Snakepit : A Stargate - Draka Crossover

[NecronLord]

Interesting, serpent guards in Tanith's force? Who's Apophis aligned with?

[iborg]

Merciless
Satria air space, Nautona


The Goau’ld lord known as Tanith rose from his throne and regally walked toward the observation bay. The protective armor cover slid up, uncovering the transparent vision plate and allowing an unobstructed, direct view of the Tollan city. As far as his eyes could see, Goau’ld craft were in control of the sky, and rising smoke dotted the scenery showing the extent of the Jaffas’ ground progress and places where resistance was crushed under plasma fire. It was a vast city, but not a dense one except in the central clusters of high-rise buildings. Habitation districts were generously interspersed with garden belts and parks, waterways and lakes adding their own jewel-like blue-grey glitter in the distance.
The other Hatak’s were visible as well, looming over the metropolis like threatening mountains, occasionally adding the fire of their secondary batteries in support of the Jaffa onslaught.
Yes, this would be a great victory. The proud Tollans, at last falling to his might.
Oh well, he couldn’t have done it without Anubis and the technical improvements the dark lord had gifted to his allies. Of course, Tanith suspected the mysterious Goau’ld ruler kept some under his belt, so to speak. Like the Kull Warriors only he knew how to produce and parceled to his deserving lieutnants. Those incredibly effective soldiers were so powerful, it was a good thing they were so unwaveringly loyal. And maybe it wasn’t such a pity their main birthing facility was turned to molten lava by a surprise Alliance attack, Tanith sometimes reflected. After all, just what would prevent Anubis from using those tightly controlled assets to, say, enforce the continued obedience of his “allies”, whom he treated more like subordinates ?

Heavy boots drummed on the pel’tak’s floor and the immaculately-attired Goau’ld turned aside. Alarm flashed through his mind before he consciously slashed the instinctive reaction. The warrior wearing the serpent-shaped helmet was his own First Prime, he saw as the cumbersome-looking headgear retracted into the soldier’s collar.
Smirking and crossing his arms, he welcomed the newcomer.
“Reetak ! You are bringing good news I gather ?”
“Indeed, my lord,” the scarred fighter bowed curtly, “I have captured the facility controlling this world’s protective barrier. This armor was very useful.” he added, glancing down at his own chest.
“Good. I knew those serpent suits we captured from the fool Apophis would come in handy one day” Tanith commented, and waved away the two guards who had followed Reetak in. “Tell me. Have you captured many prisoners ?”
A satisfied grin answered. “Yes, my lord. Among which many technical specialists…” he glanced over his shoulder, and extended his arm toward the little group making its entry in the mothership’s bridge area, as if to welcome guests. “And I brought you the Tollan commander, caught alive as she as cowering in fear of our ineluctable victory”

The once-immaculately uniformed Commander Kain was half-carried, half-restrained by two burly Jaffas in serpent gear, two more bringing up the rear with another captive whose attire perplexed the Goau’ld lord momentarily. He frowned. Well, he would undoubtedly get an answer.
As if reading his master’s puzzlement, Reetak commented the arrivals. “The small one was found attached to the other” Understanding dawned in Tanith’s mind, and he rejoined the Jaffa in a jeering chuckle.
“Unbelievable, isn’t it, my lord ? Women commanding warriors - well, no wonder they folded so fast before us !”
“Indeed, Reetak. Didn’t I tell you how decadent and weak the Tollans were ? See how I was right !”
Tanith approached the uniformed woman, looking at her haughtily. Her escorts had forced her to kneel down, and he remarked that she seemed to favor one leg over the other, trying her best not to wince and show pain. To his delight, the captive avoided his gaze, keeping her eyes away and down. He glanced aside at Reetak. “I see she already learnt some proper manners”
The Prime’s grin became harder. “I gave her a personal lesson during the trip, my lord. A much needed one, I may say. Obviously the women of this world don’t know their proper place.” He made a tutting noise in reproach. “No respectable Jaffa woman would be so bold and insolent” Lip curling in disgust, he almost spat out. “And their conduct…” His eyes flitted from the tamed officer to the half-naked girl behind, who hadn’t needed any obedience lesson. She had shown proper fear from the get-go as she was manhandled out of the captured underground fortress and into the waiting transport, flinching away from her captors’ touch. No doubt she had expected to be raped here and now !
Well, it was too bad they were in a hurry to report back to lord Tanith.

Kain felt strong fingers grip her chin and force her head up. Wincing in pain from the bruises on her face, she gathered the courage to look directly at her captor, trying not to appear too belligerent doing so. Her eyes met the Goau’ld’s, and his flashed the characteristic gold radiance of the parasitic species.
A male distorted voice, unnaturally deep and resonant, addressed her in perfect Tollan.
“I am the god Tanith. Learn to bow before me as your lord and master”
Fuck you, Kain wanted to say. Instead, she merely avoided his gaze, keeping her lips tightly pressed together. Besides, opening her mouth hurt. The none-too-gentle handling and numerous cuffs she had received at the hand of the brutal Jaffa had made her lips rather bloody and tumefied.
The alien lord’s face towering above her smirked as if in anticipation. The voice spoke again.
“I see your hidden defiance, woman. Perhaps it is commendable. I don’t doubt you feel loyal to your misguided leadership. But” he paused, looking at the beleaguered city beyond the transparent bay “resistance is futile, as you personally have experienced today. Your worlds will fall one after the other. This one” he tapped his foot on the deck as if to designate the ground below “is already under my thrall, and your pitiful army won’t be able to do anything about it.”

He began to walk to and fro, glancing aside at the kneeling Tollan, projecting godly assurance. Kain’s eyes followed him from under her lowered brow.
“It is time to submit. It is your people’s only chance. They will surrender and serve me if they want to live.” His voice became flat and forbidding. “Else, they will die. Every last Tollan man, woman and child will burn alive as my divine wrath consumes their cities.”
A pause, to let the threat sink in. His manner turned less rigid, more conciliating, he flicked his wrist dismissively. “But, you see, I can be merciful.” He smiled at the kneeling woman.
“If you truly want to help your people, then you will help me.”
Here we are, the commander thought.
“You see, I didn’t want your facility destroyed.” His grin became wider. “In fact, I expected the shield to remain active. After all, my ships are already in position here.”
Kain wanted to curse herself. She should have thought of this ! The active shield prevented the Tollan vessels to get in, but the Ha’taks were sitting safely inside !
“My warriors have captured this planet’s primary power generation facility as well. No doubt, studying it will yield benefits for me and my associates” A working zero-point field powertap was worth the whole operation alone. “Therefore, I only need your code to be in full command of the global forcescreen. Oh yes, your biometric signature was child play to reproduce. I am a god, am I not ?” The trailing snigger grated the woman’s ears. She looked up blankly.
“You will give me your encryption key. I could probably divine it, but it would take some time and annoy me. You don’t want me to get annoyed, do you, woman ?”
I want to you to die in hell, asshole.
Seconds ticked away without a sound.
“I see. Then we will do it the hard way. Hard for you, naturally” Crystalline laughter echoed on the gold-plated walls.

The Tollan commander did a mental double-take when the Goaul’d didn’t halt in front of her, but instead behind. Her Jaffa wardens pulled her up and pivoted her to face Tanith and the other prisoner.
The Goau’ld’s right hand rose, light glimmering on the gold-and-platinum ribbon device coating his palm and fingers. Savian’s eyes opened wide, her pretty features contorted in abject terror.
“Please no please I don’t know anything oh please…” Tanith ignored the frantic whimpers, glancing instead at Kain.
“Are you going to let your lover suffer this agony ?” he asked maliciously.
The Tollan woman’s blood-crusted cheeks turned away. She couldn’t stand to watch this, and she couldn’t betray her secrets. She fought back the urge to leap up and tear the arrogant bastard’s throat. In her weakened state, she wouldn’t even budge the grip of her two guardians.
The girl’s imploring eyes welled with fresh tears as her silent plea was seemingly ignored by the woman she loved. A loud sob shook her shoulders.

Tanith briefly rolled his eyes, and thought-commanded the hand-device to activate. The familiar rich yellow-orange glow sprang from the bejeweled palm, bathing the Tollan female’s forehead. The arcane flux of radiant pain penetrated her skull, reaching her brain and artificially inducing excruciating torment. Radiance seemed to escape from her eyes and mouth, opened wide now and screaming hoarsely. Her body tensed and shook uncontrollably under the Jaffas’ binding pressure, as whirling scalpels danced like a tornado in her head and arrowed along every nerve of her body, forcing out any thought or perception other than pure, refined pain.
Her voice died out even, ragged nightmarish rasps coming in shaking fits from her throat.
Then the pain was cut, the sudden interruption almost overpowering her blanked out mind and sending her into catatonia. Her head lolled on her chest, dribbing saliva stretching to the sweat-drench fabric clinging to her rapidly-heaving chest. Her entire form hung limp with only the Jaffas’ hands under her armpits for support, and a pungent smell wafted from the puddle of urine soaking the floor under her.
The warriors remained impassible, accustomed as they were to the stink they encountered so often on a battlefield. Tanith feigned a small grimace of disgust.

“Not very resilient, the little slut” he commented in a calculated insulting tone. He made a sweeping glance at the Jaffas. “See ? What does it say of Tollan men, when little wimpy things like this have to take another woman as lover ?”
The warriors all grinned and chuckled, relishing the moment of familiarity with their god and master.
“What do you have to say…” their lord spat in Kain’s direction “cunt ?”
It took all her remaining self-control not to seethe openly and growl at the tormentor. She continued to look away, determined not to betray any emotion. Of course, Tanith wouldn’t have it. His left hand darted to her neck and twisted her into facing him.
“Nothing ? You would let your precious lover die in such pain and humiliation out of your sense of duty.” He examined her briefly and turned away, grabbing next a handful of the quietly sobbing girl’s hair, lifting her visage toward him. He looked closely, checking her apparent state, and satisfied that she was still able to understand : “Poor little doll. You thought she loved you, didn’t you ? I bet that realizing how little you’re worth to her feels even worse than the pain I just inflicted you.” He relished the spark in her red and swollen eyes. She was realizing indeed. By the primordial waters, he thought, it was so much fun toying with the vulnerable mind of such a weak inferior creature.

“As I said, I can be merciful. I see that killing you wouldn’t make her” he gestured at Kain “any more cooperating. I guess I’ll have to just torture her instead” he sighed loudly. “As to your miserable person” he cocked his head back with even more arrogance “I have no further use for it.”
A wave of his hand, dismissive. Addressing the two Jaffas instead : “Take her back to the holding cell. You may rape her if you want, but do not harm her body permanently. She will be added to this world’s captives to be sold in slavery, when I head back to my capital”.
The two warriors’s scarred and weathered faces split into a wide grin and the leftmost one answered first.
“My lord, you are indeed the most generous !”
Tanith nodded indulgently.
“This is but a small starter. There will be more, much more loot to reward my brave warriors. Now, go !” He waved his hand dismissively. Obediently, the pair of soldiers pulled their charge up and away, dragging her out of the pel’tak.
When they were out of sight, Tanith turned back to the remaining prisoner. His face turned cold and hard.
“Now, whore. You will learn the meaning of pain !”

[iborg]

Rejoice, all you heathen ! Today is Doubleplusgood Edition Update Day !
I just realized I'm more prolific than usual when I'm writing rape and torture scenes. Gosh, what does this say about me ? :rolleyes:



Kain gritted her teeth and prepared mentally for the coming ordeal as best as she could.
It wasn’t enough. After what seemed like an eternity spent drowning in a sea of bone-snapping agony, the vicious light shut off, leaving her quasi-blind and reeling. Clinging to sanity, she felt every fiber of her being torn and excruciatingly sensitive, every motion, even the most minute, an aching after-shock in her limbs. The taste of blood was strong again in her mouth, and she knew she had voided her bowel as well. She didn’t care. She just wanted the pain to leave and never come back, even if it meant her death.
Tanith judiciously chose the moment to destroy this hopeless wish.
“You cannot escape through death. I can ressuscitate you, over and over, and make you wish you were never born. In the meantime, my armies are strengthening my hold on this world. In the end, your defiance means nothing, so you should really spare yourself further suffering.”
He smiled wickedly. “You still have the opportunity to make your future fate easier… if not yours, at least you could spare your lover the fate that’s currently awaiting her. Spending the remainder of her life as sexual relief for brutal men, when she isn’t doing such chores as cleaning up dirty latrines. And breeding many little Jaffas for me !”
The truth of his words bore into Kain’s mind, battering at her will. Savian, sweet gentle Savian… she didn’t deserve such a fate. Yet the commander was still torn between fear, compassion and her sense of duty.
Her Goaul’d captor sensed the turmoil behind the woman’s grimy, weary features, the weakening of her physical and mental strength. She only needed a little more motivation.
He walked to his throne, yet didn’t sit, instead he put his hand on the armrest’s control interface. Accessing the ship’s obedient intelligence, he accessed the network of interior sensors and found the precise area he was interested in.
The pel’tak’s holographic viewer flickered into life, set to display the visual take from the holding cell where the Tollan girl was being detained, and the related soundtrack flooded the room.

Kain flinched as she recognized what was happening. She pressed her eyes shut, but the afterimage of Savian’s denuded body splayed under the metal-clad bulk of a Jaffa lingered in her vision, and she couldn’t prevent her ears from hearing the cries and supplications mixed with moans of pain and anguished sobs. Even more disgusting were the male grunts of pleasure coming from the scene.
Tears of sorrow and pity welled up in the corner of her eyes. Almost against her conscious will, her mouth opened awkwardly and her slurred voice asked for mercy.
“St-stop t-this !”
“Only you can make it stop, commander” Tanith whispered back, bent close to her ear.
She flinched again, unable to control her feeling of distress, her mental defenses weakened by the brutal torture session. Her neck bent even lower, as if to shield her face from sight, hiding her shame behind the loose curtain of her hair. She let out the fatal secret in a broken voice, one Tollan letter and number after another, the last ones in a barely audible murmur.
The Goau’ld straightened up and repeated the sequence aloud. The mothership’s central computer core translated it, using the conversion programs specially installed before the invasion, and sent a subspace signal to the remote terminal waiting under Vanitas Peak, grafted onto the Tollan control circuits by a Kull Warrior. The Goaul’d databomb inserted its forged signal into the Tollan logic stream, fooling it into thinking Commander Kain was physically present and inputing her code. As soon as it was entirely injected and authenticated, control of the shield emitter was released from lock, the outsmarted Tollan computer believing it had just done its duty.

On Merciless’ bridge, a feedback message flashed on a secondary screen, confirming that, as of now, Tanith was fully in control of the planet’s primary line of defense.
Elated, he turned back to Kain’s prostrate form.
“Well, you just helped me save some of my precious time,” he smiled genially, adding a little flourish with his arm. “I guess I’ll let you live.” Looking from the woman to her wardens, he started to address them. “You can take her out of here…-” He was cut off by Kain’s urgent voice.
“Wait ! You said you would spare her !”
An ominous instant passed as Tanith’s mouth hung open without emitting a sound, and his eyes flashed in anger. “How dare you interrupt me, impudent wench !” He took a step forward, radiating menace, and stopped just short of the slick area of wet floor around the soiled female. Unlike his Jaffas, he didn’t want nor needed to come into contact with the foul piss-coated floor. And it was a good thing the Tollan wore pants too, he reflected.
Cocking back his head, he spoke in the captive’s mother tongue. “Did you think you sluts deserve a preferential treatment ?”
“But… you promised !”
A slow shake of his head. “I did not promise anything. Why would a god make promises to worthless inferior beings such as you ?” He switched to Goau’ld speak.
“Remove this foul worm from my pel’tak. Strip her naked and throw her into a cell.”
The Jaffas nodded. “We obey, my lord !” They hefted the woman up, trying to keep as far as possible from her shit-smelling body, and started to drag her away. As they closed to the bridge’s exit, one of them looked back with an expectant expression. “My lord ! Are we to keep her untouched ?”
Their master’s tongue flickered briefly on his mouth, which curled up minutely.
“Hmmm.” He adopted a thoughtful attitude, left arm folded across his chest, right elbow standing on the supporting forearm, two fingers crossing his lower lip, and appeared to think for a brief moment. Both warriors, as well as the disbelieving Kain, were delightfully suspended at his mouth.
He gave his answer at last.
“You may clean her up and use her as you wish, you and everyone of my warriors, provided of course they aren’t on duty.”
“Thank you, my lord !”
“Oh. And send some servants here to clean up that mess”
“Kree, my lord !”
He smirked mirthfully as he took in the Tollan’s expression of betrayal and furor, and her screams and curses were music to his ears in the time it took the Jaffas to drag her out of sight.




Dante Base, Luna, Solar System
The next day

Anton de Polignac’s mind was blissfully blank. There was nothing like a good round of exercise at the gymnasium followed by a vigorous bodyrub by two pretty serfs. It certainly beat sitting in the conference room listening to the scientists reporting the discoveries they’d made on the latest explored world, a planet that showed no sign of Goau’ld presence and bore the provisional name of Flowersong. One of the eggheads had come up with the slightly poetic name after the scientific team had started to uncover the humanoid inhabitants’ peculiarity. Those had posed no threat whatsoever to the preliminary recon team headed by one Tetrarch Jourdain, who had been adamant on leading an exploratory mission at least once. As she had put it “Ah havn’t joined the bloody Army to babysit yo’ ass, Merach !”
His sensitive ear told him another Draka had entered the massage room. He knew it was a Citizen, for he didn’t actually hear him, instead he heard the unoccupied serfs scurry forward.
He opened an eye just as the lead serf greeted the newcomer. His gaze crossed hers, for it was none other than the tetrarch herself. He made a little salute with his finger, and she stepped to the adjacent massage bed, followed by another pair of attendants, a male and a female, similarly clad in the light thigh-length tunic that constituted their uniform. The Drakensis woman was already disrobed and her skin had the characteristic sheen of time spent in the sauna.

She smiled at him, laying down on her belly.
“Anton, I knew you’d be there”
“You just can’t get enough of my company, eh ?” he answered lightly. “So you left those poor eggheads alone with Thomas, did you ?” he added in mock reproach.
She shrugged, the motion coming strangely in her prone position.
“Bah. Listening to them blabber about how extraordinary it is to discover a species of humanoid beings living in a symbiotic relationship with some oversized plants gets boring fast”
“Well, it is an extraordinary discovery” Anton countered. “Another servant race for the Yoke. And they seem pliable enough.”
“Oh sure, they’re completely passive, yo’ mean. Can’t even leave their precious flowers alone or they die. Just what is the Race supposed to do with ‘em ? We don’t need an entire planet worth of fooking gardeners !”
“Ah, I’m sure the science directorate will find a way for those to serve us. Besides, they might have useful genes”
“If the next genetic mod turns me into a vegetarian I’ll fucking strangle the whole directorate with my treehugging arms !” the woman exclaimed, making her companion laugh in return.

Minutes passed in silence as both Drakas enjoyed the relaxing touch of the massaging hands, rubbing and soothing limbs that were being worked even harder than usual to compensate for Luna’s low gravity. Yet Polignac couldn’t shake the feeling that his fellow woman had something else to say. It was subtle signs that none other than another Drakensis could catch, like the faint off-taste of her natural scent or the way her eyes didn’t look as steady in his presence.
The tetrarch and himself had been having casual sex for a long time, and by no mean was it exclusive, but he’d been suspecting a deeper interest from her lately. Not that he minded ; Jourdain was attractive and smart - of course every Drakensis was - and he did fancy her, he had to be honest with himself. And there was the biological urge to procreate firmly set in the New Race’s genome by their parents. He’d felt it more insistent lately, and she had to, as well. Danger seemed to sharpen that particular instinct, and while they’d been successful so far, both were conscious that they stood at the Domination’s frontline against the threats lurking in the galaxy.
“Anything you’d like to tell me, Alex ?” he decided to incite her into coming out.
He knew he’d been on spot when she couldn’t refrain a tight rueful smile.
“That’s unnaturally perceptive of you, Anton” she gently mocked. As he made up a pained expression, she sighed softly and gazed squarely at him.
“Oh well… the worst thing you can do is say no, so…” she inhaled firmly.
“I want to have a baby, and I want you to be the father.”

Her statement produced a fleeting pause that affected everything in the room, from the stroking hands to Anton’s breathing.
“Ooooh.” He exhaled slowly, his face blank, and caught the expectant look in Alexandra Jourdain’s features. “Well…” he broke into a smile. “I wouldn’t mind producing an addition to the Race. I suppose you’re going to use a surrogate ?”
“Of course, I wouldn’t interrupt my duties here, if that’s what you mean”
Polignac’s arm extended, and his hand met the woman’s. Fingers able to bend steel joined and squeezed in unison.
“So be it.”
As both Drakas united their hands, smiling at each other, the serfs around them grinned joyfully and the male close to Jourdain spoke first.
“Congratulations, Masters !”
A chorus of cheers and good wishes followed, all of them sincere as servi were bred to be, loyal, loving, and obedient. Their enthusiasm was further proven when the three cheerful serf girls boldly spoke the same question at the same time.
“Mistress, do you have a brooder already ?”
More laughs followed, shared by servus and Drakensis alike.
They died out when the urgent beeping of Anton’s personal com-unit started. Frowning lightly, he reached out and brought it close to his face.
“Polignac here. What is it ?”
The voice of the duty officer at Command Central rose up from the device.
“Merarch, we have a situation”
Anton turned on his side, propping hiself on his right elbow, alertness replacing the smile on his face.
“Tell me”
“It’s Abydos, sir. They have just received a message from the Tollan. One of their planets is being invaded by the Goaul’d… and they’re asking for our help.”

[iborg]

Update day.

Chapter 16
Between Charybdis and Scylla

Satria Central Districts
Nautona, Tollan Empire

“Cenor, I’m so afraid !”
In the dark gloom of the emergency shelter, lit only by feeble glowstrips, forms huddled in clumps, silent but for low whispers and occasional louder sobs and curses. The Goau’ld invasion had torn the Satrian urbanites from their sunny pleasant day-to-day life, the sirens and public alert messages throwing surprised and distressed crowds into a mad scramble for shelter from the aerial bombardments and ground assaults. It was a testimony to the Tollan society’s sense of order that the city didn’t devolve into mass anarchy, yet this had perhaps more to do with the haste to reach a safe refuge and fear of the Jaffa onslaught than any innate civic sense.
It was even worse, for large parts of the intricate civil administration responsible for the daily upholding of law, order and safety in any civilized society were already gone, burning or blown to bits by plasma fire. There didn’t seem to be any semblance of organized resistance, instead isolated clumps of armed civilians and law enforcement personnel tried to hold onto whatever hasty improvised defensive position they could find, and whenever their resistance held up the Jaffa advance for an significant amount of time, air strikes came in, strafing runs by Death Gliders swooping from above and soaring again, leaving burning wreckage and scattered limbs behind them.

The Tollan city was rapidly falling house by house, block by block, park by park, under Tanith’s rule, and it didn’t look like anything could oppose the fact. Certainly not the fleet assets orbiting helplessly above, unable to breach the planetary shield even if they wanted to. Besides, the rampaging squadrons of fast attack craft left behind by the Ha’taks still roamed at large in the system, attacking isolated installations and ships and retreating whenever Tollan gunships attempted to close in.
Worse, picket sensors in other Tollan systems reported other Goaul’d incursions, none of them by capital ships, and systematically hypering away when detected, but the threat was obvious. The enemy was keeping the Imperial forces under pressure, forcing them to keep naval assets scattered in local defensive postures.
But the civilians gathered inside the shelter didn’t know any of this. They only knew that their fairly orderly routine had been brutally interrupted, and that their lives were in mortal danger. It wasn’t a pleasant realization when you grew up in a modern, safe and affluent society where most violence consisted in private disputes gone sour or rowdy drunk sports fans.

The young woman who had just spoken her fears sat in a corner of the low vaulted subterranean bunker, a centuries-old relic of the pre-Unification era, when old separate states still occasionally warred over the newly-colonized planet. It had been a very long time indeed since the grey-painted bunker had welcomed refugees inside its cool walls, its presence only remembered through the bright and regularly maintained emergency notice panel standing over the thick outer doors set in the basement wall of an old commercial building. Civil regulations had forced the successive owners to maintain it and keep it accessible as well as clearly indicated, and they had done so, despite their believing that it was an antiquated and useless necessity.
Now the building’s owner silently blessed the forethought. When the attack had come, he had rushed down to open the shelter, then instructed his personnel to guide the store’s patrons toward safety. He was rather proud of their professionalism : they had prevented the onset of panic, and channeled everyone down in a short amount of time. A few more people had rushed in, passerbys caught in the street far from their homes or jobs ; then he had sealed the bunker’s two sets of doors, the upper one and the thicker, heavier one at the bottom of the access stair.

Now they all waited. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a datanet port, and radio waves didn’t penetrate down there. They were cut off from information, their only link to what was happening outside being the faint artificial tremors felt through the tough concrete floor. Those were in no way reassuring.
Nevertheless, the young man going by the name of Cenor tried to comfort his girlfriend, hugging her tightly. Her head was buried against his chest, he could smell the familiar scent of flowers from her regular shampoo. He bent down a gave her blonde hair a soft kiss, hugging her tighter. Her warmth radiated straight into his body, and that somehow made it easier to support the precariousness of their situation.
He patted the back of her head. “Don’t worry, Natylis. Everything will be fine, I’m sure”
in truth, he was sure of nothing. The mere thought that a Goau’ld invasion could actually happen on a Tollan core world was profoundly unsettling. Such an event was considered impossible… right before it happened. Could anything be certain any more ?
Someone else voiced his latent question.
“I can’t believe this is all happening. Where’s the Navy ? Why aren’t they doing their job ?”
The man’s tone was angry and upset. He clearly didn’t understand how the powerful Tollan navy could let them down.
The landlord tried to placate him, answering from the other corner of the room, aloud but in a conciliating voice, intended for everyone, not only for the well-dressed middle-aged man who had just spoken.
“I’m sure they are doing their best. We must remember that the Goau’ld are very powerful and have a large empire… they could throw more ships and men at us than we have to defend ourselves”
“Oh come on ! Why didn’t they do it long before then ? I’ll tell you : someone in the government made a mistake, and we’re all going to pay for it as usual !”

Murmurs and muted rumbles of agreement answered from the shelter’s denizens. Words of “treason” and “incompetence” sounded from several places, and the rumor increased as others offered counter-arguments and declarations of support for the Tollan leadership. Old fractures started to reappear, ideological divides almost forgotten during peacetime. Now that danger was close, discord reared its ugly head again.
“Fucking imperialists” spat a thin old woman, features hard in a narrow face, white hair held neatly in a pleated bun. She elaborated as her neighbors turned toward her. “Nautona was free before the Empire came with their ships and threw my people under their rule !” A moment of silence followed as everyone else took in her appearance. She wore the green and red colors of the Nautona Freedom Party, the fringe movement claiming the right for conquered world to secede from the Empire. The movement had been strong in the past, plunging its roots in the local resistance toward Unification, back when the newly coalesced nation-states of Tolla, united at last after a long period of conquest and political maneuvering, had expanded their rule to the neighbouring colony worlds. None of those had taken well to the sudden tighter integration used as they were to managing their own affairs without much outside interference.
While peace and abundance progressively won over the younger generations to Imperial rule, helped in that by the Franchise granting everyone full citizen status, old grief and resentment remained festering among some of the elders, usually muted but for the NFP’s political activism.

“Oh please, do you really think the Goaul’d would have respected an independent Nautona’s sovereignty ?” the first middle-aged speaker shot back. “If so then you’re a damn fool !”
“Fool yourself,” the elderly opponent hissed in return “all of you Tollan-lovers and collaborators…-” she was cut off by and angry retort.
“Shut your mouth, you old hag ! People like you should be the first to face the Jaffas if you’re so hot about you fucking independance !”
The landlord leapt with surprising speed, pushing himself between the two opponents as they both stood up and made it toward each other. He spoke loud and authoritatively, eyeing both of them in turn.
“Now stop this, damn it ! We don’t need that sort of behaviour, here and now ! If you intend to pick a fight then by the star elders I’ll throw both of you out and you’ll finish your argument outside !”
He glared at them, and after a few seconds, both turned away and sat back in ponderous silence.



Tollania, Capital of the Tollan Homeworld
The Curia Building

An emergency meeting was convened as soon as word of Tanith’s invasion attempt reached the Empire government body. The eleven elected councilors were all present (in three cases, their holographic projection, transmitted by secure encrypted subspace com) around the semi-circular table, almost overwhelmed by the foreboding tactical plot shown in the central holotank displaying the malignant gold-coded Goau’ld presence in the Nautona system. Secondary holowindows hung around, their geometry appearing the same way to every councilor, the charts and figures they contained drove home, in their dry mathematical way, the appalling extent of the Tollan lmilitary and civilian losses in-system.
By now everyone who could had evacuated, the fleeing refugee ships escorted by ITN vessels up to the hyperlimit where they punched a course straight to the Home System. That left millions trapped on Nautona’s surface, in cities and towns invested by Jaffa shock infantry. The remaining naval forces were unable to do anything, for Tanith had somehow gained control of the planetary defense grid. Not only did the global shield protect the almost-landed Ha’taks, but in addition subverted surviving ion batteries had taken potshots at friendly Tollan ships, crippling a heavy cruiser and damaging two destroyers before the rest pulled away.
Even Disceia, the command station, had to be evacuated preemptively, though for some reason the enemy left it alone.
In short, it was a disaster, the worst in Tollan history.

Information was locked down so far, as the subspace intersystem transmitters were government-controlled, but sooner or later someone would wonder why Nautonian addresses didn’t respond to queries and requests on the global datanet.
Besides, the first refugee ships would arrive in no later than two days, their slower civilian-spec hyperdrives granting that much respite. There was no realistic hope of preventing news of Nautona’s fall from disseminating once they made realspace transit on the well-traveled system hyperlimit. Which meant the imperial leadership had two days at most to retake Nautona… or at least find some positive news to offset the predictable public outcry.
Not to mention save their Curia seats. Already the atmosphere had gone sour with political recrimination and accusations. One hawk-stance councilor had almost gleefully thrown at his colleagues from across the political divide their past opposition to an increase of the naval procurement and research budget. The money had gone instead to social funds and artistic grants.
He was still ranting away, in a jubilant accusative “I-told-you-so” tone, unfazed by the cries of foul play coming from the opposite side of the U-shaped bench, and buoyed by applause and supporting shouts by his associates. It was a good thing Curia emergency sessions were not broadcast live, the council’s senior member and de jure chairman decided, mulling over the choices he had. On one hand, he rather approved of the speaker’s argument. In his own opinion, the Empire had been too complacent in the past decades. But then how could they have justified a larger military allotment, when the last Goau’ld incursion had happened almost half a century ago and Tollan hardware had proven itself time and time again able to destroy a Ha’tak in barely more than one shot ?
It had all seemed so sensible to reduce public expenditure instead, and focus it on public works and projects.

Of course, now all those glittering schools, lavishly equipped hospitals, immaculately manicured parks and high-standing urban developments seemed to stand at the mercy of some Goau’ld bastard with a god complex, a lasting grudge and access to much-improved technology.
Eventually the elder elected took a deep breath under his neatly-trimmed white beard, and grabbed the red-painted handle of the silencer field. He exhaled and pulled the small lever, activating the chamber’s active sound-suppression system. At once, the din subsided. The speaker’s mouth continued to work for a couple of seconds before he realized no sound was produced, and then he looked at the raised seat at the head of the U-table. He was followed by everyone else. The Curia president waited as every pair of eyes in the room turned to his direction, then released the lever and began to speak.
“Please, fellow councilors…” he made a face like a schoolteacher berating rowdy pupils “will we cease this kind of nonsense ? We are in a difficult time and Tolla needs us to show strength and unity of purpose, not fruitless bickering !”
He paused, taking the time to stare everyone in turn. The previous speaker shrugged apologetically and sat down.
“Now, I don’t want to hear any more recriminations. The past is the past, what is done is done and cannot be unmade…” he shook himself mentally. He needed to keep his tendency to verbal flourish under control. “I want to hear serious constructive proposals. We owe it to our fellow citizens, first of all the beleaguered inhabitants of Nautona !”

A rumble of approval echoed around the table, then the previously ranting official raised his hand.
“Councilor Damoros of Demarchoi” the presiding one acknowledged “The Curia recognizes you.”
The man rose up, made a curt bow and began to speak in a serious but non-confrontational tone.
“Elder Lata-Berim, fellow Councilors” he nodded left and right “as I needn’t tell you, the situation is grave indeed.” He made a sweeping gesture at the holotank. “Tanith’s forces have secured control of the planet Nautona and its defense grid, and driven away our space squadrons. His Jaffa infantry has an ever-expanding foothold ground-side and what remains of our military on-planet is in no-position to contest them the battlefield. Furthermore, the civilian population is at Tanith’s mercy, and we can expect him to use them as hostages against a space-borne assault. Not that we could even mount one as long as the global shield’s operating under his control.”
“Yes, yes, we know all that” the opposition leader interrupted dryly. “My contacts in the admiralty told me they’re assembling an expeditionary force even as we speak, though.”

Damoros nodded at the immaculately dressed grey-haired female across the chamber, granting her the validity of her remark, and made a narrow, grim smile.
“Of course, of course, Councilor Lomarr. I happen to have the same information” the unspoken subtext being whatever links you have in the military, mine are tighter “but we all know that our ground force doesn’t have the training and equipment to deal with such an unprecedented situation. Especially since our previous ace card was rendered inoperative.” He let the fact sink in, and nobody tried to contest it. “Therefore, our soldiers will inevitably suffer heavy losses -if they even find a way to Nautona’s soil, because none of our ships can cross the planetary shield !”
“I’m sure they will find a way” the female councilor asserted, but her voice was lower and her tone lacked firmness.
Her colleague made a grim chuckle, shaking his head. “No, we can’t be sure - the only thing we can be sure of, is this : for the first time in our past history, were are outclassed and outplayed by the Goaul’d. We need help”

His last statement sparked another bout of skeptical commenting and arguing around the table, but this time it died out without any need to use the silencer field.
“And just who do you propose we ask for help, my dear friend ?” Lomarr asked with a hint of sarcasm. “Surely not the Nox, I gather ?” A few snickers welcomed her quip. The other man remained impassible.
“Asking the Nox for help is about as useful as pissing in the Trantsch sea to color it yellow” he answered undiplomatically, the slang expression not exactly belonging to the dignified Curia chamber. The Trantsch sea was a popular holiday location with its sandy tropical islands and its clear blue waters were famed around the Empire.
“No. As you certainly know, we have made contact recently with a newly-discovered human power…”
“Oh” Lomarr mouthed almost dismissively “you mean those Drak-something…”
“The Domination of the Draka” Damoros pronounced the foreign words without hesitation.
“Yes, the Dra-ka” the female politician repeated, the unfamiliar syllables sounding exotic in her mouth. “How could they help us ? According to the Diplomatic Service, they don’t even have FTL ships”
A controlled smile welcomed her observation.
“My estimed lady, you must have skimmed the report if that’s all you retained from it” a hand rose placatingly before she could make an angry retort “the military attache to the delegation we sent came back with a very rather different estimation of their military capability.” He glanced at the Lata-Berim. “If I may call up the relevant documentation ?”
“You may, Councilor”

Damoros used his personal flatboard to replace the Nautona system schematic with excerpts from the Draka mission report. Text scrolled down in the air, flanked by illustrative pictures and videos. He was pleased to see his colleagues gape at the looming shapes rotating with photonic-created reality.
“Just… what is this beast ?” a wide-eyed Lomarr uttered at last.
The other councilor smirked. “This” his arm swept at the battle-armored ghouloon “is a genetically-engineered shock trooper created by the Domination. Bigger, faster, stronger, more resilient than any Jaffa. Its armor can take multiple staff weapon hits and if it runs out of rifle ammunition, it can simply tear enemies apart with its bare hands. The Drakas have entire regiments of them.”
He called up another item, a two-dimensional video which, from its quality and occasional stuttering, had to come from a headset recording. It showed what was obviously a sparring room, similar to the ones used on Tolla by martial arts practitioners. In the middle of it, two… people stood face to face, dressed in black bodygloves that didn’t conceal any line and curve of their anatomy. Low gasps were heard among the councilors as they realized the fighters were female… inhumanly fit and muscular ones, although they exhibited a panther’s graceful, flowing strength rather than the bulky mass of iron-pumpers.
Then mouths hung open in stunned silence as the standing shapes abruptly dissolved in a blur of barely-discernible strikes and counter-strikes, holds and counter-holds, faster than anyone had the right to be.

“Tell me this is sped-up footage” Lomarr asked to no-one in particular, though Damoros answered her. “No, it isn’t. And they’re not pulling their punches either”
“Great mother” another councilor cried out as a lightning-fast kick connected with an unprotected solar plexus, throwing its target to slam in the far wall and ending the fight. “She should be dead !” he added as the defeated woman stood up, wincing only slightly and rubbing her sharply delineated abdominal muscles, clearly more upset at having lost the match than from any physical discomfort. Both combatants exchanged what sounded like guttural words then clasped forearms. As they half glided half walked out of the sparring mat, the camera turned away and focused on a man in a Tollan Ground Force commander’s uniform who was quietly conferring with another, much taller and whose body-structure clearly marked him as belonging to the same people as the female fighters. His uniform was grey, less form-fitting than the sparring garment yet plainly revealing his athletic chest and upper arms. The video then froze.
“These are the people who made our Goau’ld friend Bar’shan prisoner after he tried to attack one of their planets, then utterly annihilated his palace and remaining Jaffa army, saving one of our men in the process” the Tollan councilor added.
“Did they ? That’s…” his counterpart trailed out, still mesmerized by the incredibly hunky alien soldier.
“That was in the classified report as well” Damoros mischievously completed.

Another Curia member rose up. “Who says they’ll want to help us ? And… at what price ?” he inquired aloud, drawing a buzz of assent. “I know that Intelligence isn’t so utterly enthusiastic about those Draka”
“Bah ! I assume you’re alluding to Director Tresim, don’t you ?“ Damoros received a blank expression in return, and went on nevertheless. “He’s a professional paranoiac… as befits his position, naturally,” other chuckles echoed his own slightly condescending smile “but I think that we should look at the immediate benefits, especially in this grave hour” he finished in a concerned voice, cutting off the last derisive comments as all turned dead serious again.
The other man didn’t desist, though.
“Yet Tresim was right when he warned us about the need to be wary about the Goau’ld.”
“Well, Intel has been saying that for what, centuries ?” the Demarchoi-born councilor retorted. “They still failed to predict their sudden and recent progress.”
His interlocutor half nodded, half shook his head and sat down, conceding the point, and Damoros pressed on. “We need to contact the Draka and find out if they can provide assistance. We need to do it soon, for every passing hour means more of our fellow Tollan dead or under Goau’ld servitude !”
A chorus of assent sounded around the table, and the decision was made to send another delegation to Abydos, without delay.
In the Curia’s defense, little did they know back then that one breed of servitude could hide another.

[iborg]

Dante Base, Complex A, Conference Room
Solar System


Although the waiting room was bright and painted in light cheerful tones, the three Tollan representatives were far from feeling comfortable. There was an easy explanation, of course. The circumstances under which they had left Tollania were gloomy at best, and there was no certainty that their request would receive a favorable answer. After all, one didn’t willingly pick a fight with the System Lords if they could help it, and it wasn’t like Tollan-Draka relations were so old and tight that the latter would automatically find it in their interest to help the former. However, the urgency of the circumstances had driven the Curia to allow generous concessions in the balance.
Still. Sitting under the gaze of several stone-faced Drakas made each delegate feel like the proverbial bird in the cage, with the hungry housecat outside watching and licking its chops expectantly.
Eventually, they had finished their presentation. A few questions came their way, which they answered as well as they could, and eventually they were invited to wait in a nearby salon, under the attentive care of a serf attendant who managed to offer them adequate refreshments, despite the language barrier. The Tollans didn’t try to pursue a conversation anyway, even though the steward was alone with them. He merely stood, making himself busy behind a small bar and humming along discreetly. The only distractions were the paintings scattered on the walls and the spacecraft models presented in glass cases.

At last, the door slid open again and the familiar face of Daniel Jackson leaned in, his expression nigh impenetrable.
“Please follow me. His Excellence the Archon wishes to express his decision.”
Wordlessly, the three delegates put down their glasses and sat up, then left the waiting room one after another. The found the conference table just as they’d left it. The wall screens were still displaying the high-ranking Drakas who were remotely taking part in the meeting. The imperial legate tried to make out any sign, positive or negative, in their bearing and expression, and failed. When a Draka put on his game face, he reflected, there was really nothing left to divine.
Once they had all rejoined their seats, Jackson leant forward and flexed his fingers. The resulting crack sounded loud and sharp. Polignac merely sat straight, arms crossed on his chest.
“I will translate for you” the civilian said, then every face turned to the far wall as Eric von Schrakenberg began to talk. The Tollans were not fluent enough in their hosts’ language to understand the words or inflexions, and his piercing gaze didn’t betray his meaning either. They had to wait until he finished his speech and the doctor translated in precise Goaul’d, finally allowing a faint smile to crease his lips.
“The Archon says your request has been carefully examined, and the Domination of the Draka is prepared to give a favorable answer.”
As air escaped their mouth, every Tollan realized they had been holding their breath. They continued to listen, as their interpreter elaborated.
“There are three conditions to be met. One, pertaining to technological transfers.”
Agathes tensed unconsciously.
“We expect the Tollan Empire to accept every item of the exchange agreement that was already under negociation before this day. That is, the immediate transfer of all theoretical and practical knowledge in the fields of subspace applications, gravity manipulation, faster-than-light travel, materials science, computing theory, and nanotechnology. On our side, we guarantee the delivery of the medical technology we already agreed to provide, related mainly to life extension, organic regeneration, and cancer treatment”.

The Tollan negotiator exhaled quietly. Those terms were actually more reasonable than he feared. And there was nothing about phase shifting - granted, that particular item had never figured on any document submitted to the Drakas. Still, never before had the Empire considered such a comprehensive knowledge grant. In previous occurences, the partner had been either roughly equal, or clearly inferior, therefore dictating much more limited exchanges.
On the other hand, never before had a Core World been invaded successfully.
He nodded slowly to the image of Archon von Schrakenberg. At least this gesture meant the same thing in both cultures, and the distant man took the signal to continue, Daniel Jackson translating afterwards.
“Two, related to military operations aimed at fighting off the Goau’ld invasion and retaking Nautona.”
This time, it was Commander Katallax’ turn to open his ears wider.
“Ground-side operations will be placed under sole authority of a Citizen Force commander. Space-borne operations will be directed by a joint Tollan-Domination command staff, with the Domination side being the ultimate decisional authority. Citizen Space Force liaison personnel will be detached on Tollan warships as needed.”
Part of Katallax’ mind started to scream in outrage. How could those upstarts have the pretention to give orders to the Imperial Navy, on its own turf to boot ? The perceived affront to Tollan sovereignty and the disparaging assessment of Tollan military efficiency the Draka demand constituted, grated his sense of pride and patriotism. But then they had a point, his analytical sense countered. And given how the Drakas were under no compulsion to bleed for a Tollan world, yet seriously envisaged to do so… well he couldn’t blame them for ensuring their blood would be spent in the best possible fashion.

“Third” Daniel Jackson followed another declaration by the Archon, “The Domination will have priority salvage rights on Goau’ld hardware, not to mention Goau’ld and Jaffa prisoners in the Nautona system. To this effect, Domination military and technical personnel will be granted unrestricted access to the planet and surrounding space after the Goau’ld presence has been fully removed.”
Elledia fought back the urge to whistle and raise an eyebrow. The last Drakan demand could after all be construed as the right to occupy a Tollan world. As she mulled over the implications, Daniel Jackson made a good-natured grin, translating the last sentence.
“Naturally, whatever insight we may gain from this would be shared with Tollan authorities”
This was obviously intended to sweeten the deal, she thought.
Now, every pair of eyes turned to Legate Agathes, who appeared to reflect on the Drakan proposal. Ultimately, he would give the Empire’s answer, as empowered by the Curia, for time was of the essence and they felt they couldn’t afford a delay in reaching an agreement. It was slightly reckless, Elledia felt. She really wasn’t comfortable with the fact that the Empire was forced to act with such urgency, dealing with a recently discovered foreign power whose ulterior motivations were not yet fully clear, apart from the obvious need to fend off the threat from the System Lords.
On the other hand, as her eyes inadvertently found and met the Draka scholar’s, and she felt a familiar warm tingle between her legs, at least it would give her more opportunities to… learn more.

“On behalf of the Tollan Curia, I accept those conditions” Agathes enunciated.
Katallax’ jaw twitched. Elledia exhaled. The Drakas broke their stone mask and allowed themselves to smile in what the foreign delegates hoped was a display of friendliness, and not something else, more sinister. A fleeting picture of herself, bound and naked and her neck bearing a serf tattoo flashed through the Tollan woman’s mind, so fast she had trouble deciding if the idea appalled or aroused her. She decided not to delve on this train of thought.
Well, here we are, was Katallax’ point of view. I hope we won’t have to regret this later.


Satria Central Districts
Nautona, Tollan Empire

Hours had passed. The time between tremors had stretched. It seemed that the fighting was abating, as far as the people could tell inside the underground bomb shelter. The question in everyone’s mind, of course, was whether it meant the invasion had been repulsed, or the city had fallen.
With no line of communication to the surface, they had no way of finding out, lest they cracked the door open and took a peek outside. So far, nobody was quite impatient enough to try.
At least they had water, and sanitary facilities inside the shelter, something every refugee was thankful for. Left with nothing to do, some were playing games on their wristcoms, others were napping, propped themselves as comfortably as they could on the hard wall.
Cenor cradled the head of his girlfriend on his lap, cushioning her sleep and stroking the soft hair gently like they used to do on the grass-covered, sun-drenched grounds of the Satrian Academy of Arts where they were both students, living the carefree life of sheltered, cherished youth in a peaceful, progressive world. The Goau’ld invasion had fallen like a hammer, shattering the dream-like insouciance and brutally reminding them of the grim dangers looming in the universe-at-large. Whatever happened, Cenor realized, they would never again feel totally secure in the cushy sentiment of Tollan superiority, like they used to without even realizing it before this day. The fall of innocence, he smiled grimly, thinking that is would make a great title for a poem to be written about this fateful date.

Another hour went by in the dark. Then there was a shock and a rumble and everyone woke up at once.
“What was that ?”
The question echoed in several mouths, but none had an answer to provide. As if cued by some sixth sense of inmminent danger, gazes converged on the bunker’s entrance. The steel door was almost invisible, set inside a recess at the end of the short access corridor.
No sound came through, yet Cenor couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something on the other side. Natylis was awake now, and she whispered, pressing his arm urgently.
“What’s happening ? Is anyone coming ?”
The young man diverted his gaze from the distant doorway to the wide blue eyes who were looking up at him, as if begging for reassurance. He mustered the most soothing smile he was able to conjure, and tenderly traced the wide sensual arc of her lips with a finger.
“Shhhh. I’m sure it’s nothing, my love”
“Are you s-”
Her question was cut short by a loud resounding boom whose provenance couldn’t be mistaken. Someone was knocking on the door, and not too gently either.
Cenor felt the pressure on his arm increase sharply and cursed his powerlessness at dispelling the young woman’s fears. Worse, he realized he was sweating despite the cool temperature inside the shelter.

Boom.
Boom.
Something wafted to the refugees’ nostrils. The smell of burnt paint. Curses and expletives followed as they realized the access corridor’s walls were faintly illuminated by an orange glow, whose cause became apparent a short moment later. The steel door’s inner face shone a hellish bloom, and heat radiated from it, the closest men and women could feel it on their skin.
The steel plate protecting the shelter’s entrance had never been designed to withstand plasma. The metal reddened and lost its hardness, bubbling and deforming. A couple more hits and molten matter splashed out, leaving a heat-blurred hole in the thick panel where the locking mechanism used to be.
Hearts froze inside the underground chamber. The newly created orifice let exterior noise in, the sound of beating feet and harsh voices.
They weren’t Tollan, Cenor realized with cold dread. His companions of infortune had reached the same conclusion, and they crowded hurriedly at the far end of the bunker, away from the door, just before it flew open with a resounding clang.
Like creatures unleashed from some nightmare, grey-armored Jaffas poured in, staff weapons crackling with barely-restrained energies, shouting harsh frenzied warcries under the petrified Tollan gazes. A woman started to shriek in protest as a warrior grabbed a handful of her hair and yanked her up ; a man close to her was beaten with fists and boots as he tried to rise ; then everything devolved into a frenzy of hysterical shouting and screaming. Cenor watched in frozen dread the building owner stand up and try to interpose himself, shouting at the lead Jaffas with flailing empty hands, only to stagger back with a smoking scorched hole in his chest and collapse to the floor with a look of horrified pain, clutching his spilling intestines in the time it took his eyes to glaze away, his dying form already hidden by the stampeding feet of the warriors coming for the rest of the civilians, and right then the young man felt panic, clutching Natylis desperately and shielding her face with an arm that felt so pathetically weak against the brutal onslaught.

Nothing had prepared him for this, his mind protested, it was unfair !
Thinking became moot as the grey tide reached the couple, and stronger hands than his gripped and pulled, tearing the two lovers apart as they called out each other’s name. The Tollan student glimpsed Natylis as she was dragged away by two Jaffas, she was still shouting his name when his eyes were abruptly cut off from her cherished form by a descending flurry of kicks that forced him to curl up on the floor in protective reflex, trying to spare his head and ribs from the gleeful beating.
The battering didn’t go on for more than a dozen heartbeats, and he cautiously reopened his eyes. His assailants were now administering their tender mercies to another unlucky fellow, and he strangely felt thankful for that, and guilty, for he wished they would keep beating the other man and leave him alone.
He searched the pandemonium for Natylis, and found her several paces away, and his heart and mind sank brutally. She was trying to fight off the grip of a warrior pinning her arms behind her, twisting and bucking madly, yet her efforts came to naught as two strong hands took hold of her embroidered dress and ripped the delicate fabric apart, scattering torn silver fasteners that clinked on the hard floor. She yelped as the hands assaulted her flesh, squeezing the firm white globes and twisting viciously the pink areolae that Cenor remembered kissing adoringly the previous night.

Natylis spat at the Jaffa’s bald leering face, her usual gentle expression turned to a mask of hateful rage that her partner didn’t recognize. The Tollan youth flinched as the warrior replied with a wide sweeping slap that left a baleful red welt on her fair skin, yet didn’t faze her struggle or cut off the flow of verbal abuse coming from her mouth as the alien soldier tore off the last shred of fabric and fully exposed her pristine nudity to every watching eye, although to Cenor’s almost relief, everyone else seemed far too busy to care. The Jaffas were already beginning to push and shove people away and out of the shelter, hitting those who stumbled or didn’t hasten enough. Other women were being dragged away in various states of undress, men were bleeding and limping, eyes were blackened and swollen.
Cenor shook himself out of his dazed state. Nobody seemed to be paying attention to him right now, how could he cower flat on the ground while the woman he loved was subjected to this ? He bit his lip in self-disgust. It didn’t matter if the warriors killed him, he could never live with the memory of his betrayal if he didn’t attempt to save Natylis. Then conscious thought was replaced by reflexive rage as his vision witnessed the Jaffa’s filthy grime-encrusted finger roughly violate Natylis’ blonde-fuzzed intimacy, drawing a high-pitched shriek from her throat and a greasy laugh from the brutes.
His limbs tensed under him and he prepared himself to leap up, baring his teeth instinctively.

A fraction of a second before he sprang, a heavy boot slammed down on his back, smashing him flat on the floor. The leaden weight pinned him down and the hard tip of a staff weapon was jammed at the base of his skull. A Jaffa voice shouted down at him, and Cenor understood the rude words, having learnt the Goau’ld language in secondary like the majority of Tollan students.
“Stay here, little worm !”
The young man’s fists closed in helpless frustration, driving the nails deep in the skin of his palms, wishing the pain, anything, to take his mind out from this nightmarish reality ; and he wept burning tears of dismay, grinding his torn lips on the rough concrete floor.
No, no, no !
He didn’t dare look again. The sound was enough, so like her and so unlike her at the same time, like a grotesque parody of her familiar lovesong. The mesmerizingly cruel tune kept hypnotizing him and he didn’t move, almost didn’t notice the hands rifling through his person, removing his wristcom, identification and currency cards, even the earbuds he used to listen to his favorite music. Nothing remained but one obsessive thought swirling inside his mind.
This is just a bad dream. I’m going to wake up. This is just a bad dream...

[1234q1234q]

Hopefully the Domination and there subhuman solders will commit enough atrocities in the battle and occupation that the Tollans will be shocked into going to a full war economy. The Tollans will have some time to respond even with the transfer of Tollan knowledge it will take time to develop the industry needed to build a war fleet. The permanent Domination occupation will only be able to steal the garrison fleet which still leaves the balance of power temporally in the hands of the Tollan.

Provided that the Tollans are wise enough to quarantine and fully test their first genetic test subjects, they just might make it out of this story with half of their planets and government intact. Of course if they are truly wise they will sell (or “accidentally” leak) out the Domination and let the Goau’ld kill off most of them.

[NecronLord]

It's obvious that the Draka have their phonomenal luck here, too. So, yeah, I doubt the Tollan will smarten up in time. If they did, it would be trivial for them to annihilate earth. Open the gate, send (IIRC, the Draka don't have an Iris yet, even if they do, phase it) one of their reactors through rigged to blow.

Not only would Luna be destroyed, neighboring planets, let alone Earth, would be rendered uninhabitable.

[iborg]

It's obvious that the Draka have their phonomenal luck here, too. So, yeah, I doubt the Tollan will smarten up in time. If they did, it would be trivial for them to annihilate earth. Open the gate, send (IIRC, the Draka don't have an Iris yet, even if they do, phase it) one of their reactors through rigged to blow.

Not only would Luna be destroyed, neighboring planets, let alone Earth, would be rendered uninhabitable.

Too bad the place will be littered with abandoned or trashed Goau'ld hardware. Remember Point Three ?
The Draka are lucky... so far, otherwise it would be a short story.
BTW, Tollan zero-point generators work basically on the same principles as a ZPM, but they're monkey models. Hence they're the size of a Soviet "factory" with an output that's only enough to blow up a planet, not an entire star system

[NecronLord]

It's obvious that the Draka have their phonomenal luck here, too. So, yeah, I doubt the Tollan will smarten up in time. If they did, it would be trivial for them to annihilate earth. Open the gate, send (IIRC, the Draka don't have an Iris yet, even if they do, phase it) one of their reactors through rigged to blow.

Not only would Luna be destroyed, neighboring planets, let alone Earth, would be rendered uninhabitable.

Too bad the place will be littered with abandoned or trashed Goau'ld hardware. Remember Point Three ?
The Draka are lucky... so far, otherwise it would be a short story.
BTW, Tollan zero-point generators work basically on the same principles as a ZPM, but they're monkey models. Hence they're the size of a Soviet "factory" with an output that's only enough to blow up a planet, not an entire star system

If you're interested, the 'deutrocanonical' (which is to say, supposedly canon but later contradicted in small ways, and later lost the license) Stargate RPG said that the power source in question was a small cylinder device that fitted into a backpack (this was acutally before a ZPM appeared on screen) using a technological two-stage process which peformed fission on some kind of fuel source (needn't be radioactive to liberate energy, and it needn't actually liberate energy anyway, the fuel is not stated except that it's as good as free, but could be oxygen or something). Unfortunately, the statistics are highly contradictory, but yeah, they think it's a backpack sized device.

That said, these Tollans seem much less advanced than the canonical ones (all the warring in their history, perhaps). As Niam correctly summises, penetrating Anubis' shield technology would be something they could do in weeks. An all out attack by the Tollan using the weapons Tanith had them construct, would probably decimate the Goa'uld empire. Any attack that didn't keep them under-thumb continously after defeating their ion cannons would simply result in them upgrading to phase missiles.

Similarly, the fact that these ones want a cure for cancer demonstrates far inferior medical technology. The canon Tollan supposedly had something equivalent to the sarcophagus. The only way to reconcile Omac's death with their first appearance is to assume it's not used for natural death (presumably due to the psychosis of repeated uses) which Omac's appeared to be, or that Omac had some kind of 'don't revive me' living will (or they said that he did). They outright say that death isn't a problem for them, and ask the primitives to not save them in the first one.

[Simon_Jester]

Too bad the place will be littered with abandoned or trashed Goau'ld hardware. Remember Point Three ?
The Draka are lucky... so far, otherwise it would be a short story.

If the Draka weren't lucky they wouldn't exist at all. Their very survival past the World Wars (let alone world conquest) depends so much on the strategic idiocy of their enemies that the ability to induce stupidity in foreigners is practically a canonical ability if you're going to write the Draka Stirling-style rather than Drakafic-style.

[iborg]

Dante Base, Conference Room
Solar System

“So there’s no way to go through the shield unless you’re in hyperspace, yo’ telling us”
Katallax shook his head.
“Pity our prototype Goau’ld-pattern hyperdrive’s still months away from completion at the earliest. Although really, I can’t believe you didn’t try to improve yours during all that time !”
The Imperials winced at the Merarch’s observation. In retrospect, it looked like more complacency. The Tollan-designed FTL drive worked and seemed enough given the volume of space they usually operated in, and getting an intact Goau’ld drive from a destroyed Ha’tak was an iffy proposition. The only other possible source for a ready-to-install engine was the Hebridean Republic, and they’d steadfastly said no.
There was also a political reason for the apparent lack of motivation to develop a better model. The Empire was a large entity, and contained heterogenous elements in addition to the fringe ones that plagued any developed society. The idea that anyone with access to a FTL-enabled spaceship could emerge right on top of a populated planet with almost zero reaction time from the authorities just wasn’t palatable, especially with the Ghijian Crater marking the site of the biggest terror attack in Tollan history, when a Seritan separatist group had flown an intrasystem tugboat straight down on what was, at the time, the capital of a big pre-Unification state. The huge scar and the eight million victims had since been brandished under the public eye whenever the Navy or some research institute had timidly talked about a better, faster hyperdrive.

Elsewhere, the Domination’s war machine rumbled to life, at least the parts that weren’t currently engaged in the Pacification campaign. Messages were sent to various Space Force officers, ordering them to report on Luna ASAP. The starry blackness was lit by titanic forces as pulse drives came to life, boosting ships on least-time trajectories to Cislunar space, while on Earth Citizen and reserve Janissary legions went to high alert, anticipating movement orders. Equipment and ammunition was checked and rechecked, troops were briefed on the latest intelligence concerning the Goaul’d and Jaffa, and officers made sure to emphasize the fact that, this time, there should be no indiscriminate raping and looting, “unless they could put the blame on the Jaffas”.
On more than one occasion, the statement was answered by a half-serious “what if we kill the witnesses ?”, to which the reply was “not if there are too many”. Quick courses in the Tollan language were given to Citizen soldiers, while ghouloons were merely told the essentials, including the fact that Tollan civilians were absolutly not to be eaten. Especially children. Those were to be protected in priority, and delivered to medical personnel “for humanitarian purposes”.
Special care was given to the symbiote threat, and the need to wear collar protection at all times, as well as watch prisoners and civilians for signs of Goaul’d infection. Military doctors demonstrated the recently-developed medical telemetry upgrades installed on infantry armor. Normally, the biosign readings of a symbiote latching onto a soldier’s nervous system would trigger an alert and warn the rest of his unit along with the chain of command. The precaution was expected to prevent Goaul’d possession, and it worked well enough according to the tests done by the Bioscience Directorate.

In the meantime, someone had to find a way to bypass the shield issue. This was proving to be the main hurdle.
“Could we steal a Goau’ld ship somewhere ?”
Katallax made a skeptical moue. “Outside a System Lord’s capital world, there’s no guarantee to find one in time, and attacking those would be suicidal”
The physically present Drakas exchanged a glance meaning suicidal for you, maybe.
“Besides” the Tollan went on “even if by chance we got hold of a Ha’tak somewhere,” his lips curled in derision at the preposterous notion “trying to fight off Tanith’s ships in Nautona’s airspace would be devastating for the planet’s population and infrastructure !”
Polignac was sorely tempted to mutter “too bad”, but kept it for himself. The Tollan had a point. And their Goau’ld enemy had no less than ten motherships laying around.
Therefore, this particular idea had to be ruled out.
“You said Tanith brought a stargate along, yes ?”
The imperial officer turned to the wall screen where the question had come from. Framed in the display was the raven-tressed Arch-Strategos Schneider, whom Katallax had learned commanded the Domination’s space navy. Given the technological gap, she might have been an age of sail wet-navy admiral trying to wrap her mind around the tridimensional, infinite line of sight characteristics of space combat in the Tollan’s professional opinion, but she did seem to have a sharp mind. Not that it surprised him by now.

“Indeed, according to the few reports we have received from surviving military personnel ground-side. He’s using it to bring more occupation troops and send away captured civilians -” his voice caught momentarily “-likely into extra-planetary slavery.”
A moment of silence trailed his sentence.
“Well, this gives us a way of entry” Schneider observed matter-of-factly.
“That’s all well and good, and we can even compute the gate address since we know its current location, but there’s the small matter of the Jaffa legions camping around !”
Polignac waved his hand dismissively.
“Bah ! Jaffas aren’t the problem. As soon as we have a secure beachhead, mopping up those morons will be easy” and we’ll spend ghouloons to do it anyway “the problem is, those motherships have to be neutralized before we can properly roll over the Jaffas” he finished seriously. “And there are six of them in Satria alone, which is a substantial force.”
“So we draw some away” Schneider picked up.
“And just how do you mean to achieve this ?” Katallax voiced up, half curious half skeptical.
“Well, that’s easy. We attack somewhere else.”

The three Tollans repressed snorts, but their disbelief had to be obvious, for Schneider raised an eyebrow and cocked her head.
“Your own intelligence says that Tanith cannot have a lot more than those ten motherships. On the other hand, your navy still has powerful reserves. We need to find a place Tanith has to defend.”
“You can’t be serious ! You’re proposing to send our fleet, the only thing standing between the Goau’ld and the rest of our worlds, on some wild chase in the hope that maybe Tanith will dispatch away some of his ships ?” Agathes blurted.
The Drakas remained unfazed.
“Yes.” Polignac leaned forward, hard eyes boring at the legate’s. “We have a saying here : defensive strategies are for fools !” He continued in a precisely enunciated and forceful voice. “If you’re not willing to take risks, you’re bound to lose everything ! Right now you’re shitting your pants in fear of this Goau’ld, and it needs to stop right now, otherwise we,” he made a sweeping gesture at the Draka side of the table “are not going to follow your sinking boat !”
He didn’t wait a reply from the astounded delegates, instead driving his argument deeper in a calmer voice. He could smell the whiffs of fear. His own pheromonal control had slipped slightly during his tirade and as a result, the three Tollans looked rather unsettled.
Good, he decided. They needed the shock.

“Besides, we do have our own intel source, as you know. Among other things, Bar’shan gave us coordinates for many worlds held by his fellow Goaul’d, including Tanith. We can crosscheck those with your own data, but there’s this,” he fiddled with the touch-sensitive interface of the table. Data appeared mirrored on the far wall display, shrinking the windows containing the teleconferencing heads. Strings of gate symbols were overlaid on a zoomed-in galactic map, marking Tanith’s presumed planetary possessions. Katallax’ eyes flitted to the scale marker and made a quick estimate. The closest was located no more than four days of travel at military speed. His heart leapt. Yes, this idea might possibly work…! Although not in time before the first Nautonan refugees arrived. Oh well, the Curia would just have to deal with the flak.
He heard the Draka officer’s voice and forced his attention back to the room.
“A combined assault from space and through the stargate on one of those worlds would be just the kind of threat that Tanith couldn’t ignore” Anton was saying. “The ground side we can manage ourselves, and keep in mind that it would be a raid, not an invasion, although it has to look serious enough that our Goau’ld enemy has to detach forces from Nautona.”
Agathes started to beam.
“Yes, yes !” he chimed in excitedly. “This is a great idea, don’t you think, Commander ?”
Katallax returned the diplomat’s hopeful stare, and he felt a smile crack his lips at last.
“It could work, yes. ” Then he shook his head minutely. “But it won’t rid us of every Ha’tak, and it’s going to be a temporary respite at best. No more than three or four hours until the vessels sent to counter our diversion are back”
“Then we’ll have to make the most of our window of opportunity.” Polignac commented.
“Well, gents, now that we have the outlines of a plan, let’s start going over the details” Arch-Strategos Schneider concluded. “There’s a lot to do.”


Goaul’d-held planet Lak’nor’te
52 hours later

Millions of years ago, at the height of the Gate-Builders’ civilization, they had strived to facilitate and encourage the spread of life across the galaxy, mapping and adding habitable planets and moons to the expanding network of stargates. It wasn’t enough, and whenever their probes encountered a celestial body whose orbital characteristics made liquid water possible, it was registered so that years, centuries, even millenia later (for the Gate-Builders thought of the long term) one of the huge roving terraforming vessels that were so similar to their city-ships in size and configuration, but solely dedicated to remaking a world’s environment into one that could sustain and feed the spark of life, would arrive and accomplish their mega-scale landscaping task. It would convert the atmospheric mix to a breathable one, create seas and oceans, then seed them with the proto-life that would evolve and keep sustaining the nascent biosphere. Depending on the initial conditions, the process could be further advanced, following a standard template that attempted to match the Avalon model - the first planet colonized by the Gate-Builders’ ancestors when they reached the Milky Way.

This titanic process lasted almost a million years, before the vast roaming ships were called off. Many more worlds now existed to welcome sentient life and the Gate-Builders’ collective felt it was enough. They sat back and watched their creation grow, and dismantled the demiurgical machines, converting them into more flying cities to accomodate their expanding numbers.
The rest, as they say, was history, albeit long forgotten by the time the Ancestors’ long-removed progeny spread their wings through the starry void. Nobody remembered the gigantic life-bearing vessels, and the memory of their creators became myth and legends telling of exceptional beings wielding unique power.

One of those planets was rediscovered many, many eons later, by the then-expanding Goau’ld empire. It was found to hold small but valuable deposits of the elements that were the building bricks of advanced technology, and a hospitable if somewhat arid environment. Its first owner named it Lak’nor’te after the way its sun appeared to blaze red through the dust-laden atmosphere. Slaves were brought in to work the mines until the easy-to-reach layers were exhausted, then the workforce was rounded up and sent to another conquered world with untapped resources. The planet was left alone, fading into oblivion, its name all but forgotten.
Until Tanith’s expanding dominion reached it years ago, looking for neighboring resource-rich worlds. On that matter he was disappointed. Eventually, Lak’nor’te’s only value laid in its location, about half-way to the Tollan Empire’s outer reaches. Passing ships could replenish their stores of consumables and Jaffas could ring down for a quick ground-side jaunt.
Therefore, it was only lightly-occupied. A small fortified compound housed a hundred warriors, a set of transport rings and an automated subspace sensor array to warn of opening hyper windows, on top of a dry shrub-covered hill overlooking a rocky sea shore. It was a fairly boring place, all things considered, with the only distraction afforded by the nearby sea. Swimming wasn’t practical because of the vicious currents and jagged rocks, but fishing was bountiful and afforded both a past time and a welcome dietary supplement for the garrison.

As a precaution, two staff cannons were set in sand-walled emplacements, each located a stone-throw from the stargate so as to provide enfilading fire against invading warriors. Both positions were linked by a trench where more Jaffas could hold the line with staff guns. There was even another trench connecting the fieldwork to the main housing block, itself enjoying a commanding view of the Chappai behind thick rock walls.
As far as Tanith’s Jaffas were concerned, it was a fairly strong defensive position and it would hold at bay anything less than a massive and determined attack by counterparts serving a rival god. There was even a special magic to undo the Tollan usurpators’ trickery.
Unfortunately for them, it wasn’t other Jaffas that came this time, nor Tollan soldiers.

It was minight local time. Most of the garrison were sleeping, but a strong guard was enforced. The cannons were manned, the Chappai and the area surrounding it were lit by burning torches, and a dozen Jaffas were sitting in the trench, meditating or playing games with small animal bones to pass the time. Really, they couldn’t be blamed for a lack of vigilance. Indeed, when the chevrons started to light up one after another, they went to full alert and rang the alarm bell to wake up their sleeping comrades.
The wormhole stabilized under the ready crackling maws of the staff weaponry trained at the blue vertical pool, just as the first awoken warriors jogged out of their accomodation on their way to the dug-in fighting position. More and more came into the open, staff guns pointed in the stargate’s direction.
Ten seconds later, all of them were beginning to feel the sting of impatience as nothing seemed to happen. Maybe it was a false alert ?

Suddenly, something came out, or rather flew out, too fast for the eye to follow or even fully register the shape. One of the cannons opened fire ineffectually, the plasma rounds wasting themselves into the open wormhole then into the night, trying to follow the object’s trajectory as it turned sharply up, using the full maneuvering capability afforded by its vector-thrust booster and aerodynamic control surfaces.
The Jaffas craned their neck to follow the rapidly climbing flame, and squinted to try and see better when the blaze cut off and faint lights seemed to ripple briefly along the thing’s dark flanks. Smaller cylindrical objects fell down unseen in the night, while a dark grey parachute deployed from the powered-off Tactical Interdiction Cluster Missile and slowed its descent to the ground. The infrared camera in the projectile’s nose witnessed the fall of the fourty millimeter anti-personnel submunitions it had just shed off as they each deployed stabilizing fins, scanned the area below for targets, found one and lit their small acceleration motor. Sixty smart grenades arrowed down like shooting stars, leaving their prey no chance to react. Miniature shaped charges intended to pierce cermet personal armor hit unprotected Jaffa heads with predictably spectacular results, splattering the area with brains, blood and bone fragments, and fourty-two headless corpses collapsed onto the ground. The rest of the munitions, having found no warm body to attack, peppered the barracks instead, killing two more warriors but doing no more than cosmetic damage to the structure.

Having expended its deadly cargo, the missile had not finished its task yet. In fact, the cluster rain was merely intended to purge the stargate’s close surroundings from any immediate threats. Its main job was to provide a sensor picture of the area in order to allocate targets for the follow-up strikes, and two heartbeats after the last grenade had impacted, another missile screamed out of the event horizon, the wake of its passage raising swirling vortexes in the dust. The thermobaric version of the tactical missile homed straight and true into the barracks entrance, and the following blast reduced the late Jaffas to charred paste that blew out of the building’s small apertures amidst fire and smoke just before the weakened structure collapsed on itself, thus burying whatever remained of the transport rings and hyperwindow detection gear.
As dust and smoke rose over the destroyed compound, the dead silence was broken again, but this time no more missiles appeared. Instead a squad of ghouloons deployed from the open wormhole in rehearsed fashion, establishing a close-in perimeter, followed by more of their kind who expanded the secured area. As one of the chimerical soldiers approached a decapitated Jaffa’s corpse to check for a live symbiote, the almost-mature snake-like creature leapt out, its instincts telling it to seek a host to invade and control, its senses telling it that the approaching humanoid could provide an adequate puppet for lack of something better.
It was a forlorn chance, the embryonic Goau’ld realized when its dash was interrupted in mid-air, caught by an impossibly fast hand-reflex. The sentient serpentine creature writhed and hissed furiously in the ghouloon’s fist, spitting fury borne from immediate desperation and bloodline-transmitted viciousness, while the genetically-enthralled warbreed examined it with curiosity behind its protective visor. Eventually, the encounter was cut short as two bestially strong arms ripped the fragile shape in two, letting the broken halves stir feebly in the dust and die next to their erstwhile womb.
Elsewhere, short bursts of gunfire told of similar ends, shredding surviving symbiotes inside their cooling pouches or outside, for the arid soil offered no cover against thermal imagery and the soldiers were instructed to take no prisoner.

The wormhole had been active for three minutes when the last comers appeared. Drakensis men and women walked out confidently, even though they weren’t armored but wore instead Space Force uniforms, black and form-fitting, and carried bulky cylindrical bags that contained their deployment kit : vacuum-rated skinsuits, personal weapons, a set of alternate clothing and sundry items, enough for the time they would spend aboard Tollan navy ships.
One of them dropped her bag on the ground, apparently unfazed by the surrounding carnage, and fished out a small Tollan communication device from a side pocket. She raised it to face her blonde-framed face, peered at the screen then drawled out in accented Tollan.
“Traveler to Big Bird, objective secured”
She peered up at the night sky and unfamiliar constellations. An instant later, the reply came loud and clear.
“Traveler, Big Bird here. Transitioning to realspace.”

Millions of kilometers away, where the star’s gravity well became shallow enough to allow the Tollan hyperdrive to generate an exit window, space rippled and pulsed in shades of blue and violet in the visual spectrum, accompanied by a burst of invisible high-energy exotic particles and radiation. Out of the disturbance came the white dagger-shaped form of a Tollan heavy cruiser, immediately followed by more of its kind, a full reinforced squadron, flanked by two flottillas of smaller destroyers, looking like cones flattened on their longitudinal axis and studded with sensor and weapon blisters, gravitic drives flaring brightly with secondary radiation as they accelerated away to their standard screening formation around the bigger ships.
The fifty-ship task force wheeled sunwards and increased speed.
“Big Bird here, on our way, estimated time of arrival four hours”
The Draka spacer acknowledged, then put the Tollan communicator away and produced a Domination-issue encrypted radio. She made a short situation report and signed off. As if on cue, the wormhole dissipated behind them.
“And now we wait” she winked to her companions.

Four hours later, just as announced, shuttles swept down to the planet’s surface, having left the warships in advance and used their superior acceleration to leave the slower vessels behind. It was a time-saving maneuver, intended to spare the fleet from having to decelerate to a relative rest and thus cutting down the time spent in-system.
Augmented Drakensis eyes followed the blazing lines in the upper atmosphere and counted the incoming aerospace transports. Eighteen, amounting to the precise number of waiting officers. One for each heavy cruiser, and each destroyer flagship.
“Freya’s tits, look at the way they’re decelerating !”
“How many gees do you think they’re taking ?” another asked to no-one in particular.
“Ah’d say like fourty or fifty. Amazing what inertial compensation can do, eh ?”
“Ah’ can’t wait until we have something lahk’ that” one Mars-borne and accented female blurted out, summing up what everybody was thinking. This assignment was shaping up to be exciting. Of course, they knew the risk, and casually dismissed it. They were soldiers of the New Race, after all, born for war and danger.
More of a concern was the fact that they would spend at least a week surrounded by ferals who had no idea of their rightful place. Hence why Aerospace Command had selected officers who not only had relevant naval experience, but also showed a higher-than-average ability to behave cordially with serfs and metic citizens, and keep their self-control when antagonized. The group was also briefed in person by Daniel Jackson on Dante Base before they left for Lak’nor’te.
Hopefully they wouldn’t kill any hapless or tactless Tollan out-of-hand.

The shuttles landed smoothly on extended struts, secondary gravitic thrusters kicking up sand and pebbles in concentric waves, and as soon as the first aircraft was stabilized on the ground, a rectangular hatch opened aside on its rounded flank. An Imperial Navy subcommander, two silver bars on his white-jacketed breast, looking dignified with a short neatly trimmed grey beard, appeared and climbed down the extended ladder. Draka and Tollan met halfway between the dormant stargate and the crescent of landed white-painted shuttles and exchanged salutes. Expectant silence followed for the duration of five human and two Drakensis heartbeats as man and woman gauged each other.
“Greetings from the Imperial Tollan Navy” the white uniformed man spoke first, looking up at the tall female. “I’m Subcommander Anthim, Second Officer on the heavy cruiser Majestic.”
Twin emerald eyes gazed back, almost unnerving with their slit-shaped pupils and unnatural steadyness. Their owner’s humanity was however confirmed when they contracted in unison with a small twinkle of her lip, a minute but genuine sign of good-natured warmth, and ITN Majestic’s second in command suddenly found that she was indeed not only stunningly beautiful, but also looked very attractive in a friendly if somewhat standoffish way.
“Pleased to meet you, Subcommander Anthim,” her voice flowed around the Tollan words with almost musical tonality and Anthim realized he listened with rapt attention. She made a small gesture at herself, increasing her smile. “Cohortarch Gwendolyn Ingolfsson, Domination Aerospace Force, executive officer on the Lionheart… well, that was two days ago. Now I’m a liaison officer, detached for the duration of this operation” she finished.
“Well, Cohortarch Ingolfsson, please forgive my rudeness, but we need to hurry. If you and your fellow officers” he waved at the group waiting close by, listening to the exchange “would embark now ?”
“Of course” a curt nod answered, half directed at the Tollan, half at the other Drakas. The group broke into motion, individually making their way to a parked shuttle in quick purposeful strides, and the blonde Cohortarch followed Anthim back to his craft.
A minute later, the eighteen little aerospace transports lifted up and immediately went to maximum thrust on updated return vectors, bringing their predatory cargo to the cold heavens.

[1234q1234q]

So far the Drak have had incredible luck with their pheromones. However, since these ships are closed systems, even a routine examination of the ships environmental systems will show dangerous amounts of foreign particles emanating from their Drak passengers. This is guaranteed to occur sooner or later in the operation, simply because the Drak are incredibly sloppy in using their pheromones. In fact, according to what you have written, pheromonal self control did not even enter the equation in there briefings. As a result they will be spraying pacification and domination pheromones in every room they enter.

[holyknight]

So far the Drak have had incredible luck with their pheromones. However, since these ships are closed systems, even a routine examination of the ships environmental systems will show dangerous amounts of foreign particles emanating from their Drak passengers. This is guaranteed to occur sooner or later in the operation, simply because the Drak are incredibly sloppy in using their pheromones. In fact, according to what you have written, pheromonal self control did not even enter the equation in there briefings. As a result they will be spraying pacification and domination pheromones in every room they enter.

Sadly, that's rather unlikely. As you must have noted, while on what to hard technology refers, the Tollan are very advanced. However, they seem to be very backwards on what to biological sciences refers compared to the Draka, on such a scale, that the idea of Genetic Engineering did shock them indeed. For their sensors to detect the pheromones, they would have TO KNOW what they're searching for first hand. otherwise that's going to be ignored, til when its too late to do anything bout it.

[Simon_Jester]

Sadly, that's rather unlikely. As you must have noted, while on what to hard technology refers, the Tollan are very advanced. However, they seem to be very backwards on what to biological sciences refers compared to the Draka, on such a scale, that the idea of Genetic Engineering did shock them indeed.

The catch is that the Tollans already know their hosts have been modified, and they're going to start wondering why it is that they always seem so eager to agree with drakensis specimens whenever they're in the same room, even when they feel like idiots for agreeing after returning to their own quarters (where the air filtration system is working). They may very well be smart enough to wonder if it's something in the air.

For their sensors to detect the pheromones, they would have TO KNOW what they're searching for first hand. otherwise that's going to be ignored, til when its too late to do anything bout it.

Of course, this being a classical Draka story, people ignoring the Drakas' moves against them till it's too late to do anything is par for the course.

[iborg]

For their sensors to detect the pheromones, they would have TO KNOW what they're searching for first hand. otherwise that's going to be ignored, til when its too late to do anything bout it.

Of course, this being a classical Draka story, people ignoring the Drakas' moves against them till it's too late to do anything is par for the course.

Don't be so sure of that
It's only the beginning of the story !

[[R_H]]

The sentient serpentine creature writhed and hissed furiously in the ghouloon’s fist, spitting fury borne from immediate desperation and bloodline-transmitted viciousness, while the genetically-enthralled warbreed examined it with curiosity behind its protective visor. Eventually, the encounter was cut short as two bestially strong arms ripped the fragile shape in two, letting the broken halves stir feebly in the dust and die next to their erstwhile womb.

No snacking on a nice living baby Snake?

[Coalition]

Dante Base, Conference Room
Solar System
“Indeed, according to the few reports we have received from surviving military personnel ground-side. He’s using it to bring more occupation troops and send away captured civilians -” his voice caught momentarily “-likely into extra-planetary slavery.”

Well, sounds like the Tollans are getting trained for their future jobs as Draka serfs.

Goaul’d-held planet Lak’nor’te
52 hours later
Having expended its deadly cargo, the missile had not finished its task yet. In fact, the cluster rain was merely intended to purge the stargate’s close surroundings from any immediate threats. Its main job was to provide a sensor picture of the area in order to allocate targets for the follow-up strikes, and two heartbeats after the last grenade had impacted, another missile screamed out of the event horizon, the wake of its passage raising swirling vortexes in the dust. The thermobaric version of the tactical missile homed straight and true into the barracks entrance, and the following blast reduced the late Jaffas to charred paste that blew out of the building’s small apertures amidst fire and smoke just before the weakened structure collapsed on itself, thus burying whatever remained of the transport rings and hyperwindow detection gear.

Hopefully follow-up Draka teams are digging that hardware out and taking it back for study.

More of a concern was the fact that they would spend at least a week surrounded by ferals who had no idea of their rightful place. Hence why Aerospace Command had selected officers who not only had relevant naval experience, but also showed a higher-than-average ability to behave cordially with serfs and metic citizens, and keep their self-control when antagonized. The group was also briefed in person by Daniel Jackson on Dante Base before they left for Lak’nor’te.

Week over there for combat training, a few hours of excitement, and a week back. What will a single Draka on board a ship of Tollan who are celebrating a victory b tempted to do for the entire week?

[iborg]

Well... they're gonna poke around.



ITN Task Force Avenger
Goaul’d-Tollan Buffer Zone


Four hours in, four hours out. The Tollan task force didn’t linger in-system, nor did the ghouloon troops on Lak’nor’te’s surface. As soon as the shuttles were up and going, their leader had punched in Abydosian coordinates, and a minute later only the dead remained on the planet. The attackers didn’t bother to hide their traces : it was expected that Tanith would blame the Tollans anyway and at worst retaliate on Nautonan civilians, which would play in the Domination’s hand eventually. As Dominarch Schneider had put it, “the more that Goau’ld mistreats them, the more they’ll welcome us as liberators… and accept anything we ask !”
Two more days. That was the time needed to reach the fleet’s actual target, a world that was both important and closest to the border. It was a gamble : there hadn’t been time to effect much recon, and existing intel was spotty at best, which some of the Tollan officers had vigorously debated, stating that the whole operation was reckless and bound to fail. Others had on the contrary espoused the idea with an enthusiasm borne from sheer frustration at their apparent incapacity to help the Nautonan population. The very thought of counter-attacking at last instead of merely taking the punches and waiting for the next Goau’ld aggression appealed to the more militant Imperials. Eventually, the debate was closed by the Curia’s firm orders to go along with the plan. It allowed the politicians to tell the population that something was being done, without actually revealing exactly what. Both the Drakas and the ITI had judiciously pointed out that Tanith’s bold attack had obviously relied on accurate and up-to-date intel on Nautona-based assets and force dispositions, meaning that he had to have agents operating inside the Tollan borders.
It didn’t have to be an infested official either, and this was very unlikely anyway given the precautions taken against this possibility, but anyone could access the Global Datanet and find non-restricted information.

By the same token, mention of the Drakas was carefully avoided in front of anyone not directly dealing with them. Indeed, Task Force Avenger (as the expeditionary fleet was aptly named) had departed the Home System without even knowing it would swing by Lak’nor’te. This, as well as complementary information about the passengers to be taken, had figured in a sealed order packet that was only opened after the fleet had hypered away, and divulged only to the officers of the ships that would host one of the foreign guests.
Naturally, scuttlebutt had done the rest. Speculation ran rampant among the crews during the first leg of the trip, with bets being taken regarding the identity of the visitors, with most guesses pointing to the Hebrideans, and a few original minds suggesting that the Nox had finally grown a pair of balls and decided to make themselves useful, only to be scoffed at by their fellow sailors.

The shuttle Gwendolyn Ingolfsson was on, stenciled MJ-01 and outfitted as a VIP transport, intended to ferry commanding officers and the occasional civilian official on a ceremonial visit in and out of the prestigious vessel, contained six plushy self-adjusting seats, four of them facing each other with a touch-interactive tablet in-between that could either display images directly on its flat surface or command a holographic projector, but was currently inactive. The passenger compartment was separated from the two-crew cockpit by an airtight bulkhead, and remarkably isolated from noise and vibration, the young Cohortarch reflected. There was another remarkable feature : gravity didn’t fluctuate in the slightest as they left Lak’nor’te’s gravitational field. In effect, it was as if she was sitting in planet-based aircar. It seemed fabulous, and she had to check through the nearby rectangular window that they were actually flying in space.
In fact, the novelty was such that it must have shown on her face, for her Tollan accompaniator picked on it.
“I understand that artificial gravity must seem strange when you’re not used to it” he commented in a tone that sounded friendly enough, although Ingolfsson’s keen perception discerned a trace of… curiosity, not scorn, she decided. She inwardly shrugged off a spontaneous whiff of annoyance at having been caught almost gawking, and promptly composed herself into a blank expression as she turned her attention from the window to the man sitting across her. She briefly considered her answer, tempted to reassert her natural dominance in a rather forceful manner, then banished the instinctual response and clamped down on her pheromonal output. Her inner debate only lasted a fraction of a second, then she made up a discreet pleasant smile.

“Truth be told, it feels unnatural” she answered graciously “I’m not sure I’d like the lack of physical feedback, actually.”
Anthim nodded in agreement. “In fact, I quite agree with you. I started my career flying a gunboat, and back then I used to leave a couple gravity increments of leeway in the inertial compensation,” he spread his hands in illustration “much better feel in my opinion, but this is a personnel shuttle, so its systems are set for maximum comfort” he finished explaining.
A fractional smile told him that it made sense from his guest’s point of view. It encouraged him to keep talking while they were flying towards the fleet.
“Ah, about the little practical aspects of this… visit, we were taken quite by surprise, and unfortunately we couldn’t make arrangements for your presence in advance.”
Gwen merely raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to elaborate.
“Our ships don’t have much spare room for extra crew…” Anthim’s tone became apologetic “so you will have to share the officers’ quarters.” Only he, as Second Officer, and the Captain had individual rooms, and he certainly hadn’t received orders to vacate his, he kept to himself ; instead he went on to explain “you will share an officer’s suite. Of course, this means you will have an enclosed bunk, but will have to share a common recreation room and sanitary facilities with three other crew. Females, naturally. I really apologize for this…” he added with as much sincerity as he could muster, not that he actually cared that much.

He personally didn’t have a preconceived opinion about the foreign passengers they were instructed to host, and he had to admit she was very pleasant on the eyes, but until those newfound allies proved their worth, he didn’t intend to go out of his way to oblige them. At least that’s what he’d thought before he met Cohortarch Ingolfsson, along with most of his colleagues. There was a minority who didn’t take too well the apparent trespassing of what they considered to be their own turf and had therefore expressed doubt, even contempt, for the unknown visitors. In Anthim’s personal opinion, this was exactly the kind of attitude that ended in lost battles and Goau’ld-occupied planets. So he was going to give the Drakas a chance to show their worth.
He had no idea that his counterpart was perceptive enough to pick up the minute hints and signs that he wasn’t even conscious of giving, and thus had a rather good idea of his underlying thoughts. Not that she allowed herself to show it, retaining a tactful, low-key smiling facade.
“No apologies necessary, Subcommander.” she answered politely, underlining her words with a discreet gesture of her hand. “After all, my mission is also intended to gain a better understanding of your people” two can play the game, she smirked inwardly, “and I’m sure that sharing accommodations with fellow Tollan naval personnel will go a long way towards that goal” she flashed a charming smile, accompanied by a burst of seduction-arousal pheromones.

She reveled in the Subcommander’s half-conscious reaction. The Tollans were so human, she mused, watching him flush and respond unknowingly with the scent of his own heightened physical interest. She chose to encourage it playfully, appearing to pick this precise moment to stretch luxuriously on the form-adjusting seat, and caught the man’s eyes flitting of their own accord towards her chest as the suddenly strained fabric clung to
the curve of her breasts. She smiled wider, watching him under her impishly lowered eyelids. He fiddled on his seat, trying to hide his suddenly awoken lust and the beginning of a raging erection, his inner turmoil rather obvious to her. She guessed that he must be cursing his own apparent unprofessional lapse in self-control and feeling ashamed of it. Oh, maybe he was married, how delighting. He seemed to have no clue that he wasn’t to blame for his undignified state. How could he ? It wasn’t like the Tollans had been briefed on Drakensis’ full range of capabilities. Maybe they would eventually find out about the pheromones, Gwendolyn contemplated, if they knew where and how to look. And more importantly, if they lasted long enough to have the opportunity.
As far as she was concerned, the Domination should only support the Empire as long as it was strategically useful. Once the Race had obtained the means to resist Goau’ld might on their own, the Tollans’ usefulness would end. Then the only question would be whether they would fall under the Yoke or be wiped out by Draka, or for that matter Goau’ld, might.

Perhaps fortunately for Subcommander Anthim, the pilot’s voice broke the spell, coolly professional and coming from somewhere in the compartment’s overhead fittings.
“We’re cleared to dock in shuttle bay one, ETA three minutes”
In truth, those three minutes felt like the longest in Anthim’s life, filled with awkward attempts at small talk and crackling sexual tension. At least the cockpit had a separate life support system, and the two pilots remained perfectly oblivious of the lust-saturated atmosphere behind.
At last the passengers felt the muted jolt of docking clamps clasping the shuttle, having watched the blackness of space make way to the brillianly lit white-painted interior of the bay, marred here and there by grille-covered vents, color-coded pipes and wiring bundles all neatly laid out and organized. This at least wasn’t disorienting to the Draka spacer’s eyes.
A small status screen came to life near the compartment’s exit. Gwendolyn peeked at the displayed message.
“The hangar’s not pressurized ?”
Anthim jumped at the opportunity to switch back to his professional mode.
“No, no, as you can see” he blurted out, then made an effort on himself and continued in a more sedate tone “not that it’s technically unfeasible, since an air-tight forcefield can be established when the bay doors are open, but standard practice keeps it depressurized for safety and damage-control reasons.”
“Sensible” the blonde Draka commented succintly, rising out of her seat in preparation for disembarking, and stopping herself in time to avoid bumping her skull on the ceiling. Apparently Tollan shuttles weren’t designed for people her size.
Right on cue, the status message changed to indicate a successful coupling and equalized outside air pressure. Anthim stood up as well, ostensibly flattening the creases of his uniform jacket, and Gwendolyn noticed that he was stooping like her even though he didn’t have to. She didn’t say anything but smiled inwardly. From his posture and body language, she surmised that he was going to visit the head as soon as he was able to.

[iborg]

Small update, but I hadn't written for a week because of work.
Merarch Ingolfsson spends some quality time in Tollan hospitality !:drevil:


ITN Majestic
Task Force Avenger
Tanith’s outer dominions


Gwendolyn Ingolfsson examined her reflection in the full-length mirror of the suite’s common room. At one meter and seventy-six centimeters, she wasn’t the tallest Draka around, but in Tollan society she was a oddity, and towered above the female crewmembers. She angled her face closer and slightly lower in order to peek more closely at her scalp. Barely visible were the reddish hair roots, although she had dyed her mane two week ago. The novelty had greatly aroused Aloïs, she remembered, and she had to admit it gave her a different air… more innocent maybe, if any Draka could be called so. In any case, the closely trimmed red hairs below still showed her true colors.
Satisfied with her head, she peered at her body. Fresh out of the shower (a welcome luxury, she thought, compared to the rather spartan sanitary facilities onboard a Domination cruiser, even a large one), her wet skin reflected ambient light, delineating the Drakensis muscles underlying it and emphasizing her feminine curves. She shifted and lightly scolded herself for the display of vanity, the examined herself critically. Small restrained movements to shape and check the muscles. She didn’t risk losing her tone, but the lack of proper exercising equipment aboard the Tollan cruiser was annoying.
She remembered the first day, after the obligatory tour of the ship (punctuated at each station by a lengthy technical briefing), meeting with her cabinmates, and being told important procedures (mostly related to damage control and emergency evacuation). At the end of the shift, she had longed for some well-earned physical relief, starting with some palestra routines.

As she quickly learned, there was what could charitably be called a gym. Sensor Watch Officer Larian, one of the three crew she was sharing the suite with, had very helpfully brought her to the ship’s physical training area, relegated at the back of the crew quarters. Gwendolyn had barely suppressed a sneer. There was a smattering of off-duty crewmembers working out on machines and benches, and unsurprisingly, the foreign woman instantly recognized what most implements were and how they were supposed to be used. Human physiology being the same on Earth and Tolla, the same needs tended to produce the same tools, she reasoned. Then she had translated the indicated weights and inwardly snorted.

It was a good opportunity to rub the ferals in Draka superiority, and she couldn’t resist showing off. She headed straight to the nearest unoccupied bench, picked up a barbell and loaded it silently with the thickest and heaviest weights she could fit. From her estimation, and under local gravity, it came to approximately two hundred kilograms. Putting the loaded bar onto the supports, she had then stretched a couple times, apparently oblivious to the stares coming from the Tollan crewmembers. She was very conscious of the incredulity mixed with lust : although she kept her pheromones in check this time, her Draka-style working outfit was revealing enough. The black fabric was mostly intended to wipe away moisture and sweat, helping her keep cool during the effort, and the sheer microfiber weren’t exactly concealing.
One enterprising Tollan male, a nice-looking specimen, Ingolfsson noted, came forward like a fish being reeled in, and asked nervously if he could assist, pointing to the heavy weights at the barbell’s extremities. She’d agreed amiably and laid on her back, ignoring, for the time being, the scent of excitation that was very noticeable this close to the Tollan’s crotch.
Then she had gripped the bar and lifted almost effortlessly. From the corner of her eyes, she saw the wide open stares and gasps, and mirthfully proceeded to a long series of push-ups. After fifty, she was starting to feel the weight, but she was used to much heavier routines back in the Domination. In fact, she had broken the two-hundred kilos barrier at seventeen. She could continue all day long if she really wanted to, although if she did she knew her arms and chest would ache mutely for hours afterwards, the time necessary for her enhanced physiology to recover from the exertion.
Not that her witnesses could hope to approach such a feat, she surmised. It was clear from their expressions and whispers - which she could hear clearly enough - that they viewed her as something between “freak” and “goddess”, the latter tremendously titillating her mind.

She stopped at a hundred reps, put the bar back on the supports, and rose up from the bench in a supple flowing motion, nevertheless flashing an apparently unpretentious smile of thanks to the dumbfounded Tollan man. In fact, she confessed that it was rather fun to assess her superiority in that manner rather than through the traditional Draka way of saying “Yo’ undah the Yoke, yo’ serfs ! Obey or meet the stake !”
Of course, that would come later, she thought more soberly. In the meantime, why not indulge in the situation ? She had suddenly realized, back then, that the situation she was experiencing was unlike any her ancestors had gone through. Here were… ferals, sure, but she was free to behave around them without the century-old burden of Master-vs-Serf struggle. She could never had known this on Earth, where every non-Draka was either a serf, or feared to become one and conversely hated the Domination with a passion, which quite a bit skewed any interaction between a Citizen and anyone else.
The Tollans didn’t have this legacy of fear… oh yes, she could pump out the pheromones and alter her presence to project sheer ferocity if she wanted. An angry-looking Drakensis was nothing if not terrifying. But she wouldn’t. Right now, she felt content enough, luxuriating in the awed and admiring stares. The Yoke could wait. In the meantime, she would savour fully the novel experience : mingling freely with humans who didn’t have an ingrained reason to hate her, and whom she didn’t need to force into submission.

Not that some of them hadn’t submitted already, and a little smile appeared on her lips as she looked in the mirror. The small room positively reeked of sex, and the discarded uniform pieces laying around where they had been ripped out told the tale eloquently enough. The bunk she had left early was still occupied by Officer Larian, still sleeping off the night’s exhaustions, as did Theria and Agleia, respectively Engineering and Logistical Officers, limbs entangled on a nearby berth. The three women weren’t exactly stunning, but ranged from “plain” to “cute” and the military routine at least enabled them to keep in shape. And whatever inhibitions they harbored in their past life were well and truly a thing of the past.
The form-adjusting beds were a bonus. As the quatuor had found, it greatly facilitated some of the figures and provided a welcome support in other configurations.
Gwendolyn sighed softly. The three Tollan females had been neophytes at this. From what she’d been able to gather, lesbianism and bisexuality were uncommon in Imperial society, not that they were repressed as such, rather, they never had become more than a marginal practice, a curiosity. In fact, Larian and Agleia were married, their husbands were back on Tolla, and they might well find their partners subtly changed the next time they met. If they survived the coming battle, that is.
That thought brought her back to the present. The next day would see them fighting whatever awaited in the target system, and she still had many things to learn about Majestic’s systems. Those she was allowed access to, at least. But even if some doors remained closed to her, she could perceive and overhear things much better than her Tollan minders believed.

As she swivelled in place, Larian stirred and cracked open an eye. A moan escaped her lips and she stretched vigorously, her back arching up, then abruptly relaxed with a dramatic sigh and rolled on her side, propping her head in her hand, chestnut hair cascading over the left side of her face.
“Gwen ?”
“Yes, sweetie ?”
“I want to do it again”
The blonde woman laughed cheerfully and took three strides towards the bed, slightly exaggerating the sway of her hips under Larian’s wanton gaze. Her knee straddling the Sensor Officer’s thighs, she bent down and grabbed the back of her head then kissed the proffered lips. The brunette answered the kiss hungrily, sucking down on Gwendolyn’s probing tongue and pushing herself up in a bold effort to fasten her whole body to the powerful being hovering above, as if nothing else counted. There was an electrifying instant and she gave out a muffled moan, feeling two feverish fingers slide between her inner thighs and start rubbing her most intimate area. Seconds later, the blonde woman broke off the kiss and brought her hand up, ignoring the reflexive pelvic thrust trying to follow the retreating probe, and stared straight into Larian’s eyes as the smaller female ran her tongue first, then swallowed whole the glistening fingers, twisting he tongue over them and sucking as if they were sweet lollipops. The brown eyes were alight with lust, the Tollan’s whole expression one of pure, shameless, unabashed longing for sexual pleasure.
There was no escaping the rekindled fire, a corner of Gwendolyn’s mind whispered. The Tollan woman was literally wrapped around her finger, looking towards the Draka to bring her to unknown heights of ecstasy.
Which was not only extremely entertaining, but also promised valuable intelligence potential. And that was her last rational thought for the time being, as Larian’s own fingers took hold of her sensitive nipples and began to tease and twist them through an orgasm-building recital. Oh yes, she was learning quickly.

[holyknight]

Hoo boy.....seems that if this keeps...its just a matter of time for a Tollan with a rather "Draka-like" mentality, to become the first "Collaborator"(Read Traitor) of the Domination on the Tollan side.....

[iborg]

So I started to write again as the workload finally got lighter




Later

“Well, Merarch, here you are”
Subcommander Anthim’s shoulders rotated slightly in her direction as Ingolfsson entered Majestic’s bridge. She noticed that he was back to his slightly aloof attitude, arms crossed behind his ramrod back, the stereotypical picture of a naval officer down to the neatly trimmed beard.
“I take it you’re getting familiar with the ship ?”
Gwendolyn’s lips curled into a faint smile.
“Indeed, Subcommander. I must commend the Tollan navy for its hospitality and competence”, it didn’t hurt to be nice.
“I’m sure you have learned a lot” he commented neutrally. Or at least he believed that he was letting nothing of his inner thoughts out. His Drakensis interlocutor could read him like a book, though, and the subtle hints and barely audible (but for the bridge’s otherwise silent atmosphere) subvocalizations told her everything she wanted to know.
Her various feats had obviously made it around the grapevine, including, it seemed, the night’s lesbian orgy. She wondered if they went so far as to spy on their own crew, and shrugged inwardly. It didn’t make any difference to her, in fact, she enjoyed being watched. Besides, if the Tollans thought Drakas were sexual freaks, it might blind them to their other, more quirky traits.

“I heard that you managed to fraternize quite well with the crew” Anthim cautiously elaborated, keeping his face and tone neutral. Gwen refrained a smirk and chose to answer just as diplomatically.
“I found the Tollan people to be most welcoming, yes. It bodes well for our future relations”
“Yes, yes, I’m sure it does” the commander managed to keep a straight face, and switched to a less slippery subject. “We’ll reach our emergence point in five hours. You may wish to rest until then”
“Thank you, Subcommander, but I’m as rested as I could ever be. I’d rather spend that time reviewing the plan”
Anthim chuckled amiably. “By all means do so ! Although I’m afraid the battle plan’s rather scarce, just like our intel.”
“Remember, we don’t have to conquer the system, only drag Tanith’s warfleet away from Nautonan space.”
“Yet we have to make it convincing enough. That’s going to cost lives, and ships, most probably.”
“War is hell” the blonde shrugged. You don’t build a plantation without flogging a few serfs, she added mutely, keeping the old Draka wisdom to herself. “In the meantime, with your permission, I’m going to Engineering. Officer Theria very graciously offered to tutor me in the arcane field of hyperdimensional geometry calculations.” And it was even true. Sex was all well and good, but sometimes even a Citizen had to work for a living.
“Very well, Merarch Ingolfsson. In any case, we’ll ring General Quarters ten minutes before emergence.”


Planet Atheros
Tanith’s Dominion

Most Goa’uld planets, as a rule, were sparsely populated and developed. A geograph would say that the System Lords showed an extensive rather than intensive approach to exploiting their possessions, seemingly scattering small slave communities around stargates wherever it suited them, and often leaving those communities to their own devices for decades before swinging in, making a suitably impressive appearance to reinforce their godhood in the slaves’ eyes, proceeding to grab whatever useful material had been accumulated during their absence, take in a few personal servants (very seldom) or Jaffa replacements (which happened a bit more often, and was usually a sought-after career opportunity - “be a warrior, see the stars, meet new people, kill or rape them !” appealed to youth everywhere) and then taking off again.
It could be rationalized after a fashion : there were thousands of known inhabitable worlds, likely many more unregistered, and it was decidedly easier to dial a stargate than try to cross seas and continents on the same planet when you were a medieval-level Goa’uld minion.

Still, there were worlds that were either more ancient, or more useful, or were simply chosen by a particular System Lord to reflect his glorious might, and thus received a favored treatment. Atheros was one of those. It had belonged to Tanith for seven centuries. He had driven off and killed the second-rate Goa’uld ruler who controlled it beforehand and used it as his capital. Therefore, the conqueror found a planet that was already densely populated (for Goa’uld standards), dotted with cities, rich in agricultural products and exported many refined trade goods crafted by its skilled artisans. A couple thousand public executions were enough to quell any discontentment and ensure a smooth transition to the new management.
In the following centuries, Atheros became a steady source of well-trained Jaffas, personal slaves and general purpose manpower. Its importance grew with Tanith’s ambitions, culminating with the establishment of several shipyards on the planet’s surface, that were churning out the entire range of Goa’uld spacecraft, from zippy Udajeets to lumbering Ha’taks.
This also made Atheros a priority target, accordingly protected by hundreds of Death Gliders and Alkesh gunships, supplemented by minefields and defense satellites. At least that was before the would-be god’s latest conquest spree. The Tollan hadn’t exactly rolled over and curled up to die, and while upgraded Hat’aks were able to soak up heavy ion cannon fire, smaller units still paid a hefty price. As a result, Tanith had to marshall his fighter and bomber squadrons for the Nautona operation… stripping his planetary defenses in the way. The Draka and Tollan strategists had counted on this factor, although they weren’t sure how much it would matter.


Down on Atheros’ surface, inside the sprawling eastern wing of the capital city’s stone and marble palatial temple, a lone Goa’uld sat contently on the gold-plated commode that stood like a throne in the middle of his apartment’s spacious bathroom. Palace slaves waited obediently nearby, holding jugs of scented water and wet sponges for the noble task of cleaning up the master’s divine bottom.
He was Kopros, the Tanith-appointed governor of Atheros, a relatively young Goa’uld at barely three centuries of existence, but he had displayed just the right mix of ambition and willingness to serve his older and better brethren during his apprenticeship. He had successfully climbed the steps from low-ranking administrator to his current position, showing competence and efficiency at every level. Tanith knew the younger Goa’uld had even greater ambitions, up to becoming a System Lord in his own right, but he didn’t feel threatened : he had always made sure that Kopros was kept as much as possible out of the loop when it came to military matters. That way, the eager administrator never had the opportunity to build himself a powerbase among Tanith’s Jaffas. He knew just enough to let him fulfill his task of managing the planet’s population, which he did quite well, with the right blend of severity and benevolence. The various guilds and trade councils of Atheros lauded his wisdom and fairness in arbitrating disputes, and his servants quietly praised his relative gentleness compared to Lord Tanith himself.
An impartial observer would have credited Governor Kopros for the rather smooth way he administered the planet. At any rate, there were much worse places one could be born under Goa’uld rule.

Kopros was relaxing on the velvet-covered ring, letting his host body take care of its excretory needs while his executive mind reviewed the case he was to arbiter during the afternoon audience. Again, the city councilors were complaining about the increased draft levels, arguing that civilized, urbane folk shouldn’t be subjected to the same treatment as filthy grimy peasants from some lowly agricultural shitworld. The Goa’uld found himself agreeing somehow, since Atheros’ skilled classes were far more valuable (and usually more pleasant to look at) than the common rabble sent to do menial work on newly conquered planets. Shoveling dirt and breaking stones had to be done by someone, of course, and Kopros reflected that his liege’s latest success would mean a lot of that.
The blasphemous modern cities of Nautona would be cast down lest their proud glittering towers eclipse the glory of the only true Lords. No trace of the Tollan’s former power and independance should remain : in this galaxy, humans were here to serve the superior Goa’uld species, let nothing else argue otherwise.

His slightly out-of-focus eyes snapped from their contemplative stare as a Page burst in, followed by a bejeweled Jaffa. Kopros recognized him instantly, he was the most senior warrior left on Atheros, effectively Tanith’s local military commander. The well-dressed young servant opened his mouth hurriedly, pointing accusatory stares at his rather more imposing companion and apologetic ones at the throned Goa’uld.
“My Lord, he didn’t stop at the door…-”
Kopros raised his right hand. “Let him talk” he snapped off. It had to be important, for no sane Jaffa would barge in uninvited without a seriously good reason. More good news from Nautona ?
The warrior nodded curtly, evidently unwilling to waste time on protocol.
“My Lord, a Tollan fleet has dropped from hyper in the system’s outer limits. They are accelerating towards Atheros as I speak”
Kopros didn’t betray his surprise. The Tollans, here ? It was preposterous ! They should be trying to fight off Tanith’s forces on Nautona, if anything !
“Put every defense on alert”
“Already done, my Lord !”
A nod of praise rewarded the Jaffa’s diligence.
“How long until the blasphemers are in range ?”
“Approximately three hours, my Lord”
“Good. Return to the war room and await me there !”
The man bowed a little deeper this time and saluted, fist over his heart, then swivelled on his heels and departed in great purposeful strides.

Left behind, Kopros made a small grimace as he contracted his bowels to hasten the purging process. He was rewarded with a satisfyingly loud noise and a healthy smell. A breath later, he waved for the waiting body servants to approach and begin their neatly choreographed duty, which they did with great attention and pride as usual.
As the domestic staff attended to his hygienic requirements, the planetary governor couldn’t help but wonder what the Tollans could expect to accomplish. The cities and shipyards of Atheros were protected by shields against orbital bombardment, even if the attackers made it through the outer defenses. It really looked like a wasteful move, borne off the desperation the uppity humans had to be feeling. Well, at least watching them as they were crushed by Goa’uld might should be more entertaining than listening to the locals complaining again.

[iborg]

xxxx

Ten minutes later, Kopros walked regally into the Palace’s command room, dismissed his bodyguards and stood before the throne-chair, not willing to sit down just yet. He took the time to sweep the whole room under an imperious looking stare, flashed his eyes and finally addressed the Jaffa commander.
“Now. Tell me”
A customary short bow later, the warrior answered, pointing to the Pel’tak-style display hovering in front of the room’s occupants.
“As you can see, my Lord, the blasphemers are heading right towards this world. They have deployed small craft squadrons to screen and scout for their main force as they customarily do. Our own Death Gliders and Al’kesh units are up and awaiting orders”
“Good. You have acted wisely.” Kopros was all too aware of his separation from the military side of things, and it didn’t hurt to get on the Jaffa’s good side, although he harbored no illusion as to the man’s unwaveringly fierce loyalty to Tanith. “I assume the orbital fortifications are active as well ?”
“Of course, my Lord. If the blasphemers try to close with this world, they will feel the full wrath of the Gods !”
“Excellent. Let them come to us and die !”


“They’re expecting us to walk into their fixed defenses”
“Hoping to pounce on us once our formation’s disorganized and weakened by whatever traps they have in orbit”
Merarch Ingolfsson listened to the Tollan bridge officers stating the obvious. Ever since TF Avenger had exited hyperspace, the sensor crews inside the dashing white vessels had been sweeping the system with active scans, not bothering with stealth since the whole premise of the operation consisted in broadcasting “Here we are ! Come and fight us !” as loudly as possible, but instead intent on finding out whatever laid waiting in front of the fleet.
The Goa’uld spacecrafts were accounted for as soon as they lit their drives to break orbit, but everyone onboard Majestic assumed there had to be cloaked minefields and defensive satellites, for every important Goa’uld world seemed to sprout those lately. And even the most rudimentary cloaking field (the kind that would be installed on expendable assets) required full scanning power to be detected at anything but point-blank range.
Which would have constituted an almost insurmountable obstacle for the attackers, had their Draka counterparts not come up with an idea that seemed at first preposterously crude, then started to make sense when the Tollan technicians condescended to examined it. After all, cloaking fields, just like protective force-shields, were rated for a certain amount of energy to warp and deflect.

The Domination officer observed that Subcommander Anthim’s facial expression, as well as Ship Commander Olmoc’s, held something very much akin to a hunting Drakensis’ predatory grin. Somehow, she was beginning to like those people. Naturally, it helped their mood that she was currently outputting a tailored pheromone mix intended to stimulate homo sapiens’ innate aggressive tendencies. It had felt somewhat wrong at first - encouraging ferals to be aggressive and warlike went against the Domination’s whole recent history - but she rationalized it easily : after all, her own life was on the line as well, and the Tollan’s success here would serve the Race.
Her enhanced senses made the bridge crew’s heightened state of alertness apparent, from the tenser way they held themselves to their elevated heartrates and subtly altered scent, all pointed to them being eager to fight yet focused and professional. A fleeting thought passed through her mind. Like good Janissaries, back when we used them. When the Final War came, ghouloons shock troopers had already replaced the majority of the human soldiers in Janissary formations. The last fighting serfs were rather cynically expended in Pacifications sweeps, but the policy had a point : those particular serfs were too inclined to violence, and the Final Society wouldn’t need them. Better use them up, besides, they loved the fighting, looting and raping and would rather die in battle rather than go back to plowing fields. Viewed this way, the Draka policy was almost merciful.

Gwendolyn snapped out of her reverie and glanced at the mission clock.
Right on cue, Majestic’s commanding officer stared in her direction.
“Well, Merarch, if I’m not mistaken, the ground invasion should begin about… now ?”
Before she could open her mouth, a female voice preempted her answer. It was Larian’s, currently sitting at her post overlooking the ship’s sensor suite.
“Sir, I’m picking up as subspace energy spike, congruent with a wormhole opening on the planet’s surface !” The cute little woman held her gaze up, barely keeping her excitation in check.
“Looks like the answer to my question” Ship Commander Olmoc almost smirked. “Now we’ll see how good you Drakas are” he added to Gwendolyn’s intention. She kept her face straight and neutral. The man hadn’t intended his comment to be altogether impertinent, more like a friendly goading. She felt a slight, unrelated pang in her mind. Her brothers and sisters were going to fight and risk their lives down there, and here she was sitting (more accurately, standing) pretty and safe in an air-conditioned spaceship’s bridge. Oh well. Soon she would be taking her fair share of danger.


Back on Atheros, the first sign that something was amiss happened to kill its witnesses, as a hail of smart grenades scythed through the ten-Jaffa detail keeping an eye on the Chappai almost as soon as the event horizon was settled. Most of the munitions wasted themselves reducing already dead bodies to fleshy residue, but a few found their way through the gaping portal at the far end of the gateroom, sailed out of the truncated, painted pyramid and found themselves not wanting for targets : the large stone steps leading to the entrance overlooked the city’s busiest and most affluent thoroughfare, a position befitting the importance of the Ring of the Gods, but a decidedly poor placement when a hostile force was storming out of it. A couple more Jaffas were blasted to bits, followed shortly by an unlucky merchant who would never again sell his earthware to passing travellers. Unnoticed among the more immediately destructive ballistic devices, a small fixed-wing drone followed, relying on its mimetic skin and lack of engine noise to keep out of attention. It climbed as soon as it cleared the building’s exitway, the sensor dome under its nose taking in the scenery below and relaying it by encrypted, low-profile datalink back to its commanders untold light-years away.

By this time, the two guard towers outside the transit pyramid sprang to life, rising to their maximum extension while the gunners on top wasted no time pointing their staff cannons inward, feeling secure behind their protective shields. The feeling of security lasted the short amount of time needed for the first Tactical Interdiction Missile to flash out and turn immediately, using its aerodynamic and pyrotechnic control systems to generate more than 70 gravities of lateral acceleration, right into the leftmost tower. Initially an anti-armor missile, its tandem heavy shaped charges punched straight through the light forcefield and neatly decapitated the vaguely banana-shaped contraption, pulverizing both gun and gunner.
His colleague only had the time to shout an imprecation before the same fate caught up with him.
Barely thirty seconds had passed since the stargate’s activation, and by now two smoking pyres framed the sacred building, and screaming cityfolks were running away as fast as their legs allowed them, scattering out of sight as if Death itself was on their heels, and a wave of panic began to ripple outwards as one by one the inhabitants of the proud capital realized their home was under attack.

The defenders did what was expected of them : more Jaffas poured out of the small barracks flanking the crucially important edifice while a heavy stone shutter fell down to block the entrance to the Chappai Hall. For a minute, nothing happened, and the warriors arrayed around the great stairway almost breathed in relief, thinking the attackers were confined inside the temple. Of course, nothing could prove them wrong better than the massive slab of basalt exploding outwards, blasting the way clear for the stream of armored figures that burst out almost as swiftly as the stone fragments just before.
The Jaffas wasted no time opening fire, and a hail of plasma bolts tore through the air towards the hulking shapes storming out of the square hole. The ghouloons shock troopers didn’t care and charged straight into the inferno, but their sheer movement speed and the staff gun’s notoriously atrocious accuracy allowed most of them to cross the interval alive, shooting their rifles on full auto and spraying projectiles with arguably better results than their opponents. The defenders started to die from bullet wounds even before the warbeasts came into contact, with numbers barely attrited by the plasma barrage - a few charred spots on their armor, or for that matter, on their fur, did nothing to slow a battle-frenzied ghouloon.

The Jaffas’ devout practice of their ancestral close-combat technique, Mastaba, was unfortunately to no avail. Whatever its efficiency against human opponents, it just fell short when the opponent was a hulking gorilla-sized intelligent ape bred for strength and ferocity. Defending warriors managed to staff-parry sweeping oversized limbs, but found the hard way that the sheer inertia of a ghouloon fist contemptuously brushed the obstacle away. Even without the cermet plating, a ghouloon’s dense musculature and reinforced bones were proof against sledgehammer blows. Worse, the creatures’ standard-issue bladed weapon, an adequately oversized machete-like that was essentially a bigger, meaner version of the Space Force’s wicked layer knife, displayed a remarkable ability to cut through Jaffa mail and even the stem of a staff weapon.
A Jaffa wasn’t. The close-up, hand-to-paw fight ended quickly with two dozen dead or incapacitated ghouloon troopers, while their brethren stood among a ring of broken and mangled bodies, half their number going through the post-combat checks - essentially making sure no larval Goa’uld remained alive - under the cover of the other half, rifles trained outwards from behind whatever cover they had managed to find in the immediate surroundings.

With the immediate area secure, or at least under observation, follow-up forces came out of the wormhole. More ghouloons, some carrying crew-served heavy weapons to set up defensive emplacements, their Draka officers in segmented armor, Citizen Force infantry squads and scouting elements in the low-profile chameleon suit, dozens then hundreds of soldiers set foot on Atheros’ soil, and more men and women kept coming.
A smattering of Tollan soldiers and combat engineers appeared, escorted and herded by blank-visored Draka infantry, followed by a trio of power armored heavy weapon specialists. The suits were even taller and bigger than ghouloons, brushing the passageway’s ceiling with bare inches to spare as they walked out with a flowing gait that belied their size and bulk. They took positions at the foot of the monumental stairway, with a commanding view of the avenue leading away in a straight line for three hundred meters before it opened into a wide plaza. A pair of symmetrical, official looking buildings flanked the square, their flat roofs supported by exterior colonnades. It could have looked greco-roman, except the cable columns were gilded and the vividly painted bas-reliefs had a more stylized, almost egyptian look that bewildered the more historically-minded members of the invasion force.

Mansions and affluent houses lined both sides of the avenue, many sporting gaudy signs displaying the owner’s profession in colorful illustrations. It was obviously one of the richest parts of the town, and the first Drakas were quick to realize the proximity of it would make looting a lot easier. The orbiting drone showed the rest of the city’s features, Draka and Tollan technicians worked furiously on their portable consoles in order to update the tactical maps appearing on everyone’s helmet displays or perscomp screens. A river cut the town in two, arcing lazily between the roughly eastern and western halves. The pyramid sheltering the stargate laid on the western side, and the avenue continued from the distant plaza towards the East, crossing the waterway and ending into another large square from where smaller streets meandered away maze-like among progressively more modest dwellings, until the urban area started to mingle with the surrounding countryside in a spontaneous fashion unhindered by any perimeter wall.
Larger buildings dotted the town, which the invaders assumed were public edifices, one in particular, connected to a covered stone canal on archways that could only be an elevated aqueduct, had to be a public bath. Apparently, the locals were serious about hygiene too. As far as one could see, the streets appeared quite clean, belying the overall medieval aspect of the place, although whatever sewer system existed likely led into the river itself.
The most relevant construction, however, appeared to be the palace stretching its graceful porticos and white marble walls amidst the south-eastern quadrant of the city, kept away from direct observation by a low terrain bulge sporting its own three-story high, ovoid arena.
All in all, it looked like a warped mix of ancient Mediterranean architectures, transplanted on a world that certainly had never heard of Rome or Alexandria.

Whatever, Polignac thought as he surveyed it from the top of the stairway, having just made the transit from the Abydos staging ground, the priority target was the palace. On foot and assuming no delaying action, they could reach it in under fifteen minutes, but the Drakas wouldn’t have to walk all the way. The wormhole didn’t stop disgorging troops, yet a brief lull in the infantry arrivals heralded the coming of the heavy assault elements given the go-ahead for transit.
Scattered gunfire cracked around the pyramid as Jaffa stragglers were cut down by the emplaced Draka weapons, just as a low whine and a subdued rattle indicated the arrival of the first repurposed Hond VI main battle tank, the last model fielded before the Final War. It was more compact than its earlier incarnations thanks to a three man crew sitting entirely inside the hull, which scarcely allowed it to drive through a stargate with a comfortable margin between the narrower unmanned turret and the inwardly curving internal ring of the stargate. The first vehicle moved forward on its flexible composite track until it reached the top of the steep descending stairs, then tilted down and rolled over the stone steps, its active suspension transparently absorbing the irregular ride. Its crew rotated the turret sideways to keep the main gun from hitting the ground when it reached the bottom, then back in 12 o’clock position after the tank was again moving horizontally.
A couple soldiers cheered the armored beast as it rolled away, squishing a few dead bodies under its path, and stopped short of the avenue’s mouth, then a second one appeared upstairs.

By the time the fourth Hond was on the way, the first one had already mowed down its first Jaffa squads, spotted as they ran out of the twin buildings on the plaza, and ghouloons soldiers were moving out into the neighboring buildings, expanding the invaders’ controlled area, finding no resistance from the clearly terrorized townsfolk.
Inside the palace, Kopros was only beginning to realize the Tollan fleet wasn’t the more pressing matter on hand.

[iborg]

xxx

Twelve minutes after the initial attack, the Draka motorized column started to move out, spearheaded by the platoon of main battle tanks. They were kitted for urban warfare, the most visible signs being the dozer blade mounted on the front glacis, appliqué armor on the turret top and automatic grenade launcher supplementing the two machine guns (one coaxial, one mounted on top of the turret itself).
The designers of the last Hond generation took into account the changing trends of the late XXth century : more numerous and lethal infantry-held weapons, increasingly resilient armor material, and above all the threat of orbital weaponry loomign above the battlefield. This dictated the need for an armored combatant that would be stealthier, more mobile, yet retain heavy firepower and protection. Hence the move to an automated turret and a narrower body, using a more compact powertrain scheme. The primary turbine generator was smaller than a turbocompound, and was only used to charge the superconductor storage coils that fed independant electric motors inside each road wheel. As a result, the Hond VI benefited from steep acceleration and braking performance, a high operating speed (helped by the active hydromagnetic suspension) and the ability to run silent in full electric mode, which cut its infrared signature drastically.

Its main weaponry was a 140mm electrothermal-chemical, liquid-propellant smoothbore gun firing a range of guided and unguided munitions up to muzzle velocities of 2600m/s. A heavy coaxial machine-gun and a medium one mounted on a dedicated turret roof mount provided secondary fire, while grenade launchers flush-mounted in the turret’s skin were able to deploy multispectral smoke screen, active decoy and close-defense antipersonnel munitions.
Shielded optronic sensors were arrayed on the hull and turret in order to provide a 360° coverage to the crew. The main sensor clusters on the turret front included infrared and visible wavelength cameras as well as lidar, all cued to the machine’s redundant compcore. The fusion of data from onboard sensors and external datalinks provided the commander with enhanced situational awareness, and while the whole system took its designers untold sleepless nights to troubleshoot, the final result managed to put to rest fears that the unmanned turret would isolate the crew from the tactical situation and reduce its effectiveness.
Finally, a layered defensive scheme protected the tank and its crew. First, the integral active protection system was able to engage and destroy missiles and, to a certain measure, destabilize antitank darts thus reducing their armor penetration ability. Said armor was a composite of space-manufactured materials, density-enhanced ceramic-metallic plates and carbon nanotube matrixes with an anti-laser ablative coating.
Superconductor magnetic shielding could protect the vehicle against EMP and particle beam weapons (up to a point).

While formidable, it was felt more and more that heavy armor would become obsolete when orbital weaponry could be brought to bear by any foot-soldier equipped with a datalink system. This trend of thought was proven to be premature during the last phases of the Final War, when orbital fire had become spotty at best for a while and the first waves of Draka airmobile infantry attempting to establish a bridgehead in America were decimated by entrenched Alliance units who did have armored support.
The lesson was quickly learnt, and subsequent invasion waves were spearheaded by heavy armor brigades which gave better results. Unfortunately, there just weren’t many of them anymore, therefore progress had been slow and bloody, grinding out Domination’s armor reserves.
In fact, by the time of First Contact, there was barely sixty Hond VI in working order in the whole Domination’s arsenal. To be fair, new constructions were proposed but deemed very low-priority when there was so much crucial infrastructure to rebuild.
The four tanks currently on Atheros had been taken from the reserves, lifted to Luna (a technical first in itself) and sent to Abydos to join the waiting diversionary force, meeting the IFVs already there.

And now, their secondary weapons spoke as they ground their way down the main avenue, shooting clumps of Jaffas to bits. A mechanized infantry century followed in Phalanx wheeled vehicles, since the standard tracked Hoplite couldn’t fit through the stargate.
The column moved at a steady pace, shooting everything that looked remotely threatening, with fire control systems on automatic. Unfortunately, this also included civilians who tried to look from windows and didn’t possess a Draka IFF tag, and occasionally bloody explosions showered the street with gore and body parts mixed with stone and wood fragments. Reaching the first plaza took a couple minutes. No more Jaffas seemed to be coming out, and the vehicles drove on while the infantry wave behind them spread out, kicking or shooting doors open when needed. Inside the buildings, ghouloons and human soldiers found cowering civilians, most of them clad in rich robes, for a quick interrogation yielded the fact that the twin constructions were actually the seat of the city council.

The councilors were marched out, bound and chained, as soon as the city block was deemed secured. They walked or were manhandled by ghouloons with much terrorized screaming, sweet sounds to the Drakas ears, especially mixed with the on and off gunfire further into the town where the armored column was proceeding on its own mission.
By now, the invaders were flushing out the Atheros folks out of their houses, channeling them into the side streets in order to keep the central avenue clear, and a first triage was established. The young and the female were separated from the old and male, with Draka soldiers making stripping the former. Protestations from the latter were cut short with customary brutality, and soon the sobbing and whining of naked children and women echoed the groans and howls of pain from men with broken limbs and crushed genitals.

Witnessing the spectacle, a few Tollan men thought to protest against the casual mistreatment. Their officer scolded them in no uncertain terms.
“What do you think happened to the men and women Tanith captured on Nautona ? Think they” he pointed at the closest Atherosians “would hesitate to buy them on a Goa’uld slave market ?” He almost spat at them. “Serves them right to obey the fucking Goa’uld !”
One of his subordinates tried to argue.
“But Sir…-” he was cut short before he could end his sentence, they don’t have a choice !
“Look at them ! Fat and happy, with those gilded robes and shiny jewels ! Do they look like they’re being oppressed by the Goa’uld ?”
He had a point, the first Tollan conceded, his expression becoming one of understanding. The officer went on nonetheless.
“I’ll tell you : those whores thrive on Goa’uld depredations ! I’d bet they were cheering the news when Tanith attacked us !”
By now, neighboring Drakas had noticed the argument and were listening intently. The white-and-silver uniformed man drew himself even straighter. I’ll show them us Tollans aren’t weak-kneed pussies !

He stared at his fellow Imperials, as if daring them to show otherwise, then at the Drakas eyeing him curiously, their expression showing the slightest hint of expectation. He took it as an encouragement and strutted to the nearest upper-class Atherosian, pausing just short of the middle-aged, somewhat overweight kneeling man looking at him with fluttering eyelids. He took in the rotund face, now contorted by fear, and sneered contemptuously.
“I guess your precious god cannot protect you now, does he ?”
The captive was too frightened to reply.
“Answer me, you wog !” spat the Tollan, adding a back-handed slap as emphasis. Another sweeping glance, and he drew out his sidearm. The spectators held their breath as he put the muzzle against the man’s forehead, and frantic begging at last poured out of the local’s mouth.
“What ? Sorry, I can’t understand you !” The vicious chuckle was covered by the whiz-crack of the ion-bolt pistol that cut short the jabbering voice. A nearby middle-aged woman started to scream. She must have been pretty once, but decades of indolent life had thickened her figure and made her facial features pudgy and vulgar under the heavy make-up. Probably the dead man’s wife, the Tollan deduced, and kept grinning even as he switched his aim and pressed the firing stud again. Again, the sharp sound of energized ions tearing a path through air was followed by the wet splurtch of a cranial cavity emptying itself explosively in a bloody spray of cooked brains.

“Fuck you all ! Fuck you, fuck you all !” the Imperial officer shouted at the prisoners, already aiming to shoot a third one. His manic grin froze at once when steel-hard fingers closed on his extended forearm and lifted it firmly, the pressure on the very threshold of being painful. Looking aside, he saw a Drakensis in recon armor. The green slitted eyes returned his gaze quietly, but there was a glimmer of amusement in them.
“I’d say they’re fucked enough already” Anton de Polignac drawled in native Tollan. “Don’t worry, we’ve planned a very special goodbye for Tanith when we leave this place” His eyes flickered aside, as if to point in the pyramid’s direction where some ghouloons were already busy planting stakes in the ground.
The Imperial’s arm relaxed and the merarch released his grip.
“Now, I think you folks have a job to do, don’t you ?”
A nod answered him, and the Tollan glanced back to his subordinates. “All right, let’s move ! We need to set up those sensor arrays before the armor guys reach the palace !”

Polignac watched them leave. One of the technicians was green-faced. The rest seemed to stomach the whole episode better.
An interesting bunch of ferals, those Tollans.

[[R_H]]

Man, the Draka sure demilitarised quickly after the Final War. Are the ghouloons capable of procreating amongst themselves, or all of them grown in labs?

[holyknight]

Man, the Draka sure demilitarised quickly after the Final War. Are the ghouloons capable of procreating amongst themselves, or all of them grown in labs?

Yeah. But they are now re-militarising as quickly now, as now there its a big wide galaxy to put under the Yokel. Methinks that it will given a big incentive to the remaining normal population of the Domination to start having Drakensis children on healthy amounts, in order to ensure many generations of Draka for the coming wars.....