Warnings: AU world, violence, sexual content, clichés, and a touch of horror.
Disclaimers: I earn no money from this, I write only for pleasure. I own no part of the Stargate world, only the characters that I have created that are birthed exclusively from my brain.
Spoilers: Set in established AU world and in equivalent time to mid season 4 and is based solely on the television series (not the novel series that followed it). This story calls heavily on the events of the all previous fics in this saga.
Summary: ALLIANCE FIC – Almost two weeks have passed since the events of 'Interlude 4 – A New View' and Atlantis has begun its new trading contract with the Elite while also desperately trying to track down the location of Janus' secret lab. Meanwhile, Teyla – still feeling slightly unwell – is aboard the Sythus on its way to hunt down the elusive Skerti out beyond the Alliance border. And in the Elite Training Facility, Oneakka continues his recovery while struggling with new developments regarding Seeal.
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Note: Hi everyone, sorry it has taken a long time to start publishing this fic. It is a CHUNKY fic and the last year has been busy with work, a lovely summer, and having to do some intense study for a nasty work exam (passed it a few weeks ago – yay!). There is a lot happening in this story, with various threads going on, and there will be some sections where certain characters feature more heavily that others, but then it will switch around in another section. As such, I have split the fic into three Acts as there is so much story to cover.
I hope you are all well in these still challenging times. Thank you to those who have reached out to me in recent months to touch base and enquire when another fic was on the way. Glad to finally be able to say: "now"...
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ACT 1 – DISCOVERY
Chapter 1 – Prologue
A storm was brewing on the distant horizon, long thick clouds darkening with a strong wind building behind them.
Mind Song lifted his face into the wild-edged breeze, drawing in the fresh damp air. Even in the years before his capture by the prey Kolya, he'd missed this. Since the time all his kin had awoken at once to face the growing threat of the Armoured Herd, most of the Hives had left their planted worlds to patrol and fight for their feeding grounds. The days of living on a world and leaving only for cullings was long gone and it meant that entire generations of Warrior and Drone batches knew nothing of natural air except during swift cullings on prey worlds, instead living their lives in the controlled air of Hive or Cruiser.
He though remembered life spent on living soil and breathing in sun-warmed air, of Hives sat so long that great forests grew over them and mountains cracked around their unyielding position.
Now though, such things were a rarity.
Which had made the discovery of this Wraith base so fortunate. He glanced down the slope to where the entrance to the base sat nestled in the protection of the valley, two Drones currently patrolling past its glowing entrance in the dusky light. The patrols were used to him coming out here most days to drink in the air, drawn to the open space and sense of freedom that Kolya had denied him for too many years.
It also gave him time away from the base and its Young Queen's uncontrolled mind, providing him space to ponder the future, the fate of his kin and the details of his plan.
He doubted Sheppard had intended it when he had selected this planet on which to deposit him, but this base had presented a very useful situation for him and Long Sleep to exploit. For what they needed was a way to ensure the warning about the return of the ancient, and formally mythical, Skerti reached the right powerful Queen's ears, and who, in return, might be able to provide them with information about the Skerti. By Mind Song's reckoning, Sharp Claw was the oldest Queen who still lived, and her feeding grounds were still far enough away from the Armoured Herd's territory that she should still be there. She had also been a contemporary, and occasional ally, to his and Long Sleep's original Queen who had birthed their mutated batch. He hoped that link would make her receptive to their story and that she would share any intel she had on the Skerti with them. However, it would take an introduction by another Queen to get them an audience with such an elder Queen as Sharp Claw, which was where this base's young Queen, New Breath, would serve them well.
She had been living in this small base for years, left here by her Mother Queen to mature and build her forces, hidden away from the Armoured Herd and other Queens. But her Mother Queen clearly had not returned for her and this rather backwater planet presented very little for a now mature, naturally power-hungry young Queen. So when he and Long Sleep had arrived, two highly experienced Warriors, at New Breath's door requesting her assistance, the young Queen's excited eagerness had been obvious.
Long Sleep had provided her with the current status and intel of the Queens out beyond New Breath's quiet planet, and Mind Song had informed her that they had vital information that needed to be delivered to the elder Queen Sharp Claw. It was exactly what New Breath needed now her new Hive was almost grown and her batches of Drones and Warriors were strong enough in number to fly it.
Usually newly mature Queens served as a minor Queen to their Mother Queens, helping defend the feeding ground and gather prey. That allowed them time and opportunity to learn and gain much needed fighting experience, until a day arrived that they either usurped their Mother or stole enough of her forces to break away to form a new Hive and feeding ground of their own.
But, since New Breath's Mother had not returned, most likely because she had been killed, the young eager Queen needed a way to buy herself into a position as a minor Queen to another older, experienced Queen. His and Long Sleep's 'vital message' would serve her needs perfectly to approach Sharp Claw.
The only problem was that New Breath's Hive wasn't quite fully grown enough to depart, so they had to wait. Mind Song had grown all too used to the need for patience from his imprisonment, but the long days of waiting had given rather too much time for him to worry over the future of his Wraith kin. And there was plenty to worry over for they now faced significant threats from multiple directions.
From Long Sleep he had learnt of the shocking numbers of Queens and feeding grounds that had been lost to the Armoured Herd while he had been imprisoned. Mind Song had recently seen for himself how densely populated an Armoured Herd planet had become, lost as a feeding ground perhaps forever, and Long Sleep's recounting of the shocking destruction of a powerful coalition of elder Queens only proved how treacherous the Armoured Herd had become.
Then there was Sheppard's people, whom Long Sleep reported had become a threat of their own; not so brutally invasive of feeding grounds as the Armoured Herd, but they had also removed several powerful Queens.
And Mind Song knew what probably no Queen knew, that despite being on different sides of the galaxy, the Armoured Herd were working with Sheppard's people; Sheppard's own mate a Queen Killer.
The Human prey had become powerful and perhaps already outnumbered Wraith, but at least they were a known understandable threat. The Skerti though were a blank. All that was known of them from kin memory was that no single Wraith had survived an encounter with them, that their name had become synonymous with death and myth over the millennia. Though Long Sleep had fortunately survived to tell of the Skerti Queen who had disguised herself as Wraith, he had little information on her. What were the Skerti? What did they want? What were their weaknesses?
Too little was known of this new dangerous threat, so he had to find out what he could. Hopefully, Sharp Claw would be the key.
The clouds grumbled loudly in the distance, the first rolls of thunder crashing out over the landscape. He watched the first jagged strike of lightning briefly light up the depths of the clouds, revealing the natural fury crawling towards the base from the horizon. It felt all too acutely symbolic for Mind Song.
So many Queens fallen, some lineages obliterated entirely…
His original Queen had used to say that 'Wraith were never ending' and he had always believed that to be so, but he could not help but see dark days ahead for his kind.
Feel the threatening teeth of potential extinction looming on the horizon.
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TBC