Diplomacy (14a/27)
Title: Diplomacy ( Table of Contents)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Nothing you recognize is mine. I gain nothing of material value from this.
Pairings: Gen.
Chapter1a-- 1b Chapter2 Chapter3 Chapter4 Chapter5a-- 5b Chapter6 Chapter7 Chapter8 Chapter9 Chapter10 Chapter11a-- 11b Chapter12 Chapter13a-- 13b Chapter14a-- 14b Chapter15a-- 15b Chapter16 Chapter17a-- 17b Chapter18 Chapter19 Chapter20 Chapter21 Chapter22 Chapter23 Chapter24 Chapter25 Chapter26 Epilogue
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Frater, Mater, Pater, Part II
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13 November 1998; Temple of Kheb; 1700 hrs
"Put your weapons down," Daniel repeated, like he was working out a puzzle and not asking them all to leave themselves completely defenseless. To be fair, he sounded so distracted Jack didn't think he realized he was repeating himself. On the other hand...
Jack clenched his fists and breathed out carefully through his nose. "We're not even touching our weapons, Daniel." If he had been, he had no doubt that he would have found an Abydon with absolutely no common sense whatsoever standing in front of his gun, and, goddammit, what the hell was wrong with him? As he watched, however, Daniel was not only returning his zat to its holster but also pulling the damn thing off his leg entirely. "Daniel?"
Daniel paused. "Jack?"
The monk was watching them without a word, as if to see what they would do, so Jack forced his tone light as he asked, "Whatcha doing?"
As if noticing only then that no one else was taking off any gear, Daniel gave him a pleading look, balancing Shifu against his hip as he put the zat on the ground. His eyebrows did an intricate little dance, complete with occasional glances in the direction of the temple and the warden. "Jack..."
"No, Daniel," Jack insisted.
"Can't shoot a storm cloud," Daniel pointed out in a lowered voice.
Carter glanced at him and tilted her head silently in that 'it's a good point, sir' way. "I don't want to hear it, Captain," he told her.
"Yes, sir," she said, unperturbed, though her expression said she was still thinking it very strongly. Bra'tac looked like he thought they might possibly all be crazy, but he lay his staff weapon carefully on the ground beside Daniel's zat and didn't comment.
"Jack," Daniel said again, quietly, "you gave me orders to communicate with the beings on this planet. There's no reason for that to have changed just because those beings somehow speak English, and I am certain that weapons won't help us."
Jack was already regretting having done any such thing.
"You saw what happened out there," Daniel insisted. "I know what you think of me, but I'm not being reckless, not this time. If"--he glanced over at the monk and dropped to a whisper--"he wants to kill us, nothing we have with us will stop him, except good will. He hasn't harmed us yet, and we shouldn't--"
The radio crackled to life on Jack's shoulder. "Sierra Golf one niner, this is Sierra Golf two niner. Do you copy?"
Jack reached up automatically to answer, not looking away. "Loud and clear, Major. We're all good here; you can relax."
"Sir," Ferretti's voice said, sounding spooked, "there are dead bodies littering the ground where we came through. They were fried by something, and bad, like no weapon damage we've ever seen before. Look like Jaffa--Horus symbol. It's like they were hit by lightning."
The monk was still watching. "That's because they are, and they were," Jack said.
"Sir?"
"They're Horus Guards who got struck by lightning. As a group."
There was a pause, and then, "What the hell?"
"We'll explain when we get back," Jack settled on saying. "Whoever you guys brought with you--just stay at the 'gate. We've met some"--he eyed the monk--"nice folks, and we're sticking around here for a while. Check back in three zero minutes."
"Roger, sir."
"Oh, and..." Boy, was this going to sound dumb. "If a storm starts gathering, you'll want to put down your weapons."
"...Colonel, say again?"
"Yeah, I know. Just..." Jack glanced at Daniel. "Just trust us on this one, Lou. In fact, I'm making that an order."
"Yes, sir. Ferretti out."
Apparently, however this monk guy was controlling the weather, he had been busier than they'd realized. Where had that glowy thing gone, anyway?
Carter stepped toward him and said quietly, "He's not a Goa'uld, sir."
"How can you tell?"
She gave him an odd look, then said simply, "Jolinar. No symbiote."
Ah, right. Jack kept forgetting about that side effect.
So, because he'd feel like an ass if he got struck down by lightning for holding a weapon, Jack unclipped his submachine gun and motioned to his team to do the same with their arms. But that wasn't all; no, of course not, because there was also the issue of--
"Put no barriers between you and where you are," the monk said.
"We...excuse me?" Daniel said uncertainly.
"I believe he wishes us all to take off our boots," Bra'tac said.
"Ah..." Jack said, still finding it disconcerting how the usually straightforward Jaffa master was so willing to go along with all of this. "Nah, I don't...think so."
Daniel, on the other hand, was all too eager to kick off his boots, and Jack was reminded of the alien boy they had brought back to Earth a year ago, who read hieroglyphs and couldn't remember not to walk barefoot around the base. "Okay," Daniel said, carefully sliding his arms out of his pack so he could pull a restless Shifu out of the carrier and hold him more comfortably.
Jack was on the verge of telling him not to do that, because who knew if they'd have to start running again, except he had a feeling that wouldn't be much of an issue as far as the Horus Guards were concerned. As for the monk and the glowy thing, he'd relax when he knew how the monk was controlling the Mother at all.
On second thought, he'd relax when they were out of range of the death clouds.
The monk turned to him, Carter, and Teal'c again, and Jack repeated, "We're good. Trust me, we had a long walk. We're not doing anyone any favors by taking these babies off."
"When the mind is opened," the monk said, "the spirit is freed, and the body matters not."
O...kay. Well, Jack was pretty keen on keeping his spirit right where it was, thank you very much, and his body was pretty useful for that whole being alive thing. "I'm just saying."
"Do you seek oneness with Desala?" the monk asked.
"Desala?" Jack found himself looking to Daniel for a translation.
Daniel shook his head. "I don't know. I don't even recognize..." The two Jaffa seemed lost, as well. "What is Desala?" he asked.
"Desala is everything," said the monk.
"I thought that was the Mother," Carter said, confused.
"Or is that her name?" Daniel asked. "Desala?"
"A man may wear many coats, but he is still a man."
Jack thought about that for a second, then said, "What?"
"I'm sorry," Daniel said, "it's just that we've come a long way to try to find some answers. Will you please at least hear out our questions?"
"Your journey has only begun," the monk told him. "You seek the end before you have set foot upon the path."
Daniel opened his mouth, blinked, and closed it again, the calm expression beginning to fray. "I don't understand what I should be doing instead."
Silently, Jack agreed. Subtlety was one thing, but this...this was downright cryptic.
"The doors must be opened before light can enter."
Jack bit back an impatient retort, but it was wasted effort, because Daniel's frustration leaked through audibly when he finally asked, "What doors?"
Bra'tac stepped in, then. "Perhaps it is we who must open the door and enter, O'Neill. The being of light we observed also entered into here." He gestured toward the temple, not quite able to hide the eager longing in his eyes. At the monk's nod, the elderly Jaffa raised his chin and walked inside without a backward glance.
Ah. So that one was literal.
"Carter, Teal'c, you guys want to see the glowy thing, too, don't you?" Jack said, wanting a skeptic or two in there with the Jaffa master.
"Uh...sure?" Carter said unconvincingly, just as Teal'c told him flatly, "I do not."
They exchanged glances, and then Teal'c amended unhappily, "I was mistaken." Looking much more reluctant about the find-the-path-to-the-light deal than Bra'tac was, Teal'c searched the monk with another long stare before following Carter into the room after Bra'tac.
Daniel made to go as well, but the monk held out a hand to stop him before he could enter.
"You must first rid yourself of your burden," the man told him.
With a glance down at the infant in his arms, Daniel took a wary step back. "Uh, that...that's okay."
"You cannot achieve oneness with Desala until your burden has been released."
"No, no," Daniel protested with forced casualness that didn't really cover his nervousness. "He's not a burden at all. I'll just...hold onto him."
"I'm not sure he means a literal burden," Jack told him, and then asked the monk, "Who said we want to achieve oneness with anyone?"
The man didn't answer him, instead continuing to direct this words directly to Daniel. Maybe he could tell Daniel was the one who was interested in this mumbo jumbo. "You hold tightly to this child of flesh and bone."
Jack heard an audible swallow and took a step closer, careful to keep his hands in the open where he could not be mistaken for anything threatening. Not that anything would seem threatening to a guy who apparently had Mother Nature on a leash. "Yes, I do," Daniel said cautiously. "I promised we would make him safe--he is the son of my sister."
"Then why do you bring the child here?"
"To... I don't... To find answers," he said again. "She told us to bring him here and said we could find answers. To seek help in keeping him safe. To talk to you, I suppose. I don't know."
The monk didn't move. "Because the answer is so clear, it takes a longer time to realize it."
Jack imagined he could see smoke coming from Daniel's ears from how furiously the wheels were turning in his head. Finally, he admitted, "I have no idea what you mean. But we need help, so...please. If I cannot enter with my brother, at least let me ask you my questions before you go back inside."
"Is there another reason?"
"N--what? Another reason for what?"
"You bring the boy here to fulfill a promise. Is there another reason?"
Daniel hesitated, then said, "Yes. We need to understand about him and about our enemy."
"You cannot understand until your mind is open," said the monk. "To open your mind is to understand. The path is illuminated. You have but to take the first step.
"I'd like to," Daniel parried swiftly, frustrated, "but you're blocking the way."
The monk's lips curved into a serene smile. Finally, he stepped back, no longer standing in their path. "When your mind and soul are truly at peace, the physical will no longer be an obstacle." He turned and walked into the temple himself, leaving Jack and Daniel alone outside the doors.
"I think that was a 'welcome in,'" Jack said.
"You do?" Daniel asked uncertainly. "I thought that was a 'stay out.'"
Jack shrugged. "I say we go in."
Bra'tac was somehow managing to look dignified even without his shoes or weapon, his cape draped over his arm as he studied the temple's interior. Teal'c was still near the entrance and seemed to have been waiting for them to enter. The walls of the temple were covered with markings of some kind, and the monk stood watching them from the middle of the floor. It was all very Zen. Jack wasn't particularly fond of Zen unless it had to do with fishing.
Carter was pacing nervously and snapped to attention immediately when they stepped inside. "Sir, was something wrong?"
"Nope. Just a little blip," Jack told her.
"Wow," Daniel breathed. His attention consumed by the walls, he ignored the others in the room and gently shifted the baby into one arm, freeing his other hand to dig for his glasses. "This...these walls are literally covered with writing."
"Can you read it?" Carter asked.
"Well, no, but it does bear some slight resemblance to some ideographic writing systems on Earth. In fact..." He turned suddenly, his face alight and animated, in sharp contrast to the composed monk in the center of the room. "Did you write this? Or are the people who wrote it still here? Is that why we're here?"
"Why did you come?" the man asked in place of an answer.
"I already told you why."
"Then why did you ask?"
Daniel's excitement dimmed a little. "But...right. Okay." He looked around, then asked, "Can you read it?"
"Knowledge can be found by all who truly seek it," the monk said.
Jack thought he should be canonized for not throttling the man out of pure frustration.
Turning to them, Daniel said, "I think...this might take a little time."
"We've got time," Carter said, glancing at Jack. "Right, sir?"
"Time," the monk added as he lowered himself to sit on the floor, "is no constraint to one who has achieved oneness with Desala."
"Okay, yeah," Jack said, not in the mood to pursue that line of thought. The biggest possible threat at this point seemed to be right here, from whoever this person was and whoever the glowy Mother was, and since they'd been here for a while without being struck down, being nice to them was probably the safest they'd get on this planet. He stuck his head outside into the dark, almost expecting to see all of their supplies gone and realize this was all a horrible trick of some kind, but everything was just how they'd left it.
"Teal'c and I can keep an eye on our stuff," Carter offered, apparently also thinking the same thing.
"Good idea," Jack said and watched as they stepped outside, both bending immediately to pick up their weapons. He glanced at his watch, resigning himself to what had disconcertingly begun to look like a boring research mission, even as he still felt the adrenaline from their flight and the uneasy feeling of something off about the rest of it.
Daniel didn't even seem to notice their exchange, still studying at the writing as if he could read it if he stared hard enough. "Daniel? Are you forgetting the reason we came here?" Jack gestured toward the Harsesis, who was blinking up at them sleepily after the long day's journey.
"Uh...of course, you're right," Daniel said, looking surprised enough that Jack started to suspect he had forgotten, after all, but there was a note of reluctance in his voice, like he'd remembered but not wanted to remember, just in case he learned something about his baby brother that he didn't want to hear.
"Can you tell us anything about the Harsesis?" Jack asked the monk. "Child of two Goa'uld?"
"That knowledge is here for those who seek it," the monk said, which, to Jack's mind, was probably a 'yes, I can.' "Why do you wish to know?"
"Well," he said with a glance toward Bra'tac, "we think he can help our people fight our enemy."
Nodding, the Jaffa master stepped in closer. "The child possesses knowledge that we can use to defeat them."
"If you know this for certain," the monk said, "why do you need to ask?"
"We know that the knowledge exists," Daniel explained, "but we don't know what the knowledge...is. We were told we could find help here, but we don't know very much of anything at all about Shifu, and..." The monk stared at him, emotionless and unperturbed by the uneasiness Daniel was beginning to exude. "He may be in danger from people looking for him, or we may be in danger for harboring him. I...I was hoping you could help us."
"There are many forms of knowledge. He who understands does not need to know."
"Oh, for crying out loud," Jack muttered.
"Jack," Daniel said. Then, to the monk, "Can you teach me?"
"I cannot teach you what you already know."
"How about what I don't know?"
Jack tossed one more wary glance at them, then stepped up beside Bra'tac as the monk gave another non-answer. "Do you have any idea what we're doing?" he asked softly.
For once, he was greeted with a thoughtful pause rather than an insult. "I am uncertain," Bra'tac finally admitted. "But I believe this man--this guardian--to be one who can tell me what I seek."
Lowering his voice, Jack said, "Bra'tac, how much do we really--"
"You do not trust," the monk said now, and when Jack turned, the monk was staring right at him and Bra'tac.
"Sure I do," Jack said warily, because he did, sometimes--just not until he knew the beings he was supposed to be trusting. Or saw, even--he'd take visual confirmation at this point, and the monk was still hiding the glowy thing somewhere. People with something to hide too often ended up being trouble.
As if hearing his thoughts, the monk clarified, "You do not trust the Mother."
Daniel turned to him, too. "She saved our lives, Jack."
"And why did she do that, Daniel?" Jack retorted.
"Jack..."
"Daniel!"
The monk's unnervingly calm eyes watched them as they tried to stare down each other down. Jack should have had the advantage there--he was armed with height, experience, and shoes, after all--except that Daniel didn't give a damn about the etiquette of glaring people into submission and glared right back.
Finally, when it was clear the stalemate wasn't about to end, Daniel turned away from him, walked toward the center of the room, and sat down in the circle as well, shifting the baby's weight partly onto his lap. "I'll trust her," he said. "What would she have me do?"
"You need only open your mind," the guardian monk told him.
"Yes," Daniel said. "Okay. But how?"
"The journey is a simple one, but not easy. One man cannot make the journey for another."
"Well, I'm not trying to--" He broke off, staring at the baby, and then at Jack. He cocked his head in thought, glanced again at the monk, then rose to his feet again to approach Jack. The monk didn't stop him or comment. "The guardian probably has a lot of the answers we're looking for," Daniel said quietly.
"Yeah, I got that," Jack answered.
"I need to talk to him, Jack."
Jack didn't move. "You want me to go away." Daniel tilted his head slightly in agreement. "You've gotta be kidding me!"
"I will remain, O'Neill," Bra'tac spoke up, striding forward to take a place sitting in the circle. "I, too, wish to know more of this...journey."
"Look--"
"Sierra Golf one niner, do you read?" Jack's radio chirped, making him start and reach for a weapon that wasn't there.
Thirty-minute check-in. Without moving his gaze, Jack reached up to the radio and replied, "I read you, Major. We're okay; give me a minute."
"Roger, sir."
"See, you just told Major Ferretti that we're fine," Daniel pointed out, dropping his voice even lower until only Jack could hear. "We need to figure out what this place is, what they can do, what they know...and I'm sure it will go a lot faster if we follow the guardian's lead, and I don't think we'll get anywhere unless we all do as he asks."
"I can do that," Jack countered.
"You wouldn't take off your shoes."
"Oh, for--What's that got to do with anything?"
"That's exactly my point."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Your presence is unhelpful," Bra'tac said bluntly, somehow managing to make it seem like he was looking down at Jack, even as he looked up from where he sat on the floor. "You will only prolong our stay. I will remain and ensure that all goes well."
Jack bit back the angry retort. Nothing was guaranteed to go well, but the old Jaffa could be right, because Jack might commit violence against the monk if the guy said one more thing about souls and freeing and enlightenment. With a final nod from Bra'tac, Jack turned back to Daniel. "You don't come out, someone's coming in to check every hour."
"Wait--" He bit his lip, then looked down at Shifu. "Could you watch over him until we're done? In case we're wrong about..." Daniel tilted his head very slightly toward the monk.
"Daniel, if you think there's any possibility--"
"I don't. I really think we can trust him, Jack. I just...don't want to take the chance with my brother. And it might take some time, so..."
Jack glanced at the monk again, unable to shake the twitchy feeling this place gave him. Finally, he sighed and took the sleeping baby from Daniel's arms. "Everything he needs is in your pack?" he asked unhappily. "Got enough food and everything?"
Daniel sighed in relief. "Yes. Thank you, Jack."
"Every hour," he reminded.
Teal'c tilted his head in curiosity when Jack stepped out. "Uh," Carter said, looking at the baby warily. "What's going on, sir?"
"Daniel and Bra'tac are going to play along with the monk person," Jack said, with the uncomfortable feeling that it might not be 'playing along' as much as it was 'being strung along.' He sat down on the steps of the temple, his back against a pillar so that he could see both the courtyard entrance and the temple entrance easily the same time.
"O'Neill," Teal'c said, "I do not believe that is wise."
Neither do I, Jack wanted to agree, but only said, "Maybe they'll learn something. Bra'tac won't let something happen to Daniel, and I doubt lightning can get through that ceiling. Carter, hail Ferretti and give him a sit rep. Teal'c, open Daniel's pack and toss me whatever blankets are in there, will you? Looks like we'll be here for a while."
He pretended not to see his team exchanging glances with each other before Carter reached up to her radio. Teal'c raised an eyebrow to him in the dark as he pulled the blanket around the Harsesis, arranging what they had into a makeshift cradle on the steps of the temple. Jack hoped they wouldn't have to stay here any longer than necessary. "Can I tempt you to play babysitter?" he asked the Jaffa in weary joke.
Teal'c eyed the Harsesis. "We will stand guard in shifts," he said. He didn't say what they were guarding and from what. Jack leaned back and didn't ask.
Continued in Part b...