The Anunnaki Unification, Book 3: A Stargate SG-1 Fan Fiction Story

by Michele Briere

  He looked at Cohen for a moment. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather talk with someone from your own field?”

  “I think I would, yes,” Cohen admitted and downed the shot of Kahlua in one gulp.

  Jack went to the door and stuck his head off the porch. He raised a hand and made a signal before returning to the house. He put Olivia into her play pen and handed her a bottle.

  Cohen was looking a little pale in the gills. “A bird?” he questioned, slightly hoarse. Jack held out an arm.

  “Zu, to me!”

  The bird appeared on his arm and squawked.

  “This is Zu,” Jack told Cohen. Olivia laughed and tried a Z sound, succeeding in drooling out a bit of juice as she held out her bottle. Zu muttered and hopped to the play pen where he preened Olivia’s skimpy hair. “He’s sentient, you can ask him questions. No? Ah, Sergeant.” Jack turned to the door where one of the neighborhood SF had presented himself. “Escort General Pastor Cohen to Beth-El Temple and present him to Rabbi Melnik. If the Rav isn’t available, take him to my brother. He might be at the Academy hospital, if he isn’t at the church.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Once the pastor was on his way, Jack watched Zu and Olivia.

  “So, Zu, how’s Erra?” he asked.

  “Errrraaaaa muuuu,” Zu said. “Errrraaaa make nesssst Inaaaaana.”

  “Good,” Jack nodded. “Can you watch Olivia for a while? I want to finish the door.”

  “Annnnna.”

  A few neighbors stopped to chat while he worked, and a delivery truck dropped off three boxes for Daniel. They were from the publisher of his manuscript. From the weight and the wiggle, Jack guessed that they were advanced copies. He went into the house and called Daniel.

  “Yes, open them,” Daniel told him, a little breathless in his excitement. Jack put the phone down and tore open a box.

  “Books with your face on the back,” Jack told him, turning one over and opening it. The new spine cracked and the smell of new book filled the air. “This is great, Danny. Hey, Zu is here. Want me to send one of these to you?”

  “Yes!”

  Jack handed the book to Zu, who took it with strong claws, and he disappeared.

  “Thanks, Zu,” he heard Daniel say. “Wow, Jack, this turned out so great. Zu, can you bring a box? Would it be too heavy?”

  Zu reappeared, dug his talons into a box, and popped out again without even trying to flap his colorful wings.

  “Thanks,” Daniel said. “Here, take this to Sam, please?” Zu squawked in annoyance.

  “The letter says it’ll be on store shelves next month,” Jack told him, reading the letter that came with the packing slip. “That’s a little earlier than originally planned.”

  “Yeah, they’ve been working over-time on it,” Daniel said, his voice distant as he perused the book. “Jack, I’m going to send one of these to Sarah’s family in England. I think they deserve it. Sam’s family, too.”

  “I agree,” Jack said. “Send them to whomever you’d like, they’re your books. I think Henry’s waiting for one, too.”

  “How many all-together?” Daniel asked. “Three boxes? So, thirty-six.”

  Jack opened another box. “Danny, the chaplain for the Air Force was just here. Henry sicced him on me. Would you mind if I gave him one of these?”

  “I don’t mind, go ahead,” Daniel said. “Set two aside for Michael and your Mom, too. Jack, this is our story, not just mine. Why don’t you take a box and Sam take a box? I’ll take care of Hammond. Oh, before I forget; I’m heading out to Austria with Sheppard. This one is too interesting for me to pass it off to someone else. How the hell did Heaven’s Bow spot that one?”

  “No idea,” Jack said. “Please be careful and don’t touch anything.” The ship did pick up something earlier on a planet scan, but it was just a small blip, nothing to get excited about. The initial report from Daniel’s team should be interesting.

  “Jack, I can’t examine anything if I don’t touch,” Daniel said patiently. “I think having Sheppard going around touching things is more dangerous.”

  “That’s true,” Jack admitted. “Alright. Keep your eye on Sheppard.”

  Zu zipped back in and dropped a book into Jack’s hands. There was a sticky note attached to it. “Please sign this.” Jack noticed that Daniel had signed the inside cover, addressing it to Hammond. He signed it and handed it back.

  “Zu, when you’re ready to go home, could you take this one to Teal’c?” Jack asked, putting a book on the table. Zu acknowledged and zipped out with the signed book.

  He put baby stuff in the truck, locked up, and headed out. He dropped a book off with his mother, snatched several cookies, and went to his office. Cassandra took the book from him, excited to see it. Paul was also pleased. Although not a kid-person, Paul had somehow managed to be won over by Olivia. She raspberried him from over Jack’s shoulder.

  “Daniel and Sheppard are taking a team to Austria,” Jack told him, wiping baby spit from the back of his head. “Heaven’s Bow spotted something in the mountains.” He told Paul the coordinates. “It originally showed up as just a speck on the Bow’s scan; nothing the size of a ship. It still isn’t registering as anything larger than a dinner plate, though.”

  Paul thought about it and tapped on his computer. “There was a tremor recently,” he said. “It caused several avalanches in the Alps. Those combined with the warming trend could have caused cloaking equipment to malfunction, if a rock hit it wrong. We have noticed that the mikku isn’t all-seeing; it only scans for what we tell it to scan for. It doesn’t seem to be programmed for ‘wild leaps.’ Still, that doesn’t tell us why the scans aren’t coming up naquadah.”

  “Well, I’m declaring it HomeSec jurisdiction, so make sure a bulletin goes out to Austria to keep that mountain off-limits. The last thing we need is to have hikers or skiers poking around. And make it a no-fly zone.”

  Paul agreed and began the notice.

  His cell phone rang the moment he left the office. He discovered that he couldn’t use the ear piece when he had the baby; she kept taking it from his ear and playing with it. An ear full of baby spit was nasty.

  “O’Neill.” Jack listened for a moment. “Thank you.” He sat down.

  “What’s wrong?” Cassie buzzed Paul. “Something’s up,” she said. Paul came out of his office and immediately went to Jack’s side.

  “I’m fine,” he told them, waving them off. “Today seems to be an interesting day. Hell must have frozen over; China just signed a treaty freeing Tibet. It’ll hit the news shortly.”

  Paul squatted next to him and touched his shoulder. “You saved Tien’s grandson, and who knows how many people by getting the ships in to beam them to safety. You were honest with him in a way no one probably ever has been and you asked for nothing in return.”

  “And this is payment. Holy shit.”

  Olivia smacked the back of his head.

  An hour later, people had come to a standstill as they listened to the radio, turned on news channels, and looked at the home pages of online news. Amidst the chaos and destruction of what was once Korea, another country was reborn. The foremost image was of the Dali Lama falling to his knees.

  “What’d you do, Jack?” Henry asked when Jack answered his cell phone again.

  “About what?” he asked.

  “You must have said something to Tien,” Henry said. “What was it?”

  “You keep telling me to play nice, Henry, so I played nice,” Jack said. “This wasn’t my doing, he made this decision himself. Oh, Henry? When you leave your current position, if you’re still interested, I’m nominating you as the Tau’ri representative to the Unified Worlds council. Does that work for you?”

  There was silence on the line.

  “Are you joking?” he heard.

  “No,” Jack shrugged and shook his head. “Henry, you’ve been pushing me around for a year. Anything to get you off this planet…..”

  “Are we
in?” Henry asked.

  “Don’t know yet,” Jack said. “Inanna knows what’s happening here and she needs to take Earth’s application before the council. This thing with the Koreas could very well disqualify us, but the rest of the world is working to help, which might push things back this way. The HomeSec members will need to approve your nomination, of course. You want me to make your nomination official, after this happens?”

  Hayes breathed heavily into the phone. “Yes. Dear Lord, Jack. This entire year will be making the history books.”

  “Yeah, and speaking of books…..”

  “I have it,” Henry said. “That bird dropped it on my desk. Jack, you really need to do something about him. He needs to learn what doorbells are for. Almost gave my secret service heart attacks.”

  Jack snorted. “You try telling Zu what to do. We can only suggest. The last time I tried ordering him, I discovered my truck covered in bird crap. Do you know what that stuff does to a paint job?”

  He went down to the R&D lab.

  “Biggs…..,”

  “Boggs, sir,” the captain corrected.

  “Is this thing working?” Jack asked, gesturing toward the plain-looking stone arch that sat against a wall.

  “Yes, sir.” Boggs held up what looked like a remote control.

  “Good. Send me and Olivia to Colonel Carter?”

  “We can do that, sir,” Boggs said.

  There were surprised salutes when he appeared in the Area 51 arch.

  “At ease,” he said, returning a salute. The baby waved at a friendly looking tech and looked around with interest from Jack’s back. “That was very cool, right, Liv?” She bounced in her carrier, patting his shoulders.

  With guidance from passersby, they made their way to Sam’s new office. Jack had never actually taken the entire tour before; the place seemed much bigger than he remembered. From the number of salutes he returned, he was sure Sam would know they were on their way up from the lab.

  “Sir.” A major stood as he entered the office.

  “At ease,” he said once more. He looked closely at the man’s uniform. “Coulter. Is she in?”

  “Yes, sir, and expecting you,” Coulter said. “Please go on in. Sir? Would you like me to babysit? My daughter is sixteen months.”

  Olivia studied him. Coulter shifted uncomfortably under her gaze.

  “Thank you, Major, considerate of you,” Jack said. “I’ll keep her, though. Were you General Taylor’s assistant?”

  “Yes, sir,” Coulter nodded. “For three years. He considered taking me to Washington with him, but felt that I would be of more use to Colonel Carter here, since I’m familiar with this office.”

  “I’m sure she appreciates your experience, son. Take care of her, or you’ll hear from me.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  They entered Sam’s office and noticed that the first thing she had done was to put up her family photos. Daniel’s book sat in the middle of her desk.

  “I think your office is bigger than mine,” Jack commented looking around. Sam smiled at him.

  “I think it is, too,” she said, and got up to kiss him. A large vase of flowers occupied the center of a small conference table.

  “Ma!”

  Sam smiled and lifted Olivia from the carrier. “You are just a smarty-pants, aren’t you?”

  “She grabbed my legs and pulled herself up this morning,” Jack told her as he dialed out from the phone on Sam’s desk. The entire building had a block on cell phones and limited internet access. “What’s Coulter’s first name?”

  “Leo. Leonard. Why?” Sam roamed with Olivia, pointing at the photos.

  “Run a check on a Major Leo or Leonard Coulter,” Jack said low into the phone and spelled the name. “What do you know about him?” he asked Sam after hanging up. She looked sharply at his tone.

  “Not much,” she said. “I met him often enough when I was stationed here before. He seems like a nice guy. Good officer. General Taylor relied on him. I know he’s married and has a baby daughter. Why?”

  “Livie doesn’t like him,” Jack said. “And I sensed….. I’m not sure. I didn’t like what I felt from him. I could be wrong. Let’s see what Nick comes up with.”

  Sam shook her head in disappointment. “That’s too bad,” she said, not questioning his gut. “I was looking forward to his assistance. Paul has a list of people he uses for filling assistant positions; I’ll see if there is anyone appropriate for out here.” She smiled at him and lifted her face. “Thank you for the flowers and teddy bear,” she said. Jack kissed the upturned face and brushed the hair from her eyes.

  “You’re welcome.”

  “You may be hearing from Daniel,” he said, turning to look her office over. “The leather boys upstairs found something in Austria, so I sent Daniel and Sheppard over to take a look. Could be Ancient. Seems a tremor caused an avalanche which may have unburied whatever it is. Nukes aren’t going to kill us, Sam, the greenhouse effect is. The Alps –melting. Christ…. Sam, can the mikku be programmed to search for everything at once?”

  Sam paused in the tapping of her keyboard. “It isn’t God, Jack; it can only do what we tell it to do.” She deleted Olivia’s helpful keyboard opinions.

  “Well, I want it to look for everything at once,” he said, his eyes gazing over as he looked at the titles on her reference shelf. “We keep overlooking stuff because it doesn’t know to tell us something is there.”

  Wheels turned swiftly….. “You want it to run all search parameters at once?” she guessed.

  “That’s it,” Jack snapped his fingers.

  “I don’t think it’s programmed to do that, but I’ll have Capt. Boggs play with it. Oh, about that whole Loch Ness thing? As far as we can determine, there’s nothing down there except garbage and old boats.”

  “Bummer,” Jack commented. “I was looking forward to monster hunting. Keir is going to be disappointed.”

  “Da!”

  He picked her out of Sam’s lap. “You are a demanding creature today, aren’t you, Miss Thing?” She rocked back in his arms, screwing her face up and sticking a fist in her eyes. “Uh, oh,” he said. “I think we missed nap time. I’ll get her home,” he said, picking up the baby paraphernalia. “She’s been queen bee all day. Keep in contact with Daniel; if there are devices up there, he’ll need your guys to come in.”

  “I just sent a message to Boggs,” she said. “We’ll keep an eye on Daniel.”

  Jack turned to her as he lifted Olivia up over his head and put her into the carrier on his back.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I won’t people your job; it’s your office, I’m going.” He pecked her mouth and headed out.

  “Jack!”

  He stuck his head back in.

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  “I’m kinda in a pizza mood,” she said. “Do we have other plans tonight?”

  “Nope,” he said. “I’ll order pizza. Anything in particular?”

  “Pepperoni.”

  Exiting her office, Olivia stared at the man behind the desk in the outer office.

  “It’s alright,” he said gently to her. It took him a moment to realize he spoke in Ancient. Whether or not she understood, she took his tone, patted him, and dug into her pouch for the bottle she dropped.

  As they made their way back to the arch, Olivia once more waved at the tech she noticed when they came in.

  “What’s your name, airman?” Jack stopped and asked. The woman straightened.

  “Chief Master Sergeant Rusty Wilson, sir!”

  Jack gave a nod, glancing at the flaming red hair on the woman’s head. “As you were, chief.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  When Jack returned to HomeSec, he went up to his office before heading home.

  “Cass, find me the file for Chief Master Sergeant Rusty Wilson,” he told her. “Just email it to me. Can you watch Livie for a while? She’s almost asleep.”

  “Sure. There’s a portable crib in the c
loset,” she said, getting up to find it while Jack gently took the carrier from his back. He knew the generals upstairs didn’t approve of him bringing the kids into work, they also weren’t happy with the day-care that was being built across the compound. Oh, well. As long as it didn’t interfere with jobs, he saw no reason why employees couldn’t take their lunch breaks with their kids. When the civilian employees petitioned his office for a day-care, Jack had Paul run the stats. It seemed that employees worked much better when they knew their kids were nearby and safe. He considered several off-world examples and agreed to a day-care.

  Once they got Olivia settled, Jack went back down to the lab and kicked Boggs out of the seat. The machine worked much quicker when Jack was at the helm; the Alps were visible to him moments after he sat in the chair. A peak had revealed a hint of brown at the top, amidst other peaks that were still covered in snow. An entire section of mountain top had shifted, and a corner of something obviously not of nature had been laid bare.

  Jack hit his comm. “Daniel, what is that thing?” he asked. “Looks almost like the top of a pyramid. Please tell me it isn’t a pyramid.”

  He saw one of the figures on the slope pause and look around.

  “Jack?” he heard. “Where are you?”

  “Watching through the mikku.”

  “Oh. No, it isn’t a pyramid,” Daniel said, speaking to a dim-witted child. “It does look like Ancient design, though. I’m guessing it’s a hide-out. Sort of a…. ouch…. hunters-blind, which makes sense if they were watching the early humans before making their appearance.” He tossed a rock over his shoulder after looking carefully at it. Just below him, Sheppard ducked and yelled at him. “Huh? Oh, sorry, John. Jack, this mountain top needs to come down.”