I've decided what my next chapter arks will be for both the Colonials and Earth, so, let's get this started shall we? But first, this chapter. I'm excited for this, been looking forward to exploring and developing the characters as they begin fleshing out what the heck is going on in the galaxy, because it is changing. These changes are what would realistically occur as Earth has seen in its own history, so I've applied those historical patterns to the Stargate Universe and holy crap! The creative possibilities are endless! But I have to choose, so here's the kick-starter for that decision.

Chapter 24

Location: Terra Nova, Stargate Command

Date: February 26, 2025

Time: 0945

Only two members of SG-1 had been left behind for the current mission, Dr. Tomas Lopez and Dr. Harold White. Both of them were the lowest tier scientists on the team, which meant neither was really wanted on a combat mission whereas a techie or a medical doctor was appreciated and Dr. Walt was a diplomat in his own right. So that left the two of them sitting to stew back at base, in SG-1's own little space where each scientist had their own lab/office.

Dr. White, the team biologist, was in his office, hovering over the phone as he tried to tame his nervousness by writing up a report on the biological life encountered on SG-1's second short-lived mission. It was the hardest thing he'd ever had to do. Sitting there, just waiting, knowing that his team mates were out there in harm's way consistently gnawed at him, making writing what should have been a fairly simple report quite difficult. He'd only been on the team officially for about a month, just like everyone else. Like everyone else on SG/E-1, he'd passed his physical, he'd passed his combat and self-defense training, and he was accomplished in his chosen field of study. But that wasn't needed or useful on the type of mission that the rest of his team mates were on. White and Lopez were just extra baggage, to be dropped off and left behind when the important missions arose. It sucked to be "that guy".

Unable to continue he saved what progress he'd made and logged off of his desktop on his desk and left through the door into his lab, which itself was joined to Dr. Lopez's geology lab next door and to the hallway where all four scientific specialties were represented in the form of four well-endowed labs with attached offices for everyone. It was down a flight of stairs or a large elevator used for moving objects or if someone was injured and unable to use the stairs. Their area of work was located on the floor below SG-1's rec room, briefing room, the offices for the military members, and locker rooms. It was fully decked out and was quite comfortable, but they didn't have everything to themselves.

SG-1 shared a gym with SG's Two, Three, and Four. But it was fine, and the gym was a good place to blow off steam or socialize or whatever. So Dr. White took the stairs up to the main level after seeing that Dr. Lopez was not in his own office or lab. Coming up into the rec room he saw that he wasn't there either so decided to peak into the gym after hearing the sound of a treadmill and a TV from there.

"Tomas!" he called out as he walked onto the black padded floor and saw Tomas on a treadmill wearing his workout clothes and the TV in the treadmill playing a soccer game and loudly broadcasting in Spanish, "What're you doing?"

"Getting into better shape," the Latino man responded between pants, "What's it look like?"

"Looks like stress relief to me," White noted honestly.

"Well I guess it's that too," Lopez panted as he stopped for a moment, holding out his arms on the bars and turned the TV to pause, "But it's something else too man."

"What's that?" White grumbled, sitting down onto an incline bench and stared up one at one of the ceiling fans high above them.

"Don't you feel…y'know like a loser sitting here in Terra Nova while the others are out on a mission?" Lopez started after taking a gulp of powerade from a bottle in a cupholder in his treadmill.

"Of course I do, I've heard the tales same as you. Of Dr. McKay, Dr. Jackson, guys like us who aren't even remotely considered soldiers saving the Earth!" White responded with annoyance.

"What's the difference between them and us right?" Lopez asked, "Not much, yet they're heroes!" he declared, holding out his arms, "We can do what they did. Go out there, and help I mean."

"They were important, McKay's a techie and Jackson was a linguist," White reminded his counterpart, "I'm a biologist and you're a geologist! Not much we can do."

"We prove we can hold our own!" Lopez suggested, "The one thing both McKay and Jackson did was they could fight and they both went on those attack missions y'know? We can too if we can prove we're not dead weight!"

"How do you suggest we do that? Challenge someone to a fight and not get our ass kicked?"

"Well…anything can stupid when you say it like that," Lopez shrugged, earning a scoff from White, "Oh come on bro, you know we can't just sit here twiddling our thumbs. We can do it!"

"How? Seriously I don't know how we can gain enough credit to be allowed on off-world combat missions like the others."

"We took the same combat courses as the others didn't we?"

"The others were needed."

"So what? I can kick all their asses! Except for Tew, he scares me," Lopez said, putting a bit of a disclaimer in his declaration.

"What? Why Tew?"

"He's a doctor man, I-I don't like needles y'know."

"Whatever, my point still stands Tomas, we need to prove we can belong out there."

"We train," Lopez said, "We spend a few hours a day in like…the shooting range, take more advanced combat courses like the military dudes do, we learn how to do tactics and stuff, it'll be awesome!"

"Probably…" White mused, rubbing his chin and pointed at the treadmills, "Probably need to get-"

"Need to get-yeah get in better shape."

"Yeah, yeah might be needed first."

"Okay, umm…guess that's it? That's the plan?" White shrugged.

"Yeah…guess so," Lopez said in agreement, looking around.

"That it?"

"Yeah it feels weird, thought it'd be this really climactic moment y'know?" Lopez noted, "Kinda…anti-climactic."

"Meh," White shook his head, "I'll uh…go get my uniform, without that armor, and go to the shooting range."

"What about the getting into shape thing?"

"I just ate…so still digesting," White quickly responded, "But I'll get on the treadmill after that."

"Yeah sure whatever."

Location: Terra Nova, Stargate Command Gate Room

SG-1 had finished their mission, although the way they had returned was not the same as the way they had left. All of them save one, including the military detachment of SG-36 appeared in a flash of white light in the middle of the gate room, courtesy of the EDFS Shokaku. The one missing member of their team, Captain Jennifer Hailey, was beamed to the medical level where a team was waiting to receive the wounded tech specialist.

"SG-1, SG-36, welcome home," General Landry called out as they arrived from orbit, "And job well done."

"Thank you mon generale," O'Neill responded with a two-fingered salute that turned into a bow.

"Gracias, O'Neill," SG-36's commander said as he led his team out of the gate room after a swift salute to General Landry, "It was an honor señor."

"You too Colonel," O'Neill replied as the Mexican team left to get their own men checked out that had gotten roughed up some.

"I assume things went as swimmingly as they normally do Jack?" Landry asked.

"What's normal?" Brenda asked calmly.

O'Neill thought about that for a moment, "That," he specified.

"He ain't serious is he?" Dr. Underwood whispered to Lieutenant Blanton.

"Brotha I don't know," the SAW gunner shook his head.

"I hope that we can make normal a bit…less full of shooting," Dr. Tew piped up, "Just to make sure that's on the record."

"Hopefully it won't have to doc," Landry chuckled, "Reports are looking promising thus far. The whole of the enemy fleet was destroyed and our listening to Colonial radio transmissions is declaring their invasion force a total loss."

"Umm…if I may," Walt interrupted politely, "Might I interject with a question as to who those people bloody were?!"

"That's one of the questions we hope to answer ourselves Dr. Walt. And we think you could help us with that," Landry answered.

"Well of course, another enemy we haven't the slightest clue about," Walt grumbled under his breath.

"Now, I'm sure you all would like to get cleaned up, get some rest, and check in on Captain Hailey, we'll have our debriefing in an hour."

"Yes sir," O'Neill responded.

"Dismissed."

The military troops quickly saluted and filed out, all smiles at their first successful mission. The new SG-1 had proven its metal in combat thus far, proving that the new model of team was in fact worth the change. It was quite an exhilarating experience to be back at base, knowing that they'd saved the day like the heroes that they knew had occupied this team before them.

"So Colonel, how'd we do?" Major Blanton asked as he fell into step next to O'Neill.

"Major you and the others might just work out," O'Neill responded with his normal sarcasm.

"Hailey got shot again," Major Rosario pointed out from behind.

"Yeah this time it was a bit more serious," Captain Pauley reminded them, "Doc! How's she doing anyway?"

"Unconscious still, the medics here'll be putting her under a prototype healing device," Kathy explained, "I'd like to be there for the procedure, apparently it's a reverse engineered Gou'ald thing."

"The one that's still a little buggy?" Tew asked, "Yeah I'd like to be there too."

"Buggy?"

"Well by medical standards, it's got a five percent fail rate. Every time it fails it fails to heal and does nothing really. No damage has been done but five percent is fairly substantial fail rate in medical circles you understand," Kathy elaborated.

"Meaning it's not in production or circulation outside of fixed military medical facilities on the larger bases."

"Shokaku was supposed to do the procedure aboard ship but they didn't risk it because of a power glitch in their main systems, she's still a new ship, a few teething problems," Ruby added as well.

"So I'll have my military technical specialist back will I not?" O'Neill straight up asked.

"Yeah, in a few hours she'll be fine, a little dazed but fine," Kathy shrugged as they reached the armory, dropping off their weapons quickly.

As they did that two familiar faces showed up there at the same time.

"Guys you're back!"

"White! Lopez!" Brenda called out, seeing them in their fatigues, "What're you two doing here?"

"Well we were gonna get some training in. See we didn't like being left behind," Lopez started, "Y'know it uh…it kinda sucks. Like we're not really part of the team."

"You're a geologist," O'Neill pointed out, "That's your part in the team."

"You took them!" Lopez pleaded, pointing at the other civilian members.

"You study rocks," Blanton sighed.

"Not just rocks!" Lopez quickly snapped back, "I have a degree in the study weather patterns as well, meteorology, not as strongly as I do geology of course."

"My point exactly," Blanton responded.

"Oh come on, we can be useful out there, we're gonna start training with more advanced stuff," Dr. White butted in.

"Guys, I appreciate the effort," Brenda interrupted, "But there's a place for everyone. Yours isn't out there on a combat mission."

"B-but we can help, while you guys are doing your thing we can help protect you," Lopez explained, "Be that last line of defense."

"Tell you what," O'Neill stated with finality, "Do your training, learn what you can. I'll keep in touch with the instructors to see how you're doing in their professional opinion. We'll have this conversation then. For now, it's been a helluva forty-eight hours. The rest of us shall get some rest in the meantime."

O'Neill and the others filed past the two of them except for Brenda, who knew that this was a conversation that had to be had.

"Brenda come on please," White begged.

"Guys I saw what they go through out there," she sighed, hesitating as she considered if she should say that she had pulled the trigger and killed somebody, "I actually…killed someone yesterday. Not kidding at all it is…the hardest thing."

"But what would we do if you guys had all died?" Lopez suggested, "What are we, the ones left behind supposed to think? That we couldn't have helped when we might have been able to?"

"We've got the same patch on our shoulders that you do, treat us the same as everyone else," White said.

"I can't stop you from trying to prove you can do it, and you learning how to fight better doesn't hurt," Brenda stated, "I just don't want to be the one to make that decision. Guess I'm glad I don't have that authority anyway."

"So impress him and we can go next time?" White asked, pointing at O'Neill, although the team had vanished around the corner.

"Yeah, if you can."

Location: Fort Jacob Carter, Assault Ship Hangar Alpha

"Attention all troops, stand down, I repeat stand down," the overhead speakers in the massive hangar called out, "All forces will return to barracks and await further orders."

"You heard the big voice!" Staff Sergeant Hanson yelled, "We're standing down."

The lines of darker green camouflage let out a collective groan. Each company was arranged in blocks with platoons' squads lined up in column forming blocks twelve deep. The brigade's vehicles were already on board, and the brigade itself was organized into three ships. Four were the smaller LSA-312 Enforcer Class Assault Ships which measured four hundred and seventy-five meters long and carried roughly a thousand of the 1st Brigade's troops. The fifth ship was an LST-313 Fearless Class Heavy Assault Platform that carried the brigade's support formations and command and control capabilities.

In this hangar, like the other three Assault Ship hangars, two full battalions of infantry were assembled on either side of the ship. Each of them was a highly motorized force, heavily built upon its fast, well-armed, well-protected Wolverine M-403 4x4 L-ATV' and M-404 Hyena 6x6 M-ATV's for its light infantry battalions. The heavy infantry was built on the M-406 Bobcat 8x8 Infantry Fighting Vehicle which was based heavily on the American Stryker. Earth Defense Force infantry brigades were built to be large, able to hit extremely hard, and then hold their taken territory. The armored forces were tracked, with their M-401 Thor's being the hammer of the ground-based forces and the M-402 Honey Badger being a fast, protected chariot that the armored infantry rode into battle to support their tanks. But the 1st Armored Brigade hadn't been mobilized for deployment, only The Vanguards had, 1st Infantry.

"Thought for sure we were going to see some action," Lee said as Hanson pulled him up, going down the line the squad was sitting in wearing their full combat gear.

"Well we aren't Lee, sorry guys," Hanson said as he progressed to Corporal McFierce.

"It's all good by me," PFC Powers grumbled under her breath as she too was pulled up.

"Excellent, we're probably going to be going on a ruck march now,"

"Wonderful, a tab," McFierce growled, using the British Army's slang term for the dreaded activity.

"It's about time we did one anyway, been a while," Kirkham laughed as he was pulled to his feet and the hangar started getting noisy as orders started to filter down and get relayed by more and more officers and noncoms.

"Time to get that Expert Infantryman Badge," Hanson called out to them all as a joke, knowing that several had already gained it or the British/Commonwealth equivalent before joining the EDF.

"Oh yeah, love hitting the stations," Tess laughed from his spot in the back of the squad.

"Staff Sergeant Hanson," Lieutenant Lincoln, their platoon commander, yelled out, "Formation, prepare to move out!"

"Yes sir! You heard the eltee get off your ass let's go," Hanson said as he quickly yanked everyone up, seventy pounds of gear and ammo included.

The squad formed with its parent platoon into a standing block of troops four deep with the squad leaders on the right side of the block and the assistant squad leaders on the other side with platoon headquarters next to them. Lieutenant Lincoln was in the front of the formation as the whole company began forming. The ship itself, held by magnetic docking clamps in the walls of the underground hangar, began powering down as the ship's crew were given the order to stand down themselves.

"Ten-hut!"

As one the company came to rigid attention, the deep drum of heels clicking together echoed in the large space as company by company the whole assembly came to attention. They all had their helmets on and lower masks off, and weapons buckled to their chests.

"Right face! Forward march!"

The formations began snaking their way out, intent on marching their way to the surface, as a little marching never hurt. Such massed marches didn't happen often, and the echo inside of the hangar from the stomping boots signified the power that was assembled here. When one remembered that there were many times this number of soldiers on this planet, awaiting their time to be called to battle it was amazing to think about. Such was the growth of Earth's military might.

The march made its way back to the surface, where the battalions split up back to their barracks. Once there the troops were dismissed to begin preparations for the activation ceremony. It was only necessary, seeing as they were mere days away from their activation they would need to do some spit polishing on their dress uniforms.

Walking into their barracks, a step up from the communal affair they'd had in basic training, the squad was somewhat bummed.

"I tell ya Staff Sergeant, I thought this was the real thing," Sergeant Kirkham sighed as he opened his door to the shared room he had with Sergeant Tess.

"Brass don't tell us grunts much Kirk," Hanson responded, standing there next to his two fireteam leaders, "Sucks but that's how it is. Go ahead and get your dress uniforms squared away, eltee wants an inspection of them once we're fully stood down."

He could see into their room and made out one of their dark gray dress uniform jackets hanging up with its plastic wrap still on it. It was an immaculate design, being dark gray with black pants with a gold stripe on the sides. A white button up shirt with a black tie was as simple as it got for their dress uniforms. There were five golden buttons and golden crossed rifles signifying them being infantry on each side of their lapel. Their medals earned went on their left chest and name plate and earned badges over their right chest on the pocket. NCO's and enlisted men had their ranks on their arms as was normal for any army and their unit insignias there as well. To top it off they wore a red beret with a black shield on the front with their own rank insignia there over it.

He had already taken a selfie of himself in the full uniform, a picture he had sent to Hannah, with whom he was beginning to develop a genuine relationship with over texts and frequent calls after training had finished for the day as they began to get more relaxed about that sort of thing. He himself had been given more and more responsibility and authority over his squad as training closed in on the end of their training.

So as part of his authority he began going room-to-room, ordering his squad to stay in their camo, with their weapons and ammo in their vests hanging up in the barracks armory. It was a key difference between Earth-bound national troops and the EDF. An attack could come swiftly, they needed their gear at hand in order to not be caught with their pants down. So each barracks was outfitted with a small bare bones arsenals to be able to get into the fight immediately, just long enough for more weapons and ammo to get moved to the battlefront. But that was just for an attack, not them being deployed.

Once his squad was all informed of their next assignment and inspection he sat down on his bed and snatched his cell phone. He opened a long-running text conversation and typed in a sentence.

Hey

He waited a few moments before his phone buzzed.

U done for the day?

Not sure yet. U?

Have one more class, Jonas Quinn is guest lecturing!

?

XO He's the first "alien" to speak to a class at TNU!

Alien?

He's human, but he's not Earth-born

Cool. Take a video for me

Will u be allowed out?

Probably not, on alert

Aww…

That elicited a chuckle from him. He loved spending time with her, eight dates in the past two weeks had done that. The two of them had hit it off, becoming an item of examination and funny jokes, but it could have turned into something serious. He just knew it, maybe she felt that way, maybe she didn't, all he knew is that he'd need to stay on his toes so he didn't come back in a box. For now however, his biggest threat was that of a tongue lashing from British lieutenant who had it out for his squad.

Location: Terra Nova University

In the largest lecture hall on campus an amazing event was taking place. Jonas Quinn was about to lecture an Earth class. This would be the first of its kind for Earth's growing awareness of the larger galaxy. Behind the scenes it had been easy enough to arrange, Jonas was a big shot in his government now. He was very much aware of the larger galaxy himself and was knowledgeable enough to teach a class for a day anyway. And Jonas was trusted by the military to not be a problem as far as revealing classified information was concerned.

"Wow full house huh Daniel?" Jonas said, looking out at the incredibly full lecture hall, and couldn't help but notice the lines of news cameras in the back row, their owners under contract not to be too disruptive.

"Yeah, they've been looking forward to this," Daniel responded to his old friend.

"Granted I wasn't the first in line though was I?"

"No you were, Teal'c felt it best if an offworld Human be first, then a Jaffa could take the stage," Daniel explained with a shrug.

"Afraid they would mob him?" Jonas chuckled.

"Oh it would be so much simpler for him if they tried," he sighed, envisioning the mountains of college students Teal'c would single-handedly wreck, "Looks like we're ready…"

"Well, here I go," Jonas gleefully stated as he smiled broadly in excitement and watched Daniel walk onto the stage.

"Good afternoon," he said into the mic, "I'm truly honored that today we are making history as our friends in the media," Jackson pointed out, motioning the news people in the back, "have so pronouncedly declared. But let us not forget what this is, Jonas is a guest speaker for this class. So I must insist that you treat him as such. The only difference between him and many others that you may have had in other such classes is the fact he was born on a different planet, to a different culture. So please, welcome Jonas Quinn."

A healthy round of applause rose from the several hundred members of the class/audience as cameras zoomed in on Jonas as he walked out onto the stage. He took Jackson's hand in a hearty handshake and below the applause Daniel gave him a courteous "good luck".

"Thank you," Jonas started as if it were no big deal as he settled in and straightened his tie and jacket and tapped the mouse to get his powerpoint started, "As many of you know, I was not born on Earth, yet I am Human…"

As he continued his introduction Hannah McGee sat in the middle front of the auditorium with notebook out. This was precisely what she had been waiting for ever since coming to Terra Nova, the chance to meet an actual off-worlder! Never before could this have even been plausible before a few years ago. Yet here she was now, taking notes from the lesson of someone most would call an alien as if it were no big deal.

Perhaps it was meant to be this way, but she didn't care, and neither did anyone else in Dr. Jackson's class. This was amazing!

"So surreal," she whispered to her friend seated next to her, "You'd think he was just some dude from Miami Beach or something."

"Oh my gosh I know!" Kirsti said with a huge smile, "I'm so going to get a selfie with him."

Hannah just rolled her eyes at that and took note of the new slid that appeared on the projector. It was a picture of Jonas standing in front of what appeared to be a city from the mid-1900's. Old-style skyscrapers rose into the air, brick buildings and chimneys rose from below and a pair of zeppelins hovered lazily in the bright blue sky.

"This is my home, the country Kelowna on the planet Langara," he declared proudly, "It was contacted by your Stargate Command more than twenty years ago. At the time we were just beginning to experiment with atomic reactions, and I was given the honor of giving Dr. Jackson a tour of our nuclear research facility. It was there that this man here," he said calmly, "Changed my life forever. He saved my life, and that of countless others during an accident at the facility. My government actually blamed him for it, if you can believe that. But I sort of…defected, knowing that Dr. Jackson had saved my people from disaster. From there, well…"

He tapped the mouse again and a picture of him with some people in military gear with their faces censored and his and Jackson's smiling broadly on a desert hill.

"Wow, look at that," Hannah said to herself, seeing the picture montage of all different places he had gone to in the service of Earth.

After waving down a few questions for later he continued, with pencils and pens furiously taking down anything that they could. Despite this being an official lesson and part of their mid-term exam it was hard to take it as such. But from the appearances of an observer it seemed to be going well.

The lesson continued on without a hitch, and then a question and answer period was called up. The first student to get a turn at the mic was a Chinese girl who tried composing herself as best she could as she read off of her notes her simple but needed-to-be-answered question.

"Mr. Quinn…how similar to Earth society is your own?" she asked.

"Excellent question," Jonas responded, stepping to forefront of the stage, "It depends on which society of Earth we are talking about. Earth is…unlike any planet I have ever been to. Normally human societies off-world are segmented pieces of a version of Earth society. That is that's what they are like until they have aged to a point where they start inevitably branching off onto their own unique path. But to answer your question…I'd say the society of my own country, Kelowna, is most similar to that of the United States."

Many Americans in the crowd did a silent "yes" in celebration at that as a much older man, actually a professor in his own right, came to the microphone next.

"Mr. Quinn, how is it that a planet such as Langara has…evolved only to a period that resembles that of mid-century Earth? I mean no disrespect you understand," the man said, realizing afterwards how it might have sounded.

"No that's a fair question it's okay. Our society evolved to our current state now because of a period in our history where our population was not allowed to advance by an oppressive species that Dr. Jackson has discussed previously, the Gou'ald," Jonas explained.

Now another questioner came to the mic.

"Is your level of advancement equal to or less advanced than most other humans you have encountered?"

"More-so actually," Jonas answered, "I've only seen five human civilizations that could rival Earth, even then rival is a stretch. But as far as my people, we're a firm minority. It seems that for every…let's see…single civilization like my own there are at least fifty pre-industrial revolution societies out there. And that's just so far. Dr. Jackson I'm sure that number has changed somewhat?"

"By quite a few yes, the number is closer to eighty as of my last check."

"See? My people are a rarity, and those like Earth…you're not going to find them without coincidence being on your side."

Now it was Hannah's turn, she'd been in line and now it was her turn to ask a question.

"You showed us that you worked extensively with us, the people of Earth," she started, "What is your opinion of us?"

"My opinion of the people of Earth?" Jonas asked, "Wow, well it's kind of hard to give an absolute answer. Truthfully it's generally good, I was around to see some of the bad some of the ugly, that occurred on Earth. And it was genuinely jaw dropped some of what I saw. But…the sheer diversity, the wealth of unique culture and the eagerness to share and to help that Earth seems to want more than anything has been something that I truly hope is a Human tendency that will start to show itself in the larger galaxy."

"So in general, he likes us," Jackson said with a laugh.

"Oh I especially love Taco Bell," Jonas specifically pointed out, "Heard there's a Taco Bell here on campus, gonna grab a few favorites before it closes."

That drew some laughs from the crowd.

"And that might be on the exam!"

So a little bit of filler for Earth, some character development and setting the stage a little bit for what is to come. I'll begin to get into some good SG-Team action in the next few chapters so stay tuned. I'll try to get another chapter before classes start up again on Tuesday, but be warned things will get busy for me with school returning.

Next Chapter Preview: The Colonials return to exploration, what shall they find I wonder?