Mathématique: Chapter 22

“You think this adorably-cut jacket is regulation?” Vala hopped from the desk and twirled. “Think again.”

Chapter warnings: Stressors of all kinds. Grief. Physical injuries. Mental health challenges. Pain.

Text iteration: Midnight.

Additional notes: None.

Chapter 22

Five hours after a lunchtime conversation with Jackson and one hour post a meeting with Landry, the Acting Commander of the Icarus Project found himself in Jackson’s office along with Vala and Mitchell, killing time while he waited for the next sit-rep from Sheppard. He perched on a non-regulation IKEA bookshelf, which housed stacks of loose paper that overflowed from the archeologist’s desk.

“And then what did she say?” The heels of Vala’s boots hit the back of Jackson’s desk with a double clang.

“Why are you having this conversation here?” Jackson asked the ceiling.

Young wasn’t sure what any of them were doing there, truth be told. The esprit de corps of SG-1 was an event horizon of mutually dependent, self-deprecating charm that was as exhausting as it was addictive. Past a certain point, there was no escape.

“She said Saturday would be good,” Mitchell replied.

“Yes, but how did she say it?” Vala asked. “Did she seem excited? Did she—hang on a tic—let me refer to my documentation on American cultural practices. Daniel, darling, where—”

“I filed it for you,” Jackson said mildly. Without looking up, he pointed to the side of his desk.

Vala followed his gaze, scowled at Jackson, then fished a folder out of the trash. “Your social skills need work. Badly.”

“Did you seriously just say that?” Mitchell asked. “To Jackson? The guy is, like, Mr. Cultural Sensitivity. He wrote the book on the subject.”

“No I didn’t,” Jackson said, in irritated sing-song.

“What’s the story with all these manuals of yours?” Young asked.

“Another thing of which we do. Not. Speak.” Jackson shot Young a pointed look over the tops of his glasses.

“Yeah, there’s a little cave of minions somewhere that reads Jackson’s field reports and uses them to put the books together.” Mitchell stole a peanut M&M from the open bag next to Vala.

“If by ‘cave of minions’ you mean the most advanced linguistics department in existence, then yes. That’s correct,” Jackson said.

“All right boys.” Vala pulled a magazine clipping from her file. “Here we go. Now, when Dr. Lam said ‘Saturday would be good’,” Vala paused to make air quotes, “did she a) mirror your posture, b) touch your arm, or c) look at the clock?”

“Um,” Mitchell said. “None of the above?”

“Not a choice, good-looking; stay focused.”

“I don’t even know what we’re doin’,” Mitchell said. “How’m I supposed to ‘stay focused’?”

“You’re getting a modified version of a Cosmo Quiz,” Young dug his knuckles into the small of his back and tried to massage away the ache.

“You know this how?” Mitchell asked.

“It was a long drive back from Casper after that foothold,” Young replied.

“Okaaaaaay.” Mitchell drew out the word. “I’ve decided not to ask you any follow up questions out of manly solidarity.”

“Thanks,” Young said.

Mitchell turned to Vala. “What she actually did was sorta look at me with a neutral facial expression?”

“Hmm.” Vala picked up a pencil. “We’ll call that one a ‘c’.”

“You don’t want it to be ‘c’,” Young advised. “Try and negotiate for ‘a’.”

“Why is ‘c’ bad?”  Mitchell asked. “Can I change it to the mirroring one?”

“Well that depends on how much you value accuracy.” Vala gave him a disapproving look over the top of her folder.

“But—”

“This is supposed to be a work day for me,” Jackson said. “A day on which I do work.”

“That’s like saying ‘today is a day I breathe air’,” Mitchell replied. “Besides, everyone wants to find out if Everett’s neighbor unlocks the mysteries of life, the universe, and everything.”

“What you really mean is everyone wants to buy John Sheppard a beer,” Jackson grumbled.

“Sheppard,” Mitchell said, “shot his commanding officer and got promoted. Sheppard,” Mitchell paused for emphasis, “is so tight with the science staff they get in line to supe up his Mustang. Sheppard,” Mitchell paused again, “is an intergalactic baller. And you are cranky. What gives, Jackson?”

“I’ve explained it at least five times,” Jackson said. “Namely it’s you. Being here. Now.”

“Today is a light day,” Mitchell said. “Light. Less work, more beer.”

“If I don’t get through this regional variant of the Book of Origin pertaining specifically to prophetic mentions of the Orici—” Jackson broke off at Vala’s flinch.

Mitchell froze, his eyes on Vala.

Jackson twisted his pencil between his fingers.

Completely in the dark, Young caught Mitchell’s eye. The other man shook his head. Don’t ask.

“Yes, that’s all very interesting, darling, I’m sure.” Vala recovered with a casual flip of her hair and the clang of her boots against the metal base of the desk. “But I’m doing Cultural Research here, so if you don’t mind—” she turned to Mitchell. “Next question: on your first date, did you a) give her a hug on her doorstep, b) kiss her on the cheek, or c) kiss her on the lips.”

“What?” Mitchell’s voice cracked. “We aren’t dating. We’re friends. Respected colleagues. Chess buddies.”

“Did you say chess?” Jackson shut the file in front of him.

“Little slow on the uptake over there, darling.” Vala twisted to look at Jackson.

The man held her gaze, communicating something that Young could only guess at. Apology, maybe? Understanding?

“We. Are. Not. Dating.” Mitchell cast a glare around the room. 

“Yet,” Young said.

“What do you mean ‘slow’?” Jackson had eyes only for Vala.

“I hate you all,” Mitchell said.

“I got you jello,” Young pointed out, offended.

“That was hours ago. Where’s Sam. I’m gonna—”

“Leave?” Jackson interjected. “Please do.”

“We’ll go with ‘b’,” Vala said.

“You should throw out the question,” Young advised, “if it’s accuracy you’re after.”

“What kinda quiz is this?” Mitchell asked.

Vala plowed ahead. “Next question: your first compliment to her was that you a) liked an outfit she was wearing, b) thought a joke she told was funny, or c) you liked the way she smelled.”

“Uh, it was d), ‘nice work stopping that intergalactic plague’.”

“Hmm.” Vala tapped the eraser end of her pencil against her temple and cocked her head like she was the star of a contemplative photo shoot. “That’s a tough one, but we’ll say ‘b,’ because that seems the most intellectual. You have to be witty to tell a good joke.”

“And to stop an intergalactic plague,” Jackson said. “Very well reasoned. Though, I think it was Gerak and Orlin who did the heavy lifting.”

“There’s no need to be cynical,” Vala said.

“Cynical? I’m the least cynical person in existence,” Jackson protested. “It’s a documented fact. Ask anyone.”

“Why don’t all y’all finish this thing for me,” Mitchell said. “Let me know how it turns out. On second thought, don’t let me know how it turns out.”

“Your tactical error was inviting Dr. Lam to a team dinner,” Young said, “rather than just dinner.”

Mitchell glared at him. “But then it seems like a date. And it’s not a date. It’s not, at all, a date. We’re doin’ something nice for someone who’s done a lot for us, which we do all the time, thanks to Jackson being a complete pushover about everything in existence, except for intolerance so—” Mitchell lost steam. “Cut me a break here?”

“Sure.” Jackson smiled faintly and dropped his eyes to his book.

“No problem.” Vala shut her file of Cosmo Quizzes. Her boots clanged against Jackson’s desk. “In that laudable spirit of camaraderie—”

“Nope,” Mitchell said. “Whatever you’re about to say, I’m good.“

“—I’ll act as your fashion consultant for the length of our dinner series,” Vala finished.

“Thanks but no thanks,” Mitchell said. “And since when is it a dinner series?”

“You think this adorably-cut jacket is regulation?” Vala hopped from the desk and twirled. “Think again.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask you about that.” Jackson squinted at her. “You can’t alter standard—” he was cut off by the simultaneous ringing of the wall phone and his cell phone. 

“Shall I—” Vala began, only to stop as another ringtone split the air.

“Well, this isn’t a good sign.” Mitchell frowned at his own vibrating phone.

Young’s cell buzzed in his pocket. With a sinking feeling, he pulled it out. Caller ID showed it was SGC dispatch.

“Colonel Young,” came Harriman’s careful diction before an automated message played. “Report to the SGC immediately. If onsite, report to the briefing room on level 27. To confirm receipt of this message, press one. To repeat this message, press two. To speak to dispatch, press three.”

Young grimaced and hit the appropriate button on his phone, taking note of the time.

There was only one reason why dispatch would page him and SG-1.

He looked at Jackson, only to find Jackson looking back at him.

“You too, handsome?” Vala traced the edge of her phone.

Young nodded.

Jackson rounded his desk, and the four of them left the room together.

“It’s not emergent,” Vala said, as they headed for the elevators. “If it were, they’d have paged overhead.”

“Yeah,” Mitchell said. “Could be McKay broke a nail.”

“I don’t think so.” Jackson glanced at Young.

“Yeah,” Young agreed. “Me neither.”

When they arrived at the briefing room, Young’s back and leg were a mass of raw nerve and muscle spasm after no further insult than a brisk walk over a stable surface. He did his best to ignore the pain as he lowered himself into a chair across from Teal’c and next to Dr. Perry.

Landry was at the head of the table, his hands clasped in front of him. “They missed their check in,” he said without preamble as they all found their seats. “Both Colonel Sheppard’s team and the Odyssey.”

“And the Odyssey? Crap.” Mitchell tried to swallow the word, but Landry picked it up anyway.

“Yes,” Landry said, in one long gravelly pull. “Crap.”

“We sending a MALP?” Mitchell asked.

“We are,” Landry said. “They’ll patch the feed through any minute now.” He glanced at the wall-mounted monitor at the far end of the room.

“Even if Nick broke the DHD,” Jackson began, “the Odyssey should be—”

“Reachable by subspace?” Landry said grimly. “I know. Harriman’s been trying for the last fifteen minutes and we’re getting nothing. Communications with Prometheus are uninterrupted, so it’s not our array.”

Young rubbed his jaw and tried to ignore the pit in his stomach.

“Do we need to spring Sam for a consult?” Mitchell asked.

“Yes,” Landry said, “but not until we know more. Brightman has cleared her for a half hour window. In the meantime, Dr. Perry, can you shed any light on what the hell is going on?”

Perry cleared her throat. Her eyes flicked over the room before she spoke. “Given what Dr. Rush was planning to do, the most likely outcome of a failed implementation of our entanglement protocol would be a software glitch that disabled the DHD. I have a difficult time imagining a scenario in which such a glitch would directly or indirectly compromise the Odyssey’s communications array or other systems.”

“Do your best,” Landry growled. “Imagine. Because if this isn’t a technical issue,” he leaned forward, “we’re facing a level of infiltration by the Lucian Alliance that’s beyond the scope of my imagination.”

Perry looked steadily at Landry. “There are several ways the hardware of the DHD might interfere with the communications array of an orbiting vessel. The most likely scenario would be a massive EM pulse generated by the DHD’s array.”

“What would the consequences be for the Odyssey?” Mitchell asked.

Perry cleared her throat. “Crystal-based systems would overload and fail. They’d lose navigation, communications, shields, the hyperdrive, transport systems, and most of the juice for sublight. Life support won’t fail. Thrusters will be enough to correct any established orbit. It’s likely they’ll be able to replace component parts in time to avoid a catastrophic outcome, provided they weren’t in a firefight or in an unusually low planetary orbit when the failure occurred.”

The monitor on the far wall went live. It displayed the feed from the gateroom MALP. The camera pointed at the flickering blue of the open gate.

“Sir, are you getting this up there?” Harriman’s voice came from the screen.

“We are,” Landry said. “You have a go.”

They watched as the MALP approached the open wormhole and was swallowed by a field of rippling blue. There was a brief interruption of the signal and then—

The landscape was dark grays and deep greens. Trees lashed back and forth in the wind. Directly in the camera’s sights was a glowing piece of unfamiliar technology, silver-white and delicate. Rain sang faintly off its exposed crystal.

“What’s that?” Young sat forward, ignoring the twinge from his lower back.

No one answered.

“Hey.” They heard McKay over static-laced wind and driving rain. “FINALLY. Not sure how you do things in the Milky Way, but in Pegasus? We send a MALP ten minutes after the first missed check in. NOT HALF AN HOUR.” 

With a nausea-inducing twist, the MALP camera spun away from the glowing tech and toward McKay. The scientist’s face was pale, his hair soaked and plastered to his forehead.

“One,” McKay snapped, “we triggered a novel subroutine in the DHD. Two, that subroutine directly or indirectly, ugh, vanished Dr. Rush and Colonel Sheppard, who were in contact with the DHD at the time. Three, simultaneous with the vanishing, our hell-DHD fired an EM pulse, rendering all our equipment useless. Four, the fact we’ve gotten no backup from the Odyssey leads me to believe they’re in similar straits because there’s no way they missed a pulse of that magnitude. Five, we’re under the leading edge of a major storm with no survival gear to speak of. Six, we need Carter. Right now. No arguments. Gear her up and send her through that gate.”

For a moment, no one spoke.

“What kind of novel subroutine?” Perry asked.

“That thing is the DHD?” Vala pointed at the video feed. “It doesn’t look like any DHD I’ve ever seen.”

“Go back to point number two,” Young growled.

“What do you mean it vanished them?” Jackson asked. “Were they transported or did they shift phase?”

“We should get out there,” Mitchell said. “We should go now.”

“QUIET,” Landry roared.

“Thank you,” McKay said, with the air of a man skirting the edge of panic. “I’m not dealing with a committee of people who have no idea what the hell is going on here. Get me Carter. We have two high-ranking personnel missing with a closing window of action and I do NOT have time to explain myself to soldiers who took one undergrad physics class. I need Carter. I need a laptop in a water resistant case. I need radios. I need tarp. I need the Odyssey up and running. I need a snack. I need things I can’t even think of yet. But number one on my list is Samantha Carter. In the flesh. Tell me she’s gearing up.”

“Carter was shot,” Landry said.

If the general’d been looking to shut the man up, he succeeded. McKay stared into the camera, stricken. “What?” he breathed, inaudible beneath the blown static of wind over microphone. “When? Why didn’t anyone—”

“She’s okay,” Mitchell said, softening the blow. “Or, she will be, but we can’t send her. We can get her on the line for a consult, for maybe half an hour or so.”

“Do it,” McKay said. “Set that up. Give me Carter and Perry and no one else on the line. You can get that organized while Reaves tells you what survival gear to ship through the gate.”

“Can you dial out?” Young asked.

“I don’t know,” McKay said. “I haven’t tried. Knowing the buffer system in this thing—” he glanced over his shoulder at the exotic DHD, “the outgoing matrix could be storing their patterns somehow. Bottom line? I don’t know if they’re present on the planet but shifted, if they’re dematerialized patterns inside the device, or if they’re displaced in space and/or time. Whatever happened to them, I’m sure it’s Sheppard’s fault. I need that laptop. Now.”

“You got it,” Landry said. “That, and whatever else you need.”

“That’s something,” McKay said. “Don’t send any personnel through the gate until I’ve had a chance to run all of this by Carter.”

Landry eyed SG-1. “Gear up.” He stood. “Dr. Perry, you’re with Carter in the infirmary. We’ll get a feed up there. Dismissed.”

Young pushed himself out of his chair, relying on the strength of his arms and trying not to betray even a hint of weakness.

Landry’s sharp eye didn’t miss a thing. “You’re not cleared,” he said.

Young tightened his jaw.

“When mission parameters fall outside those explicitly delineated in SGC regs, the determination of ‘light duty,’ shall be at the discretion of the ranking officer unless directly countermanded by a member of the SGC medical staff,” Jackson said.

“In what universe is the ranking officer not me, Jackson?” Landry rumbled.

“We could use him.” Jackson shrugged. “And he’s acting head of Icarus.”

“We’ve got an untrained Project Asset in the field with a team he doesn’t know,” Young growled. “He’s not the easiest guy to work with. It’s worth the risk of sending me.”

Landry’s keen eye swept the pair of them, then settled on Young. “Suit up. You’re in command.”

“Thank you, sir,” he said, relieved.

Landry scowled. “Don’t bench yourself on day one of your new assignment,” he said, then headed for his office.

As they left the conference room, Vala twisted to give Young a wink and Jackson a subtle ‘okay’ sign, which the other man waved away. As they passed into the hallway, Young felt the gravity of Jackson’s gaze pulling him in. It was impossible not to look at the other man.

“Thanks for backing me,” he said.

Jackson gave him a faint smile and a subtle nod.

Thirty-five minutes later, thanks to the reestablishment of contact with the Odyssey via maddeningly slow light-speed radio communications, they had enough information to know the ship had suffered a failure of every crystal-based array on board. Repairs to the transporter and shields were already completed. Based on Carter’s recommendations and the degree to which the damage on the Odyssey matched Perry’s hypothetical scenario, Landry deemed the situation safe enough to risk gate travel to the planet.

And so, Young had a go.

He wasn’t sure anyone could command SG-1, with its two colonels, its two aliens, and its machinating linguist with friends everywhere, including on higher planes of existence.

He decided he’d think of himself as a poor substitute for Colonel Carter.

With SG-1 flanking him, Young stepped through the event horizon into the midst of a storm. 

Rain pinged off the metal arch of the gate and hissed through the leaves of trees. A faint tang of ozone carried on the brisk wind, which seemed determined to unbalance him. He widened his stance on the rain-slick platform and pulled out his radio.

“Odyssey, this is Colonel Young.” The driving rain soaked through his too-long hair.

There was no response other than static, barely audible over the roar of wind through the forest.

“We gotta boost our signal to cut through this ish.” Mitchell shielded his eyes as he studied the forbidding cloud-cover above. “Speaking as a Corn-Fed, Midwestern Twister Veteran, I’d say this thing looks like it’s about to go real bad, real fast.”

“Twister?” Teal’c zipped his jacket to his chin.

“Have I got a film for you, muscles.” Vala tucked her wet hair beneath the collar of her fatigues. “Something like As Good as it Gets, but with truly atrocious weather.”

“We’re talkin' tornados,” Mitchell said to Teal’c. “Y’know. A violently rotating column of air? In contact with the ground?”

“Don’t even say it.” Jackson squinted into the downpour. “Teal’c, you’ve been on Earth for how long? Ten years? Why is Vala better with cultural references?”

“It’s not a competition, darling,” Vala said, rocked by a vicious blast of wind.

“I do not go out of my way to acquire Tau’ri slang.” Teal’c eyed the tree line, where low-hanging clouds seemed to generate their own darkness.

Young stepped from the platform, treading carefully over slick stone to approach the team huddled in a miserable fan around McKay. The ground was littered with discarded radios and McKay’s Lantean Expedition computer, as useful as the wind-stripped leaves. The three soldiers were valiantly trying to secure a tarp that would protect the working gear from the worst of the gusting rain.

It was a losing battle.

“Oh great,” McKay shouted over the wind as they approached. “More soldiers, a linguist, and—someone too hot to be a physicist,” he finished, eyeing Vala with disappointment.

“McKay!” Carter was barely audible over the open channel.

“Present company excluded.” McKay spoke into his radio. “For the record, I consider you to be a statistical anomaly in a very, very hot package. What do you make of the outgoing matrix buffer? Please god tell me you think it’s intact.”

“Give me a minute,” Carter replied.

Vala smiled, sparkling and predatory. “Isn’t this one a charmer?”

“So, are you?” McKay glanced at Vala. “A physicist, I mean?”

“No,” Vala said cheerfully, “I’m here to increase the aesthetics and decrease the ethics of the SGC’s flagship team.”

“Witty. So, a linguist then. You’re hot for a linguist, in case you were wondering,” McKay replied absently.

Jackson elbowed Vala, half-annoyed, half-impressed, wholly drenched.

Vala elbowed him back, but she kept her eyes fixed on McKay as she said, “Funnily enough, I wasn’t,” with another faux-friendly flash of teeth.

“McKay, stay focused.” Carter’s voice was a static-frayed snap.

Overhead, lightning flashed, deep in the clouds. Thunder followed, a menacing growl.

“Storm’s right on top of us,” Mitchell shouted into the wind.

“I AM focused.” McKay scrolled through data. “This is how I focus. You should know this about me by now and I think you do, you’re just giving me a hard time so Dr. Perry doesn’t get the wrong idea about our complicated personal history. I don’t stare into space for two seconds and use my feminine mystique-powered physics intuition to solve problems, okay? You’re a woman, Perry’s a woman, all this crystal-based stuff is perfect for you guys. You ladies. Gals. Whatever. Our brains are different and—”

“Stop talking,” Carter snapped. “You’re shattering Dr. Perry’s illusions about you by the second. And we have no personal history.”

“Dr. Perry has…illusions about me?” McKay asked.

“Not anymore,” Perry replied.

“McKay, I’ve gotta go,” Carter said. “Brightman’s about to unplug my laptop. I think the buffer is clear, but I’d try not to dial out with that thing unless it’s an emergency.”

“Great,” McKay said. “Thanks Sam, you were a little more helpful than the twenty-somethings trying to build me an umbrella. Before you go, real quick, does America’s most preeminent cryptographer have an assistant you can get on the line? His code is offensively economical and it’s wasting my time to try and parse it.”

“Byyyyyee McKay,” Carter said, sweet and spritely. “It’s been terrible, as always!”

“Hey!” McKay grabbed the radio. “Send me a note next time you get shot and I’ll buy you a fruit basket.”

“Missed you too,” she replied. “Carter out.”

“Perry?” McKay said, “You still there? How you doing on the Nick Rush intern situation?”

“I’ll ask,” Perry replied.

“He works alone,” Young growled.

“Well, the weird ones always do.” McKay, drenched and philosophical, wiped rain off his computer.

Young studied the man’s precarious, weather-assailed setup. The physicist’s laptop was clamped to a crate and angled into the wind, half-closed. It was connected to a messy, delicate array of wind-whipped wires that Sergeant Greer had gathered into a faintly glowing bundle.

It was a disaster waiting to happen.

Judging by McKay’s nervous glances at the wiring, the other man knew it too.

“Listen up,” Young shouted into the roaring wind. “We need to weather-proof this array and reestablish local communications with the Odyssey. SG-1, you’re on the array. Reaves and Atienza, stick with McKay. Greer and I will crack the portable coms kit and see if we can’t boost our signal through this mess.” He gestured at the menacing clouds.

Greer transferred his bouquet of wire to Vala and fell in next to Young.

“You done this before?” Young knelt next to a crate, dropping slowly to his bad knee, keeping his back straight.

“Signal boost through an Act of God?” Greer shouted over the driving rain. “No sir.”

“No time like the present.” Young blinked as a stinging spray of rain rebounded from the crate between them and hit him in the face. “Open it up.”

Greer released the metal clamps on the top of the case and flung the lid open as lightning fanned through the clouds above. With a clatter, hail began to fall, pinging off the gate and DHD.

“We may need to evac!” Mitchell crouched next to the DHD, his hands cupped around his mouth as he shouted at Young. “The gate’ll draw lightning like you wouldn’t believe.”

“No kidding!” McKay looked at Young. “But we can’t outrun electrostatics and we may have people still out here. We’re NOT dialing out until I’m certain they’re NOT in the buffer. It’s the Odyssey or nothing.”

Young gave him a thumbs up and turned to Greer, who was fishing hailstones out of their open kit. “Your team get any detail from Emerson about the weather before you lost contact?” Young asked.

Lightning flashed, followed by a long roll of thunder.

“Just that it’d get ugly,” Greer replied. “Colonel Sheppard wanted us out by gate or by ship—” the sergeant swept a hand skyward, “—‘bout an hour back.”

Young blinked rain out of his eyes and focused on the kit. “Power supply.” He pointed out items, moving clockwise through the disassembled pieces. “Base, transmitter, signal booster, receiver. Base,” he said, as Greer pulled it from the kit, “goes here.” He swept a patina of hailstones off the surface between them.

Greer snapped the power supply into the base of the unit, set it on the crate, and correctly positioned the transmitter.

“You came up from where?” Young asked, as Greer studied the signal booster.

“Marine Corps,” Greer said.

“Y’don’t say.” Young reoriented the booster in the sergeant’s grip, then mimed fitting it over the transmitter.

Greer clicked the booster into place.

“Nice work for a rookie,” Young said.

“I been known to read a manual or two in my day,” the sergeant replied.

Young pulled the receiver from the kit and passed it to Greer.

Overhead came a flash of lightning, followed by a deafening clap of thunder.

Greer glanced at the threatening sky, powered up the unit, connected the receiver, and handed it to Young.

“Odyssey, this is Colonel Young. Please tell me you’re reading this.”

“Colonel Young?” The words were drowning in static. He pressed the receiver to his ear. “This is Colonel Emerson—” a hiss of interference interrupted the signal before he was able to make out “—rrent status?”

“Two of the original team are missing.” Young felt an electric prickle at the nape of his neck. “The storm is turning dangerous. We may need an evac.”

“Understood,” Emerson replied.  “—eric scans show—”

A flash of lightning too bright and too close drew a brilliant arc between sky and active gate. There was almost no interval between the bolt and the deafening clap of thunder that followed.

The gate shut down.

“Damn it!” McKay shouted.

“Everyone away from the DHD,” Young shouted. “Away from the gate.” Already the team was pulling back. Atienza and Reaves dragged McKay from his laptop.

“I need that computer,” McKay shouted as he was hauled bodily away. “I need that computer.”

Young straightened, ignoring a vicious spike of pain. He forced himself to jog the few steps over to McKay’s laptop. He reached down, disconnected the cables with a snap, freed it from its clamp and tucked it under one arm. 

“Thank you!!” McKay shouted, with unsettling earnestness.

“We need a beam-out now,” Mitchell called over his shoulder.

“They could still be here,” McKay roared.

“Or they could be somewhere else!” Mitchell pointed at the sky. “You see that rotation? This storm is no joke. Make for the tree line! Go. Go.”

Young turned to Greer, and found the sergeant next to him, transmitter in hand, receiver held out. “We need transport now.” Young shouted to be heard above the roar of the wind. “Odyssey, do you copy?”

“Yes,” Emerson said, “but the transponders—” the signal faded to a hiss “—original team—” The man’s voice was swallowed by another brilliant streamer of lightning and clap of thunder.

“Go!” Mitchell pulled McKay’s laptop from beneath Young’s arm. “Talk and walk.”

Hail drummed against leaves and plastic and metal. An ominous buzz emanated from the gate and DHD. Young felt his hair lift with static charge. He forced himself to a jog, then into an unstable run over grass and through tangled undergrowth.

“Odyssey,” he shouted, “beam us out!”

“—only five transponders. Do you copy? We read only five transponders.”

“McKay!” Young could barely see the man through the mix of hail and rain. It was hard to keep his eyes open. “McKay!”

The scientist turned. Young waved him back.

“They don’t have a lock on everyone.” Another strike of lightning connected behind them. “They’ve only got five of us,” Young shouted, his words lost in the thunder.

“I’m amazed they have anyone through this!” McKay ducked as lightning struck a nearby tree.

Young smelled ozone, sensed the charge in the air.

“Five?” McKay gripped Young’s shoulder and held up five fingers for emphasis. “You’re sure it was five?”

“Yes!” Young slowed as they made the tree line.

“They’ll have to sweep for us.” McKay led the way beneath the dark violence of windswept branches.

Around them, trees groaned under the strain of wind and rain.

“No.” Jackson’s voice and silhouette were unmistakable even in the dim light. “A sweep? No. No. Have you seen—”

“Shut up, linguist.” McKay snapped. “Group together. Everyone. Now. Two concentric circles. Original team inside, new team outside.”

“McKay—” Young began.

“You said five. Our embedded transponders were blown out in the same EM pulse that killed our radios and our computers. They’re picking up the new team only.”

At his command, the teams formed up. Young and SG-1 made a circle, surrounding the other four.

Young depressed the button on his receiver, but McKay, next to him, stopped him by wrapping rain-cold fingers around his wrist.

“JOHN!” McKay shouted into the wind, arching his back with the effort. “If you’re out there, get in the center of this circle! RIGHT NOW.”

Young spoke into the radio. “Odyssey, stand by for a transport sweep of the radial area defined by the five signals you can lock. Give us as wide a margin as you can. On my mark.”

Young paused, scanning the roaring trees, backed by flickering lightning. He hoped that wherever Rush was, it wasn’t here, in the midst of this storm.

McKay’s fingers released Young’s wrist.

“Mark,” he said.