Dead end

Chapter Eight

Sheppard screwed his eyes up. It was almost impossible to see where he was going, and he was navigating on instinct alone.

“Are we there yet?” shouted McKay. In the howling gale, his yell was not much more audible than a whisper.

“Sure,” said Sheppard, hoping he was right. “Any minute now.”

“That’s what you said ten minutes ago.”

“Yeah, well this time I mean it.”

He powered on ahead, more relieved than he’d admit when he felt the ground rising beneath his feet. Within a few moments he spotted a dim light up ahead. In the ferocious storm, it looked as faint as candle flame.

“Bingo!” he shouted to McKay. “Let’s pick up the pace!”

Easier said than done. Despite his heavy clothing, his limbs already felt heavy and sluggish; the middle of the storm was no place for a man to be, buffalo hide or no, and he could hardly wait to get inside the Forgotten’s hidden city.

But when they reached the entrance to the cave complex, the heavy external doors were shut. Light leaked from the cracks in the wood. Sheppard hammered on the weather-worn wooden portal, the dull sound of his banging snatched away by the wind. But there was no answer and the door did not open.

The storm howled in delight, throwing all its terrible might against them, and it was hard to keep his feet even in the lee of the rock face.

“So, you want to fill me in here?” cried McKay, huddled and miserable in the shadow of the rocks. “This party season, or something?”

“Didn’t strike me as party people,” Sheppard shouted. “I don’t like it. Aralen told me these gates were always manned.”

He retrieved his P90 from deep within the furs covering him. As he did so, the icy wind wormed its way inside and he gasped from the cold.

“We’re not going to last much longer out here!” Sheppard yelled. “Get back!” He raised the gun to fire at the heavy lock. Using a submachine gun to pick a lock was hardly an elegant solution, but the cold was crippling and there weren’t many options left.

“Tell me you’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do…” groaned Rodney.

“Time to knock a little louder. You might want to get clear.”

Rodney scampered out of range, back into the fury of the storm. Sheppard took a few paces back, took aim and issued a controlled burst.

The ancient wood around the lock shredded instantly, and the heavy door swung open. From the other side, warm torchlight flooded out on to the snow.

“Typical military,” muttered McKay. “See a problem. Shoot at it.”

“Got us in, didn’t it?” snapped Sheppard, feeling his limbs begin to seize up from the cold. “Now let’s find out what the hell happened here.”

The two of them staggered through the broken doorway and did their best to close the door behind them. The freedom from the howl of the snow-laced wind was a huge relief — Sheppard found his ears still ringing even after it had been shut out.

“Stay close,” he warned, keeping the P90 raised.

McKay, for once, had nothing smart to say. The corridor was deserted. Even though the torches still burned, there was no sign of movement.

They crept down the tunnel watchfully. As they went, the noise of some commotion echoed up at them from further ahead.

“What’s that?” hissed Rodney, starting to look agitated.

The noise got louder. There was the sound of running feet thudding against the rock, shouts of alarm, stuff breaking.

“I dunno, but we’re headed right for it.”

Sheppard picked up the pace. They turned a corner and walked into a scene of chaos. The hall in front of them was one of the minor audience chambers of the settlement, and it was full of people. Men, women and children staggered aimlessly about, some moaning, others weeping. A few of them saw Sheppard and McKay enter and pointed accusatory fingers.

“Why didn’t you stop them?” they cried. Some Forgotten men began to advance on them menacingly, their eyes wild. The transformation from their earlier placid nature could not have been more pronounced.

“Whoa!” said Sheppard, eager to keep the situation from boiling over. “Stop who?”

One of the Forgotten, an older man with graying hair, pointed his finger at Sheppard.

“The Banshees! They came again. The Foremost told us you Ancestors had come to free us from their menace. You lied!”

McKay groaned. “I mean, we told him we weren’t Ancients,” he complained. “What more do we have to do?”

Sheppard raised the muzzle of his gun to the roof. He really didn’t want to use it in such a confined space, but the mood of the crowd in front of him looked ugly. He’d seen this in Afghanistan, in villages after an atrocity had been committed.

“Now slow down,” he warned, looking directly at the old man and holding his gaze. “I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about. How about you explain this, nice and slow?”

Something in Sheppard’s voice seemed to cut through the worst of the anger. The crowd wasn’t really furious with the two of them. The target of their rage was elsewhere.

“The Banshees came for us again,” the man said, bitterly. Wails of despair echoed up from corridors beyond the chamber. “We’ve been culled.”

As the man said ‘culled’, Sheppard’s blood turned to ice. He turned to Rodney.

“I thought…” McKay started.

“Yeah, me too,” said Sheppard. His voice was grim. “God, those guys get everywhere.”

“And what about…?” McKay started again.

“That too.” Sheppard was ahead of him. Teyla had been in the settlement. “Let’s go. Find her first, and then we’ll worry about the Wraith.”

Ronon staggered onwards through the blizzard, gritting his teeth against the pain in his legs.

The wind tore across the plains, ripping and buffeting everything in its path. The noise was overwhelming, visibility was down to a few meters, and the snow had begun to pile up in massive drifts. The entire landscape had transformed into an icy hell.

Each member of the team had been given massive cuts of meat to transport. The hunters had brought with them long poles stitched into sheets of leather. These had been quickly arranged to form makeshift sleds, and the now hard-frozen chunks of buffalo carcass had been piled on each one. Much meat had been left behind on the ice, ready to be picked up by a future expedition. The rest, seemingly enough to feed an army, had been loaded on to the sleds. Now each hunter dragged it through the storm, hauling the heavy burden against the crushing power of the wind and the deadening layers of snow at their feet. The going was tough. Very tough.

Ronon couldn’t remember a time when he’d been so exhausted. There’d been many occasions when fleeing from the Wraith (or hunting them — it was much the same thing) when he’d gone without food for days and trekked across harsh terrain. But Khost was something else. His lungs labored against the icy air, his fingers and toes had lost sensation, and his exposed cheeks and eyebrows were covered in a painful lattice of ice.

The hunters clustered closely together, taking turns to shoulder the worst of the wind. Ronon could see that many of them were near the end of their strength. All conversation had ceased. The storm had them in its grasp, and it wasn’t letting go.

“We close?” Ronon yelled at Orand, who was trudging along by his side.

“Nearly there!” It was hard to read the hunter’s expression. Almost his entire face was covered in his leather mask, now encrusted with layers of snow. “This storm’s a big one! They’ve been getting worse!”

Orand sounded worried. Up until now, he had laughed at nearly every challenge Khost had thrown at them. Now it looked as if they might have bitten off more than they could chew. Ronon had been reluctant to question Orand’s leadership up until that point, feeling himself a newcomer and not wanting to admit weakness. But it was clear now that the hunt was in danger of becoming their final adventure.

“We’ve gotta leave this meat!” shouted Ronon. “It’s weighing us down!”

Orand paused, panting heavily from the exertion. He looked in two minds. “We’ll never find it again! The snow will cover it!”

Ronon looked around at the rest of the party. They had also stopped in their tracks, some leaning heavily forward, hands on their knees.

“You think we have a choice?” he shouted. “Better to lose the meat than lose ourselves!”

For a moment longer, Orand hesitated. But he knew as well as the others that dithering out on the ice-sheets was the surest way to die. “Untie the sleds!” he bellowed. “We’ll pile them together and leave a jar’hram at the top. I don’t want these to be buried forever.”

With clear relief, the hunters unhooked the heavy loads from their waistbands and began to haul them into a cairn-shaped pile. The work was slow and difficult, frozen hands slipped and tired legs stumbled. By the time they had finished, the chill in Ronon’s bones had set in. They needed shelter, and fast.

“Let’s go!” The fear in Orand’s voice was palpable.

The party clustered together once more and battled onward through the snow. The absence of the load was a relief, but Ronon was dog-tired. Merely making progress against the inexorable storm was an achievement and the hunters leaned heavily into the wind, fighting against it just as they had done against the buffalo. But they were tiring, the slips became more common and every time one of them stumbled it took longer for them to get back up.

“We’re nearly there!” cried Orand, desperately trying to rally the group. But his voice had a hysterical edge to it and the effect was not comforting.

Ronon squared his shoulder to the storm, clenching his fists. He was coming down to the last reserves of strength, but was damned if he was going to give up. As long as there was icy breath in his body he would keep fighting.

Then the world lurched and everything changed. His foot, rather than crunching into a thick layer of snow, plunged deep into the ice beneath. He flailed and immediately sank up to his waist. A sudden wave of panic took over and he cried out in alarm. Hands reached for him, but it was too late. There was the sound of cracking ice, and everything below him seemed to disintegrate.

“Crevasse!” he heard someone shout, but there was nothing he could do. In a frenzied whirl of snow and ice, he plummeted downwards. He frantically tried to protect himself, cradling his arms around his head, but he was thrown in every direction by the tumbling snow. Rock tore at his thick fur hides, and then there was a shuddering crack as he hit something hard. Then everything went black.