"That's it," he declared when the download was complete. "The Ancient computer here doesn't have the data required to achieve what I need in a reasonable time frame. But even without Atlas's machine, I think I may have an alternative solution." With Sheppard's warning fresh in his mind, Rodney knew better than to elaborate.
"Can we get back to the 'gate yet?" Ronon asked. He studied a large window, but nothing was visible through the pane except unmoving sand. "How do you know when the storm has passed?"
Vene stepped to the door. "We can return to the village and find out."
Moving to follow, Sheppard passed by a small panel mounted on the wall. Immediately it flashed, and a previously unnoticed door slid open, spilling bright, natural light into the room-along with a tremendous cascade of sand.
"Aaahh!" Rodney dived under the lab bench, instinctively hugging the laptop to his chest to protect it against the expected onslaught. When it didn't come, he slowly climbed to his feet, seeing others do the same. To his relief, he noted that the sand was pale yellow.
Looking guilty, Sheppard came up out of his crouch. "On the plus side, we know the storm's over," he offered lamely.
Rodney glared at him. "Your ATA gene needs a leash."
"I didn't even know the door was there. It's not like I opened it on purpose"
"All the more reason!"
Making his way over drifts of the apparently benign sand, Ronon walked through the airlock and looked out. As usual, the Satedan summed it up succinctly. "Back door."
The team moved to join him, and Rodney couldn't repress a satisfied "Aha!" at seeing his earlier suspicions confirmed. All of fifteen meters away were the Stargate and DHD. Beside the latter rose a bizarrely shaped sand drift that had blown up against the currently invisible jumper.
Sheppard turned to Vene with a broad smile. "Guess we'll be taking the shortcut."
"You will return?" the Elder asked urgently, his eyes wide as he stared at the strangely lumped sand.
"We will. And soon."
"You have no idea how much this will mean to my people," Vene declared, accompanying them into the open. "This gives us tangible hope that some of our youngest generation might live to see our world as it was meant to be."
Outside, Sheppard pulled the remote from his pocket and pointed it in the direction of the weird sand drifts. The jumper materialized, prompting Vene to clasp his hands together in wonder.
"Glad to be of help," said the Colonel in a matter-of-fact voice. "Keep an eye out for us in case another storm blows up."
"On that count, we need to find a way to open and close this door." Rodney clambered over the mounds of sand at the entrance. The air was just as dry and the sun just as relentless as they had been prior to the storm.
"Perhaps it's automatic," Carson suggested. He squatted beside a patch of reddish-colored grains that had collected near the jumper and carefully scooped some into a tube bearing a biohazard symbol.
Sheppard motioned for everyone to back away from the airlock. The inner door closed immediately. The outer doors followed suit a few moments later, slowing when they encountered the drifts of sand. When he approached the entrance again, both doors reopened.
That settled, Rodney gave a perfunctory farewell to Vend, leaving Sheppard to fill in any remaining diplomatic niceties while he stepped into the jumper. The storm had ended none too soon for Atlantis's sake, and further exposure to the unrelenting sun would exacerbate the wasp-sting sand bums on his face and neck.
"Wonder how Teyla's doing," Sheppard said, heading up the ramp.
"With any luck, she isn't getting blown into the land of ruby slippers and the Lollipop Guild." Rodney did worry about her. If the environment they'd faced on this planet was harsh, the one their teammate had willingly entered was magnitudes worse.
Seated beside Teyla in Jumper Three, Lieutenant Corletti said, "Jumper Five, tell me what you've got up there."
"Ahell of a lot of convective activity, ma'am," reported Sergeant Smithson, dispatched to fly weather reconnaissance. "Vertical development on those clouds is twenty thousand feet, easy. Some other storm cells are starting to pop up, too, mostly around the poles. Doesn't make sense-the biggest storms are forming over the land. Give us a minute to get a better look at the weather over the Athosians"
Corletti glanced at Teyla and slid her hand forward on Jumper Three's power console. "Let's drop the hammer, boys and girls," she instructed the two jumpers flanking theirs.
Thanks to the jumper's inertial dampeners, Teyla experienced no sense of acceleration, but the speed readout began to increase. She returned her gaze to the windshield, already sheeted with rain. Ahead of them, she could only distinguish the horizon because of the huge expanse of darkness that enveloped the sky. "I have not sufficiently thanked you for your willingness to make this flight," she said to her pilot. "You were the first to volunteer, were you not?"
"I've got a big family," Corletti replied by way of explanation. "If I knew they were in trouble this bad, I'd pull a gun on someone to get there."
Teyla wished her relationship with her people could be so clearly defined. She was their leader, and yet so often she could not be among them. In making the choice to live and travel with the Earth team, she had acted to help the suddenly displaced Athosians as best she could. At the same time, she could not fault them if they sometimes doubted her sense of duty.
In truth, she felt duty-bound to both groups. When she had been preparing to brave the storm, Dr. McKay had at first tried to dissuade her. At Colonel Sheppard's subtle urging, the scientist had yielded and eventually given her a brusque but sincere wish of luck. Ronon had even offered to accompany her, but the journey was her responsibility. The expression on the Colonel's face just as he'd turned to leave had spoken clearly enough. He understood better than most the difficulty of divided responsibilities and loyalties.
The jumper bucked then, jostling her into the bulkhead.
'Pikes. It takes an awful lot to exceed the inertial dampeners' capabilities" Her mouth set in a hard line, Corletti made a quick adjustment to the controls and toggled her radio again. "How about that update, Smitty?"
"Ma'am, the worst of the storm looks to be heading away from the camps, further inland," Smithson said. "It doesn't seem to be losing strength, though."
When Jumper Three was again buffeted, nearly knocking them out of their seats, Corletti bit back a curse. "Roger that," she muttered. "Colonel, are you still on the line?"
"Right here," Caldwell's voice replied from Atlantis. "How much daylight have you got left, Lieutenant?"
"Almost none, sir."
"Then I suggest waiting until morning to effect evacuations. It'll give the Athosians time to gather everyone and assemble in the best possible locations for extraction."
Though it was not her place to object, Teyla could not be silent. "By morning, Colonel, the situation may have changed considerably. The storm may be unpredictable, but I believe we can be assured that the situation will only worsen."
"That is by no means a certainty," Caldwell argued. "The fact is, no one really knows what this machine will do. Even its creators never knew, because it was never tested."
Her rebuttal was cut off when the jumper tilted dizzyingly, dumping her onto the floor.
"Damn it, damn it, damn it," Corletti hissed, keeping her seat only by tightly gripping the armrests. "Everybody still hanging together?"
"Sort of, ma'am," came Smithson's answer. The sergeant sounded as though he'd had the breath knocked out of him. "I'm okay, but Donnelly just bit through his lip during the last bump, and he's bleeding pretty much all over the deck. Few stitches should deal with it okay."