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sg_fignewton's Alphabet Soup, which has once again caused me to write fic where I otherwise wouldn't have!
See Fig's Gen Fic Day roundup here! Alphabet Soup is now complete, with the full anthology available on Dreamwidth here, complete with links back to the authors' original postings (on Dreamwidth or LJ) for feedback.
Set after "Avatar" (8.06); spoilers possible through "Avatar."
H is for Help
"Are you sure bringing it back here was such a good idea?" Bill asked nervously. The smooth black object had a surface that looked like polished wood, but it was heavy enough that SG-1 reported they'd had a lot of trouble getting it on the FRED. Considering what Teal'c alone could lift, that was saying something.
The shape made Bill nervous too. It resembled a coffin, complete with a lid. A coffin for the Hulk, perhaps. Well, maybe not the Hulk. That depended on which version; how big he got varied.
"We couldn't exactly study it on the planet," Daniel said, a little snidely, to Bill's ears. "Little things like the acid rain, generally corrosive atmosphere. . . ."
"Still safer than bringing it to Earth, Bill," Colonel Carter reminded him.
Bill couldn't disagree; the safety of Earth was paramount. He'd be happier, though, if he were still on Earth himself.
"Sam, I think Teal'c and I are going to get out of these suits and find some lunch," Daniel said.
Daniel's suit was looking a bit worse for wear, now that Bill looked closely at it. So were Teal'c's and Colonel Carter's.
"Did the acid eat into your suits?" Bill asked in horror.
The colonel regarded the now-pitted helmet she held in her gloved hand. "You see why we didn't want to stay."
Teal'c nodded to Bill, and he and Daniel turned and left the gate room.
"Oh, oh, right!" Bill felt silly now for complaining that they'd brought the artifact back "Of course. I'll have some Marines get it to the lab, and I'll secure it. We won't try to open it until you're there and we have the thing safely in quarantine. Why don't you change and come after you've had some lunch?"
The Colonel smiled at him. "I'll grab a sandwich and join you in the lab. I can't wait to see what we've got! I want to know how this thing survived the acid rain without a scratch, and what these energy readings mean."
She followed her teammates while Bill got men to help him transfer the object onto a cart to bring into his lab. In the end, it took four heaving Marines using a block and tackle to get it onto the cart. They could barely fit the thing through the lab doors. Maybe they should have bigger doors. If the object were any larger, they'd have to move it to the hangar instead, and that would make the pilots really unhappy. Bill made a few notes for improvements, things he could work on in his downtime—if he ever got through his backlog of projects.
The shiny ovoid looked like it might be some kind of life pod. SG-1 had found it on an otherwise barren planet, sunk partway into the ground. Despite the atmosphere that Daniel had described, and the real possibility that it had fallen to the planet from space, the pod had no scratches or dings that Bill could see. They'd washed it, the FRED they'd used, and the three members of SG-1 still in their suits the moment they all came through the Gate to contain any acid or other contaminants they might have brought through. Other scientists were now studying what had washed off.
Bill got his best magnifying glass and looked more closely at the surface under bright light. Nothing. He still couldn't see any imperfections. He couldn't identify the material just from looking. He shivered a little at the dark thing looming over him. He hoped Colonel Carter would bring her sandwich soon.
Bill put on a light pair of gloves, hoping he could get a better idea of the material through the thin layer of latex. One couldn't be too cautious with alien artifacts, even if the acid should have killed anything, and then the bath had removed the acid. He moved his fingers slowly towards the surface.
Bill snatched back his hand. The object looked as though it should be cool, but it was much warmer than the ambient temperature. He touched it again gingerly and took his hand back. It wasn't hot, but very warm. He pressed his palm gently to the surface—about body temperature, he guessed.
Of course, that was when all hell broke loose.
***
The mess hall here made Sam miss the SGC's, but Daniel and Teal'c were hungry enough to stay and have real meals to make up for their missed lunches. She was bringing the least objectionable sandwich back to Bill's lab when the klaxons sounded. She broke into a trot and was close enough to see the door to Bill's lab slide shut. Then the lights went out, and she was in the dark.
A moment later the emergency power came on, bringing up the lights. Should she get a weapon and a team here, or try the door first? Maybe she could get Bill out before things got worse. Decision made, she took the last few steps to the door and tried the panel. Nothing. Damn. It wasn't really a surprise; they'd designed the labs so that they could lock them down securely. Now Bill was locked securely in his lab with an alien artifact, and they had no idea what it did.
***
When the lights came back, Bill verified what he already knew: the door had shut. He never closed that door when he could avoid it. Ever since Honduras, he hated closed doors, especially in concrete bunkers built inside mountains. He couldn't breathe. That thing must have cut off the air somehow. He looked back at the casket; a hose snaked from the previously smooth surface to the power supply in the middle of the lab. It must be sucking all the air out of the room. Bill already felt warm and lightheaded. How could it take the air so fast? He sank to his knees, bent over the floor. No, wait—not good for breathing. He lay down on his back. That was it: don't compress the lungs. Keep them open. Breathe. He should breathe slower, use up the air slower.
A low hum filled the room. Bill decided he wouldn't even worry about what the pod was doing. He would run out of air first. He knew he should have resigned. He was never safe in the Stargate Program. He began running through every disastrous moment he'd had since he joined the program.
He'd made it past the time he thought General O'Neill, Colonel Carter, and Daniel were going to kill him for getting Teal'c trapped in that game chair when he realized that his breathing had actually eased. He opened his eyes. He wasn't dizzy any more. He wasn't excessively warm.
Bill sat up. Oh, God: he'd just hyperventilated and thought he was dying. He wondered if anyone was watching on the monitors; they had cameras in every lab. It wasn't like humiliation was anything new for him, though.
***
"Bill's claustrophobic now," Daniel said slowly, clearly unhappy. "He was fine before we went after the Telchak device, but. . . ."
"We noticed, Daniel," Sam told him, hoping to ease his guilt. "You're not actually betraying a secret here. We'll get him out as soon as we can."
Sam stared at the monitors before her. After her first attempts to open the door had failed, she'd come to the control room to see if she could get a better grasp on the situation. The others had joined her. Unfortunately, security monitors were down all over the base. They couldn't get video or audio feed from Bill's lab.
Another scientist called her over. "Main power is back on, but we're seeing a big drain; it looks as though it's coming from Dr. Lee's lab," Dr. Chankul indicated, pointing to a monitor. "Shall I shut off main power again?"
"Do it," Sam told her.
"I can't," the scientist responded a minute later. "I've tried everything, but I can't seem to shut down the power!"
"Has anyone called Bill?" Daniel asked abruptly. "I mean, on the phone?"
***
The hum from the pod seemed to be increasing. Bill looked around for a weapon. Nothing. He worked on weapons all the time; how could he have nothing in this lab? Oh, because they were all in his lab at the SGC.
Keeping his distance from the pod, Bill tried to get a better look at the hose. It was shiny and black like the pod, and about four inches in diameter. It ran to the power supply, where it suddenly became a much larger bulb and covered the whole set of outlets. It must be draining power from the base. Didn't they have a way to lock out that sort of drain? Maybe they didn't. He'd have to work on that.
The hum was now so loud that Bill covered his ears. Suddenly it changed pitch, and then it decreased. He could see a change in the pod. It looked as though the side away from him was sliding open. He screwed up his courage and began to tiptoe around the pod, on the side by the lab's door, so that he didn't have to step over the hose. The humming stopped so suddenly his ears rang.
Then the hum began, though more quietly and at a lower pitch. Something else rang, and Bill jumped. Wait—that was his phone. It was on the open side of the pod. He looked at the pod, just in time to see a bright light shoot out. The phone on the wall exploded.
A moment later, Bill thought: damn. They didn't have a working mobile phone network in this mountain.
***
"It stopped ringing," Sam had to tell them as she hung up. "We have to assume something is happening in there."
"It looked like a life pod," Daniel reminded them. "Maybe something came out?"
"Or perhaps an automated defense system activated," Teal'c suggested.
Sam nodded. "Could be either. That power drain may have been to revive a being in stasis, or it could have been powering weapons. Or both."
Daniel looked as grim as she felt. "There's no telling what Bill is facing."
No one said, "If he's still alive," but no one had to say it.
***
The monitors didn't have sound, did they? Bill was pretty sure they didn't, so they might have seen him jump, but no one heard him shriek at the blast. He'd never have heard the end of that, assuming he survived the whole thing anyway. The energy pulse had come from inside the pod, above the head of a groggy alien. A groggy, furry, bipedal alien that looked like a stuffed animal his daughter would have in her collection.
The alien was about two-thirds Bill's own size. He could see grey, black, and white fur on its face and forearms. It wore boots and gloves of a brown material that looked like leather and a silver coverall that covered its legs and upper arms. The suit had pockets everywhere and some emblems across the chest no doubt meant something wherever this creature came from. It blinked slowly at Bill. Most of its face was covered in a plastic breathing mask. Black straps across its torso held the creature in something like a seat.
"Hi!" Bill said, holding up his palms to show that he had nothing in his hands. The little mounted gun that had shot the phone wasn't moving any longer, but why take chances? "I come in peace!" No, that wasn't quite right. Boy, he wished Daniel were here.
The alien blinked more rapidly and turned its head from side to side. Then it looked to its left for a longer period of time. It appeared to be reading some panel inside the pod, but Bill didn't want to go close enough to be sure.
"Do you come in peace?" Bill shook his head. He wasn't supposed to be making first contact. He wasn't that kind of scientist at all. "What's your name? Oh, mine's Bill! William Lee, actually. But you can call me Bill."
The creature turned its head back to look at Bill again and pulled off the mask.
"You can breathe our air? Good!" Bill blathered nervously. "At least, I hope that's good," he added in an undertone. "I don't suppose you can understand me?"
The creature did something with the straps, and suddenly it was free—and it fell forwards onto the floor.
"Oh, no!" Bill exclaimed and stepped forward to help it.
The creature's head snapped up and it opened its mouth, displaying rows of fangs that would not have looked out of place on a shark.
"Okay!" said Bill said, backing away slowly. "You don't need my help! What was I thinking?" He realized that he had been looming over the alien. He had reached the wall already; he slid down it slowly and sat on the floor, trying to look as non-threatening as possible. That had never worked for him before, but there was always a first time.
***
"So here's what we know," Sam announced to the full complement of scientists, along with part of the Marine and Air Force complements. They were in the hangar, the only place they could all assemble. She recounted how the initial lockdown had been triggered by their own safety systems when the pod began drawing a large amount of power, but main power had been turned back on from inside Bill's lab. They couldn't open the door from the outside the room or from the command center. Monitors inside the lab were offline. She took a deep breath and told them about the phone that stopped working in the middle of ringing.
"We don't know whether we are dealing solely with alien technology, probably programmed to defend itself, or with an incursion," she concluded. "We may have an intruder now. We must assume at this time that it is hostile."
Sam could see Daniel's lips pressed together. He didn't like the assumption, but he made no attempt to argue. Or maybe it was the fact that he accepted the assumption that he didn't like.
Colonel Pierce took over from there. "Colonel Carter will work on that door, backed by Teal'c and the Marines. Chankul, you and your team will find some way to get us a view in there, whether it's through the air vents, or a hole in the wall, or sliding a mirror around! The rest of the scientists will work on maintaining security of base systems and then and only then will attempt to re-establish control over the door mechanism and the monitors in Dr. Lee's lab. Air Force personnel here will keep this hangar secure. Dismissed."
Daniel cleared his throat loudly enough to be heard over the sounds of people departing to their stations. "I'm not going to be much help with the base systems."
Pierce paused and looked at him. "So what do you propose?"
"As Sam said, we may have an incursion. If there's someone there, I can attempt to establish contact."
Sam nodded. "I'll be happy to have him, sir, if you allow."
"Of course."
As they geared up, Daniel said, "You know, we never trained Bill for combat situations, but he seems to keep finding himself in them. Maybe he'd be safer just at the SGC? I mean, I know it wouldn't keep him completely out of harm's way, but it seems like every time he goes on a mission. . . ."
Sam thought ruefully of a Daniel who had once been untrained for combat situations too. He'd learned pretty quickly. Bill was . . . not quite the same. How could he be? No one would expect an archaeologist to do all that Daniel did; no one should expect more of an engineer and physicist than Bill already did.
"Dr. Lee has handled himself with courage and resourcefulness at times," Teal'c said.
Daniel nodded vigorously. "We never give Bill enough credit. He's still working with us despite the kidnapping and the torture. I mean, he's the one who developed these vests." He tapped his own.
Sam didn't mention that Bill had nearly let a plant take over the SGC (as General O'Neill reminded them every time Bill's name came up, even though that fiasco had nothing to do with SG-1). Worse, he had given up on General O'Neill when Maybourne had sent them to that moon. She didn't mention these things, but she couldn't help remembering them.
"He just has the worst luck!" Daniel said, mostly under his breath.
Sam snorted. "I thought that was you."
***
The furry alien was talking to him, Bill was sure of that. He just wish he had some idea what it was saying. The voice was a little too high-pitched to be pleasant, and it seemed to think that he should understand it. He was pretty sure it kept repeating the same words. It was sitting on the floor in front of its pod now and looked much less woozy, and more than a little scary.
"You know, it would help if you'd, say, point to something, so that I could learn your language," he said as inoffensively as possible.
It stopped short and bared its many, many teeth, but it didn't move towards him. It kept looking at him, apparently expecting him to talk more.
"Why don't we start with introductions?" Bill tried to think what Daniel would do. He'd seen him in action often enough. Of course, the actions he'd seen from Daniel usually involved artifacts, and not first-contact situations. Unless one counted human kidnappers as first contact, and Bill didn't think that he should.
He pushed the bad memories back and focused. He tapped his chest. "Bill." He repeated the gesture and the word twice more.
What came out of its mouth next sounded like "Byo."
"Right!" Bill couldn't keep the excitement from his voice, but that seemed to startle his new friend; it bared its teeth again.
"Bill," he said one more time, tapping his fingers on his chest. Then he held his hand so that his fingers pointed to it instead. "You?"
A long string of sounds came from its toothy mouth. How did Daniel do this? Where was Daniel?
***
"I'd feel better if we could see," Daniel told Teal'c yet again. Sam gritted her teeth. Did he think she couldn't hear? She had the door panel open and had tried everything. Nothing happened whatsoever. The panel had been completely locked out, or maybe even burned out. Maybe the whole mechanism was burned out. None of her overrides worked.
She had Teal'c try brute force; that got them nowhere, as she expected, but it was worth a try.
Daniel suddenly touched her arm. "Command," he said grimly, handing her a radio.
It was Pierce. "We've lost our other monitors," he told her. "Something in there is still accessing our system, and we need you here to help us shut it out."
Sam gave herself a moment to imagine throwing up her hands and saying, "Fine! It's not like I'm doing anything here anyway!" Then she acknowledged the command properly.
"Keep an eye on things," she told Daniel and Teal'c. "I'll be back when I can."
***
Bill was pretty sure the alien was telling him its name. But was it that whole long string of sounds, or just part? He couldn't make most of those noises if he tried, and he couldn't remember them long enough to try.
Daniel would probably be having a field day here. He wouldn't be claustrophobic, and he wouldn't wonder if the alien ate other intelligent species, and he would actually be able to communicate, damn it! But it was no good thinking like that. Daniel was on the other side of that door.
That was the key. If Bill could get that door open, he could introduce the alien to Daniel, and Daniel and it could have a good time, and Bill could run out of the base and look at the sky and hyperventilate as long as he wanted.
He stood up slowly. He meant to look harmless, and his knees creaking and cracking probably helped. The alien looked curious rather than scared.
"I'm sorry, but I'm just not getting your name," Bill explained. "Maybe we can try some other words?"
He walked slowly to his desk. The alien tensed. He put his hand on a drawer handle.
"Closed," he said. He tapped the handle. He went down to the next one. "Closed," he repeated, and he tapped the handle. The third: "closed." He went to the other side and did the other two drawers.
"Open," he said, pulling a drawer open.
The desk above his hand exploded, and he dove for the floor.
***
"Energy burst in Dr. Lee's office!" exclaimed Dr. Prentice. "It's over already."
"Do we know what it was?" she said, leaving the monitor she had just begun using and going to his.
He pulled up a graph of the energy spike.
"That looks like a weapons burst," she had to say.
Her radio crackled, and Daniel's voice came through. "Sam, we heard what sounded like an explosion from inside Bill's office! It was muffled, but it didn't sound good."
"Bill's still alive," she said, trying to convince both Daniel and herself. "If Bill weren't still alive, whatever's in there wouldn't be. . . ." She just couldn't keep up the act.
"Shooting him?" Daniel asked pointedly.
***
The shooting had stopped, Bill told himself. The shooting had stopped. Just one shot, and it wasn't near him. He tried to uncurl from the little ball he'd rolled into. He gradually determined that nothing hurt, except his heart pounding in his chest. He thought he heard faint voices calling his name, but that might be in his head.
Bill looked at the wall. They'd need a new phone there, that was for sure. The wall behind seemed undamaged, though. Precision shooting? The pod wanted to stop the noise, and it stopped the noise.
Bill turned slowly towards the alien. It was partly back in the pod now. Could that be an apologetic look on the furry face? It looked kind of like a dog that had been yelled at, but—no. It looked like his daughter used to look when she'd done something wrong, before she started thinking she was all grown up. Now got defensive instead of being sorry when she misbehaved. The alien looked at him a little sideways, not directly, as if she was embarrassed. Her head was down, just like Katie used to do. And then Katie would whisper an apology, and he'd forgive her.
"Apology accepted," he said shakily. "But how am I going to teach you 'open'?"
***
Sam cursed under her breath. Whatever had happened in that lab, it had made things worse; the alien artifact had tapped into their systems and kept shutting things down. Now lights were going on and off. It shouldn't be that easy! What would they do if it got into life support?
"Colonel Pierce? We've got a problem. I think we need to keep some doors locked open, with heavy objects wedged in them." She began to explain.
Daniel had drifted back to the control room, obviously frustrated with his inability to do anything for his friend from the corridor outside the lab. He was now having Chankul talk him through her attempts to get visuals on Bill. Sam hoped it wouldn't slow her team's work.
"Webcam!" the young woman exclaimed suddenly. "If I can get control of Bill's webcam, the way he has his desk positioned, it should show us most of his lab!"
***
The alien was not speaking to him, Bill finally realized; she was talking to her pod. She'd turn to look at him often, but her rapid sounds were aimed inside the thing. The conversation seemed awfully one-sided, though. He hoped she was telling the pod to stand down, or that he was a friend, or whatever she needed to convey to get it to stop firing at him.
On the other hand, the thing couldn't have missed at this distance. Even while his pulse still raced, Bill knew that must have been a warning shot. The pod's defense system could have killed him twice. It shot the desk above where he reached. It had shot the phone to pieces, so he knew it didn't miss by accident. It must be trying to defend the furry alien.
Now that Bill thought about it, the alien looked a hell of a lot smaller than the flight couch inside. That could hold something nearly twice her size. Perhaps she had an expression like his daughter used to get because the alien was herself very young. Perhaps the pod was set to defend her automatically because she couldn't defend herself. Even with all those pockets, the alien showed no signs of having a weapon. She had bared her teeth, but she hadn't really moved to bite him. Maybe baring her teeth was some kind of smile? Daniel had told him about a race SG-1 had encountered once where smiling looked like a threat, and they had to be careful not to show their teeth. Could he be the alien thinking that bared teeth were a threat when she'd been trying to look harmless? He remembered that he'd been trying to look harmless at the same time.
If she was not just an alien, but a child, what did she make of this place? Clearly, she had seen technology before. Yet had she ever seen a human being before? Bill had seen many aliens, but new ones still startled him. He could look pretty scary. When his kids were really small and he took them to play dates, babies and toddlers would cry if he got too close.
Daniel had won friends by sharing food, hadn't he? Bill had a supply of chocolate in his desk. He could use some right now himself. He hadn't had lunch, standing by the comms and discussing readings with Colonel Carter before SG-1 brought the pod to the Alpha Site.
"Excuse me?" he asked when the alien had been quiet for a while. "Could you tell me if you have in fact disabled your, um, rather overprotective defense system there? I don't suppose you even know what I mean."
The alien slid back onto the floor, gracefully this time. That pod definitely seemed built for something larger than she was. She let loose another string of sounds.
"And I have no idea what that means," Bill murmured to himself. If she was a child, continuing to talk might set her at ease. Either way, it made him feel a little better. Plus, somebody had to be the adult here, and he was starting to think it might be him.
***
Prentice cursed loudly. "It was much easier to get in here last time!"
"Well, if you hadn't posted a video of Bill singing and dancing in his lab to the entire base, maybe he wouldn't have secured his webcam so well!" Chankul said angrily.
Secure the base, Sam told herself. Pay no attention to the scientists having petty fights. Even if they're trying to save the life of a man you've worked with for years—and whom you'd miss if you lost him. God. Would they really lose Bill? Had they already?
After one last test, she announced, "I've isolated power and life support. I'm confident the alien system can't take control."
Pierce came over. "Have you cut off power to the thing?"
"Not yet," she conceded. "I'm—well, sir, I might be able to do it, but I'm not certain. If I try and fail, I may not get a second chance. I'm afraid of the reaction an attempt could provoke. If Bill is still alive in there, I want to save cutting off its power until last. I'd really like to get a look in there before I try it, sir."
Pierce took a long pause before responding. "I want you to work out how you'll cut power. If that thing gets any further into our systems, or poses any more of a threat than it does now, you need to cut power immediately. We don't even know if Dr. Lee is still alive."
***
"Pencil," said Bill. "Pencil." He twirled it a little in his fingers.
"Pezzz," the alien seemed to say.
"Good! Good. That's right. Pencil. Now let's see what we can do with it." Bill knew his hands were shaking. He didn't know if the alien knew what that meant. He carefully took a piece of paper off his desk and flipped it over.
"We can draw." He tried to draw the alien. His sketch was horrible. His kids would have laughed. The alien looked intrigued. That was probably because she was too far away to see how bad his drawing was. It wasn't the quality that counted, Bill told himself. Keeping the alien happy—that was what mattered.
"We can write." Help! Help! his hand wrote, before he really thought about it. No, he was going to stay calm. He could do this.
He put the pencil through the handle of the desk drawer that held his stash. Thank God he had left it unlocked, even if that jerk Prentice sometimes helped himself. He still suspected Prentice had used the spare key to get in at least once while it was locked, anyway.
"We can use it as a simple lever. Open," he said, slowly pulling the drawer open with the pencil.
The alien's eyes widened, but the pod didn't fire.
Bill put down the pencil.
"Closed," he said, gently pushing the drawer shut. He then showed "open" and "closed" several more times.
"Chocolate," he said, inching his hand into the drawer and slowly, ever so slowly, drawing out a bar of Special Dark. Prentice hadn't eaten it, because Bill had swapped the wrapper with a Mr. Goodbar. Prentice had eaten the Mr. Goodbar.
"Chocolate," he said again, revealing the bar to the alien. He slipped off the paper that said "Mr. Goodbar" and slowly peeled back a little foil.
"Chocolate," he said several more times, and then he finally took a bite and smiled. He held it out to her. She was moved from feet away to just inches from him so fast that Bill jerked back, afraid she was attacking him. Then he got a grip on himself and moved back towards her, slowly handing her the chocolate bar, trying to keep one eye on the pod while looking like he wasn't.
She grabbed the bar and sunk her teeth in as if she hadn't eaten in, well, who knew how long? She probably hadn't.
Wait. Dogs were allergic to chocolate—deathly allergic. What if he poisoned an alien? What if he poisoned an alien child?
***
"Got it!" Sam crowed as the image popped up on the screen.
"What is that?" Daniel asked, but Sam had no answer.
The screen showed mostly the profile of an overgrown Ewok with a frightening mouth dripping some substance that Sam couldn't immediately identify.
"What color is that?" demanded Chankul, who had joined them. "That's not blood, is it?"
"Sam, can you refocus?" Daniel asked, tapping the upper right-hand side of the screen. "There's a piece of paper on the floor."
The printing was too shaky to be sure it was Bill's hand, but as Sam coaxed more out of the camera, her stomach dropped. HELP HELP, it read. Clearly the creature didn't write that, but she couldn't see Bill at all.
***
No respiratory distress, no sign of hives—would he see them under that fur? Bill very much hoped the alien wasn't being harmed by the chocolate.
She sure seemed to be enjoying it. She was even chewing a little foil. No fillings, apparently; Bill didn't see any sparks. Then he wondered what was wrong with him, to think about aliens with fillings. The way her teeth looked, bad ones probably just fell out and were replaced.
The rest of the bar disappeared all too fast, and Bill was pretty sure it was the last he had.
Perhaps he could return to the language lesson? "You know, we have more food. We just have to get out of this room. See? Open?" he opened another drawer.
"Owa!" Chocolate and saliva dripped into the fur below the alien's mouth. She seemed much happier now.
"But the drawers won't get us anything else good. What if we go . . . over here?"
Bill walked the long way around the room, his skin prickling. He didn't want to go to close to the alien. At any moment, that pod could shoot. It could probably shoot him even though he was walking around the side of pod that remained closed.
The alien got to her feet and trotted after him.
"Right! Long way around, but we'll get there. Door."
Bill put a sweaty hand up to the door panel and tried to open it. He wasn't at all surprised that it didn't work.
"Owa!" said a little voice at his side. The alien was so close he could touch her. He wouldn't touch her. He didn't want to scare her—or her pod.
"Yes. Open. At least, I want it to open." He looked at the pod. "I think your craft broke it."
***
"There's Bill!" Daniel shouted, pointing at feet in the far part of the screen. "He's walking; he's alive!"
"Are you sure?" Prentice asked.
"Those are Dr. Lee's shoes," Teal'c said authoritatively.
Sam could not get sound from the webcam. It should work! Damn it! Bill's security was better than she thought; they were lucky they'd been able to get video. Did he disable the microphone separately? Who did that? Then she remembered the audio file that had made the rounds of the SGC emails a few weeks back. Bill had cause.
"Carter, is the whole base secure?" Pierce demanded.
"No, sir."
"Then get on it! We know Lee's alive, but we're not getting anything else out of that camera!"
Sam reluctantly moved back to another station. It was true: the creature had run across the screen and then disappeared. She couldn't tell if Chankul's interpretation of what had dripped from the creature's mouth was correct and the thing really did have blood on its teeth, or if Chankul had been watching too many horror movies on her laptop.
"Look, we've recalled the Daedalus to see if we can beam him out, but it's going to be another two days before it gets here," Pierce told her quietly. "I don't want to lose Dr. Lee any more than you do, but we need to make sure we've locked that alien system out of ours! Once you've done that, we can work on getting eyes on Lee again."
"He's still alive, Sam," Daniel reminded her.
***
Bill's hands had left sweat marks all over the door. Of course it wasn't moving. He couldn't open it by force! He doubted Teal'c could; it was built to stay locked once it was locked. A signal would be needed to allow it to open. The alien trying to help him push the door was really cute, though. He wondered how developed she was and how much bigger she'd get. And how much smarter. Whoever had designed that pod had a higher level of technology than they did; he could tell that just from the outside. The inside looked complex, as well, as far as he could tell from the looks he snuck. He didn't want to look directly at it for too long.
"Your pod won't let us out," he said, sinking tiredly down the wall. "Unless it's our security system, but then I think we'd at least get some blinking lights. I think your pod is trying to protect you, so it secured this room, and it isn't going to let us open it until it's confident that we're not going to hurt you."
The alien sat down next to him. "Owa?" she asked.
"Yes, I want it to open."
A set of sounds that meant nothing to Bill followed. She repeated them.
"Wait!" he said on the third repetition. "Did you say 'chocolate'?"
"Shach!" she said, with a guttural sound at the end of the syllable. She pointed to her mouth, still slightly smeared with chocolate.
"Chocolate! Yes, there's more! Out there! Open!" he said, tapping the door. "We have to get it open."
The alien jumped to her feet and went back into her pod.
Suddenly the door opened.
"Just like that?" Bill said, starting to stand. "Well, not just like that. I suppose I did—"
Everything seemed to happen at once: Teal'c appeared in Bill's field of view, dressed in a protective vest and holding his staff; the alien let out what could only be a scream; and an explosion hit the wall above Teal'c's head. Then everything froze. Bill didn't dare move a muscle, although he felt as though any moment all those muscles might just give out. Teal'c stood stock still too, clearly considering his options.
"Teal'c's a friend," Bill said cautiously. "Teal'c, put down your weapons, very slowly, and tell my friend here that you're a friend too."
Teal'c blinked and raised his eyebrows, but he did not object. Thank God for Teal'c's calm. Bill wished he had it. Teal'c slowly lowered his staff and then straightened.
"I am a friend to any friend of Dr. Lee," he said solemnly, and he added a nod at the end.
"Now tell her you have chocolate," Bill said with a forced smile.
"I have chocolate," Teal'c dutifully repeated.
A series of squeals erupted behind him. Bill continued to stand very still, and he closed his eyes for good measure. Then something brushed his side, and he looked to find the alien taking his hand.
"Shach!" she said, and the three of them started down the corridor together. The pod didn't shoot. Bill didn't faint, but it was a near thing.
***
Sam could hardly believe it when Bill introduced her to the toothy alien in the infirmary. The thing that had looked so big and bloodthirsty on the monitor seemed much smaller and less threatening in person. Still, its lifepod had shot up Bill's lab and the wall outside.
"I'm glad you're okay," she told Bill. "We were worried."
Bill smiled, taking his eyes off the alien for just a moment. "I'm fine now. I just want to make sure this little one is okay."
"You're sure she's a child?"
The alien began speaking her musical language again, and Bill didn't answer.
"Pretty sure," Daniel chimed in. "As Bill said, the pod can handle much larger lifeforms, and her coordination . . . could be better." He gestured at a stain on the front of the clothing the alien wore.
Dr. Chen tapped his foot impatiently. "I really think it does not take four of you to keep her calm so that I can finish her exam."
Bill volunteered to stay; Sam realized she should have expected that after what she'd heard about him bonding with their visitor. She got to her feet. "I've got work to do. Pierce is really unhappy about base security."
Daniel and Teal'c didn't move. Sam sighed.
"Good job, Bill," she told him.
That got his attention. "Thanks!" he said, sounding surprised. Did she compliment him so little? Maybe she should pay more attention to him in the future. He deserved better.
Bill resumed discussing the alien with Daniel as she left.
EPILOGUE
Bill was sorry to see his little friend go, but Thor had come to collect her before the Alpha Site's doctor even finished examining her. It turned out that General O'Neill had contacted him as soon as he'd heard from the Alpha Site that they had an unknown alien. The Asgard insisted that he could not take Bill to her planet, and the alien (whose name was apparently a series of whistles that didn't translate into English) had to be returned to her home immediately. Thor did tell them that he'd learned from the pod that she had been stranded on that planet for nearly a decade. Her parents must have given her up for dead; Bill's heart went out to them. Thor also acted as translator for one short conversation, allowing thanks to be exchanged on either side. Even with Thor interpreting, however, the words didn't make a lot of sense to Bill; the language was filled with metaphors. Apparently Bill was now somehow equated with chocolate in the girl's mind, and also with birdsong and flowers, if Bill understood correctly.
Everyone praised him. Everyone, even Colonel Pierce and General O'Neill. The girl had finally turned off her pod's defenses entirely (in the pursuit of chocolate). That in itself was interesting; the whole scientific complement of the Alpha Site couldn't shut it down, though the pod could get into their systems. Unfortunately, Thor had said something about the Fifth Race not being ready and claimed the pod himself, so they wouldn't be reverse-engineering it any time soon.
"Two questions," General O'Neill asked him in the briefing room back on Earth, just before Bill left for a richly deserved two-week leave. SG-1 stood around to hear the answer, so Bill suspected they weren't just the General's questions.
"How did you know she was a girl?"
"She reminded me of my daughter," Bill admitted. "You know how kids look when they know they've done something wrong, and they're afraid you're mad at them?"
"Wow," the General replied. "Your kid need a lot of orthodontia?"
Bill had no idea how to answer that. He ought to know the General well enough now, but the man still surprised him.
"Jack." Daniel was being nice to Bill now. He'd clearly been worried for him. Oddly enough, it felt good to know that, even though he already knew Daniel would risk his life for him.
"And the other question?" Bill expected it would be about chocolate.
Sam was the one who asked: "Why did you write, 'help, help' on a sheet of paper and leave it in front of your webcam?"
"Oh, um." Bill fumbled a bit. That moment seemed ridiculous now. He'd been the hero of the day; he didn't really need to admit how scared he'd been, did he? "I meant to say that I was helping with the situation, but I got a bit distracted while writing it."
In the perfect silence that followed, Bill knew that he hadn't fooled anyone.
Yet the General said, "okay," and then he was free to go. Well, free to go to finish his report on a laptop while he sat on the side of the mountain—enjoying the fresh air and the breeze and the sunlight.
Bill headed for the elevators. After he finished that report, he would pick up his kids and take them to the park. He'd bring chocolate.
FIN
Author's notes: Many thanks toredbyrd_sgfic for reading this story on short notice, making many helpful suggestions, and offering encouragement. Thanks to Brilliant Husband (who first told me it wasn't too silly and that I should keep it).
Thanks also to the writer who wrote a story in which SG-1 encounters some kind of primates, and the aliens mistake their smiles for threatening teeth-baring.—ETA: thanks tosg_fignewton for helping me here: the story is "Wavelength", by nandamai!
All remaining errors and infelicities are, of course, my own.
sg_fignewton's Alphabet Soup, which has once again caused me to write fic where I otherwise wouldn't have! See Fig's Gen Fic Day roundup here! Alphabet Soup is now complete, with the full anthology available on Dreamwidth here, complete with links back to the authors' original postings (on Dreamwidth or LJ) for feedback.
Set after "Avatar" (8.06); spoilers possible through "Avatar."
H is for Help
"Are you sure bringing it back here was such a good idea?" Bill asked nervously. The smooth black object had a surface that looked like polished wood, but it was heavy enough that SG-1 reported they'd had a lot of trouble getting it on the FRED. Considering what Teal'c alone could lift, that was saying something.
The shape made Bill nervous too. It resembled a coffin, complete with a lid. A coffin for the Hulk, perhaps. Well, maybe not the Hulk. That depended on which version; how big he got varied.
"We couldn't exactly study it on the planet," Daniel said, a little snidely, to Bill's ears. "Little things like the acid rain, generally corrosive atmosphere. . . ."
"Still safer than bringing it to Earth, Bill," Colonel Carter reminded him.
Bill couldn't disagree; the safety of Earth was paramount. He'd be happier, though, if he were still on Earth himself.
"Sam, I think Teal'c and I are going to get out of these suits and find some lunch," Daniel said.
Daniel's suit was looking a bit worse for wear, now that Bill looked closely at it. So were Teal'c's and Colonel Carter's.
"Did the acid eat into your suits?" Bill asked in horror.
The colonel regarded the now-pitted helmet she held in her gloved hand. "You see why we didn't want to stay."
Teal'c nodded to Bill, and he and Daniel turned and left the gate room.
"Oh, oh, right!" Bill felt silly now for complaining that they'd brought the artifact back "Of course. I'll have some Marines get it to the lab, and I'll secure it. We won't try to open it until you're there and we have the thing safely in quarantine. Why don't you change and come after you've had some lunch?"
The Colonel smiled at him. "I'll grab a sandwich and join you in the lab. I can't wait to see what we've got! I want to know how this thing survived the acid rain without a scratch, and what these energy readings mean."
She followed her teammates while Bill got men to help him transfer the object onto a cart to bring into his lab. In the end, it took four heaving Marines using a block and tackle to get it onto the cart. They could barely fit the thing through the lab doors. Maybe they should have bigger doors. If the object were any larger, they'd have to move it to the hangar instead, and that would make the pilots really unhappy. Bill made a few notes for improvements, things he could work on in his downtime—if he ever got through his backlog of projects.
The shiny ovoid looked like it might be some kind of life pod. SG-1 had found it on an otherwise barren planet, sunk partway into the ground. Despite the atmosphere that Daniel had described, and the real possibility that it had fallen to the planet from space, the pod had no scratches or dings that Bill could see. They'd washed it, the FRED they'd used, and the three members of SG-1 still in their suits the moment they all came through the Gate to contain any acid or other contaminants they might have brought through. Other scientists were now studying what had washed off.
Bill got his best magnifying glass and looked more closely at the surface under bright light. Nothing. He still couldn't see any imperfections. He couldn't identify the material just from looking. He shivered a little at the dark thing looming over him. He hoped Colonel Carter would bring her sandwich soon.
Bill put on a light pair of gloves, hoping he could get a better idea of the material through the thin layer of latex. One couldn't be too cautious with alien artifacts, even if the acid should have killed anything, and then the bath had removed the acid. He moved his fingers slowly towards the surface.
Bill snatched back his hand. The object looked as though it should be cool, but it was much warmer than the ambient temperature. He touched it again gingerly and took his hand back. It wasn't hot, but very warm. He pressed his palm gently to the surface—about body temperature, he guessed.
Of course, that was when all hell broke loose.
***
The mess hall here made Sam miss the SGC's, but Daniel and Teal'c were hungry enough to stay and have real meals to make up for their missed lunches. She was bringing the least objectionable sandwich back to Bill's lab when the klaxons sounded. She broke into a trot and was close enough to see the door to Bill's lab slide shut. Then the lights went out, and she was in the dark.
A moment later the emergency power came on, bringing up the lights. Should she get a weapon and a team here, or try the door first? Maybe she could get Bill out before things got worse. Decision made, she took the last few steps to the door and tried the panel. Nothing. Damn. It wasn't really a surprise; they'd designed the labs so that they could lock them down securely. Now Bill was locked securely in his lab with an alien artifact, and they had no idea what it did.
***
When the lights came back, Bill verified what he already knew: the door had shut. He never closed that door when he could avoid it. Ever since Honduras, he hated closed doors, especially in concrete bunkers built inside mountains. He couldn't breathe. That thing must have cut off the air somehow. He looked back at the casket; a hose snaked from the previously smooth surface to the power supply in the middle of the lab. It must be sucking all the air out of the room. Bill already felt warm and lightheaded. How could it take the air so fast? He sank to his knees, bent over the floor. No, wait—not good for breathing. He lay down on his back. That was it: don't compress the lungs. Keep them open. Breathe. He should breathe slower, use up the air slower.
A low hum filled the room. Bill decided he wouldn't even worry about what the pod was doing. He would run out of air first. He knew he should have resigned. He was never safe in the Stargate Program. He began running through every disastrous moment he'd had since he joined the program.
He'd made it past the time he thought General O'Neill, Colonel Carter, and Daniel were going to kill him for getting Teal'c trapped in that game chair when he realized that his breathing had actually eased. He opened his eyes. He wasn't dizzy any more. He wasn't excessively warm.
Bill sat up. Oh, God: he'd just hyperventilated and thought he was dying. He wondered if anyone was watching on the monitors; they had cameras in every lab. It wasn't like humiliation was anything new for him, though.
***
"Bill's claustrophobic now," Daniel said slowly, clearly unhappy. "He was fine before we went after the Telchak device, but. . . ."
"We noticed, Daniel," Sam told him, hoping to ease his guilt. "You're not actually betraying a secret here. We'll get him out as soon as we can."
Sam stared at the monitors before her. After her first attempts to open the door had failed, she'd come to the control room to see if she could get a better grasp on the situation. The others had joined her. Unfortunately, security monitors were down all over the base. They couldn't get video or audio feed from Bill's lab.
Another scientist called her over. "Main power is back on, but we're seeing a big drain; it looks as though it's coming from Dr. Lee's lab," Dr. Chankul indicated, pointing to a monitor. "Shall I shut off main power again?"
"Do it," Sam told her.
"I can't," the scientist responded a minute later. "I've tried everything, but I can't seem to shut down the power!"
"Has anyone called Bill?" Daniel asked abruptly. "I mean, on the phone?"
***
The hum from the pod seemed to be increasing. Bill looked around for a weapon. Nothing. He worked on weapons all the time; how could he have nothing in this lab? Oh, because they were all in his lab at the SGC.
Keeping his distance from the pod, Bill tried to get a better look at the hose. It was shiny and black like the pod, and about four inches in diameter. It ran to the power supply, where it suddenly became a much larger bulb and covered the whole set of outlets. It must be draining power from the base. Didn't they have a way to lock out that sort of drain? Maybe they didn't. He'd have to work on that.
The hum was now so loud that Bill covered his ears. Suddenly it changed pitch, and then it decreased. He could see a change in the pod. It looked as though the side away from him was sliding open. He screwed up his courage and began to tiptoe around the pod, on the side by the lab's door, so that he didn't have to step over the hose. The humming stopped so suddenly his ears rang.
Then the hum began, though more quietly and at a lower pitch. Something else rang, and Bill jumped. Wait—that was his phone. It was on the open side of the pod. He looked at the pod, just in time to see a bright light shoot out. The phone on the wall exploded.
A moment later, Bill thought: damn. They didn't have a working mobile phone network in this mountain.
***
"It stopped ringing," Sam had to tell them as she hung up. "We have to assume something is happening in there."
"It looked like a life pod," Daniel reminded them. "Maybe something came out?"
"Or perhaps an automated defense system activated," Teal'c suggested.
Sam nodded. "Could be either. That power drain may have been to revive a being in stasis, or it could have been powering weapons. Or both."
Daniel looked as grim as she felt. "There's no telling what Bill is facing."
No one said, "If he's still alive," but no one had to say it.
***
The monitors didn't have sound, did they? Bill was pretty sure they didn't, so they might have seen him jump, but no one heard him shriek at the blast. He'd never have heard the end of that, assuming he survived the whole thing anyway. The energy pulse had come from inside the pod, above the head of a groggy alien. A groggy, furry, bipedal alien that looked like a stuffed animal his daughter would have in her collection.
The alien was about two-thirds Bill's own size. He could see grey, black, and white fur on its face and forearms. It wore boots and gloves of a brown material that looked like leather and a silver coverall that covered its legs and upper arms. The suit had pockets everywhere and some emblems across the chest no doubt meant something wherever this creature came from. It blinked slowly at Bill. Most of its face was covered in a plastic breathing mask. Black straps across its torso held the creature in something like a seat.
"Hi!" Bill said, holding up his palms to show that he had nothing in his hands. The little mounted gun that had shot the phone wasn't moving any longer, but why take chances? "I come in peace!" No, that wasn't quite right. Boy, he wished Daniel were here.
The alien blinked more rapidly and turned its head from side to side. Then it looked to its left for a longer period of time. It appeared to be reading some panel inside the pod, but Bill didn't want to go close enough to be sure.
"Do you come in peace?" Bill shook his head. He wasn't supposed to be making first contact. He wasn't that kind of scientist at all. "What's your name? Oh, mine's Bill! William Lee, actually. But you can call me Bill."
The creature turned its head back to look at Bill again and pulled off the mask.
"You can breathe our air? Good!" Bill blathered nervously. "At least, I hope that's good," he added in an undertone. "I don't suppose you can understand me?"
The creature did something with the straps, and suddenly it was free—and it fell forwards onto the floor.
"Oh, no!" Bill exclaimed and stepped forward to help it.
The creature's head snapped up and it opened its mouth, displaying rows of fangs that would not have looked out of place on a shark.
"Okay!" said Bill said, backing away slowly. "You don't need my help! What was I thinking?" He realized that he had been looming over the alien. He had reached the wall already; he slid down it slowly and sat on the floor, trying to look as non-threatening as possible. That had never worked for him before, but there was always a first time.
***
"So here's what we know," Sam announced to the full complement of scientists, along with part of the Marine and Air Force complements. They were in the hangar, the only place they could all assemble. She recounted how the initial lockdown had been triggered by their own safety systems when the pod began drawing a large amount of power, but main power had been turned back on from inside Bill's lab. They couldn't open the door from the outside the room or from the command center. Monitors inside the lab were offline. She took a deep breath and told them about the phone that stopped working in the middle of ringing.
"We don't know whether we are dealing solely with alien technology, probably programmed to defend itself, or with an incursion," she concluded. "We may have an intruder now. We must assume at this time that it is hostile."
Sam could see Daniel's lips pressed together. He didn't like the assumption, but he made no attempt to argue. Or maybe it was the fact that he accepted the assumption that he didn't like.
Colonel Pierce took over from there. "Colonel Carter will work on that door, backed by Teal'c and the Marines. Chankul, you and your team will find some way to get us a view in there, whether it's through the air vents, or a hole in the wall, or sliding a mirror around! The rest of the scientists will work on maintaining security of base systems and then and only then will attempt to re-establish control over the door mechanism and the monitors in Dr. Lee's lab. Air Force personnel here will keep this hangar secure. Dismissed."
Daniel cleared his throat loudly enough to be heard over the sounds of people departing to their stations. "I'm not going to be much help with the base systems."
Pierce paused and looked at him. "So what do you propose?"
"As Sam said, we may have an incursion. If there's someone there, I can attempt to establish contact."
Sam nodded. "I'll be happy to have him, sir, if you allow."
"Of course."
As they geared up, Daniel said, "You know, we never trained Bill for combat situations, but he seems to keep finding himself in them. Maybe he'd be safer just at the SGC? I mean, I know it wouldn't keep him completely out of harm's way, but it seems like every time he goes on a mission. . . ."
Sam thought ruefully of a Daniel who had once been untrained for combat situations too. He'd learned pretty quickly. Bill was . . . not quite the same. How could he be? No one would expect an archaeologist to do all that Daniel did; no one should expect more of an engineer and physicist than Bill already did.
"Dr. Lee has handled himself with courage and resourcefulness at times," Teal'c said.
Daniel nodded vigorously. "We never give Bill enough credit. He's still working with us despite the kidnapping and the torture. I mean, he's the one who developed these vests." He tapped his own.
Sam didn't mention that Bill had nearly let a plant take over the SGC (as General O'Neill reminded them every time Bill's name came up, even though that fiasco had nothing to do with SG-1). Worse, he had given up on General O'Neill when Maybourne had sent them to that moon. She didn't mention these things, but she couldn't help remembering them.
"He just has the worst luck!" Daniel said, mostly under his breath.
Sam snorted. "I thought that was you."
***
The furry alien was talking to him, Bill was sure of that. He just wish he had some idea what it was saying. The voice was a little too high-pitched to be pleasant, and it seemed to think that he should understand it. He was pretty sure it kept repeating the same words. It was sitting on the floor in front of its pod now and looked much less woozy, and more than a little scary.
"You know, it would help if you'd, say, point to something, so that I could learn your language," he said as inoffensively as possible.
It stopped short and bared its many, many teeth, but it didn't move towards him. It kept looking at him, apparently expecting him to talk more.
"Why don't we start with introductions?" Bill tried to think what Daniel would do. He'd seen him in action often enough. Of course, the actions he'd seen from Daniel usually involved artifacts, and not first-contact situations. Unless one counted human kidnappers as first contact, and Bill didn't think that he should.
He pushed the bad memories back and focused. He tapped his chest. "Bill." He repeated the gesture and the word twice more.
What came out of its mouth next sounded like "Byo."
"Right!" Bill couldn't keep the excitement from his voice, but that seemed to startle his new friend; it bared its teeth again.
"Bill," he said one more time, tapping his fingers on his chest. Then he held his hand so that his fingers pointed to it instead. "You?"
A long string of sounds came from its toothy mouth. How did Daniel do this? Where was Daniel?
***
"I'd feel better if we could see," Daniel told Teal'c yet again. Sam gritted her teeth. Did he think she couldn't hear? She had the door panel open and had tried everything. Nothing happened whatsoever. The panel had been completely locked out, or maybe even burned out. Maybe the whole mechanism was burned out. None of her overrides worked.
She had Teal'c try brute force; that got them nowhere, as she expected, but it was worth a try.
Daniel suddenly touched her arm. "Command," he said grimly, handing her a radio.
It was Pierce. "We've lost our other monitors," he told her. "Something in there is still accessing our system, and we need you here to help us shut it out."
Sam gave herself a moment to imagine throwing up her hands and saying, "Fine! It's not like I'm doing anything here anyway!" Then she acknowledged the command properly.
"Keep an eye on things," she told Daniel and Teal'c. "I'll be back when I can."
***
Bill was pretty sure the alien was telling him its name. But was it that whole long string of sounds, or just part? He couldn't make most of those noises if he tried, and he couldn't remember them long enough to try.
Daniel would probably be having a field day here. He wouldn't be claustrophobic, and he wouldn't wonder if the alien ate other intelligent species, and he would actually be able to communicate, damn it! But it was no good thinking like that. Daniel was on the other side of that door.
That was the key. If Bill could get that door open, he could introduce the alien to Daniel, and Daniel and it could have a good time, and Bill could run out of the base and look at the sky and hyperventilate as long as he wanted.
He stood up slowly. He meant to look harmless, and his knees creaking and cracking probably helped. The alien looked curious rather than scared.
"I'm sorry, but I'm just not getting your name," Bill explained. "Maybe we can try some other words?"
He walked slowly to his desk. The alien tensed. He put his hand on a drawer handle.
"Closed," he said. He tapped the handle. He went down to the next one. "Closed," he repeated, and he tapped the handle. The third: "closed." He went to the other side and did the other two drawers.
"Open," he said, pulling a drawer open.
The desk above his hand exploded, and he dove for the floor.
***
"Energy burst in Dr. Lee's office!" exclaimed Dr. Prentice. "It's over already."
"Do we know what it was?" she said, leaving the monitor she had just begun using and going to his.
He pulled up a graph of the energy spike.
"That looks like a weapons burst," she had to say.
Her radio crackled, and Daniel's voice came through. "Sam, we heard what sounded like an explosion from inside Bill's office! It was muffled, but it didn't sound good."
"Bill's still alive," she said, trying to convince both Daniel and herself. "If Bill weren't still alive, whatever's in there wouldn't be. . . ." She just couldn't keep up the act.
"Shooting him?" Daniel asked pointedly.
***
The shooting had stopped, Bill told himself. The shooting had stopped. Just one shot, and it wasn't near him. He tried to uncurl from the little ball he'd rolled into. He gradually determined that nothing hurt, except his heart pounding in his chest. He thought he heard faint voices calling his name, but that might be in his head.
Bill looked at the wall. They'd need a new phone there, that was for sure. The wall behind seemed undamaged, though. Precision shooting? The pod wanted to stop the noise, and it stopped the noise.
Bill turned slowly towards the alien. It was partly back in the pod now. Could that be an apologetic look on the furry face? It looked kind of like a dog that had been yelled at, but—no. It looked like his daughter used to look when she'd done something wrong, before she started thinking she was all grown up. Now got defensive instead of being sorry when she misbehaved. The alien looked at him a little sideways, not directly, as if she was embarrassed. Her head was down, just like Katie used to do. And then Katie would whisper an apology, and he'd forgive her.
"Apology accepted," he said shakily. "But how am I going to teach you 'open'?"
***
Sam cursed under her breath. Whatever had happened in that lab, it had made things worse; the alien artifact had tapped into their systems and kept shutting things down. Now lights were going on and off. It shouldn't be that easy! What would they do if it got into life support?
"Colonel Pierce? We've got a problem. I think we need to keep some doors locked open, with heavy objects wedged in them." She began to explain.
Daniel had drifted back to the control room, obviously frustrated with his inability to do anything for his friend from the corridor outside the lab. He was now having Chankul talk him through her attempts to get visuals on Bill. Sam hoped it wouldn't slow her team's work.
"Webcam!" the young woman exclaimed suddenly. "If I can get control of Bill's webcam, the way he has his desk positioned, it should show us most of his lab!"
***
The alien was not speaking to him, Bill finally realized; she was talking to her pod. She'd turn to look at him often, but her rapid sounds were aimed inside the thing. The conversation seemed awfully one-sided, though. He hoped she was telling the pod to stand down, or that he was a friend, or whatever she needed to convey to get it to stop firing at him.
On the other hand, the thing couldn't have missed at this distance. Even while his pulse still raced, Bill knew that must have been a warning shot. The pod's defense system could have killed him twice. It shot the desk above where he reached. It had shot the phone to pieces, so he knew it didn't miss by accident. It must be trying to defend the furry alien.
Now that Bill thought about it, the alien looked a hell of a lot smaller than the flight couch inside. That could hold something nearly twice her size. Perhaps she had an expression like his daughter used to get because the alien was herself very young. Perhaps the pod was set to defend her automatically because she couldn't defend herself. Even with all those pockets, the alien showed no signs of having a weapon. She had bared her teeth, but she hadn't really moved to bite him. Maybe baring her teeth was some kind of smile? Daniel had told him about a race SG-1 had encountered once where smiling looked like a threat, and they had to be careful not to show their teeth. Could he be the alien thinking that bared teeth were a threat when she'd been trying to look harmless? He remembered that he'd been trying to look harmless at the same time.
If she was not just an alien, but a child, what did she make of this place? Clearly, she had seen technology before. Yet had she ever seen a human being before? Bill had seen many aliens, but new ones still startled him. He could look pretty scary. When his kids were really small and he took them to play dates, babies and toddlers would cry if he got too close.
Daniel had won friends by sharing food, hadn't he? Bill had a supply of chocolate in his desk. He could use some right now himself. He hadn't had lunch, standing by the comms and discussing readings with Colonel Carter before SG-1 brought the pod to the Alpha Site.
"Excuse me?" he asked when the alien had been quiet for a while. "Could you tell me if you have in fact disabled your, um, rather overprotective defense system there? I don't suppose you even know what I mean."
The alien slid back onto the floor, gracefully this time. That pod definitely seemed built for something larger than she was. She let loose another string of sounds.
"And I have no idea what that means," Bill murmured to himself. If she was a child, continuing to talk might set her at ease. Either way, it made him feel a little better. Plus, somebody had to be the adult here, and he was starting to think it might be him.
***
Prentice cursed loudly. "It was much easier to get in here last time!"
"Well, if you hadn't posted a video of Bill singing and dancing in his lab to the entire base, maybe he wouldn't have secured his webcam so well!" Chankul said angrily.
Secure the base, Sam told herself. Pay no attention to the scientists having petty fights. Even if they're trying to save the life of a man you've worked with for years—and whom you'd miss if you lost him. God. Would they really lose Bill? Had they already?
After one last test, she announced, "I've isolated power and life support. I'm confident the alien system can't take control."
Pierce came over. "Have you cut off power to the thing?"
"Not yet," she conceded. "I'm—well, sir, I might be able to do it, but I'm not certain. If I try and fail, I may not get a second chance. I'm afraid of the reaction an attempt could provoke. If Bill is still alive in there, I want to save cutting off its power until last. I'd really like to get a look in there before I try it, sir."
Pierce took a long pause before responding. "I want you to work out how you'll cut power. If that thing gets any further into our systems, or poses any more of a threat than it does now, you need to cut power immediately. We don't even know if Dr. Lee is still alive."
***
"Pencil," said Bill. "Pencil." He twirled it a little in his fingers.
"Pezzz," the alien seemed to say.
"Good! Good. That's right. Pencil. Now let's see what we can do with it." Bill knew his hands were shaking. He didn't know if the alien knew what that meant. He carefully took a piece of paper off his desk and flipped it over.
"We can draw." He tried to draw the alien. His sketch was horrible. His kids would have laughed. The alien looked intrigued. That was probably because she was too far away to see how bad his drawing was. It wasn't the quality that counted, Bill told himself. Keeping the alien happy—that was what mattered.
"We can write." Help! Help! his hand wrote, before he really thought about it. No, he was going to stay calm. He could do this.
He put the pencil through the handle of the desk drawer that held his stash. Thank God he had left it unlocked, even if that jerk Prentice sometimes helped himself. He still suspected Prentice had used the spare key to get in at least once while it was locked, anyway.
"We can use it as a simple lever. Open," he said, slowly pulling the drawer open with the pencil.
The alien's eyes widened, but the pod didn't fire.
Bill put down the pencil.
"Closed," he said, gently pushing the drawer shut. He then showed "open" and "closed" several more times.
"Chocolate," he said, inching his hand into the drawer and slowly, ever so slowly, drawing out a bar of Special Dark. Prentice hadn't eaten it, because Bill had swapped the wrapper with a Mr. Goodbar. Prentice had eaten the Mr. Goodbar.
"Chocolate," he said again, revealing the bar to the alien. He slipped off the paper that said "Mr. Goodbar" and slowly peeled back a little foil.
"Chocolate," he said several more times, and then he finally took a bite and smiled. He held it out to her. She was moved from feet away to just inches from him so fast that Bill jerked back, afraid she was attacking him. Then he got a grip on himself and moved back towards her, slowly handing her the chocolate bar, trying to keep one eye on the pod while looking like he wasn't.
She grabbed the bar and sunk her teeth in as if she hadn't eaten in, well, who knew how long? She probably hadn't.
Wait. Dogs were allergic to chocolate—deathly allergic. What if he poisoned an alien? What if he poisoned an alien child?
***
"Got it!" Sam crowed as the image popped up on the screen.
"What is that?" Daniel asked, but Sam had no answer.
The screen showed mostly the profile of an overgrown Ewok with a frightening mouth dripping some substance that Sam couldn't immediately identify.
"What color is that?" demanded Chankul, who had joined them. "That's not blood, is it?"
"Sam, can you refocus?" Daniel asked, tapping the upper right-hand side of the screen. "There's a piece of paper on the floor."
The printing was too shaky to be sure it was Bill's hand, but as Sam coaxed more out of the camera, her stomach dropped. HELP HELP, it read. Clearly the creature didn't write that, but she couldn't see Bill at all.
***
No respiratory distress, no sign of hives—would he see them under that fur? Bill very much hoped the alien wasn't being harmed by the chocolate.
She sure seemed to be enjoying it. She was even chewing a little foil. No fillings, apparently; Bill didn't see any sparks. Then he wondered what was wrong with him, to think about aliens with fillings. The way her teeth looked, bad ones probably just fell out and were replaced.
The rest of the bar disappeared all too fast, and Bill was pretty sure it was the last he had.
Perhaps he could return to the language lesson? "You know, we have more food. We just have to get out of this room. See? Open?" he opened another drawer.
"Owa!" Chocolate and saliva dripped into the fur below the alien's mouth. She seemed much happier now.
"But the drawers won't get us anything else good. What if we go . . . over here?"
Bill walked the long way around the room, his skin prickling. He didn't want to go to close to the alien. At any moment, that pod could shoot. It could probably shoot him even though he was walking around the side of pod that remained closed.
The alien got to her feet and trotted after him.
"Right! Long way around, but we'll get there. Door."
Bill put a sweaty hand up to the door panel and tried to open it. He wasn't at all surprised that it didn't work.
"Owa!" said a little voice at his side. The alien was so close he could touch her. He wouldn't touch her. He didn't want to scare her—or her pod.
"Yes. Open. At least, I want it to open." He looked at the pod. "I think your craft broke it."
***
"There's Bill!" Daniel shouted, pointing at feet in the far part of the screen. "He's walking; he's alive!"
"Are you sure?" Prentice asked.
"Those are Dr. Lee's shoes," Teal'c said authoritatively.
Sam could not get sound from the webcam. It should work! Damn it! Bill's security was better than she thought; they were lucky they'd been able to get video. Did he disable the microphone separately? Who did that? Then she remembered the audio file that had made the rounds of the SGC emails a few weeks back. Bill had cause.
"Carter, is the whole base secure?" Pierce demanded.
"No, sir."
"Then get on it! We know Lee's alive, but we're not getting anything else out of that camera!"
Sam reluctantly moved back to another station. It was true: the creature had run across the screen and then disappeared. She couldn't tell if Chankul's interpretation of what had dripped from the creature's mouth was correct and the thing really did have blood on its teeth, or if Chankul had been watching too many horror movies on her laptop.
"Look, we've recalled the Daedalus to see if we can beam him out, but it's going to be another two days before it gets here," Pierce told her quietly. "I don't want to lose Dr. Lee any more than you do, but we need to make sure we've locked that alien system out of ours! Once you've done that, we can work on getting eyes on Lee again."
"He's still alive, Sam," Daniel reminded her.
***
Bill's hands had left sweat marks all over the door. Of course it wasn't moving. He couldn't open it by force! He doubted Teal'c could; it was built to stay locked once it was locked. A signal would be needed to allow it to open. The alien trying to help him push the door was really cute, though. He wondered how developed she was and how much bigger she'd get. And how much smarter. Whoever had designed that pod had a higher level of technology than they did; he could tell that just from the outside. The inside looked complex, as well, as far as he could tell from the looks he snuck. He didn't want to look directly at it for too long.
"Your pod won't let us out," he said, sinking tiredly down the wall. "Unless it's our security system, but then I think we'd at least get some blinking lights. I think your pod is trying to protect you, so it secured this room, and it isn't going to let us open it until it's confident that we're not going to hurt you."
The alien sat down next to him. "Owa?" she asked.
"Yes, I want it to open."
A set of sounds that meant nothing to Bill followed. She repeated them.
"Wait!" he said on the third repetition. "Did you say 'chocolate'?"
"Shach!" she said, with a guttural sound at the end of the syllable. She pointed to her mouth, still slightly smeared with chocolate.
"Chocolate! Yes, there's more! Out there! Open!" he said, tapping the door. "We have to get it open."
The alien jumped to her feet and went back into her pod.
Suddenly the door opened.
"Just like that?" Bill said, starting to stand. "Well, not just like that. I suppose I did—"
Everything seemed to happen at once: Teal'c appeared in Bill's field of view, dressed in a protective vest and holding his staff; the alien let out what could only be a scream; and an explosion hit the wall above Teal'c's head. Then everything froze. Bill didn't dare move a muscle, although he felt as though any moment all those muscles might just give out. Teal'c stood stock still too, clearly considering his options.
"Teal'c's a friend," Bill said cautiously. "Teal'c, put down your weapons, very slowly, and tell my friend here that you're a friend too."
Teal'c blinked and raised his eyebrows, but he did not object. Thank God for Teal'c's calm. Bill wished he had it. Teal'c slowly lowered his staff and then straightened.
"I am a friend to any friend of Dr. Lee," he said solemnly, and he added a nod at the end.
"Now tell her you have chocolate," Bill said with a forced smile.
"I have chocolate," Teal'c dutifully repeated.
A series of squeals erupted behind him. Bill continued to stand very still, and he closed his eyes for good measure. Then something brushed his side, and he looked to find the alien taking his hand.
"Shach!" she said, and the three of them started down the corridor together. The pod didn't shoot. Bill didn't faint, but it was a near thing.
***
Sam could hardly believe it when Bill introduced her to the toothy alien in the infirmary. The thing that had looked so big and bloodthirsty on the monitor seemed much smaller and less threatening in person. Still, its lifepod had shot up Bill's lab and the wall outside.
"I'm glad you're okay," she told Bill. "We were worried."
Bill smiled, taking his eyes off the alien for just a moment. "I'm fine now. I just want to make sure this little one is okay."
"You're sure she's a child?"
The alien began speaking her musical language again, and Bill didn't answer.
"Pretty sure," Daniel chimed in. "As Bill said, the pod can handle much larger lifeforms, and her coordination . . . could be better." He gestured at a stain on the front of the clothing the alien wore.
Dr. Chen tapped his foot impatiently. "I really think it does not take four of you to keep her calm so that I can finish her exam."
Bill volunteered to stay; Sam realized she should have expected that after what she'd heard about him bonding with their visitor. She got to her feet. "I've got work to do. Pierce is really unhappy about base security."
Daniel and Teal'c didn't move. Sam sighed.
"Good job, Bill," she told him.
That got his attention. "Thanks!" he said, sounding surprised. Did she compliment him so little? Maybe she should pay more attention to him in the future. He deserved better.
Bill resumed discussing the alien with Daniel as she left.
EPILOGUE
Bill was sorry to see his little friend go, but Thor had come to collect her before the Alpha Site's doctor even finished examining her. It turned out that General O'Neill had contacted him as soon as he'd heard from the Alpha Site that they had an unknown alien. The Asgard insisted that he could not take Bill to her planet, and the alien (whose name was apparently a series of whistles that didn't translate into English) had to be returned to her home immediately. Thor did tell them that he'd learned from the pod that she had been stranded on that planet for nearly a decade. Her parents must have given her up for dead; Bill's heart went out to them. Thor also acted as translator for one short conversation, allowing thanks to be exchanged on either side. Even with Thor interpreting, however, the words didn't make a lot of sense to Bill; the language was filled with metaphors. Apparently Bill was now somehow equated with chocolate in the girl's mind, and also with birdsong and flowers, if Bill understood correctly.
Everyone praised him. Everyone, even Colonel Pierce and General O'Neill. The girl had finally turned off her pod's defenses entirely (in the pursuit of chocolate). That in itself was interesting; the whole scientific complement of the Alpha Site couldn't shut it down, though the pod could get into their systems. Unfortunately, Thor had said something about the Fifth Race not being ready and claimed the pod himself, so they wouldn't be reverse-engineering it any time soon.
"Two questions," General O'Neill asked him in the briefing room back on Earth, just before Bill left for a richly deserved two-week leave. SG-1 stood around to hear the answer, so Bill suspected they weren't just the General's questions.
"How did you know she was a girl?"
"She reminded me of my daughter," Bill admitted. "You know how kids look when they know they've done something wrong, and they're afraid you're mad at them?"
"Wow," the General replied. "Your kid need a lot of orthodontia?"
Bill had no idea how to answer that. He ought to know the General well enough now, but the man still surprised him.
"Jack." Daniel was being nice to Bill now. He'd clearly been worried for him. Oddly enough, it felt good to know that, even though he already knew Daniel would risk his life for him.
"And the other question?" Bill expected it would be about chocolate.
Sam was the one who asked: "Why did you write, 'help, help' on a sheet of paper and leave it in front of your webcam?"
"Oh, um." Bill fumbled a bit. That moment seemed ridiculous now. He'd been the hero of the day; he didn't really need to admit how scared he'd been, did he? "I meant to say that I was helping with the situation, but I got a bit distracted while writing it."
In the perfect silence that followed, Bill knew that he hadn't fooled anyone.
Yet the General said, "okay," and then he was free to go. Well, free to go to finish his report on a laptop while he sat on the side of the mountain—enjoying the fresh air and the breeze and the sunlight.
Bill headed for the elevators. After he finished that report, he would pick up his kids and take them to the park. He'd bring chocolate.
FIN
Author's notes: Many thanks to
redbyrd_sgfic for reading this story on short notice, making many helpful suggestions, and offering encouragement. Thanks to Brilliant Husband (who first told me it wasn't too silly and that I should keep it).Thanks also to the writer who wrote a story in which SG-1 encounters some kind of primates, and the aliens mistake their smiles for threatening teeth-baring.—ETA: thanks to
sg_fignewton for helping me here: the story is "Wavelength", by nandamai!All remaining errors and infelicities are, of course, my own.
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*Happy!Hugs!*
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And I wanted Bill to get credit for something, because he does so much, but he seems usually to end up as the butt of jokes.
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Of course chocolate makes anything better :)
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Chocolate--the universal language!
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Aliens are fun to write :)
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This was wonderful! Intelligent diversion to Alpha Site, Bill doing his best under the circumstances, the little girl and chocolate, Teal'c at his deadpan best and Sam and Daniel worrying and... ::happy sigh::
And that last line! Just perfect. :)
The fic you're thinking of, BTW, is Nanda's Wavelength. A wonderful fic to be inspired by!
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I'm glad you enjoyed it. As you know, it was supposed to be just a short little thing, but then it grew like Topsy.
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Chocolate is good for practically all sentient living creatures, Bill, I'm sure of it! Don't panic!
Orthodontia. *snickers* Oh, Jack. Never change.
Wonderful!
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Bill's lucky he had any chocolate left at all. I think Prentice will be replacing any chocolate he took now, however. . . .