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| SG-13 by General Debbie/Amidala |
| Chapter One: Introductions |
| Isis glanced down at her watch for the fifth time in fifteen minutes. "Damn traffic," she said to herself. Her rental car sat in the middle of the expressway in bumper-to-bumper traffic that had stopped suddenly about two hours ago. Thanks to tow-trucks taking their sweet time to remove the wrecked cars off of the roadway, she was effectively trapped in the middle lane on a beautiful summer day, a day that would have been better spent at the beach. She was sure that at any minute, they would finally clear the expressway of the debris and she would be on her way again. |
| She glanced at the passenger seat. The tan leather seat held one single item, an envelope. The envelope held a folder. And the folder held a few sheets of paper. She carefully slid the folder out of the envelope and opened it. Reading the first page brought a small smile to Isis' lips. The military had decided to give her a field promotion. She was now an official Brigadier General. |
| There hadn't been a promotion ceremony and there wouldn't be one when she arrived at her destination. She had received the promotion because of the last mission her team had completed. That mission had very nearly ended all of their lives. Four of her crew were dead and twenty-seven others were injured, five critically. The only reason why everyone else hadn't been killed was because of her quick thinking. She didn't think that she had done anything heroic. In fact, she felt like she had failed her team. She didn't feel like she had reacted quick enough and four members were dead. But her commanders knew that it was her actions that had saved the rest of her team and there was nothing that she could have done to save those who had died. They had tried to make her understand this, but she didn't fully believe it herself. The critically injured would be medically discharged in the coming months. |
| The others would continue on, now reassigned to a new base, a new part of the world for them to be stationed in, a new place that didn't have the nightmare waiting for them each time they turned a corner or glanced over their shoulders. A fresh start was what they were given. It was what they needed if they were going to emotionally survive the disaster. |
| Her team didn't know about her promotion yet. 'Well, that will change in about forty-eight hours' she thought. Glancing at the second page in the folder, she found the name of the commanding officer of the base. "Major General George Hammond" she said quietly. "Now where have I heard that name before and what the hell does 'SGC' stand for?" she questioned. Looking up, she noticed that traffic was starting to move again. "Yes!" she exclaimed, "I may not be late after all." |
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| Colonel Irish had just finished up her last physical therapy session when the courier came by with her new orders. "Well, they don't waste any time do they." she joked. |
| "No ma'am they don't." he replied and went back out the door. |
| As she stood up, she winced slightly as her leg muscle went into another spasm. "Stop that. You are not allowed to hurt anymore" she told her leg. "Uncle Sam has come calling for us so it's back to business. No more complaining." |
| Glancing up at the door, she saw Dr. Fatguts come in. "Well, Doc, it looks like we're outta here" she said. |
| "Yes, finally! These hospital environments give me the creeps." Dr. Fatguts smiled as he finished the sentence. |
| Irish raised her eyebrows at him, "They give you the creeps?" she asked disbelievingly. |
| "I can't stand being around sick people and not want to help them. The best help I could give them would be by telling them that their doctor is an arrogant prick who's just in this business for the money, and oh, by the way, he's a lousy doctor and the laughing stock of the entire medical community." he yelled. |
| "Okay, calm down! Sorry I asked." she said as she threw him the envelope. "Our orders came through." |
| "Where are we off to this time?" he asked. |
| "Look for yourself. Back in the States this time." she answered. |
| Walking through the doors and not glancing behind them as they left the physical therapy room, Doc cast a quizzical look at Irish, "SGC?" |
| "I was hoping you would know," she answered with a quizzical look of her own. |
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| Colonel Wulfbane walked into his apartment and bent down to pick up the envelope that had been slipped under his door. Shutting the door, he walked over to the kitchen to get a glass of water. He was pulling the folder out of the envelope when someone knocked on the door. Opening the door, he motioned for the man to come inside. |
| "Have you seen our new orders yet?" Major Stealth asked as he walked into the kitchen to get a beer out of Wulfbane's refrigerator. |
| "Help yourself to a beer Stealth" he said sarcastically. |
| "Why, thank you" Stealth smirked while he sat down on the sofa in the living room. "How's your shoulder?" he politely inquired of his friend. |
| "Oh, about the same as your knee Stealth." |
| "So, have you seen our new orders yet?" he asked again. |
| "I was just getting ready to read them when you knocked on the door." |
| Wulfbane read the contents of the envelope. Looking up at his friend, he asked, "What's 'SGC' stand for?" |
| "I was kind of hoping you would know." |
| Shrugging their shoulders, they turned on the television and watched the rest of the game before they started packing for their new home. |
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| Major Parker was growing impatient. "Damn it people! We were supposed to leave an hour ago!" he yelled out. Although he couldn't see anyone behind the stacked cardboard boxes, he could hear them. |
| "Relax Major, we'll make it on time. They gave us a ten hour window." Captain Vansen's voice was slightly muffled by the cardboard box she was leaned over and packing her lab equipment into. |
| "They gave us a ten hour window after you called up the head of the base and threatened to scramble the test results of his favorite officers if he didn't give you more time." He accusingly shot back at the area where it sounded like she had answered from. |
| "Yeah, well, they should know that you always pay off your bets when you lose the game to the person responsible for clearing you for duty." she mumbled. |
| Laughing was heard from across the room. "So that's what happened then," Lt. Chic's head came up from under the lab equipment she was taking apart. "I wondered about that. Remind me to stay on your good side Captain." |
| "All you need to do to stay on her good side is to make sure you pay up when you lose a bet." Lt. Justin said. |
| "That and to stay out of her way when she's mad." Lt. Varen volunteered. She looked over at Captain Vansen and smiled, "No offense ma'am, but you're scary when you get angry." |
| Vansen grinned "Good! You should be scared of me." |
| "PEOPLE! Please, can we get this done any faster?" Parker pleaded. |
| "Women are always slow sir. You know that." Justin joked. |
| "Yeah well, I know of a few things that men like us to be slow in." Varen teased him. Chic started laughing at the flushed look on Justin's face. |
| "Come on guys. Let's get this done. We have the next forty-eight hours to be creative with after all of this packing." Vansen said. |
| "And just what are you planning on doing during those hours ma'am?" Chic asked. |
| "Well, I think we're going to have the first trans-world two day poker match with Corry, Odis, and Franks." she grinned evilly. |
| �A collective gasp could be heard. Vansen turned around and stared at the shocked expressions of her teammates. |
| Leaping onto a chair so she could draw attention to herself, Vansen started talking in her best 'announcer' voice, "Yes, that's right folks. We're being whisked away on an exotic 'round the world trip thanks to the United States Military. First we pack our stuff into these cardboard boxes and supervise the Marines who will be loading our stuff onto the moving truck. Then we ride in the truck to the lovely airport complete with its own fleet of kick-ass jets and heavy bombers. Then we'll next play hopscotch as we go trekking across the globe picking up our scattered teammates. Then at the end of our forty-eight hour journey, we will land in exotic Colorado, providing we don't decide to jump out of the aircraft and parachute our way down to our new home away from home." |
| Taking a bow, she jumped down off of the chair and asked, "Has anyone figured out what the 'SGC' stands for yet?" Everyone shook their heads no. Shrugging her shoulders, she went back to packing her lab equipment. "Well, I guess we'll find out when we get there." she mumbled to herself. |
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