Stargate SG1 - Roswell (45 page)

“We knew we couldn't come through the Egyptian 'gate—didn't fancy turning into a wall mural—so Vala took us back to a planet where we could grab a 'gate-capable death glider and come back to 1908 via the Antarctic 'gate.”

“So the time travel function of the hand DHD didn't work as planned?” asked Sam, wondering how it was calibrated. She motioned for Daniel to turn around so she could help him finish dressing. Teal'c was already fully kitted out, having had considerably more practice.

“Don't know.” Cam frowned. He glanced at Daniel. “Did you know that Qetesh sometimes allowed Vala's consciousness to get a look in, after she took her as a host?”

Remembering that sense of helplessness when Jolinar had taken full control of her, Sam felt ill. She'd only been under Jolinar's control for a short while, and despite her haughtiness, the Tokra had intended no one harm. What it must have been like to be under the control of a Goa'uld for years was beyond comprehension. For the first time, Sam wondered exactly how long Vala had been a host.

“No, no, I didn't,” Daniel said in a quiet tone. “Guess that would explain a lot.” He wrapped the collar around his neck and Sam fastened it.

“Well, the planet she took us to may or may not have had a death
capable glider, but the reason Vala remembered it was there, was because—”

“It was under the control of Qetesh,” Daniel finished.

“You got it. Next thing I know, Qetesh is poking through my brains
with a hand device.” Cam's voice was flat and unemotional, but it did little to disguise his anger or the pain he must have
suffered at the hands of the Goa'uld.

“What happened to Vala?” The General was helping Daniel with the last of the Jaffa armor, but he paused when Cam didn't reply immediately.

Taking
a deep breath, Cam shook his head. “She convinced Qetesh
to take her as host. Qetesh saw the value in that, figuring
it
might give her an edge.”

Shocked, Daniel spun around to stare at Cam. “Vala
voluntered?”

“Thereby preventing her younger self from being taken as a host,” Teal'c said.

Cam nodded. “You got it. The one good thing to come out of all this, I suppose.”

“First Prime, huh?” O'Neill remarked.

Cam's face tightened. “Promotion opportunities abound in the service of someone like Qetesh. Occasionally I get to prevent the odd atrocity, instead of just helping it along.”

Sam suspected this brief precis of the last forty years was all they
were likely to get.

The General must have assumed the same thing because he asked, “So, what's Qetesh doing hanging out with Ra in 1947?”

Cam didn't hesitate before answering, clearly grateful for the change of subject. “When you knocked off Ra in 1994, Qetesh ended up with the short end of the stick. Between Vala's memories and the knowledge she pulled from my brain, she found out why, and that Langford would begin experimenting with the Stargate in '45. She passed that last bit of information on to Ra, but neglected to mention the stash of nukes which, if I remember correctly, are currently stored at Roswell.”

“It all keeps coming back to Roswell,” Daniel remarked.

“More than you know,” Cam said. “I knew Ra was itching to reclaim Earth, but he's fixated on conquering places via the Stargate, and Earth is kind of a long hop by ship. Langford's resurrection of the Stargate was his signal to attack. Thing is, if Vala and I were going to meet up with you guys anywhere in the future, it had to be at a time when we knew there was a good chance of you being here. Or, if not you, then maybe the Asgard who survived the crash at Roswell could help us. You have no idea what it's taken to get Ra to hold off attacking Earth until now.”

Sam shook her head in wonder. “But how did you know we'd be
here?
Now?”

“I didn't. Based on what Vala said, I thought you'd be in the Asgard ship. When I came through and saw the Stargate was parked in the Met instead of a military warehouse in DC, I figured Howard—Carter, that is, not Lovecraft—had screwed up, and if you were around, you'd come looking. Got a little worried when I couldn't locate the Asgard ship in orbit.”

“What was with the death gliders over Roswell?” O'Neill said.

Cam smiled humorlessly. “Qetesh, bless her patricidal little heart, spent the time since she caught us, positioning herself so that if Ra is knocked off, we'll all be singing 'long live the queen'. And she's planning on doing that via a nuke ringed aboard his ship.”

In the awkward silence that followed, Daniel and the General finished dressing, and then Cam asked, “What do you guys need to get back to 1908?”

“Loki booby-trapped the time machine and Asgard transport. When we arrived in 1947, he had himself beamed out and left in An's ship.” Sam told him.

“Like a pack of replicators were on his tail,” the General injected.

Cam's expression hardly altered, but when he met her gaze, she
could
see something, a hint of resentment she might have imagined, perhaps, fall away. Or maybe it was just her own sense
of
guilt for having left them behind, seeing something that
wasn't there.

“We recovered An,” Sam continued. “He's installed a replacement transport in the jumper, but that unit needs a new power supply module in order to safely beam you and Vala aboard in 1908. So, we need power for the transport, preferably
additional
modules to bring the jumper up to fully operational, and a time machine.” A thought struck her. “Does Ra know about the hand DHD's time travel function?”

“Hasn't got a clue,” Cam assured her. “Qetesh knows, although ever since Ra decided he liked it and took the thing off
her, she's not game to mention it for fear that if she shows any interest, he'll wonder why.”

“Where's this hand DHD thing now?” the General asked.

“Ra's normally got it. but no DHD in New York kinda cramps his style, so he's taken a couple of death gliders to Russia to grab the full-sized model. He's given the hand DHD to his First Prime to facilitate two-way travel until he gets back.
And yeah, I can get it for you, but the timing is gonna have to be perfect.”

“How so?” The faceplate on the General's helmet snapped shut, and he accepted a staff weapon from Sam.

“You need to get to the jumper, sort out the transport — we'll grab all the naquadah you need on the way—and then wait till Qetesh returns here with the nukes.” Cam gave them a once over and nodded approval. “Once I'm sure I can detonate a nuke, I'll get the hand DHD to you. You should be able to operate it without any trouble; it functions pretty much the same as any other hand device. You just need to go to Antarctica and focus on the date as well as the destination—Antarctica 1908.”

“The Antarctic 'gate isn't protected?” Daniel sounded incredulous.

“Why would it be? It's buried under half a continent of ice and the DHD is dead as a doornail. That's why Ra set up the Egyptian 'gate in the first place. One of the few pieces of information Qetesh never got out of me is that the jumpers come with their own DHDs, and she had absolutely no interest in your ability, Sam, to hotwire the 'gate. You'll need additional naquadah to cut your way through the glacier and get it operational. You can get back home to 2006 the same way, except the destination will be the SGC.”

Cam's mention of the Antarctic 'gate solved a puzzle that had been bugging Sam for years, and offered a brief glimpse into her future self's motivations.

“You're coming with us, right?” Daniel asked.

Opening the door, Cam checked outside before motioning them to follow. “The moment you're gone, I'll ring one bomb aboard Ra's ship and trigger a second one here in New York. That'll take out Qetesh and put a real nasty sting in anyone else's ambitions to invade Earth. It'll also make it easier for you to dial out the Antarctic 'gate—less potential for signal interference.”

“That's not a plan,” the General snapped, falling into step beside Sam. “That's suicide.”

“Begging the General's pardon,” Cam replied without any trace of deference, “but I seem to recall you were prepared to do exactly the same thing on Abydos.”

“This is
Earth,
Mitchell.”

“The wrong Earth, sir. And if you're successful, none of this will have ever happened.”

“And if we're not?” Daniel followed behind them.

“Then everyone in this city, possibly the entire country, will be put to death anyway, because Ra doesn't take kindly to losing his toys.” Cam led them to the stairs and stopped. “Besides, Vala and I both want this over with.”

Daniel looked at him curiously. “You keep speaking of Vala as if she's still the Vala we know and not the host of Qetesh. How do you know she's even aware of what's going on?”

“Let alone coherent enough to make plans with you to destroy Ra and Qetesh?” the General added with a frown.

Cam shrugged. “She's been pregnant twice. Qetesh took a vacation to protect the babies. We had to be careful, because Qetesh had access to Vala's memories once she'd given birth, but
we had a little time together.”

That would have been monstrous for Vala, Sam realized, particularly after what happened with the Ori. “What happened
to her children?”

“They're fine.”

“Who's the father?” Daniel sounded as shocked as Sam felt. He would know what such a thing would mean to Vala, even more than she did. “Does it matter?” There was a warning edge to Cam's voice that suggested it would not bode well to enquire further into the
matter.

Teal'c, apparently, didn't notice it. “A Goa'uld with Qetesh's tastes would not limit herself to simple pleasures. Or singular
ones.”

Cam nodded in agreement and headed down the stairs. “Let's just say she likes a lot of Jaffa when she parties, and leave it at that.” He stopped then, and turned to them. “And for the record, Qetesh is a sick bitch. She keeps Vala's conscious-ness awake, to torment her like some sort of goddamned pet.”

“Oh, God.” A horrible, sick chill crawled over Sam.

“Yeah, well it gets better.”

“What do you mean?” Sam said.

“Qetesh is bored with Vala's body. She's going to...” His voice caught and his eyes took on a momentary edge of desperation. “She's going to take...her daughter, Seshat, as a host when Seshat turns eighteen. So whatever happens to you guys in
this timeline, in three days Vala will be dead, Qetesh will have taken...an innocent kid as a host, and I will still be First Prime to a monster we've been planning to destroy for decades. So if you have
any
doubt at all that I'm not willing to nuke those bastards out of existence...” Cam let the rest of the sentence hang. He turned and continued down the stairs.

Beside her, she felt the General tense, while the multilingual curses coming from Daniel ended only when they reached the bottom of the steps. Their trip through time had only taken a few days. Cam and Vala had been living this nightmare for much, much longer.

“Egyptian Pharaohs commonly took daughters or siblings as wives,” Daniel remarked. Sam glared at him. “I was just thinking out loud. Ra was reputed for that sort of thing.”