Lieutenant Annie Parker was finished. She was done! She was sweaty and tired and if she had to look at one more column and decide if it was Doric or Corinthian for stupid anthropologists, she was going to kill someone. And now Ford had gone and left!

“He what?!” she yelled at Wu, not embarrassed in the least by the screech it came out as. She’d heard perfectly clearly, but if she denied it loud enough, maybe it’d go away.

“He’s gone, Ma’am,” Wu said simply. What he really meant was, ‘it’s not my fault.’ Like shit it wasn’t.

“Well, I can see that! Where’d he go?”

“P6Z-457.”

She glared.

“The Rejekans.”

“Where Sheppard’s team went? With Dr. Weir?”

“Yes, Ma’am. There’s been a slight problem.”

“A slight problem?” To Wu, a slight problem could be anything from a rat infestation to the sun going supernova.

“The whole team disappeared. The Rejekans didn’t see them. Bates and Ford and Zelenka are there right now trying to sort it out.”

“And we have no clue where they are?”

“Bates said there was an ambush, but we don’t know anything more than that. Zelenka is trying to use a new technique to figure out the last address dialed.”

Annie tried to run her hands through her hair, but found it to be kind of hard with it all up in a ponytail. All she wanted was a long hot shower. Why’d this have to happen now?

“And Ford had to go with him, why?”

“I have no idea,” Wu said. “But, they’ve instructed us to dial in every twenty minutes. They can’t dial out, you see, because . . .”

“Yes, I know. When’s the next scheduled dial-in?”

“Now.”

Annie sighed. “Do it.”

She watched bleakly as the chevrons encoded. This did not bode well - all three members of the main command staff off-world, then the two second best replacements out hunting them. Who the hell thought this up? Oh yeah, Aiden, the marine. Not that she didn’t love Aiden, because she did. But . . . seriously . . . he cared more for Sheppard’s approval than he did for the goddamned responsibility of logical thought process.

Wu nodded to her that the connection was ready.

“Ford, this is Parker. What the hell do you think you’re . . .” Yeah, so she wasn’t doing so well on military formality and all that jazz today. But 3 days on column-world with half-naked natives waggling their pickles at her while she watched Lin do whatever the hell it was Lin actually did, which was a mystery to pretty much anyone, even his fellow anthropologists . . . after all that and this new situation Aiden had dumped in her lap, she deserved to be a little pissed-off.

“Lieutenant, this is Bates. I’m sorry Ma’am, but Lieutenant Ford and Dr. Zelenka are no longer here.”

“Damnit!” Annie said, not bothering to censor herself. “Do you know where they are, Sergeant?”

“Not exactly, Ma’am.”

Her day just kept getting worse and worse.

“What do you mean by ‘not exactly?’”

“Zelenka got the redial stuff to work, but it blew the DHD. Ford took the rest of the team through and left me here to communicate to you. While the Gate was still active, we were able to triangulate the coordinates. Zelenka says to check them against known Gate addresses in the database and dial him as soon as possible.”

“Why didn’t he take you with him?”

“I was supposed to return to Atlantis to help run things if you hadn’t returned.”

Great. Aiden was going to put Bates in charge. What had the world come to?

“Anything else you’d like to tell me, Sergeant?”

“Could you send someone to pick me up in a Jumper? We also have to do something about the Rejekan’s DHD.”

“Give us five minutes. I’ll send Stackhouse. Parker out.”

She nodded to Wu, who tapped his earpiece. But before he could even start, the chevrons lighted up and the wormhole engaged.

“Receiving Major Sheppard’s IDC, Ma’am,” Wu said, voice inflectionless as usual. The man needed to buy himself a personality.

“Finally, some good news. Everyone in position?” For all they knew, Sheppard had been captured. “Lower the shield.”

The shield dropped and Sheppard staggered through. There was a wave of tension spreading through the room like blood as the marines guarding the Gate stepped forward in unison, weapons raised.

“Kolya,” Annie said, as the man holding a gun to the Genii commander’s neck collapsed.

The marines were already in motion, rushing the dark figure in the center of the room and shoving him to the floor. But Annie’s entire focus was on the prone form of her commanding officer, smearing blood on the mosaic that was the Ancient floor. She thought of Julius Caesar, even though the analogy certainly didn’t fit.

“Medical team to the Gate Room.” Wu’s voice was inflectionless as always above the commotion below.

Elizabeth stumbled into the tent, ignoring the thick smell of urine and the familiar grime of streets and villages a galaxy away. She’d seen poverty before – Beijing, Cambodia, Mexico. She’d seen this same hard look of desperation worn on the bright blue eyes staring up at her, world-weary and cold as steel. She’d seen it in conference rooms, on veterans, in her father’s eyes a million times. It was the look of a man who knew the wars diplomats like her could only see through gazes like this. But she had never known why.

It took a million light-years and an alien world before she finally understood. Someone who had seen this could look at you and see your body lying on a battlefield somewhere. They could look down on you, knowing that you would never understand. The hardness was callousness in some, pity in others. This was what mankind was, and diplomats were foolhardy to speak of rights and territories and words that faded on the wind.

The man with the cold blue eyes scrutinized her. He did not stand. He did not blink. He just fixed that gaze on her, ignoring Teyla standing mute beside her. Teyla was the warrior, but Elizabeth had the power. This man knew that. He knew it the way all good commanders did.

She narrowed her gaze at him. She, too, had seen things he could not imagine – she let a little of her latent wonder show. Maybe it was naïve, but she still believed there was hope. “My name is Dr. Elizabeth Weir.” She didn’t give her position or any recognition of the City of the Ancestors. She knew nothing of these people – only that they treated visitors roughly and suspected everything. Better to first find out why they were so paranoid, before confirming any of their fears.

“Commander Fenal Sheran.” He did not extend his hand, a custom that Elizabeth missed less and less by the day. “The patrolmen that found you tell me that you claim to have come here through the Great Ring.” His doubt was as piercing as his gaze.

“We did. We escaped here from . . .”

“So, you are refugees?” He sounded disinterested, shifting several piles of papers on the dark surface of what appeared to be his desk.

“Our trading party was attacked by . . . an old enemy. Teyla and I managed to escape through the ‘Great Ring.’ Please, two of our colleagues were captured. We need to return to our world to help with their rescue.”

“Who is this enemy of whom you speak?”

Elizabeth winced inwardly. These people, with the dirty grey uniforms and bombs exploding all around, could be allied with the Genii for all she knew. It was a similar level of technology. “They betrayed our people and then attacked our city in order to steal supplies and technology.”

“They are Magi?” Sheran asked, forcefully, suddenly interested.

“I’m afraid that I don’t know what that means.”

He chuckled, low and deep and tritely amused. “Of course you do not. If you claim to be from another world, you would claim not to know of the Magi.”

Elizabeth felt Teyla’s impatience beside her. Teyla was a good diplomat, but she was also prideful, quick to respond to a perceived insult. At least this was better than the near catatonic silence that had consumed her as their capturers pushed them from mud-filled trench to mud-filled trench, beneath barbed wires and around corpses, stinking with blood and rot. Elizabeth had thrown up twice. Teyla hadn’t even moved to comfort her.

“I have not heard of them. Perhaps you could explain.”

Sheran sighed, turning his gaze from her again. “They are magicians, possessed of some great evil. For years we allowed them to control all, naively believing that they could protect us from the Wraith. But their power is too great. Their power is a threat to all our people. It is power too great for those of impure blood to wield. Once their conspiracy is overthrown, we shall all be free.”

Elizabeth did not bother to school her features. She let the questioning and confusion shine through. With the Wraith just awoken, what were these people doing fighting a revolution? But, no matter. Her chief concern was to get herself and Teyla back to Atlantis where they could begin the search for John and Rodney. “There have been similar situations on my world,” though few in Pegasus, “where one group of powerful people took on whole colonies which were essentially slaves to them. My country was one that overthrew an empire like that.”

Sheran smiled for the first time. “We have not had visitors of any kind through the Great Ring since the Magi have controlled it. If you are truly revolutionaries from afar, we welcome you and any help you might provide us.”

He finally stood, walking slowly around his desk to touch Elizabeth’s muddy check with pudgy fingers that were not much cleaner.

“We would be glad to discuss trade agreements with you, but Teyla and I have to return to our people. Now.”

Sheran nodded, smiling one of those smiles you only saw on people who had truly seen war – a smile that said that they had been to the edge, and had never truly come back. “We will make arrangements as quickly as possible, Dr. Weir . . . that is assuming that you truly are who you say you are.”

And then, if as on cue, two burly men, both covered in dried mud died red by the battlefield, stepped into the tent, looking over Elizabeth and Teyla, smiling.

“Take them to be tested,” Sheran ordered. “My apologies, ladies, but you must understand why this is necessary.”

Elizabeth didn’t, but she nodded anyway.

Lieutenant Aiden Ford made a frantic hand gesture which he hoped would be universally understood as stay down and shut up. Ford was less worried about Zelenka, in truth. He was obviously ballsy enough to stand up to McKay (the guy even intimidated Aiden sometimes) but also knew when to be quiet and stay out of the way.

Now was a good time.

The complex was as dull and boring and grey as the Genii themselves. Aiden, and all his possible future children, hoped that it wasn’t as radioactive. There was a tower in the center, clearly a sentry post. Aiden looked through the scope on his P-90, but saw no guards.

They were either really lucky or really screwed.

Either way, this facility was large – large enough and foreign enough that he’d needed his whole strike team. He couldn’t afford to leave Zelenka behind with a babysitter, so he’d have to tag along.

He shifted the P-90 to his other hand . . . the one not in a cast. Why the hell did he have to be so clumsy and fall on his wrist trying to beat the major at basketball? Aiden was good . . . it wasn’t his fault Sheppard had the reflexes of a pilot and almost half a foot on him.

Aiden nodded to Miller, whose strange Ancient Swiss-Army Laser (as Aiden had proudly named it) made quick work of the thick metal slats of the fence. Aiden would’ve preferred to do this under a cloak of darkness, but they didn’t even know if their team was here and they couldn’t afford to leave them in enemy hands a second longer than they needed to.

Aiden ran through the hole in the fence, letting Peterson toss a grenade at the door. It blew apart with a nice satisfying boom, shards of burning metal clanging to the ground in front of them. Aiden didn’t stop moving for a second.

There was nobody in the narrow corridor, only thin trails of red . . . four of them on the left wall. Someone with blood on their hands had steadied themselves on the wall for support. Not good . . . Aiden’s stomach clenched, but he forced himself to relax, forced the safety blanket that was the soldier’s calm to come down around him.

He signaled his men to split up . . . search this place inside out . . . find whoever left this haunting trail against the stark grey wall, hopefully.

Zelenka tailed close behind him as he advanced, a quick military stride, crouched low, weapon ready . . . ready for a fight that never came.

There was nothing down this hallway except a single cell, floor like one of those paintings by that abstractful guy with the paint buckets . . . what was his name? Andy Warhol? He didn’t remember.

There was no one here. Aiden sighed in frustration, tapping his radio. “Dead end over here.”

A chorus of empty-handed soldiers responded back. They had nothing. Their people were still out there. His team was still out there. If only he hadn’t been so stupid . . . he’d be with them now. Maybe they’d even all be back on Atlantis, teasing Dr. McKay or watching ‘Independence Day’ on Sheppard’s computer.

“Lieutenant?” Zelenka asked.

Aiden whirled around. He’d been ignoring the little scientist, painting him into the background with everything else that wasn’t a threat. He was pale and trembling, the reflection off his glasses not hiding the darting of his wide pupils.

“It’s okay, Doctor Z.” He didn’t know why he said it. From all the blood and all the ‘negative, Sir’s he’d just received, there were a lot of ways it could be not-okay.

Zelenka bent down, picking up what appeared to be a blood soaked rag. Even Aiden thought this was absolutely disgusting, but Zelenka didn’t gag or anything, like he’d expected him too. All the man did was let the shirt hang from two sets of fingers . . . the material didn’t need to still be blue for them to recognize it as one of McKay’s short-sleeved synthetic shirts.

Aiden idly wondered how it was that Zelenka never seemed to wear any short-sleeved ones. He wouldn’t have put it past McKay to steal them all.

“What now?” Zelenka asked.

Aiden gritted his teeth. All this blood. “Now we find whoever did this and we make them regret it.”

Zelenka looked shocked. He shouldn’t be. Aiden might be young, but he wasn’t lacking in experience. He’d do what needed to be done.