sga_flashfic | A Chance Encounter by Slybrarian

slybrarian.livejournal.com posting in

Title: A Chance Encounter (Not Dead Yet challenge)
Author:

slybrarian
Rating: PG
Characters: Gen; John and Adria
Words: 2,228
Summary: John's new team goes on a simple botanical mission, and they discover that even in the Milky Way John still attracts every female galactic overlord around. Set during "The Return, Part I" and features Team Bumbling Fools.
Author's notes: Beta by

archae_ology.

Adria stood before a table of galactic maps, intently studying the latest movements of her fleet and army. Her ship had landed on a deserted world for a brief pause in the campaign while she planned out the next wave of attacks, choosing targets and considering the necessary logistics involved. It was a vital task, but a tedious one that left her eager for a distraction. When one of her lieutenants entered the chamber she looked up with interest

"We have captured a Tau'ri soldier, Orici," he reported. "He calls himself Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard, and he claims to be alone."

"Alone?" Adria considered that and shook her head. "Lieutenant colonel is one of their high ranks. He will have others with him. Search the area, capture them in alive if possible. Bring the leader to me."

A few moments later two more soldiers arrived, pulling the captive along between them and then shoving him to his knees in the center of the room. He was an unusually scruffy specimen, with a stubbled jaw and hair that could only be described as unruly. For a moment she wondered if this was really someone pretending to be Taur'i, perhaps a conman like her mother, but she dismissed the idea after a moment. Few people would be foolish enough to continue the ruse in this situation, and his calm reaction to his plight was one she'd seen on other lieutenant colonels.

"Leave us, and bring the others when you find them," she ordered the soldiers. She noted the small tick in Sheppard's expression at the order, and knew she'd already found his weakness.

"Well, this is familiar," Sheppard said, flippant and casual as if her were speaking to a friend. "I have to say, you're a snappier dress than the women I usually end up kneeling around."

Adria smirked and continued to study her maps, not even bothering to look his way. The witty ones were always the most enjoyable to break. "Why are you here, Colonel Sheppard?"

"Would you believe that I'm on a diplomatic mission from Alderaan?" he asked.

She shook her head slightly. "This would be much more pleasant for everyone if you simply told the truth. Especially for your team."

John sighed. "I'm supposed to be collecting botanical samples. Between you and me, I don't think the general likes me much. Can I go now?"

"Do you really expect me to believe this it is a coincidence that two days after I arrive, an SG team headed by a lieutenant colonel shows up as well? I'm not stupid." Adria turned around and slowly walked over to the kneeling soldier. Looking down at him, she ran a finger down his jaw and touched his mind at the same time. She frowned as the probe seemed to slide off an icy wall. Few humans had the training and strength to block even a casual look inside their heads. Despite that she was glad to have not given him over to a prior - she so rarely got a challenge of this sort.

"It's not that onerous, Colonel," she started to say.

"Call me John," he interrupted. She nodded slightly.

"John. No one needs to be harmed here. All you need to do in order for you and your team to live is give me a little information and say four simple words."

"I've told you the truth about why we're here," he replied, "That's all you're getting. Sorry."

"It's your team that will be sorry." She focused and probed his mind again, feeling resistance once more. She pushed harder, until her entire body tensed up with the effort, and yet he didn't even seem to notice at all, just watched her with a slightly puzzled look. She gripped his chin and forced him to look up into her eyes, and threw all her might at him. There was a crack in his shield, and then the ice shattered into a million pieces. She smiled triumphantly and looked inside, expecting to bend him to her will. Instead she recoiled and stepped back as something terrible and wonderful unfolded from his mind, something that blazed like a star.

"You're not supposed to be here," she blurted out. At first his reaction was simply shocked confusion, but then there was a subtle change, and slowly a smirk spread across his face.

"Maybe you should post some sort of no-trespassing sign by the gate, then." Sheppard shrugged and spread his hands. "I'm just saying, it'd be polite."

She pointed an accusatory finger at him. "We had an agreement!"

"Pray that I don't alter it further." Sheppard shrugged and Adria looked at him like he was insane. He went on in an eager, helpful tone, "Okay, you need to get out more. Hey, Rodney's flying in this weekend - if you want, you could come over and we could watch The Empire Strikes Back."

"What?" Perhaps she was mistaken. Surely this couldn't really be the City-Builder, the Shepherd, the Wanderer, the Lightbringer.

The Starsnuffer.

"Seriously, you really do need to learn to relax and joke a little," he continued. "Skipping childhood was a mistake, even if you did bypass puberty. You've got no idea what it's like to really live. I've always found the long road, ah... enlightening. You could learn a lot by spending a little more time with your mother."

"That's none of your business," she snapped. "You're not allowed to interfere in our business. Return to Atlantis at once and leave the Tau'ri alone."

"Or what?" he drawled. "You'll make me?"

"You couldn't take us all on," Adria said, sounding less confident then she looked. "Especially in this limited form."

"That's what the Furlin-Kast said to me once." Sheppard looked around curiously. "I haven't seen any Furlings around lately, have you? Maybe they're hiding under a rock or something, they do that sometimes."

He looked back at her and she flinched at the coldness that lurked in his eyes. Images poured in from her ascended memory and threatened to overwhelm her. She remembered how the great alliance of the four races had been broken and betrayed by an attack on a shining city; remembered the terrible wrath that had crashed into the traitors like a tsunami and ground their entire civilization into nothing. She saw fleets of ships smashed like toys, planets shattered into dust, entire stars put out and their ashes scattered across the void. She saw billions of mortals perish, and worse yet saw countless ascended beings slaughtered. Not suppressed and bound, not even descended, but eradicated from the very fabric of existence. It was an impossible act, so far as anyone else had found over the eons, and yet it was reality.

For the first time in her life, Adria was afraid.

He must have seen something in her expression, because he sighed and ducked his head, and when he looked up the cold was gone and only a boyish charm remained. "Relax, Adria. Like I said, I'm here because the general dislikes me and because Helia's still a bitch after ten thousand years. Think of it as a vacation." He laughed again and shook his head, before adding thoughtfully, "I give her two or three more weeks, tops, before she screws up badly enough I have to go fix it. Don't worry, I'll be out of your hair soon enough."

Adria couldn't hide the relief she felt, and she cursed that inability when Sheppard's grin grew wider. He stood, brushing his pants off in the process, and she forced herself to say, "That's good. I take it you have no objections to my current plans?"

Sheppard shrugged casually and waved a hand. "What you do in this galaxy is your business. Leave me and mine alone, and I'll do the same for you. I'll give you a bit of friendly advice, though: Earth is going to be a tougher nut to crack than you think. You might destroy it, but I doubt you'll enslave the people anytime soon."

It was typical Tau'ri arrogance, Adria suspected, an assertion born of his human shell and not his true self. "We'll see."

His expression grew subtly harder, although that damnable smile was still on his face. "I should mention, though, that I've got some very close, very important friends on Earth at the moment, friends I hope will be the first generation of my new Lanteans. If they were harmed, I'm afraid I would have to object. The same goes for my team here. They're a bunch of clumsy kids, but they're my clumsy kids. I really hope they haven't been hurt."

"I'm sure they haven't been," she replied carefully, and praying that it was true.

"I'm sure," he repeated. "Also, even once I'm back home, there'll still be a few on Earth I've grown attached to. If you could give me a little warning before you do anything too drastic, I'd appreciate the favor. You know how to reach me."

"No trouble at all." A sudden thought struck Adria, and she stepped closer to Sheppard and smiled coyly at him. "We could do you other favors, you know. The Wraith are strong, and your resources few. We could help you, in exchange for a little help in seeing that Earth's liberation is as peaceful as possible. It'd be much easier to arrange safe passage for your servitors that way."

Sheppard raised an eyebrow. "And all my people in Pegasus would have to do in thanks would be to say four little words, no doubt. Thanks, but no thanks."

"Very well." Adria knew better than to press her luck with this one. She looked over at the door, and a moment later one of her soldiers entered. "Sergeant. The Colonel and his men will be leaving us now. They're to be allowed to go through the gate unhindered. See to it that nothing happens to them."

"Of course, Orici," he said. He looked curiously at Sheppard, perhaps wondering why he was being freed, but like a good soldier he did not question and simply gestured for Sheppard to follow him.

"See you around, Adria. Give me a call if you ever get tired to the galactic conqueror thing. You deserve better." Sheppard sauntered over to the door, but stopped at the threshold. Not looking back, he said in a level, civil tone, "And Adria. I meant what I said about my friends."

He left, and Adria stared at the door. After a minute, she let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding and slowly returned to her maps. Perhaps, she thought, it would be best for the next attack to advance in a direction away from Earth, at least for the time being.

-----

Frank was not going to freak out. He absolutely was not. He was a lieutenant in the United States Air Force, and lieutenants didn't freak out, especially not when they were in charge. They definitely didn't do it even when they'd come over a ridge on a perfectly safe planet on a perfectly safe mission, found themselves face-to-face with an Ori mothership and a dozen Ori troops, and then, in the ensuing scramble to run away, let their CO get captured.

He was so completely screwed.

"Okay, guys," he said, looking at the other two men huddled with him in a small cave. "Don't panic. Everything will be fine."

"Fine?" said Larry, his fellow lieutenant. "There's about five thousand Ori soldiers out there. And we lost the colonel!"

"I think he has a point," put in Erik, their Canadian botanist. "We're fucked."

"No, we're not. Here's the plan." Frank took a deep breath, came up with a plan, and said, "Larry, you take the doctor back to the gate. I'll try to locate the colonel so when reinforcements come they'll be able to rescue us. Him, I mean."

"What? We can't leave you here," Larry objected. "We have to stick together, that's what the colonel would say."

"Look, we have to get the civilian home and get the SGC to send help. And someone has to stay, because we don't leave anyone behind, and I'm in charge so that's my job."

"Uh, not that I wouldn't normally be in favor of fleeing," Erik said, "but I'd really rather face the Ori than tell Doctor McKay that we lost the colonel."

Frank thought about that and grudgingly said, "Okay, you may have a point."

At that moment the Colonel popped his head into the cave, said, "Hey, guys," and ducked when they all turned their weapons on him.

"Colonel!" Frank said. He rushed forward and, unable to control himself, hugged the older man. It was quite possibly the most awkward hug ever, and from the look on the Colonel's face he thought the same thing. Frank quickly stepped back and said, "We were just planning how to rescue you."

The Colonel blinked a few times, and said, "Really? Um. Good job, I'm sure it would have gone great." Everyone beamed at him, and uneasily he added, "Anyways, let's get out of here."

The followed him along through the woods, and as they neared the clearing with the gate, Larry eagerly asked, "Colonel, how'd you escape?"

The Colonel scratched his head, and after a minute replied, "You know, I'm really not sure."

Page 1 of 2 << [1] [2] >>

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

comanche-rider.livejournal.com

Oh, I loved this. Nice to see Adria brought down a little after being so annoyingly overconfident.

Plus you can never go wrong with Ancienty(Ori-y?)!John.

From:

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags