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Stargate Babylon
Chapter 6: Introduction to the Greater Galaxy
The first Stargate mission was deemed a great success and a victory for the Earth Alliance, and propelled the careers of many of the surviving officers. In the first few days after the mission a joint archaeological and science expedition was sent to Abydos via the Stargate, as well as several teachers and engineers to help the Abydonians improve their quality of life. Several Earth Force R&D scientists and engineers descended upon the now codenamed Cheops-class pyramid ship and had begun the process of reverse engineering the treasure trove of technologies aboard.
Doctor Jackson married Sha're in a huge celebration after Ra's defeat, after a short honeymoon he returned to Earth briefly to put together an archaeological team as its team leader. Mainly to look for more structures on Abydos that had been built by Ra which could contain more information on the Earth Alliance's new enemy.
Using a combination of ground penetrating sensors and UAV aerial reconnaissance they soon found a structure not too far away from the Pyramid buried under several meters of sand. It took the Earth Force Corp of Engineers a day to unearth the structure, and the archaeologists were eager to enter the temple.
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Doctor Jackson, along with Doctor Meyers were studying the main doorway, looking for a way to open it without blasting it open like one of the Earth Force Combat Engineers had wanted to, but Doctor Jackson believed there could be another way. He was deciphering the writing on the doorway as much as he could before the combat engineers lost their patience and just blasted their way through and possibly damaged any artefacts or writings inside, they could even bring down the entire structure if they weren't careful.
"Daniel we've been at it for hours, and the sun and heat is really getting to me, why don't we take a break, huh?" Doctor Meyers asked with his brow covered in sweat.
"Not yet Gary, I've almost deciphered this last grouping of glyphs, and I'm not about to let those combat engineers use explosives on this structure," Doctor Jackson retorted. "But by all means Gary, take a rest and have a drink of water..." he said as he used his finger to gently brush away some dust from what appeared to be some alien control pad and lightly tapped on the buttons in a random order and suddenly the doors opened, letting out a powerful puff of foul smelling air, enough to make both archaeologists retch and almost made them lose their lunches and they started running. They quickly got away from the doorway, both of them cursing up a storm and thoroughly miserable.
"Damn it all, I should have been wearing a breather," said Doctor Jackson between retches.
Soon after Captain O'Neill, still in his combat armour, along with Sha're came running down to the dig site.
"What happened?" was the first question out of O'Neill's mouth.
"I accidentally opened up the entrance and rancid air came pouring out," said Doctor Jackson gasping. "That's what happens when fresh air is trapped for a couple of thousand years and since this structure is underground it was under pressure, so the moment I opened the door me and Doctor Meyers got the full blast of it."
"Can we go down there?"
"Not without breathers, which we forgot to pack, and not until it's fully ventilated which it should be by tomorrow."
"Very well," said O'Neill as he turned towards the guards. "No one goes down there until tomorrow morning, and follow Doctor Jackson's directions when your down there to the letter, there's no telling what kinds of traps could be lurking down there," ordered O'Neill. "In the meantime let's get the two of you checked out," he said as he helped up Doctor Meyers while Sha're helped up her husband, whom she was admonishing in her own native tongue.
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Meanwhile back at the pyramid ship, which was still docked on top of its pyramidal landing pad, Earth Force Naval Intelligence officers as well as a few EIA agents were debriefing, or, as in most cases, interrogating their Jaffa guests and POWs. One of the more cooperative prisoners was Jaffa Master Ta'Ror who was being debriefed by an EIA agent and an EFNI officer, Agent Jonathan Clapperton and Lieutenant Commander Dean Farrow.
"What can you tell us about the technology of the Goa'uld?" was the first question out of the EFNI officer.
"Very little, only that the mineral Naquadah which your people call Q50 is the base material in much of goa'uld magic, and that knowledge of magic is forbidden among the Jaffa, except among the priests who craft the weapons and devices we use."
"You do realize that what you see as magic is nothing more than technology created specifically to give the illusion that the goa'uld are gods?" asked Agent Clapperton.
"Yes. I have seen many worlds, witnessed many battles, and I have seen gods fall, by the hand of the false god Ra and my own. I have seen the dead rise again from what should have been certain death, but I have also seen that Ra is not infallible, that he is not all powerful and all knowing."
"What can you tell us about the goa'uld, what you know to be the truth?"
"They rule by force. Their numbers were once few, but in the last few centuries they have grown far more, and their lust for power is great. They are all born with the knowledge of the previous generations that came before, but only the System Lords have the forces and technology at their disposal to dominate all the other minor goa'uld, whose forces are not so powerful. Ra himself was the Supreme System Lord and had the largest armies and the most powerful and fastest ships in the Empire, which has ensured his dominance across the galaxy."
"How many worlds and systems do they control?"
"Many hundreds, perhaps thousands, but there are worlds which the goa'uld has no use for. On those worlds the slaves are abandoned and allowed to roam free."
"These slaves, where did they come from?" the EIA agent asked, knowing the answer to that question already.
"There is a tale of a primitive world that the goa'uld discovered long ago, the Tau'ri, the world which life forms of this type first evolved. It is said that the goa'uld harvested among the primitives. Some became goa'uld hosts, others became Jaffa, the rest were became slaves for the goa'uld, but that world has been lost for centuries."
"Ta'Ror, beings of this form evolved on our home planet of Earth," said Commander Farrow.
"Your world?" the old Jaffa Master was stunned. He had looked into Commander Farrow's eyes and saw no hint of deception, but he still could not quite believe what he was hearing.
Agent Clapperton continued. "It's true Ta'Ror. Ra came to our world over ten thousand years ago. If our ancestors hadn't rebelled..."
"Then you would not have become free, and grown strong enough to challenge them. You are the human slaves of this galaxy's greatest hope for freedom, as is mine," said Ta'Ror.
The two intelligence operatives looked at each other and made a few notes, both uneasy with what they had just learned of today.
"What do you know of the Asgard?" the agent asked.
"The Asgard are a race that are far superior in technology and protect certain planets that are part of the Protected Planets Treaty, however their ability to enforce the treaty has come into question in recent decades."
"Why is that?"
"There are far fewer Asgard warships patrolling the galaxy, sightings have become so rare that among the Jaffa in general they are spoken of more in terms of legend than fact. No Jaffa in living memory has faced the Asgard in combat for almost a generation."
"What makes these worlds special, why does the Asgard protect these worlds?"
"I do not know. All I know is that the Goa'uld have forbidden travel to these worlds, and every Jaffa is taught the sequences of Chappa'ai symbols to those worlds to ensure that no goa'uld goes there."
"What do you think would be the Asgard's reaction to us visiting their worlds?"
"I do not believe you would be met with any hostility, but they would ask that you do not interfere with the people of those worlds development."
"Could you please give us the coordinates to these forbidden planets?" the EIA agent asked as he pushed forward a pen and paper towards him.
The Jaffa Master began drawing out several stargate addresses and pointed out the first one in particular. "This is the sequence of symbols for the world known as Cimmeria, all Jaffa are required to know this sequence. Something transpired upon that world long ago that Ra never wished to speak of, but from time to time a minor goa'uld has gone to that world and each time none of them has returned."
The two operatives noted that Cimmeria would be on the list of places to explore first, both to investigate the human civilization and possibly contact the Asgard.
"Thank you Ta'Ror," said Agent Clapperton as the two humans left the jaffa's quarters. As soon as they left the agent turned to his EFNI comrade. "How long do you think it is going to take for our techs to break into Ra's personal files? We need to cross reference what we've learned from our jaffa friend."
At that Commander Farrow frowned. "I'm not sure. Commander Carter should have an ETA on when we can properly interface with their databanks."
The two of them continued on towards a set of rings where a four man fire team of GROPOS lead by a sergeant were guarding them. "Where to sirs?"
"The throne room please," Commander Farrow ordered and the corporal nodded and inputted the proper sequence. Almost instantly a set of five rings lowered from the ceiling and with a flash they appeared in the cavernous and gaudily decorated throne room. It had been turned into a massive lab area where numerous scientists and engineers had set up shop.
Working diligently at a console that O'Neill had seen Ra use was newly promoted Lieutenant Commander Samantha 'Sam' Carter. She had cautiously hooked up a number of fibre optical cables with specialized adaptors from a portable diagnostic computer into the crystal guts of the console which Ta'Ror had previously identified as the main control console for the ship with numerous Earth Force data-crystals in boxes scattered around her.
"How's it going commander?" Agent Clapperton asked.
For a moment there was no reaction from her, then with a start she turned towards the two intelligence officers. "Sorry sirs, I didn't notice you were there. This technology is quite intriguing."
"In what way," Commander Farrow asked.
"In some ways its similar to both our own data-crystal storage technology and Centauri crystal computers, only a few more generations more advanced. I've modified some of our adapters so we can tap into their systems and we've already managed to gain some basic access, but as you can see it's all in goa'uld, and translating all of this is going to take some time," she said as she showed them the lines of goa'uld text displayed on the small screen of the computer.
"We've already got a team of linguists here and a basic translation matrix that's being improved upon every minute we listen in on the prisoners locked in their cells," said Agent Clapperton.
That comment gave Commander Carter an uncomfortable look on her face. "Unfortunately sirs while the Jaffa speak and write the same language as the goa'uld none of them have any knowledge about how any of this works, and neither do any of the human servants. Most of them consider all of this to be goa'uld magic."
"Which makes our job a little bit harder," Clapperton groused.
Once again the rings activated and deposited a fully armed and armoured Captain O'Neill. "Hey kids."
"Captain, how goes the hunt for the remaining Jaffa?" Commander Carter asked.
"With some help from the locals and their mastadges we think we got them all. Doctors Jackson and Meyer have just opened that buried building not far from here and got a face-full of rancid air," said the Captain with a small smirk.
"Are they alright?" she asked.
"The medics say they'll be fine, and Jackson's wife is berating him for his stupidity. He says that it should be safe to enter by tomorrow, once it's been aired out. He and the archaeology team are quite eager to go in."
"Like kids in a candy store," commented Commander Farrow with a smirk of his own and the others reciprocated.
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Earth Dome, Geneva, Switzerland
Meanwhile on the other side of the Orion Arm a meeting was about to take place in the office of Rear Admiral Lefcourt, the head of the Exploration Division of Earth Force. Brigadier General West was also in attendance with Secretary of State Margaret Lenoir. Soon enough the person they were all waiting for arrived, the Centauri ambassador to Earth, Londo Mollari in his signature Centauri outfit and peacock hairstyle, with an ever present smile on his face.
"Mollari, welcome to my office," greeted Admiral Lefcourt. "I'm glad you could join us today, have a seat."
"Thank you admiral, it is enjoyable to see you and the madam secretary again, though it is my first time in meeting General?"
"General West," the general supplied.
"Yes, and by the decorations on your chest you both seem to share a good deal of combat history, don't you," said Mollari joyfully. "Now I am curious about the purpose of this meeting, it is not often that a meeting with me is requested by people such as yourselves."
"Recently we came across some ancient tablets in our archaeological archives that provided the coordinates to a world on the very edge of known space. We sent one of our Explorer class ships, the Amundsen, to that world and we found this." The admiral put up an image on the monitor of a small city in a desert. "A city populated by humans, where there definitely shouldn't have been any humans in the first place, over three hundred light years from Earth."
The Ambassador was now becoming intrigued.
"We landed a small team and we discovered that they were abducted over ten thousand years ago by an alien impersonating himself as Ra, the ancient Egyptian sun god, and made them worship and work for him in these mines, mining for a mineral we don't really understand the properties of just yet." A carefully worded white lie, they understood its properties, but they had yet to be able to refine it to be able to use the material to its full potential.
"While we were there Ra came on a little visit to the planet. We fought him and won, destroying both him and his ship and set the slaves free."
"A nice story, but what does this have to do with the Centauri Republic?"
"During our brief struggle with Ra we noticed that the design of Ra's race's fighters was eerily similar to yours," said Lefcourt and let a few more images play across the screen, this time of what they now knew as the Goa'uld Death Glider. There was a hint of recognition in Ambassador Mollari's eyes, but he said nothing.
"Have you seen anything like this ship before?" Admiral Lefcourt asked as he put a virtual image of Ra's vessel on the monitor. "Or do you have any gods in your pantheon that was said to be humanoid with glowing eyes?"
"There have been stories from ancient times, just before our own recorded history begins, stories that tell of dark creatures under the control of the gods when they once walked among us, until they were driven from our world by the Great Maker and made to live amongst the stars, away from us mere mortals," said Ambassador Mollari.
"We have never had proof of such a thing, but there are ancient craters on my home-world that indicates many thousands of years ago on the continent of the Xon that our world suffered from some form of orbital bombardment. We have also found numerous ancient ruins with some technology in them; in fact it is where we got our basic crystalline computer technology from." The ambassador scrutinized the design, though ancient history wasn't one of his favourite subjects he had been fascinated by ancient bedtime stories told by his great grandfather, and he remembered an old story about serpentine entities that would take over a Centauri's body and use it as its own.
"Do you have a name for this race?"
"From the enemy soldiers we captured we know that they are called the goa'uld." The look of shock was evident on the ambassador's face for only a second before he managed to regain his composure. "Does that name mean something to you ambassador?"
"It is an ancient word for gods in one of our most ancient dialects, and one that only describes the most evil of them. All of their temples were destroyed during the Xon Wars, but enough remnants remained for us to guess that over eight millennia ago an ancient race posed as gods, and we have been ever watchful, but no sign of them has been found except for the ancient ruins of your world, in particular your pyramids."
"Why didn't you tell us?" Secretary Lenoir asked.
"Would you have believed us?" the ambassador retorted. The humans looked at each other and knew that at the time they probably wouldn't.
"I will contact my government and ask them to send everything my people have on these creatures, though most of it will only be ancient stories," said the ambassador as he got up from his chair. "Good day and good luck to you if you ever encounter this race again, next time it may not go as well as the last time." Mollari strode out of the office and left three human officials with more questions than answers.
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Abydos, recently unearthed structure
On Abydos the next day the air inside the structure was clear of harmful toxins and Doctor Jackson with Captain O'Neill and Lieutenant Commander Carter had gone in exploring. The walls were beautifully decorated with several pillars holding up the ceiling of the cavernous rooms and corridors of the structure. As they walked they also noticed several larger than life Horus Guard statues standing near the walls with staffs in hand at five metre intervals, like great guardians. They soon came to a central chamber that was about twice the size of an NBA basket ball court with tall walls covered in hieroglyphics, lit up by the hard light of the torches they brought with them.
"Wow," exclaimed Commander Carter.
"Daniel, you have any idea what this place is?" Captain O'Neill asked.
"I'm not entirely sure," the good doctor responded as he took a closer look at the symbols carved into the walls and pillars, a hover-cam was hovering close by, recording and taking still photographs of the entire room, missing not a single detail.
"Cartouches, similar to what we found on the cover stones that were on top of the Stargate and in the Abydos catacombs," the doctor paused as he thought the matter over, then it hit him. "Of course," he exclaimed. "This room is a map room, Stargate symbols grouped into cartouches containing six symbols, Stargate addresses, Captain this room is quite literally a huge chart of a vast network of Stargates, gates that are all over the galaxy."
Captain O'Neill and Commander Carter looked about the room in wonder, both realizing the possibilities of this revelation, Jack thought of all the possible enemies that could come through, while Carter couldn't help but feel giddy at the thought of exploring the galaxy through these Stargates instead of using ships.
"So the Stargate can go other places?" Jack asked.
A young archaeologist came running into the chamber with a frantic look upon his face.
"Doctor Jackson, you should come and see this," said the young man and the trio followed him back outside to a pair of military skimmers, then took off for the pyramid, making a fifteen minute walk into a two minute flight. Frantically the young academic took the trio down into a series of catacombs underneath the pyramid, no writings or pictographs until they entered a chamber deep within the pyramid.
"Earth Force engineers found them when they were conducting a structural survey of the pyramid, there are numerous writings on the walls, and we've only been able to translate a fraction of this," the academic said as he pointed to several large murals depicting various images of Ra and the day to day life of his rule.
"Daniel, can you translate this for us?" O'Neill asked.
"Just give me a moment Jack," said the young archaeologist as he closely scrutinized the murals and writings on the walls. After about an hour, in which both O'Neill and Carter merely sat down and let Doctor Jackson do his work the good doctor stepped away from his intense scrutiny.
"From what I can tell all this is a story about Ra, the size of his domain, how great he was and how he triumphed over his enemies."
"Enemies?" asked O'Neill nervously, he didn't like what that could imply.
"It talks about how he defeated the other gods and dominated them as the Supreme System Lord, of course that would explain his self imposed title," said Daniel.
"His title?" asked Carter.
"When me and Sheridan were taken before him he addressed himself as such, and he obviously had the strength to back it up, having the largest armies and the most advanced technology which he used to dominate the rest of his kind."
"Wasn't the story in the catacombs under the city about how he was dying and that he was one of the last of his kind?" O'Neill asked.
"Yes, but keep in mind that Ra wanted the Abydonians to believe that he was the only one, and he had essentially brainwashed them to worship only him."
"Are you sure about the 'dominate' part?"
"Yes, it's the closest translation I can get."
"To be dominated you have to be alive. Who's to say that more of his species couldn't have done the same, we'd better get this to the spooks," said O'Neill.
"Too late, we already know," said Agent Clapperton as he came through the entrance to the catacombs. "Jaffa Master Ta'Ror gave us the complete lowdown of the situation as he knows it in the Goa'uld Empire."
"Has Earth Force Command been informed?" Lieutenant Carter asked.
"Commander Farrow is already on his way to debrief the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the president. It appears that the goa'uld are using humans as their slaves not just on this world, but all over the galaxy, ancient peoples taken during the bronze age and earlier. For all we know there could be millions, possibly billions of humans out there in the galaxy under their heel."
The Captain and his companions took a few moments to digest that piece of information.
"Daniel, continue translating what's on the walls here with the rest of the archaeological team, see if you can dig up some more info on Ra and his kind."
"Will do Jack," said Daniel.
"Carter, Agent Clapperton, walk with me for a minute please," Jack asked, though his tone made it more an order. They walked out of the chamber and back up into the pyramid proper, finding a small room.
"Alright Jonathan, did Ta'Ror give you anything else?"
"Well, you didn't hear this from me, but apparently there is an older race, possibly older than the Abbai, called the Asgard. For centuries they have been protecting at least a small number of human occupied worlds, and the goa'uld seem to be scared shitless of them," said the agent.
"Sounds like the kind of allies we could use on our side," said Carter hopefully.
"We already have the coordinates for one of these protected planets under Asgard jurisdiction."
"So maybe we should look them up!" said Jack thoughtfully. "I'll have a chat with General West; see if I can get an expedition through the Stargate to this world, what is it called?"
"Cimmeria, one word of warning though, the Asgard may not like it if we try to interfere with their natural development."
"Then we'll be careful then, just ask the locals about their gods and see if they left anything behind that we can use to get in contact with them."
"Sir, what about Abydos? Do you know what Earth Force's long term goal for this planet?" Lieutenant Carter asked.
"Only that they are considering making this planet a protectorate and help the local population get acquainted with the rest of humanity. Don't worry captain; we won't be making the same mistake that the Centauri made with the Narn," said the agent who then walked back to his interrogations of the Jaffa.
"No, we'll make new ones," said Jack quietly, though he hoped he was wrong.
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AN: Credit goes to DanTheVanMan for his work as a beta reader.