Out of the Woodwork

A/N: This story is set in "Urban Legends", a variant of Gryph's "Deep Water" universe, developed by Gryph and Laura Boeff. Stargate belongs to Showtime, MGM, Gekko, and Double Secret; Godzilla: The Series belongs to Toho and Tristar, Airwolf belongs to Bellisario and Universal, the Real Ghostbusters belong to DIC, Gargoyles belongs to Buena Vista. If you recognize anyone else, they're not mine either. No infringement intended for any of these. Story set after "Site Omega: Aftermath", an epilogue to G:tS episodes "Monster Wars". For those who haven't seen "Monster Wars", basic plot: telepathic aliens try to take over the world with mind-controlled mutations and spaceships, only to be stopped by H.E.A.T.

~*~*~*~*~

Seated behind his heavy oak desk in the bottom of Cheyenne Mountain, General George Hammond regarded the pile of paperwork on his desk with a scowl that could sink a battle cruiser. Three SG teams were currently off-world and in trouble. SG-9 was trying to negotiate a treaty with a hybrid Asian-Aborigine culture that engaged in friendly bouts of competitive skull-bashing and didn't understand that American craniums just weren't up to the strain. The Tok'ra had sent another of their not-so-politely-worded demands for SGC assistance; Hammond was staring at it cross-eyed trying to figure out how the alien resistance group meant to screw his people over this time. And SG-1 was in the infirmary, Major Carter and Teal'c sedated to the teeth while Colonel O'Neill and Dr. Jackson waited, worried, and (in the archaeologist's case) scratched under casts. Again.

We're in a war, the general thought bleakly. A small war, a guerilla war; a war the Powers That Be had decided the rest of the world might never hear about. Until the System Lords finally wised up, decided Earth broke the Protected Planets treaty just by existing, and sent a fleet of Goa'uld pyramid ships to blast their planet to smithereens. And we're losing.

A familiar rap at the door; Naomi Jarvis, ready to dump another pile of bad news on top of worse news. "Come," he sighed.

The neatly-dressed secretary kept her expression bland, handing over a plain manila folder. "I think this needs attention immediately, sir."

Of course it did. Didn't everything? "Thank you, Ms. Jarvis," Hammond said civilly, flipping open the folder as she departed. Might as well skim the bad news, at least-

Fire-breathing wyvern spotted in dogfight over Scotland coast, he read off the top sheet.

"What?"

Unknown vessel defends Easter Island. Winged 'demons' attack invaders in Guatemala.

"Ms. Jarvis!"

The door swung open; apparently she hadn't gone very far. "You bellowed, sir?"

Damn lucky she was a civilian. He'd tried keeping a petty officer in the position. They kept asking to get transferred to combat roles. Scuttlebutt had it they said it was safer.

The general rattled the pages. "What is this?"

Naomi didn't so much as turn a neatly-combed hair. "Research's follow-up on the Site Omega situation, sir. You did want to know if we had any other… non-governmental assets to call on. Besides Dr. Tatopoulos' team."

In case the Hivemind tried invading again. Aliens that scared the Goa'uld; very nasty customers. "Ms. Jarvis. Godzilla and H.E.A.T. are quite well-documented. But wyverns-"

"Everything in that file was corroborated with video, audio, and/or multiple eyewitness accounts, sir." She stood at a loose approximation of attention. "Will there be anything else?"

"No. Thank you." As the door closed, he turned back to the Tok'ra request, eyeing the scanty details one more time. Maybe he should bring this down to Dr. Jackson, have their chief linguist see if the Tok'ra had skated over pertinent information in translating to English….

And his gaze slipped back to a plain manila folder. He'd asked for this report almost as soon as the dust settled on Monster Island, as soon as he'd realized how little damage the alien invasion had done. An entire fleet had hit Earth - yet the various nations had been able to pass most of it off as just more "monster attacks". It didn't make sense.

Damn it, now she'd gotten him curious.

Opening the folder, Hammond took another look.

Black helicopters. Mutant snakes. Creatures out of myth and legend. Across the globe, the Hivemind's invasion had clashed head-on with defenders Earth's military hadn't even known existed.

Broken down by locality, the general observed, making notes of various governments for the State Department to contact. Carefully. The very fact that these defenders had apparently popped up out of nowhere implied they weren't with governments.

Which might not be a bad thing, Hammond thought, considering the intelligent dust storm that had apparently sprung up spontaneously in the Rub' al Khali - a piece of the Middle East so dry and deserted it was called the Empty Quarter. Not so empty now, with the bits of techno-organic wreckage scattered through it. Hate to see that aimed our way.

Flipping back to North America, he considered New York. That city should have been one of the hardest-hit places - its native mutation had been half a world away, helping H.E.A.T. wreak havoc on Site Omega - yet the City That Never Sleeps seemed all but unscathed. No one was quite sure why. The most coherent reports pointed to a massive defense mounted from a former Manhattan firehouse. Other, more hysterical accounts mentioned one hell of a light-show from the Xanatos' Eyrie Building.

Hammond drummed fingers absently on oak. I wonder if we could stretch the budget for a few particle beam rifles? They wouldn't be good for off-world; frequent recharges weren't available on most planets. But for on-base defense, they might be worthwhile.

Ice creatures in Canada…. Hammond turned the page. Monster worms in Mexico… L.A.?

If New York had ten pages, Los Angeles had forty. Reports had come in of everything from one of the aforementioned black helicopters flying cover over Edwards Air Force Base, to an unidentified blonde snapping cops out of the aliens' mind control, to "a curly-haired guy in a red suit" steering falling ships away from school buildings. The amount of bent, damaged, and just plain vaporized Hivemind spaceships in the area boggled the mind. As did the thought of tracking down all the film currently in Hollywood of the alien attack.

Not a chance, the general thought with a certain amount of grim satisfaction. The government would try; no doubt of that. But inevitably, some would slip through their fingers.

Hammond was career military. Air Force blue was in his blood. If the President and Joint Chiefs decided information on aliens was best kept classified, he'd be the last person to leak it to the press.

But, dammit! People had a right to know why their world had almost come to an end. And that it might happen again. Soon.

And now the word's going to get out. One way or another.