CHAPTER THIRTEEN

 

 

“But the others did get back. So there has to be a way off this planet,” Corporal Wilkins said for the eighteenth time since their encounter, and he was sounding anxious. “If it’s all the same to you, sir, I don’t wanna end up like Gonzo, poor bastard.”

“Gonzo” was the man whose body they had discovered at some distance from the Stargate, hanging off a lintel in the perimeter wall. The corporal had served with him, and he had insisted on cutting down the flyblown corpse of Private Joe Gonzales. The beasts had inflicted terrible injuries, but Private Gonzales had died from a single shot to his head. Someone had possessed the mercy to spare him further suffering.

Once they had buried him, they had continued in a south-easterly direction. Just after nightfall they had come upon a ruined guardhouse and set up camp for the night. Approximately two hundred meters further on, across open terrain, was a large gate in the city walls, now swallowed by shadows. Had they arrived earlier, Teal’c might have proceeded inside, although some indefinable instinct warned him against any such foray. However, instincts or no, tomorrow at first light they would have to explore what lay beyond the gate.

“I was wrong. We should have gone looking for White, Lambert, and Ryder.”

The corporal was referring to the soldiers who had arrived with him. His petulance was beginning to tax Teal’c’s patience. Or perhaps it was merely a combination of the relentless heat and humidity and the renewed silence of the forest. A nub of masonry was pressing against his still aching shoulder, and Teal’c noiselessly shifted his position, wishing he could afford the peace of kelno’reem. He had seated himself by the doorway, observing a jungle and ruins bathed in pale starlight. It imbued the world with a ghostlike quality, enhancing the now familiar sense of foreboding that had befallen him as soon as the silence settled over the trees once more.

From behind came a soft rustle. Corporal Wilkins had risen and crawled closer on all fours to peer out the door. “I gotta go find those clowns,” he muttered and, with the next breath, “Got a stinking headache, though.”

Unable to discern any smell and struggling to keep his tone civil, Teal’c replied, “I recommend you ingest appropriate medication and try to sleep. I shall wake you for your watch.”

“Been popping aspirin for the past three hours, sir. It’s a miracle if I’ve got any stomach lining left after this.” More rustling. The corporal had retreated to the back of the room and was rummaging through his backpack. Then he returned, carrying his weapon. “Gotta go find them,” he said again.

Teal’c grabbed a fistful of his sleeve. “Corporal Wilkins, we have discussed this repeatedly. It would not be wise for you to attempt a search. Not on your own, and especially not in darkness.”

“Let go of me!” The corporal yanked his arm free and only barely seemed to curb the impulse to train his weapon on Teal’c. “I’ve got my orders, and you’re not authorized to stop me. Sir!”

The address was made to sound like an insult, and Teal’c felt his blood boil. “What orders, hasshak?” he hissed. “Not long ago you were attempting to run back to M3D 335 like a frightened boy!”

The weapon snapped up, but Teal’c was faster. On his feet in the blink of an eye, one hand clamped around the barrel, he wrenched the submachine gun from the corporal and jabbed its stock into the man’s midriff. For a moment Corporal Wilkins sagged back, winded, then he collected himself and was about to attack again.

A sound from outside, a stone accidentally loosened and kicked by a boot perhaps, penetrated the scrabbling noises of their fight.

“Quiet!” Teal’c barely breathed the command and his hand shot up in warning.

The corporal’s training reasserted itself. Slowly and carefully, he recovered his submachine gun and moved in behind Teal’c who had retrieved his staff weapon. Directly south of them a dark shape oozed from the tree line like a thing spawned and bred in the jungle. Curled into a crouch, it approached the guardhouse, its silhouette broken up only by the black protrusion of the gun barrel. A Marine then, or perhaps—

The half-formed hope was smashed by a shot tearing through the window at the far end of the room. Corporal Wilkins cried out, and Teal’c whirled around. The flare from his staff weapon briefly illuminated a blackened human face. It dropped from sight in a shower of dust and crumbling masonry. The corporal had been hit, but not grievously. Sprawled on the ground he opened fire on the man approaching from the trees. None of the rounds struck its target. But it could only be a matter of time.

Teal’c did not feel the curious tingle that would have announced the presence of a Goa’uld symbiote. “Hold your fire!” he shouted. “We are friends!”

The answer was a barrage of shots from the window. Flattened against the doorjamb, he loosed another staff blast. This time there was a scream and the thuds of a body dropping limply behind the casement. Teal’c cursed softly, hoping the man was wounded rather than dead. Barring Dr. Fraiser’s assault on him, this was the first instance of human aggression he had encountered, and it almost came as a relief. Because, unlike the other dangers on this planet, it was comprehensible and meant that questions might be answered—provided he could take at least one of the attackers alive. He needed information, and in his experience dead men spoke very little.

“No friends in this game, Mr. First Prime,” the corporal snarled. “It’s either them or us, so save the negotiations for when they’re dead.”

“I was not aware that this was a game,” grunted Teal’c, keeping a close eye on the other hostile who had dropped in a patch of ferns and was almost invisible now. “We need to—”

The ferns twitched. Their movement provoked an extended burst from Corporal Wilkins’ gun. Stalks and fronds ripped apart, and the man hiding in the clearing returned fire briefly, then leaped up and scurried toward the tree line. Without Teal’c’s volition, the tip of his staff weapon swiveled after the fleeing figure, blossomed orange in the night, ready to unleash death. His fingers were tightening on the weapon’s grip, nearing the pressure required to trigger the blast. He heard the bellow of blood in his ears and, faint but clear, a voice commanding him to kill lest he be the one killed.

“What are you waiting for?” Corporal Wilkins screamed. “Shoot him!”

With supreme effort Teal’c forced his hands to unclench and was rewarded by a sharp bolt of pain that ripped through his skull and scattered his confusion. Howling with fury, the corporal brought up his gun, fired. A reckless sprint spirited the attacker to the relative safety of the jungle. But there might be a second enemy yet hiding behind the guardhouse. Teal’c ran out the door and around the building, Corporal Wilkins in close pursuit.

The man was still there. Even in the pallid starlight his wounds seemed horrid, his face melted away by the staff blast. But he was alive and, though blind and undoubtedly in agony, he would not desist. Clutching a K-bar knife in his right, he had pushed himself to his knees and was listening intently for any sound that might betray his opponents’ position.

Knowing that it was a half-truth at best and would be to no avail, Teal’c said, “Put down your weapon. We have no wish to kill you.”

The knife slashed at Teal’c’s leg, and only a jump back saved him from injury. The man opened what had been his mouth and emitted a gurgling noise. It could have meant anything; a plea for mercy or a pledge to fight to the death. Teal’c never found out. Corporal Wilkins had arrived, weapon raised, but before he could fire or Teal’c could intercede, the wounded soldier gave a keening wail. The knife slid from his fingers, and he fell forward, his whole body racked with spasms that gradually eased until he remained perfectly still.

Plagued by regret Teal’c crouched, reached for a neck slick with blood, hoping to find a pulse. He did not succeed. The man was dead, and perhaps it was kinder this way. About to remove one of the man’s dog tags, Teal’c heard a soft metallic click and forced himself not to show any reaction. He had expected this.

“Sorry, Mr. First Prime,” the corporal said. “Nothing personal.”

“If it is not personal, what are your reasons?” Teal’c enquired calmly, his right hand furtively digging into a pile of rubble and mortar dust.

“No more than one winner in this game, Mr. First Prime. You’re good, but you ain’t good enough. Or maybe you are, but we’re not gonna find out. ’Cos if you’re dead you’re not gonna be chosen.”

Teal’c’s fingers closed around a fistful of debris. “And only the best survive the challenge and are worthy to serve their god.”

“That’s right.”

Starlight reflected in the corporal’s eyes, making them seem drained of color, drained of soul. This latter notion, Teal’c believed, was none too far from the truth. He himself had survived a Jaffa training camp, survived the final selection. He had killed to survive. But not in cold blood. Not a warrior of his own team. So what was happening? He could not afford to think it through now. He had to act, else he would have mere seconds to live.

“I see,” he said, allowing his left hand to slide along the grip of his staff weapon.

The movement was minute, but it was enough for Corporal Wilkins to notice and be distracted. His gaze shifted. “Don’t even—”

Teal’c’s right shot up, flinging a handful of dust and broken stone at the man’s face. Corporal Wilkins cried out, controlled the reflex to claw at his eyes, fired, and missed. In throwing the rubble, Teal’c had dropped sideways. Now he bounded to his feet and was on the disoriented man in one leap. For the briefest of moments, he felt a craving to kill and attain the glory of selection. He forced it away, knowing it was not his own mind speaking to him, twisted the weapon from his opponent’s hands, and knocked the corporal out cold.

Patting down Corporal Wilkins, he found a sidearm and a combat knife, which he pocketed. The sidearm he unsafed, taking a deep breath. His theory might be flawed, but putting it to test was the only option. The damage inflicted would be temporary after all. He placed the gun next to the corporal’s ear and fired. Then he turned the man’s head and repeated the process.

Roused by the noise and pain, Corporal Wilkins gave a yelp and his eyes snapped open. Wary of a renewed attack, Teal’c sat back on his haunches, watching his patient. The corporal blinked several times, awkwardly pushed himself to a sitting position, and squinted around in some confusion. Finally his gaze lighted on the dead soldier, and his eyes darkened with anguish. Teal’c knew then that both his suspicion and his treatment had been correct.

“Ryder!” the corporal croaked, evidently recognizing something other than the soldier’s face. “Ryder. How—” It was then that he became aware of his deafness. Staring in panic, he fingered his ears, brought his hands away smeared with a trickle of blood. “What happened to me, sir?” He all but screamed.

“Do not be afraid,” Teal’c said. “It will pass in time.”

Hearing himself speak, he grasped that his method of curing the madness, while successful, had one fundamental flaw.

 

For the first time in days Sam Carter wasn’t in pain or immediate fear for her life, and the morphine was trying to suck her into a blurry, wooly headspace. Maybe she should have taken the stuff from the start. Things really were a lot more pleasant this way. She refused to concede that this absurd sense of wellbeing had anything to do with her current mode of transport.

No way.

“Stop fidgeting, Carter,” he muttered. “You’re not helping.”

“How about piggyback?” she offered and tried to straighten up.

“Major! If you don’t keep still, I’ll sling you over my shoulder, caveman-fashion, I swear!”

Worth thinking about. She’d have a nice view of his ass. And he did have a great ass. For a commanding officer. Sam giggled.

“For cryin’ out loud!”

“You okay, Jack?” Soft and concerned, Daniel’s voice came drifting through the halo of his flashlight.

“Yeah. Except Carter’s contracted ADD on top of everything else.”

The beam of the flashlight froze in place, allowing them to catch up. “Want me to carry her for a while?” asked Daniel.

No.

“No. I’m fine.”

Thanks, sir. Not that Daniel doesn’t have a cute butt, but—

“We need to keep moving.” Janet, cold and impatient, not like Janet at all.

Sam remembered now. This was why she had to stay alert. “Something’s wrong,” she murmured.

“Everything’s okay, Carter,” the Colonel said immediately. “Doc’s gonna look after you.”

The way she’d done earlier? With cold hands, colder eyes, unaware or uncaring that she didn’t heal but hurt? Not like Janet at all.

“No,” Sam rasped.

He wasn’t listening. “How much further?”

“About five minutes, tops,” the Dr. Fraiser dybbuk replied, trying to sound soothing.

“You gave us the five minutes spiel half an hour ago,” snapped Colonel O’Neill. “Mind telling me where we’re going, Fraiser?”

Janet pointed up. Same walls, same statues, same treetops silhouetted against an indigo sky full of alien stars. The stars looked cool and clean, as far away from this planet as you could get, and Sam wanted to be there. Maybe it was she who was wrong, not Janet. Couldn’t tell anything for sure, not with that goddamn drug in her system. Next time she’d do it the way people did in the movies—bite down on a leather strap.

They climbed an alley of stairs and the ruins below fell away into darkness. No animal calls, and it felt like the forest was brooding, hatching something. Whatever it was, you could bet your six that it wouldn’t be good for either your health or your sanity. After all, just look at them. Her. Janet. And what about Teal’c? Where—

Tripping on a step, Colonel O’Neill nearly lost his balance. After that there was a distinct seesaw to his step. Sam looked up, saw his mouth compressed to a tight line, muscles in his jaw working.

“Sir, I could try to—”

“Don’t say it, Carter,” he gasped.

“Levitate?”

He barked a brief laugh. “You’re high, but you’re not that high, Major.” Up ahead, the flashlight had stopped rising. “Keep going, Daniel!”

“Wouldn’t know where. I’m at the top.”

“Jacob’s Ladder has an end?”

By the time they reached the paved plateau at the top of the stairs, Sam was still trying to figure out how her dad came into this and what he needed a ladder for. Daniel was waiting for them, caught on to the limp.

“Dammit, Jack—”

“Save it, Daniel. Where now?”

“It’s through there, sir.” Janet, hovering like a gloomy ghost.

Obediently Daniel’s light illuminated through there. It was a passageway barely wide enough for two people to walk side by side.

Wreathed around the entrance was a trio of figures.

“Great,” murmured the Colonel. “Fear, Terror, and Death.”

“Bhaya, Mahabhaya, and Mrityu.” Daniel yanked the flashlight away from the statues.

For the briefest of moments the beam brushed Janet’s face and the inhuman anticipation written there. This wasn’t right. Sam had known Janet Fraiser for five years, they were friends, close friends, and this wasn’t Janet. This was a shell filled with something unspeakable.

“Don’t go in there, sir,” Sam whispered. “It’s wrong. It’s all wrong.”

“What’s wrong, Carter?” he asked back quietly. “Goa’uld?”

“No. No, not that.” How was she going to explain? There was nothing she could put her finger on, and her brain wasn’t working.

Janet edged closer, placed an icy hand on Sam’s forehead. “Fever’s spiking, Colonel. She’s probably getting delirious. We can’t afford to wait.”

Perhaps it was true. This was Janet, after all. Carried into the building, Sam clung to that thought for dear life. It didn’t help. Shadows threatened to smother her, and the wrongness exploded out of all proportion. She fought an impulse to curl up, claw Colonel O’Neill’s shirt like a startled cat. Wouldn’t do. Wouldn’t do at all.

Sounds were reduced to boot falls that drowned out the patter of Janet’s bare feet—how come she was barefoot?—and the steady plinking of condensation from the walls and ceiling. The gleam of Daniel’s lamp ghosted ahead over moss-coated masonry, until it tumbled out into a chamber and refracted into dazzling brightness. All around the room gilt friezes flickered to life as the beam of the flashlight danced over them.

Daniel sighed softly, enthralled, his reaction as unalterably out of place as it was normal and reassuring. Everything would be okay. Wouldn’t it?

“Give me a hand, Daniel,” the Colonel said.

“What? Oh.”

“Here, let me hold this.” Smiling, Janet reached out for the flashlight and staff weapon Daniel was carrying.

No.

“Sure, thanks.”

“No,” croaked Sam.

Or maybe it had been a shout rather than a croak. Colonel O’Neill’s face tightened, all hard angles, the way it did when he was trying his damnedest to keep a lid on his feelings. Had he ever realized that they knew him far too well to buy it anymore?

“It’s gotta be done, Carter,” he murmured. “I’m sorry.”

What was he talking about? Oh. Her leg. With an air of detachment she stared down at the festering mess. Right now it was easy to pretend this didn’t belong to her. She didn’t care. Much. She cared about the staff weapon. Which was changing hands.

No. Sir, can’t you see it’s wrong?

Daniel’s arm, warm and strong, slipped under her back, and together he and Colonel O’Neill eased her to the ground. Stone tiles, and when she turned her head they felt cool under her cheek. Past Daniel’s back she watched as Janet carried the weapon across the small room and placed it on the floor along the wall.

The doctor turned, shining the flashlight directly at Sam, blinding her. “See?” Janet asked. “Nothing to worry about.”

“Uhm, Janet?” Going by the tone of Daniel’s voice there was everything to worry about. “I don’t see any—”

“Surgical kit,” completed the Colonel. “What the hell is going on, Fraiser?”

By ways of a response, the light receded. Sam squinted against the glare, but all she could make out were a pair of bare feet walking backwards.

Suddenly Colonel O’Neill leaped from his crouch. “Don’t! Don’t do—”

“Unless you want to be cut in half, stay where you are!” The voice was glacial. Not Janet’s. Not Janet’s at all.

The rings shot from the ground. Daniel grabbed the Colonel’s arm, yanking him away from the periphery, yelling something Sam couldn’t understand under the hum of the ring transporter. Around them the room disintegrated in a brilliant flash of light.

A heartbeat later, she found herself lying on a different floor.

“—trying to kill yourself, Jack?” Daniel finished hollering. Then his jaw dropped, and he took in their new location still hanging on to the Colonel.

They’d landed in a basement vault—surrounded, from Sam’s perspective, by a picket fence of armor-clad shins. Her gaze traveled up the shin plates, thighs, bellies, chests, to the faces… face. One face, times six.

“Kumtraya,” she whispered.

“If that’s Harlan’s idea of a joke, so help me, this time I shoot the fat old bastard!”

“With what, Jack?” Daniel slid a pointed glance at his friend’s empty hands. Janet had seen to it that their staff weapon wouldn’t make the trip.

“Good point. Make that throttle.”

“Besides, I don’t think they’re robots,” Daniel added. “I think they’re real.”

“That’s what you thought last time.” The Colonel freed himself from Daniel’s grip and took a couple of steps toward the nearest Jaffa, regarding him as if he were mustering the troops. “I remember this guy from the exercise. He’s one of Norris’ surprise mob.”

With peculiar grace, almost as if he were performing a dance, he spun on the man to his left. His elbow slammed into an unprotected midriff, and the Jaffa recoiled, startled. Colonel O’Neill tried to follow up with a right hook, but the man had regained his wits, blocked the punch, and delivered two hard, rapid jabs to the Colonel’s chest. Smiling, he watched as Jack O’Neill doubled over, fighting for air.

The Jaffa raised his staff weapon for a blow. His doppelgangers cheered him on. “Let’s see how this feels. Maybe—”

He didn’t get any further. Daniel had grabbed the nearest thing remotely looking like a weapon and flung it at him. The staff missed its target as the backpack hit the Jaffa in the face, exploding into a shower of field rations and cooking gear, and two of the man’s doubles piled on top of Daniel to inflict an etiquette lesson. The remaining threesome looked on unconcerned.

Between their legs Sam could see movement. Somebody else had entered the vault. Delicate feet, golden toe rings and anklets, sheer, flowing fabric. A woman. Jaffa?

“Enough!” The metallic resonance of the voice gave it away. A Goa’uld.

Fighting a bout of dizziness, Sam watched as Colonel O’Neill and Daniel were dragged next to her and pushed to their knees.

“Kneel before your goddess,” one of the Jaffa intoned, while the others shuffled aside to clear a path for the Goa’uld.

“You were right,” the Colonel muttered at Daniel, eyes narrow. “Did I mention that I hate it when you’re right?”

“Sorry.”

Sam had no idea who or what they were talking about, until the Goa’uld casually strolled into her field of vision. Nirrti. Could this day get any worse? Probably yes. Her interest in the prisoners seemed to be strictly confined to one person only, and the look on her face was predatory. Great.

“We meet again, O’Neill,” observed Nirrti.

“Thrilled. Can we go now?”

“If you wish.” Nirrti stepped closer and nudged Sam’s side with her foot. “Naturally, if you leave, she dies.”

“So?”

“I believe it would distress you.”

“You believe wrong.” To anyone who didn’t know him well, the Colonel’s show of indifference should have been convincing. The only giveaway was a white stress line around his mouth, always there when he was holding on too hard.

Nirrti’s fist closed in his hair, and she pulled his head back, forcing him to look at her. “And you are lying. You persuaded your superior to free me in order to save the Hankan girl. Because the thought of her death distressed you.”

“We all make mistakes.”

“Indeed.” Nirrti smiled. “Some greater than others.”

His control began to slip. “What do you want?”

“You.”

“Fine.” The answer came too rapidly, flagging up his relief. “You can have me, but you let Daniel and Carter go.”

“You are hardly in a position to make demands, Tauri.” To underline her point, Nirrti forced his head back further. “That is what you told me not so long ago, is it not? Count yourself lucky that I do not hold grudges. I shall grant your wish. Some of it at least.” She abruptly released the Colonel and addressed the Jaffa guarding Daniel. “Take this one back to the shrine and set him free. I have no use for him.”

“No!” Colonel O’Neill tried to get up, but a pair of beefy hands held him in place. “He’s injured and unarmed. It’s a death sentence.”

“It is what you asked for.”

“You damn well know it isn’t. I—”

“Can’t wait to get a bit of fresh air.” Through a bruised and swollen face, Daniel tried to grin. “Hate to tell you, Jack, but you could do with a shower. Don’t get into any trouble while I’m gone. I’ll be back and—”

“Enough! Take him away!”

The Jaffa hauled Daniel to the center of the vault. From the cage of the transporter rings he kept smiling at Sam and the Colonel until he disappeared in a pillar of white light.