"Previously on Stargate Atlantis." "What's the nature of Major Sheppard's injury?" "Some sort of funky alien bug attached itself to his neck." "Part of Ellia is human, and part of her comes from a creature we call the Iratus Bug." "She took the retrovirus." " You said it wasn't ready." " It's not." "Not by a long shot." "It looks like you've been infected with the Iratus Bug retrovirus." "It's beginning to alter his DNA." "He'll devolve into a creature similar to what Ellia became." "I'm not safe to be around anymore." "Eyes straight ahead." "Focus on me." "Never, ever look away from your enemy." "Shows weakness." "Are you weak?" " No." " Good." "Are you ready?" "McKay, what did I say?" "Don't take your eyes off of me." "Got to anticipate the next move." "You all right?" "All right, well, I'll try to ease up so I don't hurt you." " Thank you." "Thanks." " You're getting better." " Really?" " No." " How are the ninja lessons going, Jet Li?" " What do you want?" "WEIR:" "We lost contact with the Taranans." " You mean the volcano people?" " Super volcano people." " What happened to them?" " Well, we don't know." "Seeing how we lost contact with them." "They usually check in from time to time from the new settlement." "We've been sending them food, medical supplies." "It's the least we can do since getting the Orion blown up." "But we haven't heard from them for a few months." "I tried to contact them by radio, but no response." "So send a MALP." "We just did." "Everything looks okay, but the settlement's a couple kilometers from the gate, so we don't know anything yet." " I want you to check it out." " What?" "Eyes." "Yes." "You may wanna change first." "McKAY:" "They got a lot done in the short time they've been here." "They're hardworking people." "I've made several trips to assist them in getting settled." "This is Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard from Atlantis calling anyone in the Taranan settlement." "Please respond." "I thought I'd give it a shot." "All right, let's go." "Anybody home?" "McKAY:" "Well, it looks like they abandoned the place." "Well, maybe they found somewhere better to live." "They left everything behind." "Why would they do that?" "Let's get these workstations powered up." "Maybe we can figure out where these people went." "I got something." " A single life sign." " Where is it?" "It's below us." " Quite a way below us." " They built underground?" "No." "One of the previous civilizations that lived here was similar to the Genii, living below the surface to avoid detection by the Wraith." "They left behind several underground passages, but the Taranans didn't utilize them." "Yeah, well, someone is." "How do we get there?" "Rodney?" "Wait!" "What is that?" "Looks like a cocoon of some sort." "What's inside it?" "Well, whatever it is, it's not inside anymore." "Has Colonel Sheppard's team dialed in with a status report yet?" "Well, not yet, but they haven't been gone that long." "Go ahead and dial them." "How's it going there?" "I think I know why we lost contact with the Taranans." " Why?" " They're gone." "What?" "All of them?" "Looks like it." "The entire settlement is deserted." "Rodney's picked up a life sign underneath the tunnel." "But we're tracking it." "We don't think it's human, though." "Why not?" "We discovered a large cocoon in one of the rooms under the settlement, and we think whatever hatched from it is what we're detecting." " Did you just say cocoon?" "Yeah, it's like a big slimy..." "It's a pod." "Well, I was gonna say egg, but who knows what the hell it is?" " I'm sending in backup." "We can handle it." "I know you can handle it, but I'd rather be safe than sorry." "I'll send in a team of Marines to assist you." "All right, if you feel the need." "I feel the need." "Weir out." "It's a hell of a complex down here." "It's like a maze." " We're closer." " How far?" " Forty meters." "It's stopped moving, so we're gaining ground on it." "All right, good." "Look, if it makes any sudden moves, I want you to make sure that..." "Where's Ronon?" "Ronon!" "In here." "McKAY:" "Oh, my God!" "Taranans!" "Wounds on their neck, all of them." "Does this look familiar?" "It's disturbingly familiar." "You don't think..." "Ronon?" "Oh, for God's sakes!" " Ronon!" "In here." "You can't wander off like that." "You got to..." "Oh, no." "Iratus Bug." "I hate those things." "That explains why the wounds look so familiar." "What is it doing here?" "Iratus Bugs are not indigenous to this planet." " Well, somebody brought it here." " Let's hope it's the only bug they brought." "So some kind of a Wraith experiment?" "I doubt the Taranans did this to themselves." "I do not sense any Wraith in the settlement." "McKAY:" "Our little friend is on the move." "It's headed right for us." " How fast?" " Very fast." " It knows we're here." " Ronon, stun." " Why?" " Stun." "Colonel Sheppard, come in." "Colonel Sheppard, this is Lieutenant Negley." "Do you copy?" "Yes, Lieutenant." "Sir, my team has just come through the gate, and we're proceeding to the settlement in order..." "Great." "Terrific." "We'll meet you there." "Right now, I need radio silence." "Sheppard out." "It stopped." " Why?" " How am I supposed to know?" " Where is it?" " Well, I think it's out in the tunnel." "It's close." " Are you all right?" " Yeah, I'm good." " What the hell was that thing?" " What is that?" "It's a piece of an arm, it looks like." " Let's hope that slows him down." " Well, maybe it'll bleed to death." "Or just grow another arm." "Dart!" "It's still moving away from us." "Let's hope losing a chunk of his arm slows him down." " We need to finish it off to make sure." " I couldn't agree with you more." "Yeah, and how are we gonna do that?" "Am I the only one who noticed that our bullets had no effect on it?" "It appears to have a hardened shell on its back." "Right, set that thing to kill again." "Lieutenant Negley, this is Sheppard." "How far away from the settlement are you?" "Negley, this is Sheppard." "Come in." " You did say radio silence." " Negley?" "Respond!" "Great." "It's through that doorway." "This is not good." "Dr. Weir, we just received a data transmission from the Taranan settlement." "Lieutenant Negley checking in." "And how are they doing?" "Well, they've contacted Colonel Sheppard's team, who were about 10 kilometers further inland from the settlement." "Negley and his team are on their way to meet up with them." "Ten kilometers inland?" "What are they doing there?" "Well, they found the Taranans." "Apparently, they've abandoned their settlement for a better location inland." "What about the cocoon and the life sign they were tracking?" "There was no mention about it." "It was a brief transmission." "They were almost out of range." "Okay, good." "Keep me posted." "We searched the whole room." "That thing ain't in there." " Just a bunch of unhatched eggs." " Pods." " Whatever." " Is there another way out?" "No, it's the only door to the room." "Yeah, well, it must have found another way out" " because it is still on the move." " Alien." "The movie Alien." "They use the air shafts to move around the ship." "And then systematically killed the entire crew, one by one." " Thank you for bringing that up." " They didn't kill them all." " What do we do now?" " Track this thing down and kill it." "Agreed, but first things first." "The structure is very peculiar." "Yeah." "I believe the word is "disgusting."" "Go!" "Go!" "Go!" "Go!" "Sheppard!" "They're hatching!" "We're good." "Let's go." "Shut the door." "Shut the door!" "Fire in the hole." " Everyone okay?" " Yes." " I'm good." " I think you singed my eyebrows." "Think you used enough dynamite there, Butch?" "Rodney?" "McKAY:" "I think we got them all." "That's good." "Except for our armless friend." "He's still on the move." "Let's go get him." "Lieutenant Negley, this is Sheppard." "Do you read?" "Negley, respond." "Damn it!" " Perhaps they encountered the creature." " And, what, it killed all four of them?" "No way." "One creature isn't gonna take out four Marines." " It almost killed all of us." "But it didn't." " We need to find them." " If they were alive, we would see them on the life-signs detector." "Not if they didn't make it to the settlement." " This thing only has a range of 100 meters." " Where's the creature now?" "Wait a minute." " It's back that way." " Behind us?" " You just said it was that way." " I did." "Well, it was, but it must have..." " It must have doubled back." " Damn air shafts." "Obviously it knows its way around this place better than we do." "Perhaps we should consider returning to the gate." " What, you mean give up?" " No, not give up." "We can find out what happened to the Marines and request additional backup so that we may do a proper search of the settlement." "I like this plan." "I mean, if we're taking a vote." "Sounds like giving up to me." "Teyla's right." "Enough of this cat and mouse." "We're better off doing a full-scale sweep of this area." "Including the air shafts." " All right, how do we get out of here?" " This way." "In all the worlds I've been to, I've never encountered anything like it." "Anybody get a good look at that thing?" "McKAY:" "Aside from its severed appendage, no." "That thing moved incredibly fast." "In some ways, it looked almost like a human." "McKAY:" "If by "human," you mean clad in a grotesquely proportioned exoskeleton, yes, very "human."" "I meant it looked like it had two arms and two legs." "It looked like a giant bug to me." "I hate those things." "If it was indeed a Wraith experiment, perhaps it was created by combining the genetic elements of the Iratus Bug with the Taranans." "Which is, as we know, exactly how the Wraiths evolved." "I mean, Iratus Bug bites human, human DNA mixes with theirs, 1,000 years go by, Wraiths." "So, what, they're trying to create more Wraiths?" "That doesn't make any more sense." "If they wanted to create more Wraiths, wouldn't it be easier to get a male and female to, you know, get a room?" "It doesn't work that way with the Wraiths, all right?" "At least, we don't think it does." "We're not entirely sure as to the Wraiths' reproductive methods." "I don't wanna be around to watch that film." "Anyway, look, it's probably less likely they were trying to create another Wraith than they were actually trying to create some kind of a hybrid creature, probably to be used as a weapon." "Super-Wraith?" "That's all we need." "Well, that's the whole distance from the settlement." " I don't see any sign of the Marines yet." " Maybe they went back to Atlantis." "No, they would have radioed us." "They must have encountered the creature." "There's no other explanation for why they're not responding to us." "If that thing took them all out, then that is one nasty bug-person." " Dial us out." " Right." " No." " What?" "No, no, no, no." "Rodney?" "Control crystal's missing." " Missing?" " We can't dial out?" "Well, fix it." "It is not a matter of fixing, okay?" "The crystal is just gone." "Someone has removed it to prevent anyone else from dialing out." "Stay here?" "Hey, Elizabeth will wonder why we haven't checked in." "She'll dial up to get our status." "We can request backup, also a Puddle Jumper to come get us." "We don't know how long that'll be." "That could be hours." "We'll be safe here." "The life-signs detector will alert us if the creature's nearby." "She's right." "We can set up a..." "What do you call it?" "A perimeter." "Wait it out." "We're not leaving without those Marines." "Let's go back to the settlement." "What?" " I'm sensing something." "Wraiths?" " Cannot be certain." " Rodney?" "No." "No, I've still just got the one reading." "Still on the move, heading..." "No." "No, picking up another life sign." "Just popped up out of nowhere." "How is that possible?" " Maybe one of those eggs hatched." " Maybe." " That or part of the settlement is shielded." " Maybe it's one of the Marines." "If it is one of those Marines, that something Teyla's sensing is heading right toward him." "They're close." "What was that?" " Teyla." "Teyla!" "Ronon!" "John!" "Where'd she go?" "I'm reading two life signs moving away from us, but one floor up, I think." " That or more air shafts." " Let's go." "Wait!" " They disappeared." " What?" "The life signs, they just vanished." "I was right." "Part of the settlement must be shielded." "Wait!" "No!" "We won't be able to track them." "What?" "This will proceed much more quickly if you don't resist." "Michael." "Hello, Teyla." "You need to aim for the stomach area." "It seems to be more vulnerable." "It's a soft underbelly." "You were able to kill it when you hit it there before." " Thanks." " Which way?" "I don't know." "It's not showing me anything." "It's useless." "This way." " You're the one who's done all this?" " All this?" "This experiment." "You murdered those people." "You allowed those bugs to feed on them." "A necessary step in the process." "To create these creatures?" "Why are you doing this?" "Do you not recall our last encounter?" "How you left me to die on that desolate planet?" "The hive that finally rescued me, they could tell something was different." "They sensed the human in me." "To them, I was unclean." "I barely escaped that hive with my life." "So now I find myself hunted by both humans and Wraiths, so you can understand my need to protect myself," "to survive." "It did not have to be like this." "You could have lived with us." "As a human?" "My consciousness erased by your retrovirus?" "No, I will live the rest of my life as I choose, but I can't do it alone, so having taken my cue from the experiment your people performed on me," "I figured out how to reverse the process." "To create a being even more formidable than a Wraith." "It began with the feeding." "I allowed the bug to gorge itself, to absorb as much human DNA as possible." "This, of course, led to the death of the subject." "The timing of the feeding was critical, ensuring that the bug laid its next egg quickly, before the genetic material could filter it out of its body." "The embryo then contained enough human DNA for me to manipulate." "I accelerated the development, augmenting the complexity of its physiology." "There were several adjustments, several mistakes, until I finally found the perfect balance between strength, agility and resilience." "A perfect animal to do my bidding." "Must be some kind of security lockdown." "Whoever took Teyla no doubt triggered it." " We gotta open this up." " Stand back." "Jeez!" "Mind giving us a little more heads-up before you start blasting everything?" "You got any more C4?" "I saw how you and your team destroyed the incubation room, but don't think that's the only one in this complex, and don't think that this is the only planet from which I'm conducting this experiment." "That's right." "Soon, hundreds of these creatures will be at my disposal, and their numbers will continue to grow so long as I have human subjects in supply." "And now that you're here, I do." "All right, that's the last of the C4." "Let's hope it's enough." "Ready?" "What happened?" "Jeez!" "All right, let's go." " Serious energy spike." " What does that mean?" "We probably just entered the shielded section of the settlement." "Your friends are coming for you." "They'll meet the same fate as you, one by one." "Others will come for us." "Dr. Weir will send..." "Don't concern yourself with Dr. Weir." "She thinks your team has met up with the Taranan people and all is well." "One of the Marines she sent to help you was kind enough to assist me in transmitting a message back to Atlantis." "Michael, please don't do this." "After what you did to me, twice, how could you expect anything less?" " What happened back on the planet?" " No more excuses." "Your experiment failed." "You decided to kill us." " We believed we were left with no choice." " And now I'm in the same position." "You drove me to this." "Oh, my God." "Where are the others?" "Sheppard." "Over here." "You hear that?" " It sounds like bugs." " Come on." "Put that thing away." "I thought you said it didn't work in this area anyway." "I just..." "I thought I could recalibrate it to take into effect..." "It's dead." "John!" "John!" "Nice shot!" "You okay?" "Yes." "It's Michael." "He's the one doing this." "Michael?" "Our Michael?" " He's alive?" " Yes." "He created the creatures, and he's attempting to build an army of them." " Where is he?" " I don't know." "He ran off as soon as he heard the gunfire." "We need to come up with the best plan here." " The best plan is to kill him." " Hey, just hang on a sec." "Maybe I should check out these workstations." " There might be some intel." " We don't have any time." "Such as how many of these creatures he created and if they have any weaknesses that we might be able to exploit." "All right, Teyla, you stay with Rodney." "Ronon and I are going after Michael." " We'll stay in touch on the radio." " You can't." "Shielded, remember?" "Look, the energy spike, it fouls with radio communications as well." "Well, then unshield it." "Let's go." "You go that way." "I'll go the other." "Oh, hey, wait." " Set your gun to stun." " What?" " Yeah, we're gonna need to question him." " No, no more talking, no more questioning." "I'll do what we should've done the first time we captured him." " Ronon, listen to me." " No, you listen to me, John." "This whole retrovirus thing was a mistake." "I said it then." "No one listened to me." " It was a bad idea." " We had to try." " If it'd worked, we wouldn't..." " But it didn't work." "Admit it." "It just made things worse." "How long do you wanna keep paying for it?" "God, it is amazing how much work he's been able to get done in such a short amount of time." "He's quite the industrious little fellow or Wraith or whatever." "What does he look like now?" "I mean, is he full-on Wraith again?" "Not quite." "There are still human characteristics present in him." "No doubt it's why I was confused when I first felt his presence." "You'd think that the human side of him would temper his aggression a bit." "Yes, because we humans aren't aggressive at all." "Well, certainly less aggressive than..." "Oh, sarcasm." "Yeah, nice." "What Michael is doing right now must be stopped, and he cannot be allowed to escape." "He's far too dangerous." " You're preaching to the choir, my dear." " But I understand his anger." "His life has been destroyed." "He no longer has a home or family." " He had a family?" " I don't know, but I've often wondered what he left behind when he was captured by us." "We know nothing of his past other than he was a Wraith." "A very smart Wraith." " Perhaps he was a scientist." " Sure." "Probably." "Why not?" " One of their very best, I'd wager." " Like you." "Right." " Wait a minute." " What is it?" "I think I just figured out how to disable the EM interference that is causing the shielding." "Sheppard, you there?" " Yeah, I'm here." " I got the shielding disabled." "So I see." "Any luck finding Michael?" "No sign of him yet." "Is that life-signs detector working yet?" "Oh, of course." "Oh, my God." "What?" "I'm reading a ton of life signs near you." "Well, define "ton" and define "near."" "A few dozen." "I mean, they're all bunched together." "Prisoners in a holding cell, maybe?" "Or worse." "Whatever they are, someone just released them, and they're headed your way." "Oh, crap." "Keep going, straight up the tunnel." "Ronon should be coming around the corner towards you now." "It's not Ronon." "It's one of the bugs?" "Michael." "Colonel Sheppard." "No offense, but I was kind of hoping never to see you again." "I had hoped just the opposite." "Well, then you've seen me." "Now say your goodbyes, but first, give me the control crystals to the DHD." " I don't think so." " Or I can just kill you." "Unless I stun you first." "As much as I'd like to sit around chatting..." "Extraordinary, aren't they?" "Your army of bug people?" " I thought you'd be impressed." " Not so much." "After all, I'm merely continuing the experiment your people began." "What then?" "Take over the entire galaxy?" "That's a little too Dr. Evil if you ask me." "McKAY:" "Sheppard, the creatures are closing in on you fast." " You better get moving." " You and Teyla go to the gate." " We'll meet you there." " Right." " Give me the control crystal." " I can't do that, Colonel." "Just so we're clear, I have no problem killing you." "And I have no problem with dying because even if you kill me right now," "I'll die knowing that you and your team did not get off this planet alive." "Go." "Rope climbing's the reason I got bronze instead of silver" " In the ParticipAction program." " What?" "Hurry!" "They're coming!" "This is messed up." " This must be where they got up." " What?" "Air shafts." "It's about time we used them." " Michael's." " No doubt." "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" "I fly it, pick you, Rodney and Teyla up." "We use the Dart's DHD to dial the gate." "I was thinking, blow it up, but your idea's better." "Get moving." "Sheppard!" " Wait!" " What is it?" " Life signs up ahead." " Colonel Sheppard?" "Ronon?" "Doesn't sound like it." "Life signs behind us, too." "It's closing in fast." "Oh, God." "We're surrounded." "Incoming wormhole." " Colonel Sheppard's IDC." " Lower the shield." "Are you all right?" "Where are the Marines?" " Didn't make it." " What?" "We barely made it ourselves." "We had to commandeer a Wraith Dart just to dial out." "We ditched it on another planet." "Didn't wanna risk damaging the control room." " Daedalus can pick it up later." " What happened to the Taranans?" "They're dead, all of them." "Wait a minute." "Lieutenant Negley sent a message saying they just relocated to a new settlement." "No, it was Michael." "He sent the transmission." " He's the one that killed the Taranans." " Michael?" "We'll tell you about it in a minute, but first, is the Daedalus here yet?" "It's still a few days out." "Why?" "We're gonna need it to make another stop on the way." "Okay." " Elizabeth?" " I just came from McKay's lab." "He's been examining the research he was able to upload" " From Michael's experiment." " Has he been able to determine just how many more of those creatures Michael was able to create?" "Well, not an exact figure, no, but Rodney believes it's well into the hundreds." "Yeah, and it appears Michael has similar labs on at least three different planets." "It's amazing how quickly he's been able to incorporate our science into his." "What is it?" "Michael found out about the Taranan settlement through information the Wraiths hacked from our database during our brief alliance with them last year." "We led Michael straight to them." "Colonel Caldwell just radioed." "They did a full sweep of the planet." "No life signs." "They searched the settlement." "No Michael, no creatures." " He already dialed out." " Yeah." "We got the control crystal back in the DHD." "Rodney's trying to figure out the last address dialed, but you know how long that takes." "I'm sure Michael immediately dialed elsewhere to cover his tracks." "You can count on that." "We need to find him." "He's already too dangerous." "And I'm sure we're number one on his hit list."