10: Dawning Alliance
by Chaoseternus

When Enerina is sent to investigate why every gate in an area of space will not establish a wormhole, she finds something totally unexpected...

Eighteen

Thor was impressed, he had to admit.

He knew it was easy to underestimate these humans, a trap he tried not to fall into. They did after all show the same passion for knowledge, the same determination and drive and the same dark core within that had characterised the ancients.

Great adventurers they might have been, architects and healers too, but however much they tried to rationalise themselves, saying ‘it's for the greater good', ‘we can't stand by whilst such evil is carried out', they were always the first into a fight, into a war and always the last out.

These humans showed all that and more. They had a darker core to themselves certainly, as if some dark creature sat on their shoulders constantly egging them on to do darker and nastier deeds in the name of the ‘greater good' or personal power, a demon within which controlled many but those who could resist it, it made stronger. It wasn't a flaw the ancients had shown that often.

But then again, he had never called an ancient friend; there never was an ancient whom he had ever gotten close to. They had been allies yes, acquaintances certainly and there was no enmity or hatred between their peoples and never had been. But, they had never been friends, not as races, not between individuals.

The humans were one up there, he had individuals in the ranks of the SGC he considered to be friends, and those same individuals, the original SG-1 were considered to be friends of the Asgard people. The Ancients had never gotten under the Asgard skin, so to speak, like that. These humans had.

Yet, Thor wouldn't go so far as to call their races friends. Too many humans did not even know of the Asgard and too many of those who did had proven themselves to be cast of the same die as the Goa'uld.

And now, he had to add ‘bold' to the list of human virtues the Ancients didn't have, or in this case, didn't show that often.

He remembered a comment he had once heard O'Neill make about having a pair of big brass reproductive organs and in this case, the Tau'ri had certainly shown they had those.

He glanced at his displays once more, shaking his head a little awed at the massive construction project underway within the depths of the Edonia nebula.

Taking a system, one that Anubis considered to be of strategic importance from him and planning to keep him out. Yes, they had a pair of brass ones all right.

Still, he didn't have long before he had to return home, the situation in Asgard space was still way to fragile for him to take the leisurely holiday helping out his friends like he so desperately wanted, and hadn't had in over a thousand years.

There would come time enough for that when Asgard were no longer dieing of diseases and lack of food, both supposedly cured long ago but returned anew with the near collapse of civilisation after the destruction of the homeworld and the diversion of every resource the Asgard had to containment and then destruction of the Replicator threat.

Whilst O'Neill hadn't asked for anything big, or particularly resource intensive, he had asked for a number of small favours and whilst Thor knew he would have no difficulty carrying them out, it did mean travel time and build time.

First off...

Scan the Ancient device and dump the results from the superior Asgard sensors onto the computer cores of the defending Tau'ri warships. Curse the Ancients for their healthy dose of arrogance once more as the readings come in and send a copy of the readings straight home for analysis. The Ancients hadn't mentioned anything like this, or Thor would have made it an Asgard stronghold long ago. The idea of Anubis or Maktenos having control of such a device, an interdimensional gate, just sent shivers up his spine.

Second off, deploy a satellite which would instantly inform both him and O'Neill of any activity through the gate. O'Neill already had the Earth receiver...

Hmmm...

Should have left one with either Hammond or Carter in the Sol system too. No matter, he would drop one before he went home.

Next off, to check on the weakening Hyper Barrier.

Damn.

Now that was a feat to be proud of.

How had the Ancients managed it?

Sure, they had been more advanced then, before their arrogance and their tendency to jump into any fight head first got them killed but this was beyond advanced, this was true manipulation of the laws of nature themselves, not just use of those laws.

They must have had to do something cataclysmic to get this barrier to form in the first place, to separate Anubis and Iblis from their fleets and keep them away from their technologies, infrastructure and the like. Yet, they also managed to have it maintain itself for a thousand years.

Impressive, even more so that it looked, from a distance, to be a purely natural occurrence. Yet it wasn't, the sensors of his Colonel Carter could just pick out traces of an old underlying structure amongst all the natural chaos.

Still, that was another scan log to dump to the Tau'ri and copy for Analysis later. He had little doubt that a number of Asgard scientists were in for a real treat once this data landed in their laps. He had no doubt they would also try to arrange an expedition to both locations, but Thor knew there would not be time for purely scientific curiosity for years yet. They would have to rely on whatever data the Tau'ri could get, O'Neill had already promised to pass it on.

Next stop, Minbar and they weren't expecting him which could make things interesting. He just hoped Wier would get word and vouch for him before he had to start disabling ships, of course, when one is as technologically aware as the Asgard, its easy to help luck along a little...

xxx

Groaning, Weir yawned, groggily rising up from her bed as her alarm sounded. Then, abruptly stopped, all trace of tiredness washed away in an instant as she caught sight of the message written on a heavy plastic and attached to her door.

Her locked door.

With Minbari Warriors and Marine's patrolling the corridors outside, indeed the entire complex and both Tau'ri and Minbari sensors running constantly on security mode.

And no alarm having been raised during the night, nor had she been woken up at all. Damn. Whoever managed that was either very good, or very lucky.

Weir rose up, pistol sliding easily from under the pillows and into her hands as she carefully walked towards the note, wearily glancing around the room for any other signs of intrusion.

She glanced at the note, and groaned, slipping the safety back onto her pistol.

Damn O'Neill he was even teaching aliens his own thankfully unique brand of humour now.

She grabbed the radio of her desk, “"Wier to Sheppard, you up?”"

“"Ask me again after about twenty coffees..."

Weir smiled, as she imagined the look that would soon be appearing on Sheppard face, “"did you know the Asgard are sending a ship here?”"

“"The Asgard? bang ow, shit that hurt. Asgard? Why? When? Who did that happen, I thought they weren't talking to us now”"

Weir glanced at the note, a wry expression on her face, “"Thor left a note whilst I was asleep"”

“"In your room?”"

"“Yep”"

“"Perving aliens... lovely”"

The wry look was replaced with a disturbed one, “"Sheppard? Please keep your thoughts to yourself”"

xxx

Thor's visit wasn't a long one, O'Neill had asked for the Stingray to be shipped back to Earth for repair something he knew the O'Neill class could do to far larger vessels but it was a capability the Tau'ri didn't have yet, not over significant distances.

But Thor couldn't be bothered with the effort it would take, far easier to just repair the compact warship himself in situ and let the Tau'ri decide what to do with it then, after all, it wasn't as if the ship didn't have a crew already aboard to run her.

Next on his list was an update on the Drakh/Anubis alliance, something he wanted for himself and for his people, after all, after the Replicators, Anubis was the next big threat and they would have to get involved at some point. Besides which, he had a bone to pick with Anubis and he would pick it, even if he had to make Anubis corporeal just so he could pull his bones out one by one...

Oh no, he told himself inwardly, not a sore subject at all.

Damn, O'Neill really was rubbing off on him, even his inner voice was getting sarcastic.

Still, despite Weir's obvious hinting he couldn't stay.

One last quick stop at Earth, then it was back to Asgard space and rejoin the rebuilding.