Prometheus (episode)

Prometheus is the eleventh episode of the sixth season of Stargate SG-1.

Plot
While going to her car, Major Carter is stopped by a journalist named Julia Donovan, who questions her about a secret project dubbed “Prometheus.” She catches Sam’s attention after brandishing a sample of the metal, trinium. Carter simply shrugs it off and drives away. Back at Stargate Command, she informs General Hammond about the incident. The general reveals their next course of action.

In the meantime, Miss Donovan is contacted by Major Davis, with the intention of stopping the story’s release. However, she couldn’t care less and reasons the story must be big if the military is trying to cover it up. Davis informs Hammond and partners with Carter to go confront Miss Donovan at her network. Although they are able to stop the network from distributing it, she threatens to go to a foreign network. Her producer then bargains to get the exclusive rights, and agrees to reveal the source of the information in exchange for allowing Donovan and a camera crew into the facility. The SGC then plans to double-cross her and destroy the video after getting the source.

As agreed upon, Donovan, her producer, and a camera team are brought to a secret location in the desert. They travel in an elevator down several hundred feet and are confronted with the Prometheus, the first starship of the Air Force. Carter explains the background and technology behind the Prometheus. While Donovan and her producer are led through the ship (where they are also shown the engine room and the hyperspace engine), the camera team stuns two guards with a Zat and starts to commandeer the ship. Unaware of the camera crew’s duplicity, Carter is unable to contact the bridge and goes to check the situation while Jonas Quinn watches the two reporters. Carter is then attacked by two of the camera team but is able to escape to a room, which is then sealed by the intruders. In the meantime, Jonas wants to retake control of the ship, doing anything he can to slow them down, but he and the journalists are stopped by the intruders. The producer reveals himself as an agent working with the camera crew and helps them gain a firm foothold in the ship. The rogue camera crew activate the hyperdrive engines and Jonas determines they're attempting to overload them, in an attempt to create an explosion.

Outside the hangar, Major Davis informs a furious Col. O'Neill about the situation, when they are contacted by the hijackers. They demand the release and delivery of Frank Simmons and Adrian Conrad. While events transpire outside the ship, Carter is able to contact the outside by modifying some equipment around the room she's sealed in to create a radio, and devises a plan to manipulate the sub-light engines. Inside the ship, the hijackers threaten to kill their hostages if Jonas doesn't fix the settings vital to hyper drive functions that he modified in his attempts to slow them down. The producer protests the hijackers callous nature and is swiftly killed. Jonas, to spare further loss of life, submits to their demands. As promised, Adrian Conrad (still controlled by a Goa'uld) and Col. Simmons appear and are brought aboard Prometheus. Col. Simmons takes the bridge and they start the ship, while Carter, after a quite a while, is able to free herself using a plasma cutter. Col. O'Neill and Teal'c plan to get to the ship themselves in a Death glider.

When the Prometheus has left Earth, Simmons informs their hostages about what will happen now. Carter is finally able to manipulate the sub-light engines but is then confronted by three of the hijackers, who are deftly immobilized by O'Neill and Teal'c. It’s too late as they are unable to stop the ship from entering hyperspace. On the bridge, the Goa'uld attacks Simmons and a female hijacker, yet Simmons is able to subdue the enemy. Simmons, who is now controlled by the Goa'uld, attacks O'Neill and Teal'c. O'Neill succeeds in opening a door that sucks Simmons into the vacuum of space.

Afterwards, SG-1 meets the hijackers head-on who divulge their original plan, to search for a cache of advanced weaponry. However, the group appears to be stuck somewhere in space with no way to get home when an Asgard-ship appears. Thor beams on the bridge. He explains that the Asgard have been monitoring all hyperspace activity around Earth and tracked them and pleads for their help…to defeat the Replicators who have overrun the Asgard homeworld.