4 Who Got The Job, 1 Who Didn't [5 Things Challenge]

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Title: Four People Who Got the Job (and One Who Didn’t) OR  Below the Stairs, Before the Mast
Author: 2ndary_author
Fandom: Stargate: Atlantis
Characters: Sheppard, McKay, Jack O’Neill, OC, references to Elizabeth Weir, Ronon
Rating: PG-15
Words: Too Many

Notes: set after Sunday with a slight, barely-there spoiler for that episode. I made up a lot of the military stuff, but not the epigraph: that's by WH Auden, because even intergalactic space-age colonies need worker ants. Can be read whole or in sections.

Summary: further SGC/SGA new-hire interviews, in the vein of Sixty-Eight Whiskey;
  

 

Thousands have lived without love, not one without water.

Comments

[kiffle.livejournal.com]

These were really interesting! What interviews for Atlantis must be like!

One question re: the fourth one: there are several references to "the captain". Not sure if I missed another person being involved, or if that should be "colonel"?

Thanks for sharing!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

no, you're right--fixed! I couldn't figure out exactly what rank certain people would have, so I made them up, and then went through and changed some (but clearly not all) of them. Good catch!

[jennytork.livejournal.com]

Okay, I adored this!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I had so much fun writing it:)

[sef1029.livejournal.com]

Oh, those were lovely and fun. Great stuff!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Fun to write, too.

[naye]

Oh, I love this! I'm always fond of outsider POV's, and these were all fun! Fun to keep guessing what they were doing, and if they would get the position, and it's fun to imagine them all on Atlantis, keeping the place going. The last one was particularly sweet, and I cracked up at the "how do you feel about whales"? You did a wonderful job giving us a sense of who these people interviewing are, and how they would fit in (or not, in the case the Judge Advocate) on Atlantis.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Well, the whale question was a dealbreaker: Rodney needs to have an ally on this. And I, too, love outsider POVs--one of the reasons I like this fandom is it that all the characters get to be outsiders occasionally. I did try to make each of them be a little more than just a job applicant, although it was hard b/c I was also trying to make this story a reasonable length. Thanks for commenting!

[rhianona]

Oh this was a fascinating read. I enjoyed the interview process. The last one was terrific.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

The last one is actually the one I wrote first, and then I had to come up with 4 others or wait until the appropriate prompt came along. Bah, I laugh in the face of continuity! Anyway, I'm glad you liked it.

[eliyes.livejournal.com]

You've got a bit of a repeat going here:

The general’s undone his stiff collar buttons and located a gallon of milk in the walk-in refrigerator. (The cooking wine’s not fit to drink and, besides, he’s still technically in uniform and on duty).

“You like working here in Yorktown, then?” The general unearths a stack of measuring cups and selects the two largest—the actual glassware is in the plating station beyond the dining room and neither of them can be bothered.

Harris shrugs. “Sure. A little fancier than what I was trained on, but that keeps things interesting. And it’s a nice area, good if you have a family. Nice schools. There’s milk in the fridge, near the cream sauce. It’s that or water; the cooking wine’s basically vinegar.” She sticks a few pieces of dampened ciabatta into the microwave, hoping to approximate the ordinary white bread, which her CO flatout refuses to keep in the kitchen.

“Milk’s fine for me. Technically still on duty, I guess, depending on what time zone we’re in.” The general finds a gallon in the walk-in. “Do you?” he asks.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

haha, yes I do. Or I did. It's fixed now. Thanks:)

[tzzzz.livejournal.com]

I really liked all of these. You really captured everyone from an outsider POV and each interview was very clever and fitting. Thanks for writing.

[danian.livejournal.com]

That was fascinating! All five of them were great, but I liked the last one and the errant Ancient LED the best - the weird solutions were most interesting :)

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I was tempted to make all the interviews kind of MacGyver-ish, but that gets old after awhile, and it makes each section really, really long. But (don't tell), those two sections were my favorite, too.

[mirabile-dictu.livejournal.com]

Really enjoyed this -- and I love watching McKay and Sheppard working together. Thank you!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

McKay & Sheppard tag-team the new recruits: a deathmatch in 5 rounds!

[wordwitch.livejournal.com]

I really, really like all these people. Especially Linc and Charlene, who have a real "figure out how to do the job as outlined" attitude.

Well done.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Haha, I've just spend three minutes watching your icon--I love it! Anyway, I tried to make each of the OCs the kind of folks I'd like to see on Atlantis, so I'm glad they came across as likable. (Though I do have a special liking for Lincoln & Harris). Glad you liked it:)

[incidental-fire.livejournal.com]

This was brilliant! I often enjoy non-cast POVs, and this was a marvelous example of one. All of the OCs were interesting, and I could definitely see all 4 fitting in very nicely on Atlantis. Well done!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

I *love* outsider POVs! And at the risk of making these characters too good (or 2-D), I didn't want to be responsible for sending jerks through the stargate. Thanks for commenting.

[muscatlove.livejournal.com]

Oh man, this fic caught my attention with the title, since I love to read stories about the rank-and-file characters you never pay much attention to otherwise, and by the second interview I was completely hooked. You made me feel like I was the interviewee as I read each one, and I loved watching the main characters through fresh eyes.

<3 Thanks for posting a great fic!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

It is great seeing this show from an outsider POV, and there are so many outsiders to choose from! I'm glad reading one made you want to read more: those are the best kind of 5 things, and I worried that my sections were too long to make that easy. Thanks for the lovely comment:)

[lillian13.livejournal.com]

I liked all of these immensely, but especially the last one. (Ronon's going to love her!)

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Ronon is going to *propose marriage*--and then John is going to explain that, no, seriously, she cooks that way for everyone. After that, Ronon will simply content himself with hijacking Rodney's computer to map out a spreadsheet of Harris's shifts, so that he can be first in the chow line for each and every one of them.

[siegeofangels.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love these! The first one is heartbreaking.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

The first one was really hard to write--it revolves around a particular event that happens offstage, and that the main character doesn't know about, plus it sets up the background necessary for reading the story as a whole and not 5 parts. I'm so glad it's still a meaningful read!

[winetraveldance.livejournal.com]

Fun stories! I'd like to see an episode focused on all of the support personnel they must have on Atlantis now. And (personal bias) love, love, love the mention of the Coast Guard!

For future reference: Coast Guard cutters are not single sexed and haven't been since 1977. My dad was a captain of a few different cutters and had women officers and crew (definitely in the minority, but still there). Women even captain their own ships these days. :)

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

My brother is in the Coast Guard, so that was kind of a shout-out to all the folks who keep him fed (which is, as my mother could tell you, basically a fulltime job). All his cutters have been single-sex...but then, they were also pretty small and more than a few were in the Middle East (which wouldn't work for my purposes), so that may have had something to do with it. Call it artistic reordering of the facts!

Glad you liked it:)

[wpadmirer.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed this very much. Thanks!

WP

[linziday.livejournal.com]

OMG!! I *love* this. So completely filled with goodness. I thought Lincoln was my favorite until I got to the vet. I thought the vet was my favorite until I got to the cook... and I really can't decide between the lawyer and the ordnance guy. . . so I have to love them all. Excellent job. :)

[rinsbane.livejournal.com]

This is great! It's such a fascinating idea and I love the way you pulled it off. Great fic.

[littlebuttercup.livejournal.com]

This was wonderful!

“They’re all damaged, soldier,” explains the lieutenant colonel calmly, not even turning around. “I shot them.”

Oh, John. John, John, John. Always with the shooting things. Made me smile though, so thank you :)

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Haha, it's true though!
Rodney: hmm, we're need to interview for a communications repairer--how can we make fixing these radios devilishly complicated, so as to sort wheat from chaff?
John: uh, I could shoot them?
Rodney: I'm pretty sure that wouldn't get people to volunteer for our mission.
John: I meant shoot the radios, McKay.
Rodney: oh. Right. I was about to suggest that myself.

[dragonladyk.livejournal.com]

That was awesome. My favorite is the last.

DragonLady

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Mine, too! I basically wrote the rest of the story just so I could keep that section.

[scifinut.livejournal.com]

Wonderfully written! I love the research, the fact that you happen to KNOW what an Electric Bass player is.

By the way, curiosity, where did you find it all?

In any case, the last one was perfect, it's SO Jack that it's not funny.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Wikipedia supplied the Electric Bass Player...and actually, once I learned that, I had to write it into the fic b/c, seriously, when else am I going to use that information? (I stored it away for my next cocktail party, but somehow I don't see the topic arising). Wikipedia is now telling me it has separate entries on MOS for each of the services, bit I used mostly the governemtn recruiting webpages that list basic job descriptions.
I'm really delighted about the Jack characterization, though; I was basically working off what I know about him from fic, since I've seen very few SG-1 episodes (will fix this as soon as I find a good online source, b/c SciFi doesn't rerun things in order). So glad you enjoyed it!

[wellifnotwisely.livejournal.com]

A clever and entertaining concept, very well executed. One of those rare little gems of a story that makes me want to sit down and write hundreds of words explaining why I love it so much:

how effective all the OCs' POVs are; how your characterisation of Rodney is both vivid and nuanced; how you've made John Sheppard collapse into hysterical laughter and it's completely in character; how Atlantis' bells and whistles and the expedition's history are part of the stories fabric; how deftly you've woven in all the military matters, especially

most servicewomen end up on land since Coast Guard cutters are single-sex, and that sex is invariably male. Heaven forbid she jump the bones of one of those impressionable young guardsmen. It’s not like they’re trained military professionals or anything.

How I would love to see Linc and Charlene as canon characters!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

What a lovely comment (and the section after the colon is actually almost 100 words)! If you read up in the comments, you will see that I may have been wrong about some classes of CG cutters...am still researching that point (internet, don't fail me now!) In the meantime, I think there's far too little John-laughing-hysterically in fic, a situation that should be rectified promptly. And I'm happy to loan Lincoln or Harris out to anyone who needs background characters, though I think canon is too much to hope for;)

[water-soter.livejournal.com]

This is totally cool! One of my favs by miles. Great idea, great execution and great story!!!!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Thank you:) Making up the OCs and trying to figure out how they might see the real characters was a weird experience...but fun!

[seekergeek.livejournal.com]

I loved all of these, but I think my favorite was the 'interview' where Sheppard and McKay tossed bits and pieces at the candidates and had them McGyver the bits into working items. That was priceless!

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

I would probably start crying if I ever had an interview like that--or rather, the equivalent of that interview, but in my professional field. Still, for a place like Atlantis, that really would be the most effective way to find the right person for the job: can you fix stuff that's broken? can you do it fast? can you build stuff out of the wrong pieces? can you work with other people, on other projects, using whatever stuff is lying around? oh, and when you touch Ancient stuff, what happens?

[slybrarian.livejournal.com]

Very cool. I love seeing how outsiders think about the team, especially the John and Rodney Comedy Hour. The bit with O'Neill was funny, too.

[2ndary-author.livejournal.com]

Thanks you! My SGA fic is *never* funny, but I really tried this time;)