Well, she felt stupid.
Lying on her back, Sam stared at the man-sized hole on the ceiling, sand still dribbling down its edges, formerly the floor she was drilling a fissure to gather a core sample. Her drill, now in pieces against her right hip, broke through the layer to her surprise before the crackling sound told her something was seriously wrong. By the time she stood up, barked a warning, the floor bent inward, depositing her into the dank smelling hole.
Considering how many caves were here, you should have expected there was probably more underground caverns we didn't see, she thought sourly as she saw a head shaped shadow poke through the hole.
"Major Carter!" Despite the even tone, she could tell Teal'c was upset, judging how loud that particular roar was. "Are you well?"
"Uh...yeah." She sat up and waved her hand at Teal'c, but the Jaffa didn't see her. "Over here."
"I can not fit the opening. Can you reach my hand?" A dark limb dangled down, inches from her hand.
"No! I think we'll need some rope!"
"Very well." Something fell through the hole and bounced off something but she couldn't see where it landed.
"Teal'c?" she called out through cupped hands over her mouth. "I can't see where it went!"
"I will bring a light."
Sure enough, a flashlight dangled down, a strap tied around its aluminum body so she could grab at it. Reaching for it, she felt her fingertips brush against the flashlight. She staggered, tiptoeing higher for reach, practically wobbling on the balls of her feet left and right as she curled her fingers around its ends.
Before she tripped over something soft.
"Oof!" As she felt her boot strike something, she clutched the flashlight tighter. Luckily, the flashlight remained intact as she landed hard on a surface of sand and rock.
Crick.
She blinked, eyes watering from the sand falling from the opening above her head. Fumbling, she felt the on switch for the light and pressed it. A small spot of concentrated light popped into existence, dancing on the darkness merrily but unable to penetrate the thick murk.
"Do you see the rope?" Teal'c asked, head hovering over the hole, blocking the little light there was to begin with.
"Think I just tripped over it," she muttered, swiveling her flashlight towards her legs when she heard it again.
Crick.
"Did you hear that?" she whispered, hushed.
"Hear what?" Teal'c asked, head now lowering into the hole. She gawked at the sight of his head upside down. It was almost a comical sight if the hair on the back of her neck wasn't standing upright. Her flashlight passed by the Jaffa, catching the gleam of his golden tattoo before it swept to the right.
"I thought I heard something," murmured Carter, eyes narrowing as she pulled in her legs, getting up unsteadily.
"Perhaps I should come down," suggested the alien.
Sam shook her head. "You would need to punch a bigger hole, and I rather wait til I'm up there. Place might cave in over my head."
"Very well." Teal'c paused, head still upside down. Carter wondered briefly why the Jaffa wasn't dizzy from all the blood rushing through his head. Teal'c didn't look at all bothered by the awkward position.
"I heard it. I'm pretty sure," Sam said, eyes narrowing as she tried to discern what the light was showing her. She sighed. "I think we need some more lights down here. Let me just get the rope and-"
Crick.
There! She heard little taps against hard rock skittering behind her. Sam spun around, the flashlight already on the floor, scanning up along the plane and froze as she saw what it was that tripped her.
It wasn't the rope.
"Oh...god..." She moved her hand over her mouth, nauseated as she saw the wrinkled, brownish limb lying on the ground next to her rope. Suddenly the strange smells made a connection, and she twisted around to shine the rest of the cavern she was in.
"Major Carter?" Teal'c frowned as Carter stepped away from his sight. The Jaffa wiggled a little, slipping in deeper into the hole so his own flashlight attached to his vest's shoulder can shine a light to track her.
Both shines added to the brightness and widened the scope of visibility in the cave. Carter made a funny sound, stepping back as their combined flashlights revealed what was in the back of the cavern.
"Bring my meter down here, and...c-call...call the colonel and Daniel," Sam whispered, eyes glued to the piles before her. When her light caught the gleam of yellow polished teeth under piles of other gruesome grins exposing yellowed teeth, she turned her flashlight off, preferring the dark instead.
By the time Jack reached the cave Teal'c described, Daniel trailing a short distance away, the colonel caught the glimpse of the Jaffa pulling a rope before grabbing Carter's hand from a hole. He hurried his steps, dropping down carefully on his knees and reached out to grab the other flailing hand, pulling up a very white faced major.
"Carter?" Worried by the pallor, Jack's grip tightened around her wrist. "What happened? How the hell-?"
"Is...is...s-she okay?" panted Daniel, staggering to the cave mouth, gasping for air.
Jack frowned, looking over his shoulder. He didn't like the way Daniel was leaning into the wall, one arm out to brace the surface for support, bent over as if he run miles when they only went across the campsite, barely a few dozen meters away.
"Sir...the cavern..." Carter was gasping as well, but Jack doubted it was the exertion of the climb. Mentally filing Daniel's appearance for discussion later, Jack gripped Carter by both shoulders, hauling her up with him as he rose. She mumbled her thanks, stepping away to wipe the perspiration off her forehead.
"What? What was down there?" Jack demanded, going from Carter to Teal'c. He eyed the dark hole with a frown. "Carter." He looked back at her. "What was down there?"
"Bodies," Teal'c answered for both of them. "There were many bodies, O'Neill."
A sliver of cold stuck into Jack's back. "What?"
"There were stacks of them, sir," Carter was still heaving, gulping fresh air as if she was holding her breath for a long time. "Up against the walls." She pointed to the back of the cave they were standing. Rubble, huge boulders were visible from where they stood. "Went beyond this blockage up here, underneath. The cavern looked about maybe twelve hundred square feet." Carter made a face. She walked around the entire area to be sure of the length.
"And you just went down there like this?" Jack grated out, pointing her attire.
Grimacing, waving down at her dusty uniform, Carter murmured, "I sort of didn't have a choice at the time."
"You should have went back up and went through your procedures," O'Neill went on tightly despite her argument.
Sam winced. "Sir, I know I should have went MOPP 2-"
"You think?" the colonel bit out. "Last thing you need is to get contaminated by some weird...thing!"
"Air was clean, sir. A bit...stale, but clean." She lifted her meter up to show Jack. The older man grumbled.
"N-not everything can be protected just by wearing isolation suits," Daniel stuttered, walking over to the others. He still sounded a bit breathless. After a second of standing without a prop, he exhaled, sitting on the floor by Sam's feet.
Jack stared at the top of Daniel's head with a frown. "You sound a little winded."
"Hard running on sand," explained the archeologist as he peered down the hole. "Sam...how was the interior?"
"Same material as the caves," Carter reported, giving the colonel a nod too. She noticed Daniel was gasping as well. "I could go back down there and get some footage-"
"I should go down there as well," Daniel said thoughtfully.
"Carter and I can go," Jack cut in.
"No offense, Jack, but you really wouldn't know what to look for." Blue eyes gazed up from the floor, narrowing suspiciously. "I need to see the cavern myself."
"There's a lot of bodies down there," Sam warned.
"I know, Sam," Daniel said tightly. "I think by now...I can deal with it. Don't worry, I won't freak out over the sight of a body."
"Hey!" Snapping his fingers, Jack drew Daniel's attention. "She didn't mean it that way! We don't know what's down there!"
Daniel turned to Sam abruptly. "You said the air was okay?"
Startled, Carter nodded. "Uh, yeah...the meter didn't show any signs of radiation or-"
"How do you feel?" interrupted Daniel.
She blinked. "A bit bruised from the fall, but other than that, fine."
Daniel went back to Jack. "Guess it's okay, then."
Jack saw three pairs of eyes on him. He ground his teeth together and forced out a "Fine." He motioned everyone to open their packs, pulling out their masks. "Let's go."
He always thought the air tasted stale behind the gas mask. But then, maybe it was just him. Jack and the others didn't seem to have his problem as they donned the filters, blinking through thick lenses of plastic. Daniel watched as Sam ordered everyone back while she bored another hole parallel to the one that dumped her down the dark pit and let the two holes naturally crumbled together to one large enough for everyone.
Despite what Carter said, O'Neill insisted on everyone going MOPP two, a term that took Daniel a while back then to remember what it meant.
Heavy gloves, a head cloak with goggles and a filtered mask for air, and a poncho draped across their shoulders, were pulled out of everyone's packs. Daniel had to run back to get his pack from the cave so by the time he staggered back, why was he so winded anyway, everyone was already ripping open the sterile packets, although Jack was staring at him thoughtfully when he returned. The stare was unnerving, like Jack had solved some puzzle and looked tempted in announcing the answer. Daniel ignored him, pulling at zippers with his head bowed, Jack's stare burning into his back. But then Jack sighed before finally flipping out his poncho with a quick turn of the wrist. Pretty soon, everyone was ready with the exception of Daniel, still fumbling with the damn wrapper with fingers tingling like needles stabbing the tips. What was wrong with him? When Sam stepped forward to try and help, the bag finally opened, much to Daniel's relief, and hurriedly he donned the required articles to enter the hole.
Flashlights danced in the dusty atmosphere, stopping short of revealing the intricate carvings and decorations lining the curved walls. It was hard to see, but Daniel could tell anyway some things which should have been there were gone, their former spots vacated, scored with scratches as if whoever it was just didn't have time to be gentle with their wares.
Such a waste, Daniel thought as he steered his light upward to admire the pieces of artwork in the center of an arced ceiling. Downward the flashlight went, brushing by Sam's boots as they thumped loudly in a hollow corridor, the wind whooshing by the tunnels freely. Thump, thump, their boots went. Briefly, Daniel thought they seemed to be echoing their own heartbeats as hollowed tunnels stretched the sounds to repeat.
Jack turned slightly to look at him, the flashlight momentarily streaking across and blinding him. "Daniel? Any ideas about this place?"
His flashlight bobbing up and down to trace the passageway, Daniel kept his eyes on it as he murmured, "Uh...Looks like it was built by a pretty advanced race, then stripped and deserted." He gazed sadly at one gutted wall which appeared as if it could have held a statue of some kind.
"MALP showed no life signs," reported Sam, but her rifle with her flashlight attached to its barrel, still swayed left and right as she took her front guard position very seriously. Only once did her footsteps pause when a large door that reminded Daniel of a cartouche appeared before four spots of light.
"Ready?"
Daniel looked up and saw Jack standing next to him, brown eyes through blurred plastic lenses, visibly concerned despite the distorting pieces. Setting his jaw, Daniel nodded. He did it before, and he could do it again. But as he tracked Sam dropping back down in the dark hole on the rope ladder anchored by two spokes Jack hammered on the ground, her light a sharp line of white against black, Daniel couldn't help but shiver.
The door opened, rolling away to the right, its round cover opening, revealing a small space the size of the SGC briefing room. Daniel flinched at the odor wafting out of the chamber. He turned his face slightly away as the winds that spun behind them swirled into the newly opened room, dispelling the rotting stench.
"Now that is not a good smell." Daniel couldn't see Jack's expression, but the stiff shoulders cast in his light were tensed, the arms higher as the rifle automatically went up.
Out of habit, before entering the room, Daniel took a deep breath and followed before the others.
To Daniel's chagrin, he landed with a stumble from a drop where the ladder abruptly ended. He felt Sam's hand on his elbow, steadying him, and he was about to snap at her when he saw her clear eyes, holding not the pity he thought it would contain, but the anxious concern he thought he saw back in the ward. He wasn't sure then if it was there, vision blurred by madness, by MacKenzie's drugs, but it was here now before him so he couldn't do anything more than duck his head and mumble his thanks. She responded by squeezing his arm before walking away.
First thing he noticed were the tables, gold gilded, dust kicked up with each step they took. To Daniel's disappointment, there wasn't anything on the tables besides dust, the walls basically plain compared to the hieroglyphic ones he was accustomed to associating with Goa'uld architecture. Maybe there was something on the farthest wall. Daniel trained his light on it, using the growing spot on the surface as his guide in telling him how much closer he was getting.
Then, he tripped.
The sound his stumbling made caused all remaining flashlights to swing his direction as Daniel spun around with a quick hop and shown his on the ground, reeling back a step with a breathed "Geez" when he saw what had made him lose his footing.
It was a body.
"Shit," Jack breathed as his light danced around the cavern with the others. Daniel could see the colonel shaking his head, light scanning the smaller humanoid forms all strewed out in stacks like sacks of flour.
Daniel took a step back, his own light focused on the walls for any writings, trying to ignore the sensation of the possible foul stench managing to seep through despite the filters. Walking backwards as Teal'c dropped down from the hole right in front of him, Daniel's heel struck something, and this time it was the Jaffa whose hand snapped out and caught him before he could fall.
"Watch out behind you, Daniel," Carter said softly. Daniel knew, judging by her voice, what was behind him so he only nodded mutely and attempted to walk away from what his foot had stepped on, while waving a hand to Teal'c and Jack before they asked if he was okay.
They're dead. They can't hurt you. You should be finding out what happened to them, Daniel scolded himself angrily as he glued his eyes on the wavering spotlight, frowning as it seem to vanish from his sight. He tapped the side of his equipment, squinting furiously as the light blurred, then solidified. Scowling at the bright spot, Daniel turned to ask if anyone else was having this problem, but they didn't seem to notice his troubles, Jack and Sam approaching the stacks for closer examination, Teal'c standing guard so he swallowed his questions. Tugging at his collar, Daniel wondered why it was so cold down here.
White hair in tuffs, eyes long gone with time, the only thing standing out was the sickly tanned textured skin, sunken deep to its skeletal structure, and its lively red vest that stayed remarkably bright. Daniel stood riveted to the spot.
"Alright, level A," Jack was saying, as backpacks zipped open in quick unison.
Daniel could have sworn the corpse was moving. Didn't the hand just twitch? Of course not, he chided himself as he fumbled with getting his bag open, pulling out the hood and mask. The place was centuries old; the room clearly showed abandonment. What was he thinking? Daniel kept busy, unraveling the mask, eyes on it instead. Pretty soon, they all became featureless, armed with flashlights that swung left and right, up and down.
"There's another here."
"More over here."
He swallowed. How many were here? He stared at the first one, arm out as if reaching for help, entreating him for aid decades, perhaps centuries too late. Daniel gently took a step back.
"These aren't quite human."
Daniel spun around just as Jack and Teal'c's spotlights came around to the body in question, Sam pointing hers on the back of one of them. She looked up, blue eyes wide, visible through the thick lenses. "They're Goa'uld."
Back to the first one again, Daniel gawked at it before taking one more step back.
"Okay." Jack sounded very calm, his voice muffled behind the hood. "So they were once snakes. Carter, you sense anything from these guys to suggest they're still in there?"
Daniel could hear Sam's disgust, probably wrinkling her nose as she shook her head, the hood crinkling as she went. "No, sir. Nothing. I very much doubt any larva can survive this long in a dead body. It needs a live host to survive."
Okay, no Goa'uld. Just a whole bunch of dead bodies, Daniel thought, forcing himself to move further away from the first one, the bright red vest and hollowed eyes branded in his memory.
"Daniel?" Jack's flashlight gleamed at his face quickly before lowering so it wouldn't blind him. "Something about that one?" The older man's light flicked across to the red vest questioningly.
"N-no." Shrugging, Daniel shone his light all around the room, turning his back on the dead body. "I wonder if they left any records about what happened here?"
The colonel stayed where he was, tracking Daniel for a moment, before grunting. "Doubt it. Looks like these guys might have been surprised."
Daniel shook his head. "I don't know, Jack." He managed to stay out of Sam and Teal'c's way as they scoured the chamber themselves. "Some of them are under the table. This doesn't look like any living quarters." He pointed his light at the tables. "More like a meeting place. There aren't any chairs so they might have been standing. Why are they all under the tables now?"
Sam paused from her position at the opposite corner. "You could be right, Daniel."
Jack didn't sound impressed, but he did grunt again. "Okay, I see your point. So obviously these guys knew what was happening to them then, maybe tried to hide?" He shook his head. "Doesn't make any sense."
Daniel shook his head. Stop it, stop it, stop it. It wasn't the same. It wasn't. He forced himself to open his tired eyes wider and deliberately turned around to stare at the body which blocked his path before.
Look at it. Just don't touch it, and you'll be fine. Gulping back on a dry throat, Daniel trained his light on the almost eradicated features, the flesh pulled back, shriveled and distorting its teeth to a hideous grin. Daniel could feel his hands shake. What the hell was wrong with him? He felt nauseous, his stomach cramping uncomfortably.
Jack's voice came out of the blue, causing Daniel to start, his flashlight swinging wildly. "Do they look like Goa'ulds, Carter? Back of their necks got anything?" O'Neill turned slightly towards Daniel. "What?"
"N-nothing." Daniel took a deep breath, metallic tasting air coming through, and he gagged. "Uh...the one over here looks pretty well preserved, just recently in fact."
"Oh?" Jack's voice was as dry as the sand outside the caves. "Like within a few hundred years or so?"
Daniel took another look at the body, noting the light discoloring. Exposed arms through rotting leather tunics showed purplish spots all over its arms like blood vessels had burst. "Actually, um...yeah."
"Really?" The colonel sounded surprised. He cleared his throat loudly. "Great. Uh...these look different though." He pointed back to the stacks on the back walls.
Sam nodded, her hood rustling against her vest. "Daniel, some of these looked fossilized even." She pointed her rifle at one near the bottom without touching it. "Here. I thought it was just rock but it was actually an arm." She indicated the outline of a withered bicep, blackened and gaunt. "What do you think, Daniel?"
What did he think? Daniel wanted to laugh. What he thought was they should pack up and leave. But he could imagine what their reactions would be. Hushed talking, pointing, murmuring until they went back through the Stargate, and he'd find Mackenzie waiting to take him back-
Stop it! Daniel pounded his fist against a thigh.
"Daniel Jackson?" Teal'c took a step forward, stopping when Daniel reacted by taking one back.
"I..." Daniel made himself face the stacks, flashlight adding to Jack and Sam's. The wall brightened considerably, and he felt his throat constricting at the sight before him. He scanned it quickly, trying to discern the clothing from the decay. Something tugged at his mind, nagging him, and he knew he had to step closer. One, two, three steps and Daniel realized. He frowned, scanning the bodies now with a sharper eye.
"Daniel, what is it?" Sam stood up straighter, lowering her flashlight.
The higher levels of bodies had rotting leather, straps dangling from limbs, too worn and decayed to stay intact as the original clothing.
Scrolling down the pile, Daniel bit the inside of his mouth as the light passed over blank stares, making quick comparison with the lighter skin tones, the beaded fabric permanently embedded on flesh, then to the lower half of the stack with the metallic like armor fused to stone like limbs.
"They're different," murmured Daniel.
Jack pointed his light back at the stacks. "Different?" He faced Daniel once more. "How so?"
Waving his flashlight like a pointer, Daniel indicated between the various stacks. "Look at them. They're...we have a few different types of clothing, different levels of..." He swallowed. "Uh...decay."
Crouching, Sam didn't seem bothered by their close proximity as she nodded. "He's right, sir."
Peering at one figure, Jack grunted.
"Perhaps they are of different caste, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c shifted the staff weapon in his grasp. "On Chulak, we were dressed in various articles to indicate our status. I wore my armor as First Prime." The ending rumble in Teal'c's voice showed how unpleasant the memory was.
Crestfallen, Daniel nodded. "That's possible." Then he shook his head. "No, it looked pretty much like these people died in different periods. Clothing aside, the decay factors are too vast here."
Jack swung his flashlight from each member of the team, thinking carefully. Daniel thought he saw doubt in the colonel's eyes but then the light swung back the other way instead, shadowing the dark eyes from view. Something stung in Daniel's eyes as he realized he was probably going to have to provide more proof. As his gaze drifted back to the bodies, he realized he wasn't even sure himself.
There seemed to be bodies everywhere. Daniel felt his mouth go tight and dry. Swallowing didn't seem to help, and despite the winds, the smell of the dead clung to his filter, further distorting his air. The walls felt like they were closing in, and he averted his attention to the floor instead to stop thinking about it. A gleam of gold caught his eye, and he walked over to the center of the room to a few complicated interlined triangles painted on the floor. "Teal'c, do you recognize this symbol?"
Teal'c walked over, his light brushing across the design as well. "It is the crest of the Linvris."
A hooded head bobbed up towards their direction. Jack swung his light left and right to both Daniel and Teal'c, before staying it mid-waist on Daniel. "Which is what? Or...who?"
"A rival league of lesser Goa'ulds who challenge the system lords." Teal'c was recognizable in his stance, Daniel realized, calm and composed despite the nondescript masks over their heads.
Jack's hood tilted a bit before swinging around to examine all the bodies. Daniel couldn't see his expression as the older man's flashlight glared out his features. "A minor league."
"Yes, there are nine."
Sam was already going around the room, counting. "Five...six, seven, eight..."
"Nine," Jack pointed out the last one, the one with the red vest. At its mention, Daniel had involuntarily glanced back over to it. He tore his eyes away from the body once more.
"Found them," announced Sam. Daniel looked around the room, dread growing. All nine of the Linvris, curled under the tables as if cowering in their last breath.
What happened here?
No symbols. Daniel swept his light across the floor before swinging up to the walls. The caverns weren't decorated like the other caves he was looking at. He could hear Jack and Sam lowering their voices in discussion, and his ears burned at the thought of what they might be saying.
Concentrate, he told himself sternly, walking along the edges of the walls. The ripples on stone came to clarity as he swept his beam over them. Nothing. The surfaces were smooth as if-
"These were made!" he blurted.
"Huh?" Lifting his head, Jack stayed where he was, holding a jar as Carter carefully peeled an aging fabric from one mummified body. He watched as Daniel's light went left and right slowly before settling on his face. Jack flinched. "Daniel-"
"Sorry." The light lowered. "I'm saying these walls. They're man made."
Carter raised her head as well, pliers in mid air above the opened jar. "You sure?"
"Pretty sure," Daniel replied tightly. "The walls look formed, not eroded away like the others. Nor are they covered with carbon as you might expect with the exposed caves we saw."
"True." Nodding her head, the major gave it some thought. "Most of these caverns could have been naturally there, like pores in bedrock. When the planet had its stellar impacts, the tremors and force could have pushed up the continental plates furthest away from the impact crater like folded paper." She bend her hands downwards into a V sign. "Would explain why some of the caves are exposed. They weren't really caves at all." She rotated her beam around the cavern, catching glimpses of Teal'c and Daniel as she did. "It's like the moon with its various impact craters. Scientists theorize there was probably hundreds of networks of tunnels below we could find with the right sensors."
"Holes?" O'Neill drawled. "Like swiss cheese?"
Carter bit back a smile as Teal'c turned to the colonel. "The moon is made of cheese?"
"Or so some say," Jack said dryly.
Daniel didn't laugh as he stood slightly away from the hole. Carter could only see the glint of his goggles as he spoke dully, "Would explain the drawings."
"They do?" she asked as she gingerly placed the fabric she was retrieving into the sample jar the colonel was holding. O'Neill capped it and gave a quick twist, effectively sealing the lid.
Watching as they took samples, somewhere in the back of his mind told him he should be there doing that as well, Daniel shrugged. "I had wondered about the various drawings I've uncovered so far. The styles and methods differed too much. The last cave I went to didn't use any form of paint."
"Maybe there wasn't any available at that point," Sam mused out loud.
Heartened by the agreeing words, Daniel nodded. "Makes sense." Momentarily forgetting the darkness of the room, he swept a hand across the cavern. "Nothing in here, but the other caves had drawings. They seem to center on the theme of hunting, although we have the same thing on Earth where paintings in Post Ice Age era that were more of a narration of hunting parties, records of nomadic-" He stopped when he realized he was rambling. Flushing, grateful for the mask, Daniel mumbled, "They could have been done by different generations of people or entirely different races."
"Carter?" Turning to her, Jack gestured towards the bodies. "Think they all came through the Stargate some time ago?"
Rising to her feet, the woman shrugged. "Could be possible, sir. I mean, you've seen the chamber we arrived through. SG-11 didn't explore much further than around that cavern, but their observations were relatively correct." She waved a hand around the cave. "The Stargate was housed or maybe buried in rock. There was enough pockets of air I would guess to form the wormhole. Stargate must have been used constantly, and the cavern it was in was disintegrated to the size we saw."
"The Goa'ulds have not occupied this planet," Teal'c spoke. "I do not recall this planet being mentioned. Nor did I see any signs of Goa'uld presence."
"Anything would have been destroyed with the meteor showers if they're as frequent as we think." Walking around in a small circle, Carter indicated the cavern. "Nothing could have survived."
"They did." Getting up as well, Jack pointed to the bodies. Daniel could hear the disgust in his voice as the colonel stepped away, walking back and forth impatiently. "Or...they did until they all died here."
"I don't think they died here, sir."
"What?" Jack's pacing froze mid step.
"Well, if Daniel's correct, they might have been dumped here because they all died in various times or eras."
If Daniel's correct.
Daniel sucked in his breath, the heavy feeling on his chest returning full force. He wanted to argue further but realized how desperate that would sound and appear so he just kept scrolling his light around the chamber.
The ceiling was high, also smoothly carved rock, uniformed streaks of white across reddish stone. Daniel dully noted they too looked deliberately made. Ceremony chamber? He mentally shook his head. There would be some sort of markings noting it as sacred ground.
Not all places would do that, his mind argued, and Daniel absently nodded his head. He kept walking, hearing everyone's voices in the background like a soft murmur as he tried hard to piece together everything in his mind. He tugged at his collar once more. It was a little chilly in here. He distracted himself by examining the ceilings once more.
Ripples like gently lapping water stretched across the surface with its white marks. Daniel fumbled around, swearing softly when he realized he left his pack up on the surface. Why did he do that? Wearily, he pressed his gloved hand to the back of his neck. Odd, it felt like his backpack was still attached to his vest. Shrugging back his shoulders, he tracked the ceiling, feeling his eyes burn. Line after line of white against red, something nagging him that this was odd, not natural. Of course it could be normal for this type of mineral. Some quartz-
At the edge of his beam, Daniel saw black. He stopped, brow furrowing under his hood and backtracked his trail to the spot. He caught a glimpse of black again and shifted left.
A swarm of trilobites were wiggling on the ceiling, piling on top of each other.
"God!" Daniel jumped, staggering back, his flashlight falling to the sand.
Lights zipped left and right frantically near his location.
"Daniel?" Sam called out worriedly, the discarded flashlight turned away from Daniel, concealing him in the darkness.
Heart pounding, Daniel told himself furiously to compose himself. You're tired and maybe you started daydreaming, maybe its a cluster of fossils. There's a logical reason for this, for what you're seeing. Calm down. Calm down!
Jack was suddenly there, hands on his shoulders as Daniel shook. "What? What is it?" The older man rubbed his hands up and down Daniel's arms. "Daniel, it's me. Tell me, what is it?"
Shaking, Daniel shoved the hands away, hands fumbling for the fallen flashlight. He picked it up, shrugging away Jack's demands as he waved it up to the ceiling again.
Nothing.
Frantically, he swung it to the left. Then right.
Nothing.
There was never anything there.
In the back of his mind, he could hear a Stargate locking its chevrons, and he couldn't tell if it was memory or just his mind finally buckling. Maybe Machello's traps just pushed what was there, maybe like Nick, Daniel was just a tightrope waiting to snap-
"Daniel!" Jack spun Daniel around, bracing him on the shoulders. "What? What did you see?"
See? Daniel wanted to laugh, but was afraid it was going to sound shrill. "N-nothing. I thought..."
Jack tilted his head up as Sam and Teal'c came closer. Daniel was soon surrounded by them. The archeologist flinched as Jack's eyes were visible through the mask.
"What was it?" the colonel asked tightly.
Daniel did laugh, the sound bitter. "Don't worry. There aren't any closets here..." he trailed off as he saw Jack's shock before the older man's hands lowered, freeing him. God, what was he doing?
"I...I need some air," Daniel mumbled, elbowing through the trio. Jack abruptly grabbed Daniel painfully by the left forearm, jerking the archeologist to a halt.
"Daniel, what was it?"
"Nothing! I just thought...Let go of me." Daniel yanked out of the painful grip, stumbling. He avoided Teal'c's stretched hands and clung to the rope ladder. "I just need some air. I'll...I'll be right back." He scrambled up the rope, not realizing he dropped his flashlight as he headed for the light above.
