Scott was still turning over the days events in his head when Dr. Heath quickly approached him. She didn’t seem to have anything to say to anyone else but him, which he thought was odd in itself considering the rest of the crew had done all the work to get them to safety while he stood silently by. Then she told him she wanted him to join her in reporting to the colonel. It made sense, she had seen his look of approval and surely she would want the colonel to know about it before he changed his mind. But what was she really playing at?<br/><br/>Scott snapped to attention and nodded crisply, “Yes Ma’am. I will meet you there as soon as I can.” Then he followed Dr. Randall’s lead in exiting the room. Scott rounded up the military personnel and aside from a few bumps and scrapes everyone is doing well. Checking the ship kept him from thinking about much else and that was just as well. It took just over an hour but in the end they had only sustained minor damage to the ships auxiliary systems and a few injuries. Amazingly they were much better off than he had anticipated. The surrender ploy had worked wonders to mitigate the damage.<br/><br/>He dismissed everyone and then made his way for the communication stones. The stones were still an unknown for him. On the one hand he had his doubts that they even worked. It just didn’t make sense. But on the other, he wanted to experience it for himself. Changing bodies with someone a thousand or hundreds of thousands of light years away! He would be using the body of another person on earth and they would be using his. And with that instant thought he changed directions for his room to take a shower and put on a clean uniform. It would not be good to have someone else using his body and being disgusted by the smell of his day of running around and sweating on an alien world.<br/><br/>In one moment he was sitting on a spaceship and in the next he was in a basement office of the Pentagon. A distant part of him screamed to return to his own body but once he got up and moved around things felt natural enough. Apparently the people here were fairly used to this so he was the only one who seemed out of sorts. He smiled at Dr. Heath who was now apparently in the body of a woman half her age and as she turned to report to the IOA, Scott was told that the colonel was waiting for him upstairs.<br/><br/>He sat across from Colonel Miller after confirming his identity; the colonel quickly dismissed all pleasantries and simply said “Report.” Scott had hoped for little give and take or maybe a hello but he had to remind himself that he may spend his time surrounded by civilians but he was a Marine. Scott quickly recounted their first few days on the ship providing only pertinent details of the encounter on the planet. He told about the attack by the unknown enemy. And he made specific mention of Dr. Heath’s apparent courage under fire and her brilliant surrender and escape. He made sure to mention that he agreed it was the best, and likely the only, option.<br/><br/>For the next fifteen minutes he was interrogated by the colonel. He had questions about Dr. Heath and more than a few questions about Dr. Randall’s limited experience in the field. But he also seemed to have questions about every single civilian on the mission. Scott did his best to deflect the questions and to provide politically correct answers. He truly didn’t have anything bad to say about anyone at this point it had only been a few days! And when he finally got around to mentioning that it seemed to calm the colonel a bit. “I understand Captain.” He said finally. “There is a large battle brewing right now for control of the Stargate Program. I’m afraid the eggheads at the IOA are winning and I can’t allow that. The program has always been in the hands of the military and it should remain so.” The colonel then launched into a speech about ‘damned politics’ and ‘civilians’ who don’t know how to wage war; it was becoming increasingly clear what the situation was and why he and Dr. Heath had been placed at odds from the start.<br/><br/>Finally upon his return to his own body and his new space bound home he trudged to his room, more mentally drained than he had been in a long time. It was late and all he wanted to do was go to his room and get some sleep. He reminded himself of the old military saying, ‘The only easy day was yesterday.’ which always seemed to bring a smile to his face and a simple resignation. He wasn’t sure why but he was feeling a bit out of place out here in the stars.<br/>