SG1-15 The Power Behind the Throne

by Savile, Steven

  “As I am to you, Iblis.”

  The juxtaposition of the assertion against the spoken word and the silent thought made the Goa’uld smile. Such a simple statement, so filled with devotion, and so absolutely true on both levels. “Indeed, as you are to me, Kelkus.”

  “I shall enjoy cleaving the wings from this angel personally, master. Thou shalt worship no other gods,” the scientist said with an utterly straight face. “He shall pay for his blasphemy.”

  “That is as it should be. Tell me, Kelkus, how go your experiments? I am eager to hear of some successes to appease the Great Keen’s restlessness.”

  “Ah,” the scientist said, wringing his hands together as though washing the filth of the Kelani out of them with lye. “There is so much to tell, master. So much.”

  “Then tell me, Kelkus. Share your genius with me. It would please me greatly to hear of your successes.”

  “Yes, yes, of course, my lord. Of course. I do not know what, precisely, you know of the Facility and how I have divided its operations?”

  “I know enough, believe me.”

  “Good, yes, of course. The Kelani are sorted by age and sex as they arrive. At first we were not interested in the women or the young, so they were sent for treatment.” That was the scientist’s euphemism for being disposed of. It was rather interesting the way his mind rationalized the slaughter, turning it into simply another function of his studies. “The men we divided according to age and body type, endomorphic, ectomorphic and mesomorphic, to better study the effects of certain things. The unique specimens are sorted out, the twins, the midgets, those with startling genetic differences are sent to the experimental blocks. There is much to be learned. We have performed a number of live autopsies, for instance, studying the effects of stress and pain on the heart. One thing of interest, given the nature of the world, is the effect of extremes on the body — of heat and cold. Did you know a body can be chilled into unconsciousness and then revived by warmth? No? That is interesting, no?”

  “Fascinating, I am sure,” Iblis agreed.

  “The average body temperature is thirty-seven degrees. Kelani only seem to die when their body temperature is reduced to around twenty-five. That is a drop of twelve degrees.”

  “That does not seem overly much,” Iblis agreed. “It would suggest that these humans freeze to death rather easily. That may well be something worth remembering, Kelkus.”

  “Thank you, master. I believed it would prove an interesting fact. Curiously, the temperature also affects a woman’s ability to ovulate. This was not something we had originally considered, but it has helped us greatly to develop a technology that effectively renders the Kelani sterile.”

  “Oh, Keen will be pleased,” Iblis said, barely masking his distaste for the notion.

  “This of course has opened many other avenues of investigation — for instance, it set me to wondering if we are superior, are we actually perfect, or are there perfections that can be refined?”

  “What do you mean?” Iblis asked, but he knew all too well what the scientist meant. He could see the light of madness in the man’s eyes.

  “If one is to assume that there is a blueprint encoded in our flesh, something that separates Corvani from Kelani, is that blueprint complete and perfect, or are there still impurities? After all, if a Kelani woman ruts with a Corvani male, what of their offspring? She merely provides the egg, it is the Corvani seed that fertilizes it, so is the genetic purity of the species diminished or can the stronger Corvani genetic encoding override the impurities and prevail?”

  “So tell me, can it?” Iblis knew of the room in Rabelais that Kelkus had set up with its women and children subjected to endless tests and experiments before inevitably their tiny innocent bodies failed them. Neither Keen nor Kelkus cared, obviously, because as half-breeds they were less than human. The sickness of the human monster was endlessly fascinating to Iblis. With them he could create an army of demons far more lethal than anything the System Lords could harness. If only they understood the human race’s capacity for cruelty…

  “No. The genetic coding does not appear to work that way.”

  “A pity.”

  “Indeed, but other studies have proven that it is possible to alter the general coding before birth.”

  “Truly? That is fascinating. Are you saying you have the key to weed out the weak from the strong, the clever from the retarded?”

  “That would be something, would it not?”

  “Indeed. So do you have that knowledge?”

  “Not yet, but to my understanding this genetic code is rather like a set of building blocks. We are coming to understand what makes a person’s eyes blue or their hair brown, and as we do so, we can refine the process of winnowing out the undesirables.”

  “Keen will be pleased.”

  “But are you, master?” the scientist asked, desperate for his god’s approval. Iblis smiled indulgently.

  “More than you could possibly imagine. You are indeed worthy of being called my disciple, Kelkus. When I rise up and take my position at the forefront of this society and reshape it in my image there will be a seat for you at my right hand.”

  “You honor me, my lord.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “And what of your failures?”

  “Those that do not fit the ideal can be cleansed easily enough,” the scientist said with such detachment it sent a thrill of delight the length of the Goa’uld’s spine. “At the moment we are investigating the possibility that the secret might actually be in the blood itself, not in the flesh at all.”

  “An interesting extrapolation of the facts,” Iblis said. It wasn’t, it was a dullard’s way of thinking but he had no intention of dampening his disciple’s enthusiasm for the task at hand.

  “Thank you, master. I am glad you approve. It is vital that we collect living data. Only so much can be learned from the dead.”

  “Indeed. I trust you will use all of your resourcefulness on this fallen angel that has wandered into our midst.”

  “Oh most certainly, master. I am sure there is much that can be learned from his living tissue.”

  “I am sure there is,” Iblis agreed. “I shall report the good news to the Great Keen, I trust it shall improve his humor. You have done well, Kelkus.”

  “Thank you, my lord god Iblis.”

  Iblis walked away, then stopped at the doorway, his hand on the huge iron handle. He appeared to think for a moment, and then turned. “Tell me,” Iblis said, making it seem almost an afterthought, “do the Corvani respond to your experiments in the same manner? Does the cold render them unconscious, for instance?”

  “We have not carried out any experiments upon the Corvani, master.”

  “Ah, but perhaps you should? In the name of science and understanding, of course. What better way would there be to prove Corvani superiority than to demonstrate it empirically?”

  Kelkus nodded emphatically. “Yes, yes, of course. Of course. It shall be as you suggest, master.” His eyes lit up with obvious glee. “For every experiment we carry out upon the Kelani, we shall duplicate it on a Corvani test case.”

  “As it should be,” Iblis said. “I look forward to learning more of your results, Kelkus.” He closed the door behind him.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Fear of Daylight

  They were surrounded on all sides by thousands upon thousands of terrified Kelani being herded like cattle. Indeed, the analogy was distressingly appropriate, Daniel thought, seeing another black and silver clad soldier walk forward and taser a frightened woman. There was something utterly reprehensible about the man’s calm. Daniel bristled but before he could do anything stupid O’Neill rested a steadying hand on his shoulder.

  “Pick your fights, Daniel.”

  Daniel wanted to argue but there was absolutely no point, O’Neill was right.

  There was something soulless about the Kelani. It was as though every last ounce of spirit and resistance had been s
tripped from them. They milled about like ghosts consigned to Purgatory. Beside him a young girl clawed at her father’s arm. She had cried all the tears she had inside her. She wasn’t even afraid, she was just hungry. He could see it in her bones as they pressed out through her skin. Her father drew her close to his side as though he could somehow absorb her so that she need not suffer any more than she already had. It was a tender moment in a crowd of desperation. People pushed and shoved, but without any real spirit. The fight had been leeched out of them.

  He had talked to a few families, their stories had all been the same. The Raven Guard had come at night and dragged them out of their beds. It was all about fear. Come in the dark, batter down the doors, use fire and noise and anything else at their disposal to instill fear. Nothing broke the spirit as effectively as the unknown — and that was what they had been subjected to. They stumbled into the streets, frightened and disorientated, clinging to each other. Family became the only thing they could hold on to as more and more of the Kelani were dragged into the streets, branded filth, spat at and beaten. It was almost a science, intimidation and hate. It was all about striking hard and fast, not giving the people time to understand what was happening to them. Inevitably some of the Kelani must have died from the beatings, and not only by accident as the Raven Guard flexed their muscles.

  It was every bit as effective as heads on spikes and other medieval tortures — it worked the same way, after all. Fear.

  And now they were here, huddled up in their familial groups, the fear no less dulled for the hours they had been forced to sit and wait, not knowing if they were going to be separated and given all the time in the world for the reality of their situation to sink in.

  They were never going home again.

  Daniel listened sickly as one father told a story of the last few months in the city that broke his heart. It had started with the simplest of discriminations, children in the classrooms segregated according to race, the Kelani picked out for ‘special classes’. This had moved into other sectors of life until Kelani men were being sent home from work suddenly surplus to requirements and women on their way to market were being sworn at and spat on for being filthy. None of it made any sense to the man but it made far too much sense to Daniel. He could imagine the diagrams on the classroom walls showing the difference between the shape of a Kelani skull and a Corvani one and the lists of measurements about eye placement and shape of nose and all of these other spurious differences. The evils of man repeated themselves from planet to planet, they dressed themselves in different colors and sported different flags and badges, but they were all the same when stripped down to basic evils.

  Daniel’s stomach churned; it felt like the drum of a washing machine tumbling around inside him, wringing his insides out. The next stage would be the shakes. They were classic withdrawal symptoms. He had no idea what they had been pumping into his body but he felt every hair follicle and every nerve ending creeping and crawling like they wanted to come out through his skin. He knew all it would take was one more hit to make the pain go away, but that kind of thinking wasn’t going to help any of them.

  A woman walked among the crowd carrying a pitcher of water. She gave out barely a mouthful at a time, and only to the children and the old. Beside her walked two men with a huge platter of moldy cheese chopped down into cubes less than the size of a fingernail in any dimension. They rationed it out one piece of cheese per person. Desperate people pawed at them trying to get a second mouthful. One of the men kicked out, his booted foot catching the Kelani under the chin and snapping his head back. He lay sprawled in the dirt unmoving. More Kelani just climbed over him reaching out hungrily. Before they could pull the cheese man down a gunshot rang out. A second and third were fired into the air. Everyone in the square froze, eyes darting, frightened. Daniel half expected to see a blood-red rose flower in the side of someone’s temple but the bullets had been fired into the air — this time.

  Sam sat beside him, her back pressed up against the wall. She was shivering. It wasn’t cold. He scooted up closer to her and put his arm around her. The gesture made them look like any other Kelani family frightened of being torn apart. She scratched at her arm where they had hooked the drip into her. He wanted to sooth her but he barely had the strength to hold himself together. She looked like hell. Her hair, lank and unwashed, had begun to clump into greasy ringlets. Her eyes had taken on a dark sunken look and her skin was flaking. She was living with ghosts. But then so were the others. He couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten a proper meal. He knew he wasn’t alone. The hunger showed in each and every haunted face in the crowd. There was something utterly desperate about all of them. They didn’t know what was happening to them or why.

  He must have looked at a thousand faces, but none of them were Teal’c’s. They hadn’t seen the big Jaffa since he had rescued them from the maze. It had taken eight of the guard to bring him down, and even then he had maimed more than half of them with his bare hands. Teal’c was the immovable object being bombarded by the irresistible force. And for a moment it had looked as though he might hold his own forever, battering them back even as they threw themselves forward. And then a tranquilizer dart fired from long range had buried itself in the Jaffa’s open palm as he went to swat it away. He weakened heartbeat by heartbeat as the sedative mingled with his blood, his symbiote fighting to neutralize the drug. Still he didn’t fall until a crushing blow struck the side of his head. There was nothing any of them could do to stop the guard from taking him away. Jahamat had come to taunt them after that, goading and kicking O’Neill as he delighted in telling them that they would never see the Jaffa alive again because Iblis had chosen him.

  Iblis.

  It had taken a little while for the significance of the name to register.

  Iblis. It that causes despair. The enemy of man.

  According to the Qu’ran, Iblis was the name of an Islamic demon prince with an army of fiery demons at his beck and call. “The Companions of Fire,” he said softly, trying to remember everything that he had heard in relation to the demon. Sam looked up at him, not understanding. In four years they had encountered enough so-called gods and devils across the galaxy to know any such mythic resonance was no coincidence. Daniel hoped beyond hope that he was wrong, even as he became more certain he was right — Iblis had to be a Goa’uld. Had to be. It was an essential part of their psychology: the aggrandizement, the fraud, it was all part of their psychosis, and Iblis was no different.

  Islam was outside of Daniel’s comfort zone, he was much more familiar with ancient Egypt, the Sumerian myths, Babylon and Mesopotamia and such, but he knew enough without having to go back to the books. The story went that Iblis had refused to bow the knee to Adam because he was formed of clay, a lesser being, and had been cast out of heaven for it. Fallen, he had been given the name Shaitan for his hubris and set to wandering the world as penance. The Arabic epithet Shaitan translated roughly into ‘evil’ or ‘devil’. Indeed, the role of Iblis in the Qur’an bore some startling similarities to the devil figure of Judeo-Christian faith, Iblis being the tempter of both of God’s first children to eat the apple, earning their expulsion from Eden. Part of the demon prince’s vengeance on God was a promise to corrupt as many of Adam’s descendants with lies and half-truths as he could before judgment day.

  Lies and half-truths. It was hardly the Goa’uld way; it suggested subtlety and cunning as opposed to braggadocio and arrogance. But then, perhaps this Iblis was a different monster, being that he chose to hide himself behind Corvus Keen, opting for the shadows over sunlight?

  Daniel used the distraction to take his mind from the hunger. He ran through the pantheon of gods the Goa’uld were known to have drawn upon, trying to find parallels to the demons and angels of Islam. Oddly, perhaps, Shaitan was almost completely analogous to the Christian concept of Satan: a whisperer who urged men and women to commit sin. What that meant in terms of this Iblis, Daniel shuddered to think.

>   Around the square he saw the occasional muzzle flash as the sun caught the sniper’s steel, reminding them that all around them guns were aimed silently at their heads and chests. At the first sign of trouble death would rain down from on high. It was a far cry from the world any of them had been born into. At every corner stood a dozen or more of Corvus Keen’s black and silver Raven Guard, ostensibly to keep order and see the refugees were railroaded onto the trains that would take them to the Facility.

  Daniel shuddered, his head racing with all of the parallels. Over the heads of the prisoners he saw the funnel of steam and heard the clash and hiss of a huge old train rolling in. Everything about this sent a murmur of trepidation through the Kelani packed into the square. A few stood, craning their necks trying to see, more seemed to sink into themselves as though they hoped they might somehow become invisible inside the crowd.

  Guards came forward and slammed back the rusted iron bolts holding the drop-down sides on the carriages in place, and stepped back as the wooden panels fell with a bang. The sound rang out across the square, as deafening and more damning than any retort of gunfire.

  The segregation was as quick as it was ruthless, soldiers walking through the clusters of tired and frightened people, picking out one or two from each group and dragging them toward the train. They took young and old. Something about the selections disturbed Daniel. On the surface it appeared as though there were no rhyme or reason behind the choices but it was so random it had to be deliberate. A few minutes of watching them and he knew what it was that bothered him about it — they were weeding out the weaker ones, the youngest of the kids, the older men, the women, anyone lacking the physical strength they would need to survive a labor camp. And with that realization came a second one: he was looking at a death train. These grandfathers, mothers and sons were being culled.