Dr. Daniel Jackson (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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trans_92011-12-15 10:09 am
hi_there_aliens) wrote in trans_92011-12-15 10:09 am
Entry tags:
Sobek the Immortal [Closed]
Planet Designation: Kalimba
Status: Terrestrial, H-class.
Non-sentient life: Extensive flora and fauna.
Semi-Sentient Life: Unknown
Sentient Life: Ruins and step pyramids suggest the presence of intelligent life at some point. Currently: Unknown.
Water: 70.2% of the planet's surface. Heavy rainfall/monsoons.
Climate: Earth-like.
Landscape: Primarily jungle and swamp, some plains, severe arctic conditions in northern and southern poles.
Air: Type I (breathable)
Sky: Blue-green.
Warnings: Medium to high levels of megafauna. Watch your step. Conditions in the atmosphere make several forms of orbital scans and equipment unreliable.
Mission: Archaeological investigation of step pyramids and ruins, investigate for signs of source of abnormal energy signature in target area.
The first thing the group would notice was that Kalimba's air was humid and heavy, with a light breeze. The morning had long since burned off most of the mist, and in the distance, clouds lazily drifted onwards towards the horizon. The typhoon season was a long ways off.
The undergrowth was tangled and dense, seemingly impassable in places. Vibrant flowers and vines took up residence where some of the tree cover faltered. With limited sunlight available, it was every plant for themselves. Disturbed by the archaeology group, "birds", each easily half the size of a person and more salamander than avian suddenly took to the air in a flash of brilliantly colored wings. They were gone almost instantly, slicing through the air and leaving only the ear-splitting shriek behind.
The hill sloped down. The cover of trees broke as they came out onto the stone remains of path that must have once been heavily used. Now, just like everywhere else, massive roots and tanglers tore at the ground, slowly swallowing any signs of civilization back within itself. There were trees of all shapes and sizes as far as the eye could see, a rolling wave of jungle and rainforest. Tan and dirty gray step pyramids, all more massive than those found on Earth, and the occasional obelisk rose through the canopy cover like claws, dotting the landscape.
Stac's scans indicated much of the planet was covered in these structures, with the largest in this location. Aside from the archaeological mission, her scans also indicated the presence of an abnormal power that may be of interest.
Non-sentient life: Extensive flora and fauna.
Semi-Sentient Life: Unknown
Sentient Life: Ruins and step pyramids suggest the presence of intelligent life at some point. Currently: Unknown.
Water: 70.2% of the planet's surface. Heavy rainfall/monsoons.
Climate: Earth-like.
Landscape: Primarily jungle and swamp, some plains, severe arctic conditions in northern and southern poles.
Air: Type I (breathable)
Sky: Blue-green.
Warnings: Medium to high levels of megafauna. Watch your step. Conditions in the atmosphere make several forms of orbital scans and equipment unreliable.
Mission: Archaeological investigation of step pyramids and ruins, investigate for signs of source of abnormal energy signature in target area.
The first thing the group would notice was that Kalimba's air was humid and heavy, with a light breeze. The morning had long since burned off most of the mist, and in the distance, clouds lazily drifted onwards towards the horizon. The typhoon season was a long ways off.
The undergrowth was tangled and dense, seemingly impassable in places. Vibrant flowers and vines took up residence where some of the tree cover faltered. With limited sunlight available, it was every plant for themselves. Disturbed by the archaeology group, "birds", each easily half the size of a person and more salamander than avian suddenly took to the air in a flash of brilliantly colored wings. They were gone almost instantly, slicing through the air and leaving only the ear-splitting shriek behind.
The hill sloped down. The cover of trees broke as they came out onto the stone remains of path that must have once been heavily used. Now, just like everywhere else, massive roots and tanglers tore at the ground, slowly swallowing any signs of civilization back within itself. There were trees of all shapes and sizes as far as the eye could see, a rolling wave of jungle and rainforest. Tan and dirty gray step pyramids, all more massive than those found on Earth, and the occasional obelisk rose through the canopy cover like claws, dotting the landscape.
Stac's scans indicated much of the planet was covered in these structures, with the largest in this location. Aside from the archaeological mission, her scans also indicated the presence of an abnormal power that may be of interest.
Re: PART 2: Prison cell
In other words he was faintly surprised to find he still had a nose after getting a spear-butt to the face. For having so many squishy bits, he'd be the first to say that the chin and hair didn't do very much -- make that anything at all - at cushion duty. The Doctor groaned under his breath as he came to, giving a little jolt as his nose decided it had enough waiting around for the rest of him and began to throb and ache and generally made a nuisance of itself. His head pounded while he floundered a bit on the cold stone floor of the cell, finally blinking awake as he clapped a hand to his head and cradled his nose, in that order.
"Ow," the Doctor said, poetic as always. He tried again. "Ouch!" Okay, so Ow and Ouch didn't do much to help the pounding in his head. Worth trying! The Doctor floundered a bit more like a...well, like an oversized flounder, until he finally managed to roll unsteadily to his side and sit up.
He could see even with the poor lighting that most of the others were there with him. Everyone but Daniel Jackson who (he hoped) had the sense to run and hide instead of adventuring right into the guards like he had. Might want to watch out for the staffs. Listening to the chanting, which, by the way, he ought to recognize except for the part he couldn't, the Doctor went to check on their cell, patting his pockets only to come to the conclusion that his sonic screwdriver was missing. Lovely. If he believed in curses, he'd say this had to be cursed -- first sharks, then explosions, and now this! His old sonics suddenly seemed so much more reliable in comparison. The guards may have taken it, although he doubted they knew what it was and he was hoping they at least didn't toss it away.
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Eva and the Doctor had both been unconscious, there wasn't much she could do besides hope, wait and check their vital signs, both of which were fine. Well if you counted two heartbeats as fine, that wasn't exactly an immediate concern though.
Where was Daniel? All the others were here, Vala hoped to God he'd made it off the planet and back to Stacy. Hopefully reinforcements would be imminent, because with these kind of odds, thousands of them and no weapons Stacy was pretty much their only hope. She'd even checked the Doctor's pockets for his green light thingy tool, so unless she was picking a lock with a hair grip - which really only worked when there weren't constant Jaffa on guard - for the meantime at least they were stuck.
The Doctor started to stir and Vala stepped down from the ledge that enabled her to see the proceedings through the bars, wincing a little at the pain in her chest where she'd had the pleasure of having her ribs viciously booted.
"Nice to see you awake finally. We might have a bit of a problem on our hands. Sobek has returned." She was still trying to wrack her brain to think if Qetesh had ever had any dealings with anyone called Sobek. The name only rang a very faint bell and she couldn't place it, he'd been obselete since before Qetesh had ever taken her as a host. She really had nothing on him at all.
"How are you feeling? You took a hell of a blow."
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The second is that she notices she's in a cage. A cell, a cage, restraints, whatever - they're all the same. They all exist to rip away the precious freedom she fought so hard and lost so much for.
She gets to her feet before anyone has a chance to help her and runs, full-tilt at the metal bars. She doesn't hesitate before slamming her shoulder into them. The thing about living within your body and yet without it for years, about surviving torture, is that pain doesn't hold the same weight for you as it might others. When the bars don't fold under the force of her body, she wrenches at them with her hands, wraps her mouth around one and bites down until she can feel her molars splintering and splitting, kicks at them with her feet.
She can't be caged. Not now. Not when Daniel needs her to right this wrong, this wrong that can never, ever be completely erased. Not when she's been free for five years.
Her thumbnails snap off and blood dribbles from her mouth as she wrestles with the bars, and she gives a cry of almost animal frustration.
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Vala seems to have caring for the Doctor and Eva in hand, and there's little he can do. There's little she can do, too, but she's already done what she could, and he's grateful to her for it. They've left him his sporran, since there were no obvious bulges to make them think there's anything actually inside now - but he dares not try to rummage through it to see if there was anything that could help them get out. Not with those guards or whatever they were managing to keep a close eye on them even despite the excitement throng that's gathered in the courtyard.
So it's to be waiting, and trying to figure out what's happening. And, well, trying to ignore the Master's presence in the cell with them, but there's very little he can do either, which makes it a little easier than it might have been otherwise. However, when Eva wakes up and flings herself at the bars in a decided lack of concern out of her condition, his eyes widen. Jumping to his feet, he darts through what little space there actually is in the cell with all of them in it and reaches out to try and grab her by the waist and pull her away.
"Eva, come away back! Those bars won't break. Hurting yourself won't change that any."
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The Doctor waking receives all of his attention, however. The Master strolls over, trying not to give away too much eagerness, to stand over the Doctor and Vala. It's difficult; besides the laser screwdriver, those moronic drones have taken all of his Anetrizine. By now his head is pounding, flooded with that persistent rhythm.
"Making friends with the natives already, I see," he grins tightly. He has no doubt in his mind that this is all the Doctor's fault. The other Time Lord and prison cells practically go hand-in-hand.
And then he turns his head, momentarily startled, as Eva makes a run at the bars, his mouth twisting up a little further at the spectacle in something like amusement-- or a strange sort of fondness. His instincts about her were correct after all.
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The Doctor suspected today was a Thursday, somewhere and somewhen. It explained things.
"Sobek? Never heard of him. Her. Possibly him judging from that voice outside." The Doctor multi-tasked, rambling and trying to stand at the same time. He struggled to get to his feet, reaching out so he could use Vala as a human crutch slash support person thing. Oh, that hurt! Lump the size of an egg or three probably. Maybe a black eye in his future. The Doctor unsteadily reached out to pat Vala's hand for reassurance and probably missed. "Had my better days! I'll be fine, just need my feet. Seem to have lost them."
He shot a sidelong frown at the Master, the man grinning like he'd take being imprisoned if it meant he had a front row seat to this. It was somehow surprising he'd been taken prisoner too, though. The Doctor would've thought he'd have the sense to not get captured. Not quite hero material, that man! Wincing, the Doctor heaved himself to his feet with the help of Vala's shoulder, teetered, managed not to trip over Vala and instantly regretted standing up. His head spun. He took a few long seconds to reorient himself, turning to fix a look at the Master.
"We'll just have to explain things to them," the Doctor said to the Master, tilting his chin up defiantly even though he had his own doubts. The roaring of the crowd outside told him that it might take more than an explanation. Easily more than two explanations. "Now then!"
The Doctor wobbled over to Eva and Jamie, doing his best to help him pry the woman off from the bars. She seemed dead set on trying to bite through them, which was fine and all except humans weren't built that way and she was only going to hurt herself going at it like that. Between Jamie and Eva panicking, it was only a matter of time before someone got in the wrong way of Eva's flailing -- in other words, an elbow suddenly found itself smacking into the Doctor's face. He stumbled back, stunned both at elbows in his face (tip: they didn't belong there), and the way that Eva had turned into something like an animal. Truth was he'd never seen her in a state like this. She was another woman entirely now. Trying to ignore the fresh pain all over his face, he went back to trying to pull Eva away from the bars. Maybe between Jamie and him they could get her seated and calmed down.
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Oh. The rest of the crew. She hardly noticed.
She sits up and, exhausted from that frenzy of energy, leans her head on the Doctor's shoulder. The Doctor. It's nice knowing he's here. As aggravating as he is, he's a comforting figure. He's seen things like this before. They both have. "I'm sorry about your face," she murmurs.
Vala and Jamie are decent enough sorts. Not the first people Eva would want by her side in a prison, but then again she hardly knows them. Maybe they're secretly the best-suited for this sort of thing, and she's lucky.
Lucky, right. Right after she flipped her lid and embarrassed herself in front of these relative strangers.
John Smith she is less pleased about. If losing control in front of Jamie and Vala is embarrassing, losing it in front of John is humiliating. They had their little tet-a-tet, before. Now he'll always have the upper hand because he's seen her like this.
She sits up entirely, face eagle-like and pitiless.
"Sobek is Yeerk. Or Goa'uld. Or something like that." She notices that when she speaks, it's like she's just taken an unpleasant trip to the dentist. Her voice sounds distorted, her consonants all round and wobbly, and bringing a hand up to her lips she realizes it's because she hurt herself, really hurt herself there. Blood is oozing from the back of her mouth and she can't seem to close her jaw right. She keeps speaking anyway. "Infested Daniel, obviously. I don't think I have to elaborate on the sort of hell he's in now. Do we have a plan?"
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Luckily Eva decides to cooperate before there's too much more damage, apart from the Doctor getting elbowed upside the head and and what she's done to herself already. He reaches up to where his neckerchief is and starts to undo the knot keeping it in place. He doesn't have the silver slider on today, which means it takes him a little longer to get the thing undone before he can hand it over to her.
He nearly drops it as she mentions Daniel being infested, eyes going wide briefly before he manages to recover at least somewhat. They've got to get out of here, but how? Flicking a glance at the guards, he looks them over for a moment, trying to assess the situation. It doesn't look good.
"We've got to get to him somehow, but I'll not fancy our chances at doing so while we're stuck like this. How much do ye think the guards understand what we're saying? Whatever they're speaking makes no sense to me at all."
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"They're dumb as bricks," he says dismissively, shooting a pointed look at the Doctor. "No point in explaining anything to them."
He peers at Eva and Vala in turn, curious. "What do you know about this Sobek, exactly?"
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And here he'd been thinking Eva was the last human alive prone to panic.
He gives her an awkward pat on her shoulder with his free hand, the other one still cupping his nose and what with how his whole face hurts, it occurs to him that maybe he needs to regenerate with more hands next time because he's already running out of them. The news about Daniel explains all sorts of things, though, right up there the question of where that other human had turned up to. The Doctor doesn't know much about the Goa'uld, but he's heard enough about the Yeerks from Tom to get a good picture about what that means. Infested and trapped in his own body. Like his own little personal Pandorica, only instead of just sitting there for all time stuck with yourself, there's a parasite moving itself in without even a "May I".
(Also, Master, lovely to see you're as helpful as ever, because they haven't quite established just how much the locals can understand them) The Doctor shoots the other Time Lord one of those frowns that apparently only his best enemy can get out of him, his eyes narrowing over his hand. The Master has a bad habit of saying aloud all the dark little thoughts that everyone in the cell probably had as well but aren't willing to admit, even to themselves.
The Doctor included. His mouth settles into a line.
He's the first to break eye contact from the Master, still frowning away behind his palm. "What about removing a Goa'uld from its host?" he asks, since the Master had to go turn around and do the practical thing and ask a good question.
He tries to slide his hand away from Eva's shoulder so he can check his pockets for his sonic. Jamie's there to help him support the woman and he's grateful that for every Master being so -- so infuriatingly complicated that there's also a Jamie McCrimmon. Jamie's rock-solid and what's more, he's had plenty of experience being tossed in and out of cells with him too. The Doctor tries to give off an air that he knows precisely what they need to do, how they need to do it, and that it's only a matter of time before they escape. It's a bit of a multi-part Thing, really! Pretend you know how to rescue Daniel and the rest of the crew, Eneesh's bugs included, and maybe you can fool the others into believing it too.
Hopefully Eva and Vala can shed some light on this. Despite all the species he's run into, this is new to him. Even if he could find his sonic, he doesn't know what setting to use and aiming at Daniel on Shuffle means he could accidentally kill him.
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Unfortunately the plan thus far was to come up with a plan. Well it was a start at least, no use in getting all desperado just yet. With any luck this Sobek wouldn't see them as anything worth worrying himself over and whatever indiscretion they'd committed would go forgotten about now that they were safely in custody. That gave them time.
That was her state of mind until Eva told them what happened though. The news that the Goa'uld was using Daniel's body though was enough to strip away that layer of logical self control. There was no surge of anger though, no scream or throwing herself at the bars. Vala simply backed away slowly into the corner of the cell, letting the devastating news try and reach some part of her mind that might accept it as reality.
"They're speaking an ancient Goa'uld dialect," Vala replied in response to Jamie when he spoke about the guards. Her voice didn't have the enthusiastic self confident tone to it that he was used to, quietly croaking out the words underneath a veil of thinly restrained emotion and hatred for the Goa'uld. "I'm only getting every few words."
There was no easy extraction process, these things wound themselves intricately into the spinal chord and brain stem of their victims. "Any attempts to remove Sobek without the Tok'ra will result in Daniel's death." There was very little in Vala's expression, she simply stared blankly ahead. There wasn't any pain in her ribs anymore, there wasn't anything.
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"His death would probably be a mercy," Eva says. "Our efforts shouldn't be on saving Daniel. They should be on eliminating the Goa'uld threat. If Daniel's collateral, or if any of us are collateral, so be it. That's a fate worse than death, to be a host. Many times worse."
Hopefully someone else will ask what the Tok'ra is. Eva would, but she's pondering the value of saving Daniel at all. She knows, logically, that his life needn't be over. And yet she's lived the hell of recovering from being a host and it hardly seems like much of apology to offer Daniel. Here, Daniel, we saved you from being a host, now welcome to the life of waking hell that is the aftermath.
She's only alive because she's too stubborn to die, after all.
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Okay, so maybe he's not the best at getting the pronunciation down exactly right when it comes to saying new words he doesn't understand. But given the conversation it should hopefully be close enough that Vala'll understand what he meant by it. He turns that same puzzled expression towards the Doctor, who more than anyone would be used to that particular quirk of Jamie's.
"Have ye heard of something like that, Doctor?"
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"I'm afraid nobody's answered my question," he reminds them. "What is a Goa'uld?"
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"I'm all for eliminating the Goa'uld, but he's strong and he can survive this and come out of the other side. And don't even try to tell me about being a host to one. What would you know? I've been one. Seven years."
The confession came flooding out with little forethought, it was reactionary and far too emotional a subject for her to brush over with ease. "Obviously dislocating your jaw on metal bars is a much better plan, though. Let's all try it shall we?"
Vala couldn't help herself, she was the only one here that seemed to even have a clue about the Goa'uld, and it was Daniel who'd been infested, her Daniel. Vala was on the edge of breaking down herself. She needed to calm down and think.
"They're a parasitic race who enter through the throat or neck of a human host and wrap themselves around the brain stem and spinal chord. They take control of the body, but leave your mind intact. They're sadistic and power hungry and will stop at nothing. Their 'god' powers are from a substance in their bloodstream called naquadah, it's a powerful energy source that is used to activate their weapons and healing devices. The Tok'ra are a race of similar symbiotes that choose willing hosts and live in unison, they can sedate the Goa'uld for extraction stopping it killing its host."
"There. Everybody up to speed now? Good. Maybe we can actually think about how the hell to get out of this mess then."
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Obviously they're all a little tense. Granted, they're all in a prison. And one of their own has been turned into a slave. They have reason, but it won't get them anywhere.
And yet Eva wants to lunge at Vala and rip her face off over the implication that recovering from infestation is a matter of strength. It isn't strength. Eva has - Eva had, once upon a time - strength and will to spare. It wasn't her strength that let her down. It was everything else.
"I never said Daniel has to die, so stop putting words in my mouth. I don't think it could take much more damage." She unfolds the kerchief and inspects the blood on it, out of something to do besides glare at Vala rather than out of actual interest. "But the greater threat is that the Goa'uld are here. We can't afford to turn this into a rescue mission if it comes at the cost of loosing them on more innocents than they already have been."
But she is listening to what Vala tells them. "This naquadah, is there a way to neutralize it?"
Sorry it's short guys. :( I can write gud today?
Still, he's not quite sure what to do with two human women who are suddenly giving those looks at each other and they both have perfectly good points, to make it difficult. The Doctor nurses his nose and looks back and forth from Vala to Eva to Vala again, and finally at Jamie. Naturally the human assumes he's seen everything and anything and all the stuff in between in the galaxy.
Which might be closer to the mark if they were back in his home universe. The Doctor shakes his head, almost reluctantly.
"No, Jamie." He veers back to the subject of the Goa'uld. "You mentioned sedation. How do the Tok'ra deliver it? Could paralyzing the Goa'uld let the host take control?"
If he could figure out what setting to use the sonic (once he fished it up again, wherever it had gotten itself lost to this time), maybe there's a chance for Daniel. As far as he knows, this isn't a fixed point in time, which means the human can be saved, one way or another. Preferably without breaking the laws of time.
lol 'short' shut up
Still, his mind is racing, taking in all the possibilities as he turns away, looking out through the bars and tapping his fingers against his thigh. Sedation-- impossible without an effective sedative and the means to introduce it. Neutralization-- same problem. Killing Daniel still seems the most likely to succeed.
"You mentioned healing devices," he turns back to Vala. "How powerful are they?"
In other words, how broken would Daniel's body need to be to kill the host in turn?