AN: Thou shalt not annoy the author lest ye end up the subject of the author's imagination. Congrats. You live on in fan-fiction infamy guys. In other news having concluded my DM would probably drop dead if he actually complemented me I've decided to no longer take it personally, just do my danged job and maliciously comply with his requests. I'll be doing EXACTLY what he says to do. At least on paper. Because whatever. lol.
Anti-Stans
"Huh." Jack said looking at the weird message. Carter hadn't chewed them out either. Odd.
He'd started adding an author's note to his chapters of his Wormhole X-Treme stories because his browser was turning his downloaded content into a jumbled mess of formatting characters a few months ago. And he couldn't figure out why it didn't do it for stuff he typed into the document. After a bit of experimenting, he'd established that it needed about a hundred or so typed not pasted words to not turn his copied document into something that looked like it was written in Asgardian.
He supposed he could have asked Carter how to fix it the right way but that would require admitting he didn't know what the hell he was doing in the first place.
"Dammit." He muttered as he popped off a reply to the reviewer.
Three days later after he posted another chapter, Jack sat gape-mouthed at the review on the screen. Had he not just explained this nonsense to the last idiot? "Oh fer cryin out loud." He muttered as he replied 'per his previous e-mail'…
Sam rounded his desk to see Jack try to close his web browser.
"Sir… didn't we discuss not doing that at work?" She said of the window he'd hastily closed.
Jack gulped. "It's not what you think." He yelped.
"So that wasn't Fan Fiction dot Net I saw open." She said dryly as she swiped a pen and found the form she was looking for in his disorganized pile of paperwork cluttering his desk.
"Uh… okay, it is a little what you think it is but not entirely." Jack hedged.
Sam gave him a flat look.
"I don't suppose you've read the comments lately?"
Sam shrugged. "I don't usually." She admitted. She didn't care what his other readers thought. He mostly wrote them for himself and, in a way, for her. He did have a somewhat healthy fan club for such a cheap show to fan write for. "Has someone figured out you work with Marty on some of the plots?"
"No. Thank God. But I'm getting weird reviews."
Sam's eyebrows drew together to accompany a perplexed frown. "Weird… how?"
Jack frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. "Weird."
"Okay?"
Jack huffed out a sigh, got up, closed and locked the door then sat back down before turning the laptop towards her. "Weird." He repeated.
Sam read the comments. One person was complaining Monroe and Danning would never do something so unethical. Another person admitted to not knowing a thing about the military, disparaged black ops people, then insisted they had rules they don't cross and the situation described crossed that line. The next couple were just some guy weirdly trying to talk Jack into a comic book crossover with his favorite comic book characters. Then the entitlement started.
Sam's face scrunched into incredulity. "Why the hell does he care?" She asked under her breath.
"That's what I was saying!" Jack agreed with wild gestures of his hands at the screen. "I tried writing the guy back to explain I was having formatting problems and he told me he has a hundred books and none of them have author's notes." Jack whined.
"A whole hundred, huh?" Sam said dryly.
Jack flashed her a grin. Jack's garage easily had over a thousand novels, all of which he'd read. He knew Sam knew this too as she'd had to help him move the boxes when he had to store Cassie's things when she went away to school since Janet had downsized her home at that time.
"So what do you want to do?" She asked him.
"Go to their houses and suggest it might be a little entitled to tell an author with an English Minor and a career in spec ops how to write their fan fiction?"
Sam giggled. "That's one thing you could do." She agreed. "But let's do something a tad less drastic then showing up in your class As and the Colonel face." She suggested still giggling.
"Dammit." He grumbled good naturedly.
Sam shook her head in amusement. "First turn on moderate comments. That will force them to sign in so they can't anon respond to stuff. Some of these read like the same person with dummy accounts." She mused.
"Okay, how do I do that?" Jack asked her.
"Go down here to your options." Sam told him, pointing at the screen. "Now click on that and toggle it." She showed him.
"Nice." Jack said with a smug smile.
"All right so that should de-clutter your feed somewhat. You will still have to look through them but for the most part if it's unrelated nonsense or just rubbish you can decline the review."
"Rubbish, Carter?" Jack asked her in amusement. "Auntie Helen has been in town again, hasn't she?"
"How did you know about my aunt Helen?"
"Daniel told me." Jack said absently as he switched screens to copy a file into a new document.
"Huh." Was all Sam said. "What's going on with your browser?" she asked him.
"My what?"
"You said there's an issue with formatting?"
"Oh... that." Jack sighed. "Promise you won't laugh." He admonished her.
"Scouts' honor." Sam swore putting up two fingers and crossing her thumb over her ring and pinkie fingers.
"Close enough." Jack grumbled. "I had to start adding author's notes because the sweet spot is about a hundred words give or take fifty."
Sam chuckled. "Not that you ever belabor a point… sir." She said in amusement.
"Hey, if I want to grumble about Kinsey's crap it's my platform…" Jack muttered.
Sam shrugged in amusement. "He's going to end up in there anyway. Authors write their life or the life they wish they had but good authors always base their heroes and villains off people they actually know."
"Exactly!" Jack said pointing a finger at her in triumph. "Stacy is more abrasive than you, though."
Sam shrugged. "Creative license. Danning is arguably an idiot. Something you aren't."
"Eh…" Jack said with a shrug which earned him an amused cuff on the shoulder from Sam.
"I might be able to fix it." Sam hedged.
"Oh?"
"Yah, give me a couple of days. Someone might have figured out a work around."
"All right, Carter. Give it your best shot." He agreed readily.
"In the meantime sir, I suggest you explain if they don't stop whining, you'll just make the entire chapter one long author's note." Sam told him with a dark smile.
"Duly noted." Jack replied but a look of concern settled on his face.
Three days later Sam sat in Jack's office looking miffed.
"Nothing?"
"Not a dammed thing, sir." She grumbled darkly.
"So what do you suggest I do?" He had added an author's note explaining the reason he had the damned things and relayed Sam's off the cuff suggestion in a joking fashion. It was met with yet another review admonishing him for bringing his personal life into his stories. Yah, like he'd almost actually add personal stuff considering half the base knew who DLM was by now as he'd started writing under that psude again when he got a bunch of complaints about him not writing at all and at least two thirds of the people on base who read his stuff had probably figured out he was living out a fantasy life with Sam in those stories.
"Tell them the hell off." She said, arms crossed over her chest. "Where the hell do they get off telling you how to write? It's not like you don't clearly mark the author's note."
"Right." Jack agreed trying to settle her down.
"You even tried to explain to those idiots why you were doing it."
"I did." Jack agreed, his tone still gentle. It wasn't working. Sam was getting more irate in his defense than she was before.
"And where does that girl get off telling us if something is ethical or not. We'd use a puppy to catch a velociraptor if it got the job done." She said savagely.
"We would." Jack agreed after tamping down his amusement at her quip.
"To hell with them, sir. Tell them if they don't like it too bad." Sam all but growled and got up to stalk out of his office.
"Uh… Carter… where are you going?" Jack asked, his tone concerned.
"To call in the Cavalry." Sam said to him with maniacal glee and left his office.
"Oh boy." Jack said in a worried tone. I've been watching too much Quantum Leap, he thought. His eyebrow went up. What if Dr. Beckett leapt into Danning? Jack's eyebrow went up a little more as he considered the possibilities.
"They what?" Daniel asked her.
"I wish I was kidding." Sam said. She was with Daniel and Janet in his lab. Siler had joined them.
"Well, I don't know where they think they get off but I'm going to give all of them a piece of my mind." Janet snarled.
"Same." Siler agreed emphatically.
Daniel just narrowed his eyes.
Jack giggled in glee.
"Who do you think you are disrespecting a war veteran? He told you that in his bio. If he says real military people would do that and probably not get in trouble. Well I think he knows a bit better than you do!"
"As a civilian liaison to the military I can assure you MLD is correct. They don't care as much about 'ethics' as you think."
"You've read a hundred books? Were they comic books?"
"As a Historian with a PhD in history and archeology, I can assure you authors notes are quite historically common. They are not confined to editors and acknowledgements except in the case where the author has passed or the edition has been abridged. I recommend the book 'A History of Writing' as a jumping off point before further discussing what is and is not common to books as by your own assertion, you are not well read."
"If you don't like how DLM writes their stories I suggest you read something else. No one is forcing you to comment. Don't act like you are his biggest fan. I've been reading his stuff since he came to FFN and I've never seen you comment even once on his stuff."
"Oh, Carter?" Jack asked Sam in a very mild tone on the elevator down to the SGC.
"Sir?"
"Care to explain the glut of reviews on a certain fan story?"
Sam grinned. "Nope." She said cheerfully.
"Danny commented twice." Jack said of the two he knew were Daniel, one of which he'd made a dummy account just to write.
"I wouldn't know what you mean, sir." Sam said with a suppressed amused smile.
Jack didn't say anything for a while. "Thanks." He said softly, his tone heartfelt.
"Any time, sir." Sam told him as the elevator doors slid open.
Siler slipped in as they closed again. "Bowling tomorrow, sir?"
"Sure." Jack said. "Thanks." He added as started towards the elevator to his office. As the doors opened, he cheerfully greeted Siler.
Siler grinned at him as they stood next to each other in the elevator. "I kind of like the author's notes. Especially when you complain about Felger." He said chuckling as the doors slid open again on 28.
Jack laughed and shook his head as he got out.