2014

President Landry wondered at the majesty of it all. How did a simple research….Well, maybe it was never simple. Anyway, how did a DARPA project get to be so damn complicated? First, the Brits joined in the fun, and now we have all of NATO. He was relieved when Col. Chekov thought it was best not to include Russia. With the political climate in Europe, it was looking rather tense to have to deal with President Ramiro Alekseeva right now. Why did they have to elect an ultranationalist? He really began to think President Alekseeva is wanting to bring back the USSR. His campaign slogan was to 'Make Russia Great Again.' I thought they were doing great already. Well, it's their country.

All major military powers of NATO had representation in Cheyenne Mountain, though they thankfully left to the actual project in American hands. They agreed it was too far along to change things up in the middle. Although the Brits supplied another archeologist, it was just to help speed things along. A little touch and go when he discovered it was Dr. Jackson's ex-wife. Must be fun for him to get an actual 'I told you so' in, he mused. Anyway, he now had to get to the eventual recon mission, if they activate the Stargate. Glad they quit calling it the Ring. I hated that movie.

"Gentlemen, have you any suggestions for the recon team?"

All the ambassadors look at each other, then nod. Sir Kenneth Bainbridge, the British ambassador begins, "We have concluded that it may be for the best to keep that to an American team. We agree that trying to develop a cover story for the movement of any military personnel may be difficult to explain to our respective governing bodies as to why we need to temporarily assign such people to an American Base. Especially to Cheyenne Mountain."

President Landry was visibly relieved. "I agree, but it is reassuring that I don't need to convince you gentlemen of it. We have enough foreign personnel in the Mountain to keep our Intel people nervous enough as it is. If Project Giza leads to more, we will revisit the situation when the time comes."

Now the President really hated the next part. "As to the mission, I have authorized another item to be taken through the Gate. We have added a Tactical Nuke." Boy did that get things going. Jean-Guy Girardot, the French ambassador, looked like he was about to faint.

Germund Beckmann, the German ambassador, was the first to find his voice. "I think we would all like to know what you think would warrant such a device?"

"If at such time, it is felt that the situation at the destination is a threat to the WORLD, then we believe it may become necessary to eliminate such threat. Gentlemen, it is not a decision my Generals have taken lightly."

The British ambassador was nodding his head. "I think my government would agree. Please, gentlemen, that is why we are all involved. How would you like to discover that the Americans took a unilateral decision on behalf of the world without consulting anybody? That is what very well may have happened. If there is a threat, I rather eliminate it on another world than to wait for it to show up on our doorstep."

Thomas S. Eddington, the Canadian was shaking his head in agreement. "I concur. Maybe I've lived too long near Americans, but I have to say I would just as soon not have worry about the Gate being used to threaten Earth."

Later Landry calls Cheyenne Mountain. "General O'Neill, you have a go to transfer one of the portable tactical nukes to Cheyenne Mountain. I emphasize that it is to be a last resort only weapon. Make sure whoever you put in charge of it understands."

Jack absently nods his head, then remembers the President can't see him. "Yes sir. I have a man in mind."

Major John Sheppard was considering getting out. Out of the Air Force and checking out of life. He never thought he would ever have such thoughts. No, he really didn't seriously think about killing himself, but lately, he noticed that he was taking too many risks. He was afraid to tell anybody, but he knew his CO noticed. Maybe he should give up on recovering his career before he took one too many chances. Yeah, maybe it was time. First, he had to deal with whatever the CO was calling him in for. "Major Sheppard reporting, sir."

Col. Wilcox looked at him, "Relax, John. I have something for you. You are being reassigned."

John looked surprised. "My tour isn't up for another six months, sir."

"I know that, but when the orders come straight from the Pentagon, you don't really argue with them too much. You are to report to Cheyenne Mountain to a General Jack O'Neill. Good man. I served with him in the first Gulf War. Apparently, he picked you out personally."

John took the manila folder and glanced at the contents. "Picked me? Why?"

"I didn't ask. Above my paygrade. You are to report in one week. Not much time to pack up, but I've seen your apartment. Not too much to worry about. Dismissed."

John absently saluted, nodded his head, and started out the door. This was certainly strange. Well, maybe he wouldn't resign his commission just yet.

One week later, he was standing in front of the desk of General Jack O'Neill. He usually didn't get nervous, but that was an awfully big file he was reading with his name on the cover. The General looks up, "Major Sheppard. I bet you are asking yourself why anybody would handpick you? I can answer that. You are what the kiddies like to call a hot mess. In Afghanistan, you disobeyed orders to attempt an unauthorized rescue mission. The mission resulted in the death of the very man you were trying to rescue. Along the way, you managed to rescue five others but was shot down, which is where your buddy died. You have spent the last few years floating from one dead-end assignment to the other. Though I see you expressed a slight enjoyment of your time in McMurdo. Now you have been deemed psychologically borderline. I see you didn't know that last bit. You had to be aware of the reasons, though?"

"Yes sir," John winced, "I have been getting, well not sloppy so much as not giving much thought to my general wellbeing."

The General was scowling across the desk, then suddenly relaxed into a smile. "John, I have need of a little of that. Your records say you won't risk others, but you have no problems with the dangers you put yourself in. I want to show you something. First, I need you to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement. Normally military don't sign these things, but circumstances are different here."

John took the large document and started to read it, but after the first couple of pages, it was pretty standard 'we will shoot you if you talk' type stuff. He signed the dotted line then General O'Neill motioned him to follow.

Many levels lower than John thought the Complex went, they came to a specially locked and guarded room. "In 1928 archeologist uncovered a strange artifact on the Giza Plateau in Egypt. It was a rather large ring, nearly eight meters in diameter made out a totally unknown material. We still don't know what this material is today. Over this ring, there was a Coverstone unlike any ever recovered in Egypt. Right now, scientists are working on deciphering that Coverstone. What was underneath that stone, besides the ring, was cause for concern."

A door slides back revealing what John thought at first was some kind of sculpture, but he quickly realized it wasn't. It was the seemingly petrified remains of something not human. There seemed to be a human torso, but the head was animal-like. "Sir, what the hell are you showing me?"

"We believe that aliens visited Earth a long time ago. Then for whatever reason, they left. The Ancient Egyptians buried the Gate. Something tried to come back to Earth and this is what is left. We think that the Stargate, what we call the ring, is a device for traveling to other worlds. We want to figure it out. Open a passage to another world. Explore that world. Then, if there is a genuine threat to Earth, we want you to detonate a nuclear device and destroy the other side.

If you agree to this assignment, I will immediately promote you to Lt. Colonel. Otherwise, I can see to it that there is nothing standing in your way to resign your commission if you so choose. Major, I chose you because, despite disagreeing with your actions in Afghanistan, I think you had the best of intentions going in. This mission needs somebody that will make a tough decision with the understanding that they may not make it back. Frankly, I think you are still level headed enough to make the tough decisions, but in just the right frame of mind to go through with it with no regrets."

"Sir, that is kinda harsh. I can't say that I disagree with your assessment, but still harsh. Your opinion is that I am crazy enough to blow up a nuke while sitting on it, but not suicidal enough to do it for the hell of it?"

"Pretty much. You hungry? I hear the chow hall is serving cake today with lunch."

"Daniel," began Sarah Gardner, "We have exhausted all of the language databases we have found, but these symbols are still so much rubbish."

"I know, I know." Daniel was really getting annoyed at his ex-wife right now. "Sarah, all I can think of is to look through ANY of the references pertaining to ANY pictographic language. Hell, I thought of entering the rubbings into Google Image Search to see what that leads to."

Paul coughs. "Well, I actually did that last week. No match, but the 'similar image' results kept sending me to astrology websites."

"Really?" chimed Daniel and Sarah together. They look at each other, briefly startled.

Daniel suddenly jumps over to Paul's terminal. "Show me." As Paul reloads the images into Google, Daniel stares at the links. "Shit. I can't believe it."

Paul is still confused. "Believe what? Your horoscope off for today? What?"

"Paul, Sarah. They aren't hieroglyphs. They're constellations."

Cheyenne Mountain was full of bigwigs today. Sitting around the big table in the briefing room were Generals, two Admirals, and NATO ambassadors. Not to mention President Landry. Daniel was consulting with Col. Samantha Carter about the presentation when General O'Neill interrupted. "Okay, kids. Any day now."

Looking sheepishly at each other, Daniel starts the PowerPoint. "Here you can see the previously unknown symbols on the Giza Cartouche. As you know, they have defied translation for the past two years. At least until frustration took over. Paul Littlefield entered the rubbings of these symbols into an image search and kept getting what he thought were nonsense results. In desperation, I looked at those results and realized that these symbols are not hieroglyphs at all. They are constellations."

President Landry looks up, "Constellations? Why would they be that?"

Daniel looks to Sam, letting her address this. "Well, sir, those symbols correspond to symbols on the Stargate. We have been aware of this for some time. Because we didn't understand their purpose, we didn't understand why when we entered those symbols that the Gate didn't activate. Knowing their purpose, we can correct that."

Landry was a little amused and frustrated at the same time. Jack warned him about her talent of saying a lot without saying anything. "Colonel you still haven't told us that purpose."

"Oh, right. Sorry. The symbols act as a coordinate system." Going to an animation on PowerPoint, "This shows that you can determine a destination by using six symbols to establish a 3d triangulation in space. All you need to is a seventh point to represent the point of origin."

Carter was looking very pleased with herself until Jack coughed, "And did you find this seventh symbol?"

"Oh, yes sir. Daniel, well Sarah, they both found it and identified it on the Gate. We are just waiting for the go-ahead to dial it up."

Jack looks to the President. Landry searches the faces of the assembled NATO representatives, who nod their heads. "I guess we would all like to see if this thing actually works. Get the probe ready and dial the Gate."

The team drops down to the Control Room as the blast barrier raises to allow the Conference Room audience to observe. Minutes later, Paul starts entering the symbols into the Pedestal. Computers interfaced with it are reading the power levels and recording all activity. Finally pushing the seventh symbol, everybody was holding their breath. Nothing happened. Paul looks at Sam in panic, who shrugs her shoulders. Staring at the Pedestal, trying to see if he entered the symbols in order. Out of frustration, he wraps his fist against the big red button in the center. It lights up and the Gate, well you could say it flushed.

"We have a stable wormhole," says a technician. "Sending in the probe."

The probe is NASA's contribution to the project, all though they didn't know it. Originally it was one of the Curiosity prototypes. It was acquired by DARPA. With a few modifications, it served its new function quite nicely. As the probe entered the event horizon tracking computers registered the voyage. Looking at a large screen showing a stellar map, the coordinates were clearly marked. The star system was fairly close.

"We are receiving telemetry. Atmospheric composition…close to Earth normal. Temperature….whew, 113 degrees F. Maneuvering around the LZ. I see a passageway. I'm going to see if I can get outside." A few minutes later, the probe is panning around, showing a desert environment, when suddenly the Gate shut off. "We lost signal, but according to the data, the planet will support life. The gravity was reading near Earth normal."

Back in the Conference Room, Gen. O'Neill looked around the room. Then President Landry nodded. "You have 'Go' to send the Recon Team."

Jack was briefing the Team. Lt. Col. John Sheppard was Mission Commander. Major Aiden Ford was in charge of the Marine Force Recon unit that had been assigned as security. They had been the easiest SF team to get reassigned without pulling an SOCOM unit out of rotation. The Major was young, but he was extremely well qualified. Daniel was going along to ensure the team could actually get back. He was going to be responsible for finding the coordinates to redial Earth. Sam was going for technical support, and because she was qualified to operate the UAVs being sent along. Plus, she counted as being another scientist.

The whole team was going to ride through the gate in some of the SF boys new light weight Polaris Dagor ATVs. These had been modified to run on some new high capacity electric motors. They had portable solar panels as well as the nuclear power source on the probe to recharge as necessary. Hopefully, they wouldn't take that long to get back.

Jack decided to get the briefing started. "This mission is simple, at least on paper. Go through the Gate. Collect data on the other side. Learn to dial back to Earth. I know that last bit can take a little while, so we are sending plenty of supplies. Also, we will dial the Gate on our end to maintain regular contact. At least radios will still transmit back and forth. I get a headache every time Carter tries to explain to me the reason you can't just step back through when we dial from Earth. I'll just take her at her word. She is smarter than any of us, anyway. If necessary, we will send more supplies through, but under no circumstances will we send more people. That is why there is an independent duty Navy Corpsman going as part of the Marines. Any questions that I may have an actual answer to? Okay, then mission departs at 0800 tomorrow."