Fic: Minor Characters I: Odd Man Out (5/19)
Title: Minor Characters I: Odd Man Out (5/19)
Fandom: Stargate
Rating: T
Genres: action/adventure
Summary: Everyone knows SG1... but what about the other teams on the roster? Here's one of them. Meet Major Thomas Moore, Captain Laura Greenspan, Lieutenant Maureen Reece and Master Sergeant Simon DeLisle - also known as SG10 - and accompany them on the mission that made them a team.
A/N: *head desks I completly, wholly, forgot about the fact that I've got one a million chapters of one and a million stories to post on LJ and I swear I will stop that. I hope guess the next couple of entries will be story, so be warned about look forward to it. Argh. Just... argh.
(also, again, not betaed, but hopefully still okay)
( Odd Man Out 1/19 )
( Odd Man Out 2/19 )
( Odd Man Out 3/19 )
( Odd Man Out 4/19 )
Chapter Five
Moore
If anyone ever again tells me that General O’Neill is such a nice and comfortable guy to be with, I’ll personally strangle them to death. Really, I will. That was one hell of a lecture he gave me. When he sent the others out of the room, I thought he wanted to talk about some detail of my report or something like that, but what followed was a fucking dressing down. And all because of the way I treat Lieutenant Reece.
All right, so I do treat her differently than the others. But I don’t give her a “fucking hard time” or “dress her down constantly” or “make it impossible for her to become integrated into the team”. I just treat her like a commanding officer treats a junior officer. She had no combat experience prior to joining the SGC, and she needs a lot of training. I just try to give it to her. And I don’t have “exaggerated expectations”; I expect her to be a Marine, nothing more and certainly nothing less, and what she’s displaying at the moment is not what I’d call a Marine.
I mean, alright, she is so punctual it’s almost painful, and she’s intelligent. She’s working very hard, when we’re on base duty. Okay, even when we’re off-duty; at least when O’Neill doesn’t order her to do something other than sitting in the lab and translating her hieroglyphs or trying to decipher Ancient texts or whatever she and those other language geeks are doing in their labs. And yes, she’s one of the fittest girls I ever met.
When I saw her the first time, I seriously doubted that the small and delicate woman before me was fit enough to carry her equipment vest, backpack, Beretta, P90, communication equipment and everything else needed on missions with her. But from the first day on in the field she never uttered one complaint about it being too heavy or us being too fast or of being tired… If I’m honest… she doesn’t speak much at all. I mean, for being a linguist and all she sure is awfully quiet most of the time. She didn’t even scream when being stabbed from behind or being shot at on our pre-last mission.
I pause in my attempt to beat the crap out of the punching bag. What am I thinking? I try to tell myself that O’Neill gave me a hell of an unjustified spanking and start numerating Reece’s advantages? D’uh… I think, I’m in for another round of boxing…
No, maybe I’m not, as there’s someone in the operations room bellowing out over the base-wide PA system, “All on-base members of SG-10, immediately report to the briefing room. Repeat: all on-base members of SG-10, immediately report to the briefing room.” Dammit, not even 24 hours of down-time and they what? Lose a precious artifact? Let one of the geek teams loose without some military chaperons so they can get themselves captured by some alien race? What?
Grumbling, I pack up my stuff and head to the briefing room. Not my fault that now everyone has the great opportunity to see me running half-naked through the SGC’s hallways.
Reece
All right, I have to admit, Major Moore in nothing but his skivvies and a towel around his neck is a sight to see. You don’t get to see a body like this every other day, even around here, what with all the well-trained SFs and Marines. But anyway, I ain’t here for making googly-eyes at the Major. I’m here for General O’Neill’s briefing.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I know that at the moment your are all probably thinking of a slow and painful death for me, for calling you back on an emergency. But such is military life, and this is an emergency.” Did I hear the Major mumble something about clumsy scientists that need baby sitting 24/7? “I heard that, Major Moore, and I’m sure your own scientists would be just too happy to know your sentiments about them.” Yes, I definitely heard Moore grumble that stuff. Maybe I should attribute this slip of tongue to extensive loss of water since he is glistening with sweat all over… Uh-oh, will not fantasize about my CO who thinks of me as a complete failure; will not fantasize about my CO who thinks of me as a complete failure; will not fantasize about my CO who thinks of me as a complete failure…
“Have you been listening those past moments, Lieutenant Reece?” Errr, have I?
“Errr… no, sir. Sorry, sir. Won’t happen again, sir.” Goddammit, why am I such a bad liar? I’m so bad with lying that I don’t even try to.
But luckily O’Neill just nods and continues, “Right. Anyway, while you’ve been trying to enjoy your down time, SG-12 came back from their mission to P9X-155. And they brought back some very interesting information. After looking at what they found there, it looks like the planet has become a junk heap for some interesting things. It seems that the bio-weapons lab we have been searching for is finally found. Captain Greenspan, you read the report on the spare parts, right?”
Laura nods. “Yes, sir. I can only confirm what the analysts already found out. The parts listed here are significant parts for a stationary biological warfare lab.”
Dee raises his hand and speaks up, encouraged by O’Neill, “Sir, if I may add… the chemical traces they have found on P9X-155 indicate that they were also transporting some kind of explosives. I think we have to include the possibility of biological bombs into our plan.”
O’Neill nods, his face grave. “I agree, Sergeant.” And then everyone is looking at me. I’m already blushing heavily and curse my typical pale red-head complexion for the n-th time. What the heck do they want from me? I’m just a linguist. I talk. “Anything to add, Lieutenant?” O’Neill asks and raises an eyebrow.
“Err… n-no, sir. I’m just… waiting for my part in the mission.” I catch a short glimpse at Moore and see him furrow his brow and wrinkle his forehead in a frown as deep as the Grand Canyon. And I can see the same thing happening in O’Neill’s head. Great.
“Yes… we’ll come to that. In fact, you’ll be playing a big part in the whole mission.” Oh dear, not again. The last time I had to play a “big part” in some mission I screwed up way beyond royally. “Since we don’t have enough teams to spare to go barging in full force, we’ll use you as an infiltration team. You’ll be outfitted as Marines, and pretending to have defected just recently. And this is where you come in, Lieutenant Reece. Since you’re the only real Marine on this teams you’ll be given the task of briefing the members of your team in Marine vocabulary, conduct of behavior, blahblahblah, the whole hullaballoo. You got two days. Think you can handle that, Lieutenant?”
I gulp. Normally, I’d have no problem with teaching; I even thought about becoming a teacher after my time with the Marines. No, it’s the “talking like a Marine, walking like a Marine”-thing. Alright being a linguist, I know how to distinguish talking habits, accents, all this stuff, and I can easily imitate them. And my sociology minor surely helped in being able to observe behavior and reproduce it correctly. But since my first day in the service, I was told that I wasn’t a proper Marine, and that I would never be one. I just…
“Lieutenant?” Fine. I clear my throat and take a short look around. The Major shakes his head, just barely noticeable, but I could still see it. Laura raises an eyebrow, as if to say “Well, here’s your chance.” while Dee nods encouragingly. Right. My chance. To prove the Major wrong. Maybe there will never be a better one.
“Yes, sir. Of course, sir. Teaching my team to be Marines. I can do that.” Is that a self-satisfied smirk I see on the General’s face?
“Great. See you again in two days, 0600. Dismissed.”