Exogenesis Read online

  Judging by Radek's humorless expression, the reference was lost on the scientist. "You are here because you can pilot the jumper and because the owners of the life signs we seek may be injured." He somehow managed to sound both fatalistic and resolute. "I am here only because Rodney McKay is a tyrant of the first order."

  "Relax, Doctors," said Sergeant Stackhouse, sitting behind them. "This is a cake walk."

  The battle over who had suffered the graver injustice was destined to end in a stalemate, so Carson surrendered. Ignoring the Marine, he asked Radek, "How has your lab been managing these days, anyway?"

  "We survive through metric tons of caffeine and regular offerings of power bars to the self-proclaimed deity of science," Radek answered morosely. "I am thinking we need airline meals as addi tional tribute."

  Carson winced. "Rodney has been a bit tetchy lately." Visibility was diminishing as they descended, so he followed Jumper One's lead and activated his craft's external lights. If anything, the limitations of the lights only added to the gloom.

  "The difference from his usual charm is slight, but noticeable." Radek resumed the adjustment of his suit.

  "Can't blame it on the concussion any longer. It's been a couple of weeks now." Carson wasn't a psychiatrist, but as Atlantis's chief medical officer he had a fair idea of the sort of nightmares that no doubt plagued their highly-strung resident astrophysicist. Peering out into the depths, he noted that he had lost sight of the whale-which was not the slightest bit reassuring. Although he could track it on the head-up display in the jumper's windshield, he would have much preferred to keep it within visual range. There was no telling if the animal might decide to come back and give them a nudge. "Rodney was stuck down here alone for a damned long time."

  Radek nodded agreeably. "The situation would have made even a Wraith ...what was your word? Tetchy?"

  "Aye." And that was an odd mental image if he'd ever had one.

  "Hmm. Tetchy. Strange word. Useful in this instance"

  "Keep a close eye on your positioning, both of you." Rodney's voice erupted from the com unit in Carson's ear, startling him. "If you can get the jumpers within, say, one meter of the positions I indicated relative to each other, the resultant shield bubble should extend far enough to cover one of the city's anchor points"

  It was not something that Carson had given a lot of thought to, but of course the city still had to be tethered to the ocean floor in some manner, or they'd have bobbed around like a cork the moment Atlantis had surfaced. And that would have been just lovely given his predisposition to motion sickness.

  "Copy," Colonel Sheppard replied from Jumper One. No doubt referring to the whale, he added, "Our escort is now circling overhead."

  The American officer's easy drawl should have provided Carson with a measure of confidence, but the Colonel had years of flight training to aid him. Until coming to Atlantis, Carson had never considered that his genetic ability to use Ancient technology would be employed for the purposes of flying-especially when the jumper mostly operated by reading his mind. Precision vehicle maneuvers of any sort certainly hadn't been covered in medical school.

  "Just as it did when we pinpointed Rodney's jumper," Radek confirmed.

  "Admittedly the life signs in those pods are the priority, but we need to know that whatever triggered the avalanche doesn't pose a risk to the moorings," Rodney continued. "If we ever manage to acquire sufficient ZPMs, I might be able to submerge the city again, and it'd be strategically useful to know whether or not the mechanism for doing so is still intact."

  "Rodney," Radek commented with false patience, "our assignment is to examine four jumpers and their contents, and possibly effect a rescue of the ten-thousand-year-old occupants. All this while wearing uncomfortable suits, separated from several tons of very deep, very cold ocean only by energy. It has surely occurred to you that this will be difficult enough without adding to our list of tasks, yes?"

  "Of course, yes. I'm fairly certain I face similar situations on a regular basis." Rodney's impatience was unmistakable, even through the radio. "Choir, preaching, all that. You're down there, so the least you could do is take a look."

  "I'm sure they'll do right by you, Rodney." Elizabeth's voice held a touch of tolerant amusement. "Let them work."

  "Okay, gang." Sheppard cut into the conversation. "End of the line."

  Below them and ahead, the lights from the Colonel's jumper revealed a sloping section of the ocean floor strewn with rubble. Carson brought Jumper Three around so that its lights could cover a wider area. "What next, Colonel?" In the distance, he could just make out the oddly rounded shape of the whale's tail. Apparently satisfied that they had responded, the animal was now heading off into the depths.

  "We're losing our St. Bernard, so let's check out the place," Sheppard suggested.

  As the jumper's sensors moved slowly across the debris field, Carson learned a great deal more from the head-up display than from the eerie scene outside. According to the HUD, most of the rocks that he was seeing consisted of nothing but calcium carbonate. "That's incredible," he observed. "It looks like a massive coral reef grew around the outside of the city's force field."

  "Isn't it kind of cold for a tropical reef?" Sheppard asked. "Not to mention deep?"

  The biologist in Carson was intrigued. Uneasiness now forgotten, he replied, "Not all coral polyps prefer tropical waters, Colonel. On Earth, many species thrive in extreme temperature conditions. The wee animals here were most likely attracted to the residual heat given off by the city's force field, and once they began to build, well-" The coral structure now visible before them was well over thirty meters high. "You're looking at ten thousand years of accumulated animal skeletons."

  "Unbelievable," said Stackhouse, a trace of awe in his voice. "You mean animals actually built that thing?"

  "Tiny animals at that " Carson had been off-world before. Indeed, `off-world' was an accurate description of Atlantis itself in his view. Even so, this was the most alien environment he'd yet encountered.

  He edged Jumper Three closer to the wall, and the lights transformed what had at first appeared to be an indistinct mass of graygreens into a riot of color typical of a thriving community of marine life. Schools of tiny fish darted by, flashing silver in the glare from the jumper's lights. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of unidentifiable aquatic creatures whirled around like a swarm of butterflies, while a few larger animals stuck their heads out from cracks and crevices just long enough to size up the jumper before making a strategic withdrawal to whatever caves they inhabited. It was all very much like a National Geographic documentary, except that none of these odd-looking animals-assuming they could all be classified as animals-had ever been seen on Earth.

  Gliding along the edge of the precipice, the jumper soon came to a sharp indentation in the reef. A glance down at a particularly large volume of rubble on the seabed confirmed that this section had collapsed. Very likely it had occurred in the none too distant past, for while the polyps of hard corals had not yet had time to attach to the cutaway section, faster-growing sponges and soft corals or perhaps some form of sea-pens were prolific. Also abundant were the clouds of rainbow-striped fish that clustered over the waving tips of... anemones, perhaps?

  "Somebody want to give a visual description for those of us trying to follow along at home?"

  Before Carson could suggest that Rodney stick his radio somewhere uncomfortable, Sheppard responded. "Relax, Rodney, you were right. A section of the reef must have broken away when the city rose, probably burying the jumpers."

  "Yes, gratifying, but hardly a surprise." Was that muted, rhythmic sound actually Rodney's foot tapping? "Obviously, the accumulated debris that slid off the shield included some kind of manufactured material which interfered with the life pod signals. Check. Next. Have you isolated the location of the life signs? According to what I'm seeing from up here, you should be within visual range."

  Ahead of them was an overhang. Beneath, a small
er section of coral had collapsed even more recently, leaving behind a scar that gleamed chalk-white under their lights. "Colonel," Carson said.

  "I see it "

  "What?" Rodney demanded. "What do you see?"

  Beside Carson, Radek was pointing to the HUD. "There."

  "Aye." While Carson had not expected to find the jumpers parked neatly on the seafloor, dusted with a bit of rubble from the undersea avalanche, neither had he expected to encounter what the HUD was now telling them. The Ancient craft were actually embedded inside the base of the coral wall.

  "For the love of God, what?" Rodney barked.

  "You were wrong," Radek replied with barely concealed delight. "Dr. Weir was correct "

  The reply was immediate and indignant. "How could I be wrong when I don't even know you're seeing?"

  "Calm down, Rodney," Elizabeth admonished. "Colonel, what is it, exactly?"

  "I've got a good view of two of the ships from here." Sheppard executed a graceful about-face, bringing Jumper One nose to nose with the section of wall that had most recently broken away. A pair of large, circular protrusions jutted out. "First jumper's facing this way, but the windshield is shattered."

  "What the hell are those things crawling around inside?" came a voice that Carson recognized as that of Sergeant Alderman. He'd certainly heard enough of the Marine's Southern twang while treating him for a couple of broken fingers the month before. "The giant bugs with the long feelers?"

  "Don't know, but if we can catch a few, this might turn into the best dinner of the whole expedition. Anybody bring a lobster cracker?"

  "Uh...well, we've got pliers, sir."

  "Good enough for me "

  "If you can tear yourselves away from the thought of food for a moment, please?" Rodney sounded as though he were about three breaths away from losing what passed for his temper.

  "Oh, the irony of that remark," Radek muttered.

  "This is a cheap payback, isn't it?" Rodney snapped a reply. "I refuse to accept that I was in error without a detailed explanation."

  Carson smiled and shifted Jumper Three into position to examine the second protrusion. From what he could see, the vessel was facing away from him, which made it impossible to get a glimpse inside.

  "I do not think the hatch will open easily," Radek reported-a remark that Carson considered incredibly understated, even for the Czech.

  "This is insane. Elizabeth," Rodney whined. "Order them to tell me what's going on down there!"

  "Gentlemen, please, for my sake if not for Rodney's, exactly what are you seeing?"

  "The jumpers aren't buried under rubble," Sheppard replied. "They're entombed."

  "You mean covered?" Rodney corrected.

  "What the Colonel means, Rodney," Carson explained, "is that the wreckage forms part of the reef's structure. The recent avalanche did expose the jumpers, but it wasn't the rising of Atlantis that concealed them in the first place. According to the readings on my HUD, the interior of the craft I'm looking at is naught but a scattering of Ancient materials completely cemented together with coral rock."

  "Same over here," Sheppard confirmed. "Although we could probably dig past the busted windshield, ten thousand years adds up to a lot of growth. We could maybe hit it with a few small charges of C-4, but a blast strong enough to dislodge that stuff wouldn't do your spare parts any favors"

  "All right, that's that. Moving on-life signs, people," Rodney urged. "The jumper you're looking for should be about ten meters to your left."

  "Port."

  "What?"

  "At sea, left is port."

  "Oh, is it, Sailor Sheppard?"

  "Hey! To an Air Force man those are fighting words."

  "John, Rodney-behave." Dr. Weir's voice was gently chiding.

  Their sniping faded into the background, and Carson concentrated on edging his jumper down the newly scarred section of the reef wall. His lights suddenly caught another protrusion. This time the distinctive pattern of a jumper hull was visible. "I've found the third wreck," he announced. "But given its condition, it can't be where our life signs are hiding"

  Radek blinked and sat forward, examining the wreckage first through the windshield and then the HUD. "I did not think that possible."

  "Man, look at that, will ya?" Stackhouse added from behind.

  "The hull's been crushed," Carson informed his radio audience. He backed his jumper out from beneath the overhang so that he could see upwards. "It would seem as though something fell on it...oh." That explained it.

  "What?" Rodney's voice rose in pitch. "Now is not the time to go monosyllabic "

  "You'd be pretty stunned too if you could see this," Sheppard told him, angling Jumper One up beside Jumper Three to provide better light.

  Stackhouse uttered an expletive. "Guess I should've known that a city as big as Atlantis would need awfully big moorings, but damn."

  A simple, monstrously imposing structure towered over them at an alarming angle. Five stories high at least, Carson estimated, and that was only as far as he could see in the gloom. It had to be part of the apparatus that had anchored Atlantis to the seafloor, and the third jumper appeared to have taken the brunt of its fall in the rockslide.

  Over the radio, someone whistled the opening notes to the theme from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

  "Sheppard, I know that's you," Rodney accused. "Either start giving me some useful descriptions of what you're seeing or-"

  "It's a monolith, Rodney, all right? It's huge and, according to my HUD, has a density that's off the charts. Apparently it beat the hell out of one of the jumpers when it slipped. Radek's right. There's no way anything's alive in there."

  "So you've said, but that doesn't change the fact that the life signs are located at the exact position of this supposedly destroyed jumper."

  "There's nothing supposed about it, Rodney," Carson put in. "The thing's been flattened to the thickness of a hubcap."

  "Perhaps we have an instrumentation problem?" Radek wondered.

  "The equipment is functioning perfectly," Rodney insisted. "I still have two readings, clear as a bell but fading, and they're right on top of you."

  "Not on top of," Sheppard said suddenly, swinging his craft around. "Underneath."

  It took a moment for Carson to grasp what the Colonel meant, but when the lights from Jumper One's motion shifted the angle of the shadows, he spotted the fourth vessel. "The last ship is set slightly back from and below the crushed one, at the very bottom of the reef," he explained, briefly taking pity on Rodney's lack of visual information. "That's got to be where your life signs are originating."

  "All right, good, excellent" It was hard to tell what was faster, exasperated McKay-speak or exhilarated McKay-speak. "Let's get that shield set up. Radek, you're confident on the recalibration procedure, right?"

  "Yes, mother," Radek replied, twisting to access the controls behind his seat. "Jumpers in, water out."

  "It's not that simple. You're already displacing a few tons of water, so you don't want to unbalance the mooring any more than necessary. The last thing we need is that block to shift and trigger another rockslide while you're all out there dealing with the life pods."

  "I will leave rocks alone. Modulating the shield to encompass them is not so difficult as you think."

  "I'm just saying to be careful, both now and when you get outside the jumper. While still learning everything you can about the mooring, of course."

  Radek engaged their shield and turned down the volume on his microphone. "This is punishment I do not deserve," he muttered to Carson. "I am kind to small children and animals. I use my intellect for good and not evil. . .how have I earned such treatment?"

  Assuming it was a rhetorical query, Carson ignored him and concentrated on Sheppard's steady voice in his ear, guiding their jumpers into position. Their respective shields merged just before he felt the craft settle onto the seafloor.

  A loud creaking sound sent a burst of adrenaline through Carson, ins
tantly banishing his momentary sense of relief. He shot a fearful look at Radek.

  "It is to be expected," the scientist explained with a shrug. "The shield has encapsulated wreckage and coral. The force of many atmospheres of water has been displaced by air of only one atmosphere."

  Somehow that didn't sound terribly reassuring. "Is that supposed to happen?" Carson pointed to the dozens of fish now flopping around the ground inside what he could only think of as a fragile bubble of air beneath a great deal of ocean.

  Radek nodded once. "Force field is currently calibrated to repel only seawater."

  Carson was not comfortable in the least. The human body was composed mostly of water. Furthermore- "Everything's still wet."

  Crossing his arms, Radek politely explained, "I calibrated the shield to repel water of a certain molecular weight. Now that the shield is in place, I have recalibrated to prevent anything entering. If that"-he pointed through the windshield to the looming monolith and glanced at Carson over his glasses-"falls, it cannot pass through the shield."

  Yet it had successfully penetrated whatever shield had encapsulated the flattened jumper. Lovely thought.

  "Everybody gear up," Sheppard instructed from Jumper One. "Mueller's going to go out first and check the stability of things inside the shielded area."

  Presumably Elizabeth had sent Rodney for coffee, because the radio frequency was unnaturally quiet. Carson watched apprehensively as the German engineer emerged from the jumper and clam bered around the mass of wrecks, coral, and mooring block.

  The groaning of stressed rocks and metal sounded again. Radek cleared his throat and sent a slightly anxious look in Carson's direction, which did absolutely nothing to enhance the doctor's peace of mind. "Tell me a number," Radek said.

  Puzzled, Carson replied, "Eight."

  "No, no, bigger."

  "Forty-three?"

  A snicker came from the general area of Stackhouse's seat. Radek sighed. "You have not played Prime, Not Prime before, have you?"

  Before the Czech could explain the game, Mueller reappeared. "It is uncertain," he told the team, his accent sounding particularly thick coming from within his HAZMAT hood. "As you see, the hatch on the bottom vessel is partially open. Two long boxes are inside, one atop the other-I assume that these are the life pods. I cannot be sure if the bulkhead of the jumper is intact or if the pods themselves support it "