Hilda charged through the gate, as Kaspar hurried to catch up with her. As usual with the Tauri Stargate, it seemed to impart a bit of extra momentum to travelers, so Hilda came flying out the other side. Almost expecting it, though, she managed to stay on her feet running until she came up against the MALP.

Kaspar's 'creaky old bones' didn't fare so well, and the gate seemed to throw him out the other side, sending him sprawling and tumbling away from the gate.

The platform on which the stargate sat was only one step above the ground, though it was always possible that there was more to it that had become buried under the centuries of weather.

There was no visible threat, and nothing seemed to have changed from the pictures. The DHD was still there, set in the middle of a yellow brick road that led all the way up to the gate platform, splitting around the DHD, probably indicating that the road had been built long after the gate had been placed here.

FRED and Vasandra come through. The vehicle has a bit more speed, and Vasandra has to jump off the one step to keep from stumbling.

Gavin, at a more sedate pace to match FRED, must have made a misstep, led with his left foot instead of his right... or whatever, but he comes through as if pushed from behind, and goes tumbling to the ground as well.

While not the first to enter, or leave, the gate Vasandra is none the less the first to react to the new world on which she finds herself.  Settling her stride after a few quick steps the likes of which any dancer would be proud given the sudden and surprising acceleration from the slightly out of tune gate she reverts the FRED to a stationary waiting setting rather than it's automatic forward travel necessary to traverse the gate separately from the remote.  With the potential crisis of a multi ton cargo vehicle driving over some important person or object averted she takes a moment to make a brief manual inspection of the DHD.

”It looks like the MALP's analysis of the DHD matches with it's apparent condition, I will test dial it once we break the connection to the SGC to ensure it is working correctly but everything looks right.”

Coming through last, Gavin was expecting the worse, but that just turned out to be getting 'pushed' from behhind that sent him sprawling on the ground, mostly because he didn't see that first (and only) step until the last moment. As he quickly got to his feet, he looked around, didn't see any immediate threat, and just shrugged.

He saw Vasandra examining the DHD, and walked over to it as well.

"I believe our first priority is to secure the perimeter," he suggested to her, but he touched one of the 'buttons' on the device. If it lit up, that meant it had power, which was the first concern.

He was also looking around, particularly behind the stargate, since that was often a 'blind spot'.

Hilda laughed as she hurtled out of the gate and ran into the MALP. The Midgard Stargate might be out of alignment and dangerous, but that didn't mean she couldn't try to enjoy it. Having been thrown off a horse, pushed by a cow, and tripped by a pig, the Cimmerian was used to the rough-and-tumble.

She'd already moved far enough way from Vasandra and her precious FRED that she didn't have to worry about them running up behind her. Eagle-eyed and with bow raised, Hilda quickly scanned the area for any sign of danger, but found nothing immediate. Exiting a Stargate always left one vulnerable to ambush.

She went over to Kaspar and helped the elder to his feet. 'It is quite a ride, já?' She remembered the vision of the glittering blue tunnel through the stars, the wormhole or the branches of Yggdrasil. It was a mystical experience, to see the whole cosmos spread around you.

Using her radio, she called back to the SGC before the puddle faded away. 'We have arrived safely on Oz. May Thor grant us courage.'


OOC: Listen 13, Spot 25 (rolled a 20)
09:52, Today: Hilda rolled 13 using 1d20+5. listen.
09:51, Today: Hilda rolled 25 using 1d20+5. spot.
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:07, Mon 09 Dec 2013.

Once SGC got Hilda's report, they went ahead and shut down the gate, presumably to allow other teams to return.

After helping Kaspar up, Hilda scouted around the area, listening and looking for anything suspicious.

Her first impression was that it was unnaturally still and quiet, but soon after the gate shut down, she could hear the birds and insects again. The gate activation had made sufficient sound, light or perhaps other energies to 'warn' the wildlife. It was like they'd been holding their breath waiting for something to happen.

There were no signs of footprints or scat anywhere around the stargate or on the yellow brick road. What she did find odd was that there were no weeds growing on the road. She could understand that the bricks were so tightly packed together that no dirt or weeds could get in, but it was fairly neat along the edges, too.

The grass in the area didn't seem to grow very high.

It was only after she made these observations that something else caught her eye: the very thing she'd wondered at the absence--weeds in the road. About 50 yards ahead, she spotted what appeared to be grass in the middle of the road. She had to move a bit closer to get a good look, but finally saw that their was a break in the road! It was a small crack that ran all the way across the road. The road past the break looked to be a 1/2 inch lower.

Hilda had another look around the horizon, then reported to her fellows 'It looks all clear.' The return of birdsong was a relief to the Cimmerian.

She began circling the Stargate, where the yellow brick road ringed it and the grassland beyond, staying ahead of the team. Keeping her eyes down, she looked for tracks and other spoor, anything to tell if people or animals had been moving around here. The hard brick road itself gave her few signs, but she had other ways of reading that. It seemed well cared for, the bricks kept together, no weeds between the bricks or at the edges, at least until she got to the crack running across it. What did that mean? 'Earthquake or subsidence, maybe. I don't think anyone's been here in a while.'

Testing the DHD as promised Vasandra reconnects to earth for the expected systems check offering a rather standardized radio broadcast once the gate is connected to ensure a minimum of confusion.

”SGC, The DHD works properly.”

With the last of the mission prep tasks on the checklist completed Vasandra turns her attention at last to the landscape the others have been inspecting for some time and comes quickly to the same conclusion they must have all made by now.

”Given the lack of available cover we may as well take advantage of the road, even though it is very likely to evolve into some sort of trap at least we will have some idea of where such a trap will be approaching from, until that happens however it may be wise to have the FRED follow along behind as it may spook any natives, particularly if they are unable to maintain the road.”.

"Hilda and Kaspar seem to have secured the perimeter," Gavin comments to Vasandra, as the two of them remain by the DHD for the moment.

When she activates the gate to verify its working status, he adds, "We can send the MALP back now. Its initial recon is done."

He also extracts his radiation sensor that came with his bundle. The MALP had detected faint radiation coming from the road, so he decided he'd check. He'd probably need to check for awhile as they moved along the road, in case the radiation started to increase.

"It does seem as if the road should lead somewhere, whether it's to the temple or not. I suppose it could lead nowhere. Any thoughts on who the road builders might be?"

"And I was worried about you!" Kaspar said, as Hilda helped him back to his feet and the gate shut down.

"I notice the road goes around the gate platform, here.  Does the road continue on, on the other side of the gate, or does it end here?  Or start here, for that matter!" Kaspar says with a grin -- in an accent that sounds much like all the Americans back at the SGC.

When Hilda reports about the 'crack' in the roadway, Kaspar heads that way.

"Does the crack run straight, or is it jagged?" he asks as he approaches, "Is there a gap between the bricks, or just the height difference?"

"It may just be simple ground subsidence, but it could also represent the edge of an energy barrier, or something like that, so be careful."

Hilda laughed and whacked Kaspar on the back, hard. 'If the Stargate is to spit me out, I should already be jumping in the air, já? I jump, so I am ready to land. You walk, so you fall.'

As Kaspar asked a lot of questions, she simply pointed for him to look for himself. When he suggested there might be some kind of energy barrier, she shrugged and scooped up a clod of earth and grass, then tossed it across the crack in the road.

Upon reaching the crack in the road, Hilda threw some loose dirt across the crack to see if there was some sort of energy field there. The dirt did not encounter anything.

The crack appears to be about a quarter inch wide, and, looking around, it can be seen that the crack in the ground continues off to the left and right. It looks like it goes maybe 100 feet to the left, and disappears into the woods on the right. It gets wider as it goes on the right, creating a gap in the trees.

Through the gap, maybe three- to four-hundred yards, buildings can be discerned.

Via binoculars, the temple, still a mile away, appears to be made of red bricks. The architecture doesn't match any known architecture from Earth. Some of the bricks are in unusual shapes... cylinders, half-circles, triangles and many shaped as animals or figures.


Gavin easily picks up the radiation from the road, and almost as easily identifies it as naquadah.

"Hmm. I suppose this could just be normal geological fault activity." Kaspar says, digging out his digital camera and taking a series of shots of the 'crack', starting from the left, crossing the road, then as it widens to the right.  The final couple of shots are of the buildings which can be seen through the trees.

"Okay, I know the mission is to investigate the so-called temple, but does anyone remember any mention in the briefing about those buildings in the woods, there?  Maybe I missed it, but I don't remember a mention of them."

Following along behind the others with the FRED Vasandra stops it well short of the crack in the road, not inclined to add more pressure to the situation than necessary without some investigation, and continues forward to share Kaspar's viewpoint on the crack through the forest.

”Nothing leaps to mind, if the buildings are overgrown and covered by the forest canopy it may be very hard to spot them without this particular vantage point.  We should not assume that such a conveniently located crack is purely accidental, for all we know it was caused by something in the buildings.  No matter how you look at it we really need to take a look at whatever they are before we move on, we can't really afford to leave something that unknown between us and the Stargate.”

"Exactly what I was thinking, Captain." Kaspar nodded to Vasandra, putting away his camera, and taking out his binoculars.

"Those buildings are closer than the temple.  Also, if we went straight to the temple. those buildings, and anything they may house, will be between us and the gate." Kaspar said, looking over the buildings through his binoculars.

"Can anyone tell if these buildings share any qualities with the temple?  Are those walls brick, like those of the temple?"

Kaspar lowers his binoculars, and turns his attention to the golden brick road.

"The terrain rolls a little bit, here.  This road looks like it heads towards the temple, but we can't actually see it arrive there, from here.  It could swing off and make its way around to those buildings.  Maybe.  However, it looks to be a shorter trip if we just cut through the forrest, here."

"Hilda?  What do you think? Should we approach on both sides of this little ravine..." Kaspar indicates the crack in the ground, "...and I point out that it appears to get wider as it gets nearer the buildings -- or should we all stay together on one side of the gap?  What's your thinking?"

'The MALP did not see these buildings, it did not roll far enough down the road to see this crack.' Hilda said, producing her binoculars and watching both the buildings to the side and the temple ahead, and also scanning over the surrounding landscape, trying to discern the lay of the land.

'Our mission is not just to study the temple. It is to find the people who live here and learn what kind of people they are. We should go there first, learn what rules they have on the temple. I do not want to trespass on holy ground.' she reflected.

'The road is long and open, and where we don't know where it goes.' She pointed to the ravine and cleft in the forest. 'This way is closer, we know where it goes, and may hide in the forest if we do not like the look of these people... But the FRED cannot follow, can it? It would have to go down the road.' Hilda asked, looking to Vasandra for an explanation and feeling the horseless cart was more trouble than it was worth.

She took out her magnetic compass and made some notes, following the Tau'ri practice of orienteering as she worked out their position and direction. But she was starting to feel hopelessly lost already.


OOC: Survival (forest) for navigation: 8, rolled a 1
13:54, Today: Hilda rolled 8 using 1d20+7. survival - forest.
Apparently that's an automatic failure, even if the DC could well be low enough for a success. That also risks a critical failure. Or I could just play it safe and Take 10 for 17.
This message was last edited by the GM at 10:08, Wed 11 Dec 2013.

The yellow brick road didn't actually go around the stargate--it started (or ended) at the stargate foundation, but it did go around the DHD.

It would have required a bit of elevation that the MALP didn't have in order to see the crack in the road or to tell that the road didn't go in a straight line. It appeared to go in the general direction of the temple but curved around to the right around the edge of the forest, so it might possibly lead to the buildings.


The crevasse widened to maybe 3-4 feet at the far end near the buildings, with as much as 15" difference in height. The side to the left was lower.

Through the binoculars, at least two separate buildings can be seen. One seemed to be right in line with the crack, which appears to have caused a large gap in the building's side. Just to the right of that building is a corner of a second building. The buildings appear to be made of stone and timber, with thatched roofs.


Hilda quickly discovers that standing on the road affects her compass adversely. once she steps off the road and moves at least 3 feet away, it works normally.

Hilda watched her compass go wild, then stepped off the yellow brick road to see it settle down. 'This road contains lodestone.' she reported, puzzled to find that much lodestone buried under the yellow bricks. Feeling unable to rely on it, she exchanged it for her inertial compass. Standing at the DHD, she calibrated it to that location.
This message was last edited by the player at 09:17, Wed 11 Dec 2013.

"I'm still detecting the radiation that the MALP did," Gavin tells the others. "It is definitely coming from the road. I believe it's coming from a trace of naquadah in the bricks. That probably means naquadah is present on this planet."

"On the other hand, it's always possible that the bricks came from off-world."

He looks back at the road that leads either to or from the stargate.

"We should look for any deposits of yellow clay."

He smiled a bit at the slight paranoia that the others seemed to display. While hostile natives and ambushes were possible, there had been no indication anything like that was likely here.

"Kaspar, you should take a sample of the bricks while we've got the opportunity now. We might not have the time upon our exit," he suggested to the major.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:24, Wed 11 Dec 2013.

”We can just as easily park the FRED right in the middle of the road or conceal it a bit inside the tree line, there seems to be little enough traffic here that it is unlikely to make any difference.

Even if someone does come along and try to figure it out all the dangerous parts are locked away and it would give us a fairly good clue as to who lives here.”