Robotech: The Stargate Saga

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters and universes that I am about to mangle around and mash together for my own demented author amusement – sadly all Robotech and Stargate characters and concepts remain the property of Harmony Gold and MGM respectively – I am merely borrowing them and make absolutely no profit from their use. As a result, please keep the legal attack dogs – also known as lawyers – firmly muzzled and on a leash as I have no money to give to anyone.

Authors Notes: Sorry this chapter has taken a bit longer to come together than I originally expected its just things have been a bit hectic around here recently, especially over the last two days as my lovely little dog Poppy has just produced a litter of four puppies. But the chapter is finally done and while I couldn't include all the scenes I originally planned to do – mostly because I cannot do diplomatic meetings to save my life, somehow it always feels like I'm trying to freeze dry my brain – I hope your all happy with the result. Okay that's about it for now so let's crack on with the chapter shall we?

Oh yes a quick reminder that conversation in italic or in bold italic represents a host and a symbiote talking.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Nox Shuttle

Approaching Robotech Factory Satellite

Earth Orbit, That Same Time

Sitting comfortably in the shuttle that was taking him, Lya and Antaeus to their meeting Elder Ohper of the Nox was deep in thought as he contemplated the situation that had brought the three of them here at this time. A few days ago he had been summoned to a meeting of the Council of Elders after, for the first time in over four hundred years, an Asgard battlecruiser the Snekke had dropped out of hyperspace over Gaia. To say they had been surprised to see the Asgard again after so long had been an understatement though they had naturally invited the ships commander down to the capital to see what had brought their old, now somewhat distant, allies to Gaia after so long.

The tale the Asgard commander, Otkel, had presented to them had been frightening as it had shown just how power could corrupt a species that had once been quiet a noble one – from what Otkel had said the human-stock species involved the Tirolians had once been looked on with respect and approval by the Asgard who had actively considered approaching them to make an alliance as the former spread across their galaxy, establishing trading relationships with other worlds and cultures and generally being decent people – and transform them into a force of evil that far surpassed even the Goa'uld. How the now very imperialistic, totalitarian Tirolians had created an entire race of giant humanoids – the Zentraedi – to serve as tools of warfare and conquest and how they had enslaved multiple galaxies using weapons of immense power, power not seen since the reign of the Ancients and even then only sparingly.

Otkel had explained how for nearly five hundred years this had gone on adding that while his people had tried to stop the expansion of the Tirolians – or as they now referred to themselves the Robotech Masters – they were massively outnumbered and outgunned. The best they had been able to do was contain them and even then the situation was tense. Only now that had changed, a change that first began nearly twenty years ago when a scientist named Zor – tired of his people's misuse of his discoveries and technologies and despairing that his attempts to change their course had failed – finally took action to try and bring an end to the Robotech Masters reign of terror. Action that included secreting the source of the Tirolians power – something called the protoculture matrix – aboard his flagship and fleeing with it. Zor ultimately meeting his end in a clash with another species, the Invid, but not before sending his ship away hoping that it – and with it the protoculture matrix - would get lost in the eternal void of intergalactic space forevermore.

Only that was not what happened.

Through some odd mechanism the vessel had made it across the great void of intergalactic space and managed to pass through a sizeable chunk of Goa'uld space without being detected. Something that Ohper had to admit he was somewhat grateful for as the Nox were not unaware of the cruel nature of the sentient parasites, what they would have done with the Tirolian technology. The horrors that they would have unleashed with it frankly didn't bear thinking about. After passing through Goa'uld space the ship had crashed here on the planet below, been recovered by the native human inhabitants who had begun reverse engineering technology from it all the while rebuilding the damaged vessel.

That was until after a decade the Zentraedi arrived, following the lost vessel with orders to recover it. A war had erupted and had ultimately been responsible for turning much of the planet below into a wasteland when the Zentraedi Supreme Commander, a being named Dolza, bombarded the planet with something called reflex weaponry. But the war was not in vain as the people of Earth had broken the chains of servitude binding the Zentraedi to the Robotech Masters and were helping them to discover that there was far more to being alive than simply being at war all the time. In return the Zentraedi were doing their best to help them deal with the worst effects of the bombardment their former, now reduced to subatomic particles dispersing in the stellar winds, leader had subjected the planet to. But even with the Zentraedi's aid Earth was a very, very long way from recovery.

Which was why the Asgard had come to see them on behalf of the Terran race. The Asgard were asking that they use their knowledge and technology to help repair – at least as much as possible – the damage done to Earth's biosphere. The Council of Elders had agreed to the Asgard request, he was just here now to arrange with Terran representatives how they would go about helping them. The other elders also wanted him to give them a few pointers, a couple of nudges to more peaceful and reasonable races than the Goa'uld who they had already clashed with at least once, on using their recently rediscovered Stargate.

"You are thinking about our mission here are you not Ohper," Lya said bringing him out of his thoughts.

"Indeed I am Lya," Ohper admitted, smiling at the slightly younger Nox. It would be another hundred years before Lya was old enough to be considered an elder and welcomed to the council that had for millions of years led there people but he could already see she would be a very valuable addition to their ranks. "The damage this planet has sustained is very severe. Even with our techniques and abilities regenerating its biosphere will prove extremely challenging."

"We have regenerated biospheres before," Antaeus pointed out from where he was supervising the shuttles synthetic intelligence as it guided them towards the enormous factory satellite. "Though I will admit few have been this damaged in recent centuries if not millennia."

"Agreed though the type of radiation left behind by the weapons that did this does concern me," Ohper admitted, recalling everything that Otkel had told them about reflex weaponry – or to use its full name quantum reflex energy wave weapons – and the hyper phasic radiation it left behind, radiation that normally was only found in certain subspace domains, especially those that were close to the normal space/subspace boundary layers. Cleaning that up – especially as like all subspace-based radiations you had to be careful with the method you used as conventional clean up methods didn't necessarily work and could actually make the situation worse – was certain to be very challenging, especially compared to the gamma and other more mundane radiations they were used to cleaning up. Especially as for millennia now they had been quietly cleaning up and regenerating worlds that had been levelled and then abandoned by the Goa'uld, bringing them back to life so that one day – when the System Lords finally fell as they inevitably would – some race could again make them there home.

"It will be difficult," Antaeus admitted frowning. "Though I do not understand how a subspace radiation form can continue to exist in normal space for so long. Even if it is present in the remnant energy left behind it should have broken down and dissipated almost immediately not lingered for nearly two of this planet's years."

"That is a puzzle," Lya agreed knowing that subspace radiation forms were usually highly unstable in normal space and usually would, in minutes at most, begin breaking down into lesser radiation forms that were far easier to deal with like gamma radiation and x-rays. "Maybe we should ask the Asgard about it during the meeting. Given their past confrontations with the Zentraedi and the Robotech Masters they might be able to assist us in getting rid of this radiation form."

"Perhaps," Ohper agreed knowing that Lya was correct, when it came to the Zentraedi, their creators and there technology the Asgard were far more experienced and knowledgeable than they. If anyone knew how to clean up the hyper phase radiation it would be them. "How much longer until we dock?"

"Another four minutes, the Asgard shuttle will land approximately seven minutes after us."

"Very well let us go over our strategy one last time while we wait."

Lya and Antaeus both nodded and the latter came over to join the two of them, leaving the synthetic intelligence of the shuttle to its job. Then he sat down and the three Nox began to talk.

Docking Bay L27

Robotech Factory Satellite

That Same Time

Martouf smiled as he began running the last of a sequence of diagnostics on one of the three Tel'tak cargo ships recovered from the hangar bays of Charon's flagship. He and Freya had been surprised earlier today when Admiral Chase had once again asked to see them in his office, naturally they had gone to find out what he wanted. It made a nice change of pace from speaking to those intelligence personnel debriefing them on everything that they knew about the Goa'uld and the state of the galaxy. Information that they frankly didn't mind giving them as the more they knew about the Goa'uld and the galaxy in general the better things would be for them.

Especially as they had already clashed with the Goa'uld on two occasions and in the second instance had actually taken down one of the System Lords. Granted Hades was a relatively minor System Lord, only controlling a dozen star systems and he did attack the Terrans first – even giving a captured Terran soldier, a Sergeant Zackary Reed, to his Fleet Lord as a new host – and they had been well within their rites to respond, but it would have them flagged as a threat to the Goa'uld Empire. A threat that the System Lords would attempt to eliminate as soon as it was feasible for them to do so. Given the ongoing civil war it wasn't likely that the System Lords would be able to spare any major forces for quite some time, but they couldn't in good conscience not warn them of the kind of thing they could expect from the Goa'uld now that they had shown themselves to be a serious threat.

As the transports holographic HUD came on and showed the results of the latest diagnostic he thought about what Admiral Chase had said when they'd met with him. Somewhat to their surprise he had made an incredible offer in exchange for their assistance in understanding the technology on those damaged Goa'uld warships they'd recovered – after very thoroughly pounding Hades into the floor and capturing Charon who had since been removed from Sergeant Reeds body by the Asgard and wasn't them being involved here a surprise – from the assault on Elysium they would provide them with one of the operational cargo ships. Which would enable them to return to the Tok'ra.

After talking about it among themselves for a few moments both hosts and symbiotes had agreed to the deal. They had even adjusted it a bit with – if the ship was working properly – Martouf returning to the Tok'ra with news of the Terrans, their Zentraedi allies and the level of technology they had while Freyr/Anise remained here to assist with understanding the technology on the Goa'uld ships. They both knew that doing that would encourage the normally quite insular and conservative High Council to open some form of diplomatic relationship with these people. People who the four of them could tell could be about to radically shake up the entire galaxy, especially as until now they had never heard of such things as robotechnology. The sciences and technologies covered by that one catch all term were definitely advanced and some were completely different to anything possessed by the Goa'uld as until now they had never head of fighters that could in an instant transform into a giant warrior robot or battloid. Which was just as well as both Martouf and Lantash shuddered to even think what the Goa'uld would have done with veritech technology.

He put aside those thoughts for now and focused on the diagnostic. With some surprise he noted that not only was the cargo ship fully operational but it was definitely a newer model with a number of upgrades over the previous model that had remained largely unchanged for nearly two millennia. The power plant and hyperdrive had been upgraded though the biggest upgrade was to the shield generators and emitters. It appeared that much like with the newer Nar'kesh frigates – three of which had been acquired by the Tok'ra over the last few years – and the Sha'ha'tak motherships the shields were now conformal to the hull. The final upgrades were to the sensor systems which was certainly to enable the ship to be an even more effective scout than it normally was and the installation of weapons. According to the diagnostic behind retractable panels in the nose this new model of Tel'tak sported a pair of plasma repeater cannons. He could only conclude that they were there to be a nasty surprise for any would be attacker plus possibly would allow a Tel'tak to offer limited fire support to a ground invasion force.

"Interesting upgrades," he said mentally to Lantash.

"Indeed it seems that the Goa'uld are increasingly upgrading all their ships as the civil war continues," Lantash replied. "That process is probably only going to continue especially given the rumours the High Council has begun to hear about a new model of fighter in development."

"Plus there is bound to be some reaction to the Terrans and the Zentraedi especially given the firepower and technology that they have. Though the fact that they are apparently somewhat friendly with the Asgard, as why else would an Asgard fleet should up to help them against Hades, should give the System Lords pause."

"True. We should leave the ship now and tell our hosts its fully functional and we only need some supplies of food and water to be on our way. I just hope Anise behaves herself while we're gone, you know how abrasive she can get."

"She'll behave I think especially as she knows what could be at stake here. The best thing for us would be to make a favourable impression with these people and both Freya and Anise will know that."

"I hope you are right."

"So do I. Now we should go and speak to the Terrans and arrange some supplies."

"Indeed."

His discussion with his symbiote concluded, for now at least as he and Lantash spoke often as host and symbiote should, Martouf stood up. Powered off the computer and made his way to the airlock. The moment he passed through and walked back into the interior of the factory satellite he found himself face to face with the station's security chief Major Aidan Ford. Who had clearly been waiting for him, not that he was surprised.

"It's ready," he said at the look the dark-skinned Terran shot him when he saw him emerge from the interior of the ship, "I just need enough food and water supplies for three days before I can return to the Tok'ra base."

Ford nodded in understanding. "That will not take very long at all to arrange," he replied knowing that even though the station was not yet fully operational – it wouldn't be for another few weeks since, thanks to the Masters, the Zentraedi had had no idea how to maintain the station or divert power to the automatic systems that maintained and repaired everything and thus damage had mounted all over the station – the logistical support systems were working fine. Once he ordered the food and water for Martouf it wouldn't take longer than a few minutes for a drone to deliver the required items from station stores. "In fact if you want to start pre-flight I can have it here in a few minutes at most."

Martouf blinked. "You can have supplies ready that fast?" he asked surprised as given how utterly enormous this station was, and how parts of it seemed to be undergoing some sort of repair or renovation, he would have thought gathering the required supplies and bringing them to this bay would take at least an hour.

"Of course," Ford answered.

Martouf looked at him for another moment, easily seeing that the Terran was telling the truth and that he could indeed have the supplies in the required amounts here ready to be loaded in mere minutes. Clearly despite the ongoing repairs the station's logistical support capabilities were beyond impressive. But then they should be since this thing is designed to build or service entire fleets larger than anything this galaxy has ever seen, he thought.

"Alright if you will order the required supplies I'll start my pre-flight checks."

"I'll let you know when the supplies are here and help you load them."

"Thank you major."

"Your welcome."

Martouf smiled once more then turned and began walking back inside the Tel'tak. As he walked he mused on the handful of things he and Freya had been able to discover about this factory satellite. While there hosts had not been secretive, and had always answered questions when asked, they had hardly been forthcoming about the true capabilities of the station never volunteering anything unless specifically asked a relevant question. Still what they had managed to learn about this thing, where it came from and what its capabilities were was downright terrifying. Whoever these Robotech Masters were they were clearly a power that far surpassed the Goa'uld, there empire – being a multi-galactic entity – alone indicated that but the fact that they had many stations like this that at full power could build a million warships and all the small craft, battle mecha, weapons and even clone the crews and troops for them in just a month was frankly downright terrifying.

"I agree Martouf it is terrifying," Lantash said and in his symbiotes mental voice Martouf clearly heard a reflection of both his own awe and fear of the sheer power and majesty of the Robotech Masters power. This one station alone, and the Free Zentraedi who had allied with the Terrans, represented a level of power that had not been seen in this galaxy for a million years if not longer. "I for one am very glad that these Robotech Masters are quite literally galaxies away from here. Our galaxy has enough problems with the Goa'uld and the civil war Sokar started several years ago. We do not need a race powerful enough to build on this kind of scale coming here as well."

"Thank goodness for that. Though it does raise the question of why this station, and why the Zentraedi, are here in our galaxy in the first place. We are a very long way from the Tirolian Empire's outer territories."

"You think our hosts know," Lantash asked as Martouf sat down in the pilot seat of the Tel'tak and began tapping the crystals in the correct sequence to bring the cargo ships upgraded naquada reactor fully online and begin final checks of all flight systems from sublight engines and inertial dampeners to the hyperdrive itself.

"I do. They obviously know a lot more about this station and the technology here than we do."

"The High Council will certainly want answers from them."

"I know hopefully whoever ends up debriefing us is one of the more reasonable members of the Council."

Unsaid was the fact that Martouf didn't want to be debriefed by someone like Delek or Thorun, but then he didn't need to say it for Lantash to know it. Know and actually share the sentiment as those particular two were not the most pleasant of Tok'ra to deal with, especially by those who like Lantash himself believed wholeheartedly that the host should always be encouraged and accepted as the primary personality – it was after all their body as the symbiotes were only a guest – and didn't have to be subservient in any way to the symbiote inside them. Unlike Delek and Thorun who were both somewhat infamous among the Tok'ra for preferring weaker willed, far more timid hosts who wouldn't offer any objections to them being the primary personality. For Lantash and other like-minded Tok'ra it was behaviour that was far too Goa'uld like for comfort.

"We can but hope,"he agreed. "Though even the more moderate members of the Council are likely to be very alarmed by what we have to report."

"I know. As long as the hardliners like Delek don't convince them to do something stupid we should be fine."

"Agreed."

A crystalline chirp from the console reported that the pre-flight checks were completed. The holographic HUD came on again with the information on the results of the checks and both host and symbiote were pleased to see that everything was in perfect working order. Now they just had to wait for Major Ford to arrive with the promised supplies then they would be able to leave and begin the long journey across the galaxy to the current Tok'ra base on Vorash.

It was at that moment that they heard someone calling them – or rather calling for Martouf – from outside the ship. Standing up again Martouf made his way back out into the docking bay the cargo ship they were being given had been moved to, to find that Major Ford was standing there with some kind of anti-gravity cart on which were two boxes of supplies and a few jacks of water. Impressive that he got those here so fast, he thought as he stepped out of the shadow of the Tel'tak.

"I'm impressed major you got these here as quickly as you said," he commended as he walked over.

"The logistical support systems here are very good," Ford replied, "for a factory satellite like this to operate they have to be."

Martouf nodded knowing that the human was right. For a place as massive as this space station and which frankly had a level of industrial capacity that was frankly beyond scary, the logistical support system would have to be highly efficient. He had to wonder if it involved some form of teleportation – though they had not yet seen their hosts display anything like that technology, or even ring transporters – technology. It would allow the truly colossal amount of raw materials the station had to consume when it was running at full capacity to be moved around with incredible speed and efficiency. He made a mental note to ask about it another time as no doubt the High Council would send him and Lantash back here with any delegation they chose to send.

"Would you help me?" he asked as he picked up one of the boxes.

"Sure."

Martouf smiled again as Ford picked up a box himself and one of the jacks of water. Together over the next minute or so they transferred the provided supplies to the central cargo compartment of the Tel'tak and stowed them away in the appropriate compartments. As they worked Ford scowled at all the elaborate gold walls covered with hieroglyphics.

"Man someone really likes their bling," he commented. I thought my last girlfriend loved bling but all this gold is frankly ridiculous, he thought with a mental shiver. Really how could anyone seriously fly through space in such gaudy surroundings?

"Believe it or not this is actually fairly tame for a Goa'uld," Martouf replied, "cargo craft like a Tel'tak don't really rate any truly ornate décor, that's usually reserved for the motherships especially whichever one the ruling Goa'uld has chosen to be their flagship. Walls covered with pointless hieroglyphs that don't mean much at all – well beyond the usual bragging about the power of the 'gods' – is thus considered very basic."

"Huh I'll take your word for it," Ford answered as he put the last of the water jacks in a compartment and closed it. "Well that's everything."

"That it is. Thank you for your assistance major."

"Your welcome, both of you," Ford replied, "now if you'll excuse me I will go and get you clearance for departure and a flight vector away from the station and the Zentraedi fleet outside. Departure control will contact you when your clear to depart."

"Thank you. Do you know roughly how long it will take?"

"When I last looked it was pretty quiet out there this afternoon. So probably no more than a couple of minutes."

"I see. Very well I will have to take my leave of you now major hopefully we will meet again."

"I don't doubt that we will. Until then I wish you a safe journey."

"Thank you."

Martouf watched as Major Ford left the interior of the cargo ship via the airlock. He followed him far enough to close and secure the airlock from this side before walking back to the pilot's station and making himself comfortable. He hoped that Major Ford was right and departure clearance and a flight vector would not be long in coming but if it took a while he was quite content to wait.

Several minutes later Martouf carefully guided the Tel'tak out of the hangar bay and into space. As had been requested he kept his speed down as he carefully manoeuvred away from the factory satellite onto the vector that would take him out beyond this world airless moon. Once there he was clear to open a hyperspace window and begin the long journey home to Vorash. Secure on the correct vector he took a few moments to look around and nearly had a heart attack when he saw the sheer number of Zentraedi vessels in orbit of either Earth or the factory station.

"Bloody hell there must be hundreds of them," he said aloud in shock, even as he noticed an anomaly among the closest ships. If this case the anomaly being the imposing, terrifying form of an Asgard warship, albeit one that was of a completely different design to any he had ever seen before and, at over two kilometres long, was also a great deal larger than any Asgard vessel ever encountered by Goa'uld or Tok'ra. The mere thought of the immense firepower it had to possess was enough to send a shiver of cold dread down his spine.

"Agreed though don't focus on the fleet. Let us just go back to Vorash," Lantash told him.

"It's going to be a few minutes before we clear the moon," Martouf replied even as he took his symbiotes advice and focused instead on guiding the cargo ship clear of Earth's orbital space. Out of the corner of his eyes he could see one of the Zentraedi cruisers had moved away from the bulk of its fleet and was just floating there, a green leviathan hanging amongst the stars. He gave it a quick glance and noted that a number of small craft from the planet were heading towards it on a rendezvous course. He couldn't help but wonder what that was all about before, feeling the mental equivalent of a poke to the ribs to stay on task from Lantash, turning his full attention back to following the provided course.

It took another couple of minutes, especially as he wasn't allowed to accelerate to maximum sublight speeds due to Terran transit regulations inside the orbit between the planet and its moon, but he eventually past the moon. Finally, he thought as he entered the command to engage the hyperdrive. A familiar whirring hum filled the cargo ship and through the windows he saw the purple vortex of a hyperspace window created by a Goa'uld hyperdrive appear ahead of him. A second later the viewport was filled with the shimmering blue tunnel of hyperspace travel.

Martouf smiled and leaned back in the chair – releasing the control orb as he didn't need to do anything until he finally reached Vorash – and began to think about just how he was going to explain all of this, everything that had happened since he and Freya had been sent to Linkotis, to the Tok'ra High Council. It was going to be a difficult proposition, even though he had some sensor data to back it up and there was the fact that Freya had remained behind to help build bridges with what looked like a rising power, as some of the more conservative members were really not going to like parts of this for their own reasons. He and Lantash would have to find some way to either get through to the likes of Delek and Thorun who had both gained quite a bit of sway over the council over the last few years, or better yet find a way to bypass them, in order to ensure the best possible outcome for their kind and the cause they had spent millennia working towards.

To say it would be tricky was thus an understatement. Still he and Lantash had three days – as even though this Tel'tak had an upgraded hyperdrive Vorash was still a very long way from here – to figure out just how they were going to do this. And he was confident that they would indeed figure it out, they had to.

Authors Notes: Well another chapter bites the metaphorical dust. I hope you all enjoyed it. I am sorry that I wasn't able to include the launch of Rick Hunter's expedition to Mars in this chapter as I had originally planned but the chapter was starting to get a bit too long and to do the scene justice I felt it would be better served moving it to the start of the next chapter. Which means the next chapter will be almost entirely about the mission to Mars, what they find there and the next adventure by both ship and Stargate that it is going to send our intrepid robotech defenders on. Until next time.