A Walk Across Elysium ~Next time Jack says 'duck!', I'm not going to look around to see why. I'm just going to hit the dirt faster than anyone else in the vicinity and stay *down.*~ Daniel Jackson repressed a sigh and rubbed at the manacles on his wrists as he stumbled after his latest keeper. Another yank from the guy holding the chain, and he'd be lucky not to get lead poisoning from the cuffs. ~Next time the tribal leader asks about our gods, I'm going to make sure he's not a fanatical atheist before I answer. Next time....~ Well, there'd probably be a next time; he'd been in worse spots before. Getting captured by Heru-Ur, for example. Locked up on Natu. Held prisoner on Hedante. Except that all *those* times, he'd been with his team. The last time he'd been in trouble on his own, it had been Nem asking him over and over about Omoroca while everyone else thought he was dead. Not a good thought. ~No. Because this time, Jack and the others know I'm not dead. They'll come for me, we'll get away from whoever just bought me, and then we'll go home and this'll all be another exciting chapter for the unwritten memoirs.~ Right. He was only a day, a day and a half at most, away from the camp he'd been kidnapped from. The rest of SG-1 had probably managed to find the trail, and were on their way to get him right that minute. Jack would shoot whoever got in his way, Sam would bop them over the head with big rocks, and Teal'c would pick them up and hug them to death. Nobody would be able to stop them. Always assuming they were all okay.... ~Stop it. They're fine. Nobody was hurt, the last you saw of them. You've got bigger problems at the moment. Think about what you can change, not what you can't.~ Like how to get away from his new 'owner' at the first possible opportunity. The leash-happy maniac holding his chains secured them to a marble block next to the booth where payments were made, then wandered off without a backward glance. Too bad the holding pin was sunk so far into the stone; this would have been the perfect moment to run for it, if he could have worked himself loose. Damn. Looked like the moment was gone already. "Your property, lady." The oily creep whom the tribesmen had sold him to five hours earlier was bowing and scraping his way over to Daniel, dipping down low enough to get dust in his beard while grinning like he'd won the lottery. Six hundred sesterces must have qualified his new owner for the kiss-up treatment, because otherwise the woman studying him didn't look too much out of the ordinary. Dark hair in a thick braid, cool black eyes, with skin a few shades tanner than the almond-coloring of the natives; she was fairly good-looking, but nothing in the woman's jewelry or dress set her apart from the men around her. Hunh. Come to think of it--- Daniel glanced around, then back to the woman in front of him with a frown. 'Men' was the operative word here; unlike the few other women he'd seen, her face wasn't concealed, although a small face veil dangled from a cord around her neck. Her leather armor was similar to the city guards', but with a few modifications, like what appeared close-up to be some kind of chainmail shirt and metal bracelets--- "Oh, shit." ~No no no, tell me this isn't happening! ~ "Dr. Jackson. Please don't force me to do something ugly to you," his new owner said mildly, reaching out for his chains with the hand sheathed in a Goa'uld ribbon device. Somehow, despite the human voice, he doubted that she was a *former* Goa'uld host, like Sam. "I have no reason to hurt you, yet. And I should hate to damage a new acquisition so soon." ~I'm dead. I'm soooo dead. Jack, guys, get here *now*.~ Daniel set his jaw and met the woman's eyes, determined not to react again and give her any idea how worried he was. ~There weren't supposed to be any Goa'uld here! This was supposed to be outside the System Lords' domain, what the hell is she doing here?~ The Goa'uld cocked her head at him, then nodded in satisfaction when he didn't attempt to jerk away again. "Good. You're going to be reasonable. That does make things simpler." She looped the chains around her wrist, then stepped closer to him, lowering her voice. "If you even attempt to escape, Doctor, I will not hesitate to kill one of these innocent barbarians in retaliation. Every person in this town is hostage for your good behavior, do you understand me?" "Perfectly," he spat out. ~Trust a Goa'uld to threaten the bystanders to keep any prisoners in line.~ "I am glad to hear it. I have rooms nearby. I trust you can restrain yourself until we've had a chance to talk." His unnamed owner unlocked the restraints, then tugged him in the direction of the exit. ~What?~ Daniel blinked at her, confused, then nodded warily and followed her. ~Talk? About what? Is she Tok'ra? That doesn't make sense. Or maybe she's like the Lindris? She could want an alliance with us, I guess....~ In which case, he'd have to lie and nod and tell her whatever she wanted to hear in order to get back to the Stargate. ~Joy. Okay, what do I remember Teal'c and Selmac saying about the lesser Goa'ulds? They always serve someone. Maybe she wants us to overthrow her boss?~ Or maybe she just wanted a better offer than the price currently on Daniel's head; maybe she needed time to send ransom demands to the SGC. Too many options. ~Wait and see what she says, calm down, let her set the tone.~ Hard to do, when every instinct he had was screaming at him to run. But he looked at the hand covered by the gold links and metal, and the zat'nik'tel dangling from her belt that hadn't been obvious before, and gritted his teeth. ~Wait. Calm. When you're outside the city, you'll have time. Just... wait.~ ~ The room at the best local inn was barely acceptable by her standards, but she'd never had to sleep there, and it was a convenient place to leave her belongings when she was on the planet. So the Goa'uld who called herself Malena endured it. Dr. Jackson didn't look any more impressed by his surroundings than she was--- but then, he wouldn't be, if all she had heard of his people in the past few years was true. "Sit," she said, gesturing to one of the padded chairs and dropping the chains connected to his cuffs as she took a seat herself. "I have questions for you." "Thanks, I'd prefer to stand," the Taur'ii responded, crossing his arms and looking annoyed. "Why did you---" He cut off whatever he was about to ask when the innkeeper entered the room with a tray of her usual foods, smiling and looking greedily hopeful for her largess. She fobbed him off with a few gold coins, told him that they were not to be disturbed under any circumstances, and waited until the man had bowed his way out the door before turning her attention back to the Taur'ii. "Why did I... what? Buy you? Refrain from killing you on sight, if I knew who you were? Bring you here?" She poured herself some wine, then selected one of the fruits from the basket. "All in good time. My questions first, Doctor." His expression became even more mutinous than before, and it was all she could do not to laugh. "I see the Taur'ii have not grown any wiser in the last two thousand years. Any other of your race, from any other planet, and you'd be begging for your life or worshipping me. Instead, you pout like a child because the person with the weapons and the chains refuses to listen to you. It's so refreshing." She took a sip from her cup, unable to repress a chuckle at his annoyed expression as she did so. "What about the Asgard?" he asked challengingly. "What about them?" "They're not afraid of you. Neither are the Tollans. Or the Tok'ra," he said triumphantly, as if he had just won a point in an academic debate. "The Goa'uld aren't as impressive as they like everyone to think. If it weren't for the fact that you're routinely oppressing people who have *no* technology whatsoever to fight you with, you'd all be getting your butts kicked halfway to the edge of the galaxy by everyone who hates your guts!" My, he did have a temper. It sorted oddly with his appearance; somehow, he didn't have the air of a soldier, but of a scruffy scribe wearing his older brother's uniform. Malena took another sip of her drink, blinking at him calmly for a moment. "Now that you have that off your chest... can we have a normal conversation?" Deflated, he glared at her, then grumpily said, "Sure. I suppose." Then, muttering under his breath, "I'm still right." "Perhaps, but it hardly matters. I'm not interested in oppressing the natives, as it happens." She put down the cup and fruit, rising from her chair to stand in front of him. "I am interested in information. Truthful information." Daniel Jackson's eyes narrowed as she studied him. "How you answer will determine what I do with you, doctor. I recognized you from a bulletin the System Lords put out some time ago, along with the price for handing you over to them. Any money I would receive for you would be quite substantial. Substantial enough to set me up nicely." He remained silent, glowering sullenly, and Malena felt her smile fade. "Except that there was other information in that transmission as well." ~ "What other information?" Daniel asked cautiously. ~Great. Someone with a grudge. This just keep getting better. Next time--- and there *will* be a next time--- I'll make sure the shaman thoroughly explains their version of heresy before I open my mouth....~ "The reason why the price on your head, and upon the heads of the members of your team --- SG-1? --- were so high." The Goa'uld glanced away, then paced over to the table, keeping her back to him. "Tell me, is it true that a member of your team killed Hathor?" "Yes. She was killed after she'd taken our team hostage, and she was planning on trying to overthrow the System Lords. I don't think the Goa'uld should hold that one against us, really." Heru-Ur probably did, just as a matter of principle; but Hathor had been his mother, so that wouldn't be a surprise. ~Don't let her be someone's sister or daughter, *please*....~ It was strange to be thinking in terms of familial revenge; the Goa'uld acted as separate entities the majority of the time, engaging in wary alliances only against common enemies. Then again, any relationship this woman had with a dead Goa'uld would probably be an excuse, more than anything else. She'd nodded at his confirmation, one hand idly playing with a red fruit on the table. "And is it true that another of your team killed Ra, almost four of your years ago?" "Yes." There was no point in lying, and would only give her an excuse to hurt him. ~Or someone else,~ he thought, remembering her threat against the natives. "Seti?" "Seti-- oh, Seth. Yes, we did. Sorry you didn't get to do it yourselves, I know you wanted to." How could anyone have mourned Seth? He'd had a price on his head from the System Lords for more than two thousand years. ~Then again, you wouldn't have believed Nem could mourn his wife that long...~ "Amonet?" ~Sha'uri.~ Only a few months ago. It still hurt to think of her, at odd times when he didn't expect it. He'd be blindsided by a song, or an idea that connected to his search for her, and have to remember all over again that she was gone, never to return. Daniel cleared his throat. "Yes. Amonet, too." His new owner whispered something under her breath, her hand still restlessly turning the apple-like orb on the table. "Excuse me? What did you say?" "Nothing of importance." She straightened and turned back to him. Smiling widely at Daniel's uncertain expression, she took the keys out of her belt-purse, and unlocked his cuffs. "Let us just say, that it appears I owe no debt to the System Lords. And I have no intention of giving them anything they want." "So, you're setting me free?" Stunned, he let the chains fall, then took several steps away from her, trying to disguise his wariness behind a blank expression. "Umm... why?" "Does it matter?" "Well, I, uh, guess not." ~ Clearly it did; just as clearly, Dr. Jackson wasn't about to question her decision too closely in his wish to get as far away from her as possible. "If you don't mind, I think I'll just-- go. I have friends waiting for me, and---" "I wouldn't recommend walking out of this room without me," Malena said, sitting down and taking out a knife to cut her fruit. "They'll just put you back on the block again. The local population has incredibly intricate customs for the freeing of slaves, and taking off the chains doesn't begin to fulfill them all." "Damn. Then what the hell am I supposed to do now?" He demanded, flopping down in the chair across from her and reaching for a fruit. She slapped his hand, and he drew it back with a look of outrage. "Get your own. And if you can't pay for it, go hungry. This is mine." "Thanks a lot!" "You're welcome. As to what you might do now---" She shrugged, then pointed her knife toward the shabby window and the marketplace outside. "I intended to escort you across the countryside to the Stargate. As my slave, no one would stop you. You may meet your people there, if they're still looking for you. And if I do this you will do me the courtesy of *not* letting them take me prisoner, if we should encounter them." "And I would do this... why?" he asked suspiciously, looking for a trap in her plan, again. Let him; she had no need to lie. "Because you _owe_ me, Dr. Jackson." Malena raised her eyebrows significantly. "I owe you no personal debt. I do what I do for my own reasons. *You* are beholden to me; and if you keep your team from killing or capturing me, we will be even." "What if I don't feel any sense of obligation?" Eyes that had seemed too young, too naive when she bought him and when she brought him to the inn, were now as cold as the emptiness between stars. "The idea that I could *owe* a Goa'uld _anything_ is ludicrous. There's no 'even' to discuss. My people have been oppressed and enslaved by yours on a thousand planets for going on ten millennia, and any damage I can do to the Goa'uld sounds like a good idea to me." "Then I will not return you to your Stargate. And your friends will have to fight to capture me in a town full of bystanders, possibly causing many innocent deaths. And drawing the attention of any other Goa'uld passing through the area." The look he gave her at this was full of dark hate, wishing her a painful death of her own. Malena rolled her eyes. "Come now, Dr. Jackson. I have never heard that you were a stupid man. Your freedom, your friends' safety, the lives of those out there; you care about all of these. Why, I do not know, but you do. Promise me--- and keep your promise--- that I will not be harmed, and you will have them all." He stared at the table top for long seconds, thinking hard. Then he raised his eyes to hers. "Okay. Fine. I promise. I can't promise for Jack and the others, but I'll try. Just don't hurt them." He let out a long breath, his voice becoming more intense. "And if I think you're lying about *any* of this, I'll do my damnedest to add you to the list of dead Goa'uld along with Ra and Hathor." She wasn't fool enough to think that an idle threat. But since she did not intend to give him cause, it did not trouble her. "Fair enough. I suggest your order some food from the innkeeper. It's a long walk to the chappa'ai, and you'll need the energy." "I don't exactly have any currency, remember?" She reached over to her bag, and pulled out the Taur'ii's knapsack. "Here. If you don't have any coin in it, sell the bag to the innkeeper. I'm sure that he'd like it." "When did you get that?" he demanded. "When I bought you." Malena shrugged. "The auction-master threw it in for another twenty sesterces; I thought that it might make you more cooperative to have your own things. I have no use for it." "I'd say thank you, but---" "I am an evil Goa'uld and you feel no gratitude toward me." She smiled sarcastically. "You're welcome, Dr. Jackson. Now please, order food. I'd like to leave within the hour." "Fine." He rummaged in the pockets, digging out some local coin, then stood up to ring the bell for service by the door. Then he stopped, furrowing his brow. "Just out of curiosity, who are you, anyway?" "You may call me 'mistress', if you like." The Taur'ii seemed to have an arsenal of varied glares; this one was tinged with blatant disgust. "No? So touchy... very well. Malena will do." "Malena of...?" "Just Malena." "Malena." He repeated the name, his eyes unfocusing, probably trying to remember if he'd heard of her, if he could put a history to the name. Which he wouldn't. All the names that he would recognize were buried on Earth, with her reasons for freeing him. She had no intention of sharing either. ~ The marketplace was full of fascinating people, sounds, smells.... but Daniel couldn't properly appreciate most of them. He was too aware of the company he kept, and the wide cuffs that had been re-attached to his wrists. Malena had left the chains off, explaining that they were unnecessary; the cuffs alone marked him as her property. He lagged behind her as far as he could without losing sight of her, but he didn't dare try to escape. Not as long as she had weapons that the local population had no defense against. ~Now I know how Sam felt back with the Shavadi,~ he thought grimly. ~I should be trying to take anthropological notes, but I'm too angry to do a good job of it.~ "Doctor Jackson, come here. What do you think of this?" Malena called pre-emptorily, holding up a glinting pendant. Reluctantly, he walked forward and looked at it; a purple-blue opal set in gold. It suited the usual gaudy tastes of the Goa'uld. "Very pretty." "It's better than 'pretty', Doctor. It's splendid." She held it up so it shimmered in the light, smiling delightedly. "I'll take this, and the ruby. Oh, and the bracelet," she added, turning to the jewelry-seller. "Very good, my lady. Are you certain I can not interest you in a collar for your slave? Something with a decorative design?" Daniel's gaze snapped back to Malena, and he bit down on his tongue, hard, to keep from saying anything. Her amusement was already too obvious. "No, no. I have... special... collars for him, at home. These will be enough." Several inventive curses he'd learned from Jack O'Neill went through his mind, but he settled for quietly muttering, "Enjoying yourself?" "Somewhat. But not as much as I soon will be. Carry this." She slapped the bag into his hands, then spun on her heel to appraise the cloth at the next stall. "Carry it your---" Daniel's angry tone drew stares from passersby, and he closed his eyes and counted to twenty in Mandarin as Malena turned back, her eyebrows raised, eyes sparkling. ~She's looking for an excuse to do something! Cause a scene, or have me beaten, on the excuse that I forced her to! That...~ He swallowed his irritation, eyes narrowing, and put the bag into his knapsack before walking over to join her. Real slaves had it much worse, he reminded himself. A real slave would have no hope for freedom at the end of the day. ~Unless, of course, this is all an elaborate lie, and she has no intention of letting me go.~ "The mauve or the gold, Doctor? What do you think?" "They're both nice," he said through clenched teeth. He suddenly remembered helping Janet and Sam shop for Cassie, and begging off in the middle of it to go to a bookstore. ~Evidently shopping torture isn't just confined to Earth.~ "What's the matter? Don't you enjoy being asked your opinion? I thought that was what you Taur'ii were constantly fighting for--- the right to do and say anything you wished." He looked around nervously, wondering if she was *trying* to give away his identity, and she laughed softly. "Oh, please, Dr. Jackson. There aren't any other Goa'uld within hearing distance. If there are any in the market at all. And I would know. These people have no idea who the Taur'ii are, and care less. Calm yourself." "I _thought_ you said we were going back to the Stargate." "We are. But this *is* a merchandise buying trip for me. I don't intend to leave until I've obtained enough goods to make it worth my while, since I won't be selling you at a profit." "Wonderful." "Now, now, Doctor. I'm being incredibly generous in letting you off your chains. You might *act* as if you were grateful." She laughed openly at his expression, holding her sides for a moment before straightening up. "No? No, perhaps that was too much to ask..." "You think this is hysterically funny, don't you? That a human being wanting to be treated with respect for their wishes is absolutely laughable." Bitterness welled up in him and he spoke without thinking. "Tell me, does your host share your warped sense of humor?" ~ The Goa'uld widened her eyes in surprise, then turned away to contemplate the fabrics again. "My host and I are one. What I feel, she feels. There is no difference between us." "That's a lie." Her fingers stopped moving across the fabric, and she could feel Nialla shivering, hiding in a corner of their mind. ~Make him stop, Malena. Make him stop!~ "I don't know what the people around here think you are --- a god or just a good customer--- and I don't know if you've convinced the woman whose body you've taken that there's no hope of escape. But we know differently, back on Earth. There's more than one way to free a human from Goa'uld control---" Nialla was wailing now, a high-pitched frenzy of fear, and Malena turned her attention to her. ~Hush. Ignore him! That will not be allowed to happen!~ ~You promised! Please! You promise me?~ ~Yes. I promise. Now, hush!~ "---and acting as if your wishes are the only ones that matter doesn't make it true." "If you continue to speak of this, Doctor, you will make me change my mind about taking you back to the Stargate." She raised her eyes to his, keeping her face expressionless, betraying none of the turmoil within her. "It does not matter if I lie, or tell the truth. All that matters is that you carry my baggage and do not *speak*. Is that understood?" "Perfectly," the Taur'ii spat out, his mouth tightening to a thin line. "You don't want my opinion on the cloths." That bordered dangerously on insolence, but Jackson remained silent under her increased glare. And Nialla was calming now. Unwilling to risk upsetting her further, Malena turned away to contemplate her purchases, pushing aside her resentment of the Taur'ii's tone. He didn't understand. He could not; his experience was so limited and naive. It was a wonder his people had become a threat to the System Lords, with that attitude. Then again... perhaps that *was* why. Fools rushing in, defeating the old demons, because they knew no better. They would not survive long if that was the case. But that was none of her concern. Two hours later they set off through the forest north of town, both of them laden down with bags, rolls of cloth, and jeweled goods that were almost as heavy as Daniel's standard Army pack. Conversation had been limited to 'hold this' and 'carry this' since their disagreement in the marketplace, and Daniel should have been relieved. But his curiousity had been tweaked: he'd been wondering about Malena's purchases, and her reasons for them; about where precisely she came from. And what other reasons she may have had to visit the planet, and that town, aside from textile shopping. But annoyance kept his questions in check, and he maintained a stiff silence until they were almost half an hour away from the city walls. "Why are we turning this way? The Stargate is to the east." "So are the charming people who sold you to Estaces, remember?" Malena rolled her eyes and gestured to the track curving in front of them, then to the fork he had expected them to take. "This road leads to the only bridge crossing the river between here and the Stargate for at least seventy kilometres. In the territory of the Tendazi, the river is shallow enough to be forded with little effort, but for two hundred kilometres to the west, it it is impassable. Unless you use the bridge. Does that meet with your expert approval, Dr. Jackson?" "It's fine. I just wanted to know why," Daniel said, hunching his shoulders defensively and readjusting his pack. "Of course, you're perfectly free to find your way back on your own, now that we're outside the city environs. I'm sure you're more than capable of avoiding the angry tribesmen who sold you to their infidel neighbors, and of coping with the native ursine population. Most of them are probably still hibernating. You shouldn't meet more than one or two--- they might not even be hungry yet---" "No, that's okay. Really. I'll... stick with you." He unclenched his jaw and tried to sound polite, even as irritation with the Goa'uld's manner steadily rose within him. ~She thinks she owes you a favor, remember? You do *not* owe her, even if she thinks you should be grateful. You do not have to resent her help. Or her attitude. You *don't* have to act grateful. You just have to get back to the Stargate.~ "This is fine," he repeated, more to himself than to his guide. "Ah. You trust me, then." "Not a chance." Malena laughed outright at this, but she didn't sound amused; more like disbelieving and exasperated. Daniel gritted his teeth again, and kept his voice precise. "I trust that you have some agenda, and that you don't wish to harm me for now. But the second I get a better idea or plan, we part company." "You'll get no argument from me, Dr. Jackson. If we come across someone else who can guide you to the Stargate, I'll happily surrender you to them. I have as little wish to encounter your brethren as you have to remain with me." Daniel muttered "Hear, hear," under his breath as they came around a bend and the forest thinned enough that he could see the bridge down the slope from them in the distance, suspended over a rocky gorge. It was an uncertain, rope-and-wood structure which queasily reminded him of the Gatekeeper scene in that Monty Python movie Jack liked. What is your name, what is your quest, what is your favorite color? Daniel Jackson, to explore new worlds, defend Earth and fight the Goa'uld, true blue. Somehow he didn't think that the three brutes guarding the end of the causeway were going to be satisfied with just asking questions. And he couldn't see a Goa'uld being willing to part with anything beyond answers. "Um... maybe we could find another way around...." She turned a puzzled glance on him, then turned back to study the bridge. Her mouth twitched slightly. "Do you have a fear of heights, Doctor?" "No, not really... I just don't like the welcoming committee who's waiting for us right in front of it." "You can't be serious. They hardly present any kind of problem." Daniel stopped in his tracks, forcing the Goa'uld to turn around to face him, her expression annoyed. "Malena, maybe I should have said this earlier, but I really don't want to be around when you're going to 'solve' problems with the ribbon device. Or the zat'nik'tel, either. I have kind of a moral objection to it, all right? There has to be another way across, so let's just---" "Have a little faith in my abilities, Doctor. I said they won't be a problem, and I meant it. If you wish to find another way across, I won't stop you, but *I* am crossing _here_." Malena turned on her heel and was sprinting off down the track before he could grab her, as if that would have helped. She probably would've just used the ribbon device on him, then dragged him to the bridge and left him to recover and cross on his own. "Damnit. Damnit! Damn..." Dreading the scene he was sure was about to occur, he followed her, tripping over tree roots and hoping that she wouldn't hurt the three men too much. Not to mention trying to figure out what he could have said to change her mind or stop her, with the sick guilt of being an unwilling witness to another Goa'uld attack already beginning to set in. ~Maybe I can tackle her before she takes all of them down---~ She reached the bridge a few moments before he did, and stood before the three men blocking the bridge in a challenging stance. But she didn't whip out the ribbon device and use it, which threw him just enough that he didn't tackle her on arrival. That gave her enough time to speak; and what she said next baffled him enough to simply stand there, confused and disoriented. "Rollo, my very good friend, how is your lord's business today?" The largest of the goons gave her a mournful look, clasping hairy hands in front of him and shaking his head. "Very bad indeed, my lady." "Oh. I am so sorry to hear that." "He will be most pleased to hear that you said so, my lady. He holds you in much esteem." "As I hold him." Malena rocked up on her toes, and smiled brightly at the trio, who nodded respectfully at her, then they glanced consideringly at Daniel. Malena's smile became a shade more crafty. "I have purchased a new slave at the auctions, to do the heavy work in my forge. He cost me dearly; do you think I made a good bargain, Rollo?" "How much did you pay for him?" the leader asked, looking Daniel up and down with a skeptical expression. Daniel managed to restrain himself from puffing out his chest with a major effort. "Six hundred sesterces." Rollo gaped in appalled shock. "My lady! You were robbed! That swindler at the markets has cheated you! He can't be worth more than two hundred sesterces. You should take him back and exchange him, or demand your money back." "You think so?" Malena's face showed only grave concern, but Daniel could *hear* the smothered laughter in her voice. "I know it, my lady. Look at the way he stands. He'll cave into a pile of green kindling after a week. Truly, my lady. You've made a very bad purchase." Rollo's face lengthened in sad commiseration. "And you so canny, most of the time. 'Tis a shame." "I can't believe you're right, but perhaps you have a point. I haven't much experience in purchasing slaves." Malena sighed heavily."But it's far too late to return now. I have commissions to fulfill, and I must be home within a day." "Oh." Rollo's face fell even further, and his voice took on just the slightest edge of surliness. "My lord will be sorry to hear of this, my lady. Very disappointed." "Do tell him that I'll be returning within a moon, and that I might have a trinket for his lady wife, since I was most fortunate in my other purchases on this visit. I understand she has a weakness for rubies." One of the brutes elbowed Rollo, muttering something in his ear, and he swatted at his friend as Malena went on smoothly. "And of course, I shall pay an additional half-toll at that time for the price of allowing my slave to cross on this trip." "Hmm...." Rollo's eyes narrowed to slits, and he rubbed a hand across his chin. "Well. Seeing as it's you, my lady. I don't see how my lord could ask for anything more." "Of course not. He is a very reasonable man, after all." Malena handed over a small leather purse which clinked only slightly, patted Rollo's arm, then reached over and yanked a stunned Daniel forward, then pushed him in front of her across the bridge. "Please give your lord my fondest regards, won't you?" "Yes, my lady Malena. Good journey!" "Thank you, Rollo. And a very good day to you!" Daniel waited until they had negotiated their way across the rickety bridge, and were well away from the roaring of the river before he voiced his thoughts. "What just happened back there?" Malena blinked at him, a wicked smile flickering before she controlled her expression. "What do you mean?" "I mean, why did you let those shake-down artists---" "Shake down?" She tilted her head in question, but didn't take her eyes off the passing foliage, seeming to admire the wildflowers that were drooping from vines tangled around the trees. "Highwaymen. Enforcers. Robbers, whatever. Why did you let them have your money? Why didn't you flatten them into a pulp? Why aren't you furious enough to kill someone?" His companion slanted a speculative look at him, then returned to contemplating the trees. "They weren't highwaymen. They were toll collectors. They really do work for the local overlord; you have to pay the tax to use the bridge. If you leave the market during the week with any excess monies on your person, it's the local law that you must surrender them at the toll bridge. It encourages trade, since everything at the market is taxed to him anyway." "Okay. So, why...?" Daniel took a second to gather his thoughts, then shook his head in frustration. "I don't get it. What am I missing here?" "You expected me to throw them into the river." "Yes, yes, that's exactly what I expected. That's what any Goa'uld with a weapon would have done. And you could have, easily. Why didn't you?" Malena shrugged. "It would have been inconvenient, later. The overlord would just send someone else, a squad of ten, or twenty--- however many it took to hold the bridge. Or he would have it cut down next time, and then install a raft ferry, or a hanging basket. Which would be harder to traverse, and easier to be ambushed while crossing." "That still doesn't answer all of my question. *Why* do you care what the local overlord does? Why don't you just--- intimidate him into letting you pass? Walk up to his castle or manor and tell him that you'll annihilate anyone who tries to threaten you in any way?" "You sound disappointed that I didn't," Malena observed coolly, leaning down to pick a native violet. "Damnit, I'm just trying to understand. You're not acting like a Goa'uld. Are you Tok'ra? Because if you are, and this pretending to be a Goa'uld has been a joke at my expense, I don't think it's funny." "The only funny thing here is your persistent preconceptions. And how rudely you express them." Malena stopped walking and crossed her arms, slowly twirling the flower between her fingers. She rolled her eyes at his frustrated expression, then spoke very slowly, as if to a child. "I am not of the Tok'ra. I am not suicidal enough to align myself with that group of rebellious idiots. And I am not some cock-eyed idealist who believes that the System Lords should be universally overthrown and executed, so that the humans they rule will be 'free'. I doubt that would happen even if all the Goa'ulds that exist were to die tomorrow. Most of your people aren't ready for self-determination, doctor." "Who are you to judge that?" Daniel demanded heatedly. "The Goa'uld have no right to make themselves gods over the people they've conquered, no right to force them into serving as hosts and Jaffa----" Malena impatiently waved the flower in his face and interrupted him cuttingly. "*They* made us gods, Dr. Jackson. And if they lack the courage and imagination to fight for their freedom, I hardly think they deserve it." He actually saw red for a moment, like a flash of blood-colored light across his vision, and then he felt cold settle in down to his bones. "Is that what you told your host before you invaded her body? Or is that what you tell yourself when you listen to her scream inside your head?" Malena stiffened, and then her eyes flashed gold for the first time since they'd met. "Do *not* speak of my host again, Dr. Jackson," she ordered him in the metallic tones of the Goa'uld. "It is uncalled for and I will not tolerate it. Do you understand?" "Yes," Daniel forced out through his teeth. He was clenching them again. The urge to attack her, to go for her throat and to hell with the consequences, was incredibly strong. But the hand holding the flower had opened, and he could see the glow of the crystal in her palm. He'd be nursing the headache for miles, if she didn't just abandon him here. "I understand." "Good." She walked back down the path, and did not turn to see if he followed. ~ ~We should leave him to find his own way. Give him a map, tell him the landmarks, and then let him go! I don't like him, Mala. He frightens me.~ ~No.~ Malena endured the wave of frustration and anxiety that her host sent toward her, then patiently continued to internally speak the soothing words she had been repeating since the argument with the doctor. ~He is a stranger here, and it wouldn't be safe. I owe his people a debt, Nia. They killed someone I vowed to execute, when I was not allowed. I can not overlook that. It will only be a few more hours. We should reach the chappa'ai by sundown, and then he will be gone.~ She glanced over her shoulder at Dr. Jackson, still trudging several yards behind her, then quickly focussed ahead, where the path meandered over the green foothills and along the ridge above the floodplain. ~Why does he upset you so? I know you are--- shy.... but you've never been this timid before.~ ~He wants to take you away from me.~ The fear in Nialla's mind was almost drowned out in a wave of loneliness. ~I will not live through that, Mala. I can't.~ Malena swallowed back her own emotions, and concentrated on transmitting calm back to Nialla. ~He doesn't understand, Nia. And I don't know how to convince him; I doubt he would believe anything I could say. But I swear to you, I won't allow that to happen. I promise. You must trust me.~ In truth, she was tempted to do as her host urged, and leave Dr. Jackson on his own. There _was_ a risk that his friends would not regard her with any kind of mercy, and that she and Nialla would be forced to separate. When weighed against what she owed them, the danger was too great to be disregarded. And yet... ~I must know how he died, Nialla. I can not simply walk away, not knowing if he suffered as my love suffered, or if his death was an easy thing. And more: I must know what he was doing before that. I must know how much of what they told me was lies. I have lived without knowing the truth for far too long. Please, you must grant me this. I will be careful, I swear.~ Her host didn't answer, instead withdrawing further, and Malena knew Nialla was not reassured. Sighing, she climbed the rise before her, and then waited at the summit for Dr. Jackson to catch up. To the west the hills rose in waves, with stands of silver-barked trees curving over the horizon; to the east below them, the ground dropped sharply for several feet, then sloped downward toward the river, with thickets of brush and smaller trees following the gullies down the hill to another, larger road, where in the distance, a slow-moving group of horses and oxen could be seen making their way south. Across the river the canyon walls rose above them, then leveled off to a plain that seemed to go on forever. The road Malena had chosen was barely more than a footpath, a beaten-down dirt road occasionally used by traders going north, but seeing little other traffic. This was the longest way from the town to the Stargate, but at least the likelihood of running into the tribesman was minimal; they were uncomfortable off their familiar plains. "Are you tired?" she asked the doctor when he reached her. He was breathing hard, and he leaned forward with his hands on his knees when he saw that she taking a rest, leaning against the a nearby tree. "A little." He eyed her warily, clearly expecting censure for perfectly normal weariness. "There is a resting place within two kilometres. If you like, we could stop there and have something to eat. We are still several hours from the Stargate, and it should not cost us much time." "Okay." Dr. Jackson relaxed a little, his eyes still suspicious, but his expression easing marginally as they turned to walk along the edge of ridge. As they came around a curve in the hillside, he stopped suddenly, and dropped his pack, bending down to fish something out of its depths. "What are you doing?" He stood and put a flat metal Taur'ii device to his eye, looking through a small lens as he scanned the countryside, his voice becoming more excited by the moment. "I have to get this on tape, the view is phenomenal, nothing like I expected--- I can see the entire valley from here! What's that settlement in the distance?" Bemused, Malena followed his pointing finger and squinted at the roofs of the town visible through the breach in the mountains on the horizon. "Peth-el. It's fifty-some kilometres away. We're not going there." "Is that a mosque? That almost looks like an onion dome---" "I believe so. I've only visited once." She raised an eyebrow at him, but he didn't seem to notice her questioning look. "Fantastic. I suspected that the local population was taken from the vicinity of Phoenicia approximately fifteen hundred years ago, but this puts an entirely different light on it--- it had to have been at least a few hundred years later, the architecture is wrong for anything earlier than 850 C.E...." "Really." She restrained herself from any further comment, unsettled by his abruptly intense enthusiasm about trivialities, while hoping it would pass quickly. It didn't appear that it would. "Yes, because the development of the techniques of dome-building prior to that were very distinctive---- wait. What's that?" He pulled the device away from his eye and frowned down at something in the floodplain. "What is what?" "Down there. It looks like..." He put the device to his eye again, directing his attention to the floodplain below them, several hundred meters away. "Damn! That caravan is being attacked! And they're completely outgunned, there has to half again as many swordsmen going after them as there are with the caravan." Malena frowned, shading her eyes as she studied the situation. The Taur'ii was correct; the caravan of thirty or so was in a bad position, pushed back against the river, with archers shooting from above them, and the oxen held in place by some of the swordsmen. An ugly mess, which made her glad she had chosen the ridge road as the swiftest way through the hills. "We have to help them." She blinked as Jackson dropped his viewing device into his pack, then withdrew a Taur'ii projectile weapon and a knife. "What do you think you're doing?" she asked in alarm. "We can't just stand here and let them be slaughtered!" "Dr. Jackson, it is no business of ours," Malena stated firmly, then modified her tone at his incredulous stare. "And I doubt they'll kill anyone --- just relieve them of their excess gold and goods, then wave them along---" "They've already killed the lead caravaner, I could see that much, and there are women and children in those carts, I could see that too. It's too big a risk, too many people could get hurt---" "And none of them are anything to do with us!" "How can you--- What am I saying?" He took a step backward, his face contorting in disgust. "Never mind, I forgot who I was talking to. I'm going down there, and if you try to stop me, I'll shoot *you*. Which might not kill you but would definitely still hurt!" And before she could do anything, raise her hand or reach for her zat'nik'tel or even think of a cutting response, he was scrambling down the rough shale of the slope, knife in one hand, gun in the other, heading for the archers between them and the caravan. ~He's going to get hurt,~ Nia observed cautiously. ~They won't like it that he tried to stop them.~ ~I know~ Malena seethed. ~Stupid, stupid Taur'ii-- he's going to get himself killed, and then I'll be left with the explanations....~ No, she wouldn't. If the idiotic human wanted to die stopping a robbery which had nothing to do with him, she certainly wasn't going to go back to the Stargate and tell his friends what had happened. They'd either blame her or call her a liar, and either way he wasn't worth their reaction when they found out the truth. Furious, she watched as Dr. Jackson came up behind one of the archers and yelled to him, pointing his weapon at the man, probably telling him to put down his weapon. The highwayman took aim at the Taur'ii instead, and the doctor squeezed the trigger of his weapon, shooting for the ground in front of the man, kicking up dust. The highwayman skipped back a few feet, alarmed, then surged forward. The second shot echoed across the floodplain and the highwayman fell, clutching his bleeding hip. His accomplices turned and searched the hillside at the burst of sound, and when they located the cause, two of the other archers scrambled across the slope toward the doctor, while a few of swordsman near the front of the caravan stopped their attack, looking undecided about what to do. Malena expected the doctor to turn and run right then, but he didn't. The Taur'ii called the same warning to the approaching archers as he had before; and one of them stopped and nocked an arrow in response. Jackson called something again, more intensely, then raised his weapon, again, wasting ammunition in shooting at the man's feet. ~Stupid, stupid, *stupid*....~ The archers were intimidated, but she could see two of the swordsmen making their way up the grassy slope behind him, and one of them was signaling to the archers. ~He's going to get killed...~ One of the archers fell back farther, then raised his bow and let loose an arrow, forcing Dr. Jackson to scramble for cover behind some bushes. The swordsmen put on a burst of speed, and the Taur'ii barely turned in time to see his approaching attackers and aim his weapon at them. More thunderous shots; one hit a highwayman square in the chest, and the man collapsed, dropping his sword within cutting distance of the doctor as he went down. But the other shot went wide, and Jackson grabbed the fallen man's sword, and then went tumbling and scrambling down the slope toward the fray surrounding the caravan, before the swordsman he'd missed could close on him. ~Hopeless. Absolutely hopeless---~ And he was still fighting. He'd been lucky so far, but there were at least ten men down there harrying the caravan, and they outnumbered their prey by four or five now, and any second someone would attack him--- ~Like that,~ Malena thought grimly, as two of the attackers yelled and raised their swords, running toward him and cursing his ancestors. ~And he'll run out of ammunition soon---~ A movement in the corner of her eye caught her attention; one of the archers was aiming for Dr. Jackson from the ridge below her. ~I should let him die.~ She raised her hand. ~It's no less than his foolishness deserves.~ She could feel the heat coursing toward her palm as the crystal in her gauntlet began to glow. ~But not yet. My debt is still unpaid.~ The blast from her ribbon device took the ground from beneath the thief's feet, sending him tumbling headlong down the slope. Malena aimed her weapon at the archer still standing, and sent a kinetic blast toward him as well, slamming him into the hillside fifty feet away from where he'd started. The last swordsman on the slope had turned toward her when he'd realized where the attack on his friends was coming from, and had started up the hill, waving his sword and screaming in rage. She braced herself, narrowed her eyes, and _pushed_. The power from the gauntlet knocked the swordsman off his feet and sent him plunging away from her, leaving him to fall ten meters before he hit the slope on his back, then sliding and tumbling a few more meters before he crumpled into a heap. When she turned her attention back to the caravan, she could see that the travelers were rallying, still fighting hard against their attackers, but still trapped on the road. Two more highwaymen lay by the road, dead or in too much pain to move.... ....and Dr. Jackson lay next to one of them, very, very still. Rage and disbelief rose up and choked Malena for a moment, and she let out a scream of speechless frustration. ~No! Damn you, not yet! Not now! No, no, no~ She forced herself to take a long breath, and then another, then she dropped her pack and rummaged through it quickly, cursing all Taur'ii and their idiotic ideas about fairness before she found what she wanted. Tucking the healing tool into her belt, she scrambled down the slope toward the caravan, already angrier than she could remember being in decades. ~If those caravaners have cost me the answers I wanted, and my honor as well....~ ~Careful, Mala, careful. Please---~ ~Hush, Nialla! I know what I'm doing!~ Two of the swordsmen saw her coming toward the fight, and one broke off to intercept her. She was thirty meters away when she let the power of the killing bracelet hit him full in the face, and she could hear his neck snap audibly as he fell over. His companion stopped in shock, his eyes widening visibly, and he turned and ran back to the caravan. Malena's mouth compressed to a sneer as she stumbled the last few meters toward Dr. Jackson. ~Cowards. Bullies and cowards. Nothing ever changes.~ ~Is he alive?~ Nialla asked, her mental voice shaky with fear at being in the middle of so much violence again. Malena kneeled next to him, and placed her hand on his neck. He was far too pale, and the knife jutting out from his ribs was probably the main reason why. ~Yes. Bleeding a lot, probably stunned, but nothing looks broken, and he's breathing.~ She glanced up at the sound of running feet, as four swordsmen --- the one from the slope, plus reinforcements --- came screaming towards her, swords held high. ~Fools. They think I can't get all of them, if they rush me in force.~ She stood slowly, disgust and rage gathering strength within her. She could feel her pulse beating heavily in her ears, Nialla cowering in terror in the depths of her mind, as Dr. Jackson bled to death for the sake of people he didn't even know. ~Let them learn.~ She swept her hand in front of her, rage giving the blast extra power, sending the highwaymen *flying* away from her to land in the dirt, bones breaking as they landed. Dispassionately, she stalked forward, watching as one of them reached his feet and looked back at her, his eyes terrified as he turned to run. She raised her hand again, and sent another burst at him, slamming him into the ground and into unconsciousness with a thought. Two of the others were lying in the road crying in pain, begging for mercy, while the fourth was already out cold. "Bitch! Bitch queen! Stop now, or I kill her!" Malena turned slowly, to see the leader of the gang holding one of the younger women by her hair, a knife at her throat. The girl was terrified, her face already streaked with tears and blood from a cut on her head. The bandit's eyes were glinting with a combination of fear and fury, and the knuckles holding the knife were white with strain. "You let me go, she lives. You try to stop me, she dies! Got it?" She didn't care about the caravaner. She didn't particularly care about the highwayman, either. But she was still angry. And if it weren't for this man, she would be peacefully walking toward the Stargate, without having to worry that her best chance of paying back her enemy's executioners was gone. ~Fool. Greedy, vicious, stupid fool....~ "Understood." Malena held out her hand, palm down, so he could see that she wasn't aiming the ribbon at him. Then she grabbed her zat'nik'tel with her left hand and shot him and the woman both, and watched as they collapsed into an untidy heap, the energy discharge crawling over their bodies a moment before it faded away. Malena walked over to the pair and gently pulled the girl away from the bandit, taking care not to aggravate her injuries. With two more shots from the zat'nik'tel, all traces of the bandit leader vanished. She turned to the remaining, semi-conscious highwaymen. And shot each of them twice, leaving their bodies for the caravaners to dispose of. Then she went to where Dr. Jackson lay and put the healing device on her hand, closing her eyes before reaching for the inner calm necessary to use the gauntlet. ~Mala?~ ~Yes?~ ~Is it over?~ ~Yes, Nia. It's over. Come help me heal Dr. Jackson, please. I don't think I can do it alone.~ A sound like a sigh in her mind, just a whisper of relief. ~Of course. You know I will. I'm good at this part. And after all, it's the least I can do.~ ~Thank you, Nialla.~ Daniel woke to the smell of smoke, acrid but thin, stinging his nostrils. ~Owww...~ His head hurt; one of the highwaymen had slammed a gauntleted fist into his face, right before pushing his own knife between his ribs. Strangely, his head didn't hurt as much as he'd expected it to, and his side ached, but without the sharp, tugging pain of ripped muscle and internal damage. Experimentally, he took a deep breath, and aside from breathing in a lungful of smoky air, it didn't hurt. ~How hard did I get hit?~ He sat up, and Malena's voice came from immediately behind him. "Slowly, Dr. Jackson. You're not wounded any more, but you did lose much blood. You will remain weak for a few days longer." Twisting his head to look for her, he winced as his side finally hurt like he'd expected it to, if not quite as much. "I didn't imagine getting stabbed, then? I wasn't sure... What's burning?" Daniel looked around, squinted, then fumbled for his glasses, grateful to find them in his breast pocket after a moment's searching. "You didn't imagine it." Malena stepped into view and offered him a hand up; he let her help him to his feet, staggering a little as he fought for his balance. "I used the healing band to treat your injuries. As well as those of some of the caravaners." Now that he got a good look at her, Daniel noticed that she looked exhausted, the lines of her face drawn taut with strain, and her voice was subdued, without its usual undercurrent of mockery or amusement. "You should be fine in about five days." Daniel blinked at her, stunned, and a little ashamed of himself for being so surprised. She'd been sarcastic and occasionally superior, but she'd never given him reason to believe that she was a threat. Why was it so hard to accept that she might not mean him any harm? ~Because every other Goa'uld you've met has wanted your death or your worship. Maybe it's not fair to judge her by those standards, though...~ "Thank you. I... appreciate your help. I know you didn't approve of me trying to stop the attack, but I had to try." Malena shrugged one shoulder in acknowledgement, her face expressionless but not hostile, he sensed. Probably just tired. "What happened to the caravaners?" He turned toward the source of the smoke that had been bothering him, and froze. A funeral pyre piled with nine or ten bodies was burning within a circle of stones, flames hungrily consuming the corpses of the men who'd attacked the caravan. He took a deep breath, almost choked on the smell, then let it out slowly. ~Well, you can't blame the caravaners for being angry with them. But this seems a little extreme for the culture I've seen so far.~ A chill rose along his spine, and he closed his eyes as sickening idea occurred to him, and he swallowed back the acid that rose in his throat. "After the highwaymen were killed, and the injuries of their people were treated, they invited us to join them. I explained that we were going in the other direction, and since they are expected in Tilanie in a few days, they decided to continue on in the hope that they would reach the next town before nightfall." Malena handed him his backpack, and a few of the bags she'd had him carrying before. "Which is what we should do. We'll never make it to the Stargate before dark, but I know a place where we can stop for the night." He grasped the bags and pack with clumsy fingers, unable to look away from the blazing fire. "Did you...." Daniel closed his eyes, and tried to think of a way to ask what he didn't want to know. What he had to know. "Did you kill them?" he asked, his voice much quieter than he expected. "Not all of them." Malena's voice was a weary rasp. "The caravan guards killed two. You killed one on the hillside. One ran away, but he was badly wounded. He won't get far." "And you killed the rest." She turned away and began walking up the river road, not answering him. For a moment, Daniel wondered if it was even worth confronting her about it, and then he looked back at the blazing pyre and the blackening corpses almost hidden behind the red flames. He forced himself to hurry after her, and grabbed her arm when he reached her side. "Why? Why did you have to kill all of them? Forget that, why did you kill them at all--- you could have left them stunned, or wounded---" Malena yanked her arm out of his grasp and pushed him away from her, almost sending him to the ground before managed to right himself. "You have incredible gall for someone who owes me his life," she spat out coldly. He did. He'd be dead if she hadn't saved him. "But that doesn't change the fact that _they_ are dead," he said, pointing back to the pyre. "And I'd like to know why! Just this once, I want to know why killing is the first thing a Goa'uld thinks of!" "It isn't the first thing! It was simply the only possible thing to do!" she shouted back at him, then closed her eyes and drew a hand over her face in weariness. "Would you have had me leave them alive, at our backs? There were too many of them to simply let them go." "You could have captured them, turned them into the authorities---" "And chance their escape, or release? Bribery is rampant here. And *you* may not have to return to this planet, Doctor, but *I* have business here, and a regular route that I am loathe to change. I can not afford enemies wandering free. It was too great a risk." Her eyes narrowed, and she growled, "And if the caravaners had done this, you would not question it. You were trying to kill them yourself, if you remember, if not with any skill. None of this would have happened if you had stayed away from them." That stung, because it was partly true. He'd wanted to scare them off, hoped that superior weaponry would carry the day and make killing anyone unnecessary, but the highwaymen hadn't been intimidated enough to back down. Daniel could hear Jack's voice in the back of his head, telling him to *think* before he leaped, to not take chances without considering the consequences. "Damnit, this isn't what I wanted to happen!" "And you think I did?" "Yes!" Malena turned back to the road and started walking again, not looking at him. "Perhaps. But not for pleasure. For simple survival." She stopped suddenly, whirling to face him. "You speak of the Goa'uld as if we can do nothing but kill. There were more than ten of them, against two of us, Dr. Jackson. I have no Jaffa to defend me. No sarcophagus to rise from if I am killed. No one to heal me if I am hurt aside from myself, which is no easy task. I am no lord, no queen, no ruler of thousands; I am one woman alone, and I will not be killed when I have the means to stop it. And I see no reason to apologize for that, when you and yours would do nothing less." She set her jaw and spun away, striding faster ahead of him in a manner that was already far too familiar. All of which would almost sound reasonable in a primitive culture similar to this one, where an eye for an eye was the common rule. Except for one thing, which he could not forget, and could not set aside. Malena was a Goa'uld. ~Every time I think I have a handle on her, on the exceptions to her behavior, she changes them. Every time I think she's just like the others, she does something different from them. How the hell am I supposed to know what she's capable of if she keeps changing the rules?~ Slowly, Daniel followed her up the road, watching the gathering storm clouds on the horizon, shivering as a sudden wind blew the scent of burning flesh past him. ~ They didn't speak for the next hour. It had started raining shortly after they began walking again, making the already uncomfortable hike even more difficult; the path turned into mud, and the chilly downpour was steadily numbing Daniel down to his bones. He was so tired he thought he'd drop-- and he was just about ready to lie down in the ditch in order to get some rest-- when Malena suddenly veered from the path and up the slope above them without looking back at him. Given no other choice, he followed her through the slender trees to a rockfall, where several huge, moss-covered boulders had fallen together at the base of a steep embankment. Climbing over the rocks, Malena pushed aside a fall of greenery to reveal the entrance of a cave. She held the vines aside long enough for Daniel to enter, then quickly followed him within, dropping her pack before turning back to the entrance. "Start the fire. I'll be back with more kindling soon. I don't want us to run out in the middle of the night, especially if this storm continues." "Malena---" "Save your speeches, Doctor. I am not in the mood for another argument." She was gone before he could say anything else, which was probably a good thing. He had no idea what he'd been about to tell her, or ask her. With a small sigh, he put down his pack, rummaged inside for a small camp lantern, and lit it, taking a look around the cave. It wasn't impressive, less than forty by forty feet, but it was clean, and had clearly been used before. A small firepit had been dug out in the center of the room, with an opening in the ceiling above for the smoke to escape through. A large log had been placed to one side to serve as a makeshift bench, and a pile of dry wood had been stacked next to it. He shivered and placed the lantern on the log and began to build the fire, wondering how he was going to attempt to sleep in the same room as a Goa'uld, when most of his worst nightmares featured System Lords in starring roles. ~Should I apologize for what I said? Explain why the killing bothered me? Or just let it lie?~ Daniel struck a match and lit some of the dry leaves piled at the base of the fire, coaxing the twigs into catching fire before stripping off his soaked jacket. ~Would it make any difference if I did? Maybe this is the one time when an alien viewpoint is just too alien.~ He couldn't quite force himself to believe that it was just about species differences, though. Selmac and Lantesh were both capable of understanding the outlook of their hosts, as well as that of the SG teams they had worked with. Anise-Freya had been a little less flexible, or maybe just too focused on her scientific results to consider the different perspective of the humans at Stargate Command. None of the Tok'ra he'd ever met had been as this hard to understand; none of the Goa'uld he'd ever encountered had been this difficult either, but then, they were fairly straightforward. 'Crush, kill, destroy-- just like the miniature Godzilla-wanna-bes they are' as Jack had once put it. Malena fell through the cracks of his previous experience, and he was just beginning to realize how large those cracks were. ~If I could just establish a basis for a little trust....~ He'd made friend with an aboriginal Unas, once. And Malena didn't have to like him, just truthfully answer a few questions that were driving him crazy. Actually, it would probably creep him out as thoroughly as Anise's crush had, if Malena *did* show any signs of approving of him as a person. But there was too much about her that was out of kilter with everything he thought he knew, and if he was going to endure another round of teasing and yelling about getting kidnapped again when he got home, the least he could do was go back with new information about the Goa'uld. He'd rolled out his bedroll and put one of the MRE's from his pack near the fire when Malena returned, pushing aside the vines with the kindling piled high in her arms. "We'll have to make this last," she said in a neutral voice, stepping around his bedroll to dump the wood next to the log. "I couldn't find much else out there. The rain has soaked the little there was. It's the wrong time of year for foraging." "I think this'll be fine. Thanks." Malena cut him a suspicious look, then stood and went back to her pack, unloading a small bed roll and a packet of dried meat before returning with them to the opposite side of the fire. The closed-in space of the cave was starting to warm, and Daniel could still hear the rain falling outside. It all would have been almost cozy, but for the company. The kind of camp-out he'd done a hundred times with Sam and Teal'c and Jack. Who were probably camped out on the plain right now with SG-3 or SG-6, trying to get the tribesmen to tell them where Daniel had been taken. He'd have given a lot --- three new excavations, maybe, or enough time to properly translate Asgard text --- to have any one of them here with him at that moment. He cleared his throat, saw Malena's eyes flicker up from her contemplation of the fire and back, then asked, "Can we talk for a while? I have a lot of questions... and I'd really like some answers. This has been a pretty strange experience, and it's made me think about a few things." "That depends on how nicely you ask. And what you want to know." The wary look Malena shot him wasn't encouraging, but she wasn't outright refusing to speak to him. Which was as much agreement as he was likely to get. "I want to apologize for jumping on you about the highwaymen back there. You... weren't wrong." He fiddled with one of the longer twigs, poking the fire, sending a shower of sparks up before it settled down again. "I'm still not happy about it. But I think I might have overreacted." Daniel glanced at her, caught her skeptical expression, and gestured with the stick. "But can you understand why it makes me angry? They never had a chance. The second you got into the fight, it was all over. Just like every other time I've seen a Goa'uld go up against a native population. The technology advantage your people have makes it impossible for most of them to even think about fighting you." Malena opened her mouth, paused, and took a bite of the jerky she'd been eating, her expression contemplative. "You speak as if your people wouldn't do the same thing, if you possessed the ability to use a Naquadah gauntlet. As if you wouldn't use every advantage you had in a battle against your enemies." She raised her eyebrows at him, shaking her head. "Surely you don't expect me to believe that." "It's not the technology or the strategy. It's the level of--- overkill, that you apply. For lack of a better word. Why must you so completely defeat everyone you come in contact with? Why does it always have to be worship or death?" "Have I asked you to worship _me_ yet?" Malena asked sharply. "No. No, you haven't. Which I also don't get. But that's not what I..." Daniel took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and then took a sip from his canteen. After a second to calm down, he said more quietly, "I didn't mean you, personally, even though what happened back there... bothers me. I just... I'm trying to understand it, and I don't. I understand self-defense. I even understand why you felt you had no choice, though I don't agree." Malena glared at him, and before she could speak he went on in a rush. "But I've seen events like that far too often, with a lot less excuse. I expect that. People who are no threat to the Goa'uld at all, exterminated or enslaved or left with nothing--- but then you didn't attack the guards at the bridge. And you rescued me." He pushed his glasses up, gesturing emphatically, his voice rising. "And now I'm completely confused about what the norm is for your people! Before today, I would've expected racial memory and your society's standards to guarantee that not one Goa'uld would ever lift a finger to save a human, much less go out of their way to lend a hand. I just... I just want to know why. Why you can avoid hurting humans who demand your money, and save an enemy of your people, and then say that humans deserve to be slaves. Please." Malena rolled her eyes and tore off another strip of meat, shaking her head in disbelief. After about a minute of muttering under her breath, she finally spoke. "Oversimplification must be a talent of your species. I don't think that you could possibly have developed such a generalized perspective on the Goa'uld with so little data if it were not an innate talent." She took a bite of her jerky, chewed for a moment, then swallowed and met Daniel's patient gaze. "Some of what you are asking about is specific to me, and personal. And some of it should have been obvious to you Taur'ii a very long time ago." "For instance." "For instance," Malena echoed his prompting, her tone irked. "Doctor, how many humans do you believe inhabit the worlds in the Stargate system?" "Many billions. I'm not sure," Daniel said slowly. "We've been trying to do a census as we've explored, but we know there are several planets that lie outside the System Lords' jurisdiction that might have humans inhabiting them as well, and there's no way to get to them." "Several hundred billion, Dr. Jackson. I don't know the final number either. But assuming a trillion or so may not be out of line." Her mouth tightened into a line. "Now. How many Goa'uld do you imagine inhabit those worlds?" "Uhh.... One of the Tok'ra said something about several thousand or more one time---" "Think about that number, Doctor. Thousands. Hundred thousands, yes, definitely. Maybe even as many as ten or twenty million. Your species outnumbers ours by approximately *ten thousand* to one." She leaned forward, her eyes holding his, glittering and hard. "In our infant state, we are helpless. More helpless than even the youngest human. We can survive without hosts, in an aquatic environment--- but that is all. We can't accomplish anything without a symbiotic carrier; we can barely communicate, defend ourselves, or travel beyond a contained atmosphere. We can't reproduce without Jaffa to incubate our young; and for every child we spawn, only one in a hundred will probably make it to full adulthood. And those proportions *must* stay stable, or we would risk the possibility of spawning children for whom there would be no hosts." She stared at him a long moment, letting her words sink in. None of the statistics were completely unfamiliar to Daniel; he and Janet had speculated on several occasions about the limits placed on the Goa'uld by their biology, but somehow he'd never regarded those limits as anything except reasons to be grateful that there weren't more of them. He'd believed that the Goa'uld themselves had never considered those realities to be boundaries on anything they wished to accomplish--- they certainly never gave the appearance of regarding themselves as anything other than perfect. "To say that Nature has placed us at a gross disadvantage to your species is a spectacular understatement, Dr. Jackson. Your people breed easily, you adapt quickly, and you have a superior physicality, even to that of the Unas whom we first used as hosts; they are very strong, but not especially flexible or fast. If we hadn't had the advantage of being several thousand years ahead of your species from a technological standpoint, we could have been easily defeated the first time we set foot on your planet." There wasn't any bitterness in Malena's voice, just a dry and weary acceptance. "If we didn't implement a policy of 'overkill' toward those whom we conquered, we would have died out thousands of years ago." Daniel stared at her over the fire, feeling slightly stunned. "I never thought I'd hear one of your people say that." Malena shrugged. "Most wouldn't. To admit that we are anything other than gods to a human would leave us open to the worst kind of doubt, and after that, we would never be able to stop fighting you. The strangle-hold we have over your species owes more to their lack of imagination than to the technology gap. I'll grant you that our weaponry won the first conflicts; but the continued dominance of the Goa'uld is, in my opinion, due to your species' credulity and acceptance of us as your gods. Nothing else." "Until now." Daniel straightened and pushed up his glasses, his voice firming as he spoke. "Until we started fighting back. We did it ten thousand years ago, and you left Earth. And now we have the means to take the fight to you." "Do you think this is something to be proud of?" The Goa'uld's tone was exasperated. "You have killed --- killed! Not captured, not enslaved, not imprisoned, but *killed* --- four System Lords who had survived for ten thousand years while being worshipped and protected by humans and Jaffa, all within the last five years. No Goa'uld would have killed them. It is anathema in our society, to murder another Goa'uld. Death is reserved for traitors, like the Tok'ra, and those who would overthrow the current System Lords. Even Nurti's little plot to kill Chronos last year led to her being given as a captive servant to Yu, not to her execution. We enslave each other, we torture each other, we imprison each other for decades: but we rarely, rarely kill each other. There are too few of us for that." Her voice became caustic as she fed another piece of wood to the fire. "And now the Taur'ii have returned to indiscriminately kill any Goa'uld System Lord whom they encounter. Did you think your actions would garner any response other than the harshest measures possible?" "You're saying they're afraid." Daniel took a long pull from his canteen, trying to reconcile this concept with the hard-faced arrogance of Heru-Ur. The brutality of Sokar. Hathor's relentlessly self-centered plotting. Apophis's oblivious, homicidal drive to conquer. Afraid? "Of course they're afraid. And they don't *like* that, Dr. Jackson." Malena sighed softly. "The other obvious things that you should have figured out *are* simply biology. We do not form many of the emotional ties that your people seem prone to. We are born with a hundred brothers and sisters, and we are in competition with them-- for Jaffa, for hosts, for resources and territory--- from the moment we are spawned. We have almost no contact with our parents, although we share their memories. You ask why we treat your people so badly and with such harshness; the truth is, we treat each other in exactly the same fashion. Even without the memories that form us before we ever have experiences of our own; even without the effects of a sarcophagus, we would have little use for mercy. The universe is unforgiving. Your people are simply fortunate--- or delusional--- in not understanding how cruel it can be." Malena took another sip from her flask, and fed a few more twigs into the fire. "Oh, we understand." ~Anyone that's ever had any contact with a Goa'uld--- they end up learning.~ "We just don't agree that it's right. Or think that it's a condition that should be allowed to endure." "Right... wrong." Malena sighed and shot Daniel a contemplative look. He couldn't be sure what he saw in her face, but it wasn't anger. She should have been outraged, or defensive. But she appeared to be neither, only tired. "Will any of that matter when you're all dead?" "We aren't going to die." Though they'd come close, a few times. Apophis's ships, hovering over the horizon; Ryac's false tooth filled with a plague that would wipe the planet clean; Nurti's little plot, which could have resulted in all-out war. Too close. Daniel firmly pushed those thoughts away, holding Malena's gaze across the fire. "You think not? You think that alliance you forged with the Asgard will save you? That the Tok'ra will somehow think of a strategy to unseat the enemy they've fought for so long?" She watched him for a moment, then shrugged. "It makes very little difference to me, whether the Tau'rii live or die. *That* is the main answer to your earlier questions. I am not a System Lord. I am an artist; I design jewelry and clothing, which I sell to various outposts and traders--- the kind of things the ruling class buy as trinkets. I have a small home on another world, far from here. I belong to no court, I have no slaves, I keep to myself. And I avoid trouble, unlike certain humans who should have learned better by now." Daniel glared at her for that comment, but without heat, his curiosity stronger than his irritation. "Don't most of the Goa'uld belong to a court? Every one I've met before now has been in service to one Lord or another. I didn't think they tolerated anything else." He took his MRE out of the coals carefully, and ripped open the foil packet before hunting for his spoon. "Most of them wish to be. There are very few ways for Goa'uld to support themselves, outside of the courts and domain of the System Lords. But it is sometimes useful to the System for there to be Goa'uld who are not in service. Those who are not, are careful not to make enemies, or alienate communities where we must go alone." Malena studied his meal with a frown, then took another bite of her jerky. "For those of us who do not owe fealty to any Lord, there are certain rules which must be followed. It is not an easy life. No slaves and no Jaffa are allowed; and few weapons. Sarcophagi are rare enough that we are not allowed access to them. I am supposed to report my movements to certain officials of the courts at regular intervals." "Supposed to." Daniel watched her carefully, and her eyes flicked downward, avoiding his as she fed the fire. "But you don't. Do you." She didn't look up, merely played with one of the sticks, letting the tip catch, then stubbing it out. "You hate them as much as we do." Malena's head jerked up, and her dark eyes went round in surprise, then they narrowed, and her mouth twitched. "No. I don't hate them enough to waste a human lifetime trying to hurt them. If you want to spend yours on that, be my guest; I have other things to do." "But you hate them enough to free one of their enemies. Enough to be glad that someone else is fighting them." He was sure that it was more than that, that there was one specific grudge she was avenging in helping him, but she'd never have imagined *this* method of payback if she hadn't already resented the Goa'uld ruling class. Malena studied him for a long moment, then slowly said, "That... would be an overstatement. But I owe them nothing. They demand absolute loyalty, but they have done very little to earn mine. I would not cry, if the Taur'ii defeated them." Her face darkened. "But I would not tolerate being ruled by a human." "We don't want that. We just want *our* people --- all of the humans on all of the worlds --- to be allowed their freedom. And to not have to worry about being blown up because one of the System Lords thought of a new way to do it." "A moot point." Malena took another sip from her flask, then screwed the top back on. "Since you will all doubtless be destroyed, and Earth with you, eventually. A shame, really. It was so pretty... But I don't think you have a chance." She turned away from him, taking off her boots and rolling herself into her blankets with quick, economical motions, then lay down with her back to him. "Wake me in four hours, Doctor. I will take over feeding the fire then. The nights are too cold here to let it die down." Daniel wanted to continue the argument with her, but Malena was already breathing slowly and carefully, obviously trying to fall asleep. And what could he say? He knew the odds facing the SGC as well as anyone. He just didn't think it made a difference. Whether or not they could win, they had to try. There was too much at stake: the fate of worlds. The fate of individuals. His own peace of mind. Nothing she could understand, evidently. He fed a leaf into the fire, and watched it glow, wishing that just this once he could *make* one of the Goa'uld understand. Sam's victories were about conquering their technology, figuring out ways to use the Stargate that they'd never heard of. Teal'c's included converting the Jaffa to their side, and perceiving and defeating the strategies of the System Lords. Jack's victories were wherever he could take them and make them, whether it was blowing something up or saving civilians from deadly Goa'uld armies. Daniel's victories had always been in understanding. Learning about the Asgard. Convincing the Tollan to trust him. Finding out about the Ancients, and deciphering the histories and secrets that the Goa'uld wanted to hide. If he walked away tomorrow, and Malena's belief that the fate of Earth and the humans around her as predetermined and negligible remained unchanged, and still inexplicable, he'd know that he'd failed, somehow. Maybe it wouldn't make a difference if she never understood them, but at he at least had to understand why; and in finding out, maybe to understand if there was ever any hope that the anything short of genocide could stop her people from continuing to enslave the human race. ~ ~Mala, wake up. Wake. Up!~ Malena burrowed further into her blankets, but there was no escaping Nialla's anxious voice inside her mind. Or the hand shaking her shoulder that came from someone else. "Your turn to watch the fire, Malena. It's been four hours." "Mmm." Groggily she opened her eyes halfway, and pushed herself to a sitting position. Dr. Jackson's face was shadowed with exhaustion; he really hadn't had a very good day, all told -- kidnapped, sold, the march through the forest, half-killed by the raiders.... She was surprised he hadn't awakened her early for her watch. "Very well." She swiveled inside her blankets towards the fire, as the human stumbled over to his side of the cave and collapsed on his bedroll. He didn't lie down, though; just studied her across the fire, his eyes fixed and intent. She cocked an eyebrow at him as she stoked up the blaze, adding in a few pine cones, watching their edges glint with the gold-orange flames. "You look as though you have *another* question, Dr. Jackson. Aren't you tired enough to sleep yet?" "Almost. It's been a long day." He worried at his lower lip, glanced down at the canteen he'd picked up, then back at her. "But there's one last thing that's bothering me." Tolerantly, Malena made an 'out with it' gesture with her hands, then bent forward at the waist to shove another cone into the fire. The Taur'ii put the canteen down, and loosely clasped his hands around his knees. "When were you on Earth?" She rubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand and took a deep breath, still half-asleep, but already defensive. "What makes you think I've been there?" "You said how pretty it was. What a shame it would be if it were destroyed." His voice was quiet, and not accusing. But she still pulled the blankets around her closer. "Were you one of the ones that first brought humans through the Stargate?" She opened her mouth, and found she had nothing to say. Closed it, then tried again, to just say 'no.' Then she raised her eyes from the fire to his face, rigid and still in the flickering shadows of the campfire. "Yes." His eyes held hers, asking for details without giving voice to any questions. She glared back, bitterly regretting ever rescuing him from Estaces and the slave market. "Do you want an apology, Doctor? Do you want me to express an emotion so inane? Do you want me to justify it, or tell you how small my part in your people's enslavement was?" "I want--- I want you to tell me why. I want you to tell me how you can hate them, and not fight them. I want to _understand_," he said, his voice passionate but still controlled. "And I want to know how you can walk by all of the humans you must have seen over the last thousand years, hating the System Lords, watching the people around you suffer and letting them win, when you're partially responsible. Or are you incapable of feeling anything for anyone else?" Persistence was very similar to pestilence, she thought. No wonder the price on the Doctor's head was so high; no wonder he succeeded in re-opening the Stargate, where others must have failed. Only a day since they'd met, and he'd already exhausted her, poking at all the old wounds, the feelings she kept under guard, memories she'd buried and tried to forget. She would be very, very glad to see him go tomorrow. "Because I want to live, Dr. Jackson." She threw a pine cone into the fire with a little too much force, watched the sparks shoot up, and then unclenched her fists. "And I may be as responsible as all the others who first visited Earth. But that was all a hundred lifetimes ago. Two hundred lifetimes, even. I enslave no one now. I kill only when I have to. And there is nothing I can do." "That's a lie. You could join the Tok'ra ---" She snorted, and Jackson's eyes narrowed behind the glasses, reminding her of the hate-filled glares he'd shot at her in the first hours they'd met. "You *could*. You could protect humans from the Goa'uld and Jaffa, when you had the chance; you don't have to just walk away and say there's 'nothing you can do!'" He stared at her, hard, and his voice dropped. "Or maybe I'm wrong. Maybe everything I've seen you do *has* been pure expediency, and you don't give a damn if it isn't about your own survival. But don't kid yourself: you *are* responsible." His jaw set, and he took a swig from his canteen, then twisted the cap on it, and put it aside. "We've got a saying on Earth: the only thing evil needs to win is for good men to do nothing. You're letting it happen." She stayed silent for a few seconds, not trusting herself to refrain from screaming if she opened her mouth. To be lectured by this *human*... "Do you think I have never fought? Never tried? Have you even been listening, Doctor?" Bitterness was seeping into her voice, unstoppable and anguished. "I was on your planet, ten thousand years ago. Do you think in all that time, that I have never fought them? Do you think when I speak of defeat, that I am only talking about the defeats of *others*, and their losses?" She rose to her feet and prowled around the edge of the fire. "You _child_. You colossal, idiotic, stupid, _blind_...." Malena came to a stop before him, rage thickening her voice until she felt she would choke on the emotion. Jackson blinked up at her, expression slightly stunned, but she couldn't have stopped speaking even if she wanted to. "Like all your race. A handful of victories, and suddenly, you know you are going to win. You know *nothing* of what it takes to outlast the System Lords. You are fortunate you have only one lifetime to lose. I have been the victor and the victim more times than I can count! In my time, I have even offered freedom to the humans I have known, when I thought that it was possible, and achievable; that they may have deserved it. And every time, the pattern of destruction or worship reasserted itself, and your people were enslaved again, and mine were left to scramble and beg for what was left after our rulers had destroyed and taken what they wanted. Nothing. Ever. Changes." She took a step backward, breathing heavily. "Let the humans free themselves. Let them prove they *want* to be free. Let them behave better than the System Lords, and cease to prey on each other. Then, maybe, I'll believe in change. Until then, leave me out of it. I have no interest in being disappointed or betrayed again. I will take no responsibility anymore, not for anything beyond myself." Dr. Jackson stood up too, looking lost and a little overwhelmed. He pushed his glasses up, looked at her carefully, and ducked his head a little before he spoke, his voice uncertain. "I'm sorry..." His hands gestured aimlessly, then firmed into fists as his voice steadied. "I'm sorry it didn't work out for you, those other times." His chin came up, and his voice was clear and strong as he spoke over the crackle of the fire. "But I have two more things to say." "Say them and be done, so we may cease this pointless conversation." "Fine." He shoved his hands into his pockets and nodded curtly. "One: I'm still right. We still have to fight for freedom, even if defeat seems guaranteed. You said it yourself--- my people have already made a difference in the last few years since we've been back. We've shifted the balance." He took one hand out of his pocket and pushed it through his hair, looking exhausted. "We've gotten lucky so far, and we may not always be. But there's a reason to try, now. And even if I'm wrong--- some things are more important than personal survival." Malena remained silently disagreeing, staring at him stoically, her arms crossed over her chest as she hugged herself. "Two. You *are* still enslaving someone." Malena blinked at him, confused, and opened her mouth to object that he was free to go any time he wished, but he spoke too quickly for her to interrupt. "Your host. Who never had a choice, and is stuck with you controlling her body, her life, and her thoughts. You want to know why the Taur'ii fight so hard? *That's* why," he concluded, his face grim. "We may do a lot of things to each other, but we can never match the Goa'uld for sheer parasitic horror. You're our worst nightmare. So don't tell yourself you're any different from the System Lords. Maybe you had some good intentions at one time, but when it comes right down to it, you're exactly the same." Her eyes flared gold, she could feel them burn in response to Nialla's panic and her own fury. "That is _not_ true. *You understand nothing!*" "Is she fighting you now?" Jackson asked coolly, and she took a step back from the icy anger in every line of his face. "Is that why you're reasserting control? Why your voice is vibrating again?" "Stop this! Stop questioning us! You have *no* right!" Her hand started to clench, and she felt the warmth course down her arm to the ribbon device. Nialla was shrieking at her not to, that it was a mistake--- Malena could barely think over her host's panic--- "Why don't you let her speak for herself, then?" "She doesn't wish to!" "How can you say that?" the Taur'ii shouted back, his fists coming up into a defensive posture, his face contorting in hate. All of the civilized interaction between them had fallen apart, falling back into this, the hatred that the human directed toward Goa'uld, lurking beneath the surface ever since they'd met. "How can you stand there and lie and force her to give up her life for you! How can you pretend you deserve to live, doing that to her!" "*You are a fool!*" She raised her hand, rage gaining control of her, and then--- "No, please, stop, please stop, please please---" Her own voice, but not herself speaking. High and thready and panicked; a voice she'd only heard inside her mind, and alone, in the dead of night. "You don't understand..." She lowered her hand in shock, listening to the words tumble from her mouth. "Mala saved me. Please, please, she is not like that. She is not. Truly. You must believe me." "What..." Jackson stopped, shocked, studying her, and Malena took the moment to speak urgently to Nialla. ~Why are you doing this?! *What* are you doing? Nialla---~ "I..." Nialla gulped, and backed away from Jackson, but he didn't move forward, instead watching her with fascination and possibly the dawning of understanding. Nia whispered, "She saved me. She is my friend. My moksha. I...." She ran out of words, and Malena could hear her begin to panic. ~Mala, I want to go back now, I don't want to talk to him!~ ~You don't have to, but I think you may have made this worse---~ "It's okay." The doctor's voice was gentle, comforting. "This isn't an act, is it? I mean, I've seen Goa'uld pretend to be human before, but this is---you're really her. The host." He studied her for a long second, then softly asked, "What's your name?" Nialla shook her head violently. "No. No. I won't tell you, I... I'm dead. I escaped. If I tell you the name, it will all return, and I'll be trapped.... Just don't hurt Malena! Promise me. Please? Promise?" "I promise." Nialla was crying, inside and out, and then she retreated, and Malena let her drift back, sending her waves of reassurance and comfort. ~Thank you, friend. But why---?~ ~You were going to hurt him. And you still want to know what happened to Agni's murderer, so much. I couldn't stop you, so I stopped him instead.~ Nialla's whisper of thought was as fragile as breath. ~I'm so tired, Mala...~ ~Rest.~ She opened her eyes to find Dr. Jackson staring at her closely, and his expression changed to one of wariness as she wiped the tears from her cheeks with her fingertips. "Malena." "Yes." He backed up a step, then turned toward the fire and crouched down next to it, his face troubled. "She said you were her... moksha?" He darted a glance up to her, and she gingerly approached the fire, and settled back into her blankets, watching him over the flames. "Her release?" She pulled a blanket around her shoulders, and let out a soundless sigh, waiting for her breathing to settle down after Nialla's upset. "Yes." "From what? Death?" "No. Life." Malena looked at him, the questions in his eyes, and relented grudgingly, knowing his persistence now, but still wishing her host had stayed hidden. "Terrible things happened to her, Doctor. She lost much. Too much, perhaps." She twisted her fingers in the blanket, her voice softening as she remembered. "My last host found her among the ruins of her city. The sole survivor of a war that killed everyone she knew, damaged and near-mad with grief. We took care of her. Palene was already dying of old age then...." She lifted her eyes to his, uncertain of why she wished to explain. Defending Nialla, maybe; she was not weak, not a coward, simply... hurt. Incomplete. "When we told her what we were, she begged us not to leave her. She offered to become my host." Malena rocked forward, grasped a twig, and fed it into the fire, defensiveness making her avoid the doctor's eyes. "I do not take hosts by force, Dr. Jackson. It is none of your concern, but... it is difficult to control a host without a sarcophagus. Accommodations must be made. And it is easier to find those who are willing than the Taur'ii would believe. Many consider it a fair trade." She met his gaze, defiant, watched the shadows of consideration flicker in the blue depths. "Ni-- my host... did not wish to live her life. She has me to protect her, and to keep her from being alone. If I we had not blended, she would be curled into a hole in a mountain hillside somewhere." "Instead, she's curled into a hole in your mind," Jackson observed slowly. He didn't sound critical; just thoughtful. "That's not much better...." "Perhaps not." Malena shrugged, regret turning down the edges of her mouth. "But she has been my host for fifty years. And she only ever wishes to come out when we are completely alone, sometimes, to watch the stars." She closed her eyes, then opened them again in weariness. It was not always easy, to always be the one in charge.... "She seems content. I will not force her to do what she does not wish to." She dropped a handful of leaves on the fire, shook her head and softly said, "You are the first person she has spoken to in more than thirty years." They were quiet for several minutes, and then Dr. Jackson broke the silence. "I'm sorry for what I said, about you enslaving your host. I was wrong. And... I probably wouldn't have believed you, if you'd told me. I'm sorry I upset her." He looked at her from under his brows, exhaustion pulling his face into harsh lines, making him look much older. "My wife... Sha'uri was taken by Apophis, to be Amonet's host." The ache in his voice was like unsanded tiles; emotion catching on the edges, on the jaggedness of raw pain. "She died a little over a year ago." "I know." It had been in the bounty bulletin, along with a few other personal details about SG-1. She should have remembered, when he was hurling accusations at her, that he had more reason than most to hate Goa'uld and the System Lords. ~As much reason as I do....~ He didn't seem to hear her. "She surfaced at the end, as Amonet died. She said she loved me." Dr. Jackson's eyes weren't seeing the fire; they were fixed on the memory of his wife's death, and Malena could almost see that moment unfold in his eyes. "I failed her. I couldn't save her. I wanted to *so much*, and I never gave up, and..." His voice trailed off, and he closed his eyes, his shoulders slumping with a grief that was all too familiar to her. "And still life broke your heart." ~ He wanted to laugh at that flat statement, to have a witty comeback or sardonic answer, something to shield himself from how much it hurt. Maybe in another year he would. Right now, it was still too new. He had forgiven Teal'c, forgiven himself, and accepted that she was gone; but he wasn't over it yet, oh, no. Maybe he never really would be, not completely. Daniel opened his eyes and stared into the flames, telling himself it was the smoke that made them sting. A year. A year was a long time. Long enough to not let it show. "Yeah. It did. Not the first time. But definitely the worst." Malena shifted inside her cocoon of blankets. "So far." He lifted his eyes to glare at her, and instead of the cynical amusement that should have matched her words, he was shocked to see compassion on Malena's face. Open sympathy, actually. It bewildered him; what had happened to her disdain, and the detachment she'd shown since they met? "I won't tell you it gets better, because it doesn't. Not really." She rested her chin on her knees, her eyes reflecting the fire, making them glow as if they were still shining with the fury of a Goa'uld. "It does become... manageable, however." "That's comforting," he responded, his voice tight. "It isn't meant to be. It's just the truth." Malena looked up from the fire, her voice kinder than it had been except when speaking of her host. "If you live long enough, and do not die of the pain, you will love again. And perhaps lose again. And recover, again. It's the nature of being alive, I think. As true for my people as for yours." She seemed to be studying him, but Daniel had looked away during her speech, his finger tracing Sha'uri's cartouche in the ashes at the edge of the fire. "But your first real love... you don't forget that. Especially if it ends... badly." Her voice was terribly even and quiet, but with a wealth of meaning behind the calm. He didn't look up, but his finger stilled, his attention caught. "Three thousand years ago, on Earth, I was a queen. I had a husband, whom I loved. I had loved him for a thousand years, and I believed I would love him for a thousand years more." He didn't dare raise his eyes, but he held himself immobile, listening to not just the words, but a pain that matched his own. "He came into conflict with Set. It hardly matters why, now... He was betrayed by one of our own people, and not for freedom, or love, or any great thing, but for power and riches. Setesh killed my king beyond all hope of resurrection." She paused, her voice becoming slightly unsteady. "I lit the pyre and threw my crown on the roses burning beneath him. I would have followed him into death, but Setesh still lived. I demanded justice from Ra--- the opportunity to avenge his death--- and was denied. Ra was cautious of Setesh then; not enough to order his death, but enough to allow him the freedom to do as he wished, as long as he did not challenge him directly." Her voice had dropped to a low whisper, as quiet as the rustling fire. "I cursed Ra, and Apophis, and the System Lords, and attempted to kill him myself, but they prevented me. Then they banished me. Forced me through the Stargate and told me never to return to Earth." Malena fell silent, and Daniel finally lifted his eyes to her face. It was expressionless; the carved mask of an idol that had never felt an emotion of any kind. "And that's why...." "And that is why you are here, and alive. Yes." She blinked, met his eyes, and a mirthless smile formed on her lips but didn't reach beyond them. "They told me later that they had killed him for his treacherous ways, you know. But I was never sure if I believed them. No one had seen Setesh in more than a millennia, but still.... I could not swear fealty to Ra or Apophis, after that. I should have been given the chance to kill him, even if he killed me. They simply didn't wish the trouble it would cause among the alliances they had built. They betrayed me. Even more than I betrayed the memory of my lover in failing to avenge him." Malena closed her eyes. "How did he die?" Daniel shivered suddenly, wishing he were anywhere else, reminded again of Em, and Omoroca. Feeling very mortal, and human, and like he should be out of his depth, faced with a thousands-year-old grudge; except that he understood Malena's emotions all too well. If someone else eventually killed Apophis, he would want to know the details, want to be sure, absolutely certain, that he was dead. "He started a cult back on Earth. He was brainwashing the members, getting them ready to die for him... We infiltrated his compound, and he set charges to destroy it and kill everyone inside." His mouth felt very dry, but he wasn't thirsty. "We got most of his followers out of the structure, but he slipped in with them, and tried to escape in the crowd. One of the Tok'ra sensed him, and tried to stop him with a ribbon device. Set struck back; then Sam--- Major Carter--- took the ribbon device from the Tok'ra, and followed Set. He tried to strike at her with it, but she turned the pulse back on him. She didn't want to, but he would've brought down the walls if she hadn't stopped him...." Sam had been appalled at what she'd done, even though it had been self-defense, and in defense of others; a scruple Set would never even dreamed of having. They had all told her that, over and over, pointed out that her very revulsion proved she was in no danger of becoming any kind of monster. "He was buried three feet into the floor by the force of the blow, and almost every bone in his body was broken." Malena sighed heavily, shifted forward and opened her eyes, meeting his gaze with steady calm. "Thank you for telling me that, Dr. Jackson." She readjusted the blankets around herself, then pushed another stick into the fire. "You should get some sleep. Dawn comes early here." "Mmm." He was so tired. A long, long day, with too much to think about and process, and too many contradictions to reconcile. Daniel climbed into his sleeping bag, and pulled up the zipper on the outside, nearly asleep already. "Dr. Jackson?" "Yes?" he whispered, taking off his glasses, placing them where he'd find them easily in the morning. She paused so long that he was nearly asleep when she spoke. "You may not have been wrong... about the Taur'ii. And fighting. And the need to do something." Then, even more quietly, "Sometimes it is simply impossible to know how." * "Only a few more kilometres, Doctor. We should be able to see the chappa'ai from the top of that hill." Malena pointed to the east, and a green-gold mesa gently sloping up from the path. The mid-morning sun was barely over the edge of the ridge, slanting into Daniel's eyes and throwing long shadows across the grassland they had been walking through since dawn. Malena hitched one of the bags further up on her back, and shot him a considering glance. "If your people are waiting for you there, we will part company on the rise. No offense to them, but I don't think a meeting between us would go well." "None taken," Daniel responded dryly. He squinted upward, then looked back the way they'd came, noting how the river snaked behind them through the forests several miles back. All told, their actual journey had taken less than twelve hours; it was the... incidents... along the way that had made it last for an entire day. But without Malena, it might have taken him days to return on his own without a map of the area, or knowledge of the terrain. Somehow, he didn't think that was going to make explaining what had happened to him any easier when he got home. "You know, I never learned what the natives call this planet? I got grabbed and sold off too fast to ever find out." "Most of the names translate to Elysium." "Elysium? As in Elysian Fields?" Daniel snorted. Malena grinned wickedly. "Does this place not remind you of the abode of the righteous dead?" "Not even close." Daniel settled his backpack as they started to climb the hill, grateful that his little adventure was almost over, and that he was almost home. They hadn't discussed the furious argument or emotional revelations of the night before, instead retreating into careful politeness and superficial commentary on their surroundings after they'd started walking again. Hopefully, they'd manage to say their good-byes in the next half hour without inspiring Malena to turn the ribbon device on him, which would put him significantly ahead of all the other encounters he'd had with a Goa'uld. And that was aside from everything she'd given him to think about. He was sure the debriefing from this side-trip was going to be exhaustive, covering every single thing she'd said to him for some scrap of useful intelligence for the SGC. When they reached the crest of the hill, he could see the Stargate in the floodplain below them, the only thing taller than the wildflowers for miles in every direction. Pushing off his pack, he rummaged through it and retrieved his magnox, then checked the landscape for signs of SG-1 or the tribesmen who were probably still a little upset with him. The F.R.E.D. was parked right in front of the 'gate, as well as an Airmen with a SG-6 patch on his shoulder, standing guard. Jack, Sam, and Teal'c couldn't be far away. "They left a sentry, so they're probably pretty close. And still looking for me." "Then it is definitely time for me to leave. I wouldn't want to spoil the mood of the reunion." Malena cocked one eyebrow at him sardonically, and Daniel grimaced. "You know... There's a lot we could learn from each other. You *could* come and just meet them, I could explain---" "No, Doctor. That would not be a good idea." She shook her head as she bent over the bags he had been carrying, re-knotting the ties and arranging the weight of the goods so that she could carry them all. "Over the last day you and I have managed a small amount of--- diplomacy. And that was not easy to do." Daniel crossed his arms, watching her settle her belongings. "Probably because you threatened to kill civilians if I didn't cooperate with you, right after we were first introduced." Malena stood up, and smiled at him with almost as much mockery as she had the first time they'd met. "And it would have nothing to do with my understandable caution of you, given your reputation for acting as if all of my people deserve lingering and painful deaths, of course." She shrugged one of the carryalls over her shoulder, looking wry. "Do you honestly think that it would be any easier for me to meet your friends and exchange travel memoirs?" Malena rolled her eyes. "I think it would be wisest if we did not tempt our good luck or mutual tolerance any further." "Then... thanks. For getting me back here safely. And for, uh...." He blinked and waved an arm to take in all of the last bewildering, enlightening day. "Listening. And talking. And..." Daniel raised his eyebrows, still a little overwhelmed by what had occurred. "Rescuing me and not killing me. Even when you probably wanted to," he said with a rueful smile, hoping she took it as the joke he intended. Her mouth twitched, and then a smirk crossed her face. "It has definitely given me a greater understanding of the price on your head, Dr. Jackson. I tremble to think what the rest of your team must be like, if you are an example of what the Taur'ii have become." She sobered a little, and added lightly, "Perhaps the changes your people have made will persist, since you seem to be so good at that." "I hope so." She started to turn away, then paused, staring off at the Stargate a moment. "I wonder... Doctor, tell me. On Earth, is there still a place called Calicutt?" "Calicutt..." He shook his head, thinking, then brightened. "Maybe. Calcutta? In India, on the Asian continent? Near the Ganges River?" "Yes." Her lips curved into a smile of remembrance, nostalgia softening the sardonic lines around her eyes. "Calicutt was my city. So warm and glowing in the spring--- and the flowers, the colors.... So many of them. Sometimes I still dream of it. I was so happy there...." Her voice trailed off for a moment, sadness clouding the remembering tone. "My love's ashes were poured into the river where it met the bay." She sighed slowly, then shook her head. "And Calicutt still stands?" "Yes. It's home to more than four million people. It's not exactly rich anymore-- in fact, it has a lot of problems, they're having trouble adapting to the changes of this century, but... yes. It's still there." Daniel studied her for a moment, then he let the question that had been plaguing him since he'd met her finally break free. "Did you have any other name, when you were on Earth? Something besides Malena?" She raised her eyebrows in consideration, then pursed her lips. "Oh, yes. Many names. Chandi. Shitala." She watched his face, looking for signs of recognition. "Annapurva. Devi. Too many others to remember." "I know I've heard of them --- devi means goddess--- but I can't remember specific details about them right now...." "Just as well, I think. I left all that behind when I was banished. It has been a long time since I was worshipped, and I have no wish to return to it.... Still. It is good to know that the city I helped build remains." She met his gaze with steel in her expression. "And no city bears the name of Setesh. Correct?" "Yes." She nodded slowly. "It is enough." Malena turned back to him and studied him for a second, unsmiling. "I can not say it has exactly been a pleasure, Doctor, but--- I am glad we met. And I appreciate the chance to pay my debts. I wish you and your people well, for whatever that is worth." "It's definitely not worthless." He wished he knew the right words to reach her, to convince her to fight, or to defy the System Lords again as she once did. But there was really nothing left to say. "For what it's worth, I hope that things go well for you and... your friend, in the future." She blinked at him, and a small, surprised smile crossed her face, then faded away. "Thank you. Good-bye, Dr. Jackson." "Good-bye." He watched her walk back down the hill, toward the west, and when she reached the valley floor, she turned back, cocking her head against the sunlight to see if he was still there. He raised his hand in acknowledgement, and she nodded, then turned away. Daniel stooped down and picked up his pack, and then began the hike down the hill, already anticipating his teammates' reactions to his disappearance and reappearance. ~They're never going to believe this one....~ ~*~From the Mission Report of Dr. Daniel Jackson: PJ3-679 (Elysium): While everyone was extremely relieved that I found my own way back, I think I could've lived without Jack's lecture about carrying bread crumbs next time. Or his suggestion that "Property of the SGC" be stamped on my forehead along with return postage. Balancing out the teasing was the genuine worry I caused when I told them exactly who and what had guided me back to the Stargate. Dr. Fraiser checked me over a hundred ways from Doomsday to make sure I wasn't infected with any kind of virus, nanite, or electronic tracking device when I got back, but she found nothing. I'm not sure everyone has quite accepted the truth of what happened yet, and I can't exactly blame them. I'm still having a hard time working through all of the implications myself. For instance: not all Goa'uld completely support the System Lords. Most do, yes. But some do join the Tok'ra, and others might, if they thought this was a fight they could win. Not all Goa'uld take hosts against their will: they don't all have the resources (sarcophagi, time, ability to enforce isolation from the host's original home) or the inclination. Many, probably most, Goa'uld are still what we consider evil. No System Lord currently in power has ever given any indication of having regrets about their actions in killing, torturing, enslaving, or possessing humans. But what do we do when the System Lords are defeated? How far does the responsibility for the repression of the human race spread? Until now, I've always thought of this war as an all-or-nothing conflict... but the truth is, unless we're prepared to commit genocide on an interstellar scale, and become as evil as the Goa'uld, we're going to have to deal with them one-on-one at some point. If we win this war, if they're defeated and sue for peace, we'll have to decide what the terms are going to be. Do we hold Nuremberg Trials for those guilty of atrocities? How do you prosecute a race that can jump host bodies and escape detection? How do you prosecute Jaffa who were protecting their families, and were raised to believe that the Goa'uld were gods, and may have had as little choice as Teal'c did, before he came to the SGC? How do you assign responsibility and avoid persecuting the innocent (or at least those who are not guilty) when the crimes stretch back so far--- and there's really no way they can be repaid? And what will we do about those who've changed over the years? Maybe this is a moot point, but... we know next to nothing about Goa'uld society. We've only ever dealt with their leaders. From what Malena said, some of the Goa'uld may have as little choice in serving the System Lords as the human slaves around them. But does that mean we can trust them? How are we ever going to know? Malena slipped the blue opal she bought in the market into my pack while I was asleep, along with a note addressed to Sam which said: "From what Dr. Jackson has told me, you will not wish to accept this token for your actions in executing Setesh. But I ask you to accept it in the spirit it was intended; for laying to rest a ghost that has haunted me for centuries, and preventing the deaths of thousands more." Sam said she didn't want it, that she didn't deserve any kind of reward for killing him like that, but I told her that I thought Malena was being honest in the note--- that it really wasn't a vengeance payment for killing him, so much as a thank-you gift, maybe a medal, for stopping him when Malena couldn't. I think she believes me; she hasn't worn it, but she hung it up on her bulletin board in the lab, next to some of her personal photos from off-world, as a keepsake. As per General Hammond's request, I did some more research on Malena, also known as Chandi, Annapurva, Devi, and Shitala. And what I found is---unnerving. Jack says I dodged a bullet on this one, and I can't quite shake the feeling that he might be right. Annapurva: one of the ancient names of the mother goddess of India. Devi, Shitala, Chandi; also known as Parvati, Sati, and Shakti: consort to Shiva, the benevolent ruler and god of light. Usually a protective and beloved guardian of the home and family, source of creativity and life.... Which would all be fine, except.... Calcutta, or Calicutt, orginally: Kali-ghut, meaning Kali's Steps. Named for the warrior goddess Kali, whose titles included: drinker of blood, consumer of souls, killer of demons; she who dances on the bones of her enemies. *~* Author's Notes: Thanks to Val for sharing the obsession with this part of the Stargate universe at the same time I was getting more compulsive; Dee, Lizbet, Cath and Abby for reading and liking and commenting and helping me figure out the moral boundaries; and Perri for the usual stringent and necessary beta'ing. A day's hike with you guys would be much less painful than what I put Daniel through. And yes, that is the real origin of the city of Calcutta's name. That which destroys sometimes saves, in eastern mythology.... July 5, 2001 Feedback to Chris   Back to Stargate SG-1 Fanfic / Back to the Chaos Horizon