AN: Almost in the home stretch. Weirdly a friend who has been giving my husband the cold shoulder now wants our kids to go to her kid's birthday party. As I deeply resented my mom's drama ruining MY friendships I told my hubby to suck it up and take the kids for the sake of THEIR friendship. He can sit there and read a book while they enjoy themselves after all.

Chapter 13

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me." Jack muttered while looking through the binoculars Sam had passed him.

Sam smiled ironically and tried not to laugh. "This is awkward." She muttered.

"Yah think?" Jack asked her sarcastically.

"Sir, we're in position." The black clad airman told Jack regarding the shake down.

"Wait for them all to enter the building before you move in." Jack said. Some of the airmen had been there all night and slept on the roof of the engineering building waiting for the fireworks.

"Yes sir." The airman agreed.

Sam and Jack went back to watching Jimmy and the scary waitress talk to Mike and his merry band of misfits discuss the pros and cons of letting him see the product.

Jimmy for his part was acting like an irate peon. "Look, I don't give a crap what your problem is. If we don't see it, my buyer is pulling the plug." Jimmy said, gesturing wildly.

Melinda just stood there looking terrifying.

Mike didn't say anything for a long time. He really didn't want to reveal their artifacts but at the same time he wanted out from under this situation as soon as he could manage. He looked at Bill who frowned and sighed. "Fine. We'll show you what we've got in good faith but if you try any crap this whole place is booby trapped. You take us out, everyone dies." Mike said, making that entirely up on the fly. Bobby was inside already which lended some believability to the lie.

"I'm glad we have an understanding." Jimmy said, trying to sound like a slightly mollified lackey.

"Right." Mike said with a huff.

Sam and Jack who were listening in on the bugs planted outside the plant recently by their support team both rolled their eyes.

"It's not really that bad of a lie." Jack said.

"Oh, come on Jack, Cassie lies better and she's terrible at it." Sam said in amusement.

"He tried." Jack said with a tight grin that made Sam chuckle softly.

They went back to watching Sam's employers lead Jimmy and 'Susan' into the building and Jack kept one eye on Sam as she counted down in her head how long it should take them to get from the door to the lab accounting for the number of people involved and possibly some dawdling on the part of the thieves in the hopes of not having to go through with this part.

Sam signaled that they should all be in the lab.

Several things happened at once. The SGC airmen got the drop on Jimmy, his bodyguard waitress, and Sam's shady employers.

Out of nowhere, an unfamiliar aircraft uncloaked directly above the building and special agents rappelled to the roof, startling the airmen who had the building surrounded.

Everyone drew guns on everyone else.

"What the hell!" Jack cursed. "Secure the target. Do not let anyone remove it. I don't care who they say they are." He growled into his mic. He and Sam made their way to the parking lot from their overlook on a partially hidden fire escape landing three buildings away.

Back at the building, the Air Force black ops specialists had Billy, Kevin, Mike and Bobby herded into one small group against a wall. Jimmy and Melinda were in a separate group. Agents wearing black with 'SHIELD' emblems alternated between training their guns on the thieves and trying to find out who was in charge of the Air Force op so they could negotiate.

Jack stalked into the lab like a man ready to burn the whole place down. "Is the device secured?" he asked his infiltration ops leader.

"Yes sir. I-"

"Excuse me… Sorry. Phil Coulson. SHIELD. Can we discuss the device you are here to retrieve?" A slight man with military short hair and a friendly honest sort of face said to Jack while sticking out his hand.

Jack looked the agent up and down. He was dressed in a nondescript suit which was typical of the type. "That's classified." Jack growled.

"Right, well it looks like your people and my people are after the same thing and you're detaining a couple of my agents." Coulson said with a polite smile.

"Until General Hammond says otherwise everyone involved is under military arrest." Jack said to the other man with a frown.

"Well I'm sure he's a reasonable guy, right? Let's talk about this. See I really don't want to deal with these guys but they stole some proprietary tech from SHIELD and we want it back." Coulson said with a shrug.

Jack sighed and scrubbed at his hair. "Seems that's going around. Which one is your doohickey? You can't have ours by the way."

"I wouldn't dream of it, sir." Coulson said. "Didn't catch your name by the way, or your rank." He said pointedly.

"O'Neill, Colonel to you, agent." Jack grumbled while he kept one eye on Sam who was checking on their missing alien technology.

"Right. Anyway, Colonel O'Neill, I'd really appreciate it if you released my agents." He pointed at Jimmy and Melinda.

Jack turned and scowled at Jimmy. The expression had no effect on Agent May but Jimmy swallowed visibly and waggled his fingers at Jack in a 'hi' gesture.

Sam returned to Jack's side. "It's no worse for the wear, sir. I can probably fix anything they broke over the last few weeks."

"Hi, Agent Phil Coulson." Phil said, putting out a hand for Sam to shake.

"Agent, my second in command, Major Carter." Jack growled as Sam took Phil's hand but before she could speak to the man.

"Major." Phil said. "I'd like to take a look at the tech these guys stole from my people if you wouldn't mind." He said this looking at Sam without overtly ignoring Jack in his appeal.

"Sir?"

"Show him his doohickey, Carter. The sooner he gets his crap, the sooner he's out of our hair."

"Right. Come on, Agent Coulson, your missing tech is over here." Sam said to the man with a friendly smile that was in opposition to Jack's annoyed scowl.

"Is he always like that?" Coulson asked Sam soto-voco once they were away from Jack.

Sam shrugged and smiled a bit as she led Phil away from Jack. "It's mostly just for effect. He doesn't like people moving in on his ops."

"I mean, who does right?" Phil said with an answering smile. "No, I think it's because we aren't strictly military." He surmised quickly.

Sam gave him a speculative look. This Coulson guy read people faster than average.

One of the Airmen approached Jack. "Sir… two of the prisoners say they are special agents for something called 'SHIELD."

"Yah. I got that part. Bring them over." Jack said with an annoyed sigh.

"Jack… so, funny thing… apparently everyone was a secret agent. Well, except those guys over there." Jimmy said, then stuttered to a stop at Jack's expression and Melinda's not so discreet pinch of his arm.

"What my partner is trying to say is thank you for the assist but we'll take it from here." Melinda said firmly, stressing the word partner as though she was not entirely pleased that he was which Jack could well understand. The puppy thing apparently was not an act.

"Not so fast... Agent?"

"May. Melinda May."

"I have some questions for you and your boss, Agent May." Jack said. His friendly smile did not reach his eyes.

"Coulson is not my boss." Agent May said firmly. Coulson was, at best, in her opinion, of equal rank.

"Well, he seems to be the one in charge here. What are you guys after exactly?"

"I'm not at liberty to say." And her expression reflected that even if she was, she wouldn't tell Jack anyway.

"Great. Well, everyone can just sit tight until my boss talks to your boss then." Jack said, with seeming regret. Inwardly he was highly amused to be getting under Agent May's skin. She took herself too seriously even if this was field work. He himself was ignoring his own stern expression and body language at the moment.

"Hey yah let's just have Director Fury talk to Jack's boss and then we can all get out of here." Jimmy said hopefully with the enthusiasm of someone who would cheerfully be almost anywhere else but here.

Agent May, Jack noted, gave Jimmy a look that would kill a less stalwart companion. "I'm all for it." Jack said clapping his hands in anticipation. "Have your guy Coulson give him a ring."

"That won't be necessary." A voice said from behind Jack.

Jack turned and sighed. Adding to the mix the FBI had now shown up too. "What is this? An alphabet soup party?" Jack groused which made Jimmy snort and choke on a laugh he tried to hide before Melinda pinched him again.

"Colonel. I understand you have detained several technology brokers who were attempting to sell stolen tech."

"Yah, my tech. Hands off, Feebee." Jack grumbled.

"I'm not interested in the product. Only the thieves." The middle-aged man who would have easily blended into any setting were it not for his dark suit jacket and sunglasses at night look.

"Lucas!" Jack yelled to the airman that had secured the prisoners.

"Sir?" the man called over his shoulders, never taking his eyes off the bound men in front of him.

"Give the nice man in the monkey suite our detainees."

"Sir?"

"You heard me, Lucas. Hand them over. We don't really want them anyway as long as we got our stuff back." Jack said with a shooing motion regarding the four men who were looking very apprehensive about their fate.

The latest arrival to the party caught Coulson's attention as he and Sam drifted back to join Jack.

"Now, wait just a moment. We have some questions for those men." Coulson said to the FBI man who had joined the conversation. Several dark suited men surrounded the four prisoners and shielded them from Coulson and Jack's view.

"Have your director call my director." The FBI agent suggested blandly. No more inclined to offer his name then Jack himself had.

"Is the-" Melinda kicked Jimmy before he could finish.

"What my teammate would like to know is if our interests here are secured."

Coulson nodded. "They're boxing it up right now."

A circle of golden light suddenly appeared near the small group and everyone backed away and drew their guns. The man who walked through was dressed strangely which was appropriate all things considered.

"I'll take that now." Steven Strange said of the box a SHIELD agent had brought over to Coulson.

"Now look, I don't know who you are but you aren't just taking this." Phil objected.

"It's Strange." He introduced himself.

"No argument from me." Jack muttered.

"Dr. Steven Strange." The man continued. "And the Tesseract is coming with me."

"Look, I don't know who you are but I've come up against aliens before. I'm not afraid to take you on." Coulson said as his eyebrows lowered in annoyance.

Jack slowly turned and looked at Coulson. "Aliens?" He asked mildly. "Anyone I know?"

"What?" Coulson asked absently. "How should I know." He said distractedly, never taking his eyes off the caped figure.

"Look, Dr. Who. I don't know what you think you're doing here but we have enough agencies already." Jack said in exasperation.

"Dr…" Steven stopped and looked at Jack. "Do I look British?"

"Well, I mean if you want to get technical about it…" Coulson said in a thoughtful tone

"Enough." Strange said in exasperation. "Just hand over the Tesseract so I can secure it somewhere a long time from here."

"Excuse me but did you say a long time?" Sam asked coming up to the conversation.

"Yah emo fancy Danny wants Agent Phil's doohickey." Jack supplied.

Sam bit her lip trying not to laugh at this description.

"Look, certain events in history will not play out if the Tesseract is recovered today. I promise it will be in safe keeping in the meantime." Steven interjected, his tone exasperated with Jack's jokes.

"Which events?" Phil demanded.

"I see you've found my cat," said another voice who joined the conversation.

Everyone turned to see a tall black man with an eye patch carrying Goose over to them.

"Oh, he's yours." Sam said in a disappointed voice.

"He is. And he's a good kitty, yes he is." the man said, scratching Goose fondly. "He likes you so I'll assume you're good people." Fury said to Jack and Sam. "The jury is still out on you, Bela Lugosi. Why should we just give you the Tesseract?"

Strange huffed a sigh. "Because I'm retrieving it on your orders."

"I gave no such orders and I certainly wouldn't ask Orizon the magician if I did." Fury said in indignation.

"Who?" Coulson said under his breath.

"Fifty Million Frenchmen. It's an old comedy from the thirties." Jack said to the other man under his breath.

"Why do you know that?" Jimmy asked in confusion.

Jack just shrugged.

"This is getting wildly off topic. I have proof." Strange said to Fury.

"Oh? Do tell?" Fury said in mock interest.

"Goose is a Flerken."

"A what?" Jack asked in confusion.

"Intradimensional being from an alternate reality."

Jack nodded as though this made absolutely perfect sense. "Which one? There's hundreds."

"Billions." Sam corrected.

"What she said." Jack agreed.

Fury looked at them strangely.

"Well, Goosey, looks like you get to be just a regular cat for a while." Fury said having come to a decision.

"Sir, I really don't think we should just hand over the Tesseract to an unknown based on a random fact he knows about your cat." Coulson objected.

"Duly noted, Coulson. Now give the nice wizard the magic box." Fury said.

"Any objection to me handling the prisoners, sir?" The FBI agent asked Fury.

"None whatsoever, Agent. You enjoy interrogating them. I doubt they really know anything anyway." He said dismissively.

Goose yawned in Fury's arms.

"Thank you, sir." The agent said and turned to direct his own people to round up the prisoners.

"Now as for you to…" Fury said, turning to Jack and Sam. "You didn't see anything about a glowing box or an alien cat."

Jack looked at the other man with a considering frown as though he was honestly pondering the situation.

"Sir." Sam said in exasperation.

"Right." Jack said, seeming to snap out of it. "We'll just collect our alien spaceship parts and leave then." he said with a feral sort of smile.

"I'm glad we're on the same page, Colonel." Fury agreed. "Phil, give Count Chocula the Tesseract so we can get out of here."

"Yes sir." Coulson said, in exasperation, handing Strange the device.

"And good riddance. Future me can deal with that thing." Fury grumbled as he stalked off, Goose in his arms..

An hour later, Jack surveyed the scene. Sam's missing scientists had been cuffed and were carted off by the FBI who had pulled rank over SHIELD and the SGC. Hammond didn't honestly care what happened to the idiots who took the tech, but he did care about his shielded power unit schematics that Sam had retrieved and wiped. Similarly Coulson had retrieved the glowy blue box and handed it off to the magician in the fancy cape who had left the way he came, through some kind of portal Sam clearly looked like she was dying to figure out how it worked.

"Jack." Jimmy said to him as he walked up and similarly watched the unfolding events.

"James." Jack said noncommittally.

"So, Air Force, huh?"

"Yup."

"How's that gonna work with the whole… well… you know." He said, clearly indicating the situation with Sam with his vague hand gesture in Sam's direction where she was talking to Agent May about the Tesseract.

"Don't know what you mean." Jack said vaguely.

"Well, you know… the whole… thing."

Jack turned to Jimmy and gave him an amused smile. "We faked that."

"What?"

"We were faking because we knew the house was bugged." Jack said as though that should have been obvious.

"You… you faked-"

"Yup."

"All of it?" Jimmy asked, blushing at the memory of their enthusiastic moaning most nights.

"What kind of idiot would sleep with his subordinate knowing it would get him court-martialed." Jack pointed out.

"Oh. Um. Right. Of course you faked it.

"Good talk, Jimmy." Jack said as though he couldn't have cared less.