The colonel's answer died in his throat as Lady Erony walked over to the DHD where they stood. "You have conversed with your friends?" she asked.
Sheppard nodded. "I've been given full diplomatic status, apparently. It's kind of a new string to my bow, but I'm hoping to do well with it."
She began to enter a sequence of symbols on the oval podium. "Excellent. I will furnish you with a formal introduction to Halcyon's ruler after we arrive."
The Gate flared with exotic energies and opened. "You can do that?"
"Of course," said Erony, with a hint of amusement. "He's my father."
Chapter Two
They emerged from the Stargate into the yellow sodium glare of harsh spotlights, and for a moment Sheppard had to fight back the reflexive twitch of his trigger finger. Then the beams turned aside and a set of bells and trumpets struck up a brief fanfare, the flourish echoing around them as Lady Erony walked forward.
"She must be important," McKay said from the side of his mouth, "she's got her own theme music."
Blinking away the afterimage on his retinas, the colonel glanced around and took in the place where they found themselves. The chamber was long and wide, open inside with illumination in tight clusters from the spotlights and thin window slits at the tops of the walls. There were aircraft hangars out at Nellis and Groom Lake that were large enough to hold a B-52 bomber with room to spare, and this place could have swallowed one of those easily. He imagined that a good pilot could have backed the Daedalus in here for a touchdown. The Stargate had pride of place, raised up on a wide dais and ringed with skeletal derricks. As he stepped forward, Sheppard heard faint whirring noises coming from the tops of the towers and looked up. He could see ornate horns like something from an old gramophone and huge glass-eyed, wooden-bodied cameras that were the size of a doghouse. Thick cables snaked away from them into the shadows. A broad pavement led down from the dais, marked every few meters by poles topped with elaborate ceremonial banners. Beyond those were indistinct shapes in the dimness past the pools of yellow light, broad cylinders of dull gray metal. More men with the same large rifles as Erony's party stood at attention in a semi-circle before them, heads bowed. The colonel noted that their uniforms, while similar in cut to those of Erony and her men, were of a different color and the tabards were reversed. Same army, different unit? he wondered.
There were giant cogwheels on pinions overhead, thick chains big enough to haul battleship anchors, and massive, silent pistons. Sheppard couldn't be sure, but he thought he could see the very slightest knife of daylight coming from a long horizontal join in the roof above. The Gate Hangar-he was already thinking of it as that, as it was way too big to be considered a Gate `room'-was hissy with steam and there was the unmistakable smell of oil and grease. This was a wrought iron edifice, heavy, boiler-plated and industrial; the absolute antithesis of the clean silver lines of Atlantis.
From the corner of his eye he saw Mason and the SAS troopers, Ronon and Teyla, all of them eyeing the shadows with the same air of wariness.
McKay looked at the ground under his feet and nodded. "Huh. We're standing on a natural stone platform. Looks like this place was built around it, or maybe it was brought here from somewhere else."
"The latter is the correct assumption," said Erony. "You are quite observant."
"I'm a scientist," McKay noted. "Observation is part of what I do."
"Indeed?" The woman gave him an appraising look, as if she were re-evaluating him. "Forgive me, but I do not have your name…
"Oh yeah, sorry," said the colonel. "I'm terrible with introductions. This is Dr. Rodney McKay."
"Greetings," said Erony, inclining her head.
"Ronon Dex, Teyla Emmagan, Staff Sergeant Mason, Corporal Clarke and-"
"Of course," Erony didn't appear to be paying attention to Sheppard any more, still studying McKay.
"— and, uh, Privates Bishop and Hill…" The colonel concluded.
"It is unusual for a scientist to be part of a hunt splinter on Halcyon," she continued. "Is this the first time you have been allowed to venture from your conclave?"
Rodney straightened. "Absolutely not. I'm a valuable member of a front-line team. In fact, I'd go as far to say that my expertise has often been the key factor in the survival of this, uh, this unit."
"Couldn't imagine life without him," added Ronon.
If Erony noticed the faint sarcasm in Dex's words, she gave no sign of it. "You will all accompany me, then. My adjutant Linnian has summoned a conveyor to take us into the capital." She gestured at the pavement. "This way."
"If I may ask, where did your Stargate come from, if it was not found here?" said Teyla, as they walked.
Erony spoke over her shoulder. "Star-Gate? That is what you call the Great Circlet? What a delightful term." She smiled briefly. "Yes, my ancestors brought our Circlet from an area in our polar regions, many generations ago, long before we had deciphered the sigils on the podium and learned the secrets of the portals it contained. It remains here now, inside the Terminal, held secure so that all on Halcyon understand that they are protected from any intruders it might admit."
Sheppard glanced up past the banners and got a better look at the oval-topped cylinders. Now he could see them for what they were; a cordon of gun turrets, short, stubby barrels of large caliber all pointing inward toward the Stargate. He had no doubt there were just as many on the other side of the Gate from where these stood.
Erony saw where he was looking and threw him a proud nod. "Invaders who come through the Circlet with malice in their hearts are not allowed far, Lieutenant Colonel." She pointed up at one of the flat concrete walls and Sheppard could just make out the discoloration of old blast damage. "The Wraith sent one of their screamer-ships here, when I was a small child. They paid for their impudence."
"So I see."
At the end of the pathway, two more troopers snapped their rifles to arms as a large elevator platform came level with them. Erony's second-in-command from the ice planet had gone on ahead and stood there now, waiting for them. He bowed. "High ness, all is prepared. The Lord Magnate has been informed of your return. He wishes to speak with you."
The group boarded the elevator and it began to ascend. "Just so," said Erony. "I will see him when we arrive at the High Palace."
"Forgive me if I correct you, My Lady, but the Lord Magnate desires otherwise. He wishes you to contact him via telekrypter prior to leaving the Terminal."
There was a flash of annoyance on Erony's face. Sheppard gave a wan smile. "Parents, huh?"
The elevator rattled as it rose out through the ceiling of the Gate Hangar and into bright daylight, past the upper tiers of the facility. Through the iron mesh of the shaft's walls the layout of the complex became clearer.
"Military base," said Ronon, noting the dispersed lines of blockhouses, the parade grounds and ranks of troops. Many of these wore the colors of the men on the lower levels, but many more were in different hues of blue, brown, red and purple.
"Cathedral," countered McKay, indicating the ornamental rows of statuary that studded the site. There were vast arches and spires more suited to a church, obelisks and what looked like complex shrines.
"I am not familiar with that word," said Erony. "What does it mean?"
"A cathedral… It's a place of worship, a building where you can venerate your religion…"
The woman let out a short laugh. "Oh, Doctor, do you seek to mock us? Please, Halcyon is not some backwater world of savages where we huddle in caves and pay homage to ephemeral deities! This is a society of rational, intelligent thinking. You will not find the delusions of religion here."
"You have no faith on this world?" said Teyla.