NationStates Jolt Archive

Tel'Varinis had been resting for several weeks, events within the Tnechat nation had left him exhaustedhis companions and he had returned to Home, partly seeking new members for their troupe, the losses they had suffered still hurt but they had a duty to perform. Tonight through as he sank into Reverly once more, that semi-sleep state of the Elves, more restful than sleep, but deeper, she returned. In Tnechat Tel'Varinis had summoned a Archon to his aid, such creatures required repayment and he still owed her a debt of service.

Tel'Varinis I come to claim my service, Deep within Revalry the Elf was closer to the weave to Magic, and easier to contact for such beings such was the reason for it contacting him in this way. On the planet Seket Hetep is a creature that has stolen the life of innocents and uses them for it's foul purposes. Enslaving worlds and minds, they pass themselves as God's. It and it's servents are a blight upon all that life. Yet these creatures have a weakness, their own greed and lust for Power.

The Sleeping mind of the Elf could only give an equivelnt of a nod of understanding I will send you to this place there you will kill the currently Body of Atum and use that greed against them, it's servents will fight over his power, and weaken them perhaps allowing the enslaved to break free to see the truth revealed to them.

With no choice, and indeed no desire to argue he gave his assent, when he arose from his Reverly he readied himself for the journey ahead and then was gone as the Archon made good on it's promise.

Meanwhile, around the same time, on the recently occupied planet of Seket Hetep, the false god in question was rather busy, the room he used for implantations was somewhere aside from the main palace complex. At one end of the room, a large vat containing something that looked like the cross between a worm and a catfish swam up and down expectantly. He was supervising this, another under lord for his growing numbers.

Two rather heavily built armoured figures were dragging a third into the room. The third was a slender woman; the others were of uncertain gender to the observer due to the all covering helms they wore over their faces. In those larvae that Atum considered to be worthy of some measure of respect, he would allow them to choose their hosts, but in this case, there would be no choice. The woman had been one of the locals of this very planet, but this did not matter to neither Atum nor to the creature in the tank.

The number of larva as lucky as this one was low, normally they would be simply killed when their use was done, and occasionally the others who had hosts ate them in cannibalistic rituals. However, Atum had a use for this one, who would become the commander of his third capital ship. Extending a hand to the raven haired woman’s head, a jewelled device on his palm flashed once, and the muscular figures on either side dragged the suddenly limp body over to the table. Atum stood and reached into the tank, the creature within not even attempting to avoid his grasp. He carried it over and placed it unceremoniously on her back.

With little more than a whimper as the creature burrowed into her neck, strangely not damaging her flesh all that much as it did so, leaving only a little trickle of blood, the woman ceased to be… herself. The newly ‘born’ goa’uld’s eyes flashed once, the pupil and ‘white’ of the eye glowing a searing white. ‘She’ moved quickly onto her knees, not out of true respect or fealty, but out of fear of retribution. “What is your name,” asked Atum, his voice strangely resonant.

“I am Anat,” she said, “It is my honour to pledge my allegiance to you Lord Atum.”

He smiled, “Rise…”

The gate shimmered for only a second in the night time air of the world. The Archon had been careful, careful to deliver Tel'Varinis far from any habitation. His revealry done for the day he would not need to return to the state for now for many hours, now he would have to set off alone. His Fine armour was hidden under his clothing and further through illusions soon he would have to look upon the peoples of this world to mask himself as one.

Slowly he made his way through the enviroment, quite at home amongest the trees and the such of this world. In many ways the relative calm made him more determined this world held much that he valued that it could be held by something so vile...

As he neared the place he had been told of he grew ever more cautious, it was slowly becoming light, and it would be best to rest before proceding. In the stillness of the night his Vision would give him an advantage over many, but during the day he would be exposed. Quickly then he scaled the nearest tree, until he was high amongest it's branches, as he tied himself to it and hid himself amongest the branches. He drifted into Revalry once more. Taking advantage of the ability all Elves had of chosing when to enter this state.


((Notes on Reverly it lasts four hours only. and is all the rest an Elf needs I think It is however much deeper than sleep hence his taking such precautions.))

The trees were indeed largely unaffected by the goa’uld, ironically enough, they were more economically sound than their predecessors. Not that they valued woodlands, indeed they couldn’t care less about ecology, but they had no need to harm the woodlands, as they had no use for the land, their own technology having transcended the use of such things, and their populations were too primitive to expand in the explosive manner seen in industrial civilisations.

However, that didn’t mean that the woods were unoccupied. Indeed during his reverie a patrol of Jaffa, the burly human sub-species bred to serve the Goa’uld as troops and as incubators for their larva, passed nearby. They made much noise, but did not awaken the sleeping elf, and they didn’t manage to notice him, looking up into the trees without good cause wasn’t a common event among them.

And later, pair of Death Gliders, flying craft with stylised hawk feathers were flying overhead, early morning practice for three of the new Horus Guard. But other than that, nothing else happened of consequence.

Night came once more as the impatient Elf lowered himself from the branches, now was the most difficult time before him, he would have to see his enemy to craft an illusion capable of masking himself as one of them. He moved cautiously closer to the habitation, noticing some signs of the occupation, that destruction had taken place here of some sort was apparent, in many ways he felt sure the inhabitents had been stripped of much.

It seemed likely in fact, in Toril it might have been libary's in an effort to remove Magic from an occupied territory here he suspected it had been the beasts of Metal that had been removed.

He resisted the urge to truely make his movements truely silent the spell would reveal his presence in other ways in any case, and have restricted his options if it came to a fight. And so he moved ever closer to the city, and ever closer to danger.

OOC:
Tag...
Very nice.

The perimeter of the city - if it could truly be called that any more – every building had had its roof knocked in, many were little more than smouldering wrecks, and all the new construction was simple wattle cottages – was deserted. It had been rather rapidly impressed upon the serfs that leaving the city made them prey for Jaffa patrols in the woods beyond, whose habits were to subjugate first and hang the prisoner from a tree in the centre of the city later.

However some people moved, carrying some kind of staff and hurrying from building to building, keeping out of the street in order to reach one of the burnt out shells in a small cluster that had obviously been hit by a heavy weapon of some kind.

Meanwhile in the other direction, another pair of figures could be seen, though they had noticed neither the interloping elf nor the other figures creeping from building to building.

For a moment he felt almost sickened, in the distance surronded by the poverty of the streets, the destruction, he could see a huge Pyramid half constructed, and at odds with the rest of the city, out of place. They destroy so much, ruin so much, and now they, build palace's Still this was not his main concern, he still needed a disguise.

His first temptation had been to follow the ones moving into the buildings, they appeared after all armed, yet he thought again. While indeed it would be useful to look such, it would be risky. If he was discovered before he'd discovered more of these people he would have to fight. Even if he won, the dissapearance of two guards on patrol duty would raise questions, questions he did not wish to answer... Yet.

So he altered direction subtly and sneaked off towards the group further into the distance, moving himself now from building to building. He had spells to fully mask his presence, but they would only last a short while, and he felt it best to keep them aside for now. He may need them later.

The pair of Jaffa marched along solemnly. They looked to be humans to all intents and purposes; one of what one would call African ethnicity, another of uncertain Middle Eastern extraction. They wore bulky plate armour over coats of mail and undertunics of some grey material. The helm of one of them was down, and the other lacked one altogether. The former wore upon his forehead a tattoo of a symbol that was a stylised a mound or hill. On the latter, a more elaborate symbol depicted a hand with horns on it.

They were talking to each other in some strange language casually, with long staff like devices held nonchalantly in a hand, one possessed a knife, and another a device that appeared to be some kind of white and blue curled serpent type in a wrist holster.

He froze almost instantly as he drew closer, his eyes showing him the truth perhaps too late he feared. How could he have been so foolish, the Two before where sneaking not marching in confidence... Slowly his hand lowered down to his blade, while his free hand lay by his side, his lips moving and his voice as low as he could make it, he would not have much time...

He had seen what the Masters of this City looked like, but he was not quite ready to adopt their form. Some Details needed to be examined closer. The Tattoes for one, they appeared importent, but he did not know for what reason, and the staffs, the people that had done this would not bare surely simple Staffs, perhaps they where like the Staffs of the Magi, containing power within? No If the details where wrong it would all be for nothing.

“Did you hear something?” asked on of them, in their own language, turning around curiously, staff held horizontal to the ground. With a brief tap on one of the buttons of the weapon its head split into four and a crackling line of energy flickered about the head. A moment later, he touched a point on his neck guard and plates of metal slid out to form an all-covering helmet with a loud noise. The glowing eyes of the falcon-headed armour swept about, night vision piercing the darkness, but finding nothing.

The Horus Guard looked at his compatriot, and said something else in their strange language, and they continued on their way.

He smiled as he dissappeared, the invisibilty coming into effect, he still had to be careful through as he movd away. The spell masked his visble presence not his sound. Yet moving invisibly was difficult, and while his steps where graceful and controled he had no visible referance for himself to go by, he was invisible, to everything, including himself. There was also the simple overconfidence, that all could fall guilty off.

So it was perhaps understandable that he had not noticed the way his robes billowed out, or the slightly altered position of his blade, nor how it caught a Pebble occasionally, small sounds in the still of the night. Eventually through he dislodged more than a pebble in the war torn streets as a loose brick tumbled from a building by his side.

Two more of the armoured figures walked onto the street. Their falcon-heads, glowing red eyes, scanning this way and that as they searched for any breaking the curfew imposed by Lord Shu. From the shadows a figure darted, and one of the armoured figures raised his arm, a device held in his hands springing up. A bust of blue lightning leapt from his weapon, and hit the running figure.

The fugitive dropped to the floor with lightning playing around his form and a startled gasp, and it could be seen that he was only a child, probably about ten. The jaffa marched over, staves in hand, and one kicked the figure in the ribs. They walked off, satisfied that punishment had been meted out…

One could be heard to say, “Right, that’s it, time for the shift-change,” as they did so.

Bile rose in his throat as he witnessed the enemy attack and 'kill' the child, he acted without thought, his Anger over-whelming any reason or plan. The only concession to reason to cover himself in a shield spell, the Shield arose covering the fron of his body in a almost invisible energy field. The edges the only areas that shone. Then came His Scream arising from his throat even as the Three Balls of energy flew from his hands, with unerring accuracy striking the chest of the guard who had kicked at the child.

The Invisibilty was cancelled the moment his attack began, and so he seemed to Appear in the middle of the road facing the two guards, Blade in one hand, and a cold look of pure hate in his eyes. 'Come brave slayers of Children, let us see how you handle a real warrior...'

The first spear-carrier staggered backward as the magic-missiles hit him. A little part of his armour was glowing, and the warrior was obviously quite injured. He was however, also determined, and he tilted the zat’nik’a’tel to point in the general direction of the elf and squeezed off a pair of shots, that went rather wide as he sank to his knees. His compatriot however, seemed a lot more composed, and he quickly spun his staff down into position, walking in a diagonal manner away from both the other jaffa and the recently appeared intruder. With a characteristic snap-sizzle the weapon powered up.

Tel'Varinis simply smiled as his free hand wove in the air around him, and his feet brought him closer towards his foe. He had to move quickly however not wishing to feel that Staff's wrath. His Form shimered and where previously their had been one, now stood Six identical versions of himself. Each stood copied his own movements perfectly.

More importently the spell had shifted his exact location and while he was still one of the Six, he was no longer stood where he had previously stood. and now he advanced upon the enenmy readying for closer combat.

It is perhaps easy to confuse the actions of the jaffa here for cowardice. But that is far from true. He had seen one of them appear from nothing, shimmering into existence from thin air. When five more of them did it, he was quite outnumbered, with only a wounded comrade for backup. Thus he ran, backward at first, putting a bolt of energy through the first one that had appeared to no effect. The staggered compatriot squeezed off another shot at one of the remaining six potentials, this time with better aim…

The First shot passed through the Illusion and destroyed it, one less Illusion now stood to the face the Jaffa. The secon shot was far luckier and struck the shield of the Real Tel'Varinis dispelling it in an instant, but being stopped at the same time. A slight smile of congratulations spread across his, and the remaining images faces... As the deck was shuffled again and his position altered amongest the line up.

Now he ran at full speed towards the guards, he could not let them retreat, as word of his appearance must remain a secret, their deaths would give less clue as to his nature... The injured Jaffa was still in the fight it appeared to him, and so that had to be rectified fast, he would be his target then.

The closer Horus Guard shot the same one as he had previously shot, but failed to get nearly as satisfying a reaction, bracing the gun with his other hand, letting out an annoyed growl, altered by the helmet to sound quasi mechanical and more threatening than it would have done otherwise, he let loose with the weapon, firing at the rapidly converging... 'elves.' The other meanwhile, continued running, just for good measure putting the staff over his shoulder and firing blindly behind him.

As oone after another of the Fakes winked out of existence Tel'Varinis at last reached his foe, Sword raised and ready to strike, sweeping in low at the jaffa, he fully expected this opening blow to be parried this was a feint, aimed to expose a normally less critical part of the body, for he had a surprise in store for his foe, and his blade hungered.

Dropping the zat gun, the wounded one brought his own staff up horizontally to block the feint...

((With Player permission from IRC))

The staff came down quickly to meet his blade but it was as Tel'Varinis expected, riding the Staff up a moment, he deftly moved outwards with an ease that seemed to make it almost dancing, his blade slipped now under the Staff and into the Guts of the Jaffa...

His Blade drank deep drawing life energy from the victim usually it would transfer a part of this energy to it's barer, to heal him, but at the moment it did not need to, then it felt it... It felt unclean, a second life within the first...

There is another in here, a second, sustaining the first. It pulsed back up to Tel'Varinis.

Too the second presence it pulsed a different message What are you? As for Telvarinis as he watched the life rapidly be drawn from the Jaffa his attention had turned to the fleeing Jaffa even as confusion crossed his face.

The other jaffa continued his flight even as the closer one sank to the floor. The only reply of the second prescence was a stab of focussed malice and rage, and an effort to dominate its new... host, though it wasn't entirely sure where it was or what was going on, it was by nature a parasite, so instinct, and genetic memory took over.

Seconds away from casting a spell to slow the remaining Jaffa Tel'Varinis paused, he felt something, malignent enter his sword attempting to wrestle control away from him of it. With no choice he forgot his foe and pushed his own mind deep into the blade, seeking out the intruder.

It was a Battle for the sword now, one that would shape the blades small almost instinctive personality into something more definied and Tel'Varinis was determined it would not be for evil that the Blade would become.

Abattle not like any other of course this was shaped by mergings and twists, or reshaping the personality into one more suited to the desire's of the combatent, where they met, each saught to undo what the other had done, In many ways at first Tel'Varinis felt his opponment had the upper hand, was more fully present, but that would become it's weakness...

Rather than defend his blade, Tel'Varinis tied the Creature into the Blade, and twisted it from inside, where before he had kept them seperate now he made them one, it was far from perfect when he had finished, his weapon was no longer as inert, and had many desires that conflicted with his own, but it was... enough.

Now he turned to look for the last of the Jaffa, and snarled in dissapointment, he had escaped... It was too late and he had to escape these streets.

The goa’uld-sword howled in rage. It was now stuck here, and it would need to bide its time and plot the downfall of the impudent fool who had dared to imprison it so…

The remaining jaffa meanwhile, ran straight for the nearest barracks building, bursting through the door, he sighed loudly and hit the button on his collar, retracting the falcon helmet. Nearest to the door, another of his kind awakened from the – ironically elflike – trance that replaced sleep in jaffa. The first related his encounter to the second, and all the others who were there. Quickly they reacted…

Breaking open cases of armaments, staff weapons, zat’nik’atels, hand claws, shak’nels and others, they passed them around. It was time to go hunting. But first, they had another thing to requisition. They did not have such things nearby, and they had to send a pair of their number up to the mothership in orbit in order to requisition them, a type of weapon known as “transphase eradication rods,” specially designed for just this sort of thing. With five of these weapons, one per pair of jaffa, they set off on their little hunt

It was time to get off the streets, infact it might be best to get out of the town, but it wouldn't do to get hasty, before leaving he bent and picked up the Jaffa's weapons, he'd have time to discover their basic functions later... Now came some more preparations. A simple cantrip was needed here, the simple spell would create false tracks for the inevitable pursuit. Showing foot prints heading off in the opposite direction for a while, before being lost...

Now he moved himself, taking care to avoid the more open areas, although his eventual target was to leave the city, he had one last thing to do first... He suspected now that the two shapes he'd seen earlier where not guards, that being the case, they had to be warned, patrols would soon be combing these streets, and if they where found it would not matter to the overlords of this town if they where responsible for the attack or not...

Unfortunately one of the few things Jaffa were actually good at was tracking. When they came to the false tracks, some were tempted to follow them, and a short argument erupted, but after a few moments it was settled. However, two detached from the main group and headed off, just in case, while the others headed in the other direction. Another had stopped to guard the body of their slain comrade.

Meanwhile, where he had seen the others before now seemed rather deserted. If he forced his way into the room they had been in, there was much to be found, sheets of papyrus and provisions, even two of the staffs carried by the jaffa, but fortunately, word had already been passed that something was up, and the occupants had departed.

A Quick glance at the papyrus and the unreadable(for now) writing was enough to convince him to snatch a few copies and he planned to be gone, glad that no one had remained in the building. His movements where still careful through, his first goal of course was to get out of this Town, but he had to do it in a way that any pursuit would be useless, what he needed he decided was a brief time of no tracks, for even through he was hopeful his false lead might have led some away it would not last he knew. After all they did not go far enough, at most it would buy him an hour.

His need then was to loose pursuit, he had a few options open to him for this goal, but until he saw something that fitted them he would just have to keep moving, still he had a grim idea. but it wouldn't work in the current room, so he simply grabbed the two staff weapons and ran. What he needed was a room with only one real entrance but perhaps two exits, on the face of it, it sounded impossible but that would be a mistake to think that. For the second exit he needed would be high up, beyond the usual way of entering and exiting a building. For it was time for 'Last stand'.

The patrol that had been searching the town burnt the original building that he had found the papers in, and proceeded to scour the area. To be honest, jaffa were very good at blundering into ambushes, it was practically part of their training. Thus when the first of the Horus Guard entered the low building, a flash of fire shot from the ceiling and through his armour - dead centre - killing him almost instantly. The second looked up, stepped forward, shooting at what he thought was the target and was shot in the head. In the next buildings, three more dashed out and toward the doorway...

One of them was carrying a small object, metallic, much like a bowling ball, and a zat'nik'tel, he crouched at the entrance and rolled it in. The shock grenade bounced once, skittering off a piece of fallen masonry, and came to a stop in the centre of the ajoining room.

The illusion of Tel'Varinis stood there as the shots of the Jaffa raged around it, and through it, the shock stick rolling into the room of course did little to affect it, from the roof Tel'Varinis watched the Jaffa at work below, in many ways this was a informative showing of their plans. Still he had little time, he noted that he had been wrong in the time his decoy had bought him...

In fact it seemed to have bought him no time, he was forced to conclude he'd underestimated these peoples skills in at least one field, he wouldn't make the same mistake again, another twitch of his spell sent another blast out of the door. He did not have long left with the minor enchantment and the limitations would soon show....

Simply put he had tied two of the Staffs up and was now pressing the activation stud on the weapon, he could not move the weapons, and so when the Jaffa entered the building, they would perhaps notice this, added to this their was a growing number of foes. If he snuck away they might notice him if he stayed eventually they would find him.

It might he concluded be best to attack now suddenly from his vantage point... Then a far more subtle plan hit him. If his pursuers wanted to catch him... perhaps it was time for a chase. He would have to move quickly, cutting the ropes binding holding the staff weapons up, he made it look as it his illusion had dropped them and ran towards the wall...

Of course to the simple amalgmation of light the wall was not solid, it was not there, and so the Illusion appeared to run through the walls and away down the street...

There was astonishment on the faces of the jaffa as the deception ran through the wall. One more of them had fallen as they dived through the door - it was not unknown for people to have the fortitude to resist the shock grenade, and so they'd used a little caution. They dashed out and began running down the road after the swift footed 'elf,' their heavy armour slowing them considerably. Astonishingly, he seemed to be headed toward the city centre - or rather the crater formerly known as the city centre.

Neither thought that it might be a distraction...

quietly Tel'Varinis moved towards the Darkest part of the roof and used the last of the spell that had got him onto the roof, regretting that he had not memorised fly, he would still need to walk, still be forced to leave tracks but at least he could float down to the floor benaeth him. Throwing himself forward of the roof that is exactly what he did, and floated soundlessly to the floor. He was careful now to get out of the city, but he also did not make any more side tracks, he also knew he had little time still...

Thirty minutes after it was cast the illusion vanished blinked out of existence and was gone. by which time he hoped to be back in the forests again... and to find a place to lay low. It would be a day or two before he would return to the city, he had some information to digest, and understand.

Once out of the city he felt more comfortable, these where 'his' surrondings, a place he was more at ease in than these strange creatures he hoped, still he did not stop for most of the night and for most of the next day, eventually he knew he would have to, but for now he kept moving.

Eventually he spotted a small cave, almost completly hidden by overgrowth and rocks it would make he hoped a good place to establish a camp while he read the documents. A Spell the next day would help him understand the text, but for now Reverie was ahead of him after he ensured the cave was hidden.... A few false tracks where layed, not as before by magic but by hard work, he would appear to walk away from the cave and further into the woods. before following his foot steps back to the cave, careful to step only where he had stepped before.

Meanwhile, aboard the flagship of Atum

From his throne Atum regarded the jaffa warrior in front of him with disgust. He had heard everything that had transpired, and he was not amused. This Ha’shak had dishonoured his name in following a simple hologram, an ancient trick that had long been used by the Asgard and one which the jaffa were supposed to be able to comprehend.

Dishonour.

There was a good reason that the word in the Jaffa language for dishonour also meant death. Of the original eight, five stood before him now. He glanced at Atal, then pointedly at the two who had followed the hologram. “Kill them,” he said, his voice resonant and reverberating. She strutted forward from her post – with a fully armoured Jackal Guard, who served as Atum’s personal guard, behind her – on the off chance that she tried something, her throat would be torn out in short order.

The young under-lady strutted over to the two at the end without even considering their lives as the four Jackal guards aimed their weapons at the unfortunate pair. One of them started begging and grovelling for mercy until Atal silenced him with a powerful punch to the gut, crushing the larval goa’uld he carried and merging its toxic blood with his own. He was the leader, and so his death was worse, many hours of crippling pain. The second was killed quickly, a still painful and torturous death by the power of the Kara Kash, a ribbon like hand device most goa’uld wore.

Atum turned his attention to the one who had left to raise the alarm, “You however, did well,” he said, “you shall know my gratitude. Now, take an Al’kesh and bombard the area…”

One of the others interjected , “My lord, there are many inn-“

He did not get far into his subversive sentence before one of the Jackal guard cut him down with a shot to the head from his Shak’nel. Atum continued, “and bombard the area until there are no remaining life signs. Jaffa kree tal.” As they left he looked at the dead one, the dying one, and the one gulping for air like a fish out of water as Atal’s device destroyed his mind. He shook his head sadly. Eventually this natural selection would work and they would stop making terminally stupid mistakes. Eventually.


Meanwhile, the papers taken by Tel’virinis proved to be most revealing, speaking of ships in orbit, and something akin to the spell teleportation circle, with permanency on it. This was in any of several jaffa barracks – annoyingly, and guarded around the clock. Much of the rest was propaganda – of a sort, though evidently true – urging resistance and insurrection.

Interesting, these devices, they are obviously what I need, now to get too one. A smile crossed his face, he knew all he needed to know tommorow would begin part two of his plans.

The day had came, the day to attempt his little infiltration of the Jaffa. He set out early, a few quick spells prepared his disguise, a Polymorph made his physical features the same, a illusion for now would make his armour looking the same. His tatto was chosen to mirror the first he had seen the Primodial mound. Closing on the city he would look like one of the Goa'uld. another spell gave him the language, it had originally been created to let the caster speak any tongue, but it worked well he thought for infiltration.

He marched then towards the outskirts of the City and towards the nearest baracks.

There were two guards outside the barracks, that much at least was new. They watched the disguised mage as he entered, but did not interfere with his progress. Inside however, was a different matter. An old man, of one hundred and three, though he looked merely sixty or so, approached him. “Where is your partner?” he shouted, in the strange language, irritably, “Wait! You’re from Blue Battalion. Have you been out consorting with the natives! Tell your friends that if another of you lot comes in here the day after, drunk, I’m going to shoot you! I swear it!”

Blue battalion hmm I guess I had better show understanding. I am guessing this man is a senior officer Quickly snaping to attention he nodded gravely 'Ti'u Sir, I will make sure they know sir'

Even as he spoke his eyes stared behind the man, hopefully that would be expected, he was looking for something that might be one of these ring devices he had read about. He also wouldn't mind to much seeing real versions of this armour, to help his disguise. He also noted the numbers present in the room, and prayed he wouldn't end up being lumped with some duty or other.

The Jaffa Master stared for a moment, and then shrugged, “Right!” he said, gesturing with his thumb over one shoulder, past the pile of crates in the room, labelled discretely in their language ‘wheat.’ “Right. While you’re here, take a few crates up to the Ha’tak,” he said, as a a door opened and a pair of jaffa, in plain leather armour, walked out, took a crate each, and placed them on a ring in the floor. They returned, and repeated that. “Well…” said the officer...

Nodding his assent he could barely hide his grin as he turned rather sharpely towards the crates and bent over to pick one up, for a second he did worry about the weight, these Jaffa where strong by appearance and while the Polymorph spell had increased his own physical strength to one closer to the form he wore it was unlikely he was the same. Straining under the weight of the crate he walked towards the Ring device hoping the documents where accurate. Deciding it best to make it look good, he made sure to load the ring with a few crates, before going up with them.

now was the delicate bit, he was unsure how long he'd last in his disguise now, at least however it had got him aboard the Ha'Tek.

“Useless Blue Battalion git…” said one of the jaffa, picking up a crate, watching Tel’Virinis walk off down the gold corridor of the Ha’tak, without bothering to do his share of the crate stacking. “They always were a lazy bunch of Orac…” agreed the other.

The polymorph spell had turned him into something resembling a jaffa, and even though he lacked a symbiote, the ship’s sensor operators deemed nothing unusual about this, as many jaffa in service to Atum lacked symbiotes. It was a privilege to carry them, and one that Atum’s policies denied to the unworthy. Unsurprisingly however, being unworthy to carry a symbiote did not make one unworthy to be cannon fodder. Here, in the bowels of the ship, access to the higher levels would be a long and gruelling climb – three hundred and eight meters. Not enough to be a mountain, but fully half. Of course, there were lifts, but the buttons were not labelled with letters as much as pictographs, which could be infuriating. So that left the choice of hitting buttons at random, or a long climb using the ladders

He had to chuckle at the climbing of Ladders, and with a shrug set to it. He was tempted to use Levitation but it would be a potential waste, and even worse may be detected some how. No it was best to just climb, and so climb he did. slowly but surely, he rose up the craft. After a hundred metres or so he was begining to reconsider, this was insane, just how large was this thing?

Anhoer fifty metres with seemingly no end in sight and he decided it was worth the risk, his arms felt like they where made of lead, it would do no good to make it to this Lord Atum's chambers and be so phyiscally exhausted he couldn't even wield his blade...

Glad of his Bladesinger training he held on with one hand as his other made the subtle hand gestures required to cast the spell, and he began to rise up the shaft, careful to start climbing whenever he approached an opening.... Time would tell if they had the ability to detect his spell.

These levels were more ostentatious, and incense burners appeared every meter or so in the corridors. The personal quarters of the ‘god’ were rather heavily guarded, a heavy metal door, with four Jackal Guard – former possessions of Ra – waiting outside. These jaffa were far more fearsome than the ordinary spear-carriers, they carried swords, hand claws, and were generally fearsome close combatants. They eschewed armour in favour of black robes, and wore a short ranged weapon the Shak’nel, a rare pistol like design peculiar to the forces of Ra and Atum.

He realised that with the seemingly low opinion held about the 'Blue Battalion' it seemed unlikely he'd be able to get past the Jackel Guards under his ruse, and to be truthful he was growing bored with it. The time for sublety was over... and it was now time for aggresion. It would come in two stages, firstly he did not want these guards rushing in while he dealt with their God...

Appearing to wave to the guards he dropped the Polymorph and the illusion, his features seeming to shift and melt into that of his natural form, a massive drop in mass was achieved as his body shrunk and muscle atrophied away. With a wave to the guards his first spell was unleashed, a small ball of orange sped towards the Jackal Guard impacting on the door in a huge explosion of flame...

OOC Chuckles seems Tel could have passed himself off as a member of another Battalion and gained access but ahh well such are the mistakes people make

All four of the guards were caught in the ball of flame, and the black robes they wore instead of armour did not help them at all. With assorted cries of pain and rage, they drew their weapons. Seeing that the opponent carried a sword, they went for the same weapons, martial honour was something they did have, after all. Meanwhile, beyond the door, Atum looked up from the tablet reader, a device like a PDA he had been working with, and glanced at the door, hearing a dull roar and a cry beyond it. Standing slowly, he activated his personal force shield.

He did not have long, as it was possible the target was already attempting to escape, and yet, these people wished to actually fight him, they may actually deserve his attention. With a laugh, he drew his blade and looked towards the approaching guards. Four foes, certain rules applied to such combats, certain patterns that needed to be observed. First he would have to see how well they fought together, if they where used to fighting as a team it would be far more difficult than if they where more singular warriors.

For now through he did not wait for them to reach him with a burst of speed he charged one of the guards sword seemingly raised high he brought it low at the last second to swipe at his foe, before leaping backwards and away again. To stand still while so outnumbered would be insane, it was neccersary for him to keep moving to strike and move, refuse to be tied down in one place.

In a single flowing motion the one of them attacked brought his katana down to deflect the attacker’s blade – part of which was doing its best to resist him – with barely a flinch toward the feint. His partners stood off for a moment. This was because of the honour derived single combat, they had no desire to swarm an opponent they didn’t have to do so against, there was less honour in that than there was in one of them slaying him.

Therefore, the other three stood with their blades up in an oriental style guard, watching, but otherwise motionless as one of their number advanced on the elf.

A Little surprised by their reaction he smiled a little, and gave a salute with the tip of his blade. 'I see I was wrong about another thing about you...'

Then he was back at the Jaffa, this time he did not move away again, this time it was a dual he knew to he death no outside interferance. His stance moved into the first of his dances, a slightly defensive stance he used it now to try and gain a better feel for his opponments style, and his Skill, while hopefully leaving few openings. His blade met the Jaffa's in a few blocks as both fighters sought an advantage to exploit. A Slight mis-step or an opening, but for now Tel'Varinis refused to take advantage of any that may have presented themselves, he still was unsure of the opponments skill after all, he needed a little longer to gauge that.

And do I have the time I need to discover this fact?

The jaffa's moves were precise and dextrous, but in the end, he began to loose confidence, the elf's movements were a little too fast, a little too assured. His weapon wasn't designed for this kind of fighting, and he becan to sweat slightly. Movements becoming less coordinated as the duel dragged on, he began to falter...

Smiling his opponment was good, but he was better, he could sense that now, with a few deft moves and a few feints to draw his opponment high his sword drove deep into the essence of the Jaffa, this time he was careful and even as it drew the energy from the 'man' he kept it away from the second sentience, in many ways in this both aspects of his blade acted as one. As the trapped entity did not feel like sharing it's prison with another, it was already feeling cramped after all.

Even so, he had recieved a few cuts and from the fight it had not gone entirely his own way after all, those now began to close as the blade transfered the life energies from his opponment to him, closes cuts with a small crackle of energy across his skin, when he turned to face the remaining three Jaffa he was as fresh as when he had begun the fight.

Saluting them he smiled 'I hope you all prove to be at least as skilled as this one, he was both skilled and Honourable, I salute you for this, your Master does not deserve such honourable servents as you. I wish things could have been different'

Even as he said so, a loud sound flooded the hall, the sound was a keening wail of an alarm, with the strange language of the Goa’uld shouting loudly, “Intruder alert, all jaffa to sector one…” it shouted, and in the distance the sound of booted feet hitting the metal deck could be heard as troops rushed to obey, abandoning and locking down their posts in order to crush the interloper.

The first of the remaining three jaffa charged almost instantly, rushing with determined looks. And hidden behind the door, the System Lord gloated as he stepped away from the control console and back to standing behind the door, palm extended, surrounded by a shimmering golden force shield, toughly amused by this assassination effort. He would enjoy tormenting this impudent fool.

With a slight shake of his Head Tel'Varins looked at his new opponment. 'I'm afraid it seems I don't have time for you three, we will soon have company. I have enjoyed our Dance and hope we can continue it another day.'

His free hand quickly began to weave and he muttered arcane words, in his distracted state the Jaffa Horus guard was able to gain a lucky strike upon Tel'Varinis the pain almost forced the words he muttered from his mouth and ruining the spell, but in the end he was able to get it off. A Shimmering door of Black 'light' appeared behind Tel'Varinis with a simple leap backwards he was gone.

and inside the Throne room of Lord Atum, by coincidence he appeared on top of the God's throne, with a simple flourish he sat on it, looking at the man and smiled. So your the fool who thinks himself a god, can't say I'm impressed shall we dance then sir?

Atum’s confused expression was replaced with a sneer after a moment, and with a gesture and a snarl of annoyance he thrust his palm out, resulting in a rather unpleasant wave of light… and force… leaving his palm and headed toward the impudent upstart. A strange noise, seemingly out of place appeared to come from somewhere as he snarled, and the whites and pupils of the man’s eyes flashed a bright white colour.

It didn't take much to work out the light coming towards him was a weapon of somesort, with a dive from Throne to the side he smiled. A quck flick of his wrist sent a Dagger from his belt hurtling towards the Goa'uld to impact the energy shield of the creature, and drop harmlessly to the floor. Not that it mattered, Tel'varinis had not expected the dagger to achieve anything, and he was already moving.

Moving once more to stand near the throne this time he ducked behind it, to raise a shield of his own. When he emerged from behind the throne he was better readied for the fight.

'Impressive I must admit, but you seem to have overestimated your position here.'

His free hand began to weave once more.

Again the System Lord let loose a blast from his Kara Kesh, but it wasn’t just that. There were a few tricks he had up his sleeve but for now the most simple and obvious was to approach this impudent pup and keep it up, sending blast after blast in his direction. While, being somewhat more canny than his kin, it did occur to him that this creature posed a threat, it was clear how much of a threat he posed, even after his unusual means of ingress to the room. “Fool, I will kill you,” he snapped. Meanwhile from beyond the door the sound of dozens of staff weapons pummelling the unfortunately reinforced metal could be heard.

With a shrug, Tel';Varinis dived away from the Blasts although one did catch him the pain for a moment was indescriable, and yet not a hint of it appeared on his face. 'So you say false one, yet I seem to be still here...' His hands weaved once more and small balls of light emerged from his hands to hurtle towards Lord Atum, 'Oh and just so you understand, no technolgy, no tricks no lies, I made them, I created them, and just so we are in complete understanding... I can do much more than that.'

With a slight laugh he moved to the side a moment and then paused to look towards the door and smiled, he had a little longer till those guards where through the door still he was growing bored of the game. time to turn it up a notch. with a quick casting he was ready his movements hastened, he charged his foe, ready now to fight him close up.

Atum laughed as the shield around him crackled like orange lightning, "You will need to," he hissed, and narrowed his eyes in surprise as the opponent dived forward with horrid speed. He knew that the shield would not protect him against this, and he backed off a little, extending a palm far too slowly to be of any use.

Outside the door, three more, knew jaffa, finished setting up the heavy cannon they had brought up from the armouries many levels below, and turned it to face the door, the large emitter snapping open with a loud 'crack' sound.

With a smile he kept coming half an eye on the door waiting for it too give he estimated at most a minute or two, enough time he hoped. His blde came down with sickening speed, directly at the 'God' cleaving flesh in massive chunks from the arm, and drinking deep for a second replacing part of the strength lost from when he was hit, then he turned to face the door as the door exploded inwards from the heavy cannon emplaced outside it.

Even as the first guards pored in he moved and from his fingers poured forth sticky threads of webbing to cover the gurads. Although no Spider had woven threads this thick that the Guards had faced before, it held most of them still and even for those who still could move they found it hard, fighting every second unless they burst through.

Then he turned to face Atum once more... 'Seems I might not escape, at least I shall die knowing you went ahead of me.' He stated this as a simple fact and once more leaped at his foe, as one who knew he would die, and had accepted that fact, and was not afraid of it. Under his breathe he whispered a prayer, a simple act of faith, it would do nothing, but in his heart he felt the eyes of his god's on him.

Atum screamed, his voice tainted by the deep resonance that had been in it before, as his entire arm came away - along with his weapon. Backing off hurridly from the opponent even as the door exploded, his eyes were drawn to the jaffa, lead by one of the Jackal Guards, katana flashing as he tried to cleave his way through the webbing in order to resume their broken duel. Then his gaze returned to the interloper, just long enough to see the gleam of the sword approaching. He had just long enough to hear the final laughter of his host in his mind...

The Sword plunged into the Eye socket of the Host and for a moment Tel'Varinis paused to look into the remaining eye of the Host, as far as he was aware the Creature had been slain, and yet he recalled what he had discovered and although behind him he could knew the guards where approaching, would almost be through the webbing, he bent beside the Body.

'May the Seldarine take you as their own, for you have suffered, I bring you the freedom of the grave, I am sorry I could not bring true freedom.'

Rising he turned to face the oncoming guards and smiled. 'It is over, come then, let us finish what has started.' With a salute he stood awaiting the guards moving not an inch as the first of them broke through the webbing.

The Jackal guard stepped forward once more, sparing a cursory glance for the deceased System Lord, his expression unreadable before raising his weapon in a guard stance once more.

The others however, had other ideas, and a small horde of jaffa, seven at least, charged into the room, staff weapons blazing, emitting dull "whoomp" sounds as they shot at the elf...

There was simply too many of the Guards and tel'Varinis knew it, he avoided the first shot and even the second the third smacked into him knocking him backwards, th energy spilling out over him, and driving him momentary to his knees, allowing the fourth and Fifth to impact, his eyes began to close as he fell towards uncouniousness...

a small flash on his armour and one of the sigils painted onto it by the Wild Elves of his home vanished, the symbol was of a Unicorn and one of healing.

He regained his conciousness only for the Sixth and seventh Shots to smack into him even as he attempted to regain his feet... another flash and the last Unicron faded from his armour and he with a groan for even the healing energies of the magic left it's toil upon him he stood once again proudly... smiling a mask of bravado...

'You'll have to try harder than that.... Come on I just slew your so Called god...'

Then with a Shrug he charged... determined to go down as he had lived defying the odds...

((Enjoy atum... Feel free to do what we discussed on IRC in your next post))

Anat laid out her implements on the table, smiling. This was the first time she’d gotten to do this, but each and every knife, needle, acid vial, parasitic organism, variant of the kara-kesh, and other implement of pain seemed intricately familiar to her, from using every one countless times in the well of memory that she had inherited.

They’d found the corpse in quite a mess. Surrounded by several fallen jaffa warriors. Anat had been fortunate enough to arrive soon enough to deny Atum access to this sarcophagus. She would find something suitably ironic to do with the body later, but for now, she was far more interested in where this hok’tar interloper had come from. His equipment had, so far, defied all efforts to analyse it, and indeed, managed to claim the lives of several jaffa so far, even several in Atum’s throne room. Another thing she hadn’t quite figured out was how one swordsman, even an exceptionally skilled one, could cause quite so many casualties.

Picking up a long and wickedly pointed shock stick, she smiled, walking over to the sarcophagus, which should be finished its cycle soon…

It was pain he came round to, searing pain, They had taken him alive worse they whre determined it seemed to break him. How long could he hold out, it was a simple enough question, no one could resist Torture for ever, eventually he would break. As a Child of the Seldarine he had other 'options' The Seldarine would not allow it's creations to suffer needlessly, all he had to do was give up on life, surrender to the call to Arvandor.

But he did not want to die, it went agazinst every fiber in his body, he would fight, the question for now he knew was simple what would break first his will to fight the pain or his will to live?

Still the smallest fraction sought a means of escape, linked in part to his will to live, if that hope where to go, then his breaking in either direction would be so much closer.

Finnally he opened his eyes, slowly blinking in the light of the cell and looked up at his tormentor, his mouth slowly opening and closing as his throat dry and sore forced his choked words out from his chapped lips....
'Correllon protects his children, I have...' coughing blood a moment he struggled on, 'have, done what needed to be done....'

After that for a while apart from screams the only sound to pass his lips was that of prayer.

OOC Holy Thread necromancy... well I have more time now to catch up with Giltheran full catch up should be done tommorow