Miah and Cali Versus the Wraith Lover
In between blello jolly rogers on the SO's office walls, and gutted Disguise Generators, Miah and Cali deal with a Stargate: Atlantis Sue who creates an OC replacement, Not!Todd as the target of her affections. Also, introducing Castor, the winged mad scientist in cuddly kitten form.
Disclaimers: I do not own the PPC. It was created by Jay and Acacia--the original Assassins. The text below is a review in narrative form and also contains elements of parody/satire. Stargate: Atlantis was created by Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper, and Agent Eileen is borrowed with permission from Bronwyn. The fic that is being sporked is definitely not mine. It can be found here: The Little Things Give You Away by Todd's Pet.
Beta: Neshomeh (thank you!)
Previous appearance: Interlude 1: How Cali Met Miah
Miah and Cali Versus the Wraith Lover
Just as Miah opened her mouth to give Cali some ground rules on this cleaning business--
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
Cali's bowl clattered to the floor, "What is that?" he asked
"Never fails. Just as I sit down to eat." She had already pulled the papers from the printer to scan the page when she heard Cali's shrill question.
She looked over at him with one eyebrow raised. She had practiced the look after admiring the results Teal'C from Stargate SG-1 got with it.
Cali managed to appear as though Miah had offended his dignity even though he was dripping white sauce from the noodles and still had his hands over his ears.
She chose to ignore him, and read the paper. It was from the SO. "Agent Miah Arthur, expect your new partner sometime later today. Do not shoot him. He is not a Sue, even though he does have blue hair and thinks he is a super hero."
She crumpled up the paper and threw it across the room. "Thanks for the timely message!" she shouted at the ceiling. Cali finally removed his hands from his ears, and started to fidget with the mess of noodles. Just as Miah was contemplating going Upstairs to complain,
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
Cali slapped his hands over his ears again--his hands that were covered with white pasta sauce.
"Don't think I'm going to forget about this," Miah grumbled to the air around her.
"Really, what is that?" he asked. But Miah was not paying him any attention. Not even to give him that superior look over the high pitch of his voice when he was startled. She was reading the papers that had come from a slot on the shiny thing with a lot of buttons.
He uncovered his ears cautiously--just in time for Miah to throw the papers in the air-they fluttered down all over the room-and shout "Why? Why! They are life force sucking space vampires with bad teeth, slimy looking skin, and too much leather. Why would anyone fantasize about sex with the wraith! And why Todd? He is too cool to let a Sue do this to him." Miah was pacing in an erratic pattern across the small room, seeming not to notice that Cali was barely managing to avoid a collision as he tried to gather up the scattered papers. She continued on with her rant, but Cali tried to block it out in favor of reading the papers that Miah had flung.
Stargate: Atlantis. He'd never heard of that before. The papers simply said, "An un-named wraith has to get to grips with his growing feelings for his human slave while she learns that love is not always hearts and fowers and soaring passion. Todd"
He looked over at Miah, who was still muttering about biological improbabilities and people messing with her favorite bad guy while she shoved an improbable amount of stuff into a worn-looking backpack. "What's wrong with Wraith!love? And who is Todd?"
She stopped and stared at him with her mouth open. "Who? Who is Todd?" Just when he was about to wave his hand in front of her face, she finally continued. "You can not go on a mission looking like that. You have to have a uniform." She looked at him again. "And you have to wash your ears."
He wiped the sauce off his ears, and looked down at his clothes. His pants were still splattered with a generous amount of pasta sauce, but he didn't have any spares. "I'll- I'll, uh, go get my armor back on," he said lamely. What kind of self-respecting super hero faced a villain with pasta sauce all over his clothes?
"No, no, no. You have to wear the PPC uniform. Come on," she said dragging him to the door. "You need your flash patch." She proudly showed him a circular patch on her jacket sleeve that displayed a red pot with a saguaro style cactus in it.
"A cactus? What is that supposed to mean?" Cali asked.
"I don't know. It's just always been like that." Miah flung the door open and turned-right into a set of knuckles that had been poised to knock on the door. She grabbed her nose and glared at the girl standing in the hall. Cali stepped back, a little shocked by the girl's appearance. She had red hair, and wore a white lab coat over black clothes that were similar to Miah's. None of that was too surprising. The surprising thing was that she held a bundle of black clothes in her right hand, a squirming fluffy gray kitten in her left hand, and a third arm wrapped over her shoulder still poised to knock. She bounced nervously in place.
"I am so sorry! What are the odds of me trying to knock just when you were coming out the door. Oh! Long odds, of course this happened. Are you alright?"
"Eileen." Miah made a show of checking her nose for injuries, "To what do we owe this assault?"
"We? Who is 'we'?" Eileen said as she thrust the kitten into Miah's hands. Cali noticed then that it had wings. "Look what I made today! Isn't he sweet? This one is for you."
Miah held the kitten away from her warily, and waved her arm behind her until she grabbed Cali's shirt, then she dragged him forward to stand beside her. "Eileen, meet Cali Still, my new partner, courtesy of the Mystery Men continuum." She looked critically at the kitten. "What does this thing eat?"
The 'thing' nipped Miah's finger.
"Ow!" Miah yelped, almost dropping the kitten as she stuck her finger in her mouth. Cali managed to snatch it just in time.
"You're not a thing are you?" He crooned in a cutesy voice. "What a sweet little ball of fluff. What is your name, you handsome little guy." He broke off as he noticed that both of the female agents were staring at him. "What? He's just the cutest little kitten, I've ever seen." He didn't seem to notice that he had dropped back into cutesy talk before he finished.
The kitten rubbed its head on his chest, and purred loudly. It curled up with its wings folded tightly to its fluffy little body, and the tip of it's tail overlapping its nose. Just before it closed its eyes, it said, "Casssstorrrr."
Cali looked up. "He talks?"
"At least a little bit. I guess his name is Castor. Oh! There are two of you now, I bet you want another kitten, don't you Miah? You'll have to come to the lab for another one, and I'll get some papers for Cali to sign. I've never tested anyone from the Mystery Men continuum before..." her voice trailed off as she apparently plotted the 'testing' she had planned for Cali.
"Oh, look at the time," Miah said loudly. "We were just on our way to get him a uniform. We have a mission waiting, but he doesn't have anything yet." Miah tried to drag Cali past Eileen.
"Oh no, here." She handed Cali the bundle of clothes he had noticed earlier. "Apparently these little guys have a bent toward mad science, and-did you notice the opposable thumbs?" Miah shook her head, and Cali held out a finger with a small furry paw wrapped all the way around it. "Yes, well, apparently, some of Castor's sisters got bored, and..." she trailed off.
"What? How did bored kittens result in you having Cali's uniform?" Miah asked.
"Weeeell, they sort of added Bleepsinthe to all of the day's liquid fertilizer. I don't know how they managed it, really. Only a couple of plants used it before they figured it out, and got fresh supplies, but I have to split my babies up. You have to keep him out of trouble."
Miah looked over at the purring ball of fluff snuggled into Cali's chest. She tried not to smile as she pictured the effect of Bleepsinthe on Flowers. "Still how did that result in you having his uniform?" Miah then said to Cali, "You need to go put those clothes on, we still have a Mission waiting for us."
"I've been all afternoon, convincing them that this won't happen again, and that the Daisy would eventually stop thinking he was a pirate and the head of the PPC. You knew it somehow got into the SO's office and locked the SO out for over an hour, right? I think the blello finger paint it used to put jolly rogers all over the walls will wash off...eventually. Anyway, when the Marquis woke up-it really doesn't handle even faux liquor well at all-it said since I was there, I should take the uniform with me, as it did not want to see another Agent in the near future."
"Wow. When we get back you have got to tell me more. Your kittens, did all that? Seriously?"
Eileen nodded solemnly.
"Cool! Come here kitty!" Miah retrieved a sealed box from the fridge and pulled out a smelly sardine. "You little furballs totally deserve a treat."
"They like pumpkin guts and Sue glitter best. And you are supposed to be keeping him out of trouble, not encouraging him!" Eileen suddenly became interested in looking around the remarkably clean room.
Before Miah could answer, Cali stepped out of his room wearing the black uniform, but he still had his spray-painted-green body armor and shin guards on over it. "I miss my green shirt and gloves," he said morosely. Castor immediately went to rub on his leg.
"What happened to The Lair?" Eileen asked. "It doesn't look anything at all like it did last time I was here."
"He happened," Miah said pointing at her partner who seemed to be entirely occupied by the odd little kitten again.
Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Beeeeep!
"Keep your capacitors on, we're about to get going! We have to go, Eileen. Thanks so much for the mad scientist in kitten form. See you soon." Miah said as she ushered the other Agent out the door, and closed it.
"Okay, Cali. Ready for your first Mission? What killing weapon do you prefer?"
"K-k-killing? We don't lock them up or something?"
"Nope. Thou shalt not suffer a Sue to live, or something like that. If we don't kill them, they will continue to influence and warp their target world. How about you man the charge list this time around, and we'll see what kind of killing you can do before our next Mission." Miah shoved a notebook and pen into his hands, and started fiddling with the knobs and dials on the console. She scanned the words on the print out, which Cali had helpfully re-stacked in order on the table, and sighed. "Well, it looks like we are going to have to spend the whole time under the bed that the Sue has added to canon. Too bad, there won't be a need for disguises."
She pushed a final button and a shimmering pool of light appeared in the room. She got down on the floor and pushing her backpack in front of her, she crawled through the light. Cali wasn't sure what to expect, but he followed her example.
*O*O*O*O*
When he sets his hand down on the other side of the light he finds that the ground is moist and squishy. He can barely make out Miah ahead of him, because of a mist that rises from the floor. Luckily it is still daytime, and his powers allow him to see even though there is very little light. He crawls forward and tries to sit up, but bangs his head on something hard. Miah pushes him to the floor, and shushes him.
"This story is present tense, so brace yourself," she warns Cali. Miah scans the words to see if the tense changes later. It doesn't. She finds it really annoying to have to complete an entire Mission in present.
Before he can question if that is why all his actions feel strange the sound of soft rock booms around them, loud enough to rattle Cali's teeth. Don't wanna reach for me, do? I mean nothing to you. The little things give you away. It stops as suddenly as it starts. He notices that even Miah has covered her ears over this one. They are still under the very large, hard, and heavy something. He rubs the back of his head where he had made sure it had those characteristics.
The setting around them starts flickering between green pastures, idyllic beaches, and the misty, dark space. He closes his eyes, and curls up clutching his stomach.
Miah has been through some pretty bad time distortions before, so she handles this one better than her partner. Since they don't have much of anywhere else to avoid being seen by the Sue, she hopes he will be able to control himself. She rolls onto her back, and uses the bottom side of the bed to read the words, as nothing has seemed to actually happen yet. Ah, that makes more sense, she thought. The Suethor is telling-not showing, in present tense, making 'now' the month before 'now', and apparently the month after 'now' all at the same time. Canon can't decide which 'now' is the right one and keeps flickering between them.
"Cali you still have the charge sheet, right?" He uncurls just enough to hold up the slightly crumpled, small notebook and the pen. "You need to start writing down charges, kid." He starts to straighten out enough to write, but then drops the notebook and scrambles away a bit before throwing up. Canon helpfully holds onto a scene of multiple villages being destroyed by the Wraith, all overlapping one another, like a double exposure picture from a film camera until he is finished. Finally a scene break stops the flickering.
Miah peeks out at the scene around the bed, and sees everything moving in super speed. The Sue is zipping along so fast she is blurred, with flashes of the Wraith blinking in and out here and there. Cali groans from his side of the bed, and manages to look even greener. Miah decides that maybe this is just his armor reflecting on his skin through the mist, though. Finally, the setting has settled into one location, and time settles into a normal pace. Cali seems to relax a bit, and Miah hands the notepad back to him.
One night her curiosity gets the better of her and she takes her courage in her hands and asks him, "Why am I here?"
"What is she getting all philosophical, now?" Cali asks. His voice is a little hoarse from the vomiting. Miah hands him a bottle of water from her backpack.
"I think she is just being annoying. Listen, we're missing some of the annoying dialogue."
"You want me to abuse you?" he asks her harshly.
"No!"
"So long as you do your chores efficiently further 'worshipping' is of no concern to me." He gives her a pointed look, before turning towards the door. As he leaves he adds, "Be grateful for that."
"Okay, she is going to go off and angst some about how she feels sorry for herself that he is ignoring her instead of beating her. Start writing charges. We missed a few while you were checking to see if my pasta tastes the same coming up as it does going down.
He tries to sit up to start writing, and bangs the front of his head. "Ow!"
The Sue pauses in her angtsing to look around the room. Miah clamps her hand over Cali's mouth to keep him from making any more noise. The Sue shrugs and goes back to her angst fest.
Cali takes the mature route and gives Miah's hand a slobbery lick. She wipes her hand on his cheek and then punches him in the shoulder. She opens her backpack, pulls out wipies, and hands one to Cali before washing her own hand. "No more slobbering. I hate slobbering. Now start writing charges. You can start with gratuitous use of present tense, creating scene and time distortions, and making a PPC Agent sick. Also, indicating that the Wraith would let a culled human loose in any part of their ship as a worshipper without first addicting them to the feeding enzyme. Hey, did you notice if she was slimy when she came in?"
Cali pauses in his scribbling to shake his head. Miah shrugs, "Well it did say that she was told to get herself cleaned up, maybe she did have the cocoon slime on her." Miah scans the words again and spots that Dawn now lives on a wraith hive ship, "endlessly drifting through the depths of space, empty and dark."
"Add charges of not capitalizing Wraith or Hive-multiple times, and making it seem like the Hive is abandoned and defunct in uncharted space." Cali scribbles faster trying to keep up.
"Didn't it say that Todd was in this story?" She asks. He nods. "Have you seen him yet?"
He finishes noting the other charges before saying, "I don't know who Todd is, so how should I know?"
"Oh yeah. Well, let's see, this Wraith is described as 'the strong, silent type even by wraith standards.' and as being 'devoid of all passions.' Neither of those describe Todd at all. He tells jokes, laughs, displays anger and hatred, and generally talks more to the other canons than any other Wraith ever did on the show."
"Maybe he will come into the story later?"
"Maybe, we'll wait and see."
Cali feels the gut wrenching lurch that accompanies the poorly marked scene changes, and then hears the Wraith and Sue talking somewhere near their hiding place.
"She's bored? And she is telling her owner that she's bored? This Wraith is extremely patient." He looks over at Miah, "Is that normal?"
"I'd say yes and no. Yes the Wraith, Todd in particular, are very patient. They basically live forever, I guess that teaches them patience. Todd is at least more than 10,000 years old, because he was personally involved in the war with the Ancients. So yes, they are very patient, but they generally take very little guff from their food."
"Th-their food?" Cali gulps.
"Yep, humans in the Pegasus Galaxy are farmed as cattle by the Wraith. The Wraith have a feeding slit on their right hand, which they put over your heart like so," Miah demonstrates by thumping him hard on the chest, "and then they drain the life out of you. Only thing left is a mummified corpse."
Cali rubs his chest. "You enjoy being violent don't you?"
Miah grins at him. "It took you this long to notice?"
They both jump at the heavy thump coming from somewhere across the room. Miah crawls to the edge of the bed and peeks out. A table has appeared, brought in by new description. The Sue and the Wraith-both still completely physically generic by lack of description-are sharing some heart warming discussion over helping the Sue not be bored by reading. Miah gags when it ended with the promise of lessons in reading Wraith.
The gagging almost ends as throwing up as they lurch over yet another poorly marked scene divider. The Sue and Wraith are talking nearby, but the Agents can't see them. Miah risks wriggling out from under the bed and creeping through the mist to find them. She is just in time to see:
He's dragging a brush with an elaborately tooled handle through his hair and it snags on a partial braid.
He makes an exasperated sound and flicks the offending braid over his shoulder.
Dawn bites her thumb between her teeth, wondering if she should dare to suggest… "I could do your hair for you…" she blurts out before she changes her mind. "That is, if you would like…"
He shrugs, but then wordlessly hands her the brush.
She is about to march in the room to beat the Sue to death with the hairbrush, when Cali grabs her from behind, and drags her into a small room.
"Don't you need your weapons before you attack? What if he tries to eat you?"
"But-but-she's doing his hair! In braids! Todd does not wear his hair in a braid. None of the Wraith do. What is this, some kind of teenage slumber party?"
"I should write that down as a charge, then?"
Miah glares at him. "Yes. And while you're at it, add in charges for all this furniture. Even the Commander of the ship's private chambers only included a viewing console and work station in the canon. I don't think Wraith even sleep, outside of the hibernation chambers. They have never shown a Wraith sleep in canon, even when held for long periods as a POW by the other canons."
"They just stand around all the time?" Cali looks incredulous.
"Well, if they are weak or malnourished, like Todd was in Common Ground, then they have been shown to lie around conserving energy, but even then, he never seemed to sleep. Shouldn't we be having another scene break soon? These things only seem to be lasting two or three paragraphs each." Miah went back to scanning the words. "Oh, this hair brushing business seems to go on for months. Let's portal ahead."
"Hey, show me how to work that thing." Cali says grabbing for the Remote Activator.
"Not in the middle of a Mission," Miah says snatching it back.
Cali makes another grab for it. Miah jerks it away again, and accidentally activates it. They fall through the portal, and land with a thump back in the same closet. The air is dry and extremely cold. The mist is gone from the floor, and the organic surfaces have been replaced by unforgiving generic surface.
Miah shoves Cali away from her, and hastily scans the words to find out where they are, and why the Hive ship environment has changed so much.
She's shivering almost uncontrollably when he gets back, huddled in her corner, wrapped up in the fur from her bedding.
"So she has bedding in the corner. I'm getting this image of the Wraith having to muck out the corner, like a stall in a barn," Cali says, giggling.
"You are getting way too much enjoyment out of this," Miah finally says.
They peek out of the closet and watch the Wraith give Dawn the Sue some dates, and tuck her into the bedding corner.
After the lurch of the scene divider, Miah says, "That was a charge. They made it pretty clear on the show that the food in the Pegasus Galaxy was not native Earth food. There should be no dates. Did you write down the charges for the change in the environment? When we came in, the canon had defaulted to normal. Now the Sue has added description and created this mess."
Another scene break jolts them before Cali can even finish noting the charges.
When she returns from her chores at the end of the day, he is already back and sitting at his work station. On the big table in the corner there is a large and beautifully crafted glass bottle.
He sees it catch her attention and says simply, "It is for you."
Dawn picks it up, noting the delicate lilac colour of the viscous contents and opens the stopper. Immediately she smells lavender and sandalwood.
"Uh, doesn't the word 'viscous' mean something is thick, sticky, and doesn't flow?" Cali asks, looking confused.
"Yep. Watch this," she says pointing to what was happening in the room. The Sue was rubbing oil all over herself while in her underwear. Cali was a little too mesmerized by this process, Miah thought. He was still doing better than the poor Wraith, though. The guy was standing there transfixed and having stomach flutters. When the Sue artfully couldn't manage to reach her back, the Wraith took over, and rubbed her down with the oil. The Sue seemed to enjoy it immensely.
"See, now we can charge for oil being a thick, sticky, non-flowing substance, that still spreads easily and resolves dry skin. For rapidly changing points of view, for a Wraith having school-girl worthy stomach flutters, and for having him rubbing oil on her with both of his hands."
"Yeah, I'd be too worried that the life force sucking alien is thinking, 'Marinade, yum!' to be relaxing with that feeding hand rubbing oil all over me."
"Exactly! Also, did you notice how she never worries about how he obtained this gift? His group here had to have gone down and culled another human world for him to have gotten this. Most humans in Pegasus hate and fear the Wraith to a level that I can't even describe, and she is just all happy that the Wraith was thinking of her while he was out killing more humans."
"Ok, charged for lack of concern for fellow humans is noted. How many more charges to we have to have?"
"The end is coming up. The final charges are in the next to last scene. Let's see, I think we can skip the next several scenes, in fact. Only minor charges. That bottle of viscous oil turns out to be Sueical. She has the poor Wraith rubbing her down with it every night, yet it never gets empty. Oh then we get some stalkery watching her sleep bits, and, yes. Right there seems like a good place to stop." Miah fiddles with the Remote Activator and they step through the portal this time instead of falling through it.
Dawn huddles in her corner, trying to keep the fur up to her chin, so as not to let the cold seep into her bones through any tiny little gap. Why is it always so cold at night in the hive?
Miah shivers from the intense cold the Sue is calling up.
Damn it to hell, she thinks! She leaps up from her corner on the floor and dives into the bed, burrowing into the deep-piled furs.
Curled up into a ball in the middle of the enormous sleeping area, it takes a while for the warmth to creep back into her body. When it does it brings with it a slightly musky odour, not unpleasant. In fact the longer Dawn lies there, the more pleasant the scent becomes and she eventually catches herself rolling in it, breathing it into herself in great lungfuls.
"Charge! Charge! The humans in Pegasus do not have Earth religious concepts. They worship the Ancients. The closest they have ever mentioned to a concept of hell and damnation is to be culled by the Wraith and die by being fed upon," Miah shouts
Cali shushes Miah, as the Sue stops rolling in the scent in the 'enormous' bed and looks around the room suspiciously.
Another scene lurch, and suddenly the naked Sue is leaping out of the bed, because the Wraith has joined her. Miah pushes Cali further back into the closet as he is rendered inarticulate by the sight of naked Sue. "Charge for Not!Todd here having tattoos on both sides of his face, and all the way down his sides. Let me check, but I am just about certain we have a full replacement character here."
She pulls the CAD out as they lurch over yet another scene break-it is getting to the point of only being a couple hundred words per scene. She points the CAD at them and it responds: OC, female, human, Wraith lover!Mary Sue; OC, male, Wraith?
"Why did it have a question mark beside Wraith?"
"I think Not!Todd's descriptions have been so far from the normal behaviors of a Wraith that he almost doesn't count as one anymore. It didn't list him as a Gary Stu. You know, he actually seems like a pretty nice guy. Maybe we could take him home with us instead of killing him?"
"Wouldn't he try to eat us?" Cali says before pushing back to the front to look out the door. "What just happened? Everything just faded out."
"Uh, oh yeah, I'd say that one of the world's most ambiguous sex scenes just happened. Get ready for the scene change." After the stomach dropping lurch, Miah says, "Thank goodness. Last one, it'll be a few hours before they are both due back in the room. Hey, without the Sue here to mess things up, the temperature is back to normal. Let's get a little rest, and shoot her when she comes back." Miah immediately snuggles into a corner and falls asleep.
Cali stands there, amazed that Miah could fall asleep so quickly, but finally he manages to settle into a somewhat comfortable pose, and falls asleep, too.
He is jolted awake, by Miah saying, "Now seems like a good time to kill her, don't you think?"
He groggily gets to his feet as Miah pulls out her tranquilizer pistol and steps into the room, where the Sue is rubbing a large conch shell. The Sue looks up in surprise, but doesn't dodge before Miah shoots her. "You can come out of the closet now, kid." Miah said, then snickered.
*O*O*O*O*
"Hey, I'm not-what?" Cali walked over to the motionless Sue. "Just like that? You already killed her? Why did I write down all these charges?" Cali complained. "Hey, did you see that? We're back in past tense. That feels way more comfortable. But how?"
"We're in control of the Sue now, so canon is helping us out. Just like it did to keep her from finding us all this time. And of course, she isn't dead yet. Tranquilizer darts remember?" Miah pulled plastic zip ties and duct tape out of her backpack, and restrained the Sue. "Now we just have to find Todd, and talk to Not!Todd before we can kill her."
Miah walked over and snatched the never emptying bottle of 'viscous' oil, and carefully placed it in a pocket of her backpack. When she saw Cali watching, she says, "Hey, you never know when something like this will come in handy. Besides, if we bring back something for Eileen to start testing, maybe she will forget about wanting to run tests on you. Don't sign any papers she pushes in your direction, by the way," Miah said as she stuffed the conch shell into another pocket of the backpack.
"Yeah, that stuff does sound handy then." He made a pile of blankets and furs next to Miah's backpack. He had found that Miah didn't have many spares when he was cleaning The Lair. "I found this strange glowy thing over here under the human stall," he called over his shoulder.
"Good job!" Miah said, thumping him on the back. "That's a massive plot hole. I bet if we clear the rest of this out that we'll find the real Todd in there."
Cali started to finish clearing the area, when Miah shouted, "Not yet! We need to be ready for him, and for a quick exit, because he is going to be pretty curious about how we got here on his ship, don't you think? And he is not the nice guy that Not!Todd is."
"Who are you, and what have you done to Dawn?" Miah heard Not!Todd snarl from behind her.
"We are Agents from the Protectors of the Plot Continuum. We are here to rescue the Stargate: Atlantis continuum from this Mary Sue," Miah turned slowly as she was talking. She didn't think he had noticed, or at least that he hadn't noticed the significance, of her dart gun, yet. She kept it ready, just in case he attacked. "See, this creature, has been warping the whole world-including you-to suit her needs, which apparently include being in love with a Wraith."
He took a step back and sat heavily on the bed. Confusion clouded his features. "Yes, you can sense how wrong this is, can't you? You've never had all this stuff in your quarters before, and you've never wanted to have sex with your food before, right?"
"N-no. Now that you have pointed it out, this does all seem strange. And I-I-last night--" Miah didn't know that a Wraith could turn that shade of green.
"Listen, you know that you won't fit in with the others in this state. You could come with us; work for the Protectors of the Plot Continuum--instead of being an outcast." He looked lost, unsure. It was an odd expression for a Wraith. "Listen, we have to take care of a couple more things, then we can go somewhere you can think about it, okay." She patted his arm, reassuringly, but he seemed to be too deeply in shock to notice. Miah supposed that being forced into what amounted to bestiality could do that to a person, even a Wraith.
Dawn the Wraith lover!Sue was starting to come around.
Miah prodded the Sue with her foot, and earned a glare. Cali started reading off the charges.
"Dawn you are charged with creating scene and time distortions and making a PPC Agent sick, indicating that the Wraith would let a culled human loose in any part of their ship as a worshipper without first addicting them to the feeding enzyme, with making a Wraith unsure and nervous, and not having his fellow Wraith murder him for it. For not capitalizing Wraith or Hive-multiple times, and making it seem like the Hive is abandoned and defunct in uncharted space, complaining about being bored while a slave, having a Wraith have snuggly teaching-you-to-read-Wraith scenes, adding uncanonical furniture, food, and religious beliefs, for creating a never-emptying bottle of 'viscous' oil--you do know that means it is thick and sticky, right? You've made an oxymoron in a bottle there. For not worrying about any of the humans who are getting culled, including the ones from your own planet, for rolling in a scent-what are you a dog?"
He paused for breath, and Miah cut in, "But most of all for replacing a really cool villain with an Original Character. Todd is the single most recognizable Wraith in canon. He has a single star shaped tattoo around his eye, not random tattoos all over his face. As for up and down his body, I guess that is possible. He has an amazing, deep voice, tells jokes, and gets passionate. He is also one of the most ambitious villains ever. Your replacement twu wuv here, works night shifts, and stays in the same place and rank for months. The real Todd managed to manipulate his way into being in charge of a whole fleet of Hive ships within a year and a half of being dropped off on a planet, half-starved, with nothing but the clothes on his back! Also, I am charging you for being comfortable snuggling against a back that has a large ridge of bony things sticking out from the spine, for forcing a creature to have sex with its food, and finally, for being a Mary Sue. For these charges against fanfiction in general and Stargate: Atlantis in particular, you are going to die."
Miah grinned evilly. "And now for your sentencing. Since you wanted to meet Todd so badly, here he is. He might be more than a little hungry after being trapped for months in this plot hole you created, though." Miah dragged the Sue over to the corner.
The Sue was squirming and struggling against her restraints. Miah keyed in the coordinates of their RC and opened the portal. She helped Cali shove all their things through, and then pulled out her nueralyser. She nodded to Cali who finished uncovering the shimmering plot hole.
Todd burst into the room, in full Wraith rage mode. Taking in that he was on a Hive ship with no weapons pointed at him, he advanced on the Sue. "You are responsible for my imprisonment," he growled. With one last threat assessment of the room, he slammed his feeding hand into her chest and drained the life out of her. Miah was waiting for him, with her sunglasses on when he finished. Flash!
Todd stood, glassy eyed, not noticing that the Hive ship was rapidly returning to its normal state. Miah waved Cali toward the portal. He grabbed the barely responsive Not!Todd and shoved him through the portal.
"You have not been imprisoned and starved for months by an oddly sparkly creature. You have enough ambition to try to take over two galaxies, and you should go check on your ship now."
Todd nodded absently, and went out the door. Miah helped Cali finish shoving the Sue body through into the RC.
"What do we do with it now?" Cali asked pointing at the Sue corpse.
"Well, I'd say we could feed bits of it to Castor, but it's all out of glitter. I guess we could throw it down a garbage chute. Do you want the scalp? I've never been a scalp collector myself, but sometimes you can trade the scalps for other products." Miah opened a pocket of her backpack and without even looking inside pulled out a knife, which she held out to Cali.
"Uh, no thanks. I don't think I want to keep them either."
"Where is your kitten, Cali?"
"Why?"
Miah pointed toward the door of Cali's room, where wires and electronics parts could be seen trailing along the floor. The odd flash lit the room. She looked back at the console and saw that the disguise generator had been gutted. "At least he didn't mess with the RA circuits. I'm going to let you explain this to DoSAT, while I take Not!Todd here to ficpysch." She grabbed her backpack with one hand and the still dazed Wraith by the arm with the other hand, and ran out the door.
Next appearance: Mission 2: Of Glitter and Men
Disclaimers: I do not own the PPC. It was created by Jay and Acacia--the original Assassins. The text below is a review in narrative form and also contains elements of parody/satire. Stargate: Atlantis was created by Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper, and Agent Eileen is borrowed with permission from Bronwyn. The fic that is being sporked is definitely not mine. It can be found here: The Little Things Give You Away by Todd's Pet.
Beta: Neshomeh (thank you!)
Previous appearance: Interlude 1: How Cali Met Miah
Miah and Cali Versus the Wraith Lover
Just as Miah opened her mouth to give Cali some ground rules on this cleaning business--
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
Cali's bowl clattered to the floor, "What is that?" he asked
"Never fails. Just as I sit down to eat." She had already pulled the papers from the printer to scan the page when she heard Cali's shrill question.
She looked over at him with one eyebrow raised. She had practiced the look after admiring the results Teal'C from Stargate SG-1 got with it.
Cali managed to appear as though Miah had offended his dignity even though he was dripping white sauce from the noodles and still had his hands over his ears.
She chose to ignore him, and read the paper. It was from the SO. "Agent Miah Arthur, expect your new partner sometime later today. Do not shoot him. He is not a Sue, even though he does have blue hair and thinks he is a super hero."
She crumpled up the paper and threw it across the room. "Thanks for the timely message!" she shouted at the ceiling. Cali finally removed his hands from his ears, and started to fidget with the mess of noodles. Just as Miah was contemplating going Upstairs to complain,
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
Cali slapped his hands over his ears again--his hands that were covered with white pasta sauce.
"Don't think I'm going to forget about this," Miah grumbled to the air around her.
"Really, what is that?" he asked. But Miah was not paying him any attention. Not even to give him that superior look over the high pitch of his voice when he was startled. She was reading the papers that had come from a slot on the shiny thing with a lot of buttons.
He uncovered his ears cautiously--just in time for Miah to throw the papers in the air-they fluttered down all over the room-and shout "Why? Why! They are life force sucking space vampires with bad teeth, slimy looking skin, and too much leather. Why would anyone fantasize about sex with the wraith! And why Todd? He is too cool to let a Sue do this to him." Miah was pacing in an erratic pattern across the small room, seeming not to notice that Cali was barely managing to avoid a collision as he tried to gather up the scattered papers. She continued on with her rant, but Cali tried to block it out in favor of reading the papers that Miah had flung.
Stargate: Atlantis. He'd never heard of that before. The papers simply said, "An un-named wraith has to get to grips with his growing feelings for his human slave while she learns that love is not always hearts and fowers and soaring passion. Todd"
He looked over at Miah, who was still muttering about biological improbabilities and people messing with her favorite bad guy while she shoved an improbable amount of stuff into a worn-looking backpack. "What's wrong with Wraith!love? And who is Todd?"
She stopped and stared at him with her mouth open. "Who? Who is Todd?" Just when he was about to wave his hand in front of her face, she finally continued. "You can not go on a mission looking like that. You have to have a uniform." She looked at him again. "And you have to wash your ears."
He wiped the sauce off his ears, and looked down at his clothes. His pants were still splattered with a generous amount of pasta sauce, but he didn't have any spares. "I'll- I'll, uh, go get my armor back on," he said lamely. What kind of self-respecting super hero faced a villain with pasta sauce all over his clothes?
"No, no, no. You have to wear the PPC uniform. Come on," she said dragging him to the door. "You need your flash patch." She proudly showed him a circular patch on her jacket sleeve that displayed a red pot with a saguaro style cactus in it.
"A cactus? What is that supposed to mean?" Cali asked.
"I don't know. It's just always been like that." Miah flung the door open and turned-right into a set of knuckles that had been poised to knock on the door. She grabbed her nose and glared at the girl standing in the hall. Cali stepped back, a little shocked by the girl's appearance. She had red hair, and wore a white lab coat over black clothes that were similar to Miah's. None of that was too surprising. The surprising thing was that she held a bundle of black clothes in her right hand, a squirming fluffy gray kitten in her left hand, and a third arm wrapped over her shoulder still poised to knock. She bounced nervously in place.
"I am so sorry! What are the odds of me trying to knock just when you were coming out the door. Oh! Long odds, of course this happened. Are you alright?"
"Eileen." Miah made a show of checking her nose for injuries, "To what do we owe this assault?"
"We? Who is 'we'?" Eileen said as she thrust the kitten into Miah's hands. Cali noticed then that it had wings. "Look what I made today! Isn't he sweet? This one is for you."
Miah held the kitten away from her warily, and waved her arm behind her until she grabbed Cali's shirt, then she dragged him forward to stand beside her. "Eileen, meet Cali Still, my new partner, courtesy of the Mystery Men continuum." She looked critically at the kitten. "What does this thing eat?"
The 'thing' nipped Miah's finger.
"Ow!" Miah yelped, almost dropping the kitten as she stuck her finger in her mouth. Cali managed to snatch it just in time.
"You're not a thing are you?" He crooned in a cutesy voice. "What a sweet little ball of fluff. What is your name, you handsome little guy." He broke off as he noticed that both of the female agents were staring at him. "What? He's just the cutest little kitten, I've ever seen." He didn't seem to notice that he had dropped back into cutesy talk before he finished.
The kitten rubbed its head on his chest, and purred loudly. It curled up with its wings folded tightly to its fluffy little body, and the tip of it's tail overlapping its nose. Just before it closed its eyes, it said, "Casssstorrrr."
Cali looked up. "He talks?"
"At least a little bit. I guess his name is Castor. Oh! There are two of you now, I bet you want another kitten, don't you Miah? You'll have to come to the lab for another one, and I'll get some papers for Cali to sign. I've never tested anyone from the Mystery Men continuum before..." her voice trailed off as she apparently plotted the 'testing' she had planned for Cali.
"Oh, look at the time," Miah said loudly. "We were just on our way to get him a uniform. We have a mission waiting, but he doesn't have anything yet." Miah tried to drag Cali past Eileen.
"Oh no, here." She handed Cali the bundle of clothes he had noticed earlier. "Apparently these little guys have a bent toward mad science, and-did you notice the opposable thumbs?" Miah shook her head, and Cali held out a finger with a small furry paw wrapped all the way around it. "Yes, well, apparently, some of Castor's sisters got bored, and..." she trailed off.
"What? How did bored kittens result in you having Cali's uniform?" Miah asked.
"Weeeell, they sort of added Bleepsinthe to all of the day's liquid fertilizer. I don't know how they managed it, really. Only a couple of plants used it before they figured it out, and got fresh supplies, but I have to split my babies up. You have to keep him out of trouble."
Miah looked over at the purring ball of fluff snuggled into Cali's chest. She tried not to smile as she pictured the effect of Bleepsinthe on Flowers. "Still how did that result in you having his uniform?" Miah then said to Cali, "You need to go put those clothes on, we still have a Mission waiting for us."
"I've been all afternoon, convincing them that this won't happen again, and that the Daisy would eventually stop thinking he was a pirate and the head of the PPC. You knew it somehow got into the SO's office and locked the SO out for over an hour, right? I think the blello finger paint it used to put jolly rogers all over the walls will wash off...eventually. Anyway, when the Marquis woke up-it really doesn't handle even faux liquor well at all-it said since I was there, I should take the uniform with me, as it did not want to see another Agent in the near future."
"Wow. When we get back you have got to tell me more. Your kittens, did all that? Seriously?"
Eileen nodded solemnly.
"Cool! Come here kitty!" Miah retrieved a sealed box from the fridge and pulled out a smelly sardine. "You little furballs totally deserve a treat."
"They like pumpkin guts and Sue glitter best. And you are supposed to be keeping him out of trouble, not encouraging him!" Eileen suddenly became interested in looking around the remarkably clean room.
Before Miah could answer, Cali stepped out of his room wearing the black uniform, but he still had his spray-painted-green body armor and shin guards on over it. "I miss my green shirt and gloves," he said morosely. Castor immediately went to rub on his leg.
"What happened to The Lair?" Eileen asked. "It doesn't look anything at all like it did last time I was here."
"He happened," Miah said pointing at her partner who seemed to be entirely occupied by the odd little kitten again.
Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Beeeeep. Beeeeep!
"Keep your capacitors on, we're about to get going! We have to go, Eileen. Thanks so much for the mad scientist in kitten form. See you soon." Miah said as she ushered the other Agent out the door, and closed it.
"Okay, Cali. Ready for your first Mission? What killing weapon do you prefer?"
"K-k-killing? We don't lock them up or something?"
"Nope. Thou shalt not suffer a Sue to live, or something like that. If we don't kill them, they will continue to influence and warp their target world. How about you man the charge list this time around, and we'll see what kind of killing you can do before our next Mission." Miah shoved a notebook and pen into his hands, and started fiddling with the knobs and dials on the console. She scanned the words on the print out, which Cali had helpfully re-stacked in order on the table, and sighed. "Well, it looks like we are going to have to spend the whole time under the bed that the Sue has added to canon. Too bad, there won't be a need for disguises."
She pushed a final button and a shimmering pool of light appeared in the room. She got down on the floor and pushing her backpack in front of her, she crawled through the light. Cali wasn't sure what to expect, but he followed her example.
*O*O*O*O*
When he sets his hand down on the other side of the light he finds that the ground is moist and squishy. He can barely make out Miah ahead of him, because of a mist that rises from the floor. Luckily it is still daytime, and his powers allow him to see even though there is very little light. He crawls forward and tries to sit up, but bangs his head on something hard. Miah pushes him to the floor, and shushes him.
"This story is present tense, so brace yourself," she warns Cali. Miah scans the words to see if the tense changes later. It doesn't. She finds it really annoying to have to complete an entire Mission in present.
Before he can question if that is why all his actions feel strange the sound of soft rock booms around them, loud enough to rattle Cali's teeth. Don't wanna reach for me, do? I mean nothing to you. The little things give you away. It stops as suddenly as it starts. He notices that even Miah has covered her ears over this one. They are still under the very large, hard, and heavy something. He rubs the back of his head where he had made sure it had those characteristics.
The setting around them starts flickering between green pastures, idyllic beaches, and the misty, dark space. He closes his eyes, and curls up clutching his stomach.
Miah has been through some pretty bad time distortions before, so she handles this one better than her partner. Since they don't have much of anywhere else to avoid being seen by the Sue, she hopes he will be able to control himself. She rolls onto her back, and uses the bottom side of the bed to read the words, as nothing has seemed to actually happen yet. Ah, that makes more sense, she thought. The Suethor is telling-not showing, in present tense, making 'now' the month before 'now', and apparently the month after 'now' all at the same time. Canon can't decide which 'now' is the right one and keeps flickering between them.
"Cali you still have the charge sheet, right?" He uncurls just enough to hold up the slightly crumpled, small notebook and the pen. "You need to start writing down charges, kid." He starts to straighten out enough to write, but then drops the notebook and scrambles away a bit before throwing up. Canon helpfully holds onto a scene of multiple villages being destroyed by the Wraith, all overlapping one another, like a double exposure picture from a film camera until he is finished. Finally a scene break stops the flickering.
Miah peeks out at the scene around the bed, and sees everything moving in super speed. The Sue is zipping along so fast she is blurred, with flashes of the Wraith blinking in and out here and there. Cali groans from his side of the bed, and manages to look even greener. Miah decides that maybe this is just his armor reflecting on his skin through the mist, though. Finally, the setting has settled into one location, and time settles into a normal pace. Cali seems to relax a bit, and Miah hands the notepad back to him.
One night her curiosity gets the better of her and she takes her courage in her hands and asks him, "Why am I here?"
"What is she getting all philosophical, now?" Cali asks. His voice is a little hoarse from the vomiting. Miah hands him a bottle of water from her backpack.
"I think she is just being annoying. Listen, we're missing some of the annoying dialogue."
"You want me to abuse you?" he asks her harshly.
"No!"
"So long as you do your chores efficiently further 'worshipping' is of no concern to me." He gives her a pointed look, before turning towards the door. As he leaves he adds, "Be grateful for that."
"Okay, she is going to go off and angst some about how she feels sorry for herself that he is ignoring her instead of beating her. Start writing charges. We missed a few while you were checking to see if my pasta tastes the same coming up as it does going down.
He tries to sit up to start writing, and bangs the front of his head. "Ow!"
The Sue pauses in her angtsing to look around the room. Miah clamps her hand over Cali's mouth to keep him from making any more noise. The Sue shrugs and goes back to her angst fest.
Cali takes the mature route and gives Miah's hand a slobbery lick. She wipes her hand on his cheek and then punches him in the shoulder. She opens her backpack, pulls out wipies, and hands one to Cali before washing her own hand. "No more slobbering. I hate slobbering. Now start writing charges. You can start with gratuitous use of present tense, creating scene and time distortions, and making a PPC Agent sick. Also, indicating that the Wraith would let a culled human loose in any part of their ship as a worshipper without first addicting them to the feeding enzyme. Hey, did you notice if she was slimy when she came in?"
Cali pauses in his scribbling to shake his head. Miah shrugs, "Well it did say that she was told to get herself cleaned up, maybe she did have the cocoon slime on her." Miah scans the words again and spots that Dawn now lives on a wraith hive ship, "endlessly drifting through the depths of space, empty and dark."
"Add charges of not capitalizing Wraith or Hive-multiple times, and making it seem like the Hive is abandoned and defunct in uncharted space." Cali scribbles faster trying to keep up.
"Didn't it say that Todd was in this story?" She asks. He nods. "Have you seen him yet?"
He finishes noting the other charges before saying, "I don't know who Todd is, so how should I know?"
"Oh yeah. Well, let's see, this Wraith is described as 'the strong, silent type even by wraith standards.' and as being 'devoid of all passions.' Neither of those describe Todd at all. He tells jokes, laughs, displays anger and hatred, and generally talks more to the other canons than any other Wraith ever did on the show."
"Maybe he will come into the story later?"
"Maybe, we'll wait and see."
Cali feels the gut wrenching lurch that accompanies the poorly marked scene changes, and then hears the Wraith and Sue talking somewhere near their hiding place.
"She's bored? And she is telling her owner that she's bored? This Wraith is extremely patient." He looks over at Miah, "Is that normal?"
"I'd say yes and no. Yes the Wraith, Todd in particular, are very patient. They basically live forever, I guess that teaches them patience. Todd is at least more than 10,000 years old, because he was personally involved in the war with the Ancients. So yes, they are very patient, but they generally take very little guff from their food."
"Th-their food?" Cali gulps.
"Yep, humans in the Pegasus Galaxy are farmed as cattle by the Wraith. The Wraith have a feeding slit on their right hand, which they put over your heart like so," Miah demonstrates by thumping him hard on the chest, "and then they drain the life out of you. Only thing left is a mummified corpse."
Cali rubs his chest. "You enjoy being violent don't you?"
Miah grins at him. "It took you this long to notice?"
They both jump at the heavy thump coming from somewhere across the room. Miah crawls to the edge of the bed and peeks out. A table has appeared, brought in by new description. The Sue and the Wraith-both still completely physically generic by lack of description-are sharing some heart warming discussion over helping the Sue not be bored by reading. Miah gags when it ended with the promise of lessons in reading Wraith.
The gagging almost ends as throwing up as they lurch over yet another poorly marked scene divider. The Sue and Wraith are talking nearby, but the Agents can't see them. Miah risks wriggling out from under the bed and creeping through the mist to find them. She is just in time to see:
He's dragging a brush with an elaborately tooled handle through his hair and it snags on a partial braid.
He makes an exasperated sound and flicks the offending braid over his shoulder.
Dawn bites her thumb between her teeth, wondering if she should dare to suggest… "I could do your hair for you…" she blurts out before she changes her mind. "That is, if you would like…"
He shrugs, but then wordlessly hands her the brush.
She is about to march in the room to beat the Sue to death with the hairbrush, when Cali grabs her from behind, and drags her into a small room.
"Don't you need your weapons before you attack? What if he tries to eat you?"
"But-but-she's doing his hair! In braids! Todd does not wear his hair in a braid. None of the Wraith do. What is this, some kind of teenage slumber party?"
"I should write that down as a charge, then?"
Miah glares at him. "Yes. And while you're at it, add in charges for all this furniture. Even the Commander of the ship's private chambers only included a viewing console and work station in the canon. I don't think Wraith even sleep, outside of the hibernation chambers. They have never shown a Wraith sleep in canon, even when held for long periods as a POW by the other canons."
"They just stand around all the time?" Cali looks incredulous.
"Well, if they are weak or malnourished, like Todd was in Common Ground, then they have been shown to lie around conserving energy, but even then, he never seemed to sleep. Shouldn't we be having another scene break soon? These things only seem to be lasting two or three paragraphs each." Miah went back to scanning the words. "Oh, this hair brushing business seems to go on for months. Let's portal ahead."
"Hey, show me how to work that thing." Cali says grabbing for the Remote Activator.
"Not in the middle of a Mission," Miah says snatching it back.
Cali makes another grab for it. Miah jerks it away again, and accidentally activates it. They fall through the portal, and land with a thump back in the same closet. The air is dry and extremely cold. The mist is gone from the floor, and the organic surfaces have been replaced by unforgiving generic surface.
Miah shoves Cali away from her, and hastily scans the words to find out where they are, and why the Hive ship environment has changed so much.
She's shivering almost uncontrollably when he gets back, huddled in her corner, wrapped up in the fur from her bedding.
"So she has bedding in the corner. I'm getting this image of the Wraith having to muck out the corner, like a stall in a barn," Cali says, giggling.
"You are getting way too much enjoyment out of this," Miah finally says.
They peek out of the closet and watch the Wraith give Dawn the Sue some dates, and tuck her into the bedding corner.
After the lurch of the scene divider, Miah says, "That was a charge. They made it pretty clear on the show that the food in the Pegasus Galaxy was not native Earth food. There should be no dates. Did you write down the charges for the change in the environment? When we came in, the canon had defaulted to normal. Now the Sue has added description and created this mess."
Another scene break jolts them before Cali can even finish noting the charges.
When she returns from her chores at the end of the day, he is already back and sitting at his work station. On the big table in the corner there is a large and beautifully crafted glass bottle.
He sees it catch her attention and says simply, "It is for you."
Dawn picks it up, noting the delicate lilac colour of the viscous contents and opens the stopper. Immediately she smells lavender and sandalwood.
"Uh, doesn't the word 'viscous' mean something is thick, sticky, and doesn't flow?" Cali asks, looking confused.
"Yep. Watch this," she says pointing to what was happening in the room. The Sue was rubbing oil all over herself while in her underwear. Cali was a little too mesmerized by this process, Miah thought. He was still doing better than the poor Wraith, though. The guy was standing there transfixed and having stomach flutters. When the Sue artfully couldn't manage to reach her back, the Wraith took over, and rubbed her down with the oil. The Sue seemed to enjoy it immensely.
"See, now we can charge for oil being a thick, sticky, non-flowing substance, that still spreads easily and resolves dry skin. For rapidly changing points of view, for a Wraith having school-girl worthy stomach flutters, and for having him rubbing oil on her with both of his hands."
"Yeah, I'd be too worried that the life force sucking alien is thinking, 'Marinade, yum!' to be relaxing with that feeding hand rubbing oil all over me."
"Exactly! Also, did you notice how she never worries about how he obtained this gift? His group here had to have gone down and culled another human world for him to have gotten this. Most humans in Pegasus hate and fear the Wraith to a level that I can't even describe, and she is just all happy that the Wraith was thinking of her while he was out killing more humans."
"Ok, charged for lack of concern for fellow humans is noted. How many more charges to we have to have?"
"The end is coming up. The final charges are in the next to last scene. Let's see, I think we can skip the next several scenes, in fact. Only minor charges. That bottle of viscous oil turns out to be Sueical. She has the poor Wraith rubbing her down with it every night, yet it never gets empty. Oh then we get some stalkery watching her sleep bits, and, yes. Right there seems like a good place to stop." Miah fiddles with the Remote Activator and they step through the portal this time instead of falling through it.
Dawn huddles in her corner, trying to keep the fur up to her chin, so as not to let the cold seep into her bones through any tiny little gap. Why is it always so cold at night in the hive?
Miah shivers from the intense cold the Sue is calling up.
Damn it to hell, she thinks! She leaps up from her corner on the floor and dives into the bed, burrowing into the deep-piled furs.
Curled up into a ball in the middle of the enormous sleeping area, it takes a while for the warmth to creep back into her body. When it does it brings with it a slightly musky odour, not unpleasant. In fact the longer Dawn lies there, the more pleasant the scent becomes and she eventually catches herself rolling in it, breathing it into herself in great lungfuls.
"Charge! Charge! The humans in Pegasus do not have Earth religious concepts. They worship the Ancients. The closest they have ever mentioned to a concept of hell and damnation is to be culled by the Wraith and die by being fed upon," Miah shouts
Cali shushes Miah, as the Sue stops rolling in the scent in the 'enormous' bed and looks around the room suspiciously.
Another scene lurch, and suddenly the naked Sue is leaping out of the bed, because the Wraith has joined her. Miah pushes Cali further back into the closet as he is rendered inarticulate by the sight of naked Sue. "Charge for Not!Todd here having tattoos on both sides of his face, and all the way down his sides. Let me check, but I am just about certain we have a full replacement character here."
She pulls the CAD out as they lurch over yet another scene break-it is getting to the point of only being a couple hundred words per scene. She points the CAD at them and it responds: OC, female, human, Wraith lover!Mary Sue; OC, male, Wraith?
"Why did it have a question mark beside Wraith?"
"I think Not!Todd's descriptions have been so far from the normal behaviors of a Wraith that he almost doesn't count as one anymore. It didn't list him as a Gary Stu. You know, he actually seems like a pretty nice guy. Maybe we could take him home with us instead of killing him?"
"Wouldn't he try to eat us?" Cali says before pushing back to the front to look out the door. "What just happened? Everything just faded out."
"Uh, oh yeah, I'd say that one of the world's most ambiguous sex scenes just happened. Get ready for the scene change." After the stomach dropping lurch, Miah says, "Thank goodness. Last one, it'll be a few hours before they are both due back in the room. Hey, without the Sue here to mess things up, the temperature is back to normal. Let's get a little rest, and shoot her when she comes back." Miah immediately snuggles into a corner and falls asleep.
Cali stands there, amazed that Miah could fall asleep so quickly, but finally he manages to settle into a somewhat comfortable pose, and falls asleep, too.
He is jolted awake, by Miah saying, "Now seems like a good time to kill her, don't you think?"
He groggily gets to his feet as Miah pulls out her tranquilizer pistol and steps into the room, where the Sue is rubbing a large conch shell. The Sue looks up in surprise, but doesn't dodge before Miah shoots her. "You can come out of the closet now, kid." Miah said, then snickered.
*O*O*O*O*
"Hey, I'm not-what?" Cali walked over to the motionless Sue. "Just like that? You already killed her? Why did I write down all these charges?" Cali complained. "Hey, did you see that? We're back in past tense. That feels way more comfortable. But how?"
"We're in control of the Sue now, so canon is helping us out. Just like it did to keep her from finding us all this time. And of course, she isn't dead yet. Tranquilizer darts remember?" Miah pulled plastic zip ties and duct tape out of her backpack, and restrained the Sue. "Now we just have to find Todd, and talk to Not!Todd before we can kill her."
Miah walked over and snatched the never emptying bottle of 'viscous' oil, and carefully placed it in a pocket of her backpack. When she saw Cali watching, she says, "Hey, you never know when something like this will come in handy. Besides, if we bring back something for Eileen to start testing, maybe she will forget about wanting to run tests on you. Don't sign any papers she pushes in your direction, by the way," Miah said as she stuffed the conch shell into another pocket of the backpack.
"Yeah, that stuff does sound handy then." He made a pile of blankets and furs next to Miah's backpack. He had found that Miah didn't have many spares when he was cleaning The Lair. "I found this strange glowy thing over here under the human stall," he called over his shoulder.
"Good job!" Miah said, thumping him on the back. "That's a massive plot hole. I bet if we clear the rest of this out that we'll find the real Todd in there."
Cali started to finish clearing the area, when Miah shouted, "Not yet! We need to be ready for him, and for a quick exit, because he is going to be pretty curious about how we got here on his ship, don't you think? And he is not the nice guy that Not!Todd is."
"Who are you, and what have you done to Dawn?" Miah heard Not!Todd snarl from behind her.
"We are Agents from the Protectors of the Plot Continuum. We are here to rescue the Stargate: Atlantis continuum from this Mary Sue," Miah turned slowly as she was talking. She didn't think he had noticed, or at least that he hadn't noticed the significance, of her dart gun, yet. She kept it ready, just in case he attacked. "See, this creature, has been warping the whole world-including you-to suit her needs, which apparently include being in love with a Wraith."
He took a step back and sat heavily on the bed. Confusion clouded his features. "Yes, you can sense how wrong this is, can't you? You've never had all this stuff in your quarters before, and you've never wanted to have sex with your food before, right?"
"N-no. Now that you have pointed it out, this does all seem strange. And I-I-last night--" Miah didn't know that a Wraith could turn that shade of green.
"Listen, you know that you won't fit in with the others in this state. You could come with us; work for the Protectors of the Plot Continuum--instead of being an outcast." He looked lost, unsure. It was an odd expression for a Wraith. "Listen, we have to take care of a couple more things, then we can go somewhere you can think about it, okay." She patted his arm, reassuringly, but he seemed to be too deeply in shock to notice. Miah supposed that being forced into what amounted to bestiality could do that to a person, even a Wraith.
Dawn the Wraith lover!Sue was starting to come around.
Miah prodded the Sue with her foot, and earned a glare. Cali started reading off the charges.
"Dawn you are charged with creating scene and time distortions and making a PPC Agent sick, indicating that the Wraith would let a culled human loose in any part of their ship as a worshipper without first addicting them to the feeding enzyme, with making a Wraith unsure and nervous, and not having his fellow Wraith murder him for it. For not capitalizing Wraith or Hive-multiple times, and making it seem like the Hive is abandoned and defunct in uncharted space, complaining about being bored while a slave, having a Wraith have snuggly teaching-you-to-read-Wraith scenes, adding uncanonical furniture, food, and religious beliefs, for creating a never-emptying bottle of 'viscous' oil--you do know that means it is thick and sticky, right? You've made an oxymoron in a bottle there. For not worrying about any of the humans who are getting culled, including the ones from your own planet, for rolling in a scent-what are you a dog?"
He paused for breath, and Miah cut in, "But most of all for replacing a really cool villain with an Original Character. Todd is the single most recognizable Wraith in canon. He has a single star shaped tattoo around his eye, not random tattoos all over his face. As for up and down his body, I guess that is possible. He has an amazing, deep voice, tells jokes, and gets passionate. He is also one of the most ambitious villains ever. Your replacement twu wuv here, works night shifts, and stays in the same place and rank for months. The real Todd managed to manipulate his way into being in charge of a whole fleet of Hive ships within a year and a half of being dropped off on a planet, half-starved, with nothing but the clothes on his back! Also, I am charging you for being comfortable snuggling against a back that has a large ridge of bony things sticking out from the spine, for forcing a creature to have sex with its food, and finally, for being a Mary Sue. For these charges against fanfiction in general and Stargate: Atlantis in particular, you are going to die."
Miah grinned evilly. "And now for your sentencing. Since you wanted to meet Todd so badly, here he is. He might be more than a little hungry after being trapped for months in this plot hole you created, though." Miah dragged the Sue over to the corner.
The Sue was squirming and struggling against her restraints. Miah keyed in the coordinates of their RC and opened the portal. She helped Cali shove all their things through, and then pulled out her nueralyser. She nodded to Cali who finished uncovering the shimmering plot hole.
Todd burst into the room, in full Wraith rage mode. Taking in that he was on a Hive ship with no weapons pointed at him, he advanced on the Sue. "You are responsible for my imprisonment," he growled. With one last threat assessment of the room, he slammed his feeding hand into her chest and drained the life out of her. Miah was waiting for him, with her sunglasses on when he finished. Flash!
Todd stood, glassy eyed, not noticing that the Hive ship was rapidly returning to its normal state. Miah waved Cali toward the portal. He grabbed the barely responsive Not!Todd and shoved him through the portal.
"You have not been imprisoned and starved for months by an oddly sparkly creature. You have enough ambition to try to take over two galaxies, and you should go check on your ship now."
Todd nodded absently, and went out the door. Miah helped Cali finish shoving the Sue body through into the RC.
"What do we do with it now?" Cali asked pointing at the Sue corpse.
"Well, I'd say we could feed bits of it to Castor, but it's all out of glitter. I guess we could throw it down a garbage chute. Do you want the scalp? I've never been a scalp collector myself, but sometimes you can trade the scalps for other products." Miah opened a pocket of her backpack and without even looking inside pulled out a knife, which she held out to Cali.
"Uh, no thanks. I don't think I want to keep them either."
"Where is your kitten, Cali?"
"Why?"
Miah pointed toward the door of Cali's room, where wires and electronics parts could be seen trailing along the floor. The odd flash lit the room. She looked back at the console and saw that the disguise generator had been gutted. "At least he didn't mess with the RA circuits. I'm going to let you explain this to DoSAT, while I take Not!Todd here to ficpysch." She grabbed her backpack with one hand and the still dazed Wraith by the arm with the other hand, and ran out the door.
Next appearance: Mission 2: Of Glitter and Men