Entanglement

by Martha Wells

  Carson focused on the HUD. It was the life signs screen, and there were lights appearing on it, all around their position. Wraith, beaming down from the darts. "Good lord," he muttered. "They must suspect we're here." He hesitated, a cold sensation growing in his stomach. "You don't think they found the others..."

  "I hope not, Doc," Lorne said, but his expression was grim. More life signs appeared on the screen, close to the jumper, and Lorne swore. He looked back at the rear cabin, at the scientists and techs under his charge, and grimaced. "Dammit. I hate to do this, but we can't hang around."

  The jumper lifted smoothly off the pavement, heading for the Stargate.

  "So this whole thing was a Wraith trap?" Colonel Caldwell said, his voice coming in over Atlantis' comm system, a little too loud in Elizabeth's currently crowded office.

  Elizabeth sat at her desk, still studying her copy of the last transmission from John's team. In the puddlejumper bay above the gateroom, the teams from the moon base camp were still unloading their equipment. As soon as Major Lorne had brought her the transmission, she had called Caldwell, wanting to get the Daedalus on its way as quickly as possible. The ship had only arrived this morning, and hadn't finished offloading the supplies it had brought yet. Lorne and Carson Beckett were sitting across from her, and Chuck, Laroque, and several other members of the operations staff were clustered in the doorway. She really should have sent everyone back to work, but she knew they were as anxious as she was.

  "I don't know, Colonel," she answered Caldwell. From what Zelenka had said in the last transmission, John and the others had assumed the contact from the Wraith calling itself "Trishen" was a trap. But that didn't feel right, somehow. "The Mirror itself is genuine, obviously. And making them believe they were being contacted by an alien ship... That seems a bit imaginative for the Wraith. We've never seen them do anything quite so elaborate."

  "Unless they suspected your team was from Atlantis, and wanted to try to get some information out of them," Caldwell said.

  "That's a possibility," she admitted. As far as they knew, the Wraith still believed Atlantis had been destroyed, but they would certainly still be looking for survivors who had escaped with Ancient technology. "This makes it all the more imperative that the Daedalus reach the system as soon as possible."

  "No need to convince me, Doctor, I understand that you have personnel in danger. And we can't allow the Wraith to get their hands on that Mirror, not to mention sensor technology that can see through the Ancient cloak. I'll be breaking orbit immediately." Caldwell sounded somewhat sourly resigned, and Elizabeth winced in equal parts chagrin and annoyance.

  She hadn't meant to imply that she thought Caldwell would resist the idea of a rescue mission, or that he wouldn't understand the implications of what the team had found. But their working relationship had gotten off to a rocky start when she had had to squash his attempt to replace John, and things hadn't exactly been going smoothly since. She felt it would work out eventually; she and John had had clashes and arguments at first, too. But then John, for all his quirks, was far less prickly than Caldwell and had always been much easier to get along with. And at this point the original expedition members had all been through too much together to let disagreements get in the way of friendship.

  Frustrated, Elizabeth frowned at her laptop screen and didn't apologize to Caldwell. She wondered if he understood that some of her closest friends were on that lost jumper. She just said, "Thank you, Colonel."

  Major Lorne sat forward, his expression urgent, and Carson waved frantically at her. She added, "I believe Major Lorne and Dr. Beckett would like to accompany you.

  Caldwell sounded slightly more resigned. "Then tell them to get ready to be beamed up."

  He signed off, and there were murmurs of relief from the people waiting outside. Major Lorne pushed to his feet, looking relieved. "Thanks, Dr. Weir. We'll bring them back."

  Elizabeth nodded firmly. "I know you will, Major." And she thought privately, I hope you will. She kept the worry off her face, but she had the bad feeling that this was going to be more complicated than just a Wraith trap.

  CHAPTER SIX

  onon hated waiting. He could stand the stillness and silence required for hunting and stalking, but this was different.

  Pacing the rear cabin was the only outlet for his frustration. Sheppard had ordered them to move, and Kusanagi had been trying to take the puddlejumper toward the hills to the south, but the Mirror's last abrupt discharge had forced them down in the grassy plain not far from their original position. Now Ronon couldn't even help Kusanagi and Zelenka by volunteering to stare at a screen; the interference had turned all the sensors to glittering multi-colored static. They had sent the transmission to the camp on the other moon, but now the comm wasn't working either, and they had no idea if there had been a reply.

  And the whole thing had been a trick, a Wraith trap. He should have seen past it, even if the others hadn't. That was the whole reason he was here. But he had never heard a Wraith speak like that before. Speak to people as if they were equals, not just prey. The voice on the comm had sounded as much like a human woman as Teyla or Kusanagi, and he had been deceived by it as easily as the less wary Atlanteans.

  "Still nothing. I can't get through this interference." In the jump seat, Zelenka typed on one of the little portable computers, glancing worriedly at the hazy cloud hovering in the air where the HUD was normally displayed. "Surely they weren't hurt. They were moving away from the Mirror or they would not have been able to get that last transmission through."

  In the pilot's chair, Kusanagi tapped the control board impatiently. The holographic display just responded with more fuzzy bursts. She said, "I don't understand how Trishen could be a Wraith. The data that Dr. McKay described-"

  "Yes, I don't see how Wraith could fake those readings, not well enough to fool Rodney," Zelenka said. They shared an uneasy look. "Perhaps Wraith from some other reality have come through the Quantum Mirror."

  Ronon felt his.) aw tighten. "That's all we need."

  "Perhaps they'll fight with the Wraith here and kill each other." Zelenka saw the expression on Ronon's face and shrugged philosophically. "Well, we can hope. Wait, wait-" Looking back to his small screen, he waved a hand excitedly. "I'm receiving sensor data-" He touched his headset. "Colonel Sheppard, are you there? Can you hear me, anyone? Rodney, Teyla?"

  Kusanagi's hands moved competently over the board. Her face intent, she said, "The HUD is coming back online. The life signs detector should show us-" But when the HUD screen popped up, she gasped. "Dr. Zelenka-"

  Zelenka flung his arms up in frustration. "I can't get through to the others! Do prdele! There is still too much interference!" He turned his chair, looking at the HUD, then froze. "Oh, no."

  Ronon stepped forward, leaning on the back of Kusanagi's chair. He couldn't read the language scrolling along the sides and bottom of the image, but he knew that glowing dot in the center was a ship. "Wraith." He felt his lip curl into a silent snarl. This was just getting worse. "A hiveship?"

  Zelenka shook his head, going pale as he studied the screen. He said faintly, "Too small. It's a scout ship, already in orbit. The interference from the Mirror must have concealed its approach." He touched his radio headset again, his voice tight with urgency. "Perhaps they did not detect-"Another screen popped up in the HUD, displacing the longrange sensors, flashing with urgency.

  Ronon knew this one, too. It was the jumper's life signs detector, blinking dots superimposed over a grid. It was picking up three signs close together, moving through the lower level of the giant building behind them. And five more signs moving toward those. Ronon's hands tightened into fists. "They're heading right for them."

  John led the way back down the passage, glancing warily at the ceiling, checking for signs of imminent collapse. The dust was a thick haze in the air, glittering in their lights.

  His voice tight, Rodney whispered suddenly, "Wait, wait, I'm getting life signs." John
looked back to see him studying the detector, his face set in a grim expression. "Five, out in the main corridor. We were right, she must have had company."

  John fell back a step to look at the detector's screen. It was still fuzzy from the Mirror's interference, but he could see the five signs were moving fast down the corridor from the direction of the Mirror platform, blocking the clear path to the outside. "Crap. Come on." He turned back the other way, deeper into the building, hoping this passage wasn't blocked.

  Teyla kept an eye on their six, saying sourly, "At least I can sense them now that they are not in Trishen's ship."

  "It's still only an assumption that they came from her ship," Rodney corrected her sharply. "If they have some kind of advanced shielding now that our sensors can't penetrate, they could have been concealed anywhere-" He stared at John, appalled. "They could have already found the jumper. That ship has sensors that can penetrate the jumper's cloak-"

  Still trying his radio and getting nothing but static, John shook his head. "They had time to get away." He didn't want to say anymore, because it was all too frigging possible the Wraith had found the others.

  His eyes on the detector again, Rodney reported, "They're turning down this passage." His voice was urgent. "We need to-"

  "Yeah." John increased his pace to a fast jog.

  A short distance up ahead the corridor took an abrupt turn, ending in a triangular hatch. John stepped back to the corner to cover the passage behind them, while Rodney hurriedly wrenched off the wall console and Teyla watched the door. Rodney said in frustration, "And how the hell do they know we came this way? As far as we know, they don't have bio-sensors this exact and they can't use the Ancient devices-"

  "The corridor floor was covered with sand," Teyla pointed out, her voice grim as she kept a wary eye on the door. "Our tracks led them to us."

  John flicked off the P-90's light before he risked a look back down the passage. He could hear a faint scraping that might be footsteps. "Now would be good, Rodney," he whispered harshly.

  "No, really?" Rodney snapped, "I thought we'd just stand around here and wait forGot it," and the doors were sliding open, releasing a rush of air.

  In another moment they were through the hatch, with the doors sealed safely behind them. Rodney pulled two of the crystals from the wall console on this side and tucked them into a vest pocket. "That should hold them for...a minute or so, anyway."

  "That's all we need," John said, flashing his light around. It glinted off cool blue stone and embossed metal. They were in a large foyer, with three open corridors heading off in different directions. Teyla shone her light across the floor. No sand, so they wouldn't leave tracks. This section was pressurized and the seals must have kept out the dust and dirt. The Wraith would be expecting them to head for the outer edge of the installation, toward the jumper's last position, so John picked the corridor leading back toward the inner ring and Mirror platform. "This way."

  They started down the new corridor, and not far along they were rewarded with another set of branching passages. His eyes on the life signs detector, Rodney said in relief, "We're good. They picked the wrong corridor." As if in response, a low vibration trembled through the floor; the Mirror was still dangerously active. "They might be doing something that's setting off that interference," Rodney added with a grimace. "If they have darts or another ship close enough to affect the Mirror's nimbus, it could be causing those energy bursts."

  Teyla said reluctantly, "There may have already been another Wraith ship in position to attack the jumper. Once we entered Trishen's ship, the trap would have been sprung."

  "Yes, but the problem is that the trap wasn't sprung," Rodney bit the words out. "Why didn't she lock the hatch before she showed us what she was? It doesn't make sense! If she had just left her helmet on, she could have kept us there, out of radio contact, with no chance to warn the jumper until the attack was over." He waved his free hand, warming to his point. "Trust me on this one, if Miko was in a dogfight with darts or Ronon was manfully wrestling drones in the rear cabin, Radek would have mentioned it!"

  "I don't know," John said, teeth gritted. The radio was still picking up nothing but static. "You said that data wasn't fake. If these Wraith got that ship and that shielding technology from some place they went to through the Mirror-"

  "Maybe." Rodney shook his head, frustrated. "I still think we could actually be dealing with Wraith from another reality."

  "I believe you are right," Teyla told him. "She did seem different. And it is strange that she gave us a name. I did not believe they had names, even among themselves."

  "But it doesn't matter which reality they came from." Rodney's face was grim, his mouth a hard line. "We have to shut this Mirror down permanently, now. Even if it destroys this entire installation in the process."

  John exchanged a look with Teyla, just in time to see a flicker of hope in her eyes. If this new technology spread to all the other Wraith... That wasn't an option. They couldn't let it be an option. "What do you need?"

  "I don't know yet..." His expression intent, Rodney dug into one of the pockets of his tac vest, pulling out the camera he had used to record Trishen's data display. "But this might tell me."

  Rodney needed a place to concentrate with a little less threat of imminent painful life-sucking death. He would have preferred his main lab at Atlantis, but that not being available, he settled for following Sheppard and Teyla further up into this section of the installation.

  A short distance down the passage they found a stairwell and went up a couple of levels, further away from the area the Wraith were searching. The power was fluctuating all through this section, lights blinking out at random, doors wedged partly open, drafts where bursts of recycled air came out of broken vents. Now that Rodney knew that Trishen might be monitoring the security system, he set his equipment to scan for the video signals. But fortunately the system didn't seem to be active here.

  Sheppard found an empty lab where most of the vents were working, providing enough air to let them turn off their SCBAs and save the tanks. Rodney sat down on a broken stone plinth and said, "Don't talk to me." He ignored Sheppard's eye roll, got the camera out, and started reviewing the playback and the data downloaded to his tablet. Sheppard and Teyla took up guard positions on the door, and Sheppard tried to raise the jumper again.

  The static on the radio seemed to be dying down, but Sheppard still couldn't get any response. Rodney swal lowed in a dry throat, put that out of his mind, and tried to concentrate.

  At one point, Sheppard showed the life signs detector screen to Teyla, telling her, "The interference keeps messing with the signal, but it looks like the Wraith are leaving this section, heading in toward the Mirror platform."

  She frowned. "Perhaps they are going to Trishen's ship. But I wonder why."

  "Maybe they're having a meeting," Sheppard said. He sounded sarcastic, but then everything Sheppard said sounded sarcastic, even things like "pass the salt," and Rodney had always put it down as an unintentional byproduct resulting from the combination of his unidentifiable accent and his slacker attitude. Sheppard seemed completely unaware of it, though it probably explained the recurring problems with his military career. And of course, the damn Mirror could pick now to have one of its catastrophic discharges and wipe out the Wraith on the platform, but Rodney knew their luck didn't run that way, and if the Mirror was going to kill anybody that way it would be them.

  Then his headset crackled and Rodney heard a babble of familiar voices. Startled, he looked up as Sheppard hurriedly keyed his radio, saying, "Jumper One, please respond. This is Sheppard."

  Over the rush of static, Rodney heard Zelenka saying, "Colonel! Such a relief to hear your voice!"

  Rodney felt the tightness in his chest unclench just a little. The Wraith hadn't found the jumper. So far, despite the Mirror, the Wraith, and what was apparently a group inclination for suicidal behavior, they had all managed not to get killed. He went back to verifyin
g the direc tional indicator on that elusive power signature that kept reappearing in the data. "You too," Sheppard replied to Zelenka, exchanging a look of relief with Teyla. "What's your situation?"

  Zelenka began, "We thought-" In the staticobscured background, Miko said something urgently and Sheppard's pet caveman growled. Zelenka finished, "Yes, yes, I'm telling him! Colonel, there are Wraith everywhere."

  Rodney rolled his eyes and spared a moment to contribute, "You don't say."

  "Zelenka, I need you to define `everywhere,"' Sheppard persisted. "Is it a hiveship?"

  "No, not yet," Zelenka replied hurriedly. "The jumper has detected a small ship in polar orbit, matching our data on the energy signatures for a Wraith scout ship."

  Teyla's brow furrowed. "We must assume a hiveship is on the way."

  Ah ha. Here we go. "Got it." Rodney pushed to his feet. He stepped over to Sheppard and Teyla, tapping the tablet's display. "I was certain I saw this but I wanted to verify the location. Trishen's equipment registered an energy pulse coming from along the top of the installation." He pointed up for emphasis. "If I'm correct, that pulse is designed to generate a containment field just above the Mirror's accretion surface, to stabilize the singularity's event horizon. Without it, the singularity keeps trying to expand, pushing at the naquadah frame, the structure of the installation, the bedrock beneath it. Like the rest of the installation, the pulse generator is drawing power from the Mirror's subspace conduit, but something is causing it to only function erratically at the moment, which is why the discharges are occurring. And the energy signatures of the jumper and any Wraith darts may be disrupting the pulse itself whenever they come within range, causing the discharges to occur more frequently." Rodney tucked the tablet under his arm. "The Mirror is already dangerously unstable. The key to rendering it unusable is going to be in destabilizing it further-"

  "So you want to blow up the thing that's generating the pulse?" Sheppard said.