Application

[has_2ls]

• Your character's name: Colonel Jack O'Neill

• Your character's canon: Stargate SG-1

• What type of canon is it (Book series, film, etc.): Both an independent film and a long-running television series.

• Your character's LJ: has_2ls

• Is your character living or dead at their time of entry?: Living.

• Does your character have any pre-existing disabilities of a medical, physical, or psychiatric nature?: Other than sarcasm, no.

• Tell us about your character's background:

Colonel Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill's beginnings are humble, in stark, stark contrast to his current life within the Stargate program. Minnesota born and raised, Jack has been career military for many years before actually entering the Stargate program. An offshoot of the Air Force, the Stargate program uses an artifact left on Earth by an ancient race to travel to new planets via wormhole, thus eliminating the need for space shuttles or other types of interplanetary travel.

Jack is recruited for the project in 1994 from Air Force Special Forces, his extensive military experience thought to be a good fit for the project and its classified nature. Jack's involvement with the program comes at a time of duress in his life; shortly before the first mission through the Stargate his son, Charlie, accidentally shoots himself with Jack's pistol. This tragedy and its aftermath eventually causes Jack to separate from his wife, Sara, and throw himself wholeheartedly into the Stargate program as a man with nothing left to lose.

The first mission through the Stargate in 1994 is to an analog of ancient Egypt known as Abydos, where Jack, along with archaeologist Daniel Jackson and the rest of his Special Forces team are able to help the local population overthrow their evil god, Ra (Who turns out to actually be a member of a parasitic alien race known as the Goa'uld, unbeknownst to the locals or SGC.) Having incurred the wrath of the Goa'uld, much of the work Jack does with the SGC is exploring new worlds via Stargate ostensibly to make diplomatic relations with other planets and to exchange and obtain technology in order to defend Earth from the Goa'uld threat.

The major Goa'uld threat during Jack's first four years of commanding SG-1 is Apophis, the serpent lord, and Jack joins Daniel Jackson, Major Samantha Carter (astrophysicist) and Teal'c (former Apophis guard) to make contacts throughout the galaxy and to remain one step ahead of the Goa'uld as part of Earth's first line of defense.

Jack would enter Tabula Rasa directly from the episode A Hundred Days. While in this particular situation, a meteor storm has destroyed the Stargate and left Jack stranded on the planet of Edora, his last attempts to dial out will land him at Tabula Rasa instead, stuck instead on the island for an indeterminate period of time.

And Jack doesn't like indeterminate.

• Your character's personality:

Sarcastic? You betcha. In a marked change from his first appearance in the Stargate program, time has rendered Jack the kind of man who uses sarcasm as a shield for his deeper-seated emotions and puts him in stark contrast with the other members of the SG-1 team. This sarcasm and this deflection has its roots, like much of Jack's personality, in the death of his son and the subsequent loss of his wife. It's hard for him to get close because getting close means taking a risk, and Jack doesn't like risks.

In spite of the sarcasm and on-the-surface insubordination, Jack has a deep appreciation for the military and for the stability it brings. Even within the Stargate program which is admittedly out there, Jack takes solace in knowing that he'll wake up in the morning, do his job, save the day and come back home to do it again. To that end, Jack is a perfectionist who doesn't see failure as an option. While he is less likely to use logic to work out a problem like Carter, his sheer dogged determination drives him to see anything through, no matter how dire.

Jack brings a lighthearted, if trigger-happy, approach to SG-1 and while this often puts him at odds with the more diplomatic Daniel Jackson, there's nobody else you'd want in a firefight. While self-effacing about his own intelligence, Jack is able to think on his feet at an alarming speed, often able to devise crafty and efficient ways to escape even dire situations. "MacGuyver," could come to mind, but Jack is more likely to use his wit and physical skills to escape a situation than hand-crafted weapons/bombs/what have you.

Jack's defining characteristic is his love for his team. Underneath all the bickering and the sarcasm, he would put himself in front of the metaphorical bullet more than once for his teammates and does not consider allowing any man to be left behind. He deflects, he skirts the issue, he distracts himself with teasing but ultimately he loves each and every one of them (even Daniel) and brings that passion and that love to the forefront when faced with the tough choices any military CO faces in the field and beyond.

• Why do you want to play this character?:

I think there is a depth to Jack that many people (myself included) can miss on the first glance. While it is insanely fun to play a witty, sarcastic character, there is a subtlety to Jack O'Neill that can only truly be explored through in depth writing and character development. The environment of the island, a place where you really can't go home again, is enough of a stressor that Jack would be able to evaluate his own motives and methods of engagement and perhaps let his team (or what is there of his team) know that he actually does care about them.

I relish the opportunity to write with such talented people and to contribute to the fabric of Tabula Rasa in a meaningful and (hopefully) memorable way. The interactive nature of the game and the lack of the deus ex machina of the Stargate will provide opportunity to develop Jack in a way we're just not able to see in canon and I think it will help me as a writer just as much as Jack could contribute to the community with his military survival skills.

• Your character's initial personal inventory:

[1] pair of boxers
[1] zat'nik'tel (a Goa'uld sidearm that provides an electric shock.)
[1] pair of cargo pants, green
[1] black t-shirt
[1] baseball cap, khaki in color
[1] pair of boots, military standard issue, with socks

• Your character's entrance post:

It was always the quiet ones you had to look out for. Nice, sweet little planet with no Goa'uld and no threats, great people and of course fiery doom had to be hurtling from the sky with no real way to avert the crisis. Carter had crunched the numbers and determined that it was a once in a hundred years event and gee, weren't they lucky to get to see it. Of course, there was the problem with evacuating an entire village of people through the Stargate until the planet was safe again, but practical concerns were far outweighed by the…whatever. Jack had tuned out when the talk went to science rather than how they were going to get the hell out of there.

Quick plans provide quick solutions and everyone agreed the best idea was to get the Endorans through the gate as soon as possible, monitor the meteor storm via existing technology and send a MALP through when it looked like things were all clear before coordinating sending everyone back through. Would have been easier if the Endorans would just cooperate and considering a third of them wanted to stay behind, Jack was finding it difficult to remain rational. Even when it had been dark, even in those days when Charlie was gone and he and his wife were strangers to each other, he'd never deliberately given up and hoped it was over. Oh, sure, he'd thrown himself into one crazy mission or another, but he'd never actually considered giving up entirely. He was too much of a fighter for that.

As the meteors started hitting the ground with greater frequency and lighting the fields on fire, he motioned toward the gate where Daniel, Carter and Teal'c were gathered. One of the Endorans had decided to hole up in a cave and Jack couldn't leave the kid to die, so he ushered his team through the gate. He'd dial in as soon as he got back with the kid and make it out; damn gate was made of naqahdah, after all, and from what he knew of the stuff, it was pretty damn indestructible.

He broke into a run toward the caves and stopped when another meteor hit the ground about a hundred yards in front of him, lighting up the ground like napalm on gasoline. It shook him and he stumbled and as much as he hated to admit it, it was a situation where he was going to end up killed with no discernable gain. Doing a quick cost-benefit analysis in his head, Jack opted to head back to the gate. He'd break the news to the kid's mom himself if he had to, but there was no way he was going to make it to him and back before the whole planet was destroyed.

He dialed quick and frowned when the event horizon looked a little…off. Still, with fire raining from the sky, there wasn't time to compare color swatches to make sure the gate was working correctly. He'd deal with it later if he ended up in the sixties again but for now, he was saving his own ass. Hard choice, hopefully the right one, and he closed his eyes against the heat of the meteors and the weird, tickling feeling in his stomach whenever he stepped through a gate.

He opened them on the other side, blinking for a moment. Last time he checked, SGC didn't have its own tropical beach with warm sun and fragrant breezes and he sure as hell didn't remember dialing another planet along the way. Maybe his fingers slipped on the DHD, but he'd looked and checked them twice before engaging. Maybe it was one of those damn solar flares—they always seemed to futz with the system no matter how intricate.

Or maybe it was just classic Jack O'Neill luck and something else entirely had happened. For all he knew, he could be in lockup with some Goa'uld and it was all an illusion. Only one way to find out. Plenty of people around, after all, so someone was bound to notice him if he started raising a fuss. And oh, he had one hell of a fuss planned.

"Hello? Carter? Teal'c? Daniel? Where the hell am I? Anyone? Jack O'Neill, Earth, Stargate…any of it ring a bell?"

He looked behind him in shock. The gate was…the gate was gone.

Damn.