Comes the Hunter

Posted on Wed Apr 3rd, 2019 @ 4:54am by 1st Lieutenant Hunter Williams & Brigadier General Nathan Wolf & Major Jacob Asher

Mission: Interlude 1
Location: Cheyenne Mountain: Project New Dawn
Timeline: Current (Monday)

Nathan was looking over Hunter Williams file when someone knocked on his door. "Enter!" he said. Jake Asher stuck his head in.

"You wanted to see me, sir?" he said.

"Yep," Nathan said. "With both Hawk and Caleb on temporary assignment elsewhere, we've been sent a guy to be your new team XO. He's a retred. In addition to his military training, he's got a bachelor's degree in anthropology, which I think makes him a good fit for us."

"And you want me to meet him now?" Jake said. When Nathan nodded and pointed to a chair, Jake took a seat. "Sure thing, sir."

Nathan eyed Jake suspiciously. "Jake Asher," he said. "Have you done something wrong? Because you're being unusually respectful today."

"Nope," Jake said. "Just not in the mood to be a wiseass at the moment. I promise to turn into one the moment it seems appropriate to be one if that makes you feel better, sir."

Nathan shook his head. "One of these days you're going to wise off at the wrong person, Jake."

"I'll keep the general's wise words in mind as I travel the highways and byways of this journey we call life," Jake replied.

Nathan laughed.

"Thank you," Hunter said to the general's attache as he opened the door, being told he should head straight in and he should be expected. Walking in, he noticed the General at the desk, a Major sitting in one of the visitor chairs - and he couldn't help but notice the Major carried a sidearm on base, highly unusual. But, that was secondary. He'd been through this again and now he actually had to enforce these courtesies.

He stood far enough in the room to let the door shut, facing both equally. "First Lieutenant Hunter Williams reporting as ordered, sir," he said, saluting General Wolf, except for the papers in his left hand, he was almost parade ground perfect. He'd practiced the speech as soon as he learned he was reporting to a general. It wouldn't do to screw up and refer to himself as a Senior Master Sergeant. He'd done plenty of pushups his first few weeks of CRO for getting that wrong.

Nathan returned the salute. "Have a seat, Lieutenant." Nathan said. "The wiseass with the gold oak leaves is Major Jacob Asher. I stepped in him several years ago and by the smell I'd say he was still stuck to the bottom of my boots. He hasn't made a wisecrack yet, but give him time. He's the commander of SG-1, so he'll be your immediate superior. I know you're older than he is, but you've both been there and done that so I expect you to do your damnedest to get along, complete your missions, and bring your team back safely. Is this understood? I expect an answer from you, too, Jake, sans wiseassery."

"I understand, General," Jake said. He looked at the Williams. "Answer the man, Lieutenant, so I can start making wisecracks again."

"As you order, Major," Hunter said, falling back on his former life. He felt he'd probably do that a lot, despite going from stripes to bars. "General, I first left as a Senior Master Sergeant, I'm used to wet behind the ear pipsqueak butterbars barely off their mama's tits being my 'boss', sir. I see no difference here, sir, other than I'm hoping the Major has been weaned. No offense intended, Major, you look comfortable with a weapon so I'm going to presume you've been in some shit."

"Lieutenant," Nathan said. "I have known Major Asher since he completed the old Combat Control Officer Pipeline. Not only has he been there and done that, but he did the lion's share of it under my command. That means he's earned the right to be a wiseass with me. Despite your considerable experience, haven't earned that right with him, yet. I have friends that say you're damn good at what you do. Jake knows some of those same friends so he's prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt. But at the end of the day, he's a Major and you're a Lieutenant. He's the Team Leader, you're his second. You can be a little rowdy. Just don't forget that. Now, you two will go and get to know each other. That's an order. I'm sending you out in about a week, so you're not allowed to beat each other up. That's all. Dismissed."

Jake shrugged. "You heard the Old Man, old man. Let's vamoose." Jake got up and gestured for the Lieutenant to proceed before him. "Age before beauty, Lieutenant."

"Keeping the General's well deserved dressing down in mind, Major, I'm not sure how to proceed, as I am older, and much better looking. However, since I'm not ever going to win the collar tab game in this room, I'll proceed before you."

He waited for Asher to join him in the hall and then extended his hand. "Nice to meet you, Major, obviously I'm new to this officer gig."

Jake laughed and followed Hunter out into the hallway. When Hunter extended his hand, Jake shook it. "No hard feelings. I think General Wolf figured if I responded then there would be this whole thing we'd have to work out and it would be awkward, and all that crap. I actually have had the chance to read some of your file, Lieutenant. You were kind of a badass, HALO jumping from pterodactyls, doing CASEVAC for cavemen... Sorry, couldn't resist. In all seriousness, I'm glad to have you on the team. We should talk about my two problem children. I'd welcome any advice you might have. One isn't really so bad since I almost executed her on a mission, the other... the other is either the greatest special operator waiting to happen or a complete dud and I haven't figured out which."

"Don't you forget how badass I was with dinos, sonny-boy," Hunter said, "Nothing like the mammals you have to face today. We're talking teeth as sharp and long as my memory!" He indicated they should proceed and, as he followed behind Asher, he turned a bit more serious. "Here I thought I was going to have to beg to be handed problem children. But, execute? That sounds extremely serious, if I may so so, Major? Also, maybe you can catch me up here? I thought I was coming to teach those wet behind the ears pipsqueaks barely off their mama's tits how to be butterbars and, I'm thinking that's not it."

"Sure," Jake said. "My office is down this way. I've got coffee, tea, water, and, off the record, something that social mores require only be consumed after five in the afternoon local time." Jake started walking. When they got to his office, he ushered Hunter in. "Have a seat. What can I get you, Lieutenant?"

"Long as you're not talking to my doctor then coffee, lots of it and the stronger the better," Hunter said as he took the offered seat. "I'm not sure where I'd like to ask you where to start. Screwup operator annoys the hell out of me, considering training was my job and I'd never allow that. Or the much more concerning idea of you stating you were going to execute a member of the team. Though, all that's secondary to what it is we're doing here, cause, considering everything, it's got to be some incredibly top secret shit."

Jake put on a pot of coffee and sat at his desk. "Okay, so, contrary to what Crow, Sergeant Corvus, thinks, I don't go around threatening to shoot people for kicks. What you need to know is that on every mission, either certain members of the team, or sometimes all members of the team, are issued GDOs, or Garage Door Openers. They send a signal through the gate to tell the Control Room to open the covering we've got set up to block unwanted visitors. Shae has a home on a friendly planet and has permission to return there as she pleases, as long as she meets her responsibilities here, so she has one of her own. Everyone else, including Doctor Andrews, has to turn theirs in at the end of every off-world mission.

Jake's coffee pot was a small one so it was done quickly. He poured to mugs of coffee and handed one to Hunter and let him fix it the way he wanted as he fixed his and then continued.

"Doctor Andrews is host to a Tok'Ra," Jake said. "Technically, they're Goa'uld, but they share their host's body rather than completely take it over and they are the enemies of the Goa'uld that have styled themselves as ancient Earth gods, the ones that are sometimes referred to as the System Lords. Now, this means that Jessica, and her Tok'Ra Salara, are familiar with travelling off-world and they are, of course, free to leave as they please, but they need permission to take a GDO with them. We were on a mission that we'd planned the day before, a very dangerous one. When we got to the planet and I tried to execute the plan, Jessica tried to toss that plan out and replace it with one that might have worked if she was flying solo, but was far too dangerous for a team to pull off. I ordered her to stick to the original plan. She refused and tried to run off through the gate on her own. I then ordered her to hand over her GDO, since her running around God knows where with it, places where it might be taken from her, presented a serious global and national security threat. She refused that order. So I and the other members of the team who I had worked with before, all aimed our carbines at her and I informed her she could a) get with the program, b) hand over her GDO and leave, or c) be put down like a rabid dog. Corvus managed to settle the situation down and we got back on track. But I assure you, if she had tried to leave with that GDO, I would have put her down and continued on like it was any other day that ended in the letter 'Y', and you can take that as the absolute truth."

"And Corvus, crow?" Hunter stopped to chuckle at that. The names of people. "That's your other problem child I take it? Wait a minute. Dr. Andrews?" He set his mug down on the edge of the desk. "That wouldn't be an anthropologist by the name of Jessica Andrews would it?"

"Disappeared about seven years ago?" Jake said. "Right around the time she finished her PhD? Yeah. That's her. Why?"

Hunter smiled as he shrugged. "I got in a bit of trouble with one of my professors for trashing one of her articles in a paper. Didn't realize the professor and Andrews were friends. But the paper did have some errors that she skipped over by just stating she was right and offering no proof. I found that pretty arrogant. Others and I were getting a little loopy at a study session and came up with the theory that she's got to be multiple personalities because she contradicted herself often in her published works. Wow. I finally get to meet her and see where she's at now. But seems she's still as full of herself as we thought she was back then. Okay, so there's that problem. Give me a brief overview of your other wayward problem, this Sergeant."

"He's either a train wreck or a sharp operator and they're no predicting which he'll be," Jake said. "He did something really stupid, I told him what he did was stupid. Now he keeps going around trying to prove he's not stupid instead of proving he's smart, and since you can't prove a negative, he ends up doing more stupid things."

"And now he's focused on you negatively and the two of your are clashing?" While it sounded like a question, it was really more of a statement. "Not my first rodeo on that one. How do you want to handle it?"

"I'm open to suggestions," Jake said.

Hunter drank coffee to give himself a few moments. "Generally, that type is that type for a few reasons. The cocky, arrogant bastard that thinks he should be in charge. The complete screwup that somehow passed through all the training - which I don't believe if the case here, unless training got really lax. The guy whose got some problems going on that he's not dealing with or the daddy's boy. Maybe a combination of some of them. Let me ask you, Major, you said you saw my jacket. You trust me enough at the moment to start dealing with this issue? On both your sides?"

"The way this works, Lieutenant," Jake said. "Is that shit rolls down hill, not up. I deal with you, you deal with him. I'm not interested in hugging it out. If he has some kind of a problem with me, he needs to find a way to deal with it that doesn't involve wasting my time. I fail to see why I have to take on his bullshit. Why shouldn't I just tell General Wolf that Corvus is a waste of space and have him booted?"

Hunter set the cup down again and sat up straight. "With respect, Major, if that' the way you felt about him, you would have already done it. You must think there's something salvageable about him if you're willing to give him a, what? Fourth chance?" He relaxed slightly. "Tell you what, if I can't get him into the same room with you, and civil all around, by the start of the next mission, I'll have him booted. Not just from this command, but the service itself. Fair?"

"Uch," Jake said. "Let's not go nuclear. We're off for the week. You put us in the same room and I'll listen to what he has to say. I'll even give him the opportunity to tell me it's all my fault if you think that will help. But when he's done blaming me for his mother not breastfeeding him or whatever, then we figure out how to work together, preferably before someone gets killed because we can't. Do you know he actually let a goddamn wolf bite him on the last mission in an attempt to expose those CDC guys? I mean, he was right that they were bogus, no doubt there. And I fucking missed it, which pisses me off to no end. And he'd been mentally regressed to the age of about 18 or 19 at the time, so that sort of gives him a pass, but he let himself get bit by a goddamn wolf for fuck's sake! He could have lost his leg!" Jake smiled, shook his head, then just laughed. "A goddamned dire wolf sized wolf!" Then he cracked up laughing some more.

"Are you fucking shitting me?" Hunter asked, sitting straight up and fuming. He's always willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt, there were more than one side of the story. But that went beyond the pale. To allow himself to be injured? What sort of asshattery ignorant, cowardly bullshit was that? But, he took a deep breath and held it before releasing the steam valve slowly. "How's he doing?" If he didn't lose the leg, then Hunter was determined he was going to get a good lesson in self-harm.

"Fine, I think," Jake said. "I haven't been to see him, and yes, that's an oversight. I was going to track him down today and check on him, but I haven't had the chance yet."

"If he's focused on you, now might not be a good time. I'm willing to bet it's only fed into his 'anger' toward you and it'll be thrown up as another accusation. But, if I can get him turned around, then, if you feel it's appropriate, Major," he sort of stressed the rank showing that he knew Asher could do as he wished because rank definitely had its privileges, "you can bring it up then."

"I'll defer to your experience, Lieutenant," Jake said. "A phrase I never thought I would hear myself say. Oh, and my friends call me Jake. I don't want to muddy the waters, but I think you're probably smart enough to figure out when to use my rank and call me sir and when it's okay to call me Jake."

"Yes, sir, will do, Major," Hunter said with a smile. "But, give me some time. CRO kicked my ass into super motard mode and I'm clawing my way out slowly. Is there anything else I should know? I want to get a little settled then begin meeting the team."

"Just this," Jake said. "Out there, off-world? We're a goddamn long way from home. There's no CASEVAC by air or any other kind of vehicle. No close air support, no artillery or naval bombardments. We can sometimes operate UAVs, but there's no satellite imagery, no GPS, and no sat phones. It's just us. Wolf will open the gate for scheduled check-ins, and if we fail to make one, he'll start a clock on sending back up. But if you think about it, by the time we miss a check in, we might really be in the shit. You're pretty squared away, so I'm sure you'll bring your A game to every mission, but if you're going to accidentally leave your A game at home, try not to do it when we're scheduled to go off-world. Making mistakes out there is...scary. I know. I've made some."

"Roger that, Major," Hunter said, standing. "And if I may say so, Major, that's surely one hell of a motivational speech."

"Yeah," Jake said. "I'm a regular Tony Robbins. Just trying to make sure you know what you're in for, Hunter. A little bit later this week, the General will open the next mission to the rest of the team. It's a scout, essentially. Nothing too strenuous. Of course, that's what they said about the last one. Anyway, Lieutenant, I have things to get to. We'll grab a beer or something sometime soon. Until then, go forth an do great deeds of doing in my name, and by that I mean make great strides in solving my Corvus problem."

"Copy that, Major," Hunter said as he made for the door, but then stopped. "Major, when I first enlisted, back before you were a gleam in your father's eyes, there was a tradition that wise, experienced Majors bought the first round for all newly minted lieutenants. Now, I figure, I got skipped up a rank due to my advanced....experience...so that seems like two rounds to me. I'm sure the team will appreciate it."

"I accept," Jake said. "You do realize you're only about six or so years older than me, right?"

"A fact which I intend to bring up with every dinosaur joke you make, or anytime you express 'concern' if I can keep up with the young'uns," he said with a smile. "As for the drinks, I'll carve out a time with the rest of the team where we can all get together. Preferably in some nice, military friendly bar in town that's far outside of work. In the meantime, I think I have a few phone calls to make and some people to meet."

"I'll walk you out," Jake said. "I've got to go to the control room to look at probe footage."