Mystery Solved


Disclaimer: The characters of the Stargate Universe belong to MGM. The characters of the Four Orders are entirely my own.


AU/SGU/FO: A powerful being from another universe appears on the Destiny just as Eli's time had run out. Stranded on the ship he has to figure out how to go home and the best way is to help the crew of Destiny.


Season Seven – 'Tempus Magnarum'

Premise:

The crew of Destiny exited stasis only to discover two new passengers from another universe, which have spent their time fixing the ship. After some deliberations, they choose to keep them onboard as their newest allies.

As an Ancient seed ship tries to kill them, they set out to discover the reason. Tasking the SGC to assist, Diablo hopes for some results but the lack of progress prompts his decision to return to the Milky Way Galaxy.

Returning to Earth surprisingly fast, Diablo makes use of a base of a race as old as the Ancients. Firmly decided not to share them, he joins the SGC to expedite matters and while things develop fast uncovering the Ancients' history proves more challenging than anticipated.

But Diablo provides the SGC with invaluable information on the location of the fabled Clava Thessara Infinitas and that changed everything for Earth. SGC moves to reveal the Stargate program to the public in order to gain the benefits from it.

Meanwhile on the other side of the universe, Destiny continues on its course set out million years ago hoping for a better future.


Chapter 2

Previously:

Daniel had an epiphany. "The chevrons… "

"BINGO!" Diablo exclaimed happily. Finally, they were starting to pay attention. "And they have how many chevrons there, Doctor?"

"Nine,"

"Yes, they do." Diablo smiled. "Now, you all assumed that the address leading to the treasure is made of seven glyphs but that is not the truth."

"I don't follow."

"Jackson, let me ask you one question that will answer that."

"Go ahead."

"How many syllables are there in Clava Thessara Infinitas?"

And now:


Daniel did not reply right away. He was counting and then as he was about to say it, he froze. The epiphany that came with it seemed impossible. Who would have thought that the most important clue was in the name itself?

"What you have to ask yourself is why the Ancients built the gates this way? Why weren't there only 7 chevrons? I mean for galactic use you have 7 glyphs that work – a direction in space and a point of origin. Of course, with other galaxies in the mix, they become eight. So why not have the gate have only eight glyphs?"

Diablo paused and then turned back to Dr. Jackson. "How many are the syllables, Doctor Jackson?"

"Nine," Daniel replied finally. "The clue is in the name but it can't be a gate address as the spoken glyphs can't provide for the entire name."

"That's correct, Doctor. It doesn't but it is not that simple either." Diablo said and left the audience to absorb the significance of this revelation. "You see the name itself is the clue in terms of how many chevrons. Now as you said not all of them are part of the spoken glyphs."

"So which ones are?" Carter asked.

"Cla-va Thes-sa-ra," Diablo replied. "Those are the spoken ones. Now, the situation is different with Infinitas. In it there is only one syllable that can be found in the spoken glyphs."

"So, we have only 5 chevrons of an address and four missing," Daniel said. "The Earth glyph should be present at the end though not as the point of origin."

"That is nearly correct but not entirely. The Earth glyph is there but not where you think. Now, you have to understand the motivation behind everything. The meaning of the phrase clue is not to be taken literarily, Doctor. You see this is where everyone got it wrong.

It says the Key of the infinite treasure, yes? Yeah, not quite. In the past, you and the Goa'ulds assumed that the key refers to the Rosetta stone where the address will be displayed or engraved. But when you checked it – there was nothing there."

"That is what led me to believe that it is a hoax."

"No, not a hoax, Doctor, it was a misdirection." Diablo explained. "It was designed to throw people off the real scent. The word key has many meanings and, in our case, a very different meaning.

When you say that something is 'Key to the Success', you mean that this is the 'it', which you need to make something happen. It is an essential or a fundamental or a foundation or a pillar, and many others. And yes, it can be an actual key as well. But our Ancient friend had a different meaning all together. The meaning itself is more abstract and indirectly linked to the word key."

"Then what is it?"

"To answer this, we must first find the words before that. Treasure in most cultures, the advanced ones anyway, means knowledge. No, no, gentlemen, it doesn't mean trinkets or gold or silver or platinum or some nth metal. It means knowledge (especially in Hindu). I mean these guys-built temples of gold like they were using dirt. But treasure for them was knowledge and that is what they left behind in most of their temples.

But we are deviating again. Infinity, now that is a curious choice of a word. There is no such thing as an infinite treasure even knowledge is not infinite. So, perhaps, he meant something else. "

"Where is this treasure then?" Hank Landry asked. He was definitively getting impatient.

"That is an excellent question." Diablo beamed. "Now, treasures, Doctor Jackson, are usually what?"

"Buried or lost,"

"Yes, very good," Diablo nodded approvingly. "But in our case, it is not lost nor is it buried or made lost. It is hidden behind a very complex and abstract scheme created by our Ancient friend.

The trouble with the word hidden however is that it doesn't exist within the spoken glyphs so I had to find the closest in meaning and that is Proclarush or Praclarush, whichever pronunciation you fancy."

"No, that means simply lost in fire." Daniel objected.

"No, Daniel, he said that closest to its meaning." Carter corrected.

"Well, I am glad someone is paying attention." Diablo said. "The word itself could be translated as lost in fire or lost. But for our purposes it would be hidden."

Daniel thought about it and while it was getting far-fetched it had a lot of logical elements.

"And there it is your address – Pro-cla-rush Thes-sa-ra At Cla-va."

"No, the glyph At must be the last one." Daniel shook his head.

"Again, Doctor, you are wrong. The translation essentially goes Hidden Treasure at the Key, not Hidden Treasure Key Here. It is the subtlety of the language and the logic behind it. The Key, in this case, is not the fundamental or an actual key, but the meaning that the treasure is hidden in a vault that is the key."

Daniel again had to bend to his logic. He had assumed that they were looking for an actual key or Rosetta stone that will solve the puzzle. He never considered that what they are looking for is located at the key. For Key could simply be the name of the vault or the planet.


He had to admit that the creator of this puzzle was a genius and a psychopath. Only someone, very deranged could create something so abstract.

"Oh, ok, then now we need an Icarus class planet to access the..."

"No, no, no, General Landry, the Icarus class planet works for reaching Destiny but the vault is not far way. It is in the Milky Way."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Well, it is pure logic. If you hide something far away, then you risk the locals finding it, albeit accidentally. No, you need to keep it close so you can keep an eye on it. That is one of the reasons our Ancient friend went back in the time to remove from knowledge, all vestiges and clues that could potentially lead to it."

"But why?"

"Well, he wanted to make it nearly impossible to find so only those that are worthy will find it."

"That seems ridiculous."

"It is. I agree."

"So, what is exactly in this treasure?"

"I would say the one thing even when I arrived in your universe I couldn't find."

"Which is what?"

"The most annoying and mind-boggling thing, General – manuals."

"Manuals?"

"Yes, what all of the databases are missing is the blueprints of the Ancients technologies. You know many things now. You know how to make certain things but you do not possess the knowledge to build the Stargate the way they did, despite that ugly contraption that you are building several hangars away."

"We are what?" O'Neill looked at him quizzically and as innocent as possible.

"Seriously, General O'Neill, do you really think that you can start building your own version of the Stargate without my knowledge? I mean you people are doing it practically under my nose and my nose is very sensitive."

"I do not know what you are talking about."

Diablo did not bother to answer right away. He simply looked at Avatar and an image with the Earth's version of the gate appeared. The description of it being ugly was not without its merits. It looked like they had gathered several thousand tons of scrap and they have put together this rough looking version.

"While I have no doubt that it will work perhaps it would be best to wait until we find the actual, original blueprints and then you can compare notes and possibly improve that thing before you make a test where something goes wrong and Earth becomes uninhabitable."

O'Neill and the other generals moved uncomfortably. How in the name of whatever has he discovered its existence? This was the most heavily guarded secret in the SGC.

"Anyway, as I was saying, the blueprints for the Ancients technologies can't be found anywhere. They are not in Atlantis. They are not in Destiny's computer. They are not in the repositories of knowledge."

"Actually, he had the blueprint for the DHD." Daniel noted.

"Yes, I literally drew it." O'Neill confirmed. "That's got to be...you know."

"Yes, but not the other things, they are not there."

"For the latter, we do not know, you mean?" Carter interjected. "We have not specifically looked for it even General O'Neill had the knowledge in his head."

"I am glad you mentioned that. You see our Ancient friend is the reason General O'Neill nearly died twice for that thing."

"How would he have anything to do it? The knowledge of the Ancients was overwhelming for him. It was too much for him to handle..."


Diablo started laughing uncontrollably. "You are indeed as a species sometimes very amusing and I like that about you."

"What is so amusing?"

"It is your belief that you can't hack it. You have no idea what the human mind can actually handle. You can't begin even to fathom that." Diablo replied. "Let me give you an example." He turned to Avatar who began preparations and then the others. "Ladies and gentlemen, please allow this little deviation from our current topic."

As everyone nodded intrigued, Diablo continued. "You see I have started one little experiment in the Pegasus Galaxy. When I had the chance to look at everyone that you met there, one race caught my attention. It was the way they built their ships that was very telling."

"To whom do you refer?" Carter asked.

"I am referring to the Travellers."

"They are descendant of the Ancients. Why would they be more peculiar than the others?" Daniel asked.

"Ah, you see, Doctor Jackson, this is where you are wrong again. The Travellers are not descendants of the Ancients."

"They are not?"

"Oh, no, they come from another race. That race is probably one of the most annoying races to have ever inhabited the cosmos, which is probably why they were wiped out so quickly."

"What is that race?"

"The name of the race is somewhat irrelevant here. Imagine the entire knowledge of all the planets inhabited with humans. Imagine all that existing in the mind of only one of those bastards. They were like walking encyclopaedias.

They had the uncanny ability to learn. But not just learn but also understand. They learn with the speed of light."

"What's this got to do with the Travellers? And what experiment, are you conducting with them?" O'Neill asked.

"It is a very simple one. I am tracking their ability to learn new things. Do you know what the result is?"

"No,"

"They learn on average five to ten times faster than the average human of Earth."

"That's impossible." Daniel exclaimed.

"Oh, but it is. Their ancestral genome has very little commonalities with yours or with that of the Ancients." Diablo announced. "Now to the test. Dr. Jackson. Pick twelve pictures from that folder that Avatar is going to open for you and memorize them. I will not be looking."

He closed his eyes and waited for Daniel to make his selection. Avatar then hid them inside the folder and shuffled it.

"How many are there in that folder?" Daniel asked as the bar was almost invisible.

"Oh, I don't know – a few million." Avatar replied. "We are ready."

"Good," Diablo said and turned to the others. "Now, Dr. Jackson, you will provide me with clue of each picture, a partial. Avatar is then going to shuffle them again, and then he is going to display them one by one at lightning speed."

Everyone stood still.

"Now, Doctor, describe the first picture to me." Daniel did so and Avatar let loose the pictures. They were changing so quickly that they had become a blur. After a few minutes, Diablo exclaimed. "Stop. Go back four pictures, no another two, and this one. Put it in another folder. Jackson the next one."

That continued for all twelve pictures. Diablo would stop the flow at some point and pick one, and at the end Avatar revealed the twelve.

"Are those your pictures, Doctor?" Diablo asked.

"Yeah..." Daniel was stunned. He was not the only one though. "How did you that?"

"Well, I have evolved. I can read at lightning speed. But the race we spoke about would find these same pictures about five to seven times faster than me."

Daniel's eyes depicted sheer surprise. How smart was that race with the ability to do such a thing?

"You see, Doctor, these guys could learn a language faster than you can breathe, well not that fast, but very fast. But you see they will not only learn the language they would know its intricacies better than those who were born with it.

Their thoughts travel literarily at the speed of light. Their ability to absorb information doesn't have an equal. No computer I have ever seen can keep up with them. And that is the representation of the mind of only one of them. And mind you there are distinction levels between them – not so much as stupid and smart like with us, but you get the gist."

"Wow!"

"Now to return to my previous point, your minds can process an insane amount of information. Handling the repository of knowledge would have been a cake walk. But when O'Neill absorbed the knowledge, he panicked of its sheer size and then allowed you and the Asgard to tell him that he is not evolved enough to handle it and that, Dr. Jackson, is horseshit. Your minds are more than capable of handling it.

Had he believed in himself even a little would have been a very different story. But now to return to my original point, our Ancient friend removed the blueprints from all databases including the repository of knowledge. By doing so however he destabilized the data, which is the other reason why O'Neill had a panic attack."

"So how do we access the address if we do not need an Icarus class planet?" Hank Landry decided they have stayed off topic for too long.

"I think 2 ZPMs ought to do it." Diablo replied.

"Only two?"

"General Landry, we know for a fact that several Ancients, about two thousand years ago, got their asses on the Destiny from Earth. I am pretty sure they did not blow up even one planet in order to do so.

I am also certain they have used ZPMs to get on Destiny hence the reason I am confident that a ZPM or two will work with a nine-chevron address."

"Where do you get this confidence?"


Diablo did not reply right away. He instead moved to the computer console and started searching for something. Minutes later, he seemed to have found it. It was a painting, an old one, of Roman times.

"You got to love sometimes some painters." He spoke. "I think this should answer your question, General Landry."

The painting in question showed the time of Jesus and his ascension. Next to the cave where he was buried there was a ring-shaped stone that remarkably looked like a gate there were two stars of blinding light.

"ZPMs," Daniel exclaimed having now understood. When they learnt that Jesus was actually an Ancient this painting definitively made much more sense.

"Now you get it." Diablo smiled.

"But how?" Carter asked. "It doesn't make sense. The two ZPMs do not have nearly enough power to dial Destiny. Perhaps they went to another planet and from there they got to Destiny."

"You should really learn to read, Carter." Diablo said and pointed at the name of the painting.

"Iter ad Fatum. Daniel?"

"It roughly translates as Journey to Fate or Destiny."

"Does this answer your question, Carter?" Diablo inquired.

"Yes, it does but it is circumstantial."

"Yes, I thought you might say that." He turned around and revealed another one. "So, there it is your answer."

The painting was mind blowing. In the background of stars, a mighty chariot flew forward with Jesus on it and in a tight window behind him, the left behind life on Earth.

"Now, while this is a painting from some poor old sod that saw Destiny, he depicted it in the only way he understood."

"Ok, ok, they used two ZPMs." Carter surrendered.


In the next few days, they got their hands on the ZPMs. Now the question was how to use the ZPMs.

"Well, they did not have cables back in the day, Carter. What does Ancient tech use?"

"Crystals,"

"Quartz, hum, interesting,"

Diablo focused on the gate. He was certain there was a reason the painting depicted the two power sources the way they appeared in it.

"Now, what is that?" He exclaimed. He came closer to the gate and his eye gaze shifted from its brown colour to the pure energy (it was something that still scared everyone around as it was uncanny).

Suddenly he lifted the gate and started turning it. "That is not in its proper position."

"It is round. Does it matter?" O'Neill exclaimed with the obvious retort of 'duh'.

He did not receive an answer as Diablo kept turning the gate until he settled it back on its place. He then took one of the ZPMs and walked to the side of the gate. He bent and then without any further ado lodged the ZPM into the gate. He went to other side and did the same with the second one.

"Now, would you look at that?" He exclaimed satisfied. "How about it, Doctor, dial the gate?"

Carter started the dialling sequence - 36-10-16-35-3-31-1-3-28.

"Wouldn't the turning of the gate hit the ZPMs?" Daniel wondered.

He received his answer when the ring reached the ZPMs. They both glowed and hovered away from the gate but maintained their glow. And now the last piece of the puzzle took shape. Daniel had to remind himself that people at the time drew exactly what they saw and this is what the unnamed painter had seen.

As the ninth chevron locked in, the whoosh sound was heard and the unstable vortex appeared then the puddle settled still.

"Well, what do you know? There you have it. Send a drone." Diablo said all beaming.

The drone scanned the immediate area around the gate. It was a lush green world and perfectly safe for them.

"Carter, assemble SG1 and go find the infinite treasure." O'Neill ordered.

"How long would the gate stay open like this?" General Landry inquired.

"I would say as long as there is charge in the gate and in the ZPMs, so a long time, mon generale." Diablo replied. "Excellent, let me know what you find."

And with that he did his disappearance act.


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