Chapter Text
“This one is really flooded,” Radek muttered, shining his flashlight over the water as they sloshed through it. Rodney sighed ahead of him.
“Yeah, they claim they ran into problems while pumping out this sector. Something about bowing in the foundation—but that doesn’t make any sense,” he huffed, flinging the beam from his flashlight over darkened walls. “In my honest opinion, they just didn’t want to finish the job properly. Probably didn’t maintain the equipment and gave up when they hit a snag.”
With an exasperated grunt, Radek stumbled along, frowning at the wet weight of his shoes. At the back, the two marines—Sergeants Berry and Werner—stayed silent. “I’m sure they’re doing their best, Rodney.”
“Clearly not. If they were, we wouldn’t be knee deep in seawater.”
Radek rolled his eyes.
“What’s down here anyway?” he asked, trying to steer the conversation to something a bit less insulting.
McKay hummed thoughtfully. “Map showed a couple of labs, but the specs weren’t clear. The flooding is probably still messing with the sensors.”
As cold water chafed the rough material of his pants against his legs, Radek hoped for a short trip. The ominous drip drip drip between splashed steps set him on edge, and he’d rather be somewhere dry and safe. And well lit.
“They’ve got to be pretty clo—hup!”
Rodney dropped out of sight, swallowed up by dark water with a chilling splash. Almost immediately, he emerged with a mighty spray of moisture, flailing his arms in a panicked swim.
Dropping down into the shallow water, Radek surged forward, pushing his hands in front of him. He felt frantically for the drop off in the flooring, hissing when a jagged edge scraped along his palm. “Rodney! Rodney, come here.”
The two marines had taken position on either side of Radek, joining the scientist’s reaching arm as Rodney swam madly toward them. Berry and Werner took hold of Rodney’s arms, and Radek gripped Rodney’s vest, all three pulling Rodney toward safety.
“Careful, careful,” Radek admonished. “It’s sharp where the flooring broke off.”
Rodney spluttered and coughed, sending a water-logged glare in Radek’s direction. “Well, how am I supposed to get back up without—agh! Christ!”
They stopped tugging, Rodney huffing as he tried to roll toward a different part of the edge.
“Pretty sure that shredded my pantleg,” Rodney growled painfully.
Radek freed one hand to feel the edge, wincing when he felt the jutting point of jagged metal. He felt further down the line. Better. “Let’s move him over here,” he instructed, already pulling Rodney toward the safer edge.
After getting him in place, they hauled Rodney out of the water, trying to ignore the sharp gasps as Rodney’s body scraped against the torn flooring. Once they had him upright and out of deeper water, they moved him to the edge of the corridor, flashlights moving wildly in the dark. Radek and one of the marines positioned Rodney against the wall, half his body submerged by the hallway flooding.
“Great. Awesome. Now I’m going to get some kind of infection,” Rodney muttered through gritted teeth. The marines angled their flashlights to wash Rodney in bright light, wisps of red threading through the water in front of him.
Alarmed, Radek was searching for the wound before Rodney could protest. “Where are you hurt?”
“Does it matter? I have an—ugh—open wound in bacteria-infested seawater.”
A weary sigh puffed out of Radek’s lungs, but he kept searching. “Think you can walk back?”
“Can I walk back . . . of course I can walk back.”
There was a splash. Behind.
They all froze.
After a beat, the marines turned, raising their P-90s. Lights flashed across the hallway, scouring over dark water and walls.
Another splash.
Even in the low glow, Radek could see the worried crease on Sergeant Berry’s face. The marine trailed his light over murky flooding, brow furrowed. “What—?”
Abruptly, Sergeant Berry was yanked from underneath before he could finish his question. His body slapped the water with a sharp smack before being pulled violently beneath the shallow water. Dragged.
Reacting quickly, Sergeant Werner shot a spray of bullets into the water, praying he wasn’t hitting his patrol partner with wild shots.
A tentacle shot through the dark, knocking Werner’s P-90 out of his grip. It fell against his chest, saved by the securing strap. He scrambled to get ahold of it again, the beam from his gun light looping wildly in the dark.
Radek gasped when he saw it. Another tentacle, but something in the club flashed in the light, sharp and glinting.
It came down with blurring speed.
“Oh, sh—hngh!” Werner bent at the waist, and Radek hastily moved his flashlight to investigate.
Blood. So much blood. Dripping into the water from Werner’s stomach
Werner’s pale face whipped in their direction, and Radek recognized the look on his face.
The look of a soldier.
“Get out of here!” Werner ordered urgently, taking an unsteady step to one side, as if trying to put more of himself between them and the unknown threat.
Radek had been through enough marine admonishments to know that he shouldn’t argue. But he couldn’t help the fire of terror he held for Sergeant Werner.
Feeling the buzz of adrenaline, Radek moved to grab hold of Rodney’s waist and hoisted him up with a weighty grunt. After a few clumsy steps, the two of them quickly ran down the flooded corridor.
There was a harsh cry behind them, cut off with an awful gurgling sound. Radek tried not to put images to the sounds, but he could practically see the gallons of splattered red behind. Falling into the water. Blooming in gray-blue.
The terrible fate of the quiet Sergeant Werner.
“Rodney, we have to go faster,” he pressed, pulling the other scientist along with an intense urgency.
“I’m trying,” Rodney hissed back. But then he made a small noise of alarm.
Radek sensed what was happening immediately. He latched onto Rodney with surprising strength, bracing himself. But he hadn’t been truly prepared for the sudden jerk, and Rodney nearly slipped out of his hands with a startled cry.
It was trying to drag Rodney in.
Radek thought fast, retrieving the knife from his vest—one he’d started carrying as a precaution against the ever-threatening dangers of an unknown galaxy. He raised his arm above his head, bringing it down in a swift slash.
And he cut . . . something.
Rodney stumbled at the sudden snap in force, staring wide-eyed into the water.
“Let’s go,” Radek prompted, pushing Rodney onward. They tried to get away. They longed to get away.
But then there was a suspicious slicing sound, ringing off cut Kevlar. Radek heard Rodney’s gruff grunt, and he managed to catch the man before he fell facedown into the water.
He tugged Rodney along, unable to spare time to investigate. Rodney jolted again in his arms, this time releasing a pained scream.
Oh, God. They had to get the hell out of here.
Radek gathered everything he had as he pulled and yanked, trying to get to safety. The door was just ahead. Ten feet.
He could do this.
Then he felt an agonizing slash across his forearm, a hot burn against the stinging split in his skin.
The adrenaline took over, and he strained every muscle to get to the door.
Finally.
It opened at his presence, bathing them in light, and he threw his body weight into pulling Rodney across the threshold. The door snapped shut, and he had to let Rodney drop to the still flooded floor as he yanked his multitool out of his vest. With a flick of a small screwdriver, Radek popped off the console cover, and without hesitation, he yanked out one of the essential crystals just as the door moved to open again. Interrupted, it quickly shut, and a relieved breath burst from his lungs.
A loud clang rang against the door, leaving a slight dent as Radek jumped back. His chest heaved as he stared at bent metal.
Then he remembered Rodney.
The other scientist was sitting in the water, leaning some to one side with ragged, pained breaths. There was blood. Swirling.
Rodney’s.
Radek rushed toward him, gathering the other man back into his hold. Another clink against the door startled him, and he could feel his heart rising up his throat at the sharp whine of something scraping against metal. Then whatever it was slipped between the seam in the door, pushing it open a fraction.
It was getting in.
Radek allowed only a frightened gasp at the danger, resuming his panicked task of getting Rodney to safety. As they dragged on, the water grew shallower and shallower, and Radek remembered Rodney saying something about the sector’s floor bowing some—probably had something to do with that gaping hole in the floor.
He managed to get a waning Rodney through a few more doors, pulling crystals at each one before continuing. Satisfied there was enough of a barrier between him and the killer tentacles, Radek collapsed in a weary heap alongside Rodney on the floor, tapping his radio.
“Dr. Beckett. Dr. Beckett, come in,” he gasped, wheezing as his body struggled to catch up.
“Radek?”
“We have a medical emergency in the bottom level of the west pier,” Radek reported breathlessly, moving to remove his vest and jacket. His arm throbbed, and he could feel a phantom sizzle against his skin, hot and unrelenting.
“Alright, lad. We’re on our way,” Beckett answered, that sharp, comforting tone ringing through every word. “Can you tell me a little bit about what we’re dealing with?”
“There’s . . . something down here. There’s a breach in the foundation, and it climbed through. Berry and Werner . . . they’re gone. And it got Rodney. Cut him, I think.”
Radek turned to Rodney, who was listing heavily as his breathing hitched in a shallow, pained panic. He hastily ripped off the other man’s vest, laying Rodney on the floor.
“What if it . . . gets through?” Rodney panted.
“We can’t worry about that right now,” Radek answered hastily, gritting his teeth at the bloody tear in Rodney’s lower left abdomen. A stab wound. From some alien squid.
And Radek suspected there was an even larger puncture on the other side. On Rodney’s back.
Straight through.
God, what is this thing?
Bunching up his jacket, he pressed it against the wound and leaned his body weight against it. Rodney managed a tight yell of pain, but it tapered off into a small whimper as Rodney tried to compose himself.
Radek tapped his radio.
“Dr. Beckett?”
“I’m here, Radek.”
“You better hurry.”
“We’re on our way. We’ll find you, son.” Beckett sounded winded, and Radek took slight comfort in knowing he was at least on his way. “Are you able to contact Dr. Weir to tell her about the danger?”
“Yes, I think so,” Radek replied shakily. Rodney squirmed beneath him, and he tried not to think about the burning slash on his arm. “See you soon, Dr. Beckett.”
“See you soon.”
Radek hastily hit the radio again, simultaneously focusing on breathing more steadily. “Dr. Weir?”
“Dr. Zelenka?”
He thought about how to word it, but then realized there was really no perfect way to explain it. “We have a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
“Something’s down here. It got through a hole in the flooring.”
“Are you alright?”
Radek swallowed a sob. No, he wasn’t alright. But he had to keep it together. “I’m fine. Dr. McKay’s been injured. And we . . . we lost Berry and Werner.”
“What? What happened?”
“It . . . it got them. Berry was dragged underwater and Werner . . . I don’t know what it is—I’ve never seen something like this before. The tentacles are sharp, and it’s clever. It may be trying to pry open the doors to get to us as we speak.”
“Standby,” she said curtly, taking command of the situation. There was a suffocating silence, and Radek could only focus on trying to slow Rodney’s bleeding with a wet jacket. “Radek, it looks like there’s three or, hm, four life signs trying to breach one of the doors to the flooded sector.”
“How many doors between us and them?” Radek asked uneasily.
“Two.”
“Dr. Weir. Listen to me carefully,” Radek huffed, eyeing Rodney’s paling pallor. “As soon as we and Dr. Beckett’s team are out of the area, you have to lock down the area.”
“You said the area was flooded. Do they need water to move? To survive?”
“I don’t know,” Radek huffed. “For all we know, they could be out of the water for limited amounts of time. And who knows what kind of damage they could manage in that time.”
“Better to not risk it,” Elizabeth surmised.
“Exactly."
“It looks like Carson’s team is close. Hang tight. How is Rodney?”
Radek looked to Rodney’s face, dismayed to see the scientist fading to the edge of unconsciousness. “Not good.”
There was a squeal on the other side of the nearest door, and Radek spared a panicked glance.
“Radek, hold on. Help is on the way.”
He could only hope.
-0-0-0-0-0-
John was walking back from a quick patrol check when his radio crackled to life.
“John?”
He kept his stride, wondering vaguely if he should redirect to the gate room. “Elizabeth.”
“I need you to join Carson at the ground level on the west pier. Right now. Take a marine or two along if you can spare the men.”
He paused a step before pushing forward. “What’s going on?”
“McKay’s exploration team was attacked by some unknown marine life. Zelenka and McKay managed to put a few doors between them, but whatever they are . . . they’re still in pursuit. And they seem to be able to pry open the doors.”
John ignored the skip in his pulse, breaking out into a run. “Are they okay?”
“It sounds like Rodney’s been injured. But Radek seems to be relatively okay.”
“Berry and Werner?”
There was a pause, and he knew her answer before she put it into words. “They didn’t make it.”
He clenched his jaw, flooded with a protective surge of aggression. “On my way."
Narrowing his focus, he hastened his sprint down the hallway, already tapping his radio for the next call. With Teyla and Ronon off-world, there was only one call to make. “Lorne.”
-0-0-0-0-0-
Radek felt immensely relieved when Carson arrived with a team, already geared to deal with the situation. Carson moved quickly in the puddled water, taking over what Radek had started, packing the wound with a focused precision.
And that’s when the sharp blade of a tentacle wedged further through the split of the nearest door.
“Oh, God!” Carson cried, jerking back at the sight of the whitish, jagged blade that worked its way through the seam. Then another joined. And a third. “Get Rodney on the gurney. Now.”
Carson’s team was swarming Rodney now, placing his lax arms on his chest and pulling the gurney close. With coordinated effort, they moved Rodney to the gurney, tossing Carson’s medical bag to the space between his legs.
By then, the gap in the door had widened a couple inches.
“Carson, move.”
Radek whipped his head around to find John moving into the room, his sidearm raised dangerously. John’s focused glare had a severe edge to it that sent a shiver down Radek’s spine. Lorne was following cautiously behind, a P-90 in his capable hands.
Carson’s team was already on the move, rushing Rodney toward the nearest transporter. John shouted something to the Scot, but Radek missed the message completely. He was too busy trying to clumsily rise to his feet.
But then there was the metallic screech of a door being wrenched open behind him, and he felt something brush his ankle before the loud bang of a pistol reverberated through the room.
Before he could really understand what was going on, he felt John’s arm loop under his, pulling him up. His ears were ringing, and Lorne’s face swam in front of him. He felt something encircle his uninjured arm, the pressure firm but careful. Distantly, he realized Lorne was tugging him along, urging him to safety.
Sharp pops cut through the ringing in his ears, and Radek pushed faster, finally getting ahead of Lorne. Hands pressed on his back, guiding him.
Then he was in the empty transporter, collapsing against the wall.
And it was over.
He’d gotten away. Somehow, he’d gotten away.
Hands were on him again, gripping his shoulders worriedly. A shock of spiky, dark hair came into view, and hazel eyes found his. John was saying something, but Radek couldn’t make it out.
He found the concern in the hazel, bleeding through the dangerous glitter that lingered. And he realized what John was asking him.
“I’m okay,” he answered, but the words sounded muffled in his own ears. “Can’t hear well, but I’m okay.”
John seemed to wilt in relief, and Radek was briefly touched by the reaction.
He always knew the colonel was invested in the wellbeing of each and every member of the expedition, but it was different to see it up close. To be on this side of it.
And he was so very grateful John had showed up in time.
Radek could feel the adrenaline bleeding from his body, leaving only complete exhaustion in its wake. He leaned heavily against the wall of the transporter, eyes already drooping.
There was a comforting pat on his back, then hands on him again as John and Lorne hauled him upright, pulling his arms across their shoulders.
Safety. Finally, safety.