by Stargate
“Drain us of intel before she drains us of life,” noted Lorne. “Nice.”
Sheppard folded his arms. “We may have already given her way too much of that already.”
“I’m sorry!” snapped McKay, feeling heat rise in his cheeks. “How was I to know that data pad would be hijacked the moment we got here? Quadruple 128-bit encryption seemed like it would be good enough —”
“It’s not your fault,” Carter broke in. “We have to fix the problem, not the blame, Rodney. Don’t beat yourself up about it.”
Lorne nodded. “The Wraith will do that for you.”
Sheppard gave the major an acid glance. “The way I figure it, Queeny and her gang here didn’t come looking to pick a fight with Fenrir. You saw how she spoke to him. She knows they don’t have the grunt to beat the Aegis in a stand-up fight.”
“Lucky for Fenrir she didn’t know the combat systems were damaged,” Carter threw in.
“I think she wants that ship intact, or at least as in as few pieces as possible. I mean, think about it. Forget the collapsar bomb for a second, even without that an Asgard warship is some pretty heavy iron. Intergalactic hyperspace capability, transporters, advanced weapons and shields.”
Carter considered this. “Enough to tip the balance in a battle, that’s for certain.”
McKay saw where Sheppard’s train of thought was leading. “They take the Aegis and become Wraith Clan Number One…”
“Maybe even turn the tide of battle against the Asurans,” added Lorne. “But if the Queen knows about the bomb… She’s not going to let that slide. She’ll want that too, the whole nine yards.”
All of them were quiet for a while. McKay knew that Carter, Sheppard and Lorne were all thinking the same thing he was, imagining a war-torn Pegasus galaxy ripped open by collapsar weapons and pirated Asgard technology, set afire by the battles between the Wraith and the Replicators; and beyond that, the threat of the vampiric aliens venturing further, perhaps to the Milky Way galaxy as well.
“The Wraith cannot, under any circumstances, be allowed to possess that ‘isa’ device or the Aegis.” Sam’s voice was low and grim. “We have to do whatever it takes to deny it to them.”
Rodney wandered over to the cell entrance and glared at the web holding them inside it. “The only question is, how?”
“A communication,” said the Wraith scientist, pausing in his work. “From the Asgard.”
The Queen heard his words but did not acknowledge them. She lay back in repose upon the command throne at the centre of the Hive Ship’s control chamber, her subordinates working over the open incision in the flesh of her abdomen. The pain from the live cut was harsh and constant, but it focused her thoughts in a way that nothing else could. Because of the quickened nature of her species and the lightning speed with which Wraith could heal, it was necessary for one worker drone to constantly slice at the edges of the slit to stop the bleeding edges from knitting back together before the surgery could be completed. “Finish it,” she hissed, savoring the pain.
He bowed slightly. “Just so, mistress. It is almost done.”
She felt a slick, dense shape as it was slipped beneath the epidermis of her torso. In seconds, the matter of her flesh was meshing around it, making the implant part of her.
The scientist backed away and bowed again, oily lines of royal blood staining his fingers. “Complete,” he breathed. “You shame us all by your willingness to accept this burden, my Queen.”
She looked down and waved the other drones away, watching the wound pull itself tight and scab over, the flow of seeping blood slowing, stopping. “We are Wraith,” said the Queen. “And no matter what caste we are born into, we still serve the greater good of the clan at day’s end.” With difficulty she stood up, wincing at jagged darts of agony from her abdomen. “Ah. I will bear this duty proudly.”
The scientist brought his hands together. “My colleagues labor below in the egg orchard,” he noted, referring to the protected chamber in the heart of the Hive Ship where knots of genetic material that were Wraith yet to be born were formed. “The pheromones have been injected into a suitable zygote. Birthing of an alternate will commence when… When…” Suddenly the Wraith halted and gave a shuddering sigh, something akin to a human sob. “Why must you do this?” he demanded sorrowfully. “Why must it be you?”
The Queen reached out and cupped his chin in her hand. “Because only I can.” She bared her teeth at him. “Do not be afraid. I do this for you all, for the clan.” The female Wraith spread her hands to take in the whole of the chamber and all the drones and warriors working about her. “I do this because I love you all.”
She stepped down from the throne’s dais and stood in front of a flickering lens-screen. “Prepare the warriors and open a channel,” she ordered, buttoning her tunic closed. “I will speak with the Asgard now.”
“As you command.” The scientist touched a fleshy nerve-control and the screen resolved into an image of the dark-eyed alien.
“Fenrir,” said the Queen, noting without comment that the human female Teyla — the one whose genetic matrix had been marked by one of the other clans — stood behind him. She had been slightly disappointed when the woman had not been given to her as the other humans had; but it was becoming clear to the Queen that the Asgard viewed these lessers as some sort of pets. Perhaps this Teyla was his favorite…
“I will hear what you wish to say to me,” said the Asgard, without preamble. “Under truce, as you requested.”
The Queen gave the scientist a sideways glance and he nodded. Everything was proceeding as she had expected it would. “I will speak to Fenrir,” she replied. “Only to Fenrir.”
“Whatever you have to say can be heard by Teyla Emmagan,” said the Asgard. “In the interests of balance, I will hear you both.”
The Queen flicked at a long, talon-like nail. “Very well. But I will not address you from a distance. If I must speak to you in this manner, it will only be face to face.”
“I cannot accommodate you,” retorted the spindly humanoid. “I can communicate only through this avatar —”
“And I have only the word of a simulation that it is indeed the real Fenrir!” Her voice rose. “I trust nothing,” she continued, “only the evidence of my own eyes. Face to face, Asgard, or you will never know what I have to offer you.”
There was a long moment when the image froze, and briefly the Queen entertained the thought that she might have misread the little alien’s emotional state; but then Fenrir’s avatar flickered and changed, nodding once. “Very well,” it replied, “but none other than you.”
“That is all that will be needed,” she noted. The screen went black and she turned quickly to the scientist. “You know what to do. No thrusters, use only —”
The rest of her command disappeared into the humming rush of a teleport discharge.
Teyla watched the Queen bow stiffly toward the Asgard and in turn Fenrir’s avatar inclined its head. She stood nearby and did nothing, never taking her eyes off the alien female. Her nostrils twitched; the moment the Wraith appeared in the teleporter flash, she had detected the faint odor of blood — but Wraith blood, not human. She wondered what might have transpired on the Hive Ship and fought down the desire to shout out and demand to know the fate of Sheppard, Carter and the others.
“Speak,” said the avatar.
The Wraith Queen glanced casually at the Risar standing about the chamber and walked toward the cryogenic capsule. “Fascinating technology,” she began. “Your flesh-form is in suspended animation, yes? And yet you are capable of communication through this instrumentality,” she nodded at the holograph, “and these organic drones. Your knowledge is far superior to ours. We Wraith are utterly dormant when we enter a slumbering state.”
“I will not grant you that technology,” Fenrir replied. “The Asgard do not share their knowledge with strangers.”
“But you shared it with the humans,” she noted. “And ‘the Asgard
’? Do you mean the High Council, Fenrir?”
Teyla saw his dark eyes narrow at the mention of his peers.
The Queen continued. “They are dead, my friend. All that is Asgard exists here now.” She chuckled. “You can decide what is and is not to be shared, or with whom.”
“The Wraith want only to feed and to rule,” snapped Teyla, no longer able to remain silent. “Anything you give them will be turned to that goal!”
To her surprise, the Queen gave a slight nod. “The human is almost correct. Yes, we do seek superiority, but only against our enemies. We wish to end our war with the Asurans, the Replicators. You could help us do that. With this ship.” She licked her lips. “With the isa device.”
“How do you know of that?” Fenrir demanded. The Risar mumbled the same words beneath their breath, coming forward in a threatening manner.
“Does it matter? The humans were careless. I know that you have the power to blind suns. If you granted that to my clan, we would be able to wipe out the Asurans in weeks.” She inclined her head. “Think of it, Fenrir. The Replicators, the scourge of galaxies, finally wiped out forever! Is that not fitting?” The Queen came closer, her voice thickening with venom. “After all that they took from you, after all the destruction they wrought across the worlds of your kind, is it not right that a child of Asgard extinguishes their blighted kind from the universe?”
Fenrir’s image trembled. “I… Am the last…”
“You cannot give them the collapsar!” cried Teyla. “Once they have destroyed the Asurans, what then? Will the Wraith stand down, or will they use your technology to plunder? The hunt… The cull is all they know!” She moved toward the avatar. “Pegasus will burn in their wake, and no life will be safe from them. They will claw across the void and pillage every world they find.”
“We have no interest in empires!” snarled the Queen. “Only justice for our dead and an end to the Replicator menace!”
“She lies!”
“And she is afraid!”
“You will both be silent,” growled Fenrir. “I… Have made my choice.” He wandered to the oval screen, where a vast intergalactic map was displayed, a red line showing the course the Aegis had taken on its penal cruise, from the Othala star cluster, through the Kalium and Andromeda galaxies to distant Pegasus. The Asgard seemed lost in the image. “My world is dead. My people gone. There is nothing here for me now.”
With those words, Teyla sensed some terrible fraction of the distance in Fenrir’s heart, and it robbed her of her breath.
On the screen, the red line extended, moving up and away into the starless void between galaxies, projecting a course into an infinite dark. “You will both be put off my vessel. I will leave this quadrant of space and never return.” He paused. “I want nothing more to do with war. Perhaps I will find solace in other places… Other universes…”
“A pity,” said the Wraith, glancing at the Athosian. “That was not the answer I had hoped for. But in truth, I suspected the human cattle might have swayed you.”
“Fenrir’s choice was his own!” Teyla retorted.
“Do not attempt to employ force against me,” warned Fenrir. “My Risar have completed repairs on the weapons systems of the Aegis. I can disable your Hive Ship with a single command.”
The Queen gave a long, staged sigh. “Yes, I noted the damage to your vessel… I wonder what systems still do not function? Matter transporters? Force shields?” She grinned. “Internal sensors?”
“What do you mean?” Teyla whirled as the oval screen morphed into a display of the ship’s interior; as before, may parts were still blacked out.
“I took advantage of your weakness, Asgard,” she purred. “While we have spoken, my clan has inserted clusters of warriors aboard this ship.”
“I have detected nothing. This is a bluff.”
The Queen wandered toward the centre of the room, the Risar moving to encircle her. “Believe that if you wish. But the reality is, my clan will not let this ship or its bounty slip from our grasp. We are going to take the Aegis, with or without you.” She reached down and undid her tunic as she spoke, pressing at a bulge in her stomach. “This prize will ensure our mastery of all Wraith…”
In the depths of Teyla’s mind there was a sudden jolt of pure, black emotion, resonating out from the thoughts of the Queen. “No —”
“That victory,” said the alien, “is worth any sacrifice.” With a strangled yell, she twisted the knot of flesh in her gut and leapt toward the cryogenic capsule.
Even before she was aware of doing it, Teyla flung herself in the other direction, diving for the cover of a control console.
In the churning core of the organic implant inside the Queen’s abdomen, bio-chemicals mingled with Wraith blood and triggered a catastrophic release of burning energy.
In less than a heartbeat, the alien evaporated, becoming the core of an exothermal detonation that ripped apart Fenrir’s Risar and tore into the Asgard’s vital life-support frame.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The wooden door rolled back on its stays with a groan and Ronon heard a ripple of fear sweep down the length of the enclosures. Takkol and the other elders retreated like startled animals, pushing themselves as far as they could into the shadowed corners of the cages.
The troop of Wraith marched up the central corridor with the one bearing the commander’s sigils at their lead. He wore a fanged smile that was hideous to behold.
Ronon knew what would happen next. He took Keller’s hand and pulled her away from the wooden bars. “Get behind me,” he grated.
She could read his intentions in his expression. “You’re in no condition to fight,” she whispered urgently. “Don’t do anything crazy!”
“Too late to play it safe now,” Ronon stifled a cough and nodded to Lieutenant Allen, ignoring the stab of pain from the muscles in his neck.
The officer returned the nod; she would follow his lead.
The Wraith commander drew level with their cage. “It has been decided that your value to our clan is negligible.”
“Y-you’re going to let us g-go?” stammered one of Takkol’s adjutants, desperation raw and pitiful on his face.
“In a way,” replied the commander. “Open the pens,” he ordered, and a pair of warriors moved forward to unlock the heavy iron chains holding shut the cages.
“Stay back, you fool!” cried Takkol, but it was too late for the other man. He took two steps toward the opening doorway and another of the Wraith surged at him. A thin scream echoed as the warrior ripped into his chest and fed upon him.
Cries of alarm joined the scream; if Ronon had harbored even the slightest doubt that the Wraith had come to execute them all, it vanished now.
In the first seconds, the Satedan had the advantage; there was only one way into the enclosure where they stood, and that meant the Wraith had to come in single-file. The first into the cage approached him, claws raised. The dart-daggers concealed in Ronon’s palms had grown warm and sweat-slick as he had waited for the inevitable attack, and now he threw them, left and then right. He cursed as the first one went wide, his sickness-blurred vision making him miss; he was dimly aware of the small blade bouncing off the alien’s chest amour and clattering to the floor
The second dagger found purchase in the hollow of the alien’s throat and it wailed, clutching at its neck. Ronon went in and followed up the attack with a punch that drove the dagger still deeper; the memory-metal of the blade was designed to expand on contact with organic matter, growing to twice its width in a matter of moments. The Wraith fell to its knees, vomiting black fluid.
Chaos was all around him as the Wraith began their cull of the prisoners. There were screams and yelling, the ozone stink of a stunner discharge. He glimpsed Keller swinging a heavy clay bowl into the face of the Wraith commander, knocking him off balance.
Allan came up from a crouch with the other dagger in her fist and struck at another of the Wraith warriors, dislodging its helmet
. It turned on her as the blade-tip scraped over its bare shoulder and the creature viciously shoved her back. Ronon moved to help her, but he was sluggish and his joints ached with each motion.
The Wraith planted its hand on her chest and hooted with pleasure as it began to feed off her. She screamed, the flesh of her face turning grey, becoming taut across the bones of her skull.
Ronon kicked low and connected with the Wraith’s knee, smashing bone. The creature twisted and dropped, freeing Allan from the death grip. She pitched forward, wheezing, and shoved the dagger into the warrior’s eye socket. The Wraith tumbled over in a twitching heap.
He caught the lieutenant and heard her gasp; in the space of just a few seconds, the Wraith had drained decades from her life. The young woman he had spoken to before was twenty, thirty years older in aspect, her buzz-cut hair streaked with grey and her face lined. “Behind you!” she husked.
Ronon turned and punched blindly. He was rewarded by a howl and the sensation of cartilage snapping beneath his knuckles. The Wraith commander spun backwards, out of the cage proper and into the confusion of the corridor beyond, blood gushing in a fan from his crushed nose.
But these were only minor victories in the melee. Ronon saw Takkol’s men becoming food for the Wraith, while the former elder stumbled on his robes as he tried to flee the killing.
The Satedan grabbed Keller’s arm and dragged her out of the cage, with Allan hobbling along behind. “We have to fall back,” he shouted. “Find another way out!”
They pressed into the cluster of survivors, Takkol, the medical team and the last of the Atlantis airmen with them, but the further back they retreated down the corridor, the clearer their situation became.
“There’s no other way out of here,” the lieutenant coughed. “There’s only one exit from this place, and the Wraith are between us and it!”
“They’re going to butcher us like herd animals!” moaned Takkol.
“Not without a fight,” said Ronon.