Cleaning Up After The Ancients - Chapter 41

Chapter 41 - The Never Ending Shuffle

Looking over Carson Beckett’s shoulder at the near line of people waiting outside her office, Elizabeth Weir held back a sigh before focusing back on the person who was currently asking her permission for yet another potentially dangerous thing.

“And you’re sure this genetronic resequencer can fix Grodin?”

“Oh aye.” Carson agreed with an emphatic nod. “Pretty sure now that Evan was thinking of using the standard combination of chromosomal inducer and cellular regeneration field that the Lantean’s went with when they wanted to flip their sex. And aye, that would work. But since we have sample’s of Grodin’s original DNA just lying around we can bypass that whole mess and just use a genetronic resequencer to turn him back to his original self.”

She had been extraordinarily uncertain about allowing Carson to go through with exposing himself to any version of the Ancient repository of knowledge. However four days in and he’d yet to show any of the symptoms Jack O’Neill had with his experience, so she was reaching a point of being hopefully optimistic that her concern might have been misplaced.

“What about potential risks from the two different procedures?”

“I cannae say none since we're dealing with Lantean technology.” Carson began as he seemed to consider the question. “However assuming the equipment's still in workable condition, there'd be a better chance of me winning the national lottery then something going wrong.”

Elizabeth gave a permissive nod. “Then you have my approval to go ahead, assuming Grodin's agreement of course .”

That did bring to the fore a question she had been hoping to ask Carson though, and given the circumstances she couldn't think of a reason not to do it now.

“While we're on the subject, have you discovered any potential long term side effects from the Thalia device?”

“Surprisingly no.” Carson admitted with a bemused shake of his head. “I even ran him through the Lantean scanners, and there wasn't so much as a nucleotide out of place.”

“Then it would be safe for human use?” Elizabeth floated as she considered the three requests Doctor Heightmeyer had forwarded to her.

“It should be.” Carson said as his brow furrowed in thought. “But I'm not sure why anyone would…”

He trailed off mid sentence as a look of abashed realization flashed across his face.

“Ah, well, I suppose it would be a subject of interest to some, though medically speaking I would suggest anyone who wanted to directly study the effects of the technology in such a manner discuss the issue with Doctor Heightmeyer first.”

“I'll keep that in mind.” Elizabeth said as she shot him an amused smile. “Is there anything else?”

“No.” Carson said as he pulled himself out of the chair and glanced over at the still growing line outside of her office. “Good luck with the rush.”

With that he walked out, giving a passing nod Major Sheppard as he passed.

Letting out a sigh, Elizabeth took a moment to get up and stretch before motioning for Sheppard to come in.

“Busy day.” He offered in an amused tone as he looked back at others outside before walking over and sitting down.

“You don’t know the half of it.” Elizabeth returned tiredly as she sat back down. “So what did you need? And please don’t say more men, Colonel Caldwell is already annoyed enough that we’ve effectively downed the Daedalus to a skeleton crew.”

“More men would be nice.” Sheppard admitted in a teasing tone before setting a binder down on her desk. “But in this case it’s more that I finished re-arranging the stargate teams so we can integrate the people that came over on the Daedalus.”

“Paper?” Elizabeth questioned with a raised eyebrow as she picked up the binder and began flipping through the pages.

“New security precaution.” Sheppard admitted with a grimace. “After Hermiod found that Wraith virus on the Daedalus, General O’Neill didn’t want to take any chances. So till we can confirm all our systems are clear of infection, it's paper for anything Secret and above.”

“I assume he’s aware that we have a rather limited supply of paper to work with out here?” Elizabeth put forward with a frown as she considered how long that would likely take with everyone’s current workload.

“He promised to send us more when we get around to returning the Daedalus’s extra ZPM.” Sheppard admitted. “Even offered to include the old typewriter he used to use to fill out mission reports at the SGC.”

“You don’t say.” Elizabeth drolled as she fought down the urge to giggle at the mental image that conjured up.

“Well, I don’t see any problems with this.” She continued as she passed the binder back to him. “And I’m sure Lieutenant Ford will be happy to hear he’s finally getting his own team.”

“Probationary team.” Sheppard corrected with an apologetic grin. “Not a hundred percent sure he can handle the command aspect without letting it go to his head. But I want the new teams run by people who have experience dealing with the Wraith, and the only one’s who’d be better in the position are already running teams of their own.”

Which was really just an unfortunate fact of being as disconnected as they were from Earth’s general personnel base.

“I’ll send his team on a few low priority missions to start with then.” Elizabeth offered, knowing that was what he was asking for even if he wasn’t directly asking it. “Do you have any idea about who you want to fill his spot on your team?”

Sheppard avoided looking in her eye at that, a sure sign he was about to say something he didn’t think she would approve of. “Figured I could put that off till after McKay gets back.”

“After Doctor McKay returns we’ll be returning to Earth for a full debriefing by the IOA.” Elizabeth pointed out, the fact that they had been able to dodge that till now resting solely on the fact that she had been able to defer the IOS’s requests under the idea that they were busy assisting in the recovery of multiple Ancient warships.

“Can’t say I didn’t consider that.” Sheppared returned with a wane grin. “Though speaking of the IOA, have they said anything about bringing Teyla along yet?”

“Yes.” Elizabeth confirmed as she hid a smile. “They were a bit concerned about a possible connection to the Wraith given her newly discovered genetics, however General O’Neill was apparently able to talk them around to allowing it.”

She had been somewhat surprised at that, but she supposed the man had more than enough experience dealing with the Jaffa to know that sometimes you just had to accept the risk.

“She’ll be happy to hear that.” Sheppard said, grinning in a way that suggested he was also personally happy with the decision. “She’s kind of wanted to see the real Earth since that thing with the aliens from M5S-224.”

“They also want us to bring the Ancient along.” Elizabeth added in with a sigh, hoping he’d have a better idea of how to accomplish that then she did.

“You remind them that the Ancient’s his own person?” Sheppard put forward skeptically.

“It may have come up.” Elizabeth admitted with a grimace, having been less than successful in getting through to them that it was very possible he would just straight up refuse. “However, they seem to have faith in my abilities to get it done.”

Sheppard shot her an awkward smile. “Well, good luck with that.”

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Author’s Notes: Jokes on you, Eventus wants to visit Earth, he has sights to see, and horribly lopsided deals to make. Maybe even women to meet.