Stargate SG-1: Trial by Fire: SG1-1 (13 page)

The time before had been worse. They'd ascertained his
whereabouts fairly early on in the game, only to find that extraction
was impossible. All they could do was organize a diversion and
pray. It had worked, and he'd recognized the chance for what it
was, escaped, and stumbled home a few days later, tired and wan
and reticent. The clothes he'd worn had been shredded in odd
places, but there'd been no physical evidence of what Baal had
done to him, other than a ripe case of sarcophagus withdrawal. It
spoke volumes; the only thing that did. To this day the General
was convinced that Colonel O'Neill's so-called report contained as
economical and sanitized a version of the truth as Jack had thought
he could get away with.

I ended up rescuing an old gir~friend I'd never met before.

And then some, George Hammond reckoned. And then some...

And now this.

"What happened?" he asked.

No matter how exhausted or anxious, at least Major Carter could
be counted on to deliver a succinct debrief, and thank Heaven for that. The story was convoluted enough, what with ghost ships, high
priests, divine retribution, underage monks, and guerrillas in funny
hats.

Halfway through the directly relevant part he interrupted her.
"You're saying you... lost... Dr. Kelly as well?"

Sam Carter flushed, which finally put some color into her
cheeks. "Yes, sir. She... uh... she disregarded orders and went to
the temple on her own. It's no excuse, sir. I should have been aware
that she'd try something like that."

Perhaps, but General Hammond had the distinct impression
that, should Dr. Kelly decide on any specific course of action, there
would be no stopping her. Having said that, he didn't exactly look
forward to his upcoming conversation with the British Secretary
of Defence.

Most frightfully sorry, old chap, but we've lost your
representative. Sure you want her back?

"Teal'c and Dr. Jackson?"

"They're at Tyros. Daniel's trying to gather as much background
information as he can, and Teal'c's there to smooth the waters with
the Synod. The locals -"

"Think he's a spirit. Yeah, I got that," Hammond cut in, figuring
that this had to be one of the most outlandish notions he'd ever
come across, and he'd come across quite a few of those since being
posted to this command.

"At the moment it's helpful, but we don't know how long it'll
last," she admitted. "Sooner or later it'll turn into a problem.
Kandaulo seems to feel that Teal'c threatens his position, so we'll
have to make the most of it while we can."

The General nodded. "And there's no indication of Goa'uld
presence? What about this Meleq? Could he be Goa'uld?"

"It's possible, sir, but we have no confirmation either way. Daniel
says a girl he spoke to referred to the Stargate as the entrance to
Meleq's realm. It could be a hint. If Meleq is a Goa'uld, he keeps
an unusually low profile."

"Let's hope it stays that way. Carry on, Major."

"Teal'c tracked the Phrygians to an old harbor in a cove about
three klicks west of the temple. He believes that four, maybe five, of them were on horseback and that the riders had Colonel O'Neill
and Dr. Kelly, and also some of the older children. The smaller
ones were carried on foot."

"A harbor?"

"Yes, sir. They got away by ship. Actually, we're guessing two
ships."

"Major, oceans have a habit of being large. Very large. How in
the blazes do you -"

"Have a look at this, sir."

She leaned sideways and fished for her backpack. When she got
it, she pulled out what looked like a papyrus, unrolled it, and spread
it on the table, careful to avoid the wet patches she'd left earlier. It
showed a rugged shoreline stretching east to west, with a mountain
range rising behind it.

"Hamilqart let me borrow this. It's a map of the coast and the
offshore islands. Not exactly GPS accuracy, but good enough to
work with. Relative distances pretty much pan out, and the scale is
about 1:10.000." Sam Carter's right index finger stabbed a speck
inland. "There's the temple precinct. And there" - the finger slipped
further west - "is the harbor they used. Tyros is to the east of both,
which is handy tactically. No risk of running into reinforcements
coming from the city. If they are as clever as we think they are, they
won't have sailed east, past Tyros, nor west, past Sidonia." She
pointed at the blob that marked Sidonia. "In other words, the most
likely course for them to take would have been south."

General Hammond dubiously stared at a profusion of tawny
irregular shapes that littered the blue ground south of the coast.
"Just how many islands are we talking about, Major?"

"Not all of them, sir." She was trying to sound upbeat and failed
miserably. "Only about fifty."

"How many?"

"We've narrowed it down as much as we could."

The edges of her palms sectioned off a cone-shaped area opening
towards the south. It showed considerably more than fifty islands,
though some clearly too small to serve as a potential base for the
kidnappers. A number of others were marked in delicate writing,
which he couldn't decipher.

"What are those?"

"Tyrean colonies. Hamilgart pointed them out for me. He
believes that the Phrygians are unlikely to hide on any of these. I'm
inclined to agree. That leaves any uninhabited island of reasonable
size and with some kind of natural harbor. I realize it's still a huge
area, sir, but it's better than nothing."

Not by much, Hammond thought, and asked, "How do you want
to proceed?"

"I'd like to stage the first UAV sortie as soon as I've computed
a search grid, sir. Distances and flight conditions will be marginal,
but when I left Tyros the storm was starting to blow over. If we get
the jump on this, sir, we might be able to spot them while they're
still at sea. It'd nail them there and then. The Tyreans are too scared
of the wrath of Meleq to set sail in this kind of weather."

If, if, if... The air was thick with conditionals, but it wouldn't get
any better than this, would it? The General gazed at Sam Carter's
hands, still cupping that wedge of map, as though she were trying
to contain something precious.

"I'll have this map, Major," he said at last. "Sergeants Davis and
Siler can do the necessary. You go have a hot shower and at least
six hours of sleep. That's an order."

"No!" The hands flipped down, pinning the map to the tabletop,
and she added, "Sir."

"Major -"

"General, I know they're both more than qualified. But I'm
faster. Plus, we won't have telemetry beyond thirty miles radius
around the `gate. I'll have to preprogram search patterns and the
recording sequence. Once I've done that I'll hand over to Davis
and Siler and have my shower." She gave a wry grin. "I'll even try
to sleep, as per your order. Please, sir."

She'd definitely hung around Jack O'Neill enough to pick up a
slightly nonchalant attitude. On the other hand, George Hammond
couldn't deny that she had a point. He smiled a little and rose.

"Alright, Major. You've got forty-five minutes. Then you're out
of there until 1730 hours. Are we clear on this?"

"Yessir! Thanks, sir."

Before he could say anything else, Sam Carter jumped up, snatched the map, and was on her way to the control room.

The unmanned aerial vehicle zipped from the event horizon,
climbing rapidly until it had reached operational height, and buzzed
south towards the coast.

"Another one!" Hamilgart shouted excitedly, blinking in the
rain, his eyes tracking the UAV for as far as he could see it.

Which was a pretty long way. On a clear day the grayish blue
paint job on the device would have made it invisible from the
ground, but beneath the overcast sky it stood out, a fast-moving,
lighter blip. Not that anyone here had the wherewithal to shoot it
down, even if they'd wanted to.

"Graceful like a crane," mused Hamilgart. For the moment he
seemed to have forgotten that his son was missing, too.

The crane would plummet like a lead duck if it ran out of fuel,
but Dr. Jackson decided not to disillusion their host. This was the
third and last UAV sortie, and Hamilgart had greeted the previous
one in similarly rhapsodic style. The guy's enthusiasm reminded
Daniel of Jack, and in a roundabout, bleary-eyed kind of way that
got him back to last night's weird dream and the unsatisfactory
conversation that had followed.

DanielJackson, we -

What? We believe you should mind your own damn business?
Dollars to donuts.

He sighed and flipped up the collar of his jacket against the
wind. It didn't keep out the cold, but it sent a small cascade of
rainwater chasing down his back. Lord Meleq's alleged climatic
reprisal was beginning to reach old-testamentary proportions.
Obviously his lordship was peeved enough to aim for the Deluge.
It hadn't stopped raining since last night, and if it continued a little
longer, Daniel would be able to farm mushrooms under his boonie
hat. He spent a rueful thought on the comforts of the warm, dry
Synod Hall.

Said comforts had been precipitously abandoned when the
UAV's receptors picked up the tracking signal from Jack's radio
ten seconds into the first go-around. Much to the alarm of the
Synod, Dr. Jackson's own radio had burst into crackles and started to emit the gruff tones of General Hammond who'd requested that
someone check out the coordinates. Seeing that Teal'c's esoteric
status would allow him to make easier headway with the priests,
Daniel had volunteered and departed for grid coordinates G-J/37.
Despite the weather, Hamilqart had offered his services as a guide,
either because Kandaulo had told him not to let the strangers out
of his sight or because he felt guilty for abandoning Jack and Dr.
Kelly.

They'd found their target within five paces of where Jack's knife
had lain, half submerged in mud, which explained why even Teal'c
had missed it the night before. Of course there was no further trace
of Jack. He must have lost his radio in the fight. Daniel had reported
back to the SGC, secure in the knowledge that the combined radios
now made him 200% trackable. A dejected General Hammond had
asked that Dr. Jackson stay onsite to help with the retrieval of the
UAV if necessary.

That had been six hours ago. When the UAV had returned for
the second time, a couple of Siler's guys had arrived through the
`gate and brought an umbrella whose style suggested that they'd
requisitioned it from an elderly lab assistant. The umbrella had
lasted exactly eleven minutes before succumbing to a gust. Folded
over and half stripped, it looked like a spider with psoriasis and
lurked in a sheltered comer by the steps to the dais. Daniel himself
had retreated among the trees by the path and slumped in the mud
in silent acknowledgement of the fact that he couldn't possibly get
any wetter or filthier than he already was.

Hamilqart finally lost sight of the UAV and came to join him.
He cast a dubious glance at the archaeologist, then at the squishy
ground, and turned around a couple of times like a giant cat looking
for a place to settle. At last he grunted and dropped into a stiffbacked squat, which he evidently deemed necessary for opening a
conversation.

"This bird of Meleq? Did the Lord Meleq himself create it,
Daniel Jackson?" He had adopted the spirit's way of addressing
Dr. Jackson.

Grinning, Daniel shook his head. "No. We built it."

"But it comes from Lord Meleq's realm."

"No. It comes from a place called Earth, where we live."

It was Hamilgart's turn to grin, and he coupled it with a sly
wink. "You are making fun of me, Daniel Jackson. Every child
knows that the Chappa'ai is the entrance to Lord Meleq's realm."

"It's the entrance to a great many places. Literally hundreds
of them. You punch the right combination of symbols on this" -
Daniel pointed at the DHD - "and you can travel almost anywhere
you like." Suddenly a thought struck him. "Do you know which
symbols open the gate to Meleq's realm?"

Eyes so huge that the pupils were ringed by white, Hamilgart
stared at him as though he'd been asked to kill his own mother.
"Only two people alive ever know this secret. The High Priest
and his successor. Since the death of Abibaal it is merely one,
Kandaulo, as no successor has yet been chosen. Of all the people
of Tyros, Kandaulo alone is permitted to touch the lock. For anyone
else even to try would be the most despicable heresy."

The lock, huh?

"I'm sorry, Hamilqart. I didn't mean to offend. I'm just
curious."

"So am I, my friend. So am I." Pulling his dripping robes a little
tighter around him, he recovered his affability as quickly as he'd
lost it. "And I am sure you meant no harm. But tell me, this bird?
How do you make it fly? Is it magic?"

"No magic. It's science."

"Science?"

Terrific, Jackson! This guy's idea of science is Pythagoras
and very little beyond. Should have agreed to magic and left it
at that. He'd now have to try and explain Bernoulli's Principle,
which he barely understood himself, to someone whose grasp of
aerodynamics was strictly limited to sailing and in a rudimentary
fashion at that. Where was Sam when you needed her?

Having backed himself into a comer, Daniel decided on an
unhappy medium. "We studied the wings of birds and copied them.
That's how we make the machine fly."

"Ah," said Hamilqart and pounced on the obvious flaw. "But
they don't look -"

- like birds' wings. Dr. Jackson was painfully aware of it.

"Hamilqart, may I ask you a question?" he interjected quickly.

"Of course you may."

"I was told that Lord Meleq visits the temple sometimes."

"This is true. What is your question?"

"Have you ever seen him?"

"Just once, a long time ago." Hamilqart's face crimped into the
likeness of a basset hound, and he seemed to want to disappear in
the folds of his robe.