CHAPTER NINETEEN
During breakfast the next morning, Teal'c expressed his displeasure over what Sergeant Grossman had said. Daniel thanked him, but made it clear that he didn't want the Jaffa to do anything about it. He then turned to Jack and said the same thing.
"I think Grossman's learned his lesson," the colonel said. "And he's probably going to keep right on learning it for quite some time to come every time he sees one of the females on base. He's not too popular with the ladies right now."
They were just finishing their meal when a request came over the P.A. for SG-1 to go see General Hammond. They went straight to the briefing room.
"As I'm sure you know, the archeological teams are still on Egerania, examining the Ancient ruins," Hammond said. "It appears that they may have found something."
Every member of SG-1 instantly became more interested.
"What did they find?" Sam asked.
"A room that they are unable to enter. One of the teams was examining a structure that appears to have been a large complex. The building has a tower at the center, which they wanted to investigate. However, when they attempted to enter the room that would give them access to it, they found it sealed by a door that they can't get open."
"Okay, so what makes them think that there's anything really worth investigating there?" Jack wanted to know.
"The fact that the door's electronic locking mechanism is still working."
Sam sat up straighter. "That means that there must be a functioning power source somewhere."
Hammond nodded. "They are hoping that you can manage to get the door unlocked and opened, Major."
"I can sure give it a try."
"Good. Get suited up. You'll be heading out in one hour There will be ATVs waiting for you at the base camp in the meadow outside the city." The general turned his gaze on Daniel. "Will you be able to operate one with that hand of yours?"
"It might be a little painful, but I'll manage."
After leaving the briefing room, Daniel went to tell Egeria what was going on.
"You look excited," she observed after hearing about the mission.
"Yeah, I am a little. I told you about the Lost City and how we've been looking for it. Now, we might actually have found it. If we have, it might give us what we need to defeat the Goa'uld."
"I hope that is true, Daniel. It would be a glorious thing for both Earth and the Tok'ra, as well as our friends among the Jaffa who wish to be free."
"Yeah."
Egeria ran a finger up and down Daniel's arm. "So, does this mean that I will not have the pleasure of your company tonight?"
"That all depends on what we find inside that room. It's possible that we might get back today." Daniel checked his watch. "I need to get ready for the mission. If we're not going to make it back tonight, I'll make sure that someone lets you know."
A while later, Daniel and his teammates were in the gate room, waiting for the wormhole to connect.
"So, back we go to Egerania," Jack remarked. "All I can say is that it had better not be a waste of time this time."
The trip to the ruins went smoothly. They were met on the outskirts of the Ancient city by Doctor Sousa, who led them to the structure with the locked room.
As they approached it, Daniel studied the tall tower that rose from the center of the large building, wondering what purpose it had served.
When they got to the locked door, Sam studied the mechanism closely. "It looks like some kind of hand scanner. If it works similarly to ours, I should be able to bypass the scanner and get the door open."
"Well, have at it, then, Carter," Jack told her. "I'd really rather not spend the night here, if at all possible."
Sam was getting more than a little frustrated. She'd been trying for over half an hour to get the door to the mysterious room unlocked, but all her efforts had been in vain. It appeared that the mechanism was specifically designed with safeguards to prevent tampering, and she hadn't yet figured out how to get around them.
Not surprisingly, Jack had suggested that they use C4 on the door, but both Sam and Daniel pointed out that the blast could damage whatever was on the other side.
Daniel came up to her. "Still no luck?"
She let out a sigh. "No, not really. On the surface, it looks like a simple hand scanner, but it has multiple levels of safeguards to prevent someone from doing exactly what I'm trying to do." She peered into the guts of the mechanism again. "Daniel, could you do me a favor? I want to try something. I doubt it'll work, but it's worth a try. When I tell you to, put your hand on the scanner."
"Okay."
As soon as Sam told him to, he placed his hand on the scanner. It lit up, and he felt the slightest of tingling sensations, then, suddenly, the door slid open.
"Hey, it worked!" Sam cried in delight.
Jack heard her outcry and appeared from around the corner. "Well, it's about time."
They all went into the room and looked around.
"I have to say that this is somewhat . . . disappointing," Jack remarked.
The reason for Jack's statement was that the huge, circular room – dominated by an enormous column in the center that was apparently the base of the tower – appeared to be completely empty.
Daniel walked over to one of the walls. It had a stone shelf, which traveled the entire length of the wall and sat around desktop height. Spaced at four-foot intervals were shallow niches a couple of feet wide and extending up to the ceiling.
"I think these were work spaces or something like that," Daniel said. "There were probably computer terminals at each one."
"Yes, but they're all gone now, along with everything else," Jack responded, not very happy about the wasted trip here.
Daniel's attention had gone to one of the sections of wall between the niches. It was covered in Ancient writing.
"This might tell us what was in here and its purpose. I should probably at least skim through it."
Jack sighed. "Fine. Whatever. We've already wasted all this time. What's another hour or so? Knock yourself out."
As Daniel began to read, Jack and Sam left the room. They were joined by Teal'c, who had been outside. They filled him in.
"Sir, while Daniel's reading, I'm going to check out the rest of this place, make sure the archeological team didn't miss anything." Sam said.
"All right. Take Teal'c with you."
After the other two had left, Jack went back into the room and discovered that Daniel was no longer reading. Instead, he was staring at the tower. He walked up to it, then went all the way around the circumference.
"That's strange," he murmured.
"What's strange?" asked Jack.
"There's no entrance. I mean, this must be the base of the tower, so how do you get inside?"
"Maybe there is no inside."
"There must be. It's too big to be solid. Besides, why have a gigantic, solid stone column rising up out of a room? What purpose would it serve?"
"Big ass lightning rod?"
Daniel glanced at the grey-haired man briefly. Jack was definitely smart enough to know that you wouldn't make a lightning rod out of stone. He was just being an ass, as usual.
Losing interest, Jack wandered off to the far side of the room and stared up through one of the numerous slits in the roof that likely acted as skylights.
Daniel started a second circuit around the tower, studying it more closely. He came to a spot where there was a single circle etched into the stone. Nothing more, just a lone circle.
"Huh. I wonder what this is," he murmured as he stepped closer.
Several yards away, Jack heard him. "Did you say something?" When he didn't get an answer, he turned around. "Daniel?" he called a little louder. Still getting no response, Jack strode over to the tower. "Daniel, where are you?"
When a trip around the tower and a peek outside the door yielded no sign of the archeologist, Jack started to get a little worried. Daniel would not have just walked off without saying anything. It's as if he'd disappeared into thin air.
"Daniel, if this is some kind of joke, and you're hiding somewhere, it's not funny," Jack called out. The complete silence that greeted his words increased his concern. He reached for his radio.
"Carter, Teal'c. Come in."
"Carter here, sir," Sam answered.
"Get back to the room on the double."
"What's wrong, Colonel?"
"Daniel's disappeared."
"Oookay. This probably isn't good."
Daniel's words echoed slightly in the room in which he'd suddenly found himself. He'd just tried to contact his teammates and gotten no response.
"Why is it that things like this keep happening to me?" the archeologist muttered. He walked forward. As he did so, more lights in the room turned on, revealing its contents. It appeared to be in some kind of lab or perhaps a control room.
Daniel stepped up to one of the consoles, which activated automatically. He scanned the symbols and found the controls. A holographic screen came to life at his touch. Skimming through the words that appeared, Daniel determined that it was talking about a sentient species discovered by the Ancients. Though his curiosity was begging him to read more, this was not what he was looking for right now. What he needed was to find the way out.
Leaving that console and going to the next one over, Daniel began his search for a way to get him back to where he was before he got beamed here. By now, Jack must be aware that he was missing and might have even called Sam and Teal'c to help search for him. The problem was that they might end up being transported here, too.
Daniel thought about what he'd done to get himself into this mess. Actually, he really hadn't done anything. All he did was step up to that circle on the column. A couple of seconds later, he'd found himself here. He could only assume that he'd tripped some kind of sensor.
Okay, there was no reason to get concerned. There had to be a way out. All he had to do was find it.
"I am definitely picking up an energy signature," Sam said, running her scanner over the base of the tower, "but your guess is as good as mine as to what's generating it." She looked at her C.O. "So, one second, he was here and, the next, he was gone? You didn't see it happen?"
"No, I didn't see it happen. I was stupid enough to turn my back on him for five seconds. Apparently, that's enough time for him to get himself into trouble again."
"He must have tripped some kind of transport beam. He could be almost anywhere in the city."
"If he was capable of doing so, would Daniel Jackson not have contacted us by now?" Teal'c asked.
"Yes, he would."
"Which means that either he's someplace where his radio won't work or something's happened to him," Jack said.
Really hoping that it was the former rather than the latter, Sam resumed scanning the column. She noticed a lone circle engraved into the stone. Curious, she stepped closer. "I wonder what this is."
Jack and Teal'c came over and stared at the circle.
"Doesn't look like anything to me," the colonel remarked.
"No, but the fact that it's the only thing on the column must mean something." Sam reached out to touch it.
"Ah, do you think that's wise, Carter? Maybe that's what sent Daniel off to wherever he is."
"Well, if it is, sir, at least he won't be alone, and you'll have a better idea of what happened. You can bring a team in from the SGC, and they might be able to figure out where we were sent."
Though he wasn't happy about it, Jack told her to go ahead.
"Just be careful," he said.
Taking a deep breath, Sam touched the circle. Nothing happened.
"Well, it was a nice try," Jack remarked. "Any other ideas?"
Sam frowned and pushed at the circle a little harder. "I don't know why this is here if it doesn't do anything."
"Perhaps a device of some kind was once there," Teal'c suggested.
Sam nodded. "Yeah, you're probably right."
"Okay, I'm calling the other teams in," Jack announced. "We need to start a search of the ruins."
Daniel stared at the consoles from the place where he sat on the floor. It had been two hours since he began his search for a way out. The consoles had yielded information on a wide variety of subjects, but he hadn't found one word about how to get out of there.
By now, everyone was probably getting worried. Would they have sent someone back to the gate for more help? If so, Egeria would find out that he was missing, and she'd be worried, too.
With that thought in mind, Daniel got off the floor, determined to find the way out. As he walked toward one of the consoles, there was a flash of light. When it disappeared, the archeologist discovered that he was no longer alone.
"Hey, Jack. Nice of you to drop in."
Sam gaped at the place where the colonel had been standing only a second ago. She walked up to the spot before the circle on the column, Teal'c, who had also witnessed the disappearance, right behind her.
"I don't understand this," she said. "I stood right there earlier, and nothing happened. The colonel didn't even touch the circle. So, what's the trick? Why Daniel and Colonel O'Neill and not me?"
"Perhaps it is because of my proximity," Teal'c suggested. "The repository of knowledge would not function for me. Though I no longer carry a symbiote, it may be that it is detecting the Tretonin in my body and believes that it is a symbiote."
Sam nodded. "You may have something there. If that's the case, it's probably doing the same thing with the Naquadah in my blood. Damn. Okay, we need to send someone back to the gate to tell General Hammond what's happened. I still have to believe that Daniel and the colonel are in this city somewhere. We need more people searching with scanners."
The astrophysicist turned back to the column, hoping that, with more people searching, they'd find the missing half of SG-1.
"Nice to see ya, Daniel," Jack remarked.
"You too."
"How you doing?"
"Oh, could be better, could be worse."
"So . . . where the hell are we?"
"I have no idea."
"Not the answer I was looking for."
"Sorry."
Jack wandered over to one of the consoles. "So, what are these?"
"They have a whole lot of information about a great deal of stuff. I'm guessing that, at one time, this was some sort of science lab or perhaps even a learning center, although I don't know why the Ancients would find it necessary to hide a learning center."
"I suppose that you haven't found a way out."
"If I had, I wouldn't be here."
"Yeah, that's what I figured."
Daniel walked up to Jack. "There has to be one."
"You'd think that, wouldn't you, especially since this place doesn't seem to have a bathroom."
Daniel's gaze went to the spot where Jack had appeared. Was that the same place he was when he arrived? He walked over to it, examining the floor, then the ceiling. There were no marks or any signs of some kind of technology, but that didn't really mean anything. Sometimes, ring transporters, which were also created by the Ancients, were completely hidden.
Could it be that easy?
"Jack, come here."
"Why?"
"Just . . . just come here. I might have discovered the way out."
Jack walked up to him. Daniel grabbed his arm and pulled the man closer as he stepped onto the spot where Jack had been standing when he appeared in the room.
They remained unmoving for around four or five seconds.
"Okay," said Jack. "Is something supposed to be hap—"
"—pening?" Startled, the colonel looked around, suddenly realizing that they were back in the circular room.
"Daniel! Colonel!" Sam cried, running up to them.
"Hi, Sam," Daniel greeted.
"Are you two okay?"
"We're fine. More than fine, actually. Wait until you see what I found."
"There's no bathroom," Jack added, "so, if you have to go, you'd better do it beforehand."
"Oh!" Sam said. "I need to stop Doctor Perkins from heading back to the gate." She got on the radio and told everyone that Daniel and Jack had made it back safely. Hearing her announcement, Teal'c quickly returned to the room.
"I am pleased to see that you are unharmed," he said.
"So, where were you?" Sam asked.
"In some kind of lab or computer center," Daniel replied. "Now that I know how to get back out, I need to go back there and really pay attention to what was on those computers. You wouldn't be able to read Ancient, but you might be able to figure out what the place was used for."
"I may not be able to go there, Daniel. Teal'c and I have a theory that the reason why you and the colonel were beamed there, but I wasn't even though I stood in the same place is because of the Naquadah in my blood."
"You mean that it thinks you're a Goa'uld."
"Yeah."
"I guess there's really only one way to find out, then."
"Just hold on there," Jack said. "I'm not so crazy about you or anyone else beaming back to that place when we don't even know where it is. What if that transporter thing stops working while you're there?"
Sam sighed. "I'm afraid he does have a point."
"Well, wherever we were, my radio signal wasn't getting out," Daniel said, "which means that either the room is shielded or it was deep underground. For all we know, it could be right under our feet." He looked at the huge column. "In fact, that may be exactly where it is. I still think that this tower must have some purpose. Perhaps it has to do with that room. I think we need to take the chance and go back down there. There's no telling what kind of information is on those computers. If this is the Lost City, they may be able to tell us where the weapons are."
Though it was against his better judgment, Jack said, "All right, but just one more trip. You and Carter have two hours, then I want you back up here. Got it?"
"Got it, sir," Sam answered.
She and Daniel went over to the spot where the archeologist and the colonel had been beamed away. Daniel stood right in front of the circle with Sam close beside him. Nothing happened for around three seconds, then they were suddenly transported to the room.
"Wow," was the first word out of Sam's mouth as the lights turned on and she saw all the consoles. She went up to one of them, but it remained dark. "How do you turn them on?"
Daniel frowned. "That's funny. They turned on automatically before." He walked up to Sam's side, and the console immediately lit up. "Okay, that's weird. Could it still have something to do with the Naquadah?"
"I suppose so." Sam ran her scanner over the console. "I wonder where the power for these things is coming from." She began making a circuit of the room, running her scanner over the walls, looking for a spike in the reading. When she got one, it was a big one.
"Daniel, come here."
The archeologist walked over to her.
Sam pointed at the wall. "Look at this. It looks like it might be some kind of access panel."
Daniel reached for it. As soon as his hand touched the small, hexagonal panel, it pushed out from the wall, making him and Sam hastily step back a pace.
What was revealed was some kind of crystalline structure that glowed a deep orange.
"That has got to be the power source," Sam said, stepping up to it. She ran her scanner over it. "The reading is completely off the scale. I've never seen anything like this before. I can't even begin to guess how much power this generates."
Leaving Sam to examine the orange crystal, Daniel returned to one of the consoles. He brought up the holographic screen and glanced over the text. Seeing that it was information on stellar phenomena, he brought up the index, something he'd learned how to do during his previous search. Paying a lot more attention this time, he began scrolling down the list. Quite a few topics caught his interest, but he decided to keep going. And then he spotted something that made his heart beat just a little faster. He selected the item and began to read the text that came up.
"Uh, Sam? I've found something."
Hearing the restrained excitement in Daniel's tone, Sam came up to him. "What did you find?"
"This is information on the repositories."
"You mean like what downloaded the information into the colonel's mind?"
"Yeah. Sam, these are instructions on how to use them. According to this, there is a way to limit the amount of information that's downloaded, which was something I always wondered about. It never made sense to me that it was all or nothing."
"That's fantastic, Daniel. It's a shame that the one Colonel O'Neill used is out of power. This could help us operate it. And we don't know where any others are."
"Um . . . we do now." Daniel pointed at something on the screen. It was a gate address.
As soon as General Hammond saw the look that was on the faces of Daniel and Sam when they and their teammates came through, he knew that something big had happened. In the debriefing that followed, he found out what that something was.
"We need to go get that repository," Daniel said after the general had been filled in. "We're talking about a device that contains all of the knowledge of the Ancients."
"Yes, and makes you go screwy in the head, talking and doing all kinds of nonsense," Jack added. "In my opinion, we should stay as far away from that thing as possible."
"Sir, with the instructions we found in that lab, we might be able to find a way to retrieve the information without anyone interfacing with it," Sam told him. She turned to Hammond. "General, the knowledge in that repository is invaluable."
"It could give us what we need to defeat the Goa'uld once and for all," Daniel said.
The general nodded. "I have to agree with you. This opportunity is too important to pass up. We'll schedule the mission for tomorrow morning. I'll send SG-3 with you."
When Daniel talked to Egeria, it was easy for her to see how excited he was.
"Ever since we first learned about the Ancients, I've been dying to know more about them," he said. "After I ascended, I would have gained their knowledge, but I lost it all when I descended, not even remembering what I did during that year. That bothers me a whole lot more than the other things I lost when I descended. My whole life has been in the pursuit of knowledge, and, now, we are on the verge of getting something that holds all the knowledge of one of the most advanced races we ever encountered, millions upon millions of years of knowledge. I can't even begin to guess what all is in there." He paused. "Yet, at the same time, I can't help but wonder if we're ready for this. Years ago, we met a race called the Nox. They called us very young. They recognized that, as a race, we still had a lot of growing up to do."
"You fear that some may use the knowledge obtained from the repository for things that it should not be used."
"Yeah. I doubt that we're going to be able to keep this a secret from Russia, China and the other countries that know about the Stargate. They're all going to be demanding access to that knowledge, and, as much as I hate to say it, I'm worried about what some of them might use it for, not that this country is above using it for unethical purposes. But this could also end the war with the Goa'uld once and for all, and I guess that outweighs the danger that someone here on Earth might misuse it."
The next morning, SG-1 and SG-3 headed off to P3X-439. As SG-3 remained at the gate, SG-1 walked to the structure that they guessed was the location of the repository.
After an hour of searching, they'd found no sign of it. In fact, there appeared to be no way to get inside the monument, if there was even an inside at all. Jack finally got tired of looking and sat down on the grass a few yards away as Daniel began to read the writing on the colonnade. After another half-hour, Daniel found something.
"It says it's inside," he announced.
"Inside?" Jack responded, getting to his feet and walking over. "What inside? All I see is a whole lot of outside, Daniel."
"I know." The archeologist studied the writing some more. "If I'm right. . . ." He didn't finish his sentence. Instead, he pressed several of the symbols in a certain order. Suddenly, a familiar object appeared out of the wall. "Found it."
The four members of SG-1 cautiously approached it. Daniel got a little too close, and the repository grew out from the wall further, making them all jump back.
"Damn, I hate those things," Jack muttered. "Okay, so how do we get it out?"
"We'll have to cut through the wall, sir," Sam replied. "This isn't the first time that we've extracted one of these things, so we have some experience."
"What if the batteries on this one go dead just like that other one did?"
"Obviously, there is a chance that the power level is low, but no one will be interfacing with it like you did with the other one, which is likely what drained the last of the power."
"So, I guess we need to get a crew here to get it out," Daniel said.
Jack frowned. "Yes, and not get their heads grabbed by that thing in the process."
A couple of hours later, the crew was hard at work removing the repository, with Sam overseeing the process. The end of the repository had been covered in order to prevent someone from accidentally interfacing with it.
The three male members of SG-1 stood a few yards away, watching the proceedings.
"I can already guess that this is going to keep you and Carter busy for days to come," Jack remarked to Daniel.
"Yeah, probably so. Sam can't read Ancient, and some of the technical stuff is over my head, so we're going to have to work together on this."
"And have either of you given any thought as to how we're going to get all that knowledge out of the thing? You said that the instructions in that lab were on how to set the thing to download only part of the stuff instead of all of it, but that still means that somebody's gotta stick their head in it."
"Like Sam said, we're hoping that won't be necessary, that we'll be able to find a way to download the information into a computer."
"And if you can't?"
Daniel hesitated before replying. "I don't know. Obviously, we'd be hesitant to let someone interface with it, even if they wouldn't be getting all of the information, but if that's the only way to get it, we might have to take the chance."
"You mean that you might have to take the chance." When Daniel looked at him, Jack said, "Oh, come on Daniel. You can't tell me that you aren't dying to have some of that knowledge dumped into your brain, get back part of what you lost when you descended."
"Okay, so I have been thinking about it."
"Uh huh. Well, that isn't gonna happen."
"Not even if there is no other way to get any of the information?"
"Daniel, in case you've forgotten, I almost died when it happened to me."
"Because you got too much, Jack. That wouldn't happen with a small download."
"Even so, I'm not willing to take the chance. So, don't you go putting your head into that thing."
Once the repository was out of the wall, it was loaded onto a FRED, and everyone returned to Earth. Hammond greeted them in the gate room.
"Welcome back, everyone," he said. "SG-1, we have a bit of a problem. Once you get your post-mission exams attended to, come to the briefing room."
All during their time in the infirmary, the members of SG-1 wondered what the problem could be. As soon as they got to the briefing room, Hammond told them. For some reason, the science team that had been sent to examine the hidden lab in more detail was unable get there. No matter how long any of them stood in the correct spot, they were not being transported to the room.
"That makes no sense," Sam said. "It worked for Daniel and the colonel. I assumed that the reason why it didn't work for me and Teal'c is that it was mistakenly identifying us as having symbiotes."
"Maybe the power ran out," Jack suggested.
"Based on the readings I was getting from the power module, I don't see how that could be possible. There has to be another explanation for why it's suddenly not working."
A frown came to Daniel's face. "Maybe we're looking at this backwards."
Sam stared at him. "Backwards?"
"What if the problem isn't that the sensor was detecting something in you and Teal'c that prevented it from activating? What if, instead, it wasn't detecting something that's needed to make it work?"
"Please explain, Doctor Jackson," Hammond requested.
"Okay, I was ascended. What if, when I descended, a little something was . . . left behind? That sensor could be programmed only to work for Ancients or someone who is the same as the Ancients in some way."
"Okay, that makes sense for you, Daniel, but I was never ascended," Jack pointed out.
"Yes, but remember what Thor said about you? He said that you were more advanced on the evolutionary scale. They even thought for a while that your DNA might hold the key to their genetic degradation problems."
"Daniel, you might be on to something," Sam said. "The only way we could test it is to see if the transporter works for you and the colonel."
Jack sighed. "You mean to say that we have to make that trip again? It is really starting to get old."
"I'm afraid so, sir."
"Great."
"Very well," said Hammond. "It is too late in the day for you to go today, so it will have to wait until tomorrow."
As they lay together in bed that night, Egeria could tell that Daniel's mind was on something. She rose onto an elbow and looked down at him.
"You are troubled."
"No, not troubled, not exactly. More . . . pensive. All this time, I assumed that, when I descended, I'd been returned to a physical state exactly the same as I was before I ascended, except, of course, that I no longer had the radiation poisoning, and I came back sans all the scars I collected over the years – and with my appendix back in place. Even my vision was the same as before. But, now, it looks like I might have been wrong. How different am I? What ended up getting left over from my time as an ascended being? And was it done on purpose?"
"You told me that Teal'c believed that Oma Desala deliberately made it possible for you to regain your memories from before your ascension. What if this, too, was of her design. Perhaps she believed that you might have a need for it in the future."
Daniel thought about that. "I guess it's possible. Unfortunately, I can't ask her."
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