Disclaimer: I don't own Danny Phantom, Stargate SG-1, Reign, or anything else I reference.
Chapter Eight: Thousand Year Grudge
Danny sat on the floor of his room with his eyes closed in a meditative pose as he focused on projecting his consciousness in another dimension.
He ignored the distraction of the rain outside and focused on reaching the dimension that he had seen when he killed Seto. He had been going through the information that Laurent had known. According to Laurent's memories it is called the Other Side. It is the destination that all "supernatural beings" reach when they died. The witches are supposed to be in charge of that place with free reign to move around the world and appear where they wished.
He decided to contact them from one of the most haunted places he knew of in this time. All manner of ghosts had appeared in this place.
He could feel the dimension he wanted to reach. Like how he changed his vibration to let Prince/King Francis pass through him he did the same to access tis dimension.
'This must be what limbo feel like.' Danny thought as he looked around this alternate dimension.
Despite how far he looked he could not see anybody else besides him. For a supernatural purgatory it was surprisingly empty.
It explained the feeling he got when he first felt this place.
'Can anybody hear me?' He yelled out with his mind. 'I want to speak with a witch! Any witch that feels like talking I am a great listener.'
The only complication with the situation is that there could potentially be a spirit that is old enough to remember the time of the Jaffa and the Goa'uld. The Strix had not told Laurent how long the Other Side had existed so it could be possible.
A presence appeared in his room.
"There is no need to shout." A spirit said from in front of him. "What are you doing here?"
The spirit's voice belonged to a woman. She is speaking French very well but just like him she could not get rid of her accent.
So, a foreign witch had decided to answer his calls.
Hopefully, it was someone important and old enough to answer his questions.
Danny opened his eyes.
Her body physically looked to be a bit older than his. She had long black hair, tanned skin, and wearing a dark flowery dress with sandals.
"Who are you?" Danny asked the lady floating in front of him.
"I am Qetsiyah. What are you?" Qetsiyah asked him. " I created the other side, and you should not be able to contact us like you did."
This person is a lot more important that he originally thought.
If she is able to create an entirely alternate dimension, then she must have had a lot of power when she was alive or had access to some truly incredible information. The ability to create pocket dimensions were something that the Lanteans/Alterans had been working on for a while before they found a way to ascend and even that was only possible if they focused on keeping it in one location. Qetsiyah somehow managed to make one that wrapped around the entire planet.
She must have had access to an impossibly vast energy source.
"How did you manage to do that?" Danny asked.
"I will not tell you that." Qetsiyah denied. "I will ask again. I want to know why you are trying to trespass into my realm?"
"I am the curious sort." Danny said. "I only called because I have many questions for you spirits."
"Very well. This is a new experience." Qetsiyah said as she ran a hand through her hair. "I may deign to answer, or I may choose not to."
"Alright then." Danny said. "How long has this place existed?"
He first wanted to know because the amount of knowledge available to Qetsiyah was more than likely relative to how long such a place has existed. The Goa'uld had arrived on the planet in 17,000 B.C. and left the planet in 10,000 B.C. and there were no records of vampires or werewolves back then.
The only monsters he was aware of were the Goa'uld and their creations.
"I created this place in what people the people of this kingdom now refer to as the 1st century B.C." Qetsiyah said.
Good now he had a point of reference.
This dimension is over a thousand years old. Long after the Goa'uld and Jaffa had left but also long enough to hold important information. She could tell him how the vampires were created. Who the Original Vampires are? Maybe the location where he could find them? Maybe who had created the werewolf curse? Stories about Camelot? Most important of all where he could find Setesh.
"Is there anything you want in the world of the living?" Danny asked.
She had been watching events all over the world since the moment she died. There had to be something that she would want. Her story and deeds remembered throughout history, A village that worshipped her name and built statues to her, A way to come back to the world of the living, her descendants taken care of and given everything they could possibly want in life.
Something.
"You want to make a deal with me?" Qetsiyah asked him.
He could use force and rip the knowledge from her mind, but he figured that it would be better to have tried and be friendly first to get what he wanted.
"Yes. Is there anything that you might want?" Danny asked and watched as Qetsiyah started thinking.
"I will get back to you on it." Qetsiyah said before she disappeared.
It looked like there is something she wanted.
Danny felt a smile grow on his face.
He opened his eyes as he returned to his body.
She is aware of him now. If they wanted to reach him, they would know where.
0-0-0-0-0-0
"So, Princess Gisla defeated the first attempt to raid Paris by waving a flag?" Danny asked.
Currently he and Osmund are at the point where Paris is being sieged by the Viking Ragnar Lothbrook and his army.
"It is not just any flag." Osmund corrected. "The Oriflamme is a sacred banner that had been carried by Kings of Frankia. It motivated the people to defend their home and prevent it from being sacked and raided."
"Where is the Flag now?" Danny asked. "In case I ever want to see it?"
"It resides in the abbey of Saint Denis." Osmund said. "It was named after a martyr for our faith during the third century."
"How did the flag gain its importance?" Danny asked.
"King Charlamagne used it to drive out the Sarecans." Osmund said. "It is said he received a divine vision that he would win if he carried it with him."
"So how did the raid end?" Danny asked.
Osmund felt a brief emotion of grief and pain.
"The Viking Ragnar Lothbrook tricked the people of Paris." Osmund said. "He claimed that he wanted to be baptized and buried in Paris. When the King invited his coffin into the city, he broke free and took Princess Gisla hostage."
Danny wrote that down.
The information could be useful later.
"Looks like our hour is finished." Osmund said looking at the sand clock.
"Alright." Danny said standing up.
He teleported to the Al'kesh hovering above the castle while they waited for his lesson to finish. "Command Ka'ri to begin flying."
0-0-0-0-0-0
(Giza, Egypt)
"The lot of you stay out here." Danny said as he stared at the pyramid in front of him. "I am going in by myself."
"Are you sure my king?" Ka'ri asked him.
He did not know what kind of traps and defensive measures this pyramid had. In the show Osiris and Isis had long been taken away from this pyramid by the archeologist Sheldon Stewart.
"I will be perfectly fine on my own." Danny said walking to the front of the pyramid and taking a good look at the object that was holding his prizes. "Raios give me a scan of the pyramid and see where the canopic jars might be."
The canopic jars are probably hidden in a super-secret tomb that laid at the center or the pyramid or in a secret chamber that was almost impossible to find unless you had some kind of clue.
"I am sending the results of the scans to you right now my king." Raios said.
"This place is huge." Danny said to himself as the map appeared before him.
The pyramid was 820 feet wide and 360 feet wide. It went about twenty feet down below the ground.
"Do you still wish to go alone?" Ka'ri asked him.
"Yes. I am more than capable of surviving through whatever traps the ancient humans used to seal this place. Danny said. " If not, that is why I am carrying the sword we retrieved from Honduras."
"Very well. We will wait for you here." Nadu said.
Danny walked to the pyramid and phased through the walls. He had two duplicates create light so that he could see which was that he was walking. No natural light reached the inside of the cave and the torches had long been turned to dust.
"Why are you robbing the dead?" Qetsiyah asked appearing from behind him.
Seems like she had decided that she will make a deal with him.
"Sometimes the dead have the best stuff. All you have to do is get past their annoying traps." Danny said as he took a step and the ceiling revealed that it had sharp spears contained within. "See the only reason that such things exist is because people want to protect something valuable."
"Are you not worried you might activate a curse?" Qetsiyah asked. "Places such as these are well known to have employed witches."
"That is why I came alone. I could deal with such things easily. My Jaffa not so much." Danny said doubting that such "curses" really existed.
This universe ran on the concepts of science. The "supernatural" creatures and events that happened could be explained away by science. In another universe the rules might be different but here magic was really just advanced science even if he liked to act like otherwise.
"Where did you find those soldiers of yours." Qetsiyah asked. "They feel different from the people of this world?"
"Their ancestors came from this planet but that was a long time ago and they were changed to be stronger and faster than baseline humans." Danny said taking a look around at what was the statues of the ancient Egyptian deities.
He could see Ra, Osiris, Isis, Heket, and countless others. All of them were either Nirrti's enemies or acquaintances that yet to be turned to enemies. He wondered how the originals would feel about the fact that the Goa'uld had taken their names and their stories if they existed at all.
"What are you looking for?" Qetsiyah asked.
"Something that was locked away a long time ago." Danny answered as he turned intangible and let the spears pass through him and stab into the ground.
"My King people are coming to the pyramid." Raios said through the communication device.
It is done that way so he would be able to use the data pad that is projecting the map with his hands.
"How many?" Danny asked.
"Twenty my king." Raios responded.
"Do they look to hold aggressive intentions?" Danny asked as he saw a trip wire in front of his feet.
He wondered whether he should step on it or not.
"Affirmative they are carrying weapons on them. They will be approaching in 30 hiks." Raios said.
So about thirty minutes before these strangers arrived. It was probably going to take longer for him to search the pyramid.
"Fire at them with our weapons set to stun." Danny said. "I want to be able to question them when I am finished."
"You are very merciful." Qetsiyah said mistakenly.
With his plan they probably would have preferred that he had killed them with one large energy blast from his ion cannons.
"I try to be." Danny said as he stepped on the trip wire and heard the sounds of a giant boulder rolling his way.
He broke into a run wanting to see how far this path would lead him. He could hear his duplicates sigh at him, but he dismissed their annoyance as they turned intangible and let the boulder pass through them.
"Why are you running from this boulder? Can you not break it apart?" Qetsiyah asked him.
She was from a time before movies, so she had never questioned how it felt scouring an ancient pyramid for treasure while being chased by a giant boulder. The original Danny had dreams of such an event as he searched for ancient treasure and here, he is living them out. He was really glad that the original clone had accepted the deal.
"Because that would be boring." Danny said looking at the giant pit hole ahead of them.
The trap was probably to get people to focus on the giant boulder following them that they did not see the giant pit in their rush to run away. The scared adventurer would be moving so fast they were not paying enough attention.
Danny jumped over the trap hole and watched as the boulder fell in blocking it about halfway.
"That was great." Danny said as he started walking again.
"You are so strange." Qetsiyah said.
She had probably been thinking that he would not hear her.
"We are from different time periods. We think different things are fun." Danny said as they came upon a series of tunnels each marked with the symbols of the Egyptian deities which had been stolen by the Gao'uld. "Friendship happen by appreciating the differences in people."
"What does this mean?" Qetsiyah asked him.
"It is time to make a choice." Danny said as his duplicates lit up each side of the room and on the wall, he saw a riddle in ancient Egyptian.
For your sin of greed, you have let the path of Thoth
Turn to Set and you will be devoured
Anubis guards the path
Turn to the sun and you will be free
Let Hathor be your guide
Pick right and you shall be rewarded
Pick wrong and you will face the scarabs
He wondered how they would feel if they learned how much Ra hated Anubis.
Anyway, back to the riddle. Hathor was the first queen of Ra, and he was described as the god of the sun and order so if he chose that path he might be sent back outside the pyramid. Anubis was the god of the underworld and guarded the dead. It said he guarded the path so that probably meant he protected the canopic jars and the treasures. So, if he wanted Osiris and Isis that meant he would have to choose the path of Anubis.
"Which way are you going to choose?" Qetsiyah asked.
"This way." Danny said as he started walking.
"Are you going to tell me why you picked this path?" Qetsiyah asked.
"I had a good feeling about it." Danny said as he walked along the path that held images of a man with the head of a jackal.
"You are risking your life on a guess?" Qetsiyah asked as she came around in front of him.
"I want to live my life to the fullest." Danny said.
"What do you expect to find in such an old place?" Qetsiyah asked him.
"Knowledge and treasure." Danny said.
Osiris and Isis had been very close to Ra before they had tried to betray him and so they were probably aware of many locations that Ra had kept to himself after he declared himself Supreme System Lord.
The Eye of Ra is just one example of the things they could be aware of.
He was under no delusions though. The two Goa'uld could not be trusted as far as he could throw them. He wanted to see if he could take the information from them while they were stored in their jars. If that could not happen, then he was going to make sure that wherever their new prison was it was going be guarded by people that had been dosed with Nish'ta.
It was the only way he could trust someone to watch over them.
"It seems like you dealt with all the traps." Qetsiyah said and it was at that point that the statues of Anubis around them began coming to life.
"Thanks a lot." Danny said drawing his sword from the sheath.
"What kind of sword is that?" Qetsiyah asked him.
"It is very special one." Danny said as he ran to the golems.
He had plenty of one-liners to say as he slew the golems. Are you Anubis or are you chickens? Guardians of the underworld then you should have guarded your heads better. You were born from sand, dirt, and dust and now you return. You fear the sun? Well have some light. You serve the gods well let them appreciate this sacrifice.
"Are you done enjoying yourself?" Qetsiyah asked with a bored tone.
For such a pretty woman she could be a major buzzkill.
"When having fun, it is best to take your time." Danny said raising his sword as he finally stopped slaying golems. "Things like this are why I steal from tombs like this."
There is always something amazing buried in them.
The sword of his somehow prevented the golems from healing despite how hard they tried so that was another useful function he learned.
He had to make sure no one used this thing on him.
"Be careful." Qetsiyah warned him. as they approached a metal door. "I sense magic beyond here."
"Seems like we found the place I was looking for." Danny said as he raised his hand and telekinetically pushed the door away from them.
He stopped it before it hit the wall and laid it against the bricks softly.
"You two go ahead." Danny said as he sent the two duplicates ahead of him to see what happened.
The moment that they stepped into the room Danny saw an energy field travel the room and watched as his duplicates were set on fire and vanished.
"I understand how it works now." Danny said.
Just like he could see the spirits in The Other Side by shifting his vision he could see the invisible cage surrounding the room with Egyptian symbols. The glowing ones were related to the fire but there were many others as well which he had no idea of what they did.
"I told you that in the ancient times places like this hired witches to protect their treasures." Qetsiyah said.
"That just makes me want them even more." Danny said taking a look at what was inside.
Weapons, books, and treasure. The most wonderful things that you could find on a treasure hunt.
"Can you help?" Danny asked.
She would accomplish this faster than him. She could use one of her "spells" to bring the trap down.
"Since you are going to help me with my task, I can lend you a hand." Qetsiyah said as she started chanting.
It took a few seconds for Qetsiyah to erase them from the room but just to be sure he sent another duplicate just to make sure that the room was safe. Once nothing happened, he personally took a step in and walked to the center of the room where the jars that held Osiris and Isis stood still upon a dais.
'Today is turning out just wonderful.' Danny thought.
"So have you found what you wanted?" Qetsiyah asked him.
"It would seem so." Danny said with a smile on his face.
He was going to spend a lot of time searching over what he had recently gained. "Ka'ri I am coming out of the temple with my treasure. Make sure there are enough ships to take it back with us."
"As you desire my king." Ka'ri responded.
"We can talk more when you return to the castle." Qetsiyah said before vanishing.
0-0-0-0-0-0
(Jade Arrow, Mars)
Danny walked across The Ha'tak to his personal quarters to place the canopic jars holding Osiris and Isis in a safe and secured vault.
The vault was behind a picture of him being crowned king of Dinai by Nirrti and safeguarded by biometric scanners which could only be accessed by typing in names that no one in this universe could possibly know. The names shifted on a constant cycle by the day. He wanted to make sure that even if someone teleported onto his Ha'Tak or created a clone of him they could not reach them.
The rest of the pyramid's treasures were to be split in half. Half of it was to be placed in his quarters at the castle so that he could show them off. The rest was going to Kleak.
"Now that they are safe it is time to check on the prisoners." Danny said leaving his room.
He had some strangers to question.
Them coming to the same pyramid as them right when he was exploring was too much of a coincidence to be natural. Something had alerted them to his presence, and he wanted to know what.
The Jaffa had loaded the warriors captured outside the pyramid in a Tel'tak. They were too unconscious at the time to worry or care about space. When they woke up, they were going to miss the peace that their unconscious had given them.
He had experiments to run.
He had been wanting to see the process by which someone became a vampire.
The biological process of turning into a vampire was rather simple in this universe. Drink the blood of a vampire and die before the blood left your body. Drink human blood within 24 hours and the process would be complete.
There were so many things to test.
What would happen if a vampire drank the blood of a Jaffa? What would happen to a vampire on another world without the Other Side? Could a vampire be turned on another world? Would the weakness of a vampire be constant even if they were on another world? Could the blood of a vampire by synthesized and retain the same properties?
Depending on the answer the role of vampires in his army could be very different.
Some could serve as rapidly healing soldiers fighting on the battlefield. Some could serve as spies and help him control the people he installed to rule his other worlds. Others could infiltrate worlds as healers and spread vampirism making sure he never ran out of troops.
He just needed a way to control them all first.
Vampires were hardly known for being loyal creatures.
0-0-0-0-0-0
"Hello Laurent. How have you been?" Danny asked looking at his prisoner who had not been fed in the past two weeks.
His skin was starting to gray out as if he were a mummy.
The others could hear the music which meant that Prince/King Francis knew he had come to the cells.
He wondered if The Price/King was expecting a visit.
"Come inside I want to talk." Laurent said with a hoarse throat.
Danny did not need to know to be an empath to know that is a lie. The moment he walks inside Laurent is going to try and drain him dry.
"You should try but remember how you ended up here in the first place." Danny said as he lowered the shield and walked in.
The moment he took a step inside Laurent rushed at him. A simple twirl of the wrist and Laurent's neck was snapped, and he was sent into sweet nothingness. It would be a while before he woke up but that was plenty of time to drain him of enough blood.
"Kada bring the tubes." Danny said as he looked at the Jaffa waiting behind the corner.
"I am here my king." Kada said as brought the tray holding the bio-tubes that were going to suck out Laurent's blood.
"Good." Danny said as he used telekinesis to lift the bio-tubes and stick them into Laurent all at once.
As the red line reached the top showing that they were full Danny removed them and placed most of them back on the tray while taking one for himself. "Now you take those nineteen bio-tubes. Four to go to the lab to be studied and synthesized. Six are to be injected to the Egyptian prisoners after they are stunned again, and the rest can go into cold storage after which you go back to your duties at the Pel'Tak."
"As you command." Kada said.
Danny raised the energy shield for Laurent's cell and walked away from Kada. He went down a flight of stairs to the floor where the Egyptian prisoners were waiting. Their weapons had long been stripped of them and placed in a cargo room.
They were shaped as simple weapons of the time period. Spears, swords, khopeshes but important thing is that they were made of a mix of steel and refined trinium.
Clearly questions needed to be asked. Which is why he is here.
"I heard the lot of you were up." Danny said as he stood outside the cell. "How are you doing this evening?"
"-" The man said something but because he did not speak the language he did not understand.
It was probably something rude given the look on his face.
"Looks like this is going to happen the hard way." Danny said as holding out his hand and then pulling it back bringing the man closer to the energy shield as well.
The man's eyes widened as he started floating and tried to push back against the force pulling him.
It did not work as there was nothing for him to hold on to or get leverage from. The energy shield preventing him from leaving made mind reading harder, so he had to lower it and bring the prisoner through. The moment the shield went down, and the man was floating in the air Danny went deep into his mind learning everything Abasi knew.
"Let me go demon." Abasi said glaring at him.
"That is very hurtful." Danny said as he shook his head.
Abasi and the other nineteen men that came with him are Medjai. The Medjai are an ancient order of warriors dedicated to protecting their land from the rise of evil. Whether that evil come from their ancient past or the current world. It began with Egyptian men that decided to prevent the rise of Osiris and/or Isis.
Medjai legend states that if Osiris and Isis were to rise that untold evil would engulf the world.
Despite the praise mythology gave those two the medjai never forgot the pain and slavery they reigned down upon mankind. So, for millennia the Medjai guarded the pyramid so that no could steal its treasure or so that the grand evil could escape.
As the ages went by though they had to change the nature of their order. Over the years the numbers of evil they protect the world from has grown. They and their allies are prepared to die in the fight against such evil.
"I cannot do that. You and your group have answer to questions I am looking for." Danny said.
They would be hunted down.
"I will not tell you anything." Abasi promised.
"Yes. One of your principles is that you will not betray your brotherhood." Danny said as he walked up to the floating man and injected him with one of the bio-tubes. "We will see how long that lasts."
"What did you put in me?" Abasi asked looking at the injection mark.
"That is just something that will make you more cooperative when I come back to talk to you later." Danny said lying.
In the off chance that some of the Medjai took their lives while being in that cell the few that he injected with Laurent's blood would be coming back.
0-0-0-0-0-0
(Royal Castle, France)
"So have you decided what you want?" Danny asked as he looked across the table at Qetsiyah.
"There is a certain man that I want you to kill." Qetsiyah said. "I have had agents of my own to hunt him down, but they have failed again and again over the centuries."
"What did this man do to you?" Danny asked.
He probably would do it for this deal to happen, but he would still like to know what the reason was this man was dying for.
"He left me at the altar." Qetsiyah said with a glare on her face and a feeling of deep hate in her heart.
Seems like she was not the type to let things go.
"If you built this place and died over a thousand years ago how is anyone you knew still alive at this point? Did he figure someone way to leave this place and come back to life?" Danny asked. "Did he possess a vampire?"
There were a lot of questions to ask at this point. Given who she was he doubted that this guy she wanted him to kill was a baseline human.
"No, I died long before the Vampire species was created." Qetsiyah said. "Silas on the other hand has never died. The bastard is immortal."
That actually shocked him. A lot of interesting things have happened to this planet since the Goa'uld had left.
"This sounds like a long story." Danny said.
"Our story started back in Greece. Silas and I were part of a tribe of witches that are now called travelers. We were to be married and Silas asked me to create an elixir that would let us, and our love exist for eternity." Qetsiyah began.
"What happened?" Danny asked her.
Given the situation things did not work out.
"I created the spell. I went against my duty as a witch and rules of our tribe. I created the elixir for the both of us to drink on our wedding night. I even created a special garden for the wedding ceremony only to learn that Silas had no intention of marrying me." Qetsiyah said.
This Silas guy would definitely be nominated town the award for worst fiancé in the world.
"Duty as a witch?" Danny asked feeling his fingers begin to twitch.
"Witches are servants of nature. We are to make sure that nothing breaks the natural order." Qetsiyah said. "Silas wanted to break the rule that everything that lives must one day die."
These witches were beginning to sound more and more like the ascended. However, unlike the ascended it seems like this group is fine with messing with the lives of those still living. If Qetsiyah proved to be as annoying as the ascended are then he would destroy them. Something is keeping them tied to the word so if she started getting on his nerves then he would just have to get rid of the power source for this place. These people could end up being a threat though it seems that they are confined to this planet.
So, if he left it, they would have no way to follow him or his army or spy on him if he decided to scheme up in the space.
"He took the elixir by himself?" Danny asked.
It was something a Goa'uld would do. Make a promise for some treasure then once they got their hands on it, they would break the promise and take it for themselves. More than likely killing the other Goa'uld in the process.
Maybe that was how she ended up dead?
"For his crime I gave him the option of apologizing and getting back together as long as he took the cure. It is another elixir I made before I died. This one to take away his immortality and become a mortal witch again." Qetsiyah said. "He refused my offer and so I decided to let him enjoy his life in the bottom of a cave unable to leave. Give him some time to think. I waited for him to take the cure and join me once his life ended naturally."
He had the feeling she would have ended that life rather quickly. Still no reason to say that.
"You are a lot more forgiving than other people I know." Danny said.
If someone tricked a Goa'uld out of a treasure they worked on especially on their wedding, there was no world they could run to that would protect them from their wrath. There would be no price too high to get revenge.
"Over a thousand years have passed and he still remains stubborn." Qetsiyah said.
"This world's longest argument." Danny said with a smile.
"I want you to go to Silas and force the cure down his throat and kill him." Qetsiyah said looking at him.
Seems like she had gotten tired of waiting.
"How strong is he?" Danny asked.
"He cannot leave that tomb. The only blood he has had for the past thousand plus years have been small drops fed by foolish humans he has managed to trick." Qetsiyah said.
That just proved he had to be careful when dealing with the witches. He may have had more power than most of them, but one determined enough could make him suffer even if they could not kill him.
"Give me the location and I will do it for you. In return I want you to be my ally. To give me the information that you witches have. The events that you have seen with your unobstructed view of the world of the living." Danny said.
"Very well." Qetsiyah said sticking her olive-skinned tone hand out for him to shake.
"I hope we can work together well Qetsiyah." Danny said as he shook her hand. 'Well, it seems that I have a new task to accomplish.'