"The Wraith?" Zelenka asked, a little startled. "The detector shows they are still searching-"
"No. The others." Ronon had thought he would find their bodies. The Wraith discarded human corpses like trash, leaving them where they fell; they would never have bothered to move the bodies after a feeding. Something else caught the light and he crouched, running his fingers through a scatter of plastic and metal debris. The remains of one of McKay's computers. He allowed himself a grim smile; the destruction was thorough, nothing left to give the Wraith any information, any hint that Atlantis still lived.
"Oh, you mean…no bodies?" Zelenka hesitated. "But then perhaps they are alive? If the Wraith beamed them up, their life signs would disappear from screen-"
"Maybe. That doesn't mean they're alive now." Ronon stood, moving to the metal housing that shielded the device they needed to destroy. He felt along it, looking for an access panel. If the others were alive… They would be aboard that Wraith scout ship.
The jumper couldn't take on a Wraith ship that size. Ronon would have to figure out a way to get onboard. And then get off again, if he found them alive. And he couldn't believe he was planning something this mad, but then the Atlanteans seemed to encourage this kind of thinking. Sheppard would do it, he thought. So would Emmagan.
He shook his head. This first, he told himself. Ronon's fingers found an indentation in the metal; an access panel. "I found-"
The sudden explosion sent him to the ground, crouching low. A moment later he realized it couldn't be the Mirror; the blast hadn't even made the building tremble. "Zelenka, what was that?"
Zelenka was cursing in his own language again. "We heard it, but whatever it was was too close to Mirror platform for our sensors to detect the source. Wraith scout ship is still in orbit, we're detecting no darts-"
The Wraith had no reason to blow things up near the Mirror. And explosions made Ronon think of Sheppard and McKay. He stood, feeling for purchase on the housing, and found a spot to plant his boot; he pushed himself up. Craning his neck, he could just see over the top.
It was too dark to see much, but near the far side of the Mirror's frame there was a large scatter of debris that was sparking with energy. It was right about where the strange Wraith ship had been. "It's been blown up," Ronon reported. "The Wraith female's ship."
Then his headset crackled with static and he heard, "This is Sheppard. Ronon, is that you?"
"Sheppard?" Ronon grinned, jumping down from the housing. That explained the explosion.
On the headset, Zelenka demanded incredulously, "What? Colonel? Colonel, you are all alive? Rodney and Teyla?"
Sheppard's voice answered, "We're all fine. Zelenka, what's your position?"
"The same one we had before," Zelenka said, sound ing deeply relieved. Ronon could hear Kusanagi laughing and clapping with joy in the background.
Sheppard said, "Good. Just stay there for now and wait for instructions."
Ronon broke in, "Sheppard, I'm on the roof, near the pulse generator."
"There are Wraith up there with him," Zelenka added hastily. "Well, not with him, but they have turned and are heading back in his direction. I think they are only heading back toward the explosion, but-"
Ronon heard McKay in the background this time, then Sheppard said, "Ronon, we're going to beam you off the roof, back outside the installation, near where the jumper is.
"Uh, okay." Ronon studied the dark sky uneasily. Beam? "Where are you?"
"That's a long story" From Sheppard's tone, Ronon didn't think he was going to like this story. "I'll tell you once we get you out of there."
Nobody had liked John's brief summation of their plan: John could practically hear Ronon's expression of deep cynicism over the radio, Radek had muttered in Czech, and even Miko had said doubtfully, "Dr. McKay thinks this is a good idea?"
"Yes, yes he does," Rodney had inserted into the conversation. "Now just shut up and do it."
The jumper rendezvoused with the shuttle, and with both ships cloaked, they headed toward the mountains. They were looking for a spot where they could land and regroup; they needed the breathing room, and Rodney needed the jumper's equipment to come up with a way to fix the Mirror.
The flight away from the installation would only take a few minutes, but John could tell it was going to be an awkward few minutes. He and Teyla were standing back in the main compartment area, watching Trishen in the cockpit while Rodney worked at pulling more data out of the terminals. Trishen was flying the shuttle using only the instruments and a couple of bubble displays; there wasn't anything like a viewport, and that was making John's nerves jump. He was used to flying by instrument, but no windows at all just felt all kinds of wrong. And Trishen didn't trust them, and they didn't trust her. Even Rodney, who had pushed the "let's work together" solution, was jumpy and uncomfortable in the confined space of the compartment and passages.
At least they had intel on the Wraith's movements. The shuttle was still receiving data from sensor buoys Trishen had placed around the Mirror when she had first arrived. She had set one of the holographic bubbles in the compartment to display the video feed, and they had a good view of the Mirror platform.
The eclipse was waning, the light getting steadily brighter. They could see the base ship's glowing debris field, and the Wraith climbing around the Mirror's frame. John asked Teyla, "You think they know what it's for yet?"
Teyla studied the little figures moving in the display, her brows drawn together. "It is hard to tell. As the shuttle was lifting off, I could sense their frustration, their anger at being thwarted, that was all. There was no feeling that they had made a great discovery." She shook her head. "But they must realize the Mirror is a portal to somewhere."
"They probably think it's just a giant Stargate, like we did at first," John said, then snorted at himself. Just a giant Stargate, like that's something to sneeze at. The Wraith might think it went to some hidden refuge of the Ancients, some nice new feeding ground for them. Well, it could, if we don't get the damn thing shut down. He stretched, rolling his shoulders, wincing as sore muscles and bruises protested the motion. From the cockpit, Trishen glanced up, saw he and Teyla watching her, and quickly looked down at her terminal again. John let his breath out. He really hated this. There was just too much about her they didn't know. He lowered his voice and said, "If she can do that mental communication thing… she could tell them where we are without even touching a radio."
Teyla didn't look happy either, but she said, "But she released us, destroyed her ship. She seems as if she truly wishes to escape them, and this reality."
John shrugged, resigned. "Yeah, I know. I'm just… paranoid. Every time we trust somebody new they turn around and stab us in the ass." And he couldn't help thinking that her description of the Eidolon or whatever they called themselves was too good to be true. "And if the Wraith in her reality don't feed on humans or any other kind of people-like alien, what do they feed on?"
"She does have water and some sort of rations in this ship." Teyla's lips twisted and her brows indicated skepticism. "Though I find it hard to believe that her kind are entirely human in that respect. Perhaps, unlike the Wraith here, they are able to feed on the life force of animals."
John nodded to himself "Well, we're never going to find out, and I'm okay with that."
They reached the foothills a short time later, and found a low plateau for a landing site. It was stony and bare of the tall red grass that would betray the presence of two cloaked ships, and sheltered by high bluffs and rocky overhangs.
The shuttle was bigger but John had made it clear that they were doing any joint research in the jumper. It was awkward, as they would need to keep the ramp down and everyone would have to wear SCBAs the whole time, but he didn't want any unpleasant surprises. Rodney agreed with an impatient grimace. "Yes, let's skip the possibility of an intruder control system that leaves us all helpless now that we've introduced her to the other members of our little group," he muttered, watching Trishen as she was absorbed in her instruments. She was carefully guiding the shuttle into a landing on the stone shelf. "I thought she'd at least try to keep one of us as a hostage, and that we'd waste an hour threatening each other and arguing about it."