A Sword in Agate - Chapter 7
Disclaimer: I do not own Stargate: SG-1, Atlantis or Universe, I am just playing in the world
Previously: Ch 1 | Ch 2 | Ch 3 | Ch 4 | Ch 5 | Ch 6
A Sword in Agate - Chapter 7
Colorado Springs, New Year's Eve 1989
Cameron leaned his head against the cold glass of the passenger's side window of Sam's Volvo. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath of the cold air into his lungs as she opened the driver's side door and settled herself into the car, handing him the paper bag and rubbing her gloved hands together after closing the door. She started the engine and had the heaters going soon after. One benefit of buying a Swedish-built import was the good heating system built to stave off the Scandinavian winters. She put the car in gear and drove off, heading for downtown Colorado Springs.
"There wasn't much, even for New Year's Eve." she grumbled and he chuckled, looking inside the bag to see a standard-sized bottle of Asti Spumante, he glanced up at her and she gave him a look. "I don't care what you think, we're celebrating, we have lots to celebrate." He let her recite it all. "It's New Year's Eve even if we can't be with our families," he nodded, his extended practice schedule for the Liberty Bowl had curtailed any plans for going home over Winter break, Sam just didn't like flying back to Washington to stay with her father, "I'm now a second class Cadet/Master Sergeant," he smiled at the reminder that she was still proceeding at the pace she'd set for herself when she'd arrived at the Academy, "it was my birthday two days ago and I don't care that you lost the Bowl game." She growled the last with a warning look and raised her finger at him. "You got me a good present, I didn't expect a Bowl win on top of it, you ass." He chuckled softly.
"I know, Sam, I would have liked it, but it was also my last game. I wanted to go out a winner." He was surprised when he felt Sam's hand taking a hold of his and gripping it hard, then lifting it so his arm raised up to the roof of the car. He gasped in pain and clutched at his side, holding on to the ribs he'd cracked just before half-time when he took a nasty late tackle from an Ole Miss linebacker after handing off to his running back.
"We were up 20-14 when you got injured. So as far as I'm concerned, you did go out a winner." she said softly, gently lowering his arm and then running her fingers over it in apology. He breathed in tightly through his nose for a few moments with his eyes closed. "I don't care that Mississippi won the game, you weren't on the field." Her voice dropped so it was just barely audible before she continued. "I only go to watch you play." He glanced at her with his brows tightly furrowed, but said nothing. They were already crossing Pike's Peak Avenue onto South Union Boulevard before Cam recognised Memorial Park on their right. Sam turned in and navigated to the car park just south of the Veteran's Memorial. She killed the engine and turned to him for a moment. "I need you to understand something, Cam. You can't disappoint me." He let his gaze drop to the dashboard and she opened her door and got out. Cam followed after another moment. His boots crunched into the light layer of snow covering the lot. He paused to look over the Memorial Monument, its stone fingers, lit from below, reaching high into the night sky and joined together into a circle at their zenith by a crown of ironwork panels. He turned to her as she moved to the trunk.
"I know, Sam, that's not-" he stopped when Sam laughed out loud, that full throated laughter that he loved so much. He drew his lips tight with a sigh.
"Yes it is, Cam. Don't deny it." She eyed him with a smirk as she pulled out a small basket and a large blanket. He walked forward, the brown paper bag with their sparkling wine held under his arm. He took the basket from her hand as she closed the trunk with a grateful look. They set off towards the picnic area at the edge of Prospect Lake and placed their things under one of the canopies, keeping them out of the light snowfall which had begun a few minutes before.
Cam glanced around at the few others who'd had the same idea as they had for a slightly less crowded New Year's gathering spot, albeit one which still afforded amenities. There were people clustered by a small stage erected next to a bonfire by the lake's edge, enjoying the soft strains of an acoustic guitar being played by a local musician, her voice clear as crystal in the cold air even without amplification. Sam perched herself atop the table with her feet up on the bench and reached into the basket to fish out a thermos, pouring out a measure of steaming coffee into the lid and wrapping her fingers around it protectively as she inhaled the aroma. Cam smiled to himself as he looked down and picked up the blanket from beside her and opened it out, draping it over her shoulders. She smiled at him, her lips clearly visible thanks to the distant firelight from the lake's edge and the moonlight streaming down from above.
"You have no idea, Cameron, how much you've already done for me." she breathed after taking another sip. He stood in front of her with his hands in his jacket pockets. "You throw me off balance, only to steady me once more." He turned to look out over the ice-bound shore of Prospect Lake, out past the breaking ice to the shifting surface of the water and its fractured reflection of the Moon. "You cloud my thinking, only to shine a spotlight on the exact idea I need." He turned his head to look out over the bare trees by the lake, the snow lining their branches, whipped up by the wind and clinging to one side of their trunks. "You push me so hard, right up to the point where going on would set me back." He turned to the small throng of people around the musician as she sat on a tall stool with her guitar propped up on her knee and the last quavering note of a song floated towards them to be followed by grateful applause and enthusiastic cheers. "I wouldn't have quit the Academy even if you hadn't been here," he turned to face Sam as she gave him a playful smirk before piercing him with a more serious look, "but you have made something which would have been frenetic, stressful and difficult, into something interesting, laid-back and fun." He blinked as she looked down into her coffee before she offered it to him. He reached out and took it, taking a good swig of the dark, bitter liquid before handing it back. He felt the warmth seep down his throat and spread from the pit of his stomach outwards. "So I'm here to celebrate. And to say thank you." He looked down with a sigh and a shake of his head. She really had no idea.
He turned his head around and Sam dropped off the table, letting the blanket spill off her shoulders, when the small throng of people by the stage started calling out a countdown. She grabbed his arm with an eager grin and a glint in her eye and pulled him over to the bonfire. They joined in with the last few seconds and everyone cheered and cried out their greetings to the newborn year as soon as the first streak of fire was seen rising into the sky over Pikes Peak and erupting into a globe of blue sparkles to rival the stars, to be followed by more in hues of green and red and orange and purple and white. Their distant explosions soon joining the pealing of the bells of the nearby churches ringing in the New Year. All around them the people were hugging and kissing and their jostling had forced Sam into his arms, where she grinned and looked at him with eyes reflecting the shower of fire in the sky with their own inner blaze. Time slowed as he watched her grin falter slightly into something softer, the curve of her lips illuminated by the moonlight punctuated with each coloured explosion of the heavens. He leaned forward slightly, unconsciously, seeking the warmth he knew would be there in those lips.
"Come on everybody! Kiss the person next to you! Get 1990 started off right!" cried the singer as she leapt down from the stage and planted a kiss on the first cute guy she could get her hands on then began strumming on her guitar energetically as everyone cheered and followed suit. When Cam returned his gaze to Sam after it had been pulled towards the singer he found her smiling broadly again and chuckling. She tilted her head to the side and her eyes sparkled.
"Can't disappoint 1990 while it's still so young, right? Shall we?" she asked and very purposefully placed her hands on his shoulders. He smiled and nodded, resting his hands on her back and leaning in for a small kiss as everyone around them cheered in delight. They were applauding and hooting for every kiss they saw in the small crowd. He pulled back and felt Sam pressing into him tightly, her cheek flush against his. "Happy New Year, Cameron." she breathed.
"Happy New Year, Sam. Thank you so much." he replied. She pulled back and grabbed his hand in hers, pulling him back towards the picnic area.
"Come on, we have wine and I made sandwiches, brie and cranberry on French sticks. We can warm them up on the grill set up by the bonfire." She grinned as they crunched through the snow. "Brie is lovely when it's slightly melted."
Stargate Command, May 2006
Cameron frowned and his hand holding the razor stopped just over his foam-lathered cheek. He reached up, wiped away some of the steam from the mirror in front of him and saw Daniel looking at him in a rather suggestive manner. His first thought was that the linguist was playing a joke on him, that didn't seem likely though. Jackson had a sense of humour, but it was heavily based on sarcasm and irony. He turned around slowly. Another thought was that he'd gone and fiddled with some piece of alien technology, certainly a possibility, but Cam tended to keep abreast of anything the archaeologist was working on. He certainly remembered nothing that sounded even vaguely dangerous or which could mess with his mind.
"Jackson? Is there something I should know?" he asked and Daniel shrugged his shoulders with a very wide grin on his face. This was getting disturbing. The grin looked kind of familiar.
"Perhaps, Cameron, that you look very good with just a towel on?" Daniel began while leaning to the side and very definitely checking out Cam's backside. Some of the others in the locker room were already backing up, some in amusement, others not so much. "Or maybe that-"
"You're not Jackson." Cam interrupted with a scowl and crossed his arms over his chest as he leaned back against the sink. Daniel stood up straight with broad smirk and shook his head. "Okay, honesty is good, so you have five seconds to tell me who you are or I get Private Danning over there to call the SFs." Daniel looked over at the stern-looking young Marine and waved before turning back to Cam.
"It's me, Vala." Another smile from Daniel had Cam looking away with a grimace. There was another possibility, that Daniel had finally had a psychotic break and developed multiple personalities. "I swear, Daniel hasn't gone wonko," he flourished his fingers on either side of his head, "it really is me." Cam looked back and narrowed his eyes. Daniel cocked a hip with his hands at his waist and looked at him appraisingly. "So... I've been gone for ages, have you told her yet?" Cam blinked in alarm and frowned. Damn, it really was her. What the Hell was going on? He pointed back towards the entrance.
"Go wait outside, I'll be out in five. Then we're getting some answers... Vala." he muttered and turned back around. Daniel beamed and spun on his heels theatrically, waving to all the men around him. Cam shook his head while he looked in the mirror at the way Daniel's hips rolled as he sauntered out. Five minutes later, Cam found Daniel/Vala chatting happily with one of Daniel's very confused assistants who must have spotted who she thought was the archaeologist in the corridor and came over to discuss some small project. "Vala, don't mess with people's heads!" Cam nodded towards the young linguistics scholar and pointed at Vala. "Not currently your boss, Dr. Simpson." She looked flustered, but relieved that she hadn't just been having a conversation about lip gloss and nail polish with her supervisor.
"Um, alright, Colonel Mitchell, um... I guess I'll... just be going." She smiled at Cam and turned away quickly.
"Bye, Mary." Vala waved after the retreating young woman. She turned to Cameron and fell into step alongside him and looped an arm through his. Which drew stares from those around them. "So where are we going, my dear Colonel Mitchell?"
"We're going to find Sam, I expect she'll know what's going on." Cam replied as they reached the elevator and called for it. Sam would likely be eating her breakfast in the mess.
"So you haven't told her?" Vala asked as they entered the elevator and the doors swished shut on them. Cam glared at her then shook his head. "Cameron..." He raised a finger in warning which she just ignored. "I really don't understand, even if you can't be together you should tell her. You're just making yourself unhappy as you are." Cam closed his eyes and sighed. The worst thing was the woman had a point.
"I can't, Vala, if it messes up things between her and me, that would be worse." he breathed softly as the car slowed and came to a stop on sublevel 22. Vala blew air from Daniel's pursed lips and looked away abruptly.
"Just imagine I tossed my hair at you, Daniel's is too short." she groused and he chuckled, stepping out of the elevator. Definitely Vala. "I think you're missing out on something very important, Cameron, and for what? Some rules on a piece of paper somewhere?" Cam glared at her fiercely.
"It's for our careers, her career. Sam's one of the most important people in the Air Force right now and I would never-" He was stopped by Daniel's finger against his lips.
"Sometimes you say the stupidest things, Cameron." Vala muttered and walked on. He bristled and stormed after her towards the mess, hoping desperately to regain his composure before he got there. As he walked in he spotted Sam at their usual table, he paused for a moment just to watch her before pulling Vala forward and stepping up to her table, pointing at the smuggler in an archaeologist's body.
"How is this possible?" he asked Sam as Vala tilted Daniel's head to the side and stood with his hands on his hips. Sam looked up in confusion then dawning comprehension and Cam had to close his eyes momentarily because it was far too adorable.
"Oh, my God. It worked!"
USS Odyssey, above P3X-474, May 2007 + 3,480 days relative
"You want to build another simulator?" she asked as he moved the control stone over the etched metal surface of the Core's console. He looked over his shoulder as she sat at her chair by her laptop and crossed her legs while looking at him.
"Not right away, maybe won't even need to. And it won't be a simulator, more like a regular holodeck." he gave her a little look as she started laughing. "So you think it's a silly idea?" She shook her head with an amused look in her eyes. He smirked and walked over to her. "Come on, Ms. Skeptic. Let me show you something." She quirked her eyebrow and let him help her up then held his hand as they walked from the Core room. "I've been doing the groundwork for it in my simulator. Main thing was adding forcefield projectors." She tilted her head.
"Forcefield projectors?" She looked away for a moment as the possibilities rushed over her. "Traction fields for movement, surface projection for structures. Honey, you've added this to your simulator already?" He nodded as they entered the elevator.
"The basics of it, nothing fine grained." He looked at her as they exited into the corridor closest to the flight bay. "What I'm thinking about for the real thing needs to do more than just project surfaces." They walked out onto the flight bay and moved over to his simulator. As she rounded the corner at the back of the simulator she saw several open panels under the computer stations and lots of cables spilling out to several pieces of machinery lying haphazardly on the floor. "Sorry about the mess." She giggled and he led her inside the dome after retrieving the remote from its holder on the console. He pressed a few buttons and the F302 rose up on its stanchions high past the center of the sphere, almost touching the wall.
"Cam, didn't you say that the computer uses the cockpit as the origin for its simulation?" she asked as she watched the gantry fold itself under the fighter's fuselage. He grunted and handed her the remote. She took it and looked down at the display to see it flashing a notice. 'Dynamic Origin Mode' was emblazoned at the top of the display.
"In this mode the computer takes the midpoint between our heads to use in its calculations as an approximate origin. Also it gets the 302 out of the way." Cam explained and she nodded. She spotted a menu on the side labelled 'Locations' and she flicked through it and chuckled. At the top of the list were the obvious locations, 'USS Odyssey' and 'P3X-474' with further submenus leading from them. She was surprised to see some other locations, 'O'Neill-class battleship', 'Othala' and 'Orilla', the submenu of which listed a few locations such as the 'Yngmir Forest' and 'Lake Urstavanger'. She quickly selected the lake and the display shifted from the black with yellow gridlines to the treeline at the edge a vast placid lake, with the reflections of the distant mountains shining under the twin moons of the former Asgard homeworld, now destroyed.
"Oh, Cameron, this is beautiful." she breathed. "You got this from the Core?" He nodded. "It looks amazing." He took her hand and led her to one of the trees and he placed her hand on it. She pressed and frowned, it felt as if it was definitely there, but it didn't feel right. "Fine grain control?" He smiled and nodded at her understanding then led her around the edge of the lake, they walked for a good five minutes, talking about the scenery and what he'd learned from the Core about the place. She realised they must be walking over the top of a shaped traction field and they were probably right in the center of the simulator. Cam held up the index finger of his hand then led her towards the water, she shied from it until he stepped right in. It looked perfect, the water flowed around his legs just as they should. "Vala will want to use this to film live-action location shots." She chuckled as he smiled then she bent down to place her hand in the water. Again, definitely resistance, but it felt wrong against her skin. Not like water. "You're thinking of simulating water droplets with forcefields?" She asked incredulously.
"Believe it or not, it would take less power than having the Asgard transporters create real water as needed, not to mention having to hide the white shimmer behind holograms all the time." He pointed out and she nodded. "Still needs a lot of work though, I'm sure you can tell."
"Yeah, it doesn't feel quite right." She stared back into the treeline. "Individual leaves, individual blades of grass?" He nodded, but raised a finger.
"Only at interaction points." he said and she blinked at the simplicity of that. Cam was always finding little things that would save time and speed and processing. Such as only projecting the forcefields for things which were in contact with one of them.
"So if I had a stone and threw it into the lake?" She laughed as he tilted his head and looked at her as if she were talking nonsense. "Of course, we wouldn't bring real stones in here." She reached down into the water and pulled up a stone from under the water. It felt very smooth, a little too smooth, but still very stone-like. "As soon as this leaves my hand..." She lifted an eyebrow at him and he nodded smiling.
"The force fields switch off and it becomes just a hologram." he confirmed. "Even if it hits the water off in the distance it'll just be a hologram. Only if you toss it to me will it reapply the forcefield once my hand touches it."
"Well, what you've got already is amazing, Cameron, but what about when two people are in here, but walking in opposite directions?" she asked.
"When they get a certain distance apart-" he started only to chuckle when she interrupted him as her eyes sparkled in amazement.
"The traction field splits and a double-sided hologram comes up between both people," she began rapidly, "which obscures the other person while simulating the growing distance between them." He nodded.
"The hologram between them bisects the dome." He pointed up and she followed with her eyes, noticing that the F302 was being hidden behind another hologram. "Best thing is that, since we're not moving at Mach 3, it can handle the extra workload of two origin points without any extra processing hardware." She grinned then looked back at him seriously.
"I don't understand what this is about. Why do you want to do this?" she asked while leading him back out of the lake as the fake water flowed strangely around her ankles.
"Just look at this place, Sam, you said it yourself, it's beautiful." Cam exclaimed, spreading his arms out wide while still having a hold of her hand. "Imagine camping out in this, or visiting a beach or-" He stopped when she put her fingers over his lips.
"You had me at camping." She looked around at the night sky, and the near moon occluding its larger sister in the distance. "So, honey, what are your holiday plans?"
Camelot, September 2010
Before they could say anything by way of greeting to their friends or their hosts, Sam found herself engulfed in Vala's embrace. She laughed and hugged her friend in return.
"Samantha! I missed you so much!" Vala cried.
"It's only been a couple of weeks, Vala, but yeah, I missed you too." She grinned as she looked over to Daniel and Teal'c. "We missed all of you, we really did." Cam nodded in agreement while Teal'c bowed slightly to them. Daniel sighed with a soft smile on his face.
"Good to see you again, Meurik, Valencia." Cam greeted each with a hand shake. Sam did likewise once Vala had been pried away from her by Daniel. She noticed the sword at Valencia's side and the militia insignia on the young woman's tunic and grinned at a beaming Cameron. "Congratulations, Valencia." She blushed slightly at his approbation and nodded happily. "Really, thanks for putting up with these three for all this time."
"It is always a pleasure to host Dr. Jackson and Teal'c." Meurik replied. "It has also been a joy to meet Lady Vala." Sam looked pointedly at the former smuggler who just shrugged with an innocent look. "You are both welcome to Camelot once more, Colonel Mitchell, Colonel... pardon, Dr. Carter." The older man smiled slightly as he corrected himself and Sam nodded to him. The town elder then made sure to invite them all to dine at his home and left to carry on with his duties. Vala took the opportunity to hug Cameron while Daniel gave Sam a quick hug then clapped Cam on the shoulder. After Teal'c was greeted in his turn Daniel wasted no time in grabbing Cam's left wrist and bringing it up so he could examine the dark metal clasp more closely.
"Try not to dislocate anything, Jackson." joked Cam to the archaeologist's dissatisfied grunt.
"You're given a piece of advanced technology by a member of the most powerful race to have ever walked this galaxy and you use it to tell the time." Daniel glared at him before bending Cam's elbow to show him the familiar time display. "Mountain Standard Time at that! I bet this thing could automatically adjust itself to any planet's rotational cycle instantly." Cam pointed at Daniel with raised eyebrows.
"That's a good idea, Jackson." he said brightly and Daniel snorted in disgust.
"I still can't believe you two met the builder of Selenis." breathed Vala in awe as she looped her arm through Sam's. "And that Selenis can rise to the surface! We are so doing that again as soon as we get back! Understood?" She frowned seriously when Sam and Cam both laughed and shared a knowing smile.
"Show it to me." ordered Daniel tersely as he let Cam's wrist drop. Sam looked at him curiously for a moment until he rolled his eyes. "The Key." She nodded and was about to touch her hand to the clasp when Cam stopped her. She glanced at him as he looked towards Valencia.
"Valencia," he began seriously in his best impression of Daniel, "there is no magic." He gave Sam a nod and Vala was already laughing at the warning look Daniel threw towards the Air Force officer. Valencia for her part just grinned mirthfully as she stood next to Teal'c. Sam drew her fingers away from her wrist then slipped her hand into the strip of light she had created in the air in front of her. Valencia was looking on wide-eyed while Daniel just shook his head until Sam pulled out the silver disk and handed it to him. The strip narrowed and thinned before fading completely. Daniel was already flipping the disk over and over in his hands, running his fingers over the grooves, raised bevels and Alteran glyphs.
"I don't believe it. And you say this is related to the Lock of the Eternal Moment?" he asked them and Sam shook her head.
"The Lock of the Moment of Eternity." she corrected and he nodded slightly with a tilt of his head. "And that's a part of the Key to the Vault of Infinity."
"Of course, thessara can mean 'treasure' or 'the place where treasure resides.'" he murmured absently.
"Ilemus did describe it as a subtle though predictable mistake." added Cameron with a smile. Daniel was busy turning the disk around in his hands. He didn't even seem to notice as Vala walked to him and directed him to a seat with small touches on his shoulders. Sam smiled at the sight. "Oh, here's something else." He touched his fingers to his own clasp and drew it away, pulling a large case from the strip of light. "We brought the Lock too, so you could look at it." Daniel looked up at that and his eyes glittered in gratitude as Cam rested the case in front of him on a pile of books on the table. "And one more thing," he reached his hand into the strip which hadn't yet faded and pulled out a steaming cup of coffee from Daniel's favourite café, "Sumatra Mandehling. One cream, two sugars." The stunned archaeologist just blinked. Sam bit her lip as she smiled as Cam winked at her. "This thing seems to hold whatever we put into it in some sort of stasis."
"Did you bring me anything, Cameron?" Vala purred as she sidled up to him. Cam laughed and drew out a tub of chocolate ice cream for the elated woman, she gave a little squeal and ran over to Valencia with the tub in hand. "Come on, Valencia, you're going to love this." She grabbed the young woman's hand and ran out the library in search of cutlery. Sam laughed as Vala blew them both a kiss as she darted out the door. Daniel was still staring at the cup of coffee as if he couldn't quite believe it was there.
"We didn't leave you out either T-man." Cam began as he reached into the strip of light and pulled out the custom stock and grip of Teal'c's preferred M60E3 machine gun. "All your favourites." He laughed at Teal'c's clear look of amusement and Sam's vague look of dismay.
"Cam, you haven't..." She trailed off at his stupid grin, realising that of course he had, he probably had a small armoury's worth of weaponry in there. She created the tear and reached in, pulling out a P90 with a sigh, stuffing it back in she pulled out a block of C4 and stuffed it back inside just to pull out the front end of a FIM-92F Stinger shoulder-mounted anti-aircraft missile launcher. "Cameron!" she cried as she stared at him aghast, he just shrugged while Teal'c nodded his approval. Daniel was reaching for the cup and he still seemed only distantly aware they were there. Sam glared at Cameron as she stuffed the missile launcher back inside then pulled out exactly what she thought she would, an ice-cold bottle of beer. "Holy Hannah." she breathed as Cam began laughing.
"Let's just say I have yet to discover a limit to this thing." he said through his chuckles and Sam shook her head, putting the bottle back. She glanced at Cam while her hand was still inside the strip and he gave a little nod. She concentrated and nearly groaned as she pulled out a plate with a fully loaded turkey sandwich. "Don't ever say I don't love ya, T." He grinned as Sam passed the plate to the Jaffa who accepted it with a light chuckle and a short bow to them both.
"You're unbelievable, Cam." she breathed with a shake of her head as she slipped an arm around his lower back. He slipped his hand around her shoulder and smiled.
"I'll say." Daniel added as he nursed the cup of coffee he'd been taking short sips from in between long satisfied sighs.
Fifteen minutes later, Vala and Valencia were both licking their bowls of any last trace of chocolate ice cream while Sam leaned against Cam's shoulder on their high-backed bench as she played idly with the long spoon from the sundae glass of blue jello she'd found inside her clasp's storage dimension. God she loved Cameron. They all sat around the table in Merlin's Library while Daniel had been summarising his and Vala's findings from the previous fortnight.
"It's still as slow as ever going through this place." he grumbled. "I'm seriously thinking of asking General Landry to authorise a full digitisation and indexing program for these books. It would really help out." He opened a couple of books in front of him to pages he'd marked off with loose pieces of paper. "I didn't get any hits in any text for a few days, until then we'd really only had the stories Vala managed to learn from the townspeople and their legends. Valencia helped her out a lot." He chuckled as the young woman smiled softly. Vala grinned and ruffled her hair before taking over the summarising.
"Just about every legend told by Valencia's people, and by those of the surrounding villages Teal'c and I visited with her, have a direct connection to Merlin or Arthur in some way." she explained. She was about to prop her feet up on the table when she was stopped by a cough and a warning glare from Daniel. She sighed and let them drop back to the floor before continuing. "A lot of them have to do with the Sangreal as you'd imagine, most of those which specifically mention Merlin in opposition to someone involve Morgan le Fay. There are a few which mention a group of men, traitors who stood against Merlin's ancestors."
"We know them as the Tilexsuli." Valencia elaborated.
"The Exiles of Tile. Or as we know it, Thule." Daniel translated.
"The main legend is of the remaining Tilexsuli fighting a great battle against Merlin at a place called the Plains of Ar Domûn." Vala continued. "Merlin discovered that the Tilexsuli had released a scourge upon several lands in the distant past. In retribution for these heinous crimes he froze them under the earth in a vast block of crystal. There to spend all eternity imprisoned." Sam glanced up at Cam in wide-eyed surprise and he frowned slightly. "What is it, Samantha?" asked the raven-haired woman after she noticed the look.
"Well, Vala, we found Ilemus encased in a stasis block," Sam began and the other woman nodded, "from the outside it looked an awful lot like a column of crystal, lit from within."
"That would fit with our assumptions about what Merlin did." agreed Daniel in a soft voice.
"Do we know anything about this Ar Domûn?" Cam asked. Daniel shook his head apologetically.
"No, nothing, but that's not the interesting thing about this legend." Daniel leaned forward and picked up one of the books he'd opened earlier, passing it to Teal'c who handed it to Sam. She laid it across hers and Cam's laps. She couldn't read what was on the page itself; it was a local dialect, related distantly to Alteran; however, the sheet of paper Daniel was using to mark the page had a translation of the passage he'd found interesting. "Every variation of the story from every source I find it in, mentions that after the battle, Merlin left for the Agate Seat." Sam looked at him askance. "The 'agate' in this case is the translation used for a catch-all term in the original which refers to all sorts of semi-precious gems of igneous and sedimentary origin. The original is Sedis Murani."
"Merlin went to Muranis?" Cam asked incredulously and Daniel nodded. He turned to Sam and she nodded, sitting up and pointing to the clasp on her wrist.
"Daniel, two nights ago, we found out what the Archive of Ilemus is." she began as Daniel's eyes became steely and intense. "Cam and I shared a dream of Ilemus visiting Muranis, after the exodus to Lantica." The archaeologist jumped up and ran for a shelf, dragging out a scroll that lay atop a line of books and spreading it out on the table. He scanned it then pointed to a column of text.
"'Myrddin landed in the abandoned Home, following in the footsteps of Ailemu. Seeking for the chalcedony key, lost in ancient times.' Do you see what this means?" he asked. "The lost key of chalcedony, the key of Muranis." Sam glanced at Cameron with a small frown. Merlin went to Muranis in search of the Key, the text specifically mentioned Ilemus as well.
"There's a connection between Merlin, Ilemus and the Key." Sam said softly to Daniel's satisfied nod.
"Have you seen anything else from this Archive?" he asked expectantly only for his shoulders to slump when they shook their heads. "I was hoping you'd be able to confirm something for me." He gave Vala a little signal and she stood up, heading for a bookshelf behind her, pulling out a small book which she brought to the table, opening it to another marked page. "We found mention of the Agate's Home Sigil in the legends Vala learned from the locals. When I looked over some heraldry lists I saw this inscription under a depiction of the coat-of-arms device of one of Arthur's knights." Vala handed them the book and Sam looked at it as Cam placed the other book they'd been holding back on the table. It was an image of a shield painted black, in the center of it, in green, was a hexagon with eight curved rays of gold rising from its center to stop just short of its edges. "We think this is Point of Origin symbol for Muranis' home planet. The Agate's Home, so to speak." Daniel muttered uncertainly and Cam looked up in confusion.
"Jackson, this isn't one of the symbols for those other two addresses which share Selenis' first eight chevrons." he said with a small frown.
"I know. Which is why we were hoping you'd be able to confirm it." He sat back down dejectedly not noticing the look of alarm that passed between Sam and Cameron.
"~Galadia, open a subspace channel to Selenis, please.~" Cam said after raising a hand to his comm. Daniel looked at him curiously while Vala shared a look with Teal'c.
"You appear to be concerned with this new information." stated the Jaffa as he glanced between them both.
"Well, Teal'c. If this is Muranis' home planet Point of Origin symbol and it still shares the first eight symbols with Selenis, one of the other two symbols we have is for Kariala." Sam explained. Daniel frowned in confusion.
"~Connection established, Colonel Mitchell.~" confirmed the ship in orbit.
"~Selenis, this is Colonel Mitchell. Lock out the other two Stargate addresses in our database which share your first eight symbols. Sound a Red Alert if a connection from either one is established.~" Cam ordered as Teal'c's features finally settled into understanding.
"~Acknowledged, Colonel Mitchell, I will inform Stargate Command.~" replied the AI and Cam thanked her.
"And the other is for Thule." Sam finished for Daniel and Vala's benefit once the comm had disconnected. Both looked back in horrified silence.
On to Chapter 8