Futura Memoratia

Chapter 9 obses (hostage)

Rodney took his time, making certain everything was in place, well-seated, all connections tight.  He replaced the housing and surveyed the machine carefully.  The Ancients had peculiar ideas about electronics.  God forbid they should put a simple on/off switch on anything.  Some things responded to touch, others to thought, others required a sequence of buttons to be pressed.  He picked up Graden’s instruments and took some readings.  It was sipping power, like an electronic device on standby, so it was already initialized.

Now the real problem was to figure out how it worked.  There were small doors on each side of the long rectangular device.  These were where the samples were placed, he was certain, based on the internal layout of the device.  But he couldn’t get them to open.  There was also a small screen that he knew should pop up out of the front of the housing and he couldn’t get that to happen either.  He must have made some small sounds of disgruntlement, because Emily appeared at his elbow again, watching him work.

After a few moments, she volunteered, “Did you notice that the doors on each side say ‘press simultaneously?’”

“What?” he asked irritably and joined her at the end of the bench to peer at one of the small doors again.  He moderated his tone to make it more friendly when he continued, “All I see is the word ‘press.’”

She frowned.  “Oh.  Hm.  I sent an email meant for all Atlantis personnel, well over a year ago, containing my research into non-alpha-numeric symbols—didn’t you get it?”

“You’re saying this symbol means ‘simultaneous’?  I thought it was just some kind of decoration.”  He didn’t remember getting such a memo,  but that didn’t mean he hadn’t.  No need to dwell on his previous lack of respect for her work, at any rate.

She looked annoyed.  “Maybe it didn’t get through for some reason.  I’ll have the SGC print something up to distribute, like a pamphlet or something.  I find these symbols all over ancient technology—it’s something everyone on base should be well-versed in.”

“Maybe it got lost in the shuffle during one of our many crises?” he suggested.

She seemed perturbed over this revelation.  She shook her head and he watched as her curls bounced and jiggled, just inches from his face.  He caught a whiff of a fruity scent, something like ripe peaches, that must have come from her hair.  He realized she was speaking again and tried to focus. 

“Possibly.  At any rate—yes, this symbol means simultaneous.  It seems an odd method of opening these small apertures to load samples, though, doesn’t it?  I was thinking one side was for loading the sample and the other for extracting it, once finished, maybe?”

“Hm,” he said, furrowing his brow.  He reached out and touched both doors at the same time and nothing happened.  He tried again, pressing a little harder and leaving his fingers there a little longer.  Again, nothing.  “Maybe it’s the angle.  Here, you press that one directly in the center of the door and I’ll press this one—on a count of three.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?  You do realize I’m not one-hundred-percent certain I’m correct about what this does.”

“What’s the worst that can happen?  It’s from a genetics lab.  It’s not a bomb,” he said confidently with an enthusiastic smile.  “I just want it to do something so I can take some more readings.  There isn’t much more to learn from it at this point.  We can’t analyze a sample until we get the doors open, right?”

She looked doubtful.  “Ok, but what kind of sample do you want to put in it?”

“On Earth they commonly use mouth swabs, hair or skin, don’t they?  Do you have any hairs you could spare?”  He smiled, gesturing at her abundant locks.