She said, "Yes, I think they're using some sort of cutting tool to get into the control panel, but that should take them some time." On the next to lowest level, she stopped at another control area, bigger than the shuttle's cockpit, with more of the floating displays. She started hitting control pads, and said, "Main console to shuttle. I've turned on the internal comm throughout the ship, so you can-
Rodney's voice on a loudspeaker interrupted, "Notify you when I'm ready, yes, yes, get to work."
John left her to it, going down half a level until he had a view of the hatch for the main airlock. The buzzing noise from outside the hatch didn't get any louder, but it was still making John's nerves twitch. He listened to Rodney and Trishen talking back and forth on the comm, mostly incomprehensible techno-babble. It sounded like Rodney had finished converting the shields to a cloaking device and they were just waiting on the drive build-up.
Then Rodney's voice said abruptly, "Wait, what the hell is that?" John tensed, pushing to his feet and stepping back onto the platform. Before he could ask what the hell was what, Rodney said, "Trishen, do you have a view of the outer hatch?"
Alarmed, Trishen hit a control. One of the display bubbles expanded to a view of the outside of the ship. The vantage point looked like it was up on the shuttle, and the image was blue-gray, as if it was from a nightvision scope; the daily eclipse must have started.
There was a cluster of drones and a few male Wraith around the ship. Three of the drones had strange tools about the size of an AT-4 Rocket Launcher, and were just pointing them at the outer hatch. The beams came on, so intense the glare washed out the image. Sounding appalled, Trishen said, "They're cutting the hatch out!"
Rodney's voice was sour. "They must have heard the drive build-up and decided not to bother trying to take the ship intact. That's typical."
John ducked back to the steps to look at the outer lock from this side. Even from here, he could see a hot blue glow growing in the center of the hatch. Oh, hell. "Hurry it up, guys, they're burning through the inner hatch!"
He heard Rodney ask Trishen, "Can you seal off that section? Oh, at what point does that make sense!" John guessed the answer had been "no." Rodney added urgently, "Then keep going, overload everything-"
The blue glow was getting larger. The hatch was steaming, giving off a sharp odor far too close to burning flesh for John's comfort. He moved back up a few steps, crouching to keep the P-90 aimed at the outer hatch. The metal of the whole central core was starting to tremble and over the whine from the cutting tools he could hear a muted reverberation that had to be the overloaded drive. Trishen pushed away from the controls, saying, "It's done! We have to get away-"
John saw the blue glow of the cutting beams suddenly expand, the black hatch material turning white with heat. He yelled, "Go, now!" The hatch exploded inward, and John fired down at the first of the drones that slammed through the white-hot remnants. The first two drones collapsed in the lock; they would regenerate in a couple of minutes but right now they were dead weight, slowing the others down, forcing them to clamber over the temporarily inert bodies.
Trishen bolted out onto the platform, then started up the steps.
John fired at the hatch again, then pushed to his feet and darted up the stairs after her. At the next platform, he turned to fire down, catching a male Wraith just as it stuck its head out into the central well to look upward. It fell back and John charged up the stairs.
From above, Teyla fired her 9mm down the central well. John reached the shuttle connection platform and backed toward the hatch, firing to cover Teyla as she drew back from the railing. Then something hit him, sending him staggering. The right side of his body went instantly numb, and he sagged, barely clinging to the railing; he must have been clipped with the edge of a stun blast. Teyla shouted in alarm, firing down the stairs, and John knew the Wraith were almost on them. "Teyla, get out of here!"
Then Rodney ducked out of the hatch and grabbed John's numb arm, hauling him across the platform.
Teyla emptied her second clip as John and Rodney reached the shuttle's hatch. Turning, she shoved both of them through. The gravity field grabbed them and John slammed into the shuttle's deck, Rodney landing half on top of him. John managed to turn his head in time to see Teyla land on her feet beside him. A Wraith snarled up at them from the platform directly below, just lifting its stunner to fire. John awkwardly scrabbled for the P-90 with his good arm, but Rodney and Teyla were yelling, "Now, now!"
The hatch slid shut.
John let his head drop back. "Yeah, that was close," he gasped. "Thanks, Rodney, Teyla."
"Close?" Rodney shouted incredulously. "Shut up! And you're welcome!"
Teyla let her breath out in relief, sliding down the wall to sit on the deck. She looked at the sleeve of her jacket, where there was now a hand-shaped rip in the gray material. "Very close," she said with a rueful grimace.
Too close, John thought. A little less momentum, and that thing would have had her. He heard muted banging on the lock, and tried to shove himself upright. "We need to get out of here-" He felt a thump through the deck that sounded a lot like a docking clamp releasing, then a gentle push as the shuttle lifted away from the base ship.
Trishen's voice called from a nearby compartment, "We're away!"
"That's nice." Rodney shoved himself into a sitting position, planting an elbow in John's numb side in the process. He called back to her, "Are we cloaked?"
"Yes, it seems to be working!"
Rodney rolled his eyes. "Seems to. Oh, that's fine. We'll know for certain when the scout ship starts shooting at us." He yelled, "Is the base ship blowing up?" He added in a lower voice, "Please, please blow up."
Somewhere below the hatch, muted by distance, thin air, and the shuttle's shielding, John heard an explosion.
Rodney slumped in relief. "Thank you."
Chapter eight
The sky was a deep purple when Ronon made it up to the roof, the big planet that filled the sky almost blocking all but the last light of the sun. He paused in the doorway of the little dome that sheltered the lift platform; it was too dark to see more than the outlines of the various lumps and projections on the roof, but he couldn't hear any movement.
"Ronon, they are still heading away from you," Zelenka whispered in his headset. "Five hundred yards, a little further. They are moving fairly slowly, crossing back and forth in a search pattern. I think they are looking for the puddlejumper."
He heard Kusanagi add, "Perhaps they think the others landed on the roof, that the ship is still there, cloaked. They must suspect we are from Atlantis."
"Suspecting is fine," Zelenka told her. "As long as they don't know for certain. And even the possibility of a jumper doesn't tell them the city is still there. It would be unreasonable for them to believe that none of us escaped through the Stargate before the destruction."
Using the low platforms as cover, Ronon headed for the roof's edge. There was still just enough light for him to see the darker shadow of the trench. He took out the little battery lightstick and crouched low, cupping his hand over it to shield the beam, and flashed it over the floor of the trench. He moved along the edge until the light found disturbed dust, the marks of tracks and scuffling. Then the light caught the glint of the metal shells cast off by the Atlantean weapons. It happened here, he thought
He jumped down into the trench, landing lightly, and paced down it. After a few moments' search, he frowned. This was the right place, but something important was missing. He touched his headset. "They aren't here."