"You mean you got that artifact from Indiana Jones?" Sam's eyes had widened in disbelief, yet she leaned closer, fascination gradually crowding out her doubt. "I knew he was a real person but I always thought the movies were completely fictionalized."

Daniel nodded. "Well...yes. He was always one of the few who was willing to grant my theories, before Catherine recruited me to translate the inscription on the capstone. We e-mail each other sometimes. I couldn't tell him about the Stargate, of course, but he's given me some useful information anyway."

Jack picked up the artifact and hefted it in his hand. "So what is this thing, anyway?"

"It's the headpiece of the Staff of Ra," Daniel explained, watching Jack's eyes narrow at the mention of Ra. "I'd heard of it years ago and even seen it before, but it wasn't until after I came back from Abydos that I started wondering if it had simply been named for an Egyptian god or if it had anything to do with the character we met on Abydos. The image isn't intended to be Ra because this image doesn't represent a hawk-headed being. Maybe we can't find out what the actual Staff of Ra was intended to do. Dr. Jones used it to find the Ark of the Covenant--I wonder if that was a Goa'uld device, too--but those symbols around the rim that explained how to find it were added later." He pointed to the incised letters.

"You said something about a deflection device, Teal'c," Sam remembered hastily over Jack's muttering about the Ark. "What does it deflect?"

"Energy fire from staff weapons," Teal'c replied promptly. "You have all seen the personal force shield possessed by Apophis. This device pre-dates that development. Such deflectors are not in use any longer. The Goa'uld possess more sophisticated technology that they discovered on other worlds. However, if this artifact is functional, it would serve the same purpose in the hands of a skilled user."

"But you're saying it would work for us, if we fell under attack from Jaffa on a planet?" O'Neill's face held approval. "Nice going, Danny. How does it work?"

"I'm trying to understand the notes," Daniel replied. "Things can be translated several ways when working with hieroglyphics. When I first arrived here, for instance, the interpreters had translated the word 'Stargate' as 'door to heaven'. We tend to interpret text and artifacts we don't understand with automatic religious implications. If we don't know what function a building served, we assume it was a temple."

"So your notes don't explain about its use as a defensive weapon?" Jack turned to the Jaffa. "Teal'c?"

"I have not seen one of these deflectors since I was a child," Teal'c replied, picking it up and holding it in his palm, the side with the most writing facing out. "The Goa'uld simply point it in the direction of attacking weapon fire, and the crystal draws the energy toward it and then reflects it back at the attacker. It requires quickness and dexterity."

"Reflects like a mirror?" Sam asked. "Or bounces fire back on the Jaffa? We'd have to assume that the stone is not simply a crystal, then, Teal'c?"

"Bounces fire back. The crystal is called a par'tac and it is not of this planet. Such shield devices vary in appearance from world to world but they can be worn as medallions as this one was obviously meant to be or simply carried in one's hand. Often the Goa'uld would use them as a religious focus for the subjugated peoples. If anyone had the courage to attack, the device would strike down the attacker and give the Goa'uld the appearance of godlike power."

"That would work well on primitive people, assuming primitive people had the ability to direct energy fire," Daniel mused.

"One might steal a staff weapon or another Goa'uld device," Teal'c pointed out. "It would never do to allow the slave populations to believe their 'gods' were mortal."

"That was true on Abydos, Jack, remember?" Daniel pointed out. "They even knelt to me because I was wearing Catherine's Eye of Horus amulet on a chain around my neck. It was only when they learned the Jaffa armor concealed men, not gods, that they considered revolt. A device like this one might help to maintain the status quo on worlds like Abydos."

Still holding the Headpiece, Jack nodded at the clock. "Then we'll take this with us to P3C 187. We have no evidence that the Goa'uld are on the planet, but I think it might come in handy on missions."

"I haven't finished the translation," Daniel objected.

"No, but you don't need to. Teal'c knows its purpose."

Daniel folded up his notes and stuffed them into the breast pocket of his fatigues, determined to learn as much as he could. He held out a hand for the Headpiece.

Jack shook his head. "No, I think Teal'c should carry it," he decided. "He knows its function better than the rest of us do."

"I'm not so sure, Colonel," objected Sam. "If Teal'c needs to defend himself, the staff weapon requires both hands. Let Daniel take it."

"He carries a gun, too," Jack pointed out, his fingers automatically caressing the Headpiece.

"Yes, but he isn't trained in it like you and I are," she replied. "He knows how to use a firearm and can if necessary, but he's purely a scientist, while I'm a military scientist. When we get back, we can analyze the artifact, see if it's made from the same substance as the Stargate, determine if the crystal is really something more. We don't even know that P3C 187 is still inhabited. No one was seen in the initial images, after all. The site appeared deserted." She gestured at the pictures, which represented an abandoned city.

"Many cultures live directly around the Stargates on their worlds," Daniel replied. "Abydos was an exception because there was no oasis at Ra's pyramid." He took the Headpiece back from Jack and slid the chain around his neck, tucking the amulet inside his shirt. "We might not even need it today, but it could prove useful."

"I don't like taking an untested weapon into a field situation," Jack argued, but since he'd been prepared to take it there himself, he didn't have a lot of room to argue. "We'd better get down to the gate room," he added. "Come on, kiddies. Let's go see what the cards dealt us up this time."

"I am not a 'kiddie'," Teal'c muttered under his breath as he turned to follow O'Neill.

*****

P3C 187 possessed Egyptian-style architecture, but not a Saharan climate. Instead it reminded Daniel of Greece; the sky a vivid blue, the soil fairly dry but capable of supporting growth. Remembering orchards of olive trees from his last visit to Delphi, and flowers blooming everywhere, he decided this place, with its trees that were probably the planet's equivalent of olives or date palms and the splashes of reds and blues and golds from the flowers that grew in untidy beds along the deserted walkways, he assumed the world had a climate similar to Greece--or Southern California. They had arrived in the heart of a huge city, the Stargate in the middle of a small park. To their left, the ground sloped away, presenting them a vista of the distant countryside beyond the blocks of structures that had a vaguely Egyptian look to them. To the right, roads led between buildings into the heart of the city.

"It looks deserted," Carter observed, studying the surrounding city streets through a pair of field glasses for traces of movement. "Like nobody's been here in awhile. Everything's overgrown, abandoned. It feels sad."

The Stargate stood before a pyramid much smaller than the one on Abydos but clearly Egyptian in design. It was very old, older than the rest of the structures in visual range, though the twin rows of buildings that looked like mastabas, or tombs, with flat roofs and sloping sides, could have been built in antiquity as well. Beyond them, were a series of streets separated by parks like the one where the Stargate stood. The effect was of light and airiness gently moldering into decay.

"Look at this, it's fascinating," Daniel exclaimed, pointing to the more modern buildings. "It's as if they took the Egyptian style of architecture and modified it over the centuries. A culture that arose out of the ancient Egyptian dynasties and continued to modernize might well look just like this. The columns are different; they're not typical, and the use of statuary as a part of them has changed, too. It looks like a case of isolation from the primary culture causing divergence. I bet their language is different, too, even if they've continued to write with hieroglyphics. Of course Ra forbade the Abydons to write...."

Lost in memories, he fell silent, and Sam, sensing his mood, continued quickly. "I don't think anyone has been around here in several years, Colonel. The gardens were originally well tended, but they've been allowed to run riot. Grass is spouting up in the cracks in the pavement, too. Just look at the place. It's deserted."

"But it was abandoned recently," Jack decided, his weapon at ready. "You can still see how these gardens were planted. Sure, they're untended, but they're not as wild as they could be. Looks like they had a pretty good life here. I'd say it took something important to make them move away and leave all this behind. And I'd bet good money what it was."

"The Goa'uld?" Daniel hazarded. "Maybe there hadn't been any Gate activity for a long time. If the Goa'uld found them again, they'd probably take off, move to another location remote from the Stargate."

"What would the Goa'uld do if they came through and found the people had taken off, Teal'c?" Jack wondered. "Hunt them down? Call it good riddance?"

"We don't know that they moved, after all," Daniel interrupted before Teal'c could speak. "They may have been taken away through the Stargate. Some of them anyway. The Goa'uld have a habit of that, after all." He felt a surge of bitterness. "They might have taken some to serve as possible Goa'uld hosts, and as soon as they returned through the Stargate, the ones who were left moved to another site."

"That is possible," Teal'c said. "Some primitive cultures worship the Stargate, but the people on this world had progressed beyond the primitive."

"If so, why abandon the Stargate? Why not simply bury it?" Sam wondered, turning to stare at the huge circle. "That would be the one sure way to keep the Goa'uld from returning."

"Maybe they didn't think of it. Maybe they didn't have time. Maybe they knew the Goa'uld had ships." Jack frowned as he offered his theories. "If it were my world, I sure wouldn't walk away and leave this unguarded. They may have left soldiers stationed in the city. We could be under observation right now."

Daniel instantly felt a prickle on the back of his neck. He hoped it was the result of the power of suggestion.

Warily Jack eyed the roads that radiated from the Stargate park, trying to detect movement. Only the leaves moved, dancing in the breeze.

"There's no evidence of vehicles," Daniel said thoughtfully. "We don't know if they'd have motorized transport; it's hard to tell from what we see. But even carts drawn by domesticated animals should leave some trace."

"Unless they took it all away with them," Sam put in. "What do you think, sir?" She turned to O'Neill.

"We'll check it out," Jack decided. "Any trace of movement or activity, I want to know now. You got that?"

Teal'c raised his staff weapon. "I am ready," he offered.

They started down the nearest street in a line, O'Neill leading the way, Teal'c bringing up the rear. Remembering the Headpiece of the Staff of Ra, Daniel freed it from his shirt and curled his fingers around it. He had an idea it wouldn't be that easy to use it as a defensive weapon. Wouldn't he have to intercept the energy to bounce it back? He withdrew his fingertips to the very edges of the circle. Maybe he should have let Jack or Teal'c take it after all. The chain wasn't quite long enough. Quickly he pulled it over his head.

Rows of tall, blank windows watched them, some with broken glass, all dusty and obscured. Nothing moved behind them but, as they walked, the team cast uneasy glances at the buildings on either side, checking for motion. Daniel wasn't sure if he were really being watched or if he had simply been spooked by the atmosphere. Had the place been abandoned for decades or centuries, it wouldn't have been so bad. But the inhabitants of this beautiful city had gone away so recently their aura still clung.

"Jaffa!" The angry cry rang out behind them. Whirling, the team discovered a cluster of young men, little more than boys, really. They wore their hair long in elaborate braids, vaguely like Skaara's, causing O'Neill to stare at them in astonishment. They looked Egyptian, they looked like the kids on Abydos who had helped Jack fight off Ra and only the clothing, trousers and mid-thigh tunics in a series of muted browns and tans, were different. The weapons in their hands were unfamiliar, but something about the flowing lines of them suggested an energy gun rather than a projectile weapon. The boys stared at Teal'c with undisguised hatred. Jack fired a round over their heads as a quick deterrent.

"Ah, hell, they're just kids," O'Neill burst out. He would hate to make war on children. It would be like shooting Skaara--or his own son.

"Jaffa!" howled the boys and the tallest took aim at him.

Teal'c hesitated for a second; the youth of his opposition and the fact that they had targeted him for what he had been made him reluctant to fire on them even though he readied the weapon.

"Teal'c, look out," Sam cried. "Tell them, Daniel."

He called out in the Abydon dialect, "We're friends."

"Hah!" The scorn was readily translated to any dialect. They didn't believe him--but that meant they could understand his words. That left two choices, to shoot the town's defenders, mere children with whom they shared a common enemy, or find a way to convince them of their innocence.

"We hate the Goa'uld as much as you do," Daniel cried, choosing the latter option. "They took my wife and made her into one of them. Do you think Teal'c would be with us if he had not turned on the Goa'uld, renounced them?"

"Your words are strange." He could understand the oldest of the boys, but just barely. The language had shifted with time and the accent was so strong he had to strain to understand. "And they are lies. He is Jaffa! He must die."

Without hesitation, he fired at Teal'c, a beam of golden energy lancing out like a laser directly at the Jaffa.

Holding the Headpiece up, Daniel jumped between Teal'c and the boys and raised the ancient amulet. As if by magic, the light angled toward it, capturing it in a brilliant burst of fire that nearly made Daniel drop it, although it didn't even sting his fingers. The crystal in the center of the device sucked in the light, then it shot forth in a concentrated stream at the oldest boy, who yelled in alarm and flung himself behind a pillar a split second before the energy would have impacted on him. A choked cry suggested he had suffered at least a graze from the glowing beam, but he didn't fall. Daniel's stomach knotted up. He hadn't wanted to hurt any of the children, only to defend his friends.

"Daniel, no!" Carter cried behind him, but before he had time to demand an explanation, three more beams lanced out at him. Teal'c grabbed for him to drag him down to safety, but the energy hit the Headpiece all at once.

Energy lanced back at the attackers, who howled, "Goa'uld!" and dove for safety, vanishing into tunnels in the ground. The force of the triple impact rocked Daniel back on his heels, causing him to drop his arm, the Headpiece dangling by its chain from numbed fingers. Jack yelled a protest and laid down covering fire and Teal'c grabbed the anthropologist's arm to yank him to shelter.

None of them saw the last beam coming until it was too late. His arm hanging at his side, Daniel's body shielded the crystal from the energy stream. The charge slammed into the middle of his back just below his backpack and pitched him into Teal'c's arms so quickly he scarcely had time to realize what had happened before, in a blaze of agony, the world went blank around him.

*****

"Daniel," Sam screamed.

"Damn it," Jack ground out. He fired at the kid who had downed Jackson, but he had dived into another of the holes in the ground and vanished.

Carefully Teal'c lowered Daniel to the ground, laying him prone in the grass of the boulevard park. The wound across the middle of his back was red and blistering already, at least a second degree burn, the fabric of his clothing charred away around it. How deep did it go? Jack watched the Jaffa ease Daniel's pack off, then his jacket, pulling away the tattered remnants of his black tee shirt. Beside him, Sam drew in a sharp breath that hissed between her teeth. Her gun at ready, she cast her eyes at the escape holes, ready to return fire if anyone emerged. On guard, too, half of Jack's attention was on the downed anthropologist. He gnawed hard on his bottom lip.

"They will return," Teal'c cautioned in a particularly flat voice, his big hands gentle as he probed the wound. Even in unconsciousness, Daniel's skin flinched under the touch and he shifted uneasily. "They will regroup and return. The use of the deflector convinced them that Daniel Jackson is a Goa'uld."

"Can you speak their language, Teal'c?" Jack's eyes raked the square. He wanted to kneel beside Daniel as Teal'c was doing, but he couldn't let his guard down. Their lives depended on it.

"I speak it."

"Then tell them who we are. Tell them we're not Goa'uld and that you came over to our side to win freedom for your people."

Teal'c obeyed. Raising his voice, he called out a long explanation for their presence. It did sound a little like the talk Jack had heard back on Abydos. He'd never really learned any of it, maybe an odd word or two.

There was an immediate reply. "Ne ne," followed by a long, angry burst of words. Okay, the kids didn't buy it. His eyes measured the long slope of street leading back to the Stargate. If they tried to run, carrying Daniel, they would be cut down long before they reached the Gate. Even now, some of the boys could be scrambling for better position, heading for those empty windows in the buildings overhead.

"Captain?" he said in an urgent undertone to the woman beside him, gesturing her down to help Daniel. "How is he?"

"I think it's a surface wound only," she said doubtfully, as she bent over the wound. "But I'm afraid he'll go into shock, and we can't treat that here. We need him back at the base, in the infirmary, and we need him there now."

"That's a big surface wound," Jack said doubtfully, risking a quick glance at the blistered area the size of a dinner plate in the middle of the scientist's back. The shot had just missed his backpack. A few inches higher and he might have been spared the worst of it. "Will he be able to walk?"

Teal'c broke off his argument with one of the unseen guardians. "I have seen such weapons before. The danger is not to internal organs or even to his spine. Infection, disruption of the bodily systems, and shock are what kill. In field conditions, they kill more quickly. We must take Daniel Jackson through the Stargate immediately."

"And how do you suggest we do that?" O'Neill demanded impatiently. "The minute we move they'll be on us and cut us down."

"The deflector does work, O'Neill." He snatched it up from the grass where it had fallen from Daniel's nerveless fingers. "I shall go first, using this to defend ourselves."

"And what if they surround us?" Jack asked. "You hold that up over our heads, will it draw energy from every weapon?"

"I do not know." Teal'c frowned. "If that does not serve, then I will offer myself in trade for your freedom."

"N-no!" Daniel's pain-filled gasp was scarcely audible, but the whole team heard it. Jack went down on one knee at his side and put a steadying hand on his shoulder.

"We're getting you home, Daniel, and that's the bottom line."

"I--won't--sacrifice--Teal'c." The word were slow, laborious. He had to catch his breath after each one. Eyelids only half open, he sought out Jack's gaze, a desperate need to speak evident in the clouded blue of his eyes. "...dying already. Don't...lose another one... Teal'c--"

"I am here, Daniel Jackson. They want me. If I surrender to them, they may let you go."

"No." Daniel shook his head, his hair tangled in the long grass. "I won't...buy my safety...with your...life. I couldn't...live with that."

"No more could I live with your death for my old guilts, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c replied. "I have never been to this world, but others of my kind have come here."

"Yeah, and you don't have to pay their debts," Jack snapped. "We went through all this when you had to face the Cor-Ai. You're not turning yourself over to them, and that is an order." He could sense Daniel's approval of his words.

"Then...leave me," Daniel pleaded. "I'd...hold you back."

Sam finished taping a gauze pad over the wound. "We can't leave him, Colonel," she insisted, one hand gently stroking Daniel's hair.

"Damn it, no, we're not leaving you, Daniel," Jack snapped. But he couldn't see how to move him back to the Stargate either. Even if they waited until dark, which probably wouldn't work because the kids with the energy weapons could be positioning themselves in the buildings around them to get a clear shot at them, there was no guarantee the Stargate would remain undefended. These kids were patient. They'd waited until SG-1 had moved away from their only means of retreat before attacking. All they had to do was set up a row of armed guards at the Gate.

Teal'c called out again to the guardians. This time, no one answered.

"That's it, we move now," Jack decided. "Before they can get into a better position. Teal'c, give Sam the staff weapon. You use the deflector. I think you could handle it best. I'll take Daniel."

"I am strongest. I should carry him," Teal'c disagreed.

"The last I heard I was in command of this mission," Jack muttered under his breath. "When I want volunteers, I'll ask for them." He knelt beside Daniel and put out a hand to touch his hair. "Daniel, you still with me?"

"Y-yes."

"I'm going to have to take you in a fireman's carry," Jack explained. "It won't put as much pressure on your back, but it will hurt. Can you hold out?"

Jackson's face was taut with suffering, but there was determination in the line of his jaw and in his eyes. "Did I...make it worse?" he asked.

"Make it worse? How the hell could you make it worse?" Jack's anger exploded, borne of worry for his teammate.

"They think...only a Goa'uld...would have a...weapon like that."

"You're not responsible for what they think. We might all be dead if you hadn't used the weapon. Teal'c definitely would be."

Daniel looked like he doubted he had done anything special. He'd been wounded but he wasn't dead of it--yet, and Jack didn't mean him to die. "I'm gonna move you now," he said. "If you want to yell, go ahead. It's okay." He rumpled the tangled hair affectionately, then bent to pick up the injured man.

Daniel screamed.

Freezing, Jack lowered him back to the grass where Daniel collapsed, struggling to bite back whimpers of agony and to control his frantic breathing. "Well, that isn't gonna work." O'Neill felt like a sadist.

"Jack...you...have to," panted Daniel, grasping feebly at the Colonel's arm. "...sorry...."

A white-faced Carter, bottom lip clutched painfully between her teeth, edged up behind him. "I'll help you lift him up," she offered. "We have to get him back to Dr. Frasier as fast as we can." Pulling a thin blanket out of her pack, she tucked it around Daniel. In spite of the day's warmth, he would need extra heat to fend off shock.

Beams of energy struck near them and Jack and Carter flung themselves flat. Teal'c grabbed his staff weapon and returned fire, but the energy came from too many directions. He sheltered beside a boulder and took out the Headpiece in a futile attempt to ward off the enemy fire.

"Where's it coming from?" Jack craned his neck to see. "We've got to get to cover. Sorry, Daniel, but I have to move you now."

"Go ahead." Daniel braced himself.

Before Jack could lift him, Sam called a warning. Suddenly patches of earth popped up, revealing hidden coverings, and five young men leveled their lasers at SG-1. One of them barked out a command that sounded as if he expected instant obedience. Teal'c palmed the Headpiece. "He says to drop our weapons or they will kill Daniel Jackson," he announced, lowering the staff weapon. He let the Headpiece slide down into his pocket.

Realizing they were surrounded, Jack grimaced as he put down his gun. "Sam...."

She lowered hers as well. "I don't like this, sir."

"Well, yeah, it's not my pick of the week either." He raised his hands in surrender, which was a signal to the natives to come swarming out of tunnels, their weapons aimed at Daniel. Each of them did the same thing. Jack realized Jackson had been right when he'd said they believed him a Goa'uld. If he shifted position to stand between Daniel and their captors, he would confirm it, but he knew he had to. He edged sideways.

"Ne ne," snapped the oldest of them. He wore a hard protective covering over his arm like molded plastic; he must be the one who had been struck by the return fire from the Headpiece. It wasn't a bandage but a fitted covering that closed around the arm like a brace. A little device at the top looked like a miniature compass with numbers on it in a circle.

"Check out the arm thingy," he said in an undertone. "Teal'c, do you know what it is?"

"I do not. I suggest a medicinal covering. One of them was wounded earlier," the Jaffa replied.

The injured boy barked a command. "He wishes us to be silent," Teal'c translated. He spoke hastily to the natives' leader. "I am explaining that I understand their language but that you do not," he informed Jack.

"I...understand it...too," Daniel's thin, pain-filled voice informed Jack he was still with them.

"See if you can get him to give Daniel something like his arm gizmo for his back," O'Neill told Teal'c. He dropped a reassuring hand on Daniel's shoulder.

Teal'c tried, gesturing down at the fallen anthropologist. The leader spat a scornful response that didn't take a linguist to recognize as a 'no.'.

"Oh, come on," Jack burst out, standing up to face the injured man. "He's hurt. I know you never heard of the Geneva Convention, but where I come from, we don't treat injured prisoners like that."

The boy drew himself up to his full height, about three inches shorter than O'Neill. He snarled a long explanation, in which the only recognizable word was 'Goa'uld'.

"I held...a Goa'uld weapon," Daniel reminded Jack. "And I...travel with a Jaffa. He...believes me a Goa'uld." Struggling to speak, he rattled off a long string of gibberish. Jack caught three words in the whole bunch: Jaffa, Goa'uld, and Teal'c. Daniel's voice was earnest and full of pain and he shifted restlessly, pausing to catch his breath in a painful gasp when one restless motion jarred his back. Sam eased up next to him and caught his hand, squeezing it reassuringly.

The injured young man took exception to Daniel's words. He barked off a command to him, his face haughty and arrogant, and more boys emerged from the tunnels, all of them armed. Daniel spoke again, more slowly this time, with longer pauses between words.

At that, Teal'c intervened. He, too, went on for a long time. Jack, who knew him well, could hear the earnest tone of his voice. He wasn't sure the armed boys who gathered around would hear anything but the voice of a Jaffa, though. Gathering himself to plunge into the fray, he only halted when Teal'c made a quick gesture. "No, O'Neill. Anger will serve us nothing. I have reminded him that, like a Jaffa, a Goa'uld will heal more quickly than an average person."

"So, what? They're going to wait until Daniel dies and then they'll know he's innocent?" Jack's temper soared. "I'm not going to let him die simply because they're hung up about the Goa'uld. They're our enemies, too, but I wouldn't let someone die just because I couldn't look past my prejudice." Would I let even a Goa'uld suffer like that? The question halted him. But then another question. What if it were Skaara? What if it were someone I had known first. Sha're? No! I'd never treat an injured prisoner like that. Or would I? Suppose it were Apophis...?

"Jack...." Daniel's voice was weaker now, and required more effort to talk. When Jack squatted behind him and touched his face, his skin was clammy. "The Goa'uld...came here. They took away...hundreds of people. They took at least one relative of each of these boys. When the city--the world--was evacuated, they...stayed here. They left...the Gate unburied...because they had...vowed to kill Goa'uld...to revenge...their families." He lay catching his breath, shivering a little in spite of the blanket tucked around him. "The Goa'uld took my wife. I...understand what...they are doing."

"You'd hardly let an injured man suffer like this, Daniel," Jack replied. He ran his hand through the tangled hair, then he started to erupt to his feet.

Daniel's hand curled around his wrist. Jack knew he could break free of the grip with no effort at all, but he wouldn't do that to Daniel. He hung back. "I have to make them understand." He didn't want to attack the boys whose families had been shattered by the Goa'uld incursions, either. But he couldn't sit here and watch Daniel die.

"They won't...understand you."

"They won't believe Teal'c."

Carter jumped up beside the Jaffa. "Teal'c, translate for me. Tell them about Sha're, about why Daniel joined SG-1, because he wanted his family back. Tell them he's in the same position they are."

Teal'c relayed her words. Jack suspected he had gone over that ground already, but Carter stood there in determination, her worry for Daniel spelled out on her face. "I know where your Goa'uld larva goes," she persisted. "You couldn't hide it. But is there a place on a Goa'uld that would prove Daniel doesn't have a symbiont? Kendra had a scar here" She touched the nape of her neck.

Jack slapped his hand against his forehead. He'd never even thought of physical proof.

"I have been present on many occasions when someone was implanted with a Goa'uld," Teal'c replied. "A Jaffa may have many infant Goa'uld, so for us, it is different. A small mark on the back of the neck, a fading scar, might be the only indication. The Goa'uld aids health and healing. The scar might disappear entirely. The lack of one is not proof."

"Well, that wasn't what I wanted to hear." Jack glowered at the injured teen. "There's got to be a way, short of drowning a witch, to prove innocence."

In spite of the circle of angry captors, Teal'c stopped and frowned at the Colonel. "I do not understand."

"A historical reference for Earth," Carter intervened quickly. "Teal'c, remind them a Goa'uld would have healed more quickly than this. We have to do something."

Daniel's fingers still clutched O'Neill's wrist loosely, but suddenly they slackened and slid free. "Daniel?" He gazed down at the injured man. He was still breathing, but he had weakened, his eyes closed. "He's passed out. Come on, Teal'c, there has to be something you can tell them to convince them Daniel's not a Goa'uld."

Teal'c studied the inimical faces that surrounded him, then he began to open his shirt. He said something quiet and abrupt to the leader, and the larva began to emerge from his stomach.

"What are you doing?" Jack demanded, jumping up to stand beside him. "How is that thing going to help us?"

"I told them I had renounced the Goa'uld," Teal'c said in a completely level voice. "They did not believe me. I said I would prove it."

"By dying? Come on, Teal'c, nobody's going to show up with a handy replacement larva like Daniel and Carter did that time on Chulak. Put it back!"

"Then Daniel Jackson will die."

"I'm not going to let him die--but I'm not going to let you die either. No! What makes you think I'd let you throw your life away?"

Teal'c met his gaze. "If you could offer yours, O'Neill, you would do so."

Jack grimaced, shaking his head. Teal'c had him there, all right. But he was in command of SG-1. "I order you to stop what you're doing. Last I heard, I was in charge of this mission. We'll find a way to save him that doesn't mean you die."

"You need Daniel Jackson."

"I need both of you," Jack said angrily. He lunged at the wounded leader. "I won't give either of them up, do you hear me?" Half a dozen weapons leveled at him, but he ignored them. "I know you don't understand me, but Teal'c is willing to die to save Daniel."

"Colonel, they'd expect that," Carter said unhappily, looking up at them from her place at Daniel's side. "A Jaffa is willing to die for a Goa'uld. It hasn't convinced them." She rested a testing hand on his forehead. "He's getting worse. If we don't take him back through the Stargate right away, I--I'm not sure he'll...make it."

That did it. Jack ripped open his shirt to prove he was no Jaffa. "I don't have a cultural imperative to protect him. He's in my command and he's my friend. I'm taking him home now. I'm not going to let him die. Yeah, I feel for you, for what happened here, but killing innocent people won't bring your families back. Tell them, Teal'c." As the Jaffa spoke, O'Neill spun away to Daniel, knelt, and picked him up, settling him into a fireman's carry. "I'm taking him back to the Stargate right now. If they think they have to kill me, then they do."

"Colonel, no, you're doing what you wouldn't let Teal'c do," Carter objected, bouncing up after him.

"I'm not a Jaffa. And I'm sure as heck not a Goa'uld. Have they seen any glowing eyes? Don't they think even a wounded Goa'uld could hurt them if he wanted to?" He breasted the leveled weapons, ignoring them as he started up the street toward the Stargate. The boys shouted warnings, but they didn't fire.

Teal'c maintained a running translation and, for the first time, O'Neill saw doubt in their eyes.

"Ask them if they found a Goa'uld weapon, wouldn't they use it?" he persisted, stalking on, surrounded by armed teenagers. "That wouldn't make them Goa'uld, would it?" Daniel stirred against his shoulder and made a muted sound of pain as if struggling to hold it in. That he should need such courage infuriated Jack. "I'm taking him home and I'm doing it now. Let's show them not everyone who comes through the Stargate wants to hurt them."

The boys formed a solid line between him and the Stargate, but Jack kept on walking, right up to them putting out a hand to shove them aside. Teal'c and Sam fell in, one on either side of him, Teal'c's hand reaching out to steady Daniel. He kept on talking.

The injured boy asked a sudden, abrupt question. Teal'c answered it. He answered it at great length, gesturing at the colonel, then at Daniel. He spoke again, and Jack caught the word 'Chulak', then the name of Teal'c's son, Rya'c.

When he finished speaking, none of the boys said anything for a long moment. Jack took three strides toward the Stargate.

Suddenly the boys lunged at him, tearing Daniel away from him. Weapons came up to fend him off, but the leader spoke urgently and they were lowered. "What's happening, Teal'c?" he demanded uneasily.

"They will take Daniel Jackson and let the rest of us go."

"The hell they will." He struggled toward Daniel, but the teens wrestled him away.

"I believe they mean to heal him," Teal'c volunteered. "I am not certain, but when I told them of our own losses, they stopped to listen."

"Well, they're not taking him without us," Jack said, pushing his way through the armed teenagers to the one with the bandaged arm. "We're coming with you."

But the boys grabbed O'Neill and restrained him, and Sam, too. In moments, they had been bound with thin cords, their hands pulled roughly behind their backs. Pushed down to sit on the ground, they were guarded by three of the squad. The leader gestured to Teal'c.

"They take me with them," the Jaffa said. "I can speak their tongue--and they do not trust me not to break away. I will watch Dr. Jackson."

"NO!" Jack yelled. "Let us go. We all go together, or none of us do."

"I will guard Daniel Jackson," Teal'c vowed. Six of the boys grabbed him and bore him off in the wake of the unconscious Jackson.

"Damn it," O'Neill growled when they had vanished into a structure across the roadway. "This isn't going right."

"They obviously have a form of medical treatment," Carter tried to reassure him. "Maybe they'll take care of Daniel."

"And if they don't, how long do you think he'll live?"

She turned her head to stare at him and he saw the fear in her eyes. "That's what I thought," he said and began to shift his wrists cautiously, determined to free himself in spite of the kids that still guarded him and go after Daniel. He could tell Carter was doing the same.

*****

Teal'c did not need the restraints imposed by the six young boys. He meant to follow Daniel, to protect him if possible, and to defend him to his captors. He saw the weapons aimed at him and he could understand them. He had not been here before; he had not harmed these children. But others of his kind, other Jaffa, other Serpent Guards, had been here, and they had stripped away family members, leaving a broken world behind. Teal'c himself had done the same many times, and he had been willing to accept his responsibilities during the Cor-Ai.

But now, his duty was different. He had to maintain the life of Daniel Jackson, since he alone could do so. It might be possible to discover the youths' medical facilities, and if so, that would be his goal. The leader of the team had appeared with his wound covered by an unfamiliar technology. He had seemed somewhat weak at first appearance, but during the confrontation, he had regained strength and energy. The device was a useful one, and perhaps a similar device could treat the oozing wound on his teammate's back. Teal'c meant that to happen, and as soon as possible.

It seemed that, perhaps, there was a hope of it. The boys carried Daniel Jackson into a room that spoke of a medical center with a diagnostic bed and equipment that could be used to treat illness and injury, although its design was unfamiliar. Unlike the other areas, the room had been maintained and the diagnostic bed was clean. One of the boys raised his voice and shouted, "Jaxo?"

A moment later, an older man, perhaps O'Neill's age came in through a side door, pausing to stare at the motley collection. "Jaffa?" he asked, elevating a bushy eyebrow. He was lean and whipcord strong, his hair receding from his forehead, the little that remained shaggy and prematurely white, unkempt. Like the children, he wore a tunic and trousers with a device like a badge of office pinned to the left chest. Vividly blue eyes under beetling brows measured and judged Teal'c but without the overt hostility the boys projected. He looked like a man who would listen before he condemned, and Teal'c was glad of it.

"I no longer serve the Goa'uld," the Jaffa spoke at once. "My friend is injured. The boys believed him a Goa'uld because he carried an ancient Goa'uld device discovered on his planet by archaeologists. Are you a doctor?"

The boys raised their voices in protest, but the leader, a hard-faced seventeen years old, held up a hand and shouted, "Wait!" They fell silent, bunching around him, their weapons still aimed at Teal'c. "Jaxo, you can tell if he's a Goa'uld, can't you?" He waved a hand at the unconscious Jackson.

"Possibly. But if he is not a Goa'uld, you may have injured a potential ally. Put him on the table." It looked like a diagnostic bed with a series of controls or tools built into it and a readout screen at its head. Above the bed were several monitoring devices. The boys lay Daniel upon it face down.

"They came through the Circle, Jaxo. They came through with a Jaffa. What else should we have believed?" His long face held no trace of yielding as he backed away from Daniel Jackson. He bore the look of someone who had never been young, and Teal'c thought of Rya'c, back on Chulak, and felt a surge of sympathy for him. The Goa'uld made young boys grow up too fast, made them lose their innocence before their time. It was not right.

The other boys raised a clamor but the leader silenced them with a hand gesture. "Jaxo?"

"You young savages think you can run wild and blast anything that moves. If you were wrong this time, it may not be too late to save him. Allow me to examine him. Your stories can wait." He cuffed the leader gently on the side of the head. "Your shield-cover should be finished, Tallo. Have Marno remove it and I'll examine your burn when I am finished with this one."

The leader's lips tightened--he did not relish being ordered--but he flopped down on a bench along one wall and a second youth came and began to undo the protective covering. Still heavily guarded, Teal'c moved to the foot of the diagnostic bed. "What is this place?" he asked.

Jaxo, a hand-held device gripped tightly as he made passes over Daniel Jackson's back with it, didn't bother to look up. Setting aside the device, he flipped toggles and the monitoring devices above Jackson lowered and began to take readings. His face hardened slightly but not, evidently, at what he detected. "It is what your Goa'uld have left us, an abandoned city where our youth throw their lives away in games of revenge."

"Better to bury your Stargate to prevent further Goa'uld incursions," Teal'c suggested.

"Many fought for that. But ours is a world where retribution is valued. Your Goa'uld took away our best and brightest. We will make them pay the price as long as we survive."

"Did you not try to locate allies through the Stargate?" Teal'c asked. "That is one of the functions of my team. To discover allies with whom we can stand to fight the Goa'uld. I wish to free my people from their domination."

"But you are Jaffa," the medic replied with an abrupt gesture. "You have the snake in your belly."

"Yes. Without it, I would die. Should I remove it, I could do nothing more for my world and my people. Someday I could wish my son were free." He gestured at the armed boys. "He is almost of an age with them. I do not wish him to grow to a man only to serve a Goa'uld."

"He's lying," Tallo muttered, twisting his neck to study the nearly healed burn on his arm. "He's saying what he thinks we want to hear."

"Well, one thing you want to hear that is true is that this man is not Goa'uld," the doctor interjected, pointing at Daniel Jackson, then turning to face Tallo expectantly. "He is as human as we are. My devices do not lie."

"What?" Tallo bounded up and rushed to the bed, staring down at the unconscious man in disbelief. "He can't be. He had a Goa'uld weapon."

"An archaeological find on his world," Teal'c repeated. "We were to test it in field conditions. Would you not use a Goa'uld device against them, should you find one?"

Tallo's hostile glare proved he did not like the question, particularly from a Jaffa. His mouth tightened. "I'd use anything I could find against them," he snarled. "They took my sister away. She's one of them now. I will kill every one of them I can find."

Teal'c could sympathize with him. "And if, one day, you find her, and she is a Goa'uld?" he asked, sympathetically.

"Then I will kill her, knowing the real Tatli would thank me," Tallo snapped.

Jaxo nodded. "I have worked for years to modify this--" a gesture at the equipment over the bed-- "to detect the presence of the Goa'uld, but I have found no way to remove one without destroying the host." His eyes held much pain, and his mouth was rigid as if he would not tolerate sympathy from one he perceived as an enemy.

"That one," Teal'c said, pointing at Daniel Jackson, "lost his wife to the Goa'uld. She is now one of them, like Tatli. But he constantly hopes he can discover her and restore her to herself. You and he share a common enemy and a common grief."

"He may be correct, Tallo," Jaxo murmured. "Yes, that one is Jaffa, but this man, if he has lost a loved one to the Goa'uld, is one with us."

"Can you heal him?" Teal'c asked anxiously.

"His condition is not good. I must work very hard. I will not ask how it is you speak our language so well or if you have come to our world before." He picked up another device and held it against Daniel Jackson's arm. It made a slight hissing noise.

"I have not," Teal'c replied. He folded his arms across his chest and watched the doctor. The injection seemed to help. Daniel Jackson's very unconsciousness had been uncomfortable; his muscles had been tight with a pain that did not leave him alone, even comatose. But now his body relaxed and his breathing eased slightly.

"A pain killer and antibiotic," the doctor explained, setting the injector aside and picking up a large flat plate, one side smooth like the outer casing of the arm covering Tallo had worn, the other glowing with an unfamiliar energy field. "You do not recognize our healers, Jaffa? This creates a sonic effect, healing with sound waves. It does not actually touch the wound; it hovers over it, fractionally above the damaged tissue." He placed it on Daniel Jackson's back, twisting a dial on the control section. "This will take time. The weapons create a nasty wound intended to worsen until it leads to death, if untreated. We do not use them against our own kind." He paused to frown at Tallo. "This man is our kind. He is as human as we are. He possesses no internal Goa'uld. Let this be a lesson to you, my boy. You attack too quickly."

"I saw a Jaffa. I acted." Tallo's bottom lip protruded stubbornly.

"Daniel Jackson acted to save my life," Teal'c informed the boy. "Considering that I am the one who took his wife and gave her to the Goa'uld, perhaps he will be fair enough to forgive you, as he has forgiven me. He is a very good man. Will he live?" he asked the doctor.

"I think I got to him in time," the doctor said. "I should know within a half-unit."

"There are two more of us, also not Goa'uld," Teal'c explained. "We are not your enemies. We come from a world called Earth, a world committed to stopping the Goa'uld. They came to Earth long ago, millennia ago. But the ancient Earthlings buried their Stargate. Only recently have they begun to use it again."

"And they came here?" The doctor frowned. "I must think of this. Allow me to monitor your friend while I consider what you have said."

Teal'c nodded once then he took his place at the foot of Daniel Jackson's bed, prepared to guard him until he recovered.

*****

"Colonel, I'm free," Carter spoke in an undertone, not out of secrecy, for the three who guarded her did not speak English, but to avoid irritating their captives. They were tense and uneasy, jumping at slight sounds and casting nervous glances over their shoulders. One of them, Sam had realized early on, was a girl, although she was clad just as the boys were. Either she had donned male attire for her guerilla activities or clothing did not serve as a gender distinction on this world.

"Can you reach your sidearm?"

"I could if they hadn't taken it away," she reminded him. "But I found a rock. I used to be pretty good at softball. I could throw it--"

"Why don't you save that, Captain? We might need it later."

The girl snarled at them, probably warning them to be quiet. Sam smiled at her hopefully. "It's okay. We're only plotting how to get away. Why don't you try to understand, woman to woman?" She lifted an expectant eyebrow.

The girl muttered, "Ne, ne," and turned away.

"It's a girl?" the Colonel demanded, squinting up at the smallest captive. "Son of a gun. I hadn't even noticed."

"I think there were more girls with them than the one," Sam realized. "I just thought some of them were younger, but the tunics are baggy enough to hide breasts."

"I was remembering the kids on Abydos. They were all boys."

"Different worlds have different customs," Sam replied. "I don't know whether they dressed in male clothes because it was more convenient or whether they always dress like that. Daniel would be interested."

Jack's jaw tightened. "What do you think they're doing to him?" The question was purely involuntary. If they'd had a task to do, he could have sublimated his worry for Daniel and Teal'c, but sitting here like this with nothing to distract him, he'd probably been suffering with an impotent apprehension. O'Neill was a good officer, one who looked after his people, one who had the best safety record of any of the SG teams. But there was nothing he could do now, and Carter knew that had to eat at him. Especially since Sam had seen his friendship with the members of his team grow and deepen. She hadn't been sure she was going to like O'Neill at first and had, as a result, been counter-defensively offensive at their first meeting, standing up to him in a way that hadn't proven necessary in the long run. She'd pegged him as one of those hard-ass, maverick officers who didn't want women in his command and who went his own way--and instead, he'd proven the best officer she'd ever served under, and a good friend. She'd come to regard the SG-1 team as members of her family, and Jack, divorced from his Sara and still grieving for the accidental death of his son, had grasped for that sense of family much as she had.

She could understand Jack's friendship with Teal'c. Although from different worlds, they each came of a military discipline. Both were leaders, although Teal'c served willingly under the Colonel's command. But even though Jack and Daniel had the history of the initial Abydos mission, she believed that friendship had come a little harder. Yet somewhere along the line the two men had become brothers. They didn't always agree; they came at life from radically different directions. Jack often became irritated with Daniel's lengthy scientific explanations in a crisis when he wanted quick, useful answers. Daniel couldn't understand Jack's lack of scientific and theoretical excitement at each new puzzle. But those differences made their friendship work. If they had been just alike, the team would have been the weaker, and Daniel would be no different from any by-the-book Air Force officer. But Daniel's brilliance and enthusiasm took him on a different path, and that was good for all of them: for the team, for their growing friendship.

If Daniel died....

No, she wouldn't think about that. The oldest boy had received medical treatment, that arm covering. If only she could believe they had offered Daniel medical treatment when they took him away. If they had a hospital or a medical center here, the doctors should be able to prove to the boys that Jackson wasn't a Goa'uld. Teal'c could speak the language. He'd find the words to explain. He had to.

Other worlds had been reluctant to trust Teal'c though. And this world seemed a suspicious one.

"Captain?" O'Neill's voice was a breath of sound.

"Yes, sir?"

"You'd say these kids had a hair trigger, right?" He'd fastened onto an idea and meant to pursue it. She nodded. His thoughts might be taking him to a place hers had just begun to go.

"And they're out patrolling the city, watching for the baddies to come through the Stargate. That kinda leads me to think that maybe they do come--regularly. If they'd stopped popping in, these kids would've lost their edge. They'd be sitting at home playing video games instead of tiptoeing through the streets waving laser guns around."

"You're saying we can expect Goa'uld or at least Jaffa to come through the gate at any minute, sir?" She didn't like the idea, but it had a lot going for it.

"I'm saying I'd feel a lot better if we had our weapons." O'Neill cast a sidelong glance in the direction of the guns the children had taken from SG-1. They'd been so thorough it was a wonder they'd let Teal'c palm the Headpiece that way--unless they knew it was only a defensive weapon, of no value to him unless they fired at him. But that was foolish of them from a military point of view. If he made a break for it, they'd be sure to fire, and they would risk themselves. Even if they believed he was Daniel's 'first prime' they wouldn't risk it.

But she was assuming they thought like trained military personnel. They were children, probably none of them more than sixteen.

Their three captors spoke together urgently, voices raising. The tallest boy kept pointing toward the Stargate. He gestured vehemently at the captives. The girl seemed doubtful, but the youngest boy offered a hasty comment. They spoke more quietly, earnestly, then the girl nodded, and the tallest rose and trotted up the street in the direction of the Stargate. "Gonna check it out," Jack murmured. "I think I'm right. I think they do pop through all the time. The kids're probably enough of a minor annoyance that they haven't blasted the world, but they probably want the type that'll stand up to them to feed their larva to, to make new Goa'uld--the way they took Skaara. So maybe they're grabbing the kiddies when they come."

"Or there could be a resource we don't know about on this planet that they want," she argued. "It seems to possess a level of technology if that device the leader was wearing over his wound is any example. The Goa'uld steal their technology whenever possible and then adapt it for their own use. Maybe they can use those sarcophagus things for healing, but only if you've got one handy. Something like that boy's arm protector might be useful to them in field conditions. Or they could even have ships. It's hard to tell the level of this world's technology from seeing a few streets of one abandoned city."

The girl barked a command at them and reinforced it by putting her hand over her mouth. No talking. Sam frowned and made herself a little more comfortable. Her bonds were loose and she could tell the Colonel was making progress with his own knots. When the time came, they'd both be ready.

*****

Revulo crept up the hill to a place he knew where he could watch the park without being observed, should the enemy come through the Circle. It had been six days since the last time the despised ones had come through the Circle, six days while the team patrolled and watched and waited, ready to strike them down when they came. They had not left it so long before, and these new ones had seemed the enemy at first, especially with the one called Teal'c wearing the serpent design upon his brow and carrying a staff weapon. The other one, Daniel, he had a shield device, or a device to protect himself, but he wore no glove weapon and he did not dress as a Goa'uld. Revulo had begun to suspect these were not enemies after all. Even Teal'c did not wear the armor of a serpent guard. His friends looked just like the Nahkti. Human. They were human, and the Jaffa dressed as they did. It was so hard to imagine a Jaffa turning away from the Goa'uld, but maybe it could happen.

And if so, these were not the enemies expected for days. Which meant the enemy might still come, unwatched for. Sendi didn't believe it. She was still suspicious, and Ro was too young to know better. He could be swayed easily. But Revulo meant to check, to watch for the enemy, to make certain no one else would be taken as his sister Kahti had been taken just half an orbit ago. Revulo was as determined as Tallo to stop the Goa'uld invasions of their world. But while Tallo wanted a glorious military victory, Revulo would be content to set a telescope in one of the high buildings and watch the settings on the device before the Stargate to learn how to reach the Goa'uld planet. He would follow them home, find his sister Kahti, and bring her back with him to Nacht. If a Goa'uld had taken possession, then Jaxo would find a way to drive it from her. Jaxo was a genius, a man who did not think on conventional lines. He would know. Revulo had to keep believing that.

These strangers that had come through, he was certain they were not evil. He could not tell how it was that he knew that, but he did. Tallo had not quite listened, although he had been uneasy. But Revulo had seen the glow of friendship surrounding them. He often saw emotions that way, feelings. It was his gift in a world where the gifted had nearly stopped being born. How long had it been since there had been a new telepath? A new levitator? Nowadays, only small gifts surfaced, and the gifted were out of favor. Hard times, his father had said, and his mother had claimed it was the result of their technology. They could make what they needed; the gifts were no longer necessary. But both of them were glad when they learned that Revulo could see emotions in colors. It was not an easy gift. A friend might lie to him with evident sincerity, but Revulo could see the lie. Of course it worked better on his own kind, people whose rules he knew, but there had been no orange of lying around the Jaffa, Teal'c, when he claimed he no longer served the Goa'uld. And there had been the deep, rich blue aura of love and friendship mingled with the sharp yellow of worry in the two left behind when their friends were taken away. Of course the one called Jack had been angry and frustrated, too. He was the military one, the one in command and even the Jaffa listened to him and obeyed. But he, too, had watched the wounded one carried away and he had suffered.

If only he could have been trained in his Gift, learned more. Once a whole section of schooling had been given over to the use of various Gifts. Then he could have acknowledged it, told Tallo what he had seen. But the Gifts were to be secret. They were not even welcomed these days. Even his parents had refused to help him learn to use the ability. But he had sometimes practiced in secret, and now he knew the truth.

The newcomers were not enemies. They must have come from a different world entirely, one that might help his people. Revulo knew he had to watch to look for the real enemies because no one else would do it. And if they came through while everyone else was with Jaxo, it might be too late.

Flinging himself on his belly in the long grass, the boy prepared to watch for his enemies.

*****

The first awareness Daniel had was of pain, deep, throbbing pain in his wounded back. He sucked air in through his teeth, wincing, but then, even as his muscles tensed against it, he realized it did not strike so sharply as it had done before. He could even feel it easing slightly as he concentrated, driving it back to a level he could tolerate and endure, although it still bit deeply and made his senses catch in shocked outrage. Let it go. Let it go away. He kept his eyes closed tightly. Enough sensations battered him without the sight of those who had captured him.

There were voices in the background. They were speaking the native language, the one that was close enough to the language of Abydos for him to get most of it without too much concentration, although the pronunciation was strange. It was based on Ancient Egyptian and had drifted away from the pronunciation of Abydos, with the insertion of some new words he couldn't reason out, not while he was so shaky.

That deep rumble of voice that went on and on was Teal'c; he was explaining his history to someone who was not one of the band of children, an adult. Not an unsympathetic one, either. "...the people of Earth," Teal'c spoke. "They were the first I felt could help me against the Goa'uld. You want your people's freedom. So do I want the same for mine. I do not want my son to grow as I did, enslaved to false gods."

"These boys have all lost some of their families," the adult replied. Opening his eyes a slit, Daniel saw a white-haired man who was balding but whose body seemed fitter, younger than the age suggested by his hair. Thin and wiry, he gave the impression of abundant ebullience, even standing still. His body almost crackled with repressed energy. "They volunteered to stay behind when the city was abandoned, to continue the fight."

"They said the world had been abandoned," Teal'c pointed out.

"Yes. We have long known the use of the device you call the Stargate. The Chapa-ai. We simply call it the Circle. For centuries we used it for exploration. We learned of the Goa'uld that way, whilst visiting other worlds. They never came here so we foolishly believed ourselves safe from them. We were wrong. One day they came. They came with energy weapons and armored troops. They took away those they found easily, back through the Stargate. We knew by then what the Goa'uld were, what they used captive people for. We also knew they would come again."

"Yes, that is their way," Teal'c conceded. "I have done the same. I was raised to believe they were gods, that it was their right. But as years passed, I came to see that they were not gods, that they had no right to take away innocent people. Their only right was power and strength, and to be able to do a wicked thing does not make it right."

"No, it doesn't," the man agreed. "But there are always those who will do so, simply because they can. We knew they would return. But there were those among us who were cautious. We developed a contingency plan. For centuries we had built colonies on worlds we reached through the Stargate and through our trading ships. The colonists went out from Nahkt, seeking what adventurers and discoverers always seek, new horizons, new dreams. Contact with the colonies was as easily as stepping through the Stargate. We have lightships, too, although not very many yet. We are an advanced race, and we developed it ourselves. Apart from the Stargate, we did not steal technology. We were seeded here through the Stargate, we know that. Then we were left alone for several millennia."

"Your people...came from Earth originally," Daniel said, finding it easier to keep his voice steady than he had expected. Something hummed against his back, taking away the agony, allowing him to think. "All humans we have found on our journeys through the Stargate...came from Earth. Even your world's name, Nakht, that is the name of an Egyptian form of hieroglyphics. Your people came from my world."

"If true, your kind and ours are brothers," the man said. "We are sorry for your injury."

"They could have been enemies, and I am not sorry for my precautions," snapped the lean-faced boy. His arm appeared healed now except for a fading redness where he had been struck with the energy backlash.

"They were correct to be prepared," Teal'c spoke. "Your own 'soldiers' on Abydos would have done no less, Daniel Jackson."

He knew that to be true, and nodded. "So your world was abandoned?"

Jaxo nodded, leaning down to check the reading on the device Daniel wore. "Yes. It took us a considerable time. For nearly five solar orbits we have sent people away to our colonies, always knowing the Goa'uld could come when travelers waited in the Great Square but needing to take the risk. Three times, they did, and took many. But we saved our population. Always the colony worlds made certain there would be room for the rest of us, when we followed them."

"And your planetary government allowed these children to remain behind?" Daniel asked, shocked.

"No one 'allowed' us to stay," Tallo replied with a show of defiance. "We chose to do it. We got together and we voted. We are a democratic people and we vote for what we do. It was easy to slip away a few at a time and hide, shielded from search scans. They had no choice but to leave us behind."

"Very reluctantly, they did it," the older man said. "But there were those of us who could not abandon children. I chose to stay as well." He glanced over at the insolent Tallo. "This one is my son. I would not leave him behind. They took his sister and his mother is dead. He is all I have left. So I chose to stay. They would need medical care and I am a fine doctor."

"Evidently." Daniel tried to look over his shoulder. "What are you doing with my back?"

"You feel better?"

"Yes, I can actually feel the pain leaving. Teal'c, this is amazing. Do your people have anything like this?"

"We do not. We have other devices, but none that function in this manner. This device is a sonic healer. I do not understand its exact function."

"I'd love to take one back to Earth to for study," Daniel said.

"Then you shall," the doctor, Jaxo, offered. "Earth, it seems, could be an ally to the Nakht. If people of Earth could convince a Jaffa to see the light, then we will respect Earth. I cannot speak for my people's government, but I can speak in your behalf to my government and I believe they will listen."

"Well, it was Colonel O'Neill who talked Teal'c over to our side," Daniel said. "Jack can be awfully persuasive." He looked around, realizing abruptly that Jack and Sam had taken no part in the conversation, and worry pumped through him. "Where are the Colonel and Sam?" he demanded urgently.

"Held prisoners outside," Teal'c replied. "They are unharmed."

"Well, I want to see them," Daniel insisted. "We're not your enemies. My name is Daniel Jackson, and this is Teal'c."

"I am Jaxo Prin," the older man replied. "My son Tallo Prin and his friends. Tallo, go and fetch their companions. We must talk and plan."

Tallo hesitated, then he shrugged his shoulders in a gesture a human Frenchman might have envied. "Very well, Jaxo," he muttered.

"Tallo?" the doctor prodded expectantly.

"Oh, all right." He turned to Daniel. "And I'm sorry," he muttered in a reluctant undertone, before he grabbed a couple of the other boys and gestured for the door. The entire collection of them charged away.

"I apologize for my son," Jaxo said. "Since we lost his sister, he has been...angry. He is young, he must have someone to blame. Anyone who comes through the Gate is an enemy to him. He was wrong, but he will never be comfortable admitting it."

"I guess he's not entirely wrong," Daniel said slowly. "I was the one who wounded him."

"You were defending yourself--and your friend. I am glad it was not worse. The Goa'uld make us all uneasy, but let them not make enemies where none need exist."

Daniel relaxed, realizing suddenly that his muscles allowed him to do so. The pain was nearly gone. It was still there, and it hurt, but it was a bearable pain and growing more so all the time. He didn't have to brace against it any longer. "We come through the Stargate to explore, to find other cultures, to find allies against the Goa'uld. We could never have done it without Teal'c. Don't hold what he once was against him."

"My kind have hurt these people," Teal'c replied.

"But you haven't."

Jaxo bent over the device on his back. "Your wound is healing, but you should rest now. Tallo sustained only a graze. Your friends do not speak Nakhti, I believe. Rest. Teal'c can translate for them when they arrive."

It seemed an excellent idea. Daniel closed his eyes. He could feel the device working, easing the pain, taking away the cold, shaky feeling. Jack would want to take this device back through the Stargate, and Daniel liked the idea of that himself. He knew a lot of the pentagon types expected weapons as the main byproduct of the Stargate project, but he would be glad to see technology that could heal. What if the device could be adapted to drive out a Goa'uld implant without killing the host? It might be used to save Sha're.

"Rest, Daniel Jackson," Teal'c urged. "I will stand watch."

Daniel let himself drift into the safety of sleep.

*****

Revulo stiffened. He could see the chevrons glowing on the Circle. Trouble. Unless it was simply a team come to search for the ones he and his friends had captured, it could be Goa'uld. He wiggled backward from his exposed position to the shelter of the line of buildings, reaching their safety before the Circle opened. Watching its glowing surface whoosh out and settle into its normal open pattern, he gnawed his bottom lip, hoping for the sight of a team dressed like the ones he had just seen.

Instead Serpent Guards came out of the gate, three, four, seven. And there! The way they bunched around the last one through--he had to be a Goa'uld. Revulo watched the Circle shut down, then he turned and raced madly down the street to give the warning.

*****

O'Neill saw the troublemaker leader and his troop popping out of the tunnels in the ground, and no trace of Teal'c or Daniel with them. He'd been afraid of that, but he didn't like it. Now he was sorry he hadn't overcome the boy and girl who had been guarding them. He'd managed to free his bonds; he and Sam could have escaped. But that would have left Daniel and Teal'c in their hands, so Jack had opted for caution.

The leader stopped in front of Jack, gesturing for the girl to approach him. She circled around behind him obediently, then cried out in astonishment and snatched the loosened bonds, displaying them to the older boy. His mouth twisting wryly, the boy shook his head. He pointed toward the tunnels and spoke in his own language. O'Neill and Sam stood up hastily, unable to understand the quick words, except for two things. "Daniel Jackson." More gibberish. "Teal'c."

"They want to take us to Daniel and Teal'c, sir."

"Ya think?"

"Should we go?" she asked.

"We need to get together with them. Let's play along for now. Maybe we'll be in a better position. They're not rushing to tie us up again. Maybe Daniel and Teal'c convinced them we aren't enemies."

The leader barked a question, and the younger boy pointed in the direction of the Stargate. Everyone turned and saw the missing guard returning at a dead run, gesturing wildly behind him. "Goa'uld!" he cried, continuing in his own language. "Jaffa!"

The leader grabbed O'Neill and pointed at the nearest tunnel. It seemed like an excellent idea. Waving Carter before him, he scurried down into the shelter, surprised when the leader handed his guns down to him. Holstering his sidearm, he gripped the other and made his way down a rung ladder to the first level below the street where it opened out into a broad passage. Carter stood looking around, surprised when the girl offered her weapons back.

"The enemy of my enemy, I guess, sir," she said, gasping when the tunnel coverings snapped into place, plunging them into stygian blackness. But a moment later light came on, a long string of glowing illumination that ran along the ceiling in an unbroken stream. The leader took his hand away from a panel on the near wall and pointed.

Frowning at a thin metal strip that ran along the tunnel floor, Jack gestured at it. "Subway system?"

"It could be, sir."

The boy who had been guarding the Stargate spoke rapidly to the leader, who turned to O'Neill. "Jaffa," he said and held up nine fingers. "Goa'uld." One finger.

"Well, that's pretty straightforward," Jack replied. "So what do we do about it. Hide out till they're gone?"

"These kids didn't hide out when we came through," Sam reminded him. "I don't think they will now." She pointed to a number of them, scurrying both ways down the tunnel. "I'd guess they were going to places where they could watch them. Maybe they want to let them get away from the Stargate like we did before they attack."

The leader touched Jack's arm and pointed across the passage to a lighted platform. "Daniel Jackson. Teal'c."

"You gonna take us to them? Okay, I'll buy that," O'Neill conceded. "At least we'll be able to understand what's going on." Teal'c or Daniel must have convinced the locals SG-1 was not their enemy. But the real enemy was here now. That meant they couldn't get home through the Stargate at the moment. They'd have to go with the flow and see what happened.

What happened proved better than he expected under the circumstances, although he wasn't sure at first that it would be that way. The oldest boy led them through a series of passageways, finally stopping at a doorway, flinging it open to reveal a medical center. Daniel lay prone and shirtless on one of the diagnostic beds, a device like the one the injured boy had worn lying on his back, and his eyes were shut. Across the room, Teal'c and a white-haired man were seated on a long bench, though the Jaffa leaped to his feet when O'Neill and Carter entered. At least he was unharmed.

"Daniel?" Sam cried and hurried over.

"He will live," Teal'c spoke hastily.

"Daniel?" Jack stopped beside the bed and put out a hand to Jackson's shoulder.

The blue eyes opened instantly, squinting up at the Colonel. "Jack?" His voice sounded alert and pain-free.

"You sound better," Sam said at Jack's side.

"This device is incredible," Daniel burst out, trying to point at the gizmo on his back. "It just starts taking the pain away immediately, you can feel it going. It's great. And Jaxo says we can take one home with us." He tried to sit up, and the white haired man made clucking noises of disapproval and hurried over to lift away the healer device. Daniel's back was still faintly red but the oozing wound was gone. The older man threw a long string of incomprehensible words at Daniel, who grinned and offered a few in return. The doctor would have helped him to sit up, but Jack and Sam forestalled him, easing the scientist into a sitting position, his legs dangling over the side of the table. Teal'c passed Daniel his glasses.

"You look better the right way up," O'Neill told him. He squeezed Daniel's shoulder before letting go, winning a smile from the anthropologist.

"You look great," Sam told him, giving him a hasty hug.

"But we've got problems," O'Neill informed Daniel and Teal'c, nodding at the boy who was talking hastily to the doctor.

"They're saying we had a Goa'uld come through the Gate," Daniel replied. "They've been coming fairly regularly lately. Almost the entire planetary population has been evacuated to their colony worlds but that didn't stop the Goa'uld from coming here. These kids ran off and hid to stay behind so they could stage a guerilla war. Each of them lost family the Goa'uld. Jaxo volunteered to stay with them. He thought they'd need a doctor." He nodded at the older man.

"So they could attack the bad guys?" O'Neill couldn't help remembering their kids on Abydos. He'd suspected their intentions all along and had fought down his resentment at being captured, realizing they had a common enemy if the team could only prove it.

"The 'bad guys' are here now, O'Neill," Teal'c replied. "They will leave guards at the Stargate."

"You mean we can't get home?" Daniel asked.

"Not unless they leave the Gate untended or until they leave again," O'Neill replied. "Or unless we decide to take them on."

Daniel translated hastily, and the leader of the teens spoke vociferously. "He wants to attack the guards," Daniel explained. "Maybe you shouldn't encourage him, Jack. He's a hothead."

The doctor turned and began an argument with him. "Jaxo is Tallo's father," the scientist continued hastily. "That's why he was the one to volunteer to stay behind. We can't let these kids go up against nine Jaffa."

"How about the kids and us together?" Jack offered. "We're all armed and together we outnumber them. We've got the Headpiece thingie unless they confiscated it. We know it works, and those nasty guys out there won't expect us to have it. If we can grab another staff weapon or two on the way out, so much the better."

"Daniel may not be up for a firefight, sir," objected Sam, resting her palm on Daniel's forehead.

"I don't have a fever." Daniel grinned. "My back's a little tender, that's all. My pack won't rub it and it's above my belt. I don't know where my shirt went...." He suddenly noticed he was bare-chested and an expression of mild embarrassment ran across his face.

Taxo handed him a tunic like those his people wore and spoke to him. Daniel listened, frowning.

"Jack, he says they've lost hundreds of people to the Goa'uld," Daniel translated when he had finished. That's why they moved their people so quickly to colonies that weren't entirely ready for them. I mean, I've heard of people being taken by the Goa'uld on many worlds, but never so many, not even from the Byrsa. I wonder why they took so many here. Let me ask."

That was true. On Abydos, only Sha're and Skaara had been taken. "Did they take others on Abydos, before we destroyed Ra?" Jack asked.

"I think they did occasionally, but not as many as here. I wonder if there is something special about the people here."

"Well, if there is, it will have to wait until we figure out how to get out of here," Jack decided. "And we really ought to take these kids with us and send them to their colony worlds through the Earth Stargate."

"I'm not sure they'd go," Daniel replied.

"I think they have to go," Carter offered. "These kids probably know how to dial the colony world. If they get taken by the Goa'uld, they could jeopardize the rest of their people. If we tell them that, maybe they'll agree to come."

"What they should really do," Daniel offered, his voice muffled as he pulled the tunic over his head, "is bury the Stargate here--but that would mean they'd have to stay behind, and they're just kids. Do they all know the coordinates for the colony world? Or does only Jaxo know?" Settling the tunic in place, he turned and asked a question of the doctor, who spoke quickly, with a negative gesture from the boys.

"He says they decided they shouldn't know," Daniel replied. "But he knows. The boys protect him, but there's no guarantee they can go on doing it. And he believes some of them do know it. He won't say why."

"So we need to get them all out of here or risk the population of a couple of different worlds," O'Neill decided. "Tell them, Daniel."

*****

Daniel tugged at the tunic. It didn't go very well with the military-issue pants he wore on missions, but at least it was warm. "Jaxo, they're thinking we should take you and the boys out of here, back to Earth, and from there, you could go to your colony worlds. That way, you're not risking the rest of your people. If they catch you, they could find out how to get there. It sounds like the Goa'uld really want your people. Do you know why? I mean, why specifically? I've seen them work on other worlds, and they never take so many."

Jaxo frowned. "You must realize, Daniel Jackson, my trust of you might endanger my son and these other boys. They have all been taught, ever since the Goa'uld first came, to deny the existence of what I am about to tell you. Not even among each other do they admit the secret."

Hearing him, Tallo's eyes narrowed and he drifted closer. "Secret?" he demanded, staring at his father in surprise. "What secret, Jaxo?"

"I wish you would call me 'father'," the older man muttered in the resigned tones of one who had often made such a request without result. He turned back to Daniel. "Our people possess what we call the Gifts. But our young people no longer believe the young have Gifts, powers or abilities beyond normal human standard, even though nearly all of them do." When Daniel looked a question, he continued. "Mind powers. The ability to control or know the environment through the abilities of the human mind."

"Psychic abilities?" Daniel didn't know the Abydon word for 'Psi' so he had to say that one in English, winning a questioning gaze from Jaxo and a narrow-eyed frown from Jack. "Reading minds? Moving objects with the power of the mind? Seeing future happenings?"

"Precisely."

The boys set up a clamor, speaking so rapidly Daniel couldn't follow half of what they said. Tallo waved them to silence urgently, spinning around to confront his father. "You have kept this knowledge from us? Forced us into secrecy? Denied us our heritage? Why? Why have you done such a thing? All of us have grown up believing our own Gifts were the last ones and that we must keep them a secret. You made us believe we had to keep quiet about it. Why?"

"What's going on, Daniel?" Jack demanded impatiently, picking up on the tension that filled the medical center. His eyes darted around from boy to boy. "Come on, something's going down."

"It's about psi powers," Daniel answered hastily. "The people on this world have it, but they've suppressed it in the current younger generation."

"Oh, for crying out loud," Jack exploded. "We're talking table tilting and mind reading games here?"

"Let him find out, sir," Sam interjected, catching Jack's arm. "We've seen different abilities on different worlds. This isn't Earth."

"No, but these people are human," Jack persisted stubbornly.

Ignoring O'Neill's questions, Jaxo gripped his son's shoulders. "It was to protect you, to protect you all. What do you think brings the Goa'uld here so often? They seek the Gifted, to turn them into Goa'uld hosts. If the Gifts no longer existed, our people might be less attractive to them. It was to save all your lives, my son."

"NO!" Tallo spat. "To endanger them. Sometimes I practice my Gift, but only in secret. I could have been trained. All of us could. There might be one among us with foresight, who could have warned people of the coming of the evil ones. These others, they have gifts, too?"

Small voices ventured tentative assent. The children cast nervous glances at each other then lowered their eyes hastily. Daniel got the impression that they had been raised to believe their Gifts weren't quite nice, powers that should remain unmentioned in polite society. Maybe they had done a little experimenting the way Tallo did, but with no thorough training. The concept of a planet of psi users fascinated Daniel. These people were human, from Earth. Had the Gifts developed out of generations of practice, or had some existing condition on Nakht enhanced the potential that existed in all humans? There wasn't time to find out now, but Daniel would have loved to ask more questions. Instead he offered a few more words of translation to Sam and Jack. O'Neill's face was full of suspicion. The very way he stood suggested he was braced for trouble.

"You see?" Tallo cried, gesturing at his friends. "We've all hidden Gifts that might have been used against the evil ones. If I had learned, been trained like our grandfathers were trained, I might have known that these were not our enemies. I could feel their pain, but even enemies suffer. I could not distinguish. If we had known--" and he gestured at his comrades-- "we could have developed means to keep them from coming, to lure them away from the Circle once they were here, to trick them into exposing themselves to our weapons. You let us stay here, knowing we had puny powers we never dared try?"

"Let you stay here? You ran away and stayed here on your own," Jaxo insisted. "No one wanted to risk you. We only wanted to make the children safe from the Goa'uld. Maybe we were wrong, and maybe we were right, but it's done now."

"No!" Tallo stood his ground. "Now we must be taught. We must use what we were born with. We have had our very birthright stolen." His face softened fractionally. "You did it to protect us, but that was wrong. I know it was wrong. Masitti was still taken. So how safe are we without our powers? We ran away, our people ran away and left our world when we could have fought for it."

"And maybe all died? We know from our space voyages that the Goa'uld have destroyed entire worlds from space, worlds that threatened them, worlds that defied them. If our great grandfathers, with the full Gifts, could not drive them away, how can you do so? We saved our society. The young always take too many risks."

"It is true," Teal'c interjected. "The Goa'uld may have come and destroyed this world. They have done so with others. They would find the idea of the Gifted appealing, if controllable. Otherwise, they would view them as a serious threat."

"The Goa'uld like to take those who are strong," Daniel added. He saw Sha're's face in his mind's eye, and knew how spirited she had been--and might be again. If Kendra could oust her Goa'uld with the help of Thor's Hammer and survive there might be a way to bring Sha're and Skaara back. Both of them had been strong, both had been fighters.

"What's all this Goa'uld talk?" Jack interrupted, folding his arms across his chest. "I don't like hearing about those guys when I can't even understand it."

"We're talking about why they come here so often," Daniel said in a hasty aside. "Let me try to figure it out."

Do your people have the Gifts, too?" Jaxo asked Daniel.

"Well.... No. At least not many of us. Our world doesn't really believe in the existence of the Gifts. A few people have them, but most people on our planet believe they are fakes, phonies. Do you have a Gift?"

"My gift is the same as my son's," Jaxo admitted. "It is the ability to feel the pain of others. It is what makes me a doctor. Revulo over there can see people's auras, can detect their emotions. Sendi can move small objects with her mind. But until now, none of them knew of each other's abilities, unless they spoke of it in secret. We have gone out of our way to spread the word that the Gifts were dying out. On our broadcast transmissions, specialists have bemoaned the loss, blamed our technology. But in fact, each family with a Gifted child shielded and protected him or her, telling the story that she or he was alone and should not admit the power."

"But don't you think the Goa'uld realized about the power the first time they implanted a Goa'uld larva?" Daniel asked urgently. "That's why they come back, isn't it? Wanting more people with Gifts. It has to be. The Goa'uld knows the mind of its subject, it has access to all that information. They'd want that enhancement, assuming they could control it. Did any of the people who were taken know the coordinates for you colonies on the DHD--the control panel for the Circle?"

"No. The knowledge of setting those controls was never known by the entire population. I know it because I stayed here to try to bring the children home. Tallo knows it, too, but none of the rest, unless he has shared the information."

Tallo grimaced wryly and nodded, his braids bobbing. Closing his eyes in exasperation, Jaxo muttered something that Daniel didn't recognize but that he took to be a curse.

"Which means if any of you should be taken, you endanger both colonies, don't you see?" Hastily he explained what had been said. Jack's eyes narrowed at the threat to several worlds.

"Daniel Jackson is correct," Teal'c stepped in. "The Goa'uld would value humans with such abilities. They would want to take as many with these gifts as they could. The Goa'uld within would be able to access such powers, and it would give him an edge over his fellow Goa'uld. The competition between them is very strong. They choose hosts for many factors, intelligence, strength, appearance. But they would also choose for such gifts as the Nakhti possess. Imagine Apophis with such abilities."

"I don't want to imagine it," Daniel said positively. He exchanged a worried look with Teal'c.

"I agree. We will go with you," Jaxo said. "We will help your people if we can, if you will help us get these children to safety."

Tallo opened his mouth to argue, to insist he was not a child, then he shut it. For a moment, his face scrunched up in concentration. "My father is in danger?" he ventured, eyes sliding sideways to Jaxo, who practically bristled with exasperation.

"He is. But all of your presence here endangers your entire people," Teal'c told him.

Tallo's eyes held an angry, frustrated look. "He won't leave without me. And I won't leave without the others. And I can't risk the rest of the Nakhti either. You think you've won, don't you, old man?"

"I think my son will be safe," Jaxo replied, clasping the tall boy's shoulder with affection and relief. "For now, that is all that matters."

"Assuming we can get to the Gate," Daniel said, and turned to translate in detail what he and Teal'c had learned for Jack and Sam.

*****

The Gate was guarded by two serpent guards who marched back and forth, back and forth, on the platform directly in front of it. O'Neill frowned at them. He'd been frowning a lot since Daniel told him the kids were all untrained psychics and that was why the Goa'uld wanted them. It was a little easier to believe the inhabitants of a distant planet were psychics than to believe it of the people of Earth but these kiddies were human, just like Skaara and the kids on Abydos. They'd even come from ancient Egypt originally. Carter had suggested something about the environment of P3C 187 might have enhanced dormant or latent psi abilities and Daniel had agreed enthusiastically, offering a plethora of theories in his fascination. Teal'c, too, didn't seem to doubt the possibilities. But Jack couldn't help thinking of phony seances and carnival sideshow acts. It was all a little far out for him to swallow easily.

On the other hand, they couldn't leave Tallo's squad alone on a deserted planet to be harvested by the Goa'uld for talents they had never practiced or developed. SG-1 had to take them back--and from the base, they could send them through the Stargate to one of the Nakhti's colony worlds. It sounded like a plan to him--but the idea of easily getting ten kids and one doctor through the Gate without Jaffa interference didn't look easy, especially since their way home was guarded..

Tallo led them unerringly through their deserted 'subway' system to a manhole that opened into the park near the Stargate. Wiggling out before O'Neill could stop him, he concealed himself behind a bush. Jack followed him out and worked his way over to him. "Did I say you could come out here?" he demanded. The kid made him uneasy. Even if he couldn't communicate with him, Tallo's very body language challenged Jack's authority.

Tallo replied in his own tonuge, pointing at the Jaffa. Then he edged over to the tunnel. "Sendi?"

The girl squeezed out, Sam in hot pursuit. Daniel came next, causing Jack to throw up his hands in disgust. "Nobody ever remembers I'm a Colonel," he muttered. The bushes provided a flimsy barrier, and there was no telling when the other Jaffa would return, catching them right out here in the open or when the ones at the Gate would notice movement in the shrubbery and come to investigate. "Teal'c, keep everybody else back," Jack insisted. The situation was getting out of control fast. Tallo might consider himself hot stuff, but he was just a kid. It was Jack's mission. The Jaffa moved obediently to block the tunnel.

But Tallo spoke urgently to Sendi, who listened, then her face lit up, as radiant as the sun. She nodded in delight.

"He's asking her about her telekinesis, Jack," Daniel said in an undertone, his eyes widening with excitement. "Asking her if she can use it to lure the Serpent Guards away."

"Can she?" O'Neill asked. He'd never have considered that possibility but, once it had been mentioned, he could not ignore it. Maybe there was an advantage to all this weird power stuff after all. "What can she do?"

As if she understood the question, Sendi sat back on her heels and closed her eyes. She was probably fifteen, slender and unformed, still boyish in appearance, but her face was luminous with a strange inner beauty. She gnawed on her bottom lip as if concentrating with all her strength--

--and across the square, a series of rocks in a small cairn clattered to the ground. The girl gasped and sagged, losing concentration. She breathed a hasty apology, but Tallo aborted it with a quick hand movement, encircling her shoulders with his arm.

The Jaffa whirled and fired their staff weapons at the sound without even pausing to check it out. They were awfully trigger happy. Typical, O'Neill thought wryly.

"She says she was never allowed to practice, and that's all she can do," Daniel translated. "These kids were conditioned all their lives to repress their Gifts."

"Their fire will bring the rest back, Colonel," Carter muttered, gesturing down at the Gate's guardians who had hurried over to the disarrayed cairn to investigate. "We have to go through the Stargate now. They'll be back any minute. Or they'll realize it was a distraction and send for the others."

He had realized that already. "Okay, kiddies, out of there now," he urged, hearing Teal'c offer a translation as he ushered the children out of the tunnel. Pulling up his gun, Jack jumped up and took aim at the Jaffa, who had gone to investigate the collapse of the cairn. He didn't want to burst out of here so quickly, not when they didn't know how far away the other Jaffa were, but once they had fired, there was little choice. He wished he'd known what the girl had meant to do before she did it. There might have been a better use of her latent talent than that.

"Anybody else have any useful little Gifts?" he demanded expectantly. Daniel translated.

One of the smaller boys held up his hand as if he had been called upon in class. He spoke rapidly in a piping soprano, his voice not yet changed. Tallo jumped in and added his two cents worth. The smaller boy nodded vehemently and threw out his skinny chest.

"He says maybe he can make them think we're not here," Daniel insisted. "Maybe he can influence their minds. I'm not sure, though, Jack. They haven't practiced any of this very much, but--"

"Then have him do it," Jack ordered. He wasn't sure he bought it; a kid that young, only a year or two older than Charlie had been when-- Anyway, a kid that young could hardly affect a couple of Serpent Guards.

But the boy closed his eyes, his hands clenching into fists as he concentrated with all his strength. Jaxo put a comforting hand on his shoulder.

Across the park, one of the Jaffa shouted, jerking up a hand to point down a side street. The other one turned to investigate, then both of them took a few steps in that direction, their very posture hesitant.

Okay, maybe there was something to this psychic thing after all. Jack didn't like relying on a bunch of untested kids to bail their butts out of the fire, but anything that would get his team and the children through the gate was worth a shot.

"Daniel, head for the DHD," he ordered. "We have to get out of here now, while they're distracted." He grabbed the scientist's arm. "And for pete's sake, stay low and don't make yourself into a target again. Once is enough for any mission."

Jackson nodded. "I don't want to be a target," he said quickly, a means of reassurance. At least he seemed fit enough to do what needed doing.

"Carter, go with him, cover him," Jack ordered.

"Yes, sir."

Daniel set off behind the bushes in a weaving run, his pack settled awkwardly on the alien tunic. Carter went with him, offering him cover. The kids jumped up, the laser weapons zipping out, prepared to fire if they were discovered.

At first, Jack thought they might just get away with it. The Jaffa had reached the street entrance and seemed unaware of the hasty migration toward the Stargate. O'Neill and Teal'c shepherded the kids along, even though their own weapons were ready. At least they were decent guerilla fighters, but the Colonel didn't want to endanger them.

The doctor, Jaxo, weighted down by the pack that held the sonic healing device, stayed beside Teal'c. Every so often as they ran, Tallo looked over his shoulder to make certain his father was all right.

Daniel thudded up to the DHD and started to key in the symbols to take them back to Earth.

That was when their luck ran out. Fire from a staff weapon missed Jackson by less than a foot, and he ducked down, using the DHD as a shield, stretching up his hand to key in another symbol and yanking it back warily as another blast just missed him.

"We've been spotted, sir," Carter called to him as the boys ducked down, those in the open flinging themselves flat.

"Ya think?" He set off a round of fire in the direction of the approaching Jaffa, tearing up the ground in front of them and making them hesitate. When O'Neill loosed a second burst of fire, Jaffa turned and leveled staff weapons at him. At least that gave Daniel the chance to edge up push another button.

"O'Neill!" Teal'c returned their fire, planting himself at Jack's side behind the dubious shelter of a small boulder. Out of the corner of his eye, the Colonel saw Daniel duck as the Jaffa fired a warning shot at him. They didn't aim directly at the DHD--it was their ticket home, too. But they aimed around it with precision, forcing Daniel to retreat behind it for shelter. Carter returned their fire, but she had been caught out in the open and had to dive down beside Jackson. The Serpent Guards moved toward them.

Suddenly Teal'c lunged to his feet and raced toward them, making himself a clear target for his former allies. Spotting him, one of them called out, "So, Teal'c. The traitor," and raised his staff weapon.

Teal'c dropped his own and stood waiting as if for execution. Daniel and Carter yelled inarticulate protests, then Daniel nodded as if something had clicked. "Go for it," he shouted.

"No! Are you nuts," bellowed Jack, sprinting to defend Teal'c from the attack of the two Serpent Guards. He could hear distant cries and the thudding of running feet on the street between two rows of buildings and knew the rest of the Goa'uld's party was returning to investigate the sound of weapons fire. Time was running out.

The second the Jaffa aimed at Teal'c, Daniel popped up and continued dialing home, Carter beside him, weapon at ready.

The serpent guards fired at Teal'c.

At the moment they fired, he raised the Headpiece of the staff of Ra that had been concealed in his hand.

Spotting it, the two Jaffa yelled a warning, scrambling backward in a frantic effort to jump out of range, but they had no time for more before the energy rebounded off the crystal and lanced back at them. They could not outrun the blast that tore through their armor and flung them backward, their bodies smoking from the impact.

Satisfied, Teal'c nodded, hooked the Headpiece's chain around his neck, and grabbed up his staff weapon again.

Tallo raced toward the downed Jaffa, causing his father to let out a wild yell of protest. Jack caught the doctor's arm. "There's no time. Teal'c, get that kid back here, now!"

Teal'c hastened after Tallo, bellowing a stern warning in the boy's language. Jaxo struggled fiercely in Jack's grip as the Colonel manhandled him toward the Stargate. By then Tallo had reached the fallen Jaffa, only a step in front of Teal'c. He grabbed up one of the staff weapons, then threw the other one to Teal'c, who caught it neatly. The two of them raced back toward the Stargate. Jaxo muttered something under his breath that any father in any world would understand without words.

Daniel flung his palm down on the center stone of the DHD and the gate whooshed open. The children set up a cheer, bunching at the foot of the ramp.

"Get them through," Jackson yelled at the top of his lungs, adding something in the Nakhti language. "Teal'c, move. Tallo, decto! Jack, get the kids through." He gestured wildly, urging them to safety. At the end of the street, the troop of Jaffa and the Goa'uld emerged and charged, shouting.

SG-1 and the Nakhti raced for the Gate, the teenagers moving urgently as the distant Jaffa started firing. They were too far away to be accurate, but they were moving at a dead run.

"Sam, take them through," O'Neill ordered, waving Captain Carter through the gate with the teens in hot pursuit. One by one then vanished into the wormhole, disappearing without a trace as they crossed the threshold. "Go with them, Daniel."

Jackson hesitated, braced to jump through the Gate. "Hurry up, Jack," he yelled back. "They're coming fast."

"I hear you. Teal'c, go!"

Clutching both staff weapons under his arm and chivvying the guerilla leader before him, the Jaffa moved toward the gate, holding the Headpiece out at full extension of his chain, ready to use it if the enemy fire came too close. Tallo fell in beside Jack, his liberated staff weapon aimed at the approaching enemy.

"Get out of here, Tallo," Jack ordered through gritted teeth. "Decto!" He didn't know what it meant, but he hoped 'hurry' was a good guess.

The boy yelled something back. All O'Neill could recognize in it was his own name.

Teal'c caught one burst of fire with the Headpiece, causing the approaching Jaffa to scatter and dive for cover. From the haste with which they moved it was clear they recognized the device. The Goa'uld in their midst raised his hand, the glove weapon in place.

Daniel yelled a warning, seconded by the white-haired doctor who waited stubbornly at the anthropologist's side, and Jack saw them standing directly in front of the Gate. Nudging Tallo's arm, Jack pointed at his father. Staff weapon fire exploded only a few feet in front of them, and Jack didn't hesitate a second longer. He fired back a quick burst, then he grabbed the teen by the arm and manhandled him up the ramp. Seeing them coming, Daniel pushed the last of the children through and, forced Jaxo after them. "Hurry up, Jack," he muttered under his breath.

"Damn it, Daniel, will you go!" shouted Jack, pushing Tallo up the ramp in front of him. Daniel's eyes caught O'Neill's for one second, then he nodded and stepped through with Teal'c at his side. A second later, with weapon fire chasing them up the ramp, Jack and Tallo prepared to jump through. Seconds before he would have leaped to safety, O'Neill felt the hot wash of energy fire brush his arm with a burst of agony. He staggered and started to fall.

"O'Neill!" Tallo cried, and grabbed him, half dragging him through the Stargate as he collapsed into darkness.

*****

"Off-world gate activation!" The warning over the P.A. system jerked General Hammond from the report he had been preparing to send to the President and he jumped up to hurry to the control room. No one was due through back through the gate for at least several hours.

"It's SG-1," the tech informed him as he arrived. "We got their recognition signal just now." The iris was open.

"They're three hours early." The General wondered if that meant trouble. He ordered troops to the room, just as Carter burst through the gate followed by a motley collection of teenagers with elaborately braided hair. After a second of delay, an older man with receding white hair came through and turned as if to return, only to be forestalled by the arrival of Dr. Jackson and Teal'c. The Jaffa at once caught hold of the man's arm to restrain him.

"Who are these people?" General Hammond demanded into the mike, surveying the motley collection of children who bunched together at the foot of the ramp. The white-haired man had an arm around the shoulders of the oldest of the teens. Behind the General, armed troops leveled their weapons at the newcomers. "And where is Colonel O'Neill."

"Refugees, General," Daniel said, looking up at the control room window. "They are the Nakhti, humans whose ancestors came originally from ancient Egypt. They have another world to go to. We'll be able to send them home. They helped us get away. And Jack's right behind us."

To prove his point, O'Neill crashed through, supported by yet another teenager, his body sagging, evidence of a burn wound on his left arm. Daniel yelled, "Jack!" and jumped for him, and he and Teal'c lowered the Colonel to the ramp while the older man, freed from Teal'c's grip, lunged for the tall boy and grabbed him in an urgent embrace. Shivering, the boy returned it briefly, then broke away to count the teenagers. Spotting the armed troops, he tensed and started to raise his weapon. He spat something hotly in an unfamiliar language.

Kneeling at O'Neill's side, Daniel and Teal'c called out in the same language. "It's okay, General Hammond," Carter reassured him hastily as the boy let the staff weapon fall. "They're on our side. Close the iris. There are Jaffa after us."

The general gave the order, relieved when the iris shut, blocking out Jaffa pursuit. Raising a hand to the troops, he called, "Stand down." At once the rifles were lowered and the troops retreated. Hammond did not dismiss them, not yet. He had learned it paid to be cautious. When the weapons lowered, the boy grinned wryly and turned back to the older man with a hasty and obviously sarcastic comment before he began a head-count of the other teens. Hammond took the moment to hurry downstairs to the embarkation room.

"We need Dr. Frasier," Daniel cried as the General entered, fussing over the messy wound. "Jack's hurt." Immediately she was paged over the P.A. system.

O'Neill groaned and opened his eyes. "I hate it when that happens." Twisting his head to see his injured arm, he winced. "It's just a graze. I'm okay."

"No, stay down until Dr. Frasier can look at it," Daniel urged, gripping his shoulders. "Teal'c, help me."

"I will do so." The Jaffa put a big hand flat against Colonel O'Neill's chest. It would take a stronger man than O'Neill to fight off the Jaffa from flat on his back.

"Oh, great, a conspiracy," groused O'Neill. He was obviously in pain, but there was nothing in his voice to suggest it was a serious wound.

The white-haired man knelt beside O'Neill, and began to cut the fabric of his jacket away with a small knife to expose the wound. He said something firmly in his own language and pulled a strange looking artifact out of his backpack. When he pushed several buttons on a control grid, the thing changed shape before their eyes, going from flat to gently curving. Hammond leaned closer and the troops hesitated as if aching to bring up their weapons again. For all Hammond knew, it was these children who had hurt the Colonel in the first place. Maybe they'd even used this device to do so.

"What is he doing?" he demanded when none of SG-1 seemed upset at the process.

"They have medical technology they are willing to share with us, General," Carter explained quickly. "That device will take care of the Colonel's arm easily. They have a comparable technology to our own, but they're a little ahead of us in the medical department. Let him help. They already saved Daniel's life with one."

"Yeah, after shooting him in the first place," muttered O'Neill sourly, rolling over onto his side to allow the white-haired man easier access to his arm. He shot an annoyed glance at Tallo, who returned it with a cocky grin, his eyes wide as he stared around the embarcation room.

"Are you all right, Dr. Jackson?" Hammond was unable to detect evidence of injury; the scientist might be oddly dressed but he looked healthy and was moving with no evidence of pain. "Get Dr. Frasier down here, now," he added over his shoulder. "Where the hell is she?"

"Here I am, General." Dr. Frasier arrived, casting a quick, sideways glance at Jackson to be sure he didn't need treatment, then displacing him at O'Neill's side. "It looks like a burn from a staff weapon," she remarked.

"It is. They chased us back through the gate." Daniel spoke hastily to the white-haired man, evidently explaining that Dr. Frasier was the base doctor. Then he looked up. "General, it was amazing. They used a sonic technology to heal me. This gizmo will take care of Jack's arm in a minute. This is Dr. Jaxo Prin. He'll explain it to her, once he gets it in place."

Dr. Frasier began to take the Colonel's vitals.

"Oh, good, I get to be a test case?" O'Neill was still in there pitching. "Okay, Doc, do your stuff." He nodded at the older man.

The healing gizmo hummed to life as the alien doctor placed it firmly against the Colonel's arm. Jack grimaced, then his eyes widened in surprise. "I didn't know it would feel like that," he blurted.

"I told you it was great," Daniel reminded him. "Are you okay?"

"I'm getting that way fast."

"Amazing." Frasier had her fingers on O'Neill's wrist, feeling his pulse. "This might be the best thing you ever brought back through the gate."

"And we have a new ally," Sam put in with a grin. "One at much our own level of technology. We shouldn't have the problems we had with the Nox or the Tollans. And we have the Gate coordinates to their colony worlds. We can send these children home as soon as we've had a chance to debrief."

"That's very good news," Hammond replied, heading for the older man. "General George Hammond, in command of this project," he offered, holding out his hand. "Welcome, Dr. Prin."

Teal'c translated hastily. "They do not speak English," he explained as the man pumped Hammond's hand, then touched his own chest. "Jaxo Prin," he introduced himself.

"I can speak their language, General," Daniel explained. "It's very similar to the language on Abydos, although some of the vowels are different and the accent's pretty thick. It shouldn't take me long to get the hang of it. They can understand me, anyway, and I can get what they say as long as they talk slowly. I think SG-1 should visit their colony worlds. I can interpret. We've got a lot to talk about."

"That sounds like an appropriate mission, Dr. Jackson. I'll take it under advisement." He turned to issue orders. "Find these people some food and clean clothing, and a place to rest until we can get them home. Teal'c, will you accompany them to interpret?"

"I will." The Jaffa spoke to Jaxo Prin, turned a questioning eye to O'Neill, then he rose and he went with the soldiers that led the Nakhti teens away to be assigned temporary quarters, the oldest boy lagging back until the doctor dismissed him with a careless wave of his hand. When they had gone, Prin helped Jack to sit up, curving the healing device around the Colonel's arm and securing it in place. He said something to Daniel.

"You need to leave it on about fifteen minutes," Daniel translated. "At least that's the most I can make out of their time system. I'm not sure what a 'unit' is, though it's probably comparable to a minute. This is fascinating."

"You went through a similar treatment?" Frasier asked him, reaching out to grasp his wrist and take a pulse.

Daniel nodded. "And I'm fine now. It's still slightly tender, but not so bad." He grimaced at the woman's expectant look. "Oh, come on, I'm okay."

"I want to see the affected area."

"But I'm fine--"

"Now, Dr. Jackson."

When Frasier used that tone of voice, even Hammond didn't dispute her. Hiding a smile, the General watched Daniel heave an exasperated sigh as he took off his pack and set it down on the ramp, then pulled off the native tunic he was wearing. Turning his back on Frasier, he displayed a large, faintly-reddened patch in the small of his back. That could have been a serious wound, if it had looked anything like O'Neill's arm.

"Jaffa?" the doctor asked, poking it with her fingertips. "You are a lucky man. That must have been nasty."

"I think we nearly lost him," Carter admitted, fading remnants of her worry lingering in her eyes. "We didn't want to say so at the time, but it was pretty close."

"And it wasn't Jaffa." O'Neill's mouth might have been drawn tight at the pain of his own injury, but more likely it was because a member of his team had been endangered. "It was the kids. They thought Danny was a Goa'uld."

"He hardly looks like one," objected Hammond, wondering if he shouldn't assign guards to watch the children.

"No, but he had that artifact. Apparently they assumed it made him one. And we had Teal'c with us and they decided Daniel was a Goa'uld and Teal'c was his First Prime or something. We got that all worked out, though, and they fixed him up. He was out there taking crazy risks with the Headpiece."

"He saved Teal'c's life," Sam chastised.

"Yeah." O'Neill shook his head. "A crazy mission. But at least we made some new friends."

"Was the artifact you took with you of any use?" Hammond asked, knowing he'd have to call the briefing as soon as possible. There were a lot of things going on here.

Daniel grinned. "It repels staff weapon fire--and other energy fire," he said. "It was fantastic."

"One of them alone might not be enough to carry on a mission," Jack replied, sitting up cautiously. He grinned when the motion didn't upset his equilibrium. "I wonder if it could be duplicated."

"I think it's made partially of naquadah," Daniel replied.

"Then I'm going to suggest we requisition this artifact for study to determine if it might benefit SCG to duplicate it."

"Dr. Jones won't like if it he can't get it back."

"He'll get it back if we can duplicate it, Daniel," Sam reassured him. "General, those children we brought back possess latent psi abilities. Their entire culture does."

"We theorize that's why the Goa'uld were so interested in them," Daniel said. "I think they'll make really good allies for us."

"Then the mission was a success." The General smiled. "I'll see you in the briefing room in one hour for debriefing."

*****

"Every Nakhti teenager possesses a form of psi power," Dr. Janet Frasier told the General two days later when he met with SG-1 shortly before the Nakhti were to be sent to the safety of one of their colony worlds. "I've run a number of tests, and I have come to the conclusion that they are using maybe three to five percent more of their brains than standard Earth humans. It seems that is where the psi ability comes from. According to Jaxo, who has picked up English in an amazingly short time, they didn't have powers when they were first taken to Nakht a few millennia ago, but within a few generations, the abilities began to manifest. They never did determine if it was simply a coincidence or if conditions on their new world, possibly something in their diet, enhanced the powers. Over the centuries, they developed the powers, trained people in their use. It may be something on Nakht started the development, but it has not died among their world's colonists. Their colonies have been in place for over a hundred years. Jaxo says their planetary leaders realized it was the psi abilities that drew the Goa'uld to make so many visits to their world to harvest Goa'uld hosts."

"I hate that word, 'harvest'," Jack muttered.

"'Enslave' isn't any better." Daniel's face wore the taut look it took on when reminded of what had happened to Sha're.

"But the Nakhti decided to do something about it to protect their children," Frasier continued. "They began to claim that the ability was dying out. Each parent told his child that he, alone, had the Gifts, and that they should never mention it to their friends, who might then feel inferior. Even the children on Tallo's team rarely talked about it and even then it would be between one or two of them. Tallo knew, for instance, about the girl, Sendi's telekinesis because she is his girlfriend. But he didn't know about the younger boy, Daxo's ability for limited mind control. And most of them didn't know about the rest of the Gifts. The children are rather outraged about it, and they've been practicing like mad ever since they got here, trying to develop and refine their Gifts. When they reach their colony worlds, They won't be as out of step as the rest of the children who left on the final mass exodus and who have probably been receiving proper training ever since."

"And we have the coordinates of their colonies?" Hammond asked.

"Yes, for both colonies," Daniel replied. "We are going there, aren't we, general?"

"I've put some plans in motion," Hammond replied. "Dr. Prin will discuss the possibility of sending someone through to work with us, or for us to send advisors through. Possibly an ambassador. Which would mean we might ask you or Teal'c to teach the language. A crash course."

"I can do that," Daniel replied, and Teal'c nodded. "Some of them will want to learn English, too," Jackson continued. "Most of the kids are pretty fluent already. Their whole culture just seem able to pick up languages fast."

"I've had the lab boys running tests on the artifact you acquired from Dr. Jones," Hammond added. "Given sufficient supplied of naquadah and some of those par'tak crystals Teal'c mentioned, it might be possible to duplicate the device. Apparently the crystals are very rare and likely to be the main problem. How soon will Dr. Jones expect it back, Dr. Jackson?"

"I got e-mail from him yesterday. He'd like it back as soon as possible. I've been translating the notes he sent me, and I've come up with some different interpretations. Evidently, whoever used it as a device to find the Ark of the Covenant's location knew something of its use and adapted it. I've been wondering if maybe the Ark of the Covenant couldn't have been a Goa'uld device, too, but of course we don't know its location."

"If it's anything like the movie, General, maybe you could pull a few strings at the Pentagon," O'Neill suggested facetiously.

"I'll take that under advisement, Colonel," Hammond replied wryly. "Dr. Jackson, I'd like you to notify Dr. Jones, and let him know that his Headpiece has been requisitioned for study by the Government and that we'll get it back to him as soon as we can."

"He's not going to like that."

"Oh, good, he'll show up here, cracking his bullwhip," Jack grinned.

Teal'c's eyes widened. "A bullwhip?"

"I'll show you the movie sometime," Jack promised. "I betcha you'll like it."

*****

"I have enjoyed your world." Dr. Jaxo Prin had made amazing strides in English, all right. He held out his hand to O'Neill, who took it in a firm grip. "Thank you. Without your coming. I would not have con--concined? Quah si, regusto?" he threw at Daniel.

"Convinced," Daniel corrected.

"Ah. Convinced my son to leave Nakht." He slung an arm around the tall boy's shoulders.

"We would still fight," Tallo argued. "We can back go to Nakht. We have killed many Jaffa already."

"No, not for now," Jaxo replied, refusing to loosen his grip. "I would have my son safe."

"Running around on an abandoned world like that is too dangerous," Daniel said. "On Abydos, we didn't have a lot of choice. We kept the kids trained as militia in case the Goa'uld came back, but the Abydons didn't have anywhere else to go."

"They are our brothers," Jaxo said. "You told us they came from the same part of Earth as we did. Maybe one day come to us?"

"Well, not yet." Jack shook his head. "Your people just took on the population of a whole world. You've got to have some major overcrowding right now. But maybe down the road that might be a plan. What do you think, Daniel?"

Daniel hesitated. It would protect the people of Abydos, but it would also plunge them into major cultural shock. Ra had dominated them so strongly, refusing to l