STARGATE SG-1: Oceans of Dust (44 page)

He peered through the nearest, down into a dizzying cylindrical shaft. “Ho boy.”

“This place must go right around the Auger,” said Daniel. “What’s the betting the guidance controls will be on the far side?”

“Symmetry and our lousy luck says even,” Carter sighed. “Sir, I’d suggest two teams.”

“Agreed. Carter, Bra’tac and Daniel head thataway. Teal’c, you’re with me.”

There was no time for more. He turned, leveled his spear, and charged.

Almost immediately, another gold-armored Jaffa was coming at him. He threw himself aside as a blast screamed past him, used his own momentum to spin completely around and loose off a shot on the rebound. It took the warrior in the shoulder, flipped him into the shot Teal’c had fired.

O’Neill cursed as more bolts splashed the viewports beside him. There were two Jaffa up on the gallery.

Teal’c darted forwards, fired up twice. The shots hit the rail, sending the men back. O’Neill used the respite to run again, but as he set off a shot whined down to explode right next to him, the blast kicking him against the viewport. He felt his head connect hard with the transparency, and sparks flared in his vision.

He fell back, pulled the spear up as he did so and fired directly upwards, taking the man who had fired in the chest. The blast continued right through the Jaffa and into the ceiling. What was left of him crashed backwards.

O’Neill scrambled up. Teal’c was ahead of him, running, then leaping, hurling himself into the air to grip a buttress and swing himself up one-handed. He twisted, whirling the spear around behind him and triggering it as he opened his other hand. The recoil threw him forwards, back down to the deck. The shot, high enough to get over the balcony, blew the golden warrior clean off it.

They hit the ground roughly at the same moment. One in a messy, tumbling heap, one in perfect landing, head down, spear held out in his right hand, its long grip behind his shoulders.

“Show off,” said O’Neill.

Teal’c dipped his head, then rose, and continued on. O’Neill followed him, risking a look sideways through the viewports. He saw flashes on the far side of the Auger, bright sparks of yellow light flicking back and forth.

The corridor opened out ahead, opposite the transporter platform as Carter had predicted. There were two Jaffa there, each on one knee and already firing. Both got two shots off before they died. Teal’c and O’Neill jumped over their bodies as they fell.

The guidance area was big, bigger than the pel’tak. There was a second gallery above the first, extending out into a platform, and the deck below must have jutted a considerable distance into the Auger. The platform, typically for something built to a Goa’uld sense of scale, must have been ten meters above the deck.

O’Neill paced under it, spear leveled and crackling.

From the other side of the chamber, a Jaffa flew backwards and rolled to a smoking halt. Bra’tac emerged at a run behind him, with Carter and Daniel darting out a moment later.

Teal’c touched O’Neill’s shoulder, and pointed up at the platform. O’Neill nodded.

There were ladders up to the first gallery. He chose the nearest and climbed as fast as he could with the spear still in his right hand. One day, he thought as he ascended, the Goa’uld would get around to fitting their staff weapons with a sling so they could do more than one thing at a time, and then Earth would be in serious trouble.

He clambered up onto the gallery, and stepped to one side so Teal’c could join him. On the far side, Bra’tac was already there, stalking towards the steps leading up to the platform.

Carter caught his eye, and held up two fingers in a V-sign. He nodded, and padded up the steps, keeping low as he reached the top and peering over the floor level.

There was a viewing screen on the inner edge of the control chamber, a huge glassy panel stretching from the deck to the vaulted ceiling. The platform overlooked it, and the railed edge was lined with consoles.

Neheb-Kau was there, hunched over a bank of controls, his mask retracted and his ruined head snapping left and right as he prodded and stabbed at the panels. His First Prime, Kafra, was behind him, staring over the rail at the screen.

On it, a graphic of the Ash Eater planet was overlaid with streams of crimson hieroglyphs. Red light from it washed back over the platform, bloodying them both.

As O’Neill climbed the last step, the First Prime turned to look right at him.

He didn’t move.

O’Neill frowned, and leveled his spear. Carter had been right: without the heavy club at the other end, it was easier to aim.

He fired, and the blast screamed blindingly away into the ceiling.

Neheb-Kau spun around, his right hand outstretched. O’Neill caught a glimpse of the glowing gem in his palm before a ripple of distortion hurled him back into the outer wall.

More bolts whined onto the platform from both sides. O’Neill opened his watering eyes to see the barrage strike an invisible curve around Neheb-Kau, extending far enough back to encompass his First Prime and half the platform. A personal force shield, he realized: Apophis had used one too, on occasion, although his was smaller, less powerful. Neheb-Kau had been tinkering with that, too.

“Fools,” the Goa’uld spat. “You waste your final moments on this?”

O’Neill forced himself up. The ribbon pulse had hit him like a truck. “Just shut the damn locks off and let it fire!”

“And see my children destroyed?”

“Your
children?
”

“Of course. Did you not see them? My unborn children, in their millions, sleeping below, waiting to be born!”

“So you’re content to die,” Carter said, stepping as close to the shield as she could. O’Neill saw her brush its surface with her fingertips, a crackle of voltage following her hand.

“Our deaths will be their birth-scream,” the Goa’uld replied, his lidless eyes glowing with rage and fervor. “And my legacy to them will be the galaxy, fat and ripe for them to suckle on!”

“Now that’s a damn nasty image,” muttered O’Neill.

“Kafra,” Carter called. “Do you want this?”

“What can be done? The guidance controls are locked.”

“Locks have keys.” She put her spear down. “Please, Kafra.”

He looked at her strangely. “I cannot undo what my master has done. I cannot steal the dreams of a God.” O’Neill saw his gaze flick back to Neheb-Kau. “
Not alone.
”

“We can,” O’Neill told him. “Hell, we do it all the time.”

“That is what I had hoped,” said Kafra. And he smiled.

At the last moment, Neheb-Kau must have realized what was happening. He whirled, robes flying, and raised his hand to Kafra, but the Jaffa was already lurching forwards.

Once-powerful arms spread, and wrapped around the God.

“No!” screamed Neheb-Kau. But he was already being hauled off his feet. His arms flailed, clawed hands scrabbling at Kafra’s armor, at the boiling skin of his head, but it was too late. They both knew it.

Kafra ran with him to the rail and jumped.

“Carter!” yelled O’Neill, over the sickening sound of their impact. “Go to it!”

“Already on it, sir.” She was at the consoles, deactivating the gold and crystal devices clamped to every panel. He ran to her, helping to lift them free.

Daniel appeared at the rail, watching the screen. “Still a lot of red, Sam.”

“Give me a minute.” The devices were gone now, and she was tapping frantically at the panels.

“Ah, I kinda think we’re out of minutes…”

“Some people,” she said flatly, “are always in a rush.”

The icons on the screen went blue, and vanished upwards.

Light, intolerably bright, flooded the platform.

“Holy crap!” O’Neill ducked away from it, shielding his eyes with his hand. The screen was blocking most of the light coursing down beyond it, but enough was spilling past to be painful.

“Sorry people,” Carter said, wincing. She worked the controls again. “Didn’t have enough time to get the blinds down.”

The light was dimming to less searing levels, as the viewports on either side of the screen began to darken from the top down. O’Neill squinted over the rail, still with his hand cupped over his eyes, watching a river of pure white glare thundering past the viewports.

The Auger was firing. Its energies seared downwards in a vast beam, through the centre of the ring and into their target.

On the screen, the graphic had changed to a full view of the Ash Eater planet. The beam was a dot of livid white at the centre, growing, the black clouds edging away from it as if unable to withstand the brightness of it, the purity. A sphere of brilliance was growing down there, matter flashing into energy, the raw tunneling power of the Auger chewing effortlessly through the thin crust of the hollow world and ripping into the tether beneath.

He turned to Carter. “Nice work.”

“Thank you, sir. But it wasn’t all me.”

He nodded, and followed her down from the platform.

Kafra lay on his back, under the rail, blood pooling around him. Neheb-Kau was a sprawl of silk robes a few meters away. Carter ran to the First Prime, and knelt beside him.

“He died free,” said Teal’c. “And with honor.”

The Auger beam shut off, its thunder turning to silence.

O’Neill felt the deck beneath him tilt fractionally. He let out a long breath. “Guess we’re moving again.”

“Next target,” said Carter. She was still kneeling. “He got me out of a lot of trouble back on Neheb-Kau’s ship, sir.”

“He got us all out of a lot of trouble right here.” He put a hand to her shoulder, then moved away.

Daniel was standing below the platform, gazing up at the screen. “Would you look at that,” he murmured.

O’Neill followed his gaze, and blinked. “Wow.”

The planet had a hole in it.

Under the spiraling, roiling clouds, the cavity carved by the Auger was growing. The crust was caving in, thousands of tons of rock shattering away from the hole’s ragged edges and tumbling inwards, drawing the clouds with them as the atmosphere followed them down. Ash and dust must have been sieving down too, mountains of it, the whole nightmarish landscape falling in on itself.

“The suppression field must have given out,” said O’Neill.

“Hm?”

“Carter said that the air was kept out of the centre by a field. Look at those clouds.”

Daniel grinned. “I’m impressed. Hey Sam?” He turned, and froze. “Oh hell.”

While they had been watching the screen, Neheb-Kau had gotten up.

He was in dreadful shape. One side of his head was a crimson ruin, one eye obscured or gone. His left arm hung limp by his side, the robes there clinging and sodden with blood.

His right arm was up, and the ribbon device was pulsing fire into the side of Carter’s skull.

O’Neill snapped the spear up and fired, but the blast whined off the Goa’uld’s shield. “God
dammit!
”

The awful face turned towards him. “Be fair, human. You have taken everything from me. I merely take one thing from you.”

“No,” said O’Neill.

He thumbed the spear’s control, and the weapon fell silent in his hands, the spear blades snapping shut.

Neheb-Kau smiled. “Good boy.”

“You wish.” O’Neill drew his arm back, and hurled the spear, straight and true, clear through the shield and into Neheb-Kau’s black heart.

The Goa’uld staggered back, a look of utter shock on his broken face. His mouth worked. His right hand came up, touched the spear-shaft emerging from his sternum as if to confirm its unbelievable existence, then rose to O’Neill. But the gem in the centre of the ribbon device was dark and cold.

Neheb-Kau sank to his knees, twisted, and fell.

There was a flicker around him as the shield failed. O’Neill was already running to Carter, and felt wisps of voltage brush him as he charged through it.

She was in a heap, but struggling to lift herself, her eyes blinking rapidly. As he dropped down beside her, she glanced around at Neheb-Kau, saw the spear sticking out of him, and then turned to stare at O’Neill.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” she gasped.

“Wasn’t even sure it would get through.” The shield Apophis had used would allow slow-moving objects through too. He had tried a bow and arrow, once, and it had almost worked.

“Nice guess.”

He helped her up. Behind them, the Auger erupted into searing life again.

When they reached the transporter platform, there was a small army of hoplites waiting for them. O’Neill counted at least twenty, along with a handful of Spartan Guard and a pair of hulking Minotaurs. They parted as the team approached.

In their midst stood Pythia, her mournful face streaked with tears. And at her side a small, pale woman in a white dress, with sandy-gold hair and gray eyes.

“Look who’s back,” O’Neill said warily.

Daniel was next to him, helping Carter along. “Ericaceae.”

“That name no longer has meaning.” The woman’s steely eyes narrowed. “There is only Hera.”

“Guess having a backup has its uses.”

She walked slowly up to him, tipped her head back to fix his gaze with hers. “You succeeded.”

“Looks that way.”

“The planet is collapsing. Within hours, it will be no more.”

He shrugged. “Sounds like a result. So what happens now?”

“What indeed?”

He heard running footsteps. From around the opposite side of the transporter came two Spartans. “My Lady!”

“Report.”

“Neheb-Kau lives!”

O’Neill gaped. “What?”

“The host is gone. The Goa’uld lives, for now.” She looked back over her shoulder at the Spartan. “It’s name will not be spoken again.”

“It’s still alive? Jesus… What does it take to kill you guys?”

She smiled grimly. “We shall find out, over time. A
very
long time.” She turned to Daniel. “The Spartan Guard tell me that you honored my sister, in her last moments. For that reason, and that alone, I will spare you.”