The Inheritors

Chapter Four The Pride of the Genii

Woolsey and Radim returned to the original conference room, leaving O'Neill behind to continue talking with the Wraith. Woolsey was in two minds about that, but he told himself firmly that O'Neill was a competent and experienced negotiator. The Wraith seemed to respond better to military personnel, anyway — Todd had always seemed far happier to talk to Carter or Sheppard, and now O'Neill had stepped easily into those shoes. That just left him Ladon Radim to deal with.

They went through the motions of settling in, Woolsey offering refreshment, Radim accepting, exchanging barbed chitchat while they waited for the mess hall staff to arrive with a tray. The main thing now, Woolsey thought, as he poured a careful measure of skim milk into his mug, was to get Radim and his people to agree to join the attack, and — perhaps more important — get them out of Atlantis before they got any inkling of the existence of Hyperion's weapon. The Genii would have no compunction about using it, and Woolsey could understand their position.

"Under the current circumstances," he began, "it seems that it would benefit both our peoples to join forces."

A fleeting smile crossed Radim's face: as an opening, that was weak, and they both knew it. "And we would, of course, be willing to honor our agreements."

"Then we can expect the Pride of the Genii to join us." Personally, Woolsey agreed with Sheppard, the Ancient cruiser should have retained its previous name, but he wasn't about to offend Radim over something that small.

"Of course we'd be glad to," Radim said. "But we're somewhat hamstrung at the moment."

"Oh?"

"As you know, none of my people have the Ancient blood, the ATA gene." Radim smiled sweetly. "Without it, our ability to crew the ship is limited."

"We would, of course, we willing to loan you appropriate personnel," Woolsey said. "In fact, it might be helpful in any case, as we have had somewhat more experience in interstellar warfare."

Radim inclined his head. "A very generous offer, Mr. Woolsey, and one I would like to accept. But it doesn't change the fact that at some point we will need to handle the Pride ourselves. And for that, we do need this gene. Or the genetic therapy that your people have developed."

Woolsey spread his hands. "My understanding of that therapy is that it allows a recessive gene to emerge, to be expressed. It only works on people who have a copy of the gene. On anyone else, it's useless. And I am told that the ATA gene is very rare in the Pegasus Galaxy."

"So it seems," Radim said. "However, our scientists have been pursuing a different possibility, a therapy that would allow a functioning ATA gene to be inserted into an individual's DNA. Your technique would allow us to shorten the process considerably."

"Indeed," Woolsey said, in a tone calculated to express polite disbelief.

Radim gave a thin smile, acknowledging the unspoken skepticism. "You would be surprised, Mr. Woolsey, at how quickly biology has advanced on our worlds once we realized the key to our problem."

And, of course, they could steal from the Wraith, Woolsey thought. He knew better than to say that, however, and merely nodded.

"We believe we have isolated at least a variant of the ATA gene itself," Radim said, "If it can be activated — well, we would be more than happy to exchange the use of our warship for a sample."

"As you know, we on Atlantis," Woolsey began. The request startled him, and for a moment he was afraid he let it show. "We are an exploratory mission. It's something we simply didn’t bring with us. Our people were treated before they left the Milky Way."

We must have it, though, he thought. They woulnd’t have come to Pegasus without it, but— He couldn't see the IOA being willing to give the Genii the key to Ancient technology. And saying they didn't have any — well, it might buy him as much time as it took Radim to point out that they could use the Stargate to send for it.

"And certainly we're in a difficult position at the moment," Radim said.

"Which we need each other's help if we're to survive," Woolsey pointed out. There was nothing to be lost in making that explicit.

"Precisely. However, it would certainly make things easier on my people if we were able to start with your therapy." Radim smiled. "Surely that can be arranged, even on short notice."

Over my dead body. Woolsey swallowed the words, managed a thin smile of his own. "My government frowns on using unwilling subjects for medical experimentation, Mr. Radim."

“My volunteers are all willing,” Radim answered. “Nor would I call it ‘experimentation.’ After all, you know perfectly well that the gene therapy works.”

"It's against the policy of my government," Woolsey said. He put his hand to his ear as though he had received a radio signal. "Yes?" He paused, letting imaginary words roll through his mind — excuse me, we need to talk to you — and turned back to Radim with the best smile he could manage. "I'm sorry, Mr. Radim. I'm needed urgently. Perhaps we could return to this discussion a bit later?"

"Of course." Radim rose politely. "But I do want to make our position clear, Mr. Woolsey. Unless we get access to the ATA gene, the Pride of the Genii remains where she is."

"Commendably clear," Woolsey said, and let the door close behind him.

Rodney McKay bent over his laptop in the new quarters he'd picked out as temporary housing. It wasn't as nice as the rooms he'd given up, but it did have an actual bathtub, and the outer room had a tiny balcony, which was less important, given the weather, than the fact that the balcony came with a clear glass door that gave onto a view of ocean between two of the towers. On the negative side, the bedroom was small and dark, but then, he wasn't doing much except sleeping in it these days. He hadn't really unpacked yet — there was bound to be something better once he had time to explore a little further — but it would do for now, and it kept Sheppard happy, in that everyone knew where to find him when he was off duty. That wasn't something Rodney actually wanted to think about in any detail, and he bent closer over the screen, studying the model he'd created. The order was to destroy Hyperion's weapon, and he could guess what Carter's solution would be. Surely there was something more elegant than just dropping it into the nearest sun.

The trouble was, there might not be a more efficient method. He'd pulled up all the files on "destroying things in naquadah casings" — of which there were rather more than he'd expected — and most of the successful results seemed to come from large nuclear devices or dropping it into a sun. Of the two, the sun was probably preferable.

A part of him wished there was a chance to examine it more closely. He'd like to know how it was supposed to work, as well as what it actually did, but Alabaster's warning had been enough to sober him. "Burn out the brain of everyone with Wraith DNA": it wasn't just that the category now included him, but there were too many innocent, non-Wraithy people who carried some trace of the Wraith. Teyla and Torren, for two, and he wasn't about to risk them. Not when she and John finally seemed to have gotten themselves together. It was nothing to do with worrying about his own fate.

Besides, he was feeling less Wraith-like with every passing day. Yes, there was still that weird residual telepathy, though he was getting better at tuning it out, and his hair was still stark white, but other than that he was unmistakably himself. It was a pity some people didn't seem to recognize it. He grimaced at the thought, ducked his head closer to the screen. They'd get over it. Eventually.

"Rodney."

Zelenka's voice sounded in his ear, as close as telepathy, and Rodney straightened, scowling even though he couldn't be seen. "Yes, what? I'm busy."

"Sorry." Zelenka didn't sound particularly regretful. 'You're needed in the control room. Immediately."

"Would you like to tell me why?" Rodney was working as he talking, putting his laptop to sleep and shrugging into his jacket. "Or at least whether we're being invaded?"

"If we were being invaded, I would not be calling just you," Zelenka said. "It is — urgent, but not dire? We are searching for something that should be there, but we have the sensor field at maximum, and we cannot pick it up."

"I'm on my way," Rodney said, and slung the laptop over his shoulder.

The control room was busier than he'd expected, and when he glanced over the railing into the gateroom, there was a trio of Genii soldiers standing to one side under the watchful eye of an equal number of Marines.

"What are they doing here?" he asked, and Zelenka looked up from his console.

"Oh, good, you are here."

"Yes, obviously. Why do we have Genii in the gateroom?"

"Ladon Radim is here," Zelenka said.

"Ok, yes, but why is he here? What does he want from us this time?"

Zelenka finished typing in a series of commands, and pushed himself back from the keyboard. "He says that Queen Death has launched an all-out attack and that her fleet will be here within thirty-six hours."

He kept his voice low, but Rodney flinched in spite of himself. That explained the tension he could see in people's faces, the way they kept querying their screens, erasing the results, and querying again. "We should be able to see her if that's the case —"

"Yes, yes," Zelenka said. "Except that we can't. The ships would be at the limits of our sensors, yes, but we ought to be seeing something. And we're not."

"Then Radim is lying," Rodney said. "It wouldn't be the first time. And that's Woolsey's problem, not mine."

"Woolsey wants us to find the Wraith fleet," Zelenka said. "Or prove it isn't there. At the moment, I am unable to do either."

"Let me see." Rodney took his place in front of the main sensor array, frowning at the screen. "OK, that's — look, all you need to do it extend the bandwidth, here, and channel more power through the phased array —"

"No, wait —"

Sparks flew under Rodney's fingers, and he snatched his hands back. "Ow!"

Zelenka reached past him, swearing in Czech, and hit another switch. The sparks died.

"What the hell did you do that for?" Rodney demanded. Now that he looked again, he could see that the settings were different, the power routed through new pathways.

"Why do you think?" Zelenka retorted. "We had to make certain changes while you were — away."

They both stopped, Rodney for once speechless, all too aware of what Zelenka wasn't saying, and after a moment, Radek gave an awkward shrug.

"Well. You see what we did."

"Yeah." Rodney looked at the screen again. He was not going to pursue the issue. There was nothing he could say that would make them trust him any sooner — though, really, of all people Zelenka ought to know him better than that. Except that there was that moment in the ZPM room, when he'd come too close to killing Zelenka, and he doubted either of them had forgotten. He made himself concentrate. "Well, that's why you're not getting the readings you want. With the power fed that way, you're losing efficiency in the long-range band."

"Yes, I know," Zelenka said, "but it meant —"

He stopped abruptly, but Rodney could fill in the rest. It meant that he didn't know how the sensors were routed, meant he couldn't control them even if he had managed to gain access to Atlantis's systems, and it meant that anyone left in Death's fleet who knew what he'd done would have the same problems.

"Yes, right. But right now it means you're not actually reaching the scanners' full range." Rodney frowned at the screen again, considering the new parameters. There wasn't any way to boost the power, not without rerouting everything, and that would take— well, hours, and presumably Woolsey and O'Neill wanted an answer sooner than that. All right, that was the obvious solution. What was less obvious, and more effective? A Wraith fleet was hiveships and –

"Wait," he said. "Just give me a minute here." Zelenka was looking dubious, but Rodney plowed on, his fingers busy on the keys. Just a little adjustment there, the search frequencies narrowed to one low band — yes, the available power would reach maybe even a little further than the sensors' original limits. "Yes. There."

Zelenka peered over his shoulder. "And this is searching for what, specifically?"

"Hiveships." Rodney took a last look at the settings, and hit the button that made it live. "See, hiveships tend to give off a low-frequency electronic field, not in a range that's particularly useful for anything, but it's a lot harder to get rid of than it is to just live with it, so if we concentrate on just looking for that…."

His voice trailed off as the results appeared on the screen, dull purple spots against the black. Two, three — four large spots, and half a dozen smaller purple flecks: four hives and at least six large cruisers. A fleet, definitely, and — his hands danced over the keys. Yes, the signal was increasing, slowly but steadily. Queen Death's fleet was on its way to Atlantis. "Crap."

Zelenka said something much stronger in Czech. "We must inform Mr. Woolsey right away."

"Yeah." Rodney stared at the screen. He knew those ships, knew how strong they were — knew just how determined Queen Death was, her and her zenana. Daedalus was still on Earth, the Hammond was still undergoing repairs — even if the Genii threw in their Ancient warship, there was no way they'd learned how to fly it in — what? — a couple of months. And an alliance with Guide was only good as long as it benefited Guide…. "We are so screwed," he said, and only then realized he'd spoken aloud.

Woolsey paused in the corridor, put his hand to the radio at his ear, ignoring the Marines who waited outside the doors of both conference rooms. "Dr. Keller."

There was a moment of silence, long enough that he was already reaching to switch channels, and then Jennifer answered. "Mr. Woolsey?"

She sounded wary, Woolsey thought, and well she might. "I need five minutes of your time, Dr. Keller — perhaps ten — and it's urgent. Right away, if possible."

"I — yes. Yes, if it's really urgent, sure, I can make time." She paused. "Do you want Dr. Beckett as well?"

"Yes," Woolsey said. "I'll be down right away."

It didn't take long to reach the infirmary. For a wonder, it wasn't very busy, just a technician working on one of the diagnostic machines, and a Marine corporal having her ankle brace replaced. Both Keller and Beckett were waiting, and Keller waved a hand toward her office.

"Is that okay —?"

"Fine, thank you," Woolsey said. He let her take her place behind her desk, for all that every nerve screamed for him to blurt out his questions, waited until Beckett had found a place to perch as well. "Dr. Keller, Dr. Beckett, I need your assessment of Genii medical technology."

Jennifer blinked, started to say something, but Woolsey ignored her, laid out Radim's proposal as baldly as it had been made.

"So my question is, can Radim's people actually use our gene therapy to insert an artificial ATA gene?"

Beckett pursed his lips, tilting his head to one side. "Aye, that's a question."

"I don't — I wouldn't think they could," Jennifer said, frowning. "I mean, nothing we've seen so far is that advanced. But I'm pretty sure we haven't seen everything."

"That's for certain," Beckett said. "They couldn't do it three years ago, or they wouldn't have taken Lorne prisoner. And what we saw then — I'm not at all sure they were as advanced as Hoff…."

"I think they were at least that far along," Jennifer said.

"The Hoffans concentrated everything, all their development, on their drug," Beckett said. "They were well in advance, I believe. At least in that regard."

"All right, but that only puts them — well, I don't think they have anything more advanced than we had in the 1950s. Maybe the early 1960s." Jennifer shook her head. "I'm not sure they'd even be able to isolate DNA, much less create their own version of the ATA gene."

"They'll have stolen the technology for that from us," Beckett said. "And they know what they want to do."

"But do they have the technology?" Jennifer asked.

"Doctors," Woolsey said. "I need an answer." It was suddenly important that they understand, and he kept on, laying the words out like counters in a game. "We can't let the Genii get full access to Ancient technology. With that — I don't believe Ladon Radim has any compunction about trying to become the dominant power in the Pegasus Galaxy and, with Ancient technology, I believe they can do it. On the other hand, we cannot stand against Queen Death without the Pride of the Genii. And Mr. Radim has made his position clear: unless we give him the gene therapy, their ship stays safely grounded."

Beckett shook his head slowly. "I don't believe they can do it, Mr. Woolsey. They just don't have the technology. Not to create a working ATA gene."

"But they believe it can be done," Jennifer said. "And the Genii — they're not stupid. In fact, they're pretty sophisticated, and they're desperate. They may not have the equipment now, and I'll even grant they probably can't make a working version of the gene even if we give them the therapy. But that just means they'll steal it. They’ve already tried it once."

"Eventually, yes, they'll get hold of the gene," Beckett began, and Zelenka's voice crackled in Woolsey's ear.

"Mr. Woolsey. You're needed in the control room right away."

Woolsey put his hand to the earpiece. "I'm in the middle of something, Dr. Zelenka —"

"It's urgent," Zelenka said. "We've sighted the Wraith fleet."

Only long training kept Woolsey from swearing, and he felt his face freeze into his most unrevealing mask. "I see."

"They are perhaps thirty, thirty-two hours away." Zelenka's accent was thicker than Woolsey could remember, the first indication of nerves he'd seen in the man. "And there is no mistaking their course. There are four hives, plus cruisers, and they are coming here."

Woolsey made himself take a breath, denying the fear that coiled at the base of his spine. This had been coming since they'd first encountered Queen Death, and there was no use wishing for a better time because there never would be one. "Dr. Keller, Dr. Beckett. I'd like the two of you to put your heads together and give me an answer to my question. Within the hour, if possible."

"But —"

He ignored Jennifer's automatic protest. "You will also need to begin preparing for a Wraith attack on Atlantis. Queen Death's fleet is on its way."

Jennifer said nothing, stricken to silence, and Beckett nodded, his expression grim. "We'll do that," he said, and Jennifer shook herself.

"Yes. We'll be ready."

"I never doubted it," Woolsey said, and turned away.