Title: Interlude 2 - Three Days in Space Dock
Chapter: 1 – Prologue
Part: 1/20
Rating: M
Warnings: AU world, violence, swearing, horror, and Satedans.
Disclaimers: I earn no money from this, and I own no part of the Stargate world, only the characters that I create for myself.
Spoilers: Set in established AU world, set in equivalent time to mid season 3.
Note: This fic is designed as a short linking fic between two larger stories. It is also important to note that this is an ELITE fic, and therefore Atlantis and John do not appear, but are of course mentioned constantly throughout. Everything has a purpose, I promise, and all will become clear by the end of this short fic. I hope people can still enjoy it. Wedjatqi x
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Chapter 1 – Prologue
Distant Edge of the Pegasus Galaxy, approx 10,000 years ago
The flickering brilliance of the gateway shone brightly across the vast screen. The entrance to the pocket was still holding, perfectly balanced on the knife-edge of the tearing nature of the technology splitting space and time apart.
Alcamenes watched with fixed focus as the last ships slid into the eye of the pocket's entrance, sliding into the small contained pocket outside of normal space that he had forged. He dropped his gaze to the console before him that had been his focus for almost an entire cycle of his life. Beneath his fingertips, the warm responsiveness of the console was comforting. All was working as predicted.
Not like the last experiment.
This time he had perfected the entrance, controlling the frequencies and energy balance perfectly. This time there would be no devastating black hole left at the entrance to the pocket, bent on drawing in any passing innocents. This pocket was stable and once closed would be undetectable and would hold forever – or at least as long as any calculation could predict.
And it needed to. It was vital that it did.
In all that his people had done, served, and created, it was their ignorance and indifference to the powers of evolution that had brought about the greatest cost. The natural mixing of insectoid DNA with newly evolving humanity had been an amazing revelation, even to Alcamenes' people. It had been wondrous to observe the newly evolving hybrids, to watch its subspecies develop, die away, and the genetic balances naturally stabilise.
They should have known such a thing could not be safe to allow.
For the creatures had hidden dark secrets on their world; their need to feed on other living beings had been far more terrifying than had first been realised. It had taken the scientists too long to realise the loss of human numbers on that planet had had a very specific cause, and that the new creatures' lust for understanding technology had all served a purpose realised too late to be prevented.
It would perhaps be the greatest failure Alcamenes had ever seen caused by his people's hand. Living easily in the great city, they had grown too relaxed, too willing to give free rein to that which was perhaps unnatural, despite the creatures' varying seemingly natural evolutions.
And once free of the constraints of their one homeworld, one new species, Wraith as they called themselves, had spread like a disease, consuming and multiplying like a fatal virus. Their viciousness, the like of which had not been witnessed in more centuries than Alcamenes' people could recall, had been overwhelming. And a response had formed far too slowly and almost too late.
But there had been hope, even in the ruined seemingly empty forests of the Wraith's birth planet.
A way of fighting back with the like-minded.
Only that too had failed. What had seemed like saviours had become almost as worse.
They at least would now be contained. The weapons that they were.
It was a sad day though - sad for these beings, regretful for Alcamenes, but still ultimately necessary. They would be able to live out their natural lives in the pocket, isolated away from the rest of the galaxy, away from the death and destruction they had caused.
The console sent a vibration up Alcamenes' arm, confirming near completion.
Yet...one ship remained at a distance. Alcamenes triggered up the view of the ship on the screen before him.
Behind him, his two technicians shifted their stances slightly, betraying the first signs of nervousness. He trusted them to be careful with their thoughts and their feelings though. After all, the three of them had been selected for this mission not just because of their advanced technical skill, but because they were able to so skilfully and absolutely hide their thoughts and feelings from the one stood to Alcamenes' left.
Alcamenes would have preferred there not be one of their kind on the Guardian vessel, but there had been no way to exclude an observer without betraying the true nature of the mission.
This mission to trap them all away.
This one remaining on the outside would never be allowed to leave this tiny vessel that stood at the pocket's entrance.
Alcamenes had designed Guardian to withstand time and the likely shift of gravity within this system. It would be able to survive either a close orbit with the system's star or the deepest cold of the outer reach of the system. It was the pocket's holding point, but outside of space itself, the pocket would never be discovered.
It meant that Alcamenes and his technicians could not leave as well, not now. They would contain this last creature, and then enter into the hibernation chambers. The Guardian had been sealed from the outside, launched from inside a ship, so it had no airlock to the outside. Alcamenes knew he would not see the great city again, would not fight in battle again, but he could serve here on Guardian, awakened if necessary to oversee that the pocket's stability. That the creatures would never escape.
Except, the last of their ships was not entering the entrance to the pocket. It was stationary at a good distance away.
Alcamenes looked to his left, looking up at the pale face of Assh-Uk, the last creature stood beside him. Locking his thoughts and emotions even deeper inside than normal, Alcamenes formed only specific communicative thoughts to it.
"They must enter the pocket," he sent to Assh-Uk.
Assh-Uk's slit pupils lowered to meet Alcamenes' gaze. The blue veins across the pale skin seemed to hum with its strange alien nature.
"They leave, return when ready," Assh-Uk's thoughts arrived with their usual solid suddenness that was uncomfortable for many of Alcamenes' colleagues.
"The mission will not succeed if the Wraith detect you," Alcamenes argued. The last ship still had time to enter the pocket, but if not, they would be dealt with by the Bellerophon, Alcamenes' former ship, which hung in space further out in the system. "You must all be hidden, ready to spring the trap upon them."
"One ship, no harm," Assh-Uk responded, the words arriving abruptly inside Alcamenes' head. The words were the best that Alcamenes' brain could draw on to interpret the alien's psychic message. And along with those words, Alcamenes could sense Assh-Uk's determination. There would be no discussion and the true mission could not be risked now. If Assh-Uk became suspicious, then the others could exit the pocket.
One ship would have to be sacrificed.
Alcamenes looked down to the console, feeling a moment of regret, but still triggered two control sequences; one sequence to communicate execution of the secondary plan to the Bellerophon, and the second to close the entrance to the pocket.
Within a fraction of a second, Guardian's powerful control of the entranceway shut down, sealing the entrance to the pocket in an abrupt flash as the usual natural laws of physics returned into balance. The pocket was closed. It would never be opened again.
Assh-Uk reacted physically, perhaps from the severing of its communication with its kind inside the pocket.
"How long-" Assh-Uk began to ask, but blinding weapons fire suddenly lit up the screen as the Bellerophon opened fire upon the last ship.
Assh-Uk let out a psychic cry of anger, the burst physically hurting Alcamenes' head before he clamped down even tighter shields around his mind. In that moment, he finalised the seal on the pocket's lock via the console, knowing that he was also sealing his own fate with it.
He turned from the console and faced Assh-Uk. "The pocket is sealed forever now."
"NO" Assh-Uk sent, the accompanying anger and fear like horrific nausea to Alcamenes' mind, but he ignored it.
"Your kind cannot be allowed to run free anymore," Alcamenes stated clearly and apologetically. "We regret this, but you are too dangerous. You have killed too many in your war."
"War, you start," Assh-Uk declared, its tall body vibrating with anger and its large pale hands outstretched, sharp blue claws seeming longer now than ever before.
"You cannot kill humans along with Wraith as you do," Alcamenes stated.
"Betrayal!" Assh-Uk sent, the black wrappings hanging from its arms sailing around it, bizarrely creating a flowing outline so akin to the trickster psychic imagines the Wraith use to confuse their prey.
"It has to be this way," Alcamenes argued. "Your people will live out their lives in the pocket; they will live."
Assh-Uk's eyes moved to the screen, across which the fiery weapons battle continued between Assh-Uk's remaining ship and the Bellerophon. "Traitorous Lanteans."
"I am sure it seems that way to you," Alcamenes replied. "We have a duty of care to the humans of this galaxy."
Assh-Uk's lips parted around sharp teeth and a low hiss emanated from inside its dark mouth. "Care for food."
"They are more than food, they are living beings and must be allowed to flourish," Alcamenes responded.
"Lanteans began this, gave us weapons," Assh-Uk stated, its body shaking with restrained fury.
"It was a mistake, and we are correcting that. Your people will live in the pocket in peace."
"Release them," Assh-Uk ordered furiously.
Alcamenes shook his head. "That is not possible."
"RELEASE THEM," Assh-Uk shouted inside Alcamenes' head. Behind Assh-Uk, Alcamenes saw both his technicians flinch in physical pain at the psychic shout.
"It is not physically possible to do so, Assh-Uk," Alcamenes explained calmly. In the corner of his eye he saw the ships outside exchanging heavy fire between them. Both would be lost now, but the mission would be complete. That was all that mattered today.
Assh-Uk's large pale sharp clawed hands caught at Alcamenes' shoulders. "TRAITOR! RELEASE THEM!"
Alcamenes, with years of experience and control to his name, pressed his hands to the insides of Assh-Uk's wrists, holding back any further attack. Assh-Uk was excessively strong, but then so were Alcamenes' people. Lanteans may appear as humans to Wraith, but they were far from the same.
"I am sorry, Assh-Uk, but this is the only way. They will live; it is just that you cannot be with them. The seal on the pocket cannot be reopened," Alcamenes explained as he resisted Assh-Uk's strength. "The seal has a decay chemical lock."
Assh-Uk's pressure relented and the slit eyes moved to the screen. Assh-Uk was a scientist and so understood the point. A decay lock would not be broken.
"It will not open, I am sorry," Alcamenes explained.
"Not hold forever," Assh-Uk argued.
"No, but it will hold for thousands of years. Long enough for it to no longer matter," Alcamenes explained. "And even when the decay will eventually allow the lock to be freed, no one will know the entrance is there to find the lock or know how to open it if they did, and there will be nothing left inside the pocket by then."
Assh-Uk's hands snatched away from Alcamenes' shoulders, panic and fury rippling across the psychic space between them.
"I am sorry, Assh-Uk, but your people will have to live isolated from the rest of the galaxy."
Assh-Uk's eyes narrowed. "No, you will not live. Lanteans need us. Wraith will spread. Kill all."
Alcamenes felt his own sliver of fear to know that those words may be true, but he controlled it in front of Assh-Uk. "We have another option, another way to fight back." He explained, but the truth was that he was not confident that the new approach would work. Technology designed with thoughts and determination to kill Wraith. Robot life to destroy Wraith – how could his people be sure the same horror would not happen again?
Assh-Uk turned away and then back in clear frustration, the rippling fabric twisting around its arms and body.
"I live, I find a way," Assh-Uk declared.
"The hibernating units will not work for your kind," Alcamenes pointed out. "And even if they did, by the time the decay lock was ready to use, none would still live inside the pocket to free."
Assh-Uk looked back at Alcamenes, eyes narrowed, hatred pouring out of every pore.
Alcamenes saw the brilliant flash of a ship exploding on the screen to his right. He glanced round to see for himself, and true enough the last ship was gone, sending pieces of debris and likely living beings out into the vacuum of space. Assh-Uk's kind could survive longer than most without oxygen, but not for that long. The other side of the screen showed the Bellerophon heading out of the system, on fire and unlikely to last long. They would send out word of the mission, to remind the others of the mission today. To be sure never to return here to this system again.
The mission was a success.
A sad and dark day yes, but a success.
Alcamenes could only hope that the new plan to defeat the Wraith would work as well, making this act worth so many lives.
Movement to his left drew his attention back to Assh-Uk. A stillness had settled over the creature, dark and potent. Alcamenes faced the hatred on behalf of his people.
"You mistaken. Foolish Lanteans," Assh-Uk sent. "We will live."
"Yes, your people will live out their lives in the pocket."
Something close to a cruel smile broke across Assh-Uk's white face. "No, Lantean. We grow."
"It is possible that your people will breed enough to keep the race going inside the pocket," Alcamenes replied logically, though all the research suggested that Assh-Uk's kind would not be able to breed well inside the pocket, their gene pool would be too small. "Be pleased that they will live on, will evolve on into their own destiny, away from Wraith or humankind."
Assh-Uk pulled back a fraction, that strange smile widening into a sneer. "No Lantean. We closer to Wraith than Lantean know."
No, Alcamenes thought, his people already knew that. It would be most likely that Assh-Uk's kind would feed on each other inside the pocket. There was a planet inside the pocket, basic with vegetation, enough for them to live upon, but their preferred feeding could only be found on each other. It would be their choice as to how they would survive. Alcamenes believed that nature would win out eventually with them – they would consume each other, and if they bred, only a small colony would survive and unlikely to be anything dangerous as the generations passed.
"Years matter not," Assh-Uk hissed loudly. "Only need to sleep deep."
Alcamenes frowned at the sentence, realising the meaning of Assh-Uk's revelation. No, they weren't able to hibernate, and certainly not that long...
Assh-Uk hissed in what sounded horribly like laughter.
Alcamenes looked up the tall pale creature in worrying realisation. If Assh-Uk could hibernate outside the pocket, here in the Guardian then-
The alien leapt, fabric billowing as two pale hands wrapped around Alcamenes' head. Alcamenes reached down to his hip to his weapon.
Nothing mattered now but ensuring Assh-Uk died, for this mission might still succeed, but if the pocket were to be opened in the years of future generations by Assh-Uk, the creatures inside still the same, alive, angry and ready to battle again...
Alcamenes' thoughts were cut short in that brief split second though for he felt teeth bite and his life-force draining.
He tried to fight back, to scream to his colleagues, but already he could feel energy blasting over him from their weapons, stealing away his consciousness, but also his pain. They would have to win the last battle against Assh-Uk in the Guardian.
As he slipped away into the darkness, he heard the technicians shouting, heard an alien roar, and finally only the whispering rushing sound of his ears filling with blood, and then eternal blackness engulfing him.
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On to Chapter 2 -