A Hero is Born
It had not one of Professor Felgar's better days.
The experimental photon torpedo had failed. Spectacularly and with lots of noise and sparks. Lots and lots of noise and sparks.
Head down, shoulders slumped, tie crooked, Jay Felgar had never been so...despondent.
He had been so sure the newest weapon he'd invented would work. It was supposed to replace the missiles on the X-303 one day, and he'd privately thought he'd win a Noble Prize for it. With scientific confidence gleaming in his eyes, he plugged the two cords together and stepped backwards, wondering why so many sparks flew. The weapon obediently lit up and started to hum. Loudly. Peskier sparks, a loud bang, and cloud of smoke culminated in all the lights in the bases going out. He'd felt sick. The experiment was considered a bust, and O'Neill had snarled that he wanted to see him once the lab had been rendered safe.
With a mournful sniff, running his hand under his nose like a small boy, he recalled the meeting, second by agonizing second. O'Neill had yelled at him. He had walked in, slapped the palms of his hands loudly on his table, and declared a moratorium on scientists with no damn idea what they are doing. The hurtful comments still rung in his ears, and his eyes stung with unexpected tears.
A pest? Him? Was that really what the Colonel thought of him? Surely not!
His latest disaster of an idea had been a real zinger...it had however, a few teething problems. Nothing that couldn't be sorted given time, another less terrified assistant, and a whole lot more money. There was the kicker! Apparently General Hammond had decided, in that persnickety way he had, that throwing money at Felgar was like leaving the inmates in charge of the asylum.
An unkind analogy.
So, Jack told him that he had one week to show some results or start searching the 'help wanted' ads. Jay hyperventilated. To make matters worse, as he stalked out, O'Neill suggested that England looked mighty nice at this time of the year. England? Did he even speak the language?
Jay knew he needed to come up with an idea so fantastic that all talk of England and lunatics would be forgotten. Question was...what?
Then it happened...his luck changed! Bill Lee slumped past his lab, hands in pockets while complaining that the commissary's coffee machine had taken a swan dive and toppled to the floor. "What base could run without a coffee machine?" he said.
Jay had considered this a very lucky break! He figured there maybe the possibility that his help wouldn't be needed, but if he could somehow beat Siler to the repairs, then he would be to go-to guy forever. Go-to guys were never given the boot! Photon torpedoes and coffee machines couldn't be that different he told his shocked companions.
He had conceded, through a mouthful of donut, that this was a mission fraught with danger. Siler, he explained, hand sticky with raspberry jelly, had a big wrench after all, but if he could zat a Jaffa he could out maneuver one bespectacled sergeant!
His friends weren't so sure. Chloe had shaken her head. Lee had arched an eyebrow, and his latest assistant repeated his request to transfer labs. It was once again denied.
Felgar had not been dissuaded, and creeping covertly down the hallways of the SGC, eyes slitting back and forth, he arrived at the commissary, wrench in hand. There had been a flurry of personnel but whistling in a devil-may-care- manner, he found to his surprise, that most studiously avoided eye contact with him. He slipped through the back. Taking out his wrench, he raised it above his head, just as the muscled bound airman in charge of the mess turned around and eyeballed him.
With a frightened squawk, Jay's life flashed in front of him. The wrench toppled to the floor where it hit and bounced off the top of the broken coffee machine. Miracles do happen, and the machines lights flickered off and on tentatively. With a final flicker the green light stayed on. Professor Felgar had fixed it! The coffee machine had been fixed! All Hail Dorothy!
Felgar, with a modesty that was truly modest, accepted the hyped-up, coffee addicted, base personnel's thanks...after all, he conceded, he had saved the world as they knew it.
The End
