something through soon.” It would be just his luck, after all this effort, that there was a problem with the MALP’s transmitters.
Zelenka clapped him hard on the shoulder. “Look again,” he said, enjoying the moment. “That’s a real snowstorm.”
McKay screwed his eyes up and studied the feed more closely. The lines of white and gray were momentarily broken. There was an fleeting image of a vast, open space. A glacier, or perhaps a snowfield of some kind. Then the streaks of snow and ice returned. The camera was rocking badly. The MALP had been sent into the middle of a storm. It looked absolutely filthy.
“Atmospheric readings?” asked Zelenka.
“Usual oxygen/nitrogen mix. Within standard Ancient parameters. Perfectly breathable.”
“And the temperature?”
McKay took a look down the screen at the flickering figures being transmitted by the MALP. He let out a low whistle.
“
Cold
. Very cold. That’s odd.”
Zelenka gave him a quizzical look. “I don’t see why. The Czech Republic is cold. Everywhere the Ancients seeded doesn’t have to look the same. These are planets we’re talking about, not movie sets.”
McKay gave him a withering look. “Yes, but the similarity we’ve noticed between most of the places we’ve been to is no accident. Surprisingly enough, the Ancients didn’t want their populations freezing to death within a generation. So they made their homes as pleasant as possible. And this is way outside the normal envelope.”
Zelenka sucked his teeth thoughtfully. “But habitable?”
McKay studied the readings.
“Yeah, I’d say so. Just chilly.” He looked suddenly worried. “I’m really not that good in the cold. It’s a family thing. My circulation’s bad.”
Zelenka ignored him. The signal from the MALP began to break up. “You’re not the only one. We’re losing the MALP.”
“We can’t be losing the MALP,” snapped McKay, frowning. “Those things are tough. It’s got to be a transmission problem. In fact, now I look at them, there’s something
really
strange about these wormhole integrity indicators…”
The video feed sheered into nothing, and the data readings gave out soon afterwards. McKay looked at the empty screens, suddenly perturbed. The euphoria of getting a MALP to the mysterious gate address had dissolved into a nagging worry about what it had found.
“God, that place looks horrible,” he breathed, half to himself.
“Then good luck!” said Zelenka, grinning at him. “You’ll need it. This is one mission I’m happy to miss.”
Chapter Two
Sheppard digested the information on the screens carefully. There were a lot of numbers he didn’t understand, but he could read a temperature gauge. The planet they’d all started to refer to as “Dead End” didn’t sound that inviting. Teyla and Ronon looked similarly thoughtful. Weir was downright skeptical.
Having finished his demonstration, McKay leaned back in his chair and looked at the others clustered around him in the Operations Center. He looked genuinely torn between his desire to see what the Ancients had been up to and his dislike for the expected conditions.
“It
might
work,” he said, giving Weir a sidelong glance. “It’s going to be cold.
Very
cold. And we’ll need the proper gear.”
The mission commander looked back at him sternly. “
If
I authorize this mission, then you’ll get all the equipment you need,” she said. “But I’m not sure I’m there yet. We’ve seen the footage from the MALP. We don’t know if there’s any settlement on this planet, or even if the Ancients actually did anything much there at all. For all we’ve discovered, this experiment might never have gotten off the ground. I’m all for exploration, but are we taking a sensible risk here?”
Sheppard shot her a winning smile.
“So it’s a little chilly,” he said. “It’s not gonna to be a picnic, but we’ve experienced worse. Cold weather gear, some extra rations, and