The Price of Defiance – Part 1
- Location
- Germany
The Price of Defiance – Part 1
Hearing Colonel Dorn's plight, you tried your best to sound sympathetic, but inwardly, you were already calculating how to turn this into your favour. If there was confusion about the status of the upper levels of the Cheyenne Mountain Complex, then why not resolve them? Right after your talk with the commander of Peterson SFB was over, you instead called a few acquaintances in Washington. Senators, Generals, some lobbyists and everyone else who might have been inclined to nudge NORAD towards abandoning their plans in Cheyenne Mountain. Especially Raytheon seemed very amenable to your suggestion as they would get paid either way and you made some off-hand remarks about your own procurement budget being rather generous.
After a days' worth of politicking, you finished by telling your own staff to keep an ear to the ground and appraise you of any news concerning the upper levels. It would take a while to see if you had succeeded.
The next morning, you were going over some papers as an urgent meeting request came in. For once it was not someone from outside the base, but the freshly arrived Master Sergeant Walt. Given that she was scheduled to lead the rescue mission to Abydos in just two hours, the urgency was probably warranted. She was ushered in by Harriman a few minutes later.
The young woman came to a perfect parade rest in front of you desk. "At ease, Sergeant," You told her, but that did not mean she actually relaxed even tiny bit.
"Sir, I have concerns about the upcoming missions," she blurted out after a while, the words rushing out despite her nervousness.
"So have I." You sighed, which was only half played. "Missions to Abydos have not been showing a tendency to according to plan so far."
For the first time she actually looked at you instead of trying to bore a hole into the concrete wall behind you with her eyes. "It is… I am concerned about my soldiers, Sir. I frankly don't think they are ready." Her eyes went back to the wall and she tensed even further as she waited for your reply.
"You have been deployed in Afghanistan, is that correct? Did you feel ready for your first combat patrol?"
"Yes, sir," the answer came immediately.
"And, just between the two of us, were you actually ready?"
This time she hesitated. "No, sir, I was not."
"Good, Sergeant. You passed the test by not lying to me," you tried to sound jovial while saying it, but Walt still stood there as if you were about to summon a firing squad. "Your concerns are noted and to be quite frank, I share them. But unfortunately, we are short on experienced soldiers in this command and SG-1 won't hold out forever while we cut through the red tape necessary to deploy Delta Force through the gate."
You waited a while, giving your words a bit of space to sink in before you continued. "We have mission that needs to be fulfilled. We have comrades out there who are counting on us. You are here, Master Sergeant, because I trust you to be able to keep my soldiers alive until they are ready to bear that responsibility on their own. Do you feel capable of that task?"
Finally, she seemed to relax the slightest bit. "Yes, sir," she answered and even managed to sound sincere.
A small smile crept on your face. It had been a while since you had to give an NCO with nerves a pep talk, but you apparently hadn't forgotten how to do it. "As long as I am your direct superior, my door remains open and I would ask you to come to me with all your concerns or suggestions."
You were ready to dismiss her, but thoughtful look on her face made you pause. "I do have a suggestion, sir. I have spoken with Captain Carter…"
When the time for the mission had come, the control room slowly filled up with people. Captain Fraiser had insisted to be present in case she would be receiving wounded and Captain Carter had come up with some excuse about observing kinetic interactions on an active gate. It did not help her explanation that she was obviously nervous, which grew even worse once the dialling process had begun.
"Relax, Captain," you said quietly to your side. "Speedy thing go in, speedy thing go out is pretty much what we keep seeing from the gate."
"Of course, sir, but there might be an upper limit for that… or safeties to stop people from doing what we are about to try…"
"Even if it does not work, it won't jeopardize the missions." At least you hoped so. The general nervousness in the base had largely passed you by, but now that showtime was drawing close, that began to change. And yet, you could not show it. When everyone around you was doubting themselves, at least you needed to seem to know what you are doing.
"Chevron seven locked." Harriman called into the microphone before him.
Time to see if you knew what you were doing. "Send the MALP in," you told him before turning to the second microphone and pressed the button for the gate room. "Master Sergeant Walt, you are in command of the gate room."
From there on, you could only watch. The MALP lurched forward through the gate and showed the by now familiar sight of Abydos temple. It was not empty though. Three guards could be seen on the video stream, two standing right next to the drone and another with the by now familiar snake helmet near the temples entrance.
SG Teams: (1 +1 +1 +1) + 4 (MSgt. Walt) + 4.5 (SG-2) + 4.5 (SG-3) + 2 (Machine Gun Support) = 19
Serpent Guard: (1 +0 +0 +0) + 4 (Elite Serpent Guard) + 6 (6x Serpent Guard) = 11
Round 1: 19 vs 11 => 8 degrees of success for SG Teams
Losses – SG Teams: 1d6 = 6 => 6 negated by successes => 0
Losses – Serpent Guard: 1d6 = 3 => 2 additional losses from successes => 5
Who is left standing? 2d7 = (4 3) => 2x regular Serpent Guard
1 Elite Serpent Guard down
4 Serpent Guards down
Beachhead established.
Serpent Guard: (1 +0 +0 +0) + 4 (Elite Serpent Guard) + 6 (6x Serpent Guard) = 11
Round 1: 19 vs 11 => 8 degrees of success for SG Teams
Losses – SG Teams: 1d6 = 6 => 6 negated by successes => 0
Losses – Serpent Guard: 1d6 = 3 => 2 additional losses from successes => 5
Who is left standing? 2d7 = (4 3) => 2x regular Serpent Guard
1 Elite Serpent Guard down
4 Serpent Guards down
Beachhead established.
You did not hear Walt give the command, but you heard the machine guns just fine. Both M2's opened up on the event horizon and the Stargate dutifully turned the speeding bullets into raw energy and back into deadly projectiles on Abydos. Everyone pretended to not have hard Carters muffled cry of joy as the manoeuvre worked. The two aliens next to the MALP were immediately cut down and guard further back had to duck behind one of the badly shot up pillars to avoid the same fate.
The fire cut out and SG-2 sprinted up the ramp to the gate, followed immediately by Walt and SG-3. Everyone in the control room was glued to the screens as the MALP filmed their attack. The leader of the aliens had made the mistake of stepping out of cover again when the M2's had stopped and so was caught out in the open and took a few bursts of M-16 rounds the second that SG-2s boots hit the dirt. Four more guards came in from outside, two of which went down by fire from SG-3 as they blindly stormed into the temple and fired without much coordination towards the gate.
SG Teams: (1 +1 -1 -1)+ 4 (MSgt. Walt) + 4.5 (SG-2) + 4.5 (SG-3) = 13
Serpent Guard: (1 +1 -1 -1) + 2 (Serpent Guard) + 1 (Serpent Guard) – 2 (Commander Lost) = 1
Round 1: 13 vs 11 => 12 degrees of success for SG Teams
Losses – SG Teams: 1d6 = 2 => 2 negated by successes => 0
Losses – Serpent Guard: Yes
2 Serpent Guards down
Abydos temple under SG Team control.
Serpent Guard: (1 +1 -1 -1) + 2 (Serpent Guard) + 1 (Serpent Guard) – 2 (Commander Lost) = 1
Round 1: 13 vs 11 => 12 degrees of success for SG Teams
Losses – SG Teams: 1d6 = 2 => 2 negated by successes => 0
Losses – Serpent Guard: Yes
2 Serpent Guards down
Abydos temple under SG Team control.
The battle lasted not much longer. The aliens were badly outnumbered, and they clearly had no idea to react to the sudden attack. But they didn't stop. They didn't waver or try to surrender. They stood there, taking fire from all sides and giving badly aimed return fire, right until enough bullets found their way past their armour to take them down. It was all over within a minute and as SG-2 reached the door and peered out, it became clear that no enemy reinforcements were coming either.
Unfortunately, there was no sign of SG-1 either and a few minutes of trying to establish radio contact bore no fruit either.
What are your orders?
[] Have SG-2 secure the gate and SG-3 explore the burned down camp near the pyramid.
[] Keep SG-2 at the pyramid to secure the gate and have SG-3 try to find the settlement mentioned in the original Abydos mission report.
[] There is strength in numbers and one team alone won't stop an assault on the gate. Send both teams to find the settlement.
AN: Background rolls came up spicy.
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