Full Disclosure
Disclaimer: Stargate Sg-1 and its characters belong to MGM/UA, Showtime/Viacom, Sci-fi Channel, Gekko, Double Secret Productions etc. No copyright infringement intended. This story is written for fan entertainment only and no money has exchanged hands. No characters are mine except for the ones that I have created. No characters that the author has created can be used without their consent.
Rating: PG
Season: Stargate SG-1 & Atlantis
The Sergeant working at the computer consul yells through the microphone:' incoming traveler. General Landry to the Gate room.'
As General Landry and SG-1 had towards the gateroom, Dr. Elizabeth Weir steps through the watery event horizon of the Stargate as planned. She was scheduled to gate in around 10 o' clock and she was punctual. She's there to head to Washington D.C. along with General Landry, Richard Woolsey and the delegates of the I.O.A. for the big day: the announcement of the Stargate program to the public. Nobody there thought that that day would come, but in light of what they have learned and the threats that exists in the galaxy, President Hayes and the other leaders of the countries who know about the Stargate, felt that it was time that the public became aware of the program. They have taken every precaution to make sure that the public was ready, but slowly letting things leak out to the public. A strategy, President Hayes hoped that would pay off and not start any riots.
Of course no one can predict how the American public would react to it, not to mention how the rest of the world would react to it. They predict that other leaders, who weren't in the loop, could stir up things. That would be unavoidable at this point.
General Landry greets Elizabeth Weir. He asks her if she is ready for her close up.
'Well, I have been for the cameras before, but not for anything like this. I have to admit that I'm having mixed feelings about this.' Says weir
'Well, welcome to the club..' Says Mitchell jokingly to Weir. 'Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell.' Mitchel introducers himself to Weir, who hasn't met him yet. She has met General Landry and SG-1 before, with the exception of Mitchell.
The gate shuts down. The company walks away from the Gate room. They all are excited and nervous about tomorrow, when President Hayes along with General Hammond, O' Neill, Landry and Dr. Elizabeth Weir announces to the public the Stargate program. SG-1 is required to attend the broadcast, but they don't have to participate in it.
The next morning, they all arrive on a rainy Washington D.C. morning in the Pentagon, where they will announce it. Everyone is excited and nervous. Nobody knows how the public would react to it. Worst case scenario, they have a world war on their hands, the likes SG-1 have seen a couple of years earlier on a alien world. The president and the pentagon have done everything they can to prevent such a thing, by informing first the other nations of this program, in the hopes that when it does go public, most nations wouldn't be so quick to go to war over it. The press meeting is about to begin. Elizabeth Weir is very anxious about the whole thing. She hopes that she doesn't trip over her own words when it is her time to speak about her involvement in the program. She tries to calm her nerves by talking with Cameron and Daniel about the latest developments on Atlantis. A trick that seemed to help her calm her nerves. General Landry is talking with Major-General O'Neill about the possible outcome of this meeting and possible strategies to defend the planet against the Asurans or the Ori ships. O'Neill hopes that the Alterian Outpost in Antarctica would be sufficient to destroy any ship, including the remaining Ori ships, if they ever should attack Earth.
'We can only hope that the Ancient outpost is powerful enough to take out any Ori fleet that attacks us. So far we can tell, the shields these ships have, are more advanced than anything we have seen so far. If the drones can't penetrate the shields, we will have a big problem on our hands.' Tells General landry. General O'Neill agrees with him, hoping that will be enough.
When the president enters the room, followed by the secretary of defense, the press meeting can begin. President Hayes starts by welcoming the press and starts by addressing the various rumors that have been spreading over the last couple of weeks about aliens and some sort of advanced alien transport device. For the whole world, he admits that for more than nine years, the U.S. military has a program that allows them to transport them instantly to other alien worlds in matter of seconds through what is known as a stargate. The rest of his speech about the program is about details of how the device works and what they have done up and till this point. He points out that the teams who go through the gate are professionals and heroes in their own right, who have saved the world on more than one occasion, referring to the invasion fleet of Apophis and Anubis that were destroyed in orbit, and many others, but leaving out the Prior plague. They felt that it was wiser to point out the positive effects o the program, revealing the many alliances Earth has formed over these years with the Tok'ra, The Asguard and Atlantis.
He than give a signal to turn of the lights and turn on the projector to show pictures of the Stargate, the SGC, of the Alpha, beta and the newly build Gamma site and even the Daedalus class battle cruisers and the Prometheus. The lights are turned on again and the president than tells of the newly outpost in the Pegasus galaxy that would benefit Earth even more, now that they have access to information far beyond their current technological level. Not to mention that they also reveal the information about the Alterians, who built the Stargate network and that we are the second evolution of this form. An anxious Elizabeth walk towards the stage and thanked the president. She starts by revealing more information about Atlantis, but still keeps it limited. The last thing that they want is to shock everyone about the dangers that exist out there. Although what is revealed is shocking to the public, but is only a small portion of the truth. Telling everything immediately could result in problems. And they expect problems from the U.N., European and African Union and many other nations who take offense to the program.
After the press meeting, Elizabeth, General Landry and SG-1 return to Cheyenne Mountain to do their jobs. Elizabeth gates back to Atlantis, while SG-1 prepares themselves for a new mission. They follow the news reports of the various protests and riots over the world and how people were baffled by this new information, that some of the experts have a hard time believing this to be true. The U.S. government gets criticized by many people, even senators, who felt that they were kept out of the loop. There is a lot of criticism from civilian agencies towards the military and how they handled it. Some of them felt that the military handled the situation poorly, that with guidance from civilian agencies a decent policy could be set. Others feel that they could do a better job at handling the Stargate program. There is a lot of pressure from civilian agencies to hand over the Stargate to a more civilian controlled agency, a move the military currently is not thinking about. Major Davies has a lot of work ahead of him, trying to convince the public opinion that keeping the Stargate under control of the U.S. military is a good thing, even if they have to answer to a civilian organization like the I.O.A. which the military says they don't mind at all. Everywhere it is the same story, people can't believe what they were told by their governments. First they are amazed by it, but that soon passes as greed and selfish needs starts to take control over the debates.
A couple of months later Elizabeth comes back through the gate for a meeting with the I.O.A. Something she doesn't really look forward too. With the new threat of the Asurans and reports that they have the capability of getting to Earth is something that upsets them. And everyone else who knows about the threat of the Asurans. Although the replicators were destroyed a couple of years ago during their invasion of the Milky Way, these replicators are somewhat different. Samantha Carter are the ones waiting for her, to accompany her to the meeting since their presence are also requested.
Elizabeth steps through the gate and greets Sam, who welcomes her back to the SGC.
'Thanks. How are things here on Earth. How is the world coping with the news of the stargate program?' Elizabeth curiously asks. She hasn't been kept in the loop of how things are going on Earth after the revelation of the stargate program. They start to walk through the corridors while talking, heading towards the briefing room where the meeting will take place.
Sam informs her over the situation. She tells that she doesn't really follow it, but knows enough to see that she thinks that they revealed to much. She fears that the world wasn't ready for it yet. 'Over the next couple of weeks and months after the revelation, religious extremists causes protests, claiming that this new information is a outright lie, that mankind isn't the second evolution, that they were made by God. In the west, these protests are albeit peaceful, but not always. In some third world countries, these same protests by Christian, Muslim and even Jewish extremists are anything but peaceful. Embassies of Western countries were attacked and in some instances sacked. This in turn caused outrage and criticism by western nations that these countries don't do enough to protect their embassies. While the religious side seem to pose a threat to the program, another threat is emerging, one that we have dealt with before with the rogue NI.D. It seems that various multinationals see this as good news for them, as potential new markets for their products on other worlds. Not to mention that some companies want to mine on some of these worlds for minerals, gold, etc… They see potential in this, as they can hire locals to do the mining for little money or no money, so that the profits are even higher than on Earth. If this move is allowed, this would mean that entire companies could move to another world to build there and send the finished products back to Earth through the gate or by ship, which would result in more poverty on Earth.'
'I seriously hope you are kidding, major?'
'I wish I was, doctor. I wish I was kidding.'
'Don't they see the potential this has for Earth and for our own future? We have learned more in these ten years about our places in the universe and about the universe itself, than in the last hundred years, and you are telling me, that they object to this or only are interested in making more money.'
'I'm afraid so, doctor. It seems that the news of the stargate program has brought out the worst in us. Keep in mind that the political side has not fully grasped the news yet, so the backlash can take a while before it starts to show.'
'How are things in the Milky Way, with the Ori invasion fleet?'
'Not so good. The Free Jaffa Nation can't stand their ground against the Ori invasion. They are losing ground really fast. We estimate that it would take several months before the Ori ships start to show up in our solar system. At this point, we are still not sure if the ancient outpost will be more than able to destroy them.'
'Let's hope for all of us, that it will be sufficient. We still have to deal with the Asurans and the Wraith. Our latest reports seem to suggest that the civil war that is plaguing the Wraith keeps them from going after us, even though some of them are aware of our presence. They haven't done anything yet that suggests that they are looking to attack us again.'
'At least some good news can be shared at the meeting.'
'I don't know. The Asurans are a greater threat than the Wraith. I think it was John who suggested that we try to set the Asurans up against the Ori and see who survives the battle. A kind of Ori vs. Asurans war sort of speak.'
'I don't really know him, but he seems to remind me of General Jack O' Neill.'
'Well they do share somehow the same sense of humor.'
Upon their arrival in the briefing room, Woolsey is also present. They start the meeting by discussing what the options are to deal with the Asuran and Ori threat. Sam points out that the Sangrall is their only hope for defeating the Ori and their followers, but at the moment she doesn't know how to deal with the Orici or with the Ori invasion fleet. At the moment, Sam points out that the Ori have not established a second supergate to replace their first one. This could mean that they either are not aware of that their gate is useless to them or they are confident enough that they could conquer the galaxy with just three ships. At the moment, they are still working on a plan to defeat the Ori and possibly even defend Earth if it comes under attack.
Within six months are the revelation of the Stargate program, several African and a couple of middle eastern governments were overthrown and replaced by a regime that it outward hostile towards the west, and towards the Stargate program. Some European countries have expressed criticism of how things were handled so far, which resulted in the I.O.A. became a agency of the United Nations. Some countries have expressed the desire to use the gate to start building colonies on some of these worlds, while others expressed the desire to conquer other worlds. Some religious groups, who always had the strong desire to proselytize have pointed out that most of these explored world do not worship their God and that if there is any alliance between Earth and them that they must convert to Christianity and Islam as they feel that their religion is the only true faith. Hostile governments they can deal with, but religious extremism is a though nut to crack. Members of SG teams are approached by several religious groups in a attempt to proselytize them and through them, the explored worlds in the galaxy. Although most resist these attempts, some do fall for the tricks of these groups. This means more work for General Landry as he now not only has to worry about the alien invasion fleet, but also about his own men, who would start spreading their religion in a similar manner like in the past. He knows that this could strain any alliances Earth already has formed over these years. In any way, Stargate Command has a lot of challenges ahead of itself. No one knows what the future will hold, but one thing is certain: it will be a difficult road ahead as they will have to deal with both external and internal threats to secure a promising future among the stars.