Cleaning Up After The Ancients - Chapter 144

Chapter 144 - Ancestors and Gods - Part 3

The three native born Earthlings exchanged glances for a few seconds before with a sigh O'Neill made a good ahead gesture.

“A life codex?” Weir asked, seemingly taking the initiative. “I’m sorry to say I’ve never come across the term before.”

That was somewhat understandable Eventus supposed, as the name was one of those things that really didn’t match well with the English language. “It's an imprecise translation. You might have seen it referred to as something more like ‘a record of memory’ or ‘annals of life lived’?”

“Sorry.” Weir shook her head apologetically. 

Eventus sighed. “It's basically a digital copy of a being's memory that's stored as a virtual experience and eventually transcribed into a readable format by the city's central core.”

“It is of course highly illegal to force someone to undergo the recording procedure.” He added in so they wouldn't get any unfortunate ideas about using the system against their enemies. “However I will be making it quite clear that her other options for restitution to your people, the Jaffa, and the other humans of this galaxy are much more distasteful and long lasting.”

“Just to be clear.” O'Neill began after a moment. “You're offering to give us a copy of everything she knows as part of her restitution?”

“Oh heavens no.” Eventus shuddered at the thought of how many complaints he'd end up having to deal with in that case. “But if she agrees, I will be offering both you and the Jaffa an abbreviated transcription that strips out things like non-relevant private moments, dreams, bathroom trips, and sexual encounters.”

Vala let out a sound somewhere between a choke and giggle. “That's… Probably for the best…”

An awkward silence settled over the room, holding for several seconds until Weir finally broke it. “I suppose those aren't the sorts of things most people tend to think of when the idea of memory reading is brought up.”

“You'd be surprised.” O'Neill muttered under his breath.

“Yeah.” Eventus agreed sagely. “There's good reason that most people with the gift of mind reading did their level best to suppress their ability to read minds any time they went out in public.”

“Not that I’m against the idea.” Daniel put forward, glancing uncertainly at O’Neill before continuing. “But why do you think the various groups she might have wronged would consider that sufficient restitution?”

Eventus offered the archeologist an amused grin. “Leaving aside the fact that it would include a complete record of her infiltration of your world, which I’m sure General O’Neill has already realized and is working out how to get across the near priceless value of to the various politicians who are going to be angry about this situation.”

“Yup.” O’Neill confirmed.

“The knowledge of how to build and maintain Goa’uld infrastructure has to be worth several thousand times Yami’s weight in Naquadah to the Jaffa given the Goa’uld did everything they could to minimize that knowledge reaching those serving under them.”

Of course, it was very possible the Jaffa wouldn’t be satisfied with the proposed restitution and instead demand that the only acceptable option was Yami’s head on a platter. However that would be more their problem then Eventus’s given the only way Yami’s death would be on the table was if she turned out to be some kind of assassin.

“All right.” Weir put forward, all of the sudden sounding tired on several different levels. “Since it doesn’t seem we can talk you out of this, are you expecting us to bring Yami to Atlantis when we head back in two days?”

“That probably wouldn’t be safe.” Eventus admitted honestly, really not wanting to consider just how much a Goa’uld might be able to do without the city’s security system set up to actually monitor her. “I still have to head to Dakara and meet with the Jaffa Nation tomorrow, after which I’ll be picking up Janus from the moon and then heading out with the Asgard to deal with that issue I can’t tell you about.”

“On the Samantha Cater.” O’Neill interjected with an amused tone.

“Yes.” Eventus confirmed with a nod. “But unless you have a better idea, I was planning to keep Yami with me till I got back to the city.”

O’Neill stared for a moment before slowly raising an eyebrow. “All the time?”

“Well no.” Eventus confessed. “I can’t take her with me to Dakara for obvious reasons, so I figured I’d leave her here in the jumper for that. And the other thing will probably involve going down to at least one planet, but I’m sure the Asgard ship will have a room or something I can hold her in while that’s going on.”

“So you want us to watch her while you’re gone?” O’Neill clarified skeptically.

Eventus considered the obvious problems with that for a few seconds before bobbing his head in acquiescence.“I’ll see about asking Teyla or Rayla to watch her. Neither of them are fully human, so Yami would be gambling with her life to jump hosts and try to take one of them over.”

And Rayla's healing abilities, like his own, would treat a Goa'uld trying to take her over like they would any other parasite. Which shouldn't be survivable for any Goa'uld making the attempt unless it occurred within a suppression field.

“Not that it's likely to be needed since for the next few days my good graces are going to be literally the only thing standing between her and whatever fate your people might otherwise decide on for her.”

“Rayla's barely a month old.” Weir protested, clearly unhappy with the idea. “And you can't just keep expecting Teyla to play babysitter.”

“Her people literally worship mine.” Eventus pointed out dryly. “I could ask for her hand in marriage and I'm pretty sure the only reason she'd say no is that she's secretly in love with Sheppard and still holding out hope that he'll figure out her signals and actually make a move on her.”

“That happened a couple weeks ago.” Vala offered glibly. 

Daniel and Weir shoot the former host an odd look that she answered with a shrug. “We've been talking the last couple nights. And can I just say, you all could learn a thing or two from her about not taking everything so seriously.”

A slightly awkward look briefly flashed across Weir’s face before settling into a frown as she focused on Eventus. “I understand what you’re getting at, but Teyla has a lot of other things on her plate that shouldn’t just be dropped because you need help with a situation.”

“I feel like there are several arguments I could make about that.” Eventus acknowledged with a slightly annoyed frown. “But Teyla is the leader of her people so I’ll give you that she probably has a lot of other important things on her plate. Rayla doesn’t though, and her age isn’t a limiting factor for this given the worst that could happen is Yami convinces her to give evil overlording a chance.”

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Author’s Notes: Is it really though? I mean, the Goa’uld are probably really good at subtle manipulation when they put their minds to it. And Anubis was able to pull the wool over Oma Desala’s eyes for however long his plot took. Which is really a headscratcher when you think about it.