1"They don't make any sense!" Daniel complained to Teal'c in the commissary. Teal'c gave him an annoyed look, Daniel hadn't stopped complaining since he'd been kicked out of his lab. First it had been that they'd taken over his lab, then it'd been that they wouldn't tell him what the Code was or what the papers on his wall said, then it was that nothing made sense...

"It does to them, DanielJackson."

"I know. I just wish they'd tell me..."

They were interrupted when the 'they' in question entered the room. Sam and Jack had been in conference with Morgan since she'd arrived the day previously, and they hadn't eaten since. "Finally!" Daniel said, getting up and hurrying past his friends to get into his office. Both Sam and Jack smirked at Teal'c, bringing trays of food over.

"What is funny?"

"It's still locked, he'll be back in a few minutes."

"Can you not let him into his own office?"

"Don't know," Teal'c raised an eyebrow.

"We're not sure how we're keeping him out."

"Did you not rewrite the security protocol on the key reader?"

"Nope."

"That is odd."

"Indeed," Jack said, imitating his friend's voice.

Daniel came back into the commissary then, looking like he was going to strangle his friends, who immediately jumped away from the table to hide on the far side behind Teal'c. "Why can't I get in?"

"We're not sure."

"What do you mean?"

"We didn't do anything to the card reader, or the cameras, but apparently they're not working..."

"What did Morgan say?" They glanced at each other but didn't say anything, so Daniel repeated his question. Teal'c turned around to observe the pair of them, raising an eyebrow.

No, Jack.

C'mon, Sam, it's Teal'c and Daniel, fercryinoutloud.

She said not to tell them.

She didn't say why.

So?

So... I like to know why I'm not allowed to do things.

That's never stopped you from doing them anyways.

If memory serves you came along on a few such missions yourself.

Well- we were saving the world... again.

Yes, but we're saving the world again here. And if we end up going anywhere they're coming too.

Whether we like it or not.

I know. Jack opened his mouth but was interrupted by the loudspeakers.

UNAUTHORIZED OFFWORLD ACTIVATION.

Of course there is.

It's always something, sir.

Why do you continue to do that?

It's a habit, Jack, habits tend to be hard to break.

Fine. She cocked her head and smiled a little in response, following the pair of them to the control room.

"Chief?" Landry asked, glancing at Walter as SG-1 and Jack entered the room, Mitchell and Teal'c coming from the opposite side that the others came from.

"It's the Asgard, sir."

"Right on time," Jack said perkily, striding down the steps and into the 'gate room.

I thought they'd bring a ship, not use the 'gate.

So did I but... I dunno, they're they Asgard. They can do whatever the hell they want.

True, sir.

I'm not even going to comment.

Good.

Sam followed him into the 'gateroom, leaving her confused teammates behind. Teal'c and Daniel jumped after them after a moment, but Mitchell decided to stay with Landry in the control room, he hadn't really met the Asgard yet.

"Thor, buddy, good to see you!"

"I am glad you are alive, O'Neill, Carter."

Ooo, you've been updated to last name status! The pair of them chuckled.

"Hi, Thor," Sam said.

"What's going on?" Daniel asked, Teal'c looked just as eager to find out, though 'eager' wouldn't be the word used to describe him.

"I was told to come as quickly as possible, and so- I am here."

"Thanks for coming, Thor-" Sam started.

"-we need you to look at something." Jack finished for her.

"It's in Daniel's lab," Sam led the way. Thor glanced at Daniel and Teal'c, slightly amused to hear the pair of them finishing sentences for each other. Daniel and Teal'c could only shrug, they were still adjusting to it.

Mitchell watched from the control booth, feeling slightly left out. Usually he would be down there with his team, trying to fit himself into their little system, learning their inside jokes, and deciphering their unspoken language, but not with the General there. It didn't help that Daniel, Teal'c and Thor had just had a short conversation with their eyes. He glanced at Landry, knowing the man was feeling similarly.

- - - - - -

They were all standing in front of the wall that had been plastered with the images of the Code.

"Thor, we need you to tell us where we can find more of this," Jack said, motioning to the wall in general.

"Some of it's missing," Sam pointed to the corner that wasn't quite as perfectly rounded as the other corners.

"Morgan was... recalled before she could tell us where to find what we need to complete the puzzle."

"Recalled?" Daniel was concerned.

"Yeah, the others approved of her visit, but they didn't want her giving too much away."

"Indeed," Teal'c said looking thoughtful.

"I have seen this text before..." Thor said glancing from the wall to Sam to Jack and back to the wall. "I do not understand why you would want to find anymore of it."

"Care to explain what it is?" Landry asked, coming into Daniel's lab closely followed by Mitchell. Whatever barrier Sam and Jack had put on the door no longer seemed to be in effect, though no key cards but their own would open the door, and the security cameras wouldn't work either.

You explain, Sam said.

No, you. They're more used to hearing you explain stuff.

What're you going to do? Sit there?

Yes. But I'll add some things if I feel like it.

Well, thank you for the support.

Anytime. She rolled her eyes at him before taking a seat at Daniel's desk.

"All right, long story short," she glanced at Jack before continuing. "We died, we ascended, we got lots of stuff added to our heads, we ended up in Atlantis, we made ZPMs, we came back here. Part of the stuff that was added to our heads was the knowledge of the Ancients, telepathy, and the key for the Code."

"The language the Ancients translated everything into when they realized that they were all moving on," Jack supplemented when Thor gave them a blank look.

"The Code reads like normal Ancient unless you have the key. The key is like a marker in the brain, various conditions have to be met before the key activates. The Ancients set it up this way so that only those they approved of would be able to translate the Code. Even if we were to translate the Code aloud to you, all you would hear would be annoying rhymes and jingles," she glanced pityingly at Daniel, who was feeling left out of the lingual loop.

"The Ancients left some of their stuff behind without enCoding it, they didn't not want to be remembered, they just wanted their secrets. Especially from the Ori."

"Like that head-gripping brain-filling thing the General encountered- twice, I believe?" Mitchell asked. They nodded, and Jack received a few careful glances from his friends.

Aww... look how much they care!

Very sentimental, sir.

Shut up. It's touching.

I didn't say anything!

"Right, they hoped to bring the people of our galaxy to enlightenment through the clues they left behind," Sam continued.

"Why leave the Code then? Why not just have people ascend when they're ready and tell them all about it?"

"There are different levels among the ascended too," Jack said.

"Really? What level was I?" Daniel asked.

"They didn't say," Sam said before Jack could blurt it out.

"What level were you?" Landry asked.

"We weren't ascended long enough to be categorized," Jack said, picking up on Sam's discomfort. In truth they had been allowed into much higher circles than Daniel had been.

"Anyway," Sam said, attempting to return to the explanation. "They left the Code so that if any of them returned to our humble plain of existence they would still have access to things they'd need to know. If they were down here with us they wouldn't be able to hold everything in their heads, so they'd have to have a book to read. Not all of the ascended know all of the secrets of the universe, therefore not all of the ascended get the key."

"Makes sense," Mitchell shrugged, Sam and Jack nodded in unison.

"Doctor Foster went to Gloucester in a shower of rain. He stepped in a puddle right up to his middle, and never went there again," Jack told them as though it were the most important phrase that had ever been written. He received blank stares from his teammates.

"One, two, three, four five- once I caught a fish alive. Six, seven, eight, nine, ten- then I let it go again. Why did I let it go? Because it bit my finger so. Which finger did it bite? The little finger on the right," Sam intoned with all seriousness.

Landry and Thor were wearing similar concerned looks. Teal'c raised an eyebrow, Daniel looked more than slightly confused, and Mitchell burst out laughing.

"What do the town of Gloucester and getting bitten by a fish have to do with the Ancients?" Teal'c asked.

"What?" Sam and Jack asked. As far as they had been aware, they had spoken in Ancient, reading their friends a portion of the Code. "What did you hear?"

Daniel repeated the nursery rhymes to them. They shook their heads, Jack chuckled. "Well, there went that."

How are we going to get them to go there if we can't explain why?

Well, they already know we have to get the Sangraal.

Yeah, but that wont help them understand what we have to do with it.

They trust us.

They better. e .

Of course they do! She glared at him.

"Care to share?" Daniel asked.

"We have to How many miles to Babylon? Three score and ten. Can I get ther by candlelight? Aye, and back again. If your feet are nimble and light, you'll get there by candlelight," Jack said, sighing in frustration when he saw the blank looks on his friends' faces.

"I am a pretty little Dutch girl, as pretty as I can be. And all the boys in the neighborhood are crazy over me," Sam tried. Daniel chuckled.

"I didn't know you were Dutch," Mitchell said.

"This is a predicament, indeed," Thor sighed. If the little gray alien was frustrated they knew they were in trouble. Jack ran his hands through his silver hair and sighed in frustration. This isn't working.

Agreed.

"Okay, we need to find the Sangraal, you knew that. I do not like thee, Doctor Fell, the reason why, I cannot tell; but this I know, and full well, I do not like thee, Doctor Fell," Jack sighed when he realized the last of his words had come too close to what the Code said for his friends' ears. "Ummm- We need to find this portion of missing text- that's where the 'gate address is."

"We were hoping you'd know where we could find the rest of the text, Thor."

"It is in one of the oldest Asgard museums," Thor said, glad to be able to make sense of what they said. "Unfortunately, you would have to go and see it; there is no chance that the High Council would let me remove it to bring it to you."

"They kept it even though its nonsense to them?" Daniel asked.

"Many artifacts that have been discovered over the years have little meaning to us. The museum it is housed in is reserved for Ancient artifacts; they were our friends and we try to preserve what is left of them."

That's almost profound.

Sir, you ruined the moment!

I didn't say anything!

But I could still hear you.

Sorry...

Sorry, I just had to add that stuff about Mitchell feeling out of the loop- its something I've been wishing they did more of on the show. SG-1 spent years getting to know each other and developing their silent conversations but nothing happened with Mitchell except for a few behind-the-back glances early on. Don't read too much into the nursery rhymes, I'm not trying to be cryptical or anything there, it's just supposed to be kind of funny :)