It was another day in the city of Millennium, once the crown jewel of the Alliance of Four Great Races. The nebula that housed it had begun another day cycle, the clouds glowing to mimic sunlight. The expedition had gotten up to perform their usual duties. Expedition teams prepared to explore new planets, scientists studied the countless alien technologies in the city.
Major Terra Nova was back in her wood shop, her left arm in a sling after what happened during her last mission. Whenever she wanted time to herself she would come here to work on her next project. But, with her left arm out of commission, there was only so much she could do. Most of the machines required two hands for safety and she could barely even feel the fingers in her left. With not much to do, she pulled out the wooden chest she had made and begun rubbing the coarse sand paper over its surface with her right hand. She always did prefer to do woodwork by hand anyways.
"Terra?" a voice called out. Nova looked up and watched as Corin walked into the room, his hands in the pockets of his blue hoodie.
"Corin, what're you doing here?" Nova asked. "You've never come here before."
"Well, I didn't really know where this place was," Corin Nevec explained. He always knew Terra would isolate herself in her woodshop but had never bothered looking for it since he knew she wanted to be alone. "I was playing some video games with Charles."
"I'm really beginning to think Martin might not be the best one teaching you about Earth culture."
Corin just shrugged and said, "It's still fun. Just wanted to make sure you're doing good."
"Yeah, I'm fine," Nova said with an awkward nod. She had always been so formal and professional that it seemed weird conversing with her teammates on a personal level. Chen was the only one who she felt comfortable around and that was because he was never forceful about it. If there was nothing to talk about he was perfectly fine with just sitting there. In fact, during her entire stay in the infirmary, Chen took every possible opportunity to check up on her even going as far as to sleep on a nearby hospital bed. She didn't expect or even want her other friends to go that far but, still, talking to them on a personal level just seemed weird.
"Look, I appreciate you checking up on me but-"
"What's that?" Corin asked, pointing at a slab of wood laying on the table.
"That was part of my next project," Nova explained. "I've jointed the edges and a face flat but I still need to plane it."
"Uh, what?" Corin coughed, picking up the slab of wood. Nova rolled her eyes. Normally it was the scientists who babbled terms that no one else understood.
"I made the edges and a face of the wood smooth and glued them all together," she translated.
"So what would you do with it now?" Corin asked. Nova paused for a moment. It looked like Coring knew she couldn't really work with one hand so he was offering to help her. She walked over to a button on the wall and pressed it, the dust collector humming to life. She gestured to the large machine in the center. It looked like a massive printer with a metal table right in front of a slot where the wood would be inserted. Nova pressed a button on the side and the machine came on. The room was already so loud that Corin couldn't even hear himself think. He knew Nova liked using hand tools but was beginning to wonder whether it was because she enjoyed the feel or just enjoyed being able to hear.
"I already adjusted the planer to the right height," she explained loudly. "Now feed the board into the slot long ways." Corin nodded and obeyed. He stepped in front of the slot and put the board on the metal surface in front of the slot and slowly slid it in. He could feel the board shift a bit as the gears seized hold of the wood and pulled it in slowly. It was only after the planer had started sawing away at the top layer of the board with a horrible grinding noise did Nova suddenly realize that Corin was standing in the worst spot possible.
"Oh, you might want to step to the side of that!" she called out but her words were lost to the sound of the machine.
"What?!" Corin called back but it was too late. A cloud of sawdust shot out of the machine and into Corin's face. He covered his eyes but the dust continued spraying him. It wasn't until the board finally came out the other side the machine stopped covering him in the fine powder. Nova quickly turned off the machine and the dust collector and looked at Corin. His entire body had been covered in sawdust, his brown hair now looking yellow and his hoodie sprinkled with the powder. He tried to brush it off but he would need a lot more than that to get all the wood shavings out.
"You know," Nova snickered. "You actually look good as a blonde."
-.-
Almost a dozen levels below the gate room was the power core. For safety reasons, the Alliance used several smaller power stations to power the city. The one in the central tower powered central city and Stargate Operations. The circular room was a mess of cables linked to the naquadah generators and the alien power sources the expedition has picked up over the months including the zero-point generator, a pale imitation of the Ancient zero-point modules, and the paragai, a fungus that the Nox have used as a power source. Eloran heat-sinks were devices that were usually strapped to Eloran laser lances, energy weapons that concentrate photons into a thin destructive stream, to prevent the weapons from overheating and melting the gun when fired were now installed to some of their systems to prevent overheating.
And in the center of it all was Jay Felger. Hey may have aged a bit but he still insisted on working with the SGC. He was honored when O'Neill recommended him to the Millennium Expedition. He knew the reputation he carried with him but today was a new day. He was going to change all that.
"What are you doing?"
Felger almost jumped out of his skin when he heard that, not expecting anyone to be down there with him.
"Doctor Dupond!" Felger exclaimed in surprise as a woman in a tech uniform walked in. "What're you doing here?"
"I manage the power systems," she explained suspiciously with a heavy French accent. "What are you doing here?"
Felger stuttered a bit, not sure how to respond. He was so confident in his upgrades but he knew that everyone else would be skeptical.
"Major breakthrough!" he said excitedly, rushing back to his computer. "I've been looking into ways to improve our power usage. If I did this right we should cut our power consumption in half!"
Felger could already imagine everyone's reactions. Their power was doing well for now but they would inevitably have to seek out new power sources again. He could already picture the scientists congratulating him on his upgrades, General Mercer shaking his hand in gratitude. It was beautiful.
"If you did it right," Dupond said flatly, clearly aware of Felger's reputation.
"It'll work!" he repeated, rushing to his computer station. "I've run dozens of simulations on this. Just a few more things and…" Felger hit enter with an excited "There we are!"
Felger watched eagerly as the number representing the rate of power consumption went down. His heart soared. He finally did something right. Then he watched as the power consumption went below the halfway line. Well, there would be a few kinks in the upgrades. The power levels continued sinking and so did Felger's heart.
There was a click as suddenly all the lights went out and the computer monitor went black. He could see the lights down the halls go out as well. He could hear the machines all across the building shut down. He could only guess that the power all across the base had probably gone out too. Even in the dark, he could feel Joan Dupond's angry glare on him.
"Fils de pute! What did you do?! You know I'm the one who has to fix this!"
"Um…sorry?" Felger whimpered. Dupond would now have to spend the next hour fixing what he messed up. He would help but he couldn't see anything. "Not again," he whimpered.
Stargate Millennium
General Mercer may have been an old man but he was not one to be reckoned with. Felger sat in front of the General's desk as Mercer continued his paperwork in silence. After a bit of tinkering from Doctor Joan Dupond, the power had been restored. Donavan rolled in and presented the General with the report on the sudden shutdown of the systems. When Felger had first met him, Mercer seemed like such a friendly guy, almost like a grandfather. But now, he could only wait for his wrath.
"Doctor Felger," Mercer finally spoke. "I hope you have an explanation for what just happened."
"Yes, sir," Felger stuttered. He remembered what it was like to be scolded by General Hammond and he could only imagine Mercer exploding in rage. "I was very close to a breakthrough on our power usage. Very close… I thought I could cut our power usage."
"And it appears you succeeded," Mercer stated, looking at the papers. "You reduced our power usage to ten percent. It was fortunate the computer prioritized life support and chose to sacrifice power from everything else."
"I don't understand why it did that," Felger said. "It worked fine in all the simulations. Look, I just need a few more tries. It'll improve the efficiency of our power usage."
"Yes," Mercer said skeptically, pushing aside the papers. "I spoke to Doctor Dupond about that. According to her, the efficiency remained the same."
Felger paled. He was so sure that he had improved the systems, so sure that this was the turning point. Now it looked like another screw up to add to his long list.
"I can fix that!" Felger insisted. "I know what went wrong. I just need to fix a few things; dot a few I's, cross a few T's." He watched Mercer leaned forward. He could feel the old man's eyes piercing through his soul. He had originally been grateful that Mercer had not exploded in fury but now, he would prefer if the General did.
"Only Doctor Dupond and the members of her engineering team are assigned to work with our power supply," Mercer reminded him. "If you really did have a way to improve our power usage, why did you not send it to her for approval?"
Felger's heart could've stopped. He knew that if he came up with an idea that would help the expedition he would have to pass it through the heads of the department. But this would mean sharing the credit. Everywhere he went, Felger has been recognized as a complete failure. Even if he would get partial credit if his upgrades worked, he wouldn't get enough to change his reputation. He wanted people to stop looking at him and see a child playing with matches near a powder keg. Hammond, Landry, O'Neill, they have all wanted to be rid of him.
"I am very familiar with your reputation, Doctor," Mercer said slowly. "Back in the SGC the option of firing you came up several times. However, we are in a different galaxy so I will not 'fire' you from your position."
"Oh thank god," Felger breathed.
"That being said, I will not have anyone be dead weight to this expedition. I give you this one warning: if I have to deal with your screw up one more time, I will assign you to the sewage and waste disposal unit instead."
All of a sudden being fired seemed like the ideal punishment. Millennium's waste processing system was thousands of years old, prone to clogging and sometimes they had to find other ways to dispose of waste. They had found a space gate in orbit around a planet with a thick atmosphere and there were debates on whether or not they could send it through and let the waste get incinerated in the planet's atmosphere. But this still meant gathering the stuff.
"Are we clear?" Mercer asked Felger menacingly. All of a sudden this old man seemed like a monster from his nightmares.
"Yes, sir," Felger whimpered.
"Good. You're dismissed."
The General watched as Felger waddled out of his office before giving an irritated sigh. His desk-com beeped as Donavan's voice came on.
"Sir, Doctor Chen's here."
"Send him in."
The door to his office hissed open and Steven Chen steps in. Chen wasn't a prodigy like Carter or Hailey but he got the job done.
"You called, General?" he said cordially. Mercer waited for the door to hiss shut before speaking.
"Doctor, I was hoping to ask a favor from you."
"A favor…" Chen repeated. General Mercer was the leader of the expedition. What he says, goes.
"I can make it an order if you'd like."
Chen slowly took a seat, not sure where this conversation was going.
"I am sure you are familiar with Jay Felger," Mercer explained. He could see Chen instantly cringe at the name. Chen had stayed on Millennium instead of going back to Earth but if he had he probably would've made sure Felger never set foot inside the city of Millennium.
"I really wish I wasn't. This isn't about yesterday's blackout, is it?"
"Doctor, at the moment your team is suspended from off-world exploration until Major Nova fully recovers from her injuries. I would like you to oversee Felger's projects until that time."
Chen stuttered in protest, not sure where to start. "Why me?"
"As I said, your team is suspended from exploration until Major Nova recovers."
"Well, what do you want me to do?!"
"At best, see if you can…mentor him."
"Mentor him?!" Chen repeated. "Colonel Carter couldn't mentor him. What do you think I can do?"
"I am not sure but he is better off learning from you rather than preparing his next failure," Mercer explained. "Colonel Carter has always attested to his potential. Or are you saying you know more than Samantha Carter?"
Chen felt like he just swallowed a rock. Carter had faith in Felger and was willing to give him chances but Chen had no faith in the man. He would sooner trust a child to defuse a bomb than trust Felger to get something right. Still, he could not bring himself to openly question Carter's opinion on something, a woman who is clearly his superior.
"Fine," he said stiffly. Chen could not help but feel he got played as a smile spread across General Mercer's face.
"So glad we can see eye to eye," the old man said.
-.-
Lunch came and Chen could've splatted his face into his fried rice. He had no idea what he could do to help Felger. He could've been assigned to teach a dog how to program a computer and he would still yield better results.
"Look, the General said you don't have to teach him," Martin said after Chen told him about what happened. "Just make sure he doesn't do anything stupid." Chen looked at Martin.
"Stupid is what he does," Chen barked. "If we could measure stupidity they would be measured in Felgers."
Martin continued eating his cereal. Weetabix always gets soggy real quick so he couldn't just let it sit in the milk.
"What does Corin have to say about this?" Martin asked.
"Haven't seen him all day," Chen had begun to say when he spotted Corin and Nova approaching the table, trays of food in hand.
"Hey, what I miss?" Corin asked sitting down. Martin and Chen didn't answer, both of them staring wide-eyed at Nova when she sat down with him.
"What?" she asked, taking a seat next to Corin.
"It's just that…" Chen said.
"You never eat with us," Martin finished. Nova shrugged and looked at her team.
"Maybe I just changed my mind," she said casually. "What's going on here?" Chen and Martin exchanged glances, thoroughly creeped out.
"Well," Chen said, clearing his throat. "Mercer just assigned me to babysit Doctor Felger."
Nova paused when she heard this. "Doctor Felger, as in Jay Fail-ger?" she asked. Even people outside the scientific community knew about him.
"Yeah, I'm babysitting Jay Fail-ger."
"Get the painkillers ready," Corin remarked. He and Martin laughed at this statement. Nova gave a chuckle but she knew that Chen was genuinely frustrated by this and she wanted to help.
"Maybe you're being a little too hard on him," Nova suggested. Chen looked at her as if she just went insane.
"What?" he coughed
"Well, think about what we talked about when I was still in the infirmary," Nova explained. Chen remembered everything they talked about while she was still hospitalized, the similarities of their past, how they both were once screw-ups that destroyed their families but got a second chance to redeem themselves. "Maybe he just never got a second chance…"
Chen put his face in his hands. It would've been so easy just to simply dismiss Felger as a failure and an idiot. If he really was going to mentor Felger, he was going to need help. Had this been at the SGC, he would've sought Carter for help. But Carter was not around; he will have to settle for the next best thing.
-.-
Jennifer Hailey was back in her lab. Like Carter before her, she truly found the scientific advances made by the stargate fascinating. And the one thing she loved screwing around with most of all were the weapons. She had one of every alien weapon discovered thus far lined up on a rack beside her. Ror'char ion rifle, storm rifle, blast cannon, and carnifex pistols; Quinteran marauder rifles; an Eloran laser lance; even Fierri trazer rifles and trazer pistols.
Hailey picked up the laser lance and aimed it at the thick steel beam down the testing range. With a quick pull of the trigger, a beam of blue light streaked out of the rifle and hit the beam, the laser beam hitting its target with a violent bang, smoke and sparks flying from the impact while molten metal splashed across the floor. She looked up and examined the target as the smoke cleared. The steel beam now had a crater the size of an apple in it where the steel had been instantly melted and splattered everywhere.
She didn't know where to start when it came to fangirling over this weapon, this particle accelerator that fired a concentrated beam of photons at its target. The photons oscillated at a wavelength that would make it invisible to the human eye but excess photons still flew out of the beam at a wavelength human could see, hence the blue light.
A wolf whistle suddenly echoed from her doorway. Hailey glanced behind her to see Chen standing there, staring at the damage wrought by the laser lance. While the Ror'char weapons were better that still didn't mean the other alien weapons they found couldn't also be terrifyingly powerful.
"Can I come in or am I gonna get fried?" Chen asked, still staring at the steel beam.
"Nah, you can come in," she said, placing the lance back onto the rack. Chen stepped into the room but immediately wanted to run out.
"Dear god, what is that smell?!" he coughed, waving his hand in front of his nose. "Have you been doing this all day?"
Hailey shrugged at this question. "This is what I do for fun," she remarked. "You do martial arts; I shoot laser guns."
"Yeah, but my punching bags don't smell like burnt metal afterwards," Chen retorted. He looked at the rack of weapons Hailey had. She had been assigned to study these alien weapons so they could make improvements to the X699 or maybe develop other energy weapons. Chen could see the original X699 and the finalized product. It was amazing just how ugly the prototype looked, a giant plastic handlebar with a naquadah generator sitting on top and a blue glowing barrel. The naquadah generator was practically screaming 'shoot me' and one shot could not only destroy the weapon but cause it to explode in the wielder's hands. The glowing barrels looked cool but, once again, screamed 'shoot me' to the enemy. The finalized rifle was sleek and elegant. The overall design and shape was clearly inspired by the P90 but it had a much longer barrel and grip.
The steel bar was not the only thing Hailey had been testing down range. There were also plastic mannequins, paper targets, she had even set up a suit of Ror'char armor to test its limits. This was the instrument of their alien enemy that has caused them so much trouble: half full-body suit of armor that could absorb an absurd number of bullets, half powered exoskeleton that enhanced the wearer's performance, not enough to give them super speed or super strength but enough that they could push themselves to their limits without ever having to worry about fatigue.
This was actually the first time Chen got a good look at the armor worn by the Ror'char troopers. In the field, he was usually too busy doing something else, like surviving, to get a proper look and, even when he did, the armor was partially covered by a vest lined with pouches and pockets that would hold the trooper's equipment. But they were in the lab and Hailey had removed the vest. Now getting a good look at the armor it looked like a suit of armor worn by medieval warriors, like something worn by a knight or a samurai. Massive rectangular shields were attached to spaulders on the upper arm which would protect the trooper when firing. Chen could see the dents and scratches made by several dozen bullets. The trooper's entire arm would've been protected by this massive spaulder and by the bracers around the forearms; even the hands had metal gauntlets on them. The plates that composed the cuirass were scratched and dented from the battle that killed the trooper who wore it. Sturdy greaves protected the legs while interwoven metal plates protected the thighs.
Chen picked up the helmet, which sat on Hailey's desk. The thing was almost like a motorcycle helmet, the chin guard thinner and the tinted visor large enough that it would show the whole front of the face when lifted. He knew this helmet contained all the computer equipment needed to run the HUD and the machinery inside the trooper's power-armor.
As Chen put the helmet back down he peeked at a letter on her desk, quickly glancing over the text. It appears that Mercer had given Hailey permission to use the X699 on missions from here on out. He had dictated that every team needed to carry one alien weapon to even the odds against this galaxy's new threats and, after the destruction of Hailey's blast cannon, she has chosen to use the SGC's newest plasma rifle.
Hailey cleared her throat, making it clear that she did not appreciate Chen snooping around her lab.
"Is there something you needed?" she asked.
"Help," he said. "I've kinda been assigned to mentor Felger until my team's patched up."
"Well good luck with that one," Hailey scoffed wide-eyed. She certainly did not envy his position. "Wait a minute," she muttered, realizing that Chen came here to ask for help, not vent. "Aw, no! No!"
"Yes," Chen said bluntly.
"You want me to help you with Felger?"
"Carter always had faith in him."
"I'm not Sam."
"No, but you're the closest damn thing we got," Chen said. Even in her lab, Hailey's friendship with Samantha Carter was obvious. The most blaring example was a picture of her and Carter on their motorcycles during a night out on the town. "Both our teams are still out of commission. Terra's still hurt and McFree's still under psychological evaluation. I was picked since I have the most time followed by you, but I can't do this alone. Besides, let's face it. If we don't whip Felger into shape now, he'll be giving us trouble down the line. The way I see it, we're gonna have to deal with Felger eventually so we might as well do it sooner than later."
Hailey glared at Chen. She did not want to deal with the headache of Fail-ger but Steven was right.
"Alright," she conceded. "What do you have mind? What can we do that Carter hasn't?"
Chen fell silent. There was a reason doing something that SG-1 couldn't is considered an impossible feat. If they do this they would be doing something Samantha Carter never could.
"Well," Chen said. "She was a bit soft on him?"
"What do you mean?"
"Carter always said that Felger needed a little support; she tried to help him in an office, a lab, a place where he never felt pressure. Maybe if his life was on the line he might do things a bit different."
"As much as I would relish the opportunity, I don't think Mercer will let us put a gun to Felger's head," Hailey remarked as she sat down on a stool.
"Maybe not a real one. We brought VR training pods after our return from Earth. Do you think Mercer will allow us to run a sim of us and Felger trying to solve a problem while under fire?"
"You think that'll actually work?" Hailey asked.
"People work miracles with the right incentives," Chen shrugged. "You, the cadets you helped train, you guys were a mess until they put you in a position where you thought you had to face the real thing. You got taken to a moon. They thought they were facing a real foothold situation. Maybe Felger just needs to feel the pressure."
Hailey shrugged at this. They would have to ask Mercer permission to do all this but it was worth a shot.
-.-
The VR chairs were already set up in a lab near the base of the central city. Going down there was the equivalent of going into the catacombs of a city, but it certainly was a beautiful maze of tunnels, marble green white walls, pearly white pears acting as lights in the ceiling, and even a nice red carpet on the floor. The whole city had always looked like it was built with the most expensive minerals and gemstones on Earth.
Chen was already in the lab, boredly laying on a desk for Felger's arrival. Hailey was kicked back and was sorting through data on her tablet, which looked more like a pane of orange crystal. Kara Osborn finished setting up the medical equipment around the chairs before looking back at Steven.
"Can tell you look optimistic about this plan," she remarked as two technicians made sure the chairs were properly set up. Chen gave her a sideways glance, looking only half awake.
"I'm trying to train Doctor Felger," he muttered. "That tends to damper your mood."
"And I certainly do not pity you for that," she said. "But must you always use violence to solve things?" Chen looked at Kara as if she had asked the most ridiculous question in history.
"It's a VR," he said. "It's fake violence. Besides, I'm just worried he'll Felger it up and break something."
"It'll be safe once we're inside," Hailey remarked. "He just needs to get here in time."
"You didn't know?" Chen asked. "He never gets here in time."
As if to confirm Chen's statement, Felger practically rammed head-first into the door frame before stumbling in.
"I'm sorry!" he panted. He knew he was late and had to run across the city to get here. "Had this big project to finish and didn't want to leave it. Very important project…"
"I'm sure," Chen remarked flatly. He then noticed a small group of five people including Umar and Nova peeking around the corner. They had just watched Felger run in and wanted to know what was happening.
"God give me strength," Chen groaned. Not only did he have to deal with Felger but he had to have people watch him.
"So...uh...what's going on?" Felger asked ignoring the crowd. He knew half of them were watching him to see what his next screw up was to laugh at him and the other half were watching to see his next screw up to protect themselves from him. Hailey put down her tablet and stood up.
"General Mercer's assigned Chen to overwatch your activities," she said.
"Yeah, he explained to me. I mean, like, it won't be necessary. I'll be fine."
"We'll see," Chen said, sitting up. Felger hadn't even noticed him and paled as he got off the desk. "Here's the situation: you me and Hailey are going to have a few runs in the VR chairs. The current scenario we have loaded will have us infiltrate a lightly guarded Goa'uld stronghold where you will hack their computers and download some information. We get in, do our stuff, and get out."
"But…" Felger protested. "I'm part of the research team." At the moment, Felger was assigned to study retrieved alien technology and try to recreate them. While he could do things like hack a Goa'uld computer, a task he has done before, it wouldn't help him get any better in the lab.
"Yeah, but you were also once part of a field research team The hacking part of the sim is easier than what you usually do and the whole point is to see how you do under pressure. If you can accomplish this we can change the parameters of the VR to be more research based."
"Besides," Hailey added. "If you do good in the chairs, you might get added to a field or exploration team."
"Wait," Felger called out suddenly. "Aren't these the chairs that trapped Teal'c inside and nearly killed him?"
"Teal'c requested his scenario be set to its hardest difficulty and learn from him," Osborn explained. "His subconscious also wanted the consequences of getting killed to be as extreme as possible."
"We've set the scenario on medium difficulty," Chen explained. "And we've put fail safes so we can't accidentally kill ourselves. The software engineers have also patched the program so that you only need to concentrate hard enough and the chairs will boot everyone from the VR."
"Well, why the jaffa?" Felger asked, still wanting a way out of this. "Aren't we fighting the Ror'char?"
"We still haven't fought the Ror'char enough times to learn about their fighting styles or tactics," Hailey remarked. "Plus...the Ror'char are kinda harder to fight."
"It would be nice to finally fight something that doesn't need an entire mag to kill," Chen commented. "You think you can handle this?"
Felger scoffed at this question as if Chen had just asked if he could perform basic math.
"I got this!" he said smoothly as the technicians helped him into a chair. "I once rescued SG-1 from the First Prime Her'ak. I zatted a jaffa!"
The VR helmet slid on just as he said that, giving Chen and Hailey breathe a sigh of relief.
"I zatted a jaffa," Chen parroted. He couldn't tell if Felger was just trying to sound badass or if he believed his own nonsense. Everyone else was clearly amused by this statement and the moment he was in the VR, people started chuckling at what he said.
"Let's go," Hailey said, giving Chen a slap on the shoulder. She was helped to her chair as Chen stared at Nova, who still had her left arm in a sling.
"I blame you for this," he said flatly to her. He wouldn't have needed to baby Felger if Nova wasn't this badly injured.
Chen sat down in the VR chair and leaned back as the technicians hooked him up. He closed his eyes as the helmet was put on. He could feel the surge of electricity go through his body and when he opened his eyes he was not in a room in Millennium but outside in a forest with Hailey and Felger.
Hailey prepped her X699 while Chen cocked his M16. Felger stared at his pistol whimsically, wishing he had something bigger.
"C'mon," Chen said, pointing toward the pyramid in the distance. "Let's get this done."
"You know what, Chen?" Hailey chirped up. "I actually have a good feeling about this." She figured if Chen wasn't going to be optimistic she would be. "C'mon, how bad could it get?"
-.-
The doors to the computer chamber slid open and Felger dove inside as orange bolts of energy streaked into the room. Horus guards were in hot pursuit of them and Hailey and Chen rushed inside, taking cover behind the door frame. Hailey peeked out for a brief moment and fired on one of the jaffa, pelting him with energy bolts that flew through him like jello.
"Get to work, Felger!" Chen yelled.
"Just a game," Felger muttered to himself as he crawled to the computer console at the back of the room. Goa'uld text had been scrolling down the screen and the moment he touched the controls the screen rearranged itself and waited for input.
Chen peeked out from around the corner and fired a quick burst into one of the horus guards who toppled over in a storm of sparks. That's two jaffas down but three more rounded the corner. As Chen dove back behind cover he noticed Hailey with a massive grin on her mouth.
"What are you smiling at?" he asked.
"Brings back memories, doesn't it?" she asked.
"Just like old times, huh?" Chen snorted with mild amusement. He did have to admit, it did bring back memories of the good old days of just weeding out the last remaining Goa'uld and their jaffa.
He and Hailey both stepped out of cover and fired on the jaffa closest to them. Sparks flew out of the metal armor as bullets riddled his body while the other had the energy bolts go into his body and exit the other end with a brilliant flash of light, ash and ember exploding out of the exit wound.
Seeing his comrades fall, the third jaffa quickly withdrew from the hallway. He would need to wait for backup.
"Got it!" Felger yelled, yanking the memory crystal from the interface. Chen and Hailey exchanged surprised but optimistic glances when he yelled this. They had expected Felger to mess it up but he got it. Now all they had to do was get to the stargate. Even if he couldn't be part of the research team maybe he could be part of an exploration team or field team if he kept this up.
"Kree'nok, Jaffa!" a voice down the hallway yelled as a golden urn was thrown into the room, a glass panel on the urn flashing madly. It didn't take them long to realize that this thing on the ground was a grenade.
The moment Felger saw the grenade, he knew what he had to do. He knew the reason O'Neill recommended him to the Millennium Expedition was to get rid of him. He knew his reputation as a failure, laughed at by both military personnel and scientists. He knew he was nothing but a pain to both his boss and his co-workers. They had put him in this simulation because they did not think he could do even the simplest task. He needed something to turn his reputation around and this was it. He could already see Hailey preparing to grab the grenade and toss it back at the jaffa while Chen prepared to kick it out of the room. It was normal for them to do something like this but if he did it, it could be the first step to turning everything around. He could already see them applauding him for his quick thinking.
Felger lunged forward and grabbed the grenade before either of his teammates could touch it.
"Felger, wait!" Chen called out but it was too late. He raised the grenade far above his head and, with a triumphant yell, threw it as hard as he could. This was it, this was the moment everything changes. But as the alien grenade left his hand his excitement turned to horror. He had angled his throw too high; way too high. The metal urn bounced off the top of the doorframe with a clank and bounced back at Felger who just barely managed to catch it in his arms.
Felger prepared to throw it again while Hailey raced to do it for him. Chen didn't even bother, knowing that Felger had used up the grenade's detonation time. Steven barely even had a chance to utter "Crap," before the grenade exploded.
-.-
If this had happened in real life then it would've been a morbid situation that everyone would mourn. Had Felger made a screwup like this in real life, everyone would be enraged. But this was a virtual training simulation, a video game, and outside the VR everyone in the room burst out laughing at what they just witnessed on the monitors.
"You know," Nova said to Umar. "I actually thought he was going to make it."
"I'm almost glad he didn't," Umar replied. Even through his monotone voice and heavy Nigerian accent, Nova could hear his amusement. "This is going to be quite enjoyable."
"I'll make some popcorn!"
-.-
Hailey was beginning to wish this chair wasn't programmed so well. It was designed so that no two rounds are the same, jaffa guard locations different, hallways different, even their tactics different. This way it made sure the victory was through tactics and not simple memorization.
The computer console was more heavily guarded and they were now fighting twice as many jaffa. Felger was whimpering as his teammates held off the enemy forces, trying to ignore the chaos as he worked.
This was easy, at least it would've been if he could concentrate.
"Just a game," he muttered. "All not real, you'll just restart if you die…"
"Felger, what's taking so long?!" Chen yelled. It was now taking him twice as long to get the data. He prepared to fire again but suddenly the door began to close. He and Hailey stepped back as the door shut, sealing the jaffa outside and another door at the opposite end of the room opened.
"What just happened?" Hailey stuttered. They both looked at Felger for an explanation.
"I was able to hack their security systems!" he boasted, a smile on his face. He finally did something right. "I've closed every door in the pyramid but left a path for us to get out!"
"Felger, that's…" Hailey tried to say but her voice trailed off.
"Brilliant," Chen finished. Felger's face lit up with pride. They actually complimented him. Getting Hailey's compliment was especially amazing since she was handpicked by Samantha Carter.
"Come on," Jennifer said, tapping Chen on the back. The three of them raced down the hallway. It was obvious where to go since all other ways were blocked off. If Felger had done this right then this would lead them straight outside.
"What the?!" Chen exclaimed when he saw that the door ahead of them was shut. The trio stopped in front of the dead end, not sure what to do.
"Did we miss a door?!" Hailey shouted.
"Impossible," Chen said. "No way all three of us went past an open doorway without realizing it." They both stopped and glared at Felger, who turned pale. He was so sure he had done it right.
"This shouldn't be happening!" he said. "I closed all the doors except the ones to the exit."
"Obviously not," Hailey snapped.
"Jaffa, Kree!" a voice echoed down the hallway. At least one patrol had finally blasted through the sealed door and was racing down the hall.
"Alright, back up," Jennifer said. "I'm going to use a grenade to blow open the door."
"No point anymore," Steven replied bluntly, taking out a pistol, pushing the barrel into Felger's face, and pulling the trigger. If even one player died the sim would restart so this action was simply the reset button.
"Damn that felt good," Chen muttered as the game restart.
-.-
In the next round, the trio found themselves engaged in yet another firefight. They hoped to sneak past the guards but Felger's clumsiness had tipped them off. Hailey and Chen fired down the hallway at the five jaffa. Even Felger had taken out his pistol and began firing at the enemy. That was until his trigger suddenly got stuck. He looked at the gun in confusion. He wasn't out of ammo, the trigger was stuck.
"Hailey," he called out, tapping her on the shoulder. "Gun's stuck, what do I do?!"
Hailey groaned in annoyance that she had to stop to help Felger with his pistol. She took it from him and immediately spotted the problem. The bullet shell had gotten stuck while being ejected from the chamber. Felger was not used to guns except in video games. For him, you pull the trigger and they shoot. He has never seen a gun break like this before
"Stovepipe!" Hailey called out, taking the pistol from him. She ejected the mag before pulling the slider back and letting the empty bullet case fall to the ground. She slid the slider back and forth a few more times before sliding the mag back in, pulling the slider back, and handing the pistol to Felger. "There," she said before picking up her rifle and going back to the battle.
"So it works now?" Felger asked. He wasn't even paying attention to how he held the pistol as he looked at it. He was readjusting his grip when his finger brushed the trigger. He jumped in surprised as the gun went off in his hands. He looked up to see what he just shot when he noticed Hailey's angry glare back at him. He had somehow managed to shoot her directly in the chest. Chen had stopped shooting when he realized what was going on, knowing the restart would kick in any moment.
"Well," he said to Felger who could only gawk in embarrassment. "Good luck explaining this one to her."
-.-
For the next round, Felger's pistol was replaced with a trazer. At least he wouldn't be killing anyone by accident though the consequences of being shot by one might as well be the same. The pistol-style trazer fired a pellet of alien chemicals that would react when mixed releasing a massive amount of electricity that would overload the brain. If he accidentally stunned someone then they would be vulnerable to the jaffa.
Felger was a little disappointed but at least the alien stun gun still looked badass.
-.-
During the next round, they had gotten lost in the different pyramid structure. They were lucky enough to find a random computer console that they had Felger use to pull up a map.
"Here, it's this way," he said, trying to keep an image of the map in his head.
"You sure about that?" Jennifer asked, her rifle ready. "I think we should've found the main computer by now." What made this simulation even more frustrating was that she knew if it was just her and Chen then they could've easily done it and left. But no; they needed to have Felger be able to learn how to do things.
"I'm positive," Jay said optimistically.
"Felger, you should let us lead," Chen hissed from the back, not liking how Felger was in front of the group.
"Don't worry," he said. "It's right around this corner." He turned the corner and froze in his tracks. "NOT THIS CORNER! NOT THIS CORNER!" he screamed as he ran the opposite direction, jaffa hot on his heels.
-.-
During the next round, the trio was trying to sneak into the pyramid once again. This time Hailey and Chen made sure they were in front with Felger in the back. They could see the structure in the distance but it was still a matter of getting through the forest.
"Watch out," Hailey hissed, shoving Felger to the ground as she and Chen crouched down. She watched as a small patrol of jaffa marched by. They stayed low, relying on the camo of their uniforms and the underbrush to keep themselves hidden as the metal-clad warriors marched past.
"Looks like we're clear," Hailey said, looking around. "You two see anyone?"
"Negative," Chen barked, scanning the forest. Felger was not as fast to respond. When Hailey had shoved him down he ended up falling on his back and she had crouched down right above him.
"Yeah, got nothing," he stuttered awkwardly as her ass hovered over his face.
-.-
Outside the VR, everyone in the room had burst out laughing again. Even more people had shown up, curious what the excitement was and were now enjoying the show. Hailey may not have been able to see what Felger was seeing but everyone else could on his monitor.
"I think Major Hailey's going to personally kill Doctor Felger if she finds out," Umar chuckled to Nova.
-.-
During the next round, they had managed to sneak inside the pyramid but there was a small platoon of jaffa right in front of the door they needed to go through. Felger knew that Hailey and Chen would devise a plan. But he could still earn their respect if he came up with a good one first. Jennifer was about to give Felger commands but he immediately began gesturing, pointing at them, walked his fingers through the air, pointed at the jaffa, fist bumped the air, and waved his hand around, before ending it with a loud clap. He looked at the two, eagerly waiting for their approval. But all they did was stare back at him.
"At what point did you think we knew what that meant?" Chen hissed. Those words had just left his mouth when the jaffa came around the corner, staff weapons at the ready. The sound of Felger clapping his hands together has echoed down the hall. "Aw, crap."
-.-
That was enough. He had enough. Before the game could restart Chen concentrated a bit and the VR chairs ejected him from the simulation. It ejected all of them from the sim. Everyone else in the room may have been laughing but he was not. His patience had run out.
"Umm...Doctor Chen," Felger whimpered as Chen walked out of the room. He had enough.
-.-
Felger remembered how he felt Millennium was a good place to restart his reputation. He had hoped to be hailed as a hero, a brilliant scientist. Now it seemed like he was doomed to forever be the fool. Back on Earth, he would go to an old wood bridge if he ever needed space. Here, he went to the river walkway. The water that flowed through Millennium's sewage system came from an artificial river that flowed all around the city. The city would take in water from this river for use and purify the used water before returning it to the river. It wasn't a perfect system, the sludge taken from it needed to be disposed of, and scientists said that the river would need refilling eventually, but it did its job. The river water wasn't for drinking but it was still sparkling clear. The city had walkways that would let the river flow underneath it, letting residents stand and watch the crystal clear water. He couldn't help but wonder if there used to be alien fish in those waters. Didn't matter now. Now he just stood at the edge of the walkway, looking over the fence into the water. The city's day cycle was coming to an end and the glowing lights at the bottom of the river could be seen.
He gave a sigh, replaying the day's events in his head. He tried so hard to prove himself but failed each and every time.
He looked up to take a good look at the city. Light beamed through the windows of every building and he could even see through the second-floor windows of the nearest building. It was just then he noticed Chen in one of the windows. It looked like he had stepped out of someone's quarters and was staring out the window outside the door. It was then Doctor Kara Osborn stepped through those doors. Felger could see her and Chen talking about something before embracing each other. They gave each other one final look before walking away.
Curiosity soon took hold. Felger knew that Chen and Osborn were close but he didn't know why. And this was a good opportunity to find a way to get on Steven Chen's good side. It wasn't that he didn't want to change who he was, it's just that he didn't know how. He needed to know how he could get better and he needed to know what it would take to have Chen help him…
-.-
Kara Osborn had just sat back down at her desk when she heard the door chime. She stood back up and straightened her purple tunic before walking over and opening it.
"Hey," Felger said nonchalantly with a melancholy hand wave.
"Doctor Felger, come in," Osborn said, walking back to her desk. She may have been on a first-name basis with Steven and a few other members and a last name basis with Wolf Pack and the other exploration teams but she still referred to everyone else by their full title.
Felger had never been in Osborn's room before and he could not help but stare at the walls. Kara Osborn had fully moved in, decorating the place like it was her bedroom. He could see her dresser and mirror near the back. Her bookcase by the door was filled with not only medical books but English classics. Littered on each shelf were her pictures, taken from her vacations around the globe with her standing in front of or on some famous monument.
"Long day?" she asked humorously, tearing Felger out of his snooping. She figured that he would still be thinking about the massive botch up of a training session earlier. Felger just shrugged.
"Well, at least everyone enjoyed watching me screw up…again," he said. "I'm pretty sure Chen hates me more than ever. Then again, I'm pretty sure he hates everyone."
"Believe me, he doesn't," she said as she took her seat. "He wasn't always like this. He always had an attitude but he used to be a lot happier."
"You're joking, right?" Felger remarked. "Chen, happy?"
"You need to understand. Steven's been through a lot but if I had to fault him on something is that he cares too much. And if the Steven Chen I know is still in there, then he truly wants to help you but doesn't know how."
"How did you guys get to be like this?" Felger asked, sitting down in the chair in front of her desk. "Like, how long have you known each other?"
"College," she said casually. Felger couldn't see it but she pulled up an old picture saved on her computer, a picture of a younger her and Steven sitting on a bench, her head on his shoulder, a wide grin on her face. Chen's smile was much smaller but it obvious that it was genuine. "I went to Harvard in America for my study abroad program. Chen was studying at MIT but we ended up living in the same apartment building. Our first run-ins were all arguments; if you gave him attitude he wasn't afraid to return it. I guess that's how we became best friends and not long after we became an item."
"Why him though?" Felger asked. "Like, couldn't you find someone back in England?"
"Oh, I dated plenty of guys back home and I guess I wanted to try something new. And I did truly care about him. Besides, once you date one English boy you've dated them all."
Felger gave an awkward chuckle. He wanted to know about Chen's past but he didn't expect details from his love life. Still, there was on more question that needed answering. "So what happened then?" Felger asked. Kara's face sagged at the thought. There was no dancing around this subject.
"Steven always had a rough relation with his family. He lived under the shadow of his seemingly perfect sister and his parents were always on top of him to be like her. I don't doubt they loved him and wanted the best for him but they didn't give him a chance to live his life. Worst of all, his house was located in the heart of gang territory." Osborn gave a sigh. There was no dancing around this topic. "They were murdered right in front of him when he went to visit them. He survived but it…changed him. He was a lot darker…colder…angrier… We began fighting a lot more often, and it wasn't our usual stupid fights. Our relation was crumbling and I could see it happening. But, I still cared for him. So I ended it so we could always think back on the good times. I know Steven can be cold and abrasive but it's only because he cares and wants to help as many people as possible and he doesn't like taking any risks while doing so. Just give him a chance…"
-.-
Chen chose to spend the evening filing paperwork. He had enough action for one day. He had retired himself to his room, shuffling through some old documents. Along with all the new projects the engineers and scientists are working on, the Expedition had to keep track of all the projects they used to work on even back at the SGC or Atlantis. Some of these projects worked. The X699 had come a long way from the hideous and clunky thing that it started out as. Naquadah generators had smaller variations like the naquadah cell for smaller pieces of equipment. Then there were the less than successful projects. Looking over some of the concepts he could not help but wonder how these people even got the positions they had.
As he neared the back he paused on a particular document.
"Plasma weapon," Chen read. When he looked at the other failed projects he saw nothing but stupidity. But this one was different. He put the other papers down but kept the project report in his hand. He quickly turned his computer on and fed the report into the scanner. Almost instantly a blue crystal monitor near the wall turned on and displayed what was written on the document. The crystal monitor was a touch screen so Chen just used his finger like a pen and began scribbling on the digital document. There was a lot to cross out. He found a dozen mathematical mess ups, engineering choices that didn't make sense, and a severe lack of fail-safes. But, the thing that got him most was that this report and its accompanying blueprint didn't seem that bad. It seemed like that whoever made this design simply needed someone to proofread his idea and all these mistakes could have easily been fixed.
Now curious why this paper was in the 'failed' stack, Chen scrolled to the top of the page to find out who had written it. His eyes widened in shock when he saw 'Jay Felger' written as the researcher and 'Chloe Angstrom' as the assistant.
"Son of a bitch," Chen muttered in disbelief. He would have never thought that Felger could be responsible for this. And it now made sense why this paper was just scrapped rather than handed to another scientist to try again. Felger was associated with failure and the mere sight of his name probably caused the person who organized these papers to scrap his idea. But it was a good idea. He could see the mistakes right in front of him, mistakes that could easily be corrected, but what was there was a good idea. Steven gave an annoyed sigh, acknowledging what he had to do next.
-.-
It was now the middle of the night cycle and Felger had decided to just linger around the now empty mat room. It was the room that people used to train in their martial arts and other forms of hand to hand fighting. Due to the need of the extra room, hanging punching bags and extra pads it was given its own room. The entire floor was covered in a soft mat so no one would get hurt falling over. The back of the room had heavy punching bags hanging from the ceiling. Smaller punching bags and rubber dummies sat on stands near the sides.
Felger walked up to one of the bags, imagining himself wailing on it while others looked on in admiration. Jay smiled at the thought as he took up his best fighting stance in front of one of the hanging bags, thinking about all the martial arts movies he watched.
"Oh, so you wanna go?" he muttered, giving the bag in front of him a shove like it was a person. "You wanna go? You are going against the best. I've worked with SG-1, I've worked with the best. You got nothin on me!" Felger pulled his fist back and swung at the bag as hard as he could. He couldn't even react as his fist bounced off the bag and nailed him in the nose. He gave a yell in surprise and pain, clinging to his face. "Ok, let's try that again," he muttered. He looked up to try again but his eyes widened in horror. His punch may not have been very good but it still had enough force to move the hanging bag, which swung back at him. He gave another yell as the bag hit him like a pendulum, sending him flying to the ground.
Felger gave a tired wheeze. He didn't even feel like getting up. But, it didn't look like he would have to. As he stared up at the ceiling he realized that Steven Chen was standing above him staring back down.
"Chen!" Felger yelped, bolting to his feet. "I was…uh…was practicing!"
"Practicing," Chen said flatly.
"Yeah, I was just…I used to do this…back in middle school…"
Chen knew that this was nonsense but he actually found this lie somewhat amusing.
"Really? And what form did you do?"
"Uh…just, you know, some stuff: Praying Tiger, Crouching Mantis…"
"Then may I offer you some advice?" Chen asked "Don't wear shoes on the mats!" Felger looked down, realizing he hadn't bothered taking his shoes off. Even Chen had taken his shoes off before stepping on the mats just to talk to him.
"Right, I'll remember that."
"NOW, Felger!"
Felger immediately skipped off the mat while Chen took his time walking off.
"Look…uh…Chen," Felger said slowly. "I'm sorry about earlier…you know…the training."
"Save it," Steven interrupted. "I just want to know one thing: how would you feel about going on a mission?"
Felger's face lit up. A mission? He couldn't believe his ears. The biggest thing he ever did off world was study an old ring platform on an already-explored planet and that only happened.
"A mission?" he stuttered, still processing what he heard.
"Look," Chen sighed. "I decided to go through some of your past work. And you know what I found?"
"A screwup?" Felger mumbled. Chen raised an eyebrow, surprised that even Felger could acknowledge his failures.
"Yes, but not for the reasons you think. I didn't just go through your project history; I went through family history as well." Felger looked up, paling at the thought of someone going through his personal history. The SGC did have to keep every detail of the people they hire and Chen was in a position to access certain information. "Even as a child, you wanted to prove yourself to your friends and family, both of whom looked down on you, especially your father. Then when you got your first job you were desperate to prove yourself to your boss and co-workers. Teaching was just about the only thing you could do to show what you knew since anytime you tried anything else, you just failed. In the SGC, you were desperate to impress Carter and SG-1. You're always so damn desperate to prove yourself that you make shoddy decisions based on sketchy evidence, your calculations littered with math mistakes and I have to question your engineering choices. Just about every mistake you make could've been avoided had you just asked for help. If you had just asked your assistant, Chloe Angstrom, to go over your work you might've been able to prevent your screw ups. In fact, what happened to Angstrom anyways?"
"Chloe? She…uh…she said she got tired of waiting for me to pay attention to her so she left me for Coombs."
Chen's face stiffened at this statement. "Ok, that's harsh."
"I just…I just wanted to show people I'm not a screw up," Felger sighed.
"Are you trying to show us? Or yourself?" Chen barked. Felger didn't say anything. He just looked at the ground. Chen gave a sigh. It would've been so much easier if Felger was just another idiot who could be dismissed as one. But Chen now knew the truth and he couldn't turn his back now. "Did you know I used to be the worst in my sanshou gym?" Felger looked up, confused by this seemingly random statement.
"What?"
"Sanshou," Chen repeated. "It's a form of kung fu, sometimes called Chinese kickboxing. It was my first martial art. I was once the worst trainee there." Felger scoffed skeptically. It sounded like Chen was just saying something to make him feel better. Carter did the same thing once, tell him about how she nearly destroyed a planet by mistake. As far as Felger was concerned, this was just people exaggerating their mistakes to make himself feel better.
"Yeah, right."
"I was known as the guy who got kicked so hard he went flying out the front window and into the street. For the longest time I was an embarrassment to the art. But I didn't stay there; I worked my way up. I swallowed my pride, learned from my betters, and climbed the ladder. Most importantly: I didn't take any shortcuts. Carter, Hailey: they didn't start on top. They started on the bottom just like everyone else and climbed to the top. No one starts out on top and it should be obvious that your attempts to take shortcuts to the top is just exploding in your face. So yeah, you didn't just hit rock bottom; you've drilled into the Earth's core. Think about the training session. Every time you got us killed it was because you tried to do something to impress us without taking a moment to think about whether or not it made sense. If you want even a chance of getting to the top, you're gonna have to stop taking shortcuts and climb the old fashioned way."
"So what're we gonna do?" Felger asked.
"Well, for one, I'm gonna get you out of that lab. Everyone has a Felger-escape-plan for when your next endeavor fails so we should get you away from them. Next, do you know about the Fierri?"
"What about them?"
"You, me, and Hailey are gonna do a joint mission with them. They just established a research lab on a planet. We're gonna take a nice little vacation there where you will work under their strict supervision."
Felger cringed at the idea of having to work for somebody. He wanted to prove he can do it and but couldn't prove anything like that. But, he knew in the back of his mind that if he continued doing what he has always done then he will always fail.
"When do we start?" he asked. Chen didn't even smile. He knew that this was going to be painful. But, he wanted to give Felger a chance.
"I just came back from speaking with General Mercer. We can start in three hours if you like."