Of the Sand 2
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Chapter Two: Why the Hell am I Naked?
Teal’c was the first one to wake up. His eyes snapped open and he rolled to his feet, ready to fight. He scanned the room, but nothing stood out, so he turned his attention to the pile of bodies on the floor. They were all a bunch of kids, but something about them looked familiar.
A body at the bottom of the pile stirred, grumbling curses under his breath. Teal’c moved to help the child out, carefully moving bodies until the child could sit up.
“What happened?” the kid questioned as he finally looked around. “And why the hell am I naked?”
Teal’c blinked, recognizing the kid after subtracting a couple of years. “O’Neill?”
The kid blinked as he turned toward Teal’c. “Teal’c, is that you? You look… different. And I’m assuming that the nudity is not your choice.”
For the first time since waking up, Teal’c took stock of himself. He had known that he was uninjured, but other than that and the slight breeze, he had not paid attention to his body. As he inspected himself he found that he was younger by almost a hundred years. The most glaring evidence that this was not natural was the loss of his scar. His pouch may have been sewn up after it had been wounded, but he had still been left with a large, puckered scar, which was currently missing from his abdomen.
“We have been cloned,” he told O’Neill as he glanced at the unconscious kids with a new understanding.
“The rest of SG1?” Jack asked as he finally noticed the bodies.
“Indeed.” Teal’c and Jack focused on the three extra bodies at the same time. It was fairly easy to pick out the varied members of SG1 from the bodies lined up on the ground. The blond girl had to be Samantha Carter and the dark brunette girl had to be Vala Mal Doran. Daniel Jackson reminded Teal’c of when they had first met, but he looked in even more of a need of attention than he did back then. The kid of Cameron Mitchell looked exactly like the pictures of the real young Mitchell that Vala had paraded around after getting back from the high school reunion. That left three extra children: another young kid with brown hair and soft features and a redheaded girl and boy.
“I think, maybe, just maybe, that I recognize them,” O’Neill said after a minute. “But it can’t be possible, they’re all dead.”
“We are clones ourselves, O’Neill,” Teal’c reminded. As he looked at the three kids again he could fully see what O’Neill saw.
“But we’re alive, it’s possible to get our DNA, how did whoever the hell did this get theirs?” O’Neill asked, throwing up his arms.
“What is the last thing that you can remember?” Teal’c asked.
“We were just on P3-494, attending another one of those boring conferences that the kids love,” Jack finally replied. “They wanted a bigwig to talk to, so I was sent along.”
“That is what I remember, as well,” Teal’c confirmed.
“So, I get how they could get the stuff needed to create us, but what about them?” Jack motioned toward the three bodies.
“This is not the first time that we have been to P3-494,” Teal’c said. “This is not even the first time we have attended one of their conferences.”
“And not the first time that we’ve had to bring along a bigwig.” Jack started in realization. “That was back when we had Jonas on the team.”
“And General Hammond and Doctor Fraiser attended as the ‘bigwigs,’” Teal’c finished.
With this revelation, they could look at the three kids and put names to their faces. The browned haired boy was Jonas Quinn, the redheaded girl was Janet Fraiser, and the redheaded boy - more of a rust colored red than Janet’s hair - was George Hammond.
“Clothes, we need clothes,” Jack muttered after a minute of wonder. “Preferably before any of the girls wake up.”
Teal’c scanned the room they were in with more detail than just a search for enemies. It was a pretty plain room, but there were clues enough that told Teal’c that this was some sort of place of religion. It seemed to have been abandoned for a long time and there was a fine layer of dust covering everything. The room was all packed up and boxes lined the walls. It reminded Teal’c of the dryer potions of Chulak and what little he saw of Abydos before its destruction. He was fairly sure that they were on a desert world, which really meant that they needed clothing. It also meant that the inhabitants of P3-494 who were responsible for this had moved them, as P3-494 did not have a desert area.
It took Jack a minute to get over his modesty and help Teal’c search the room for any type of clothing. “Jackpot,” he softly called out as he lifted the top off of a stone box. Teal’c joined him as Jack started to lift the clothing out. The only thing within the box seemed to be robes, but they were at least something to cover their bodies.
“They seemed to be in remarkable shape for the amount of time they have been left here,” Teal’c commented as he shrugged into a robe. The edges of the robe pooled on the ground and Teal’c had to lift it up in order to walk - something that he found to be rather odd. He was used to the fact that, if clothing didn’t fit him, it would be too small, rather than too big. At least he was sure that he wouldn’t look as odd as the other younger boys would be. He was fairly sure that he looked like a young teenager instead of a child, as the other members of SG1 seemed to look.
Jack had already gotten dressed and now he stood with an armful of clothes. “How are we going to handle the girls?”
“I will take care of the girls,” Teal’c answered the unspoken cry for help as he took the bundle of robes from Jack’s arms.
“Right, I’ll pick out robes for Danny and the others,” Jack said as he turned back to the box with a relieved sigh.
Teal’c carefully covered the three girls the robes that looked like it wouldn’t drown them. It was not the first time that something like this had happened and Teal’c knew that the girls would prefer being dressed when they woke up, even if a teammate had been the one to do it. That’s not to say that they wouldn’t be out for blood, but it at least lightened the anger that their teammates had to deal with.
Janet was already stirring when he put the robe on her, so he sat beside her and waited for her to wake up. He motioned to Jack the next time the boy looked over and Jack motioned back to him that General Hammond was awakening.
“Doctor Fraiser,” Teal’c spoke when the redhead’s eyes opened.
“What happened?” she moaned as she put a hand to her head.
“We have been cloned by the people on P3-494,” Teal’c answered, raising his voice slightly when he saw Hammond look over.
“We suspect that your memories are from an earlier year than ours are,” Jack said as he helped Hammond sit up.
Teal’c did the same with Doctor Fraiser, but he held her back when she went to check on the others. “They should wake up in time, like the rest of us, Doctor Fraiser.”
“I remember April 6th, 2002,” General Hammond answered.
“Same here,” General,” Janet replied, moving slightly to check on Sam, who was next to her.
“I remember January 21st, 2008,” Jack said.
“Five years,” Hammond softly commented.
“Yeah, things have changed a bit,” Jack replied to the unasked question. “I got promoted to General, Danny came back and we picked up a few teammates - literally, in one case.”
“Five years,” Hammond repeated to himself.
“Did I mention that I was promoted to General?” Jack asked.
“What gave them the bright idea to do that?” Hammond asked, humor in his tone. “And why did you allow it to happen?”
Jack shrugged and grinned. “Things changed a bit, but that meant that I could actually keep my silver hair. Though, it’s not silver now.”
“What happened?” Jonas groaned as he woke up.
“Something happened,” Sam replied, waking up as well.
“We have been cloned,” Teal’c repeated, “and moved to another planet.”
“What?” Jack asked, looking surprised at that.
“The climate is a desert climate, which does not exist on P3-494,” Teal’c answered.
“So, how did we get here?” Jack asked, looking around, expecting to see signs of a Stargate.
“I believe that a Quantum Mirror was use to transport us here, Teal’c answered, indicating the weirdly shaped mirror that was standing at the altar space in front of them. It was also where they had been piled up before Teal’c had moved them.
“A Quantum Mirror?” Sam asked as she sat up to look. “Do you see the control device?”
“Could you find our way home if we do find it?” Jack asked, casting around for the control device as well.
“Maybe. We’ve only done limited experiments with the quantum mirror because of the Entropic Cascade Failure, so we really haven’t figured out how to recognize our universe out of the thousands that exist,” Sam answered. She got up to inspect the mirror. “But, we might be able to figure it out, because I don’t know about you, but I didn’t agree to be cloned and it’s obvious that they are trying to get rid of us.”
“You think that we’ll be able to see them in the mirror?” Jack asked.
“Jack?” Daniel called out as he opened his eyes.
“Right here, Danny,” Jack said as he made his way over to the shrunken archaeologist.
“Did someone get the license plate number of the bus that hit me?” Cam asked as he heaved himself up.
“There was no bus, Colonel Mitchell, we have been cloned,” Teal’c answered, giving a small smile at Mitchell’s grumbling.
“Wait, cloned?” cam asked, coming out of his dark mood. “Like robot clones or teen clones?”
“Younger than teenagers,” Jack cheerfully replied, giving Daniel a reassuring pat on his shoulder.
“How young, exactly?” Cam asked as he investigated himself. “And what is up with the funky clothes?”
“The clothes were the only thing here and young enough to get free candy at banks easily,” Jack answered.
“I’d say that we’re all between the ages of seven to ten, with all of us at varying ages and Teal’c looking a little older than that,” Janet said.
“Weird,” Jack replied.
“Wait, if we’re clones, then why are we so young?” Jonas asked. “The clones that we saw earlier were the same age as you.”
“They were also robots, though,” Cam pointed out.
“The Asgards did something to my genes after that one time that only makes mini-mes,” Jack answered. “I suppose that they could have done the same to the rest of you, but we are we so young now?”
“And will we have any troubles like Jack’s clone?” Daniel piped up.
“It could just be the difference in cloning techniques,” Sam offered. “Loki was an Asgard who had the same technology as what Thor had to do what he did to your genes. Those on P3-494 don’t have the same kind technology as the Azgard do, which could be why the anti-cloning technology worked better. The natives on P3-494 might have higher technology than the majority of earth currently does, but the Azgard have even more advanced technology.”
“I assuming that this clone you were talking about had some sort of medical problem?” Janet asked after Sam was finished explaining.
“Janet!” Daniel and Sam chorused as they finally noticed her presence.
“How is it possible?” Daniel continued.
“They got what they needed the last time we were there for a conference,” Sam exclaimed as she put all of the pieces together. She turned to Daniel. “It was while you were ascended.”
“We’ve got to go through introductions later,” Jack said, “but in the meantime, to answer your question, Doc, the clone was designed only to last a week before he died.”
“Well, from what I can tell right now, without any instruments, we are all healthy,” Janet frowned at Vala. “She still hasn’t woken up, though.”
“Vala,” Daniel called out as he poked her with his toes. “Vala, get up.”
“I’m sleeping, let a girl have her beauty sleep,” Vala grumbled as she curled up to escape Daniel’s feet.
“We’ve been cloned, Vala,” Daniel replied.
“Then tell them to leave us alone,” Vala said.
“No, I’m not sure how to break it to you, but we’re the clones, Vala,” Daniel replied.
“What?” Vala screeched as she bolted up. She groaned and grabbed her head. “What did I drink?”
“The headache will go away in a couple of minutes,” Janet soothed as she moved closer to the brunet. “How are you feeling otherwise?”
“I’ve been worse, although I’ve never been cloned before,” Vala answered. She blinked up at Janet. “Who are you?”
“Ah!” Jack exclaimed as he clapped his hands together. “Now that everyone’s awake, we can introduce ourselves. I’m General Jack O’Neill.”
“I’m pretty sure we all know that, Jack,” Daniel said. He glanced around, identifying everyone. “I’m assuming that my introduction will be mainly for Jonas, but I’m Doctor Daniel Jackson.”
“Back in the flesh,” Jack chimed in.
“I’m Vala Mal Doran, Daniel’s wife,” Vala introduced herself with a wicked grin.
Daniel coughed and started spluttering. “Wife?”
“On that planet with all of the pink trees, remember?” Vala asked. “We got married and Sam and the big guy got married and Cam married a goat.”
“It wasn’t a goat,” Cam broke in.
“She looked like a goat,” Vala replied.
“But she was not an animal,” Cam said, holding up a finger like he was proving a point.
“Which explains why you left her,” Vala quipped.
“She’s not my wife,” Daniel insisted before things could go further.
“I’m Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell, official leader of SG1 when General O’Neill isn’t around,” Cam introduced himself.
“I’m General George Hammond,” George went next.
“I’m Doctor Janet Fraiser,” Janet said.
“And I’m Jonas Quinn. I was on SG1 when Doctor Jackson was ascended.” Jonas turned to Daniel. “Can I just say that your notes were incredibly helpful? I could not have done so well without them.”
“I’m glad that I was of some help,” Daniel said.
“I know everyone knows me, but I guess I should say that I’m a Lieutenant Colonel now,” Sam said.
Teal’c did not say anything, as there was no point to it in his mind. Everyone knew him and there was no real change in his rank, therefore they did not need an introduction from him. “What shall we do now?”
“General?” Jack asked as he turned to George.
“General,” George replied, a hint of disbelief and humor in his tone. “You do have more experience in leading a field team than I do.”
“Right,” Jack trailed off as he looked around, ignoring Cam’s faint grumblings for being left out of the loop. “Carter, where are you on figuring out the mirror?”
“So far I haven’t found the control device and I’m not sure how to activate it without it, but there seems to be a lot of Ancient technology scattered around the room, so there seems to be a chance for us to find it,” Sam reported.
“Keep looking, Carter.” Jack ran his hands down his face. “Okay, here’s what I’m going to suggest. I think that we should split up, half of us searching the room for the doohickey that we need and the other half checking out the area.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” George said, nodding in agreement.
“Okay, I’ll go with Teal’c, Daniel and Cam to explore the area,” Jack decided. “The rest of you can stay here.”
“I’m going with you,” Vala called out as she scrambled up.
“You sure?” Jack asked.
“If Daniel’s going, then I’m going,” Vala replied.
“I would have thought that you would want to explore this place for things to take,” Daniel quipped.
Vala shrugged. “I’ll go through it later when you geek about the rocks.”
“I should have never let the two of you meet,” Daniel muttered to himself.
“Right, kiddies,” Jack called out. He turned towards the great doors that he assumed led out of the room and blinked when he realized that they really were all kids at the moment. “Cam can guard the door, but the rest of us are off to find the yellow brick road.”
They split up and went about to their various tasks. Daniel and Vala fetched sandals and head covers for the group while Jack, Teal’c, Cam, and George pried the doors open. Heat rolled into the room as soon as the doors finally moved and the explorer group quickly geared up. There weren’t any real weapons in plain sight, but Teal’c fetched three ceremonial staves for them to use. Daniel and Vala were too small to properly use the staves, but Jack, Cam and Teal’c looked to be on the older side of things and they could at least hold the staves. Plus, there was the fact that both Teal’c and Cam were experts at staff wielding and Jack had fought with enough staff weapons to have an idea of what he was doing with one.
Finally geared up and armed, the group stepped out into the blazing sun.
.
Chapter 3
Chapter Two: Why the Hell am I Naked?
Teal’c was the first one to wake up. His eyes snapped open and he rolled to his feet, ready to fight. He scanned the room, but nothing stood out, so he turned his attention to the pile of bodies on the floor. They were all a bunch of kids, but something about them looked familiar.
A body at the bottom of the pile stirred, grumbling curses under his breath. Teal’c moved to help the child out, carefully moving bodies until the child could sit up.
“What happened?” the kid questioned as he finally looked around. “And why the hell am I naked?”
Teal’c blinked, recognizing the kid after subtracting a couple of years. “O’Neill?”
The kid blinked as he turned toward Teal’c. “Teal’c, is that you? You look… different. And I’m assuming that the nudity is not your choice.”
For the first time since waking up, Teal’c took stock of himself. He had known that he was uninjured, but other than that and the slight breeze, he had not paid attention to his body. As he inspected himself he found that he was younger by almost a hundred years. The most glaring evidence that this was not natural was the loss of his scar. His pouch may have been sewn up after it had been wounded, but he had still been left with a large, puckered scar, which was currently missing from his abdomen.
“We have been cloned,” he told O’Neill as he glanced at the unconscious kids with a new understanding.
“The rest of SG1?” Jack asked as he finally noticed the bodies.
“Indeed.” Teal’c and Jack focused on the three extra bodies at the same time. It was fairly easy to pick out the varied members of SG1 from the bodies lined up on the ground. The blond girl had to be Samantha Carter and the dark brunette girl had to be Vala Mal Doran. Daniel Jackson reminded Teal’c of when they had first met, but he looked in even more of a need of attention than he did back then. The kid of Cameron Mitchell looked exactly like the pictures of the real young Mitchell that Vala had paraded around after getting back from the high school reunion. That left three extra children: another young kid with brown hair and soft features and a redheaded girl and boy.
“I think, maybe, just maybe, that I recognize them,” O’Neill said after a minute. “But it can’t be possible, they’re all dead.”
“We are clones ourselves, O’Neill,” Teal’c reminded. As he looked at the three kids again he could fully see what O’Neill saw.
“But we’re alive, it’s possible to get our DNA, how did whoever the hell did this get theirs?” O’Neill asked, throwing up his arms.
“What is the last thing that you can remember?” Teal’c asked.
“We were just on P3-494, attending another one of those boring conferences that the kids love,” Jack finally replied. “They wanted a bigwig to talk to, so I was sent along.”
“That is what I remember, as well,” Teal’c confirmed.
“So, I get how they could get the stuff needed to create us, but what about them?” Jack motioned toward the three bodies.
“This is not the first time that we have been to P3-494,” Teal’c said. “This is not even the first time we have attended one of their conferences.”
“And not the first time that we’ve had to bring along a bigwig.” Jack started in realization. “That was back when we had Jonas on the team.”
“And General Hammond and Doctor Fraiser attended as the ‘bigwigs,’” Teal’c finished.
With this revelation, they could look at the three kids and put names to their faces. The browned haired boy was Jonas Quinn, the redheaded girl was Janet Fraiser, and the redheaded boy - more of a rust colored red than Janet’s hair - was George Hammond.
“Clothes, we need clothes,” Jack muttered after a minute of wonder. “Preferably before any of the girls wake up.”
Teal’c scanned the room they were in with more detail than just a search for enemies. It was a pretty plain room, but there were clues enough that told Teal’c that this was some sort of place of religion. It seemed to have been abandoned for a long time and there was a fine layer of dust covering everything. The room was all packed up and boxes lined the walls. It reminded Teal’c of the dryer potions of Chulak and what little he saw of Abydos before its destruction. He was fairly sure that they were on a desert world, which really meant that they needed clothing. It also meant that the inhabitants of P3-494 who were responsible for this had moved them, as P3-494 did not have a desert area.
It took Jack a minute to get over his modesty and help Teal’c search the room for any type of clothing. “Jackpot,” he softly called out as he lifted the top off of a stone box. Teal’c joined him as Jack started to lift the clothing out. The only thing within the box seemed to be robes, but they were at least something to cover their bodies.
“They seemed to be in remarkable shape for the amount of time they have been left here,” Teal’c commented as he shrugged into a robe. The edges of the robe pooled on the ground and Teal’c had to lift it up in order to walk - something that he found to be rather odd. He was used to the fact that, if clothing didn’t fit him, it would be too small, rather than too big. At least he was sure that he wouldn’t look as odd as the other younger boys would be. He was fairly sure that he looked like a young teenager instead of a child, as the other members of SG1 seemed to look.
Jack had already gotten dressed and now he stood with an armful of clothes. “How are we going to handle the girls?”
“I will take care of the girls,” Teal’c answered the unspoken cry for help as he took the bundle of robes from Jack’s arms.
“Right, I’ll pick out robes for Danny and the others,” Jack said as he turned back to the box with a relieved sigh.
Teal’c carefully covered the three girls the robes that looked like it wouldn’t drown them. It was not the first time that something like this had happened and Teal’c knew that the girls would prefer being dressed when they woke up, even if a teammate had been the one to do it. That’s not to say that they wouldn’t be out for blood, but it at least lightened the anger that their teammates had to deal with.
Janet was already stirring when he put the robe on her, so he sat beside her and waited for her to wake up. He motioned to Jack the next time the boy looked over and Jack motioned back to him that General Hammond was awakening.
“Doctor Fraiser,” Teal’c spoke when the redhead’s eyes opened.
“What happened?” she moaned as she put a hand to her head.
“We have been cloned by the people on P3-494,” Teal’c answered, raising his voice slightly when he saw Hammond look over.
“We suspect that your memories are from an earlier year than ours are,” Jack said as he helped Hammond sit up.
Teal’c did the same with Doctor Fraiser, but he held her back when she went to check on the others. “They should wake up in time, like the rest of us, Doctor Fraiser.”
“I remember April 6th, 2002,” General Hammond answered.
“Same here,” General,” Janet replied, moving slightly to check on Sam, who was next to her.
“I remember January 21st, 2008,” Jack said.
“Five years,” Hammond softly commented.
“Yeah, things have changed a bit,” Jack replied to the unasked question. “I got promoted to General, Danny came back and we picked up a few teammates - literally, in one case.”
“Five years,” Hammond repeated to himself.
“Did I mention that I was promoted to General?” Jack asked.
“What gave them the bright idea to do that?” Hammond asked, humor in his tone. “And why did you allow it to happen?”
Jack shrugged and grinned. “Things changed a bit, but that meant that I could actually keep my silver hair. Though, it’s not silver now.”
“What happened?” Jonas groaned as he woke up.
“Something happened,” Sam replied, waking up as well.
“We have been cloned,” Teal’c repeated, “and moved to another planet.”
“What?” Jack asked, looking surprised at that.
“The climate is a desert climate, which does not exist on P3-494,” Teal’c answered.
“So, how did we get here?” Jack asked, looking around, expecting to see signs of a Stargate.
“I believe that a Quantum Mirror was use to transport us here, Teal’c answered, indicating the weirdly shaped mirror that was standing at the altar space in front of them. It was also where they had been piled up before Teal’c had moved them.
“A Quantum Mirror?” Sam asked as she sat up to look. “Do you see the control device?”
“Could you find our way home if we do find it?” Jack asked, casting around for the control device as well.
“Maybe. We’ve only done limited experiments with the quantum mirror because of the Entropic Cascade Failure, so we really haven’t figured out how to recognize our universe out of the thousands that exist,” Sam answered. She got up to inspect the mirror. “But, we might be able to figure it out, because I don’t know about you, but I didn’t agree to be cloned and it’s obvious that they are trying to get rid of us.”
“You think that we’ll be able to see them in the mirror?” Jack asked.
“Jack?” Daniel called out as he opened his eyes.
“Right here, Danny,” Jack said as he made his way over to the shrunken archaeologist.
“Did someone get the license plate number of the bus that hit me?” Cam asked as he heaved himself up.
“There was no bus, Colonel Mitchell, we have been cloned,” Teal’c answered, giving a small smile at Mitchell’s grumbling.
“Wait, cloned?” cam asked, coming out of his dark mood. “Like robot clones or teen clones?”
“Younger than teenagers,” Jack cheerfully replied, giving Daniel a reassuring pat on his shoulder.
“How young, exactly?” Cam asked as he investigated himself. “And what is up with the funky clothes?”
“The clothes were the only thing here and young enough to get free candy at banks easily,” Jack answered.
“I’d say that we’re all between the ages of seven to ten, with all of us at varying ages and Teal’c looking a little older than that,” Janet said.
“Weird,” Jack replied.
“Wait, if we’re clones, then why are we so young?” Jonas asked. “The clones that we saw earlier were the same age as you.”
“They were also robots, though,” Cam pointed out.
“The Asgards did something to my genes after that one time that only makes mini-mes,” Jack answered. “I suppose that they could have done the same to the rest of you, but we are we so young now?”
“And will we have any troubles like Jack’s clone?” Daniel piped up.
“It could just be the difference in cloning techniques,” Sam offered. “Loki was an Asgard who had the same technology as what Thor had to do what he did to your genes. Those on P3-494 don’t have the same kind technology as the Azgard do, which could be why the anti-cloning technology worked better. The natives on P3-494 might have higher technology than the majority of earth currently does, but the Azgard have even more advanced technology.”
“I assuming that this clone you were talking about had some sort of medical problem?” Janet asked after Sam was finished explaining.
“Janet!” Daniel and Sam chorused as they finally noticed her presence.
“How is it possible?” Daniel continued.
“They got what they needed the last time we were there for a conference,” Sam exclaimed as she put all of the pieces together. She turned to Daniel. “It was while you were ascended.”
“We’ve got to go through introductions later,” Jack said, “but in the meantime, to answer your question, Doc, the clone was designed only to last a week before he died.”
“Well, from what I can tell right now, without any instruments, we are all healthy,” Janet frowned at Vala. “She still hasn’t woken up, though.”
“Vala,” Daniel called out as he poked her with his toes. “Vala, get up.”
“I’m sleeping, let a girl have her beauty sleep,” Vala grumbled as she curled up to escape Daniel’s feet.
“We’ve been cloned, Vala,” Daniel replied.
“Then tell them to leave us alone,” Vala said.
“No, I’m not sure how to break it to you, but we’re the clones, Vala,” Daniel replied.
“What?” Vala screeched as she bolted up. She groaned and grabbed her head. “What did I drink?”
“The headache will go away in a couple of minutes,” Janet soothed as she moved closer to the brunet. “How are you feeling otherwise?”
“I’ve been worse, although I’ve never been cloned before,” Vala answered. She blinked up at Janet. “Who are you?”
“Ah!” Jack exclaimed as he clapped his hands together. “Now that everyone’s awake, we can introduce ourselves. I’m General Jack O’Neill.”
“I’m pretty sure we all know that, Jack,” Daniel said. He glanced around, identifying everyone. “I’m assuming that my introduction will be mainly for Jonas, but I’m Doctor Daniel Jackson.”
“Back in the flesh,” Jack chimed in.
“I’m Vala Mal Doran, Daniel’s wife,” Vala introduced herself with a wicked grin.
Daniel coughed and started spluttering. “Wife?”
“On that planet with all of the pink trees, remember?” Vala asked. “We got married and Sam and the big guy got married and Cam married a goat.”
“It wasn’t a goat,” Cam broke in.
“She looked like a goat,” Vala replied.
“But she was not an animal,” Cam said, holding up a finger like he was proving a point.
“Which explains why you left her,” Vala quipped.
“She’s not my wife,” Daniel insisted before things could go further.
“I’m Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell, official leader of SG1 when General O’Neill isn’t around,” Cam introduced himself.
“I’m General George Hammond,” George went next.
“I’m Doctor Janet Fraiser,” Janet said.
“And I’m Jonas Quinn. I was on SG1 when Doctor Jackson was ascended.” Jonas turned to Daniel. “Can I just say that your notes were incredibly helpful? I could not have done so well without them.”
“I’m glad that I was of some help,” Daniel said.
“I know everyone knows me, but I guess I should say that I’m a Lieutenant Colonel now,” Sam said.
Teal’c did not say anything, as there was no point to it in his mind. Everyone knew him and there was no real change in his rank, therefore they did not need an introduction from him. “What shall we do now?”
“General?” Jack asked as he turned to George.
“General,” George replied, a hint of disbelief and humor in his tone. “You do have more experience in leading a field team than I do.”
“Right,” Jack trailed off as he looked around, ignoring Cam’s faint grumblings for being left out of the loop. “Carter, where are you on figuring out the mirror?”
“So far I haven’t found the control device and I’m not sure how to activate it without it, but there seems to be a lot of Ancient technology scattered around the room, so there seems to be a chance for us to find it,” Sam reported.
“Keep looking, Carter.” Jack ran his hands down his face. “Okay, here’s what I’m going to suggest. I think that we should split up, half of us searching the room for the doohickey that we need and the other half checking out the area.”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” George said, nodding in agreement.
“Okay, I’ll go with Teal’c, Daniel and Cam to explore the area,” Jack decided. “The rest of you can stay here.”
“I’m going with you,” Vala called out as she scrambled up.
“You sure?” Jack asked.
“If Daniel’s going, then I’m going,” Vala replied.
“I would have thought that you would want to explore this place for things to take,” Daniel quipped.
Vala shrugged. “I’ll go through it later when you geek about the rocks.”
“I should have never let the two of you meet,” Daniel muttered to himself.
“Right, kiddies,” Jack called out. He turned towards the great doors that he assumed led out of the room and blinked when he realized that they really were all kids at the moment. “Cam can guard the door, but the rest of us are off to find the yellow brick road.”
They split up and went about to their various tasks. Daniel and Vala fetched sandals and head covers for the group while Jack, Teal’c, Cam, and George pried the doors open. Heat rolled into the room as soon as the doors finally moved and the explorer group quickly geared up. There weren’t any real weapons in plain sight, but Teal’c fetched three ceremonial staves for them to use. Daniel and Vala were too small to properly use the staves, but Jack, Cam and Teal’c looked to be on the older side of things and they could at least hold the staves. Plus, there was the fact that both Teal’c and Cam were experts at staff wielding and Jack had fought with enough staff weapons to have an idea of what he was doing with one.
Finally geared up and armed, the group stepped out into the blazing sun.
.
Chapter 3