Entanglement

by Martha Wells

  Rodney grimaced, saying in a low voice, "They'll give us coordinates for a hold area. If we could get the device closer to the main drive, it would be more effective, but what's she supposed to say? `Oh, give me the coordinates to your weapons and shield control compartment too; no reason, just curious."'

  Since Rodney's idea of a low voice wasn't all that low, Trishen heard him anyway. She said, "We can get those coordinates with a sensor sweep."

  Rodney's eyes lit up. "Wait, your sensors can get past their hull plating?"

  She nodded, explaining, "One of the ships in orbit has special equipment for scanning ruins and underground structures left behind by the Creators. Once the Wraith shield is down, its sensors should be able to get a partial schematic."

  Kethel looked up from his control board, telling the Queen, "We're received the information, and they have lowered their shield."

  Trishen went forward to one of the consoles, picking up another headset and speaking quickly into it. After a moment, she set it aside, saying in relief, "Yes, it worked. They've managed to get the data."

  A schematic started to form above the console, next to the real-time view of the scout ship. It rotated, offering alternate views, but there wasn't much detail, just blots and blurs of energy, dark spaces apparently indicating large compartments.

  Rodney nodded. "Good, good. We're going to want to beam it right here." He pointed to a spot on the schematic, one of the brightest red blots. "Right where all these highoutput energy signatures are, the drive, shield generators, and weapons."

  Kethel looked at the Queen, and she gave him a nod. "Beam the device."

  With everybody else, John looked at the bomb where it sat near the jumper, but he kept one eye on Trishen. All the Eidolon had been careful to keep a non-threatening distance, but she was standing only a few paces away, close enough for easy conversation. If the Eidolon were going to screw them and send them instead of the explosive to the Wraith, it would be now. And if that happened, John intended to take Trishen with them.

  A haze of light sparkled around the bomb, and it vanished with an audible pop. Okay, still not screwed, John thought, the tension in his shoulders relaxing just a little. He heard Teyla exhale in relief, and saw Ronon shift his stance slightly; he hadn't been the only one tensing for a last-second double cross.

  "Give it a minute," Rodney muttered, his gaze on the overlapping images of the Wraith ship.

  Kethel put a hand on his headset, apparently listening to a communication from the ship that had done the beaming. "Confirmed arrival." He pointed at the schematic of the scout ship. "It should be in what we believe to be the main engine compartment."

  "Perfect." Rodney pulled something the size of a radio base-unit out of his vest pocket. It looked like it had started life as some other kind of handheld control device, but had recently undergone some major alterations. There was a small readout screen with Ancient characters and a couple of touchpads. "Signal is good. And here we go." Rodney pressed a touchpad.

  John looked at the image of the scout ship. It didn't appear to be exploding. He had a bad feeling about this.

  "No," Rodney said under his breath. "No, no, no." He pressed the touchpad again. John looked at the detonator, saw that the Ancient characters were now blinking an error code. Rodney said through gritted teeth, "Nothing's happening."

  "What do you mean `nothing's happening?"' John demanded. "What happened?"

  "I don't know!" Mouth twisted with angry despair, Rodney popped the cover off, studied the weird combination of Ancient and Earth technology inside, and shook his head. "It should be working, but it isn't. If there's some sort of interference with the signal-I can try to boost it-" He turned away, heading for another empty console, ignoring the Eidolon who scrambled out of his way.

  Kethel looked from the schematic to his section of the control board, his face set in a frustrated snarl. "It may have been the transport beam. If our coordinates were off-"

  John knew they didn't have time for a post-mortem on why the frigging remote detonator wouldn't work. "In a minute, they're going to find it-" They were going to find it, open fire on the Eidolon ships, then break into the installation. John turned to Kethel. "Can you beam us over there, to the corridor where you beamed the bomb?"

  Kethel stared. "To set it off directly?" He shook his head, looking at the screen again. "It's too dangerous for living beings. If our coordinates were off enough that the device was beamed inside a bulkhead-"

  Fine, John got why that was a bad idea. "What about here?" He pointed to another more open area, only one level up from the bomb.

  "The bridge?" Kethel asked, astonished and sounding like he thought John was completely crazy. "But-"

  "Sure, there's probably only a couple of them in there right now." John thought it was a great plan. Okay, not a great plan, but a plan. The only plan he could think of.

  "I agree," Teyla said, looking urgently from Kethel to the Queen. "It is our only choice."

  Ronon just shrugged. "Sounds good to me."

  John added, "Look, you beaming us in there to take them on is the last thing they'll expect." He did a quick inventory of his tac vest, making sure he had ammo and grenades. Teyla was doing the same. Ronon just checked the set of his knife in its scabbard.

  "He's correct." The Queen's gaze was fixed on the image of the scout ship. "This must be done."

  Kethel looked at the screen again. He shook his head slightly, as if he meant to refuse. Then he said, "Once on their bridge, I might be able to activate their selfdestruct."

  John stared at him. "Wait, you, what?"

  Edane, the younger Eidolon that kept wanting to talk to them, stepped forward. "I'll go too." He looked around at the few remaining Eidolon. "Surely I'm not the only one.

  Rodney came back from the console with the detonator, his expression caught between horror and incredulity. "This is insane, we can't possibly get through the ship to the bomb. And how are we getting back?" he demanded.

  "You're not going," John told him. "You need to stay here to deal with the damn Mirror." If they didn't succeed, the scout ship might be too occupied with shooting at the installation and the Eidolon ships to worry about the Mirror or the cloaked jumper, and Rodney might still have a chance to get himself, Radek, and Miko back home. But Rodney did have a point. John eyed Kethel. "How are we getting back?"

  Trishen had been hurriedly digging into one of the equipment cases stacked up to be transported out, and now came back with a handful of little silver buttons, each set with a flat green stone. "We have emergency transponders. Simply touch this crystal and it will signal the ship to beam you back here." She looked at the image of the scout ship, adding worriedly, "As long as their shield remains down, these should work."

  Famous last words, John thought. He just said, "So let's go."

  With a few moments of scrambling, they were ready. Kethel was bringing two other young male Eidolon, Edane and Caras; John wasn't happy about it, but Kethel might be able to activate the ship's self-destruct and render the bomb unnecessary, so he was willing to put up with it. Kethel also had a handheld scanning device that would help them locate the engine compartments where the bomb had been sent, just in case the self-destruct proved elusive. The Eidolon also had weapons, long elegant silver-gray devices about the size of sawed-off shotguns.

  "Those are stunners?" Teyla asked Kethel. John had assumed they were just a different model of the Wraith version.

  "No." Kethel glanced at her, distracted. "They are energy weapons, the blast is fatal. Stunners are forbidden."

  Teyla lifted her brows, obviously not getting it anymore than John did. So shooting to kill is fine, stunning and asking questions later is forbidden, he thought. John just said, "Okay. That's handy."

  Rodney came back to shove the detonator into John's vest pocket, saying, "I tried boosting the signal, still nothing. Hopefully you won't need this. And if you do need it, the damn thing probably won't work, but there it is."

>   "Great. Wait for us in the jumper," John told him, taking the detonator out of that pocket and putting it in a more convenient one.

  Rodney shook his head impatiently. "I need to monitor the array-"

  John glared. He didn't want Rodney out here alone, distracted with the Mirror, with no one to watch his back. "Rodney, jumper, now."

  Rodney glared back, unimpressed. "Yes, because I respond so well to that sort of thing. What are you going to do, threaten to shoot me in the foot?"

  John just stared at him, narrowing his eyes. "You want to stay out here alone with the folks who look like Wraith?"

  Rodney looked around, apparently realizing it was just going to be him, the Queen, and the scatter of other Eidolon left in the room. "All right, fine," he snapped, and started toward the jumper.

  John told Kethel, "We're ready." Kethel signaled to the Eidolon who had taken his place at the control console. White light flashed.

  Abruptly another room shimmered into existence around them, John's ears popping at the sudden transition to a pressurized space.

  They were in a large dimly-lit chamber with dark walls of a rubbery black substance. There was a raised center dais, with three consoles each supported by weirdly organic-looking stalks. John spun around, opening fire on two surprised Wraith standing in front of a large irregularly-shaped viewport. Ronon and Teyla fired at the same time, and both Wraith jerked and twitched under the combined onslaught. They dropped, sprawling on the deck.

  John pivoted, checking the room, as Ronon moved around the dais to watch the door. Teyla finished her own survey of the chamber, saying, "We are clear."

  John pulled the detonator control out of his vest. "Let's see if this is going to be easy." He hit the touchpad. The readout did the same thing that it had before, blinking the error code. And he hadn't heard anything, either. "Anybody hear an explosion?" he asked, hoping against hope.

  "Nothing," Teyla said with a grimace. Ronon and the Eidolon shook their heads.

  Kethel was already stepping up onto the dais, examining the consoles. "I'll look for a self-destruct. Perhaps something onboard is still interfering with the detonation signal." Edane and Caras were warily looking around the control area.

  John shoved the detonator back in his pocket and pulled out the life signs detector. There were blips moving on the level immediately below, but none coming toward them. The Wraith probably didn't realize anything had been beamed aboard yet, and were still waiting for the Eidolon. That wasn't going to last long.

  Looking around, Caras asked, "What is that smell?" John had barely noticed it; the air had that sour taint common to every Wraith ship John had been in, the sick stench of death and rot.

  Ronon sneered. "Their supplies."

  Caras stared at him, uncomprehending, and Ronon didn't elaborate.

  Kethel frowned down at the console, his hands flat against the surface. From his expression, the news wasn't good. John knew the Wraith systems weren't anything like the Ancients' or what he had seen of the Eidolon's. The interfaces weren't touchpads or buttons, but thin membranes that the Wraith apparently manipulated by passing their hands over them. John asked, "Any luck?"

  Kethel shook his head, wiping his hands off on his coat, as if disgusted by the contact. "It's not responding to me. If I had time-"

  The blips John could see were starting to move rapidly. "No time, we've got to get down there." He headed for the door, checked the detector again, and hit the slimy control-thing on the wall. The door membrane folded open, revealing a long curving corridor, the dark ceiling arching overhead, draped with shrouds and strands of web. As Teyla led the others out, John hung back with Ronon, pulling out a fragmentation grenade. When the others were all out in the corridor, he gave Ronon a nod and they both tossed their grenades onto the dais, Ronon landing his directly atop one of the consoles. John hit the control, closing the hatch. The muted thump from inside didn't sound destructive enough, and he asked Kethel, "Can you jam this door?"

  "Yes." Kethel pulled out a tool that looked like a scalpel, slit open the bulbous control panel, and stuck his hand into it, manipulating the slimy things inside.

  John figured that would slow the Wraith down, but the ship had to have alternate controls for the shields, and they had to move fast. He looked deliberately at the Eidolon, saying, "Any time you want out of here, if you get separated, cornered, whatever, just hit your transponder. If you fall behind, we're not going to have time to come back for you."

  Kethel looked at Edane and Caras, giving them a sharp nod to reinforce the order. Life signs detector braced over the P-90, John headed down the corridor.

  They found the first cocooned body only a few paces along, crammed back into a cubby in the wall. John glanced at it only long enough to see it was dead, withered to a husk, with the gaping wound of the feeding mark in its chest.

  "What is that?" Edane asked, in what sounded like horrified fascination. He tried to stop, but Kethel took his arm and pulled him into motion again.

  "What do you think it is?" Ronon countered.

  John really didn't want to get into this just now. He said, "Just keep moving." They passed two more desiccated bodies webbed to the wall, then a dozen more, all dead. More passages led off the first corridor, dim and web-draped. Kethel guided them with his scanner, finding a path toward the big blot of energy signatures where the ship's drive was located. John caught some blips off the detector, but most of the Wraith seemed to be down below. His headset came on and Rodney's voice suddenly demanded, "Can you hear me?"

  John flinched, startled. "Yes, dammit."

  "I had to boost the gain before I could get through," Rodney explained impatiently. "Did you try the detonator again? The signal might have-"

  "Tried it, didn't work. Are you in the jumper?"

  There was a hesitation. "I'm near the jumper."

  John swore. "Rodney-Later." John signed off, his eyes on the life signs detector. Four strong blips, coming up toward them from the lower level, moving rapidly. That's an elevator He held up a fist to signal the others to stop, ignoring the slight scuffle behind him as the Eidolon belatedly realized what that meant. Where the hell is Hah, got you. The corridor had widened a little and there was a membrane stretched across an indentation in the bulkhead.

  Ronon stepped forward with John as Teyla covered the corridor. The membrane slid open, and four more surprised Wraith died in the elevator doorway. With a wary glance at the bodies, Kethel stepped forward. "The drive area is one level below."

  Teyla told him, "We cannot take this elevator, they could shut it down and trap us."

  John tried the detonator, just for luck, and got the error code again. Son of a bitch. He shoved it back in his pocket and checked the life signs detector. As he expected, the blips on this level were moving their way. The level below, at least in this area, still looked clear. "We need another way down, now."

  Kethel nodded, eyes on his scanner. "I'm reading a maintenance passage. ..this way."

  They found it around the corner, in another intersection of passages. It was a ribbed shaft like something's gullet, with multiple ladder rungs down the sides, leading down into a chamber lit with dim red light. John exchanged a wince with Teyla and grabbed for the first rung.

  Halfway down, Rodney's voice burst into John's headset again, almost making him lose his grip on the slick material of the ladder. "The Queen says the Wraith know you're there."

  "We know they know that, Rodney," John said through gritted teeth. The rungs had been spaced for adult male Wraith only, and Teyla and the two younger Eidolon were moving slowly, having to awkwardly stretch to reach them. Kethel slowed down, waiting for Edane and Caras, and John waited for Teyla, motioning Ronon to go ahead. "Rodney, what the hell are you-"

  Rodney said in annoyance, "I'm entering the last codes for a pulse array adjustment. The detachment of the singularity started to accelerate, but this should-Oh, oh, that's... unusual. Hold on a minute."

  Ronon climbed aroun
d John, then swung down, dropping to the bottom of the shaft and landing in a crouch. As the others caught up, John climbed down the rest of the way, remembering at the last moment not to drop the last few feet; his knee just wouldn't take it right now.

  The shaft opened into a wider corridor that curved out of sight just past a couple of membrane-sealed hatchways. John pulled out the life signs detector.

  Kethel checked his scanner, nodding toward the first hatchway. "It should be there-"

  That was about the moment John's screen registered a dozen or more blips headed straight for them. He yelled a warning, ducking across the corridor and hitting the control to open the hatch. Ronon and Teyla moved instantly, taking cover with John in the hatchway, but the Eidolon were slow to react.

  Kethel and Edane reached the hatchway just as the first group of drones burst around the corner, but Caras was still in the middle of the corridor. He took a stun blast in the face, dropping his own weapon before falling to the ground in a limp sprawl. Edane ran for him, as John and the others fired on the drones, driving them back.

  Edane reached Caras, stooping to touch the transponder. The Eidolon's body vanished in a flash of blue-white light. More drones poured into the corridor, and in a moment Edane would be hit, with no one to trigger his transponder. John yelled, "Go, go! Get out of there!"

  Edane looked at the drones, wide-eyed. Then he touched his transponder and vanished.

  John and Teyla kept up steady bursts of fire, with Ronon using his energy gun, and the first few drones dropped. The others retreated back around the corner, a few leaning out to take shots. John had time to notice the membrane sealing the hatch still hadn't opened. "What the hell is-" John reached around, hitting the door control again, a narrow miss from a stun blast making his fingers go numb for an instant. "It's locked! Kethel-"

  Kethel stepped past him, slashed open the control surface, and shoved his hand inside. John leaned out to cover him.

  Abruptly the door membrane folded open. As Teyla turned to cover the room inside, a stun blast hit Kethel in the side. John made an instinctive grab for him but Kethel staggered backward, away from the hatchway, and fell, sprawling on the deck.