Chapter Eighteen: Dragonflight
"What is that?" asked Jack. "What the hell is that?"
"Well I know what it looks like," said Sam who like Jack had stopped dead on seeing what was ahead. "It looks like a dragon. But I suppose it's just some sort of local wildlife."
"Oh no," said the dragon. "I'm a dragon all right and I'm not really very wild at all. At least if everybody is polite," it added with a glare.
Jack had just followed Sam out onto the lawn at the back of the Kallistien witch HQ in Demantine. They had been told that transport had arrived to take them to the scheduled meeting with potential allies against the Goa'uld. Nobody had said anything about a dragon. I suppose they think they're being very funny thought Jack.
The dragon must have been at least thirty feet long and was very much the classical dragon. It had a long, reddish scaly body, a long neck and a large head. It had what could only be two large wings coming out of the middle of its back, wings that were at present folded and held down against its side. But the most frightening aspect of the whole creature was the dental armoury. Long rows of razor sharp teeth filled its mouth giving it the sort of smile that must have terrified dinosaurs in the days of tyrannosaurus.
"A talking dragon," said Sam. "How is that possible?"
"You mean the dragons where you come from don't talk?" asked the dragon. "I've never heard of mute dragons."
"No they don't," said Sam. "Uh, that is there aren't any dragons where we come from."
"As far as we know," said Jack looking at Phoebe who had now joined them. He was remembering all of the other things that SG-1, well mainly him, had only a short time before insisted did not exist. Phoebe smiled but said nothing.
"How sad," said the dragon. "You must come from a pretty drab and miserable place. No dragons indeed."
"What sort of dragon are you?" asked Phoebe. "Apart from the talking sort. I've seen dragons before but either they couldn't talk or they didn't want to. They weren't very friendly."
"You've met hostile dragons before and survived?" asked the dragon staring at Phoebe. He sounded surprised. "You must be tougher than you look."
"Yes I survived," said Phoebe smiling. "But the dragons didn't. You seem to be a much more friendly dragon so I'm sure we'll be able to get along."
"The dragons didn't survive?" puzzled the dragon. "It takes a great deal to kill a dragon. The only ones I've heard about dying in a very long time were the three...You were there? You were one of those who faced down the Hordes of Hell?"
"Something like that," said Phoebe who by now was receiving very puzzled looks from Jack and Sam. "But that's over and done with. I hope it won't stop you helping us."
"Hmm," said the dragon, continuing to stare at Phoebe. "Much, much tougher than you look."
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"Well that went pretty well," said Wesley. "If I do say so myself."
Wesley was preening himself because of the success of the night attack on the Goa'uld camp which he had helped to plan. Wesley and Eve, while waiting for Jenny to return, had agreed to help the local Kallistians in their fight against the Goa'uld.
The two pronged attack had started after the shuttle with Jenny aboard, had taken off. The attackers had waited for the quiet hours of darkness and then launched the fire arrow attack on one side of the camp. Whilst that was going on scouts had been sent to take out the Jaffa guards around the landing field which was on the other side of the camp. The main force of Kallistians had then entered the camp from that side, leaving detachments to destroy the Jaffa vehicles and aircraft.
The attack had been intended as a hit and run raid but had developed into much more. The Kallistians had intended to do as much damage as possible and then withdraw as soon as the Jaffa started receiving reinforcements, as they usually did promptly via teleportation rings. This time no reinforcements arrived.
Something else was presumably occupying Marduk and his troops because any calls for aid from the Jaffa in the camp had gone unheeded. The attack on the camp had therefore continued until the camp and all the Jaffa vehicles and aircraft had been destroyed and the surviving Jaffa scattered or captured.
Buffy and the gang had joined in the fighting to the extent of stunning and disabling some of the Jaffa and capturing two senior officers. Xander had used his Zat gun and had shown Buffy how to use the stun function on the one she had taken from the Jaffa on the space vessel.
Following the destruction of the camp the Kallistians had dispersed to make themselves more difficult targets for Goa'uld reprisal. Buffy and the others had explained to Wesley and Eve how they had come to be on Kallistien while Wesley had led them back through the woods to the village of Hamindale.
Before they left the scene the travellers had witnessed what was probably one of the most comprehensive cover ups ever. Witches, working with the attackers had not taken part in the attack, staying back in reserve in order to deal with what turned out to be a non-existent counter attack.
Once everything was all over the witches worked together to erase what they saw as a scar on their world. The whole site, the camp, landing field and all was returned to nature. After a few hours during which the Kallistian attackers had scavenged what they could from the place, the witches had restored a fully developed forest to the area. It would be a major problem for the Jaffa to even find the location of what had been their base and even if they did they would find nothing there, well nothing but trees.
Before the clean up spell Buffy and the others had found the transport control area in the largest of the undamaged huts, in what looked like a central HQ building. But the destruction already done to the base by then meant that there was no power to operate the controls. There was therefore no discussion about whether or not to return to the spaceship.
After hearing about Buffy, Faith and Cordelia plus Xander's explanation of events in Sunnydale, Wesley and Eve told their story and the story of Giles's disappearance. Hamindale was the rendezvous point to meet with Jenny so Wesley was hoping that she would be there when they got back.
"Well I suppose Giles could be up there on that space station, spaceship or whatever," said Buffy. "But I don't think so. Jenny wouldn't have been heading north if she thought Giles was in orbit."
"Hey Will!" shouted Xander rushing forward.
Buffy looked up to find that Jenny had indeed now returned to the village and she had Willow and Tara with her. Buffy looked more closely and spotted Angel in the shadows of the porch of the building. She started trotting forward herself.
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"You're quiet," said Sam to Jack.
"I was just thinking about our next report," said Jack turning around briefly to Sam, who was sat behind him, and then glancing at Phoebe who was behind Sam. "You know, the report where we give the General a full and exact account of what went on, but we don't mention witches, dragons and things like that."
"We don't have to mention the local animal we rode on was a dragon," said Sam. "Just that it was a local animal which is sometimes used for transport."
"Who are you calling an animal?" said the dragon who turned its head completely around to stare at Sam. Since the dragon's head was about the size of Sam's whole body and was filled with razor sharp teeth Sam suddenly felt unable to speak. Sam couldn't help noticing that the dragon's breath was very warm, not to say hot and that made her wonder as well as worry.
"Stop teasing," said Phoebe to the dragon from her position on the flying dragon's back behind Sam. "Would you prefer to be called a creature, or a beast?"
"What's wrong with dragon?" muttered the dragon as it turned its head back to concentrate on flying once more. Sam let out a long breathe that she didn't realise she had been holding.
"So what do we say to the uh dragons when we get there?" asked Jack quietly. "And isn't there a quicker way to travel apart from sitting on the back of a dragon?"
"I could have travelled by broomstick," said Phoebe. "Perhaps you'd like to sit up behind me the next time I use one."
Jack briefly glanced back at Phoebe. Is she joking? She must be he thought. Phoebe just smiled.
"We're the ones who asked to be involved in planning the attack on the Goa'uld," said Sam. "The idea is to include the dragons in the attack. If they agree to help it might make a big difference."
"Yeah, well when I agreed to go to this meeting I didn't think we would be taking to dragons," protested Jack. "It wasn't actually mentioned by anybody," he added pointedly.
"We'll mainly be observers. It'll be the Kallistians who do most of the talking I think." said Phoebe meaning the three witches travelling nearby on the back of another dragon flying beside them.
They travelled in silence for a while, each with their own thoughts. The only sound was the wind and the slow flapping of the dragon wings. Sam couldn't puzzle out how such large creatures kept themselves airborne, let alone being able to carry three humans each on their backs.
Their destination was the top of a mountain, a mountain which rose high above an otherwise flat landscape. The dragon now angled down towards the summit. It might be a volcano thought Jack judging by the smoke rising from the crater on the top. Or is that smoke something to do with the dragons he wondered.
The dragon hovered, still high above the summit of the mountain but instead of flying down to land it suddenly, without warning turned upside down. Jack, Sam and Phoebe were abruptly thrown off the dragon's back and began falling towards the wide bowl shaped crater below.
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"And I say this proves the incompetence of the Stargate Command," said Senator Kinsey. "It's their job to know what the Goa'uld are up to."
"That's unfair," said Senator Trubshawe. "The SGC don't have either the responsibility or the resources to police the world for Goa'uld or Jaffa."
Senator Kinsey and his colleague had asked for an urgent meeting with General Hammond at the SGC. They had brought Colonel Maybourne with them and the Colonel had revealed that the NID had discovered that the Goa'uld were operating their own Stargate on Earth.
"But I understand the SGC can detect another Stargate operating from Earth," replied Kinsey. "Well, why didn't they detect the one being used by Marduk's Jaffa?"
"General?" said Senator Trubshawe turning to General Hammond.
"We can only detect the operation of another Stargate if it uses the Earth dialling code," said General Hammond. "I assume that the Gate the Goa'uld have been using gets round this somehow. They might have been able to make it work somehow by using another code, we don't know. They carry around Gates on some of their ships without interfering with other Gates."
"So the SGC had no way to know that the Goa'uld were operating another Stargate," said Trubshawe. "The other agencies like the NID have that responsibility. They are meant to watch out for something like that and call in the SGC when they turn up anything about Goa'uld activity on Earth."
"Which is exactly what they've done and why we're having this meeting. It's a good job the NID have been doing such a good job," replied Senator Kinsey. "Colonel?" added the senator turning to Colonel Maybourne.
"Now this is not certain but we have good reason to believe that the Gate is in the town of Sunnydale California," said Maybourne. "We're keeping watch on a building there."
"So why haven't you moved in Colonel?" asked Senator Trubshawe.
"It's like Senator Kinsey said," replied Maybourne, "this is now an SGC matter. I'm here to hand over to the SGC. It's up to General Hammond and his people what to do next."
As he spoke Maybourne remembered his last conversation with Lilah Morgan. She had continued to refuse to have anything to do with Sunnydale or going up against Willow.
"And if you've any sense you'll leave her alone as well," she had said but she had then smiled. "But if there's somebody you know, somebody you really don't like, send them after Willow and her people. And make sure they have plenty of guns with them. She really doesn't like guns."
"But I should warn you," said Maybourne to General Hammond, "the people we think have this Gate are very dangerous. Your people should be well armed and there better be a lot of them."
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"Are you sure this is going to work?" asked Piper.
"Now you're sounding like Jack," said Prue. "Why shouldn't it work? Cordy knows what she's doing."
So it's Jack now is it thought Piper smiling to herself, not Colonel O'Neill? I wonder if that'll go anywhere? Not if Sam Carter has anything to do with it I think.
Faith had been told about the Charmed Ones' fight against the Replicators and the time-jumping involved. Her suggestion had been that if you wanted to find out what had happened years before why not travel back in time and find out?
Cordelia would not be joining the time travel party. She felt very reluctant to go but didn't know why. She had got to the stage of trusting such feelings and acting on them so she would be staying behind. She had therefore been given the job of making sure that Prue, Piper and Paige would have their powers when they arrived in the past. It was hoped that even if the sisters' magic disappeared the spell done by Cordelia would remain in force.
Having completed her spell Cordelia handed back the amulets to the sisters. She had carried out a spell on the amulets, the same amulets provided by Willow and Tara prior to the fight to close the Hellmouth. The plan was that the amulets would automatically trigger the sisters' powers immediately on arrival in the past.
Prue, Piper, Paige, Faith and Daniel were ready. At Prue's signal the three sisters started their time travel spell. To Giles and Cordelia who were watching it seemed as if the five people simply faded away.
Originally Teal'c had been set to go with the women as an expert on the Goa'uld but he had been called back to Earth by General Hammond to deal with tracking down the Goa'uld Stargate on Earth. Daniel, who had originally intended to remain and continue the research with Giles had therefore joined the team as the Goa'uld expert.
Although nobody knew exactly how far back in time to jump the witches explained that this was not a problem. They had worded their spell to take them to the most appropriate time. They had done the spell as a Power of Three spell to make sure there was enough power to move the five of them a long way back in time.
As a safety precaution the time travel spell included an automatic return provision. When the time was up the travellers would return automatically. In an emergency, provided they had their powers, the sisters would be able to do an earlier return spell but the safety feature was there in case they were not able to do this and in case the group were separated in the past.
They group would all return to the same place, the witches' library, and the time elapsed back in the present would be the same as the time spent in the past. Prue explained this as a way of minimising the magic power and effort needed in doing the spell.
"When do Buffy and Angel and the others get here?" asked Cordelia after the time travellers had faded away.
"Probably tomorrow," said Giles, "late tomorrow if their train is on time."
After the meeting between Buffy's group and Willow, Tara, Angel and Jenny the Whitelighters had orbed everybody to the local Kallistian HQ. The local witches there had made contact with their base and reported what had happened.
Everybody soon realised that for the first time an attack was now possible on Marduk's Orbital HQ ship. Unlike the low key assistance granted to Wesley, Jenny and Eve the witches now pulled out all the stops to get the Earth people to the capital. A combination of teleportation and rail travel would soon bring the group to the city and a reunion with their friends.
It had been decided to go ahead with the time travel mission despite the new prospect of being able to defeat Marduk. Even if Marduk and all of his forces were destroyed there was still the threat of Apophis, so knowledge of a long term solution was still needed.
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Jack fell through space wondering if this was finally it, finally the end when he suddenly felt an arm around his waist as somebody grabbed him from behind. His descent slowed and then he found himself flying through the air. He finally came into a gentle landing. Jack turned around and to find that Phoebe had been holding him. She also had grabbed hold of Sam who was also unharmed.
"More magic?" asked Jack.
"Didn't I mention it," replied Phoebe. "I can fly. It's one of my witch abilities. I don't use it a lot because it's so visible."
"Thanks for the rescue but did the dragon know that?" asked Sam. "Did he know you could fly or was he trying to kill us?" As she spoke Sam looked around and upwards, wondering if they now had to deal with a homicidal dragon.
"I think the dragon was a she," replied Phoebe. "I don't think she was trying to kill us, just dump us in the crater lake over there."
The three travellers were now in the volcanic crater at the top of the mountain and lower down the slope was a small lake of black water. The volcano seemed to be still active since gas was escaping from various scattered points around the crater.
"I was warned it might happen," said Phoebe. "The dragons sometimes do that as a joke, especially if they've been carrying somebody they don't like. I thought the Kallistians would have told you as well."
"It's like Faith says, the Kallistian witches try not to have much to do with non-witches," said Sam.
"As if I haven't enough to worry about, now there's a dragon who doesn't like me," muttered Jack.
As they talked the three travellers walked over to where the witches had landed. Their dragon had not tried to dump them in the lake but had landed normally.
"So why haven't these dragons been brought in before?" asked Sam of Phoebe. "It's not like the war just started."
"I think the Kallistien witches have underestimated the Goa'uld," said Phoebe. "They only really got worried when they realised the Goa'uld were getting their own witches. Anyway with dragons it's always a matter of cost. Whenever the dragons have agreed to an alliance in the past they've always asked a high price. The Kallistians have been reluctant to pay it."
"Are we talking gold?" asked Jack. "All the fairy stories I remember say dragons like gold and sit around sort of watching it until the hero comes along, kills them and steals it."
"Fairy stories?" said Phoebe. "I never thought of that. Whenever I've met fairies I never got them to tell me any stories. I'll remember that the next time I meet one."
Jack looked at Sam and Sam shrugged. Jack shook his head. He was not going to ask. One day everything will be back to normal he thought. All I'll have to bother about then is weird aliens trying to kill me and ordinary things like that.
"Anyway it's not gold or treasure these dragons want," continued Phoebe. "They want cattle."
"Cattle?" asked Sam, puzzled.
"To eat, dragons have big appetites," said Phoebe. "But at least they don't eat people. Not unless they really dislike them," she added mischievously.