Personal Log –> Into The Fire: Part One
Based on my SGA3 sim character
Any resemblences to real people or places is purely coincidental.


The dog tags in her hand still felt warm and wet with blood, though they had been left untouched for over a year in her desk drawer. She ran her thumb over the punched out letters, idly tracing the sleek metal inscription.

For an entire year the dog tags had been in her desk drawer, a silent reminder of the consequences of her mistakes. Rhoannan promised to herself, and him, that she would never be the weakest link again; that she would never be the one to cause the loss of another's life. Never again.

A knock on her door caused Sub Lieutenant Orr to jump slightly and quickly drop the tags back into the drawer and slam it shut. Tompkins stood at the door, a file in hand and confused look on face.

"Ma'am?"

Calming herself and removing the agitated look she realized was written across her features, Orr leaned forwards in her chair and forced a small smile at the sergeant. "That file for me, Mr Tompkins?"

"Yes, ma'am," He nodded quickly, placing the manila tag folder lightly down on top of papers scattered across her chaotic desk. "Also, I have a message from Carter; you're needed in the tech-lab for some test or another, ma'am."

Orr nodded and peeked at the contents of the folder.

"Is that all?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Sighing, Orr smiled and waved her hand at him in sloppy dismissal, already mesmerized by the technical report and sized down diagrams in front of her. 'Cool,' she thought, 'a new power conversion protocol. Why does that suddenly make me feel like such a geek?'

The new protocol looked like it would work, and most likely would, but why would she be needed in the tech-lab? Curious and couriouser.

After gathering up a few papers and random bits and pieces of artefacts she had been studying, the young naval officer trudged her way through the labyrinth of corridors and halls until she reached her destination, the main tech-lab. Glancing in the lab, any ordinary human being would first be stuck by the amazing amount of junk and parts of junk were scattered across the large room. On second glance, while still amazed by the assorted junk, they would realize that very few of these objects looked like anything they had ever seen before except in science fiction movies. On third glance, one might even wonder if they were still sleeping and somehow dreaming about being in one of said science fiction movies.

Naquada generators, MALPs, parts of Egyptian looking devices, and lots of glowing things cluttered nearly all available surfaces, and all corners were stuffed with odds and ends of various types of alien technologies.

Orr grinned – she was in her element here, among these oddities that they often had no idea how to work or what their purpose might be. It was her passion, ever since she tried taking apart her brother's new guitar amp. First he was furious at her, but then he realized that she wasn't just trashing it and they started dismantling everything mechanical in sight. Unfortunately, when they tried to take apart the new lawn mower they did something they shouldn't have, lost a few pieces, and essentially destroyed the machine. Their dad forced them to mow the entire yard using just the old push mowers and a weed whacker that they hadn't yet gotten their paws on.

Rhoannan had moved on to bigger and better things, while her beloved brother toiled thanklessly on the family farm fixing tractors, hauling cattle, and getting screwed over by the government that failed to recognize the importance of agriculture.

That was part of the reason she had joined the military in the first place, to get away from the farm where sorrow seemed to cling to the grass and drift through the air unrestrained. Then she discovered that the military was pretty much the same way, and when she received the opportunity to work at an American base, she jumped at the chance to escape the repressed emotions building up in her homeland.

In the end, though, NORAD made her even more depressed – she saw first hand how the organization that was supposed to be a partnership between the two North American countries was really just a ruse. The Americans were in charge, and the Canadians were substandard workers brought in to keep up the image.

For a while, though not very many people knew it, Rhoannan had been highly suicidal; sometimes starting her car in the garage with the doors closed tightly, other times day dreaming of getting into a fatal car crash with a semi. If it looked like an accident, her family would get life insurance and everything would be taken care of by the military.

It got so bad that she would cry herself to sleep at night.

Then he was killed.

She found out about the two mysterious organizations in the lower parts of the mountain complex – the NID and SGC. Her life changed for the better, and that was what made her so guilty. She profited from his death and that tore at her heart every time she woke, walked into her office, got a pen out of her drawer, and every time she fell asleep.

The memories overwhelmed her, but a sudden crashing caused her to withdraw from her reflection to look over at a sheepish Sgt Stiler who was attempting to prop the lamp he had toppled over back up against the wall.

Shaking her head, clearing her mind, Orr darted over to the older man's side and gave him a hand with the annoying lamp.

"Yesh! What in the world was the quarter-master thinking when he ordered these lamps, I think you have to be the fiftieth person to trip over this thing," Rhoannan grinned at Stiler. "The day very first day it was stuck in here I look a nose-dive over those legs, with only a wrench to break my fall."

Stiler grinned and patted her shoulder, "well, their looks too damaged, so I guess it couldn't have been too bad."

Rhoannan raised an eyebrow saucily at him; "remember when I had that huge goose-egg on my forehead for a week about two months ago? Yeah, that was from that evil lamp."

They both laughed for a moment, before Rhoannan nodded and went back to her business of finding major – erm – Carter.

A pair of boots stuck out from under some alien device or another and the distinctive voice of Samantha Carter rang out, swearing as something made a crashing noise and the sound of metal and metal shrieked through the lab.

"Left-tenant Colonel Carter," she called out cautiously to the boots.

A blonde head with a oil-streaked face popped out from the side of the device and searched with bright blue eyes for the source of the disruption.

"Oh, Lieutenant," she grunted, pulling herself out from under the thing. "Just the person I wanted to see. How would you like to have the pleasure of trying to figure out how to get to the control panel of this thing?"

Rhoannan grinned slightly; the General's sense of humour was rubbing off on the many had noticed as of late, and she was beginning to emulate the CO more and more often now that she was in command of the prestigious SG1.

"Oh, that'd be ducky, ma'am," she said as she pulled of her tunic and pulled her favourite bandana out and tied it around her head pirate style. "What seems to be the hold up?"

"My arms aren't as scrawny as yours and the manual release for the panel is wedged up inside where I can't reach."

Orr slithered underneath the alien device and looked around, flashlight in mouth, for the parts Carter verbally detailed for her.

"It's right in the centre, up about a foot inside the piping – it's a little red lever."

Frowning, she snaked her arm up inside the piping towards the lever. She was almost there when her arm refused to go any further. Grunting, Rhoannan twisted and turned, trying to wiggle her arm in further. "I guess this wouldn't be a good time to tell you some good news," she heard Carter say almost offhandedly.

"Pardon," she asked with a slight groan, as her arm seemed to stretch and pull at her shoulder.

"You got on."

Orr paused, her arm jammed up inside the device and the flashlight she had been holding in her teeth fell down to the ground and rolled merrily off on its way. What did she mean?

"Atlantis," Carter prompted.

All the frustration she had built up over the lever disappeared and the device was forgotten as a sudden shriek of delight and excitement cut through the silence, but quickly turned to one of pain as she twisted her arm inside the thing.

"Are you alright?" Carter crouched down, peering under the thing in worry.

Rhoannan nodded, ecstasy written across her face despite the pain in her arm.

"Are you joking? I'm on the team," she managed to croak, eyes alight.

Carter nodded and smiled widely at the younger woman's excitement.

"Woohoo!"

The extra boost had given Rhoannan the strength and determination to push that extra bit further and she pulled the lever, causing a sproinging sound and the sudden appearance of a control panel on the upside of the device. She pulled her arm out and quickly crawled out from under. The news of Altantis was quickly forgotten, however, when both scientists' eyes fell upon the glowing and blinking control board.

"Oooooh," they cooed simultaneously.

"So cool," Orr gasped as a sequence of blue and orange lights flickered across a display screen. "What does it do?"

Carter, in a similar state of awe, shrugged and lightly stroked the surface of the device. "I have no clue."