Thanks to Whitty, hdrexel, Gen, jaxom_I, S.M, and Ruth for their reviews.
To anyone who was wondering why Jack could use Floo Powder but not be
affected by magic, my reasoning is that Floo Powder doesn't affect you, it
affects the fire. This means that Jack doesn't have to be affected, he's
just walking through the door magic opened.
Gen: It's not that Dumbledore wants to learn about muggle weapons, you'll see this chapter.
Other than saying to please leave a review, I guess I'm done with my little spiel, so on with the story!
Chapter 7
Jack lounged in the Gryffindor common room with Hermione, Harry, and Ron, who were eagerly going over the OWLs that Dumbledore had given them after his talk with Jack. Jack was waiting for Dumbledore to arrange a meeting with the Wizarding Council.
"I can't believe I got an Outstanding in Potions!" Harry said in amazement.
"Yeah, no doubt Snape had a fit when he heard that." Ron added. "I bet he thought he was rid of you for sure."
The three conversed about their grades while Jack relaxed in one of the overstuffed chairs only half listening to them. Harry had done pretty well, getting high marks in Potions, Transfiguration, Charms, and DADA of course. Hermione had top marks across the board, except for Astronomy, in which no one had gotten higher than Exceeds Expectations due to the little interruption that Umbridge had caused. Ron had managed to accumulate more OWLs than either Fred or George, but not as many as Percy. He thought he had done quite well.
Jack was just starting to doze off in the comfy chair when the portrait swung open and Dumbledore stepped into the common room. "Colonel if you don't mind, we should attend to the meeting now."
Jack nodded and got up, leaving the three teens to themselves. As soon as the door closed, they started talking amongst each other in excited tones. "Do you think he can make them see that they need help?" Hermione asked.
Harry shook his head. "I don't know. Fudge is a complete idiot, he's stubborn as a rock."
Ron scoffed. "And that git Percy still follows him around like a little dog. Maybe if the Colonel can't convince him, he'll just shoot him with that zat thing."
Meanwhile Dumbledore and Jack had just reached Dumbledore's office. "So how are we gonna get there?" Jack asked, "Are we traveling by fireplace again?"
Dumbledore shook his head. "No, we'll be traveling with this." He held forward a small keychain.
"Umm, what?" Jack asked, staring at the keychain in confusion.
"This is a portkey." Dumbledore explained. "It's enchanted to take two people from anywhere instantaneously to a specific point, in this case the Ministry of Magic, in precisely one minute. All you have to do is hold on."
"Cool." Was all Jack could think of to say.
Jack and Dumbledore waited a moment, then they both grabbed the keychain, and after a few seconds Jack felt a tugging sensation behind his navel, and he felt the world fall away.
~~~~~~~
Buffy was just about to get into bed in the quarters she was sharing with Dawn when she was startled by a loud banging on the door. She looked at her sister, who shrugged. "Come in." she called.
The door opened, and standing in the doorway was Daniel and an angry looking General Hammond. "We, uh, need to talk." Daniel said, moving into the room.
"What's going on?" Buffy asked, probing her mind for anything that she might have done in the last couple of hours on base.
"Miss Summers, you have a lot of nerve." Hammond stated angrily. "Don't you think it might have been prudent to at least tell me that one of your Slayers is an escaped criminal?"
'Uh oh.' Buffy winced inwardly. "Oh, right. About that, would you believe I forgot?"
"Buffy, we want to help, but she's a convicted murderer." Daniel said softly.
"I don't know what to tell you." Buffy said, shrugging. "Faith has changed, even before she was broken out. When she killed that man, she was scared and she didn't know how to deal with it. But like I said, she's changed."
Hammond looked at Buffy. "You expect me to just believe you that she's changed now?"
"Well actually sir you did exactly that with Teal'c." Daniel pointed out. "And I'm sure he's killed people before, in fact we went to a planet where he was put on trial and found guilty of murder."
"I suppose that's true." Hammond said thoughtfully.
"Then there was that time when Apophis brainwashed him, then we just trusted him again after-"
"Okay Dr. Jackson, point made." Hammond said. He turned to look at Buffy seriously. "Alright Miss Summers, for now we'll have the charges against Faith wiped clean."
"You can do that?" Buffy asked disbelievingly.
Hammond nodded. "We have some pretty high connections in the government. However, if she does anything to make me believe she'll be a threat to any of my people or our operation, she will be locked up again. I trusted Teal'c because he saved the lives of SG-1, I have yet to see any reason to trust Faith."
Buffy nodded, not sure of whether to be happy that Faith wasn't a criminal anymore, or insulted that the General didn't trust them. She did however return the warm smile Daniel gave her before he left. ~~~~~~~
Xander looked around the room he was in. It was entirely white, and the walls almost seemed to give off a soft emanation or glow. With the door closed, the room was a completely seamless white. In the middle of the room lay a raised table with a headrest, and suspended above it was what looked like some kind of casing or covering for the table. "So what now?" Xander asked.
Dr. Frasier pointed to the table. "Lie down, then we'll get started."
Xander nodded and moved to the table, then lay down on it, looking at the covering suspended above him. The petite redhead doctor stood overtop of him and leaned over to remove the eye patch. "It's up to you, but do you want to be asleep for the procedure?" she asked.
"Is it gonna be painful?" Xander asked, trying to make up his mind.
Janet shook her head. "No, the machine eliminates all pain, but I imagine the sensation of growing a new eye will still be a little uncomfortable."
"That's about fifty shades of gross. Yeah I'm gonna go with asleep for this one." Xander decided.
Janet nodded and removed a syringe from the pocket of her lab coat. "This is a fast acting sleeping drug. You'll be asleep for about three hours after I administer it, and the procedure should take about two and a half hours."
Xander winced a little as Janet injected him, then almost immediately began to feel the effects. Xander could just see the top of the casing beginning to descend before he fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
~~~~~~~
Dumbledore and Jack sat outside a meeting room for the Wizengamot, Dumbledore sitting patiently while Jack fidgeted. Jack turned to look at the old wizard that sat beside him. "I have a confession to make." He said finally.
"And what is that?" Dumbledore asked, surprised to see the usually confident Colonel acting this way.
"I, how can I put this? I'm not so good at these, delicate, diplomatic situations." Jack said almost meekly. "I have a tendency to lose my patience."
Dumbledore smiled. "Strange as it may seem, that might be exactly what we need."
The large wooden doors they were sitting beside creaked open, though no one came to escort them in. Jack and Dumbledore got up and walked into the room, which reminded Jack of the Asguard Meeting Hall, although it was significantly less advanced. In the center of the room sat two chairs, which Jack and Dumbledore sat in, facing a large collection of older, distinguished looking men and women in black robes. All had stern looks on their faces. 'Jeez,' Jack thought to himself, 'these guys look even worse than the Tollan.'
"For what reason have you called us all here, Albus?" one of the women asked seriously.
"Wizards and Witches of Wizengamot, I bring you the muggle Colonel O'Neill, who wants to negotiate an alliance against both our enemies, Anubis and Voldemort."
Many of the assembled wizards gasped at the second name, but quickly composed themselves again.
"Why is this muggle even aware of the wizarding world?" one of the wizards demanded angrily.
"Because, Minister Fudge, his memory cannot be erased." Dumbledore replied easily. "Colonel O'Neill possesses something I have never seem in a human before, a magical immunity. The Colonel seems completely immune to memory charms, and in fact remained standing after taking a stunning spell to the chest."
There were gasps and murmurs among the assembled wizards. "That's not possible!" one of the wizards exclaimed.
"It seems it is." Dumbledore replied. He turned to Jack. "Perhaps a demonstration is in order."
Jack shrugged and stood up. "Yeah, okay. Just this one time though."
Dumbledore pointed his wand at Jack and said, "Stupefy." A jet of red streaked out of the wand at hit Jack in the chest. Jack grabbed hold of the chair, but remained standing. "Whoa, that feels weird."
The council was suddenly deathly silent. Not one of them could believe what they had just seen. Dumbledore looked them over and said seriously, "Now that I have your attention, I believe we should return to the matter at hand."
Jack stepped forward after waiting a second for the effects of the stunning spell to dissipate. "Look, I think we're in a position to help each other here. Both our enemies will have an effect on both of us, so why don't we work together?"
Fudge, who has been eyeing Jack with distaste, snorted contemptuously. "Even if you have the ability to withstand magic, no one else does. There is nothing the muggles in general can do to help us. Your weapons don't even work in areas of high magical concentration."
"Like this one?" Jack asked.
Fudge nodded. "Muggle devices simply stop working here."
Jack pulled out his zat. "So this thing here, it won't work right?" Jack popped open the zat, and examined it. "Seems to be working pretty good now."
Dumbledore tossed a rock he had collected to Jack, who dropped in on the floor, then fired the zat three times, dissolving the rock.
Again, murmurs and hushed conversations broke out among the wizards. "What is that?" Fudge asked, still looking contemptuously at Jack.
"This is a zat." Jack explained. "It's based on crystal technology, which seems to work just fine here, and at the school I was at. Now here's the part that sucks. This isn't a human weapon; it's a Goa'uld one. That means when hundreds of Anubis' troops are storming one of your magical strongholds, they'll all be using these."
"And what makes you think the Goa'uld will attack us?" Fudge replied. "It seems their vendetta is with the muggles. He doesn't even know we exist."
Jack rolled his eyes. "What are you, like six? Anubis isn't selective. Here's here to kill everyone. When motherships are bombing the planet from orbit, you think the captain is going, make sure only to hit the military. We don't want to kill anyone else. No, Anubis is here to kill everyone. Military, civilian, wizard, muggle it doesn't matter. At this point he doesn't even want to enslave us, he just wants us dead."
Fudge turned to look at the rest of the council, his eyes uncertain. "We must discuss this decision, if you'll wait just a few days-"
"Oh for cryin out loud!" Jack exclaimed. "This is a no brainer people! You guys are even worse than the Asguard. You need help, we need help. It's not rocket science! There should be no discussion this is an easy call. Even if there should be discussion, we don't have time. Anubis and Voldywhatever are here now."
"Colonel you must understand you are asking us to simply reveal ourselves to the muggle population after thousands of years." An elderly witch in the back said.
"Oh yeah, because that would be a tragedy." Jacks said sarcastically. "For thousands of years you've hidden yourselves away from the rest of the world, content to sit in your little elitist group and ignore everything else. Well guess what? Everything else is smashing down the door. So what are you gonna do about it?"
~~~~~~~
Dr. Felger looked excitedly at his new invention. It was a new weapon that all of the Prometheus class ships would be fitted with, which Felger had decided to call a beam cannon. Sitting on the table in front of Felger was a one tenth size version that he had created for testing, and it was now ready for its' first test firing. The weapon worked a bit like a capacitor, collecting and storing a large amount of energy before expelling it all in a sustained concentrated beam. Felger aimed the beam cannon at a large trinium sheet and pressed the button to power it up, impatiently waiting as the weapon charged to full power. Unfortunately, the beam cannon collected full energy, then immediately shorted, releasing all the pent up energy back into the power system of the SGC, causing a massive power surge.
~~~~~~~
Janet sat monitoring the healing chamber, which she had targeted at Xander's eyes. It was nearing the end of his treatment, and from all accounts, the procedure seemed to be a success. The instruments monitoring Xander's eye growth all indicated that the eye had grown in properly and seemed to be functioning. Suddenly the lights began to flicker, and Janet's eyes bugged out as she watched the power draw of the chamber balloon to ten times the normal amount before the surge protector cut in and powered down the chamber. Janet jumped out of her chair and ran to the door of the chamber, shouting frantically for a nurse as she went.
End chap 7
Bwahaha cliffhanger. Will Xander be okay? Will Fudge take his head out of his ass? Find out soon! (As you can guess I don't like Fudge). Thanks for reading and please leave a review.
Gen: It's not that Dumbledore wants to learn about muggle weapons, you'll see this chapter.
Other than saying to please leave a review, I guess I'm done with my little spiel, so on with the story!
Chapter 7
Jack lounged in the Gryffindor common room with Hermione, Harry, and Ron, who were eagerly going over the OWLs that Dumbledore had given them after his talk with Jack. Jack was waiting for Dumbledore to arrange a meeting with the Wizarding Council.
"I can't believe I got an Outstanding in Potions!" Harry said in amazement.
"Yeah, no doubt Snape had a fit when he heard that." Ron added. "I bet he thought he was rid of you for sure."
The three conversed about their grades while Jack relaxed in one of the overstuffed chairs only half listening to them. Harry had done pretty well, getting high marks in Potions, Transfiguration, Charms, and DADA of course. Hermione had top marks across the board, except for Astronomy, in which no one had gotten higher than Exceeds Expectations due to the little interruption that Umbridge had caused. Ron had managed to accumulate more OWLs than either Fred or George, but not as many as Percy. He thought he had done quite well.
Jack was just starting to doze off in the comfy chair when the portrait swung open and Dumbledore stepped into the common room. "Colonel if you don't mind, we should attend to the meeting now."
Jack nodded and got up, leaving the three teens to themselves. As soon as the door closed, they started talking amongst each other in excited tones. "Do you think he can make them see that they need help?" Hermione asked.
Harry shook his head. "I don't know. Fudge is a complete idiot, he's stubborn as a rock."
Ron scoffed. "And that git Percy still follows him around like a little dog. Maybe if the Colonel can't convince him, he'll just shoot him with that zat thing."
Meanwhile Dumbledore and Jack had just reached Dumbledore's office. "So how are we gonna get there?" Jack asked, "Are we traveling by fireplace again?"
Dumbledore shook his head. "No, we'll be traveling with this." He held forward a small keychain.
"Umm, what?" Jack asked, staring at the keychain in confusion.
"This is a portkey." Dumbledore explained. "It's enchanted to take two people from anywhere instantaneously to a specific point, in this case the Ministry of Magic, in precisely one minute. All you have to do is hold on."
"Cool." Was all Jack could think of to say.
Jack and Dumbledore waited a moment, then they both grabbed the keychain, and after a few seconds Jack felt a tugging sensation behind his navel, and he felt the world fall away.
~~~~~~~
Buffy was just about to get into bed in the quarters she was sharing with Dawn when she was startled by a loud banging on the door. She looked at her sister, who shrugged. "Come in." she called.
The door opened, and standing in the doorway was Daniel and an angry looking General Hammond. "We, uh, need to talk." Daniel said, moving into the room.
"What's going on?" Buffy asked, probing her mind for anything that she might have done in the last couple of hours on base.
"Miss Summers, you have a lot of nerve." Hammond stated angrily. "Don't you think it might have been prudent to at least tell me that one of your Slayers is an escaped criminal?"
'Uh oh.' Buffy winced inwardly. "Oh, right. About that, would you believe I forgot?"
"Buffy, we want to help, but she's a convicted murderer." Daniel said softly.
"I don't know what to tell you." Buffy said, shrugging. "Faith has changed, even before she was broken out. When she killed that man, she was scared and she didn't know how to deal with it. But like I said, she's changed."
Hammond looked at Buffy. "You expect me to just believe you that she's changed now?"
"Well actually sir you did exactly that with Teal'c." Daniel pointed out. "And I'm sure he's killed people before, in fact we went to a planet where he was put on trial and found guilty of murder."
"I suppose that's true." Hammond said thoughtfully.
"Then there was that time when Apophis brainwashed him, then we just trusted him again after-"
"Okay Dr. Jackson, point made." Hammond said. He turned to look at Buffy seriously. "Alright Miss Summers, for now we'll have the charges against Faith wiped clean."
"You can do that?" Buffy asked disbelievingly.
Hammond nodded. "We have some pretty high connections in the government. However, if she does anything to make me believe she'll be a threat to any of my people or our operation, she will be locked up again. I trusted Teal'c because he saved the lives of SG-1, I have yet to see any reason to trust Faith."
Buffy nodded, not sure of whether to be happy that Faith wasn't a criminal anymore, or insulted that the General didn't trust them. She did however return the warm smile Daniel gave her before he left. ~~~~~~~
Xander looked around the room he was in. It was entirely white, and the walls almost seemed to give off a soft emanation or glow. With the door closed, the room was a completely seamless white. In the middle of the room lay a raised table with a headrest, and suspended above it was what looked like some kind of casing or covering for the table. "So what now?" Xander asked.
Dr. Frasier pointed to the table. "Lie down, then we'll get started."
Xander nodded and moved to the table, then lay down on it, looking at the covering suspended above him. The petite redhead doctor stood overtop of him and leaned over to remove the eye patch. "It's up to you, but do you want to be asleep for the procedure?" she asked.
"Is it gonna be painful?" Xander asked, trying to make up his mind.
Janet shook her head. "No, the machine eliminates all pain, but I imagine the sensation of growing a new eye will still be a little uncomfortable."
"That's about fifty shades of gross. Yeah I'm gonna go with asleep for this one." Xander decided.
Janet nodded and removed a syringe from the pocket of her lab coat. "This is a fast acting sleeping drug. You'll be asleep for about three hours after I administer it, and the procedure should take about two and a half hours."
Xander winced a little as Janet injected him, then almost immediately began to feel the effects. Xander could just see the top of the casing beginning to descend before he fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
~~~~~~~
Dumbledore and Jack sat outside a meeting room for the Wizengamot, Dumbledore sitting patiently while Jack fidgeted. Jack turned to look at the old wizard that sat beside him. "I have a confession to make." He said finally.
"And what is that?" Dumbledore asked, surprised to see the usually confident Colonel acting this way.
"I, how can I put this? I'm not so good at these, delicate, diplomatic situations." Jack said almost meekly. "I have a tendency to lose my patience."
Dumbledore smiled. "Strange as it may seem, that might be exactly what we need."
The large wooden doors they were sitting beside creaked open, though no one came to escort them in. Jack and Dumbledore got up and walked into the room, which reminded Jack of the Asguard Meeting Hall, although it was significantly less advanced. In the center of the room sat two chairs, which Jack and Dumbledore sat in, facing a large collection of older, distinguished looking men and women in black robes. All had stern looks on their faces. 'Jeez,' Jack thought to himself, 'these guys look even worse than the Tollan.'
"For what reason have you called us all here, Albus?" one of the women asked seriously.
"Wizards and Witches of Wizengamot, I bring you the muggle Colonel O'Neill, who wants to negotiate an alliance against both our enemies, Anubis and Voldemort."
Many of the assembled wizards gasped at the second name, but quickly composed themselves again.
"Why is this muggle even aware of the wizarding world?" one of the wizards demanded angrily.
"Because, Minister Fudge, his memory cannot be erased." Dumbledore replied easily. "Colonel O'Neill possesses something I have never seem in a human before, a magical immunity. The Colonel seems completely immune to memory charms, and in fact remained standing after taking a stunning spell to the chest."
There were gasps and murmurs among the assembled wizards. "That's not possible!" one of the wizards exclaimed.
"It seems it is." Dumbledore replied. He turned to Jack. "Perhaps a demonstration is in order."
Jack shrugged and stood up. "Yeah, okay. Just this one time though."
Dumbledore pointed his wand at Jack and said, "Stupefy." A jet of red streaked out of the wand at hit Jack in the chest. Jack grabbed hold of the chair, but remained standing. "Whoa, that feels weird."
The council was suddenly deathly silent. Not one of them could believe what they had just seen. Dumbledore looked them over and said seriously, "Now that I have your attention, I believe we should return to the matter at hand."
Jack stepped forward after waiting a second for the effects of the stunning spell to dissipate. "Look, I think we're in a position to help each other here. Both our enemies will have an effect on both of us, so why don't we work together?"
Fudge, who has been eyeing Jack with distaste, snorted contemptuously. "Even if you have the ability to withstand magic, no one else does. There is nothing the muggles in general can do to help us. Your weapons don't even work in areas of high magical concentration."
"Like this one?" Jack asked.
Fudge nodded. "Muggle devices simply stop working here."
Jack pulled out his zat. "So this thing here, it won't work right?" Jack popped open the zat, and examined it. "Seems to be working pretty good now."
Dumbledore tossed a rock he had collected to Jack, who dropped in on the floor, then fired the zat three times, dissolving the rock.
Again, murmurs and hushed conversations broke out among the wizards. "What is that?" Fudge asked, still looking contemptuously at Jack.
"This is a zat." Jack explained. "It's based on crystal technology, which seems to work just fine here, and at the school I was at. Now here's the part that sucks. This isn't a human weapon; it's a Goa'uld one. That means when hundreds of Anubis' troops are storming one of your magical strongholds, they'll all be using these."
"And what makes you think the Goa'uld will attack us?" Fudge replied. "It seems their vendetta is with the muggles. He doesn't even know we exist."
Jack rolled his eyes. "What are you, like six? Anubis isn't selective. Here's here to kill everyone. When motherships are bombing the planet from orbit, you think the captain is going, make sure only to hit the military. We don't want to kill anyone else. No, Anubis is here to kill everyone. Military, civilian, wizard, muggle it doesn't matter. At this point he doesn't even want to enslave us, he just wants us dead."
Fudge turned to look at the rest of the council, his eyes uncertain. "We must discuss this decision, if you'll wait just a few days-"
"Oh for cryin out loud!" Jack exclaimed. "This is a no brainer people! You guys are even worse than the Asguard. You need help, we need help. It's not rocket science! There should be no discussion this is an easy call. Even if there should be discussion, we don't have time. Anubis and Voldywhatever are here now."
"Colonel you must understand you are asking us to simply reveal ourselves to the muggle population after thousands of years." An elderly witch in the back said.
"Oh yeah, because that would be a tragedy." Jacks said sarcastically. "For thousands of years you've hidden yourselves away from the rest of the world, content to sit in your little elitist group and ignore everything else. Well guess what? Everything else is smashing down the door. So what are you gonna do about it?"
~~~~~~~
Dr. Felger looked excitedly at his new invention. It was a new weapon that all of the Prometheus class ships would be fitted with, which Felger had decided to call a beam cannon. Sitting on the table in front of Felger was a one tenth size version that he had created for testing, and it was now ready for its' first test firing. The weapon worked a bit like a capacitor, collecting and storing a large amount of energy before expelling it all in a sustained concentrated beam. Felger aimed the beam cannon at a large trinium sheet and pressed the button to power it up, impatiently waiting as the weapon charged to full power. Unfortunately, the beam cannon collected full energy, then immediately shorted, releasing all the pent up energy back into the power system of the SGC, causing a massive power surge.
~~~~~~~
Janet sat monitoring the healing chamber, which she had targeted at Xander's eyes. It was nearing the end of his treatment, and from all accounts, the procedure seemed to be a success. The instruments monitoring Xander's eye growth all indicated that the eye had grown in properly and seemed to be functioning. Suddenly the lights began to flicker, and Janet's eyes bugged out as she watched the power draw of the chamber balloon to ten times the normal amount before the surge protector cut in and powered down the chamber. Janet jumped out of her chair and ran to the door of the chamber, shouting frantically for a nurse as she went.
End chap 7
Bwahaha cliffhanger. Will Xander be okay? Will Fudge take his head out of his ass? Find out soon! (As you can guess I don't like Fudge). Thanks for reading and please leave a review.
