Ch. 36 — Viper's Strike
Harry looked at Lee, surprised. "You can't see lasers?"
"The reason you can see light beams and lasers on Earth," Hermione broke in, "is because of the tiny dirt particles in the air. What you see is light reflecting off them. In space, there's nothing in the way, so you can't see the beams."
Lee nodding at him. "Precisely!"
"Ah!" Harry said, "Of course." He shook his head wryly. He should have known that.
"The plasma cannons would be best. They can easily see those," Hermione said.
Harry shrugged. "Okay, just make sure the one firing moves immediately, in case they try to fire back."
They watched in silence as two parallel plasma blasts shot beneath the two ships and off into the distance, dissipating harmlessly after traveling almost a thousand miles. Then Angelina repeated her order, concluding. "That was a warning shot. This is your final warning. Failure to comply will result in your ships being targeted and treated as hostiles. Over."
Apophis' outraged voice over the communication's speaker began decrying the futility of attacking him, and screaming threats of revenge at their daring actually to do so.
Harry looked at Hermione and Lee. "Do we really want to do this?"
The other two pursed their lips and exchanged looks. "We don't have a choice, do we? Listen to him." She waved her arm at the image of the ships. "Remember what Doctor Jackson said they did in that alternate reality."
"Plus, if the X-wings don't work, we surely need to find it out now, sir," added Lee. "If they don't work," He shrugged, "We'll evacuate as many people as we can, then destroy the Goa'uld, later."
Everyone looked a bit pale at the realization of what they faced.
He took a deep breath. "Angel, tell all X-wings, take evasive action, and fire plasma cannons at will for five seconds."
Angelina transmitted his instructions.
It was amazing to see twenty-eight plasma cannons firing at the same time in rapid-fire mode. The globs of energy just appeared out of nowhere, the tech-cloaks still working at keeping the ships, themselves, invisible. The blasts crossed the distance between the ships almost instantly, taking less than a second.
For five seconds the two intruders disappeared behind their glowing, spherical shields as the plasma bolts struck their targets. They rapidly became as bright as the sun and the viewscreens darkened. Then firing stopped.
The intruders were still there. Their fiercely glowing shields slowly faded from view as the plasma charges dissipated. The ships appeared unaffected.
"Well, we know they have shields similar to ours," Harry said dryly. "Let's see if they work as poorly against lasers as ours do."
The two intruders were fruitlessly returning fire on the tiny, invisible X-wings. Because the small ships were constantly moving, erratically, the enemy gunners were literally shooting in the dark. Harry was sure the Felix Felicis had some effect on that, too.
Harry could see that Lee and Hermione had been correct about lasers being invisible in space. The only way to tell a laser had been fired was when a section of an intruders' ship exploded into superheated vapour.
The lasers quickly carved their way into the pyramids and the surrounding rings. The space around the two intruder ships swiftly became crowded with wreckage and venting gases. Like an atmosphere, the debris revealed the beams of light and allowed the defenders to backtrack the origins of the lasers. Unfortunately, knowing the direction a laser beam was coming from didn't tell you how far away the origin was.
In space combat, unlike aerial, once the ship started in a direction, the pilot could turn the ship sideways to its direction of travel and fire its weapons. Then the pilot could use the smaller, directional engines on the sides of the ship to change its flight path in erratic movements.
The people playing with the X-wings had been practicing such manoeuvres against each other in mock battles for over a year. Their many hundreds of hours of playing the ultimate space-war video game were paying off, now, in their almost reflexive reactions, unconscious decisions, and the tactics they used while confronting the intruders' ships.
This allowed them a long linger time for any shot, which meant a laser blast could dig deeply into, or even completely through, the intruders' ships, destroying vital functions or causing explosions that tore entire sections off into space.
"Tell them to cease fire, and retreat to a safe distance, Angel."
He stared at the two drifting hulks venting atmosphere and debris as explosions inside the massive ships continued ripping it apart. There were still a few pockets of resistance firing their ship-board weapons, trying to target the X-wings.
"Tell the X-wings to take out those weapons."
A dozen blasts later, all signs of external resistance disappeared.
He looked over at Hermione and Lee, who looked just as appalled as he felt. "I think we really want to find a way to stop lasers." The other two nodded, shaken by how much damage their lasers had inflicted.
"Falcon Three says that dozens of small ships have left the intruders' ships. Several are drifting. The others are forming up into groups," Angelina said into the silence.
"If any head for Earth or begin offensive fire, take them out," Harry said.
A moment later, Zach said, "There appear to be over four thousand surviving life-forms on the ships, at this moment."
Harry sighed. "The small ships might be lifeboats. Is there any way we can get to them before they run out of air? The battle's over and there's no reason to just let them die."
"We can just grab the small ships and drag them over here, then decide what to do about them. The ones on the two big ships? I suppose we could beam them into the brigs," she said uncertainly. "They won't all fit, though."
Lee started moving controls on his console. "We can use the barracks as brigs, and repurpose some of the other large rooms, plus do the same in the Galileo. It's already set to receive refugees. Shouldn't take more than an hour. In the meantime, it'll be standing room only, but they'll be alive. I can have Uranus Base build a prison ship for them. No engines, except station keeping. Only enough power generation for lights and to recycle air. That way they have no resources on the ship and they can't use anything on board to escape. Assign a nearby Fuel Depot to supply food and anything else they need. Something that simple won't take more than half-a-day to modify from another Fuel Depot. When it's complete, we can move our prisoners to Uranus Base."
Harry looked at Lee. "Is there any way to prevent us from accidentally bringing them over with weapons?"
"Sure, just beam them over naked, and give them new clothes on board. Then we can figure out what to do with them, later," Lee said off-handedly.
"Excuse me, Admiral," Lieutenant-Commander Edgecombe said from the piloting console, "But the pieces of the ships are starting to fall."
Harry looked up at the images of the heavily damaged ships.
Even sliced up into slightly smaller pieces, most of the sections of the two ships would easily survive re-entry. They would cause significant damage when they hit the ground — and a significant death toll if they were unlucky enough to land in a big city. Especially given how far the falling piece had to build up speed.
He sighed. "Tell the Galileo to start with the pieces that will hit Earth first. Have the replicator convert them to raw materials and store them on the Requirement's hull if we run out of storage room onboard. We can do the same when we arrive." He rubbed where his scar used to be over his right eye. "Have the X-wings see if they can pull the larger pieces into some sort of stable orbit — maybe get some of the Runabouts to help. Even if it only lasts a day, that'll give us time to salvage them." He sighed and rubbed his face with a hand. "We may need the Su Song sooner than we thought," he grumbled.
"Admiral, we can hold them in place, if we want to," Hermione said. "If we can drag around multi-mile asteroids, a few dozen pieces of shattered starships shouldn't be a problem. That would leave only the smaller pieces for the X-wings and Runabouts to secure."
Relieved, Harry nodded. "Let's do that, then, with the Galileo, while we concentrate on getting the smaller pieces. And pay special attention to those ships or pieces with the human lifeforms. Angel? See if you can establish contact with any of the smaller ships. If so, tell them to stand down and prepare to be rescued."
"Start with the ones that seem in most danger of dying."
The call went out that there would be no evacuation, that instead they needed help with the X-wings and runabouts to rescue survivors. They divided up their duties as crew members came through the Vanishing Cabinets or just apparated to the Requirement, which was still holding station over Britain. Once they had everyone who wanted to come, they would move to join the Galileo, closer to the remains of the Goa'uld ships.
██:::::██:::::██
General Hammond and Colonel Maybourne were in the Stargate Command Room staring at the telescopic display of two Goa'uld starships over the United States. They had just . . . stopped . . . midway between Earth and its moon, and were simply hovering there. They weren't trying to communicate; they weren't doing anything that remotely resembled hostile action.
The Americans were waiting for the ships to drop low enough that dodging a missile strike was unlikely. Considering how far away the Goa'uld ships were at present, they might be waiting for some time.
George alternated between fuming at the interference from Senator Kinsey, and his influence over the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and his own knowledge that things would work out despite that. If they didn't, then how could the SG-1 team have visited him in the past? Then came the question of just where that mysterious spaceship over the U.K. figured into this whole situation. Plus, the "zat" weapon still had not surfaced.
So, he had to pretend he didn't know the eventual outcome of this situation.
He just hoped the Area-51 adaption of a Mark 12A warhead enriched by the alien material, naquadah, would actually work. Unless something else were to occur, that seemed their best hope.
Unless, he suddenly realized, the SG-1 team he had met had been from a different reality who had accidentally been shunted into his, as Daniel reported had been done to him. The thought made his blood run cold and he barely controlled his shiver.
Suddenly, an airman spoke up, "General, listen to this!"
Over the speaker came a female voice speaking with a British accent, "This is Lieutenant-Commander Johnson of the Defensive Space Force Ship Battlestar Requirement," the voice said solemnly, "calling unidentified spaceships who just entered Earth orbital space. Please identify yourselves and why you are here. Over."
"That was a repeat of what she just said!" the airman explained. "I have everything being recorded."
Hammond and Maybourne exchanged surprised looks.
Although, for Hammond, it was a different reason. Battlestar? As-in Battlestar Galactica? What was it with these aliens? Star Trek transporters, a small transport that looked like the Eagle One from Space: 1999, and now a Battlestar?
What was next? A TIE fighter?
"I am the god Apophis," an imperious voice replied. "You have interfered in my affairs long enough. I have come to wipe out the scourge that plagues me."
The reply from the Lieutenant-Commander a few seconds later was clearly surprised — Hammond could almost imagine her incredulous expression. "Your transmission was garbled," she said. "It sounded as if you were claiming to be a god. Over." She also, clearly, didn't believe a word of what had been said.
Apophis' response clearly didn't impress her, as she next ordered the Goa'uld's ships to Jupiter. Apophis response was a full-blown rant at what he planned to do. When he paused to take a breath, Johnson calmly repeated the instruction to go to Jupiter and wait. Then she derisively added, "Real gods don't need spaceships or soldiers. Over."
Apophis replied with another long rant.
"Sir," said another airman, "Whoever that is that's taunting the Goa'uld, she's transmitting on all frequencies." He looked over at the General and Colonel. "Everyone on this side of the planet with a radio can hear them both. Probably the other side, too, with long-wave bounce and inadvertent satellite retransmissions."
The General looked over at the Colonel. "World-wide panic," he said softly. "Our allies will be most unhappy with us." The I told you so, was clear in his voice. "Perhaps we should have warned them," he said mildly, raising an eyebrow.
"Holy crap!" exclaimed another airman. "Two balls of pure energy just appeared out of nowhere and passed between Earth and the spaceships! They almost blanked out my display!"
The Lieutenant-Commander from the Requirement announced that they had just fired warning shots, and would take direct action if the ships did not cooperate.
Apophis sounded like he was frothing at the mouth in his response. Oddly, though, he still hadn't taken any hostile actions.
Later, Hammond knew, they would view the battle through recordings made from satellites and ground-based telescopes, and try to get a handle on the scale of what this Defensive Space Force could field as weaponry. In the meantime, all they had were reports flooding in from all over this side of the world about the sudden appearance of balls of fire in the sky colliding into two bigger balls of fire. Especially those sections not on the sunlit-side of the globe that could see the ships.
No one on this side of the planet couldn't see it, even in the areas of bright daylight, it shone bright enough to be easily seen.
There was nothing on radar or cameras to indicate what was firing the balls of plasma, they just appeared out of nowhere and shot off towards the alien ships. Which began to glow brighter and brighter with each impact until they outshone the sun. Whatever was doing the shooting was moving because each shot seemed to come from a slightly different, unpredictable location.
Careful study, later, showed that there were seven probable origin points, each shooting a collection of four plasma balls in rapid sequence. The balls of plasma were slightly offset from each other, indicating that there were four sources of the shots from the same origin, with seven origins.
Then the shooting stopped and the glow around each of the Goa'uld ships began to fade. Shortly after, they had a clear view of the two ships, apparently undamaged. Nothing happened for several seconds, then the ships began to explode and fall apart even as they put up a feeble defence. The two ships were firing their own weapons into space, seemingly at random, in a futile effort to hit their attackers.
The battle had lasted less than a minute, in total.
Later, the scientists were split on whether it was the plasma balls that caused the damage, or that a second weapon that was used. A weapon that could only be detected by the explosions that resulted. There were faint lines appearing to stab into the ships as the debris field became crowded and the ships expelled gases and material. They might have been a light-beam based weapon, such as lasers, but they could have been artefacts in the light around the battle.
Dozens of smaller ships began to leave the crippled and no-longer hovering starships.
Then the truly bizarre stuff began to happen. Big pieces of the ships that were falling, now that they weren't part of the ships and being held in position by the ships' engines, suddenly slowed and hovered in place. Tens of thousands of smaller pieces that had been expelled by the explosions began to disappear in tiny flashes of light, just as the meteors and satellite pieces had done when they encountered the mysterious ship over Britain.
In a matter of minutes, thousands of tonnes of material vanished as if it had never been.
Hammond listened to the stunned reports from the radar and communication operators. He turned to Maybourne. "It would seem Earth has an unknown protector. A very ferocious protector."
Maybourne stared back at him. "Did you expect this?" he said suspiciously.
Hammond suppressed the urge to smirk. He shook his head. "No. Not at all. But if you've read the reports I sent to the Chief of Staff when I was in charge of the Space Force Command, you would know that for a year-and-a-half, now, we've been tracking a mysterious spaceship over Britain. Based on that woman's accent, I think they might have intervened."
"The British!?" He was clearly astounded,
"Hmm . . . No," he said, shaking his head. "Not the British. Someone who is in contact with the British, perhaps. However, both M.I. Five and M.I. Six deny the existence of any contact with aliens. So, if there is contact, it's unofficial. Or buried as deep in secrecy as the Stargate program." He looked away for a moment, then back at the other officer. "Much like we haven't told our allies about our secret Stargate program and the aliens we've contacted." He snorted. "It would be rather hypocritical of us to get mad at them for not telling us something so important when we never told them about the Stargate and the planned attack by the Goa'uld, now wouldn't it?"
He gave the stunned colonel a long look. "Perhaps we should introduce ourselves, since they've been so kind as to save our . . . bacon. Not to mention announcing to the world who they are. There's no way this can be buried by the politicians."
"Airman," Hammond ordered, "Choose one of the frequencies the aliens used, and send a polite message on that setting requesting that we talk with the Captain of the Defensive Space Force Ship Battlestar Requirement at his, her, or its earliest convenience."
The colonel ran for the red telephone that connected directly with the White House.
Gulping, the airman turned back to his equipment and sent the query. He left the speaker on. He repeated the request several times before there was an answer.
"This is Admiral Potter of the," there was a slight hesitation, "Battlestar Requirement. What would you like to talk about? Over." It was a young-sounding voice that came from the speaker.
Hammond cleared his throat as another airman handed him a headset and indicated it was live. He slipped it on over his hat. "Good day, Admiral Potter, I am Major General Hammond of Stargate Command," he said sombrely. "First, I'd like to tender my heartfelt thanks to you for your handling of the two intruder ships. Might I ask why you chose to interject yourselves into this situation? Over."
There was a long pause before the reply came. "We rather like Earth, and it was clear from this Apophis' attitude and words that he planned great violence upon it." There was a brief pause. "We do not know why he merely threatened instead of carrying out his plans, but it's been my experience that insane megalomaniacs like the sound of their own voices, so they rant and monologue before they get down to serious business. I think it's a character flaw that demonstrates their own doubts and insecurities about their position and what they are doing. Over."
That had a few hidden gems of information, and unsettling ones, too.
"Second," the General said, after a moment, "as you can imagine, we have quite a few questions for you on why you have come to visit our planet, what your intentions might be, and the possibility that we could meet with you and exchange information about the Goa'uld.
"Plus, we are more than a little bit interested in anything you can teach us regarding your technology for our self-defence. Over."
There was another long silence.
"Right. Well, as for these Goa'uld, we don't know any more about them than you. We've never had direct contact with any of them, until today. As for the rest . . . well, that's rather complicated." There was a brief pause. "Umm, do you have any suggestions on how we should handle the several thousand or so prisoners we seem to have acquired? Any special warnings or things we need to be aware of? We've never dealt with thousands of prisoners, before. Over."
The General closed his eyes and sighed. He was fairly sure these were the same aliens that SG1 had encountered, but he couldn't be positive about that. He would have to proceed as if they hadn't met SG1.
He opened them in time to see the Colonel Maybourne coming his way. Hammond held up a hand to indicate the other should wait a moment, then said, "All of your prisoners are probably Jaffa, humans genetically engineered by the Goa'uld to be slaves and to serve as incubators of the Goa'uld larva. The larval symbiotes provide strength, longevity, health, and immunity or recovery from many otherwise lethal infections, illnesses, and poisons. Unfortunately, this makes the Jaffa dependent on the symbiotes to survive, as their own immune system is discarded. However, the Jaffa is always in control. The symbiote lives in a pouch in the Jaffa's abdominal cavity." He paused. "Once a larva matures, it is transferred to a non-Jaffa, where it lives in their brain to dominate and control the individual. Over."
There was another long pause.
The colonel held up a clipboard. It had "Camp David. Tomorrow. One o'clock" written on it. Hammond nodded. "I've just been handed a note asking if you would be willing to meet with the President of the United States and a few of his advisors at Camp David in Maryland, tomorrow at one o'clock local time. Over."
The silence continued for a much longer time. He was beginning to think they had signed-off when the reply came.
"Could you make that Saturday? I'm rather busy on Friday. . .. Over."
Maybourne was nodding his head frantically.
"Yes, I believe that moving the meeting to Saturday is easily done. Over."
"Good. Where in Camp David? Could you give us the coordinates in longitude and latitude? We wouldn't want to land in someone's carpark by accident. We will need a landing space that's about forty-yards across? Over."
"Yes, there's a helicopter landing pad that should accommodate anything that size. And I'll have those coordinates for you in a moment." He paused a moment. "Are there any special accommodations we need to make? Over."
There was only silence.
"I have those coordinates, now," the General said as an airman handed him a piece of paper. This time the female voice they had already heard, Lieutenant-Commander Johnson, apparently, took the coordinates. Then the Admiral was back. "No. Nothing special needs to be done. You can't tell the difference between one of us and a mu– . . . uh, a normal person." There was a brief pause. "If that's all, there are things I must attend to. Over."
At his acknowledgement that their current conversation was over, they signed off.
General Hammond shook his head as he handed the headset off to an airman, and sighed. He looked over at Samuel. "We'll have transcripts and copies of everything forwarded to the President and his staff within an hour. I'll present our conclusions to the President tomorrow morning."
He glanced at the monitor that someone had set to one of the observing telescopes. He watched as freefalling chunks of the destroyed ships disappeared in brief flashes of light. "We really don't want to piss-off these aliens." He looked back at Colonel Samuels. "You can't shoot something you can't see."
He returned to looking at the monitor. "And I have the feeling that these people are responsible for the comet that struck Mars in August." He paused. "They wouldn't even have to shoot at us, just toss one or two good-sized asteroids and we'd be back in the stone-age."
"Perhaps that was what Apophis had planned." He gave the colonel a long look. "Our enriched missiles would have been useless against an asteroid ten miles across, wouldn't they? Except to unleash a rain of radio-active, million-ton, city-sized rocks all over the world."
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Although he would never admit it, Jack almost jumped out of his skin when he heard a voice beside his ear speak up. It was a voice he hadn't heard in months, but one he wouldn't forget any time soon. It spoke with a British accent.
"Uh, excuse me, Colonel O'Neill?"
He turned and looked around, but there was no one there.
He looked over at the other three. "Did any of you guys hear anything?"
They shook their heads, but started paying a bit more attention.
Someone chuckled by his ear. "No, I'm afraid you won't spot me. I'm talking to you with what we call a drone. It's a tiny little thing, most people don't even notice it.
"So, I won't ask how you got on the Goa'uld ship, but I will ask if you want off it before we attempt to destroy it?"
Jack looked around the stark room. "I wouldn't mind being elsewhere," he said casually.
The others looked at him quizzically.
"But I should tell you," he continued, "that we've planted c-four all over this ship, and it's set to go off in," he looked at Sam, and raised an eyebrow.
She looked at her watch, and said, "Nineteen hours, twenty minutes?"
"Nineteen hours twenty minutes," he repeated.
"Interesting," the voice said, "but irrelevant to the moment. We're not going to wait that long. But it's good to know." There was a moment's pause. "So, if you're ready to go, say so." He paused. "If you'd rather stay in the brig . . .?"
"No!" Jack sighed. He didn't know who this was, nor why they were here. On the other hand, if it was the same voice as from before, and he was reasonably sure it was, then he didn't have a reason to distrust the voice, either.
"No. Being elsewhere, at the moment, sounds good."
"Excellent! In about one second there will be a set of four stones in the middle of your cell."
If Jack hadn't reflexively looked at the centre of the cell they were in, he would have missed seeing the four small stones appear in the middle of the floor. Each was an oblong rock about as big as his thumb. They were smooth, much like a rock from stream.
"Please have each of your team pick one up and hold it firmly in their hand."
Jack looked at the others. "Okay, guys," He pointed at the rocks sitting on the floor. "Those rocks prove I'm not losing my mind."
They looked at the rocks, and then him.
"Where did they come from?" Sam asked.
"They definitely weren't there a few minutes ago," said Daniel. "Even if we couldn't have seen them, we would have stumbled over them by now."
"Yeah," Jack said dryly. "I know." He sighed. "A minute ago, I heard a British male's voice — one we've heard before — tell me he was going to get us out of here." He gave them all a significant look.
Teal'c raised an eyebrow and the other two stared at him.
"You heard my side of the conversation." He took a breath. "Anyway, he says we each need to take one of the stones and hold it firmly in our hands." He moved over and picked up one of the rocks . . . which looked, felt, and weighed about what a rock that size should — no more than an ounce or two.
Slowly, the others moved to take one each.
"Now what?" said Daniel.
"You're gonna love this," the voice said in his ear. "Group closer together," it ordered. "Also, tell the others that when the stones activate, to start walking.
He repeated the order and they soon almost touching each other. "Now," the voice by his ear said, "Say this phrase loudly and clearly, there's no place like home!"
"You're shitting me," Jack said reflexively.
The voice chuckled. "No, that's not what I said. I said, say, there's no place like home. Say it firmly."
Jack rolled his eyes. "Do I need to click my heels, too?"
"Not unless it makes you feel better."
He sighed, and said, shaking his head, "There's no place like home."
For an instant, nothing happened. Then it felt like a hook somewhere behind his navel jerked him off his feet. The room seemed to vanish from around them, and a whirlwind of colours, mainly the browns and gold of the Goa'uld ship, flew past them. Or they flew past the colours, it was impossible to say which. Then everything turned black. It became intensely cold for a split second, then the four of them tumbled to a carpeted floor. Jack found himself retching, but nothing came up. His head hurt, as well.
"Here," the voice said. "These taste like rancid mud, and smell almost as bad, but they'll soothe your stomachs and clear your heads."
Jack looked up. The others seemed as badly affected as he was. A short distance away were four small bottles with corks plugging them. He hesitated, but then realized that if these aliens had wanted to kill them, why rescue them?
Groaning, he leaned over and grabbed one. The cork came out with a POP. He almost tried to take a sniff, but remembered what the voice had said. He took a swig, gagged, but kept it down. He finished the bottle with the next swallow, which, somehow, tasted even worse. He made a face of disgust as he put the bottle down, then realized, he felt . . . good. No headache, no upset stomach.
"Damn!" He grabbed two bottles and held them out to the Sam and Teal's who were closest. "Here drink these," he said, "They'll fix you right up. They taste terrible and smell worse, so do it all in one go!"
Teal'c followed orders, and then looked at the bottle in surprise. Sam made the mistake of taking a sniff and retched a second time. Still, she took a breath and swallowed the . . . whatever it was. Then it was her turn to look at the bottle in surprise.
Jack handed the last bottle to Daniel. Dan didn't even hesitate after seeing the other's reactions; he just drank it.
"Sorry about that," the voice said apologetically. "That form of transport is rather disagreeable to first-timers, and mostly used only for inanimate objects or when other methods of transport are unavailable or unusable for one reason or another. You do get used to it, but it takes a few trips."
Jack looked around and was surprise to see that they were on the same ship as they had been before.
The bottles and corks suddenly moved out of their hands and to the front wall. An opening appeared and the bottles disappeared through it. "There now. Can't leave those just lying about, Reuse and recycle, right?"
Jack had been just about to put his in his pocket. Their scientists would have loved to sample that medicine.
"Is this the same ship we were on before?" Sam asked, getting up and moving towards one of the seats.
"Nope. It's one of our standard Runabouts." There was a pause then the forward wall suddenly became a viewscreen with the two Goa'uld ships on it. "Oh, you'll want to see this," the voice said. A moment later, they heard a female's voice saying, "This is Lieutenant-Commander Johnson of the Defensive Space Force Ship Battlestar Requirement calling unidentified spaceships who just entered Earth orbital space. Please identify yourselves and why you are here. Over."
The three humans exchanged disbelieving looks.
"I think someone is pulling our legs," Jack said. "Rather hard, too."
They listened as the Johnson traded words with Apophis.
"How far are we from the Goa'uld?" Jack asked. "We look really close."
"When I first brought you onboard, we were close enough to touch the hull. Now we're at Earth, this is being relayed to us from an observer drone."
"And they couldn't detect you?"
"No more than your military can detect us." He paused. "Our tech is just that good."
Jack couldn't help but be impressed when the aliens suddenly shot bolts of plasma through space as a "warning shot." He was even more impressed at the barrage that was the follow-up.
"Holy crap!" he said as the Goa'uld ships started falling apart and exploding. They were all staring in disbelief.
"Well, that's a relief. We weren't sure how well that would work. Trying to take the ships via direct assault would have been tough." There was a brief pause. "Although our Marines were hoping for chance to test against their Jaffa. They'll be disappointed at missing out." There was another brief pause, and then they heard a sigh. "Well, it looks like the show is over. We can't take you straight down, just yet, we kinda need all hands-on-deck to keep those hundred-thousand-ton chunks of ships from causing a great deal of damage on Earth, so I'll be dropping you off in overnight quarters."
The front viewscreen abruptly changed and they saw they were approaching a suspiciously familiar ship. The humans again exchanged startled glances.
The voice started laughing. "Merlin, if you could see your expressions! Before you ask, our cloaking technique allows us to see each other, so, although you can see the ship, your people on Earth cannot. And yes, this is not a recording, that is the ship."
Their ship slid — coasted, flew? — smoothly closer and towards the opening at the rear of one of the two outriggers. They went inside the brightly lit hangar, which they saw was open at the other end. They slowed and pulled inside a large, individual bay, to the side, much like a car would park in a large public garage, but with walls to either side.
The ship slowed and stopped, and appeared to settle to the floor, although they felt no movement. A moment later, a door opened in the side of the room they were in, towards the back where the door in the previous ship had been. They cautiously stepped out and looked around. They weren't standing beside a school-bus, at least, Jack saw to some relief. But the ship bore a surprising resemblance to the Eagle One from Space 1999.
Hearing a gasp, Jack turned and saw that the wall facing them had print in several different languages, including what looked like runes. The message said. "Please follow the line on the floor," which led through the door at the back of the bay. They followed it to a room that was about the size of what Jack recognized as a standard squadron briefing-room, a classroom. The line on the floor disappeared as soon as they entered the room.
While the size of the room might have been for a briefing-room, the furniture was not what he expected. Armchairs and couches were plentiful, in red with gold highlights. Tables were placed between the pieces, with several being obvious work desks.
On the wall Jack would have said was the head of the room from the way the majority of the furniture was oriented, was a large viewscreen. The screen was on, and showing a news program of some sort. From the crawl at the bottom of the screen, they saw it was currently showing the American Cable Network News.
They stared around in amazement. Compared to the rather stark furnishings they had seen at the aliens' Stargate facility; this was downright homey!
The very familiarity of what they saw made it all that much stranger.
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