บท 21: Chapter 21: Awesome Can Be Both A Good And A Bad Thing

I stared down at the planet below me. I was contemplating simply landing the voidshuttle, snagging a sample of what I was here for, and leaving without saying a word. Some part of me balked at the idea, though, due to a degree of 'being responsible for things' that really didn't mesh with many of my past actions.

The world didn't even have a proper name yet. In the future it's residents would come to call it Langara, but until then it was just "the planet". About the only useful thing here was something the SGC would ultimately wind up giving up on due to their inability to control it's reactions: naquadriah. An unstable isotope or allotrope of naquadah, that could under correct circumstances generate immensely more power than a naquadah reactor. The only problem was that these circumstances were more and more erratic the longer one kept at it, and the more energy one tried to draw at once.

In Stargate canon, they would wind up giving up on the use of naquadriah reactors due to their inability to shield them from gravimetric events and a resulting energy overload. They, however, did not have some of the advantages I had in resolving that sort of problem. Superior technology bases -- multiple -- for providing environmental isolation field effects, and sensor technology along with true artificial intelligences able to perform literally faster than light calculations for predictive analytics, and even eldritch probability manipulation -- no, the odds were more than a little decent that I could build upon the base example the SGC had abandoned.

And even failing that, a small amount of the material could increase the reactant output of any burst-fire weaponry I had constructed with minimal risk, assuming similar levels of precaution were taken. Especially assuming that there was, in fact, a liquid form of naquadriah like there was of naquadah. In either case, this boost would help improve the combat efficacy of my empire's Militarum to nearly the same extent that eezo could, though it would significantly increase the cost of any systems utilizing it due to the necessary safety precautions to prevent radiation exposure and catastrophic overload events.

To be honest the main thing that made me even think of doing this was my increasing appreciation for the concept of "veljic". I had a true moment of enlightenment on the matter when I explained to Gefion about the technological background of some of the devices integrated into the Heartseed, especially the way the phase cannons used the gravplating as a feedback system to supercharge the structural integrity fields in order to allow the cannons to fire at overloading levels of energy output without causing the ship to actually blow up.

She'd pointed at me and uttered the word five times in a row at increasing levels of volume.

Matters got worse from there when I started to describe many of the other technological feats of the humanity of the universe the phase cannons were derived from, such as their methods for achieving faster than light travel involving the necessary use of matter-antimatter reactions which they further amplified in intensity through the use of a material that would "echo" the reactions at varying intensity into the very fabric of spacetime, which they turn used to distort reality around themselves in much the same way the sustained eezo FTL my Heartseed used. Apparently "veljic" means something like "stupid awesome" or "so crazy it flips around to brilliant". It was a bit like teaching psychics that painting things red really does make them go faster, in order to benefit from the psychic's belief on the matter and have red things legitimately go faster.

I totally wasn't going to try that. Honest. That would be irresponsible. Hilarious and awesome and irresponsible.

I had put off my decision regarding Langara for too long. In the end I decided to provide the people there with some surreptitiously placed terra-root plants equally dispersed in hard to reach rocky or mountainous locations within each of the three major nations' territories, and staged one of the nations' seedings with a run down shed that would contain apothecary notes of efforts to "study" the plants which would allow them to develop the plants as a power source, with an extra note about the measured zero resistance to energy transfer along the actual root structures of the plants there. Eventually this would stabilize all three governments to a higher energy production level which might ease some of their military disputes, but it would also inspire the Kolownans to study possible energy production uses of Naquadriah rather than just bomb-making. Especially since I also had the purpose-printed Hosts I'd sent down to collect samples there utilize minor geases to inspire explorers in each area to accidentally (as far as they would know) trip over the plants.

I could've done more there by revealing myself to them, but that would've required a long-term investment I didn't want to make. So instead I had to risk them using my gift to increase the potency of their war machines. Knowing the Langarans, they'd probably wind up making Helicarriers or something.

With my samples procured and safely stowed away, I set course for the nearest non-buried Stargate so I could make my way to my next destination.

The Asian-looking man had a placid expression on his face, and it made me want to punch it. Smug saffron-besheeted prick.

My scans -- even with the quantum beacon -- had yielded disturbingly little information of the kind I was after here. I supposed that was to be expected; the Ancients were nothing if not jealous of their secrets.

I looked the gatekeeper to Oma Desala and simply said, "I may not know the sound of one hand clapping, but I certainly know the sound that will summon your master."

The man quirked an eyebrow at me and unconcernedly spoke. "The storm may be furious, but ultimately it expends only itself."

I snorted. "Yeah, sure, whatever. Wanna see a magic trick? Watch this. 'Hallowed are the Ori!'" My tone of voice made it perfectly clear I was being sarcastic.

Sure enough, the groundskeeper monk had a perplexed expression on his face for maybe a tenth of a second; I'd rattlerattled him but not enough for him to forget himself. This was magnified shortly after by an intense glow of light coalescing into a series of streamers vaguely in the form of a cuttlefish or squid, and even as I saw a serene and flawless woman's face take form from the streams in the general area a head might be, I felt my diadem begin to heat up.

I stared at her. "Rude, much? Where I come from mindraping is bad manners."

She huffed and took on a more human countenance, though it still clearly an energetic hologram rather than de-ascension. "Where did you learn those words!? Do you have even the foggiest idea how dangerous they are? You play with fire!"

I snorted. "Boy howdy ain't that ever the truth. I thought that'd get your attention. And don't worry, your former compatriots don't yet know this galaxy is occupied with your creations. Emphasis on 'yet' by the way."

Her glare became more of a stern demanding expression. "I must insist on your explaining how you know that name. The mere invocation of them could draw their attention to this realm were it not for the Others' efforts at concealing such things, even at such a great distance as this. Tell me!" The diadem kept gradually increasing in temperature, which was impressive considering the expense that had gone into it's creation.

I set my fist on my hip and 'tutted' at her with my other hand. "What would you have me say, Oma? I learned it because I'm not from here. Isn't the fact that I'm resisting your mind fuckery enough proof of that? Still rude by the way."

She actually reacted like I had slapped her at that point. "I… yes. Perhaps you are correct. You are clearly more than you seem, or else you'd never even have noticed that. Very well. I shall ask nicely, stranger. What are you thinking risking bringing them down on us all?" She hissed the word 'them'.

I dropped my raised hand to a more neutral position, and spoke gently. "Let's try this. World As Myth."

Oma's eyes widened again. "World as… wait. No. Are you really expecting me to believe that our entire world is a simulation?" Her face took on a darker complexion with her last words, but I couldn't really blame her given what she seemed to think I was saying.

I shook my head slowly. "Err. I couldn't say towards that. If it is, I'm just as trapped in it as you are -- barring the fact that I can slide between the cracks from one to the other. Many of which have fictional references to others."

The million-year-old being in front of me visibly took hold of herself. "That's … a pretty big claim."

I just pointed up at my Heartseed and asked her, "Look for yourself, how many of the systems in that vessel are utterly novel to your people?"

Her eyes locked on the vessel which I myself could only easily spot without complex sensors at this range due to the heat signature it gave off making it glow against the background. "Far too many for me to easily dismiss your claim. You truly are a Stranger, then."

I blinked. Of course they had a word for it. "Look, Oma, I don't care for … them … any more than you folks do. I'm working with the Asgard to prevent my arrival and passage away from this universe from drawing their attention to this galaxy; at worst the Asgard can fight your former contemporaries and they know it. I'd … appreciate anything you can convince your fellow Alterans to provide me that might conceal my movements from their sight. I know it's a big ask, but … they are coming here, Oma, and if they win, you Alterans are no safer than the peoples of this galaxy. Your rules prevent you from interfering with the unascended, but they do not apply to me. And … between you and me? I can probably do something about tall dark and megalomaniacal."

Oma looked wistfully off in the distance for a moment. "Perhaps … perhaps you can at that. I would need to have a persuasive argument to provide the Others to convince them you were trustworthy to that effect. You claim you can do 'something' about Anubis? Prove it, and we will discuss this matter further."

As she vanished before my gaze, I couldn't help but think that maybe I should've taken an Acting advisor for this conversation. How in the shit was I supposed to actually follow up on what I'd just promised? Ugh. Well, the payoff might just be worth it.

Gefion was still staring at me through the transparent diamond wall of the control tank of the Heartseed. She'd been at it for the last two hours; ever since my corvette took off to depart from Kheb and transited to the gate coordinates of Abydos to make way to my next and hopefully final -- for now -- destination in the Milky Way galaxy for the time being. The biotic "Kett" drive of my little ship was fully capable of making about four hundred lightyears per day, but that still required just over six hours of transit from Abydos to Earth.

I finally glared back at her through the tank, my facemask not preventing unaided sight, and queued the holographic system to provide an avatar enough to be able to speak. "What do you want, Gef? You're beyond creepy at this point."

Gefion didn't even move an inch, except to allow for speech. "You knew where an ancient could be reached and spoken to. An ascended ancient."

I raised an eyebrow at her through the shock gel and diamond wall. "Yes. What's your point?"

The hundred-thousand year old Asgard repeated herself, and then continued. "You knew where an ancient could be reached and spoken to. An ascended ancient. You knew her name. You knew things about what she had done in the past. You even had knowledge about their history that predates even Asgard contact with the Alteran people." He voice was entirely deadpan.

I narrowed my eyes at her. "If you've got a point to make, make it."

She hissed her next words, almost like a cat. I had no idea what that meant to an Asgard. "What are you?"

I snorted. "Oh please don't you start worshipping me too. I'm … well, I'm not just a guy anymore, I can't pretend that much at least, but … look. I'm just me, okay? I am working out all of this crap as I go just like every other sophont in the cosmos."

Gefion started muttering under her breath. I distinctly caught the words, "specimen samples" as translated from the native Asgard.

I was suddenly very glad that my control tank's walls were made out of reinforced transparent diamond. That fact was remarkably comforting in ways I had not even slightly anticipated when the architectural Hosts had taken to redesigning my capsule for better integration with the Heartseed.

I did kinda miss the "egg" shape it used to have, but a twenty-meter "deep" rhomboid that was ten meters wide on the long face and five on the short face wasn't all that bad either. Especially since the extra space involved allowed for power systems, life support, biotic-enabled organic hull which would do triple-duty as FTL engine on top of defensive and weapons systems, and even Precursor-derived organic ion thrusters. Remarkable what happens when you allow a professional architect with experience designing spaceships to actually do the design-work themselves. It even had a small protein synthesizer which could do double-duty as a biorobot printer. Push came to shove, the capsule could be enough to restart my entire civilization from scratch -- the original intent my Heartseed itself had been meant to accomplish.

I turned my attention away from the bioresearcher who was apparently coming to decide that I, myself, was an integral part of the ship's systems and went back to focus on 'smoothing' the long-range biotic warpdrive (not to be confused with a biotic warp) fields in order to regulate power consumption. It could be done autonomously by dedicated Host and FTL computer calculation, but it was less energy intensive and honestly more fun if I did it myself through the automail connection to the ship.

By the time I 'came back' to myself, decoupling from the Heartseed and being reduced by the experience, I looked around to discover that Gefion was nowhere to be seen. I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I was currently operating on maximum stealth; minimizing the ship's internal mass to the lowest levels it could get without the dark energy itself being detectable, and utilizing the ion thrusters in low-power burns to get into Earth orbit while keeping the optical camouflage in place. Thermally I couldn't perfectly match the thermal signatures of any objects on the other side of the Heartseed from earth, but the coolant capillary system at least made her match the background heat of the cosmos. The internal heatsink could last for as long as five days before needing emergency dump thanks to laser-cooling which would emit heat energy directly away from the Earth in a form that would only be detectable by observation devices on that side of the vehicle. That only left radio telescopy as a means of detecting my ship, but there wasn't much I could do about that beyond simply attempting to avoid the detection arcs of any active radio telescopes while remaining in orbit of the planet. Between that and the low actual emissions on the radio spectrum my corvette was emitting, I was confident that at the very least the probability of the SGC or other institutions of the planet actually detecting the ship was quite low.

It would be even lower if I could raise the Class 2 anti-perception glamour but I didn't want to draw Gefion's attention to that particular system. It was in this state -- invisible, silent, and cold -- that my ship was now simply orbiting the planet, taking passive scans to search for the technologies I knew were present but not yet discovered by the SGC. They had already gotten ahold of the Seth compound and the devices there, and the Russian government had the local DHD -- not that I was particularly concerned about that as I had several of my own in the cargo hold. What they had not gotten ahold of just yet was Osiris's tel'tak nor his personal equipment, meaning I could finally get my hands on a kara'kesh. It would have to be largely disassembled in order for me to actually get it back to my people, but I was quite alright with that thought since the disassembly could happen far out of the reach of the human government once a Host had flown it to some Stargate-less system in a similar manner to what Osiris himself originally did.

None of this was, however, the real prize of the show as far as I was concerned. No, what I wanted most of all was something I had a far inferior version of already sitting in the cargo hold of the Heartseed. Inferior and damaged to inoperability but hopefully not beyond study, especially considering I would very shortly be gaining access to the MacGuffin that was the original deal from which Telchak had made his inferior copy. The Ancient Healing Device as was concealed somewhere in Honduras.

This was going to be an … interesting … expedition, as I was going to have my voidshuttle make a nighttime landing in Honduras to acquire the OG sarcophagus-energy zombie-maker, while I had a special team of Hosts prepared to make a biotics-assisted HALO jump to the ruins in Egypt which were in truth Osiris's prison and tech-stash. I'd even gone so far as to risk a brief operation of the quantum beacon while in low altitude flyover of Honduras in order to get the necessary sensor information to precisely target where the voidshuttle should land. The one thing I was definitely not going to do was make contact with the Tau'ri at this time. I wasn't ready for it -- not until I got ahold of that ascended-blinding tech from either Oma or the Asgard or just worked out my own version of the same.

The plan my Hosts laid out to actually acquire the technological objects I was after went off without a hitch in either case. It was almost insulting how well it all went, but then again -- this was yet another plan that didn't involve me blacking out from pain, so I was going to take the win where I could get it. One thing was certain, however; now that I had all three of the goa'uld healing devices, a sarcophagus to study, and the original device that both were based upon -- I had a number of Thinktanks to load up with all manner of goodies and see what they could work out to solve this pesky "mass limit" problem my attempts to transit between dimensions was hitting. If nothing else, I supposed I could hook up the ancient device itself to a capillary system and overcharge the ship's life-energy in a way I couldn't have hoped to accomplish before. After all; it could literally give life to that which was previously unliving. If it couldn't solve the problem, I hadn't the foggiest clue what would.