by Jo Graham
A pair of chopsticks in a paper packet waved in front of him, and Ronon looked up. Captain Cadman smiled down at him from beneath her beret, a tray in her other hand. “Spare pair,” she said.
“Thanks.” He took the packet from her.
“Is this seat taken?” She gestured vaguely to the chair opposite.
“No.”
“Cool.” Cadman slid into the seat and set her tray down. “Pretty busy, huh?”
“Yeah.” Ronon tore the packet open and split the chopsticks carefully. “When did Carter start carrying chopsticks?”
“I dunno.” Cadman applied herself to her chicken casserole with great gusto. In fact, Ronon wasn’t sure he’d ever seen a woman eat so fast, not even in the Satedan guard.
He was staring, and she stopped and looked up at him. “Something wrong?”
“No.”
“I did a six mile run on the treadmill this morning,” Cadman said. “Kind of worked up an appetite.” She didn’t look like she’d been running, her red-gold hair wound up neatly at the back of her neck. He supposed it did look wet.
“You like the Hammond?” he managed.
Cadman stopped, the food halfway to her mouth. “I do.” She took a bite and swallowed quickly, then smiled. “Colonel Carter’s a lot more of a hard-ass than Colonel Sheppard was. You’d better do it by the book and you’d better have an answer when she asks you, or you get the eyebrow and some scathing comment about being better prepared.” Cadman grimaced. “I’ve never been very good at the book. You know. Lots of people say, ‘Laura Cadman is really enthusiastic and she works hard.’ But not so many say ‘Laura Cadman is really smart.’ So I get that look a lot.” She grinned at Ronon, and it looked like the sun suddenly came out. “So I get questions like ‘What would you do if you were in a shaft filling up with water and you could blow the door with C4 but you didn’t have a fuse?’ And most of the time I’m like ‘WTF? Why would I be in a shaft filling up with water with a locked door and C4?’”
Ronon busted out laughing. “That kind of thing happens,” he said, waving a chopstick at her.
“Maybe to you! Wouldn’t it be better not to get stuck in a shaft filling up with water?”
“Yeah,” Ronon said, still chuckling. “But it happens.”
“So what would you do, Mr. Smarty Pants?” she asked.
Ronon took a long sip of his iced tea, as though carefully considering the problem. “Shaft. Water. C4.” He grinned again. “I’d say, ‘Teyla, how about getting us out of here?’”
Cadman laughed. “Oh that’s a good one. That will sit well with Carter!”
“See, Teyla’s got everything but a field kitchen in that backpack. Tiny little woman, but you get into anything and Teyla says totally calmly, ‘It so happens I have a flare gun, an electric drill, four chickens and a spare Genii uniform right here.’”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.” Ronon took another drink.
“Major Lorne said that back when he did training at the SGC, O’Neill was the one with the final sign off and he was the hard-ass. Carter was the nice one. But Jesus H. on a pogo stick, she’s the one washing people out now! There are four people with transfers pending as soon as we get back. They didn’t cut it. In, like, three months.” Cadman took a bite of her bread. “So I have to watch it. But it’s really nice that Colonel Sheppard asked to borrow me while Major Lorne is on crutches. And that he said in writing that it was because he needed ‘a Marine with a brain.’ That helps a lot.” She paused for another bite. “It sucks that Lorne broke his leg.”
“It sucks a lot more for the people who got fed on instead,” Ronon said.
“That too.” Cadman looked thoughtful but uncowed, and Ronon remembered that she was, after all, the only Marine lieutenant in five years who’d served her whole tour and gone home without a stretcher or a body bag. Cadman was good at getting by. She was like the kids he’d grown up with, the best of them.
“Cadman, why are you a Marine?”
“Laura.” She shrugged, her eyes on her plate as she took another bite. “Call me Laura. And I guess it was because that’s what my school had. It was Navy or Marines, and I don’t like boats.” She looked up, her eyes very bright. “If what you’re asking is why I’m not a graphic designer or something, it’s a long story.”
“Ok,” Ronon said. He liked to hear her talk. And she did, pretty much nonstop.
“My parents are both flakes. I was in junior high when my dad went off to Arizona to find himself and my mom went to Miami with her boyfriend. So I moved in with Nana and Pops in St. Petersburg. Pops used to be in the Navy, so he talked about how much he’d liked it and all. But Nana and Pops didn’t have any money for school, and they thought I ought to do better than the drive-thru, and my grades weren’t good enough for any scholarships. Except the Marines. So they paid for my four years, and then I owed them four years.” Cadman shrugged. “My four years are up, but I like it, so I’m staying in. How many mediocre graphic designers get to go to other planets?”
“Point,” Ronon said.
“Besides,” she said, “you meet some really interesting people. And some of them are pretty hot.”
“What, like Rodney?” Ronon asked, remembering Cadman’s whole mess with Rodney when she’d first gotten there, when a malfunctioning culling beam had left her stuck in Rodney’s body.
Cadman laughed. “No, not exactly.” Then she sobered. “I’m really sorry about Rodney. And I’m glad I get a chance to help get him back. He’s an ok guy.”
Ronon’s eyes met hers across the table. “We may not get him back.”
“It won’t be because we didn’t try,” Cadman said.
Ronon looked away. Something weird like hope was crawling around in him. Maybe they could do this. Maybe it would work. And then everything could go back to normal.
“When we get into it,” he said, “you watch out for Zelenka, ok? We’ve got to take him because we’ve got to have somebody to deal with Wraith tech if we need to, and we can’t count on finding Teyla first. He can’t shoot for shit.”
“I’ll watch out for him,” Cadman promised. “He’s a sweet old guy. Reminds me of Pops.”
One hour until time.
Sam sat down at her desk and took a deep breath, looking up at the pictures held to the metal wall above with cheerful magnets in the shape of bright colored flowers. Cassie in her graduation gown. Daniel in a floppy hat and wire rimmed glasses, Teal’c looking inscrutable beside him in the light of some alien sun — that was an old one, that picture. Daniel didn’t look much like that anymore. Jack in his baseball cap, sitting on the end of his pier with a fishing rod in his hand, looking straight at the camera with a sideways smile.
This was the email she never sent. But it was there, in case someone else needed to send it.
October 16, 2009
Dear Jack,
I’m not sorry. I don’t regret any of it, not one minute, not one second. Not ever.
Your Carter
Her radio sounded softly. “Colonel, we will be dropping out of hyperspace in fifty minutes.”
“Understood, Franklin. I’m on my way.” She carefully hit the save button and closed the laptop, turned off the light and went up to the bridge.
Forty minutes.
“Be prepared to reopen a hyperspace window immediately,” Guide ordered the helmsman.
The hive ship had not yet exited hyperspace, but Guide took no chances. Silent in the center of the control room, Queen Steelflower nodded her assent.
“We are ready, my commander,” the helmsman said, his head bent over the console, half in shiptrance. “We are coming out of hyperspace now.”
They slid through the window, blue streaked stars shifting to the speckled blackness of a normal starfield.
“We have a hail,” the ship-master said, looking over his shoulder to his queen.
“One hive ship on our instruments,” the helmsman said, “One and one only. It is Revenant, belonging t
o Queen Death.”
“That is well,” Guide replied. “All is as it should be.” He looked at Steelflower. “What is your wish, My Queen?”
“Hail Revenant,” Steelflower said evenly. “And inform them that I have arrived to speak with my sister.”
Sable, the commander of the honor guard, winced inwardly. Let it never be said Queen Steelflower lacked audacity! She spoke as a superior queen to a lesser, or at least as one who would never acknowledge lesser status. Perhaps she would come as an ally, but not as a subject queen. And yet perhaps there had been too much bowing and scraping to Queen Death. She was, after all, not the only queen.
“Yes, My Queen,” he said.
“Twenty five minutes to reversion,” Major Franklin said precisely.
“Understood.” Sam Carter settled back in her chair. “Raise shields five minutes before we exit hyperspace.” She tapped her radio. “Colonel Sheppard? Is your team ready?”
“We’re getting in the jumper now,” Sheppard said clearly in her ear. “Me, Cadman, Keller, Ronon and Zelenka. We’ll be ready to go on your mark.”
“You’re going to have a very narrow window,” Sam said. “To get inside while they’re launching darts.”
“We’ve done it before.” Sheppard sounded confident. “We’ll cloak before we get out of the bay.”
Franklin looked at Sam. “If they’re cloaked our automatic systems won’t be able to sense them. And …”
Sam nodded. “Sheppard? You’ll have to do a purely manual departure. The moment you cloak we can’t see you.”
“Got it. Just open the bay doors for us and we’re good.”
Launch and recovery were the times the Hammond was most vulnerable. While her landing bays were energy shielded, those shields were incredibly fragile compared to her hull. And the bays were small. Thirty feet in height was nothing compared to the immensity of space. A pilot error of a few feet, of hundredths of a percent, would run a ship into the walls or into the delicate components within, which was why recovery and launch were generally done with the Hammond’s systems providing constant data feedback to the 302s or jumpers. It took a very skilled pilot indeed to turn all the safeties off and do it on manual.
Of course, Cameron Mitchell had recovered her in a spacesuit on manual, aboard the Odyssey. Not that it was an experience she’d ever like to repeat.
But Sheppard was probably the most skilled jumper pilot they had, and he’d have the jumper’s systems to assist. Sam didn’t even blink at letting him do it.
“Open the bay doors as soon as we’ve raised shields,” Sam said to Franklin. “Colonel Sheppard will take it out without assistance.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The shuttlecraft mated neatly with Revenant, the door irising open in a series of cascading movements to reveal those within. Queen Steelflower stood straightbacked, her chin high, and no trace of trepidation showed on her face. At her back, her Consort loomed tall, his immaculate leather coat falling to his ankles, his expression impassive.
Steelflower’s gaze raked the assembled blades. “I am Steelflower,” she said.
Revenant’s watch commander stepped forward, inclining his head deeply. “I am Iceseeker. It is my honor to escort you to the reception chambers where all has been made ready for you. My queen will join you shortly.”
Steelflower hesitated a moment, her skirts swaying. She was not dressed formally, but rather like a warrior queen in boots and short coat, its emerald folds only reaching her knees, stiff with embroidery.
Her Consort read her movement. “Our shuttlecraft will cast off and return to our ship,” he said. “Thereby to await Queen Steelflower’s pleasure.”
There was little the watch commander could object to in that. After all, they were two alone, as they had said they would be, and the crew of the shuttle would not figure in anything that came. “Of course.”
“Then lead us, commander,” she said, and her eyes fell on him like falling sparks. “We shall await your lady.” She followed him with her head high, her slender hand set to her Consort’s wrist in a gesture both graceful and courtly, as though she stood among her own kindred.
“Five minutes,” Franklin said, frowning at the board. “Raising shields, ma’am.”
Sam didn’t reply to that. “Sheppard? You’re good to go.”
“Copy that,” Sheppard said. “We’ll be in and out before you get the paint scratched.” He sounded high on adrenaline, ready to fight. Which was a good thing.
Sam opened the shipwide intercom. “Four minutes to reversion. All hands to battlestations. It’s showtime, people.”
*It is a trap,* Guide said, mind to mind, his hand brushing against hers as they stood within the reception hall.
*I know that well,* Teyla replied. Above, the low ceiling was arched with a tracery of supports scribing a perfect circle. At the center of it a low table held oath taking materials, while each of the six radial entrances was guarded by a drone in full battle gear, weapons at the ready. They carried formal pikes, not the more mundane stunners. There were of course no humans about, and for use upon another Wraith a bladed weapon would be more effective. Stunners could be shaken off and bullets survived, but severed limbs would not regrow.
*I doubt Queen Death is even aboard this ship,* Guide said, a pleasant smile on his face.
*As long as Rodney is, and likewise the ZPM,* she replied. “That, at least is true I think. These drones cannot hide such things from me.* She likewise gave him a courteous gaze. *And no, they do not yet plan to kill us.*
*Yet,* Guide said softly, a caressing note in his voice that was almost anticipation. He caught the hint of amusement in her mind. *Does that entertain you?*
*You remind me of John,* she said.
The Hammond’s bay doors slowly opened, revealing the blue of hyperspace. Outside the puddle jumper, in the landing bay, there would be claxons hooting warnings, but inside it was silent. Flashing yellow lights indicated depressurization.
“Coming out of hyperspace,” Major Franklin said in his earpiece. “Good luck, Colonel.”
“Thanks,” John said, glancing over at Radek in Teyla’s usual shotgun seat. “Here goes nothing.” He moved the indicators to full cloak.
Outside, there was a brief flash as they reverted to normal space, sublight engines engaging with a flare of white fire. The Hammond had emerged ninety degrees to the ventral of the two hive ships, and now she pulled up in a climb vertical to her own plane of entry, forward rail guns opening up on the nearer of the two ships.
John wondered briefly how Sam had made sure she was shooting at the right one, but that wasn’t his problem.
They rocketed toward the hive ship, looking for a moment as though they intended a collision, or at least a shield on shield pass that would strain every system, pulling away at the last second with only a few tens of meters between one shield and the other, rail guns spitting bright fire, the hive ship’s shields flaring blue in the void. The Hammond’s gunners couldn’t see them, so he’d have to dodge friendly fire too.
“Here we go,” he said, and as the Hammond reeled away, diving beneath the hive ship, the puddle jumper leapt forward.
The hive ship screamed. There was no other word for it, for the alarms that rang out high and urgent in every room and corridor.
“What is happening?” Queen Steelflower demanded of the nearest guard.
“I do not know,” he replied truthfully.
“Find out,” Steelflower snapped, her Consort coming forward to her side.
The note of the alarm changed. Pilots to the dart bays. The ship was going to full battle alert.
A young blade of Queen Death’s, his hair pulled back in a single white braid, came hurrying into the chamber.
“What treachery is this?” Guide snapped. “We have come aboard your ship in good faith, and now you are attacking our ship!”
“We have done no such thing!” the blade replied. “It is the Lanteans! It is the warship of She Who Carries M
any Things.”
“We will return to our ship immediately,” Steelflower said.
The blade swallowed. “I cannot allow that,” he said.
Steelflower drew herself up, her eyes fixed upon his. “Am I your prisoner then?”
His mouth opened and then shut. “No,” he said. “At least I do not think…”
“Then you will stand aside and allow me and my consort to return to our ship,” she said, and did not take her gaze from his.
Another blade approached, his steps swift on the floor. “Ardent, what are you doing?” His mind was hooded, his resolve firm.
“Queen Steelflower wishes to return to her ship, as the Lanteans are attacking us,” the one called Ardent replied.
“That cannot be,” the other said, and Steelflower felt a frisson run through her.
*Guide,* she said, a moment’s warning as the blade drew steel.
Chapter Thirty
Revenant
“I do not see how we are to do this,” Radek said quietly as the puddle jumper jinked, dodging madly around the fire radiating outward from the hive ship, trying to hug the surface of the shields as closely as possible.
“They’ll open the bay doors to let the darts out,” John said, his hands loose on the controls. There was no need to jerk a jumper. It moved like water, like his thoughts. Nothing had ever moved like it did.
The Hammond’s rail guns spat fire, but the jumper rolled beneath it, friendly fire missing by a few meters. In the seat behind Radek, Cadman swore. “They can’t see us,” she said.
John didn’t spare a breath to respond. He’d seen the dart bay opening, the first blue dots of launching flares. “There we are. Just like that, baby,” he whispered. The puddle jumper slipped between the oncoming darts, rotating 180 as she slid through the gaps in their formation, straight into the maw of the dart bay.
Metal rang on metal as the blade drew a long knife, but Guide was faster. His arm rose in a lightning parry, catching it on a dagger of his own before his queen, a quick twist and disengage sending the weapon flying.
