The Drift

by Diane Dru Botsford

  Weiyan withdrew her hand. “Then why now? What has changed?”

  “I am leaving.” Even as Huang said the words, a silent thrill ran through him, warring with this burning desire to know his child.

  Weiyan put down the spoon, her food untasted. “Can I go with you?”

  “It is too dangerous.”

  “Dangerous?” She sat back against her chair. “I do not wish you to die, Father. Not when we have just met.”

  “Death is not to be feared, child.” He studied her face closely, trying to decide just how much of the truth he should share. “Have you not read the teachings of Sun Tzu?”

  “The Art of War? Once.” She shrugged. “All children must read his writings, but they don’t really mean much. Not in today’s world. Mother has me studying the sciences. She hopes I will pursue a degree in astro — ”

  “Once is not enough,” Huang chided his daughter. “You spoke of fearing death. When you think of me, remember Sun Tzu. ‘Until death itself comes, no calamity need be feared.’”

  “I will remember.” Weiyan again picked up her spoon and pushed the dumplings around. “Perhaps I should read Sun Tzu’s work again. If it gives me solace during my treatments — ”

  “Treatments?” Huang’s head jerked up.

  His dishonor weighed heavily on his mind as Weiyan explained her blood illness. While he could not admit to her the cause, he knew that her hemophilia stemmed from the fact that as a clone, he should never have created offspring.

  Though he had failed as a Dragon Guard trainee, that would soon be rectified, but Weiyan would carry his failure to obey Lord Yu’s laws for the rest of her life. There was little he could do to make restitution for his trespass.

  He reached into his chest pocket and pulled out a checkbook. While most of the funds from the ancient scroll had already been sent to Quing, there was still several hundred thousand Yuan left in his bank account.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  He wrote her a check for the entire balance. “Where I am going, money has no purpose.” He ripped the check from the billet and handed it to her.

  She did not take it. “I do not want money. I want my father.”

  Huang placed the check on the table with a sigh. “Your full name is Weiyan Shi. Have you ever wondered from where the second part of your name derives?”

  She dropped her head. “Mother would not say.”

  That was because even Quing did not know the truth of that name. “Many years ago, I had a brother named Lao Dan Shi.”

  “What happened to my uncle?”

  Huang swallowed back the bitter memory of Lao Dan’s death. “That does not matter. Instead, let me share with you a saying that his…” He stopped himself from saying ‘ancestor,’ for Lao Dan had been a direct descendent of Lao Tzu, crafter of the great Tao. To explain the relationship would reveal too much.

  Instead, Huang picked up the check and pushed it into Weiyan’s hands. “A favorite quote of my brother’s is worth remembering. ‘He whose desires are few gets them; he whose desires are many goes astray.’

  “Take the check, Weiyan. Perhaps it will help ease your struggles with this illness.”

  She folded the check and slipped it into her purse. “Where are you going? Home to the Taklimakan Desert where Mother met you?”

  Picking up his chopsticks, Huang whispered, “Further away, if I succeed.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  F-302 AIR BASE

  OBSERVATION HILL, ANTARCTICA

  18 AUG 04/2010 HRS MCMURDO STATION

  Paul jumped off the transport’s wide snow belts and onto the hard-packed snow. He flipped on his flashlight. The earlier gray haze had sunk again into a near pitch-black night. “Get back to McMurdo and find Colonel Ferguson,” he told the driver, an army corpsman barely out of his teens.

  “But Major Davis, what about — ?”

  “No time to argue. Just do it.”

  Rebuffed, the corpsman bobbed his head and kicked the transport back into gear.

  The sudden change from the overheated truck’s box-like cab into the frigid cold tightened Paul’s weary arms and legs. A lack of thermal layers underneath was to blame, but there’d been no time once General Hammond’s orders came through. When Paul couldn’t find Ken Ferguson to convey those orders, he’d commandeered the first available military vehicle and hightailed over to Observation Hill to get the 302s in the air and over to Byrd Station.

  Hammond wanted the Navy SEALS ordinance team laying charges up at the outpost on the double. As much as Paul wanted to believe that there was still time to shut down the continental drift device, he understood why the president had approved the general’s backup plan.

  Paul cast his flashlight across the empty base. The quake had hit hard. He took in the collapsed sentry booth, the busted windows on the pilot barracks, and the two overturned jeeps beyond the sentry booth. The hangar had been squashed flat, so where were the F-302s?

  A door slammed shut over at the barracks to his right.

  “Major Davis!”

  Two green-clad men raced toward him, each waving a standard-issue flashlight. They came to attention in front of him and snapped off quick salutes. Paul found himself envious of their USAF-issue leathered mitts as he rubbed his thinner fleece gloves together.

  “Major Davis? I’m Captain White. This here is Captain Allen,” said the taller of the two men, or at least, he supposed they were both men. It was hard to tell with their faces wrapped in balaclavas, the dark green face socks leaving only goggles to peer back at him.

  As Paul returned the salute, a sudden gust of wind shot up from his left. “Where are the birds? Can they even fly in these kinds of wind conditions?”

  “Flying in stiff wind’s not the problem, sir,” said Captain Allen. A woman’s voice. Strong, confident. A lot like Colonel Carter.

  “Then what is the problem, Captain?”

  “This way, sir.” Swinging her flashlight out toward the airstrip, she jogged off.

  With White beside him, Paul hurried to keep up. “Any word from Colonel Ferguson yet? I sent an airman to find him and pass along our plans.”

  “No, sir,” said White. “Standard radios haven’t worked so well since the first quake, but knowing the Colonel, he’ll be here soon.”

  “Great,” Paul lied. They came to a stop at the edge of an ice field. “Where are the 302s?”

  “You’re looking at them.” Allen raised her flashlight. A fifty-foot-wide cluster of broken ice thrust upward from what had been the airstrip. Jutting out from either end were matching wingtips. The F-302s’ wingtips.

  “Sea ice, sir.” White added his flashlight’s beam to the disaster. “When the earthquake hit, the resulting pressure shot out across McMurdo Ice Shelf and built up an ice ridge. The entire ice shelf probably looks like this now.”

  Paul cast his flashlight along the closer of the two birds. While the wingtips were free, most of the cockpit, the nose and tail were buried in what, under other circumstances, would be a startlingly beautiful landscape. Jagged blocks of exposed ice — some as big as a house — shined pale blue under the flashlights’ glare, the color reminiscent of toothpaste gel.

  Dropping his flashlight beam toward the base of the blocks, Paul asked, “Where are the wheels?”

  “There.” White illuminated a partially exposed strut. “And there.” He swung the light left, revealing a partial wheel, the other buried within the ice.

  “Can you dig them out?” Paul checked his watch. It was almost twenty-one hundred hours. A little more than fifteen hours were left ‘til the sun peaked the horizon and turned the Ancient defense outpost into an offensive weapon against all of Antarctica and possibly beyond.

  “Depends on how — ”

  The ground began to tremble. Ice cracked and popped. As the interceptors’ wings vibrated, Paul held his breath, hoping it would only be a small aftershock.

  He got his wish. A few seconds later,
the ground settled down. The ice went on cracking for a few more moments, and then stopped.

  Knowing next time they might not be so lucky, he pressed White for a timetable.

  “We can use hacksaws to cut away the ice, sir, but I’m not sure we could clear enough to make a difference.”

  “Let’s say you can. How long, Captain?”

  White tugged at his balaclava. “The 302s can do up to Mach 6, but — ”

  “The UN Security Council won’t like it, I know.” Even under these circumstances, he knew there was no way they’d waive the restriction. “Sub mach speed, then. How long?”

  “Under Mach 1? Byrd’s about 1400 kilometers away, a little over 850 miles.”

  “Three to four hours, sir.” Allen said, shutting off her flashlight.

  Another, more distant round of rumbling started up and Paul braced himself. The sound grew closer and with it came a pair of headlights lighting up the entire expanse of the ice-bound runway.

  It was another truck, pulling up to the frozen shoreline. As it came to a stop, Paul asked, “Any way you can shave off time without breaking UN protocols?”

  “We could bring them to Marble Point,” Allen offered. “That’s only ten minutes away from the outpost. There are two tractor-trucks stationed there, sir.”

  “What the hell’s going on?” demanded a new voice.

  It was Ferguson. Hood flapping behind him, he stormed up to Paul. “Since when do you give the orders around here, Major?”

  “Take it easy, Ken — ”

  “That’s Colonel Ferguson, airman.”

  Paul stiffened, but held his ground. “Fine, Colonel. My apologies.” He quickly outlined General Hammond’s orders. “We just need to figure out a way to break the tires free.”

  “Why send a lieutenant when you can send a major?” Ken shook his head. “So now you’re Hammond’s messenger boy.”

  “Colonel.” Paul dropped his voice so the pilots wouldn’t hear him. “Whatever your beef with me is, sir, it’ll have to wait. You know the stakes.”

  “Getting the 302s out is only half the problem. We need a runway.” Ken waved a hand toward the ice. “As you can see, that’s not gonna happen.”

  “We need those planes, Colonel.”

  “Yeah, well, you need a lot of things including getting your head examined, but that can wait, too.” Ken yanked his hood up. “These birds can’t just jump up in the air, Major.”

  “Jump… That’s it!”

  “Excuse me? What the hell are you thinking?”

  “I am thinking, Ken. That’s the point,” Paul said, irritated with his one-time friend.

  Ken sputtered off a string of profanities and threats, but Paul ignored him. He returned to studying the 302s, skimming his flashlight along the pressure ridge for possible gaps that would allow the pilots entry into the cockpits.

  The beam from his flashlight landed on a crevasse halfway across the ridge. “Is the ice safe to walk on?” he asked Captain White.

  “Uh, yes, sir. There’s at least two hundred feet of ice underneath.”

  “Good.” Paul walked out onto the ice, pointing his flashlight along the ridge, hoping to find another crevasse. He spotted one, less than a yard away from the other. Stepping closer, he aimed his flashlight into the six-foot high crack in the ice block.

  Through the crack, he saw a 302’s canopy. An idea was brewing in the back of his mind, but it would take a lot of faith on the part of the pilots, and Ken, to make it happen.

  Paul swung his flashlight beam back toward shore. “Colonel Ferguson, at General Hammond’s discretion, I must request that your pilots gain entry to these cockpits ASAP.”

  “I told you,” Ken said. “We can’t get these birds up without a runway.”

  “We won’t need it,” Paul replied. He ran back ashore.

  “I don’t get it. How the hell are we gonna follow through on Hammond’s orders?”

  “Ken, you’re a topnotch air jock, but you have to trust me.” Paul stopped in front of the F-302 wing commander. “We don’t need a runway.”

  Being a colonel might have its advantages, but having the imagination needed for what had to be done next? That took the kind of eye-opening experience of someone who’d lived and breathed the Stargate Program since its inception. Paul had that kind of experience and right now, he wouldn’t trade it for all the promotions in the world.

  He turned toward the pilots, hoping they’d follow his lead. “You’re going to jump, literally. Ground to space, and then back down right above Byrd Station.”

  “How do you figure, sir?” asked Allen. “We don’t have a runway.”

  “Forget the runway,” Paul said with a smile. “You’ll take the 302s up through a ground-to-orbit hyperspace window.”

  “You’re nuts,” Ferguson said. “What the hell does a desk-jockey like you know about hyperspace windows?”

  “Trust me, Ken. A lot more than there’s time to explain.”

  Sam sat beside Weiyan’s foxhole, watching the images rush by with mixed emotions. While her head knew the Jaffa, the ships, even the transparent buildings were only that, images, every fiber in her being wanted to bolt toward General O’Neill, Daniel and Teal’c. She wanted to help, not do babysitting duty. The men tried hammering on the invisible walls that penned them in. Whatever held them was more than just a visual display.

  Force fields, she decided. But what was the power source?

  “We must save them.” Weiyan climbed from the hole. She stumbled to her knees.

  “Take it easy.” Sam pushed her down to a sitting position. The girl had calmed down, but she was still breathing pretty hard. “I don’t think they’re in any danger.”

  She crouched beside Weiyan and glanced down at her fleece pullover. It was dry. Clean. As if there’d never been any blood. With a nod from Weiyan, Sam lifted the lower half of the pullover. Nothing. Her abdomen was bare. “How do you feel?”

  “Tired —  Oh, no!” A reflection of blue light lit up Weiyan’s face.

  “What?” Sam’s head whipped toward the building. A swath of blue streamed through its half-opened doors. The color was reminiscent of the Stargate’s kawoosh, and for a brief moment Sam wondered if the energy source was derived from the same quantum energy that powered the gate.

  The light spread further outward, enveloping the four Dragon Guards by the doors. They clutched their throats as if they couldn’t breathe.

  Though she wanted to believe her team wasn’t in danger, she jumped up and bolted toward them. She got no more than three feet from Weiyan when her head slammed into another of the transparent walls.

  Ignoring the pain, Sam called out. “Sir!”

  No answer. Her teammates didn’t hear her. Daniel pounded the air in front of him, frantic until Teal’c and the general grabbed hold of him and he dropped his fists.

  The light intensified. From her vantage point, Sam could see the guards slapping their chests. A final burst of light shot outward, and the guards dropped to the ground.

  The air rippled and the downed guards disappeared. The doors swung shut, but not before she got a glimpse of the light’s source. Inside, a central core of blue light gyrated and throbbed. Below the energy form was a glowing circular platform the size of a big jeep. Backlit trellised panels shored up the sides underneath.

  The doors slammed shut.

  “That has to be the power source.”

  “Power to what?” Weiyan asked.

  “Whatever brought us here. Whatever’s generating all this.” Sam raised her hands to indicate the valley. “It’s possible that some elaborate device — ”

  “Created by the Ancients you mentioned?”

  “Or someone else.” She tried to smile for Weiyan’s sake. It wasn’t easy with her team still trapped out of reach. “For someone who nearly bled to death, you ask a lot of questions.”

  Weiyan wrapped her arms around her torso. “My mother refers to my questions as a bad habit.”
r />   Sam was taken aback. “Hey, if it wasn’t for curiosity, humans would still be stuck in caves.”

  Weiyan dropped her chin to chest.

  Sam turned her attention back to the team. General O’Neill was talking to Daniel, patting him on the back while Teal’c seemed to be scanning the opposing hill. He pointed toward the top where a new set of images unfolded in a staggered fashion, like those old animated flipbooks. Four graves were dug by Jaffa. More Jaffa appeared, lowering four bodies shrouded in black cloth into the ground. Sam had to assume the bodies were those of the Dragon Guards.

  She blinked and another scenario replaced it. This one was of a group of Jaffa constructing a statue out of red clay, several stories in height. They’d built up the back half, which seemed to resemble a dog sitting on its hind legs. Another image flashed. Everything but the statue’s head had been formed. Three nasty blades stuck out of its red clay spine.

  “This is getting familiar,” she said as much to herself as to Weiyan. “We found one of those statues on P3Y-702. On a hill, just like that one. But that’s not possible.”

  Who was she kidding? None of this was possible. They were being manipulated. The question was, by whom and why?

  The view changed again, the statue completed. Its teeth, bulging jaw, and eye ridges stared down into the valley in ferocious protection of the graves at its base. A solitary figure stood beside the statue, dressed in the green hat and recognizable red over-vest of Lord Yu.

  The air rippled and the System Lord disappeared, but the statue remained.

  “A Zhenmushou?” asked Weiyan. “It is an ancient Chinese tradition, a funerary beast meant to protect the dead.”

  Another image shimmered into life, right in front of the building. It was Lord Yu, again. As he stepped away from the building, a ring transporter activated and swept him away.

  “Let’s just hope the dead don’t include the general, Daniel and Teal’c.” She cautiously raised a palm out in front of her and re-approached the force field. It felt solid enough. Smooth.