"Nice of you to come out here when I have no way to come back inside." O'Neill said. He begun to move the weapons and the bomb inside the rings. It was clear that he was more than a little grumpy. "You should have warned me about the creatures which come out during the night to hunt." He was right up in Mokar's face and stabbed him in the chest with a finger to empathise every word.

"I am sorry O'Neill. I did not know there were any creatures on the planet. As far as I know nothing was alive when we surveyed the planet, though that was twenty million years ago, give or take ten million." He was as calm as always but he saw a creature coming out of the forest. It must have been as tall as him and the teeth in its strong jaws could probably pierce their chests all the way through. This monstrous beast was driven forward by six thick, strong legs, two pairs in the back and one pair at the front, and it seemed to be coming at them dangerously fast. As it ran the dark blue fur which covered it wavered in the wind. The closer it came the more it looked like a machine made to kill.

With everything was inside the rings O'Neill fired four bolts from one of his new toys at the beast but the fur absorbed them all. It showed no signs of slowing down so Mokar called up the rings.

"The good news is that I've gotten everything installed and we can go to Earth." They walked into the cockpit where the Alterran console had been installed.

"And the bad news?" Slowly O'Neill raised the ship into the air, his temperament was starting to settle down.

"Well apparently my backyard have visitors." Mokar said as he plotted a course to Earth. "Does Terra still have a satellite body?"

"A what?"

"A small celestial body which orbits Terra?"

"We call in a moon."

"Well we will use it to mask our arrival then. The sensors should pick it up on the first pass." He activated the hyperdrive just as they left the atmosphere.

"The first pass?"

"We'll swing around the solar system and approach Earth from the other direction, just in case."

"I don't think there's any risk of them finding out we arrived. The X-401 is of world securing the new Icarus base and all other ships are in Pegasus for repairs or to supply the city, I should know their orders came from me."

"We should be on the safe side." He would rather be on the safe side than ending up as the target for an attack vessel or any other ship really. "It will take a few hours to fly by Terra and then a few more to turn around and get back."

"I thought you Alterra were advanced? Our ships are faster than this." His slightly better temperament was turning sour again.

"Well the hyperdrive is not built for a ship this size, it was built for our fighters, the same goes for the generators I would have used the new generators but they are much too powerful for the hyperdrive."

Jack frowned. "I thought the ZPMs powered your ships?"

"Yes, most of our larger ships and some of the more advanced small ones, but it is easier to get the correct amount of power from a potentia than a generator made to put out as much power as possible. But a potentia takes a very long time to make."

"Then why aren't we using a larger hyperdrive then?" He was getting really agitated now but Mokar still kept his calm front.

"Because I thought we were going to get a smaller ship and ordered the parts before we left the processing facility. Still a larger drive would not have fit inside the rings and I knew of no other way to get onboard."

"I know there's another way inside the ship and Carter, Daniel or Teal'c should know how to open it."

"We will not have to worry about that for long O'Neill, there is a shipyard which should work in Darecian. I will check it out as soon as we are done here, I think it is time we start building ourselves a fleet."

"Let's not do anything too rash just yet." A fleet would require large crews and they both knew it, but that did not stop Jack's mind from wandering away, dreaming of large fleets of 304s and 302s which were constructed in a long forgotten shipyard. "We're is Darecia?"

"It is one of the galaxies we settled and one of the first we evacuated."

"You settled more than one galaxy? Dumb question, I know you settle at least two. How about a history lesson while we wait. Just don't tell anyone else that I asked for it, they'd never let me hear the end of it."

"Very well O'Neill, I will not tell anyone. Our history span millions of years, but I will try to make it shorter. We first developed in a galaxy far away long ago, we call it Freya. We had many struggles within our society but eventually we rose to the stars and developed faster and better ships. We begun to explore other galaxies too and had plans for settling there too, but we never had a chance to do so before our Ori brothers begun to ravage the galaxy with their believes and their fleet.

We fought a long war with them, each planet was fought for with everything we had. They on the other hand only cared to defend their most precious planets. Some planets they left without a defensive fleet while others were used by them as bait for our fleets while they sabotaged the systems star. It was only a few of their core worlds which they defended as fierce as we did ours.

I do not know how long the war lasted but it ended on the world we had evolved on. Both sides had lost all major production facilities and all shipyards. Yet the war was fought on the ground and in the air. The stalemate lasted for many generations until we managed to build another ship and flee the galaxy. When we came here we settled in Avalon.

Over time we settled many more galaxies and befriended the natives. Of course some conflicts bloomed up but we solved them in one way or another. Eventually we lost control over the situation in a galaxy and lost a fleet meant to protect an entire quadrant over a night. We stayed to our protocols and sent two larger fleets to investigate. Meanwhile another suppressed threat took the opportunity and ravaged an unknown number of lesser races. From there things spiraled out of control and ended with us returning to Avalon. In many ways it was very much like what happened millions of years before in Freya only this time we brought a plague with us when we returned to this galaxy, one that forced those of us that were not infected to abandon our brethren. What happened after that you know as well as I.

I have not had the chance to check every gate in all the galaxies, but it seems Avalon has remained mostly the same, unlike many other. Two of the galaxies in our domain have collided since we last walked the planes of those planets. At least four of our galaxies are as good as dead since every star in the galaxies seems to have burnt out and a fifth is halfway there. And I do mean half, not a star here and there, but like a line through the centre of the galaxy, one side black and one side just like Avalon."

"The Alterran domain spanned eight galaxies, nine counting Pegasus?" As Mokar had told the story O'Neill had been sitting there and thinking about what they thought they knew about the Alterra, how much of it was wrong and how much worse it seemed their struggle had been. A lonely tear escaped Mokar's eye but it was wiped away almost before O'Neill had seen it.

"No. It spanned thirty six, but at the moment it's thirty eight since Siyava and Sudab have been merged and we settled another three in an attempt to survive."

"Well you might want to start a bit smaller than that."

"For now my only interest is Avalon, the super galaxy which came from the merging of Siyava and Sudab, Darecian and the galaxy you call Pegasus."

"That's still five galaxies. Maybe you should start with the Milky Way and Pegasus and work your way from there?"

"No, the only shipyard which seems to remain is the one in Darecian. Since Atlantis is still in Pegasus and I do think we will keep the name, I will need to deal with the Wraith. Avalon was our core galaxy and Terra our capital so I can not let it go. Despite, Terra houses a population capable of bolstering our ranks and Avalon has got the processing facility too. Lastly the super galaxy houses three of our remaining mining operations, those three alone could provide the materials needed for many years into the future. They are the five I need to start with."

O'Neill sighed. "You're the one who decides when this is all over, but my suggestion would be to fortify the facilities you need in each galaxy and clean up one at a time."

"Your idea is sound and we will we proceed."

"Why do you keep saying we? I'll live another thirty years, at most. Then you're on your own again, or are there more of you out there in the universe?"

"I am alone O'Neill, but your age is only a number and your body can be repaired, I will see to it that you live for many years to come. Perhaps one day you will be on the council."

At the same time scepticism and hope rushed through him. "How?"

"You will see when we are done here." He checked a few things on the Alterran console. "It will be a few hours until we arrive, I suggest you get some sleep."

"Now that does sound like a good idea, it's always good to be rested before you try to assassinate a president." O'Neill joked and stepped away from the controls. He walked off into the ship while Mokar slumped down onto the floor right in front of the console. Healing O'Neill had taken much of his energy and it had taken him all of his will to function properly.

Many many hours later the console woke him up with a beep and he opened his eyes he to see O'Neill standing at the controls.

"We'll arrive in the solar system in a minute or two" O'Neill said without looking up.

"I will have the cloak activate as soon as we leave hyperspace." He begun to prepare the ship for reentry. Three seconds before they left hyperspace he opened the ships log to see how the equipment had worked and panic struck. "O'Neill, prepare for evasive maneuvers as soon as we leave hyperspace" he shouted.

"I thought you said we'd cloa….." was all O'Neill had time to say before they dropped out of hyperspace straight into a fleet of Ha'taks, twenty two of them. "We're aborting this right now. Get us back into hyperspace."

All around them the Ha'taks came to life and begun to spit out orange plasma bolts. "I agree with you General. I need a second or two to plot a new course."

"I can handle them as long as we're cloaked. I just don't feel like killing the president with twenty Ha'taks ready to lay waste to the planet to punish us for doing so."

"I just thought it was a bad idea to try to destroy all the ships with this ship" Mokar replied as the hyperdrive activated and they escaped the onslaught. "We will need a fleet."

"A single 304 and a ZPM could take them on, we just need the right ship for the job."

"Perhaps the Asgard could lend us a ship, do they still reside in the Thuvalan galaxy?"

"The Asgard blew up their planet, their last colony. It was in a galaxy called Othala if memory serves. They gave all their technology to us before they killed themselves."

"I see." Another tear trailed down Mokar's face, but this time he let it fall to the floor. "Do you know the reason why they did so?" Inside he could feel sorrow trying to surface when he thought of all the Asgard there had been when the Alterra had informed them that they were leaving for another galaxy to flee the plague. The Asgard had been a surprise, when the Alterra first chose their galaxies there had been no sentient life in most galaxies and it was thought that no life would evolve without help, but a couple of million years later the Asgard came along and begun to explore Thuvalan. Their technology evolved surprisingly fast for such a young race and the Alterra could see the potential in them.

They did not come from outside their domain but rather the Asgard evolved on one of the planets there without the Alterra's notice or help. The Alterra had been quick to support the Asgard in their endeavors and when a war broke out between the Asgard and another race in the Thuvalan galaxy the Alterra had been there only days later to assist the Asgard with their own fleet. When war begun in the other galaxies the Alterra had to withdraw their ships yet only a few years later the Asgard were victorious themselves and begun to assist the Alterra where they needed.

"They did some changes to their bodies they regretted but couldn't fix, so they chose to die instead of slowly fading away."

"That is regrettable, they are… Were powerful allies. We will have to build a fleet ourselves it seems."

"We will need more than a fleet, we'll need an army. If those Ha'taks are here the Goa'uld are sure to have brought Jaffa along, we will have to deal with them at the same time. And if it's the Lucian Alliance things aren't much better."

"I can build a fleet, but I can not build an army. An army needs to be trained."

"We won't need to train an army, we just need to recruit one. There's millions of soldiers on Earth, most countries should be able to liberate themselves as long as we get those ships out of the sky. The hard part will be to organize them." A thought struck him as his face lit up. "How good are you at raising the dead?"

"The dead are dead O'Neill, could I bring the dead back I would have brought back the entire Alterran population."

"We still have her consciousness, she just lacks a human body. If you could get her back into her own body I'm sure she can organise the armies of Earth."

"In what state have you preserved her mind?" Mokar looked puzzled, had the Terran's managed to preserve a mind before they could create new bodies?

"She's residing in a replicator body floating in space, she sacrificed herself by walking through a space gate to protect Atlantis."

"You are referring to the Asurans? My knowledge of things developed in the Pegasus galaxy is limited at best. But from what little I have I do believe I can do it. I would need her body to be sure and samples of her DNA to grow a new body. But I do believe there's a lab in the Shaban galaxy which contains the necessary equipment. Do you have the address to the gate?"

O'Neill looked at him as if he was the moron. "You think I memories every important gate address we've ever visited?"

Mokar's face stayed in the same stone hard look of indifference. "I would think so."

"Well I don't."

"Very well. I should be able to find the gate, it might take me a few days to look through all the space gates in Pegasus. You would need to take the ship there and retrieve her."

"Or we retake Atlantis and use the jumpers to retrieve her."

"We do not have the manpower to hold Atlantis if we can take it. Just because I only detected around forty guards many more could hide in the city."

"Let me worry about the guards Mokar. Give me this ship, two days and I'll have a plan ready to go. Just make sure we can get through the shield around the gate and that we can dial out of there when we're done."

"That will not be a problem but first there is something we need to do" Mokar said while they dropped out of hyperspace. "There is a gate on the planet below, set the ship down a few hundred meters in front of the gate."

"There's no rings on the planet, we'll have to find some other way of the ship."

"I will make a hole if I have to, just set us down" he said while he left the bridge.

When the ship touched down on the planet Mokar was waiting for O'Neill in the cargo hold in front of a large door which was opening to reveal a large desert outside. "Looks like you found it."

"I've rigged the door to open when we send a subspace signal. Lucky for us there is plenty of transmitters in the vaults" Mokar said while they left the ship and the door begun to close behind them. They walked away from the ship and as they looked back it cloaked.

"I hope I remember where I parked it" O'Neill joked as they approached the gate.

"The same signal which opens the door will decloak it too" he said as they stepped through the gate to the processing facility. "Wait right here for a minute."

"I thought you were in a hurry" O'Neill replied when one of the hover sleighs came into the room and drifted away towards the vaults.

"I have no reason to be in a hurry. The longer we wait the higher the chance that we will have six potentias by the time we invade Atlantis. If that happens we could move the city to another planet to protect it. We could also wait for that to happen just to save the city." Mokar had disappeared into the control room but now he came back and dialled the gate again. "Come, there is something we need to do."

"Where are we going?" O'Neill asked as they stepped up to the gate.

"Gamia."