“We may have to call this one.”
Vala blinked. “What?”
“The chance of being caught in the act is much too high. We’re going to rob this house in the broad daylight, with a potential hundred witnesses, and according to Bellee, Wyrrick is the kind of person who holds a grudge. All of that adds up to too much hot water. You say I have a knack for escaping when I’m imprisoned, but the real trick is to not get imprisoned in the first place. I do that by knowing when to call it on account of impossibility.”
“It’s not impossible.”
“Fine, but is it worth the effort? You’re the one with something to prove here. This treasure is your way of getting back at Qetesh, I understand that. You want to symbolically fund yourself with the treasures you lost. But is that worth everything we’ve been going through these past few days? I’m still trying to get over the hangover I picked up on Baleya’s planet. It can’t be worth the risk of being thrown in some rich man’s dungeon if we get caught.”
Vala was looking down at the map. “It’s not just a symbolic gesture. I don’t want Kali’s treasure just to own it. Qetesh did horrible things to get her riches, and she used my body to get it.” She flipped her hair out of her face. Her cheeks and ears were burning, but she wasn’t going to cry in front of Tanis. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, waiting until her breathing was steady before she continued. “I don’t doubt Kali acquired her treasures in the same manner. Gold acquired through bloodshed and torture. I want the treasure so I can do something good with it.”
Tanis stared blankly at her through a curtain of fallen hair and Vala waited as if for a firing squad, knowing she would be mocked for her statement, but she didn’t care. It was the truth. Finally Tanis broke her silence.
“No one’s ever accused me of doing anything good.” She looked down at the map. “We’ll need a better extraction plan.”
Vala stared at her as hope blossomed in her chest. “Yes, it… it makes sense. It doesn’t matter how much we get in the ship if we can’t escape afterward.”
“It won’t be easy.”
Vala slowly felt her normal self-confidence returning. “Now, Tanis. Let’s not get discouraged. This isn’t an insurmountable problem.”
“I’m open to suggestions. Because right now it’s looking pretty insurmountable.”
“Ye of little faith. I’ve had to overcome much bigger problems than this. I’m sure you have as well. We just have to apply ourselves.”
Tanis sighed. “Well, we’d better hurry. The party is in four days and if we don’t make our move then we won’t get another shot. You better hope another female System Lord’s loot ends up on the black market if you want to get your good deed.” She began to walk around the perimeter of the building. “Insertion and extraction are two big problems, but we can’t focus on that right now. If we come up with a plan to move the items that doesn’t line up perfectly with our preset requirements we’ll be back at square one.”
“Okay. So we figure out what we’re doing inside and how, and that will inform the rest of the plan. It’s what happens inside that matters.”
“Right. And what’s happening inside is that we need to find a way to move Kali’s goods without being seen by any guards or the guests.”
Vala pursed her lips and exhaled. “We need to be invisible.”
Tanis straightened. “Yeah. That would work perfectly.”
“Sorry to get your hopes up. I sold my remaining inventory of Re’tu gland months ago.”
“That’s okay. I didn’t mean we had to be genuinely invisible. We just need people to ignore our presence and look through us even when we’re standing right in front of them. Like anyone wearing identical uniforms, moving through the crowd with covered trays or pushing carts covered with large sheets…?”
Vala’s eyes widened. “Caterers. Tanis, you genius!” She dropped to one knee and stretched out over the map. “The kitchen shares an access hall here, which connects it to the corridor with the display rooms. We could bypass the main room entirely. And even if someone happened to see us moving back and forth, they wouldn’t think twice about it. We could carry out everything we want right under Wyrrick’s nose!”
“Maybe not everything,” Tanis said. “We’d be limited to whatever we could carry on the carts and trays, so the bigger things will have to stay behind. But this way we could take more than five trips. We could take as many trips as we needed. We just have to get in with the caterers.”
Vala tapped a finger on her chin. “Easier said than done, I’m afraid. Wyrrick is sure to take precautions with this sort of thing. He’ll have planned ahead and anticipated security breaches. On the day of the party, of all days, he won’t relax his guard.”
“I didn’t say it would be easy. If I wanted easy, I would just put on my Kull warrior armor and walk in guns blazing. Oh, wait. I can’t do that…”
Vala rolled her eyes back and slumped her shoulders. “My God will you ever let that go?”
“One of the most valuable tools in our arsenal and you just walk off and leave it. Which may have been acceptable if you’d actually succeeded in the job, but no. You lost the ship, too.”
“I would like to see you steal an entire ship by yourself.”
“Remind me again how many crew members were on the ship when your plan got foiled?”
“If you had been there, maybe things would have turned out differently! Two against one, ever think of that? You wouldn’t have even let me keep Jackson on board in the first place. So the entire mess is really your fault for not being there!”
Tanis started to respond, then stopped. “Was… that a compliment?”
Vala straightened her shirt and looked away. “Possibly. You are extremely adept at getting out of tight situations. If you’d been there perhaps the two of us could have overpowered Daniel Jackson, and I’d have not lost the suit, gained the ship, and we wouldn’t have to look over our shoulders for Jup and Tenat seeking revenge.” She pressed her lips together. “I suppose what I’m saying is that I’m sorry, and I’m willing to admit you have a way with plans. It’s one reason I’m always willing to work with you even though I don’t trust you. You’re good at this, Tanis. Almost as good as I am.” She swung her arms in an attempt at casualness. “And that’s… all I’m going to say about that.”
Tanis blinked. “Okay. I don’t trust you, either. For the record.”
“Oh, you’d be a fool to.” Vala began to circle the blueprint drawn on the floor. Tanis moved in the opposite direction. “There’s a solution here, and you’ve found it. Food service. We get in, we move invisible through the crowd, we get what we came for, and we get out. Most of the hard work is done. The last difficult bit is actually inserting ourselves into the catering crew. How exactly do we go about that if Wyrrick is certain to cover every base?”
Tanis paused next to the kitchen. She tilted her head one way, then the other. Finally she looked up at Vala through her hair again. This time, she smiled.
“Hope you know how to cook, Mal Doran.”
Vala grinned.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The more she thought about it, the more horrified she became at the idea General O’Neill might have agreed to her suggestion in a moment of desperation. Morello knew that if he’d agreed to it she would currently be frantically searching for a way to back out of the deal. She very much wanted to be the one who came up with a solution, not for the glory but in order to prove herself as a valuable member of the SGC. The mission reports were full of team members doing crazy things in the interest of saving the world. General O’Neill himself had risked court-martial and treason charges on more than one occasion. Daniel Jackson had risked death several times, succumbing more than once. And Samantha Carter… well, the mental acrobatics she’d pulled off in the nth hour would be enough to destroy a normal human’s brain.
Morello had set up a workshop in the mess hall, bent over history books and encyclopedias of mythology. She was s
o wrapped up in her reading that she didn’t notice Colonel Getty’s arrival until he pushed one of her notebooks aside to make room for his tray. She reached to save it from falling onto the floor and smiled sheepishly as she looked up at him.
“Sorry, sir.”
“No need to be sorry. May I?”
She nodded. “Of course. I’m just trying to find some way to convince Kali to help us.”
Getty sat down and opened his drink. “SG-1 is on the case, Captain.”
“I’m aware of that, sir. I’m also aware that if someone from another planet was looking for the nuclear football, even if they found it that wouldn’t mean they could actually launch the missiles. SG-1 is looking for a magic button that can save the day, but even if they find it, it will still be alien technology. There’s no guarantee we’ll even be able to use it to shut off the devices.”
“Samantha Carter is a certifiable genius. She’ll figure it out.”
“Be that as it may, sir, I’m going to do everything in my power to save them the trouble. We have Kali, we might as well try to use her.”
Getty smiled. “Have you always been like this, Morello?”
“Yes, sir,” she said, turning back to her book. “Ever since I was a kid. I knew there was a gold standard out there somewhere, some lofty goal that indicated the best and the brightest. I had no idea what it was, but as long as people kept pushing me higher…” She shrugged. “From high school to the Air Force Academy. That’s where I first heard about some top-secret elite posting. I knew I had to do whatever I could to get here. So I figured out what I might need to study in order to make the grade, buckled down, went to grad school, and here I am.”
“And now?”
“Now I’m angling for the general’s chair.” She smiled. “In a few years, anyway. But for right now I’m content with just pulling my weight. Justifying my presence to anyone who might question it.”
Getty said, “No one is questioning your presence here, Captain.”
“I know, sir. And I aim to keep it that way.” She tapped her pen against the drawing of Kali. “The people who made this place always go above and beyond what’s necessary to do the right thing. Did you know General O’Neill once basically kidnapped an alien girl and took her to an elementary school? Just so she could learn how to be a kid.”
“No, I didn’t know that.”
“Samantha Carter once went into a bomb shelter to comfort a different little girl that everyone else thought was implanted with a bomb that was about to detonate.”
Getty nodded. “That I heard about.”
Morello said, “And Janet Fraiser once…” Her voice trailed off, and she looked down at the encyclopedia again.
Getty waited for her to continue. “Captain? What did Dr. Fraiser do?”
“Excuse me, sir.”
She stood up and hurried out of the cafeteria. The anecdote she had thought of was more rumor than actual fact, and it hadn’t been mentioned in the official report, but even if it wasn’t true, her reasoning could still work. She took the elevator down without thinking about what she was doing, walked down the corridor as if she owned it, and didn’t realize how presumptuous she was being until she had entered General O’Neill’s office without knocking.
She stopped dead just over the threshold, frozen in space as O’Neill and Harriman both looked up at her. She opened her mouth to apologize, tried to force herself back into the hallway where she could hope they would forget what had just happened, but her feet were frozen in place. She reached for the door as if knocking now would help at all, then dropped her hand to her side.
“Uh-oh.”
O’Neill raised an eyebrow. “Captain. Was there something you needed?”
“Um. A question. I had… a… question to ask you.”
He handed the file he’d been looking over to Walter and dismissed him with a nod. Walter left, pausing before the door closed to give Morello a look of compassionate understanding. Once they were alone, the general gestured at the spot in front of his desk.
“You have the floor, Captain Morello.”
“Right. Sorry. Um.” She cleared her throat. “There’s a rumor about Dr. Fraiser, and I wanted confirmation it was true.”
“And this is relevant to our current situation?”
“It could be, sir. Three years ago, Cassandra Fraiser was suffering from an illness. Nirrti was a prisoner of the SGC at the time, but she refused to help. General Hammond offered diplomacy, he negotiated, and according to the reports there was a long discussion between you and General Hammond about whether or not to give in to her demands. In the end the thing that convinced her to help was Janet Fraiser walking into her cell and holding a gun on her.”
O’Neill cleared his throat. “Right… but you understand that’s not the sort of resolution we condone. Even if I did want to give her a medal for that little display.”
Morello nodded. “Of course, sir. I wasn’t thinking of a direct duplication, but the mentality of the moment is what matters. We’ve exhausted asking nicely, sir. We aren’t going to offer her anything valuable enough to make her help us. We need to think like Janet Fraiser. She didn’t look at Nirrti as a Goa’uld. She saw someone who was withholding treatment from her sick child. She responded to that without any of the other complications. Yes, Kali is a Goa’uld, but she’s also a human host. We have to appeal to that side of her.”
“I assume you wouldn’t have barged in here without a plan in mind.”
“Yes, sir. I mean, no. No, sir, I wouldn’t have.” She winced. “And… sorry, sir.”
O’Neill leaned back in his seat. “No, no. You’ve got my attention. Let’s hear what you have.”
Jack came down the stairs as Walter glanced back to make sure he was there before speaking. “SG-1’s IDC confirmed, sir.”
“Bring ‘em home, Walter.”
The iris slid open and Jack descended into the gate room. “Welcome back, kids. You’re home… just in time for the…” He slowed and tilted his head to the side as he registered that his team was dressed rather differently than normal. “Show,” he finished lamely.
Sam stopped at the bottom of the ramp and sighed. She wore a black and green jacket with a stiff, high collar that made it seem as if her head had been severed and placed on a pedestal. Two vertical stripes of green makeup ran from her hairline to her jaw to correspond with the color on her jacket, passing over her eyes. Her hair was slicked back away from her face, and Jack had to admit the overall impression was much more masculine than he’d have assumed.
Sam gestured at the blazer and the matching black trousers. “Okay, sir. Get it out of your system.”
“Get what out of my system? Oh! Are you out of uniform?”
Daniel had been dressed in a flowing white overcoat with a brown leather placket. “Anton Bellee informed us that a couple of Tau’ri wouldn’t make it through the front door at Wyrrick’s party, even if we had an invitation. Which we do, by the way. Bellee was willing to part with his invite, so at least as far as that goes, the trip was a success. He assured us that Wyrrick will still have the things we need from Kali’s palace. And then he decided to take the extra step and give us something to wear.”
“Ah.” Jack looked at Sam. “No slinky little black dress? High heels, something simple but chic?”
“Bellee didn’t have any women’s clothing. We’re just lucky he had something in our sizes.”
Teal’c said, “He is rather diminutive.”
Jack glanced at the sleeveless tunic Teal’c was wearing over a pair of floating linen trousers that draped his feet like bell bottoms. “Yes. Well, it seems to have worked out for everyone. I guess this is to be expected considering how some of the Goa’uld dress.”
Sam glanced at the control room and rolled her eyes when she saw everyone watching her. “So. Sir. You said we were just in time for the show.”
“Right!” He motioned for them to follow him. Daniel self-consciously rubbed at his cheek as they
passed an airman who was trying valiantly not to snicker at their appearance. “Captain Morello on SG-9 has been busy while you guys were out playing dress-up. We’ve been trying to find a way to get Kali to help us with the device.”
Sam said, “How’s that been working out for you?”
“Not well. Turns out, the Goa’uld? Not the most charitable folks in the galaxy. But Captain Morello thinks she’s come up with a way to convince her.”
“Do we have time to change out of this stuff before we observe?” Daniel asked.
“I was just on my way when you dialed in. Morello’s waiting for me before she goes in.” He put his hand on Daniel’s shoulder as they stepped into the elevator. “But I want you to know from the bottom of my heart, even if you did have five minutes, I’d still say we had to go right now.”
Daniel sighed. “You’re enjoying this way too much.”
“Yes,” Jack said unabashedly. “It’s the first time I think I’ve been glad I’m not going off-world anymore.”
The elevator doors closed on his self-satisfied smirk.
Morello flexed her hands at her sides, opening and closing her fists as she tried to focus her anxiety. General O’Neill approved of her plan. He thought it was a good idea, albeit a little crazy. But he’d added, “Those are always the plans with the best chance of working.” She hoped he was right because, at the moment, she was feeling less than enthused. But it was her idea, and she was grateful he was letting her go forward with it. Colonel Getty was waiting with her for moral support, and her heart leapt into her throat when the elevator doors opened to herald the general’s arrival.
“Sir, I…” Her words died in her throat when she saw SG-1 behind him. They looked like refugees from Burning Man, especially Colonel Carter’s oddly flattering face paint. The general smiled at her confusion. It was one thing to try her crazy Hail Mary in front of her direct commanding officer and the man in charge of the entire base, the living legend of the base. But now all of SG-1 would be witnesses to her potentially epic failure? She couldn’t even look Daniel Jackson in the eye.
SG1-24 Two Roads Page 17
