Fox in the Wolf Den

Posted on Sat Mar 9th, 2019 @ 8:02pm by Civillian Shae & Brigadier General Nathan Wolf

Mission: Aftermath
Location: Cheyenne
Timeline: Current

Nathan hadn't had a chance to really talk with Shae since she'd joined the dysfunctional Project New Dawn family, and he wanted to remedy that. Jake had mentioned the fox girl was a tea drinker, and of course Nathan knew she couldn't drink coffee. While Nathan often drank coffee, he was also a secret tea drinker, and frequently brewed a pot or three of loose leaf tea when he got home on cold nights and went through all of it. So, he brought a few teas he thought she might like, and the gear he needed to brew it, and set that up in his office. Then he had an airman find her and invite her to his office.

Nathan had a larger office than his predecessor. In addition to his desk, he had a small two person sofa and a comfortable chair and a small coffee table. Nothing two grand, but some place to comfortably talk with someone. There was space on the walls for pictures and other decorations. There were pictures of Nathan in various locals, usually dressed for the field, including a few of him and a somewhat younger, and lower ranked, Jake Asher. There were a few of his more interesting looking Filipino blades on display. Those were as functional as they were decorative.

Nathan set the water to boil and awaited Shae's arrival.

It was not long after when a courtesy knock came from his door, and an airman ushered the new 'recruit' in. Instead of being dressed in her usual tattered wool and fur, or the green fatigues provided by the base, the young fox-woman was wearing a kimono. It was the simplest of simple garb, a common quality slubby silk with a dragonfly motif woodblock print, but it was the haori jacket that was truly eye-catching. The silk was flawless and the maple leaf design was a work of art, with each leaf lined with gold thread. Standing there with her long white hair, her fox ears standing tall, the large bushy tail following her, and the dainty paws sticking out from the bottom of her kimono instead of feet, she really did look like the mythical creature from legend.

"You asked to see me?" Shae said softly.

Nathan smiled. "I did. Thank you for making time to speak with me. Come, have a seat over here. I understand you're a tea drinker. I'm usually a coffee drinker at work, but I keep a lot of loose teas at my house. I took a chance, considering your origin, that one of the Japanese or Chinese inspired teas might interest you, so I brought a few of each. They're over there. They're labeled and you can smell them if you'd like. I checked, none of them are harmful to you. Pick one you'd like and I'll brew us a pot."

Shae looked over to where he gestured to the couch and sure enough there were some tins of tea, so she sat down and inspected the tins, lifting the lids to give them a sniff. "Mmm, these are nice," she said with a small smile as she enjoyed their aromas. Most of them were too strong for her, but she savored their scents for a moment longer before choosing a mild green tea and setting it apart from the others to indicate her choice. "So what did you wish to see me about?" she asked, folding her hands in her lap.

The water had boiled, so Nathan set to brewing a pot of the green tea Shae had selected, then sat in the chair facing her. "Well," Nathan said. "First to thank you. I know Jake gave you permission to leave the team and return to New Dawn after you'd made your introduction to...Lei Fang, I think the report said his name was. You could have returned here and let the team fend for itself, but you stayed and you helped, despite being injured in the process. I know that means a lot to the team, and I wanted you to know that your bravery means a lot to me, too."

"Something didn't feel right about how Governor Lei Fang had accepted our request for assistance," Shae informed the General. "If anything, that made me want to leave even more, but my conscience wouldn't allow it knowing that I could be leaving your team in danger. And my injury was not severe, and it was worth it to do the right thing."

"Well," Nathan said. "It still means a great deal to all of us that you pushed through your very real fears and fought by the team's side. I understand you're interested in helping us open up trade with those cultures who might be willing to work with us."

"Yes, that's right," Shae replied with a nod. "The idea actually came about from a conversation with Corvus and the woman who calls herself Ree, because we were supposed to be posing as merchants, but with nothing to trade it was an ineffective cover, and since most of my contacts developed through regular trade, it seemed only natural to introduce trade as part of the team's explorations through the Chappa'ai."

Nathan nodded. "Well, I'm very interested in this idea. It fits in well with a strategy we'll be implementing from this point forward. Essentially it involves providing what aid support we can to those people who would resist the Goa'uld but can't do so in their current state of development, negotiating alliances with not only these people, but also those who either are resisting the Goa'uld, or would if given the proper support and motivation, opening up trade with the people out there. For resources, for knowledge, for technology, and, where possible, we'll strike at the Goa'uld or assist our allies in striking at them. Two things we will not be doing at this time is either charging headlong into System Lord politics, or fighting the System Lords head on. We don't understand enough of the political, social, or military situation out there to attempt something like this mission to ally with Lord Yu, and we don't have the infrastructure--ships, weapons, technology, etc, to be effective in a stand up fight with the Goa'uld. So we'll be smart. We'll disrupt their operations, we'll create chaos in their territory, we'll rally others against them, all while improving our military situation at home and our diplomatic situation out there so that if the time comes when the Goa'uld decide to focus their attention on us, we have a better chance of taking on the Goa'uld directly. I should have implemented these plans immediately, but there was someone in command here before me who was removed from command shortly after I arrived. He had set things in motion that had to be played out. But I'm in command now, and I can assure you things will be different."

Nathan took a moment and poured tea for both of them. He sat back and took a sip of his. "Good choice." he said. "So, now that I've talked your ear off, why don't you tell me where you think we should start our trade efforts. Are there any planets you have in mind?"

"If Hen Da ye Huihe hadn't been attacked, I would have suggested we start there," Shae replied dryly. "It was a successful trade city, plenty of opportunities to get started, but... it is highly unlikely that any survivors will be keen to trade with outsiders after what happened, assuming there are any survivors at all." Having let her cup cool for a moment, Shae took her tea and took a sip, pondering something that had happened earlier with Corvus. "General-sama, I think I may have done something wrong," she admitted, resting her hands in her lap and swirling the tea around the cup. "During the fighting, the medicine man, Corvus, asked if the people in the town would be okay, and I hadn't the heart to tell him the truth; I told him they would be fine, but when he came to see me a short while ago to check on my injury, the truth came out. He was not pleased with what I had done."

"Don't beat yourself up about that," Nathan said. "Sergeant Corvus shouldn't have asked that question. It was a distraction. Frankly, I'm glad you lied to him. It helped him focus on the job in front of him and not on a situation he couldn't do anything about. I believe you know as well as I do that if he had attempted to intervene, he would have been killed, and that his death might have led to the deaths of other team members, and those villagers would still have suffered. Now our job is to focus on ways that we can protect villages like that one. As for Corvus? He'll get over it. If he doesn't, please inform Major Asher and myself and we'll straighten him out. But Shae, you did nothing wrong. You made a tough call and I think your decision was the right one."

"I still feel terrible about it..." Shae admitted, her ears drooping. She sighed, then took another sip of her tea. "Anyway, I have a few worlds in mind; some know what I am and will quite happily turn me in, so I will not be able to visit those worlds, and for the worlds I can visit, I can talk to my contacts to find out what items would be good to start with."

"I would be grateful for your assistance," Nathan said. He smiled. "And so you know, the team will do everything it can to protect you out there. You're one of us and, as I think Jake told you, we don't let our people get taken, and if they do get taken, we don't stop until we get them back. So, talk to me about these planets you think might be good places to start."

"Thank you, General-sama," Shae said with a warm smile, assured by his words that they would protect her. And then they talked planets. Over several hours and a second pot of tea, Shae started detailing worlds where she had traded, complete with addresses. She would write down the addresses, and then he would take notes since her skills writing in English were practically non-existent. She was forthcoming about who her contacts were and what she traded, which in most cases were meats and pelts, but sometimes she would acquire goods from another world if she knew her contact had need of it. She pointed out which worlds traded for items and which ones traded for coins, and which coins were good on other worlds. Once she got through all of her trade worlds, then she started listing every single planet that she had been to over the course of her life. Well, all of them except one, secretly keeping one world to herself. She did her best to estimate how long it had been since she visited each world and what the conditions were on that planet at the time, but it was hard when she was gate hopping so often, maintaining any sense of the years was quite difficult without regular seasons. The General asked questions when necessary, but didn't pry; he could tell she was often relating very personal information, so he only asked for clarification if it could be pertinent to a mission. From the way she described the worlds, it was clear she was avoiding any world with ties to any of the Japanese pantheon, while she gravitated towards other Asian-centric cultures for the sense of familiarity; since she couldn't walk among the Japanese cultures, she would get as close as she could. Seeing the long list of worlds painted a picture of a very lonely life, but Shae wondered if it was time for that loneliness to come to an end...