Ponies and Pixie Sticks
Daniel turned to Jack, who was dressed in BDUs and looking a bit apprehensive. Teal'c was at the bottom of the ramp, inspecting the containers while keeping an eye on Vala who was rummaging through an open one. Cam stood off to the side, taking a few wary glimpses at Jack. He had learned during his 200th mission that stepping through the gate with the General usually meant subterfuge and running.
"So did Col. Sheppard say why he wanted us all to come through the gate, Jack?" asked Daniel.
"Nope." Jack rocked back onto his heels, hands stuffed in his pockets. "But Carter wasn't there so I'm a bit worried. Figured he didn't want to tell me he lost her."
"Did he loose her, sir?" Cam spoke up as he adjusted his cap.
"If he did, then all of this packing has gone to waste. Do you have any idea how hard it is to shop for lingerie for another woman?" Vala spoke up as she locked the last container and sauntered up to the ramp. "Let's go then – see what our Sammie has gotten herself into this time."
Jack looked at Vala, a bit stunned, "She lets you call her Sammie?"
"Of course not, but she is in another galaxy."
Daniel rolled his eyes as the gate swooshed open and SG-1 stepped through…and into a City utterly destroyed. Plants were tilted on their side, holes were burnt into many of the walls, and every member of the expedition looked terrified – as if they had seen their worse nightmare come to life. Col. Sheppard was slumped on the stairs in front of them, wearing a three-day beard and looking as if he had had no sleep in that same time frame. Ronon stood next to him, looking pale and shaky, and that scared Jack more than anything.
"Sheppard, you mind telling me what happened and why Carter isn't here to say hello?'
John ran a hand through his hair and let out a deep breath. "Well, Sir, I'm just glad to see reinforcements."
"Shit, they're coming."
John was interrupted by Ronon, who then jumped off the stairs and tried in vain to hide behind Teal'c. The rest of SG-1 reached for their side arms and stared in horror as Teyla was dragged down the hallway by two tiny creatures. They both had mops of curls on top of their heads and were wearing Atlantis uniform shirts that dragged on the floor behind them.
It took a moment for Jack to figure out that one of the creatures was a boy and the other a girl; and as he scanned the room, he watched as everyone took a step backwards to let the trio pass, their faces passive with fear. Jack took the stairs two at a time, then knelt in front of the little female creature, whose face was smudged with dirt and the hems of her sleeves slightly burnt.
"Sam?"
The face stared at him, and then broke into a tiny-toothed grin. "General! You come to play wif us! I told you he'd come play wif us, Wodney."
"Oh holy fuck," swore Jack.
Two sets of eyes stared at him in horror. Little Rodney, who bore a bizarre liking to those weird pale figurines Sarah use to collect, poked Jack in the leg before declaring, "You said a bad word! Teyla – send him to his room!"
Teyla, who was clearly the smartest person on Atlantis, rolled her eyes and placed the kids' hands onto Jack's legs and walked away. Jack tried to ignore them, which was almost impossible to do as they wrapped jam-covered hands around his legs and demanded his attention by yanking on his pants. He turned to Sheppard to find out just what the hell had happened.
"We have no idea, Sir. We were off world and went into an Ancient temple-thing. Carter and McKay started touching stuff. Then there was glowing and they," Sheppard gestured to the moppets who were attempting to climb Jack's legs like monkeys, "were there and it's been a nightmare ever since."
Daniel spoke up, his voice tight with either laughter or horror, but more than likely laughter. "How long ago and were there any writings I can take a look at?"
"Two days. And they used the paper the writings were on to draw me a picture," John replied.
"In two days, two toddlers managed to bring Atlantis to the point you called in reinforcements and a General?" Cam wasn't even pretending to find this the funniest thing he had ever seen in his life.
"Two super-genius toddlers with the Ancient gene and enough of their memory to not only know us, but how to rewire ZPMs, want to fly jumpers, and want to build bombs. Plus, they still need to beat each other at everything, and I, sir, cannot take this anymore. They were yours first, take them back now, I want my city back." John crossed his arms and tried not to pout. However, he'd spent an hour convincing Zelenka and Lorne that putting toddlers on a raft and out to sea was not a suitable punishment. Lorne, the crafty bastard, had pointed out that most toddlers don't fly a space ship into a wall because they're too short to see over the panel.
In the end, the only thing that saved the toddlers was themselves, for they crawled into their persecutors' laps and planted wet baby kisses on them while promising to be good. Zelenka just about had an aneurysm as little Rodney wrapped his cubby arms around his neck and told Radek he loved him and he only wanted to make the ship go faster as a present. Col. Carter, or Sammie as she insisted everyone call her, just stood in Lorne's lap and attempted to put pink plastic barrettes (and just where she had gotten them, John had no idea) into his hair while Lorne tried hard not to drop her and run away.
Jack pinched the bridge of his nose, pushing back the headache he could feel coming upon him before asking, "I take it you all are trying to figure out a way to fix this?"
"Uh, yeah. Dr. Keller has barricaded herself in her lab with Dr. Zelenka and a few others. They said they won't come out again until they've figured out a cure," John said, looking like he wanted to join them in their sanctuary. Jack didn't blame him.
Jack contemplated sending for Dr. Lee, who had kids and could maybe handle this situation with more grace than the rest of them, when he realized the twosome had stopped jabbering and were no longer attached to his legs. As all parents knew, silence was not always golden and when he saw them sucking on paper straws with Vala, he tried not to panic. "You gave them pixie sticks? Are you out of your damn mind giving straight sugar to kids? Why the hell did you bring them to Atlantis in the first place?"
"What? Sammie likes pixie sticks, don't you, you pretty little girl," Vala answered as she reached down and ruffled Sammie's hair. The little girl looked up at the mention of her name, her lips and tongue a shiny pink from the food coloring and nodded her head in fervent agreement.
"I love pixie sticks! Dey are yummy. Wodney likes them, too." Sammie stuck a sticky finger out at Rodney, whose shirt was streaked with blue pixie stick dust, and poked him in the chest. Rodney poked her back. Sammie retaliated with a harder poke, Rodney shoved her and they were off - running around the containers brought from Earth, dodging the legs of grown-ups frozen by indecision, and either poking each other with fingers or whapping the other with the paper remains of their sticks.
The team from Earth suddenly had a clearer idea of just how things had devolved on Atlantis as the volume increased with each lap the kids took around the gateroom. Daniel was baffled that his calm and collected friend could even act like this; Cam kept having to yank his pants back up, because with each pass, four little hands would yank on them; Teal'c was looking more than little flustered; and Vala had decided that perhaps having a daughter bent on the destruction of the Universe was a good thing compared to this chaos (she also hid the rest of the pixie sticks at the bottom of the crate). John and Ronon just sat back and relaxed for the first time in days – this wasn't their problem anymore. Jack resorted to the age-old fall back plan of every harassed parent.
"Hey kids, I'm sure there are toys for you somewhere in those cartons," he yelled. Rodney came to an abrupt halt and Sammie ran right into the back of him.
"What kind of toys?" Rodney asked.
"Surprise toys," Jack replied. Rodney folded his hands in a move eerily similar to his adult self and narrowed his eyes. This might be harder than Jack thought. In the mean time, Sammie had gotten up and was attempting to open the closest container to her.
"Is it a My Little Pony? I want a My Little Pony," she said. Rodney paused in his stare down with Jack to help her shove the top off a bit. Cam shook himself out of his daze to lift the top off for them.
"Ponies are stupid, Sammie," declared Rodney as he stood on his tippy-toes to peer in. "I want Legos."
"Ponies are not stupid, Wodney. Legos are stupid. You can't play pretty princess ponies wif dem." Sammie stomped her foot to make her point, her voice raising a bit as she glared at her arch-nemesis. Cam took a step back from the container.
"Are not stupid, you're stupid. You can build things with legos - like space ships."
"Am not stupid! You are!"
During their argument, John turned to Daniel to say, "Would you believe this is the exact same fight they had last week?"
Daniel huffed out a quiet laugh before replying, "Good thing we forgot to pack the "Mr. Wizard Home Science's Lab"."
John met Daniel's eyes, a look of resigned sadness in them, and told him, "They don't need the toy, Dr. Jackson, they have the labs here. And they used them."
"Oh god."
"That is enough!" The voice was deep and angry and loud enough that it stopped not only the conversation of the adults, but the toddlers as well. Teal'c stood over them, a towering figure of authority that made the bottom lip of Sammie quiver a tiny bit. Rodney caught the movement and in a moment of scientist solidarity, marched over to Teal'c and kicked him in the shin with his tiny, sock-clad foot.
"You made Sammie cry, you big meanie!" Teal'c ignored the frontal attack and simply scooped them both up and walked up the stairs.
"It is time for you both to nap. If someone could show me where they are sleeping, I will ensure they rest." Ronon followed Teal'c down the hallway. Jack let his shoulders drop and rolled his head around to relieve the tension. He turned to face the remaining people.
"Okay, we are not leaving here until this is fixed and this will be fixed by the end of the week."
End of the Week
A fully restored Col. Carter sat in a chair on the balcony, her feet propped up on a railing. Rodney was seated on the ground, back up against the railing, a bottle of vodka placed in the space between them. He took a sip of the glass in front of him and asked Carter, "Do you have any idea what they did to turn us back into our superior adult selves?"
Carter rocked back in her chair for a bit, head tilted to the left. "Not a damn clue. I think it involved some sort of ritual with a bean bag throw, but I just sort of hand waved it all. For once, I truly don't care about the how, just that I'm back to being me."
Rodney nodded in agreement before grinning up at her and saying, "Ya know, I used to think we should blend our genes and create super-babies, but after seeing the destruction we caused, that's probably a very bad idea."
Sam choked on her own drink before bursting out laughing. "Oh, god! A very bad idea! Do you think they'll ever talk to us again?"
"I doubt it; we made Vala cry and kept stealing Mitchell's pants. Thank god Dr. Jackson found it funny and took pictures. Think of all the leverage we have with the photos of Sheppard, Lorne, and Ronon submitting to playing beauty parlor with you."
Sam doubled over in laughter at the memory, which was hazy but still there. "I think they're more scared of you pulling out Lorne's paints to decorate the hallways and floors."
She rummaged through the top pocket of her BDUs before pulling out a pixie stick she had found buried in a container of books and DVDs. She ripped the top off with her teeth and poured half into her vodka, then leaned over to pour the rest into Rondey's glass. Raising her glass in a toast, she said, "To us – may that never happen again. Ever"