Angelus Read online

  “Hit it so hard? My guess is they discovered most of the cities were underground, hidden from the Wraith, and just pulverized the crust to make sure they got everybody.”

  Ellis leaned back in the command throne, covering his eyes with his hands for a moment before wiping them down his face. He felt tired, exhausted, his eyeballs gritty and his neck muscles shiveringly tense. The warmth of his hands over his eyes for a moment helped a little, but that wasn’t the only reason they had found their way there. There was a part of him that wanted to shut out the image of that burning world, even though it was long gone from the viewport. He could still see the clouds, the craters, the glowing fracture lines. It was all there, behind his eyes.

  He’d even authorized use of subspace comms in order to make this particular report. He needed to speak of this quickly, as if doing so would somehow lessen its horror. The sooner it was gone from him, the better.

  “No, I meant why did they hit it at all?”

  “Oh, I see…” Carter paused, as if gathering her thoughts. “That’s the part we needed confirmation on.”

  “But it was to get Angelus.”

  “Partly. From what he told us, he’d realized that the Wraith couldn’t be fooled by the Eraavi much longer, so he decided to give his children a fighting chance. He started designing a weapon; we don’t know quite what, something extremely powerful. Not nuclear weapons, something far worse than that. The way he was talking — before he clammed up again — he didn’t seem to think that hive ships would have been a real threat any more.”

  The military side of Abe Ellis perked up at that. “Really? Are you sure he didn’t say anything else?”

  “Yes, I’m sure. Thing is, he never got to finish it. The Asurans must have picked up some kind of energy signature from his tests and realized what he was doing. Maybe they got so freaked out by it that they decided to burn the entire planet and everyone on it.”

  “And our boy Angelus just made it out, huh?” Ellis folded his arms. “All on his own.”

  “The Eraavi weren’t spacefarers. That kind of research must have been forbidden — it would have attracted the Wraith faster than anything.”

  “Makes sense.” As much as anything did any more, Ellis thought glumly. “Okay, there’s nothing more we can do here. If there’s no objection, I’ll take Apollo on to the next drop point.”

  “No objection at all, Colonel. The sooner those sensors are online the safer I’ll feel.”

  Ellis cut the connection from his end. He’d given up on feeling safe. “Deacon?”

  “Course is queued up and ready, sir.”

  “That’s good to hear. Okay, get us back in the pipe. And then stand down — you’ve been on for two consecutive watches already. That means you too, Meyers.”

  “Yes sir, if you insist. Hyperdrive is ready on your command.”

  Ellis nodded. “Do it.”

  In front of the viewscreen, a spot of silver-blue light appeared, raced towards the ship and spread open like a maw to engulf it. Ellis caught a glimpse of the stars at the edges of the hyperspace vortex streak into comet-tails of light as the ship accelerated out of the normal universe, but they were gone in an instant. Within a few seconds, Apollo was diving down the endless blue tunnel once more.

  “All systems optimal,” Deacon reported. “Estimated time to the next drop point is five hours seventeen.”

  Ellis stood up and stretched. His first instinct was to tell Deacon not to rush, to throttle the hyperdrive back a few degrees and let the crew have a little downtime, but he suppressed that urge as soon as he felt it. Atlantis needed those sensors, and fast. Besides, Meyers and Deacon were not the only bridge crew he had. They had stayed on watch of their own accord, and he had let them out of a desire for continuity on the mission, but they would need to be relieved soon anyway. Their replacements could handle the next watch or two.

  “I’ll be in my quarters,” he muttered. “Any change in status, you know the drill.”

  “Colonel?”

  “Deacon, I told you. Get some rest.”

  “Sir, I would. But —”

  “What?” Ellis turned towards him. “But what?”

  Deacon swallowed, staring at his board. “There’s been a change in status.”

  Ellis was at his side in two strides. “Show me.”

  “Here.” The helmsman pointed at a set of figures on his board, then used the keyboard to bring up a second set. As soon as the new digits appeared, Ellis could see they were deviating. “We’re off-course?”

  “Not as such. All I’ve brought up here is the time until we’re due to break out, accurate to a thousandth of a second. Obviously that’s not nearly accurate enough, but all I need to do is see it, you know? The nav system brings us out at the right time and place.”

  Ellis frowned. “But the time you just put up is the real time?”

  “According to the ship’s clock, yes. There’s a compound error that’s causing a disparity between the two countdowns. I can compensate at the moment, but the bigger it gets the harder it’ll be to keep on top of it. At this rate we could break out too early or too late, and that could be, well…” He pushed his glasses up. “Not good.”

  “So what’s causing it?”

  “I have no idea.” Deacon slid his seat back on its rails and stood up. “Sir, I’d like permission to head down to the control core. If there’s a fault, it’s more likely to be in one of the primary systems, given that none of the secondaries seem to have picked up on it.”

  “Fine. Get down there and see if you can clear this up before we break out. I’d hate to have to dry-dock the ship right in the middle of all this.” He stepped back to let Deacon go past, then noticed Helen Sharpe, Apollo’s Third Officer, put her head through the aft hatch. Deacon stopped at the hatchway, and there was a swift conversation that involved Deacon pointing at the helm and Sharpe nodding a lot. Ellis couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he knew a situation update when he saw one. A moment later Deacon ducked out of sight, and Sharpe walked quickly onto the bridge and up to Ellis. “Third Officer reporting for duty, sir.”

  “Deacon told you about the anomaly?”

  “He did.”

  “Good. Let me know if there’s any change in that glitch.” He went back to the command throne as she sat down, and dropped wearily into it. Meyers turned to give him a quizzical look, but he just shook his head at her, very slightly. There was no way he would go back to his quarters when there was a situation, even if it was just a data error.

  He saw Meyers dip her head and speak briefly into her headset, then continue what she was doing. A few minutes later, one of the bridge techs brought him a mug of coffee.

  Ellis didn’t normally like food or drink on the bridge, but in this case he was prepared to make an exception. The caffeine boost was extremely welcome — no substitute for a couple of hours sleep, of course, but in the circumstances it was the best he could hope for. After a few gulps of the stuff, he almost started to relax a little.

  He should have known that was a mistake, letting his attention wander.

  There was a sudden, urgent buzzing from the helm, followed instantly by a muttered curse from Sharpe. Ellis set the mug down on the deck and leaned towards her. “Status.”

  “The glitch just jumped by a factor of ten,” she reported curtly, already working at the keyboard. “I’ve got something else… Hold on… Dammit!”

  “What?”

  “Power slide. Colonel, if I can’t get on top of this we could lose hyperdrive.”

  Ellis keyed his headset. “Deacon, what’s the situation down there?”

  There was no answer, just a rustle of static. “Deacon? Major Deacon, report immediately!”

  This time there was a response, although not in words. It was faint, softer than the static; a sigh or whisper drawn out longer than any throat could sustain. There was a metallic, ghostly quality to it that made Ellis’ skin crawl. “What the hell?” he breathed.

 
; After that, silence. Ellis gave up and switched channel. “Security, get a team to the control core. Locate Major Deacon immediately.”

  “Colonel?” That was Sharpe, sounding something close to terrified. “I think I’m going to lose this.”

  “Stay on it, Captain.”

  “I’m not sure…” Her fingers were rattling off the keys, insect-quick. “It’s jumping, there doesn’t seem to be any pattern. If the error gets past a certain point the core —”

  Apollo dropped out of hyperspace.

  The breakout was unscheduled, uncontrolled, and sickeningly violent. Instead of the usual gentle lurch there was a massive impact, a twisting, as if the entire bridge had been hit off-center by something huge and impossibly fast. There was an awful noise, stunningly loud, a shriek of overstressed metal, and the ship seemed to drop away like an airliner in turbulence, the deck falling several meters before rebounding heavily back upwards. Ellis felt it come up and hit the soles of his boots, jarring his spine and almost sending him clear out of the command throne.

  There was a second, grinding jolt, this time in a direction he couldn’t even name, and then it was over. The ship was still.

  Ellis opened his eyes. He hadn’t been aware of shutting them, but now — after some frantic blinking to clear the sparks from his vision — he could see in just what a mess the impact had left the bridge.

  The lights had dimmed to half-brightness, but something behind him was sparking, the fitful bursts of light making the whole scene even more chaotic. He saw Helen Sharpe getting up, steadying herself on the helm console — she must have been flung right out of her seat. Meyers had been sent in the same direction, but the edge of her console had gotten in her way. She was slumped over it, unmoving.

  Groans and curses sounded from behind him, over the hateful spitting of whatever electrical failure was sparking back there. Ellis turned his head, wincing at the pain in his spine, and saw people getting up. There didn’t seem to be any serious injuries, but everyone had been hammered off their feet.

  “That,” he grated, “was one bitch of a breakout.”

  “I’m sorry, sir,” Sharpe replied, holding her head. She sat back down in her seat and slid it forwards. “The cumulative error got too much for the core to handle, and it shut down the hyperdrive.”

  “Yeah, I know what happened.” He straightened himself up, rolled his head around a couple of times to free up his neck and shoulders, then got up to see to Meyers. “But it still shouldn’t have been that hard.”

  “That was the error. Core gave us what it thought was a smooth exit, but it’s timing was already way off. Charlie foxtrot, sir.”

  “You got that right.”

  Meyers was coming around, grimacing. “Whatahell?” she slurred.

  “Take it easy,” Ellis told her. “Wait until the medics get up here.”

  “No time,” she groaned, and slumped back into her seat. “They’ll be busy. What happened to the lights?”

  “Not sure. Can you run a sweep with this power?”

  “Gimme a minute.”

  “Outstanding.” He patted her shoulder, gently, then moved back across to Sharpe. “Anything?”

  “Not much. Half the systems are down… Anything that requires fine-sensing is out, hopefully not for long, though. Auto-recalibration.”

  “Looks like one of the generators is out, Colonel,” called one of the techs, already back at his board. Ellis glanced up and saw that the man had a track of dark crimson spilling down one side of his face. Scalp wound. “Capacitor banks three and five discharged, could have blown their breakers.”

  “Shields are out, sir,” someone else told him. “Comms too.”

  “Wonderful. Meyers, can you please give me some good news?”

  She shook her head, and then winced and put her hand to it. “Ouch,” she hissed. “Note to self, no head-shaking. Okay, the bad news. I have no idea where we are. The stellar database is out.”

  There was something in her voice that told him she wasn’t quite finished. “And?”

  “And, I think…” She leaned closer to her board, squinted. “Oh crap,” she whispered.

  “Don’t tell me. We’re not alone.”

  “No sir.” She looked up at him, her face bleak. “I think it’s the Wraith.”

  Chapter Five

  Creator

  “Chapman,” Sam Carter muttered to herself. “Russel Chapman.” Then she lashed out, hard, with her right foot.

  The kick was perfect, a dhe dhad roundhouse that impacted the punch bag solidly at waist height. Had Chapman actually been the target of the blow he would have crumpled around it like a loose sack of grain.

  Carter bounced back, regained her stance, and then darted in to pummel the bag with a series of vicious elbow and fist strikes, ending the sequence with a mud dhrong punch that would have broken a strong man’s jaw. The bag, suspended top and bottom with heavy bungee cords, rattled and bounced, swaying to a slow halt as Carter backed off.

  She wiped the back of her hand across her forehead, letting the bindings mop up some of the sweat, shook some more out of her hair. She hadn’t planned on working the bag for as long as she had, and the sustained assault she had unleashed on it was beginning to take its toll. There was a continuous ache across the back of her shoulders, now, and the dull muscle-memory of repeated impacts in her knuckles and shins. Maybe, she thought, this hadn’t been such a great idea.

  Then again, ever since the IOA had called to deliver their decision she had needed to hit something. And doing so, over and over for almost an hour, had felt good.

  It wasn’t a realization that she was especially proud of. In truth, she recognized it as a failing. She should have been prepared for what the Advisory was going to decide: knowing what she did about them and how they worked, she should have expected it. But the decision, when it came, surprised and distressed her far more than she had expected. She hadn’t been able to think of another way to get rid of the effects of that call other than to make her way down to the gym, set up a punch bag and beat the living daylights out of several imaginary members of the IOA.

  There was no-one else in her section of the gym. From the next room, though, the sounds of heavy blows and occasional grunts of pain issued. Ronon Dex and John Sheppard were in there, sparring again. It seemed to be something they did frequently — Carter had only been on Atlantis for just over three weeks, and she had already noticed them in there several times.

  They were talking as they fought, but she couldn’t quite hear what they were saying. Perhaps Carter wasn’t the only one getting rid of some aggression.

  She left the punch bag to dangle, and walked across the gym to where her towel lay folded neatly on a bench. She picked it up and dried her face with it, and when she brought it down Angelus was standing in front of her.

  It took an effort not to start. She’d not heard him at all, and she was sure she’d only had the towel over her face for a second or two. Either he could move very fast, or very quietly, or both. In any case, it was something she would have to watch for in the future.

  “Angelus,” she said, as calmly as she could. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was told I could find you here,” he replied. Then he tilted his head, very slightly, gesturing over his shoulder. “Pleased don’t be alarmed. I have my chaperones.”

  Carter glanced behind him, and saw DeSalle and Kaplan by the door. “I see. Well, it’s good that you’re up and about. You must be feeling better.”

  He was looking at the punch bag. “What are you doing?”

  “Exercising.”

  “By attacking this… Object?”

  She nodded, feeling oddly embarrassed. “It’s called Muay Thai. The fighting style, not the bag… It’s a martial art from my world.”

  “Art…” he repeated softly. He walked partway around the punch bag, watching it, as though waiting for it to impart some deep insight.

  “In the room next to this one,” he said aft
er a few seconds, “I noticed Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard and a tall man with very distinctive hair. They were fighting too.”

  “That was Ronon Dex.” Carter made a slight, fluttering mime around her head. “With the hair. They’re sparring, sort of pretend-fighting. Keeps them in practice.”

  “They seemed to be taking it very seriously. Are you sure it wasn’t some kind of dominance ritual?”

  Carter smiled. “No, I think they just like hitting each other.”

  He didn’t answer. Next to him, with his stillness and calm grace and the smooth, liquid tones of his voice, she started to feel awkward. “Look, Angelus. This isn’t something I normally do.”

  “It isn’t?”

  “No. I mean, you probably think it’s pretty…” She grimaced slightly, unsure of how to go on, but his expression urged her to continue. “Pretty childish,” she said finally.

  He looked at her oddly for a moment, then a slow smile spread across his pale features. “Ah, Colonel Carter. Do you think me too enlightened to see the value of this? You think my people were any better?”

  She shrugged wordlessly.

  Angelus shook his head. “No. Oh, to hear us talk, you would think us beyond the need for such pursuits. Noble, we were, and full of high ideals… We knew all the answers, Colonel, and we shouted them like anthems, to anyone who would listen. But still.” He lifted his hands strangely, his long fingers crooked. “We are gone, and yet you remain.”

  There was the sound of a heavy impact from the next room, and a series of muffled curses. Somebody had hit the mat, hard, and Carter didn’t think it was Dex. “Maybe not for much longer,” she said grimly.

  Angelus lowered his hands. “What do you mean?”

  She sighed deeply. “You know I take my orders from a group on Earth, right?”

  “I thought you had autonomy here.”

  “On some matters, yes. But not wholly. And not when it concerns you.” She began walking back towards the punch bag, and then realized that she still had the towel in her hand. She balled it up and slung it back towards the bench. “I presented them with my report last night. All my concerns, Apollo’s sensor logs from Eraavis, everything.”