A Random Musical End

The city was dark, silent. Slumbering. Only the soft background hum of air and water alerted the smal group of people gathered behind closed doors that the city might slumber, but never sleep. Like the heartbeat of a human, Atlantis' core never truly shut down; it only dimmed slightly with the coming of the night.

A single light backlit the dark figure sitting on one end of the table. Slowly he leaned forward.

"Then we are in agreement?" he asked the other two shadowy figures.

A second figure sat in the darkest corner of the room, slighlty slumped down in his chair and covered in shadows. If this had been a corny fifties detective movie, he would have been wearing a fedora and would have taken this opportunity to drag on his cigar. But seeing as this was neither a fifties movie nor his own office (and he didn't like cigars and he was definately aware that Atlantis' leader would lift her eyebrows at him if he lit a cigar iinside the city), he merely leaned forward into the light and folded his hands together.

"It was funny at first, but I agree: this singing has to stop," Landry said.

Simon Caldwell looked at General Landry. It was he who had asked the other two to meet here. In fact, he had been transporting Landry (who had wanted an excuse to visit Atlantis for some time now) to the Pegasus Galaxy (along with what he still considered SG-1) for this meeting when they and SGA-1 had done their little musical mock-up a few days ago. The fact was that the competition between the two groups were starting to interfere with the running of his ship. And he took such matters seriously. He had even found Hermiod whistling the other day!

"It's not the singing; it's the fact that the singing is interrupting normal procedures," Caldwell remarked. "Whoever thought this prank war was a good idea anyway?"

"Wel, didn't you have money on one of them?" Landry blustered. Sometimes Caldwell wondered on whose side Landry was.

"You actually bet money on this?" Caldwell nearly exploded.

"Gentlemen," the soft but strong voice of Elizabeth Weir cut through the impending argument. She was seated where the light fell full on her face and suddenly the two men realised that by simply moving forward she had put herself in the spotlight. No wonder she had been such a sucsessful negotiator. "We're not here to place the blame on anyone. I'll talk to Sheppard about it if you'll talk to O'Neill."

"You knew about this, didn't you?" Caldwell accused.

"Colonel..." Landry began, but Elizabeth held up her hand.

"No, it's okay, General. He's entitled to his anger. Yes, I knew about it. It was supposed to be harmless. But if you feel it's intrusive, I'll end the singing, okay?"

Looking at Caldwell, Landry reflected that somehow, with that mild statement, Weir had pulled the rug from underneath Caldwell. Well, not that Landry complained: Caldwell was a fine officer, but a bit stuck-up. He smiled at Weir.

"Very well, Doctor. I'll talk to O'Neill."

Outside the closed doors two shadows suddenly came alive and moved off into the gloomy Atlantean corridors.

"So, that's it then," Rodney grumbled, but John shook his head.

"No, you noticed Elizabeth only promised to stop the singing," John smiled at him.

Rodney smiled back. "True. And I suppose we were getting a bit stuck in a rut with all the singing," he added.

"Then perhaps now it is time to reconsider Radek's crazy idea," John happily said as the two friends disappeared into the night.