Disclaimer: As usual, the characters and settings do not belong to us and we will try to do justice to their creators.
This is my translation of a fanfic written in French with my friend Marion and this is our first stargate fanfic, so please be indulgent…
We are eager for your comments, you can contact us at marion.c@frisoo.freesurf.fr and the_amyrlin_seat@mailcity.com.
A/N: I am really sorry for the long delay between part 2 and 3 (I hate authors who don't take time to update too) but I really had my hands full during the last few months and couldn't find time to make the translation. The story has been finished for a while in French so don't worry, the next part should be posted before next year! A few reviews might help me speed up… J
Thanks to Brigitte for the wonderful beta job!
The action takes place sometime during season 5 (so Daniel is not « dead » yet).
Chapter 9A passage opened in the wall. Kaleb switched off the Goa'uld lamp and all could see a bright light illuminating the whole corridor on the other side. Daniel was making a start when Jack put a hand on his shoulder to stop him.
"Wait a minute. How do we know that whatever we are going to find on the other side isn't dangerous?"
"Hem… We don't." Daniel answered frowning. "But it seems we don't have much of a choice."
"I don't know. I have a bad feeling about this. This is too easy."
The other members of SG1, Hulkin and the four Tok'ra gathered to join the conversation.
"Easy?"
"You know what I mean, Jacob. Daniel and Sam agree on the fact that this pyramid is some kind of Goa'uld trap and yet we open secret passages and we are about to see sunlight without much trouble."
"Am I supposed to resent the fact that you don't consider my observation and deduction skills?"
"No."
"Ah, OK."
"Sir, I understand your point of view, but, as Daniel, I don't think we have much of a choice."
Jack pondered the problem for a few seconds; he did not want to get stuck in that temple for longer than necessary.
"All right, but stay alert."
They moved into the narrow passage, Jack and Teal'c coming first with their weapons ready for use and the Tok'ra closing the march.
After a few minutes, the light became blinding and Jack looked for his sunglasses in his jacket pockets while Teal'c was protecting his eyes with the back of his hand.
After so many hours spent in an almost absolute darkness, it was difficult to readjust to such an intense brightness and for a few minutes, no one could distinguish anything but a powerful white strike.
Less than a few seconds after the last member of the Tok'ra had stepped out of the passage, it closed automatically with a deafening sound. Jack and Sam turned to the wall and noted with astonishment that it was gone. They called for the others and traced their steps back, but it didn't change a thing, the passage had simply disappeared.
They put their equipment down and started to inspect the place they had entered, while their eyes were getting used to the light.
A vast green prairie stretched all around them, the grass was still wet with the morning dew and a nice breeze stroked their faces. Many plants with sparkling colors and unknown on Earth could be seen. A little farther they could see the edge of a wood. Behind them the green fields stretching as far as they could see did not allow them to find their bearings. No sign of a construction could be distinguished, in any direction, even by Teal'c's fine eyes.
"O'Neill, this place looks strangely like the one where we found the pyramid."
"Daniel, Jacob, Sam… any explanation? " Jack asked, exasperation showing in his voice.
Sam was the one who answered, trying to calm down her commanding officer.
"Sir, we may be out of the pyramid. For all we know, it could be another part of the planet."
"You see, what bothers me in all this is your "maybe"!"
"I'm sorry but that's all I have to offer for the time being."
Jack put his frustration aside and assumed his role as an officer. He turned back and made sure everybody was there; the Tok'ra were admiring the vegetation and enjoying the sun they had not seen for almost four days, Sam and Daniel were discussing the different possibilities as to know where they were, Teal'c was watching the surroundings for any sign of threat and Hulkin was sitting on the grass, he was crying. Jack joined him to make sure everything was all right.
"You know, I didn't think I would see the sun again one day," Hulkin said between tears, "thank you."
"You're welcome. You have also helped us. Come on." He gave him a hand to stand up and they walked to the others. Once they had all gathered, they sat down and started to discuss what they were going to do.
"O'Neill, this position is not safe, difficult to defend if attacked, we should not stay here long."
"I agree Jack. We have two options. Either we go towards the wood, or we go for the plain and whatever lays beyond," Jacob said in a firm voice.
"Daniel, a suggestion?" Jack asked his friend who was staring at the sun with a strange intensity.
"Hum? No, in fact I'm not so sure we have left the pyramid," Daniel answered slowly, out of his reverie.
Chapter 10They all looked at each other when this possibility was brought up. After a few seconds of utter shock, Carter looked at her instruments. After she had pushed a few keys, Colonel O'Neill interrupted her.
"Major, what does your favorite equipment tell you?"
"That there are good chances we are still inside the pyramid."
"And this is a chance?"
She didn't take the time to answer and went on with her explanations.
"Up to now the GPS wasn't giving me information. The last coordinates I got are for the entrance and the way to the stargate. Here I receive something again but it has nothing to do with the outside of the pyramid, at least not the one we are familiar with."
"Excuse me Sam, but it doesn't necessarily mean we are still inside?"
"Absolutely, we could have found another exit but, and Daniel will surely agree with me, if anything like that existed, it would be opposite to the first, or on one of the other sides. And the actual coordinates don't match that either, according to my estimations."
"Fine. You are going to find another way to get us out of here, but in the meantime we are going to get cover at the edge of that wood. Let's go!"
The whole group gathered their equipment. Then, with Jack leading, they took the direction of the forest. After five meters, Jack's head violently encountered an invisible surface. Startled, he held his hand to his forehead, and extended it in front of him, searching for what he could have bumped into. Daniel joined him and made the same gesture.
"Care for an explanation?"
Daniel put his backpack down and with his two hands, explored what was in front of him. After a few minutes, he finally answered the interrogations the others were having.
"I think we are just in another segment of the pyramid and Jack, you collided with one of the corridor walls."
"How can this wall be transparent? And how can we see what's outside just like if we were there?"
Sam had gotten closer to the wall as everybody else and touched what they could not see.
"The system is probably always the same. We have to find another part of the text that would allow us to direct ourselves."
"Besides, I think we need to concentrate again on the columns. They present a logic that may help us understand the pyramid better and the way it works," Daniel added.
While saying this, he was searching around for the columns he found easily. Then he traced his steps back and tried to find the opposite wall and columns. Once he had found them, he turned to see what his companions were doing.
"What do you think, Jacob?" Jack asked.
"I think this is our best chance, even if the work may be long if we can only decipher the symbols with our hands. We should find a way to concentrate our translations on the informative passages: the ones on the walls and those which are part of the logical text on the columns."
"Concerning the wall, it's easy enough to make out the phrases in relief, "Nolbe broke in after having laid his hands on the wall, "we also have to mark the passages we have translated."
"We could rub the symbols with grass… " Daniel proposed, joining gesture to word.
And the symbols really did appear on the test column. Two teams were created: Daniel, Nolbe, and Jacob took the phrases on the walls whereas Sam, Kaleb and Garik took the columns. Teal'c and Jack went back to their surveillance duty.
Each one marked a phrase and rubbed it like Daniel had and then translated the symbols thus revealed. They discovered some phrases they had already translated and some phrases that didn't give anything new. But sometimes a phrase seemed more interesting. After an hour, they assembled to share their discoveries.
"The second phrase I read would surely allow us to return to the pyramid. It mentions an obscure zone, " Nolbe explained.
"With Kaleb and Garik, we have reconstructed a phrase that explains the wise can find their way through the obstacles of the dark world. It says the way is near the gods."
"But the Ancients did not have any god, did they?"
"I don't know Jack but I remember something about a list of Goa'uld System Lords. Maybe that's it?"
Jack broke the silence that followed.
"So we get back to the pyramid and look for that list. That's the idea?"
Chapter 11"Do you have another suggestion?"
"Hum… not really." Jack answered with resignation.
Nolbe stood up and walked to a part of the wall still green with the grass he had rubbed it with.
"This is where I read a passage mentioning an obscure zone." He pointed his finger towards a part of the text above his head.
"There are several sentences that speak of this part of the pyramid but I only found one in relief." And saying this, he stood on the tip of his toes and pressed the said sentence. A deafening sound was heard, like each time they had managed to open a passage, but to everybody's great surprise, the wall did not open in front of them. They looked at each other, unbelieving, and silence fell back on the group; nobody could speak out the worst fears that had just come back, then suddenly Jack yelled:
"The passage… on the other side!"
SG1, Hulkin and the Tok'ra turned back to the other side of the corridor and saw that indeed a passage had opened in the wall opposite to the one they had found the key sentence on. They could distinguish the passage because it was not as bright as the part of the corridor in which they were standing. On the other side they could easily feel the dark and chilly atmosphere of the pyramid they had left a few hours before.
Jack shot a questioning look at Daniel, Sam and Jacob. They looked at each other for a brief moment before heading to the open passage and walking in. The rest of the team followed, with Jack and Teal'c at the rear behind Hulkin who cast a last look at the sun he had missed so much during the last six months and which he feared he would never see again.
When they got together again in the gloomy shadow of the corridor they knew so well, the team lit up two flashlights and inspected their surroundings.
"We never went through this section of the corridor? Did you?" Daniel asked the Tok'ra.
"We are not familiar with these markings," Jacob answered after a few minutes, "do you remember where you saw that list of Goa'ulds?"
"Not really. We have translated so much text since yesterday! I'm not even sure if it was on the columns or on the wall. I am truly sorry."
"Don't worry. We will look for it on both," Sam said trying to comfort her friend.
They started to look for a sentence that mentioned gods or Goa'ulds. They formed the same groups as before, Daniel, Nolbe and Jacob looked at the walls while Sam, Kaleb and Garik took care of the columns. Jack and Teal'c took place on each side of the corridor and watched for the unexpected coming of visitors. Their task was not easy because the two flashlights of the team had been given to the translators and they had to watch in an eternal darkness, trusting more their earring than their sight and being aware of every noise with fear. Hulkin had not said a word since they had come back inside the pyramid, he was sitting against a column and seemed to wait, his eyes staring straight ahead.
After more than two hours of unsuccessful searching, both teams decided to look at the other side of the corridor. They had fixed a limited zone so they did not risk passing through an EM field and be separated from the others. To go faster in studying the text on the walls and columns they had decided not to translate all the sentences but only those where they had found the characters meaning the word god. Their research field was so limited they had been able to go through most of the text on the left-hand side of the corridor and were starting to examine the right-hand side. They had seen nothing so far that could be a valuable hint but they did not give way to despair. Jack and Teal'c were still standing watch, unaffected. Hulkin had not moved by an inch, despite the various solicitations from SG1; he was still with his back to a column, absent.
Two more hours went by like this. Two long hours during which the only noises that could be heard were the scratching of pens in notebooks and from time to time Daniel's mumblings.
When they had finished deciphering the segment the limits of which they had fixed, they all joined in the center of the corridor.
"We have found nothing here. We have to continue looking in another segment," Jacob stated.
"If I understood right, we are going to walk in the corridor and end up in another part of the pyramid without even knowing it?"
"That's about right, sir. I know this is not a very satisfying plan but that's the only option we have."
"We'll follow you, then," Jack answered, motioning for her to lead the group.
They decided to go left, quickly packed their belongings and started.
Fifteen minutes later, Kaleb stopped and signaled the others to join him.
"We have never seen that part of the text, "he said indicating the column next to him.
"Okay, we can stop here and continue our translation," Jacob proposed.
In a silent agreement the teams formed again and everybody took their post. Hulkin who had followed the group went back to staring at the dust on the ground, his back to a wall now.
Half an hour later Garik yelled: "That's it, I think I found something." He pointed to the others a part of the text on the column in front of him. They could read the name of many System Lords familiar to SG1: Ra, Apophis, Baal, Sokar… and some they had never heard of. Under that list they could guess another part of the text, somewhat erased.
"Jack, I think that it's the text below the list that explains how to get out."
"Yes! At least some good news!" Jack said, overflowed with joy.
"Don't get excited too fast. I can't translate this. The language, the code, everything is different." Daniel sighed.
"O'Neill, I think we have bigger problems."
Not too far, their distinctly heard a voice shouting: "Jaffa, kree!"
Chapter 12
At that sound, they all rushed to hide behind the columns on each side of the corridor. They got their weapons out and assumed a battle pattern. On the other end of the corridor, the Jaffa had done the same thing. Shortly, fire, zat and lance shots were exchanged. In the uproar Daniel yelled.
"We have to protect the text!"
Sam and Kaleb were the closest to that part of the wall and did their best under the heavy fire of their sworn enemies. Several Jaffas fell but the others kept moving forward. After a few minutes, they could finally see who they were fighting against: on the soldiers' forehead they were all surprised to see the mark of Apophis. Daniel had a movement of hesitation at that discovery. After thinking it over during a few minutes, he turned to Jack.
"I think they are trapped in the pyramid, just like us."
"What difference does it make?"
"None, but they surely don't know Apophis is dead. Have you seen them before Hulkin?"
"Never, no. But this pyramid is huge and I was really lucky to meet you."
During that conversation the battle was still raging and Apophis' men were slowly advancing. Then, the one that seemed to be a leader made a sign for his men to stop firing. Jack, after asking Jacob with a look, did the same. Everyone was staying alert. When Jack couldn't take it anymore, he called out the Jaffa.
"So, you're just walking around here?"
"Silence, Tau'ri, if you don't want my men to kill you."
"For now, we seem to have the advantage. You've got what? Three dead? I don't even have a wounded in here!"
"Jaffa!" the one the Colonel had been talking too shouted, quite irritated.
"Excuse me," Daniel cut in, "but how long have you been imprisoned here?"
"Those who serve a god are never prisoners!"
"About that, you may be interested to know that Apophis is dead."
"Liar, you can't kill…"
"… A god. The only problem is he isn't one!"
Upon these words, the angry Jaffas started to fire again. Jack lurched to one side to take cover and he addressed Daniel.
"You saw that, I tried to communicate, but they don't want to listen!"
Daniel rolled his eyes upwards and didn't bother to answer. They both went back to the combat, Hulkin still hidden behind them since he had no weapon. The Jaffa fell one after the other. Slowly the intensity of the enemy fire decreased until no sound could be heard anymore. They waited a few seconds before Sam dared walk out from behind the column where she was posted. She proceeded with caution, slaloming between the inert bodies of Apophis' men, and quickly followed by Jacob, the others covering them. When she reached the place where the Jaffa was lying, she looked around and suddenly she heard the characteristic sound of a lance that is being activated. She did not have the time to throw herself out of the way because the shot was already fired. Jacob reacted very swiftly and fired on the bunch in the shadow where the blast had come from. The mass fell slowly. Instantly Nolbe arrived with a torch. They looked hurriedly at the surrounding bodies, making sure they was no danger left.
The others arrived hastily. Jacob was already by his daughter's side and Teal'c equal to himself was watching the corridor. Jacob turned to face Jack.
"She is wounded on her right shoulder. She has lost a lot of blood. I'm going to patch her up as I can but we have to get her back quickly to treat her correctly. Do you have any painkiller?"
"And don't you have a miraculous device that can… I don't know… work miracles, like every good Tok'ra that respects himself?" Jack asked, giving him a dose of morphine.
Garik was the one to answer.
"We do have a device we use for first aid but the major's wound is too large."
"Daniel, you know what you have to do."
He nodded and moved to the part of the text they had noticed, followed closely by Hulkin, Kaleb and Nolbe.
All four started to work, trying to decipher this new language. After having taken care of Sam Jacob joined them. He bent to the text in question and after observing it a few minutes he turned to the translators and Selmak talked to them.
"I've already seen that kind of writing. It is a mixture of two alphabets: one is derived from the Ancient and one looks like the Cyrillic we can find on Earth. I have already come across such a text on a planet I have visited for the Tok'ra. Sadly, at that time I had not understood how it worked. Oh, I have a few pointers but nothing definite!"
"Tell us what you had found out, maybe it will help us move along."
Selmak started to talk, showing them signs or associations of symbols, explaining what he had deduced. On a few occasions he was interrupted by one of his partners giving his opinion on another possible translation. But after an hour, the text still didn't make sense. Nolbe sighed out of exasperation. Daniel shifted his head to look at Sam who was propped against a column, visibly very much in pain, even if she was trying to hide it. Hulkin sat on the ground, just in font of the text.
"Could you move a little, please?" Kaleb asked politely.
"No prob…" Hulkin started after raising his head to look at his interlocutor.
Daniel turned to him to see if everything was all right. Jack, intrigued by their new friend's attitude, was the one to question him.
"What's going on?"
"I… I think the text has a meaning from here…"
Instantly Daniel sat at the base of the wall. He was moving his head from left to right, seeming to read what he was looking at. After a few minutes he looked at his teammates.
"Well, I think the exit isn't far away…"