NEW SCC/SG-1: Temporary Alliances (gen)
Written for katie_m's birthday. Happy birthday! I'm sorry it took so long; I had to start it three times, for some reason, because it occurred to me that maybe you didn't want a story in which everyone died because Skynet won. Ahem. *g*
And, um, please pay no attention to the timeline. It's definitely meant to be a little unclear.
*
"Now, Daniel, go!" Jack hissed, with his back to Daniel.
"Jack--"
"Now!" Jack saw motion at the other end of the hallway and let off a burst from his P90, which thankfully drowned out the sound of Daniel's protests. When he let up on the trigger, he knew from the emptiness behind him that Daniel had gone.
Two exchanges of fire later, Jack's radio crackled. "Colonel, Daniel's clear!" That was Carter; Jack didn't let himself bask in the knowledge that the rest of SG-1 had made it out of the warehouse. He still had something on his tail. Something that he wasn't supposed to find in a NID-leased warehouse in Modesto.
There was no movement for the moment, but Jack didn't believe the bastard was down. He took the chance anyway to swap out his clip. Last one; he'd have to make it last.
Just in time: as Jack slammed the clip into place he saw the big bastard come swinging down the hallway, moving slow and easy despite the dozen or so holes Jack had punched in him. What the hell was he? Sure as hell wasn't Jaffa. Jack fired again, on semi-automatic, and the guy--thing--android--whatever staggered back, but didn't fall. Blood dripped from his wounds, but also other stuff, something dark and greasy-looking. He'd lost his weapon, or run out of ammo, but that didn't seem to stop him.
Jack grunted, raised his weapon again, and carefully put a bullet in the guy's face.
Okay, so, not a guy, per se. You didn't usually get sparks from a headshot. The skin of his--its--face was flopping loose, exposing a bloody metal skull, like something from a late-night horror movie. The damage didn't seem to bother it much, although its movements were more ragged now, less organic.
"Dammit." Jack put another half-dozen rounds into the still-moving body, then let his weapon drop, turned and sprinted down the hallway towards the exit.
Twenty yards to the door into the main part of the warehouse, then across that wide echoing floor to the loading dock he'd entered by. His boots skidded on the concrete floor as Jack burst out into the warehouse and veered right, heading for the exit. The warehouse was mostly empty but for two forklifts to Jack's right and stacks of crates at the far end of the building.
The loading dock door was closed, and Teal'c was nowhere in sight. Jack didn't have the breath to call for backup, and he knew damn well he couldn't survive close quarters with the robot: his only chance was to get out into the open.
Halfway across the floor, gasping for breath as he sprinted, Jack heard the door behind him crash open; the sound echoed around the warehouse. Twenty feet further on, there was a flash of movement on his right. Jack was going too fast to react, but out of the corner of his eye he saw a figure, armed with something that was definitely not a P90, step out from behind the cover of the second forklift.
He couldn't keep watching, though, because he was about to hit the loading dock door. As he skidded to a stop, hands already grabbing for the handle at the bottom, there was an unholy boom. The door handle slipped from Jack's hands, and the windows around the top of the warehouse rattled, several panes falling and shattering on the floor.
Jack spun about, putting his back to the door and raising his nearly-empty P90. Over the gasping of his own breath he could hear Daniel's voice shouting over his radio. Jack didn't listen, and instead scanned the warehouse--where was the android?
He couldn't see it; all he could see were two women, both armed, and neither of them paying any attention to Jack. They both faced away from him, towards the other end of the warehouse.
Jack tapped his radio. "Shut up, Daniel."
That caught their attention; one of the women swung around, a short ugly shotgun held easily in her hands. The other woman didn't move; she kept her weapon, a heavy-duty hunting rifle, ready to fire.
"Drop your weapon," said the woman facing Jack. She didn't--quite--aim at him.
Fuck. On the one hand, they had just saved his ass. Jack could now see, on the floor beyond them, what was left of the android: its head was mostly gone. On the other hand, she was holding a weapon on him, and Jack really really hated that.
"Put down your weapon," said another, deeper, voice, from the balcony above. "Quickly, or I shall be forced to fire."
"We're all friends here," Jack added, trying his most charming smile. He kept his hands off his P90; he could afford to make nice now he knew Teal'c had his back. "Nobody else has to get hurt."
The woman with the shotgun raised an eyebrow. "No one's been hurt yet. But if we hadn't been here, you would have died."
"I'm tougher than I look," replied Jack, and clicked on his radio. "Carter, if you and Daniel are done playing tiddly-winks--"
Whatever else he'd meant to say was interrupted by the sound of the loading dock door finally grinding up. Carter rolled in before it was fully open, P90 in her hands, and took up a position at an angle from Jack, so the two women were fully covered.
"I don't like standoffs," said Jack, and waved the muzzle of his weapon at the floor in front of the two women. They exchanged glances, the younger one--a girl, really, barely older than Cassie--looking somehow both unflappable and dubious at the same time. Jack wasn't sure how she was able to do that: it looked like something Teal'c could maybe do, but if Daniel tried it, he'd just look constipated.
After some not-very-subtle signaling, the older woman nodded and lowered her weapon to the ground. The girl stayed where she was, until the woman snapped, "Cameron. Now." Then the girl bent over in an eerily graceful motion and laid her rifle on the floor.
Jack felt much better.
"So, you mind telling me what that thing was?" He figured they had to know: they at least had brought the ordnance necessary to handle it.
Neither of them answered him.
"You NID, then? Cleaning up after Maybourne and his pals?"
The girl, Cameron, spoke in a soft voice belied by the size of the rifle in her hands. "National Intelligence Directorate." She glanced at the woman, who shook her head slightly. "No," Cameron said to Jack, "we are not NID."
"But you know what that machine is." Carter spoke for the first time. She'd moved to flank the two women, and was in a position to get a good look at the body of the android. "Whatever it is, Co--sir, it's not anything I've ever seen before. This is new."
New. Fuck. Not Goa'uld, not Tok'ra, not Tollan, not Harlan. Jack needed new alien enemies like a hole in the head.
"O'Neill," said Teal'c softly over the radio bud in Jack's ear. "Be cautious; the girl is not human."
Fantastic.
"O'Neill?"
Jack pressed the transmit button. "Copy that."
Carter had heard Teal'c as well: she was backing off cautiously, trying to put room between herself and Cameron without making it obvious. But the girl's eyes were bright and attentive; Jack doubted there was much she was missing.
Speaking of missing. "Where the hell is--"
Damn it. Daniel entered the room from the door Jack had come through earlier, his hands clasped behind his head. He never looked happy when he'd been captured; this time he looked embarrassed. Which made sense when Jack realized that the guy holding the P90 on Daniel was a scrawny kid, maybe fifteen years old, with floppy dark hair hiding his eyes.
"Good job," said the older woman, and picking up her shotgun, stepped back and around the android's body to flank the boy. "This is how it's going to be," she said, watching Jack. "You're going to pull back into the parking lot. Ninety seconds after that, we'll free your friend here," and she nodded at Daniel. "After that, I suggest you clear out. This place is going up, and anyone still here will go with it."
"Why should we believe you?" asked Carter. "How do we know you're not just trying to cover your tracks? How do we know you won't kill him anyway?" She was close enough to take the shot, if she needed to, Jack thought. But that girl was watching her, and the woman looked neither scared nor uncertain. Whoever they were, they looked like professionals, and professionals knew once you started shooting things usually went to shit right away.
The woman shrugged, but it was Cameron who answered. "You don't."
"Uh, Jack? Is that what it looks like?" said Daniel, his eyes widening as he stared at the robot on the floor.
Jack ignored him, and instead stared for a long moment at the woman. She looked about Carter's age, but dark-haired and leaner, dressed in nondescript jeans and a long-sleeved t-shirt. Pretty, maybe, if you liked tough women. She met his eyes and cocked her head. "Well?"
The girl might not be human, but Jack would put money on it that the woman and the boy were. And he wasn't in the habit of shooting teenagers.
"Fine." Jack lowered his weapon. "Carter, Teal'c, stand down. Daniel--" Jack tried to glare some sense into Daniel from fifteen yards away. "Don't do anything stupid."
"Hey--" protested Daniel, but Jack stepped onto the loading dock, covered Carter as she jumped down off the platform, then followed her off. He let Carter lead, stalking backwards into the empty parking lot of the industrial complex. A shape swung down a rickety ladder at the corner of the building: Teal'c, moving quickly. Within thirty seconds he had joined them. Carter stopped them at the far side of the lot, in the shade of the withering trees. It was brutal in the sun, the heat rebounding off the pavement, making the sweat run down Jack's back.
"What do you see, Carter?" Jack squinted, wishing for the sunglasses he'd left in his truck, half a mile away.
Carter shaded her eyes with her hand. "They're moving around, I see Daniel in the doorway, I can't tell what they're doing." She hesitated, bit her lip. "Wait, I don't see--oh, wait, here comes Daniel."
Yep, there was Daniel, running flat out across the parking lot, arms flailing as he approached. "Go, go!" he yelled, but just as Jack realized what he was shouting, the warehouse went up.
And up.
And up.
Jack was pretty sure that fireball might have been visible from space.
"You're sure they weren't Goa'uld, Carter," he said, again, hours later, as the Modesto Fire Department picked gingerly through the still-smoking debris. He sat on the curb within the tree's lengthening shadow and took another long swig of water. At this rate Jack was beginning to think pine trees maybe weren't so bad.
"Absolutely," said Carter, and Teal'c nodded confirmation. "Whatever that machine was, it wasn't anything I've seen before."
Because what the SGC really needed was new enemies.
"Great," said Jack. "That's just ... great."
END
And, um, please pay no attention to the timeline. It's definitely meant to be a little unclear.
*
"Now, Daniel, go!" Jack hissed, with his back to Daniel.
"Jack--"
"Now!" Jack saw motion at the other end of the hallway and let off a burst from his P90, which thankfully drowned out the sound of Daniel's protests. When he let up on the trigger, he knew from the emptiness behind him that Daniel had gone.
Two exchanges of fire later, Jack's radio crackled. "Colonel, Daniel's clear!" That was Carter; Jack didn't let himself bask in the knowledge that the rest of SG-1 had made it out of the warehouse. He still had something on his tail. Something that he wasn't supposed to find in a NID-leased warehouse in Modesto.
There was no movement for the moment, but Jack didn't believe the bastard was down. He took the chance anyway to swap out his clip. Last one; he'd have to make it last.
Just in time: as Jack slammed the clip into place he saw the big bastard come swinging down the hallway, moving slow and easy despite the dozen or so holes Jack had punched in him. What the hell was he? Sure as hell wasn't Jaffa. Jack fired again, on semi-automatic, and the guy--thing--android--whatever staggered back, but didn't fall. Blood dripped from his wounds, but also other stuff, something dark and greasy-looking. He'd lost his weapon, or run out of ammo, but that didn't seem to stop him.
Jack grunted, raised his weapon again, and carefully put a bullet in the guy's face.
Okay, so, not a guy, per se. You didn't usually get sparks from a headshot. The skin of his--its--face was flopping loose, exposing a bloody metal skull, like something from a late-night horror movie. The damage didn't seem to bother it much, although its movements were more ragged now, less organic.
"Dammit." Jack put another half-dozen rounds into the still-moving body, then let his weapon drop, turned and sprinted down the hallway towards the exit.
Twenty yards to the door into the main part of the warehouse, then across that wide echoing floor to the loading dock he'd entered by. His boots skidded on the concrete floor as Jack burst out into the warehouse and veered right, heading for the exit. The warehouse was mostly empty but for two forklifts to Jack's right and stacks of crates at the far end of the building.
The loading dock door was closed, and Teal'c was nowhere in sight. Jack didn't have the breath to call for backup, and he knew damn well he couldn't survive close quarters with the robot: his only chance was to get out into the open.
Halfway across the floor, gasping for breath as he sprinted, Jack heard the door behind him crash open; the sound echoed around the warehouse. Twenty feet further on, there was a flash of movement on his right. Jack was going too fast to react, but out of the corner of his eye he saw a figure, armed with something that was definitely not a P90, step out from behind the cover of the second forklift.
He couldn't keep watching, though, because he was about to hit the loading dock door. As he skidded to a stop, hands already grabbing for the handle at the bottom, there was an unholy boom. The door handle slipped from Jack's hands, and the windows around the top of the warehouse rattled, several panes falling and shattering on the floor.
Jack spun about, putting his back to the door and raising his nearly-empty P90. Over the gasping of his own breath he could hear Daniel's voice shouting over his radio. Jack didn't listen, and instead scanned the warehouse--where was the android?
He couldn't see it; all he could see were two women, both armed, and neither of them paying any attention to Jack. They both faced away from him, towards the other end of the warehouse.
Jack tapped his radio. "Shut up, Daniel."
That caught their attention; one of the women swung around, a short ugly shotgun held easily in her hands. The other woman didn't move; she kept her weapon, a heavy-duty hunting rifle, ready to fire.
"Drop your weapon," said the woman facing Jack. She didn't--quite--aim at him.
Fuck. On the one hand, they had just saved his ass. Jack could now see, on the floor beyond them, what was left of the android: its head was mostly gone. On the other hand, she was holding a weapon on him, and Jack really really hated that.
"Put down your weapon," said another, deeper, voice, from the balcony above. "Quickly, or I shall be forced to fire."
"We're all friends here," Jack added, trying his most charming smile. He kept his hands off his P90; he could afford to make nice now he knew Teal'c had his back. "Nobody else has to get hurt."
The woman with the shotgun raised an eyebrow. "No one's been hurt yet. But if we hadn't been here, you would have died."
"I'm tougher than I look," replied Jack, and clicked on his radio. "Carter, if you and Daniel are done playing tiddly-winks--"
Whatever else he'd meant to say was interrupted by the sound of the loading dock door finally grinding up. Carter rolled in before it was fully open, P90 in her hands, and took up a position at an angle from Jack, so the two women were fully covered.
"I don't like standoffs," said Jack, and waved the muzzle of his weapon at the floor in front of the two women. They exchanged glances, the younger one--a girl, really, barely older than Cassie--looking somehow both unflappable and dubious at the same time. Jack wasn't sure how she was able to do that: it looked like something Teal'c could maybe do, but if Daniel tried it, he'd just look constipated.
After some not-very-subtle signaling, the older woman nodded and lowered her weapon to the ground. The girl stayed where she was, until the woman snapped, "Cameron. Now." Then the girl bent over in an eerily graceful motion and laid her rifle on the floor.
Jack felt much better.
"So, you mind telling me what that thing was?" He figured they had to know: they at least had brought the ordnance necessary to handle it.
Neither of them answered him.
"You NID, then? Cleaning up after Maybourne and his pals?"
The girl, Cameron, spoke in a soft voice belied by the size of the rifle in her hands. "National Intelligence Directorate." She glanced at the woman, who shook her head slightly. "No," Cameron said to Jack, "we are not NID."
"But you know what that machine is." Carter spoke for the first time. She'd moved to flank the two women, and was in a position to get a good look at the body of the android. "Whatever it is, Co--sir, it's not anything I've ever seen before. This is new."
New. Fuck. Not Goa'uld, not Tok'ra, not Tollan, not Harlan. Jack needed new alien enemies like a hole in the head.
"O'Neill," said Teal'c softly over the radio bud in Jack's ear. "Be cautious; the girl is not human."
Fantastic.
"O'Neill?"
Jack pressed the transmit button. "Copy that."
Carter had heard Teal'c as well: she was backing off cautiously, trying to put room between herself and Cameron without making it obvious. But the girl's eyes were bright and attentive; Jack doubted there was much she was missing.
Speaking of missing. "Where the hell is--"
Damn it. Daniel entered the room from the door Jack had come through earlier, his hands clasped behind his head. He never looked happy when he'd been captured; this time he looked embarrassed. Which made sense when Jack realized that the guy holding the P90 on Daniel was a scrawny kid, maybe fifteen years old, with floppy dark hair hiding his eyes.
"Good job," said the older woman, and picking up her shotgun, stepped back and around the android's body to flank the boy. "This is how it's going to be," she said, watching Jack. "You're going to pull back into the parking lot. Ninety seconds after that, we'll free your friend here," and she nodded at Daniel. "After that, I suggest you clear out. This place is going up, and anyone still here will go with it."
"Why should we believe you?" asked Carter. "How do we know you're not just trying to cover your tracks? How do we know you won't kill him anyway?" She was close enough to take the shot, if she needed to, Jack thought. But that girl was watching her, and the woman looked neither scared nor uncertain. Whoever they were, they looked like professionals, and professionals knew once you started shooting things usually went to shit right away.
The woman shrugged, but it was Cameron who answered. "You don't."
"Uh, Jack? Is that what it looks like?" said Daniel, his eyes widening as he stared at the robot on the floor.
Jack ignored him, and instead stared for a long moment at the woman. She looked about Carter's age, but dark-haired and leaner, dressed in nondescript jeans and a long-sleeved t-shirt. Pretty, maybe, if you liked tough women. She met his eyes and cocked her head. "Well?"
The girl might not be human, but Jack would put money on it that the woman and the boy were. And he wasn't in the habit of shooting teenagers.
"Fine." Jack lowered his weapon. "Carter, Teal'c, stand down. Daniel--" Jack tried to glare some sense into Daniel from fifteen yards away. "Don't do anything stupid."
"Hey--" protested Daniel, but Jack stepped onto the loading dock, covered Carter as she jumped down off the platform, then followed her off. He let Carter lead, stalking backwards into the empty parking lot of the industrial complex. A shape swung down a rickety ladder at the corner of the building: Teal'c, moving quickly. Within thirty seconds he had joined them. Carter stopped them at the far side of the lot, in the shade of the withering trees. It was brutal in the sun, the heat rebounding off the pavement, making the sweat run down Jack's back.
"What do you see, Carter?" Jack squinted, wishing for the sunglasses he'd left in his truck, half a mile away.
Carter shaded her eyes with her hand. "They're moving around, I see Daniel in the doorway, I can't tell what they're doing." She hesitated, bit her lip. "Wait, I don't see--oh, wait, here comes Daniel."
Yep, there was Daniel, running flat out across the parking lot, arms flailing as he approached. "Go, go!" he yelled, but just as Jack realized what he was shouting, the warehouse went up.
And up.
And up.
Jack was pretty sure that fireball might have been visible from space.
"You're sure they weren't Goa'uld, Carter," he said, again, hours later, as the Modesto Fire Department picked gingerly through the still-smoking debris. He sat on the curb within the tree's lengthening shadow and took another long swig of water. At this rate Jack was beginning to think pine trees maybe weren't so bad.
"Absolutely," said Carter, and Teal'c nodded confirmation. "Whatever that machine was, it wasn't anything I've seen before."
Because what the SGC really needed was new enemies.
"Great," said Jack. "That's just ... great."
END