Ch 56 Stargate 10

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Carl was sitting at the mahogany desk in the cabin of his ship, the Yamato. He had designated it as his study room, where he reviewed most of the daily data concerning his organization. In the window-looking view screen to his right was a star field passing by as if the ship was speeding past many star systems. Several times in the past while working in the room Carl had tried out the drink: Tea, Earl Grey, hot.

Despite trying the drink several times, and in many different minute configurations, he never liked it. He figured that many of the food items that people loved were established in their younger years. A sense of attachment was needed to actually enjoy certain things.

Octopus-flavored crackers weren't his thing. But then again, neither was macaroni and cheese.

The drink Root Beer, however, would never let Carl down.

It didn't matter how it expressed itself. Root Beer mixed with vanilla ice cream? Delicious. Root Beer frothed with various flavors? Delicious!

Root Beer is always delicious, unlike nasty noodles with fake cheese!

Scanning the reports on his desk, Carl saw that by October of 1999 his military forces were trained up and ready to take over Sokar's territory. The administration wing of Carl's government had prepared the people and resources to swoop in on the planets that Sokar ruled and help convert them to the FCO.

Carl smirked a bit at that bit of information about "conversion", because it was how he overcame the drawbacks in this jump. The moment the people on the various planets were no longer considered "Sokar's people", due to his take over, it eliminated their drawback-driven need to resist interacting with Carl.

Carl and his people had seen this very effect before, with the amplification of suicidally loyal Jaffa suddenly losing their "drive" the moment that their Goa'uld lord had been defeated.

Carl's people were about 80% convinced of the matter, so they had drawn up plans designed to take down the targeted Goa'uld System Lord in the opening volley of each war, in order to cut down on the appearance of retaliatory attacks from the various fanatics.

If the "supernatural" influence wasn't correct, then they could continue their normal wartime operations. But if it was true, and the people lost a lot of their fighting spirit from the loss of their leader, it would save Carl's people plenty of time and resources.

Carl chose Sokar as the next target because he wanted to make a bath house. Wait, no.

Carl chose Sokar as the next target because the Goa'uld was one sick puppy, and Carl wanted to free the various people from their slavery. Most of the Goa'uld modeled themselves after various gods, because they liked the admiration of their human worshippers.

Sokar, on the other hand, chose to model himself as the Devil of the Christian religion because he liked the pain and enjoyed torturing people. A normal Goa'uld liked to dominate and be in charge. But Sokar, more than the usual Goa'uld, liked to torture everyone around him.

The Goa'uld were cut off from the human society on Earth for many years. So Carl was initially confused about how a Goa'uld like Sokar could imitate a Christian legend more than 4,000 years distant from his information feed.

It was only when Carl remembered and interrogated some of the snot balls in his custody that he found out what was happening.

The ascended Alterans were spreading certain cultures around the galaxy. The snot balls were influencing things all around the galaxy to try to bring about their desired results. And if that meant influencing Sokar to be a devil, then so be it.

Sokar obviously got inspiration for his devil and hell cult from the "snot ball's" stories. The "snot balls" didn't even need to show themselves, fulfilling their "broken" idea that they didn't interfere with the mortal world.

Sokar, obedient to the dream he had, immediately reformed his image as the King of Hell. He pyroformed the moon of his main base to be a similar environment to the fire and brimstone of hell, where he already liked to torture prisoners. The poor environment was an additional benefit for Sokar, since he was such a bastard.

Carl looked over the information he had. Sokar had actually made the moon more specialized. Some areas were more beneficial to human's survival. But the other areas were more like hell, impossible for humans to survive.

That ridiculous focus was actually a plus to Carl, and his plans to benefit humanity. But how to transform it? That was the question.

Carl decided to not worry about it. The many people of his game would come in and, like locusts, change the setting so that it was beautiful. Ignore the blood, ignore the downsides, ignore the unrealistic things. The gamers would fix everything.

Carl knew that if he allowed Sokar any leeway, then the bastard Goa'uld would make things difficult for him.

If Sokar actually enacted his war of retribution, it would greatly interrupt Carl's plans. And Carl just couldn't have the sadistic bastard interrupt his takeover of the System Lords. So before Sokar really got started, Carl had to take out his influence.

With Carl's stealth satellites, his people had up to date information on the locations of Sokar's forces. Sokar controlled 22 planets, and the largest part of his military forces were in orbit over his world Delmak.

Years ago Sokar had been the ruler of the System Lords, but he had been ganged up on by the other System Lords and been defeated. They thought he was dead, but he had managed to escape. And now that he was poised to retake his position, Carl was pleased to be on hand to stop him.

Carl was once more on board the bridge of the Lancer, which was approaching Delmak. He was going to oversee the operation his military was carrying out. Carl simply watched and waited to see if he was needed as his military leaders monitored the battlefield and sent orders to the troops.

The first inkling that Sokar's forces had that something was up was the disappearance of their Stargates. Before messages could be passed to alert them, Carl's forces struck and attempted to capture or destroy the space ships around Sokar's planets in order to deny him the ability to act.

The word was soon passed that the Hat'aks in orbit over the other planets were either captured or destroyed while Carl watched the battle going on over Delmak. There were so many space ships in Sokar's forces, that in order to keep any of them from escaping the net, they had to destroy three quarters of the fleet before they could control and capture the rest.

While Carl and his people's goal was to capture and reeducate as many Jaffa as they could, there was a limit to how much sympathy they could give the enemy in the middle of combat. There would be no quarter for a fanatic enemy that had proven they could be suicidally inclined when faced with defeat. Until they were in custody and no longer capable of blowing shit up, they would be treated with extreme hostility.

Carl watched with a small smile of approval on his face as his forces efficiently took control of the planet Delmak. Reports coming in confirmed that the same success was taking place throughout the battlefield. With their updated tactics, there hadn't been any deaths due to fanatic Jaffa killing his people, which pleased Carl greatly.

After several hours of watching the reports from the battlefield, the operation was declared an unmitigated success. There had been some minor injuries, but there were no casualties this time around. Carl left the mop up and organization efforts to his people. If they needed him for something, they could still call him, but they already knew their jobs and were starting the process of education and assimilation.

Sokar himself, while crazy and dangerous, had been captured as easily as any other Goa'uld. Carl didn't even need to assign an HFR to impersonate him, since he had been hiding from the System Lords until he had enough forces built up to attack with overwhelming force. Carl still had his people download a copy of the Goa'uld's consciousness though. It's knowledge of the territory and what he had done in the past was important to process and help the FCO know what they had to work with.

With everything being handled by his people properly, Carl teleported off to the Yamato and left the work to the people he'd assigned it to.

Over the next couple of months Carl watched the reports of defenses and infrastructure being built on his new planets. He visited each of the planets and inspected everything that was going on, even giving lessons here and there to help encourage his new citizens.

Carl had read the summary of how pitiful and downtrodden their lives were under Sokar's rule, so he wasn't completely surprised when he was being revered greatly for the amazing improvements in their daily lives. The chance to learn and make use of the "magic" of technology, and the offer to learn said magic was more than they ever thought they would have.

There was a time in his distant past when he would have been very uncomfortable being the focus of such ardent feelings and worshipful gazes. He would not have felt himself worthy of being looked at with such high regard. But he recognized that he had done something wonderful for their daily lives. He and his FCO had pulled them from the depths of hell and given them a life worth living.

Carl just accepted that they felt the way they did, and determined to himself that he would never give them a chance to regret looking at him with such high regard. He would make sure his organization ran smoothly, with every one of his citizens having the freedoms and opportunities that make life worth living. That would be enough, really, to qualify himself for the high regard they gave him.

In the middle of January of 2000 Carl received notice from his satellite spies that a minor Goa'uld flunky had crash landed on Tollana. In the shock of the crash the Goa'uld had temporarily lost control of the host, allowing the host to beg for asylum and help from the Tollan people to save him from the Goa'uld parasite.

Shortly afterwards the Goa'uld had taken control back from the host and demanded to be released. The Tollan people, trying to act in a neutral fashion, decided to hold a trial, or Triad, in order to determine just who had the rights and ownership to the body.

When Carl received word of the Triad, he rolled his eyes in exasperation at the stupidity and pretentiousness of the Tollan people. He hopped in the Yamato and made his way to Tollana to stick his nose in and watch what would happen in the Triad.

In the original show, the Goa'uld that had crash landed on the planet had been Skaara with the Goa'uld Klorel, which led to SG-1 being called in by Skaara to be his council, or Archon. A Goa'uld Lord called Zipacna had been called in as the defense Archon for the Goa'uld parasite. While the Nox woman Lya had been called in as a third, neutral Archon to judge the proceedings and cast the deciding vote.

The whole trial had been a ruse on the part of the Goa'uld. During the time of the Triad the Goa'uld had been able to sneak about and disable the Tollan's defenses. The Goa'uld would have completely succeeded if not for the SG-1 team asking Lya to hide one of the Ion Cannons that served as their defensive weapons to protect it from the sabotage. With that single Ion Cannon, they were able to hold off the attack of the Hat'aks, although some damage was done to the Tollan planet.

Tera and Carl arrived at the same time at Tollana, and Carl made himself known to the Tollan Curia (which was the governing body of the Tollan people) as a person interested in the proceeding, along with the Archon Tera who would argue the side of the Host.

Carl and Tera had deliberately made their ships seem less impressive than they were, in order to not let on to the Tollan people just how much more advanced they were. The four original members of SG-1 also showed up, since they had some prior contact with the Tollan people.

Carl wasn't too surprised to be treated like idiot unwanted cousins by the Tollan. He had watched how arrogant they were back at the SGC, and they hadn't improved their attitude even after meeting the Nox, who seemed like primitive people but were much more advanced than the Tollan people.

He was really only there to watch the fun, so Carl sat back with his popcorn and let his people do most of the talking. They were met by the Tollan Narim who had flirted with Sam back on Earth. He seemed somewhat uncomfortable with having to meet Sam again, having thought they would never interact again.

Carl chuckled at the awkwardness of the meeting, tossing some popcorn in his mouth. He knew that Narim was struggling to find a topic of conversation to get him out of the awkwardness.

Sam for her part simply treated Narim like an unwanted acquaintance, not at all bothered by their previous interaction. Especially since she now had access to tech that made the Tollan look like kindergarteners, she wasn't bothered by his act. She had no real motivation to humor Narim, so she just ignored the dude's byplay and acted neutral.

As they were following Narim through a hallway, a white light had flashed in the corridor, startling the group.

"What happened there, Narim?" Daniel asked.

"Your weapons have been disabled." Narim blandly stated with a hint of chastisement.

The group had decided to attend the event dressed in a uniform that closely resembled their previous affiliation with the SGC, and they only had a stunner/plasma handgun on their hips. Not that they really needed them, but it kept up the pretense that they were still the same people they had been previously.

"What?" Jack asked, wondering just why the Tollan people would disarm them when they were about to be in the room with Goa'uld. He was thinking the Tollan people were pretty dumb.

"Do not worry. You may continue to carry them if you wish." Narim, unaware that their weapons were perfectly functional, stated condescendingly.

"You don't think you should have told us about this before we came?" Jack asked, playing along with them.

"I didn't find it relevant." Narim stated. "No one will attack you here. You are safe. So you will not need your weapons."

Jack snorted in disgust. He was a thoroughly military minded person, and the idea of not being armed made him nervous. The idea that the Tollan people would disarm them with no advance notice made them "not friends".

Since he wasn't in truth helpless or disarmed, Jack let the issue go in order to not bring attention to his status. But the lack of trust from the Tollan in Jack's ability to judge when using a weapon or not was appropriate did not endear them to Jack.

They were then ushered into a room with a podium where a lady with her hair pulled back into a tight bun with strange robes with a high collar waited. She rose and greeted the group with a faint smile.

"These must be our visitors from Earth. Welcome."

"High Chancellor Travell, this is Colonel Jack O'Neill, Dr. Daniel Jackson, Major Samantha Carter, Teal'c, Tera and Carl Edwards." Narim introduced the group.

"We are honoured that you have agreed to participate in Triad. Your Seeker will decide which one of you will be Archon." She stated.

"Actually, we've decided that I'll be the Archon, since I have the most experience in law." Tera asserted while Carl looked on in amusement.

"Very well. If your seeker agrees to it, you shall be the Archon." High Chancellor Travell agreed.

Tera was then escorted off to meet with the Seeker while the rest of the group was ushered to the trial chambers. Carl moseyed along at the back. He noticed that all members of his group were sending out their profound senses, looking around the Tollan building to see what was happening out of sight.

When they arrived at the courtroom, they were introduced to the Goa'uld's Archon, a Goa'uld that went by the name Hunac. The Goa'uld Seeker was named Rupnot.

Carl wasn't particularly surprised to see how arrogant the Goa'uld Archon was, as he looked around at everyone like they were bugs beneath him.

Shortly afterwards the neutral Archon came gliding into the room with a small smile almost permanently on her face.

High Chancellor Travell introduced Lya to the group.

Carl pulled out another tub of popcorn and offered it to Lya, who graciously accepted. The taste of the buttery goodness that was popcorn that she had on their previous encounter was too short. She was happy to have another taste of the snack.

"Is this your custom, Carl? To gift this delicious snack to those you meet?" She inquired.

"Just with you, Lya." Carl chuckled. "This is a snack that we usually eat when watching a movie. It's my way of declaring that I'm here to watch the show."

"Indeed." Lya enjoyed the joke, since she did indeed feel like the whole process was a play. She would seriously consider the arguments, as was needed for her role as an Archon. But she did indeed feel like the question posed by the Tollan of who owned the body was somewhat ridiculous.

Over the next few days Carl watched the proceedings. The Goa'uld Archon, Hunac, asked for frequent breaks, to consult with his client, to stretch out the trial, to bide his time. All the while, Carl tracked him as Hunac visited each of the various Ion Cannons in the area to disable them.

Carl shook his head at the stupidity of the Tollan that they allowed non-cleared personnel, especially a Goa'uld, to wander where ever they wanted. The Tollan were so convinced they had control over the situation just because they shut down their guest's weapons that they didn't even keep track of him, sure in the knowledge they were safe due to their technology.

Carl's people knew what was brewing, and they decided to let it happen as a lesson for the Tollan. They wouldn't actually allow the Goa'uld to harm the Tollan people, but they would let them disable the Ion Cannons so the Tollans could see just how stupid they were to cater to the Goa'uld and debate whether or not a person had a right to their own body, or if they should give it up for the Goa'uld.

Carl was tempted to implant a Goa'uld in each of the Tollan council for a week and see if they enjoyed having their body taken over. That would give them the proper perspective on the issue. Maybe after the trial was over, he would slip them a VR helmet in their sleep and have them experience what being a Goa'uld host was like.

What was the saying? Walk a mile in my shoes?

After a few days the trial was finally over. Carl was seated in the audience section watching how the voting went.

And just like in the show, a Goa'uld Hat'ak arrived in orbit before the end of the trial, surprising everyone there.

"The ship simply arrived in anticipation of our winning the case. It will be our means of transport home." Hunac blithely lied. Carl shrugged. It wasn't like he was going anywhere after the drama happened.

High Chancellor Travell asked for the votes at the end of the trial.

Tera as the human's council naturally voted for the host, Gerry.

The Goa'uld Hunac naturally voted in favor of the parasite, Rupnot.

"After careful consideration, I believe that both Gerry and Rupnot have the right to live. But living as a host with no will of one's own is not life, therefore only one may remain in the body. To that end, I award priority to the original owner of the body. Gerry." Lya explained her decision for the benefit of the crowd.

Travell nodded in agreement of Lya's vote. "We will summon the Tok'ra to come to Tollana to assist in the removal of the Goa'uld Rupnot. He will be removed from the host and if he survives, will be sent to the Goa'uld world of his choice." She then used a handheld device and the device that allowed them to control whether the host or parasite was in control turned blue, indicating Gerry was in control.

"Thank you very much," Gerry said to Lya gratefully. Carl noticed Gerry had been giving the Tollan some not so nice looks for the whole trial thing, instead of simply freeing him from the parasite and being a prisoner in his own mind. Carl couldn't blame him. To have some pretentious assholes say that he may not get the rights to his own body must have been infuriating.

"Lord Hunac, thank you for your time. You are dismissed, with our thanks." Travell finished.

At which point Hunac took out a small ball shaped device and activated it. A moment later the Hat'ak in orbit started bombarding the Ion Cannons, destroying them.

"You will surrender to your gods or you will die!" Hunac yelled while the Tollan in the room were panicking.

Travell and Narim were desperately trying to find information on their planet's defenses, only now finding out their Ion Cannons were destroyed and they were defenseless. They were suddenly feeling hopeless about their ability to defend themselves from the Goa'uld.

Lya stared curiously at Carl. She knew the man who was Carl had many tricks up his sleeve. Carl casually pulled out a tub of popcorn and offered Lya some buttery treats in response. She smiled and grabbed a handful, curious to see what he had planned. She herself was able to hide when she wanted, so she wasn't bothered by the Goa'uld's tactics. But she was interested in Carl's abilities.

"Yeah, not gonna happen there, snake." Jack sarcastically interrupted the parasite's glory.

"You are defenseless. You will die if you do not surrender." Hunac menacingly stated while glaring at Jack.

Jack smirked and pulled out his handgun that the Tollan thought had been disabled, flicked the switch to stun, and shot the Goa'uld. Narim and Travell blinked in shock as they looked at the firearm that should have been disabled.

"What..?" Narim muttered.

Sam then pulled out a communicator. "This is Carter to the Lancer. Please take over that Hat'ak ship in orbit. We don't want them making more of a mess than they have already."

At which point the giant Battlecruiser that rivaled a Hat'ak in size unstealthed. The Goa'uld ship was soon disabled and troops teleported over to the Hat'ak and took them into custody.

They then teleported Gerry and Hunac up to have the Goa'uld removed from them and offered a place in Carl's Empire. The former hosts were incredibly happy to have ownership of their bodies, and they immediately joined the group of people who offered them freedom.

Travell and Narim were looking at the displays that told about the FCO ship in orbit that they hadn't detected before. They looked at each other in bewilderment. What happened to the Earthlings being primitive? That ship was far more advanced than their own technology.

Narim then approached Sam. "Sam. It is good that your people have such technology. Thank you for saving us. We would be interested in trade, maybe even an alliance." Narim offered with a suggestive smile, trying the same honey pot ploy that he'd used previously.

Little did Narim know how little Sam thought of him for his schemes. She had only helped him previously because she didn't want them to be used and abused by the NID. She had already hooked up with the hawt man that O'Neill had turned into, so she wasn't looking for love in all the wrong places. Even though Jack was pretty dumb when it came to science, he was a smart dude in general, and he knew enough to fulfill her needs.

"Sorry Narim. We have a policy not to give our technology to those who aren't advanced enough to be responsible with it." She gave him an insincere smile, feeling pretty good about being able to give them a serving of their own medicine. "So I'm afraid we'll have to decline at this time."

Carl chuckled in amusement at seeing the drama play out in front of him. His amusement at the scene drew some attention to him. [How did that feel to throw it back in his face?] Carl asked Sam via telepathy.

[Very cathartic sir.] Sam's mind voice had plenty of laughter in it.

Carl didn't blame her for feeling that way. As someone who highly valued her intelligence and learning ability, it had been a great insult for the Tollans to arrogantly proclaim that Sam was too primitive to be able to handle the knowledge.

And once Sam got a chance to learn something much more advanced than the technology that the Tollan had, she had proven to be a veritable sponge, soaking up the knowledge at an unbelievable speed.

"Thanks for your hospitality." Carl stated to Narim and Travell. "Now that the Triad is over, we've got plenty of things to do. We'll be in touch sometime in the future." Carl then turned to Lya. "How would you like a tour of my new home planet of Caladan?" Carl inquired.

"Yes, come and see what we've built." Tera giggled and urged Lya. She knew of the otherworldly build of the Nox race, and she wanted a friend of the race to come with them.

Everyone on Carl's side there knew that the Nox were once members of the Alliance of Four Races, and that they were practicing isolationist policies now. They had also heard Carl's rants against the former Alterans that were now "a bunch of energy snot balls". Carl wanted to get to be friends with the Nox, like he had with the Asgard.

And Carl hoped to convince the Nox to not pay any attention to the snot balls if they came calling to convince the Nox to stand against Carl's Empire, for whatever reason.

"I would be honored," Lya stated with an anticipatory smile.

Carl had Lya, Tera, and himself beamed up to the Yamato, leaving the four former members of SG-1 standing there, looking around.

"Well, I guess that's why the boss gave us our own rides," Jack said with a chuckle at being left hanging. The four of them then teleported up to their own ships, leaving Travell and Narim staring blankly at where they had once been.

Narim especially felt a great amount of regret. If he knew the lady that he'd insincerely attempted to seduce in the past would one day have access to such advanced tech that could help his people, he would have acted differently. He would have been much more sincere, for one.

Despite being barely nicer about the tech gap with the earthlings than Omoc, he too had been very arrogant and dismissive of the apparently primitive Earthlings.

But all Narim could do was regret. There was no changing what had already happened, or how much they had missed out on.

Lya's visit with Carl to Caladan was very interesting and profitable. From the very first time he had met Lya, Carl had sensed that she, and quite likely all the Nox, had some native abilities to manipulate the dimensional energy that the Alterans could as well.

Lya's reaction to the wards and wizarding plants that Carl showed her gave him the idea that, similar to Alice, the Nox might be able to learn some of the wizarding spells he had available.

After some time, the Nox agreed to an alliance between Carl's FCO and them. One of the things Carl insisted on gifting the Nox was wards to keep the snot balls away from them unless they wanted to talk to them.

Carl was still testing out ideas on the three snot balls he had imprisoned. He was learning a great deal, especially how to guard against them. It would surely be useful for whenever he ran into Anubis, the Goa'uld that was ascended before being half descended.

Once the talks with the Nox were settled, Carl turned his attention back to taking over the Goa'uld's territory. The Nox didn't want to get involved with the conflict at all, but they didn't try to chastise him over what he was doing, which was fine with him.

At the beginning of February, Carl received word that the negotiations of Kinsey and the Committee had finally borne fruit. They would gather the United States allies and inform them of the Stargate, and work to build a coalition force to explore through the Stargate.

With Carl's nudges here and there, he expected the negotiations would take at least a couple of years. The supposed invasion that Daniel Jackson had talked about had failed to manifest, and the US forces weren't out stirring up enemies to focus on them. So there was no great impetus forcing the nations to compromise for their survival.

Which all meant that negotiations could be stalled by the littlest thing, and posturing would cause the process to slow down as well.

So with the Earth's issues on the back burner, Carl's forces continued focusing on getting prepared for the next System Lord's territory to take over.

By the beginning of March of 2000 Carl's forces were prepared to take over Chronus' territory. Carl admitted to his girls that the reason he had picked Chronus was that he was the killer of Teal'c's father. So he was more than willing to give the former Jaffa and former robot the satisfaction of ending the parasite.

And now that Carl's forces and people were really starting to get numerous, the process of taking over a System Lord's territory and consolidating the new planets was really becoming streamlined.

Only three months after taking over Chronus' 25 planets, Carl's forces were already prepared to take in another System Lord's territory. What Carl hadn't expected during this time was that some enterprising entertainers in Carl's Empire petitioned for the feed from the System Lord HFRs so they could make it into a comedy show with commentary mocking the Goa'uld.

Carl approved the idea, having no idea just how popular the show would become amongst the former slaves and Jaffa. Seeing the previously terrifying Goa'uld masters being mocked and fooled by the robots seemed to do something really special for Carl's people. They just couldn't seem to get enough of it.

Even though Carl didn't really understand the appeal for his people, he saw how much they craved for anything that tore down the previously untouchable Goa'uld, so he was happy to allow them the opportunity to do so.

When Carl's next target of Niirti was announced, the Sams, Janet Frasier and Cassandra, who had been a victim of the Goa'uld's human experiments, were cheering heartily. They were happy that bitch was finally getting what was coming to her.

The operation to take over Niirti's territory in June went without a hitch, although his scientists were busy breaking down her research and the medical personnel had their hands full reversing the horrible things she had been doing to people in her territory.

The next target that the FCO took out in September was Heru'ur. There wasn't anything unusual, and by this time Carl's growing army were consummate professionals.

Carl decided that it was time for another Time Dilation training. In December he brought in 500 more students to train, which would double his cadre of students and disciples. Like his girls had teased him before, Carl was at his busiest when he was training his students. Any other time, he delegated most of the work away like a good leader should.

With the numbers that he was training, he relied heavily on his already trained students to do most of the work. But he kept rotating through classes, making sure to spend time with every new student.

When they exited the training, they spent the month of December reorganizing and continuing to train his people.

To celebrate the New Year, the first week of January of 2001 the FCO took over Yu's territory. By this point there wasn't much to say about the process other than it went like clockwork. His people already knew the best methods to consolidate and assimilate the new people. Their space mining and Stargate railroad system was continually expanding and providing the raw materials needed to build up the infrastructure, defenses, and ships needed to keep up the operations.

In March they moved onto Ba'al's territory.

In June they took over Svarog's territory.

In September Bastet fell.

And in December Kali was no more.

Carl's forces had almost taken out all of the System Lords when his HFR System Lords got word that someone wanted to address the System Lord Council. Carl decided he would be on hand for the meeting. There were only two more System Lord territories that he needed to take over, Morrigan and Olukun. And since they were kind enough to show up in one place, he could replace them now and make the takeover easier. And if the one calling for a meeting was who he thought it was, he wanted to catch the slippery snake now, before he could make a nuisance of himself.

So near the end of March 2002, Carl journeyed to the System Lord meeting. He was relaxing on the Yamato with Alice and Tera, watching the meeting when he felt him. The half ascended Anubis approached the meeting, supposedly to get his place back as a System Lord and take over the leadership.

Since Carl didn't feel like giving the snake a chance, he apparated him over and used his ghost trap to capture Anubis, while the girls took care of Morrigan and Olukun, replacing them with HFRs.

Carl chuckled to himself at just how easy it was to overcome insurmountable problems with magic and technology. The same enemies that Earth and the SGC would be struggling against were just a little obstacle for him. He had to keep reminding himself not to get too complacent or arrogant.

By June the takeover of the final two System Lord's territories was complete. All of the major Goa'uld players were taken off the board, and the Galaxy basically belonged to Carl. There were probably some minor Goa'uld still out there, and Carl's forces would continue to monitor the situation. If they ran into a Goa'uld that was being a tyrant, they would take the snake out and assimilate the territory. If they found one that was actually being reasonable, they would offer a blank clone body as a host or transference to a human body of their own and a place in his Empire.

The Tok'ra were proof enough that the Goa'uld snakes could manage to be decent people. So they wouldn't be discriminated against just for being little snakes. But if they acted like murderous thugs, then they would be taken care of like the trash they were.

The Earth Stargate Coalition had finally gotten their act together and was prepared to start exploring through the gates. Fortunately for them, the galaxy was under new management. When they got the news that they wouldn't be able to freely explore everywhere and exploit new resources as they pleased, they didn't exactly feel lucky. They felt they had lost the biggest lottery by just a couple of numbers.

So as a result of finding out that Fire Crow Industries was a subsidiary of the Fire Crow Organization (Empire), new debates and negotiations started up. Even though they wanted to crack down on FCI and exploit them, they didn't dare when they found out how powerful the FCO was. They could only debate with each other about whether they should give up their sovereignty to join the FCO in order to benefit from the advanced tech and knowledge base they so obviously had.

Carl didn't really expect that they would be able to make that decision in the next four years before he left the world. But things had surprised him before, so he would keep an eye on the situation.

Now that the Goa'uld threat was dealt with in the Milky Way, Carl had his people continue to explore solar systems that weren't connected to the Stargate Network. There was bound to be plenty of real estate and things of interest out there.

He also had his people deal with the Aschen. Investigations were conducted, the Aschen leaders who were guilty of killing off and sterilizing whole planets in the name of conquest were tried and punished with execution.

The remaining people of the Aschen were put through reeducation and morality training. Carl didn't want to discriminate against all the Aschen people for what their leaders did. Alice's example of being a scapegoat for her parents made him especially aware of not allowing the Aschen people as a whole to have to suffer from other's past mistakes. They didn't deserve to be punished for what other people did. And there really was enough real estate that they didn't need to kill off other planets in order to expand.

After several months of consolidation, in April of 2003, Carl felt it was time to travel to the Pegasus Galaxy and start cleaning up the mess the Alterans had left him there. However, before he could send off a fleet to start cleaning up the galaxy, something happened that interrupted his plans.

A Prior of the Ori arrived on one of Carl's planets.

The Ori were ascended beings, similar to the Alteran snot balls. Long, long ago, the Ori and the Alterans were one species. They grew and matured in a galaxy far away from the Milky Way. At some point in their development, there were a few members of their race that ascended. The ascended beings continued helping their physical descendants, who eventually came to have faith in the ascended beings.

The ascended beings discovered that there was an energy in the faith and worship of lower beings that allowed them to harness it and grow more powerful, or it was delicious, or something. Carl wasn't sure of that exact point, but there was a schism that developed in their society.

One side was fanatically devoted to worshiping the ascended beings, the Ori. The other side was of a more scientific mindset. They soon found themselves marginalized and hunted. The religious fanatics were more than willing to kill nonbelievers. So the people who would become the Alterans gathered in their space ships and set out into the void between galaxies to find a new home, far away from the persecution back home.

They eventually arrived at the Milky Way galaxy and began to flourish. Eventually some of their members also ascended, and started the rules of non-interference with the physical plain, hoping to avoid becoming like the Ori. But they were still human in nature, and couldn't stop themselves from meddling here and there.

Carl wouldn't even have thought of them so badly if they just admitted that they still had human emotions and wanted to help people. But instead, they put on airs and became arrogant, thinking they were above the petty concerns of humans. They left dangerous devices that became a danger to their allies like the Replicators. Or they ascended a Goa'uld and then didn't fully take care of the problem they created. Instead they left him in the Galaxy to continue to spread misery and death and slavery.

It was that attitude and refusal to clean up their messes that caused Carl to have a great dislike for them.

In the Stargate show, the people of Earth earned the attention of the Ori from a device found under Glastonbury Tor that transferred Daniel Jackson and Vala Mal Doran's consciousness over to the galaxy the Ori were in. That was how the Ori learned of Earth and all the possible worshippers there, who they just had to convert because faith energy was better than soft serve ice cream, apparently.

So as Carl was watching the recording of the arrival of the Prior, or priest of the Ori, he was wondering just how the Ori came to know of their existence. He had long ago cleaned out the things that Merlin, or Moros as his Alteran name was, had left behind. So Carl knew that no one had used the communication device to alert the Ori to their presence.

On the video, he watched as the blue and black-robed Prior with a staff condescendingly talked down to the security troops, proclaiming how they shall be converted or die. Carl was pleased to see the wards he had designed seemed to keep the Prior's powers, granted through his staff, in check. The look of shock when he wasn't able to blast the nonbelievers was very comical.

"The first question I have, is how did the Ori find out about us." Carl said to council. His first six students, the SG-1 teams, Hammond, Bra'tac, Ishta, and a few others were Carl's closest students that he worked with the most often. "Any suggestions on how to figure that one out?" Carl threw the question out to be pondered on by everyone present.

A chime at the door interrupted anyone from answering. Carl knew that unless there was something important, the guards wouldn't interrupt them, so he called for the guards to enter.

"My lord." The lead guard, Harlowe, bowed and began reporting. "We received a message that three emissaries from the Ascended wish to speak with you about a matter of great importance to the Empire, but are unable to approach due to our protections. They said the matter of great importance is information on a dire threat currently facing us."

"Well, did these three give a name, Harlowe?" Carl inquired.

"Yes, my lord. They said they were known as Oma Desala, Ganos Lal, and Chaya Sar." Harlowe promptly answered.

'Hmm, what are three ascended doing here?' Carl thought. 'Could the ascended council have done something stupid and brought the Ori to us?'

"Interesting. Here, pass these arm bands to them." Carl tossed three arm bands to Harlowe. "That should temporarily get them inside the wards so we can meet them and see what they want," Carl said.

A short time later three wide-eyed ladies entered the conference room, having just arrived on the planet through the Stargate. Carl guessed that the amount of work that his people had put into the city had impressed them.

"Greetings ladies." Carl began when the door was closed once more. They were seated in three visitors chairs in front of the conference table, while Carl's students were spread around the room. Alice was seated on his right while Tera was on his left.

"I'm the leader of the Fire Crow Organization, Carl Edwards, this is Alice, Tera…" Carl introduced the rest of his people to the ladies. "And why don't you go ahead and introduce yourselves." Carl finished.

"My name is Oma Desala." The dirty blonde-haired woman in the center took the lead. "This is Ganos Lal." She indicated the dark brown-haired lady to her left. "And Chaya Sar." Oma indicated the redhead sitting to her right. "We know you've run into the Ascended Council members before. We too are ascended, but in poor standing with the council because we keep trying to help people, and so we keep being punished by the council."

"Despite being warned against it, we've come to give you a warning. The council felt threatened by you. By how you've been protecting your territory so they can't get inside. Despite our advice against it, they decided to incite the Ori against you." Oma then went on to explain who and what the Ori were. "Because of their actions, the relentless religious fanatics will be coming for you, to convert or destroy you. We didn't want to see what happened before happened here. The plagues and deaths, the fanatic war. But the council felt like whichever one won, you or the Ori, they would be able to mop up the remnants."

"We've finally grown sick of their hypocrisy. We can't stand by while they plunge the galaxy into war. So we came to warn you, and to bring you news of a weapon that can help you fight off the Ori." Oma finished.

"Hmm, are you referring to the Sangraal, the weapon project that Moros created?" Carl asked. He was amused to see their shocked looks that he already knew what they were talking about. "Yes, I already picked up the weapon and have been studying it. Moros himself needed a rejuvenation treatment from the stasis he was put in, but he is at this moment figuring out how to deliver the weapon to the galaxy the Ori reside in, so we can end this war as soon as possible."

"W-what? How could you…?" Oma whispered.

"How could I know about it?" Carl asked and got a shaky nod from the three ladies in question. "Oh, I found the first clue under Glastonbury Tor, and the rest was easy." Carl deflected. He didn't just blab his secrets to anyone. They had to develop a certain amount of trust and loyalty first.

"Well, ladies. I have to say you are lucky you made the decision to come warn me that you did. I'm responsible for quite a lot of people. And I really don't appreciate having some people instigate a war that I and my people weren't ready for. So I was going to punish the council for their callousness and meddling in other people's lives. Since you've come here, I'll give you the chance to survive the coming war, under my protection."

The three ladies looked at each other in dismay. He was telling the truth. He really did have the Sangraal and was going to use it not just on the Ori, but on the Ascended Council too.

"Is there any way we can persuade you to save some of our friends. They too don't like what the council has been doing. But the council has too many people on their side. It has been impossible to go against them." Oma begged Carl to save some of their friends.

Carl looked at his students who were also his friends and advisors and consulted them using profound energy to project their voices to each other. The consensus was to save as many as would descend and join them in the Empire.

He turned back to the three hopeful ascended ladies and gave them the choice. "If you can bring your friends, the ones that are decent people along with you, you will have to descend back into physical bodies and join us. Then we will save you from the results of the Council's war efforts." Carl promised.

"Thank you!" The three ladies each agreed. They spent some time organizing how they would gather their friends and where they would go to descend and become part of Carl's Empire.

After the planning session, the women got up from their chairs and left. They had some work to save as many as they could. They were magically bound though so they couldn't tell anyone exactly what Carl was planning on doing. Carl didn't want the council to have the time to counter attack or flee the repercussions of their acts.