Hilda grunted as the effort of bearing the load took its toll, but the Cimmerian would never yield. 'What is going on up there?' she growled over the radio.

"One of the ropes is starting to fray," Gavin says over the radio in response to Hilda. "We're doing the best we can."

Gavin goes over to the rope that is fraying. If he can reach it, he'll cut a piece of spare rope off and tie a double sheep-shank knot over the fray.

"That should do," he explains. "The double rope should take up the stress, and if it breaks, the sheep-shank knot gets tighter the more stress is put on it."

As the team was pulling the DHD from the pit, they felt a small tremor. It was probably an aftershock but it cut the rope a bit more.

"Yes, the Ancients pre-date Ra finding Earth thousands of years ago. They pre-date the Go'auld even getting into space, for that matter." Kaspar adds, "As Gavin said, we're pretty sure that the Ancients built the Stargates; the Asgard have dropped comments that pretty much confirm that -- though the Asgard could, and probably have, built their own gates.  But they don't confirm or deny that."

"The Ancients pre-date Humanity, although the current thinking is that they may have looked just like us. That Earth was some kind of colony or outpost of theirs, and that they somehow encouraged the early lifeforms of Earth into organisms amenable to their wants and needs.  In other words, us."

"They rose to a high level of civilization over a million years ago, and then they just...left.  As far as I know, the Asgard are silent on this subject, while Doctor Jackson has put forward a very...outside the box theory that they transferred to some 'higher plane'." Kaspar shrugged, "Myself, I think it more likely they found a more interesting corner of the universe, and just moved away."

Kaspar looked around, after the tremor, and decided that this was taking too long. Confident that Sargeant Mojdar could handle the security needs of the moment, Kaspar walked over to Gavin, at the edge of the crevasse.

"What can I do to help move this along?" Kaspar asked.

The ground shuddered beneath Hilda's boots, but the Cimmerian remained firm and stable. Even so, she was growing increasingly uncomfortable standing at the bottom of a very deep and narrow hole in the ground. Sand trickled down. A stone bounced off her helmet. 'Please tell me we are nearly finished?' she begged over the radio, feeding some more rope around her straining arms as Vasandra pulled the DHD up, achingly slow. 'Maybe you can go faster, Vasandra?' I must say that to all the girls.

Not expecting something as simple and indestructible as a proper carbon nano-fiber rope to come apart as easily as this it takes Vasandra a few moments to realize the rope is very likely constructed out of something completely different if it is coming apart so easily that it is causing the disruption behind her as the slow moving FRED continues to plod along at the speed most likely to succeed without causing more problems than it fixes..

”If you could place something durable but with a low surface friction under the rope where it passes over the edge of the cliff it would make it less likely for even this substandard line to fray.”

The major's walking over to the others left Rajip nodding slowly while he was still absorbing the information the two had given him.

"So that basically makes us having just left the God's, or maybe gods', building..." he told himself. "Looks like the Cimmerian can be actually right about what she had said," he finished with a smirk, then turned back to look at the team at work, only to begin watching the surroundings again after a moment.



OOC: Just some guard duty rolls (in case they're needed):
20:08, Today: Rajip Mojdar rolled 18 using 1d20+3. Listen.
20:07, Today: Rajip Mojdar rolled 7 using 1d20+3. Spot.

Rajip was focused on the rope. He had a great surprised when he finally saw the DHD from the top of the cliff. He started to pull the rope by hand and when the DHD was close enough, he grabed it to secure it.

Right after that, Kaspar grabbed Hilda's arm to help her reach the surface and they took the DHD away from the cliff.

"Outstanding job, everyone." Kaspar says, remembering his long-ago Leadership training.

"Now we see just how damaged this thing is, yes?" he says, looking at Vasandra and Gavin.

Alas, there was probably no 'safe' spot to situate the DHD, since they were clearly in some sort of fault line area.

Moving it far enough away to be reasonable, Gavin began examining it, taking it apart as necessary.


19:37, Thu 06 Mar 2014: Gavin rolled 16 using 1d20+6 ((10)) skill check.

That's good for Knowledge (engineering), Knowledge (hyperphysics), and Knowledge (physics), but add another 3 for Electronics.

At first look, there was no broken crystals inside the DHD. But there was also no power.

Before the team could made a better diagnosis of the device, it will have to find a suitable power source to turn it on.

Once she saw the DHD disappear safely over the edge of the crevice, Hilda finally released her guide rope with a great sense of relief. She shook out her aching arms, then gathered up her tools and the now-spent flare. She tied her rope back around herself, then radioed 'Now pull me up.' She'd be stuffed if she was going to climb back out on her own after all that work with aching arms.

Finally, after being hauled up out of the hole, she was back up top and glad to be on firm ground. Hilda got herself far away from the edge, then patted all the dirt off her uniform, before sitting on the edge of the FRED for a well-earned rest.

"I don't understand," Gavin muttered as much to himself as to the others.

"None of the crystals are broken, but there's no power. Ah, that's it!"

He pulled out the large central crystal--the power crystal. It should have been red; it wasn't. It was a dull gray. He went over to the FRED, set it down on the vehicle and then extracted his gear from his backpack.

After running several of them over the crystal, he made a pronouncement.

"I can't detect any micro-fractures, so I think the power crystal is still functional. It just doesn't have any power left. Some sort of short circuit must have occurred when it fell, draining out all the power."

"We'll have to figure out some way of re-charging it."

Letting Gavin take the lead with the crystal Vasandra continues the inspection of the DHD itself, checking over the various sub systems to ensure that none of the crystals have been damaged, dislodged, or altered in unfortunate ways.  Once the inevitable conclusion is reached she offers what information she can on the subject.

”Energy supplies should be no problem, we have plenty of spare energy with us, if we need to convert it into the crystal in order to restore proper operation to the DHD that could take some time, the quick fix of simply plugging in the external power supply for a single dialing should be easy however.  Once we get back to the SGC with the crystal recharging it should be no problem at all.”

OOC: are we currently on the far side of the crevasse from the gate?  Do we need to cross the crevasse to get to the gate, and if so, how easy would it be to cross right where we are?  Or do we need to find an easier place to cross?

Rajip accompanied the Cimmerian to the FRED. Once there, he produced some water from the backpack and handed it to her, leaning on the same vehicle. "Here," he said, "I'm guessing you may need it. It's a good job you did down there. Now let's hope the egg-heads will do theirs."

He fell silent for a while, watching the people debating over the DHD, occasionally glancing around to check if there was no danger to their group.  As the matter of fact, he didn't expect any to arise, especially not after the quake.

'Thanks.' Hilda took the canteen gratefully, though she had one of her own somewhere, and took a healthy swig. She wished she could have brought some beer or mead with her on a mission.  It had been hard, hot work down there, and she was sweating like a swine. She removed her helm and tac vest so she could shake the dirt out, and stripped off her BDU jacket down to her tanktop to air out. This exposed the scars on her arms, and her impressive dragon tattoo.

'Egg heads? I do not understand.' the Cimmerian asked, confused about the term.

"It's more like 'eggheads'. One word," Rajip corrected after a moment of hesitation. "We use it to refer to people of science or those more knowledgeable, in general."

He coughed.

"Behind their backs, most often."
This message was last edited by the player at 15:14, Sun 09 Mar 2014.

Hilda frowned. 'You should respect your wise ones. They are weak but have much power and use." she said, watching the others work on the DHD. She remembered lessons in Hermod's smoky hut, listening in fascination as the Asgard taught her many things, of logic and respect. She pulled her tac vest and helm back on for safety's sake, but she didn't expect an attack. She found a chocolate bar amidst her MREs and had a snack.

"Oh, but I am, I am. You know that everyone has their role to play and ours is momentarily over. It's their turn to show us what they can do and send us home already. It's just that..." Rajip waved the remainder of his thought away with a sigh and hastily pushed himself away from the FRED.

"I'll go and take a closer look," he informed and his voice sounded a little bit hesitantly as he did it. On his way towards the DHD and the three members of the team, his boot sent a bunch of stones flying after a rapid, furious swing.

"If the crystal is undamaged, then it can be recharged, yes?" Kaspar asked, looking from Vassandra to Gavin, and back, "We can recharge it from the FREDs power supply, can't we?  We have an adapter?"

Fairly certain of the answer, Kaspar decides to move on to the next issue.

"Anyway, whatever we need to do, I leave it to you two.  I'm sure you'll figure it out.  Right now, I'm going to address the problem of us getting over to the stargate.  Carry on."

Kaspar steps away from the DHD, and looks over at Rajip and Hilda.

"Sargeant Mojdar, Miss Hilda!  To me, please!"

When the pair have moved closer to Kaspar, he points over at the stargate.

"As we've just determined, while moving the DHD isn't impossible, it's a damn pain in our collective asses.  The problem is, the DHD is on this side of the crevasse, while the stargate is on that side.  And we'll have to drive the FRED all the way over there, where the crevasse narrows enough to drive across.  I'm thinking we can improve this situation; we can collect several logs and build a make-shift bridge."

Kaspar grimaced, "However, I believe that the FRED will soon be engaged in recharging the power crystal for the DHD, so it will be unavailable to assist in this job.  In other words, we will have to do it the old fashioned way, and drag the logs over here, ourselves."

"Any thoughts before we start?"

Hilda watched Kaspar walk away, wondering what his problem was. She shrugged it off, and wondered how long they'd be stuck here instead. At least they wouldn't need to camp outside; there were plenty of empty houses in the village. She could hunt something to eat — maybe fetch that badger-boar thing — if they didn't want to try the MREs.

She was stirred by Kaspar calling her over, a little irritated to be so beckoned. 'I have honorary rank too, you should know.' she said testily. Then she listened as Kaspar outlined the problem, then scowled darkly at the task before them. 'We should have pulled it up the other side.'

While all the team was at work, the gate suddenly opened. From the radio, you could hear a message : "Here is General Hammond. You should have done your report one hour ago SG-X1. Please answer."

Then, the silence followed.

'I have honorary rank too, you should know.' Hilda said testily.

"My appologies, Miss Hilda." Kaspar responded with a small nod of his head, "I wasn't sure if you preferred 'skjerme maiden', or if you wanted to be adressed by your Tau'ri rank.  So I went with the English honorific title for an independant, adult young woman -- that is, Miss."

Kaspar again nodded, "But I shall call you Staff Sargeant, or even Shield Maiden, if that is what you wish."

The gate suddenly opened. From the radio, you could hear a message : "Here is General Hammond. You should have done your report one hour ago SG-X1. Please answer."

Frowning, Kaspar looks at the watch strapped to his right wrist.

"About time..." Kaspar mumbles, before opening his mic,

"Diss iz SGX1, Stargate Komand, Major Gorski reportink." Kaspar answered the Generals call, and once again was speaking with a thick Polish accent, "Vee vere delayed from reportink due to seismik actiwity vich both separated us from dee Stargate, az well az damaged dee DHD.  Vee are vorkink on repairink dee DHD, now."

"Vee alzo made dee preliminary inwestigation uff dee target buildink. I yam prepared to make dee preliminary report, if you vish.  Vee found some werry interestink discoveries, if I yam sayink zo, myself."
This message was last edited by the player at 05:39, Thu 13 Mar 2014.

"Ha ! It's good to know that you are safe Major." replied Hammond. "Don't worry about your report, it can wait. Are there risk of new tremors incoming ? If you need help to get the DHD back up online, we can send you a SG team."
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:53, Fri 14 Mar 2014.