Title:  Dreams
Author:  Rosemary Klein-Robbins
Category: Action/Adventure
Pairings:  None really specific, but implied
Rating:  PG-13
Spoiler:  Small ones for Emancipation and Abyss
Summary:  Jack is kidnapped, sold and brainwashed. Then he is forced to hunt those closest to him.
Disclaimers:  SG-1 and all that it entails does not belong to author. There is no financial gain from this story. It has been written for amusement.
Author's Note:  Story told in a series of flashbacks-these will be denoted by the use of parentheses.  Song quoted at the end is Fire and Rain by James Taylor.  Opening quote is from the Tempest by William Shakespeare.
Thanks again to my wonderful ghost editor and partner in crime, Sarae, and also thanx to my third set of eyes, Aud.

Dreams
©2003 by Rosemary Klein-Robbins

The helicopter bearing the patient and the doctor tending him landed at Peterson Air Force Base. There was an air of expectation and urgency that the helicopter itself seemed to exude. The weather added to the tension. It was a cool fall night and the air itself seemed to make every breath one took to be an eerie one.

The ambulance with the waiting Paramedics was standing by with engine idling and the driver on the radio notified the hospital at the Air Force Academy that their patient had arrived. They stood, shivering in the unexpected coolness of the air.

A tall black man with a gold emblem on his forehead disembarked first. He would not let anyone near the man on the stretcher until he was sure they were the proper medical representatives. His usual stoic expression showed the strain he had been under during the trip.

After the patient was transferred to the ambulance, Teal’c helped a woman out of the helicopter. She was obviously dressed in clothes that were not hers. Dr. Elizabeth Greene’s dark blonde hair looked as if it had just been left to dry, no care taken to comb, style or braid it. Dr. Greene was running along next to one of the Paramedics and rapidly giving information and instructions before jumping into the back of the ambulance. Before the doors to the back could close, Beth beckoned to the man with the gold emblem; he ran and jumped in the back, just as the ambulance started to take off.

Dr. Janet Frasier was pacing in the doorway to the ambulance entrance. Dr. Gwen Ryan watched her walk back and forth, and back and forth. She understood what Janet was feeling. Gwen’s friend and colleague was in the arriving ambulance. Gwen didn’t understand just exactly what it was Beth had done, or even whom she had gone to rescue, but Beth had said she wanted Gwen to be there when she returned. Dr. Ryan was a top notch Orthopedic doctor at Walter Reed Hospital and Beth was fairly certain that the patient was going to need her services. So, she waited.

The ambulance was going towards the Air Force Academy in what some would describe as break neck speed, but to those inside, it didn’t appear to be moving fast enough.

“Dr. Greene?” Teal’c asked.

She looked up to see his eyes darkened with concern.

“He’s holding on, Teal’c. I believe we got to him in time.”

Teal’c nodded and then looked down at the still figure on the stretcher.

“It was close, was it not, Doctor?”

Beth nodded. Yes, indeed, it was close…far too close.

After checking to make sure that he was stable, she leaned back against the wall of the ambulance and finally let the paramedic do his job.

She closed her eyes and tears started to leak out of the corners of her eyes. She felt a large warm hand close around hers and squeeze.

“He is alive Dr. Greene,” Teal’c said. “He is a fighter. He will return to us.”

Beth could only nod. He would return, of that she was certain. But her concern was *which* him would return to them?

(“Missing?” General Hammond yelled into the phone, “What do you mean missing?”

Hammond could only sit at his desk. The hand holding the phone receiver was showing the signs of a tight grip. His knuckles where showing the color of something that was held tightly in it’s grip-they were white.

“How do two Air Force officers go missing?” George was yelling louder and Daniel and Teal’c came running. Dr. Frasier was not far behind.

All Hammond could do was just listen.

Colonel O’Neill and Major Carter were missing, each within weeks of each other. In fact, it wasn’t just O’Neill and Carter that were missing. Dr. Greene was also missing. She had been with Major Carter when it was noticed that the women were gone.

“Well, call me as soon as you figure out what happened.”
Hammond hung up the phone and looked at the anxious faces of the three people in the office with him.

“Colonel O’Neill was kidnapped from his cabin in Minnesota; we think about a 3weeks ago. Major Carter and Dr. Greene have been missing 48 hours.”

Daniel was confused and raised his right hand.
“Let me understand this,” he began, “Jack has been missing 3 weeks and we only know about it now?”

Hammond nodded. “When he goes up to that cabin, he only takes his cell phone and he has a habit of ignoring it when he doesn’t want to be bothered.”

“Then," Daniel began to ask.

“How did we know?” Hammond interrupted. “When Sam and Beth came up missing.” Hammond sighed. “The last contact we had with Colonel O’Neill was the day he arrived at his cabin. He called us and called Dr. Greene to wish her a happy birthday and after that, no one heard from him. When Major Carter and Dr. Greene did not appear for the hearing at the Pentagon, some SF’s were sent to their hotel room.”

Hammond stopped. “They found signs of a struggle and a note that the two were going to be sacrificed to Angra Mainyu and that the means of their sacrifice was none other than Colonel O’Neill. They said he is on a planet that is known only to them. The note also said that if we didn’t believe them, we should check his cabin.”

Hammond shook his head and his eyes were suspiciously moist. “Jack’s cabin was ransacked. He must have put up one hell of a fight.”

Daniel and Teal’c sat back.

Daniel then took off his glasses and made a show of wiping them. “That is one mean demon.” Daniel said in a shaky voice and proceeded to describe what he knew about his God to the others.

“Angra Mainyu, according to the texts is the God of Darkness. He is also described as the eternal destroyer of good and creator evil. He brings death and disease. He also goes by another name, Ahriman, which means ‘fiendish spirit’. He is also seen as the personification of evil.”Daniel continued that if Jack had been taken by this particular being’s followers, they might not like what they got back when they rescued them.

“This is a particularly evil group.” Daniel finished. “Teal’c? Do you have anything else to add?”

“I do not Daniel Jackson.”

General Hammond suggested they needed to contact Jacob and that maybe the Tok’ra could tell them more.

Daniel was only able to sit back and shake his head. He was the only one that dared ask the questions out loud: “How did they manage to spirit Jack off world? How were they able to spirit all three of them away without anyone noticing? There were no more gates, where there? A Goa’uld ship that transported them? A renegade Asgard member to beam them up?”

No one had any answers to give to him or the others around that large oval table.

General Hammond could only rub the top of his head with his right hand.

Colonel O’Neill and Major Carter had put in seven hard years fighting the enemies of this world and Dr. Greene had only recently become involved in the serial killer investigation on Talbot.

“What,” he wondered, “did the followers of that particular Goa’uld hope to gain by doing this?”)

The ambulance arrived at the Air Force Academy Hospital Emergency Entrance. Dr. Frasier and Dr. Ryan, along with the ER welcome wagon ran to them and helped them get the patient out of the ambulance and into the waiting room.

They had isolated a whole wing on one of the floors. SF’s were posted to its entrance. No one was getting in there unless they had the proper identification. Janet Frasier saw to that. This one was one of her teammates. More than that, this was a friend.

Dr. Greene rapidly told Dr. Frasier and Dr. Ryan the type of sedative that had been used on him.

“According to Major Carter’s father,” Beth said quickly, “it is a rapid acting sedative that should have no affect on his respirations.”

Janet nodded. Sam had told her that Jacob had promised that this sedative wouldn’t hurt him. Sam also mentioned that her father had said something that had to do with grabbing hold of someone’s short and curlies, and how well it had worked to get someone’s attention. Jacob had promised that if the Tok’ra screwed up on this, there would be hell to pay - Selmak or no Selmak.

Beth told them that she had started IV fluids on the Tok’ra Hover craft after they’d picked him out of the water. She’d put on the automatic blood pressure cuff and the 3 lead EKG and had monitored his vitals every 15 minutes until they gotten here. All readings had been within normal limits and the sedative, as promised, had not compromised his respiratory system. He appeared to be coming to without incident.

The three women were shocked at Colonel Jack O’Neill’s appearance.

He was thin, pale and different. The women could not exactly explain what they meant by different.

Teal’c had explained that Jack had been quite violent in his struggles with him when they got Jack onto their ship. So, Janet and the other attending physicians had decided to put him on 3-point restraints and would keep him mildly sedated, only if he showed signs of aggression.

Janet looked down at Beth’s feet and it almost came as a revelation that Beth was barefoot. Wordlessly Janet went and brought her a pair of the sock booties that patients were given. Beth thanked her and then left the room to find Teal’c and the other members of the SGC.

It was time to let Dr. Frasier take over and let Dr. Ryan do her assessments.

General Hammond hardly recognized the woman who approached him. The oversized tee shirt and sweat pants threatened to engulf her. The brown booties on her feet were soundless as she came towards him. Signs of the tears she had shed and wiped away were still there. And her hair was a riotous mess of curls, going in every direction.

Beth went over to the nurse’s station and grabbed a rubber band. She just scrunched her hair into some semblance of a ponytail and then motioned for the General and his team to come over to the waiting room and sit.

“He is clinically stable,” Beth began. “There were no side effects from the sedative we gave him. When you see General Carter, please tell him.”

“Is he awake Beth?” Daniel asked, the anxiety clearly showing in his blue eyes. Jack was his best, if only friend, and the fear that he could possibly lose Jack showed very clearly in his eyes.
Beth shook her head. Her amber eyes mirrored Daniel’s anxiety, but there was also hardness in them, that had not been present during the worst of the investigation on Talbot.

Looking at Teal’c, Daniel and General Hammond, she realized that they “loved” this man as if he was family and were scared.
Not that she could blame them. That rescue mission she went on with Teal’c, Gwen’s husband, Colonel Liam Ryan, and the two Tok’ra members, had been harrowing. Even now, in her mind’s eye, she could still see it unfolding.

The rescue had come so close to ending with her death and Jon’s. She shook her head to clear that unsettling thought and went on to explain what they were doing for him and that all they could do right now was wait, hope and pray.

Daniel sat down next to her and put his arms around her. He held her for a long while. He could swear he could feel the tremors in her body, but then wondered if his own tremors weren’t what he was feeling.

“Do you want me to call Commander Samuels?” General Hammond asked her. Beth looked up at him. He noted the sheen in her eyes and saw the slow nod she gave him. Hammond went over to the desk and placed a call to Commander Benjamin Samuels.

The other three just sat and waited.

(Major Carter looked around the cell she was in. She rubbed her head and her eyes in an attempt to clear the blurring in her eyes.

She noted the other shape huddled on the floor and called out.

“Beth?”

The other figure slowly sat up and put her hands on either side of her head. She closed her eyes tightly and attempted some calming breaths.

“Yeah,” she finally said in a small voice. “I’m here. Wherever here is.”

Sam scooted over to her. “Do you remember anything? I can’t remember anything more than going to bed.”

Beth shook her head. The motion caused it to ache and she wondered if they had been drugged.

Both women looked at the bar cell they were in. There was straw on the floor and one window that was impossibly high up. That small and pitiful window allowed in the only light that they had.

Both women were still in their nightclothes…no shoes, no socks, just their nightgowns.

“Where are we?’ Sam wondered. “Off world? Out of the country?”

She couldn’t tell. They heard no voices and there was nothing to see.

They sat in the quiet of the cell, for what seemed like hours. And, Sam conceded, it possibly could have been hours. Neither woman had a watch. Beth could feel the headache receding and she tried to check her pulse and respirations, as well as Sam’s. She would have liked to check pupil reaction, but that would have been a waste. She couldn’t swear to it, or even against it, but she felt that they had been drugged.

Sam was inclined to agree with her.

“How long do you suppose we will sit here?” Beth asked her.

Sam shrugged her shoulders. She was sitting against the hard stone wall with her knees hugged against her chest. She didn’t want to say anything to Beth, but she was scared as well. Her military training served her well right now. But she was also wondering what had happened. Who had brought them here and why?

So the women sat. So the women waited.)

In Jack’s hospital room, the machines and the staff quietly did their jobs. Blood was drawn. IV fluids were given. Vitals were checked. And still he slept. Or gave the appearance of sleeping.
They managed to rouse him to take fluids. But he wouldn’t take more than sips before he closed his eyes.

In her report, Dr. Ryan had noted that, orthopedically, he was fine. There wouldn’t be any need for her to remain and so she returned to Washington. Her husband was still being de-briefed. Liam had been called to participate in this rescue as well as the rescue of Sam and Beth, but he hadn’t told her much more than that. She knew, of course, that he would not tell her anything at all, unless she was in the loop. And she knew that she was not. So he kept his own counsel. Colonel Ryan remained in Colorado after his wife had returned to Washington.

Before Gwen returned to DC, however, that big bluff man hugged his petite wife and told her that he would see her when he returned to DC. He cautioned her to lock her car, the house, and make sure that she had an escort when coming and going in the parking garages and parking lots.

Gwen agreed. She knew Buck was disturbed by all of this and had decided that she would just agree and give him that peace of mind.

Dr. McKenzie had met with General Hammond and Dr. Frasier. He had urged them to not press the Colonel with questions. “Let him remember at his own pace,” he urged. He cautioned them to not make any sudden moves or exclamations around him. He advised them to try to keep his room quiet and always do the routines the same; let him get a sense of continuity and rhythm. ‘Order’ was the watchword for him.

“Surprises might set him off. As long as things are quiet, he can get a sense of stability. Maybe then, he will stay awake, instead of hiding behind sleep. He is aware enough that something happened and something is different,” McKenzie added.

At first they tried to keep Dr. Greene and Major Carter away from him.

“You two were supposed to be his prey,” Janet scolded Sam. “How do we know you still aren’t considered to be now?”

Both women insisted that he needed to have them around. If they were part of his normal life before, they needed to be now.

And so, they attempted to integrate the women back into his routine.

Sam was standing next to his bed, when he suddenly opened his eyes.

What Sam saw in his eyes scared her. They were his eyes, certainly, but the person living in those eyes was not Jack O’Neill. He growled at her and lunged at her. Sam stepped back with a small exclamation. Jack struggled hard against his restraints, so much so that the staff ran in as they were afraid he would do himself some physical damage. Janet gave him a sedative through his IV line and soon he settled back down and went to sleep.

Janet looked at her accusingly, as if to say, “See? I told you.”
Sam, through tears, shook her head and could only stare at him.

(The man stood by the entrance to the cell, unseen and unheard. He watched the two women - took in their appearance, but more importantly, their scent.

They had been there a week already and not allowed to bathe, nor given a change of clothes. Sam had jokingly said to Beth that she thought they might be a little ripe right now. Beth laughed slightly, but both wondered about their not being allowed water to wash with, just water to drink and food. Their nightgowns were not enough to keep them warm at night and being made of a flimsy cotton rayon mix, not very sturdy.

The man listened to them whisper and took in their appearance and their scent. His leader told him to take in their essence and to learn about them. They were his and he needed to be familiar.
But something about the women tugged at his mind, and surprisingly, at his heart. He did not know these women; at least, he thought he did not. They were just prey. How does one have memories of things you hunt?)

Commander Samuels arrived at the Air Force Academy hospital and found Beth sitting in Janet Frasier’s office. She looked so small to him. Much smaller than their foot height difference. Small because she was still trying to deal with her memories of being kidnapped, something he had only just learned about, and with the fact that a loved one was laying in a hospital bed. Not just lying there - tethered there, by restraints, IV lines and EKG leads. The strain showed in her eyes, on her face and in her posture.

“Beth?” His voice was quiet, gentle and full of the emotions he had for her.

Beth slowly looked up and smiled. She got up from the desk and went into his arms, her right cheek placed against the part of his chest where his heart was. She could hear the steady beating of that organ and also took comfort in the warmth of his body. His arms enfolded her and she caught the scent of his aftershave: English Leather. After all these years, he still wore it. He said it reminded him of her, because she had given him his first bottle and quoted the tag line of the commercial: “All my men wear English Leather. Or they wear nothing at all.” Smiling at the memory of when and where she had given him that first bottle, he held her closer.

“Has anything changed?” He asked her and led her back to the chair at the desk.

She shook her head and told him of Sam’s experience with Jon.
“I am so afraid we have lost him for good.”

“We don’t know that, Beth.” She looked away from him and stared out the window. The trees still had leaves on them, but they were starting to turn. She wondered if they would still be having this conversation when the trees started to bud in the spring. Ben continued his thought. “And we can’t believe that either.”

Turning her back to face him, he took her chin in his hand. “We have to believe that we will all reach him. You have always said that Jack was…is a fighter. He will fight his way back Beth. You have to believe.”

Sam looked in on him from the doorway. She knew that Janet would chase her away. But Janet was not there at the moment.
“Come on Jack.” She thought about how she so easily could call him Jack in her head, but not out loud. “You have to fight. You have to come back to us. To me.”

(Beth was brought out first. She tried to resist, but they had threatened to strip Sam and take her out for the other men in the camp to have some sport with her. Beth then just got up and walked out. Her nightgown, at this point, was all but a rag. How long? How long have we been here?

They took both of her hands and manacled her to a hook. Her toes barely touched the ground. Her eyes widened in shock as she recognized Jon. But he was barely recognizable. His hair was longer than when she last saw him. Greyer too, but it was him. His body was thin and whipcord hard. He wore a loincloth and his feet were bare. He approached her with a predatory air.

He walked around her, almost as if he was circling for the kill. The look in his eyes made her afraid. She closed her eyes and she felt him near her. He was taking in her scent. She could hear him sniffing her. She tried to not think about the John O’Neill standing so close to her. Her awareness level of him was very high. "Pheromones,” Beth thought. That is why we were not allowed to bathe. He is taking in our natural scents without the perfumes and soaps.

She cast her mind back to the playmate of her childhood. Tried to steady her heart and her fear by remembering the playmate that taught her to play games and followed after her as she learned to walk and then to run; the friend that taught her to swim and ride her first two-wheeled bike.

It worked, but only until he grabbed her chin in his right hand. Turning her face to him, he brought his face very close to her and she opened her eyes. For a small second she saw the man she knew and loved, and as quickly as it was there it was gone. She could not suppress a shudder as he brought his mouth close to her right cheek and licked it. And then blew on it. He smiled as he felt and saw her body shudder and then let go of her face and backed away.

His leader smiled and then nodded for them to release her and send her back to her cell. She wanted to warn Sam, but it was a different cell they took her to. Frustrated, she started to cry. She had no way of warning Sam of what was going to happen. Sam had different memories and emotions tied up with Jon. She didn’t have the memories of a childhood friend to shield her emotions. She only had the memories of a woman in love, but a woman who dare not act on them. What, Beth wondered, would Sam do with this man?

Sam was still hanging from the hook long after the men had left. She did not recognize the man that finished “handling” her. That was the only word she could use. That man could not possibly be her friend and …no, he was something else. Someone else. He walked around her. Smelling her. Tasting her. He touched her body. Putting his large hands on her face, her arms, her stomach and her legs. When he licked her face and nuzzled her ears and her neck, she could have sworn she heard, “Sam, I’m sorry.” But when she looked in his eyes, she didn’t see the Jack O’Neill she knew and thought, hoped she was hallucinating.

Finally someone took her back to her cell. Beth went over to the door as it opened and put her arms around Sam and led her to a spot to sit down. Sam’s eyes said all that Beth needed to know. Beth knew that Sam’s emotions concerning Jon were in turmoil. Loving someone she felt that she ought not to love, but loved nonetheless. Sam’s own sexual awareness of and attraction to Colonel O’Neill was hard to deal with on a normal day. This…this was just too weird even to describe.

Sitting on the floor next to her friend, Beth stroked her hair and crooned a lullaby to her - the wordless tune that she would sing to her own boys when they had nightmare, an old Yiddish lullaby - Almonds and Raisins. She didn’t know the words, but she knew the melody. So she crooned it to Sam and slowly, very slowly, Sam’s breathing returned to normal and to the sounds of someone who had finally, and thankfully, gone to sleep.

The man lay on his cot. His own mind was in turmoil now. His leader told him that these women were his enemies. That it was his duty to learn their ways and to prepare to hunt them down. Doing so, he was told, would free him from his old ways and set him on a new path to greatness. If that was true, he thought, why then did he feel like he was doing something wrong? Why was it, he asked himself, did he say ‘Sam, I’m sorry’ to the woman with the yellow hair? And why, he asked himself, did the woman with the strange colored eyes, seem so familiar to him?)

In the hospital room the man showed signs of being restless. He heard them call him several names: Jack, John, Colonel O’Neill and Sir. His mind struggled to answer to them. Some part of him was dimly aware that he was all of those. He struggled to wake up and tell them, ‘Yes, it is me that you are talking about’, but he was unable to.

The nurse heard his struggles and his mutterings and went into check on him.

“Colonel O’Neill?” Nurse Douglas asked. He then checked and made sure that Jack’s restraints were intact and that he hadn’t pulled out his IV or dislodged any of the myriad of equipment attached to him.

Jack’s eyes were still closed, but his lids were fluttering.
“REM?” Nurse Douglas wondered, but he noted what he had observed on Jack’s chart as instructed and called the Doctor on call to let her know what he had found.

Jack found himself caught in between worlds. Was he the Hunter or was he Jack? He no longer knew anymore. And so, he slept. In sleep, he did not have to answer to either name.

(Jacob and two other Tok’ra representatives came through the gate the day after General Hammond called the Tok’ra to let them know what happened. Predictably, the Tok’ra were loath to call Jacob from his assignment, but there were some members who had better memories of what the Tau’ri had done for them and more importantly, knew how Jacob felt about his daughter. Jacob’s Tau’ri sensibilities, even though he was host to Selmak, rubbed off on a number of the Tok’ra. Jacob was contacted and brought back to go and help search for his daughter.

“What do we know?” Jacob asked General Hammond. His anxiety showed so clearly in his eyes and his voice. Selmak did his best to calm Jacob during the journey back to the Tok’ra home world and his subsequent trip to the SGC.

General Hammond shook his head. “Not too much, I’m afraid, Jacob. We can tell you the name of the Goa’uld. But we do not know where they are.”)

After two weeks, there was very little change in Jack O’Neill. He would stay awake for longer periods of time. He was starting to eat, but very little and only if fed by the male Nurses or Patient Care Technicians. He would lunge at the female staff members. Even the women Doctors were very careful when they approached him. Janet had learned, to her sadness, that even she needed a male companion when in the room with him. The good news was that he was awake longer periods, appeared to understand them, and he was eating.

After a particularly harrowing day, due to the violent mood swings Jack had experienced, Janet invited everyone over for dinner to talk.

“He is,” Janet told them, “still angry about something.”

“Do you have any idea what it might be, Janet?” Daniel asked her. The sadness he was feeling was still quite evident in his eyes.

Privately he remembered another time Jack had been in trouble and he had not helped. That time he had been an ‘Ascended’ being, all powerful and all knowing and had done nothing. And here he was again, doing nothing. He rationally understood the difference, but the sense of helplessness was still there, nonetheless.

“Dr. McKenzie believes that Jack’s sub-conscious mind is at war with his conscious one.”

Beth nodded when Janet made that comment. In some perverse way it made sense.

Beth and Sam had both made a vow that they would not discuss what had happened between them and Jon while he was on that planet. Each woman feeling that it would only serve to cause Jon and them more pain. They spoke of it only between the two of them.

(Sam came into the examination room that Beth was in and sat on the bed. Beth was finishing dressing and looked at her friend. She raised her left eyebrow and motioned for Sam to say what was on her mind.

“You lied to them too! Didn’t you?” Sam asked her. Her tone indicated that she knew that Beth had lied, as she had.

“Oh yeah, like a rug.” Beth confirmed her question. “What purpose would it serve to tell them?”

“I feel guilty about that, Beth.” Sam put both of her hands in her head and massaged her scalp. “It wars with my nature, you know?”

“Hey, you are the one that has said, on many occasions may I remind you, ‘Needs must, when the devil drives’,” Beth replied. “And the devil is certainly driving now.” Running the brush through her unruly curls, she continued. ‘It would serve no purpose, at least right now. When we bring him home, does he need to be reminded by the people de-briefing him and de-programming him?”

“Or,” Sam finished, “by the people who know and love him best? Is that what you are saying?”

Beth nodded. “Jon is going to have a lot to deal with. What happened with us…well, we’ll deal, you and I. Jon, until he is ready, will only have himself. We need him to know that nothing has changed.” Beth looked hard at Sam. “Right?”

Sam agreed. Nothing had changed. But everything had changed.)

Dinner continued on in some silence and when the dishes were cleared, washed, dried and put away, they all sat in the living room to continue talking.

“Maybe it is time for Sam and I to start taking a little more care of Jon,” Beth ventured.

Ben stood up and went to stand in front of Beth. “What?” Ben’s voice almost thundered the force and rage so very apparent in that one word.

Beth looked up at him, the gold glints of eyes sharp and clear. “Your objection?”

Taking a calming breath, Ben continued. “Are you nuts? He can barely tolerate the female staff members at the hospital. How could you even think to put yourself and the Major in that position?”

“Because he needs to get used to us as his friends again. And not just some animals he was hunting,” Sam answered. “Because part of his coming back to us and himself is his being able to fight through what they did to him and remember.”

“I thought.” General Hammond interrupted, “That we were not to remind Jack about things. That he needed to remember on his own.”

“And so he shall,” Beth answered him. “We are just going to remind his subconscious mind of our existence. “He knows who we are. That knowledge just needs to be free to come out.”

“They did one hell of a job brainwashing him,” Daniel pointed out.

Teal’c, who was usually taciturn spoke out. “I do not like this idea, Dr. Greene.”

He had every reason to believe that the women would be hurt. Teal’c never did tell the whole story about how violent Colonel O’Neill had been when they ‘rescued’ him and how very close Dr. Greene came to being drowned. If it had been any other man but O’Neill, they would never have found that man’s body. Teal’c would have killed him outright and the body would have just disappeared.

Beth looked at the tall man and smiled. “Teal’c, it will be alright. We will not be entirely alone with him.”

A look of understanding passed between them. Beth knew that Teal’c, who normally appeared so unruffled by things, had been very disturbed by Jon’s behavior during the rescue. He had never seen his friend like that. To be honest, neither had she.
Janet looked at the two women and wondered what it was they were hiding and if trying to indirectly reach Jack’s subconscious was a good idea.

Janet, an astute observer of people, knew that Sam and Beth were lying about what had happened to them and were hiding their own fears and reactions. But, she had to admit, that possibly, it might be the way to go with Jack right now.

(The Hunter had another visit with his ‘prey’. Each time after he left them, he would dream. The dreams confused him. It appeared, at least in his dreams, that he had another life and another purpose. But what? What purpose?

This night he dreamed about some living structure that he appeared to be familiar with, but it was not, as it was here. He was dressed in clothes he had never seen before and he appeared ‘happy’. What did this dream mean?”)

The man in the hospital bed was having that same dream again, but with a different twist.

He remembered the house and knew what and where it was. He remembered being in a room, preparing food and then all of sudden men bursting in from his front and back doors. He remembered putting up quite a fight, but in the end they had subdued him. They waved something under his nose and then he remembered no more.

He made a large groaning noise and woke up. Disoriented, he started struggling against his restraints.

The nurse ran in to check on him and for the first time, Jack O’Neill appeared from behind his eyes.

“What is going on? Why am I here?”

Nurse Douglas, with some caution, approached the bed and answered.

“Colonel O’Neill? You are in the hospital of the Air Force Academy. “

Nurse Douglas did not know how much more to reveal, and placed his hand on Jack’s shoulder. For one minute the nurse saw some comprehension in his patient’s eyes and then it was gone.

There was no violent reaction when the Hunter returned. His eyes turned cold. Then he lay back down, closed his eyes and ignored the nurse’s presence.

Nurse Douglas left the room, charted the incident and paged Dr. Frasier.

Janet, after returning the page, told those gathered in her living room, what had happened.

“It appears,” she said, “that Jack is trying to come back to us. Maybe it might work if Sam and Beth interact with him more.”
The men in the room looked very unhappy.

Upstairs in the bedroom they shared, Beth could sense that Ben was unhappy with the situation.

Beth was already in bed and reading a romance novel by her favorite author. Both Ben and Jack teased her about the books. She responded by saying that if she liked books that you needed to be brain dead to read, that was her choice, and they could jump in the lake. She never told them that David used to razz her about them as well. There are just some things you don’t tell a man.

She silently watched him prowl the room. Ben Samuel’s was 6’5” –a good foot taller than she was. A football player from the time he was 12, he still moved like one. She never really paid that much attention to the game, baseball was her thing. Although, she watched a lot of hockey games because of her brothers’ and Jon and his brothers passion for the game.

“Ben, will you please stop that?”

He stopped and sat down on the bed next to her.

“I don’t want you to do this, Beth.”

Beth sat up and took his face in both of her hands. “I have to.”

He took her hands from his face and held them in his hands.
His right thumb rubbed the ring she wore on the middle finger of her left hand. He thought carefully about what he was going to say. It had taken them some time to be able to talk to each other without being defensive. He loved her and wanted to build a life with her. The life that he believed they both had wanted years ago.

“Beth, you have to understand, I was so scared…” he began, “…I thought that I had really lost you for good.”

She nodded and waited.

“I don’t think that you hanging around Jack is going to help either him or you.”

“I do though,” Beth answered him. “You need to understand, that I would, will and have done whatever I could do to help him. If you can’t understand or accept that, well…”

“I have to admit, I am jealous of him. He has had your unwavering love, affection and support, and…” Ben stopped to choose his words carefully, “…and it appears to me, as if he can do no wrong for you.”

Beth laughed. “I can assure you that I am no Saint. And so would anyone else, including my late husband. That said…” Beth stopped to phrase her answer to Ben, “…I have never in my life ever considered Jon to be a Saint. And, I never felt nor said that he can do no wrong. Because he has. I’m just not ever going to go into that area of my relationship with Jon, with you or anyone else.”

Her amber eyes appeared to glow, just for a minute and she continued.

“I am just not going to sit by and watch the man that I grew up with and love, because I still love him, even now, disappear. If you cannot accept my attachment, as it were, to Jon O’Neill, then maybe we need to re-think what we are doing.”

Ben looked back into her eyes. Staring into his two colored eyes could be disconcerting and through the years they had known each other, it was.

Ben took a deep breath and let it out. He had thought about his feelings concerning Beth’s attachment to Jack. Her brothers and Jack’s always felt their relationship to be a given. Her oldest brother Aaron, when he and Beth started dating, told him quite bluntly that if you want to make any headway with her, you have to understand her attachment to us and to Jack. They were as deeply integrated in each others’ lives from long habit and long affection. If Ben wasn’t willing to understand and accept it, then he needed to find a girlfriend that didn’t grow up around boys. Beth never considered the O’Neill boys to be anything different than her own brothers. Except, of course, maybe Jon. Aaron allowed that their relationship was 75% brother/sister, it was the other 25% that tended to be up for grabs.

“I am not going to ask you to break off ties with anyone that is important to your life, least of all Jack O’Neill.” Ben told her. “But I want you to be careful with your physical self, as well as your heart. We don’t know where he is right now. Not emotionally or psychologically. The man was trained to kill with his bare hands Beth. I don’t want to think about what would or could happen.”

Beth nodded and patted the other side of the bed. “Come on. We’ve been up too long and have had too little sleep. We’ll take this one day at a time.”

Ben climbed into bed next to her and she put her head on his chest, and listened to his heart. By it’s rhythm she should hear that he was still unhappy about what they were planning, but eventually she heard it slow to a more normal pace.

In Sam’s bedroom Daniel was having a similar conversation with Sam.

“I’m not blind Sam,” Daniel told her straight out. “I am well aware of how you and Jack feel about each other and don’t even try and tell me otherwise.”

He had noted Sam’s immediate defense mode kick in and stopped her from trying to deny her feelings for Jack or Jack’s for Sam.

“I have to tell you Sam…” Daniel ran his left hand through his hair and walked over to the bedroom window. He needed some time to think about what he wanted to say to her. “I really hope that the two of you work out this relationship to your advantage. But I don’t think now is the time to do it.”

“Daniel,” Sam’s voice was soft and gentle. Daniel had been a very good and close friend to and for her. And she loved him, dearly. She did. Maybe, she thought on her most frustrated days, that he would have been easier to fall in love with and love, but she knew that only one man held her heart and still did. He was strapped to a hospital bed and she knew that she had to be able to get through to him and to bring him back.

“Daniel,” She continued. “Whatever we have to do to bring him back to us, I will do. Maybe the Special Forces dictum of leaving no-one behind can be extreme. But I will not leave him behind. Not if I can help bring him home.”

Her blue eyes were steady and focused. Daniel could see the steel behind them and nodded. “Okay, Sam, but don’t expect me to not be close behind you when you do this.”

(Angra Mainyu had noticed the restless sleep of this particular hunter. He had watched Jack toss and turn and not appear rested. He needed his Hunter rested. If he did not rest, then he could not be controlled. The device worked better when his hunters slept.

He wondered what it was about his prey that disturbed his hunter so. He noticed the hesitancy to really humiliate the women and his unusual gentleness with them. The gentleness did not come out very often, nor was it very obvious. The Leader noticed when it showed, but not the others. Lucky. It would be bad the others noticed. He had paid very well for this man. This ‘Human’ was well trained to kill and to hunt. He would make a good addition to his tribe, and would be one of his best followers.

Angra Mainyu decided to go and talk to the women. He was determined to find who they were and what they knew of this man. And, more importantly, what was their relationship to him?)

Sam’s dream started almost as she fell asleep.

(A man came into the cell and rudely kicked her awake. Sam tried to open her eyes and concentrate on the voice, but it was hard. She felt herself being lifted up and two hands rudely forced themselves into her hair and forced her to look into his glowing eyes.

“A Goa’uld,” Sam thought.

Angra Mainyu looked at her and smiled. “You recognize what I am?” He sounded pleased. “And you have had contact with a symbiote in your system.”

Turning her head to the right and the left, his smile got larger.

Then all of a sudden his face changed.

“What is HE to you?” She was suddenly asked.

“What?” Sam was still trying to get her bearings.

“What is HE to you?” Angra Mainyu asked again.

“He is my Commanding Officer,” Sam answered. She dare not add he is her friend and that she loved him.

Sharply pulling on her hair with both hands, Angra Mainyu brought his face close to hers.

“You lie!” The voice said. “Do you not to whom you are speaking?”

Sam tried to look away, but the hands wouldn’t let her.

“I am Angra Mainyu.” He told her.

Sam had very limited knowledge of all the Goa’uld system lords and their personae. But she got the impression from this one, that he was not a nice man.

“So,“ Angra Mainyu asked her again. “What is HE to you?”)

Sam woke up screaming. Daniel, Janet and Teal’c ran into her room, followed by Beth and Ben.

Janet sat down on the bed next to Sam and held her and rocked her.

“It’s okay Sam. It’s okay.” Janet kept repeating the line over and over until Sam’s shaking stopped and her breathing returned to normal.

In the bedroom that Ben and Beth shared, Ben sat down on the bed next to Beth and put his arms around her.

Ben could feel Beth shake and he tightened his hold on her.

Ben tried to get Beth to tell him if he knew what Sam was dreaming about, but she would not answer him. She only pulled her self out of his arms, rolled over and attempted to go back to sleep.

Beth knew pretty well what Sam was dreaming about. She had been dreaming the same dream since it happened.

(Beth heard him come in and interrogate Sam. She heard the harsh metallic quality to his voice and his anger when he felt that Sam lied to him. She heard him drop Sam to the floor and turn to come to her.

He lifted her up by the hair on the back of her neck.
“You will tell me, what SHE is to HIM.”

Beth swallowed hard and answered. “She is his second in command.”

He gripped her hair harder and sharply pulled her hair back.

“Again. What is SHE to HIM?”

“She is a soldier under his command.”

“You lie.” She was told.

Beth swallowed again, “In our culture, women are warriors.”

He brought his face close to her. “So tell me, are you also a ‘warrior’?”

His voice sneered the last word. Beth shook her head and answered, ”No, I am a healer.”

That he did believe. That is what women were: breeders or healers.

He grunted with some satisfaction and then…”What are you to HIM?”

Looking steadily into his eyes, Beth answered. “I am his sister.”

“His sister?” He laughed. “You expect me to believe that. I see how he looks at you.”

“He is my brother.”

“But he has feelings for you. For both of you.”

“In our world, men can have feelings for women in their lives that have nothing to do with wanting to mate with them. A man may feel differently for a woman who is not his mate, his mother or his child. That man is my brother and she is both a soldier and a teacher.”

The Goa’uld looked into her eyes and although he did not totally believe her, he knew that for now, what she said would be enough.

Tomorrow, would be another round of the training his Hunter would go through to hunt these women. And to kill them.)

Jack was slowly coming around. He started to have more and more times of actively taking part in his care and was feeding himself. He also seemed to tolerate the presence of women more easily. Sam and Beth found that he was quieter when they were around, but he still refused to speak. Every now and again they would see him watching and once in awhile, the old Jack was looking at them. But he said nothing.

(General Hammond was in his office when the alarms went off signaling an off-world activation of the gate. He ran to the gateroom and noted Jacob and two other Tok’ra coming down the ramp. Jacob had a grim look of determination on his face and as he hurried towards his friend.

“To your office, George.” Jacob was not in the mood to talk in front of the SGC members in the gateroom.

George led the way and Jacob motioned for his two escorts to remain outside. Without much preliminary talk, Jacob turned an angry face to George. General Hammond knew that Jacob Carter possessed a temper and he had never been the brunt of it, although he has been exposed to it.

“Sometimes I forget these people are supposed to be on our side,” Jacob began as he paced the office.

George’s shocked looked caused Jacob to laugh.

“Well, your response is what I felt Selmak’s to be,” Jacob told him.

Rubbing his head with both hands, Jacob decided to sit down. “You have no idea what I had to go through to find out what we knew about his particular Goa’uld.”

“You know where he is?” Hammond was excited now. The Tok’ra High Council had continued to put him off about the information that he had asked for. Hammond was ready to storm the Tok’ra home world and make them tell him.
Hammond was shocked, though, that Jacob was feeling the frustration with the Tok’ra as well.

“Yes George, we know. And we’ve known for some time. You cannot imagine what I had to say to the High Council about this.”

“How soon can we get there?”

“Give us 5 days.” Jacob proceeded to tell him that there were going to be complications.

“Aside from not being able to gate directly out of there, we have to be able to obtain a Hover Craft.” Jacob informed him. “We will need a pretty big cargo ship to carry the hover craft and enough men to go in and rescue them.”

Jacob turned sad eyes to Hammond. “If we guess wrong, we may be bringing back bodies. We all need to be prepared. This is one mean Goa’uld. And…” Jacob paused before continuing. “…he has a really nasty bunch of Jaffa hunters with him. They are trained to hunt their prey by scent. They become very familiar with their victims before they hunt them. If Sam and Beth are intended to be the hunted, then we have to pray very hard that Jack is still, well… just pray, George. Just pray.”)

Ben was sitting in the cafeteria the next morning thinking about Sam’s nightmare and wondering if Beth was having them as well. He was up most of the night, sitting by the window and watching her sleep. She didn’t seem to be restless, but who knew. His coffee was getting colder and he sat there and stared at the table. Daniel and Teal’c came into the cafeteria to get some breakfast and noticed Ben sitting there. They walked over with their food and sat down.

Ben looked up with tired eyes. They showed the signs of not having slept and Ben found the mirror of his eyes in Daniel’s.

“Hey,” Ben said to them.

Teal’c nodded and Daniel smiled, a small smile, and said hello to him.

“So,” Ben started, “sleep much?”

Daniel shook his head. “After Sam’s nightmare, I just couldn’t. I sat in her room the rest of night. Teal’c…” indicating the tall man next to him, “sat outside her door.”

“It must have been something fairly painful that she dreamt about.” Ben scratched the back of his head with his left hand. “I sat by the window watching Beth sleep. I wish they would tell us what happened to them. It’s not like…”

“…we’ll blame them?” Daniel finished. He shook his head and took off his glasses to rub his tired eyes. He put his glasses back on and really looked at Beth’s friend. “Do you believe that Beth trusts you 100%?” Daniel then asked.

Ben sat back in his chair and wondered what made Daniel ask that question.

“Why are you asking that question?” Ben asked, with some trepidation in his voice. He was not sure he was going to like what Daniel’s intent behind the question was.

“I’m asking,” Daniel started slowly, “because I believe that both of them are hiding something from us. Something that Jack did to them, that they don’t want us to know and don’t want us to confront him on.”

Ben’s face lost its color.

Teal’c and Daniel had just that conversation on the way into the cafeteria. Teal’c had told Daniel that he would never believe that O’Neill would harm the women in any way, had he been capable of making a choice. Daniel had agreed, but had countered with “what if?” Teal’c informed Daniel that there was no “What if?” and shut down the conversation.

“Are you asking me if you believe that Jack raped them?”

“Yes,” Daniel’s answer was simple, direct and damning.

“No.” Ben was certain. “Beth would forgive a lot of things, but she would never forgive that. Whatever happened, it didn’t involve that. It couldn’t,” Ben looked at Daniel and as if he needed some confirmation: “Could it?”

The three men just looked down at the table. Their eyes told each other more than the words they spoke.

None of the three, however, would even dare ask the women that question.

Jack was awake for breakfast and Beth took his tray from the orderly and went into his room.

She and Sam would take turns feeding him and talking to him.
At first, he turned his face away and resolutely ignored her.

“Well, I can see that little Jackie needs some help in eating his breakfast. Should it be the airplane going into the hanger or the truck going into the garage?” Beth tried to keep her tone and humor light. She wasn’t sure quite how this was going to go.
The plan was for Beth and Sam to do 15-minute shifts during meal times and sit with him for 15 minutes at bedtime. They were just going to talk to him, as if it was an ordinary thing to do. Whatever memories came about when they talked, they would deal with.

Jack turned his face to her when he spoke to him. His eyes didn’t hold the same amount of hardness, as when he first was brought in. Something in her voice made her feel familiar, but in an, as yet, undefined way.

She brought the spoon to his mouth, and he opened his mouth and took it. They knew he could feed himself, but they felt that this interaction might bring about the connection he needed.
After a mouthful or two, he reached out his hand and took the bowl from her, his fingers and hands touching hers. Beth tried not to flinch, but a small one took place and he noted it.

She talked about the games they played as children and the various life cycle events they had in common.

There was silence on his end, but his eyes showed he was listening.

After her time was up, Sam had come in and continued her contact with him. Jack’s eyes seemed to follow Sam more than they had Beth. There was a different interaction between them and it showed here.

(Angra Mainyu went over to where his Hunter was sitting. The Hunter looked up and stared into the glowing eyes of his Master. The Goa’uld took Jack’s face in his hands and looked deep into his eyes. Not liking what he had seen in Jack’s eyes, he turned to one of his Jaffa and ordered that he bring something to him. It was a mug. It contained the drugs that were needed to control his Hunters. This one was troubling. He was fighting the training and the Goa’uld was starting to wonder if keeping this one alive to fight for him was worth it.

“Tomorrow,” he growled at them, while he watched Jack slump into a stupor, “will be his last chance to prove that he will hunt and destroy his prey. If he does not, well, then he dies along with them.”

He then turned and left, with his men, from the hut that Jack slept in. Drugged into oblivion, but only his conscious mind. His subconscious mind was still awake and aware and fighting to get out. How would he let the Sam and Beth know that he still lived?)

(General Hammond had trouble waiting those 5 days for the Tok’ra to get everything in readiness. Hammond had already contacted the pentagon for Colonel Liam Ryan. He would be going with Jacob, Teal’c, Bra’tac and another Tok’ra by the name of Ba’rak. General Hammond knew Colonel Ryan from other contacts with him and felt that he could be trusted enough to know about the SCG and what they were doing. Colonel Ryan was also told that his family was to know nothing about what was going on. Being married to a woman, also in the military, helped him be able to say to her, “Need to know” and there would be no questions.
Jacob could only tell Hammond that they hoped for the best, but were prepared for the worst.)

*On the Planet *
(Jack appeared sufficiently tamed after he drank the mug he was given. His eyes held the hardness that showed his sub-conscious was sufficiently tamed. He was told that this would be his last encounter with his prey until he was ready to go through the purification ceremony. The whole camp would be gone for 5 days and when they returned, he would hunt and kill the women. They didn’t worry about leaving the women alone for that length of time. Where would they go? More importantly who would care?

Sam and Beth knew that the time had come. The Goa’uld had taken great pleasure in taunting them with that knowledge. He teased Beth about how her ‘brother’ would take possession of her and the pleasure of knowing he would kill her in 5 days. He taunted Sam about how her fellow ‘soldier’ and ‘leader’ would do the same. That he would touch her and tease her and then kill her as if she had no more meaning to him than would a bug.

The two women huddled in each other’s arms then and waited.

Soon Beth was dragged out and hung up by her arms. She closed her eyes and attempted to pray. She could feel her heart pounding as if it was going to leap out of her body. She was afraid to open her eyes and look at the man she called ‘brother’, ‘friend’ and ‘lover’ for so many years.

Jack approached her soundlessly. He came up behind her and put his arms around her waist and pulled her to his body. The hardness of his body caused her to moan slightly and she tried hard to take some calming breaths. However, her fear was just too much to overcome.

She felt him come around to face her and she slowly opened her yellow gold eyes. What she saw surprised her. She wanted to believe that she saw ‘her Jon’ in those eyes. They didn’t appear as hard as they had before. “Maybe,” she thought, “I am hallucinating?”

As Jack looked into those gold eyes he had a slight vision of children: a young girl and a young boy, running. The girl made a motion with her hands and stuck out her tongue and said something to him. He could not make out the words. The little boy yelled something back and ran after her. He shuddered for a minute.

The Leader told him that this one said she was his ‘sister’, could that be? For a moment he held her chin in his left hand and caressed her face with his right and almost unconsciously, he whispered ‘Littlebit’.

Beth’s eyes widened a fraction and as he placed his lips on her right cheek and ran his mouth to her right ear, she breathed out “Moose ears. J. J.” and he nipped at the skin behind her ear. The shock that he actually appeared to know her and the stress she was under combined and she passed out. Jack pulled away from her, with a smile on his lips, but it did not reach his eyes.

His Master was pleased. He motioned for them to cut Beth down and take her back to her cell.

Beth was dropped unceremoniously to the ground and Sam reached out to her and before they dragged her away Beth roused enough to whisper “Aquila est abunde evigilo.”

Sam turned those words over in her mind as they dragged her out of the cell. What did Beth mean? “Aquila est Abunde evigilo?” Sam tried to pull, through the fog in her mind, the Latin words and what they meant. “The Eagle is awake.” What did Beth mean…and it struck her. Colonel O’Neill. He was a full bird colonel - he has to be the Eagle. He was awake. Does that mean he knows who he is and is fighting? She hoped so. She, like Beth had her nerves stretched probably as far as they could go.
Sam was also hauled up and hung by her wrists.

Her eyes went wide when she saw Jack approaching her. His awareness of her and his arousal was all too obvious to Sam and she could not help but repress a shudder. There was laughter when they saw her reaction to him. His smile was deadly and showed nothing of the Eagle that Beth whispered to her.

He put his hands on her face and stared into her eyes. Her pupils were already wide open and seemed to encompass the whole of her iris. No one looking at her eyes right now would know that they were blue of the Texas Bluebonnet. Jack’s hands seemed, from then on, to be everywhere on her body. He touched and probed and caressed and seemed to take great pleasure in her shrinking away from him.
He stepped behind her and pulled him against his hard body. There was no way she could miss his body’s reaction to having hers so close. And, God help her, her body’s response to his. With his left hand pushing her hair away from her left ear, his right hand settled itself on her midriff. He made as if he was breathing in her scent and she thought she heard him whisper, ‘Sam’. She stiffened for just a minute. ‘Sorry Sam’ and ‘Trust me, I’ll get us out of this.’

Then without warning he turned her around and took possession of her mouth. She felt as if she was a castle wall being assaulted. All sorts of sensations ran through her body and the feel of him invading her senses was more than she could take. Sam was then surprised when he put his mouth to her ear and said “Faint.” Sam immediately went into a swoon. Jack gave her one last caress and moved away. The guards cut her down and put her back in her cell. Laying her down next to Beth and they threw some old blankets on the women and left.

Angra Mainyu and his men were, as they had planned, gone the next morning. Beth and Sam woke to find themselves alone. No food or water was left for them. It was intended for them to be weak and starved when the hunt began.)

(The Hover craft appeared to drop out of nowhere and Ba’rak stayed on board to pilot it, while the others dropped down near the camp.

They approached as quietly as they could, but none of the men could miss the absolute quiet and stillness of the camp.

“Where is everyone?” Colonel Ryan asked. His nerves were stretched. This was not good, was it?

Teal’c and Bra’tac could only look at each other and at the apparent abandonment of the camp.

“I was so afraid of this,” Jacob said slowly and sadly. His little girl and her friend may already be dead. They were too late.

“Let’s not panic,” Bra’tac finally said. “Maybe they are gone because of a ritual. Sometimes some tribes do that. They may have left the women in a cell with a guard.”
The men decided that they had to go on that premise, although they all felt that they would only find bodies.
The absolute stillness of the camp was eerie. They soon found a structure that looked like a jail and approached it. It surprised them that there were no guards to be found. Silently, quietly, and with great trepidation, they entered the structure.

“Who is there?” a ragged whisper called out.

“Sam?” Jacob called out.

“Dad?” The ragged whisper asked.

The men ran to where they heard the voices and found the two women. They were wrapped in the ragged and dirty blankets that they were covered with the night before.
Teal’c blasted open the cell door and they ran into the cell. Sam threw herself into her father’s arms, while Beth was comforted by Teal’c.

“Where are the others, Dr. Greene?” Teal’c asked.

“We do not know, Teal’c. They left sometime after they dumped us here last night,” Beth answered him.

“Then O’Neill is not here.” Teal’c’s words were heavy and sad.

“We can’t stay here,” Colonel Ryan said. “We need to get out of here now. We will come back for him.”

Teal’c looked as if he was going to argue, but Bra’tac put his right hand on Teal’c’s left arm and squeezed, as if to say, “Another day my friend. The women need to be safe.”

Beth and Sam tugged the ragged blankets closer around their bodies. It was then that men noticed how little covered the women. Colonel Ryan unhooked the backpack he was wearing and pulled out clothes for them.

Beth told him that there was no way they were going to put on clean clothes smelling like dead fish. Their reaction to her comment was, woman in major shock, but she and Sam adamantly stated that they were not going anywhere until they could get clean, just a little.

Jacob assured them that the cargo ship had a shower and that the change of clothes could wait until then. Allowing the women as much dignity as they could, they headed for the Hover craft and were soon hauled up and taken to safety.

When the women were clean, dry and into clean clothes, they were then fed and then debriefed.

Sam told them that the Colonel was still in there, somewhere. Jacob indicated that he probably knew what they were using to drug Jack and that he must have a very strong will to be able to break through long enough to talk to them.

Now they had to go back.

The trip back was not very long, but the discussions were. Jacob was not convinced that all Jack had done was “scare the hell out of us,” as his daughter and Dr. Greene insisted.

Teal’c took all of what was said and not said and came to his own conclusions.

When they landed on the closest planet with a Gate, they went through directly to Stargate Command. Upon their arrival they were herded into General Hammond’s office. Hammond knew that Dr. Frasier wanted them in her infirmary first, but Major Carter and Dr. Greene insisted on seeing General Hammond first.

“Major Carter…” Hammond started to say, but was stopped by the act of putting her right hand in the air.

“With respect, General,” Sam interrupted. “We need to go back now. We don’t have time to wait. If he had been successful fighting that drug, what will they do to him when they come back and find us gone?”

“We’ll get him Major.” Hammond told her. “Please believe that. But let Dr. Frasier check you two out and when we come to a decision we will let you know.”

“When you come to a decision?” Beth shrieked out. “When YOU come to a decision?”

She rounded on General Hammond. “The decision to rescue Jon is not going to be just yours.”

“Dr. Greene…” Hammond attempted to infuse a soothing tone into his words, but Beth would have none of it.

“Major Carter and I will go to see Dr. Frasier. That is the first reasonable statement you’ve made, but you will make no plans to rescue him without our input. WE were there, you know? And we are both more aware of what you would have to do to lure him away from the rest of them.”

Leaving no chance of their rebutting her, Sam and Beth followed Dr. Frasier out of the room.

During the examination, Janet attempted to question the women and get them to tell her what had happened in their interactions with Jack. Each woman, separately, told Janet that all he had done was “scare the hell out of me”. They both, independently, denied that he had sexually assaulted them or had done anything that was in any way inappropriate. Janet didn’t believe them, but she had no recourse. Unless Sam and Beth had discussed what they were going to say before they got here, they gave the same answers. Sam and Beth had, after the exam acknowledged that they’d lied to Janet and would do so again to the others.

When the exam was done, they two women were taken to the briefing room. Jacob had convinced them that they needed to go back right away and that they needed the right kind of bait.

“…and that would be?” Hammond started to ask.
“Me!” Beth stated firmly.

Beth gave Sam a level look and continued.

“First thing that we need to get out of the way here though, is that I was not an initial target.”
The men looked at her.

“My being with Sam that night was a spur of the moment invitation after we had dinner that night. I was not,” she told them, “supposed to be testifying. I was a last minute addition and Sam invited me to stay the night with her.”

“You believe,” Teal’c interrupted, “That you were an unexpected addition.”

“If that is true,” Daniel asked, “why didn’t they kill you outright?”

“Because,” Sam added, “they were told to take the woman. But with the both of us there, they didn’t know which woman and couldn’t risk killing the wrong one.”

Beth continued, “They expected that Sam would be the perfect victim for him. They expected that the military regulations would make it all the more painful and degrading if what they’d wanted to happen, would have.”

“Are you trying to tell us,” Colonel Ryan asked, “that there was no sexual interaction between you and Colonel O’Neill?”

“None,” Sam answered firmly. She was amazed at how well she could lie. Well, it wasn’t exactly a lie-he did not sexually assault them, that much was true. It was just the sexual nature of the assault - the awareness and the sensations that awareness provided to the body and its response.

“He did nothing more than scare the hell out of us. That is all,” Beth added. Then after taking a breath she continued, “That is why I have to be the bait for rescuing him.”

Sam gave her a sharp look and Beth held up her hands.

“Hear me out,” she pleaded.

“I have a long history with Jon. Whatever might happen between us during the rescue, we will be able to get past. Tell me, if he forces sexual advances on Major Carter, what then do you suppose would be the result? Aside from a court martial and an excessive amount of guilt that they may never get over.”

“No one has said anything about a court martial,” Hammond put in.

“No, no one has.” Beth stopped talking and looked around the room. She was afraid. Afraid that what she knew about Sam and Jon would get out and that they would pay a price for their love. She was afraid that Jon would pay a terrible personal and emotional price if he should, while under that alien influence, hurt Sam, in any way.

“General Hammond, the physical and emotional trauma to Major Carter aside, would you be able to guarantee that Colonel O’Neill wouldn’t be brought up on charges, should he become aggressive toward Major Carter during the rescue?”

General Hammond acknowledged that it was a good question and he had no answers for her.

Sam objected that Beth was not trained and that whether or not he tried to assault her, she would be able to stop him and that it wouldn’t change anything.

“Are you sure Sam?” Beth asked bluntly. Looking at the men, she asked that they clear out. Janet remained.
“Sam, I have been intimate with Jon. Can you say the same?”

Sam had the grace to blush and shook her head.
“Do you not think that a forced intimacy would damage your relationship with him? Think about it. Jon and I have gotten past so many things in our time together. We will be able to get past this, should it happen, but if you don’t want to think about your career or your own feelings, think about his.”

Janet turned to Sam and added “Think about it, Sam. The Colonel and Beth have a long history. They would be able to deal with that situation and come out of it ok. But think about it. Regardless of how you might think, feel or react, what do you think his reaction would be? Do you think that he would be able to get over the guilt and the anger should he…he...” Janet couldn’t even finish that thought. “It has to be Beth, Sam. She is the only safe target for all three of you.”

Sam looked at both women and nodded her agreement.
Janet went and brought the men back in.

“I am going to do it,” Beth told them. “He had been training to hunt us, and hunt he will, but we will have the advantage, won’t we?”

Sam and the others looked at Beth with some surprise and a lot of questions.

Beth, in reminding Sam, also informed the others that Jon had been trained to hunt them by scent, so she felt they would be able to use that their advantage in laying a trap for him. Beth told Sam to go home and pick out the stinkiest of her dirty clothes from her hamper.

“The longer they have been at the bottom of the hamper, the better.” Beth told her.

“Why?” Sam asked.

“Because your scent will be strongest on those items. I can place them around and he will pick up their scent and follow them, to me.”

“I don’t like this. “ Hammond put in, “But I am afraid that is what we will have to do.”

The General appeared to have aged quite a bit during this ordeal. His normally merry blue eyes held shadows. Like the others, the circles under the eyes, the bleary look and the sadness were so apparent.

“I am not certain that this is a good idea Dr. Greene.” Teal’c had grown to be fond of Beth and his concern for her safety was evident in his normally focused stare.
Beth walked over to him and put her hands on his arms.

“Teal’c, I appreciate your concern. And as finely built a man, as I have ever seen,” she started with some mischief, “I don’t think the sight of you in a Speedo will have quite the same reaction as me in a wetsuit.”

There was some laughter and Teal’c nodded his head.
Jacob pulled something out of his pocket and explained what is was to them.

“It is a sedative that the Tok’ra have invented. There will be no discernable harm to Jack and it will not depress his respiratory system with its use.”

His comment about the “short and curlies” drew some laughter all around and then Beth examined its contents, as did Janet.

“Guess, then, we are good to go?” Liam Ryan asked.
They nodded and Beth was sent to get the equipment she would need. up. Teal’c had gone to Jack’s house to obtain extra clothes and Sam went to her house to collect the “stinkiest” of her dirty clothes to bring back. They all met back to gate to where the cargo ship was.

On the cargo ship, as Beth was putting on her wetsuit, the team went over, again, what the plan was.

The Hovercraft was going to be cloaked and waiting over the lake that was near the camp. Their intent was to have Beth lure Jon to the lake and then have her dive in so he would follow her into the water. Teal’c and Colonel Ryan were wearing the harnesses that would be used to drop them into the lake to grab Colonel O’Neill and Dr. Greene. Colonel Ryan was going to bring Dr. Greene up first and make sure that she had the sedative ready to inject when Teal’c brought up Colonel O’Neill. As Teal’c strength was more than the ordinary human, even without his symbiote, they felt that he would be the best one to subdue O’Neill.

“Do not take any chances Dr. Greene,” Colonel Ryan told her. “Gwen would kill me.”

She smiled slightly, but nodded.

They were going to drop her outside the camp line and she would attempt to find Jon alone and lure him into following her. They were guessing that the Goa’uld would be in a frenzy finding the women gone and since Jon was not in camp at the time, they could not suspect him of helping them escape. The Goa’uld did, however, order them to increase the amount of drugs used to subdue his old identity and awareness and to wait and decide if it was worth going after those women again, or to just find him other prey. His hunting instincts were quite pronounced, he proved himself to proficient during the 5-day ceremony.

Beth carefully walked toward the camp, knowing that Teal’c would snatch her right off the ground if anything untoward should happen.

She thought about her conversation with Teal’c on the Hover craft as they headed toward the camp.

“Teal’c, I swear to you,” she told him. Her eyes were steady and focused on Teal’c’s. She placed her right hand on his right arm. “Jon did nothing dishonorable. His only actions were to frighten us. And I can tell you, that he did very well.”

The big man nodded. He still felt sure that she was hiding more, but he believed her when she told him that what O’Neill had done was not the violent act a man would commit against a woman.

After a while Beth noticed Jon in a clearing. He appeared to be sniffing the air.

Beth opened up the laundry bag and started placing Sam’s clothes on various plants. She hoped that the odors would be strong enough. She placed them in a trail leading to the lake. The plan was to get him to follow her into the water. She hoped that she could swim fast enough to stay ahead of him, or she was in big trouble. She knew that Teal’c would be in the water, in what could be termed a New York minute, should he determine that was in grave danger.

Soon, their plan paid off. Jack noticed her and turned. She could have sworn she hard him ‘snarl’ and she stayed in one place, letting him think she was paralyzed by fear.
He started to move towards her. It was a leisurely lope. He did not appear to be in any hurry. What would that mean?

Beth decided to try something that she used to harass him when they were children. She put her hands on either side of her head, palms out and fingers up, and yelled “Moose Ears! J. J.!” And then she took off running. It worked. He ran faster after her.

Beth hit the lake and dove in. Knowing that swimming underwater was not going to gain her any speed, she shot up to the surface and stroked for all the was worth. She dimly heard the splash of the man chasing her and that spurred her to swim faster. “Swim faster?” she thought, “yup - pigs are flying.”

He easily caught up with her, grabbed at her foot and pulled her toward him. He turned her towards him and put his hands around her throat and pushed her under.
She clawed her way up but couldn’t clear her eyes to see into his or get another gulp of air, before he dunked her again.

The next time up, she managed to scream for Teal’c. He really didn’t need much of a hint, the Hover Craft had decloaked as soon as Jack had grabbed her foot and the men were ready to go in as he dunked her.

The two wrestling in the water did not hear the splash of the two men coming in after them.

Teal’c grabbed O’Neill into a choke-hold and Colonel Ryan lifted Beth up and into the craft. He handed her the Tok’ra sedative and signaled to bring up Teal’c and O’Neill.
As soon as Teal’c was on board, Beth injected Jon. With a quiet, “I’m sorry, Jon.” She watched him pass out from the effects of the sedative.

Teal’c handed her a towel and dry clothes and told her that they would get O’Neill ready for what she needed to do, but she could help him better if she was dry.
Beth went into a changing area of the cargo ship and smiled faintly when she saw the clothes Teal’c had given her. He gave her Jon’s.

She felt a small measure of comfort from putting on Jon’s Minnesota Wild tee shirt and Minnesota Twins sweat pants. She was grateful that the sweatpants had elastic bottoms, so she wouldn’t trip. She also caught the scent of the fabric softener he used when he did his laundry. She would tease him about using such an old fashioned brand. But he would smile and shrug - his mother had used it and the smell reminded him of her.

She put her hand on Teal’c’s and thanked him for the clothes - her eyes telling him that she appreciated the gesture.

They had already dried and dressed Jon by the time she came out, as well as themselves.

She started his IV and put on a 3 lead EKG. She also set up the automatic blood pressure cuff and monitored his vitals every 15 minutes during the trip back. The sedative as promised, did not depress Jon’s breathing, and his regular respirations comforted her.

Teal’c watch her as she watched O’Neill. Colonel Ryan and Jacob also kept watch.

Jack had almost killed Beth. If they hadn’t prepared for that possibility, they would have been returning with two bodies.

Teal’c had made a silent promise that whoever had done this, they would pay. O’Neill would have called it a Jaffa revenge thing. But that didn’t matter. Revenge? Well, it wouldn’t be the first time he had taken that vow.

Colonel Ryan recognized the look in his eyes and turned to see if Jacob had picked up on it as well. He had.

Someone or something had wanted his daughter and O’Neill dead and had worked very hard to see that it happened. They had just underestimated Jack O’Neill’s own inner strength as well as the depth of attachment his friends had for him and he for them.)

It took some time for Jack to stay awake for longer periods of time. Jack also started talking again. He didn’t speak much more than to answer questions that were asked. Such as how was he feeling? Was he hungry? Did he need to go to the bathroom and so on. He asked no questions himself. Janet noticed that he still watched Sam and Beth when they were in his room, and appeared more watchful when they weren’t directly looking at him.

Jack sat up when they asked him to, laid back down when they asked him to and ate what they gave him. He made no attempt to touch them or reach out to them.

Janet was at her wits end with Jack’s passivity. To her it was as if he had retreated so far into himself, that he no longer wanted to know who he was.

Janet then decided that enough was enough. She marched into his room and sat on the bed next to him. She noted that he stiffened up when she sat next to him and she put her right hand on his. That caused Jack to tighten up even more.

“Colonel O’Neill,” she began sternly, “I think that we are all a little tired of watching you disappear into yourself.”

His eyes stayed steadily on her. There appeared to be no light in them. They were dark and empty. It was a very disturbing sight for a man whose eyes had always seemed to be light with mischief.

“I am going to make arrangements for Dr. McKenzie to start seeing you regularly.”

Jack’s gaze did not even waver. Janet hoped that McKenzie, who irritated Jack on his good days, would irritate Jack now. Maybe having somebody that would get his adrenaline going would start Jack back onto the path of coming back. She also decided that Sam and Beth needed to really talk to Jack about what happened. Maybe not reminding him of what he did, but rather what he didn’t do.

In the waiting room, a few hours after her talk with Jack, Janet talked with Sam and Beth.

“Listen,” Janet said as she sat down at the table with Sam and Beth. “You two are going to have to really talk to him.”

“I thought,” Sam started, “that we were not supposed to remind the Colonel of what happened.”

“You’re right Sam,” Janet began. She took a breath and let it out. Trying to determine what exactly she wanted to say and how to say it. “I am not asking you to say, ‘you did this’ and then ‘we did this’ and so on. I want to you tell him about what he didn’t do. How you believe that he tried to help you and to take care of you. And that you believe that what happened was not his fault.”

She stopped and ran her hands through her hair. Rubbing the left side of her face with her left hand, she continued to try and explain that Jack just couldn’t stay inside his head anymore. “If we don’t force him out, he may never come back.”

Both women gave Janet a sharp look and then Beth nodded. “He was always a confrontational SOB. Guess maybe we need to shock him out of it. Will Dr. McKenzie go along with it?”

“Good question,” Janet thought and then answered, “Go along with it? No! But he did agree that as long as you did not get specific with him and answer only the questions he asks you, as you go along, well…yeah.”

Beth looked at Janet and wondered if she had her mental fingers crossed.

Both women nodded and Janet indicated that Beth should go first. She has less to lose.

Beth walked the quiet corridor to Jon’s room. She marveled at how they could close down a whole wing of a hospital, assign as many support staff as needed and not bat an eyelash. Her trademark Doc Marten clogs were surprisingly silent as she walked to his room.

Beth knocked and identified herself before she came in. Pulling one of the room’s plastic chairs to the bed, she sat down next to him.

Jack watched her as she came in and even more so when she sat down.

Beth picked up his right hand in both of hers and looked directly into his eyes.

“Janet tells me you are in there somewhere. But that you won’t come out and play.” A small smile curled her lips and then she added, “But J. J., you have to come out sometime you know?”

There was a small reaction to the nickname she gave him.

“You remember why I called you ‘J. J.’ don’t you?” she asked him. She looked into his eyes to see if there was any reaction and there was not.

“I guess then, that I will do the talking today.” Beth looked down at his hand in her two. His large hand seemed so small right now. “You used to call me Lizzie before you called me ‘Littlebit’, do you remember? I hated that name.”

A small flicker flashed in his eyes. Beth noted it. “You also made up a really mean poem. Do you remember what you said?”

His eyebrow went up a little.

“Lizzie Greene she took an ax and gave her brother’s forty whacks and when she saw what she had done, her mother gave her forty-one.”

Silence, but she smiled at him. “Not hardly original J. J., you know? But boy, did you make me mad.”

His hand seemed to relax a little in hers.

“Jon?” she linked the pinky of her right hand with the pinky of his right hand. “Do you remember when we pinky promised that we would always be friends, no matter what?”

She felt his pinky tighten around hers. “Well, it is still no matter what. Dr. McKenzie wants what is best for you. I do too! There is nothing we can’t talk about or get through. But you have to come back to us. Come back to me. Pinky promise Jon.”

Beth could think of nothing more and unlinked her pinky from his and squeezed his hand and got up to leave the room.

Sam came in afterwards and sat on the bed next to him, her hands itching to take his into them. Wondering if that would cause him more distress or her.

“Colonel?” Sam’s blue eyes took on the shadows that mirrored those in his brown ones. “Nothing has changed for me, sir. I still trust you and value your trust and your guidance and…” She just didn’t know what else to say to him.

With the two of them, it was their eyes and their expressions that spoke of what they were thinking and feeling. With them words were both unnecessary and dangerous. So they learned to ‘speak’ to each other in a different language, in a different way.

She moved her hand close enough to his, that their fingertips were touching and yet not. She looked down at their hands and then closed her eyes. She remembered all the times that his hands both soothed and protected her and tried to blink away the tears. She envied Beth and Janet that they could say what was in their hearts to him. She could only open her heart and hope that he could see what was there. Which, really, was the only thing he could do as well.

And so silently, hands touching, but not touching, she and Jack stayed, in the dim light of his hospital room. In among the clicking of his IV pump, the whooshing noise of the blood pressure cup as it started up to record his pressure and the steady whirring of the heart monitor was the silence of two hearts trying desperately trying to reach the other.

…Been walking my mind to an easy time,
my back turned toward the sun.
Lord knows when the cold wind blows
It’ll turn your head around…
~James Taylor, Fire and Rain

The End

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