Disclaimer: Stargate: SG-1 and all related concepts are the property of MGM, while the character of Spike belongs to Joss Whedon and James Marsters, among other people (Also, the original idea for this story came from Jedi Buttercup's 'An Unexpected Gift', so I don't own it either, although I have put my own spin on things, and have been given his full permission to use his idea)
Feedback: I'd appreciate it, of course
AN: Just to clarify, if I don't show anything, it happened the same way it happened in the original episode; the only exception is Daniel and Vala's conversation about Sha're, which will never take place here because… well, just wait and see
The Ghost in the Team
A couple of days later, Spike stood on the bridge of the Odyssey, his hands plunged into his pockets as he stared somewhat sulkily at the planet spread out on the viewscreen before him.
It wasn't that he was bored or anything- on the contrary, he'd totally enjoyed the chance to spend a bit of time on a real-life spaceship; every moment he could be sure he wouldn't get yelled at for being a pain (No sense ticking off these people, after all) he'd asked somebody for information about how something worked or where this place had been-, but to come all that way from Earth, only to be told he couldn't go down to the planet until they'd established whether there's be somewhere for him to 'hide' so he wouldn't give them away…
It kind of sucked, to put it bluntly.
Just because he understood why he'd need to hide when he got down there- his clothing would stick out like a sore thumb the second he stepped onto the planet's surface, and he couldn't wear a robe without the damn thing falling through him in his current state- didn't mean he couldn't be bored silly about it. Having come all that way for nothing…
OK, so he had been able to check out the ship a bit and been allowed to go up onto the bridge while he waited for the rest of his new 'team' to be finished; it wasn't quite what he'd been hoping for when he'd agreed to this kind of thing. He'd been hoping to get a chance to kick some alien arse, and so far he wasn't even going where 'no vamp had gone before', as the one-eyed Nick Fury wannabe might have put it.
"Sir?" a lieutenant suddenly said from his position down in the front of the ship, looking anxiously over at the commander of the ship- some guy called Emerson, if Spike remembered correctly. "I'm picking up an energy reading coming from the surface of the planet."
"What is it?" Emerson asked, looking pointedly past Spike at the lieutenant; the crew had mostly tolerated Spike's presence after SG-1 had vouched for him, but otherwise they'd pretty much ignored him, undecided as to whether to treat him as a member of SG-1 or simply as a 'tag-along'.
"It's a wave of radiation, sir," the lieutenant said, his voice becoming increasingly anxious as he spoke. "It's emanating from the 'gate, spreading fast."
"That doesn't sound good…" Spike muttered, not really surprised when nobody answered him; it wasn't like he'd been expecting a response anyway.
"Get them out of there," Emerson said, looking resolutely over at Marks.
Nodding, Marks turned back to the control panel, and a moment later, SG-1 appeared in the middle of the room, dressed in the dull brown robes that they'd put on before going down to the planet's surface.
"What happened?" Mitchell yelled, looking in frustration over at the bridge crew.
"That's what we're trying to figure out," Emerson replied briefly
"Sir?" Marks said, glancing over at his commanding officer with a slightly stunned expression. "I'm… not picking up any life signs on the planet."
"What?" Sam said, turning to look at Marks in shock. "But… that's impossible."
"Is it a sensor malfunction?" Emerson asked, clearly not wanting to believe the implications any more than anybody else did.
As Sam walked over to check out another panel, Marks glanced back over the control panels in front of him before looking up regretfully at his commanding officer.
"All systems are operating normally," he said, an almost apologetic tone in his voice as he spoke.
"This can't be happening…" Daniel protested, as he looked desperately over at Sam. "There are thousands of people on that planet…"
Shaking her head as she studied the screens before her, Sam sighed as she looked forlornly up at Daniel.
"He's right," she said simply. "We're not picking up anything."
Spike could only blink in shock as he turned to look at the planet before him.
In less time than it would have taken the Hellmouth to destroy the Earth if it had ever actually been opened…
An entire planet had just been wiped out.
Any doubts Spike might have had about whether he was in the right place had just vanished; if these guys were facing something ruthless enough to do something like that- never mind the fact that they had the resources to do it in the first place-, he definitely wasn't leaving them alone now that he knew what he was up against.
As he'd told Buffy when Angelus was preparing to let Alcathla out, even back when he was soulless, he rather liked the world the way it was; just because these Ori suckers hadn't got to his section of space yet didn't mean they wouldn't eventually.
Turning around, Spike noted Vala turning around and heading for the corridor out of the control room, apparently unwilling to stick around now that they'd heard the news.
Spike, however, doubted that it was as simple as that.
From what he'd seen of Vala so far, she wasn't the type to geta bit freaked out by the idea of several people dying at once. Hell, he'd read her files, and she already had to deal with the guilt of causing several deaths when that 'Qetesh' thing had been hanging around inside her, even if she hadn't been the one in control at the time.
"Something big happen to her down there?" he asked Daniel, jerking his thumb in Vala's direction; the archaeologist looked like he was about to start hurrying after the former thief, but stopped himself when he realised that Spike was talking to him.
"Oh… yeah, kind of," he replied, shrugging off his brown robe along with the rest of the team before he continued talking to the intangible vampire. "Remind me, did we tell you about Adria?"
"Name doesn't ring a bell," Spike responded, shaking his head. "Someone important, is she?"
"She's the leader of the Ori army in the Milky Way galaxy; I'd say that makes her pretty important, yeah," Mitchell responded, nodding over at Spike as Sam sat down behind one of the consoles around the control deck and began to study the information on the screen in front of her. "Basically, she's the Ori equivalent of Jesus, I guess is the best analogy; the Ori impregnated her mom to lead their army to bring the word of Origin to the Milky Way, she grew to adulthood practically the week after she was born… you get the idea."
"OK, and the reason Vala's so freaked out by her being there is…?" Spike tried to prod.
"Vala Mal Doran was the woman the Ori impregnated," Teal'c replied bluntly.
Spike blinked.
"Ah," he said, turning around to look in the direction that the former thief had just gone before he turned to look at Daniel. "Uh… could you let me have a shot at this?"
"What?" Daniel said, looking in confusion at Spike. "Why do you want me to-?"
Spike, however, had no interest in answering the archaeologist's questions right now; his gaze fixed on the direction that Vala had just gone, he strode forward, walking through the walls of the Odyssey to catch up to her, continuing onwards in a straight line as he went over the likely routes she could have taken in his head based on his experiences here in the last couple of days.
A few moments later- after shocking a couple of crewmembers as he passed through their rooms, vanishing almost before they could even fully register that he was there-, Spike finally caught up with Vala, walking out of a wall to end up almost directly in front of her as she rounded a corner.
"What the- what are you doing here?" she yelled as she took in the sight of him standing in front of her.
"Just thought I'd see how you were doing," Spike said, shrugging casually as he put his hands in his pockets and looked at her. "I heard about the whole Adria thing from the rest; way I see it, it's got to be a bit tough, knowing that your kid got wiped out like that no matter what she was-"
"The only thing I feel about that whole thing is relief," Vala stated as she stared back at Spike. "Do you think I wanted to be responsible for the enslavement of an entire galaxy because I wasn't strong enough to do what had to be done? I knew what she was even before she was born, and I just let it happen-"
"Hey, at least you didn't actually do anything she did yourself, you know!" Spike retorted, walking up to stand directly in front of the former thief. "The last Big Bad I fought brainwashed me into becoming its little obedient assassin whenever I heard a specific bloody song and I nearly ended up killing the woman I loved before the rest of my side took the trigger out! You have nothing to be responsible for; she was your sodding kid, for crying out loud-"
"Maternal instinct can only excuse so much, Spike; she was created for the sole reason of leading the Ori's armies against this galaxy, and I still did nothing about the pregnancy!" Vala retorted, before she sighed, shook her head, and leant against the wall behind her. "I mean… OK, I did tell myself that my relationship with her might prove to be an advantage, that at some point…at some critical moment, I might be able to reach her in a way that no one else could… but, in the end, I'm just relieved that I'll never have to find out."
"Ah," Spike stated simply. "So… basically, you're just grateful that she's snuffed it, huh?"
"Essentially, yes," Vala replied, nodding at him before she leaned in as though to give him a hug before she stopped herself, most likely remembering his intangible status. "But… thanks for trying to talk to me about it; I really appreciate it."
Spike shrugged.
"Any time," he said, trying to sound dismissiv about the whole situation- something about Vala made him feel slightly uncomfortable- before he jerked his thumb back in the direction he'd come. "Anyway, I'm just going to keep an eye on things in the front until they have anything more on what caused this whole thing; you care to come with?"
Vala shook her head.
"Thanks… but I think I'd prefer to be alone right now," she said, before she turned around to walk away once more, only pausing briefly to glance back at the spectral vampire. "Seriously, though, I appreciate your concern; any time you need someone to talk to, consider me available."
"Sure thing," Spike replied, nodding back at her as she turned around and walked away down the corridor, presumably towards her room, as Spike turned in the opposite direction and walked back towards the control room; if he was going ot help out here, he'd like to be in the thick of the action as they figured out what was going on here.
After a return trip through the walls and rooms- once again ignoring his surroundings as he continued in a straight line, taking advantage of his current ability to ignore little things like desks or control panels in his path-, Spike once again found himself on the bridge, SG-1 still standing or sitting at various locations around the bridge as they studied the information coming back from the planet.
"No chemical or biological agents in the atmosphere," a voice said over the radio, the speaker (Spike presumed) talking to them from the planet's surface. "The place is clean."
Spike had no real experience with this kind of situation, but he was prepared to bet that was odd; even when dealing with magic,
"The weird thing is," the voice on the other end of the radio continued, "whatever it was, it only seems to have targeted living tissue because everything else…was left behind."
As Sam and Daniel exchanged suddenly anxious glances, Spike suddenly got the distinct impression that the situation had just become far worse than he'd thought- and he hadn't exactly thought it would be easy to start with.
"You said the wave emanated from the Stargate?" Sam asked the lieutenant who'd taken the readings, her expression making it clear that she hoped she'd be told she was wrong.
"That's right," the man said, nodding in confirmation. "From there it spread over the entire surface of the planet before dissipating."
"Oh my God…" Daniel whispered, glancing over at Teal'c, realization having suddenly struck the Jaffa's face.
"What?" Emerson asked, looking in confusion between the various members of SG-1. Spike was only partly grateful that he wasn't the only person who was a bit lost at the moment; at least he knew that he wasn't the only one here who didn't quite get what was going on.
"We know of only one device that would operate in such a manner," Teal'c explained, looking at the vampire as though he would rather have slit his own wrists than face what they'd just discovered. "And it is currently in the possession of my fellow Jaffa, on our world of Dakara."
"Wait a minute; you mean our side used that thing?" Spike said, staring incredulously at the planet before them before he looked back at SG-1. "But you sods were on the damn thing when they set it off!"
"That's part of the problem right now, Spike," Sam sighed, as she stared at the screen before her. "The Dakara weapon is indiscriminate; everything organic in range of its blast when it's activated is instantly divided at the molecular level, leaving only buildings- and, as we've seen, clothing- intact. When we first used it we were able to reprogram it to only affect the Replicators- an artificial species we were having trouble defeating; it's a long story that's not really relevant to our current situation-, but we'd thought it had been destroyed by the Jaffa High Council after the Replicators were defeated."
"Before you ask why we can't just program it to target those soldiers who follow the Ori," Daniel put in, as Spike opened his mouth as though to ask a question. "It only affected the Replicators because we were able to program the energy wave generated by the weapon to mimic the frequency of the weapon; we can't use it to just eliminate our enemies while leaving our friends standing."
"Ah," Spike said, groaning slightly as he stared at the planet before him once again, rolling his eyes in frustration. "So, basically, these 'Jaffa' guys are just using it without checking to see if it's safe for anyone else who's meant to be on their side?"
"Essentially, yes," Sam said, nodding in confirmation before she sighed and turned to look at Colonel Emerson. "We'd better get in touch with Stargate Command; General Landry's going to want to know about this as soon as possible."
A few minutes later, the message to Earth having been transmitted, Sam, Daniel, Spike and Mitchell joined Teal'c as he stared out of the window, the Jaffa clearly deep in thought about their recent discovery. For a moment, the various members of SG-1 stood in silence- Vala had retreated to her quarters to reflect on recent events-, until Teal'c finally broke the silence that had settled upon them.
"I am ashamed that my brothers have utilized these methods," he said, his expression grim as he stared at the stars before him.
"What; because they're doing something a bit ruthless to try and win against these Ori suckers?" Spike asked, looking curiously over at Teal'c. "Not saying I agree with what they're doing, but I can kind of get the why of it-"
"There is no honour in such an action," Teal'c said grimly as he looked back at Spike. "Freedom without honour is meaningless, Spike; their motives are irrelevant."
"Look," Mitchell put in, glancing over at Teal'c as he spoke, "as Sam told Spike during our meeting with Marty, we can't change the past; all we can do is take advantage of the opportunities we've got available."
"Such as?" Spike asked, glanbcing over at his new 'commander'- if he was going to join the team on a permanent basis, he supposed he'd have to get used to the idea of taking orders from the guy- inquiringly. "Let me say first off, if it doesn't allow me to go down to the planet, I'm not interested."
"Well then," Sam smiled slightly over at him, "you'll be interested; we have an unmanned, unguarded Ori ship sitting on the ground, and you're eminently qualified to check behind any clsoed doors we might discover and let us know if there's anything interesting behind them.
"However," Teal'c put in, as he looked over at Spike, "we must act quickly; there is no telling when one side or the other may dispatch soldiers to take the ship for themselves."
Spike grinned.
"Great," he said, clasping his hands together in front of him as he looked between his new friends. "Well then; let's get moving."
If nothing else, the sooner he could get back and have a chance to talk a bit more with Vala about why she'd been chosen to be the mother of this 'Adria' chick the happier he'd be, and he had no idea why he was thinking of her more than the others all of a sudden.
Once the initial 'thrill' of using the teleporter was over- Spike just found it sore, but he freely admitted that it might have something to do with the fact that only the amulet was teleported; he just got dragged along for the ride- Spike had to admit that he found his new surroundings somewhat disappoint. The SGC team may say that these Ori buggers had access to technology beyond anything they possessed, but so far Spike was only seeing more of the same thing he'd seen on the Odyssey; a bunch of corridors a few panels here and there.
True, this place looked a bit less clunky than the Odyssey's corridorshad, but that aside he wasn't really getting much in the way of 'advanced technology' from this place.
"What a dull set-up," he said, voicing his opinion of the place as he stared around him.
Mitchell shrugged nonchalantly.
"Yeah, the corridors are a bit dull; guess the Ori don't want to keep rubbing their presence in their faces in case people start thinking they're compensating for something," he said, a slight smile on his face before he looked over at Vala. "Talking of the corridors, do you know your way around this tub?"
"Sorry, no can do," Vala replied, shaking her head. "All the corridors look the same; I haven't got my bearings yet as to where we actually are in the ship."
"And there's no point sending Spike out on recon," Daniel sighed, as he tapped the pocket containing the amulet. "Even if we were sure the amulet's range would allow Spike to travel that far away from it, how would he let us know if he'd found something? He can make sure any rooms we find are safe, but that aside he's mainly here to get a better idea of what we deal with rather than to actually take point."
"Right then, I'll take the amulet and head for the forward section," Sam said, looking at Daniel as she held out her hand. "If there's a control room of some kind, it'll be there, and Spike's aid could be useful if I want to make sure anything's intact or something like that."
"Sounds good," Mitchell nodded, before he turned to look at the rest of the team. "We've got a lot of ground to cover; time to split up if we're going to get this done."
Nodding in confirmation, the six members of SG-1 went their separate ways, Mitchell and Teal'c heading in one direction, Spike and Sam in another, and Daniel and Vala taking a third path.
A few moments after they'd parted company from the main group, Spike groaned and turned to look inquiringly at Sam.
"So, just out of curiosity, is this kind of thing normal for you guys?" he asked, raising an inquiring eyebrow at her. "Y'know, going down to another planet and having to deal with some seriously weird stuff with no real clue as to what the hell you're up against or why somebody would do something like whatever they've done in the first place?"
"Uh… pretty much, yeah," Sam replied, nodding in confirmation at the vampire as they continued walking. "I mean, that kind of situation's become less common as time's gone on and we've acquired a greater knowledge of the universe, but in general it's surprising how often we encounter something that can still surprise us."
"Like what?" Spike asked, as he glanced around himself for a door of some kind, only to once again fail to discover anything interesting around him.
"Well, some of our trips through the Stargate have brought us into contact with a civilization that hit old age exactly a hundred days after their birth, a planet where the entire population were stuck in a virtual reality environment- think The Matrix without the tubes-, a world populate dentirely by life-forms that were essentially sentient water, fought a species of machines that were intent on replicating themselves across the entire universe, and even set up a base in another galaxy," Sam replied. Noting Spike's stunned expression, she chuckled slightly. "I know it sounds like something from science fiction, but trust me; it's all real, and it's all taken place within the last decade without anyone else on Earth even knowing it."
"Bloody hell…" Spike whispered softly, as he stared at the woman he was already beginning to think of as a friend. "And I thought I encountered some weird stuff from the supernatural side of the world…"
Sam shrugged. "Well, that's the way of the world, I suppose; you never really expect that things will turn out the way they do," she said casually, before she noticed an open door off to one side. "Ah, here we are."
As the two of them walked into the open room, Spike whistled softly at the sight that greeted the two of them; the room may not have much in the way of controls- just a few panels on either side of the room with a large screen at the front- but the fancy-looking chair in the middle of the room over the glowing blue lights at least provided some relief from the monotony of the place so far.
"Not bad…" he said, half to himself, before his eyes fell on the small pile of cloth and the long staff lying in front of the chair. "What the Hell?"
"Oh, that probably belonged to the Prior who controlled the ship; don't worry about it," Sam said, as she raised her radio to her mouth. "Guys, I think Spike and I have found the bridge; the main command interface seems to be a chair, similar to the weapons platform in Antarctica."
"Weapons platform in Antarctica?" Spike repeated, looking over at Sam in confusion.
"It would make sense that the technology would be similar to the Ancients…" Daniel said over the radio.
"Hold on; the Ancients?" Spike interjected, looking inquiringly over at the astrophysicist. "As in, the other lot of 'Ascended beings' you guys have told me about? The ones who actually made that 'Stargate' thing?"
"Yes, that's right; any chance you could wait to ask us a few more questions after we've sorted out the main issues here?" Sam replied, looking scathingly at Spike for a moment before she continued talking into the radio. "Vala, you said most of the people on board the ship were simple villagers, right?"
"Yes; why do you ask?" Vala's voice replied over the radio channel.
"Well…" Sam sighed, as she studied the chair in the middle of the room. "I think it's likely the Priors who are flying the ships. Unfortunately, that probably means the chair's keyed to their unique brain physiology."
"So, in other words, we couldn't just use this thing to blow the other ships to bits by making them think we're on their side and then firing?" Spike asked, groaning slightly as he looked at his surroundings; he wouldn't have minded the chance to see this baby in action, all things considered.
"Don't sweat it," Mitchell's voice suddenly cut in over the channel. "Plan B is in place; this baby'll be blown sky-high the second you give the word."
"As reassuring as that is to know, let's not jump the gun just yet," Sam said as she studied one of the panels before her. "At the very least, I'd like to try to get some information out of this database before we start blowing things up."
"I hear you, Sam," Mitchell replied, "but it won't be long before the Ori come back for this ship, and we're not going to let them-"
Mid-sentence, the voice suddenly cut off, closely followed by a sound that vaguely reminded Spike of someone receiving a light electric shock. For a moment, he and Sam just stood there in silence, waiting for something to happen, until Sam spoke into the radio once again.
"Cam?" she asked anxiously. "Cam, what's happening?"
"Not much," Mitchell replied, his tone of voice making it apparent that he was being sarcastic, "but we've got ourselves some company."
With that, the radio cut out once again, leaving Sam looking at the thing with a clearly-frustrated expression.
"This kind of thing happen often?" Spike asked casually.
"You mean us running into trouble on a supposedly routine mission?" Sam replied, looking up at the vampire. "Variations of it, yes."
Rolling her eyes, she turned the radio back on once again. "Cam, report."
"It's all right, Sam," Mitchell replied over the radio. "Just a little… misunderstanding with some of our Jaffa friends. Go back to work."
For a moment after the radio cut out, Sam just stared at the radio in her hands, a thoughtful expression on her face, before she turned around and walked over to one of the consoles before her.
"Spike, could you just take a quick look inside this thing?" she asked, indicating the console before them.
"Sure thing," Spike said, stiking his head into the machine for a few seconds before he pulled his head back out and looked over at the lieutenant-colonel. "Well, seems simple enough; just has a few crystals in it."
"Right then," Sam said, reaching over to lift the control console up and study the crystals within it. "If I remember what Daniel taught me about Ancient technology, then, if I do this…"
Waving her hands over the crystals in the console before her, she crossed her fingers briefly before uncrossing them after a moment's pause.
"Well, that's all we can do right now," she said, as she looked back over at the vampire/ghost/whatever Spike had become. "Hopefully, I've managed to disrupt the power in the ship without damaging anything significant."
"'Hopefully'?" Spike said, looking critically at Sam. "You mean you don't know it's do anything?"
"Look," Sam retorted as she glared at the vampire, "I'm working with technology that's significantly more advanced than most things we've discovered even after ten years travelling throughout the galaxy; I'm doing the best I can, OK?"
"Hey-" Spike retorted, glaring at her as he took a brief step forward, before Sam's radio suddenly activated once again.
"Sam, we've got trouble," Daniel's voice suddenly said over the radio, breaking the sudden hostility that had settled over the two. "We have Jaffa here out for our blood, and I somehow don't think they're in the mood to be very cooperative!"
"Copy that, Daniel; I'll do what I can here," Sam said, before she terminated that call and turned a dial on the radio to open another channel. "Odyssey, this is Carter, requesting immediate extraction."
After a moment's pause, Spike was only somewhat disappointed to see that they were still standing in the Ori ship; he may not like the idea of being stuck in a fight situation when he couldn't actually hit anybody himself, but at least he couldn't actually be hurt if things got ugly.
"Odyssey, what's happening?" Sam asked, speaking impatiently into her radio once again.
"We're getting too much signal degradation for successful beam-out," Emerson's voice replied on the other end of the line, which provided Spike with no explanation whatsoever. "As far as I can tell, the malfunctions aren't coming from this end."
"What does that mean?" Spike groaned, looking in frustration at Sam.
"Oh no…" Sam whispered to herself, looking over at the console she'd been studying earlier before she grabbed at her radio and, after shifting frequencies, once again spoke into it. "Guys, we've got a problem; the Odyssey can't beam us out."
"Why not?" Daniel asked.
"Well…" Sam said, looking apologetically up at Spike as she spoke, "I'm not a hundred percent sure, but I think I may have activated the shields."
"Why would you do that?" Vala asked.
"It wasn't intentional," Sam retorted, prompting Spike to raise an eyebrow; she sounded just a little bit sharper to Vala than she absolutely needed to be.
"Oh," Vala said simply at that.
"Can you reverse it?" Daniel asked.
Turning to look back at the console, Sam nodded grimly as she crouched down and opened one of the compartments before her, staring grimly at the wiring underneath the console.
"I'll do what I can," she said grimly.
With that, she turned the radio off and looked back at Spike.
"Keep an eye on the door," she said, authority clear in her voice. "If anyone starts coming this way, let me know and buy me time to finish off here."
"'Buy you time'?" Spike repeated, staring at her as though she'd grown a second head. "I can't even lift a TV remote; how the sodding hell am I meant to buy you time?"
Sam shrugged in frustration as she turned away from the console to glare at Spike.
"Sing, do a dance, tell a story; just do something to keep their attention on you rather than me until I'm ready!" she yelled, before shaking her head and turning her attention back to the console before her.
After a few moments of waiting, during which Spike was rapidly approaching the point of resorting to playing Paper-Scissors-Stone with himself- your entertainment options were limited when you were stuck as a sodding ghost and didn't even have something interesting on the wall to look at- when Sam's radio suddenly activated once again.
"SG-1, this is Odyssey," Colonel Emerson's voice said over the radio. "Three ha'tak vessels are moving into positions around the planet."
"Three what?" Spike asked Sam.
"If you want a mental image, they're pyramid-shaped spaceships that were commonly used by the Goa'uld, although these days only the Jaffa keep using them," Sam replied, before she raised the radio to her mouth. "Don't chance remaining there, Odyssey; we can't risk losing another ship."
"All right," Emerson replied, before Spike could ask what she meant by that 'another ship' comment. "Be advised that we're leaving range to avoid detection."
As the radio terminated, Spike stared uncertainly at the radio for a moment before looking back at Sam as she continued to study the console.
"What did you mean, 'risk losing another ship'?" he asked, folding his arms as he glared at her. "Did somebody forget to mention something to me?"
"Look, we lost our original flagship and a ship we'd given to the Russians- our relationship with them over the program's existence is a long and complicated issue that this is not the time or place to discuss- due to confrontations with Ori technology; it's nothing that serious," Sam said, sighing in frustration as she continued to work away at the console. "Our ships can hold their own against pretty much everything else this galaxy has to throw at us right now; the Odyssey could probably handle itself if it had to, but I'd rather it didn't have to unless we exhaust all other options. Now, unless you've got an actual contributionto make to this whole situation, can you just… wait over there?"
"Oh, sure, yell at the vamp who's totally out of his depth-" Spike retorted, only for Sam's radio to suddenly activate and an unknown voice speak through it.
"This is a message to all Tau'ri on board this vessel," the voice said, its speaker reminding Spike of Angelus in his 'I'm-so-much-better-than-everybody' moment. "My name is Bo'rel. My brothers and I have taken this ship in the name of all free Jaffa. We have Teal'c and Colonel Mitchell in custody. Surrender now and no harm will come to them. If you do not identify yourselves immediately, we will have no choice but to assume your intentions are hostile, in which case we will deal with the prisoners harshly."
Oh, bugger… Spike groaned, as he and Sam exchanged glances. Spike was simultaneously grateful and ashamed that the same thought was on both their minds; they couldn't allow these guys to know they'd found the main control room, or things would just get even more ugly.
"So be it," Bo'rel's voice said over the radio, followed by a faint electric-sounding crackle that Spike thought he recognised from Teal'c's demonstration on the way over here as a staff weapon. Tensing himself, Spike waited for the sound of an energy weapon hitting flesh…
"Bo'rel," another voice said over the radio, "this is Daniel Jackson of Stargate Command. Listen, there's no reason we should be fighting each other; we should be working together."
"I'm afraid that would not be possible," Bo'rel replied grimly.
"Look," Daniel protested, "we're dealing with some very advanced technology, and we have some experience that might be useful-"
"You doubt our ability to fly this ship?" Bo'rel replied, his voice clearly demonstrating his contempt for Daniel's implication.
"I'm just saying," Daniel insisted, trying to dissolve the suddenly-tense situation he'd unintentionally created, "there's not a lot of time, and it would be in everyone's best interests if we pool our resources."
"My orders are to take this ship and all on board," Bo'rel replied casually. "You will reveal your location to me now."
Then the sound of staff weapons powering up was heard over the radio, and Spike barely stopped himself from groaning.
That did not sound good…
"That… won't be necessary," Daniel replied, sighing over the radio.
"Bo'rel," another voice said over the radio, probably one of the Jaffa who'd cornered Daniel and Vala, "we have them."
"Well done," Bo'rel replied. "Hold them until our patrols find the control room."
With that, he terminated the radio link, leaving Sam and Spike exchanging.
"Oh, crap," Spike groaned. "I'll take it the situation's bad?"
"About as bad as it could get," Sam replied, nodding in confirmation as she turned her attention back to the console before her. "If I don't figure out something I can do before they get here…"
She didn't finish the sentence, but she hardly needed to; Spike could make a pretty shrewd guess what would happen, and none of it was pleasant.
He may be pretty much untouchable now, but that was hardly the same as being totally unkillable; if nothing else, what if the amulet was somehow broken? Would he still hang around if he didn't anything that was actually tying him to this plain of existence?
Somehow, he doubted it.
And, given his relative ignorance about alien technology, he really wasn't prepared to find out if they had something that they could use to break the damn thing…