Unification: The Anunnaki Unification Book 5

by Michele Briere

  “This is O’Neill. There’s a problem brewing in China,” he said when the line was answered. “I highly recommend any of our agents over there to keep a close eye on Beijing and cover Tien. Something’s going to start by midday their time. Positive.”

  Just before Jack was ready to leave for home, he was called and told that a group of Chinese rebel forces were taken into custody and charged with treason. If they had been poor farmers or students, he could have felt some sympathy for them. These particular rebels wanted China closed off to the imperial madness that was happening to the planet, and return to old ways. They wanted an emperor and the war lords returned to power, since no other form of government seemed to be able to gather the country together and recreate a once great nation. Jack thought honor had played a role in the old times, but maybe he was mistaken.

  “Point to the Old Man,” he told himself. Now that he had identified what the sensation felt like, he was sure he would be able to ‘hear’ it when it called again. And thinking about things, he had to admit that his nanny seemed to have an instinct when it came to ferreting out clues and obscure hints.

  Sam came into his office just before he was ready to leave. She handed him what looked like a little .22. Jack took it and looked it over and then at her. She looked around the room and pointed at a plastic plant in the corner of the room.

  “It’s attacking, shoot it,” she encouraged him. Humoring her and hoping the SF weren’t going to come charging in, he fired at the innocent plastic plant. Instead of a bullet coming out of the small gun, there was a beam.

  “What?” Jack looked closer at it.

  “The Tau’ri version of a zat,” she told him gleefully. She squeaked with excitement and took it from him. She flicked a small switch, pointed at the plant, and fired. The plant disappeared. Jack’s eyes lit up even more. “We used the body of a .22 and rigged the zat technology inside it. In miniature! It has the same power as a regular zat! See this flat, clear surface on the trigger?” She showed him and he looked closely.

  “Yeah.”

  “There’s a microchip in it,” she said. “A biosensor. It’ll do a 3-zat for only people who get programmed into it. For anyone else, it will only do a one or two zat. You don’t have to hit it three times, either, just set it for three. It increases in strength, not numbers. You set it here for stun or kill, and for training purposes, it can be locked onto stun only by the trainer. Or whoever has the clearance programmed into it.”

  “Sweet!” Jack crowed, taking it from her again and looking with new eyes. “How long does the charge last?”

  “A thousand rounds,” she said proudly. “I know the zats last for years, but I don’t think it’s wise. We’re not Jaffa. There’s a small liquid naquadah cell inside the handle. About an eighth of the size that a staff carries. And the replacements are easy to install.”

  “How’s it programmed?” he asked as he found the level switch. He pressed it and noted a small light dancing up the barrel until two lights were lit, pressed it and three lights were lit. He pressed it again and the light went back to one.

  “The microchip is connected to our main computers,” she said. “The program will be accessed only by a few, well chosen people and each unit can only be activated by those people whose fingerprints agree with the program for that unit. You could, if you wanted to, give them to all the SG teams and have only a few commanders given access to the third level. Other soldiers could have access to two levels, and non-combatants would be given access to only the first level. Or however you want it done. You could trigger them all for second level in a war situation. Heaven forbid I should suggest you grant a third level for someone on a, shall we say, delicate operation?”

  Jack’s eyes were in permanent OPEN. “It’s a ray gun!”

  Sam groaned. “Please don’t call it that,” she begged. “We’ve been calling it NEMO22. Naquadah Enhanced Military Ordinance. .22 caliber.”

  His eyes were no longer stuck open. “Too much of a mouthful,” he said. He looked at the small thing laying in the palm of his hand. “Grasshopper.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Grasshopper,” he repeated. “The Men in Black already took Noisy Cricket. We get Grasshopper.”

  They went to Paul and showed him. Sam told him Jack’s name for it. Paul wondered how to talk his commander out of it.

  “Bug.”

  They looked toward the doorway. Cassie was leaning against the frame.

  “Why?” Jack asked.

  “Because it’s little and cute like a bug,” she said.

  “And it fits in your pocket just like Jiminy Cricket,” Paul said with a snappy smile.

  “Consider yourself smacked,” Jack told him. “Make it an anagram,” he told Cassie.

  “Big Ugly Gun.”

  They knew Cass didn’t like weapons. Considering who she worked for and who her family was, it was an interesting suggestion. Jack looked at Sam and Paul.

  “I’ll think about it,” he conceded.

  Jack and Sam swung by the schools and picked up their kids before going home. Stacey was still pouting, but the adults knew she’d survive. They picked up chicken for dinner and noticed fire trucks and police cars a couple blocks from their own house. The kids wanted to watch. Jack sent them into the house with the dinner. The air smelled of smoke. A fire. The house up the street was half blackened and dripping wet.

  “Started a couple hours ago,” Jerrie said. “I didn’t see much of it. The noise was bothering Olivia, so we went into Daniel’s den until things calmed down.”

  The parents walked up the street and into the crowd. There were many families standing around, watching the cleanup happening. Smaller children were sent home, civilians mingled with their military neighbors. The police were doing their job at keeping people back, so the SF stayed at their posts.

  “Anyone hurt?” Sam asked as they found Mandy and Maria.

  “No, thank God,” Maria said, crossing herself. “Betty and Clyde were still at work.”

  “Hey, Jack, how’s my sister?” Mandy asked. Several people nudged each other, looking toward them and whispering.

  “She’s doing well,” Jack said. “She’s on a mission, but she sent you a note. A couple of Tok’ra came in today.” He dug the note out of his pocket and handed it to Mandy. “She’ll come home for a visit as soon as she can.”

  “So how’d the fire start?” Jack asked.

  Before anyone could speculate, there was a shout and the police began to run. Several feminine screeches arose from the crowd and people were shoved back. Jack urged their friends back and walked forward for a better look. When he saw what the police were running after, he stood still and watched, amused. Sam stood next to him, snickering as a naked man ran to a fire truck and climbed on.

  “Oh, my God!” A man and woman pushed past them, horrified. “That’s…. don’t hurt him!” the woman yelled to the agitated police and firemen. The man on the fire truck howled and pulled at anything he could, throwing bits of broken truck into the crowd. As several policemen closed in, the man ran up the ladder.

  “Who is he?” Jack asked.

  “My…. brother,” the woman sobbed, not even looking at him. Her husband put an arm around her shoulder, holding her tight. “He’s…. schizophrenic.”

  Jack, no longer amused, reached and felt the jumbled confusion inside the man. He walked up to the line and eyed the young deputy who attempted to push him back. The deputy got a good look and swallowed hard.

  “Sorry, General,” the man said and let Jack under the rope. Jack walked toward the main group and took out his gun, taking aim.

  “General O’Neill, we’re not opening fire on him!” one of the deputies shouted.

  “Of course not,” Jack said. “Just be ready to catch him. Move!” he yelled, waving at the men on the truck. They saw who was taking aim in their direction and quickly scrambled out of the way. Jack fired. People looked confused as the gun issued a tight beam instead of a bullet. T
he naked man on the ladder twitched and was silenced. A moment later he began to fall. The men on the truck rushed to catch him.

  “What the hell is that?” demanded Captain Manners. He took off his fireman’s helmet and wiped his blackened brow.

  “A bug,” Jack said, putting it back into his pocket. “The guy is just stunned. He’ll come out of it in a few minutes.”

  “We hadn’t actually gotten around to trying that on humans,” Sam said, watching the men carefully lower the unconscious naked man. “Just a few animals. Small ones. Guinea Pigs. Various other rodents.”

  Jack looked at her and then sent a feeler to the unconscious man.

  “He’s alive. It works fine,” Jack told her. “Got any more ready? Good. We’ll send them into the field with a couple of teams. They can test the things out there. I don’t see that we’re going to get volunteers to line up for an experimental shooting. If they work well, maybe Andy and his troops could take them for a test drive, too.”

  A few people were walking up from behind and sidled in next to them.

  “You have a new toy and you’re not sharing?” Nick asked. Jack handed the bug to him and the other men leaned over to examine it with him. Jack recognized the men from the SGC, a SF and a lieutenant, and someone he didn’t know at all and didn’t seem to be military and yet walked with the same air of confidence that other men did. The men all had leather vests on.

  “Sam’s Area 51 team just introduced it,” Jack told them. “It’s a B.U.G.”

  Nick looked at him. “It’s a .22,” he said, turning the small thing over in his hands. “Not much better than a fly-swatter. How’d you get it to throw out a naquadah beam?”

  “A couple of teams decided to have a contest,” Sam said. “See who could make a smaller zat. Those things are bulky. So one team used the body of a .22 and redesigned the inside.”

  Nick noticed that she didn’t answer his question. “Is it going on the market?” he asked.

  “Not yet,” Jack said. “It’s bio-encoded for certain people. Even if someone steals it, they won’t be able to use it. We’ll probably give them to the front line teams off-world and try it out in a few cities with the police.”

  A child pushed the big men out of the way and stepped in front of Jack, holding up a scraped elbow. She pouted at him. Jack sighed, having known that this was going to happen. He stroked her hair and touched her arm. She smiled and ran away.

  “I am not going to walk around the planet kissing owies,” he hissed at Sam.

  “Can I have one?” Nick asked hopefully, carefully examining the small gun and ignoring the child. Sam laughed at the little boy in his face.

  “I think we can arrange that,” Jack said. “That one’s mine, though. You’ll need to negotiate with Sam.”

  She took Jack’s hand, linking their fingers and swinging their hands. “I think the dock needs to be rebuilt,” she commented. “Instead of paying someone to do it, maybe we can negotiate for a trade.”

  Jack snickered as Nick’s eyes narrowed. “You are paying entirely too much attention to the queen,” Nick informed her. Sam shrugged and took the bug from him, slipping into her pocket.

  “Maybe, but she makes a mean cup of tea,” she said. “Make sure the sides of the dock are secure and there needs to be a gate on the end. Kids running around, you know.”

  Jack smiled and brought their hands up, pressing his mouth to her knuckles.

  “Maybe holders for fishing poles,” she said.

  “That sounds good,” Jack nodded. “I didn’t think of that one.”

  Nick shook his head and led his buddies back to his house where Paul was just getting out of his car and looking their way.

  “Let’s see how badly he wants a new toy in his arsenal,” Jack said to her. “That was clever, honey; I never thought to bribe him to get the dock fixed.” He kissed her in appreciation.

  “And I think that you can say no to adults, but the little ones need the owies kissed,” she told him. Jack wrinkled his face in protest.

  “You look like Olivia just before she throws a tantrum,” Sam commented. Jack smoothed his face out and opened the door, ushering her before him.

  “You’re mean,” he told her.

  It was just after dawn when a body dropped into their bed. Jack opened one eye for a moment and then sank back into his pillow.

  “Why is the engineering corps in our back yard?” Daniel muttered into his own pillow. Jack’s eye re-opened. He groaned as he rolled out of bed and went to the sliding door, stepping out onto the back porch. There were indeed a group of men in the back yard, all in fatigues and carrying supplies from around the side of the house. Fang was hooked up to his runner, watching the action, and wagged his tail at Jack.

  “Soldier,” Jack called to one of the young men as he bent to scratch the dog. They all stopped and came to attention. “At ease,” Jack said and pointed to one of the men. “You. Who’s in charge?”

  “Colonel William Grey, sir. Good morning, sir, I hope we didn’t disturb your sleep.”

  Jack took a second look at the young man. “No, you didn’t, mister, thank you. What’s your name?”

  “Cadet James Stinson, sir.”

  “Thank you, cadet. As you were.”

  Jack padded in his bare feet and pajama bottoms around to the front of the house. He found a truck that was being unloaded with wood and equipment. The cadets all paused and saluted, and once more Jack waved them on.

  “Colonel Grey?” Jack called out. A man jumped down from the back of the truck and saluted.

  “Good morning, sir, I’m Colonel Grey.” Jack returned the salute and looked at the man’s jacket. USACE patches.

  “Jack.” He looked at the driveway. Nick was walking up to the house.

  “You called in the US Army Corps of Engineers?” Jack asked. “For my deck??”

  Nick snapped his gum, a glint in his eyes of what Jack had learned was humor. “Sam wanted the deck fixed. She didn’t say I needed to actually do it myself.”

  “But….” Jack looked around. “Over night??”

  “We weren’t too far away, General,” Grey assured him. “We were on a training exercise at the Yampa Plateau. These are mostly cadets from West Point. This isn’t an imposition, sir.”

  “And I did tell you I had connections,” Nick reminded him.

  “Yeah, but….” Jack scratched at his head and threw his arms out. “Alright. Colonel, I appreciate the help. I have kids and a pup, so the deck needs to support and protect them.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Jack shook his head and went back inside to fall back into his bed.

  “Wuss doin’?” Sam muttered.

  “Nick called the engineering corps to fix the deck,” Jack told her. “We have a yard full of West Point cadets.”

  “Are they cute?” she asked. Jack lifted his head and looked over Daniel’s back at her. “Well, I have another day of ovulation and those boys are much younger and stronger….”

  Jack leapt over Daniel and tackled her.

  Chapter 60

  One by one, the children placed flowers on the grave. Only the baby toddled around on the grass while the rest of the family was mindful of Michael saying prayers for his father and daughter over Megan’s grave. It was hard, remembering those lost while celebrating Olivia’s first year, a miracle herself. Jack had an arm around his mother’s shoulder and held Katie’s hand with the other hand. Daniel kept Davy close, standing behind him, his arms over the boy’s shoulders and hands gripped while Sam held Stacey’s hand and Fang’s leash. Matthew stood, sullen, at the back of their small crowd, his hands buried in his pants pockets. Jack knew the boy was upset. He also knew Matty would come to him when he was ready. Except at that moment. Matty turned and began to run. Fang gave a woof and Michael paused, looked at his grandson and then at Jack.

  “Let him run it off,” Jack told them, watching the boy run away. There seemed to be an unusual number of police near the cemetery. “He knows
where we’ll be.” He called the SF that were waiting unobtrusively at the far end of the cemetery and had one of them follow Matthew and keep an eye on him. They’d be at Cousin Joey’s house for lunch, if the boy had not returned by the time they left. By the time Michael concluded the family business in the cemetery, Matthew had still not returned. Jack sensed for him.

  “He’s a few blocks away,” he finally told them. “Let him work it out.”

  “He’s a child, Jack,” Maggie frowned at him. “You need to go after him.”

  “He’s fifteen, Mom, he doesn’t need his new manhood babied,” Jack told her. “He needs to work it out for himself. When he’s ready, he’ll talk. It’s a guy thing, Ma, trust me.”

  Jack kept Katie under his wing on the way to Joey and Erin’s house. Davy wasn’t completely sure of what was happening and was content to have Daniel’s attention. For all their delicate probing of what Davy did and didn’t understand, they found that he lived mostly in the Now. The past was an abstract subject for him and he didn’t understand questions about the future. He did miss his mother and he was sure she was still around and watching over them, so his grief didn’t take the same form as Matthew or Katie’s. They knew he was sad when he carried his mangled red feather around, which he was gripping tightly. Daniel was pretty sure she didn’t ascend, since they had seen her body in the casket. If having his mother’s spirit around made David feel good, no one was going to make him believe otherwise. He even wore a locket containing her picture. Michael questioned the wisdom of such a feminine thing, but Davy wanted it out of his mother’s jewelry box and Jack didn’t have an issue with it. If anything surprised them, it was Davy’s request for a picture of Sam for the other side of the locket where he had torn out his father Andrew’s image. Daniel commented privately, and with humor, that the boy was well on his way to worship of the Feminine Divine. They decided not to mention it to Michael.

  Katie had been sniffling throughout their trip up north and all morning. Her nose was red and her face was blotchy. She alternated dampening the shoulders of all the adults. Jack was drying out, so she was on his shoulder. He felt a strong feeling from her and instinctively reached to find out what it was. Smarty-pants, he thought to himself. She’s learning how to focus. She wanted him to know without alerting the others that she feared for the return of her father. He lifted her chin, looked into her reddened eyes, and gave a slight shake of his head before pecking her forehead and stroking her hair. He had already given the SF orders to be on the lookout for Andrew, just in case he decided to show his face. Jack highly doubted he would, the cowardly piece of shit excuse for a man.