The atrium gave onto another, smaller hall, this one lined with pillars carved like kneeling men, taking the weight of the ceiling on their shoulders. The dome they had seen from outside rose overhead, a dozen round windows piercing its surface. The glass was missing, and the hall was full of leaves and the damp tracks of rain and wind. And of humans, she saw, and in the same moment Ronon pointed.
“They came in this way.”
“Or someone did,” Teyla said.
Ronon stooped to examine the marks. “Looks like Genii boots to me.”
“Can you tell how long ago they were here?”
Ronon straightened, shaking his head. “Not more than a week ago — maybe as recently as yesterday, depending on the weather.” He met her eyes. “Cai should have told us.”
Teyla nodded. “Yes. And still — Ronon, I trusted him. I don’t know what to think.”
“Maybe we can get some answers from the Genii,” Ronon said, with a sudden smile.
“Perhaps,” Teyla answered. “But — we should be cautious.”
“Absolutely,” Ronon said. He looked around again. “This way. There’s a side door we can use.”
Radek walked the length of the Hall of the Ancients, glancing from case to case. He recognized perhaps half of their contents, recognized that some of the items weren’t even Ancient — that odd silver sphere, half crushed, looked almost Asgard — and his fingers itched to examine them more closely.
“Don’t even think of it,” William said, without looking up from his camera, and Radek muttered a Czech curse under his breath. “We need to make a record first.”
“We may not have time for that,” Radek said. “Not if the Genii are here.”
“We know they have been here,” William said. “Not that they’re here now.”
“And that they’re planning to come back,” Radek pointed out. “You said that yourself.”
“Yeah, OK, I did say that.” William straightened, took a breath. “Priorities?”
Radek gave the Asgard sphere a last regretful look. “Undamaged Ancient objects. Things that we can maybe use on Atlantis.”
“Control crystals?”
“Have you found some?” Radek moved to join the other man at a long case that had stood against the wall. It gaped open now, the shards of glass covering the long, pale blue crystals that lay on the stained velvet.
“Yes — ”
“No, we have plenty of those,” Radek said. “And, look, see there? Most of them are cracked.”
“Well, it was a start,” William said. “These?” He pointed to the next case, where a scattering of smaller crystals were laid out in a spreading fan-shape, bright against a soft dark-red backing. There were gaps in the sequence, crystals replaced by plasticine models, but Radek caught his breath again.
“Yes. Oh, yes. Those we should take.”
“I’ll make a list,” William said. “See what we have, and then we can take as much as we can carry. The most important things first.”
There was a park next to the museum, where saplings were beginning to spring from the broken trunks of the old trees. At the far end of the green space, a thread of smoke was rising between two ruined buildings — clean smoke, cooking smoke, and Teyla looked at Ronon.
“I thought Cai said all his people were staying by the gate.”
“He did.” Ronon flicked his blaster from stun to kill and back again. “It could be somebody else. Somebody Satedan, I mean.”
“It could,” Teyla agreed.
“Yeah. I don’t think so, either.” Ronon looked around, surveying the broken ground. “If we move north along the edge of the park, we’ll be in cover most of the way.”
Teyla nodded. “Our main goal is to find out if the Genii are here. Not to engage them.”
“I know!” Ronon glared at her, and she met his stare squarely. He sighed, and looked away. “I know.”
“And then we will have a conversation with Ushan Cai,” she said.
“Yeah.” Ronon looked happier at the thought, and pointed along the crumbling facade of a long low building. “That way.”
The sprouting trees screened them from the distant camp for most of the way. The smell of the smoke was stronger, wood and cooking, and Teyla wished she’d had more than a power bar when they had stopped earlier. But that was pointless, a weakness, and she put it aside with the ease of long practice. She could see the tip of a canvas tent between the buildings, white in the sunlight, and Ronon came to a stop behind a broken set of stairs.
“Looks like the Genii to me,” he said, softly.
Teyla reached into her pockets, pulled out a pair of the Earth people’s binoculars, and eased forward to peer over the edge of the stones. The tent did look like Genii work, the odd mix of primitive and sophisticated that they now showed the rest of the galaxy — and, yes, the man stirring the kettle slung over the campfire was wearing a Genii uniform. Another man was sitting on a three-legged stool outside a second tent, working on some piece of equipment, but there was no one else in sight.
“That cannot be all their people,” she said, and Ronon shook his head.
“No.”
Teyla lifted the glasses to her eyes again, scanning the camp a second time. It looked as though they had been in the Museum — surely that metal crate was Ancient work — and she reached for her radio. “Radek. Radek, come in.”
“I want to get a little closer,” Ronon said, and slipped forward without waiting for an answer.
“Radek,” Teyla said again. “This is Teyla. The Genii are here in the city, and may be coming your way.” She paused, waiting for an answer, some acknowledgement, and none came.
Ronon signaled, and she moved to join him, crouching low.
“I’m guessing maybe six, ten men all told — ” he began, and she lifted her hand.
“I am not getting a response from Radek.”
“Damn it,” Ronon muttered. He looked at the Museum, then back at the camp.
“We should go back,” Teyla said.
“Yeah.” Ronon didn’t move, and in the same moment, the tent flap was flung aside, and a slender red-haired woman stepped out into the sunlight. Her uniform jacket was open to the waist in the warm air, showing a pale undershirt. “Is that —?”
“Yes,” Teyla said. “Sora Tyrus.” She touched her radio again. “Radek. Respond, please.” Ronon looked at her, and she shook her head. “Nothing.”
Ronon met her eyes. “Back to the Museum.”
They were getting toward the end of the hall, and Radek shook his head in frustration. The list was already too long for them to take everything that was on it, and it was obvious that this end, where the ceiling had come down, was where the curators had displayed their largest pieces. He ducked under a beam, crouched to see into the next case. It was bigger than the others had been, perhaps a meter long and half a meter deep; two of its legs had broken when part of the ceiling fell on it, and the body of the case sloped down and away from him. He checked the heavy wedge of plaster, and when he was sure it was secure, worked himself further into the debris so that he could see into the case.
It was beautiful. That was his first thought, incoherent and startled. It had been lovely enough on Atlantis even burnt-out and cracked; the intact array caught the light from his flashlight, reflected it back in a cloud of multi-colored stars. It couldn’t possibly be — but it was, it definitely was a hyperdrive control array, the missing crystal, the one that had blown out on them and dumped them onto an unnamed world, and he sat back on his heels, swearing in Czech.