Disclaimer: The Buffyverse and the Stargate 'verse belong to other people.
Author's Note: Written for Day 23 of the 2020 August Fic-A-Day.
A/N: Any suggestions on where to place this in SG-1? And which episode to use as Buffy's first trip through the Stargate?
Buffy's meeting with General Hammond, SG-1, and Dr. Frasier reconvened early the next morning.
"Now, Miss Summers, could you please tell us what happened before you came to this reality, and then what happened after you arrived here?"
Everyone was looking attentively at her, and she kind of felt like she was about to give a presentation in school but no one had told her in advance. She'd known this was coming but it was an odd feeling since it had to be heavily edited to ensure she didn't sound insane.
"Of course." She swallowed surreptitiously before she began. "There was a big fight happening and I was on top of a high, rickety tower. Below it was an unstable portal, sorry, wormhole. Some kind of lightning from it was causing serious damage to stuff nearby, including making huge holes in a nearby road. I was fighting someone up there and I fell off the tower and into the wormhole, and then I blacked out." It wasn't too far from the truth except where she lied.
"The next thing I remember was waking up in a wet back alley with three dead women nearby and sirens coming closer and closer. I was disoriented and confused about where I was, and it didn't take long before I blacked out again. The next time I opened my eyes I was in a bed at St. John's Hospital in Tampa."
Most of them were looking at her with various levels of disbelief, and given the vagueness and the fantastic details she did give, she wasn't surprised. It was obvious to all of them that she was unwilling to go into any specific detail about her dimension.
Major Carter leaned forward a little, "Where did the wormhole come from? What kind of technology was used?"
"I'm not a scientist, Major Carter." Deflect, deflect, deflect.
"Who did it and where did they intend to go?"
Buffy briefly closed her eyes and saw Glory explaining why she needed to sacrifice Dawn to get back to her hell dimension in her usual angry and entitled fashion. Buffy pushed the memory away.
"There was a crazy woman from another dimension who wanted to go home, and she didn't care about the cost or the risk, or what consequences her actions had for anyone else. All that mattered to her was her and what she wanted or needed."
Daniel frowned at her, "You're leaving out a lot of important details, aren't you?"
"I am," lying about that was pointless. It was too obvious and she was trying to get these people to trust her, but it was hard when she couldn't tell them the full truth. "But it doesn't matter. What happened there won't happen here and I can't go home, so..."
General Hammond interrupted her staring contest with the archeologist, "Yesterday, you implied you had been compromised by someone from your reality; Explain."
"I haven't been compromised!" Buffy defended herself. "It was a one-time communication where it was sort-of explained to me why I was sent here instead of the dimension she was trying to get to."
"That implies that whoever 'they' are can somehow communicate across realities, AND they somehow know classified information from other realities."
Buffy blinked at Daniel. "I hadn't thought of it that way..." She hadn't and it was creepy. It meant the PTB could spy on many different realities even if they couldn't interfere. Daniel just kept staring at her. "From what I was told, it was a one-time communication and they wouldn't be able to do it again. I'm on my own."
"Let's say we believe you, what did whoever it was you were talking to tell you about us?"
"Not much," she admitted. "They're all about the vagueness and figuring out the connections yourself. Mainly they said I should go with Jack to Colorado, let Dr. Frasier do her tests, get the education I told you about yesterday, and I should make sure to get a job here." She quickly reviewed what she said, then added. "They didn't tell me what you were doing here, but that it would help with my itchiness to fight, and it was implied that the reason I seem to suddenly be related to Jack and Sara would become clear in a few years. And some kind of offer resulting from it that I should take."
"That's a lot of shoulda, woulda, coulda's," Jack commented from diagonally across the table. "And not a lot of hard facts to go on, especially if 'they' were the ones to send you here for a reason."
"I was a warrior in my dimension, and while I'm going to pretend to be a normal person in public, just like I pretended back home, I'm going to be a warrior when they can't see me. Fighting evil aliens will do that."
They kept looking at her, so she continued. "I couldn't stay in my reality because I fell into the wormhole, but the messenger told me They wanted me to continue my work here, as it were." She shrugged her shoulders a little.
"Were these... communications," Carter hesitated slightly on the last word, "common for you in your reality?"
"More infrequent, and yes, they were vague back then, too. Even vaguer than this last one was, and they didn't necessarily make sense until after everything was done."
General Hammond spoke up again. "So they didn't tell you why you're here or what you are supposed to be doing. They didn't specify what your orders were at all?"
"I don't take orders from them or anyone else. Free will and all that." Given what the Watcher's Council did to Slayers who didn't conform, it wasn't free will, just an illusion. "It's more of a 'stop this or something incredibly bad will happen'."
"They do not appear to have your best interest in mind, Buffy Summers," Teal'c commented.
"Not really. We fight, die, get replaced. There are a lot more where I came from." She shook her head when he opened his mouth to ask more questions. He took the hint and closed it again.
"You're asking us to take a lot of faith. There's no proof of any of this." Major Carter was skeptical of her, but then again nothing of this could be proven under a microscope and that was her thing.
"I can prove my ability to fight if General Hammond allows a sparring match. I'll even consent to fight against a regular human first so you can see for yourself that I really can do what I claim."
She looked over to the man in question, and unlike yesterday he seemed to be seriously considering her request. "Setting this up will either prove my point or disprove it, you don't have anything to lose except a little time away from all your paperwork." Most of the people around the table smiled at the last part.
"Ah, come on, General," Jack said into the silence. "We'll either get a great fighter out of this or a bit of entertainment. And even then, if she proves herself right, you can still think about it for a couple of years since she has to finish college before she can start full time."
Hammond made up his mind. "Very well, I'll have a sparring match set up in the gym in one hour. Dismissed."
The elder of the officers rose, and Jack and Carter rose with him. General Hammond then entered his office while the rest of them remained in the Briefing Room.
Buffy smiled happily at no one in particular. "I get my sparring match!"
"Yes, Buffy, you get your sparring match, but you still have to prove you're as good as you claim," Daniel said in a doubtful voice. "And you'll probably have to prove it against someone other than Teal'c first."
"That's fine. I need to get back to my cell to change into something more appropriate."
"Oh, for cryin' out loud!" Jack exclaimed. "You're staying in one of our guest quarters, not a cell."
The Slayer just raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow, "It's a room that's locked from the outside, there's a guard on the door, and I'm not allowed to go anywhere by myself." She gave him a pointed look. "That's a cell or a prison. Whichever."
"She has a point, Jack," Daniel commented. "It's a cell until Hammond gives her permission to move around freely."
Jack sighed but didn't contest the statement again. "Let's go to your cell so you can change and then get to the gym."
"After you," Buffy replied cheerfully. Jack just shook his head and took the lead.
They took the elevator down to Sub Level 25 where all of them except Dr. Frasier got out. The good doctor remained inside and continued down to Sub Level 21, where both the Infirmary and the Gym were located.