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A/N: Bloody, people. Be warned.
::Communication.:: - one mind to another (ex. symbiote to host.)
Soundtrack includes "Serious Steel", "Ladies in the SCA", "The Cripples' Shield-Wall" and "Resurrection" from the Serious Steel CD. ww w. random-factors .com
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They will die. Slowly and painfully.
For one fleeting moment, Hursag allowed himself the glorious vision of a field of crosses, Preventers nailed to each one, slowly suffocating as their bodies failed. The wind would carry the scent of death as it plucked at papyrus inked with the red hieroglyphs of a Queen's execution, carried out by her First Prime's orders and hand. And there would be no merciful executioner to break their legs and hasten their demise. He would see to that.
They will die.
"Activating emergency bulkheads...."
"Fire in the generators!"
"Contained. Psychic shield up and holding. Lift in possibly twenty minutes, if we can keep the damn Dragons out of range...."
Hursag let the engineering crew's reports wash past him. The Gault Stargate was in enemy hands. There was a gaping hole in his Goddess' ha'tak where the Gundams had struck on their way past. The minefield trap on the second planet was still mostly intact, along with the fighters ranged around it, yet if Apuki's report was accurate, the Tau'ri had simply used the second 'Gate as a distraction.
Apuki's report likely was accurate, curse it. The old curmudgeon might be a cynic and a hell-raiser and teetering on the edge of heresy with every other breath, but the elderly Jaffa knew how to fight.
Too far away for them to reinforce us, Hursag thought coldly. But they can hold the 'Gate if we retreat.
Retreat was still an option. Critical systems were intact. They had a screen of death gliders in the air; enough to keep even Gundams busy for the time it would take to seal the ship. A few minutes, and they could lift.
With traitors on board.
"Unleash the Reavers," Hursag ordered. "Send shock grenades through the rings to the Stargate chamber. Double our Queen's guard on the nursery, Jaffa only; she herself comes to guard the gods' children. We will strike, and we will not fail. Remember, your enemies serve only themselves; you honor a goddess!"
The First Prime took more intelligence reports, and smiled. He would tend to the pitiful human rebels.
The Tok'ra were Dimme's prey.
---------------
The attack was swift, as she had known it would be.
Emerald robes billowing behind her, Dimme stalked the halls toward her children, confident that Hursag would handle her enemies.
At least, those outside these walls.
If I were those cowards of Tok'ra, and meant to take me unaware, I would strike-
Gas billowed up - but a flash of thought had already closed the hound helm over her face. And this poison did not work through skin.
"Fools!"
A goddess leapt into the concealing alcove, hands spread and glinting as she seized those who had posed as the most devoted of her nursery attendants. Claws sliced shrieking lips.
"Has it been so long since you faced the true gods-"
Metal gauntlets seized a neck. Twisted. Broke.
"-You have forgotten we can fight?"
Dimme stood over the dead and the dying, claws spread, blood streaking crimson down emerald sleeves. The helmet's eyes glowed blue; lips curled in a sneer under alien metal. "You have cowered in the shadows too long."
"My Queen?" a Jaffa called down the hall.
"Hold your positions," Dimme ordered, breast still heaving from the glorious joy of killing. Good, good; they had remained at their posts, though it was certain they had heard the fight. She would not need to execute them for disobedience... or treachery.
Her spy claimed the Tok'ra did not trust Jaffa, and had no agents among that race on her ship. But she had not survived so long by trusting one source of intelligence.
"We will... defeat you...."
"How?" Dimme crushed the gas dispenser in one slender fist. "With petty toys like these?" The hound helm tilted, amused. "Did you think I would claim a planet whose arsenal I did not know?"
One whole eye still glared at her out of a clawed ruin of a face. The Tok'ra's hand moved-
Too easy.
Dimme struck with all the speed and skill she'd trained into this body, slicing across and down. Bits of fingers scattered over the floor. Blood flew, the Tok'ra convulsed-
Went limp.
Chuckling, Dimme reached into the corpse's robes to remove what he'd been reaching for. Ah. A detonation trigger. He must have died so terribly disappointed.
Of course, his fellow traitors among the villagers would have backup triggers.
But that was no concern of hers.
---------------
The few, the proud, the completely insane....
Major Hopkins, Air Force Explosive Ordinance Detachment, recently detailed to a command he never in his wildest nightmares would have imagined existed, ducked as one of the bronze things his more experienced Marine escort called death gliders screamed overhead. A jet-black aircraft swooped after it, yanking up and sideways in a turn that had Hopkins' gut cringing in sympathy at the Gs that pilot had to be pulling. Green lashed out from the black bird, striking bronze dead-on-
"Move, move, move!"
Hopkins double-timed it with the rest of his team along the ridge leading away from the primitive village, keeping pace with the odd, hard-faced guys and gals in blue and green jackets that had point and rearguard. Preventers, his quick briefing had called them. An allied human fighting force... that just hadn't been born on Earth.
They've got to be kidding.
Granted, whatever language they spoke didn't sound like anything Hopkins had ever heard. And granted, that blue star in olive circle patch on their right shoulders didn't look like any unit he'd ever heard of. Not to mention that ripped-from-a-sci-fi-movie way they'd all gotten here....
Heck, NATO has a hard enough time pulling joint exercises! And they expect us to believe alien humans just up and decided they wanted to fight with us?
A flurry of swift hand signals, and the group surged sharply right around a rough wooden corral, avoiding flaming debris clattering out of the sky. Hopkins growled. "We're all going to be blue on blue if they keep this up!"
"Blue - on blue?" the Chinese-looking Preventer who'd spoken most with Marine Sergeant Deaver asked. Pretty little thing, she was; black hair and eyes, barely five-two, and loaded down with enough ammo to start a small land war. Don't these guys have a minimum height requirement? Hopkins wondered.
"Friendly fire," Deaver explained. "Getting hit by accident."
"Ii." She shrugged. "Deathscythe will mourn us if we fall. Do not be struck."
Don't get hit. Great. Hopkins throttled down his temper before he strangled someone. "So where's this depot you guys say is rigged to blow - holy-"
Giant domes, like black concrete bunkers gone wild, dotted the river plain below. Hopkins counted ten just in line of sight.
"Sir...." One of his ordinance techs shook his head, eyes wide.
"I know, Carlson. I know." Hopkins turned on Deaver. "Those maps you guys came up with better be damn accurate. How much time did you say we have?"
Deaver looked grim. "No clue."
Shit. This isn't defusing - this is suicide!
The Preventer touched his arm. "I will - em sau-ek? Sehtu-i en set'ebet teka."
Hopkins felt his hackles rise. "English, dammit-"
"Akako said she'll protect us," Deaver stated, waving them to keep going toward the jet-black domes. "She's a Guardian Ryuu, Major - a Dragon. That's why she's with us. Show her how the bombs are set up, and she can burn the C-4 out from under them."
Hopkins snorted. Pyrokinesis. Yeah, right. "So if you've got that, why the heck do you need all of-"
From the direction of the village, something screeched.
"Reavers!"
---------------
Up left jink lock fire-
Quatre wove through the cloud of death gliders on Trowa's wing, half his mind attending to the bronze ships crumbling out of the sky like fiery rain, the rest focused on the pulse of the battle below. No plan survived contact with the enemy, but so far the SG teams had been as stubborn and flexible as he'd hoped. There was the demolitions team, there the anchor teams holding a corridor back to the 'Gate, and there the aid station taking in their first casualties....
Fear/loathing/kill-
"Reavers at point Delta," Major Wade's voice was interspersed with weapons fire and zat trills; SG-3 and the Preventer teams had orders to shoot first and worry about trying to salvage Reavers later, if any survived. "Damn, these things are fast! We need help here-"
Trowa?
Yes, love.
Like a pair of falcons, they stooped. Quatre brushed Sandrock's controls as death gliders reacted to their fall; no point wasting an inadvertent diversion-
Targets acquired. Sandrock's computers scrolled up the numbers, backtracking radio transmissions and echoes of weapons fire to give him the Gundam's best guess at where and when his allies were. The screen split, a second set of numbers shooting past as Trowa's Heavyarms sent its firing solutions. And then a third, thin stream of data from Deathscythe; see you, 05 and 01 in air, will cover.
03 go/no go? The empath asked.
Trust reflected back.
They screamed down and across the rough cover, fifty feet overhead, cannon blasts shaking them with near misses, stray bullets rattling off Gundanium hulls like bits of hail. Opening his mind to Trowa, Quatre reached out to the fear and anger of the battlefield. That moving patch of heat was human, and that one, and that was animal....
And far too many were neither.
Fire, fire, hold, fire, hold, hold, fire-
And they were up and slicing through the airborne fray again. A thinner fray, this time; much dominated by death gliders trying to be anywhere but in front of a Gundam's guns.
Deathscythe shot by, glittering with hunt-and-kill, and Quatre grinned. If he tapped into 02's cockpit frequency right now, he'd get an earful of the latest back-beat music Duo had wheedled out of SGC personnel. Something called rock-and-roll, if he remembered right. Nice stuff.
And utterly terrifying when sung at high volume by the person trying to blow you out of the sky.
Two gliders wobbled; Wing and Shenlong pounced.
A wry smile touched Quatre's face as gliders scattered ahead of Deathscythe's graceful dance. Looks like Duo hacked their coms again....
---------------
"One night in Bangkok makes a hard man humble
"Not much between despair and ecstasy.
"One night in Bangkok and the tough guys tumble;
"Can't be too careful with your company.
"I can feel the devil walking next to me...."
"Shut that cursed noise off!" Hursag roared.
---------------
"And our doggie friends now have their communications shot to hell." Jack zatted the last hound-helmed Jaffa in the ring control room a third time, tilting his head as the rock-and-roll beat continued to rattle the ship's intercom system. "Nice work."
Watching by the door with Teal'c as Sam did something techno-nasty to the various control panels, Daniel drew a deep breath. When this is all over, I'm going to be sick.
It was a distant horror, detached. Abstract as the knowledge that he should feel fear, or grief, or guilt....
Not calm. Not anticipation. And definitely not a dark, vicious glee that meant to quench its thirst in the blood of his enemies.
Just stay in one piece, Duo had warned him before they left. Get through the mission. Worry about everything else later.
"Done!" Sam scurried to join them, waiting one breath more for Jack to take point before they all moved.
"Bulkhead, bulkhead, funny light, bulkhead - gotcha." Jack slapped a shaped charge on one section of wall, waved them back before pressing the trigger.
Sparks flew, outlining a removable panel.
Gloves on, Jack yanked it clear of the dark opening, waving them in. "After you, ladies and gents...."
Right behind Sam, Daniel hesitated. "Listen."
"To what?" Jack kept his voice low.
"Reinforcements, O'Neill," Teal'c noted in an undertone, ear cocked to the metallic tramp of feet corridors over. "Most likely carrying a dispersal load of shock grenades to reclaim the Stargate chamber."
"Good luck," Sam snorted, tucking a glow-stick into her wristband to brave the darkness of the ventilation system. "Those rings aren't working until I say they are."
---------------
::The High Council didn't warn us about this!::
Remind me to send them a nasty note, Rede, Ambrin thought, cinching one last strap before slapping the mare toward the tentative safety of the hills. "Ride!"
The small buckskin bolted toward the rest of her fleeing herd, carrying his grim-faced sister Nika, white-faced little Tasia clinging to her belt and the newest babe slung over her back. There'd been no time to look for eight-year-old Amek.
And his brother-in-law Svan was... gone. Worse than gone.
::You've been listening to Jacob's reports again... and when are we getting out of here?::
Ambrin hit the dirt as flaming metal fell out of the sky, skidding through the just-emptied corral before setting the very dirt about it afire. After I find my nephew.
::Aien will be setting off the charges any minute!::
Not if she and Salara are thinking straight.
::It's the Council's plan!::
Ambrin shaded his eyes to peer up, where bronze was trying to mob blinding white. Do they look like they care-
No warning. Just a flicker of shadow that shouldn't have been there. A gust of what might have been wind.
A razor-edge searing through his shoulder.
Ambrin pressed his hand to the trickling wound, fighting off a drowning wave of panic from his symbiote. Twisting gray hissed at him, herding him back with a slash of claws. Paused, tendrils waving, to deliberately lick his blood off its talons.
Horror shuddered through him; his own, and Rede's, mingling and echoing like voices in mist. ::How could Dimme... how could anyone create something like that?::
He didn't know. Even with all Rede's history to draw on, all the memories Egeria had chosen to pass down of Ra's evil and her own decision to fight - he didn't know. All he knew was a sick, roiling terror in his gut, the blind impulse to flee....
And one brief prayer. Spirits, let this not be Svan!
"Uncle Ambrin!"
And running was no longer an option.
::This way!:: Rede seized partial control, drawing on almost two millennia of infiltrators' knowledge for one specific set of knife skills.
Black-edged dagger in hand, Ambrin leaped. Please let this work!
Cloth and skin shredding. Burning pain in arms, ribs, neck as he whirled inside the circle of talons and stabbed. A high, glass-sharp shriek-
Gunfire.
::Stay with me.:: Rede disentangled them from the convulsing Reaver, pressing one hand to the blood trickling from Ambrin's neck. ::Stay awake!::
That was....
::Killing.:: Rede kept the pressure on, holding the wound as it started to seal. A human would have been unconscious and dying. ::It gets easier. I wish it didn't.::
"Uncle Amb- let me go!"
"Easy, kid! Stay back 'til we know it's dead!" Swift footsteps held the struggling child. "Ambrin?"
English. Ambrin forced his eyes open, taking in the two distinct sets of uniforms in front of them. There was the Tau'ri patch of the SGC on the heavyset man holding a squirming armful of young boy, and a strange blue star in olive circle on the jacket of a woman with blue-spotted tendrils twitching out of oak-brown hair....
::A medusa!::
Ambrin winced at the shriek in his head. Unless you're planning to go somewhere, that's not really a problem, is it?
::...::
"Sir? Can you hear us?"
"Yes," he coughed.
Some of the stiffness went out of the medusa's shoulders. "Jacob sent us for you."
::Jacob?::
"Jacob is here?"
The Marine looked at his watch. "Not yet." He set Amek's feet on the ground. "Sir, we have orders to tell you to cease and desist any and all plans to destroy the planetary armory and the local villages."
::Destroy the armory?::
Destroy the villages?! Ambrin shook his head. "You must be mistaken," he said, dazed. "It was Salara's task to set the charges, not mine... they're only set to explode the farthest warehouse, to distract the Queen...."
"No, sir. They're not."
Ambrin felt the blood drain from his face. "The only agents with seniority to order that halted would be - elsewhere."
"If you mean in Dimme's ship, sir... we haven't been able to raise them."
---------------
Wufei dove and spun, vision gray as he pushed Shenlong's inertial dampeners to their limits. Breathe, and scissors-twist, and now-
A last shot, and the final death glider crumpled from the sky.
Soaring up and clear, Chang drew in deep gulps of air, finally registering the wailing alarms of damaged systems. Half his boards were amber, dotted with red, and the main guidance system was scrawling some of Howard's worst insults across his screen. I should never have let one of Duo's allies touch my Nataku!
It didn't matter. He could still fly. And while he could fly, he could fight.
Save that there seemed to be little left to fight. What few death gliders remained intact were streaking for space and the neighboring planet, evidently running for the sanctuary of their fellows about Dimme's now useless minefield. "04-"
"Noted, 05." Quatre's breath was almost as battle-ragged as his own, though Sandrock was barely scarred. "I've contacted the Jaffa commander and negotiated terms. He'll stand his forces down... unless Dimme clears atmosphere."
Wufei's hands moved of their own will, rerouting circuits to restore the most critical systems he could in the air. "And he agreed?"
The empath's voice had a fine, cold edge. "I gave Tek'mateh Apuki my word as a Gundam pilot that if they did anything else, none of them would see the next sunrise."
"Land or die," Trowa added bluntly. "Status?"
"Acceptable." Wufei blinked away sweat and a few black strands that had somehow worked their way free of his tight ponytail. Communications were altogether too quiet. "01?"
Far too quiet.
"02?"
Static.
---------------
"Come on, baby, hold it together," Duo pleaded with his crippled craft. Never failed; with all Deathscythe's stealth and ECM, he took more damage from panicked Jaffa firing blind than from any who were trying to aim. "Come on, 'Scythe, be my lovely lady and let's just get down to the ground...."
Blue and red-marked white swooped past.
"Oh great, that's just great, you baka!" Duo grabbed the stick tight as Deathscythe rattled in Wing's vortex. "Bakayarou! Kisama! Just wait 'til I get down there, you - khebs-ta-i em senf-ek!"
Wing soared over the upper third of Dimme's ha'tak. Hovered. Lashed out with blue-white blasts.
"Huh?" Duo nursed 'Scythe nearer, working to bring up an enhanced view. Just in time to catch Wing lowering a crucial foot more as the canopy slid open. "Oh man, tell me he's not gonna...."
Katana in his arms, Heero leapt into the still-smoking hole.
"Why me, huh?" Duo implored any kami who might be listening, pounding desperately on his keyboard as he tried to match Deathscythe's crippled capabilities to what he now had to do. "That's all I want to know, okay? Why me?"
Course set and locked, Duo grabbed his infiltration pack. Touched his sun-cross. Let Shinigami swirl forward as wind caught his braid.
And leaped.
---------------
A damned Survivor!
Engineer Dagy fell back from the ragged opening with what was left of his Jaffa repair crew as a ribbon device slammed bodies through the air. They'd just rushed up here to repair the secondary generators, ready and willing to snare the rebels' infiltration team if their goddess' Reavers hadn't eaten them-
And the hull had blown in from outside, scattering Jaffa and Reavers like dropped astragali.
But the bulkheads were already sealing, and Survivor or not, their foe was one man. Massed fire would cut him down like a leaf-
Black wings swooped down.
---------------
::How could the Tau'ri have betrayed us so!::
Salara shrugged, perched in the cliff-side burrow she'd carved with a few crystals weeks ago; a quiet, cozy place, with the amenities she'd loved on her own world, and none of the primitive furnishings this planet's inhabitants took for granted. Who knew. Who cared? It was enough to know they had been betrayed... and all that mattered now was the Council's plan.
::If Rede's not clear - he doesn't know-::
He has his orders, Aien, Salara thought. Just as we do. It's only his own fault if he lets Ambrin's attachment to the people of this world sway him.
Casually, her thumb pressed the detonator.
---------------
Inside the massive black dome, the Tau'ri known as Carlson whistled. "Oh, man...."
Striding into the dim-lit expanse, Preventer Li Akako frowned as the Earth-born humans stared at the block-long stores of Goa'uld missiles, cannons, and ha'tak parts with wide eyes. It was a System Lord's armory. What had they expected? "The sebau-ib? The-" she sought for the English word.
"Bomb," Marine Deaver filled in. "Yeah. Come on. Hopkins?"
The tall Air Force officer was already searching, eyes and careful fingers moving over those weapons most likely to be trapped. "Map says over here... okay. Oh, son of a-" He clamped his lips together. "Okay, little lady. Come watch this."
Toolkits were opened and scattered on a dropped tarp. Hopkins' hands worked with delicate care, reaching out for one tool after another, each slapped into his palm by his barely-breathing fellows. A red-numbered display was moved carefully aside, colored wires traced....
"Looks like they didn't try to make it tricky," Hopkins muttered, taking hold of one white wire that led into a green-gray block of clayey material. "Anybody wants to duck, do it now."
No one moved.
"Great. We're all idiots." Jaw set, Hopkins yanked out the wire.
Silence.
Hopkins let a breath sigh out. "Right." He beckoned her close. "You see this? C-4. You can burn it just like charcoal, but one spark and it goes boom. Got that?"
"Aa." Reaching out, Akako touched her fingertips to the greasy surface. This would not be simple. She could not simply set and burn; she had to find the wires and work outward, so heat would not set off a spark in and of itself....
"Holy-!"
A sizzle of blue flame touched the wire he'd laid aside, searing off the trace of explosive left behind. More glowed from the block under her fingers, slow fire burning out the hole where the wire had been.
Akako lifted her hand away. "It is well?"
Gaping at the hollowed block, Hopkins shook his head. "I'm not seeing this. I'm just not."
"I think he means, go for it," Deaver said in an undertone, as the rest of the team stared at her with the eyes of colony-born children getting their first terrifying glimpse of an unwalled sky.
Drawing a slow breath, Akako placed her hands together, palm to sweating palm. She did not have the raw power of a Chang, but what she did have could be more finely aimed. This was the substance, this the form of her target....
Eyes closed, Preventer Li reached out with fingers of flame.
This pattern of sparks. And this. And this....
One after another, dull red flared to crimson in Akako's mind's eye, burning bright as unshielded sunlight. Strategic bits of C-4 heated and burned away from metal contacts, leaving the rest of the explosive inert.
And here. And- kami! "Down!"
Crimson already flaring - so close-
Back-burn it!
No time to duck or flee. Only an instant to meet explosion with desperate fire, concentrating all her will on the dragon within her soul, the bright blaze of justice that would not allow those in her protection to suffer-
Thunder filled the world.
---------------
Comm difficulties! Hursag seethed, racing for the nursery and his Goddess. The lake of fire, he has comm difficulties! I'll throttle Apuki with my own hands....
He would, indeed - if Dimme did not claim that honor for herself. The elderly Jaffa had drawn one heretic breath too many.
Later. For now, his Queen and her precious children must escape.
---------------
"For crying out loud!" Jack hung onto the shaft wall as the last vibrations from that strike died away. Military explosives might be some of the safest in the world, but he was just as glad they'd dumped most of theirs blowing the secondary generators. Gundam or death glider, had to be. Death glider probably wouldn't shoot a ha'tak, so - Gundam. "Don't those idiots know we're in here?"
"They do," Daniel pointed out lightly. "They also know Dimme's in here."
"Point." Jack kept moving, halted when he noticed his 2IC wasn't moving. "Carter?"
Sam's teeth gleamed glow-stick green as she stripped connections on the shaft wall, preparing to open a hatch the hard way. "We're here."
Okay. "Gotcha. Open a hole, people, let's poke in a camera before we charge in like the Light Brigade... Teal'c, why do I not like that look you're giving me?"
Almost shamefaced, the Jaffa handed over the zat-seared wreck that had been a fiber-optic camera.
"Gnrgh...." Right. Back to the basics it was. "Hear anything in there?"
"This whole network is pretty soundproofed," Daniel grumbled. "It's like being wrapped in cotton."
"There are opponents moving on the other side of the wall," Teal'c reported, ear pressed to the thinnest panel. "Perhaps a dozen. None are directly beside our entrance."
Twelve-odd guys. None of them friendly. Lousy site intel, but better than nothing. Get in, shoot anything that moves, grab the Princess, and vamoose. Jack wiped sweaty hands on his fatigues. "Showtime."
Sam worked her magic, and Jack hurled himself through the sudden opening into the larvae nursery-
Face to face with a hound-helmed System Lady whose claws still dripped blood.
And the day just keeps getting better.
Quick shots impacted Dimme's personal force shield, driving the Goa'uld back with a snarl. Even hurled off-balance, her ribbon device's blast threw him into the wall.
Damn, she knows how to fight!
A grinning Jaffa with the gold brand of a First Prime leveled a staff weapon at his face. "Die, Tau'ri-"
Gunshots and the thunder of Teal'c's staff weapon took him down in a crash of armor. Three cheers for the cavalry, Jack thought, rolling aside. Larvae tank, Jaffa, Reavers, pissed-off Goa'uld, more Jaffa, more Reavers....
Way more than a dozen.
Hell. We forgot how quiet those things were.
And the world was shooting and moving and knowing how very, very badly they were screwed-
"Aan khenaa-ten ba-aa, aan saa-ten khaibit-aa, un uat en ba-aa en khaibit-aa!"
Green fire sliced through the paired doors at the far end of the room. Golden hieroglyphs melted and shattered, screeching apart as two matched kicks broke open the slashed panels.
"Nuk Shinigami!"
And Daniel laughed.
"You!" Dimme snarled, as one braided, blood-covered pilot bounced through the smoke.
"Actually, him." Thermal scythe whirling up to rest against his spattered shoulder, Duo jerked a thumb toward blazing blue eyes, apparently oblivious to the Reaver howls swiftly approaching from the corridor behind them. "Me, I'd rather haul off and drop a couple detonators down the back of your helmet, but no...."
"Ii, merer-ek saat," Heero spat, holstering his gun. Metal sang against metal, sheath cast aside to unveil the silvery curve of a katana.
"You dare?" Glinting claws spread, ignoring SG-1's weapons as they ricocheted off her shield. The hound helm folded in on itself, revealing a crown of dark braids over sheer fury. "You dare challenge me, human?"
Lip curled, Heero crooked a beckoning finger.
"Hrarr!"
Claws met sword in a shriek of metal on metal. Locked together, all but nose to nose, glowing gold met arctic blue. Eyes narrowed. Seared.
Metal shrieked as the two tore apart, landing on opposite sides of the cleared circle. "I knew it," Dimme snarled, breast heaving. "I knew it! No mere human could defeat the gods...." Teeth bared as she splayed talons toward her opponent. "I know you, Stheno!"
"Not Stheno," Heero said coldly. "Only her memory." His katana swirled air as he settled back into stance. "Come and die."
---------------
"Mwah-ha-hah... oh you did not try to shoot my hair!"
Thermal scythe a glowing blur of green, Duo threw himself at the Reavers, ignoring the idiot Jaffa who hadn't screamed and run the other way. And a one, two, three - slice!
Skip over a tendril. Duck a claw. Weave and sidestep in a swift, deadly dance; Shinigami might be able to fight the mutating venom, but the Reavers only had to get in one good hold to simply shred him limb from limb.
The scythe whirled. Emerald light sliced up across a gray torso, cutting through an arm almost at the shoulder as the Reaver fell in convulsing pieces.
And the hissing horde swarmed him.
---------------
Not Stheno. Only her memory.
Any other time, Sam would have been delighted to have her dawning suspicions confirmed. Would have stopped and pestered the entire Wing for questions; how much of Stheno Coatlicue had survived Susanowo's ashrak, how had her memories ended up in Heero, why had the Wing let everyone believe Heero had been taken as host by a Goa'uld?
Any other time.
Right now, she was too busy shooting.
Aim, fire, duck, move-
Daniel covered her as Sam scooted to the far side of the larvae tank, leapt to join her as Teal'c opened up with staff blasts. Jack and Teal'c stayed in place, shooting at any unwary Jaffa who poked a head out from the niches around the room, making no attempt to join them in their meager cover.
Though it is cover. None of us want to hit the larvae. So we've got a crossfire, but we have to be careful on angles....
The small part of Sam's brain that wasn't either shooting or overflowing with questions was currently... well, gibbering was probably the kindest description.
Blood - claws - flying pieces - eeek!
Which was to say that the Gordian knot of Reavers around Duo looked like it'd been hit by Alexander's own razor-steel solution in the form of a fiery green thermal scythe, and the resulting carnage was starting to paint walls and floor slippery crimson.
---------------
My enemy. At last.
A part of Heero knew this was alien memory. Knew this bone-deep hate was the ghost of Stheno, bent on destroying her murderers at any cost. Including the life of the human she haunted.
It was what J had created him for, after all. Forget the sniping Jaffa. Forget twisted creations of science and loathing, striking for his heart. Kill the Goa'uld.
"Watch the hands! Betenu er thesemu, khakht er shewet... sheesh, you guys shoot like day-old ducklings!"
Thank the kami J had never factored in Duo.
"Rharr!"
Dimme's claws broke through his defenses, tearing his right arm to the bone. Talons raked down to his wrist and gripped, slamming him down-
Heero twisted, bones grinding against metal, landing a kick to her ribs that would have dropped a human dead in his tracks.
Claw, claw, hilt-strike, punch-
Curling in midair, Heero landed in a crouch. Wobbled there, bleeding, gasping for breath. He might have a Goa'uld's unnatural strength, but the body supporting it was still human.
Dimme spat blood. Looked at his wound, and his blade, and raised her ribbon device.
"Yuy!"
Ignore Jack's call. Switch the blade to his left hand. Hold it low and angled, waiting. A ribbon device took concentration as well as rage; he still had one brief moment. Duo would know how to goad her....
"Oh, come on," Daniel's voice reached through the screams and gunfire, perfect, taunting Goa'uld. "You're not going to let some human who should still be wearing the sidelock of youth beat a Queen, are you?"
Eyes flared gold, and Dimme moved-
Strike!
---------------
Jack went for the shattered doors as Reavers went berserk, trying to ignore that wet sound of steel through flesh as a crimson blade pierced through the back of emerald robes. She was Goa'uld. She was the enemy.
But the gold faded from her eyes, leaving only the host's stunned shock behind....
They're down!
Most of the Jaffa weren't any better off, curled in various corners or lying like grain-sacks on the crimson-spattered floor. Duo was keening like a banshee, scythe whirling as the Shinigami cut everything that came near Yuy's crumpled form to bloody shreds. His team was covering them both, sniping at anything that looked like it would break through that desperate defense.
But alarms were yelping to any Jaffa that the threat to their Queen was here, and writhing gray was swarming down the corridor.
I don't think we've got enough bullets... aha! Searching fingers pried open the hidden panel, punched in an override.
Secondary bulkheads slammed down where the doors had been, slicing through a writhing tendril.
Yeugh! Jack leapt back from the coiling menace, drawing his zat to fire five fast, stunning shots into the morass between Duo and his team.
Silence fell over the chamber, rasped by heavy breathing.
My god. We got 'em? "Carter! Get the frickin' larva. Teal'c! Grab Yuy."
Carter dropped her pack, dug out the portable tank R&D had rigged up. Bit her lip. Swallowed, and advanced on the bubbling tank.
Teal'c started forward, jerked to a halt. "I am uncertain that is wise, O'Neill."
Huh? What? Oh.
Duo was still standing over his bleeding partner, chest heaving, scythe-blade glowing deadly green, eyes a merry, mad violet.
"Duo." Shaking a bit, Daniel advanced on the younger Shinigami. "I kher-ek, ib-i kher ma'at. You're safe. It's over. We need to get Heero out of here."
Duo looked down. Took a breath. Wiped some of the blood off his face. "Got it. I got it. Just... pick him up easy, okay?"
---------------
Oh, I really, really don't want to do this. Sam braced herself, and yanked the cover off the tank. Slick white bodies whipped through green-tinted water, ducking away from the shadow like so many minnows.
Right. Like grabbing goldfish out of a pet store tank. Simple, right?
As if, Cassie's teenage voice echoed from her memory.
Okay. Carry tank open. Sam dipped it into the roiling surface, letting hardened plastic suck in a measure of the supporting liquid. And here comes the icky part.
Stripping tape from the carry tank's handle, Sam pulled free a small vial of amber-flecked blue. Snapped it open, smearing the gluey contents over her left palm and fingers, nose wrinkling at the waft of molasses and lime.
Gritting her teeth, she stuck her smeared hand into the water, wriggling her fingers near the carry tank opening. If Janet and the Preventer scientists were right, this mix and her own altered physiology should now make her smell like a Queen seeking one of her own fertile offspring. Here, fishie, fishie....
White bodies swished near the luring gel, wriggled away. Some fled to far corners of the tank. Others circled back, as if testing the taste.
Wait for it. Wait.
Finally, one thin larva bumped her fingers. Nuzzled against the gel.
Gotcha!
Sam scooped the larva into the carry tank, snatching a couple others nearby for good measure. Sealed the lid, and wiped her hand on a shred of cloth. "Got it!"
"Okay, campers, we're out of here." Blood-smeared emerald over his shoulders, Jack headed for the ventilation system. "Maxwell? You're shaking."
Yuy's sheath tied to his pack, Duo pressed something on his scythe's handle. Green faded, leaving dark metal to lean on as the Shinigami put one foot in front of the other toward their exit. "Yeah."
"We gonna have to carry you, kid?"
"Not yet."
Yuy in his arms, Teal'c arched a brow. Taking up the rear, Daniel rolled his eyes.
Tell me about it. Sam slipped into the vent, waiting for Daniel to close the panel behind them before uncovering her glow-stick and moving forward. She'd heard that tone before, when an RPG-torn A-10A's pilot had asked if there was a runway clear... or at the least, if ATC didn't mind, some kind of flat spot?
"Hog Three, do you have a problem?" the ATC had demanded.
"Not yet."
"Not that I mind the help, but I thought you guys were handling our upstairs problems," Jack said lightly. "Want to tell me just what you two thought you were doing?"
"Heero... didn't have much choice in the matter." Duo's voice was gray around the edges, mad laughter all but faded. "Once we cleared the skies, and he knew Dimme was in reach... saw the same thing when he went after Macha. Knew the idiot wouldn't have time to call us for backup. Damn J...." He took a breath. "Better call Quatre, when you can. My comm was out. By this time the guys have found Deathscythe touched down - least I hope she's touched down, not scattered all over the landscape, guidance wasn't looking too hot either - anyway, lil' Cat can feel I'm not in it, but he's probably biting his nails for a tactical update. And Trowa just hates that. Which I get, really. You ever tried to nuzzle somebody who bites his nails? They're all scratchy. You end up looking like the rag rug after Hrere's done playing with it...."
"Duo," Jack tried.
"...Never seen Heero bite his nails...."
"Maxwell! Who the hell is J?"
"Dead guy. I hope. Dead if I catch him. Dead and in pieces if Quatre does. G may not have been the best excuse for a human, but J is just one nasty piece of work." Duo blinked, wavered; set his scythe down a little harder, and kept walking. "It's - look, it's not my story. Okay? Ask Heero. When he wakes up."
"Sally knows, doesn't she?" Daniel spoke out of the darkness behind them. "What if she can't treat him? What does Janet need to know?"
Duo walked a few more steps, silent. "Treat him like a Survivor. He is. Mostly. Only you have to go light on the healing device. Especially on the head. Too much gives him fits. Bad." A wry smile curved his lips. "Too tough for his own good."
Jack nodded, rearranging Dimme's limp arm over his shoulder. "Not like you, huh?"
"Heh." Duo shrugged. "I'm Shinigami, Colonel. I'm not going to fall over 'til we're safe."
---------------
A/N: Astragali are the uneven heel bones of sheep and goats, used as dice from at least the time of Egypt onward. (The basis of our 6-sided dice.)
Translations from Egyptian:
Em sau-ek - Protect you.
Sehtu-i en set'ebet teka - I smite down obstructions (with) flame.
Khebs-ta-i em senf-ek! - I'll break and turn up the earth in your blood!
Sebau-ib - Fire-heart.
Aan khenaa-ten ba-aa, aan saa-ten khaibit-aa, un uat en ba-aa en khaibit-aa! - Not shut ye in my soul, not fetter ye my shade, be there open a way for my soul, and for my shade!
Nuk - I am.
Ii, merer-ek saat - Come, you lover of slaughter.
Betenu er thesemu, khakht er shewet - Quicker than coursing hounds, fleeter than a shadow.
I kher-ek, ib-i kher ma'at. - I have come to you, my heart holds right and truth.
Translations from Japanese:
Ii - good, fine.
Ryuu - Dragon.
Bakayarou - Jerk!
Kisama - You bastard!
Aa - Informal yes.