It was all too easy to believe, especially knowing that the Genii had been poisoning their own people with their experiments with radioactive materials. They’d probably like the idea of poisoning somewhere they didn’t care about that much instead.
It would be easy to promise that of course they’d help. The Genii didn’t have any right to be on Sateda, and even if Woolsey might have thought it was somehow more complicated than that, Ronon didn’t think that John would. But the Genii were supposed to be their allies, and it wasn’t up to Ronon to decide whether the alliance was starting to be more trouble than it was worth.
“I have to talk to my commander,” Ronon said. “I can’t make any promises about something like this without his authority.”
“That’s fair,” Cai said. “I know your reputation even if I don’t know you, and what I’ve heard makes me trust that you’ll do whatever it takes to help your people.”
“I will,” Ronon said, but he couldn’t help feeling like this wasn’t going to be simple at all.
Chapter Fourteen
Michael
Quicksilver had not slept well since they returned from Atlantis, woke with head and hand aching as though he needed to feed, though that faded almost as soon as he came completely awake. He thought he dreamed, perhaps of the dark-haired queen who guarded his mind’s gates, but he could no longer remember. Instead, he remembered human faces, fragments of places and voices. Some he recognized from the attack: the gate room in the city, the shabby little man who had tried to trick him, the warrior who had killed Dust, who had called him by a human name. Other things he could not have seen this time — the fierce and beautiful woman with the bearing of a queen, who had attacked him on the hive; the hall where the humans had their meeting; another woman with golden hair, and a smaller room with red walls where the humans’ zenana gathered — and he guessed those were memories of his captivity.
He shifted on his pillows, awake again, and unsettled enough that sleep had lost its appeal. Twice they had called him by a human name, promised to help him: a terrible deception, all the worse because he could almost put a face to that name. Rodney, they had said, and in the long nights, lying silent and still so as not to disturb Ember, he had remember a second name attached to that one, in human fashion: Rodney McKay. But he knew McKay, or knew of him — no, he was sure he had known him in his captivity: a human scientist, a clever man even by his own high standards, the man he was sure had been his greatest enemy among the Lanteans. Handsome and strong, at least by human measure, and certainly brilliant — a worthy adversary, Quicksilver was sure of that. But why the other humans would call him by the same name, except in mockery…
And that they would pay for. He rolled out of his sleeping niche, saw to his surprise that Ember’s door was drawn back, the narrow compartment empty. Frowning, he found clothes, dressed — that, at least, had come back to him — and slipped the communicator onto his wrist.
*Ember.*
There was no answer, and Quicksilver frowned. *Ember!*
*I am with my commander,* Ember said at last. *What is it? Is there a problem?*
*I want you in the labs.*
*It is the middle of the late-night watch,* Ember said. *Can it not wait —?* He broke off then, as though someone else had spoken to him, and when he spoke again, his tone was resigned. *Come, then. I am in Guide’s quarters, Steelflower’s Consort. It is on your way.*
Quicksilver snarled, but there was really no point in objecting. He made his way through the corridors, brushed past the drones that guarded the rooms assigned to the visiting lords, and laid his hand on the door control. It opened, though not to his touch, the door sliding back to reveal Ember, his hair pulled back into a single loose tail.
*Must we begin the day so early?* he asked, but Quicksilver’s gaze was fixed on the man behind him.
*I know you,* he said, startled. *We have worked together — where?*
He heard Ember draw breath sharply, but the older blade shook his head. *We have not,* he said. *And from what my chief cleverman tells me, it would have been a memorable experience.*
*That’s not right,* Quicksilver said. He had just enough presence of mind not to call the man a liar outright, that was too great an insult from cleverman to blade — worse from cleverman to commander, he thought, realizing abruptly that this must be Guide himself, but he could not bring himself to let it go. *We worked on — replicators? A weapon against them?*
He heard the door slide shut behind him, felt a flash of something like fear from Ember. That was instantly controlled, and Guide shook his head again.
*You and I have never met before now.*
There was force behind the words, pressure to believe, and Quicksilver shook his head. *No. I’m sure of it. Something to do with Atlantis — *
*I was a prisoner there,* Guide said. *As were you.*
*At the same time?* That didn’t seem right, and Quicksilver frowned.
*I don’t think so,* Guide answered.
*You know what was done to me,* Quicksilver said. He couldn’t have said how he knew it, but once the words were formed, he felt the confirmation, quickly shielded. *Tell me!*
*Commander,* Ember said, his tone a warning, and Guide shook his head.
*No. Not now.* He looked at Quicksilver, frowning slightly, the star tattoo around his eye very dark in the gentle shiplight. *I may not tell you.* He held up his hand, forestalling Quicksilver’s instinctive outburst. *There are good reasons why you must find that out for yourself, it is not something you can come to by way of another’s mind. But there is one thing I may share with you — *
*Commander,* Ember said again, and this time there was definitely fear in his tone. *You run too great a risk.*
Guide spared him a quick glance. *I know the risks I run, cleverman.* He looked back at Quicksilver. *Give me your hand.*
Quicksilver extended his off hand, wary, and Guide caught it in his own, circling the wrist with his long fingers, so that they spoke in intimate privacy. *I give you a name to conjure with. Michael.*
*What?*
Guide released him, turning away. *Go with him to the labs, Ember. We must not keep him from our queen’s work.*
*Yes, commander,* Ember said, and opened the door again. *Let us go.*
*But — * Quicksilver found himself in the corridor again, the door sealed behind them. *How am I supposed to work after something like that?*
*Perhaps we could sleep, then,* Ember said, with some bitterness.
*Oh, no. If I’m awake, we’re going to work. In the labs. Both of us.* Quicksilver took a breath. *And I will figure this out, with or without your commander’s help. Wait and see.*
*I most certainly shall,* Ember answered, and they started together toward the labs.
Mel made her way through Daedalus’s main corridor, tablet computer tucked under her arm. She’d heard the gossip along with everyone else in the city; the Genii were on Sateda, and getting the titanium there might be impossible after all. They’d retrieved some, but rumor said it wasn’t quite enough, and that had gotten her thinking. She’d spent the morning in the 302 bay, going over specs and supplies, and the idea that had come to her in the middle of the night had started to look like something solid. It might not work — she was the first person to admit she was no technician — and it was a risk, but she’d talked it over with Dwayne Grant, her second-in-command, and he’d thought it was a pretty good idea, too. Except, of course, for the one glaring problem, but they’d agreed that getting the Stargate usable again had to be the top priority.
She paused in the engine room hatch, glancing around the spotless compartment. It still felt weird not to see an Asgard on board, to know that they were gone, that the Tau’ri were on their own with a technology they only barely understood — but, then, Dr. Novak had been working with it from the very beginning. If anyone knew what she was doing with this stuff, Novak did. At the moment, though, there was no one in sight, and Mel frowned. Surely somebody ought to be on duty, even with Daedalus parked on Atlantis?