Looking at the huge structure, completely covered with wires, blinking sensors, relays, and other technical monstrosities, the names of which I didn't even approximately know, a vague doubt crept in…
"And for this, we spent a week looking for junk on Ermen?" I asked.
"Not junk, but remnants of technology," Chaya corrected me. A week after we discussed the plan to search for fugitives and the Proculucian began working on it, she looked almost better than before. After all, sleeping under regenerating radiation in the medbay is a magnificent idea.
It's a pity we can't do that – the equipment is closely related to a certain development of physiology and cellular structure of the recovering organism. For humans, it is almost deadly – at least with prolonged exposure, your brains will definitely flow out of your ears.
The maximum for our allies is a few minutes under radiation. With subsequent gastrointestinal disorders, bone pain, headache, and so on… Yes, this is just a theoretical assumption, and none of us dared to risk our bodies to test the endurance limit and the effectiveness of possible equipment modification.
In short, we didn't stock up on medicines on Ermen for nothing.
"Exactly, to be honest, but I don't like seeing a girl inside a huge cage covered with a kind of metal mesh."
"Are you sure it's safe?"
Chaya looked at me with sympathy.
"Does the lack of knowledge about high-energy physics, subspace fluctuations, and direction finding turn my actions into magic for you?" she asked.
"Not just for him," Alvar chimed in. "This structure reminds me of the electric cube in which the enemies of the state were executed on Ermen."
"And what is it?" Chaya became interested.
"A metal cage where the condemned was put," Alvar readily shared his knowledge. "And then, they connected power from the nearest reactor with a gradual increase in power. In five minutes, only bones remained. But, often, even they exploded."
A vivid account of how to vaporize a living creature using a reactor. Oh, this wonderful new world.
However… Compared to what Alvar told, the electric chair is just a prelude.
For experiments with the subspace beacon extracted from Jensen, Chaya chose another empty laboratory. A couple of tables, a couple of computer terminals.
And a monstrous cage, assembled by an Ancient from technology samples that we obtained on Ermen. I recall that in known events, one Ancient assembled disposable stargates from a toaster.
And here Chaya, from the wreckage of household appliances, wires torn from the dungeon, and other electrical devices, assembled… Hmm… Did Doctor Frankenstein not revive his monster with the help of this thing?
"No, this structure is completely safe," Chaya reassured us, locking the tiny door from the inside. The girl remained alone inside the device, powered by a massive glowing structure in the corner of the laboratory. And next to her, there was only a laboratory table, a scanner, and an Ancient portable computer. "I created it to shield the transmitter's signal on subspace and other frequencies. But, at the same time, if everything works out, I will be able to get data about the communication channel."
"And so we will find other fugitives?" Emagan asked.
"Yes, I think I can find other fugitives by their subspace beacons. If, of course," Chaya looked at me, "the discharge didn't destroy everything possible. In that case, I will need a little miracle to restore it. If it's even possible after the discharge. A significant part of the transmitter's nerve fibers just got fried."
Well, yes, condemn me.
"Actually, I was saving a person's life," I reminded her.
"And I am grateful to him for it," Alvar said. "And for the record – the idea of attracting fugitives is not the best one."
"Are they bad warriors?" Theyla asked.
"If they are still alive – then no, they are good fighters," Alvar objected. "However, not all of them are good guys. Fugitives are disliked not only because they bring wraiths with them. But also because many of them are extortionists, murderers, robbers, or simply thieves. When your goal is survival, moral issues can take a back seat."
"I'm not going to organize a boy band out of all the fugitives in the galaxy," I had to remind them. "And I perfectly understand that they haven't been cleaning pink ponies or picking flowers all this time. We need experienced soldiers. And not just an army unit that knows how to dig trenches, build houses, or go into an attack shouting "Shorty – cut!". But specifically a mobile reconnaissance and sabotage squad. Ideally – several. But only those whom we can trust, and not fear that they will stab us in the back."
In a galaxy where survival at all costs is elevated to an absolute, it is not so difficult to betray. But the value of friendship with those who can save you from the unenviable fate of an animal in a pen should not be underestimated either.
As well as the presence of "lawless ones" and people working for the wraiths.
"Connecting power," Chaya announced, attaching a thin tendril of wire to the tiny subspace transmitter.
At first, nothing happened, but then the multicolored blinking of the indicators on the cage stopped. The tiny diodes, produced on Ermen, lit up with a steady light.
"The blocking cage is working," Chaya shifted her gaze to her computer monitors. Connected to the scanner, it showed a lot of not very understandable data. "Well… The device was damaged, of course, but not as much as I thought. It seems that it was developed with a certain margin of safety. The peripheral contacts and the power source burned out, but the sensor itself is intact. As is the subspace antenna. I am registering the frequency on which it works… Oh, it's a two-way communication channel. How interesting. I thought it was a simple beacon with a pulsating signal. But it turns out, everything is much more interesting…"
"The wraiths won't be able to track Atlantis by this signal, will they?" Theyla worried.
"They find fugitives even at the other end of the galaxy," Jensen reminded her.
"No, the isolation cage is working and muffles the signal with an electromagnetic field," Chaya said, examining the scanner screen, which she moved over the beacon. "Hmm… This technology is more advanced than what was available ten thousand years ago."
"Did you also have fugitives?" I was surprised.
"No," Chaya said. "The wraiths made beacons as souvenirs. And with the help of people who were in their service, they passed them to the Ancients. Allegedly as a gift or under some other pretext. Before we understood how exactly they found our construction outposts, shipyards, and so on, military facilities were destroyed by the wraiths. Thousands of objects throughout the galaxy… In many ways, after this, the Lantians decided to retreat to Atlantis. Well, and, in fact, they learned about these beacons here – when the wraiths headed towards the city."
"An ingenious trap," Jensen appreciated.
"It's hard to deny the wraiths that," Chaya agreed. "This beacon," she pointed to the device, "is a very insidious thing. In addition to the main power source, it has a number of fibers that grow into the body over time."
"That's why I didn't dare to remove it, but disabled it."
"And you did the right thing," Chaya noted, pointing with a laboratory probe at the tiny black tentacles emerging from the bottom of the device. "The fibers are programmed to fuse with the skeleton and nervous system. The priority is the spine, spinal cord, rib cage."
"And after that, it will be impossible to remove the device?" I asked.
"I think that's the point," the girl said. "The human body generates a certain voltage, and with its help, the device receives power for its development. The growth is slow, but the more energy in the body, the faster it will happen. If I'm right, this beacon was supposed to replace the bone tissue in several thoracic vertebrae with its own, fuse with the spinal cord and…"
"Cruel," Theyla assessed. Despite the fact that Alvar and I said nothing, we actually agreed with her.
"I'm done," Chaya disconnected the wire tendrils from the subspace transmitter, then attached a massive terminal to it. The wire to the latter came from that very glowing structure.
Clicking a tiny switch on the terminal, Chaya covered her eyes as the wraith device flashed blindingly.
Blinking away the "afterimages," I asked:
"And what was that?"
The girl was just getting out of the Faraday cage-like structure, holding the Ancient equipment in her hands.
"I got all the data I could from the device," she reminded me. "So it's best to destroy it completely. A short circuit from the generator burned out its organic circuits. And now, we can say with certainty that it will never work again."
"It's better to throw it into the vortex when activating the stargate," I suggested. The energy vortex created when establishing a stable wormhole reliably disintegrated everything from stones to spaceships.
"As an option," Chaya placed her devices on another table and connected them to a horseshoe-like Lantiian console. Her thin fingers fluttered over the futuristic keyboard.
Horseshoe-shaped console.
"So," after a couple of minutes, a two-dimensional map of the galaxy appeared on the nearest monitor. Dotted with blue planet points, it also had blinking markers. "The long-range sensors equipped with Atlantis cover only a small part of the galaxy. But I reconfigured them to operate only at a specific frequency… Thanks to this, we have increased the sensor coverage area. I have also isolated the feedback channel from the beacon to the tracking device. We can observe the real-time position of fugitives in the galaxy. At least in the tenth part of it from us. For now, this is the maximum I am willing to provide. But later I will write a program for constant tracking with a directed beam. This way, we will save energy and be able to scan the galaxy."
The girl looked at me with warmth in her eyes.
"Thank you for the tip on how to do this quickly and efficiently," she thanked me.
"Glad to help the common cause."
The fact that I told her how it was done in the events I knew does not diminish my merits in the least.
"Not much," Alvar said, looking at the five blinking dots. "I heard that there aren't that many fugitives, but that few…"
Honestly, I'm a little disappointed too.
I remember, in known events, there were an order of magnitude more. Yes, five is also good. But, if you consider how many of them might agree to work with us, and not be connected to the wraith service, then you can safely divide by two.
"There is no guarantee that we are seeing only fugitive beacons," Chaya warned. "In the past, we encountered wraiths hanging them on each other. Moreover, this is only one subspace channel. If I understand its coding correctly, it is only secondary."
"Meaning?" I frowned.
"It's like dedicated frequencies of a single direction," Chaya said. "Imagine that there is a group of frequencies of a certain range on which the subspace transmitter operates. The ones we found operate on one, say, sub-frequency within the range. Perhaps it is designated for fugitives, or perhaps it is used by a specific hive ship. I cannot reconfigure them all now, as the transmitter only gives us access to this sub-frequency. The others have something like a cipher…"
With a short beep, two dots disappeared. A second passed, another…
"Equipment malfunction?" Theyla asked hopefully.
"I'm afraid not," Chaya said slowly. "The devices turned off suddenly. Either their carriers died, or the transmitters were simply destroyed…"
As she spoke, another one disappeared.
Alvar and I exchanged glances.
"I think we should move out," I suggested.
"Agreed. While we're admiring the blinking dots, these people might be dying," Jensen said.
"Give me a few minutes, I'll correlate their spatial coordinates with the planet coordinates," Chaya said. "If there are stargates there, we'll find them…"
"Let's go," I clapped Alvar on the shoulder. "You and I have something to do."
"I'll go with you," Theyla said. "I think, whoever the fugitives are, they've heard about the Athosians. Perhaps my presence will help you negotiate with them."
"Reasonable," I agreed. "Chaya…"
The girl continued to work magic on the control panel.
"Don't worry about me," she replied. "I'm almost done. While you're gone, I'll finish the prototype of the naquadah generator."
I glanced at the glowing vertical monster. Assembled from both Lantiian and Ermen technologies, it least resembled a generator. But a futuristic-looking doomsday machine – yes.
Although, in essence, it was just a modification of a dynamo machine from the vault using a small amount of naquadah, which we collected last week on Ermen. Not a very rich material, but the mine we chose still needs to be restored. For now, we took what we could find literally in the adits. Chaya assured me that this would be enough for some time. And she also said something about this prototype helping her enrich the existing ore, she just needs to solve the problem with heat dissipation, non-linear power drops, atomic density of matter, and… I think she just wanted me to stop asking questions.
Chaya's prototype naquadah generator.
"Excellent," I assessed. "I just wanted to ask you not to carry enriched naquadah with your bare hands. I don't want you to start glowing. Otherwise, you'll unmask us right from the bottom of the ocean."
The Ancient finally tore herself away from the monitor and… smiled. Genuinely, kindly.
"I'm flattered that you care about maintaining the natural radiation level of my body, but, I assure you – I've worked with more dangerous energy sources. Everything will be fine. I know what I'm doing."
"It's after these words that we, ordinary people, usually get into very nasty troubles," I remarked.
"Do you want me to remind you of the difference between us and humans?" Chaya asked.
"No need," I assured her. "Comparing how humans and Ancients mess up, there's no point in even trying to compete."
Chaya's smile faded. The girl stepped away from the computer, then walked to the wall. A decorative panel slid aside, and she took out a small tray with something resembling futuristic wristbands. Only made of something that looked like rubber.
"Recognition bracelets," she said dryly, handing me the tray. "For now, these are prototypes with the function of transmitting an individual code to the Atlantis gate shield. They are powered by the electricity emitted by the human body and are individually calibrated. They do not work if they are removed or on a dead body. I called it a recognition bracelet. And disguised it as wrist protection."
Recognition bracelet. Image from the internet.
"Additional security for passing through the Atlantis gates?" I clarified.
"Yes," the Proculucian confirmed. "I think we can already trust Alvar and Theyla to pass through the gates without our participation. I repeat, these are just prototypes with a single function. Without them, it will be impossible to enter or leave Atlantis – the shield will not allow it."
"If only we could attach a cloaking device or a personal shield to it," I said dreamily.
"I am working on studying the records of the last one," Chaya assured me. "But you need to understand that it works exclusively on carriers of the Ancient gene. I can, of course, try to remove this function, but it is key for such advanced technologies."
"Agreed. I wouldn't want a personal shield to fall into the hands of our enemies."
"Exactly," Chaya agreed. It seems the gloomy expression on her face has passed. I wonder, what was that? "Since we have made enemies, we should think about how to solve this problem. I have already worked on the security of the gates, for now, this should be enough."
"And what about the recognition of our physiological characteristics, which you previously set in the gate program?" I asked.
"They will remain," Chaya said firmly. "It would be foolish to find and delete them from the program. We need to have a backup in case we are cut off from the gates or Atlantis through the gates."
Hmm… So it wasn't in vain that I told the girl how many times the expedition was on the verge of failure due to their absurd entry wormhole security system.
"Curious," I admitted. "A device powered by human body electricity and transmitting a special signal… It's not related to the wraith transmitter, is it?"
"Only conceptually in terms of recharging from the human body," Chaya said. "Later, I will refine them and add other useful functions. And yes, aren't you late?"
"I suspect they won't fly without me," I put on one of the bracelets. I felt some warmth at first, but after a second, it all passed. Did I imagine it, or did the initialization system work?
Meanwhile, the bracelet slightly tightened and sat quite snugly on my arm, as if glued to the skin. But it didn't interfere with the movement of my hand, and the density of the material was enviable.
I easily removed it by prying it, then put it back on. Convenient.
"While you prepare for the mission, I will write a program to search for fugitives and upload it to the 'jumper'," Chaya said. "It's generally ready, but it needs some time to adapt the frequencies. In addition," she handed me a small connector with a port for connecting to the Ancient scanner. Which was also present. "You will need to find the transmitter, plug in the contact, and run the program I wrote on this scanner. According to the plan, it should analyze the fugitive's device and calculate the exact energy charge to burn out the transmitting antenna."
"But the transmitter itself will work?"
"Until we remove it. But without an antenna, it's not dangerous to us."
"Most likely. However, there's a suggestion. As soon as we find it and disable the tracker, we'll go to a neutral planet. From there, we'll contact you, and you'll fly out on the 'jumper' and extract the device…"
Chaya shook her head.
"I used a stationary surgical device for extraction. I'm afraid I'm not a doctor to do it in the field. It would be better if you burned out the antenna, but without damaging the power sources. Alvar was lucky, but in fact, it can lead to health problems. Strong energy discharges are not good for the body."
And she speaks so casually about the fact that I almost killed a good person… Well, the Jenai, they are all assholes.
N-da, things are…
"Have I told you that you are an excellent person and an indispensable comrade?"
Chaya chuckled softly and smiled.
"Repeat it three times a day, and your head won't hurt."
"Is this a joke?" I became wary.
"No," the Ancient assured me. "Just remind yourself that I am sufficiently qualified to work with such devices and you shouldn't worry about it. After all, it gives you a headache, doesn't it?"
"Yeah," I agreed, taking the rest of the bracelets. "Including that."
* * *
"It looks like a cheap trinket," Alvar grimaced, putting on his bracelet. Theyla had already managed and both inhabitants of the Pegasus galaxy were now checking the mobility of a body part.
"It is customary for our people to weave identical bracelets or ornaments for family members," Theyla said. "With such ornaments, we look like one family. Or a clan."
"That sounds good enough to tell those who are interested," I decided, directing the 'jumper' through the hatch in the hangar.
The stargate was already activated, but I noticed that Chaya was standing on the balcony next to the control center.
Touching the ship's communication system control panel, he asked:
"Houston, we have a problem?"
"Does Chaya have another name?" Emagan asked, surprised, to Alvar.
"No, it's something from his home planet's expressions," Jensen suggested, listening to the reply.
"Another point just disappeared," the Proculucian said. "It seems the Wraiths decided to get rid of their fugitives."
"That's bad," Alvar said simultaneously with me.
"Most likely, we'll encounter a lot of Wraiths on the planet," the Ermen explained his thought.
Yes, I thought the same thing.
"But we were able to open a gate to the planet where he is, weren't we?" Tayla clarified. "So they haven't attacked yet."
"Logical," I assessed. "Chaya, can we keep the gate open while we search?"
"The maximum time I can maintain the gate without additional energy supply is thirty-eight minutes," the Ancient replied. "After that, the address will need to be re-entered. The reconnaissance probe indicates there are no Wraiths near the gate. You will pick him up on your way back?"
This is still our only scout drone, assembled from parts of technology from Ermen.
"Yes, we'll bring him back," I promised.
And one thought kept spinning in my head...
"But can't we keep the gate open by powering it from the ZPM?" I dug into my memory. Humans, and not only them, managed to do this in known events.
"We can," Chaya confirmed my suspicions. "And you're right, only with the ZPM. The generator can't do it, the energy output isn't stable enough. Are you sure you want to discharge our only ZPM for a human who might not even be suitable for us?"
A valid point. To spend energy searching an entire planet for a human who might not join us, or might even turn out to be a potential traitor... There were such characters in known events. Seemingly cheerful Wraith hunters, but in reality, rotten to the core.
"No," I said. "Let's fly to the other side, disguise ourselves there, and search. If there are Wraiths on the planet, we'll pick up the human, just wait under camouflage in energy-saving mode, we have enough supplies for a week. They're unlikely to stay there any longer."
"I've uploaded the search program to the ship," Chaya announced. Indeed, a new program window appeared on the virtual screen. "You can go. If the Wraiths are already targeting the planet, we shouldn't alert them with a long delay in entering the address. Especially since the planet where the penultimate beacon disappeared is not too far from you. Six to seven hours with a Wraith hyperdrive, and they'll be there."
"Then we should get a move on," I concluded, directing the "jumper" into the "puddle."
Wait for us, mysterious fugitive. I hope you'll be a fierce and loyal guy with dreadlocks.