As the two jumpers rose out of the grotto, Lorne spoke up over the radio. "I don't know if this should matter to us, but how are your passengers going to make the return trip'? If we let them off at the gate, they'll be thousands of miles and an ocean away from home."
If the raptors were let off at the gate? They weren't planning on hitchhiking all the way to Atlantis, were they? Flushed with renewed panic, Rodney twisted in his seat to face Teyla.
The Athosian shook her head. "We need not concern ourselves with their journey, nor with the force fields. I am certain that all we must do is return to the gate."
High overhead, dozens, maybe hundreds of pterosaurs circled. A few darted down to snatch bits of food from among the rocks, thus answering his earlier musings, but the majority of the winged animals seemed to be…waiting.
"Whoa," said Lorne at the exact moment Rodney noticed a new signal illuminated on the jumper's instrument panel. "The force field around the lab-"
"— just reactivated," Rodney cut him off. "What did you do?"
"Me'? What do you think I could do that might result in that, McKay?"
"Our new acquaintances are responsible for restoring the force field," said Teyla.
Oh, really? Rodney glanced back at the boss raptor, whose head and shoulders now poked between the front seats as he looked out through the windshield. Apparently the jumpers had picked up an escort: the group of pterosaurs had closed in to fly alongside the craft. One animal came in for a near pass and peered in at Jumper Three's occupants, eliciting a soft laugh from Teyla.
"Major," she called, "I believe we have found the flyer who collided with us early in our first visit. He seems to be conveying his apologies."
"Well, uh, tell him not to worry about it. No harm done." Lome's disbelief was clearly audible. "And tell them we appreciate the company, but we're going orbital for the rest of this hop."
The avian dinosaurs-okay, pterosaurs-must have understood the basics, because they peeled off before the air could get too thin. Even though the boss raptor didn't look perturbed by the jumper's climb toward the stars, Rodney knew it had to be a distinctly new experience. New experiences, more often than not, made for tense situations, and this situation was plenty tense enough already. "Teyla, what's on his mind?"
Teyla paused a moment and then smiled. "Mostly he is thinking of his young. I still cannot grasp more than basic concepts, but I sense a kind of satisfaction-something related to an old mystery regarding the Ancient lab."
The suborbital flight path made the trip fairly brief. Lome brought his jumper down next to Jumper Four, parked just outside a shimmering blue energy field that surrounded the Stargate. Reducing power to do likewise, Rodney was baffled by the presence of hundreds of ridiculously oversized animals gathering around the shield and, like the pterosaurs above the lab, waiting.
"Torosaurus," Geisler murmured behind him, sounding overwhelmed. "Look at that bright red cranial plating. My God, it's nearly glowing- and the iguanodons…"
More critical to their current status and thus more interesting to Rodney was the force field, which lowered as the jumpers settled onto the jungle floor beside the third craft. He didn't bother questioning Jumper Two this time; he was satisfied that neither Lorne nor Radek had triggered the action.
Teyla moved to the back of the jumper and lowered the hatch. When their stowaways padded down the ramp, Rodney exhaled a relieved breath. As much as he trusted his teammate's intuition, he hadn't fully trusted the raptors not to change their minds about what was planned for the evening's menu.
"The force field will be raised again once we are gone," Teyla said. "Permanently this time, I believe. It will leave an area just large enough around the gate for any later visitors to dial out and depart."
While Rodney was still wrapping his head around the idea that the animals had such fine mental control of Ancient technology, another thought came to him in parallel. "If they want to be left alone, why couldn't they have put up the force field before? Surely we're not the only people to use the gate in the past ten thousand years."
Standing at the hatch, Teyla bowed her head to the departing raptors and turned toward him. "We are not. We are, however, the only ones who did not fall prey to the T. rexes living in this valley."
A muted groan over the radio signaled Ronon's return to consciousness in the other jumper. "We'll fill you in later, buddy," Rodney heard Lorne say. "Jumper Two is dialing the gate."
They'd achieved their objective, more or less. That said, Rodney felt a bit like he'd been hit by a bus. Several dozen questions vied for attention, most of which stemmed from the issue of Lilith's work on the planet. She and the other Ancients could not possibly have created this bizarre form of intelligence, because the inhabitants had obviously been seeded here millions of years earlier. Had they merely been observing its progress? Or were they looking for something that might be used against the Wraith'? Or to enable Ascension?
As Teyla raised the hatch, the event horizon rushed into being. Geisler's choked laugh captured everyone's attention. Rodney followed the other scientist's outstretched finger. Beyond the windshield, the raptors who had accompanied them now climbed onto the backs of two huge creatures the paleontologist identified as Quetzalcoatlus. As Jumper Three rose from the ground, the winged animals did the same.
"Perhaps they should have inherited Earth after all." Geisler's eyes were unashamedly bright. "They've been far better custodians of this planet than we have of ours."
Feeling somewhat charitable by virtue of not having been eaten alive, Rodney allowed Geisler the last word and guided the jumper into the wormhole.
Chapter seventeen
Daniel came to with indistinct memories of a fireball and a jolt of searing pain anchored in his mind. That alone was enough to be troubling, but he already could tell that he wasn't badly injured. Hushed murmurs came from somewhere above him: Arabic, he identified, reminding him where he was…or at least where he'd been at the start of all this.
Dragging his eyes open, he struggled to adjust to the low light and found three-no, four-men standing around him. There was no immediate evidence of weapons, although he knew better than to make any presumptions along those lines. Still, he wasn't tied up or gagged, which was a good sign. It beat the alternatives, at least.
A dull throb on one side of his head made itself known, and he reached up to brush his fingers over a light bandage just behind his right ear. Since he had a better than passing familiarity with concussions, he was confident that this didn't qualify. The material draped along his arm also alerted him to the fact that he was no longer dressed in desert camouflage but instead in traditional robes. Another good sign.
His hosts watched him, their facial hair and the uneven lamplight colluding to make their expressions unreadable. Wondering what had happened, Daniel tested his voice and found it scratchy but serviceable. "Aih elly hassal? "
All four men showed the same amount of surprise-namely, no surprise at all. Stepping closer to him, one of them answered, "Your group was attacked. Insurgents, you would call them. We were nearby and pulled you from your vehicle before they could capture you."
"Shukran-thank you."
"Mafi mushkillah-no problem. It is our way of taking some small measure of control back from the many factions in this country that claim to act on our behalf."
It was a reasonable response, but Daniel took it with a grain of salt all the same. Cautiously, he pushed himself into a sitting position and looked around. His pallet rested on the stone floor of a cellar-like room, lit only with lamps and a couple of flashlights and smelling vaguely of goats and other animals. In the corner unmatched chairs surrounded a worn wooden table cluttered with several pots and plates, a small bowl of fruit, and what looked to be homemade candles. There were no windows; he could tell it was night only because one wall was damaged and offered a porthole view of the darkened street outside.