A/N: Second Chapter up, I'm going to post one chapter each day for as long as my vacation lasts.
Reviews are welcome
Chapter 2 –The Young King
"Greetings, strangers. I welcome you to Avalon. I w..."
He stopped speaking as he noticed that none of the team members of SG-1 were actually listening. They were staring to him, completely surprised.
"What are you looking at?" he asked. "Is there something on my clothes? Between my teeth?"
"Huh. Uh. No. Sorry for staring, King Minos, but we expected you to be... different..." answered Daniel.
"Different in what way?" asked king Minos, not in the least bit insulted of the lack of interest from the strangers in his speech."
"Well, um... We kind of expected you to be ... Um." Daniel started.
"Older." Finished O'Neill.
King Minos was a kid. A boy, couldn't have been much older than fifteen or so. He had blond hair, blue eyes and was quite small. He was wearing a form of toga with short sleeves.
"Well, why would you expect me to be older?" he asked.
"I don't know. The kings we've encountered before were all grown adults." Answered Jack.
"How many kings have you met before me?"
"A lot. We're explorers, so we visit a lot of planets. Most of those planets are ruled by the Goa'uld, but some have their own kings, or leaders, or something."
"Ah. Yes, the Goa'uld. They are quite annoying. But what brings you here, to Avalon, other than exploration? Surely, the ... object ... that you've sent through the Astria Porta could have explored this world?"
"We're here to discuss the possibility of forming an alliance with your people. To trade, or to share knowledge." Said O'Neill.
"Tell me, then. What planet are you from, and what do you propose in an alliance?" he asked while he sat down on the chair on the head of the table.
"We're from the planet Earth. The Goa'uld know us as the Tauri. We could trade medicines, or food for example for minerals. We could teach you how to enlarge the harvests, or cure a disease, for example. And if you are under attack from the Goa'uld, we could offer protection or shelter on our planet." Daniel spoke.
"But we have little diseases that are hard to cure, and we have food enough. When there is a drought, then sure, the harvests can be a little bad, but we always have enough food to serve the most basic needs. We have enough farmers, and they produce enough food in an average year to make sure that no-one goes hungry. And we can protect ourselves from the Goa'uld just fine, if they dare attack."
"We've met a lot of Goa'uld already, and they usually attack a planet that is not occupied by another Goa'uld. And there doesn't seem to be a Goa'uld here, so..." O'Neill started.
"So what?" king Minos asked, not understanding where O'Neill was going to.
"So how do you plan to defend yourselves against Goa'uld attacks?" finished Teal'c.
"We capture their men and send them back through the Astria Porta to where they came from. We take everything we can use from them, except for their clothes. Only if they are severe trouble-makers, then we send them back completely naked."
"And if they come in ships, what then?" asked Daniel.
"Then we do the same, only this time we ask where they would like to be sent. And we keep the ship, of course. As you can see, we rarely need protection. And if they somehow manage to fire at the city, the civilians can flee to safety in the underground caverns."
"My lord..." panted a guard that came running into the hall hastily, "something terrible has happened. A civilian has been killed!"
"Where? When? And by who?" king Minos asked, seeming really surprised by the news.
"That is the strange part. It was in the middle of the street, and suddenly there was a flash of light and a lot of noise. Then a civilian lay dead on the middle of the road!"
"That is very strange. A busy street, on the middle of the day. Lead the way to the site, please."
"Of course, My Lord."
"If you will excuse me for leaving." King Minos said to SG-1.
"Can we come? Maybe we can help?" said Carter.
"OK. But hurry."
The group left the palace in a hurry, and they ran towards to street where the murder had taken place. It was a busy street, not really far from the large market square. Well, it would be a busy street if there hadn't just been someone murdered. A few guardsmen stood in a circle around a few civilians, family of the deceased. The other guards searched the area for the assassin. They continued their search when the small group of King Minos, the guard and SG-1 arrived. One of the guards, seemingly their leader, walked forward.
"My lord. I have sent out guards to search for the assassin. They have not found anything yet. The weapon is not one of our own. It left burn marks, so that suggests a weapon of Goa'uld type."
"You did well. But you'll not find the assassin this way. I'll capture him, before he takes any more casualties. I assume you've learned about an Ashrak in the Academy?"
"An Ashrak? How are you planning to capture him, My lord?"
"By smell."
King Minos walked to the unfortunate victim of the Ashrak, and started smelling around like a dog. He must have picked up a scent quickly, because before long he sucked in a large breath, and opened his eyes.
"Guards. Please follow me." He said.
He ran away to the end of the street. He could run quite fast for a boy his age, but then, it was unusual that he was trying to trace an elite Goa'uld soldier with a cloak by smell. At the end of the street, he turned right. Sg-1 decided to follow him, and so they ran after him.
The boy, or teenager for that part, that was king Minos had apparently lost the Ashrak, because he suddenly stopped in the middle of the street, between two low buildings. He slowly pivoted on one foot in a complete circle while trying to capture the scent of the Ashrak again. Suddenly, he turned his head upwards, and mumbled "Of course!". The rest of the guards and Sg-1, who had finally caught up with him, asked what was the matter.
"The matter is that the Ashrak is not as dumb as he looks. He, or it, actually, had climbed the building. That means that he must have ran over the rooftops."
"Can you follow him there?" asked O'Neill.
"Yes, but I don't want any of you break your necks while on the roofs. If you'd fall, you would probably die or at least break something. And that would not look good in terms of our possible alliance, or would it? So you can follow me if you wish, but be careful."
"And what about us, my lord?" asked one of the guards.
"You can come with me over the rooftops, or you can follow me from down in the streets. Do as you wish."
The guards quickly made up their minds, and decided to split the group in half. Half of the guards would follow King Minos over the rooftops, and the other half would follow him from down in the streets.
"I'll follow king Minos too." Said Daniel.
"Nah, I think I'll follow him from down in the streets. I'm too old to go climbing over rooftops at breakneck speed." Said O'Neill.
"I don't like climbing, so I'll follow O'Neill, if you don't mind." Said Carter.
"I would opt to follow king Minos over the rooftops, but I fear that the rooftops would break." Said Teal'c.
"So watch out, Daniel."
"Will do, Jack."
King Minos however had climbed up to the roof of the building to the left, and stood there waiting for the rest to come up. Daniel walked to the large vat that the king must have used as a step to climb up to the roof, and climbed up there. Then he stood there, because the roof was still a little bit too high for him to reach. He started about thinking to ask for help, when it came.
"Here, give me your hand." Said King Minos from the roof.
"Thanks, but I fear that I'll pull you from the roof if I take it. The stuff I carry is not the lightest, and I'm not the smallest guy..."
"Just take my hand" said king Minos, this time a bit louder.
Daniel took his hand and was really surprised when he was pulled up to the roof without much of a trouble. The kid was apparently a lot stronger than he looked.
After they had pulled the three guards that would follow them over the roof up, King Minos had ran away to the right. He was running a lot faster than Daniel had deemed 'safe' for running on rooftops in the middle of a city.
King Minos suddenly stopped again, apparently to catch the smell of the Ashrak. He turned to face the wall of a large building that was a little higher than the surrounding buildings. He made a very high jump, for a kid of his size, and grabbed the top of the building. Quickly, he hoisted himself up and immediately ducked down as if there was something flying over his head.
Daniel and the guards came finally close enough to try to climb the building where king Minos was fighting an invisible opponent. Daniel jumped, and he just reached high enough to grab the top of the roof. He hoisted himself up, but it went slowly, while it had seemed so easy when king Minos did it.
Daniel was now up on the roof, and the Ashrak must have noticed it because he left King Minos alone and lying on the roof.
"Look out!" king Minos screamed. "Dive to the left!"
Daniel ducked as far to the left as he dared without falling of the roof, and a few moments later king Minos had thrown himself into the Ashrak, launching it off the building into the streets below. The group that would follow them through the streets had apparently not caught up with them, because they were nowhere to be seen.
King Minos didn't seem to hesitate over jumping down, so he jumped. Just when Daniel screamed: "No! Don't!" King Minos made a big jump to the ground, three stories down from where Daniel was standing. Daniel could see him falling, and he saw the kid land as flexible as a cat, perfectly on his legs. He couldn't believe it. He knew no one that would have made such a jump with a perfect landing, without a scratch.
The fight with the Ashrak continued in the street below. Daniel quickly lowered himself one story by climbing off the higher building where he was standing to a lower one, where the guards were. Then Daniel saw the other part of the group, the one that was down in the streets.
"Jack! They're over here! Hurry!" he screamed while pointing down to where king Minos continued to dodge invisible blows.
The other group hurried quickly to king Minos. All of them seemed surprised to see the young king move and dodge around the street. Suddenly king Minos was picked up by something invisible, and was smacked on the ground with a soft 'thump'. He quickly raised his arms to hinder the invisible knife that he knew was heading for his neck, while the Ashrak was hit by a staff blast.
Teal'c had fired his staff just in time to save King Minos. He had hit the Ashrak in the shoulder, thus stopping the blade that was aimed at Minos's throat. The shot had also overloaded the Ashraks cloak, so he was now visible for everyone.
Jack was the first to respond after that as he pumped the Ashrak full of bullets from his gun. Carter immediately followed by shooting her gun empty too. The guards fired their crossbows, but the longer reloading time meant that they could only fire once in the twenty seconds at most.
However, that time was not necessary because king Minos had grabbed the Ashraks knife while the Ashrak was stunned by the bullets. He was almost dancing around the Ashrak while he was killing it in a rapid succession of stabs to the head, neck and chest. With one final stab right through the neck of the Ashrak, he finished it.
"Stupid asshole" said king Minos as he got up and kicked the lifeless body of the Ashrak, which was filled with holes from the bullets and its own blade. "I'm keeping the blade."
"Thanks for killing the Ashrak." He said, while making a small bow to Teal'c, O'Neill, Carter and the three guards.
"Um guys... could you help us out here?" said Daniel from the roof of the building. "I'm not going to jump down like King Minos, so could you tell us where to get down?"
"There is a lower building near, to your left." Said Jack. "We saw it on the way here."
"OK. Thanks." Daniel said as he started to walk to the building Jack mentioned.
After a few minutes of searching Daniel and the guards on the roof had found the building Jack had mentioned and were climbing down to street level.