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nightspear) wrote2008-10-04 06:05 pm
Diplomacy (5/27)
Title: Diplomacy (Table of Contents)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Nothing you recognize is mine. I gain nothing of material value from this.
Pairings: Gen
Note: As always, long stretches of non-English dialogue are italicized. Buckle up, folks--this is where the fun finally starts!
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Son
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16 August 1998; O'Neill/Jackson Residence, Earth; 2000 hrs
"I could skip it," Jack offered, even though Daniel knew he really couldn't. "Carter'd go along with it. Tell the President 'we saved the world, now we want a vacation.' I haven't seen Abydos in almost a year."
Exactly a year, Daniel thought, but that was in Abydonian years, not Tau'ri ones. Tomorrow, it would be a year. A whole year. "You can't skip it, Jack. And you told me once that you hate deserts, so it wouldn't exactly be a vacation."
"Yeah, but I meant deserts on Earth. Abydos is great."
Daniel forced a smile. "Congratulations on the award," he said. "The Air Medal, yes? I was talking to Lieutenant Hagman on Friday, and he explained that it's a great honor, and that you and Sam really deserve--"
"Don't try to change the subject," Jack interrupted. Daniel sighed and stopped talking. "When's the last time you slept?"
He flapped a hand in the vague direction of the air. When Jack raised his eyebrows expectantly, he admitted, "I don't know."
"Have you tried kelno'reem-ing with Teal'c? I'll take you back to the Mountain tonight if it'll help."
"No, I...can't concentrate enough," he said, because he'd tried that last night on his own, and he didn't think it would be much better even with Teal'c's calm, solid presence beside him. "I would only be disturbing Teal'c. You know," he added, "we need to leave very early tomorrow morning if you don't want to miss your airplane to Washington."
"Stop that," Jack said.
"Stop what?"
"You know what."
"No, I--"
"Daniel." Jack waited until he looked up. "Sit down a minute."
Daniel glanced up at a clock. "It's getting late, and didn't you say you never finished your report from P2X--"
"I've still got all night to finish whatever I need to. Now stop trying to wear a hole in my floor and sit down."
Daniel stopped, not having realized until then that he had been pacing. Exhaling slowly, he sank down onto Jack's couch. "I'm fine," he said for what had to have been the fifth time in the last couple of hours.
Jack lowered himself into a seat opposite him and believed him as well as he had the other four times. "I'd be a little worried if you were."
Better than a lot worried, like you are now, Daniel thought, but didn't say it. He fixed his eyes on the window instead.
"Excited?" Jack said.
Scared anxious overjoyed terrified confused-- "Yes," he said.
"Second thoughts?"
"Of course not."
"Because--"
"No, Jack. And you're supposed to leave tomorrow at--"
"Will you drop it about the damn plane?" Jack snapped. Daniel shut up. More calmly, Jack asked, "What's on your mind?" Daniel gave him a disbelieving look. "Okay, dumb question. I mean--is there something in particular you're worried about?"
Daniel chewed his lip, then said finally, "A lot of things. What if they don't open the 'gate tomorrow? What if they forgot, or Kasuf thought it was too dangerous? What if the calculations were wrong and they already opened and closed it without us knowing, and I'll never be able to--" He cut himself off, that time.
"Oy. You're making me be the logical one here?" Jack said lightly. "Well, I'm not doing it. Take a step back yourself and think about everything you just said to me."
A moment later, Daniel sighed and conceded, "Tobay is very responsible--he would never forget to tell Kasuf, and Kasuf would never forget about the Stargate. Sam checked the calculations several times, and even if she were wrong, General Hammond let us try dialing Abydos over the last few days with no lock. And Kasuf wouldn't leave the Stargate buried, because he's hoping his children will be coming back."
"And you," Jack reminded him. "You were practically raised with his kids, right? He's waiting for you, too."
"I just...I don't want anything to go wrong. I want to go back and see everything the way it used to be. "
Jack stilled, his fingers unmoving on the arm of his chair and his face pinched. "Daniel, it won't be," he said quietly. "Don't...don't go expecting things to be the same."
"I know. I know." Daniel ran his fingertips nervously over the material of the couch. "How do I tell him, Jack? How do I tell Kasuf that I'm safe and well, and his children..."
"You tell him that Skaara and his sister are still alive, and we're still looking for them," Jack said patiently.
"But we don't know if they really are." What could he say-- 'Kasuf, I participated in blowing up a ship when I knew your son was in it a few months ago. Assuming your daughter wasn't there, too, we've narrowed her possible location down to only several thousand planets.'
"We've been operating based on the assumption that they've both survived and are alive," Jack said. "You tell their father we'll keep looking."
"Yeah." Daniel fidgeted in his seat, then admitted, "I know. I know all this. I went over it with General Hammond, and...and Teal'c, and Major Ferretti, so I know what I'm supposed to say and what I'm supposed to do, but..."
"It'll be fine. SG-2 and Teal'c will make sure nothing happens. Carter and I will join you and relieve SG-2 as soon as we're done with the medal ceremony. And we'll keep people stationed there for the Abydons' safety, too, until this whole thing's settled."
"That's not the point," Daniel said, folding his arms before he could tear apart the seam he had been picking at. "I have to be the one to tell him--I can't...I have to tell him, not strangers from Earth. And then there's the alliance with Nagada to think of, and...and asking him to let me leave. Again."
Jack was watching him closely. "What do you think he'll say?"
Daniel shook his head. "It'll work. Kasuf will recognize the benefits of the SGC's friendship."
"Not the alliance part. What'll he say about you?"
Naturu, what will he think of me? "I suppose I'll find out tomorrow."
"Daniel, if this thing goes through the way we hope, they won't have to bury their 'gate forever," Jack pointed out. "You'll be able to go back and forth between both planets."
But it would never be the same.
Teal'c had visited his wife and son three brief times in more than eight months, and one of those times had been during their escape from the Goa'uld hatak. Like Teal'c, if Daniel was staying to help, he had to stay and help, not run home every few weeks. Besides, the Land of Light was a safe place and Teal'c a skilled warrior--the general might not allow Daniel to go to a high risk planet while alone and unprotected, which would restrict trips even more. He suspected his best chances for visiting Abydos would be if some team were sent there for an official reason and brought him along.
Still, he nodded. "My parents would have done everything they could to fight against the Goa'uld. What we're doing can only help my people. And this is what I was raised to do: study different places and people and, and...and learn things. It's what they would have wanted me to do, right?" Daniel chewed his lip and glanced up with a sudden jolt of anxiety when there was no answer. "Right, Jack?"
"They would've wanted you to be happy," Jack said finally. "So do we."
"I think I need to do this," Daniel said. "And there's a place here for me, at the SGC. I know that now."
"Yeah," Jack said. "Okay. And yeah, there is. But tomorrow--you're going home, Daniel. It's not just for SGC business. There are...things you probably want to do while you're there. Take some time for yourself, for whatever you need. Lou would understand."
Daniel thought about the home where he had grown up and wondered what it looked like now, after a year empty of people. "My parents will be at rest there now. My brothers--my friends. I don't even know who...died."
Jack was staring at him when he glanced up. "They would've been so proud of you, kid."
Unexpected tears stung his eyes, and Daniel had to look away again. Sometimes it felt like so long since they'd spoken to him, and so much had changed that he no longer knew what they would have thought of anything. "How...how can you know that?"
Jack was suddenly next to him, not touching, but sitting close. "Because," he said, and somehow, it was enough.
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17 August 1998; SGC, Earth; Nagada, Abydos; 1100 hrs
"Chevron seven--locked," Sergeant Harriman announced. "Wormhole to Abydos established."
"Ready?" Ferretti asked.
Daniel nodded, picking nervously at the sleeve of his uniform and fiddling with the strap on his backpack. "Ready."
"SG-2, Teal'c, Jackson," Colonel Makepeace called to them from the control room, "you have a go. If you run into any problems before General Hammond and SG-1 return from Washington, you contact me here immediately."
Daniel walked up the ramp to the shimmering event horizon and stopped with a feeling of mixed anticipation and apprehension churning in his gut. The sound of boots on metal approached from behind him. "We'll go first," Ferretti said. "Then Teal'c, and then Jackson."
"No," Daniel said quickly, putting a hand on Ferretti's arm as he started forward. "I should go first, so they see a familiar face and I can warn them others are coming through. Sir, the MALP didn't show anything wrong," he added when Ferretti started to shake his head. "They'll feel threatened if too many armed people go through at once." He glanced at Teal'c, who seemed reluctant, but inclined his head in understanding and took a step back.
"You and me, then," Ferretti compromised, calling back, "Count to ten, then follow us through."
Daniel shut his eyes briefly, then opened them and determinedly strode into the wormhole--
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--and stepped out into Nagada.
He sucked in an involuntary breath, nearly overwhelmed by the sight of the familiar chaapa'ai room. Torches lit the chamber with fire; not artificial, electric light bulbs, but real, warm flames swaying and dancing in their oil. Dry heat swelled heavily around him.
"Gods," he breathed shakily, sweeping his gaze around until he caught sight of...
"Dan'yel? Is that you?" Kasuf uttered, surprised relief in his voice, and took a few steps toward them.
The Nagadan dialect of Abydonian floated to Daniel's ears for the first time in a year, and suddenly, he was at a loss for what to say. To cover his momentary disorientation, he stepped to one side. "Elder Kasuf, this is Major Ferretti. There are four others coming--do not be afraid. They are all friends."
As if waiting for that cue, Teal'c stepped through, followed closely by Major Warren and Captains Griff and Casey. The Stargate deactivated behind them.
"Do not be afraid," Daniel said again, stepping toward Teal'c as he noticed Kasuf's gaze drawn to the Jaffa. He was momentarily grateful that Kasuf hadn't been in that room last year to see Teal'c as First Prime of Apophis. "They are here to help protect our people. This is Teal'c, my good friend and teacher."
"I am not your enemy," Teal'c added himself, arms spread to show his empty hands. "I am honored to meet you, Elder."
Kasuf glanced apprehensively at Daniel, but nodded in acceptance. "Then I am also honored to call you 'friend.'"
"Major Ferretti, SG-2," Daniel said, switching into English, "this is Elder Kasuf."
In heavily accented English, Kasuf said, to Ferretti, "I thank you to return Dan'yel safe. It is a long time." Then, to Daniel again, "It has been very long, my child."
He opened his arms, and, swallowing hard, Daniel stepped into them, burying his face in Kasuf's shoulder and breathing in the scent of the desert woven into the cloth. "Too long," he agreed in a whisper.
"Ay, Dan'yel," the man murmured in his ear, a hand on the back of his head. Even as he tightened his arms around Kasuf, part of Daniel knew that, while people on Earth saw him as a child, here, on Abydos, he truly was not, anymore. The rest of him knew he would always be a child to Kasuf and didn't care about the nearly desperate way he was clinging. "We feared you would never return, but you come back to us dressed like a man from Earth."
"The tunic I wore when I was taken is too small for me now," Daniel said sheepishly into the man's robe.
"It was a child's clothing," Kasuf said affectionately. "You begin to look as your father did when I first saw him all those years ago."
Reluctantly, Daniel pulled away, sobering. He stepped back--from the embrace, from the feel of Abydonian linen, from the comfort of Kasuf's steady voice--and lowered himself to one knee. "I regret that we do not return with Skaara and Sha'uri," he said as calmly as he could. "We believe they still live. We have not yet been able to find them and bring them back, but we will continue our search until we do."
"What do you mean by 'we?'" Kasuf repeated, glancing toward the Tau'ri.
"Elder, may we go somewhere to speak? I come here as a messenger from Earth, and there is much that I need to discuss with you." Daniel tried not to flinch as Kasuf's eyes narrowed and ran over his Tau'ri uniform again, lingering this time on the tactical vest he wore over the desert camouflage and the way he came to his feet in his now-comfortable military-issue boots.
"We can speak in my dwelling," Kasuf said finally, though a glint of suspicion shone in his eye. The Tau'ri cared a lot about Daniel's education, but Kasuf was proof that a person didn't need schooling to be intelligent. "But first, come with me. I will take you to the end of our land."
Daniel's throat tightened, and he folded his arms while he fought to control his expression. Noticing his sudden tension, Teal'c bent down slightly and said in English, "This makes you uneasy?"
"No," he denied. Then, "I don't know."
"Are we not already at the end of your land?"
"Not exactly. This is the edge of our territory, but that's not what people mean when they say..."
"Then what lies there?" Teal'c asked.
"Not 'what;' 'who,'" he corrected. "That's where we lay our dead to rest." Instead of waiting for Teal'c's answer, he turned around to SG-2. "Major Ferretti, Elder Kasuf would like me to...visit--"
"I heard," Ferretti interrupted quietly. "How far is it?"
"It's just outside the main part of Nagada. A thirty minute walk, perhaps an hour."
"I'll go with you. Warren, hold the fort until you hear from me. Keep your radios on, and make sure you don't shoot any of the natives if they wander by."
"Major," Daniel said delicately, "um...you don't have to go with...I mean..."
"I'll give you privacy when we get there," Ferretti told him, his tone understanding, though he didn't offer to stay away completely. Daniel nodded, then turned back to Kasuf.
"Come," the elder said, and led the way out of the room.
Daniel stepped out with him, Teal'c and Ferretti both on his heels. He blinked and had to squint against the glare of the sun at high noon as he emerged from the chaapa'ai room. The sharp rays beat down like a familiar physical presence, and he couldn't help crouching for a minute to touch the ground and let the hot sand sift through his fingers. How odd it was to be back home at last and not be able to feel the ground under his bare feet or drifting through sandals to tickle his toes. He closed his eyes and had to fight a sudden urge to unlace his boots, stop thinking about enemies and alliances, and just run...
"Jac--uh, Daniel?" Ferretti's quiet voice sounded from behind him.
The sand slipped out of his hand. "It's this way, sir," Daniel said, rising and moving across the desert toward the outer limits of Nagada's territory.
They started down a small dune, and Ferretti muffled a curse as he slipped on the shifting sands. Daniel felt his balance adjust automatically and smiled, just a little--his legs still belonged to the desert, no matter what seal was stamped on his boots.
Kasuf hadn't missed the exchange. As Daniel drew nearer, Teal'c and Ferretti keeping a considerate distance behind, the man asked him, "Was the land very different, on Earth?"
"Yes," Daniel said. He let out a small laugh, because, of all the things that were different, the physical land was the last he would have imagined missing."Everything was very different."
"And they have treated you well, the ones who rescued you?"
"Yes," he said again, emphatically. "They have been wonderful. The hero of the Great Rebellion himself has been very good to me," he added, knowing the elder would remember Jack, at least. "He could not come immediately, because he now being honored by their...their leader. But he will come, along with another friend of mine, as soon as they are finished. They are eager to meet the Abydonian people again."
"You have grown close to them," Kasuf observed shrewdly, a little sadly. "With your fair skin and hair, and your clothing, and the manner in which you speak of Earth...no one would guess you were born of this world. I almost did not recognize you at first."
A pain that had become all too familiar recently stabbed through him. He stared straight ahead. "I am still Abydon, Elder."
A hand cupped the back of his head, and he turned to look into Kasuf's serious eyes. "And you will always find brothers here," Kasuf said. "You will always be a son of Abydos, and as a son to me. You will never have cause to doubt your place here."
By the man's choice of words, he must at least suspect what Daniel had decided. He had to avert his gaze again. "Elder, there is something I must ask you. It is about Earth, and what they--what we plan to do against the enemy who has--"
"There will be time for that," Kasuf said firmly. He stepped in front of Daniel, making him stop walking and look at him again. "You have always been a child of two worlds, Dan'yel Mshai Jackson. But you cannot remain a child forever. Come now and pay your respects to the fallen. Then, we will speak, as one man to another."
When they reached the reached the stretch of land outside the walls of the town, though, Daniel's steps slowed. By squinting, he could make out small markers in the distance. He jumped a little when Teal'c's hand found his shoulder and glanced back into the Jaffa's sympathetic eyes set in his expressionless face. Ferretti crossed a final few steps to them.
"Major..."
"Go ahead," Ferretti told him. "Just don't wander out of sight."
Teal'c leaned in a little closer when he didn't move. "My friend, I will accompany you if you wish it, but I do not believe my presence to be appropriate in this place."
Daniel shook his head, saying, "It's not because of...it's just...I'd like to be alone with them for a while." Teal'c inclined his head in understanding. Daniel turned back to the burial ground but felt suddenly as if he were stuck, unable to step forward.
"Come." Kasuf grasped him by the arm, and he lifted his feet one by one and let himself be led away from his friends and toward his fallen family.
This land was sacred to all. The Rebellion was celebrated, it was true, but nothing could wipe away millennia of belief and betrayal of belief without some disorder and ruined foundations that needed to be rebuilt. This place, however, remained revered by all Nagadans, no matter what their varied beliefs were about gods and the kalach and the afterlife in the years since Ra's downfall.
Now Daniel was acutely aware that even the Abydonian word 'kalach' was a word borrowed from the Goa'uld, a corruption of a Tau'ri Egyptian word for the life-force that had somehow become associated with the Jaffa concept of the life that followed life. Abydonian beliefs were so entwined with the Goa'uld that truth and lie, genuine history and muddled falsehoods...nothing could be truly separated any longer. Not for the first time, he wished he knew for certain which was real and which only a legend created by a tyrant.
It was one more thing the Goa'uld had to answer for. Sometimes, Daniel thought it was the worst of their crimes.
There was a small piece of land before him, the place marked by a small, flat stone lying at its head. An approximation of 'Claire' and 'Mel' in hieroglyphs, and then the names in Roman letters below, had been carved painstakingly into the stone. Daniel stared at them in confusion--so few people could read that most grave stelae, such as they were, normally bore no words. There was nothing else, though, and he was relieved that no one had tried to inscribe an offering of his parents' kalach to some god who might be nothing more than a parasite, anyway.
Daniel inched forward. "Who wrote this?"
"Your brothers and sisters of the pen ensured that their names were written into the stone," Kasuf told him. "They wished to honor their teachers. I thought it fitting, for the people who brought learning back to our world." There was a pause, and then, "Claire and Mel rest together, Dan'yel. They were mourned by all."
Daniel had seen people laid to rest, over the years. Burial rites were simple on Abydos--use of sarcophagi and ornate tombs had been lost during Ra's oppressive rule, but some things had been preserved. He had always thought the words spoken over a grave were beautiful, but never before had he been so miserable and yet so relieved to have missed the ritual. Who had spoken the words of power for them? What had they buried with his parents to take into eternity?
Steeling himself, he stepped closer, close enough to reach out and touch the stele if he only bent down. "Kasuf, could I...?"
"I will wait for you in my dwelling," Kasuf told him. "When you are ready, lead your friends into the village and find me there--there is something I must show you. Do you remember where it is?"
"Of course." He had never gotten lost within the walls of Nagada proper, and he wouldn't now. "Thank you, Elder."
Daniel waited until the sound of Kasuf's sandals on the ground faded, then turned back to the grave and tried to figure out what to do.
There was a moment when he wanted to say something but wasn't sure what language to use, and then he wanted to laugh at himself for worrying about something so stupid when he didn't know that anyone would hear, anyway. If a kalach existed at all, it was in the afterlife, not trapped here beneath barren soil. There were stories, of Anubis and Osiris and Ma'at, but Daniel didn't think anymore that he wanted his parents' kalach in the keeping of beings whom Teal'c knew as despised Goa'uld.
Just in case they were listening, then. People were always telling him that, these days. Just in case.
"Hello," he started, coughing uncomfortably. "Uh. I was going to tell you something, but I don't know... Look--Robert says my accent's almost inaudible now. That's a good thing. I think. So..." He rubbed his forehead, feeling stupid, then folded his arms. "I don't...know what to say to you."
At the realization, his eyes began to prickle, and he let himself drop to his knees. "Um, Teal'c says I should learn when to be silent, too, s-so..." He brushed impatiently at a spot of wetness snaking down his cheek and reached out to touch their names in the stone, feeling the care that someone must have taken, and wishing he had been that person. "You don't know who all those people are, of course," he said when he found his voice again. He hated that his parents and this place had been his whole world before, and now the SGC was, and they didn't know each other. "B-because everything has changed. Which is...I mean, that's just th-the way... Gods, I miss you, and I don't know...I don't know."
He tore his eyes from the stone and fumbled with the straps of his backpack until his arms were free, then reached in and dug blindly through it until his fingers found one of his journals. "I took notes about Earth, and the SGC, and my friends, my teachers there." He coughed again and sniffed. "I wish so much that you could meet them, they're really...really. But. So, um...I wrote about th-them, and..."
Daniel bit his lip, scrubbing his jacket sleeve roughly against his eyes. "Naturu."
He gave up talking, focusing instead on digging a shallow hole in the dry earth next to the stele with his fingers. Once he'd placed the journal inside, he stared at it for several long moments, because it looked so small and meaningless now, but there was nothing left he could do, even if it didn't matter, and what if it did matter, after all, and it wasn't enough?
But that was all. "I miss you," he said again. "Mama, Papa. I miss you." He kissed his fingertips, pressed them against the cover, and, with a last sigh, swept the earth back over it.
That done, he leaned forward, elbows on his dusty trousers, swallowing back something that caught in his throat. He pressed a fist to his mouth, wishing he had a candle flame to stare into, and tried to reach some sort of calm on his own.
When he could breathe normally again, he sniffed once and said, "There's something...I need to tell you something, okay? I'm going to ask Kasuf to let me stay on Earth and serve the Stargate program. For Skaara and Sha'uri, and what was done to...to you, and...and everything both of our planets have suffered. I know you always said to find the peaceful solution, and you didn't want me to be a f-fighter...and I'm not, exactly, but...but the war came to us first. It's the right thing to do. You understand? Why I have to be part of this fight?"
He found himself irrationally disappointed when no answer came. Not that he was expecting...but. Still.
"I don't know what gods are real, or if you were looking for them," he said. "But...if they are..." He waited. There was no response--no sound or sign from above or below, and not even the dry desert to answer him. He sighed and finished, "If they are, I hope you find them. And..." He searched for some blessing he could say and actually believe and mean it, because, before these of all people, his words had to matter. Finally, he fell back into his native tongue and said, "May your names live on in our hearts, in eternity."
But when he rose to his feet, his heart sank all over again when he realized that there was another grave next to him that looked just as new as his parents', and that he didn't even know whose it was. Next to that were two more.
"Bolaa rests here," a voice said from behind him, as if reading his thoughts. "And here, Ide, and there, Mriyu."
Daniel hastily wiped his eyes again and turned to see a solemn young man standing a few steps away, the knife hanging from his hip and the thick leather band on his left arm betraying his occupation as a Guard of Nagada.
"I spoke on their behalf at the burial," Tobay said, walking toward him and looking down at Bolaa's grave. "They died with honor, in defense of our people. Kasuf spoke for your mother and father that night, as well." Daniel could only nod, not trusting his voice. Tobay smiled slightly. "I told Kasuf that you would surely return, brother."
"Tobay," Daniel choked out, then straightened to his full height and extended an arm. Tobay clasped his forearm in his strong grip, but then pulled him close into a tight embrace. Daniel brought his other arm up around and clung to his brother, his mind still numb from renewed mourning. "It is good to see you again, Tobay."
"I only regret that your return must be darkened by grief." Tobay pulled away and held him out at arm's length to run a critical eye over him. "I almost did not know you, Dan'yel. You have grown tall and strong in your absence."
"Perhaps you have become short and weak," Daniel countered, falling easily back into the familiar banter he had once shared with the boys here.
Tobay laughed delightedly, releasing him with a playful shove. "Someone needs to remind you of your place, little brother."
Daniel found his eyes drawn to the faint stripe of rank that streaked the older boy's wristband. Tobay had worn the mark before, for a time, until Skaara had bested him to claim the position; now, it seemed, Tobay was head of the Guards once again. Daniel fingered the bands around his own arm; he could still see Klorel in his mind's eye and remembered that Skaara no longer wore anything on his arms but a device of torture and Goa'uld ornaments.
His brother's smile faded then, seeing where his gaze rested. "No one can replace our Skaara, nor would I wish to. But the village must still be protected, now more than ever. I merely hold Skaara's place until his return. Kasuf tells me that you bring news of him."
"Yes," Daniel said sobering as well.
"He is not with you--but he lives?"
"Yes. Skaara and his sister, both. I will tell you, but it is not a simple matter."
"Then we have a surprise for you, for we already know of Sha'uri."
Daniel frowned. "How? What do you mean?"
Tobay grinned at him. "Sha'uri is here. We did not tell her of your arrival--she will be very pleased."
...x...
17 August 1998; Nagada, Abydos; 1330 hrs
"Teal'c," Daniel called, sprinting back to where his friends stood and ignoring Tobay's confused shouts behind him. "Teal'c!"
"Daniel Jackson," Teal'c answered immediately, jogging to meet him, his zat'nik'tel gripped tightly in one hand. Ferretti remained where he was but swung his submachine gun around into his hands. "What has transpired?"
"Daniel?" Ferretti asked, his eyes flicking between Daniel and Tobay's approaching form. "Who is this?"
"He's a friend," Daniel said quickly, before the major could start pointing a weapon at the head of Nagada's security forces. "But he says Sha'uri is here, on Abydos."
Teal'c stiffened. Ferretti's gaze snapped toward the main part of the village, as if he could see the woman through the surrounding wall. "That's the woman who was snaked?"
"Yes. Yes, sir."
"Dan'yel," Tobay called, catching up to them. He sounded at once annoyed and confused. "What is it?"
"Sha'uri is here?" Daniel demanded urgently.
"Yes, with her father. Has something happened?"
"How long as she been here?"
"More than a season," Tobay said.
Teal'c's eyes narrowed, and Ferretti said, "Will someone tell me what the hell's going on?"
"And she has not seemed...different to you, Tobay?" Daniel said.
"No, by the gods! What has come over you, Dan'yel?"
Daniel averted his eyes, then raised them again resolutely. "You must believe me. Whoever is in Elder Kasuf's house is not Sha'uri."
"Jackson!" Ferretti snapped.
"We have to get her away, Major--everyone here is in danger," Daniel said anxiously, running toward the gates to the town. His movement was cut short in a frustrated growl when Teal'c stopped him with a single arm around his chest and dragged him back. "Teal'c, let go--"
"Major Ferretti," Teal'c said, ignoring Daniel. "The Goa'uld woman is within, but the Abydonian people have not noticed any unusual behavior."
"Tobay," Daniel said as he saw his brother eye Teal'c's restraining arm and start to reach for a knife. "No, don't! Teal'c, stop, let go, I'll stop, okay?" He pulled against the Jaffa's grasp until he was released, then turned back to Tobay. "Sha'uri and Skaara have both been taken by Goa'uld. Demons, like Ra was, like the demon that attacked Nagada and took us away! Sha'uri is being controlled by one of them."
Wariness still lingered in Tobay's expression and his stance. "How can that be? She has been here among us for two cycles of the Eye of Thoth. And what could she possibly do while she is with child?"
Daniel choked. "With...child? How...but, who...?"
His brother shook his head. "She will not speak his name."
Feeling suddenly ill, Daniel repeated to his companions, "We have to go to her."
"You're not going anywhere near a Goa'uld, kid," Ferretti said flatly. "Stay out here."
"Don't call me--" Daniel started, then said, "You'll find her on your own, then? You don't even know where she is or what she looks like!"
"You could ask your friend to lead the way."
"Or I could not."
"I will make that an order, Jackson!"
"I don't care!" Daniel snarled back. "Tobay says she hasn't done anything wrong. Major, please--she's with child. I won't do anything dangerous, but I have to see her and find out."
Ferretti looked taken aback, then snapped, "Don't get between her and our weapons. Teal'c?"
Teal'c stepped forward and took up a place beside Daniel without further prompting, not holding him this time, though his stance said he was ready to do so at any second. Daniel gritted his teeth but didn't argue, instead nodding to Tobay and leading the way through the wooden gate and into Nagada proper. He didn't have to look back to know they were all following.
Ferretti's voice reached his ears, along with the static of his radio. "Heads up, boys--Goa'uld in town. She's pinned down in here, and we suspect she won't be in any condition to do much to us, but hold your position, stay the hell awake, and alert the SGC. If we don't check in after thirty minutes--"
"Dan'yel," Tobay said, alarmed, ripping Daniel's attention away from Ferretti. Daniel looked at him, remembering then that Tobay could understand some English, too, but didn't slow his pace. "You are mistaken--you must be. You cannot lead these soldiers from Earth to harm your own sister."
"I saw her attack Skaara with my own eyes, brother," Daniel said.
Tobay snapped him to a halt, authority sharp in his voice. "And I have seen her do nothing wrong for two cycles with my own eyes, brother!"
Daniel was pulled to a stop, and he looked instinctively to Teal'c for help. There were in the town now, with Nagadans watching excitedly and warily all around them, a few beginning to crowd their path. He thought he heard his own name whispered a few times, but he had eyes only for the suspicious confusion reflecting back at him from Teal'c's stony face.
"If she is indeed inhabited by a Goa'uld, then all of your people are in danger," Teal'c said, appealing to Tobay's duty of guarding the village. "But we have no wish to harm Sha'uri unless we are forced to do so."
"Yes. Major Ferretti," Daniel added, "don't raise your weapon to her until we hear her out."
"Excuse you, Jackson?" Ferretti said incredulously.
"Please. Uh, sir," he amended, wincing. "If anything goes wrong, she's alone and you'll have plenty of time to... Just. Please. She might be just a victim. An innocent, pregnant woman," he added.
Eventually, Ferretti nodded grudgingly, warning, "One wrong move, and I shoot first, got it?"
"Understood," Daniel agreed quickly. He took a sideways look at Ferretti's position so that he'd know whether the man had an open shot in the case that someone made a wrong move.
Tobay understood their brief exchange easily enough to hear the concession as well as the threat, and he removed his hand from Daniel's arm to take the lead himself. Perhaps recognizing him as a Guard, the townspeople cleared the way to let them through at the sight of his determined stride. Daniel quickened his pace to match his brother's.
"You surprise me, Dan'yel," Tobay commented to him as they neared Kasuf's home. "If I were not sure that you would refuse, I might ask you to join the Guards."
Daniel wasn't sure if that was a compliment or a rebuke. There was no good way to answer, and he didn't try.
Finally, they approached Kasuf's home. Kasuf and Sha'uri's home, it should have been, until Sha'uri married into another man's house, but...well. How many things actually went as they should?
Kasuf was waiting when they stepped through the entrance. "Have you finished--"
"Forgive me, Kasuf," Tobay interrupted. "Dan'yel brings disquieting news about your daughter."
Before he could answer, though, Sha'uri (Sha'uri, gods, he had almost forgotten how radiantly beautiful his sister was) appeared behind him. "Father, I--Dan'yel!"
Teal'c shifted almost imperceptibly next to him, his zat'nik'tel rising a few inches. Daniel placed a quelling hand on his arm, reasoning mentally that that didn't technically count as getting between Sha'uri and a weapon, so he wasn't really disobeying Ferretti's orders.
"Sha'uri?" Daniel said hopefully. His eyes were drawn immediately to her belly, and he wasn't Dr. Janet Fraiser of Earth or the physician Sainu of Nagada, but he was sure there couldn't be very much time left before the baby came.
"Beware, chal'ti," Teal'c murmured beside him. "I sense the Goa'uld within her still."
Sha'uri looked shocked, her lips falling open slightly and not making any moves toward them, threatening or otherwise. "He told me you were dead," she whispered. "I had not hoped to see you again."
Kasuf frowned at that. "What do you say, daughter? Who could have told you such a thing?"
"Kasuf," Daniel said, "the last time I saw Sha'uri, she had been taken by a demon of great power and evil. She was not who she appeared to be."
"He speaks the truth, Father," Sha'uri said, lowering her eyes.
"What?" Kasuf said.
"There is a demon called Amaunet within me, but she sleeps now." Her breath hitched, and she turned away from them. "If she did not, the child I carry would be stillborn."
Kasuf's mouth worked soundlessly. Daniel turned to Teal'c to ask, "Is that true? The Goa'uld can't take control of the host when she's with child?" Ferretti's eyebrows rose as he struggled to follow the conversation.
"I have never known a Goa'uld to father a human child," Teal'c said, not really answering, sounding unsure himself. "It is forbidden."
"But...Amaunet is the Mother Who Is Father. Perhaps there is no father, then?" Daniel said hopefully.
Kasuf's eyes widened, and Sha'uri shied from her father's look of horror as he realized the truth before Daniel did. "No. Apophis...is the father," she admitted, a tear escaping. "They have stolen my womb as well as my soul." Tobay's jaw tightened.
"Jackson?" Ferretti prompted when a pause stretched too long.
"Apophis has..." He faltered, not knowing the English word for the atrocity that had been done to his sister. "She has been... Sha'uri carries Apophis's child."
Ferretti's hands shifted uncomfortably on his weapon, but, to Teal'c and Daniel, he said, "Listen, that's gotta mean Apophis is here somewhere."
Sha'uri answered directly for herself, her English accented but smooth and confident, just as Daniel remembered. "Apophis is not here. He has hidden me away, to hide me from his enemy." At their looks of suspicion, she said, "My mind is filled with images...the Goa'uld's knowledge, memories. That is how I know that you, Jaffa, are the shol'va Teal'c. Apophis survived your assault on his ships, but his place among the System Lords is no more. He blames the shol'va for that, and the Tau'ri."
Teal'c's carefully neutral expression gained a hint of pride.
Daniel, however, was still caught on the fact that Apophis had survived the assault. That meant... "And Ska--and Klorel? He survived as well? Can you be certain?"
She turned a pitying gaze on him, and he had to fight not to look away. "Skaara still lives, and the Goa'uld within him. He escaped with Apophis, and soon after, I learned of your death at his hand, Dan'yel. At least, that was what he believed."
Alive. Alive. 'Alive' meant he could be saved. And to save them...
"Thor's Hammer," Daniel said, turning wide-eyed to Teal'c. "If..."
"It was destroyed," Teal'c reminded him quietly.
"But perhaps Thor left something else there," he insisted. "We have to do something, Teal'c, while we have the chance!"
"What is this hammer?" Sha'uri said.
Daniel glanced at Ferretti, who said, "Ma'am, your Goa'uld's...sleeping now, right?"
"Yes," Sha'uri promised. "She does not listen now."
Before anyone could voice further suspicions, Daniel said, "There's a technology that can remove a Goa'uld from its host. It's on a planet called Cimmeria. It...it's broken, but that means there is a way. If we can go to that place and...and try to contact the people who built it..."
But she shook her head. "I think not," she said. "Cimmeria?"
"You have heard of this place," Teal'c said.
Still looking scared--of Apophis or of his enemies or of them, Daniel couldn't tell--but not backing down, Sha'uri said, "There is one called Heru-ur who has built a stronghold for himself on a planet where no other Goa'uld has dared to go in millennia: Cimmeria. Apophis and the other System Lords fear the strength he has built there, that he somehow defeated what all Goa'uld have feared for so long."
Uh-oh.
"A Goa'uld...must have found out that Thor's Hammer was destroyed," Daniel said.
"Heru-ur is no ordinary Goa'uld," Teal'c put in. "He is a powerful System Lord--a conqueror and a destroyer. His armies are feared even among the Goa'uld."
Sha'uri nodded. "Apophis believes Heru-ur will come for his queen and his heir. That is why he left me here." She hesitated, then admitted, "I did not know his reasons in the first days, when Amaunet was only beginning to loosen her hold, but when I realized...I knew of nothing I could do. I believed you dead, that the Tau'ri would never return. There are few who dare to fight the Goa'uld."
Daniel took a step forward. When no one pulled him back, he took another. "And you...you are truly...?" He reached out a hand and lightly touched her shoulder; Sha'uri stood still and let him. The tingling sensation of a Goa'uld's naquadah was there, so faint that he would never have noticed without looking for it. But there, still.
"I am your sister again," Sha'uri told him, sounding a little desperate for someone to believe her. She gently grasped his hand and placed it on the bump of her stomach instead. "It is I, Dan'yel, Skaara's sister--your sister. Until the child comes."
"The child..." Something stirred under his fingers, and he drew back with a sharp intake of breath. "And then? What will happen to the child?"
Sha'uri's cool fingertips reached up to brush his hair off his forehead fondly. Daniel closed his eyes and tried to imprint the feel of her touch into his memory, because when the child came, he would lose it again. "Apophis wishes for a son who can one day become his new host."
Tobay shook his head in fierce denial. "We will not allow them to take your child."
She looked away. "He will destroy you for trying," she said, but held a protective arm around her stomach.
"We will save your child," Daniel argued. "We can protect..." He trailed off and turned to Ferretti. "Major, if we bring Sha'uri back to the SGC--"
"She said her mind was filled with Goa'uld knowledge," Ferretti said, looking thoughtful. "That could help us a hell of a lot."
Images of his sister being interrogated flashed through his mind. "No. No, that's not what I..."
"Amaunet will return soon," Teal'c interrupted. "When she does, we can protect Sha'uri and the child, but we must first return with her to the SGC."
"It'll take the danger away from Abydos, too," Ferretti added.
Gods. And when Amaunet awoke...but she would be safe. That was something. If she was with them, they could protect her. "Sha'uri," Daniel said, "will you come with us?"
"The demon within me will return," she said.
"Yeah, we'd have to keep you locked up then, ma'am," Ferretti said, "but at least we'll keep you safe from Apophis and the other Goa'uld. And...uh, we'd figure out a way to protect the baby, too. Maybe even find a way to get the Goa'uld out of you."
Sha'uri glanced once at her father, then at Daniel, hope warring with apprehension in her eyes. "I understand," she told the major. "I will go with you." Her expression hardened. "There is much I can tell you of the Goa'uld while I am free of Amaunet's mind."
"Okay. Wait here a sec," Ferretti told them, reaching up to his radio and stepping back out of the dwelling. "I'll send my team home ahead of us to alert Makepeace of a change in plans."
Once he'd left, Sha'uri shrank a little again, losing the steel in her gaze. She lowered her face and whispered, "Forgive me?"
"Daughter," Kasuf said, looking somewhere between pained and stunned, but when she leaned into him, he didn't hesitate to wrap her in his arms.
"I have brought such evil to our people. I am so ashamed--"
Surprisingly, it was Teal'c who answered her. "Only Apophis is to blame. Sha'uri is not at fault for being a slave to him and his kind."
"This...Apophis will be angry when he returns for her," Kasuf said, his voice solemn. "He will destroy the village if she is gone."
"That is part of what I wished to tell you, Elder," Daniel told him. "There is no time now if we want to keep Sha'uri safe, but the Tau'ri--the people of Earth--wish to band together with Abydos against the Goa'uld. If you will allow it, some men will remain here to keep Nagada safe until there is time for you to speak freely with our--with their leader."
"They are a trustworthy people," Teal'c added. "With Apophis weakened and expecting no resistance, the Tau'ri can strike here and now and defeat him. Elder Kasuf, tell him that his enemies stole away Sha'uri and the child."
But Sha'uri was shaking her head, thinking through the scenario. "He may not believe you."
"The deception will be only a distraction. The Tau'ri can be waiting," Teal'c countered, his voice intense as he glimpsed a chance to defeat his old master. "And when he comes, we can destroy him."
"We will fight him as well," Tobay put in. "If nothing else, we can drive him from our home."
Kasuf nodded in acceptance. "Then go with them, daughter. We will tell no one the truth of where you have gone."
Ferretti came back in. "Everyone ready?"
"One more thing, Major," Daniel said. "General Hammond said a security force would stay here until we know what's going to happen between Earth and Abydos. Now that Apophis is certain to come back, and soon..."
"Warren talked to the SGC through the MALP. Hammond's back from Washington. Makepeace and SG-3 are trying to scrounge up extra men to be stationed here for a while, a large enough force to make Apophis think twice. I sent my team home ahead of us, and they'll explain the situation. Daniel will take Sha'uri back, and O'Neill and Carter are coming through soon--we'll meet up with them in the 'gate room, and they'll help assess the situation."
"They're back from Washington already?" Daniel checked his watch automatically, knowing they hadn't expected to return this soon.
"Look, details later," Ferretti said in a tone that would allow no argument. "We have to get back ASAP, and it'll take us longer with...you know." He jerked his head toward Sha'uri.
Shaking himself, Daniel nodded, then told the others, "I will take Sha'uri to Earth through the chaapa'ai. Sha'uri, I will be nearby the whole time you are there."
Tobay frowned and leaned forward. "Dan'yel, you are not remaining here, in Nagada?"
Daniel opened his mouth but didn't know what to say. He had planned a list of explanations, but there was no time now, not when Apophis could be here any day now. "Tobay, I..."
"Go, with my blessing," Kasuf said, making both of them look at him in surprise. "Help them protect my daughter. We will speak again soon. Do not allow them to forget your people, Dan'yel."
"Jackson, we've gotta go," Ferretti said impatiently.
"Yes, sir," he answered automatically, then bowed to the man who was--had been--like a second father to him as well as his leader. "As you say, Elder. Sha'uri?"
Ferretti nodded to Teal'c to go first, then Daniel and Sha'uri, taking the back position in their procession himself. The sound of footsteps reached them from behind, and Tobay drew level with Daniel. "I will escort you to the chaapa'ai," he said, then, without another word, jogged forward ahead of Teal'c.
They were almost at the entrance to the Stargate room when Sha'uri gasped and stumbled heavily into Daniel. Ferretti was at their side in a second, calling, "Teal'c!" The Jaffa turned back to them immediately.
"Ay, my brother," she breathed.
"What?" Daniel said. He tightened his arm around her and, as he glanced down, saw a trickle of liquid running down her leg. "What...Sha'uri?"
She grabbed his shoulder in an unrelenting grip. "The baby comes!"
Oh no. "Ferretti! Major, the baby is coming," Daniel said, starting to panic, trying to help hold up his sister, but unsure whether he was supposed to let her lie down or make her walk to get into the room as fast as possible or what, because how was he supposed to know what to do with a woman beginning the birthing labors? "Sir, wh-what do I do?" he asked frantically.
"Shit," Ferretti muttered. "I sent my medic home. Hurry, just get her inside."
"It is too soon," Sha'uri whispered, then grimaced. "It is..."
Her eyes glowed suddenly, making them flinch in surprise. "My lord comes for me!" Amaunet cried gleefully.
"No, Sha'uri, you can fight this," Daniel urged, not at all thinking about the way Skaara and Sam had both struggled futilely and failed against the Goa'uld within them. "Just a little longer!"
Tobay was at their side, too. "Sha'uri, you are almost there. A few more steps."
Teal'c glanced upward. "A Goa'uld ship approaches." The rest of them looked up in alarm at the speck that was rapidly growing larger. "They seek Amaunet."
"Not...not me," Sha'uri said weakly, her voice her own this time. "They seek the child."
"The child?" Daniel asked as he pulled her urgently toward the Stargate. "Why?"
A gasp shuddered through her body. "He is...Harsesis."
"Harsesis?" he echoed.
"The forbidden child," Sha'uri said. She squeezed his arm. "He knows too much."
What? Too much what? What could a baby know?
"We don't have time for this," Ferretti growled. "Teal'c, help me get her inside. Jackson, you know how to use the DHD? Know the address for Earth?"
"Yes, sir," Daniel said, remembering the times his parents had tried to reach other planets from Abydos and the times he'd watched SG personnel do the same. "I'll start dialing." He stepped away, and Tobay took his place, helping them assist Sha'uri toward the 'gate room.
Daniel ran inside, and his hand had just hit the glyph of Auriga when an unfamiliar sound from above made him look up to where the ceiling was...
...opening?
He turned, only to see the others already coming inside. "Major Ferretti, something's happening--"
"Shit--Jackson, they're rings! Everyone out!" Ferretti called, but too late--the rings dropped.
A man--Goa'uld, it's a Goa'uld--materialized within the rings, surrounded by Jaffa guards. Daniel was barely able to see a falcon tattoo on their foreheads before the rings disappeared, and the Jaffa opened fire.
Falcon sign. Horus Guards. It was just like the stories told of Ra's servants, but this wasn't Ra, not anymore; this must be Heru-ur--
Tobay dove for one of the guns still hidden around the room. Daniel had time to pull his sister away from Ferretti as the major reached for his weapon, but then some unseen force ripped him away from her and slammed him into a pillar behind.
Dazed, Daniel forced himself up onto his hands and knees. "Sha'uri?" he gasped, wincing.
Ferretti was yelling something, and Daniel heard gunfire and Teal'c's zat'nik'tel, dwarfed by the sound of firing staff weapons. He flinched and ducked aside as Tobay's form came crashing into the wall next to him, the gun falling from his hands.
"No," Daniel breathed. "No..." He crawled toward Tobay, grasping a shoulder and pulling him onto his back urgently, but there was no wound.
Only then did he look up to see Heru-ur standing behind several Jaffa, his hand encased in the gleaming djera'kesh that had thrown Daniel and Tobay aside. Ferretti ducked a staff blast and shifted his gun to aim for the Goa'uld.
A shimmering field appeared around Heru-ur. The stream of bullets fell uselessly at his feet.
Ferretti lowered his weapon a few inches in disbelief and had no time to move before he was tossed headfirst into the back wall, slumping to the ground.
The Horus Guards turned their attention to Teal'c, who dove away and crouched behind a pillar.
Tobay groaned and looked up, shaking his head dazedly. "Dan'yel...?"
"Tobay! Did you see Sha'uri? Where is she?" Daniel asked, squinting through the chaos.
The Stargate began to turn.
Incoming wormhole.
Heru-ur whirled, the Horus Guards moving immediately to surround him. Taking advantage of the distraction, Teal'c moved out from behind his cover and neatly felled three of the remaining eight Jaffa before having to duck back again to avoid return fire.
Jack and Sam stepped out of the Stargate.
"What the hell!" Jack blurted in surprise, and then they leapt apart to dodge staff blasts and fire back.
A scream split the air as two more Horus Guards fell. "Sha'uri!" Tobay called, struggling to rise as they caught sight of Sha'uri collapsed on the ground, panting in pain, one hand on her stomach and the other splayed against the wall. Heru-ur's eyes flashed and fixed on her as well.
Daniel pulled himself desperately upright, a step behind Tobay, but Heru-ur reached Sha'uri first and dragged her roughly to her feet. A staff blast blew past Daniel's face, close enough for him to flinch from the searing heat against his skin. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a Horus Guard raising his weapon at Tobay.
Instinctively, he grabbed the back of Tobay's robe and yanked his brother toward himself as hard as he could. Still unsteady from the concussive force of the djera'kesh, both of them staggered and fell backward as the blast flew safely over their heads.
Two more sharp reports of gunfire sounded, and then the only sound was a moan. Sha'uri! Daniel and Tobay untangled themselves from each other just as the activation of the ring platform caught their attention. Light streamed from the ceiling onto Heru-ur and Sha'uri, and rings dropped around them.
Daniel thought distantly that he'd always wished to see what the rings looked like, but not like this.
"Ah, crap!" Jack's voice said, but Daniel didn't turn to look at him, entranced by the sight of his sister disappearing with the Goa'uld in a beam of white.
Teal'c rushed past them and to the entrance, returning moments later to report, "Heru-ur's ship is leaving."
"No," Daniel breathed, scrambling to his feet and running to see for himself. By the time he looked into the sky, the hatak was nowhere to be seen. "No, no, yi shay!" He kicked viciously at the stone of the doorway, spinning angrily away when a hand pulled him back.
"Jesus, Daniel, take it easy--" Jack started.
"Arik kek te, Goa'uld!" he yelled futilely into the empty desert. "Ha'taaka orak! Ona--"
"Kree, chal'ti!" Teal'c barked. "Kal shak!"
Fuming and breathing hard against the pressure clenching at his throat, Daniel slammed a furious hand against the stone but obeyed and shut his mouth. He turned away from the dunes to slump against the wall and felt himself slide down to the sand, shaking from reaction and rubbing a sleeve across his dusty face.
"Okay," Jack said, sounding somewhat winded and very stunned. "What...just happened?"
"Major Ferretti!" Sam called, stepping around the dead Jaffa toward the fallen man. Daniel's gaze followed her, belatedly remembering his temporary CO hitting the wall, and he levered himself to his feet to stumble toward them. Sam pressed her fingers to the side of Ferretti's neck, looking anxious, but he stirred and coughed.
"Ferretti," Jack said, striding toward him as well as Daniel crouched at his side. "Lou, hey, look at me."
"...Jack? Aw, shit," the major groaned, his words slurring. He turned away as Sam's fingers explored his head. "I got no damn luck in this room. Ow, Carter! S'fine."
"Concussion," Sam said. "We should get him back to Dr. Fraiser."
Jack looked over the rest of them. He bent over Daniel, brushing a careful thumb over his cheek. Daniel flinched at the unexpected sting, but Jack nodded briskly, looking relieved. "You got caught in the heat of a staff blast," he told Daniel. "No worse than a sunburn." He set a hand on Daniel's shoulder, paused, and then turned to face Tobay instead."You're the one I talked to last time. Tobay?"
Tobay nodded, straightening fully. "O'Neill."
"Okay," Jack said again. "Someone really needs to explain to me what the hell just--"
The Stargate began to turn again.
"Now what?" Jack said, exasperated. "That'd better be SG-3."
"It may be Apophis," Teal'c said. "We must cover ourselves."
"Hide, Tobay," Daniel added in Abydonian, just in case something got lost in translation.
Sam helped Ferretti stumble to a hiding place. Daniel found himself hauled to his feet and separated from his brother, Teal'c's hand on his head forcing him to duck low and Jack's arm pressing him against the wall. He squirmed between them until he could look out to see what was happening.
He couldn't help a shiver as Apophis and his Guards strode through the Abydos Stargate for the second time in as many years. Daniel watched anxiously, almost expecting to see Skaara appear, too, but the 'gate deactivated behind the last Serpent Guard.
Apophis stopped short at the sight of the bodies littering the floor. "Jaffa," he ordered, pointing.
A Serpent Guard stepped forward and flipped over one of the bodies. "Horus Guard," he responded in Goa'uld. "Heru-ur was here, my lord."
There was a movement at the other end of the Stargate room. Daniel started at the sight of Tobay standing there and began to rise, only to be jerked back, Jack's hand clamped hard over his mouth.
"Human! Where is my queen?" Apophis demanded in bastardized Egyptian. The Serpent Guards' staff weapons all primed at once.
Tobay licked his lips nervously and said, "We were attacked by Heru-ur. He took Sha--your queen with him into the sky."
"And my child?"
"And...your child, as well."
"Who killed these Jaffa?"
"My men and I," Tobay lied. When Apophis's eyes narrowed suspiciously, no doubt having seen the marks from Tau'ri weaponry, Tobay pointed to the hidden guns and lied, "There were many, many more. These were the only ones we were able to kill before they...attacked our village."
The Goa'uld's eyes flashed and his face darkened in anger. "Then let that be the punishment for your people's weakness. Return and tell your leaders that this is the fate of those who oppose the Goa'uld."
Tobay bowed. Daniel was glad he wasn't the one speaking to Apophis, or he would have been unable to stop himself from pointing out that Apophis was severely weakened and must be bluffing, and that he wasn't the one who'd won the battle today, after all.
"Kree, Jaffa!" The Serpent Guards snapped to attention and dialed some unseen address, their bodies blocking the DHD from view.
Then, finally, they were gone and the Stargate was silent again.
Daniel pried Jack's fingers away from his face and crawled from his hiding place, seeing the rest of them do the same. He and Tobay stared at each other for a long moment before he said, "Thank you for deceiving Apophis."
"We Abydons despise the demons more than these Tau'ri ever could," Tobay answered. He hesitated, then said, "You are leaving us again?"
"No," Daniel said quickly, but then amended, "Yes. But not forever. I can help the Tau'ri, and they can help Abydos."
Tobay's eyes fixed momentarily on Jack, who was listening to Teal'c's low voice as the Jaffa translated. "Nagada would be lost if not for them. I see why you choose to join them. My place is here, but fight beside them, my brother. Bring Skaara and Sha'uri back to us."
He extended an arm, as if to an equal. Daniel stepped forward and grasped it without hesitation.
"Tobay," Jack said, "we will contact Abydos, very soon. We need to get some of our people back"--he glanced at Ferretti, who was leaning heavily against a pillar--"but others will come within...oh, the next half-hour."
"I tell Kasuf of this. My men meet your men," Tobay replied, then dipped his head and left the Stargate room at a jog.
"Now..." Jack started, then glanced suspiciously at the Stargate as if expecting it to activate again. When it stayed quiescent, he walked away from it and toward the opposite end of the room, where Sam was peering at Ferretti's eyes. "Now, someone tell me what the hell happened here. Lou? You still with us?"
His mind whirring, Daniel backed quietly away from where SG-1 and Major Ferretti were gathered.
Sha'uri had said that Heru-ur's stronghold was in Cimmeria. With no other Goa'uld daring to venture there, and the Cimmerians unprepared to resist Goa'uld rule after millennia of protection from Thor's Hammer, there was no other place he might have taken her to give birth to her...Harsesis child, whatever that meant. That was where his sister and her baby would be.
And Thor...
Surely Thor had left more on Cimmeria than just a single device. There had to be something else, some other weapon, some way to contact him and his race. Cimmeria was their best chance to find help. Their only chance, perhaps.
"...that's what your team told us before we came through..." Jack's voice floated to his ears as they continued the impromptu debriefing.
Daniel considered SG-1, remembering the report of their previous, less-than-successful trip to Cimmeria. Sam had said the people were welcoming, but perhaps they would be less so, now that SG-1's actions had allowed a Goa'uld to take control there.
But Daniel hadn't been involved the last time. And Abydos was, or at least had been, in the same place as Cimmeria, oppressed by a false god. His sister was prisoner along with the Cimmerians. He would make them understand and find help among the people there. Daniel had told Kasuf that Sha'uri would be safe, and now she and her baby were captives unless someone did something.
He might be able to convince SG-1 to go, out of a sense of duty to the Cimmerians, but Jack would never let Daniel go with them to a Goa'uld-controlled planet, if he asked.
If he asked.
Daniel stared at the DHD, recalling the address for Cimmeria that he had memorized and then seen so many times in reports that he'd read over and over that the glyphs were seared into his mind.
"Jack," he called over his shoulder, "I'm going to start dialing home. Earth," he amended, because 'dial home' was an expression they all used, but it felt strange to say, standing on Abydonian soil and moving away.
Jack glanced at him. "Fine. We'll be there in a minute. Wait for us before you leave."
"I know," he lied, taking off his backpack and letting his hand hover over the first glyph. "I think my GDO was damaged in the fight, anyway."
Scutum, Lynx, Andromeda, Equuleus, Libra, Cetus...Abydos point of origin...
He slammed his hand on the DHD crystal. As Daniel watched the stable wormhole to form, a thought struck him, and he stripped off his vest and jacket, pulling off the survival knife he carried and laying it on the ground as well. He couldn't walk into this armed. He couldn't walk into it as anything other than a man from a land of former slaves asking for help. He stared at the event horizon and walked up the steps toward it, steeling himself.
From behind him, Teal'c yelled, "Daniel Jackson!" Daniel took a deep breath and ran through to Cimmeria.
Next chapter ("Thor's Might, Part I"):