I do not own Stargate, Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, nor do I own any of its characters. I make no profit off this story excepting in my own personal pleasure of writing it. This is set AU after the end of Season Five of Stargate Atlantis. It completely disregards the Legacy book series, so please no flames that it's ignoring those. Also a few characters may go a bit OOC, because I feel like it. If you don't like it, don't read it.
Chapter 19: The Politics of a World
John slumped onto his bed, feeling a mixture of rage and relief. It had been 18 weeks since his bonding with Todd, 20 since Earth was destroyed and for all that they had managed to get three of the ships his mother had left for them up, in shape and fully staffed, in part thanks to the Travelers who had latched onto the offered arrangement of being permitted to have partial use of the ships in exchange for merging with the Lantean culture. Traveler children would be raised on Atlantis, safe from threats, while the adults would be free to live on the ships, help wipe out the Wraith who wouldn't accept the retrovirus, fight the Naari, and protect humanity.
Everyone saw it was a win-win scenario. The problem was that even though they had just destroyed the sixteenth hive in the past three months, a feat no other Pegasus culture had succeeded at in the past ten thousand years, and John suspected even the Ancients hadn't managed such a swath of damage into the Wraith numbers in so short a time frame, they hadn't managed to convert any full hives.
Oh, they had received plenty of hive deserters. Their Wraithkin population was now up to 369 children and 76 adults, totaling in at 445 Wraithkin transitioned, adults being termed by any who were over the age of 16 and had at least begun their transitions. Of the adults, there were another 19 bonded pairs, though most weren't actively pregnant like the first were. The others were merely jumping ship when they were presented the opportunity. It was clear that the more that each interaction with the hives that Todd made his little speech, trying to talk a queen into submitting to the retrovirus, had allowed for more information to be transferred to the lower ranking wraith.
Apparently, even among the wraith there was a rumor mill and it was now abuzz. The majority of the couples hadn't come from Hives they took on directly, but instead where found on the dead worlds that John's people were now staking out. This was partially to prevent any such couples from walking into the death traps that were the breeding colonies, but also in the hopes of finding such colonies.
The majority of the children from the hives, 336 to be exact, along with the 12 transitioning adults were from various colonies and the consensus was that they all practiced the same methods to extract as many young wraith as possible from the carriers. Of the 348 Wraithkin that had been from the breeding colonies, only nine were carriers, all of them had been born with white hair, making them harder to detect than those with other colors, and only two of the children were girls. There were another two girls that were hive daughters from two rival hives, which had made things interesting as the four girls seemed torn between despising each other and bonding over the extremes of their situation.
However, for all these successes, they had yet to turn even one full hive. Todd settled next to John, sensing his mixed-up emotions and clearly uncertain about what to make of them. John immediately shifted his head to his husband's lap and turned it to the now very distinct baby bump there. The thing was that every time they went out, they still took Todd, as he was the one best suited to try talking the Wraith into listening, but John also hated the risks. This only increased as his husband's waistline had.
One point of unaltered joy for John, one that could not be changed at this point was that Todd was growing their little girl inside of him. John smirked at that information that Keller had provided two days prior. Apparently, the Ancient scanners were better at detecting gender sooner than human ultrasounds were. Of course, they were far better at detecting a lot of things, so that wasn't really that surprising.
"I still find it baffling that your nuzzling at my abdomen is enough to settle even your greatest angers," Todd observed.
John snorted, realizing that he had calmed quite a bit. He sent a mental nudge at the baby even though she didn't have a brain developed enough yet to have any real sort of consciousness. There was just a sense of being from her and that's it. Still it soothed him, "It's cause I get to develop a bond with the baby before she's born. It was my biggest point of jealousy with Nancy while she was pregnant with Rikki. The mother of the child has this special bond that the dad doesn't get. When she's born, it will be your heartbeat that she recognizes and is soothed by. This whole telepathy thing means that I get to have a stronger connection to her than I did with Rikki when she was first born."
"I do believe that McKay would call you a sap for expressing that sentiment," Todd pointed out, though John could tell he was amused rather than anything else.
"Which is why I'm not telling him that, just like I'm not going to nuzzle your baby bump while Rodney is nearby," John pointed out logically.
He finally sighed and sat up, "It's just frustrating. We're making progress, I know we are. Seven more adult wraith deserted their hive today, along with the twelve kids we retrieved. That's the highest number of adults we've gotten in a single go. But we haven't gotten any hives. I know the Tok'ra and Jaffa are making good progress in building two new ships so far, but we are going to need more, a lot more of we want to stand a chance against the Naari. We need the Wraith to start turning by entire hives, not by small clusters if we're going to stand a real chance."
"You are still concerned by the force of numbers used against your world in it's destruction." Todd mused.
John nodded morosely, "In the alternate timeline, there had only been a smaller, single ship with some fighters attacking Atlantis. They had gotten there earlier, but they were still there. However, there were thousands attacking Earth. We just don't have enough information. Did they base their number of ships based on the size of the population or did they only just arrive in the galaxy and went for the biggest prize first before spreading out to other, less populated worlds? What's their strategy? What's their end game? How long is the Milky Way going to occupy their attention before it turns to us?"
"You are planning on sending the Apollo on a reconnaissance mission to the Milky Way, are you not?" Todd asked.
"Yeah, we need to know the situation, see if there are more people we can rescue, relocate… train to use our tech…" John leaned into Todd's side.
"Bran and Arthur are assigned to the Apollo, are they not?" Todd asked.
"They are. They are leaving Haven with Hawk and River during the mission," John confirmed. "You did a nice job with the communications relay, by the way."
"It required numerous complex calculations to create a communications relay that could be used on an intergalactic scale," Todd shrugged. "It was also necessary. As long as the Apollo drops the relay satellites in the correct locations along the route, there should be stable communication for us to them."
"Yeah, doesn't make me worry any less. Still, we need as much intel as possible. We also need to find out if we can rescue and transport other worlds that are friendly, if the Naari have gotten there. I can't imagine the Unas taking being controlled by the Naari well. Their freedoms from the Goa'uld were hard won," John shook his head. "Plus, we have to find any Jaffa that might have survived. It's a real shit situation."
Todd looked unaffected, though John could tell that he understood that John was in a difficult position. Nancy and Woolsey had determined a rudimentary government, though it would require a lot of refinement, and had set up an election that would take place in week. John had glared pure hatred at Nancy when she announced that the candidates would not be running themselves, but rather would be nominated. If nominated, they couldn't decline, those who nominated them could campaign for them, but they couldn't campaign for themselves.
The government was to be a ruling council with seven seats, each one responsible for overseeing the day-to-day responsibilities of their area but also voting within the council on major decisions that impacted the entire populous of Lantea. The seven seats were Military, Education, Sciences, Culture, Interplanetary Relations, Health and Humanities, and Judicial.
Each seat had a different term length, how many terms could be served, and responsibilities that needed to be met or they could be forcefully removed by a popular vote, regardless of how long they were in office. The person also had to have the correct qualifications to hold the seat. Military and Judicial were supposed to be life-time appointments. Once they had the seat, it was theirs until they either retired, died, or were forced out. Military required a minimum rank of Colonel for a nomination. Judicial required a minimum of ten years practicing law.
The four candidates that had been nominated for Military were John, O'Neill, Carter, and Romanov. The first three of them weren't that surprising given their prolonged responsibilities in the Stargate Program. Romanov had been nominated by the Russian military personnel, though he assured John that he would much rather not end up responsible for the military at large, given how much work it still required.
The Judicial candidates were Woolsey, and no less than ten other law professors from various colleges and universities that had been grabbed during the evacuations. All of them had been part of the group working with Woolsey and Nancy to establish the new government and had made noises about not being interested in actually being on the council itself, so Woolsey was essentially the only candidate that had any real clout.
Interplanetary Relations was a two-term maximum position, with each term being a five-year duration. The requirements were at least a five-year history of diplomacy and negotiations, either internationally or interplanetary. This one had so many nominees that John was actually a little stunned. Almost every long running gate team from the SGC and Atlantis had nominated someone. Hell, John's team had nominated Teyla. This meant that there over twenty candidates. However, the top contenders were Jackson, Teyla, Lorne, and Dr. Elise Torres from SG-14.
Education was a three-term maximum position, with each term being four-years. The requirement was a minimum of a master's degree in an educational field, plus a minimum of five years teaching in that field. Mrs. Amanda Mitchell and Mrs. Abigail Lorne, and John's sister-in-law, Julia were the top contenders in a list of nominations covering almost thirty teachers and professors. Given that the three women were also the primary players who helped organize the basic schooling system they had only finished establishing, it was a huge factor in their favor.
Sciences had one-term with the term being a ten-year term position. The requirement was a minimum of at least one Doctorate in a hard science field be it Physics, Engineering, Botany, or another such field. The Sciences position required oversight over multiple divisions, for each of the hard sciences, with established heads of each of those fields. It had been decided that Agricultural responsibilities would fall under this category, to nearly every candidates' annoyance, however it had to fall somewhere, and the Sciences made the most sense. The only candidates for this field were McKay, Carter again, and Zelenka. Carter expressed a preference for being given this seat over the Military, but as that would only be relevant if she got elected to both, it was a moot point.
Health and Humanities was a maximum four-term, four-year to a term position. The requirements were a minimum of five years practicing in a medical or mental health field, be it a doctor or nurse, with a background of at least two-years involved in medical research, given that this position was responsible for medical development as well as overseeing the physical and mental health of the populous at large. There were only three nominees for this position, Beckett, Keller, and Lam. John was fairly certain this was because they were the only three medical professionals who had experience being head of a medical department that dealt with infectious diseases from other worlds.
The last seat, Culture was a maximum two-term, three-year term position. This position was peculiar as it the requirement was degrees in anthropology, archeology, linguistics, or the arts. The position was also one that considered essential for preserving a memory of what happened and shaping the path forward, as a people. This last position also only had three candidates, Jackson, again, was a nominee and like Carter had expressed a preference for this position if he was going to be elected into one of the seats, Dr. Elizabeth Lindsay, and Mrs. Abigail Lorne, who had been honestly stunned to be nominated for two seats. Evan, when he observed that his mother had spent so long sticking it to the man, she never expected to possibly become the man, had gotten a response from O'Neill of 'she can join the club with me and Sheppard, we have t-shirts'.
Overall, John was mildly relieved that he had only been nominated for one of the seats. He certainly didn't want the position though. In fact, he had been the one to nominate O'Neill, and had talked Nancy and Jeanie into running a little campaign on why O'Neill was the better option over John for the Military seat, given his long history of saving Earth, his experience running both the SGC and Homeworld Security, and the fact that John would be better suited to the military campaign of turning the Wraith into allies, given his marriage than he would be to the administrative side of things.
As for the voting system, Nancy had had Zelenka, McKay, and Rikki set up a program that was downloaded into the systems of everyone's personal data-pads from ages sixteen and up. Whenever a topic was up for a vote from the populous, such as council seats, in the weeks leading up to the day of the vote, the program would provide all the necessary information on the topic.
If it was an election, then the program provided bios on all the candidates, their qualifications, and their stances on numerous significant topics that involved the responsibilities of the seat. If it was a law or ordinances that they wanted confirmed by the population it would contain all the information pertaining to the topic for the vote of yes or no, no's had the option of clarifying their objections to the piece of legislature.
The program had dozens of firewalls built in with traps and alerts for any breaches, and each citizen would have their final vote on the matter submitted at the end of the day to a central computer that held numerous safeguards. This had the advantage that the election didn't require the people to go to polling stations or stop the general work of the city. They had even tested out the voting system to ensure that there was no hiccups by using it to name the third Lantean ship that was ready for service, the second one having already been named the LSS Terra.
To Nancy's annoyance, but nearly everyone else's amusement, the third ship was named the LSS Cthulhu. John had a strong suspicion that the name was so popular because one of the people evacuated had happened to have had a tablet that held the complete works of H.P. Lovecraft, that had subsequently made the rounds around Atlantis and the mainland. It had made the rounds so easily because Jackson had had some of the computer programmers create a system to allow everyone on Lantea to upload the books, music, and movies they had had on them during the evacuation, or in the city, if they had already been there, to be shared with everyone.
For some reason Lovecraft had received a sudden revival in popularity. No doubt it was the existential crisis that most of the populous had experienced that made his works so popular, but it had still resulted in the ship being named after a fictional ancient god of evil and destruction. Todd had found Lovecraft's creature a delight and had actually been the one to nominate the name, which John also figured was also a significant factor in it winning the vote.
Still, the test worked, meaning that Nancy and Woolsey felt safe going ahead with the election. The awkward part would come afterwards, as each council member worked out how to establish the different personnel and roles within the administration during their time in office. John seriously hoped that he didn't get elected, that it was O'Neill and that the guy just kept at the job until he died. Maybe in ten or fifteen years, when John's body wasn't spry anymore, he would reconsider the idea, but he had little interest in being stuck behind a desk and in meetings for a decade or more.
Todd eyed John indulgently as he ran a hand through John's hair. John enjoyed that. He also enjoyed that he didn't need to tell Todd what he was thinking because his husband knew. John sighed, "Alright, I got that meeting with O'Neill and our colonels. We are going over the dumb shit, like uniforms and divisions and the like. Honestly, it should be left to the person actually voted into the position of military leader." With that John heaved himself off the bed and stretched.
"If you were the one voted in, I believe you would have wished to have that sorted out before the election forced the task on you entirely," Todd pointed out sagely, with a bit of amusement.
John sighed, "Just another reason I don't want the job. Do you think they will let me resign immediately if I get elected?"
"If you get elected, I am not certain they will allow it," Todd shrugged.
"Great, the first mandatory service of Atlantis. That's just not fair," John grumbled before kissing Todd and heading to the room for the meeting.
Another downside to the elections being so close was that there were posters nearly everywhere. Where people got the materials for them when everyone was basically using technology rather than paper was a bit beyond John, but then Jeannie had been campaigning rather hard for McKay, and on John's request, O'Neill, and she had access to the Asgard Core. John shook his head and took a seat next to O'Neill in what had essentially been labeled the war chamber.
Jack gave him an eyebrow as Caldwell and Ellis joined them. The others all joined shortly afterward. The final people to enter surprised John a bit. It was Rikki and Tom. They held several things, some of which looked like weapons, but John figured their presence was related to what weapons they would be phasing out and those that would be solidified as what would be used going forward. However, that belief was quickly dispelled as the weapons were laid out and the pair held up what looked to be a basic, black, long-sleeved shirt. It was peculiar in that it had ties along one side, as if it were designed to be similar to an Asian style. There was also a pair of pants that looked both similar and different from standard BDUs. It had the pockets and loose nature, but it also had the ties at the hips and it also had what looked like a built-in loop for a lightsaber and a few extra pockets.
As soon as he noticed that John leaned forward. Once Rikki and Tom launched into the physical properties of the new clothing style, John got a Chester cat grin, "You're telling me that this fabric is not only bullet proof, but also can defuse stunning blasts from Wraith weapons, provided that too many aren't taken at once?"
"Yeah, apparently, MIT was already developing the Polycarbonate fabric before we grabbed a bunch of people from the campus. A few of them had been working on the project, so Dr. McKay had them work up some designs. MIT's problem was that given the bullet proof nature of the material, it couldn't really be turned into clothing easily because if a bullet can't penetrate it, how could a needle? It can't, at least not without compromising the material itself and thus it's effectiveness.
"Now, the material is lightweight and breathes well, so it's comfortable. The problem is that it isn't exactly stretchy, so it's can't be just pulled over the head like standard shirts would. That's why there are ties along the sides. They are also made from the same material, so they aren't going to rip," Rikki confirmed.
"How can it be more effective than Kevlar and lighter weight, but still breathable?" Jack asked. The question wasn't unreasonable.
"Simple. The fibric is basically a really fine, thin diamond-like material in a few layers, it's formed in a honeycomb pattern on a microscopic level, which is why it isn't stretchy, but then you wouldn't want it to be. This might be able to stop a bullet or arrow from penetrating the skin, but it doesn't stop the kinetic energy. That means that someone who got shot could still suffer major internal damage. If it were stretchy, than it loses some of its effectiveness. It's designed to minimize the damage and that they won't bleed out before a doctor even has a chance of helping them. Also, we've tested it against our blasters for the more… lethal settings and it doesn't stop them from doing damage," Rikki looked a little unhappy about that.
"Yeah, well, at least it will slow a Wraith that's planning on feeding on someone on the battlefield," Lorne pointed out.
"And if we make tack vests out of the stuff, that adds a few more layers of protection against attack," John added. He could certainly see the potential. He also liked the black material as well. He had always preferred black for the uniforms they had anyway.
"Right, now we just need a design to go along with this. Also, I say we ditch the dress uniform bullshit, it's useless anyway," O'Neill pointed out.
"So, we're really going for one united military force, rather than different branches?" Lorne asked, still not thrilled by the idea. He had put up protests about the integration into a single military force, arguing that the military had always been divided into different areas.
"It's less about different branches, more different units now. It also allows for greater cross-training. Think about it this way, would you prefer someone whose only good flying a Jumper, or a 302, or as ground troops, or for tactical strikes, or would you prefer someone who can fly a Jumper, 302, and can handle basic recon. The more diversity we have in our military, the better we stand in terms of odds of a fight," John argued. He was pushing for the united military with O'Neill. It also sorted out the awkward detail that they only had two Air Force generals and that was it in terms of generals. The various nationalities of the Colonels would cause more issues than it solved if they kept different branches.
Lorne frowned but it was Romanov who pointed out the practicality, "We aren't dealing with only different nations anymore. We are dealing with different worlds. Few have experiences with active militaries. On Earth we were isolated in a way that we aren't anymore. On Earth it made sense to have different branches of military for Air Force, Navy, Army, Marines, and the like. It's different now. We are either fighting in space, on ground, or using a Puddle Jumper. Our numbers are so low that the very fact we can have a standing military of our size at all is remarkable. In fact, our military itself makes of a significant portion of the population of Atlantis, almost fifth of the population to be exact."
Lorne shifted, uncomfortable with the reminder but he didn't argue. It was a harsh reminder that having just over eleven thousand military personnel made up almost a fifth the population of humans who were once from Earth. That was if they discounted the Travelers, who added more fighters It was a grim reminder for everyone. The fact that they did now have the Travelers increased the need for unifying a single military force.
Jack broke the awkward silence that fell, "Right, well, I think we can agree that it will be a massive undertaking to up date the uniforms, but let's be honest, for now we can limit the updates to those who will be going off world on a regular basis. The rest can be replaced over a few months, once we have numbers on necessary sizing. Honestly, the idea of a dress uniform does seems useless to me anyway. It's all about pomp and that non-sense. It's bureaucracy. I would hope that we could avoid allowing that to dictate our lives now. That's the reason we did away with the stupid regulations for hair styles and fashion. As long as it doesn't impede your ability to fight, it shouldn't matter."
Romanov snorted in amusement at that, stroking the beard he had begun to grow over the past months since the regulations banning them were dropped. Carter, Becker, and McDougal had taken to wearing their hair in simple French braids now that they didn't have to keep them off the collar. Becker had even added a little color to her hair with bright pink highlights. It hadn't impacted the organization of the military at all, it did however make everyone a lot more comfortable with their lives.
It also made them seem less stiff, more approachable. John was of the opinion that that made things less tense. The Nox certainly seemed to think so. As it was, there had been few protests to the changes. Those who did protest it were the stick in the mud type like Bates once had been. Now, however, Bates seemed to have relaxed quite a bit. As long as it didn't risk operational security, he had far less issue with it than he would have had six years ago.
After the explanation of the new materials for uniforms, and the subsequent debate, Rikki and Tom went on to illustrate the various weapons that they had brought with them. The most obvious phase out had been the projectile weapons, like the P90s. With the probability of them running out of ammo and lack of efficiency against the Wraith, the new blasters that Rikki had created were far more efficient. There was a bit of debate about using the Lantean Staff Weapon. Mitchell was all for its use, he had in fact been working with Cha'ra of the Jaffa Council to develop a modified fighting style to accommodate the differences from the traditional Jaffa weapons.
Still, few people, beyond the Jaffa, had learnt how to even handle staff weapons with any level of proficiency. It was finally decided that while gate teams could learn the weapon and if they demonstrated sufficient proficiency with the weapons, could use it in the field. John figured there would be a point in the future that the weapon either gained popularity among the younger crowd for one reason or another, or it would fizzle out of interest with other easier to handle weapons, even if they weren't as versatile as the staff weapon, when handled properly.
Zats were, like the P90s, easily settled on phasing out. They were next to useless against Wraith, knowledge gained from prior experience with attempting to phase them into use on Atlantis, though the attempt didn't last long. Wraith were, to all appearances immune to the type of energy discharge a Zat released, regardless of repeated uses. The theory was that their regenerative capabilities made the things next to worthless. If the Zat ever returned it would be because it was tested against a Naari and was proven to have devastating effect against them. However, given that it was a short-range weapon, it wasn't a good option to keep in Pegasus.
The lightsabers were almost immediately labeled a specialty weapon. While there was a high demand amongst the military to use the weapon, as it was one that would have a massive impact on fighting the Wraith and Naari alike, it also required a high level of sword training. They wanted to avoid anyone cutting off limbs accidentally. Rikki had also developed practice weapons that would be the same weight as the various models of lightsabers but lacked the dangerous edge. Instead, they created a temporary localized stunning effect on any portion of the body hit.
The effect didn't cause an organ disruption, but it did create an incredibly uncomfortable numbing sensation to the nerves in the area hit. Ronon and Teyla loved the practice weapons because they drove home the need for proficiency without causing damage that would prevent people continuing practice after a few minutes. It also created a level of seriousness applied to the training.
There were three different models of the lightsabers and their practice counterparts. There was the standard sword model, the bantos rods model, for the Athosians and those who had learnt and enjoyed that fighting style, and a staff model with the plasma blades coming out both ends. John and Ronon favored the sword model because they were comfortable with swords due to prior experience. Teyla obviously adored the bantos model and was excited to test it in the field. This was also true for the entirety of John's SpecOps unit, they preferred sword or bantos models. However, the most popular model was actually the staff model, with it's longer reach, and the knowledge that a person would often be fighting multiple opponents when in the field.
There was also the bonus of there being plenty of Jaffa to teach people how to handle a staff weapon of any type, compared to the severely limited number of teachers for the bantos and sword models. The staff model had a major disadvantage though in that it had to be folded in half and slung across the back, meaning it was also was the one that would take the longest to activate, since the user had to remove it from the back harness, unfold it and then activate it, rather than just drawing it from the side holsters like the bantos and sword models allowed.
After that decision making process, the two scientists departed, and they got to work on the long, obnoxious process of determining how to divide up the various units. There was also the matter of cross-training, what were standard expectations for all troops and what were specific requirements for different jobs. The hottest topic of debate was whether or not flight training, of Jumpers or 302s depending on the presence of the ATA gene, should be mandatory.
John was of the opinion that it should be, but there were others who didn't agree. The biggest argument was that most people lacked John's, and Jack's, natural affinity to being able to flight anything they got their hands on. It was finally agreed, however, that all military personnel with the ATA gene would be required to have at least basic training flying the Jumpers and that while 302 flight training wasn't mandatory, it would be avalible, upon request and sufficient time for training, to all military personnel.
Given that Jumper training had already been mandatory for all ATA positive military personnel, this wasn't much of a change. It was availability to flight training of the 302s that was the big change. Still, this was the last thing that they settled on for the night as it was getting late and Todd had given John a mental warning about how close they were to the mess halls closing for the night.
Todd spent the week leading up to the elections watching his mate grow increasingly tense and unhappy. He knew it was, in part, due to the looming threat of possibly being elected onto the council and as a result being forced to give up his position as the leader of AR-1. It had been one of the downfalls of the council. The elected officials would no longer be permitted to take on any high-risk missions. Todd knew that John was not the kind of man to sit back and let others do the work while he gave the orders. It wasn't in his nature.
That was one of the reasons that the Wraithkin of Atlantis had unofficially chosen John as their leader. They were all too accustomed to the tradition of having Queens. However, John's mental strength superseded any Queens that they had encountered. This was combined with his mating to Todd, his sense of honor, his prowess in a fight, and his tactical brilliance that told the Wraithkin that he was the leader they desired for the path going forward. They had also seemed to agree to obey Todd as John's second, and then Teyla and Ronon as third and fourth.
A great many of those present also had a great deal of respect for Keller and her work into freeing them from the hunger, so with regards to their physical health, they deferred to her. Otherwise, the mature Wraith had kept themselves mostly separate from the humans. The only exception was those who were training to become part of John's elite fighting unit labeled SpecOps. The bonded sires who were warriors, as well all the younger Wraith that were called adults by the humans had joined this group.
It was something that Todd intended to be part of as well once he had given birth. However, for now, he oversaw the instruction of both human and Wraithkin trainees and warriors. There were also Jaffa instructors, though they were mostly present for the purpose of developing fighting styles to counter Wraith fighting methods. Still, Todd would relax once he saw his mate relaxed. This would not happen, however, until after the elections occurred.
It did not help that the day before the elections took place, one of the teams 'staking out' the dead worlds used for contacting the colonies, had finally gotten the gate address to one of the worlds that held the colonies. Todd knew this was only possible because the Wraith Sires that controlled the colonies didn't anticipate the Lanteans even knowing of their existence, much less having an interest in them, beyond in the young they supplied the Hives for growth.
The truth was that most of the colonies likely weren't even interested in the wars, both between the Wraith themselves and with Atlantis, beyond what was needed in terms of children and the humans they got in return. John had, naturally, wanted to immediately take a strike team to the world in question. This was overruled by O'Neill, Woolsey, and the other highly placed people who insisted the election had to occur first.
Todd knew that John chaffed at the bit, but he also knew that the majority census of the population of Atlantis was that O'Neill would be better for the council, if only because he was the less active of the two men and wasn't in the condition to go into the field anymore, while John was still in his prime, perfectly capable of fighting and leading from the front. Todd suspected that was part of the reason that Woolsey and Nancy had put the ban on risky missions for council members, in order to keep John off the council.
On the morning of the elections, Todd attempted first to distract John with sex, which was successful for a short while, and then got him to focus on training with the SpecOps group, which had a greater long-term distraction. In addition to the four Athosian teens, there were 42 Wraithkin for the unit, including himself, all four of the young female Wraithkin were in that group, then there were 249 former Marines and Air Force personnel, most of whom were on Atlantis prior to its return to Earth, 21 human teens from Earth, John, Ronon, and Teyla. Of the 319 members of SpecOps, John only considered 74 'combat ready' if not fully trained. John, Teyla, and Ronon were in that number. Todd was not due to his pregnancy.
Unlike other units in the military, John was, as the Unit leader, making it mandatory for flight training with either the Jumpers or 302s, dependent on whether one had a gene or not. In addition to this, they had to have a proficiency with at least one model of lightsabers, hand-to-hand combat, be marksmen with the new blasters, could handle stealth and evasion tactics, tracking, and finally, interrogation and torture resistance. Todd wasn't surprised by John's demanding expectations for their unit. It was one of the reasons they had so few in number.
Around mid-afternoon, John had everyone finish up with their physical training and go to clean up and place their votes. He also gave a joking order not to vote for him. Todd doubted that anyone in their unit would disobey the order, despite the humor. Todd took up his own tablet once they got back to their quarters and cast his own votes. O'Neill for Military, Woolsey for Judicial, Dr. Jackson for Cultural, Lorne for Interplanetary Relations, Abigail Lorne for Education, Carter for Sciences, but only for the selfish reasoning that Todd would rather have McKay at John's back in the field rather than because he felt Carter would do a better job, and finally he voted for Keller for the Health and Humanities seat and submitted it.
Todd glanced over at John's votes and raised an eyebrow. They had voted differently on Interplanetary Relations, "Why Dr. Torres?" He asked in curiousity.
"She's got similar mannerisms to Jackson, plus the background in diplomacy, linguistics, and anthropology. Lorne is great for being friendly with the locals, but I never found him to be the best option for diplomacy," John shrugged.
"Why did you not say this before?" Todd asked.
"Because you have a right to choose to vote for who you think fits best. It's bad enough that I know you only voted against McKay because you want to keep in him the field with me and O'Neill because you know that I don't want the job," John shrugged.
Todd rolled his eyes. With a bit of experimentation, they had learnt that while Todd was naturally inclined to take direction from John on a lot of things, he didn't feel compelled to do so unless the situation was one of high risk to Todd's wellbeing. John theorized that it was connected to the bond, something that allowed John to have greater control for the purpose of protecting Todd. That did however mean that Todd had plenty of leeway with making his own decisions which had made John infinitely more comfortable with the situation.
John had also theorized, or Todd suspected mainly just hoped, that his influence would be less once the baby was born. The idea did have some merit, given that the other sires and carriers who weren't actively breeding seemed to spend a great deal of time acting independently of each other. Then again, though, the rest of the sires and carriers also didn't share sleeping quarters. They had, instead, taken suites, like John's and Todd's, and slept in different rooms. The humans found this peculiar, but then Todd knew that the Wraithkin viewed Todd and John's sleeping arrangements as peculiar too. Well, the sires did, the carriers gave Todd looks of envy.
By the time they went to the evening meal, the only topic of conversation was on who thought who would win which seat. The general consensus was that Carter and Jackson, having been nominated to two different seats, had the highest odds of being on the council, though almost no one thought Carter would take the Military seat, despite her long and decorated career.
That evening, just after the voting was finalized, the results were announced over the intercom system, by Woolsey, "Attention all citizens of Lantea, the votes have been automatically tallied as they were entered, so we now have the results for the election. For the Military Seat, the chosen elected official is Gen. Jonathan O'Neill. For the Judicial Seat, the chosen elected official is Richard Woolsey. For the Interplanetary Relations Seat, the chosen elected official is Dr. Elise Torres. For the Sciences Seat, the chosen elected official is Col. Dr. Samantha Carter. For the Educations Seat, the chosen elected official is Abigail Lorne. For the Cultural Seat, the chosen elected official is Dr. Daniel Jackson. For the Health and Humanities Seat, the chosen elected official is Dr. Jennifer Keller. All seat positions were won through the popular vote and therefore had the majority of the votes. The number of votes to all candidates for each seat are all publicly avalible and can be accessed through the elections program. Congratulations to our new council.
"And on the behalf of those who were elected I would like to say that I know that our work is going to be a long, arduous task and each of those seats has an entire system to establish. This system will influence the population of Lantea for generations to come. I hope that in time, our council will be recognized as a pinnacle of democracy. I hope to never see it become a situation in which we become polarized on issues that should be basic citizens rights. The swearing in ceremony will commence at 1000 tomorrow for all those who desire to attend or observe via the elections system's streaming," With that Woolsey's voice cut off.
John had a massive grin on his face, "So, how soon do you think that I can talk O'Neill into going after that breeding colony?"
"I believe the only delay in you being able to go before this was in that they did not wish to risk a potential council members on the mission. It is likely that you will be permitted to assemble your strike force as soon as O'Neill is sworn into his position," Todd assured John.
John gave Todd a hard kiss at that before pulling up the election results and whistled at the landslide that O'Neill had had. Of the population 43,452 adult humans and Wraithkin, adults being over the age of 16, John had only gotten a measly 649 votes to O'Neill's 31,360 votes. Romanov had gotten 6,439 votes, John suspected those were all Russian. Carter had taken the rest with 5,004 votes, which was still significantly more than John's. Todd suspected she only got less than Romanov because she had expressed a preference for the Sciences Seat.
"Obviously, your campaign for O'Neill worked well," Todd couldn't help observing. "Though, it is also possible that the people would prefer their savior to be out fighting rather than sitting on a council."
"I suspect that it's mostly the latter. Alright let's see how else the votes went," John switched to Judicial and winced.
Woolsey had taken 32,435 votes, the rest were split rather evenly between the numerous law school lawyers. Carter, McKay, and Zelenka had all been almost neck and neck for sciences. Carter had taken 15,103 votes to McKay's 14,839 votes and Zelenka's at 13,510 votes. Carter still had won, but it was by the divide of only a few hundred votes and not such a huge divide like those of Judicial and Military.
Education had a similar split, though the margin was a bit wider, at 15,569 votes to Abigail Lorne, 14,829 to Amanda Mitchell, and Julia coming in last at 13,054 votes, the additional candidates hadn't gotten any votes at all. The Cultural Seat had been resoundingly to Jackson at 38,538 votes. The remaining votes were 3,004 votes to Lindsey, and 1,910 to Abigail Lorne, though given that she had taken Education that wasn't as surprising.
Interplanetary Relations had a more typical political voting divide than the others. Jackson had come in dead last, given that he had taken the Cultural vote by a wide margin and the voting system only allowed you to vote for a person who had been nominated to multiple seats once. It was also clear that the majority of those who hadn't voted for him in the cultural had voted for him in the Interplanetary Relations position, as he had 3,082 votes there. Torres had taken the win with 23,479 votes to Teyla's 9,456 votes Lorne's 7,435 votes. However, given that Lorne had lacked the educational background, it wasn't surprising despite his long popularity. Teyla taking so many votes was surprising, if one didn't consider that she had become intensely popular with the people when it had been made know how instrumental Teyla had been in the survival of Atlantis during that first year of the Expedition.
John suspected that Torres had only gotten so many votes because Teyla had expressed her admiration for the woman and made it clear that she considered herself more of a warrior than a negotiator. Todd suspected that Teyla would still be heavily involved in future negotiations though.
The Health and Humanities election had been another landslide victory, this time for Keller, and it was more of a situation that Keller had been the face of health and medical during those first few desperate weeks after the destruction of Earth. John wondered how many people heard the words 'Dr. Keller is in charge, but she's currently in surgery at the moment' during those weeks. Her adoption of a Wraithkin child had also made her immensely popular on that front as well. She took 24,474 votes, Beckett had 11,076 votes, Lam coming in last with 7,902 votes.
John was also amused to find that probably for the first time in human history, every person of voting age had cast their votes. For those who were Americans, it was because for the first time those who previously hadn't voted due to a fear that their vote wouldn't count, believed with such low numbers and no electoral college, every vote did count. For the other cultures, it was mainly having a genuine voice in being able to select from qualified candidates. Not one person nominated wasn't qualified to fill the position. Yes, some, like Col. Lorne would have struggled, but he still had enough know how to manage it with some advice. As for the Athosians and Travelers, they were accustomed to everyone voting on major decisions and their leadership, and the Wraithkin had found it fascinating to have any say in their governing at all.
John, Todd could tell, was just personally relieved that he hadn't come even close to being elected for real. Todd also suspected that if he hadn't expressed an explicit desire to continue the fight himself, the Military vote would have gone to John.