Work Text:
A Promise Made For Keeping
by Bethany
Sam Carter walked into the Doctor’s Office… “How’s it going, Janet?” She asked.
Janet Frasier and her team of narcotics specialists had renewed working on the substance that Arris Bok had given SG1, day and night, for some time now… “Well, we’ve figured out that this ‘Rus’Na’, or however you say it, works on a particular chemical, to combine with it, and produce an addiction level need for more…”
“Back on the planet, when I cleaned Bok’s wound, it seemed to me that his body was secreting a yellowish fluid, which, naturally, blended with his blood.” Sam stated.
Seeing in which direction Carter was pointing their conversation, Janet said “It could be that this fluid is, in fact, the carrier of the chemical that mixes with the ‘Rus’Na’, to produce the addiction. The question is, is it a natural occurrence, borne of the usual Evolutionary process, whatever that may be, for Bok’s people…”
“… Or could the yellow secretion fluid have been put into the blood of Bok’s people?” Sam Carter finished off Frasier’s trail of thought.
“Exactly.” Dr. Frasier exclaimed simply.
“Well, I’m almost certain that the substance couldn’t have been put there by the Goa’uld… It doesn’t make any sense that I can see. It must have been put there, if that is the case at all, by someone wishing to protect Arris Bok’s people from the threat of becoming the next lot of Goa’uld hosts…” Sam’s thoughts were caught up in the possibility of finding another Ally for her world.
“Like the Asgard protected the Sumerians!” Daniel Jackson had just come from sharing a table at lunch with Davis and Siler. They were both family men, ordinary and average, but for their day jobs. Daniel had been listening to them chat openly about their wives, their children, and the other members of their family. Norman (formerly Walter) Davis had been telling Rod Siler about his twin daughters’ Open Evening at their Kindergarten School. He’d been telling the story of how he and his father were reunited, and how he had been introduced to his step mother, five years his junior, and the mother of his seven year old brother. A rather odd story. Siler had told of his son’s latest Judo match, and Daniel, well, Daniel, he didn’t really know what to say… He only knew that all this talk of Davis daughters’, Romily and Rosie, and Siler’s son, Eric, and extended bizarre situation half brother families, it all made him overanalyse his own situation with the sister with whom he had been reunited… The tale of how they had been separated, and the new dynamic of fitting a long lost brother into the family, it had proven tough on her.
“Yeah! Maybe… It could have been them, but why would they use a different method of helping to protect Bok’s race? And, if they truly knew of the Goa’uld’s ruthless nature, why didn’t they provide more protection?” Sam Carter wondered, as she faced Daniel Jackson, who had now walked further into the room.
“Perhaps it had something to do with how they introduced themselves to his descendants. If it was Thor’s race, Thor himself said that what his people can do to help is limited… The Asgard have their own enemies to fight, remember, and if they take just one step too far, the fragile peace they share with the Goa’uld, will be shattered, and only add to their problems.” Daniel pondered aloud. “I’ll have to do some research. Nijan could probably help me.”
“That could be helpful.” Janet Frasier added encouragingly. Figuring out the key to the resistance Arris Bok’s people had, could be the biggest discovery, and step to take, in fighting the Goa’uld. No one could afford to leave any stone unturned.
“Either way, research is a good idea… Even if it isn’t the Asgarde who may have helped Bok’s people, it could be another possible ally… Maybe, even The Ancients.” Sam Carter ventured.
Arris Bok settled down for the night, underneath a stunning canopy of stars. In the months since he had met Jack O’Neill, Samantha Carter, Dr. Jackson, and the Jaffa, Teal’c, he had managed, so far, to escape the Goa’uld’s wrath… Sometimes, the suffering from too little ‘Rus’Na’ was more than he thought he could bear for much longer… But the thought that SG1 could help his people to be free, one day, whether he lived to see it or not, was just about enough to force him through each painful night. He still hoped he would make it, that he would be around, to see his people free, to see the legacy of those Bastard Goa’ulds, driven from the very fibre of his people’s existence, never to return… That’s how all the best stories ended anyway, and Arris hoped this would be the best story he’d ever had a part to play in… He prayed for it, in fact, every night of his life since SG1 had given a little hope back to him. I fear nothing! He thought… Except that this is the way it will be forever… Then, he recalled the face of his sister, as he saw the young woman’s body, laying there, on the cold floor, twisted, and almost dead, from several beatings, and the savage hit of some weapon or other that the Goa’uld had discovered that she wasn’t immune to. He also recalled her final words to him, and suddenly, felt the helpless chill, that transported him back in time, to that moment, every time he thought of the Goa’uld.
“At least you’re still alive, Arris! Make sure you stay that way, my brother… Mother, Father, and I, will have not died without hope, if you manage to live for us.” She had said.
Despite the fact that the dead bodies of his mother and father lay not far from the dying form of his sister, for Arris Bok, nothing else existed in his world, but for his sister… He could not tear his eyes from hers, even though they awarded him only with the most painful sight of all his life. His face was so close to hers, as he knelt amongst her blood, determined not to miss a second of what some part of his brain knew would be the last moment ever spent with his sister. So close, that his silent, hot tears fell on her beautifully chiselled, pale cheeks, and into her sumptuous curls of auburn hair…
Tears just like them fell down his face at this very moment, back in a world, not of harsh memories, but of harsh realities… Arris didn’t know which world was the worst to live in. He swore to his sister, and his parents, too, “I’m still here, and I will fight to stay here, until I am as broken as those bastards made you…” Arris Bok spoke these words into a cold and lonely night, “I promise, I’m not there, yet… I’m doing just as you told me, Miranda.” With those words to his sister, Arris turned over, and tried to find the self-discipline to sleep.
THE END…