Abydos Freestate
"Where have we ended up now?" Sergeant Attwood wondered.
As they looked around, they noticed the Quantum Mirror hung on the wall of a spacious hallway. The floor was tiled with white and black marble in a checkerboard pattern. On the sides of the hallway a handful of golden neoclassical statues stood, they represented either powerful people or grateful commoners and natives. The walls were lined with red carpet and decorated with expensive paintings from many art styles, from Cubism, to Expressionism, to Impressionism, to Surrealism.
"Are we in a palace or in a museum?" Captain Mutton wondered.
Then they heard footsteps.
A man rounded the corner. He was dressed like a Victorian butler.
The butler's face betrayed surprise. "How did you get in here? Did the king invite you, lady and gentlemen?"
Doctor Novak pointed at the Quantum Mirror.
"You came through that thing?" The butler said with a French accent. "Wait, the other side looks different than normal."
"It is currently connected to the Area 51 of our reality." Novak explained.
"Wait, you mean it is possible to change to which parallel universe that thing connects?"
Michelle looked relieved. "It looks like I won't need to explain that aspect of the Quantum Mirror again."
A short explanation later.
"Ah, I'll bring you to the king. He might find your idea of interdimensional cooperation great; we have been cut off from Earth for half a century."
"We're not on Earth? Then what is this place?" Sergeant Attwood asked.
"Abydos. This is the royal palace in our capital." The butler replied as they began walking.
"Mmh, you must have a lot of money left over." Captain Mutton guesses as his eyes fell on another series of artworks, this time not from Earth but from all over the Galaxy.
"Naquadah is worth quite a lot, sir." The butler replied. "We had some money left over after our military expenses. And how much we spend on our military. Thanks to our orbital defences this planet is as impregnable as fort Eben-Emael."
"But fort Eben-Emael was taken." Michelle said. "Or at least in our timeline."
"Really? How did that happen?"
"It was attacked from above at night. 85 Germans managed to get on top with gliders and took the fort by complete surprise."
The butler was flabbergasted by this.
"So, can you tell us a bit more about what happened here? Who found the Stargate?" Doctor Novak asked.
"The British explorer, Henry M. Stanley had dug it up in 1890 in Giza. His expedition had been funded by our king's private money."
"Mh, I have the feeling I have once heard that name before." Michelle said.
"However, by the time we discovered what it was, it had already been placed in the Royal Museum of Art and History in Brussels."
As they turned another corner a double door flanked by two guards, armed with rifles and sabres, came into view. Captain Mutton distrusted them; they wore cool, colourful uniforms with golden epaulettes. Everybody knew only corrupt dictatorship and totalitarian regimes had awesome uniforms.
"Who are those guys?" One of the guards asked. Probably the highest ranking one as his chest contained the most medals.
"Visitors, we just made contact with them." The butler replied.
The guards were convinced to let QM-1 through after a quick body search.
As they stepped through the door, they looked at their surroundings.
The ceiling was decorated with marble flowers and had a great chandelier of gold and crystal hanging under it. The floor was made of tropical hardwood, with the purple colour of an extra-terrestrial tree. On it stood luxurious sofas around a table decorated with ivory animals. A golden telephone which looked like it came straight out of the Belle Epoque stood on the middle of the table.
Seated on the sofas were a high-ranking officer in an overtly pompous uniform with a sash, and a long-bearded man wearing an expensive suit.
"Marshal Van Leeuwe, your majesty, it turns out the Quantum Mirror can connect to other universes than that one overrun by Sokar." The butler explained as he pointed at GM-1.
"Ah, so we might no longer be alone here against the Goa'uld." The marshal noted. "From what kind of parallel universe are you?"
"In our reality it had been the United States of America who unveiled the secrets of the Stargate." Captain Mutton answered. "We thought an exchange of technology and intelligence with alternate realities would benefit us in our war with the Goa'uld."
"Mmh, seems a fine proposition to me." His majesty replied. "So long as we can be sure this is not some kind of Goa'uld trick I'm all for it. We can't depend too much on Earth."
"What happened with Earth? If I may ask, your majesty." Michelle asked.
"Libel and those damned socialists!" The king screamed. "The British slandered my model treatment of this colony, all out of jealousy! I was the only one with a space colony back then."
He walked towards the curtains. "Wait, I'll show you my great work. How far I have brought civilization here."
He opened the curtains so everybody could look through the window. Outside stood three large wooden shacks next to a dirt road. As it was night outside the buildings and the street were lit by electric lamps, most of which were broken or flickering.
The leftmost one had a sign saying 'l'Hôpital' sitting on its roof. In front of it stood a queue of wounded soldiers.
'Le Libraire' stood in the middle. Some local Abydonians were pushing a cart filled with autobiographies of the king inside.
The last building 'L'école' was simply way too small, even for the population of Abydos.
"Strange." Captain Mutton said. "You'd think that giant luxurious palaces would indicate that there would be loads of money left for infrastructure."
"Anyways." The king continued. "I was forced to abdicate my throne back in Belgium. The result of socialist slander, they had made the absurd claim of me becoming mad through sarcophagus overuse. Luckily, I had not lost everything, with my most loyal followers I took over my colony here and turned it into my new kingdom."
"But, sir, err, your majesty." Sergeant Attwood said. "You sure your sarcophagus use did not have any side-effects? I know somebody who became paranoid and megalomaniacal after using it multiple times."
"Mmh." The king replied. "I do have to admit that thing had made me finally realise how awesome and brilliant I am."
"It can't be that bad." The marshal added. "I also use it every year and never noticed anything."
Then the king glanced at QM-1. "But why did you tried to discourage me from using my sarcophagus? Do you wish to withhold the advantage it gives from us?"
Michelle quickly tried to divert the subject before they would be accused of being Goa'uld spies. "Your majesty, I think I remember your face. Do you happen to be Leopold II of Belgium, your majesty?" She also tried to be as polite as possible, however she knew nothing about court etiquette.
"I was. Now I am Leopold I of Abydos, however I'm sure I will be remembered as Leopold the Great."
Then the golden telephone went off.
The marshal placed the receiver next to his ear.
An expression of shock appeared on his face.
"What! A rebellion in the mines! Bring in the Force Publique! Oh, and do not forgot to bring back the hands of killed rebels to justify expended munitions. We don't want any soldiers to grift bullets."
"Oh, no." Captain Mutton muttered. I'll place this in my report once we get back. There are more than enough alternate universes, we'll simply find another one.
This surprised Leopold II. "Strange, normally they don't rebel in the middle of the night."
A storehouse near the pyramid of Abydos
The warehouse was devoid of personnel, they had just put down the last wooden crates which had come through the Stargate, mostly food bought from Vyus. All the lights had been put out.
The lid of one of the boxes was lifted up from the inside. Somebody raised his head out of the opening, his face was covered by a helmet shaped like the head of a kite.
"All clear." He yelled. "We can come out."
From dozens of crates a side fell off or the top opened. A whole platoon crawled out.
This place and Vyus are even more corrupt than the domain of Apophis. Only a pair of people had to be turned by bribery and blackmail to make this possible. Those corrupt pen pushers had foolishly assumed they had to do with smugglers, but still.
Despite it being pitch-dark, the Kite Guards had no problem finding their way. The IR-vision build into their helmets proved itself very useful.
The few guards at the exit were silently dealt with using zat'niktels.
As soon as the platoon reached the exit, the officer looked at the pyramid the Stargate was located in. As it was still a mile away, he zoomed in on it. The HUD inside his helmet could be operated using nothing but blinks and eye movements.
As expected, half the tanks and soldiers were moving away to suppress the uprising in the mines.
"Our contacts have kept their word." The second-in-command said. Nephthys had already infiltrated the planet by using doctors as spies. Who would expect somebody who has saved the lives of their children of being a spy?
"Pff, a rebellion. Such a thing would be unthinkable in our Lady and Lord's domain." A soldier commented. Nephthys was simply too just and benign ruler for such a thing to happen. For example, she had banned the barbaric customs of slavery, torture, and corporal punishment of schoolchildren in her domain. Strange enough there were some contrarians who claimed 'the Great Mother' did not ban slavery in her domains out of the goodness of her hearth, she would simply not trust slaves with the expensive explosives and tunnel-making crystals [1] she gave her mineworkers.
However, the soldier knew such cynicism was simply nonsense. Just look at the history of his own world: After Nefertum had abandoned it when the mines had run out of Naquadah, his ancestors had fallen into the greatest barbarism and internecine warfare. Nephthys had grown pity for their sorry state and had purchased the planet from Nefertum for a pittance. First, she had gained the inhabitants trust by sending them her doctors and medicine. Then she had gotten the nobles to peacefully submit to her by bribing them with exotic luxuries, and she had bought all their slaves so she could free them, using the many wonderous machines doing all kinds of work produced in her industrial worlds as payment. Finally, she had sent her agriculturalists, engineers, and teachers to introduce new crops and build amazing infrastructure and schools. His planet was one of the many she had this way civilized from a world of war, disease, hunger, and poverty into one of peace and plenty. Thus, also explaining how Nephthys and her husband were so very rich for Underlords, as a large and prosperous population can pay much more taxes than a small and starving one.
"We will sneak towards the pyramid." The commanding officer said to his second in command.
He nodded and turned towards his own men. "Start looking for positions for fire support."
When the first team had reached the pyramid, they were supposed to pick off as many enemies from afar as possible, before their comrades came out of concealment.
The soldier quickly found himself a comfortable position behind a sand dune.
He aimed his staff weapon in the direction of the enemy. An ultraviolet laser attached at the tip marked what the weapon pointed at. Based on various sensor inputs his helmet's inbuild computing crystal would compensate any plasma blast's trajectory for and wind and would display the expected point of impact on his HUD.
Was it not awesome to work for a Lord and Lady wealthy enough to afford the best, most sophisticated equipment for their troops?
[1] According to some rumours the crystals Nephthys' children had invented to ease the work of her miners were based on reverse engineered Tok'ra Crystals. This is firmly denied by her Ministry of Information. Not that that is necessary, which person in his right mind would believe insane conspiracy theorists, who believe that the Goa'uld do not exist and Nephthys is secretly an actress working for some mysterious them who secretly run the worlds, anyway?
Half an hour later in the Royal Palace.
QM-1 had been handcuffed and was now escorted out of the room by his majesty's guards.
"You think I am not aware you're planning something?" King Leopold II shouted at them.
"Indeed." The butler said. "It can't be coincidence that they happen to show up at the same time a rebellion breaks out."
"Find some place to lock them up. We'll interrogate them later."
The marshal was busy yelling into the golden telephone. "What inaccurate plasma blasts coming from nooks too small for humans to hide in? Or from mountaintops nobody can be seen on?"
Van Leeuwe turned to his king. "Your majesty, the rebels have tacluchnatagamuntorons."
"Aha. Now we can be sure it is all a foreign plot!" The king sounded self-righteous, having just seen his belief that his subjects would never rebel against him on their own once again confirmed.
"We need to immediately reinforce the Stargate!" The marshal yelled. "If they can smuggle weapons in, they might also have succeeded to infiltrate with soldiers."
"Bah! They'll never defeat the gate garrison. Those are the best soldiers on this world."
A second golden phone on the closet went off, this one was for when the first golden telephone was in use.
As the two finely decorated bigwigs started to argue the butler picked up the phone.
What he heard frightened him hard enough he let the receiver fall in shock.
"My majesty, the Stargate has fallen! Needle Threaders are flying out of the pyramid!"
"Warn the Air Force!" The marshal shouted. "We must blow it up with a naquadah bomb. It is the only way."
Their orbital defences had been designed to be incapable of targeting the planet encase of hacking or treason and would thus be incapable of providing supportive fire.
"But then we lose our main mode of interstellar travel." The king objected. "Most of our clients are too far away to deliver by ship."
"If a Goa'uld gets a foothold here it won't matter anyway. We'll simply be overrun."
"Maybe, they are real visitors from a parallel universe instead of a Goa'uld trick." One of the guards mentioned. "Why take the effort if you're coming through the Stargate anyway?"
Back at the pyramid
The commanding officer was looking at the charred remains of a tank destroyed by a single plasma blast. His Kite Guards had suffered no loses in return. In recognition of the danger posed by 'Earthling' armour piercing rounds they had received trinium-titanium armour thrice as thick as normal. An unconventional choice, not even armour of that thickness could protect against a direct hit from a fully powered Ma'tok staff and usually armour of normal thickness sufficed against shrapnel and primitive weaponry, but trinium-tungsten bullets had proven to be an exception.
He had referred to the Tau'ri as Earthlings in his mind because they differed so much from the Tau'ri from the myths his mind simply refused to accept they were the same.
Then he noticed a new droning sound coming out of the pyramid entrance.
"The war chariots have arrived." He said as past him flew a shielded hovercraft just small enough to fit through a Stargate.
"And just in time too." He continued as some black specks appeared near the horizon. He zoomed in on them with his HUD and clearly recognized jetfighters armed with missiles.
The war chariot fired the staff gatling on its back. It shot an impressive amount of plasma bursts with timed detonations at the enemy.
Despite that these primitive aircraft apparently were equipped with bought or stolen energy shields, they buckled under the sheer amount of fire.
Back in the palace
QM-1 had still not been locked up as the guards had started to quarrel between each other over the likelihood of them working for Nephthys.
Van Leeuwe put down the golden receiver his face betrayed a grave loss. "We have lost contact with our fighters, your majesty. I'm afraid we need to flee through the Quantum Mirror."
"No!" Leopold II replied. "I shall not flee again! Arm every man, we will show those savages we are not a bunch of cowards!"
"But they can bring millions of troops through the Stargate we stand no chance!"
A maniacal smile appeared on the king's face. "Then we will take as many of those barbarians down with us as possible in our last stand."
"Mais, mais." The butler stuttered in French as his face became white.
"Order all deserters and defeatists shot to death! Everybody must fight to the end! No exemptions!"
Then lightning appeared. The king screamed out of pain as he fell on the ground.
Van Leeuwe put his zat'niktel back in his holster.
The marshal turned to Captain Mutton. "Take me with you. I could easily defect to Nephthys and Horus, but as a good, pious Catholic I refuse to serve false gods."
"Hmm, ok. However, I can't decide whether you can stay. That is up to my superiors to decide." Godfrey replied. He felt no sympathy for him; however, Operation Paperclip had already shown that some people in the American government did not care for the past of people with useful skills.
"Can I also come with you?" The butler asked. "I'm bad at hiding my opinions. I don't want to risk those serpent's secret police stealing my children to be raised as spies in an orphanage or something, because I couldn't keep my mouth shut."
The captain gulped. "I'll certainly recommend you be granted asylum."
And he was not the last to ask.
An hour later
"Don't drop that thing!" Van Leeuwe yelled to the guards who were carrying Ra's sarcophagus away from the Quantum Mirror.
The next to come through was the marshal's wife, she and her handmaid were carrying a lot of baggage.
"You have made it back! I already began fearing those serpents' minions captured you." The marshal's voice as filled with relief. She had been given the opportunity to pass through as one of the first, however she had wanted to gather all her jewellery in their mansion first.
General Hammond was looking at all the material they had brought with them earlier. "Mmh, it looks like our naquadah shortages are over."
The next to come through were a bunch of schoolchildren followed by their teacher.
"We have now evacuated all the civilians, je crois." The butler said.
"Excellent, order our soldiers to fallback through the Quantum Mirror." Marshal Van Leeuwe ordered. "Let our native auxiliaries cover their retreat with one final offensive."
"Speaking of native Abydonians," Sergeant Attwood began. "I can see but a handful of them among the evacuees."
"Most of them refused to leave their homes behind." The teacher replied. "They did not believe their lot would worsen under Nephthys."
"And I'm afraid we don't have the time to settle them on another planet where they could live in freedom." Doctor Novak said, as he saw Major Carter enter the room with a nuke on a cart. They would use it to blow up the other side of the mirror in order to prevent the Kite's minions from coming through.