Chapter 19: Taylor's Suggestion and Test Flight
Between Harry and Taylor, the crew were collected into the galley in relatively short order, despite some grumbling from a few folks that they were busy. Taylor leaned back against the table and began speaking. "We have a serious topic we need to discuss as a group. Harry and I were talking about things, and it occurred to me that we may be underestimating the Family's capabilities."
Xander replied with a confused look, "Underestimating them how? I'm pretty impressed with getting my eye back, and our scaly friends obviously have some pretty powerful mojo based on the ritual they put Harry and me through."
"Yes," interjected Miles, "and for technology, mathematics and physics, we know that they seem to be on par at least with the Federation when it comes to understanding...they may even exceed it given that some of the upgrades they're installing do things better than the Starfleet versions."
"Remember what they said when they were telling us about our contracts?" asked Taylor. "They stated that they were going to help fix some things in our reality. They didn't limit that help to just us personally."
"They said that they were going to get us home, and that they wouldn't leave us in the same situations we found ourselves in," said Harry.
"Right," said Jimmy, "but doesn't that just mean that they're going to help us deal with whatever crisis we were in when we left? Like, helping the League deal with Darkseid's attack in my universe, or Daniel's pending punishment from his peers?"
Xander raised his hand to get their attention, and said, "When I was talking to Linda the other day, she told me that the Family likes to fix things in a big way...even things that you don't know are problems."
"Ianthe did say that they felt they could help out the Asgard," said Daniel. "That would be a fairly major shift in the balance of power back home if they can do that. They're one of the most advanced civilizations we know, and friendly to Earth, but their various crises and treaties keep them from helping as much as we would like."
"Ha!" exclaimed Taylor. "Exactly. My thought was that if they really can affect change that big, then we should all spend some time thinking about what the major problems really are in our realities."
Ellen frowned and said, "How do we know that they're going to 'fix' the things that we agree need to be fixed? Xander made a point to that effect during the contract meeting."
"All the more reason to spend some time thinking about things both we and they might want to change," said Dresden in a reasonable tone of voice. "They did specify we were supposed to be the local experts for our realities as part of our contracts. If that's true, then they should listen if we tell them to be cautious."
"What kinds of things are we looking for, though?" asked O'Brien. "I mean, I wouldn't mind having better security for the Federation, but that's kind of a tall order for any group, no matter how much technology they happen to have." Destroying the Borg would be nice, but Miles didn't think it was likely.
"I would put them on par with the Justice League," said Olsen. "I mean, between the powers, the technology, the magic, and the friends they can call upon, it's a pretty fair comparison. The only reason the Justice League isn't outright running the world is because they choose not to do so." In fact, some of the materials Dragon had given Jimmy had showed several different scenarios where they did, indeed, run a version of his world, sometimes for the better, but often to the detriment of the average citizen.
Peter leaned back against the bench and put his hands behind his head. "Honestly, I think you're underselling them. Speaking from personal experience, if a bunch of folks claiming to be from other realities show up in my world, and it does happen, I make sure they don't know everything about what I can do and who I know just in case, you know?"
Everybody paused to consider that, and now that it had been said out loud, nobody in the room could find a plausible argument against it.
"We don't really have a way of assessing their real capabilities," said Harry, "so we should probably make a list and see what they say."
Daniel got a cautious look on his face. "That may be a little presumptuous, don't you think? They're already helping us to get home. Do we really want to go begging for assistance for any other problems we might be facing?"
"The Family is not a typical cape team in any sense of the word, even ignoring the whole giant reptile thing. Most capes in my world, and probably in this one, seem to go looking for trouble. The Family is the opposite. They go out of their way looking for things to correct. If that's true, then I don't think providing a wish list is going to hurt anything. The worst that is likely to happen is that they tell us they can't help with some or all of it beyond getting us home," said Taylor.
"I'm getting a strong sense that Taylor's right on this," agreed Xander. "In fact, I think we may want to share out the materials we have on our own realities with the others. We may not see something as a problem if we're too close to it."
"I have a confession to make," said Ellen. "I haven't actually looked at any of the materials that Dragon sent to me."
The others stared at her. Finally, Harry asked, "Why is that?"
"Mostly, it's because a lot of it covers some extremely bad experiences of mine that are still fresh in my memory," said Ripley softly.
"Would you be willing to look at some of the stories about the rest of us?" asked Xander kindly.
"I can do that, but I don't think I'll be able to look at everything for all six of you, at least not in any reasonable period of time," answered Ellen.
"It's really just five, because I don't have any fictional media about my world," said Taylor.
Jimmy disagreed, saying, "You really have the most data, since this world is fairly similar and we have access to their Internet. Somebody should be looking at recent history, starting with when powers showed up on the scene."
There was a general agreement that nobody had the time to look over such an extensive set of media for all of their companions. They worked out a setup where two people would look over the materials for each of them. Jimmy drew up a table with the agreed-upon assignments.
"I suggest we each make up our own lists of problems, and then we can review that list with the two people reviewing the data on our realities. That should let us see any gaps in the lists," said Olsen. One of the first things a good investigative reporter did with multiple sources was to compare their stories and look for gaps.
Everyone agreed that they would take a week to make up their own lists and review the agreed upon materials. There was a shocking volume of film, television, comic books, literature, and other materials provided, and Dragon's summaries only went so far in reviewing them.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Metis and Miles were on the bridge, looking at the console readouts. Saurial, Ellen and Kevin were down in the engine room checking on things. Linda and Daniel were outside, inspecting the new warp pylons and the hull plating with Raptaur's assistance.
"All right, I'm switching the cloak system into standby mode. What are your power readings?" came Ellen's voice over the comm badge.
"The two capacitor feeds read 1.18 gigawatts and 1.21 gigawatts," said Miles.
"Damn it, I knew we forgot something!" said Kevin's voice. "We didn't install the flux capacitor!"
"The what?" asked Miles. "Are we missing something?"
"It's just a movie reference. Don't worry," came Saurial's voice.
"Oh, I saw that movie," said Daniel from outside, obviously pleased to have gotten a pop-culture reference.
Ignoring the back-and-forth, Ellen continued with, "I'm getting ready to test the cloak in three, two, one, cloak!"
There was a subtle change in the vibration of the ship, almost as if the ship was trying to be quieter. Of course, as they weren't in a submarine, noise made no difference to the ship's stealthiness.
"Holy shit!" said Linda over the badge.
"Is it working?" asked Metis.
"You bet your scaly ass its working!" answered Linda. "It's also the biggest thing I've ever seen cloaked in my life."
"All right Ripley, we've got a positive test on the cloak. You can shut it down now," said Miles. "Let's meet down in the cargo bay and talk about next steps."
The ship reappeared and the group all left their positions to meet up in the cargo bay (chosen because it provided more space for Raptaur and Metis than the galley).
"All of the tests appear to have gone exceedingly well," said Raptaur. "I believe we are ready to move on to the next phase of testing."
"Which would be the test flight," said Ellen.
The primary concern of everybody on board was the reaction of a certain winged adversary in orbit over the Earth. Nobody knew exactly how the Simurgh would react to testing a spacecraft. They weren't especially keen to know how the Ship of Fools would handle an attack from the Endbringer. They also weren't keen to see if Saurial's absence from planet Earth would be enough to trigger an attack.
"I'll head over to the wormhole site and monitor the situation with the Endbringers," said Metis. "We need to test this out locally in this reality before we start shifting between universes."
"Do you really think that creature is monitoring your presence?" asked Miles slightly skeptically.
"There are several reasons to think so," replied Saurial. "Apart from the fact that the Simurgh veered off from an attack the moment a wormhole opened to transport Kaiju to the site of the battle, we have tracking data for Leviathan, the aquatic Endbringer. He has been staying on the floor of the ocean at the point farthest from this location...and when we split the visible members of the Family up into different geographic locations, he actually moves to a point equidistant between the two."
"Really?" asked Kevin. "That's the first time you've explained it like that. Leviathan is edging around the outside of the room like a nervous pet?"
"Or like an animal trying to circle around a predator," suggested Linda.
"That may be a more accurate description," granted Raptaur.
Ellen, Daniel and Miles exchanged knowing glances. Peter's suggestion that the Family were concealing their true abilities meshed well with the current conversation. Daniel saw that Metis was watching them and had a slight smirk. He wondered how much of their thoughts were evident to the intuitive reptile. Probably more than they realized, given how she turned to look directly at him and winked.
"We should start our tests before it gets too late today," said Metis. "Randall is already waiting for me back at the WCC."
With that, Metis left, leaving the warehouse and rapidly accelerating to highway speeds, while the others went to their stations for the pending test flight.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The ship appeared out of the wormhole aperture near Venus. The location gave them a fair amount of distance between the ship and Earth while still being well within sensor range. Saurial was staying in contact with Metis, and the two had agreed to use FamTalk on the off chance that the Simurgh was able to intercept their communications. Of course, there was no guarantee that the Endbringer wouldn't understand FamTalk. Lisa and Amy both understood it, so it was possible that their powers might as well. There was also the fact that the Simurgh was certainly a precog, and possibly a mind reader, but the fact that Thinkers in general had an issue with Varga muddied the whole issue. In any event, it was better to be safe than sorry.
{Do you see any activity from our friends?} asked Saurial.
{The Simurgh is still holding position in orbit, just close enough to keep Brockton Bay in sight over the curvature of the Earth. Based on the monitoring system, Leviathan also appears to be mostly stationary.} answered the black lizard over the communications badge. Subspace allowed for real-time communication despite the distance.
Saurial considered the situation. {It's possible, given what we suspect, that the Endbringers know that we're easily within range to return home at a moment's notice.}
{That would be true from pretty much anywhere in the multiverse as long as your wormhole drive is functioning. It's also possible, though, that they're basing their behavior on the WCC's capabilities, which is limited to this dimension. I don't know how they'll react if you're in a different reality. We'll have to test that scenario,} replied Metis.
"All right," said Saurial to the others on the bridge of the Ship of Fools. "The Endbringers appear to be stationary. I think we can begin our flight testing."
"Roger that," said Miles. "All right. Ellen, let's engage the cloak." Ellen and Kevin were again in the engine room, monitoring systems, while Linda, Daniel and Saurial were on the bridge with Miles. Raptaur had supposedly stayed behind at the warehouse, though in reality Taylor and Varga had just let that body vanish after take-off.
'Engaging cloak in three, two, one, engaged.' came the voice over the intercomm.
"Everything looks good from here," said Daniel, looking at a console readout.
With the cloak engaged, O'Brien began running the ship through its paces, testing out the gravity-based thrusters. While the inertial dampeners added to the ship kept the crew from feeling the rapid changes in direction and velocity, the forward view out the bridge windows showed the stars and nearby planet shifting around at a dizzying pace.
"She handles wonderfully," commented O'Brien. "She reminds me of the Defiant at her best."
"Shall we try the transwarp drive, Chief?" asked Saurial.
Miles nodded. "Setting course for Alpha Centauri. Estimated arrival time would be...seven hours? That's quite fast for not going full speed."
"The TV show really made space travel seem faster than it is," said Daniel.
Linda chuckled. "Space is pretty damned big, even with transwarp."
"The Enterprise spent a lot of time in transit. You'll notice how in the show, they'll sometimes mention how it takes hours, days or weeks to get somewhere, but then they'll skip to the destination in the next scene?" said Miles. "In reality, we spent a lot of time doing maintenance or helping out with training or experiments. We also had plenty of downtime. Those holodeck episodes made the technology look error-prone, but the idea of spending hours in a simulation was pretty accurate."
"I'm surprised that we don't have a holodeck on board now, given all the other upgrades," said Daniel.
Saurial shrugged and replied, "With the wormhole drive, transit time isn't really an issue. Even now, we're not going to spend hours travelling to another star. We'll run for an hour or so to check the engines for stress, then use the wormhole drive and verify that it doesn't have any issues with transwarp." Of course, the Family had other ways to create a virtual reality, as Coil had learned to his detriment.
"Ripley, how do things look from your end?" asked Miles over the intercom.
'Everything is running smooth, according to the readouts. We should run some speed adjustments to test how the different power outputs stress the engines,' answered Ripley from the engine room.
For the next hour, the Ship of Fools maintained a course toward the nearest star system. Miles varied the speed from just over the speed of light up toward eighty percent of maximum velocity in order to test out the engines to the fullest extent. To the credit of the crew and the folks from the DWU, everything worked as expected.
"This is one of the smoothest shakedown cruises I've seen," said O'Brien. "Usually, a refit ship has a few problems here or there. You people do good work."
Linda and Saurial were obviously pleased. "Maybe we should add starship repair and refit to the list of BBFO services advertised?" joked Saurial.
"I think the PRT might have a fit if we did that," said Linda, laughing appreciatively. "They wouldn't know whether or not to take us seriously." It would probably be better for Director Piggot's stress level if they avoided that for the time being. She also wondered what Miles would think if she knew of Leet's reputation before they met the Family. Riding in a Leet-created spaceship back in the day would have been crazy.
"If you wanted to offer that in my reality, then I would be happy to provide references," offered Miles. O'Brien didn't realize it, but he was underestimating how valuable that would actually be. His reputation in certain circles would be enough to get a business off the ground fairly easily.
The intercom sounded. 'Are we almost ready to try out the wormhole drive?' asked Ellen.
The folks on the bridge looked around for mutual confirmation. Seeing no disagreement, Miles answered, "I think we have a go for that. Let's take the shortcut to Alpha Centauri."
The Ship of Fools opened a wormhole and quickly vanished. Back on Earth, Metis could swear that the Simurgh appeared to relax slightly, but otherwise the Endbringer had no reaction. In the trinary Alpha Centauri system, the wormhole terminus opened and spit out the vessel. Saurial and Linda stopped to look out the window at the orbiting binary pair that made up the center of the system, with the distant Proxima Centauri visible as a bright star nearby.
"This is pretty cool," said Linda quietly. Saurial just smiled at her and nodded her head.
Noticing the reactions of the two locals, Miles triggered the intercom and said, "Kevin, can you come up to the bridge for a minute?"
'Sure, no problem,' replied the engineer. After a couple of minutes, he poked his head through door. "Hey, what's the problem?" he asked.
Miles just pointed at the other two and the bridge windows. Kevin looked over, and then he noticed the view.
"Whoa...that's wicked," he said, moving up to stand next to the others.
Miles gave them about ten minutes to just take in the view of being in another star system, then he triggered the intercom again. "Ellen, how are things looking down there?"
'Lights are green across the board,' replied the woman. 'We can head back any time.'
The three stargazers were drawn out of their enchantment with the view by the conversation. Saurial turned and said, "Actually, as we're well away from watching eyes, maybe we should find someplace to perform a weapons test?"
Miles looked at Daniel, who was watching the sensors. "Are there any rocks nearby that would serve as good targets for a test?"
Daniel ran an active scan using the sensors and replied, "There's a stony asteroid floating out toward the edge of the system. It's about 750 meters long and mostly just silica."
It took less than ten minutes to reach the asteroid, and they could see that it had an odd, zig-zag shape, like somebody cut a piece from a cloth with a herringbone pattern. Scans confirmed that, other than its unusual shape, there was absolutely nothing of interest about the rock.
"Let's target that narrow portion near the end with a burst from the phasers," suggested Saurial.
Miles brought up the weapons console. They had used a Starfleet-style targeting system, as it was fairly easy to understand even for twenty-first century humans. When he fired the ventral phaser array at the indicated point, the bright nadion beam looked rather remarkably like the ones depicted in the shows, although the absurdly long duration of the special effects shots weren't duplicated. The effect of the shot was fairly dramatic as a full third of the asteroid was sliced off, and the two pieces began rapidly drifting away from each other.
"The energy output from that was...impressive," said Daniel, looking at the readouts from the firing. They reminded him more of Ancient or Asgard weapons than anything the Goa'uld used, and the shields of a Ha'tak would probably only succeed in keeping the first shot from gutting it completely.
"I still say it's overkill for a transport that's supposed to be avoiding trouble," said Miles rather acidly.
Linda just smiled. "Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it," she said.
"Let's get closer to the smaller piece and try out the point defense system," suggested Saurial.
Miles maneuvered the ship to within ten kilometers of the smaller piece of rock. With another control, he activated point defense mode for the ship. The passengers could feel a slight shift in the artificial gravity, although it was a lessening of less than a tenth of a G. The asteroid fragment obviously felt quite a bit more, as the ship projected gravitational shear forces almost at random, literally pulverizing the stone into fine gravel.
Daniel winced. "I would hate to be a fighter pilot hit by that system."
Miles wasn't so squeamish. "I would rather it happen to them than that they get a torpedo off at our bridge." If anything, the Ship of Fools' bridge was even more exposed than the typical Starfleet bridge...and the more tactically-oriented members of Starfleet had been complaining about how exposed the bridges of even combat-oriented classes like the Defiant were for years. Personally, O'Brien thought it was the influence of gung ho captains who liked to, "lead from the front," so to speak. Even Captain Picard had a tendency to want to see things first hand that was fairly unwise...not that Miles would ever say that to the man.
"Speaking of torpedoes," said Linda before Daniel could respond, "let's try out one of the militarized science probes on that remaining portion of the rock."
Everyone agreed that they might as well test all of the weapons, so Saurial and Kevin went down to the launcher to prep. Rather than using any of the existing stock, Saurial just created a new warhead, and then she helped Kevin load it into the torpedo. Once it was armed, the auto-loader system prepared it for firing in the launch tube. The two returned to the bridge so they could observe the results, although a video of the tests was being recorded by the ship's computer. Metis had insisted on that much, even if she couldn't go on the first test flight.
Miles backed the ship away from the remaining fragment just to be safe. Once they were a good one hundred kilometers out, he triggered the torpedo launch. A glowing projectile shot out of the ship, moving so fast that only Saurial and the ship's computer were really able to track it. When the torpedo reached detonation range, the effect was strange. For a moment, the asteroid remnant appeared to get fuzzy, as if the image was slowly losing resolution. After a few moments, it became clear that the asteroid had turned into an expanding cloud of microscopic dust.
"According to the sensors, we just turned that asteroid into what reads as an unusually dense nebula," said Daniel with disbelief.
"What exactly was in that payload?" asked Miles. Randall had described it as a disintegration torpedo without explaining the mechanism, so he assumed it was something like a disruptor. That was obviously not the case.
"I created what is essentially a spring-loaded ball of EDM monowire that shifts through multiple dimensions as it uncoils," explained Saurial. "It's pretty much a matter shredder, and I can set a variable area of effect."
Miles triggered the intercom. "Ellen, let's head back to Earth." After her acknowledgement, he turned to look at Saurial. "I think we need to have another conversation about appropriate levels of force."
Linda interjected, "Maxim thirty-seven: There is no 'overkill.' There is only, 'open fire,' and 'reload.'" The Schlock Mercenary web comic had become fairly popular recently around the DWU for some reason. Linda had already binge read the whole series to the detriment of her sleep.
Saurial grinned at that. "I prefer number fifty-five; it's only too many weapons if they're pointing in the wrong direction."
Miles looked back and forth between the two of them. "Where are you getting these quotes from?" he asked, slightly confused.
Daniel sheepishly raised his hand. "Yeah, that's probably my fault. I told Ianthe about a web comic that was kind of popular in my reality. Apparently, it exists here as well."
"A web comic?" he asked, still confused.
"Don't worry, I'll show you when we get back," said Linda, eager to share her new favorite.
"It appears we're back," said Saurial, pointing out the window to where they were obviously sitting back in their warehouse hideout. The rest of the folks on the bridge stared for a moment.
"Ellen," asked Miles using the intercom. "Did you just move us from floating on the outskirts of the Alpha Centauri system to sitting still in the warehouse on Earth?"
'Yes, why? Isn't that what you asked me to do?' she replied.
When O'Brien's mouth opened but no words were forthcoming, Saurial replied instead. "I think Miles is just unused to having a drive system that's quite so precise. Probably, he would have been more comfortable jumping to somewhere in-system before then jumping to Earth."
'Oh. Sorry about that, but that's well within the tolerances for the drive as Daniel and Saurial explained it,' replied Ripley. 'Don't worry, I wouldn't try shifting into the warehouse from another universe. That would be just crazy.'
Miles wondered how long it would be before he started to get infected by whatever it was that adjusted peoples' behavior near the Family. Then he wondered how much he had already changed without noticing. He would have to ask Keiko and Julian when he got back.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The group of dimensional expatriates were gathered together again in the galley of the Ship of Fools almost a full week after their earlier meeting called by Taylor and Harry. They were there to review their lists as a group before going to the Family and seeing what could be done to help their various home realities.
Xander went first. "All right, so I've reviewed the TV series and the comic books that came after...and let me say that if I ever meet Joss Whedon, he's getting a beat down. I have three major concerns listed. The first is dealing with setting up a replacement for the defunct Watcher's Council and dealing with the newly called slayers. The second is dealing with Angel's gang going to work for Wolfram & Hart, which leads to a lot of what follows, including the destruction of magic. Finally, we need to track down Amy Madison and find out if she really saved Warren Mears." Arguably, that was just part of the whole Twilight fiasco, but dealing with Warren was a personal matter for Xander and his friends. He also had to talk to Anya, but that was a Xander-fix-it, not a lizard-fix-it.
Harry Dresden and Daniel Jackson had also looked at Xander's world through the various media. "One of the things we discussed was the fact that the Watcher's Council, and your follow-on group, was pretty much operating independently. They didn't necessarily have good relations with other groups fighting to protect people. It also seems like they had poor relationships with even non-hostile demon groups, with the slayers traditionally trained to kill any non-humans," began Daniel.
"In my world," said Harry, "we have an agreement between major supernatural players called the Unseelie Accords. It effectively defines things like neutral territory, pledges of safe passage, and other rules of diplomatic protocol and recompense in the event of violation. Now, they weren't perfect, and it was actually my violating those Accords that led to the war between the Red Court and the White Council, but it generally leveled the playing field and made sure everybody knew the rules."
Daniel nodded in agreement. "One of the things I didn't like about the stories from your world is how stingy people were in general with information. You and your friends often didn't know things until the powers saw fit to provide you with a vision, and the Council just wasn't responsive when it came to research unless things were really dire," added Daniel. "One of the things I learned at the SGC was how important intelligence is before going into a fight. With that in mind, you may want to recruit some people who can gather intelligence in the field rather than just perform research. Early warning can save lives."
Xander was taking notes as they spoke. "I understand what you're saying, and I agree with you. However, one thing you have to keep in mind is that we never had the money or the influence to be able to do much. The Council never provided much, and the rest of us had to work just to pay for rent and food. As for intelligence gathering, it can be hard to keep slayers from running in with a, 'chop first, ask questions later,' attitude toward problems."
"Money and material seem like two things that the Family would be ideal at providing," said Harry. "It doesn't seem to cost Saurial anything to conjure up a half-ton of precious metals."
Xander got a gleam in his eye. "You know, I'll bet slayers would be a perfect set of users for EDM weapons. I've seen the swords that Saurial and Raptaur use on video."
"That's likely true," said Daniel. "Also, one thing you might want to spend some of that largess on is to find somebody in the know about the supernatural with a background in psychotherapy. We had regular psychiatric evaluations at the SGC. Based on what happened in Sunnydale, I'm almost certain that most of you probably need to talk to somebody about PTSD, survivor's guilt, and probably a host of other issues."
Ellen Ripley raised her hand to get their attention, and said, "While I haven't reviewed the materials, it seems strange to me that the supernatural community is secret from most people. Wouldn't it be better if everybody were aware of the danger?" That was, after all, what she was trying to do by letting people know about the xenomorphs back in her home universe.
"We talked a bit about that," said Harry. "The thing you have to remember about the supernatural world, though, is that there are greater powers that tend to keep things in balance. The more help the good guys get, the more help the bad guys seem to find. Also, people who are made aware of the supernatural tend to attract it. They can't just ignore the weird, and so they become a threat to the things that stalk the night." He thought about how Karrin Murphy just couldn't seem to get away from the weird cases, and it had ultimately killed her career as a police officer.
"Yeah, you would think that knowing would be an advantage," said Xander, "but in our experience that was only really true around supernatural hot spots like the Hellmouth. Most folks can go their entire lives without crossing paths with the mystical world." Ellen seemed to accept that answer without comment. "Do you guys have any more advice?" asked Xander.
Harry and Daniel looked at each other. Harry said, "only that based on your description, you managed to save your fiancee before the collapse of Sunnydale. That's a change that's likely to have a significant impact on the future of your world, so you can't necessarily trust the post-show sources." This was especially true given the role that D'Hoffryn, Anya's former master, played in the future portrayed in the comics.
Daniel waited until Harry was done speaking, then said, "I think I can read my list if we're done with Xander's. First, there are the major enemies we face, including the Goa'uld, the Ori, the Replicators, the Trust and the Wraith. Finding Atlantis is a big priority, with the Destiny being a second priority. Helping the Asgard and the Tok'ra would also be big, as they both have primarily biological problems that the Family may be well-suited to fixing. Finally, dealing effectively with the Free Jaffa and the Lucian Alliance will make things a lot easier," finished Daniel.
Miles and Ellen were the reviewers for the materials on Daniel's universe. Miles started with, "One of the first things you need to deal with is the secrecy of your activities. You're fighting multiple galactic and even intergalactic wars, and you don't have your full industrial base and population supporting you. That's a recipe for disaster. Frankly, from what I could see on those entertainment programs, you survived major military invasions mostly through incredible luck."
"Also," said Ellen, "the Stargate network would make colonization efforts much easier. If your Earth is anything like mine, you've probably got issues with overpopulation and resources. That's only going to get worse if you bring back the Family's biotech. You could easily put ten times the number of colonists on a world, with an equivalent increase in supplies and construction materials, as Weyland-Yutani can in my universe by using your Stargate. Developing colonies also increases your industrial capacity as well as making the survival of humanity more likely." From what she had seen, the SGC had quite a few enemies that were just as dangerous as the xenomorphs.
Daniel replied, "I don't disagree. I've often thought our secrecy was a problem. I mean, my career would have taken off if I could just publish some of the things I've learned with supporting evidence, so I even have a personal reason to want to go public. The problem is that the governments and the IOC control when information and technology get released to the public."
"I have a sneaking suspicion that our reptilian friends aren't going to be that worried about the opinions of your government or any governing bodies," said Ellen with a slight smile. "They seem to do what they want, and it's only the fact that they're so obviously helpful most of the time that mitigates that."
Miles continued. "I would also strongly recommend that you have somebody start thinking about time travel. We have a Department of Temporal Investigations, and despite how obnoxious it can be to deal with them, it's a hugely dangerous set of technology. It's also obviously possible in your universe. One of those movies had that Goa'uld Ball go back in time and prevent you from discovering the Stargate until it was too late."
"It's pronounced Ba'al," corrected Daniel without thinking. "I'm not really sure who we could trust to monitor that technology."
"What about the Nox or the Asgard?" asked Ellen. "They seemed like responsible older races. At a minimum, they may have suggestions."
"Wait a minute!" said Xander suddenly. "I just realized something. You guys at the SGC...you're Wormhole X-treme!"
Daniel's jaw dropped, and he said, "You had Wormhole X-treme in your universe?"
"That was that fake program that was created for plausible deniability, right?" asked Miles.
"Sort of...that's why the government let it go on, at least," said Daniel. "That could mean that you have a Stargate in your reality."
"You're Dr. Levant, aren't you?" asked Xander with a grin while momentarily ignoring Daniel's question.
Daniel blushed. "I like to think of myself as more of a rough inspiration for the character," he replied.
"We need to add that to the list of things to check when we get to Xander's reality," said Ellen, trying to get the discussion back on track. "Do we have anything else for Daniel?" Miles shook his head. "All right, I guess I can go next. My priorities are obviously warning people about the xenomorphs and letting people know what Weyland-Yutani has been trying to do."
Xander and Miles had spent their time going over the movies and comics from Ellen's reality. Xander started with, "Ellen, I know there are some personal things you don't want to review again, but I think you may want to at least watch some of the films. There's one called Prometheus, and a series of films about creatures called Predators. They all seem to be part of your universe."
"What are Predators?" asked Ripley.
"They're a species that lives to hunt dangerous creatures, including humans. They've visited Earth numerous times in the past, and have a predator-prey-predator relationship with the xenomorphs. That's assuming the movies are at all accurate." They reminded Miles of the Drai, the group of aliens who had chased another being named Tosk through the wormhole to DS9. Unlike Tosk, though, the beings hunted by Predators weren't voluntary participants.
"You're talking about the Hunters?" asked Ripley. Miles was momentarily thrown off track by the resemblance in terminology to the Drai. "Aliens that turn invisible and chase down people to take their skulls as trophies? I thought those were a spacer's myth?"
"Maybe, maybe not," said Xander. "Better safe than sorry. There are also a bunch of video games, comics and novels set in the universe. Some of them are contradictory, as they came out at different times during the film series. The films are probably more accurate, since we found your pod being ejected from the Sulaco like at the start of the third film. One thing you may want to know, though, is that its possible Dwayne Hicks is still alive."
"How?" said Ripley with an intent look on her face.
"One of the video games has a story where the fire on the Sulaco was caused by a Weyland-Yutani research vessel docking with your ship. The research ship was called the Legato, and it was filled with kidnapped colonists that the company was experimenting on with xenomorphs," explained Xander.
"I wouldn't put it past them," added Miles. "That company seems strangely fixated on trying to commercialize a dangerous bio-weapon."
"What about Hicks?" prompted Ellen.
"The story is that some of the colonists got free, and they released Hicks from stasis to help them against the military contractors working for the company. The resulting firefight is what ended up causing the fire that forced the ejection of your pod from the ship," continued Xander.
Miles shook his head in frustration. "There's something very strange, though, because the third film and the game all agree that it wasn't just your pod ejected. It was yours, the girl's, the android's, and a colonist trapped in Hicks' pod, and they were all loaded into an escape capsule. We definitely just recovered your pod by itself. I went to look at it in the hold, and there's no way it would have survived re-entry into a planetary atmosphere."
"That doesn't make any sense," said Ellen.
"It's a mystery," agreed Miles. "I would put that mystery on your list, along with the Predator aliens."
Ellen thought about it for a moment. There wasn't anything she could do about it immediately, so bringing it to the Family seemed like a sensible approach. "All right. Is there anything else?"
"That movie I mentioned, Prometheus," prompted Xander. "It's about the race that created the xenomorphs. They're referred to as the Engineers in some places. They look like giant, pale bald men, though some of the comics that came out before the movie depict them differently. Anyway, there's a good chance that they may want to destroy human life on Earth as well."
Ellen just nodded. The more she learned about the real history of her reality, the more she wondered if it was worth it to go back. She absolutely wanted to find out what happened to Hicks and Newt, though, even if the news was bad.
"My turn, I think," said Miles. "The biggest problems faced by my reality seem to be in the Romulan Empire. There's going to be a civil war between the Romulans and the Remans, another species from their home system, and it's going to involve the Enterprise and Captain Picard. Even more importantly, a supernova is going to destroy Romulus and branch off an alternate timeline where the planet Vulcan ends up destroyed in the past. Apart from that, well, there's far too much material available on alternate timelines and future events. A lot of it has to be apocryphal, as some of it is mutually contradictory, and some of it is just awful. However, the Borg are obviously still a threat, and while we just ended a war with the Dominion, it just recreated the status quo that led to the war in the first place. Internally, I'm worried about Section 31. They almost caused a genocide against the Founders of the Dominion, and they were willing to kidnap Julian to test his loyalty. Other stories I watched showed them doing other less than savory things."
Daniel and Harry had been the ones to review the Star Trek universe. Harry started the commentary. "One thing that stuck out for me was that the Federation is constantly being manipulated by outside parties. Maybe I'm sensitive to this because I'm used to dealing with the fae, but time travelers, super-powerful beings like the Q and the Organians, body-possessing aliens and extra-dimensional invaders are all busy changing things to suit their plans. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm sure that the powerful beings in my own dimension make an effort to manipulate things to their advantage, but there's a line that doesn't get crossed lest bad things happen."
"You know," said Taylor, "in this world, we have things called master-stranger protocols. They're protocols that are designed to keep people who are being controlled, or who have powers that let them go unnoticed, from doing bad things."
"It would probably be a good idea to get a copy of the local protocols from the Family before we head back," said Harry. "Wizards have a fair amount of advice and options for dealing with shapeshifters, illusions, and such, but the locals probably have a more organized and practical set of procedures that would apply to Starfleet."
"We also do a full medical review at the SGC whenever anybody comes back from a mission," said Daniel. "A lot of the shows in your universe seem to revolve around somebody bringing some type of energy parasite, rare disease, and so on, back with them from an away mission."
Miles felt the need to defend the Federation a bit. "Those types of situations are fairly rare. The transporters do scan for pathogens and weapons, and they almost always work. We just can't anticipate every possible scenario."
"Which is why you do medical reviews for anybody returning from a potentially hostile environment. It seems like something that could fairly easily be done on starships for away teams," suggested Daniel.
"That's true," Miles had to admit.
"Another thing that's got me curious," continued Daniel, "is that not only the Federation, but also Starfleet itself, seems awfully pacifist."
"You're calling somebody else pacifist?" asked Peter with a slightly incredulous tone.
Daniel frowned. "Just because I prefer diplomatic solutions and negotiations doesn't mean I'm a pacifist. I think violence has its place as a last resort and please don't quote that maxim back to me." Daniel looked at everyone, who all remained silent. Peter and Taylor both mimed looking away and whistling silently. "All I'm saying is that for an explicitly defensive arm of the government, Starfleet seems to be incapable of designing a purely military ship or acting with the threat of force as an explicit option."
"The Defiant was a military ship," argued O'Brien.
"Yes," drawled Harry, "which your people grudgingly developed after facing the Borg, an enemy that is both more advanced than you and has a culture that goes against your core values like a small-town preacher goes against dancing. You also don't use cloaking devices on your ships."
Again, Miles protested, "That's forbidden by treaty."
"You signed a treaty saying that nobody was allowed to use cloaking devices?" asked Ellen.
"No," said Daniel, "they signed a treaty saying that the Federation can't use cloaking devices. All of the other powers are free to use them."
Ellen stared at Miles. "Why would you agree to that?"
"I didn't sign the bloody treaty!" said Miles with exasperation. "It was signed seventeen years before I was born, and it was done to make peace with the Romulan Empire."
"I think we have to consider that some of this is the result of shenanigans," suggested Harry. "Somebody wants to keep the Federation from getting too powerful. Q may have been explicitly trying to counteract that when he introduced you to the Borg earlier than you would have met them through natural expansion and exploration."
"Starfleet is rather unusual," explained Daniel. "Every other culture I've seen had dedicated warships, with other classes designated as science vessels, transports, etc. Ships designed to be jacks of all trades tend not to do any one role particularly well, yet that seems almost the default for front-line combatants in Starfleet."
O'Brien considered their words. It made a disturbing amount of sense in a paranoid kind of way. "All right, I guess I can run it by the Family and see if they have any ideas about it." Miles had been particularly impressed with Metis' degree of insight, and Saurial and Raptaur both could summon up an unexpected wisdom when the situation needed it.
"I guess I'm the last in the non-superhero group," joked Harry.
"Before we do that, can we take a break for a bit?" asked Taylor.
Daniel and Peter both added their agreement, so the group decided to reconvene in twenty minutes to finish the discussion.
