Continuing Stargate

[s09119]

So I'm anticipating a big bit of work over the weekend, but by the end of next week at the absolute latest, the season finale will be posted.

[Guest750]

Wow, I haven't gotten an "OMG" in response to an episode since "Pyrrhus." This is promising

Oh Your God

[s09119]

Oh Your God

Can't help you there. That's between me and my god. Oh, wait a minute! I am my god! That's a problem...

(Above is paraphrased from Stargate SG-1 episode "Serpent's Song"

[Commander Thor]

If I'd known that I would have opened up my stockpile a lot sooner...

lol

So I'm anticipating a big bit of work over the weekend, but by the end of next week at the absolute latest, the season finale will be posted.

omg...i cant believe the season is coming to an end, i will miss the Der'kal

[s09119]

Ah, but the end of one thing is just the beginning of another. Season 16 will have its own share of battles and conflicts, from Earth to Heliopolis.

[Rudy Pena]

cool

well i cant wait.

[Rasunda]

I can't wait either...

[bradly08]

So any updates on the progress of the season finale?

[s09119]

So any updates on the progress of the season finale?

Progress is stalled thanks to my wonderful new assignment to write an alternate Inaugural Address for my Public Speaking class... xD I really shouldn't be on GateWorld while I'm trying to focus, but I can't keep away from the reviews on SGU.

[EvilSpaceAlien]

Progress is stalled thanks to my wonderful new assignment to write an alternate Inaugural Address for my Public Speaking class... xD I really shouldn't be on GateWorld while I'm trying to focus, but I can't keep away from the reviews on SGU.

[SG-18]

Well, s09, you do what is needed to be done. school always comes first IMO, so get that done. I can wait.

[s09119]

((And now, the season finale of Stargate SG-1!))

15x22 "The Parting of Ways, Part 2" (Part 2 of 2)
Synopsis: Crises erupt on both sides of the galaxy as Earth struggles to fight off foes from both within and without, and a stunning revelation by the enemy shocks SG-1 to the core.

Spoiler:

((30 second recap of "The Parting of Ways, Part 1"))

In the dark reaches of space, the MBP-305 Aurora is exchanging fire with a small fleet of Der'kal warships; an interdiction cruiser, two frigates, and a corvette. Blue and green plasma pass between the two sides, and a swarm of fightercraft dogfight in between, as bombers attempt to break through and hit the enemy hard. From where they stand on the bridge, the three members of SG-1 aboard, Lt. Col. Cameron Mitchell, Dr. Daniel Jackson, and Vala Mal Doran, watch as their vessel turns to get a better firing arc against its multiple targets, the glow of flashing shields illuminating the entire room. From her command chair, Col. Via Sanders sits giving orders for fire control systems, trying to coordinate her railgun fire for maximum point-defense effect. She was, after all, commander of a significant-weaker DSC-304 for years, and isn't about to simply rest on the increased protection offered by her new warship.

Clenching his teeth as he watches, Mitchell asks for permission to grab a fighter himself and get out there, but Sanders tells him that she's not about to risk such a valuable member of the ISGC when she has dozens of other pilots just as talented as he is, and that have been in a cockpit far more recently, to boot. The ship rocks slightly as it takes more combined fire, and Vala mutters that they really do need to stop just running headlong into these kinds of scenarios, earning her a rather cold look from everyone else on the bridge. Daniel pulls her back a few feet, rolling his eyes, and asks how much more of this punishment they can take. Sanders replies that she guesses they can knock out three of these targets, but dealing with them all at once is going to be a real challenge, especially when it gets down to the last one or two.

Outside, the Aurora's fighter squadrons are doing their absolute best to keep an effective screen between their carrier and the enemy, but there's only so much they can do when they're completely outnumbered. The F-302s dart in every direction at once, lacing every available space with bullets and missile trails and trying to preserve a No Man's Land that presents too high a risk to try crossing. Unfortunately for them, though, the Der'kal bombers have enough of a fighter escort themselves that many of them manage to slip past, and they fire off their full supply of high-yield missiles the second they are in range, immediately coming about and speeding back to their own vessels for resupply. The humans barely have time to transfer power from the rear shields to the forward ones before the salvo hits, draining massive amounts of power in an instant. So far, this isn't going well.

On Earth, the waves of New York Harbor are still lapping at the peninsula of the O'Neill Stargate Terminal, and the skies are still bright blue with only a trace of wispy clouds, but the situation inside the terminal itself are far from idyllic. Following the melee for control of the structure, the human and alien dignitaries have found themselves crowded in a loose semicircle around the stargate, with Danielle Talbot still at the podium surrounded by Col. Samantha Carter, Teal'c, and Maj. Rebbecca Eaton, the latter being supported by Jonas Quinn due to her wounds received offworld ("Left Behind"). The entire group is staring up at the main level balcony, where disgraced-Colonel Makepeace stands, smiling down at his captive audience.

Slowly, he walks to the staircase and comes down to the level of the stargate, letting his renegade soldiers part the crowd of representtives so he may make his way, uninhibited, toward Talbot. He manages to get within ten feet of the podium before Teal'c steps in his way, staring him down and daring Makepeace to challenge him. Close behind, Carter watches the two men closely, reading to jump in and join at any second should it turn to violence. But after a long moment, Makepeace finally steps back, not quite ready to test how far Talbot's Jaffa guardian is prepared to go. Instead, he shouts past him to where Danielle herself still stands, saying that she should have known this time would come, when she and her government of cowards and runaways would face its reckoning. Today, he and the resistance will overthrow that last vestiges of occupational rule; the "sham regime" that has been established here in New York shall fall, and liberty will return to mankind.

Scoffing at his words, Eaton manages to pull herself up a little straighter and says that he might as well give up now, since any plot he might have had to take over has no chance of succeeding anyway. The fleet and what remains of the global military are both loyal to the Free People/United Nations, and it'll just be him and his band of soldiers-turned-terrorists against far more than they can handle. And as if to illustrate the point, Carter taps her earpiece and orders the Jupiter to beam down a contingent of marines... but she soon realizes that all she's hearing is static, and that their short-range radios are being jammed.

Seeing the shocked look on Sam's face is reason enough for Makepeace to smile again, and he informs his prisoners that the resistance has all sorts of alien and Area 51-built devices at their disposal, having been left on Earth during the evacuation ahead of the Der'kal assault ("Star By Star"). Among these numerous technological marvels were jamming devices capable of shutting down not only short-range radio signals, but also Asgard beaming technology. If any of the delegates were expecting their orbiting friends to start sending down men to save the day, they are sorely mistaken. The entire area is a no-beaming zone for a few blocks in every direction, and Makepeace assures them that no one in the fleet is even aware of what just happened; as far as they are concerned, the ceremony is still proceeding on schedule, and he has men stationed just outside the black out zone to radio in false reports of how things are going to alleviate any possible suspicions. To sum it up, no one's going anywhere.

Meanwhile, across the galactic plane, an F-302 pilot is chasing down a Der'kal bomber making an attack run on the Aurora, trying to force the enemy ship into a crossfire. He lines up a clean shot and fires his machine guns, slicing through the alien craft's left side and sending it into a tailspin toward the human cruiser. It slams into the shields, but they're already so depleted from battle that the bomber slides through the field and slams into the hull, ripping a hole clean through as its unused ordinance explodes. On the bridge, an officer shouts that they have a major hull breach near the engine room, and that their shields are on the verge of failing completely. All of the enemy warships look to be of the upgraded variety, vessels that the Der'kal built in the Milky Way itself, incoprorating new technologies and armed with more-efficient and powerful weapons and defensive systems.

As the ship rocks again from multiple impacts, Sanders watches one of the alien frigates split down the middle, a fireball already erupting from within. Glancing back at SG-1, she notes that it's not so much the enemy ships that are causing so much damage, but the sheer amount of bombers sneaking past their fighter screen and delivering thermonuclear blast after blast into their shields. Their Asgard-designed defenses are oriented to absorb and deflect ship-to-ship bombardment, and she's starting to understand why the Jaffa were constantly being overrun by carriers alone in the early days of the war; it's a difficult strategy to beat, even when wielding the impressive firepower of an MBP-305. Through the forward window, she and the team watches as blue beams of plasma flash out from their ship, punching through the shields on the second Der'kal frigate and rupturing its reactor, causing a brilliant explosion that vaporizes an entire wing of bombers that had been on their way to rearm.

At the same time, a trio of puddle jumpers dart past the alien fighter screen and launch a salvo of drones at the corvette protecting the interdiction ship. The Der'kal vessel's crew tries to shoot down the energy missiles with their cannons, but ultimately they're unable to stop the jumper attack, and the drones rip into the engines unmolested. The three Lantean craft come about and make for the safety of the Aurora and its covering fire, illuminated from behind as the last of the enemy guard ships is destroyed, leaving only the command cruiser.

In the O'Neill Stargate Terminal back on Earth, things are still tense. Makepeace and his men are fortifying their position inside the building, setting up machine gun emplacements and even a rail gun or two all around the outside perimeter. The human and alien delegates, meanwhile, have been corralled a level down in three large, connected conference rooms, both to make them easier to watch and detain, and also to get them away from the stargate. In one of the rooms, Jonas is lowering Major Eaton onto a table so he and a Tok'ra medic can attend to her injuries, despite the New Zealander's protests that she's perfectly fine. Watching from nearby, Teal'c and Colonel Taylor discuss their options for taking out the ex-resistance soldiers and freeing the compound, but they both accept that there's really very little they can do, given that all of them are unarmed, many were injured in the earlier scuffle, and no one on the outside is even aware of a problem. This time, they may be up against more than even they can handle.

Upstairs, Makepeace has brought Talbot and Carter into what is slated to be the commander of the terminal's office, with the disgraced-USAF officer sitting behind the desk and his two high-profile hostages before him, flanked by soldiers that look ready to kill. Not content to just sit here helplessly, Talbot tells Makepeace that whatever he hopes to gain from this terrorist attack will never come to pass, and, if anything, his actions have only confirmed that he cannot be the leader Earth needs, let alone wants. But her captor just shakes his head, saying that it's not about what the people want, and that all that matters is that their homeworld is finally given the safety it so requires in order to rebuild. The ISGC's arrogance never ceased to amaze him, and it and its operators have proven time and again that their deluded sense of self-importance can do little more than endanger them all. Carter begins to shout that everything they ever did was to protect Earth, but Makepeace yells over her, pointing out how she took her fleet and ran when she should have stayed and fought to the last ("Star By Star"), and again when she recklessly wasted lives and resources fighting the Der'kal across the galaxy instead of trying to retake the planet ("Severed Dreams").

Under his leadership, though, Earth will finally know peace and prosperity; this so-called "Alliance of Great Races" can be done away with once and for all, and humanity will take its rightful place as the most-powerful race in the galaxy. Enough of this wasting of good men and women on fighting for aliens who are too weak to defend themselves; from now on, resources will not be squandered on fighting wars that no longer affect them, and if some Jaffa or Tok'ra get flattened in the process, that's just natural selection doing its job.

(First part of "The Parting of Ways, Part 2," see next three posts for more.)

[s09119]

(More of "The Parting of Ways, Part 2," see previous post and next two posts for more.)

Spoiler:

On the bridge of the Aurora, Via Sanders is finally breathing easier, watching with relief as railgun fire and her F-302s get a solid defensive pattern going at last, wiping out swaths of alien bombers at once. Redirecting power from sublight engines to the Asgard beam weapons, she asks for a channel to be opened to the Der'kal interdictor ship, and a moment later she gets a nod from her communications officer to proceed. Sitting up straighter in her chair, Sanders says that she's offering the enemy vessel one chance to surrender itself, after which she will gladly punch through its last bit of shielding and blow it straight to Hell. For a long moment, there's no response, but then the sensors pick up an energy transfer in the interdictor, and it begins to spin about. Vala realizes that they're trying to escape, and Via gives the command to fire, watching as a trio of blue plasma beams mangle the alien cruiser's engines, and the disabled craft explodes a few seconds later.

The crew celebrates their victory, and SG-1 congratulates the ship's captain on a job well-done. But their break from alertness is short-lived, as the sensors pick up a hyperspace window forming dead ahead, practically on top of them. Sanders grabs for her radio and orders her returning fighters to turn around and prepare for combat, but the readiness is proved unnecessary a moment later when the Hak'tyl, flagship of the Free Jaffa fleet, emerges from the window, hailing the Aurora and navigating through the thick cloud of debris toward the human vessel. The Jaffa helmsmen requests a transmission be put through, and a moment later, the display screen lights up.

On his pel'tak, Admiral Kitel greets the Tau'ri, but admits that this is far from a simple courtesy visit; the details of his mission are confidential, but suffice to say something is very, very wrong out here. The majority of his forces were just obliterated by a Der'kal fleet that has been hunting them since they approached this sector, and he was trying to retreat when an interdiction pulse yanked them back into normalspace out here. Allowing himself a chuckle, he adds that it looks like the humans took care of said interdictor for him, and he thanks them for their unintentional assistance, as his own warship could hardly go into heavy battle again so soon. He is curious, though, as to why the Aurora is out here at all, considering the momentous event taking place back on Earth, and asks what it is they're doing.

Stepping up to the display screen, Sanders explains that the Tok'ra informed them of an enormous concentration of Der'kal ships massing near P9X-335, and they set off to figure out why. Surprised, Kitel replies that this intelligence has yet to reach him, but that may be perfectly natural considering how deep behind enemy lines they are. Given this revelation, however, he feels that he should share his own reason for being here, knowing his superiors in the Senate will understand; he was sent on an expedition to probe Der'kal defenses along the border of Alliance space, but his men found that all the worlds they jumped too were devoid of alien defenders, their native people unable to inform anyone thanks to the enemy policy of burying or destroying a planet's stargate upon conquest. Teal'c wanted to keep the entire mission under wraps for now, worried about what its results might yield ("The Parting of Ways, Part 1"), but putting the two pieces of information together, Kitel is starting to see a bigger picture, one in which the entire armada looks to be pulling back. For what reason, though, he still has no idea.

Many light-years away, on Earth, Makepeace is rushing out of the office he's commandeered and up to the gate room, arriving just in time to see his men taking up defensive positions around the stargate as it activates. Grabbing a rifle off a nearby chair, the disgraced-Colonel asks why the iris isn't closed, to which one of his men replies that the controls are locked out, and they don't know which of the myriad people in holding downstairs is the one needed to free them up. Unable to block their incoming traveler, the resistance fighters watch as a Jaffa official walks through the wormhole, asking to speak with Chancellor Teal'c and glancing around in confusion at the shot-up state of the terminal. When he realizes that none of the offworld delegates are present, the official slowly begins to back up, asking what's going on here. Makepeace says that "what's going on" is the birth of a new era, and shoots the Jaffa where he stands, telling his people to find whoever is necessary to get the iris working before the alien governments get suspicious and start sending armed scouts. With that, he shoulders his gun and heads back for his new office.

Downstairs, Eaton is sitting up on the conference table Jonas laid her out on, wincing at the slight discomfort involved but happy to see her injuries all taken care of. She thanks the Tok'ra who helped fix her up, then turns to where Teal'c and Taylor stand alongside Ishta, Ka'lel, and Delek. Sitting in a chair with his head on his arms, Jonas asks if anyone has the slightest bit of a plan to get out of this mess, to which he receives only blank stares. Colonel Taylor leans back against the wall and says that the only real advantage they have is numbers, but blindly rushing up against a row of men armed with automatic weapons would kill dozens outright, if not even more, and they couldn't just ask these people to do it without some guarantee of success.

Suddenly, they hear noise from outside the door of the conference room, and everyone looks up as the door is thrown open by a trio of ex-resistance soldiers, brandishing their weapons high and ready to shoot if they have to. The woman leading them, a patch of Germany on her arm, shouts in heavily-accented English for whoever is slated to be the head stargate technician or chief of security when the terminal goes online to step forward immediately. When no one moves, she swings the barrel of her rifle out into the crowd, threatening to start shooting blind unless someone with the knowledge she's looking for tells them the access codes to unlock the terminal's gate control systems. Calling her bluff, Ka'lel remarks that there is a good chance such an action would kill the needed personnel, and the German soldier steps forward menacingly.

Looking on, Colonel Taylor turns to Teal'c and asks if they're ever going to get a better opportunity than this to make their move. Nodding in agreement, the Jaffa Chancellor reaches down, picks up a nearby chair, and hurls it at one of the soldiers, knocking his gun from his hands and sending him crashing back into the hallway. Immediately, the other captives all push forward; the two remaining ex-resistance soldiers manage to get off a few bullets, inflicting only minor injuries, before being subdued and disarmed, but the sound of more approaching men quickly do away with any thoughts that they're in the clear. Grabbing the three dropped rifles, Teal'c, Taylor, and Delek say that they'll go take on the incoming reinforcements to buy time, asking a small group of martial arts-trained delegates to accompany them.

Turning to Rebbecca, Taylor orders her to go find Dr. Talbot and Col. Carter, and to rescue them if necessary. He grabs a pistol off one of Makepeace's men and tosses it to her as Jonas grabs a gun off one of the others, saying he'll go with her. The rest of the assembled people will stay barricaded in the conference rooms for protection. Their plans laid out, the different groups head off, determined to take back their complex and finish off these traitors once and for all.

Far from the renewed battle for Earth, Col. Sanders is preparing to head back out on her mission to P9X-335, while Admiral Kitel readies his ship for a series of evasive jumps to Free Jaffa space to report what they've discovered and rally reinforcements for a strike at the enemy. The Aurora prepares to depart, but just before they engage their drive, Mitchell notices a sudden alert on a nearby sensor readout and shouts for everyone to freeze. He goes over and reads that the power conduits to the hyperdrive have been severed, and if they try and open a window now, they'll very likely be destroyed in the process. Sanders begins to ask how that's even possible, then remembers the alien bomber that crashed down in that section in the earlier battle; the resulting explosion must have caused the damage, and they simply don't have the time or resources to fix it.

Still listening in over the transmission between their two ships, Kitel asks if it's possible that he can lend a hand, offering to use his own vessel to open a stable hyperspace window for the 305 so it can continue on its mission. Curious, Daniel asks if that's even possible, to which Vala replies that of course it is; galactic citizens of good-nature often help out disabled craft in this way. The only reason the Tau'ri have never found out is because when they're ships usually lose engine power, it's the bad guys sitting all around them that are responsible, and therefore less-than-inclined to help fix the problem. But there is a catch, as with everything, and if they don't manage to repair their own hyperdrive during the short hop to P9X-335, they won't be able to jump home. After thinking it over for a moment, Sanders decides that it's worth the risk, and asks Kitel to go ahead. The Hak'tyl rotates a bit and fires up its main drive, and a moment later, a purple-blue tear appears in space, and the Aurora, after its captain thanks her Jaffa counterpart, shoots inside, disappearing with a flash.

At the same time, Jonas and Eaton are making their way up to the main level of the stargate terminal, keeping their guns at the ready and staying alert for any sign of Makepeace's men. Little do they know, though, that in the complex's control room, his technicians are slicing through the last few barriers in the computer mainframe, and they'll have complete control of the building's security systems in a matter of minutes. When that happens, they'll be able to close down blast doors all over, sealing off their captives again and preventing them from doing anything meaningful. It looks like it's going to be a race to the finish; who can take out their target first?

While tension mounts at home, the rest of SG-1 prepares to drop out of hyperspace once again, and Col. Sanders orders full combat readiness as her navigator brings them back into normalspace. They shoot out of hyperspace in orbit over the infamous P9X-335 and cruise forward, railguns and beam turrets twisting around... only to find that they are complete surrounded on all sides by hundreds upon hundreds of Der'kal ships. Untold thousands of fightercraft weave between the larger vessels, and the human cruiser, mighty as it is, actually looks quite pitiful in comparison to the sheer number of targets all around, their own weapons nodules swiveling to face this new arrival.

[s09119]

(More of "The Parting of Ways, Part 2," see previous two posts for beginning and next post for end.)

Spoiler:

Staring slackjawed at the terrifying sight all around them, the bridge crew on the Aurora don't quite no what to do. But when none of the alien warships open fire, Sanders finally tells everyone to be at ease, musing that this doesn't make sense whatsoever; they're completely outgunned, and it would only take a few seconds to blow them out of the water with all this ordinance. So why haven't the Der'kal let loose and destroyed them already? And as if only reinforcing that the universe doesn't like easy answers, the ship is hailed a moment later, and Via reluctantly has the transmission put through, shocked to see Vur'naa appear on the screen before her at once. She immediately stands, doubtless preparing to drive home her latest victory in their professional rivalry when she blasted the original Aurora's nameplate off the side of his vessel ("Quid Pro Quo"). But the alien commander merely holds up his hands in a rare show of peace, whispering that he would like to, for once, come aboard an Earth craft, to speak to its captain and her guests one-on-one.

Very much taken aback, Sanders slowly eases down into her command chair and, noting that they really have no choice, tells her crew to adjust the shields to receive a ring transmission, nodding to Vur'naa to come over when ready. Smiling ever-so-slightly, the alien says that his ship does possess beaming technology, and that he could just beam over, but Mitchell steps forward and kindly replies that they'd prefer to do it this way. Relenting, Vur'naa accepts and says he will arrive momentarily, then cuts the connection. Confronted with nothing else but a blank viewscreen, Vala, Cameron, and Daniel all glance at one another, wondering what's happening and what it all means.

Concurrent with these strange goings-on, Makepeace is standing in the doorway of his stolen office, glaring down happily at Carter and Talbot and informing them that they are just seconds away from ensuring that this place is an impenetrable fortress from which they can carry out the work of purging Earth's ranks of "traitors" like the ship captains and SG team leaders. Sam just shakes her head, muttering that he always was a good-for-nothing member of Stargate Command, and that she hopes she lives just long enough to see him pay for what he's done here today, and for what he tried to do six months earlier after the liberation of the planet. Smugly confident, Makepeace begins to spit out a retort when he hears gunfire from one level up, and his eyes widen upon realizing the location from which the shots were fired. Telling the two guards nearby to make sure Carter and Talbot don't go anywhere, he picks up his rifle and rushes off.

In the control room, itself looking down on the sunken area where the stargate sits, Eaton and Jonas are crouched behind a pair of terminals, dodging bullets as they can and shooting back at the group of ex-resistance men dug in on the other side of the room. Tucking into a roll, Jonas comes up a little closer to the bad guys and gets off a quick series of shots, killing one of them and badly wounding another. Rebbecca manages to land a few hits of her own, and between the two of them, it only takes a moment before all their adversaries are incapacitated.

Down on the balcony, Makepeace arrives, staring up in hatred at the two figures still standing in the raised control booth as Jonas overrides the security lockdown, folding back the trinium plates covering the glass dome of the terminal and letting afternoon sunlight stream back in. Realizing that he overreached this time, Makepeace shouts that they've killed Earth by ruining it all, but a voice from behind him assures him that all they've done is saved the planet today. The disgraced-Colonel turns to see Talbot standing there, zat gun in hand, who reminds him that she, a well-learned student of a few martial arts of her own ("Routed"), and Samantha Carter were more-than-capable of overwhelming their distracted guards, and now she's come to end this once and for all. Even after Makepeace tried to wipe out the entire FPE government ("Against the Night"), she recognized his work in the resistance and commuted his sentence to life imprisonment. But now, here... all bets are off, and she fires once, knocking her foe back into the railing as he collapses, fighting to stay conscious.

Managing to pull himself to his feet, Makepeace clenches his teeth and says that, like the Jaffa of old, he dies free, knowing that he will have no part of this sham regime. Shaking her head in sadness that he cannot see the error or his ways, Talbot says that she wasn't kidding when she said she'd do whatever it took to ensure the safety of humanity, raises her zat again, and fires, delivering the fatal second shot that sends Makepeace's lifeless body over the railing and crashing down into the pit below. Spent and exhausted from the day's events, Danielle slowly lowers her weapon, sighing in relief that it's finally over.

Meanwhile, the operating crew of the Aurora stands at readiness as Vur'naa, dressed in his ceremonial attire but not carrying any weapons or bringing any honor guard, strides onto the bridge. He eyes each member of SG-1 present carefully, and shows only a hint of disdain upon meeting the gaze of Via Sanders. After a long silence, he says that in the days of old, this is not how one would treat a supreme leader; but then, the days of old are long gone. When Daniel asks what he's talking about, Vur'naa explains that it has recently come to light that their deranged warmaster Lo'ral, under the corrupting influence of the Tok'ra icon Anise, met with their Exarch in a secret meeting shortly before her disastrous attack on Velieris ("Pyrrhus"). And it has also recently come to light that at that meeting, her insanity took hold, and in her madness, she took up her blade against her sole superior and killed him where he stood. Being the highest-ranking warrior in the armada, she then took on the mantle of Exarch herself, passing on her position as warmaster to Vur'naa, and with her death at the hands of the Nox...

Now Jackson puts it together, and finishes for him; with Lor'al dead, the mantle of supreme leader has again shifted. But now, it's shifted to him, making Vur'naa the new Exarch, the sole individual in command of the Der'kal Empire in its entirety. The once-commander nods solemnly, reflecting that his rage, once so potent, has been tempered by these stunning revelations, and he honestly does not know what destiny the fates may have for him anymore. Once, he believed that his people could do nothing but destroy, for that is how it has always been since the day they fled their dying homeworld. Their ever-growing fleet would encounter new worlds rich with life, seeking to gather resources and form alliances, but would always be turned away by suspicious natives. And with a dire need for what the others possessed, the Der'kal slowly began to evolve into a warrior race, their armada passing into legend as the dark force which extinguished whole galaxies in its never-ending war against Creation. Over the millennia, they rewrote their histories, erasing the true reasons for their unending crusade, a secret reserved only for the Exarch and his te'kal. But now that the secret is in his hands, Vur'naa has thought long and hard, and has made his decision.

Now that he knows the truth, he understands that this war against the "infidels" of the Milky Way is meaningless, without point or endgame. So over the course of the past few months, he has been ordering his attendants to fan out and spread new battle plans; fleets are to abandon their holdings and return to where it all began, out here at P9X-335. When word came that the Jaffa were close to discovering it all, he had no choice but to destroy them, out of fear that the Alliance would not understand and attack. Now, though, the entire armada is reassembled, broken and weakened from the surprisingly-powerful enemies they tried to annihilate. He finds it funny, in that his people chose to lay siege to this galaxy because they believed its fractured nature, after so many long conflicts, would make it a quick and easy target, a new home for the Der'kal. But in the end, those conflicts hardened them beyond any enemy the armada has ever before faced, and has become the only adversary against which the armada must admit it was defeated.

Turning to SG-1, Vur'naa declares that he will take his people back amongst the void, to try and find their way back to a place where they may settle and, to borrow a human phrase, to trade their swords for plowshares. Perhaps one day, their two great races can again meet, this time in peace, but until then, this is the end. He begins to turn, as if to leave, then thinks better of it and comes back, warning Sanders that there are several holdout factions that refuse to recognize his authority and will continue to attack Alliance ships whenever they can, intent on restoring the grand Empire of legend. And lastly, he inclines his head to SG-1, slowly and painfully apologizing for the chaos he and his people unleashed upon an unsuspecting civilization. In reply, Mitchell says that he can never really forgive the Der'kal for what they did, but perhaps, one day, they can learn to put it behind them.

A short time later, Vur'naa's flagship opens a hyperspace window for the Aurora, allowing it to jump back to Earth without incident. As the ship comes about to leap away for home, the alien armada begins to depart itself, the hundreds of ships opening portals of their own and zipping into them. As the new Exarch's own cruiser prepares to vanish for part's unknown, a single text message comes in on a tight-beam transmission from him to the humans. Pulling it up onscreen, Sanders reads, in Der'kal and English, "And so it ends, in a great parting of ways..." Accepting that maybe, for once, they've finally won, Via gives the order to punch the engines, and the 305 jumps into hyperspace, leaving P9X-335, and the Der'kal Invasion, far behind.

Hours afterward, back in the now very-heavily policed O'Neill Stargate Terminal, a few hundred human and alien delegates again sit in front of the Ancient portal, before which Danielle Talbot stands at a podium. The entire complex has been shot up, but as they say, the show must go on, and this day is no exception. Sitting in the front row, watching intently, are all four members of SG-1, Samantha Carter, David Taylor, Teal'c, Ishta, Ka'lel, Delek, and Jonas, all ready to pick up where they left off a day before. Smiling out at the audience, Talbot begins by saying that life is a funny thing, constantly changing and evolving before the eyes of those trying to survive it, and the events of the past twenty-four hours are no exception; when this ceremony began, they were locked in a seemingly-victoryless war, but now, the galaxy rests in silence, peace finally returned to its denizens.

[s09119]

(End of "The Parting of Ways, Part 2." See previous three posts for beginning.)

Spoiler:

Once more, she states that now, effective immediately, she is stepping down as Chief of State of the Free People of Earth, which is hereby dissolved, and transferring its full powers and authority to the United Nations. And just as the entire room erupts into applause, she announces that the Free Jaffa, Tok'ra, and Venii governments have agreed to hold a convention on Heliopolis in this coming year to address the status of the Alliance of Great Races, an organization in which Earth now again officially holds a seat of power.

Amidst all the cheering, Daniel and Vala embrace happily, Teal'c takes Ishta in his arms, Jonas and Rebbecca share a small look of mutual congratulations, and Carter and Taylor give one another a respectful salute. As Talbot comes down from the podium to join her friends in their celebration, the camera pulls back through the glass dome of the terminal, up into orbit where Earth's fleet sits waiting to fight any adversary, and back all the way to the edge of the galaxy, where it holds on the bright, shining disk of the Milky Way before fading to black...