Imagine: The List
Fic posted by members of Vo's Imaginings YahooGroup


Jack and his teams watched from up the street as the invasion started. "Bingo," he noted. "People, their heads have to come off because they physically eat people instead of eating energy like the wraith. Have fun and be safe." The soldiers surged forward to handle the stream of demons. "Don't touch anything that didn't come out of the portal," he called when one of them flinched away from the demon there to help. Jack nodded at them. "Thank you for the help."

"We respect parts of the human military."

"I'm General O'Neill," he said with a smirk.

"The Great Traveling One? Yes, we do trust you and respect your people." He called something and the soldiers got a lot more backup from warriors. "My people are warriors."

"Always happy to have help. Afterward, make sure you get to safety. We'll try to cover if others try something." The demon nodded, making that note and he sent his troops in to help back up the slayer and the hunters. Jack fired on a few more demons. This was stupidly hard. "I need a machete," he decided. "It's easier than blowing a head off." He called for them to be used and found his in his holster on his back, pulling it out to get further into the fray.

"Slayer, duck," the head demon shouted. "Behind you!" She ducked and turned, killing that demon, then she smiled and nodded at him. He shook his head, moving to guard them. They needed more people to help. Thankfully that general had people on their way. Including agents and other military people.

"There's unarmed combatants inside the building," O'Neill yelled at the military teams showing up. "Their higher ups did it and didn't evacuate them!" That got a nod. "The portal's that stone thing," he pointed. "Blow it! Please blow it!"

"Yes, sir," one of them yelled back. They sent teams to clean that building and to kill that portal device. Minute explosives destroyed a side and it twisted then shut itself down with a small air explosion. The building was finally cleared and all those people were quarantined to be talked to.

Buffy pushed her sweaty hair back, looking around then at the demons. "Thank you, people. You did great helping us. You have our whole team's thanks." A few smiled and nodded at her. "Go find healers and be safe, guys. If they try to harm you, I'll stomp them myself." They went back to their hidden enclave's staging area. That way if the humans followed they wouldn't find their houses or families. The military training center was easily defended.

Jack stopped a soldier trying to follow them. "No." He stared at the guy. "No way in hell. They're peaceful, they were helping, you're not going after them."

"They're..."

"I don't give a fuck," Jack noted impatiently. "They helped save this city's ass. You're not going to go after them."

"We have orders, sir."

"I'm a general, kid. I don't give a fuck." The soldier backed off, calling that in. "People, make sure the military people are given to medics so they can be treated," he called, making a hand motion.

"Yes, sir," a male voice shouted.

Jack blinked. "You're back already?" he asked, smiling slightly.

"In the last hour, sir. We snuck in under cloaking and got here in time to help clean up." He waved. "Docs, go treat people. The general's exhausted and mad."

Buffy smiled as she walked past him. "He's good though. He did really good."

John Sheppard smiled at her. "We're seasoned with end of the world battles, Miss Summers. Our program does plenty of that ourselves." She shivered. "Go rest and heal. You need it." She nodded, sneaking off with their people. He looked at the general. "We have people ready to do clean up of the other dimensional natives, General."

"Let's clear the field of the living and injured. Then they can clean it up. The higher ups of that law firm?"

"Having tea on top of a building nearby to oversee their accomplishment," an agent said. "We were not pleased, General."

Jack smiled. "We tried."

"We heard." He shook his hand. "Thank you. Have fun going back to San Diego."

"My project's in Colorado actually." He limped off. "I'm getting too old for field battles," he told John quietly. Getting a nod back. "Seen Mitchell?"

"Getting stitches." He pointed. "All our med teams are here and not happy that this managed to happen. They treated any other dimensional natives just as politely as they do us, if not a bit more politely since they were kinder to them than they are to us."

"Thanks, Sheppard. Nice timing too."

"I try, sir." He walked off with him. "If I had my way I would've parked the city sooner so we could've jumped in."

"You got here in plenty of time because I was going to call for replacements for some of us soon." He clapped him on the arm before they walked into the medical tent. "Good work, people." A few smiled at him. Doctor Lam was glaring at him. "What?"

"General Landry is having a fit, sir."

"Yeah, especially since some hackers found out he had done treasonous things," he told her, making her gasp and step back a few steps. "Along with the president and others. I actually had to give that information to the Joint Chiefs committee, Doctor Lam. They nearly ate me for it. All they could agree on was it needed to be stopped, but no one wanted to do it personally." She winced. "Yes, it's that bad. Worse than the Trust crap bad." He moved closer. "I'm sorry he's your dad," he said quietly. "But I'm not letting us all be destroyed for whoever's pulling his puppet strings."

She nodded. "Thank you for letting me know, General."

"I'm the same asshole I was earlier, Carolyn." He smirked. "Just a bit more banged up now." She pointed at a free bed and he went to sit on it. Someone wearing Commander's stripes stomped in. "I'm over here," he called with a hand wave. "I'm guessing you're the officer in charge of the battle unit?"

"I am. Who're you to countermand my orders?"

"General Jack O'Neill." He stared at him. "Air Force special forces." He smirked slightly. "And in control of that battle situation out there because we were here first because we got warned about it a few months back but couldn't stop it." The man was looking horrified. "What? Let it out. Yes, the Air Force does fight," he said patiently. He let the nurse pull his t-shirt off him, looking at her. "You're not usually that mean."

"I've had dozens of soldiers to heal today, General. Most of them I don't even recognize."

"Ours learned how to handle strange battles," he agreed. He looked at the commander again. "We are not going to be doing anything against the other dimensional natives who *helped* us win that battle, Commander. I don't give a fuck who told you otherwise. And if it was a Joint Chief, I'll go get in their face for you. This military does not touch peaceful beings of any type. We make war on warriors, not civilians.

"The military tried that once from what I've learned and it was so nasty that a few people got ordered to commit suicide instead of having a trial so they couldn't disgrace their army units. Three troops of Rangers got that order," he said at the man's opening mouth. "We do not follow, we do not harass, we do not bother the other dimensional natives in the US. Because they could be a war we don't want to start. The ones earlier are from a warrior culture."

"Our bases's general wanted to know more about them, sir. He's a two star."

"Then he's high enough to call up General McIver and ask him," Jack said bluntly. "Because he's the guy that shut down the project that screwed up so badly. He's army."

"I'll let him know. The other humans who weren't military?"

"Their job is to handle the ODN that aren't peaceful and good citizens, Commander," he said with a slight smile. "That blonde girl was in charge by the way. And also really looking for a better boyfriend who can put up with her life."

"Married, sir, but I'll let a few I know aren't shitheads know." He walked off calling his commander. "General, General McIver is here," he called. "Sir, General O'Neill referred my commander to you about the order to follow those weird looking supposed natives."

McIver looked at him, shaking his head. "No, we are not, Commander. At all. If your commander is that worried, have him come see me, kid." He walked in there. "I wish I had gotten here earlier, Jack. I only got here half an hour ago, just in time to see that blonde girl have a we survived it dance with the young guy." He stared at him. "Your source wasn't wrong," he said dryly.

"No, sir, he said an invasion." He stared at him. "The ones in charge?"

"Under heavy military police guard. I'll be damned if they're going to start this shit." He crossed his arms over his chest and looked around then at the nearest nurse. "Anyone serious?"

"Some were bitten, some were cut by others who weren't used to swords or machete work, sir," she reported. "One's in surgery to close a more serious stab and bite wound on top of it." Jack winced. "Most of the soldiers and others should be able to get back to duties within two weeks or so."

"Good. They survived the first invasion of the continent." She shivered. "Thankfully we had some warning ahead from some hackers. Speaking of, Jack, I showed up today because of them, not all this."

"Damn it, I thought I had gotten through to that kid."

"You did. He protested while another hacker put it out there. Your Dr. Kusangi just had a fit on someone on the internet and threatened to recruit them to clean toilets and other nasty things while she taught them better." Jack tried not to laugh. "Then your Dr. McKay got into it. And he agreed with the tactical reason for the timing, but he said the kids were going to be conscripted and sent to real schools with good educations so they could pay them all back for getting your whole project outed."

"Whole?" he asked with a wince.

"Every nasty, dirty bit that proved humans are stupidly ignorant. And then the new president got asked about it," he said dryly. "And he had a fit. A bible thumping and throwing it at one of the reporters fit."

"Not my doing. We just handled the problems we were handed, sir."

"That was pointed out to him and he wants to talk to you."

"Yes, sir, I can make myself available to DC tomorrow," he said with a sigh. The nurse injected some local anesthetic and got to work on his stitches. "Think he'll calm down by then, Jim?"

"No," the other general said, giving him a smug look. "Not in the least. Though only one reporter's asked the Pentagon for a statement as of when I left."

"Only three generals knew and it was President's eyes only with the IOA. I have no idea when they briefed him about that since he's been the president for about two weeks now."

McIver nodded as he walked off. "Show up being spiffy tomorrow, Jack. Be on your best behavior. Avoid the Marines." He left the medical tent.

One of the marines looked over. "I don't know why. We're doing what Marines have always done and doing it the right way," he complained.

Jack smiled. "You're my guard tomorrow."

"Sir, I'll be limping."

"I don't expect an attack yet. It'll take them a few days to get together to attack us all," he said sarcastically. "Someone tell Sheppard."

"Already heard from McKay, sir," he called from outside the tent.

"You're coming with me tomorrow. Then we'll debrief about the city, Sheppard."

"Yes, sir. If I must be spiffy and shiny."

Jack groaned. "I need to find my formal uniform. I think my last one got shot at." The nurse was giggling. "Not my fault they shot at me after giving me an award." She laughed harder but got him cleaned up so he could go mope and do any post-battle calming down rituals he had.

Sheppard handed the general his phone. "Was found on the ground, sir. Xander said to have some candy. When I asked why, he told me he always got a sugary coffee drink on his way to a real drink that had rum in it, then a candy bar as he watched the sun come up the next morning because they had made sure of it. When I pointed out the sun would come up anyway, he gave me the line about trees falling in the forest and some of their battles might've ended the physical planet as well, so therefore no sun coming up over the horizon that no longer existed."

Jack shook his head, answering Xander to make sure he knew that he was all right. All the local uncles were. They walked off together. "I need to find my uniform. I'm pretty sure it has bullet holes."

"Sucks, sir."

"Yes it does. Any news on payback yet?"

"Not yet. A bit of freaking out. Some mild screaming about mutants or demons, depending on the source. A lot of religious worrying about demons taking over humanity and why some were fighting with us."

"They're other dimensional natives," Jack told him.

"I can get that out there." He sent a text message to McKay, who sent back he'd stress that in the ranting he was doing. "The warriors helping us went to a gym looking place."

"Probably a training center. They're a warrior culture."

"They were helpful and all the other ones that showed up to help did good work too," John said, getting in to drive the general in a free jeep. "Airport?"

"We've got troop carriers. We couldn't use the ship because we're still supposedly hidden."

"Got it." He called that over the comms. "I have the general, going back to the plane to wait on everyone else to reappear. Yes, Major, this is Colonel Sheppard." He hung up and drove them off. He let an MP take it back to the battle site since they were there to turn over their prisoners to US Marshals. "You guys have fun with them," John called with a wave.

"We hope we don't have to, but if they try anything we sure will," one assured him. "Who're you two?"

"That's General O'Neill. He'll be in DC tomorrow to answer various yelling people," Sheppard said with a smile. "I didn't get here in time." That got a nod from the Marshals. They got onto the plane to rest and John told him about the flight back, and the fight in the center, and how two of the ships had warned them not to land because they had presidential orders to shoot the city and destroy it even if it were in the middle of a populated area. Thankfully they noted they couldn't see through the cloaking device. The third had been silent but hadn't fired on them at least.

***

Jack was let into the meeting room in the White House, saluting immediately. "Sir, General O'Neill, reporting as ordered." He stared at the president.

"Sit down, O'Neill. We apparently have to talk," the president said, glaring at him. "What the hell are you playing at?"

"Sir, I don't play games. Especially not with my people." He stared at him. "By the way, was it your order or the last president's order to shoot Atlantis out of the sky if and when she showed up?"

He blinked. "Excuse me?"

"Two of the three space ships warned Colonel Sheppard when they got in range, sir."

"She's back?"

"Yes she is."

"Where is she?"

"Cloaked because of that order and because she's classified, sir. But she's on the west coast."

"All right." He considered that. "I'll rescind that in a minute, O'Neill. Explain to me why we opened that gateway in the first place?"

"Originally we were exploring, seeing if other places had things that could help our people in multiple fields. That's why I traveled with an anthropologist and a science genius in engineering and physics. Who are both here and waiting to debrief as well, Sir. I figured you'd want to talk to them too."

"Yes, I do." He looked at the files. "Why didn't we open it sooner?"

"According to Dr. Jackson, Budge sucked when he translated hieroglyphics. He retranslated it and we figured it out. Then on the other side we found a place that looked exactly like ancient Egypt and had temples to the ones that built the gateways. Daniel finally figured out how to get us home after a few hours and a slight battle but by then he had a wife from not paying attention so he stayed. That lasted for a year before the gou'ald came back and took his wife."

The president looked at him. "Was it a soap opera, General?"

"Depends on the day and the team, sir. And if there was a female gou'ald around sometimes."

"They made it very soap opera like?"

"Sir, didn't you get the report on what a female gou'ald can do?" he asked. He looked at the package of information. "Daniel!" Jack bellowed. "He only got a partial briefing!" The rest of his team came in, with Teal'c. The other generals and agency heads all visibly flinched. "Easy, people. Teal'c served on my team for over ten years and he led the revolt that let his people overthrow the slave owning gou'ald that held them all hostage. I trust that man more than I do anyone in the US military." He kicked out a chair. Teal'c sat. "Daniel, no one told him what female gou'ald could do. He asked if we were a soap opera."

"Some days," he agreed. He pulled up information. "Here, someone put this tablet onto the display system." A general took it to do that. "This is Hathor, a female gou'ald we ran into a few times. This is a report on a shared female gou'ald power of pheromones." He pulled that up and they looked it over, a few groaning.

"As noted, sirs, some of us had to handle it for the befuddled men," Sam Carter said, looking a bit smug.

"Aren't you a doctor of math or something?" one of the generals asked.

She stared at him. "I've seen more combat than you have, General. To be blunt, I was on the lead field team for ten years, headed Atlantis for over a year, and had battles during all that and lab time. You're welcome for still being able to sit here since it was my science that blew up an attacking gou'ald space army by blowing up a solar system." He flinched back, moving his chair back. She smiled slightly. "Yes, I'm also Jacob Carter's daughter. You attended the base party he threw for my graduating high school class. You actually jitter bugged with me." He slumped, staring at her. She smiled. "Some of us are not only brilliant but brilliant in a few fields. We hired for the best, people."

The president looked at her. "You're in a combat position?"

"It wasn't originally meant to be one, but yes. When the prime team, SG-1, went to meet new people and we had a battle, I was with them and I fired just as much as the men did, Sir." She stared at him. "When Atlantis had a series of battles, which was pretty much almost every few hours some days, I headed the civilian contingent because there wasn't one appointed at that time. Then I came back here to do more teamwork in the field."

He blinked at her. "You're a woman."

"Yes, sir, that fact hasn't escaped me at any point in time," she told him. "To most enemies that doesn't matter and the ones it does, well I killed them extra hard so I didn't have to be rescued from their grubby hands."

He swallowed. "I didn't realize we had women in combat." He looked at O'Neill, who nodded. "That is against present military orders."

"The greatest majority of women in my program are actually civilians and sometimes they do get into the field for research and other things. Then they do have to be able to handle themselves. We make sure of it. Every single member of my program is required to be able to fire a gun at the very least. Most have to be in field shape in case something happens while they're off-site doing research," Jack said. "Including the ones on Atlantis."

"That's a future talk," the president decided. He looked at the information on the screen then at him. "How many times?"

"Three, four," Sam admitted. "We thought we killed her twice."

"Are there others that bad?" the head of the CIA asked.

"One managed to clone himself," Daniel said. "We're not certain we've gotten all the Ba'al clones."

"I think we've gotten them all. We got thirty-two if I remember right," Sam told him.

"Cloning," that director said dryly. "Now we're going there?"

"The Asgard, who you think are Roswell Gray's," Daniel said. "Did that. That's how they propagated their species. They gave up actual reproduction for cloning new bodies and transferring over. They had a few problems, which is why they look less humanoid." He took the tablet to call up information on them. "That's the Asgard. We worked very closely with them for a number of years until they had to build a time bubble to protect themselves from a potentially devastating battle against the replicators."

They all read that and the president laughed a tiny bit. "That explains a lot. Oh, God, this is messed up!" he said loudly.

"The gou'ald were preparing to come back to get more slaves," Daniel told them all. "The planets they seeded from earth's population were getting a bit genetically stagnant. It's a long running project joke that's really not that a lot of species out there would be happier to trade for eggs and sperm and fertile women than they would food, medicine, or technology that we're willing to trade."

"Never above the generator level," Sam told the worried looking people. "We have supplied generators to places that desperately needed them. Filtration systems for water systems, those sort of things. Our doctors have helped many places with health issues and taught year-long fellowships to a few advanced races' doctors who wanted to learn from us."

"In exchange," Daniel said. "We got technological information, cultural information in some cases, some limited weapons, and a lot of allies when things happen. They can't do much but if they're having a battle against the Ori we can show up and they will help us with what they can do."

The president stared at him. "Was that really an equal exchange, Doctor Jackson?"

"Yes, sir, in many cases it was. A lot of the cultures managed to stop about the Renaissance era culturally but a few have advanced beyond that. The social scientists among us always complain that we don't have a lot of time to study things that show us how we evolved culturally but about the third year, scientific and cultural exploration got waylaid in favor of military exploration. We were never sure if that was because General Hammond was ordering it or if higher ups did."

"He was the original general?" one of the other generals asked.

"Yes, that's why he took over Homeworld Security," Jack said. "That's why I took over his seat on the base and then his seat in HS, and now I'd really like to go back to my seat at the base since Hank Landry was messed up with the same program the former president was."

"We hampered him," another assured him. "He has a shadowy overlord sort that everything he does goes through."

Jack smirked. "I've met him. He hates us and I nearly had him fed to a wraith, General Constance."

"That's not really polite, Jack," he said dryly.

"Oh well. He told a Marine that he should just go sacrifice himself instead of using tactics to save everyone."

"I'll talk to him, Jack." He looked at the others then at him. "Why do you want it back?"

"Because it'll take a firm hand to keep the leaked information from getting us all blown up," Jack said sarcastically. "Plus to undo all the harm Landry did."

"The man was a disaster to Atlantis," Sam Carter agreed. "Tried to cut off food shipments and other necessary supplies. They were already trading for some but plenty of things couldn't be grown up there. Including coffee. Our science department keeps Columbia and Hawaii's coffee production in business, Generals."

"I know the head of science for Atlantis has a three pot a day habit," Daniel said. "I myself have a pot and a half a day on the normal, easy days when I'm not up for thirty-six straight."

"Why?" the president asked. "You're an anthropologist."

"I'm also a linguist," Daniel said. "And in charge of that department, sir. Plenty of times we had emergency translations that people's lives depended on."

"Is that normal?"

"If there was another program like ours, I'd ask," Jack said. "The only other one that a working gateway was Russia and they had a lot of problems. And caused us many more. We basically shut them down."

"Do we have teams from them?" the head marine asked.

"We had one at one time," Jack said. "The IOA thought it was a good idea. They were well enough behaved but didn't like our tougher rules about how things should be."

"I got really tired of teaching cultural relativity," Daniel said dryly. "Twice in the same day during a mission because they were horrified the people we were visiting had naked slaves." He shook his head slightly and sighed. "It was considered something we disliked and couldn't condone but they had things we could trade for and we weren't going to interact with any slaves. I made sure they realized that our people no longer had them and we were bothered by the sight of slaves so they had assistants show up to feed us tea while we negotiated."

"Diplomats and politicians can handle those sort of situations easier," the president agreed.

"All teams have at least one person with tact," Jack said. "We made sure when a few were more known for blowing shit up that tried to attack them. A few might've been able to be negotiated with but the rest...."

"SG-4 got a bad reputation in some places," Teal'c agreed.

Jack's phone audibly buzzed and he sighed, looking at it. "General, didn't they confiscate your phone?" the president demanded.

"No, sir, because there's plenty of people who want to blow my people up right now. Though this is my nephew and he said he's talked to the hacker who released the information. She was trying to protect the other dimensional natives who helped at the battle yesterday, and the rest hiding down here, by pointing out that many others are peaceful, just look a bit weird." He looked up. "She couldn't do that without outing the project a tiny bit and another hacker, who wasn't related to my group or her group, did the rest of the outing." He answered back. "One of my new people does know which other group that was and he's growled at them a lot, plus gotten the really great hacker who just got back with Atlantis to growl as well, and they're in deep shit anyway. They consider Snowden a saint." He looked up. "Should I note anything to him?"

"How old is he?" the head marine asked.

"Seven. I briefed my head and the old president about my nephew Xander, General. Didn't they tell you I had partially inherited him?"

"I heard you inherited a nephew."

"He's my godson. His parents were drunk shitbags and they died. I share his custody with a SEAL on detached duty and that new hacker we just got about a month and a half ago." He grinned. "We adore Xander most of the time." He wrote back to him and turned off his phone. "I let him know I'm in this meeting so he'll save any notes for an email later." Daniel's email notification chimed. Jack looked at him.

Daniel looked then shook his head. "The bookstore I go through for obscure language texts found me one." He leaned back in his chair again.

"The Sumarian you've been looking for?" Sam guessed.

"The other one, the one from earlier Egypt that was copied onto a papyrus from a tomb and then passed down." He smiled at the president. "They do come in very handy. We've found over sixty stored gou'ald canopic jars in the last ten years."

"Like they found with King Tut?" one of the other agency heads asked.

Daniel nodded. "The gou'ald took on the names and mantles of the Egyptian pantheon at the higher levels, and some other handy pantheons that were nearby at times."

"Any from the ancient Central American ones?" that agency head asked.

"Unconfirmed at this time but we believe they had been a splinter group that got wiped out," Sam Carter told them.

"We haven't found any firm evidence yet," Daniel said. "Then again, we haven't had the authorization to go on anthropological digs in years. The last one was in Egypt to find a cache of hidden canopic jars."

"Next you'll tell me mummies are real," the president said sarcastically.

"That's Watchers Council stuff," Jack told him. "We know of them because of Xander and other incidences. That blonde yesterday is their mystical chosen warrior." The president gaped, staring in horrified awe. Jack shrugged. "From what little we've heard of them we hate them already and how they treat their mystically chosen warriors. We have no idea how or why they started. I'm not sure I want to know because then I'd have to listen to Carter and others complain about magic again."

"It's not real," the president said.

Sam Carter coughed. "I looked over that portal device, sir. It wasn't run by any energy that I could find. Had no technological components. Had a lot of funny writing that Daniel can't translate and was just solid stone."

"The Watchers Council's job is to handle the problematic of the other dimensional natives, like what happened yesterday," Jack told them. "That's why they have a mystically chosen female warrior and have since before writing started apparently." Daniel nodded. "You found more mentions?"

"In early Eurasian cultures. A lot of others in early African writings and stories that have been passed down," Daniel told them. "It's said that she's imbued before birth and when one dies, another's called to the duty until she dies. We have no idea about that at this time. Frankly, we weren't going to get into an international pissing match over this yet. Until we had more intel and more research done. Right now we barely know that they exist."

The president stared at them then at the others. "Did anyone else hear about this?" One raised his hand. "Why?"

"That abomination of a program noted a slayer and a Council of Watchers in England."

"By Stonehenge," Jack said with a point in the right direction. "Hereditary based. Not the girls but the people over the girls."

The president stared at him. "Were they responsible for the invasion yesterday?"

"No, sir, that was partially a law firm," Jack said with a grin. "They were captured while watching over the battle from a rooftop having tea."

"I heard," he admitted. "The rest of the law firm?"

"Looking at their methodology with our State Department liaison," Sam Carter said. "The lower levels are minions. They have statements in their contracts that state the law firm can take their souls and recall them from the dead to be unpaid slaves. They have death penalties for turning on the law firm, which will result in that soul clause being called in and them being called back from death." The president shuddered and crossed himself. "The top three of that law firm are other dimensional natives, or demons because they don't look human, and the group that started the invasion was the top few in the law firm and a few others."

"Why are they considered demons if they're sentient and all that?" a general asked.

"For the same reason you can't see dolphins and other mostly sentient species as good as humans," Daniel told him. "Plus most of them aren't really human looking."

"Not from around here, not human looking, some have specific gifts like magic," Sam Carter agreed. "We're not sure how many of the biblical and other religious versions of demons were actually those sort and what were religiously based at this time."

"Most of the ones that used to be here, before humans were sentient enough to grunt, probably came from other places," Jack said. "But from where was lost to history and it was probably destroyed. They had whole societies then the Ancients, the ones who turned into Ori and who built Atlantis, got sentience and fought to overthrow them and took their technology to use and learn from. Then they fell from a sickness and a few problems, and we rose." They all stared at him. "We have the books, people. Some we just got recently thanks to a Watchers Council source since we only knew back to Ancients."

"Can we prove that?" one demanded.

"The half-life of the main metal component on Atlantis is over five hundred thousand years old and we have some that have passed that mark on the interior, first built structures," Sam Carter said, pulling up the report on Daniel's tablet. "Also, the city has a sentient AI that is low on power but she has talked to us a few times about her people. She was sunk in the Pegasus galaxy for about ten thousand years."

The president blinked, reading that report. "Oh, dear. That's going to cause even more screaming from people." He sighed. "Can we cover some of this up?"

"I haven't seen how open they blew us," Jack said. "I had post-battle duties and reports last night. I let others watch it for me." He looked at Sam and Daniel.

"We're mostly blown open but they left some of it as classified facts. The main objectives, the main problems, some of the bigger battles, some of the cultural facts. Atlantis. The wraith but they didn't get too specific there. The bad ones they didn't put out as much information on but the good they pointed out that half of them came from earth," Daniel told them. "I'm hoping they don't let any more out or if they do it's more on the earlier battles and the two problems we've still got to fight."

"These Ori?" one of the other generals asked.

"Ancients who want to be worshiped so they're sending their high priests around to kill anyone who doesn't convert," Sam Carter said. "They've killed whole planets for people not converting, General. They've made it here twice." The general winced. "We've gotten them gone both times. One with a few problems before we knew they were around, but we did solve it as quietly as we could. Only the NID nearly blew it open that time."

"NID is a bad idea all the way around," Jack agreed. "They keep trying to kill me to take samples."

"They once shut down Colorado Springs to try to capture Teal'c," Daniel told them. "He had been with us for over a year. Our docs had made sure he was healthy and not in any danger from anything on earth. At that time we didn't have a way to remove a symbiot and let the former host live. They didn't care, they just wanted samples. If they had asked, we had dead gou'ald larva for them to study. They just decided they wanted a living subject to torture."

"Symbiot?" one general asked, looking disgusted. "Did those people volunteer?"

"No," Teal'c said. "Most of us did not. We were slaves of the higher gou'ald, and all the Jaffa carried immature larva to make us last longer and make us stronger."

"Teal's over a century old and used to be one of the top Jaffa," Jack said, smiling at him. "I'm damn glad you decided to help us and defect, buddy."

"It has brought many challenges to my life but my people are better for it. We are free now and it's much better for us."

"If that's what an immature one does, what does a mature one?" the head of the FBI asked.

Sam Carter pulled up those files for him. "That's on Ba'al, the one who cloned himself. He's smarter than the average gou'ald lord and less interested in being worshiped."

"It seems the bad ones want to be worshipped, is that true across the board?" the head marine asked.

"No. The wraith eat us," Sam Carter said. "Our life force is their only source of nourishment and the feeding leaves us ancient looking husks."

The marine blinked at her. "That's disgusting."

"Yes it is," she agreed. "Thankfully you can shoot them, sir."

He nodded. "Good! Are they getting here?"

"The last few who were trying to come this way will be handled by Atlantis," Jack said. "We had no idea that the Ancient outpost had an automatic beacon to Atlantis. When it was started without us realizing by using the facilities, the wraith discovered it. Atlantis and it's crew took out a good majority of the wraith in Pegasus galaxy while looking for things to help us defeat the Ori."

"Let's get things in a timeline order," the head marine said. "We opened it, found gou'ald?" They all nodded. "We were found by the Ori?"

"We turned on a machine we thought had information," Sam said.

"Oh. Charming."

"If we had known it had a homing beacon we wouldn't have turned it on," Daniel told him.

"So we were fighting the Ori, we found Atlantis?"

"We found the Antarctic outpost," Jack said. "It has a chair that runs for those of us with the ATA gene, which the Ancients put into the bloodlines, and that showed us Atlantis. We had theorized but that gave us proof when Colonel John Sheppard sat down in it and it worked better than it had before. He's the second strongest ATA carrier in the US, and the world as far as we know."

"First, ATA?"

"Ancient Tech Activation gene sequence," Sam Carter said. "The Ancients put it into the human DNA pattern to provide certain strong individuals the ability to run their equipment once we got advanced enough. I can give a whole speech on that but that's the basics."

"We'll do that speech later," the president said. "Who's the strongest ATA carrier?" Jack waved a hand. "Seriously?"

"That's why whenever we're invaded I go to Antarctica to defend the planet with our drones and other things the chair runs."

The president blinked then sighed and shook his head. "Okay, so we do have planetary defenses?" Jack nodded. "If the gou'ald come back, can we defeat them in space?"

"Yes, though there's only a few left," Sam Carter said. "We have three space battle cruisers and a few lighter space craft to use for that. Plus if Atlantis has the power she has space battle capabilities, sir."

"A whole city?" the head Marine demanded. "That's probably not an easy thing to manage."

"No, but she's managed before, sir," Sam told him. "On the way back here there were two or three battles."

"We'll hear more on that later."

"You'll need to call Colonel Sheppard," Jack said. "That was his city and still is his city because the AI likes him and he's strong enough to run her because it takes an ATA carrier."

"I'm sensing a theme," the head Marine said dryly. "What about those of us who don't have one?"

"You have a latent one, sir," Sam said with a smile. "We checked medical records that were already in the system for higher level military members who has the full gene or at least a latent that could be turned on by our artificial version. You and two others in this room have one." One waved a hand and she nodded. "The other," she said with a point. "Has a latent but not a full gene it looks like. It'd be a weak version that could basically turn on the lights and operate their teleporting elevators but not the heavier machines or the weapons."

"Doctors Lam and Keller both have the shot to activate them," Jack told them.

"Yours is natural?" the head Marine asked him. Jack nodded. "Does your nephew have it? The older one?"

Jack smiled because he could out this now and not be horribly shocking to anyone. "That goes back to the Asgard and their cloning, sir. Loki made me a clone and we had to fix the limited time he was supposed to last and then hide him from the NID."

The president stood up, staring at him. "You have a clone? On this planet?"

"Yes. He has all my memories up until a week before I was cloned," Jack said with a smile. "I love the little guy and I'm about to introduce him to our nephew. He's nineteen right now and about to go to the Air Force academy."

"What if that alien put something in him?"

"Loki was told that Jack was the future of humanity because of his ATA gene," Daniel said, slumping back in his chair, but shaking his head. "So he thought his DNA would have some benefit to cure the problem they were having with their cloning program. He was making two-week lasting clones to test things on and made one of Jack. Somehow he got put onto the base and thought he was fully Jack but had been deaged. When we found out, we talked to Thor and he had Junior changed so he was fully stable and fully human. There's no programming or anything like that in him. We checked to make sure. With how many times we ran into evil versions of ourselves thanks to a few devices....we made sure very fast."

"I don't want to know about that yet," the president said. "Your..."

"I consider him a mini me but we're officially nephew and uncle so no one asks, sir," Jack said patiently.

"That's not the one that texted, right?" the president asked.

"No, that's Xander. He's just deaged thanks to a wish demon. Longer, headache inducing story there, sir, and that says a lot considering what I deal with daily." His phone turned on suddenly and let out an alarm. "What the hell?" he muttered, looking at it. "We have to move, people. Now. Someone's taken control of one of the space ships. They have guns that can decimate the white house." He got up. "Now. Let's go," he told the head of the Secret Service, who he had met and worked with before. "It's not the same group, but it's zealots."

"Let's go, people," he agreed. "General, have us beamed to Cheyenne?"

"Gladly."

Daniel tapped his glasses frame/earpiece. "People, we need to evac the situation room. One of the space ships is compromised. General O'Neill's orders." He looked at him. "General Landry said no."

"Fuck Landry. Take him out." He called. "Sheppard, me. A ...good, handle it, Landry's blocking us being beamed. Take over with Mitchell now please." He hung up. A minute later they were all beamed. It took two trips but the rest were gotten to the gate room. Jack looked around. "Are we missing anyone?"

"I'm calling an evacuation order in right now," the head of the Secret Service said as he tried to do that. Jake Jensen walked in and handed over his cellphone. "Thank you, soldier."

"Corporal Jensen, sir." He saluted Jack then grinned. "Sprout's fine. Landry's orders let the zealots up there with one already on board. An Earth Firster. Mitchell took command of the mountain and put us in lock down. Ellis has reported. Caldwell has reported but is really mad. The third ship's commander has not and we're about to send people up there to handle it. Any orders to countermand, General?"

"No. Clay leading?"

"Sheppard's leading. He's tired of this shit and he's already made that known. Clay's backing him up, and we're about to go."

"Go. Be safe. Arrest only, I want to hear them whine about why they did it," he said dryly. "Landry too."

"He's in the brig with a gunshot wound to the shoulder." Jake walked off. "I'll get my phone back later, sir."

"Xander's other uncle," Jack said with a smile for the president. People walked in and were beamed off. Sam Carter jogged up to the control room to log in and see what was going on since Jake had been doing that but went in the second beaming out. "Sit rep me, Carter," he called.

"All the personnel are held in the dining hall," she reported. A longish pause. "Gunshots on the bridge, an alarm going off. Sheppard made it to the comm and he's announced he's taken control of the ship and he's about to space anyone who whines at him, sir. John *really* needs a vacation." She looked up. "Fighting in a few halls leading to the dining hall. One hallway's being ignored and it's the one to engineering." She called up there. "Colonel, the hallway to your right is full of assholes guarding engineering," she reported. "We are back and safe. With the higher ups. Kick someone in the ass for me please." She hung up. "Colonel Clay's getting engineering free, Jack."

"Good. I knew he could. That's one reason I wanted him. That and to save him from idiots like that Max whiny boy." He looked up there. "Let me know when."

"Six targets left. Two of ours are injured by their readings on the system. Three now. Five targets." She winced. "Grenade and now two targets. Down and engineering's secure now, Jack. The dining hall's freed and the commander's hurrying toward the bridge. Sheppard's following him." She hit a few buttons. "Caldwell and Ellis to command." She hung up and waited on them. "Ship's free. Commander's heading to the bridge."

"We'll go help," Colonel Ellis agreed. "Send us please, Colonel Carter." She nodded, keying that in to Ellis's ship. They got beamed up and went to help.

John Sheppard came back with one prisoner held tight by the collar. He walked him into the gate area and handed him to the general. "Sir, this is the one that was in charge. He is not military or IOA. He doesn't even know what the IOA is or who we are. He thought we were a weird protective measure and was going to take us out so we could go to war with the Middle East by blowing up the White House in their name. There's two devices they were going to set off. Both in the basement areas." One of the higher ups was using that specially charmed cellphone to call that in. John shook the person. "As ordered, General, able to whine about his agenda at his hearing. The rest are being shipped down the traditional way under heavy guard. Who all have suits on in case they have to suddenly depressurize the jumper the city leant to this saving." He smirked a tiny bit. "Not that any of them could fly it anyway."

"Good work, Sheppard. Where's Mitchell?"

"Holding a few people hostage in our mess hall, sir. They tried to help General Landry make us commit treason with him. I'll be damned." Guards came in with Mitchell. "They gone?"

"In the brig, where they should be. In a gou'ald proof cell so they can't get out of them." He nodded. "Take him." They got the guy from John and hiked him off. "Sir," he said, saluting Jack. "Turning it back over to you, General. I hope it'll be many years before I take your place in that seat." He and John saw the President when he stepped out from behind his guard, saluting him. "Sir, didn't see you there."

"Sorry, sir," John agreed.

"As you were, boys," the president said with a hand wave. "What was this other general trying to do?"

"Take out part of the government and blame it on another country," Mitchell said. "Just like the last president had planned."

"I looked into those," Sheppard said. "McKay handed me reports on it when he looked actually. Apparently that's how the last president was going to get a divorce too."

"Landry was going to blow up the mountain," Mitchell said.

"His daughter's here," Jack reminded them.

"She screamed that at him, sir," Mitchell said. "I didn't know she could scream that way. Proved me wrong about her temper."

Sheppard nodded. "And Keller helped. They both refused to touch any of the injured people because they could not act professionally."

"Oh well. It won't kill them today," Jack said. "If so, pity." They both nodded and stepped back. "Boys, show our guests up to the bigger conference area. The usual meeting room only seats ten."

"Right this way, gentlemen," Mitchell said with a small wave. "I'm Colonel Cameron Mitchell, second in command to the program on this base. That is Colonel Sheppard, who is in charge of Atlantis so therefore third in command around here."

John nodded. "Welcome to the Stargate Command." He looked at the general, who nodded. "Let me go do a checking round and make contact with McKay before he blows up something." He walked off.

"Here, this cellphone was given to us by that young corporal," the head of the secret service said.

"Must be Jake's," John said with a smile. "He's a nice geek. Very balanced between geek and soldier. I wish I had a few of him on Atlantis." He tucked it into his pocket on the way out.

"Use it to call Xander to let him know we're all fine," Jack called after him. "And I'll call him later."

"Yup, I can do that, sir."

"Thank you." He looked at them, smiling some. "Xander would worry and might have some poker debts show up to help us." He followed them to the conference room where geeks gave reports to masses of uninterested people usually. Jack heard someone complaining up the hall and then a gunshot. "Sheppard, was that you?" he bellowed.

"Yes, sir. The head of the IOA still hates you and wants you to be eaten by the wraith. I told him to shut up and that we're under military quarantine. He got huffy, sir, and tried to grab my gun. Pity."

"Is he alive?" Jack called patiently.

"I didn't make his injury worse and he only shot himself in the leg, General. I'm pretty sure he'll survive to make us all miserable some more."

"Thank you. Any more show up, they're not allowed on the base."

"Yes, sir. Gladly."

"Who, exactly, is the IOA?" the head Marine asked bluntly, staring at Jack.

"The IOA are the idiots the president before last got pressured into putting over the program. They have people from multiple countries that don't contribute to the program who bitch about how we do things and why we do things," Jack said bluntly. "They hate me because I'm effective and I don't take their stupidity well."

"The people actually released a replicator on a ship on purpose," Daniel complained. He looked around. "My tablet." Teal'c handed it to him. "Thanks, Teal'c. I forgot all about it." He pulled up files on them. "That's the people that want detailed reports on what we find or figure out, how we created them, and how to make weapons from them."

"They never get that detailed of reports and I'll be damned if they're going to get full ones," Sam Carter told them with a smile. "Because they'd blow us all up. I am the head of Science here and I said so. They do not get weapons schematics. They don't get anything new on certain isotopes that are proven to be explosive under the right circumstances. Frankly, I'm not going to hand any of them anything because they'd all use them to blow us all up first and then themselves. Our duty to humanity is to not let that happen." The president was giving her an odd look. "I protected this planet from multiple invasions, sir. I'll protect them from power hungry idiots in command positions from other countries."

"That's nice. Do we participate?"

"We have a representative," Jack said. He looked at his teammate. "Be less militant, Carter. I know they think you're basically a calculator in human form and want to hand you to the NID to test on but still." He looked at the president again. "She let herself be used as a host so we could get critical information from a gou'ald source and since then the NID has decided she's only useful to rip apart."

Sam Carter nodded. "Pretty much," she muttered. "Sorry if I sounded militant but I have a good reason. If you had met the IOA people, you wouldn't want them to have access to algebra, much less higher maths and information either."

Daniel shrugged when they stared at him. "They hate me for various reasons. Including that I once ascended and got descended. My version of militant is to shoot them back when they try to capture me for testing." He handed over the tablet. "That's the IOA's present line up. They just switched a few people about six months ago. So far we've only seen one of the new ones and they demanded that we hand over samples of those explosive isotopes."

"It was pointed out she couldn't spell science correctly on her order to us," Sam Carter said. "And that we did not let those samples get out of ours or Area 51's hands for security reasons. She did not have the security rating at that time to know that they existed. Then we walked away while she ranted. I let one of the people with tact have her. I was having a nice, happy day until she showed up."

"Which one was she?" the president asked.

"The French one, sir. The UK, the US, and Canadian reps all try to act like people around us instead of power vacuums. Sometimes they'll even stick up for us. The IOA wanted us to not destroy an Ori fleet that was heading this way but was outside our solar system. They wanted us to wait to have the battle here, where it could potentially damage our sun or our planet."

The president winced. "So they're stupid." She nodded. "Great! We'll look at that afterwards." He looked at Jack. "Pull it all up and give us the short and nasty rundown, General. Then we'll discuss things."

"Yes, sir. Jackson? You know I can only do minor tech things." He went to pull up the show they had planned last night. It was too massive to fit onto the tablet and they wouldn't let them bring in a laptop. "We created this show last night so you'd get the faster version of what's happened in a history report format," he announced. "Then you can ask about specifics." They all nodded, settling in to see the movie file. It was an hour long. Once the president held up a hand so they paused it. He got that part explained so he allowed it to move forward. At the end, the mess hall brought down coffee and minor commercially made pastries to soothe their stomachs.

It was a kindness they'd appreciate before they got into nastier details.

They could go back to DC when it was safer and keep going over things for days of stomach complaints.

***

Jack came back from DC alone, looking at the people waiting on him. The group had went back to DC early the next day and had demanded Jack follow them back to finish this debriefing. "I'm back in charge. The Joint Chiefs actually told me I did good and warned me they were going to kick my ass if I had another battle and didn't tell them." Mitchell and Sheppard both smirked at that. "Let's go tell people."

"Yes, sir," Mitchell said. "Want to drive?"

"Not with the beer I had on the plane." He got into the back. The two colonels drove him off. "How bad was it while I was stuck with politicians?"

"Not too bad. One group came to protest," John said, turning to look at him. "They tried really hard to take pictures but Rodney did something that killed all electronics within half a mile from the gate. It worked for over six hours. By then they gave up."

"That's good of him. Our gear?"

"It worked. It's not on the same sort of electrical signal as commercially available digital cameras and phones."

"That's good. So more protests coming up?"

"Probably. Colorado Springs PD has put up a line about a mile from the gate since the entry's on a private road. Now you have to show ID at both gateways."

"Works for me," Jack agreed. He found his and put it beside him on the seat. John smiled. "Any other big problems?"

"Rodney ranted about the stupid people. The rest of us from Atlantis just watched with popcorn." Mitchell was laughing. "Cam, didn't some of yours yell?"

"Yup, but we just clapped for the drama."

Jack shook his head. "I hate the Marines going into drama queen mode." Both colonels smiled. "Any other happy news?"

"Sam Carter was dragging one of the IOA people that got let in to have her beamed into space but Radek stopped her unfortunately," John said. "The woman apparently called her a faulty project and clearly that possession had left her damaged and a danger to others so she tried to have the MP's arrest her so she could go through her office. The MP called that in and Mitchell told him to stick his foot up the IOA rep's ass."

"Bluntly and ordered him to broadcast it first," Cam said. "First checkpoint." He paused and held up his ID. "Sheppard, the general," he said with a point. Jack leaned up to show his ID. The officer nodded and let them in. He drove on. "We joked about ordering pizza and having to come out here to pick it up but Rodney went off on how stupid that idea was and how they'd probably try to poison us," Cam said, grimacing. "I asked if he needed more of a vacation than going to visit Xander and nag him. He spluttered and said Hawaii wasn't his vacation of choice. He wasn't into beaches, surfing or getting into polluted ocean water, or easy women like Sheppard was. If he was going to have a vacation he'd do it with class and go somewhere he didn't have to bake in the sun."

John nodded. "I suggested he go to a spa. He rolled his eyes so that's a possibility." They got up to the parking lot and got out, flashing their ID's as they were let through so they could start the long ride down to the office. Forty-three stories took a while but screaming met them a few floors before they were to get off. "That's not Rodney, Radek, or anyone I've heard screaming at minions," John quipped.

"Not a voice I recognize either," Cam said. The doors open and the screaming was worse. "General on site!" he bellowed. The soldiers watching the fight backed out of the way. The yelling woman yelled as she stomped over to get into Jack's face.

He stared at her. "Shut up." She glared. "I don't give a damn what you want. The IOA isn't in effect at the moment. The president is seriously thinking about changing our oversight. Secondly, you don't have rights to anything, lady. You may be IOA, that doesn't mean we're going to hand you harmful things so you can blow up the earth we've fought so hard to protect. If you don't like it, go give the president a blow job so he might consider it." She flinched back, shaking her head. "Thirdly! You are screaming on my base and I do not allow that! The only people allowed to yell and have fits here are me, my two colonels, Colonel Carter, and Dr. McKay! It's a list which you are not educated enough to land on because they all have at least two degrees."

"Still working on my master's actually, sir," Mitchell said dryly.

"Sorry, he'll be able to yell in a few months when he gets that piece of paper," Jack said sarcastically, staring down at the woman. "Fourthly, I don't care *what* being wants information on how to harness ZPM power or how to harness naqquadah as an explosive component. They're not getting it. We have a responsibility to guard the earth. Either of those subjects will kill a great many people. As Carter and McKay have both proven. So no, even if you demand it, shoot us, no. The information will be burned before I let you hand it over to various governments to tinker with so they can blow us all up. If you don't like it, again, find DC, give a blow job. Now, is there anything else?"

"You are not in control!" she snarled.

"I am in control. The Joint Chiefs and the president said I was. This is a US military installation. They're the only people who can say who is in charge. You have no right to try to put anyone behind the big desk because we are military run and headed. If you don't like it, find DC and give a blow job." He stared at her. "Anything else?"

"I'll have you arrested!"

"You go right the fuck ahead, lady. I could use the vacation." He stared at her until she shrank back. "Go. Away. Before I ask my nephew to have something eat you." She snorted, looking amused. "Steppuppy!" he called. A minute later a hellhound appeared. He smiled. "Thank you for helping us today. This lady is evil and wants to destroy everyone, including all of you." The woman was backing away from the dog. "Would you like a chew toy?" The dog sniffed her and grimaced but sat and stared at her. She was still backing away. Everyone got out of her way.

"Please? You can just use her to teach the little puppies how to hunt if you want. Xander said you do that sometimes." She tipped her head and nodded then howled. Four little hellhound puppies showed up, getting a few 'awws' from some of the personnel. "You have a good hunt. She's mean and wants to kill Sam and Daniel plus would want to kill Xander. He's my nephew now." The female licked his cheek and stalked after the human. She made it to the elevator and frantically pushed a button. The puppies looked at the big one. They went topside to wait on her. They'd have a good enough training hunt. She was easy prey.

"I feel sorry for the puppies if they bite that worthless waste of flesh," John quipped. "Any other screaming assholes?" They all broke up and walked off talking about it.

"The one that really likes my nephew tore the head off some drug dealers," Jack quipped with a grin. "Had a whole nest of them in Texas when we met him."

"Charming," Mitchell said. "Helpful but charming." He walked off. "I'm getting a beer."

"Save me one," John called after him. "Let me know when you want to debrief about Atlantis, sir." He walked off, following Cam to get his claimed beer.

Jack went up to his office to look things over. Someone had searched the office and left it a mess but that happened he guessed. The voicemail from David and Xander threatening to bring Xander back to fix that base if things were going to be that evil was funny. Someday he'd let Xander take over if he wanted to. The rest of the universe would never mess with them again.

***

Xander had tried to sneak away but David had caught him and had actually driven him to the meeting hall. He was following him as he walked in. The doors were shut so Xander kicked them open. "They're too heavy for us shorter ones to open," he said at the dirty looks he was getting. He walked up to look at the local demon council. "Okay, so some things you hadn't heard yet."

"Who are you to interrupt?" one demanded.

"The same Xander Harris I was in Sunnydale. And you're still a cunt. You were then, you are now. You'll probably never change." He gave her a pointed look. "The hackers that outed the Stargate program did it to protect you guys. Because this way the 'there's peaceful ones who just look funny' thing could be brought out for both communities."

"How dare you...." that councilor started.

"He's right," David admitted. "I talked to the kids too and I'm former SGC, ma'am."

"You're a human."

"Really? I hadn't noticed," he said dryly. "No, that's wrong, I know I'm taur'i. All the aliens made sure I knew that." She gasped. He stared at her. "We both talked to the hackers that started the project and the ones that actually outed it to protect the demon community."

"Otherwise there would've been a lot more attacks by people who decided you're all evil," Xander added. "And then they would've come a second time when the SGC got outed in a few more months because Atlantis was on the way home. Thankfully they got here early."

"The city's back?" one asked.

Xander nodded. "It's hidden under a cloak. The last president wanted the space fleet to blow it out of the sky. Uncle John's still swearing at those sort. Uncle Jack quit swearing in English again."

One of the councilors blinked at him. "You know of them?"

"When I got deaged, Halfrek had to give me to some relatives. There's Uncle Steve and his team locally, Uncle Jack and his people in Colorado, and my Uncle Jake who now works for Uncle Jack in Colorado," he said with a grimace. "But at least I'm at the age I should've been so I'm not a toddler now. That was awkward and annoying. I couldn't throw grenades at all."

The council all stared at him. "Why would you need to?" one demanded.

"Because he caught the people trying to bust in here and kill you all when we parked," David said. "He did a really sweet gas grenade toss while I called in support to arrest them."

"The humans wouldn't arrest those sort," that snotty one said.

"Uncle Steve's already arrested them," Xander said then smiled. "Uncle Steve said that bigots are assholes no matter their species or who they're against. As long as you're not terrorists or anyone like it, he doesn't care that you're peaceful citizens. Some of the PD isn't that liberal but a lot are. You're in paradise so apparently you're not evil." He waved a hand around. "Also, Uncle Steve said the governor wanted a meeting so they could talk about how to protect the locals.

"He's worried about the same sort that tried to attack the LA City Council. Though they got stopped by Gunn's people. Then someone tried to take out Gunn's people for being not like them." He stared at the snotty one. "By the way, your son's still fine. He's now a guardian of the demon shelter. Buffy told Uncle Jack that they had set one up."

She blinked. "I have not talked to my son but he lives in St. Louis."

"You're not that dumb," Xander told her. "Even if you hate your other son for having funny colored scales, he's still your egg. You should be really proud that he's protecting a lot of vulnerable beings."

"He is?" she demanded.

Xander nodded with a smile. "He got some advice from Gunn about how to set it up the best way but yeah, he's a guardian of the new shelter there. He's as big of an asshole as you are but he's doing a great thing."

"Thank you for letting her know," the head of the council said, then cleared her throat. "Your Uncle Steve?"

"Steve!" David called. "Are you free yet?"

Danny leaned in. "In a minute. He's lecturing one who's complaining that the military shouldn't put up with this." He went back to arresting idiots.

Xander looked up at David, who was shaking his head. "Most of us in the military are proud of anyone who's served honorably. If they're demons, partially or fully, and they served honorably then hoo-yah! You're my fellow vet." He looked out there at the sound of new cars driving up. "And one of them has an armored vehicle."

"I left something in the trunk," Xander quipped. "Can I go use it?"

"No," David said. "That's my fun. Excuse me for a moment." He walked out there and used the keychain remote to open the trunk, pulling out the case and slamming the trunk lid. Steve was blocking the armored vehicle from moving forward. David opened the case and pulled out the weapon. "Hey, Steve, move," he called right before he fired it at the armored SUV. The SUV flipped backwards and people around them screamed. David dropped the launcher. "We don't appreciate their sort on this island," he told one woman. "Bigots should live somewhere else. Maybe make their own country. That way they can make sure who comes in and all that." He walked over the launcher, grinning and waving at Steve. "When you're done, the Council wanted to ask you a question."

"Sure," he said with a grin. "Bring anything else?"

"Xander brought that. I only brought a few grenades. Mostly gas ones. Sorry."

"No, I'm happy with that." Officers were pulling people out of the flipped SUV.

Danny looked at David. "Don't teach the kid that. He's already too tough."

David grinned. "I do try but he's gotta protect his little pack of kids." He went back inside. The staring demons all got out of his way. "They're handled, kiddo."

"Thanks, David. Nearly as pretty as anything I've seen recently." He grinned up at him then at the Council. Steve strolled in. "This is my Uncle Steve. Head of the taskforce." Xander got out of the way.

"I like you too, kid." Steve nodded at the Council. "I'm happy to have stopped them. I hate people like them. They really need to move to their own country."

The Council smiled at him. "Thank you for that assistance. We were told that the governor wanted to talk to us?"

"Yes. That way they could go over the protection needs of the community. He saw the attacks in LA and was made aware of the ones in Chicago and he's worried we'll have to set up a safe commune area here."

"I would hope not," the head of the council said quietly. "I'm happy that some humans would help us protect ourselves."

"Most of the natives are the sort of live and let live." He smiled slightly. "We don't care what you are as long as you're Hawaiian and peaceful." She smiled back, nodding some. "We'll be sitting a few officers outside to make sure no one else tries anything that stupid. Before I have to borrow more of Xander's weapons."

"You borrow, you replace," Xander quipped. "I won't be able to play poker for weapons for a while."

"We can replace some of it, but by the time you're old enough to use the artillery, it'll be much different."

David looked at Xander then at him. "No one told Danny he had to protect his kid the other day?" he asked quietly.

"Excuse me?" Steve demanded, staring down at Xander, hands on his hips. "You did what?"

"You look like Danny when you do that," Xander quipped. "No one told you I rescued her the other day?"

"NO! We had no idea she was in danger. DANNY!" he bellowed. Danny strolled in. "Did you know your daughter had to be rescued recently?"

Danny blinked, staring at David. "Oh, no, not me, man. I heard about it when Xander called me for a desperate ride out of there. He blew the fuck out of the group that had her and they had to run before they got reinforcements because someone hit their alarm pendant. The kid had taken out the security alarm but it was independent. Then he had to stand in the corner for four hours while I calmed myself down so I could scream at him."

"I knew what I was doing."

"You're seven," David and Steve said together. "That's my job."

Danny waved his hand. "That's *my* job since she's my little girl." He looked at Xander. "Does Rachel know?" He would keep his temper for at least a few more minutes, when he could get the kid out of public view so they could have a *talk*.

"Do I look that stupid to you?" Xander demanded.

"No," Steve said. "Is Grace all right?"

"She's fine. She was scared but mad. She kicked a few and was sneering at the idiots who were taunting her about making you mad, Danny."

Danny wiped his face off and nodded. "The screaming will know *no* end when we talk about this later, Xander. We'll be teaching you how to do it right. After you're not hiding from the beating I should give you."

"Hey, I saved her," he said dryly. "You guys weren't even on the island that day."

"Oh, that day," Steve said. "Someone mentioned something was going on that was going to make us mad." He looked at Danny. Then at Xander. "We would've hurried back."

"I didn't think she'd have that much time. I tried to call Chin but his phone was busy and then went to voicemail."

"You should've called me," Steve said. "Or Danny."

"I'm not that dumb. The yelling wouldn't be finished before I had her rescued!"

David patted him on the head. "You could've told me. I would've handled it, Xander."

"We're trying to keep you out of sight," Xander told him. "So they don't assume who's helping things out here."

"Yay. I'm retired from the SGC at the moment. It's my job to do that stuff until you're old enough again." He stared at him. "Also, did you want to tell the other two parents who might be in here that their kids were there?"

Xander looked at one. "Your daughter was there too. The other was her buddy with the blue fur. They were fine, just huddled in a corner. Apparently they were talking with Grace so they took them all."

"I heard about that but not who rescued them." The mother stared at him. "You're a hunter."

"I'm formerly of the Sunnydale team. Unless they're evil, trying to hurt a person if they're not defending themselves, or doing something that would get them to be labeled as bad guy, I don't care. Vampires, yeah they're going most likely. Anyone else, I don't care unless they're bad guys."

She smiled and patted him on the head. "Thank you, Hunter."

He leaned closer. "I'm Xander," he said then smiled. "I'm always going to be a Xander. They could take my memories, turn me back into an infant, and I'd still be Xander." She giggled and nodded. "And let your daughter carry the taser I leant her. She might need it."

"I will. I had no idea she has one."

"She has mine," Xander said. "I'll get a new one." She nodded. "It's a close range weapon since it doesn't have detachable cartridges but it should still protect her."

"We can work on that," she said. "I would miss my little one." Xander grinned. She looked at the Council. "Let me go find her to make sure she's got it with her. She goes to an inclusive school."

"The one Grace goes to has an inclusive statement about accepting any race," Danny said. "Should hold up for yours too."

She smiled. "I hope so since they go to the same school." She got up and walked out. Once she had driven off she went off on a swearing fit but she was a mother and her daughter had been in danger.

Xander looked at Danny. Then at the council. "Sorry for that diversion of the topic at hand."

"No, it's very interesting," the head of the council said. "Who had them?"

"Bad guys who wanted to sell drugs but Uncle Steve beat them nearly to death the last time he caught them."

"We'll be talking," Danny said, patting Xander on the back of the head. "Though you were right not to tell Rachel." Steve shuddered. "So, how can we help the community help protect itself?"

The council smiled at him. "We will be discussing that most of today and tomorrow. Can we meet with you and the other higher ups that might need to talk to us tomorrow?"

Steve text messaged and nodded. "The governor is free from ten to noon tomorrow," he told them. "Is that a good time?" They nodded. He sent that back and put his phone up. "His assistant said it was a good thing." He smiled.

"Excellent. Were the hackers partially demons?"

"They were young and thinking tactically," Steve told her. "A few were partial demons that I know of. Not the whole group."

"I can see why the action was taken but our people outing that program would look bad on us."

"Or it could show that they're concerned about what the military will do *this* time," Xander reminded her. "Because I know most of you were." She nodded that was true. "Plus, looking for acceptance is not all that unusual."

"True."

"Also, General O'Neill has put a lot of pressure on the other dimensional natives label instead of demonic," Danny said.

"That would help a few of the species," the head of the council agreed. "Not all though."

"Uncle Jack got some history books from Giles," Xander said. They all smiled. "They knew about Ancients. Now they know about those before the Ancients." He looked at Steve then back at the Council. "Also, as a note, the slayer and most of the LA team have been made to think I was dead to ease their memories. Especially the witch that has a problem with her magic. She went from 'I'll fix you by taking you out of history' to sobbing about my age. And Anya's now a vampire."

"She sent him more things that she decided she didn't need right now," David told the pair of cops. "No more weapons but a lot more of those things."

Steve shook his head with a sigh. "Can someone remind her he's seven?"

"Eight," Danny corrected. Steve scowled at him. "He is."

"He is," Xander agreed with a grin.

Steve scowled at him. "We didn't even have a dinner to celebrate."

David waved a hand. "He didn't tell me."

"We're going to deprogram you from those bitches you knew," Danny said with a smile. "It's wrong not to celebrate your birthday." Xander shrugged. "Yay. It's important."

"Some woman wrote an article about how she doesn't give her kid holiday or birthday presents."

"Yeah, she's making her kid a bitter loner who has no self esteem or respect," Danny said. "I read that. Including the comments from some people who were raised that way who took *years* to get back to a healthier state of mind. You...you're going to start celebrating things. We do care, unlike them." Xander grimaced. "I used to celebrate Gracie getting an A on a test, Xander. Birthdays are huge and we'll start celebrating happy things." Xander shrugged again and moved back a few steps. Danny pulled him closer but Steve took him to pick up and walk off talking to him. He grinned. "We'll be back tomorrow for that talk."

"Have fun explaining things to him. The witch's parents were horrible as well and she passed that gift on."

Danny nodded. "I read a few of their books. I wouldn't trust them to raise a toad, much less someone with gifts like their kid's got." He walked off shaking his head.

David smiled. "Let us know if you need help from him, or myself. All I do all day is nag Xander to do homework but I'm well able to go on rescues and help plan things." He put down his number. "Just let us know." He left, going to save his adopted kid from the nagging uncles. At least he wouldn't have to run a raid to rescue the kid this time. Unless Kono got some of the extended family into it. Then all bets were off.

***

Kono walked into the office and paused at the yelling going on. She looked at David, who had suggested he come with her. "That bad?"

"Xander rescued three kids from some drug dealers who were going to blackmail Danny," he said with a smile. "One of them was Grace."

"Oh, fuck," she said. "That's not cute, brah."

"Not kidding. He called me to get them evacuated. He said he tried Chin's phone but it was voicemail and you guys were on another island."

She nodded once. "Wow. I want to hide now." She walked off. "Have fun rescuing the kid."

"Kono!" Danny called. "Xander didn't celebrate or note his birthday."

Kono winced. Now she knew why she had been called for backup. She came back to look at him then at the kid. "Do I look like a self-defeating little redheaded witch without manners?" she demanded. Xander slowly shook his head. "Then don't treat me like one, Xander. We would've thrown you a nice dinner. With cake even probably." She stared down at him. "We all need more happy times and you're the only little kid around us most of the time. So we're going to use you to have happy times. Suck it up."

"Fine," he muttered, curled up in a corner of the office couch. "I won't take your happies."

"We'd like to be happy because it's a happy day," Danny told him. "A birthday is supposed to be a happy time that your friends and family celebrate. We'd love to do that with you."

"Yes, sir."

Danny huffed but sat down beside the kid to hug him. "We'll get you used to more normal things but I won't tell Rachel or Gracie that you didn't tell us about your birthday. They'll go into fussing overdrive."

Xander looked up at him. "You can quit hugging."

"Nope. Hugs make you normal. Did for me." Xander huffed. "Tough. Suck it up before I tell my mother." He gave him a pointed look then a grin. "She'll be out here soon."

"Can I go hide in Colorado?"

"Nope. She wanted to meet you anyway. Grace told her about you." Xander slumped again. Danny cuddled him, grinning at Kono.

"She might be too heavy of a weapon, brah. Can he take that much fussing?"

"Well.... We might get to save him if she gets too bad." Xander looked up at him. "Maybe. She'll want to fuss over Grace more than you."

"I can hide like a mofo," Xander quipped. "Even in the woods. David, when his mom comes, we should go camping."

"Mothers like that would still find you," David said. "I told mine and she groaned but said she'd start sending cookies now and then."

"I don't mind cookies."

"She makes healthy cookies, kiddo."

"Still cookies."

"True." He shifted against the wall he was leaning against. Danny was smirking behind the kid's head. "Where did the SEAL go this time?"

"He's hiding from our discussion about how to handle having to save my daughter," Danny quipped. "He even took Chin with him to find that portable hole."

Kono shook her head. "I'd hide from that too. Have you finished that talk?"

"Yup. For now." He stared at Xander. "Haven't we?"

"I'll call if I can. Though I did try."

"No, you call me about Gracie. Not Chin."

"He wouldn't have yelled and screamed that long."

"Yeah," Danny snorted. "You call *me* about my daughter, Xander. Or Steve if you can't get me. If I'm in the hospital I'll let Steve save her for me."

"Sure, I get that," he said, wiggling to get free. "Can I go pee?"

"Fine." He let him go. "Come right back here. We'll be waiting." He grinned. Xander huffed but went to the bathroom. He considered going to hotwire the car but he was too short to reach the peddles and see over the steering wheel. Plus Steve was now parked right behind their car. Though there was a bus stop.... He washed his hands then sighed, looking back outside. Nope, there was Chin. "Save me, man?" he begged.

"If you did something for Danny to yell at you, take it like the miniature man you are," Chin shot back.

"He's already yelled at me for saving Grace."

Chin stared down at him. "You did *what*?" he demanded. Steve came strolling in. "He did what?"

"Yeah, that call from him where he didn't leave a message? That was him calling you to tell you Grace and a few other kids had been taken hostage," Steve said. "We weren't nearby so he went in and saved her himself but had David show up to evacuate them."

"Did Danny not hear about this until today?"

"A few hours ago. I'm surprised the yelling's done with," Steve said, looking down at Xander.

"He's already threatened me with his mother," he complained.

"Oh, and we missed his birthday because he never told us," Steve told Chin.

Chin stared down at him, then shook his head. "I should take him to a family dinner." Xander shrank down, shaking his head. "That way there's a lot of fussy people who would *love* to mentor him into turning into me. Or Kono." David leaned out. "We blocked in your car."

"Probably a good idea, even though that make and model of car needs the computer chip on the key to start." He wiggled a finger in the universal 'come here' motion. "He knows you're stalling. He heard Chin."

"Fuck," Xander muttered. Steve swatted him for swearing but walked him back in there.

Kono looked at Chin. "I'm going to tell a few of the cuz's about him."

"I was going to do it the easy way and bring him to a family dinner with David."

She stared at him. "That's evil, Cuz. Mostly to David."

He smiled. "Somewhat."

David shook his head. "I'll let you help him but I don't need more relatives. I've got plenty, thanks."

"Have they met the kid?" Chin asked.

"He doesn't need more warped," David complained. "It'd be worse than the guy who just married the lady with three daughters that almost got custody of him."

"I would've hidden myself *so* fast," Xander quipped. "Before I became more of a mule."

Kono looked at him. "Those girls of yours were fashionable but dumb not to appreciate you." The kid hugged her and tried to escape the office. Steve stopped him and handed him back to Danny with a smile. "That's mean, Steve," Kono said, swatting him on the bicep.

"Danny's the experienced parent here." He looked down. "Tell me who those evil idiots were so we can go beat them again?"

David coughed and handed over his phone. "Pictures?"

"That'd help, yes." He got into the recent pictures file. A few cute ones of Xander napping on a stuffed animal. One of Xander underneath the stuffed animal, which suddenly seemed to have teeth. Steve held that one up. David groaned and shook his head. "Sure," Steve decided. He found the ones he wanted and downloaded them into their system. Two came up pretty fast and Kono recognized another so was pulling up their file. Steve looked at the other pictures then showed one to David. Who pointed at Xander. He let Xander see it.

"Grace said that normal women aren't built like that. I showed her they were." He shrugged. "She's the one that was rollerblading in a bikini, bouncing all the way." He waved his hands around. "I had to take a picture of that. I'm a guy."

"Yeah, you will be again some day soon," Steve decided. He handed the phone back and got into the files. David pointed so Kono ran that face through the system as well. "It looks like that wannabe street gang is back, Danny."

Danny came out to look and nodded. "Yeah, we can talk to 'em again." He stared down at Xander. "If there is a next time, which I hope there will not be or I'll be destroying someone *very* hard, what are you expected to do?"

"Call you directly instead of someone calmer and let you scream while David and I rescue her?" Xander quipped.

Danny smirked, hugging him. "Exactly." He let David have the boy. "I'll talk to Gracie later tonight."

"Her mom's having mood swings," Xander warned. "She was sobbing because one of Grace's schoolmates lost her pet cat for a few hours."

Danny sighed. "I remember those. You two go play in the sun or something." They nodded, letting them get back to work. He looked at Steve. "My mother has heard about him somehow."

"I pity the kid hiding from all the fussing," Steve quipped.

"Yeah, could be." They got back to work finding those idiots. Then they'd go talk to Grace.

***

Danny showed up at Rachel and Stan's house that night, nodding at Stan. "Come walk with me and Grace, Stan."

"I am her mother," Rachel said firmly.

Danny looked at her. "Did you know your daughter got taken from the car that picks her up?"

Rachel stared then at her daughter. "Why did I not hear of this?" she demanded coldly.

"Because you have a blood pressure problem," her daughter told her. "You need to keep it down. I'm fine, Danno." She grinned.

"Yeah. Let's talk anyway, give your mom time to calm down."

"You didn't tell me you had to rescue her?" Rachel demanded.

Danny stared at her. "I didn't hear a thing about this until today, Rachel." She flinched back. "So we're going to go over proper procedure for this problem. Because I should've been her call, not someone else." He walked her and Stan out, driving them off to talk somewhere Rachel couldn't have a fit on them. He stopped the car and turned to look at his little girl. "So," he said.

"I called David," she admitted. "I had his number memorized and I had heard earlier you were off the islands, Dad."

Stan blinked at her. "When were you going to tell us?" he demanded.

"Never." She looked at Danny again. "They were weakly threatening me for daring to exist on their islands and were going to take out the two kids with me because they're at least partially demonic."

"I heard," Danny agreed.

"I complained his breath smelled like raw onions and he sneered but he didn't try to hit me or anything, Danno. I was killing time because I knew someone would tell you."

"Why didn't the driver tell us?" Stan demanded. She shrugged. "I'll be fixing that later," he assured them. "Or possibly letting Rachel vent on them."

"I don't want her to have problems so I wasn't going to tell her. It was scary but Danno taught me how to handle things like that when I was littler in case a bad guy came after the family for him solving something." She looked at her father. "I did what you said. When they wanted me to call someone, your phone was off." Danny grimaced. "So I called the next best thing to the team, David. I got Xander and he said he'd tell David, then he showed up and used a few things then David showed up to finish the rescuing."

"We had a *long* talk with Xander earlier for that," Danny told her, looking smug. "The kid didn't let us know more'n trying to call Chin's phone the once. We also had a talk about how he should've told David so he could've helped him rescue you three." He stared at her. "Seriously, daughter?"

"Your phone was off," she defended. "You were too far away too."

"Yeah, we'll go over that later," he said. She slumped down. "So. Damn. Grounded," he assured her. She slumped further, nodding some. "Why didn't you mention it later since it's been a week?"

"I didn't think they'd come back and you'd freak out."

"Ya think?" he shot back.

"I'm about to," Stan said. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"For the same reason. I thought it was done with and they weren't going to try again."

"Hell no they won't be trying again," Danny said. "We talked to 'em earlier in that nice, had a lot of officers with us, way." She shivered. "Even Steve's pissed off that they tried that. He proved it by blowing up their living room and the drugs." She winced. "So yeah, we wanted to hear, daughter. Sooner than a week. Like that night when you could've called in an 'I'm okay' call and then avoided telling me why." He tipped her face up. "Which was part of that talk, wasn't it?"

"Yes, Danno," she sighed.

"And we know what got you grounded for *weeks*?" She pouted but nodded. "Good! Because I nearly lost my damn mind! If we hadn't been in front of the local demon council, I would have lost my damn mind. Next time you're even looked at funny, I want to know as soon as humanly possible to handle it for you. Like Xander, you're a little kid and that's *my* job. You can't do it until you've either started to hunt demons after you're eighteen or you've joined the military or the police force!"

"Yes, Danno," she said quietly, looking down.

He pulled her closer to hug her head. "I'd be really mad if you had gotten hurt," he said more calmly. "So I will know as soon as you humanly can, daughter. Especially if someone else has to rescue you." She nodded against his shoulder. "Thank you!" He let Stan hug her. "Now, we need to have that talk again, don't we?"

"No. I still remember the last one," she said quickly.

"Uh-huh. This way your other father and your mother know you know how to handle it properly and that you're taking good defensive actions when needed. That way no one else has to hear the fit any of us nearly threw. Kono was so mad she lapsed out of English for almost an hour. Steve decided to swear in another language for nearly as long."

Stan winced but nodded. "I think mine should be doing the same but I'm not that fluent." He stared at her. "I think we should all have that talk so I know how to handle it if you're taken again."

"There's only been one other case that threatened her," Danny told him. "And that was a mob case. I made my point that they don't come near my baby girl. With a baseball bat to his desk admittedly." He grinned. "Before I sent his kid into CPS custody for him being a thug and his mother being ineffective." Stan shivered at that. "So we can go talk with your mom about this. Just in case."

"Yes, Danno," she sighed. "Mom's going to have a huge fit."

He checked his watch. "It's been twenty minutes so she should be calmer now. Down to huffing and coldly British instead of screaming and ranting." He looked at her. "Own up to it, daughter."

"Yes, Danno."

He started the car, turning around to buckle up and then driving them back to their home. Rachel threw open the door when he parked. He got out. "I reminded her of the talk we had when I had that mob case," he told her. "We're going to go over it again."

"I don't want her harmed," she said firmly.

"These pussies, they were a wannabe gang. They thought she was Steve's daughter." Rachel winced. "They wanted to react against Steve for arresting most of 'em by blackmailing me with her safety. Thankfully he blew up most of their drugs earlier. She did try, which I applaud. She had some sense. When she couldn't get me, she tried for David."

"But...." Rachel said. Grace scurried past her. "You're in deep, daughter!"

"I agree," Stan said as he got out of the car. Danny locked it as they headed inside. "Grace!" She came out of the kitchen with a drink. "Sit." She did. "Let's go over what happened and how you should handle it in the future so we all know."

Danny nodded. "We can do that."

"Who rescued her?" Rachel demanded, slamming the door.

"Xander," Grace said. Rachel went on a spluttering fit, shaking her head. "David got there to finish it and evacuate us. I was with a few schoolmates so we could work on a project. They were demonic so the thugs were sneering at them. They didn't even try to hurt me, Mom. Just sneered and annoyed me. I told the guy sneering at me to brush his teeth because his breath smelled like raw onions." Rachel moaned as she sat down, holding her head.

"We had a talk with Xander earlier when David let us know that there had been an incident," Danny told her. He looked at his little girl. "It was almost evil of you to tell your grandmother about him. Xander's still so freaked out by all that stuff he forgot to tell us about his birthday on purpose."

Grace glared at him. "That needs to be stopped!"

"We're working on it but your grandmother is about to come smother him with attention he'll hide from." He looked at Rachel again. "We were off the island to arrest someone in Lihue," he told her. "My phone was apparently not working at that time. So she called David, which I do not mind if the guys aren't around."

"I knew David could help me," Grace agreed. "He's got training like Steve outside the SEAL stuff." She sipped her drink.

Rachel made herself calm down. "In that circumstance I don't mind you calling in David," she admitted. "He could definitely help you. I mind not hearing immediately when you got rescued."

"Last week?" Stan asked her. "That's something I'm upset about as well, Grace."

Danny nodded. "The correct thing to do is what?"

"To resist the kidnapers but not to upset them enough that they want to hit me," she recited. "Offer to call someone so they can ransom me or gloat or whatever. The order of calling is you, Steve, Chin, Kono, David," she said. Danny nodded at that. "I'm to resist them giving me any drugs or trying to knock me out. But I am not to resist to the point of being hit or anything like that. It's better to be unconscious and alive than wake up in the hospital from broken things."

"Good paraphrasing," Danny said dryly. "Where were you three?"

"The driver had just dropped us off at the large mall. Our research project needed a survey about public opinions on putting up a new park." Danny nodded once. "The driver got back into the car and before he could drive off we were snatched." She sighed and sipped her drink again. "They only had us for maybe an hour. They were going to call Danno to blackmail him into making Steve leave us alone. They thought he paid me so much attention in a strange way. I didn't correct the thought that I was Steve's daughter instead. It would've caused more problems."

"Good job," Danny agreed. "That was fast thinking." Rachel huffed. "It could have gotten her hurt more. If they didn't think she had use, they might've just...well..." Rachel moaned, slumping in her chair. "That part of it was good. But still, daughter."

Grace nodded. "I should have told you as soon as we got free. Even just an 'I'm fine' voicemail," she sighed.

"Yeah, that would've gotten my attention and we would've handled them much sooner," Danny agreed. "As is, *so* damn grounded."

"Yes, Danno," she huffed. "How long am I grounded for?"

"Life," Rachel told her. "Your entire life!" She got up and stomped off.

Danny leaned down to look at her. "At least those guys were wannabe bad guys," he said quietly. "But I'll be damned, daughter."

"Yes, Danno."

"Thank you. Before I have an ulcer." He stared at her. "You knew better when you did it."

"I did."

"See, I knew you were smart." She rolled her eyes so he patted her on the head. "Next time, I'm letting Chin and Kono yell for me then I'll finish it."

"I can avoid that," she said. "It'd take forever and I'd have to look up some of the bigger words."

He nodded. "Probably." She slumped but finished her drink. "Stan, anything to add?"

"No, you covered my objections," he said quietly and calmly. "Though I will be yelling myself, Grace."

"Yes, Stan. I'm sorry I disappointed you both." She slumped, pouting at them.

"Keep it up, I'm making you shop for Xander and with your grandmother when she makes it out here to torment him."

She shivered. "That's kinda mean, Danno."

"Ya think?"

"Yes, Danno."

"Good girl." He patted her again then kissed her on the forehead. He looked at Stan. "Let me know how long the grounding lasts. That way I can make sure we don't do fun things during visitation."

"I can do that," he agreed. "It's probably going to be next year however."

Danny nodded. "Makes good sense to me."

"She can get free of it for her prom," Rachel called.

"We can arrange things so that's happening," Danny called. He looked at his daughter then smiled at Rachel when she came back in. "Be gentle with nagging Xander about not telling us about his birthday too please. He's still freaked out about normal attention. Especially since Grace told my mom about him."

"That's almost evil, daughter." She looked at her then at Danny. "I won't do more than hug him for rescuing her and then nag him about not telling me about this."

"We had an hour long talk about that earlier," Danny said with a grin.

"Mine won't be as long but it will be thorough." She looked at their daughter then at Danny. "Was she injured?"

"First I heard about it was today," he admitted. They both looked at Grace.

"A bruise on my upper arm and some soreness from being hauled up by it," she admitted. "I did a heating pad for a few days. It's fine now. If I had been hurt, I would've told you. Unlike Uncle Steve, I don't avoid the ER if I need it."

"I don't care if you don't have a hair out of place," Danny reminded her. "Even if you don't tell your mom, you tell *me*. If I have to, I'll tell your mom. Because I know you hide stuff to make her feel better so her blood pressure doesn't come alarmingly high again."

"I can do that," Grace agreed, not looking at her mother.

Danny looked at her. "If I hear, you will. You know that."

"I do," she said firmly, glaring at her daughter. "Though I should hear from her myself. Then we're going to be talking about that older gentleman who was staring at you the last time we went shopping."

"How old?" Danny demanded. "Because I'll arrest a pervert so damn fast it's not funny."

"I couldn't prove why he was staring at her since she was still in her school uniform and was getting her hair cut," Rachel admitted. "If he comes near her again I'll be sure to let you know."

He smirked at her. "Sure. Just take his picture too so we can find the gentleman for that talk."

"Gladly." She looked at Stan.

He waved a hand slightly. "I would rather hear from Grace herself but if she can only tell one of us, she should tell Danny so he can handle it and then tell us."

"I can do that," Danny promised. "Steve said the same thing and he'd tell me if she couldn't get me because I was on the stand or something."

"I like that idea," Stan agreed. "It's good we have a strong support network around us."

"Ohana," Grace reminded him. "It's family."

"Family is important," Stan agreed, patting her hand. "Go put your glass in the sink." She went to do that. He looked at Danny. "Was she injured?"

"Xander mentioned a few bruises when I asked."

"That's good then. How did he rescue her?"

"Some of his grenades." Stan sighed, shaking his head. "He was doing good and then one had an independent alarm that he triggered. David evacuated them so at least he did call in adult help."

Stan shook his head. "I'd rather he let David handle it but I'm glad he did manage it. Though I think I already have an ulcer from this event."

"It's not real often, Stan," Danny assured him. "It's only happened once before and I stopped it then."

"That's good. I'd hate to have to get more security for them." He looked at Rachel. "We'll hire a tougher driver."

"That's a good thing," she agreed, trying to pretend to be calm. "Grace." She came back, handing over her mother's phone. "Who? Oh, your grandmother." She answered her mother and put the phone down. "I won't be telling her about this. The fit will be a few weeks long and it will interrupt our vacation." The demonic hunting cat came slinking out and hopped onto Grace's lap to get some petting time in. Grace smiled, petting it. Rachel looked at her ex-husband. "They are done with?"

"Yeah. We made *real* sure they're not gonna do it again, Rachel."

"Thank you." He looked at Grace and she nodded she had it. He winked and left so they could talk to her. Rachel looked at her daughter. "I will hear about anything that threatens you from you yourself unless you are in the hospital," she said quietly. "Am I clear?" Grace nodded, not looking at her. "Good. Go to bed." Grace ran up to her room with the cat. Rachel looked at Stan. "It was a worry I used to have but he made sure nothing came near us."

"I appreciate that and I'm sure it's something normal that officers have to deal with at least once in their careers." He pulled her closer to cuddle her. "At least she's fine."

"She is. I need to make Xander a cake."

Stan smiled against her hair and kissed her on the temple. "He does love cake."

***
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