Galileo's Burden, Phase Alpha: Bungle in the Jungle

[cityship]

((PLOT POST! READ IT!))

Stacy's voice rang out through the corridors of the ship, announcing that a message had been received and would be played on the Obs Deck momentarily.

The message was patched through a few minutes later, shown on a holographic screen. It was shot in very poor video, from a very old communicator frequency.



A woman wearing a blue veil over her face appears on the screen. She speaks in a soft and cultured voice, bowing deeply before she begins.

“Greetings to the crew and command of the Transmigration 9. My name is Reda, revered mother of the village of Avania III on the planet Orya."

Reda pauses, bowing once more before removing her veil and revealing the face of a beautiful humanoid woman.



"It… pains me to ask for the help of outsiders, when we have so little to offer in return, but I beg of you. Please aid us. My people are becoming sickened by an ailment we have never seen before. It seems to come differently for all who suffer from it... some have fevers, some strange dreams, some begin to speak madness while awake. But no matter how it develops, they grow weary. Their faith weakens and they die, disgraced and turned from the eyes of the great goddess Avani."

Reda folds her hands together, frowning worriedly. "I have heard of your ship's great deeds even in such a small and isolated planet as Orya. Though I am hardly worthy of asking, I know there is no one better to ask for a favor such as this. What I ask is for… those who have knowledge."

"My people know little of the universe outside their village. They do not know what you know in the ways of medicine. Our shamans are not equipped to deal with a threat of this magnitude. We seek those who can help us ease our suffering. We have little to give in return for your help, but what we have is faith… enlightenment and enrichment of the soul, which we will gladly share with those who come to visit us."

Reda smiled softly, shaking her head. "I will understand if you deny my request. I ask much of you and cannot give much myself, but should you assist us, I will do what I can to help you. I will see to it personally that those who come to our help are taken care of and shown the greatest hospitality. My own Chosen soldiers will protect them, and if they should help us in our time of need, I will do everything in my power to aid your efforts against the Ohm. You have my word as a devout child of Avani."

The revered mother bows once more, kneeling down before the camera. "I will be happy to speak with you if you require more information. Please... I beg of you, help my people."

Comments

[hi_there_aliens]

Daniel wasn't expecting his prompting to get that severe a reaction. In the middle of writing his notes, the outburst took him by surprise, and eyes wide, he looked up. He almost expected Tamil to lurch up and start railing at the tent.

So religion was a touchy subject. It was in a lot of places, and if he wanted to continue this line of thought, Daniel was going to have to go with Tamil on it. The archaeologist didn't like having to go down this route: for a moment there, Tamil's desperation to please reminded him of the same desperation in the Abydonians to please Ra. It reeked too much of the Goa'uld inflicting their whims on their worshipers. The worst part is that many of those worshipers really, honestly believed that they deserved being tortured or killed.

For being an anthropologist, Daniel had to admit he had some prejudice in this area that he should try to work on. Daniel found it hard to care: the Goa'uld, in his mind, were the definition of evil. But there wasn't any sign of the Goa'uld so far, and not just here, but this reality. He had to try and keep an open mind.

'No other than Avani'? Was that it, another God or belief system rising up, threatening the home one?

"I understand you're devout," Daniel said quickly, and with some difficulty. "It's penance and that She is guiding you. But like you said, Avani does view you all as her Children, and yeah, children make mistakes as they learn. She would want you to reflect on your mistake and learn from it, right? Like any parent. Could you help me understand what your mistake was exactly? Within the last few days?"

Daniel added, meaningfully, hoping that he would get the message, that he needed specifics. "It might be important for us. We're eager to learn more about you." 'Us' being all the scientists making camp in their village.

[cityship]

Tamil simply stared at Daniel like his words weren't all making a perfect amount of sense. He checked the people around them in the tent again, and once he was convinced they were in relative privacy, he whispered.

"I looked at the sky," he said. "I looked at it for hours, though they told me not to. Avani saw the skylight in my eyes and then I was punished."

[hi_there_aliens]

Daniel leaned forward as Tamil whispered. It was a start. A good sign that Tamil trusted him enough to actually say it, but not that great if he thought he had to hide it from those who might be in the same boat as he was.

"That's it? You looked at the sky," Daniel repeated incredulously, although he kept his voice down. That was it? That was his sin. Daniel wasn't sure how that was a crime, there wasn't any avoiding looking at the sky here, not unless they were underground. He got the feeling he was seriously missing something more to the picture. The issue of how exactly Tamil was punished, what Avani's Wrath entailed, could wait. He needed to understand this angle more.

"What do you mean by the 'skylight in your eyes'?

Actually another question was coming up, but Daniel kept it to himself. If anything to do with the Sky was taboo, what did that make the landing party, since they were supposedly all Sky People?

[cityship]

"Avani could see the skylights in my eyes," Tamil explained. "You know... the skylights. At night?" He gestured up in the air, indicating something up in the sky.

"We are not to look at the sky. Or... we are not to look for..." Tamil drifted off.

"I only wanted to see if She was still there. But Avani forbids us from looking."

[hi_there_aliens]

So it wasn't just the sky, it was what you did when you looked at it. Your intention. Not necessarily the physical act.

"You mean stars? The white dots in the sky at night," Daniel clarified. "I don't understand how she knew you looked from your eyes though. I don't see any skylights in them."

'Still?' Big keyword there. Could be doubt or it could point to the religion not being as rock-steady as it seemed. So she had been absent or at least given that impression she wasn't around as much. Belief might be wavering in Avani. For whatever reason, Tamil had thought she might be gone and wanted confirmation that she wasn't. Interesting.

"Has she been absent before?" asked Daniel innocently.

[cityship]

"Stars," Tamil repeated. "The stars? Avani can see them, of course. She can see everything."

He twiddled his fingers together nervously and watched Daniel for a moment, his face scrunching at the question.

"I don't know," he said. "Samso said that She has always been there... but Avani says that She's not real and She was never there. I thought She was there before but I decided to look and see. We aren't supposed to look for Her."

Tamil rolled over on his side. "Samso died. I was wondering if Daena might really be there like he said. So I looked for Her. That's what Avani punished me."

[hi_there_aliens]

Oookay, so the 'She' he was just talking about wasn't actually Avani. Things were starting to get more and more interesting. Not that they weren't already, but there was more going on here. Two Gods, one determined to bury the other. What was the saying, the winner gets to write history?

Daena. That had to be the other Goddess name. He started to jot that down.

"Daena is this other.." it was on the tip of his tongue to say God, but he caught himself in time. Tamil had been adamant about only Avani's existence moments ago, but at the same time there was doubt. The fervor had an almost desperate ring to it, as if he was scrambling to renew his faith. The archaeologist decided not to risk it "...this other spirit then."

And Avani, or at least, those in her faction, forbid looking for anything other than Avani.

Hearing the tone in Tamil's voice, Daniel looked back up. What was Daenna like in the stories? "I'm sorry about Samso," he said instead. He hesitated for the first time. "What happened to him?"

[cityship]

"Daena the Sky Mother and Fuoros the Earth Father," Tamil said, in a hushed voice once again. "But they're not real. Avani says so. That's why we can't look for them."

At the other question, Tamil looked downcast. "Avani punished him too," he said. "Avani said that we would have no other gods than Her, but Samso liked the old stories. He told them to us. The temple told him to stop, and they were right. He was the first one Avani punished."

[hi_there_aliens]

His eyebrows crawled up his forehead, disappearing momentarily into the boonie's brim. He wondered if Tamil saw the problem with that statement: if they weren't real, never were, then what harm was there in studying them as fiction? He should check the temple out while he was at it.

Daniel was starting to like this less and less. He was trying very hard not to let his past experience with the Goa'uld color his judgment, but it wasn't quite working. He tried to set himself back on track. The big question here: was it his place to start pointing out the holes in their beliefs? He could think of a number of cultures that didn't mesh with his own world views, but he'd generally tried not to do a thing to influence them. He'd been there to observe and try to mediate between them and SG-1. So the answer was, no. Not usually.

Not if their wasn't any actual harm or forms of enslavement, but the problem was, it looked like there was. Not necessarily enslavement, but there were people being hurt. Samso was a casualty, and if they didn't work fast, Tamil was going to be another too. Not in the Goa'uld sense, but something weird was going on. Was it from Avani herself or from her followers?

Daniel was silent for a moment, letting Tamil be. Then he spoke. "I'm sorry. There's nothing wrong with old stories, I mean, they can tell us a lot about where we came from, what we could be. At least where I come from," he added, as an out for Tamil, and in case the other sick were listening. "When was this? Was he punished, like you are now?"

[cityship]

Tamil looked less and less comfortable with the topic of conversation, eyes shifting away from Daniel.

"Last month. He got the Burden too," he said. "Then he died."

"But I won't die, because you all are here now. That's what Mother Reda said."

[hi_there_aliens]

Daniel smiled, although it was slightly strained. He desperately wanted to save them too, but he couldn't make a promise like that, or even make one on behalf of the other scientists. He'd only met some of them today and he didn't know any of them outside of the Doctor. That was just barely for him.

That sounded too much like Jack. Realistic, yes, but Daniel couldn't look Tamil in the face and say that. He couldn't leave Tamil without some hope. He didn't want him to lie here waiting to die. He could make one promise at least. "We won't rest until we do. I promise."

Maybe he should shift it back to the Burden, away from the religious aspect. If Tamil got more comfortable, they could go back to it, but Daniel had pressed him hard as it was. Frankly he was surprised he'd even gotten this much. As far as Tamil was concerned, Daniel had to be a bizarre looking Sky Person with glass eyes and flat skin, who also happened to be a complete outsider.

He looked down at the checklist of questions he'd been absently writing down, with 'Samso; first casualty - 1 month ago (what is month on this planet?)/Burden - Deana believer, temple warned him' written in the margins. Back onto the direct topic then. "How did the Burden start, like how did you feel? Were you anywhere specific? Doing anything specific or did you just feel ill?"

[cityship]

"I don't remember," he answered. "Not a lot. I was... I was at the temple. I had a dream, a very long dream while I was awake. It frightened me. I don't remember what happened in it, but it lasted days. When I woke up, I was here. The elders told me what happened."

That was really all he knew, and he shrugged his shoulders. "Been dizzy and dreaming since then. Sometimes hot and sometimes cold. Same as the others." He gestured around them to the other sick people.

[hi_there_aliens]

Daniel looked around, following his hand. "You might still be suffering its effects." All of them? He wondered if he'd get similar stories if he tried asking them all the same thing. Were they at the temple? Did they lose time to a waking dream before ending up here?

It was just a hunch but it almost sounded like Tamil had a hallucination for the first time. The question was whether it was due to a personal medical problem or from a drug. Just the fact that he'd had it in a temple made him think it was the last option. Hallucinogens themselves weren't new to older cultures (or newer ones either) or particular spiritual or religious rituals, like those of Ancient Egypt, the Inca, or the Urarina. But the practitioners tended to know what they were doing, if not how it worked exactly, namely that they were going to deliberately go on a journey or try to invoke a spirit, or see some truth. The point was that it was intentional. It usually wasn't administered as a surprise.

And that left Tamil days of unaccounted for time.

"I think I understand what you're talking about. Back on Earth, we might call them visions, waking dreams, or hallucinations. It might happen for a number of reasons," just don't ask him to explain the mechanics of a hallucinogen, he wasn't that kind of doctor.

Daniel jotted more notes down. That temple was looking more and more like a priority, right after getting a water sample before he left. He was worried that he was still feeling after effects. Was it the water? Something else keeping it going? Damn, he wished he had Sam and Janet here. They'd know what to look for. "So the last thing you remember before this waking dream was the temple. You were completely alone?"

[cityship]

Tamil just stared at Daniel at that question, looking torn as to whether or not he wanted to answer it.

"I'm tired," he said finally. "I should not be speaking anymore."

[hi_there_aliens]

The archaeologist looked stricken then embarrassed. He'd gotten so into pursuing the theories he had floating around that he hadn't noticed Tamil getting that tired.

"Yes, of course," Daniel got to his feet. "Sorry. Thank you for being so patient. I'll let you rest." He started to go, then turned for a moment. "Would you mind if I take some water with me?"

[cityship]

Tamil smiled awkwardly. "Yes. If you want to. But it's warm."

[hi_there_aliens]

He raised an eyebrow. "...Warm?"

Naturally warm or heated for the sick? It didn't feel that hot in the tent, so he doubted it was the room temperature bringing the water's heat up.

Daniel put the notepad away, and then took out two small sample containers from another pocket. Carefully, he filled one tube, without letting the water touch his hands, then the other, before sealing them both tightly. With the pencil, he jotted down a few notes, twin sets, and attached them to the glass with a practiced efficiency.

They disappeared back into the tactical vest.

"Did you need me to get you anything before I go?"

[cityship]

"No," said Tamil. "What is it... thank you for speaking with me?"