Just as she was about to give up, light blazed from its surface. The illumination was not severe, but after so long in the dark it brought tears to Teyla’s eyes. She stepped back, shielding her face. The light dimmed and resolved into a shape. A symbol had sprung into life on the obsidian buttress, scored in lines of silver.
“By the Ancestors,” breathed Miruva, looking at the emerging shape in wonder. “We’ve found it.”
A dozen questions ran through Sheppard’s mind at once. This was good. Very good. Probably.
“What d’you know about this place, Helmar?” he asked, seized by a sudden idea. “Anything special about it?”
Helmar shook his head. “We’re out on the high plains,” he said. “Nothing special that I know of.”
Sheppard studied the proximity meter again. “You people live in caves, right?” he said, thinking out-loud. “Makes some sense — it’s real cold. But maybe even when it wasn’t you guys still did it.” He started to talk more quickly, warming to the theme. “Maybe there are places down there you’ve forgotten even existed. Maybe…”
He looked down again, as if by concentrating hard enough he could penetrate the layers of ice and rock to see what lay beneath. If he was right, the signals were coming from a long way down. And if Ancient technology was having trouble penetrating that far, then that meant dense rock.
“You really don’t know anything about this place?” he asked. “No scary stories of goblins living under the rock?”
Helmar shifted, uneasy. “I don’t know much,” he said. “No one pays much attention to stories. Aralen might be able to tell you.”
Sheppard frowned; he couldn’t imagine the Foremost liking what he had in mind. “Yeah, maybe he would,” he said. “But one way or another, we’re gonna have to get down there. You know how to mine, right?”
Helmar nodded enthusiastically. “Of course. Even our children know how to use a mallet and ice-axe.”
“Just what I wanted to hear,” said Sheppard, putting the life signs detector away. “I like the way this conversation is going.”
He glanced at the horizon. The clouds were still some distance off, but they looked like they were building. The window of opportunity was closing.
Helmar squinted at the clouds. “What are we going to do?”
“Get back to the settlement,” Sheppard said. “We’re gonna need every spare pair of hands you’ve got, and fast.”
McKay placed his pliers down wearily and admired his handiwork. But as soon as he saw the pile of wiring in front if him, his heart sank. It looked ready to fall apart at any moment. Using crude tools on millennia-old Ancient technology was like trying to fix a computer with a flinthead axe. Not impossible, but you’d only want to try it if there was absolutely no alternative.
The module was almost complete. Zelenka’s instructions had been frustratingly elliptical in places and the man had clearly not quite realized what conditions McKay would have to work in. It was one thing constructing a complex piece of equipment back on Atlantis, where there were whole banks of computers dedicated to running simulations and pinpointing structural weaknesses. Working in the rear bay of a semi-functional Jumper in the middle of a snowfield was somewhat different.
Still, it could have been worse. The life support was now more or less fully functional, making the environment in the Jumper pretty much as comfortable as it ever was. Fixing delicate control nodes to fragile input actuators was much easier when your fingers didn’t feel like frozen sausages. Much of the power to the drive system was restored and it wouldn’t be long before the Jumper could take off again.
As for the module itself, that was a complete mystery. It was impossible to test before the Jumper actually attempted to break the event horizon. He looked across the jury-rigged equipment once again; its shoddy appearance didn’t fully reassure him. However, as long as you were prepared to ignore the aesthetics, McKay couldn’t see an obvious reason why it wouldn’t work. It would just take some careful handling, a bit of faith, and a fair slice of luck.
McKay collected his essential equipment together, and shut down the experimental parts of the system. He powered up the long range scanners one last time, hoping against hope to see something different on them. It was just the same. No sign of Teyla or Ronon, just a wall of storm-cloud closing in on them from every direction. He adjusted the range, taking it out to its maximum setting. Mile upon mile of turbulence. It looked terrifying. He flicked off the viewscreen, pulled on his layers of furs again, and stood up stiffly. Hours of work had fused his joints together and he winced as he moved.
“Rodney? You there?” Sheppard’s voice crackled over the radio.
McKay picked it up. “Just about. I hope you’re enjoying yourself while I slave away here.”
“Know what? I am. But we’re heading back now.”
“Any sign of Teyla or Ronon?”
“Maybe. I’ll explain when I get back. How’re you getting on?”
McKay didn’t look at the pile of electronics again. He really had no faith in it at all. “Excellent,” he said. “Well ahead of schedule.”
“Good. We’ll see you back at the settlement. Sheppard out.”
McKay sighed. No ‘thanks Rodney’, or ‘that’s amazing Rodney — well done’. As ever, John seemed almost oblivious to how much work he’d had to do just to give them a fighting chance of getting home.
He flicked a switch and the rear door lowered. Immediately the biting air rushed in. McKay hurried outside and quickly sealed the Jumper. Turning his back on it, he began the trudge back to the Forgotten settlement.
Chapter Fourteen
Ronon kept his eyes fixed on the light streaming through the doorway at the far end of the tunnel. It was low and almost perfectly round. Before Ronon could stop him, Orand ducked under the lintel and disappeared. Cursing beneath his breath, Ronon had no choice but to follow. He had to bend double to get under the lip of the rock, but after that he managed to squirm through easily enough. On the far side, surrounded by blue, he gasped with amazement.
They were standing on a shelf of rock about twenty feet wide. On either side of them, the ground fell away and, beyond the chasm, cliffs of unimaginable height reared up. They were at the edge of an abyss, a pit that delved into the very core of the planet.
“By the Ancestors…” breathed Orand, looking at the spectacle in wonder.
Sapphire light bathed the whole scene, spilling down from the distant roof of the vast chamber. Instead of the dark, soulless rock through which they had been creeping, the ceiling of the enormous space was entirely constructed of ice. Light filtered and winked from myriad facets, and massive icicles hung down like diamonds. Ronon was not normally given to flights of aesthetic fancy, but the sight was staggeringly beautiful.
The light was clearly sunlight, albeit filtered through many hundreds of feet of ice, but it was hard to gauge exactly how close to the surface they were — the ceiling itself was several hundred feet above them.
Ronon gingerly approached the edge of the rock shelf, and took a look over. The chasm stretched off into infinity, falling into darkness. There was no escape that way.
The remaining hunters came through the narrow opening, one after another. Soon there were a dozen of them standing on the narrow shelf, mouths open, gaping at the light show in front of them.
“Right,” said Ronon, conscious of the need to keep things moving. “What are we going to do now?”
“I guess that’s our only option,” said Orand, pointing.
At the left hand side of the rock shelf, a thin pier of granite shot out into the void. The blue light caught its edges dimly, but otherwise it was nearly invisible against the bottomless shadow below. Ronon took a good look at it. It was maybe six feet wide, and looked dangerously fragile. It was clearly a bridge of some kind, though it was impossible to see where it led beyond the first few dozen feet. After that, the dim blue haze obscured everything.