SGA-18 Allegiance by Melissa Scott & Amy Griswold

Author:Melissa Scott & Amy Griswold [Scott, Melissa & Griswold, Amy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science Fiction
Publisher: Fandemonium Books
Published: 2011-11-30T16:54:20+00:00

Mel made her way through Daedalus’s main corridor, tablet computer tucked under her arm. She’d heard the gossip along with everyone else in the city; the Genii were on Sateda, and getting the titanium there might be impossible after all. They’d retrieved some, but rumor said it wasn’t quite enough, and that had gotten her thinking. She’d spent the morning in the 302 bay, going over specs and supplies, and the idea that had come to her in the middle of the night had started to look like something solid. It might not work — she was the first person to admit she was no technician — and it was a risk, but she’d talked it over with Dwayne Grant, her second-in-command, and he’d thought it was a pretty good idea, too. Except, of course, for the one glaring problem, but they’d agreed that getting the Stargate usable again had to be the top priority.

She paused in the engine room hatch, glancing around the spotless compartment. It still felt weird not to see an Asgard on board, to know that they were gone, that the Tau’ri were on their own with a technology they only barely understood — but, then, Dr. Novak had been working with it from the very beginning. If anyone knew what she was doing with this stuff, Novak did. At the moment, though, there was no one in sight, and Mel frowned. Surely somebody ought to be on duty, even with Daedalus parked on Atlantis?

“Colonel Hocken?” Novak popped up from behind one of the consoles like a skinny, disheveled jack-in-the-box.

“Got a minute?” Mel asked, with her most disarming smile, but Novak’s wary expression didn’t change.

“Sure…”

“I’m hearing that they’re still short of titanium,” Mel said. “Since the Genii turned out to be on Sateda. Our — the 302s — armor is titanium alloy, right?”

“Yes,” Novak said. “But we don’t have enough spares to do any good. Dr. Zelenka and I already went over the numbers.”

“What if you took if off one of the 302s?” Mel asked. “The shields are our main defense, anyway, and the armor is a double layer by the tail. There’s one piece that overlaps both of the under plates. Suppose you took off that redundant part?”

Novak tipped her head to one side. “I don’t think I’d call that armor redundant.”

“Just suppose,” Mel said.

“Well…” Novak paused. “I don’t know exactly how much is still missing, so I don’t know…”

“Here’s what I was thinking,” Mel said, and held out the tablet.

Novak took it, frowned at the schematic of a 302, the plate Mel figured they could spare outlined in green. “Well,” she said again. “Colonel, I see what you’re saying, but I’m not comfortable removing armor. If you lose shields — and that always seems to happen — then you’re depending on a single layer of armor at a very vulnerable point.”

“A very small point,” Mel said. “And not that vulnerable. Hard to hit even if you knew to try for it. Look, Dr. Novak, we’re willing to take the risk if it means we can use the Stargate normally again.

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