Seth.
Part 5.
Fargough Industries Headquarters. New York. 1986.
It had taken me three years to go from a PhD graduate who could not enter the highly competitive aeronautics arena due to getting blacklisted, to a successful business owner.
As planned my company would become the Stark Industries of this universe, but that was going to take at least a few more years of hard work by me.
Given the way things were going, it would be seven more years before I'd be able to build Fargough Towers here in Manhattan as building a massive corporate headquarters doesn't just take money and time, it also requires a lot of support from the people who ran this city.
For now, my company was renting a rather nice office block at 550 Madison Avenue, the building was completed in 1984 as the headquarters of AT&T, but they'd needed to relocate to even larger premises after occupying this place for little more than a year.
Time and money were things I had in great supply so all I had to was keep building up my successful company and prepare for the future. Which I knew would be very interesting.
To that end, I was sponsoring several not-so-legal digs across the world that could lead to more great treasures ending up in my greedy hands.
I didn't need more treasure in the sense of gold and jewels as my company was making a decent profit these days. No, I was after much greater prizes such as some of the alien technology and relics left here on Earth.
Finding them when I had only my old memories of the show and Setesh's knowledge of how things had been back when the Gou'ald ruled this planet, wasn't as much of a help as someone might think.
For example, I knew that somewhere in South America there was an Ancient healing device. Thousands of years ago one of the more powerful Goa'uld of the time found the device that was created by the Ancients.
They determined its primary purpose was to heal, but it was so powerful its effects on human hosts ultimately to be proved devastating.
From that device, the Sarcophagus was created, but that was a flawed bit of technology that could do with some improvement and was going to be one of the things I'd look into.
The device was also capable of reanimating dead tissue, even to the point of giving life to something that had not been alive before, such as the Kull Warriors who served Anubus, and it could animate dead tissue to create what could be called zombies.
My efforts to have people track down that device resulted in the people I sent never reporting back, and perhaps they would have been more successful if I could recall who Anubis went to war with to try to obtain that device.
It was possible that the tomb raiders took my money and ran away somewhere or that they died in the jungle as that part of the world wasn't very safe even when it was politically stable.
It was also possible that somewhere in South America some zombies are wandering around who will attack people.
Thankfully for humanity, the device has a limited range and people animated by the technology can't infect other people to make them zombies so it won't result in some sort of apocalypse.
Even if it had that was why I had a spaceship hidden away. It was good to have the means to get off this planet should there be an apocalypse.
Not all of my sponsored treasure-hunting ventures lost me money. One of them was about to pay off.
"I have them Mr Fargough," said a well-dressed man as he entered my office "Just as promised".
Since secrecy mattered to me I'd made sure to install devices that kept my office free of any kind of surveillance. Setesh might not be the most brilliant of the Goa'uld, but he was still an alien with genetic memory so creating devices that defeated any means of spying on me was easy.
As such, anyone trying to eavesdrop on this conversation would only pick up static.
"I'm glad to hear it, Mr Johnson" I replied.
Johnson was something of a treasure hunter who liked to loot old tombs and explore sunken ships. Unlike Lara Croft or Indiana Jones, he was in for the money rather than the thrill of adventure or to defeat some bad guys. Although he might enjoy the thrills that came with the job, I'd never bothered to find out.
"Yes, these are exactly what I am looking for" I confirmed.
These items were part of the Stewart expedition, which was considered to be something of a 'cursed' expedition. Back in 1931, a team led by Sheldon Stewart removed several Egyptian relics from the Temple of Osiris in Egypt.
That was a place I couldn't visit myself due to the conscripts riots taking place and I wasn't in any rush to go there since I had a ship of my own.
Now that I had the amulet that served as a key that could unlock the temple's secrets no one else would be able to access the hidden Goa'uld technology within the temple. Unless for some reason I wanted them to.
As for the other items in the suitcase in front of me, they along with the key had been transported back to the United States via an ocean crossing. Several items, including the special jars that held Osiris and Isis, were among the artefacts that were stolen from Egypt.
During the return voyage, the ship sank off the coast of New Jersey and these valuables fell into the bottom of the ocean.
Thanks to my funding the wreckage was found and pillaged as it was in the SG-1 show just much sooner, and while I didn't care what happened to a few trinkets I had to make sure that both Osiris and Isis were secure as was their technology.
This was because it was Setesh who sold them out to Ra all those centuries ago and if they got out they'd want revenge. They'd try to kill me before going after Lord Ra.
While it might serve my plans to see the Goa'uld Empire destabilised by unleashing both Osiris and Isis upon the galaxy they would come after Setesh and since I was Setesh as far as they would see things it wasn't wise to let them lose.
"You're payment as agreed," I said as I passed over a small box.
Within the box were several gold coins, each of which was more than a thousand years old.
"I look forward to working for you again, Mr Fargough," said the treasure hunter before he left.
Once the man was gone I moved to my private elevator that went down to the basement. While this part of the building might look to be devoid of anything it was actuallll protected.
Not that anyone had ever tried to break into this part of the building as while corporate espionage was big business, spies from other corporations were only interested in stealing my designs not in raiding my vault.
Even if they got this far the pieces of artwork, antiques and cash that were stored here were not the true wealth of this place. They were a mere distraction for thieves.
As for corporate espionage, it would be hard for anyone to infiltrate my company or buy information from my employees since they were all enslaved to me via the use of Nish'ta.
Once under my control, all I had to do was order them to obey me and to keep their admiration for me to themselves. My employees would rather die than betray me. Not that anyone had been killed, at least so far.
I opened up a safe and took out Arthur's Mantle, which I had found amongst the treasure in Merlin's vault. Loki hadn't taken it, possibly because it was a unique device that didn't register as Ancient technology to his sensors or because it had been powered down while the communication device had likely just been on standby.
It was even possible that Merlin had shielded the device from detection because he didn't want the Asgard messing about with it for some reason.
Had I had anyone to talk to about these sorts of things I would have emitted to feeling very embarrassed about having forgotten that the device was to be found in Glastonbury Tor.
Whatever the reason it was left behind didn't matter. What was of importance was that the device could take me out of phase, moving me into another dimension, or at least partly out of this one.
How it worked was a mystery to me, but I knew how to turn that feature on and off. It had taken me quite a while to translate enough of Merlin's research to figure out how to do even that.
I knew that the rest of the records included instructions on how to build an anti-Ori weapon or rather an anti-ascended weapon that had ended up getting mixed up with the legends of the Holy Grail.
That was a device created by Merlin to destroy the Ori and while having one of those sounded wonderful actually creating one was well beyond my skill.
At least for now, I had time to learn and develop the technology required to construct the device. I just had to be very careful about it because if the Ancients found out I had any knowledge of the Sangrall they'd snuff me out of existence.
I couldn't use the device on them without exposing the existence of humans in this galaxy to the Ori. As the Ancients were apparently keeping us hidden from the Ori, or so they claimed. I wasn't willing to risk finding out.
When I activated the device I was taken out of phase and I was able to walk through the back wall. This gave me access to my real vault that contained some of the treasure I'd taken from Merlin's vault, wealth I assume he'd amassed to fund fighting against the Ori.
Also, there were a few bits of technology that no human other than me should be allowed access to stored away here.
Aside from a couple of zat'nik'tels, I kept some Goa'uld grenades and bombs in here in case I ever needed to blow something up, alongside some Tau'ri weapons.
I even had one of the communication stones that were connected to the communication device that Loki had taken away. It was of no use without the parent device, but I had paid quite a bit for it, so I kept it secure.
Osiris and Isis would be secure here, even if they somehow got out of their jars, they would be out of phase with this universe and unable to take a host. I left them here, and then I used the device to return to normal before heading up to my office.
I got beamed away before I could exit the lift and I found myself once more standing before Loki, only this time he wasn't alone. Having been abducted before I wasn't taken so by surprise.
"Greeting Seth," said the Asgard I didn't know "I am Heimdall".
I knew this creature was an Asgard geneticist. Heimdall, unlike some other Asgard, was rather friendly towards humans if I recalled its personality correctly.
"Hello, Heimdall" I replied, "Can I help you with something?".
Loki muttered something that didn't translate.
"I am a geneticist working for the Asgard High Council" Heimdall explained "Loki is here as my assistant".
And Loki was not happy about that I could tell.
"Did you get demoted?" I asked the sad alien.
Loki muttered something else and if it had translated I felt sure I'd
taken offence on behalf of my mother.
"The High Council is concerned that my peer will in his enthusiasm disregard certain ethical practices" said Heimdall.
Such as making unauthorised clones of people.
"Now that my people can divert a little of their attention to this galaxy we have come to enlist your aid," explained Loki.
By the sounds of things, the evil Lego had been dealt with.
"So you found the device at Dakara?" I asked.
If so this was good news for us organic beings.
"Indeed" confirmed Loki "We seized the device and relocated it to another galaxy. While this had led to us entering a war with the System Lords, we were able to lure the Replicators to a remote system and destroy them".
It wasn't as the Goa'uld had the means to strike at the Asgard in their galaxy. Although the human worlds in this galaxy that were kept safe by the treaty with the Asgard might now be in danger.
"While our military remains vigilant we are confident that the threat is over" the female sounded alien let me know "As such the majority of our race is focused on rebuilding our civilization".
It seemed to me that Loki had avoided prison only because he'd helped to save his race and had agreed to be supervised.
"As genetic specialists, we have charged with making a study of humanity here on Earth" Heimdall let me know "Since you have assisted our people before I had hoped you would be able to do so again".
Thinking on it I wondered why Thor or someone else in their military hadn't come to Earth to question me. I could only assume that they had all just been too busy.
Perhaps they'd get around to it later as they were an ancient race and a few years didn't mean much to them.
"We have been authorised to offer you assistance in your own endeavours as I have done before" Loki stated "As long as it does not threaten the Asgard race".
The female-sounding alien gave the other a look before speaking.
"Or the humans of Earth" added Heimdall.
That was fine with me.
"Can you assist us?" questioned Loki.
I already knew how and I had an idea of what I wanted in return.
"There are a few humans you might want to scan," I said.
Out in the galaxy and on Earth there were a few bits of technology I wouldn't mind getting my hands on that the Asgard might be able to track down for me.
Such as Niriti's Gene sequencer, Hathor's Sarcophagus and maybe one of those jewels that Anubis uses to make his super weapon work. To me, it seemed like a good idea to stash one of the Eyes away where no one could ever find it.
"I'm willing to trade names for favours" I offered.
Loki nodded to signal his agreement.
"How did you acquire this information" questioned Heimdall.
I'd spent some time thinking about how to respond to that question if the Asgard or someone else advanced enough to make me answer.
"When I was in the hospital after Setesh tried to take over this body" I answered "While I was recovering I had a series of visions about the future, one of them involved the Replicators getting destroyed by a device in a temple. Setesh's memories let me know what world that was. Since I had no way of sharing that information with the Asgard until Loki found me I couldn't tell you sooner".
Heimdall titled her large head. Which signalled something.
"Do you know the source of this knowledge? "she asked "Did you encounter some unknown technology around that time?".
I couldn't tell them the truth, if only because I didn't know what actually had happened to me, or at least I didn't know it had happened.
"It's as if I can remember things that haven't happened yet or could have happened" I answered "That's the only way I can explain it".
Changing the subject seemed wise.
"If you want the names of the humans who will aid your research then let's discuss what I want," I said.
The two clones listened as I told them what I desired. In exchange, I would tell them about Jack O'Neill. John Sheppard and Carsen Beckett. Three men who I knew had the ATA gene and might hold the key to saving the Asgard.
Seth
Part 6
Asgard Science Vessel. In Orbit of Earth. 1986.
"You know, I do have a business to run" I reminded the grey creature known as Heimdall.
While I couldn't read an AsgaAsgard'sks as I could read a human's facial expressions, I got the impression that the clone simply didn't care about my complaint.
To be fair the clone did have bigger concerns, my life on Earth hardly mattered when compared to the fate of the Asgard people.
Heimdall was trying to find a solution to the problem her race was facing of genetic degradation caused by them making copies of themselves rather than having children.
Not that I blamed them for avoiding reproduction as during this lifetime I'd grown to dislike children, and they weren't too fond of me either.
Although that had at least a little to do with being forced to endure high school for a second time. Teenagers were so depressing.
"The work we are doing is vital to the future of my race," reminded the female sounding alien.
If nothing else, keeping the Asgard indebted to me was important for my lolong-termuccess, as such I couldn't grumble too much, and it wasn't as if they were interfering with my life ofonarth other than to beam me up to their science vessel with no warning.
At least they made sure to only beam me up when I was alone. This was good as the last thing I wanted was for a group such as the NID to catch wind of any strangeness and start looking into my affairs.
Someone disappearing in strange flashes of light was just the sort of thing that would lleadto this world's version of Mulder and Scully poking around my business.
"Yes" I agreed "But you don't need my input at this time".
Clearly they, felt otherwise even if they didn't express as much in anywaany way I could understand.
The two of them were busy going over data they had gathered from scans taken of humans with the ATA gene, people I had directed them at, and they were comparing that data with what they knew about a very interesting specimen I had very recently led them to.
"I'm not a geneticist" I pointed out.
During the course of the show, SG-1 found themselves in Antarctica, examining the site of Earth's first Stargate, the one at Giza having been brought to Earth by Supreme System Lord Ra after he discovered the Tau'ri.
While there, they find a young woman who has been preserved in the ice for several million years.
Of course, rather than leave well enough alone, they decide to thaw her out, but to be fair people who have been frozen for millions of years rarely become a threat to anyone.
Even for an advanced alien being that was a rather unlikely thing for anyone to have survived. Even Goa'uld don't last a fraction of that time no matter what you use to preserve them.
As for the woman they found. She was an Ancient, left behind when the others fled the Milky Way and headed for the Pegasus Galaxy.
She was left behind due to her having the sickness, either she'd been abandoned or she had chosen to remain behind so as to avoid infecting the rest of her kind.
Upon thawing her out Colonel Jack O'Neill, his team, and the rest of the base, all quickly fell ill as the plague that had possibly been sent to this galaxy by the Ori infected regular humans as well as Ancients since really we were the same species.
The existence of the plague was why the Ancient woman had been beamed directly into an Asgard stasis chamber once her body had been located by Loki's scans.
Finding it had been easier than I would have expected since the Stargate currently buried in the ice is made from Naquadah and that mineral is rare on Earth.
Loki had used that gate as something to lock onto when performing a very detailed scan of the area and the clone had been able to find a very faint biological reading.
Asgard sensors were very good at finding things once you have an idea of what you were looking for and could narrow down the search area.
"Your expertise on events yet to pass is too valuable to be put aside" insisted Hemidall "You may have insight that can further aid us".
I would be more eager to keep sharing information with the little aliens if I was getting more out of it, but they were refusing to let me retain any of the Ancient technology I'd led them to, so anything found at the site of Earth's original Stargate would be kept by them or left here for the Tau'ri to one day uncover.
This meant that if they had found the Ancient outpost that leads the Tau'ri to the Lost City of Atlantis then they weren't going to share anything about it with me.
Which was actually rather wise of them as while I was not Setesh, I still hungered for power as I was part Goa'uld in some sense.
I'd even told them about the six eyes that could be used to fire a superweapon either discovered or created by Anubis.
Loki hadn't gone after any of them as far as I knew. Instead that c,lone had made a report to his superiors about the technology.
According to legend, there were six Eyes, including those held by Ra, Apophis, Osiris, and Tiamat.
At least I hadn't told them about the Eye belonging to Ra, instead having told the aliens about the Eye of Tiamat that was currently owned by the Goa'uld called Marduk
That Eye was sealed in one of his temples along with the Gou'ald itself which had jumped bodies into some alien creature if memory served.
My thinking was that the Asgard sent to obtain the Ancient device would beam it out of the temple from orbit as they were very good at doing that.
Still, I'd warned Loki about Marduk having left his human host as I didn't want that parasite beingto be to acquire an Asgard body because one of the little grey guys got eager to inspect some Ancient device.
Ra should have one of the Eyes stored away somewhere on Abydos for me to steal and perhaps I would go to claim it if I could find out how the breaking of the treaty with the Asgard had affected Ra's leadership of the empire.
Again rather wisely the two Asgard were careful not to share too much information with me.
"You have been well compensated for your time" reminded Loki as the two aliens worked.
Well, he wasn't exactly wrong about that. They might not allow me access to any Ancient tech, or any detailed information about the political state of the galaxy, but at least I got to keep any Goa'uld toys they recovered.
They considered it to be my property, and even if they hadn't the tech was far beneath the Asgard that they had no use for any of it.
I'd spent small fortunes and waited months just to get my hands on a few of the relics left behind on Earth when Ra left the planet, and now the Asgard were juwasanding them over to me without complaint.
Since I could use this technology to seize power on Earth they were showing me a small measure of trust that I could hopefully expand upon.
One of the items that I'd acquired was a device once used by the Goa'uld to create a symbiote pouch in the stomach of a human for theto turnnto a Jaffa.
This was not something I knew much about as only the Goa'uld queens had ever known how to use these devices and they didn't pass this information on to their spawn.
Even if I could have used the device, and I was fairly certain that I would have figured it out, I'd not have bothered making any Jaffa.
I didn't have a Goa'uld queen so I couldn't keep them supplied with larva for their pouches and the Tau'ri had proven that with the right equipment and training, humans could surpass the Jaffa.
If I ever did get the stage when I started conquering planets I would make sure to use a modern-style army with some decent equipment.
Although there were reasons why the Goa'uld made the Jaffa use weapons that should have been ceremonial. They didn't want the Jaffa too well-armed should they rebel.
Since I wouldn't rule as an evil god I wasn't worried much about my own warriors rebelling, but I would make sure to always have an escape route accessible just in case there was some kind of uprising.
The SGC got rather good at getting the humans of this galaxy to overthrow their masters and they might try to do the same to any followers that I gained even if I wasn't an evil tyrant.
Rather than talk to either of the clones I went over to my own workstation that the Asgard aliens were letting me use.
Not just as a courtesy, it also allowed them to monitor what I was up to, and they were welcome to do that since I was not doing much and the Goa'uld technology was no threat to them.
The Asgard were able to produce some sort of suppression field which prevented Goa'uld technology from doing anything destructive, something I'd known about since I'd seen what happened to Goa'uld technology on tint world protected by Thor.
Not that this mattmattersif the clones wanted to kill me they could easily beam me into space and I would be foolish to attack such powerful aliens.
The Kara Kesh more simply known as a hand device, that I was in the process of taking apart, had belonged to Hathor who Loki kept in another stasis chamber here on his ship.
I had considered asking them to set her free and seeing if she would rule with me as I could do with a queen on my side, but Hathor would want to be openly worshipped as a goddess.
Even if I could get her to understand how enjoyable life could be when you didn't try to rule as a deity over some primitives, Hathor's ego would never allow her to see me as an equal, she'd expect me to serve her, and I'd rather be in charge of my own life.
So while I got her Sarcophagus, it was good to have a spare, her Jaffa-making device and her hand device, she got to stay in stasis and I assumed that the Asgard would try to remove the parasite so that the human host could have her life back.
Although I didn't think there was much hope of the human host having any sort of life due so to her spending so much time in a Sarcophagus and how long she'd been trapped in her own head while watching Hathor do all sorts of evil stuff.
As I worked on turning Hathor's Kara Kesh into something easier to wear and less noticeable, I wondered if I should tell the Asgard about the Ancient healing device that was somewhere down in South America.
They might be able to use to hit eal the damage to their DNA with the right modifications, but I'd chosen not to so far since they were keeping Ancient technology for themselves.
A pity that they hadn't been more generous otherwise I might have told Loki and Heimdall all about the rogue Asgard who were living in the Pegasus Galaxy. That offshoot of their race had found some sort of solution to their cloning problem.
Best to hold on to that bit of information until I needed something from the Asgard. Assuming that they left me some way of communicating with them. If not then that was their loss.
Seth.
Part 7.
Temple of Ra. Abydos. 1986.
The Asgard had left me on Earth with a little more Goa'uld technology for me to play with as well as the understanding that when the SGC was formed the galaxy would not be what I was expecting as the Asgard had declared war on the System Lords.
What this war would involve I just didn't know as the race of clones aliens were unwilling to share much information with me. This was understandable as those I had worked with were genetic specialists, not military leaders, and their work kept them away from their people.
Even if they had known what the Asgard High Council had planned they would have been foolish to share such knowledge with someone who might end up sharing that information with others, and not by choice given how many ways the Goa'uld had of brainwashing people.
I wasn't anywhere near ready to take on a Goa'uld, and if one captured me my fate would not be pleasant as Setesh had a bounty on his head, that was why I remained on Earth, or at least one of the reasons. Another factor keeping me close to Earth was that I didn't have access to the Stargate.
Perhaps I could have gotten my hands on the Stargate buried at the south pole, but that kind of operation would be noticeable and it was possible that the Asgard, who had gone to some effort to keep Ancient technology out of my hands, had tagged the gate and would know if anyone messed with it.
While I did have my own small Goa'uld vessel it had a very limited range, and this meant the planets that I could visit were very few in ydos was one of those planets because it was only a handful of lightyears from the Sol System.
The Stargate on the planet Abydos was located inside the Temple of Ra, but I ignored the device and took the rings to a different level once I'd made orbit. As much as I would like to see the pyramid from the outside, I didn't wish to be seen by any of the locals in case they reported anything to Ra when he next visited.
I could recall from the movie how Ra's ship landed on the pyramid when it came to the planet, for the last time, I wondered if that would still happen in this timeline if the Asgard were really at war with the System Lords. Would the clones destroy the System Lords or forge a new Peace Treaty?
It was unknown to me whether or not there were other pyramids on the planet only that I hadn't been able to detect them from orbit. But I did know that in the show this pyramid was destroyed along with the natives of Abydos when Anubis fired on it with his superweapon, or at least that was what happened in the show.
I was here to ensure that Anubis couldn't get his hands on all of the Eyes, and while the Asgard should have taken the Eye of Tiamat to their homeworld I couldn't depend on that, so I wished to seize the Eye of Ra.
Aside from denying Anubis one of the Eyes, I was here to secure the treasure for myself as each of the crystals had couldnify energy on its own, so even one Eye acting alone could give me an edge over an enemy if used correctly.
If Ra ever discovered that his treasure was missing he would blame the humans of this world and destroy them. While I was a power-hungry jerk I wasn't a true Goa'uld so I'd used Setesh's memory of the Eye of Ra (he'd greatly envied his lord for possessing such a treasure) to create a fake that would stay in the vault.
The fake wouldn't fool anyone with a scanner, but from what I knew of Ra he didn't pay much attention to his treasures. The old parasite hadn't even known that the ZPM he'd kept on Earth could be used for more than impressing a bunch of savages.
Sure this trick might not work, but the fake hadn't cost me much to create, and the idea that one day Anubis's plan might be foiled by me having put the fake here was rather amusing.
By making use of my modified Kara Kesh, which looked much like the Infinity Gauntlet used by Iron Man to defeat Thanos, I was able to gain access to the secret chamber that stored Ra's treasures. Among them were the Lost City tablet and the item I sought, which I would soon grab.
Written in Ancient, the tablet described the history of the Ancients in this galaxy just not in much detail, and a little about how they began to suffer from a plague, it also mentioned that they retreated to what translated as either the lost city or the last city.
My understanding of the langue of the Ancients was limited, but this hardly mattered since I knew all about Atlantis. The city was of little interest to me since I lacked the special gene required to use the Ancient technology found in that galaxy and to get there I would not only need access to a Stargate on Earth I'd also need a ZPM.
Merlin's book was much easier to read and it went into much greater detail. Despite this, I took a sketch of the tablet and recorded images just in case the information came in handy one day then I took the Eye.
I placed the fake in its place and quickly made my way out of the temple, using the rings to get back to my ship. Again I considered booby-trapping the chamber, but I didn't want to risk killing Ra too soon.
The rest of the contents of the chamber held no interest to me even if it had been safe to remove them. Besides, compared to the treasures I already had stashed away both on and off Earth the valuables here weren't very interesting. Most of it had clearly been tribute paid to Ra by the primitives he ruled over on different worlds.
There was a chance that Ra might stop by for a visit and the last thing I wanted was to draw the attention of the Supreme System Lord, so as soon as possible I sent the ship into hyperspace. If all went well then no one would ever know that I was here.
Seth.
Part 8.
Fargough Tower. New York. 1993.
Captain Samatha Carter did not squirm in the comfortable seat she had been given to sit in as she waited for her appointment. She sat still and went over what she wanted to say once the meeting started.
She certainly did not act like a nervous teenage girl just because she was about to meet one of the most powerful men in the world, despite feeling an odd desire to fidget. She'd been in far more intense situations than this.
She had graduated at the top of her class from the U.S. Air Force Academy, and as a pilot, she'd logged over 100 hours in enemy air space during the Persian Gulf War, and she'd kept her cool during all of that so it made no sense that she was nervous now.
Nor was she frustrated about having to wait. Plenty of superior officers had made her wait outside their offices while they finished important business or because they had wanted to assert some kind of authority over her by making Carter waste her time.
As to why she was here in the newly built Fargough Tower, the corporate headquarters of Fargough Industries here in Manhattan, she'd come here to speak with Seth Fargough in person.
She'd had to come here because some things couldn't be discussed over the phone nor sent by letter others that might be read by someone before the mail made its way to the right person.
Recently Captain Samantha Carter joined Doctor Catherine Langford in a research program meant to find a way to successfully make use of an alien device found in a dig in Giza before the second world war.
At first, she'd been more than a little sceptical about the existence of such a device since it was supposed to be alien in origin, but now she was attempting to develop a sophisticated supercomputer that could interface with the device.
While the project was new it was in many ways a successor to a failed program, the first Project Giza, they were even keeping the name, which had been housed in the Creek Mountain facility before the device had been moved so as to make use of more advanced equipment now available.
The Cheyenne Mountain Complex was now the home of the new Project Giza and despite the end of the Cold War, the airforce was still willing to fund the project in the hopes that the device would give them some advantage over hostile nations.
To develop a supercomputer that could make use of the alien device, Carter and her team had taken apart the old supercomputers used in the first Project Giza, so they could be studied and Carter had hoped to find out how they had failed.
The supercomputers built all those years ago had been unique, constructed by MIT specialists doing classified work in the early 1980s and then later updated to meet the needs of the project by different people over time, so no person fully understood how the different computers worked or so they thought.
Since they'd been created for the project rather than be adapted after being ordered from some company they were non-standard machines and already so out of date that current experts had never seen anything like them.
As it turned out that there might be one person who could know how the supercomputers worked and that was Doctor Seth Fargough. He might have been a mere student at the time, learning computer science at MIT, but even then he'd been ahead of the so-called experts.
Doctor Seth Fargough had been the man who'd done most of the work on the old supercomputers, going as far as to physically build many of their components from whatever parts the airforce had been able to supply. He'd even written quite a bit of the coding used in the software.
Unlike the older men who had been brought to Creek Mountain, Doctor Seth Fargough had not retired since then, nor had he lagged behind as computer science greatly advanced over the last decade.
This meant that if Seth Fargough was willing to help then she was sure that her team would be able to take strides in building a new supercomputer. A machine that would one day be up to the task of finally letting them interface with the device and discover its function.
Although Carter wasn't hopeful that she could convince Seth Fargough to leave the tower he had made his home and to go back with her Cheyenne Mountain Complex so that he could teach her team exactly how the old supercomputers worked before they started building new ones. Which was something else he might be able to help them with.
After all, Doctor Seth Fargough, it wouldn't do for her to forget that he had a PhD, ran a company worth hundreds of millions, and the man had many interests outside of his own company, he was known to have invested in many different ventures and it all had to be managed.
Despite her achievements to date and her intelligence, she found that she was a little in awe of Doctor Seth Fargough. He was a genius even by her high standards and seemed driven to advanced American technology.
Samatha had always found herself drawn to older successful men, and yet none of them had ever been the kind of man she was looking for. She was self-aware enough to know that this had a lot to do with her father.
She admired Jacob Carter for his success and service to his country, yet she'd always found him distant emotionally and she felt that he too often put his work ahead of his family. Despite that, it was clear that Sam very much wanted the approval of her father; after all, she had followed his footsteps right into the Air Force.
It was only natural that she'd seek approval and support elsewhere, yet she found it hard to find a man who took her as seriously as she would like. Others were too controlling and a few couldn't handle her success, as Carter often equalled or even surpassed men with greater experience than herself.
Some men were even intimidated by her physical prowess and intelligence, but she refused to let the opinions of such old-fashioned people hold her back. Besides, she was a busy woman and had little time for romance or anything outside of work.
Despite her thoughts on the matter, Samatha wondered if Seth Fargough would be different should he show an interest in her, not that she took the idea that he would seriously, even if they might end up working together, as an extremely successful businessman Seth Fargough could have his pick of women.
Doctor Fargough was brilliant, and if his biography was truthful, he'd gone from an above-average student at sixteen who had lost his parents before nearly dying due to getting involved with a cult, to a brilliant MIT student who had earned PhD in computer science engineering by the age of 22.
Ten years after that Fargough Industries was the single biggest supplier in the Aeronautics industry. The jet she'd been flown to New York in had a guidance system built by this company and its new engine was more fuel efficient than anything that came before.
Not only was the man an inventor and leader in the world of business, but he was also a science fiction author. Samantha had read a good chunk of his first novel while on the flight to New York in the hopes that it would give her some insight into the man she wanted to recruit for the project.
She'd already seen the movie and found that she much preferred the book. Both had similar themes, a group of free-thinking people, mostly scientists, fled a distant galaxy due to persecution and came to the Milky Way, to settle many worlds and give rise to the second evolution of the human race.
The bad guys in the movie had clearly been space communists rather than religious fanatics, who had chased the independent thinkers out of the galaxy during an epic space battle, but it had been entertaining enough during the otherwise dull date she'd been on when she'd watched the film.
"Captain Carter," said a pleasant female voice.
Samantha was brought out of her thoughts by Fargough's young and attractive assistant.
"If you'll come with me I'll take you to Mr Fargough's office" said the employee.
The two women didn't speak as they walked down the short corridor to the boss's office. Even with the large double set of doors in the way, Carter was able to hear the man himself on the phone.
"Tell John Hammond that I'm not interested in investing in his venture" Seth Fargough was saying over the phone "And then sell my stock in International Genetic Technologies, Inc. I have a feeling that its stock is going to plummet by the end of the summer".
Since Samatha was an astrophysicist and a combat pilot she knew very little about genetic engineering, but if Seth was cutting any ties he had to that company then it must be in some sort of trouble. According to the air force file she read, Fargough was known for investing in certain biotech firms.
She got her first proper look at Seth when his assistant opened the doors and the man behind the desk removed his headset, a device that looked to be years ahead of anything she got to use, and she found that he was a somewhat handsome man. He kept his dark hair short and wore a neat beard.
Carter took in her surroundings with a quick glance. The office was large with plenty of open space and decorated with items that looked as if they should be in a museum. Sam had hung around with Catherine Langford to know when someone had an interest in ancient cultures.
"Sorry about that," he said as he ended the call "John Hammond is about to open up a theme park".
Carter dragged up the name from her memory.
"John Hammond the industrialist?" she asked.
She remembered reading about him while researching Seth Fargough as they were both big names in the business sector, but Hannound was an industrialist, so it made no sense that he'd want to open a theme park.
"Yes, he and Benjamin Lockwood are about to shoot themselves in the foot," said Seth Fargough.
She didn't understand exactly what that meant and she didn't care enough to find out more as she was here for an important reason.
"Do you prefer Doctor or Captain?" the man behind the desk asked.
Samantha was taken aback and for a moment she wasn't sure what to say. She was here on behalf o the Air Force, but she was here to recruit a civilian.
"Captain Carter will be fine, Doctor Fargough," she said.
She was directed to take a seat and she refused the offer of refreshment. The last thing she wanted was more caffeine.
"Doctor Fargough, more than ten years ago you did some classified work for the Air Force as part of Project Giza," she was now saying "Were you ever made aware of the full scope of the project?".
The problem with dealing with classified material was that it was often hard to get your hands on all the information required and since it had been more than a decade since Fargough had been involved with Project Giza no one remembered much about his involvement.
Even Doctor Catherine Langford, who had a wonderful memory and an eye for details, couldn't recall much about Seth Fargough, beyond that he was brilliant and that he had assisted some MIT researchers back in the early 1980s.
It had shocked both Doctor Langford and General West to discover just how involved Fargough had been with the project. Carter had been left thinking that so-called experts of the time had been taking credit for someone else's work. Another good reason not to bother inviting any of them to help with the new Project Giza.
"I'm not supposed to talk about that." Doctor Fargough stated.
Normally he would be correct about that, but not this time. Samantha reached into her case and took out a file that Fargough quickly looked over. Parts of it had [REDACTED] so as to keep light on details, but anyone who had been part of the original Project Giza would know what it was about.
"I'm in charge of the team that is attempting to build a new supercomputer, one that can
successfully interface with the alien device you saw in 1981" said Carter "We need your help to find out what went wrong with the first attempt so that we don't repeat any mistakes and if you are willing I'd like you to join my team as we attempt to build a successful interface".
Carter expected Fargough to refuse or to at least argue that this wasn't a good time.
"Alright," he said, "But I think we'll need several supercomputers working in parallel to make it all work".
Samantha hadn't expected this, nor had she thought that Seth would already have a brilliant idea for her to muse over, using computers in parallel could give them enough processing power.
"You can just drop whatever you are doing?" she asked.
Seth looked through the papers some more before answering he was now no doubt recalling what he'd gotten up to in the early 1980s.
"I'm sure you can provide me with an office to work from and I have a private jet if I am needed back here," he said "I have a great team of department heads, lawyers, accountants and assistants who can run things without looking over their shoulders".
Samantha hadn't imagined that it would be this easy.
"Given what my company produces it won't look odd if the Air Force takes me on a part-time consultant".
That was something which Carter had been told to suggest.
"You're a lot more eager than I expected" she admitted.
The man behind the desk simply shrugged.
"I've spent the vast majority of time since I left MIT working on setting up this company" he said to Carter "Now that things are running smoothly I could do with a new challenge".
If he wanted to make this all easier for her then Captain Carter wasn't going to complain. All she had to do was sort out some minor details and give General West the good news.
Seth.
Part 9.
Fargough Tower. New York. 1993.
Not long after Captain Samantha Carter left my office, one of my minions brought me my afternoon tea, I had been British in my past life, and I was left to think about what had just happened during that short yet very productive meeting.
I had been invited to join this new version of Project Giza. That this had happened sooner than expected pleased me as now I would have plenty of time to make myself a necessary part of the project, and by the SGC was founded, they shouldn't be able to run the operation without my input.
It was very important to my long-term plans that I be able to keep an eye on the SGC and since I would be able to I could advance my plans in other areas sooner than expected. This put even more of a smile on my face than the prospect of meeting Samatha Carter had.
I'd forgotten just how attractive the young woman was, and she was smart enough that I figured that I'd enjoy working beside her, she had the kind of mind that would make her a stimulating person to spend time with, and if I could get her to go to bed with me it would be something to cherish.
While still thinking of the smart and sexy blond I finished my tea before I walked over to an empty part of the room. Once in the right spot pushed open the top of my watch to show that beneath the clock face, there was a small red gem.
As I pressed it a set of transport rings shot up and a moment later I was engulfed in white light. When I could see again I was within the lowest levels of the tower.
This was a part of the building that didn't appear on any plans, which had been constructed by men who had been brainwashed by me and then made to forget that they had ever worked on this part of the tower.
The architect who designed the tower had died in a car accident and the only plans on record for my tower didn't include anything that should lead to anyone figuring out that the tower went deeper down than the public knew or that it had a set of ring transports.
These lower levels of my headquarters had an independent power source as well as water and waste despoil systems that were not attached to the city's infrastructure in any way. The people who worked down here had other jobs for my company or were officially dead so as to my security.
This was important as they were part of EXALT, an organisation I'd created based upon a faction that appears in one of my favourite video games, XCOM: Enemy Unknown.
In that game, EXALT was a human paramilitary group intent on acquiring alien technology as part of some master plan that might involve taking over the world, I could quite recall their overall goal and it wasn't important.
Unlike the aliens, EXALT resorts to cloak-and-dagger tactics, such as increasing panic in nations that support XCOM and stealing XCOM's resources, forcing the player to use intel gathering and counterintelligence ops to bring them down.
I'd based my organisation on EXALT despite not wanting to dominate the Earth, rather it was because even I had limited resources and funding. As such I had to keep the organisation rather small and I would be forced to underhanded methods in order to achieve my goals.
Ruling as a false god held no appeal to me, not when I could work to decide the fate of this entire galaxy with little risk to myself. EXALT would be my tool in expanding my influence to entire worlds. That way I would have an easier time taking a role in galactic leadership should I go down that path.
The organisation would pretend to be the SGC of some alien world populated by humans with a similar level of technology to Earth, it had to be this way as the American government would never tolerate anyone in this world other than them ever using the Stargate.
For this to work EXALT needed uniforms and equipment different than anything used here on Earth. That wasn't as hard as it might sound since many worlds were populated by humans across this galaxy, and if they get past the medieval stage they do develop similar technology to that of Earth a lot of the time.
For example, Jonas Quinn's homeworld even had its version of the Manhattan Project and the planet the Tok'ra Queen was stuck on was industrialised if memory served, so when, it would just be a matter of time, an SGC team ran into an EXALT team it should seem too odd if they were alike.
Most of EXALT was off-world because if had a DHD then dialling the gate was easy and it was much safer to bring unknown technology to an off-world base than it was to bring it to Earth. It also limited the need to dial the gate here on Earth thus making the operation here more secure.
Given this, it might seem wiser to do my best to sabotage Project Giza, but there were risks in doing that as I could be caught, and I'd rather have my foot in the door when the SGC starts up so that I know what they are getting up to. I might even be able to guide the SGC down certain paths if I was careful about it.
I'd purchased the DHD, that Lord Ra had brought to this world along with a Stargate, from a retired Russian General. The Russians had taken it from the Nazis at the end of World War 2 and the Germans had acquired the technology from Giza very early in this century.
That high-ranking officer had decided to abandon the USSR as it collapsed and move to some remote island. I'd helped to fund his retirement after he reached out to me, my interest in strange historical relics having become known to certain types of people.
Since I'd been concerned that the Asgard might have tampered with the gate at the south pole, I'd flown back to Heliopolis and taken that world's gate. I'd brought it here via my ship and then gotten it moved in the basement before hooking it up to the DHD that I'd gotten from the Russians.
If the SGC ever looked into the matter I would show the damaged DHD that I'd also taken from Heliopolis and tell that I had very recently acquired the item from a buyer who never told me where he'd gotten it from as there is a lot of secrecy involved in the artefacts trade.
Even a damaged DHD would have been a great boon to Project Giza, but I was in no hurry for the SGC to be formed, not until I was sure that would want to keep me involved as a part-time consultant.
That job would consume enough of my time and it was good that I could delegate so much of my work to minions who had been brainwashed, and I had other ways of ensuring that I could handle my workload.
"Dial the Gate" I commanded.
There weren't that many people down here since anyone could punch in a few symbols on a DHD so mostly what went on down here was the storing of supplies that were sent via the Stargate to a system called Gliese 892.
The planet was 21 light years from Earth, and thus it was once part of Ra's domain before the world was abandoned. Once the gate was open and the right signal sent I walked up the ramp. A short time later I was walking on an alien planet. Not exactly a novel experience for me.
This world was the home of the Icarus Base in the Stargate Universe show because it had a uniquely powerful radioactive Naquadria core, which made it an ideal location for the Icarus project, or at least that had been true by 2009.
Naquadria is a highly unstable radioactive isotope of Naquadah which has the potential to be an enormously powerful energy source. It could be used to greatly enhance the destruction caused by a bomb or it could power defence shields and hyperdrive.
It was also important to know that Naquadria does not exist naturally. As such it is impossible for this world, which currently didn't have a name, to have a core made of Naquadria.
Given the heat and pressure in a planet's centre, there was no way a core of Naquadria could form because it would be too unstable.
Thanos, the Goa'uld who had occupied Jonas Quinn's world thousands of years ago, had created Naquadria when he had been experimenting with the Naquadah deposits of that planet.
Somehow Thanos had managed to create a small amount of Naquadria by developing a process to convert raw Naquadah, but he had been killed in a cataclysmic event that nearly destroyed the planet 3,000 years ago. So Naquadria should only exist on that planet.
This world didn't have a core of Naqudah, although it did have deposits going deep down that were inaccessible to anyone even with modern mining equipment, and since the Goa'uld didn't let their slaves have such advanced tools they'd never set up a slave population here as far as Setesh could remember.
Yet there had been a mining operation here at one time and it seemed to have been created by humans so perhaps Ra had tried to set up some of his slaves here. They could have died out or been moved somewhere else.
Not that it mattered beyond the fact that the mine could serve as a base of operations which could be expanded upon and there was still plenty of Naquada here that was easy enough to get at for people with proper mining tools.
Since it was possible to convert Naquadah into Naquadria I suspected that someone had learned about the process during the 21st Century and replicated it here. Perhaps Ba'al as he had an agent on Kelowna when that planet was nearly destroyed by its Naquadah transmuting into the unstable Naquadria.
Given this world's close location to Earth, I suspected the NID might also have been involved, they might have wanted their own supply of Naquadria, only to abandon the world when they realised that they'd made it so dangerous for anyone to be here.
It was surprising how many who had worked in construction ended up homeless or near enough, because of this had plenty of recruits to brainwash and send through the Stargate to this world, who could work in the mines while setting up EXALTs headquarters.
"Burke," I said as my chief of security came over.
The former CIA operative had come to my attention due to me having people poking around parts of South America while looking for that Ancient Healing Device. His career had taken a turn for the worse during an operation some time ago and with the end of the Cold War, he began looking for other career options.
Despite his troubled past I decided to hire him since I could brainwash people, and I used the same method Apophis had used on Teal'c to bring that Jaffa back into his service, to ensure that Burke and other mercenaries I'd hired would remain loyal to me.
Nis'ta wasn't a good brainwashing method to use on troops who might end up in a battle with the Jaffa because one zat blast would be all that was needed to free them from my control.
As such, I'd been forced to use more extreme methods mixed in with bribes. The promise of wealth, adventure and a comfortable retirement on another planet far away from anyone who wanted them dead was another way to ensure loyalty.
I even made use of tretinoin which was created for me by a biotech term who had used Isis and Osiris to synthesise a version of Tretonin. I'd made sure to destroy the minds of those who Setesh had betrayed before giving them over to the lab.
While Tretonin destroyed the immune system of anyone who used it. As long as they kept using it they enjoyed perfect health and it had life-extending properties. It wasn't even expensive to supply people with it.
So far I was only using it off-world because if people on Earth found out about it then I would never be able to supply their demand and it would likely be taken from me by the US government. Aside from that it was too advanced to have been made on Earth.
One day that would change as I had biotech firms laying the groundwork for an amazing discovery by advancing biotechnology and tretinoin would make a nice explanation for why I seemed to age so slowly.
Of course, I would have to make sure that the SGC never discovered the existence of Tretonin when out in the galaxy, but I had plans in motion to deal with that.
"How are things progressing here?" I asked.
The man had a relaxed attitude to his work, but he got things done and kept people working, so I didn't mind.
"Everything's going fine, boss" he assured me "The supplies are coming in on time, and the workers are only a little behind. The miners are starting to stockpile a little of that mineral you're so interested in".
That didn't surprise me as I knew enough about construction to know that things happen to slow people done. People suffer injuries, even if only minor ones, tools break, and things get misplaced. It was all fine as I had taken all of that into account.
As for the Naqudah, it was plentiful here and with the right tools I would have access to tons of the mineral. This was important as not only did it fuel advanced technology it was valuable to trade. I fully intended to use the stockpile here as a currency of sorts once EXALT was allied with a few of the more advanced worlds.
"Good work" I praised.
Burke would oversee the training of the teams that would go through the gate once we started off-world missions
"The only problem is the guys getting bored in their downtime," said the former CIA agent.
I'd considered that and intended to sort it out.
"You'll get your entertainment," I promised.
Soon I would have someone to run this place very effectively.
"I'll be in my lab," I told Burke.
He wandered off and left me to inspect the clones that I kept in the lab. I was no Asgard and I had no access to their cloning science so unlike Ba'al, I couldn't just whip up hundreds of clones. Instead, I slowly grew a few and once ready they would help me to run my domain.
One would rule this world while another could manage things on Earth behind the scenes while I focused on Project Giza for a time. I liked and trusted myself enough to share power and like me they would have access to Setesh's memories.
"It won't be long now," I said to the clones.
I just needed a bit more time for their minds to properly develop before I woke them up.
