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Jack O'Neill's POV

"General O'Neill! I demand that Colonel Carter and Doctor McKay be removed from this investigation!" Charles Rutger roared, clearly building up to a big rant the likes of which he hadn't heard since Kinsey. "That woman is clearly emotionally compromised and the so-called scientist doesn't understand his place!"

"Colonel Carter is the finest officer I've had the pleasure of serving with and her record is beyond reproach, MISTER Rutger," he said, making it clear that he would not be spoken to in that manner. "As for McKay, I admit he can be a bit difficult to work with sometimes but he's one of the brightest minds on the planet. He's saved this planet and members of the Atlantis expedition on numerous occasions. I'd say that earns him a little leeway in how he acts."

He could just see the veins in the man's forehead bulging but, since he had no particular desire to endure more ranting, he decided to move along to the real important stuff.

"As a matter of fact, after you were removed from the equation, Carter managed to get some images transferred to her laptop of the area surrounding the building her cousin and the others were based out of." he said, showing how valuable his former second in command really was. "We're currently having those images analyzed for any specific plants, weather or mountains that might give us a location. We're also cross referencing with every property Farrow-Marshal Aeronautics owns or owned at some time in the past. Once we have someplace to go, I plan on launching an aggressive assault on the place to seize both it and the goold."

"You let her open up Atlantis' systems to a cyber-warfare specialist!? Are you insane?!" Rutger asked incredulously with anger. "You've compromised the entire CITY!"

"Rutger? Do I look like a COMPLETE IDIOT?!" he said as he stood up and leaned over his desk to glare nose-to-nose. "The laptop was completely isolated from Atlantis' systems and so is the projector being used to display the images for the techs examining them. Unless you think that Rosenberg SOMEHOW managed to embed a virus in the images themselves so that they'd somehow get into the system via the cameras, Atlantis is perfectly safe. Now unless you have something CONSTRUCTIVE to say I suggest you go back to your IOA newbie buddies and let them know we're on top of things. I've got no time to hear you complain just because you didn't get your way."

Seeing the vein get bigger even as the man's face got red with anger, apparently he had two brain cells to rub together because he began to storm off towards the office door. Sadly, like most politicians with the same attitude as Kinsey had years ago, he just had to stop long enough to get the last word in.

"This isn't over O'Neill," Rutger said with dead seriousness in his tone. "You and Carter might think you can do whatever you want with your commands but one day you're going to screw up and I'm going to be there to see you both court marshaled!"

With a slam of the office door he was finally alone and just to make sure it stayed that way he walked over to the closed door and locked it. If someone wanted to see him they'd have to knock and convince him it'd be a good idea to let them in. Considering the mood he was in at the moment, it'd probably take a trusted friend or someone from the White House for him to open himself up to possible hassle. Moving back to his chair, he had to wonder how best to handle the situation. Athena had to know her former agents had been captured by now or at least that they weren't coming home anytime soon. How would the snake head react? Would she start hauling ass to evacuate the place where Carter's cousin and her team had operated out of? Had everything already been destroyed? Or had the old goold cockiness worked in their favor once again? Better not risk it.

Picking up the phone he decided to get the ball rolling with preparations.

He'd already taken a look at the images Carter had been given and had a hunch about where the goold's base was located. He'd start assembling a force from the military bases surrounding that area but not so close that there'd be a chance Athena might pick up on the troop movements. The troops would be airlifted in by chopper, with a heavily armed escort surrounding them at all times in a formation that'd keep them from getting wiped out in one fell swoop. He'd even have the George Hammond work overwatch on the operation from orbit to make sure that the assault force would have advanced knowledge of any surprises. He'd also have the ship maintain teleportation locks on as many of the members of the attack force as possible so they could be pulled out of the line of fire at a moment's notice. He knew some people might say that it'd be better to just teleport the entire attack force in using the three-oh-three and forget about the choppers.

However that would be a strategic mistake in his mind.

Both from the photos gained from the Area Fifty-One investigation and the agents themselves, he had good reason to believe Athena had access to advanced aircraft so not employing air assets would be a mistake. He would not leave the ground forces vulnerable to an air assault plus he had to factor in the possibility that Athena and her group would bolt using some souped-up sci-fi aircraft. That'd be why he'd have a squadron of F-302's ready to deploy from the Hammond if the goold's escape craft made it into space and another squadron of F-22 Raptors ready to scramble if things stayed in the atmosphere.

He just hoped that that would be enough.

After listening to Carter's interrogation and rereading the reports from the various encounters with Elizabeth Summers' team, there was a bad feeling brewing in his gut. Tech, weapons and vehicles from fiction suddenly becoming real seemed so completely out there he didn't want to believe that it was true but the facts didn't lie. The only thing in their favor was the fact so little time had passed between the abductions of Summers and her friends and now that there was no way that Athena could've made much. Maybe a small army of enhanced soldiers, a couple of fictional vehicles and a warehouse filled with advanced weapons at most in his opinion. It'd be a cast iron bitch taking them down if Athena had time to prepare for an assault, which would be why after he got the ball rolling he'd call President Hayes to get the guy to green light the entire operation. They needed to be able to move the second they had a location and that meant getting all the bureaucratic red tape dealt with right from the beginning. If they could catch the enemy forces while they were still setting up they could lock things down before too many body bags got filled on either side.

Hmmmm… what the hell! he thought as he decided to go with a risky play. If Athena's gonna have a bunch on her side, we might as well have five on ours.

He knew there'd be a lot of people against the idea of putting Summers and her group in the assault force but to him it'd be a good way to reduce the level of casualties. He'd done some quick skimming on the net of the fictional characters Carter had mentioned back at the SGC and what he saw made him long for the old days. He might've gone up against some strange stuff back as the leader of SG-1 but never did he feel as outclassed as he did right at this moment. Energy weapons, personal force fields, robot bodies that could toss Humvees around and swords capable of slicing through a tank in one swing? Give him Anubis' Kull warriors and Ori warriors any day! If Athena had managed to upgrade even ten people with this kinda sci-fi stuff, the casualties on the invading side would be ridiculous.

However if they had a team of five fighting for them and they made enough of a splash, it might make the goold's forces focus on them, taking some of the pressure off of the ordinary soldiers letting them survive.

Besides, from his point of view, Summers and her people didn't have a lot of options and made the best of the hand they'd been dealt. They'd had their lives changed forever, were tortured for the secrets their bodies held and were forced into wet work under threat of pain or death. Anyone, even seasoned soldiers, put through something like that would have a tough time keeping it together through all that, much less keep the fire going in their souls. Besides, it'd serve the snake head right to have some karmic payback tear their way to her to deliver some divine retribution. Still, he'd probably have to make sure he or Carter were with them to keep them from going all the way with their revenge. As much has he could understand their inclination to go all Pinhead on the goold, the fact of the matter was that the host was innocent. Aside from being a ruthless businesswoman, Charlotte Mayfield was a prisoner inside her own body at the moment and not guilty of the crimes Athena committed while in possession of it.

If they wanted to skin the symbiote alive after it'd been pulled out of the host he'd let him. He'd buy them the best skinning knife money could buy!

But he would not let their thirst for revenge cause them to harm the life of an innocent.

They'd done enough murdering thanks to that sick snake!

It'll be years before they manage to wash all the blood of their hands, he thought as he heard the sound of the phone ringing on the other end of the line. But they'll get their chance. I promise you, Carter: Lizzie and Dawn will get their chance.

Goa'uld Athena's POV

Seeing Wesker enter her office, she was once again forced to confront one of the few irritating qualities her bodyguard possessed: his ability to express emotion through his face was significantly limited. Since she'd originally hired him on, it'd felt like the only time feelings manifested visually was when they were reaching their upper peak and that didn't happen often.

Still, the one thing she could trust was that when she sent him to complete a task, he almost never failed her.

"Report," she ordered, lacing her fingers together in front of her face.

"It is as you suspected, Mistress," Wesker said in his usual professional manner. "All five members of the Cheyenne Mountain insertion team have been captured and are currently being held in Atlantis' brig."

"And the failsafe's?" she asked, narrowing her eyes at the unexpected turn of events.

"Your agent activated the device as he'd been instructed to once he was within range but there was no change in the status of the agents." He showed no change in his emotional state. "He attempted twice more at even closer range but only obtained the same result. It is therefore logical to assume that either the force field of the cells blocked the termination signal or the implants themselves have been somehow neutralized."

"Indeed," she said with a chill creeping into her voice.

This was NOT a part of her primary plan.

The primary plan called for her agents to remain in her employ for a good while yet, likely until their more advanced replacements were ready to succeed them, and only then would they be terminated. She'd wanted them to each train their successors to the fullest of their abilities so that she could have agents of equal or greater skill at her command. Now, though, it looked as though she would have to have faith that the natural abilities and the skills learned while in their pre-enhanced states would be enough to meet her needs.

A setback certainly but fortunately, unlike her brethren, she had possessed foresight enough to plan for this turn of events even if it hadn't been the path she'd have preferred things go.

"Begin contacting our 'special customers' in various parts of the world and tell them one word: Jörmungandr." Her tone said that she would not tolerate failure or error. "Then begin preparing this facility for a siege. Use every piece of technology we've acquired from my former agents and summon every 'employee' able to bear arms that is less than an hour's drive from here. I leave it to you and Smith to decide who will be the shield and who will be my silent serpent."

"As you command, mistress." Wesker gave her an obedient nod of his head before turning around and leaving her office.

As soon as her subordinate was gone she turned to her computer and began the complex process of connecting the vid-com system to another larger facility that she wished to speak with. Even if every human that could fight for her was armed to the teeth, she was under no illusions about how the coming battle would end. It was going to happen months before she'd intended it to occur and that meant that several defense systems and weapons would not be in place to greet the invading force. It'd always been technological superiority that she'd been counting on when it came to restoring the System Lords and reconquering all that had been lost. Indeed, technology would ensure the obedience of those who served her. Technology would ensure that the defenses of her targets would not be able to hold against what she would bring to bear against them. Technology would ensure that those she wanted dead would indeed die.

However technology took time to assemble and that was something she was running out of at the moment.

Fortunately she knew of a way to buy more time.

With the final keystroke a 'processing' icon appeared in the middle of the vid-com window and she leaned back in her leather seat as she waited for it to finish. She didn't have to wait long before a familiar face appeared with an equally familiar background behind the man.

"Captain Pantoliano! I trust things are going well for you at your new posting?" she asked, deciding that some pleasantries could be permitted.

"Indeed, Mistress," Captain Sid Pantoliano replied with a satisfied smirk on his face. "Engineering just finished their primary systems diagnostics and everything's green there. I was just about to order them to run the diagnostics on the secondary systems."

"I'm afraid that they'll have to be done on the fly, Captain," she said, letting some seriousness seep slowly into her words. "I've just been informed that crucial intel has fallen into the hands of the enemy. I expect they'll begin moving on this facility 'aggressively' within the next five hours."

"I can be airborne within the hour and at your location in minutes." he stated with his voice becoming all business.

"Excellent. However I would like your arrival to be a… surprise… for the opposition." A malicious look settled on her face. "I trust THAT system is fully operational and has been tested at least once?"

"Indeed it has, Mistress," he replied with a malicious look of his own. "I anticipated it should be given priority and, as of twenty-three thirty hours last night, it has been confirmed as operational and completely effective."

"Excellent. I can see that my decision to make you captain of my flagship was a wise one." Genuine glee dripped into her tone. "Wait for my signal before making your grand entrance. Timing is everything if one wants an appropriately dramatic effect."

"Of course," he said with a nod of acknowledgment. "Any orders regarding the enemy forces? I'm confident with the armament at my disposal I could wipe them out if that was your wish."

"No. Merely provide defensive fire for my craft until it enters the hanger," she said reluctantly even as she chose to adhere to her long term plan. "Many before us have made the mistake of underestimating this enemy or overestimating themselves, only to find themselves defeated and dead. I will leave NOTHING to chance. We will leave. We will leave and return at a time of our choosing with an army that will sweep over this world as a tsunami of blood!"

"By your command Mistress," he said with nod of subservience.

"I will await your arrival, Captain," she said as she reached for the vid-com termination button. "DON'T be late."

With that the vid-call was over with and she was free to move onto the next part of her preparations.

Leaving her office she proceeded to the elevator before pressing the button for the lowest sub-level of the complex. It was on that level that not only was the central power supply for the complex located but also the entirety of the database system where all that had been learned was stored. She was not there to begin transferring this information to another location, though, that had already been done months ago, but rather to obtain the means by which she could ensure that the enemy gained nothing. The Tauri had showed an impressive ability to assimilate and adapt newly acquired technology in the past and it was not unfeasible that they could come to match her in strength by the time she returned to their world.

This could NOT be allowed under any circumstances.

Exiting the elevator she made her way to the main power room, ignoring the few employees she encountered along the way. They had served their purpose and most of them were of no further use to her. Those that she had chosen to continue serving her would escape with her aboard her craft when the time came to leave. She had plans for them, plans that went beyond aiding in the construction of her future army, but best to leave those thoughts until they were more relevant. By her reckoning, presuming that all went well, it would be two years before she would return to Earth at the head of her army.

She could afford to leave some decisions for later.

Entering the central control room for the power generators, she looked about and immediately located the woman she'd put in charge of maintaining the energy generation. Moving towards the impeccably dressed woman, it was not long before she was noticed by the one she sought but then she had never been able to sneak up on the woman before so this was to be expected.

"Mistress," the woman said after going down to one knee before her.

"Rise," she said, pleased by this woman's obsession with following protocol to the letter. "It is time to prime 'Ragnarok'."

This produced a look of surprise on the woman's face, as well as a little fear, but it didn't last long and soon after the woman strode quickly over to a nearby safe. Efficiently the door was opened and two metal keys were removed and the woman returned to her, handed her one of the keys before stepping to the side and gesturing to the part of the main control console where the keys were to be used. Striding purposefully forward she soon found herself before a section of the console that had two slots for the keys at either end of a closed and reinforced compartment. Looking to the head of the power department, they both placed their keys at one of the slots and, on the count of three, inserted them and turned them. The compartment slid open, revealing a hand held detonator that was plugged into the console but it only remained there a moment before she reached in and pulled it out.

In response to this action every other console and interface connected to the main console shorted out rather dramatically, causing the others who were in the room to jerk away from their stations. With this done every manner of accessing the systems to shut down her little surprise was rendered either useless or requiring more time than available to fix. While there was a SMALL possibility of one of her former agents managing something, she felt it was small enough to not require further exertion to stack the deck in her favor.

"I suggest all of you begin clearing out your desks and find someplace far away to be VERY quickly," she said loudly enough so that everyone could hear her. "Your employment is going to be terminated with a BANG in the very near future."

For a moment it looked like some of them might actually try asking her what she meant but, when they saw what she had in her hand as well as the open compartment, they clued into the truth.

At once it was a stampede for the door that left her chuckling at the preview of what would soon be happening on planets all across the galaxy at the mere mention that she was coming.

GLORIOUS!

Colonel Cameron Mitchell's POV

"Mind explaining again what these new 'accessories' are?" Xander asked, poking at the metal collar around his neck.

"Officially? They're there to let the attack force know you and your pals are friendlies just in case the opposition has nanosuit soldiers and cyborgs of their own. Wouldn't want you to get pumped full of holes by accident," he replied even as the troop transport carried him along with SG teams one, three, five and twelve, not to mention Team Five as he was calling them.

"And unofficially?" Xander asked, sounding like he already knew he wasn't going to like the answer.

"Unofficially the powers that be don't trust you. Each collar is made of a Trinium/naquadah alloy and is filled with C4 explosives." His reply made it clear that he really did not like this part of the operation despite how he could understand the reasoning behind it. "If you or your team forget which direction your weapons are supposed to pointed or look like you're playing both sides…"

"I get it. BOOM." Xander said bitterly as he came to the logical conclusion.

He REALLY didn't like this part of the operation.

Jack had really pulled out all the stops to put him, Sam and Teal'c in charge of chaperoning Team Five rather than a team from outside the SGC appointed by that ass Rutger. He'd only been in the IOA idiot's presence for a couple of minutes and already he knew he didn't want to have to deal with the man any more than he absolutely had to. Clearly the guy was trying to come off as in charge and was overcompensating with the 'been there, done that, stop feeding me bullshit' attitude he kept throwing at people. Team Five had seriously damaged the credibility of the IOA and the SGC with their actions and that'd caused a lot of people to go to the extreme to try and get it back. That was why almost a hundred ground troops, armed to the teeth, had been assigned to this operation along with some pretty impressive air and space support.

Not that I'm gonna look a gift horse in the mouth, he thought as he waited for the signal that they'd arrived at the touchdown point for their chopper. I might not be as big a gamer and anime nut as some people but I know enough that only an idiot would look forward to what's gonna happen next.

The weapons and abilities he'd seen in the Halo games and the Ghost in the Shell had him worried about how well they'd fair in the fight to come. The ability to go invisible, to slice through APC armor like it was butter and personal force field's? They might've encountered similar stuff at the SGC but never all at once, plus he had a feeling that what they'd be facing would make what they'd fought seem like cheap imitations. Also, while he'd like to think that they'd brought enough troops for the mission, they had to consider the possibility that they hadn't.

Here's hoping that the Hammond doesn't lose the teleporter locks on us, he thought as did a quick check of his gear. I think we're gonna need it.

"One minute from the LZ," came the voice of the chopper pilot through vehicle's speaker system. "Prepare for touchdown."

"Alright, boys and girls, here's the plan!" he said turning to face the assembled forces. "We're about to take a trip to techno wonderland. Weapons and opposition are going to be badass. Don't assume the usual Goa'uld weapons and if you see something that looks local, DON'T assume they'll have the same punch. Our 'new friends' will give us a heads up when they can but treat this as a blank slate situation. Be paranoid, careful and take down the opposition hard. The brass says while it'd be a nice bonus to be able to take prisoners for intel they'll be just as happy with a coroner's report.

"We've got three objectives. In order of importance they are: apprehend the Goa'uld using Mayfield as a puppet, with both of them being alive, secure the compound in as good condition as we can manage so the eggheads can go over it with a fine tooth comb and lastly access the compound's network so we can find out just how bad the rot goes with this snake head." He measured the reactions of everyone present. So far, so good. "Is this the only place she's manufacturing the sci-fi stuff out of or are there other places? If there are other places where are they located? To that end me, Teal'c, The Major and Master Chief here will hauling ass to the main building and her office while the rest of you play with the main enemy force."

"We really expecting to be fighting that many, Colonel?" asked one of the members of SG-5.

"We don't know how many we're going up against," he replied, voicing his own frustration. "They wouldn't let the Hammond do a sensor scan just in case it tipped them off that we were coming. Our friends here didn't get a chance to get a full tally of the number of people working out of the place and it's been hours since they didn't report back. That'd be time enough to call in some extra trigger fingers if the snake head thinks she might need them. Go into this assuming we're the underdogs. The Hammond is going to be overhead and will be keeping locks on all of us to pull your asses out of the fire if things get too hot. You find yourself in a pinch you can't get out of and you don't want to get sent home in a coffin, don't be afraid to call for a beam out. Any other questions?"

When he didn't hear anything after a minute he took that to mean 'no'.

"Then lock and load, people! Time to show the goold that no one messes with the mean and green!" he declared full of the usual ground pounder gusto.

He felt the chopper begin to descend a little while later and, when they all felt the thump of touchdown, the rear hatch dropped, allowing them to pour out the second it stopped moving. Just like they'd been trained the first five out immediately established a defensive perimeter and looked for any sign of trouble while the rest disembarked. As soon as they were all out they divided into their assigned teams and began to make their way towards the complex the lab boys had managed to find by cross referencing the images the Major had provided with likely locations.

"Alpha One en route," he transmitted through his throat microphone.

"Bravo Two en route," came the voice of the second group commander through his com-piece.

One after another each group leader confirmed that they were on their way to the complex until all one hundred troopers were accounted for.

That's when the fun began.

Assault choppers flew by overhead at an impressive rate of speed since it was their job to be advance scouts and takeover targets of opportunity. Once they had a better idea of any fixed weapon locations or major troop concentrations they'd know where to send most of their forces as well as what'd be the safest yet quickest path for his group. They had to get into the main building and access the internal network so that they could get the info before Athena or one of her minions could delete all the info they were after and trashed the desired hardware too. It didn't take a genius to figure out that if they won the battle but lost the resources that'd allowed the goold's team to steamroll past the security of two of the most secure facilities on the planet, the brass would be livid even if they sacked Athena. The higher ups would want to get a good look at the tech so that they could improve security with it and arm their troops better so they could never get spanked like they had again.

Plus he imagined that some of them would be interested in using the tech to help their economies.

Unlike some of the stuff that they found going through the stargate, there'd be things from Ghost in the Shell or Crysis that wouldn't be too far ahead of what was available to the public. With a little creative wheeling and dealing two or three of those advances would be enough to give an economically troubled country a nice financial boost. One thing that'd be up in the air, though, would be any of the weapons or cybernetics. While the IOA had been around awhile now and each represented country tried to get along with one another so they could do what's best for all, they still tended to look out for their own national interests more often than not. As a result when the topic of guns or robot bodies came up there'd be arguing over who got first crack and, when someone inevitably tried to pitch dividing everything equally, one or two nations would argue they deserved more. He hoped that when all the yelling, mud-slinging and petty grudge spouting ended, something resembling a reasonable agreement would be hammered out.

Somehow he doubted it.

When he began hearing explosions and sounds that were a mix of gunfire as well as something else, he took it to mean that the fun had started.

"Alright people! Let's do this!" he said as he led the way for his group taking only a quick peek at his compass to make sure he was going the right way.

P-90 positioned so that he could bring it up and fire at a moment's notice, he let anything not mission related fade into the background.

Unlike other SG-1 missions, he didn't think he'd have time to think up any jokes or funny comments.

Xander's POV

NANOVISION ENGAGED

"Two hostiles at eleven and four at two!" he yelled over the sounds of battle after he'd dropped back behind the improvised cover his mission team was crouched behind.

"So what? That suit have X-Ray vision or something?" Colonel Cameron Mitchell asked after peeking to confirm the number of hostiles. "Cause I'm not seeing anything."

"I see their body heat," he replied even as he prepared to use his SCAR assault rifle. "If you can't see'em then that probably means Mayfield's probably managed to give'em nanosuits of their own. Want me to deal with them?"

"If it's not too much trouble…" Mitchell said, as though giving permission to take out the trash.

Which, from a certain point of view, was indeed the case.

CLOAK ENGAGED

He didn't know whether or not Mayfield had managed to give her troops the full nanosuit package or not, including the nanovision option, but if she hadn't then he had the advantage. Rising up from behind cover he took aim at the group of four first, letting off controlled bursts, pointing at each individual enemy in turn. He didn't stop to see if they were dead because, just like his Prophet memories said, taking serious hits knocked the cloak option offline, so the rest of his mission group could handle them now. Swinging the barrel of the assault rifle towards the group of two, he began to come under fire but had a solution for that.

MAXIMUM ARMOR

He didn't exactly have a lot of bars left on the nanosuit's energy meter but, fortunately, he didn't need it for very long since two more bursts at the remaining enemies knocked their cloaks offline temporarily.

Two loud blasts let him know that Willow had decided to back him up with the Franchi SPAS-12 she'd picked out as part of her weapons load out for the operation. He couldn't argue with the results as both of the enemy soldiers he'd decloaked with his SCAR went down like bowling pins. Looking about the area for any sign of incoming hostiles since he'd shut off his nanovision, he couldn't see anything so he looked Mitchell in the eyes and shook his head in the negative.

"Nice job. Let's keep moving forward!" Mitchell ordered before the rest of the group fell in behind him.

Sure would be nice to be able to keep the nanovision on all the time, he thought as he relied on the sun overhead to illuminate any enemies they came across. That's the only real con to the nanosuits: you can only use their cool functions for a little while before they gotta recharge.

Maybe once the trust level between him and the governments improved he could ask them to see about building him an extra battery pack for the nanosuit or improve its energy efficiency. He wasn't going to whine about it and he'd make do if he had to but the limited energy capacity for the suit's special functions put it all on him to cope when they weren't available. If they could double or triple the amount of time he had with each function, he'd be able to do more and that'd raise the probability of a successful mission significantly.

Still, no point in crying over what he didn't have, especially when he needed to keep his eyes open for enemy troops or fixed weapon positions. Since the operation had begun a little under an hour ago progress had been happening in spurts, with enemy weaponry forcing his mission team to dive behind whatever seemed like useful cover. Sometimes they got lucky with the odd rocky outcropping or even a structure capable of at least blocking the enemy's line of sight, but other times the only thing that'd saved them was the enemy's piss poor aim. Based on what they'd faced so far it looked like the assault on Mayfield's complex had happened quickly enough that the bitch hadn't had time to bring in highly skill troops. Security guards, maybe a few ex-soldiers who'd been bought and, unless he missed his guess, some civilians that might've played paintball war games at some point in their lives.

Anything that increased the odds of them making it through with few, if any, casualties on their side was something he could get behind.

It was as they came to the top of the hill that, according to the map he'd seen of the area, should give them a straight line to the complex that they hit something of a snag.

Rising up out of the ground via hidden metal doors were two weapon emplacements that basically looked like someone had taken two giant sci-fi assault rifles, yanked off their pistol grips then put them on a swivel mechanism. For a second he couldn't recognize where they came from but then it hit him like a ton of bricks.

"DOWN!" he yelled as he dropped to the ground himself.

The others followed his lead and the purple plasma bolts the weapon emplacement spewed out burned holes through the air. He didn't know if his nanosuit could protect him from something like that but he sure wasn't inclined to find out the hard way.

"HK tank plasma cannons! Very nasty!" he explained as the weapon emplacement seemed to be following a 'spray and pray' targeting method, followed by a gradual zeroing in on its target.

"Nah! Ya think!?" Mitchell said as he brought his P-90 up and started raining bullets on the emplacement in the hopes of hitting something vital.

Unfortunately either the building materials for the thing were naturally tough or Mayfield's people had the foresight to add some armor plating because, after a full clip was spent, the thing still functioned. With bullets apparently ineffective he was scrambling to think up a way to take the emplacement out but fortunately, like he usually did, G-man came through right before zero hour.

"Stay down!" Giles said before getting up and breaking into a sprint.

Watching the SPARTAN-II go, he was amazed to see that, despite the obvious weight of the man and the armor, the former Watcher was actually managing to stay just ahead of whatever targeting system the plasma cannons were operating under. All during the time the big man was running, though, he was also advancing on the emplacement, managing incredibly nimble leaps and evasions when necessary. Eventually Giles got close enough to actually leap onto the emplacement and then, with the superhuman strength available to him, tore the deadly weapon in half down the middle. This evidently disconnected it from both its main power supply and the targeting system as the plasma cannons soon sputtered out and died.

Watching him hop down off of it almost made you think it was just another day at the office but all of them knew better.

"You're awful quick on your feet, Chief," Mitchell said as they got off the ground and brought their weapons up in case trouble found them sooner rather than later.

"You should see me tap dance." Giles said in perfect deadpan. "We should expect things to get hotter the further we go in."

"The snake head can make things as hot as she wants!" Mitchell said as he snapped a fresh clip into his P-90. "We're still bringing her down."

"Amen to that," Willow said with resolve that was borderline scary.

Buffy's POV

"Hostiles terminated," Dawn said after surveying the immediate area with machine like precision. "No new hostiles detected within sensor range. We may proceed."

It's wrong.

She was glad that it looked like Dawn had somehow managed to delete or overwrite the Queen Bitch's directives but it still felt so wrong that there was so little emotion or LIFE in her little sister. She had memories, countless ones, where Dawn smiled or laughed or showed off her infamous Summers temper but ever since Rayne cast the spell… nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

Fortunately, in the present situation, this provided her ample motivation to take down the opposition so she could get her own pound of flesh before the others finished things without her. She WANTED to charge ahead and cut her way to the source of her hatred but the fashion faux pas around her neck made that inadvisable. Colonel Mitchell had made it clear that, if she and the others didn't act like good little soldiers, they'd explosively lose their heads. From what she'd been able to see of the man's face, she got the impression that he wasn't in favor of this little 'precaution' but at the same time he wasn't protesting too loudly, either. While this put him a level or two above those that'd likely prefer that the 'freaks' be put down, she still wasn't ready to count him as an ally. As far as she was concerned it was going to take a lot of hard work from both sides before she and the rest of her 'team' were no longer considered mass murderers, but possibly friends.

It might even take as long as twice the normal human lifespan.

She might even last long enough to see that day come.

Dawn certainly would see that day, presuming, of course, that she wasn't destroyed before then.

Turning back to the members of SG-3 and five who were still crouched behind cover, she asked, "You boys just going to crouch there or are you going to help us girls take this place?"

This shook the soldiers out of the state of awe they'd been in after they'd seen Dawn take down eight different enemies, on her own, without getting large amounts of her fake skin blown off.

"You heard the lady, men!" Colonel Reynolds said as he rose up from his crouch with Colt M16A3 rifle brought into a ready position. "We've still got ground to cover and assholes in need of a little more lead in their diet. Move out!"

She took the lead with Dawn, knowing that the men behind them wouldn't care too much, and would probably think of them as shields to be used against incoming fire. Better that the 'freaks' get it than them was that they were probably thinking. It didn't matter to her what they called her because, after all she'd done, she deserved to be verbally torn apart at the very least and at the very most torn apart in the most painful manner conceivable. However she would NOT tolerate anyone giving the others a hard time, especially Dawn, because while they'd all done terrible things, her sister hadn't had even the scarce options the rest of them had possessed. Her little sister had been completely chained by the directives Mayfield had put into her and, in her opinion, suffered from her emotions being buried so deep they might as well not exist.

That was her opinion and she was sticking to it.

As for the others… she'd leave it to them to decide what punishment would be appropriate as penance for the lives they'd taken.

Snapping her Solid Eye pieces over both her eyes, she kept a sharp eye out as they went for any sign of enemies or automated weapon emplacements. Her group had already come across both on the approach to the main complex itself but hadn't lost a single person thanks to their combined skills. With the machine-sharp reflexes and accuracy Dawn managed to turn any surprise attacks back on the attackers while her imprinted ability allowed her to deflect any projectiles. With the two of them leading the way the SG teams behind them were more free to pick their shots, thus allowing them to efficiently towards their goal. Still, there was something that bothered her, something instinctual, and she had learned since becoming the Slayer to trust those instincts.

This is too easy. She continued to hunt with her eyes for signs of approaching enemies. So far all that bitch has sent at us are nanosuit soldiers, normal infantry and the odd automated weapons. Where are the SPARTANS? Where are the cyborg warriors like me? Where are the terminators?

Her thoughts distracted her for a moment and it almost allowed a burst from an MP5 to hit her if not for the ingrained training she'd gotten from Raiden.

"You okay there, Miss Summers?" Colonel Reynolds asked as he fell into stride alongside her at short while later.

"Yeah. Sorry. Something about this just doesn't feel right." She glanced at the man for a moment before resuming her survey of the path before them just in time to see Dawn dispatch her attacker. "Mayfield should be throwing more at us. A LOT more."

"We caught her by surprise is all," Reynolds said reassuringly. "She wasn't expecting on having this place found out so soon."

"Maybe. It just feels like she's holding back on purpose." She was unable to shake the feeling that their progress was allowed rather than earned. "She's had files and scans on my friends and me for months. Yet in all that time this is all she's managed? No. Something's wrong."

"You might have a point but 'til we have some idea what that something is, we have no choice but to press on."

"I guess so," she said, forced to concede that, without something more than instinct to go on, going back could be as dangerous as going forward.

"AARRRUU!" An inhuman sound from ahead of them echoed from beyond the collection of trees and instantly it pinged a sense of recognition and concern.

"What the hell is-?" Reynolds asked but, before he could finish his question, something crashed through the trees, snapping them like twigs.

Gekkos.

"Scatter!" she ordered without thinking about it, charging the trio of Gekkos, high frequency blade drawn.

She knew even before she got within their reach what was going to happen and so, when the lead gekko attempted a roundhouse kick with its leg, it was like riding a bicycle. She leap over the artificial limb, cutting through half of its width with her sword as she passed over it before landing. Not even looking back to examine her work she came under fire from a pair of M2 Browning fifty caliber heavy machine guns. Being under such a bombardment wouldn't have been impossible to handle with just her sword but somehow Mayfield had taught these monstrosities to work as a team. The one with the guns would drive her towards its partner without them and that one would attempt to pummel her with its legs. However, when she evaded the leg attacks, she left herself somewhat vulnerable to the bullets from the fifty cals, which made blocking or evading them… difficult.

She was eventually forced to be economical with her movements, deflect only the bullets that would do her serious damage if they hit, as she fought to defeat all three.

Deciding that the long range threat needed to be dealt with first she used a feint to temporarily throw off its targeting systems before sprinting towards it. Just as it was about to reacquire her she leapt into the air using all the strength her artificial legs possessed, sending her soaring into the sky only to land atop the armed autonomous fighting vehicle. Reorienting herself she grabbed one of the fifty cals and used her superior strength to force it to aim itself at the gekko she'd maimed with her blade. Like the monsters from Raiden's memories the one she rode upon struggled against her, uselessly firing the fifty caliber heavy machine gun as it did so, but this only aided her as the bullets perforated her desired target. From the bottom of its legs right up to the metal 'body' the damage occurred and, with one final bestial bark, it fell to the ground like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

One down. Two to go. She brought her HF blade up and stabbed it into the top of the gekko she was on before back flipping to avoid the kick from the unarmed one.

BOOM!

As it turned out she didn't have to.

Colonel Reynolds fired his grenade launcher again even as his comrades focused their automatic weapons fire on the remaining artificial animal's right knee. Before long the fake muscles were torn up so bad they could no longer serve their function but, even as it compensated for the damage by trying to put the majority of its weight on its undamaged leg, it was merely a delay. Refocused fire went for the other knee joint and before long the last gekko was on the ground, flailing around trying to fulfill the programming inside of it but finding itself physically incapable of doing so. In the end it was Dawn who finished things with a concentrated spray of bullets directed at the same spot she'd plunged her HF blade, bringing the useless movement to an end.

Looking about from the spot she'd hopped to after finishing her second gecko, she couldn't see any more of the mechanical monsters approaching so she took that to mean that her group had a respite to savor for a little while.

"Damn. Hope there aren't any more of those things," Reynolds said, shaking his head as he took in what they'd taken down collectively as a group.

"If we were back in Sunnydale I'd smack you upside the head for saying something like that."sShe said with exasperation. "But seeing as we're not I'll say 'probably not' and hope for the best."

As the soldiers reloaded their guns and she kept her HF blade in a relaxed yet ready for action position, they resumed their march towards the complex to finally finish thing.

Karma was a bitch and Mayfield was about to get all she could handle.

Jack O'Neill's POV

"How're things going?" he asked as he re-entered the mission observation room after a brief trip to the bathroom.

"Considering the intel we had to work with going in? Not too bad," Carter asked as she kept watching the main monitor that displayed a combo of helmet cam feeds and a virtual representation of how things were going on the battlefield. "Could've been worse if the choppers hadn't gone in first."

"Yep," he said in agreement with the statement. "Nothing ruins a good defense like a strafing run of Hydra 70 rockets and twenty millimeter M197 Gatling rounds."

Indeed, once the choppers he'd sent in were done escorting the troops, sending them ahead to stir things up had been a good move. One of the choppers had taken some damage from some anti-air defenses scattered about the inner perimeter of the complex but the pilot had managed to land safely some distance from the fighting. The flyboys would have to wait until things cooled down before someone could be sent out to effect temporary repairs that'd allow it to fly to the nearest AFB. The remaining choppers were performing hit and runs to take pressure off of the advancing units before retreating out of range of Athena's defenses. With this strategy no more choppers should go down and the odds of ground casualties should decrease as well.

Not that there hadn't been any so far, of course.

Even after he'd done everything he could to get the operation moving as soon as possible, the goold had still managed to set up a respectable defense. What her forces lacked in skill or experience they more than made up for it with the advanced hardware at their disposal, not to mention the fixed weapon emplacements scattered about. The troops scrounged up in a hurry were a combination of SG teams and Ranger teams that were close enough as well as available for deployment. Totaling one hundred bodies they attacked the place but, due to the advanced weaponry and tech, that number had dropped to eighty-three since the first shot was fired. Sadly most of those seventeen were fatalities rather than injuries, leaving him with a bad taste in his mouth when he thought of the 'we regret to inform you' letters that would be sent out.

Still, based on the main monitor and the chatter filling the room, the assault force had made it to the inner perimeter of the complex and Mitchell's team was breaching the main building itself right before his eyes. With a little luck they'd have the goold in custody within the next twenty minutes or so and access to her computer files ten minutes after that. It'd take a while longer for the entire complex to be both safe and secure, considering the potential for surprises of the fatal kind, but he was confident they'd manage.

Looking to the right he couldn't help but smile at the impotent fury on Rutger's face at the moment since not a single incident had come up to justify pressing the button on Elizabeth Summers or her team. In fact, unless his hearing was starting to go in his old age, more than a few soldiers sounded like they were grateful that the enhanced humans were fighting alongside them. Not every soldier was speaking praises, though, but from what he'd heard most of those people were probably concerned about their future job security. It didn't take a genius to know that, once government-sanctioned eggheads gave the enhancements their seal of approval, every nation in the know would want to 'upgrade' their armed forces. They'd be stupid not to since refusing to do so would put them at a serious disadvantage if they ever came into conflict with their neighbors or a hostile nation that had upgraded their forces. Some soldiers, though, wouldn't be comfortable with the idea of putting machines in their bodies or being made into something that didn't fit their definition of 'human'. However if there was one thing he'd learned since the day he first walked through the stargate it was that humanity didn't necessarily mean matching the physical description of human that'd been around for millennia. Humanity was as much a way of thinking, of behaving, as much was it was how you looked on the outside.

Putting all of that aside, he couldn't stop thinking about Miss Summers' comment to Reynolds about how something was off about this battle.

Like Reynolds he wanted to pass it off as just being a case of them managing to storm the gates before the goold had her defenses fully in place. Goold were like that when things didn't go according to their divine will, like losing their favored agents unexpectedly or having their enemies find out where they live way before they were supposed to. However there was an itch in the back of his mind telling him that they should be suffering more losses than this. Where were the Pelicans Athena should have? Where were the terminators? The goold might not have had enough time to make cyborgs like Miss Summers or SPARTANs like Mister Giles but he felt like she had had enough time to make advanced aircraft or robots.

On instinct he went over to the station that handled the information coming from the George Hammond and the spy satellite that'd been repositioned for this operation.

"Anything odd coming up?" he asked the technician in charge of the station.

"Honestly, General, it's all more than odd to me so could you be a bit more specific?" the technician asked, sounding like he was a little thrown by some of the participants in the battle.

Normally he'd have been a little annoyed by someone not speaking to him like a professional military man should but he decided he'd cut the younger man some slack.

"Something that hints at a cloaked ship in the air? Spots on the ground that could be hatches to underground areas that haven't opened yet? Things like that." he replied, keeping his tone calm and polite. "Colonel Carter was talking about fixing it so that we could monitor any abnormal atmospheric disturbances that had no visible cause…"

"…Like a cloaked ship. Gotcha," the technician said, finishing the thought before going to work on his console. "Give me a few minutes General. With the mess that is NORAD at the moment, we've lost almost all our ability to monitor the air for these sort of things and even with the Hammond and the satellite helping this won't be easy."

"Just do what you can," he said encouragingly, somewhat confident that the tech-guy wouldn't be here if he couldn't do his job well.

Glancing up at the main screen, he could see that almost all of the groups the troops had split off into had left the surrounding forest and were now officially treading on man-made ground. This was good in that it could mean that the battle was almost over but it could also mean that Athena had them right where she wanted for one massive 'wipe them all out' attack. Turning back to the technician's station screen, he waited for anything that could tell him if he was just being paranoid or if his instincts had been dead on once again.

"Alright, I've entered the parameters and accessed the functions of both the satellite and the Hammond that'll let us see atmospheric disturbances as well as an infrared look of the complex," the technician said, sounding confident of his work. "Let's see what we've got."

At once an image showed up on the station's monitor that looked like an overlay of the wind patterns within a certain radius of the complex and separate readings showing what was giving off heat on the ground to one degree or another. Looking back and forth from the main screen to the station monitor, he mentally started pairing up what he saw looking for anything that showed up on one but didn't show up on the other. It didn't take long for him to spot his first point of worry in the form of a rectangular shape roughly the size of a football field smack dab in the middle of the open area in front of the complex. For a shape so well defined it couldn't be mere chance and his gut was telling him he could be looking at either the spot where the mother of all weapons would be raised up or… or an underground hanger!

"Get on the horn to the choppers!" he yelled over to the stations in charge of managing communications for the operation. "We got a possible underground hanger right smack in front of the complex! I want it secure! Anything tries flying out of there I want it staring down the barrels of every missile pod and Gatling gun they've got!"

It was nice to watch the communications technicians immediately work to follow his orders instead of questioning his statement or looking to some other high ranking officer for confirmation. Looking back to the station monitor, he went back to work trying to find anything else that they weren't supposed to see and only peripherally sensed when Carter joined him in looking.

"Nice job, General," Carter said once she did her own comparison between the main screen and the station monitor.

"Ah, it was nothing you couldn't have done," he said humorously, trying to brush off his little bit of inspiration as being unworthy of remark. "Still, I'll bet you a month's salary that that rectangle leads to Athena's escape ship. We lock that down and she'll have no place left to run."

"Yep!" she said, trying to mimic how he usually said the word when he was trying to be humorous.

It needed some work but it was a good first try.

Still, when he couldn't find anything else that stood out as suspicious, his inner paranoid finally calmed down and he began to ease into the idea that the battle was all but over with. All surviving teams were now treading on the complex proper and Mitchell's team was inside, heading towards Athena's office where either she'd be or her computer that Miss Rosenberg could hack into for intel. According to the plan, half the remaining troopers would secure the perimeter around the buildings to nab any stragglers as well as keep an eye out for reinforcements. The remaining half would enter the complex itself and spread out floor by floor to look for Athena or her minions so that both could be captured and then restrained.

With the front door being stormed by well trained and armed troops and the escape route covered by some VERY nice guns, it'd take a miracle for Athena to escape.

Colonel Mitchell's POV

Backs to the wall on either side of the door that they had every reason to believe led to the goold's office, he looked to the members of Team Five and gave them the hand signal for a three second countdown.

As soon as they'd made it to the front door of the main building, he'd talked to them about how they'd approach nabbing Athena and, after a bit of discussion, they came up with a plan. It was simple, it'd be effective and it'd end hopefully with few if any of them getting hurt. He liked those plans. It'd start out with Mister Giles going in first since he had not only an energy shield to protect him but also some pretty sturdy armor. That would allow the big man to soak up enemy fire while the rest of them used him as an improvised tactical shield. Once the SPARTAN was far enough in, he and Mister Harris would split off to either side, focusing their fire on whatever seemed most dangerous at the time. The remaining members of the SG teams under his command would follow suit, with Rosenberg staying out of the line of fire since they needed her to hack the system and she couldn't do if she was dead. The young woman turned Major Motoko Kusanagi had protested this but he'd insisted, saying that they'd be in close quarters once they entered the building and that didn't leave her with a lot of maneuvering room. Since she wasn't bulletproof and she didn't possess an energy shield of her own, all it'd take was one lucky hit to the brain case to ruin everything.

The member of Team Five had reluctantly conceded the point but still didn't look happy about it.

Three…two…one…NOW! He thought even as he made the hand signals to Mister Giles.

With all the strength of the armor he possessed, 'Master Chief' burst through the door, ready to take enemy fire even as he and 'Prophet' went off to either side to catch any hostiles in a crossfire.

When they saw no one there but a single man in a suit standing to the right of a flat screen TV built into a wall… well, they still trained their weapons on the guy but they were also disappointed that it wasn't Athena.

"Mistress Athena sends her apologies for not being able to greet you in person, Colonel Mitchell, but she has a schedule to keep," the unidentified suit said as he took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves before methodically making sure his gloves were on properly. "I have been asked to remain and resolve any issues you might have. Shall we begin?"

Without warning and with speed that was definitely above what a normal human was capable of, the man charged Mister Giles with the intent of knocking the SPARTAN's block off. He wasn't worried because there was no way a simple punch was getting past the force field, even if the man could move damn fast. He was all prepared to see the idiot break his hand on the force field… when it somehow passed right through connecting with Mister Giles' helmet and knocked the 'Chief' back half a dozen feet and on his ass. This shocked just about everyone present since, according to their minds, this shouldn't have been possible but, when the newly classified high threat came after him, the one person who wasn't shocked stepped in.

With impressive speed 'Prophet' wrapped his arms around the suit's waist and then performed a German suplex, releasing the hostile at just the right time so as to get out of retaliation range quickly. This sign that they had a chance, that, while tough, defeating the surprising foe was not impossible, brought everyone back to themselves and that's when the bullets started to fly. Again he'd thought that while the guy might be fast and somehow able to bypass Mister Giles' force field, the odds were still good that the suit would go down with enough bullets pumped into him.

When Teal'c opened up with his drum magazined AA-12, he felt his position vindicated when every shot caused the hostile to stagger back like he'd been hit in the chest with rib-breaking punches. However, when the twelve gauge shells stopped firing and they all expected their foe to drop dead to the ground, they got the shock of their lives when what little damage was visible began to heal right before their eyes. They watched as the subordinate of Athena looked down at his chest and what remained of his shirt before tearing off what remained of the article of clothing, dropping it on the ground.

"I liked that shirt," the man said with mild irritation that didn't match the look of anger in his…red…reptilian…eyes?

"What the hell?" he gasped even as their foe began to change in subtle ways.

The…man's?... skin began to turn a bloody red, bits of bone began to poke through at all the points where they converged in a human, with some being protective in nature while others were offensive, like spikes. The teeth that had until recently looked human were now becoming sharp enough that anyone with a brain could tell that this…creature…lived off a strictly carnivorous diet. By the time all the changes seemed to finish, he didn't know what he was looking at but it looked nasty and VERY lethal.

"Bloody hell! A P'ir'tea demon!" Chief cursed before charging forth to meet the 'demon'.

He didn't get time to ask what a P'ir'tea demon was because, when the two combatants collided, the room shook with the impact, telling him a great deal about the power being brought to bear. From there it turned into a veritable clinic of grappling techniques, with things see-sawing back and forth between the demon-who-would-be-man and 'The Chief'. Every time it looked like one combatant had gained the advantage, the other managed to counter the move, returning things to stalemate for another couple of seconds. What made it even worse was the fact that the grappling had the duo spinning clockwise then counter clockwise, keeping anyone else in the room from getting a clear shot in a support capacity.

In the end it wasn't necessary since, with a knee thrust that hadn't been expected, Mister Giles managed to gain the advantage and, with a mighty yell of exertion, threw his foe at the far wall… and THROUGH it! Seeing as how that wall was one of the buildings outer walls, that'd put the 'demon' outside and on the ground with the forces charged with securing the perimeter. Immediately he, 'Chief' and 'Prophet' moved to the hole in the wall in preparation to reengage the enemy, only to watch him glance in their direction once before running almost faster than the eye could see away from the complex.

"SG-1 to command! Non-human hostile attempting to escape from operation zone!" he said into his throat microphone. "Hostile is EXTREMELY dangerous. Recommend use of vehicle mounted weaponry to dispatch. Explosives, preferably. Do not, I repeat, do NOT allow mid-to-close quarter combat. Over."

"Roger, SG-1. Message received," the voice of the communications officer said over the com-link. "We'll spread the word. Description of hostile?"

"Six to six and a half feet tall, red skin, bone protrusions and built like a pro-wrestler," he replied, putting the pertinent facts forward. "Possesses above human speed and strength. Bullet resistant with accelerated regeneration ability. Managed to grapple 'The Chief' to a standstill for a couple of minutes. That good enough for you?"

"A-affirmative, SG-1," the com-tech said, sounding thrown a bit by the description. "Will advise heavy caution to all forces."

"Oh, that won't be necessary," came a voice he recognized as Goa'uld and Athena's. "Wesker's only job was to delay you until I'd transferred the last of the pertinent files to my personal getaway vehicle. Now that that's done I doubt you'll see him again unless he wants you to."

"Running scared, snake head?" Miss Rosenberg asked with a casual tone that quickly turned icy hot. "You should be."

"Hardly, Miss Rosenberg," Athena replied, completely ignoring the hate being directed at her. "While I'll admit that your defeat and 'liberation' was unexpected, it was not unplanned for. Unlike my fellow Goa'uld I was quite thorough with my planning and covered EVERY contingency… including this one."

"You're not getting away!" Harris growled angrily at the woman's arrogance. "You're surrounded, your troops are being mopped up along with your defenses and we have enough air support to shoot you down if you try to run by air. It's over!"

"Is it?" Athena asked with a smile that he did NOT like as she pressed something out of view of the camera. "Captain Pantoliano? I want total air supremacy NOW."

"By your command, Mistress Athena." an unfamiliar man said the same way a subordinate would address a superior officer.

"I suggest you all look out a window." Athena said with glee. "I doubt you'll want to miss this."

Almost afraid to look, he still went back to the hole in the wall and looked for something that would justify the goold's supreme confidence.

He didn't have to wait long to find it but he almost wished that he'd remained ignorant.

Appearing where there should've been nothing, hexagonal scales began to rain down from the sky, disintegrating before they hit the ground below. What was revealed to be hidden beneath the scaled sky was a ship that was beyond large, easily bigger than any of the X-303s they had but smaller than Anubis' mother ship.

He didn't immediately recognize the ship but Mister Giles did but not in a good way.

"The Pillar of Autumn…" 'The Chief' gasped in disbelief at what he was seeing.

"Not quite, Mister Giles," Athena said, sounding pleased by the SPARTAN's reaction. "I've named it 'The Column of the Fall'. Much more ominous sounding and quite fitting considering the differences between it and the ship you're familiar with. It incorporates all the various technology gleaned from you and your friends plus a few pieces my forces 'liberated' off world before bringing them to Earth. I'm quite proud of it."

It quickly became clear why since, the moment the last of the cloak faded away, energy weapons fire began to shoot out from various points on the hull. Before any of the choppers covering the underground hanger could do more than TRY to run they were obliterated like they were plastic models rather than the real deal. Thanks to the strength of the weapons the parts of the choppers that were hit directly were completely vaporized while the fragments that remained fell from the sky, fully ablaze. He didn't get a chance to even think the question 'where are the other shots going' because, over his earpiece, he could hear chatter from other groups answering his question. Every chopper, even the fighter jets that should've been well outside of viable weapons range, had been knocked clear out of the sky without any difficulty whatsoever.

It didn't seem real.

How could it be real?

They'd come here expecting soldiers and maybe some air support craft, not… THIS.

"The skies are clear, Mistress." Captain Pantoliano declared, sounding quite satisfied by what his ship had done.

"Good. I'll be joining you shortly," Athena said, sounding like a sports fan after their favorite team had just won the world championship. "Now I'd hate to leave you feeling as though you'd accomplished NOTHING so here's a little farewell present."

With those words the woman brought a detonator into her camera's range before flipping up the safety and pressing the red button on top. As soon as she did that a five minute countdown began displayed in big red numbers on the screen, blocking some of the goold's face.

"There. I've just initiated this complex's self-destruct." Athena said like she was talking about the weather. "In less than five minutes the fusion generators deep below this complex will overload and detonate with the force of a three hundred and forty kiloton nuclear bomb. I suggest running now. Some of you might actually survive the blast to suffer slow, agonizing deaths. Have a nice day!"

With that the screen went dark save for the countdown.

"I really, REALLY, hate her!" He growled before pressing the transmit button on his throat microphone. "SG-1 to all teams! A self-destruct has been initiated by Athena with a possible yield of three hundred and forty kilotons! Recommend the Hammond begin teleporting people to safety IMMEDIATELY!"

"NO! She does NOT get to do this to us!" Rosenberg yelled furiously, clearly not pleased by how things were turning out. "I won't let her!"

Without giving him a chance to calm her down she ran out of the room, shoving the other SG team members out of her path along the way.

"You don't think she's gonna-?" he asked looking at Mister Giles, hoping for a negative.

"Try to defuse the self-destruct? Yes, I think she is." Mister Giles replied with a nod of his head. "And she won't be alone."

With speed he'd gotten used to over the course of the operation, the SPARTAN ran after the other member of Team Five, intent on helping her out. The other SG members wisely got out of the way this time rather than get steamrolled by a tank on two legs. Deciding to see if it'd be three for three, he turned to Prophet, raising a questioning eyebrow as if to ask him 'are you going to go too?'.

"What're you looking at me for? I shoot and blow shit up. I don't do nuke disposal." Prophet said as though the idea of him shutting down a self-destruct was ridiculous.

Well at least he hasn't gone crazy! he thought with a roll of his eyes.

With a sigh he reached up to his throat microphone to tell the Hammond to save his group for last on the teleportation list.

Who knew? Maybe Mister Giles and Miss Rosenberg would actually manage to pull it off.

Willow's POV

Nothing else mattered!

She had to get to the lowest sub-level, the most likely spot for the fusion generators, before the five minutes expired and disable the self-destruct.

Nothing else mattered!

At her top running speed she reached the elevator doors in under a minute but she wasn't going to casually ride the elevator car down. She didn't have time for that. Upon reaching the doors she emptied her shotgun at a spot where the doors met and, once she was satisfied that she'd created crude handholds, she threw her empty weapon to the ground. Getting a solid grip on both doors she brought to bear all the strength her prosthetic body could muster as she began to force them open. It wasn't happening as quickly as she would've preferred since, despite being stronger than a human, she still wasn't strong enough to rend steel. Still, she managed to get it open enough to fit her slim body through and that was all that mattered.

Once she was through she leapt for the cable in the center of the shaft and began to slide down into the darkness as fast as gravity and friction would let her. She could see the fake flesh covering her hands being scraped away by the friction but that didn't matter to her since it could be repaired easier than, say, vaporization. When she finally landed atop the elevator car itself she opened the hatch on the top and dropped inside before looking to find out what level she was on. The digital display above the doors told her that she'd lucked out and that whoever had used the elevator last had left the car on the final sub-level. With the press of the 'door open' button she finally exited onto the desired level, thanking the Goddess for stupid employees since it was only for them that the directions to the main power room was painted on the wall.

She got about twenty feet down the hall before an awesome crashing sound had her turning around to see what the cause was just in case something nasty had followed her down.

What she found instead was a demolished elevator car and Giles climbing his way out of the shaft and into the hallway with her.

"I told you that cable wouldn't hold!" Cortana/Jenny exclaimed with irritation through the external speakers of the Mjolnir armor.

"So noted. Now let us get to the important business of preventing our imminent vaporization, shall we?" Giles said with grudging agreement.

By unspoken agreement the former Scoobies had decided that Cortana would remain their little secret until they could be sure that nothing shady would be done to her or them. While penance was still the order of the day for them, they wouldn't let the military take Cortana from them to tear apart, looking for every scrap of useful information she contained. All of them had felt it when Jenny had been murdered by Angelus and, when they'd learned that she had been brought back in the form of the Master Chief's A.I. partner, they'd been overjoyed. Even if Jenny's soul had yet to let go of the Cortana template, it still gave them hope it might one day happen.

They were NOT going to let anyone take that away from them.

"This way!" she said as she resumed her sprint for the main power room.

It was roughly two minutes later that they finally arrived at their destination and that meant by her reckoning they had only a little over a minute before the big boom. She was dismayed to find that many of the work stations had been fried, likely by some intentional mechanism, but no such system was fool proof. She immediately sat down at the one that looked mostly intact while at the same time pulling out her interface wire from the back of her neck. A moment's inspection was all that was required for her to find a port and choose the right adaptor before plugging herself in. Immediately the real world fell away to be replaced with the cyberspace of the power room's network and so she took a minute to get her bearings before seeking out the representation of the self-destruct program. The connection wasn't perfect as occasionally it destabilized but it went back to normal soon enough that she chose to proceed to her destination. As she flew along the data streams she felt another presence coming alongside her and turned to see Cortana's digital self coasting along the same as her. It was a unique opportunity considering that up, until now, she'd only ever heard the woman's voice and nothing else. From what she could see the majority of the features matched her few memories of the videogame version but there were some recognizable features that could only belong to Jennifer Kalderash. All in all it made for a rather beautiful combination, making her wonder how Giles would react if he ever came face to face with a life sized version of her.

It'd either be very amusing or very disappointing.

"Here to back me up?" she asked as they continued to navigate their way to their objective.

"The Chief thought we'd double the odds of success if we both worked to shut down the self-destruct," Cortana replied with a nod even as they both began to pick up on signs that they were getting closer to where they wanted to go.

"I can't argue with that," she said as her 'eyes' finally found the locus of the self-destruct program. "Anything that maximizes our chances of coming out of this in one piece can't be ignored."

They arrived at the program just as the clock dipped below the fifty second mark and immediately went to work shutting it down with their computer prowess. She made sure that she had dummy barrier's in place to block any countermeasures Mayfield might have put into place but her focus was definitely on her attack programs meant to break down the defenses of the program. Cortana was likewise working on getting through to the command subroutines of the program so that they could metaphorically activate the 'cancel' command. She did her best not to allow the diminishing time they had left affect her skills but, as the seconds went by, her confidence became ever more unstable.

"C'mon, c'mon! Just a little further!" she muttered even as she worked at the speed of thought to get those last few 'inches' past the defense programs.

"Just keep doing your best, Willow," Cortana said as she repositioned herself to further reduce the integrity of the defense programs while blocking the offensive subroutines attached to the program. "We'll make it."

Focusing to the point of forgetting that the timer existed, she put both her own hacking skills as well as those of the Major to the test. The second she saw an opening to the core coding of the self-destruct program she dove for it, mentally interfacing and thus gaining access to its commands. With all the speed her mind was capable of she activated the abort command and breathed a sigh of relief as she felt everything stop. As her phenomenal focus faded she looked in the direction of the timer to see just how much time had been left.

Two point three five seconds.

"Talk about cutting it close!" she exclaimed with a bit of humor as she looked over at Cortana.

"You're telling me. I haven't cut it this close since I disabled the bomb the Covenant planted to take out one of the orbital MAC guns." Cortana said sounding as relieved as she did. "Let's get out of here and tell everyone the good news."

"See you there!" she said as she closed her eyes and withdrew from the power center's cyberspace back into her own mind.