"Stay with them," Sam said. "Stay close. But not too close," she amended. If they were overloading the cruiser's power plant…
A flight of Darts skimmed in, and for a moment the viewscreen flashed blue, the forward shield darkening with the energy absorbed. The cruiser was dropping back, trying to dive between two of Death's hives, and the Darts provided a screen. The rail guns would destroy a Dart instantly of course, but their tracking was far too slow to provide an effective cover.
Mel pulled wide, trying to get a good look at the bigger picture for a moment. That was the squadron commander's job. The second cruiser was venting atmosphere, pulling back at an uneven pace, obviously damaged, but the hives still packed a full punch, and the Darts still outnumbered them. More importantly, the Hammond was in too tight to retrieve 302s.
It had been six minutes.
In the rest of the world that was barely time to get through a fast food line, but in space combat that was forever.
Mitchell's voice, calm on the line. "I've got one on my tail. Assist."
"Coming," Mel said, and banked hard right to follow.
Chapter Nineteen
Fatal Choices
"What can I do?" Vala asked, stepping back out of the way of the pandemonium in the gate room. She didn't really have an excuse to be there, but no one had told her to leave yet.
Woolsey looked at her as if aware for the first time that she was there. "Find McKay," he said. He didn't sound as if he really expected her to, but she nodded brightly and then gave the matter her most serious consideration.
Everyone was busily looking for McKay all over the city, assuming that he was planning to sabotage some essential system. But he'd had every opportunity to do that for days, and the only thing he'd shown a seemingly unnatural interest in was stealing Hyperion's weapon.
All right, then. Assume what Daniel swore was a maxim of Earth philosophy, that the simplest explanation was most likely to be correct. Vala could think of a lot of complicated explanations that had turned out to be correct, but it seemed worth a try. McKay had stolen Hyperion's weapon because he was under Queen Death's control, and he wanted to make sure the weapon wasn't destroyed.
If she'd stolen something vitally important, the first thing she'd have been looking for was a means of escape. There was really only one means of escape from Atlantis while it was in orbit, and that was a puddlejumper. One puddlejumper had launched without authorization, contents assumed to be John Sheppard plus Ancient device, but in reality unknown.
"I'm just going to go look in the jumper bay," Vala said. She didn't think Woolsey heard her, or at least he affected not to hear her. She slipped out and made her way down to the puddlejumper bay.
She tried to work her way backwards through what might have happened as she went. If McKay had stolen the weapon and left Atlantis with it, he'd stolen it from Sheppard. Sheppard had left the control room, probably on his way to the jumper bay to make a brave and suicidal gesture. But if he'd run into McKay there…
She nearly stepped on Sheppard, and had to flail to keep from tripping over him where he lay sprawled on the deck of the jumper bay, unmoving. "What do you know, philosophy works," she said, and bent down to see if he was still breathing.
One cruiser disabled — abandoned, according to the Pride: it was a start, but there was no time to enjoy the victory. The Darts and 302s still wove a glittering net, flashing into Lorne's awareness as they came in range, vanishing as soon as their danger was past. Radim was handling fire control, and they were his problem, if and when he thought he had a chance to hit them. The remaining cruisers were the problem, the cruisers and the hives.
Comm, he thought at the ship, and a light flicked on, followed by a hollow emptiness in his ear. "Colonel Carter. We can cover if you want to try to get the 302s back in —"
"Thanks, Major." Carter's voice was calm, but the Pride was sensing weak spots in the Hammond's shields, the remaining cruisers moving to catch her in crossfire. "That would be a help."
The Hammond dived out of the trap, shields flaring, and Lorne heeled the Pride to come up beneath the larger of the two cruisers. He heard Radim give the order, and saw blue fire blaze across the cruiser's belly. No real damage, though, and the second cruiser was on him at once, spinning to catch him broadside. He caught his breath as the shots hit home, heavy blows along the starboard shield. There was a distant bang somewhere, and Radim swore.
"We've lost a gun emplacement."
"Get a technical crew down there," Lorne said, to Radim, to the ship, not caring who obeyed, and spun the Pride, trying to take advantage of the tighter turning radius to come up behind the cruiser again. Its commander wasn't fooled this time, and peeled off at an angle, trying to draw the Pride into its sister's fire.
Shields at 60 percent, the ship murmured. Lorne could feel them softening like cardboard in the rain, pulled up and around to present a narrow target. The first cruiser swept after him, but the other turned its attention back to the Hammond. Lorne's eyes narrowed as he judged relative positions, lines of force relative to the ships' twisting courses. Yes, just there — he brought the Pride up in a sweeping loop, freeing himself from the cruiser. There was time for one good shot — he heard Radim talking, urging his people on — and then they were past, bearing down on the cruiser attacking the Hammond. Lorne saw a handful of their shots strike home, and then they were wheeling away again, but the cruiser didn't follow. He shook his head, lining up for another pass, but Carter spoke in his ear.
"Negative, Major, it's not going to work. They're not being distracted."
"Copy that," Lorne said. The Pride rocked as the first cruiser swung past, firing, and he turned to chase it.
John Sheppard struggled up from unconsciousness to the sound of footsteps. Hands seized him roughly, flipping him over onto his back in the perfect feeding position, his head lolling, a black leather boot against his face. Any moment now the Wraith would bend to open his tac vest.
John flailed out uncoordinatedly, rewarded by a very human sounding "Ow!" He opened his eyes.
Vala Mal Doran looked down at him rubbing her chin. "That wasn't nice," she said. "And what happened to you?"
He was lying on the jumper bay floor, and it came back to him in a rush.
"Rodney stole the weapon back," he said. "He stunned me and he stole a jumper." He sat up, reeling. "How long have I been out?"
Vala steadied him. "How should I know?"
"He's still working for Queen Death." John hated to say it out loud, but it was true and now they were all screwed. If only he hadn't trusted Rodney so much! He grabbed Vala's arm, scrambling to his feet. "I've got to get down to the chair."
The civilians had been ordered to a set of windowless rooms on the lowest level of the central tower. The lights were on, there were chairs and couches and cots, and there was even a coffee urn and hot water and baskets of cold sandwiches. It all seemed incongruous, William thought, but he made himself a mug of tea all the same. A number of people had their laptops going, monitoring the battle, but William didn't really know how to tap into the city systems, and wasn't sure he wanted to know. Winning or losing, there wasn't anything he could do about it; the best he could manage was to keep out of people's way.
With that in mind, he edged toward a quiet corner, but stopped short as he saw that one of the three chairs was occupied. "Oh. I'm sorry, Dr. Robinson."