Disclaimer: this is all a figment of my imagination, with certain key aspects supplied by older and richer people than myself.
Reviewers: thank you, thank you!
Vinnet, Sadie, Dottid, daroos, Magda1, Malaskor, agirlfriday, Airam4u, Hecate, paula, FuFuMira, honor, Jordan, Mara Jade Jedi, bard2003, Vanessa, myeerah & probably Legend1957: congrats! Yes, this is indeed a MacGyver crossover. There are obviously quite a few closet (or not so closet) RDA lovers out there :)
The Sithspawn, WBH21C, Lorency, Nicola, Josh, paininthemikta & kala: glad you liked it!
kholly: cheers for the comment – yep, I didn't want to give the game away too early so created a couple of extra characters and threw in some minor ones who already existed, which may be biting me on the bum.
Mara Jade Jedi: you know what, I have no idea whether Michael and Sam would get on (Sam only turned up in one episode after all), and… uh… no-one really mentioned their ages so I kinda guessed that bit based on how old Mac and Pete are. I don't like it when everyone's happy and friendly with everyone else though – life never seems to be like that, so I threw in a minor conflict :)
P.S. "Lucy" and "Jen" are just window-dressing for the moment, but they will have their uses later on. If either starts acting like soppy girlfriend or (heaven forbid) a Mary Sue, please slap me with a trout or something!
P.P.S. Original Jack and SG1 will be making a significant appearance, but this will be a mini-Jack & Mac story for the most part.
People laughed.
People talked.
People ate.
People drank.
People got nervous. At least, some of them did.
It was a party. A celebration of all kinds of things, but mostly a reunion of close friends. A time to have fun.
Or not.
A call from the kitchen had caused Jennifer Cassidy to leave her daughter and daughter's boyfriend alone, all three of them feeling troubled.
"What was that about…?" Lucy wondered aloud. "Mom looked so… shocked."
"Beats me," Jon replied helplessly. He'd thought he had a fair idea of what was going on, but now he wasn't too sure. There couldn't be another one, could there?
"I mean, you do look a lot like her on-off boyfriend –"
It was a struggle to keep panic out of his voice. "I do?"
"Yeh, in fact he's here someplace – one of the 'uncles' who vanished a few minutes ago…"
Lucy went back to scanning the garden for her mom's missing friends, mentioning how they'd known this guy since she was a little kid, while an ugly suspicion formed in Jon's mind. He couldn't figure out the hows or the whys, but maybe there was another double of Jack out there. Could it be Harlan's robot-Jack? But how would he get here? Had they invented a better battery pack?
He felt a hand clasp his.
"C'mon Jon, let's go inside," Lucy suggested brightly, pulling him in that direction. "There's some photos – take a look, see what you think. Maybe your uncle and Mac are related somehow – that would be so cool!"
"Mac?"
"Yeh, short for MacGyver – he won't tell anyone what his first name is, so we just call him Mac."
Jon stopped short, his memory working overtime. Mac. MacGyver. Hates his first name… Oh crap.
"Lucy!"
"Sam! Where've you been!" Lucy stopped in her tracks and totally forgot about the previous topic of conversation. Mac and his uncanny similarity to Jon could wait – right now she wanted her 'brother' to meet her boyfriend. "Sam Malloy, this is Jon Murphy."
Jon had a bad feeling about this guy straight away. He had a poker face on, even though he was smiling – in fact his smile was about as fake as Jon's own. Was someone here on to him already? Worries pushed aside for the moment, he held a courteous hand out. "Hi, I've been hearing a lot about you."
"Likewise."
The tone was warning, and even Lucy picked it up. "Sam, I told you to be nice – remember?"
Turning his head, young Mr Malloy looked Jon square-on and searched his face for signs of unease. He found plenty, but his journalistic instincts backtracked – was that because he had something to hide, or because he was being confronted by his girlfriend's 'brother'? He decided on a course of action and shook the other guy's hand.
"Uh, yeh – sorry 'bout just then, I don't what came over me," he apologised blandly, before sidetracking the most vulnerable person in this situation. "Luce, I think your mom wants you to ask people if they need new drinks or something, is that ok?"
"Geez, you'd think it was a dinner party or something… ok – Jon?"
"I –"
"You could help me with the bbq if you like," Sam suggested with a definite tone of 'you will.' "I left the tools with a complete amateur."
Jon eyed up his sudden opponent. He looked vaguely familiar, but he still hadn't placed Sam in the scheme of things. What had Lucy said about him? That his dad and her mom were close, they were kinda like brother and sister… wait, this kid belonged to MacGyver! What about his name? There was only one way to find out, and this party was becoming more of a mission by the minute.
"Sure. I can do the manly 'open fire, raw meat' thing."
Lucy laughed, ignoring the underlying rancour in this exchange. As far as she was concerned this was just a male chest-beating exercise, and once these two got to know each other they'd be best buds. She was sure of it.
Giving Jon a quick peck on the lips, she left them to it. "Ok boys, I'll see you in 10. Play nicely, and I don't want to be eating charcoal!"
Jon and Sam watched her go, standing in identical hands-in-pockets posture.
"She's a great person, y'know," Sam commented, choosing his words carefully. "I wouldn't want anyone to hurt her. Ever."
"Likewise," Jon replied, raising an eyebrow. This was definitely going somewhere.
The pair turned and looked at each other, then nearly jumped apart as they realised how similarly they were standing.
"Burgers?"
"Yeh."
As they headed up to the bbq, Jon decided that this had to be a case of all or nothing.
"So, I hear I look a bit like your dad?"
Back in the house, Mac was scrolling through the data file on 'Jonathan Murphy' with increasing sense of foreboding. His gut didn't like this, and he usually trusted his gut – even though he was more of a desk jockey these days.
"Y'know, we have a hell of a lot of information on this kid – why's that?"
It was Pete who replied, his voice amused. "Coulda told you that before you all went running. Mandy's got her eye on him, but was kinda put off when she found out he's as close to career military as you can be at that age. It's not like I ever saw a photo of him though, heh."
Mac had to chuckle – it was sad that Pete Thornton's glaucoma had robbed him of sight, but at least the guy wasn't wallowing. He had his life's work to get on with, and Amanda Belling was one of his best recruiters. The day-to-day running of the Phoenix Foundation was now left to younger men like MacGyver and Pete's own son Michael, but his experience as Director of Operations meant that he was the ideal person to seek new blood for the team. The fact that they'd unwittingly stumbled on a young man who looked a lot like one of the Foundation's most notorious operatives was almost funny…
"And Mandy never noticed?" Michael probed in amazement.
"At this stage she's just interested in what potential people have – looks are irrelevant, unless they have too many distinguishing marks," Pete reminded him. "I remember her mentioning that this kid had a reputation for making excellent snap decisions, a mature attitude, and good enough grades to get bumped ahead and sent to grad school despite an obvious personal bias towards operations. It's like the Air Force is grooming him for something – and we didn't think we'd be able to shift him."
"Says here he has a problem with authority too," Mac remarked, his brow creasing. "This is a little… weird."
"Right, sounds a hell of a lot like you," Mike agreed from his vantage point by the window, watching the interaction between Sam and Jon Murphy. "Are you sure Dad didn't hit the nail on the head before?"
"Huh?"
"That you might have another mystery kid out there?"
Mac shook his head… slowly… "I hope not…" What had he'd been doing back in 1987? Who'd he been with?
"Kinda kooky that he has a place up in Minnesota though, isn't it?" Pete continued, tapping a finger against his lips. "He's a bit young for it, isn't he?"
"True," Mac scrolled faster to find the note in question. "Shared ownership with a Major-General J. J. O'… crap."
"What?" Michael asked. "Have you found something?"
"Oh yeh."
"Well?"
"Jack O'Neill – he could be a link."
The two Thorntons just shared a look and shrug. One day Mac might actually get to the point, but he seemed to be trying to wriggle out of it. Unsuccessfully, but still wriggling.
Pete asked the question first. "Who's Jack O'Neill, Mac?"
Finally Mac found what he'd been looking for – the 'family/relationships' section. "Crap, he is…"
"He is…?" the older man hinted, quite unsubtly and impatiently.
MacGyver sighed and sank into a chair, placing the XDA on a coffee table. It had been years since he'd thought about the guy, even longer since they'd spoken, and neither had had any need to do so after the family gatherings stopped. It wasn't like they'd gotten on too well in the first place, but now this? Obviously he'd have to talk to the kid, but did this mean he'd have to talk to Jack? Chances were the kid would mention him, and it was likely that Jack had talked him into the Air Force…
"You can choose your friends, but family? They can be a blessing or a curse, and you've got with them for life." Mac shook his head, recalling some unpleasant memories that he'd put behind him decades before. He turned towards his old friend and smiled wryly. "Jack's my cousin, on my mom's side. We never saw eye to eye as kids, in fact the complete opposite, and I haven't seen him since before my dad died. The file mentions him as Jon Murphy's uncle, and co-owner of the cabin up north. Could explain a few things."
Pete nodded sagely, while Michael carried on pacing.
"Could it? I mean, he could be your cousin's nephew but he could also be a plant of some kind – y'know, dig up a forgotten relative and build an identity around it. Fraudsters do it all the time!"
"I guess it's possible…"
"You're going to have to speak to this guy Jack –"
"I don't think so!"
"Why not? Have you got a good reason for avoiding him?"
Yeh, and then some, Mac muttered inwardly. It wasn't like him to make quick judgements like this, but then he'd heard that what you experienced as a kid could stay with you forever. He was assessing his cousin based on a 50 year old, unresolved rivalry – something he knew to be horrendously unfair – but the feeling of dislike was as strong as it had ever been.
"No, we just… didn't get on. Plus he's a General in the armed forces, Mike – I don't think anything would have changed," Mac laid it out, knowing that his argument was weak.
Outside, Jon was trying not to nit-pick about Sam's cooking methods. He was on thin ice already, he knew that, but there were far better ways to grill a burger damn it, and those chicken kebabs could be ruined! So much for the 'amateur' who had the tools before because this one wasn't much better…
Stuffing his hands back in his pockets, Jon decided to get back to the matter at hand. They'd already established that he did indeed look like the kid's dad (Jon still thought of anyone under 30 as a kid), but an awkward silence had been building up since then. Sam had the excuse that he was working, but Jon was turning every possible angle over in his mind… and it wasn't looking good.
"So, what do you do for a living Sam?"
"Huh? Oh, I'm a journalist – I spend most of the time overseas though," the guy smiled as he shuffled the fried onions, thinking that reporters generally scared those with something to hide. "Freelance as a rule. Just got back from a tour in Iraq, checking out what's left of the place."
Jon snorted, suppressing memories with humour as usual. "Yeh, I guess they bombed whatever we left standing…"
"Something like that…"
The conversation trailed off again, back into awkwardness.
Jon stuffed his hands in his pockets and took another good look around the garden. There were a few new faces since he'd arrived, and Lucy was chatting to a bunch of them. That meant that MacGyver and his band of merry men must still be elsewhere – and he had a really bad feeling about that. Not only that, but Jon was torn between trying to talk his way out of this and coming partially clean, at least to Mac. See, if Jon looked like Mac it followed that Mac looked like Jack – hey, poetry! But on a more serious note, while Jon didn't want to tell any civilian about the Asgard – let alone Angus – Jack O'Neill was still a target as far as some people were concerned, and that could place his long-lost cousin on the wrong side of a bullet/zat/other potentially fatal weapon one day.
There was also the fact that Jon's background wouldn't stand up to a thorough check – at least not to a member of the family. As far as anyone else was concerned this Air Force recruit was the son of Donald and Carolyn Murphy, and he had the certificates to prove it, but cousin Mac over there would probably know that Jack never had a sister. And now his cousin had a journalist for a son, and had vanished with his friends the moment he'd turned up! This was just peachy!
"Did Lucy say you're in the Air Force?"
"Huh?" Jon had to re-orient himself, after winding himself up into a bundle of nerves. "Uh, yeh – they farmed me out for a while, probably too much of a trouble maker."
"Kinda young for that aren't you?" Sam wondered out loud. "Have you even graduated the Academy yet?"
Jon frowned. This really didn't bode well – those weren't the innocent questions of a tentative friendship. Still the truth was better than any lie, especially today. "No, but I spent a lot of time in the cadets at high school – went on junior exercises every break, even got sent to the Academy for a summer – so they bumped me up a year and decided to make up the rest by sending me to SFSU."
"Won't that tie you to them for years?"
"Well, yeh – but it's not like I want to go anywhere else."
Sam blinked. Kids – what he called anyone who wasn't a few years out of full-time education – didn't usually have such strong views about their future so early on, apart from the odd born doctor, and he said so.
It was Jon's turn to stand back and think, especially since his mouth seemed to be digging a hole right now.
"I guess you're right, but I just can't explain it. I know the Air Force inside and out, have done since I was a kid – my, uh, uncle joined up when he was 17 too – and it's what I want to do." He decided to throw in a little sarcasm. "This time in California is like a vacation for me, but it'll be hard graft once I get commissioned."
Sam laughed softly. "You never know, you might get an easy posting."
"Oh, I don't think so…" Jon sing-songed, then caught Sam's curious (in a very intense kind of way) look. "Everyone wants a return on their investment, right? So I'm gonna get a doozy of a posting."
"Mmm, fits." Sam nodded. It did make sense after all, but trust could come later. "So tell me about this uncle of yours?"
"Jack?" Ah, that old chestnut. What could he say about Jack? So many things – not all complementary of course, but it wasn't his fault that Loki landed them in this situation. One brief resume coming up! "Well like I said he joined up early, but I don't really know much about what he's done. Classified, or so he says. Made Major-General though, I know that much – got a big job in a department that doesn't exist. Haven't seen him for a few years now."
That's convenient, Sam thought in return. "Any other family?"
"Nope, not any more," Jon gave a genuine sigh. "They're all dead, one way or another." Apart from you and your dad, he added silently.
Sam shook his head. Wherever this was leading, he couldn't see it. Hell, this kid looked more like his dad than he did! He needed to see what his dad and the guys made of Katie's data… and now Lucy was coming back.
"Would you mind looking after the bbq for a while?" he asked, a simple enough question.
"Sure thing!" Jon replied, thinking that there might still be time to save those kebabs before the hit squad arrived. At least that way he could die happy. "Lucy!"
"Hi guys," the girlfriend in question called out in reply. "I got us all a beer! Hey, where do you think you're going, mister?"
"To find my dad," Sam apologised with a sidewise glance at Jon.
Lucy handed over the beer and frowned. There was still a definite atmosphere between these two - hadn't they finished with the chest-beating yet? She smiled sweetly, an instant message that she was not best pleased with her 'brother'. "He's in the living room with Pete and Mike, so you can fetch them a drink on your way through too, ok?"
"Yes mom…"
Jon took the last beer and clinked bottles with Lucy, then put an arm around her waist before Sam turned to go. It was childish, but what the hell. "See ya later, alligator!"
"In a while, crocodile…" Sam muttered under his breath. He really, really didn't like this.
