Sticks and Stones – Chapter 30 - by Emma Nisbet (grnfield)
As Ferretti and his hidden team watched the Chamakan people entering the ravine they saw many tearful reunions when family members located their loved ones. Sadly though they saw just as many people who were clearly lost and bewildered by the fact that their family members were nowhere to be found. The heartbreak was plain to see on the faces of these, now lonely souls and many a time they saw men, women and children breakdown in tears when they realised that they would never see their loved ones again.
#
SG-2 remained hidden in the trees for many hours. Laying on their bellies they crept forwards at random intervals to peer over the edge of the ravine. They were glad to see that the Jaffa were pretty much leaving the Chamakans alone, in fact there were surprisingly few Jaffa guarding the canyon entrance at all - just one standard group of six warriors, but only three of those visible at any one time. Teal'c pointed out that the Jaffa were, in many ways, just as arrogant as the Goa'uld. They were the superior force on this planet and had full control of the Chamakan people. This was also the main reason that the guards were in full body armour, including helmets. The Chamakans could see the large warriors, in all their gear, and be in awe of their massive strength and power and because of this there was no need for a large Jaffa presence at the ravine. The Chamakans had been subdued and placed in a virtually impenetrable area so that most of the Jaffa could return to the Ha'tak to feast in the style that they had grown accustomed to.
Lou questioned Teal'c as to whether this knowledge could be used to the advantage of the SG teams. Teal'c put forward a suggestion that once SG-3 returned they would have sufficient manpower to replace the squad of Jaffa that were guarding the canyon. If this was done under cover of darkness, when the rest of the Jaffa were elsewhere then hopefully it could be achieved with minimal risk to both the members of the SGC and the Chamakan prisoners as well. The SG-replacement-Jaffa could at least ease the suffering of the young women and children during the next day and possibly manage to get a message to the Chamakan people that help was finally on the way.
#
When SG-3 returned, several hours after midnight, they brought news that the SGC would not be sending any more teams through straight away. The IOA had inserted their usual spanner into the works and were complaining about the cost - both monetary and human - of a rescue mission for a group of people who, in their opinion, hadn't given very much in return. Initially SG-3 had been ordered to return to Earth along with the team of Marines, who were guarding the gate. Reynolds had pointed out that SG-2 were maintaining radio silence and this could not be broken for fear of alerting the Jaffa to their presence. If the SGC couldn't contact Ferretti's team by radio then someone was going to have to return to them and 'drag their sorry asses back through the gate'. After a fair bit of haggling Hammond had finally got agreement for the teams currently on the planet to remain where they were. Basically they were on their own, their orders were to gain as much intel as possible on the current situation, to stay out of trouble and then to return through the gate as and when they could safely do so.
Most of the team-mates left on Chamaka had served under General Hammond for many years. They knew the Texan Grandfather would have done anything in his power to allow his men to be able to help save the Chamakan people. One of the main complaints from the upper echelons inside the SGC was that their hands were tied in so many of the most important decisions. The 'bloody minded bureaucrats' had a great deal of power and unfortunately also held the purse strings for the whole Stargate project. It was one of the main reasons that Colonel O'Neill couldn't and wouldn't have handled a desk job when he left SG-1. He'd butted heads many a time with some of the people holding most of the power - Robert Kinsey being the prime example.
Therefore the teams on the planet took their 'orders' with a hefty pinch of salt. They had no intentions of leaving the Chamakan population to the predicament that they had unfortunately found themselves in and it was decided that the two teams would have to take matters into their own hands. Whatever they could do to make life difficult for these two particular Goa'ulds - and their Jaffa too, of course - would be done with as much preservation of Human and Chamakan life as possible. The current Chamakan prisoners were in a bad condition already. Should many more of them perish in the next few days then it was almost certain that the Jaffa would go out and collect the residents of the next inhabited village. This would go on - ad infinitum - until either the work on the base was completed and the mine was empty, or until the Jaffa ran out of useable Chamakan people. That possibility didn't bear thinking about. If the population of Chamakans was wiped from the face of their planet then Ba'al would, almost single-handedly, have caused their genocide. The Chamakans had never travelled from their homeworld and SG-5 had caused a furore when they had first stepped through the gate a few years before. Once the locals had calmed down, SG-5 had been received as friends and an agreement had been drawn up between the two worlds.
#
Ferretti was glad to see that Corporal Franks had returned with SG-3. There had been no need for the young man to remain with the marines at the gate but as no-one had been willing to let him catch up with the other two teams on his own, he'd been stuck there when he had returned the children through the gate with Mills and Fernandez's group.
This was good news as it meant that ten members of the SGC were now camped above the ravine. Just increasing their numbers by one meant extra security for the teams. The six largest people could be used to replace the entire squad of Jaffa, leaving Lou and Sam with Jimmy Sands of SG-2, and Sergeant Davies from SG-3. Ferretti was loath to split up his team but this combination made the most sense. Teal'c obviously had to become one of the replacement Jaffa as he knew what was to be expected of the troops and could coach the others to avoid raising suspicion. Sergeant Bell from SG-2 was a large strapping soldier and had a decent understanding of the Goa'uld language, whereas Mickey Davies was a small man, and a recent addition to SG-3 team at that.
Everyone remained in their makeshift camp for a couple of hours more. This gave the members of SG-3 a chance to rest for a while after their trek through the dark woods of Chamaka, but tensions ran high in the camp and no-one got much actual sleep.
#
Once the faintest glimmer of light started to show in the sky, Teal'c advised that it was 'now or never' as the plan needed to be put into action before dawn broke completely. The Jaffa patrols would soon be leaving the Ha'tak and heading back to collect their contingent of workers for the day ahead. They would bring food for the Jaffa guarding the canyon and then return with the prisoners to guard either the mine or the construction area.
Reynolds queried why the Jaffa guarding the ravine didn't get to eat on the Ha'tak. Teal'c was quick to fill him in on the ranking system within the Jaffa. The lower ranking warriors were the ones who were selected for menial tasks like guarding the children in the ravine. Higher ranking Jaffa had more high status tasks such as guarding the women on the construction area or the men in the mines. These higher ranking warriors had previously won their right to eat onboard the Ha'tak, a privilege they had earned with blood, sweat and toil.
Teal'c, Reynolds, Bell, Nicholson, Franks and Grimm moved swiftly away from the camp, and drifted silently towards the entrance of the ravine. The three Jaffa currently standing guard were efficiently despatched and the six men swiftly stripped them of their armour and hid the bodies deep within the wooded area on the far side of the canyon.
Teal'c, Reynolds and Nicholson were soon clothed in the Jaffa uniforms and they donned the helmets quickly, to begin patrolling the entrance to the ravine. Their three comrades made their way quietly to the area where they knew the remaining three guards were sleeping. The two marines and Sergeant Bell had no problems with the sleeping Jaffa but had to make several trips back and forth to hide the bodies. Jaffa were never particularly lightweights and it took two fully grown men to easily manoeuvre each cadaver through the trees and place them where they wouldn't be easily discovered.
With that unpleasant task completed the three Tau'ri returned to the Jaffa camp and wrapped themselves in blankets to give the impression that they were sleeping. Teal'c had told his team-mates that the Jaffa camp would more than likely not be disturbed. The only reason a higher ranking soldier would enter the camp would be if there was a major problem - or a high suspicion of one. Either way, the SG teams would already be in serious trouble.