SGA Scrapped Fanfic Book 1 Chapter 7 The sword in the stone

To chapter 6 

This is the final chapter of the scrapped contunuity, it's meant as a reference to the sword in the stone and knight that col. Mitchell faces some year later in sg-1. 

(The following section needs rewriting, supplement ancient swordsman for wraith full time and consider removing miller)

Hoglund along doctor Petersen and lt. Miller was going over some areas of the southern pier. They had been checking out dark dank closed down rooms and labs for several hours. Mckay had not permitted pwer to be wasted on these areas yet, only specific potions of the city along with mpst of the east pier and the main tower was powered at any one time, but doctor weir wanted to know if any of the labs here merited a generator so they were lugging one around. But the labs here didnt seem to hold any great breakthroughs. At least not the type they could realise what it was in the time they had alloted for each room. Several rooms contained empty racks that lt.Miller suggested might have been weapons racks. It was possible the south pier have contained the military contingent of Atlantis. then as they came down the ramp into the basement of a large building they came upon what looked somewhat like an arena, or at least the bottom rows of one. It was roughly ten meters across and perfectly circular and around the sides where empty weapons racks, behind those racks where two rows of stands, clearly not meant for audience but more like a place to wait. Petersen found a jack to plug the generator into and soon they had the lights on.

"So what do you think?" Petersen asked Hoglund, he was surveying the arena with disintrest, to some extent Hoglund could understnad his position, it was after all only a well lit open room. It however told much that they didnt know about the ancients, gladitorial games didn't exactly match their profile, on the other hand their language had been the root of latin and the roman had fought gladitorial games so it's possible they got that tofrom the ancients.

"Bread and Circuses" lt Miller suggested as if he had read Hoglunds thoughts.

"Somehow I doubt it" Hoglund said "No evidence we've seen so far have shown the least intrest in the glory of personal combat that such an idea would suggest"

"Ancient is the..." Petersen began.

"Yes thank you petersen I am well aware of that, but considering the rest of this building seems to be military rahter than entertainment aligned i'd say an exercise ground"

"An ancient dojo, their version of the room on the eastern pier we use for gym" Miller agreed.

"Militarism like that doesnt sound like the ancients we know about either" Petersen argued.

"Sure the universe is infinite and all but they didn't fight a century long war against the wraith with philosophers" Hoglund muttered and stood unto the arena. All of the sudden there was a blusing flash and beam scanned him.

"What in the..." Miller began but was intrupted by a calm cool male voice, obviously the ancient counterpart to the female plain voice used by the humans of earth.
 The words were in ancient and while most expedition members spoke ancient the speech banks of this computer must have been damaged because the words made no sense. Something about judging and chosing. Then in the middle of the room a weapons rack like those at the side suddenly appeared. It had to be ahologram but Hoglund started walking towards it anyway.

"Hoglund!" Miller called after him "You really shouldnt do that!"

"I'm fine, i just want to look at the design of the ancient weapons!" Hoglund called back.

"No really, Hoglund, Don't!" Peterssen shouted too. They kept on, Hoglund ignored them, Milelr could be excused he guessed he was a military man he was paid to be paranoid, but he had expected Petersen to be more curious. He was a scientist after all. Hoglund reached the rack. There were plenty of weapons there, one was a small stick with one side crystaline, it loked somewhat like a roman gladius but you held the side that would be the blade on the gladius. And then a relatively normal pistol, the innards of it seemed to be made from the same crystaline material as the crystal side of the stick. And then a sword, stuck in a stone. Hogludn paused at it, there were other weapons but this was literally a sword in a stone. Well if atlantis was real why not the sword in the stone, he reached out to touch it.

And found that it was solid, it hadn't been there when they entered but now it was as solid as his own gear. He wondered if the items had been transported there or simply integrated from energy. The he heard the voice again, it was still impossible to understand what it said, but this time it was clear where it came from. An elder man stood a few meters away from him, Looking straight at him also with a sword in his hand. the voice came from him.

"Some help here" Hoglund shouted then looked for his colleges and found them hammering on an invisible wall. Oh he thought that was what they had been shouting about earlier. He turned his agtention to the man before him.

"Abort!" he tried, the old man shook his head and said something else incomprehensible, then took a step toward him with the sword drawn. Hoglund threw himself away from it, when he was a kid he had fought with wooden swords just like most kids, he hadn't been very good at it though. "Apsraho!" he tried. same message again. Hoglund sprinted round the rack so it got between him and his pursuer, unfortunatly all weapons but the sword had dissapeared from the rack, probably in the very moment he had touched the sword. Even more unfortunatly the ancient stepped right through the rack and came at him again. Hoglund sprinted to one side but far to late the blade dug into his side. Or it would have if it had been a blade of steel, but it wasnt, it was still only an illusion, but it gave him some sort of high voltage shock as it passed through him though. Hoglund collapsed on the floor. The hologram said something again, and made a motion for him to get up. Hoglund felt  a flicker of hope maybe if he didnt get up he'd forfit and shut the program of, instead the hologram advanced again. He roleld away from the blade as it split the ground right where he had been a moment earlier. He jumped over to the sword in the stone and drew it. At least that worked, he then turned and lunged towards the hologram. Who simply sidestepped him and hit him in the side again. While not an acute wound as the similiar swords wound would have been, Hoglund knew that if he kept getting hit he would eventually die from those shocks, death by a thousand cuts. He got up again, the alternative was just layign down and die. He had hoped that the scanning had perceived his ability and set the dificulty accordingly,, that didn not seem to be the case it was probably broken just like everything else here. The move that the holgoram had just made, Hoglund had read enough about swordsfighting to know that it masterfully executed. Hogludn began backing away from the hologram, towards his friends. The hologram came after him, slowly but surely, it didnt need to stress, it didnt need to force battle, if a machine could be confident in it's own victory this holographic representation was it. Hoglund chanced a glanc eover his shoulder, Petersen was working on a console.
 Hoglund looked back to the hologram just in time to throw himself away from the blade, he landed on his back. Fortunately the hologram did seem more reluctant to advance when he was regaining his feet.

"Do you think you can fix the speech circuits of this thing at least!" Hoglund shouted over his shoulder.

"Look I told you not to walk in there, I told you not to touch those things!"

"Can we save the I told you so speech for when one of us is not in mortal peril?"

"when you chose the sword I assumed you knew how to use one" Petersen snapped back.

"Cant we just cut the power" Miller suggested.

"If we do that without reducing the load on it first the generator will overload" Petersen snapped irritably. He pushed a few butttons. "I have rebooted the speech program!"

"Abort! Apsraho!" Hoglund tried again.

"I am sorry but due to the parameters of this scenario only the administrating officer may order the termination of the exercise"

"I guess he's talking about you peterssen!" Hoglund roared and actually managed to parry a blow from the hologram  before it snuck it'sblade under his guard again and shocked him.

"I would have a lot more time if you weren't such a bad swordsman!" Hoglund was going to respond but had to duck a few swordstrikes and decided that he didn't have time to shout at Peterssen.

"What are the parameters of this scenario"

"A close combat drill meant to prepare soldiers for facing xenoform 2312-3,in close combat, full realism,the parameters is based on all known close combat encounters with xenoform 2312-3"

"What is xenoform 212-3?"

"third encountered evolution of xenoform 2312, the iratus bug, 2312-3 has been designated..."

"Wraith" Hoglund interrupted him. The hologram hadn't been chivalrous to him he realised, it was closer to a cat playing with it's food.

"That is correct"

"Why are you resembling an ancient then?"

"This hologram takes it's likeness of it's creator High councillor Moros of the Atlantis council, but if considered preferably" the hologram stood still for a second then the old ancient man was repalced by a snarling wraith.

"Wonderful" Hoglund muttered. He was so dead, perhaps Teyla of Major Shepard could take on a wraith but there was no chance in hell he could. Maybe if he had a gun, he didn't like guns but he preferred them to death.Normally this was where he would start considering another way to get out of this mess but the arena was empty except the empty weapons rack in the middle and he only had an hologaphic sword.

"hoglund!" he heard Peterssen shout "The shut down command isnt working" He had Miller and Petersen though. Not the best odds but they might be able to do something. he sprinted away from the wraith knowing it would run after him. he had never been face to face with one in real life, but he had read enough reports.

"Is it a locked console?" He shouted

"What?" Petesen answered, Hoglund was just about to asnwer when he felt a shock in his back and collpased. This wasnt good he needed time to execute his plan even if it worked.

"Is the console locked into the simulation mainframe?" the wraith was done playing it slashed his arms and raised his hands, he didnt know what it would do but it was meant to simmulate death utter and final so he had a feeling he would not like it.

"No"

"then run a full citywide diagnostics"

"What?"

"Just do it" Hoglund rolled out of the way but before he could get on his feet the blade stuck him again. the wraith hologram grabbed him and turned him to face it, it lifted it's hand again. then stopped. Hoglund rolled away and grabbed his sword again."About time" he shouted the wraith slowly like if it was moving in glue turned towards him. "I've had enough of you" Hoglund spat at him and ran his sword into the hologram. In a single instant the sword disappeared and the wraith disappeared and the walls around the arena disappeared.

"Not a bad idea" Petersen said. "overload the system and hope it creates lag in the simulation"

"No thanks to you" Hoglund muttered.

"I'm not the one who walked into a combat simulation despite the objections of everyone else"

"I'm still curious about the sword in the stone, it is  weird that it would be represented as such"

And so it's over no more parts of this, when i get time I'll start afresh.