NOTE: Originally this chapter was just a few words between Giya and Teal'c as she was working but it sort of blossomed into this. There's a really good flashback in this.

Chapter 24 – Night

It had been late and Landry had suggested they break for the night before they discussed these matters further. Most of the team were exhausted and liked the idea of calling it a night. Teal'c however was satisfied with his latest dose of Tretonin and had already had his required amount of sleep. Giya's story had intrigued him and he was heading towards her quarters to speak to her.

The halls that he walked through were almost deserted. A janitor mopping the floor. Two technicians adjusting some systems. The base had turned in for the night.

Giya opened the door as soon as he knocked. "Oh," she seemed a little shocked at seeing him, "you're Teal'c aren't you?"

Teal'c nodded courteously, "I am. Were you expecting to see someone else?"

"Actually I was thinking you might be Daniel."

"I was also expecting you to be sleeping."

"Well I think I've slept enough for a while."

No one said anything for a moment.

"Perhaps I could enter?" said Teal'c. "There are matters that I wish to discus with you."

"Oh, of course." Giya said, stepping aside to let Teal'c past. "I'm sorry. I'm just a little…well nervous around Jaffa."

Teal'c silently indicated for her to sit at the small table in the room. When she was seated he sat himself opposite her. "You said earlier today that you had many Jaffa as part of your cause."

"Well I guess that was a bad way to put it." Out of her regal dress Giya's manor was quite different. Her shoulders were more forward as she seemed to crumple up her chest cavity. She held her head much lower and her voice was much softer too. All in all she appeared meek and almost inconsequential now. "I should have said that I'm nervous around Jaffa I don't know. All of the Jaffa on our side were either known very closely by myself or…or Jas'ak…" her eyes just seemed to miss Teal'c's face as her thoughts drifted and her voice suddenly grew strained.

"It is your story of Jas'ak that has brought me here."

"Can I ask you something?" Giya said abruptly.

Teal'c was shocked for a moment but inclined his head for her to continue.

"Is all of this planet like," she look around the sparsely furnished concrete box that was her room, "this?" The line between her brows deepened. "There's no sun, no sky, nothing is green.

"I saw such vision in Daniel when he was ascended. I don't know how he could get it if this is what he was fighting for all that time."

Teal'c took a moment to think over Giya's words before he grasped his hands together and replied. "Do not worry Giya. The facility is built underground to keep the Stargate of this world safe and a secret. I have seen much of the outside in my time on this planet and the surface holds as much natural beauty as other worlds."

Giya nodded to herself, "That makes sense."

"However," Teal'c leaned on the word, "the determination of Daniel Jackson and all other warriors of this world do not simply fight for their planet, but for the freedom of everyone on it and every human that they find. Not only humans, but for all beings that they encounter. They are noble people."

Giya's gaze seemed permanently distant now. "It seems I've always been fighting. I think that I've never fought for anything." She looked at Teal'c but she was thinking to hard to see.

Teal'c surprisingly broke a small, gentle smile. "I would not worry over it. You would not have come to warn us of the Ori if you were not fighting for something. One day I think that you will find out."

Giya wasn't very convinced but quickly changed the subject. "You wanted to talk to me about something?"

Noting Giya's avoidance, Teal'c decided not to press her. This was something she was going to have to find in herself. "It concerns the Jaffa you knew, Jas'ak." He could see the muscles in Giya's neck constrict but her face remained the same. "You morn him greatly do you not?"

Giya couldn't trust herself to do more than nod. Even the mention of his name mad her stomach twist painfully. It had been a thousand years since he had died but in a way for her, it had literally been yesterday since she saw his face.

"You were close?"

Nod.

"I know what it is to lose one that you care about but I no longer morn my wife…I am now glad I knew her in the time that she had."

Giya didn't say anything for a long time. "Um…" she managed to choke out, "Thankyou…I…I guess…" She was struggling to keep together. She inhaled in a choking sob that she desperately tried to suppress.

Teal'c wasn't finished yet, "I would, however, have you know this. Jas'ak fought for the freedom of the galaxy from the goa'uld did he not?"

Two nods. Jas'ak had always had such dreams but had had to settle for simply making life for the goa'uld as difficult as possible. Though he would never admit it, it was killing him inside that he couldn't do more.

"Know that finally his cause has come to pass. What both of you fought for is now a reality."

Giya thought back to her first years of knowing Jas'ak and gave a small, far off smile. He had so much passion. He would tell her of the worlds that he imagined for everyone and never failed to inspire her. She would always look up at him in wonder. "I remember when I first met him."

/-----\

"IN THE NAME OF MORDEL, EXIT YOUR HOMES." The booming voice that could only belong to a Jaffa echoed through the village. Giya peeked through a crack in the door to see a large group of Jaffa marching down the main road, opening doors to see if there was anyone still inside. "Who are they?" she asked as she turned back to Cenla who had been housing her for the past few days.

"They are the soldiers of Mordel." Cenla answered in a frantic whisper as she ran her hands over each other. "They check in on the village every few weeks to discourage unrest and collect produce. They shouldn't be here for a few more days, after the harvest of the southern fields. If I had known they would be hear now I would never have agreed to have you here." She was starting to panic now. "If they find you…"

Giya grasped Cenla's aged hands in both of her own and spoke in a calming voice, "Peace now Cenla. You should make your way out onto the street so they do not enter. I will make my way out unnoticed. You need not fear. No one will ever know I was here."

Cenla squeezed Giya's hands. "All power be to your cause Giya."

The two women said hurried farewells and Cenla made her way outside, being careful to close the door behind her.

"You took your time old woman. What were you doing in there?" said the suspicious voice of a Jaffa through the door.

"Oh," replied Cenla, "My old bones are not as spry as they once were and I had to douse the fire. No good an unattended flame burning down the whole village." Cenla had raised her voice a little at the end of her sentence.

"I think we will have a look inside. Jas'ak…"

"There is no need." Cenla interrupted hurriedly.

"Do you have anything to hide, old woman?" The Jaffa questioned suspiciously.

Giya looked out the back window only to see people filing down the street that the house backed onto. Not that way then.

"No." said Cenla as if he had just insulted her.

Giya took a quick look at the small gap between the house she was in and the next. She considered climbing onto the roof of the next house and finding a window to get in through but the amount of time it would take would mean it would mean it would be likely that she would be spotted.

"Well then. Jas'ak!" There was the sound of gravel crunching as someone stepped forward. "Have a look inside."

Dam it. Giya dashed through to the next room in the two room house which was a small bedroom. She hoped that this Jas'ak would only look to see if the fire had recently been extinguished.

The door creaked open and then closed. Giya tried to breathe as quietly as possible. She was pressed against the wall behind the door hoping that if he did look in the bedroom it would only be a quick glance and he wouldn't see her. She could hear Jas'ak's boots clunk on the floor. One…two…three. He stopped. The boots then made a grinding noise as he turned one way…then the other. Giya pressed her arm against her own mouth in an attempt to muffle her breathing with her clothing. The boots began to march again.

She had sworn she wouldn't go back.

The boots were getting closer.

She would never go back to the others.

The door to the bedroom creaked open. Giya pressed herself as flat as she could against the wall but the door kept moving. Eventually the door touched the toe of her foot and she could fell the pressure on it as the Jaffa tried to push it further.

Giya sighed as she heard the zat'ni'katel being primed. The door was pulled away to reveal an armed Jaffa.

"So," Giya said. She sounded almost confident mainly due to the fact that she knew when she was backed into an inescapable corner. "Are you going to kill me then?" She would be returning to the judging thoughts of the others soon enough.

Jas'ak's face remained still.

"What are you waiting for?" Giya wouldn't be caught cowering at death anymore. "Do it!" she said in a dramatic whisper.

Still Jas'ak remained still as he watched her.

"I won't be taken prisoner!" This Jaffa's stern stare was starting to unnerve her. "I'll run and fight and you will have to kill me."

"Why?"

"What?" Jas'ak's sudden ability to speak shocked her. She also didn't understand what he meant.

He stepped forward, closer to her, "Why would you fight?"

She didn't really know what to say. "Because I vowed to fight your gods. I won't lay down and submit like the rest of you." She may as well let off some of the frustration that had been building up inside of her. Cenla had been a lucky find. Most of two years since she had left the others had been spent living rough. What had she been able to achieve in that time? She'd managed to maim two mining camps with explosives that had been easily replaced within the month. She was limited by the fact she couldn't kill the human slaves that had done nothing wrong. "I said I would fight until my final breath and it looks like I have too. So," she took a step forward towards Jas'ak so that there was an inch between them. Giya was a bit less than a head shorter than Jas'ak but her head was held high, her shoulders back and she had a commanding presence.

"What have you found in there Jas'ak?" came the voice of the Jaffa commander from outside.

Jas'ak was silent and then, without moving his gaze from Giya he called out, "There is nothing. The woman was telling the truth."

Giya was confused and couldn't get her thoughts together.

Jas'ak lent towards her and put his lips a fraction of an inch from her ear. "Stay hidden." He whispered.

Giya stood dead still.

"Do not allow yourself to be seen." he continued, "At dusk you will be able to make your way to the stargate. Wait there." And then he was gone. He'd made his way swiftly out of the house, onto the street.

\-----/

"I heard them leave. They took all the villages down to the southern fields while a few of them stayed behind to search the rest of the homes. I think they some how managed to track me to that world. It was one of Mordel's mining camps that I had hit about a week before. I thought I had made a clean escape…obviously not.

Teal'c had remained silent through out Giya's story. He had not asked her to tell it but she had felt compelled to and anyone could tell that there was a great weight on her shoulders. So he had let her talk. The whole time she had never focused her eyes on one point and her voice sounded like she was talking to herself.

"Did you meet him at the Stargate?" Teal'c asked.

Giya nodded. "I had watched him in the fields through the day and he seemed to be different to the rest of the Jaffa. He was…well…kind to the villagers. He would only ever tell them to work harder if they were truly slack. I even saw him let Cenla pass by with a half empty load. And not once did he strike or even speak harshly to any of them, which is more than I can say for the others.

"So I met him and we talked for a while. At first he was very reserved, suspicious but eventually he told me about why they had come. They had been told to track down a woman that seeked to weaken their faith in Mordel. Most of the Jaffa had associated this with a rumour, tales of a waif, a ghost that would come in the night to destroy. He had even been at the mining camp and right after the explosions had gone off and caught a glimpse of me.

"I do not think an older Jaffa could have spoken as he did. He had not lived in servitude long enough to have the fight drawn from him. He feared the ideas of rebellion that he had and I told him that he should always fight for his freedom. I told him what he had needed to hear for so many years: that he was not the only one that thought the goa'uld were not gods.

"We met many times after that, in secret. A month later he left his home to join me in my fight." Giya seemed to come to her senses then. "I'm sorry. I must be keeping you from your rest." She stood up in a clear but polite indication that she wanted him to leave.

"Do not be sorry." Teal'c stood as well. "I will leave you in peace." As he reached the door he turned around to face her. "Please know that Jas'ak history is one that will be recovered and treasured by the Jaffa nation when it is whole again."

"Thankyou," Giya said softly, "Goodnight."

With a final nod Teal'c exited, closing the door behind him.

Without bothering to change out of her cloths, Giya half lay, half fell onto the bed. She lay on her side, pulled her legs tight against her chest and waited for the morning.

NOTE: Review and suggestions pretty please.