SGA-21 - Inheritors - Book VI of the Legacy Series

by Melissa Scott

  INHERITORS

  Book six of the Legacy Series

  by Jo Graham, Melissa Scott & Amy Griswold

  An original publication of Fandemonium Ltd, produced under license from MGM Consumer Products.

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  METRO-GOLDWYN-MAYER Presents

  STARGATE ATLANTIS™

  JOE FLANIGAN RACHEL LUTTRELL JASON MOMOA JEWEL STAITE

  ROBERT PICARDO and DAVID HEWLETT as Dr. McKay

  Executive Producers BRAD WRIGHT & ROBERT C. COOPER

  Created by BRAD WRIGHT & ROBERT C. COOPER

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  I who am dead a thousand years,

  And wrote this sweet archaic song,

  Send you my words for messengers

  The way I shall not pass along.

  I care not if you bridge the seas,

  Or ride secure the cruel sky,

  Or build consummate palaces

  Of metal or of masonry.

  But have you wine and music still,

  And statues and a bright-eyed love,

  And foolish thoughts of good and ill,

  And prayers to them who sit above?

  – James Elroy Flecker

  Previously, in Legacy….

  The Wraith invasion of Earth has been defeated, and the city of Atlantis has settled to the surface of the Pacific just off San Francisco. The team assumes that this is a temporary respite before the city returns to Pegasus, but it becomes clear that the IOA and its member governments would like to keep the city on Earth. Woolsey recruits Teyla to be ‘the face’ for the people of Pegasus, and she and the rest of the team throw themselves into the unfamiliar political arena. Despite their best efforts, the IOA’s decision goes against them: Atlantis is to remain on Earth, to be slowly dismantled for its technology.

  This hits the team hard, but there seems to be nothing left that they can do about it. Rodney McKay resigns in a temper, and takes a job at Area 51; Jennifer Keller goes with him, and they begin to build their new life together. Colonel Carter, now in command of the George Hammond, begins siphoning off the cream of Atlantis’s military personnel for her new ship; she also invites both Ronon and Teyla to join her team, as advisors. John Sheppard is left in limbo. There’s no place for him on the Hammond, and neither Woolsey nor Jack O’Neill will accept his resignation. The only good thing about still being on the city is that he is able to thwart the IOA’s attempt to take Guide, the captive Wraith known as Todd, for medical experimentation. Instead, John and Dr. Carson Beckett succeed in putting him into stasis, but that is only a temporary solution.

  O’Neill, however, has one last card to play. As Atlantis has landed in US territorial waters, he claims the city for the United States, and in the ensuing uproar, the IOA agrees to send Atlantis back rather than see it fall into the sole possession of any one country. Woolsey resumes command, and the team reassembles to prepare the city for departure before the IOA can change its mind.

  Atlantis lifts from Earth, and begins the long trip to Pegasus. Despite the shortened preparations, everything seems to be going well — until a hyperdrive emitter fails, throwing them out of hyperspace and using up nearly all of the power in their ZPM. There is a single planet close enough to reach at slower-than-light speeds. It’s a cold world without a Stargate, but it’s their only choice. After a difficult flight, John successfully lands the city, but there’s not enough power left in the ZPM to move the city or gate back to Earth.

  The crew reestablishes contact with their old allies in Pegasus, only to discover that things have not been going well in their absence. The Wraith have united under a new queen who calls herself Death, and they have destroyed a number of human worlds. As the team investigates the devastation on one such planet, Todd manages to escape, only to discover that he has lost control of his alliance and has only a single hive under his command. In a bid to weaken Queen Death and regain his former power, Todd informs Atlantis of the location of the queen’s next great attack.

  Trusting Todd is always a gamble, but John sees this as a chance to stop Queen Death in her tracks. The team travels to the planet Levanna, where they join with the local ruler and a detachment of Genii to wait for Queen Death’s attack. The Wraith arrive in force, Darts and drone infantry backed by a hiveship in orbit. The battle is close and hard fought, but at last the Wraith retreat. For the first time, Queen Death has been defeated, and even it if it’s only temporary, it’s a boost for humans throughout Pegasus.

  However, Queen Death’s response is rapid and devastating. Atlantis receives a distress call from New Athos, warning of a Culling. John leads the team through, only to find — nothing. There has been no attack; everything is perfectly normal in the settlement. As they try to figure out what happened, the Wraith attack in truth — and the Darts target Rodney. Before the others realize what’s going on, the attackers have snatched up Rodney and have vanished back through the gate.

  Their first desperate searches turn up nothing, and the team splits up to pursue two sets of leads with two sets of reluctant allies.

  John, Teyla and Carson Beckett meet with the Genii leader Ladon Radim, who promises them the aid of his spies all over the galaxy if they will help him with a project of his own. The Genii have found an Ancient warship that had crashed on a remote planet. Genii salvage teams have been repairing it but they need someone with the ATA gene to fly it back to the Genii homeworld. John agrees that they will accompany Radim's sister Dahlia and bring the warship back to the Genii in exchange for their help. Unfortunately, the Wraith ambush them, leaving them to a long hike across a hostile desert to reach the warship. An attack by carnivorous lizards leaves Teyla and Carson injured, and John questioning his own judgment about his rash decision to do this without consulting Atlantis or getting additional personnel – that this is like the mission in Afghanistan that cost the life of his friend Holland many years ago.

  Meanwhile, Ronon and Jennifer have been sent to meet with Todd on a world controlled by Wraith Worshippers. Despite Todd's assurances that the Wraith consider this world neutral ground, all bets are off when Queen Death's people arrive and Ronon and Jennifer are forced to hide in a tomb. One of the Wraith Worshippers double crosses Todd and tries to kill them, thwarted only by Jennifer's quick thinking. Ronon blames Todd, but he assures them he is no fonder of Queen Death than they are, and says that he will let them know if he finds out anything about Rodney's fate. They must be satisfied with that, desperate as they are to save Rodney.

  At the same time, Rodney is in a situation that's far more horrific than his friends have imagined. Queen Death's men have reverse e
ngineered the retrovirus created by Dr. Beckett that turned a Wraith into the human the Atlantis expedition called Michael, and Rodney is now a Wraith! Known as Quicksilver, and believing himself to be fully part of Queen Death’s court, he is now bending all his attention to helping the Wraith conquer Atlantis.

  After a dangerous flight home, John returns to Atlantis with his team and the badly damaged Ancient warship. Shortly thereafter Sam Carter arrives in Atlantis with her new battlecruiser, the George Hammond. When Todd contacts Atlantis and tells them where Queen Death's ship will be powered down briefly for repairs, it seems like a good time to attack and retrieve Rodney. However, the mission goes wrong when Rodney, believing he's a Wraith, resists the attempts of the team to rescue him. He stuns John and as the hive ship powers up, Sam beams off John and the rest of the team before they can be captured. But Rodney is still in the hands of the Wraith, and now Atlantis faces a more dangerous foe than ever before – their own man turned against them!

  Meanwhile, back in Atlantis, Dr. Zelenka discovers that Rodney has left ‘back doors’ into the city's computer systems, and that some of them are active. Now that Rodney is helping the Wraith, he will be able to not only betray their location to the Wraith but let the Wraith in. Zelenka and Sam Carter work on finding Rodney's code, but it's taking too long and neither of them can put aside all other work. Fortunately, it's possible to bring in an expert both on the code and on Rodney: his sister, Jeannie Miller. Jeannie agrees to come and help, and arrives in Atlantis aboard Daedalus. Also aboard Daedalus is an old friend of John's, Lt. Col. Melissa (Mel) Hocken, now in command of Caldwell's 302s, and the city's new archaeologist, Dr. William Lynn.

  Jeannie's arrival is timely, because Rodney, believing himself to be the Wraith Quicksilver, has agreed to help Queen Death invade Atlantis by remotely dropping the shield on the Stargate. Once within the city, Rodney plans to steal the ZPM, thus crippling Atlantis's defenses.

  The Wraith attack, led by Rodney, who manages to get to the ZPM room and take the ZPM. Though John and Ronon mount a counter attack, Rodney escapes through the Stargate, badly wounding Lorne in the process.

  Without a ZPM, Atlantis is in serious trouble. They cannot dial earth, and the only way to keep the Wraith from dialing in is to keep dialing out, rendering the gate busy, but sooner or later they're going to have to stop. Carter suggests building a mechanical iris like the one at the SGC which isn't attached to Atlantis's computers, but doing so will require large titanium plates, something that isn't easy to find in the Pegasus Galaxy. However, Ronon has an idea where they might get them – the ruins of his home planet of Sateda. The Satedans had the technology to make them, and it's likely that some usable stores remain.

  Ronon believes that Sateda is presently uninhabited, but when the gate team arrives on Sateda it's clear that isn't true. A group of Satedan refugees led by a man named Ushan Cai have returned home and laid claim to parts of the old city. They greet Ronon with enthusiasm and are willing to trade large titanium plates they've salvaged for goods from Atlantis. Ronon also suggests that they might want to have a look at the old city museum on Sateda, as there might be a ZPM. The team goes to check it out but finds bad news – the Genii are here, and they're also looking for something at the museum.

  When Ronon confronts Cai, Cai says that the returned Satedans don't have the weapons or the numbers to stop the Genii from looting Sateda if they want to. If there is going to be an agreement about who owns the city and the salvage rights, it's going to have to be brokered by Atlantis. Backed by Colonel Caldwell, John and Ronon work out a deal with Ladon Radim to keep the Genii off Sateda in return for John not exposing Radim's plan to get rid of Sora, who has remained a thorn in his side. In return, the Satedans let the team keep the ZPM they have found, though it is almost drained and only has enough power left to fire a few drones and hold the shield for a few minutes.

  Meanwhile, the IOA is unhappy with Woolsey's performance and recalls him to Earth to face a hearing. Despite Jack O'Neill's support, it looks like Woolsey may be relieved of command in Atlantis. However, since Atlantis is now out of communications with Earth, no one knows what is happening.

  The worst looks like it may come to pass when a Wraith patrol finds Atlantis. In the ensuing battle, John uses the remaining power in the ZPM to hold off the Dart attack, while the Hammond and the Daedalus fight off the hive ships. In the process the Hammond is badly damaged. Carter and Caldwell decide that Daedalus will return to Earth to reestablish communications, leaving the 302 wing with Carter while the Hammond is under repair.

  Meanwhile, Jeannie has found a message embedded in the code the Wraith transferred to the city during an attack – what appears to be a cry for help from Rodney. John goes to the gate address Rodney specified, only to be caught in a culling. A prisoner aboard the hive ship of a young queen named Waterlight, he realizes that Rodney has not betrayed him. These Wraith don't know who he is, but they will surely find out.

  Guide, finding out that John is a prisoner, has no choice but to tell Carter where he is, fearing that otherwise John will disclose to Queen Death Guide's own duplicity. In Atlantis, the team tries to figure out how to rescue him. However, at the moment they have no spaceworthy ship and the hiveship is not near a Stargate. Teyla has an idea. There is a Wraith cruiser that was wrecked in the battle. She can fly it. If she resumes the disguise she wore last year as Guide's queen, perhaps she can persuade the Wraith to release John to her custody. It's a dangerous plan, but it's the only one they have. While Zelenka and Carter repair the Wraith ship, Jennifer once again transforms Teyla into Queen Steelflower.

  Arriving at the rendezvous, Teyla persuades Waterlight to give her John, but at the cost of promising Waterlight the assistance of Guide's alliance against Queen Death. Guide shows up and Teyla suggests to him that they become allies in truth – Atlantis and ‘Steelflower's’ Wraith against Queen Death. Both Guide and John are skeptical. Teyla talks both of them into considering the arrangement. Guide reveals that his scientists have been working on a retrovirus of their own, entirely unlike Queen Death's. Theirs works on humans to make the feeding process not be fatal, a potential game changer. He wants Jennifer to come and assist him in perfecting the retrovirus. Though John is disturbed by the notion, he agrees to take Guide's proposal under consideration.

  Meanwhile, on Earth, Woolsey's hearing with the IOA is going badly. Jack suggests that Daniel would make a good replacement for Woolsey in Atlantis.

  In Atlantis, Ronon goes to check out the site of an Ancient installation on the planet where Atlantis has come to rest on the theory that perhaps once it had a ZPM, taking Laura Cadman, Dr. Robinson, and the new Dr. Lynn. They determine that it once did but that the ZPM was removed long ago, and also that the installation was a prison that was abandoned thousands of years ago. Unfortunately, they disturb some dangerous wildlife living there and in the firefight Dr. Robinson breaks her leg. Also they bring down the ice ceiling, leaving them trapped.

  Fortunately, John and Teyla return and John rescues the overdue gate team. Together, everyone considers the implications of Guide's proposal. If they don't help, Guide may make the retrovirus work by himself and then they will have no idea what he's doing. If they do help him, they may be able to use it to prevent Atlantis personnel from being killed by the Wraith. Decisively, Jennifer volunteers to go and work with Guide while Teyla goes with her to resume the role of Steelflower and rally Guide's alliance against Queen Death. Jennifer and Guide work together and ultimately test a version on Jennifer, but it doesn't work.

  Also, the IOA, afraid they're going to wind up with Daniel Jackson in charge in Atlantis, reinstates Richard Woolsey.

  Meanwhile, everyone else prepares for a raid on Queen Death's ship in hopes that they will be able to recover Rodney who is still a prisoner. The team gets aboard her ship while Carter engages the Darts, but are separated. Ronon and Jennifer find Rodney and stun him. Cut off and with the hive ship about to explode, Guide beams out John, Teyla
and their team, while Ronon puts Rodney and Jennifer, who is having some kind of seizure, into a lifepod.

  Ronon ejects as the hive ship blows up and the Hammond goes to hyperspace, leaving them adrift and alone. Rodney recovers from being stunned, and together Ronon and Rodney land the lifepod on a nearby world. Unfortunately they land some distance from the Stargate and will have to travel across country to get there. Jennifer awakens and has no explanation for what happened – except perhaps it was a side effect of the retrovirus trial, which may have made her immune to the aging effects of being fed on by a Wraith. As they travel it becomes clear that Rodney is in serious trouble. He's starving, and the food that Ronon traps gives him no sustenance. The only way he can feed is as a Wraith. Faced with the possibility of Rodney's death, Jennifer tells him to feed on her. She thinks she will not age, and it's a gamble she's willing to take. Ronon doesn't like this plan, but when Rodney does feed Jennifer doesn't die. Still, tensions between the two are high when they reach the Stargate and dial Atlantis.

  But once back in Atlantis Rodney isn't out of the woods. Queen Death's retrovirus is wearing off and his body is rejecting the Wraith implants. With Rodney's life in the balance, Carson and Jennifer operate to save him and hopefully restore him to himself.

  Meanwhile, Dr. Lynn suspects that there's more to the installation Ronon found than meets the eye. John takes the team to look around. They find little, but their investigations spark long-buried memories of Teyla's, the memories of one of the First Mothers, Osprey who is her long ago Wraith ancestor. These memories reveal that the Ancients created the first Wraith as part of a medical experiment at the installation on the island, a retrovirus test that went badly wrong and that the Ancients then tried to kill their creation. However, some of the test subjects escaped, taking with them the installation's ZPM, which was nearly full.