Fic:: WIP::Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves IV:: SGA/SG-1:: [a]

[auburnnothenna]

Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves IV
an Alternate Universe SGA/SG-1 Crossover
by Auburn

Gen Plot with Mixed Slash and Het Elements
Part One
Part Two
Part Three

Part Four [a] [b] [c] [d]

Teyla found the Revenge's practice room on the third day, once sufficient rest and food combined to leave her restless and out of sorts, needing to move. She hadn't stayed in one place - and though the ship traveled, it remained the same inside, where she was - in a year. Running had marked her deeper than the surface; her instincts cried out that she needed to go.

Pacing the endless-seeming corridors and climbing the ladders between the decks taught her the layout of the ship and burned off some of her energy, but the rest of the crew had duties to occupy them and she felt shocked as she realized she was bored. What could she do on this ship, surrounded by technology so very different from the worlds she knew through the Ancestors' ring? Vala had offered her a crew place. Maybe they needed fighters. The ship had obviously been built to carry more than the crew it did currently.

She didn't know if she wanted to stay with Revenge, but didn't know where she would go if she didn't.

She had no other place to stay with Athos gone.

If any of her people had survived the culling, they were scattered through the rings, as lost to her as she was to them.

Her skin pulled tight and itched from the overly dry air in the ship. She didn't know if she could bear its confines beyond one voyage. The shush of its ventilators reminded her of breathing, though Revenge didn't live the way the hive had. The sound rasped at her nerves, but perhaps it could become comforting; a signal that all was well onboard?

It masked the sound of her footsteps too, so that the scarred man - Til? - didn't hear Teyla shadow him down a corridor. She meant no harm from it, but she did not trust these people yet. She'd learned many things from watching those unaware they were observed - like the staff that Til carried was in actuality a weapon of the Tau'ri's enemies.

Til entered a room and she glimpsed him prop the staff weapon against a wall before the door slid shut. The writing beside the door remained incomprehensible, though Teyla recognized shapes from the Tau'ri gear Samantha and the expedition had carried. She would learn it eventually. The Tau'ri's text was lighter and more fluid, even the very upright characters, than Ancestor writing, but more machine-like than Athosian or the trade tongue common through the ring system. Janet Fraiser had taken the time to explain the color codes painted on the decks and walls. Blue indicated a space open to anyone, red was restricted and dangerous, yellow and orange called for caution; Teyla memorized it easily. Their base ten number system took a little more time, but proved worthwhile by allowing her to navigate with much greater assurance.

After a moment, she touched the door control and entered.

Though it was different from the soft dirt bantos circle, she immediately recognized a like space. The equipment she didn't recognize, but the blue mats on the floor were self-explanatory. So, as well, were the wooden staves Til and Jehan were using to spar.

Teyla found a clear space where she wouldn't distract them, sank down and watched the two men. The style they practiced, with the single long stave - perhaps standing in for the staff weapon Til carried? - differed from the bantos fighting she'd learned, but she could see both men were skilled in it. Jehan moved faster than Til, but lacked the sheer strength that Til displayed. Teyla thought she would use the same strategy Jehan used against either man: avoiding blows rather than engage to block, remain out of reach and disarm, then use the stave to bring down her opponent. She knew she could beat either man, though Jehan had an awareness of himself and the space around him that promised he could learn her skills.

If she were to stay with them long enough to teach him. Provided he was even interested, too. It was one of the few things she had to offer, so she considered it.

When Til and Jehan parted and bowed to each other, she remained seated. Jehan retrieved a water bottle and a towel before joining her.

"I would like to practice here," Teyla told him.

He opened the bottle and took a sip, then nodded.

"My people have an art, much like that," she said. "With two rods." She illustrated the length of each bantos. "To defend ourselves."

Jehan considered her, then with a raised eyebrow that Teyla answered with a nod, took one of her hands in his and examined it. Not her calluses, she realized, but the measurements of her palm and fingers, comparing what she could grasp securely against his own grip. His hands were narrow. The nails were clean and cut close to the quick. He touched her with the same impersonal care Janet Fraiser had, very different from the blatant invitation Vala had presented the first night. Teyla found his quiet far more appealing than Vala's seductions. She felt at ease with Jehan.

"Mer can make you something that will fit," Jehan told her. He released Teyla's hand. "Plastic. You'll have to work out the weight with him. Until you can find the real thing."

"I could teach you to fight with the bantos," she offered, "if Mer - Meredith? - would create a set for you as well."

It would not repay these people for removing the Wraith tracker from her back, but it would give her days aboard the ship a purpose until she decided whether to stay or go.

~*~

The Edwe knew nothing of the Tau'ri expedition. They were happy to trade fresh produce for the worked metal tools, shovels and plows and pots produced from the same fabrication labs that Meredith used to create a set of bantos rods each for Teyla and Jehan, but they had not heard of the Tau'ri expedition or even that Athos had been culled.

The Edwe began a mourning song when Teyla told them. She felt her expression freeze and had to hurry away from their gathering, where once she would have joined them.

What good did singing do, she wanted to demand of them. What did building a bonfire and tossing herbs into the flames do? Her hair smelled of smoke and Athos was still dead.

Demios, a man she'd always thought shared her views, hurried after her. She nearly hit him when he touched her shoulder. She didn't, but the possibility that she might have hurt that gentle man made her bleed inside, even as he recoiled from her expression. She shook her head at him and continued away from the Edwe's gathering, out beyond the firelight, into the darkness where she belonged now. Demios went back to the bonfire without her.
A soft footfall alerted her to someone else following her, but this person didn't presume to touch her. Teyla hadn't realized how often she and her people had touched until she met the Tau'ri. Now she appreciated the personal distance the crew of Revenge observed, even the non-Tau'ri.
She turned back and was unsurprised to see Jehan. Silhouetted from behind by the Edwe's fire, his expression was a mystery, only the sharp outlines of his cheekbones and jaw limned in light. The bonfire flicker caught red embers in his shaggy hair as he cocked his head. He watched her silently until Teyla shifted restlessly, lifting an empty hand in an empty gesture just to move.
"I had thought to remain here," she said

Jehan nodded but told her, "You can't go back." It was less of a non sequitur than it seemed, but she hadn't understood until she saw Demios flinch away from her. She'd known the culling would have savaged Athos, but part of her, a naïve place in her heart, had believed she could go back to who she had been once the tracker had been removed from her back. Now she saw that she couldn't.
Staying on Edwe would be trying to go back to her old life, but she didn't fit there any longer. Instead, she had to keep moving forward; still the Runner, even without pursuit.

Demios offered Teyla a place with the Edwe, as she'd known he would, but she made him and his people as nervous as Vala and the rest of the crew did. The difference between predators and prey. Demios was afraid of her now.

She'd changed. Where once she'd understood the Edwe, now they made her impatient and angry. They were too cowed by the Wraith to ever defy them and couldn't even imagine defeating them. They chose to live the best lives they could under the threat of culling, but Teyla couldn't any longer. Dying, even defeated, would be better than accepting.

The Fahn were the same as the Edwe, except no one offered Teyla a place with them and Vala accidentally propositioned a young man and nearly found herself married.

Teyla still persuaded Vala to trade for a stock of the Fahn's hardwoods. Despite Vala moaning repeatedly that the Pegasus galaxy was forcing her to engage in honest trade, that it had nothing to steal and no shipping to prey upon and that all her skills were rusting away, Vala was a shrewd bargainer. Teyla had eventually decided Vala was a much better woman than she seemed. Profit hadn't made them rescue Teyla on Athos and they could have just as easily abandoned her on a planet or killed her when they learned she was a runner and the threat that she had posed. No matter what anyone said, Vala's crew might want the City of the Ancestors, but if that were all, they would be searching for it, not the lost Tau'ri expedition, no matter what rewards Jackson swore the 'SGC' would pay for rescuing its people. The crew was loyal to Vala and Vala was a curious mixture of kind, clever and pragmatic that Teyla admired, despite her theatrical ways. Working with her was easy and amusing.

Meanwhile, the crew were eager to accumulate Pegasus goods that wouldn't deplete their finite supply of refined metals. The hardwoods would be enough to offer on Manaria, where Teyla hoped they might learn something of any survivors from Athos.

After the way the Edwe and Fahn reacted to Vala and Teyla, Jackson lobbied successfully to join them on Manaria.
~*~

Teyla appropriated several lengths of chalyb wood from the trade goods and began work on a proper set of bantos rods. The rods Meredith had made were ribbed to keep the smooth, weighted plastic from slipping, but were otherwise drab and gray. They were excellent practice rods, but didn't satisfy her need to hold onto something that was of her home.

She traced the simplest traditional patterns of Athos onto a piece of paper from memory before she began. She ruined three lengths of wood and left wood shavings in the rec room and the mess, but no one commented beyond Novak silently handing her hard plastic case with carving tools inside. By the time Revenge settled into orbit over Manaria, Teyla had two sets ready for the fire.

Vala wanted fresh water for the ship, so Jehan brought Revenge down to the surface. He landed in an uninhabited area where they could take the water on before approaching the town closest to the ring.

"Always load supplies first, then goods," Meredith said in the rec room the shift before.

Janet Fraiser looked confused.

"In case we have to leave in a hurry," he explained. "Remember Hebridan?"

"Sorry, I was still locked up then," Janet replied.

Meredith flushed and waved a hand. "Never mind."

Revenge shuddered like a beast beset by flies as Jehan piloted it into atmosphere. Teyla joined most of the crew on the bridge and watched as the shields burned white with heat and Meredith's voice sizzled through the speakers from the engine rooms, cursing Jehan and the ship, those who had built it and all their ancestors. Teyla did not know the language he used, but Daniel Jackson was making notes. She worried a little, but Caias and Vala were unruffled and Jehan seemed relaxed even when the ship bucked under their feet.

"Just a little turbulence," Jehan said when Meredith shrieked something vicious. "We're fine. She's made to do this."

"Never mind this hulk has the aerodynamic properties of a brick!" Meredith howled over the comm. "If the anti-grav fails - "

"We're all pancakes," Jehan agreed. Jehan was a quiet man, tending more to sly smiles and rolled eyes shared with Meredith than words, but he became more verbal when the two were separated. They often shared jokes that seemed to go past other members of the crew, though Teyla had seen Janet and Jackson snicker over some of statements that made no sense to her at all.

Pancakes were self-explanatory however and not reassuring, but Jehan's confidence soothed Teyla's worry. Revenge settled onto its landing struts as lightly as a bird came to rest moments later.

"Nothing to it," Jehan said.

The comms muttered something about cocky flyboys and cold water before cutting out.

Meredith, Til, Novak and Vala wrestled a massive, flexible pipe down from the ship's belly and into the glacier melt river close by. Stakes were driven into the still half-frozen earth and metal straps secured the pipe in place. Teyla understood why as it jerked and writhed once the ship's pumps were engaged.

Teyla took the opportunity to finish the bantos rods, choosing a clearing at a safe distance from the landing gear and yet still within the shadow of the ship.

Afterward, Jehan joined her as she gathered the wood for her fire. Meredith trailed behind him, complaining about the damp weather, splinters, and the ice-edged mud puddles. Teyla had already learned this was Meredith's way and ignored him. Meredith's actions were the true gauge of his worth, just as Jehan's were, and they were both there with her.

"So is this some kind of religious thing?" Meredith asked after Teyla laid the fuel into a fire that would produce the proper heat the cure the chalyb wood.

Teyla quirked an eyebrow at him, amused, then lit the fire with a starter Jehan had provided from the ship.

"No."

Meredith gestured to the two sets of rods waiting for the fire. "So, you're just really unhappy with the way these turned out?"

"No," she told him.

He scowled, first at the rods, then at the fire starting to lick through the fuel piled into a cone, and finally at her.

Teyla waited until the trickle of smoke from the damp wood gave way to shimmering waves of heat. She held her palm toward the fire and counted, judging the heat. Sufficient, she decided, and set the rods in an equal square around it. "Perhaps you could watch them with me, Meredith?" she asked.

"Of course." Meredith's frown cleared as he studied her arrangement, before snapping his fingers. "You're curing them!"

"Yes."

The chalyb wood would harden as the natural saps sweated out of it. It left the grain of the wood zigzagged in shades of black and red, too, turning the bantos rods into unique works of art.

"How long?"

The first beads of sap were forming on the bantos rods.

"I will continue feeding the fire until the wood stops sweating," Teyla explained. Chalyb grew on Athos and many worlds besides Fahn, but few people knew the trick of sweating it to change it from soft to hard. She would wrap her hands in rags to protect them and wipe the rods periodically so that the sap wouldn't burn onto the wood. It was hard and tedious work for one person.

"I'll get some more wood," Jehan said.

She wasn't alone.

"Thank you."

It was a tedious task, made more unpleasant when the wind rose and whipped the fire's smoke into her eyes. Meredith watched as she wiped the rods the first times, then alternated the task with her and then with Jehan when he returned with more fuel. They were all blistered and reeked of smoke before the chalyb wood took on the deep glow Teyla remembered from her old bantos rods.

"They are done," she declared.

Meredith swung one of the still-hot bantos rods with his rag-wrapped hands. It hissed through the air. "It's lighter than before." He handed the rod to Jehan, who hissed when his palms came in contact. "Oh, crap, sorry."

Jehan juggled it gracefully and let Meredith exam his palm once he'd laid the rod down. "Fraiser'll have something to fix you up," Meredith promised. Jehan let himself be pulled closer to Meredith, their heads bent together, and Teyla looked away from them. Her chest ached only from breathing too much smoke, not envy.

When she turned back, the two men were apart once more. Meredith was wiping the bantos rods down one last time, carefully cleaning out each groove and hollow, while Jehan knocked the fire apart. Beyond them, the heavy pipe flexed as the pumps chugged on, still filling Revenge's reservoirs.

"Dush will have something ready to eat by now," Meredith said. He handed the rods to Teyla. "These are quite...something."

She hid a smile as she set them aside and grasped his shoulders. Meredith's eyes widened and went still. Slowly, he bent as she tightened her hands and pulled. Little puffs of breath smoked from his lips into the cold air, brushing over her face as Teyla touched her forehead to his and rested there for a moment. She released him once he relaxed into the contact.

Jehan was watching them speculatively.

"These are yours." Teyla turned to Jehan and handed a set to him. "Perhaps you will not earn so many bruises from me using them." She stepped closer and Jehan caught on. He bowed his head without any urging from her and completed the Athosian gesture with that schooled grace she'd observed in him from the first.

"I take it this means you're going to stay with us?" Meredith said when Jehan and Teyla both stepped back.

Teyla tipped her head, then inclined it in ascent.

"I will."

Jehan twirled one of the rods.

"Good."

~*~

The Manarians were a sly bunch. Vala, Caias and Jackson dealt with them, while Teyla and Jehan watched their backs and Til kept an eye on the door.

The Manarian town showed more development than the Edwe or the Fahn, but they still had little to offer that Revenge needed. Fresh produce and meat that could go into the ship's freezers, but no technology, no refined metals, nothing Ancestor made. A few traders had stalls in the market place selling bits and pieces, but nothing functional.

They said they hadn't heard of the Tau'ri. If Teyla hadn't traded there with her father and Halling, Jehan suspected they would have denied knowing of the Athosians too.

Jackson proved his worth, though, peppering Trade Minister Smeadon with endless questions about his culture until the man's eyes glazed and he began answering on automatic. Once he did, Jackson started slipping in other questions, that still seemed to be about Manarian society, but gave away what the crew wanted to know. Enough to make it worth cultivating Smeadon further.

Vala struck the deal for fruit.

"Double-dealing sminchas," Teyla whispered to Jehan, rigid with disapproval. "They demanded twice that from my people for the same goods."

Nothing there to surprise Jehan. The Manarians might have had Teyla's people over a barrel, but not Revenge's crew. They could fly away or just as easily take what they wanted. Jehan had drifted the ship's shadow over the town before they landed in a nearby field. The panic that caused hadn't endeared them to the Manarians, but it had impressed them.
Caias had wanted to extort a cargo from the Manarians using the ship as a threat. None of the rest of the crew had been willing to victimize the poor people of this world. The argument had turned bitter enough Vala had ordered him to ring down with them.

The deal was sealed over a tankard of ale. More ale followed. Caias and Jackson sipped their ales slowly, but Vala matched Smeadon drink for drink, until the Trade Minister was swaying in his seat.

Jackson's subtle interrogation had revealed the Manarians had close ties to an ally called the Genii, the natives of an only apparently agrarian world from Smeadon's description. Jehan listened out of boredom.

"The Genii empire fell a thousand years ago," Smeadon confided to Vala. "But they mean to rebuild it. Once they've destroyed the Wraith." He nodded repeatedly. "They've begun."

"And you are part of it, Trade Minister," Vala cooed to him, "you and Manaria. You will be heroes to the entire galaxy."

If Meredith had been there, he'd have been gagging. Of course, if he'd been there, he'd have derailed the entire negotiation. There was a reason he stayed back on the ship. He hated 'primitive' planets - which encompassed anywhere lacking electricity - anyway.

"We will," Smeadon slurred. "Manaria was part of the empire before, after all."

"A toast to Manaria," Vala declared. She raised her tankard and Smeadon picked his up automatically.

"Manaria!"

Caias and Jackson clinked their tankards together and sipped, while Vala and Smeadon drained theirs.

Jehan angled a glance at Teyla. He knew she'd hoped they would find news of survivors from Athos. So far there had been none. Smeadon shut right up when he spotted Teyla, but Vala had manuevered until Teyla was out of Smeadon's sightline and as the evening wore on, he'd forgotten her presence.

"They've got these scientists," Smeadon slurred. "Not Ancestors, Tor-Tar-Tau'ri." He nodded as he got the name right.

"The Tau'ri are with the Genii?" Vala murmured. She leaned closer to Smeadon.

"Bombs," Smeadon confided. "They're making bombs to blow up the hives while they're sleeping." He hiccupped. "'cept they're wake. Awake. Them."

"The Wraith."

"But it'sss sssstill good," Smeadon mumbled. "Cowen's got these sssscientishs. Athosh wash culled an', an' they got 'way, shome got 'way to Genea." He mumbled something incoherent and then, "Got 'way from Koooolya too."

He tipped his tankard to his mouth. More ale ran down his face than went in his mouth and he fumbled setting it back down, but Jackson caught and steadied to tankard. Jackson's face was blank.

"Din't care 'bout the 'thoshens," Smeadon went on. "Sh-ssscientishes. Got some." He blinked at his empty hands and groped for the tankard again. "Shome. Shome got 'way." Slyly, he looked up at Vala. "You got any scientishts?"

"Not for sale," Vala murmured.

There were good reasons to leave Meredith aboard Revenge beyond his sharp tongue. They'd learned that from the Oranians. Novak was too valuable to risk without reason too; she was even less of a fighter than Meredith, despite the lessons Vala insisted on giving her in self-defense. She might be good some day. She wasn't weak, just unsure. She was getting better under pressure, just like Meredith.

"Cowen would pay," Smeadon told her. "Bounty. For any of them. Tarri. Pay for them."

"Even though they already have some of them?" Vala coaxed Smeadon.

He nodded and blinked; his eyes were no longer tracking with his movements.

"Down in the tunnels," Smeadon mumbled. "Bunks."

"Bunkers?" Jackson prompted.

"Mmmm. Need army t'get down there." Smeadon rubbed at his face and seemed to realize what he'd been saying. His gaze flickered to Jackson and Caias, then he twisted and looked at Teyla and Jehan. Since Jehan had his bantos rods sheathed over his back and hadn't spoken, the Manarians had taken him to be another Athosian along with Teyla.

"You're Tau'ri," Smeadon whispered.

Vala patted his hand. "Not even close, Smeadon. Just interested in anything or anyone that might make us a profit."

"You're not Tau'ri?" Smeadon glanced at Teyla and Jehan again. "But they're - "

"Crew," Vala told him. She tapped her lips. "I wonder, if the Tau'ri would pay to have their scientists back." She smiled. "What do you think, good friend Smeadon?" Her eyes slid to the side, meeting Jackson's gaze.

He shook his head fast.

"No, no, no one could get them out, not even the Satedans, not even with their guns," Smeadon blurted. "The Genii watch the Ancestors' ring. No force, maybe not even the Wraith, could find them and get away."

"But the Tau'ri, some of them, got away?" Jackson said.

Smeadon shuddered.

"When Kolya catches them..."

"Kolya?" Vala repeated.

"Commander Kolya," Smeadon said. Just saying the man's name seemed to finish sobering him up. A good dose of fear could have that effect.

"So, this Commander Kolya is holding some of these Tau'ri," Vala murmured thoughtfully. "He doesn't sound like a man I'd like."

Smeadon's eyes dipped to where her halter showed Vala's cleavage to excellent effect. "He would not appreciate you either."

"There's no accounting for taste," Jackson muttered. "Even a bad guy can have some." He flinched. Presumably Vala had heard and kicked him under the table.

~*~

"Okay, we know where some of our people are - " Jackson said when they back aboard Revenge.

"Your people," Signe corrected.

They were gathered in the mess hall, except for Caias up on the bridge. An open comm let him listen and comment, while avoiding the rest of the crew. The crew generally debated plans over Dush's food. Full stomachs rounded the edges off the sharpest tempers. Mostly. Vala would do what she decided to do, but knowing what the crew thought informed her decisions. Sometimes.

"Members of the expedition that we are looking for, who will know where Atlantis is," Jackson snapped in response. "Atlantis, remember, the Ancient city you want to loot?"

Vala rolled her eyes.

"Daniel," Janet said.

Daniel gave her a sulky look, but got back on track. Keeping Janet Fraiser, aside from her medical skill, had been a good choice. She managed Daniel better than anyone else. She had natural authority. Vala respected that.

"We should contact the Genii," Daniel suggested. His earnestness made Vala smile even as she shook her head. "I'm sure that they'll see reason. Smeadon was drunk." There he paused to glare at Vala. "Negotiation, not intimidation."

Vala shook her head again.

"There's nothing wrong with intimidation," Signe insisted. "It works. We haven't seen a sign of anyone in this galaxy besides the Wraith having any kind of technology that could contend with this ship."

"With this ship," Reckell muttered, "but we're not exactly an army."

The Goa'uld had had the Jaffa when they needed forces on the ground. Smeadon had said these Genii had bunkers and tunnels. They were ready to defend against the Wraith ships; those defenses would work just as well against Revenge.

"So," Signe said, "we bomb a few fields, show them what we can do. They'll be pissing themselves to give the Tau'ri to us."

"God, that's your solution!?" Jackson yelled. He surged to his feet, chair tumbling back with a screech. His face had gone red, something Vala hadn't seen happen before. "You're worse than Jack and the Goa'uld!"

"Don't you compare me to the Goa'uld!" Signe snarled. He didn't bother getting up, just threw himself across the table at Jackson, murder in his eyes.

Reckell shot to his feet, grabbed Jackson and swung him out of Signe's reach while interposing himself. In a fight between Signe and Jackson, Vala would always bet on Signe. Jackson was muscular and tough for an academic, but Signe had been fighting since he was a child. He was skinny, but he fought mean and dirty. Reckell, though, had size, Jaffa-level strength, and armored scales. He could handle both men. While still holding Jackson out of the way, he shot out his other hand and stopped Signe cold.

"Enough," Reckell growled.

The rest of the crew were on their feet too, wary and ready for things to get worse. Jehan was a step in front of Mer, hand resting on the butt of his pistol. Novak and Dush were ready to duck into the galley. Fraiser had one of the metal meal trays in her hand. Vala wondered how many bar fights the doctor had been in, to have such a good instinct. Those trays were heavy enough to conk most people out.

She noted Teyla had those bantos rods of hers in her hands.

Vala set her hand on her hip, cocked it, and kept her voice low but also dismissive. "Boys, boys, save it. If you've got that much testosterone, you can always come burn it up with me."

Jackson made a moue of disgust. Signe shook off the quick anger and stepped back from Reckell's hand. Unlike Jackson, he never took Vala's flirting too seriously. It just served to remind him she was there and he needed to rein it in.

The rest of the crew subsided into the seats. Jehan leaned against Mer, still coiled tight and watchful, as was Teyla. The Athosian woman had placed herself where she could guard Jehan's flank. Vala didn't know whether to be surprised or not that Teyla preferred those two to Jackson, despite his efforts at bonding with her. Maybe she felt a little jealous that they'd let Teyla in so fast, when Mer and Jehan were usually so skittish about strangers. Useful though, she thought that Teyla made a reliable addition to the crew, one which Vala judged would stick.

"What's going on down there?" came Caias' voice over the comm.

"A disagreement between Dr. Jackson and Sig," Reckell responded.

Caias made a raucous noise, tinny through the speakers, probably loud in the otherwise empty bridge. He didn't get along with either man, barely tolerated the rest of the crew, and was vocally unhappy over the lack of loot so far. Serving as second pilot after Jehan didn't please him either. Vala would have put him off the ship already if they'd still been in the Viastella. She couldn't bring herself to dump her old mentor, though, while they were in Pegasus.

"They won't be 'pissing themselves'," Jackson said. "They'll be digging in and using our people as hostages."

"Your people," Signe repeated, but it was pro forma, because he wasn't stupid most of the time.

Mer shifted in his seat. Jehan's hand, resting on his shoulder, flexed. "I hate to say it, but Daniel's right. Almost."

"Thank you, Rodney."

"Don't call me Rodney," Mer snapped. "And I said almost." His hands came up to make quote marks. Jehan had needed to explain to Vala about quote marks, but Jackson knew.

Jackson pulled off his glasses and squeezed the bridge of his nose.

"So, do you have some kind of suggestion or are you just breaking my balls?" he asked Mer.

Vala grinned. The good doctor Jackson could dish it sometimes.

Mer's eyes clouded. When he spoke, his inflections were subtly different, giving away to Vala at least that he was reaching back into Jolinar's experiences. Jehan's hand tightened on his shoulder.

"The bunkers are built to protect them from the Wraith, because the Wraith have spaceships. They watch their chappa'ai because they think that is the only avenue anyone else has to assault them."

"Which is why we'll have to negotiate with them," Jackson insisted.

Vala heard what Mer meant. She had Qetesh's memories to draw on. All the Goa'uld knew that trying to send an army of Jaffa through a chappa'ai never worked. The bottleneck that resulted from the limited numbers that could fit through it at once, not to mention the thirty-eight minute limit on a holding a wormhole open, made the other side of a chappa'ai a perfect killing ground.

Which was why the System Lords moved their Jaffa armies and fought their wars with ha'taks. The Tau'ri were a little slow on the uptake sometimes.

"We have to take them by surprise," she said.

Mer nodded.

"They won't be guarding against any covert infiltration that doesn't come through the stargate. With Revenge in orbit, we could ring down an assault team that would go into the bunkers and retrieve whoever they're holding there."

"We still don't have enough people," Reckell objected.

"We don't," Vala commented, "but maybe someone else does." She looked at Teyla. "What about the group Smeadon mentioned? The Satedans?"

Teyla shifted uncomfortably, startled, before saying slowly, "Everyone knows what happened to Sateda."

"We don't," Jackson corrected her.

She narrowed her eyes, but explained, "A Great Culling, the first in generations." She gestured to the weapons all the crew wore. "Their factories, their towers and armies, all were broken. Sateda is a dead world."

Vala caught Mer's gaze on her and nodded. It sounded like the Wraith had done to Sateda what they had done to the first worlds Revenge had found. A fresh reminder of what happened to any world that grew too ambitious. They might customarily leave enough people behind to rebuild a population, but not if they were making an example of a world. The Goa'uld System Lords operated the same way.

The Goa'uld, of course, would have left a few witnesses just to spread the word. Had the Wraith? Smeadon hadn't spoken of the Satedans in the past tense.

"But there were survivors?" she asked, just to confirm her conjecture.

"Those who fled through the ancestors' ring."

"Scattered, I suppose." Vala wondered how they might find these Satedans. It seemed as difficult as finding the lost Tau'ri expedition.

"I had heard that Belsa and Belkan gave many of them refuge," Teyla said. "Belkan takes in those who have skills." The perfect neutrality of her tone gave way her disapproval. "The Satedans hire their soldiers to the traders who sell at the markets there."

Now Smeadon's remark made more sense. Mercenaries. What could they offer the Satedans to fight for them? A promise of whatever loot they could pick up, assuredly, but if they were smart - and if they weren't, they would be useless - they would want something more certain. If they'd been a technological society, then likely they were missing medicines and other manufactured goods. Perhaps, given an example or two, Mer and Novak could provide them with weapons or ammunition. There would be something the Satedans needed.

It would be worth trying this Belkan world. If nothing else, a trade center would be more likely to have word of the other Tau'ri and the Athosians, even without the Satedans.

"Did your people trade on Belkan?" Vala asked Teyla.

"I have been there, though it was years ago," Teyla replied. "But memories are long among the Belkan. There will be someone who will talk with me, I am sure."

~*~

Jehan stretched, enjoying the lazy ache of well-used muscles as he watched Mer desultorily pick up the clothes they'd left in a trail from the door to their bed. He slid his toes under the undershirt lost in the sheets and flicked it at Mer. The squawk of outrage that followed made him laugh with stupid delight.

Mer pulled the shirt off his shoulder - his bare, pink-flushed shoulder - and balled it up. "You're such a child."

Jehan laughed from his belly.

"Come back to bed."

"Ugh. Not until we change the sheets."

"Seem fine to me."

"Because you always roll me into the wet spot," Mer grumbled.

It did kind of smell in the cabin. Jehan lifted his arm, sniffed, and wrinkled his nose. Rank. Not so much the cabin, then, as them. He gave in to necessity and rolled off the bed. Time to change the sheets, turn up the ventilation and then indulge in a hot shower.

He started stripping the bedding, frowned, and turned back to Mer.

"Where's your blaster?"

His was in its holster on the nightstand, where he could grab it even in bed. Jehan never got tired of the idea that he had a blaster. It was better than a pistol or a zat as far as he was concerned, especially after Mer tinkered with the charge cells, upping their efficiency seventy-four percent.

Mer paused. "Uhm."

"You don't know?" Jehan asked in disbelief.

"Well, of course, I know, after all I left it there," Mer said in a defensive tone. He crossed his arms.

"I can't believe you left it somewhere!" What good did the stupid blaster do if Mer didn't have it when he needed it?

"It's in the drive control room," Mer snapped. "That's not just anywhere, it's where I work, and I took it off because it gets in the way! I don't actually need a penis extension strapped to my thigh day and night."

"It's useless if you don't have it when you need it," Jehan declared.

Mer rolled his eyes. "We're in hyperspace. That's as safe as it's possible to be by definition. Nothing can penetrate the dimensional bubble the drives create. I'll show you the math if you don't believe me."

Pleasure that Mer thought he could grasp the math almost derailed Jehan. Except he knew Mer had intended exactly that.

"I don't care," he said. "Wear the damned blaster."

"Look, I'll make you a deal. I'll wear it except when I'm working. Even tied down, it catches on stuff when I'm doing maintenance. All the access spaces were designed for anorexic six-year-olds as it is."

He wanted to argue, but it wouldn't help. Mer would just refuse to do even as much as he'd just offered. Plus, Jehan acknowledged, the access spaces were cramped and a thigh holster could easily catch on something.

"All right."

Mer smiled at him. "I'll hang the holster on the back of my chair at the main control console. That's where it is right now."

"Just promise to put it back on when you leave engineering."

"Pinky swear," Mer said.

It was the best deal Jehan was going to get.

~*~

Hendon reached for Teyla's wrist, trying to catch her as she left the table where they'd been sitting. She moved too fast for him and he nearly fell from his chair.

Jehan had his gun out and aimed at Hendon. Til had swung around the cover the rest of the tavern. His staff weapon opened, ready to fire. Jackson shoved his chair back from the table, but didn't draw the pistol they'd issued him. Instead he held out his open hands.

"Hey, hey, let's all just be...calm here," Jackson said.

Hendon drew back his hand. He ignored everyone but Teyla.

"Don't trust the Satedans, Teyla Emmagan," he told her.

Jehan relaxed slightly. Hendon had only meant to warn them.

"Why let them stay here if they are untrustworthy?" Teyla asked.

"Because they're useful," Hendon said. "Because they keep to themselves down in the old quarter or the settlement on Belsa." His gaze flicked to Jehan and Til. "And because they have enough weapons and soldiers to cost us as many deaths as a culling, even if they have abandoned their world."

"That doesn't sound so good," Jackson said after they left the tavern and started for the old quarter, "but I don't think we should judge the Satedans on just one person's opinion. They're refugees, living in a ghetto, of course the majority of the population sees them as a threat. Historically, though it was also based on religious grounds, numerous minorities suffered punitive measures while being tolerated for skills they possessed that were secrets or mysteries to the majority of the population..."

Belkan boasted a city built of stone, though the fortifications had fallen millennia ago and been scavenged. Deep scores and blast marks were still graved into the oldest blocks. The streets were paved in cobblestone with deep central gutters and drains that kept the city from succumbing to disease. The reek of sewage drifted up from the grated drains where the spring rains had backed the system up.

"At least they are not in league with the Genii," Teyla replied. She glared at Jackson. The news of the Genii's long term treachery and Hendon failing to have any news of her people had both been bitter disappointments.
Hendon's warning against the Satedans would be unnecessary. Teyla wouldn't trust again soon. Jehan doubted she even trusted Revenge's crew - not completely. She certainly didn't like some of them, at least not Jackson. Maybe Jackson was too much like Teyla had been before the Wraith made her a runner. Or maybe she had simply noticed that Jehan avoided Jackson when he could and had taken her cue from him.

"Hey, I'm the one who wants to find the expedition - and your people," Jackson reminded her. He waved at Til and Jehan. "These two and the rest just want to... to get rich."

"Careful or we'll sell you to the Genii," Til growled.

The old city of Belkan clustered behind the walls of a former fortress. The streets were tangled and unmarked, but Jackson suggested they follow them uphill, and successfully guided them to a postern in the crumbling wall.

Two large men in leathers and clothes that still showed signs of having once been uniforms stepped into the street when they walked through a stone arch into the narrow, warren-like confines of the old city. Jehan noticed the guns slung over their shoulders. Tri-barreled, shorter than rifles and definitely the product of a technological society, but not from anywhere in the Milky Way. The cartridges they took were three inches long and sausage-thick. Bores big enough to blow a nasty hole through nearly anything too. He wondered how they performed against the Wraith. The Wraith that killed Dil had shrugged off zats and the 5.7x28mm rounds fired by the P90s until several clips were emptied at it. Its wounds had healed at a stunning speed. A shotgun would probably have been a better weapon against it. That's what the Satedans' weapons resembled.

"State your business," one of them said.

"We wish to speak with Dranta Kell," Teyla told them.

Both men were taller than Jehan, eye to eye with Til, who bared his teeth at them, and they were startled when Teyla spoke.

"Don't know that Kell would want to talk to you."

"And you don't know that he wouldn't," Teyla said, all silky steel, and Jehan knew, even if no one else realized, that she was about one breath from putting both men down hard. Teyla was a patient teacher, but she simmered with anger under her calm expression the rest of the time. Had she been like that before the Wraith turned her into a cat-toy, he wondered, or had the poise she still wore like a mask come from real serenity? He didn't wonder long since it meant as little now as who he had been once. This Teyla was the only one they had and he liked her fine.

"Maybe you should tell us first."

"Look, we're here to - "

Jehan glared at Jackson. "Shut up."

"If you'd just let me explain - "

"Let him explain," urged the bigger Satedan.

Jehan ignored him.

"Teyla's doing the talking, remember?"

Jackson glared back at him.

"Got everything sorted out?" the second Satedan asked with an amused chuckle. "Then you should go." He reached for Teyla.

Teyla slipped out of his grasp before he could close his hand on her arm, while Til powered up his staff weapon and Jehan moved to intercept the bigger Satedan.

It took Jehan only a minute longer than Teyla to put his target on the ground; the soles of his boots slipped on the worn-slick cobblestones. The studded bracers on the Satedan's forearms gave Jehan a good grip, so Jehan chose not dislocate his opponent's elbow and threw him cleanly instead. Up close, the Satedan smelled of sweat, leather, gun oil and fear. It was the fear that changed Jehan's mind.
He finished and looked up, spotting Teyla's man was cradling a broken wrist and whining to himself.
"Jehan," Teyla snapped, looking past him.
Jehan's opponent had rolled to his knees and was reaching for a weapon. Jehan dodged and Teyla kicked it out of the Satedan's hand, eliciting a scream, before they both whirled to face the group rushing out a nearby doorway.

Jehan drew his blaster and fired into the ground before a tall, dreadlocked man. The actinic green flash from the stun setting reflected off the cobblestones up the man's leather-clad legs before it dissipated down into the ground. Anyone who had looked at it directly would have a afterimage streaking across the field of vision, a handy side effect that didn't offset the way a blaster pinpointed itself each time it was fired. The men and woman behind Dreadlocks came to a stop, took in the scene, and then one of them laughed. "Hegit, you let this tiny woman disable you?"

"There was no let," Teyla replied. Her cool expression hid any hint of smugness, if she felt it, and her body was coiled tight, ready to keep fighting.

Dreadlocks considered them and nodded.

"What do you want?"

"We came to hire soldiers," Teyla told him. She gave the two men on the ground a jaundiced look. "But I am not impressed."

The tall woman behind Dreadlocks laughed again and remarked, "Well, Hegit and Silon aren't doing sentry duty on a back postern because they're the best we have." She shook her head and grinned toothily, while her eyes watched Til and Jehan and the weapons they held.

Dreadlocks grinned too.

"You want to be impressed?" he asked. He flexed one big hand in a come hither gesture.

Teyla scornfully dismissed the invitation to fight . "I want to do business."

Dreadlocks consulted the shorter man beside him. "Tyre? What do you think?"

Tyre's dark, sharp eyes took in everything about them, first their weapons and then beyond to the state of their clothes, their health, the other manufactured goods they wore, even how clean they were.

Like the rest of the crew, Teyla had traded in some of her battered gear for goods out of Revenge's extensive inventory - crew privilege to help yourself as long as you checked in with Dush to keep the inventory up to date. Revenge had a very extensive inventory, since whoever had made out that cargo manifest had been thinking colony not three-hour tour. Vala had held on to nearly all of those supplies even after the refit. Teyla had on a long-sleeved tee-shirt of the same kind Jehan, Mer and Daniel all favored under her leather vest.

The Satedans and Revenge's crew actually dressed much alike, in a mixture of tough leather, uniforms, and practical native goods, but the Satedans' gear showed more wear and tear. They had to mend and make do, because they couldn't replace anything. It was a subtle contrast, but there.

Tyre nodded at the three of them. "Yeah, I think Kell will want to talk to these people."

~*~

Hendon's warning proved unnecessary.

Teyla mistrusted Dranta Kell immediately.
A big man in his middle-forties, he didn't share the darker skin of most of the Satedans or their remarkable size, though he was tall. He'd likely been a handsome youth, but his features had matured into harsh angles emphasized by his shaved head. His eyes were a neutral bluish-brown, made memorable only by the razor-cold intelligence behind them. Teyla had led trade negotiations with other men like him: they were only fair with their equals.

He dominated the common room of the tavern that the Satedans had taken over as their headquarters. Guards were stationed at every entry. For all they tried to look like mere customers, the Satedans weren't subtle. Unlike Meredith, though, they weren't bluntly honest either. Teyla had to wonder whether Kell had those guards in place to protect him from Jehan, Til and herself or from his own people.

She didn't think it was the former.

Kell didn't bother rising from the chair he occupied. Instead he leaned forward with his elbows braced on the polished surface of the table before him. The table belonged somewhere other than a rough common room with a floor dusted in wood shavings that didn't quite mask the lingering scents of alcohol and vomit. The room had gas lanterns for lighting, like much of Belkan's ring city, but the globes weren't lit, leaving the interior dim.

"So, you're here looking to hire soldiers?"

The dreadlocked Satedan had led them to the tavern headquarters, but the man named Tyre had peeled away. Clearly, he had taken a shorter route to their destination and briefed Kell.

Teyla met his gaze.

"Yes."

"And you know my name." Kell smiled at that, obviously pleased at that.

"I obtained a name," Teyla told him.

"Mine," Kell insisted. He gestured to the dreadlocked man, who had taken up a place at his shoulder. "These are Ronon Dex and Tyre, and you met the rest of Essav Squard and two of our sentries as well. Now, I'd like to hear yours."

Teyla dipped her head.

"I am Teyla Emmagan of...the ship Revenge," she said. Each time she had introduced herself as 'of Athos' the words had been more bitter than a lie. She had left behind Athos as surely as she had Fahn and Edwe and had never even considered staying behind on Manaria. Despite her doubts, the crew on Revenge had given her a home. She would honor that. "These are Jehan abd-Ba'al and Tilawithes Tulafame, also of the Revenge." She paused and added, "And Daniel Jackson of...the Tau'ri."

She watched closely to see if Kell know of any Tau'ri, but his reaction came before Daniel's introduction and focused on something else.

"Ship," Kell repeated in a flat tone.

"Ship," Teyla repeated. "I presume you are familiar with the concept? I understood Satedans were sufficiently advanced that you no longer believed the Wraith were evil spirits?"

A step behind her, Daniel shifted his feet and drew in a breath, obviously unhappy with Teyla's words. She heard the quiet click as his teeth came together instead of a spitting out words and assumed Jehan had silenced him with one of his slit-eyed looks. Those looks had no effect on Meredith or Vala, but Daniel still quailed when receiving one. Perhaps, unlike Vala and Meredith, he wasn't so confident Jehan wouldn't shoot him and dump his body into hyperspace.

Kell considered the four of them. His eyes rested longest on Daniel, correctly assessing him as the mostly likely to give up more information.

"Prove it," he said.

"I have nothing to prove to you," Teyla said.

"Kell," Ronon Dex murmured. He nodded toward the weapons Teyla and her companions carried. "They've got access to technology."

Kell steepled his hands before him, while frowning at Teyla.

"You're aren't a Traveller," he said.

"No," she acknowledged. "I am planet born."

"Hmn."

Teyla waited and said nothing. Jehan and Til were silent too; the only one she worried about was Jackson, but instead of speaking he shifted to catch her eye. His gaze flickered toward Kell and his nostrils flared, a wordless communique Teyla found glass clear. Daniel Jackson didn't trust Kell either and would follow her lead. Teyla dipped her head in a miniscule nod.

"You aren't in charge of this ship then," Kell said. He sat back. "I want to talk to whoever that is."

Teyla glanced at Jehan and raised an eyebrow.

"We figured," he said.

She nodded.

Jehan touched the tiny communication device hooked over his ear. Dushka had found them among the stores. Meredith had modified them, promising that the encryptions he added would render them secure against eavesdropping by the Wraith or even Tau'ri with the same type of equipment. Teyla wasn't used to them yet, but the ability to communicate with the crew on Revenge or on the ground impressed her.

"Got a lock?" Jehan asked. "Teyla found our guy." His finger tapped off the radio mic and he addressed Kell. "Vala's on her way."

"So you say," Tyre murmured.

The flare of white light that accompanied the activation of Revenge's ring transporter turned the tavern headquarters stark. Teyla had to work not to give away her own nervous twitch; she wasn't used to this technology either and the light reminded her very much of a culling beam. The rings were steely blue, etched with Tau'ri markings rather than Ancestor lettering, and fell out of the empty air to stack upon each other with a bone-thrilling shump shump shump, before disappearing upward and leaving Vala behind as the light faded away.

The Satedans jerked and Dex had his triple-barreled weapon aimed at her, while Vala waited out their shock, taking a long slow survey of the room and the men in it, standing hipshot with her hand on her butt of her blaster where it rested in a thigh holster. She had on her regular black leather and the top that was mostly straps and buckles.

"Vala Mal Doran," she introduced herself, throaty voice so full of promises Teyla felt herself react and she wasn't even the target of Vala's seductive attention. Vala hadn't even been trying the first night she'd tested Teyla aboard the ship. Every man in the room shuddered a little and Jackson made a little clicking noise in the back of his throat. "Captain of the Revenge."

Kell cleared his throat.

"Useful trick."

"Isn't it?" Vala replied. Her hips swayed as she strutted over to Kell's table and perched on it, giving herself a height advantage over the seated man. She smiled in approval and purred, "No one said what fine, strapping... big boys you Satedans are."

Kell preened.

Vala tapped his cheek and leaned close enough that Kell couldn't avoid looking at her chest. "We need an assault force, covert insertion and extraction of an unknown number of captives from a fortified, underground bunker. Can your people do that or should I look elsewhere?"

Kell gaped when she sat back and waited.

"We can do that," Ronon Dex told her.

Kell glowered at him.

"The question is why you need us if you've got tech like," he gestured to where the rings had deposited Vala, "that?"

"I need my crew to fly Revenge," Vala replied, "and you for feet on the ground."

"Gun fodder."

Vala bared her teeth at him.

"I can find idiots everywhere. I want professionals who can go in, retrieve our objective, and get out. Not get killed and give away our plans at the same time. Believe me, if we just wanted to kill people, we could do that without leaving the bridge of our ship."

"You don't expect us to manage this without casualties?" Kell demanded.

Vala's laughter had a dark edge.

"Do I look like a fool, Dranta Kell?"

"No," he said huskily.

"Then all that's left is to agree on terms."

"Not quite," he said and closed on hand on Vala's wrist. She held still and kept smiling. "I won't waste my people on an assault through the Ancestors' ring."

"You'll be transported to our objective aboard the Revenge. Your force will be ringed down and picked up the same way, while our ship stays in orbit." She tapped the tiny radio mic and earpiece. "We'll outfit your people and be in constant touch." Vala made 'touch' sound dirty and sexy and licked her lips after saying it. "The ship can provide some very impressive distractions, once we know we won't be blowing up the people we're there to get."

Vala turned her wrist in Kell's grip, a feat of strength given his grip, and one that widened his eyes. Teyla knew it had taken an effort, but Vala acted like she hadn't even noticed Kell holding on.

"Right now, if the Belkan authorities decided to arrest those of us dirtside," Vala went on, "my first mate and gunnery officer might decide to flatten the new quarter of the city or burn all the fields from here to the horizon. We'll make very sure the Genii are concentrating elsewhere."

"Compared to what a Goa'uld would do, that's almost going easy," Jackson muttered.

"Ba'al once had his Jaffa kill every child under ten and every adult over twenty on a planet where some teenager emptied a chamber pot into the street he was walking down," Jehan murmured back. "He considered himself quite merciful."

"I'm sure," Jackson said.

Kell grunted and said, "The Genii? They're a bunch of farmers."

"Apparently not so much," Jackson replied.

"Doesn't matter," Kell said. "We can beat them."

Dranta Kell and Tyre were too intent on Vala and her charms to have heard the soft exchange between Jackson and Jehan, but Ronon Dex had paid better attention to his surroundings. Teyla detected a flare of horror in his expression, before he smoothed his features back under control. She felt the same. To wipe out children as no more than a petulant lesson? The Wraith only took children during the Great Cullings. Otherwise, they left the very young to mature and produce new populations for them to return and prey upon.

Vala had lifted one of the heavy cartridges that the Satedan guns used and was turning it between her fingers.

"Do you still have the infrastructure to manufacture more of these?"

Kell's frown gave away the truth.

"I'm sure we could provide you with a shipment of ammunition, given a sample like this," Vala offered. She'd begun tossing the cartridge in the air and catching it.

"I believe we can come to an agreement," Kell said eagerly.

"Great, now we're arms dealers in addition to pirates," Jackson whispered.

~*~

continued in [b]