Fleet Sparrow

Title: - Argyris

Fandom: I Am In Eskew/Stargate SG-1

Pairing/Characters: David Ward, Daniel Jackson, Jack O'Neil, Samantha Carter, Teal'c, mentions of David's coworkers, mentioned George Hammond, the city of Eskew (if you know, you know)

Content Notes: Canon-Typical Violence, Canon-Typical Psychological Horror, David's POV is a dark comedy, the SG-1 crew's POV is a horror film, David's special level of apathy + denial, Post Episode 5: Illumination (I Am In Eskew), Nebulous timeline sometime mid-Season One of Stargate SG-1, One's horror story is another's comedy, minor hints of SG-1 team as family, it's my found family and I'll do as I pleasure!, this isn't in the story but just know that the team lowkey adopts David into their group, he's their team mascot, a pathetic little stray alley cat man is what David is indeed, David's usual classy level of judginess on others, David thinks he's being executed, the team think they are rescuing him lmao, miscommunication, Canon-Typical Paranoia

Prompt: July 18 - Color as a title

***

There is something new happening in Eskew. The oppressive feeling of being watched has intensified and I can feel the hairs on the back of my neck rise the same way that I can feel goosebumps break out against my skin. The uncomfortable office chair I’ve been seated in for the last four hours chafes against me as I resettle myself, attempting to brush off the weight of unseen eyes rovering over my skin, my hair, my clothes. It takes a moment for my mind to process the sounds coming from down the hallway of the main bullpen, given how focused I have been with ignoring the weight of being perceived.
The sounds spilling in from the cracked door are odd, a deep thrumming that shakes the floor and buzzes up my legs and into my bones. It sets my teeth on edge and I find myself grinding my teeth together to reflect the tightly woven ache inside myself, clawing and weaving tighter against my insides until I feel like I will puke it all up in a never ending stream of gore and viscera and mess.
And then, just as quickly as it came, the sound stops. The vibrations have gone and the only sound left is the clacking of keyboards and the clicking of heels across the linoleum flooring, the regular sounds of an office building hard at work. I wait a moment, my fingers pausing over the keys, to see if there will be anything more to it than the bizarre noise. But there isn’t and I can almost chalk it up to another audio hallucination, a product of a weary mind stuck in a monotonous daily task.
That is, until I begin to hear shouting, some of which I can identify as my coworkers. Their voices are panicked, swelling up until I can’t even begin to pick out an individual voice amongst the cacophony. Something is happening out there, and although curiosity is eating me up inside like a spreading caustic acid, I don’t move from my spot. There are many things here in Eskew that are better left alone, after all. This is no different.
I am David Ward, and I am in Eskew.

***

It isn’t until I hear a knocking coming from the doorway that I look up from my screen, my eyes flicking between the faces of four strange people I have never seen before. It’s an eclectic group, and their outfits are bulky and weighed down with weaponry and tools that I cannot properly parse from each other. Military, it would seem. Sweat begins to slide down from the nape of my neck into the collar of my overly starched button-up shirt.
There is no reason that I can recall for the military to show up in my office building, let alone my specific room. There is also no one else around me to help alleviate the initial contact that will surely be awkward, full of uncomfortable questions and accusations that I am not entirely sure I will be able to answer. I keep my body still even as I continue to stare at the four soldiers, their eyes searching me up and down just as closely as I am to them.
I clear my throat, feeling my tongue reach out to moisten my lips. It doesn’t work.
“Can I…help you?” I broach cautiously, placing my hand on the top of my laptop’s lid. The soldiers’ eyes all quickly jump at the movement to track my hands, and I clench the laptop harder. There is no way to show I come in peace, other than to submit. But that would show guilt, and I am unsure if that would be the best move at this moment. They don’t seem to be ready to hurt me, although the woman has placed her hand on her holster and I can feel my heart begin to race faster.
The moment of silence stretches further out than I thought it would, and I am beginning to wonder if this is yet another vision from Eskew to test me before the man in the front answers. His weathered face looks…conflicted. Like he’s just seen something that has left a bad taste in his mouth. I don’t take offense to it, not really. That is a common enough face I would receive when speaking to people, before I came to Eskew. There is a sting to it that even here, it still follows me on a stranger’s face.
“Are you…” The older man, the leader, pauses his question as he glances around the room, “...are you David Ward?”
I don’t quite perk up, no, that would give myself away. Surely, they wouldn’t send armed military personnel out just to find me if something hadn’t gone deeply, deeply wrong. Maybe it was the fact that he was still receiving those lovely emails despite it having been over a week since the bridge fiasco. Already, his memory of it, of those emails, was nebulous and oddly foggy. Like trying to tell the details of someone’s face through frosted glass.
“That, uh, depends on who is asking?” I try to be subtle, and miss it by a country mile. My voice breaks on the last word, lilting upwards to make it a question rather than a statement. I can see it in the man’s eyes that I’ve only raised suspicions.
The other three fan out, hands on their hips (or in the case of the woman, on her holster still). I am caged in like a rat, frantic and terrified. I try to keep them all within my peripheral vision without turning away from the leader. My muscles tense, prepared for a mad dash to freedom that I am certain I will not make it to. There are many things in Eskew that are surprisingly fast, faster than a human for certain. I’ve yet to see if this will be one of those.
I’ve lost track of the dark skinned man with the odd forehead symbol, which is odd considering how large he is. He is built like one of those models in those health magazines that I would pick up to scoff at while seated somewhere menial, like a doctor’s office or the dentist perhaps. Something larger than life, and entirely impossible without steroids. Losing track of him shoots my paranoia to its limits and I finally break the staring match with the ringleader to turn my head, scanning for him. He’s in the corner of the room, watching me while the other, smaller man peaks through the documents that have been sorted and filed in the cabinets that were shoved haphazardly together before I had ever taken over this office.
I almost snap at him to stop looking at those papers, that they are the property of the Eskew Tribunal, until I catch the eyes of the larger man and am reminded of the feeling of being prey. This man, for there is nothing else he can be, holds the presence of someone who’s seen battle and lived to tell its sordid tales. The papers are not important enough to risk his ire, or the ire of any of the soldiers.
I turn my head to catch sight of the woman watching me, her brows knitted together in what looks like concern. Her face is guarded, her hand on her weapon still, but there is a hint of something there. Like she is peeling beneath the layers of my protective skin to the pulsing, aching core of me and she isn’t sure she likes what she has seen. I am reminded of my own mother, of her glances at my drawings and shaky writing when I was a young teen. Of the hushed phone calls in the kitchen when she assumed me to be holed up in my room.
There is only one choice left, now that the silence has overstayed its welcome and the intruders have begun their search.
“I am David. David Ward.” I say mildly, finally closing my laptop and clenching my hands together to prevent them from shaking. If this is to happen, I might as well be upfront about it. There is no hiding from this city, after all.
But of course, that’s just flights of fancy on my part. The city wouldn’t waste its time with someone like me, at least, not in this way. There are plenty of other options. The leader has not stopped staring at me and I’ve begun to wonder if this was not the proper move. If I was meant to play coy, to dance around the question like I’ve seen on those overly dramatic television shows. A game of wits that I had shown all my cards on.
“Come with me, son.” The leader commanded, his voice stern. I am reminded, suddenly, of the stories told in hushed tones of those that are taken away by police, or by the military, never to be seen again. And I feel the coiling knot of dread settle in my stomach as I allow him to grab onto my arm when I rise from my seat. It’s tight, but not painful. “We’ve been sent to locate and return you to Earth.”
My mind freezes for a moment along with my legs, and I nearly fall on my face as I trip over myself. The only thing keeping me from an embarrassing accident is the leader’s hand and the woman’s hand finding the small of my back. I am ashamed to say that I startle a little at her touch. I had not noticed her wandering back over towards us, but a glance behind me shows that all four of them have boxed me in, a cage of bodies that make my skin prickle. There is no escape now. The maw of Eskew has clamped its teeth around me, ready to devour.
Like a man heading for the gallows, I bow my head meekly and allow them to shuffle me off towards the bullpen. I almost run into the back of the captain when he stops in the center of the room and I glance back up in awe of the large metallic gateway in front of us. It had not been there this morning, when I had passed through to the breakroom for cheap coffee and even cheaper small talk. The engravings are intricate and ancient, in a language that is neither English nor Eskovian.
“O’Neill, we’ve gotten into contact. The gate will open in 90 seconds.” The woman calls over her shoulder to her captain, after spending a few minutes fiddling with a radio on her hip. The smaller, glasses-wearing man is snapping photos of the paperwork and posters on the wall, most of which are written in Eskovian or poorly translated English. There is a singular Spanish poster, translated from Eskovian to English to Spanish and is certainly just gibberish by this point.
The man, O’Neill, moves his hand from my arm to my shoulder, holding me in place like he can sense I wish to run, while the dark-skinned man stands at my other side. They are right to do so, as I jump upwards at the sound of a machine powering up. The rumbling I had heard earlier is nearly deafening, and as I watch the glowing blue fill the center of the arch, I have a thought that perhaps this is how I will be disposed of. Thrown into a swirl of unidentifiable liquid, perhaps to somewhere else. Somewhere worse.
I side-eye the group as they all come to stand in a line around me, feeling an inkling of resentment at their confident stance. Like they have done this before, like I am not their first victim. And perhaps, I am not. Maybe I am not even their hundredth victim, screaming internally at the vivid light before them as the hand on their shoulder tightens to keep me in place.
“Alright, time to head out.” O’Neill says, somber. Like a eulogy, like a death prayer. And we begin to march into the gateway.