the infirmary, bare chested and with so many bandages wrapped around his middle he looked like a giant tortilla. He shifted uncomfortably and then stopped with a small sigh.
"Are you alright, Rodney?" Teyla asked.
He gave her a tight nod. "This bed is so uncomfortable."
"You know it's deliberate," John said. "This way, you get better faster and don't hang around for too long."
Ronon gestured down at Rodney's stomach and said, "I'm impressed you're already awake and coherent. Well, more so than usual."
Rodney grabbed the edge of the sheet and pulled it up to cover himself, he didn't like them staring at him or the huge bandage covering the injuries he had sustained. It was bad enough that he was hurt and now useless, they didn't all have to look at him! He swore Keller and her team of needle threaders had deliberately made it look really bad. Why that was, he didn't know. They kept telling him he'd nearly died and that the bullet had ruptured certain things inside that didn't like to be ruptured. Rodney was so hopped up on morphine and sedatives, it didn't feel that bad, only like he was about to scream all the time from the barely suppressed pain. But he knew the worst was yet to come when they dialled back the good drugs and he had to start moving around again. That was when he'd really start to feel it.
"I got the data," Rodney said in a small voice. "We've already seen Ancient warships and they're nothing on the Daedalus or the Apollo anyway."
John nodded and then his face fell. "Radek said the data is mostly useless. Stuff we already know and places we've already been."
Rodney deflated and his insides twinged unpleasantly, making him twitch and his face twist in an involuntary grimace.
Teyla looked concerned as she said, "But Radek also said that there are three new gate addresses to check."
Rodney's eyes started to droop a little in tiredness as the conversation wore him out. "Hope there's something worthwhile of Keller's wrath at those places..."
"And Woolsey's," John added. "As well as all this." He indicated the bandages and IV line steadily dripping fluids and painkillers into Rodney's now caffeine purged and free veins.
"But even if there isn't," Rodney said, "At least we'll know for sure. Better that than not knowing what was on board I suppose."
John nodded. "When you're feeling better we can go and check out the gate addresses together. Lorne shot the warship with that final drone so that neither the Wraith nor the Travellers will ever get that data."
Rodney sighed and sunk back into the bed, moving a hand up and resting it on the bandages wrapped tightly around his middle. "Let's hope there's something useful on at least one of them."
Ronon said, "Something that was worth you getting all shot up."
Rodney gave him a grim look. "A ZedPM in exchange for my pain sounds fair."
Teyla gave them all a troubled look as she countered, "I think ten ZPMs and the means to make more would still not be enough payment for what you are enduring, Rodney."
John nodded. "What she said."
Rodney gave him a long suffering look. "Well, send a prayer up to that ascended woman you spent six months dating before she turned into a light beam."
"We weren't dating," John protested. "She taught me how to meditate."
Rodney gave him the patented ‘yeah, right' look and lifted his chin. "Oh, sorry. I meant your 'meditation partner.'" He framed it with wiggly quote fingers and even though it made him wince, it was worth it.
John rolled his eyes, but couldn't hide the smirk threatening to break free. He shifted in his chair as Keller came over and shushed them, topping up Rodney's pain meds until his eyes glazed over blissfully and he sunk down into restful, painless sleep with his team watching over him.