A beaten-down truth says: "Once is chance. Twice is a pattern. Three times is statistics."
So, to hell with that "three." I'm not ready to scrape myself off a chair — command or control — every time a situation I myself planned reaches its climax. That is, to the point of my brain exploding.
Figuratively speaking, of course. But I suspect the third time, I really might not get up.
I'm already sick of this darkness and…
"Are you sure he's healed?" oh, I know that voice! Chaya, sweet, kind Chaya, whose voice radiates care and concern. No, I'll never get tired of that voice.
"Yes, the recovery was successful, the consequences have been eliminated, including the brain hemorrhages," Seliza, even though I haven't seen her, I'd bet my hand that the girl is currently standing before the "Governor" of Atlantis, batting her eyes. "Honestly, I didn't even expect the regenerator to work so well."
"So, he won't be an idiot?" another voice inquired. There's no sympathy in it… No, wait. I can literally feel a certain anxiousness from the owner of that voice.
And I recognize her.
Larrin. Since when does she worry about me?
"You think it could be worse than it is now?" that growl of an enraged tigress I'd recognize out of a thousand. Trebal. Although even in that rudeness, there are shades of worry, fear, anger… Anger, surprisingly, is the strongest.
"There's always room for improvement," Larrin snorted. "But I think we need a more insulting epithet…"
"You're mean," I groaned, opening my eyes.
Oh, I shouldn't have. Inside my skull, it felt like someone had turned on a whirlpool, and my whole body was like cotton.
Ah, the infirmary… A hospital bed again, my vision swimming slightly again. And the beautiful girls are standing nearby again, worrying. Look, one is even coming towards me, probably wants to hug me, cry a little, tell me how much I scared her…
In one moment, it became loud, painful, and burning. My head snapped from the slap so hard I heard my spinal column crack. Thank God my head didn't spin a full two hundred and seventy degrees around it.
Well, at least my vision cleared.
"Trebal, are you out of your mind?!" Seliza yelled, rushing to the commander of the Hippaforalkus.
Looking at the Dorandan woman, I saw tightly compressed lips, furious eyes, and hands clenched into fists.
"Let me go!" the girl lunged forward, closer to me, but Larrin was already behind her, grabbing her by the waist and pulling her back. "Let me go, I said! I want to break his face right now!"
"Yes, yes, yes," Larrin snorted. "Get in line, friend… But only after he gets out of the infirmary. Otherwise, you'll definitely kill him."
"At least it would be guaranteed!" I don't know where the Nomad gets so much strength, but she's literally practically carrying Trebal out. "He'll die once, but for sure!"
She was still saying something, but Seliza and the Nomad had already shoved her out the door. Our one and only medic bravely stood in the way of the enraged girl and left the room with her, hammering something into that wild head.
"Being unconscious wasn't so bad," I muttered, touching my cheek that was burning like fire. The next moment it got a little easier — Chaya, who had come up to me, placed her hand over the spot of the hit. The girl's palm was cold…
"How are you feeling?" she asked.
"Better than I remember," I admitted. "Did something go wrong again?"
"Yes, more problems," Sar confirmed. "It turned out that the maximum number of projectiles that can be launched and kept under direct control on Ares isn't determined by software. Only by the operator's endurance limit. Well… You beat the record of everyone who ever sat in that chair before you."
"And… how badly did I beat it?" I asked.
"Badly," Chaya assured me. "About double or something like that. Your genetics allow you to synchronize with the neural interface of Lantean technology at a much higher level than I know of. And to a much greater extent than the battleship provides us in normal diagnostic mode. Now I'm starting to understand why it's specifically 'Ares' and not 'Mars.'"
"They're both gods of war," I shrugged, feeling the pain and burning on my face subside. "No difference…"
"Oh, believe me, there is," the girl assured me. "Ares was a prominent Lantean scientist and explorer about ten thousand years ago. Same as his brother Mars."
"Really?"
"Yes, I had time to cross-reference the needed information," Chaya assured me. "Both were heroes, explorers, and war leaders. Except the second one was noble and selfless, founded many outposts that served as development points for many races and cultures, while the first one was cunning, sly, slippery, and treacherous. From a certain point of view, he's a war criminal who used any opportunity to fight the Wraiths."
"There's definitely something wrong with these Lanteans," I complained. "Who in their right mind names a ship after a war criminal?"
"I suspect those who decided to program the ship based on Ares' algorithms and tactics," Chaya said, taking her hand away from my cheek. "Is the pain gone?"
"Yes, thank you," I smiled. "You're just incredi…"
The second slap was barely weaker than the first. And that's considering her modest, almost frail figure!
"… bly sympathetic!" I grabbed my twice-assaulted cheek.
"But you don't sympathize with our worries at all," ice appeared in Chaya's voice. "Maybe on your planet it's customary to throw yourself into the hot zone first, but here it will lead to your death. I hope you learn the right lesson from this."
Then the girl turned on her heels and quickly left the infirmary, nearly knocking over Larrin, who was standing in the doorway. The Nomad looked at me with undisguised sadistic pleasure and a mischievous grin on her face.
"Until now, I thought you Ancients were completely unlike us," the girl peeled herself off the doorframe and walked over to me. Reaching her hand toward my face, she chuckled softly when she saw me flinch almost imperceptibly at her movement.
"I'm not going to hit you," she assured me, placing her fingers on my chin and turning my head slightly so she could see the consequences of my encounters with my women. Of course, if they're still mine. Something about what happened doesn't feel like tender feelings… Oh right, we never really had a courtship period. "I wonder, did they do that on purpose, or was it accidental?"
"What do you mean?"
"Both prints almost perfectly overlap each other," Larrin explained. "However," she unexpectedly stroked my sore spot, "sometimes it's even useful. You'll live, and trust me, that makes everyone happy. Especially the Wraiths."
"Information of dubious value," I winced. "Those guys would have been happy to tear me to pieces."
"Actually," Larrin put on a cocky smile, sitting down on the edge of the bed, "they wouldn't have had time. Your ladies would have killed you much sooner…"
"No," I assured her. "Those are just role-playing games we do. Trust me, they were just worried about me."
"… if, when I brought you to Atlantis, I hadn't changed clothes," Larrin finished, looking me in the eyes. It seemed she wanted to see my reaction…
Hmm, really!
She's not in her usual biker-girl-from-a-roadside-strip-bar outfit. She's wearing an Ermen-style uniform, which we designated as the standard attire for our battleship crews. Except it looks like she's at least altered or taken it in in certain places.
"I don't quite follow you," I frowned, doing my best to look truthful. But I know I'm lying.
And apparently, she knows it too.
"Did you know that Nomad uniforms are made from the hide of a beast that changed the shade of its skin if it was wounded?" Larrin purred. "The hide would stain at the point of blood contact and stay that way until it wore off naturally. We didn't go that far, of course, but it still proved extremely effective. But walking around your own flagship with two paw prints on your buttocks… Like a couple of idiot Wraiths decided to drain my life but confused the application point. You know, this isn't how I imagined serving in the Lantean fleet."
"And I think your cocky little smile says you're mocking your own commanding officer," I grimaced.
"Well, I have to get some moral compensation for pulling your practically unconscious carcass out of the control chair, and you not only groped me but also got blood all over my chest," Larrin snorted. "By the way, were you delirious when you were rubbing between my girls and muttering 'brrr,' or did you just take the chance to grope me?"
"I don't even really remember that," I winced.
"But I can see in your eyes that you do," Larrin smirked. "I made some inquiries. Seliza says that at the moment of the hemorrhage, your conscious mind should have partially shut down and your subconscious taken over… So I think you were doing what you wanted, but what you wouldn't have intended to do in your right mind."
"Are you done?" I grimaced.
"I've only just started," she smirked.
"Well, I'm already finished."
"That was fast," the girl pretended she climbed off the cot for some reason other than me nudging her with my foot. "Though I suspect women tell you that often…"
"You know that as soon as I get out of the infirmary, you'll have to answer for all these taunts?"
"I'm counting on it," the Nomad kept smirking. "The only question is, are you man enough to deal with me without informing your ladies?"
As dense as I am with hints, even this… The "even simpler" option would have meant she'd have to hold up a sign with her wishes over her head.
"Are you enjoying this?" I tried to dodge the answer. This was the last thing I needed around here.
"Entertainment is pretty scarce in this city," Larrin grabbed the nearest chair and sat down on it "cowboy-style," meaning with its back toward me. "What do you think happened in the seven days they were resuscitating you here?"
Seven… Each time they have to revive me longer and longer. This isn't just a warning bell anymore. There's a church bell being rung full force nearby.
"Let's skip the riddles," I asked. "I already feel like I've been put through a meat grinder."
"Seliza said it'll pass — the nervous system is recovering," Larrin nodded. "Okay, point by point. The Resolute and the Swift…"
"We'll talk about the ships later," I interrupted her. "What about our people?"
"About a dozen dead, the rest are alive, though some were injured," Larrin seemed to smirk. "A few were fed on by Wraiths, but Alabaster fixed that, returning years of life to people, and health to some. The longest in the infirmary, besides you of course, was Saya. She had to be both healed and repaired."
"Does that even happen?" I was surprised. "Isn't she invulnerable or something?"
"What gave you that idea? She gets hurt too, like this time. But they patched her up, restored her."
Huh. And I thought Saya could be sent to clear Wraith planets on her own. A joke, of course, but I thought she was the least likely to get injured in battle.
"Alright, let's get back to the hardware. What about the starships?"
"Asan's and Labrea's ships are heavily damaged; they can't leave that system on their own. Repairs are underway on the Hippaforalkus; Ihaar and the hundred and fifty technicians Chaya sent aboard are working multiple shifts to fix the wiring and mechanisms so the battleship can get itself out of the dead planet system…"
"That's good, but… a hundred and fifty technicians?" I clarified. "We had just over a hundred Ancients total, and not all of them were technicians."
"You asked me to tell you, so I'm telling you," Larrin narrowed her eyes. "And I'm doing it the way I like. Questions?"
"Why are you interrupting yourself? Go on, this is very interesting."
The girl snorted.
"Ares is practically undamaged, except for a couple of burned-out shield emitters — Chaya said that messing around with expanding the energy field isn't very good for it. Plus, one of the super-reactors is currently out of commission — you literally drained the charge from its core for your experiments."
"The projectiles…"
"The ship's arsenal was used very uneconomically by you," Larrin smirked. "Out of a thousand projectiles, only a little over two hundred are left. However, we're reloading from the Hippaforalkus' arsenal. It clearly won't need them anytime soon or in the long term, but Ares, after a short repair, could very well return to battle."
"Without the super-reactor?"
"Without one," Larrin corrected, "super-reactor. The other three are working. Though Chaya said she has a supply of the super-refined naquadah used in it, so a couple of weeks and the ship can be brought back into service."
Super-refined… I only remember one item with that kind of naquadah. Alright, I'll figure it out later.
"The Wraiths?"
"We know for sure that one of the Arrows managed to escape through the Gate on the planet — Chaya activated it right away when you ordered her to during the battle, but the Arrow pilot was faster," Larrin sighed. "Trebal thinks it was Styx himself. And I have to agree with her. It looks too much like the commander rescue tactic common among the Wraiths."
"The problem isn't solved," I winced.
"That depends on how you look at it… The Superhive is destroyed, plus another Hive Ship and five Wraith cruisers on top of that," Larrin arched an eyebrow expressively. "And we didn't lose a single one of our starships. Yes, most of them will need major repairs, but we accomplished the main task — Styx's faction is destroyed. And that's with us acquiring two Hive Ships and a Wraith cruiser. Yes," she smiled wryly, "they're also in flying scrap-heap condition, but Alabaster claims she can at least bring one of them back to life in the next ten days, while we power the ship from our own generator."
"That's precisely the problem with the generator," I said. "Do we know where Styx went?"
"Possibly to the Scavenger," Larrin said, seeing the anger rising in me. "Chaya pulled the last fifty addresses from the dialing device and is working on cross-referencing and verifying them. I think he escaped to some intermediate world and then fled from there. So from every new planet, we also take the coordinates from the dialing device where there is one…"
"I'm almost sure it was the Scavenger," the ache in my body began to recede under the pressure of my anger. I even managed to clench my fingers into a fist. "When I was the projectile… the projectiles…"
Larrin's eye twitched.
"You need to talk about this with someone professionally," the girl said. "Identifying yourself with a weapon… I think that's some kind of mental disorder."
"Woman, are you kidding me? I took the projectiles under my direct control and literally saw each one through their sensors! I felt like I split — I was the projectile and I was the operator, the pilot in the chair..."
"Sounds like schizophrenia, but keep going," Larrin said, pulling an Ancient scanner from her jacket and turning something on its small screen. "Don't mind me, keep going, I'm recording this for the specialists."
"You're kidding me?"
"Of course," Larrin snorted. "You could say I'm a punishing angel delegated by the Lantian faction's leadership. Only the violence isn't against the body, but the mind and feelings."
"You don't like me," I sighed. "I'll leave you all. Go to a monastery."
"Knowing your preferences — definitely a convent," Larrin smirked. "But seriously, no one expected the Scavenger to accept death peacefully aboard his own ship. Yes, it's a shame we couldn't destroy him. But if he did survive, he's alone now — no faction, no ships, no subordinates."
"Did they find the Talus energy source on the captured ships?" I asked.
"No, nothing unusual. It was probably on the super-hive..."
"No, it wasn't. There was nothing there that wasn't built by Wraiths. I deliberately searched every compartment and corridor of that ship with my projectiles to be sure." Larrin sighed heavily at my words.
"That's not good," she said. "So he dragged that energy source somewhere. So he has a bolt-hole or secret lair somewhere."
"Or a Wraith base, or something else along those lines," I said. "And it's also possible he had more ships in his service than we know about, and not all of them arrived."
"Stop right there," Larrin slapped my leg with her hand. "Stop spouting that pessimistic heresy! Yes, we might not have killed the big bad, but the mission was successful. It's not a given he has anything in reserve — no ally or enemy is universally brilliant across the board. Alabaster says that if he's alone or has no fleet in reserve—which we're all extremely doubtful about—then he poses no threat to Atlantis. No one will deal with the Scavenger, let alone listen to his ravings."
"Not counting the fact that he might have scanner recordings showing Lantian ships."
"Sorry, but there's nothing we can do about that," Larrin spread her hands. "The long-range sensors don't show a single Wraith starship, so for now Atlantis isn't in danger."
"Except we didn't see his ships — the last three — on those same sensors until they dropped out of hyperspace."
"Chaya explains that by saying the battleships have less advanced scanners than Atlantis. In any case, we can repel any threat to the city. We have a satellite, we have projectiles. And the shipyard... We'll manage if the need arises."
"Fine. So we've got three Wraith starships in our assets?"
"And almost three hundred Wraith soldiers on them that Alabaster has subordinated," Larrin said with suspicious calm. "One hive ship from some minor clan, and the second one — the one that belonged to Queen Cunning Blade. The cruiser from the clan that Demon belonged to, and his destroyed hive ship."
"Cunning Blade... Did you find her?"
"No, there was no queen on the ships. Alabaster and Koschei poked around in the heads of the surrendered Wraiths — no one has seen the queen since the Scavenger captured her. No one's seen her corpse either."
"So she could be a prisoner."
"Well, or the Scavenger killed her far from the eyes of her former subjects — again, no way to know."
"So one hive ship will be operational soon?"
"Alabaster assures us, yes. After that, she intends to move the Nomad starships one by one closer to Ermen so they can reach the planet and do repairs on the surface. Doing it in vacuum isn't as easy as it looks."
"I can hear it in your voice — you've warmed up to the Wraith queen," I noted.
"She saved Alvar from death," Larrin looked calm this time. "And Nevik, Kaspar, and six other Nomads. Not to mention the Athosians. Teyla is grateful to her for that. I... Well, I want to kill her just a little less now."
So that's how it is? Alabaster saves a few people's lives, and suddenly she's off the top of the execution list.
"Teyla... Is she all right?" I asked.
"Woke up about three days ago. Still under observation, but Seliza and Alabaster note that she's become a little stronger mentally. Apparently the strain helped her develop her gift."
"I wouldn't mind if my own ordeals had good consequences too." Larrin smiled when she heard this. "Did I say something funny?"
"Not really," she said. "I'm just curious. You knew that the best approach would be to take direct control of the 'bolts' without wasting energy expanding the shields, right?"
"Yes," I admitted reluctantly.
"And you yourself said we don't have many projectiles, we need to conserve them... But the moment Trebal was in mortal danger, you rushed to save her."
"So?"
"And you said you were pragmatic," Larrin smirked now. "If you hadn't taken the projectiles out of direct control, if you hadn't drained one of the super-reactors dry, you wouldn't have had enough energy to avoid the 'bolts' attack. And you'd all have died — you, Trebal, and both battleships. You could have killed all the Wraiths, including the one that got away, but you chose to protect your woman instead."
"I was saving the battleship," I lied. "There aren't that many of them in the galaxy, you know."
"Sure, sure," the Nomad chuckled. "Trebal actually believed that."
"Did she really?"
"No, of course not," Larrin laughed. "She said she'd break something on you when you get out of here. Because you should have sacrificed her and the rest, but eliminated the problem. Who knows how things might go from here."
"Right, I'll keep that in mind," I assured her, feeling some sensation returning to my right arm. "I think my body awareness is coming back."
"It should be fully back by the end of the day," Larrin assured me. "Koschei offered reverse feeding to speed up the recovery process, but both your ladies promised to rip off something vital if he mentioned it again. So he stuck to Ancient regeneration treatments."
"And that brings us to the talk about a hundred and fifty technicians," I concluded. "I take it Alabaster fed Koschei all the unreliable ones among the surrendered commanders and smart ones?"
"She gave us all the commanders and smart ones," Larrin smirked. "All except the soldiers. And when even that wasn't enough, she fed half of them too. Only kept the minimum needed to operate the ships of her new hive."
"Ships?" I snorted. "I thought it was just one hive ship."
"Well, considering she and Koschei worked nonstop on reviving the Ancients," Larrin chuckled at the joke, "she declared she's counting on bonuses. She emphasized that she didn't feed the people in the food storage chambers on the surrendered ships. And she's ready to discuss new terms of cooperation with you. Considering what was done, of course."
"Ah, what was done..."
"The revived Ancients," Larrin said. "And the rest of what I listed."
"And... how many did the two of them revive with Koschei?" I asked.
A sly smile appeared on Larrin's lips.
"All of them," she said briefly and succinctly. "Two hundred ninety-nine crew members of the Aurora are now alive and well. And many of them want to see you immediately."
All of them... Well, that makes me feel a little better now.
At least one problem is solved.
Though it's spawned a good dozen more.
But that's for later.
We'll solve problems as they come.