"— that the entire population of the planet will need to know what's coming, which means it would only be a matter of time before the Wraith find out and react." Caldwell's reluctance seemed to be at least partly linked to Rodney's enthusiasm, but Elizabeth agreed with his assessment of the risk.
"What sort of time frame are we looking at to prepare Atlantis?" she asked.
Rodney made an impatient sound in the back of his throat. "The sooner I'm allowed to stop talking about the issues and start working on them, the sooner I'll be able to provide that answer."
"Why wait to collect the ZPMs?" Caldwell wanted to know. "If it'll reduce the amount of time for the Wraith to pick up on the plan, we ought to tell these people to start moving ASAP."
"You didn't read the diplomacy primer, did you? It's generally bad form to waltz in and say `excuse us, but you need to beat it so we can take your ZPMs to power up a cityship we pretended had been destroyed.' Look, it's going to take me most of a week, even if I forego sleep"-Rodney pointedly checked his watch, reminding them that it was past midnight-"to get everything set up both here and on Polrusso. As far as we know, Atlantis hasn't been a space ship for several million years. We can't just fire up the engines and expect everything to work perfectly. That's why we need every last technician and, dare I say it, Hermiod to stop working on the Daedalus and concentrate on prepping Atlantis."
"There was no sign ofAtlas's machine?" Caldwell pressed, still looking for options.
Irritated at being diverted from his message, Rodney threw him an incredulous glare. "The thing is, what, a twenty-centimeter-long piece of pipe, misplaced ten thousand years ago?"
Caldwell was unfazed by the obvious scorn. "So that would be a no.,
"Yes, Colonel, it would indeed." Rodney gingerly touched a raw patch of skin on his cheek. "In fact, I suspect Atlas actually triggered his device, thus causing the malfunction in the original terraforming program. Before I shut the terraforming down, I'll need to know if that's the case."
He looked to Elizabeth expectantly, waiting for a go-ahead. While she would have much preferred to have found a way to prevent the nanites from destroying the planet, she couldn't deny that the idea of Atlantis once again taking to the stars held a considerable thrill. So far, however, it was nothing more than an idea. Sometimes Rodney tended to get a little ahead of the curve. "All right, proceed. But do so with extreme caution. We can't risk alerting the Wraith on Polrusso."
"I'll ask Hermiod to stop work on the hyperdrive repair. I can tell you right now that he's not going to be happy about it " The set of Caldwell's jaw made it clear that his Asgard crewmember wouldn't be the only one displeased.
"Dr. Weir," said a voice in her earpiece. "We have an incoming call from the mainland. No visual, and the signal's weak."
She hurried out to the control room, the others hot on her heels. "Kwesi, can you hear me?"
"Just barely," Kwesi called. His words were fragmented by static, but she could tell he was upset. "We have moved as many people as possible to a more protected location across the other side of the river. Our original location and the main camp have been inundated by a mudslide."
And things just kept getting worse. "Casualties?"
"Some. I cannot guess at a number." The engineer paused. "How many jumpers were sent to retrieve us?"
Elizabeth closed her eyes. "Kwesi, I'm sorry. They couldn't reach you, and we had to recall them. We've lost contact with Jumper Three-the ship Teyla was on."
"That is what I feared. During the slide, we saw a jumper being carried down the mountain."
The tight knot in Elizabeth's chest that had begun to unwind with Rodney's proposal instantly snapped back into place. Damn it. She wanted to scream at the blatant unfairness of it all, but she didn't have that luxury. Looking at Teyla's teammates, she found the same bitter conflict reflected in their eyes.
"Until I see them dead, they're alive," the Satedan stated bluntly.
John hesitated for a second before nodding. "I'm with him."
Elizabeth wished she could share their faith.
Chapter Nine
Rodney heard his teammates' words, but his reaction was a bit different. "Let me see if I've got this straight. Teyla and Corletti are out there in a wrecked jumper, and you're sitting in a cave?"
"We are now on the wrong side of the river," Kwesi replied. "The wind and rain are very strong, and we have minimal light to work by."
"Oh, and I've never had to save an entire city while held at gunpoint by a madman under those exact same conditions!"
"The jumper was lost in the mud-"
"So a little dirt is a problem now?" Rodney couldn't believe what he was hearing.
"Rodney, be reasonable," said Elizabeth. "Let Kwesi finish."
"Nothing about this is reasonable-why should I be the exception? The man is just sitting out there while Teyla-"
Her look of exasperation stalled his protest but not his seething anger.
Kwesi's response would have sounded clipped even without the static. "I may have been understating our circumstances. This is not a little mud. It is no exaggeration to say that half a mountain has collapsed on the camp. Those of us who managed to escape are on the far side of a river now swollen to three times its normal volume. Squalls coming through have gusts of over two hundred kilometers an hour, and the rain is so violent it is difficult to breathe at times. So I am sorry, Dr. McKay, but I do not have the ability to search for the jumper-no one here does. Even if the sun were to shine bright and clear come morning, I would expect the valley to be buried and the river to be five times its normal width. We are only praying that the squalls will die down and that you also experience a break in the storm so that it will not be so dangerous for you to lend assistance. We have many injured here"-there was a break in the transmission-"…understand if that is not possible."
While Rodney had not been unsympathetic to the plight of the Athosians, the situation was entirely different now that it involved Kwesi and Teyla. His anger at the engineer abruptly morphed into worry. "Kwesi, we need you back here!" he blurted, but received only maddening static in reply.
Elizabeth stood in front of him, ever poised despite her obvious concern. "Let me worry about the mainland," she suggested. "You have to focus on your work. That's as much as you can do for now, and I'm sure you'll agree that you're singularly good at achieving impressive results under pressure"
"It does seem like I do my best work under the threat of disaster, doesn't it?" Rodney got the distinct impression that he was being handled, but he didn't have time for an abundance of indignation. "All right, give me a couple of hours to go through the files I brought back with me. After that I'm going to have to speak to everyone, and I do mean everyone, about what we need to do to get this city prepared for spaceflight"
"Woo-hoo!" yelled Lieutenant Corletti. She flashed a triumphant grin at Teyla as the puddle jumper pulled free of the grasping mud and took to the air.
"Well done, Lieutenant," Teyla acknowledged with a relieved smile. The Marine had been unable to bring the jumper's flight systems online until slamming her fist down on the control panel. "Is this a standard technique for encouraging recalcitrant equipment to operate?"
Corletti mumbled something about a Millennium Falcon before adding, "Okay, we're not as functional as I'd like. Inertial dampeners aren't responding too well. I'm having to fight every gust-and man, that wind is howling once we get any kind of height"
The view through the windshield was a jumbled mess of lightning strikes and impossibly heavy rain. The HUD, however, clearly showed Teyla the extent of the mudslide that had carried them down the mountain's face. The cascade of wet earth had stopped just short of where many life signs were clustered on the near side of the river. Though fully half of the camp had been destroyed, it appeared that no one had been injured, except- "There!"