"I found it. It landed." John cautiously eased back down, digging his binoculars out of a tac vest pocket. "Guess where."
John could hear Rodney thumping himself in the forehead. "It's next to the jumper, isn't it?" Rodney said bleakly.
"Yeah. Maybe about twenty yards from it." John wiped sweat and dirt off his forehead and lifted up enough to focus the binoculars on the alien ship. "That's not an accident. It has to be able to see through the jumper's cloak."
"An Ancient ship would have that ability," Radek put in, sounding unnerved.
Teyla said, "But if they were somehow Ancestors, they would see we are human, and try to contact us."
"They could be like us, humans who have found and learned to use Ancient technology," Miko added cautiously.
"Maybe they are trying to contact us," John pointed out. With the binoculars he could see more detail on the ship, including bulbous projections that might be sensor devices or weapons, and a curved depression in the hull that could be a hatch. He put the binoculars away, checked his watch, and grimaced. They didn't have a lot of time left on the air tanks, and all that climbing and suppressed hysteria had to have used up an extra share of oxygen. "If they wanted to lure us out into the open, all they had to do was fly behind the building and wait till we came out."
Then Ronon said, "Maybe they just want to make sure we're good to eat first."
John shook his head wearily. There was a moment of silence, then Teyla said, "Ronon. That was unnecessary."
"We have fifteen minutes of air left," Rodney added, his voice grim.
"I know." John didn't see that he had a lot of choice. "I'm going to get the jumper and bring it over here. If I'm not back in seven minutes, get back to the building. Teyla's in command."
Rodney was already sputtering, "What? Alone? Are you out of your mind?"
Easing up to the top of the steps, John didn't see how company would help if the ship decided to fire on him. "Yeah, alone."
"Sheppard, I'll go," Ronon said as Teyla began, "Colonel-" and Rodney started, "We could try-"
"Ronon, stay with the others and do what Teyla says. That's an order. Everybody shut up now. That's also an order." Wincing, John stood cautiously, already feeling like he had a target painted on his chest. But there was no sign of movement from the ship.
The others interpreted "shut up now" as "continue to argue in furious whispers" but it kept John company as he crossed the suddenly endless stretch of open ground between the pit and the cloaked jumper. He moved at a jog, because he just didn't have time to take it slow and cautious. He gave the other ship as wide a berth as possible.
The argument was still raging in his headset. He heard Rodney say, "You're discounting the possibility that it could have come through the Mirror!" and Radek reply, "I am not discounting! I see no reason to theorize in advance of my data!" John hoped Kusanagi's earlier guess was right, and the ship was occupied by Pegasus Galaxy humans who had stumbled on Ancient technology and figured out how to use it. The other option was aliens, and he really wasn't comfortable with that.
It wasn't that he didn't believe there were benign aliens. He had seen all the SGC reports and he knew about the Tok'ra and the Nox and all the assorted others, and he had met an Asgard in person, though he still thought Hermiod was a creepy little bastard. But his gut reaction wasn't ever going to change. In an argument where Rodney had called John a xenophobe, Rodney had pointed out that John's perception of aliens had been adversely affected because his first experience with one had involved being pinned to a dinner table by a life-sucking vampire that wanted to eat his entire species. John had replied, yeah, so what? and that was pretty much the end of rational discourse on that subject.
Of course, if it was humans in there, that certainly didn't mean they were out of the woods. Instead of sitting in there thinking hey, other people with a spaceship, let's contact them, it could be hey, another spaceship, let's kill them all and steal it.
But they could have done that with one burst of fire into the pit and they hadn't, and that was all John had to go on right now.
"Colonel! What's going on? What is the alien ship doing? What-" Rodney demanded.
"Nothing, yet." The ship was just looming silently on the sand, like a giant metal conch shell.
Forty yards now from the square dent in the sand that marked the jumper's position, John debated the relative merit of glaring suspiciously at the strange ship versus trying to pretend it wasn't there. Thirty yards and he was starting to think he was home free.
Then the dent in the purple hull made a metallic clunk and started to slide open. "Crap," John muttered, spinning to face it. He kept the P-90 aimed toward the growing opening, still backing toward the jumper.
"What? What is it?" Rodney said urgently. The others had gone quiet.
"The hatch is opening," John said through gritted teeth.
The hatch slid all the way up. The interior was too dark to see anything but a shallow airlock. Then a helmeted head peeked out.
John stumbled to a halt because he was having a The Day the Earth Stood Still moment. Except this figure was a lot smaller and more tentative than Gort. It was maybe a little over five feet tall, human-shaped from what he could tell; everything was concealed in the dark blue folds of a loose outfit that might be a pressure or environmental suit of some kind. The helmet was dark glass, opaque, and attached to a small purplish-gray unit strapped to its back. It was gripping one side of the hatch, braced as if to leap back into the ship, its whole stance conveying uncertainty and trepidation rather than hostility. John was still mostly expecting it to shoot at him, though its hands were empty.
They stared at each other for a very long moment. Then it lifted a gloved hand slowly, fingers spread in what had to be a greeting. Five fingers, John noticed. Slowly, he took one hand off his P-90 and waved back. He said, "Uh, hey there. I actually can't do this right now, because I'm running out of air, and I have to move my ship."
In his headset, he heard Rodney say, "What? Who are you talking to-Oh. Oh, God."
The figure hesitated, then a voice, light and a little tinny as it was filtered through whatever comm device the helmet used, said, "Oh." Then it added, "I–I'll wait here."
They stared at each other for a moment more, then John said, "Okay." He reached into his vest and triggered the remote. He heard the welcome hiss and thump as the jumper's ramp opened behind him, felt the cool breeze as the conditioned air flowed out. He backed up until his heel caught the end of the ramp and he barely managed not to fall on his ass. Fortunately the cloak extended far enough that the human-alien-person-whatever would have missed that part.
John bolted inside, hitting the switch to close the ramp. He went immediately to the cockpit, saying, "I'm in the jumper. You guys okay?"
"What? What happened?" Rodney shouted into his headset. "What was it? Human, alien, what?"
"We are fine," Teyla answered, sounding relieved. "What did you see?"
"The hatch opened, somebody stepped out." The jumper was already powering up as John dropped into the pilot's seat. The HUD flashed on, showing him the energy signatures and relative position of the alien ship. He saw with relief that as far as the jumper could tell, it was the only other ship in the area. And the sensors were only reading one life sign, but the handheld detector hadn't read anything, and this one might only be registering because the person-alien-whatever was standing in the hatch. Though something about the tentative way it had peeked out had suggested that it was alone. John wasn't going to count on that, though. "He's wearing an EVA suit and helmet; he mostly looked human, but I couldn't tell." He hesitated, then dropped the cloak. The ship obviously had instruments that could see through it, and he wanted to try to keep this whole thing at the cordial level it had started out on.