Author: BadgerGater
Email: [email protected]
Category: Drama, from Gen. Hammond's POV
Rating: PG, couple adult words
Spoilers: COTG, Enemy Within, Fire and Water, Matter of Time,
Warning: None
Season/Sequel: late second, early third (written between 2 & 3)
Summary: Gen. Hammond assesses his second in command Disclaimer: Stargate and its characters belong to Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Gekko, Double Secret Productions, etc. I'm just borrowing them. No copyright infringement intended, no money exchanged hands. It's all in fun.
Author's note: Feedback, please, okay campers?
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Quite frankly, he's never been what I expected.
Oh, I'd heard plenty about him even before I met him. Ice cold, hardnosed, taciturn, dour, 100% all business were the words I'd heard used to describe Colonel Jack O'Neill. The first man through the Stargate, and the one man none of them had expected to come back. But he had come back, without Dr. Jackson, telling General West he had completed his assignment and set off the bomb destroying the alien Ra. Then O'Neill set off a bombshell of his own by promptly resigning and disappearing.
People thought he was crazy. At the time, I now know, he was. A little.
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At the door to the infirmary, I pause, looking in, to where he's lying on a bed. Only here, unconscious or asleep, do I ever seen him still. Or looking at peace.
He's my best warrior and my most trying.
He'd have turned all my hair gray by now, if I still had any.
"General, Sir?" asked a nurse. "Can I help you?"
"Just came by to check on Colonel O'Neill," I answer, indicating the still form on the bed. "Any change?"
"No Sir. His vitals are stable but he's still unconscious. You can go sit with him if you like..."
"No, that's fine, Lieutenant, I can see he has company. I'll check back later."
Dr. Jackson is sitting at O'Neill's bedside. Now there's another strange one, Daniel Jackson, multiple PhD, linguist who speaks 23 languages, archeologist, stargate decipherer and traveler, and Jack O'Neill's best friend. A more unlikely pair could not be found anywhere in the galaxy, I think, as I return to my office.
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Back at my office, I look at the stack of reports spilling across my desk. Half a dozen of them are SG-1's. My best team. My first-contact, send-them-anywhere, oddball-but-somehow-they-work-because-of-their-differences team.
As enigmatic as their leader.
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I'll never forget my first meeting with Jack O'Neill. I'd checked up on him first before sending for him, any smart man would have. I even called his old CO, my predecessor here at the SGC, General West. West had called him unreliable, a loose canon, trouble, big time; a timebomb waiting to go off, and he'd been damn glad to be rid of him.
It didn't fit with the man I met, the man who had engendered such fierce loyalty from good soldiers like Ferretti and Kawalsky; who, according to his personnel file, had battled back to resume active duty after a horrific parachute accident; who had survived four grueling months as a prisoner in Iraq; who was a career military man whose combat and covert ops records, and not his social skills, had precipitated his rise in rank.
You don't get to be a colonel in the United States Air Force without doing something worthwhile. No, I thought with a snort, with some officers, sadly, it was who they knew and not what they did; men like Maybourne and Samuels were like that.
But not Jack O'Neill.
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When he'd walked into my office in civilian clothes, defensive, cynical and sarcastic, I hadn't seen much there to like, I admit. But then the subject of Abydos came up. At the sight of "his" men, and the threat of sending a bomb to a planet where people he cared about would be hurt, well... the real Jack O'Neill surfaced: a dedicated, loyal, initiative grabbing, independent and innovative problem solver-- not qualities often admired in the military.
But just what I was looking for. I didn't want or need a yes man or a follower.
I wasn't about to send some stand-behind-his-troops-and-watch officer to command teams offworld. I needed a leader-- someone more comfortable in fatigues than dress blues, someone who wanted to be a hands on, lead from the fore, never send a man to do a job he wouldn't do himself, old fashioned warrior.
He is that. And he's a damn good one. There is no man I would rather have at my side in a fight than Jack O'Neill-- no quit, no give, no quarter. He would die for his comrades. He has, and lived to tell of it, I think to myself with a smile.
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Early on, there were times when I thought West had been right, times I regretted taking this job and even more, taking on O'Neill.
He has his quirks, to be sure. Like his thing about scientists, for one, although these days I really do think he is probably over that, thanks to Jackson and Carter. But then, he seems to have transferred his contempt to politicians, and the toadies who kiss up to them. I would never leave Jack O'Neill alone in a room with the likes of Senator Kinsey or Col. Maybourne. Not that I wouldn't like to.
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O'Neill is his own man. He retired once, has threatened to do so several times since, and if pushed too far, I truly believe he would do it again. Except, of course, for that loyalty thing, loyalty to the team that has become his family.
The military has cost Jack O'Neill a lot. Some would say it's cost him everything-- his son, his marriage, his peace of mind. I have read his medical and personnel files, even the classified bits, and he's paid an unimaginable price. But he is one of those rare human beings who still believes in duty, honor, and sacrifice.
I wish I had a hundred like him-- no, honestly, I'm not sure I could handle that, I chuckle ruefully.
Jack O'Neill is one of a kind. Thank God.
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It's 3 a.m. and I'm back at the infirmary. Daniel Jackson is sleeping in a bunk just across from the Colonel-- refusing to leave, but exhaustion taking over. The infirmary is dim and quiet, O'Neill the only patient.
"How are you doing, son?" I ask, knowing I won't get an answer, but needing to say something as I set myself down on the hard chair next to his bed. Asleep, he seems smaller; so quiet. He seems a stranger, not at all the man I know, the man who is never still or quiet, never at ease or at peace, never compromising or giving in.
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He's lying here because once again he stayed behind to protect his team. Someday, that fierce loyalty will get him killed.
I had seen them return home, as I have dozens of times over the past three years. I knew it was trouble, too, well, that's usually a pretty fair guess with this team. They'd only gone through the gate to P4B-808 a couple of hours before, and here they were, coming home early. Almost always, with SG-1, that means disaster.
I was right. I stood at the base of the ramp, worried about what kind of trouble they might be bringing home with them this time. Dr. Frasier and a medical team hurried through the doorway behind me as the iris opened.
Daniel Jackson appeared first, sweat stained, rumpled, gasping for breath like he'd been running a marathon (which was about what they had just done, I would learn later). He stumbled from the wormhole and down the ramp, turning immediately to look for the others.
Carter came through mere seconds later, also arriving at an exhausted, stumbling run. "Natives, sir, chased us back to the gate..."
Before she could say more, another figure appeared, Teal'c, the huge Jaffa trotting grimly from the fluid filled ring, a sheen of sweat on his ebony face.
Now only one more to account for. "Colonel O'Neill?" I asked.
"The Colonel was just meters behind me," Teal'c answered in his always precise way.
Jackson and Carter exchanged a worried look. "He was running, providing cover fire...." said Carter.
"They were shooting at us, darts..." said Jackson.
Typical, I thought, O'Neill putting himself between his people and danger.
And then, the Colonel was there, airborne, diving through the ring, hitting the ramp and rolling, hollering "lock it up." The rest of SG-1 exchanged relieved smiles. O'Neill pushed himself up on his elbows, checking on his team, looking from face to face, assuring himself they were all there and okay.
I felt myself relax as the wormhole disengaged and the iris closed. "Welcome home, SG-1. We'll debrief in...."
Something was wrong. O'Neill dropped his head, then pushed himself to his feet with an obvious effort, took a couple of wobbly steps away from the gate, and promptly crashed to the floor. Now, I could see a dart sticking in the back of his calf, another in his back.
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Thirty-six hours later, he was still unconscious. Dr. Frasier didn't know when he would wake, or if he would. Whatever substance was on those darts, the medical staff was still unable to identify it. They didn't know how or why it slowed his heart rate and respiration, why he was still unresponsive, or when or if the drug's effects would eventually wear off.
I hate waiting, almost as much as O'Neill does. I'm just better at hiding it.
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I wonder how General West was able to do what he did to O'Neill, how he could sleep after. Or maybe he's one of those men who has no conscience to keep him awake at night. He would have to be, to order back to active duty an officer in the throes of grief and depression, and aim him like a deadly weapon at the Stargate.
West sent him out to die. Oh, I suppose he figured O'Neill would die anyway, I know Jack was suicidal after the death of his young son. West would have seen him not as a man but as a tool, a resource to be used before he was wasted on a senseless self-inflicted death. O'Neill dying for his country would save someone else's life. That's probably how Jack saw it at the time too.
Sometimes, the Air Force can be unbelievably cruel.
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Jack O'Neill had defied them all, not only surviving that first Stargate mission, but seemed to have somehow found himself again, out there in the universe. Since then, he has made a place for himself here.
There isn't a better man I could send through the stargate, no one I trusted more. Hell, I trusted the whole damn planet to his judgment.
There were plenty in the Air Force who thought *I* was the crazy one for doing that. More than once, Jack has proved them wrong.
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And yes, even as my second in command, he has his moments. At his worst, he's a bullheaded, impatient, impertinent, smartass. At his best, he's courageous, perceptive, aggressive and uncompromising.
Maverick that he is, he challenges me, and that's a good thing. A general needs to be reminded now and then that he's fallible and human. O'Neill stands up to me. And God knows, he makes me laugh, even though I try my best to hide it. It's not becoming of a general to laugh at a smart mouthed Colonel.
Okay, so he tries my patience now and then. Well, truth be told, more often than not, but usually with good reason, often great reason. He can be stubborn, sulky, surly and downright disrespectful, though too smart to be actually insubordinate. He has a code of honor and ethics he will not breach.
And Hell, I can't look past the fact that he's saved the planet, the whole damned planet, twice, if you count the Black Hole incident. It's a damn shame he'll never get the recognition he deserves for the things he's done. Of course, I know he doesn't much care, at least not for himself. He'd gladly give all the honors to his team.
Don't get me wrong, Jack O'Neill is a proud man, proud of what he's done, and he has a right to be. He's earned every one of those honors he's been awarded. I'll admit, the first time I was at his house, it surprised me, that in that curiously sterile place where this very private man lives, where there are no personal pictures and no private momentos, his medals and citations covered the mantle. They're not something he's ever talked about or even mentioned to his friends or co-workers. But there they are, on display in his living room, a statement of who he is and what he stands for.
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Cocky, some folks call him. Heartless and cold.
They don't know the Jack O'Neill I know. Maybe they don't see all that he tries to hide, because they don't look beyond the brashness and the sarcasm, to see the humanity he hides underneath.
They didn't see his eyes when that reporter died and how he struggled to believe what I told him that day. They didn't see his face when General Carter took that alien boy away, through the Stargate. They didn't see him at Kawalsky's funeral, or Daniel Jackson's wake, or grieving for Henry Boyd. They've never seen him when he thinks he's alone at night, in his office, the weight of his memories beating him down.
You can't do the things he's done in the name of his country, and not pay a price.
There are those by the book, stuffed shirt traditionalists in the Air Force who don't think much of him, but I'll tell you what, in my book, there's not a one of them that's worth a damn compared to him.
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"Son, you could wake up now," I tell the still form on the infirmary bed.
I'd be proud if Jack O'Neill really was my son. I've called him that often enough, though I'm not that much older than he is. And I don't know a thing about his family, have simply presumed they must be dead, or somewhere along the way he would have mentioned them.
He doesn't talk much about himself, it's true, he's much too private. That's an unhealthy thing, and I worry about it, the way he carries his burdens alone. I've tried with a quiet moment and a stiff drink to encourage him to talk, but I've found you can't make him open up about something if he's not willing. Come to think of it, you can't make Jack O'Neill do anything he truly doesn't want to do. Certainly not me, a mere General. Not the United States Air Force. Not the President. Probably not God himself.
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Colonel O'Neill brought together, and has kept together, the best and most unusual team in the SGC or any other branch of the service.
Okay, so I did have to insist on putting Sam Carter on the team. To put it mildly, Jack didn't exactly welcome her onto what would become SG-1, it's true. I still chuckle when I think of the look on his face when she walked through that door. Oh, that was a precious moment. But in the end, O'Neill didn't let his prejudices stand in the way of accepting a good officer whose skills were needed. He gave her a chance, that's good sense and good leadership, something the Air Force could use a lot more of, I think sadly.
And then he surprised me again, when he backed the bid of the civilian scholar Dr. Jackson to join the team, an unorthodox move that worked despite my misgivings. Ditto for the Colonel's fight to get Teal'c on SG-1. At the time, Jack's impassioned defense of the Jaffa truly surprised me. It doesn't anymore, though, now that I know him. O'Neill fights for what he believes in, out there in the universe, back here among the brass, even right here in my office, on occasion, wherever he has to. It's just his way.
So, there they are, SG-1: my throwback maverick Colonel, the Captain/scientist, a civilian/scholar, and an alien warrior. Somehow, O'Neill is the glue that holds them together.
I asked him once to describe his team to me. Daniel, he told me, is their conscience; Carter is their spirit; Teal'c their soul; and what was he? He shrugged, changed the subject, never did answer. But I know. He is their unyielding heart.
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Lord, let him pull through this one. I know I've asked this before, and I know I don't deserve another miracle, but you know, he does. We need him, the Air Force, the SGC, the Earth, his team and friends. I need him. I don't see how we could do this job without him.
It's quiet, too quiet, here at O'Neill's bedside, when suddenly I see his eyelids flutter.
"Colonel? Jack?"
His eyes are soft, unfocused, drifting around the room, before coming to rest on my face.
"Sir?" he mutters so softly I can barely make out the words.
"You're in the infirmary, son. You're going to be okay."
"My team?"
"They're just fine."
"Umm." His eyes close again.
"Rest, Jack. We'll talk more later."
"Yes Sir."
He's back asleep in moments. I watch silently a little longer, then head slowly for a few hours sleep in my quarters here on the base.
My 2IC will be okay.
All's right at the SGC.
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FINIS
