They Come in Peace (FIrst Contact Challenge) by Elvinborn
Title: They Come in Peace
Author: Elvinborn
Rating: PG
Spoilers: None
thanks to Zeonn for ideas, encouragement, and general sounding board duties. None of this is her fault.
John wished McKay would just shut up. Five minutes of blissful silence. That was all he was asking for. Even worse was the fact that McKay was probably right. The only thing they had found on this planet had been ruins, and those barely more than a pile of grass-covered rocks. There hadn’t even been any evidence of writings anywhere, and there were always writings in ruins. That was kinda the point, John thought.
The sudden lack of McKay’s jabber brought John back to reality. It appeared they had stopped moving. “What is it?”
“Movement, sir,” Ford whispered, looking into the woods over the sight of his P90, “over that way.”
“Alright, what say we take a look?”
“You have got to be joking, Major. There was nothing on the life signs detector to show people in the area, and anything else would simply be a waste of time.”
“What if it’s something we could eat?”
“Good idea, Ford. Let’s all run off into the woods hunting for God knows what to see if we can eat it, when we all know that odds are it will eat us first.”
“We’ve got time,” John said, breaking off McKay’s tirade. “Let’s see what it is. If it’s mean, we shoot it.”
“Major?” Teyla’s voice was quiet, and her entire body was tensed. John followed her line of sight and found what he supposed was their quarry.
“What the hell is that?”
“Well, Rodney, I think it’s a...” John sized the creature up, “...spacechicken.”
The three-lobed head peering at them from behind a rock looked like a three-leaf clover, only each leaf had an eye on it that was looking at them. John was sure the shining eyes were spinning at him. Each leaf-lobe had a sort of radar looking thing in the middle of it. One blue, one red, one green. They were moving from side to side like fans. John could only guess that the creature was using them for listening.
“That is interesting,” McKay said, tilting his head and walking vaguely toward the creature.
“I do not think that is wise.”
“Teyla’s right, McKay, where are you going?” Ford yelled. He looked nervously over to John for directions.
John was still watching the spacechicken. McKay’s movement hadn’t phased the creature much. It seemed to have made the thing more curious. It chirped sweetly at them, and then the lobed head was being followed out of hiding by a long, goose-like neck and a large barrel body. It stood on thick short trunks that ended in overlarge webbed duck feet, and had insignificant wings that wouldn’t possibly allow the thing to take flight. The most interesting thing about it was its coloring. It was a weird brownish black covered in what John could only call iridescent chickenpox. To top it all off, there was a plume of a tail on what John assumed was its butt that looked like it came off of a glittery my-little-pony.
“Major?”
John realized that he was staring, and he had no idea how long he had been doing so. Long enough, it appeared, for a handful of the almost-birds to gather at the rock. He looked around to see if McKay had captured one of the things, and found the man sitting on the ground dazedly staring at the creatures. Ford had dropped his gun and was making odd grunting noises as he sat opposite McKay. Teyla was standing to the side, looking bemused and somewhat concerned at all three men. “What?” John asked with a shrug.
“The three of you have been staring at these creatures for some time, Major Sheppard. I have been trying to gain your attention.”
“That doesn’t sound good,” he said tilting his head and squinting at the creatures and the other two members of his team. One of the chickens looked directly at him, and its middle eye began to spin slowly. The thing made a grunting sound much like the strange noises Ford was still making, and its other two eyes began to spin in opposite directions. John felt himself being pulled toward the creature. Was it saying something to them? The grunts and urps made John think of the classic movie-alien phrase we come in peace. Somehow, he thought that ought to make him nervous, as the phrase almost always meant trust us, we’re going to kill you all, or something equally as sinister. A little spacechicken could hardly take over the world.
“Major Sheppard!”
John couldn’t figure out why Elizabeth sounded so annoyed. What had he done wrong this time? Why was she yelling at him? She might scare away the chickens. “What?” he snapped, turning to fire an irritated look at her. Then he wandered why she was here. And when had she had time to get here?
“Please turn away from those things, Major. You behave most strangely when you look at them. As do they,” Teyla said looking toward McKay and Ford. Both men had moved closer to each other, and to the creatures. If John looked at them from the corner of his eye, he could take in the scene. Ford squatted next to the rock and made the same grunting sounds as the creatures. Meanwhile, McKay was doing a fabulous funky chicken dance on his knees while making odd little urping and wooping sounds. Several of the spacechickens seemed to find his display entertaining. Twelve of the things had gathered around him with their eyes spinning up at him and the little radar-ear-things fanned eagerly.
“John,” Elizabeth said quietly, as though she was talking a jumper off of a roof. “Why don’t we go over there,” she said, gesturing in the direction of the stargate, “and discuss what, exactly is going on here?”
“But, McKay? And Ford...”
“Teyla will stay here to watch them. I think it best that you come away while you can still respond to us.” With a nod and a glance toward his fallen comrades, John followed Dr. Weir over the rise in the path.
They walked longer than John thought was exclusively necessary before Elizabeth finally stopped. “Okay, Major, now that you are out of earshot of the ... creatures, I want you to tell me what you remember.”
Not much John thought, but he knew Weir wouldn’t accept that. “I was looking at that spacechicken ...” Elizabeth smirked. What was she smirking at? “... and then you were there. Why are you here? We’re not due back for at least another hour.”
“John, you should have been back in Atlantis roughly five hours ago.” That was not what he had expected to hear. “Teyla radioed for help because she couldn’t get any of you to respond to her. Beckett came through first, but he was no help when he started strutting about flapping his arms. It was shear luck that he brought a female nurse with him, or we would never have discovered that the effect only seems to work on men.” That would explain Teyla and Elizabeth, but not the lack of Carson on the scene with Ford and McKay.
“How is it that Beckett isn’t still here, and I’m talking to you instead of displaying for the chickens?”
“We don’t really know why you were able to snap out of it. We think it’s because you didn’t get as close as the others. Carson went straight toward Ford because he was the most affected, and the closest. Teyla knocked Carson out when he made a run for the harem McKay seems to have collected. She and the nurse had to carry him back to the gate. Our last radio communication confirmed that he is fine except for a broken rib and a large bump on the back of his head.”
“She broke his rib?” Sheppard was incredulous.
“Carson broke his rib when he attempted to fly and landed on a tree root.” The smirk had now become a full-fledged smile that was threatening to release the laughter that John saw sparking in her eyes. That wouldn’t do.
“So what do we do about McKay and Ford?” John asked, hoping to bring her back to the present problem. “Can we knock them out?”
“To use force, you have to catch them, and that has proven difficult. They behave like wild animals. Very stupid wild animals. Ford bites when we corner him, and he runs so fast that we don’t feel safe trying to tranquilize him.”
“The kid can run, can’t he.” John mused. “How do you catch a wild animal?”
The question was rhetorical, but Elizabeth answered anyway. “Traps? Food? Whips and lasso?”
“Can we run the spacechickens off?”
“We haven’t had any luck in getting them to move. So far they haven’t responded to anything but you men, and they seem to be gathering rather than scattering. This would all be easier if we knew what it was they wanted.”
“They come in peace,” John muttered.
“What?”
“Um... nothing. So we try to get Ford and McKay to come to us with food. Right?”
“Okay. Then how do we get them away from the creatures?”
“Don’t worry about it. I have a plan.”
“Oh. Right. Why is it that I don’t find that reassuring?”
~*~
Teyla, Elizabeth, and three of the female soldiers from Atlantis stood in a semicircle around men and creatures. The congregation of glittering, urping spacechickens had grown exponentially so that there were easily a hundred of them holding court around Rodney. Ford had about forty of his own, and kept looking jealously toward the scientist. Standing on the hillside above the scene, John thought that McKay’s dominance had more to do with his costuming than because the creatures liked him better. The man had festooned his hair with grasses and small flowers. His shirt was gone, and leaved twigs of various lengths were tucked into his waistband like plumage. John wondered where he had found the mud that he had used to paint markings on his chest and face - like grey and brown chickenpox. Ford’s only decoration was a bit of the mud markings on his face. The kid just wasn’t as devoted, John thought, then wondered why the idea sounded so peevish. He checked his earplugs and hoped Elizabeth had been right about the sound being the source of the creatures’ appeal, and the explanation for his resistance was his unreported ear infection.
John sighed. There was no way this was going to end well. “Hear, chicky, chicken,” he called meekly. He knew it wouldn’t be enough to just call at them, but he could still hope. “Oh, chickens!” he half sang at them. Nothing. There was nothing for it. It wasn’t like he had any dignity left in this scenario anyway. He had gone back to Atlantis a good Air Force Major and left the city with each nail of his hand glittering with different colors of polish, somebody’s bright red hair die making his head look like Ronald McDonald had caught on fire, and a pink boa from who knew where. John would have thought that the women of the city were out to humiliate him if it hadn’t been Zelenka who produced the body paint. He was sure he didn’t want to know.
Elizabeth and Teyla were looking at him with twin smiles of expectancy. The marines had the good sense to look anywhere but at John. Best to just jump in head first and see what happened, John told himself sternly. John dropped the towel, and stood on the hillside in just his skivvies. One of the nurses had been so kind as to use Zelenka’s paint to cover him in gate symbols and swirls. Actually, John thought, that had been rather nice. It had been the audience of sniggering scientists that had been hard to take. John took in a deep, steadying breath, and set their plan into action with a loud whooping rooster crow.
That got their attention, John thought as nearly two hundred urping heads turned in his direction, ears flapping furiosly. Oh, crap. What now? He had to act fast to keep their attention, so he closed his eyes and launched into his best impression of a peacock mating dance. He whopped and flapped his elbows, and threw in a resounding burp as imitation of the chickens’ grunting sounds. After a few moments of this, he opened his eyes long enough to see if it was working, but closed them before he could see the women laughing at him. The spacechickens were all coming toward him. John started to strut, elbows pumping and head bobbing; the pied piper of alien poultry. He hoped they would follow him and perhaps kill him so that he wouldn’t have to face the aftermath of this display. One word from anybody, and he was going to shoot them all. He remembered to open his eyes before he strutted off a cliff and landed under a pileup of horny spacechickens.
The sweet blessed light of a wonderful flare lit the darkening sky. The ploy had worked, and they could go home. John looked back at the strange following he had gathered and tried to decide how to get rid of them. The flare should have been fired from the gate when the others reached it. Evidence suggested that the creatures weren’t particularly fast. Even though they seemed to appear out of air, they moved with an awkward-looking lumber. Hoping Teyla had the gate open, John sprinted for home.
They moved faster than he had thought possible, but John was able to outrun them the short distance to the stargate. Elizabeth stood next to the great ring and failed to smother a smile as she held out the towel. He snatched the piece of cloth from her hand and wrapped it around himself, an action that proved difficult as the fastest of the spacechickens had reached him and was trying to attach itself to the fabric. More of them were shuffling speedily toward the gate, their eyes whirling, pitiful wings flapping wildly in imitation of flight. John could only be grateful the creatures couldn't actually fly as he kicked away the nearest chicken, grabbed Elizabeth's arm and shoved her through the gate.
~*~
“Raise the shield!” John bellowed the second their feet met the floor of Atlantis. There was no way the poultry was making it through behind them. He heard the satisfying electric noise of the shield engaging followed by the swish of the wormhole closing down. Reaching up to take the plugs out of his ears, John looked over at Rodney and Ford. Both looked very disoriented as they clutched their powerbars amidst the swarm of Carson's medical team. John suspected with a wave of jealousy that they wouldn’t remember a thing. “We’re taking that planet out of the system, right?”
Smiling, Elizabeth trailed a finger over the Atlantis gate symbol on John’s chest. "We gathered enough documentation for the scientists to start studying the creatures. They'll be looking over the recordings they made for months studying those things."
John checked his ears for the plugs he had just removed. "Recordings?"
"Of course, John. Your so-called spacechickens are a new species. It was only responsible to make a thorough documentation of their behavior." That smile was simply wicked. "The behavior of Carson, Rodney, Ford, and yourself is certainly a most interesting part of that document."
"You wouldn't..." She would. "You couldn't possibly..." She definitely could. "Elizabeth, it's not right to have that kind of footage even existing!"
“I’ll get right on that,” she said, taking hold of the pink boa still wrapped around his neck and leading him from the gate room. Maybe remembering the afternoon wouldn’t be so bad after all.
Author: Elvinborn
Rating: PG
Spoilers: None
thanks to Zeonn for ideas, encouragement, and general sounding board duties. None of this is her fault.
John wished McKay would just shut up. Five minutes of blissful silence. That was all he was asking for. Even worse was the fact that McKay was probably right. The only thing they had found on this planet had been ruins, and those barely more than a pile of grass-covered rocks. There hadn’t even been any evidence of writings anywhere, and there were always writings in ruins. That was kinda the point, John thought.
The sudden lack of McKay’s jabber brought John back to reality. It appeared they had stopped moving. “What is it?”
“Movement, sir,” Ford whispered, looking into the woods over the sight of his P90, “over that way.”
“Alright, what say we take a look?”
“You have got to be joking, Major. There was nothing on the life signs detector to show people in the area, and anything else would simply be a waste of time.”
“What if it’s something we could eat?”
“Good idea, Ford. Let’s all run off into the woods hunting for God knows what to see if we can eat it, when we all know that odds are it will eat us first.”
“We’ve got time,” John said, breaking off McKay’s tirade. “Let’s see what it is. If it’s mean, we shoot it.”
“Major?” Teyla’s voice was quiet, and her entire body was tensed. John followed her line of sight and found what he supposed was their quarry.
“What the hell is that?”
“Well, Rodney, I think it’s a...” John sized the creature up, “...spacechicken.”
The three-lobed head peering at them from behind a rock looked like a three-leaf clover, only each leaf had an eye on it that was looking at them. John was sure the shining eyes were spinning at him. Each leaf-lobe had a sort of radar looking thing in the middle of it. One blue, one red, one green. They were moving from side to side like fans. John could only guess that the creature was using them for listening.
“That is interesting,” McKay said, tilting his head and walking vaguely toward the creature.
“I do not think that is wise.”
“Teyla’s right, McKay, where are you going?” Ford yelled. He looked nervously over to John for directions.
John was still watching the spacechicken. McKay’s movement hadn’t phased the creature much. It seemed to have made the thing more curious. It chirped sweetly at them, and then the lobed head was being followed out of hiding by a long, goose-like neck and a large barrel body. It stood on thick short trunks that ended in overlarge webbed duck feet, and had insignificant wings that wouldn’t possibly allow the thing to take flight. The most interesting thing about it was its coloring. It was a weird brownish black covered in what John could only call iridescent chickenpox. To top it all off, there was a plume of a tail on what John assumed was its butt that looked like it came off of a glittery my-little-pony.
“Major?”
John realized that he was staring, and he had no idea how long he had been doing so. Long enough, it appeared, for a handful of the almost-birds to gather at the rock. He looked around to see if McKay had captured one of the things, and found the man sitting on the ground dazedly staring at the creatures. Ford had dropped his gun and was making odd grunting noises as he sat opposite McKay. Teyla was standing to the side, looking bemused and somewhat concerned at all three men. “What?” John asked with a shrug.
“The three of you have been staring at these creatures for some time, Major Sheppard. I have been trying to gain your attention.”
“That doesn’t sound good,” he said tilting his head and squinting at the creatures and the other two members of his team. One of the chickens looked directly at him, and its middle eye began to spin slowly. The thing made a grunting sound much like the strange noises Ford was still making, and its other two eyes began to spin in opposite directions. John felt himself being pulled toward the creature. Was it saying something to them? The grunts and urps made John think of the classic movie-alien phrase we come in peace. Somehow, he thought that ought to make him nervous, as the phrase almost always meant trust us, we’re going to kill you all, or something equally as sinister. A little spacechicken could hardly take over the world.
“Major Sheppard!”
John couldn’t figure out why Elizabeth sounded so annoyed. What had he done wrong this time? Why was she yelling at him? She might scare away the chickens. “What?” he snapped, turning to fire an irritated look at her. Then he wandered why she was here. And when had she had time to get here?
“Please turn away from those things, Major. You behave most strangely when you look at them. As do they,” Teyla said looking toward McKay and Ford. Both men had moved closer to each other, and to the creatures. If John looked at them from the corner of his eye, he could take in the scene. Ford squatted next to the rock and made the same grunting sounds as the creatures. Meanwhile, McKay was doing a fabulous funky chicken dance on his knees while making odd little urping and wooping sounds. Several of the spacechickens seemed to find his display entertaining. Twelve of the things had gathered around him with their eyes spinning up at him and the little radar-ear-things fanned eagerly.
“John,” Elizabeth said quietly, as though she was talking a jumper off of a roof. “Why don’t we go over there,” she said, gesturing in the direction of the stargate, “and discuss what, exactly is going on here?”
“But, McKay? And Ford...”
“Teyla will stay here to watch them. I think it best that you come away while you can still respond to us.” With a nod and a glance toward his fallen comrades, John followed Dr. Weir over the rise in the path.
They walked longer than John thought was exclusively necessary before Elizabeth finally stopped. “Okay, Major, now that you are out of earshot of the ... creatures, I want you to tell me what you remember.”
Not much John thought, but he knew Weir wouldn’t accept that. “I was looking at that spacechicken ...” Elizabeth smirked. What was she smirking at? “... and then you were there. Why are you here? We’re not due back for at least another hour.”
“John, you should have been back in Atlantis roughly five hours ago.” That was not what he had expected to hear. “Teyla radioed for help because she couldn’t get any of you to respond to her. Beckett came through first, but he was no help when he started strutting about flapping his arms. It was shear luck that he brought a female nurse with him, or we would never have discovered that the effect only seems to work on men.” That would explain Teyla and Elizabeth, but not the lack of Carson on the scene with Ford and McKay.
“How is it that Beckett isn’t still here, and I’m talking to you instead of displaying for the chickens?”
“We don’t really know why you were able to snap out of it. We think it’s because you didn’t get as close as the others. Carson went straight toward Ford because he was the most affected, and the closest. Teyla knocked Carson out when he made a run for the harem McKay seems to have collected. She and the nurse had to carry him back to the gate. Our last radio communication confirmed that he is fine except for a broken rib and a large bump on the back of his head.”
“She broke his rib?” Sheppard was incredulous.
“Carson broke his rib when he attempted to fly and landed on a tree root.” The smirk had now become a full-fledged smile that was threatening to release the laughter that John saw sparking in her eyes. That wouldn’t do.
“So what do we do about McKay and Ford?” John asked, hoping to bring her back to the present problem. “Can we knock them out?”
“To use force, you have to catch them, and that has proven difficult. They behave like wild animals. Very stupid wild animals. Ford bites when we corner him, and he runs so fast that we don’t feel safe trying to tranquilize him.”
“The kid can run, can’t he.” John mused. “How do you catch a wild animal?”
The question was rhetorical, but Elizabeth answered anyway. “Traps? Food? Whips and lasso?”
“Can we run the spacechickens off?”
“We haven’t had any luck in getting them to move. So far they haven’t responded to anything but you men, and they seem to be gathering rather than scattering. This would all be easier if we knew what it was they wanted.”
“They come in peace,” John muttered.
“What?”
“Um... nothing. So we try to get Ford and McKay to come to us with food. Right?”
“Okay. Then how do we get them away from the creatures?”
“Don’t worry about it. I have a plan.”
“Oh. Right. Why is it that I don’t find that reassuring?”
~*~
Teyla, Elizabeth, and three of the female soldiers from Atlantis stood in a semicircle around men and creatures. The congregation of glittering, urping spacechickens had grown exponentially so that there were easily a hundred of them holding court around Rodney. Ford had about forty of his own, and kept looking jealously toward the scientist. Standing on the hillside above the scene, John thought that McKay’s dominance had more to do with his costuming than because the creatures liked him better. The man had festooned his hair with grasses and small flowers. His shirt was gone, and leaved twigs of various lengths were tucked into his waistband like plumage. John wondered where he had found the mud that he had used to paint markings on his chest and face - like grey and brown chickenpox. Ford’s only decoration was a bit of the mud markings on his face. The kid just wasn’t as devoted, John thought, then wondered why the idea sounded so peevish. He checked his earplugs and hoped Elizabeth had been right about the sound being the source of the creatures’ appeal, and the explanation for his resistance was his unreported ear infection.
John sighed. There was no way this was going to end well. “Hear, chicky, chicken,” he called meekly. He knew it wouldn’t be enough to just call at them, but he could still hope. “Oh, chickens!” he half sang at them. Nothing. There was nothing for it. It wasn’t like he had any dignity left in this scenario anyway. He had gone back to Atlantis a good Air Force Major and left the city with each nail of his hand glittering with different colors of polish, somebody’s bright red hair die making his head look like Ronald McDonald had caught on fire, and a pink boa from who knew where. John would have thought that the women of the city were out to humiliate him if it hadn’t been Zelenka who produced the body paint. He was sure he didn’t want to know.
Elizabeth and Teyla were looking at him with twin smiles of expectancy. The marines had the good sense to look anywhere but at John. Best to just jump in head first and see what happened, John told himself sternly. John dropped the towel, and stood on the hillside in just his skivvies. One of the nurses had been so kind as to use Zelenka’s paint to cover him in gate symbols and swirls. Actually, John thought, that had been rather nice. It had been the audience of sniggering scientists that had been hard to take. John took in a deep, steadying breath, and set their plan into action with a loud whooping rooster crow.
That got their attention, John thought as nearly two hundred urping heads turned in his direction, ears flapping furiosly. Oh, crap. What now? He had to act fast to keep their attention, so he closed his eyes and launched into his best impression of a peacock mating dance. He whopped and flapped his elbows, and threw in a resounding burp as imitation of the chickens’ grunting sounds. After a few moments of this, he opened his eyes long enough to see if it was working, but closed them before he could see the women laughing at him. The spacechickens were all coming toward him. John started to strut, elbows pumping and head bobbing; the pied piper of alien poultry. He hoped they would follow him and perhaps kill him so that he wouldn’t have to face the aftermath of this display. One word from anybody, and he was going to shoot them all. He remembered to open his eyes before he strutted off a cliff and landed under a pileup of horny spacechickens.
The sweet blessed light of a wonderful flare lit the darkening sky. The ploy had worked, and they could go home. John looked back at the strange following he had gathered and tried to decide how to get rid of them. The flare should have been fired from the gate when the others reached it. Evidence suggested that the creatures weren’t particularly fast. Even though they seemed to appear out of air, they moved with an awkward-looking lumber. Hoping Teyla had the gate open, John sprinted for home.
They moved faster than he had thought possible, but John was able to outrun them the short distance to the stargate. Elizabeth stood next to the great ring and failed to smother a smile as she held out the towel. He snatched the piece of cloth from her hand and wrapped it around himself, an action that proved difficult as the fastest of the spacechickens had reached him and was trying to attach itself to the fabric. More of them were shuffling speedily toward the gate, their eyes whirling, pitiful wings flapping wildly in imitation of flight. John could only be grateful the creatures couldn't actually fly as he kicked away the nearest chicken, grabbed Elizabeth's arm and shoved her through the gate.
~*~
“Raise the shield!” John bellowed the second their feet met the floor of Atlantis. There was no way the poultry was making it through behind them. He heard the satisfying electric noise of the shield engaging followed by the swish of the wormhole closing down. Reaching up to take the plugs out of his ears, John looked over at Rodney and Ford. Both looked very disoriented as they clutched their powerbars amidst the swarm of Carson's medical team. John suspected with a wave of jealousy that they wouldn’t remember a thing. “We’re taking that planet out of the system, right?”
Smiling, Elizabeth trailed a finger over the Atlantis gate symbol on John’s chest. "We gathered enough documentation for the scientists to start studying the creatures. They'll be looking over the recordings they made for months studying those things."
John checked his ears for the plugs he had just removed. "Recordings?"
"Of course, John. Your so-called spacechickens are a new species. It was only responsible to make a thorough documentation of their behavior." That smile was simply wicked. "The behavior of Carson, Rodney, Ford, and yourself is certainly a most interesting part of that document."
"You wouldn't..." She would. "You couldn't possibly..." She definitely could. "Elizabeth, it's not right to have that kind of footage even existing!"
“I’ll get right on that,” she said, taking hold of the pink boa still wrapped around his neck and leading him from the gate room. Maybe remembering the afternoon wouldn’t be so bad after all.