REBUTTAL of:
SGC ~ INTERNAL MEMORANDUM
To:
Colonel Hard-ass Soon To Wish He Was Never Born O'Neill ..............................................................................................................
USAF
They
say they own him, they're bloody well welcome to him. I just wish
they'd take responsibility for him and do a better job of keeping him
from ANNOYING me.
From:
Colonel Jack O’Neill, USAF
The
one and only. God help all of us.
Date:
His last day on Earth
................................................................................................
**TOP SECRET**
I have news for you Colonel, sir. Though I expect it's
hardly news by now. You've sprung a leak. You are nursing a
traitor to your bosom. One of your trusted associates sold you
down the river.
I know who it is but I'm not telling. Can't make me.
I'm on to all your methods. Including the infamous
tickle-torture. If a Goa'uld with a ribbon device can't break me what
makes you think you're going to have any more luck with your beer of
choice, ten fingers and a pair of roguish brown eyes? No - not
EVEN the eyes.
In
the sense he’ll make my life a living hell forever if he finds this.
I
can't for the life of me imagine why you would think this. Colonel
'If I don't get things my way I'll do everything in my power
to make sure you don't enjoy getting yours'. 'Petty is not my
middle name but it damned well should be'. 'It's easier to just
give in, trust me.' 'You haven't even BEGUN to suffer'
O'Neill.
Can't imagine why YOU would think this of me. At all.
Re:
Commanding Doctor Daniel Jackson in the field (or anywhere else for
that matter)
I
am breathless with anticipation...Not to mention a certain degree of
trepidation...
1.
I use the term ‘commanding’ in its loosest possible sense, since Daniel
has stated clearly for the record he’s never trusted my command. You're
never, EVER going to let this go, are you? No illicit
substance, no mind whammy, no alien virus, no amount of alcohol,
pleading, yelling or tactical tickling will induce him to explain that
remark to my satisfaction. Told you. I should know. You think
you're good. I know I'm better. I’ve tried a frenzied
interrogation every damn time.
And
you can just go right on guessing. If I was ever - I mean EVER
inclined to explain myself...well, it ain't gonna happen now...
2.
I have certain dark suspicions that I should have put my foot down hard
on day one and insisted he called me Colonel O’Neill. Instead he
disarmed me completely by calling me Jack, actually, you
misunderstood me. I was calling you JERK. I'm considering
reverting to the former appellation. Seriously...and now I
just have to put up with the fact he happily follows my orders just so
long as they are cunningly disguised as sensible suggestions Hah! (or
unhappily follows them if I tell him ‘that’s an order’, which is
me-speak for ‘sorry, Danny, I know I’m a prick but you HAVE to’)
Really? and I hustle him along before he can think of anything
even more sensible or ‘interesting’ to suggest to me that we should
do. Not that you ever LISTEN to me, or anything...Oddly
enough, if you don’t show enough hustle carrying out orders Daniel
happens to agree with wholeheartedly – such as ‘Save the Earth!’ – he
will badger you mercilessly until you perform to his satisfaction and
ruthlessly keep you on topic if you so much as wheeze a dissenting
opinion. You’re never gonna win this one. Suck it up.
I
am unclear as to the exact nature of your objection. You're not
complaining that I DON'T follow orders, but about the way that I DO?
May I suggest I'm not the one with the problem here? If it's simply a
question of 'style' - if it gets the job done, what's the
problem? We are on the same team here, right? Right?
3.
Daniel will automatically know and make you face the flaw in every
specious self-serving argument, the consequences of every bad decision,
the ethical responsibility of your command and the fly in every
ointment. It’s not enough he makes us think about all the things
we NEVER want to think about. He makes us fix them, too.
Are
we STILL complaining, Colonel? Just doing my job.
4.
Whilst he is CRYSTAL clear on knowing right from wrong, most days
Daniel doesn’t know north from south, and in the face of extreme
archaeological or linguistic excitement, can appear to the uninitiated
to be decidedly shaky on differentiating his ass from his elbow.
I
can't tell you how gratified I am to learn, after four years of putting
up with you, how much of an effort you've apparently expended into
putting up with me. I have been blissfully unaware I've been such
a constant source of amusement and concern for you, and my gratitude
for your continued understanding of and tolerance for my manifest and
encompassing ineptitude knows no bounds.
And if you bought one word of that last paragraph you
obviously are suffering from calum cubito confusion as well. Look
it up. That way we'll both learn something.
5.
Daniel’s patented trembling, pouting I DO NOT POUT! lips and
pleading, soulful eyes are LETHAL. Just say NO. Even if you
do come off as a heartless bastard for hurting his feelings and you
know the other two will pointedly give you attitude every step of the
way back to the gate for being mean to him.
I'm
vaguely troubled by the implications of this last paragraph.
Quick question, Colonel, do you know how old I am? Maybe that
should be how old do you THINK I am? I think I should state, for
the record, right here and now, anyone who attempts to burp me, chuck
me under the chin or WIPE it - WILL be shot. Dead.
Instantly. I have a gun, and I do know how to use it. Don't
make me show you. Patting on the head is allowed, under certain
circumstances. The ass is also negotiable. Hmm, upon
further reflection, maybe I should reserve judgement on that last
concession until I read a little farther, here.
6.
Daniel’s extraordinary beauty, charm, innocence, sweetness,
intelligence and empathy win for him many admirers. More
questions. What reality are you living in and WHERE do you get
this stuff? It is not Daniel’s fault that the above character
traits prevent him seeing it coming until AFTER they have expressed
their admiration for him firstly by forcibly separating him from his
teammates, and secondly, by forcibly separating him from his
clothes. All right, let's have a little time out, here.
This has happened exactly ONCE in four years. Okay, twice.
Ke'ra does NOT count - no clothes were removed, no mind altering
substances were involved, I knew what I was doing and there were SF's
on the other side of the damned door the whole time, not to mention a
pathologically HOVERING (no doubt put up to it by YOU) Jaffa. All
other incidents of supposed lusting over my supposedly irresistible
body have been entirely fabricated by your frustrated, twisted,
depraved, furiously sublimating and until very recently heavily in
denial, mind. Not to mention your insanely hyperactive and
overdeveloped imagination. And don't you DARE bring up P4B-911
again. You were NOT there, you didn't see what actually happened
and Major Coburn has learned his lesson. You have quite convinced
him you have no sense of humour WHATSOEVER when it comes to ANY
suggestion I may have been in a situation off-world you do not approve
of when in someone else's custody, and he will never, EVER try to wind
you up again by putting a deliberately salacious slant on a perfectly
innocent and above board first encounter situation. 'Cause if you don't
kill him, he knows I will. The shoot to kill policy instigated by
the team after the Destroyer of Worlds Is A Peach incident has nothing
to do with the seething hell-pit of caustic jealousy I unexpectedly
plummeted into and everything to do with Daniel’s health, safety and
welfare.
The
HELL it doesn't! And don't try and hide behind that threadbare 'I'm
just doing this for your own good' tattered fabric of pathetic
rationalisations and desperate lame excuses. The previous observation
about you no longer being in denial? I take it back.
7.
Flirting. Make him stop.
I
am getting tired of saying this. I do not flirt. As well as being
in denial, the Colonel is clearly delusional. Get him some
help. Quickly. PLEASE.
8.
The only language Daniel doesn’t speak, the only alien
protocol he doesn’t follow, the only culture he fails to comprehend
is…Military. I thought we had discussed this already.
Obviously not enough. This is inaccurate. I fully comprehend
Military. What I do NOT comprehend is the way it requires its
participants, in the spirit of becoming 'team players' and going 'by
the book' to check their brains, free will and judgement at the door
before entering. Moreover, you will pardon the presumption and
perspective of an outsider looking in - while I can understand the
theory behind needing to instil order and discipline in an effort to
enable a bunch of disparate individuals to respond as a seamless unit
under difficult and life threatening conditions - the entire concept of
'chain of command' has an inherent and tragically unavoidable
flaw. It presumes, sometimes incorrectly, the person giving the
orders is the right man for the job. And the order he is giving is the
correct one for the situation. Which may or may not always be the
case. The name Bauer springs to mind for some reason…As I am not
hampered by the requirement of having to forgo my independent thought
processes or my discernment in order to serve as a member of SG-1, I am
therefore able to exercise these faculties in the field. To your
benefit. If you would stop getting all pissy about my methods
you'd realise I'm only trying to help YOU do your job by providing you
with ALL the possible options. Whatever you may think of me I've
always been a team player, Jack. And I'd love to actually be allowed to
work with you, instead of in spite of you. Any time you're
ready...I’ve got a sneaking suspicion he’s kindly allowing me to
feel pleasantly superior about this even when I feel completely
bewildered by everything else, ‘cause he can sure as shit do all the
stuff we do. He just won’t admit it.
Thank
you. I think.
9.
Daniel NEVER complains. Ever. Seriously.
His invariable response to any mission disaster, moral minefield
unsuccessfully negotiated, personal tragedy or physical injury up to
and probably including decapitation, is a crisply enunciated,
emphatically prompt, ‘I’m fine’. Is this a complaint? You
would prefer I should scream for hours about a paper-cut, like other
people we both know? It's pointless for one, extremely
undignified for another. If we were talking decapitation, he
might, and I emphasise might, trouble someone for a band aid.
You are of course exaggerating. Not to mention using a patently absurd
example. I hardly think a band-aid would be efficacious in this
particular instance. This tends to contrast somewhat starkly with
his reaction to YOU if you happen to be whining at length, profusely,
loudly and annoyingly...about the aforementioned mission disaster,
moral minefield, broken nail, yadda yadda…in which case you’d better
brace yourself for TLC, Jackson style, the gift that keeps on giving
until General Hammond makes you give him back. A small price
to pay if it will get you to STOP whining. Don't read anything
more into it than ruthless self-interest. I have no desire to go
deaf from having to listen to you go on. I also have no desire to see
either Sam or Teal'c (or both of them) kill you to get you to shut
up. Don't ask me why. I'm at a loss to explain it myself.
(Killjoy. All that crap about exploitation…well, it was
unnecessarily harsh in my opinion.)
Why
does that not surprise me???
10.
Daniel is ALWAYS, I repeat, ALWAYS right. Excuse
me? What did you just say? Give me a moment to restart my heart
and pick myself up off the floor again. Each and every
time you forget this immutable truth and ignore his flaky, that's one
New Age, excuse me? touchy feely I beg your pardon? advice in favour of
some plausible sciencey thing from Carter, I am not even going to
dignify THIS with a response...it will snap you in the ass. It's
not gonna be the only thing next time you feel you’re in need a bit of
input from Doctor FLAKE. Daniel sounds flaky, that's TWO
in the same paragraph. Playing with fire, here, Colonel...in
fact he often sounds NUTS, I am about thirty seconds away from
requesting a transfer here, but he’s always right, nope,
sorry, too little far too late while Carter sounds emphatically
rational and she is in fact quite often wrong. Ditto for this
one. It’s…embarrassing, but fortunately he isn’t the type to
hold grudges. Unless you’re a System Lord.
I'm
rapidly becoming persuaded to start taking up the practice. At
least Apophis never called me odd. Or flaky. New Age Touchy
Feely? I'll give you 'New Age' - I'm going to make a prediction
for you, Colonel. I predict the next time you throw your back out
and want the services of the magic fingers they're not going to
be available.
11.
Speaking of System Lords, Daniel is prone to snake-baiting. Aw,
they had it coming. Leave me alone! He tends to indulge
in this exciting pastime at moments of extremis, such as being right in
front of the infuriated System Lord in question, surrounded by armed
guards with hair triggers. Um, so like when have we ever been
in the company of one when this HASN'T been the case? My
invitation to the System Lord 'Welcoming the Tau'ri to the Galactic
Community Die as you are Cotillion' must have gotten lost in the
wormhole. He is particularly fond of comments like
‘yep, killed her too’ after the by now apoplectic System Lord has
enquired after some absent loved one. Hey! He started
it! It’s only a matter of time before my greying follicles
give up the unequal struggle and just hit the road to Kojakville.
Why
wait? I have a razor you can use. Employ it where you think
it'll do you the most good.
12.
Daniel is a people-person. This can cause a little tension given
the rest of us are shooting-people persons. Daniel launches
hopefully into that peaceful explorer spiel every time he bounces
through the gate, even though he knows it lacks conviction when we’re
visibly armed to the teeth (literally in Carter’s case; she bites) you're
obviously never going to let THIS one go either. Were you
a terrier in a past life? A remora, possibly? Or just a
huge millstone around someone's neck. Oh wait, that's what you
are in THIS life…..which makes me wonder what I did wrong last time
around to deserve you now...which tends to make the locals think
they’ll be going home in pieces.
Go
on, admit it. You love scaring the crap out of people who've
never done you any harm. One of the perks of your job.
Along with getting to make my life a living hell.
13.
‘TMI aka too much information’. Daniel doesn’t actually ramble
endlessly on, this is just a vicious rumour circulated by me, for
reasons you don’t need to know. Maybe they don't, but
suddenly, I do. Daniel does however seem to know almost
everything, and he can do almost everything, come to think of it. You're
trying to lull me into a sense of false security by complimenting me
again. I am NOT falling for it. Next paragraph you'll be
sneering at me and calling me a FLAKE. The man who knows
everything is a frustrated teacher. He no sooner learns a thing
than he wants to SHARE. Well, d'uh - yeah! This can lead
to TMI, a frequently occurring scenario when Daniel innocently makes
the rest of us look like the intellectual mutts we are. Your
words, not mine. I have never thought this, said this or implied
this. (Carter is getting…better…at dealing with
this) Daniel is used to blank stares, glazed eyes and
careful explanations. We try to work around him being a highly
educated genius, and he tries to work around us being us.
Sigh.
I can see we're going to have to have another talk. I have no
idea where you get some of these notions from. You're slowly
driving me crazy, you know that. I can only say 'you are not
dumb' so many times before I start feeling I should be changing my name
to Polly. You try and give me a cracker I'm shooting you.
Oh what the hell, I just might shoot you anyway.
14.
Contrary to popular belief, Daniel doesn’t wander off. Well, THANK
YOU for that, anyway. He doesn’t have to. Two minutes of
concentrated nagging and/or pouting last time I am telling you this
I DO NOT POUT. Getting my gun. I'm not kidding here...gets
him - and us - wherever he wants to go. The pouting actually
works in a nanosecond, but there isn’t anyone on the team who won’t
milk that sulky little pout DNP!!!and the stormy eyes ???
for as long as they can get away with it, and for a variety of reasons
no one will share with anyone else. You know that vaguely
distressed feeling I had at the beginning of this appalling
dissertation? It's turning into a full-fledged red alert. A
whole, resounding chorus of alarm bells. There is a team consensus
that we’re not going ANYWHERE there’s even a whisper of a hint we’ll
find telepaths, no matter how fascinating Daniel finds the
concept. He has nothing to hide. The rest of us are
pleading the fifth and avoiding each other’s eyes.
So,
if I am understanding what I am reading here correctly, the three of
you have, on at least one occasion, gotten together and DISCUSSED
this? How much you enjoy annoying me and getting me to behave
like an alleged THREE YEAR OLD so you can watch me POUT - which I do
NOT do, in case I failed to make myself clear on this point
earlier. What's more, if you don't stop SAYING I do I just might
sit here and hold my breath 'til I turn blue, so there!
15.
We LOVE Daniel. If we don’t get him back in EXACTLY the
same condition in which you signed for him, you have a life expectancy
of maybe two minutes, which is how long it would take one of us to get
to the Armoury and back.
Okay,
Jack, up until you used the L word, you had me. I was buying this
latest sordid attempt to blatantly pull my chain but you've just tipped
your hand. Even you're not INSANE enough to use the L word in
conjunction with me in a memo you actually intend anyone but me to see.
I've been set up. This whole thing has been one sick joke.
If I was to walk to my door, right now and throw it open I'd find both
you AND the erstwhile traitor, not to mention the other one who HAS to
be in on it as well, all with your ears pressed up against my door,
listening to the sputtering symphony of outraged and indignant vocal
protests I've been making in the course of perusing this document,
trying your damnedest not to kill yourselves laughing. I hope
you've all enjoyed yourself and the amusement value of the exercise is
worth the amount of pain, suffering and cold disdain it is about to
earn you.
Don't the three of you have ANYTHING better to do? If
the answer is no, shouldn't that tell you something? Wait a
minute, not only am I sitting here reading this - I'm...
Oh lord, we're all totally pathetic. The next sounds
you hear will be the sounds of my forehead impacting with my
desk. Repeatedly. Don't be alarmed and just leave me
alone. I'll be fine. And you can keep your band-aids.
Declaration.
I
fully understand the confidential nature of the information contained
in this contract and hereby agree to forfeit the limb of my choice if I
reveal a word of it to Dr Daniel Jackson, including punctuation.
Jack,
you do NOT want to know what I'm thinking right now.
I
undertake to command Dr Jackson in the field (or anywhere else for that
matter) in accordance with the above guidelines and accept you will
kill me severely if he isn’t returned promptly and in mint condition.
This
of course, presupposes I WANT to be returned. I'll get back to
you about this. Or maybe I won't. Maybe I'll just POUT for
a bit to the considerable amusement of all and sundry.
And
may God have mercy on my soul if I fuck up in any conceivable way.
Too
late!
Signed
..............................................................................................................................................
USAF.
Dated
...................................................................................
Witnessed:
Master Teal’c of Chulak. Your God will not have mercy,
and nor will I.
All
three of you have yet to deal with ME.
Dated
.................................................................................
ADDENDUM
You
DON’T get to keep him!
Sigh,
but you do. I have no idea why, but for some strange reason I
have a very large soft spot in my heart for you. Not QUITE as
large as the one in my head, apparently, but sizeable all the
same. I am coming out there now to bust all three of you
miscreants (yes, you're going to have to look THAT one up too) and once
I have duly chastised and dismissed Heckle and Jeckle you and I are
going to go home and we are going to talk. Yes, Jack -
talk. You can't run, and you can't hide. Not only do I know
where you live, I have a key. Suck it up and take it like a man,
or trust me, you'll not be sucking anything else any time soon.
And by the way, I love you too. Where do you want me to sign?
Daniel
p.s. All right, I will admit it. This bizarre
exercise in whatever, even though it is sick, twisted and appalling, is
also rather sweet - in a completely offensive way. And of course, it's
all a joke. Right? The three of you came up with this
'contract' as a joke. It's all been in aid of trying to drive me
insane. No one else has seen it. You haven't ACTUALLY given it to
anyone and made them...
Oh my God. Even you're not THAT possessive. And
paranoid. You wouldn't! Tell me you really
WOULDN'T! I'll never be able to show my face in the
mountain again. Maybe it's not too late to… Shit. I'm
heading out with SG-11 tomorrow. Shit, shit SHIT! Jack, as soon
as I find my gun I swear to God...when I decide who I'm going to use it
on, you or me, I'll get back to you.
Btw, I hope you didn't lose the keys to the doghouse -
you're going to need them. Pack a lunch. Pack
several. Dress warm. If you're looking for me I'm going to
be very busy interviewing prospective new C.O.'s. There has to be
at least one non-pathologically protective SG commander out there who
has absolutely no sense of humour. We live in hope. That's
all I have left...
ref//coljo/majsc/1234im/07/06/01//
Colonel O'Neill feels the Rebuttal loses
something in the translation and suggests you stick with the original.
He has nothing to lose by suggesting this. He's in the doghouse already.
Feedback makes the difference between writing
and posting; please contact me at biblio@jd-divas.com
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