Tok'ra

"We are not Goa'uld."

- Garshaw

The Tok'ra are a resistance group of symbiotes who resist the cruel ways of the Goa'uld and more specifically, the System Lords, deriving their name from the Goa'uld words "tok", meaning "against" and the name of the Supreme System Lord, the deceased Ra who was killed by Jack O'Neill and Daniel Jackson on Abydos.

Creation
"There is an old legend among the Jaffa forbidden to speak of concerning a group of Goa'uld who opposed the ways of the System Lords."

The Tok'ra were first spawned by Egeria, a Goa'uld Queen and former mate of Ra. She had come to conclude that the Goa'uld Empire was too evil to continue, and mothered the Tok'ra with her mental imprint of compassion, and a belief that they should only take willing hosts. She would mother several broods of her children to take the fight against the evil of her race. In a final act of spite, the group was named the "Tok'ra" which meant "against Ra".

Ra would later contract the Ashrak with hunting the rogue queen down which they managed to accomplish. They would remove the symbiote from her host and ensured that the Tok'ras numbers would never increase to such magnitudes again. This would be a traumatic time to the movement whose loss of their queen would impede on their organization. Dozens of Tok'ra symbiotes would be captured and killed by the Goa'uld and almost spelt the end of their kind. Luckily, the eldest brood of Egeria led their kind into hiding where they managed to survive.

After taking stock over their situation, the Tok'ra realized they were unable to acquire military forces sufficient to counter the System Lords and thus they adopted strategies of subterfuge.

Sworn Enemies of the System Lords
"I learned a lot from Jolinar. Enough to know that we could be good friends."

- Major Samantha Carter



Eventually, the Tok'ra came into contact with the people of the Tau'ri when Jolinar, fleeing from an Ashrak sent by Cronus, took Samantha Carter as a host in order to survive. However, despite her best attempts, she was eventually killed by the assassin but not before ensuring that her host would survive. Elements of the genetic memory remained within Carter.

Through those memories, she managed to locate the Tok'ra encampment which intiated first contact between the two races. The Tok'ra were skeptical about the humans of the Tau'ri with Garshaw even angered when she learnt that Apophis' motherships around Earth were destroyed by SG-1 which resulted in the death of several of their agents. In addition to this, some believed that the humans were too reckless and independent for the Tok'ra liking. At the time, the Tok'ra believed that the only way an alliance could have been formed was if the Tau'ri were willing to supply the Tok'ra with willing hosts which resulted in tensions. They refused to allow the humans to return to their world until they evacuated as two of Cronus's motherships were converging on the planet but after they helped reveal that Cordesh was a traitor, they accepted the Tau'ri aid. Furthermore, Selmak was given a willing host in the form of Jacob Carter which brought an official alliance between the two races.

The Tok'ra hatched upon a plan to use a captured Ha'tak taken by SG-1 from the recently deceased Cronus to destroy Apophis' fleet. They made use of filtered misinformation given to the Goa'uld spy in their ranks to bring Apophis' fleet to a system where they dropped a Stargate dialled to a planet with a black hole into the planetary star. This caused a chain reaction bringing about an explosion that destroyed Apophis' fleet.

The race was almost destroyed when Anubis ordered his Underlord Zipacna to attack the Tok'ra base at the Vorash system which served as an outpost for Revanna. The resulting battle resulted in many Tok'ra deaths but they managed to survive to a degree. They fled to the Alpha Site where they took shelter with members of the Jaffa Rebellion though hostilities almost erupted due to a cloaked Ashrak assassin in the base. Eventually, relations with the Tau'ri broke down when Anubis discovered the Tau'ri Alpha Site and sent his newly developed Kull warriors to the settlement. During the course of the investigation, the Tau'ri demanded that the Tok'ra reveal where their agents were placed. However, the Tok'ra refused and felt that the humans jeopardised them which forced the Tok'ra to sever ties at the time. In addition, there were many in the high council who questioned Selmak's loyalties.

Later Years
After the fall of the System Lords, there was little activity on the part of the Tok'ra. The rising threat of the Ori did mean that they used their intelligence network to aid the Tau'ri and the Free Jaffa Nation to monitor the galaxy for newly formed black holes that indicated the presence of a Supergate.

The Tau'ri called upon the Tok'ra's aid in the removal of the cloned symbiote of the System Lord Ba'al that had infested Adria's body. A Tok'ra doctor and his aides were successful in the operation and managed to remove the symbiote from its unwilling host.

After the Ori crusade ended, the final clone of Ba'al was captured and was escorted to the Tok'ra homeworld where the Extraction Ceremony was performed on the Goa'uld, thus ending the reign of the last of the System Lords.

Society
"Goa'uld take hosts. Ours wish to be so."

- Garshaw



The Tok'ra are similar to the Goa'uld and are in fact the same species. However, where the Goa'uld forcibly take over hosts and lord over their subjects as gods, the Tok'ra pridefully state that they do not take hosts. Instead, their hosts willingly chose to be with a proper symbiosis maintained between both symbiote and host. When speaking, the Tok'ra make use of their symbiote voice to show that the symbiote itself was speaking while the normal voice indicated the host was talking.

When the symbiote takes on a new host body, the process is done only with the hosts consent and done so through the mouth as Tok'ra find the entry mark as unsightly. They also strongly believed that the host had the right over control over their bodies and find those of their kind that attempt to forcebly take over them as disgusting.

The Tok'ra consists of hundreds of symbiotes who were all devoted to the fall of the Goa'uld empire. However, among them, there were several different generations of Goa'uld broods. The eldest of which are few in number after succumbing to old age and natural deaths. These older symbiotes, such as Selmak, were respected, loved, admired and revered by the younger Tok'ra.

Furthermore, the lack of a queen sympathetic to their cause means that the Tok'ra suffer from zero to negative population growth and the loss of any one of their number was a staggering blow. There were the rare few occasions where defecting Goa'uld would be accepted into their ranks who would be the most infamous of the movement. These rebel Goa'uld would gain a title based on the battle where they revealed their betrayal.

They believe that their greatest weapon against the Goa'uld was their secrecy. At the time, they believed that anything that was not beneficial to them did not warrant a breach in their security procedures. The only thing beneficial to them in forms of an alliance were either hosts or advanced technology. This made them quite practical in their way of thinking.

Many of the Tok'ra had a degree of hostility towards the Jaffa whether they were free or loyal to their masters. This was because every Tok'ra symbiote that died at the hands of the Goa'uld had a Jaffa being responsible for the task. This meant that there were no Jaffa within the ranks of the Tok'ra. They were also skeptical on the Tau'ri and believed them to be too independent as well as reckless. Infact, some believed that Tau'ri did more harm then good as more Tok'ra symbiotes died as a result of their actions then over the centuries. The Tok'ra also believed that the Tau'ri were being arrogant in their attempts at reverse engineering technology that was too advanced for them.

The greatest level of hatred was reserved for the Goa'uld themselves and the Tok'ra show little sympathy over the exploitation of their symbiotes as they believe that the Goa'uld have done much worse to humans over the centuries.

A noted ritual among their kind was the burial of their dead which involved them being placed in a pyre raised to the level of a Stargate. Once there, they say the relevant words about the recently deceased after which the Stargate was activated ,causing an Unstable vortex, which destroys the remains to prevent their capture by the Goa'uld.

One of the key aspects of the Tok'ra culture are the Extraction Ceremonies which was where a Goa'uld System Lord was captured and faced the extraction of the symbiote itself. This begins with the captured Goa'uld placed in stasis while the Tok'ra leaders begin chanting in their own language which states a list of crimes the accused had committed. Depending on the Goa'uld in question, this ceremony can last up to three hours long. Once complete, the accused was released from stasis and allowed their final words. After which, they are placed in the Symbiote extractor. The symbiote was then removed from the host body and placed in a cylinder where upon a leader of the Tok'ra shatters it on the floor as everyone watches the Goa'uld wither and die without a host.

The race is governed by the Tok'ra High Council with their leader holding the position of Supreme High Councillor. Its membership is unknown but its decisions are binding on the rest of their people.

Technology
The Tok'ra have developed several technologies, many of which are based off Goa'uld design, and others that have been created in conjunction with the Tau'ri. Tok'ra technology is based primarily around the use of naquadah, a substance that the Tok'ra secrete into the bloodstream of their hosts. Naquadah is also used as a sort of interface initializer to interact with their most valuable technology, such as the hand device and healing device, similar to the Ancient Technology Activation Gene.

Worlds under Tok'ra control

 * Melia *
 * P34-353J *
 * Ghanaz *
 * P34-353J *
 * Vorash *
 * Revanna *
 * Tok'ra homeworld ''(Current Tok'ra homeworld)


 * Former bases marked with *

List of known Tok'ra

 * Aldwin
 * Anise
 * Antoc
 * Cordesh
 * Delek
 * Egeria
 * Garshaw
 * Jalen
 * Jolinar
 * Kanan
 * Kelmaa
 * Khonsu
 * Korra
 * Lantash
 * Malek
 * Mapep
 * Marteen
 * Mingala
 * Ocker
 * Per'sus
 * Ren'al
 * Selmak
 * Sina
 * Ta'seem
 * Thellas
 * Thoran
 * Zanuf
 * Zarin

List of known Tok'ra Hosts

 * Jacob Carter; blended with Selmak
 * Samantha Carter; former host of Jolinar
 * Kevin Elliot; host for Lantash
 * Firnan; blended with Cordesh
 * Freya; blended with Anise
 * Martouf; blended with Lantash
 * Nyklos; blended with Marteen
 * Jonathan J. O'Neill; former host of Kanan
 * Benjamin J. Reilly; blended with Mapep
 * Rosha; blended with Jolinar
 * Saroosh; blended with Selmak
 * Thina; blended with Mingala
 * MacAlester St. John; blended with Antoc
 * Yosuf; blended with Garshaw

Related

 * Tok'ra and Goa'uld biology
 * Tok'ra tunnel