A/N: Just a little story I thought up. I should get on with my other story, but I couldn't resist this very silly idea...

Cometh the hour, cometh the man

CMSgt Walter Harrimen sat and stared out of the window of the control room at the ancient ring sitting innocuously in the next room. Nothing was happening – well, as close to nothing as the SGC ever got. All that had managed to go wrong during his shift so far was a blown lightbulb, a reboot of the dialling computer, SG-14 coming in hot having been ambushed by the Goa'uld, a broken generator, and Siler being put in the infirmity trying to fix said generator.

Yep. For the SGC in the middle of the night, not much at all. Not like the previous few days, which were some of the busiest Walter had ever seen at the SGC.

But, as Walter had once said to another technician, a team could be about to come through the gate at any second, under fire and needing the medical team.

Of course, he'd said that right before the gate in question had vanished from the gate room, so he wasn't going to think that thought now.

Walter's thoughts were interrupted by the unmistakable sounds of the Stargate dialling in, and the chevrons locking into place. The SF teams stormed into the gateroom as the iris slid shut and Walter yelled into the microphone the inevitable phrase:

"Unscheduled offworld activation!"

"Any ideas who?" said General Hammond as he jogged into the room, still wearing his coat – he had obviously only just arrived for the morning.

"Receiving IDC sir – it's SG-9. Opening the iris. Also receiving audio-"Walter replied as he turned the volume up. They heard the unmistakable sounds of gunfire and energy blasts coming through the speaker, just before a staff weapon blast flew through the opening iris and slammed into the concrete, blowing a sizeable hole in the concrete near Walter's head.

"SG-9 coming in hot! Closing the blast doors -" Walter's attention flicked up to the monitors now showing video images of the gate room. More blasts filled the air as the SF's ducked for cover around the room. Two people stumbled through the gate and threw themselves on the ramp. Tense seconds past before two more figures flew out of the wormhole and onto the ramp, so fast they almost made it to the concrete beyond.

"Closing the iris! Medical team to the gate room!" Walter shouted as he hit the palm scanner with one hand while raising the blast shields with the other.

"Could we just program the computer to say your catchphrases instead of having to pay you?" quipped Hammond as he hurried out the room to check on SG-9.

Walter cautiously knocked on the door of General Hammond's office. He really didn't want to add to the man's problems. SG-9's dramatic arrival that morning had only been the next on the list of the problems they'd been having. Virtually all the SG teams had been put out of action in some way this week – half of them were recovering in the infirmary from various ailments, and the other half were all already out in the field. There was a nasty flu bug going round, so half of all personnel were off sick anyway. Now Walter had some news he frequently delivered and always hated.

"Sir... SG-1 have missed their scheduled check-in time. We haven't heard any reports of the ship being destroyed either, so we must assume they have failed and been captured..."

SG-1 had been assigned to destroy yet another of Apophis' new types of ship. This one had some sort of special weapons power core or something, according to Major Carter, or so Walter had heard – he didn't pretend to understand what the geeks talked about most of the time. He just punched the chevrons. All he knew was that SG-1 had requisitioned a large amount of C4 before they had left.

Hammond sighed and put down his pen.

"I thought this might happen. Next time we get some intel from the Tok'ra I might be tempted just to ignore it... what options do we have for a rescue?"

"Well sir, not many. We hardly have any SG teams ready for action after the last week – I think SG-18 are the only ones in rotation at the moment."

"Have them gear up for a rescue, then Sergeant. Tell them to bring SG-1 home." Hammond replied with determination.

Walter waited a beat before replying.

"Sir, SG-18 are a diplomatic unit."

Hammond looked up, his brow furrowing.

"So they are. Well, who else do we have Walter?"

There was another pause.

"Well, there's you and me, sir..." Walter replied with a small smile, "but no front line teams, I'm afraid."

"I'll have to call the president on this one, see if we can't get someone in." the General replied, picking up the red phone. Walter took this as his cue to leave, and stepped out of the office, back towards the nice, safe control room.

Walter knew it wasn't good when he saw the General stride into the control room several minutes later. He did not look happy.

"I've been ordered not to attempt a rescue of SG-1, " Hammond started, before being interrupted by Walter.

"What? Sir, you can't do that. They've come through for us before – we owe them this..." replied Walter vehemently.

"Well, Sergeant, unless you can magic personnel out of thin air here, we have no-one to go. And the president won't give us anyone else, as 'no-one is available'. Kinsey's doing, I bet." Hammond sighed.

"But sir... we owe it too them to try."

"With who, Sergeant? You seem to be the only one not sick, injured, offworld or missing right now."

Walter looked around and realised the General was right. He was the gate tech left, and he'd hardly seen anyone else all day, even at the usually bustling corridors of the SGC. It was time for drastic action. SG-1 had saved Earth and along with it, him on multiple occasions – now it was time to repay the favour. Walter stood up to his admittedly short full height, wishing he had the presence Dr. Fraiser had when she wanted.

"Sir! Requesting permission to go through the gate and rescue SG-1!"

General Hammond was so surprised he nearly fell over.

"What? You? Rescue SG-1? On your own? Do you realise how many Goa'uld there are on that ship?"

Walter realised he needed a different plan of attack.

"Sir! Requesting permission for 24 hours leave!"

Hammond looked Walter straight in the eye for a long moment. He sighed resignedly.

"Permission granted." The words had hardly left his mouth before Walter was a blur running down the corridor. General Hammond sat down heavily in Walter's seat and closed his eyes. Was the universe just playing a big joke him today, or was he dreaming?

Walter ran into the gate room passed the amazed SF team guarding the door. No longer was he wearing the blue jumpsuit and his headset. Instead, he wore black combat fatigues, an armoured vest and boots. He was carrying a zat and a pistol on his hip, a backpack full of explosives and sharp things, a shotgun over his shoulder, and an assault riffle was cradled in his arms. He jogged up to the start of the ramp and loaded his weapon.

Or he tried to, at any rate, as the magazine fell out when he let go of the handle.

Walter closed his eyes, and decided he would try to recover his lost pride. He turned and yelled for the gate to be dialled what he hoped was an impressive voice, while slamming the magazine back into the rife.

The magazine stayed in... but the sounds of the gate dialling were conspicuous only by their absence.

He waited a beat before turning around to see what was happening. Behind him the SF at the door had not managed to pick his jaw off the floor. Behind the glass of the control room, he could see General Hammond at the console – hitting random buttons on the console. After a moment, the General keyed the microphone hesitantly.

"Walter... I think you're going to come and dial it yourself..." he said sheepishly.

Walter's shoulders slumped as he turned and trudged back to the control room. So much for looking like SG-1, he thought.

Several minutes later, Walter once again stood at the bottom of the ramp, this time facing an open wormhole. He heard the microphone come on again.

"You have a go. Good luck and godspeed... Walter." the General announced. Walter snapped off a crisp salute before turning to face the wormhole. He began to walk up the ramp before he had an idea. He stopped. He loaded his rifle this time more successfully, and took the safety off.

Here goes.

Walter turned and charged into the wormhole, spraying bullets out of the rifle into the event horizon while screaming an unintelligible battle cry. Empty cases flew everywhere as he disappeared into the blue puddle, but the shouting reverberated around the concrete room for several seconds. The next sound to be heard was General Hammond's head hitting the console as the wormhole disconnected.