Jack just grunted in reply and moved further into the room, picking his way through the people gathered around the fire, eating and watching him with open curiosity. Eventually he reached Daniel and dropped down on the floor next to him. He stifled a groan as he did so, as if moving was an effort, and sat there for a moment flexing his fingers, shaking them like he had pins-and-needles.
“Where’s Sam?” Daniel said, looking around. “Aedan said she was with you.”
“She’s coming.”
And a moment later Sam appeared at the end of passageway, one hand braced against the wall for support, looking groggy and unstable on her feet.
Teal’c immediately stood up. “Major Carter.” He flung a disapproving look at Jack. “You require assistance.”
She tried to wave him away. “I’m fine.”
But Teal’c ignored her, hurrying over to take her arm and lead her to a space on the opposite side of the fire. “Sit here,” he said. “I will find you food and water.”
With a grateful smile she eased herself to the ground. “Thanks, Teal’c.”
Jack said nothing, his angry glare apparently engrossed by the dancing flames.
Looking between them, Daniel couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on. “Is she okay —?”
“She’s fine,” he growled. He jerked his head toward Aedan, who was still talking to Megan on the other side of the room. “You find out anything useful yet?”
Swallowing his irritation — and admittedly this wasn’t really the time or the place to make a scene — Daniel resettled his glasses on his nose and said, “As a matter of fact, Elspeth was about to tell me about the war.”
“When they nuked the gate?”
“I don’t know. That’s what she was about to tell me.”
Jack gave a shrug as if to say, Don’t let me stop you.
So he didn’t. Elspeth was watching the exchange curiously, her inquisitive gaze darting between Daniel and Jack, as she steadily worked through the last of his MRE as if it were the finest meal she’d ever eaten. Perhaps it was. But she smiled when he looked at her again, licking gravy from her fingers.
“So,” he said, “the war?”
She nodded, pushing the MRE container aside and settling down for the story. “Well, it happened long ago, when our parents’ parents were young.”
“Longer ago than that,” Aedan corrected. He’d climbed up onto a ledge of rock halfway up the wall and sat there fletching arrows.
“It was in the time of the old gods,” Elspeth said, ignoring the interruption. “They were beautiful, and very powerful, and our people served them and worshiped them.”
“Some of our people…” Aedan, again.
Elspeth scowled but carried on regardless. “Then the Amam came — Devourers, as we call them now.” She dropped her voice, adding a little extra drama. “It’s said that they came in a single night, pouring through the Eye from the underworld.”
“The underworld?”
Jack gave a disparaging grunt, but in fact the term made perfect mythological sense in the context of ‘Amam’. Not that Jack knew that, of course. Or would care much, probably.
“And what — exactly — are the Amam?” Daniel said. “Are they people, like us?”
Elspeth shook her head. “They are the undead. They come from the underworld to devour the flesh of the living.”
“Zombies.” Jack raised an eyebrow. “That’s new.”
Daniel ignored him and smiled encouragingly at Elspeth. “Go on — the Amam came and… ?”
“And the old gods fought them. They sent every one of their mighty warriors against the Devourers, but they couldn’t defeat them. You see, the undead cannot die. And so the war lasted for many, many years. It is said that millions of people died.”
Daniel glanced over at Aedan, to see if he’d object to the exaggeration. He must have sensed Daniel’s eyes on him, because he looked up from his work and gave a slight nod. “That much is true,” he said. “No one doubts that. We find their bones everywhere.”
And that was an image to keep you awake at night.
“The Goa’uld have been known to use tactical nukes,” Sam chipped in, talking around a mouthful of the stew she was eating. She gave a little shrug, “If we’re talking about WMDs and ‘old gods’…”
Daniel nodded. It was pretty clear that the Goa’uld had been here at some point, and maybe they hadn’t left. “So these Devourers, the Amam, they won the war?”
The girl’s expression darkened. “Yes. They drove out the old gods and then there was no one left to protect us. The Devourers swarmed over the world like rats, feeding on flesh ‘til they could eat no more. Some few of us survived, like this, under the ground where they can’t find us. But others…” She looked over at Aedan, her voice less certain. “In the south, they say, there are camps where humans live penned like animals. The Amam feed on them at their pleasure.”