I own neither Stargate nor the X-COM franchise. No infringement is intended, no profit is to made and I'm just not worth the hassle of suing anyway unless you want a share of the wages of an underpaid Civil Servant.
Cheyenne Mountain – Earth – November 2000
‘So how are you doing today Teal’c?’ O’Neill asked, pulling up a chair beside the bed in the infirmary.
‘I would be more comfortable if I were able to at least lay on my back O’Neill’ Teal’c replied. ‘I cannot even lean back in a chair or the pain soon becomes excruciating.’
‘Junior not worked his magic yet then?’ the Colonel asked.
‘Teal’c’s recovery has been exceptional’ Doctor Fraser injected, looking up from her desk in the corner of the infirmary. ‘If not for his symbiote I doubt he would have even been able to sit up at all yet. The injury caused by the alien plasma weapon was extensive.’
‘At least his armour took some of the hit’ O’Neill said, ‘could have been a lot worse.’
‘Having picked several armour fragments out of his back I can tell you he was only lucky one didn’t go through his spine’ Doctor Fraser told him. ‘Of course given the number of SG Team members that returned here in a body bag or with permanently debilitating injuries Teal’c is lucky period, one of the larger alien weapons would not have been survivable, armour and symbiote notwithstanding’ she stated.
‘Bugs have good guns, got to give ‘em that’ O’Neill replied with a shrug. He had thought his L2A1 Laser Rifle had been impressive until he got to see what a Sectoid Heavy Plasma Rifle could do. Hell their pistols were more powerful than a Goa’uld Staff-Weapon and were more accurate too if only because they had decent ergonomics.
‘They are not unskilled warriors either O’Neill’ Teal’c opined rolling onto his side to face the Colonel. ‘I would not have thought a creature so similar to an Asgard would prove to be so effective in battle’ he said.
‘Makes you wonder what one of those big armoured Muton things is like if Loki can make the little grey guys into a half-decent grunt’ O’Neill asked rhetorically. From what he’d heard a greater and greater percentage of the ships landing were carrying the genetically enhanced alien super-soldiers and it was getting nasty for X-COM as their casualty rates rose. ‘Hey the geeks managed to make a prototype copy of their Plasma Pistol’ he told Teal’c, ‘they think they’ll have the rifles like the one they shot you with figured out by the end of the month.’
‘And the larger model rifles?’ Teal’c asked, ‘The firepower of those devices was practically that of a small staff-cannon’ he noted.
‘They’re working on it’ the Colonel told him. ‘We might not get issued them for a while though even when they get the things figured out’ he said. ‘They’re overkill for Jaffa, hell our lasers already give us a huge edge.’
‘How is Major Carter?’ Teal’c asked.
‘Still kinda pissed that another alien hijacked her brain’ O’Neill replied, ‘At least the last one turned out to be a good guy but somehow I don’t think there’s any such think as a Tok’loki’ he said. ‘We’re getting replacements for the people we lost but General Hammond has scaled down missions for a while so you rest up as long as you like.’
‘I would like to get back to duty now but Doctor Fraser says she will not allow me sufficient painkillers to render that possible’ Teal’c replied.
‘Even if Teal’c might take a while to develop a dependency we’re not sure what the effects of heavy doses of morphine would have on the developing symbiote’ the doctor noted.
‘You think Junior might turn into a junkie?’ O’Neill turned to her and asked in surprise.
‘More to the point we don’t know what having the thing going cold turkey in there might have on Teal’c immune system’ she replied. ‘I probably shouldn’t have said that in front of one of the X-COM people earlier’ she continued with a frown, ‘I have this terrible notion that they’ve got some poor Jaffa prisoner in one of their Alien Containment cells high as a kite right now so they can cut him off and see what happens when he goes through withdrawal’ she said. ‘There’s more than a faint whiff of Doctor Frankenstein about their medical people’ she opined, or maybe Doctor Mengele she thought to herself with distaste.
‘They’re fitting that X-COM Sergeant Breytenbach with a claw to replace his hand’ O’Neill told Teal’c. ‘They offered a prosthetic that looked... well more like a hand but he wanted a claw because he thought it would be more useful’ he said. ‘They won’t quit and they’re so short of people they’re letting him stay’ he continued. ‘So if you ever need a beer he’s going to have a built-in bottle opener.’
‘The remnants of his left arm are in the refrigerator’ Doctor Fraser said. ‘He came back with it in a plastic bag and asked me to put it somewhere for safe keeping until he decided what he wanted to do with it’ she said, rolling her eyes. ‘Can you pass on a message I’ve still got his watch too’ she added.
‘Still working?’ O’Neill asked curiously.
‘Yes amazingly’ she replied.
‘Got to be a Timex’ the Colonel stated confidently. ‘Takes a plasma beaming, keeps on ticking’ he said. ‘So I’ve got to go to a briefing’ he announced. ‘See you later Teal’c.’
‘I will see you later O’Neill’ the Jaffa replied. ‘Could you bring something for me to read from my quarters when you return?’ he requested.
‘One of those Star Trek novels?’ O’Neill queried, it still made him grin that a man born on another planet with an alien larvae living in his guts was a sci-fi fan.
‘Yes thank you O’Neill’ Teal’c replied, ‘none of those written by Shatner’ he requested, ‘in hindsight purchasing them was a grievous mistake’ he said sadly.
With Teal’c laid up in the infirmary so she didn’t have to keep so close an eye on him Lyudmila Andianov found herself with more free time. She was currently putting it to gainful use by working out in the base gym and amusing herself by pretending to be unaware of the fact that three members of SG-8 had positioned themselves with good vantage points for when she did stretching exercises or treadmill work between sets of free-weights. It took much of her stoic self-discipline not to laugh at the inadvertent moan when she touched her toes the first time, she wasn’t what you might call stunning to look at, Major Carter was the prettier female on SG1, but she was athletic and limber and back in her Spetsnatz days Russian Special Forces members used to make appreciative noises when she exercised too.
This was of course why she wore such short shorts and why her old olive brown Russian Army training top was perhaps a little tighter than it needed to be, Andianov liked to play games with the men, it was cheap entertainment and in the unlikely event one ever stepped out of line she was more than capable of flattening him as she had once done to a drunken Captain from GRU Military Intelligence in Moscow who grabbed her ass after a session at the bar, he hadn’t even bought her a drink the cheap bastard.
The men the in gym who came from X-COM didn’t tend to look so much, they were generally far more focused on the task at hand of getting just a little bit faster, a smidgen stronger so they wouldn’t die or at least they’d take a few more aliens with them when the did. They often had an intensity about them which Andianov had realised made others uncomfortable in their presence, to be honest some of them even gave her the creeps, especially Ulbricht the expressionless German now attached to SG-12. The story was he had been the sole survivor on three separate UFO retrieval missions and had gone very strange as a result, he was only assigned to the SGC because even the X-COM psychiatrists who had no problem sending people with severe Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder back into battle thought he needed a break, it was the fact he seemed so unbothered by it all that worried them, he didn’t even get drunk and start fights like a normal X-COM grunt would.
To the disappointment of her audience Andianov finished her training session and decided to hit the firing range after taking a shower, as she headed out she ran into Captain Griff from SG-2 who greeted her with a smile. Griff had been one of the more friendly towards the X-COM personnel generally and her in particular ever since the mission to P3X-888, it was hard not to hold a favourable opinion of a person that risked their life to save yours even if she had been wearing armour unlike he had been at the time. ‘You are well Captain?’ she asked.
‘I’m peachy’ Griff replied. ‘Sorry I missed the fight in Poland, if we’d known we were needed SG-2 would have been there instead of scouting another pile of ruins somewhere in the ass-end of the galaxy’ he said.
‘Maybe you will get the opportunity to be killed next time’ Andianov replied with a wry smile.
‘Yeah this streak of bad luck I’m having has got to run out eventually’ Griff joked. ‘Do you know the X-Commer they’ve just assigned to us?’ he asked. ‘Lieutenant Collignon?’
‘Emile yes’ Andianov confirmed. ‘A good soldier but he will start yelling at you in French when the situation becomes hectic’ she told him. ‘I found swearing back in Russian made him realise what he was doing.’
Griff grinned. ‘I don’t speak any Russian’ he replied.
‘Practice this’ Andianov told him. ‘Zatknis' na hui’ she said.
‘Zatknis' na hui’ Griff repeated as best he could. ‘So what does that mean?’ he asked.
‘Shut the fuck up’ Andianov translated.
‘I’ll try it in English’ Captain Griff decided.
‘I can only guarantee the Russian version will work’ Andianov told him.
Area 51 – Earth – November 2000
With Teal’c still out of action and General Hammond opting to scale back off-world activity whilst the SGC recovered from its losses Major Samantha Carter found herself with more time available for her first love, physics. Shooting at Jaffa was exciting but there was a special joy to be had from taking apart a piece of alien machinery and figuring out how it worked which she thought only Daniel could really relate too as she saw the same light in his eyes when he translated the words on the outside of an artefact as she felt when she figured out how to turn it on.
The Colonel was a great deal smarter than most people figured, though why anybody thought a man that had reached the rank of Colonel in the USAF could be as wilfully ignorant as O’Neill sometimes deliberately made out to be was amusing in itself, Carter thought as she was guided through the complex by one of the base security staff, it was obvious Jack played dumb so people underestimated him just like she suspected Teal’c sometimes pretended to be more lost in social circumstances that he really was.
Carter was greeted at the laboratory door by a familiar face and smiled. ‘They’ve got you back at Area 51 then Radek?’ she asked the Czech physicist.
‘For my sins Samantha’ Zelenka replied. ‘I think McKay is a trial sent by God to test me’ he said before dismissing the security guard and showing her inside where it was nothing but him and piles of equipment.
‘He’s not here is he?’ Carter asked nervously, looking around like she would for concealed Goa’uld assassins.
‘Fortunately he has been sent to Russia for a few weeks to assist in the work being done there on the modified Elerium Engines we plan to put on the F-302X’ Zelenka replied.
‘Russia?’ Carter repeated. ‘I didn’t think X-COM had a base there?’ she queried.
‘It’s a Russian Federation installation not X-COM’ Zelenka replied, ‘the one at Yamantau some call the Russian Area 51’ he said. ‘It’s in the Ural mountains, or perhaps under one of them would be a more accurate description’ he told her. ‘X-COM does not like to keep all its eggs in one basket and Russia, along with France, Britain and China are all now trying to compete for more influence by offering money and resources’ he told her. ‘The British are starting a second manufacturing line for nuclear warheads for our Avalanche Air-to-Air missiles at their Aldermaston facility and the French are making the missiles themselves at their Aérospatiale-Matra plant.’
‘What are the Chinese offering?’ Carter asked.
‘Cannon fodder’ Zelenka told her with a sigh. ‘Unfortunately a fresh supply of what the military arm of X-COM calls “meat for the grinder” is extremely valuable to us’ he said. ‘Especially with our mounting losses due to the Muton’s’ he explained.
Carter nodded. ‘I can easily imagine Beijing being more willing than the West to throw bodies at a problem’ she opined. ‘So how goes the research in Plasma weaponry?’ she asked, half nodding towards the half-disassembled Sectoid Rifle on the nearest lab-bench.
Zelenka moved over to the device in question. ‘Although it works on the same basic principles and uses some commonality of design as the Plasma Pistol we have already back-engineered the rifle here is more complex’ he said, ‘and the more powerful Heavy Plasma Rifle even more so’ he said. ‘The first problem we faced was of course that the device is rigged to only work when used by the aliens that created it themselves or else we would have simply issued the ones we have captured already to the troops’ he said. ‘Removing the electronic devices concerned is taking longer than for the pistol, they have a greater degree of tamper-proofing’ he said.
‘So what happens if you just cut the wires?’ Carter asked.
‘The power-cell running the electronics overloads and melts the internal components’ Zelenka replied. ‘And before you ask no you can’t just pull the power-cell first, if you do that it explodes’ he said. ‘We lost a good man at the base in Japan doing that’ he said regretfully.
Major Carter pursed her lips. ‘So how long do you think it’ll take to figure it out?’ she asked.
‘We are making steady progress and have many scientists working on the project’ Zelenka replied, ‘small teams dealing with each component simultaneously as fortunately the Sectoids design according to modular principles as we do’ he said. ‘It should not be too many weeks until we can copy this weapon and issue them to our soldiers.’
‘How does it compare to our Laser Rifles?’ Carter asked.
‘It is around thirty to forty percent again as powerful’ Zelenka replied, ‘the larger version we have called the “Heavy” Plasma Rifle however is perhaps twice as powerful as our laser rifle in a weapon of equivalent mass’ he said.
Carter shrugged. ‘No need to sell me on the Heavy Plasma’ she said, ‘when something has shot at you with one you either die or want one of your own’ she said. Watching the things put craters in concrete walls had been a sobering experience. ‘So how’s the Elerium supply? She asked.
‘Not too bad’ Zelenka replied, ‘though we can only obtain it from captured alien vessels our use of your naquadah reactor for non-propulsive power generation on the Firestorms has reduced our usage to half what it would have been and during the “happy time” we built up a decent stockpile’ he said.
‘Happy time?’ Carter asked in confusion.
Zelenka smiled. ‘It is what we call the time between the introduction of the Laser Rifle and the appearance of the Muton’s in large numbers’ he said. ‘Our UFO retrieval teams were victorious in many engagements without losing an unacceptable number of soldiers in the process’ he explained. ‘The rotary-staff weapon equipped HWP’s and Zat'nik'tel weapons also helped enormously’ he added, ‘unfortunately the armour worn by the Mutons seems to offer perfect immunity from Zat fire and considerable resistance to Staff-Blasts’ he told her sadly.
‘We once met a bounty-hunter named Aris Boch that wore a type of armour that was Zat-proof’ Carter noted. ‘He looked human but must have been from a sub-species because the people of his race rejected the Goa’uld symbiote, they couldn’t be used as hosts.’
‘Useful trick’ Zelenka remarked.
‘Not so much’ Carter disagreed, ‘the Goa’uld wiped most of them out and addicted the others to a narcotic called roshnah to keep them subservient and not a threat’ she told him.
Zelenka rolled his eyes. ‘Such a nice species the Goa’uld’ he said, ‘I look forward to the day when we genocide their entire evil parasitic race’ he declared. ‘Them and Loki’s vicious minions’ he added then perked up. ‘Have you heard the results of the latest studies into the Sectoids?’ he asked.
‘No I’ve gotten behind in my reading’ Carter admitted, ‘I tend to prioritise physics so the biological stuff gets put at the bottom of the pile’ she admitted.
‘Me too’ Zelenka told her, ‘biochemistry and biology are so... what’s the word? “Icky” sometimes’ he said.
Carter laughed. ‘The three laws of science’ she said, ‘If it moves, it’s biology’ she began, ‘if it smells, it’s chemistry...’
‘And if it doesn’t work it’s physics’ Zelenka finished for her, grinning.
‘So what’s “moving” with the Sectoids then?’ Carter asked, smiling back.
Zelenka picked up a file from on top of a nearby stack and opened it to a summary sheet. ‘You are aware that only the higher-ranking Sectoid’s can use psionics’ he asked.
Carter grimaced, she still remembered the thing getting into her head. ‘Yes, and it’s good that they can’t all do it’ she stated vehemently.
‘We are now certain that it is because they have an extra gene in their DNA which the ordinary Sectoids lack’ Zelenka told her. ‘And it appears to have been spliced in from human gene-stock’ he continued, ‘or at least from the genetic code of a certain population of our species’ he said.
‘Human DNA?’ Carter queried.
‘Yes’ Zelenka confirmed, ‘in fact identifying the gene concerned has proven to be extremely useful in our own ongoing investigations into psionics in humans’ he told her. ‘There actually seems to be two separate genes at work, one seems linked to psionic skill, the ability to control or influence others whilst the other is linked to what X-COM is calling psionic strength, or your ability to resist others control’ he explained. ‘We did wonder why some people are seemingly almost immune to psionic attack whilst others were highly susceptible to it, the “strength” gene appears to be the reason’ Zelenka stated. ‘Every one of the people that we’ve tested who could easily shrug off sectoid mental influence had the gene, on the scale of resistance we’ve determined, from one to a hundred, people with this gene score in the nineties.’
‘Jack... I mean Colonel O’Neill resisted a telepathic attack much better than I did’ Carter noted. ‘I guess he’s got the gene’ she said thoughtfully before an idea occurred to her. ‘Thor told us that one of Loki’s goals was to make it possible for the Asgard to ascend, and that the presence of a gene carried by the ancients, who could ascend, was needed to work some of their technology’ she said. ‘Colonel O’Neill could interface with the Ancient technology on P3R-272 which downloaded data into his mind.’
Zelenka crossed his arms. ‘It might be worth screening him to see how he scores on our psionic scales for both strength and skill’ he said. ‘I’ll talk to our wetware people’ he added.
‘I’d like to be tested too if that’s okay’ Carter requested.
‘Eventually everyone will be so that should not be a problem’ Zelenka replied. ‘I will say however that there does not appear to be any link between either of the psionic genes and intelligence, comparisons of IQ and either mental strength or skill quotients have demonstrated no correlation’ he said.
Carter nodded then smiled again. ‘To be honest Radek it all sounds a little like voodoo’ she said with a chuckle.
‘I could not agree more’ Zelenka replied. ‘Some of the more... free-thinking members of the group even believe that telekinesis may eventually be possible with continued research’ he said with a chuckle.
‘I’ll believe that when I see it’ Carter replied, ‘under laboratory conditions and after peer-reviewed study’ she declared.
‘My sentiments exactly Samantha’ Zelenka agreed wholeheartedly.
X-COM BASE TWO (North America) – November 2000
Daniel looked through the glass screen, or rather the reinforced transparent polymer screen that separated him from the Goa’uld then held up his notes for her to read. ‘And you say that your ship was the standard light cargo and transport vessel before the Tel’Tak?’ he verified.
‘Yes, I assume that it was phased out of use because the Hyperdrive has stability problems’ Osiris replied. ‘How long will I remain in this confinement?’ the Goa’uld inhabiting the body of Daniels former girlfriend Sarah inquired.
‘Until we develop the technology to remove you safely from the host ourselves or get an ally to do so’ Daniel replied.
‘I would kill the host first’ Osiris replied, eyes flashing in anger.
‘If you did we’d feed you into a waste disposal unit an inch at a time’ Daniel stated coldly, ‘if you’re lucky’ he continued darkly. ‘If not some of the people down the corridor at Research and Development would vivisect you completely conscious and fully aware of what was going on as they fed you into the spinning blades just to monitor how much it hurt with the electrodes they’ll have stuck in your itsy bitsy brain.’
‘You’re bluffing’ Osiris replied with a sneer.
‘No, I was actually quoting one of them’ Daniel replied honestly, ‘they regard the Goa’uld around here like they do one of the things in the next cell but one called chrysallids’ he said. ‘That’s not too highly’ he explained redundantly. ‘You’re just another human-infesting alien parasite, they don’t care that you’re self-aware and capable of reason.’
‘And you care for my wellbeing I suppose?’ Osiris asked sarcastically.
‘Less than I care for Sarah’s, a lot less’ Daniel replied, ‘but I’m not hypocritical enough to think to put zero value on the life of a sentient, sapient alien lifeform but still think my species is special anyway’ he said. ‘By cooperating you’re helping yourself, you may be thousands of years out of the loop but Goa’uld society and technology has only moved glacially over that period so you’ve got information that still has value’ he said. ‘Many of the same System Lords still rule and I doubt their personalities or methods have shifted too much’ he said then smiled at how Jack might have put it. ‘If you want to save your own ass you’ll rat out your people.’
‘You would think I would betray my race to help preserve my own life?’ Osiris asked with another sneer.
‘Yes, every time, it’s a racial failing’ Daniel opined. ‘Only the Tok’ra have any notion of self-sacrifice for the collective whole, the rest of you are self-serving, egomaniacal, megalomaniacs who’ve spent so long pretending to be God’s some of you are crazy enough to start believing it.’
‘The Tok’ra?’ Osiris said with a snort of derision. ‘Deviants born from a genetically or mentally defective Queen who passed on her weakness to her offspring’ Osiris replied. ‘I would not have believed my kind could fall so far until you told me of them’ the Goa’uld stated. ‘I slept in that canopic jar too long, if myself and my Queen Isis had been in a position of power during the early stages of the Tok’ra treason we would have helped Ra crush them.’
‘The Goa’uld have been trying to crush the Tok’ra for two thousand years’ Daniel replied, ‘somehow I don’t see you doing much better’ he said.
‘When my fellow Goa’uld come, conquer this world and liberate me I will personally lead a crusade against the turncoats’ Osiris declared haughtily.
Daniel laughed. ‘Sorry but if the Goa’uld do come you’re shit out of luck anyway because this base is designed to pump nerve gas into the cells, then microwave them and finally we’re sitting on a thermonuclear self-destruct system’ he told Osiris. ‘You were unconscious thanks to a stun rod when they bought you here but there’s a sign on the door to the Alien Containment block, abandon hope all ye who enter here’ he said.
‘Dante’s Divine Comedy’ Osiris noted, Sarah Gardner the host had read the book so the Goa’uld was fully versed in the work.
‘We’re underground’ Daniel noted, ‘It’s the seventh level of hell for hostile aliens’ he said.
Osiris smirked. ‘As traitors the Tok’ra should be held even lower, on the ninth level’ the Goa’uld declared.
‘But they’re out there and you’re in here’ Daniel reminded Osiris, ‘that’s pretty funny really, an alien parasite pretending to be a God kept under lock and key by us self-professed mortals’ he said, ‘Now that’s divine comedy.’
‘When I escape you will see what I am capable of’ the Goa’uld thundered.
Daniel laughed at the bluster. ‘Good luck with that’ he said. ‘You’re living on borrowed time and at our sufferance’ he continued flatly. ‘I’ve seen some of the plans of this place you can’t get out’ he said tapping on the thick plastic that separated them, ‘and I hate to break it to you but if you’re thinking there’s anyone else that will help you you’re deluded’ he stated. ‘There’s no followers of yours left on this planet so if you’re expecting a band of lost Goa’uld worshippers to spring you from this facility think again, your name is nothing more than a ancient myth’ he told the creature infesting a woman he still cared about.
This time it was Daniel's turn to look smug. ‘Trust me’ he said, ‘the Cult of Osiris isn’t coming’ he announced confidently.