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The Cheyenne Mountain Irregulars: A Stargate Story Hour. Updated 7/20
- Thread starter Ladybird
- Start date
DrNilesCrane
First Post
Great beginning!
You're definitely off to a great start - I like the characters & the action, plus there's a real feel for the TV series (could definitely see the scene play out well as if it was an episode)!
Keep it coming!
You're definitely off to a great start - I like the characters & the action, plus there's a real feel for the TV series (could definitely see the scene play out well as if it was an episode)!
Keep it coming!
Ladybird
First Post
Previously, on the Cheyenne Mountain Irregulars, Part 2
(We're back! Sorry for the delay, folks - I hope to be posting more regularly from now on. Thanks to Joe and Orieth's players for their input on this post. Enjoy!)
August 14, 2010
Joe always liked working on his car.
It was quieter than you’d expect under there, when the engine was turned off – the heavy metal blocked out a lot of the noise of the outside world. He could focus on the motion of his hands, letting his mind go numb and just working through the physicality of it all, the sensation of grease and metal, not listening to anything except the instincts of his muscles as they turned, scraped, pounded.
Sometimes, at times like this, even the voice in his head stopped.
He kind of figured it got bored.
Today it had been pretty quiet – a little chattering in the morning, praising him on the new kind of bacon he had made for breakfast, but not much since then. That’s why he thought it was the voice in his head, at first, when he heard a man speaking to him while he was under his car.
“Joseph Healy?”
Not now, he thought automatically.
But the voice didn’t answer the way it usually did. Instead, it said it again. “Excuse me? Chief Petty Officer Joseph Healy?”
Joe twisted his head to the side, peering down the length of his body to the strip of light between the car and the ground. Two pairs of feet were standing there. Polished shoes. Crisply ironed pants cuffs. Uniform pants cuffs. Why me?
Joe rolled out from under the car, squinting into the sunlight. “Yeah?” And then he saw the rest of the figures. Dark blue uniforms; two stars on the shoulder of the taller man; a caduceus on the collar of the shorter one. Joe climbed slowly to his feet, pulling himself up with a hand on the fender as if he were stiff. Retired, he thought. “General?”
The general smiled under the brim of his hat. “Mr. Healy.” An Air Force general? What did that mean? He nodded towards the house. “Can we go inside?”
The doctor, shorter and younger, and with an eager smile, added, “We’ve got some things to talk to you about that would, uh, probably work best if we were all a little more comfortable.”
“I don’t understand,” said Joe, narrowing his eyes warily.
The doctor nodded. “You will soon. Don’t worry, Chief – we’ll explain everything.”
Joe snorted. “It’s Joe. I’m retired. Sixteen years.”
He led the other two men into the house, hastily scooping away a pile of books from the battered couch to make room for them to sit down. The doctor blinked at the titles – Principles of Cognitive Psychology, The Sun Also Rises, The Last Tycoon – and Joe dropped the books in the corner, shooting the doctor a defensive glance. “So…what is this? Is this about those tests I had at the VA a couple months ago?”
The doctor nodded, quick to agree, but he didn’t look any more comfortable than he had outside. “Yes, that’s right.”
They send generals now, to tell you that smoking is bad for you? Joe thought. Hey, maybe he’s the Surgeon General! He let out a raspy chuckle.
Stop that! There are other people around! There it went. The voice in his head. It wouldn’t have been nearly so annoying if it weren’t right most of the time. And it wasn’t really that funny.
It was too, Joe thought back.
From outside his mind, there was the faint sound of a throat clearing – the doctor. “The doctors at the VA noticed…er…a few irregularities on your MRI.” From a large portfolio briefcase, the doctor pulled out a transparency, holding it up to the light of the dusty window. It took Joe a few seconds to realize that the strange collection of light and shadow on the film was his body – yes, there was the collarbone, and there was the spine, and there was…something else. It looked like another, smaller spine next to his own, with tiny feathery bones. He shook his head, squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them and looked again.
The voice in his head started up. Can it be? Has your technology really become sophisticated enough to detect me?
Shut up.
The voice ignored him. It had gone tremulous, tightly controlled against fear-- or exhilaration. There may be trouble. Are we ready to run, if we must?
Shut up, Joe thought again, more forcefully.
He caught the doctor watching him with a sympathetic smile, completely misunderstanding the strained, uncomfortable look on Joe’s face. “Yes, I can understand,” the doctor said. “That’s about how the doctors at the VA reacted. They were, well, pretty disturbed. So they referred it to someone higher up – who, fortunately, knew enough to send your records to us.”
“The Air Force knows more about X-rays?” Joe ventured. His voice was absent, slightly distracted, as he fought back the voice in his head. Shut up! That’s a general!
Yes, I know! The question is what he will do with us. Let’s not run. Not quite yet. Although perhaps it m—
Shut up shut up…
Outside in the real world, the doctor was still speaking. “Well, not exactly. But we do have some specialized knowledge that allowed us to interpret your MRI results correctly. Especially when combined with your other medical records.” From the same briefcase, the doctor pulled a thick dusty file. “The psychiatric evaluations…”
“Wait just a second!” Joe stood up, instantly on guard. “I don’t know what the – “ he caught himself, glanced at the general, then decided on “heck you’re doing here, or who you are, but you have no right to be going through my medical records!”
“Hang on, Chief.” It was the General’s voice, slow, and soothing, that cut him off. “Sorry – I mean, Joe. I know this all must sound a little…weird. But trust me, it’s going to make sense soon. We’re not here to harass you, or put you in a hospital, or anything like that. In fact, we may have a job for you.”
“Both of you,” the doctor added.
Joe was suddenly filled with a sense of hope. Also terror. And he knew at least one of those emotions wasn’t coming from himself. Both, the voice prattled on. Implying acknowledgement of dual sentience-- at last, at last--I had almost doubted myself!-- he tries to soothe me, but to what purpose? How much knowledge was preserved by the Tau’ri? Joe pressed his mouth tightly shut, as if by doing so he could stop the other voice from talking; trying not to shiver in the sudden image of himself, dead; an asp next to him in process of being dissected.
“We think it probably happened when your ship was sunk--actually, we think it sank your ship,” the doctor was saying. “It was so close to the North Korean border that the wreckage must never have been found. And you recovered so quickly from your injuries, and have stayed in such excellent health since then. You’re – 78 now?”
“79,” Joe grunted, hunching his back reflexively. All his mental energy was going towards keeping that voice quiet. Shut up and I will let you buy all the stupid cheese and awful music you want! he thought desperately.
“And still running an eight-minute mile on the treadmill, according to the folks at the VA,” interjected the General. “Wish I could do the same.”
“So? I heard there’s a hundred-and-four year old guy who runs marathons. You talk to him?” Joe started to get up. Maybe if I get out of here, they’ll all stop talking…
The doctor held up his hands. “The point is, we know that you’re not your average 79-year-old man. And we think we know why.”
The General leaned forwards, looking straight into Joe’s eyes. Joe could feel the other presence in his mind looking back at the General, sizing the other man up, wary and hopeful and fatalistic all at the same time, which was pretty much more emotion than he’d felt at one time in years. “I’m the head of a top-secret Air Force unit called Stargate Command – SGC, for short. We’ve been operating out of a facility in Colorado for the last thirteen years.”
Apologies, my friend.
“Stargate? Chappa’ai?” It was Joe’s mouth that moved, but it wasn’t his voice that came out of it. It was deeper and more resonant, and its speech pattern was smoother than Joe’s usual monosyllabic grunts. Oh God, why me? Joe thought, from somewhere far back inside his own mind.
“Ah,” said the General, barely batting an eye at the sound of a different voice coming out of Joe’s mouth. “I thought so. To whom am I speaking?”
“I am Orieth, of the Tok’ra,” said the other voice. Joe could feel his heart pounding.
The General smiled. “Pleased to meet you. It seems that your friends back home have been pretty worried about you for the past 50 years. They’ll be very happy to hear that you’re all right.”
“You’ve been in touch with the Tok’ra?” The eyes closed in relief; for a moment, Joe felt the reins to his own body fall-- most disconcertingly-- then Orieth’s voice lifted with excitement. “What is the status of the resistance? What progress have we been making?”
“Oh, you’ll be happy to hear that we’ve been working with the Tok’ra for some time now. With their help, we’ve managed to eliminate quite a few of the System Lords.” The General’s smile broadened. “But we’ll have plenty of time to go into specifics later. I’d like for you to take a trip with us to our base in Colorado.”
“We’d like to run some more tests,” the doctor broke in, as if he thought this might be a treat. Then he caught himself, adding, “And….um…put you back in contact with the other Tok’ra, of course.”
“And maybe give you a job,” the General added. “We think that you have a lot of knowledge that could be very helpful to us at the SGC. So…what do you say?”
(We're back! Sorry for the delay, folks - I hope to be posting more regularly from now on. Thanks to Joe and Orieth's players for their input on this post. Enjoy!)
August 14, 2010
Joe always liked working on his car.
It was quieter than you’d expect under there, when the engine was turned off – the heavy metal blocked out a lot of the noise of the outside world. He could focus on the motion of his hands, letting his mind go numb and just working through the physicality of it all, the sensation of grease and metal, not listening to anything except the instincts of his muscles as they turned, scraped, pounded.
Sometimes, at times like this, even the voice in his head stopped.
He kind of figured it got bored.
Today it had been pretty quiet – a little chattering in the morning, praising him on the new kind of bacon he had made for breakfast, but not much since then. That’s why he thought it was the voice in his head, at first, when he heard a man speaking to him while he was under his car.
“Joseph Healy?”
Not now, he thought automatically.
But the voice didn’t answer the way it usually did. Instead, it said it again. “Excuse me? Chief Petty Officer Joseph Healy?”
Joe twisted his head to the side, peering down the length of his body to the strip of light between the car and the ground. Two pairs of feet were standing there. Polished shoes. Crisply ironed pants cuffs. Uniform pants cuffs. Why me?
Joe rolled out from under the car, squinting into the sunlight. “Yeah?” And then he saw the rest of the figures. Dark blue uniforms; two stars on the shoulder of the taller man; a caduceus on the collar of the shorter one. Joe climbed slowly to his feet, pulling himself up with a hand on the fender as if he were stiff. Retired, he thought. “General?”
The general smiled under the brim of his hat. “Mr. Healy.” An Air Force general? What did that mean? He nodded towards the house. “Can we go inside?”
The doctor, shorter and younger, and with an eager smile, added, “We’ve got some things to talk to you about that would, uh, probably work best if we were all a little more comfortable.”
“I don’t understand,” said Joe, narrowing his eyes warily.
The doctor nodded. “You will soon. Don’t worry, Chief – we’ll explain everything.”
Joe snorted. “It’s Joe. I’m retired. Sixteen years.”
He led the other two men into the house, hastily scooping away a pile of books from the battered couch to make room for them to sit down. The doctor blinked at the titles – Principles of Cognitive Psychology, The Sun Also Rises, The Last Tycoon – and Joe dropped the books in the corner, shooting the doctor a defensive glance. “So…what is this? Is this about those tests I had at the VA a couple months ago?”
The doctor nodded, quick to agree, but he didn’t look any more comfortable than he had outside. “Yes, that’s right.”
They send generals now, to tell you that smoking is bad for you? Joe thought. Hey, maybe he’s the Surgeon General! He let out a raspy chuckle.
Stop that! There are other people around! There it went. The voice in his head. It wouldn’t have been nearly so annoying if it weren’t right most of the time. And it wasn’t really that funny.
It was too, Joe thought back.
From outside his mind, there was the faint sound of a throat clearing – the doctor. “The doctors at the VA noticed…er…a few irregularities on your MRI.” From a large portfolio briefcase, the doctor pulled out a transparency, holding it up to the light of the dusty window. It took Joe a few seconds to realize that the strange collection of light and shadow on the film was his body – yes, there was the collarbone, and there was the spine, and there was…something else. It looked like another, smaller spine next to his own, with tiny feathery bones. He shook his head, squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them and looked again.
The voice in his head started up. Can it be? Has your technology really become sophisticated enough to detect me?
Shut up.
The voice ignored him. It had gone tremulous, tightly controlled against fear-- or exhilaration. There may be trouble. Are we ready to run, if we must?
Shut up, Joe thought again, more forcefully.
He caught the doctor watching him with a sympathetic smile, completely misunderstanding the strained, uncomfortable look on Joe’s face. “Yes, I can understand,” the doctor said. “That’s about how the doctors at the VA reacted. They were, well, pretty disturbed. So they referred it to someone higher up – who, fortunately, knew enough to send your records to us.”
“The Air Force knows more about X-rays?” Joe ventured. His voice was absent, slightly distracted, as he fought back the voice in his head. Shut up! That’s a general!
Yes, I know! The question is what he will do with us. Let’s not run. Not quite yet. Although perhaps it m—
Shut up shut up…
Outside in the real world, the doctor was still speaking. “Well, not exactly. But we do have some specialized knowledge that allowed us to interpret your MRI results correctly. Especially when combined with your other medical records.” From the same briefcase, the doctor pulled a thick dusty file. “The psychiatric evaluations…”
“Wait just a second!” Joe stood up, instantly on guard. “I don’t know what the – “ he caught himself, glanced at the general, then decided on “heck you’re doing here, or who you are, but you have no right to be going through my medical records!”
“Hang on, Chief.” It was the General’s voice, slow, and soothing, that cut him off. “Sorry – I mean, Joe. I know this all must sound a little…weird. But trust me, it’s going to make sense soon. We’re not here to harass you, or put you in a hospital, or anything like that. In fact, we may have a job for you.”
“Both of you,” the doctor added.
Joe was suddenly filled with a sense of hope. Also terror. And he knew at least one of those emotions wasn’t coming from himself. Both, the voice prattled on. Implying acknowledgement of dual sentience-- at last, at last--I had almost doubted myself!-- he tries to soothe me, but to what purpose? How much knowledge was preserved by the Tau’ri? Joe pressed his mouth tightly shut, as if by doing so he could stop the other voice from talking; trying not to shiver in the sudden image of himself, dead; an asp next to him in process of being dissected.
“We think it probably happened when your ship was sunk--actually, we think it sank your ship,” the doctor was saying. “It was so close to the North Korean border that the wreckage must never have been found. And you recovered so quickly from your injuries, and have stayed in such excellent health since then. You’re – 78 now?”
“79,” Joe grunted, hunching his back reflexively. All his mental energy was going towards keeping that voice quiet. Shut up and I will let you buy all the stupid cheese and awful music you want! he thought desperately.
“And still running an eight-minute mile on the treadmill, according to the folks at the VA,” interjected the General. “Wish I could do the same.”
“So? I heard there’s a hundred-and-four year old guy who runs marathons. You talk to him?” Joe started to get up. Maybe if I get out of here, they’ll all stop talking…
The doctor held up his hands. “The point is, we know that you’re not your average 79-year-old man. And we think we know why.”
The General leaned forwards, looking straight into Joe’s eyes. Joe could feel the other presence in his mind looking back at the General, sizing the other man up, wary and hopeful and fatalistic all at the same time, which was pretty much more emotion than he’d felt at one time in years. “I’m the head of a top-secret Air Force unit called Stargate Command – SGC, for short. We’ve been operating out of a facility in Colorado for the last thirteen years.”
Apologies, my friend.
“Stargate? Chappa’ai?” It was Joe’s mouth that moved, but it wasn’t his voice that came out of it. It was deeper and more resonant, and its speech pattern was smoother than Joe’s usual monosyllabic grunts. Oh God, why me? Joe thought, from somewhere far back inside his own mind.
“Ah,” said the General, barely batting an eye at the sound of a different voice coming out of Joe’s mouth. “I thought so. To whom am I speaking?”
“I am Orieth, of the Tok’ra,” said the other voice. Joe could feel his heart pounding.
The General smiled. “Pleased to meet you. It seems that your friends back home have been pretty worried about you for the past 50 years. They’ll be very happy to hear that you’re all right.”
“You’ve been in touch with the Tok’ra?” The eyes closed in relief; for a moment, Joe felt the reins to his own body fall-- most disconcertingly-- then Orieth’s voice lifted with excitement. “What is the status of the resistance? What progress have we been making?”
“Oh, you’ll be happy to hear that we’ve been working with the Tok’ra for some time now. With their help, we’ve managed to eliminate quite a few of the System Lords.” The General’s smile broadened. “But we’ll have plenty of time to go into specifics later. I’d like for you to take a trip with us to our base in Colorado.”
“We’d like to run some more tests,” the doctor broke in, as if he thought this might be a treat. Then he caught himself, adding, “And….um…put you back in contact with the other Tok’ra, of course.”
“And maybe give you a job,” the General added. “We think that you have a lot of knowledge that could be very helpful to us at the SGC. So…what do you say?”
Last edited:
GreenArmadillo
First Post
Once again, you've managed to capture exactly how this scene would play out on the show, were we able to hear the internal dialogue with the Tok'ra. Great work, Ladybird!
And y'all actually went with the two players, one body Tok'ra plan I see. Very cool. Out of curiosity, how do scenes like this one play out at the gaming table? Does Orieth's player cross-talk against the GM/other PC's (with the rest of the table pretending only to hear the currently dominant personality)?
And y'all actually went with the two players, one body Tok'ra plan I see. Very cool. Out of curiosity, how do scenes like this one play out at the gaming table? Does Orieth's player cross-talk against the GM/other PC's (with the rest of the table pretending only to hear the currently dominant personality)?
Ladybird
First Post
GreenArmadillo said:
For internal communication, the two players actually have a notebook that they pass back and forth, writing comments to each other. It can produce some wonderfully realistic results sometimes - for instance, Joe laughing at something that Orieth has written, but that nobody else has heard.
Thanks for the comments and support! It's always great to know that people are out there reading and enjoying the Story Hour!
GreenArmadillo
First Post
Ladybird said:
Interesting, though I could sadly never play a Tok'ra - my poor host wouldn't be able to understand my handwriting.
Obezyanchik
First Post
GreenArmadillo said:Interesting, though I could sadly never play a Tok'ra - my poor host wouldn't be able to understand my handwriting.
We don't _quite_ have the right equipment to have them chatting over an IM service on laptops during the game, but we've been discussing it. Maybe eventually we'll get it to happen.
Obezyanchik
First Post
Ladybird said:
It really made my day when that happened. It was just so cool!
Ladybird
First Post
GreenArmadillo said:Interesting, though I could sadly never play a Tok'ra - my poor host wouldn't be able to understand my handwriting.
Fortunately for me, both players have decent handwriting
And that notebook is an amazing resource for a Story Hour writer - I mean, how often do you get to see what's actually going on inside the other characters' minds?Similar Threads
