1. From his bedroom window one morning, John thinks he sees Colonel Sumner standing on a distant balcony overlooking the South Pier. But he knows full well that Sumner was dead weeks before that part of the city was ever explored. It can’t be him. Well, it can’t be him anyway, because he’s dead. But it would make no sense for it to be him. John shrugs it off.
The next morning he sees him again. John fumbles a pair of binoculars out of his storage cupboard and races back to the window. The figure is still there. He locates the right building, the balcony, the man standing there.
It is Sumner. Smiling contentedly.
John’s jaw drops.
Sumner turns his head and looks right at John.
They were a nice pair of binoculars, and John’s glad that he didn’t actually drop them off the side of his building, but he’s never, ever going to use them again. He gives them to Ford and keeps his curtains closed in the mornings.
2. Rodney sees Peter Grodin a lot. It’s always as he exits a transporter or a room, and Peter is just disappearing around the corner of the hallway Rodney’s entering. Rodney is a scientist, and he certainly doesn’t buy into any of that paranormal crap. It’s a look-alike, or a resemble-at-a-distance-alike and it’s just that Peter’s on his mind.
But it keeps happening, and Rodney’s sick and tired of it… and beginning to wonder despite himself. So he goes through the personnel records and looks at all the photographs, and makes a list of everyone who might remotely look like Peter when barely glimpsed. And then he contrives to get them all in one place at the same time, and walks out of that room into the corridor, heart pounding.
And when the man at the end of the hallway who can’t possibly be Peter Grodin pauses for the first time, and begins to turn his head, Rodney shuts his eyes tightly. Because he really, really doesn’t want to know.
3. Sam sees Elizabeth out of the corner of her eye, sitting at her desk. Her desk. Their desk? When Sam walks into her office, there is no one sitting at the desk. When she looks in through the glass walls, there is no one there. When she’s working at the desk, she feels no other presence. But when she rises from her chair and moves away, Elizabeth takes her place.
There’s not much that scares Sam any more, and she takes this unexplained phenomenon in her stride and just wishes that Elizabeth was getting a little bit of the endless paperwork done.
4. Carson knows he doesn’t believe in ghosts. He knows he’s never believed in ghosts. He finds it ironic that he’s most likely the only person in history to be haunted by his own ghost, and doubly ironic that that ghost knows exactly how he feels.
5. Teyla was the first to see her. Confused and troubled, she told no one. Radek saw her twice, and thought she was real the first time. Ronon saw her in the mess hall and nearly dropped his tray. He could tell she wasn’t real. Woolsey thought he saw her, but knew he must be wrong. John and Rodney were together when they saw her. They started talking to her, surprised and pleased, and she smiled at them before she vanished.
People talked, rumors spread. She was seen everywhere on Atlantis that day.
Woolsey put a priority message into the next day’s scheduled data burst.
The response came back from the SGC. The Hammond, Colonel Samantha Carter commanding, had been lost with all hands.
Five ghosts that haunt Atlantis
The next morning he sees him again. John fumbles a pair of binoculars out of his storage cupboard and races back to the window. The figure is still there. He locates the right building, the balcony, the man standing there.
It is Sumner. Smiling contentedly.
John’s jaw drops.
Sumner turns his head and looks right at John.
They were a nice pair of binoculars, and John’s glad that he didn’t actually drop them off the side of his building, but he’s never, ever going to use them again. He gives them to Ford and keeps his curtains closed in the mornings.
2. Rodney sees Peter Grodin a lot. It’s always as he exits a transporter or a room, and Peter is just disappearing around the corner of the hallway Rodney’s entering. Rodney is a scientist, and he certainly doesn’t buy into any of that paranormal crap. It’s a look-alike, or a resemble-at-a-distance-alike and it’s just that Peter’s on his mind.
But it keeps happening, and Rodney’s sick and tired of it… and beginning to wonder despite himself. So he goes through the personnel records and looks at all the photographs, and makes a list of everyone who might remotely look like Peter when barely glimpsed. And then he contrives to get them all in one place at the same time, and walks out of that room into the corridor, heart pounding.
And when the man at the end of the hallway who can’t possibly be Peter Grodin pauses for the first time, and begins to turn his head, Rodney shuts his eyes tightly. Because he really, really doesn’t want to know.
3. Sam sees Elizabeth out of the corner of her eye, sitting at her desk. Her desk. Their desk? When Sam walks into her office, there is no one sitting at the desk. When she looks in through the glass walls, there is no one there. When she’s working at the desk, she feels no other presence. But when she rises from her chair and moves away, Elizabeth takes her place.
There’s not much that scares Sam any more, and she takes this unexplained phenomenon in her stride and just wishes that Elizabeth was getting a little bit of the endless paperwork done.
4. Carson knows he doesn’t believe in ghosts. He knows he’s never believed in ghosts. He finds it ironic that he’s most likely the only person in history to be haunted by his own ghost, and doubly ironic that that ghost knows exactly how he feels.
5. Teyla was the first to see her. Confused and troubled, she told no one. Radek saw her twice, and thought she was real the first time. Ronon saw her in the mess hall and nearly dropped his tray. He could tell she wasn’t real. Woolsey thought he saw her, but knew he must be wrong. John and Rodney were together when they saw her. They started talking to her, surprised and pleased, and she smiled at them before she vanished.
People talked, rumors spread. She was seen everywhere on Atlantis that day.
Woolsey put a priority message into the next day’s scheduled data burst.
The response came back from the SGC. The Hammond, Colonel Samantha Carter commanding, had been lost with all hands.