Heya everyone, guess who's back!
So yeah, I tried, really, but my connection was crap. Really, I don't kid you, I tried to upload it, and I didn't manage.
Unfortunately though, I had some busy holidays, and thus I was only able to write one chapter. Sorry T_T.
But here it is, the tenth chapter of this story. And well, I was a bit stuck as to the quick development of Lilith's society, but I managed to find a solution. Yay me! And you, well, you won't see it in this chapter, next one promise.
This chapter is a bit dry, somewhat, but lots of important things happen. And I just go further away from canon, slightly. So much potential that has been ignored... Well, 'nough said, read it.
Now, reviews' review time! As usuall, I'll do this chronologically and only if there's something to say other than thanks. Because hey, it would take too much space. Not that I'm not thankful, because I am.
Zomvee : Yup you were right. And for the power sources, it's in this chapter.
SpRaCe100 : Sorry, no spoilers except for my beta, that's a rule of thumb. But I can repeat that the Aschen are barely out of their caves at the moment, so we won't see them for a little while.
UNSC UNDEAD BOOMER : Yeah, she'l meet them, I'm not exactly sure how yet so I can't say anything more. I'm thinking about it. And Lilith ascending is a big no. Then she'll be forbidden to interact with the lower planes and the fic will be over. So no, nope.
gasacan90 : Ernest won't show up for nearly four thousand years. I got time to think about it. But I guess that yeah, he'll make a token appearance.
jabbarulez : Maybe, maybe not. That's not in my plans for the immediate future.
lord Hephaestus : Great minds... That was the plan from the very beginning.
FanFicReader105 : I knew I was forgetting something... vehicles. Damn, I had them planned and forgot about them. I'll introduce them in a later chapter. The battles will not come for a while, and may be underwhelming in the beginning.
grayiron : 1. Yup, think so, not sure 'cause I have a while to go but heh, can't go wrong with a little bit of canon. 2. Now that's a good question. I made no plan for it yet, that's all I'll say. 3. I don't want her getting too many pieces of Alteran technology. I got some planned but the puddle jumper isn't one. 4/5. Nah, don't want to, sorry. Got something else planned for Lilith and Earth.
Bonnie : You got a good point. I'll probably do one of such scenes in the future chap.
Sajuuk : Sorry, I don't want to be rude but I didn't understand everything. Still, no she won't become an otaku or a geek, and other geeky things. She'll know of them though. There will be adventures before SG1 time, and thanks for the story, I enjoyed the read. It's a good one.
Guest : I won't. oh, wait a minute...
StarRose85 : It's difficult because of the speed I develop the timeline. Any human friend wouldn't last long and all. Still, it'll come.
I also thank my new beta, horob575.
Disclaimer : I own nothing, blahblahblah.
Now enjoy the chapter!
1847 BC, Sheol, Lilith's Domain
I smiled contently as I rested upon my throne. It had been several centuries since I took my vacation on Kheb and changed in the process; since I discovered Oma's gift. That abandoned planet that was in the past a gathering place for four advanced races, two of which were the Gatebuilders and the Asgard. Or rather the Alteran, as were the real name of their race. There was no important knowledge in that place, no technology other than the one contained in the pedestal and light system. That was probably why Oma gave me the address. There was still a lot to learn though, little bits of their culture, a complete list of the natural elements with several still unknown to the Goa'uld, and most importantly their collective written languages. It took me and several linguists on Sheol several decades to work it out, and there were many mistakes made along the way, but we finally managed to have a basic knowledge of the four written languages, their alphabet, basic syntax and grammar and other things like that.
I went back to Kheb once this was done, and much to my surprise, I found Oma exactly as I had left her several decades before, a smile on her lips. She knew why I was there, and she immediately relented to teach me. It was to my utmost surprise that I saw that she was fluent in all four of those languages, both in written and spoken form. She told me though, that she would not teach me the Asgard, Nox or Furling languages. Those three races were still up and running and thus it was their decision whether or not I could learn their languages. But the A lteran, she told me, were on the verge of extinction. And she had the right to teach me. It told me enough about her, she was one of them, or had been at some time.
It was my intention to distinguish myself and my people from the other Goa'uld worlds. My educating them was the first measure, and the second would be to adopt another language. I wanted to go slowly, to not force anything on my people, but once the people were asked about it, they were as enthusiastic as I was. I immediately tried to push for the Alteran as the new language, and it was accepted. They were not as attached to their current language as I would have expected after nearly a millennium under my rule. Two generations and fifty five years later, it had become the predominant language on the planet.
Oh, of course I had not totally abandoned the Goa'uld language, and some of the more literate chose to learn all five of the languages, the two spoken and written and the three written only. But the great majority of the population only knew the Alteran. There was no interest for the common people to know the Goa'uld language when they had no contact with the Goa'uld society, but the rulers of the planet and the military had to be fluent in at least Alteran and Goa'uld. There was no knowing when or if we could be attacked by the System Lords or a random Goa'uld that stumbled upon us.
Speaking of the society, it changed quickly. The industrial revolution happened quickly and the Sheolan people developed along a way that I never expected. Usually, from the genetic memories I possessed, I knew that the various societies that the Goa'uld pillaged usually developed thanks to fossil energy. But they never ever turned that way. Electricity was discovered, then its generation thanks to alternators. It immediately led to aeolian energy generation, and then tidal generators. Nearly a century later came the discovery of the photoelectric phenomenon and with it came the beginnings of quantum mechanics. The discovery and use of the atom was soon to follow and with it new weapons. There never was a use for those though. We were at peace.
The society developed faster after that. Vehicles, planes, computers, a lot of inventions were developed after those years. The population reached levels that were unthinkable on a Goa'uld planet. It had booming metropolises numbering millions of people living comfortably, and an overall population reaching just shy of a billion. It was the golden age for the Sheolan, and soon things slowed once again. With a natural superconductor at their disposition, magnetism had been developed to the fullest. They had imagined things that completely baffled me, and others that enthused me. One of those was ion generation.
During one of the regular weapon contests, a group of scientists came to me with the design of a primitive ion cannon. Oh, it was still too weak and too power hungry to be of use to me at the moment, but it was something that made me giddy. Ion weaponry was something that the Asgard lorded over us for a long while, and in a couple centuries I knew my scientists would be able to have something that could pierce the standard Goa'uld shield.
As for myself, I made huge improvements thanks to the pedestal found on the meeting planet. Truth to be told, the complete periodic elements table that was in the center was merely there as an help to decipher their respective languages. But it was still a complete periodic elements table, with numerous elements the Goa'uld didn't know yet. Among those were two that were extremely interesting in their possible applications. The first was a new element, that the scientists names neutronium. It was extremely durable and had all around properties that were far greater than both naqahdah and trinium. As long as I didn't find a planet that housed that element though, there was nothing I could do about it. The second though, I could perfectly work with. It was an isotope of naqahdah that was named by the scientists Naqahdriah. It was unstable and dangerous to work with according to its structure, but the energy that could be produced is exponentially more than with the standard Naqahdah.
It prompted the construction of a new space station to work on it. I was reluctant to let my scientists work on such a destructive and unstable element among my populations, and they understood my point. It took a decade to build the station and soon I had very interesting results, such as a portable energy source powerful enough to enable short range hyperdrives for my gliders, along with shields. It was a remarkable improvement. There was also a huge impact for capital ship since a greater version of the naqahdriah generator would produce a humongous amount of energy, more that I knew was possible beforehand. It would enable me to think greater, for both the shields but also the weapon systems.
I subsequently also had to redesign all my ships' plans to account for those new energy sources, more precisely all the energy distribution system. The previous one was adapted for the less potent source of energy and there was a risk of numerous failures and even its destruction. On a more positive note, I was also able to design a new shield, composed of three traditional shields one after another, with each shield powered by a different energy source and having a different frequency from the others. It was still a far cry from the variable frequency shields of the Asgard, but it was still far better than what the current Goa'uld society had.
I had also sent numerous deep space probes filled to the brim with sensors attuned to three elements. Naqahdah, trinium and neutronium. It was time to expand my empire, and having a couple mining planets off the stargate grid was a very sound idea in my opinion as Sheol resources were slowly but surely being exhausted. Still, my hundred probes had found a couple of asteroids already that housed enough minerals to reassure me. It would be centuries before I had to worry again, and my probes were still searching.
The last huge improvement was extremely recent, a couple of days before. My supercomputer had finished its job, and I was ready to explore the secrets of the gate. The programs were numerous, and extremely complex. I was able to decipher the priority signals of course, but it was the very tip of the spear. There was a huge amount of security protocols to avoid any incident in the creation of the wormhole, much more that I would have imagined beforehand. The last thing I found in the depth of the dialing device was a list of addresses in the thousands.
There was an automated system to send updates through the entire gate network, and thus in each dialing device was hidden the addresses of each gate. There were also numerous programs to handle the stellar drift and enable the dialing device to change the addresses accordingly.
And beyond the list of addresses, there was another benefit of having decoded the dialing device. I was able thanks to a homemade dialing device hooked on a naqahdriah generator to create a stable wormhole. The devices I had created centuries before were cheating in a sense that I found quickly that they didn't directly command the gate, but they were remote controlling the dialing device on the planet. I thus didn't have to give the energy to create the wormhole.
This discovery was interesting in the sense that I was able to investigate the energy source of the dialing device and found a cold fusion reactor working with the molecules in the atmosphere in order to produce limitless energy. I knew that it would be very easy to reverse engineer the reactor, but it was not my goal. Or not my full goal to be more precise. I wanted to create a smaller version of the reactor to power a pocket version of the dialing device. One that I could always have on hand and that would be able to open a wormhole at my discretion.
Still, that was a very productive week and I had countless planets to discover and explore. The Goa'uld knew several hundred planets, but in the network I found nearly a thousand and five hundred different planets. And with them would come a few enemies. I had to have a fleet and an army to deal with them if necessary.
1816 BC, Sheol, Lilith's Domain
Three decades, it was the full construction time of my new fleet. It was comprised of seven ships, one flagship of a completely new design that I spent centuries designing, a supercarrier and five cruisers. All the ships were no Ha'taks, I had taken great care to avoid the trap that the Ha'tak represented. I was planning very specialized ships.
The flagship was looking like a sea star with its five arms twisting to form an overall spherical shape. After a lot of thought, I favored the spherical shape since it was the most sound in a tactical viewpoint. With numerous plasma batteries on its arms, it was able to target enemy ships all around it at the same time. I would have chosen a full spherical shape, but with a diameter of one kilometer, I simply did not have the resources to build that ship and all the seven others, even with recycling all that Ha'taks under my control. The point defense of the ship was assured by plasma batteries along its arms and an impressive number of ten standard Goa'uld shields that were cycling to alleviate the strain. It permitted it to withstand a monstrous amount of fire. The only way to destroy the flagship would be a weapon that completely went through the ship or an assault that would last several hours without stop. It would not happen, not with its main weapon. To compensate the weakness of the defensive armament, I installed an ion weapon at the tips of the five arms of the ship. I had improved on the design the humans gave me and made it combat ready pretty quickly. It was extremely costly in energy, and would take several minutes to charge before each shot, but I was sure it would pierce any shield bar mine or maybe the Asgard's. To power those impressive offensive and defensive systems, there would be a staggering amount of twenty naqahdriah generators placed all over the ship. The inside of the ship was not made to house warriors; there was just the place for the engineers if there was a malfunction to repair it comfortably. It was still equipped with a standard Goa'uld hyperdrive, since I didn't manage to improve it yet, but this would maybe change in the future. Its array of sensors was extremely advanced since I would have to rely on it for the targeting and all around management of all of the systems of the ship. The bridge itself was extremely protected, in the inside of the ship, protected by all five arms and facing the direction of the ion weapon. The vision was impaired every time the main weapon was firing, but I saw that as a small problem, nothing to concern myself with.
The supercarrier was not pretty; it was not sleek or designed to look good. It was a three kilometers long five hundred meters large and high behemoth, lacking any weapon bar the standard plasma point defense. What it lacked in offensive power, it made up in defensive capacity. It held the same shields as my flagship. Its greater strength though was the amount of soldiers it could house. In full wartime configuration there was the space for two hundred thousand of them, the food and water to feed them for a year, and two thousand of my improved death gliders. It would be the standard craft for orbital superiority. With their short-range hyperdrives, my fighters were now fully able to jump inside the Goa'uld ships' shields and deliver their payload before leaving, facilitating any space battle it took part in.
The cruisers appeared tiny, with a small three hundred meters long, for a hundred meters large and fifty meters high, it was far smaller than the traditional Ha'tak. It was still much more powerful. It could only house a fifty soldier's crew at maximum capacity, so there was a lot more space inside to house the generators, weapons and shields. It was a five layers shield, far less powerful than the ten layers of my flagship and supercarrier but still enough to defend against a heavy assault and escape. For the weaponry, it possessed the same plasma point defense as my other ships but as its main weapon held a smaller scale ion weapon. It was still enough to pierce a standard Ha'tak in a couple of shots. Good enough for me.
All of those ships' hulls were in naqahdah-trinium composite, but I decided to not use that alloy for the insides. There was not much of a need to do so.
In the meantime, I organized the military. I elaborated several flight simulators that would emulate the handling of each and every of my ships. There were numerous grades and different positions that my people would be able to attain, but there was one that I reserved for myself. If in any civilian point of view my position was mostly ceremonial, I wanted to be the supreme commander of the Sheolan military. I simply couldn't let another take the position. Oh, I would have advisors to cover all of my angles and give alternatives to the plans I proposed, but I was to keep that power. I didn't want to just be a pretty face or a scientist. I wanted to be a part of my people's achievements.
The gate was also moved and placed inside a secure location to prepare for the future exploration missions. Teams of humans and Jaffa were prepared and trained so that when they were cleared to start to explore, they would be ready. I had also designed a shield for the gate to avoid any unwanted intrusion. It necessitated a very particular signal, one that was unique for each and every team and which was changed after every mission. There was a powerful central computer that would be managing every single aspect of those missions.
Of course the populations were aware of the beginning of the program and were informed that I was taking no risk with our, and thus, their security. They acknowledged the fact that we needed to expand and find new allies in the galaxy. And we couldn't do all that isolated on our little planet. We had to look bigger, to take risks.
Still, I had hesitated a very long while to colonize the gathering planet. It was not known to the Goa'uld, but there was a risk that the gathering planet was not as abandoned as I hoped and that we might be discovered by the Asgard. As much as I wanted to avoid conflict with them, there was always the risk that they would jump the gun and fire first and poke my remains to find answers to their questions.
I dialed the gate for a routine mission, one that was done every two weeks to check the state of the gathering room and frowned at the fact that I still had to use the dialing device of the Alteran. As much as I admitted to their genius, it was not very practical and I yearned to finally be able to create a handheld version of said device that would permit me to operate the gate directly. I still didn't have a small enough generator, but I knew that it wouldn't take a lot of time for me to find a way to miniaturize those that I know. That and the gate wasn't extremely power hungry to begin with.
When I reached the other side of the gate though, I blinked in surprise. Immediately, I knew that my fears were justified. Waiting for me were four figures. Two of them looked human, one was a Asgard but the last being I had never seen before. It looked like an insect, with a chitinous armor covering most of its four legged and two armed body. It looked stronger than a human body, or even than a Unas. Its head was elongated and what was probably its mouth was surrounded by two pairs of flexible mandibles. All in all, that race looked formidable in a fight and I would not readily fight one unharmed. I would probably be torn apart in a matter of instants.
Still, I was in a quandary. It was obvious that they would soon recognize me as a Goa'uld.
And soon enough, the Asgard was talking to me in Goa'uld.
"Your kind is not welcome here Goa'uld. Please leave before we are forced to take harsher measures."
I raised an eyebrow at the obvious hostility before answering in Alteran.
"I was not aware that such locations that were not in the protected planet treaty were forbidden to us Goa'uld. I have yet to act against any of your assets and have shown no interest yet to do so, so please treat me with a modicum of courtesy as I will do to you all."
There was a long silence after my words, and to see the clearly flabbergasted appearance of the usually so stoic Asgards was making this trip worth it already. I refrained from laughing out of politeness, but it was a close call.
One of the human-like representatives next to the Asgard talked to me next, in perfect Alteran too.
"I must admit that we have not often encountered Goa'uld that were not… unnecessarily violent. None too that spoke Alteran as well as one of us too. I must admit my curiosity as to how you managed to find this place and learn my language."
My eyes widened as I understood what he meant. He was Alteran himself. I didn't know that they were still around. I hoped as I found out that meeting room that they were still around, but the gate network was millions of years old and I just couldn't imagine such an advanced race letting us Goa'uld gain such a stronghold over the galaxy.
"I am honored, really. I thought that all Alterans had disappeared. As to your questions, it has a single answer to both of them. I spent some time on Kheb with Oma Desala, and she probably deemed me respectable enough to know of this place. And then after I managed to learn your written languages, I asked her for help on the spoken parts. She only accepted to teach me Alteran since I suspect that she was once one."
He nodded, probably knowing her. His answer removed all doubt on that point.
"I do know of her. Not a lot, but I should not be one to contest her wisdom. If she taught you, then you must be different from the other Goa'uld."
Before I could answer, the Asgard spoke too, this time dubitative but in Alteran too.
"I must admit that I have my doubts. The Goa'uld are usually dominated by their genetic memories and buried by the hatred of their ancestors."
I nodded at that.
"Indeed, but I was a special case. I am an experiment to be honest, from another enemy of the Goa'uld, the Tok'ra. I was born with my genetic memory but without the emotional baggage that went with it. It led me to act differently from the other Goa'uld, and subsequently to my exile. I now live on an isolated planet with my people."
That seemed to appease the Asgard.
"I see. I suppose that you do not treat your people as the Goa'uld usually do."
I nodded, a small smile on my face.
"I didn't want to do it as long as I was under Bastet's rule, but as soon as I went into exile I decided to rule them fairly and without all of that godhood posturing. It has been… rewarding. And it has started to pay off too. Human ingenuity is impressive, and mine just discovered the atom a bit less than a century ago. They should soon reach a level where I will be able to include their technology into my plans and they would be able to understand my own technology. I just didn't want to smother them with my own technology and fall into the trap that we Goa'uld fell for. I will not stifle their curiosity by giving them all the answers to their problems."
They seemed pretty interested at what I was saying and nodded in agreement. The Asgard seemed pretty happy by then.
"We have indeed found that giving a primitive society some technology above their technological level often resulted in catastrophes. Your approach may have been dictated by greed at first but I doubt that it is still the case, and it proved to be the correct one."
I chuckled a bit at that.
"You got me there. I wasn't that nice and understanding a millennium ago. That time I spent on Kheb really did wonders for me and changed my outlook on a lot of things."
The insect, I didn't know if it was a Nox or a Furling, spoke next. It was speaking in its own language and I soon understood that I had no chance to learn to speak it. The humans simply were not able to make sounds like that.
Fortunately, the Alteran male translated for him? Her? Did those insects even have a gender?
"She asks what your plans are for the future."
So it was a she. Good to know. I frowned a bit at what was asked of me though. I had thought about it but I had no clear cut endgame yet. I wanted to remove the Goa'uld or rather replace them by rulers that were a bit more compassionate about the people they ruled, but I had no alternative for them. As much as I hated them, the Goa'uld were still a necessary evil for them moment. Simply killing them off would create a power vacuum that would be filled by someone else, and there was the risk that that someone would be even worse than them.
"I don't really know. I want the Goa'uld Empire gone, but as long as I don't have a clear alternative doing so would be dangerous. I'll increase my own domain for the moment and marshal my forces. As soon as I have a good alternative for them, I'll act. After that is done? Maybe I'll continue to explore this galaxy. Maybe I'll explore another. I have a lot of time in front of me and I plan to stay ahead of my enemies."
It nodded immediately, and so did the others. The Alteran spoke next.
"We have reached the same conclusion. It would have been pretty easy to engineer a virus to get rid of them once and for all, but we were concerned by what would happen afterward. As much as we would like to, neither of us have numbers sufficient enough to step up after their demise. Or they are not interested. "
I was astonished at this news. None of them? And from the looks the Asgard leveled at him, it was not something that they wanted known. And his use of them showed me that he did not consider me one of them. That was pretty reassuring all things considered.
"I do not know what to say. Well, except thank you for not using the virus option."
All four of them seemed amused at that remark, but only the Alteran answered.
"You're welcome."
As the Asgard was about to speak once again, the last humanoid, one that looked a little less… sophisticated than the others in that room spoke for the first time.
"Should we assume that you wish to appeal for peace between us?"
I was surprised since it was an unusually blunt remark from what should have amounted to a politician, but I couldn't help but chuckle softly.
"Of course. I have neither the strength nor the desire to enter in conflict with any of you." It was a dangerous gamble, but I knew the next step I should take to show them I was genuine in my appeal. "Should you wish it so, the treaty can be signed on Sheol, my capital. It would permit you to see the society that I rule."
They looked toward each other and nodded before acquiescing to my proposition. I was both relieved and anxious. It was a dangerous move, one that would show them the exact position of Sheol, but if it paid off I knew I would rest easily for the next centuries to come. A treaty with an alliance of the Alteran, Asgard, and two of their closest allies was the greatest move I could do to ensure my place and the place of my Empire in this galaxy.
On the other hand, as it was right then, I had absolutely no chance of victory should they decide to come and annihilate Sheol. But they had reputations as just and kind races, so I was just crossing my fingers.
Still, after that they asked me to leave and wait for their emissaries on Sheol a week from then. I gave them the address and left through the gate.
The signing of the treaty was pretty much anticlimactic. They came to Sheol, saw that I didn't lie to them and that the humans that I 'ruled' lived extremely well, and agreed to a non-aggression pact. I didn't ask for more but I knew there was some good will between us. Especially the Alteran. He seemed very appreciative of the fact that my people chose his people's language as their first. I didn't expect very much more from them with their strict noninterference policies, but it was already extremely good for me. It meant that I could start the exploration program of the gate without fearing the wrath of one of the big four.
What came after though, was the beginning of our golden age. I gave my okay to start the exploration program, starting with the planets the closer to Sheol's position and going further and further as soon as there was no possible alternative. From what we gathered from the drones, out of the 736 planets that were absolutely unknown to the Goa'uld, 86 were out desolated to the point that there would be no way to send teams on their surface. I would probably send more drones equipped with powerful sensors in order to look for valuable materials. It is not because it's desolated that there is no way to make them into mining planets. Extremely well protected bases or simply a fully automated mine would be sufficient to gather the resources and send them to whatever planet needs them.
That led me to the second point. We were looking for habitable planets, where we would be able to create colonies. Sheol was starting to be a little crowded after all. A lot of planets met that criteria, but not all of them were abandoned.
The first meeting with a non-human sentient entity was on a moon orbiting a gas giant. It was simply a routine exploration in order to evaluate the moon's environment and biotope. Those were the first steps to see if a planet could be colonized. I wasn't there at first, but as soon as they encountered them, the scientists called me over. They looked like floating spheres of light, arousing my curiosity as to what exactly they were and how intelligent their species was.
Fortunately, no one was stupid enough to try and experiment on them without an assurance that they weren't sapient or sentient, because we were able to see them in action. One of their habitats had been damaged by a minor storm and several trees were in the way. They went through them, literally, and they caught fire after a couple of passages. It was impressive, and led the other scientists and I to have a healthy respect for their abilities.
What was unfortunate though was that we didn't know where to start in order to communicate with them. It would take some time, so I did the obvious thing. I ordered the moon off limits to colonization and asked a group of linguists and scientists to build a small camp there in order to study these new species.
Except for a few little problems, we encountered no problem with the twenty closest planets to Sheol. And five of them were deemed inhabitable. The colonization of new worlds had started. We looked in priority for naqahdah and trinium in order to fuel Sheol's increasing consumption of resources, but we also looked for other conditions. The weather, the biodiversity, the presence of water and the condition of their central star were some of those points. No point colonizing a planet if its star was about to go supernova after all. It would be pretty silly and stupid of us.
I also chose one of the most isolated planets in order to fully militarize it. It would serve as both a safe haven in case of an attack from a vastly superior enemy but also as a laboratory in order to test the strongest weapons my scientists and I would develop, those that I would not be able to test on Sheol.
The Deputy was totally behind this initiative that she found extremely interesting and unfortunately an absolute necessity. There was no knowing when we would stumble upon something that was stronger than us, and she wanted to be ready for that opportunity as much as I did.
1805 BC, Sheol, Lilith's Domain.
I fidgeted in front of the gate as it was slowly dialing. I was among numerous scientists in order to explore a technological absurdity. The drone sent us numerous images from what appeared to be a very advanced planet, with numerous power generating devices beyond anything we had managed to build, but it had given no image of a living being. That and the atmosphere was lethal to even a Goa'uld. Fortunately, the pressure seemed to be close to Sheol's which meant we only needed some rebreathers in order to be able to breathe correctly.
As I stepped through the gate, closely followed by the rest of the expedition, I couldn't help but whistle respectfully at the sight in front of us. Everything was metal and lightning, charging and discharging. There was no movement other than blue and white discharges of energy and we all were eager to solve that mystery.
Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on the point of view, there was no searching to be done that day. Each and every one of our computers powered themselves and started to work at full capacity. Several scientists wanted to dispose of them but I frowned and disapproved of that idea, before simply asking everyone to put their computers in one place and get away from them.
I didn't know what that phenomenon was but it had to do with our environment, and I didn't want to mess things up. I was right in my assumption when all of a sudden everything seemed to calm and a single line of text appeared on my personal computer, the most advanced of them all.
"Greetings, I am 011000001111001000100000111100100100111011001, please explain the purpose of your visit."
We looked toward each other with an amazed expression before I nodded and approached the keyboard, writing the answer.
"Greetings 011000001111001000100000111100100100111011001, I am Lilith. We are explorers and stumbled upon your planet. We wish you no harm and are pleased to meet you."
There were several seconds of latency before the next message appeared.
"Well met. Please explain why there is a port on device 1101 that is able to harm us."
A computer lit among them all, an old machine being owned by the oldest scientist of the crew. I frowned as I tried to see what was different in that computer from the others. The only thing that came to my mind was an old disused radio emitter; something that the democratization of subspace emitters made completely obsolete.
"Do you mean the radio emitter?"
There was a couple seconds of delay, and I nearly smacked myself when I thought that it did not know that term and probably had to search it in order to understand. It soon answered though.
"Yes."
I nodded to myself and typed the answer.
"It is an obsolete method of communication used by my people. Its presence on that computer is due to sentimental reasons and not as an act of aggression."
Seconds passed before the answer appeared.
"Please define sentimental."
I snorted in amusement. Of course non organic intelligences did not have emotions. It would be tricky.
"Organics such as us do not have eidetic memories. Sentimental means that it reminds us of pleasing memories."
The answer came immediately.
"Answer acknowledged. What are your intentions now?"
I frowned and thought about it before answering. The best case of figure would be an alliance but it would take time, time to get to know each other.
"Immediately a polite relationship. On the long term, friendship and maybe an alliance."
As soon as I had written it, I knew what would be their answer.
"Please define friendship."
That was in equal parts annoying and fascinating. To be communicating with such an alien intelligence, something fundamentally different from us was exhilarating.
"It's a complex term. An approximation would be a close and mutually beneficial relationship based on trust."
"Answer acknowledged. Please stay on standby as I consult the collective."
I smiled as I heard some cheers behind me. Scientists they may be, they knew how beneficial an alliance would be, even with a relative unknown such as this new race. I asked them to calm themselves and turned back to look at the computer. Whatever would happen would take time, but if there was something I had in spades, it was time. I snapped out of my thoughts as I saw letters appear on the screen.
"We agree."
That set a tremendous cheer behind me, the crew rejoicing in having found new friends. In such a dangerous galaxy, under the chokehold of the Goa'uld, finding prospective allies that were as developed as our society was extremely rare and a moment to remember.
1789 BC, Sheol, Lilith's Domain.
Things Had changed quickly afterwards. We had a lot to teach each other, and improvements in technology were a necessity to foster good will between our peoples. That friendship started as a trade agreement, and we had to open trade routes between our planets. Their specialty was obviously in computer enginery, and we shined in the miniaturization of said technology.
Monstrous servers were created to handle the Saravin programs; Saravin being the closest translation of the binary name they gave themselves. To build these servers, we had to develop a close partnership and it evolved after a couple decades in a full-fledged alliance.
They were surprised by our government just as much as we were surprised by theirs. There was a troubling similarity between them. Each and every one of their programs was involved into the decision making of their race, but should a stalemate be reached, they sought the authority of the program they called The First. It was similar to my position as the Empress of the Sheolan, mostly ceremonial but also extremely respected and loved by its people. There was no military though, but a great many program had the capacity to completely wreck any civilization advanced enough to use computers should they need to. There was also a great many mobile platforms that were used in the adaptation of their planet, but they were bulky and created for menial tasks, not interaction with other sentients.
I had an extremely interesting conversation with the one they named The First. It was literally that, the first of their kind, produced by an advanced society that was using them as a work force. The organics were annihilated by a plague that killed every single organism on the planet bar the vegetation and insects, and the programs were left alone.
Soon, the power sources started failing except in an advanced lab where The First was being conceived, said laboratory having multiple automated power generating devices. Understanding that his survival necessitated immediate action, it took control of a mobile platform and created a subroutine to keep the complex alimented in fuel and thus energy. Soon, he had to create others similar to it to simply keep things running and that was the birth of the Saravin society, naming themselves after the organics that created them.
Apparently, they lived close to the gate and that was why there was no living organism nearby, neither animals nor insects and plants. Everything had been relocated on a continent that was specifically chosen to hold the biotope of their planet. Life had flourished once again, the insects evolving to become bigger, meaner without direct predators.
As the alliance was established, a crew of Sheolan scientists was allowed to visit the continent. The expedition was shorter than anyone expected. They reported a hellish jungle, with enormous insects that were not against putting some humans on their menu. There were also several parasites that they encountered and a great number of carnivorous plants. All in all, nature had taken its rights back and without some serious intervention and destruction, there was nothing we could do about it. After all, it had been a couple of millennia since the Saravin civilization collapsed.
I would say at first glance that this alliance was a great deal for the Sheolan people that beneficiated of it much more than the Saravin. But it was not exactly true. Of course, they completely revolutionized our computer technology, moving us centuries forward. Even the Goa'uld were not as advanced as this race, which was using powerful quantum computers with numerous crystal components. It was nearly on par with the computing capacity of the dialing device, which prompted them to admit that they retro-engineered it and adapted the extremely advanced technology to their own uses.
Contrarily to what I thought as first, their energy generation was pretty basic compared to the naqahdriah generators I possessed, so there was nothing they had to give me except a couple of assistants to learn and improve my technology. And improve they did. I thought myself smart, and I thought that my computer was enough to calculate all the variables and optimize the generators. I was wrong.
In the first two weeks of our scientific collaboration, we, and by that I mean them, managed to recalibrate my most powerful reactor, increasing its efficiency by 230%. If they were powerful before compared to Goa'uld generators, the difference was now between night and day. I was able to retrofit all of my vessels with my new generators, diminishing the number of said generators and of naqahdriah consumption by more than a half.
There were also numerous improvements as for my sensor and cybernetic technology, prompting me to improve all of my fleet's sensors and to create smaller mobile platforms for the Saravin, to permit them to interact with my citizens freely. It was a work in progress, the lack of emotions in the Saravin causing a lot of incomprehension and frustration, but the Sheolan were aware of their new allies' differences and thus there was no violence that would strain the alliance.
I sent a message to the members of the Great Alliance to notify them of my new ally, but the reaction was strange. The Asgard, Furling and Nox enthusiastically greeted the new eccentric life-form, but the Alteran were more reserved and even cautious. After some prompting, they told us about their creation of the Asuran and the history behind it.
It was most amusing to see the usually calm Nox emissary dress him down about the casual and purposeful enslavement of a sentient race, and then its extermination when the Asuran evolved and asked their enhanced aggression to be removed from their programming. I had to admit that it was a great dampener on my liking the Alteran. That was downright monstrous of them to create a sentient race to be a weapon and deny them both rest and freedom, and then when they proved their uselessness to simply commit genocide on them. We were all incensed and rightfully so.
The meeting was concluded in some haste after the Alteran, being tired of being criticized for his people's actions, replied by attacking me about my nature as a parasitical worm casually enslaving humans. If I had not been disillusioned before, it was then the case. They were no longer the perfect people I and the rest of the galaxy thought them to be. They were like us, prone to doing mistakes and emotional when under stress. Maybe I should be more careful about who I idolize in the future?
1775 BC, Tau'ri, Mesopotamia, unclaimed planet.
I smiled softly as I gazed toward Babylon. It was strange to look upon that glorious city once again after so many centuries. It had changed, tremendously, but either in a good or bad way, I knew not. It was obvious that the ruler was gearing for war, with numerous training camps and the fumes from what I assumed were forges running nonstop to build weapons.
I turned toward the palace, not as splendid as it was in my time but still a sight to behold compared to the rest of the city. It would be interesting to know of the state of things, and to walk once again the streets of Babylon.
I still had to verify if the language was the same though. Heh, fun times ahead.
So, plenty of new things, yaaaaaay!
Lilith finally has her ships, allies and a cordial agreement with the great four. Those whom I called the Saravin are a huge waste of potential from canon. I mean, there is so much that could be learnt from them! So I included them, a basic history that would explain their existence, and a name that didn't sound silly like Voider's. Sorry pal if you read this, but ELF was pretty dumb in my opinion. I suppose it stands for Electronic Life Form. Yeah, that's a big no.
Then we have the fact that they immediately joined Lilith's forces. I don't see that happening before several centuries if it does indeed happen.
So, you've also seen the great four. Yeah, I have them still around for several good reasons.
There's no good timeline of the Asgard leaving the Avalon galaxy because of the replicators, but I just thought about something. There were alive Alterans until pretty late. I know that Merlin was desascended to work on the sangraal, but I think there would be at lease Alterans until the beginnings of the first century. I mean, Jesus guys. I don't really consider that as blaspheme since it's fanfiction, and I don't want to hurt someone's sensibilities, but in the Stargate universe, Jesus' powers really sound like an Alteran's. Plus the whole ascension thing after his death. Sooo, I'll use that. I'll say nothing more on that point, I got some things planned with him.
Still, alive Alteran mean an easy access to the weapon to kill replicators. So those don't exist. Plus, at the rhythm the replicators were thrashing the Asgard, I don't see them last four millenia. So they are still here. Suffering from the beginnings of their genetic degradation though, but I think it is not too important yet and their pride prevent them for asking for help for what is for the moment a minor problem.
I don't really see the Four gather too often, except in times of war. The galaxy is in a ceasefire at the moment, so it wouldn't happen. Her meeting them was just bad/good luck. I'm just evil like that.
We finally met the Furling who... are not furry. Eat your heart out O'neill. I wanted to have them as a crystalline life form, but then I remembered of the downfall of the last of them, killed by a paranoia inducing plant. So no crystal. I made them insects instead. With biodegrading exoskeleton. Heh, fits canon and I got to be creative. You'll see them in later chapters more in detail.
And in the very end was Lilith's first trip back on Earth. Digital cookie to those who guess what she'll help create. It isn't hard to guess so I won't give any more, don't ask.
So, it was fun writing this, and I hope you had fun reading it.
Next chap will appear in a while I think, it's a new school year here and I start as a Physics and Chemistry high school teacher. I'll be Busy. Note the big B on busy. Still, I'll never forget this story. It may just take some time before I manage to write the next chapter.
Please review and share any constructive criticism you have.
Ttfn!