Chapter 2
Planet P3X-2722 was an odd one already, Jack decided. Exiting the gate brought them into a cold, dark cavern that was smaller than his first apartment, and a kid who looked like he was skin and bones. Without a larger tunnel the SGC couldn't deliver aid supplies if he requested it, and he already knew the paperwork to relocate these people was going to burn him out.

The poor kid they greeted didn't look like he knew what they were talking about when Carter talked about the sky. And he looked so pale… which made the fact that the lad had apparently no issue whatsoever to dig through god knew how many tons of rock and earth with…. A mere hand powered drill.

Behind him, he had noticed how Carter also stared at him going at it… before muttering something about matter disintegration and advanced technology in mundane tools.

Well, he didn't know about that, Jack was closer to the boy than the captain, and what he saw was simply the work of muscle and grit.

Considering that even he wouldn't be able to pull that off did unsettle him more than a little though. Well, something to keep in mind for later.

"Alright, let's follow the boy now, shall we?" Jack waved after him.

Simon was his name. Surprisingly modern, compared to the names they usually encountered. He kept throwing glances back at them while knocking against the walls of the tunnel he was enlarging…. Probably meaning to show them that it indeed was stable, before heading deeper into the tunnels depths.

He had his doubts about how safe it was, to be honest.

"In such restrained confines, we wouldn't have room to defend ourselves in case of an ambush." Teal'c drily remarked, the Jaffa grasping his staff weapon while observing the cavern and what he could see of the tunnel.

"The boy can't be older than 12 or 13." Daniel of course protested to that. "You can't honestly think he's gonna do something like that?"

"Not the first time the bad guys have used kids and won't be the last time either." He sighed and stashed away his P-90 in favor of his zatnikatel. "Aights, Zats out. If we see an ambush, we stun the locals, if the tunnel collapses, start disintegrating dirt. Now let's move out."

He glanced over the metal structure the Kid had been hiding in…. Looked like some totem of sorts. Like the stone heads on the Easter Islands, just made of metal…. hmm. Daniel would undoubtedly go over it with a fine comb once they established first contact with whatever the nearest authority was, probably that village the boy had talked about.

The others mirrored him as he pulled out his ray gun, before advancing carefully in the tunnel. Despite his efforts it was still cramped, he had to hunch over lest he smack his hat on the roof. He wasn't quite crawling on all fours, but it wasn't that much better either.

Simon was obviously in his element - something which did cause Jack to recall rather nasty images of children working the mines in their own past - but Sg-1 was no strangers to tunnels either.

He had had to go through plenty of tight spaces and rudimentary dug tunnels in his missions in the Middle East and East Germany, Daniel was an enthusiastic archeologist, so digging through caves, tunnels and sealed vaults was essentially his purpose in life and Teal'c was Teal'c.

Sam struggled the most, she was shorter in stature than the rest of them but she wasn't used to huddling down like this. There was a world of difference between crawling into a panel for emergency repairs or in the guts of an alien ship to study it, than crawling in a narrow tunnel full of sharp edges, and she grunted every time she smacked off the walls. Being Sam meant she didn't voice a complaint about it, she was no quitter.

The tunnel was astonishingly long, making him wonder just how far this boy had dug and over what time span he had done this. Surely he had help? And how he was still standing, let alone boring the tunnel larger for the sake of his new guests. Jack peered over the kid when he was reaching up, seeing the absolutely tiny hole that marked his initial path. There were Viet Cong tunnels that were more spacious.

Whoever was in charge of this joint had better give some answers.

Finally, after a long trip of hunching down, smacking his head off an outcrop, and seeing a rare creased brow of annoyance on Teal'c, Simon busted open the opening, freeing them from that cramped tunnel… into a slightly larger tunnel. At least this one had lights strung up on the walls, so they weren't completely reliant on their flashlights.

"This place is lived in, not a crypt." Daniel noted once he could stand up straight.

The smells alone gave that away, it was dank, stale, and had the distinctive reek of unwashed bodies. It was chilly too, whatever heat source they had wasn't enough. Jack could only imagine how bad the sanitation system was down here.

For his part Simon slumped, lowering his drill and lifting his goggles, showing hands that looked abraded. "Whew, dug a lot farther than I thought. Welcome to Giha village."

Whispered mutterings picked up as they left the tunnel, heading into the town square: a bowl with stone bridges criss-crossing the center, and lines of holes marking where people were coming and going, or stopping in the case of those who spotted the outsiders in the area. Every person Jack saw was dirty, clad in filthy rags, and hunched over.

More than a few looked uncomfortably thin.

Jack exchanged a glance with the others, seeing them share the same expression. This was going to be one of *those* planets.

Daniel sighed, rolling his shoulders. "Alright, let's find whose in charge-"

The ground began rumbling, Jack immediately braced himself. Then a correction hit him: this wasn't a quake, this was-

"Make way for the surface!" A bellowing shout caught his attention, Jack whirled around and felt a stab of fear.

What were those cow sized monsters? They looked like big mole pigs, with dark fur and mouse-like noses, and why were they so huge? He didn't know, but there were a whole bunch of them charging their way!

"Move, move!" Jack snatched at Simon, aware that Teal'c was rushing to scatter some bystanders out of the way, with Daniel shouting alongside Carter to do the same. The boy was heavier than he seemed, and for whatever stupid reason he was doing a double take at the herd of monsters rushing at them.

He succeeded in dragging him out of the way, just in time to whip his head up at the sound of a laugh, seeing that there was a crazy bastard actually riding one of the moles.

A shirtless guy, a kid he mentally corrected, who somehow looked tanned and sporting a lot of tattoos, was cajoling some other kids in the charge. No matter how much he yelled or declared, he couldn't hide that his orange glasses looked dumb.

Jack got a good look when the kid caught sight of Carter, visibly widening his eyes and tracking her, showing a stupid grin right until his mount ran face first into a wall. He went flying as his horde of moles charged into the same wall, piling up in a mass of squeaking animals.

Slowly tracking how the conflagration came to a messy end, Jack picked himself up while tracking the others. Teal'c was okay, he managed to get a few kids out of danger. Daniel was also okay, looking at the mess of twitching animals like he never saw a mole stampede before. The same went for Carter, who was raising an eyebrow at the mass while they regrouped.

"Uh, what just happened?" Daniel asked first.

"I'm not sure, but what kind of animals are-" in the middle of her question Carter suddenly flinched, yanking her P-90 up at the figure who slithered to her side.

It was that jackass riding the mole, the one with the stupid glasses. Ignoring the gun aimed at him, he grinned and leaned closer to Carter, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.
"Yo, what brings a babe like you to a pit like this? How about you and I go see the sights around here?"

How Carter found the strength to keep from smacking him with the butt of her weapon, Jack did not know. Instead Carter cringed, only reluctantly lowering the weapon. She didn't deign to answer, looking away to examine the mess.

"Uh, bro? Are you okay?" Simon moved into view, looking at the dolt with concern. Wait, bro? Jack looked between them, he didn't see a family resemblance.

"All good Simon, now who is this beauty? Actually, who are you guys? You're not from around here." The idiot frowned for a second, and unexpectedly his face lit up. "Hold up. Are you from the surface?"

He lurched to pick up Simon, holding him by the shoulders with a wild gleam in his eyes. "Simon, do you know who these bozos are? Tell me they came from the surface, did they? Huh!?"

"Actually Kamina-" Simon was being shaken, babbling in the face of the demands.

After examining them Jack determined that he wasn't in danger, he had a moment to collect himself. And to sneak in a rare opportunity, shuffling closer to Carter as the hubbub around them grew louder, due to the locals realizing that there were strangers in their midst. Time was short, he had to make use of this rare opportunity.

"So Captain Carter, staying sharp?"

"Yes sir." She didn't look like she caught on, glancing around as well. Jack saw a flash on Daniel's face, he knew what he was planning.

Jack grinned. "I meant your track record Carter. Gotta keep the alien men eating out of the palm of your hand."

Carter opened her mouth, closed it, then leveled a stare that danced on the line of insubordination, just barely avoiding open anger.

"There is someone approaching." Teal'c ruined his fun, gazing at someone big pushing his way through the crowd.

That someone bursting through the crowd was a big fellow, relatively. He was shorter than Jack, let alone Teal'c, and oval shaped with his fat gut. He was also clutching a sheathed sword, his balding head showing a gleam in the dim light.

"That does it! Kamina! I'm going to tan your… huh?" He did a double take, eyes narrowing. "Who are you people?"

"Ahem, we are peaceful explorers from another world." Daniel stepped forward to introduce them, managing to deliver the diplomatic greeting in a friendly manner.

The chief, so Jack assumed him to be anyway, squinted at them. "I dunno who you people are, but you're not Giha villagers. And that stuff you're holding… You're coming with me, I'm gonna get to the bottom of this."

"Eh? Are you being thick headed again old man?" The idiot kid, Kamina? Whatever his name was, he stood up from badgering his apparent brother, huffing like a troublemaker teen he was.

"Don't think you're off the hook either!" The chief stabbed his still sheathed sword at them, puffing up his chest.

Kamina ignored the hostility, swaggering closer to put himself between SG-1 and the chief, hands in his pockets and zero fear on his expression. He ignored both Simon showing panic and Daniel trying to interrupt, tensing up and scowling.

"Now, don't give me that crap! These are people from the surface! Things are clearly fine up there!" He pointed at the ceiling.

"I've had enough of your nonsense!" Before Jack could do anything he swung his sword, cracking Kamina on the skull. It was a hard blow, there was blood leaking from a cut where the shealth smacked him, but the kid barely flinched. He gritted his teeth as he was struck again, and again.

"Hey! That's enough!" Jack snarled, stomping forward.

Leaving welts on the kid, the chief turned to growl at them, clutching his weapon. "Now you can come quietly, or I will make you! Don't force my-"
In the middle of his threat Teal'c shot his Zat at him, the bolt of electricity rolling over his body. He collapsed before it dissipated, thumping on the dirt pathway with barely a grunt.

Daniel and Carter both had hollow looks, but Teal'c was entirely unapologetic as he holstered the weapon. The crowd around them was still for a moment… then as one they bolted, scattering in every direction to take cover. The only exceptions were the boys, Simon because he was rooted to his spot in terror, Kamina because he apparently didn't have a fear response, raising a brow in confusion.

Jack just sighed. He hoped this would be the last bit of trouble they faced, he had enough paperwork as it stood.

AN:
I am sure that this will be all the trouble Jack will have to deal with on this world.