"What about our theory that humans ARE the Ancients, and the Ancients came from our future?" Daniel insisted.
Ninurta tilted his head in thought. "We have been considering that," he said. "There is no precedent for it, though. Granted, you all went back in time, a couple of times, so to speak, but it wasn't really that far back. I don't know what would happen, if it's even possible, to travel millions of years back. We're pushing that one to the side, for now. The concept even managed to knock the Asgard on their little gray butts."
He stood to pace a few steps as he thought. “So Aba tinkered, amusing himself with a species that was about to become extinct anyway. I know, I know, not very humane of him. He’s mellowed in his old age. I think that my mother had a lot to do with ‘humanizing’ him. I think that once his own children began to be born, he realized the error of his ways. My own opinion, of course.
“Anyway. The Ancients eventually returned, checking out their old homestead, and you can imagine their surprise to find that not only had life remained, but it flourished. And it didn’t take them long to realize what was done with the proto-humans. They were angry about it. Not even the Ancients approved of tampering with natural evolution. But not too many Ancients were left to disapprove. In the long run, it proved to be a boon. There may not have been enough of them left to repopulate their species, but humans were advanced enough to be recognized as modern humans. Homo-sapiens.
“Our people weren’t around, at the time, I don’t know. Something about another project. So before the Ancients de-evolved back into the human race, where their DNA would at least be kept alive, they gave the Asgard the task of watching over the planet. The humans grew, the Ancients disappeared into the woodwork, so to speak, and when Aba and Nanna, Inanna's father, finally brought their troops in, your people were beginning to understand the concept of crops and villages. The Asgard returned the watch to Nanna and we spent time guiding your people. Until the Goa’uld, and you know the rest.”
Ninurta sipped from his own cup of what smelled like cinnamon as he contemplated his clan-son napping against Jack’s side.
“And the site in northern Scotland?” Daniel asked.
“We don’t know,” Ninurta said with a shrug. “At the time that site is dating, it would have been much further south. Perhaps near the equator. If so, it is possible that it is part of a larger Ancient site that has long since been turned back into molten rock. From the images you sent, it could be quarters for slaves and their families in attendance to a main house. Aba didn’t speculate much more than that. Don’t think it degrading to the primitive humans, Daniel; remember that the Ancients would not have brought them further than they were capable of understanding for their time. Considering the fact that most of your forebears were still camping out in caves and straw lean-tos, that kind of a structure would have been a castle to them.”
Whatever was in the tea, it was helping. The men were feeling halfway normal again. Except Jack’s brain which was trying to push an idea at him, and a sense of something that he’s missing. He hissed and put a hand to his head.
“Jack?” Daniel touched his arm. Jack leaned forward, holding his head. Daka slid from his resting place and looked confused.
“Time,” Jack muttered.
“What?”
“Something about….. time,” Jack said. He squeezed his head between his hands, trying to get the information out.
“Relax and center,” Daniel told him. “Just let the information come through. Talk. You can sort it out later.”
Jack breathed, forcing his awareness to the center of his being. A flood of concepts rushed over him, not offering definition only of being.
“Time,” he said again. “Something….. I don’t know… not being said.” He opened his eyes and looked at Ninurta. “You’re withholding again. I’m going to assume this is one of your games and I’m supposed to figure it out. Okay. Time. Timing….. timeline…. time…. travel. Enki isn’t hundreds of thousands of years old, only a few thousand. He went back to tinker with people, didn’t he?”
Daniel considered it and was stunned. Ninurta didn’t say anything, only sipped calmly at his tea.
“He changed our past,” Daniel guessed. “How much of the future did he see that caused him to change the past of an entire race?”
“Well, Daniel, I don’t particularly give a flying….” Jack looked down at his side, “you know what, I’m getting a little tired of word games and half-truths. In fact, I’m rather pissed about it.”
“Jack, I can’t give you anymore than you can access from your own brain,” Ninurta reminded him. “Go ahead and get angry with me, but there are things that I am unaware of myself. I give you clues when I can. If you would do as Aba continually asks you to do, spend time excavating your head, you would figure these things out for yourself. The history is in there, dammit; quit being a turnip.”
Becoming furious with the know-it-all warrior, Jack opened his mouth to object.
“Okay, okay,” Daniel held up a calming hand. “We will work on in, right, Jack? Let’s back up a minute because I have a question.”
Jack crossed his arms in a fit of pique while Ninurta’s eyes narrowed and threatened daggers at him.
“I thought the Ancients invented time travel,” Daniel said.
Ninurta pursed his lips for a moment.
“It was a group effort,” Enki said from the doorway. The old man came in, wiping his hands on a cloth, and poured himself something to drink. “Look, Jack, I’m sorry you’re feeling a little in the dark, but it can’t be helped. We need you to do this yourself, and you know it. Now, putting the time relay into the ships was the Ancients idea. Why would they do that, if they weren’t going to use it? Why equip the seneschals with it and not the other ships? Have you thought to ask yourself that? That answer is in your head. Figure it out.”
Jack stormed out of the room. Daniel murmured an apology and thanked the men before following Jack. Once in the gateroom, “….put them back into that fucking phased whatever the hell…..! bring that fucking Goa’uld back and let him…..! fucking old con artist….! tired of his bullshit….!” The SF did their best to ignore the ranting as Daniel signaled up at the window and hurried to follow Jack who had stalked through the arch. “…who died and made him almighty creator….?! …..fucking around with our brains…..! creating an entire species and for what….?! why didn’t he just go back and get rid of those fucking snakes on their own planet…..? did we ask him to create us? I don’t recall asking him to play God….! go back into OUR past and play fucking Pinocchio….!”
“Jack!”
Jack slammed the refrigerator door, rattling the various bottled inside.
“What!”
“Geppetto, not Pinocchio,” Daniel told him. “And we seem to have guests.”
Around the dining room table sat Michael, Maggie, Sam, Cassie, and Harper. Blood had drained from Michael’s face leaving him ghostly white.
Daniel leaned into Jack and said quietly, “And for the same reason Enki withholds information from you, you withhold information from others. You are going to destroy a hell of a lot, if you don’t make a few changes. I will deal with this, you go find a quiet corner and take a time out. Get a grip, Jack.”
The last thing he wanted to do was to hurt his brother. Which was exactly what he did. Jack left out the back door and headed toward the woods. Daniel was right; he needed head-space. He wasn’t sure what was making him so angry; the old man was always withholding information and although it was irritating, Jack usually enjoyed working it out and playing with the new ability it usually brought. He considered the hormone factor and acknowledged the possibility of his mental processes being affected by it, and then decided that it was too early to be having hormonal temper tantrums.
He was about two miles from the house when he finally sat and rested back against a tree. The back of his head made contact with the bark of the trunk and he shut his eyes. When he opened them again, the li
ght made him look around. Something was different. The sun was at a different angle. He must have taken a nap. Small movement caught his drowsy attention and he watched a dark pod wiggle on the thin branch that it was attached to. It tore open and a brightly colored wing appeared. The new butterfly fell to the ground and hobbled upright, spreading its wings to dry before it could use its weak, newborn strength to fly. Jack looked around, making sure there were no hungry creatures waiting to take advantage of the hatchling. An hour later it stretched its wings and took its first haltering flight. Hesitant at first, it grew more daring and flew away.
“Have a nice flight,” he told his fellow flier. He stood and slowly walked back to the house. The house was quiet. There was no one in the living room or around the dining table. He found Sam in the study working at the computer.
“Are you alright?” she asked.
He nodded. “I’m sorry if I interrupted anything.”
“We were going over wedding plans,” she told him. “Only five weeks until Cass is married. She’s a little upset. She wants to lose a couple of pounds for her dress.”
Jack frowned. “Lose a couple pounds from where?”
“It’s a bride thing,” she told him.
“Oh. Where are the kids?”
“Out playing. Mom has the baby. Daniel’s downstairs. And I think Michael will be alright. He knew you were hiding something from him, something to do with religion. I think he was beginning to guess, and was in denial. Are you alright?”
Jack thought about it. “I think I need to be in Truth-space,” he confessed. Sam shut the computer off and took his hand. They went downstairs where Daniel was also working on a computer. His desk was covered in old papers and a few artifacts. He looked over the top of his glasses at Jack and Sam.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
“Feeling…. distant,” Jack said, considering his condition. Sam told Daniel what Jack wanted and the computer was turned off while Jack began to take his clothes off. There was always a slight chill in the air of the den, which was technically underground. Daniel usually had a dehumidifier running to keep the moisture from his collection. Jack sat between Daniel’s legs and relaxed into the warmth of his body. He positioned his legs over Daniel’s while Sam sat in front of them.
“Alright,” Daniel said once Jack was settled. “What’s got your knickers in a twist?”
Jack pillowed his head against Daniel’s shoulder and clenched his fingers around Daniel’s knees.
“I don’t want to leave you two,” he said. Daniel tiled his head away to look at Jack.
“You planning on a trip?”
“Only a major head trip.”
Daniel looked at Sam as he considered. “The files in your head,” Daniel guessed. “You’re afraid you’ll fry your brain if you open the files.”
“Twice bitten,” Jack said.
“Jack, you’ve had access to those files for quite a while now,” Daniel said. “Besides the fact that the CT scans show your brain to be wired in ways no one has ever seen before, you speak fluent Ancient, you’ve been doing mechanical drawings of things Sam’s spent years trying to figure out, and you can do things that science fiction writers can only dream about. You made one of my ties the same color as my eyes.”
“And if I open those files completely, what will happen to me?” Jack asked. “I can’t handle that much information, we proved it before.”
Daniel slid his arms around Jack’s chest. “Jack, you’re not thinking it through. I told you –your brain is able to handle it. The wiring is there. It’s in place. The computer has been built, you only need to access it.”
“And how much more will I need to keep my mouth shut about?” Jack asked irritably.
“You’re afraid,” Daniel pieced together. “You don’t want to access those files because you’re afraid.”
“I’m not….!”
“You’re afraid, Jack. Scared. That thing no military officer should feel, no warrior should feel. Admit it, Jack. Say it!”
“I’m not…..!”Jack spit out, struggling against the arms that held him tight. “Let me go! Who the fuck are you to call me a coward! Let me up! I won’t…. I’m not…… God, dammit!” A fist grabbed the top of his head and Daniel’s legs abruptly changed places with Jack’s, putting Jack into a body lock.
“Say it! I’m scared! Say it!!”
Sam watched, stealing herself to remain focused and not respond to Jack’s struggles. Jack choked, fighting the arms and legs that held him. Daniel pulled the fist of hair tight, putting his mouth next to Jack’s ear to whisper gently, “Say it. It’s okay, we have you. Just say it.”
The internal fighting blackened his thoughts as a whirlwind spun within. The small voice within told Jack that this was exactly why he put himself into Daniel’s arms, so why was he fighting it? He wasn’t a coward, he put himself on the frontline time and time again! You’re scared, not a coward, he told himself. Daniel never called you a coward, Jack O’Neill, so just admit to what he wants to hear. You’re afraid and that’s the truth of it.
“I… don’t want to lose myself,” he whispered. The hand gripping his hair eased and caressed. “I… don’t want to not be human. I’m afraid… of not being me. I’ll still be in my middle age when you two are at the end of your lives. I’ll see five or six generations of grandchildren, if the rest of the world allows me to live here that long. Part of me isn’t human anymore and I’m not sure I’m happy about it. I’m afraid that if I access my brain my remaining humanity will be gone.”
Sam went to them and curled up around them, helping Daniel to hold Jack. “Whatever happens, we will be at your side,” she promised. “You need to do it, Jack. If you don’t, the pressure will grow and grow until it reaches a critical threshold and blows up. Release the pressure a little at a time. Find a way to access the information in bits and pieces. Like the internet. Search a word or phrase and see what comes up.”
“Control it,” Daniel told him. “Don’t let it control you. Find a way to bring it in line and offer information at your bidding.”
Jack closed his eyes and leaned back. “This shouldn’t have been me,” he said quietly. “I don’t deserve this. You or Daniel should have it. I’m not…. I’m just a grunt.”
“Don’t pull that,” Daniel told him. “I couldn’t use this kind of information, I’m bad at leadership. We all know what happened when I was shown an alternate future. I blew us up after I became lost in the power. I couldn’t do this.”
“And I couldn’t because I’m not the same kind of leader you are,” Sam told Jack. “I’m only just now learning how to lead. Jack, sometimes we can’t think clearly around all the information in our heads. We become so focused on one thing that we’re blind toward everything else. You know how we get sometimes.”
“And am I supposed to sit on the information I get?” Jack asked. Daniel tightened his arms and pressed his mouth to Jack’s head.
“No, you help guide us,” Sam told him. “Like you’ve done for years. Jack, we aren’t the Ancients. We might be in the future, but we aren't now. We shouldn’t create technology just like theirs. So you can come up with all the schematics, does that mean we should follow them exactly? I wouldn’t. We can, however, use the schematics to adapt technology we already have and make it user-friendly. As for the history, who cares? Sorry, Daniel. The history of the Ancients has very little to do with us, at this present time. Only about ten thousand years of history belong to us, anything before that is of a different culture. A different species. Sure, it’s interesting to learn about it, but it doesn’t help us. I don’t care when and where the Ancients came from; I care about our children and their future.”
Jack breathed, feeling calmer, and leaned over to put his head on Sam’s stomach. There was a small, hard spot just below her belly-button, big enough to be felt and yet small enough not to be showing. He kissed the spot. Sam caressed his hair.
“When can we find out if we have a Jake or Clair?�
�� he asked huskily.
“Gender is visible at about fourteen weeks,” Sam told him. He could hear the smile in her voice. “We have about eight weeks.”
Daniel turned onto his hip and slid his legs around Jack’s. “Does it really matter to you why we were created?” he asked. “For all we know, we’ve already accomplished the task. If the problem is centuries in the future, we still don’t need to worry about it. All we can do is our best to make a decent planet for our kids.”
“I don’t like that old man’s advice,” Jack said, scowling. “I refuse to be that cold.”
He felt Daniel’s forehead against his shoulder. “Jack, I think he’s been trying to make you find your humanity. Even in the myths, Enki pushed people. You really should read some of those stories. He was a bastard, mainly to Inanna and Ninurta. He’s the king of psychological warfare and he’s been taking it easy with you. In case you haven’t noticed, he hasn’t once reprimanded you for doing things opposite of his advice. He knows if he pushes one way, you’re going to head in the other direction. He doesn’t hold hands; he expects people to stand on their own two feet and be the best person they can be, and if he has to goad you into it, that’s what he’s going to do.”
Jack thought about it. “So, does he want me to dig out the information or not?”
“That’s up to you,” Daniel said. “Either way, I don’t see that it makes a difference. The difference comes in what you decide to do with the information. If it’s important to you to know what the Ancients were doing, dig it out. Otherwise, just stick to schematics and help Sam get the planet’s pollution problem under control.”
The Anunnaki Unification, Book 3: A Stargate SG-1 Fan Fiction Story Page 49
