"Well, it's about time,"
Jack proclaims.
Carter says the lost trio
-- stuck on "bolthole" planet P4X234 at the end of last
episode -- have been dialing the beta gate for over a week. She also
mentions that Thor their Asgard host and friend was retrieved in his stasis
pod after the team arrived on P4X234.
After a quick debriefing,
the team is dismissed to shower as a direct order from General Hammond
-- their week of being castaways has left them less then fresh.
~
Fishing for bugs
Later, Carter is in her lab
looking at a small metal rectangle through her magnifying glass when O'Neill
startles her. She says she is examining a piece of a replicator bug found
at the wreckage.
Jack is still bent on going
fishing but, despite the ongoing hints of romantic tension between them,
she still wants to stay behind.
Unfortunately, when he tries
to leave, Hammond calls and orders Carter to retrieve him yet again. Major
Davis is flying in from Washington. There will be no fishing.
In the boardroom soon after,
Davis briefs the team on reports that a Russian sub was attacked by a mechanical
spider.
At first the Pentagon considered
it a joke, but when communications were cut off -- and later, when U.S.
forces found the submarine with the crew all dead -- they took it more
seriously.
Jack identifies a picture
of the spider as one of the replicators. When Davis says his superiors
would like to capture a few specimens, O’Neill responds by requesting that
they tow the sub out to sea and nuke it -- Earth cannot risk a techno-spider
infection.
~
Interplanetary incident
Davis also says the Russians
have detected the Asgard ship in orbit and are already blaming the Americans
for the disappearance of their submarine.
Carter feels that by now
the bugs will have replicated, but when Davis asks if there is any alien
technology that they know of that could contain the bugs, Teal’c says only
that Goa'uld weaponry is useless against the bugs. Only guns have worked
with any effectiveness.
Carter suggests that a small
team goes on a bug hunt in the sub.
Suddenly, another unscheduled
offworld gate activation starts the annoying klaxons sounding.
In the gate chamber the gate
opens. The iris refuses to close on command and the power in the base drops
to nothing leaving the room in partial darkness -- the only light the blue
illumination of the gate.
Thor slips through and walks
down the ramp. After Jack tells the soldiers to stand down, the alien offers
his thanks to the team for saving his life aboard his bug-infested ship,
which crashed into the ocean at the end of last season.
The Asgard then asks for
help in fighting the bugs, which are on the edge of invading one of his
people's worlds -- crushing the SG-1 team's longstanding hope that humanity's
alien allies will be in a position to aid us, rather than the other way
around.
~
Send some dumb humans
Jack asks what Earth can
do to help people as advanced as the Asgard.
Thor explains that SG1’s
handling of the Belistner proves that replicators have to be dealt with
by a "less sophisticated" form of thinking.
Hammond tells Thor that he
appreciates his situation, but they need SG-1 here on earth. However, Carter
volunteers to split the team -- she will help Thor and the Asgard while
Jack and Teal’c hunt bugs in the sub.
Hammond agrees, so Carter
leaves with Thor through the gate.
Afterwards, Jack, Teal’c
and two other soldiers suit up and enter the sub. Daniel will monitor the
operation on a video and audio feed.
~
Tea with the Asgard
Carter and Thor beam directly
to a room on the Asgard homeworld. As a testament to the aliens' advanced
technology, no stargate is in sight.
We are treated to the awesome
sight of a floating city on a stark landscape and a magnificent ship floating
above. Thor tells Carter that this is the Asgard’s newest and most advanced
ship, named after Jack -- the O’Neill.
Unfortunately, the ship isn't
ready for combat.
Back in the submarine, Jack
and Teal’c lead separate teams to explore the vessel more efficiently.
Jack's team makes first contact with a bunch of bugs -- interestingly,
these are a different color. Since they are not overtly hostile, he decides
to move on.
Teal’c finds a big bug surrounded
by a horde of little bugs -- a queen and her spawn. Unfortunately, a firefight
breaks out soon after, forcing our heroes to join up again and get out.
Meanwhile Carter and Thor
head for the endangered Asgard world on another spaceship.
While Thor explains the basics
of how the replicators operate, Carter initially feels frustrated by her
lack of understanding, but then realizes that understanding hasn't helped
the Asgard. She is there to give them a new point of view.
~
The weak alloys of Earth
Back in the infirmary, Fraiser
pulls a replicator piece out of Teal'c. Daniel notices that the block is
corroded -- since the bugs literally are what they eat, the relatively
primitive nature of Earth metallurgy has left this new strain weaker than
the Asgard variety.
Regardless, the Pentagon
calls off the scheduled nuclear attack on the submarine because the first
bug -- now the queen -- is still made out of Asgard metal and might survive.
The bugs then start up the
submarine's engines, forcing the team to go back to kill the "mother" replicator
face-to-face. They hope to kill the queen after distracting the younger
replicators.
Meanwhile, back on the Asgard
ship, Thor gets a communication that the replicators have taken the offensive
and taken over the entire alien fleet. They are not interested in the ship
he and Carter are on because it is less technologically sophisticated than
the other Asgard vessels.
Luckily, the bugs use ship
power needed for hyperspeed to replicate, keeping them from heading straight
to the Asgard homeworld. Furthermore, Thor explains that the replicators
can either use the hyperdrive or their ships' combat systems.
Thor then offers Carter some
food cubes, but she fails to find them appetizing. The talk of food gives
her an idea, however -- by using the advanced ship O’Neill as bait they
could lure the replicators into hyperspace, where they would lose the use
of their shields. It would then be relatively easy to blow the ship up,
taking the bugs out with it.
The alien seems unsure of
this plan.
~
Blowing things up
Teal’c and Jack go bug hunting
a second time, this time setting a charge to lure the energy-hungry replicators
away from the queen. They then find the queen and merrily blow it up with
a combination of shotgun blasts and a grenade.
Carter argues with Thor,
telling him the whole reason that she is here is to come up with "stupid"
ideas like this one -- the type of plan that the Asgard would never think
to try. Thor gives in to the absurdity, and soon we see the O'Neill baiting
the bug ships into hyperspace, where they are destroyed.
Jack and Teal'c have trouble
of their own after destroying the queen -- a replicator wall blocks their
way while bugs start to fill the room, literally chewing on the scenery.
Seeing no way out, Jack orders
Daniel to blow the sub. When Daniel look like he might refuse this order,
Davis repeats it. The U.S. submarine Dallas torpedoes and destroys the
submarine.
Jack and Teal’c disappear
with a flash of light -- but not from the torpedo explosion. Daniel tries
to tell Davis that they are all right, but his joyous stutter makes coherent
conversation impossible.
What has actually happened
is that Thor has beamed Teal’c and Jack aboard his ship to thank them for
their efforts against the replicators. Significantly, he tells them that
the Asgard will help them in their fight against the Goa'uld one day.
While only one planet has
been saved, this is a small victory -- there is now hope where there was
none before.
Jack then offers to take
Thor fishing, but the alien only beams them back to Stargate Command.
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