Chapter 5
After dinner John grabbed his laptop and package and headed to his room. He had a date with some football DVD's. Plus he wanted to see what else his dad had sent him. Once in his room he sat down on his bed and up ended the box. Wow, his dad had sent one hell of a care package.
Ten DVD's, five were football and five were action movies that had come out in the past two years. Various magazines, gum and candy that wouldn't melt, some sodas, Popcorn, and a small photo album. Quickly flipping though it he saw that they were pictures of him and his mom and dad as he grew up. There were also some pictures from after his moms death.
Deciding that he would look more closely at the pictures later he picked on of the football games at random and entered it into his CD-Rom drive. Then he settled down to watch, falling asleep sometime during the third quarter.
John took a cursory glance around the mess the next morning as he walked in, looking to see if there was anyone he wanted to sit with. Elizabeth and his team were gathered around a table to the back. He quickly made his way though the mess line before heading there way.
"Good morning everyone."
"While you are correct that it is morning, Colonel, it has yet to be determined if it is good."
"Good morning John," Teyla replied with a smile while Ronon just grunted and continued eating.
"So how many football DVD's did you end up with?" Elizabeth inquired.
"I got five. Got most of the way through the first game last night before I fell asleep."
"Oh no," Rodney complained. "What kind of crazy person sent you football games on DVD?"
"That would be my father, Rodney."
"Your father? Is he in a mental institution? Because If he isn't you really need to look into that."
"Rodney!" Elizabeth exclaimed, halting the impending rant.
"Sorry, but it's true. Do you know how many times we, his trusty team have been subjected to the torture of watching American football? Your military commander here thinks it's a great team building event. Let's not forget the fact that he is the only American on his team. Now he has even more games."
"Look on the bright side McKay," Ronon joined in. "At least next time we get roped into watching it won't be a game we've seen ten times before."
"But they all look the same!"
"Did he send you anything else?" Elizabeth asked, wanting to put an end to the football discussion.
"Yeah he did. He sent me five action movies that must have come out since we've been here. Some popcorn and soda, a few magazines… he said he thought about sending some cookies that his neighbor bakes but wasn't sure if they'd still be good by the time they got here. I think when I email him I'll ask that he send some along anyway."
"Cookies? Maybe he's not so crazy after all," Rodney said.
"Yeah," John said dreamily, propping his head on hi hand. "Mrs. Evans used to make the best lemon bars."
"Lemon!" Rodney exclaimed. John couldn't help it, he burst out laughing soon to be joined by the others. The look on McKay's face was priceless.
"Oh haha, very funny. Pick on the guy with deadly allergies. I have important work to attend to but you all just stay here and keep laughing."
"Lemon bars, John?" Elizabeth asked her second in command after Rodney left.
"What?!" John asked, trying to look innocent. "She really does make good lemon bars. I'll ask my dad to send some in the next package. Speaking of which, I should probably go and write him an email if I want it to go out this afternoon. I will see you all later."
Dear Dad,
First of all, thank you for all the goodies. I watched most of the first three quarters of the 49ers/Cowboys game last night. Rodney says thank you for sending them two me, he was getting tired of watching the same games over and over again. Actually, he said you belonged in a mental institution because, according to him, you just provided me with a torture device. Rodney is Canadian and just doesn't get football. Speaking of which. As long as there are no chocolate chip that will melt before they get to me, I would love some of Mrs. Evans cookies. Some of her lemon bars would be lovely. Rodney is deathly allergic to citrus.
You asked about my rescue mission? Well, everyone came out of it alive at least. One of the men had been hit in the head with a rock before we got there and had lost a lot of blood. He ended up with a nasty concussion but he's back on duty. Another of the men had a sprained ankle, also sustained before we got there. The team leader and my second in command, Major Lorne, was grazed with something as we were pulling out but it was very minor, he was back on duty in no time. Lt. Cadman was lucky, all she got was a bruised shoulder…
Okay, I've been staring at the computer long enough debating with my self. I was also injured as we were pulling out. I am fine now so you don't have to worry. I got hit with some Toxin that Played havoc with my system. I was in a coma for two weeks while Dr. Beckett tried to figure out how to neutralize it. But as I said, I am fine now. I have been back on full duty for two weeks now and back at 100.
Want to hear my own kind of funny letter delivery story? Well, even though I wrote that letter I hadn't decided whether to send it or not before I went on that mission. So sometime while I was out of it Elizabeth took a walk around the base and ended up in my office. She saw the letter and took it back to her office with her. She says she didn't read it. Any way, she kept it in her desk, I guess to keep it handy in case she had to send a condolence letter along with it.
The day I woke up she looked at the letter one more time before coming to see me, forgetting to put it back in the draw. A week latter she realized she hadn't seen the letter and asks if anyone had seen it. Supposedly one of the guys saw it when he was gathering the stuff Elizabeth left to be sent home and assumed that it was to be sent as well. I had here worried for a while that I was going to extract some kind of revenge.
Want to know one of the worst parts of being the military CO? Well, other than all the paperwork? On delivery day I have to be out there to supervise and make sure that we have everything that we're supposed to and that it gets where its supposed to go. The coffer almost ended up in the Amory yesterday. Delivery day also means mail day. Now, we've had supply runs about every month for a year now, and we've been handing out the mail at dinner after everything has been put away for almost a year. But some scientists seem to forget that fact. There were so many people hanging out while my people and I were trying to work that when I yelled for there attention they didn't hear me at first. Once I had there attention I told them that if they didn't leave they'd be put to work. Needless to say, most of them left. And the ones who stayed to help got to learn the best kept secret on base.
Now what is the best kept secret and how does it stay so? Simple. If they tell then their mail will be held hostage. Those who help unload get their mail early. Now, all the military people no this, most of them have been rotated through supply duty in the last year. It's kept secret mainly because I don't want a bunch of scientist to come complaining to my door. Plus, it's not like the same people get their mail early every month. The benefit of being one of my close friends is that I also usually pull out your mail if I see it and if you come by my office before dinner, you to can have your mail early. If you don't make it by then I some times lock my door and make you wait even longer. Unless you're my boss. I tried to keep Elizabeth from her mail yesterday when she came by my office and she threatened me with all the worst assignments. Did I mention that I think she purposely sends Major Lorne off on patrol when ever a supply run is due so that I can't pawn it off on him?
I better wrap this letter up if I want you to get it before next week. Today is our weekly contact with the folks back home. We can only send transmissions once a week because we need to conserve power. Rodney came up with this nifty compression algorithm so it only take about a second to send everything we need to. That includes all the personal emails, weekly reports, the novels some of the scientist write up on their research, and all the other paper work we manage to accumulate over the week.
I am attaching a list of things I wouldn't mind having.
Love you,
John
John added the email to the file of things that would be compressed then sent to the SGC that afternoon. Once the SGC received the data burst they would uncompress everything then they would sort though what they received. Mission reports and other military matters would be delivered to General Landry and others. The science reports would be sent to the relative people and all emails would be mailed to the recipient. Personal emails sent to addresses that were not cleared for sensitive information were read and censored if necessary before getting forwarded on to the intended precipitant.
John figured his dad would receive the email in two, maybe three days. Depending on how fast they got to it.
After sending his batch of reports and emails off to the science department so they could compress it John decided it was beyond time to get out of his office. He set off to find Teyla or Ronon to see if they wanted to spar. He was pretty sure he could get one of them to join him. They had a mission the next day which meant he had a whole day out of the office. He really had been spending to much time cooped up in there, what with several weeks of light duty after his run in with the killer water balloon. Yep, it was defiantly time to get out of the office.
