Across Many Worlds... Children of the Gods [Jumpchain]

[ganshunter1]

Great chapter.

 

[NakedFury]

Things are developing nicely in the StarGate universe.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Tidings
Conclusion​

The escalation of conflict between Apophis, and his nephew the last few weeks had coincided with the start of the Egyptian new year... that probably was intentional on Heru'ur's part. Whether it was economic, or simply symbolic was harder to say, but Heru'ur had clearly planned his offensive before hand, and his fleet had struck a series of worlds in rapid succession. Rapid enough that most of the ritual fighting by other goa'uld had slackened to almost none. Heru'ur had the attention of the other system lords, and Apophis's neighbors were waiting for the Serpent's response.


To that end it had been something of a surprise to receive the report. In hindsight of course he shouldn't have been, word would have reached K'tano about the state of the war and thus the rebel probably had some idea about the goa'uld fleets currently waiting for Heru'ur to over commit or for Apophis to begin an offensive somewhere else... or for Cronus to take advantage of this three sided mess. What more annoyed him was that K'tano's attack on Hak'tyl was that it was apart of his Forest Province and not so much the rebel Jaffa personally. He could guess why, "And that is a second time he has been repulsed."


There was some rumbling from the Jaffa at the pronouncement. Not that they really needed reminding of that fact... or that it had been Ishtar's priestesses who had done it. If he had to speculate on the matter K'tano had launched this attack to try and wipe the stain from his honor at having failed to succeed the first go round, but that was speculation. If it was indeed that then it was doubly true that something needed to be done.


"The rebel forces are threadbare my lord. Many fight with the weapons of humans," Ishtar meant bows and arrows, and spears not the weapons of the Tauri. She didn't mean guns. Not that Jaffa weren't quick to dismiss Tauri firearms, or gunpowder weapons in general, as primitive. That was problematic of course from a tactical level of thinking.


Primitive or not most Goa'uld didn't like the idea of gunpowder societies being allowed to develop... though there were a few exceptions. Most of those were in the domain of Yu Huang Shang-Ti though that largely took the place of entertainment, fireworks, as well as in his mining industries. Most of the other goa'uld were happy enough to import firecrackers from Yu's domain for entertainment rather than have their own societies develop early and dangerous blackpowder that might add additional fire hazards.

So no these were Jaffa who were in a position to still be using more simple weapons. BY all reports few even had armor.... for what use iron armor would have been against staff weapon. Of course Imhotep had been a poor goa'uld to begin with his realm, and whatever jaffa who had fled into the hinterlands probably wouldn't have had an abundance of staff weapons to begin with. The neighboring domains, never mind the stargate, were mix of a variety of goa'uld seeded cultures in the intervening area of space. A large swathe were settled by the usual Mediterranean basin, and near east, cultures, but there were hindu transplants both from apparently India, and the pre Islamized 'Indies'.

The Dragon stood up, and walked to the observation port that peered out over the shipyards. The concept of drill originated in antiquity. It might have been the spanish of the fourteen hundreds and the fantasists of the Renaissance who set the stage for what would become regiments, but the basic prospect of drill was known to the goa'uld. Some goa'uld took it a little more seriously than others, Ptah's Ushabti, Pelop's spartans, and of course Yu's Jaffa armies, and even his human ones. There were a few others, but most goa'uld emphasized a warrior elite where distinction was earned by the individual. The prospect of drilling jaffa in such volumes and to such an extent was just anathema to the way most goa'uld behaved.

On the other hand it wasn't a completely alien concept. The idea of organizing Jaffa in groups of one thousand, but having it broken down into smaller units, as well as that one thousand being part of still larger formations wasn't unusual. Plenty of goa'uld, even those who didn't rely as heavily on drill still needed ways to organize troops.

"Given their threadbare appearance they must have been searching for weapons, and food." He said turning his attention back to the rebels. "Its not as if Imhotep's domain was particularly wealthy to begin with." Unlike Ares, and Svarog who were both System Lords in their own right Imhotep was basically no one. He'd been a minor goa'uld functionary on earth.... not even properly a sub lord to a system lord. The records suggested he'd been a functionary of one of Ra's sub lords, and had probably received his free holding status for reporting some transgression or another. Not that being a freestanding lord had done Imhotep a huge boon. At least as an underlord to one of Ra's sub lords he had been relatively well insulated against Goa'uld aggression. If he'd been one of Ra's underlords directly he'd have been fairly safe... instead he'd basically ended up neighboring Moloch, or near enough that Moloch alternated between bullying him, and claiming to be 'friends' with him.

They'd have to confirm Imhotep had indeed been overthrown though. He wasn't a system lord so it was possible that it might have escaped notice. Still that only explained some of the attacks there were others that had been reported which didn't seem to be rebels either. Better equipped Jaffa who weren't attacking in accordance to usual custom.


It was something of a pity Hak'tyl wasn't developed enough to support capital ship yards. Alkesh, or an equivalent, would be the largest thing they'd be able to sustain with the planet's meager naquadah access. It wasn't as if those reserves had ever properly mined anyway. The real priority though was economic development elsewhere. It was part of the reason he hadn't been investing in some massive overhaul of Jaffa armaments, which might have been necessary for more expansionist warfare.

He dismissed the Jaffa. A naval reply at this juncture, realpolitik demanded discretion if it looked like his fleet was moving towards 'Egyptian space' there might have been an assumption he had taken sides. The conflict would almost certainly bankrupt Apophis, and Cronus. As for Heru'ur's finances, at least in the way the system lords measured such things, weren't likely doing well either. This was precisely the sort of destructive warfare that Ra's overlordship had prevented, and was why the other system lords had accepted that overlordship for the most part. There was no one with the resources to force them to stop so they likely weren't going to, and every time one of them managed to take a planet, or secure some other victory it only redoubled the tensions.

This was probably Apophis's fault though. Every time the Serpent lord cracked down on potential rebels... well trying to hold sand and what not. That and of course Apophis had had rebel problems before his imprisonment, and savaging several of his own worlds after he'd escaped looking for traitors had done him no favors.

No sending a flight of Ha'tak to go searching for the rebels wouldn't have an appropriate response. There were cloak capable Alkesh coming on line in the next few weeks, and that would give him a better idea of what was going on in Imhotep's domain. He waved a hand, and activated the communications suite. "Zeus."

"Older brother," The Asgard returned formally, signifying that he must have had company, "The expedition progresses, and by spring should see Nirti's pestilence cleansed from her former domain."

--
Lieutenant General Vidrine represented the first real step to move beyond a fairly tightly woven number of largely research, and asymmetrical operations elements. Vidrine's command was in theory to be the first operational US space fighter wing. That had been the plan, and why he had been brought in on the X 301 project. That had, Hammond felt now, been premature. The 301 had obviously not been ready for that move, but that had been a choice made higher up in the air force. Vidrine however had been briefed and he outranked both himself, as well as well as Bauer.

"This goes to your Byzantine hypothesis, Doctor Jackson." Vidrine commented.

"Prelate is a term that is normally associated with a bishop. By itself its hardly definitive, but we also know that the Raptors also use the title, or rank of Exarch. Its true that their architecture is meso american, but we've seen that before actually. There are several cultures that range from Aztec to populations from further south in the meso american region."

Major Carter shifted, "The Tollan, they're a mix of people homogenized between Romans, and the Toltecs, or Mayans."

"Yes that's what we think." Daniel replied with a slight bob of his head, which raised the question of when exactly the Tollan had been pulled off of Earth. "But it isn't just them. There are also other populations in the galaxy that show these trends." The archaeologist had complained about the difficulty of piecing together Earth history of antiquity never mind the galaxy at large, which was of course another one of the problems they needed to address. Doctor Rayner remained a major security vulnerability. The damage of the Kara-kesh largely looked like a concussion and he had claimed that he only knew that the amulet supported the more conservative admission that Doctor Jackson's hypothesis of a much older Egyptian civilization was valid. That was good, but it also meant that he might pursue ideas, pull at pieces of yarn and unravel more of the truth. "I think this shows with the, evolution of armor we see particularly with Zeus's Jaffa."

"And Human soldiers, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c added, "It is not unheard of for system lords to have human axillaries to supplement Jaffa, but it is uncommon for a goa'uld to chose to equip and train humans to jaffa standards. Ra was known to do it, but that was more of a statement of his power as supreme system lord."

"And Yu does it as well." Daniel remarked, "and that may be all that it is. The equipment though, even though its not my area of expertise is of better quality. By all indications, Zeus's chosen are using armors we don't normally see outside of more elite troops."

"I'm sorry Doctor Jackson." Vidrine started, "I don't know what that means."

"When, we first encountered Apophis, his most elite cadre of serpent guards had armor that was constructed using a naquadah invested alloy. This allowed them to withstand fire arms much more effectively including from the M16. Sokar's necropolis guard, both in use by Sokar himself, and then Apophis," After the destruction of Netu, which General Bauer had been very interested in, "also demonstrated this, though it seems that Apophis can't produce these armors on his own, and as they're lost they're gone for good."

The prevalent thinking was Anker's 'Dragon beyond shadow', Zeus's acknowledged older brother was in fact Sokar. "I'm not going to complain," O'neill remarked. "So these 'Chosen' have that kind of armor."

"Colonel Makepeace actually believes it is better, O'neill." Teal'c replied tilting his head slightly.

Colonel Makepeace was actually off world still, and couldn't be recalled for this meeting, but his report had been relatively clear on what he had seen. "Svarog's Jaffa were still able to get through it, but it required them to be at what Makepeace described as spitting distance. "It looks like Zeus is organizing his Chosen into hundred, or a hundred twenty men groups, that form company like formations with command staff totaling about five hundred men." Jackson paused looking around, "Sorry Company is the wrong word in contemporary military group, I think the description Makepeace used was battalion."

"That's right for Marine and Army units," Simmons agreed, "But most of the Jaffa are fielding the same equipment, with limited modifications correct?"

"So far that we've seen."

Vidrine nodded, "Colonel," He turned to O'Neill, "Better armor, I can understand that you described the staff weapon as like a shotgun in report."

"Uh yeah, yes sir. The staff weapon," And Jack pointedly refused to say Ma'tok whenever he absolutely didn't have to, "is in many respects comparable to a shotgun. While accurate fire is possible, and Daniel had compared to napoleonic massed fired doctrine in ranks, its a bit like shooting skeet in my opinion. You can sweep the staff fire, and go on from there. It has a lot of the same downsides though, in my opinion sir." ... and that Teal'c wasn't a slouch on the skeet course probably helped that comparison for Jack.

Daniel Jackson nodded, "As I mentioned to Colonel O'neill though we're seeing reports of significant civil engineering projects on a scale that we haven't encountered among the goa'uld anywhere else. Its not just engineering though, we're seeing a uniform institution of Greco-Roman esque laws and administration, including the structure of multi planet provinces that are administered from a provincial capital and provinces coordinated at a... I'm loath to say national just yet, but a level above that of provincial."

By this point Hammond was well acquainted with the simple fact that Goa'uld didn't micromanage their imperial holdings. They might try and micromanage personnel projects, but most goa'uld had neither the temperament nor the talent to remain on task for the average work of running a government day to day.

Major General Bauer grimaced, "Not to diminish the importance of such changes, and what they might mean Doctor Jackson," and he did seem to an extent genuine about the regret, "But I'm a little more concerned about Sokar's ability to actually effect naval force projection than well, these other projects."

"I was getting to that," Daniel replied, "Because sir, quite frankly those other projects are allowing him to significantly step up naquadah, and what we have confirmed is trinium mining."

It was Vidrine's turn to look concerned. "That's news to me, this was confirmed recently then?" It was, Hammond suspected that the report on mining operations and other geological operations had probably been marked lower priority in the face of Osiris's flight from earth, and everything that had happened after. "These newer Ha'tak?"

"That's what we think its going to, sir." Major Carter replied. "They're a standardized design. The Goa'uld translation loosely can be thought to mean 'Improved', and they've replaced the volume of many smaller ship to ship guns in favor of a fewer number of larger more powerful ones."

There was some ruffling of papers, "Major," Colonel Kennedy was running fingers down a print out looking through something, "Isn't Cronus doing the same thing. What you're describing seems to be Dreadnoughts in the naval sense of ship evolution."

"No sir, well in a sense, yes sir. Cronus, presumably as a war time expediency has reintroduced a modernized Chel'tak. A Goa'uld ship that preceded the Ha'tak, and is a, for lack of a better term, Siege Ship, or gun platform. His 'new' Chel'tak aren't as well protected as Ha'tak, but they do mount heavier than standard guns on them. The only reason Apophis hasn't started fielding a new battleship design is most likely because we succeeded in sabotaging his prototype using the Atanik devices supplied by the Tok'ra." Jack scowled.

"Is it possible that that ship was something that Apophis stole from Sokar? We know that, we have observed Sokar constructed Ha'tak in Apophis's fleet have cloaking devices, or at least some of them do, and all observed have superior hyperdrive and weapons technology."

"Its possible," Carter replied, "But I was also going to say is that Apophis also seems to be, according to Tok'ra reports a new super dreadnought to serve as his flagship. It may even be operational already. Certainly they believe that this new flagship is nearing completion. There are reported similarities though its possible that's parallel development, and Apophis's flagship is project to be much larger. If both are originally Sokar designs, it would make sense according to what Teal'c has said."

"The System Lord Ptah has never particularly, ah, 'gotten on well'," Teal'c rumbled appropriating a 'Tauri idiom' he had picked up somewhere, "with his brother Apophis, and Apophis has never particularly had the patience for the process of research even though he has been willing to pursue such things from time to time. Given his imprisonment by Sokar, I doubt Apophis would have been able to pursue or finance such a project as those Major Carter has outlined. As we are not seeing such vessels in use by Heru'ur I do not believe they originated from Ptah's research, laboratories either." He declared. "I would think it quite likely Apophis has simply made off with them when he appropriated forces from Sokar after the destruction of Netu."

"And Heru'ur has been pursuing carrier doctrine," Kennedy added, "I've read about that. Its really quite interesting that he has an FtL capable shipyard. I really wish we knew more about that as well, or the fact that he was willing to build and supply warships to other goa'uld commercially." Of course that wasn't unheard of in Earth history either, and while Heru'ur was the main one, other goa'uld also were known to do it. It seemed as if Heru'ur filled the role of British shipyards supplying ships to greeks, and turks, and so on in the late 19th​, and early 20th​ centuries.

"So these improved Ha'tak are also bigger,"

"Somewhat sir," She replied, "However we're talking about a larger ship, by mass. There aren't any of the hollow superstructure spaces as with older Ha'tak. Looking at the readings the Tok'ra have taken, they seem to have sacrificed any priority to troop carrying. This is a dedicated space supremacy platform. The Tok'ra do say that the one they've observed carried more Alkesh, perhaps double, the number of a standard goa'uld mothership." Which could be big, or could mean little. "That isn't normal."

--
Commentary: Okay so it is c. late 2000 (It should be mid to late October) when this occurs. This may undergo further revisions, being as its largely the rest of the original tidings chapter with some extraneous material and other changes cut. The next chapter will carry us through Samhain and into November and expand on both the Apophis front, and the Jaffa rebellion brewing in the no man's land along Apophis's border with his neighbors.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Eventide
Part 1​

Stennos though lacked an abundant source of Naquadah, the mines had been played out long ago, and thus there would have been no easy way to make the jump to hyperspace faring civilization without offworld resources.
Societies developed certain ways for a reason. They were usually in response to a specific need, and as a result innovations tended to occur either in fits and starts. If not for the last years of fighting on the European continent, the Earth wouldn't have been nearly close to the position it was in... and that was probably as a result of the export of philosophical ideas from even earlier. The crumbling of the Roman empire on Earth had opened the way for an improvement in European agriculture, reforms of which Zeus had overseen on Stennos, and that were now being introduced throughout the provinces. That would mean, much as it had in western Europe more productive farms, and better diets, that would eventually mean healthier people, and the ability to better support specialist populations living in urban areas as well as the armies.


It was when you got down to it a matter of economics. A matter of supplying basic necessities to a degree that greater time could be spent making other goods. Such systems had already existed in less productive societies, but the galaxy at large was administered in a hands off inefficient, and non standardized manner, but one that could trade with planets across the galaxy so long as you could get the goods through a stargate. The goa'uld appreciated art, music, and other crafts even if they had no martial role it was something they encouraged, but pursuing labor saving had never really been a priority. Stennos was heavily populated by most goa'uld standards in no small part because Zeus had spent the five centuries since his crash landing working to build up a population to what on earth might have called a renaissance level tech base...


... the problem there, Oskyld recognized looking at the world from the bridge view display of the flagship... was that Stennos was not 15th​ century or 16th​ century Europe. There were lesser nations of humans on Stennos on previously un touched distant contintents but they weren't really equals... and given another fifty or sixty years Zeus probably would have been introducing corned gunpowder or even rifling and iron cannons simply for the novelty of advancement rather than in response to an actual threat that needed to be innovated against. That was why unlike on Earth there wasn't a similar issue.


For the goa'uld warfare was under Ra somewhat rigidly defined in terms of conduct and behavior, it kept casualties down and maintained the status quo. Staff weapons weren't really something a bronze age populace understood or could innovate against. Even if they could have that would have been discouraged by not simply the goa'uld, but Jaffa, or even human potentates. Transphase eradication rods weren't intended to to be staff weapon counters though, they were intended to fight a hostile outside force... and so the goa'uld didn't care as much. Zatnikatel were similarly a specialist weapon for a specialist task, and they were unnecessarily ornate and expensive. Zats unlike TERs were an unnecessary extravagance in a galaxy at war given they were rarely issued to any but the most senior Jaffa or very very rare specialists.


Oskyld half turned. "more suicide attacks?" His lips curled pulling back to bare long sharp canines in irritation.


"An ineffective strike my lord. The explosive used was of poor quality." Was the offered response.


That was irrelevant to the point. The first attack could have easily been dismissed as an idiot overcooking the grenade... theoretically that was possible with goa'uld grenades, in a similar manner as humans. Start the timer and then be a little slow after releasing, the problem had been attacks that hadn't involved goa'uld explosives... or rather proper goa'uld grenades.


Corned gunpowder returned to the forefront of his thinking. Ktano's rebels knew enough about chemistry to make an explosive, but not enough to make it safely or reliably or pure enough that... well it was still dangerous. Like Stennos, Hak'tyl had little in the way of reliable naquadah reserves, and Hak'tyl's population was as sparse as most under, undeveloped even goa'uld worlds... but that wasn't true for all of Forest Province. Making an attempt to steal naquadah made sense for Jaffa rebels, no doubt hoping to use the talents, the bars of naquadah to procure weapons and other supplies, as it did for anyone else hoping to raid planets known to mine the ore, or handle refining.


There were any number of potential solutions to this, but none of them really ideal. He needed the naquadah to feed to his shipyards, thus any kind of delay was undesirable, especially as most of the work was being structured, and resources allocated to make each provincial fleet domestically built... which had meant building new shipyards. Then those shipyards needed to produce Ha'tak, which of course needed naquadah.


It also just ran into the issue, of while K'tano's domain, and the retched stretch of space that formed the unclaimed or nominally independent planets situated between the space Oskyld had laid claim to and the Greek and Egyptian pantheons had the stargate to use for travel as well simply being close by relatively speaking. This was a nuisance he didn't need given that it wasn't just Cronus, and Apophis nearby. Heru'ur was relatively close, not as close as the other but enough that his frontage with Apophis was within striking distance of emerging standards for hyperdrive. Then of course there was also Cimmeria being in between his and Heru'ur's domain. Either reason was sufficient to deter him from moving ships off that front.
--
There were simply too many other things he would have preferred to have been spending his time on. He understood all the reason why someone wouldn't want to micromanage a multi planetary empire. This wasn't any thing like managing Arthas, where even at the end he'd managed a small continental expanse... a population of rough equivalent to the Roman Empire... and of course there was the reality that it hadn't been just humans. So administration wasn't completely alien. He'd been a sorcerous god king under the dark sun...


The thought prompted a ripple of magic to twist through the area. Plant growth followed, just as it had in channeling Isis blessing through a world scoured of green vegetation. It wasn't the only reason for the reaction though. The Egyptian new year tended to fall close to halloween. Though he hadn't enacted by his time on Athas, the souls he had expended to enact the great necromantic rite had already been accumulating, and that rite had fallen on Samhain. That Halloween night had been nearly a century ago now, but supplemented sorcerous god king mantle of power Athas had built... and of course the Jaffa had noticed.


Goa'uld meant children of the gods.


The investment of energy into the land, the tapping of faith had tangible effects on those who lived here, and years having passed since he had killed the golden calf and assumed his place as System Lord were readily obvious. The more skeptical might have questioned if it was really magic, but that didn't matter, the change was too hard to miss now.


Not when it was occurring right in the middle of the biggest festival Ishtar's priestesses organized in a year... and would last through the longest night of the year when the Raptors continued their celebrations that dated to Athas.
The goa'uld played at divinity, scrambling for the trinkets of the ancient race of ridiculously powerful precursors that had uplifted them for the sake of prestige, and thinking that they were supposed to rule the galaxy. Not that Oskyld had any interest in ruling the galaxy, he knew he wouldn't be here for that long, but chances were good that sooner or later the other system lords would start taking note of his burgeoning domain whether that happened while he was here or after Zeus assumed control of the whole domain dind't matter it was inevitable... and precautions needed to be taken.


He waved a hand and watched as the protective enclosures receded and projected the image of a world that had clearly suffered a much worse version of the space battle that had happened to Stennos. The Ancient repository even still digesting it told him all too well what the Eye of Balor was... of course it had only been through reviews of historical record of his cartouche of gate addresses that had yieled that find. Six control systems to regulate an Alteran vessel the size of a city, one capable of terraforming a world, or effectively rendering it to slag in short order. One of six eyes, and it wasn't hard to find the identities of the other six at the time either... Ra, Apophis, Osiris, Tiamat, Baal, and Balor. It was interesting... not the three for the Egyptian pantheon but the other half.


--
Commentary: This is the chapter that would take place between Tidings, and the events of the Episode the Tomb, during which the conflict between Heru'ur and Apophis escalates (more on that next) and of course the fact that a lot of the goa'uld don't do science even if they understand how to make the gate work, and even fix it to an extent when it does break down.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Eventide Part 2​

She had to remind herself that regardless of the clarity of the images she watched that this was neither the past, nor that the battle was close. The edge in individual power of the great ships lay with the uncle. Apophis's fleet across the border, many stars distant, engaged the much more numerous ships of his nephew. The general consensus though was that Heru'ur could better sustain the losses he was suffering.


Losses that would have been an unfathomable measure of wealth a few short years ago, but beyond that was the devastation rained down on the helpless world below. It was no secret that both System Lords had bombarded several planets of the other from orbit by this point, but this wasn't even that. Scoured by star fire ships from both sides listed painfully from the battle line, and even more fraught vessels had begun to slip descending into the planet's gravity well, the sensors forcing them to watch in slow motion as they plunged towards the planet's surface where they would come to a sudden inevitable stop.


There was nothing to be done. Ishtar again reminded herself that they were safely on this side of the border light years away from Apophis, and Heru'ur's fleets did battle. Though she had not used the oratory to inquire, she had heard from other that the situation was much the same on Apophis's front against his ancient rival the titan Cronus. The scale of this war had long eclipsed all that she had known.


Only a desperate fool would have hoped for hospitality in Moloch's domain so long as the golden calf had still existed, but desperation, the privation of the war between gods made many refugees. This was not the sort of war Moloch would have been suited to fighting, but then this was no longer his domain. Even now she sat on the dais of the oratory of one of the great warships that had emerged from the Dragon's shipyards. The same class of improved Ha'tak as served as the vessel of command the lord of thunderbolts lead his campaign from. An honor not lost on her fellow Jaffa, who clamored for the inevitable war that was sure to be in planning stages now.


There could be no other explanation of course, even now the lord of the Underworld's younger brother clearly longed to begin what would surely be a greater campaign still than pacifying the borderlands. The lord of thunderbolt's chosen however had made clear that there was still much work to be done, especially as those marcher worlds were brought into the fold. The humans of Stennos were craftsmen par excellence, knowing their trades and work far better than any humans who had ever breathed Moloch's air, and even now toiled to lay roads which would carry the supplies of many cohorts of Jaffa, as well as of course human auxiliaries. That was of course only natural.


Some of her sisters suspected that the only reason they were not marching to the war Zeus desired was the Dragon's focus on the demonic swarm of insects across the hindi border lands. The Reetou still occasionally preyed upon Jaffa, but were just as often prey to the Unas legions who guarded worlds at the Dragon's command. That was however a conflict against the most unclean of creatures, and not the war between gods that she was watching play out. A conflict that was in fact worsening and showed no signs of waning. Just as the Falcon lord built up his fleet to match his uncle's numbers, so too did the Dragon's shipyards continue to build the great bones of new ships as well.


She turned back to the clarity of the image before her, and watched Heru'ur's superior numbers, and the masses of alkesh they had carried into battle secured the Falcon's victory over his uncle, if at a steep price.


--
Oskyld flexed his hands, revealing the thicker bones and musculature that reinforced a manakete's scything talons extending them. The Reetou shrieked before one of its nyphm like wings was ripped clear. Lightning bubbled from his outstretched hand catching another of the alien bugs. The Reetou were not a product of natural evolution, any more than Jaffa were, or for that matter the modern Goa'uld subspecies that dominated the galaxy. The product of artificial cultivation, and intervention by something more.


He done enough autopsies to confirm that suspicion, and was sure of it.


It took several minutes to finish slaughtering the mass of would be insect assassins, leaving the room caked in charred chitnious debris from the latest bit of best control. The indication that there were no more was confirmed as the Jaffa recovered. The vibrations of the reetou no longer occurring, as that oscillation required them to still be breathing. The Dragon allowed his immaterial energy form to solidy back into the rest of his physical body.


Phillip Alexander bowed the human general having been unaffected by the reetou but able to do little productive in the fight. The communication flashed opening the subspace channel to Zeus's flagship. "Hail," He greeted settling into the throne, its back illuminating as gate builder pattern sensors came to full power. It was a pity of course that the Asgard database had no indication of the Reetou as a species, the Alteran database was not quite as useless... but its nearest match to the Reetou was a dead world, and one that had been destroyed well before the Goa'uld had risen to galactic prominence... so that had been no help.


Zeus gave a gallic shrug, "were that I bore glad tidings, all the hives of these insects to which I have smote have been far too young and small to be their origin home." There was presumably a central hive, or at the very least some series of large hives, but it was also true that Zeus's mission was to secure the frontier. It was not a core objective to find the Reetou in particular.


This was one more problem he really would have preferred not to have, especially with the way the system lords on his borders were throwing down. It had gone well beyond just accidents or intentional orbital bombardment. Nuclear booby traps, and reports of chemical weapons had begun to circulate... that had probably begun with Apophis, but likely now included reprisals by Cronus, and likely if not Heru'ur himself his sub lord Montu. That along with this latest Reetou incursion was of course on top of his planned overtures to his other neighbors to open up trade with the Celtic pantheon.


The connection remained open though. "What is it?"


"Nirrti's laboratory, and her notes speak at some length of her mother."


Oh, "That is a problem then." and one technically the charter which organized the system lords should have 'merited' bringing to the council... not that anyone did.

 

[Imperator Pax]

--
Eventide Part 3​

Staff blasts sizzled through the air as Jaffa fired in ranks, at least this was between Jaffa, Ishtar considered. This was honorable combat against a peer. Some pride could be taken in this struggle... it was not the battle against the Reetou.


... and it was not a battle determined by the great ships. It was not rebels seeking plunder, but rather a battle between the Jaffa of separate system lords.


Isthar told herself these things even as the ranks of Cronus's jaffa, and those of his long time rival, attacked on another. Apophis's ranks included the determined number of jaffa who wore the mark of Sokar on their brow, and armor that seemed a poor imitation though similar in girth to those worn by the raptors...


The jaffa of Cronus, and his Grandson Ares did not have any who copied the styles of Zeus's elite. No pigeon breasted plates of naquadah alloy were worn by those men leading in the front.


The orrery flickered as men advanced volleys across the field, but it was impossible to tell who was winning in the fray. Cronus, and Apophis seemed evenly matched. In other battles, and perhaps overall the Titan, especially with his kin joining the battle, had the weight of numbers and perhaps that was how meant to secure victory. To wear Apophis's ranks away with time. The war already encompassed an unfathomably great number of Jaffa already.


The armies were tens of thousands of Jaffa strong on each side. All Jaffa, that wasn't counting the multitudes of human auxiliaries, and never mind the supporters who were not warriors themselves. The uniform numbers of Jaffa in chainmail and coif, and only a small few with the great helms of the serpent guard fell among the reed fields. There was no cover provided, and the ground they had closed in on each was spongy slowing their advance even beyong the usual march.


Many would die.


Her attention tore away from the magical view of a distant world's battlefield, and the arrival of one of her fellow soritas. The Hak'tyl priestess look tired, and irritated, Neith shook her head and complained, but then regarded the battle, "The men adopt well to some of the changes, and poorly to the others."


Not that they didn't attempt to conceal the latter from the eldest lord of indeterminable darkness. The Chosen of Zeus were much more outspoken when they misliked it, and oddly fond of long drawn out debates and rhetoric. The extreme was odd, but unique to Zeus's most favored subjects. The majority of the changes though brought by the death god, and his younger brother were changes Ishtar welcomed, even if she didn't understand all of them, or the many of hte rituals of the Dragon's Raptors. Zeus's chosen were human at least, odd as it might have been they were close enough to be understood.


"Is Nirrti responsible for the Reetou scourge?"


Anker stirred from his torporous sitting, the sin eater turning its crocodilian head towards the two priestesses, "The Dragon holds the evidence she has merely exasperated the situation. Not that her antics are the origin." The Prelate had been in tune with the orrery as well and so deeply unified with the divine machinery that she had forgotten the Unas had been present at all.


--
In a temper tantrum more likely to have been associated with Baal, or even Ra for that matter Apophis had nuked a series of worlds in order to deny them to his rivals. It wasn't really news any more that kind of escalation had become something of the norm for the conflict... which made the other system lords concerned. What they didn't care about was the stream of people fleeing the war, and the mass of Jaffa being recruited for criminal or even rebellious groups in the desperation.


Moving into the territory ran into the real politik issue of encroaching on the border, or worse a competing system lord, or one of their commanders assuming he was taking size. It was prevailing reason not to move against K'tano's domain, but as the months had dragged on, and it became increasingly hard to ignore the reports he wondered why the goa'uld hadn't made a move. The paralysis was presumably born out of one part realpolitik, and realistically the fact K'tano had only unseated a minor goa'uld. He was a much less grave threat, a nuisance really, compared to risking involvement in what was proving to be an increasingly bloody conflict.


That and there was the exterior threat of the Reetou were implacable. K'tano was somewhere in Imhotep's former dominion, located in a no man's land, but in theory the system lords as a body could have all agreed to hunt him down... fat chance of that right now.


... and of course they had other problems, "Well that isn't concern in the slightest either," He muttered.


"Sarcasm is a base form of humor," Zeus complained, "But I concur, it explains the success of Nirrti's bio weapon programs, or for that matter especially her greater success in human modifications compared to Olokun or Pelops."


He growled reflexively. Nirrti had a border with Cronus, any kind of alteran artifact would have potentially drawn him, or her other former neighbors crawling into that region of space far far faster than a response to 'some upstart rebel' like K'tano. "That will have to be found and secured." It was useful, or potentially so for a number of things, but especially keeping it out of the hands of anyone else. "It explains also her... symbiote breeding project."


"Indeed, and its failure." Nirrti had plenty of experience, going back thousands and thousands of years on human modifications, and working on simpler organisms. "She's running head long into Alteran fail safes with no real knowledge how to interact with those markers... hence the runaway aggression triggered by hormone imbalance. A relatively minor problem compared to other potential side effects."


"Well it confirms at least that she isn't in active contact with a gatebuilder," That was something of a small relief at least. Still this presented more of a headache since they would have to move forces back into Nirrti's domain and potentially draw the attention of her neighbors the system lords Kali, and Bastet. They in turn had a border with Heru'ur's domain through what had at one point been the domain of the System Lord Sobek, now deceased.


... of course on the other side of that strip of space belonging to Heru'ur was a strip of space claimed by his uncle, and Apophis while not necessarily exploding any stargates was hitting planets with weapons only relatively smaller than what was necessary to destroy a gate. So effectively anything coming to light might very well bring in all three belligerents in short order.


"What shall we do?"


This would have been much simpler if their largest concern had been the ships of Nirrti's fleet which were still at large, but that was the question what to do? He waved a hand activating the holographic display... he had been hoping that Zeus's return would let them pivot to deal with the Reetou problem... but there had been no material leads to the investigation of their homeworld either. Idly he would have been focusing on the next flight of standard Ha'tak being constructed, and... "Standard Ha'tak should attract less attention from our neighbors than the improved versions, and it isn't as if we're expected to hold territory." A standard Ha'tak carried Alkesh, and Tel'tak which were both hyperspace capable. "It will take time though, the latest Ha'tak," Had been intended to fill out the provincial fleets on the other side from the Forest and Wind Provinces. "I'll see to the work, but if she's concealed it this long..." he willed the master cartouche into existence, and then to cross reference it with the Asgard cartouche looking for worlds with known gate builder planets within Nirrti's former domain. The long strings of gate addresses resolved itself, and he paused... and there was no assurance she hadn't not publicly claimed a world, and kept it hidden during Ra's reign from the other system lords. He adjusted the list criteria bringing up a map of that part of the Milk Way.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Relics Part 1

​

Assuming his grasp of the calendar line up with earth was accurate, December was fast approaching. Zeus had departed across the border with what had been Nirrti's realm with ships intended for Thunder Province's provincial fleet, but hopefully they would be able to act quickly. In theory the improved hyperdrive would permit ships to move around, and return to reinforce as necessary but they would see. Oskyld ran his fingers over the crystal, and frowned. Even by itself a technically Goa'uld could very well have used it to potentially dangerous results improving a ship... but the only system lord with the technical acumen to do that was probably Ptah... and Ptah by all indication would have spent the time instead studying the crystal for novelty of it, and trying to learn everything he could about the computer's programing and the heuristics used in power management.


As far as gate builder technology went though it was positively ancient... dating to a time when the Alteran had still be sending out seed ships to terraform the galaxy and 'correct', reorder the galaxy to be more habitable for the life forms the Alterans wanted to study... it was unfortunate that their records about the unmodified state of the galaxy before the mass terraforming were sparse, barely footnotes in the archive at best.


He suspected that Balor had been able to use a fraction of Eye's power and that explained the graveyard of ships over his former capital, and the ones that had fallen down into the gravity well of the planet with the thousand changes of the seasons since then. It had been a potential explanation for Zeus's Asgard 'chariot' having been destroyed, but it was a lead that didn't seemed to have panned out... there wasn't enough information to conclusively say it wasn't, but it seemed unlikely. Admittedly, Oskyld recognized that someone might have used another of the six eyes, or none of them at all... they might never have a satisfactory answer and the passage of time may well have erased that enemy. The last great potentate of the Celtic System Lords though had been on the far edge of range for what Oskyld had considered a reasonable hyperspace cruise for the ambush... and he was fairly certain that Dagda and Manaan's revolt predated the attack on Zeus. It had been worth investigating Magitireth as well, even if the official reason for the vist was to restore some degree of habitability to the world ...even if the planet was itself slowly recovering on its own.
Ordinarily another few hundred years of the natural ecosystem stitching itself back together would have been nothing to a system lord but that was before the war, and before Ra's downfall at the Tauri before that.


The treaty with the humans probably would have been a greater priority if Apophis was not tied down fighting both Cronus, and Heru'ur. There was limited concern Apophis would spin off the necessary ships to attack Earth, but it didn't hurt to keep an eye in that direction. There had been no further sign of the ship that had belonged to Osiris either, which was unfortunate. The System Lords as a collective body had acknowledged the information, but had not acted on it. It was unlikely Osiris was in a position to do much though, not with much of Ra's domain having been picked over by the system lords in the intervening space of years.
Years. Decades even were the sort of mentality that the goa'uld operated under. That had b een fostered by the efforts of the system lords to maintain the status quo. He was going to have to rely on a technical solution to Magiteth's problem showing up and using a planetary scale alchemy array to fix the problem, even ones deployed via starship would raise far far more questions than he wanted to answer from an associate, and certainly not from any of the other goa'uld in the celtic pantheon never mind any of their neighbors.


"The carrier design will be able to carry and then resupply with its standard load out in short order." More specifically because Alkesh were already hyperspace capable the Alkesh could remain on their side of the border, and be able to return if something came up.


The Raptor Exarch clasped its fist to its chest in solemn acknowledgement. Sibir would be commanding the wing aboard the carrier, even if he was sending Ishtar as nominal command of the vessel at large.


The shape of the ship was broadly similar to the in-service I-class, and he had tried to maintain as much cross compatibility as possible but the central pyramid had been replaced by a more saucer like top and bottom section. Like the I's in theory it could still land on a body of water on a planet's surface, but the round base was not suited for putting it on the ground. That wasn't the only trade off of course, the change in base alignment had also meant reducing the number of new 'dreadnought' large 'caliber' plasma cannons as well... but in theory it would be this line of ship development that might result in developing a cloak device for capital ship size vessels that could then be applied to the new standard flights, and the standard base Ha'tak. That was not to say it suffered from the same problem of being under gunned as the older Cheops.


He glanced to the white painted superstructures of the hull, with their gold trim. "This mission is both to shore up," to complete the agreed upon, "Trade arrangements and also one part demonstration of power." He wasn't expressly allying with the phantom queen, not militarily in any sense, but she was her mother's regent and that made her a valuable source for new symbiotes... though he was having to keep those separate from symbiotes sourced elsewhere. The larval goa'uld were too prone to frenzying even without Nirrti's modifications, never mind his own additions. The trade had other values besides, but in particular gave him the public answer to a problem Moloch had never been able to satisfactorily answer for his jaffa.


That was simply part and parcel of being a system lord. The public perception of power was important both from below, and from his peers. He would not be making the trip in person, nor did he expect the appearance of any of Morrigan's court. This would be strictly handled, bluntly that Ishtar would take the cluster of ships escorting her, say some pretty words and the ship would handle the automated dispersal of Alteran terraforming systems to begin the process of among other things fixing the planet's atmosphere, clearing and then reseeding the barren ash strewn surface to engender a return to green arable future farmland.


It was theater in another sort of way as well. Barring the very odd goa'uld who did actually believe technology were the same thing, this demonstration would further cement the appearance to the system lords of great technology, and thus make them less likely to believe in magic, while of course 'great magic' would only reinforce the beliefs of human, and jaffa solidifying his mystique. It was important political theater to cover other actions.


2001 was going to be an interesting year.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Relics Part 2​

For as long as she had known there had only for a 'proper' System Lord been a single vessel to form the core of a fleet. The Ha'tak had risen to prominence centuries before her birth, and never had she expected to see them replaced in general service. It was true that Ra commanded from a cheops, as much a show of the Sun Gods status, and other goa'uld had built great flagships to demonstrate their wealth, but the ha'tak was the ship class that had for centuries been the standard warship of a system lord fleet.


It was the vessel of choice, and a show of wealth and power. This was the second new class of vessel larger than the standard Ha'tak she had found herself aboard. Unlike most of the Dragon's new greater Ha'tak the new ship had been painted white with gold trim, excepting the black superstructure, in contrast to what had become standard of dark red enamel like color. It wasn't just the exterior of the ship, the entire interior of the great barque was substantially brighter in color with white walls prevailing.


It had occurred to one of her sisters that the change in appearance was likely a gesture of diplomacy, an idea that Ishtar had considered something of an absurd notion on its face. The Dragon's main battle fleet were in the dark red, and black color scheme, while the reserves of older pattern Ha'tak, remained gold and black, but it was also true that the lord of thunderbolts preferred a white base scheme for his own fleet. The white was less of a stark and unyielding color scheme, and might very well have been chosen as a gesture of geniality.


Of course at the same time, while it carried fewer guns and supposedly less armor, the still armored carrier still mounted enough of the newer larger guns to reduce a typical ha'tak to free floating slag in short order... if anything were to go wrong. Not that she suspected Arawn's most fleet ships would be able to catch the Dragon's detachment. The Skull Lord might not try, or might only do so if prompted by his own liege, but Arawn was widely regarded as the greatest master of the arcane of the pantheon once headed by Dagda, and with a viciously curious nature.


Moloch had once attempted to breach the nominal underlord's domain and had returned shaken and ghastly at the horrific creatures in service to the skull lord. The hounds of arawn were said to have been crafted by the magiks of the ancient goddess who had raised Arawan, and taught him his magics and were thought near to unkillable, but they were preciously few and Arawn like Ptah, and Thoth in the Pantheon of Ra had little expressed interest in martial combat and conquest of his neighbors... which was why Arawn was underlord to Manaan mac Liir.


Ishtar had always considered that strange... but then Dadga, the Celtic Pantheon was had always been strange by the standards of the Goa'uld dominions. They recognized, or had recognized, peaceably Ra's right as Supreme System Lord, and had confined themselves to their insular realm of stars. Moloch had been the oddity she supposed. It would explain the loathing his fellow gods had so self evidently displayed to the worlds.


She stared out at the ocean of passing stars curtained by the corridor of hyperspace, tinted ocean green by the fact the ship's shields remained at combat readiness despite travelling beyond the boundary of light's speed.


--
"I'm telling you Danny," Jack huffed and cut himself off. Daniel didn't understand... he half doubted even Carter didn't understand. Not really. The truth was he'd have preferred the Russians had just outed the Stargate program... oh there would have been a congressional hearing sure, but then it would have been out there. Even if there was another Church commission it would be over and done with. They, the Russians, would have had no leverage.


The threat though of the black mail, and having to actually to come to deal with the black swan of what all the outing of that information would mean. It was absolutely a political question, but Jack was willing to admit that he wasn't used to it. The CIA liked being able to keep secrets just for the sake of keep secrets. It had been that way Vietnam, and throughout his stint with agency operations through the eighties.


"The agreement with the Russians says we will share intelligence and scientific discoveries based off of the use of the stargate."


"Yeah didn't we tell the Brits the same thing about the A-Bomb?" Jack replied snarkily, "I don't think anyone was thrilled when we held stuff back, but not telling the Russians some of this stuff makes sense."


"Why Jack? The cold war is over... and whether you like it or not I hate to say it but they have not access to the German Stargate program notes, and who knows what's in there, but Britsky's publications up until they stopped definitely suggests that at least some of their academia were making progress towards the same sort of discoveries that lead Kathryn to recruit me into the Stargate program." Daniel shook his head, "Its not just the water gate event we want to avoid, we want to make sure there isn't another Seth, and chances are there are a lot more goa'uld artifacts left on earth than we know. Cooperation makes sense here, especially I remind you, you're the one who said Maybourne's story didn't make sense."


He didn't appreciate that speculation being thrown back at him, but it was true Maybourne's alleged defection didn't add up. He figured it was much more likely the NID had been attempting to get a dependable mole inside Russian intelligence presumably out of the same reasons Daniel had just outlined, that there were alien artifacts on earth left over from the original goa'uld time on the planet. Maybe he was just being suspicious but Maybourne had too many ... odd conveniences, and too much support after he'd disappeared. The timing was particularly a red flag, Maybourn just happens to defect to the soviets... the Russians, "It doesn't," He grunted. "But I don't like this whole exchange idea, and regardless of whether or not they're being cleared for the base or not," And it wasn't like he hadn't been given the Utah Nuclear speech already, but, "I don't like it." He was half tempted to utter beware greeks baring gifts, "Just its bad timing, they're just now all of sudden wanting to share information and access, what's the game?"


"Most likely its they have there own cartouche," He replied. "Probably not a large one, but the implication I take from some of Britski's translations from digs done in the Levant, and Mesopotamia in the eighties suggest he might have been finding what were actually goa'uld sites. Ra's cartouche was much more complete than what we normally see on goa'uld worlds," Abydos had been important to Ra, and they hadn't gotten a chance to find Apophis's equivalent but Teal'c and Bratac, and Selmak and some of the other Tokra, Jack would grudgingly admit, had helped them start to identify the affiliations of various worlds. "There is also the chance that the Nazis managed to get the gate working, either they had a list or managed to connect via random dialing and could have an address that way. Regardless we're also looking at worlds right now that are all on the border or contested territory."
--
Commentary: While I won't be covering Chaka or Tyler on screen Ktau's events will make an appearance from Zeus's perspective, and Orlin will talk to Sam shortly. Then we will move on to Nirtii and the Tomb. Season 5 of SG 1, which speaking of 5 and for that matter 6 its interesting on the rewatch of how real life didn't seem to rewrite the plot any. I mean yes the War in Afghanistan is clearly occurring but unlike other US mil centric shows of the period we don't get any real commentary on the towers or the invasion of Afghanistan which would have occurred presumably late in 5.

Additional notes, Fed Ex alleges my BattleTech Wave 2 KS stuff will finally be arriving this afternoon.... we're not going to even mention how many boxes that is... that will not effect October's schedule. I've got a schedule for the month most outlined (except the last couple of days in October not allocated) I'll be sticking to that, but I will probably be make revisions to my 'standard update' pattern in November, on top of it looking likely that my Pathfinder Kingmaker story will be getting its own thread. Details will be forthcoming.

 

[NakedFury]

Sweet loot! Enjoy that sweet delicious smell of awesome that comes from opening successful kickstarter boxes.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Relics Part 3​

"The alien came back," Kennedy didn't seem thrilled by it. The whole Velona debacle, and the loss of what had been an example of a surface to orbit weapon system capable of destroying a goa'uld invasion fleet would have been a big win for the SGC, and the Air Force. "Major you have to stop bringing home strays." He muttered in a tone that would have been completely out of line at the pentagon but seemed more acceptable deep under NORAD away from the censors of DC. The colonel leaned back and shook his head.


Hammond didn't censure him, but cleared his throat, "What did Orlin have to say Major Carter?"


There was a rippling of light that clashed with the overhead tube lighting of the briefing room thirty storeys beneath the mountain... and that Colonel O'neil might be the only officer in the room to be armed, in itself a violation of base safety regulations... and that the nearest armed air men were outside a sealed door intended to prevent eavesdropping or surveillance of other sorts. "Merely that something is very wrong with the galaxy general." Orlin was far from an imposing figure he looked like a beach bum if Hammond were going to be entirely honest. He didn't look like a threat, certainly not a physical threat, but he had just appeared as if by magic in a sealed and supposedly secured briefing room.


Kennedy asked the question he would have if the younger man hadn't beaten him to it, "Well what does that mean?"


"Its ... complicated?" Orlin glanced up to the ceiling, "I can't easily explain it, your understanding of the universe is so primitive." O'neill gave him a flat look from across the table, and Hammond had noticed that Jack's hands were under the table, "Its..." Orlin hadn't noticed or if he had he didn't show it instead lost in his thoughts, "A tangible presence in the galaxy. Our kind, the others like me, we lived on this world... a long time ago. The thing, out there is like us, different, maybe another like us but from a different group."


"Another group of Ancients?"


"Yes, that's," Orlin brightened immeasurably, "That's an excellent way to simplify this... Its like another group of us has returned. Someone is out there acting, acting in a way that the others don't approve of." He shook his head, "I mean you can feel it in the way the galaxy moves now, well you can't feel it literally but imagine if you could someone was changing the gravitational constant, and not in a standard deviation, it was just changing intermittently and to different values."


Hammond assumed that was supposed to be a metaphor, but all the same didn't like how Major Carter's eyes were bugging out, "So what are you saying Orlin? Who or what is doing this?"


"We don't know. There are accusations being thrown around right now, even as we speak between the others." Orlin frowned, "Even among us higher beings, there is mistrust right now, suspicion about how this is playing out."


"Could it be one of the ascended?" Daniel Jackson asked.


"If one of the collective was acting we'd know about it. Even if we couldn't directly stop it from occurring we would know about a direct usage. I suppose that's the biggest issue of concern if there are other groups acting now."


The discussion had now monopolized the briefing room, taking over from what should have been relatively normal business involved in the operations of Stargate Command.
--
Zeus watched the ship move away. K'tau had been a world taken from Ra by Odin thousands of years ago, and incorporated into the protected planets treaty by the Peace of Tonsberg over a thousand years earlier. It had allowed what had at one point been a rather typical world of humans transplanted from the Nile delta, and then later infused with norwegians, swedes and danes to go from a basic bronze age civilization to one a few centuries ahead of where Stennos had stood prior to the Empire's establishment.


Ktau was still largely agrarian with only the most basic measure of steam power, and ability to harness natural running water for industrial use, but compared to how most of the galaxy was... well Zeus had been impressed. As he watched the ship make the jump to light speed he wondered what had caused the malfunction of the Gate network in the first place that had led to the stellar instability. The Alteran network, the stargate network, was famously reliable with many redundant safety systems that it shouldn't have permitted a connection to cause a problem like that... and the truth was that the Asgard ship should not have legally intervened without contacting the system lords.


... unless perhaps there was evidence of goa'uld responsibility, which seemed unlikely Few Goa'uld would have done something as complex as destabilizing a star even those with the technical acumen... indeed even the ones with the technical acumen understood best that if they did try and do that it was very likely result in a concerted effort by their neighbors to disabuse them of such at the point of a sword. The danger to Ktau had been averted and no one seemed any wiser, and that was probably for the best, and as the ship's signature moved further away Zeus returned his attention else where... to matters closer to home... or rather the matters of the Front.


In Goa'uld terms eighty thousand fully armed Jaffa was quite an army, and that was not counting human auxiliaries or laborers to support the army. That was a vulnerability he recognized as deep in Nirrti's domain as they were. He had to be constantly on his guard for any signs of plague or other diseases showing itself in his support personnel even as the troops scoured for signs of what they were looking for... at least evidence of such.


Too many of Nirrti's worlds had shown to host abominations and disease from her failed experiments, and Zeus cursed the witch and her ancient mother for their ventures regardless of whatever grand design they pursued in their work's course. Nirrti was still out there of course, not that he was concerned the Saurians even now kept vigil against cloaked foes... not just Nirrti of course but the Reetou, they had also been a problem... and the fleet was prepared to deal with any incursion of Ha'tak... whether Nirrti returning or one of her neighbors coming to investigate what it was they were doing.


One system lord investigating would very likely lead to others taking notice, even if they hadn't noticed the initial investigation. The longer this dragged on the less likely it was that they would be able to find any ancient artifacts that had been in Nirrti's possession without getting into a fight over their ownership... and of course any battle would surely culminate in a naval engagement all too likely to reveal the capability of the fleet to other system lords. That was attention that they did not need for their cause.


He adjusted the Alteran developed sensors of the great capital ship and watched Asgard ship. It dropped out of light speed in the Adara system, and Heimdall's ship returned to what must have presumably been an asgard facility in the milky way. He would have liked to reach out to the scientist, to the federation as a whole, to promise a solution to the problems of the race... but not yet. They weren't there yet.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Relics Part 4​

Orlin shook his head, "Sorry I wasn't a biologist." He replied, even as Fraiser checked Cassie's forehead again. "I recognize some of it, but in this form I just don't have the full resources that would potentially address it." It in this case was whatever mengelian retrovirii that Nirrti used to experiment on Cassie's people. Fraiser's adopted daughter insisted on needing to return to her world but that wasn't an option at the moment.


Jack banged through the doorway with Teal'c, "We found a goa'uld lab. Teal'c says that Nirrti's research was chase a mythic type of human, a Hok'tar. Trying to make some kind of super host it sounds like."


Orlin quirked an eyebrow, "Hok'tar?" he shook his head.


"That mean something to you?"


"Its a butchering of a concept. Your species Samantha is a parallel development, not really a natural one that in many respects mimics our own form. A second evolution of our form of being, and some members of my race wanted to expedite the process of evolution. To make you more like us." He glanced at O'neill, "Obviously it was never entirely successful, but the goal must have been passed down to the goa'uld by the faction that left this Nirrti to her own devices."


"Look there was a lot of stuff there that I wasn't comfortable messing with, given Nirrti nerve gassed the planet, for I remind you for no good reason, but there might be something there. Hammond wants to send SG 7 back there to start cataloging the whole site, see if we can't find something but lets say he's right," He jerked his head in Orlin's direction, "Nirrti trying to speed along evolution via human experimentation makes sense, but Cronus threw her in Jail."


"She is believed to have escaped when Apophis's forces broke the cordon around Tartarus last year."


Jack shrugged, "Ok, sure Tee, but that doesn't help us. Its a big galaxy out there, and none of us are really suited to doing it ourselves, and we don't have time to hunt her down." After all if the Goa'uld were still looking for Osiris Nirrti was certainly going to still be someone they'd be looking for after she managed to slip Cronus's super prison.


"What are you suggesting O'neill?"


"We call Thor," He shrugged, "I think I can call in a favor at least, and its not like the goa'uld can complain about this sort of thing right?" The other members of SG 1 nodded, and Hammond when broached on the subject had no objections. The only real issue was the fact that they had to end up going to yet another world to ring the Asgard home galaxy.


"O'neill, greetings," Thor said, and a second gray form Asgard raised a hand in salute, "This is Heimdall he is one of the finest of our people's genetic researchers."


"Humans of SG 1 I hope I will be of assistance, you spoke of a laboratory from whence the goa'uld Nirrti was conducting research on the humans of Hanka?"
--
Oskyld frowned, "Interesting." He remarked. Not that it was surprising per se. The Asgard bases for lack of a better description in the Milky way were kept separate of the protected planets treaty, but Thor's vessel had gone to Adara first and then there. That may have really meant nothing at all, but presumably there was some permanent Asgard presence at whatever facility was there that had warranted stopping there rather than going directly to Earth.


It wasn't actually a violation of the protected planets treaty... or he had no reason to suspect it to be. He could still have justified investigating, but wasn't going to. That would have tipped his hand regarding hyperspace speeds his ship was capable of... and of course dialing in and asking what was going on, would have revealed potentially something about his monitoring of the galaxy at large, or at the very least of Earth. Especially given the stop into Nirrti's domain and then the return to Earth.


Zeus was correct in wanting to wait... or rather not so much wanting to weight as that they dind't have a choice, they just weren't yet in a position to where they could act. They needed time, and having an ancient genetic resequencer would certainly help the attempts to reconstruct and reform a serious damaged genome. The other option, and one he was surprised that the Asgard hadn't done was to construct a time dilation field and simply reconstruct the whole genomic sequence down the basic protein or something.... given their technology and no other options Oskyld was relatively sure that that would have been how he would have done it. The only thing they could do for the moment was to bide their time and focus on the more pressing matter of coalescing the empire into a coherent entity while their neighbors bled each other white.


On that front things were getting desperate, really more desperate. Apophis's desperation, his willingness to resort to scorched earth tactics with increasing frequency over the last two years had likely killed millions. He didn't have the industrial base to match Heru'ur and it was showing as well, even without recognition that he was in a war with Cronus at the same time. With Ra gone there was no one with sufficient political acumen to arbitrate, and well frankly the Hindu pantheon had to contend with the problem of the Reetou as well, as did their neighbors. That was a conflict most of the other system lords were willing to put off simply because Kali and Bastet seemed to have things well in hand. The Reetou were losing and lacked the power to meaningfully threaten the systems lords as a whole causing most focus to remain on the multipolar conflict of apophis heru'ur and Cronus.


What was largely slipping beneath the notice of the politics of empires run by unscrupulous god kings in the paranoid regarding of their rivals was the crisis of the refugee. The displacement, the hemorrhaging of displaced persons into the hinterlands between empires... and that those people made excellent recruiting by rebels and traitors. Osiris's escape from earth had initially led to no signs, but then like Hathor had apparently done she had begun to recruit Jaffa into her service. That was something of a known development but as Osiris had no known fleet they had no way of tracking the exile's movements, merely that she had begun the process of building up a power base. It seemed unlikely she was the only one with the System Lords distracted it seemed there were a number of other little breakaway sects, and minor goa'uld who felt now was their time to carve out their own little fiefdoms.


He was more than willing to let them divide up the no man's land between the great realms that still remained from the Pax Re. They created buffer states while he industrialized... as much as that term could actually be used, as he invested in developing the eight provinces and built the shipyards necessary to prepare the necessary ships to defend them. The Reetou threat's continued existence had been opportune as an excuse to relocate all stargates into the ... much as he loathed the description maya ball court structures under the vigil of Raptors to insure no cloaked enemies came through the stargate.


That was where things stood. Zeus nodded, and gestured towards the holographic display, "Most of the evidence I've found are of copies from Nirrti's lab." Attempts to recreate Alteran medical technology were not unknown, the goa'uld had been doing it for thousands of years, and ranged from the common hand healing device, to the much more impressive sarcophagus. It was simply part and parcel of a greater trend in copying Ancient technology wherever possible, "The master copy remains elusive." He continued unnecessarily, "But it is obvious that someone has been here before us. Nirrti's labs showed recent use at least as residence, if perhaps not as scientific outposts."


"Any further bio weapon attacks?"


"Nothing that can be identified as an active attack. Nirrti seems to have recklessly permitted experimental escapades to flourish in the wild in hopes of seeing what results might occur. Interviews with many different populations also speak of a disease among human children called the mind fire, which seems too coincidental to not be related to her experiments."


"Is there something else?"


"The conflict across our borders cannot last much longer," Zeus remarked, "I expect that we will not have much longer until peace must be made," Or another round of escalation began, "Sooner or later though we will realistically have to contend with a challenge from a nominal peer."


Because once Apophis was defeated, and that did seem the most likely outcome the System Lords would likely feel the ened to suss out a new hiarchy and it was doubtful that they would simply leave him in peace to build his empire, "I," He frowned, unlike the goa'uld Oskyld was capable of turning faith into magic, providing divine magic and spells to his clerics, and so forth... and the spheres of magic around each world that that faith generated gave him an idea of events there that as it developed in turn enveloped solar systems and eventually merged with the other neighboring systems into increasingly larger bubbles... that gave him a much much better idea of social events than the average goa'uld who still needed to actually talk to his priests or jaffa... or have a complex spy apparatus in place ... if you were Kali.


--
Commentary: So Monday I will be updating my Pathfinder Kingmaker story, which will probably get several updates through the remainder of the year. I also have an annoying bugbear of a cyberpunk itch which may get scratched eventually depending on how thoroughly I go through my various source books and what not... as to this... well that's complicated.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Relics
Part 5​

Kennedy might have been an asshole desk jockey but Jack had to admit he wasn't wrong. This was probably best demonstrated by the fact Kennedy had less issue with the Asgard being here than he did Sam's creepy million year old stalker and Nirrti not being in a cage. On the other hand even Heimdall agreed that given the time constraints of treating Cassie's deteriorating condition... taking Nirrti's help was the best option available... which was some teeth grinding aside enough to get pencil pusher to tentatively agree to it.


"You think she's lying?"


"Of course she's lying." The real question was what, not if. Nirrti telling the truth was ridiculous. She had to have some idea why Zeus was plundering her domain, cause it sure wasn't just typical Goa'uld shit. He was looking for something... and they'd even gotten to get Nirrti to concede that it certainly seemed like that. "We've got an agreement though, if she can fix Cassie," Jack trailed off, he didn't like it, but they'd cut the goa'uld lose He didn't like the idea of letting the snake bitch go, but they had the fucking agreement in writing... which had been Kennedy's dumb idea. "If she can fix Cassie she dial wherever she wants and if she knows what's good for her ass she'll stay out of our way."


"What about Zeus?"


Jack shook his head, "She won't tell us what he's after, and I can't say I like it," He stopped talking as Kennedy came back in the room. He paused to hold the door open for Generals Hammond, and Vidrine. The Lieutenant general sat down at the head of the table.


"Our visitor thinks we should see a return to normal in the next six hours." Hammond remarked sitting beside Vidrine. "We'll keep Cassandra sedated and under observation until tomorrow morning and Heimdall should have a full panel done by then. After which she can dial out to whatever planet she intends to go," Hammond remarked echoing Jack's own statement from a moment earlier.


"The Pentagon has concerns about the deteriorating condition of the galaxy." Vidrine remarked, "Doctor Jackson."


"General?"


"The Russians have come forward with a series of publications from a Doctor Britsky finally, specifically our Russian Liaison has reported that one of the addresses we were scheduled to visit had been found in the course of one of his digs in Iraq under Soviet auspices. They have hinted that other Soviet archaeological excavations, and other digs conducted by the current Russian Federation may have excavated sites that may have stargate relevance." Jack almost spoke up but he got pointed looks from not just Kennedy but Hammond, and didn't speak up. "The Russians under previous examples of cooperation want to bring in their own team to see what's there." Jack nearly exploded, "The Pentagon has agreed. We don't know whats there, but you will have the documents in shortly. The conflict between the system lords is worsening. Colonel O'neill, Supreme Commander Thor wants you present for a briefing on ongoing fleet engagements involving Apophis along his border. This is considered a priority by the Pentagon."
--
Oskyld retracted his consciousness from the aether around him. He had been using it as a secondary source of information in a way that hadn't been a thing in previous worlds. The galaxy was more densely populated by humans here, and it was easier to project power, the mechanics of divinity in the growing weave of magic reshaped parts of the galaxy not in immediately obvious physical ways but in subtler directions. Terraforming was easier this way than with machines and infrastructure as he could subtly adjust and redirect rain fall, and weather currents to nurture crops or plants, and of course that meant occasionally adjusting the wind to blow rain formations out of the way so that they wouldn't over inundate the local grain crop as it ripened.


The system was much more complex than the one ... its predecessor on Athas had been. That had only been for a single world, and only really at the end designed to insure the system worked when he was gone. That was still the point of course.


"Power weapons." He ordered.


The Raptor nodded reaching for the controls even as hypersapce telemetry tracked the flight paths of the incoming pairs of ships. "Directing the fleet to battle stations." The Raptor intoned. The first ships to arrive were those Apophis were chasing, the Ha'tak and Cheops bore the marks of Heru'ur, and his underlord Montu. The second ships all bore Apophis's symbols.


"Go system wide."


The Jaffa stood to attention from the flanks of the bridge as the raptor at the center of the command deck informed both flotilla of ships that they were trespassing. "You will power down your weapons and depart for your own domains as soon as possible." In one of those surprising instances of Goa'uld free travel customs and law technically tried to cover all the bases System Lords who were not at war were supposed to permit free passage to an extent... admittedly the short distance given the fleet's current FtL speeds meant that they weren't talking very far at all. Damaged vessels would be permitted to make repairs, but they couldn't make planet fall without a remittance paid to the reigning system lord.


Montu decided as his holographic image appeared probably to try for the old stand by of entreating them to assist him in destroying Apophis's force, or at least that was what Apophis's general decided he must have been trying to do. "Apophis's vessels are powering weapons, and firing."


That was a major breach of system lord etiquette.... which was fine. "Destroy them." He ordered not bothering to rise from the high back throne. Massive twin barreled turrets tracked and fired blue white near coherent beams of energy into the midsection of one Ha'tak barely after he had spoken the command. It speared through one side of the vessel and then as a less coherent mass perforated the superstructure of the other side.


All the other ships initiated their own pattern of firing Ha'tak, and Improved Standards, Ha'tak, and Cheops under Montu as well poured fire into Apophis's now outnumbered Flotilla of black and gold pyramid ships. Technically speaking, at least in a simplified capacity his flagship was in many respects a hand built, or near enough, prototype or technology demonstrator much as its two sister ships of the first flight were. The other Improved Standards weren't quite as powerful, but had produced at a greater economic cost. The prototype guns could fire faster, and were more powerful, but traded this for greater energy consumption and of course the cost for what was reall marginal improvement.


Apophis's fleet hadn't been expecting a first shot hit, never mind one that gutted the lead ship of their formation, much less for the following shots from batteries to complete the vessel from the fight entirely. Even so the ships had already been prepared to rapidly launch their gliders, probably as soon as the ships had dropped from light speed, which was already in progress within the first round of naval gunnery being exchanged between capital ships.

 

[NakedFury]

YEAH! The fight is on!

Stargate suffered from the syndrome of keeping a villain alive WAY past its expiration date. Much like the show Heroes with Silar.

They should have resolved the Apophis conflict maybe in the second or third season and then moved on to bigger galactic politics showing how unprepared they were and just plain plot armor lucky they got.

 

[Imperator Pax]

YEAH! The fight is on!

Stargate suffered from the syndrome of keeping a villain alive WAY past its expiration date. Much like the show Heroes with Silar.

They should have resolved the Apophis conflict maybe in the second or third season and then moved on to bigger galactic politics showing how unprepared they were and just plain plot armor lucky they got.

Click to shrink...

Especially as canonically apophis thought he was gonna go and fight all the other system lords and then they resolved that by carter blowing up a sun which apophis somehow survived and thus I legitimately expected him to come back in the following season.

here apophis has just officially bitten off more than he can chew

 

[NakedFury]

Yeah. So much lost potential in using the Goauld better. What with all the pantheons they had, they should have used that to do the same as the Tokra. While Ra and the Egyptian theme Goauld were supreme at the moment, there was an uneasy peace with all the others since they could have allied together to dethrone Ra.

But no, we got generic Goaulds galore.


Another thing they could have used was the worship system of later Ori. Much like them, the Goauld had been worshipped by millions and millions for millenia, that should had given them some minor, for not being Ascended, "divine" powers.


Bah. I keep getting away with day dreams.


And aliens. There wasnt a single good looking alien species outside the Goauld and Unas. Th Asgard sucked so much.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Yeah. So much lost potential in using the Goauld better. What with all the pantheons they had, they should have used that to do the same as the Tokra. While Ra and the Egyptian theme Goauld were supreme at the moment, there was an uneasy peace with all the others since they could have allied together to dethrone Ra.

But no, we got generic Goaulds galore.


Another thing they could have used was the worship system of later Ori. Much like them, the Goauld had been worshipped by millions and millions for millenia, that should had given them some minor, for not being Ascended, "divine" powers.


Bah. I keep getting away with day dreams.


And aliens. There wasnt a single good looking alien species outside the Goauld and Unas. Th Asgard sucked so much.

Click to shrink...

If only we could have gotten Farscape's props and animatronics for SG 1 instead

 

[Imperator Pax]

The Tomb
Part 1​

Oskyld did not appreciate being brought into the conflict. He had been trying to honor the expectations of the rules regarding free travel between border territory but the war had grown increasingly dangerous, and it seemed finally the time for neutrality had passed. This didn't technically bring him into the war as a whole. He wasn't really allying with Heru'ur so much as entering as a co belligerent specifically against Apophis.


That didn't mean Cronus was going to just ignore it. Apophis provoking a fresh fleet to enter the battle stripped ships that the Serpent lord had needed else where. That was giving Cronus beleaguered fleet of aging vessels breathing room to regroup. Oskyld recognized that might be a problem in the future, but unlikely to be one while Apophis still drew breath. There was no telling what would happen after.


In this case that would be some time in the future. Oskyld sat back into the throne and dismissed the hologram. He wasn't sure how Heru'ur would ultimately react to his war aims regarding the conflict with Apophis. The jewel of the operation was to take Saqaara, and most of the lesser worlds around it in space. All of those had been apart of Ra's domain before the death of the Supreme System Lord.


There was a flash of light as they made the transition back to sub light speed on the exit of hyperspace and the fifteen capital ships fanned out. At the flanks of the formation were two groups of four groups of standard Ha'tak. Interior to them were a pair of three ship squadrons leads by newly finished Improved Ha'tak. The twelve hundred meter production versions of his own flagship, they each commanded a pair of standard 'kilometer' length Ha'tak. It was a more reinforced formation than the squadrons hitting Apophis's border. Squadrons from the fleets of Forest and Lake province had crossed the border with single I-class Ha'tak serving as squadron flagships commanding flights of four three ship squadrons of standard Ha'tak.


Part of the reason for that was that here was intended to serve as the main offensive thrust. Once they achieved local space dominance they would guard the system until a second flight of ships ferrying an invasion force to take the planet.


--
Jacob was pacing in the briefing room in the Pentagon. The Tokra hadn't been thrilled that they had let Nirrti go, the Asgard had however agreed it was the right thing to do... the legal thing to do, and that having it in writing while unlikely to help much wouldn't hurt any future legal involvement of Earth, in regards to disputes the Asgard were party to. Jack wasn't entirely convinced of that since Nirtti was technically an outlaw, but Thor was usually right about these kind of things.


"Our spy in Heru'ur's ranks managed to pass word of Apophis chasing Montu over the border." and the results.


"Yeah Thor mentioned snake face, or one of his lackeys went and got his teeth kicked in." Jack remarked, "Can't say I'm feeling too sorry for Apophis."


Selmak nodded at this, though responded with the more Earth laden vernacular he had gained from melding with General Carter, "He's certainly bitten off more than he can chew now, we weren't even sure that Sokar had that many ships. Do the Asgard have any idea how many shipyards he actually has?"


Jack shook his head, not that the Asgard might not know know, just that they hadn't actually said one way or another. "Thor hasn't said. Probably violates some statute or agreement they've got with the big shot snakes. The Tok'ra have any idea?"


"No." Jacob Carter replied, "Each of the provincial capitals have shipyards, the Imperial capital has shipyards. It seems likely from what we have heard that there are other shipyards on other planets but we haven't had any luck getting into the complexes themselves. They operate on a completely different sort of security set up than most goa'uld facilities, far as we can tell the Reetou must have tried something at some point because they're all crawling with the lizards, and a significant number of them with TERs. Cloaking technology wouldn't help."


Not seeing an issue Jack shrugged, "Sounds about right?"


"About right? Jack thats enough shipyards that would have prompted Ra to try and intervene a century or two ago. Most of Heru'ur and Apophis's shipyards are from before Ra's death, we're talking an investment of naquadah that, well the council is right in describing it as without a historical comparison for time frame. Coupled with what looks to be a much larger economy than we expected, and better internal security on top of the expected more advanced fleet, the council is nervous. We're not talking about Delmak where its one major industrial world where blowing up an already geologically unstable moon will remove it without much effort Jack."


"All of his eggs aren't in one basket." Jack summarized, "So what do you think is going to happen?"


"I don't think he was planning for the conflict this soon. We've heard as much via Bratac, and Rebel Jaffa. He had ongoing diplomatic missions to the Celtic Pantheon, and there is whatever he was doing in Nirrti's domain, which might have partly been hunting the Reetou as he's since claimed. On the other hand if this is what he can deploy when not prepared... we run the risk of looking at another sixty or seventy Ha'tak over 2001, and potentially more if the war continues into the following year."


Thor had made a point that ordinarily the goa'uld didn't trust one another enough to operate joint system lord fleets. Ra, and Heru'ur, Kali and Bastet were pairs that usually worked together, but they were exceptions. Ptah was willing to work with any of the system lords under a council mandate... but only as a matter of unanimous consensus among the system lords... which was rare. The result was that in theory if that consensus came the System Lords could all chip in enough ships to field two hundred ha'tak, but drawn in such away that none of their fleets, as they had been in 1999 before the naval build up, would be particularly weakened.

Which brought the two back to the original summation that Apophis had bitten off more than he could chew by opening a third hostile front between the ones with Heru'ur, and Cronus. That was the only advantage Jack could see is that there wasn't a coordination between the snakes, and that technically Heru'ur and Cronus were shooting at each other as well.


Jack glanced up the clock, "Its not good news, but," And it hadn't been the reason for this, "But the Air Force has been planning to try and answer the spaceship gap question since we found out about them."


"Earth isn't ready to answer that question Jack. You got lucky with Apophis's pair of ships, and loosing two ha'tak to a primitive world like Earth made him a laughingstock among the system lords." Selmak paused, "Admittedly the higher ups here probably recognize that and why the Russians are being told some if not all of the reports from the Tokra, and,"


"Yeah yeah, I know Thor thinks we should honor our agreements with the Russians. He made sure Chekov is coming to the briefing so he can see how much of a mess the snakes are making of the neighborhood." Thankfully Jacob spared him the 'the cold war is over' and 'cooperation with the Russians wouldn't be so bad'... but that distasteful idea aside if they did ever manage to get an anti orbital system designed coverage was going to require launchers in Russia both because well covering that half of the planet, and apparently treaty agreements regarding nuclear sharing and arms interoperation... but mostly because they needed to cover the other half of the planet. "Think NorthCom is done with lunch yet?"

"I think its sort of a waste to involve them at this stage the Air Force doesn't have enough 302s to start testing them or briefing capital defense area. If the goa'uld show up where we need to field fighters then..."

"Thor has had his bluff called, yeah I know." and it was actually worse than that, "and so far as Northern Command is concerned they're going to bring the armed services committee into it."

"Kinsey?"

"No its the House this time."

 

[glocknar]

"No its the House this time."

Click to shrink...

OOF. That has all the hallmarks of not being fun at all.

On the Oskyld side of things, I have to admit to being pretty ignorant concerning stargate, is he aiming to grab Saqaara have more shipyards and is therefore great to grab because more shipyards mean more ships built and maintained equals more dakka, does it have a good amount of natural strategic resources (read: naquadah), or is it simply because it's the most built up planet in area near his borders and so is something of a natural hub? Or is there another thing I'm missing because I haven't seen the show?

 

[Imperator Pax]

OOF. That has all the hallmarks of not being fun at all.

On the Oskyld side of things, I have to admit to being pretty ignorant concerning stargate, is he aiming to grab Saqaara have more shipyards and is therefore great to grab because more shipyards mean more ships built and maintained equals more dakka, does it have a good amount of natural strategic resources (read: naquadah), or is it simply because it's the most built up planet in area near his borders and so is something of a natural hub? Or is there another thing I'm missing because I haven't seen the show?

Click to shrink...

Saqarra was one of Apep's throne worlds (This is Ra and Apophis's father, and the Supreme System Lord before Ra), the most obvious importance of it, is that it houses the Great Library which is itself built on an ancient outpost housing an Alteran / ANubis style mother ship that the library was built on top of. Its got naquadah, and trinium its relatively wealthy planet, but the library itself is also accorded neutral ground under the system lords, Apophis taking control of it after Ra died was a massive status symbol even though he didn't really do anything with the library or its retinue of goa'uld scientists before Sokar came and kicked Apophis's ass later.

So basically the short version is Oskyld has a map of all the Alteran outposts in the galaxy, and guess whats just a a couple dozen light years over the border.

 

[glocknar]

Holy cow, yeah okay that's pretty good target to nick off Apophis, any one of those things would make it worth considering, all of those combined mean you would have to be a moron or have better stuff than everything you could get from there not to at least be tempted by it.

 

[Mastersgt]

Man, when are they going to finally learn that he is not Sokar?

 

[Imperator Pax]

Man, when are they going to finally learn that he is not Sokar?

Click to shrink...

When Carter actually gets face to face enough that Jolinar's memories resurface to be like 'oh' coupled with the, thats fully replicated gate builder technology not just knock offs there of.

Which will happen after ANubis starts to make his move, and of course the Kull warriors will start showing up in approximately three / four chapters around the same time.

 

[Imperator Pax]

The Tomb
Part 2​

He had a bad feeling about this. The House Armed Services Committee... he didn't think the NID was involved. Not directly... not at least that way... it was possible Kinsey had decided that in the name of oversight both chambers of Congress needed to be read in... but it didn't seem like it was that. For one thing for better or worse they were doing this in the Pentagon's briefing rooms. They hadn't been demanded to appear on capitol hill for an explanation... on the other.. there was Thor to consider. Not just Thor, they were doing the whole combined briefing to include the Russians for this.


"Are you ready for this?"


He scowled at Jacob's question. It wasn't the question that a general usually asked. Jacob was in uniform which just underscored it. He would have felt better if Teal'c and Carter were both here as well. Daniel was here, which was something of a plus... except that if Jack were being honest 'Jenny' was more likely to recognize Daniel than Jack... not that he was banking on not being recognized... having the two of them together ... their gooses were cooked.


In the absolute best case she'd wait to get them along before the congresswoman decided to bring up their trip to the past. If not there would be an international incident in front of the Russians, Thor, and a bunch of air force personnel in the peanut gallery besides. "O'neill." Thor greeted even before the light completely faded.


The briefing room was now crowded with Asgard gizmos and projectors, and the weird kind of polymer feeling paper the Asgard used as hard copies of documents, "Heya buddy." Jack replied. "Lets get this show on the road."


The Pentagon as a facility was even older than the Cheyenne mountain complex... and it showed in a lot of ways at least in Jack's opinion. It was probably the strangest building in the US military for what it represented, and the tramping into the room that would have been considered spacious only by the standards of the 1950s and earlier was a procession of generals and full bird colonels with all manner of fruit salad on display all in air force blues. This was an Air Force show, and it made the assembly of the service's officers just another demonstration of what made the pentagon strange. Jack imagined scuttlebutt had recognized something was going on but it was the air force so it could have been anything, maybe hypersonic stealth bombers.


The exception were the congress critters and their arrival. The 107th​ Congress of the US had marked a slightly shift in favor to the winners but the military procurement sub comittee was a mix of both parties. Clark was after all only a couple of years older than Jack was, but the overall makeup of the House didn't make her age standout. The Chair of the committee was old, but there were members who were twenty years younger than Jack was. Kinsey was no where to be seen, which strongly supported the notion that he had had no part in this gathering. Small mercies.


Thor at least waited until the doors were shut, and everyone was sitting down, and the Fighter Don had welcomed everyone in to start his light show. That caused no small amount of murmuring from a bunch of two and three star generals.


There was a drawl from one of the Texans of "So aliens then." Jack wished that Hammond had been here instead of having Jacob, and Vidrine.
--
Oskyld opened his eyes, mind still directing the ship's sensors as they probed the solar system around them. This would become Marsh province's capital, but they had to seize the system first... and he permitted the archaic greek recitation proclaiming their arrival and intent to claim... even if Alexander's poetry made it sound as if he was Hades come to preside over the judgment of the unworthy. There had apparently been an actual poetry contest at some point between the warriors and various clergy for the honor to compose the declarations of conquest recited before battle was joined... despite the fact that the fighting ongoing between Heru'ur, Apophis, and Cronus had largely caused those traditional rites to fall by the way side in the increasing violence between the forces of those system lords and their allies.


The superior shields had outright ignored the aging second line ha'tak that had scrambled to defend the planet. Their presence suggested of course that while Saqarra was a prestigious possession Apophis was unaware of its more Alteran facilities, and didn't have the resources to spare at holding a world that wouldn't have been within immediate striking range of Cronus or Heru'ur's main fronts.


"Enemy gliders in flight." The equivalent of a CAG announced though he was actually address his fellow Jaffa, and particularly through the ship's mind machine interface their own death glider complement as they prepared to sortie. It would be at that level that this was going to be the closest to fair.


Oskyld knew that eventually he'd be able to overhaul the air frame enough to mount either shields or cloaking devices along with better weapons, but the Alkesh had taken priority. The fight between glider pilots would be a largely fair conflict compared to the engagement of Alkesh on one side that were under gunned and less protect, might even lack shields entirely... and never mind the capital ship engagement.


In the time of Ra this world would have been deep within the territory claimed by the Supreme System Lord. It was a temperate world with much of its holdings being like the Mediterranean basin writ large, the populated expanses of the world not dominated by the rivers and marshes were expansive grassy plains coming down from the mountains. Ra had settled humans from Earth taken from Egypt at some point about four thousand years earlier to make up for the dwindling population of Unas. Not that there had ever been particularly many Unas on the world either, far fewer than the four million bronze age natives who lived in the main basin and cradle of civilization.


Indeed in many respects Saqarra could have itself been considered the cradle of goa'uld civilization. The Serekh, a giant pyramid the height of the chrysler building had been erected to house Apep's library, as well as ostensibly to house the remains of the Alteran precursor who had mentored the ancient Goa'uld warlord. It was such an edifice of historical distinction and grandiosity that the goa'uld accorded it neutral ground status... that and the Serekh was probably invulnerable to most goa'uld weapons due its shields in the event someone did try and destroy it. Of course part of the reason this was permitted was because a specific bloodline of goa'uld off shoot maintained a strict policy of neutrality and stayed on the planet to maintain everything.


System lords of good standing were supposed to be free to travel to Saqarra, with a limitted retinue, and it had been that way since before Ra had been Supreme System Lord. Ra's down fall and Apophis's seizure of the world had thrown the status in question. Not the least of which had been Sokar's harrowing imprisonment of the serpent lord, and then Apophis's subsequent escape.


By itself the Serekh more than justified being the center piece of a new province, of being a provincial capital, but that wasn't why he was here. Oskyld's throne projected a series of eldritch green motes. No, he was here for what the Serkh had been built atop of. What provided the great pyramid its protection from weapons.


He would have to build shipyards of course, but unlike Stennos, Saqarra had naquadah and trinium reserves that could be exploited. "Take us into orbit." He ordered as the motes solidified into targeting solutions for the flagship's primary batteries and long lances of silver white beams started their siege cycles. Once they were in orbit they would simply begin beaming down entire battalions of Raptors to secure the world's critical cities until Alkesh could be freed to carry Jaffa from orbit to the surface. That was really the downside to the larger ship size. It was not intended to land on a planet's surface.


Once the pyramid platforms were secure though, the standard Ha'tak would be able to land allowing them off load tens of thousands of Jaffa over the course of the next week or so far faster than they could be brought through via the stargate.

 

[Imperator Pax]

The Tomb Part 3​

The briefing itself was something of a dog and pony show, to use Jack's description ... Daniel would have preferred prestige presentation, but the concept was the same. Having Jack, and Thor here were the main event, he was just here to provide academic ... buttressing and prestige as a member of SG 1. They didn't even need translators, Thor spoke English... which was its own sort of headache. Thor spoke English because the Asgard native tongue was.... a version of either Proto Norse or potentially, likely even Daniel considered, proto Germanic, by all indications in the records the Asgard had been active on earth since at least the Early Northern Bronze Age.


... and of course if that weren't head ache enough they weren't the only race of the great four to speak what was still linguistically obviously what on earth were generally referred to as a 'indo european' language... the Ancients appeared to have spoken an immediate precursor to Latin possibly Etruscan that had gone extinct on Earth thousands of years ago. If Nox and Furling had used a similar language it might have been one thing, but the Furlings seemed to speak a distant relation to the Afro Asiatic language group possibly related to Akkadian... at least according to one of the tongue whetting papers the Russians had pronounced. They similarly believed that the Nox might have been an ancestor to the uralic languages. Whether that was true or not it was difficult to say, especially given that the Nox used or were used to speaking both Ancient and Asgardian to the point that their English was nearly as good as Thor's...


Indeed it really was that the Asgard, and Gatebuilders spoke languages within the same broad language family on earth, and even used similarly related scripts that presented the larger academic hurdle. "So more reasonably these Ancients probably introduced the language family that they shared already with the Asgard." Jennifer Clark questioned.


"Its not that simple." It couldn't be that simple, "They're both what we think of as Indo European languages but," Without even touching on the goa'uld, and particularly Britsky's work in the near east, "Ancient, or Alteran dies out on earth relatively early while Asgardian apparently is taken by humans and evolves into ... probably modern English." He finished, "I mean most likely the Asgard Heimdall introduced or contributed to barley cultivation either while Ra had the planet or sometime afterwards, but probably concurrent. All of the Asgard settled worlds speak some branch of it including one world that speaks that as far as we can tell a dialect of Gothic." At the look, "It went extinct on earth centuries ago, "


Chekov nodded perfunctorily, "As based off of Doctor Ballard's research work has since determined," And Daniel really would have preferred him not to have brought up Nick's research, "The ancient alliance also obviously included, ah junior members. In the Omeyocan case spoke Mayan, and it is from such that concerns within the Russian Academic community that there would be extraordinary risks to archaeological sites if such information was put out there. The tyrants, Napoleon and Hitler looted many important places historically, and others were destroyed by other short sighted individuals to gamble with a spate of such actions potentially unearthing or making available on the black market of antiquities alien artifacts that might then be misused.


She nodded, "Yes, I can understand why that would be a concern, but I'm not certain that it would entirely appropriate to have Stargate command be responsible for handling such." The congresswoman glanced to where Jack was surrounded by a group of generals, "Even this matter with spaceships and contact certainly seems to have outgrown the initial exploratory forays that were the purpose of the original Stargate program."


"It is hardly my place to speak for the preferred stance of my government, but it might not be the best idea to begin construction of a public space force immediately. Certainly the defense of the homeworld will require that at some point that is self evident, but given the threat of the goa'uld likely being something that the other allies the traditional united nations in the sense of the great patriotic war they would not understand. The goa'uld are, will continue to seem very far awaay, until they are not. Short of a public display in orbit how could we effectively demonstrate to public satisfaction the very real danger that exists from the many conflicting alien overlords."
--
"Yeah Russian NID that sounds great," Jack grunted, "Ok so that's why they haven't, why they've been so cagey about sitting you down with Britsky." and going through all of his notes with a fine toothed comb, "He's missing." And probably dead.


Major Davis fidgeted, "With respect Colonel, this is still progress. At least the Russians have decided to volunteer the information even if it is a bit late."


"Only because we were going to the planet anyway," And really he was surprised that they hadn't just let them stumble out into whatever was on the other side of the gate and try and keep mum about it, "What have they told us?"


"They want a joint team. Britsky's orders were unknown but his team were experienced personnel, and Britsky's research into the ancient near east had been ongoing. He had to return to dig sites in the near east for additional research, but the Russian government were against allowing him visit Iraq again. His exact reasoning were either not made clear to the government, or they were concerned that Saddam's government might realize something up."


Jack grimaced and ground his teeth at the dictator's name, "So what do we know about the planet?"


"It belonged at one point to Tiamat, but was subsequently seized by Marduk during his coup d'etat, and well Marduk was later deposed, and while the system lords did annex some of his border worlds, Ra created a buffer zone from the remains of Marduk's territory."


"So its currently sandwiched between a bunch of angry snakes." Jack didn't wait for confirmation, "Which ones?"


"Apophis." Teal'c rumbled, "Many of Marduk's kinsmen fled to Apophis's court when Ra elected not to name one of them Marduk's successor and help them to secure the post."


"P2X-338, are we expecting anything?"


"Its been almost a year since the Russians closed down their stargate program, since Britsky didn't dial back we're not expecting survivors, though of course its possible," Davis added hastily, "Colonel O'neill was of course stranded on Edora for several months." Jack winced, and gave the major an irritated glower.


Hammond simply nodded, "Colonel Chekov and the Russian stargate team will be here soon, I expect SG 1 to be prepared for all possibilities, and recommendations in the event we need to deploy additional teams."


"Is Makepeace available?"


"Still on safety stand down," Davis replied, "Doctor Fraiser believes they're over it but we're still keeping them under observation, to make sure." The pentagon man responded hastily. Makepeace being unavailable just reminded Jack of Kawalsky's death, but SG 2 was expected to be off world for at least another week. "SG 4? Shouldn't they be back soon general?"


"That's correct," The Texan replied, "Doctor Jackson?"


"I'd rather have SG 11 ready, General." He glanced to Jack, "Most likely we're going to need a larger team, people who have experience with archaeological exploration if we have to conduct any kind of excavation they'll be prepared for what we need to do. SG 4 doesn't have any experience in that field." Because Daniel had deployed with SG 11 on those sorts of missions while SG 4 hadn't.


"Colonel O'neill."


"Danny's right if we're going to have to dig SG 11 would be better." He paused, "Anything else?"


"Representative Clark wants a briefing on SGC affairs and plans for going forward," Davis remarked, "The pentagon feels that SG 1 should take point on that, she seemed very comfortable with Colonel O'neill and Doctor Jackson and that it might be wise to have them handle that, but she won't expect a tour in the immediate near future, the mission to P2X 338 takes priority, and the Pentagon believes locating the missing Russian team should be viewed as critical."
--
Commentary: This is largely an expansion of exposition material. Again to be clear timeline this is pre 9-11 the towers attack, and pentagon, haven't happened yet, part 4 of this chapter will actually take place on P2X 338 inside Marduk's palace ziggurat.

 

[Imperator Pax]

The Tomb
P2X 338
Part 4​

Not for the first time he cursed the surroundings. He hated Iraq. A distaste that had begun in the eighties of course during the over the borders while Saddam and the Ayatollah had been murdering each others peoples for shits and giggles... Jack had never understood the politics behind the debacle but Langley had forever been interested in the mess. His brief experience as a POW in the Gulf War had only compounded his distaste for the country's environs... and this planet was very much a dead ringer for the banks of the Tigris.


"We might still find Doctor Britsky."


"I thought you people were allergic to optimism?" Jack questioned. The Russian Colonel shrugged, and Jack mimiced the gesture, "IF we find him is he AWOL?"


"Britsky, nyet. Maybe argue about the rest of the team. It would depend on how they were separated, the high command will have questions of course, but if he is alive, the questions will be more important than anything. Doctor Jackson wants to ask questions as well."


Danny did that. That was certainly true. Danny was currently scouring the wall scribbles. "How long Doctor Jackson?" The russian called.


"Sorry?" Danny replied looking up from his notepad and letting his pen hand loosely.


"How long, why are there no people around. This place has been abandoned for some time."


"Oh," He glanced at Teal'c, "I'd guess probably since Marduk disappeared. The UAV flight," That had proceeded them through the gate, "Saw signs of a settlement further down river, "But this fell into disrepair probably a hundred or two hundred years ago."


"You cannot be more specific?"


He pointed up to the timbers, "This is really good treated wood. It weathered very well. Really good laquering treatment of, it had to be shipped from up river. I'd say that even without care it must have lasted centuries. This is a pretty generous climate for preserving this kind of prepared material."


"You think he'll want us to haul that back to the stargate?"


Jack shook his head, "Not, us, SG 11 though." He declared eliciting a laugh. The two full birds looked up at the ziggurat. "Come on Danny, its been here for centuries it will still be here when we come back." Daniel grumbled some at it, and the Russian colonel went back to trying to be afable.


"Maybe this is what happened with Doctor Britsky? They went to live with the locals."


"Before or after your stargate program went to hell?" He grunted.


"Sir,"


The front door was locked, Jack grunted again and looked around, "Pack a cigarettes. They're russian." He remarked. "Daniel get this door open." Jack ordered turning to face the writing on the wall. It was typical snake fare. Snake puzzle lock designed to stop people who were illiterate from opening doors, but Daniel wasn't illiterate. Jack glanced at the surroundings, the view the ziggurat was a commanding one. It gave them a view of the dilapidated agricultural scrub and irrigation works. He disliked the reminder of Iraq, "Come one day Danny speak the words of power."


"Stop rushing me Jack. Its a dialect I'm not familiar with."


"Oh come on what could it possibly say besides, I am Marduk I big important snake. Much important." He sneered. "Is his bragging about putting one over on one of the other goa'ulds?"


"Jack these are older pictographic characters not sound representing characters." Daniel begged for a couple more minutes to read. Jack adjusted his hat, and glowered at the surroundings.

"reminds me of Iraq." Zhukov muttered.

He couldn't stop the reflexive question, it was a soldiers' nature... he did it talking to other bastards who had gone to vietnam too, and Zhukov accent might have been russian but it was habit. "You too?"


"Da, oh yes you fought as part of Operation Desert Saber. Hunted sites ahead of the main force of advance."


That was was his file said officially. "Somebody had to do it. Certainly is hot enough to be Iraq."


"Its the middle of summer here, sir." Carter remarked, as Talinov joked about the old men.


"So what do we know about Marduk?" He said prodding Daniel with his booted toe. "Is there much fellating of his ego or what? Carter is up for some demo practice you know. Teal'c certainly could use some to, hell maybe Zhukov here wants a go with the ole C 4."


Daniel scowled. "Its the Babylonian Creation Myth, so yes, much self aggrandizing." He pushed some sections, "But its out of order for the poem." The door opened. "You need to press them in the correct order."


"See was that so hard?" He looked past Daniel at the dusty interior, and a piece of masonry shifted loose inside and fell... "Don't usually see that with snake architecture."


Teal'c moved inside and shined his streamlight up, "This doorway has been damaged. At some point in the past there was a fight here. Fights." He swept the light from what were obviously old staff weapon damage to much more recent bullets.


"Twenty Two it looks like," He fished his knife out and pulled a splintered bullet. "Not five five six." He muttered holding it under the flashlight.


"Yes, its Russian 5.45. Probably from AK74. Standard Russian Army Ammunition." Zhukov and his team were carrying joint security cooperation equipment in NATO calibers. That made more sense for Peace Keeping in the Balkans or ... wherever drawing from Nato ammunition but the Air Force had authorized P90s into inventory for the SGC's airmen and officers on the basis that the PDW would better reflect their usual missions. The Marines with their Everybody is a Rifleman schtick wasn't hearing it, and Hammond wasn't pushing them to. "What are the energy weapons from? When rather."


"Probably the rebellion that overthrew Marduk." Teal'c grunted. "They're very old."


"And this temple is over four thousand years old."


Everyone nodded. "The temple is very large yes?"


"Bigger than any of the ones we know of on earth," Daniel replied.


"We should split up then, cover more ground."


Jack shrugged, "Lets radio SG 11, and you can take Teal'c with you."


"To read Goa'uld?"


"Sure." Lets go with that, "He'll know what to look out for."


Zhukov nodded, "You should take Lieutenant Marchenko so youre not a man down then."


"Fine, Markie stick with Carter alright." He ordered as he and Zhukov walked back to the entrance to radio the larger SG Team.


"Bet it gets cold here at night." Zhukov muttered.


"Probably," Jack agreed as SG 11 told them they'd dial the SGC and update general Hammond. "Well we got plenty of daylight still better get cracking." Zhukov grunted in agreement and they walked back inside. "You think Kirensky's team made it in here?"


"I am told Dr Britsky is an expert in ancient babylon. I think he could get the door open."


"Yeah, Daniel says Britsky was brilliant."


"He might still be alive."


"There is you being optimistic again." He shrugged, "Lets hope you're right, Daniel does have a lot of questions he wants to bounce off your missing doctor." They moved to split up


They'd just found the remains of one of Kirensky's men when things start going wrong, and how? The man's flesh was flensed off his bones, eaten by some alien critter on this damn planet. Tiny teeth marks on the bones. At about that same time he'd tried radioing Zhukov SG 11 had tried to radio in. Zhukov had triggered some kind ancient security lock.


They were treated to more masonry falling. "Did anyone get what SG 11 was trying to tell us?" He demanded as they tried to set Marchenko's broken leg. The Russian Lieutenant had some bruised ribs and a nasty cut to his skull, but he was damned lucky he hadn't been crushed by the doors trying to slam closed.


"No, it was garbled. I couldn't understand anything they said." Zhukov declared. "Could you understand anything at all?"


"Nothing useful." Jack snorted. Carter tried to radio SG 11 again. "Nothing?"


"No sir, I can't get through."
--
They didn't much poking around. There were a lot of staff blast scarring in the room they had settled in. It must have been one hell of a fight back in the day, but part of their caution had been trying to make sure that Marchenko was going to make it.


So when the rings activated they were caught completely flatfooted. Jack kicked himself for now scouring the room for goa'uld tech. He could guess now what SG 11 had been trying to warn them about though.


The rings activating abruptly had caught them off guard, much as he wanted to curse it. They hadn't even expected rings, but in hindsight Jack figured it made sense. They should have checked for goa'uld tech in the chamber, it wasn't as if sarcophagus were common items for the goa'uld. Marduk had been a big shot snake so of course he would have had rings up here. He felt goddamn stupid, and doubly so because the Russians were along on this damn errand.

"Lower your weapons." The lizard rumbled.

"Say what now?"

"We would prefer to avoid a ricochet." The lead lizard cocked its armored head, "Our combat armor is equipped with personal shields that might cause your projectiles to ricochet."

"Right." Jack muttered. On the plus side the lizard wasn't pointing a weapon at them... yet. "So why are you folks here?" He asked slowly lowering his P90. Daniel followed suit, and then Carter and Teal'c... the Russians didn't... not immediately.

If the lizards noticed they didn't mention it. "Marduk was imprisoned for a reason. As this planet is relatively close to the front," With Apophis so they were lucky these weren't Serpent Guard, "we have a device monitoring the stargate's activity. "Our orders have been updated."

"Oh," That sounded good... not.

"To what?" His Russian counterpart asked. Zhukov had adopted a more moderate stance cradling his 5.56 yugo built AK pattern rifle on his hip.

"Terminate Marduk, recover the eye of Tiamat for relocation to a more secure facility."

"Wait we found Marduk he was in the sarcophagus." Daniel protested.

"No, our sensors indicate he is still somewhere in the ziggurat." That was news.... the goa'uld life signs detection technology was useful, but not enough to generally identify a specific individual, and usually those were apart of a ship's sensor suite like on a tel'tac.

"The Russian stargate team that was here before is all dead."

"Indeed, he is probably not inside of a human host."

"Wait, so whatever ate the other team, is this goa'uld, is Marduk?" Valarin questioned and not sounding thrilled by it.

"Yeah, great you have fun with your bug hunt." O'neill retorted turning to the Lizard officer, "Can we use the rings to get out of here?"

"Of course." The Lizard replied. "It will deposit you a short walk from the stargate."

"And we can just leave from there?" Zhukov seemed skeptical.

Jack wasn't going to deny it was a fair question to ask, but he wanted to find out what was SG 11's situation as well, "Well, we found your missing team, lets go."

"You cannot be serious." He jerked his head at the lizards, "We just take their word for it?"

At least he hadn't shouldered his assault rifle, but Jack found it a little difficult not being acerbic in his reply. "We found our way out," He retorted to Zhukov. "As far as I'm concerned our mission is accomplished if they want to kill some goa'uld I'm all for it, but Markie there needs a trip to Fraiser, if that drops us by the gate all the better."

"They said they are here to recover the eye of Tiamat, at the very least we should find out as much as we can about it... given that it warrants this much at least." The Russian marine colonel replied, "You came by ship yes?" He asked the lizard.

The lizards had cleared the ring platform, "We did. The eye of tiamat is one of six dual purpose core crystal structures, that is an imprecise translation into English. They take their name from the guardian over each respective eye as apportioned by the system lords in ancient times. They are in fact of gate builder artifice."

Jack glanced back and raised an eyebrow at Daniel. "They're ancient in origin?"

"Yes. Marduk took his when he usurped Tiamat, and at that time none of the goa'uld thought it wise to attempt to take the eye. Balor's eye was recovered only recently as well, having been left with the wreckage of his fleet."

Jack grimaced, but decided since they were asking questions he might as well play the game. It wasn't like they were in that big of a hurry. The pyramid wasn't just going to collapse on them after all. "You said there are six of these things?"

"Apophis, Ra, Balor, Tiamat, Baal, and Osiris."

Daniel about jumped out of his skin at the last name, which was not a reaction that Jack liked. "Osiris had one?"

"Indeed. After his imprisonment it is unknown if Ra recovered it or not. It is doubtful that Ra did recover it, regardless its location is unknown at present.."

"Teal'c?" Jack glanced to the Jaffa.

"I have seen a jewel about palm sized ringed with a filigreed metal disk that was called the Eye of Apophis by his priests, but I do not know if Apophis was able to employ as anything more than a symbol of his prestige as a system lord."

"Do you know if he still has it?" Daniel couldn't help himself.

"To the best of our knowledge, yes." The lizard replied even if it had been intended as for Teal'c. It waited a moment longer before the team of lizards began to move off.

"We are just going to let them go?"

"They have shields and we don't." Jack found himself retorting, "Live and let live, besides if they want to go snake hunting I'm not going to complain."

"They have just stated," Zhukov protested, "That the Eye of Tiamat is an artifact of the gate builders."

"Yes, I heard the eight foot murder lizard explain that the alleged magical rock is a gate builder magic rock." He retorted. "I also heard that there are six of these things, and Apophis has one." He paused, "And Osiris."

"Well if it was on Earth than she probably took it with her when she fled." Carter pointed out, "It would make sense that if it wasn't in her temple, it would have been on the ship."

"Right," He agreed, "But it won't hurt to look. We found your missing team, we have no good reason to stick around."

Zhukov grumbled even as Teal'c moved to the panel, "This should indeed deposit us near to the stargate. We should at the very least report back to the SGC as to our findings. General Hammond can then decide our next course of action. "However I would be remiss to point out that most of Marduk's old domain fell under the control of Apophis. If there is a mother ship in orbit his fleet will have taken notice of it."
--

 

[SIDoragon]

of course it is the Russians that want to attack the first alien thing they've seen that didn't try to kill them.

 

[Imperator Pax]

of course it is the Russians that want to attack the first alien thing they've seen that didn't try to kill them.

Click to shrink...

Its specifically Zhukov who wants to, as unlike in canon Russian SG 1 survives here so he'll be back as will Marchenko when Disclosure opens up for the Commonwealth countries getting SG teams (Canada, UK, Australia, specifically)

 

[JohnSmithMIB]

Makes sense they want to get their hands on it if it is as important as the lizard is describing (IIRC it is). Plus I wouldn't trust any system lord's troops entirely if I had missing men. I'd think it's a 'thanks for the info but I'm going to have to confirm it' situation.
If the SG team is going to stick around I would have expected Daniel to push for working together (not mixed squads but like jointly eliminating monsters & perhaps some joint investigation). If there's a lizard Ha'tak in orbit then not really much the SG team can do since I think they'd have to ring to a hostile ship to get out.

 

[Imperator Pax]

The Tomb
Conclusion​

Jack had expected a ship in orbit, maybe even some death gliders flying overhead. Hard to miss a klick wide golden pyramid anyway, "I count three stars up there, anybody else?"


"Three ships, sir." Carter frowned, "Those don't look like standard Ha'tak either."


Jack shrugged, and ribbed Teal'c, "Think Apophis will take the bait?"


"It seems unlikely he would allow such a provocation to go unanswered." The Jaffa replied as they moved up the scrub covered hill towards where SG 11 was spread out around the plaza containing the stargate.


He glanced back to Danny's ziggurat, "Zhukov?"


"We will need to report this," He grunted tracking towards the pyramid, "Nothing we can do with their presence here now. I am uncomfortable simply leaving such an artifact in the hands of the goa'uld or their lackeys." Zhukov grumbled as Carter radio SG 11 that they were coming in.


"I doubt Apophis knew any of the devices secrets, and it seems unlikely Marduk did either, it certainly did not prevent Tiamat's usurpation."


"That does not mean none of them know. There are six stones," So much for looking on the bright side, but as they'd just reiterated they knew Apophis had had one. "The comment regarding the eye of balor suggests that they are being reassembled, and I cannot see how that is not the sign of someone who understands their function."


"We can't bank that it is simply a prestige play," Carter agreed, but there was nothing they could do, and so they dialed earth and prepared to go home.


Within a few hours they were in an expedited debriefing in one of hte conference rooms.


"It is unfortunate regarding the outcome of the mission," Chekov remarked, "Dr. Britsky's death, and the loss of Kirensky and his team are regrettable." He paused to sip at his coffee, "As for P2X 338, we have to consider the situation, but further investigation of the planet may be in order. At the very least we should repatriate the remains of those lost there." Then sparing a glance towards Major Davis, and Colonel Kennedy, "These joint operations can be considered broadly a success."


General Hammond spoke up preventing either visitor from the Pentagon from responding, "We are waiting for Jacob to get back to us to corroborate your intelligence report regarding the eyes, but it may take some time for the Tok'ra to get back with something." The general glanced around to the assembled teams, "In the mean time a joint Russian, and American archaeological expedition is being organized to examine the Osiris temple. Doctor Jackson you'll be needed for that. I'll be pulling SG 1 from the active exploration mission roster for the duration."


If the Russians hadn't been here, or that weasel Kennedy Jack might have protested that decision... but not with them here. Not when he got the feeling that there was more going on. A joint archeological team in Egypt would almost certainly have state's fingerprints on it... and that meant Jack could almost be certain that he'd be getting follow up calls asking about his recent trip to the scenic countryside from Christians in Action. He'd been expecting a lunch invitation anyway from the CIA since they had gotten back, and without SG 1 being in rotation he was sure that would be sooner rather than later.


A nod, "We should be prepared to address this issue at the regular conference." He meant the quarterly meetings set up between the USAF and the Nominally VKS detachment command to which Chekov had been effectively permanently assigned to. "I have however been apprised that we have gathered all of Doctor Britsky's effects from out of storage, including what might be ancillary material regarding other digs in Iraq. Most of this material was not actually deemed to be classified."


Only after they had confirmed his team was dead. He expected the Russians had been keep it all in reserve just so they'd have a bargaining chip if Britsky didn't manage a miracle and turn out to be alive


"But you still boxed it all up when he disappeared through the stargate."


"Da, out of an abundance of caution, you understand." Chekov remarked, "Of course as part of cooperation between our countries there are a number of experts in Egyptology coming from Moscow to assist Doctor Jackson in the field. There is an existing research center in Cairo, though I must express my concern regarding Doctor Rayner."


Hammond frowned. "We do not intend to involve Doctor Rayner in this."


"He's been helpful with collaborating Sarah, and Doctor Jordan's notes, and cataloging their research material," Daniel commented, in a somewhat pained admission, "but we're very lucky that no one prior to us didn't try to full excavate the temple. What if the Eye of Osiris is still in the temple?"

"Well," Chekov began ponderously, "It is not as if we actually know what it does. Not properly. Britsky's translations regarding the Eye of Tiamat were vague. As you have said the Goa'uld Osiris may have taken it with her when she departed aboard her spaceship. Indeed some of my technical colleagues believe that the ability of the temple to conceal the ship might be useful to more practical means of planetary defense."
--


Selmak shook his head, "Teal'c wasn't wrong," Jacob took over and jerked his head at the map of space surrounding P2X 338 from the political perspective. "Apophis attempted to swing a fleet down, but he doesn't have the resources. Most of his fleet is tied up fighting Heru'ur and what wasn't tied up there was fighting Cronus. "As for the eye, Like I told you when Osiris got loose we don't know what the Eye of Osiris does."


"Zhukov naturally suspicious sort that he is thinks that that might not be true for Sokar."


"If Sokar's Ancient patron has returned that may be true." Selmak agreed, "It would make the most sense from the behaviors we're seeing from within his empire.


"Yeah," Jack grunted, "The lizards copped that it was of gate builder artifice. .. and that they had the eye of Balor."


"We heard that as well. There have been diplomatic in roads to Morrigan's domain that we didn't expect from either Zeus or Sokar... if I had to guess-"


"Daddy is telling junior to play nice with the other kids?"


"Something like that." Selmak's eyes glowed, "The Ancients are the only existence in the universe that a goa'uld would willingly defer to in such a fashion. Most goa'uld princes eventually buck against their parents, but the ancients... if one has returned... indeed the title System Lord is one we inherited from the Alteran, even though from Egeria's memories we believe it meant something quite different to how the goa'uld today reign."


"Danny says that Ancient, and Asgard language have a common ancestor, and that that's where we get latin and old norse from." and who knew whatever else from.


Selmak nodded, "Interesting. Admittedly linguistics is not my field but the Alteran are often referred to as the ancients for a reason," He looked at the glossy photos taken by SG 11 during their time on P2X 338, "I know that there are several goa'uld warlords, not proper system lords who utilize latin as their preferred language, Egeria as well imparted the Tokra with knowledge of it, as it existed on earth during the period Jacob refers to as the Roman Republic." He tapped the picture of the ziggurat taken from about a mile out, "If you do go back there Jack probably be a good idea to bring us along. Marduk was nasty by Goa'uld standards, and Tiamat wasn't any nicer." Jacob declared, "Not saying we will find anything but if you're bringing the Russians along bringing me and Anise might be a good idea. Just an idea."


"Might be a while Jacob," Jack replied, "Sg 1 is benched for the moment. Don't know when we'll be able to go. Any particular reason why they would want to kill Marduk?"


"Marduk was a mean snake, Jack. Maybe not as bad as Moloch was but it takes a lot for a priest hood to overthrown their god... and Ra more or less let it happen without recrimination officially... that should give you an idea of about how well liked Marduk was." He shook his head, "I doubt the priests would have done much more than seal marduk in there with that thing. And since the Russian team were the first one in there in years we might be able to salvage some valuable materials?"


"Treasure hunting jacob?"


"Talents of Naquadah, Significant volumes of refined naquadah could be in the central vault." Selmak remarked, "Even if we have missed the eye of tiamat it wouldn't hurt to look." He glanced back at the map, and ran a finger through the air in a circle distorting the holographic motes of stars, "We could use any bit of naquadah we can get, and just because Marduk might not have known doesn't mean he might not have stored away Tiamat's other treasures."


Commentary: Tomb concludes with the SGC's political and resource problems, and of course by proxy the lack of resources of their allies, and we're right at the part where not only is the Jaffa rebellion getting more recruits, but various minor goa'uld are vying for system lord status, and of course Anubis is clawing for resources and trying to make his return.

 

[ArKFallen]

The Tomb
P2X 338
Part 4​

Click to shrink...

This one (which is the chapter before the one you just posted) is missing a threadmark.


I wish i had more solid comments for you but I have trouble doing more than just enjoying this jump's story.