Cleaning Up After The Ancients - Chapter 22

Chapter 22 - Overheating Problems

“Good to be back.” John offered as he and McKay exited the gate back to Atlantis, Teyla and Ford having opted to stay behind and assist Beckett with the still ongoing disaster recovery “Not that the Taranians weren't nice, but it always felt like…

He stopped mid sentence as the distinctive smell of burnt metal hit his nose, and a quick look around the gate room allowed him to pinpoint the source. Twin trails of melted metal leading from the gate to a half melted boxy device with a somewhat recognizable shape.

“Don't tell me.” He muttered as he stared at the remains of a device that looked remarkably like the ZPM cradle McKay had described his team putting together.

“I'm afraid so.” Weir offered in an apologetic tone as she walked down the steps from the control platform to meet them. “But we were able to get in touch with General O'Neill and the SGC before everything caught on fire.”

“Caught fire?” McKay demanded as he looked between the still lightly smoking cradle and the gate with an almost personally offended look on his face. “I ran the numbers myself, and with the power draw of an intergalactic wormhole the design should have been good for at least twelve minutes of use before you needed to shut everything down to let it cool.”

Weir’s forehead scrunched together in confusion as she focused on McKay. “Twelve minutes? Doctor Kavanagh said it should have been good for at least twenty when he set it up.”

“Twenty!?” McKay yelled as his face all but turned red in anger. “Twelve was pushing it as it was, there’s no way it could have lasted twenty.”

“It overheated at sixteen.” Weir confirmed with a grimace. “I was mid conversation with General O’Neill when it burst into flames. Doctor Zenelka had to rush down and pull out the ZPM before we lost it.”

“He okay?” John asked in concern, knowing electrical fires were absolutely no joke.

“Some mild burns.” Weir admitted with a wince. “But the nurse on duty said with proper treatment they should heal up without issue in a few weeks.”

Getting the distinct sense that McKay wanted to stalk off to go yell at someone, John briefly debated letting him back before deciding it was probably better to direct the man’s anger to someplace a bit more constructive.

“Hey McKay, you wanna go check the ZPM? Make sure there wasn’t actually any damage done so we can plug it in without worry it’ll explode or something?”

Not that he thought that was an actual possibility given how sturdy the Ancient’s usually built things, but just putting the option of possible death out there was usually enough to make the scientist want to double check.

“That’s…” McKay began only to pause as his outrage quickly faded into a worried frown. “I should probably go do that.”

“Lord knows we can’t trust Kavanagh with doing it.” He muttered in annoyance as he stalked off towards the transport chamber.

John waited a moment for the door to close behind the man before turning back to Weir with an apologetic look on his face. “Sorry about that. So, good news from General O’Neill?”

“That’s why I called you back.” Weir admitted. “But we should probably have this talk in my office.”

That could mean several things John knew, but the most likely was that whatever it was Weir wanted to talk about involved something she didn’t want the rumor mill catching. 

“Sure thing.” He told her, following after as she turned and made her way up the steps to the glass enclosed office.

“The good news is that Earth was apparently able to locate a ZPM somewhere.” Weir admitted as they both took a seat. “And General O'Neill made it clear he would be sending us backup as soon as he could get it authorized.”

“Which could mean tomorrow or could mean sometime next month.” John said with just a touch of bitterness in his voice, well used to politicians who couldn't tell the back end of a horse from its front.

Weir gave him a wry grin. “He seemed to believe the fact we've located a working Ancient warship and drydock facility would help speed things along.”

“I'm guessing that you didn't exactly mention the whole Taranian problem?” John asked, the three days they had spent on the world long enough for him to be glad the whole issue would be someone else's problem to figure out.

“It didn't exactly seem relevant at the time.” Weir confessed with a shrug that told him that it had likely involved a purposeful lack on her part.

Taking a moment to consider the logistics of everything Stargate Command might need to move around, John was left with the unfortunate realization that it likely wouldn't be a particularly quick response.

“Depending on what General O'Neill plans to send, even if he can get immediate authorization it will probably take anywhere from a couple days to a week before they dial us back and start sending people through.”

Pursing her lips in thought, Weir began drumming her fingers lightly on the surface of the desk. “Assuming the longest, that would have them arriving about three days before the Wraith.”

“Pretty much.” John agreed, feeling a bit bad about what he was going to say next. “But while the extra men would be appreciated, especially if they include a few trained pilots, the only thing that might make a difference are drones or nukes.”

And he didnt think for a second that the IOA would be willing to hand over any of Earth's limited drone supply.

“Nukes?” Weir repeated as she stared at him with a single raised eyebrow.

“Worse comes to worse I figure we could use cloaked jumpers to sneak them onto the hives.” He admitted, having spent the past couple days running through various tactical scenarios in this head while watching McKay work.

“Speaking of options.” Weir digressed with a slight grimace. “How were things going with Eventus?”

“Last I talked to him?” John said, cringing slightly at the memory. “He said he's on track to make it back here with the Enterprise with at least ten hours to spare.”

The confused look on Weir's face when he said the name all but spelled out what she was about to ask.

“Rodney suggested renaming the ship that.” He explained with a sigh. “And Evan thought it was a great idea. Something about how Hippaforalkus hadn't even liked being called by this full name in the first place.”

An opinion John could absolutely get behind, after all, if his parents had named him Hippaforalkus, he was pretty sure he wouldn't have wanted to go by that either.

“All right then.” Weir said as she gave a lightly bemused shake of her head. “I take it the Taranian's have been a bit more amenable since Doctor McKay explained why Eventus did what he did?”

Wincing slightly, John took a moment to think about how to best put how things had been going without making them sound as bad as it had felt like. “They were starting to, but then Evan kind of shanghaied Norina into being his personal assistant. And she is practically the anti-McKay so far as likability is concerned, so the Taranian's were getting a bit testy about the whole thing.”

“His… Personal assistant” Weir repeated, clearly not sure how to take that.

“Yeah, you know. Pick me up breakfast. Listen to me complain about my day. Toss out the annoying person who keeps bothering me. Personal assistant things.”

“Honestly?” John confessed as he thought back to similar circumstances with others. “I kind of think he just doesn't want to be alone so dragged in the first moderately non-objectionable person who presented themselves.”

He gave an acknowledging nod of his head at the other point the Taranian woman had going for her. “Also she's really hot.”

Though Teyla seemed to believe it was highly unlikely that Norina's physical attributes were why Evan had singled her out. Of course, the Athosian woman had also been oddly distracted about something the last few days, so John wasn't entirely sure how much weight to place on her insight into that particular matter.

“In better news.” He continued, moving the subject off something he suspected Weir would just get judgemental about. Something he found moderately amusing given her alternate self had apparently been flirting with that Janus guy in the past. “Evan showed Rodney how to submerge the city, so if he turns out to be late getting back here we can just do that.”

“Oh, and he also promised to send some drones from the facility’s ordinance storage bay back with Beckett and the others.”

The place's stockpile had apparently been nearly as depleted as Atlantis’s own, but an extra hundred or so drones wasn’t exactly something to scoff at when their current supply was just ten.

“That’s something I suppose.” Weir said as she let out a tired sigh. “I assume the Taranians weren’t exactly thrilled by that?”

“I don’t think he’s really planning on telling them.” John admitted, moderately sure that kind of behavior would blow back on them eventually.

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Author’s Notes: Everything permitting, we’re at T-Minues 2 chapters till we get to the second Siege of Atlantis. Those poor Wraith.