4.
He got up at 6am and had a quick run before breakfast, the kids were up and ready for school before he got back and Jane was having a well deserved lie in. He showered and ate his cereal, and then he woke her at 7:30 to get Lizzy to school. He stepped out his front door to get the car when he heard a horn. He turned and there was a huge family van at the end of his drive
"Carter, want a lift?" Dixon shouted at him.
"I'd rather take my car first day" Mark shouted back, after all if he took a lift he was relying on them to finish at the same time to get him home.
"You can't get on base with it, it has to be registered first" Dixon told him "Don't worry you can get a lift home any time you want from an SF, you won't be stuck there, General O'Neill's orders, and when he orders something… you can be sure it gets done!"
Mark shrugged and stepped down to the road, whoever the man was that Sam had married, he had Power! With a capital P.
As Mark had suspected, the other three men from the other side of the road were already in the car, the only person from the street missing was Daniel and they explained he had actually gone back to base after the welcome yesterday. Mark asked about the house at the end of the street as it seemed that the whole road had been bought out by the Airforce and was told that it was for 'the General' whom he assumed meant O'Neill, not George Hammond.
The men were having a laugh about the house, evidently it was supposed to have been built in a month, and here they were 6 months down the road with workmen STILL there! 'The General' was NOT pleased at all, there was talk about how long it would be before 'HE' took a hit out on the foreman, or whether 'HE' would see to it himself. Bosworth even opened a small notebook and offered odds on each probability! Mark just sat quiet and absorbed everything, he was lucky, he had a perfect memory, so any time he wanted he knew he could review the statements he was hearing, knowing they would make sense some day.
The main question for Mark was why would a man O'Neills age, with no family who had just got married to his 40 year old sister, want a house THAT big? Did they entertain that much? Jacob never had, but then, by the time Jacob made General he was a widower, maybe that was the difference.
Dixon noticed Mark quietly sitting there and changed the subject, turning the radio on to cover any low chatter going on in the back, and they made their way up to the base.
It was impressive, Mark had seen bits on the news over the years about the base, he had even seen a documentary about them building/excavating it, it was another thing to see the tunnel into the hillside and know that once past that HUGE steel and lead door you could be cut off from the world. Even the air was not pumped straight into the facility in case of attacks. Ahh the good old paranoid days of the cold war! Mark remembered the 70's and 80's and living on AF bases that would have been some of the first targets in a war, he was glad of the worldwide changes that had come about, at least his kids didn't have to worry about being bombed from on high, or being invaded!
Mark had to wait at the security desk on the ground floor, Dixon had got him into the car park, but not much further. A security detail was dispatched to his house to check his vehicles and register them for passes, and he was photographed, retina printed, finger printed, voice printed, palm printed, and DNA printed!! He said it was a wonder they didn't need a picture of his arse, at which point the SF told him to drop his trousers. Mark grinned at him and put a finger up in the air.
Next the huge man from the day before turned up to escort him to the infirmary, where he had to undergo a full physical. He protested about this, as he said, he was only a computer programmer, but he was told, by the SFs at the desk, that it was routine, if he did not have the physical he would not be allowed on base, everyone down to the cleaners and the catering staff had to have full physicals regularly! So he went down one lift, out of it around a corner past another security point, who scanned him again, and then down to the infirmary.
The doctor who greeted him was what Jane would have called 'an old dear' he was slightly hunch backed, had a shock of grey white hair that reminded Mark of Einstein. He had merry eyes that twinkled with good humour and made Mark feel well looked after, Mark also had to grin when he introduced himself… not every day he met a rock star he said, to Dr. Frankie Lyman! Mark stood being poked and prodded, he had more blood taken and a full medical history, even though he had had his doctors forward their patient notes to the CMO of the base. The man on a bed at the end of the small ward nodded his head in sympathy every time Mark complained, he had a nurse stitching his hand while he was trying to clean his glasses with the other, no easy trick, the doctor just kept on with his job ignoring the man and his actions!
The doctor enquired after his family and took notes on everything he answered, he even wanted to know which childhood diseases the kids had had! Mark was getting more and more irritated when he heard a strange noise, no one else in the room reacted at all, but Mark was sure…
The doctor dismissed him quickly after that and as Mark was walking out of the infirmary, the huge shadow still with him, he could have sworn he heard it again, a baby cry! A door opened at the far end of the infirmary and there it was yet again, definitely a baby! What the hell was a baby doing in a top secret military base? Again, no one else reacted to the noise!
Mark followed… Teal'c… as the doctor had called his guide, back to the lifts and down to the next to lowest level, 27.
They walked along the corridor and as they drew level with a door marked "KEEP OUT! Authorized personnel only" it opened and Jack stepped out, Mark looked behind him and all he saw was a small space, could have been a store cupboard in a past life, but there was no sign as to why it was so special, it was totally empty. Jack shook his hand and gestured further down the corridor, where Mark could see Dr. Jackson getting coffee when the door opened again and Sam stepped out. Now how the hell had they done THAT?
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Jack draped an arm around Sams shoulder and gestured again to the room at the end of the corridor, Mark went down to it. There was a large table in the middle of the room, and a huge picture window/wall that was covered in steel shutters, keeping whatever was on the other side away from his sight.
They sat at the table and Jack asked about the move, and about the kids, and about the computer programme. As soon as Mark started discussing the job he had been employed to do Jack seemed to lose focus, and Sam took over the meeting, she described the bits that were missing and told him that he would have full access by the end of the day, she had a lot to show him, and even more to tell him.
She started to tell him about the laws governing the secrecy of the facility, she then told him a tale of a dig in the early 20th centaury in Egypt that uncovered something, and she had just got up to her being assigned to work on it when suddenly something happened!
In the corner of the room was a red light, it started flashing and a huge siren went off
"UNAUTHORISED OFFWORLD ACTIVATION" said a voice over a PA system. Everyone in the room jumped and ran for the stairs in the corner, Jack shouting "Stay there!" to Mark and an SF who had been stood silently in the corner stepped forward when he went to follow them. He could hear voices from the room below if he concentrated, evidently 'Master Bra'tac' was coming… and then here, and after a 15 minute wait they all trouped back in with an older man with very bad skin and a strange leather skullcap on. When he came fully into the room his whole outfit was strange, most of it black leather, but he wore a long cloak too! And boots that looked, just, wrong, somehow. He also had a huge wooden stick that he held in his hand.
Jack looked at Mark as if he had forgotten that he was there, he then looked back at the man in the strange clothing.
"Ermm Carter" Jack said gesturing to him.
"Yes sir" his sister replied, "I'll take him down to the…" she flapped her hand a bit but he seemed to know what she meant
"Yeah… I'll be down soon" she gestured to Mark to leave the room and as he turned the old man held out a hand to Jack
"Human, I offer my congratulations" he said… WHAT THE HELL… HUMAN?
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