Into The Ice
Apr. 6th, 2006 11:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bungakertasWarning(s): none
Pairing(s): none
Spoilers: “Out Of Mind” (season 2, episode 22), “Into The Fire” (season 3, episode 1), “Hathor” (season 1, episode 14), plus anything from seasons 1 through the first episode of 2 that I care to mention.
Disclaimer: "Stargate: SG-1" and related characters and situations are the property of MGM Television Entertainment and Gekko Film Corp. No money changed hands and no copyright infringement is intended or implied.
Feedback: All comments are welcome.
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It has been so long. I don’t even entirely remember my own name anymore. I think it began with an S…maybe. Perhaps my forgetting it is a byproduct of sarcophagus usage?
I am called Hathor now, though I am not she. Hathor is the evil creature within me. I am the vessel. And so it has been for centuries.
The tau’ri she captured are here now. In this very room, examining her mock-up of their facility.
“I’ve never seen this place so deserted.”
Ah, yes. I remember that one. I could not forget him. He was so sweet. A bit foolish, perhaps, but very sweet.
The one called O’Neill wanders close to where Hathor has hidden me. I was always a bit proud of that. I remember myself. Hathor may be the one in charge, but I am always there.
“Guess they figure they don’t need to keep up the act if we’re unconscious.” That one is…Samantha Carter. She led the force of women that defeated us when Hathor took me to their facility. Oh, how I’d hoped she’d have to kill me, but that would not have killed Hathor, which is now my last desire.
You see, I can no longer wish to see my loved ones. Or wish to be returned to my husband. Or to laugh with my best friend. They all died a long time ago, happily and gratefully surrendering me up to what they thought was a blessing. My dear, misguided, loving, foolish family. I miss them so much.
O’Neill stands now very near to me. He kicks the gate with his foot and it rings hollow and empty.
“It’s fake.”
As he returns to his friends at the bottom of the ramp, Daniel speaks again. “I don’t understand. Who would have spent enough time in the base to be able to reproduce it in this kind of detail? You don’t think Apophis—?”
A sick surge of anger chokes my mind. Hathor is angry. I had hoped that she would allow them to simply look around and then have her jaffa capture them, but now it seems I am not to be so fortunate.
“Silence!” my voice orders them. She used my true voice this time. I wonder why?
My hand pushes a button on the device Hathor used to make me invisible and I appear to them. I know what they see. A ripple of air, and then a beautiful, redhead, wearing not nearly enough clothes standing before them, proud, and haughty and utterly vile. Their faces twist with the appropriate disgust as I approach them.
“Oh, I was so hoping never to see you again,” O’Neill said to her as I passed him.
I had hopes never to see you again, as well, O’Neill. I had hoped you would be somewhere else, not captured by Hathor, fighting her kind. I had hoped you would be safe from her. Now you will not live to regret this, I fear.
Rau’lee and Trofsky, Hathor’s tok’ra spy and first prime respectively enter, armed with zat’ni’katels and dirty looks, fixing both on the tau’ri. I hope Rau’lee moves quickly with whatever she is planning.
I have reached Daniel. Hathor raises my hand and strokes his face with it. He reminds me, in some ways, of my long-dead husband. His name, too, is forgotten to me, though I remembered it longer than I recalled my own.
We were no great lovers, my husband and I. Our tale is not a tragic one of romance and lost love, I am afraid. Our wedding was arranged and executed by our parents when we were quite young and I did not see him much in the intervening years until our marriage was consummated when I became seventeen years of age. But he was gentle and kind to me, never raising a hand against me as some men were prone or forcing me to do what I did not wish to.
I would have come to love him, I believe. He was quite funny and easy for me to talk with. I think that we would have been quite happy. I would have joyfully born him many children and kept our home happy and ordered for him without complaint.
“We have indeed missed you, our beloved,” Hathor tells Daniel, now using the echoing tones that mark me as host to a goa’uld.
Yes, my husband, I have missed you so much it is painful!
“Daniel, don’t let her breathe on you.”
If I had the ability any longer, that comment would have made me laugh quite hard. As if he could prevent Hathor from using me to breathe wherever she wished. The utterance itself sounds humorous when pronounced.
In my mind I laugh both at Samantha for saying it, and at my symbiote, the vile creature, for not being able to perfect her pheromone so that it will work multiple times on the same person. Foolish serpent, for believing you could be a god!
Hathor snaps at Carter, “You think that we would go to these lengths if you were not already immune to that organism?” Her anger was directed at me as well, I believe, for mocking her, because a now-familiar pain shot through my body. Hathor does not feel it, and can therefore make me appear as if I am not in pain, but I am in a very great deal. If I had control of my body, I would likely be on my knees with the pain.
Daniel has joined his friends on the ramp. I am walking around the jaffa that now serve Hathor.
“Do you like our guards?” Hathor asks them. “We managed to lure them from the remote outposts of our enemies. We are quietly building our forces before the System Lords even know that we are alive. But doing so is difficult when we have to operate with limited knowledge of the empire.”
Every difficulty you suffer is just, beast!
More pain is my only answer.
“Let me take a guess,” O’Neill interrupts. “It’s just a wild guess, but that’s where we come in, right?”
I have always liked how O’Neill has absolutely no respect in the presence of System Lords and former System Lords. I think that I should like to die by his hand. It is only fair since he has made some moments of my captivity almost bearable.
“We know more than you do,” Samantha says.
The tau’ri do have a habit of stating the blindingly obvious at times, though.
“Perhaps. We are prepared to offer you a life of luxury as servants in our royal court, for sharing information. Deny us…and you will not enjoy the alternative.” While Hathor makes this speech, she forces me to walk to O’Neill. By the end of it, I am nearly nose-to-nose with him.
“You know,” he sighs, “you really should do something about the breath.”
I laugh at Hathor again. I had wondered if she might regret not cleaning my teeth this morning.
She ignores me. “How do we contact the Asgard so that we might ally with their forces?”
And again, I must laugh at the foolishness of this beast. She could not truly believe the Asgard would ally themselves with one so foul as her.
“Try Roswell. Little place in New Mexico.”
I think this was meant to be funny, but I am afraid the reference has escaped me. In any case, Hathor is not happy with his answer.
I move to Samantha. “What is the sequence of numbers necessary to open the barricade protecting your Stargate?”
Truly this is a day for laughter. This time, there is a surge of pain across my body. Samantha maintains a stubborn silence.
“If you will not give us the information that we desire, we do have another means of retrieving it.” Hathor snaps my fingers and a jaffa enters. He comes and stands before me, waiting patiently. SG-1 is watching curiously. “An opportunity has presented itself at a most…” Here Hathor has paused for a dramatic effect. “…fortuitous time.”
My hand reaches into the jaffa’s pouch and I retrieve a full mature, hissing, screeching goa’uld. Even I wish to recoil from the sight. It is not a pleasant one.
Again, the serpent within me speaks. “Our friend here is ready for a host. Tell us, which one of you shall it be?”
If the situation were not so dire, this too, would be funny. I am brandishing a goa’uld symbiote as if it were a weapon and using it to menace SG-1. The picture I present must be an odd one indeed.
“We ask you once more, which one of you shall be host to our new friend?”
O’Neill looks at Samantha and says, “He has her eyes.”
He truly does laugh in the face of impending death. I wish that I shared his brash unconcern. I have only a gloomy sense of certainty. Sooner or later, I will die. Still, his comment is quite funny.
“Silence!” Hathor orders him. She does not like it when I enjoy things.
I walk to Daniel and my free hand strokes his face. “Shall it be our beloved? We could spend an eternity together. Do you not remember the joys that we once shared in one another’s arms?”
“I really try not to,” he replies disgustedly.
Poor Daniel. I sympathize with him. Forced to endure unwillingly at the hands of one person what he truly desires to have from his spouse. I would give a great deal to be returned to my husband’s bed.
I now stand before Samantha. “Shall it be the female then? She who would challenge us?”
Again, I silently congratulate Samantha. She did brilliantly when she defeated Hathor over one of her years ago. I have noticed the change in her, though, as has Hathor. My heart aches for her, that she should have suffered as I do now. Yet she is somehow free of it. Is there yet hope for me?
Likely not.
“You have since been possessed by a goa’uld, we sense. Perhaps once more?”
“I’m not afraid,” Samantha informs Hathor, coldly.
Yes, remember that, my hated enemy. My body you possess, yet my mind is still my own. You can not defeat that.
“You should be, my dear, for the pain a symbiote can inflict in its host is unimaginable,” Hathor informs her. I believe she speaks to me, however, because yet another surge of white-hot pain ripples over my body.
The goa’uld in my hand screams and lunges for O’Neill. No! No, it should not be him! Choose another!
“It seems that our friend has chosen,” Hathor informs everyone. That particular tone of triumph is reserved for those rare instances when she could not influence a decision that turned out poorly for me despite her inaction.
O’Neill looks at the serpent in my hands. “What? The gray doesn’t bother you?” Still, he jokes? I doubt he will do that ever again. “All right, fine, let’s do it. Just please, I beg of you, not in the back of the neck, I’ve got some problems—”
He snatches out for the goa’uld in my hands. Yes! I scream, even as Hathor begins to force me to move. Yes! Crush the vile beast!
The shot of a zat’ni’katel shocks me. O’Neill falls to the ground, but the symbiote is not entirely missed. My head is snapped around.
“Fool!” Hathor hisses at Rau’lee. Bless that wonderful tok’ra! I hope she’s done some sort of irreparable harm.
“He would have harmed the symbiote,” Rau’lee protests.
Then again, perhaps this is not as good as I’d hoped. Rau’lee is not a very apt spy, it seems.
“Which you have done in his place! Return it to the safety of the jaffa! Take him…” Hathor looks down at O’Neill, who lays by my feet. “…somewhere where he can be properly restrained.”
It does not take long. The goa’uld is returned to the jaffa, O’Neill is carried and weapons are leveled at Samantha and Daniel. The walk to the cryogenics room in which he awakened is a short one, but O’Neill awakens on the way there. He is settled into a cryogenic tank and strapped in.
“We are not pleased,” Hathor informs him.
I seem to have been mistaken. Hathor’s ability to state the obvious far exceeds that of the tau’ri.
“Neither are we,” O’Neill returns. Even from a prone position, tied down, he manages have more of a presence than I do. I am truly sorry to see him meet this fate.
My hand reaches down and savagely removes the memory device from O’Neill’s temple. He winces in pain. I sympathize. That must’ve truly hurt.
“Once host to a goa’uld you will take the lives of your friends,” Hathor informs him.
The full force of my mind is suddenly focused in anger on her. I can not remember my name, or my husband’s, or those of my family or friends, but the day that I killed my best friend will always stay with me. I remember everything of that day, right down to the color dress I wore, and the fact that Hathor had recently broken the nail of the small finger on my right hand. I had thought that I hated Hathor before then, but I was quite mistaken.
“We don’t think so.” Sad vanity, I fear, O’Neill.
“You will have no say in the matter. You will witness their deaths through your own eyes…helplessly.”
This is true. I could not do anything, though I tried. I tried so hard. I fought with all my mind to regain control just for a few seconds. Just enough to give her time to flee. She had the audacity to publicly suggest that one of Hathor’s decisions was less than perfect and for that, Hathor killed her personally.
My hands reach out and tear open his shirt. “It may take some time for the goa’uld to take control. But we will greatly enjoy experiencing your eventual defeat,” Hathor informs him.
I bitterly fume at Hathor as my hands scoop out the goa’uld from the stomach of the jaffa and place it on O’Neill’s chest.
“Oh, god, no,” O’Neill protests. I watch as the goa’uld goes for his neck.
“And when you awaken from the joining, you will kneel and pledge your loyalty to us,” Hathor informs him. I wish it were not so, but I know this to be true. I had hoped that O’Neill would not be the one.
“No,” he says again, but now it is too late. The symbiote is in.
His eyes do not glow, though. That is the signal that the goa’uld has taken full possession and usually happens the moment the symbiote is inside. Only exceptionally strong-willed individuals may prevent this from occurring right away. I was, sadly, not among the blessed. Hathor was in control from the moment she entered me.
Weapons’ fire rang out from somewhere in the compound. Staff weapons and the projectile affairs of which the tau’ri are fond. There may yet be hope for O’Neill after all.
“Jaffa! Kree’mel!” Hathor has me order. Daniel and Samantha are immediately taken away to a secure location. I turn to Rau’lee and Hathor says, “Lok shak kel’mak a kree!”
Then, secure in the knowledge that her orders will be obeyed, Hathor turns me and I sweep away, surrounded by the jaffa. I have to wonder what game Hathor is playing. She knows that Rau’lee is a tok’ra and yet she leaves her alone with O’Neill.
I am sorry, O’Neill. You shall be missed.
Hathor forces me to wait outside the cryogenics room, just far enough away that we cannot be sensed as goa’uld, while Rau’lee attempts to prevent the goa’uld from taking full control of O’Neill. As a tok’ra, she knows how difficult this is. And unlikely. If the goa’uld takes full possession of its new host at any point before full O’Neill is full immersed in cryo-stasis, it will survive. The host will protect it. Rau’lee has a great deal of faith in O’Neill.
On a small device, she monitors the progress of her jaffa. The jaffa are doing much better than I would wish them to. Still, I must wait.
Of all the things that I hate about being host to a goa’uld, this part ranks among the highest. I have watched as my own hands, hateful appendages, have committed atrocities. I have killed children too small to speak with these very hands. I have done horrors so awful that I put them from my mind.
But it is almost (and I stress the almost because I am no longer sure) worse to wait. Hathor may hide her thoughts from me sometimes, if she truly wishes. As the years progressed, I grew more apt at reading her, though little good it did me. Yet, if she is determined, I can not learn of what she plans. It is then that I know I am about to do some other cruelty. It does not matter how great anymore, I think. My hands are so stained that they could not become any dirtier.
Now is one of those times. I wait in the corridor for several more moments and then reenter the cryogenics chamber. The tau’ri are holding their own, much to my serpent’s dismay. I believe she may be altering her plans. Samantha and Daniel were just recovered by their comrades.
O’Neill is being lowered into the cryogenics pit. Rau’lee is watching. I silently approach.
“Jaffa, kree!” Hathor orders her. This has always puzzled me. Hathor must know that Rau’lee is not jaffa. Indeed, Rau’lee must have known that Hathor would spot her as someone who was not jaffa as soon as she passed within five units that I believe the tau’ri call feet. Certainly, it was known to her that this cover story would not work. I have never understood why Rau’lee attempted it in the first place.
It is odd the thoughts that pass through my head when Hathor is in the middle of a fight of some sort or another.
“Kel’noc shree jaffa! I am of the tok’ra. If the tau’ri do not destroy you, know this: we will.”
My hand raises towards her and the ribbon device on it activates. Rau’lee is tossed to the wall like a child’s doll. She was no great spy but I had hoped that she might find a way to effect my death in the event that the tau’ri failed to do so.
Now I fear I may have effected hers. Not yet, of course, but how long will she survive with injuries such as she has now sustained?
I stride quickly to the command room of Hathor’s complex. Trofsky is there, along with most of the other senior jaffa. Status reports are given to Hathor quickly. Her jaffa have killed the jaffa who had guarded the chappa’ai and vacated the area, leaving nothing behind them. The tau’ri inside the complex, however, seem to have disappeared. Hathor fears they may have already exited the complex.
“Send a guard to the Stargate,” Hathor orders. “The tau’ri will undoubtedly try to escape. We must ensure that they do not.”
Trofsky bows and rushes out to do her bidding. I turn to face one of the stations in the room. “Erect the barrier surrounding the chappa’ai. Let us make things as difficult as possible for the tau’ri.”
“Yes, my queen”s issue from various mouths. Now we wait just a little bit more.
A jaffa enters the room. Young. A messenger, I think. He bows. “My queen, Trofsky has arrived at the chappa’ai. He instructed me to tell you that he would report as soon as he was able.”
“Very good,” Hathor replies. “Go to the cryogenics section. If anyone should break in, initiate the alert for that sector.”
“Yes, my queen.” He leaves.
External sensors report weapons’ fire attempting to penetrate the barrier around the Stargate for a few seconds, then nothing. Several moments pass as I wait for more news.
If I had the ability, I would be crying now. My best hope for death lay with the tau’ri. They killed Ra, and did the same to Apophis. Surely one more goa’uld was not too much to hope? Surely it was possible?
Now, as I have so many times, I curse my beauty. My features, my voice, and my quite unusual hair were a curse that I did not recognize. If only I had known what evil they would bring to me, I would have done something to change them. Had I been born ugly, Hathor would have never chosen me as a host.
The communication console blinks and Trofsky’s image fills a screen.
“My queen, the chappa’ai is secure,” he reports.
“And the tau’ri?”
“They have fled into tunnels of tok’ra construction. There must be a spy amongst us,” he tells me.
Rau’lee seems to have fooled all those in the complex but the one person she truly needed to. How ironic.
“The tok’ra spy has been taken care of. Take as many of the humans as you can, alive. They will make an excellent addition to our new army of jaffa,” Hathor orders.
“Yes, my queen.” Trofsky nods his head just before the communication is cut off.
Hathor sits back and again, we wait. Soon, the tau’ri will discover that they will be unsucessful in thwarting the barrier from underground just as they were above it.
Yet, the fact that they are still free is comforting. Perhaps hope is not so lost as I feared. If the tau’ri have remained uncaptured for so long, then there may be a chance, however remote, that they will at least escape this planet. They are a resourceful people.
Hathor’s displeasure at the hopeful turn my thoughts have taken manifests itself in pain that shoots across me yet again. She never does seem to tire of hurting me. It is like a joke told to young children. Long after the joke has truly ceased to be funny, they continue to laugh uproariously every time it is told. Her glee at hurting me has never diminished, no matter that she causes me a great deal of pain every day.
Trofsky is calling again. My hands turn on the communication channel.
“My queen, the tau’ri called us here from their Stargate. I believe they were communicating with their warriors here. We have disabled their communications device and are continuing the search, however we have had no success thus far.”
“We will not tolerate failure,” Hathor growls. “You will continue to keep us appraised of what seems to pass with you for progress.” My hand cuts of the transmission angrily. Hathor stands and begins pacing across the room.
“All of you!” she orders the other jaffa in the room, “get out. We will maintain our own defenses better when not surrounded by fools and idiots!”
The jaffa cannot leave fast enough.
I can hear her thoughts this time. She is genuinely worried. The tau’ri are loose and she does not know what they are doing. Her jaffa have captured the Stargate, but they have yet to report back on any sort of changes in the situation. This means they have not yet captured the tau’ri or they are unable to report. In either case, that means the gate may yet be lost. If the gate is lost and the tau’ri escape, this complex will need to be evacuated or else she may loose all that she has built up.
I am cheering. I shall not die this day, but Hathor may suffer a great setback. At the very least, she will suffer an embarrassment beyond that which she has suffered for a very long time.
Ah yes, this familiar and gut-wrenching pain stops my cheering, but suddenly it fails, and for the first time since I have been possessed, Hathor is so distracted that for a split second, my body is my own.
I drag in a great, shuddering gasp, collapsing to my knees. And now the moment is over. Again the pain comes, but this time it is not so great. Hathor is distracted and now I know why. There is an intruder alert in the cryogenics sector. Sadly, it seems Hathor yet has one jaffa capable of doing her bidding.
Back firmly under Hathor’s control. I rush out of the command center, double-checking the ribbon device, which I still wear. As I approach the room, I hear Rau’lee’s voice. Never have I ever been so glad to hear the voice of that inept spy!
“The goa’uld within is gone. The cryogenic process destroyed it, before it had a chance to meld with the host. He will revive automatically,” Rau’lee informs…someone.
I hear sounds of a cryo-tank being removed from that icy pit. I am much closer now. Silently, I enter the room to see Samantha, may she be blessed with a thousand blessings, freeing O’Neill from his restraints.
“Colonel? I don’t feel its presence. You’re going to be all right.”
O’Neill fought the possession? Joyful, wonderful, happy, happy day!
My celebration does not last long. Samantha turns to see me, and my hand shoots up, ribbon device activated, centering the device’s energy right on the center of her forehead.
Much as I was moments ago, she is forced to her knees in pain. I fear that Hathor will kill her this time for what she has done. Samantha, who defeated her once. Samantha, that brave woman. For the first time since I killed my best friend, I struggle for control of my own body. My symbiote is distracted, there may yet be a chance.
I do not gain control, but her attention is now divided and she has forgotten what I still remember. O’Neill is no longer restrained, and he is himself. If he is at all able, he will kill me, and her as well.
“We had hopes for you,” Hathor informs Samantha. Nothing on my face betrays the fight I am conducting with her inside.
Seized! Hathor suddenly realizes why I distracted her, but it is too late. O’Neill has us. One arm pins my hand with the ribbon device behind my back. The other holds me flush to him. I cannot move, though Hathor forces me to struggle.
“We will destroy you for this!” Hathor shouts. It is an empty threat, though, because this time, I am sure. There is something about the angry way O’Neill holds me, how purposefully his cold hands are placed that leaves me no doubt. The means is before us. The cryogenics pit is not covered and waits eagerly for me.
“We would just like you to go away!” O’Neill returns. We rush forward and he catapults me over the railing of the cryogenics pit. Hathor forces me to scream, but I could not go more willingly. In a split second, a delightful, blissful cold covers me, freezing me right down to my bones, killing the serpent.
Then there is darkness.
Pairing(s): none
Spoilers: “Out Of Mind” (season 2, episode 22), “Into The Fire” (season 3, episode 1), “Hathor” (season 1, episode 14), plus anything from seasons 1 through the first episode of 2 that I care to mention.
Disclaimer: "Stargate: SG-1" and related characters and situations are the property of MGM Television Entertainment and Gekko Film Corp. No money changed hands and no copyright infringement is intended or implied.
Feedback: All comments are welcome.
It has been so long. I don’t even entirely remember my own name anymore. I think it began with an S…maybe. Perhaps my forgetting it is a byproduct of sarcophagus usage?
I am called Hathor now, though I am not she. Hathor is the evil creature within me. I am the vessel. And so it has been for centuries.
The tau’ri she captured are here now. In this very room, examining her mock-up of their facility.
“I’ve never seen this place so deserted.”
Ah, yes. I remember that one. I could not forget him. He was so sweet. A bit foolish, perhaps, but very sweet.
The one called O’Neill wanders close to where Hathor has hidden me. I was always a bit proud of that. I remember myself. Hathor may be the one in charge, but I am always there.
“Guess they figure they don’t need to keep up the act if we’re unconscious.” That one is…Samantha Carter. She led the force of women that defeated us when Hathor took me to their facility. Oh, how I’d hoped she’d have to kill me, but that would not have killed Hathor, which is now my last desire.
You see, I can no longer wish to see my loved ones. Or wish to be returned to my husband. Or to laugh with my best friend. They all died a long time ago, happily and gratefully surrendering me up to what they thought was a blessing. My dear, misguided, loving, foolish family. I miss them so much.
O’Neill stands now very near to me. He kicks the gate with his foot and it rings hollow and empty.
“It’s fake.”
As he returns to his friends at the bottom of the ramp, Daniel speaks again. “I don’t understand. Who would have spent enough time in the base to be able to reproduce it in this kind of detail? You don’t think Apophis—?”
A sick surge of anger chokes my mind. Hathor is angry. I had hoped that she would allow them to simply look around and then have her jaffa capture them, but now it seems I am not to be so fortunate.
“Silence!” my voice orders them. She used my true voice this time. I wonder why?
My hand pushes a button on the device Hathor used to make me invisible and I appear to them. I know what they see. A ripple of air, and then a beautiful, redhead, wearing not nearly enough clothes standing before them, proud, and haughty and utterly vile. Their faces twist with the appropriate disgust as I approach them.
“Oh, I was so hoping never to see you again,” O’Neill said to her as I passed him.
I had hopes never to see you again, as well, O’Neill. I had hoped you would be somewhere else, not captured by Hathor, fighting her kind. I had hoped you would be safe from her. Now you will not live to regret this, I fear.
Rau’lee and Trofsky, Hathor’s tok’ra spy and first prime respectively enter, armed with zat’ni’katels and dirty looks, fixing both on the tau’ri. I hope Rau’lee moves quickly with whatever she is planning.
I have reached Daniel. Hathor raises my hand and strokes his face with it. He reminds me, in some ways, of my long-dead husband. His name, too, is forgotten to me, though I remembered it longer than I recalled my own.
We were no great lovers, my husband and I. Our tale is not a tragic one of romance and lost love, I am afraid. Our wedding was arranged and executed by our parents when we were quite young and I did not see him much in the intervening years until our marriage was consummated when I became seventeen years of age. But he was gentle and kind to me, never raising a hand against me as some men were prone or forcing me to do what I did not wish to.
I would have come to love him, I believe. He was quite funny and easy for me to talk with. I think that we would have been quite happy. I would have joyfully born him many children and kept our home happy and ordered for him without complaint.
“We have indeed missed you, our beloved,” Hathor tells Daniel, now using the echoing tones that mark me as host to a goa’uld.
Yes, my husband, I have missed you so much it is painful!
“Daniel, don’t let her breathe on you.”
If I had the ability any longer, that comment would have made me laugh quite hard. As if he could prevent Hathor from using me to breathe wherever she wished. The utterance itself sounds humorous when pronounced.
In my mind I laugh both at Samantha for saying it, and at my symbiote, the vile creature, for not being able to perfect her pheromone so that it will work multiple times on the same person. Foolish serpent, for believing you could be a god!
Hathor snaps at Carter, “You think that we would go to these lengths if you were not already immune to that organism?” Her anger was directed at me as well, I believe, for mocking her, because a now-familiar pain shot through my body. Hathor does not feel it, and can therefore make me appear as if I am not in pain, but I am in a very great deal. If I had control of my body, I would likely be on my knees with the pain.
Daniel has joined his friends on the ramp. I am walking around the jaffa that now serve Hathor.
“Do you like our guards?” Hathor asks them. “We managed to lure them from the remote outposts of our enemies. We are quietly building our forces before the System Lords even know that we are alive. But doing so is difficult when we have to operate with limited knowledge of the empire.”
Every difficulty you suffer is just, beast!
More pain is my only answer.
“Let me take a guess,” O’Neill interrupts. “It’s just a wild guess, but that’s where we come in, right?”
I have always liked how O’Neill has absolutely no respect in the presence of System Lords and former System Lords. I think that I should like to die by his hand. It is only fair since he has made some moments of my captivity almost bearable.
“We know more than you do,” Samantha says.
The tau’ri do have a habit of stating the blindingly obvious at times, though.
“Perhaps. We are prepared to offer you a life of luxury as servants in our royal court, for sharing information. Deny us…and you will not enjoy the alternative.” While Hathor makes this speech, she forces me to walk to O’Neill. By the end of it, I am nearly nose-to-nose with him.
“You know,” he sighs, “you really should do something about the breath.”
I laugh at Hathor again. I had wondered if she might regret not cleaning my teeth this morning.
She ignores me. “How do we contact the Asgard so that we might ally with their forces?”
And again, I must laugh at the foolishness of this beast. She could not truly believe the Asgard would ally themselves with one so foul as her.
“Try Roswell. Little place in New Mexico.”
I think this was meant to be funny, but I am afraid the reference has escaped me. In any case, Hathor is not happy with his answer.
I move to Samantha. “What is the sequence of numbers necessary to open the barricade protecting your Stargate?”
Truly this is a day for laughter. This time, there is a surge of pain across my body. Samantha maintains a stubborn silence.
“If you will not give us the information that we desire, we do have another means of retrieving it.” Hathor snaps my fingers and a jaffa enters. He comes and stands before me, waiting patiently. SG-1 is watching curiously. “An opportunity has presented itself at a most…” Here Hathor has paused for a dramatic effect. “…fortuitous time.”
My hand reaches into the jaffa’s pouch and I retrieve a full mature, hissing, screeching goa’uld. Even I wish to recoil from the sight. It is not a pleasant one.
Again, the serpent within me speaks. “Our friend here is ready for a host. Tell us, which one of you shall it be?”
If the situation were not so dire, this too, would be funny. I am brandishing a goa’uld symbiote as if it were a weapon and using it to menace SG-1. The picture I present must be an odd one indeed.
“We ask you once more, which one of you shall be host to our new friend?”
O’Neill looks at Samantha and says, “He has her eyes.”
He truly does laugh in the face of impending death. I wish that I shared his brash unconcern. I have only a gloomy sense of certainty. Sooner or later, I will die. Still, his comment is quite funny.
“Silence!” Hathor orders him. She does not like it when I enjoy things.
I walk to Daniel and my free hand strokes his face. “Shall it be our beloved? We could spend an eternity together. Do you not remember the joys that we once shared in one another’s arms?”
“I really try not to,” he replies disgustedly.
Poor Daniel. I sympathize with him. Forced to endure unwillingly at the hands of one person what he truly desires to have from his spouse. I would give a great deal to be returned to my husband’s bed.
I now stand before Samantha. “Shall it be the female then? She who would challenge us?”
Again, I silently congratulate Samantha. She did brilliantly when she defeated Hathor over one of her years ago. I have noticed the change in her, though, as has Hathor. My heart aches for her, that she should have suffered as I do now. Yet she is somehow free of it. Is there yet hope for me?
Likely not.
“You have since been possessed by a goa’uld, we sense. Perhaps once more?”
“I’m not afraid,” Samantha informs Hathor, coldly.
Yes, remember that, my hated enemy. My body you possess, yet my mind is still my own. You can not defeat that.
“You should be, my dear, for the pain a symbiote can inflict in its host is unimaginable,” Hathor informs her. I believe she speaks to me, however, because yet another surge of white-hot pain ripples over my body.
The goa’uld in my hand screams and lunges for O’Neill. No! No, it should not be him! Choose another!
“It seems that our friend has chosen,” Hathor informs everyone. That particular tone of triumph is reserved for those rare instances when she could not influence a decision that turned out poorly for me despite her inaction.
O’Neill looks at the serpent in my hands. “What? The gray doesn’t bother you?” Still, he jokes? I doubt he will do that ever again. “All right, fine, let’s do it. Just please, I beg of you, not in the back of the neck, I’ve got some problems—”
He snatches out for the goa’uld in my hands. Yes! I scream, even as Hathor begins to force me to move. Yes! Crush the vile beast!
The shot of a zat’ni’katel shocks me. O’Neill falls to the ground, but the symbiote is not entirely missed. My head is snapped around.
“Fool!” Hathor hisses at Rau’lee. Bless that wonderful tok’ra! I hope she’s done some sort of irreparable harm.
“He would have harmed the symbiote,” Rau’lee protests.
Then again, perhaps this is not as good as I’d hoped. Rau’lee is not a very apt spy, it seems.
“Which you have done in his place! Return it to the safety of the jaffa! Take him…” Hathor looks down at O’Neill, who lays by my feet. “…somewhere where he can be properly restrained.”
It does not take long. The goa’uld is returned to the jaffa, O’Neill is carried and weapons are leveled at Samantha and Daniel. The walk to the cryogenics room in which he awakened is a short one, but O’Neill awakens on the way there. He is settled into a cryogenic tank and strapped in.
“We are not pleased,” Hathor informs him.
I seem to have been mistaken. Hathor’s ability to state the obvious far exceeds that of the tau’ri.
“Neither are we,” O’Neill returns. Even from a prone position, tied down, he manages have more of a presence than I do. I am truly sorry to see him meet this fate.
My hand reaches down and savagely removes the memory device from O’Neill’s temple. He winces in pain. I sympathize. That must’ve truly hurt.
“Once host to a goa’uld you will take the lives of your friends,” Hathor informs him.
The full force of my mind is suddenly focused in anger on her. I can not remember my name, or my husband’s, or those of my family or friends, but the day that I killed my best friend will always stay with me. I remember everything of that day, right down to the color dress I wore, and the fact that Hathor had recently broken the nail of the small finger on my right hand. I had thought that I hated Hathor before then, but I was quite mistaken.
“We don’t think so.” Sad vanity, I fear, O’Neill.
“You will have no say in the matter. You will witness their deaths through your own eyes…helplessly.”
This is true. I could not do anything, though I tried. I tried so hard. I fought with all my mind to regain control just for a few seconds. Just enough to give her time to flee. She had the audacity to publicly suggest that one of Hathor’s decisions was less than perfect and for that, Hathor killed her personally.
My hands reach out and tear open his shirt. “It may take some time for the goa’uld to take control. But we will greatly enjoy experiencing your eventual defeat,” Hathor informs him.
I bitterly fume at Hathor as my hands scoop out the goa’uld from the stomach of the jaffa and place it on O’Neill’s chest.
“Oh, god, no,” O’Neill protests. I watch as the goa’uld goes for his neck.
“And when you awaken from the joining, you will kneel and pledge your loyalty to us,” Hathor informs him. I wish it were not so, but I know this to be true. I had hoped that O’Neill would not be the one.
“No,” he says again, but now it is too late. The symbiote is in.
His eyes do not glow, though. That is the signal that the goa’uld has taken full possession and usually happens the moment the symbiote is inside. Only exceptionally strong-willed individuals may prevent this from occurring right away. I was, sadly, not among the blessed. Hathor was in control from the moment she entered me.
Weapons’ fire rang out from somewhere in the compound. Staff weapons and the projectile affairs of which the tau’ri are fond. There may yet be hope for O’Neill after all.
“Jaffa! Kree’mel!” Hathor has me order. Daniel and Samantha are immediately taken away to a secure location. I turn to Rau’lee and Hathor says, “Lok shak kel’mak a kree!”
Then, secure in the knowledge that her orders will be obeyed, Hathor turns me and I sweep away, surrounded by the jaffa. I have to wonder what game Hathor is playing. She knows that Rau’lee is a tok’ra and yet she leaves her alone with O’Neill.
I am sorry, O’Neill. You shall be missed.
Hathor forces me to wait outside the cryogenics room, just far enough away that we cannot be sensed as goa’uld, while Rau’lee attempts to prevent the goa’uld from taking full control of O’Neill. As a tok’ra, she knows how difficult this is. And unlikely. If the goa’uld takes full possession of its new host at any point before full O’Neill is full immersed in cryo-stasis, it will survive. The host will protect it. Rau’lee has a great deal of faith in O’Neill.
On a small device, she monitors the progress of her jaffa. The jaffa are doing much better than I would wish them to. Still, I must wait.
Of all the things that I hate about being host to a goa’uld, this part ranks among the highest. I have watched as my own hands, hateful appendages, have committed atrocities. I have killed children too small to speak with these very hands. I have done horrors so awful that I put them from my mind.
But it is almost (and I stress the almost because I am no longer sure) worse to wait. Hathor may hide her thoughts from me sometimes, if she truly wishes. As the years progressed, I grew more apt at reading her, though little good it did me. Yet, if she is determined, I can not learn of what she plans. It is then that I know I am about to do some other cruelty. It does not matter how great anymore, I think. My hands are so stained that they could not become any dirtier.
Now is one of those times. I wait in the corridor for several more moments and then reenter the cryogenics chamber. The tau’ri are holding their own, much to my serpent’s dismay. I believe she may be altering her plans. Samantha and Daniel were just recovered by their comrades.
O’Neill is being lowered into the cryogenics pit. Rau’lee is watching. I silently approach.
“Jaffa, kree!” Hathor orders her. This has always puzzled me. Hathor must know that Rau’lee is not jaffa. Indeed, Rau’lee must have known that Hathor would spot her as someone who was not jaffa as soon as she passed within five units that I believe the tau’ri call feet. Certainly, it was known to her that this cover story would not work. I have never understood why Rau’lee attempted it in the first place.
It is odd the thoughts that pass through my head when Hathor is in the middle of a fight of some sort or another.
“Kel’noc shree jaffa! I am of the tok’ra. If the tau’ri do not destroy you, know this: we will.”
My hand raises towards her and the ribbon device on it activates. Rau’lee is tossed to the wall like a child’s doll. She was no great spy but I had hoped that she might find a way to effect my death in the event that the tau’ri failed to do so.
Now I fear I may have effected hers. Not yet, of course, but how long will she survive with injuries such as she has now sustained?
I stride quickly to the command room of Hathor’s complex. Trofsky is there, along with most of the other senior jaffa. Status reports are given to Hathor quickly. Her jaffa have killed the jaffa who had guarded the chappa’ai and vacated the area, leaving nothing behind them. The tau’ri inside the complex, however, seem to have disappeared. Hathor fears they may have already exited the complex.
“Send a guard to the Stargate,” Hathor orders. “The tau’ri will undoubtedly try to escape. We must ensure that they do not.”
Trofsky bows and rushes out to do her bidding. I turn to face one of the stations in the room. “Erect the barrier surrounding the chappa’ai. Let us make things as difficult as possible for the tau’ri.”
“Yes, my queen”s issue from various mouths. Now we wait just a little bit more.
A jaffa enters the room. Young. A messenger, I think. He bows. “My queen, Trofsky has arrived at the chappa’ai. He instructed me to tell you that he would report as soon as he was able.”
“Very good,” Hathor replies. “Go to the cryogenics section. If anyone should break in, initiate the alert for that sector.”
“Yes, my queen.” He leaves.
External sensors report weapons’ fire attempting to penetrate the barrier around the Stargate for a few seconds, then nothing. Several moments pass as I wait for more news.
If I had the ability, I would be crying now. My best hope for death lay with the tau’ri. They killed Ra, and did the same to Apophis. Surely one more goa’uld was not too much to hope? Surely it was possible?
Now, as I have so many times, I curse my beauty. My features, my voice, and my quite unusual hair were a curse that I did not recognize. If only I had known what evil they would bring to me, I would have done something to change them. Had I been born ugly, Hathor would have never chosen me as a host.
The communication console blinks and Trofsky’s image fills a screen.
“My queen, the chappa’ai is secure,” he reports.
“And the tau’ri?”
“They have fled into tunnels of tok’ra construction. There must be a spy amongst us,” he tells me.
Rau’lee seems to have fooled all those in the complex but the one person she truly needed to. How ironic.
“The tok’ra spy has been taken care of. Take as many of the humans as you can, alive. They will make an excellent addition to our new army of jaffa,” Hathor orders.
“Yes, my queen.” Trofsky nods his head just before the communication is cut off.
Hathor sits back and again, we wait. Soon, the tau’ri will discover that they will be unsucessful in thwarting the barrier from underground just as they were above it.
Yet, the fact that they are still free is comforting. Perhaps hope is not so lost as I feared. If the tau’ri have remained uncaptured for so long, then there may be a chance, however remote, that they will at least escape this planet. They are a resourceful people.
Hathor’s displeasure at the hopeful turn my thoughts have taken manifests itself in pain that shoots across me yet again. She never does seem to tire of hurting me. It is like a joke told to young children. Long after the joke has truly ceased to be funny, they continue to laugh uproariously every time it is told. Her glee at hurting me has never diminished, no matter that she causes me a great deal of pain every day.
Trofsky is calling again. My hands turn on the communication channel.
“My queen, the tau’ri called us here from their Stargate. I believe they were communicating with their warriors here. We have disabled their communications device and are continuing the search, however we have had no success thus far.”
“We will not tolerate failure,” Hathor growls. “You will continue to keep us appraised of what seems to pass with you for progress.” My hand cuts of the transmission angrily. Hathor stands and begins pacing across the room.
“All of you!” she orders the other jaffa in the room, “get out. We will maintain our own defenses better when not surrounded by fools and idiots!”
The jaffa cannot leave fast enough.
I can hear her thoughts this time. She is genuinely worried. The tau’ri are loose and she does not know what they are doing. Her jaffa have captured the Stargate, but they have yet to report back on any sort of changes in the situation. This means they have not yet captured the tau’ri or they are unable to report. In either case, that means the gate may yet be lost. If the gate is lost and the tau’ri escape, this complex will need to be evacuated or else she may loose all that she has built up.
I am cheering. I shall not die this day, but Hathor may suffer a great setback. At the very least, she will suffer an embarrassment beyond that which she has suffered for a very long time.
Ah yes, this familiar and gut-wrenching pain stops my cheering, but suddenly it fails, and for the first time since I have been possessed, Hathor is so distracted that for a split second, my body is my own.
I drag in a great, shuddering gasp, collapsing to my knees. And now the moment is over. Again the pain comes, but this time it is not so great. Hathor is distracted and now I know why. There is an intruder alert in the cryogenics sector. Sadly, it seems Hathor yet has one jaffa capable of doing her bidding.
Back firmly under Hathor’s control. I rush out of the command center, double-checking the ribbon device, which I still wear. As I approach the room, I hear Rau’lee’s voice. Never have I ever been so glad to hear the voice of that inept spy!
“The goa’uld within is gone. The cryogenic process destroyed it, before it had a chance to meld with the host. He will revive automatically,” Rau’lee informs…someone.
I hear sounds of a cryo-tank being removed from that icy pit. I am much closer now. Silently, I enter the room to see Samantha, may she be blessed with a thousand blessings, freeing O’Neill from his restraints.
“Colonel? I don’t feel its presence. You’re going to be all right.”
O’Neill fought the possession? Joyful, wonderful, happy, happy day!
My celebration does not last long. Samantha turns to see me, and my hand shoots up, ribbon device activated, centering the device’s energy right on the center of her forehead.
Much as I was moments ago, she is forced to her knees in pain. I fear that Hathor will kill her this time for what she has done. Samantha, who defeated her once. Samantha, that brave woman. For the first time since I killed my best friend, I struggle for control of my own body. My symbiote is distracted, there may yet be a chance.
I do not gain control, but her attention is now divided and she has forgotten what I still remember. O’Neill is no longer restrained, and he is himself. If he is at all able, he will kill me, and her as well.
“We had hopes for you,” Hathor informs Samantha. Nothing on my face betrays the fight I am conducting with her inside.
Seized! Hathor suddenly realizes why I distracted her, but it is too late. O’Neill has us. One arm pins my hand with the ribbon device behind my back. The other holds me flush to him. I cannot move, though Hathor forces me to struggle.
“We will destroy you for this!” Hathor shouts. It is an empty threat, though, because this time, I am sure. There is something about the angry way O’Neill holds me, how purposefully his cold hands are placed that leaves me no doubt. The means is before us. The cryogenics pit is not covered and waits eagerly for me.
“We would just like you to go away!” O’Neill returns. We rush forward and he catapults me over the railing of the cryogenics pit. Hathor forces me to scream, but I could not go more willingly. In a split second, a delightful, blissful cold covers me, freezing me right down to my bones, killing the serpent.
Then there is darkness.
