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Chapter 10 – Earth
Three days had passed since the water planet and with dust bugs as people had started calling them gone their supplies were holding. They were short on food but the situation was not yet critical, so for the moment they were doing alright. Colonel Young and Camille Wray were going off ship via the stones back to Earth but the crew kept on working.
Eli was walking to the mess hall hoping to catch a bite to eat when he saw Brody talking through a Kino controller to someone on the other end. He walked over and asked Brody
"Hey what you doing?" while peering over the older man's shoulder to see what he was looking at and saw a complicated mass of machinery through the viewer, Brody jerked Eli back a step and said annoyed
"Do you mind we're trying to work here" and Eli unabashed just asked
"We, I just see one of you man" but an annoyed voice on the other end of the Kino spoke up
"Eli do you mind were busy here" Eli realised it was Claire's and repeated his first question
"Hey I'm just curious what are you two working on?" not taking the hint to leave them alone and Brody decided with an annoyed sigh to tell him so hopefully he'd get bored and leave
"We're fixing this part of the elevator system; the ducts to get to the mechanism are too small for me but Claire managed to fit through them and get to it. I'm just talking her through it" Brody explained and gave Claire a new instruction "Now just use the screwdriver to pry open that housing" he told her and she followed orders but Eli seemed determined to stick around and asked another question
"Why are you guys fixing a lift when there are loads of things more important that need fixing?" causing Brody to groan in frustration
"Because if we fix this lift we can move things from the cargo bays more easily and if we fix this lift then it allows us access to other parts of the ship since its jamming a key conduit" Brody explained and turned his attention back to Claire and giving her instructions through the Kino and Eli decided to stick around but did not interrupt them mercifully and soon Claire with Brody's guidance managed to unlock the elevator. Claire dropped down into it and called for it to deliver her to near the gate room; she let out a sigh of relief when it started moving and quickly arrived at her destination. She stepped out of the lift and walked to were Brody was waiting at the entrance to the ducks, oblivious to the looks she was receiving from the people she past in the corridors. When she arrived to see Brody and Eli talking or rather Eli talking to Brody both men looked at her and just stared
"Well it works now maybe we can start moving between here and the cargo bay easier" she said and waited for them to respond but Brody and Eli just kept staring at her, it was quite unnerving and she crossed her arms and asked
"What? What is it?" and Eli gulped before saying
"You might want to get a shower" he said and Claire suddenly looked down at herself and realised why they were staring.
She'd been so caught up in her work that she'd failed to notice that her sweat and grease from the machinery had caused her clothes to cling tightly to her body and her skin to develop a kind of glow almost. Her clothing, today a tank top and white leather trousers were so moulded to her body she might as well not been wearing anything. She sighed and walked off to grab a quick shower before she met Vanessa, TJ and Chloe in the room set aside for working out. She felt eyes on her ass all the way to the shower, she almost blushed but decided to take a leaf of Vala Mal Doran's book and just go with it and so she held her head high as the stares followed her down the hall
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After a quick shower and changing into a t-shirt and shorts she jogged to the Workout room, finding her three friends already there. TJ was working with some weights they'd improvised from things they'd found and Vanessa was doing sit ups with Chloe. They all stopped when they arrived and got up to meet her but Claire waved them off
"Sorry I'm late, took longer than I expected fixing the lift" she said and they went back to their workout with Claire doing some Tai Chi moves which she taught to Chloe. She and Vanessa had given in to Chloe's request to teach her to fight and so they were doing Tai Chi and physical exercises with her to build up her body before they started doing actual martial arts. They did that for an hour and then an hour of jogging after that before hitting the showers and getting back to their posts, this was going to become their routine every day. Chloe was going to spend the rest of her time in the infirmary learning medicine from TJ or getting martial arts and weapons training from Vanessa. Matt was avoiding Claire after what had happened in the Infirmary a few days before but Claire felt confident she'd got her point across.
So after Chloe and TJ had gone off to work in the infirmary, Vanessa was organising the armoury after moving the last of the energy weapons and their rechargers into the makeshift room they'd set aside. Claire was going to get back to finishing her analysis of the inventory.
Some of the items she was finding in there could be incredibly valuable, things like; Ancient versions of hard drives for external data storage, fabrics for clothing, seeds for plants, hydroponics equipment and tools amongst others. There were other things that she couldn't identify like something called the Cubile Medicus, loosely translated 'Doctor Bed' which might be a medical tool but they wouldn't know till they found and dug it out of storage. But there was also something called which didn't properly translate but had the word Renovo in its name, which meant repair that they'd had to investigate.
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A few hours later when Young and Wray returned to Destiny, the news quickly spread.
Earth had found a way to get them home.
At first Claire was ecstatic at the chance to return to Earth, but when she heard about what they were suggesting she nearly fainted, using Destiny as a conduit to channel the power from a star to dial Earth.
She took one look at the numbers and quickly came to the only possible outcome of such an attempt using these numbers. They were going to die and so she took her conclusions to Colonel Young, Camille Wray and Rush hoping to stop this madness in its tracks, but was disappointed
"Claire I understand your concerns but my hands are tied. The President wants this done as soon as possible" Colonel Young told her. Claire decided to at least try to get it put on hold for now till they could stop it
"Well at least have Samantha Carter or Rodney Mckay look at these numbers. They know the gates better than anyone. Everything Sam taught me screams that this will only get us killed" Claire said desperately. Camille Wray looked on with uncertainty in her eyes and Rush looked almost pleased but about what she didn't know.
Colonel Young looked her in the eye and sighed when he saw her determination. He said "Alright I'll try to get them to hold back on the attempt till we've got Colonel Carter or Rodney Mckay to confirm whether it's safe or not" he told her and could only sigh again as he thought about how much of a struggle that would be.
Claire said a strained "Thank you Colonel" before walking out of the Colonel's quarters and back towards her own before she heard a voice call after her
"Claire wait" she turned around and saw Rush was running after her and she tensed up, what did he want? She thought
"Yes" Claire acknowledged and he looked around as if to see if there was anyone around and seeing no-one he looked back at her
"You reached the same conclusion that I did; this course of action will only end with our deaths. We both know that those crackpots on Earth will get their way because to them we are just an experiment" he told her and she nodded. Some of those crackpots had been working at the SGC when she'd been there and half their work was generally second rate, that was part of the reason why scientists like Sam and Mckay were in such high demand they didn't make those kinds of mistakes
"Those idiots are going to kill us for the sake of their experiment and when it goes wrong they'll stick it on us, saying that it must have been a fault on our part to save their own skins" she agreed
"Well we need to make sure that they don't get the chance won't we" he said in a sly voice
"What are you suggesting?" she asked already knowing it but wanting him to confirm
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After Rush told Claire his plan, she was a little hesitant to go along with it given how underhand it was but she agreed that it was the only way to save everyone and stop those idiots from Earth from using them as lab rats again. So with Rush she started to make the appropriate preparations.
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She was disappointed to hear that when Young and Wray returned from Earth again that the idiot scientists had gotten their way. Sam wasn't on Earth and Mckay was busy with the preparations for taking Atlantis back to the Pegasus Galaxy so they could continue the war with the Wraith. The IOA had tried to keep Atlantis on Earth but with the Wraith such a big threat the protection offered by Atlantis was essential especially now that the Wraith were trying to get to Earth.
So she was Rush continued with their plan, making sure that there were safeties in place to save everyone and arguing the dangers of the plan. They watched as everyone bustled about and felt the hope in the air. Claire felt sad that they were going to be disappointed but at least they'd be alive to find another way home she reassured herself.
At least under Colonel Young she'd felt safe, knowing that if it looked like it was going wrong he'd stop it to keep them all safe. But she'd become nervous when Colonel Young, Eli and Chloe had been replaced by Telford and two of the idiot scientists if they were even worthy of the name Williams and McCormick. Claire had always hated Telford; he'd tried it on with her again and again and even once felt her up on Icarus. She'd given him a dislocated shoulder that day as he didn't know that she was a black belt in several martial arts which she did as a way to exercise and let off steam. He'd been too ashamed to let anyone know the truth and said it was an accident.
She'd been in the briefing when they'd had the details explained to them and despite having voiced her objections and even having the visitors admitting that the plan 'might not' work but still insisted it was worth a try and unfortunately most of the crew went for it. Greer was locked up by Telford simply because he could and he had a beef with the Sergeant.
Rush and Claire continued to try and convince others about the truth but no-one was listening, they were too caught up in the chance of going home.
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Later as Brody and Riley had been conducting repairs in spacesuits an explosion had almost killed Riley, Claire, Brody and Rush waited outside the infirmary after Brody dragged him back to hear his prognosis.
TJ came out of the infirmary with a worried expression on her face, Brody got up to meet her and all she could say was that it was going to be touch and go before going off to tell Colonel Telford. As the three of them peered in through the open door and stared at Riley who was motionless on the bed.
Claire turned to Rush and he nodded sensing her question without her asking it. She looked at the ash faced Brody and said
"Brody we your help to stop this happening again" and a still shocked Brody turned to her and asked
"What are you talking about?" Claire let Rush explain
"The plan those idiots have put together is going to fail, they're still going ahead with it even after what happened to Riley and the risks involved. Both I and Claire had looked at the plan and run it a thousand times, it only ever ends with failure and us dying inside the star" Rush told Brody "We need to stop them"
"How?" Brody asked
"By putting safeties in place to stop it" Claire told him "Rush and I have already started but it would be a lot easier if you would help us" she looked to him hoping that he would agree.
Brody looked at Riley again for a few moments, he turned back to look at them and nodded
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Hours later as the preparations were complete everyone gathered in the gate room while they waited for the attempt, Claire waited with Rush at the gate control with Brody watching from a far. As the ship plunged into the star and began to recharge itself, Volker, Williams and McCormick channelled power to the gate ready to start dialling. Telford gave the order to start dialling and everyone watched as the lights on the gate lit up and spun around to align the correct symbols.
But then the first sign that something was going wrong started just as Claire and Rush predicted when after the third chevron engaged the ship began to shake and electrical discharges started flaring around the gate. Scott had everyone stay as far back from the gate as possible.
Brody had McCormick and Williams bring the power level down but it did no good and soon the discharges were becoming very violent, the two scientists wearing Eli and Chloe's bodies looked on powerless as both Claire and Rush were proved right and the ship couldn't handle the needed power. The shield began to fail and even Williams said that we needed to abort; Telford hesitated for a while as the trembling got more intense before shouting "Shut it down" and Williams said after his attempt failed "The system's not responding"
The three visitors looked at each other before walking out of the gate room and towards the communications lab, Scott shouted after them but they ignored him. Claire, Rush and Brody looked at each other and Brody went to follow as Scott turned to Rush and Claire and urged them to "Do something" but Rush and Claire waited for Brody's signal
"They're gone" Brody's voice called out over the radio and Claire and Rush went to work, they instantly shut the gate down and the trembling stop and the lights returned to their normal level. Everyone looked shocked and Rush stepped forward to speak
"Ladies and Gentlemen if you haven't already guessed we will not be going home today, not yet anyway" he added to keep hope alive
"But you can all relax and return to your quarters, the ship will not be exploding at least not today" he reassured them and Scott asked him if the power levels would be at normal soon and Rush assured him they would be. Everyone started to make their way back to their rooms with disappointment written all over their faces. Camille and TJ walked up to Rush and Claire and looked at Rush with suspicion
"You staged the whole thing" Camille said accusingly at Rush and Claire decided to own up herself
"Not alone" and Brody nodded, everyone looked at the three of them shocked
"So all of this was to get rid of Telford" TJ said
"Had to be done" Rush told her
"So you're saying that the ship was never going to explode?" Greer asked him and Claire answered this time
"If Rush, Brody and I hadn't put certain safeties in place then we would certainly all be dead" she told them "We also added a bit of theatricality with some alarms and warnings to go off for effect" she said and Camille, Scott, TJ and Greer just looked at them amazed
"You could have warned us you scared the crap out of us" Scott said annoyed and Claire said
"WE did warn you that their plan was never going to work but we were ignored and we didn't know who was on our side" she told Scott and Rush, Claire and Brody left to go to check everything was alright.
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"Colonel Telford removed not only any sense of command but the two scientists who designed and implemented the program that was causing the crisis" Colonel Young told the board back at Homeworld Command as he reported back, Camille and Claire had accompanied him
"The situation appeared to be irreversible" Williams said trying to defend himself but Young continued on ignoring him
"Fortunately Doctor Rush and Claire Williams were able to avert the disaster" Young finished
"We liked like to see how they were able to do that along with any data collected during the experiment" Williams said and Young pounced on his wording
"Those are people's lives you were experimented with" and Williams and McCormick had the grace to look ashamed but Claire decided to make it clear to the people there what had happened
"The three of you ran away leaving us to die to save your own skins while yet another pathetically badly thought out project of yours ends in near disaster, just like when you attempted to install wormhole drive on the Daedalus last year and wouldn't be on the ship to see it through. The only reason we didn't lose the ship was because Doctor Zelenka was on-board and he managed to shut it down before it went critical but that still didn't stop you putting the blame on Colonel Caldwell only for the inquiry to clear him" Claire told them angrily
"We were trying to help" Telford argued back but Young put him in his place
"You cut and ran, leaving no one in charge in a life and death emergency" and he turned to General O'Neill and Carl Strom the Head of the IOA and were frustrated to be told they Colonel Telford was following orders as were the two scientists so they wouldn't be punished. Colonel Young decided to get to the point
"After much deliberation we have decided to stay in communication with Earth, I hope that personal visits for everyone will still be permitted"
Carl Strom started to object "That depends Colonel" but Colonel O'Neill stepped in
"Consider it done" Strom looked annoyed at the General
"Thank you sir" Colonel Young told his mentor before he went back to the Stone Room and Claire stepped forward and asked
"Can I speak to you for a moment alone General?" O'Neill said "Of course" and they stepped into his office
"Claire I know your disappointed but" the General started but Claire cut him off
"Damn right I' am but that's not what this is about" she said
"Well?" O'Neill asked
"I want to give my stone time to TJ so she can study more on Earth to improve her medical skills, I'm sure Doctor Lam would be willing to take her place on Destiny for a while" Claire told him and O'Neill looked at her in surprise
"But don't you want to visit people on Earth?" O'Neill asked her feeling that this noble gesture was a reluctant one
"The only people I want to visit are SG-1 and most of the time they're off-world themselves, you know I don't have any family left. I think TJ would feel a bit more confident in her role as the ship's medical officer if she had some more training under her belt" Claire told him and he thought about for a moment before nodding "I'll arrange it"
"Thank you" Claire nodded smiling now before asking
"How's Sam?" she asked
"Annoyed about having to go on maternity leave in a couple of months but otherwise she's glowing. Vala's already buying baby clothes and everything" O'Neill told her smiling before "The President arranged an exception to the fraternization regs given our service to Earth, but her getting pregnant was as much as a surprise to her as to me" he said feeling happy that he was going to be a father again despite his anxiety over what had happened to his other son.
"Give her and the others my best" Claire said before giving him a hug and walking to the stone room to join Colonel Young
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Camille meanwhile was talking to Carl Strom
"I need to access Claire Williams file to fill some of the gaps in my files on Destiny" Camille asked him
Carl Strom said "I'll get you the right clearance level by your next visit but her file is sealed"
"Why?" Camille asked
Strom just said "It was sealed by order of General O'Neill when she joined the Stargate Program, said what happened in her past was her business" he didn't much care either way
Camille was intrigued, what did Claire have to hide?
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