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Cleaning Up After The Ancients - Chapter 19
🕑 Added 2024-12-03 18:49:27 +0000 UTCChapter 19 - Catching up to the Cleaner
“Certainly feels homey.” John said as he looked around the control room that, if it wasn't for a number of clearly aftermarket addons that looked like they were lifted from world war two, could have been on Atlantis itself.
“Suppose they didn't exactly have Home Depot back in the day.” Ford added in from where he had taken up watch by the entryway.
“I rather doubt they needed it.” McKay put forward in a distracted tone as he rapidly looked between something on his tablet and information streaming across the central Lantean control console.
“Well.” Councilor Lycus inquired impatiently, the older white haired man all but glaring over McKay's shoulder as the pair of guards that seemed to be the man's omnipresent shadow watched from a safe distance. “Can you fix it or not?”
“Easily.” McKay said, frowning at his tablet in a way John had long come to realize meant they were in some kind of trouble. “He basically just flipped on a basic safety lockout for most of your systems. But the problem is, I'm not sure yet if I actually should override it or not.”
That was pretty much what John had expected when he'd heard the words safety lockout, but he doubted the Chancellor would see it the same way given he seemed like the type of politician who wanted things done this way or not at all.
“What do you mean you're not sure?” Lycus demanded angrily. “We allowed you to come here because your Doctor Weir promised you'd be able to help.”
“What part of safety lockout don't you understand!?” McKay snapped as he turned to the man with an annoyed look on his face. “While I haven't been able to determine everything Evan has running, I've found enough to tell that lifting the lockdown could be bad.”
“How bad is bad?” John asked cautiously, wanting to be prepared just in case it ended up happening anyways.
“Crushed by machinery larger than the Bank of Montreal bad.” McKay returned.
John frowned, not sure just how large that was, but suspecting it was probably a good bit bigger than the couple story bank the name brought to mind.
McKay rolled his eyes. “Think two thirds the size of the Empire State Building. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Because as far as I can see he brought this whole place straight to full operational status.”
“I don't see why that would be a problem.” Lycus huffed, glaring at McKay as if the scientist's words had somehow personally offended him. “My people aren't stupid you know, if there are dangerous machines at work we're perfectly capable of avoiding their path.”
“Oh, aren't you now?” McKay said in a dangerously smug tone as he brought forward his tablet and flipped it around to show the Chancellor. “According to this you've been running the facilities shield at full power for nearly a year.”
“Rodney.” John warned, moderately sure the man was about to say something that would risk having their invitation revoked. “We're here to help. So unless this has something to do with getting things running again it might be best to let it lie.”
The look McKay shot him at that was anything but happy. “It's what Eventus warned Elizabeth about. Because those numbers I just showed you? That's the temperature of the magma chamber steadily increasing die to the high level power draw of the shield.”
He had really been hoping to avoid that particular pitfall given Evan had made it sound more like a long term problem kind of thing. But first hand information trumped speculation, so if McKay thought they were in danger John wasn't going to argue.
“How long do we have?”
Scowling, McKay quickly flipped his pad back around and returned to studying the information on it. “I was just getting to that. So if you'll just give me a minute I'll…”
“Oh.” He finally finished, sounding more than a little surprised.
“Is that a good oh, or a bad oh?” John inquired, narrowing his eyes at McKay as he began mentally running though their quick evacuation options.
“It's an I think I know what caused the Earthquakes oh.” McKay answered, the tension from moments ago all but vanishing from the other man's frame.
“And that would be?” John prodded when the scientist failed to expand further.
“Evan used the outposts shield to bleed off most of the built up heat from the magma chamber.”
“So a good oh.” John stated for the rest of the people in the room, relaxing significantly himself now that the threat of volcanic doom was no longer on the table. “Didn't know that was something you could do with shields.
“It's not.” McKay replied, and John turned an odd look to the man since evidence clearly suggested otherwise.
“To do it he had to override pretty much every safety system the shield had, and with nowhere else to go the excess energy fed directly back into the shield emitters burning most of them out.”
Chancellor Lycus lost strength in this legs at that, clutching onto the nearby console to keep himself up. “He burned out the shield!? But we need that to protect our people from the Wraith.”
“I said most of the shield emitters.” McKay corrected in annoyance. “But given it was a choice between that and this place going up in a blast that would make Mount Vesuvius look like a firecracker, I'd say you came out on top.”
The man had a point, though John probably would have tried to be a bit more diplomatic about it. But that was why they usually attempted to keep McKay away from easily offended dignitaries.
“I don’t suppose there's anything you can do to help the nice people fix up their shield?” John put forward as a potential olive branch since, really hoping Teyla was having more luck finding that missing scientist than they were fixing things for the Chancellor.
McKay wiggled one of his hands back and forth in a quick so-so motion. “I don't know, maybe. I'd have to physically examine the emitters to know one way or the other. And I kind of have my plate full right now working through everything mister Ancient has doing with the place.”
“Might be a good idea to prioritize that.” John offered to preempt what probably would have been a long complaint from the Chancellor.
“There's no point.” McKay waved off as the Taranian leader began to flush in clearly biding anger. “With the decrease in magma chamber temperature and deactivation of the accelerator system they used to pump up the power output the outposts geothermal generator is running at something like ninety four percent capacity just to keep up with all the systems Evan has active.”
“So no shield till Evan finishes working on the warship.” John simplified for the Chancellor.
“Which according to system projections will take another twelve days. So as I said, not exactly a rush.”
“Feels like that's cutting it pretty close if he wants to get back to Atlantis in time to stop the Wraith.” John muttered, not exactly sure how long the trip from Taranis to Lantea would take the vessel.
“The fact that you're so blatant with your wish to abscond with our Ancestral Warship has me once more doubting your people's intentions here.” Lycus stated as he straightened himself to his full height and shot them a somewhat anemic glare.
“It’s not like you were using it for anything.” McKay groused as he began typing something into his tablet. “Or even able to do more than… Oh no… That could be… Okay, they’re not self replicating so that’s something.”
“Rodney?” John asked in a cautious tone, not liking the direction those words pointed towards in the slightest.
“A big part of the repair process seems to involve the use of nanites.” McKay explained, all but confirming John’s fears.
“What are these nanites?” Lycus demanded, clearly reaching the end of his patients with McKay.
“Think small machines.” John told him. “It’d be a bit long to get into specifics, but they’re very dangerous.”
“These moderately less so.” McKay added in. “From the translated warnings these are only dangerous if you stick your hand in the power transmission field.”
“How dangerous is dangerous?” John inquired, knowing there always tended to be at least one of those guys who either intentionally or accidentally tested their luck.
Rolling his eyes, McKay flipped his table around to show John a stick figure like person with their arm in a semi transparent triangle and the limb beginning to dissolve.
Staring at the picture for a moment John couldn’t help but wonder. “You think he added that for our sake, or it was already there?”
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Author’s Notes: It was a “for dummies” standard Eventus convinced the rest of the Ancients to adapt by showing a 37% decrease in accidents amongst non-ancient populations working in ancient facilities utilizing it.
Comments
fireking50
I love the fact that Even made Portal (the game) instructional videos about hazards that could cause harm and/or death.
Nato J
He was human from Earth before he died, he would know all about it and what technology can work.
Jarrik32
That's kind of the problem in canon (and here) for both the wraith and everyone else as their is nowhere near enough 'food' to go around. Everyone got screwed by Atlantis waking them up ahead of schedule and no Wraith in their right mind will go back to sleep with threats like Atlantis and the Genii on the loose. So things are to get very messy going forward with most wraith on starvation diets sooner than later.
Droman
The bulk of post-Lantean human societies in the Pegasus Galaxy could probably all get fitted onto one City Ship with ease. Their numbers, even if in the tens of thousands, just don't seem to be that high to support a Wraith cull atmo.
Marius Petrauskas
nice
Eternity Smut
Local Ancients takes control of the facility and ensures that it stays that way. Also don't stick your dick in the nanomachine blob ;p Also it doesn't belong to you sir. Not just this facility but the entire planet :/
anthony corcoran
Its the same with most of the ancient tech featured. Over 90% of it was found and hoarded by the various people and they couldnt use any of it. They were actually worse at it than the milkey civs as at least those guys generally understood most of what they fiddled with due to the Gauld making ti idiot proof. Even the travellers who seem to be tooling around in broken down ancienct cruisers and homegrown ships didnt really seem to know how alot of the advanced stuff works. and needed to kidnap shepard to get the ancient warship working nd still let him alone in the one place you really shouldnt. Everything and action in the show generally comes back to the expdiation woke the wraith so out fo guilt had to treat everyone with stupid amounts of respect and be nice even when someone literally spat in their faces when they offered help. Then they generally got blamed for the situation going wrong. Some though was just bad writing.
anthony corcoran
to be honest SG:atlantis did seem to try and focus on a group of societies that generally moaned alot and didnt really want to co-operate with each other at all. Even when they eventually formed a councilish once the SG had dealt with most of the wraith they went back to dickering and backstabbing rather quickly.
Killerdrone
To be honest the Taranian's are basically screwed. Atlantis is only a few days away from having constant contact with earth and when they hear about a fully operational Lantean shipyard and a warship they're gonna be sending people to take command of the outpost.
Killerdrone
I think it's mentioned that a lot of the population were actually just refugees from different planets. They probably lied about being there for a lot longer because they didn't want someone like Eventus to come along and evict them. Infact I wouldn't be surprised if Eventus actually has dealt with having to evict people who decided to make their home in a Lantean facility.
Fateor
The truth is the story they gave Team Atlantis just straight up didn't make a lot of sense when looked at critically. "We are deep underground. The Ancestors constructed an extensive system of corridors and tunnels throughout the facility and beyond. In fact, it was by following such a tunnel beneath our nearest settlement that we discovered this facility." The facility was visably sitting right in front of the stargate with a bunch of other ancient structures in the area. On top of that, their entire population was maybe a few thousand at most. So the whole thing very much reads like they within the past few decades they came through the gate and just found the place.
Nato J
And the fact when Lycus said it was there ship/facility, Eventus will strongly disagree, seeing them as refugees fleeing from the Wraith.
Killerdrone
The worry that the Councilor keeps having about the Wraith even though they haven't shown up to that planet once in 10,000 years makes me think they haven't actually been on this planet that long.
James Thomas
Ahh yes, Ancient Hazardous Warnings. Wonder if Eventus was responsible for an Ancient version of OSHA or a Maintenance Workers Union.
