"Life is like a hurricane, here in...Duckburg. Race cars, lasers, aeroplanes, it's a...duck blur…" The song and bass accompaniment went on for some time, while half of the audience sat in bemused silence.
"I'm sorry," Sam looked over at Vala. The dark-haired woman stared at the television, frowning in concern, "but why exactly are we sitting here watching an old cartoon?" Her eyes widened as a thought occurred to her. "We're not expecting another visit from Martin Lloyd, are we?"
Sam held back a snort. It was an understandable reaction; not one member of SG-1 looked back on the television writer very fondly.
General Landry interjected, "Nowhere in the nearby future, if I have anything to say about it. As strange as it may sound to you and Teal'c, we're trying to learn what we can concerning our latest visitor."
"And that requires that we watch a cartoon about anthropomorphic waterfowl?" Teal'c asked, with his usual subtle skepticism. The three Earth native members of SG-1 traded a look among themselves.
"Actually, Teal'c, it does," Samantha said, taking the thread of the conversation from General Landry. "The visitor in question just happens to be one of those anthropomorphic waterfowl. She goes by the name of Della Duck, and claims she's from Duckburg itself."
Teal'c raised an eyebrow, which everyone knew to be his confused expression. Vala, on the other hand, openly balked at Sam. "You're saying...one of those cartoon characters is living on the base as we speak?"
Cameron hummed. "Maybe? I don't think I've heard of Della Duck before in anything Disney related." He drew out a photograph. "What really got my attention was when I saw the guy in the sailor suit."
He handed the picture to Sam. The duck on the left was a dead ringer for a character she'd seen numerous times in her life. Even now she could hear, via childhood memory, his angry garbled voice and she smiled a little.
Passing the glossy photo to Daniel, Sam pondered the situation. For a supposed cartoon character to emerge into the real world was well nigh improbable. She herself had trouble processing it, despite seeing, and talking to, the evidence firsthand.
"Is it not possible that she may be the result of genetic manipulation?" Teal'c asked.
Sam immediately shot that theory down with a shake of her head. "No. Cloning may be a possibility, if Ba'al were still around, but he would first need an imprint of an actual living being. That eliminates the possibility of Della being a clone. On the other hand we have Nirrti. She may have been able to manipulate human DNA into something that looked like a duck but, as with Ba'al, she's also dead. That goes vice versa if she wanted to experiment on a duck and give it human level intelligence. Even if she were able to find a way to do it, why would she have wanted to? There's no advantage she'd have as a Goa'uld to use anything other than a human as a host, even with an above average intelligence, and there's very little reason any of those scenarios would be in the least bit plausible. The fact stands that..."
"'When you've eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth,'" Cameron interrupted. Everyone stared at him, slightly nonplussed. "What? I read a lot of Sherlock Holmes when I was a kid, okay?"
Sam rolled her eyes. "Essentially, Cameron is right. Della Duck is a real person, no matter how outlandish it may seem."
Daniel said, slowly as he thought out loud, "Since that is the case...that begs the question of how. How did she get here, to this reality? This isn't like when I went through the quantum mirror the first time, or when all those other SG-1 teams gated here via the black hole."
"I have a theory," Sam said. "There must have been some dimensional technology fused into the Spear of Selene that caused it to trigger when the lightning strike hit the hull. I'll have to look through the ship's wreckage to confirm that. That could take more than a few days, maybe even weeks, sir," she finished, looking at General Landry.
"Get to it, Colonel," he said gruffly. "In the meantime, Colonel Mitchell, make sure Vala and Teal'c are acquainted with our guest, but don't go overboard with the questioning this time. Carolyn wasn't too pleased after the last encounter."
Cam nodded contritely. "Understood, sir." He exited the room with Vala and Teal'c in tow.
"Doctor Jackson, since there aren't any emergencies at present, I'd like you to find out whatever you can concerning Della Duck. I don't care whether it's concrete evidence or not. This entire situation has given me a headache and it would help me even if you find one random fact on a worn out comic strip."
"On it, General."
"Glad to hear it. You're dismissed."
Samantha smiled at Daniel's mock-tense expression. "This'll be a fun can of worms to open," he quipped. Sam could commiserate with that sentiment as they walked down the stairs to their respective offices.
"I know. The ship is docked at Area 51, and I'll probably be there for the foreseeable future to figure out just what happened."
"In other words, disassembling the Spear of Selene without Della's knowledge and hopefully piecing it back together? I don't envy how long that's going to take," he said as they exited the gateroom.
She lightly punched him in the arm. "I'll still appreciate it better than going down the rabbit hole of the internet."
Daniel groaned. "Oy vey." He pressed the up button for the elevator as they stopped in front of it.
"Orders are orders."
The doors opened. He waltzed in, looking back at her in fond exasperation. "Indeed. Such wonderful orders. Have a good time, Sam."
"Try to have a good time, Daniel," she countered, grinning as the elevator closed.
With all the other members of SG-1 now occupied, Sam made her way to the lab. It was now more of Bill's lab than hers, as running Atlantis had taken up most of the year. She missed Atlantis, but welcomed the thought of being released from the burden of running the citywide base. Despite her initial concerns, Woolsey, it seemed, was doing just as good a job as she or Elizabeth had. Being back among the team, even for a limited time, made her feel part of a whole again.
She shook away her meandering thoughts at the sight of an SF outside the door of the lab. She walked in, curious at the SF's presence, but stopped in her tracks at an unexpected scene. "Bill?" she asked, her voice taut.
The balding scientist turned in her direction, looking positively gleeful as he removed a pair of welding goggles. "Sam! Have you met Della yet? She's amazing! You're never going to believe the stories she's been telling me!"
"What exactly is going on here?" Sam asked, with more than a little bewilderment seeping into her voice. There were discarded steel poles and plates strewn about the table, as well as the wheelchair she had last seen in Della's guest room. Speaking of which, the wheelchair looked to be missing some of its key components.
Carolyn was not going to be happy about this.
"Well..." Bill began to say.
"There she is!" a voice said loudly from behind. Sam whirled to see Cameron, Vala and Teal'c walking inside. "Sam, what's happening here?"
She shrugged. "I know about as much as you do right now."
The sound of metal slapping against stone made everybody look toward the source.
Della Duck was in the center of the room standing at her full 3'8" height, on two legs, Sam realized with a raised brow. That explained all the scrap metal. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Bill beaming at the duck.
What's more, Della's beak was wide in a genuine grin as she reveled in the stunned gazes around her. It was a profound change since the previous day when she had looked so morose. "Hey, guys! What do you think of my new robot leg? Pretty cool, huh? I just made it!" As if to guarantee the veracity of her claim, the metal flipper on the prosthetic actually moved. Sam thought her eyebrows would climb up to the ceiling if they weren't firmly attached to her head.
Vala, apparently having decided the silence had gone on for long enough, let out a smirk and said, "I think I like her."
End Note: The fourth wall has now been broken! Let me know what you guys think!
