Aberrant: Stargate Universe - Doing Carter's Bidding [Complete]

[z-Olivia Jenings-Izumi]

“So, part of your punishment is being subjected to me, huh?” Carter asked playfully, grinning at the smaller woman before her.

Dr. Jenings-Izumi smiled and shrugged. “Your lucky two weeks, I guess,” she said with a smile.

“Yeah,” Carter agreed. “Let’s get started. “ She opened a folder and glanced at it before laying it to one side. “The first thing I’d like to test is your memory.”

“Alright,” Olivia said agreeably. “What did you have in mind?”

“Let’s start with something simple,” Carter said, pulling a deck of cards. She peeled off the first five, and laid them down one by one. “Look at each for thirty seconds and then we’ll do some quick distraction puzzles. That will let us measure your recall.”

Olivia nodded and focused her gaze on the cards; Sam flipped each over for the thirty seconds and then back. After Olivia had seen all five, Carter set them aside and pulled out a quick game that required Olivia to focus on it to win. It was designed to prevent her from holding the cards in short-term memory.

But the cards weren’t just in her short-term memory; they were in her memory now, and when Carter asked her to repeat them, she rattled them off with ease. “Do you really want to test me?” Olivia said, when the test was over.

“What do you mean?” Carter asked, frowning a bit.

“Let’s save some back and forth,” Olivia replied. “Shuffle the deck.” When she’d done so, Olivia took the cards and started to flip through them. She only looked at each for a few seconds before setting the card down. When she’d gone through all fifty-two cards, she set the deck aside, and did the puzzle again. She handed the deck to Carter, made sure she started at the right end, and started to list off the cards.

“Very good,” Carter said with a smile. “Your memory is as good as, if not better than, Jonas Quinn’s, who had the best memory I’d seen before you.”

“Yes, I’ve read about him in the mission files,” Olivia said easily. “I haven’t read what happened to him, but since I haven’t met him, I assumed he wasn’t here.”

“No,” Carter said, “he isn’t.”

“Keep those cards, Captain. At the end of the week, I’d like to see how many I remember,” Olivia said.

“You think you’ll remember them all?” Carter asked.

Olivia just nodded seriously.

[z-Olivia Jenings-Izumi]

“Can you hear that?” Carter asked, and there was a tone of awe in her voice. Olivia knew that she shouldn’t be hearing it, even as she nodded. “That’s well beyond the normal range of human hearing. And you can hear radio waves?”

“And transmit, as well as using it in kind of a sonar effect,” Olivia said, nodding.

“You’ve done all of this?” Carter asked, slightly incredulous.

“Yes, on my last mission,” Olivia replied, folding her hands over the desk. “I used the sonar in the valley to ‘read’ what was under the sand, used my ability to pick up on radio waves to find Jaunt, and was able to hear the ‘zat that lead us to the address room.”

“I understand the hearing parts, but the ability to engage in active sonar is incredible.” She shook her head. “Just amazing. To do that implies that you have some new organ in you that can do that, but Dr. Frasier has found no evidence of that.”

“Could that have something to do with the swelling I had in my brain? When I was ‘becoming’ or whatever?” Olivia asked, curious.

“Dr. Fraiser suspects that’s related to your incident with the black pentagon,” Carter said, glancing down at Olivia’s folder. “Most of the swelling that happened occurred in the same areas that were injured by the pentagon.”

Olivia really didn’t like hearing that. “Any ideas why?”

Carter shrugged and shook her head. “No. We’d have to know what the pentagon did to you before we’d have much idea of how it interacted with your ‘eruption’.”

Olivia nodded. She didn’t really expect to get any answers on that front anymore; the tests had been inconclusive, and no one else had been allowed direct contact with it again. “But no sign of a new organ?”

“Nope,” Carter said, raising her eyebrows and shaking her head. “Not on the MRI or CT scans. Someone else might be able to take a deeper look, but I’m sure it’s not a concern.” She considered Olivia for a moment. “Tomorrow, be dressed in BDUs. We’ll be doing some external exercises.”

“I can’t leave base,” Olivia reminded her.

“You let me worry about that,” Carter grinned.

[z-Olivia Jenings-Izumi]

Apparently, you could leave base if you went through the StarGate. Olivia supposed that was technically true, but she doubted that. “Major,” she said nervously to Carter, “are you sure this is ok? I don’t want to get in trouble.”

“You’re not being granted leave off the base,” O’Neill said from behind her, making her jump. She’d known someone was there, but she hadn’t realized it was the general. “You’re going to be working for Carter – whatever she says, goes. Got it?”

“Yes, sir,” Olivia agreed, nodding quickly. To her surprise, he was dressed like they were, in BDUs. “Are you coming, too, sir?”

“Yes, I am. I’ve been needing to inspect Alpha Site again for a while,” he said, resting his arm on his P90 casually. Behind him, Daniel nodded at her, and she smiled at him, happy to see him. Teal’c got a polite, distant nod from her; she didn’t know him particularly well. There were other people milling around, preparing to go with them; Olivia guessed that a personal change was probably happening right now as well.

That was when she realized that she was going off-world with SG-1 – well, her and two dozen others. “Sir, I assume this is an affirmative, but does my CO realize what’s going on?”

“He was informed, of course,” Major Carter said, grinning at her. “We’re not stealing you.”

“Yet,” Daniel added, lightly. “From what Sam’s been telling me about your abilities, I’m starting to wonder if we shouldn’t split up the Specialists onto separate teams. We almost have enough to put one on each team.”

O’Neill was shaking his head. “That’d offset the balance,” he said. “We just got them figured out again, Daniel, don’t go rocking the boat. Everyone ready?” When he got affirmatives, he nodded to the Gate Room technician. The StarGate started to spin, and Olivia smiled. “Does this ever get old?” she asked Daniel softly.

“Not really. Familiar, but never old.”

The event horizon established itself with a hollow roar and a rush of air; then SG-1 went up the ramp first. Olivia trailed after, pausing to touch the fluid-looking plane of energy. It slid over her fingers, cool and dry. Someone behind her muttered, “Move it, newbie.” She knew she wasn’t supposed to hear that, so she just stepped forward and let the wormhole take her.

She stepped out into a large cavern. Table in front of her held computers set up for the familiar dialing program, despite the DHD which sat off to the side. Olivia peered around; Daniel reached out and tugged her arm to pull her out of the way of the rest of the travelers. She jumped and pulled away from him, even as she apologized.

“Alright, Carter, Specialist J-I, go check out those caves, take Teal’c and Daniel,” O’Neill ordered, looking oddly relaxed in the field. He was being pulled away by the residents of Alpha Site almost before Carter could acknowledge his orders.

“Caves?” Olivia asked. “And since when am I Specialist J-I?”

Carter chuckled, but ignored her second question. “A portion of tunnel collapsed and opened up some natural caves. We’re exploring them, mapping them out.”

“Ah,” Olivia said. “Have I mentioned a certain amount of dislike to being trapped under rocks.”

“You just did,” Teal’c pointed out unhelpfully. “Do not worry, Specialist’Olivia’Jenings’Izumi. We will not let you get stuck.”

Remembering what Vinny had said about aliens calling him Lieutenant like it was his name, she gazed shyly at Teal’c and asked, “Could you call me Olivia instead of all that?”

“Yes, Olivia,” he replied, nodding his head in his serene manner.

“Thank you,” she answered.

“Actually, what I’d like you to do is test your sonar against a sonar that we have,” Carter said. “Testing your accuracy.”

“I’m bad about gauging distance,” Olivia warned.

“Just do your best,” Carter encouraged.

For the next few hours, they worked hard, Olivia pushing herself until her ears rang with the effort and her head ached fiercely. They stopped when she finally confessed to the headache, letting her go rest back in the main cavern. Eventually, she heard O’Neill call them back over the radio – using the real radio this time – and she met them at the StarGate.

“Get whatcha needed?” the general asked Carter.

“Almost, sir. I’d like to try that experiment,” she said pointedly.

“Come on, Carter,” O’Neill said, grimacing, “I don’t wanna play around with the GDO. That is fatal.”

“Yes, sir, but we should know,” Carter argued. “I’ll transmit another IDC after, just to be safe.”

“Okay,” O’Neill said, looking weary. “Do what you gotta, Carter.”

Carter nodded, clearly excited. “Olivia, listen to this, please.” She toggled the GDO strapped to her wrist, and Olivia nodded as she heard the transmission.

“Got it,” she said easily.

Carter stopped. “Damn,” she said, “I didn’t think about that.”

O’Neill looked both cranky and nervous as he queried, “What, Carter?”

“Well,” Daniel said, “with Olivia’s perfect memory, she knows this unique IDC, and she can probably transmit it through the gate. Or at least she can transmit over the phones, so this is a good assumption to make.”

“It’s just noise,” O’Neill said. “And the code changes.”

“Sir, if Olivia is correct about her memory, and we know she can transmit, sir, then she can transmit any IDC through the gate that she learns. They do change, but that is something to be aware of,” Carter said, her voice a little urgent. And she was right to sound urgent; the IDC system was supposed to be the lock on the door into Earth

Olivia felt her heart sink as O’Neill turned to look at her. It was an appraising glance, as if she was somehow more dangerous than she had been before. “Carter, dial us home. Specialist? Care to knock on the garage door?”

He was testing her, but she nodded. There was no point in hiding what she could do. When the StarGate roared to life, she transmitted the IDC. She was aware of everyone watching her, but there was nothing to see, save that she opened her mouth as if talking, but nothing came out – nothing that the watching humans could hear. But she could hear the pure, electronic notes of the IDC. Just to be sure, she opened her mouth again, and ‘said’, *StarGate Command, this is Specialist Jenings-Izumi. Was SG-1’s code accepted, and is the Iris open?* O’Neill’s eyebrows rose as her voice came over the radio.

*Yes, it is. You’re cleared to come home,* she heard – twice. As she ‘heard’ it, it came over all the radios.

“Creepy,” O’Neill muttered as he led the way home.

Daniel paused to pat her on the shoulder and give her a smile. She wasn’t fooled. They all knew she was a living key to the Iris, and they were all deeply concerned about that. With a sigh, she followed them home.