3,013A/N: So it's a bit embarrassing how long it took to get this chapter done, I really struggled with it and that turned me off from writing it sadly. Add on that I have been super busy, working weekends, been writing other things, stuck on this chapter for like a year, sick, and a number of other excuses on why this took so long to get done. I did rewrite it three times, as I am honestly still not super happy with how the chapter turned out, even now. Not to add onto possible bad news, but POE2 is coming out soon, and I plan to sink a serious amount of time into that so less time for not writing. So don't expect another chapter for this story this year sadly.
It also feels like every time there is news about a new revival of Stargate I get all excited and I want to write more for this story, to only have my muse get kicked in the balls when inevitably bad news about the prospects of a show come out. Here hoping recent news doesn't flounder as well. That said I do things about the story and add to the outline, but not as much as I have been for my other stories.
All that aside, I am excited where the story is going from here as this is when a number of fun things open up and start happening in the story. There is one scene where I am 99% sure I hadn't covered the topic yet, but maybe? So excuse that if it's a repeat, but I couldn't find that section anywhere in the posted chapters. I hope you all enjoy the chapter and thank you for reviewing, I try to read them all and the messages too.
No, I am not dead. No, this story isn't dead, even if it's only getting 1 chapter a year for the last 2 years at this point…
This is not Betaed as I am Lazy and haven't got that discord server up and running yet. Sue me.
Chapter 15:
Daniel was constantly looking around at all the interesting and fascinating looking people; in fact, he was having trouble deciding just what deserved his attention most. There were many people wearing obviously different types of dress from many distinct cultures, even those that looked like possible divergent subcultures separated by many centuries. Some clothing and accessories were of better make than others with more complex materials, and he suspected that these all more.. ruggedly dressed were some of the new arrivals that were constantly being brought to Argensis. He was certainly not too fond of that idea, uprooting cultures and peoples and bringing them somewhere so different. It felt to him like blatant destruction of traditions and culture, a people's way of life, and something he was going to bring up later if he got the chance.
"Come this way. We will use some Transport Rings to get to our next destination." Fabian said leading their tour group through the massive Stargate hub? He would have to ask what they call this building. They made quick time through the sprawling building, as unlike most of the rest of the building there were not throngs of people in the route they were taking, and he was far more interested in looking at both the people and the architecture that he was seeing than following the group. It was quite amazing, and clearly futuristic looking, not something he was expecting from any Goa'uld adjacent culture. There was also this simplicity to the area that didn't distract from how it looked. Simple, yet elegantly futuristic.
Still, what stood out the most to him was the large numbers of people, maybe several thousand he could make out in the massively cavernous building they had arrived in. He could also see many guards sprinkled throughout the building and crowds. They were far less intimidating compared to the Phoenix Guard that had come to the SGC, but still were a stark difference from the typical Jaffa he had seen before. They wore full armor, helmet and all, and we're wearing similar if slightly less bulky armor and weapons than their elite counterparts. He expected Jack was probably spotting a million things he was missing, but he only had so much time to spare for them when he had a billion objects he wanted to look at and even more questions to ask.
"Where are we headed initially?" he asked his first question to Fabian as they moved through the building.
"We are going to one of my favorite locations in all of Argensis, and that is the Imperial Central Archives! It is where many original written works are stored and preserved and acts as one of the largest archives and libraries in all the Empire. As each new culture and group joins the Empire, many of their cultural and historical relics and objects are preserved there for future generations." Fabian explained excitedly to him and the rest of the group. "My understanding from the brief I got, this is something you would be interested in Doctor Jackson?" The question didn't surprise him and brought a smile to his face.
"Certainly, but I am not sure how long Jack will want to spend there." he said honestly with a smile knowing that Jack and the others had things they wanted to use this trip to learn and spending it in a library was not what they probably wished for. There were important things to find out; especially when it came to finding a place where Teal'c could feel his family could live a good life.
"Yes understandable, sadly our initial visit will be extremely short, but you will have several days of free time to return after today, and I encourage you to do so." Fabian said with a smile.
"Where else are we planning to visit today?" One of the Senators, Alessandra, he thought her name was, asked.
"Well, I have planned several locations based on some of the places your governments mentioned each of you were interested in visiting. First, we will go to the Imperial Central Archives and get you all setup with guest armbands to access various technology, and guides while here on Argensis. Then we will take an Air Car to do a quick tour of the capital from high up before heading towards the Planetary Science Academy that I believe several of the representatives from Rena are interested in seeing. That will also give us a good opportunity to view a brand-new city being built nearby to the Academy, to be ready for future students and more waves of people coming to live here on Argensis." Fabian answered happily, clearly enjoying what he was doing, as they slowly passed through the building and to less and less packed areas.
"Yes, our government is quite interested in the Academy, as it will hopefully be a fruitful endeavor between our two peoples." said Senator Gilbert in a jolly manner that seemed to be the man's standard demeanor.
"If you don't mind me asking, what is the purpose of this academy?" Teal'c asked from the side, having not said anything since they arrived, simply observing their surroundings.
"Ah yes! My apologies to our friends from Earth! You would not have any information on the new academy. It is a joint project between The Empire and the people of Rena to study planets and learn more viable methods for altering their environments to more suit human life, promote healthier ecosystems, and many other things I couldn't even fathom. At least that is my understanding, as sadly I know next to nothing on the topic." Fabian said excitedly. "I believe, Rena's interest is due to a planet in their system sharing similar attributes to their home world, however lacking an atmosphere."
"That is correct. It has been a long-held desire of our people to terraform Dipeka into a planet that we could comfortably live on." Alessandra said happily.
"Well, here we are, if you all could step inside the circles here, we can be transported to the Central Archives." Fabian said, pointing out a number of what looked like discreet ring platforms built into the ground. It was odd, he had never seen multiple sets all placed together like this before, but once he thought about it made a lot of sense, most likely to allow more people to come and go at one time. Possibly to divert incoming people to a different set of rings if people were already occupying one of the sets here.
He along with his team and Fabian took two rings and watched as the Senators from Rena got into one more before they all activated. Frankly he had not expected to already be surprised but it didn't take a genius to realize that these rings seemed to be an improved version compared to what the Goa'uld used as they were much quieter, a bit faster, and smoother? He was not a scientist, so couldn't explain it, but it seemed the whole process went better than before, and they arrived in another massive room. If the whole room hadn't changed it would have been harder to tell you had moved unlike a traditional set of Rings.
Well maybe room was not quite the right word, perhaps giant open concept hall might be more appropriate. As he looked around, it became clear they were on a massive several story tall open planned floor that itself was several dozen stories up a tower and was enclosed by glass. Turning around a few times to take the place in, it was incredible, with many people present going about their day, and yet it was quiet with an air of respect. The numbers of people were also far fewer than where they had just come from, and far more uniformly dressed, or at least in style.
"Amazing, where are we?" he asked quietly, almost whispering, looking over to Fabian quickly for the answer.
"I am pleased to welcome you to the Imperial Central Archives." Fabian said, gesturing wildly with his arms. "The primary purpose of this institution is to give public access to all the stored knowledge and artifacts of the Empire. Here all the cultural writings and practices along with many physical objects from each incoming culture of the various peoples being incorporated into the empire are stored and preserved for future generations. My understanding is that the goal is to ensure that the cultures of new citizens of the empire are not entirely extinguished when they start adopting wider imperial culture into their daily lives." Fabian said with a smile as he moved farther into the floor for everyone to look around.
"What are your people trying to preserve?" he asked, fascinated by the idea and the fact that the Empire would go out of their way to do so. While his worries were still there, it at least seemed that Lord Hariric was trying to preserve some of his new subjects' cultures. Certainly not something he would have ever expected from a Goa'uld, but if he was being honest with himself, it was something not too far out of line for what Hari has been doing so far.
"Sadly Doctor Jackson, this is not my area of expertise, so I only know limited information on the process, but my understanding is that writings, important objects, and even everyday things are preserved. The archives stretch for many, many, floors below ground to accommodate the sure volume of items that are being carefully preserved here for public access." Fabian answered while moving towards one of what looks like a tall piece of glass that was clearly a display screen. There were many of these scattered throughout the hall, and smaller ones on desks several people were sitting at.
"So, anyone can access these artifacts?" he asked, looking around at the various people, many of which seemed to be reading either books or more commonly reading something off a padd.
"Not just anyone, as you do need to apply for approval to get hands-on access to a number of physical artifacts, primarily for the artifact's own preservation, but usually such access is granted if you have a reasonable reason for its need." Fabian answered before hitting something on the display they had moved towards.
"Does that mean someone can look up designs for military equipment on one of these terminals?" Jack asked in disbelief, but looking interested.
"Unfortunately for the inquisitive, you cannot." Fabian said with a smile. "There are many types of technology and information that are not included in the public archives. For example, these archives do not include other private information or communications of citizens of the Empire. Some information is deemed not appropriate to be made public. Many of the most advanced technologies of the Empire belong to the God Emperor and fall under that category." Fabian explained killing Jack's joy.
"Property of the Emperor, how does that even work?" Jack asked, perplexed.
"As nearly all the most advanced technology in use today, beside some newer examples coming out of the universities and academies, were created by our Lord. Designed and invented by him. Built with materials he owns and operated by people he pays. I don't see why the God Emperor wouldn't own such technology." Fabian said honestly, looking at Jack for a reason.
"Shouldn't the material wealth of the Empire belong to the people, not the Emperor?" he asked, trying to bail out Jack and take this conversation to a deeper level as he was interested in the answer and what it could imply about the Empire as a whole.
"Apologies, I fail to understand why." Fabian replied confused. "This land belonged to Lord Hariric long before anyone else alive lived here. Nearly everyone here was invited to live on this land by Lord Hariric. It only makes sense he owns what is in and on it too. And the technology our great military uses were all created by Lord Hariric, why should it not belong to him the same as anyone else?" Fabian asked him, looking intrigued, if not still confused.
"Well in most cases we have come across the land belongs to the people, and from there sometimes owned and operated by a government for the betterment of the people." he said, not an expert on the topic, but still quite well versed as it is something that comes up frequently when learning about new societies. He also knew that personal ownership of land was not something possible in all societies he had studied or even on Earth, so it wasn't like there wasn't a president.
"Hmm I can see the benefits of such a system, but also the drawbacks. Here the land is owned by the God Emperor and sometimes leased or owned by private individuals or institutions for their own benefits." Fabian said thoughtfully before continuing. "I see the land owned by Lord Hariric as being used towards the benefits of the Empire, and the strength of the empire directly impacts the quality of the lives of its people. It is sometimes easy to forget when looking out over the peaceful city that we are at war at this very moment. Right now, the God Emperor is leading our forces in battle in some distant star system." Fabian passionately replied while moving over to one of the large windows looking over the incredible city.
It was honestly odd to him not seeing the customary criss-crossing of roads going everywhere. Sure, there were still a few 'roads' in the city he was looking down upon, but they were far fewer and are nearly to a rule smaller. There were several large central avenues that were for some form of parades or something, as he saw almost no vehicles using any of them. What extremely few vehicles he could see were flying, mostly close to the ground, with only a couple flying higher than surrounding buildings.
The city seemed to be built in consecutive circles, one after another adding layers to it. And there was so much more greenery than he had been expecting, if he would have to guess he would say nearly 40% of the city was plants, and not buildings. It was not off putting but was a shocking difference from the majority concrete jungles of Earth. Then the largest thing that stood out for him was the inner circle which contained what he guessed was the 'old city' as it was in a clear Greco-Roman style from what he could make out from here. That was absolutely something he wanted to get a closer look at, there was so much one could learn and tell about a people from what they valued, especially what they are trying preserve from previous periods of development.
"Now let us move over the help desk quickly and we can equip you all with your guest armbands that will allow you to interact with some of our technology better and even purchase some items during your stay." Fabian said, leading them over to a small desk with a man standing in front of a half dozen armbands like the one Sam had been given, but a little smaller. "Major Carter, you won't need a new armband, you will just simply need to temporarily reactivate several of the networking features for the duration of your stay to make purchases." Fabian said with a smile at Sam.
"Do you know which one's I need to reactivate?" Sam asked.
"Yuqi here can explain which features need to be reactivated." Fabian said to the smiling man behind the desk. "I barely understand these armbands as is and I am just a happy user." Fabian said with a beaming smile and a chuckle.
"I am most happy to be of service." Yuqi, a tall skinny Asian man said before moving over to one of the senators looking at an Armband. "Here you put it on with this side on the top of your forearm." Yuqi started the several minute explainers on how they get their armbands on and how to use some of the basic functions. Including how to start up the tutorial. However, they didn't get too much time to play around as Fabian was already ready for them to move on as soon as their final armband was connected and working.
"During your stay after the guided tour, this building is a great place for you to come to gain any additional information you may want to learn about the empire and the city, or even other locations to visit and simply ask questions. Though your guest access on your armbands do have some limitations." Fabian said with a smile after everyone had looked over their armbands. "If you would all kindly follow me, I will lead you to our Aircar for the day that we will be using to see more of what the planet has to offer." Fabian said with a smile as he walked towards a large balcony.
Maybe it wasn't even fair to call it a balcony, but as they approached the glass doors slid open for them, and they walked out onto the sprawling outcropping. Their 'Aircar' was waiting for them with a driver standing beside it in a spiffy suit. Now if he was being honest this Aircar is what he would expect if he was thinking about more advanced civilizations, or an Earth far into the future. It was also quite large, far larger than a car from home, but that might just be because it was designed for a party as large as theirs.
"Now if everyone could climb aboard, we can start the main portion of our tour." Fabian continued, having opened a door on the air car after they finished approaching. He thanked the fact that the Aircar was hovering over the balcony and not hovering just off the edge, which meant he didn't need to step over a gap, instead simply stepping up slightly into the car. The inside was not quite to the point of being luxurious, but it wasn't too far off, as it was very nice and comfortable inside, with ample room for maybe 12 people. Clear windows surrounding them to allow for a good view as they traveled. There was even a screen built into the middle of the floor showing a view from a few different cameras on the Air Car.
Thankfully it was comfy inside because they spent most of the next six hours inside the vehicle touring around and getting their questions answered. Of course, there were periods where they stopped somewhere to check it out on foot, but primarily their tour was done from the Air Car and he could understand why. They had gone to many places across the planet and had seen quite a bit, it honestly had him reevaluating his opinion of Hari and the Empire. It seems that he had been letting his prejudices about the state of Goa'uld domains cloud his image of what the Empire would be like, and oh how he was wrong, yet right in other regards.
So many things were on a massive scale too. The 2 active and 1 in construction universities they visited were massive, their campuses far dwarfing anything on Earth, with each having more than five hundred thousand students. Education was clearly an important aspect of imperial life, and the topic had certainly come up, and the discussion had been even more surprising for them.
"Yes, that is correct, basic knowledge and understanding of simple concepts are all slowly downloaded in people's minds over a two-year period. This is usually done between the ages of three and five, but also for adults who are newly joining the empire. For adults the process can be sped up a bit to be covered in 6 months rather than 2 years." Fabian had said while explaining the concept.
"It comes in extremely handy for people to be able to understand and speak to each other as English is one of the first things downloaded. The Empire encourages and even promotes people to maintain their cultural ties to a degree, and language plays an important role in doing that, so making the transition to using English for most other things as seamless as possible for new arrivals has shown great results. People are still encouraged to use their native languages at home and with other speakers, but English dominates everything else. There are several other benefits to the learning process, but one that my friends rave about is that they get more time to spend with their children before they need to start daily lessons. It sadly does not replace experience on the job, as that can still be critical for someone doing something correctly." Fabian finished.
"Is that how you are able to integrate people so quickly into the workforce? I have noticed the rate of construction on various sites we visited today was extremely fast, and there appears to be many workers on the new Academy construction site." Senator Gilbert asked.
"It does play a key role in onboarding new arrivals and getting them working to allow people to feel they can have a direct positive impact on their daily lives and the Empire as a whole. The basic education package is not the only one available, as there are a number for various specific industries, including one for construction workers to give them some of the skills, concepts and practices we use here in the Empire. It means that someone can arrive and within a few short months be an active contributing member of the Empire." Fabian said with a massive smile on his face.
"I can see how something like this could have a large impact on construction of space assets as well." Senator Johnson replied while looking at Fabian carefully.
"To a degree, as we saw when visiting the terrestrial shipyard here on Argensis, many people still work on those ships' construction. However, it is my understanding that the ship construction done in space, which accounts for the vast majority of our ships being built and is done nearly entirely automated without people." Fabian answered after thinking about it for a bit. "I sadly am not too well versed when it comes to military matters, so if you want more information on that topic, I would look up our orbital shipyards in the Archives later on or make an inquiry via your government contact."
"Interesting. I know you said earlier that most technology is owned by Hari as he is the one who invented or created it, but with these universities is new technology not coming from others? How does that even work?" Sam asked, obviously interested.
"Many many new things are coming from students and graduates of the universities; it is just my understanding that there is still a wide gap between what they are coming up with and what our Lord is able to create. This means for the time being nearly all the technology going into defending the Empire is still created by the God Emperor. So most new things made by others are primarily for the commercial market and not for the government."
"Then how do ownership rights work for those who invent or create new things?" Sam asked, something he was wondering as well. It seemed to him that there would be some protection as this was shaping up to be a market economy from what he had seen.
"The Empire has a robust series of patent laws that allow for inventors to benefit from their creations for ten years and then they start losing rights to it. This actually removes many of the problems of my home world, where people would hold on tightly to the secrets of their inventions as there were no other real protections, sadly this meant there were a number of inventions that died with their creators." Fabian replied happily, not missing a beat. It was what he expected but also an important confirmation, it seems Hari was keen on looking out for the rights of his people if this and other things he had learnt today were true, and he had no reason to believe they weren't.
"Why is the period of protection so long?" Senator Alessandra asked, clearly confused, but also got him and Sam looking at the woman in shock. Patent laws on Earth usually give twenty or more years of protection, so 10 years was already low for Earth. It seems maybe Rena has even shorter protections.
"Is that long?" Fabian asked back clearly, not sure. "My understanding is the length is designed to allow their creators to profit from their inventions while also not hindering progress too much."
"Let's go back a bit here, are there more of these terrestrial shipyards?" Senator Johnson asked, changing the entire conversation subject, something Daniel had been interested in. He did not have a good impression of this Senator, as he seemed to be sneering constantly throughout their tour at various things, and interrupting conversations to divert back to topics he was interested in. It appeared that the Rena government chose poorly in sending this man as a representative, as he looked to be slightly xenophobic at best and his behavior was most likely noted by the Empire.
"I believe that the one we toured is the only remaining terrestrial shipyard on Argensis. The others had been dismantled a year or so prior to my arrival in the Empire. There might be a second one on another planet, however nearly all ship production happens in space these days as I explained." Fabian replied in the same happy tone seemingly ignoring Senator Johnson's attitude. It was clear to him that this Senator's main goal here was to get information on the Empire's military capabilities. Even the other Senators from Rena were looking at Senator Johnson negatively.
"And where are the ground troops trained or their equipment produced?" The senator continued his line in inquiry.
"Well besides the military Academy we quickly flew over, I am only minimally informed on military matters. However, I do know Argensis is not a major military industrial center, and primarily focuses on other areas. I am sorry to say most of that information is need to know and is not something I am privileged to." Fabian answered back after thinking for a moment.
"What are the punishments for breaking any of these rules or laws we have discussed?" Teal'c asked changing the subject to something Daniel was far more interested in. Teal'c having been quiet for most of the tour simply taking in what was around them which had not been a surprise to Daniel.
"Ah a topic I am actually intimately familiar with, having been an advocate on my former planet." Fabian said with a huge smile. "Thankfully crime is quite low here as no one needs to steal or connive to get what they need to get by. What little crime there is, is unfortunately usually fights breaking out between groups or people. Sadly, tensions between newly joined Jaffa and former human slaves is not an uncommon sight. Most punishments are handled by making those who are guilty and are deemed not a risk to others, to do community service for as long as it takes to make up for the damage they have done to society when they broke the law."
"Fascinating." He said, as it was an interesting approach, rarer on Earth but some communities and nations still practiced similar approaches to punishment. "And those deemed too dangerous?" he asked.
"They are sent to the prison world Maragheto for the duration of their sentence. Those are few in number, as it is rare for someone to be such a danger to others, they can't serve out their sentence doing community service here or in other city worlds." Fabian replied seriously, his usual smile having dimmed.
"And these incidents are uncommon?" Teal'c asked again to clarify things for everyone.
"Yes, they are quite rare, and most conflicts between groups or people are non-violent in nature such as negative messages being graffitied on buildings or homes or yelling and shoving matches between groups. However, these criminals are quickly caught and after some time integrating into society these tensions become less and less an issue as differences become less as both Jaffa and Humans alike start living similar lives." Fabian said with his smile back.
"The increased tensions between Jaffa and former Human slaves makes a lot of sense to me. The heightened emotions related to the way humans and Jaffa interacted for years would not go away overnight. Even now some on Rena still look at the Jaffa negatively for their role they played in the attack on our world." Senator Alessandra stated calmly before continuing. "I could imagine many human slaves would have blamed the Jaffa for their circumstances, even if it was ultimately the Goa'uld who are the ones responsible."
"Yes, one hopes that those people can see the difference between those who enslaved them and their fellow brother and sister Jaffa who now fight and work towards the same goals as them here in the Empire. That takes time however, and as such is something that gets slowly weeded out from new arrivals. Thankfully it is widely understood in the Empire that the Jaffa were nearly just as much victims of the Goa'uld as the human slaves they were forced to police." Fabian answered what Daniel felt was honestly a fair assessment. "It is one of the primary factors for the integration process taking nearly a full year, as these truths need to be taught."
"With the influx of so many people, is it harming the economy?" Senator Gilbert asked as they flew through the air, clearly quite interested in learning more about the Empire, but unlike Senator Johnson it seemed for far more benign reasons.
"Not from what I have been able to observe or been told, if anything the opposite. Though transitioning from agrarian pursuits to other things is another hurdle as there is minimal need for farmers in the Empire." Fabian said after thinking about it for a second. "There is always far more demand for workers than there is workers to fill such roles. So much so, a few larger business leaders have been asking for more expedient integration of new arrivals so they can get more people for their workforce without having to raise salaries to extreme levels to just attract people from their existing jobs. One of my close friends, Lucas, has moved between 3 jobs in the last 4 months and seen more than a 20% increase in pay each time." the man said happily to them all, in the open vehicle, which had started to remind Daniel of an overly large limo with far better seating and windows to view the outside.
They were currently just flying over the incredibly beautiful site that Fabian called the Crystal Farms. It was nearly a dozen square miles of all things, giant purple, pink, blue, and orange crystals growing out of the rich black dirt covering ground. Some were several dozen feet tall and three or four feet wide already. Honestly it was one of the most incredible sites he had seen in his life, seeing the crystals growing randomly in various directions in an otherwise organized manner in the farm. They were flying along and in a small clearing he even saw two people who were seemingly having a picnic.
"Ah young love. It seems a couple has chosen our incredible Crystal Farms for an afternoon outing." Fabian said with a smile and a chuckle drawing everyone else's attention to the couple they could barely make out as they passed by.
"Fabian if you don't mind me asking, but what are all these crystals used for? Is it not easier to simply manufacture them?" Sam asked, having been closely observing their surroundings the entire time.
"I am not too certain on that. All I know is that supposedly naturally grown crystals are more effective for some uses Lord Hariric has for them." Regardless of the reason for the need it was incredible anyways. It was like they were growing trees made of crystal and he was all for it if it meant sites like these.
"You know there is something I have noticed since we arrived that has been bothering me, why are there so few other vehicles in the air?" Jack asked after a few moments of no one saying anything. They had started making their way back to the Capital city at this point too, so he was happy to look out at the pristine countryside as it passed by. Today had been incredibly informative and left him with lots to think about.
"Ah, I believe that is due to a number of factors. Air Cars are not cheap, and as such are something few bothers saving up to afford, as few have any need for one. Most simply use the public ring transportation system, and don't see any need for an air car. There is also the fact that some of the infrastructure to handle larger volumes of traffic are still under construction, so permits are harder to get at the moment." Fabian answered Jack.
They were flying back over the capital when Daniel saw a large gathering of people in one of the squares at the intersection of two large avenues, and standing around a large monolith or stele depending on how you looked at it, and it quickly drew his interest. There had to be nearly 300 hundred people there, and it was the first large scale gathering of people outside the Stargate facility they had seen so far.
"What is that gathering there about?" he asked Fabian while pointing the group out. Fabian looked over happily, but his face dropped slightly before looking back to Daniel with a smaller smile.
"That sadly is a group of family and friends of those lost during whichever battle that specific obelisk demarks. Each member of the Imperium that fights and dies for the Empire will have their names marked down on these monuments for all to remember and to act as a place for their loved ones to convene and mourn and/or celebrate." Fabian said with a slightly strained smile.
"I have not seen there like before." he said intrigued, as he had not heard of any Goa'uld using anything remotely similar. "Do all those lost in battle get one, or only for specific battles?" he asked
"All those since the founding of the Empire, and even some before, who died while in service of the Empire are written down on monuments like these. They are quite popular sites for families to visit and as you can see down below there are yearly even sometimes monthly large gatherings where people come together to show their respects, and even celebrate the lives of those lost and their achievements. They are seen as incredibly important to the communities they are in and as such are well taken care of." Fabian said with a more generous smile this time.
"Do you know which battle this monument remembers?" Teal'c asked without looking away from the people down below.
"Just a moment and I can find out." Fabian said with a smile before getting a far-off look while presumably using his armband and then replying. "It appears that this specific monument actually denotes those who recently lost their lives in battle against the False God Nirrti. The monument also includes the names of those who switched sides during the battle to fight against Nirrti and subsequently lost their lives as well." Fabian said seriously.
"The Empire does well to honor those who have fought and died for it." Senator Alessandra said seriously.
"And certainly not something other Goa'uld would do." Jack fired into the more subdued atmosphere in the air car. Jack had been staying uncharacteristically quiet for quite a bit of the journey, only asking a few questions here and there. It seems maybe being read the riot act on how they as a team and even the SGC itself needs to treat powerful foreign leaders and governments has helped. When things had started progressing this far with the Empire, they had gotten someone from the State Department come down on their heads on how they need to act when dealing with powerful foreign dignitaries and leaders.
"Is there a monument like this for those lost in the battle over Rena?" Senator Gilbert asked seriously and clearly sad.
"Yes, I believe there are three." Fabian answered before continuing. "The Emperor splits the names of those lost between various pillars if there are too many for a single one to ensure each person has a prominent spot on the pillar and their name easily read from 5 meters." Fabian said with another beaming smile. It was clear the man really loved the Empire he lived in and certainly may not be highly devout but loved Hari too.
"I would very much like to visit those before departing." Senator Gilbert said to Fabian.
"That should not be difficult to arrange. While personally I do not see it as such, many people feel laying down their lives in battle for the Empire is the ultimate glory they can achieve in their lifetime. As such a visit from delegates from Rena will be well received and show Rena also respects those peoples' sacrifices on that day." Fabian said far more seriously than he normally replied.
"I was wondering if it would also be possible for us to visit the inner, older looking portion of the city?" he asked, looking at Fabian in expectation. It was one of the places he was most interested in visiting, well maybe besides going back and spending some quality time in the Central Archives. A library that large was a history nerd's dream come true.
"Well, you are in some luck Doctor Jackson, as that is where we are headed right now. I felt that taking a tour on foot of the Old City and culminating in a visit to the Grand Temple would be an excellent way to end today's guided tour." Fabian said, looking at everyone to gauge their reactions. Everyone seemed to have a positive reaction, except perhaps Senator Johnson.
"And will Lord Hariric ever deign to grace us with his presence?" Senator Johnson asked, sneering. Which got the man a stern look from his colleagues, while Fabian seemingly ignored the not-so-subtle lack of respect for Hari, once again.
"Apologies. As I mentioned earlier Lord Hariric is quite busy with the ongoing campaign against Nirrti. The hope is that he will have some time to meet with us while we tour the Grand Temple in a few hours." Fabian replied quickly.
"If it's appropriate to ask, could you tell me a bit about the priesthood devoted to Lord Hariric?" he asked, trying to place what form of religious worship was practiced here. What type or form could tell you a lot about the society itself, and what they valued or prioritized.
"I don't have any close connection to the priesthood, but I am absolutely willing to answer any questions you may have to the best of my ability." Fabian replied with a smile looking at him waiting for his questions.
"How large is the priesthood here in the Empire, and what are their primary roles?" he asked quickly.
"Not too large, as there are only a few dozen devoted solely to the faith at each temple. I would think maybe 10-20 thousand members total across the Empire, with there being many more part time workers and volunteers. As I mentioned earlier some Jaffa and former slaves see building and maintaining the temples as a way to show thanks to the Emperor."
"As to their roles, primarily it seems to me that they are focused on consolidating and documenting Lord Hariric's religious program. Often that simply means they have someone following the Emperor around or reviewing footage to record what he says and any deeper messages he may have for his followers. Their other main role is to direct people in their worship of the Emperor in an appropriate manner, and act as religious figures during special events like weddings." Fabian finished after thinking about it for a moment.
"What do you mean that they show people the appropriate manner to worship Hari?" he asked, not quite sure what Fabian meant, and worried what the implications of such a thing were, but his fears were quickly doused by Fabian's response.
"As you can imagine with so many different groups comprising the Empire, there are many different ideas on how one is to worship Lord Hariric. Some forms of worship are frowned upon or even banned, such as animal sacrifices, as such the Priesthood is responsible for making sure people are directed to approved methods of worship."
"It was mentioned several times in the past during our meetings with Imperial representatives, and even Hari, that worshiping other gods is against the law here in the Empire, how has that affected the induction of new arrivals?" he asked while they walked by a large market that seemed to focus on selling art and crafts related goods. Though interestingly the question got a small chuckle out of Fabian.
"That law has been relaxed some since its inception even if it matters little. The law changed to only banning the worship of the Goa'uld or Deities linked to them, but it seems more and more that those coming to the Empire are adopting the God Emperor as their deity of choice to worship. It's hard to deny our Lord's godhood when there are so many examples to look at. About the only form of worship that has any meaningful following beside that of Lord Hariric, is ancestral worship." Fabian replied in his unusually open candor. The man was a great guide, and it could be easily seen why he was chosen for them. Though the fact he was so open with information had been an initial surprise for Daniel.
"And those who choose to worship other deities aren't singled out for persecution?" he asked as Fabian continued to answer his questions as they walked through this amazing portion of the city. While there certainly had been awe inspiring sites during their visit, looking at this pristine and incredible architecture from Earth's past had far more of his interest. Though he couldn't forget the look on Jack's face looking at the production of one of the Empire's 'Scout' class ships in the shipyard.
"Not that I am aware of." Fabian answered back while directing them over to a small building that looked like a museum or something. There was more to see on their tour it seemed.
Harry had been unexpectedly busy over the last few days with his campaign against Nirrti as they had gotten some key intel on a few locations that Nirrti was still using as a base of operations and secure storage. While the attacks on those locations had not been too complicated; decoding and figuring out what to do with a lot of the data they got from them had been.
At this point in time, he was certain Nirrti was relegated to simply flying around space in her sole remaining Ha'tak class ship, hiding out in the black of space. All the information they had captured pointed towards this being her last bastion of refuge from his troops. In fact, her having any remaining Ha'tak had been surprising. Nirrti's unique approach to managing her space had made for a slog of a war against her but was now coming to bite her in the arse, as she virtually controlled little to nothing as of now. What remained of her followers had been instructed by her to scatter and go to ground.
The fact that it was only his lack of boasting that allowed Nirrti to keep her position as a System Lord amused him to no end. If the other System Lords knew the state she was in, the first thing they would do is kick her out of their exclusive club, but more importantly it would most likely mean even more enemies of hers coming out of the woodwork to start causing problems for her. Claiming what they could have of Her's that they could take. Problems he could honestly do without and was one of the many reasons he wasn't boasting about his conquest of Nirrti's territory. He didn't need random groups of Jaffa appearing on planets he had recently conquered.
The only real thing to be thankful for was that this most likely would mean that the majority of his role personally in this conflict was coming to a close. While he would still have ships out searching his now much larger domain for Nirrti, her capture just was not one of his major priorities anymore, as she had lost much of her power and therefore the threat she posed. A single Ha'tak targeted at even his weak points would do little damage.
For now, though he had a group he was late to meet with, and if he was not lying to himself, it was one of the few things he had been looking forward to over the last two weeks. He always enjoyed his discussion with most of SG1 and even some of the sharp remarks from Jack were a breath of fresh air. Few had the gumption to speak to him like that anymore or outright reject things he says, so it was really refreshing. Then there was the fact that the representatives from Rena were also present, and he had strong hopes for their future relationship, as they would be good allies to have long term.
Regardless of his desires there were certain actions and positions that needed to be addressed with the Rena government before they would be able to get anywhere near close enough relations wise to even start doing things like joint military exercises. There was much work to do on improving their relationship, and that is why the information he had been given on his arrival was... annoying to say the least.
It was weird it felt like some things were progressing so quickly, and yet at times he felt that things were going by at a snail's pace. It was incredibly odd, to feel you have tons of time to work on projects as you try to fill your day while on campaign, and then at the same time feel there are tons of things you need to get done, but don't have enough time to get to. Like the fact that he was in dire need of more people to man his ships, while his civilian side of his government was struggling to handle the sure volume of new arrivals on their planets to be integrated into the Empire.
This led to one of the biggest limiting factors for the recent campaign against Nirrti being that he could only field a limited number of ships due to the limited numbers of crews available. Once the firsts OCY had finished, his number of ships had started to quickly out pace his number of trained personnel to man them with. Thankfully there was quite a bit of automation, so crew numbers could be way under their optimal operating numbers, but that still was only a temporary fix, and he was quite looking forward to the graduation this year at the Naval Academy.
He was thinking about all this while walking through the Grand Temple on his way to their guests who were touring around nearby. One thing that had been fairly apparent with his few weeks away from Argensis was that fact that the Grand Temple truly was a focal point of what he has been calling the Faith energy that seems to give him a tiny boost in power. Since being gone it was more noticeable than ever before and he could clearly sense it concentrating at the temple where many came to pray. It was an interesting development and not something he had any real knowledge on, and the books he had brought from the wizarding world were no help whatsoever.
What was clear to him now was that the number of people praying to him had a linear effect on the amount of faith energy he accumulated. For now, with the numbers of people in his empire only still in the double-digit millions, it had a marginal effect on his overall magical growth. The results of the energy he was getting were interestingly enough also affecting more than just his magical growth, as it was having a qualitative effect on his soul, changing it slightly, making it well.. more, all the while directly increasing his overall magical strength. It was still an ongoing learning process, but at the same time not something he had been sparing a lot of time to investigate.
He just spotted the tour group and prepared himself for the coming confrontation. How Senator Johnson thought he could smuggle an explosive device in like that was beyond him. To be honest, he had not been expecting at all to have to deal with a suicide bomber of all things. It almost reminded him of the 'Troubles' in Ireland. Hopefully the Senator wasn't being coerced into doing this, as having to deal with someone's family being taken hostage or some other means of motivation was simply not an issue he wanted to have to deal with. It would be far simpler if that man was just a fanatical supporter of his cause willing to kill and die for it.
At least there was the bonus of being able to chat with Jack while dealing with the situation, Jack who was one of the few people besides Dobby and his loves that were willing to needle him. It was refreshing and then there was Major Carter, who he always loved talking shop with, and even looking at, she was gorgeous inside and out. The silver linings were what he needed to keep in mind as he plastered a smile on his face.
While she could admire the architecture like Daniel, she was far more interested in the way that technology had been subtly incorporated into the design of the old city they were in. It clearly showed that the people of Argensis were taking extra effort to ensure the look and feel of the area was maintained. However, the Grand Temple they were touring around did have a bit more of a modern feel to it than some of what she assumed was the more historically correct old city. Even one of the Ring platforms off to the side of the walkway they were on was incorporated to look like a floor mosaic and not their typical look seen around the planet.
It was mainly the small things like that started to add up together to make the incredibly advanced feel of the planet they were touring. Not to discount the incredible sights like the ground side shipyard they had gotten a quick tour of or the colossal university under construction, but there was still something about the planet that made it stand out from other advanced ones she had visited. There was just something in the air, it felt cleaner, and even more lively somehow, even if like now it was fairly quiet and certainly wasn't congested with people.
Her perusal of various interesting sights was distracted by her catching sight of Hari approaching them, the one person she was really looking forward to seeing. The man was tall and had that imposing presence he always carried with him, but Sam would be lying if she didn't find the man very attractive. It was like they put the mind of one of the best scientists in the world in the body of an Olympic swimmer who also happened to be a model with superpowers.
She liked what she saw, but also knew nothing ever would or could happen, but that didn't stop her from appreciating. Maybe it was a bit of her loneliness and lack of a love life that was getting to her. While the Star Empire and Earth were for now going to be trade partners, and possibly even more in the future, that was all still up in the air. There was still a small chance that they ended up as enemies of the Empire, but she felt that was becoming less likely as time went on. Still watching Hari approach was a nice sight.
It only took a few moments for the others in their group to notice Hari's approach as his presence was nearly impossible to miss regardless of if you were looking at him or not. It was a tangible thing, and you could feel it getting stronger the closer he approached; it was things like this that caused her to question rejecting the truth of some of Hari's claims. Their group halted their movement and waited for Hari who was walking alone to finish arriving and quickly she could see the tension in various members of their group going way up.
"Greetings my lord!" Fabian said excitedly while he bowed low in obvious reverence for Hari.
"Fabian White. It is good to meet you, and I am glad you have settled in so well here on Argensis. Thank you for taking your time today to show our guests around our wonderful world. I apologize for being tardy, but I was delayed with the current ongoing military operations against Nirrti. I hope there were no issues?" Hari asked Fabian who looked ecstatic and was about to respond before Hari's demeanor suddenly shifted and he looked sharply at Senator Johnson who looked conspicuous and oddly had both hands in his pockets.
"Ah, it seems you truly are a fool. I had been holding out a slim bit of hope Senator Johnson, for what, I am unsure, but it seems we found the target and reason for you bringing that fusion bomb with you today that you have so well hidden away in your stomach." Hari sharply addressed Senator Johnson causing the man to blanch and go white before sputtering out an answer. It also caused her and everyone else who realized what was going on to look at the Senator with extremely negative looks. It seems that this disgusting overweight man had just tried to blow them all up!
"Wha.. what bomb?!" The Senator replied, clearly flummoxed himself, even if his answer was not at all a convincing lie. She looked down to the man's stomach area and could not notice anything abnormal under the man's admittedly nice clothing.
"The bomb that is in your stomach cavity. The one you just tried to set off with that switch in your pocket." Hari said angrily looking at the man who quickly drew his hand from his pocket. A bit too late... "I was interested to know who or what your target was, so we only disabled the device on your arrival and allowed you to continue on." Hari said, looking at the man in ridicule.
"What! It's not a bomb, just an advanced sensor to get more information on you and your people and to make sure we are ready for when we are finally betrayed by you!" Johnson's answer started out weak only to gain a bit of strength as he went on. Regardless, even if the man was telling the truth, it was clear he had been duped and she had no problem believing Hari and his people's claims.
"If I was any less capable, I would not be able to tell that you're in fact telling the truth about believing it to be a sensor. Sadly, I am here to inform you that you have been misled and that you're carrying a powerful bomb in your stomach." Hari said to the Senator who was quickly losing all color in his face. "But it does not remove your culpability in this act, nor your stupidity to allow yourself to be turned into a suicide bomber." Hari said angrily, having simply stood where he was while glaring at the senator. "Take him into custody and to holding to be processed." Hari said to the air, making her wonder who he was talking to just before three Elves dressed in dark uniforms appeared out of nowhere and bowed to Hari before snapping their fingers and disappearing with the Senator. All in a matter of seconds.
"Are you certain he had a bomb on.. in him?" Daniel asked just before it seemed one of the other guests from Rena were going to say something having recovered from their shock at how quickly things happened.
"Yes Doctor Jackson, the fusion bomb was detected immediately on his arrival and was disabled via the beaming technology we obtained from the people of Rena and improved upon all before the shield around the stargate landing area was deactivated. Allowing an active weapon to move around the planet is obviously not acceptable." Hari replied confidently, but clearly not happy with the situation, but far less upset than she would have expected of someone who just had an assassination attempt made on them. Personally, she was still reeling from the fact that had Hari or his people not taken action or discovered the plot in the first place she could have just been murdered here on a peaceful tour of a temple.
"If that is true, I hope you understand that Senator Johnson was not acting on behalf of the Rena government, and had we have known about his plans we would have taken swift action ourselves to prevent them from going forward." Senator Alessandra replied seriously and contritely.
"While I don't hold the actions of an individual against the whole, it is clear here that Senator Johnson was not acting alone, and as such I will expect the Rena government to take appropriate actions to ensure such an event like this does not occur again and the other perpetrators are held accountable." Hari said seriously to the Senator. "While my life was never in danger, that explosive was strong enough to damage many nearby structures and would have been responsible for dozens of deaths; you all included." Hari said reminding them that he was not normal, not that a reminder was needed. Does he truly not fear death or maybe the destruction of his body truly doesn't mean death for him, or it wouldn't have destroyed him anyways?
"And we are just supposed to believe you that the Senator had a bomb?" Jack asked with a bit of attitude, but it was clear the Colonel was not having any issue believing what was being told. Senator Johnson had been giving off a shifty vibe the entire tour, as if he was too good to be there with them touring Argensis, quite unlike SG-1 or his own colleagues who were all happy to be on the tour. Whereas everyone else was at least interested in the tour if not excited, even Teal'c in his own way, made the Senator's behavior stand out even more.
"I require no faith. There is ample evidence from our sensors and such. Then there is the fact that we only disabled the device, and didn't entirely remove it from the Senator's stomach. We will leave that to the Rena government after we turn the Senator back over to them when we are finished with him. We have little desire to hold onto the man as long as Rena commits to ensuring that he will see proper consequences." Hari replied to Jack with a smile.
"We are thankful that you are willing to defer to the Rena government in a situation like this. Not many would. And I will ensure that if Senator Johnson is guilty of the crimes he is accused of, that he will feel the full wrath of Rena law. Any collaborator of his will be found and caught!" Senator Gilbert was certainly upset, and who wouldn't be with one of their colleagues possibly having just tried to set off a bomb that would have taken your own life. It didn't hurt that Senator Gilbert also seemingly did not have a good relationship with Senator Johnson, as was clear from the start of their tour. Seems politics is the same in most places.
"Unfortunately, my lord, if I may be so bold to say so," Fabian started getting a nod from Hari to continue. "If word of this gets out, then I do believe many people will be extremely upset at the attempt on your life and even the act of trying to damage the Grand Temple." Fabian said angrily, and for the first time Sam saw the man clearly upset. "There are many who would not be as accepting, especially after the aid we provided to Rena, for the Senator to not face justice here." Fabian said, looking over at the other Senators, having reigned in his anger a bit.
"I understand their feelings, truly I do more than most would know. However, as I said earlier, we cannot hold the actions of lone individuals against the whole when they played no part. I can see the souls of the other two guests here from Rena and neither are bad people nor desire to do us harm. And preventing the Rena government and people from holding their own Senator accountable would be removing their own right to justice." Hari replied seriously to Fabian who was nodding along before bowing his head slightly at the end. "Sadly, I do believe we will need to cut this tour short to deal with this situation." Hari said before looking at her and then the rest of SG-1 before speaking again. "I had been hoping to be able to show you all around personally to a few places I am especially proud of, but it looks like that will need to be postponed."
"Well honestly, I don't mind continuing the tour even with the attempted murder." Jack said in a laughing manner but got a serious response back from Senator Alessandra.
"I agree. We should not allow Senator Johnson's actions here to damage or interrupt our tour and worsen relations between our peoples. I have been looking forward to seeing more of the Grand Temple all day, and certainly anything you are interested in showing us Lord Hariric is worthwhile to see." Senator Alessandra said while bowing slightly to Hari.
"Then let us continue. I know Major Carter here has been looking forward to seeing an example of a wardstone since I explained what they were to her some time ago." Hari said getting her attention as it had been something she mentioned interest into Hari during his visit to the SGC.
"I didn't think that was something we could see. Is it not considered a security risk showing people the wardstone?" she asked. He had explained to her previously that the wardstone was responsible for planetary shield defenses, and only a little bit more; so, her excitement was totally heightened. Their discussion on the topic had been so short, so she wasn't certain on any details about wardstones, and was one of the reasons she was so excited to see the technology. As even if it ran off magic as Hari states, it still sounded like technology to her that was simply powered by a different energy source.
"Ah you are referring to the planetary wardstone, but there is also one that covers most of the city and temple that we can look at, to give you all an example of magic being applied to great effects." Hari said excitedly as he usually did when magic was brought up. It was clear the man loved talking about magic similarly to how she felt about technology. The conversation continued as the group walked further down the path and into the temple, Senator Johnson seemingly forgotten as being an unimportant blip in their day.
"Teal'c thank you for joining me." Hari said as the often-stoic Jaffa walked into the small room off the central area of the Central Archives just a bit away from the rest of their tour group. The group was looking at all things plans for the Colosseum that they were going to visit tomorrow for a concert that was going on. "I felt while we had the opportunity, it would be best to offer you the chance to ask any questions you may have had in relations to your family possibly moving to the Empire." he said looking at the man whose face changed little, but he could feel the man tensing up slightly at the serious topic.
Teal'c was a large and imposing man, but with the magical enhancement Hari had made and the various potions to fix his physique, not to mention his growing magical power and the effects it had on the rituals he performed, he was now taller and stronger than the Jaffa. He had thought about using this opportunity to try and turn Teal'c to his side, but felt it wasn't worth as much as simply going through with his offer.
Teal'c looked around the near empty room quickly before looking back at him. It was clear to him that Teal'c wasn't upset with what he had seen, but if Hari was going by just what he could see then he would have had a much harder time telling. Thankfully he had his magic that gave him most of the information he needed, Teal'c was anxious but excited. Just as he was about to start talking again, Daniel Jackson also walked into the room. Deciding to copy the Jaffa, he raised his eyebrow at the good Doctor.
"Coming to support your friend in his dire time of need?" he asked with humor to Daniel who smiled in return, the tension in the room being cut through with the simple small joke as a smile even graced Teal'c face.
"Well.. yes. I am always willing to aid Teal'c when able." Daniel replied back while walking fully into the room.
"Your support is not unwelcome Daniel Jackson." Teal'c replied to the man and smiled. "If my family came here, would they be free to move around as they please? Visit other worlds as needed?" Teal'c asked, the tone back to an entirely serious manner.
"I am sorry to say, but no." he replied back quickly before explaining. "While movement on the planet they reside on is only restricted in a few secure areas, travel off world is highly restricted. Travel to other planets outside the Empire via the Stargate requires proper prior permissions, and there must be a reasonable need to do so. Which is rarely granted. Taking a trip to a planet to just visit family or friends is not a reasonable need. Even traveling to certain planets within the Empire is highly restricted as well." he said knowing that it was probably not the answer that Teal'c wanted, but for the safety of the Star Empire and his people, this was not going to be changing for some time.
If he allowed people to travel to other worlds outside the Empire, it would only be a matter of days before word of what he was doing got out, and that timeframe would be disastrous. Too short for him to have all his ducks in a row to not care too much about word spreading. It was inevitable that information about the Empire would leak, however how quickly that happens is something he strongly wants to control and limit. Spies can't visit and report back if transportation and transmissions off world were highly limited or outright prevented.
Even going to other planets that were parts of the empire were somewhat restricted, except for a few population centers. For now, there was little reason for people to be traveling to various mining planets without a reason to be there, and there certainly was not a reason for them to be going to more secure locations like the first Stronghold planet that protects the Ancient genetic manipulations machine. The only major issue this has been causing was the fact that even a few planets where he had relocated populations from were now restricted from travel as well, and several people wanted to visit their former home worlds. Even if it's just to see the sights, as those planets no longer had people living on them and most structures had been fully removed.
"And would my family be able to see the same benefits as the rest of your people?" Teal'c asked, his tone not changing the entire conversation so far, keeping to his serious manner.
"Yes, along with some of the same obligations all citizens face." he replied back.
"Such as?" Daniel asked, clearly having just beaten Teal'c to the question.
"Each person living within the Empire has certain obligations. Like a minimum level of education, following the legal code, etc. I will have a more detailed list sent to you Teal'c so if your family does decide to live here, they can know what they are responsible for and entitled to."
"And what tasks or work would be required of them?" Teal'c asked his next question, not having given much away on what he was thinking.
"None. Everyone living within the Empire has the option to work or not. Extremely basic necessities are provided to all for free, and people are only encouraged to work to provide themselves with better living conditions and luxuries."
"So, the Empire is truly moving towards being a post scarcity society?" Daniel asked, derailing the conversation slightly.
"In some regards yes, in others not so much. It makes little sense to not provide certain resources and needs for nearly free when they can be produced in such volumes and at such low prices for us. Other goods and services still fall within normal demand and supply cycles." he replied back, dipping into the little bit of economics he had acquired over the years.
"What if my wife and son decided they no longer wished to live within the Empire and wanted to leave permanently?" Teal'c asked, bringing the conversation back to its main topic and being even more serious now, but the question did have him thinking as there were many implications to his answer.
"If it's within the next 3 years, I will most likely just need to remove some of their memories related to information on the Empire and living here. If it's after that, then they would most likely be able to leave at their leisure." he replied back honestly.
"You can do that?" Daniel asked in shock, giving him a look of surprise clearly talking about removing memories.
"It is well within my power." he answered back calmly, looking at Daniel before looking back at Teal'c. Even Teal'c seemed slightly surprised, but quickly schooled his expression.
"And there are no side effects?" The large Jaffa asked.
"None besides some gaps in their memory." he replied, as Teal'c moved off to a window to look out over the city view.
"If I may ask, why are you even offering this opportunity to Teal'c's family in the first place?" Daniel posited after a small lul in the conversation as Teal'c thought something over. He looked at the man and thought it over slightly before answering, deciding on how honest he should be.
"There are a number of factors, and if I am being honest, being closer to Earth and the SGC is one such factor, however it is not the biggest." he said while looking over at Teal'c who had turned back to them to ostensibly observe him while giving his answer. "The primary reason is that it is my belief that within the next decade or so the Jaffa will make major strides towards gaining their freedom and independence from the Goa'uld. So, fostering good relations with some of the more prominent Jaffa who are predisposed to aiding their fellows in their bid for freedom will only benefit the Empire long term." he said observing his guests to see their thoughts.
Both seemed to be surprised but Teal'c's surprise quickly faded into a small amount of satisfaction Hari could feel emanating from the man. Daniel seemed far more surprised though, before becoming excited, and rearing to interject; but Teal'c beat him to it.
"Truly you believe my brothers will gain their freedom so soon?" Teal'c asked seriously.
"Yes, to me it's only a matter of time, and with the death of Ra and the Tauri's march into the galaxy that period is rapidly approaching us. Too many Goa'uld have put their power into the hands of their Jaffa, and the clock is ticking on when those same Jaffa decide to take that power for themselves."
"Incredible, and you think this is coming soon?" Daniel asked, repeating essentially the same question in his excitement.
"Yes. With the efforts of a number of people and groups around the galaxy, it feels to me that a decade is a conservative estimate." he answered the doctor. "Teal'c's public betrayal of Apophis has only accelerated that time frame, and is another reason for the admittedly, overly rapid societal changes going on here in the Empire." he said with a chuckle and some more honesty.
"How so?" Daniel questioned.
"Well, I had originally thought I would have a few more decades, but events have brought that time table up a lot. Specifically, the death of Ra." he said looking squarely at Daniel Jackson.
"Ah yes, well that was not our intention when we first went through the gate." Daniel said rapidly trying to defend their actions.
"I don't think many here will blame you Daniel, simply that it moved my timetables up substantially, and has added a level of uncertainty that is undesirable. However, as I said, I feel it's one of the key events that will lead to a widespread Jaffa uprising, and so I don't feel you will find many that would reprimand you or the SGC for your actions. I quite like a galaxy without Ra in it." he said the last bit with a big smile, getting one in return from the two men.
"And you don't fear any uprising here in the Empire?" Daniel asked.
"Do you feel I need to fear one?" he asked back, raising an eyebrow, clearly knowing the answer. However, it was Teal'c who answered.
"Unlikely. The loyalty of your subjects is without question. Would Rosha have to give up her Prim'ta?" Teal'c asked a question he hadn't thought about. He knew some Jaffa feared giving up their Goa'uld larva, as if it would make them weaker, or lesser than they had been. He however had worked hard on improving the various options Jaffa had when removing the larva Goa'uld from their stomachs. The genetic augmentations done by his nanites to Jaffa to fix their immune systems and remove the pouch provided more benefits than they had previously with the Prim'ta. Faster, stronger, and of course healthier.
It was something he was looking far more closely at for several reasons, but the main one was actually personal. It all mainly had to go back to the trinity of power, being the mind, body, and soul. Each had a major impact on his power, with his magical core being analogous to his soul, which had been increasing by leaps and bounds for years now since he first underwent a ritual to boost his power and augment his magical growth back in the Wizarding world. With the constant strain he was putting on his core primarily from the drain the Elves were putting on him, but also various wardstones and daily use, his core had not stopped expanding and growing at an incredible rate. Or well 'growing' as it was not really gaining size, but constantly becoming more and more dense and refined as time went on.
Even his mind had undergone substantial growth when the Goa'uld symbiote had been incorporated into his body, acting like a second extremely dense brain. This allowed for his mind or mental ability to expand greatly, but it also lacked somewhat in the quality he was looking for and only acted like a temporary crutch as he worked on evolving or improving his brain or mental abilities. Spending some time with Oma and seeing her abilities simply from using her mental powers, had opened up an entirely new avenue of growth for him. He had quantity now he needed quality. Something he was steadily working on. Interestingly enough the small amount of Faith energy he was getting from his subjects was helping in this department, but also in expanding and refining his soul; albeit extremely slowly.
Lastly and easily the worst off was his body. While he had done a number of rituals and even taken some elixirs to improve his body, most of those simply added on to the existing body, not actually changing it. And to boot they were mostly tied to his soul and not the body itself. This did make it nice as when he 'possessed' one of his clones the effects of the ritual also passed onto the clone, but that didn't address the fact that his baseline body was only marginally better than a normal human, minus the changes he had made to his skeletal structure by replacing most of his bones. The only real thing that has had a major impact on his body, was the effect of the shard of the Basilisk fang that had embedded in his shoulder blade, and the tears of the phoenix, both of which had a fairly profound effect on his blood, and even his DNA.
So, he had been working on a template to further genetically alter his body, symbiote included, that would drastically increase all his stats, but most importantly for him at the moment, also evolving his brain to a degree that he was hoping he would be able to start using some psychic abilities Oma has displayed. Sadly, that was a small hope as his knowledge on biology was only so far along, even with the help of all the Memories of Pelops and his augmentation of the Jaffa. This was all something he planned to try out with his next clone, as he hadn't felt the need to ditch his current body simply for an upgrade.
"She would." he answered Teal'c naturally after thinking over the question. "While I would like to say that all Goa'uld symbiotes are banned within the Empire, sadly that is not the case, as the Tok'ra are welcome on some of my planets. However, all Jaffa are required to rid themselves of their Prim'ta and are provided several options as replacements. If your family came to live here the more permanent options will also be available to them."
"Permanent options?" Daniel asked for him to clarify.
"Yes, for instance, genetic manipulation rather than an ongoing medication." he replied, having already shared some of this info with the SGC it didn't hurt to reiterate it. "Regardless of their choice, they must make one, as having the risk of a Prim'ta maturing and attempting to take a host in the Empire is too obvious of a risk to not remove it outright. Especially when there are a number of other large negatives to having Jaffa that need a Prim'ta."
"If you would satisfy my curiosity, what are some of the other reasons to switch away from using a Prim'ta?" Daniel asked again, ever the intellectual seeking new knowledge. He looked at the Doctor before quickly deciding there was limited reason to hold back on this topic.
"A prominent reason is the population of Jaffa being limited by the number of Prim'ta you have or can produce. This is why many of the Jaffa armies of various System Lords are only so large, when they could easily support much larger armies. It is also why Goa'uld queens are considered extremely valuable strategic resources. Having so many Jaffa packing a Prim'ta who are moving about also prevents or massively impacts those who can sense a Goa'uld nearby. Not that it's a major concern here on Argensis, but it could be quite valuable to easily be able to determine if someone is a host without sensors or some other method on other planets." he answered back.
"It is also a major weakness that can be exploited, with a simple knife to that region or perhaps a poison gas that targets specifically Goa'uld. Finally, there are the myriad cultural reasons, mainly being that fact that it is a large tie between the Jaffa and the Goa'uld, removing said tie, makes it far easier for the Jaffa to seek independent action and make decisions for themselves." He continued, but left out the fact that he wanted to more quickly integrate the Jaffa and humans into the greater Imperial culture. Which sadly means that many traditions of the Jaffa needed to go, same with many of the Human groups joining the Empire. Personally, he didn't put much faith into traditions, because if they need to go, they should just go and people shouldn't wallow in the past simply because that is how things were done.
"Fascinating. I never realized the lack of Symbiotes was a reason for the smaller armies fielded by the Goa'uld. I had always wondered why there weren't larger armies facing us through the gate." Daniel said excitedly and with a lot of enthusiasm that was contagious causing him to smile. Teal'c nodded in agreement, seemingly well aware of the issue. Many Goa'uld even put limits on how many children a Jaffa could have, or even required outright permission to keep population numbers under control. "I know the Empire seems to be doing a good job trying to preserve the cultures joining, but I hope enough effort is being put in?"
"It is often a struggle to find enough qualified people to aid in the transition, however we do put in the effort as you have noticed, but to say it's our highest priority would be a lie." he said seriously before continuing at the look on Daniel's face, trying to find the right words for the Doctor, who puts the cultural value of a people extremely high. "Currently the Empire's highest priority has to do with ensuring our security and ongoing development. There are many who see us as enemies across the Galaxy and it would be negligent of me not to ensure we are prepared for the worst-case scenarios."
"You still fear the Goa'uld?" Teal'c asked, looking at him seriously as if to assess his answer.
"Yes. While no single System Lord would be a danger to us, if several of them ganged up together they could pose a massive threat to The Star Empire. We are simply not at the point yet where we are powerful enough to openly and fully confront the Goa'uld Empire controlling this Galaxy." he said back honestly, reiterating the same message he had been hinting at and spelling out to the people of Earth.
"You seem to indicate it's only a matter of time before you are prepared to openly confront the Goa'uld?" Daniel asked, and he could sense from the man that he honestly no longer associated him with the Goa'uld, which was great for him. At least one down, though he felt Major Carter was also well along the way too. Jack and Teal'c were still open questions.
"As I said, Jaffa like Teal'c here will more than likely bring about a revolution within the next decade now that Ra is dead. It would only be proper for the Empire to be prepared to openly confront the Goa'uld within that time, no?" he rhetorically asked Daniel, getting a look of shock on the Doctor's face, and one of surprise but happiness on Teal'c's. "Every year the Empire is given to prepare, we are exponentially more capable to confront the Goa'uld System Lords. That said, I don't pretend to not expect something disastrous to occur unrelated to the Goa'uld that will throw some wrench in my timetables, but that is simply life." he said the last portion a bit exacerbated, as he better than anyone knew about his bipolar luck.
"I think there will be a number of people on Earth that will be happy to hear that." Daniel said after a moment.
"Sadly, my time is extremely limited, as it was already hard to set aside the time to join on the tour for the time I have, and now I will be dealing with a delegation from Rena coming to handle the situation with their senator." He said before looking towards Teal'c. "So, if you have any more questions for me, now would be the time."
"Do you give me your word that my family will be safe here?" Teal'c asked extremely seriously, giving him a steady piercing look.
"Yes, I will protect them as well as anyone living in the Empire can expect. They should be safer here than anywhere else I can think of." he said back just as seriously. It was funny seeing Daniel out of the corner of his eye looking quickly back and forth between the two of them.
Teal'c however simply nodded then walked from the room, leaving just him and Daniel standing there.
"Is he always like that?" he asked the Doctor who he was quickly becoming acquainted with and liked what he saw in the man. Daniel had principles he stood by, and most of those principles are those others could easily respect if not always agree with. He is good people, and another reason Hari enjoyed interacting with SG1 and some of the people he had met on Earth. The SGC seemed to be quite full of quality individuals if he thought about it.
"Yes often, so don't take it personally." Daniel said with a smile, before continuing. "I think that went well, but if you have a few moments to spare, do you think you could answer a few questions for me?" Daniel asked, pointing out to him why the Doctor reminded him so much of Hermione.
"Certainly, as I said I have a few moments" he replied with a smile.
"So, are you truly a god?" Daniel asked, surprising him by asking the same questions again, before the man's face split into a small smile and he continued with a laugh in his voice. "Only joking. I think I am coming to understand what you first said when we met and have repeated many times, that it depends on one's definition of whether you are a god or not. And I am not too certain it matters much when so many people believe you are a god, but what do you personally think?" Daniel asked, having finally gotten to his question. It had him pausing as he decided on how to answer, or more realistically how honest he should be.
"There are times when I question the answer to that very question Daniel." he said looking at the man, getting the Doctor's full attention before looking out over the city again. When he had all his thoughts in order he continued. "Like yourself I was born to two loving parents, each themselves wielding great power, albeit a far from what I am capable of today. My people are born with the ability to manipulate the universe to their will, admittedly though, to far more limited capability than myself, and yet they can still change the fundamental rules and laws of the universe by simply exerting some power and will. It was a very strong belief amongst my people that they were descended from the gods, or demi-gods to be more specific.
"Even with all their power, my people are still far from being gods, and this is where I come in. I through a number of circumstances have far far exceeded my people in power, to the point it is hilarious to compare us. While I share many similarities to my people now, my power in scope, scale and capability no longer compares. If my people were seen as almost being demi-gods, what does that make me today? At the same time, I know my limitations and where I fall short in my own definition better than anyone and they do exist." he said letting that sit in the room a bit before continuing only glancing at Daniel to realize he had the doctors rapt attention.
"For example, I can summon the spirit of someone dead back temporarily or even resurrect someone from death, but I have no power over the afterlife that I am conscious of, nor do I control where souls go when they die. And yet at the same time I can feel an extremely small but real effect on my power from the many faithful who pray to me. It is these moments that I question the varsity of my internal doubt; have I truly reached godhood, or simply teetering at the edge? So, to answer your question, most of the time I don't feel like a god, but then there are situations where the reality of my godhood smacks me fully in the face and I have to reassess." he answered honestly, not having truly thought about it in some time. And he was being honest in that he was not so sure anymore if he didn't count as a god or not, unlike before when he had simply been pretending. Though he was still leaning towards not. It took a few moments for Daniel to collect his thoughts before replying.
"So, if I understand you correctly, you can actually bring someone back from the dead without a sarcophagus?" Daniel asked, obviously shocked.
"Yes; but if someone has been dead for a longer period of time, their soul will already have transitioned into the afterlife and become for lack of a better word acclimatized to the afterlife." It was more complex than that and from what he has been able to study so far, souls seemed to be almost quantum in nature, and some appeared to know they were going to be resurrected in the future, even the far distant future, and so would stick around, others not so much. It was quite confusing and an intriguing area of study for him.
"The simple act of being on this plane of existence will start out being uncomfortable for those souls who have acclimatized to the afterlife before quickly becoming excruciating, hence why I will not even do so to bring my own parents back to life. Summoning one's spirit temporarily to talk with if far less invasive and while it is something I am willing to do, I will only do so once for any specific soul and ONLY if the reasons are great enough to warrant disrupting their final rest." he answered back feeling much freer to share this information as he didn't feel it was that important to keep secret. It was nice at times to talk about his powers and their limitations. His discussions with Dobby and Oma could only scratch so much of that itch, and he was still careful in what he ultimately shared with Oma. Maybe there was even an element of him showing off a bit to someone he was starting to see as a friend or close acquaintance.
"Incredible! Fascinating! There is truly a lot to unpack there, and I think it may take me time to realize some of the implications of what you just told me." Daniel said after a few moments breaking out of his stupor. "I am coming to understand your uncertain answer to my question. But could you clarify one thing for me, you gain power from your followers praying?" Daniel asked the last bit clearly perplexed, yet clearly incredibly intrigued.
"Yes, that came as much of a surprise to me as it does you. And it took me quite some time to realize that it was even happening. The amount of power I gain from such a method is so minimal and far out stripped by my natural growth that I didn't even realize something was happening for quite some time. But yes, it does seem that I do gain power from the Faith of my followers, even if it is an incredibly small amount. It is one of the major factors that causes me to hesitate in my answer to your question."
"If I understand correctly the more followers you have the more power you would gain, why then don't you then just mandate all people in the Empire pray to you?" Daniel was clearly very interested in the topic. He wasn't surprised it was an incredibly fascinating little quirk of the whole situation, nor that Daniel went there with his thought process.
"For one I don't believe in forcing people into any faith. Even the outright ban on worshiping the Goa'uld doesn't fully sit well with me. Some people even here to this day still truly believe the Goa'uld are gods, thankfully they make up a tiny tiny portion of the population. Secondly, while I am not certain, I would not be surprised if the effect only occurred when those of true faith pray that I gain anything from it. Therefore, forcing people to convert or trying to push the religion would most likely have the opposite effect.'' He answered back having given the idea some thought, and while he did believe it required true faith to have an effect, he also was not stopping the Priesthood from spreading his faith. The benefit was miniscule at the moment, but it could build on itself over time to have a noticeable impact.
"Hmm that could make some sense." Daniel said while thinking, clearly in his researcher mode. "I know you refer to your power as magic, but is there another term you use or way you perceive it?" Daniel asked, getting into another interesting discussion, and starting a long conversation that resulted in him being super late for his next meeting. Though he wouldn't have chosen differently, chatting with Daniel so casually had been a balm on his soul after the day dealing with the fallout of Senator Johnson.
"My lord I have to ask, why have you allowed the people of Rena to take permanent custody of that.. scum? Once word spreads, there will be many that will be angry that the Senator won't face harsh punishment here on Argensis for his crimes." His first Prime Gelon asked, causing him to look over to the now highly important man of the Empire. Gelon ran almost the entire day to day operations of the military and worked diligently to ensure whatever plans Hari came up with were executed, quickly and efficiently; all the while ensuring the quality the Empire was becoming known for, at least internally, was maintained.
"A few reasons," he replied calmly. "Foremost, it is a low conscience test to challenge and give us a good idea on how much going forward we will be able to rely on our growing allies, the people of Rena. We lose little and gain much in value by seeing how they handle the prosecution of one of their own who is guilty of crimes against us. And as much as we have been working diligently to create and cover all the bases with our new legal code, it is sadly just not yet robust enough to handle prosecuting a foreign dignitary. And finally, I don't want to have to deal with the extra work trying to prosecute the man would entail." he said the last bit with a smile and humor but was being entirely honest.
"Even so, there will be many that will be upset, my lord." Gelon said as the gate shut down, having finished transporting the legal and security representatives who came from Rena to collect said forthwith Senator. The initial conversation with the Government representatives of Rena and how serious they were taking the situation only lent credence that this was the right path forward. However, only time will truly tell, and even if it turns out poorly, Rena only has so much to offer the Empire. He had already gotten most of the tech he was interested in, and now it was only their ongoing contributions their highly educated population was making.
"How is Melina?" he asked, changing the topic and getting an update on one of his favorite subjects.
"She is excelling my Lord. I cannot be any prouder than seeing her constant progress in learning new things and expanding her breadth of knowledge." Gelon said with a massive smile on his face, talking about his daughter was a topic that didn't fail to bring a smile to his First Prime's face. "She has only cemented her convictions to become one of the great scientists of the Empire and produce technological wonders herself to alleviate some of the burden upon you, my Lord." Gelon chuckled a bit at the end.
"Hopefully she is not pushing herself too hard." he said with a smile of his own. It was nice to hear about his people succeeding. "I can manage for some time still, that said I am truly looking forward to the day that my people start coming up with technology that pleasantly surprises even me. How are the crews for our ships progressing?" he asked back.
"Sadly, bringing our ships up to full crew compliments is going slower than I had hoped. Even with the recent graduating class from the Naval Academy, we are barely meeting the demands for the bare minimum crews for new ships being produced. Let alone filling out the crews on existing ships. We will need to either expand the academies or plan for a reduction in ship's being produced."
"And how many ships are we at now?" he asked, already knowing the number but just wanting confirmation or maybe it was to give his First Prime the option to add any additional information he deemed necessary. It was exciting to think how quickly their fleet was growing. His automated shipyards, the OCYs, that could even build themselves from their eggs, were simple genius that were paying major dividends already.
"As of this morning we are at 19 Scouts and the third Poseidon Class is due to roll out of its shipyard in ten days."
"And you still believe moving the second complete Poseidon Class to S-1 was the correct move?" he asked back, having given more freedom to his First Prime to make decisions but he felt it was important to review those decisions, as no one was perfect and even he was still learning. To be honest, large scale military actions, and everything that went into making that happen was an area that he was truly lacking in. It was only thanks to memories from Pelops that he wasn't a complete amateur.
"Yes. While it would benefit the static defensive satellites here on Argensis a bit when defending the planet, it will provide far more protection over S-1 and be able to respond much easier to issues in that region of space. As we conquer more and more of Nirriti's former domain towards the Tau'ri home world, Argensis itself is becoming less and less centrally located in the Empire. As such I do still believe having more assets over S-1 will only aid in defending the entire Empire as a whole. That doesn't even take into account the importance you have placed on the device housed there." Gelon passionately defended his decision he had made to move the second Poseidon Class. Hari smiled back at how far his First Prime had come, even willing to argue his position to him.
"Good, then I am glad we are in agreement about the move." he said back lightly to his first prime with a smile. "You have done an excellent job Gelon and have been doing me and the Empire proud." he said, giving a bit of a break before he changed the subject. "Oh and Gelon, Senator Johnson didn't get away scott free, I cursed him before he left." he said with a sneaky smile.
"With what, if I may ask my Lord?" Gelon asked, looking intrigued, and a tiny bit shocked.
"Impotency. The more attractive he finds someone, imaginary or not, the harder he will find it to... well get it up." he replied with a giant smirk as the look of shock on his First Prime's face turned into one of schadenfreude before he broke out into roaring laughter causing those nearby to look at him in surprise.
"It sounds like your trip through the gate this time was a bit more interesting than we were expecting?" General Hammond opened the debrief with a softball question. Jack had already briefly let the General know about the attempted bombing by Senator Johnson, and thankfully the attack had nothing to do with them this time around.
"A bit more than we were expecting, Sir." Carter replied back with a small smile.
"And were we able to learn what we were hoping to with this visit?" Hammond asked again, looking at each of the members of SG-1.
"Mostly Sir. While we were not able to get any close look at much technology, even the cursory glances we could get from afar told us much." Sam answered before going into more detail. "The Empire is using technology on a scale we have never seen from any Goa'uld before. It isn't simply their military; it has permeated nearly every aspect of their society. For example, Sir, they use Ring technology as THE primary method of traveling and transporting packages around their planets. This alone has some major implications, like there being very few vehicles moving around the cities, and substantially less roadways designed for vehicles. It's a lot greener than one would expect from a city here on Earth as a result." The Major answered back, obviously excited about the topic.
"While they do still have roads or forums made with mind blowing materials, for example melting snow automatically, it's their ability to control access to the rings and even potentially disabling them or using them to flank, which would make any attempt at attacking quite disastrous if utilized properly." he added on having thought about how difficult attacking Argensis would be. Just breaching their Stargate defenses would be nearly impossible let alone everything else. It made the SGC look like a cake walk, and even had given him a few ideas to pass onto the General later on to improve their security here on the base. For Pete's sake they even had bloody walls surrounding their cities!
"We also didn't see too many soldiers patrolling around during our trip. They seemed to only be posted at certain places, seemingly guarding important sites. Unless I missed something, it really looks like their military wasn't being used to police their people on the streets at least." Daniel added on his own two cents. "It made me believe internally that the Empire is quite stable and not at risk of revolt or an uprising like we have seen from many of the Goa'uld worlds."
"Were you able to get any numbers or ideas on how fast they could produce military assets?" The general asked the whole group but was clearly directing the question at him. Jack honestly felt better about the whole situation since their tour, even if he felt the Empire was even more of a military threat than he had originally thought, he just didn't think they were as much of a threat to Earth as he had originally feared. As juxtaposition as that was.
"Nothing on numbers, only that they didn't seem to be hurting for troops anywhere. There were hundreds alone in their Stargate facility, and all were well equipped with the same setup." he replied back. "As to production, I don't have much to compare it to, but I feel they put any other groups we have found through the Stargate to shame. I saw zero indications that they were lacking in anything for their troops or any improvisation to make up shortfalls in supplies." he added on the last bit as nearly all the troops had looked almost identical in what gear they had been lugging around.
"I concur. Their rate of production far outstrips any Goa'uld I know of. It is fast." Teal'c said, breaking the quiet silence the man had been keeping during the debrief. "It would not surprise me if they could produce many ships in a year. From what Hari admitted, a number of System Lords could still pose a major threat to Argensis and the Empire if they acted in concert." Teal'c finished nodding his head at the end as if agreeing with the statement.
"Sir I believe there is much we can learn from them; Even over that of other Goa'uld." Carter added on excitedly before continuing. "They have made a lot of advances in areas the Goa'uld have not even looked at, this armband is simply just one example." Sam said while holding up her arm which had the now ever-present armband. If he was being honest, the damned thing had already come in handy on a few missions already. It had a short-range mapping feature that even picked up life signs that had helped them out in a pickle to avoid a Jaffa patrol just a week ago. He would be lying if he didn't admit he also wanted one.
"And you Teal'c, have you made any decision on whether or not to move your family to Argensis? Remember they are also welcome to live here, however I understand your reluctance for them to live on base." General Hammond asked Teal'c who had been quiet since their trip to Argensis. He had talked with his friend, and it seemed the man had already made his decision before they had even left. Jack had been hoping in the week leading up to their tour that permission would come through for Teal'c's family to live off base, but even then, he didn't think the big guy would go for it. Teal'c didn't like his family being so far removed from other Jaffa, or the ability to travel to other planets. Which he understood well enough, it just put him on edge trusting Hari this much already.
"I have General. While the situation is not ideal, with their travel off-world severely limited, it is a marked improvement over their current situation." Teal'c fired back softly with another nod to the general. "I have also been given assurances that they will be allowed to visit here as much as they wish, and we are welcome to visit Argensis whenever we wish." Teal'c said, indicating the whole team, not that Jack was surprised. It had been made clear to them that they were welcome back to continue talks or simply to expand on their tour.
"Then I am looking forward to your detailed report. Major, make sure you include any interesting technology that jumped out at you." General Hammond said as he was getting up before pausing to address them all again. "If you would all highlight anything you feel warrants it, I will pass it along to my superiors and the president. Both the president and Joint Chiefs are taking this dialog with Argensis extremely seriously. Dismissed." The general said before leaving the room to his office to make some reports of his own Jack expected. Looking around the room he couldn't help himself from smiling as things did actually look a bit up, so he chalked this mission up as a success.
"How could this possibly have been allowed to happen?! This was supposed to be a simple fluff tour for our people to get a better idea about our most important allies, create a stronger bond, and yet this is what happens?" Governor Nadine yelled at those assembled before her fuming with anger.
"We are uncertain when they approached Senator Johnson, but we can confirm this was an attempt by the Raffan group." The smartly uniformed man, Alfredo, head of senate security and enforcement, answered calmly looking at a report. "We are already putting together updated information on all its members, but it seems they have shifted focus and gained several prominent new additions during and after the attack by the Goa'uld. While their attempts at taking control of the various aspects of the government have utterly failed during the months-long invasion, they did somehow manage to turn Senator Johnson to their cause."
"And pray tell, how did they manage to do that?" she fired back, still extremely annoyed at the situation she now had to deal with.
"Their lack of any major successes in the past and inability to operate smoothly had them labeled as a minor threat and only put under minor surveillance. It was only their admittedly easy success in turning Senator Johnson to their cause that made them from a minor annoyance into an actual threat." Alfredo said while looking at a report quickly before looking back at her. "Sadly, we had not discovered the Senator's betrayal till now, and the Federal Service had only been informed just yesterday that the group had obtained the materials needed to create a fusion bomb. We were preparing a raid for them in the coming days, but it seems that it was too late." That had her stewing for a moment before she huffed and aired her grievances to the council.
"It is clear to me from what we had previously learned, and what our two LOYAL Senators reported, that the Empire has far less to gain from us than we do from them. While there are certain areas where we do lead them in, they are quickly closing the gap, and there are MANY areas where they far outstrip us in power and technology. We need them far more than they need us, if they ever needed us in the first place." she said heatedly at first before becoming exacerbated by the end. "We need to ensure this alliance works out, and therefore we will throw every possible crime against the former Senator that we can and show the Empire and Lord Hariric that we take the crimes against them seriously. Any disagreements?" she asked the medium sized room giving the few dozen shuffling occupants time to say something, but none did.
"I agree, but I think we need to pursue this even further and ingrain ourselves even more with the Empire. Even if it's only to learn from them and gain temporary protection, but from what I can see the benefits far outweigh the risks." Senator Dimitry said surprising her, as he was the leader of the major opposition she faces in the senate, and not someone she expected to be so vocally supportive of her aims.
"Then what are we to do with Senator Johnson?" Senator Brian asked quietly to the room.
"We punish him to the fullest extent of the law, and make sure The Emperor and his people know we have." she said with finality.
Hari was lamenting after reviewing the most recent information on their offensive. Nirrti was going into further hiding it seemed, and what was left of her people had been captured or already in hiding. The extremely few followers that remained. The ironic part is that even after a few months according to his intel from spies in place with other Goa'uld, they thought Nirrti was on the up and up, gaining more territory and power as basically no word of their conflict had slipped out. Usually, it would be the conquering and winning Goa'uld who would be bragging about his or her exploits to all the other Goa'uld. As he was not doing so, and Nirrti was certainly not going around discussing her spectacular defeats, combined with her lack of normal major settlements, made it nearly impossible for others to confirm her current status.
Those same spies he now had Ishta spread sporadically through some Goa'uld domains, especially those near his own, such as Cronus, were there to try and learn as much as they can. It's easy to send some people to pose as Jaffa or Slaves in the service of an enemy Goa'uld. In fact, the hardest part was training up people to be able to do so without getting caught and to know what they should be looking for. That last bit turned out to be a bit harder than he had expected and had needed some personal attention. The spies were how he knew that most of the Goa'uld in the galaxy were now in some form of shifting conflict with each other over more space to add to their domains. That and the information network Dobby's 'specialized' Elves were responsible for spreading.
With all the increased conflict, and the death of Ra came the huge increase in the number of ships that were being produced. Shipyards are booming across the Galaxy. Oh, and just look how so many System Lords somehow had a couple extra Ha'taks hidden away somewhere that were quickly added to their fleets over the last year. Color him not surprised. Then there were the rumors going around about Apophis's losses over Earth. Thankfully no word of his or someone else's intervention had made the rounds yet, most blame was either being put on Earth or more seriously a Tok'ra plot. Even then, the Tau'ri were being discussed frequently as it seemed they were a hot topic, mainly for their humiliation of Apophis more than anything else, but also the fact that they have been appearing on Goa'uld worlds all around the Galaxy.
It was becoming an extremely turbulent time for the Galaxy, and he was not quite sure what role he and his empire should play in things going forward. He had some ideas but most of it simply came back to him wanting to ensure that he is in a place that won't have to worry too much about the Goa'uld. The conflict with Nirrti and various other people being discovered in the Empire's borders were making his attempts at having a nice stable rise to power generally more complicated if not outright failing in certain areas. Removing Nirrti from the picture will only be a boon for his empire going forwards, but it was not something he wanted to have to do so early on in the Empire's development.
From the latest interrogation report, he now knew that Nirrti had less than 200 Jaffa to her name, and no settlements currently under her control. Nirrti's days as a powerful Goa'uld were over at this point, however he was hesitant to write her off as the snake had a nasty habit of somehow coming back from nothing and being a royal pain in the ass. He would be lying if that didn't bring him a large measure of satisfaction over the fate of such a shitty person.
Nirrti was also in a way more dangerous than most of her contemporaries, as her area of scientific exploration and advancement could and have had major impacts on her level of power she wields. By Merlin's sweaty sack, he almost lost several hundred Jaffa to a fast-acting disease she had released on one of her own planets to kill everyone off, the planet's denizens included. And if her attempts to make a Hok'tar were successful she could pose an even more acute threat. He didn't need other people running around with similar powers to his own, even if they were pale imitations.
He was just about to turn on his design computer after going over the report and get some more work on his ongoing exploration of the computer system within the Stargate, as he was hoping to apply the technology to a few of his other devices, when his Adjacent George swiftly entered the room. George was more or less his personal assistant that helped him keep UpToDate and in contact with those trying to reach him not via his Armband.
"My Lord! There is an emergency and a critical issue I must report." George said as he came into the room and snapped to attention waiting on him to acknowledge the man. The rush here didn't put him at ease, and just knew this was going to be another big thing.
"Go on." he said, giving his Adjacent the attention he deserves.
"Sir, the Scout vessel named Black Raven was in contact with the Central Science Academy doing some scans for them around a nebula they were interested in when they came under attack from an unknown ship. The battle only lasted for a few minutes before the Captain of the Black Raven initiated its self-destruct after its shields failed. I believe all hands-on board were lost."
"And do we have a scan of the ship that attacked us?" he asked as he moved toward a console and processed what to do about this situation. It was not good, and frankly he really didn't need anymore enemies right now, let alone the loss of several of his up-and-coming crew members.
"Yes, my Lord, the Black Raven stayed in contact with the Academy throughout the encounter and were able to transmit their entire sensor logs during the engagement." George replied back, and he was about to ask another question and pull up the sensor readings from the battle when George continued. "Unfortunately, Sir, I received this news just as I was leaving the command center to report another issue to you. One of our planets within our space that initial system scans showed a high level of population, further scans of the system and specifically the inhabited planet showed a concentration of several hundred thousand immature and mature Goa'uld. Sir, it's unlike anything I have ever seen before." His assistant finished clearly confused.
A hundred thousand Goa'uld in one place was nothing to scoff at, and honestly had him shocked at the news. It was easily more unbelievable than the attack on one of his Scout ships. He honestly could not think at all why that would be the case, what could so many Goa'uld in one spot be doing? Both these issues were going to need his immediate attention, however the attack on one of his ships would have to take precedence for now.
"Are you certain the scans were correct?" he asked, still in disbelief.
"I am certain my lord, I had them redone several times to confirm. It was also confirmed that there was no activity via Stargate on the planet during the last month." George said before handing over the Padd he was holding onto. "I was also able to confirm that nearly all were not currently within hosts or housed by Jaffa." His Jaffa commander said, only causing him to be even more perplexed. What could this Goa'uld queen who was spawning all these Goa'uld be doing. And if the numbers were right then there had to be a Goa'uld queen involved somehow. Just as he was about to go over the sensor data, he had moved from the padd to his console another Jaffa ran into the room, this one clearly flustered.
"My Lord Hariric, a Goa'uld by the name of Montu, has arrived on N-2 and is demanding an audience with you!" The young Jaffa who had rushed in reported causing him to sigh and almost facepalm. It seems when it rained, it truly poured.
A/N: Well there we are. I am super excited about the new enemies, which many may recognize, however, they were so minimally explored in the show that I have some really fun ideas for them to be an enemy for the Empire during this time when the Goa'uld are still building up themselves since Ra's death, and some of the bigger threats have not emerged yet. I honestly have some somewhat unique ideas for these guys and how to make them different. I was really trying to decide if I should include the battle in this chapter or open the next with it, and decided to go the latter route instead.
Thanks for reading, and hope to see what yall think.