Disclaimer: I don't own anything that you recognize. Stargate, Predator, Alien, and miscellaneous references all belong to other people. (And if any of these other people want to sign over their rights to me, well, I'll happily accept.) Also, if anything you read in my writing is offensive to you, look away quickly. After all, no one is holding a shotgun to your head and forcing you to read aloud to an assembly of first graders. (I hope.) That being said, begin title credits.
10. We Be Grilling
It was roughly six o'clock when they arrived. They were dressed informally, but their very walks suggested great power and importance. Wait a moment. Why am I talking like a Bronte novel?
My father and General O'Neill were dressed casually. We all were. Well, as casually as you can be when having a General over. I think the most relaxed thing my mother wore was her Kiss the Cook apron. Me, now, I'm smart. I wore an ironic t-shirt. (Picture of a pig with Eat pork or die written in Arabic. Offensive, yes, but the piggy is just so cute… I mean tasty.) I was the very epitome of relaxation in my ragged jeans and toe socks. And gum. I was craving gum for some reason; don't remember why now.
They wore jeans and t-shirts too, which made me feel a good deal better. I was surprised that the General would wear sneakers, but I guess he's human too. We made ourselves comfortable in the living room while Mom fussed over things that were going perfectly fine without her fussing in the kitchen. Claudia and the General's girlfriend, Samantha Carter, (Isn't that cool? Another Sam.) chatted at the table, skillfully avoiding my mother as she moved things. (My mother's way of cooking and mine differ substantially, but I don't dare complain, lest I be recruited.)
"So," my father said, "have you done anything revolutionary since I last saw you? Besides make your hair bigger?"
I was tempted to tell him about K'ata, as I'd probably be tempted to all night, but I refrained. His words, I realize, look cruel on this screen, but they were meant to be kind, teasing even. "Liz and I are getting married," I said blandly.
The General, who asked me to call him Jack, the travesty, had been taking a drink of his beer when I said that. The effect was not pleasant, as the beer was very fizzy, and I know first hand that getting fizz in one's nose while laughing is not at all pleasant. After he recovered a bit, he asked me, " Aren't you a bit young to be getting married?"
"It's her or the alien," I said. Several seconds later, I realized the seriousness with which I had spoken, and the words to boot. "I didn't mean that!" I said quickly. "We're simply in love, and there are no aliens involved."
Jack looked at my father, and my father looked at Jack. Jack looked to me and then back to my father as if this was a coherent question. Dead old Dad shrugged. Eloquently. "I'm afraid I don't believe that," Jack said aloofly. "Care to explain?"
"Um…" Lie. Right. "Er, I'm harboring illegal aliens from Guatemala?"
"And can you show us these Guatemalan aliens?" my father asked uninterestedly.
"Er, no, they're, um, at work. Yes, they're at work," I said firmly.
"You're a bad liar," Jack observed calmly. "You should know that we know a great deal about aliens. We've met quite a few."
"Er, Jack," my father began.
"He knows something, Larry. Won't hurt him to know more. Tell us what aliens you're talking about."
Crap. K'ata was leaning on the bar, but I didn't want to expose her. But, I realized evilly, she wasn't the only alien I'd ever met. Feigning defeat, I said, "She isn't here any more, so I don't see what good it'll do you."
"Tell us anyway," my father said. His attention was like mine, easily attained.
"Well, okay, I guess she won't know. I'll be safe. Her name was Turi, and she beat me at fencing. She was almost human, except for the tail." Insert nervous giggle. "She only wanted to know a little about me. Favorite food, favorite color, that kind of stuff." Lies. I was testing them.
"Okay. And I suppose you won't mind telling me who that charming blur over there is?" Jack said with a grin. "Yes, I saw you," he said as she moved.
"Should I?" I asked her.
"Doesn't matter."
"Okay," I said brightly. "That's K'ata. She's been living with me for a few weeks now. Political refugee, you might say. You may as well consider what I told you about Turi's intent as nonsense; I lied. Would you please de-cloak? These are important people we're talking to," I said mockingly.
She did. Both of them jerked back in surprise, even though at least fifteen feet of room separated them from her. K'ata waved and said "hi" in a very bored voice.
"I hope you intend to leave us alone," I said. "We're not doing any harm, and-"
"He knows Baal," she said suddenly. Oh, right, the mental search. "This isn't the same Baal I remember though. He's… eviler."
Jack winced. "How do you know Baal?" It was almost comical, the way he said that, like it was some sort of commercial, or a revival: "Do you know the Lord?" that kind of nonsense.
"He emailed me," I said glumly. That shut them up.
"He… emailed you?" Jack asked.
"Yes. Email. It's that thing you do on a computer, with the typing?" I said as thought I were explaining it to a very slow five year old.
"I know what email is," he said crossly. "I just don't know how he managed it.
"Maybe he's on Earth," Samantha said from the doorway. K'ata's presence didn't seem to bother her at all, nor did the seriousness of the atmosphere. "Dinner's ready, by the way."
We filed into the kitchen and found everything to be pretty. K'ata went up to my room and hid; I assume she didn't like my mother's cooking any more than she liked mine. I explained that to Jack, whom I was seated by, by an irate Claudia. I don't think she knew what we were talking about, and it annoyed her to no end.
We toasted my father, Jack, Mum's hospital, and the war. Oh, excuse me, the global struggle against extremism. (To which Jack responds, "Huh?" Apparently, he didn't know the name had been changed, ha ha.) My mother had done a fabulous job on the barbie, and I swear, when I move out, I'm commandeering her recipes CD.
While Dad blathered on about this new project he's been working on, I nudged Jack and asked him, "So, what's this about you knowing other aliens? And Baal?"
He looked around, as if expecting ninjas to leap down the stairs at any moment. (Our kitchen and dining rooms - and laundry room, too - are in the basement. Strange, yes, but Mum said the agent was desperate enough to add a discount for the inconvenience. I didn't have a say in it: I was a fetus at the time.) "Okay, you're not allowed to tell anyone, understand?"
"All of my friends know K'ata. Liz has been into space with me," I said flippantly.
"Okay, anyone besides them, and the military will make you disappear." I was tempted to tell him just what I thought of that, but he was too fast in explaining the whole Stargate program. I think my eyebrows disappeared into my hair.
"How pleasant," was all I could manage before downing my soymilk. (Yes, I drink that stuff. It is lightly vanilla flavored, and I'd like to see any cow beat that.) I think I was wishing for a valium. A big valium, the kind you give to irate elephants. I didn't speak throughout the rest of the dinner, except to correct Claudia in that I was fourteen, nearly fifteen, not twelve. Mum gave Cloudy dishes, for the way she was acting towards me. Insert smug smirk.
I fetched K'ata and told Jack to join me (us) for a little stroll (a shortened trip to her ship, the path of which I'd conveniently marked with scrunchies on trees) to discuss my career (Baal, and Jack's relationship with the bloke). Of course, I think Jack is parentheses illiterate, so this was as pointless as trying to explain Pink Floyd to my Sam, who's tastes run more to the Singers and Standards channel than to genuinely good music. Oh well. You can't save them all, Clarice.
The trip only took about ten minutes, so when we got there I explained the need for dear Jack to go into the ship and not attempt escape while K'ata scanned him. (Her idea, not mine. Gods, he probably thinks I'm mad as pantaloons. Worse, mad as a goat. Yes, I think a goat represents me quite well indeed.) Needless to say, the plasma cannon was aimed a few times before we got him to cooperate. Poor man.
I felt a bit rubbishy too, to tell you the truth. Self-doubt and -depreciation were gnawing at my yama-induced inner calm. But they were nothing to worry over compared to what awaited us in the-- Well, you might call it a foyer. A spaceship foyer. I kill myself.
A very handsome overdressed man with glowing eyes and a knowing grin was standing between two guys wearing the Commander-Tino-freaky-looking-suit thing. "Well, if this isn't the best day of my relatively long life, I don't know what--"
"Shut up," Jack said in a decidedly non-cheerful way. "That," he said as though he were referring to a very bad dog which frequently did naughty things to the carpet even though it was house-trained, "is Baal." He even pointed for emphasis.
Baal did a rather charming moue and said, "It is very rude to point, impudent human."
"That was the idea-- Hey, isn't your voice supposed to be… different?" Jack asked cannily.
Baal grimaced. I didn't get it. His voice was quite nice as it was, I think. "Bollocks. What gave me away?" he asked in a very mate-y, bloke-y, London voice. "By the way, I'm Cliff Simon. Baal is rather, um, drunk at the moment, so I took over."
Simon. Simon. He was familiar, somehow. Internet familiar, and if I remember something from the Internet, it's important.
Jack beat me to it. "Aren't you an actor?"
The guy was looking rather uncomfortable. "I was, but then there was this accidental thing with this lady in Australia, and, um, suffice it to say that I'm not from this universe anymore." His eyes glowed brilliantly and his voice went strange. "He means he 'accidentally' got smashed and slept with that universe's version of my wife, switched realities, became my new host, even though they looked the same, and now he's stuck with me. You're MacGyver," he said to Jack. "No amount of torturing you could make me happier than knowing that you once had a mullet, and I can get pictures of it over the Internet."
Jack ran a hand through his rather cute - Liz's words, not mine; I am not strange - silvery hair and said to me, "I think he's gone crazy. Defeat's sent him over the edge."
"Defeat!" Baal - not Cliff, oh, this is going to be terribly confusing - said with a bitter laugh. "I like to call it a well-timed reorganization of forces."
"He freed his Jaffa on one planet and said he'd pay them if they stayed with him," Jack said. "About half of them stayed, and that half decimated the others, with the help of tall, mean, and violent over there," with a nod to the two black-suited guys.
"They don't have enough personality to be mean," Cliff corrected.
"Whatever."
Three red dots of light appeared on Baal, or Cliff, or whoever he was, and K'ata growled menacingly, "Get off my ship."
"Yours, lady?" Cliff asked. "Oh, I doubt any of this is yours. Pirated it, more like. Tokra crystal technology, loot, ore, fuels, you name it, you've got it."
"Well, I didn't put it here," she said indignantly.
"And just who did?" he asked in a falsely friendly tone.
"My partner." The way she said it indicated a business-type partner, not someone you'd want as a friend.
"Oh?"
"Angus Thermopyle, if you insist." Ther-mop-uh-lee, in case you were wondering. He doesn't like the spelled pronunciation, I found out later. "The cyborg, remember?"
"You mean the violent and unhinged criminal. I'm off," Baal said as all three of them were beamed somewhere else.
There was another one of those long, pregnant silences where you wonder who's going to start chewing who out first and just where might be a good place to hide when the aforementioned begins. Well, that was what I was wondering, anyway.
"I'm leaving now," Jack said, well, it had a sarcastic flair to it but it was too blunt of a statement to be truly sarcastic. We didn't try to stop him, in any case. There wasn't really any point.
"Why is my life a soap opera?" I asked the corridor floor. I half-expected a cheeky answer, but none came. I knew the answer. It was one of those many-part answers where therapists can spend the whole day analyzing all the bits. I'm rich, I'm relatively good-looking, I'm eccentric, I'm in love, I have an alien… Maybe I can switch places with Alvin for a while. He's… Never mind, he's worse-off than me, with those rugged good looks and those dreads…
Gods, I'm depressing.
Change the subject. Right. "So, er, K'ata, you're a pirate?" And daft. Depressing and daft. And I need to trim my hair, what else is new.
She whirled violently to glare at me. "It's none of your business," she hissed.
"What do you mean, not my business? Are you my friend?"
She thought for a moment, and finally replied, "Yes, but I don't see--"
"And I'm your friend. And the role of a friend is to get all up in their friends' business. It's a human thing. Just tell me, and I'll stop annoying you, as I obviously am, and I'll go back to my boring, pathetic, little excuse of an existence." I know. Pity just works so well, though.
"No." Ouch.
"If you don't, I'll cry."
"It isn't your affair."
Ooh, cheeky girl. Alien monster, I mean. Cheeky alien-- I can't do this any more. I'm sick of all this angst and nonsense. K'ata and I returned to the house to find my father waiting out on the back deck. The same deck which my room opens out on. I hurried a bit, as I didn't trust him not to search my room for any proof of aliens that he might filch.
"Don't tell your mother or Claudia, alright?" he said.
"Don't tell them what?"
"About them," he said, referring to either the tiki torches or K'ata. Knowing my father, it could be both.
"Oh, like I would. Mum would have elephants."
"I've got to leave Wednesday. They'll be needing me back by them."
"Mmhmm. Fishing?"
"I was considering it, yes."
"I'll leave K'ata with Liz, and we can go tomorrow." Fishing with my father was more like Oprah than anything else. "Everything but the food is ready, and I can do that in a few minutes in the morning."
"Devious planner," he said cheerfully. "Oh, what shall I wear?" We both laughed at that, as it was as me as one could get.
"And I suppose you think you can just send me wherever you like, right?" K'ata said grumpily. "What if I want to stay in my ship with the loot, or what if I want to go see Tim?"
"Do you really want to do either of those?" I asked gently.
"Well, no, but I'd like to have a choice in things sometimes."
"Telepathy, dear." I'd been perfecting its use on her, and I could now tell what she was thinking if I tried. I couldn't do anything to anyone else except pick up faint emotions, but any psychic vampire worth the name can do that. Of course, she didn't know this.
"You've-- Well, I am surprised. Let me just go over to Liz's, them, Mr. High-and-Mighty-blue-gingham-wearer."
"You two can take the van," my dad said. Did he just offer to give me use of an actual automobile, one which I would be driving? He's lost it. Too much time away from his family has turned him into a stark raving loony.
"Okay," I said nonchalantly. Hey, I'm going to take advantage of whatever I can. "Keys?"
"You do know the basics of driving, don't you?" He looks at me with such a hopeful expression on his face that I have to lie.
"Er, yeah, Tim taught me, and you know Tim…" Lies. He had no idea who Tim was, and I intended to keep it that way. I am, after all, a proud member of TOPA: Tellers of Porkies Association.
"Er, has he ever had any wrecks?"
"No, no…" If you don't count the two last spring when he was trying to prove that he was immortal and he drove into telegraph poles. He runs into poles and gets a new van; I run into a pole with my Barbie Jeep when I'm three and people think I'm "special". (Yes, I had a Barbie Jeep. Cloudy and I traded, as she liked my blue mini-Bug and, well, you know my thing with the color pink.)
"Okay." He fished a set of keys out of his pocket and told me to go look in the garage. Funny, these weren't the van keys…
"Oh. My. Gods." I was staring at a shiny new convertible. A red convertible, with a cream leather interior. This is my dream car. It even has a huge pink ribbon on the hood. I gave a girlish scream of delight, and leapt on my dad, hugging him as hard as I could. I've never told anyone about this particular dream, so that means he's either telepathic or this was pure instinct. I'll go on the second one, thanks.
"It's almost the same as my first car," he told me fondly. "I had the black interior, though, and some Mardi Gras beads strung on the rearview. From my first Spring Break. Your mother had shotgun, and Liz's parents were in the back." He chuckled at that memory. "Anyway, I hope you have as much fun as I did. Go show Liz; bet you a tener she'll go green with envy."
Next thing I knew, I was driving, and I was thinking that this was crazy. I don't even have my learner's permit. And yet… I'm driving. I'm actually driving, and I wasn't crashing into anything.
Granted, I was going about ten miles per hour. I can walk faster than that. Ten. Oi…
Oh, yay, we're there. Oh, happy day. How do I shut this thing off…?
"Omigod, Morrick!" Liz shouted from the porch. "You didn't?"
"I did, and it's officially mine." I was feeling very queasy. I kept telling myself that it's the same thing as being a passenger except you're in another seat and you're in control. Control is good. Right.
"Morrick, do you even know which one's the brake?"
"No. That's why I went so slow, dummy."
"Oh, God, we're doomed. Please tell me you're going to learn how to drive before you go on an actual road."
"Duh. I'll get Tim to teach me."
She snorted in disbelief. "Tim? Use Alvin. Alvin can avoid the poles, you know."
"Look, we'll spray paint that bridge when we get to it, so bah." I was here for a reason, but Liz has an effect on me. I always forget the important stuff when I see her.
"Oh, hi, K'ata," Liz said cheerfully.
"Hullo," she said sullenly. Oh, now I remember…
"Liz, can K'ata stay with you tomorrow? My dad's here, and we're going fishing."
"Oh, cool. Yeah, she can crash here for a while. And I've rented some movies, too."
K'ata likes television. "What movies?" See? She likes the tele…
"Stargate, King Arthur, some vampire movie with Hugh Jackman in it. You'll like 'em." Liz grinned. "Come on. Name That Fruit is on."
Not bothering with the door, K'ata leapt over the side. She was doing that strange chuckling thing.
"Oh, sure, leave me without even a hug of goodbye in case I die," I said mournfully at them both. Liz laughed and hugged me, and I noticed that she was wearing the perfume I got her for her birthday. (I didn't give her just that, either, in case you were thinking I'm a callous idiot. I got her some tasteful diamond earrings, too. Who doesn't love diamonds, I ask you?) K'ata gave me a pat on the head. Oh well. Not everyone loves me.
"Good luck with the getting home bit," Liz said as I started the devil car. What? It frightens me.
"I'm very glad you have a circular driveway," I said as I rolled slowly forward.
"And Morrick?" K'ata asked.
"Yes?"
"The brake's on the left."
"Ha ha. Thank you, anyway. Now I can imitate Tim."
I didn't, though. I went a very sedate twenty. Home was a very welcome sight, even if I did owe someone a tener. Claudia was on the porch, holding a new puppy. A poodle puppy. What is it with these women and poodles? Liz and Sam don't like poodles. K'ata doesn't like poodles. I don't like poodles. In fact, I think they're the only ones in the county who like small, fluffy, permed devil dogs.
"I can't believe he gave you a car," Claudia said as she scratched the little beast's ears. "Can you even drive?"
"I drove to Liz's and back, didn't I, hippie?"
She gave an exasperated sigh. "I am not a hippie."
"Yes you are."
"Am not."
"Are too."
"Am not!"
"What's the dog's name, hippie?"
She glared at me, and then said his name. "Jesus." Well, she pronounced it HAY-soos, but that's how it's spelled. My sister named a poodle Jesus. Go ahead. Laugh. I did, when I got back to my room. We've always had three poodles in the house, and one big dog outside. It's always been like that, for as long as I can remember.
I emailed Sam and told her all the good news, i.e., my dad's home, I got a car, and Cloudy named the new poodle Jesus. I received this back:
Morrick,
U smegger, I cant b leve u got a car b4 I did. Ur sister's an idiot. By teh way, I wanna meet ur dad. He sounds kewl. C u day after 2morrow.
Sammy Kool Dawg
Memo to self, make friends learn proper Internet grammar. I can barely read that chat room nonsense.
I went downstairs for my usual late night ice cream, and I found my dad, and surprise, surprise! He's got ice cream. We stared for a moment. Alright, I had curlers in my hair, so he had a reason, even if I didn't. "Hello," I said cheerfully.
"Um, hi, madam." He was trying not to laugh, and he wasn't doing a very good job of it.
"Go ahead. You know you want to. Just remember this moment when I'm in thousands of fashion magazines as the world's best loved male model."
"Is that what you really want? To be a model?" he asked through a mouthful of Fudge Swirl.
"Not really. I'm going to go into medicine." I think, anyway. I'm going to be a doctor, and Liz is going to be a lawyer. Well, we'd planned to do that, but now K'ata wants to take us with her, so…
"That's where the money is," my dad agreed. "Of course, you could be a model if you wanted. Alvin's mother, Lauren, you've met her? She used to be a supermodel."
"Yeah, and now she owns three magazines and has her own lingerie line. I know," I said as I rummaged through the freezer for my sherbert. I love sherbert, especially the blue kind.
Lawrence tottered down the stairs. Now, you'll please remember that Lawrence is a very big dog. As in, taller than my waist, weighs more than me, and very toothy. Unfortunately, he's got the brain of a lap dog.
He looked at my hair curlers and gave a doggy snort which I interpreted as a laugh. My own dog was laughing at me. He must've been speaking to Cloudy.
"Dad, what do you really do?"
He hastily stuffed more ice cream into his mouth so he'd have time to think. "No lies, or K'ata will know when I talk to her about it."
"Find," he said, and I think he was suffering from brain-freeze. "I'm nod really a doctor-doctor, I'm a medic thingy. And I go to other planets sometimes."
"Oh." I grinned. "Classified, right?"
"Mmhmm."
"Great. I've been into space. 'T was fun."
He snorted. "'T was nauseous-making, thank you very much."
"Well, you went the normal way."
"Woof!" said Lawrence. I gave him a rib from earlier. "Woof!" he said happily.
"You're welcome, Majesty."
Dad and I chatted of aliens, space, and conspiracies until about midnight, when I dozed off in the middle of one of his speeches on how plants might be intelligent if we only… See? Nap worthy. I headed off to bed, and he, I'm sure, tried to get into Mum's room without waking her up.
My room looked empty without K'ata.
A/N: Look at him! He's roadworthy!
Dee: Thanks for the review. Cynthia appreciates your sentiment.
Veriea: Well, thank you! I'm glad you like… Keep reading, and I'll be a happy little… thing.