Adam, Janet, Jack and Thor came into the research lab to find Richie still laid down on the table in the centre of the room, sound asleep. Sam had taken a seat on a slight step near where Mani was working on the control console at the right of the door.
"Is it my imagination of is Richie asleep?"
"It's not your imagination, sir. He must have been beat; he hadn't lain down for more than two minutes before he conked out."
"I finished with the scans sometime ago. I thought if he was that tired it would be best to let him rest." Mani turned away from his readings to look at the group as they'd entered.
Adam shook his head and walked over to the centre of the room and started nudging Richie in the shoulder.
Richie's sleep fogged mind didn't realise what was happening at first and tried to just bat away the irritation, but it refused to go away instead increasing it's attack with more force. Trying a different approach he rolled away from the annoying attack only to find himself falling a few feet onto the hard floor.
"Owww!"
"Serves you right! I can't believe you fell asleep on an alien ship! What has MacLeod been teaching you? You let your guard down in an alien environment, literally!"
"What? Oh yeah, alien ship and test!"
"Yeah, alien ship and test and can't forget falling asleep during said test! What's the matter Louise keeping you up too late?"
"None of your God damn business!" "Adam, now is not the time!" "Hey! Do you mind! 'Parent' here!" were the responses of Richie, Sam and Jack, while Janet couldn't help but snigger at the comments that were flying around the room.
"What? I was just stating the obvious!"
"Sure you were." Richie mumbled finally managing to lift himself fully from the floor.
"Whatever! So, Mani, you finished with Richie here?" Adam asked turning back to the little grey alien.
"I have completed all of the tests that I require at this time."
"Good. Come on Richie, Thor's going to beam us back down, so you'll finally be able to get some answers."
"It's about time!"
"Doc, stay up here with Sam, get Thor or Mani to call us if there's any problems. I've got to go back with these two but I should be back with Adam after the briefing." Jack instructed.
"Yes, Sir!"
Jack nodded at Janet then turned around and left the room this time only followed by Adam and Richie.
Once the door to the room closed Mani turned to Sam and instructed her to lie down on the same table Richie had vacated moments ago. Befor Sam managed to lie down though Janet managed to find something to prop her up slightly with.
When she was finished seeing to Sam, Janet joined Mani at the control console and looked over at what Mani was doing. Unfortunately, she was unable to translate what was being displayed on the screen as it was in Asgard so she turned and watched Sam as her eyes scanned the small bit of room she could see.
Jack, Adam and Richie all beamed into an empty briefing room. Jack looked around for any sign of Hammond, while Adam watched Richie look around with curiosity. Hammond noticed the flash of light in his peripheral vision and guessed it would be Jack with Richie so he exited his office and entered the briefing room.
"Sir! This is Richie!"
"Richie…?"
"Ryan, Richard Ryan, but everyone calls me Richie."
"Well Mr Ryan. Please take a seat."
"Yes, Sir."
Adam couldn't hide the smirk that graced his face, as he couldn't recall another occasion when Richie had acted so obedient before. Normally, Richie had always had a bit of a rebel in him, which came from feeling unwanted after getting moved from foster home to foster home through out his childhood.
Hammond cut into Adam's thoughts after noticing the grin on the Immortal's face. "Mr. Pierson, if you could kindly bring yourself back down to earth and take a seat."
"Sure." Adam did as Hammond requested and took a seat at the large briefing table although his smirk clearly stayed where it was, which, in turn, made Richie more annoyed with him.
Once they were all seated Hammond handed one of the folders that had already been placed on the table in front of Richie. "That's a non-disclosure form, could you please sign that before we continue."
Richie opened the folder and scanned though the pages making sure that it was just what Hammond had said it was. Once he decided it was indeed just that, he picked up a pen that Jack had thrown his way and quickly signed in the appropriate part then handed the folder back to Hammond and the pen back to Jack.
"Thank you. Now as you may have noticed the United Stated is in contact with aliens. The ones you've met today are called Asgard."
"But they're good guys' right? They're not like the ones in the movies? In other words, are they evil man eating monsters?" Richie couldn't help the smile that appeared on his face as he thought he'd made a joke but soon sobered as he saw the straight faces of the others.
"Don't tell me I'm right!"
"More or less. There's another race that we are at war with. They are little snake-like parasites that take over people as hosts. They are known as the Goa'uld."
"You're kidding."
Jack shook his head. "'fraid not. Oh yeah, they like to pretend to be gods."
"And 'THOR' doesn't pretend to be a god?" Richie said emphasising the name Thor, as he knew that Thor was a name of a god although he couldn't put his finger on what belief system.
"I never said that, but at least they're the good guys and they're not trying to take over the universe." Jack looked like he was warming up to his favourite subject.
Richie just shook his head and threw up his hands in the air. "Whatever!"
Hammond cut in to stop Jack before he got going about how and why he hated the Goa'uld. "There is also a group of aliens which are like the Goa'uld and they're called the Tok'ra. The Tok'ra believes in a purely symbolic relationship with their host while the Goa'uld takes complete control of their host."
"Ok, so the Gould are the bad guys and the Asgard and Tokra are the good guys, right?"
"Correct!"
"Ok. I can understand the good guys and the bad guys, but what I can't figure out is how Adam got involved and what's going on with the little grey guys and why I had to sit though half an hour worth of tests."
"What? You slept through the test so what does it matter to you." Adam jumped in unable to keep the smirk off his face at Richie's last comment. That and he was trying to distract Richie from asking too many questions about how he found out about the Stargate. Although Richie knew his true age there were still a few things that he preferred less people know about. Richie was fine with everything at the moment but how would he react if he found out the great Methos used to date an alien.
"Please gentlemen. Could you keep the sarcastic comments out of the briefing room? Mr Ryan, the reason why the Asgard were doing those tests. Well I'm guessing it had something to do with the reason why Adam has been informed about the SGC."
"And what's that reason?"
"We believe that the Asgard may have something to do with the creation of the Immortals."
Richie risked a glance at Adam not sure if Hammond should know about immortals or not. Adam noticing the look and couldn't help another smirk from gracing his face.
Adam reassured Richie that Hammond knew about Immortals before he'd had a chance to explain it to him. He told him about how Hammond was in fact Janet's watcher and how Jack had reassured him stating that he was trust worthy.
The meeting went on for about an hour after that with everything being discussed from why the Goa'uld were a threat to how the Asgard were going to help them find out if Loki was indeed responsible for the creation of the Immortals.
It was with great relief that Hammond finally closed the meeting and reminded Richie how important it was for knowledge of the SGC to be kept a secret.
Once Hammond had finally left the briefing room to return to his office Jack turned to face a slightly white faced young immortal.
"So what now?"
"Now, there's nothing that can be done. We're going to have to wait for Thor to get back to us regarding the results of all the tests he put you through, so all we can do is wait."
"Any idea how long it'll be until we find out?"
"I'm guessing here again but with it being the Asgard it won't be long but I really don't know about it. That's more Carter's and Daniel's area."
Adam tried to reassure his young friend. "Don't worry too much about it Richie. There's nothing we can do about it at the moment apart from wait and see what happens."
"Yeah, right! You try having this news planted on you and see if you manage to take your mind off it that easily."
"Ok, but try at least. Come on, let's go see if we can find Louise for you. Then you can both go home and finish off where you left off when you got beamed to the Asgard ship." The smirk was back, plain as day on Adam's face and there was nothing nobody could do about it.
"Yeah, right, that's if he can manage to stay awake long enough." Jack couldn't help but add his own remark even though they were talking about his 'daughter'.
"You don't have to worry about that Jack. I've had a nap today so I'll be fine until well into the night now." Richie plastered a devilish smirk on his face knowing that he'd managed to get one over on Jack without him realising it. The look Jack threw back at him confirmed he wasn't expecting Richie to come out with something like that and it just made Richie smirk even more.
"Way more information than I asked for there, maybe I'll just have to set Teal'c on you and let him teach you to respect your elders."
"Teal'c? Who's Teal'c?"
"What, you mean to tell me Louise hasn't told you any stories of our friendly neighbourhood Jaffa?"
A/N: - Remember to let me know what you think.