SGA-13 Hunt and Run (2 page)

“Ronon is not unfeeling,” Teyla defended her friend. She ignored the ‘caveman’ comment — they were all used to Rodney’s snide remarks, especially toward Ronon. “He has feelings just as anyone else does. But he has learned to do what is necessary, and to do so without that hesitation which could be fatal.”

“A fact,” Sheppard hastened to point out, “that’s saved your butt more than a few times.”

“Yes yes, I’m grateful for his reflexes and his martial skills,” Rodney acknowledged. “But that has nothing to do with this. We help others because it’s right? Because it shows we’re not animals? That’s just an excuse not to think about it. Really, I want to know — what do we get out of this?”

“Maybe,” Sheppard growled, reaching the all-too-familiar limit of his tolerance for Rodney, “they’ll have some magic way to shut you up. That would be worth any price.”

Teyla laughed and even Ronon grinned.

“Oh, ha ha,” Rodney grumped. But at least he didn’t continue the argument. Sheppard estimated it would take at least a minute before the scientist burst out with something inane again.

By then they’d be at the other ship. Hopefully that would keep him too occupied to speak further.

*
 
*
 
*

“There she is,” Sheppard pointed out a few minutes later, cutting Rodney off mid-breath and mid-argument. The silence had only lasted a minute before Rodney had felt compelled to pick up the same whine as before. But seeing the ship materialize on-screen brought his scientist self to the fore, and cut off any other complaints he might have been about to make.

“Standard configuration for a local ship,” Rodney confirmed after a second of scanning the readouts. “Short-range, too. What’s it doing way out here? Have we got any planets within range?”

“A few,” Teyla responded, tapping her own console for confirmation. “But none inhabited. That is strange.”

“Are you picking up anyone onboard?” Sheppard asked. He was already looking the other ship over, trying to decide the best angle from which to approach. They’d use the Jumper’s ceiling hatch rather than the rear cargo door — it was smaller and wouldn’t leak out as much of the cargo bay’s atmosphere. There were ports on both sides, so he’d pivot the Jumper, bringing it in on its side so the ceiling hatch lined up with one of those. It would be easiest to come at it from the far side, looping under and around. That’d also give him a chance to make sure there wasn’t anyone lurking beneath it, too. He’d had a few too many ambushes sprung on him not to be cautious.

Behind him, Ronon obviously shared his concerns. “No outward weaponry,” the Satedan pointed out. “No shields, either. Definitely not a military vessel or even a proper scout ship. Most likely civilian, possibly merchant.”

“Which again begs the question, what is it doing out here?” Rodney interrupted himself as his console chimed. “I’ve got life-signs!” he announced. “Seven of them, all strong.”

“Hailing now.” Teyla was already typing in commands. “No reply,” she said after a moment.

“We’re still getting the distress beacon,” Ronon commented, “but they may be unable to respond further.”

“I’d say so,” Rodney told him, “seeing as how responding would require power and they haven’t got any!”

“If it’s powered down — ” Teyla began, but Sheppard had jumped to the same worry himself.

“ — then they’ve got no life-support,” he finished for her. He kicked their speed up a notch, and began the arc of the turn. “I’m bringing us in fast as I can — every second could count here!”

The others began suiting up while he piloted. Their MOPP gear wasn’t actually a spacesuit and wouldn’t last long in a total vacuum, but they would serve to get from the Jumper to the injured ship. Once inside, they’d keep out any airborne contaminants and could regulate body temperature. Each suit also had a small air canister and could recycle that for ten to twenty minutes if there wasn’t any other air present. Hopefully that would be enough. They did have one actual spacesuit on the Jumper, but Sheppard didn’t want to use that unless it was absolutely necessary. “I see no signs of damage,” Ronon pointed out once he had his protective suit in place. He was leaning on the back of Sheppard’s chair, peering over him out the front, but Sheppard had neither the time nor the energy to care. Besides Ronon knew better than to get in his way while he was flying. And he was right, anyway — the distressed ship looked structurally intact. No blast holes, no missing pieces, not even any major dents. Hell, it was in better shape than their Jumper!

“So if it’s not hurt,” Rodney asked, “why is it just floating here?”

“There could be any number of reasons,” Teyla reminded him. “The most likely is some form of internal power failure.”

“Or poison gas,” Ronon added darkly.

That earned him a glare from Rodney. “Oh, great! You just had to say that, didn’t you? What if our gas masks aren’t enough to deal with something like that? What if it’s acidic and eats right through our suits? Huh? What then?”

Ronon shrugged. “Then we die.”

“That’s your answer? Just like that?”

Sheppard could feel Ronon shrug again through the chair. “Hopefully,” he agreed. “It could be long and drawn-out and painful instead.”

“If you’re so eager to check,” Rodney managed after a moment of stunned silence, “maybe you should just go in by yourself!”

“We’re all going in,” Sheppard told him sharply. He spun the Jumper lightly on its axis, and eased the engines off just as their roof nudged up against the side of their target. The impact wasn’t even rough enough to count as a scrape. Damn, he was good! “The MOPP suits can handle it,” he assured Rodney as he stood and accepted his gear from Teyla. “And if the suit scanners do pick up anything beyond their rating we’ll back off at once and quarantine the entire ship, okay?”

“Fat lot of good that’ll do us after we’ve already been exposed,” Rodney muttered, but he fell into line a minute later as Sheppard led them through the bulkhead door into the cargo hold, and then to the Jumper’s ceiling access hatch.

“All set?” Sheppard asked everyone. He got two nods and a grumble he took to mean yes. “Then here we go.” He reached up and punched the release switch, and the hatch hissed open. The shuttle’s door was right beside them, inches away, and he simply grabbed the handhold beside their hatch and pulled himself up so he could hit the door’s access panel. It slid open — good thing it didn’t open outward! — with a faint hiss. Beyond it he could make out only darkness.

“Hello? Anybody home?” Sheppard hauled himself through both doors, taking a second to let his body reorient so the shuttle floor was ‘down.’ “Avon calling!”

“If we die,” Rodney warned as they clambered one after the other into the distressed ship, “I’m blaming you!”

“Fair enough.” Sheppard stepped to the side once he was through, allowing the others in, then closed the door behind them. No sense letting any possible contagions onto the Jumper if they could avoid it. Rodney was a coward and a complainer, but he wasn’t stupid and he did occasionally have some valid concerns. “Okay, let’s have a look around.”

They split up, though in a ship this size that didn’t mean much — even when he had reached the far hull Sheppard could turn around and see the others’ faces within their helmets. The Jumper had room for a crew of four and perhaps another six to eight passengers. This ship would be lucky to fit eight total. Especially since it didn’t have any seats in the back section.

“Light cargo,” Ronon guessed, completing a sweep of the interior. “Only the two seats up front, pilot and copilot, and the rest is cargo space.”

“And no sign of anyone,” Teyla added. “No bodies, no remains, nothing.”

“I’m not seeing any interior damage, either,” Rodney pointed out, sweeping a handlight along the walls and particularly over the panels. “I’d have to crack everything open to be sure, but at least on the surface there’s nothing to indicate why this thing isn’t zipping along somewhere.”

“Distress beacon was activated,” Sheppard reminded them, gesturing toward the front console, where a small light blinked on and off. “Somebody hit it. And this thing is dead in space, so something happened. We just need to figure out what.” Something about all this was bugging him, though. He just couldn’t put his finger on it right away.

Rodney didn’t have any such problem. “There’s nobody here,” he declared suddenly.

“I think we got that,” Teyla told him.

“No, listen,” the scientist insisted. “There’s nobody here. So where did those life-signs come from?”

It was Ronon who answered — sort of. “We need to leave,” he announced. “Now!”

“What? Why?” Sheppard turned but the Satedan was already striding back toward the shuttle door. “Hey, hold up, big guy! What’s going on?”

“We need to get off this ship at once,” Ronon insisted. “And touch nothing!” That last comment was directed sharply at Rodney, who had been in the act of reaching for an instrument panel near the front console.

“But if I can get in here — ” Rodney started to protest.

“Leave it!” Ronon repeated. “Or viruses will be the least of your worries!”

That shut Rodney up and got him moving in a hurry. By the time he reached the rest of them Ronon had the door open. He ushered them all through before leaping back into the Jumper himself. Then he pulled the shuttle door shut again, but he didn’t shut the Jumper’s ceiling hatch.

“We need to push off,” he said instead. He gestured toward one of the collection nets that hung from a rack above one of the rear seats. “Sheppard, give me a hand.”

Sheppard knew better than to argue — Ronon never did anything without a darn good reason, and most of the time that reason was their immediate survival. The Satedan had survived seven years as a Runner, after all — and if being chased nonstop by the entire Wraith empire didn’t teach you to recognize danger signs, Sheppard wasn’t sure what could!

He handed Ronon the net and watched as the Satedan reversed it and used the butt of its handle to shove off against the shuttle’s hull. He could see Ronon’s muscles straining, and after a second the constant pressure nudged the two ships apart. Once they were separated the Jumper’s own slight momentum carried it further, and the impact against the empty ship forced it to drift in the opposite direction, widening the gap.

“Be ready to engage the ship’s drive,” Ronon warned as he finally pulled the ceiling hatch closed and air began to filter into the cargo hold again. Their MOPP gear had held — barely. “But don’t activate it until we’ve gained more distance.”

“Got it.” Sheppard hurried back into the cockpit and slid into his seat, not bothering to remove his suit, and began but didn’t finish his preflight checklist. “So, want to tell us what’s going on?”

“Later,” was the only answer he got. “Once it’s safe.”

Couldn’t argue with that, Sheppard decided. The rest of the team had joined him back in the cockpit and had closed the bulkhead door behind them, slipping into their usual seats. He sat impatiently, one hand poised over the engine controls, until he caught Ronon’s nod. Then he fired everything up and immediately spun the ship around, putting its back to the other vessel —

 
— which was why the blast propelled them forward when the distressed ship exploded.

Even though he’d been half-expecting it, Sheppard had to fight the controls as the Jumper bucked and fought, the shockwave tossing it about like a leaf battered by a hurricane. The fact that they’d already turned had definitely saved them, though — if they’d still been alongside their viewports would have been shattered by the blast, and most of the Jumper’s systems fried as well. As it was, warning lights were flaring up all across the console, and klaxons were screaming through his helmet.

“We’ve got damage to the thrusters!” Rodney was shouting at him, “and to life support! Communications are out! Engine coolant levels are plummeting — we must have a crack in one of the lines somewhere! We need to set down!”

“Can we make it back to the gate?” Sheppard asked him, still battling the helm.

He got the answer he’d been half-expecting and completely dreading. “Not a chance! We’ll be out of power in minutes. Six at most.” And the Stargate was at least ten minutes away. Damn!

“There is a planet within range,” Teyla informed them quickly, her fingers dancing across the computer panel on her suit’s arm — at the moment it was a more stable option than the ship’s own systems. “I will enter the coordinates.” She tapped them into the ship’s navigation, and Sheppard nodded as it came up on-screen. Definitely closer than the gate. The only question was, would it be close enough?

“Not like we have much of a choice,” he muttered. “Okay, hang on — I’m going to floor it!” He stopped fighting the controls and settled for maximum speed, letting the ship’s own momentum carry it part of the way. Better to put that velocity to work, even if it wasn’t a smooth ride. They all still had their suits on, which was also a good thing — no telling how long the life-support would hold, and every little bit helped.

Hopefully, it would be long enough. Then, of course, they’d just have to figure out what to do next — stuck on an uninhabited planet in the middle of nowhere, with a dead ship, unable to reach the nearest gate, because someone had set an empty vessel as an ambush.