The Patience of Kings - Chapter 7
Disclaimer: I do not own Stargate: SG-1, Atlantis or Universe, I am just playing in the world
Previously: Ch 1 | Ch 2 | Ch 3 | Ch 4 | Ch 5 | Ch 6
The Patience of Kings - Chapter 7
Willard Intercontinental, Washington D.C., November 2000
Cameron caught sight of her as she walked into the lobby of the old hotel and he felt time stand still. This place was something else, veined marble and polished mahogany, shining brass and crystal cut glass, a golden light suffusing the entire space making it all glow. He felt as if he was walking through an old Technicolor movie. And the leading lady had just made her appearance. Joseph and Mary, did she look good. He'd never thought mess dress was particularly flattering, but Sam Carter made it work, although if he was forced to admit it he wouldn't mind seeing her in something a little more... fashionable. Something floor-length and shimmery. He shook his head to clear the images from his mind.
"Mm-mm-mmm. Look at what just made this evening a Hell of a lot more tolerable." growled Nash as he stood by Cameron. He held up a finger in front of his friend's face while still looking at Sam as she handed her overcoat to a concierge. He had to hold it up quite high as the man had several inches height on him.
"You'll keep a civil tongue in your mouth, Alonso. At least around me." Cam warned. "That is Major Samantha Carter and she's receiving the same medal as we are tonight." He looked up to see Nash blinking slightly. "And I think she's had to wait a while to get it, because they needed some way of deflecting attention from her unit and the op they're being awarded it for." Alonso narrowed his eyes slightly.
"Classified op?" he asked. "And we're camouflage?" Cam nodded slowly.
"Did you really think the Vice-President was here to pin medals to our chests, man?" he prompted and Nash turned pensive.
"So you know her?" his friend finally asked with a glint in his eye. Cam gave him a little glare and just began walking forward.
"Hey Sam, you sight for sore eyes." he greeted her with a smile and she grinned broadly as she caught sight of him. She wasted no time in moving towards him and wrapping her arms around him in an embrace as soon he was close enough. "It's good to see you."
"Oh, Cameron, it's good to see you too. I've missed you." she murmured as he held her close and smiled in contentment.
"And congratulations on your promotion, it's about time." he offered, pulling back slightly so he could brush his fingers along the Major's shoulderboards and look into her eyes. "You look good." He smiled at her blush while she let her hands drift to his shoulders where they smoothed over the lines of his mess dress jacket.
"I could say the same for you. You can certainly fill out any style of dress uniform." It was her turn to smile at his sheepish grin. "As can your friend." she added, glancing over his shoulder. Cam turned and found Alonso smirking at him in a way that could prove life-threatening for the man later on.
"Don't say that, he already thinks far too highly of himself." he muttered much to Nash's amusement. "Sam, this is Major Alonso Nash, Alonso, Major Samantha Carter, Ph.D." He smiled as Sam and Alonso shook hands and made the usual noises of introduction. "Nash is my 2IC until next month, when I ship out to Prince Sultan AB and the 79th FS." Sam blinked and looked at him wide-eyed.
"You're going back to Saudi? It's been what... seven years?" she asked and he nodded. "Wait, isn't the 79th Lt. Colonel Ferguson's beat?" Cam chuckled and rubbed the back of his head.
"Yeah, that's right, I'll be Bryce's 2IC out there." He smiled when she rubbed his arm softly.
"I'll bet you're looking forward to seeing him again." she burbled and he nodded again. She turned back to Nash. "And you're going to step into Cam's shoes at Kadena, Major Nash?"
"Please, call me Alonso. I'd like to think any friend of Cam's is a friend of mine." he said with an easy smile. "And yes, I'll be taking over the reigns of our flight in the 44th. It'll be nice to finally get some decent leadership for a change." Alonso laughed at Cameron's theatrical glare and Sam smiled as she bumped shoulders with him.
"I read about the operation you're being honoured for, Alonso." she said and he smiled at the use of his given name. "That was excellent work." She included Cameron in the praise with a look. He couldn't help but smile softly at her proud gaze.
"Thank you for saying that, I only wish we could say the same." Nash looked at Cam with an amused glint and he shook his head in return. "But we're sure it was something outstanding." Sam smiled wryly and made a twisting motion with her pinched fingers over her lips. Nash laughed.
"Unfortunately, even boring things, like my job analysing Deep Space Radar Telemetry, need to be kept secret sometimes." She shrugged and Cam chortled, which earned him a smack on the arm. Alonso was smiling as he watched them until he caught sight of something over Sam's shoulder. Sam looked over and Cam turned slightly to see what had caught their attention, seeing a statuesque African-American woman in a full length dark purple gown handing off her coat to the concierge. Cam groaned and shook his head, knowing what was coming. Sam glanced back to him in confusion.
"If you'll excuse me, Samantha, Cameron," began Nash as he straightened his white bow tie, "I do believe my future wife just arrived." Sam started laughing as Nash grinned and winked at them as he moved away.
"You do realise he has yet to convert a future wife into a current wife, right?" Cam muttered with an amused tilt of his head at Sam. She chuckled some more. He watched her for long moments and she looked at him curiously.
"What is it, Cam?" she asked softly as she placed her hand on his forearm. He looked down and reached over to place his hand over hers, she looked down as well and they both just watched his fingers brushing across the back of her hand on his arm.
"I don't know if I can go another three years without seeing you again, Sam." he murmured. "Emails and phone calls are all well and good, but..." he trailed off and sighed.
"It's no substitute for being there." she finished in an almost whisper and looked up at him. He nodded with a faint smile. "You need to learn to be patient, Cameron." He glared at her and she laughed.
Dakara, June 2007
"Jackson's having a whale of a time, General." Cam said jovially into the radio as he and Sam stood by the DHD with a wormhole to Earth open in the Stargate. "The man likes dust, whether it comes blowing off books or from digging in the dirt doesn't seem to matter to him." Sam gave him a little look and he just smiled back. She rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Vala on the other hand, is about ready to snap, I think."
"Do try to keep the fallout to a minimum, Colonel." came Landry's amused reply.
"Yes, sir." He tilted his head at Sam and she reached for her radio.
"It's been pretty quiet, sir." she added. "The Jaffa who still live on Dakara, though they've been very helpful, tend to stay away from the ruins themselves."
"A bit of a sore spot for them, I imagine." Landry offered and Cam watched Sam nodding sadly.
"Just so, sir." she supplied. "We've basically had the ruins to ourselves the last few days and now that Daniel's found something we're probably going to be heading back to Earth sometime in the next few hours."
"Understood, Colonels, we'll keep the light on for you. SGC out." came the General's sign off which they acknowledged just before the 'gate shut down. Sam walked over to the platform and propped herself against the stonework at the side and took off her green patrol cap. Cam walked over and stood in front of her with the heel of his hand resting on the stock of the P90 against his chest.
"Everything okay, Sam?" he asked gently as he reached to touch her arm with the tips of his fingers. She looked up and gave him a slight smile.
"Yeah, everything's fine, just... I had a weird dream last night." she replied, looking slightly embarrassed. He canted his head to the side in concern. "It was nothing, a very vivid dream is all." she tried to smile at him reassuringly.
"Well, we've been camping out in a ghost town for the last several days," He raised his head to look around the wide space in front of the ruined temple in which the Stargate stood before returning his gaze to Sam, "this place can do that to you." She shook her head as she reached across and took his fingers in hers. He liked the contact, it seemed simple.
"It's not like that, I..." She shrugged and shook her head with a smile. "I can't explain it. It didn't feel like a dream." She looked up with a slight frown, still holding his fingers. Cam moved a bit closer and she shifted slightly, not to move away, but to get more comfortable in their new positions. She still held his fingers over the back of her hand, pressing down on them with her thumb. "It's nothing." she breathed as she finally let his fingers go and looked down to the ground. He tilted his head forward to try and look at her downcast eyes then moved to her side and hitched up on the stones the Stargate rose up from. She closed her eyes and sighed as she let her head lean over and rest against his shoulder.
"Sam, it must have been really bad if-" He was stopped by her hand rising and the backs of her fingers pressing against his lips for just a moment. "Sam..."
"It wasn't bad, Cameron." she said reassuringly. "It was like I had a lifetime of memories and what I was seeing made perfect sense to me until I woke up." She sighed and lifted her head up once more. She reached up to pull her short braid from under her collar and to tease out the locks of her hair which were brushing over her cheek. She replaced her cap on her head and looked up into his eyes with a slight smile. "Cam, we've been good friends, close friends, for a very long time." she began hesitantly and he nodded. "Have you ever..." She looked down and gulped slowly. "When you think of me..." she sighed and turned her head away. He frowned and reached across to flick at her chin with a finger. She looked back at him for just a moment before looking down again. "It's nothing. I'm just glad you're my friend, Cam. You have no idea how important you've been to me over the years." He closed his eyes for a moment and sighed.
"Don't you worry, Sam, I'll still be your best friend even when you're a doddering old genius writing incomprehensible universal insights all over whiteboards for others to ooh and aah at." he said softly and felt her chuckling slightly through their touching shoulders. "And I'll still be visiting you to bring you blue jello and collect you for movie nights." He felt her take in a long slow breath and glance over at him. He was alarmed at the intensity he saw there, how her blue eyes were shimmering with a fierce glow.
"Cameron, I..." He could see the struggle playing across the muscles in her neck and jaw as she gritted her teeth. After a few moments her shoulders sagged slightly and she turned away as the fire slipped away from her gaze. "Don't make promises you can't keep." she whispered. He frowned at her.
"Sam, I never just make you promises." he growled and she looked over in alarm. He turned away. "For you, I make guarantees." They were quiet for several moments until he pushed off from the stone platform and turned to face her after taking a step. "Let's go." He gave her a lopsided smile as he held his hand out to her. "Vala's eruption can't be far off now." She watched him with a troubled look in her eyes before slowly raising her hand to take his. He pulled her up and turned to lead the way back to Daniel's excavation site. Sam fell into step alongside him, looking down along their path until they were well into the twisty little maze of streets off the temple complex.
"I'm sorry I said that, Cam. I know how much you care about me." she said just above a whisper, surprising him. He sighed.
"You really don't, Sam." he breathed. "I don't even know that." He looked up at a keening wail from somewhere behind them and cursed when his eyes picked out the arrow-shaped forms of Ori fighters.
"Ori? Why?" Sam began incredulously as she started running through the narrow streets.
"No time for that right now, Sam." Cam quickly followed her when he saw the ships dropping off portable ring platforms in a courtyard not far away. He grabbed for his radio as Sam took cover behind the vertical support of an archway. He darted to crouch behind the low wall opposite the gap. "Hey, kids, guess what?" he called as Ori ships flew past them and explosions went off in the near distance with the added bonus of staff blasts fired by footsoldiers sizzling over his head. "We are under fire."
San Francisco, July 8th, 2009 (alternate timeline)
"Heliopolis."
"What was that, Jackson?" Cam asked the rather distracted archaeologist as they walked up the stairs on Pier 39 towards the arch of the Fog Harbour Fish House restaurant. Daniel turned to him slightly for a moment with a strange look and tightly drawn smile.
"Cameron, Daniel!" They both turned at the melodious voice which greeted them at the top of the stairs as Sam rushed over and gave Daniel a crushing hug. "Happy birthday!" she cried as Daniel chuckled and tried to unpin his arms to return the embrace. She let him go after he managed to thank her and hug her himself and she turned to melt against Cameron as he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her tenderly. "I've just been inside checking our reservation, it's all ready." She smiled and took his hand and led both of them into the restaurant. They soon found themselves seated at a table by a window overlooking the Bay with a view of Golden Gate Bridge off in the distance to the west silhouetted by the last vestiges of the setting Sun. They already had a bottle of champagne waiting in a high hat and Cam busied himself pouring for them all. "So that's all of us with one birthday under our belts in this timeline." Sam said with a rueful smile as she looked down at her fingers twirling the stem of her flute.
"Here's to not having any more before fixing things." Cam toasted with his champagne glass raised, Daniel and Sam joined in. "And happy birthday, Daniel." Sam raised her glass to that with Cam while Daniel smiled. They all took a long sip before Sam slid closer to Cameron and leaned against him. He smiled at her before turning back to Daniel. "So what was that about Heliopolis, Jackson?" Sam perked up slightly with a look towards her friend across from them.
"Heliopolis? As in Egypt, or as in PB2-908?" she asked and Daniel smiled slightly. He was about to speak when a waiter arrived with bread baskets and menus which they took. Once the server had moved off the archaeologist began to speak while spreading some butter on a torn hunk of a bread roll.
"As in 908, Ernest's world." He glanced up with a small smile and Cam had to force himself not to recite details of that mission. He felt Sam patting his arm and glared at her amused smile. "I just woke up this morning and it was swimming there in my fore brain for some reason. I think I might have been dreaming about it." He frowned slightly and pushed his lips out pensively. "I just woke up, thought 'it's my birthday', and pop... Heliopolis." Cam laughed softly.
"You're weird, Jackson." he teased and the linguist glared at him.
"No, the weird thing is that I got a 'Mitchell vibe' as I thought of it too." Daniel said before taking a bite of the bread. Cam quirked an eyebrow.
"Cameron doesn't have anything to do with Heliopolis, Daniel. That was..." she trailed off and Cam jumped at the opening.
"October '97. Jackson's going through the DoD's Stargate archive and finds reels of film of them manually turning the 'gate's inner track, one of which shows a wormhole forming and Dr. Ernest Littlefield-" He stopped when Sam leaned over and kissed him. Daniel laughed.
"Thank you, sweetie. We were there." she said with a smile as she pulled back. He grinned and stole another kiss.
"Okay, Sam, you've just volunteered for the position of Mitchell's exposition-buster." Daniel declared with a point of his bread roll between them. Sam laughed and kissed Cameron again. "By far the most effective method yet devised, but only available to you."
"You do realise, Jackson, you've just made it a very attractive proposition for me to rattle off mission file facts at the drop of a hat." Cam pointed out with a slow smile. Daniel blanched and gulped while Sam laughed again, beginning to turn a decidedly dusky shade of rose.
Abandoned airfield near Colorado Springs, September 2010
Cam stood by the Fireblade at the side of the road after he'd turned it around and ridden back beyond a blind spur out of sight of the base. He spotted the black vans approaching and waved them down.
"Yeah, T-man, I see you." He waved the vans off the road into the small clearing he'd found and Teal'c stepped off the side of the van before it had even come to a complete stop. "It's good to see you, man."
"Indeed, Colonel Mitchell." Teal'c said as he hung up the headset he was wearing and Cam did the same. "I have brought your 'toys'." he added, motioning him to the back of the van. "And Samantha Carter's. You are still in contact with her?" Cam nodded.
"Yeah, she can hear what I hear essentially, if either of us feel it's interesting." he explained to Teal'c's faintly confused look. He opened the back of the van as the members of SG-17 spilled out around him and checked their guns. He began going for the racks of weaponry and stuffing assorted items in through the strip of light. "She doesn't feel she can speak though. I guess she's worried about surveillance in the cell. Does she have a frequency scanner in her gear?" he asked, moving over to where Teal'c had arranged a small footlocker full of equipment from Sam's lab. Teal'c picked one up and handed it to Cam.
"I believe this is the item she requires." he intoned and Cam nodded, putting it in, as well as her laptop and just about anything that looked useful. His phone buzzed against his chest and he touched his headset.
"Mitchell." he muttered softly.
"Cameron, we're almost there along with SG-2 and 3. Any news?" Cam smiled slightly at hearing the anxiety in Vala's voice. The two women had grown so close over the years. He chuckled now when he remembered how Sam had first referred to Vala as a backup singer.
"She's fine, Vala, locked up in a cell at the moment, but unhurt." He turned to Teal'c. "I think Sam just took the frequency scanner out. She tapped my wrist." Teal'c nodded though Vala sounded a confused mutter into the phone. "Sorry, Vala, long story. Tell you in a bit." He went back to the weapons and grumbled at the too-long sleeves of the jacket he was wearing. He shrugged it off and dropped it on the bench. Teal'c raised an eyebrow as he looked it over. "Tergali's Jaffa tried to kill me. Took his coat, hat and bike to trail after the son of a bitch incognito." Cam explained and Teal'c nodded.
"We're here, Cam." called Daniel over Vala's phone and he heard the phone hang up. He stepped out of the van and saw Vala bounding over to hug him tight. He smiled and hugged her back and smirked lightly when he felt her slip something into the pocket of his dress blues. "You look like Hell, man." Daniel said as he walked over and put a hand on his shoulder.
"Ribs are a bit sore. Head hurts." He lifted the Jaffa's cap off his head to reveal the ugly looking cut underneath. Daniel cringed and waved over a medic. "Did you bring me a set of BDUs?" Daniel's eyes widened slightly and Cam chuckled and shook his head. "No worries." The medic looked over the cut and began to clean it after retrieving some things from her kitbag. Cam winced in pain then clenched his jaw when she began stitching it closed as he sat on the back steps of the van. Colonels Dixon and Reynolds and Majors Tavarez and Pasternak of SG-17 and 12 approached him while he was being tended to.
"What's the lay of the land, Colonel?" asked Reynolds while Dixon crossed his arms across his burly chest.
"I did a circuit of the airfield's southern perimeter, I saw no sentries or anything which looked like a camera, but that doesn't mean there isn't some sort of automated security or surveillance." Cam replied. "The buildings are clustered at the southwest end of the compound, one large hangar and two smaller ones, several buildings attached to the large hangar as well. The control tower looked dark."
"Does Dr. Carter have any intel?" Dixon asked while the medic took up Cam's hands and began looking at several scrapes and abrasions along the palms.
"She might, but she still feels she may be under surveillance in her cell so she's not-" He stopped when he heard Sam's voice in his ear.
"Signal and frequency sweep clear, Cam. There's nothing recording or transmitting from this cell. Mistake number four." He laughed giddily for a moment and the medic glared at him warningly then motioned for him to take off his jacket and unbutton his shirt so she could check his ribs. He complied.
"So good to hear your voice, Sam." he murmured as Vala bounded to lean closer into his ear.
"I've given Cameron a pair of my blue thongs, Samantha." she whispered very lightly and Cam smirked wryly while Sam on the other end giggled manically.
"In a second, Vala." he muttered darkly while the former smuggler just grinned at him. "Sam, what can you tell me about their personnel?" She told him she'd seen less than a dozen men and women, but the part of the facility she was in was several storeys underground so she wasn't sure exactly how many people there were. He relayed her response to those present. She also indicated she was taken into a large hangar and underground from there and Cam nodded while passing that on too. Dixon and Reynolds waved over their seconds and began formulating plans. "Sam, we're coming to get you, okay? Be ready. There's just about anything you might need ready for you."
"You need to hold off, Cameron." Sam said quietly, probably knowing exactly what sort of reaction that request would get from her fiancé.
"No." he said simply.
"You have to, Cam, I'm not kidding." she said warningly.
"Neither am I, Sam. I'm coming to get you." he declared as he stood up, much to the annoyance of the medic who had just been wrapping a bandage around his ribs.
"Not yet, Cameron. We need more intel and I'm in the perfect position to get it." Her words made him frown heavily, but he listened. Everyone was glancing at him curiously. "Remember when Riley mentioned that discussion topic between Masim and the Aschen that sounded... imminent?" He drew his lips tight in a grimace.
"Yes, I remember. You think they were talking about your kidnapping?" he asked and motioned over for Daniel and relayed Sam's theory. He blinked and looked over at Captain Lewis who had heard it too. She glanced at her commander who just nodded to her and she and Daniel walked off towards one of the vans with uplink equipment to the SGC.
"Yes, I do, Cameron." Sam replied. "They want me for a reason and we need to know what that reason is. I know what you're thinking, Cam." He grumbled knowing that she probably did know he was thinking he didn't particularly care what their reasons were right at that moment. "You know I'm right, sweetie." He covered his eyes with a hand and sighed.
"Alright, Sam, you win." he conceded. "I'll give you some time to play spy. Do you need anything from us?" The medic pulled his t-shirt back down after tying off the bandage and he began buttoning up his shirt again.
"Just knowing you've got my back, love." His brow tightened and his lips drew tight at her words.
Abandoned airfield near Colorado Springs, September 2010
She flipped Cam's combat knife idly in her hands as she paced along the wall of her cell with the door in it. She didn't feel as exposed anymore, though being Vala's they were a little tight for her. The ear buds were so simple it amazed her, and the clasps seemed to be able to discern what information they wanted to hear or they wanted the other person to hear and adjusted the intensity of the vibrations accordingly. So right now, Cam's tactical discussions with the SG teams were just a buzzing in the background while she tried to figure out how to get out of the cell. She took up her scanner again and studied it intensely, poking the spot on the wall with the largest energy readings with the point of the knife. This was probably the relay which powered the door and lock. She reached into the strip and grinned as she pulled out the silenced high speed drill she wanted and another quick grab pulled out the wide diameter diamond tipped circular bit. She felt along the wall for a moment before pressing down and starting the drill which ate through the thin metal sheet of the wall in seconds. She slipped the drill away and pulled out a flash light. Shining it in the hole, she saw several wires and data connector leads which led to the locking mechanism.
She took a wire tool and started bringing wires out with the hooked end to get a closer look. She checked over the connectors too and measured various readings with her scanner. She nodded slightly and stored the scanner away and pulled out some low resistance alligator clips. She stripped the sheath off two wires and bypassed a section of each with the clips, then sliced through the wires with the combat knife. She stripped the ends with the wire tool and crossed one wire with the other, then tied them back up again. She then severed a third wire and pulled the clips off the other two. Stripping the ends of the third she passed them across each other and heard the locks in the heavy metal door clunk. She pulled out one of Cam's CZ 85s and pushed the door out with the pistol at the ready only to blink in surprise at the woman from earlier, who now stood by the door with the front fascia of the card reader dangling from some cables and her fingers rooting through the wires in an attempt at bypassing several control circuits in the reader mechanism itself. The woman blinked in surprise at Sam in turn.
"Did you do that or did I?" she asked softly, glancing in confusion at the gun pointed at her.
"I did, you look like you still have a ways to go." Sam replied and flicked the end of her gun up. The woman stood up straight and put her hands up.
"Where did you get that?" she asked. "I searched you thoroughly in the SUV." Sam smirked at her, flicking the barrel to the side this time. The woman turned around slowly and put her hands on the far wall. Sam patted her down with one hand, finding two zats attached to the back of the woman's trousers under her jacket, she pulled them off and tossed them into the cell. There was some sort of radio as well and she clipped that to the low back of her dress
"I have hiding places no one will ever find." Sam offered.
"Except me." piped up Cam in her ear. She rolled her eyes. Further searching uncovered her hair pins. She took them back.
"I figured if I took them, claiming them for myself, I could give them back to you." she explained and Sam just nodded. "Not to mention they're sharp. They would have taken them from you anyway." Sam pulled on the woman's shoulder and let her turn around again. She looked long and hard into the woman's face.
"Reynard." she whispered softly and the woman nodded.
"Reynard? Tanis Reynard? One of the Hebridan prisoners from the Seberus?" Cam asked and Sam smiled slightly at his recall. She heard him talking excitedly with Teal'c in the background.
"I was hoping you might remember me." Tanis pointed towards the zats on the floor of Sam's former cell. "One of those was for you. Though it seems you don't need it." She whispered the last.
"What are you doing here?" Sam asked as she took a step back and motioned towards the card reader. Reynard seemed to get the hint as she started reassembling it.
"It's a long story. I suppose you could say the Lucian Alliance took advantage of the Ori's capture of Hebridan." she murmured as she finished detaching several clips from bare wires and tossing the components attached to them into the empty cell. "I'd just been wanting to serve my time and go back home." She turned her head and smiled ruefully when Sam snorted. "I know what you're thinking. Let's just say a girl can change when all she has left is a log cabin on a hill on the women's island of a prison colony." She closed up the fascia with several clicks and a few hits from the heel of her hand. "Nothing except wide open grassland, a patch of dirt to grow extra food and time to think." She turned to face Sam. "You don't have to believe everything, Major Carter. Just that I'd rather take my chances with Earth again than the Lucian Alliance." Cam grunted in her ear.
"They do seem to have that effect on people, don't they?" Sam smirked at his words.
"It's just Doctor now, Reynard. I retired my commission, as a Colonel." she said. "Now tell me why you're the only one here and how much time do we have until more come."
"It's my shift on the door." she explained. "I don't expect anyone for another two hours. That's enough time for us to get off base undetected." Sam raised an eyebrow at her. "There aren't a lot of people here, only two dozen or so. Its the night shift and Tergali's back. Most of them are asleep."
"Why didn't you unlock the door with the key card?" she asked. Tanis slowly reached into her top pocket and pulled it out to show Sam.
"Every time the scanner is used it is logged and the door appears on a screen in the control room as unlocked, the card that did it is also logged, I was trying to bypass those feedback functions." she explained, Sam nodded.
"Well, since I have no intention of escaping just yet you can spend that couple of hours telling me everything about this base." Sam smirked at Reynard's look of surprise. "Oh, don't worry, I'm going to walk right out of this place. I might even take you with me. If you give me a good reason to." The other woman nodded in understanding. Sam motioned into the cell and Tanis stepped in, carefully taking a seat along the bench furthest from the zats.
"Well, you know about the personnel, the dorms are the next level up, one for men and a smaller one for the women..." she rattled off the features of the base and Sam could hear the muffled relay of Cameron jotting this all down for the SG teams. How the Lucian Alliance and Tergali were trying to keep a low profile by not having many people visible outside. Instead, the perimeter of the base was ringed with several layers of motion detectors and other such alarms connected to a control room at the base of the ATC tower and all the buildings were connected with underground tunnels and mini transit systems. These tunnels and the new sections of the bunker had been built through the use of some technology modules provided to them by allies of Tergali's head man, Masim. Sam expected it was the Aschen. She eventually stood up and kicked the zats over to Reynard.
"I need to find somewhere where I can gain access to the base computers." Sam stated clearly and Tanis stood up after retrieving the zats and reattaching them to the back of her belt.
"There's a storage room on the next level down with a computer terminal for stock control. It has access to the main servers." she offered and Sam nodded and slipped the gun in her cleavage for a moment. She paused and looked at Reynard.
"You searched me, did you take the rings I was wearing on a chain?" she asked and Tanis shook her head in confusion.
"I have them, honey. Sorry, should have mentioned that." She sighed in relief at Cam's words and proceeded to hitch up her dress slightly with some tucked folds at her waist which lifted the tail, ruined as it was, off the ground. She slipped one of the hair pins into the locks at the back of her head and looped it around to gather her hair up then slipped the other one in across from it for a quick hold. She then took up her CZ 85 in both hands once more and held it at the ready, but lowered and pointed away from Reynard, who took the hint and pulled a zat out and led the way.
The woman had been right about the night shift, they encountered nobody on their short journey down the stairs to the storage room. Once inside Sam motioned for Tanis to stand guard and walked to the computer. She pulled her laptop from the strip of light and some equipment which she used to patch in to the network where the stock control computer was, she opened up her laptop and connected wirelessly to the device and started navigating the menus through her available programs.
"Hey, where did that come from? You were not hiding that thing under your dress!" Reynard said in a piercing whisper from the door. Sam just smirked while she started running some of her infiltration algorithms.
"Sorry, a magician never reveals her secrets." Sam joked and she heard Cam bark a laugh. When the device was well on its way to hacking through the internal firewalls she created a new command in her menus called 'HAVE RILEY PRESS THIS CAM', closed the laptop and slipped it back inside the strip. The command would run several programs which would connect the laptop to the network on the base through an external connection she'd programmed the infiltration device to open and maintain. She picked her gun off the table while she whispered to Cam over the ear bud. "Laptop, Cam."
"Gotcha." he replied and she smiled at his cry of indignation when he opened the computer. "I coulda figured it out... maybe... perhaps..."
"It will take a little while," she said as if she were speaking to Reynard at the door, "but we'll have full control of the defense perimeter eventually." The other woman was frowning at her and looking over her shoulder in confusion.
"Another magic trick?" she asked referring to the vanished laptop and Sam nodded with a grin only to be interrupted before she could say anything as the radio on the back of her dress squawked into life.
"Reynard, bring Dr. Carter to the control room." ordered Tergali as Tanis stared at Sam wide-eyed. She took the radio from behind her and tossed it to the other woman.
"Tell him you're on your way." Sam said as she made as if to hide her gun down the back of her dress, but instead slipped it into the strip of light while Tanis couldn't see. She did the same with her hair pins. Reynard looked at her nervously, but raised the radio to her lips as Sam readjusted her dress back to the way it had been.
"On my way, Tergali." she replied to the Lucian Alliance mercenary. Sam held her hands in front of her, crossed at the wrists.
"Do you have another pair of plastic wrist ties, Madam Gaoler?"
On to Chapter 8