by Stargate
"Spofforth and Kasugo were wrong," Wodeski declared, ignoring him. "They maintained that only the xochimiqui, those captured during the Flower War and sacrificed to the major gods, were eaten."
"Eaten?" Teal'c's voice was curiously flat.
A flutter of an unwanted memory snaked its way into Daniel's mind. He closed his eyes and shook it off. The madness induced by Artemis was completely different to what was happening here. "The Aztecs had the same problem on Earth," he explained. "A chronic shortage of protein. Cannibalism wasn't mindless, or random. It was as structured as every other ritual associated with Nemontemi." Then he saw the expression on Wodeski's face, and his stomach lurched. "You didn't..."
"Don't be so righteous, Jackson. You must have wondered what it was like. All these years of studying cultures that indulged in ritual cannibalism. You can't tell me you weren't the least bit curious - "
Daniel grabbed him by the arms. "Dammit, what sort of game do you think you're playing? Look!" He grabbed Wodeski's jaw and forced his face to the sky. "That planet up there is not an illusion. You have to come back with us, now, before the real gods arrive!"
Teal'c cocked his head and looked at him oddly. Real gods?
Wodeski burst out laughing. "Real gods?"
"Goa'uld!" Daniel all but jumped up and down in frustration. "They're not really gods! They usurp the role of ancient human deities and - " He waved his hands in the air.
"Who is it that approaches the gods?" Teal'c called in his best intimidating voice.
Daniel spun around. The arriving fire priests immediately dropped to the ground. A seventh figure, slighter and shorter than the others, seemed uncertain, until the fire priest behind him gave him a quick shove, and sent him sprawling face down onto the ground. Okay, so this must be the apprentice.
Pasting an imperious look on his face, Daniel said, "Stand, Heart-eater, and tell me if the gods that came through the Chappa'ai were dressed all in white?"
Heart-eater's head nodded jerkily in the dirt.
"Answer!" Teal'c bellowed.
Daniel sent Teal'c a look, but as much as he loathed intimidation, these people would expect no less.
"Yes, my Lord Jaffa," replied Heart-eater, daring to lift his head an inch. "They wore white. Then they removed their garments and appeared much as you do now. Their skin was not gold, as yours is," he added, risking a quick glance at Teal'c. "But was also white."
Sam and Jack were alive, and well enough to travel. Daniel almost sighed in relief. "And where did these... gods go?"
Heart-eater. Daniel didn't need to see the boy's face; everything about him screamed mortal terror when he blurted, "They... accepted flowers! And then they took the children, the offerings, to Xalo. I...left them when we reached our tzonipantli, our skull cave." He moved an arm through the dirt until it pointed in the general direction of the Pyramid of the Moon.
Now Daniel understood. The Aztecs normally `sacrificed' only flowers to Quetzalcoatl and Chalchiuhtlicue, but during Nemontemi, some diehard fire priests would hedge their bets and sacrifice a few slave children. If the same rule applied here to escaped slaves as had applied on Earth... "To the Emperor's palace garden?"
"Please, my Lord, I am worthless, I have failed in my duties!"
"No, no you haven't failed," said Daniel in a resigned voice. "And you're not worthless. But we...wish to find Quetzalcoatl and Chalchiuhtlicue, for we have been on a long journey and would rejoin them before we return to Earth."
"Onweyocan," Teal'c whispered.
"Omeyocan," Daniel quickly corrected.
"Omeyocan?" Wodeski said loudly. "Now who's playing g... rlph!"
Teal'c had moved back into the temple's shadows, and grabbed Wodeski from behind. "If you do not refrain from speaking again," he whispered to the struggling professor. "I shall find it necessary to remove your tongue."
Fortunately the fire priests were still prostrate, and Heart-eater couldn't possibly hear anything; he was shaking so hard his teeth were rattling. "When?" Daniel asked the apprentice.
"Three conch shells past."
Three hours ago. From the comer of his eye Daniel saw Teal'c pull Wodeski inside the temple. They couldn't very well drag the professor along by the scruff of his feathered cape, at least not while he was playing the mortal manifestation ofTzcatlipoca. But equally they could not leave him behind. "Leave us," Daniel said. "We will confer with... Tzcatlipoca."
The priests remained prostrate on the ground until Daniel went back inside - to see Wodeski squirming ineffectually in Teal'c's arms.
"We don't have a lot of time, Professor," said Daniel. "So you need to listen very carefully." Wodeski stopped struggling long enough to glare at him. "Good. Now unless you believe in Velikovskyism and think the planet up there is Venus doing a close fly by, you cannot possibly retain the illusion that you're still on Earth."
Wodeski rolled his eyes but nodded.
Teal'c slowly removed his hand from the professor's mouth. "You may speak. Quietly."
"When I found the skull and looked into the eyes, I realized that, well, Ballard might have been on to something." Wodeski's voice turned grudging. "Although I admit until seeing that... thing out there in the sky - they call it Meztli - I thought that I really had gone back in time." He looked up at Daniel. "I'm not a moron. I knew I'd have to return before Nemontemi ended." His eyes darted to Teal'c, and he snapped, "Now get your grubby paws off me!"
Teal'c impassively retained a firm grip on the professor's arms.
"Listen, you young fool," Wodeski hissed at Daniel. "What difference does it make? The fact is this culture is Aztec and the impact on the archeological community... Why it will cause an upheaval greater than the invention of carbon dating!"
"Except this isn't Earth, it's a moon called Xalotcan. This culture has probably evolved in ways that you cannot possibly imagine."
"Don't be so agonizingly melodramatic! Would you please let me go?" The blue spider veins across the professor's nose and checks were threatening to burst.
"Only if you give me your word that you'll come back with us.
Wodeski pulled a face like a petulant child. "You can't get back without me. I have the skull!"
Teal'c's eyebrow hiked up. "I believe that the true Quetzalcoatl will not be pleased when he learns of this, Daniel Jackson."
"True Quetzalcoatl?" Wodeski was trying to twist free when he caught sight of Teal'c's tattoo. His smirk evaporated and he went still. Eyes narrowing myopically, he demanded, "What's that gold thing on your forehead?"
"A symbol of slavery," replied Teal'c.
"Teal'c's not human, he's Jaffa," said Daniel. "He carries in him the larval form of a parasitic Goa'uld, an alien, which, as I was trying to tell you before, usurps the belief structures of the inhabitants of different worlds. In other words, they like to play god. Quetzalcoatl is not a god, either. He's a very advanced alien who's ...in charge of the skull transport system."
Wodeski stared at Daniel incredulously.
"If you try to return to Earth by using the skull," Daniel continued. "You'll end up under a hundred tons of rubble, which is all that's left of the excavation tunnel and cavern. The only way out of here is through the Stargate."
If Nick was right about how the skulls worked, then Wodeski would probably arrive in one of many caves around Teotihuacan. But Daniel had no intention of telling him that.
"Stargate? What's that?"
"You may have heard them refer to it as a Chappa'ai."
Wodeski's eyes flickered in recognition. He stopped struggling then turned to look at the glyphs on the far wall. "I wondered about that. It's another transport device, a ring shaped thing. Right?"
Daniel followed the direction of Wodeski's gaze, but it was hard to make out the images in the spluttering torchlight.
"Everyone joked about you vanishing off the face of the planet," the professor continued. Visibly deflating, he grumbled bitterly, "So your ideas weren't insane after all. Oh, alright then, I suppos
e I better go back with you."
When Teal'c cautiously released him, Wodeski rubbed his arms, and straightened his cloak and headdress. "But make no mistake, boy," he added grumpily. "You better cite my name as a co-discoverer. After all, I found the skull at Teotihuacan and used it to get here all by myself"
"We'll make absolutely certain you get all the credit." And a life sentence in a Mexican jail. "C'mon," Daniel added, picking up the professor's fallen notebook. "We need to get out of here before sunrise."
They left the temple and headed for the Pyramid of the Moon, Wodeski chattering as they walked. "The fire priests call the skulls the Ohtliquetzalcoatl."
"The Roads of Quetzalcoatl," said Daniel. "That makes sense."
"They believe Quetzalcoatl gave the skulls to the people that were here before, the ones who built Teotihuacan. But the skulls disappeared soon after the first Aztecs arrived. That's when they began using that thing you called a Chappa'ai. There's been a lot of quakes recently. When I arrived, a big one broke open a sealed chamber in the cavern beneath the Pyramid of the Moon - the Temple of Tzcatlipoca - and a skull fell out."
The professor's arrival had not only caused the flood, it had triggered a disastrous chain of prophetic events, for the appearance of the skull, followed by `Quetzalcoatl's' arrival could well be interpreted as signs that the world was coming to an end. "And the priests just gave it to you?"
"One of them tried to use it." Wodeski shot Daniel a supercilious smirk. "He couldn't get it to work so he practically threw it at me."
"Since you let him think you're Tzcatlipoca, he was probably hoping you'd use the skull to confront Quetzalcoatl on another world."
Wodeski abruptly grabbed him by the arm. "The priests said the Chappa'ai was flooded. You said the skull on Earth is buried. So how did you get here?"
"I used another skull to come via a different planet."
A look of cunning crossed Wodeski face. "Pilli ocelotl!" he shouted into the night. "Noble jaguars!"
Suddenly, Teal'c raised his staff weapon and called, "Jaffa! Kreef'
Daniel saw them, jaguar shapes emerging from the shadows. At Teal'c's words they faltered - but only for a moment. Daniel pulled out his zat and turned to cover their backs.
The professor was having none of it. He used the distraction to scurry into the shadows of the pyramid. Daniel went to stop him but Teal'c fired his staff weapon. A smoking hole appeared in one of the smaller pyramids along the Avenue. The jaguar warriors froze in their tracks.
"Oh, great," Daniel muttered. How would Coatlicue have Jaffa unless... He groaned softly. Unless she was a Goa'uld queen like Hathor, and her offspring were now posing as Aztec gods, including ones named Tzcatlipoca and Tonatui.
"They come for the Roads of Quetzalcoatl!" screeched Wodeski. "They come so that Quetzalcoatl can end the world!"
The Jaffa carried wooden swords like fence palings with handles. Lined with razor sharp slivers of obsidian, the swords gleamed black in the strange light. For all their odd appearance, Daniel knew that the weapons were deadly. But what interested him more was the Jaffa's lack of staff weapons. And their hesitation. It suggested that while Coatlicue had taken over of the planet by slipping into the Aztec belief structure, even with a number of offspring, her control was limited. The warriors were now tom between loyalty to Tzcatlipoca and their considerably more ancient belief in the prophecies of Quetzalcoatl.
One of the jaguar warriors lunged from the shadows. Two more attacked from the opposite direction. Teal'c shot the first in the leg, while Daniel zatted the second and third. The others hung back, muttering something about lightning and fire-rain. And tonali - the fate of the world.
"They're not dead" Daniel pointed to the men he'd zatted. If these people followed the Aztec belief structure as closely as it seemed, then he would have to play this very, very carefully. "Our presence here must not be seen as fulfilling prophecy!"
"Yca mapilxocoitl," spat one of the warriors.
It was so incongruously commonplace that Daniel couldn't help it; he burst out laughing.
Teal'c stared at him like he'd lost his mind.
"It means, literally, `you can take that with a pinch of salt'," explained Daniel, still chuckling. "I suspect the saying is originally Aztec." When Teal'c continued to stare at him, he added, "I'll explain later." Then he called out to Wodeski, "You gave me your word, Professor!"
Wodeski was hiding behind a large block of stone. "To quote my warrior, yca mapilxocoitl."
His warrior? Wodeski seemed to be immersing himself in the role a little too deeply. "Listen to me, Professor. You have to come back with us otherwise you'll be marooned here."
"I lied to you, Jackson. The fire priests gave me all four skulls, including the one like Ballard found! I'm betting it's the one I need to get back, right? And when I inform the academic community of what you've been doing here - "
"They'll do to you exactly what you did to Nick!"
The zatted jaguar warriors had begun to wake. Their companions made no attempt to help them, nor were they backing away. For an Aztec, dying for your god was a sacred duty. You then got to hang out with the gods and your dead buddies for four years before being reborn on Earth as a carefree butterfly. But in their minds, if Quetzalcoatl really was about to return, it signaled the end of all worlds, which put a more permanent face on the meaning of the term dead.
"Good old Mexican standoff, hey Jackson?" Wodeski called.
Did the damned man have to be so right? He should have zatted Wodeski when he'd had the chance. And then what? Tied him up and had Teal'c carry him to the `gate? "One last time, Professor, it's not the end of Nemontemi you have to worry about. None of the skulls will get you to Earth, and if you don't leave before the Goa'uld arrive, you're going to end up as the main course."
"Bye-bye, Jackson!"
"You can lead an equine to the well," Teal'c said. "But you cannot force him to imbibe."
"That's horse and...oh forget it. Nick was right; we should leave Wodeski here. It'll be dawn in a few hours, and we still have to find Jack and Sam."
CHAPTER TEN
am looked down at Two-water, who was dozing in her lap. The toy dog, Xipe, had somehow found its way into the little girl's possession again. Despite the warm air, the forlorn little Chihuahua shivered uncontrollably.
Dabruzzi had warned them that seismic waves generated subharmonics, the sort that caused dogs to howl before an earthquake. He had further warned them it could make people edgy, even paranoid. Sam just hoped that was the reason for her headache and disorientation, and that it wasn't masking the symptoms of incipient altitude sickness.
A conch shell sounded a booming aubade. Two-water sat up sleepily, wrapped her arms around Sam's neck, and said, "I will miss you, Chalchi. Will you remember me when the time comes for me to enter the next world?"
Sam bit her lip and looked at O'Neill, who paused pulling on his pack. How could she promise Two-water a place in a Heaven that did not exist? She recalled something that Daniel had once told her, that belief in an afterlife gave people hope when their lives had none. The children were now safe, so what harm was a promise that would make Two-water happy? "Of course I'll remember you," she replied.
While the jaguar warriors looked on curiously, the Colonel reached into the bag that White-owl had carried all the way from the cave, and distributed every last one of the chocolate bars to the children. White-owl, now versed in the mechanisms of opening foil wrappers, showed one of the bite-sized bars to Atlatl.
"Chocolati!" declared the warrior, staring at O'Neill. In the dwindling light of the setting Meztli, Sam could see that Atlatl had actually paled. "You truly are Quetzalcoatl!" His voice quivered with fear, but then a strange mixture of adoration and relief crossed his face. "When you return, I and all that I am, is yours."
The Colonel opened his mouth to make what could only be some flippant remark, but then he seemed to change his mind, and nodded gravely. Something very important had just
happened; Sam only wished she had a clue what it was.
White-owl's knowing grin once again reminded her of Skaara. "Thank you, Jack Quetzalcoatl," he said. Turning to Sam, he added, "I look forward to the day that I may serve you both in Omeyocan." Then he bowed deeply and, lifting Two-water into his arms, followed the warriors.
"God, it's good to see you two!" called a familiar voice.
Sam spun around. A troupe of jaguar warriors - and Daniel and Teal'c - were coming along the path from the pyramid.
"You see?" White-owl called loudly as he continued walking. "They really are gods!" The children waved a final goodbye.
Daniel looked startled, while Teal'c smiled and said, "It is indeed good to see you."
A surge of delight flooded Sam. "Daniel! Teal'c! How did you get here?"
"We found them at the entrance of the Roads of Mictlan," one of the jaguar warriors said to Atlatl. "They say that they are Quetzalcoatl's messengers, and that they came from Teotihuacan." He pointed to Teal'c's gold tattoo.
"Ah, yes." Daniel turned apologetically to the warrior. "About that. I'm really sorry I...well, you know."
"I, too, regret that we attacked you needlessly," added Teal'c.
"You attacked them?" The Colonel stared at Daniel.
"Yes, well, we had a few problems with the jaguar warriors in..." Daniel turned and pointed back they way they had come. "Uhm, in Teotihuacan."
Atlatl looked at the sky again. It was getting lighter. "Quetzalcoatl - "
"Maybe I should explain on the way," Daniel said, following Atlatl's gaze. "We really need to be leaving before the sun.. .before Tonatui lifts his face into the sky and sees you."
Atlatl nodded gravely and motioned for the men with Teal'c and Daniel to walk with them. Speaking to the Colonel, Atlatl said, "If Tzcatlipoca has learned that you are here - "