Event Horizon Part Six – By Ladyholder

Reading Time:
8 Minutes

Art by Starkindler

“General Hammond, currently, we can see the pattern of the last person who traveled through the gate and is still in the buffer. We believe that’s Teal’c based on his position when we reached the stargate’s plinth.  We are working out how to extract that pattern and reintegrate it so he can exit the gate successfully,” Carter reported. “We’ve got some computer models running as we don’t want to do anything with the gate to endanger the pattern.”

“And the sensors you’ve attached to the gate? What information are you getting from them?” Hammond asked

“Currently they’re monitoring the buffer where Teal’c’s pattern is being stored to make sure that the integrity of the information is intact,” she said.

Rodney kept his face straight with an effort. That was less than 10% of what the sensors were reporting, and he was going to be scathing in his after-action report about this mess. As much as Hammond wasn’t a scientist, he still needed all the information they had so he could make informed decisions. Carter and her gatekeeping weren’t helping.

“Dr. McKay, I understand that you were brought here to be a subject matter expert regarding the gate. Do you have anything else to add?” Hammond asked.

“Yes,” he said. “You need to make sure that those sensors stay on the gate from now on. We have very little information on how the gate acts during normal travel because there haven’t been any studies done. Also, I would suggest that the DHD that is currently in several hundred pieces on my lab table be put back together and stored here if you are going to continue to use the dialing computer.”

Hammond nodded slowly before he pinned him with a level stare. “That sounds doable. What’s wrong with the dialing computer?”

“When the gate was first discovered, they didn’t know what they had, and it was separated from the DHD. Eventually, the Russians got the DHD, and it was buried in whatever passed for a secure warehouse over there,” Rodney explained. When Hammond nodded, he waved his hand at Carter. “Major Carter and the team here built the Dialing Computer to take the place of the DHD, and it’s done an exemplary job. But it’s not a DHD, and it’s not able to process all the information the gate provides.”

“We made certain to utilize all the important signals,” Carter protested. She frowned at him when he raised an eyebrow at her in question. “The gate works, and it works well.”

“I’m not saying that it doesn’t. It’s been working for years, but it could do better,” Rodney said bluntly. “There’re roughly 400 signals coming out of the gate, and you determined that 150 to 180 are useful. That leaves up to 220 that are not being accepted and acknowledged. One of the signals was connected to the buffer, confirming that there’s a pattern stored in there. It only seems wise to update the program now that we’ve got them and can trace where they come from and what they do.”

“The signals you mentioned… Do you think they are required?” Hammond asked.

“No,” Carter said firmly. “We’ve used the gate safely for years without them.”

“Yes,” Rodney said. He frowned at Carter and shook his head at her. “The Ancients are the ones who built the stargates, and they included every single one of those signals for a damn good reason. Ignoring them because you currently don’t know what the signals mean is silly.”

“The signals are redundant,” Carter snapped. She waved her hands at the gate below them. “We’re able to use the gate without them.”

“No data is redundant, Doctor,” Rodney snapped. He slashed his hand through the air when she opened her mouth to argue. “Look, we’ve got the signals. We’re labeling each of them with what we think they do, and we’ll get that confirmed when we can restart normal gate travel. It’s not that hard to update the Dialing Computer to take that information into account and react accordingly.”

Carter glared at him before turning back to the General. “The data sets we’re using are sufficient, and adding more would just overwhelm the system.”

“Major, how is not using all the data that the stargate generates a bad thing?” Hammond demanded.

“It’s unnecessary!” Carter huffed.

“You didn’t build the tech, Doctor, so you don’t get to choose what information is unnecessary,” Rodney snapped. He held up a hand to stop her from protesting further. “Look, you got the gate to work when there were no directions, no plans, and no support to do it. Now, it’s working, and you don’t want to cause it to fail. With the DHD here, you won’t have that because the device that controls it will be on hand. However, it’s criminally dumb not to use all the information you have when it’s made available.”

Rodney could feel the seething anger moving under Carter’s skin, but to her credit, she didn’t let any of it show on her face. Hammond just seemed like he was processing everything that they had discussed.

“Right now, we’ll leave the Dialing Computer alone,” Hammond decided after several seconds. “I can’t see taking it offline at this time because we need it to work. When we’ve got Teal’c out of the buffer, we’re going to discuss what upgrades are needed to take advantage of all the extra information you’ve discovered.”

“Thank you, sir,” Rodney said. He glanced over at Carter and suppressed a sigh at how angry the woman was. She needed to get over herself. Shit happened, science changed, and you had to roll with both when you were confronted with things.

“Dismissed,” Hammond said after several seconds.

Rodney turned on his heel and walked out. John was leaning against the wall across from the door, and he raised an eyebrow at his sentinel. “Don’t give me that,” John said softly before he raised his volume slightly. “Colonel O’Neill has gone to check with a confidential source of his and expects to be back when Dr. Jackson returns.”

“Did he say who he’s going to talk to?” Carter asked. Rodney could feel her shoving her anger away and calm filling her core instead. When John shook his head, she sighed, curiosity rising and falling in her emotional landscape. “The Colonel will get back in contact with us when he’s got whatever answer he’s looking for.”

“Okay. Now what?” John asked.

“Now I think we need to go back to my lab and test some permutations on how we can get Teal’c out of the buffer,” Carter said slowly.

“Are you going to be okay with this? Because you were furious five minutes ago,” Rodney said warily.

“I think you’re wrong,” Carter said simply. “And I’m hoping that the computer tests we’re going to run show that. But if I got bent every time someone disagrees with me or points out problems with my science, I’d spend all day, every day, pissed off. I can’t do that. Just make sure it’s just my science that you question, nothing else.”

“You’re beautiful,” Rodney said bluntly. “I noticed. But that’s not honestly important to me.” He waved at John and smirked when she looked at him. “My sentinel is just as beautiful. I’m not going to judge you by the turn of your face.”

Carter looked at him for several seconds before she turned to look at John. “So, I’m not going to comment on his looks because he’s an Air Force officer and so am I. It would be unprofessional in the extreme. However. I will say this: You got very lucky.”

“Thank you,” Rodney said. He cleared his throat and tried to suppress the blush he could feel spreading over his cheeks. “Shall we get started on the simulations?”

“Yes.”

He turned to follow her down to her lab. He was going to ignore how amused John was by their conversation. Damn the man.

“I was not expecting to have a Goa’uld this close to Colorado Springs,” Jack growled as he stared at the small house.

“Me either,” Maybourne mused. “How are we going to make sure no one bothers us when we go in there?”

Jack let his senses spiral out and hit several sentinels in the houses surrounding him. None of them seemed to be paying attention to them, and he turned his attention back to the house in front of them. The combined hum of a set of white and brown noise generators blanked out everything going on in the house. Interesting.

He pushed against the wall of sound and slipped in around it. As soon as he slipped into the house proper, he could sense the Goa’uld. Jack grimaced as his senses were assaulted with the damn snake. “Found him.”

“Gross,” Maybourne said. He eyed the house and turned his attention back to Jack. “Gonna tell me how this place hasn’t been swarmed by all of your compatriots?”

“Noise generators,” Jack said softly. “They’re spilling out so we’re covered as well.”

“So, us assaulting the house isn’t going to bring attention?” Maybourne confirmed. When Jack nodded, he grinned. “Let’s do this then.”

“Sure,” Jack said. He walked up to the front door and twisted the knob. When it opened, he snorted softly. “For fucks sake.” From the laugh Maybourne let out, he wasn’t as quiet as he wanted to be, but in his defense, the generators were pretty damn strong.

Maybourne pulled his gun out and eyed him before following his hand signs to head to the back of the house. When Maybourne did as directed, Jack walked towards the room where the Goa’uld was sitting. Opening the door, he leaned against the jamb as he took in the host the snake was wearing. He didn’t recognize the meatsuit, but that wasn’t surprising.

“He’s alone in here,” Maybourne reported as he walked up behind him. “I’ve already spliced into the surveillance and looped it.”

“Goodie,” Jack said with a bloodthirsty grin. His grin got a bit bigger when the Goa’uld started to sweat. “We have some questions.”

“I don’t answer to you,” the Goa’uld blustered. The double voice of the snake wasn’t surprising, and Jack had to suppress the urge to kill the damn thing. “You will get no information from me.”

“Honestly, I’m not surprised that this guy thinks that he can call the shots. The host’s name is Adrian Conrad, and he’s a businessman,” Maybourne reported.

“Huh. So Conrad’s in there, letting the snake know what they’re dealing with…” Jack mused. He leaned forward and stared into the eyes of the people in front of him. “I have some questions. You’re going to answer them. If you don’t, well…”

“You won’t kill me.”

Jack smirked at the pronouncement from the Goa’uld. “I’m a sentinel. Killing you won’t do more than make me wash my hands.”

From the way the snake stilled, he hadn’t been expecting Jack’s comment. Jack was sure that Conrad was letting his passenger know exactly what they were facing. When the Goa’uld leaned back and nodded, Jack stood back up. Time to start asking questions.