It's said that a beginning is a very delicate time - a time for ensuring that one has all the correct balances in place. Maybe that's true. Beginnings are funny like that. It was an age of discovery and of conquest. The Tau'ri had ventured out into the galaxy for the first time, and they had brought revolution and war in their wake. The Goa'uld had been challenged for the first time in generations, and their strength had been found wanting. It was a time of great upheaval, and it was a beginning, though of what remains yet to be seen.

In a beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
In a beginning, the Lantians reseeded life in the Milky Way in the wake of a devastating plague.
In a beginning, twelve planets perished in nuclear fire as their surviving populations fled into the vast gulf of stars, pursued ever onwards by an implacable enemy they themselves had created.

In a beginning, the rag-tag fleet appeared in a series of red and blue flashes against eternity. First one, then another, then another and another, until the whole star-field was full of ships: survivors of the twelve colonies, with the Battlestar Galactica hovering protectively over them like a sheep dog guarding its flock.

In the Combat Information Center of the Galactica, the crew went to work, calculating their new position, watching the dradis to ensure that the rest of the fleet had arrived safely, and otherwise going about the business of their daily routine, and daily routine it had become; it was now ten days and ten jumps since the fleet had left Kobol, the birthplace of mankind, behind them: ten days since they had set their course for the far distant Lagoon nebula, their only clue to the location of Earth.

Saul Tigh was having a day much like any other, remarkable only by virtue of his still being sober when, strictly speaking, he didn't need to be. He'd long ago grown accustomed to the jolts and discomforts of FTL jumps – they'd all gotten over that after the two hundredth jump or so, back in those early hours of their flight from the Colonies. "Report," he snapped.

There was a brief silence as those concerned double checked their information, and then,

"No unfriendly DRADIS contact." The speaker was the young Lieutenant Gaeta, studying the display at his station. A moment later, another crewman - Petty Officer Dualla - announced, "All ships present and accounted for, Sir."

The CAP was already launching, and within seconds the familiar green DRADIS blips of friendly Vipers were circling out towards the edges of the display. More reports were coming in, but those two had been the most important. Colonel Tigh studied the DRADIS for another moment before nodding in a satisfied manner. He picked up the speaker off of the central control console, waited for the Commander to pick up on the other side, and gave his report.

On the flight deck, Galen Tyrol had only just finished overseeing the CAP's launch and was going over the day's business with his crew. Three vipers in need of repairs. One raptor's primary gymbal had broken down. Again.

In the brig, a heavily pregnant Sharon Valerie sat speaking to the father of her unborn child who stood on the other side of the unbreakable glass wall.

And in the pilot's ready room, Lieutenant Kara Thrace fell to the floor and clutched her head in agony as sheer, unmitigated sensory overload tore its way through her brain.

"..Kara...?"

Someone was calling her name, but she couldn't... couldn't... her eyelid was held open with a fingertip. Someone's face. It was too bright. Too sharp. Too focused. Tiny imperfections. Distracting vocal harmonics. A song. A melody. Familiar. Painful. Too sharp. Too much.

"...omebody call Doc Cottle..."

All of this has happened before.
All of this will happen again.
In a beginning.

Earthsong
A Stargate SG-1 crossover fanfic
by P.H. Wise

Chapter 1: Frakked

Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 belongs to Sci-Fi. I think. So does the new Battlestar Galactica. I am neither Sci-Fi nor any of the other people likely to hold ownership of any of the involved properties. No copyright infringement is intended: please don't sue me. I'm not making any money off of this.

The best laid plans o' mice an' men gang aft agley. That's what we're told, anyways, and for the most part, it holds true. Certainly Daniel Jackson didn't expect to be in the situation he was in when he got up this morning. He'd had the whole day planned out, actually. He'd spend a few hours studying the latest off-world finds, he'd file a few mission reports, and then he'd curl up with a nice, relaxing book. Unfortunately, none of that was going to happen. Not now.

Now, Daniel Jackson was in hell.

Oh, there were experiences he'd thought had qualified as Hell before. Take Ne'tu, for instance. Fire and brimstone, pain and suffering, pain sticks. Then there was the time he'd gotten addicted to the sarcophagus on P3R-636, and had to spend weeks going through medically supervised withdrawal back on Earth. That one was pretty bad. Then there was the time he'd had to watch as Baal tortured Jack to death over and over, resurrecting him every time only to torture him to death again, totally unable to interfere. Well, mostly. But none of that compared to what he was experiencing now.

"Come on, Daniel," Vala insisted, her tone halfway between pleading and sexual-teasing, "It'll be fun! I still haven't seen your marketplaces, and you promised you'd take me to one!" Her hair was done up in pig-tails that looked more like an artist's ironic interpretation of faux-girlishness than anything else, especially when contrasted to her rather skintight leather clothing.

"When did I promise that?" he asked, trying very hard not to grind his teeth.

"Well, you may not have said it in as many words, but it could have been interpreted to mean..."

It was noon, though you'd never be able to tell it from looking. Life is like that when you're living it at the bottom of a converted missile silo. Amidst the drab concrete of the SGC's commissary, Cameron Mitchell sat, polishing off a bowl of red jello. Across from him sat Daniel Jackson, with Teal'c forming the third point of the triangle around the rectangular table. Vala was... in Daniel's lap, actually.

He didn't remember seeing her move. With a nonplussed look, Daniel pushed Vala off into the seat next to his, and glanced Teal'c's way. "So you're sure that the link hasn't worn off? If I shoot her, I still die?"

"Yup," Mitchell replied.

Teal'c looked stoic. "This is a trial you alone must endure."

The day previous, the team had returned from P8X-412, having completely failed to prevent the world from falling to Origin, and having witnessed the Prior's power, it is perhaps understandable that the mood of Stargate Command's flagship team would be a little strained, but Vala for one had never done 'strained' very well, and the team was used to rolling with the punches.

Mitchell shook his head incredulously, trying to suppress a grin.

"Think of it this way, Daniel," Vala said. "You can either take me on a tour of the surface," she tapped a finger to his lips, her finger nail brushing against the groove of his upper lip, "or you can convince your handsome general to let me accompany your team through the gate again. Don't you have a mission you need to go on?"

"There's a third option here," Daniel pointed out.

Vala nodded. "Right. Or, you can endure me constantly asking you to take me to the surface or on a trip through the Stargate until you go mad."

"Right, or that."

Silence for a long moment.

"Well?" Vala asked, growing impatient.

"I'm thinking," Daniel replied.

As if in reply, Walter's voice sounded out over the PA system: "SG-1, please report to the briefing room. SG-1 to the briefing room immediately."

Vala was the first one out the door.

Teal'c, Cameron, and Daniel exchanged looks. After a moment, Mitchell shrugged. "You heard the man," he said.

They left their food where it was and made for the exit.

A hop, skip, and a jump across the galaxy away, Commander Adama sat at his desk in his private quarters, reading over the morning's reports. Standard, day to day affairs, the odd report on fleet logistics, requests from various ship captains for increased rations of food and water for their crews, and so on. Some requests he signed off on, some he denied. Some reports he read, some he left for later.

Presently, the telephone mounted on the wall buzzed. He took off his glasses and looked at them. They were smudged and badly scratched. The smudges he could clean. The scratches would be harder, but he was unlikely to get another pair. The phone buzzed a second time. He set his glasses down, took the phone, and brought it to his ear. "Go," he said.

Twenty minutes later found Commander Adama striding purposefully through the doors of Galactica's medical bay. It wasn't crowded today, with only two patients visible, and Lee Adama pacing back and forth in front of a white coffin-like cylinder. Doctor Cottle was nowhere to be seen. Lee saluted as his father entered, and the Commander gave a quick, "As you were."

A pause.

"What happened?"

Lee glanced at the sensory deprivation tank, then back at his father. "When I started the morning briefing, Starbuck seemed fine. A little shaken up over something, but that was all. As the briefing went on, I noticed that she didn't look well, so I put Kat on the first CAP in her place. Then, after the briefing, she was still sitting in her chair holding her head in her hands. When I asked what was wrong, she just..." he looked helpless, "... started screaming, and then collapsed. Doc Cottle's been running tests since then. They put her in the tank about ten minutes ago."

A curtain was pulled back, and both Adams looked up at the sound. Sherman Cottle stepped out from behind a privacy curtain, restored it behind him, and approached the two men.

"Doctor," Adama said in greeting.

Cottle nodded. "Commander." He didn't salute. He never saluted. But he did his job, and he did it well.

"You want to explain to me what my best pilot is doing in a sensory deprivation tank?"

"Right now? Floating. If you want more than that, you're just gonna have to wait for the test results like everyone else."

Adama gave Cottle a look, and after a moment the good doctor elaborated.

"Bear in mind, I'm not a neurologist, but I think..."

"Cottle thinks there's something wrong with her brain," Lee said.

Cottle raised an eyebrow. "Who's the doctor here? Me? Then let me do the explaining."

Lee had the decency to look abashed. After a moment, Cottle went on. "This is the brain scan I took of the good Lieutenant at her last physical." He produced an image of Starbuck's brain that neither Adama had any idea how to interpret. "This," he said, producing another image, "Is her brain right now." The image looked different. It was more brightly lit, different sections were highlighted in the image, and there were various numbers and figures that weren't there in the original.

"It's... different," Lee said haltingly.

"Got it in one. And now you both know exactly as much as I do. When the test results come back, I'll be able to tell you more."

Lee looked nonplussed, but the elder Adama simply nodded, long since having gotten used to the cantankerous doctor. "Keep me posted," he said.

"I'll let you know if anything changes. And Commander?"

The Commander glanced over his shoulder at the doctor.

"I could use Doctor Baltar." The words tasted sour when he said them, but that didn't make them less true.

Adama departed without another word.

Twelve thirty. Stargate Command. The briefing room.

Colonel Mitchell, Daniel, and Teal'c sit at the table across from General Landry, with Vala standing by the window that overlooked the gate room.

"... Tok'ra intelligence suggests that the people of P3Q-579 may soon be targeted for conversion by the Priors. The Tok'ra report that this planet is part of an advanced star-faring culture, and frankly, we really can't afford to lose a potential ally to the Ori."

"How advanced are we talkin' here?" Mitchell asked.

"A few hundred years ahead of where Earth was before we began the Stargate program," Landry replied. "Colonization of other worlds, practical space travel, that sort of thing. I want you to travel there through the Stargate, make contact with their leadership, and do what you can to prevent the Priors for gaining a foothold there."

"With all due respect, General," Daniel began, "The last time we tried to oppose a prior, it didn't exactly go well..."

"I have the utmost confidence in your ability to think of something, Doctor Jackson," Landry replied.

"You can count on us, General," Mitchell said with more cheer than he felt.

"Indeed," Teal'c said.

"You don't suppose they'll be so grateful to us for saving them from forced conversion to Origin that they'll be willing to, oh, say, shower us with riches?" Vala asked.

All eyes turned to Vala.

"What? I'm just asking."

"You know, General," Mitchell said, "We haven't actually tested the link between pigtails and Jackson here in the last couple of days. We could always leave her here, bring her through afterwards if Jackson faints?"

The General tried very hard not to roll is eyes. "Good luck, people," he said. "I want you offworld in ten."

Eight minutes later, SG-1, such as it was, plus one assorted hanger-on, was geared up and ready to go in the gate room. The Stargate whirled and spun impressively, and steam drifted up around it as the computer dialed the address. "Chevron five encoded," came Walter's voice over the speaker.

"All right, people," Mitchell said. "On your toes. No telling what might be on the other side. Could be anything. Anything at all. Oh yeah. Going into the unknown as the head of SG-1." He looked enormously proud of himself.

"Chevron six encoded."

"You realize that the rest of us have been doing this for eight years, right?" Daniel asked.

"I grew up with the Stargate system," Vala chimed in helpfully.

"I too was not unfamiliar with the experience of gate travel before I ever arrived on Earth," Teal'c said.

Mitchell shot the others an annoyed look. "Come on, people. Don't tell me it's not still exciting?"

"Nope."

"Nuh uh."

Teal'c did not reply aloud, but raised an eyebrow.

"Chevron seven... locked."

The gate whirled open with a whoosh, filling the gateroom with undulating blue light, and as the four of them walked up the ramp and into the gate, Cameron Mitchell called out, "You gotta take some joy in what you do. When we step through this wormhole, we'll be..." He vanished into the event horizon, and a moment later, so did the others.

"...halfway across the galaxy!" Mitchell finished as he and the others emerged from the gate on the far end, stepping out into what appeared to be a museum of some sort. None of the lights were on, but there were lights, so that was a positive step. The stargate prominently displayed amidst a series of artifacts that Mitchell didn't immediately recognize, covered in writing that he definitely did recognize: Ancient. Assorted Greek-style statues placed prominently on either side of the stargate, and the whole section was done up in the style of either a Greek or a Roman temple. "You can never get tired of that. That'd be like getting tired of rock and roll, or chocolate."

Daniel shrugged.

Mitchell made a disgusted motion with his hands. "Aw, forget it. Let's just try to make contact with whoever it is that lives here." He stepped over to where the MALP was waiting next to the DHD at the base of the stylized ramp which led up to the stargate display.

"Wow," Daniel said, looking around.

"You got something, Jackson?"

"It looks like this civilization is definitely heavily influenced by either Greek or Roman styles, and given that we know that the language of the Alterans was sort of a form of proto-Latin, well..."

"Well, what?"

Jackson looked at Mitchell. "Well, it's fascinating."

Mitchell rolled his eyes. "Right. Anything helpful?"

Teal'c had gone ahead to make sure the area was secure. Vala was helping herself to various artifacts. "Vala..." Daniel said warningly, and she irritatedly put back the gold-encrusted cup she'd had in her hands.

"This is interesting," Daniel said, looking at a plaque in front of a statue of a beautiful woman holding a stone bow. "It's written in a variant of Greek. Some of the words and the way they're used is unusual, but if I'm reading this correctly, this is a representation of Athena, one of the 'Lords of Kobol.'"

Vala blanched at the name, but said nothing.

"Goa'uld?" Mitchell asked.

Daniel nodded. "It seems likely. These people were probably brought here from Earth during the time of the ancient Greek civilization." A pause as he considered the implications. "The Greeks actually had some relatively advanced technology at that time, but most of that was lost after the burning of the library of Alexandria, and much of the rest was lost when the Roman empire fell. I've often wondered where we might be back on Earth if the dark ages had never happened. Maybe these twelve planets will show us."

A minute later, Mitchell rounded a corner and frowned deeply. The previous section had been intact, but this part of the museum... had seen better days. Parts of the floor had collapsed, and... he blinked. Was that a corpse down there in the rubble? He sniffed the air, and now that he was paying attention, yeah, he could smell it. Definitely a corpse. He had no idea how long the woman had been at the bottom of the collapsed section, but the bit of rebar through her chest couldn't have been good for her health. Her body was starting to discolour, but she was still striking. Blonde hair, nordic features, tall.

"Not the way I'd wanna go," he murmured.

Daniel shook his head. "Not the most pleasant, no."

The radio squawked, and Teal'c spoke: "Colonel Mitchell, I believe I have found something which you and Daniel Jackson will wish to see." A short exchange of directions followed. After about a minute of walking, they found what appeared to be the main entrance to the museum, in front of which Teal'c stood, glancing up at the archway over their heads before directing his gaze out at the streets beyond. Beyond the ruined doors of the museum was a blasted city, craters all around, carbon scoring, ashes, some buildings partially collapsed. This had been a war zone.

Daniel glanced up at the archway, absently noting the Greek letters which spelled out the words, 'Delphi Museum,' and then caught sight of the city, stopped, and stared.

"... On the plus side," Vala pointed out, "They're not likely to convert to Origin?" It was tasteless, and she knew it, and none of the others responded.

"Colonel Mitchell," Teal'c called out in warning. While the others had been gawking at the sights, he had been checking for possible threats, and he had found one: a blond woman had just rounded a street corner, followed by at least twenty large robots.

Mitchell looked up, "I see them. ... any chance you think these folks are friendly?" Even as he spoke, he and the others moved quickly to take cover from any possible incoming gunfire even as they hefted their own weapons.

"Hello!" Daniel yelled out to the distant woman. "We come in peace!" He paused a moment, and then repeated himself in as close to ancient Greek as he could manage on short notice.

The woman pointed, and the front rank of robots allowed their hands to fold back into their arms, replaced by machine gun barrels. A moment later, bullets began to strike the pillars that SG-1 had taken cover behind.

"HOLD YOUR FIRE!" Daniel yelled, still speaking in Greek, "WE ARE PEACEFUL EXPLORERS FROM EARTH!"

If anything, the gunfire grew more intense.

"Nope," Daniel announced. "Not friendly."

"Yeah, thanks, I got that."

"Jackson, Vala, Teal'c and I will cover, you run. Ready?"

Vala and Daniel nodded. A moment later, Mitchell produced a grenade, pulled the pin, and lobbed it over the fallen pillar he was taking cover behind. It landed short of the robots, but its explosion did create enough of a distraction to allow him to open fire.

Vala and Daniel darted into the museum, with Daniel stopping short and taking cover in the entry arch before opening fire as well, joining his weapon's voice to the chorus of gunfire that already echoed across the streets of the blasted city. A robot fell, brought down by the SGC's standard issue armour-piercing rounds. The fall of the first robot brought a momentary break in the fire of the others in the front rank, and Mitchell and Teal'c took the opportunity to run into the Museum.

"The rest of you ready to get the hell out of here?" Mitchell asked.

Teal'c glanced Mitchell's way. "It is an acceptable location to visit, but I would not desire to make it my place of residence." He let off a burst into the body of the first robot to enter the museum, and it staggered but did not fall.

SG-1 continued its fighting retreat through the museum, bullets ricocheting off of floors and walls, priceless artifacts shattering around them, but no bullet finding its mark in their bodies. At last they reached the stargate, and Daniel rushed to its controls, only to curse loudly in dismay. "We have a problem," he announced.

Mitchell glanced at the DHD. "Oh, no, no, no..."

He hadn't noticed it before, but the DHD was missing a few symbols. Specifically, it was missing two of the symbols necessary to dial Earth.

"Dial something else!"

The Centurions would be on top of them at any moment.

"If you have any suggestions..."

Gunfire bounced off the side of the DHD, grazing Vala's leg, and she yelped loudly. By chance, her gaze strayed to some carvings at the base of the state of Athena. A gate address. "Oh, to hell with it!" she muttered, and punched in the address.

Success. The gate opened with a spectacular display of energy as the unstable vortex whirled into existence. "Let's go, let's go!" she yelled, and limped into the event horizon.

"Jackson, go! We'll cover you!" Mitchell yelled over the sound of gunfire, he and Teal'c having taken cover behind the statues of Zeus and Athena respectively.

Jackson ran for the gate and dove through just as a burst of gunfire sheared through an old column covered in Alterran writing: it toppled, crashing down heavily on top of the DHD, burying it in a pile of rubble. The gate disengaged. A moment later, the chamber in Mitchell's P-90 clicked empty.

"Ah, hell," he muttered.

At first, Doctor Baltar had been annoyed at the summons to the medical bay. He wasn't a medical doctor, even if he did have a great deal of expertise in the medical and biological fields. Theoretical and laboratory work was more to his liking, but his true expertise lay in the area of computer science. Still, after the situation had been explained to him by that intolerable tyrant who ran the medical facility, however, his interest had been piqued - particularly once he got his hands on Kara Thrace's test results.

"Well?" Cottle asked expectantly.

"It's really quite astonishing," he murmured.

"Doctor?" Adama asked.

"Quite, astonishing," Baltar said. It was now a few hours after he had finished his tests in the medical bay, and he was seated at a table in a cramped room with Tigh, Commander Adama, and Doctor Cottle. "I realize that not all of you possess the medical expertise to understand the data were I to show it to you..."

"Just tell us what you found, Doc," Tigh said, looking annoyed.

"Of course," Gaius replied, very carefully suppressing the resentment he felt towards the balding officer. "At first, I suspected that Lieutenant Thrace may be another sleeper Cylon agent, but the Cylon detection test has disproven that fairly conclusively." He went on a bit, explaining the methodology of the test, and why he'd thought that Kara might have been such an agent.

"Doctor Baltar," Adama said. "Your findings?"

"Yes, yes, of course. Doctor Cottle was correct in his initial assumption that it was a problem of neurological function. From what I've been able to determine, Kara Thrace's brain has begun forming new neural connections at a rate that simply doesn't happen outside of the first years of a child's life. I can't explain it, and I've never seen anything like it."

Commander Adama held Baltar's gaze for a long moment; Baltar looked away. "So what's the plan?" he asked.

Gaius floundered, then, "I, that is, I can only presume that sensory overload is one of the side-effects of whatever it is that is happening, and will probably subsi..."

Cottle cut him off, completely ignoring his ensuing glare. "The bottom line is this: we're out of our depth. We've never seen anything like it."

"What's causing it? Is it contagious?"

All at once, Baltar was sitting on the deck of his lakeside home, shirtless, basking in the sunlight. Six sat on a reversed chair in front of him, smiling coyly. "That is a good question," he told her. "What IS causing it?"

"It's her, Gaius," Six said, leaning over the back of the chair.

"Yes, of course it's her. Who else would it be? ... But what's causing it?"

Six shook her head, disappointed. "Did you really never read the Pythian prophecies?"

"I can't say that I ever really paid much attention to the study of religious texts, no."

"Doctor?"

He was back in the cramped room again. "... I'm not sure. Certainly there's no physiological reason that I can determine. Unless Doctor Cottle has found something?"

Cottle shook his head. "No. I don't like it. Things like this don't happen without some kind of cause, and until we figure out what that is, we can't move forward with any kind of treatment regimen beyond what is already being done."

"Well," Baltar said, "There you have it, then."

None of them liked that. Answers that only raised more questions were rarely welcome. But there was little that could be done about it. Commander Adama dismissed the two doctors, telling Cottle to keep him posted, and then sank back into his chair, brow furrowed in thought.

Stargate Command, Colorado Springs, Earth

Several hours later, back at Stargate Command, SG-1 was overdue for their scheduled check-in time, and they hadn't sent their MALP back. Landry was beginning to worry. "Dial it up, Walter," he said. He stood in the stargate's control room, watching as the technicians did their work.

"Aye sir. Dialing now..."

The gate spun up, encoding each of its chevrons in turn, until... "Chevron seven, locked. Receiving MALP telemetry..." Walter punched a few buttons, and an image appeared on the screen in front of him. At first, nothing seemed out of place. Then the camera panned around, revealing significant weapons damage to the area which had not been present before, and no sign of SG-1. Movement at the edge of the camera's field of view. The camera panned up to reveal two large metal robots and, looking directly at the stargate with a stunned expression on her face, was a stunningly beautiful blonde woman. She looked... perfect. Her eyes focused on the MALP, and she approached it. The two robots followed her. She bent down and studied the MALP for a moment, then stepped away, gesturing at the robots.

They opened fire.

The camera cut out an instant later.

"Damn," Landry said. "Sergeant, shut it down. Flag the address as hostile, lock it out of our system."

Walter looked up, surprised. "Yes sir, but... what about SG-1?"

The General met Walter's gaze, sounding more confident than he felt. "I've got some ideas about that."

A conflux of events. Disconnected. Interrelated. The destruction of the Twelve Colonies. The frantic flight of the ragtag fleet. The return to Kobol. The arrow of Apollo. The plight of Pegasus and her crew. SG-1 goes missing on Cylon-occupied Caprica; a ship is sent to locate them. A pilot collapses in the Galactica ready room. A grouchy old man brings in the one man who was really capable, however reluctantly, of understanding that pilot's plight. A prophecy. A dream. A word spoken in hope for the future. A song of a distant blue planet; a mote of dust suspended in in a sunbeam.

In a beginning.

END CHAPTER 1

Author's notes:

Timeline wise, this story begins after 'The Powers That Be' for Stargate, and just after 'Flight of the Phoenix' in season 2 of Battlestar Galactica. As far as the Pegasus goes, this technically happens after Pegasus finished her repairs after the blind jump, but before their attack on the Cylon staging area.