Raiders of the Seven Systems by ltlj, commentary by teenygozer 2/7
Title: Raiders of the Seven Systems
Author: ltlj
Fandom: SGA
Commentator: teenygozer
Story without DVD commentary: Right here!
***
Rot7S Commentary Part 1
The clock was ticking and they only had so long now before one of the dead crewmen was missed or a radio check-in to the brig went unanswered. But when they left the brig and reached the transporter/elevator, the life-signs detector showed a sudden influx of blips, congregating on the decks above them.
"This isn't good," John muttered, studying the screen.
Jittering with nervous energy, McKay snapped, "No kidding, Captain Blood."
Captain Blood! Starring Errol Flynn and Olivia DeHaviland as the leads and Basil Rathbone as the baddie, it's a bit like a sea-worthy version of Robin Hood, which was filmed 3 years later. It's got a handsome doctor who is sold into slavery for doctoring a wounded rebel friend, who is subsequently purchased by Olivia's character. He rallies his fellow slaves and they all escape, steal a ship, and become pirates. Oddly, though the movie was filmed in black and white, I always seem to remember it in a sort of Technicolor Panovision. It's really the only film I can think of that absolutely ought to be colorized. The advertising taglines:
THE MOST MAGNIFICENT & THRILLING SEA ADVENTURE EVER FILMED
A million dollars worth of adventure!
To do justice in words to its fascination is impossible!
His sword carved his name across the continents - and his glory across the seas!
Oooh, bad graphics. I've seen better manips done by high school students. I had a "his hed is pastede on yay!" moment seeing poor chubby-cheeked Errol on this poster.
...I love this movie but I think the ad goes a bit... er, overboard in its wacky praise. I particularly like the clunkiness of ad copy like "To do justice in words to its fascination is impossible!" I think what they were trying to say was that the awesomeness of the movie could not be textually rendered.
Here is the more recent VHS and DVD cover -- more modern-looking in its graphic design. I'm guessing the red is meant to suggest blood! That's a bit literal for my taste.
"That's Major Blood," John snapped back automatically, then thought, okay, mistake. He wasn't used to guarding what he said; with the others it didn't matter. This tiny bit of John & Rodney back-and-forth is quite a workhorse. We start with a nod to the canonical running gag about John correcting Rodney on his rank from second season, plus the likewise canonical running gag about John and Rodney nerd-talking about action movies, plus the author snuck in a pirate-movie joke, plus it introduces the plot point of John having been in the military being revealed to Rodney & Sam, plus it shows us that he doesn't want anyone to know about his time in the military, plus it shows us how things have already started changing for John in that he has to watch what he says now. So yeah, good couple of sentences there.
Carter just glanced at him, sharp and thoughtful. But McKay demanded, "You were a major? In what?"
John gritted his teeth. "What does it matter?"
Maybe some of John's impulse to just kill him rather than answer his question got across Yeah, I think I've seen that particular look over in the face_of_joe community., because McKay backed down. He folded his arms, lifting his chin. "It doesn't. I'm just trying to make polite conversation."
"You are not very good at it," Teyla told him, her voice dry.
"Tell me about it," Carter said wearily.
"There's more coming in," Ronon said, pointedly dragging everybody's attention back to the matter at hand. "If they know we're down here, why aren't they heading this way?"
He was right. John took long strides back to a computer terminal in the corridor wall, activating it and going straight into the ATA interface. Ronon stood back to watch the corridor while the others gathered around him. The schematic popped up in response to John's urgent thought, diagramming the new life-signs all over the ship. McKay jumped a little as it appeared, staring incredulously and with more than a little jealousy, because without John's gene, apparently there's been no gene therapy for anyone. He said, "How do you know how to do that? Who are you?"
His voice an annoyed growl, Ronon answered, "He's Sheppard, I'm Dex. Now shut up."
John ignored the byplay. He could see the big bay they had avoided was now occupied, that a Genii ship must have docked in it. The life-signs were gathering just a deck above this one, in a large area that might be a conference room. But the signs weren't staying put, they were wandering in and out, up and down the connected corridors. "What the hell are they doing, having a party?" …um, yes? And it's one you don't wanna be invited to.
Carter frowned suddenly. "Oh, wait. Kolya said something--"
"--about meeting some people, by which he meant showing us off to his cronies," McKay finished grimly. "This must be it."
John winced. "Crap." Kolya wanted to show his prisoners off, demonstrate his power to his allies by proving that he now had someone to make his Ancient tech work.
"You could have mentioned it earlier," Teyla pointed out with some acerbity.
"Well he didn't say when he was having the party," McKay told her in exasperation. "He didn't exactly give us an engraved dinner invitation."
"It was more like we were going to be the dessert," Carter said, studying the schematic intently. "Where are we trying to get to, exactly?"
John knew she was the one to watch. McKay was noisy and aggressive, but something about Carter made him suspect she was military. From the way Teyla was watching Carter, she thought so too. Yet they never seem to come right out and *ask*! I'm beginning to think that these guys are less like pirates and more like the Foreign Legion, where you go to escape your past and nobody asks who you are. He let the schematic highlight the smaller jumper bay and said, "Our ship, here." The corridor accessing the bay was clear, but the nearest transporter on that deck was too close to where people were entering for Kolya's little get-together.
"Can we get up there from another point and reach it from the other direction?" Carter asked immediately. "Is that a transporter or just an elevator?" Okay, that's something of a tip-off right there that Carter has been to Atlantis (though I suppose she could have seen transporters in one of the Ancient ruins she and Rodney were exploring.) But she definitely recognizes the transporters for what they are.
"It is a transporter, though the Genii do not seem to know of that function," Teyla said. "We have only known them to use them as elevators."
John couldn't see any other option. "We'll go here," He picked out a transporter on the far end of the jumper bay's deck, "and work our way back around." I'll bet it's rather fabulous for everyone to see these 3D maps in the air being CGI'd by John. I can only imagine that it looks almost magical, and Rodney is jealous beyond words.
***
We are now entering McKay POV territory! God help us!
This next bit is so exciting, I have trouble concentrating enough to comment on it, preferring to just read it.
Rodney was beginning to think they were out of the frying pan and into the blast furnace. "How do we know they aren't tracking us?" he whispered, grimacing as he flattened himself against the corridor wall. They had just had to duck yet another group of Genii, apparently wandering the ship sight-seeing. Carter and Teyla Emmagan were huddled behind another wall on the other side of the cross-corridor. "They could have life-signs detectors too."
He didn't know what to think about Sheppard. He had heard the stories about Athosian pirates, and if someone had asked him what he thought one would look like, he would have picked Emmagan out of a line-up. Hot woman, terrifyingly self-possessed, heavily armed, dressed in leather, check. Dex, the cave man with all the knives and hair, also met expectations. Sheppard, an Earth human with the Ancient gene so strong that even the half-fried computers on this dying ship did tricks for him, didn't fit. Neither did the fact that he was probably military, with pretty boy looks and spiky hair and something burning him up inside. It was so obvious that even Rodney had noticed it, and that was saying something. I must confess that at this point, with the references to John's boyish good looks and something "burning him up inside", I wondered if Kolya had tortured John by stealing Ford's youth and shoving it into John via Wraith. Because I cannot think of much that would more horrify John than to have youth and health because of that poor kid's stolen life-force inside him, and that it would burn him up with guilt. John never shares the details of Ford's demise and how it went down with anyone and barely allows himself to even think about it, so we will never know.
Sheppard threw him an acid look. It's actually a very good question, and there really wasn't any other way for Rodney to know. But John (now "Sheppard" as we're in Rodney's POV) has taken a dislike to McKay for his prying ways and even an innocent question is met with distrust and anger. "The Genii don't have anybody with the Ancient gene strong enough to initialize the internal sensors or use a detector."
Rodney rolled his eyes. "How the hell was I supposed to know that?" he pointed out.
"You could ask." Sheppard had a very sarcastic drawl.
"I did ask!" Rodney put as much outrage as possible into his whisper.
"And I answered you." Seriously, Rodney had no idea how four words could get across that much sarcastic disdain.
"Then why are we arguing?" Rodney snarled.
Because you are John and Rodney, and it's what you do.
Sheppard glared. "I don't know!"
Dex ducked back around the corner. "Clear."
"Thank God," Sheppard muttered, and they were moving again.
They made it through another two corridors, past smooth blue-white walls gleaming in the low light, silver stanchions, devices Rodney didn't recognize that there was no time to examine. They had to stop again when the life-signs detector showed a large group of people ahead. Rodney was sweating in the cool air, and this whole escape felt highly improbable.
Sheppard sent Dex to scout ahead, and in a few moments he came back to report, "That corridor turns into a balcony, going across a big meeting room. It's high enough that we can cross it without them seeing us." He shrugged. "It's the closest way."
Sheppard and Emmagan looked at each other, appearing to share a moment of telepathic communication. Then Sheppard said, "Let's go."
After only a few more turns, they reached the room Dex had described. The corridor turned into a gallery, fortunately with a solid silver rail up to waist-height, and above that decorative metal slats in fan-shaped patterns. Sheppard and Emmagan started across first, Rodney following with Carter and Dex behind him. Amusingly, this reminded me of several of the fancier convention hotels I've been in, with a gallery over a ballroom or meeting room.
As they moved, noisy conversation from below covered any sound from their footsteps. Rodney risked an uneasy glance through the fan slats. The group in the room below was a mixed bag of men and women in the brown Genii uniforms, mercenaries in the leather outfits reminiscent of a bad SF movie, and a few people wearing robes or more ordinary clothes that might be business standard wear on other planets. But there was also a large group wearing what could only be described as 18th century farmer costumes. Except the people wearing them were just as heavily armed as the others. The contrast was a little...psychotic.
This is a picture of the Genii out and about in the galaxy without the strictures and pressures placed on their society by the Wraith. They turned out to be a very Nazi-like culture, with bully-boys in charge who throw around the weight of the power granted to them via their scavenged technology by destroying burgeoning cultures before they can pose a threat (not unlike what the Wraith do in canon) and even terrorizing their so-called allies. I cannot help but think that the Athosians were destroyed because they reached a certain level of tech, were perhaps "invited" to join the Genii Confenderacy (as in "I made them an offer they couldn't refuse"), they declined due to the Genii being Class D thugs, and the Genii attacked, destroying the Athosian civilization. I have to say, Kolya seems more depraved in this version, a Kolya with even less honor than the one we were canonically shown, and with more leeway to do as he pleases.
All right, that's just freakish and disturbing. "What's with the Amish get-up?" he asked, keeping his voice low. "Does anybody else find it incredibly creepy?"
"It's not just you," Carter muttered from behind him.
"They are Genii leaders, from their homeworld," Emmagan explained.
Then Carter whispered, "What the-- Oh."
"What?" Rodney looked again. He stopped, Carter bumping into him.
Below, at the front of the room, a man he easily recognized as Kolya stood with some of his guards. He was wearing a leather coat straight out of an Italian western. But that wasn't what had caught Carter's attention.
The nearest door was open, and more men were dragging in a tall figure, heavily chained. It had dead white hair, blue skin, alien distorted features. It snarled and the entire room cringed back. Kolya laughed. As I said before, it's a room full of Genii allies, and here is Kolya, having a laugh because they're all cringing away from this gothic horror he's in control of. It's a childish and thug-like preen-of-power he's indulging in.
I thought this Wraith was Todd on my first read, but we find out later that Todd happily went to his death a Free Wraith after he and Sheppard escaped. He did not wish to live without his people and, as in the episode, he was happy at that point to die under an open sky. ::tears up a bit:: Oh, Todd! We hardly knew ye!
Rodney felt his skin crawl. He had seen Wraith in holograms and images in the Ancient database. Somehow none of it had prepared him for the reality. Below the Wraith jerked its head up, fighting the chains, sniffing the air. It knows we're up here, he thought suddenly, sick. It knows where every human in this room is.
Ahead, Sheppard had stopped too, frozen like a statue. A little bit of PSTD causing John to freeze in place; Teyla has seen this before and moves quickly to snap him out of it. Emmagan grabbed his arm and spoke urgently, too low for Rodney to hear. Sheppard twitched and started to move again. Carter gave Rodney a shove and he jerked himself into motion, following hurriedly.
They had reached the opposite doorway when shouting from below made Rodney freeze again. He heard Kolya yelling something about the prisoners, then Dex shoved Rodney through the doorway.
"Move, come on," Sheppard snapped, and they were running down a corridor.
"They know we're gone," Carter said, a little breathless. "Dammit."
"Kolya must have sent for us." Hurrying to keep up, Rodney followed that thought to its logical conclusion. He stared at her, appalled. "He brought that thing into the room and he sent for us!"
Carter grimaced in agreement. "Your timing couldn't be better," she told Teyla.
Sheppard jolted to a sudden halt, holding up a fist. Carter, Emmagan, and Dex stopped immediately. Rodney tripped and stumbled into the wall. Sheppard said, "Timing could have been a little better." He was frowning at the life-signs detector. "They're spreading out, they're between us and the jumper."
"Can you activate the quarantine?" Rodney demanded. "Don't tell me you won't stoop to that because there's some freakish reason involving the pirate code?"
That got Sheppard's attention. He looked sharply at Rodney. "Quarantine?"
"Pirate code?" Dex repeated. His expression suggested that Rodney could not have sounded more insane if he had suddenly slapped on a clown hat and started singing an aria. What? John didn't tell you about the pirate code?! I'm not surprised, he didn't even know why they call it a Jolly Roger.
Ignoring him, Rodney said, "What, you don't know about the quarantine?" All the cool kids are doin' the quarantine! You can do it, too, John!
Carter explained in a rush, "Activating it will close all the interior hatches. The protocols will let an Ancient gene carrier through, but anyone else would have to open the wall consoles and pull the crystals -- would the Genii know how to do that?"
"Yes." Emmagan gave her a tight nod. "They raid many Ancestor sites, they would know how to force the doors. But it would take them time."
Sheppard hesitated. "I don't know how to turn on the quarantine. It's not in the regular system?"
"It's an upper level protocol." Trying to sound reasonable and persuasive, Carter said, "Find a terminal and we'll show you how to activate it." I think "reasonable" is my default Carter. I've watched the show since day one, and feel that if a writer doesn't get that Carter is one of the most reasonable human beings who ever lived, she's being written OOC. OTOH, Carter kinda sucks at manipulation, so when she tries to be persuasive (or manipulative), as she is here, it's always pretty obvious and a little amusing. She's too open and honest for it to come off as anything but unnatural to her, which is I think why the author points it out. She's "trying" to sound persuasive, as opposed to just sounding persuasive.
Rodney was past reasonable and persuasive and into hysterical rage. Sheppard was staring at the wall, biting his lip, and Rodney wanted to see that as stubborn stupidity. I'm actually pretty interested as to what might be going through John's mind at this exact point. I think Rodney nails it. But he remembered the smiling traders and how fast an ostensibly friendly conversation about Ancient artifacts had turned into a kidnapping, how they had dragged him and Carter off to the Genii, knowing they were handing them over to a life of servitude, with or without bonus torture. He knew what Sheppard was afraid of. He said furiously, "You think we'd try to hand you over to Kolya in exchange for our freedom? We're not idiots, he'd never let us go!"
Dex and Emmagan turned as one, glaring at him with grim suspicion. Yeah, that wasn't what they were thinking until Rodney said it. Now they're thinkin' it. The expression in Sheppard's eyes went from undecided to an icy opacity that Rodney knew was way more dangerous than the open anger of the other two. This is the patented Sheppard "hotass" look; always a surprise given how many "adorkable" looks he goes through before he gets to it. Carter shook her head at the ceiling and said, "God, Rodney."
All right, maybe he had spelled that out a little too clearly. He added rapidly, "Besides, we're not the kind of people who would do something like that! You let us out of that cell, and you say you'll let us go if we help you, and so far we have no reason not to believe you, though of course if we did--"
"Rodney!" Carter said in exasperation. She turned to the others. "We want out of here, you want to take us out of here. Let us help you do that."
A shout from somewhere up the corridor decided the matter. In an even reasonable tone that somehow conveyed pure murderous intent, Sheppard said, "All right. But if you screw us, you're not going to live to see Kolya."
Rodney believed him. Yeah, I do, too. This is the John we've seen in episodes like The Storm and The Eye. His "reasonable" tone is a façade that covers the killer in him, waiting to be unleashed.
***
Congratulations, you've survived Rodney POV and are back in John POV. This section has a strong sense of suppressed excitement that explodes into action when the bullets start flying.
John's nerves were jumping and he kept thinking he could smell Wraith. The quarantine thing had worked like Carter said it would, shutting all the interior hatches, but opening them one by one when John touched the wall console. He just hoped the Genii didn't have an Ancient gene carrier strong enough to trigger the doors. And no Genii had intercepted them yet, so Carter and McKay hadn't sent some kind of message through the system to Kolya. Yep, that was what was going through his mind before.
He hoped. And he hoped none of the Genii figured out where they were heading fast enough to stop them.
If Kolya caught them, it would be like Ford all over again, only with Ronon and Teyla the ones tortured to get John's cooperation. So, we are granted a brief window on how that went down.
Finally they reached the access corridor to the jumper bay. John put his hand on the console, hoping this wasn't the one door that would refuse to respond. Despite his generally crappy luck, This is a running theme of John POV, he sees himself as some sort of sadsack loser, perennially out of luck. He never stops to think that he's the only survivor of that huge battle in Antarctica, and one of the very few prisoners who have escaped the clutches of the Genii, and that he had the great good luck to come upon the Athosians. If anything, his luck is really rather stellar. it started to slide open just like the rest had. "This is it," Teyla told McKay and Carter in relief. "Our ship is--"
Ronon spun around, jerking his weapon up, pointing it toward the interior door across the corridor, directly opposite the hatch into the bay. "Genii," he said.
A second later John heard it too -- someone was cracking open the wall console on the other side of that doorway.
"We didn't do it!" McKay said frantically. "That wasn't us! We--"
"I know that," John interrupted. The bay hatch was slowly opening, stretching his nerves to the breaking point. "They're not stupid, they're checking all the small ship bays." The Genii had just gotten lucky.
The bay hatch opened just as the Genii got their door to slide reluctantly upward. John jerked up the P90, and he and Teyla sprayed the Genii at the door with a sustained burst. The Genii dropped, others falling back.
"Go, go!" John triggered the jumper's remote, and Ronon shoved Carter and McKay through into the bay. More Genii appeared in the doorway and John and Teyla fired again, driving them back. John motioned Teyla to go, then bolted through the hatch after her, hitting the wall console to close it.
The jumper's ramp was opening smoothly and McKay shouted, sounding outraged, "You have a gateship? How did you get a--" Once John gets to Atlantis, you wanna bet everybody immediately starts picking up the expression 'puddlejumper' instead of gateship?
"Get aboard!" John yelled.
Everybody scrambled up the ramp. The jumper was already powering up around him as John reached the cockpit, dropping into the pilot's seat. Ronon hit the switch to close the ramp and John waited, tight knots of tension forming all over his body, for the jumper to pressurize and send the command to open the outer bay doors.
Something was trying to override them, probably whoever was outside the inner hatch, trying to pry it open. But the old warship decided to listen to the jumper instead, and the outer doors started to cycle apart. The bay's interior hatch slid open a little and John caught a glimpse of stunned faces just as he hit the cloak. The jumper rose and dropped backward out of the bay, into clean space. When it comes to matters of ATA and Ancient tech, John has the decided upper hand. It always likes him better.
Genii ships buzzed around, looking for something to shoot at, but John guided the cloaked jumper around and through them, right past their sensor ports. "Oh my God," McKay muttered, and Ronon dragged him out of the cockpit. Rodney may well be unaware of the jumper's capabilities. I am reminded of canon-AU Jack yelling, "THERE'S A CLOAK!?" to Daniel in ancient Egypt in one of the Mobius episodes--he'd been using the Milky Way jumper for days and yet hadn't known about the cloak, and the ship had taken a lot of shots because of it. It takes testing and using to figure out what the jumpers can do and these AU Atlanteans may not have gotten that far without John.
"Sheppard." The voice came from the comm system. It was Kolya. "Sheppard, I know it's you. Did you miss me? I knew you'd come back."
Eek! See, at this point, I started to get a very bad buzz from this version of Kolya. There's something even creepier about him than the one we were presented with canonically. Somewhere along the way, I came to the conclusion that John may have been raped by Kolya, and my mind doesn't usually go there when I'm reading fanfic. The unwholesomeness of Kolya plus John's intensity suggests that this was taken down to a level of personal that even goes past the torture and death of Ford. YMMV.
"Do not answer him," Teyla said from behind John.
"I know. He wants to fix our position with the comm," John said. He set their heading for the asteroid and the Vengeance of Athos, thinking, it's always going to be me, Kolya. Right to the end. John's reaction seems very reasonable on the surface, but he's got a lot going on in his head that he doesn't let Teyla see, and it's very intense.
***
McKay had made covetous noises about the jumper all the way back. Odd; if he has access to all the puddle jumpers his little heart desires in Atlantis, why does he covet this one? I just get the feeling McKay & Carter have been to Atlantis, I do not think he and Carter were kidnapped or lost before the Daedalus had reached the city. But this *is* Rodney, it's likely he's just being typically greedy and wants the entire set. But having given this some thought, I remembered that John's puddle jumper isn't an Atlantis puddle jumper: it's a puddle jumper he brought with him from the Milky Way, so it would be Janus' most updated model of that form of ship. Presumably it's the same as the one SG-1 jaunted all over time and space in, in one of our canonical AUs.... and hey, wasn't there a time machine installed as an extra in the Milky Way puddle jumper? I wonder if this one comes equipped with a time machine, but since John doesn't know what it does, he hasn't messed with it! I googled "Stargate puddle jumpers" and was surprised to find nobody, not even Wikipedia, has a truly comprehensive entry on the subject. To be comprehensive, they'd have to have a timeline that incorporates puddle jumpers from both series/both galaxies and exactly what they were used for/their capabilities. Some of the entries I saw didn't even mention Janus, the inventor! If John hadn't been the only one with the Ancient gene, he would have been tempted to chain it up once they landed safely in Vengeance's hold.
The Vengeance had already lifted off the asteroid by the time John and the others reached the bridge. Zoe was in the pilot's chair with Adrat in the shotgun seat. As John stepped up behind her, she said, "We ready to leave?"
John nodded. "Get us out of here. The neighborhood's getting crowded."
The course was already plotted. Zoe took the ship up and out of the larger debris field. John watched the HUD, seeing the Genii were too far behind them and too slow. The sensors picked up a few distant bursts from weapons and a lot of yelling on the comm as the Vengeance slid smoothly into hyper. Later, losers!
Everybody breathed out in relief. Zoe turned her seat around, lifting a brow inquiringly. "I take it things went well?"
"Mostly." John glanced around. McKay and Carter had followed them up to the bridge, and were looking around curiously. Ronon had dropped into the chair at the sensor suite, stretching his long legs out, and Teyla was standing at the hatch with Selana.
John started to introduce the newcomers to Zoe and the others, when McKay said suddenly, "Why the hell are there bloody handprints on the console?" He pointed, glaring around at them all, suspicious and appalled. "You people believe the ATA is activated by some sort of human sacrifice? What the hell is--"
For God's sake, John thought wearily. "It's the only way to keep our Ancient tech working when I'm not here." He held up his scarred hand.
"That's barbaric!" McKay recoiled in horror, then he stepped closer, suddenly interested. "Does it actually work?" Could be worse, Rodney; it could be vomit (see Farscape episode "Lava's A Many Splendored Thing")
John gave him the fake smile that had helped drive some of his toughest COs to sputtering rage. "No, I'm a masochist and they're enablers."
McKay folded his arms, and said witheringly, "Yes, I know, but does it actually work?"
Teyla rolled her eyes, and made her voice polite and firm. "Selana, show our guests to the common room, where they may rest."
"This way," Selana said, in a tone that didn't permit argument. Carter took McKay's arm and dragged him after her.
Zoe looked up at John. "Can I kill him?"
"Dibs," Ronon said.
John dropped into the chair at the comm console, suddenly aware of just how tired he was. Tension made every muscle in his body ache. He tilted his head back to squint narrowly at Ronon. "You can't call dibs after she asks." Omigod, John totally taught Ronon the Earth-concept of "dibs", didn't he! The same way Ronon has picked up saying, "Whatever" from John canonically on the show!
Ronon snorted. "Stupid rule."
Teyla gave them all a tired but indulgent smile. "After they help us with our systems, they will probably wish to leave." Sadly, one of them is going to want to take a parting gift with him.
John could hope.
***
Everybody else drifted off to clean up, but John stayed in the cockpit, avoiding their guests. But after a while three different people came by to tell him dinner was ready, -- because everyone knows John needs looking-after! -- it was actually Telan's watch, and John had fiddled with everything he could fiddle with while the ship was in flight. And he was hungry. He gave in and went down the length of the ship to the common room.
It was a slightly larger compartment, metal walls softened by a couple of colorful Athosian wall-hangings. Everyone off-duty was sitting down to dinner, either at the round tables or on the furs and woolly goat pelts draping the bench seats and the floor.
John dropped onto a bench at the far side of the room from where Deona was ushering McKay and Carter into seats. Itasa brought John a plate and sat next to him, eyeing their guests suspiciously. John was glad he wasn't the only one.
Dinner was baked toba root with gravy and cora greens. John had stopped craving junk food a while back, but he still found the Athosian food dull. Zoe loved it, but then she said where she came from they had usually been too poor to afford fresh vegetables and fruit. Not a lot of meat, I notice.
John had been hoping nobody would talk to him, but apparently his ability to project an aura of "leave me the hell alone" was broken today. McKay took the offered seat at a table and immediately asked him, "Do you have coffee?" John stared at him and he added, "Just thought I'd ask. What, didn't you bring anything from Earth?" Jeez, this is right up there with chummily trying to force a glass of wine on someone you don't know (only to find out you've been trying to force wine on an alcoholic) or asking, "so, why don't you two have kids?" of a married couple and finding out they are most painfully unfertile and have spent thousands trying to conceive. Rodney has majorly put his foot in his mouth here, I'm just sayin'.
Ignoring him, Teyla smiled, determinedly polite, and asked Carter, "Where did you come from?"
"A planet called Earth, in the Milky Way," Carter said. Her ironic glance at John suggested she knew that they had heard of it before. "We came here on a ship with some others, but we were separated from them." She doesn't mention Atlantis, but of course she wouldn't. Like I said, I do think she and Rodney have, in fact, been on Atlantis. But one way or another, she doesn't elaborate much on the tale in any way and once again, the pirates are too polite to break the pirate code and ask.
"It is a terrible thing to be separated from your people," Calena, Itasa's twin sister, said, then she turned pale with realization. She turned to John, Ronon, and Zoe. "I am sorry."
Ronon shrugged, but flicked a brief smile at her. Zoe's smile was more rueful. "It's all right." She fixed an ironic gaze on McKay. "It's not like you were praising rope in the house of the hanged." That line captures the feel of the dialogue on Firefly perfectly.
"Speaking of which--" McKay leaned forward, staring hard at John. "Can we please talk about the gigantic elephant in the room?"
"No," Ronon said, around a mouthful of toba root. …and what's an 'elephant', anyways?
Ignoring him, McKay continued, "Where did you come from, Sheppard?"
Why the hell not, John thought. He kept his expression laconic, and deliberately echoed Carter, "A planet called Earth, in the Milky Way." He added, "I came here on a ship, with two other people. One bled out on the way to Pegasus, Kolya killed the other because he didn't have the Ancient gene." He deliberately ate another bite of toba root. "Happy?"
McKay frowned. "Not really."
"So how did you end up with Kolya?" John countered. Rodney was rude enough to ask so it seems to make it okay for John to ask a pointed question in return.
McKay began, "Well, as you saw, we weren't with him--"
Carter interrupted, "We were on a planet called Denabi, at a big trading market, looking for Ancient artifacts. We were told to go to a certain trader who had a good collection. Well, he did. He also knocked us out with some kind of stunweapon and when we woke up, we were prisoners on a Genii ship." Her expression was resigned. "Somehow I have the feeling we're not the first people to fall for this."
Teyla nodded, watching Carter with some sympathy. "It is a common Genii trap. Kolya is constantly searching for travelers who study the Ancients." She tilted her head inquiringly. "Was that where you were separated from your people?"
"It was earlier," McKay said, brisk and abrupt. A guilty wince briefly crossed Carter's face and she poked at her food. We never do get the story on this. In retrospect, the fact that McKay and Carter didn't have some young, strapping marines (as Jack likes to refer to them) or Teal'c with them to guard them on an alien planet, and they were wandering around alone, is a pretty strong indication that they were already, for some reason, lost in space when they were grabbed. Odd, because apparently they were looking for Ancient devices rather than trying to find their way home, and why they didn't just dial a gate home to Atlantis, assuming these two have been on Atlantis, I can't say. And from the wince, whatever happened was possibly, probably, Carter's fault. No idea what the hell could have happened with these two characters, scientists who are in their own way fairly non-adventurous outside a narrow definition. And what I mean by that is, it's not like Vala "Shenanigans R Us" Maldoran is with them. John wondered if the rest of their group was dead. Then McKay asked him, "So how did you become a pirate?"
Zoe's eyes narrowed in annoyance. "What about you," she asked McKay deliberately, obviously trying to get the spotlight off John. "How did you learn all this Ancient technology?" Another running theme in this story has to do with communication: miscommunication, both purposeful and accidental, and the dangers of *not* sharing information. You could say this universe seems to run on a "Don't ask, don't tell" basis. Note how Rodney in this instance flies in the face of Zoe's expectation and does his usual TMI, as willing to give info as he is to demand it. Zoe, annoyed, genuinely thought she was being rude; she *hoped* to offend. There's definitely a pirate code in effect here, where people are allowed to ask some questions but not press for others, and the people they are questioning get to keep it to themselves if they so choose.
Except that Zoe had miscalculated, forgetting that not everybody was as reticent about their past as they were. McKay immediately launched into a complete description of his education and career, with a litany of place-names like MIT, Caltech, Area 51, and Siberia. John got up to take his plate to the galley and fled through the maintenance passage back up toward the bridge. He stopped in the small bay where there was a port looking out on the starfield, distorted and streaked by the hyperspace drive. He just leaned on the bulkhead and stared out at it.
He knew McKay wasn't puffing up those credentials, he was the real thing, and so was Carter. They had real Ancient tech experts, finally, after all this time; John should be ecstatic. Well, he would have been ecstatic, if they had been Suderians.
Maybe he just wasn't ready for all the baggage that came with memories of Earth. Capping off his career disaster by being caught up in the Trust raids, and having to fight his way into the escape plan since Sumner was so damn sure that John would go over to the other side at the first opportunity. This AU Sumner is the King of all Asshats, if he thinks John going back to save men against orders = a guy who'd eventually go over to the other side, especially given that John has been diagnosed by the other side as having the gene, and is therefore considered an alien by them. OTOH, if Sumner had been even the least bit reasonable, John would have died in Antarctica along with everyone else on the two BC303s. Then the stunned horror when John and Ford had realized that their jumper was the only ship to make it through the supergate. Burying Janet on an alien planet, under a sky with three moons.
Their first alien contact had been on a planet with a big market, like the one on Denabi that Carter had described. They had been lucky, and it had gone well, and for a while they had gone from stargate to stargate, partly making a living as traders, partly just exploring. Each alien planet was like a revelation, terrifying and fascinating. Then the Genii had found them.
After John had escaped from Kolya, he had been crazy, hell-bent on killing Genii wherever he found them, and feeling like something damaged that just needed to be thrown away. Yeah, see that? That sets off all my alarm bells. I just feel there's more to that feeling of being "damaged" than just being captured and seeing your friend threatened, hurt, and then killed in front of you; that's being raped, or maybe that's having your friend's life-force stolen from him and shoved into you, which is another kind of rape. But John's mind shies away from detailed memories, and nobody talks about it, so we will never know the details, only suspect them. Of course, this could be a classic case of horror not shown being far more horrible for being only in the reader's mind! Teyla and Halling and the others had brought him back from that, and he owed them everything. So get over it and make nice with the Ancient tech experts you risked everybody's lives to find, he told himself, disgusted at his own weakness.
John didn't know how long he had been there when Teyla's footsteps on the metal deck brought him back to awareness. She stepped into the bay, leaning against the other side of the port. John stirred, asking, "Everything okay?"
"They are settling in." She added with some irony, "They seem like good people, though Dr. McKay is very inquisitive. I hope we can come to trust them." She hesitated, watching him. "Is it very difficult for you, having them here?"
John leaned his forehead against the cold metal. "Once we get them to fix the cloak for us, show us how some of the other stuff works, they can leave. We'll give them the gate addresses for the Keran Reach, that'll get them out of Kolya's territory."
Teyla smiled ruefully. "That did not answer my question." Oh, yeah; like John's gonna answer a question about his emotions without you forcing him, Teyla. Nobody answers questions in this story, and now that I think of it, hardly anyone is asking the right ones.
"No, yeah, it doesn't matter." He admitted, "It's just...weird." He knew Teyla didn't get it, exactly. He knew if she was in his situation and suddenly ran into two Athosian survivors, she would have welcomed them with open arms, not tried to strategize a way to give them the bum's rush out of her life as quickly as possible. But one of the things he liked most about Teyla was that she didn't have to share your feelings to understand. Again, John as someone who doesn't want to share, even if it's just his feelings. He's found himself among people who do not pry, and that was what he needed for a while. He's content, but he's also static, stuck in place emotionally. He needs his own people to kick him in the ass and get him moving again, and it's going to be painful, but it's got to be done if he's ever going to heal.
She just shook her head and said, "Go and get some rest. We will keep watch."
"Yeah," John agreed reluctantly. "You too. Don't stay up all night."
"I will not." She smiled gently, and he went back to the crew quarters, several tiny compartments with stacked bunks joined by a single corridor. The lights were turned low and most of the off-duty crew had already turned in. John ducked under several curtains of laundry -- just because Athosian women could kick ass didn't mean they didn't like silky things and lacy tops GLEE!-- making his way to the little room where Ronon was draped across a top bunk like a sleeping lion. He opened one eye in a suspicious squint when John came in, grunted an acknowledgement, and went back to sleep. John didn't bother to undress, just took off his boots and coiled his gunbelt up beside his pillow. He lay down in the scent of clean wool and incense, wide awake, listening to the others' deep breathing and Ronon's quiet snores. Awww! John's doing bunkbeds with Ronon. Cute! But poor John is unable to sleep. He doesn't feel safe, his safe place is threatened by these lousy interloping Earthers who are shaking things up. Cheer up, John; things usually get worse before they get better.
***
Wheeee! Back to Rodney's POV! It's short….
"What are we going to do?" Rodney hissed, pacing their quarters. It was a small cabin, with two bunks and a miniscule attached bath smaller than a closet, but even he had to admit it wasn't that unpleasant. Someone had painted abstract designs on the metal walls, and there was a knitted rug on the deck and afghans on the beds. It's the exact opposite of the cool, blue/white, sleekly modern Ancient ship.
"Rodney." Sam, stretched out on the lower bunk, eyed him with a certain degree of impatience. "This morning I woke up in a twelve by twelve cell, with you, and no bathroom facilities. I can think of a number of fangirls for whom that would be the very definition of nirvana. Okay, maybe not the no-bathroom part. Now I've had a dinner that tasted like turnips in rice pudding, we have a place to sleep with clean bedding, a shower, I've been loaned clean underwear, and no one's even holding a gun on me. I'm not going to do anything at the moment."
"So we're just going to sit here on this flying commune of lesbian separatist pirates ::is appalled at Rodney's lack of PC:: and do nothing?" Rodney grimaced, waving a hand in frustration. "He's the strongest Ancient gene carrier we've ever seen. Stronger than O'Neill."
"I know. And we do nothing." Carter rubbed her eyes tiredly. "For now." Oh, Carter; if you weren't so exhausted, you could have nipped this in the bud right here.
***
Avast, ye scurvy dogs! We're about a third of the way through! Now it gets complicated.
Rot7S Commentary Part 3
***
Author: ltlj
Fandom: SGA
Commentator: teenygozer
Story without DVD commentary: Right here!
***
Rot7S Commentary Part 1
The clock was ticking and they only had so long now before one of the dead crewmen was missed or a radio check-in to the brig went unanswered. But when they left the brig and reached the transporter/elevator, the life-signs detector showed a sudden influx of blips, congregating on the decks above them.
"This isn't good," John muttered, studying the screen.
Jittering with nervous energy, McKay snapped, "No kidding, Captain Blood."
Captain Blood! Starring Errol Flynn and Olivia DeHaviland as the leads and Basil Rathbone as the baddie, it's a bit like a sea-worthy version of Robin Hood, which was filmed 3 years later. It's got a handsome doctor who is sold into slavery for doctoring a wounded rebel friend, who is subsequently purchased by Olivia's character. He rallies his fellow slaves and they all escape, steal a ship, and become pirates. Oddly, though the movie was filmed in black and white, I always seem to remember it in a sort of Technicolor Panovision. It's really the only film I can think of that absolutely ought to be colorized. The advertising taglines:
THE MOST MAGNIFICENT & THRILLING SEA ADVENTURE EVER FILMED
A million dollars worth of adventure!
To do justice in words to its fascination is impossible!
His sword carved his name across the continents - and his glory across the seas!
Oooh, bad graphics. I've seen better manips done by high school students. I had a "his hed is pastede on yay!" moment seeing poor chubby-cheeked Errol on this poster.
...I love this movie but I think the ad goes a bit... er, overboard in its wacky praise. I particularly like the clunkiness of ad copy like "To do justice in words to its fascination is impossible!" I think what they were trying to say was that the awesomeness of the movie could not be textually rendered.
Here is the more recent VHS and DVD cover -- more modern-looking in its graphic design. I'm guessing the red is meant to suggest blood! That's a bit literal for my taste.
"That's Major Blood," John snapped back automatically, then thought, okay, mistake. He wasn't used to guarding what he said; with the others it didn't matter. This tiny bit of John & Rodney back-and-forth is quite a workhorse. We start with a nod to the canonical running gag about John correcting Rodney on his rank from second season, plus the likewise canonical running gag about John and Rodney nerd-talking about action movies, plus the author snuck in a pirate-movie joke, plus it introduces the plot point of John having been in the military being revealed to Rodney & Sam, plus it shows us that he doesn't want anyone to know about his time in the military, plus it shows us how things have already started changing for John in that he has to watch what he says now. So yeah, good couple of sentences there.
Carter just glanced at him, sharp and thoughtful. But McKay demanded, "You were a major? In what?"
John gritted his teeth. "What does it matter?"
Maybe some of John's impulse to just kill him rather than answer his question got across Yeah, I think I've seen that particular look over in the face_of_joe community., because McKay backed down. He folded his arms, lifting his chin. "It doesn't. I'm just trying to make polite conversation."
"You are not very good at it," Teyla told him, her voice dry.
"Tell me about it," Carter said wearily.
"There's more coming in," Ronon said, pointedly dragging everybody's attention back to the matter at hand. "If they know we're down here, why aren't they heading this way?"
He was right. John took long strides back to a computer terminal in the corridor wall, activating it and going straight into the ATA interface. Ronon stood back to watch the corridor while the others gathered around him. The schematic popped up in response to John's urgent thought, diagramming the new life-signs all over the ship. McKay jumped a little as it appeared, staring incredulously and with more than a little jealousy, because without John's gene, apparently there's been no gene therapy for anyone. He said, "How do you know how to do that? Who are you?"
His voice an annoyed growl, Ronon answered, "He's Sheppard, I'm Dex. Now shut up."
John ignored the byplay. He could see the big bay they had avoided was now occupied, that a Genii ship must have docked in it. The life-signs were gathering just a deck above this one, in a large area that might be a conference room. But the signs weren't staying put, they were wandering in and out, up and down the connected corridors. "What the hell are they doing, having a party?" …um, yes? And it's one you don't wanna be invited to.
Carter frowned suddenly. "Oh, wait. Kolya said something--"
"--about meeting some people, by which he meant showing us off to his cronies," McKay finished grimly. "This must be it."
John winced. "Crap." Kolya wanted to show his prisoners off, demonstrate his power to his allies by proving that he now had someone to make his Ancient tech work.
"You could have mentioned it earlier," Teyla pointed out with some acerbity.
"Well he didn't say when he was having the party," McKay told her in exasperation. "He didn't exactly give us an engraved dinner invitation."
"It was more like we were going to be the dessert," Carter said, studying the schematic intently. "Where are we trying to get to, exactly?"
John knew she was the one to watch. McKay was noisy and aggressive, but something about Carter made him suspect she was military. From the way Teyla was watching Carter, she thought so too. Yet they never seem to come right out and *ask*! I'm beginning to think that these guys are less like pirates and more like the Foreign Legion, where you go to escape your past and nobody asks who you are. He let the schematic highlight the smaller jumper bay and said, "Our ship, here." The corridor accessing the bay was clear, but the nearest transporter on that deck was too close to where people were entering for Kolya's little get-together.
"Can we get up there from another point and reach it from the other direction?" Carter asked immediately. "Is that a transporter or just an elevator?" Okay, that's something of a tip-off right there that Carter has been to Atlantis (though I suppose she could have seen transporters in one of the Ancient ruins she and Rodney were exploring.) But she definitely recognizes the transporters for what they are.
"It is a transporter, though the Genii do not seem to know of that function," Teyla said. "We have only known them to use them as elevators."
John couldn't see any other option. "We'll go here," He picked out a transporter on the far end of the jumper bay's deck, "and work our way back around." I'll bet it's rather fabulous for everyone to see these 3D maps in the air being CGI'd by John. I can only imagine that it looks almost magical, and Rodney is jealous beyond words.
***
We are now entering McKay POV territory! God help us!
This next bit is so exciting, I have trouble concentrating enough to comment on it, preferring to just read it.
Rodney was beginning to think they were out of the frying pan and into the blast furnace. "How do we know they aren't tracking us?" he whispered, grimacing as he flattened himself against the corridor wall. They had just had to duck yet another group of Genii, apparently wandering the ship sight-seeing. Carter and Teyla Emmagan were huddled behind another wall on the other side of the cross-corridor. "They could have life-signs detectors too."
He didn't know what to think about Sheppard. He had heard the stories about Athosian pirates, and if someone had asked him what he thought one would look like, he would have picked Emmagan out of a line-up. Hot woman, terrifyingly self-possessed, heavily armed, dressed in leather, check. Dex, the cave man with all the knives and hair, also met expectations. Sheppard, an Earth human with the Ancient gene so strong that even the half-fried computers on this dying ship did tricks for him, didn't fit. Neither did the fact that he was probably military, with pretty boy looks and spiky hair and something burning him up inside. It was so obvious that even Rodney had noticed it, and that was saying something. I must confess that at this point, with the references to John's boyish good looks and something "burning him up inside", I wondered if Kolya had tortured John by stealing Ford's youth and shoving it into John via Wraith. Because I cannot think of much that would more horrify John than to have youth and health because of that poor kid's stolen life-force inside him, and that it would burn him up with guilt. John never shares the details of Ford's demise and how it went down with anyone and barely allows himself to even think about it, so we will never know.
Sheppard threw him an acid look. It's actually a very good question, and there really wasn't any other way for Rodney to know. But John (now "Sheppard" as we're in Rodney's POV) has taken a dislike to McKay for his prying ways and even an innocent question is met with distrust and anger. "The Genii don't have anybody with the Ancient gene strong enough to initialize the internal sensors or use a detector."
Rodney rolled his eyes. "How the hell was I supposed to know that?" he pointed out.
"You could ask." Sheppard had a very sarcastic drawl.
"I did ask!" Rodney put as much outrage as possible into his whisper.
"And I answered you." Seriously, Rodney had no idea how four words could get across that much sarcastic disdain.
"Then why are we arguing?" Rodney snarled.
Because you are John and Rodney, and it's what you do.
Sheppard glared. "I don't know!"
Dex ducked back around the corner. "Clear."
"Thank God," Sheppard muttered, and they were moving again.
They made it through another two corridors, past smooth blue-white walls gleaming in the low light, silver stanchions, devices Rodney didn't recognize that there was no time to examine. They had to stop again when the life-signs detector showed a large group of people ahead. Rodney was sweating in the cool air, and this whole escape felt highly improbable.
Sheppard sent Dex to scout ahead, and in a few moments he came back to report, "That corridor turns into a balcony, going across a big meeting room. It's high enough that we can cross it without them seeing us." He shrugged. "It's the closest way."
Sheppard and Emmagan looked at each other, appearing to share a moment of telepathic communication. Then Sheppard said, "Let's go."
After only a few more turns, they reached the room Dex had described. The corridor turned into a gallery, fortunately with a solid silver rail up to waist-height, and above that decorative metal slats in fan-shaped patterns. Sheppard and Emmagan started across first, Rodney following with Carter and Dex behind him. Amusingly, this reminded me of several of the fancier convention hotels I've been in, with a gallery over a ballroom or meeting room.
As they moved, noisy conversation from below covered any sound from their footsteps. Rodney risked an uneasy glance through the fan slats. The group in the room below was a mixed bag of men and women in the brown Genii uniforms, mercenaries in the leather outfits reminiscent of a bad SF movie, and a few people wearing robes or more ordinary clothes that might be business standard wear on other planets. But there was also a large group wearing what could only be described as 18th century farmer costumes. Except the people wearing them were just as heavily armed as the others. The contrast was a little...psychotic.
This is a picture of the Genii out and about in the galaxy without the strictures and pressures placed on their society by the Wraith. They turned out to be a very Nazi-like culture, with bully-boys in charge who throw around the weight of the power granted to them via their scavenged technology by destroying burgeoning cultures before they can pose a threat (not unlike what the Wraith do in canon) and even terrorizing their so-called allies. I cannot help but think that the Athosians were destroyed because they reached a certain level of tech, were perhaps "invited" to join the Genii Confenderacy (as in "I made them an offer they couldn't refuse"), they declined due to the Genii being Class D thugs, and the Genii attacked, destroying the Athosian civilization. I have to say, Kolya seems more depraved in this version, a Kolya with even less honor than the one we were canonically shown, and with more leeway to do as he pleases.
All right, that's just freakish and disturbing. "What's with the Amish get-up?" he asked, keeping his voice low. "Does anybody else find it incredibly creepy?"
"It's not just you," Carter muttered from behind him.
"They are Genii leaders, from their homeworld," Emmagan explained.
Then Carter whispered, "What the-- Oh."
"What?" Rodney looked again. He stopped, Carter bumping into him.
Below, at the front of the room, a man he easily recognized as Kolya stood with some of his guards. He was wearing a leather coat straight out of an Italian western. But that wasn't what had caught Carter's attention.
The nearest door was open, and more men were dragging in a tall figure, heavily chained. It had dead white hair, blue skin, alien distorted features. It snarled and the entire room cringed back. Kolya laughed. As I said before, it's a room full of Genii allies, and here is Kolya, having a laugh because they're all cringing away from this gothic horror he's in control of. It's a childish and thug-like preen-of-power he's indulging in.
I thought this Wraith was Todd on my first read, but we find out later that Todd happily went to his death a Free Wraith after he and Sheppard escaped. He did not wish to live without his people and, as in the episode, he was happy at that point to die under an open sky. ::tears up a bit:: Oh, Todd! We hardly knew ye!
Rodney felt his skin crawl. He had seen Wraith in holograms and images in the Ancient database. Somehow none of it had prepared him for the reality. Below the Wraith jerked its head up, fighting the chains, sniffing the air. It knows we're up here, he thought suddenly, sick. It knows where every human in this room is.
Ahead, Sheppard had stopped too, frozen like a statue. A little bit of PSTD causing John to freeze in place; Teyla has seen this before and moves quickly to snap him out of it. Emmagan grabbed his arm and spoke urgently, too low for Rodney to hear. Sheppard twitched and started to move again. Carter gave Rodney a shove and he jerked himself into motion, following hurriedly.
They had reached the opposite doorway when shouting from below made Rodney freeze again. He heard Kolya yelling something about the prisoners, then Dex shoved Rodney through the doorway.
"Move, come on," Sheppard snapped, and they were running down a corridor.
"They know we're gone," Carter said, a little breathless. "Dammit."
"Kolya must have sent for us." Hurrying to keep up, Rodney followed that thought to its logical conclusion. He stared at her, appalled. "He brought that thing into the room and he sent for us!"
Carter grimaced in agreement. "Your timing couldn't be better," she told Teyla.
Sheppard jolted to a sudden halt, holding up a fist. Carter, Emmagan, and Dex stopped immediately. Rodney tripped and stumbled into the wall. Sheppard said, "Timing could have been a little better." He was frowning at the life-signs detector. "They're spreading out, they're between us and the jumper."
"Can you activate the quarantine?" Rodney demanded. "Don't tell me you won't stoop to that because there's some freakish reason involving the pirate code?"
That got Sheppard's attention. He looked sharply at Rodney. "Quarantine?"
"Pirate code?" Dex repeated. His expression suggested that Rodney could not have sounded more insane if he had suddenly slapped on a clown hat and started singing an aria. What? John didn't tell you about the pirate code?! I'm not surprised, he didn't even know why they call it a Jolly Roger.
Ignoring him, Rodney said, "What, you don't know about the quarantine?" All the cool kids are doin' the quarantine! You can do it, too, John!
Carter explained in a rush, "Activating it will close all the interior hatches. The protocols will let an Ancient gene carrier through, but anyone else would have to open the wall consoles and pull the crystals -- would the Genii know how to do that?"
"Yes." Emmagan gave her a tight nod. "They raid many Ancestor sites, they would know how to force the doors. But it would take them time."
Sheppard hesitated. "I don't know how to turn on the quarantine. It's not in the regular system?"
"It's an upper level protocol." Trying to sound reasonable and persuasive, Carter said, "Find a terminal and we'll show you how to activate it." I think "reasonable" is my default Carter. I've watched the show since day one, and feel that if a writer doesn't get that Carter is one of the most reasonable human beings who ever lived, she's being written OOC. OTOH, Carter kinda sucks at manipulation, so when she tries to be persuasive (or manipulative), as she is here, it's always pretty obvious and a little amusing. She's too open and honest for it to come off as anything but unnatural to her, which is I think why the author points it out. She's "trying" to sound persuasive, as opposed to just sounding persuasive.
Rodney was past reasonable and persuasive and into hysterical rage. Sheppard was staring at the wall, biting his lip, and Rodney wanted to see that as stubborn stupidity. I'm actually pretty interested as to what might be going through John's mind at this exact point. I think Rodney nails it. But he remembered the smiling traders and how fast an ostensibly friendly conversation about Ancient artifacts had turned into a kidnapping, how they had dragged him and Carter off to the Genii, knowing they were handing them over to a life of servitude, with or without bonus torture. He knew what Sheppard was afraid of. He said furiously, "You think we'd try to hand you over to Kolya in exchange for our freedom? We're not idiots, he'd never let us go!"
Dex and Emmagan turned as one, glaring at him with grim suspicion. Yeah, that wasn't what they were thinking until Rodney said it. Now they're thinkin' it. The expression in Sheppard's eyes went from undecided to an icy opacity that Rodney knew was way more dangerous than the open anger of the other two. This is the patented Sheppard "hotass" look; always a surprise given how many "adorkable" looks he goes through before he gets to it. Carter shook her head at the ceiling and said, "God, Rodney."
All right, maybe he had spelled that out a little too clearly. He added rapidly, "Besides, we're not the kind of people who would do something like that! You let us out of that cell, and you say you'll let us go if we help you, and so far we have no reason not to believe you, though of course if we did--"
"Rodney!" Carter said in exasperation. She turned to the others. "We want out of here, you want to take us out of here. Let us help you do that."
A shout from somewhere up the corridor decided the matter. In an even reasonable tone that somehow conveyed pure murderous intent, Sheppard said, "All right. But if you screw us, you're not going to live to see Kolya."
Rodney believed him. Yeah, I do, too. This is the John we've seen in episodes like The Storm and The Eye. His "reasonable" tone is a façade that covers the killer in him, waiting to be unleashed.
***
Congratulations, you've survived Rodney POV and are back in John POV. This section has a strong sense of suppressed excitement that explodes into action when the bullets start flying.
John's nerves were jumping and he kept thinking he could smell Wraith. The quarantine thing had worked like Carter said it would, shutting all the interior hatches, but opening them one by one when John touched the wall console. He just hoped the Genii didn't have an Ancient gene carrier strong enough to trigger the doors. And no Genii had intercepted them yet, so Carter and McKay hadn't sent some kind of message through the system to Kolya. Yep, that was what was going through his mind before.
He hoped. And he hoped none of the Genii figured out where they were heading fast enough to stop them.
If Kolya caught them, it would be like Ford all over again, only with Ronon and Teyla the ones tortured to get John's cooperation. So, we are granted a brief window on how that went down.
Finally they reached the access corridor to the jumper bay. John put his hand on the console, hoping this wasn't the one door that would refuse to respond. Despite his generally crappy luck, This is a running theme of John POV, he sees himself as some sort of sadsack loser, perennially out of luck. He never stops to think that he's the only survivor of that huge battle in Antarctica, and one of the very few prisoners who have escaped the clutches of the Genii, and that he had the great good luck to come upon the Athosians. If anything, his luck is really rather stellar. it started to slide open just like the rest had. "This is it," Teyla told McKay and Carter in relief. "Our ship is--"
Ronon spun around, jerking his weapon up, pointing it toward the interior door across the corridor, directly opposite the hatch into the bay. "Genii," he said.
A second later John heard it too -- someone was cracking open the wall console on the other side of that doorway.
"We didn't do it!" McKay said frantically. "That wasn't us! We--"
"I know that," John interrupted. The bay hatch was slowly opening, stretching his nerves to the breaking point. "They're not stupid, they're checking all the small ship bays." The Genii had just gotten lucky.
The bay hatch opened just as the Genii got their door to slide reluctantly upward. John jerked up the P90, and he and Teyla sprayed the Genii at the door with a sustained burst. The Genii dropped, others falling back.
"Go, go!" John triggered the jumper's remote, and Ronon shoved Carter and McKay through into the bay. More Genii appeared in the doorway and John and Teyla fired again, driving them back. John motioned Teyla to go, then bolted through the hatch after her, hitting the wall console to close it.
The jumper's ramp was opening smoothly and McKay shouted, sounding outraged, "You have a gateship? How did you get a--" Once John gets to Atlantis, you wanna bet everybody immediately starts picking up the expression 'puddlejumper' instead of gateship?
"Get aboard!" John yelled.
Everybody scrambled up the ramp. The jumper was already powering up around him as John reached the cockpit, dropping into the pilot's seat. Ronon hit the switch to close the ramp and John waited, tight knots of tension forming all over his body, for the jumper to pressurize and send the command to open the outer bay doors.
Something was trying to override them, probably whoever was outside the inner hatch, trying to pry it open. But the old warship decided to listen to the jumper instead, and the outer doors started to cycle apart. The bay's interior hatch slid open a little and John caught a glimpse of stunned faces just as he hit the cloak. The jumper rose and dropped backward out of the bay, into clean space. When it comes to matters of ATA and Ancient tech, John has the decided upper hand. It always likes him better.
Genii ships buzzed around, looking for something to shoot at, but John guided the cloaked jumper around and through them, right past their sensor ports. "Oh my God," McKay muttered, and Ronon dragged him out of the cockpit. Rodney may well be unaware of the jumper's capabilities. I am reminded of canon-AU Jack yelling, "THERE'S A CLOAK!?" to Daniel in ancient Egypt in one of the Mobius episodes--he'd been using the Milky Way jumper for days and yet hadn't known about the cloak, and the ship had taken a lot of shots because of it. It takes testing and using to figure out what the jumpers can do and these AU Atlanteans may not have gotten that far without John.
"Sheppard." The voice came from the comm system. It was Kolya. "Sheppard, I know it's you. Did you miss me? I knew you'd come back."
Eek! See, at this point, I started to get a very bad buzz from this version of Kolya. There's something even creepier about him than the one we were presented with canonically. Somewhere along the way, I came to the conclusion that John may have been raped by Kolya, and my mind doesn't usually go there when I'm reading fanfic. The unwholesomeness of Kolya plus John's intensity suggests that this was taken down to a level of personal that even goes past the torture and death of Ford. YMMV.
"Do not answer him," Teyla said from behind John.
"I know. He wants to fix our position with the comm," John said. He set their heading for the asteroid and the Vengeance of Athos, thinking, it's always going to be me, Kolya. Right to the end. John's reaction seems very reasonable on the surface, but he's got a lot going on in his head that he doesn't let Teyla see, and it's very intense.
***
McKay had made covetous noises about the jumper all the way back. Odd; if he has access to all the puddle jumpers his little heart desires in Atlantis, why does he covet this one? I just get the feeling McKay & Carter have been to Atlantis, I do not think he and Carter were kidnapped or lost before the Daedalus had reached the city. But this *is* Rodney, it's likely he's just being typically greedy and wants the entire set. But having given this some thought, I remembered that John's puddle jumper isn't an Atlantis puddle jumper: it's a puddle jumper he brought with him from the Milky Way, so it would be Janus' most updated model of that form of ship. Presumably it's the same as the one SG-1 jaunted all over time and space in, in one of our canonical AUs.... and hey, wasn't there a time machine installed as an extra in the Milky Way puddle jumper? I wonder if this one comes equipped with a time machine, but since John doesn't know what it does, he hasn't messed with it! I googled "Stargate puddle jumpers" and was surprised to find nobody, not even Wikipedia, has a truly comprehensive entry on the subject. To be comprehensive, they'd have to have a timeline that incorporates puddle jumpers from both series/both galaxies and exactly what they were used for/their capabilities. Some of the entries I saw didn't even mention Janus, the inventor! If John hadn't been the only one with the Ancient gene, he would have been tempted to chain it up once they landed safely in Vengeance's hold.
The Vengeance had already lifted off the asteroid by the time John and the others reached the bridge. Zoe was in the pilot's chair with Adrat in the shotgun seat. As John stepped up behind her, she said, "We ready to leave?"
John nodded. "Get us out of here. The neighborhood's getting crowded."
The course was already plotted. Zoe took the ship up and out of the larger debris field. John watched the HUD, seeing the Genii were too far behind them and too slow. The sensors picked up a few distant bursts from weapons and a lot of yelling on the comm as the Vengeance slid smoothly into hyper. Later, losers!
Everybody breathed out in relief. Zoe turned her seat around, lifting a brow inquiringly. "I take it things went well?"
"Mostly." John glanced around. McKay and Carter had followed them up to the bridge, and were looking around curiously. Ronon had dropped into the chair at the sensor suite, stretching his long legs out, and Teyla was standing at the hatch with Selana.
John started to introduce the newcomers to Zoe and the others, when McKay said suddenly, "Why the hell are there bloody handprints on the console?" He pointed, glaring around at them all, suspicious and appalled. "You people believe the ATA is activated by some sort of human sacrifice? What the hell is--"
For God's sake, John thought wearily. "It's the only way to keep our Ancient tech working when I'm not here." He held up his scarred hand.
"That's barbaric!" McKay recoiled in horror, then he stepped closer, suddenly interested. "Does it actually work?" Could be worse, Rodney; it could be vomit (see Farscape episode "Lava's A Many Splendored Thing")
John gave him the fake smile that had helped drive some of his toughest COs to sputtering rage. "No, I'm a masochist and they're enablers."
McKay folded his arms, and said witheringly, "Yes, I know, but does it actually work?"
Teyla rolled her eyes, and made her voice polite and firm. "Selana, show our guests to the common room, where they may rest."
"This way," Selana said, in a tone that didn't permit argument. Carter took McKay's arm and dragged him after her.
Zoe looked up at John. "Can I kill him?"
"Dibs," Ronon said.
John dropped into the chair at the comm console, suddenly aware of just how tired he was. Tension made every muscle in his body ache. He tilted his head back to squint narrowly at Ronon. "You can't call dibs after she asks." Omigod, John totally taught Ronon the Earth-concept of "dibs", didn't he! The same way Ronon has picked up saying, "Whatever" from John canonically on the show!
Ronon snorted. "Stupid rule."
Teyla gave them all a tired but indulgent smile. "After they help us with our systems, they will probably wish to leave." Sadly, one of them is going to want to take a parting gift with him.
John could hope.
***
Everybody else drifted off to clean up, but John stayed in the cockpit, avoiding their guests. But after a while three different people came by to tell him dinner was ready, -- because everyone knows John needs looking-after! -- it was actually Telan's watch, and John had fiddled with everything he could fiddle with while the ship was in flight. And he was hungry. He gave in and went down the length of the ship to the common room.
It was a slightly larger compartment, metal walls softened by a couple of colorful Athosian wall-hangings. Everyone off-duty was sitting down to dinner, either at the round tables or on the furs and woolly goat pelts draping the bench seats and the floor.
John dropped onto a bench at the far side of the room from where Deona was ushering McKay and Carter into seats. Itasa brought John a plate and sat next to him, eyeing their guests suspiciously. John was glad he wasn't the only one.
Dinner was baked toba root with gravy and cora greens. John had stopped craving junk food a while back, but he still found the Athosian food dull. Zoe loved it, but then she said where she came from they had usually been too poor to afford fresh vegetables and fruit. Not a lot of meat, I notice.
John had been hoping nobody would talk to him, but apparently his ability to project an aura of "leave me the hell alone" was broken today. McKay took the offered seat at a table and immediately asked him, "Do you have coffee?" John stared at him and he added, "Just thought I'd ask. What, didn't you bring anything from Earth?" Jeez, this is right up there with chummily trying to force a glass of wine on someone you don't know (only to find out you've been trying to force wine on an alcoholic) or asking, "so, why don't you two have kids?" of a married couple and finding out they are most painfully unfertile and have spent thousands trying to conceive. Rodney has majorly put his foot in his mouth here, I'm just sayin'.
Ignoring him, Teyla smiled, determinedly polite, and asked Carter, "Where did you come from?"
"A planet called Earth, in the Milky Way," Carter said. Her ironic glance at John suggested she knew that they had heard of it before. "We came here on a ship with some others, but we were separated from them." She doesn't mention Atlantis, but of course she wouldn't. Like I said, I do think she and Rodney have, in fact, been on Atlantis. But one way or another, she doesn't elaborate much on the tale in any way and once again, the pirates are too polite to break the pirate code and ask.
"It is a terrible thing to be separated from your people," Calena, Itasa's twin sister, said, then she turned pale with realization. She turned to John, Ronon, and Zoe. "I am sorry."
Ronon shrugged, but flicked a brief smile at her. Zoe's smile was more rueful. "It's all right." She fixed an ironic gaze on McKay. "It's not like you were praising rope in the house of the hanged." That line captures the feel of the dialogue on Firefly perfectly.
"Speaking of which--" McKay leaned forward, staring hard at John. "Can we please talk about the gigantic elephant in the room?"
"No," Ronon said, around a mouthful of toba root. …and what's an 'elephant', anyways?
Ignoring him, McKay continued, "Where did you come from, Sheppard?"
Why the hell not, John thought. He kept his expression laconic, and deliberately echoed Carter, "A planet called Earth, in the Milky Way." He added, "I came here on a ship, with two other people. One bled out on the way to Pegasus, Kolya killed the other because he didn't have the Ancient gene." He deliberately ate another bite of toba root. "Happy?"
McKay frowned. "Not really."
"So how did you end up with Kolya?" John countered. Rodney was rude enough to ask so it seems to make it okay for John to ask a pointed question in return.
McKay began, "Well, as you saw, we weren't with him--"
Carter interrupted, "We were on a planet called Denabi, at a big trading market, looking for Ancient artifacts. We were told to go to a certain trader who had a good collection. Well, he did. He also knocked us out with some kind of stunweapon and when we woke up, we were prisoners on a Genii ship." Her expression was resigned. "Somehow I have the feeling we're not the first people to fall for this."
Teyla nodded, watching Carter with some sympathy. "It is a common Genii trap. Kolya is constantly searching for travelers who study the Ancients." She tilted her head inquiringly. "Was that where you were separated from your people?"
"It was earlier," McKay said, brisk and abrupt. A guilty wince briefly crossed Carter's face and she poked at her food. We never do get the story on this. In retrospect, the fact that McKay and Carter didn't have some young, strapping marines (as Jack likes to refer to them) or Teal'c with them to guard them on an alien planet, and they were wandering around alone, is a pretty strong indication that they were already, for some reason, lost in space when they were grabbed. Odd, because apparently they were looking for Ancient devices rather than trying to find their way home, and why they didn't just dial a gate home to Atlantis, assuming these two have been on Atlantis, I can't say. And from the wince, whatever happened was possibly, probably, Carter's fault. No idea what the hell could have happened with these two characters, scientists who are in their own way fairly non-adventurous outside a narrow definition. And what I mean by that is, it's not like Vala "Shenanigans R Us" Maldoran is with them. John wondered if the rest of their group was dead. Then McKay asked him, "So how did you become a pirate?"
Zoe's eyes narrowed in annoyance. "What about you," she asked McKay deliberately, obviously trying to get the spotlight off John. "How did you learn all this Ancient technology?" Another running theme in this story has to do with communication: miscommunication, both purposeful and accidental, and the dangers of *not* sharing information. You could say this universe seems to run on a "Don't ask, don't tell" basis. Note how Rodney in this instance flies in the face of Zoe's expectation and does his usual TMI, as willing to give info as he is to demand it. Zoe, annoyed, genuinely thought she was being rude; she *hoped* to offend. There's definitely a pirate code in effect here, where people are allowed to ask some questions but not press for others, and the people they are questioning get to keep it to themselves if they so choose.
Except that Zoe had miscalculated, forgetting that not everybody was as reticent about their past as they were. McKay immediately launched into a complete description of his education and career, with a litany of place-names like MIT, Caltech, Area 51, and Siberia. John got up to take his plate to the galley and fled through the maintenance passage back up toward the bridge. He stopped in the small bay where there was a port looking out on the starfield, distorted and streaked by the hyperspace drive. He just leaned on the bulkhead and stared out at it.
He knew McKay wasn't puffing up those credentials, he was the real thing, and so was Carter. They had real Ancient tech experts, finally, after all this time; John should be ecstatic. Well, he would have been ecstatic, if they had been Suderians.
Maybe he just wasn't ready for all the baggage that came with memories of Earth. Capping off his career disaster by being caught up in the Trust raids, and having to fight his way into the escape plan since Sumner was so damn sure that John would go over to the other side at the first opportunity. This AU Sumner is the King of all Asshats, if he thinks John going back to save men against orders = a guy who'd eventually go over to the other side, especially given that John has been diagnosed by the other side as having the gene, and is therefore considered an alien by them. OTOH, if Sumner had been even the least bit reasonable, John would have died in Antarctica along with everyone else on the two BC303s. Then the stunned horror when John and Ford had realized that their jumper was the only ship to make it through the supergate. Burying Janet on an alien planet, under a sky with three moons.
Their first alien contact had been on a planet with a big market, like the one on Denabi that Carter had described. They had been lucky, and it had gone well, and for a while they had gone from stargate to stargate, partly making a living as traders, partly just exploring. Each alien planet was like a revelation, terrifying and fascinating. Then the Genii had found them.
After John had escaped from Kolya, he had been crazy, hell-bent on killing Genii wherever he found them, and feeling like something damaged that just needed to be thrown away. Yeah, see that? That sets off all my alarm bells. I just feel there's more to that feeling of being "damaged" than just being captured and seeing your friend threatened, hurt, and then killed in front of you; that's being raped, or maybe that's having your friend's life-force stolen from him and shoved into you, which is another kind of rape. But John's mind shies away from detailed memories, and nobody talks about it, so we will never know the details, only suspect them. Of course, this could be a classic case of horror not shown being far more horrible for being only in the reader's mind! Teyla and Halling and the others had brought him back from that, and he owed them everything. So get over it and make nice with the Ancient tech experts you risked everybody's lives to find, he told himself, disgusted at his own weakness.
John didn't know how long he had been there when Teyla's footsteps on the metal deck brought him back to awareness. She stepped into the bay, leaning against the other side of the port. John stirred, asking, "Everything okay?"
"They are settling in." She added with some irony, "They seem like good people, though Dr. McKay is very inquisitive. I hope we can come to trust them." She hesitated, watching him. "Is it very difficult for you, having them here?"
John leaned his forehead against the cold metal. "Once we get them to fix the cloak for us, show us how some of the other stuff works, they can leave. We'll give them the gate addresses for the Keran Reach, that'll get them out of Kolya's territory."
Teyla smiled ruefully. "That did not answer my question." Oh, yeah; like John's gonna answer a question about his emotions without you forcing him, Teyla. Nobody answers questions in this story, and now that I think of it, hardly anyone is asking the right ones.
"No, yeah, it doesn't matter." He admitted, "It's just...weird." He knew Teyla didn't get it, exactly. He knew if she was in his situation and suddenly ran into two Athosian survivors, she would have welcomed them with open arms, not tried to strategize a way to give them the bum's rush out of her life as quickly as possible. But one of the things he liked most about Teyla was that she didn't have to share your feelings to understand. Again, John as someone who doesn't want to share, even if it's just his feelings. He's found himself among people who do not pry, and that was what he needed for a while. He's content, but he's also static, stuck in place emotionally. He needs his own people to kick him in the ass and get him moving again, and it's going to be painful, but it's got to be done if he's ever going to heal.
She just shook her head and said, "Go and get some rest. We will keep watch."
"Yeah," John agreed reluctantly. "You too. Don't stay up all night."
"I will not." She smiled gently, and he went back to the crew quarters, several tiny compartments with stacked bunks joined by a single corridor. The lights were turned low and most of the off-duty crew had already turned in. John ducked under several curtains of laundry -- just because Athosian women could kick ass didn't mean they didn't like silky things and lacy tops GLEE!-- making his way to the little room where Ronon was draped across a top bunk like a sleeping lion. He opened one eye in a suspicious squint when John came in, grunted an acknowledgement, and went back to sleep. John didn't bother to undress, just took off his boots and coiled his gunbelt up beside his pillow. He lay down in the scent of clean wool and incense, wide awake, listening to the others' deep breathing and Ronon's quiet snores. Awww! John's doing bunkbeds with Ronon. Cute! But poor John is unable to sleep. He doesn't feel safe, his safe place is threatened by these lousy interloping Earthers who are shaking things up. Cheer up, John; things usually get worse before they get better.
***
Wheeee! Back to Rodney's POV! It's short….
"What are we going to do?" Rodney hissed, pacing their quarters. It was a small cabin, with two bunks and a miniscule attached bath smaller than a closet, but even he had to admit it wasn't that unpleasant. Someone had painted abstract designs on the metal walls, and there was a knitted rug on the deck and afghans on the beds. It's the exact opposite of the cool, blue/white, sleekly modern Ancient ship.
"Rodney." Sam, stretched out on the lower bunk, eyed him with a certain degree of impatience. "This morning I woke up in a twelve by twelve cell, with you, and no bathroom facilities. I can think of a number of fangirls for whom that would be the very definition of nirvana. Okay, maybe not the no-bathroom part. Now I've had a dinner that tasted like turnips in rice pudding, we have a place to sleep with clean bedding, a shower, I've been loaned clean underwear, and no one's even holding a gun on me. I'm not going to do anything at the moment."
"So we're just going to sit here on this flying commune of lesbian separatist pirates ::is appalled at Rodney's lack of PC:: and do nothing?" Rodney grimaced, waving a hand in frustration. "He's the strongest Ancient gene carrier we've ever seen. Stronger than O'Neill."
"I know. And we do nothing." Carter rubbed her eyes tiredly. "For now." Oh, Carter; if you weren't so exhausted, you could have nipped this in the bud right here.
***
Avast, ye scurvy dogs! We're about a third of the way through! Now it gets complicated.
Rot7S Commentary Part 3
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