Ronon glanced at his teammate, leaving the choice to her. He knew Teyla had been reluctant to leave the gate for fear a rescue team from Atlantis would fail to find them. All the members of the off-world teams had recently had transmitters placed under their skin so that they could be easily located, but as yet no one was certain of the devices' range. If a rescue was as improbable as he suspected, however, their best chance-as slim as it might be-lay with these people.
After a moment, Teyla gave a slight nod. "I am Teyla Emmagan," she replied. "My companion is Ronon Dex. We would be honored to join your hunt."
Dantir beamed and fell into step beside Ronon as the group moved out. "Are you properly called Ronon or Dex?"
With a shrug, Ronon said, "Ronon's fine."
"Very well. We are tracking the paledon, Ronon," Dantir explained. "Winter comes, and the village will need to store much meat."
"Paledon." Ronon watched the trees for movement. "Is that the small four-legged creature we saw before we ran into you?"
"It is," the boy confirmed. "We will pick up its herd trail, and I will show you how we hunt."
A muted laugh came from one of the older hunters. "You are on your first hunt yourself, and you mean to show the off-worlders how it is done?"
"My aim is truer than yours, Temal," Dantir shot back.
Ronon grinned to himself. This kid had guts. Then he spotted a flash of fur disappearing behind a rock, and he halted. The instincts of the hunters were well honed, because they immediately noticed and followed his lead.
Before long, a paledon stuck its head out from behind the rock, and after another moment it emerged fully. Ilar silently fell to one knee and drew her bow, but something startled the animal, and it began to scamper away.
Without a second thought, Ronon leveled his gun. The energy bolt sizzled through the air and dropped the paledon instantly to the ground.
"Ronon!" Teyla's voice was appalled. A beat late, he wondered if he might have offended their hosts: some cultures that hunted for sport placed specific rules on such pursuits. But these people needed the food. They couldn't get too angry about his method.
Risking a look at the hunters, he found their expressions shocked and impressed. Dantir's eyes were huge as he smiled widely.
liar found her voice. "Perhaps," she said, "this arrangement will benefit us all."
From her elevated vantage point on the walkway outside her office, Elizabeth watched the security team form up in the gate-room. To be sure, her second journey to PM-418 would be undertaken more solemnly than the first. There would be no idealized optimism this time. Atlantis had nothing to gain from the proceedings; she was returning solely to help the Falnori and Nistra find a way to coexist. She could only hope that both groups' leaders would take her at her word.
John stepped out of the control room to join her. "Jumper Three's starting its second orbit," he reported neutrally.
Without knowing just what debris might be lurking right on the other side of 418's space gate, it had seemed more prudent to send a jumper through the ground gate and fly it up to orbit to scan for both the gate and Teyla and Ronon's transmitters. The recovery team had departed about an hour ago, and John hadn't left the command level since.
"Anything yet?" Elizabeth asked, knowing she'd already have heard if the answer was positive.
He shook his head. "There's a lot of space out there. It might take a while, but we'll find them." Glancing over at her, he asked, "What about you? Sure you want to do this?"
She raised her eyebrows. Maybe she'd let him off the hook in their previous discussion, but time had renewed her resolve, and in her view the subject of his resignation was far from closed. "Are you asking if I'm sure about going back to 418, or about leaving you in charge?"
Subconsciously, maybe, she'd hoped to produce a flinch with that comment. He didn't oblige. "I recommended Rodney."
"Yes, you did. But you also agreed to remain at your post until the SGC could send a replacement on the Daedalus, and if I hand the reins over to the chief science officer instead of the chief military officer, people are going to start asking questions that I don't think you'll want to answer just yet."
With a slight tilt of his head, John conceded her point. "I was asking about going back to 418. There's not much we can accomplish there."
"If we can do anything to keep the leaders from coming to blows, I'll consider the trip a success." Elizabeth leaned one elbow on the railing, facing him. "We jumpstarted this fight. Granted, it may only have been a matter of time before it escalated to this point on its own, but we brought the two sides face to face. Now six people are dead, and two societies are moving toward a pointless conflict. We can't walk away from that. Sometimes we have to do the right thing for all concerned, not just the expedient thing for us."
"I understand. I'm just not sure how far we should be willing to go to protect these people from their own out„rage.
She didn't have a ready answer for him. Objectively she knew that they'd have to draw a line sometime; if ten sions came to a head, she couldn't put Atlantis's Marines between advancing armies. Still, she had to believe peace was possible, and she had always believed that the carnage of needless battle was the purest form of tragedy.
Too many of her principles had been shaken by this galaxy already. She needed to cling fiercely to those that remained.
"These people shouldn't be at odds," she said at last. "They don't have incompatible values or beliefs. All I have to do is convince them of that."
"While also giving them a surprise about the ore that drives their respective economies. Better you than me." John sighed, rolling the strain out of his shoulders. "You think they'll listen this time around, or just step up the rhetoric? Or worse?"
She shrugged, choosing not to muzzle a brief burst of fatalism. "War is the continuation of politics by other means, I've heard."
The rueful twist of John's lips resembled a smirk, but it was entirely humorless. "Somehow I think Clausewitz would've had more to say if he'd met this galaxy."
At that point they were joined on the walkway by Carson, shouldering into a tactical vest as he walked. "I must say I have my doubts about whether the governor and minister will understand a warning about the hazards of adarite any better coming from me than they would from you," he remarked.
Not long ago Elizabeth might have believed his comment to be rooted in anxiety about going off-world. Carson Beckett had not been the most eager member of the Atlantis expedition at first, at least when it came to anything outside his infirmary. Now, of course, she knew better. If a task had to be completed for the greater good, whether it involved the weapons chair or an off-world mission, he wouldn't hesitate.
He might not sleep all that well afterward, she reflected, recalling with a twinge their utter failure with Michael, but he would act.
"I don't want to run the risk of being unclear and making the situation worse," she told him. "This way you can back me up if my Cliffs Notes version of the neurological effects goes astray."
"This may sound paranoid," said John, "but are you prepared to trust both those guys? As unlikely as it may be, there's still a chance that one of them is in league with the raiders."
In spite of the circumstances, Elizabeth felt encouraged by his caution. The Colonel may have been willing-too willing-to give up his title, but its associated responsibilities came more naturally to him than he may have realized.
"We can't eliminate the risk completely," she replied. "All we can do is assess it and mitigate whatever elements are within our control."
John made a face. "Why am I getting creepy flashbacks to the Air Force's Operational Risk Management course?"