Trishen hesitated, and John swore under his breath. He had had the feeling there was another shoe about to drop, but he had hoped to put it off for a while longer. Trishen made a frustrated gesture, saying, "I didn't think they would be able to. Their minds are so… different. But they only have a vague awareness of my existence. Obviously they can't pinpoint my location."
"What?" Rodney stared at her. "Hello, were you not standing right there when I explained the plan to make it look like we were all dead, so the Wraith would stop looking for us?"
Ronon grunted in a way that clearly meant I told you so.
John ignored both of them, pointing out to Trishen, "You could have mentioned this earlier."
"I didn't know," she insisted. "I've kept myself closed off from their minds, I thought that would be enough." John's expression must have conveyed what he thought of that excuse. Sounding urgent, she added, "But you can use it to your advantage. I can distract them away from you.
Rodney clapped a hand over his eyes in exasperation. John just said, "I hope you're right about that."
The work was interrupted twice more by searching darts, but Trishen was right in that they didn't seem able to pinpoint her. And the base moon hadn't responded to John's transmission yet, giving him something else to worry about. He knew it was all too possible for the Wraith to have followed the signal traces the Mirror was sending to the monitoring station in the ruined city. Lorne would've gotten them out of there, he told himself. Lorne better have gotten them out of there.
Rodney finally said, "All right, we've got it." He motioned everyone to gather around the ramp, and turned the laptop, which was displaying a partial schematic of the top half of the installation. "As I suspected all along, the key is in the pulse generator that stabilizes the Mirror's accretion surface. Since it was first constructed, factors that affected the required degree of stabilization have changed. Now these factors could be anything from the decreasing levels of oxygen in the atmosphere, changes in the ozone layer caused by the Mirror itself, orbital drift, and so on. There was apparently no compensation mechanism for this because the Mirror was meant to be abandoned-" He glared at John, who was making "get on with it" gestures. "Fine. The instability has kept the Mirror active since Trishen's ship came through, and it's still connected to the correct destination; we just have to make that connection stable enough for transport by adjusting the pulse. We've done the calculations, but the corrections are going to have to be made directly to the consoles that control the array."
"Okay." John thought it sounded deceptively easy. "Do we have a clue where that is?"
"Yes, yes, I'm getting to it." Rodney hit a few keys to change the schematic, bringing up another section. "From the exploration that Trishen managed to do before we arrived, we suspect it's here, on the roof, above the section of the installation where the environmental and security system controls are located." He indicated a highlighted spot on the roof, not too far from the observation area they had found when they had first managed to get into the building.
"You suspect?" Teyla said, before John could. "What if you are wrong?"
Rodney gave them all a sour grimace. "I'm not wrong. According to everything we've discovered about this place so far, and the exploration Trishen did before we arrived, the controls we need have to be in this section."
Zelenka shifted forward. "The good news is, once the shuttle has passed through the Mirror-which should take only seconds-we can shut the entire pulse generator down from that location. It's much more effective method of destabilizing the Mirror than just destroying a section of the array itself, as we originally planned. Instead of dramatic discharge, the singularity is likely to just collapse inward and disappear." He shrugged. "And we will probably not be killed."
"And the Wraith can't find these controls and turn it back on?" John said, wanting to be absolutely certain.
Rodney signed in annoyance and folded his arms. "That would be a yes, since it's the entire point of this insane exercise.
"It would do no good to turn it back on." Zelenka made motions indicating something big getting suddenly very small, and then waved his hands rapidly. "Some of the physical structure of the Mirror may remain, but the quantum components will no longer exist in this reality."
"Thank you, Dr. Zelenka, that was the answer I was hoping for." John smiled engagingly at Rodney. "I assume you've got some way for us to land on the roof without triggering another discharge from the Mirror?"
Rodney appeared to take a lot of pleasure in saying, "For once, you assume correctly. Trishen's shuttle emits a field which keeps it from disrupting the pulse array, and we're going to temporarily adjust the jumper's cloak signatures to mimic that field. That should allow us to fly above the Mirror platform and land on the roof without triggering another discharge."
"Which would cause us to crash and die," Zelenka added helpfully.
Rodney checked his watch. "We'll have to time our arrival for the moment that the Wraith scout ship's orbit takes it out of scanning range. It'll be out of range for only forty-five minutes, so we'll need to move quickly. Not that the scout ship wasn't out of range the last time we tried the roof, but it gives us a slight advantage." With a wince, he added, "Very slight."
"This is where I can help," Trishen said, sitting forward. "I can draw the darts away from the area with my shuttle."
Rodney eyed her, as if reluctant to let her participate. Not too far away. Even once we enter the corrections, the Mirror won't be stable for long. We'll need you to be ready to go through as soon as we make the adjustments." He looked at John impatiently. "Well?"
John nodded. It sounded like a plan. It also sounded like their only option. "Let's do it."
"Looks pretty quiet," John said, studying the jumper's screens as he guided it in a smooth arc above the installation's roof. The adjustments Zelenka had made to the jumper's cloak must be working; the Mirror hadn't made so much as a grumble. "Good job, Radek."
"Thank you, Colonel," Zelenka said from the right hand jump seat. "It's nice not to crash." Rodney was in the co-pilot's seat, comparing a tablet to the energy signatures the jumper was displaying on the HUD. Teyla was sitting behind John, with Kusanagi and Ronon watching from the rear cabin. Trishen's shuttle should be paralleling their course, though it was invisible to both instruments and visual contact. Relying on Trishen not to crash into him wasn't exactly John's favorite part of this trip.
"I do not see any Wraith on the platform," Teyla said from behind him.
"Yeah, they're probably inside." The life signs screen wasn't showing any Wraith in the open at all; they were probably busy ransacking the building, looking for more intel on the Mirror. Most of the darts were out of the immediate area, searching the mountains and the surrounding area. "Rodney?"
"Will you slow down? Hold it-" Rodney sat forward, pointing out the viewport. "Here we go. Right there."
John slowed, bringing the jumper in a little lower. Rodney was pointing at a small dome on top of the roof, not far from the trench that bordered the curved housing of the pulse array. It was the same dark stone as the rest of the building, and from the air it looked like one of the round elevator-access kiosks. The HUD popped up a terrain sensor screen, comparing this dome to the other structures on the roof, and John could see it was somewhat larger. He hit the comm channel. "Jumper One to Trishen. We're about to set down. If you can proceed to the south side of the complex and circle around, we'd appreciate that."