Fighting Passions - Ronon Dex - Stargate Atlantis

Progeny PT.4

Rodney and I along with Niam who is currently standing guard,  work together to rewrite the Replicator code when Sheppard calls in.

"How's it coming, you two?" 

"Slowly." 

"What's the hold-up?" 

"What's the hold-up?" Rodney repeats incredulously. "Do you have any idea what we're trying to do here?!"

"Niam gave you access to the program code, and you're screwing around with it." 

"He's not wrong." 

"Thank you, Ali." 

"Okay, still, we're not dealing with rock'em, sock'em robots here, we are dealing with a complex code of over three billion chemical base sequences." He explains.

"Rod's not wrong either. It's like asking us to mess around with the structure of DNA but has it only affect one thing." 

"Okay, so what... five minutes?" 

McKay rolls his eyes. "It will be done when it is done, and you applying pressure is not gonna..." He stops midsentence and gasps.

"What?" 

"Gotta go. McKay out." He gets off comms, gestures for me to come closer, and quietly whispers, "You see it?" 

And see it I do, it's our get-out-of-jail-free card if Niam can't hold up his end of the bargain. We look at each other and nod, knowing we can't pass an opportunity like this up.

When we're done, the two of us make our way back to where the team is waiting for us. 

John is the first to greet us. "Did you do it?" 

"Yes, yes, yes! We've removed the aggression directive from the base code. It is uploading to Niam as we speak. But, I discovered something else, nothing short of brilliant, I might add." I elbow him. "Technically, we discovered something, but it's mostly me." 

"What?" 

"Okay,  even though these Replicators are each separate functioning beings, their basic command code is interconnected over a powerful subspace frequency. They have these, uh, periodic collective program updates or, uh, merges, they call them, where they exchange new information." Rodney explains, nearly jumping from the excitement.

"That's how Niam hopes to distribute the new code to the others?" Weir asks. 

"Yes. But while working, Rodney saw that there was a way to create a glitch, so we worked together so that on our command, they should momentarily freeze." 

"Should?" 

"Okay, will. I mean, dead in their tracks, like hitting the pause button. I mean, temporarily, until they... figure out how to override it." 

"How long?" Ronon questions. 

I shrug. "There's no way to be sure. They're highly evolved and there's no way to figure out just how smart they are." 

"Days? Hours? Minutes?" Sheppard asks for clarification. 

"Well... look it's minutes, but I don't know. That's just what Alison said!" 

"Ten? Twenty?" 

"Look, okay, fine, you want a number? Fine. Seven. Seven minutes and thirty-one seconds! You happy?" 

"No!" 

"No."

"That's not enough time!" 

I roll my eyes, sharing a look with the other two women with me.