Fic: Shattered Mirror (2/4)
Enjoy the second part of Shattered Mirror!
Part I
“Ah,” Rodney says happily as he settles himself in front of a laptop, “much better.”
Zelenka and Simpson say nothing, much to his annoyance. Even as his fingers begin to fly over the keys, he comments sarcastically, “You know, if I hadn’t heard you speak to Ronon, I’d assume that you both were mute.”
Simpson rolls her eyes at him. Zelenka, who is sitting across from him, his eyes on his own laptop, actually deigns to reply. “You fill up the silence so well, we didn’t think you noticed that we weren’t saying anything.” He smirks.
Rodney rolls his eyes. “Oh yes, ha-ha.” The three begin their work in earnest and the silence falls again, this time punctuated only by the occasional scrape of a stool and by the near-constant sound of fingers tapping on computer keys.
Eventually, however, Zelenka and Simpson are summoned to look at the screen of the laptop they had loaned to Rodney. “There,” he says, pointing at the screen. “That’s what we need.”
Simpson stares at it and then at him skeptically. “A depleted ZPM and a naquadah generator? How is that supposed to work? Naquadah power isn’t compatible for a ZPM. If it was, we’d use our own generators to recharge our ZPMs.”
“True,” Rodney concedes, “but in this case, it isn’t necessary. One thing I noticed about the portal is that it seemed to draw power from different energy sources. From the readings I was able to get, it’s almost like a three-prong adapter, and adapts everything to fit its specifications. The sources on this side of the portal were depleted by our arrival, which is why we started dialing addresses so we could find possible power sources to use to recharge it.”
Simpson nods. “I’ll inform Doctor Weir.” She turns around and strides out before either man can say a word. Rodney stares at Zelenka. Zelenka stares at Rodney.
“So…” Rodney says slowly, his eyes falling back to the computer screen, “what’s been happening? How’s life? Good? Bad? Okay?”
“Well enough, giving the circumstances,” Zelenka replies. “Life has not been easy for any of us lately. We make do.”
Rodney nods. “Oh. So, then I guess since my other self isn’t in here attempting to match my great intellect, then that means…”
“The Doctor Rodney McKay of our reality is dead, yes,” Zelenka says shortly, his voice gaining a harsh quality to it. He abruptly turned away. “He died ten months ago, in a battle with the Asurans. Colonel Sheppard died shortly thereafter.”
Rodney doesn’t say anything. Really, what can he say to that? Being faced with your own mortality, no matter how skewed, doesn’t exactly leave you full of speeches. Besides, words are something Elizabeth’s good with, not him.
Well, he thinks, Elizabeth wanted to know more about the city and its circumstances. He thinks this qualifies. “And Teyla?” he asks hesitantly. “Did she die with us… er, them too?”
Zelenka, who has returned to his own laptop, doesn’t look up at him, but his body radiates suppressed tension. “No, she survived that battle. She died a few weeks later, when she was captured by Michael.” He glanced up momentarily. “You know him, yes?”
The scientist cringes. “Far better than we’d like,” he answers stiffly.
Zelenka seems to understand his hesitance. “She was off-world with Major Lorne’s team, trading with the Imotemins. She was speaking with the leaders of the village when the building they were in suddenly caught on fire. Major Lorne’s team and the villagers were able to put it out without any major damage, but when they managed to get everyone out of the building, Teyla was missing. We searched everywhere for her, but found nothing.” He stops, seemingly struggling within himself, but eventually continues. “She appeared one week later, when Doctor Weir was at the Imotemins’ village. There… there was not…”
He trails off, but Rodney gets the picture. In his own reality, Michael had attempted to experiment on Teyla before, tried to make her like one of his beastly bug minions. He shudders.
“Doctor Weir put a price on his head,” Zelenka tells him after several moments, and something in the man’s voice makes Rodney look up. There’s a vicious quality in his eyes that he has never seen in the usually mild-mannered Czech. It’s actually rather frightening. “We have even received a few leads on his whereabouts, though he has eluded us so far,” Zelenka adds. “But we will find him. It is only a matter of time.”
Rodney watches the other man return to his work, as though he had just made a simple, inane statement about the weather. Suddenly, he likes this reality even less than he did before. It’s no longer because so many friends are dead, but because the living are just as unsettling. He saw it first with the other Elizabeth, and even the other Ronon a little bit. Now Zelenka.
Rodney forces himself to concentrate on his laptop. He wants to go home. Sooner, rather than later.
Night has fallen and Weir prepares to settle in. Tomorrow, she plans to respond to Earth, and she needs to be rested and ready to deal with them. She has no doubt that Generals Landry, Hammond, and O’Neill will issue their normal batch of threats, and she’ll merely state what they already know: If they attempt to take Atlantis, the expedition members will fight back with everything at their disposal. Weir sighs. She’s rather tired of it all. It’s fast becoming a waste of everyone’s time.
She strips down out of her clothes and grabs the t-shirt and nightshirt she left at the foot of her bed. Weir snorts as she slips the shorts over her hips. So much has been happening that it’s hard for her to recall when she last slept in her own bed.
Her bed looks more inviting than it normally does. Usually, her bed is often the last thing she wants to see. Sleeping in it means dreaming, and then she wakes up feeling as though she hadn’t slept at all. Tonight, however, Weir’s so exhausted that she’s fairly certain she’ll sleep without dreaming.
Just as Weir sits down, however, her door chimes. Typical, she thinks tiredly. Grudgingly, she stands back up and grabs her robe. Throwing it on, she calls, “Come in.”
The doors slide open and Weir is faced with her other self. She raises an eyebrow. “It’s late. Can’t it wait until morning?”
Elizabeth, however, is in no mood to wait, it seems. She stares at her intently. “Why?” she asks simply, crossing her arms.
Weir cocked her head quizzically. “Why what? I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific than just a single word.”
“Why did you break off from Earth?” she fires back.
Weir doesn’t answer her immediately. She isn’t all that surprised with the question, really. She’d known the moment Ronon had told her that her other self and Colonel Sheppard were digging in the hologram room that it was only a matter of time before she would be facing this question. The facts were there, but not the reasoning behind them.
Sighing again, Weir turns away from her other self. She stares out at the city view that her quarters afford her. After several moments of tense silence, she gestures to the chair at her desk. “You’d better sit down. This could take a while.”
She doesn’t turn to look, but Weir hears Elizabeth take the seat. Slowly, she moves back to her bed and sits down at the end. Her shoulders hunch slightly as she presses her palms down on the mattress.
“We didn’t have a choice,” she says at last. “It was either cut ourselves off or lose everything we fought and bled for, what some of us had already died for.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Daedalus discovered that the Asurans were building warships,” she explains. “The analysts on Earth assumed that such a large fleet couldn’t just be for dealing with Atlantis, so they had to have something bigger in mind. Naturally, they assumed that the Asurans were meant to come and attack Earth.”
Elizabeth nods. “That happened in our reality. They sent the Apollo under Colonel Ellis to launch a preemptive strike against them.” She wrinkles her nose. “It didn’t do much more than infuriate the Asurans and result in them retaliating against Atlantis. We had to submerge the city, and then fly it to another planet.” A shadow crosses Elizabeth’s face, and Weir figures that there’s probably more to the story than what her counterpart is saying, but she lets it pass for the moment.
“Roughly the same thing happened here, and eventually the conflict erupted into a full-scale war. We were able to fight them off, and force them to retreat, but that was only for a few days,” Weir continues. “They were relentless. We needed options, including reinforcements, but the IOA, in its infinite wisdom, said we had to make do with what we had, namely the Apollo and the city’s defenses. Everything else, they claimed, was needed to beat back the Ori, despite the fact that Adria was dead.” Weir knows her tone and words are bitter and harsh, but she can’t bring herself to care. She despises the IOA, and makes no secret of it.
“It was only a matter of time before we began to suffer casualties,” she says. “The Asurans were content to scale back their ambitions to just destroying Atlantis and those of us that inhabited it. Earth could wait.” She clenches her fists. “After one particularly… brutal battle, we were able to destroy them, but not without cost.” Weir catches Elizabeth’s eyes. “That was the day we lost our Doctor McKay and Colonel Sheppard.”
There is silence for several minutes and Weir watches her other self. She hides her emotions well, but not well enough. She can see the pain and sympathy in her eyes. Weir glances away. She has no need for pity.
Weir opens her mouth to continue, only to be stopped by the chirp of her earpiece, which sits on the small, functional nightstand to the right of her bed. Frowning at the interruption, Weir leans back on the bed and grabs it. Putting it in, she taps it, saying, “This is Weir. What is it?”
“Doctor Weir,” comes the voice of Peter Grodin, “Our sensors have picked up a ship moving in-system. They’re under a cloak, but we’re picking up zero-point energy.”
Weir’s lip curls up in a snarl. “Earth,” she growls. “Raise the shield,” she orders Grodin, “put the city on alert. Tell Ronon to meet me in the control room. Weir out.”
She stands up, noticing that Elizabeth had done the same. “What’s going on?” Elizabeth demands.
“We’re about to fall under attack,” she replies, grabbing her recently-discarded clothes. Throwing them on over her pajamas, she says, “Sorry to cut this short, but duty calls.”
Ronon is on his way out the door when the alarms sound. Grodin’s warning had sent him hurrying out of his quarters toward the Control room, barking orders at everyone he came across. He doesn’t see too many people, however, since by now everyone knows what to do. The scientists race to the vital areas of the city, ready to make quick repairs. Many of the Marines follow, guarding those areas in case the enemy makes it past the shield.
The Control room is a scene of controlled chaos. Weir is already there, glaring at the view screen as Grodin and the other techs struggle to show her what they are facing.
Ronon also notes that the other team is also arriving. The other Elizabeth is standing at the edge of the control room, just in front of the bridge that leads to Weir’s office. Sheppard stands with her, as does his other self. All three are watching them with sharp, keen eyes.
He ignores them and moves to stand with Weir. “What is it?” he demands. “Wraith?”
“No,” she replies. “The sensors are detecting high levels of zero-point energy.”
“A ZPM,” Ronon deduces. “The Odyssey then?”
She nods. “Or one of the Earth ships, at any rate.” She looks over at Grodin. “Anything?”
The dark-haired man starts to shake his head, but then he stops. “Wait. We’re picking up a signal.” He looks at them. “They want to talk.”
Weir snorts derisively. “I’m sure they do,” she mutters under her breath. After a moment, she nods. “Open the channel.”
Grodin adjusts a few of the controls and then a familiar face appears on the screen. Ronon has never met the man face to face, but this isn’t the first time his face has appeared in Atlantis. Weir, though, knows him all too well.
“General O’Neill,” she says coolly.
The older man’s face reveals nothing, and his voice is just as even. “Doctor Weir.”
“What can we do for you?”
“Don’t bother with the small talk, Elizabeth,” O’Neill snaps. “You know why I’m here.”
Weir crosses her arms. “Yes, Jack, I suppose I do. I just never thought I’d see the day you’d play the IOA’s lapdog.”
“They’ve got nothing to do with this--”
“They have everything to do with this, and you know it. How many times did a pack of bean-counting bureaucrats try to take the S.G.C. away from you and your team?” Weir demands. “We fought and bled for this place, and we lost far too many in order to save it after the IOA decided to take on a race we had little defense against.” She glares at him. “Then after all that, they declare us obsolete?”
“Go back, General,” she hisses. “There’s nothing here for Earth anymore.”
Elizabeth watches the exchange between her other self and Jack O’Neill. She’s always been fond of the general in her reality, just as he is of her. After watching Weir, Elizabeth observes the rigid stance as Weir faces the screen and finds it almost sickening in how things stand between these two.
She watches as Weir makes a sharp, cutting motion in Grodin’s direction and the connection is promptly severed. “What are they doing?” Weir demands.
“They’re powering weapons,” Grodin replies. “Firing… drones?!”
“What? Return fire, intercept them!”
Whoever is in the control chair must have a good aim, Elizabeth notes, because it feels like only a few get through to impact the shield.
“How the hell did they equip a ship with drones?” Elizabeth jumps slightly, not having noticed Rodney’s arrival.
“Just what the hell is going on would be my first question, McKay,” John mutters from his spot to her immediate left.
“They’ve broken off from Earth,” Elizabeth reminds him. “I suspect Earth didn’t take it well, and they’re attempting to retake the city.”
“Shouldn’t we help?” Ronon asks.
“Which side?” John cuts in wryly.
“It doesn’t matter,” Elizabeth shakes her head. “We don’t know enough of the situation.” She turns to Rodney. “Have you found a way to get us back yet?”
Rodney’s eyes are still on the commotion taking place all over the control room as everyone struggles to repel the Odyssey, but he nods. “Yes, we think we’ve got something that might work. If we take the naquadah generator-”
“Good,” she interrupts, her eyes still on her counterpart, “I want to get out of here as soon as possible.” She is about to continue, when John interrupts.
“Where’s Teyla?”
The corridors out by the east pier are mostly dark, lit only by flickering lights. Even though her own Atlantis is in much the same state in certain areas, Teyla finds it unsettling. There is a great deal in this place that unnerves her. The people that she has encountered since her release have often looked at her as though she was an apparition, and her guard, Sergeant Arnold, is no exception. She assumes that her other self is dead, just as they had assumed the other Colonel Sheppard and Rodney McKay were also dead. Given the looks she receives and the fact that she has not seen this universe’s Teyla at all since they were brought here, the conclusion is inescapable.
Still, the fact that she unnerves Sergeant Arnold has not stopped him from heeding her advice. This is still Atlantis, and a woman very much like her friend is in command. The radio signals are being jammed. Something is wrong, and she is determined that even this terrible reflection of her home must be given the chance to defend itself.
Teyla rounds a corner and sees lights sweeping around up ahead. She shrinks back the way she had come, dragging Arnold with her, and watching the distant figures. The alarm had sounded some time earlier, Teyla thinks. Surely there would not be anyone else out this far into the city besides the two of them.
Though she has no evidence to back up her supposition, she believes that something is terribly wrong here. There are intruders in Atlantis. When she turns to speak of this observation to her companion, Teyla sees that Arnold has also come to that conclusion already. He motions for them to fall back the way they came.
Once they deem themselves far enough away, Teyla asks, “No one else is supposed to be out here, correct?”
The sergeant shakes his head as he checks his stunner. “Not during an emergency.”
She had expected as much. “May I borrow a weapon then, please? We need to contact the control room and inform them that there are intruders in the city, and I do not wish to do so while unarmed.”
Arnold stares at her for a moment. Teyla knows that for him to give her a weapon violates many of the military procedures he has been trained to follow, but one of the human proverbs that Colonel Sheppard has used in the past does say something about desperate measures, if she recalls correctly. After a moment, he takes out his pistol and hands her his Wraith stunner.
“Come on,” he says after a moment, “we’ll try the other way. There might be something there we can use to warn everyone.”
Weir orders a scan of the city to look for Teyla, but keeps most of her attention on the Odyssey and its movements. She knows that Jack O’Neill isn’t going to give up on retaking Atlantis just because she said a few hurtful words. She wouldn’t have either, if their positions had been reversed. Still, Earth lost its right to the city of the Ancients when they decided their own people were expendable in a war that should never have been fought.
“Peter?” she demands.
“They’re just sitting there, ma’am. They aren’t even preparing to fire another shot.”
She glares at the screen, waiting for O’Neill to make his next move and wondering if she’s always been this impatient.
A beep on the controls catches their attention and she immediately turns. Grodin puts his hand up to the transmitter in his right ear and his eyes widen. “It’s Sergeant Arnold and… Teyla,” he says after a moment. “They’ve spotted intruders moving along the edges of the city.”
Weir’s eyes widen. Without hesitation, she taps her ear radio and opens up the correct frequency. “Sergeant,” she barks, “report!”
“Yes ma’am. We have at least six hostiles lurking out here on the east pier. Teyla and I are keeping a safe distance, but we’ve been observing them. They’re moving toward one of the transporters.”
Ronon, who apparently has also been listening, demands, “How did they get through the shield?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Weir snaps. “I want these people contained now.” She taps her radio again. “Sergeant, can you and Teyla get around them and beat them to the transporter?”
There is a pause, but then he answers, “I think so, ma’am.”
“Good. Contact us when you get there. Weir out.” She whirls at Peter and orders, “Check the sensors and find a way to detect these people. See if there are any other teams too.”
He nods and bends his head over his console, ignoring everything else around him. The console soon begins beeping in response to the commands Peter puts into it.
Weir turns to Ronon. “Get a team of Marines ready. Use stunners only,” she says. “I want these people alive if at all possible.”
John watches everyone spring into action. Despite the many differences he has seen here, what he sees now is familiar. These people move and work together like a well-oiled bicycle. They know and trust one another.
What concerns him, though, is Teyla. He doesn’t have any idea what could have possessed her to go out that far from the central area of Atlantis, though he supposes he should be grateful that she did. They never would have known of the intruders otherwise.
John turns to Elizabeth. “We should help,” he says.
“No,” she replies without taking her eyes off of her doppelganger. “We don’t know enough about the situation--”
He cuts her off. “Teyla’s out there now with a bunch of unknowns that I doubt are friendly to anyone in this city. They don’t know that she doesn’t belong here. That’s all I need to know.”
John watches her hesitate for a moment, but she nods. “Fine, but only to retrieve Teyla,” she says, eyeing him sharply. “Do not engage unless you have no other choice.” She pauses before adding, “And that’s if they will even let you go.” Elizabeth jerks her head towards her counterpart and the others.
John considers them for a moment, trying to decide the best approach. Finally, he shrugs. Best to be direct, he thinks. Besides, his presence seems to throw Weir off a little. Maybe he can use that to get her to agree.
“Rodney, stay here with Elizabeth,” he commands. “Ronon, with me.” John doesn’t wait for Ronon to reply, just walks forward to stand in front of Weir.
“A word, Doctor?”
Weir turns her fierce gaze on him for a moment and John forces himself to hold it. He can barely see the tiny flinch in her eyes, but he starts talking the moment he does. “Let me and Ronon go with your team to get Teyla back.” She opens her mouth up, probably to refuse him point blank, but John cuts her off. “You know we won’t get in their way. Teyla’s our objective.”
For several moments, she says nothing, just keeps staring at him. Her gaze is a little unnerving, since it’s so different than the stare he’s so accustomed to. After considering him, she nods slightly.
“Don’t do anything stupid out there, Colonel,” she says quietly. Then, in a louder voice, she tells the two guards that are still shadowing him and Ronon, “Give them stunners and a vest for Colonel Sheppard. Help them bring Teyla Emmagan back up here. Do not engage the enemy unless you have no other alternative.”
The two Marines chorus their recognition of her orders. John only has a moment to nod his thanks to her before hurrying out of the control room, leaving Rodney and Elizabeth behind.
It doesn’t take them long to stop at the armory and get what they needed, nor does it take too long for them to catch up with the other Ronon and his Marines. He doesn’t look surprised to see them, leading John to assume that Weir had informed him of their arrival.
“Don’t get in our way,” is his only comment just before he and three of the Marines step into the transporter.
As the other heavily-armed Marines follow, John murmurs, “No problem.” He’s not eager to incur the wrath of Ronon Dex, no matter what reality he’s from.
Teyla is very relieved when the promised team comes through. The other Ronon is the first out of the transporter and he stares at her, likely surprised that she is alone and carrying a stunner.
“Sergeant Arnold is down the corridor,” she explains, “watching for the intruders.”
He nods shortly and then starts directing his men down the way she indicates. A few moments later, the transporter activates again and John and steps through, accompanied by her Ronon and their two Marine guards.
“Teyla,” John starts, “let’s go. We’re only here to get you out--”
John is cut off by the sounds of shouting, stunner blasts, and gunfire. Several shots plow into the walls near their position. All five of them whirl in the direction of the commotion and without even hesitating, take off running toward it.
The scene they come upon is the usual chaos of battle in close quarters. Teyla can see the other Ronon firing further down the corridor, along with Sergeant Arnold and four of the Marines that came with him. The remaining two lie on the ground. Teyla thinks she sees their chests rising, but she cannot be certain. She also sees three other bodies on the deck, presumably the intruders.
An errant shot comes near her head and Teyla ducks low, returning fire automatically. She throws herself down behind the cover that Sergeant Arnold is using and continues to fire her stunner at the invaders. She nearly scowls when she misses hitting one by mere inches.
Teyla notes that John and Ronon have also done as she has, taking cover and opening fire with their own stunners. Ronon’s shots are performed with their usual accuracy, and he hits one of the remaining three intruders, a woman with long, dark hair. There is no time for Teyla to wonder at the faint hint of recognition as she continues firing.
Given how outmatched the intruders are, it is only a matter of time before the last two are subdued. When the smoke from the P-90s begins to clear, the other Ronon and all of the Marines carefully move forward, keeping their weapons at the ready. Once the intruders are restrained, Ronon turns to the rest of them.
“Let’s go. Weir’s not going to be happy.”
He had been right. Weir isn’t happy, and neither is her counterpart.
Ronon misses most of the dressing down the other Sheppard and his other self receive, but they still are not finished by the time he returns to the control room after securing the prisoners in the brig.
“… told you not to get involved, John,” Elizabeth is saying as he walks in, her expression hard.
“They started shooting at us,” he maintains, his arms folded. “What were we supposed to do?”
Weir glares at him. “Retreat?” she asks scathingly. When John only shrugs, she rolls eyes and turns to Ronon. “What did you find?”
Wordlessly, he holds out a group of dog tags to her. She takes them and looks through them. “Airman James Hinton, Sergeant Thomas Porter, Corporal Nick Latimer,” she murmurs. When she gets to the fourth one, however, she pauses for several moments. Eventually, she continues, “Colonel Charles Reynolds, Vala Mal Doran, Colonel Samantha Carter.”
Silence permeates the control room. Ronon watches as Weir grips the dog tags in her hand, and then glances at the others present. Elizabeth and John are also watching Weir carefully, like one would watch a wounded, hostile animal. Ronon’s counterpart and Teyla’s expressions are inscrutable as they observe the events. Rodney doesn’t bother hiding his own apprehension as he stares at Weir.
Weir stays silent for several more seconds, before turning to Peter, who still has not left his station. “Were you able to detect any more of these incursions?”
He shakes his head. “I was able to configure the sensors and picked up the intruders. They have some kind of transmitters beneath their skins-”
“Subcutaneous transmitters,” John supplies. Ronon notes that both Elizabeth and Weir give him a dark look, obviously not desiring his participation in the conversation.
Peter either doesn’t notice or ignores it. He simply nods. “Yes. The shield mutes the signal for the most part, and it also prevents outside interference.”
“So the Odyssey can’t beam them out?” Weir asks.
“No,” Peter replies. “At most, they can monitor their position.”
“So O’Neill knows they’ve been caught,” Ronon puts in.
Peter opens his mouth to reply, but is cut off by an alarm going off on his console. He looks down at it briefly, but then looks up at Weir. “I guess that answers that. We’re being hailed by the Odyssey.”
Weir struggles to keep calm. All of their cards had been played at this point, and now it’s the endgame. She doesn’t doubt that Jack O’Neill is aware of this, especially when she now has both his rumored lover and the mother of the Orici in her brig.
When the grizzled man appears on the screen, she stares at him. “Your incursion failed, Jack,” she say. “Colonel Carter and her team are now in custody.”
To his credit, O’Neill doesn’t so much as bat an eye. “Really? No idea what you’re talking about.”
Weir sighs. “Enough of this, General. This isn’t the first time Earth has attempted to retake Atlantis by subterfuge. I’m sure you recall what happened to the team we captured the last time?” She doesn’t doubt that he does. He was at the SGC when she had every member of that team thrown through the Stargate, only giving the home base a few seconds warning to open the iris. That team could have died if Walter Harriman had been off his game that day.
She holds his gaze for several seconds, but notices that he doesn’t seem broken up about his people’s capture. Weir’s eyes narrow, considering him. Jack O’Neill is the wiliest military man she’s ever known. It’s quite possible that he’s up to something else.
Well, if it includes that team, then she will not give them time to execute their plan. She turns to Peter. “Cut the channel.” The moment O’Neill’s face disappears, she tells Ronon to bring the group to the Gate room. Just before he leaves, she adds, “Blindfold them, though. The less of Atlantis they see with their own eyes, the better.”
The moment the Satedan left, her counterpart stepped forward. “What are you doing?” she asks.
Weir smirks at her. “I thought you didn’t want to get involved?” she replies mockingly.
“Too late. We are involved whether we like it or not. What are you going to do?”
She shrugs. “Exactly what I did last time. Doctor Lam has no doubt already taken the blood samples from them that she requires. I’m not about to waste further resources on these people.”
“And just what does that mean?”
“They’re a liability, Doctor. I cannot afford to have anyone on this base that I cannot trust. I’m certainly not about to trust Samantha Carter, of all people. Best get them gone now before they cause even more trouble than they already have.”
Part III
Part I
“Ah,” Rodney says happily as he settles himself in front of a laptop, “much better.”
Zelenka and Simpson say nothing, much to his annoyance. Even as his fingers begin to fly over the keys, he comments sarcastically, “You know, if I hadn’t heard you speak to Ronon, I’d assume that you both were mute.”
Simpson rolls her eyes at him. Zelenka, who is sitting across from him, his eyes on his own laptop, actually deigns to reply. “You fill up the silence so well, we didn’t think you noticed that we weren’t saying anything.” He smirks.
Rodney rolls his eyes. “Oh yes, ha-ha.” The three begin their work in earnest and the silence falls again, this time punctuated only by the occasional scrape of a stool and by the near-constant sound of fingers tapping on computer keys.
Eventually, however, Zelenka and Simpson are summoned to look at the screen of the laptop they had loaned to Rodney. “There,” he says, pointing at the screen. “That’s what we need.”
Simpson stares at it and then at him skeptically. “A depleted ZPM and a naquadah generator? How is that supposed to work? Naquadah power isn’t compatible for a ZPM. If it was, we’d use our own generators to recharge our ZPMs.”
“True,” Rodney concedes, “but in this case, it isn’t necessary. One thing I noticed about the portal is that it seemed to draw power from different energy sources. From the readings I was able to get, it’s almost like a three-prong adapter, and adapts everything to fit its specifications. The sources on this side of the portal were depleted by our arrival, which is why we started dialing addresses so we could find possible power sources to use to recharge it.”
Simpson nods. “I’ll inform Doctor Weir.” She turns around and strides out before either man can say a word. Rodney stares at Zelenka. Zelenka stares at Rodney.
“So…” Rodney says slowly, his eyes falling back to the computer screen, “what’s been happening? How’s life? Good? Bad? Okay?”
“Well enough, giving the circumstances,” Zelenka replies. “Life has not been easy for any of us lately. We make do.”
Rodney nods. “Oh. So, then I guess since my other self isn’t in here attempting to match my great intellect, then that means…”
“The Doctor Rodney McKay of our reality is dead, yes,” Zelenka says shortly, his voice gaining a harsh quality to it. He abruptly turned away. “He died ten months ago, in a battle with the Asurans. Colonel Sheppard died shortly thereafter.”
Rodney doesn’t say anything. Really, what can he say to that? Being faced with your own mortality, no matter how skewed, doesn’t exactly leave you full of speeches. Besides, words are something Elizabeth’s good with, not him.
Well, he thinks, Elizabeth wanted to know more about the city and its circumstances. He thinks this qualifies. “And Teyla?” he asks hesitantly. “Did she die with us… er, them too?”
Zelenka, who has returned to his own laptop, doesn’t look up at him, but his body radiates suppressed tension. “No, she survived that battle. She died a few weeks later, when she was captured by Michael.” He glanced up momentarily. “You know him, yes?”
The scientist cringes. “Far better than we’d like,” he answers stiffly.
Zelenka seems to understand his hesitance. “She was off-world with Major Lorne’s team, trading with the Imotemins. She was speaking with the leaders of the village when the building they were in suddenly caught on fire. Major Lorne’s team and the villagers were able to put it out without any major damage, but when they managed to get everyone out of the building, Teyla was missing. We searched everywhere for her, but found nothing.” He stops, seemingly struggling within himself, but eventually continues. “She appeared one week later, when Doctor Weir was at the Imotemins’ village. There… there was not…”
He trails off, but Rodney gets the picture. In his own reality, Michael had attempted to experiment on Teyla before, tried to make her like one of his beastly bug minions. He shudders.
“Doctor Weir put a price on his head,” Zelenka tells him after several moments, and something in the man’s voice makes Rodney look up. There’s a vicious quality in his eyes that he has never seen in the usually mild-mannered Czech. It’s actually rather frightening. “We have even received a few leads on his whereabouts, though he has eluded us so far,” Zelenka adds. “But we will find him. It is only a matter of time.”
Rodney watches the other man return to his work, as though he had just made a simple, inane statement about the weather. Suddenly, he likes this reality even less than he did before. It’s no longer because so many friends are dead, but because the living are just as unsettling. He saw it first with the other Elizabeth, and even the other Ronon a little bit. Now Zelenka.
Rodney forces himself to concentrate on his laptop. He wants to go home. Sooner, rather than later.
Night has fallen and Weir prepares to settle in. Tomorrow, she plans to respond to Earth, and she needs to be rested and ready to deal with them. She has no doubt that Generals Landry, Hammond, and O’Neill will issue their normal batch of threats, and she’ll merely state what they already know: If they attempt to take Atlantis, the expedition members will fight back with everything at their disposal. Weir sighs. She’s rather tired of it all. It’s fast becoming a waste of everyone’s time.
She strips down out of her clothes and grabs the t-shirt and nightshirt she left at the foot of her bed. Weir snorts as she slips the shorts over her hips. So much has been happening that it’s hard for her to recall when she last slept in her own bed.
Her bed looks more inviting than it normally does. Usually, her bed is often the last thing she wants to see. Sleeping in it means dreaming, and then she wakes up feeling as though she hadn’t slept at all. Tonight, however, Weir’s so exhausted that she’s fairly certain she’ll sleep without dreaming.
Just as Weir sits down, however, her door chimes. Typical, she thinks tiredly. Grudgingly, she stands back up and grabs her robe. Throwing it on, she calls, “Come in.”
The doors slide open and Weir is faced with her other self. She raises an eyebrow. “It’s late. Can’t it wait until morning?”
Elizabeth, however, is in no mood to wait, it seems. She stares at her intently. “Why?” she asks simply, crossing her arms.
Weir cocked her head quizzically. “Why what? I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific than just a single word.”
“Why did you break off from Earth?” she fires back.
Weir doesn’t answer her immediately. She isn’t all that surprised with the question, really. She’d known the moment Ronon had told her that her other self and Colonel Sheppard were digging in the hologram room that it was only a matter of time before she would be facing this question. The facts were there, but not the reasoning behind them.
Sighing again, Weir turns away from her other self. She stares out at the city view that her quarters afford her. After several moments of tense silence, she gestures to the chair at her desk. “You’d better sit down. This could take a while.”
She doesn’t turn to look, but Weir hears Elizabeth take the seat. Slowly, she moves back to her bed and sits down at the end. Her shoulders hunch slightly as she presses her palms down on the mattress.
“We didn’t have a choice,” she says at last. “It was either cut ourselves off or lose everything we fought and bled for, what some of us had already died for.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Daedalus discovered that the Asurans were building warships,” she explains. “The analysts on Earth assumed that such a large fleet couldn’t just be for dealing with Atlantis, so they had to have something bigger in mind. Naturally, they assumed that the Asurans were meant to come and attack Earth.”
Elizabeth nods. “That happened in our reality. They sent the Apollo under Colonel Ellis to launch a preemptive strike against them.” She wrinkles her nose. “It didn’t do much more than infuriate the Asurans and result in them retaliating against Atlantis. We had to submerge the city, and then fly it to another planet.” A shadow crosses Elizabeth’s face, and Weir figures that there’s probably more to the story than what her counterpart is saying, but she lets it pass for the moment.
“Roughly the same thing happened here, and eventually the conflict erupted into a full-scale war. We were able to fight them off, and force them to retreat, but that was only for a few days,” Weir continues. “They were relentless. We needed options, including reinforcements, but the IOA, in its infinite wisdom, said we had to make do with what we had, namely the Apollo and the city’s defenses. Everything else, they claimed, was needed to beat back the Ori, despite the fact that Adria was dead.” Weir knows her tone and words are bitter and harsh, but she can’t bring herself to care. She despises the IOA, and makes no secret of it.
“It was only a matter of time before we began to suffer casualties,” she says. “The Asurans were content to scale back their ambitions to just destroying Atlantis and those of us that inhabited it. Earth could wait.” She clenches her fists. “After one particularly… brutal battle, we were able to destroy them, but not without cost.” Weir catches Elizabeth’s eyes. “That was the day we lost our Doctor McKay and Colonel Sheppard.”
There is silence for several minutes and Weir watches her other self. She hides her emotions well, but not well enough. She can see the pain and sympathy in her eyes. Weir glances away. She has no need for pity.
Weir opens her mouth to continue, only to be stopped by the chirp of her earpiece, which sits on the small, functional nightstand to the right of her bed. Frowning at the interruption, Weir leans back on the bed and grabs it. Putting it in, she taps it, saying, “This is Weir. What is it?”
“Doctor Weir,” comes the voice of Peter Grodin, “Our sensors have picked up a ship moving in-system. They’re under a cloak, but we’re picking up zero-point energy.”
Weir’s lip curls up in a snarl. “Earth,” she growls. “Raise the shield,” she orders Grodin, “put the city on alert. Tell Ronon to meet me in the control room. Weir out.”
She stands up, noticing that Elizabeth had done the same. “What’s going on?” Elizabeth demands.
“We’re about to fall under attack,” she replies, grabbing her recently-discarded clothes. Throwing them on over her pajamas, she says, “Sorry to cut this short, but duty calls.”
Ronon is on his way out the door when the alarms sound. Grodin’s warning had sent him hurrying out of his quarters toward the Control room, barking orders at everyone he came across. He doesn’t see too many people, however, since by now everyone knows what to do. The scientists race to the vital areas of the city, ready to make quick repairs. Many of the Marines follow, guarding those areas in case the enemy makes it past the shield.
The Control room is a scene of controlled chaos. Weir is already there, glaring at the view screen as Grodin and the other techs struggle to show her what they are facing.
Ronon also notes that the other team is also arriving. The other Elizabeth is standing at the edge of the control room, just in front of the bridge that leads to Weir’s office. Sheppard stands with her, as does his other self. All three are watching them with sharp, keen eyes.
He ignores them and moves to stand with Weir. “What is it?” he demands. “Wraith?”
“No,” she replies. “The sensors are detecting high levels of zero-point energy.”
“A ZPM,” Ronon deduces. “The Odyssey then?”
She nods. “Or one of the Earth ships, at any rate.” She looks over at Grodin. “Anything?”
The dark-haired man starts to shake his head, but then he stops. “Wait. We’re picking up a signal.” He looks at them. “They want to talk.”
Weir snorts derisively. “I’m sure they do,” she mutters under her breath. After a moment, she nods. “Open the channel.”
Grodin adjusts a few of the controls and then a familiar face appears on the screen. Ronon has never met the man face to face, but this isn’t the first time his face has appeared in Atlantis. Weir, though, knows him all too well.
“General O’Neill,” she says coolly.
The older man’s face reveals nothing, and his voice is just as even. “Doctor Weir.”
“What can we do for you?”
“Don’t bother with the small talk, Elizabeth,” O’Neill snaps. “You know why I’m here.”
Weir crosses her arms. “Yes, Jack, I suppose I do. I just never thought I’d see the day you’d play the IOA’s lapdog.”
“They’ve got nothing to do with this--”
“They have everything to do with this, and you know it. How many times did a pack of bean-counting bureaucrats try to take the S.G.C. away from you and your team?” Weir demands. “We fought and bled for this place, and we lost far too many in order to save it after the IOA decided to take on a race we had little defense against.” She glares at him. “Then after all that, they declare us obsolete?”
“Go back, General,” she hisses. “There’s nothing here for Earth anymore.”
Elizabeth watches the exchange between her other self and Jack O’Neill. She’s always been fond of the general in her reality, just as he is of her. After watching Weir, Elizabeth observes the rigid stance as Weir faces the screen and finds it almost sickening in how things stand between these two.
She watches as Weir makes a sharp, cutting motion in Grodin’s direction and the connection is promptly severed. “What are they doing?” Weir demands.
“They’re powering weapons,” Grodin replies. “Firing… drones?!”
“What? Return fire, intercept them!”
Whoever is in the control chair must have a good aim, Elizabeth notes, because it feels like only a few get through to impact the shield.
“How the hell did they equip a ship with drones?” Elizabeth jumps slightly, not having noticed Rodney’s arrival.
“Just what the hell is going on would be my first question, McKay,” John mutters from his spot to her immediate left.
“They’ve broken off from Earth,” Elizabeth reminds him. “I suspect Earth didn’t take it well, and they’re attempting to retake the city.”
“Shouldn’t we help?” Ronon asks.
“Which side?” John cuts in wryly.
“It doesn’t matter,” Elizabeth shakes her head. “We don’t know enough of the situation.” She turns to Rodney. “Have you found a way to get us back yet?”
Rodney’s eyes are still on the commotion taking place all over the control room as everyone struggles to repel the Odyssey, but he nods. “Yes, we think we’ve got something that might work. If we take the naquadah generator-”
“Good,” she interrupts, her eyes still on her counterpart, “I want to get out of here as soon as possible.” She is about to continue, when John interrupts.
“Where’s Teyla?”
The corridors out by the east pier are mostly dark, lit only by flickering lights. Even though her own Atlantis is in much the same state in certain areas, Teyla finds it unsettling. There is a great deal in this place that unnerves her. The people that she has encountered since her release have often looked at her as though she was an apparition, and her guard, Sergeant Arnold, is no exception. She assumes that her other self is dead, just as they had assumed the other Colonel Sheppard and Rodney McKay were also dead. Given the looks she receives and the fact that she has not seen this universe’s Teyla at all since they were brought here, the conclusion is inescapable.
Still, the fact that she unnerves Sergeant Arnold has not stopped him from heeding her advice. This is still Atlantis, and a woman very much like her friend is in command. The radio signals are being jammed. Something is wrong, and she is determined that even this terrible reflection of her home must be given the chance to defend itself.
Teyla rounds a corner and sees lights sweeping around up ahead. She shrinks back the way she had come, dragging Arnold with her, and watching the distant figures. The alarm had sounded some time earlier, Teyla thinks. Surely there would not be anyone else out this far into the city besides the two of them.
Though she has no evidence to back up her supposition, she believes that something is terribly wrong here. There are intruders in Atlantis. When she turns to speak of this observation to her companion, Teyla sees that Arnold has also come to that conclusion already. He motions for them to fall back the way they came.
Once they deem themselves far enough away, Teyla asks, “No one else is supposed to be out here, correct?”
The sergeant shakes his head as he checks his stunner. “Not during an emergency.”
She had expected as much. “May I borrow a weapon then, please? We need to contact the control room and inform them that there are intruders in the city, and I do not wish to do so while unarmed.”
Arnold stares at her for a moment. Teyla knows that for him to give her a weapon violates many of the military procedures he has been trained to follow, but one of the human proverbs that Colonel Sheppard has used in the past does say something about desperate measures, if she recalls correctly. After a moment, he takes out his pistol and hands her his Wraith stunner.
“Come on,” he says after a moment, “we’ll try the other way. There might be something there we can use to warn everyone.”
Weir orders a scan of the city to look for Teyla, but keeps most of her attention on the Odyssey and its movements. She knows that Jack O’Neill isn’t going to give up on retaking Atlantis just because she said a few hurtful words. She wouldn’t have either, if their positions had been reversed. Still, Earth lost its right to the city of the Ancients when they decided their own people were expendable in a war that should never have been fought.
“Peter?” she demands.
“They’re just sitting there, ma’am. They aren’t even preparing to fire another shot.”
She glares at the screen, waiting for O’Neill to make his next move and wondering if she’s always been this impatient.
A beep on the controls catches their attention and she immediately turns. Grodin puts his hand up to the transmitter in his right ear and his eyes widen. “It’s Sergeant Arnold and… Teyla,” he says after a moment. “They’ve spotted intruders moving along the edges of the city.”
Weir’s eyes widen. Without hesitation, she taps her ear radio and opens up the correct frequency. “Sergeant,” she barks, “report!”
“Yes ma’am. We have at least six hostiles lurking out here on the east pier. Teyla and I are keeping a safe distance, but we’ve been observing them. They’re moving toward one of the transporters.”
Ronon, who apparently has also been listening, demands, “How did they get through the shield?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Weir snaps. “I want these people contained now.” She taps her radio again. “Sergeant, can you and Teyla get around them and beat them to the transporter?”
There is a pause, but then he answers, “I think so, ma’am.”
“Good. Contact us when you get there. Weir out.” She whirls at Peter and orders, “Check the sensors and find a way to detect these people. See if there are any other teams too.”
He nods and bends his head over his console, ignoring everything else around him. The console soon begins beeping in response to the commands Peter puts into it.
Weir turns to Ronon. “Get a team of Marines ready. Use stunners only,” she says. “I want these people alive if at all possible.”
John watches everyone spring into action. Despite the many differences he has seen here, what he sees now is familiar. These people move and work together like a well-oiled bicycle. They know and trust one another.
What concerns him, though, is Teyla. He doesn’t have any idea what could have possessed her to go out that far from the central area of Atlantis, though he supposes he should be grateful that she did. They never would have known of the intruders otherwise.
John turns to Elizabeth. “We should help,” he says.
“No,” she replies without taking her eyes off of her doppelganger. “We don’t know enough about the situation--”
He cuts her off. “Teyla’s out there now with a bunch of unknowns that I doubt are friendly to anyone in this city. They don’t know that she doesn’t belong here. That’s all I need to know.”
John watches her hesitate for a moment, but she nods. “Fine, but only to retrieve Teyla,” she says, eyeing him sharply. “Do not engage unless you have no other choice.” She pauses before adding, “And that’s if they will even let you go.” Elizabeth jerks her head towards her counterpart and the others.
John considers them for a moment, trying to decide the best approach. Finally, he shrugs. Best to be direct, he thinks. Besides, his presence seems to throw Weir off a little. Maybe he can use that to get her to agree.
“Rodney, stay here with Elizabeth,” he commands. “Ronon, with me.” John doesn’t wait for Ronon to reply, just walks forward to stand in front of Weir.
“A word, Doctor?”
Weir turns her fierce gaze on him for a moment and John forces himself to hold it. He can barely see the tiny flinch in her eyes, but he starts talking the moment he does. “Let me and Ronon go with your team to get Teyla back.” She opens her mouth up, probably to refuse him point blank, but John cuts her off. “You know we won’t get in their way. Teyla’s our objective.”
For several moments, she says nothing, just keeps staring at him. Her gaze is a little unnerving, since it’s so different than the stare he’s so accustomed to. After considering him, she nods slightly.
“Don’t do anything stupid out there, Colonel,” she says quietly. Then, in a louder voice, she tells the two guards that are still shadowing him and Ronon, “Give them stunners and a vest for Colonel Sheppard. Help them bring Teyla Emmagan back up here. Do not engage the enemy unless you have no other alternative.”
The two Marines chorus their recognition of her orders. John only has a moment to nod his thanks to her before hurrying out of the control room, leaving Rodney and Elizabeth behind.
It doesn’t take them long to stop at the armory and get what they needed, nor does it take too long for them to catch up with the other Ronon and his Marines. He doesn’t look surprised to see them, leading John to assume that Weir had informed him of their arrival.
“Don’t get in our way,” is his only comment just before he and three of the Marines step into the transporter.
As the other heavily-armed Marines follow, John murmurs, “No problem.” He’s not eager to incur the wrath of Ronon Dex, no matter what reality he’s from.
Teyla is very relieved when the promised team comes through. The other Ronon is the first out of the transporter and he stares at her, likely surprised that she is alone and carrying a stunner.
“Sergeant Arnold is down the corridor,” she explains, “watching for the intruders.”
He nods shortly and then starts directing his men down the way she indicates. A few moments later, the transporter activates again and John and steps through, accompanied by her Ronon and their two Marine guards.
“Teyla,” John starts, “let’s go. We’re only here to get you out--”
John is cut off by the sounds of shouting, stunner blasts, and gunfire. Several shots plow into the walls near their position. All five of them whirl in the direction of the commotion and without even hesitating, take off running toward it.
The scene they come upon is the usual chaos of battle in close quarters. Teyla can see the other Ronon firing further down the corridor, along with Sergeant Arnold and four of the Marines that came with him. The remaining two lie on the ground. Teyla thinks she sees their chests rising, but she cannot be certain. She also sees three other bodies on the deck, presumably the intruders.
An errant shot comes near her head and Teyla ducks low, returning fire automatically. She throws herself down behind the cover that Sergeant Arnold is using and continues to fire her stunner at the invaders. She nearly scowls when she misses hitting one by mere inches.
Teyla notes that John and Ronon have also done as she has, taking cover and opening fire with their own stunners. Ronon’s shots are performed with their usual accuracy, and he hits one of the remaining three intruders, a woman with long, dark hair. There is no time for Teyla to wonder at the faint hint of recognition as she continues firing.
Given how outmatched the intruders are, it is only a matter of time before the last two are subdued. When the smoke from the P-90s begins to clear, the other Ronon and all of the Marines carefully move forward, keeping their weapons at the ready. Once the intruders are restrained, Ronon turns to the rest of them.
“Let’s go. Weir’s not going to be happy.”
He had been right. Weir isn’t happy, and neither is her counterpart.
Ronon misses most of the dressing down the other Sheppard and his other self receive, but they still are not finished by the time he returns to the control room after securing the prisoners in the brig.
“… told you not to get involved, John,” Elizabeth is saying as he walks in, her expression hard.
“They started shooting at us,” he maintains, his arms folded. “What were we supposed to do?”
Weir glares at him. “Retreat?” she asks scathingly. When John only shrugs, she rolls eyes and turns to Ronon. “What did you find?”
Wordlessly, he holds out a group of dog tags to her. She takes them and looks through them. “Airman James Hinton, Sergeant Thomas Porter, Corporal Nick Latimer,” she murmurs. When she gets to the fourth one, however, she pauses for several moments. Eventually, she continues, “Colonel Charles Reynolds, Vala Mal Doran, Colonel Samantha Carter.”
Silence permeates the control room. Ronon watches as Weir grips the dog tags in her hand, and then glances at the others present. Elizabeth and John are also watching Weir carefully, like one would watch a wounded, hostile animal. Ronon’s counterpart and Teyla’s expressions are inscrutable as they observe the events. Rodney doesn’t bother hiding his own apprehension as he stares at Weir.
Weir stays silent for several more seconds, before turning to Peter, who still has not left his station. “Were you able to detect any more of these incursions?”
He shakes his head. “I was able to configure the sensors and picked up the intruders. They have some kind of transmitters beneath their skins-”
“Subcutaneous transmitters,” John supplies. Ronon notes that both Elizabeth and Weir give him a dark look, obviously not desiring his participation in the conversation.
Peter either doesn’t notice or ignores it. He simply nods. “Yes. The shield mutes the signal for the most part, and it also prevents outside interference.”
“So the Odyssey can’t beam them out?” Weir asks.
“No,” Peter replies. “At most, they can monitor their position.”
“So O’Neill knows they’ve been caught,” Ronon puts in.
Peter opens his mouth to reply, but is cut off by an alarm going off on his console. He looks down at it briefly, but then looks up at Weir. “I guess that answers that. We’re being hailed by the Odyssey.”
Weir struggles to keep calm. All of their cards had been played at this point, and now it’s the endgame. She doesn’t doubt that Jack O’Neill is aware of this, especially when she now has both his rumored lover and the mother of the Orici in her brig.
When the grizzled man appears on the screen, she stares at him. “Your incursion failed, Jack,” she say. “Colonel Carter and her team are now in custody.”
To his credit, O’Neill doesn’t so much as bat an eye. “Really? No idea what you’re talking about.”
Weir sighs. “Enough of this, General. This isn’t the first time Earth has attempted to retake Atlantis by subterfuge. I’m sure you recall what happened to the team we captured the last time?” She doesn’t doubt that he does. He was at the SGC when she had every member of that team thrown through the Stargate, only giving the home base a few seconds warning to open the iris. That team could have died if Walter Harriman had been off his game that day.
She holds his gaze for several seconds, but notices that he doesn’t seem broken up about his people’s capture. Weir’s eyes narrow, considering him. Jack O’Neill is the wiliest military man she’s ever known. It’s quite possible that he’s up to something else.
Well, if it includes that team, then she will not give them time to execute their plan. She turns to Peter. “Cut the channel.” The moment O’Neill’s face disappears, she tells Ronon to bring the group to the Gate room. Just before he leaves, she adds, “Blindfold them, though. The less of Atlantis they see with their own eyes, the better.”
The moment the Satedan left, her counterpart stepped forward. “What are you doing?” she asks.
Weir smirks at her. “I thought you didn’t want to get involved?” she replies mockingly.
“Too late. We are involved whether we like it or not. What are you going to do?”
She shrugs. “Exactly what I did last time. Doctor Lam has no doubt already taken the blood samples from them that she requires. I’m not about to waste further resources on these people.”
“And just what does that mean?”
“They’re a liability, Doctor. I cannot afford to have anyone on this base that I cannot trust. I’m certainly not about to trust Samantha Carter, of all people. Best get them gone now before they cause even more trouble than they already have.”
Part III