Beyond the Iris: A Stargate Story

Chapter 6

Bill Lee

I heard the clicking of footsteps enter the lab and looked up from the generator I was tinkering with. Eleanor Owens walked in, small satchel in hand, and a confused expression on her face.

"Hey Bill," she set the satchel on the table and took a seat on one of the stools across from it. "Can I trouble you for a moment of your time?"

"If this is about our upcoming campaign, Felger is refusing to budge."

"Oh, I can host, that's not an issue. No, this is work related." She opened the satchel and with a set of long needle nose tweezers pulled out a perfect cube almost three inches wide and set it down with a gentle tink against the metal table. "This was in a crate that was brought for me to put away in storage yesterday. However, when I went to upload it, nothing happened. I don't feel comfortable keeping it if the Asgardian tech can't manipulate it. I know that sounds silly but," she shrugged and I nodded understandably.

"Do we know which team brought it back?"

"SG-9, they were on a diplomatic mission for the new potential quarry, and a local gave them this. It's made from the refined trinium, but the markings on it predate the planet's writing. They almost look like ancient symbols, nothing that I've seen though, and I'm not a linguist." She sighed and pulled the clip out of her hair, scooped the auburn coils up and out of her face, and readjusted the clip.

"Do you think they're maybe just designs for aesthetics? It almost resembles a hand game similar to a puzzle box."

"There is that possibility. From the mission report a local woman traded it, wrapped in a woven pouch of organic fibers, probably some sort of a spun wool, for three chocolate bars and a field blanket. Sgt. Jensen wanted to give her the chocolate bars but she insisted, so in good will he chose that from her counter and threw in the blanket for her shivering son in the corner."

I gingerly took the small cube, it reminded me of the rubix cubes my niece was so fascinated with. There was a set of three pentagrams carved into each side with engraved symbols. Some of the symbols had clear pigments ground into them, and others had been worn over time. "This hasn't gone through my lab, but you know everything goes through someone's science department before it gets to you. It's a security measure that was set up after Major Carter was temporally displaced, the second time." I ran my fingers over the edges of the cube and turned it over. There were no buttons or levers, nothing remarkable about it.

"I know, and I'm sure whoever had tested the relic was very careful, but I've never seen something rejected by Asgardian devices before."

I placed it back down on the table and furrowed my brows, "it looks like a game to be honest. Nothing remarkable about it."

"Well, if it's safe then, sorry for wasting your time." She smiled softly and reached for the cube. The moment her hand touched the metal she vanished.
"Eleanor?" I croaked out, but no response. I groaned and ran my hands over my face. Not again. This always happened in my lab, never in Coombs or Garcia's. Always mine.

I started pacing, the last time this happened I at least had some sort of basis on what to go off of. This was a cube that I had picked up and touched, then she touched, and she was the one who vanished. I spent the next 20 minutes trying to get any sort of response to see if she was around me, that's usually what happened. Major Carter would flip light switches or make my computer screen blurry. Just any sign, but there was nothing.

"Hey Doc, I heard Owens came in here, she was going to meet me for lunch but I can't track her down." Sgt. Lonnie Carlson's voice came bumbling through my door.

"She's not here." I grimaced, still looking down at the cube, "I mean she is, was."

"Do you know where she is? Because it's never at her desk." He smirked back and I could feel the lump lodged in my throat, stilts staring down at the cursed cube.