Continuing Stargate

[Dr. Daedalus]

As for those asking for a new galactic map... there's nothing really to show. The Der'kal advance has stalled in the past year, with neither side taking or losing much ground... just lots and lots of ships in the back-and-forth. Their vast conquests are working against the invaders now, as they have a massive front to defend, all the way from one end of the Milky Way to the other. They no longer have the ability to just launch gargantuan fleets into Alliance space without risking severe losses at their newly-built shipyards or resupply stations.

There was a line in "Earthfall" that got me thinking that there had been major changes in the battle lines. Once I looked at the most recent map I realized I was wrong.

You did a good job on the summary of the invasion. I can't wait for your next episode.

Dr. Daedalus

[Rasunda]

I can't wait ider
When will the episoed be done?
Take you'r time it will only be better

[s09119]

There was a line in "Earthfall" that got me thinking that there had been major changes in the battle lines. Once I looked at the most recent map I realized I was wrong.

You did a good job on the summary of the invasion. I can't wait for your next episode.

Dr. Daedalus

Really? Which line?

And thank you

[Rasunda]

Again when is the new ep coming out?

[Dr. Daedalus]

Really? Which line?

The line was about Dar Eshkolon (sorry if I spelled it wrong) being nearly captured and once captured it would open a direct line of attack on Chulak. I had forgotten that Dar Eshkolon was near the front lines in the latest map.

And thank you

You are welcome. .

Dr. Daedalus

[Rudy Pena]

Okay, here's a general idea of the Der'kal Invasion and where we're at now (NOTE: in the belligerents section, the races are listed by species, hence the Tok'ra (the organization) being referred to as "Goa'uld" (their species)):

Der'kal Invasion

Spoiler:

Date:
December 2008 - Present (2014)

Location:
Milky Way Galaxy (primary westward of galactic core)

Status:
Ongoing

Belligerents:
Alliance of Great Races
- United Nations (Tau'ri)
- Free Jaffa Nation (Jaffa)
- Tok'ra (Goa'uld)
- Nox (Nox)
- briefly Hebridanian Federation (Serrakin/human)
- et. all
Der'kal Empire
- Der'kal Empire (Der'kal)
- briefly Lucian Alliance (Cross-species)
- et. all

Strength:
Alliance of Great Races, et. all
~35 billion
Der'kal Empire, et. all
Unknown, many billions

Casualties:
Alliance of Great Races, et. all
~17 million
Der'kal Empire
~4.3 million

Major Battles:
(Blue denotes winning side, Red denotes losing side. A <> denotes a Pyhrric victory by the winning side.)
Battle of P9X-335 (12x20 "Shatterpoint")
- Der'kal Empire
- Alliance of Great Races
- Lucian Alliance

Battle of Hebridan (13x01/13x02 "Inroads, Part 1"/"Inroads, Part 2")
- Der'kal Empire
- Alliance of Great Races

Battle of Telin (13x04 "Routed")
- Der'kal Empire
- Free Jaffa Nation

Battle of the Jaffa Refugee Fleet (13x04 "Routed")
- Der'kal Empire
- Free Jaffa Nation/ISGC

Battle of Deraan (13x06 "Frontlines")
- Der'kal Empire
- Deraanians/ISGC

First Battle of Ankgor (13x10/13x11 "Rogues, Part 1"/"Rogues, Part 2")
- Der'kal Empire
- Free Jaffa Nation

Battle of Pelos (13x16 "Cold War")
- Der'kal Empire
- Free Jaffa Nation

Second Battle of Ankgor (13x20/14x01 "Xenocide"/"Total War")
- Der'kal Empire <>
- Free Jaffa Nation
- The Trust (briefly)

First Campaign Against the Human Worlds (14x02 "Growing Pains")
- Der'kal Empire
- Numerous human worlds

Battle of Illios (14x03/14x04 "Resistance"/"The Coming Storm")
- Der'kal Empire
- Illiosians/ISGC <>

Battle of the Station (14x08 "The Station")
- Der'kal Empire
- ISGC (with the unknown assistance of the Station)

Second Campaign Against the Human Worlds (14x09 "Coventry")
- Der'kal Empire
- Numerous human worlds

Battle of the Furling Armada (14x11 "Lost and Found")
(Stalemate and mutual retreat)
- Der'kal Empire
- ISGC/Furlings (ships only)

Third Campaign Against the Human Worlds (14x13 "Tet")
- Der'kal Empire
- Numerous human worlds
- Alliance of Great Races

Battle of Galar (14x18 "United We Stand")
- Der'kal Empire
- Alliance of Great Races

Battle of Dakara (14x18/14x19 "Untied We Stand"/"Divided We Fall")
(Der'kal diversion, stalemate)
- Der'kal Empire
- Alliance of Great Races

Battle of Earth (14x20 "Star By Star")
- Der'kal Empire <>
- United Nations
- Alliance of Great Races (briefly)

Occupation of Earth (14x20/15x05 "Star By Star"/"Earthfall)
(Ongoing conflict)
- Der'kal Empire
- United Nations (remnants)
- Tau'ri resistance movement

Oh, so cool.

[Aewon]

the beavers are comming! The beavers!

I wonder if the Furlings looks like beavers.

[Rasunda]

Look at the sg-1 episode "200" and you will see the emaginary furlings

[bradly08]

I wonder if the Furlings looks like beavers.

Maybe the beavers are the next form of the furlings, just like we are the next form of the Ancients

[Rasunda]

Maybe, maybe...
...you have given me a lot to think about...

[s09119]

15x06 "To Have Loved and Lost"
Synopsis: A message emanating from deep space prompts the team to reflect on who they've become... and what they've been forced to leave behind along the way.

Spoiler:

Colonel Taylor is staring absently at the stargate in the Beta Site's gate room, not seeming to fully be aware of his surroundings. Coming up behind him, Daniel asks if he'd like to go get some ice cream from the mess hall, no doubt referencing Carter's statement about dealing with loss a few weeks before ("Loyalties"). The Brit, though, just shakes his head; Rebbecca Eaton isn't dead, she's just on an extended mission. But that doesn't make it any easier to think about—the two of them were good friends, and her absence affects him in ways he never thought it would.

Jackson gives him a clap on the shoulder, telling him not to get too hung up on it, and goes to leave. Suddenly, one of the communication consoles beeps, and the officer manning it calls out for Taylor to come look. When they pull up the transmission, it lists just a single sentence, but it's all corrupted; the data was sent from three galaxies away, and interference from solar wind and space radiation has just fried it completely. However, one portion survived well enough to be made out; the sender, Jason Carter.

Later on, Carter, Taylor, Jackson, Talbot, and O'Neill have met on the Jupiter, using its Asgard computer systems to speed the process of repairing the damaged transmission they received. Scratching his head, O'Neill asks what in the world the young Carter was doing out so far away, and Talbot points out that he is traveling with Janus ("Star By Star"), and given the specifications of the Lantean ship they're in, distance probably won't be much of an obstacle. Just what they're seeing or doing, though, remains anyone's guess.

Reading over the garbled message on the screen, Taylor mutters that it must be quite an adventure, whatever the case. Then, looking out the window at the Beta Site, he turns and asks the others where it all went wrong. Once upon a time, weren't they all taking part in quests just as grand and breathtaking? Exploring new worlds, meeting amazing alien races... and yet it's all come to this, scraping out a meager existence while extragalactic invaders torch their homes and destroy everything their people have struggled to build over thousands of years. How did it come to this?

Thinking back, Carter says that it wasn't really anything they did; everyone tried their hardest to stay hopeful when it all began. The survivors were all united in their urge to liberate Earth, but somewhere down the line, it all just fell apart...

Begin Flashback - Three hours after the Fall of Earth

High above Chulak, a small Free Jaffa fleet hovers in orbit, a task force still being assembled to relieve the battered Tau'ri in their fight to save their homeworld ("Star By Star"). On the bridge of the lead Hak'tyl-class mothership, Admiral Kitel is outlining his battle plan to a group of First Primes that will assist him in commanding this mission. Given the sheer volume of people on the human planet, they'll need to maximize fire control and ensure that they're coming in at an angle so that even if their shots miss, they won't slam into Earth itself. The main priority here is clearly preserving as many lives as possible while inflicting the least collateral damage, and the Admiral wants to make sure his subordinates understand that.

Suddenly, the sensors officer picks up a number of hyperspace windows opening, and Kitel, curious, turns to see what's going on. Outside, the Jupiter and the other surviving human ships from the battle over Earth drop out, many badly damaged and practically limping into allied space. Almost at once, a transmission comes in from the X-305, and Carter appears on the screen, eyes red from crying. She wipes at her face and looks pleadingly at the Jaffa on the bridge of the Hak'tyl, begging for assistance of any kind; their home is all but lost, and this is all they have to show for it...

Present Day

Carter turns away from the others, as if overcome by the emotional blast from the past. Frowning knowingly at the group, Jack pulls away and takes ahold of his wife, murmuring that it's all over now and that they did everything they could. Seizing upon that, and hoping to distract Sam from the painful memory, Daniel asks O'Neill how he came to be captured by the Der'kal after escaping Washington. He never did quite tell them, after all, and Jack shifts uncomfortably as he explains that it's not the most-exciting of stories, but if they want to know, he'll fill them in:

Begin Flashback - During the Battle of Earth

With the battle lost, everyone is finally pulling out of the Pentagon. The entire building is shaking with the rage of battle outside, and the lights are constantly flickering. Even so, Jack O'Neill is watching a monitor showing the surviving starfighters over Paris as they race toward the safety of a nearby military base, shaking his head in sadness. Then someone calls his name, saying that they need to get out of here before the entire complex comes down, and he rushes off. Jack and several others come out a side entrance of the building, running toward a jumper parked nearby that is waiting to ferry them to the ISGC for evacuation. O'Neill, though, sees one of the women (the female technician who first reported the Der'kal's arrival, in fact) trip and fall, and he runs back to help her up. Ironically, this ends up saving his life, as a moment later the puddle jumper is destroyed, blown to bits by enemy gunships making a run on the area.

With nowhere to go and the sound of more incoming ships growing louder, Jack grabs the woman's arm and pulls her toward the highway just a few hundred meters away. They may not be able to get offworld, but they an at least get out of the open. Then the camera pulls out, farther and father, entire all of Washington is seen... just as bright blobs of green plasma begin to rain down from orbit. The bombardment has begun, all across the globe, and there's no chance of stopping it.

An hour later, Jack and the woman are still running, now down the alleys on the outskirts of the capital. The sky is filled with plasma raining down all over the area, and explosions are intermixed with curdled screams of dying civilians. The few people left in the city are mostly looters, breaking into stores and taking what they can even as alien gunships begin appearing overhead, landing troops to search and occupy the city.

Diving into an alcove to hide from a passing squadron of alien fighters, Jack pulls the woman close, trying to muffle her terrified cries. When she's calmed down, he holds her at arm's length and finally asks her what her name is. She gives it as Rafia Khan, an American with Pakistani lineage who worked in the Pentagon's Middle Eastern division. During the attack, she was assigned to oversee United Nations combat efforts to repel the Der'kal in that region, though she doubts they held out any better than the West did. She, of course, knows exactly who Jack is, and she hugs him then, thanking him for getting her out of there when he could have saved himself far more easily.

O'Neill shakes his head at that, saying that he would never leave anyone behind—but then he's cut off as a green burst of plasma slams into the building they're hiding in. Rushing out into the street, he looks up to see a Der'kal corvette dropping out of orbit toward the city, already launching attack squadrons to pepper the streets with energy blasts. Jack grabs Rafia and pulls her out onto the main avenue, running at full bore away from the incoming enemies. Even the looters seem to finally sense danger, and they all scatter across the area.

It's abundantly clear to Jack that he won't be able to get the both of them to safety on foot, so he decides to make sure that at least this innocent woman gets to taste freedom, if only for a few more minutes than he does. Seeing a subway entrance up ahead, he grabs her and tells her to run down into the underground rail system and make her way out of the city there. When Rafia asks how he plans to get out, then, he smiles sadly at her and says that he doesn't. Without another word, he shoves her away and rushes back towards the inbound fighters, waving his arms so they can clearly see his uniform and recognize him as a target of importance. Looking frightened but by no means beaten, Jack resigns himself to his fate as a nearby gunship slowly diverts itself in his direction.

Present Day

Everyone in the room stares at Jack in quiet shock, acknowledging the sacrifice he made so that others might escape and find shelter. But O'Neill laughs it off, saying that any of them would have done the same, but no one's really sure. After all, spending a year on the receiving end of Der'kal torturers does not sound pleasant by any stretch of the imagination. Then again, trying to scrape some sort of dignity out of being refugees was not exactly a "happy" life, either...

(Start of "To Have Loved and Lost," see next post for more.)

[s09119]

(End of "To Have Loved and Lost," see previous post for start.)

Spoiler:

Begin Flashback - One week after the Fall of Earth

Standing at the foot of the marble staircase leading into the Free Jaffa Senate building on Chulak, Samantha Carter pulld her hair back into a loose ponytail and sighs, dreading what she has to do. Straightening her uniform and forcing a smile, she ascends the steps into what was once the Palace of Apophis, no doubt remembering that it was through the efforts of her and her friends that made this place what it is today. Thinking to herself, she wonders why she didn't ask Talbot, the current de facto leader of the refugees, to do this... then she seems to remember her reasoning, and her smile fades.

Walking into the Senatorial chamber itself, Sam sees Teal'c standing at the Chancellor's podium, rubbing his hand over the woodwork. He has just emerged from intensive care on Dakara following his duel with a female Der'kal warrior there ("Divided We Fall"), and he is just starting to recover. Even before he sees Sam, though, he seems to know that she's there, and he mutters that Bra'tac always wanted there to be a Senate for the Jaffa, that he always wanted to see a "man like Teal'c" in charge of things, as he used to put it. His breath catching, the former member of SG-1 puts his head in his hands, leaning on the podium, and shouts that this invasion has destroyed everything he has come to love. Slamming his fist into the beautiful speaker's platform with so much force that it splinters, he roars that the Der'kal will pay for every life they've ruined with their bloodlust, and collapses onto the floor, barely able to stand for the pain.

Not knowing quite what to do, Sam rushes over and pulls her friend to his feet, trying to pull the bandages over his stitches back in place. She starts to call for a medic, but Teal'c stops her, muttering that he's fine... and then he asks what she came here to ask for. When Carter tries to say that it can wait, her old teammate locks gazes with her and quietly explains that he is still the leader of the Free Jaffa Nation in name as well as practice, and he will not allow these flesh wounds or emotional discharges distract him from his duties. Ignoring the rare tears in his eyes, he repeats his question.

Bowing her head, Sam explains that they've finally run out of supplies for all the human refugees... and she would like to negotiate for some from the Alliance. When Teal'c asks why she doesn't just go to Heliopolis to bargain directly, Carter admits that she's too ashamed. After years of Tau'ri hubris and overconfidence, how can she go before the High Council and practically beg for foodstuffs and medical trimmings? No, sit's hard enough coming to a longtime friend like this, and she won't send someone else to do it. It's her fault they lost the battle for Earth, she says, and she has to be the one to fix it.

Teal'c tries to make her understand that it's not her fault, that she did everything that anyone could, but Sam won't hear it. She finally just asks if she can have the blasted supplies or not, to which Teal'c says that of course she can, then watches as his confused, hurt, and oh-so-lost friend leaves the chamber, trying to figure out where a soldier belongs without a war to fight.

Present Day

Taylor looks up then, saying that Sam never told him that story. To be fair, Carter admits that she never told anyone, not even Jack. Seeing Teal'c like that, and the very way she acted to him... it was all so wrong. And then a few days later, it just got worse. Daniel nods, remembering, and says that was the day he felt that their last link to their old lives just up and vanished.

Begin Flashback - Two weeks after the Fall of Earth

Jackson is in his temporary lodgings on Chulak (a small room in a kind Jaffa family's house) packing his bags with what little possessions he has left to him. Carter has decided to move the refugees to the Beta Site, the largest and most-defensible human outpost left with Earth and Nueva under Der'kal control and all contact with Atlantis lost. A lot of the survivors don't want to go, fearing that life on such an untamed planet will be fraught with danger, but the Tau'ri need to be independent again. They can't just feed off the Alliance's goodwill forever.

As he tosses one bag to the side and starts on another, there's a knock on the door, and Daniel turns to see Vala Mal Doran standing there, a bag slung over her shoulder and dressed in her old pre-SG-1 clothing. An offworlder pistol is holstered at her side, and a zat hangs loosely on her thigh. Stepping away from his bed, Daniel asks what all this is for, to which Vala replies that she's decided to strike out into the galaxy in an attempt to rally other planets to the Alliance cause. She's come to the realization that four "Great Races" are not enough to combat the threat the Der'kal pose, and more help is needed. Hopefully, she can unite enough of the advanced worlds out there to come back with a sizable fleet to pitch in.

Of course, Daniel tries to dissuade her, saying that they're aren't enough planets with the technology necessary to really join the war effort, but Vala points out that she was able to do it in an alternate timeline ("The Time Traveler"), so she can surely do it here and now. Putting her hand on Jackson's shoulder, she whispers that she knows he's worried about her, but she'll be careful. She survived out there without his help once, and she can do it again if need be. Besides, Tok'ra intelligence suggests that another group has sided with the Der'kal, as lone Alliance ships are falling under attack in sectors the aliens have yet to penetrate. Whoever's behind this is quick and efficient, and she hopes to get to the bottom of that mystery, too.

Patting his cheek, she promises to come back soon, then turns and heads for the doorway. Daniel drops his stuff and rushes to her, shoving the door closed and pulling Vala close, embracing her in a deep, passionate kiss. The two share a tender moment together before they finally pull apart, with Jackson whispering that he couldn't live with himself if he lost her again, referencing her brief death only a month or two before ("The Higher Planes"). Torn between their obvious feelings for each other and her long-estranged husband Tomin, Vala promises that he'll never have to feel like that again, then leaves before he can say anything more.

Present Day

Sitting on a stool next to Daniel, Talbot reaches over and puts her hand on his, trying to relieve some of the pain he must feel at not having heard from Vala in so long. She says that she knows exactly how he feels, though she doesn't elaborate on who it is she misses like that.

Suddenly, the Asgard computer begins to beep, and Sam gets up to check the progress of the decoding; it's done. Calling the others over, she opens up the decrypted file, hoping to see what urgent call her nephew sent to them from half a universe away. But when it's fully extracted, they see that it is nothing more than a single line of text. Tapping the console to enlarge it, Talbot reads, "I have the answers. Who wants to know the future?"

Staring at one another, no one in the group knows quite what to say; they'll have to wait until Jason makes his return, bringing with him, perhaps, all the secrets of time itself...

[Crazy Tom]

It took them that long to reconstruct that text?

[Rudy Pena]

cool eppy.

[s09119]

It took them that long to reconstruct that text?

What, it's not as if they were talking for days on end. And realistically, subspace transmission should almost always be hampered by radiation and all other manner of interference out there that the signal has to tunnel through. Why it isn't in sci-fi is beyond me... but my guess is that a message from several galaxies away would (realistically) be completely distorted, no matter how small.