Not Shergesh, of course, and not an elven forest, but very nice indeed."
That's how I commented on the landscape that opened up to me after the "jumper" emerged from the Stargate. It had already become habitual to instantly activate the cloaking and veer sharply upward to change the possible trajectory that could be tracked.
Having paranoia doesn't mean no one is watching you. Especially when you've flown half the galaxy to find one person.
Landscapes of the new world.
"I thought we agreed to avoid words that might be unclear," Teyla said. The girl was sitting in the seat next to mine, while Alvar sprawled in the chair behind her, enjoying the views.
"And I don't mind at all," the Ermenian said. "It's nice sometimes to hear about distant worlds that have never heard of the Wraith."
You'd be greatly surprised, brother, if you learned that on my Earth, they've also never heard of Stargates, Atlantis, or human life in other galaxies.
"So, let's start the search," I activated the scanner program that Chaya had written.
The intelligent being we were looking for, marked by a blue pulsing dot, was far to the north. I suspected he was either in the forest belt at the foot of huge snow-covered mountains or running through the rocks.
Well, not everything is as bad as it seemed at the beginning. I hope he's at least not wandering through the catacombs.
But just ten minutes into the flight, when the Stargate barely fell into the jumper's scanning zone, fate threw its weighty word into our leisure.
"Is that what I think it is?" Alvar tensed up, seeing a dozen red dots far behind us. Some of them were moving faster than the others, and that was a signal that the day was no longer languid.
"Wraith," Teyla said grimly.
"Correction," I sighed. "A bunch of Wraith. Including 'darts.' Judging by their course, they have good tracking of our unknown friend's beacon too."
"Means there'll be a fight," Alvar climbed out of the chair and headed to the aft section of the ship, preparing for battle. "Got a proposal, Mikhail."
"You think we should first watch how good he is, and only then intervene in the fight, coming to help at the very last moment?" I clarified to the Ermenian.
"Exactly," he said. "In our world, they say: 'The thoughts of the wise converge.'"
"We have that too," I agreed. "Only the proverb isn't about the wise."
From Teyla's expression, it was clear that she was intrigued by Earth's epic, but the girl decided to postpone her curiosity until better times.
* * *
The energy pulse with a sharp sound crossed the clearing, spreading in a flash across the body of the Wraith soldier. For a moment, he froze, took another step, but immediately impaled himself on the second charge.
And only after that did the opponent collapse to the ground like a machine gun.
The next soldier after him rushed in pursuit of the man fleeing through the bushes. Too stupid to recognize the obvious ambush, he ran several meters along the barely noticeable path leading to the foothills before his foot gave way under the ground.
Sharpened stakes inserted into parallel wooden drums pierced his limb through, not allowing him to either escape or take a convenient position for self-defense.
It was at this moment that the man in garments more like rags sewn from different pieces of fabric and strips of leather jumped down from the crown of a nearby tree. The Wraith soldier clearly heard the sound of landing and a couple of quick steps behind him. But no matter how he tried, he couldn't turn to aim at the enemy. Well, and the latter turned out to be an experienced enough being and gave no quarter to the opponent.
Seizing the moment when the Wraith posed the least danger to him, the man ended up behind his back. His hands lay on the opponent's neck, and the next moment there was a characteristic crunch. The soldier went limp, collapsing to the ground in an unnatural pose.
The runner, however, shoved the energy pistol into his thigh holster, pulled the massive energy rifle from under the dead man. Right now, he needed any firepower available.
And the Wraith shock rifle, standard armament for Wraith soldiers, wouldn't hurt him.
Shock rifle of the Wraith.
The Wraith stunner rifle, like all their small arms, is not intended for killing. In practice, it's easy to verify that it fires an energy pulse that causes all muscles in the victim's body to tense and relax at once. This leads to temporary paralysis, which is enough for the Wraith to either take the victim to their ship or feed on them on the spot.
For an ordinary person, one hit is enough, but for a Wraith and for a person who has been hit by such charges more than once, it takes at least two hits.
The time to regain consciousness also depends solely on the endurance of the affected organism. Though, like much else.
But it's better to have at least such a weapon at hand than not to have it at all, or too little.
It was only the hearing honed over the time he had been a runner, reacting to the barely distinguishable crack of branches behind him, that saved his life. The trained body threw itself into the bushes on its own, away from the corpse.
A white-blue energy charge whizzed through the place where he had stood a moment ago. But, as expected, it brought no result to his enemy.
Jumping to his feet, the runner managed to examine his new enemy. It was a Wraith hunter. And that was already bad.
Firing at the enemy with the rifle and waiting until he took cover and couldn't shoot in the back, the man ran. Confusing tracks and not moving in a straight line for more than a couple of seconds to prevent aiming, he plunged deeper into the forest thicket. Unlike most humans living in the galaxy, the runner knew perfectly well that the Wraith small arms charge becomes useless even with a small obstacle between it and the target.
Leaves and tree branches would do just fine.
The hunter knew this too and preferred to rush in pursuit rather than waste shots in the back.
Among the Wraith he had encountered over the years of his escape, Wraith hunters were the most dangerous. They were versed in the art of reading tracks, navigated the terrain excellently. Sometimes they even had organism enhancements that allowed them to better tolerate radiation on planets, see in the dark, run, jump farther and better than ordinary Wraith soldiers.
At first, he confused them with Wraith commanders, who were also usually armed with no more than a hand stunner pistol and wore more refined clothing than soldiers. But the differences are clear to those who have encountered both categories.
Wraith commanders usually don't cooperate with each other, don't form squads of several heads to track one runner. For that, they have numerous squads of ordinary soldiers.
But hunters... They operate in groups, are well familiar with ambush tactics, pursuing the victim, and much more. Where there's one, there will definitely be others.
And this is also proof that on the previous planet, he had thoroughly thrashed them. Usually, Wraith hunters were sent only after he destroyed a dozen or two dim-witted soldiers on a specific planet. But by that time, he had already managed to leave for another planet, leaving several deadly "surprises" on the approach to the Ancestors' Ring.
This had to be taken into account when planning actions. Under no circumstances could he allow the Wraith to discover the cave where his shelter was. And that meant he had only one chance for salvation: kill them all.
Lost in thought, he almost missed the Wraith scout jumping out to cut him off. The latter hesitated too, but his right hand was already rising, clutching the stunner pistol...
Hand stunner pistol of the Wraith.
Except for its shape, compactness, and ability to fire with one hand, this weapon differed in nothing from the opponent's other small arms. One or two shots and it would paralyze him.
And this Wraith hunter would gladly feed on him.
Maybe, but not today.
"Catch!" he shouted, throwing the trophy rifle at the Wraith.
Naturally, the latter didn't react like a human, instinctively catching the thrown object. The hunter stepped aside, but that was enough for him to miss: the runner dodged the shot and yanked a short blade from its sheath, which he didn't part with even in sleep.
The first thrust hit the tip of the stunner pistol. The excellently sharpened blade damaged the glowing energy cells of the weapon, making it useless for the next shot. The hunter understood this too.
Throwing the damaged weapon at his prey, he attacked without the slightest delay. But apart from his hands, the touch of one of which was deadly to any living being, he had nothing more. He hadn't managed to draw his dagger.
The Wraith hunter attacked in the classic manner for his race—spreading his arms and slightly raising them above his shoulders, he rushed at the runner. The latter, slashing at the right hand on whose palm the dangerous thing was located, stepped aside, smiling at having cut off the hand right at the wrist.
A grimace of pain flashed across the Wraith's face. But for his race, serious injuries weren't particularly dangerous—the regeneration of the Wraith was hundreds, if not thousands of times stronger than that of ordinary people. The runner had more than once seen wounds on his enemies heal literally before his eyes.
The hunter rushed at him again. But that led to the quickest resolution.
The man stepped aside, letting the opponent pass to his right. At the same time, he delivered a chopping blow to the Wraith's torso from the right, from the side of the severed arm. The blade easily passed through the Wraith's innards, forcing him to slow down to realize the severity of his situation.
At that very moment, the man severed his opponent's head with one motion. Piercing bodies or maiming was a waste of time. To buy some time, you need to kill the enemy, not wound him.
The runner examined the damaged stunner pistol of the killed Wraith and came to the thought that the weapon was damaged beyond repair. Throwing it aside, the man switched to running again.
With each kilometer paved through the forest, he led the enemy farther and farther from the caves he had chosen. Over the years of his escape, he could hope that he had studied his opponent quite well.
***
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