"She'd be stupid to play it any other way." O'Neill gave her a mulish stare.
"But." Radek swung away from his console, lifting a finger. "We can jam the signal, that is not hard. We know their communications frequencies, and we can block them. And — if I go with you, I can probably defuse the bombs. Or help you send the ship on another course. I have worked on a cruiser before."
O'Neill's face stilled. Teyla could almost read the calculations, the balance of risk and reward, the city's need against the possible loss of his people. "How sure are you that you can jam the signal, Doc?" he asked.
Radek smiled. "I will bet my life on it."
"You're betting more lives than that," O'Neill said. "Woolsey! Who've we got who can fly a puddlejumper that we don't need somewhere else?"
Woolsey frowned, but answered directly. "There are ten civilians currently in the city who have the ATA gene, and all of them are checked out on the jumpers. Why?"
"See that cruiser?" O'Neill nodded to the screen. "It's full of explosives. We need to get somebody over there and defuse it before it hits us. Teyla has volunteered to lead a team to do just that, but I don't have anybody with the ATA gene that I can spare."
Woolsey's thin mouth compressed, lips almost vanishing, before he spoke. "I'm sure there will be someone. Teyla?"
She followed him into his office, the door sliding softly closed behind them as though this were just another meeting. He reached for his laptop, tying into the city's communications system, and looked at her over its lid.
"You don't have to do this, you know."
"But indeed I must." Teyla smiled to show him she accepted the risks. "I am the only one who can." This is what it meant to say it was a Gift, she thought suddenly. This was the thing she could do that no one else could manage, that could very possibly save the city and everyone in it, and that was indeed a gift she had not anticipated.
"Yes. I suppose so." But I don't have to like it. Wooley's expression said that as clearly as if he'd spoken aloud, but he turned his attention to the screen. "All personnel." He ran through the situation quickly and clearly, laying out the problem and the proposed solution and the need for a volunteer who was checked out in the jumpers.
There was an instant babble of response, at least four voices clamoring to be chosen, and Teyla's heart swelled. That was the thing she had grown to love about the people of Earth, or at least these Earth people, the ones who had walked through a gate knowing they would not return unless they found their own power source on the far side. They were a people for risks, for gambles, in a way that the people of Pegasus could not afford to be, Culled as they had been for millennia. She sorted out the voices — Coleman, one of the line cooks, on duty now with the other airmen protecting the lower floors of the central tower; Dr. Majeski, who blushed and stammered and knew more about the city's use of gamma radiation than any man alive; Eva Robinson, her voice cutting through the babble. Woolsey's eyes flicked closed for an instant.
"Dr. Robinson," he said. "If you'd join the party in the jumper bay. And thank you."
Teyla nodded. Eva was the one who could best be spared. She fastened her tac vest, and started for the bay herself.
Chapter Twenty-one
Boarding Party
Ember stared at the image. If he had not been shaking already in the aftermath of Ease's death, he would have shuddered: those were the Ancient weapons, the ones legend said had nearly broken the Wraith in the first war, before the queens had overcome them by sheer weight of numbers. For the first time, he thought he understood what it might have been like to have been born in those days.
He glanced back at his boards, the data trickling monotonously down the screens, repeating that Just Fortune was as ready for battle as it would ever be. And still they waited. He risked a glance over his shoulder, but Guide's face was impassive, impossible to read. Alabaster was easier, frowning in more than mere concentration as she watched the cruisers twist in the central screen. She wanted to join the battle, Ember thought, but deferred to her father's judgment. Though surely Steelflower would want to see Death defeated first, and whatever agreements must be made with the Lanteans could be resolved later….
Precision hissed softly, and Guide said, “Not yet.”
“We cannot wait forever,” Alabaster said.
“We must,” Guide answered, and there was that in his tone that silenced any protest.
Ember looked back at his boards as a sudden knot in the data caught his eye, and touched his controls to disentangle the problem. It was the status transmission from Farseer's hive, power spiking suddenly in the secondary systems, and he snarled in spite of himself. The readouts wavered, warnings blooming and dropping, only to vanish as Farseer's clevermen fought the problems. The hive had been badly damaged when Farseer fled Queen Death's fleet, and the repairs had been hastily made.
"Commander!" The voice came from the communications console, Farseer's face and shaved head snarling from the screen. "Commander, we have a problem with our maneuver engines —"
"Sabotage?" Guide's tone was controlled, but Ember saw his feeding hand open and flex.
"No, damage from our last fight — some of the repairs have come adrift."
Ember looked back at his console. The stream of warnings had slowed, but now the off-line indicators pulsed ominously, an all-too-familiar pattern. He had warned Whirlwind that the patches would not hold.
"We've lost lateral thrusters," Farseer went on. "My men are working on it, but — your cleverman, Ember, he did the first repairs. It would speed our work if we could borrow him again."
Guide glanced toward him, and Ember met his gaze. “I will go, Commander.”
“Very well,” Guide answered. “Take a shuttle, and be quick about it.”
Ember glanced back the screen as he left the control room, seeing the Lanteans still locked in battle with Death's fleet. Surely Guide would act, and soon.
John watched the puddlejumper go, trying not to change course too much until Eva cleared the shield. Cloaked, it was invisible to the Wraith, but he still held his breath until it was out of the fire zone, zipping for the crippled cruiser.
The city took another strong barrage from the hive ships, the shield holding firm. How much power was there?
The answer was there immediately, the city answering his thought — the ZPM is at 83 % and dropping slowly. Well, it would have to be, considering the power required to maintain the shield. Which was getting increasingly harder. The city showed him, information flowing in.
John surfaced, his eyes opening though he remained in the chair. "We're going to have to withdraw the shields from the edges of the city," he said.
"Why?" Woolsey replied on the headset. "We have power."
"We've got plenty of power. That's not the problem," John said. "But the repairs we made to the city's systems while we were on Earth are way not up to spec. Our stuff isn't nearly as good as the Ancient stuff, and it's not handling the load right when we're taking this kind of fire and holding the shield against hard vacuum. It's using too much at one time. We've got to cut power to something. And I'd rather it wasn't the hyperdrive, or we won't be able to bug out if we need to."
There was a long silence.
"Okay," Woolsey said at last. "We'll give the warning and then pull the shield back from up here."
"Sounds good." John closed his eyes again, tilting back into the chair's embrace.
One of the hives had gotten free of the Hammond and the Pride, coming on strong.