Chapter 7

July 7th, 1945

As the excavator took the first large shovelful of and dirt from the ground, Paul Langford marveled at how much had changed in such a short amount of time. The war in Europe had ended several weeks ago, and Japan was in its death knell. While he was happy that the horrific war was nearing its end, Paul was also pleased at the numerous resources that were becoming available to him and his program, and various military deployments to Europe were being cancelled, or shifted around to focus on Japan. While the logistics train of the United States was a marvel, it was still imperfect, and the occasional shipment of supplies or soldiers had "gone missing" when they were appropriated for the Program. In addition, Truman had discussed his plan to bring the British onboard with the program as well, he planned on letting them know during the conference he was going to in newly defeated Germany later in the month. Paul was surprised how quickly another nation was being brought on board, but agreed with Truman's logic, this gate was a matter of importance for the entire globe and while it was prudent to see as much advancement go to America as possible, not informing other nations about it, and its potential hazards, would be horribly irresponsible, and the British had proven to be a stalwart ally during the war and a good friend to America, despite what Kennedy kept trying to stir up. Having them would be a boon also, given that many of the academics in England specialized in Egyptology and would be great assistance in figuring out more about Ra's people, to say nothing of the military aid that would be brought over as well. Returning his gaze downward, he looked at the papers spread across the hood of the jeep.

Dr. Langford was actually quite proud of the plans for the new facility as he and the engineers poured over the finalized blue prints for the base, which was to be located in a patch of Nevada desert . Originally they were thinking somewhere in Colorado, potentially near the airbase near Colorado Springs, but the area had already been claimed by Fort Carson and not wanting to disclose too much information they would have to do to wrestle the area away, it was decided to move further west. They had settled for a large patch of undeveloped land a few dozen miles north of Las Vegas, and fortuitously, there was still a rather large construction presence in the area owing to build up around Las Vegas, as well as the remnants from the Boulder Dam construction a while back. In addition, the nearby Las Vegas Army Airfield provided a potentially secure area off site that could come to assist in the event the main compound was compromised in any way. In addition, various areas around the base site were earmarked for military use and development as well, so most likely their humble abode would be sharing space with other locations that could serve as secondary lines of defense, as well as masks to help shield the base's true purpose.

Ernest and the others at Heliopolis, including newly promoted 2nd Lieutenant Hammond, had helped as much as they could, drawing up basic plans and using the video link to show Earth. The final result for the gate room was quite impressive. Their main priority was twofold; first it was to make a base that could easily serve as a defensive stronghold in case of incursion from the Stargate, while also still being large enough to allow it to serve as a transit terminal for future exploration and possible expansion out of the Stargate. Ernest and his people had delivered on a strong initial concept for the base: the hallways of the facility were large enough to drive tanks through with ease, but with all pathways leading to the Stargate following a downwards sloping fashion. According to Hammond, this would allow defenders to continually hold the high ground from any incursion, which would have to climb up small inclines to gain access to the rest of the base The main facilities of the base were also located underground, these would consist of barracks, several recreational areas, including a gym, swimming pool, and library, a mess hall, the gate room, plenty of storage areas, all other necessary facilities, and armories that looked like they were supposed to supply a front-line position over in Europe.

The layout of the facility would be fairly simple. A total of four levels were planned, with the gate room located on the lowest one. The room was in essence, a long empty corridor with the Stargate located at the very end. Reminding Langford of the dirigible hangers back east, this cavernous room would protrude from the base so that no facilities would be built above it (for the most part). At the other end of the chamber, in the small area that was to be built below the main base, were to be a series of lifts and elevators, in addition to the ramps that lead to the next level. It was planned that in the event of an off world team needing assistance; the vehicles in the bay above could be rapidly lowered into the gate room in conjunction with vehicles coming down the ramp. This was applied to the base in general, thinking long-term, the corridors were big enough to drive tanks through, complete with ramps to allow them to drive between the levels, and there were plans for a vehicle housing area to be attached to the gate room in the future. The gate room itself was, to put it bluntly, a kill-box. It was roughly a hundred and fifty feet long, and just wide enough for the gate to fit.

There was a second story, accessible only from outside the gate room, that ran along the edge of the room, a U-shaped ledge on top of which would be mounted several machine guns, with enough cover to allow several dozen troops with rifles to hide as well, Running behind the long walls of the gate room, evidenced only by the tall, narrow slits, all angled toward the gate and staggered so that you'd have to really try to hit someone in the corridor on the other side of the gate room, through which machine gun and rifle barrels would protrude, were defensive corridors, designed to provide as much cover as possible to those in them. Near the end of the room where the exit was, two additional machine guns would be planted. There were several indentations in the floor where shaped-charge anti-tank explosives would be placed. In a stroke of barbaric genius, the suggestion had been made by a clearly sadistic corporal to rig up a flamethrower at the base of the ramp, serviceable by a crawlspace underneath. Or put it to one side of the gate. Either way, "Roast the alien bastards before they can even look around," had been the corporal's words. They were still considering that possibility. Finally, a swing-down barrier raised by electric winch would be installed. The winch would be housed in the ceiling, completely concealed by the barrier when the barrier was not in active position, to keep it safe from damage. The doors at the gate room's exit could be blocked by thick plates that would roll across them on motors and wheel tracks. Overall, if an alien decided to send his troops through and Earth's weapons could affect them, the only thing he'd be doing was sending them into a meat grinder.

They also had the last ditch failsafe as well. The plan was to line four fifths of the chamber's roof and upper walls with explosives which could be detonated in the event control of the base was lost. In that case, the ceiling above the gate would cave in, filling the entire room with sand and dirt, burying the gate and hopefully preventing its use. In addition, a number of shaped explosive charges would be placed on the outer ring of the gate, at the top on the front, and on the bottom on the back, designed to go off before the charges that would collapse the gateroom to attempt to land the gate on its back and use gravity as a weapon so that anything coming out fell back in.

The third level was the nerve center of the base. A control room was located near the gate, so that it had a small view above the sole entrance to the gate room. Inside would be charts, maps, radios, and there were even talks of a computer. This room would serve as the coordination center of the base, as well as off world operations. In addition, the main armory was on this level, while there were several other smaller ones that would be located near the barracks, this one would be the main repository of the bases countless munitions and arms, as well as the heavier weapons that couldn't be stored in the level two armories. In addition, a rather sizable medical wing was also to be located on this level, complete with an operational and surgical suite, an x-ray machine, as well as several quarantine chambers and even a large decompression chamber, in addition to a smaller mobile one. A small secure conference room would also be built adjacent to the command center. Finally a small wing of holding cells were also planned for the base, in the event they needed to capture or contain an alien.

Level Two was the largest area, here is where the barracks and the internal vehicle hanger bay were to be located, as well as many of the crew facilities. The vehicle bay was by far the largest room of the base, easily twice the size of the gate room. Capable of housing dozens of tanks and other vehicles, in addition to maintaining and refueling them, this room also had a large lift that could connect directly to the gate room to lower a small number of vehicles directly into the room, in the event of rapid deployment. Finally, vehicle weapons and ammunition were located in a secure armory built off to the side of the bay, on the opposite end of the fuel storage location. The barracks were a series of multiple housing wings that had central communal meeting and recreational halls, in addition to housing several gym facilities. There was also a small movie there and library located on this level as well. In addition, several hydroponic gardens were planned as well, both to provide fresh food for the soldiers, and to provide a solid stream of food in the event the base got cut off from outside support for some reason.

Level One was primarily for intake. A briefing room was located here to allow new arrivals to become familiar with the facility, and much of the bases non-essential storage would be located here as well. There were also several small security stations guarding the only entrance into the base as well, a giant, three meter solid steel gate which used a series of hydraulic pumps to open and close. On the surface, all that could really be seen of the base area was a small hill with a giant metal door built into it. If it weren't for the small road leading to the base or the acres of barbed chain-link fence surrounding the facility, it would be fairly inconspicuous all in all, yet would be the home to thousands of soldiers and personnel.

July 20th, 1945

As Truman signaled the technician to come in and remove the projector, he looked over at Prime Minister Winston Churchill as he took a long slip of brandy from his tumbler. As he uncorked the decanter and poured himself another drink, he finally looked up at Truman and spoke.

"So, just to reiterate, you found an ancient alien device that can send you to different worlds, you have a base in an ancient alien castle, and on one of the three places you can connect to, you found a group of aliens that can shoot heat rays at you?"

"Well, we don't think they're heat rays, but yes that's the gist of it."

"Well, I can certainly say that Britain and her people appreciate you telling us this, obviously this is quite the discovery."

"Indeed, though right now we're obviously planning on keeping this classified for a long while, there are just too many unknowns about it currently, and bringing it forward to the world right now, or even at some point in the immediate or near future, could cause enormous problems."

"Oh, agreed, rest assured we'll stay mum on this."

"Excellent. Also, any British involvement will, of course, remain contingent on the United Kingdom's continued silence pertaining to this device. Which brings me to my next point; we're slowly building a combat force capable of responding to any threats that might emerge from this Stargate. We're presently working on converting the 13th Airborne for this task but it will take some time. If you and your people can contribute any forces, it would be greatly appreciated."

"Indeed, I can promise you that if I win in a couple days, you'll have that support, but…well, Attlee and Labour have been running strong and they might be taking the reins from this old warhorse. I'll see what I can do in the event that happens, but be ready to give this briefing all over again if they do win. In general though, I think regardless of whichever man wins, you can count on Great Britain's assistance, though we might be tied up for a while. A lot of our colonial holdings are in a tad bit of a spot, the natives are getting uppity in a lot of places, India especially." Taking another sip of brandy, he muttered to himself , "I kept telling everyone that we should have hung that Gandhi bastard when we the chance."

"Anyways, I'm glad to have your assistance Mr. Prime Minister, regardless of which way the political situation goes."

"Indeed, and who knows, perhaps one day the British flag will fly proudly over an alien world, who knows, perhaps there are some aliens out there in need of civilizing."

August 1st, 1945

As Truman signaled the technician to come in and remove the projector, he looked over at Prime Minister Clement Attlee, who was taking a long sip of a cut of tea. As he slowly steeped another cup, he looked up at Truman and spoke.

"Well…Churchill was certainly right, this is quite significant." he said as he set his utensils down.

"I take it then he filled you in on a lot of the details then?"

"He did, though he mentioned that I should still see the footage you had…Well, I can safely say that yes, the United Kingdom will provide whatever assistance it can to your efforts Mr. President."

Truman sighed with relief; he'd been worried that the new British government might not be as amiable to supporting the Stargate. As he began to settle in, though, Attlee spoke up.

"So when are you planning on informing the Soviets about this?" he asked innocently as he sipped on his tea.

Sitting up straight, Truman looked into Attlee's eyes "Never … or at least not for any immediate frame of time. We're not going to risk Stalin getting his hands on any alien technology."

"Oh come now, Mr. President, Stalin and his people are our allies, may I remind you they took the brunt of Hitler's forces and are partners at this conference. Considering this is a matter of global security, it would be prudent to inform them."

"If it was any other power, I'd agree with you, but this is Stalin, I don't trust that man any further than I can throw him."

Frowning, Attlee set his tea down before continuing "Ah yes, Churchill kept warning us about the Soviets. Did you know that nutter wanted to rearm the Germans and send them right back at the Soviets while we helped them invade? Preposterous! I concede Stalin may be a strong arm tactics user, and there certainly have been unsavory reports of his opponents…"disappearing," but he's not some power mad megalomaniac who's bent on world domination. Considering the Soviets have one of the largest militaries and manufacturing bases left intact from this whole horrific war, it would be absurd to not include them."

"That may be Mr. Prime Minister, but myself, and my government feel quite differently on this. For the time being we don't want any Soviet involvement; while that could change later on, our present concerns with Stalin and his forces have left us quite adamant on this. And as I'm sure Churchill told you, British involvement would be contingent on your government being able to keep this a secret as well."

Attlee frowned at the not so veiled threat, but he still sat tall. Speaking quietly, with a small edge to his voice, he continued, "We can keep this a secret, Mr. President. I may not agree with you, but we will, if only to gain access to these technologies. But know this, when it comes to safety of our planet, and its inhabitants, we cannot be picky about our allies. I'd have thought this war would have hammered that point home…Mr. President."

Pulling out a briefcase, Attlee pulled out several pieces of paper and began to write several things down. "We're a bit spread thin for the moment, but I think we can manage to pull up a few squads and some equipment for your program. Churchill already gave us the specifics about it; they need to be comfortable with the prospect of potentially never returning home and such. We'll also start scouting some of our academies and other programs to find qualified scientists and others who may be of some assistance as well."

Finishing his notes, he looked back to Truman and extended his hand "His Majesty's Government looks forward to working with the United States on this endeavor."

Smiling Truman took his hand and shook it. The program had just gotten a boost that he was sure Dr. Langford would be pleased about.

Meanwhile in another hotel room in Potsdam, Pavel and Boris looked at the scattered papers around them.

"Have you found anything yet, Boris?" Pavel asked, as he discarded another stack of papers

"Nothing yet, comrade, the British and Americans have been fairly through, they've even found our bugs so we've got nothing from the American president's meeting with the British."

Pavel swore, the same thing happened when they tried to bug his meeting with Churchill. They'd been pouring over communiques and other documents they'd manage to steal and or copy, but so far had no luck in uncovering anything vital.

After another hour of searching, Pavel say backwards on his bed and huffed. They'd been at this for three days, trying to find any kind of information that could prove useful, but so far no luck. Just as he started to close his eyes, Boris gave a shout of joy.

"What is it?" Pavel yelped as he snapped his eyes open.

"You remember that program the American started a little bit ago, that 100 million dollar one that bugged you? Well I found its name. Area 52!"

"Excellent, what is its function?" he said as he stood up.

"Eh…well that's the thing, it doesn't list its function, only the name and a very large classified stamp."

"Well fuck, that doesn't really give us too much, does it Boris?" he snapped.

"Hey now, at least we know the name of that thing. Maybe once we finally have some time we can investigate." Clapping his hands he continued, "Now come on, we have to keep looking for anything that has mention of Manhattan or Trinity."

Rubbing his eyes, Pavel say back down and continued to look through the papers.

January 5th, 1946

Ernest was staring at the currently-active light emitter. Well, more accurately, he was staring at the atomic structures it emitted. There had to be some kind of rhyme and reason to it all. He paced around the room, glancing up and down. He'd been here almost a year by Earth reckoning, and they still had so much work they needed to do. Several more groups had come through, boosting Heliopolis's population to just over one hundred. Four squads of soldiers now lived here, including the British squad that had come through with several specialists from the United Kingdom. All guarded the civilians. Hammond organized daily exercise regimens for the soldiers which usually consisted of them running up and down the spiral stair case several times a day. They'd also rigged a mechanical pulley system to create moving targets at the gate room's improvised shooting range so they could try and maintain their shooting training. Most of the civilians had also become proficient with some form of fire arm, usually one of the pistols. The location had settled into something of a routine as well. In addition to recently-authorized scouting missions out to five kilometers in all accessible directions on land, when people weren't working on their assigned tasks, they were usually clearing out rubble. That was one strange thing they had discovered about the castle, it was a sturdy building, apparently more than capable of taking severe punishment, but something had clearly happened a long time ago that damaged it relatively severely. Anything like this on Earth would have probably crumbled or been just about ready to fall apart, but here, the superstructure, they had discovered, was reinforced with strange steel like metal that they had so far failed to acquire a sample of. Nothing seemed to affect the metal, and when they tried to take a small chunk off with a cutting torch, the metal rapidly cooled to the touch. They'd spent half a year now trying to figure out how to get a piece of the metal for a sample. In the meantime, they'd been slowly going through the castle and removing rubble, starting from the lower levels and working up; using mostly their hands and a few hand baskets, they'd managed to clear out roughly ninety percent of the castle, only few upper rooms still had rubble left in them. Soon Heliopolis would be back up to 100%.

Looking back to the lights, Ernest continued to struggle with them. They were missing something, something that could help them decipher it in the long run. He couldn't figure out, though, why the vertical height of the projected atoms varied so much. If this was just a fancy book, why were the lines so crooked and the spaces between the atoms so inconsistent? Unlike the other writing in Heliopolis, this one had been maddeningly frustrating, even some of the writings on the wall in this chamber were getting deciphered; Dr. Norwich was making headway on the set of runes which, according to him, were very similar to a set of runes found in ancient Nordic settlements, which itself opened up the possibility of further alien involvement beyond merely Egyptian god-impersonators. Looking back to the projector, though, it was like a book written by someone who didn't know how to keep the lines straight or evenly space the words out. There was no reason for such chaos in such a technological form, though. Unless…

"Of course!" he said quietly. "We've all been idiots! The height of and spacing between the atoms are part of the code's structure!"

Picking up a pencil he began to trace several of the lines and dots, mentally reciting several compound and other base structures. To his delight, the lines matched up to several of the compounds in his mind. The language, the code, it was a basic building block for a language, it had to be if this was indeed some kind of meeting place, they would need some kind of universal written way to communicate, and what could be more simple than the very unchanging elements of the universe itself. Just as he began to settle himself in to start taking notes, Dr. Stevens came rushing down the staircase, and nearly ran into Ernest.

"Oomph." he said as he caught himself just before colliding. "Ernest!" He half shouted excitedly, "We have something! Something huge!" He gestured at Ernest to follow him as he darted up the stairs.

Sighing, Ernest put his pencil and pad away, the console would still be there later, he supposed. As he ran and followed Robert, he strained to hear him over the small echo of the stairwell.

"…We were moving some rubble from one of the side rooms near the gate, that's been kind of low on our list, since we've mostly be building up near the gate room and clearing out the living rooms. But then we turned over some of the rubble and found something! We've been straightening it up and re aligning it and…" He stopped as they reached the small alcove, Robert doubling over and wheezing as he struggled to catch his breath "… there … were … coordinates!" he finished as Ernest entered the room.

There were dozens of pieces of rubble arranged against the wall, meticulously put back together so their images realigned in a reasonably readable fashion. The stone was at least twelve feet tall, and carved into it were dozens of stargate coordinates.

"We've counted at least 54 coordinate sets on this cartouche so far, while they're probably only a fraction of viable addresses, we theorize that since Ra and his people may have only lived here a short time, they only had time to mark down a comparatively small handful of possible planets, and most likely, these were the important or significant ones." Robert said standing up straight.

"That's good work." Ernest said admiring the cartouche, next to each address was a small inscription of hieroglyphs, most likely denoting the importance of that address. "Once we start exploring we'll have a list of potential worlds to visit an.." he said before Robert cut him off.

"That's not all, Ernest. Look at the coordinate set that's third from the bottom." Stevens said, handing Ernest a piece of paper. On it was another set of scribbled out translations from the doctor until he'd finally unscrambled it. It read "Those of the first world." Looking at the cartouche again, next to those hieroglyphs were also a large number of what appeared to be crudely drawn humans. Most of the other addresses had a simple star, or a star and column next to their address.

"Those of the first world, and it had a drawing of humans! Ernest, I think this is Earth's address!" he said, his voice rising. "We've found Earth! We aren't stranded anymore!"

"Hold on Robert, this could mean anything; it could be Ra's home world for all we know. We need to be careful and think this through." he said, his voice not betraying his excitement. If this was Earth, they could all go home. On the other hand, it could be something dangerous. "Let's follow protocol; I'll dial this address and radio to see if it's home."

Catherine's eyes widened as she saw the ring, she remembered it all too well from when she accompanied her father on his trip to Egypt nearly twenty years ago. As she walked through the warehouse, she could hardly believe what her father had told her about its purpose. At first she'd though he was just teasing her, humoring her as he tried to explain what had happened to Ernest. Those first few weeks after Ernest had left had been hard, when her father had said that he had to send him to England to meet with others for an emergency project. Then he said that a new meeting had to happen in Australia, and then a few weeks after that, another one in Canada. She'd grown suspicious and confronted her father about it, and he finally admitted that he and Ernest were involved in a classified project and couldn't tell her more. He also explained that due to its nature, Ernest couldn't really talk to her.

So she'd waited, months passed by and nothing happened, Ernest was still gone and her father was still tight lipped. She'd continue to pester him about it, and she could see that he wanted to tell her, but couldn't. So it'd come to her as a surprise when he approached her and offered to explain everything. They had to go through a lot of hoops first, she had to submit multiple forms of identification to the government, go through several interrogations about her political views and views of other nations, had her entire background reviewed, her choices in friends and acquaintances examined, and then sign a mountain of paperwork that basically said opening her mouth about it would be a one-way ticket to a dark cell for probably the rest of her life, and that she understood those consequences perfectly well. But she'd done it without a second thought, since it all meant she could finally find out what happened to Ernest.

Her father explained most of it on the drive to the warehouse. She'd been shocked when he explained it, but she slowly had time to process what he said. A doorway to another world, Ernest being trapped in an alien castle, and the strange being with the light staff, one thing was for sure, it'd take a bit of time to adjust to the new reality. As the entered the warehouse, he father was finishing up his speech.

"…And so in a little bit, we'll be dialing Heliopolis and sending a regular supply shipment. While we do that, you can radio Ernest. I'm sure he'd love to hear from you in person." he said with a smile.

As they entered the room, though, the gate seemed to already be on, a pool of blue light bathing the center of the ring. Various soldiers milling around to the side of the gate, their weapons to their sides.

"What the hell?" he father muttered, "I told them to wait on the shipment until we arrived." He began to walk towards the gate technician who was talking into his radio.

"It's all clear," she could hear him say as he father approached him. She wasn't paying attention though as she stood, entranced by the gate. Suddenly, a small whoosh sound emanated from the gate as a solo figure dashed through the blue light and onto the ramp. Her eyes widened…

"Ernest!" she shouted, as the figure caught sight of her and broke out into a mad sprint. She saw her father look up as Ernest dashed over to her and scooped her up in his arms and spun around a couple times.

"Catherine!" he said with a loud whisper and he rested his forehead against hers and looked into her eyes, a large grin on his face. Looking up to her father, he gestured to her with his head with a confused look on his face. Her father smiled and nodded his head.

"We figured it out, well, Robert figured it out! Earth's address, we have it, we can finally go back and forth … we can come home!"

Looking back at her, he gave her a long kiss as the two held each other, finally reunited after being apart for the better part of a year.

Catherine broke the kiss, stepped out of Ernest's embrace, and then slapped him. "What were you thinking?!" she yelled. "You could have been killed! And you didn't even think to tell me you were going to risk your life doing something so stupid!"

Ernest was stunned by Catherine's action. "What?" he said.

"We were supposed to be married months ago, and then you go off and risk your life without knowing what you're walking into! What would have happened if you'd been killed?"

Paul stepped over and put a hand on Catherine's shoulder. "Catherine, stop." he said. "Ernest could have been killed, yes, but he was the only one willing to take the risk of going through. If he hadn't, we'd still be just as ignorant of what's out there. Ernest's actions have led us to realize that there are dangers and wonders out there that we never imagined. Now, because of Ernest's risk, we can begin finding ways to protect ourselves from the things out there that would have no issue destroying us or enslaving us or doing other things to us. Ernest is a hero to Earth."

Catherine stewed for a moment. "You could have told me." she said quietly after a moment's silence.

"I'm sorry." Ernest said. "I wasn't thinking. I was so excited by what could be out there, I didn't stop to think about the effect it would have on you. I assumed that coming home would be easy." he said.

"I'd like to see this place, this Heliopolis, for myself." Catherine said. "I want to see where you've spent the last ten months."

"Oh, you'll love it." Ernest said eagerly. "It's incredible! Wait until you see the projector room! And the control center! There's so much there, lifetimes of research! Whoever built it, I pray they're still around so I can meet them one day!"

Paul spoke up. "I never said she could go through, Ernest."

"You have to let me!" Catherine said.

"You have to let her!" Ernest said simultaneously.

"No, I don't have to. And I won't. Not until I've had a chance to speak to Truman about this latest development. " He said taking a few small steps back. But then Paul Langford's lips broke into a small smile "And then, I'm going back with you two. I want to see this place with my own eyes at last."