Spoilers for Season 4 discussed in this chapter.
They had ringed down to the lab.
Jonas looked around wonderingly at the wall shelves and installments full of symbiotes, each in their individual containers. "There must be hundreds of them," he remarked.
"Yes."
"And Ashtoreth was going to make all of them into soldiers?"
"With my help. She asked me to develop a method of communicating with these symbiotes via a mental link. I've been trying, but I haven't been able to succeed yet."
"Hmmmmmm." Jonas sat down on a chair near the glass table that Kianna and Netty often used for their work. "And these symbiotes are being kept alive… with…"
"Pond water. Yes, I know. A few other nutrients, and carefully regulated electrical pulses and oxygen levels. I have collected enough notes by now to replicate that part of her work."
"Great! So you're telling me that you could keep these symbiotes alive if we started transporting them out of here now." He stood up again.
"Alive? Maybe. But how many trips would that take us? How would we go unnoticed a dozen times from the stargate? And on top of that, there's still another problem."
"Which is?"
She braced herself. "Kelnoreem."
He just twitched a little, awaiting further explanation.
"Without Kelnoreem, these symbiotes will never be able to inhabit a human host. They will die shortly after reaching the age of maturity."
"Did Ashtoreth know this?"
"Yes. That is why she developed this." Ophrenet rose and went to Ashtoreth's lectern, where she took down the autonomic control panel. It was wire-free, so she carried it over and set it down on the table where Jonas was sitting.
"She was able to adjust the levels of these variables to induce a state of Kelnoreem in the symbiote. I was able to replicate this. However, the symbiotes also need a human biologic element in order to learn."
"What does that mean?"
"That is why she was in the habit of performing human sacrifices."
"Oh." He frowned in a fair bit of disgust. "They need…"
"Blood."
"Well, surely they don't need a whole humans' worth of blood…"
"For her purposes."
"For just one."
"No, each one takes only a trace amount." Netty wasn't sure what he was getting at. Kianna had a vague idea, though.
"Can we do an experiment now?" Jonas asked.
"Yeah, sure, I don't see why not." Kianna plopped down next to him.
He got up and tinkered around, figuring out how to get a canister down from the wall. Kianna didn't go to instruct him, she knew he learned better by puzzling things out himself.
"So your plan," he said. "These symbiotes. You raise them all to maturity here in these capsules. Somehow. Start a blood drive, or maybe find some acceptable substitute. What then? We agreed to take on one symbiote, not eight hundred. How are you going to find hosts for them all?"
Netty was trying to hide her feelings, but Kianna could sense them all the same. They roiled in frustration.
"You want me to just let them die?"
"No, but I don't see what's the alternative."
"We'll find hosts here on the planet."
"Eight hundred consenting hosts here on the planet?"
Netty's eyes flashed yellow but she said nothing. However, just in that moment, Kianna caught a glimpse of her imagination. And she didn't like it.
You can't do that.
They'll be good. It's okay because they're good. The humans will come to understand. You did.
And I shouldn't have to explain how different our case is. I know what you want. You want to use force or deception to implant eight hundred Goa'uld symbiotes in unsuspecting hosts, and just kind of hope that everything works out.
I don't see what choice I have. Aren't their lives worth the same as the life of a human?
Yes, but—Netty—
"Netty?" repeated Jonas, before realizing that he must be interrupting something.
I don't see how that plan is any different from Ashtoreth's.
What? It's totally different.
The only difference is that she wanted to forcibly implant the population in order to make them into soldiers for galactic domination. You want to make them into your protégés to spread your ideas and influence—and you think yours are better than hers—but if you use her same methods your claims of being "good" or "reforming the Goa'uld" fall apart from the bottom.
Netty pushed a moment, and Kianna pushed back.
The Goa'uld crumbled.
I—I—I know. You're right. I'm sorry.
But Netty knew that "sorry" just wasn't sufficient. This whole plan—everything she'd been playing at over the last few days—it was a bluff. An impossible façade, dragging her toward a precipice. She couldn't have her dreams of power and her professed values at the same time.
"I know," she said, out loud, to Jonas. "It's ridiculous. Forget I said it. We'll have to leave and make our base somewhere else. I don't know how many symbiotes we can take with us, but…" Her eyes teared up. She was about to cry. Kianna, help. She'd never felt less in control of the body while being in control. She was piloting this meat sack and she was about to cry against her will? Ridiculous.
"Hey," said Jonas gently. "It's okay. We don't need this place. We'll take as many as we can, and find hosts for as many as we can. We can get this thing working." He set the capsule down on the table with a heavy thud. "And I know just how we're going to do it. I just remembered one of the files that I read when I was working with the Tau'ri."
She dried her eyes, managing to get her emotions under control for the moment. This announcement usually preceded something good; Netty and Kianna both listened at attention.
"Teal'c, the Jaffa—you remember him, right? He once knew a woman, a Jaffa priestess named Shaun'ac, who claimed to be able to communicate mentally with her symbiote."
Netty had never heard of such a thing before. "Claimed, you say? Was it successful?"
"She said that she had advanced to such a deep state of Kelnoreem that her vital functions slowed to a point where, momentarily, her heart actually stopped. It was at this point that she was able to communicate with her symbiote. Teal'c attempted to do the same thing, and he was able to communicate with his symbiote as well."
"Really."
"Shaun'ac's symbiote was named Tanith. She claimed she'd been able to share memories of love and goodness with it, and it returned her affections."
"It did?" She leaned forward on the edge of her seat. Perhaps there is some hope for us after all. We are not created with evil natures. She felt better, now, almost, after her guilt and rebuke of a moment ago.
"No, Tanith tricked her. He killed her immediately after maturing, and went on to try and deceive the Tok'ra too. Teal'c was very angry. He dedicated a lot of time to hunting Tanith down and killing him."
"Oh."
Ophrenet fell back in her seat. She felt rather like she'd just been stabbed.
"But, but, but that's not the point, Netty. The point is that it can be done. All you have to do is align the sliders just so that—"
"That the simulated heartbeat seems to stop!" Kianna jumped up. She, at least, felt excitement. Netty had retreated suddenly, somewhere so deep inside herself that for the moment she wasn't even sure what had happened. Why Netty wasn't excited about this new discovery was perplexing and a little worrying.
Netty?
She received no response, but didn't want to let Jonas know that anything was wrong, so she carried on. "Of course. It would be too dangerous for the Jaffa, but we can do it at our leisure since all of this is a simulation." She walked around the table, keeping her hand on the device. "The fact that the symbiotes are memory-free makes it less dangerous, of course, and there's no way we could get the same results as Teal'c or his friend."
Jonas unscrewed the top on the canister. "Do I just—"
He had a pocket knife in his hand. Kianna wondered how he'd managed to hide that without having it taken from him by Circe.
Kianna winced. "Yeah…"
He rolled up his sleeve and made a small nick on the back of his arm, then dipped the tip of the knife, with a few drops of blood on it, into the water.
"We have to hurry and connect it now," said Kianna, and they mounted the canister back on the wall. She quickly plugged the wires and tubes back in, then went back to the control panel. She knew the settings for a normal Kelnoreem. She brought the sliders into alignment, then pulled out her memory recall device and its associated display.
Netty? She tried again, but there was no response.
The brain waves were typical. "It's experiencing a normal Kelnoreem right now," she said. "So if we just…"
"Try lowering the heart rate."
She lowered it a little. "I don't see any change."
"To zero. Slowly."
The electrical pulses, along with the pressure changes in the tank, became slower, farther and farther apart.
She kept looking back and forth between the tank and the screen, watching for any change. And oddly enough, he was right. The symbiote seemed to be waking up. It was moving more, its brain activity was increasing.
Netty! It's working!
Kianna picked up her own half of the memory-recall device from the table and placed it on her temple. She felt as much as heard the twinging screech emitted from the device; and then it was in.
Netty. Come on, Netty.
She searched around for Netty, for the symbiote, for anything other than her own consciousness.
She felt something. A slight pulsating sensation. It drew her in.
Darkness.
Soothing darkness.
Mild agitation, movement. A faint warm light. Soothing darkness. The taste of pond water. The taste of blood.
Kianna's eyes snapped open. Netty! Come on, Netty. You have to be here for this part! I need you!
There was no reply.
How could she share with the symbiote? What would she share that it would need or want? She felt uncertain of how she'd telepathically communicate with a human child, much less a child of another species.
She remembered being a child herself, in their tiny one-room apartment on Kelowna. In Kelowna. She kept forgetting that; it was easy for politicians to change the name of a planet on official documentation, not so easy to change the way you think of it in your mind. She remembered being held in her mother's arms. Gas lamps, floral wallpaper. The bedtime stories about birds and dogs, and friendly garden bugs, that never made her think any more fondly on bugs.
They had been poor back then. Her only toys were dolls that her mother had sewn together by hand out of old clothes and buttons. Mrs. Cyr did her best, but sometimes she'd felt jealous of the other children. She'd always wanted more, to be more successful, to be—
Kianna plucked the memory-recall device from her temple.
What am I doing? How can I know what memories to share? I don't know how this is affecting the symbiote. I could be shaping the Goa'uld race for all of time. Netty, help me!
"Netty?" asked Jonas. "Is it working?"
"It's just me," said Kianna. "I think it's working, but Netty isn't helping me right now." She shook her head.
"What?" He put his hands on the table. "Why not?"
"I think she got a little upset after you told the story about Tanith and Shaun'ac."
"Oh…" he pulled a wry face. "Netty, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that as any sort of reflection on you… really. I know you're in a tough position," he finished lamely.
"I think we need to go back to the palace," said Kianna. "I need some time to sort this out."
Kianna had impersonated Ophrenet sufficiently well to get them all the way back up to the palace, with the exception of her speaking style. However, they were going to need that soon if they wanted to keep up appearances. It really did create a few problems when your second personality decided to ghost you.
It was now evening, and even the Fates had gone home. The censers burned low; she suspected it was Jonas whose job it now was officially to refill them. Making him her Lotar had been clever, but it did have some downsides, one of which was that work didn't actually get done. She'd have to figure that out later. If at all.
Kianna barred the doors of the tree palace; she wasn't expecting any more visitors tonight. She headed up to the Queen's suite, and closed the door between her room and Jonas's.
Netty? She curled up on the four-poster bed, on top of the silk sheet, hugging her knees. I know you're in there.
Kianna was overwhelmed by a sudden wave of despair and self-loathing from her symbiote.
What's going on? Do you want to talk about it? Kianna didn't like these feelings; she felt her own insecurities threatening to flare back up along with them.
I need your help to teach them, she said. I can't do it by myself.
Don't ask me to corrupt them.
Netty's words stood alone, and Kianna was once again reminded that she was mentally communicating with one of those things down in the lab, except attached to her brain stem.
What do you mean?
It's impossible. What you say is impossible. I'm not a good person. I've never been a good person and I've never been innocent like those symbiotes.
Well, Netty… she didn't know what to say.
Jonas? Now there's someone worth preserving. There's a man worth dying for. Just look at that face. He's so damn innocent. I have no right to be anywhere near him. I'm afraid of spoiling him somehow. Hurting him, or worse, corrupting him. I envy him so much.
You envy him?
I've known horrible things since before I can remember. It's a cruel paradox. I don't know if you can even call it a childhood. No immature being should ever be forced to deal with the things I became aware of before I could even understand them. I thought that what I perceived in my memories was just life. How could I have ever turned out anything close to what you think of as normal?
Innocence isn't about what you know, said Kianna, stating a certain fact. It's about what you've done. No external person can corrupt you by giving you wicked knowledge.
Maybe. But this isn't solely something that was done TO me. My memories shaped me from conception. It's a part of who I am. My personality. I'm broken deep down and I'm not innocent. I could be repulsed by the things in my memories but as often as I'm repulsed by them, I'm attracted to them as well. My very existence is an abomination. I should probably be killed for the good of everyone else in this universe. I have evil thoughts, I do evil things, and I'm going to go on having more evil thoughts and doing more evil things.
On my life I can't understand why you chose to be my host.
Because I love you, Ophrenet.
Why do you love me?
Because I see what you are better than you do. I see what you are capable of becoming—great evil, possibly, yes, but also great good.
You actually believe this.
You know that I do.
Why?
Well, for starters, you have the self-awareness and honesty to tell me everything that you just said.
Thanks. It's new.
Now. Netty. Become what you are capable of being. Remember what I said before? Become what you are.
How?
I will help you.
Jonas slept late the next morning. She didn't wake him. She was up a little bit late herself, and it took her a while to put on her queenly clothes and make it down to the throne room to open the court.
The Goa'uld would be expecting her, and there was daily business to attend to before anything else. She still wasn't sure who she would transfer power to, and how she would get out of it alive, and that was one of the issues she needed to bring up with Jonas.
She refilled and lighted the censers herself, then waited for him to join her.
The Fates came to present themselves, bowed before her slightly, and then took their positions outside the door.
Jonas came down in a rather outrageous getup. She supposed he had chosen the closest thing he could find to armor, in anticipation of making their break for it today. He had metal pauldrons on his shoulders, gauntlets on his arms, and his shirt was a halter-top held up by a chain.
"Do you need a spear?" she asked with an amused tone.
He didn't waste a moment, however, his concern spilling over. "Are you all right? How's Netty doing?"
In reply, she beckoned him toward the throne with her fingers. He smiled uncertainly but came up onto the dais.
Still sitting, she reached up and took hold of his chin with the authority of a Goa'uld queen, and gently drew his face down to her own. Her eyes flashed gold.
"That's my girl," Jonas murmured.
They kissed, him leaning over the throne and her twisting backward, one hand behind his neck, the other on his cheek, not wanting to let go of him. Ophrenet felt herself melting, slipping, so much so that she released herself, and she was no longer in control, but Kianna was, and she didn't let go either. How Kianna's heart fluttered! It was as if she was a little girl.
And then it was over.
The doors of the throne room burst open.
Nike, with her stony-gray chiton clasped to one shoulder, stood there with a derisive smirk. "Your Majesty. Am I interrupting something?"
"Yes." Ophrenet released Jonas's face from her fingers and sat up straight. "What is it?"
"You may wish to be aware that my Lord Ba'al's motherships are now en route to Sidon and approaching quickly."