Author's note: The first two or three chapters are going to be character development and interaction. I promise that action and combat are coming, along with all the drama that the IOA can bring to the table.

Chapter 1

Jack hated deskwork. He was a man of action, built and bred to be out in the field, taking risks, doing the real work. Yes, having fun. Whatever one could say about deskwork, "fun" did not exactly describe it.

"Thus, we believe that an archeology team needs to be dispatched to this planet, immediately." The scientist had been droning on about rocks for over an hour. How were rocks exciting?

"Dr..." O'Neill trailed off, having forgotten the man's name over the past hour of mind-numbingly tedious lecture.

"Leestone, sir. Dr. Leestone," the man replied, a little irritated. O'Neill nodded.

"Leestone, is there any benefit to the SGC in actually investigating this? New power source, new hulls for the 304 being built, cool space weapons, anything like that?"

The scientist bristled at the tone. "Not all discoveries need to be related to blowing things up, General. The knowledge we could find would revolutionize our understanding of the universe! The planet is over six billion years old and yet is just as comfortable as Earth, and has had life long before Earth even existed!"

O'Neill yawned. "Sorry, Leestone, but the rules are no. Our mandate is to look for stuff that can help defend Earth against hostile forces, not go on field trips. Go through the IOA if you want to dig up fossils, they'll give you the funding."

He rubbed his eyes as the scientists packed their presentation up in a snit and stormed out. He didn't know what was worse, having to go to these pointless meetings, or the phone call he was going to get later in the week ordering him to make room on the gate schedule for a science expedition. Still, he enjoyed frustrating people who wanted to waste his time to begin with.

A knock on the doorway got him to look up, and he sat a little straighter. "Come on in, Carter. At least I know you aren't going to be boring."

Col. Samantha Carter sat down across the table. "Rough day?" she asked as she got a look at his haggard face.

"I had no idea that someone could think that talking to a General for over an hour about rocks would be a good idea. I'm going to tell Walter to assign someone to screen these kinds of things for me. I don't know how Hammond did it."

Sam smirked. "He had someone handle lower-level stuff for him, sir. You could always ask him for advice."

"Maybe. What brings you into this den of boredom anyway, Carter?"

"Well sir, it's about one of the new recruits you assigned to the tech lab. One Mr. Graber."

O'Neill only had to think for a moment. "Computer geek, right? The IOA has been throwing civilians and foreigners at us since last year. How the guy even made it through training is beyond me."

"Well sir," she spread her hands on the table. "He's actually really good with computer software. Maybe he won't ever be on a team but he is handy in the lab. My point is less about him, and more about a project we've been running for the last couple of years."

"Which is?"

"We've been studying Goa'uld computers, mostly from Death Gliders and Scout Ships that we've gotten hold of. The Jaffa rebellion even let some of our guys poke around one of their Hataks. Anyway, Graber was able to produce a trojan program that would allow us to basically hijack the main computer core of a Goa'uld spacecraft."

"Oh, I've seen this movie," Jack replied leaning back. "The aliens crash into Area 51 after upload the computer virus."

"Sam, had to look down so her superior wouldn't see the grimace that played across her face. "Not quite, sir. Basically, we would need to be aboard said ship and access one of their terminals to upload the program. However, once we did, we could take control of just about any system we wanted. We could lock down the whole ship and deal with the Jaffa contingent at our leisure, free prisoners, maybe even fly it. At least once we work any kinks out."

"Kinks?"

"Well, we've only had simulations to test it on. My team is running it in one of the captured Death Gliders now, to see how it runs on an actual Goa'uld ship. We would want to test it on something bigger, maybe an Al'kesh bomber."

"Ok, Carter, I trust you. You guys run your stuff and I'll see what our Jaffa buddies might be able to spare. In the meantime-" he was interrupted by the blaring of the base alarm.

"Uscheduled offworld activation!" Walter's voice came over the speaker system. O'Neill and Carter bolted for the door.

Gate Room

O'Neill made for the gate room as soon as he heard it was a Tok'ra IDC that had come through. Even as he entered, the Iris was opening. A single, balding, figure stepped through the gate.

"Jacob!" O'Neill shouted with joy. Here was about the only Tok'ra he actually liked.

"We've got a problem, Jack."

O'Neill stopped as Jacob came over to him.

"Hey, howdy, how've ya been?" he asked in frustration.

Jacob sighed. "The replicators have begun attacking the System Lords. At least three of them have already been killed. Only Ba'al is holding them off, and right now he's only barely doing so."

"I thought the Asgard had killed the replicators off?" Carter asked. "They had the Ancient design that Jack got from a repository."

"Apparently not," Jacob told her. "It looks like only a handful of them started the assault, but over the past two days they've multiplied like nothing we've seen before. Unless the Asgard have a way of hitting whole sectors of the galaxy, I don't know what we're going to do."

"I'll start calling in SG-1," Carter said. "I'll call the President," O'Neill answered. "Jacob, get set up in the briefing room. We'll talk in an hour."