“I expect so. Anyway, it seems to be part of the museum catalog, so we’ve been bringing it into the computers so we could analyze it properly. But today we found an entry that seems to describe a ZPM.”
Ronon nodded, and the airman scooted out of his way so that he could scan the screen. William avoided looking at Radek, who was tapping his fingers lightly on the nearest table.
“You should have called me,” Radek said, after a moment, and William sighed.
“There was no point in dragging you away from the new iris — how’s that coming, by the way? — until I knew whether it was a real reference, or, I don’t know, their head archeologist’s wish list.”
“If there is any chance that we might find a ZPM, I should be informed,” Radek said.
“I wasn’t sure that’s what this was,” William answered. “It might be anything.”
“The drawing is too accurate to be guesswork,” Radek said.
“Hey.” Ronon looked up from the screen. “Do you want to know?”
“Yes,” Radek said, and William nodded.
“What does it say?”
Ronon glanced at the screen again. “It says ‘this artifact was found in the Ancestors’ presumed guidepost installation on Ascretta’ — do you want me to read all of this?”
“Yes,” William said.
“Just the important points,” Radek said. “Please.”
Ronon nodded. “OK. The important points. The chief curator found this on Ascretta, he says it was glowing very faintly when found, and it’s been stored in the museum ever since.” He tilted his head to read the handwritten note that ran up the side of the typed entry. “Somebody else moved it to more secure storage thirty years ago, and it looks like it’s still there.”
Radek said something under his breath in Czech — anatomically unlikely, William thought — and Ronon nodded again.
“Sheppard’s going to have to rethink what he was going to say to Cai.”
John drummed his fingers on Woolsey’s desk, wondering if he could justify going down to check on how the new iris was coming along. Radek had reconfigured the design to make better use of the titanium they’d gotten from Sateda, which meant they could stop racking their brains to figure out where they could get more. He wouldn’t learn anything else that he couldn’t find out by calling down there on the radio, and for that matter, he was pretty sure that what he’d learn by doing either one was ‘we’re working on it’. All the same, he was beginning to find himself sympathizing with Rodney’s claustrophobia. Every morning he came in here, the office seemed smaller.
“Hey, Sheppard,” Ronon said from the doorway. “Got a minute?”
“Sure,” John said, standing up gratefully, and then sat back down as Radek followed Ronon in, laptop under his arm. “You don’t mean ‘let’s have lunch’, do you?”
“We need to go back to Sateda,” Ronon said.
John ran a hand through his hair. “Look, I know how you feel about this,” he said. “But we got what we needed, and we’re just not in a position to help out right now. For one thing, the Genii are about the only people who like us these days — ”
“For a value of ‘like’ that includes holding Carson hostage,” Radek said.
“I’m not happy about that either,” John pointed out. “But the other thing is, we’ve got our own problems right now. Even if we wanted to try to kick the Genii off Sateda by force, we can’t spare any troops to do it as long as we’ve got the Wraith breathing down our necks. And the Genii have the best information network around, which means they’re one of our best chances for finding Rodney. When Woolsey gets back, maybe he can talk to them, but for right now — ”
“I do not think we can wait,” Radek said. He set his laptop down on John’s desk, its screen showing a sketch of a familiar shape surrounded by writing that looked Satedan.
“Is that what I think it is?”
“We believe it is a ZPM,” Radek said. “It may still be in storage in the Satedan museum we visited earlier. The descriptions from when it was found suggest that it may not be entirely depleted. Of course there is no way to know how much power remains, but at this point any amount would be better than none.”
“We could maybe run the shield,” Ronon said. “At least in an emergency. We could power the weapons chair.”
“We think we could maybe power the weapons chair,” John said.
“That’s better than knowing we can’t.”
John knew he’d be saying the same things if he were the one on the other side of the desk. He sincerely wished he was. He’d rather it be somebody else’s job to argue that they couldn’t afford to get on the bad side of the Genii. As far as John was concerned, the Genii could stand to make more of an effort not to get on the bad side of them.
“What do you think they’re going to want for it?” John asked.
Ronon looked at him like he thought the answer should be obvious. “For you to kick the Genii out.”
“That’s a pretty steep price.”
“Not for what the ZPM’s worth.”
John frowned. “To them, it’s an interesting paperweight that used to belong to the Ancients.”
“Not to us. You planning to cheat them?”
“You said yourself they didn’t have any use for this stuff.”
Ronon’s expression was stormy. “That doesn’t make it worthless and you know it. If they knew how much we needed it — ”
“If we tell them how much we need it, they’re going to set a price we can’t pay.”
“If you can get the Genii out, that’ll be good enough,” Ronon said.
“The Genii are stealing artifacts from the Satedans that cannot be replaced,” Radek said. “If they have their way, they will take possession of the entire Satedan homeworld. Are we to say that this is acceptable behavior in our allies?”
John rubbed his forehead. “I don’t think it’s okay, no.”
“Then do the right thing,” Ronon said.
“We may well find that the Genii are willing to negotiate,” Radek added.
John frowned. He’d wanted them to work as a team. It was good that they were putting up a united front. He just hadn’t expected to be on the outside of that, and it stung unexpectedly much.
“All right,” he said after a moment. “You’re right that we need the ZPM, and you’re right that we can’t let the Genii screw over the Satedans without even trying to stop them. We’ve got Teyla for the negotiations, but the Genii have problems dealing with women as equals. Normally I’d say that’s their problem, but it’s not going to help Teyla get any concessions out of them. Sora’s the only one who’ll actually take her seriously, and Sora hates her.”
“So handle the negotiations yourself,” Ronon said. “You’re in command of Atlantis, and you used to be military commander — ”
“I am the military commander,” John said. “This is temporary.”
“Whatever,” Ronon said. “The point is, they take you seriously. Lorne, too.”
“Lorne’s not even out of the infirmary yet,” John said. “Keller’s talking about letting him out on crutches in the next couple of days, but if we’re off negotiating with the Genii, he’s going to need to stay here and hold down the fort.”
“We could hold the negotiations here,” Radek offered.
“We’ve got enough problems without the Genii wandering around the city,” John said. “Not that I don’t trust Radim, but I’d still rather he didn’t hear all about our problems with the iris.”
“We may be getting ahead of ourselves,” Radek said. “Let us first see whether the ZPM even exists, and whether it retains any power. If so, we will see what Cai wants in exchange.”
“Take Teyla and Dr. Lynn and go check it out,” John said. “If you find the ZPM and you’re right about what Cai wants, you can tell him that we’re willing to try to set up a meeting with the Genii to talk about the situation.”