Handful of Dust
Sep. 5th, 2011 01:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stringertheoryTitle: Handful of Dust
Rating: PG
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Characters: Jonas Quinn
Word Count: 2480
Categories: drama, angst
Spoilers/Warnings: None. Set during S10 - post-series.
Summary: "Meanwhile we received word that five more planets have fallen to the Ori, including Hebridan and Langara." Vignettes of Jonas in the wake of Langara's fall. Ways things might have gone.
This time, Jonas does not run.
The Prior arrives unannounced, though not unexpected. Earth had sent advance warning, alerting Langara to the presence of the Ori in the galaxy, to who they were and what they wanted. When the first Prior appears through the Gate, the people recognize him for what he is.
The Prior surveys the crowd—a large gathering of people moving around the Gate plaza during the midday hour—with a calm expression. The words of greeting he offers are filled with the enticement of enlightenment and peace. But Jonas sees the arrogance behind the Prior's eyes, the disinterest at odds with the beneficence he preaches. He hears the threat of malice laced so faintly through the Prior's promises. Jonas understands, and the knowledge rages through him like a fire.
The reports from Earth about the powers of the Priors echo in his mind. Warnings—in Dr. Jackson's own words—stir worry in his gut, but they are a faint quiver against the pulse of truth that hums through him with every breath.
Jonas does not run. He does not cower. He stands up.
Pushing through the crowd, he climbs the few steps to where the Prior stands in front of the quiet Gate. In a clear, calm voice that carries to every corner of the plaza, Jonas tells the Prior what he knows. He knows that the Ori lie to their followers. He knows that Origin is a perversion of the path to ascension. He knows that the promises of the Prior are empty. Jonas knows these things, and he and his people want nothing to do with Origin or the Ori.
The Prior watches him with a pale, unblinking gaze. Then he stares out over the crowd. The faithful will be rewarded, he tells the gathered masses. Those who refuse to follow the path will die.
When the Prior raises his staff, Jonas knows: he will die as an example. He keeps his eyes open.
Langara falls, but her people resist in every way they can until the Ori and their followers are defeated. After it is all over, a memorial is built in the newly-named Jonas Quinn Plaza.
-00000-
Jonas reads the Book of Origin in one day. Then he reads it again. When the Priors return to Langara a week after their first appearance, he is ready.
He knows what the Priors can do. He knows what they will do once the dissenters begin to appear, and they will. Already there are disdainful whispers among the populace, disbelief and the time-forged strength of independence turning them against anything that requires full submission. Privately, Jonas cheers their staunch lack of interest in the false promises of the Ori. But he also foresees the price that will be paid for such outward confessions.
So he sets himself as a distraction.
When the Priors return, he comes to them with earnestness and humility, eager to learn as much as he can of Origin. He tells them that he is a leader among the people of Langara, one to whom the people turn for mediation and understanding. As such, he needs to understand Origin as perfectly as possible, to better facilitate the country's conversion. To further support the point, he also stresses his own interest in the path of Origin and in spreading the word. He wants to study, and he has many questions.
The Priors, with supercilious nods, welcome him into their tutelage. So Jonas learns and he carefully questions, using what few tools are at his disposal to distract the Priors for as long as possible. He does not know if his actions make any difference, but he has to try.
After the Ori are defeated and the Priors leave, Langara once again makes contact with the outside world. From all accounts, it appears that they did not suffer as much as other places. Few of their people died, the planet's infrastructure is mostly intact, and they expect to regain and surpass their pre-Ori bounty within a year. There is speculation as to why they were spared when so many others just like them were not. But the answer is elusive and the question fades from their minds as they turn to more important tasks.
In the city, Jonas returns to his office and to the role of diplomat and scientist.
-00000-
Jonas is appointed negotiator by a unanimous vote.
In the wake of the Prior's first visit, the council does not even need time for deliberation. They are sure that Jonas—who has more experience with other peoples and worlds than all of them put together—is the only person for the job. No one else but Jonas could deal with the Prior. No one else knew how to negotiate with aliens.
Jonas can't make them understand that no one can negotiate with the Ori.
When the Prior returns, Jonas meets him in the plaza by the Stargate. With diplomatic courtesy honed through his time as liaison between the nations of his home, Jonas escorts the Prior through the city. They meet with the council, who regard the Prior with barely veiled dislike and distrust. When the Prior demands to address the people, Jonas somehow manages to convince him that they are merely determining the best way for him to do so, as the population of Langara is rather large. The Prior appears mollified by that, and merely takes his leave to recruit more of his brethren for the task.
Under Jonas's direction, the council agrees that they should all play along with whatever the Priors order. But only until Jonas can negotiate terms with the Priors to allow them freedom of choice in whether or not they follow Origin. They are sure that Jonas can arrange this liberty in no time at all. Until then, they will pretend.
With expectations heavy around his neck, Jonas attempts the impossible.
Before long, few are still pretending.
-00000-
The leaders of his country drink up the Prior's words with hunger in their eyes. Jonas can sense how the offers of Origin would appeal to them, to their egos and pride and love of power. But he had not expected them to believe so blindly. The eagerness with which they listen to the teachings of the Prior makes his blood run cold.
He tries to argue with them, to point out the flaws in their beliefs, to point out the menace behind the promises of Origin, but they are deaf to his warnings. They delight in the path of the Ori and spread it to the people even before the Prior returns for a second visit. So many people gather at the plaza to hear the Prior preach that even the surrounding rooftops are filled. They listen to the Prior in rapturous silence. After he leaves, they call an emergency council session and decide unanimously to adopt Origin as the national religion. Jonas's admonitions are ignored.
They roll out the welcome mat. Jonas leaves through the back door.
In between visits by the Prior, Jonas requests to travel to one of Langara's trade partners. The council appears somewhat suspicious of his motives, but allows him to go. To mask his true intentions, Jonas packs only the bare essentials for what the others believe is to be an overnight stay. He arrives on the planet in the dead of night and quickly slips into the surrounding countryside.
Long months later, when the Ori are defeated and the Priors shells of their former selves, Jonas returns home to help pick up the pieces.
-00000-
The first to resist are killed.
The early resisters attempt to overthrow the Priors with direct attacks. They fail. They die where they stand and fall without a mark on their bodies. Or they burn like torches, screams echoing in the dreams of those unfortunate enough to hear them. Some merely vanish, and the silence of their absence cuts as deeply as the screams.
After the initial, disastrous wave, the resistance moves underground. Somehow, Jonas finds himself the leader.
For a time, their movement consists almost solely of subversion and small acts of defiance. Insincere prayers, a wandering mind during prostration, whispers of shared disbelief in dark alleyways – these are the ways of the resistance. They suffice at first, soothing restless spirits fettered against their will. But soon murmurs begin of more direct action. The need to do something grows into an overwhelming desire that Jonas' warnings and the memory of those already lost cannot squelch.
To Jonas's surprise, they turn to him for guidance, for a plan. Forgetting the life he once led, he doesn't understand what they expect from him. But then he remembers, and the realization chills him.
To the people of his home, he is a fighter, a leader, a soldier.
He attempts to sway them from their resolve, knowing the extreme danger inherent in any direct attack, but they are determined. They will fight without him if need be. He almost steps back and allows them to go ahead without him, but he can't. Even though death waits at the end of any plan, he knows they have a better chance with his help than they do without it.
He has learned to fight. Now he will have to.
So he strategizes and plans and trains to an extent that he thinks would impress even General O'Neill. He makes back-up plans for his back-up plans and worries over every scenario. He stretches out the preliminary stages for as long as he can, staving off action and staving off death. But eventually the resistance decides that it is time to resist.
Their defiance is short-lived, but spectacular. Three months later, the Priors lay down their staffs.
-00000-
Langara falls slowly.
Many readily accept the teaching of the Priors, either sincerely or out of fear. But there are others who resist, many others who do not believe the promises of the Ori and are not afraid to say so. The Priors merely preach longer and more often, their words carefully selected to illustrate the wickedness of the unbelievers. The passages they turn to again and again foretell doom and punishment for those who do not seek the path.
When people begin to fall ill, no one suspects the Priors. The first victims live in the same building and had contact with each other on a daily basis. But then cases appear in other cities, hundreds of miles away. Quarantine efforts fail and even the best physicians cannot create a cure or a vaccine. The hospitals fill with the sick and people die faster than the bodies can be carried away.
In the streets, the Priors calmly continue to preach.
Jonas helps where he can. He spends most of his time with the sick, assisting with futile treatments and offering empty reassurances. It takes him two weeks before he catches the plague. He fights it for two more days before he is relegated to bed.
He dies alone in one of the crowded hospital wards.
-00000-
They had expected the Prior. When he arrives on the planet, no one resists. He wanders freely into the city to meet the people.
Jonas, at work in his office, does not know of the Prior's presence until he hears excited murmurs from the hallway. When he is told the news, he immediately heads to the council chambers. He alerts them to the Prior's arrival and posits that his plan—the one agreed upon months earlier after the first rumbles of trouble in the galaxy reached Langara—be put into motion. The council members share dark glances, then nod as one. Jonas returns the nod and runs for the Gate.
His heart pounds inside his chest as he dials Earth. The Gate seems to spin in slow motion and with every breath he expects to hear approaching footsteps, to watch the lights of the Gate flicker and die as the Prior stops him. But the Gate opens and he quickly sends his identification code through before darting after it into the wormhole.
He is lost to the aether mid-flight, like a whisper in wind.
On Langara, the Prior surveys the Gate with heavy disapproval. Earth receives only Jonas Quinn's IDC before the Gate immediately shuts down. When they attempt to dial back, they are unable to get a lock on the address.
No one else leaves Langara.
-00000-
When the Priors arrive on Langara, Jonas is not there. He is visiting one of their allies on a diplomatic mission, and is told by a harried messenger that word had been sent that Langara had fallen.
Jonas is unable to get back. He is unable to get help. At a loss and with no real desire to stay where he is, he gates to another friendly world. And then another. And another.
While the Ori sweep through the galaxy on a quest for domination, Jonas bounces from planet to planet and attempts to stay as far away from them as he can. He barters and trades and makes friends where the people are willing, moves on quickly when they are not. He never encounters anyone from Langara, and worries about its fate.
News of the Ori's fall is late to his ears. By the time he discovers that the galaxy is once again safe, Langara has been free for nearly three months. At a bar on a planet known to his country, Jonas inquires about his home. The people do not know much, but what they do know indicates that Langara did not suffer much and has already begun to recover from what little damage it did sustain. Jonas is pleased to hear it and finds himself standing in front of the planet's DHD, hand outstretched to dial home before he even realizes that he does not want to go back.
He frowns at the Gate for a moment, then smiles. He pulls a random Gate address from his bottomless memory and continues on his journey around the galaxy.
When he encounters SG-1 nearly a year later, they do not recognize him. He has taken to wearing a beard, and the knowledge that once shone from his eyes has turned into something more closely resembling wisdom. But his smile is the same, and Sam and Teal'c recognize him in it. Daniel shakes his hand warmly and introduces him to the newest team members. They swap stories and share intel and he is invited to come back with them to Earth.
He politely declines. It is time he returned to Langara.
They see him off at the gate. New IDC transmitter in his pocket, he dials the familiar symbols. Before stepping through the Gate, he gives the team a little wave, a half-salute, and a grin. Then he walks home.
Rating: PG
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Characters: Jonas Quinn
Word Count: 2480
Categories: drama, angst
Spoilers/Warnings: None. Set during S10 - post-series.
Summary: "Meanwhile we received word that five more planets have fallen to the Ori, including Hebridan and Langara." Vignettes of Jonas in the wake of Langara's fall. Ways things might have gone.
This time, Jonas does not run.
The Prior arrives unannounced, though not unexpected. Earth had sent advance warning, alerting Langara to the presence of the Ori in the galaxy, to who they were and what they wanted. When the first Prior appears through the Gate, the people recognize him for what he is.
The Prior surveys the crowd—a large gathering of people moving around the Gate plaza during the midday hour—with a calm expression. The words of greeting he offers are filled with the enticement of enlightenment and peace. But Jonas sees the arrogance behind the Prior's eyes, the disinterest at odds with the beneficence he preaches. He hears the threat of malice laced so faintly through the Prior's promises. Jonas understands, and the knowledge rages through him like a fire.
The reports from Earth about the powers of the Priors echo in his mind. Warnings—in Dr. Jackson's own words—stir worry in his gut, but they are a faint quiver against the pulse of truth that hums through him with every breath.
Jonas does not run. He does not cower. He stands up.
Pushing through the crowd, he climbs the few steps to where the Prior stands in front of the quiet Gate. In a clear, calm voice that carries to every corner of the plaza, Jonas tells the Prior what he knows. He knows that the Ori lie to their followers. He knows that Origin is a perversion of the path to ascension. He knows that the promises of the Prior are empty. Jonas knows these things, and he and his people want nothing to do with Origin or the Ori.
The Prior watches him with a pale, unblinking gaze. Then he stares out over the crowd. The faithful will be rewarded, he tells the gathered masses. Those who refuse to follow the path will die.
When the Prior raises his staff, Jonas knows: he will die as an example. He keeps his eyes open.
Langara falls, but her people resist in every way they can until the Ori and their followers are defeated. After it is all over, a memorial is built in the newly-named Jonas Quinn Plaza.
-00000-
Jonas reads the Book of Origin in one day. Then he reads it again. When the Priors return to Langara a week after their first appearance, he is ready.
He knows what the Priors can do. He knows what they will do once the dissenters begin to appear, and they will. Already there are disdainful whispers among the populace, disbelief and the time-forged strength of independence turning them against anything that requires full submission. Privately, Jonas cheers their staunch lack of interest in the false promises of the Ori. But he also foresees the price that will be paid for such outward confessions.
So he sets himself as a distraction.
When the Priors return, he comes to them with earnestness and humility, eager to learn as much as he can of Origin. He tells them that he is a leader among the people of Langara, one to whom the people turn for mediation and understanding. As such, he needs to understand Origin as perfectly as possible, to better facilitate the country's conversion. To further support the point, he also stresses his own interest in the path of Origin and in spreading the word. He wants to study, and he has many questions.
The Priors, with supercilious nods, welcome him into their tutelage. So Jonas learns and he carefully questions, using what few tools are at his disposal to distract the Priors for as long as possible. He does not know if his actions make any difference, but he has to try.
After the Ori are defeated and the Priors leave, Langara once again makes contact with the outside world. From all accounts, it appears that they did not suffer as much as other places. Few of their people died, the planet's infrastructure is mostly intact, and they expect to regain and surpass their pre-Ori bounty within a year. There is speculation as to why they were spared when so many others just like them were not. But the answer is elusive and the question fades from their minds as they turn to more important tasks.
In the city, Jonas returns to his office and to the role of diplomat and scientist.
-00000-
Jonas is appointed negotiator by a unanimous vote.
In the wake of the Prior's first visit, the council does not even need time for deliberation. They are sure that Jonas—who has more experience with other peoples and worlds than all of them put together—is the only person for the job. No one else but Jonas could deal with the Prior. No one else knew how to negotiate with aliens.
Jonas can't make them understand that no one can negotiate with the Ori.
When the Prior returns, Jonas meets him in the plaza by the Stargate. With diplomatic courtesy honed through his time as liaison between the nations of his home, Jonas escorts the Prior through the city. They meet with the council, who regard the Prior with barely veiled dislike and distrust. When the Prior demands to address the people, Jonas somehow manages to convince him that they are merely determining the best way for him to do so, as the population of Langara is rather large. The Prior appears mollified by that, and merely takes his leave to recruit more of his brethren for the task.
Under Jonas's direction, the council agrees that they should all play along with whatever the Priors order. But only until Jonas can negotiate terms with the Priors to allow them freedom of choice in whether or not they follow Origin. They are sure that Jonas can arrange this liberty in no time at all. Until then, they will pretend.
With expectations heavy around his neck, Jonas attempts the impossible.
Before long, few are still pretending.
-00000-
The leaders of his country drink up the Prior's words with hunger in their eyes. Jonas can sense how the offers of Origin would appeal to them, to their egos and pride and love of power. But he had not expected them to believe so blindly. The eagerness with which they listen to the teachings of the Prior makes his blood run cold.
He tries to argue with them, to point out the flaws in their beliefs, to point out the menace behind the promises of Origin, but they are deaf to his warnings. They delight in the path of the Ori and spread it to the people even before the Prior returns for a second visit. So many people gather at the plaza to hear the Prior preach that even the surrounding rooftops are filled. They listen to the Prior in rapturous silence. After he leaves, they call an emergency council session and decide unanimously to adopt Origin as the national religion. Jonas's admonitions are ignored.
They roll out the welcome mat. Jonas leaves through the back door.
In between visits by the Prior, Jonas requests to travel to one of Langara's trade partners. The council appears somewhat suspicious of his motives, but allows him to go. To mask his true intentions, Jonas packs only the bare essentials for what the others believe is to be an overnight stay. He arrives on the planet in the dead of night and quickly slips into the surrounding countryside.
Long months later, when the Ori are defeated and the Priors shells of their former selves, Jonas returns home to help pick up the pieces.
-00000-
The first to resist are killed.
The early resisters attempt to overthrow the Priors with direct attacks. They fail. They die where they stand and fall without a mark on their bodies. Or they burn like torches, screams echoing in the dreams of those unfortunate enough to hear them. Some merely vanish, and the silence of their absence cuts as deeply as the screams.
After the initial, disastrous wave, the resistance moves underground. Somehow, Jonas finds himself the leader.
For a time, their movement consists almost solely of subversion and small acts of defiance. Insincere prayers, a wandering mind during prostration, whispers of shared disbelief in dark alleyways – these are the ways of the resistance. They suffice at first, soothing restless spirits fettered against their will. But soon murmurs begin of more direct action. The need to do something grows into an overwhelming desire that Jonas' warnings and the memory of those already lost cannot squelch.
To Jonas's surprise, they turn to him for guidance, for a plan. Forgetting the life he once led, he doesn't understand what they expect from him. But then he remembers, and the realization chills him.
To the people of his home, he is a fighter, a leader, a soldier.
He attempts to sway them from their resolve, knowing the extreme danger inherent in any direct attack, but they are determined. They will fight without him if need be. He almost steps back and allows them to go ahead without him, but he can't. Even though death waits at the end of any plan, he knows they have a better chance with his help than they do without it.
He has learned to fight. Now he will have to.
So he strategizes and plans and trains to an extent that he thinks would impress even General O'Neill. He makes back-up plans for his back-up plans and worries over every scenario. He stretches out the preliminary stages for as long as he can, staving off action and staving off death. But eventually the resistance decides that it is time to resist.
Their defiance is short-lived, but spectacular. Three months later, the Priors lay down their staffs.
-00000-
Langara falls slowly.
Many readily accept the teaching of the Priors, either sincerely or out of fear. But there are others who resist, many others who do not believe the promises of the Ori and are not afraid to say so. The Priors merely preach longer and more often, their words carefully selected to illustrate the wickedness of the unbelievers. The passages they turn to again and again foretell doom and punishment for those who do not seek the path.
When people begin to fall ill, no one suspects the Priors. The first victims live in the same building and had contact with each other on a daily basis. But then cases appear in other cities, hundreds of miles away. Quarantine efforts fail and even the best physicians cannot create a cure or a vaccine. The hospitals fill with the sick and people die faster than the bodies can be carried away.
In the streets, the Priors calmly continue to preach.
Jonas helps where he can. He spends most of his time with the sick, assisting with futile treatments and offering empty reassurances. It takes him two weeks before he catches the plague. He fights it for two more days before he is relegated to bed.
He dies alone in one of the crowded hospital wards.
-00000-
They had expected the Prior. When he arrives on the planet, no one resists. He wanders freely into the city to meet the people.
Jonas, at work in his office, does not know of the Prior's presence until he hears excited murmurs from the hallway. When he is told the news, he immediately heads to the council chambers. He alerts them to the Prior's arrival and posits that his plan—the one agreed upon months earlier after the first rumbles of trouble in the galaxy reached Langara—be put into motion. The council members share dark glances, then nod as one. Jonas returns the nod and runs for the Gate.
His heart pounds inside his chest as he dials Earth. The Gate seems to spin in slow motion and with every breath he expects to hear approaching footsteps, to watch the lights of the Gate flicker and die as the Prior stops him. But the Gate opens and he quickly sends his identification code through before darting after it into the wormhole.
He is lost to the aether mid-flight, like a whisper in wind.
On Langara, the Prior surveys the Gate with heavy disapproval. Earth receives only Jonas Quinn's IDC before the Gate immediately shuts down. When they attempt to dial back, they are unable to get a lock on the address.
No one else leaves Langara.
-00000-
When the Priors arrive on Langara, Jonas is not there. He is visiting one of their allies on a diplomatic mission, and is told by a harried messenger that word had been sent that Langara had fallen.
Jonas is unable to get back. He is unable to get help. At a loss and with no real desire to stay where he is, he gates to another friendly world. And then another. And another.
While the Ori sweep through the galaxy on a quest for domination, Jonas bounces from planet to planet and attempts to stay as far away from them as he can. He barters and trades and makes friends where the people are willing, moves on quickly when they are not. He never encounters anyone from Langara, and worries about its fate.
News of the Ori's fall is late to his ears. By the time he discovers that the galaxy is once again safe, Langara has been free for nearly three months. At a bar on a planet known to his country, Jonas inquires about his home. The people do not know much, but what they do know indicates that Langara did not suffer much and has already begun to recover from what little damage it did sustain. Jonas is pleased to hear it and finds himself standing in front of the planet's DHD, hand outstretched to dial home before he even realizes that he does not want to go back.
He frowns at the Gate for a moment, then smiles. He pulls a random Gate address from his bottomless memory and continues on his journey around the galaxy.
When he encounters SG-1 nearly a year later, they do not recognize him. He has taken to wearing a beard, and the knowledge that once shone from his eyes has turned into something more closely resembling wisdom. But his smile is the same, and Sam and Teal'c recognize him in it. Daniel shakes his hand warmly and introduces him to the newest team members. They swap stories and share intel and he is invited to come back with them to Earth.
He politely declines. It is time he returned to Langara.
They see him off at the gate. New IDC transmitter in his pocket, he dials the familiar symbols. Before stepping through the Gate, he gives the team a little wave, a half-salute, and a grin. Then he walks home.