"Why are we imprisoned?" Daniel gripped the bars, rattling the door to get the guards' attention. "What crime did we commit?"

Jack, standing beside him in much the same manner, was demanding the same answers in English.

The guards remained quiet, but the archaeologist suspected from their uneasy shuffling that they were as much surprised by the monarch's arrest order, as SG-1 were to be arrested.

"Are you, deaf?" Jack growled, waving his hand in front of the closest guard's face. All the man did was look away. He gave an annoyed huff then spoke to Daniel. "Any theory on why we got such a welcome?"

Daniel shrugged. "The only thing I can think of is the deliberate mispronunciation Keelah had me make. There was no abnormal reaction before that."

"For the moment I don't think we'll be getting any explanation from Keelah," the general said quietly, his eyes flicking in concern to the woman crouched on the floor. She was not reacting well to their incarceration. "Keep trying to get some answers from the breathing statues." He gestured with his head to the impassive guards.

Daniel nodded and immediately started a new bombardment of questions, using the limited vocabulary he had of the language. Feeling more and more like he was talking to a brick wall, his mind thought back to the series of events that had brought them here. It had started off so simple...so normal...not really different from any other day until that madcap debriefing of SG-5's latest mission...

It had taken him a full week to reconstruct the Canopic jar from Kinsey’s abduction. The Jaffa’s body had decimated the stoneware when he had fallen on it, and aside from a single shard two centimeters wide, the rest were smaller than a fingernail. There were chipped pieces of hardened wax inside the lid that Daniel assumed was where the tracking device had been kept, sealed inside with the symbiote. Much to the archaeologist’s frustration, all that painstaking work resulted in was a name. There were no other inscriptions telling of the Goa’uld’s crimes for which he had been imprisoned, nor any information on when or where he came from. The recurring patterns etched into the stone were only images of various plant life. He had switched his search to looking up the history of the Goa’uld on Earth. The references to him in Ancient Egyptian mythology gave barely any more information and none that was particularly useful. Changing his search parameters yet again, he hit enter on the keyboard and waited for the computer to generate a new list of possible references.

"Are you searching for divine inner guidance, Daniel?" Keelah’s voice was softly amused. She could tell from his frown he was far from serene.

"I think God’s inbox is full," he muttered. His frown turned to one of perplexity. "Interesting choice of words."

"You were chanting the word ‘Uneg’ under your breath," she shrugged.

It didn’t surprise Daniel that he’d been talking to himself; it was something he did to help jog his memory. "Uneg is the name of the Goa’uld Kinsey was interrogating. The only references I’ve been able to find is that he’s a plant god, and a single inscription in a pyramid text proclaiming him as the son of Ra. Not really earth shattering stuff." He tilted his head curiously. "Does the word mean something else to you?"

She nodded. "In my language it literally translates to ‘inside’, but it’s more of a spiritual meaning."

"It has religious connotations?" Keelah had been teaching him her native language. He had picked up enough that he could hold basic conversations, but like any new language, colloquialisms and syntax made it an ongoing process.

"My people are not religious in the way Earth is, nor have the enforced devotion of the Goa’uld. We are of the belief that the gods live in us all and guide our hearts to the correct path."

"The gods are like a conscience?" Annika looked up from the tablet she was trying to get a reading from.

Keelah considered the question. "That is one way to describe it."

"There’s no formalized religion?" Violet eyes widened. The revelation was startling. Aside from ancient species like the Nox and Asgard, she couldn't recall a single culture that didn't worship a god in some form or other.

"We have people who devote their lives to finding inner peace, but it is a personal journey."

"Do you know how that belief system came about?" Daniel leaned forward eagerly. Learning about any culture was always of interest to him, especially one that had deviated from the norm as Keelah's had seemed to.

She shook her head.

"No history of the Goa’uld ever being on the planet?"

"Not that I’m aware, but I was taken at a young age. And my schooling up to that point had been about more recent history." She tilted her head curiously. "You think there’s a connection between Uneg the Goa’uld and our spiritual meaning?"

"Possibly," he shrugged. "Ra’s been gone from Earth for over seven thousand years, so the Goa’uld has been imprisoned at least that long. A Goa’uld lives inside the body. It could be that on your world when he did not return, that’s how your faith evolved, changing from a physical personification to symbolic."

"But if this Goa'uld does have a connection to my people, that still does not help with his current location," Keelah pointed out.

"Nope, but it’s interesting to speculate nonetheless."

A page requesting Daniel go to the briefing room interrupted them.

"I guess SG-5 found some interesting ruins." They had all heard the klaxons a few minutes ago as the team had arrived home. He rose to his feet, his hand absently brushing against Annika as he strode by her. Entering the briefing room a couple of minutes later he saw SG-5 seated, with Hammond in his traditional place at the head of the table. What was strange was that Ratty seemed to be practically bouncing with jubilation, while Shakespeare looked ready to pull his hair out in exasperation. Hammond wore a bemused expression.

"Come on, Shakespeare," Ratty wheedled. "Indulge me."

"I've been indulging you all day."

"Not in English," the scrawny man grumbled. "Say it in Goa'uld or Phoenician."

The anthropologist just shook his head muttering under his breath.

What Daniel caught was a curse in Mandarin.

"Hey," Ratty became indignant. "I understood that!"

"I know you did."

Hammond beckoned Daniel in. "Doctor Jackson, the people of the planet SG-5 have returned from apparently have a medication that allows instant recognition of any language."

"Wow. Really?" Daniel realized that the general hadn't called him for his archaeological knowledge but rather for his linguist skills. "You want me to test it, sir?"

Hammond nodded. "If you wouldn't mind." He wasn't exactly happy that Major Harper had permitted his teammate to ingest an unknown pharmaceutical. However, from what he'd been told thus far, the team had been given little choice. The inhabitants had taken SG-5 to what they described as a customs depot, like at an airport, where all groups of visitors were given one pill per group. Harper had delayed letting the captain under his command ingest it until other interplanetary visitors had taken it, to observe reactions and side effects, of which none were obvious.

Daniel contemplated which of the two dozen odd languages he spoke fluently he should try first. Chose Russian, asking if Ratty could understand him. "Вы можете понять меня?"

"Да. Но то был очевидным вопросом, котор нужно спросить." Ratty replied in perfect Russian that he did but it was an obvious first question. "Ask a harder one."

"Okay..." Daniel considered a different question, one that had nothing to do with the situation. Switched to German, asking what year the Berlin Wall fell. "Welches Jahr tat die Berliner Mauer kommen unten?"

"Nicht Lappalienfragen," he complained in German about the trivia question. "Ich bin nicht ein Textbuch."

Daniel switched to Greek asking the man if he had plans for the weekend.

"Προσέξτε ένα παιχνίδι στην τηλεόραση." Ratty answered that he was going to watch a game on TV, then spoke in English. "Maybe treat my old lady to a night out." He gave an apologetic shrug at reverting to his normal language. "Slang gets lost in translation."

"I'll let you know if the rumors are true." Ratty didn't bat an eye as he responded in the same language, though his body remained still.

Interesting, Daniel thought. The pill appeared to stimulate the language center of the brain into an instant linguist dictionary, but it was just theory as opposed to practice. That could cause some problems. He tried to get more details and chose the Abydonian dialect of Goa'uld, the language he was most comfortable with besides English. "How does the medication work?"

"Put it under the tongue. Kicks in after a few seconds."

"How long does it last?"

"Apparently varies for different people. They say between two and three days."

"I cannot take two more days of him yapping in my ear," Shakespeare bemoaned, having listened to the exchange.

"Thank you, General." The lieutenant sighed in relief.

Hammond addressed Daniel. "I'm guessing by what we just witnessed, the claim is true."

"Yes, sir," Daniel nodded. He tried to expand his earlier notion about the pill being just a theory lesson in speech. "Captain, can you read other languages?" He quickly jotted down a quick note in Ancient.

The man studied it but his face remained blank. "Nope, it's just squiggles."

"That's a relief." Daniel's mouth tilted into a smile. "For a second there I thought I was out of a job."

"Captain, were you aware of the switching of languages?" Hammond asked.

Ratty had to really think about that question. "Sort of. I hear that it's different from English but I understand it."

"This pill could be invaluable," Daniel said thoughtfully. "Especially during meet-and-greets." How much time had been 'wasted' because of the need to translate during negotiations? Or precious seconds lost to prepare to fight, because the enemy order to engage had not been understood? He paused. "It could also cause some problems."

"How so?"

"People assume if you know their language that you also know their customs. They tend to be more lenient with unintentional transgressions if it's obvious you don't know their ways. The tribal dialect I used, if Ratty had been talking to one of the actual natives, he would have come across as pompous and aggressive because he didn't use the hand gesture to soften the comment into a casual reference."

Hammond gave a thoughtful nod of understanding. "But it could still be useful on say, covert ops, where teams only need to hear and understand enemy conversations."

"Undoubtedly," Daniel agreed.

"Major, are the people willing to trade for these pills?"

"Any interplanetary trade can only be organized by the King," the team leader answered. "We couldn't even get a foot in the door. But I think we should at least try again, sir."

"Captain, I want you to report to the infirmary immediately. Make sure there are no side effects that haven't shown up yet."

"Yes, sir." Ratty jumped to his feet and hurried out.

Hammond turned his attention back to the remaining members of the team. "I take it these people are quite technologically advanced?"

"Not at first glance, sir," Harper shook his head. "The township to look at is like something out of Camelot, complete with a castle sitting on the hill top."

Shakespeare picked up the description. "The buildings and people's dress are medieval in design. It is a 'Kingdom' in every sense of the word as we know it. However walking through it, it became apparent that they are advanced in medicines and agriculture. It seems their main source of trade with off-worlders are their crops of grain-based plants. The plants grow quickly with less disease."

"They also have nifty personal weapons," Chewy added. "At least the King's Guard does. We saw a man go down quicker than being hit by a bullet."

"It's a lethal weapon?"

"From what we saw it has different settings. It discharges an energy pulse like a zat'."

Further discussion was cut off by Sam rushing into the room, Jacob was close behind her. Eyes alight with excitement, she waved a report clutched in her hand. "Sir, sorry for the interruption, but we need to go back to that planet!"