Stargate: Insurrection #7 – PizzaRat dot Net

The cover to the seventh issue of ‘Stargate: Insurrection,’ where we see the members of the missing SG team (plus the alien woman Nemesis) throwing up their hands to shield their eyes from the bright light shining behind a descending alien spacecraft. The titular Stargate frames the figures from above. The text, “A toy comic by Phil Wrede,” is visible at the bottom of the image.

A page devoted to summarizing the relevant events of the past six issues, including: the overtaking of Stargate Command at Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado Springs, Colorado, by a governmental “shut-down team” led by billionaire asshole Alexander Weir (no relation to Dr. Elizabeth Weir, and “played” by an action figure of Walton Goggins); the loss of our primary SG team someplace in the universe (and their eventual capture by Nemesis); the death of loyal SGC soldier Sgt. Louis Jones at the point of a gun fired by a shutdown team soldier; the small rebellion led inside SGC by Samantha Carter, Richard Woolsey, Ronon Dex, and the unseen Jack O’Neal; and SG team member Major Ellen Cooper’s flight into low orbit around the planet she and her teammates find themselves on. There are no stars visible in the empty space surrounding this nameless planet.

On the planet, Colonel William Stryker, SG team leader, orders Cooper to return to the planet’s surface, so they can regroup and determine another plan. The title of this issue, “‘Momentum Generation’ (Part I),” is visible near the bottom of the page.

The rest of the team, as well as the freshly-captive Nemesis, await Cooper’s return. As she turns her spaceship back towards the planet, she misses a small pink-and-green craft appear in the distance.

The inhabitants of this newly-arrived ship waste no time in identifying both Cooper’s ship, and the lifesigns dotting the planet below them.

The commander of this new ship orders them to begin their own descent. After completing her landing, Cooper reiterates to Colonel Stryker and his son, Dr. Randall Stryker, what she saw in space (or, really, what she didn’t see).

The pink-and-green ship breaks atmosphere loudly in the sky overhead, and the team runs for cover. Nemesis turns to Cooper, and demands that she be given her weapons, which were seized from her when she was captured.

Hiding behind Nemesis’ ship, she and the team watch as this mystery ship lands. After considering the situation, Cooper eventually decides to give Nemesis her guns back.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, Alexander Weir orders some of his most faithful soldiers to prepare the Cheyenne Mountain Stargate for transport. He orders more guards to fan out, as Ronon, Carter, O’Neal, and Woolsey approach his location.

Weir continues to bark orders at his soldiers like they’re shift workers at a moving company, and the soldiers aren’t enthusiastic. Through a window, our Earthbound heroes are able to hear everything Weir says.

Weir explains some more of his plan, which at least has the virtue of being simple: he intends to use the Stargate to take other resources from worlds across the galaxy. Our heroes on Earth have no interest in letting him pull off his plan.

As our heroes agree not to let Weir leave Cheyenne Mountain with the Stargate, Weir himself is threatening to dishonorably discharge any soldiers who refuse his direct orders (something the soldiers themselves are pretty sure he can’t do).

Concurrently, back on the Eldritch planet, the newly arrived aliens step out of their spaceship, and try to engage the SG team in dialogue. They introduce themselves as “the Graphers,” and claim to be peaceful explorers.

Nemesis, and the members of the SG team, all agree that they’ve never heard of these “Graphers” before. The Grapher leader, who wears all black, continues to approach Nemesis’ spaceship, explaining that they thought they had gotten hopelessly lost in the galaxy, before finding this world, and the life signs upon it

The Grapher leader tells part of his story so far: that his people were looking for living worlds, and wound up only able to find dead ones recently.

The Graphers encourage the SG team to step forward, and after a little conversation, Colonel Stryker says “hello” to these new mysterious visitors.

The team pumps the Graphers for information, but they’re not willing to share much, beyond describing themselves as “scientists,” and claiming to be interested in remaking and perfecting life itself!

Our story returns to Earth again, as an armored Jeep and a forklift approach the Cheyenne Mountain loading dock. Weir, once again, orders his soldiers to prepare the Gate for travel, while O’Neal and Ronon decide that they have to advance into the loading area, now.

Ronon blasts a soldier distracted from his guard duties by Tetris into unconsciousness.

As the heroes of Earth rush into the Cheyenne Mountain loading dock, they train their guns on Alexander Weir, and a mysterious figure whose face is blocked from their view by the Stargate’s ring. Looking closely, this new character appears to be wearing a U.S. Army general’s uniform, and its nametag reads, “Klorel” (whom sharp-eyed, long-time Stargate fans may remember of SG-1 like the first season’s finale, and the second season’s premiere).

O’Neal and Carter are stunned at seeing Klorel again; Woolsey and Ronon don’t know who this Goa’uld is. Weir and Klorel, at least, appear to have become close friends, and as he steps from behind the Stargate, we can see his enormous Egyptian-style headdress covering his head.

The credits for the comic, citing the Unsplash users whose photographs were the background art (as well as the U.S. National Archives and NASA/JPL), the use of fonts by Blambot, the creators of the Stargate film, and the SG-1/Atlantis TV series, the ownership of the Stargate IP by Amazon Studios, the use of stock visual effects by Action VFX, and that the figure (and certain background) photography/script/lettering were by me, Phil Wrede.

A new month brings with it the introduction of new characters (heck, a whole new alien species), and the return of yet another old favorite!

Well, I don’t know if Klorel was ever anybody’s favorite character, but he’s at least a character with a vaguely recognizable name.

Why Klorel? Well, I thought that even the worst, most psychotic billionaire asshole would need significant support to dismantle the U.S. government from the inside (I’m not sure even Weir would want to shut down USAID), and that support would need to come from somebody more than a President whose popularity ebbs and flows. The Goa’uld have infiltrated our systems of power before, and it frankly doesn’t ever seem like we do enough to prevent them from doing it again.

Plus, I saw this guy for sale online, and just knew I had to add him to the Stargate cast.

As for the “Graphers”… I had the story of the SG team on the Eldritch planet pretty well outlined, before the Battle for Stargate Command grabbed ahold of my brain and demanded roughly equal time to tell its story, and one of the things I knew was that I wanted to introduce about four major groups of players on the Eldritch planet before things really kick into gear there. Since the Eldritch have scourged all other forms of life from their planet, those other player groups need to come from outside, and since the literal stars around the Eldritch planet are masked from view, why not have an alien race whose job literally is mapping the stars (or so they claim, anyway) show up?

Anyway, welcome to the start of the next phase of the story here on Stargate: Insurrection! If this is your very first visit to Pizzarat.net, and you enjoyed what you read, why not stay a little longer, and get caught up on the story so far?

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