4: Thundergate
by Chaos_eternus
“Understood Sir” Major Penhall switched off his radio as the gate deactivated, and trudged back to the McCaffrey. O'Neill had obviously been very persuasive; Hammond had decided to trust Enerina, for the moment at least.
That in itself had to be a miracle, O'Neill actually trusting a Goa'uld.
Well, other then Carter / Selmac anyway.
Of course, this could just be another of the labyrinthine plots SG-1 seemed to get themselves into every now and again.
He found Enerina in the engine room, checking over the modified engines of this Ha'tak, faster they might be but according to Enerina they were temperamental and needed to be watched closely. A classic trade-off in other words.
“Enerina,”
She stood up, and looked worriedly at Penhall.
“Just got word from command, a warship, the Dauntless was just sent to Alpha Centauri and we are to rendezvous there, Hammond has decided to trust you.”
He left the ‘for the moment' unsaid, but she seemed to hear it anyway.
“Where is this Alpha Centauri?”
“Trinary star, closest planetary system to earth”
Enerina nodded, that was enough to tell her which system it was on her star charts, but first she had a little business of her own to deal with…
“I have 100 Jaffa to pick up at Chi'hin'zi, preferably before Maktenos orders them killed. These Jaffa are loyal to me, and he knows it.”
“Maktenos?” she wants more Jaffa… damn. She already had them significantly outnumbered should it come to a fight, but then again, if O'Neill was willing to give her a chance perhaps he should too.
Warily of course.
“The Goa'uld who has your man as host…”
Penhall grimaced at the reminder, then asked “Where is Chi'hin'zi?”
Glancing around the room once, she sighed, then gestured towards the door, leading him swiftly to the bridge, where Enerina pointed the system out on the star charts.
His eyes narrowed, he studied the location, something about it seemed very familiar, then his eyebrows shot up in surprise and a little pleasure. They could use this…
He reached forward, cupping his hand around a small, glittering dot within the holographic display, “New Tollana is here, Tanith destroyed it almost a year ago now, it's pretty close, we could check for survivors.”
“Agreed” she strode over to the controls, and moved the Ha'tak off the planet and towards Chi'hin'zi but leaving Penhall with a quandary.
Did she agree because she wanted to approve willing or was it because she had her own business with the former Tollan homeworld? Or was there some Machiavellian plot at work here?
Trust, he reminded himself, be wary, but give an opportunity for her to prove herself for better or for worse.
Penhall stepped out of the Tel'tac and onto the remains of new Tollana's primary city with a curse. The place had pretty much been levelled, and whilst plants were starting to grow within the ruins, he saw no sign of survivors. Nor did any of the ion cannons appear to have survived, which was a real pity. They could have used those, even if they couldn't reverse engineer them.
Frowning, he glanced twice at one of the pedestals. It also appeared that a few were missing, no doubt taken by Taniths troops. Hammond would certainly need to know about that.
He turned around with a sigh to the SG teams, some of Enerina's Jaffa would have speeded up the search enormously, but any surviving Tollans would really have gone to ground if they saw Jaffa wondering around.
“All right people, you know what to do, spread out.”
As Penhall moved through the rubble, he gained the feeling that he was being watched. He looked around cautiously, but saw no-one. He looked closely at the ruined overhead walkway to his left, and then to the stagnant water to his right, nothing, but in front… he stiffened, and moved quickly forward, stopping and bending to look closer at the ground.
He glanced once at his companion, who nodded silent agreement, his eyes lingering on the remains for one moment, before turning his attention back to the perimeter.
“Someone else is here people! I have a fire, been put out but still hot…” he flicked his radio off, and glanced around again. He was being watched, he was sure of it, but where from?
“I am Major Penhall, StarGate Command Team 2, is anyone here?” he shouted into the wind.
He waited, but there was no reply, he tried again but still no response. Sighing he turned to leave just as a clatter of falling rubble alerted him to his watchers. Standing on the rubble of the overhead walkway were about 35 individuals in bedraggled and ruined clothes. He assumed these were the once proud and strong Tollan people but it appeared they had been reduced practically to primitives, eking out their survival as best as they could with what little of their technology and knowledge that survived.
“I am Narim, is SG-1 here?”
“Back at the SGC, SG-2 and 5 are here”
Narim turned to his fellow Tollans, “I told you they would come, even if it took them time, they would come for us”
He turned back to Penhall, “We must leave this place, Anubis sends Jaffa to check for survivors at irregular intervals, he will be back”
“Shit!” Penhall cursed, “How many of you are their?”
“32 with me, another 46 somewhere further to the east, that's it”
“Penhall to SG-5, sweep east, roughly 46 survivors in that area, I have 33 here” he clicked the radio off, and turned back to Narim, “We have Ha'tak and a Tel'tac we picked up at Chi'hin'zi, but space will be tight, we have 143 Jaffa and a friendly Goa'uld with us as well, so just grab what you can, I'll call the Ha'tak down now”
‘78 survivors out of near enough a million people, Jesus' Penhall thought as he keyed his radio again.