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Allies Alphabet Soup - U is for Ultimately Unmoved
This is my entry for today's Allies Alphabet Soup (here in full on DW) and (here in abridged form on LJ), posted a little ahead of the go-live hour because I'm heading out to visit colleges with Middle Daughter and visit family this week.
Title: Allies Alphabet Soup - U is for Ultimately Unmoved
Season: Pre-series through Season Two, with passing mention of Season Nine and Ten events in a non-spoiler-y way.
Spoilers: The Fifth Race, One False Step, mention of the bad guy race from Seasons Nine and Ten.
Warnings: BEHIND YOU! No, just kidding. I don't really think there's anything to warn about.
Synopsis: Some allies are active participants in the ongoing struggle. Others? Not so much.
Disclaimer: I take no responsibility for Jack O'Neill's major Furling letdown if he ever finds out. Wait? That's not what you mean by disclaimer? OH ALL RIGHT! Not mine, even though I wish they were. Not stealing, just borrowing. No money changing hands. No reason to sue me and leave me destitute and out on the street in the cruelly cold Vermont winter. Please do not send me any funny white naked guys in lieu of SG-1. I have enough children, and the ones I have would get creeped out by having a bunch of them peering into their faces and poking at the things they eat. Send them to Michael Shanks instead. He can entertain and amuse them for hours with his masterful plane impression.
U is for Ultimately Unmoved
Long and long ago when the galaxy was much younger, and no modern human beings had yet evolved to walk the Earth, there were four great races that allied themselves. Although the Tau'ri were to assume later - and mistakenly - that these races allied to fight the Goa'uld, this was not so. At that time the Goa'uld were still confined to the swamps of a single backwater planet, and they were considered a curiosity, and a curse on the few Unas that were afflicted with them. It was only millennia later, when humans had evolved and some of the Unas had been taught the use of the stargates and had begun to wander the galaxy that the Four Great Races, already allied, turned their attention to the scourge that was the Goa'uld, and because defeating the Goa'uld had never been the reason for their alliance, merely yet another of the paths that they explored in their attempts to better the universe, they did not - as a body - feel that they needed to see that task through.
They had banded together because they were each intelligent, space faring, curious races, and the universe is a vast place and evil was as strong and as dangerous back then as it is in our time. They were stronger together than individually, and thus they allied themselves, to share knowledge, to share resources, and to pool their questions about the nature of the universe. A dying race, still older than any of their own and the possessors of great wisdom, passed on to them the prediction that a Fifth Race would arise and walk amongst them all, and this race would be the one to defeat the Goa'uld, once and for all. Then that race, whose name has vanished into time, came to an end, taking their vast wisdom with them, a bitter development for the Asgard, who had hoped to benefit from it.
The first to drift away of the Four were the Ancients. They were always an overweening and outward-turned race, seeding the universe with stargates and with races created in their own image, using their stargates to spread the most successful mutations as they evolved far and wide throughout the universe. They studied time and learned to travel through it when the spirit or necessity moved them, and eventually they grew so mighty and had reached so far beyond their corporeal forms, and were so wracked by a great schism, that they passed beyond the ken of the other three races, ascending or becoming the gods of the Ori, depending on which side their loyalties lay.
The Nox were next. Though they had discovered many beauties and wonders out on the other worlds of the galaxy, the technology that they used to reach out to the stars had badly damaged the ecology of their planet. The Ancients had given them a stargate, enabling them to travel the stars by other means, but the Nox looked at the ruins of their native planet and they felt great sadness and great shame that their selfish quest for the wonders beyond its bounds had led them to abuse the other organisms that they shared the planet with. Their thirst for knowledge ceased to lead outward, and instead focused on finding the best ways to undo what they had done, and learning how to live in harmony with the environment they would cultivate and restore. They were, alas, not wise enough to be able to fully recreate all that had been lost. Some things, once broken, cannot be regained, but it would have been difficult for outsiders to see this. They tended their garden and worked to perfect the ability to live in harmony with all things.
The Asgard, alone of the Four, stayed and fought on, but their quest to amass ever greater intelligence and knowledge by defeating death was their downfall. With growing minds and failing bodies, they faced the press of their duty to hold back the tide of the Goa'uld, and this was complicated almost beyond feasibility by the rise of the Replicators. Still, courage and steadfastness is a quality more of the mind than the body, and they soldiered on, keeping back the forces of darkness, and waiting for a sign that the Fifth Race had arisen to help them bear the burden. It had been said that the Fifth Race would come of its own volition to the Asgard, and that it would have a wisdom unlike any other, binding the hard strength of the warrior with the fresh curiosity of the child. The Asgard fought, and watched, and waited.
This left the Furlings, and they had their own ideas about who the Fifth Race might be. The Ancients had tried to create them, sowing the seeds and starting the process of evolution, helping it along here and there. The Nox had turned away from the quest for the Fifth Race, and had instead cultivated their own garden. The Asgard were absorbed with guarding the seeds the Ancients had sewn, and if the Fifth Race was not to arise from that source, well then they were content to wait for it to come to them. A race older and wiser than themselves had told them that it would come, and they had no reason to doubt that this would be so. The Furlings had their own idea about what kind of beings had the best shot at becoming the Fifth Race, and so they put down roots and entwined their lives intimately with those they were grooming for the role, content to let nature and evolution take their course. If they regretted giving up their freedom and binding themselves inextricably with another species, they have never made that known to any others.
Long years passed. One day was much like the next, and the Furlings delighted in the harmony that they and their chosen race created. The people they nurtured did not grow or advance as fast as had been expected, but as the Furlings spread over their globe, so did their chosen people, and they were a peaceful, gentle, loving race. In time the Furlings hoped they would do great things indeed, and bring their harmony to the universe at large. The Furlings were slow growing and patient. They would wait.
And so the days followed each other, and the years passed away, and change was slow and very, very gradual. Each day was much like the day before, and would be much like the day to come, until unexpectedly change and disaster came calling all at once through the stargate. This stargate on the planet the Furlings had chosen to put down roots on had not been activated in millennia, but suddenly one day it burst into life, and a terrible death-dealing machine issued forth, flying through the air and slaying one of their number. Then it was that the Furlings regretted deeply having put down such deep roots. In building the bond between themselves and their chosen people they had been forced to make the choice to give up wandering the stars. They no longer had the capacity to rise up and fight fire with fire. All they could do was make their displeasure known, in hopes of driving away the invaders that followed the terrible machine. It would be effective, but this would also affect their chosen people. Many of them would also sicken and die. At least this way they would remain pure and uncontaminated by the violent nature of the Ancient's spawn that came through the gate.
But the intruders did not wither and fall fast enough. Still more came through, and these invaders took one of the chosen ones back through the gate. The Furlings pressed harder, and still the intruders did not leave, although they began to show signs of difficulty. Eventually more of the intruders began to make their way back to the gate, and the Furlings began to sense victory. There was sorrow for the one that was stolen, but at least it looked likely that the intruders would all turn back and leave in time.
As the outcome began to look more certain, the Furlings began to discuss another disturbing development amongst themselves. One of the intruders had a genetic marker. The tell-tale pheromone had wafted their way. It was unmistakable. The Asgard had done this, marking him as a likely member of the Fifth Race. That one had gone to the Asgard. They apparently felt that he was in fulfillment of the prophesy, and they had marked him as such. Although not all the Furlings were convinced that this view was correct, the majority felt that as disappointing as this development was, it was altogether too likely that the intruders, these aggressors, these cultivars of the Ancients, were in fact the Fifth Race, and the Furlings' beautiful, peaceful, harmonious people were just that, people. They were not destined to go forth and free the world, only to live their peaceful lives and sing their sweet songs. If, indeed, they ever sang again, because they had been sickened, and both they and the Furlings were spiraling into disaster now. The Furlings themselves were too out of harmony, and arguing amongst themselves, and as they continued to emit their soured sounds, their people sickened further, and the Furlings could feel themselves drawing down in and away, and their people did not sing to bring them back.
Then came the final proof that the Furlings needed to be convinced as a whole that the intruders were of the Fifth Race. The original four came back, with new machines, and the new machines played the Furlings’ own voices back to them, a sound from before the machine had mown down one of their number. Their chosen people began to recover and revive, and as they did so, they began to sing. They were saved, and the intruders had saved them! These were not evildoers, but well-intentioned, if unintentionally deadly voyagers. Happy and relieved, and content to let the intruders go in peace to wander the universe and fulfill their destiny, the Furlings stretched themselves up towards the sun and began to sing their own song.
The intruders stood for a few more moments to watch the results of what they had done, as the people sang and the strange white flowers reached for the sun and began their own song. They were discussing what had just happened.
The Asgard-marked one turned to another and said "Captain?"
"I... I talk to my plants, okay?" said the shortest, slenderest one, and they began to pack up their machines and leave.
The Furlings barely noticed them pass away, moving on to their destiny. The home of the Fourth Race was here now, with their people, and the sun was shining, the music was beautiful, and all was well with their world. They had spent many long millennia striving. Now their roots ran deep on this planet, and the Alliance of the Four Races was no more. Let the Fifth Race and the Asgard strive and struggle. If they were called on the Furlings would honor their ancient alliance and do what they could, but for now they were content to bloom and fruit here.
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Well, I'm off now to catch 3 pitiful hours of sleep before I have to get up again. I hope you enjoyed this, and if you comment and I'm not prompt to respond, it's because I'm on the road or FINALLY catching up on my sleep. Not that I'm too put out. Given the choice of getting enough sleep or getting a chance to see my grown kids and my mom's family, I'll jettison the sleep anydaynight!
Title: Allies Alphabet Soup - U is for Ultimately Unmoved
Season: Pre-series through Season Two, with passing mention of Season Nine and Ten events in a non-spoiler-y way.
Spoilers: The Fifth Race, One False Step, mention of the bad guy race from Seasons Nine and Ten.
Warnings: BEHIND YOU! No, just kidding. I don't really think there's anything to warn about.
Synopsis: Some allies are active participants in the ongoing struggle. Others? Not so much.
Disclaimer: I take no responsibility for Jack O'Neill's major Furling letdown if he ever finds out. Wait? That's not what you mean by disclaimer? OH ALL RIGHT! Not mine, even though I wish they were. Not stealing, just borrowing. No money changing hands. No reason to sue me and leave me destitute and out on the street in the cruelly cold Vermont winter. Please do not send me any funny white naked guys in lieu of SG-1. I have enough children, and the ones I have would get creeped out by having a bunch of them peering into their faces and poking at the things they eat. Send them to Michael Shanks instead. He can entertain and amuse them for hours with his masterful plane impression.
Long and long ago when the galaxy was much younger, and no modern human beings had yet evolved to walk the Earth, there were four great races that allied themselves. Although the Tau'ri were to assume later - and mistakenly - that these races allied to fight the Goa'uld, this was not so. At that time the Goa'uld were still confined to the swamps of a single backwater planet, and they were considered a curiosity, and a curse on the few Unas that were afflicted with them. It was only millennia later, when humans had evolved and some of the Unas had been taught the use of the stargates and had begun to wander the galaxy that the Four Great Races, already allied, turned their attention to the scourge that was the Goa'uld, and because defeating the Goa'uld had never been the reason for their alliance, merely yet another of the paths that they explored in their attempts to better the universe, they did not - as a body - feel that they needed to see that task through.
They had banded together because they were each intelligent, space faring, curious races, and the universe is a vast place and evil was as strong and as dangerous back then as it is in our time. They were stronger together than individually, and thus they allied themselves, to share knowledge, to share resources, and to pool their questions about the nature of the universe. A dying race, still older than any of their own and the possessors of great wisdom, passed on to them the prediction that a Fifth Race would arise and walk amongst them all, and this race would be the one to defeat the Goa'uld, once and for all. Then that race, whose name has vanished into time, came to an end, taking their vast wisdom with them, a bitter development for the Asgard, who had hoped to benefit from it.
The first to drift away of the Four were the Ancients. They were always an overweening and outward-turned race, seeding the universe with stargates and with races created in their own image, using their stargates to spread the most successful mutations as they evolved far and wide throughout the universe. They studied time and learned to travel through it when the spirit or necessity moved them, and eventually they grew so mighty and had reached so far beyond their corporeal forms, and were so wracked by a great schism, that they passed beyond the ken of the other three races, ascending or becoming the gods of the Ori, depending on which side their loyalties lay.
The Nox were next. Though they had discovered many beauties and wonders out on the other worlds of the galaxy, the technology that they used to reach out to the stars had badly damaged the ecology of their planet. The Ancients had given them a stargate, enabling them to travel the stars by other means, but the Nox looked at the ruins of their native planet and they felt great sadness and great shame that their selfish quest for the wonders beyond its bounds had led them to abuse the other organisms that they shared the planet with. Their thirst for knowledge ceased to lead outward, and instead focused on finding the best ways to undo what they had done, and learning how to live in harmony with the environment they would cultivate and restore. They were, alas, not wise enough to be able to fully recreate all that had been lost. Some things, once broken, cannot be regained, but it would have been difficult for outsiders to see this. They tended their garden and worked to perfect the ability to live in harmony with all things.
The Asgard, alone of the Four, stayed and fought on, but their quest to amass ever greater intelligence and knowledge by defeating death was their downfall. With growing minds and failing bodies, they faced the press of their duty to hold back the tide of the Goa'uld, and this was complicated almost beyond feasibility by the rise of the Replicators. Still, courage and steadfastness is a quality more of the mind than the body, and they soldiered on, keeping back the forces of darkness, and waiting for a sign that the Fifth Race had arisen to help them bear the burden. It had been said that the Fifth Race would come of its own volition to the Asgard, and that it would have a wisdom unlike any other, binding the hard strength of the warrior with the fresh curiosity of the child. The Asgard fought, and watched, and waited.
This left the Furlings, and they had their own ideas about who the Fifth Race might be. The Ancients had tried to create them, sowing the seeds and starting the process of evolution, helping it along here and there. The Nox had turned away from the quest for the Fifth Race, and had instead cultivated their own garden. The Asgard were absorbed with guarding the seeds the Ancients had sewn, and if the Fifth Race was not to arise from that source, well then they were content to wait for it to come to them. A race older and wiser than themselves had told them that it would come, and they had no reason to doubt that this would be so. The Furlings had their own idea about what kind of beings had the best shot at becoming the Fifth Race, and so they put down roots and entwined their lives intimately with those they were grooming for the role, content to let nature and evolution take their course. If they regretted giving up their freedom and binding themselves inextricably with another species, they have never made that known to any others.
Long years passed. One day was much like the next, and the Furlings delighted in the harmony that they and their chosen race created. The people they nurtured did not grow or advance as fast as had been expected, but as the Furlings spread over their globe, so did their chosen people, and they were a peaceful, gentle, loving race. In time the Furlings hoped they would do great things indeed, and bring their harmony to the universe at large. The Furlings were slow growing and patient. They would wait.
And so the days followed each other, and the years passed away, and change was slow and very, very gradual. Each day was much like the day before, and would be much like the day to come, until unexpectedly change and disaster came calling all at once through the stargate. This stargate on the planet the Furlings had chosen to put down roots on had not been activated in millennia, but suddenly one day it burst into life, and a terrible death-dealing machine issued forth, flying through the air and slaying one of their number. Then it was that the Furlings regretted deeply having put down such deep roots. In building the bond between themselves and their chosen people they had been forced to make the choice to give up wandering the stars. They no longer had the capacity to rise up and fight fire with fire. All they could do was make their displeasure known, in hopes of driving away the invaders that followed the terrible machine. It would be effective, but this would also affect their chosen people. Many of them would also sicken and die. At least this way they would remain pure and uncontaminated by the violent nature of the Ancient's spawn that came through the gate.
But the intruders did not wither and fall fast enough. Still more came through, and these invaders took one of the chosen ones back through the gate. The Furlings pressed harder, and still the intruders did not leave, although they began to show signs of difficulty. Eventually more of the intruders began to make their way back to the gate, and the Furlings began to sense victory. There was sorrow for the one that was stolen, but at least it looked likely that the intruders would all turn back and leave in time.
As the outcome began to look more certain, the Furlings began to discuss another disturbing development amongst themselves. One of the intruders had a genetic marker. The tell-tale pheromone had wafted their way. It was unmistakable. The Asgard had done this, marking him as a likely member of the Fifth Race. That one had gone to the Asgard. They apparently felt that he was in fulfillment of the prophesy, and they had marked him as such. Although not all the Furlings were convinced that this view was correct, the majority felt that as disappointing as this development was, it was altogether too likely that the intruders, these aggressors, these cultivars of the Ancients, were in fact the Fifth Race, and the Furlings' beautiful, peaceful, harmonious people were just that, people. They were not destined to go forth and free the world, only to live their peaceful lives and sing their sweet songs. If, indeed, they ever sang again, because they had been sickened, and both they and the Furlings were spiraling into disaster now. The Furlings themselves were too out of harmony, and arguing amongst themselves, and as they continued to emit their soured sounds, their people sickened further, and the Furlings could feel themselves drawing down in and away, and their people did not sing to bring them back.
Then came the final proof that the Furlings needed to be convinced as a whole that the intruders were of the Fifth Race. The original four came back, with new machines, and the new machines played the Furlings’ own voices back to them, a sound from before the machine had mown down one of their number. Their chosen people began to recover and revive, and as they did so, they began to sing. They were saved, and the intruders had saved them! These were not evildoers, but well-intentioned, if unintentionally deadly voyagers. Happy and relieved, and content to let the intruders go in peace to wander the universe and fulfill their destiny, the Furlings stretched themselves up towards the sun and began to sing their own song.
The intruders stood for a few more moments to watch the results of what they had done, as the people sang and the strange white flowers reached for the sun and began their own song. They were discussing what had just happened.
The Asgard-marked one turned to another and said "Captain?"
"I... I talk to my plants, okay?" said the shortest, slenderest one, and they began to pack up their machines and leave.
The Furlings barely noticed them pass away, moving on to their destiny. The home of the Fourth Race was here now, with their people, and the sun was shining, the music was beautiful, and all was well with their world. They had spent many long millennia striving. Now their roots ran deep on this planet, and the Alliance of the Four Races was no more. Let the Fifth Race and the Asgard strive and struggle. If they were called on the Furlings would honor their ancient alliance and do what they could, but for now they were content to bloom and fruit here.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Well, I'm off now to catch 3 pitiful hours of sleep before I have to get up again. I hope you enjoyed this, and if you comment and I'm not prompt to respond, it's because I'm on the road or FINALLY catching up on my sleep. Not that I'm too put out. Given the choice of getting enough sleep or getting a chance to see my grown kids and my mom's family, I'll jettison the sleep any
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(And I hope you get some sleep. Sleep is a good thing!)
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Now after two nights of catch-up sleep, I'm feeling much more relaxed and have some time to say thank you. I signed on to write on this one without any clue as to what I wanted to write about, and when you come right down to it, there really aren't that many allies specifically are there? So I went through the episode list looking for allies, and this is what came to me.
Glad you enjoyed.
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Also? Love the warning - definitely LOL. :D
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So. much. WIN.
I love how you turn everything on its head. And why not, from such a distant perspective?
And you're right - Jack would NEVER get over it. :D
Thanks for contributing!
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Teal'c would have to shame him into stopping by telling him his behavior was unseemly for a warrior.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. I got a little stuck for allies, really (since I really didn't have much to say on the Tok'ra or Jaffa front) and this is what came out.
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I'm also glad that you wandered by because answering your comment after the first rush of posting and response has passed has allowed me to realize that because I was travelling the week this went up, I never went back and linked up to the whole Soup, which was rather unfair to the other authors! All fixed now.