The Barque of Heaven

by Stargate

  "Daniel Jackson, I have uncovered clothing," Teal'c stepped back from the tattered rags revealed in the hole he had cleared.

  Daniel peered up at him, squinting despite his sunglasses. A faint shock ran up his nape at the sight of Teal'c: dusty face streaked with sweat and lungs heaving from labor, which under normal conditions he would have done one-handed. Junior's peculiar talents were now noticeably absent. There was nothing they could do, words of concern would only make Teal'c feel self-conscious.

  Removal of the cloth revealed a leg. Encouraged, they wielded pick and trowel, hauled on half-buried bricks with cramp-curled hands, until nearly two hours after Teal'c had fired the first shot in the excavation, the body lay completely exposed. No pockets were found in the clothes. No Eye of Ra lay conveniently by the remains' side.

  "We'll have to turn it over." Daniel wiped sweat out of his eyes with the back of his glove and removed the face mask. "Fifteen minute break first," Jack called from where he sat, surrounded by carefully sifted hills of Carter's spoil.

  They dropped to the ground around him and shared the last of their food.

  "Moon's up." Sam pointed to a near-full white satellite, well into a low arc across the sky.

  "Water's getting low." Another obstacle to their survival here. If they didn't find the key, they would all be dead within a day. "Better hope the next planet is more hospitable," Jack said. "We're going to be foraging from now on."

  The sky remained a deep, dark blue, unmarred by even the merest hint of a cloud. Jack closed his eyes, visibly battling a headache. In the silence, their remaining time seemed to tick loudly by.

  "Carter, you should take a break."

  She shook her head, more to wake up than signal refusal. "I'm good, sir. I had some sleep on the last planet."

  He cracked open an eye at her. "You were unconscious."

  "Same thing, sir. Besides, I was faking it while Daniel carried me," she grinned.

  "Hey!" Daniel cried, feigning outrage. "You just liked being the damsel in distress for a change."

  Daniel refastened his canteen to his belt, the water warm and metallic in his mouth. Not wanting to expend further energy getting up, he crawled back to the body. He exchanged his thick work gloves for rubber ones and repositioned the white mask over his mouth and nose. Bending close to the ground, he cleared the soil around the body with sweeping strokes of the trowel, his left hand sifting each freed pile of dirt.

  Teal'c joined him and accepted the gloves and mask Daniel offered. When they had cleared six inches under the body's left side, Daniel nodded and they set aside their tools. They placed their hands under the withered torso and heaved. With a gruesome cracking of dried flesh, they pushed the body up and over as far as the stiffened right arm would allow.

  "Hold it up."

  Daniel attacked the dirt-encrusted clothes with trowel and brush, knocking away clods of earth. The left arm had been broken and crushed under the body. There was nothing in the hand. The clothes on the body were simple pants and a thin, sleeveless shirt, two pockets in each. None contained the key.

  "Oh, please. It has to be here, somewhere." He groped through the dirt where the body had lain, heartbeat picking up each time an object came under his hand, but three stones, a flask top, a button and some kind of decoration or brooch were all he found.

  Jack and Sam stopped in their own search as Daniel sank into the dirt, overheated and close to despair. If the key had been dropped and washed away in the rains they would likely never find it, certainly not in time to save their lives.

  Teal'c, still holding the corpse on its side, indicated a slip of fabric, coarser in weave than the body's clothes, barely showing in the hardened mud. "Daniel Jackson, there is something buried in the ground, above the head."

  Daniel leapt on it like a desperate gopher. He found a strap, and the strap was attached to a carry bag. He yanked it free and sat back in the dirt. Teal'c respectfully lowered the body back to its resting place.

  The bag, half rotted, fell to pieces in Daniel's hands. Tools, water flasks and a broken comb scattered to the ground as he sorted quickly through each mud-covered item.

  "Yes!" An odd but familiar shaped lump stuck to the side of a flask caught Daniel's eye. He attacked it with a brush and from the cloud of dust emerged a dull twinkle of red; a carved Eye of Ra. "We've got it!" he coughed hoarsely.

  Teal'c smiled and settled himself next to the diggings. Sam groaned with relief and flopped backwards into the dirt.

  "I am turning in my trowel." Jack dusted it off and stashed it in Daniel's pack. "Nice job, Daniel, all of you. Let's get this over with and then we'll head back to the 'gate. I'd like us all to have some proper rest before we go through."

  "I do feel the need for kel'no'reem," Teal'c admitted. "However, should we not rebury this one?"

  "Seriously T, I don't think any of us have the energy to spare."

  "Just push the dirt back over, Teal'c." Daniel crawled back to his pack and pulled out a small leather roll holding his finework tools. "The wind will do the rest in no time."

  He selected a slim dental pick and carefully cleaned the crusted muck from the Eye. Barely finding enough spit to clear away the last trace of dirt, he held up a beautiful carved ruby. He shoved the tool roll into his pants' pocket and presented the ruby to Jack.

  "Try it.,,

  Jack took it gingerly and tossed it and the diamond to Sam. She groaned and rolled to her feet. The rest of them followed suit with a chorus of grunts and complaints, and staggered to the wall. Once out of the awning's shade, the heat and glare hit with renewed ferocity.

  Sam fitted the diamond into the aperture on the left-hand side of the archway. A panel of stone closed over it with barely a noise. She reached out and dropped the ruby into the slot on the right. It too was pulled inside the archway. There was a tense few moments of silence, then a holographic display appeared in the shade of the doorway; seven address glyphs and a phrase in Goa'uld script.

  Daniel quickly jotted them down, double-checking that he had the phrase `Teb her kehaat' correct, then compared it with what the others had memorized. He made three copies and handed them out.

  Drained, they stood for a couple of anti-climactic minutes; exhaustion gnawed at them now the urgency was gone.

  "C'mon." Jack clapped Daniel on the shoulder and frowned at the resulting wince.

  "Teal'c, I'd like to re-dress that wound when we get back to the Stargate," Sam said.

  "I would appreciate that, Major Carter."

  The awning was dismantled and the body given a scant reburial. Within ten minutes they had shouldered packs and were walking back through the ruined temple.

  It was a slow hike back to the Stargate. As they plodded along, Teal'c found his attention diverted inwards as the silence of the desert wrapped close around him. The halfthought words and impressions that had been irritating his subconscious for two planets now rose up in his mind, clamoring for attention. Satisfied the team was not currently at risk, he let the images crowd his thoughts.

  Tumbling, entangled, they flooded together nonsensically; released from the confines of the Books, words and sounds merged and separated in rivers of confused meaning. Teal'c brought his powers of meditation to bear, and with a mental snap that sent a shiver down his spine, the streams separated, slowed and gave up their meanings.

  The words, if that was the correct term, paraded past his inner eye in the delicate, flowing script. As each word came to him, so did its meaning and its pronunciation in a melodic dialect, coupled with its equivalent meaning in Goa'uld.

  For some time Teal'c lost himself in the joy of discovery as more and more of the language made itself known to him. With a little mental practice, he found the control needed to marshal the information, ascertaining where it was storing itself in his mind and how to stop and start it up again. With the confusing babble tamed, Teal'c finally rose out of his light meditative state and looked around, surprised to see the Stargate looming distinctl
y before them.

  He glanced over at Daniel Jackson, tramping along, eyes half shut and walking on auto-pilot. Having denied the man who loved languages the discovery granted by the Books, Teal'c felt constrained to share.

  "Daniel Jackson."

  "Hmm? What?" Daniel roused himself and looked up at Teal' c.

  "The Books of Djehuti are unfolding their language to me and I am beginning to comprehend it.,,

  Daniel stumbled to a halt. "Really?"

  "Not the language of the creatures on the last planet?" Major Carter drifted to a stop and pulled her canteen free, the sloshing of the water within a reminder that their supplies were running low.

  "It is not, Major Carter. This is quite different. While I was able to understand Yerryk's speech, I had no insight into her species' written language. I believe that ability was included in the Books merely to allow access to the Stargate. Now however, I am... learning both the written and spoken elements of this new language."

  "Show me," Daniel nearly demanded. He pulled his notebook from its plastic baggie in his BDU pocket, and thrust it and a wom pencil at Teal'c.

  Teal'c considered carefully, then wrote a short passage in the flowing script.

  "I've never seen this before." Daniel peered intently at the words. "And you can pronounce it?"

  "I can. It reads, `Dal cho'thlin pas weh-ah'. It means," he paused as the Goa'uld words came readily to mind and he translated those into English. "Bright wings bear the morning light."

  "Write down the translation for me," Daniel pushed the notebook back to Teal'c, unable to tear his eyes from the beautiful writing.

  Teal'c complied and they walked on in silence as Daniel studied the script.

  Eventually he said, "I don't get it. Why would Ra give people attempting to enter his service access to a language that isn't Goa'uld?"

  "This I do not know, Daniel Jackson."

  "I always thought the Goa'uld were pretty xenophobic when it came to other species or races," O'Neill said. "All the Goa'uld and Jaffa we've come across have used the same basic language, haven't they?"

  "You are correct, O'Neill," Teal'c said, trying not to sound surprised at their leader's perception. "A central language has been imposed for millennia as a means of better controlling conquered planets."

  Daniel nodded, sounding the new words quietly to himself. "Except for isolated communities like Abydos, who evolved their own dialect and even that shares the same root language as basic Goa'uld. This-this is really odd, Teal'c."

  "Indeed it is."

  The sun, in its higher arc, was chasing the moon toward the horizon when they arrived at the Stargate. Daniel stopped a few paces away, his eye caught by a pile of stone slabs next to one of the seal formations. It wasn't a natural formation and the crust coating the rocks heralded what could be a hidden life-saver.

  "Guys, I think I've found water." He dropped his pack and knelt.

  Removing the topmost slab released a puff of steam, redolent with minerals, rising from a dark cavity.

  "A thermal water course." Teal'c stooped beside him and shone his flashlight into the hole. Less than a foot down, clear water glinted with bubbles lazily rising to the surface.

  "It's hot, but it should be drinkable," said Daniel. "If we pool what water we have left, we can refill the rest of the canteens."

  A dark stripe of shade along one side of the platform offered a slim place to rest. Lining up six canteens to cool, Daniel sighed in relief. Despite the sleep he had snatched earlier, his head was thumping with exhaustion and his eyes felt rough and gritty.

  "Shouldn't we push on, sir? Get out of this heat at least?" Sam rested her back against the warm stone and fanned her face with her boonie.

  "We've got... two hours, seventeen minutes left." Jack dropped his pack and sat in the shade of the Stargate's ring. "We're slowing down too much. Who knows what's waiting next. Now we have extra water, we can take the time to rest a little. Carter, you and Teal'c get your heads down. Daniel, I'll trade you off in an hour."

  "Yes, sir." Sam slid down, head resting on her pack and was asleep in minutes. Teal'c folded himself into the welcome peace of meditation and was lost to the outside world.

  Daniel stretched out in the shade. He drifted into a tenuous, half-dream state full of shifting images. Goa'uld and hairy monsters chased first him, then each other, through deserts where it rained all the time. He reached out for his friends, but they ran past him and disappeared into the dense trees now growing in the desert. He called to them, ran after them, but it was dark and he was alone, the wind and rain tearing at him, pulling him down into hot, wet sand that choked him, swallowed him up until there was no air left to breathe....

  He jerked up, shocked awake, heart thundering in his ears. Daniel fumbled his canteen free and sucked down the bitter water, aware of Jack sitting above him in the meager shade. He looked at his watch. Thirty minutes left. Quite sure he didn't want to go back to sleep, he climbed onto the platform and shooed Jack away to rest.

  Silence settled around them, constricting in its intensity. The occasional snore from Sam or huff of breath from Jack were the only sound.

  Daniel dug his digital camera out of his pack and studied the readouts. The memory card, the fourth he had used on this mission, was almost to capacity. He pulled it out and tucked it with its predecessors in a small plastic container, stashed safely in the side pocket of his BDUs. Almost as an afterthought, he fished out the dead man's recorder and set to cleaning away the encrusted muck with his dental pick, glancing up every minute or so to ensure they remained alone. With infinite care, he unearthed a tiny speaker on the device. He stared at it for quite some time before activating the record ing. The dying man's face hovered in the hot air, his voice reached out from beyond his dusty grave, harsh and hollow in Daniel's ears.

  `Sidhe, beloved. I speak to you from where I shall now never leave. Misfortune has struck me down and my Trial is at an end. I engaged this Trial with all my confidence, certain its reward would bring all that I hoped to bestow upon you, give you the richness in life your devotion and love has given me through the long years of our bond.

  `Never did I regret undertaking this glorious Trial, but with my dying breath shall I regret not being by your side every day of the life you will live without me.'

  The dying man broke off, consumed by a coughing fit. Daniel stared at the projection, eyes prickling in the dry heat. Was this man not the Goa'uld they had thought him to be?

  The coughing finally ended. Gasping, the man wiped away bloody spittle-and his eyes flashed a dim, unnatural golden light.

  Goa'uld then.

  `Remember your Bacis, my love, as you walk the fields of our home. I shall, as ever walk by your side. Think of me only as absent and waiting for you until we are joined once more in the life beyond.'

  Bacis choked again, weakening coughs that petered away. The picture wobbled as his hand dropped to the ground. He shuddered, then stilled as the light left his eyes.

  Daniel was about to turn the display off when Bacis' eyes dragged half-open. A few whispered words stuttered from his lips in a language Daniel had never heard before. Then, with a sigh of exhaling air, the host, too, passed away.

  Daniel sat, disturbed to say the least, as the shade moved away from him, until it was time to rouse his teammates and forge once more into the unknown.

  GATE TWELVE

  Within the Cavern of Her Lord

  hat first breath of fresh, cool air was sweet nectar to Jack as he stepped out of the Stargate. His parched lips welcomed the moisture around them as bright afternoon sunlight shone down. He moved a few steps forward as his team slurped through behind him, weapon half-raised, his gaze darting around him, taking in a shale beach bordering an ocean, flowering bushes along the edge of the shore that would be ideal for camouflage and....

  "We've got company!"

  Jack thumbed the safety off his gun and took aim as armed Jaffa scurried out of the bushes' cover like so many
rats. One, two dozen, more. He held fire and dove off the Stargate platform after Teal'c, Daniel and Carter likewise hurled themselves over the far side.

  "We're too low on ammo to make much of a fight of it," he said, nevertheless aiming at the leaders in the group running toward them.

  "Another phalanx approaches from the rear," Teal'c said urgently. "We are without means of retreat."

  "What do you think, is this part of the Trial?"

  "I am uncertain, O'Neill. We have encountered Jaffa before, however these seem much more aggressive."

  Odds were decidedly against them.

  "Carter, Daniel, hold your fire. Let's see if they're willing to talk," Jack yelled over the stone platform.

  The troops were nearly upon them. Jack lowered his gun, fighting the basic instinct to start shooting and take as many of the enemy with him as possible. Horus-helmeted soldiers spread out around them: their expressionless metal faces filled Jack with foreboding. Several marched straight up to SG-1 and with no more preamble than pointing weapons in their faces, proceeded to strip away every weapon the four carried.

  "Hey, watch it, pal." Jack leant back reflexively when one came at him with a knife and attempted to cut away his sidearm, holster and all.

  The soldier responded with a stinging backhand. Beside Jack, Teal'c moved to intercept and was pounced upon by three Jaffa who wrestled him to the ground. Within seconds, Jack was overpowered, his arms yanked behind his back and he was forced to his knees. Bitterly, he glared at their inhuman masks and regretted not taking the slim chance they'd had to fight.

  Sounds of a scuffle rose up from the other side of the platform. Jack and Teal'c both craned to see Carter grappling with two Jaffa who had Daniel pinned, struggling furiously, to the ground. It took three more to pull her off and hold her down long enough to remove her weapons, vest and pack, and bind her arms. Daniel, Jack and Teal'c were also swiftly stripped of their gear, then a metal-shod boot in the back sent both Teal'c and Jack to the ground.