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January 2011

Stargate command

It's not the first time Cameron Mitchell walked into Samantha Carters Lab to find her crying. She's been doing that a lot the past few weeks. Daniel was already there comforting her.

"Knock, knock." He said aloud. Sam wiped her eyes and nose before responding.

"What can I do for you Cam?"

"Nothing I just brought someone to see you."

General Jack O'Neill walked into the lab. "Hi kids," he said

"Jack." Sam and Daniel spoke in unison.

"It's good to see you sir." Sam replied.

"What brings you to the mountain?" Daniel asked.

"Well, you know Impending doom and such.

The people in the think tank I was stuck in didn't like me much."

"Do tell," Cameron prodded.

"Yeah, a guy named Dr. Shulk was giving me a hard time. He told me I couldn't possibly be the man chosen to lead our flagship team through the Stargate for eight years because I didn't understand basic scientific principles. I told him that I had a scientist on my team that was so much better at her job than he was and was able to explain situations without losing anyone."

"Bet that didn't go over well." Daniel replied.

"He knew Carter by name."

"He did?" Sam asked.

"Yeah, he said if you had to deal with me for eight years as your C.O.; he'd personally nominate you for sainthood."

Sam smiled a real smile. Something she wasn't able to do since she read the data.

"I still don't have a clear picture as to what's going on or why but I'm just glad to be out of there."

"You seriously don't know?" Daniel asked.

"I know we have to leave the planet because of earthquakes and other volcanic stuff. Somehow caused by the sun but, I'm a bit lost on how and why. Like I said the scientists there couldn't explain things clearly without going into geek speak."

"Well basically sir, the sun gave off a massive solar flare a few months ago that injected the earths core with a large amount of neutrinos. The neutrinos reacted to some of the elements in the core to create a new kind of radio active mineral that has made the core even hotter. So hot that it's reactivating dormant volcanoes and the plates are melting at the fault lines leaving them free to shift. Most, if not, all the continents will sink into the oceans."

Cam and Daniel were surprised. Sam got through the explanation without bursting into tears.

"I see." O'Neill deadpanned. "You see, you're so much better at explaining things without losing anyone." He smiled at her. "Where's Teal'c been during all of this?"

"He and President Hayes went to the Jaffa counsel with SG-5 and 13 to seek their assistance in taking more people and equipment from earth before it's all gone."

"Well, if he's going to be a "hands on" president, maybe he'll let me be a hands on general. So, I'll be allowed to go off world more often."

Everyone looked at him as if he grew a second head. They looked at each other before looking back at him once more.

"What?" He asked.

"Sir, you do know that should anything happen to the president your next in line to run this branch of government. You'll become President by default."

"WHAT! Are you telling me that I've somehow become vice President without running for office?"

"Well, desperate times call for…"

"No. no, no, no, no, this isn't happening! I'm not the guy for this. This can't be happening." Jack shouted cutting them off.

"Sir, you'll only be president of earths off world forces. You'll be commanding a little more than what you did while being in charge of the SGC. The personnel have more than tripled since then, but it's still the same. As far as day to day operations are concerned; General Landry will be handling the SGC. Mr. Woolsey will handle Atlantis. Colonel Mason will handle the Alpha sight. The commanders of our ships will handle their own. The president will remain in charge of diplomacy and strategies for them all." She finished. O'Neill relaxed.

"As far as the President being off world, he only went because he could." Cameron put in. "He wanted to go before anyone could stand up to him and tell him he should stay here and let our diplomatic team go and negotiate for some aid. You do realize that this is his very first time through the gate. He probably won't get that chance again. So I guess you're here at this time to hold down the fort while he's gone."

Jack put on a little smile. He knew the feeling of the first time. He was always able to relive the experience through others. He also knew the feeling of wanting to go through the Stargate and told he couldn't since he became a general. "Good for Henry." he thought.

"Well then I guess I'd better report to Landry. I suppose there will be a meeting at some point. Hey Danny, why don't you bring me up to speed as to what, we've been doing out there, while we head up to Landry's office."

Daniel knew Jack would be on top of everything related to the SGC. So he figured he wanted a private conversation away from the others.

"So, what's up Jack?"

"What's going on with Carter? I know it's a dumb question but she really looks a mess."

"Well the information hit her hard since the day she heard about it. From the day she started the Stargate program she's been loosing parts of herself. Like Jolinar, her father, Janet, us."

Us, What do you mean us?

"SG-1, every time one of us went missing. Or all those times, you guys thought of me as dead. Well, it turns out that the one thing she was able to rely on was that the world was safe and that made all the craziness in her life worth wile. The stable environment of earth was her stability, her rock. Now, her rock is going to sink and she just started seeing her brother and his family on a regular basis. In the end they'll be gone as well."

"Damn, I forgot she still had real family outside of the SGC. That's got to be rough."

"That would be an understatement."

"I know that, but what else can ya say. Listen, what's the general attitude on base."

"Quiet for the most part; but I suspect that they're all a bit down probably mixed with some fear. Not as much as Sam. Most of the people hired for the SGC were hired because they haven't got families but it doesn't mean that they don't feel anything about what's going on."

"Of course, it doesn't."

Just then, they came upon General Landry's door. Jack knocked.

"Come in." General Landry yelled.

O'Neill opened the door. "Just wanted to let you know I arrived on base Hank."

"Jack, come in have a seat. I wanted to congratulate you on your new appointment. Did they tell you if we should be calling you Mr. Vice President or do they have another title picked out for you?"

"Ah…well, to tell you the truth, I just found out about it through other channels about five minute ago. I guess Henry is supposed to tell me when he gets back."

"Well, regardless of that, congratulations. How do you feel?"

"Oh you know. Shocked, nauseous, But I got to tell you, if they keep promoting me like this I may start to believe I deserve it."

Landry chuckled. "So do you know if you have an order of business you need to be attending to? Do you have any questions?"

"Like I said; I wasn't told anything officially except to come here. So, I guess I just need to get settled and wait for President Hayes to give me my new orders. As far as questions, I guess I'd like to know how the evacuation is going."

"For the most part, we've only started the farm animal evacuation. The human evacuation hasn't really gotten underway. There are a lot of people being brought in off the street so to speak. They have to fill out a mile of paperwork and secrecy forms. Then, they'll be told what there being thrown into. Finally, they'll be told about the fate of the world. They'll be given a week or two to adjust to the new information and monitored to make sure they can keep quiet."

"And if they can't?"

"They're confronted and told that it has all been a test and they have the option of prison or a dishonorable discharge."

"That won't work. If you sign a secrecy act form and they start talking then it's off to prison." O'Neill stated.

"But since we're telling them that it was false information, they'll believe they didn't really tell anyone anything of any real value. As such, allowing them a dishonorable discharge should sound fair and more agreeable then prison. The government is giving those people a way out because they believe prison would be a terrible place to be when the world ends."

"And what if they tell someone in the media; what if they try to hold a press conference?"

General Landry and Daniel no longer made eye contact. They seemed to find the desk top interesting.

Jack knew what that meant. "Ah damn it, has anyone flunked that part of the test yet?"

"Not on our side." Daniel announced.

"What do you mean not on our side?"

"Some people in the private sector have started to find out what's going on and are trying to stir up trouble." Landry provided. "Hackers and conspiracy nuts mostly but most of them are being ignored because no one listens to them and they have been known to cry wolf to many times, all for attention. The average person just tunes them out. However, when people with more credibility get involved… well, from what I hear it isn't pretty."

"Another reason Sam's upset is one of her 'Idles of old' from NASA tried to let the cat out of the bag. Ended up dead in what was called a fishing accident." Daniel said. "A scientist named Myerson. He headed the Atlantis space shuttle program. Had he kept his mouth shut he would have been going to the Bata sight on Atlantis itself."

"Why was he in the private sector and not a government pick?"

"He was deemed a security risk years ago. Actually, Dr. Jackson, he was going to be on one of the arks not Atlantis. He would never have been trusted with the knowledge of our off world programs."

"If he was a security risk why was he considered at all?"

"It was for his brains, what else?" Landry asked, rhetorically while shaking his head in disgust that brains were considered more worthy of being saved than being average. "Listen Jack, we're not the people who kill to keep secrets. That comes from the darker area of our government. The lighter side is either trying to stop it or turning the other cheek, but the one thing I do know is that if we try to stop it we'll be the ones under attack."

Jack muttered after some thought. "I could use a drink."

"Good Idea. Let's forget the negative and accentuate the positive as they say.

We'll have a toast to your new assignment." He said reaching into his desk drawer for a bottle of bourbon and a few of glasses. He poured the drinks and they all took their glass."

"To your new assignment," Landry toasted.

"To a brave new world," Daniel toasted.

"To better tomorrows," Jack toasted.

"Amen to that," Landry said before they all drained their drinking glasses.

Authors note; I tried to get this up Friday but stuff kept getting in the way. I hope that posting it now will brighten the start of your week. Thanks for the reviews and thanks for being interested enough to put this story in your alerts. I'd like to answer some of your questions but I don't want to give too much away. So I'll only answer one of them you won't see.

Old Girl Lost; I love end of the world stories as well but 2012 was the first movie I thought would work with what I had in mind.

Sorry but I won't be evacuating people to other dimensions. This is going to be a story about the heroes struggling to make in through the devastation. Some will have it harder than others and there will be character deaths. I'm just not sure who.

I've got news; I've made a video based on this story on youtube. There's a link on my main page.