(E2B-178 – Near the Stargate – Day 8, 0922)
As G’Yal had expected, the planet was hot. But that was not what was on his mind. He was still surprised that Colonel Vale had asked him to be on his team. He was walking next to the Colonel, his weapon ready. The Tau’ri had given him a projectile weapon called a MP5SD. It included a device which removed the noise that normally resulted from firing it. He would never admit it, but he was actually quite proud of this sign of trust.
“E2B-178 ?” He asked. (He was speaking into his radio, which included a translator.) “Who named this world ?”
“The computer. Apparently it’s some kind of translation of the coordinates of this planet.”
“Colonel….may I ask you something ?”
“You want to know why you are on this team ?”
“Yes, sir.” He paused. “Some of the crew said that I was a…token alien ? They also mentioned two people called Teyla and Teal’c, who are apparently other aliens and also on SG-teams. So…”
“…you thought you should ask.” Vale said with a smile.
“That is why you are here. You’re not a token alien, G’Yal. You’re good with a
gun and you’re not afraid to ask or give your opinion. I’ve learned the hard
way that you need at least one soldier like that. Back when I was still a Roman
soldier in training, we followed order without asking questions and it ended
badly.” He paused. “I was away, delivering a message to another unit. They were
ambushed by a group of robbers and wiped out. Since then, I ask questions.”
“I see.” He looked at the desert. “You think anybody lives here ?”
“There are no footprints. So if they do, they haven’t been to this part of the planet for a while.”
They continued to walk. It took about twelve minutes for them to reach the oasis. (Major Hailey had given him a Tau’ri wristwatch and told him how to read it.) There was a small puddle, which was surrounded by some grass and six palm trees. But no animals or footprints. G’Yal took a pair of binoculars out his backpack and scanned the horizon. He spotted four more oases.
“If there is nobody here, we could send NR-5 to collect as much water as possible. The Puddle Jumper should be able to carry a good amount.” He paused. “Does that mean that it would actually be puddle jumping ?”
Patterson moaned and shook her head at the pun. Suddenly, Vale’s radio came to life.
=/\=Hailey to Vale.=/\= Hailey said. =/\=We’ve had a development here.=/\=
“Vale here.” He said into the radio. “What’s happening over there ?”
=/\=The count-down clock just popped up.=/\= Hailey said. =/\=It’s at forty-two minutes and counting down.”
As part of their programming to keep their mission going, Destiny’s and Spera’s AI’s both limited the time the crew could spend on a planet. On board Destiny, there were countdown clocks throughout the ship. But aboard Spera, there had not been a single countdown clock in sight. Hailey had suspected that Spera actually used existing displays to show the clock. Also, she believed that the AI had apparently needed time to adjust to the presence of its new crew. And from what he had just heard, she had been right.
“We’ve found several oases with water.” Vale began. “Tell NR-5 to take Jumper One and bring the supply of jerrycans.”
=/\=Yes, sir.=/\= Hailey said. =/\=Hailey out.=/\=
The radio went dead and Vale turned to Porter. “It will take them a couple of minutes to gear up and get here. Let’s start testing this water for poisons, bacteria and anything else that could kill us.”
“Sounds like a plan to me.” Porter said as she put down her bag. “Even if the tests are all negatives, I still want to sterilize it and run it through all the filters in water reclamation system, just to be sure.”
“We’ll do.” Vale said.
Porter set to testing the water. While she did that, Patterson sat down next to one of the palm trees. G’Yal then sat down next to her. “So, what is your homeland like ?”
“Wet. It rains a lot where I come from.” She leaned towards him. “May I give you a piece of advice, G’Yal ?” He nodded his approval. “Stop trying to bond so much. These things simply takes time.”
“How are the tests coming, Doc ?” Vale asked as he sat next to Patterson on the other side.
“So far, so good.” Porter said. “I’ve already got a few negatives.”
“What about the trees ?” G’Yal said. “Could they be of some use ?” He paused. “And is it me, or do they look at little too….normal ? We have trees called E’Rall trees that look just like that. I know that this is my first mission, but shouldn’t alien trees be more…alien ?”
“We call them palm trees on Earth.” Vale said. “And I’m afraid that some things are kind of universal. Including trees. As for using it, the wood is simply too soft.”
“How do you know things like that ?”
“Homework. I read a lot of mission reports while we were on-route to the Hope Galaxy.” Vale said. “We have people on translating several of key reports into Ursini and Nakai. So you have some in your future as well.”
“Yes, sir.”
Then Vale’s radio came to life and McConnell announced that NR-5 had just come through the Gate.
(Spera – Mess Hall – Day 8, 1105)
The mission to the planet had gone smoothly. They had collected a lot of water and come back with three minutes to spare. When the clock had hit zero, the ship had jumped back into FTL. G’Yal was writing up his report on the mission in the Mess Hall. (It was the only room in the Wraith expansion of Spera which was finished.) He was writing it on a Nakai computer – the Tau’ri would have called it a laptop – which was writing the report in Nakai, Ursini and English at the same time. (He simply wrote the report in Nakai, while the machine did the rest.) He had just finished when Jennifer Hailey approached the table he was sitting at. She was carrying a tray of food.
“Lunch ?” G’Yal asked.
“Yes.” Hailey said. “Report ?”
“Done.” He closed the laptop. “But this mission was not really that exciting. We came, we collected, we went.”
“Trust me. Enjoy it while it lasts.” Hailey leaned forward. “Sooner or later, trouble will find us. And when it does, you will miss these ‘boring’ missions. Before I was at the Beta Site, I spent several years on a SG-Team. My team got into a lot of trouble and whenever we did, I really missed the quiet missions.”
“So, what on the menu today ?”
“Tuna sandwich with milk and an energy bar.”
“Milk ?” G’Yal frowned. “What is milk ?”
“You’ve never heard of milk ?” Hailey looked at him in surprise. Then she explained about cows and how they gave milk. “Didn’t you have livestock on Colony One ?”
“No, we had heard about it. There was some kind of livestock back in Nakai Home Galaxy, but none of them were brought along when the planets were colonized. And we never did find anything like livestock on any of the worlds we visited in our galaxy.” He shook his head in surprise. “Tau’ri drink cow juice.”
“Yes, we do.” Hailey said with a smile.
G’Yal got up and went to get himself some food. Cow juice, this he had to try…. As G’Yal went to collect his lunch, he did not notice Aranov and Colson watching from another table. The two of them had overheard the entire conversation. (They had already finished their lunch and were now working on their reports on the Wraith expansion.)
“What do you think it will be like ?” Aranov said. “Going through the Stargate for the first time, I mean ?”
“You’ve been through the Gate several times by now, Nick.” He leaned forward. “And you’ve studied alien artifacts before. You’ll do fine.”
“Thanks.” Aranov said. “But I still think it will be very different than anything we have done before. And considering what we have been through to get to this ship, I think that’s saying something.”
“Good point.”
“Speaking of different. I thought that our FTL-drive needed at least three hours of cooldown time between jumps ?” Aranov said. “But we jumped out and then back in less than an hour.”
“Destiny needs three hours of cooldown time. But from what I’ve managed to wrestle out of the database, she has a Mark 2 FTL-drive. The basic technical data on Spera says she has a Mark 3 FTL-drive.”
“So, the new and improved model ?”
“I hope so.” Colson said. “Because if we run into those berserker drones, we’ll need every edge we can get. So…” He got his feet. “…back to digging in the database.”
“Good luck.”
The two of them headed out. As they walked out of the room, they passed G’Yal, who was busy vomiting into a nearby trash can. Apparently, Nakai and milk did not mix.
(Spera – Bridge – Day 8, 1657)
Jennifer Hailey leaned back in the command chair. Vale had covered the 0800-1600 shift. Since she was the second-in-command, it was her job to lead the 1600-Midnight shift. The job of leading the last shift – Midnight to 0800 – had fallen to Major Teldy. Since she was the only other Major aboard and Chief of Security, Teldy was the third-in-command. When Vale or Hailey was off-world, she would be the acting XO. She looked at the clock. Vale had ordered her to drop the ship out of FTL at 1700 hours exactly. Hailey got up and walked up to the Forward Helm Station, where Patterson was flying the ship.
“Drop us out of FTL and then check the Wraith expansion for damage.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Patterson said, before dropping the ship out of FTL. “No damage reports. Spera has apparently totally adjusted to the Wraith expansion, ma’am.”
“Ma’am.” Henderson said as he approached the chair from the rear section of the room. “I got the numbers on the FTL-drive.” He handed her a piece paper. “The minimum cooldown time is forty-five minutes, that is the big upgrade of this engine over the Destiny’s model. But the minimum amount of time in FTL is still four hours, ma’am. Shut them down earlier and you damage them.”
“Nice work.” She gave him back the paper.
“Actually, it was Alec who did most of the work.” Henderson said. “And I’ve got some diagnostics to run, ma’am.” And with that, he walked back to the rear of bridge.
“Porter, how many Gates do we have in range ?”
“Three.” Porter said. “But one of them is locked out.” She hit several keys. “From the readings, I believe that the planet used to be habitual. But there have been numerous volcanic eruptions since the gate was put there. The sulfur percentage went through the roof and now the atmosphere is toxic. And we don’t have any spacesuits….” Those had been lost with Nova Roma. “…so that is a big, fat no.”
“What’s behind Gate one and two ?”
“Gate one….” She hit some keys. “….is on an ice planet. It’s a small island in the middle of a frozen lake. The atmosphere is breathable, so we could send NR-5 on another water trip if they use the Puddle Jumper. Gate two….” She hit more keys. “….is on a green planet. The seed ship spotted grass and trees, but no life-forms bigger than bacteria. I recommend we send a team to collect as much wood as possible. And that they should wear hazmat gear. I have a feeling that we don’t want any of those bacteria on board.”
“For the record, why didn’t we wear hazmat gear on our mission ?” Patterson asked.
“E2B-178 was a desert, the bacteria count was way lower.” Hailey said. “Tell NR-5 to gear up for a trip to the ice planet with Jumper One and NR-3 will get us some wood.” She looked at the countdown clock, which was at three hours and seven minutes. “And tell them that are cleared to use Jumper Two.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Patterson grabbed her radio and began contacting people.
No comments:
Post a Comment