When she trailed off, John again got the impression she was wrestling with something. "But?"
She pulled in a deep breath and, pausing midway up the steps, turned to look at him. Her expression had closed off, and any trace of uncertainty had vanished, replaced by a mask of focused professionalism. "They fit the profile of the more pacifist sect of the Lilith cult like a glove. The sect doing the killing is the more fundamentalist of the two. Having found the location of the gate, they're also searching for something more."
"So we need to figure out what that `something more' is." John had accompanied Rodney on plenty of similar treasure hunts in the Pegasus Galaxy. Most of them tended to start with a stroll through Atlantis's Ancient database. The local equivalent of that would be… "What else is in the cult's scriptures?" He removed his own sunglasses and tucked them into his pocket.
Ahead of him on the stairs, Rebecca tossed an approving look over her shoulder. "You're not bad at this investigative stuff," she said lightly. "The symbology provides the best clue."
"Okay. Should I be reading Dan Brown?"
Her lips twitched. "Maybe you can pitch the Jell-O theory to him for his next book. Symbols are representations, generally designed to provide meaning on more than one level. For the Lilith cult, the circles and geometric shapes represent the Stargate, which is both a metaphorical and in fact a functional `gate' to the `heavens'-celestial bodies in the sky, other worlds. There's a second component overlaying that: the isosceles triangle."
"Rodney's Wraith Dart." He nodded. "I have to admit there's a close resemblance, especially those markings indicating the cockpit."
"If you're right, then that's the physical representation, but what's its function in terms of its symbolism? There's an important detail to this that no one's mentioned yet. No matter where in the world these symbols are located, the tip of the triangle always points due south. You found a Stargate and evidence ofAtlantis in Antarctica, so I asked General Landry to have someone check the list of victims for any known link to your not-quite-normal-channels Antarctic expedition. Relatives, close friends, professional colleagues-anything." She detached her cell phone from her belt again and held it up for John to read the text message she'd received back in the lab.
DR L: YOU WERE RIGHT. LANDRY.
John had to grin. Just like the General to get straight to the point. "Then there is a connection between all of the victims."
"All except the ones here." Rebecca pushed open the stairwell door to the second floor. "I'm betting the Iraqi victims had something to do with whatever it is that Dr. Jackson is after, and that it links back to Lilith."
No sooner had they taken three steps toward the office than a lieutenant came speeding down the hallway. "Colonel Sheppard!" The young man skidded to a stop in front of them. "Sir, been looking for you. Joint Operations Center reported that a convoy was attacked outside the Iraq National Museum. The area's been secured, but there were a number of casual ties."
John's gaze flicked to Rebecca, who went pale. "Any word on Dr. Jackson?" he asked, half certain he already knew the answer.
From the grim hardness of the kid's expression, it looked like he was almost as experienced at delivering bad news as John was at receiving it. "He's missing, sir. Most likely he was identified as a civilian and abducted for possible ransom."
Damn it. John closed his eyes, all too aware that ransom was the one of the better options they could hope for. There were plenty that were much, much worse.
Chapter sixteen
Since the very beginning of his association with the Stargate program, Rodney had prided himself on his ability to function at peak performance under extreme stress. It was a talent not many people possessed, certainly not at his level. At the moment, however, that capacity seemed to have deserted him. He couldn't move, couldn't speak, couldn't even force himself to swallow to alleviate his abruptly parched throat. The pounding of his heart assured him that at the very least his autonomic muscles were functioning. Of course, being frozen with terror hadn't done anything to prevent a rush of adrenaline, urging him to put as much distance as possible between him and the creatures that had seemingly appeared out of nowhere. Regardless, the analytical part of his brain informed him that he was currently incapable of any voluntary movements whatsoever.
The dinosaurs-the dozen or so bipedal animals now slinking into the lab had to be dinosaurs, right? Although the things looked more like two and a half meter tall escapees from a tolerable old television series called V, Geisler would no doubt bite Rodney's head off for even suggesting that they were reptiles. Then again, at this point, head biting was a far more significant concern in the literal sense than the figurative.
Seated in front of an Ancient computer connected to his laptop, his fingers frozen mid-stoke on the keys, he had barely enough control over his eyeballs to watch what was bound to be his final minutes of life.
Honestly, what was the point of bringing the Marines along if they couldn't handle the simple task of watching…?
Rodney ended that train of thought as soon as he realized he could now move his head sufficiently to see beyond the lab's entrance. The entire area was crawling with the twolegged dinosaurs, including, he could tell by peering through the windscreens, a bunch making themselves at home inside the jumpers. That was less worrying than the fact that several of the reptiles were carrying limp, uniform-clad bodies in their grips.
Through the floor, Rodney could still feel the rhythmic pulse of the ocean as the surf pounded up against the beach outside. For the first time, it occurred to him that the sound of seabirds was one sensation that was absent from this place. On Earth, gulls would descend on a low tide area in droves, dive-bombing and snatching up anything edible that had been stranded by the receding water. Some small recess of his mind tried to imagine what animal filled that ecological niche here. Another part wondered what had possessed him to waste his last thoughts before becoming a dino snack on the contemplation of the planet's ecology.
Seconds now, that's all that were left to him until he was eaten alive. God, of all the deaths he might have imagined-and he'd imagined quite a few even before coming to Atlantis-the only time he'd seriously acknowledged the possibility of being consumed was when he'd been contemplating his role as this galaxy's version of Jonah. But that experience at least had come with the consolation of knowing the water pressure would crush him to death prior to his consumption. And while death by Wraith was unquestionably horrific, nothing, absolutely nothing, beat the thought of having parts of him being ripped out and chewed upon while he just sat there helplessly, screaming inside his mind.
From vast experience with such matters, Rodney was fully aware that even he could only maintain an elevated level of dread for a certain length of time. When one of the creatures brushed past him without so much as a sniff, he got a wholly unwanted closer look at its smooth skin, patterned like a carpet shark, no doubt for camouflage. But he also got a sense that this entire situation might not end as badly as he had first assumed. This despite the fact that they definitely were cousins to the velociraptors made infamous by Jurassic Park, right down to the tails and the massive feet complete with a deadly upright killing claw on the third toe. The only real difference he could discern, given his limited range of movement, was that the cranial section of their skulls seemed significantly enlarged.