Death Game

Chapter Twenty-Six

“Get back!” Ronon whispered.

Though he was already pressed tightly to the stone wall, Radek attempted to make himself even smaller. He could see very little ahead of them through the bulk that was Ronon, but Radek could hear the others.

There were voices coming down the corridor that their corridor branched off from, three or four men’s voices raised in argument.

“I said we should have gone that way.”

“Shut up, twerp. Unless you’d like to take me on, ok?”

There were heavy footsteps. Radek could see Ronon’s shoulders tensed, his stun pistol at the ready. If the strangers turned into their corridor they would get a surprise.

“How about that way?”

The footsteps paused and they considered.

“No, this way!”

It seemed that they decided to stick with the main corridor. They went past, the sounds of their passage loud in the dim light.

When the last noises had faded away, Ronon moved, holstering his pistol again with a grin. “Not so bright. Any enemy would hear them a mile away.”

Radek let out a deep breath. “They would be the first contestants, it seems. We are beginning to reach the part of the maze where the games are being played.”

“Or they’re beginning to reach us,” Ronon said. “These are the guys in front. They’re probably the most dangerous because they probably screwed over plenty of other people to get here, and they’ll turn on each other before the end.” He straightened. “Ok. Let’s get back in the main corridor and keep following the cables.”

Radek looked up. “They are bundled now,” he said. “See how they are tied and painted over? We must be getting close.” He set off down the corridor, in a hurry to reach the control room.

Ronon grabbed his shoulder. “Stop!” he said. “Watch where you’re going!”

Just ahead of Radek the floor disappeared. Instead of smooth corridor floor there was a drop of seven or eight feet to a second floor lined with spikes of bright steel cut in sharp snowflake points. And on them…

Radek looked away, swallowing hard.

“One of those guys was careless,” Ronon said. “We can’t be.”

Radek very deliberately looked over at the floor on the opposite side, not glancing down at all. “How can we get across?” Ronon could probably jump, fit as he was, but Radek harbored no illusions about his ability to jump across the pit without the same unfortunate consequences as the contestant below.

Ronon grinned wolfishly. “You know that movie Sheppard had us watching last weekend on DVD? The really good one?”

“I do not,” Radek said. He tended to avoid movie night unless something he particularly liked was playing, as two hours of watching cars blow up bored him senseless.

“Where the guy says, ‘Never toss a dwarf’ and the other guy just picks him up and flings him?”

“Oh, that movie,” Radek said with a sinking heart. “You are not seriously considering…”

“No problem,” Ronon said, picking him up under the arms. “Easy peasy, as Beckett says.”

“Put me down! Put me down right now!” Radek shouted. “Do not…”

And then he was flying through the air, then smacking face down on the floor on the other side, his arms flung out to protect his glasses. The wind knocked out of him, Radek lay on the floor trying to catch a breath. Behind him he heard a scuffle, and Ronon knelt down beside him.

“Sorry. Maybe I threw you a little too hard.”

Radek rolled over, hoping that no bones were broken. “That was not funny.”

“It got you across, didn’t it?” Ronon offered a hand to help him up.

Radek gingerly uncurled. His legs seemed to work. He glared at Ronon over the top of his glasses. “Do not ever do that again.”

“You could jump,” Ronon said.

“I cannot.”

“Then don’t complain,” Ronon said. “You’re across, aren’t you?”

He hauled Radek to his feet. “Come on. We’re following cables, right?”

“Yes.”

Unfortunately, the body in the pit was not the last one they found. A little further along they found a man who had been hit over the head with something large and heavy. Perhaps, in the infirmary in Atlantis, he might have been saved, but here his breath had already stopped.

“This game is not so much fun,” Radek said grimly.

“Neither is being a Runner,” Ronon said. “Unless it’s fun for the Wraith.” He ranged ahead, checking the floor and walls for more traps. Radek sincerely hoped he found them without tripping them. But perhaps the men who had already passed this way had tripped any booby traps that had been set.

There were cameras, of course, and now it was impossible to avoid them entirely in the main corridor. Hopefully, the Wraith would conclude they were just regular contestants in the confusion of criss-crossing corridors. Still, they moved swiftly and tried to stay out of the light.

“Stop,” Radek directed. “I need to have a look at this.” Along the ceiling the mass of cables ran into a small box and then exited on the other side. They ran a few feet further along, then disappeared in a small hole in the side wall at ceiling level.

“What is it?” Ronon asked.

“That is what I am trying to ascertain,” Radek said. He craned his neck to see better. “The cables disappear into a solid stone wall? That does not make sense. Why would they go to such trouble? Drilling through stone is very difficult, and they have just fastened the cables to the ceiling elsewhere.”

Ronon came back. “Are we out of the cameras?”

Radek glanced down the hall. “Just barely. I do not think that one can see us.” He put his hands to the wall as far up as he could reach beneath the drilled hole. Yes. As he thought. “Ronon, put your hand to this wall and tell me what you feel.”

“Nothing,” Ronon said, running his hands over the uneven surface. “What am I supposed to feel?”

Radek took his other hand and put it to the wall three feet away, smiling. “Do you see?”

Ronon nodded cautiously, looking at the section of wall in front of him. “It’s not cold. The stone is cool over here.”

“Stone does not heat easily,” Radek said. In fact, the temperature in most deep caves stays around ten degrees Celsius year around. It does not vary much, away from the surface. It does not get much colder unless it is in a very intemperate climate, nor much warmer. But this section of wall… He ran his hands along it beneath the cables. This section of wall is warmer. It is not made of stone.

Ronon ran his hands over the surface. Claster painted to look like stone?â

We have found our door, Radek said. This is a false surface. What is beyond it I do not know, but something has been hidden.

The control room?

Possibly. Or a technical closet, which would be nearly as good. Radek looked at it speculatively. If it is a server closet or one where the camera cables attach to a power source, we are in business.

If it's the control room there could be Wraith in there, Ronon said, drawing his pistol. You get back around the corner.

What are you going to do? Radek asked.

If it is just plaster, I'm going to blast through it, Ronon said. So get back.

The water tossed Teyla, throwing her around and around like a leaf in a stream. She had thought that she could hold onto John, but that proved impossible. The strength of the water ripped their hands apart in seconds.

She had no idea how long she was underwater. It seemed forever, but it could hardly have been long, as her lungs had not yet begun to burn with the need to breathe. Suddenly there was nothing beneath her, no sides to the drain, and for a second there was the sickening feeling of falling. From how far up, she wondered? How far down?

And then she smacked the water full on her back, came up struggling. She kicked for the surface and gulped in a huge breath. Just one. And then John landed right on top of her.

She had a moment of panic, pressed beneath him, the shallow bottom of the pool scraping along her arm, pinned beneath his weight beneath the surface. Then he twisted, and she bounced up like a cork, the spray from the incoming freshet in her face.

What a ride! John said, and he was grinning as he tossed the water out of his eyes. Teyla had the momentary urge to slap him.

We did not do this for fun, Teyla snapped.

I take my fun where I can get it, he said.

She did not need to tread water. The pool only came up to the middle of her chest. Teyla looked around.

About five feet above her head the drain poured from the wall in a torrent of white water. Two other drains did the same to her right, one larger and one smaller than the one they had descended, presumably feeding from traps and settings in other parts of the maze. The pool they stood in was broad and shallow, with a grate covering a drain at the far end from which came mechanical sounds that were loud even over the flowing water resumably the pump which recycled the water through the system. The ceiling was high, perhaps thirty feet above, of natural stone. Dim emergency lights hung on cables, illuminating the room with fitful low fluorescents.

I do not see anything that looks like a terminal or a workstation,Teyla said, frowning.

He looked around too. Me neither, he said.

There were no banks of lights or panels, no screens or anything that looked like heavy equipment, just the drains in and out, and the loud sound of the pump that recirculated the water.

John pushed his sodden hair back out of his face and started wading toward the edge of the pool. The water wasn't as cold as it was further up, but it was still quite uncomfortable. It must be controlled from somewhere else, he said. after all, contestants must wash up in here occasionally still alive. He gave her a shrug replete with gallows humor.

We are alive, she said, clambering out of the pool as well. The air was cool but not chilled, little warmer perhaps than the caves above, but still far from comfortable when one was soaked and cold. And we need not fear we will suffocate here.â

That's true, John said, looking up at the vents in the wall far above. This room was lit and ventilated, even if it was rarely used.

Teyla sat down on the stone and tried to wring out her pants. The leg pocket had a soggy copy of Watership Down in it, and she hated that she had probably ruined it. He had brought it to her from Earth aboard the Daedalus only a few weeks ago, and said it was a story of his people that he had loved and thought she would enjoy. Perhaps it would dry. Perhaps all the pages would not stick together and the ink run as so many of the books she had seen did.

John paced around. There is a door, he said. Instead of the ordinary wooden ones they had encountered in the maze, this was a metal power door with no visible hardware on it, obviously meant to open electronically. John waved his hand over it and around it, but nothing happened.

Perhaps it is locked, Teyla said.

You are kidding! John grinned to take the sting out of it. Why don't you come over here and see if your Wraith gene opens doors the way the ATA gene does for me?

It never has before, Teyla said, but she came and tried anyway. The door remained stubbornly closed. It is lock mechanism, she said, examining the sides of the door. Perhaps this is meant to be opened from the outside.

If this is just a water treatment trap, probably, John said.

And now it is a trap for us, she said. I do not see any other way out. The vents were small and high in the wall, and no doubt the drain was only the cover on the pump that recycled the water. It would not actually lead anywhere.

He can't climb back up, John said thoughtfully. But there's got to be a way to get this door open.

While he considered the wall beside the door, Teyla walked around the edge of the pool. The larger of the other two drains that fed it was not entirely full to the top of the pipe, and the water was not running as hard. It flowed rather than erupted in the bubbles of white water under pressure. But she could not get a better look without getting back in the frigid pool.

Casting a glance at John still examining the door, she waded into the water. It was very cold. Knee deep. Waist deep. From there she could see up the pipe, even though it turned. There was a strange blue light, as though it were not far to a chamber lit electrically with colored lights, and she thought she could even see the end of the tunnel perhaps fifteen feet ahead at a gentle slope.

John! Teyla called. Come, look at this!”

He waded out to join her. “What?”

“Do you think that could be a way out?”

Wincing at the cold, he waded over to the end of the pipe. It ended just about at the level of his shoulders, definitely a curved pipe with a low gradient. The water splashed over his whole body as he put his hands on the pipe and pulled himself up, looking. It made her colder just looking at it.

“I think you’ve got something,” he said. “It looks like there’s a pool that’s draining down this pipe, and the drain is in the side of the pool, not the bottom. I don’t see a cover on it either.”

“Perhaps they are just as happy to let all the bodies aggregate in one place,” Teyla said grimly.

John nodded. “Probably. It would be a pain in the neck to have to hunt for them all over this place, even if they can turn the water off and drain the pools.” He let himself back down. “I think we can get up there. It’s not too steep to climb.”

“Then we had best do it,” Teyla said. “This cold water saps our strength. The sooner we are done with it, the better.”

“I’ll boost you,” he said, and put out his knee for her to climb on, his hands on her waist. With that it was easy to get up in the end of the pipe, though crawling forward through the water sent stabs of pain through her shoulder. Even on all fours her shoulder would not easily take her weight.

The pipe gave a little as John came up, his head just behind her buttocks in the tight space. “Need a push?” he said.

“I think I can manage,” Teyla said. The pipe was a gentle curve, and it was only the flowing water that made it difficult to climb. Her hands were numb with cold before she reached the top, and it was an effort to haul herself out of the pool onto the ledge just above the drain. She sat there, rubbing her chilled hands together, while John pulled himself up beside her.

“Well, this is different,” he said.

Above them the ceiling soared eighty feet, festooned with stalactites. From somewhere in the darkness around its final peak, blue lights shone out at intervals, casting eerie shadows among the stones, as though they were sharp teeth. On the far side of the pool a waterfall plunged down some half the distance to the ceiling, green lights below the water casting a nacreous uplight, turning the flowing water into a mysterious glittering green and blue curtain. For those who had never before seen colored electric lights, the effect must be beyond unsettling. It must be terrifying.

The pool itself lapped against the sides of the chamber, filling it nearly entirely except for the ledge they sat upon. Other ledges jutted out over the water at intervals, dark corridor entrances opening onto each one.

“This is very impressive,” Teyla said. It was no doubt designed to impress, and she could appreciate the workmanship even if she wished to be gone. It was beautiful, in a strange way.

“Yeah.” John looked around them. “That’s one word for it.”

On the far side of the cavern and far above three figures appeared at the cavern entrance, looking out across the expanse.

“Should we call out to them?” Teyla wondered.

John shrugged. “And ask them to do what?”

“You have a point,” she said. They were far across the chamber, and the entrance they stood upon looked out over a bare drop of thirty feet to the surface of the water. Teyla twisted around, looking up. There was another ledge about fifteen feet above where they were, but the sides of the chamber were steep and slick with spray from the waterfall. “I do not think I can climb that,” she said reluctantly.

“I figured that.” John scratched his head. “We’ll figure out another way.”

The people on the other side of the cavern disappeared from the corridor entrance, no doubt concluding that they could not go this way.

“I’m getting pretty tired of this game,” John said.