Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Stargate
Daniel Jackson was beyond frustrated as he once again stood from the chair he had been sitting in for an indeterminate amount of time in order to search for another reference book; one that would probably once again prove to be worthless. He had been granted time off from Jack, just for the week, in order to search the British Library for any references to any writings that could refer to the Ancients or Atlantis.
He had been astounded to have come across a picture in one of their old catalogs that had shown the library had a copy of a small manuscript with examples of writings that some old explorer had found painted onto the walls. One of those had looked like Ancient and Daniel would have been there later that same day had it not taken days for Jack to approve the trip to England. Sadly, he still only had the one week to try and find anything useful.
Honestly it would have taken longer for him to have gotten permission if Jack had not felt slightly guilty for not allowing Daniel to join the Atlantis Mission. Daniel had no problems on guilt tipping his old friend to speed up the process of getting the approval for this trip. They had just found the actual address for the lost city and added one more member to the team; one that had the ATA gene and could use the Ancient technology, but Jack still would not allow Daniel to join. He was needed here in this galaxy or something. Daniel rolled his eyes at his current thoughts before shifting his attention to another shelf in the small study room that he was currently sharing with one other person.
Daniel had been surprised when he had been lead to the small study room that was dedicated to some of the more obscure languages that the library had writings on. He had expected to have the room to himself but had found a petite woman with curly brown hair already seated at the table in the middle of the room with a few different books spread out in front of her. When he had taken a seat at the other end of the table she had glanced up and given him a soft smile before turning her attention back to her books.
They had been sitting in the small room together now for a few hours now without talking. Daniel periodically breaking the silence as he pushed his chair back so that he could get up to search for another reference book in the hopes of finding a mention of the Ancient's language. So far he had found nothing and was feeling frustrated.
Shifting over so that he was now standing behind the woman that was sharing the room with him, he started looking on the shelf right behind her in the hopes that something would jump out at him as though to say. 'Pick me! I have all the answers.' Snorting internally at the turn his thoughts had taken yet again, Daniel shook his head and glanced over at the woman to see if he had disturbed her with the noise he was making. He seriously needed to focus and stop letting his thoughts drift.
It looked as though she was still lost in her own little world. He gave a little smile in relief that he had not annoyed his tablemate before he turned his attention back to the bookshelf. Moments later, his eyes widened and he snapped his head back in her direction so that he was once again looking towards the woman. The notebook that she was making notes in were covered in what looked like Ancient mixed with some writing he had never seen before mixed in with what could be other ancient Earth languages.
Straightening up as quietly as he could, he moved a bit closer so that he could see what else the woman had in front of her. Aside from her notebook, of which he could identify four ancient languages intermixed with the language of the Ancients and English, there was a hand bound book that looked to be extremely old and fragile. Daniel had to bite his tongue to keep from cursing out loud as he recognized that, not only was the book written in Ancient, but there was a gate address written on the left page.
After backing up a few steps and taking deep breaths to calm himself down, Daniel made his way back over to the table and pulled out the seat next to the woman. "Ahem." Daniel smiled as the woman looked up at him with her brows raised in question. "I am sorry to interrupt you, but I could not help but notice that you are currently working on a book with a language I have only seen in a few locations. I am Doctor Daniel Jackson; I am an archaeologist and linguist.
The woman just blinked before looking down at her book for a moment. When she looked back up to Daniel, he could see that she a bit startled at being interrupted and was having a bit of trouble pulling her mind back into the here and now. It was odd to see the expression his teammates picked on him about on someone else. She blinked a few more times before Daniel could see that she had finally processed his introduction.
"Hello. Doctor Hermione Granger. Archaeology sounds fascinating. I try and keep track of the reports from the different expeditions if possible." She looked down at her notes for a moment before turning her attention back to Daniel. "You said that you have seen this language on some of your digs? I am also a linguist but I have never met anyone that had seen this particular language." It did not take a rocket scientist to tell that she was surprised at the thought of someone coming across the language anywhere.
"Yes. I have been trying to translate the small samples I have come across, but have not had much luck as there was not a lot of the writing available to come to any conclusions. You can imagine my surprise that I have just stumbled across someone that seems to be able to read it like it was written in English."
Hermione chuckled as she closed her notebook and the book she had been working on before she pulled them closer to herself. Daniel watched her stack the books she still had on the table and tried not to panic. He had to get this woman talking and needed to make sure that he did not come across as many academics did. He could well remember how Steven Rayner had acted when the Osiris jar had been found.
"How did you come across an actual bound book? The only samples I have come across have been carvings or paintings." She looked at him for a moment before sighing and settling back in her chair while fidgeting with a ring on her left hand.
"I am not surprised that you have found so few writings. It is a very old language. It is a precursor to what we would now call Ancient Latin." Hermione looked up and saw the completely fascinated expression on the face of the man that had introduced himself as a fellow linguist and could not help but to satisfy his curiosity. "It was only used by a small group of people, so it was never as widely used as the Latin. Such a shame too; it is much more lyrical in my opinion. The Alteran were a very advanced people and their language reflected that, so it is also a bit more complicated than Latin as well."
"Alteran?" Danial could not quite hide the excitement in his voice.
"Yes." Hermione smiled at the excitement he was displaying. It was always a joy to find someone that could be excited over something as simple as an obscure language. "That is what they called themselves. As to how I came to have such a book, well that is a bit convoluted. The Alterans tended to isolate themselves from others; not wanting anyone to use their knowledge in ways they did not approve of. They felt that other people should have to work for their knowledge instead of having someone give it to them. So they passed their knowledge down through their families. Eventually, only those families that were the…holders of their knowledge were still able to read, write or speak the Alteran language, and they continued to pass everything down. Unfortunately, even they came to a point that they could no longer understand what was being passed down. I guess they just thought that it was no longer that important and so they stopped teaching their children. They did however continue to pass down the writings they had. When one family would die out, the writings would always be passed on to one of the other families that had collections as well as it had been written for the original covenants which had been passed down orally as well as renewed within each bequest."
Daniel was just staring at Hermione with wide eyes. Hermione smiled as she wondered if she had broken the poor doctor.
"I went to a boarding school when I turned eleven, and there I started to do a lot of self-study. I have always found languages to be easy having already been fluent in five languages by then. One day my friends and I were called up to the Headmaster's office. While we were waiting for him I started to look thorough his bookcases to read the titles. I could not help myself. One book caught my attention, and when the Headmaster came in I had already lost myself in the book. After he had talked to us about the bit of trouble we had found ourselves in he asked that I stay for a few moments. When my friends had left, he asked if I was able to make anything of the book and was quite surprised that I had been able to pick out some words here and there. Because of that, he loaned me a few books and asked that I translate them as a side project. It was not until I was finished with the books that he told me that they were written in a language that even he could not read. He said 'If you need something done, then give it to someone that does not know that it is impossible.' He said that languages were my gift, and so he began to lone me other books in the hopes that I would be able to read them."
"Professor Dumbledore eventually told me that he was the last living member of the families that had been collecting the knowledge, at least as far as he knew at the time. I did not realize it, but while I had been trying to translate the books he had loaned to me he had been researching my family. You see, the book and knowledge could only be passed on through family or to another family that was entrusted to be keepers of the knowledge. The legal documents were very clear and ironclad. It really did not matter how the connection was made in the end, but the professor was the last of his line and he no longer knew of any family members that would have been able to carry the legacy for him. He was able to find a connection for me though. It was pushing the boundaries of the rules set forth in the previous wills, but he was able to leave everything to me. I found out when I was sixteen and he died."
"I…What?" Daniel asked incredulously.
Hermione just laughed at his expression. "It's the truth. That is how I came to be in possession of this book." Hermione softly tapped the cover of the book in question.
"So your professor was a descendent of these…Alterans? And you as well?"
"Well yes." Hermione was puzzled at the baffled expression on the Doctors face. "You of course realize that it is not all that odd. Being an archaeologist, you must know that being a descendant of one of the ancient peoples is fairly common. The only odd thing about it is that he could trace his linage back that far because of the surviving records that came from people trying to keep their history alive as long as they could. I imagine that there are many people that share my ancestry but that are completely unaware. I was very lucky that the professor could remember the names of the other families that had been entrusted as a keeper of the knowledge."
"I guess that makes since. So you have connections to the Alterans." He was glad that she was looking at her book again and therefore missed the calculating look he was giving her. I bet she has the ATA gene.
"Yes. Dumbledore was able to find out that one of my ancestors on my father's side was actually a second child of one of the other families. My ancestor had been separated from the main branch of the family due to...a family disagreement. He then married and his children and so forth never knew their heritage. I was quite shocked when I found out when the lawyer gave me the letter explaining my inheritance. I had also heard of the Dagworth-Grangers, but I had been completely unaware of the connection. I was very thankful though. I had new knowledge about my heritage and also access to even more books in ancient languages."
"So you were here translating this book?" Daniel said while softly tapping the cover of the book she had closed earlier.
"Oh, no. Today actually I was comparing some myths about a creature across different cultures." Hermione could see the curiosity spike within Daniels eyes.
"What creature? What did you find out?"
"Well. Alright. Have you ever heard of a Basilisk?" Daniel blinked at her while his eyebrows tried to disappear into his hairline. She began to carefully pull other books that were also hand bound out of her bag. She stacked them as she spoke, only putting one to the side as she glanced at the covers. "So you have heard of them. Well, I wanted to see how close the mythos was for the creature across different cultures. I checked a few references that I had. There was the Alteran myth, of course. Then I found references here for an Old Norse legend, Greek, and this one for an old Germanic myth. They were all basically the same myth." Hermione smiled as she stroked the cover of the topmost book for a moment. "I thought that they would be vastly different mythos for each culture, but they were surprisingly in sync; something I have not seen very often while comparing different mythos across cultures."
Daniel pointed to the book she had set to one side. "What about that one?" He was surprised when Hermione made a face at the book as though it had offended her. She placed the other books back into her bag before opening that book and turning it so that Daniel could see it. Daniel found himself once again biting his tongue to keep himself from cursing out loud. The book was written in Goa'uld.
"This one is not about Basilisks at all. I should have checked it more thoroughly before bringing it, but I guess I was in a bit of a hurry to get here today. This is a sub-dialect of Ancient Egyptian. Pretty much this is just a story about the evil git that set himself up as the serpent god Apep." Hermione had an odd smirk on her face as she looked down at the book. "Apparently he thought he should be so feared that no one would say his name, thus he became the original He Who Must Not Be Named. Eventually he was overthrown as all evil bastards must be and died only for someone else to decide to take his place; Some idiot calling himself Apophis. It takes a true egomaniac to set themselves up in the image of a god."
"Fascinating." Daniel could not think of anything else to say. He had been hoping that she would not have been able to read it, but at least she had not said anything about aliens yet. She did have an uncomfortable amount of knowledge about Apep and Apophis though. Shit, she is probably censoring herself. She may have already read something about the Goa'uld. While desperately hoping that he was wrong and that she knew nothing about the state of the galaxy he tried to find something…anything else that he could say.
"I suppose. Unfortunately there will always be idiots like that; ones who want the world to bow down and worship at their feet." Daniel was thankful that she spoke and saved him from having to come up with something witty to say but was surprised at the faraway expression that crossed her face as she spoke. She sighed and packed away the book just as carefully as she had the others.
"The book you were working on earlier, is it just a book on mythology and mystical creatures.?" Daniel did not want her to walk away without getting more information on what she knew about the Ancient writing.
"Sort of, I guess it could be construed that way. It reads like a collection of stories, but not really like the myths you would see from the Roman or Egyptian cultures."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, if it had been written in English, they could be read like modern day fiction. Here, take this story for example." Hermione carefully flipped through the book until she found the passages she wanted before turning the book towards Daniel. "This is one of my favorite stories in this book."
Daniel had to clear his throat a few times before he could say anything. He was once again looking at a gate address, but this one he recognized. It was the address to the Nox world. "What is it about?" He was proud that his voice gave nothing away about his current panicky feelings.
"It is a love story. A girl and boy fall in love but are forbidden from being together by the girl's father. Because they love each other they run away together through the astria porta to Munita Portum ad Omnis or safe haven for all. There they hid from the girl's father. The father of course tracked them down, and saw the boy as he had stepped out of the safe area provided by this world's native peoples. The father, furious at the thought that this boy dared to think he was worthy of his daughter, immediately tried to kill the boy with…a weapon. As in any good story, the daughter saw her father aim at the boy she loved and jumped in front of him and was killed instead. Greif stricken, the father and the boy began to grieve together; they found their common ground in the death of someone they both loved. While they were grieving, the people native to the lands used their knowledge to heal the girl from her wounds and brought her back to the two grieving men. They were so happy to have her back that they put aside their defenses and pretty much lived happily ever after. I suppose it is kind of early Romeo and Juliet but with a better ending." Hermione smiled as she looked up at Daniel.
It took a few moments for him to realize that she had finished telling him about the story. Hesitating only for a moment, he reached over and tapped the section that held the gate address. "What does this say? It is complete different from the rest of the text." He honestly did not know how he wanted her to answer but she had clearly already read something that explained the Stargate if she knew that it was called the astria porta.
"Oh that is the name of the world in the story. Munita Portum ad Omnis."
"How did you manage to translate that?" Daniel was still trying to assign sounds to the different glyphs but had only a few references from the last time that Jack had been speaking the Ancient language thanks to the repository being downloaded into his brain. Unfortunately there were some times too many or too few syllables to work correctly.
"The Alterans had a lot of time on their hands apparently. This writing here is made up of symbols that have sounds and meanings assigned to them. This is probably going to be difficult to explain." Hermione looked at Daniel as though trying to gage whether or not it was worth it to try and explain the symbols or not. "I will try to explain the best I can. Stop me if you get confused." Hermione waited for him to nod his agreement before she opened her notebook and found pages that were covered in different symbols. One set he could clearly recognize from the Stargate system they used to travel the galaxy. Daniel was once again biting the inside of his lip and tasting blood from the effort it took to keep silent and calm.
"Alright, there are three basic generations of symbols that are used as world names. Funnily enough, they correspond to different locations in the night sky as well. They used a type of math that they called Arithmancy to calculate where these worlds would be. Out of all the ancient cultures of the world, I would have to say that the Alteran were probably the most advanced in Astronomy and understanding the stars. Anyways, this is the first generation of symbols and there are thirty-six of them in total. These are almost purely mathematical in nature although they do have sounds that are associated with each symbol. I think it looks like Morris Code on crack to be honest."
Daniel nodded as he took in the symbols that were written in vertical lines. Each line had a series of dots, lines and squiggles to make up the full symbol.
"Because these are almost purely mathematical in nature which limited there use they created the second generation."
Hermione slid her finger along the page until she was pointing to the symbols that Daniel was most familiar with from all the times he had dialed home from other planets.
"Now the second generation has thirty-nine symbols or glyphs. Each one has a mathematical component but they also each have different sounds and meanings. When you combine them into a set to represent a world, you would need to use the mathematical components of the symbol to find the right sounds as they can change. Are you still following?" Hermione waited until Daniel had nodded before she continued. "Now, working out the Arithmancy for each grouping of symbols would also point towards a specific point in the night sky, which is why Munita Portum ad Omnis is referred to as a world. Like I said, they were extremely advanced in mathematics and Astronomy. Each of these symbols correspond to a Constellation within the Milky Way. Using what they called an astria porta, they would enter these symbols or glyphs to indicate where they wanted to go." Hermione sat in silence for a few minutes as Daniel tried to process the information.
"Astria porta?" Daniel winced as he asked the question. He really needed to talk to Jack.
"Theoretical gateway. Translates into Stargate or Doorway through the stars.
"Ahh…so…these worlds could be anywhere within the Milky Way galaxy?" Daniel was unsure of what questions he should even ask at this point.
"For the most part. Like I said, this is a second generation, so any of these would be used for this galaxy. The thirty-nine symbols of the second generation are in addition to the original thirty-six. When you add two of them together you would have more variety available; both for mathematical purposes and for sounds and meanings. It is both a new alphabet and an extension to one at the same time. There are some stories of worlds that are in other galaxies, but not as many that would correspond with the Milky Way. There is one that refers to a people that the Alterans thought had a beautiful art culture, and their world would have been located in the area of the Fornax Dwarf galaxy. That world contained a mix of second and first generation symbols within its name."
"Fornax Dwarf?" Daniel would deny to his dying day that his voice squeaked as he spoke. "How did you pinpoint that area?"
"Well sure. The Alterans were always writing about the different 'clusters of stars' and what they would find there. I am not completely sure of whether or not they were just really lucky regarding the math or just ridiculously advanced and in possession of some type of telescope that I have no record of, but every story that I have read and done the Arithmancy for has corresponded with a galaxy at the very least. Even if they did not have anything like it we do have star charts that make it easy for me to calculate where they are pointing to."
"I suppose that they could take the cultures they met here on earth and just write about them as though they were from different worlds, but the way they write gives the impression that the universe is populated with countless inhabitable worlds and cultures. It is a wonderful thought and is a key component to their culture. Those Ancient Astronaut theories had to come from somewhere you know. They were not the only culture that wrote about the visitors from the skies." Hermione smirked at the baffled doctor that was blinking at her before she continued. It's not like I can get into trouble with the Ministry of Magic for telling him this since they have no idea about this part of our history. Idiots.
"The Alteran creation myth would actually have them arriving here from another galaxy altogether. Probably somewhere like the Sextans B irregular galaxy if not further away. It could be in another cluster entirely; probably NGC 7582 or something equally isolated. The stories are very vague in the hopes that their 'children' or descendants never try and return to their original home world. The story tells that they left because their people were split into two factions. The Alterans decided that they would leave because the others, called the Ori, thought that all people that were not as advanced as them should worship them in return for their protection. The Alterans felt that other cultures should be allowed to grow at their own pace with no interference. It was after they had left that world and came here that they supposedly created the second generation of symbols so that they could visit the other worlds."
"Right. That is amazing." Daniel was almost whispering. This random woman that he had ran into in the library of all places had already given him a more detailed history of the gate builders than he had heard in all eight years he had been using the Stargate and exploring the galaxy. He still had no idea what he should ask her and now wondered if he should just tell her everything he knew about the Stargate at this point. If he did tell her though, Jack would probably kill him. "What about this group?" Daniel finally tapped the last set of symbols on the page. These looked like they may depict constellations as well, but they were dots that had been connected with lines.
"This is the third generation which added another thirty-eight symbols. Each has more sounds and mathematical components; it technically has a thirty-ninth symbol that represents this world but that one also exists in generation two. For some reason they thought it should be in both generations. Probably just for aesthetic reasons or to show that they would always consider this their home even if they were able to leave it to journey through the stars. These symbols normally show up in stories that would have been placed within the Pegasus galaxy, though they would also work for the neighboring ones as well when the other two generations were added in."
"Oh look here, I have a visual to help explain the generations and where they would be used." Hermione flipped though her notebook for a moment before she found a picture that she had obviously printed out from the internet. It was a picture of the Local Galactic Group as it would appear in a cylinder. Hermione quickly drew two diagonal lines to separate the middle cluster of galaxies from the bottom cluster and the four upper galaxies. "First generation, the one that is mainly mathematical based would cover long distances so when they would have traveled from Sextans B or somewhere in NGC 7582, that generation of symbols were the best to show the distance. Now when they supposedly settled here, they created second generation and these are the galaxies they would refer to with second generation or a combination of both. Of course the focus would be on the Milky Way galaxy. Finally, the third generation would cover these at the bottom, focusing mainly in Pegasus but with the addition of the other two generations they would be able to refer to any in the grouping. The further they were from their home, the more symbols and sounds they had to add. That is why it is a bit hard to know what the worlds would actually be called. With each symbol having different meanings and sounds, you have to know the math to even figure out a general translation. Then you have to make sure that it makes sense for the story." Hermione frowned a bit as she looked at the picture of the Local Galactic Group. "I don't think they have any stories that would take place outside this group aside from the possibility that their supposed home world, but if they did then I imagine that there would be a fourth generation of symbols."
"Hn." Daniel just blinked. The Hell?
"Oh my, so sorry, I tend to ramble when I get started on something like this. I hope that you weren't completely bored with my explanation." Hermione quickly started to pack up the rest of her things after taking a quick glance at her watch.
"What? No. That was one of the most exciting explanations on an Ancient language I have heard in a long while. It is rare to find someone that can explain a language that is basically unknown in such detail. It is obvious that you have no trouble reading this so I have to ask, exactly how many languages do you speak?"
Hermione blushed at the question. "Well, at last count I think it was somewhere around forty something." She wondered how many she would have if she were to include Gobbledegook or Mermish to her tally.
"You know over forty languages." Daniel just sat back in his seat stunned.
"Yes well, like I said…languages are a bit of a hobby. It was very nice meeting you and speaking with you Doctor Jackson." Hermione stood and pushed her chair in before holding her hand out for him to shake.
"Yes, it was lovely to talk to you as well." Daniel just blinked as she pulled her bag over her shoulder and left the room. After a few moments of sitting in silence he rushed to pack up his own things. He had not even fully left the building before he was calling the airport to change his ticket to the first flight back home. He had to talk to Jack.