The Mountain King Part 12

Makepeace skidded down the slope amid rolling gravel and dirt kicked loose by his boots. His men stumbled after him on the precarious footing, following the path he and Andrews had taken earlier. Earthquake damage littered the way, but nonetheless he navigated the rocky debris swiftly, not wasting any time worrying about safety.

He slipped when a patch of ground crumbled underfoot, caught himself, and rushed on. Behind him, he heard Johnson ask if he was all right, but ignored the question. Something deep inside him--something he refused to dwell upon--told him they had to hurry.

Down the slope they ran, up a short rise, then down again. The exit from the city came into view. Makepeace looked past it, down to the pair of bright, canary colored roads that waited on the flat area at the city's edge. The unnatural yellow was stark against the blue striated landscape. He'd never seen anything so beautiful.

Two death gliders buzzed overhead without attacking. Sitala must've gotten over her rage already, and it looked like she still wanted live prisoners. The gliders were probably just tracking SG-3's movements. So far.

That wouldn't last, but soon it wouldn't matter.

He paused, focusing on a barely perceptible sound, and his team came up beside him. Johnson said, "Colonel, what--?"

"Quiet," Makepeace said. "Listen."

From far away came a faint rumble, like a distant jet liner. A dark blot appeared on the horizon.

"Another train," Henderson breathed.

"It made sense that Vara had more than one available," Makepeace said. "Come on, we won't have much time once Sitala figures out what's going on."

SG-3 hurried the rest of the way down to the roads. A leading dust cloud rose as the train sped closer. A harsh wind kicked up, and heavy, black clouds moved in to blot out the sun. As the sky darkened, a flash of lightning seared the men's retinas then faded. Thunder sounded, drowning out the roar of the train. Watching the storm, Makepeace felt anticipation and a fierce sense of satisfaction.

The streamlined transport tube decelerated and stopped to hover before them. The door slid open. Before the ramp had finished extending Makepeace yelled, "Get on! Move it!" and gave each of his men a shove as they boarded to hustle them faster. He vaulted through the entrance right on their tails.

The transport sealed up. It shuddered and lurched, toppling the men off their feet. Then it started moving back in the direction it had come from.

"It can change direction on the same road?" Henderson said, scrambling across the floor to stare out the transparent sidewall.

Andrews winced and rubbed his butt. "Not gracefully."

Makepeace's knees felt bruised from the fall he'd taken. He scooted to the back of the train, seeing the emerald city recede into the distance.

And then the strangest thing happened: the city began to melt. The towers and arches dissolved, their sharp, faceted features liquefying into rounded lumps. Emerald rivulets ran freely into the earth. Everything dwindled away like a sand castle in the waves.

A few moments later, the last green humps vanished. Varayimshaeta's city was gone.

A frisson ran up Makepeace's spine, a nagging memory surfaced.

"Huh," he said.

"Sir?" Johnson asked.

"I finally remembered where I'd seen that china pattern before. It was my grandmother's. I haven't seen it since I was ten." She'd passed away that year, he remembered. He hadn't seen that china since, not until he had eaten off it in that city. And now it was gone again, like everything else Varayimshaeta had created for SG-3. He bowed his head, remembering two perfect little fetuses that he had consigned to death.

Johnson looked at him like he was crazy. Maybe I am, Makepeace thought.

The storm churned, the thick clouds rotating, gathering into bands and circular knots. Lightning flared, striking the ever more distant mountains. Blue-gray desert flashed by as the train rocketed back toward the Stargate. Makepeace couldn't be sure, but it seemed like the vehicle was traveling even faster now than it had when SG-3 had first been conveyed to Varayimshaeta's city. He wondered just how fast these things could move.

"Four-hundred parazong-zu-horu" bubbled up into his thoughts. The answer was incomprehensible to him, as he had no idea what a parazong-zu-horu was. He suspected that he could figure it out if he wanted. He just needed to do a little mental dredging and compare the results with the measurement systems he knew. He had no intention of even trying.

A pair of death gliders swooped down, weapons firing, the energy blasts raising clouds of dust and debris. The men ducked instinctively. The tinted, transparent walls made them feel exposed and terribly vulnerable. There was no false sense of security to be had; the threats outside were all too visible.

"They missed," Henderson said in a strained voice.

"They aren't trying to kill us. All they have to do is get us to stop, or knock us off the tracks," said Andrews. He stroked his rifle and watched the death gliders zoom up, back toward the clouds.

Makepeace said, "If they knock us off the tracks at this speed, we'll be dead, anyway."

"Not if Sitala's got a sarcophagus."

"We've already had this conversation."

Andrews didn't reply, he just continued to finger his rifle. A tense, forbidding atmosphere seemed to fill the space between Makepeace and Andrews. Johnson and Henderson studied their two teammates with wary curiosity. Johnson frowned and opened his mouth.

Makepeace glared at him and said, "Not now."

Johnson shut his mouth again.

The death gliders returned, strafing the train even closer this time. Explosions ripped the ground on either side of the cabin. The percussive force shook the train.

Makepeace watched helplessly, his hands clenched into fists. There was nothing he could do, nothing any of them could do. Except trust an enraged, alien computer to protect them.

Incredibly, that trust was not misplaced.

The greenish-black swirls of clouds overhead formed into small, tight whirlwinds. The tips of the vortices stretched down to touch the Goa'uld fighters. The death gliders ruptured and exploded, their pieces flung wildly across the arid countryside. Makepeace watched with a cold smile, while his men swore and marveled as the funnel clouds unraveled and vanished. Somehow, the train hadn't even been jostled.

Localized mini-tornados seemed quite an effective weapon against small aircraft. Makepeace wondered how they'd do against Sitala's ground forces, and wondered why Varayimshaeta hadn't employed them back at the city. He thought hard about that, but no solid, unquestionable factoid revealed itself to him. Instead, a vague impression of impotence arose, the feeling centered on the city itself. Apparently, the city and its grounds had been off limits. He figured the limitation was due to some strange, built-in programming that Varayimshaeta couldn't override. Then again, the real reason might be something else entirely. He had no way of knowing what the problem was.

The capricious nature of the downloaded information in his head frustrated him.

Two more death gliders appeared and attacked the train. More mini-tornados formed, shattered the craft, and dissipated.

Andrews made a satisfied noise at the demise of the death gliders. "That's really something," he said. "I'm sure glad Vara's on our side."

"Wait until we get to the Stargate," Johnson grumbled. "It'll probably be swarming with Goa'uld. Sitala's an idiot if she didn't lock it down first thing."

Makepeace's gut--or maybe something else that he didn't want to ponder too deeply--told him it wouldn't be a problem. "Vara will take care of it."

His men gave him uncomfortable looks. Johnson asked quietly, "You're sure, sir?"

Makepeace nodded. "I just hope we get off this dirtball in time." Now where the hell had that come from?

"In time for what, sir?"

Johnson's question echoed his own thoughts. Makepeace's stomach churned, but again no solid answers were forthcoming. He shrugged. "I'm not sure. Something bad."

Henderson said, "Something bad, like irradiating the planet again? That got rid of the Goa'uld before."

Andrews gnawed his lower lip. "Yeah, but it was only a temporary solution. Remember, Vara said it was going to chase off the Goa'uld for good this time."

Varayimshaeta's words echoed through Makepeace's brain. "The World will be purified, and made safe for all time," he said. He deliberately didn't think about how or why he remembered the exact quote, but something in his brain tickled his consciousness with an uncomfortable, non-human literal-mindedness.

"That does sound permanent."

"Vara could always blow up the whole planet," Henderson said carelessly. "That's pretty permanent."

Everyone went very still.

Johnson turned to Makepeace and asked, "Colonel? Can Vara do that? Commit suicide like that?"

"I don't know." But he suspected. Oh, yes. Makepeace was too aware that he was capable of suicide under the right conditions, and over the last few days it had become obvious that Varayimshaeta had absorbed more from him than just English.

Henderson said, "Whatever Vara does, it'll wait until we're through the Stargate, right? That's what it said, that it wanted to get us off the planet before it did anything drastic."

Under the scrutiny of his men, Makepeace restrained himself from fidgeting. "That was the gist of it," he said, hoping Varayimshaeta would hold by its words. "But it's not exactly sane and stable, at least not by our standards. If Sitala provokes it any worse than she already has..."

He didn't have to finish that statement. From the looks on their faces, his men all got the picture.

The landscape zoomed by, moving at a sickening speed. Makepeace forced himself to watch, controlling his stomach, hoping it was fast enough. Nearby, Henderson sat on the obsidian floor, checking and rechecking his weapons, saying nothing. Every so often Johnson would look outside and mumble a quick prayer. Andrews didn't pray, at least not to any benevolent god, to judge by the occasional bursts of profanity that issued from his mouth. Makepeace didn't care what deity intervened, as long as SG-3 got off the planet before Varayimshaeta implemented its ultimate solution to its Goa'uld problem.

Two more death gliders strafed the train and were efficiently dispatched by mini-tornados. After that, Sitala must have wised up, because there were no more direct attacks. Six death gliders flew in formation overhead, but didn't harass the train. Instead, they zipped forward, following the yellow roads, and disappeared on the horizon. All four men knew they'd be waiting for SG-3, along with any other troops that Sitala had left there to secure the Stargate.

Unless Varayimshaeta intervened.

The train hurtled onward. The storm grew darker and heavier, and the whole sky took on a greenish cast. Ahead, thick bands of black clouds arced over the horizon, looming ominously like the mouth of Hell.

"Now there's an ugly sight," said Andrews.

Henderson asked, "What's going on up there?"

No one could answer. Then something hard hit the top of the train with a loud bang. The men all jumped and looked up nervously. Another bang rattled the cabin. And another.

After that last hit, there was a moment of quiet, while SG-3 watched the transparent ceiling. Then the sky opened up. Thousands of white spheres the size of softballs pounded the train and the surrounding landscape. The cabin reverberated with deafening bangs. The men instinctively covered their ears and hunkered down, but it soon became clear that the walls and ceiling were strong enough to withstand the onslaught. Although the train shook with the force of the impacts, it kept moving forward without even slowing down.

"It's hail," Makepeace shouted over the noise.

The storm abruptly ceased. Shaken, the men unlimbered themselves from their protective crouches. Outside, everything was covered in hailstones. The balls of ice reflected the greenish-black color of the clouds, making the barren desert look even more alien and forbidding.

"Shit," said Andrews.

"Jesus, look at that," said Johnson, pointing forward.

In the long distance they could make out the black form of an enormous funnel cloud that stretched from the clouds to the horizon. A gray haze rose from the ground, surrounding the tornado. Bolts of lightning flared, blue-white against the churning sky, highlighting the ominous tableau. In the quiet cabin, the scene was all too eerie.

"That's big," said Henderson.

"Big? Shit, Tommy, it's the great granddaddy of all tornados," Andrews breathed.

Henderson shook his head. "Ten to one it's over the Stargate."

"And we're heading straight into it."

Makepeace said, "Calm down. It's dissipating already."

It was the strangest sight. As they watched, the tornado seemed to lose cohesion and just evaporate into fuzzy mist. In a few minutes it was entirely gone.

"I doubt any Jaffa survived that," Makepeace said smugly.

Johnson gave him another of those funny looks, but Andrews said, "Hell, yeah. Goa'uld Armageddon. Vara rocks."

A short time later they arrived at the dome. The train's door stood open, waiting patiently for them to exit, but no one could make themselves move. They only stared out, not sure what to make of what they saw.

All was silent and very, very still. Not even the tiniest breeze ruffled their hair, though black clouds still loomed low. After the wild storms, the men had been expecting devastation and gore. They'd prepared themselves for smoking wreckage, broken bodies, and buckets of blood. Instead, they saw very little evidence that the Goa'uld had ever been anywhere near the Stargate. A number of the giant hailstones littered the area. Strange, wide paths gouged in the earth gave evidence of the monster tornado that had scoured the area. Some twisted scraps of metal lay in a few places, but not enough to account for even one death glider.

Wordlessly, SG-3 walked down the ramp. Nothing else stirred.

"This is creepy," said Johnson, nervously clutching his rifle.

Makepeace nodded. It reminded him of when they'd first arrived on this world, when everything had felt dead to him. Only the occasional bit of Goa'uld metal gave any hint that there had been a living presence here just a little while ago. Now he was glad Varayimshaeta had not used any tornados back at the city; such a heavy-handed weapon might have killed them all.

"There's the dildo," said Andrews, pointing to a spot between the two yellow roads. "It's toast." Incredibly, it hadn't budged, despite the tornado. The object looked like it had exploded from within, its innards blackened and melted slag.

Makepeace became aware of a faint trembling beneath his feet. He looked down. "You guys feel that?"

Henderson said, "The ground's shaking."

"We'd better get off this planet, ASAP."

Johnson asked, "What's going to happen?"

Varayimshaeta's commiting suicide, something screamed in Makepeace's head. He said, "Something really bad. I don't think we should be here when the planet blows up."

"Amen," said Andrews fervently.

They hurried toward the dome's entrance. There they found one more indication of the former Jaffa presence. On the right side of the great, open doorway was a greasy, charcoal blot. It was vaguely man-shaped, although smudged. A few trickles of thin red liquid had run from it and were now drying on the curved wall.

Henderson grimaced and said, "Ew."

"Yeah, that pretty much covers it," Makepeace said, swallowing.

Andrews said, "I really don't get it. If Vara could do all this, why didn't it just wipe out the Goa'uld the first time they came here?"

With a sidelong look at Makepeace, Johnson said, "I figure, back then, Vara probably didn't know how to do this."

"No," said Makepeace, somberly. "It didn't."

All those eons ago, Varayimshaeta had only applied the crudest methods, sterilizing its own planet after all its People had died. Doing anything on that scale sooner would have resulted in unacceptable levels of collateral damage. It didn't possess much imagination, and hadn't had a seasoned Recon Marine's knowledge, creativity, or skill at killing available to it.

But now it did. Everything Makepeace knew, Varayimshaeta knew. Makepeace briefly shut his eyes, wondering what else Varayimshaeta had learned from him, what use it might put his own memories to. His knowledge and experience, even his emotions, combined with an insane, near-omnipotent computer's inhuman rage. It didn't bear thinking about.

"The sooner we're gone from here, the better," he said. "Vara won't wait forever."

Gold flashed on the horizon.

"That's Sitala's pyramid ship," said Andrews. "It's coming this way."

The gold object rapidly grew larger. Johnson shielded his eyes with a hand and peered into the distance. "She sure don't give up easy."

Unlike the other three, Henderson was staring down. He swallowed and said, "I think the ground's shaking harder."

They all felt the trembling increase steadily, a more ominous sensation than a full-blown earthquake would have been. Hailstones and pebbles jittered ever so slightly. In the sky, Sitala's ship was close enough now to look like a golden triangle. As they watched, it abruptly veered up, rising and disappearing into the clouds.

"What the hell?" said Andrews, gawking.

"That's it," declared Makepeace, "we're bugging out. Everyone into the dome. Johnson, dial the Stargate. Come on, move your asses!"

They bolted through the open door. Near the Stargate, the other Goa'uld spy device had also been destroyed, exploded from within just like its twin outside. The trembling underfoot turned to outright shaking. A faint rumbling could now be heard. Johnson clutched at the DHD for balance while he punched in the address for Earth. The Stargate flared into existence. Henderson sent the GDO code, and all gathered around, watching for the little indicator light to signal that the way home was clear.

Only a few seconds passed, but the time seemed to last forever while the shaking grew stronger and stronger, and the rumbling became louder. Then the light turned green.

"Go!" Makepeace shouted, but the team was already moving. Almost as one, the four Marines dived through the event horizon.

On the other side, they tumbled onto the SGC's ramp. Behind them, the wormhole just...disengaged. No fanfare, no disasters--it just shut down.

They all stood up and turned back to the Stargate. All around them were klaxons, flashing lights, and SFs. Up in the control room, Hammond was at the window, urgently demanding explanations over the loudspeakers. The four men of SG-3 just let it all wash over them as they stared stupidly at the inactive Stargate.

"Is it over?" Henderson asked, very quietly.

"Yeah, I think it is," Makepeace said, but he wasn't entirely truthful. It was over for his team, perhaps, but Varayimshaeta's memories and rage still lurked at the base of his thoughts, guaranteeing that, for him, it would last forever.

Three days later, Makepeace sat at his desk, staring at his computer and coming to terms with his new orders.

He had been indefinitely grounded. That hadn't been a surprise, since he himself had predicted that particular outcome. Fraiser and McKenzie had both recommended it, and Hammond had agreed. Makepeace was frustrated and angry, yet he understood their reasoning. How could he blame them for not trusting his state of mind, when he didn't even trust it himself? He'd have made the same call, had it been one of his men.

He hadn't expected to be shipped off to Area 51, though.

He supposed he shouldn't have been surprised. Varayimshaeta still sang in the dark corners of his head. His own mind had betrayed him, integrating the alien thoughts and memories so well with his own that he sometimes had trouble differentiating between them. They felt too familiar. The task was complicated by the fact that human beings had been substituted into the blank spots that Varayimshaeta's People should have occupied. Those memories he had to examine good and hard, picking them apart and analyzing them. Blue-gray dirt, the Zand-Faylakk road system, and emerald domes were the usual giveaways that the past events he remembered were not part of his own, Earth-born experience.

He couldn't help wondering if he was really the same person anymore. Small wonder McKenzie felt out of his depth and had opted to pass him on to the big guns.

He'd already had several sessions with McKenzie. The base shrink's strange expressions, so at odds with his soothing comments, had been warning enough that Makepeace's problems were out of McKenzie's league. It must be worse than Makepeace thought, for McKenzie to have come to his decision so quickly.

Then there was the tech angle. Part two of his new orders. Makepeace knew that the top brass had been very, very interested in all that apparently abandoned technology. All the circumstances told him so: the fact that Hammond had agreed to the extended mission on 3Y5-116 so quickly and easily, the alacrity with which he had provided all the survival gear Makepeace had requested for the survey. All done without question or delay. Additionally, Hammond had been ordered to reestablish contact with 3Y5-116, despite Makepeace's speculation that Varayimshaeta had destroyed its own planet. The control room techs had been dialing the address twice a day over the last two days--ever since SG-3's reports had been filed and forwarded. The Stargate never succeeded in making a connection.

Makepeace thought that was a blessing. He had no problems with obtaining technology for Earth. Until recently, he had approved whole-heartedly. The Goa'uld had to be stopped, before they did to Earth what they had done to Varayimshaeta's World. However, this last mission had taught him that some alien tech was a disaster waiting to happen. Varayimshaeta's had not been designed for humans, but for a truly alien species with a disturbingly non-human psychology. Earth would do better to stick to scavenging and trading for technology developed by humans and human-similar species. Makepeace had already said as much, several times, but no one wanted to hear that.

It was just as well 3Y5-116 was now "unreachable."

That wasn't going to stop the brass, though. No one wanted to believe that the planet was probably gone. Nor did they believe that there wasn't useful alien knowledge locked up in Makepeace's head. Even General Hammond had pressed him to look deeper into the new, alien places in his mind. Aside from Varayimshaeta's history lesson and a few odd bits of language and trivia, there was nothing. At least, nothing any weapons designers could use. On the flip side, the anthropology, linguistics, and archeology types--like Doctor Jackson and his cronies--were already requesting interviews.

Makepeace was leaving for Area 51 the next day. He might not be looking forward to his trip, but he also wasn't particularly sorry that he'd have to disappoint the prying scientists.

A knock on his door broke his train of thought. Just as well. "Come in," he called.

Lieutenant Johnson stepped into the office, his expression somber. "Ready to go, Colonel?"

Makepeace glanced at his desk clock. It was that late already? He'd lost track of time. As he got up, his gaze fell on the family photo on his desk, taken a few years earlier during happier times. The picture showed himself, standing to one side of his seated ex-wife Joanna. Her smile had always been incredible, he thought with a touch of melancholy. He had his arms around their daughters, Eleanor and Jillian, while Joanna held three-year-old Adam in her lap.

A vision floated through his head, of babies in gestation tanks, bathed in golden light.

Johnson said, "Sir?"

"I'm coming, Lieutenant." He pulled himself together and headed out into the corridor.

While Makepeace had been dealing with psychiatrists, physicians, scientists, and impatient superiors, all demanding answers to questions he didn't want to explore, Johnson had arranged a memorial service for the unnamed babies that Varayimshaeta had created from SG-3's genes. A private ceremony, just the four of them and the base chaplain, in the SGC's small chapel. Something to mark the passing of six tiny lives that should never have even existed. Something to ease four guilty, distressed, and angry souls.

Not too surprisingly, Johnson and Henderson had taken the news of their near deaths at their comrades' hands in stride. They admitted that they'd been expecting--even hoping--that Makepeace and Andrews would remember the pact they'd made at the destroyed train platform and honor it. They'd had no illusions about mercy from Sitala, and at the time there had been no other way out. They were all glad it hadn't come to that, and no one lost any sleep about that particular "might-have-been."

The babies, however, were another matter altogether. Lingering guilt and a sense of impotence haunted all four men.

Johnson was the most outwardly affected, and had taken to having long discussions with the base chaplain. Henderson had compartmentalized everything, and only discussed the fetuses in terms of biology and technology. Andrews was spending a lot of time at the rifle range.

Makepeace just tried to avoid thinking about the subject. It was fairly easy during the day, when he was preoccupied by demands for information while on duty. At night, when alien dreams and all-too-human nightmares threatened, he forced himself to concentrate on other things. Recreating obscure historical battles in his head, working out strategies for both sides that would result in alternate outcomes. His paperwork was all caught up and his house had never been cleaner. These methods worked. Usually.

It might seem somewhat pathological to an outsider like McKenzie, but the Marines were all coping in their own ways.

Makepeace and Johnson walked in taut silence. The chapel came into view. Another vision appeared in Makepeace's head, of Varayimshaeta's city dissolving and sinking into 3Y5-116's blue dust. He remembered the pain and accusation in Johnson's eyes when they'd had to leave the too-young fetuses behind, and said quietly, "Daryl, I am sorry about the babies."

Johnson stopped and regarded him with a solemn expression.

"We did what we had to do," Makepeace said. "There wasn't any other way."

"I know." Johnson heaved a weary sigh. "Doctor Fraiser confirmed Henderson's assessment after we described the babies to her. They were too young. It's just hard."

"Yeah." Makepeace wished they'd never stumbled upon the gestation chamber. He stared down, not meeting Johnson's eyes.

Johnson shifted from foot to foot. "Colonel," he said, sounding uncomfortable. Makepeace looked up. Johnson blurted out, "I would've made the same decision--about them--if I'd been in your place. That's hard for me to deal with."

Forgiveness, of a sort, and understanding. Makepeace briefly closed his eyes. "I know," he said, echoing Johnson's earlier words. "It takes time. We all need some space, I think." He did, especially. To deal with everything that had happened, all the decisions he had made, not just to mourn the doomed babies. Makepeace was almost glad he was going to Area 51 tomorrow. He might not like the reasons, but he could appreciate the distance it afforded.

Johnson nodded.

Makepeace opened the unadorned metal door. Inside, Henderson and Andrews were standing by the small, non-denominational altar, waiting along with the chaplain.

He said quietly, "Let's go," and together the two men entered the chapel.

*** the end ***

July, 2006

Return to Send in the Marines!