Survival of the Fittest - PDF Free Download (2024)

SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST Stargate SG-1 - 07 Sabine C. Bauer (An Undead Scan v1.0)

To Tanya—beta extraordinaire and the one who’s responsible for Everything!

PROLOGUE

The childlike face—she’d been a child, first and foremost, a smart, needy, tantrumthrowing teenager who’d made an awful mistake—never moved Jack reached for her neck as if to feel a pulse they both knew had never been there. It wasn’t the pulse he was after, Daniel realized Below her right ear a hidden catch activated and released the energy cell that had powered her. The crystal fizzed briefly and winked out, looking dull and dead its removal a clear case of overkill. Nothing would revive her now. After all, Jack O’Neill, ex-Special Ops, was a crack shot. “You stupid son of a bitch!” “Hey, you’re welcome.” Daniel wanted to hit him, for the glib reply alone. Someone up in the control room gave the all clear. The klaxons stopped their wailing, and the gate room fell quiet enough to hear the soft clickety-click and clatter as all throughout the base Reese’s ‘toys’, bereft of the life-force that had fuelled them, disintegrated to a harmless rain of metal wafers. Rain or tiny needles of snow. Daniel felt cold Another difference not made, for Reese and for an entire race of beings who were getting their little gray asses whipped by the offspring of her ‘toys’. Too many differences not made. Maybe it was time to leave. No point in staying and pretending things were just fine when everything had changed. Or perhaps nothing had changed. He heard himself start up an argument, because he was Daniel and Daniel always argued pitting the ever-same reasoning against the ever-same justifications and with the ever-same results. “Look, I’m sorry,” Jack said finally. “But this is the way it had to go down, and you know it.” Now brush your teeth and go to bed! He stopped short of that. Instead he turned away, muttering into his radio, and began walking off toward the blast door. He’d still be holding the gun, always would No difference. Daniel didn’t look up, afraid of what he’d see, of the decisions it’d force on him.

CHAPTER ONE

Convergence: The development of similar features in distantly related lineages due to the effects of similar evolutionary factors. The subject, strapped to a gleaming metal table inside a gleaming surgical lab, opened his mouth for a scream. Thankfully that particular audio channel had been set to mute. The scream was enduring and heartfelt, which didn’t come as any great surprise. Suddenly the subject’s eyes rolled up, and he stilled. The solemn face of a white-clad doctor interposed itself between camera and surgical table. The doctor shook his head. Another failure. How many had there been? Eight? Nine? It was high time to consider the alternative. Frank Simmons switched off the aftermath of the experiment and turned to the central monitor bank. Each screen showed the same image, just from a different angle. The backgrounds varied. French doors and a glimpse of a garden or pristinely starched curtains or a blank white wall. However, all of them showed bars in the foreground and, behind the bars, a man. Or what looked like a man. He was dark-haired, tall, and heavily built, and he moved with a curious absence of grace, as though mind and body hadn’t really connected. Which might be the case after all. Some of the guards called him Herman. The likeness was indisputable, but Simmons discouraged the joke. Herman Munster was a cretin. This… thing… on the screen was highly intelligent and commanded the entire knowledge and viciousness of his species. Prettifying him would be lethal. Until quite recently the man-thing had been a person called Adrian Conrad. Obscenely rich and incurably ill and unwilling to appreciate, let alone accept, the irony of it. And so he’d paid a large amount of money for a larval Goa’uld and let it infest his body. The alien parasite had cured the disease but usurped the host’s mind in exchange when the removal process had run into a hitch. Tough luck. Good luck for the NID. Thanks to Simmons, the secret government agency owned the Goa’uld exclusively. Right now, the thing that had been Conrad sat inside his cage leafing through a textbook. Genetics. Suddenly, and with all signs of disdain, he leaped from his chair and flung the book against the bars. “Where are you?” The harmonics of the distorted voice made the speakers hum. “I know you are there! I demand to speak to you!” Simmons took another bite from his sandwich—pastrami and pickle, though they made them better in New York—and watched as Conrad paced the cell. Let him stew. Sooner or later he’d grasp that he was a prisoner. Maybe he’d learn some manners then.

Ten minutes later the sandwich was gone and Conrad had stopped pacing and slumped back onto the chair. It was time. Simmons scrunched the wrapping paper into a tight ball and pitched it at a trash-can. He missed, shrugged, and left the control center. When he entered the prisoner’s room, trailed by two guards armed with zat’nikatels, Conrad straightened up, his eyes glowing. “You are late!” Ignoring him, Simmons nodded at the guards. “Unlock the cage.” Given the Goa’uld’s immense strength, it posed a risk, but it also was a psychological necessity. Remaining outside the cage would have betrayed fear. More importantly, a face-to-face meeting suggested a degree of equality that would facilitate cooperation. The ploy had worked before, it would work now. The door of the cage fell shut behind him, and Simmons picked up the book, leisurely flicked through its pages. “Not to your taste, I take it?” “It is puerile! Your so-called scientists do not know half of what they ought to know. Even the men my host employed were amateurs.” A sly glint stole into the alien’s human eyes. “You killed another one, did you not? That is why you are here. But I can only tell you what I have told you before. Your plan will fail.” “Not if you help me.” “Why should I help you? So that you can assemble an army of warriors to destroy my kind?” “Your kind?” Simmons leaned back against the bars of the cage and started laughing. “Since when did you develop feelings for the family? Your kind would kill you just as soon as look at you, and you know it.” He did, of course. For a second, the eyes flared in annoyance. Then he rose and approached until he was mere inches away, towering over Simmons. From somewhere outside the cage came the dissonant chime of zat’nikatels being readied. “Stand down!” Simmons snapped and, more quietly, added, “We’re having a friendly discussion.” The parasite molded his host’s face into a smile. “Indeed. Suppose I could help you, human, would you accept my price?” “Freedom? Not just yet. You’re a little too useful for that, I’m afraid.” “No. Not just yet.” The grimace deepened, bared teeth. “But if I give you those warriors, you are to send them against whom I tell you when I tell you.” When hell freezes over! Simmons stared past Conrad and at a strip of sunlight that dissected the white floor of the cage. The reflection was painfully bright, and he closed his eyes, hiding a flicker of triumph. It was true. The Goa’uld’s arrogance was their greatest weakness. “Why not?” he said. “With the one obvious exception, of course.” “Of course. Unfortunately, I cannot help you.” “What?” Simmons’ eyes flew open in time for him to watch Conrad back off in a show of boredom. “What do you mean, you can’t help me?” “I mean what I said. I do not have the skill. However…” “However?” It took some doing, but Simmons managed to bite back a more suitable reply. However, once he’d squeezed that punk dry, he’d kill him personally. Slowly.

“My mistress possesses the skills you require.” “Your mistress? Forgive my skepticism, but mistress implies that you do what she says, not the other way round.” “The price I have named will be ample to buy her assistance.” “I see.” Simmons allowed a trace of interest to creep into his voice. “And how would I invite your mistress to join us for negotiations?” “I assume there were communication globes among the loot you took from our worlds?” “Of course, but… What about range?” The NID’s tame Goa’uld smiled.

CHAPTER TWO

The place was vast, gutted, and its acoustics stank. Which was to say you twitched an eyelid and got an echo. Consequently, Colonel Jonathan ‘Jack’ O’Neill, USAF, wasn’t considering any twitching. What he had been considering for the past ten minutes or so was getting up and stretching his legs. His knees were very unhappy with the current state of affairs, a reminder that, maybe, he was getting a little long in the tooth for this. This spelled waddling along a metal catwalk in stealth mode and a crouch. And anyone who thought it was a piece o’ cake could be his guest and try it in combat boots. This also was the only way of getting anywhere near the enemy position. The enemy, quite unfairly, had displayed unforeseen tactical originality. Okay, not unforeseen, but Jack still felt a little insulted. Tactical originality was his department. Then again, he wasn’t doing too badly himself. The gallery lining the room fifteen meters above the ground seemed inaccessible. The staircases leading up had either collapsed or corroded to brittle red trash, and if, for some perverse reason, you had your heart set on getting up here, you were in for a stint of shinning up the side of the building, forcing a window, and carefully dislodging a bunch of loose bricks. Which they’d done—having the aforementioned perverse reason—and it had paid off. This was the last place the enemy expected them to be. You could tell. The hostiles had a three-strong sentry unit holed up amid a few dozen bales of molting white stuff. Cotton, by the looks of it, though what it was doing here beat him. Part of the enemy force was prowling the grounds outside, led on a wild goose chase by Teal’c and his team. The rest were in the building, securing a stairwell Jack wasn’t interested in. Yet. Below, Larry, Curly, and Moe felt safe as babes in arms— never a real smart proposition, in life or in warfare. It got you dead. So far none of them had bothered to check above. They’d better not. If they did, things would get ugly in a hurry. Fallback options were at a premium up here. On the bright side, even if they did check, they’d have to look closely. The windows in the two outer walls were blind, encrusted with decades of industrial dirt. The only light trickling in filtered through a handful of broken casem*nts, and the room, nearly a hundred meters long, half as wide, and about thirty high, was mired in almost solid gloom. The enemy position sat smack in the northeastern quadrant, beautifully chosen, because it covered both ground floor entrances. Jack O’Neill wanted it. In fact, he coveted it. Once he took it, it’d be like shooting fish in a barrel. His teams would be able to pick off the hostiles as they came home to roost. A faint whiff of herbal shampoo announced that his 2IC had caught up with him. He turned, saw her grin, teeth flashing in a face blackened by camouflage paint. Then

she shucked a stray coil of the zip line back onto her shoulder and gave a thumbs-up. Evidently Major Samantha Carter was enjoying herself. He signaled her to keep going. With a brisk nod she crept on, followed by Pancaldi and four others. They did good, moving quickly and quietly, until they reached the corner where the catwalk turned along the short wall, some ten meters on from his own position. Perfect. Now all he needed was the third prong of his attack force. And there it was, right on time. Diagonally across, six ghostly shapes settled in behind the railing. Daniel and his braves had taken the other way round, with the braves gamely submitting to the command of a geek. Well, if truth be told, Dr. Daniel Jackson had lost his official geek status quite some time ago. Whether he liked it or not, he was getting good at this. Very good. Now he peered over, waiting for the signal. The Stooges down below still were blissfully oblivious. They’d have a rough awakening. Showtime. Jack raised his hand, thumb, forefinger, and middle finger extended, and slowly began to count down, folding in his thumb, three, then the forefinger, two, then— A whirr and a whoosh, five, eight, ten times over, zooming down from the ceiling. No! Goddammit, no! He felt himself go ice-cold, knowing what he’d done in one terrible instant, knowing that he’d pulled the screwup to end them all—the same dumbass stunt as the Three Stooges. He hadn’t bothered to check above, because he’d felt too damn sure of himself and his brilliance. It’d make a great epitaph: Here lies Jack O’Neill, Smug Bastard. And not just he. Not just he… “Take cover!” he roared. Too little, too late. Besides, there wasn’t any cover to be had. Black-clad and masked, they hovered on their zip lines like so many giant spiders, and they moved with the same eerie speed, instantly opening fire. Like a mad lightshow, the thin red streaks of laser sights crisscrossed through dust-laden air, hit walls and struts and bodies. One drilled toward him, and Jack rolled away, brought up his own weapon, fired, missed. Somewhere behind him rose a cry. Chen. Chen was down, his group of five a man short now, and it was only the start. Chances were he’d lose them all. The red streak swiveled back, still searching for him, then it went wild. Daniel had taken out the shooter. Go, Daniel! Giving up on the non-existent cover, Jack got to his feet, found another target, and had the satisfaction of seeing the man sag into his harness. Next! By now there was a fairly constant barrage from Carter’s corner. She and her group took out three attackers in quick succession. Daniel’s gang clocked up two more. If they could keep it up then maybe, just maybe— “Stevens!” he shouted back over his shoulder. “Get the lines ready! We’re going down a floor.” “Yessir! On your—” Stevens toppled as the wall burst outward. It did the same thing in two other places, behind Carter’s and Daniel’s teams. Apiece of mortar ricocheted off Jack’s head, picking up some skin and hair along the way. He reeled back, and the groans volleying from various locations on the gallery told him that the flying masonry casualties were mounting. It was the least of their problems. Through the holes in the 8

walls piled more guys in ninja outfits. Twelve in all, four to each breach, they exploded onto the catwalk like the wrath of God. Jack never even had time to aim. He fired anyway, from reflex and an instinctive urge to stop the nemesis thundering toward him. The shot went high, and all he could do was brace for the onslaught. His dance partner was a woman, surprisingly enough, at least an inch taller than he and built like a Russian shot-putter. Etiquette would have to suffer, he concluded, and rammed the butt of his rifle into her midriff. It didn’t slow her down. Miss Universe bellowed like an ox, one beefy hand slapping away the rifle, the other delivering a roundhouse blow that tore Jack off his feet and flung him against the railing. It sounded like someone clearing his throat, and he felt it before he heard it—the dry crunch of ancient metal deciding that enough was enough. The railing gave. There was an endless, weightless moment of teetering on the edge and Carter screaming his name. As if it’d been waiting for that chance, a red streak leaped through dusty air and at the middle of her forehead, shearing off the scream. Gravity kicked in the same instant, and Jack fell, ass over tit and almost grateful, still hanging on to his gun, knowing this was it. Here flies Jack O’Neill, Smug Bastard. He’d be lucky if he didn’t survive. He landed on something soft and squishy that compacted under his weight. Teeth still rattling from the impact, he lay inside a crater of white fluff. Over its rim gawked the baffled faces of Larry, Curly, and Moe. “Hi,” Jack said grimly and brought up his rifle. “Just thought I’d drop in.” A curiously Dopplered yell from above cut off whatever else he’d meant to say or do. By the time he’d located its origin, it was too late. Miss Universe came hurtling through space like a monster fruit bat, on a trajectory that ended smack atop one Jack O’Neill. Who, knowing what would happen, closed his eyes in silent resignation. The First Aid tent had adopted all the atmosphere and civility of the catering marquee at a biker shindig. People were guzzling or spilling coffee of every description— cream and two sugars left the best stains on lab coats—and dropped empty paper cups where they stood. Sergeant Pancaldi had eviscerated an MRE pack to get at the candy bar—which, frankly, he could do without—and sat on a spare gurney, a happily munching nucleus at the heart of the mayhem. Calories or no, you couldn’t discount the curative properties of chocolate. Pancaldi was the only satisfied customer in the entire tent. Everybody else, including the female contingent, was squirting testosterone. “…could have killed her!” “It was an accident! Besides, she—” “Accident, my ass!” “I can spell it out for you, jarhead!” “Jarhead! Wanna take that up with an officer?” The participants in this lively conversation had surrounded a portable defib unit and were threatening to come to blows over it. A shy-looking orderly took his life into his hands and tried to rescue the equipment. “Excuse me?” “What officer? Somebody’s actually in charge of you hoodlums?”

“Excuse me!” “Yo, flyboy! Butt out!” “Muscles are required, intellect not essential. Can you string the initials into a word Jarhead?” “Excuse me!” The orderly made a grab for the defibrillator and got in the way of a shove. That did it. Dr. Janet Fraiser was all for healthy social exchange between the service branches, but this was getting a little too tactile. She’d either have to start administering chocolate or clear the tent. The latter was better for her nerves, and never mind the patients’ welfare. “Shut it! That’s an order!” The bellow stalled arguments, made Marines and Airmen flinch, provoked ducked heads among nursing staff, caused Pancaldi to choke on his candy bar, and trailed blessed silence in its wake. Inevitably, really. Most mouths hung open. Yep. Meet the mouse that roared. Janet Fraiser was five foot three in heels and not of a build anyone would associate with Pavarotti volume. A good diaphragm had its perks. What made it especially rewarding was the fact that at least half of this mob didn’t even know her. She smiled winningly. “Ladies and gentlemen! Now that I have your full and undivided attention, listen up. Anyone who can walk and doesn’t have a job to do, get the hell out of my tent and don’t step back in unless you’re dying!” From the gurney to her right came a rustle, followed by a strangled moan. Without even looking, she snapped, “That doesn’t include you, so stay put! Sir!” The rest of the delinquents were still gawking at her, though some of the mouths had started to close. “Well? What are you waiting for?” “Shorry, Doc,” mumbled Pancaldi around a chunk of chocolate. Then he slid off his perch and led the exodus. Two minutes later the tent had cleared, except for three patients—well, two patients and an immovable object—and two nursing staff. The daredevil orderly still clucked over the defib unit like a hen over her chicks. He had a slightly nervous disposition, but he was a cracking triage nurse. “Stand down, Corporal. I think it’s safe,” she said, trying hard not to sound patronizing. “Can you see to Private Lamont? The morphine should have kicked in by now, and her jaw needs bandaging. It’ll have to be wired shut, but I don’t want to do that here. The ambulance is standing by, so whenever you’re done, she can go.” “Yes, ma’am!” The corporal relinquished the defibrillator and headed for the opposite corner of the tent, where PFC Lamont lay sprawled on a gurney, humming tunelessly. The morphine had kicked in alright. Now for the fun part. Fraiser squared her shoulders and turned to the would-be absconder who, unlike the now departed multitudes, knew her exceedingly well—too well to even have tried to vamoose. The back of his gurney had been raised, bringing him to eyelevel with the immovable object, which was delivering a hushed lecture. The patient, not in the mood for sermons, dispensed one of his patented glares.

“Dammit, Daniel!” His outburst stopped the lecture in its tracks and rattled the tent poles. Then he lowered his voice. “Can the pep talk already. I screwed up.” Sitting in a chair next to him, Daniel Jackson sported a first-class shiner that was only partly concealed by an eye patch. Shiner and patch were down to a close encounter with an airborne brick. His glasses were trashed, though they hadn’t done any further damage, and he squinted myopically at his friend. “Guess what, Jack? We all do. Live with it.” Whereupon Colonel O’Neill looked ready to throttle an archeologist. The temper was only a first reaction, and Janet Fraiser knew it. She sure as hell didn’t want to be there when it all sank in. He wasn’t exactly adept at forgiving himself. If this had been for real, eighty percent of his men, Sam Carter included, would be dead and it would have been his fault. If it had been for real… Well, it hadn’t been! She sighed and moved in to join the fray. Nothing like a good distraction. Which really was the reason why she’d allowed Dr. Jackson to stay. That and the fact that, for the first time since Reese’s death, there seemed to be a spring thaw in the cold war between him and Jack O’Neill. Maybe the accident hadn’t been such a bad thing after all. “Let’s check you out, Colonel,” she said. I m— “Peachy. Yeah. I heard you the first six times. Newsflash, sir: you’re peachy when I say you are and not a moment sooner.” “Na—” “—poleonic power monger. So you keep telling me.” “I was going to say ‘naturally’.” For a split-second his gaze met hers, and he shot her a grin that was as brittle as glass. “The Marines who pulled him out said he had trouble breathing,” Dr. Jackson offered, which earned him a sour snarl. “I’d like to see them breathe with a mature killer whale landing on their asses.” “It wasn’t your ass, and she didn’t mean to. One of our guys knocked her off the gallery.” “Didn’t mean to? She took aim! Just keep her the hell away from me!” “She—” “You won’t have to worry about her for a while,” Janet cut in. “Private Lamont’s worse off than you, Colonel.” His scowl crumbled into concern. “She gonna be okay?” “Eventually. She struck the stock of your rifle face-on. Her jaw’s fractured pretty badly. She’ll need some new teeth, too.” “Ouch.” Dr. Jackson winced. “Yeah. Ouch. Speaking of which.” She nodded at O’Neill. “Can you take your shirt off for me, sir?” He tried. The result were clenched teeth and a grimace and something that sounded like cannelloni herbs and summer fish. Janet blinked. “Come again, Colonel?” “Can’t sit up.” He made an elocution lesson of spitting out the words. At a guess, the respiratory problem had resolved itself. “It hurts like a son of a bitch!”

“Ah. Good job I didn’t let you sneak out then.” “It wasn’t that bad a while ago.” If he actually admitted to it, it had to be really bad. She peeled the shirt apart. His skin had barely left the flushed stage for indigo, but tomorrow it’d be a dozen shades of purple. About five inches wide at its broadest, the contusion looped from the lower right front of his ribcage up the side and disappeared under his arm. Superficially nothing seemed to be broken, which was great news—if not entirely pleasant. Deep bruising could be more painful than a fracture and for longer. “Sorry,” she announced. “This’ll hurt.” “Ya think?” As gently as she could she probed for injuries, bits that moved when they shouldn’t or were stuck where they didn’t belong. He didn’t say a peep, but by the time she finished his face had turned pale under the tan and glistened with sweat. “Sorry,” Janet said again, meaning it. “I had to make sure.” “Sure of what?” he panted. “My pain threshold?” “Didn’t know you had one, sir.” Eyebrows arched in mock surprise, she grinned. “Button up. The shirt, I mean. You’re lucky. When Lamont fell on top of you, those cotton bales absorbed most of the impact. No broken ribs this time.” “Then how come—” “But you’ve got severe contusions, and I don’t have to tell you that those always are fun. They’ve triggered something that’s called intercostal neuralgia.” “Panama Canal?” “Costal, not coastal!” Across the gurney, Dr. Jackson rolled one eye. “That was crap, Jack, even by your standards.” In Janet Fraiser’s experience, the safest course of action lay in ignoring the pair of them. “I’ll give you some Demerol, Colonel, but other than that it’ll just have to heal on its own.” “I don’t need painkillers.” The phrasing was disputable, though she knew better than to quibble. He didn’t want painkillers. He thought he deserved everything he got and then some. Janet pasted on an innocent smile. “Oh, you’ll need them. Sooner or later you’ll find it necessary to take off your pants or tie your shoelaces.” Assertions of the contrary were cut off by a commotion at the entrance. The ambulance crew was about to stretcher off PFC Lamont, and two visitors were trying to get past it into the tent. Her orderly made the most unlikely bouncer you could ever hope to meet. “Sorry, ma’am. Uh…” With an uncertain look from the blond Major to the enormous black guy whose rank, if any, was a mystery, he added, “Sir. You can’t come in unless you’re dying. Dr. Fraiser’s—” “It’s okay!” Janet called before the corporal, in the line of duty, committed a folly he might regret. “Let them in.” Dusty, disheveled, streaks of camouflage paint still decorating her nose, Major Carter pushed past the orderly. She came to an abrupt halt in the middle of the tent, the relief on her face boundless and, for once, unguarded.

Teal’c filled in what she didn’t say. “O’Neill. Daniel Jackson. I am pleased to see you alive.” Trust him to come straight to the point. His dark voice rang with genuine warmth, and it had the added effect of shaking up Sam Carter. She snapped back into her usual efficiency, just about jumped to attention, and said, “Sir. Daniel. Debrief’s over at the factory in fifteen, if you’re good to go.” Major General George S. Hammond’s chair—an exquisitely uncomfortable creation in orange plastic—crowned one end of two stained tables, which had been pushed together lengthways to create a debriefing venue for this debacle. At the other end, too far to kick the man’s ankles but not far enough to miss the smirk, sat Lieutenant General Philip “Alistair” Crowley, USMC. Whoever had dreamed up that call sign displayed commendable insight into the human psyche. The key members of his coven sat along one side of the makeshift conference table, looking as superior as their intrepid leader. The Air Force participants opposite looked anything but. The room itself was high in ambience, a former cafeteria on the top level of an abandoned factory building on the outskirts of Colorado Springs. The floor was padded with newspaper where the linoleum had cracked, the windows were dirty and streaked by drizzle, and yellowing acoustic tiles drooped from a damp ceiling. Atop two crates in a corner sat a TV/VCR, screen snowy with static. Up until two minutes ago it had been playing video footage of the Armageddon that had taken place two levels below. All in all, Hammond wished he were in a galaxy far, far away, where they had comfy chairs. Where the people voted least likely didn’t suddenly commit catastrophic deployment errors. Where one’s superiors didn’t insist on scheduling exercises that did more harm than good and only served to stroke inflated egos. Maybe he wasn’t entirely objective. Losers rarely were. He closed his eyes. The galaxy far, far away didn’t materialize. The underlying mistake had been his, of course. He should never have agreed to it: a handpicked crew of Recon Marines against the finest the US Air Force had to offer. Okay, he hadn’t agreed to it. Staging an exercise like this at a time when the Navy was at the Air Force’s throat, and the Air Force at the Navy’s, and the Army at everybody’s because they’d all been led to believe it was a matter of survival? Madness. Waste. To the best of his knowledge, rivalry among the forces had never won a war yet, and fact of the matter was that they were fighting a war—the most crucial war ever. Even if only five people in this room were aware of it. So he’d said no. Once, twice, a half dozen times. But Crowley had been more insistent than an insurance salesman. He also was well-connected. After all, the Marines guarded you-know-whom. The final invitation had arrived via that red phone on General Hammond’s desk, and its phrasing had been along the lines of Do it! RSVP. If he weren’t up to his eyeballs in politics, struggling to keep Senator Kinsey and the NID at arm’s length, he still might have talked his way out of it—he’d done it before—but giving in had just seemed quicker. Easier. Safer. The hallmarks of a poor decision.

In consequence, a bunch of good people who should be out there doing it for real had got the crap kicked out of them for kudos, and one of them had damn near got himself killed. Christ almighty, Jack! What the hell went wrong? Rejoining the proceedings might be one way of finding out, Hammond figured. To his dismay, the room hadn’t magically transformed into a desert island when he opened his eyes. At least the timing was perfect. Crowley was through pontificating on the merits of inter-service competition. Gives the men an edge, and that’s what we want, right? Rah-rah! “So, let’s assess this, ladies and gentlemen, shall we?” brayed Crowley. “George?” Hammond dumbly nodded his assent—what else could he do?—thinking all the while that, if anything, Colonel O’Neill might have lost his edge. Under the circ*mstances, eighty percent casualties were indefensible. It had been a simple raid scenario. The rules allowed each team to carry laser-sighted intars—the Marines had been told they were a new type of long-range stun gun—and basic equipment and two cutting charges. Specialized gadgets, even radios, had been off-limits. Straightforward stuff, in other words. Which, in the way of any decent circular argument, led right back to What the hell went wrong? If Hammond were to play it by the book, today’s performance should be Jack’s ticket to a desk from where to organize supplies. Under strict supervision. But when it came to this particular officer, Hammond rarely played things by the book, and he wanted to know a lot more before he even contemplated going down the supplies route. Question was whether he’d learn it in this room. Chest feathers puffed, Colonel Pete Norris, the CO of the Marine teams, had begun outlining his strategy, which boiled down to Take It And Keep It. Pragmatic, if hardly novel. Either side of him, his team leaders dutifully scratched the highlights onto notepads. Crowley interrupted here and there, asking through a benign smile for reiteration of choice moments. “That’s correct, sir,” replied Norris. “There were those steel girders under the ceiling. I ordered ten of my men up there when I realized that the gallery could be critical.” “That’s a considerable proportion of your manpower, Colonel,” Crowley observed. “Wasn’t that a bit reckless?” “With respect, sir, no. We had the ground floor entrances covered. Same goes for the only staircase to the upper levels. I had twelve people on standby there. Those are the ones who were then deployed to break through the walls onto the catwalk.” “Hang on a minute.” Dr. Jackson, who until now had been listening with sullen forbearance, started scribbling numbers onto the notepad in front of him. Once he was finished, he frowned at them. The eye patch made him look like a kid who’d come to the Halloween party in a pirate outfit two inches shy of menacing. “You’ve got a question, Doctor?” Crowley was craning his neck, trying to see what Jackson had written. “As a matter of fact, yes. These figures don’t add up. We were allowed no more than twenty-five men each. Now, even if the unit that Murray”—he cast a quick 14

glance at Teal’c whose tattoo was safely hidden under a watch cap—“and his team chased around the grounds was only half the strength we assumed it was… still seems like Colonel Norris had about five men too many.” “That’s exactly why civilian contractors shouldn’t be allowed in the field!” Norris snarled. “How can you folks even start to comprehend tactical issues?” Slick as a buttered bun, Crowley cut in. “Dr. Jackson, have you considered that Murray was chasing his own tail because Colonel O’Neill’s reconnaissance wasn’t quite what it should have been?” “No, because that’s absolutely—” “Colonel Norris, please continue,” said Crowley. And on it went. With the one difference that Major Carter had furtively swapped her notepad for Dr. Jackson’s and was adding some scribbling of her own. At last Norris ran out of brilliant ideas to present for applause, and Crowley thanked him and turned his gaze on Jack O’Neill. “Colonel O’Neill? Your take on it, please.” Face rigid, Jack abandoned an ongoing attempt to skewer his notepad with a pen and stared at the window. “Yessir.” He kept staring at that window throughout a clinical analysis of his actions that lasted a fraction of the time Norris’ homily had taken and was twice as brutal. Largely on himself. Halfway through, Hammond heard the door open and close. Somebody had stepped into the room, silently hovering in the background. Whoever it was could wait while Jack relentlessly approached the crux of the matter. He had failed to correctly assess the tactical situation inside the factory. The problem was, George Hammond still refused to believe it. “I screwed up. Sorry, sir.” Jack finally gave up on the window and glanced at Hammond. For once, he looked his age. “I’m just glad it was an exercise. God help me if it hadn’t been.” “That’s one reason why we stage these things,” intoned Crowley. “We all can do with a wake-up call now and again. Now, ladies and gentlemen, I think that wraps it up. Thank you all for your efforts, and hopefully we can arrange a rematch at some point. Dismissed.” There were perfunctory handshakes across the table, then the Marines rose and Norris went to collect his pat on the back from Crowley. In a cloud of chatter they filtered out the door. The Air Force contingent all but ignored their exit. Colonel O’Neill had resumed his scrutiny of the glassware. Dr. Jackson and Major Carter were huddled over a notepad. Maintaining his quiet air of aloofness, Teal’c didn’t huddle but peered over sideways and evidently didn’t much care for what he— The slow, deliberate claps echoed through the empty room like gunshots, startling them all. “Astonishing. I didn’t think I’d ever have the privilege of seeing you eat humble pie, Colonel. Actually, for a moment there I thought you’d choke on it.” The man slid off a chair by the door and ambled toward them, perfectly groomed in a suit by Armani or Boss or some other designer that didn’t tailor for people of Hammond’s stature. The urbane facade was as deceptive as quicksand, of course.

Sam Carter’s face suggested that somebody was trying to feed her live slugs. “What are you doing here?” In a way, Hammond was grateful she’d beaten him to it. He couldn’t have risked infusing the question with quite the same amount of venom. Then again, he didn’t have quite as much reason to hate the man. “Simmons,” he ground out. “Oh yes.” Colonel Frank Simmons smiled. “Surely you were made aware that the NID had assigned an observer to this… masterpiece?”

CHAPTER THREE

“Come on, Gus! Don’t go official on me,” Sam Carter purred, grimacing—partly at herself for the purr, partly at Gus and his habit of making people woo him. She wasn’t a wooer. Eighty-seven degrees through a monumental eye roll she caught sight of Daniel who came strolling into her lab, Teal’c in tow. Pinning the handset between ear and shoulder, she gestured for them to grab chairs. At the other end of the line, in an office in Chantilly, Virginia, Augustus “Gus” Przsemolensky was graduating from No way! to I’m not supposed to. “For old times’ sake. Gus! This is me!” Teal’c’s left eyebrow did a pull-up, and Dr. Jackson mouthed Gus? with such an exaggerated look of surprise that Sam exploded into a snort. “No! I had to sneeze. Dust.” She glowered at Daniel. “Look, if somebody asks… Yeah, blame it on CORONA… You will? Great! Got something to write? Here goes…” Sam reeled off a set of coordinates, date, and time and repeated it all for good measure. “You got my email address. Ten minutes would be good… Okay, okay… Half an hour. Thanks, Gus.” She put the handset back into the cradle and sagged onto her lab bench, forehead resting on folded hands. “Talk about giving birth to China,” she muttered at a technical drawing. “Gu-u-us,” sang Daniel, drawing it out over three syllables. “Anything you want to tell us, Sam?” Raising her head just enough to glare at him between bits of disassembled particle accelerator and mummified donuts, she growled, “Not really. How about you?” Daniel’s glee evaporated. “Looks like they’re here to stay.” “Damn! Have they talked to either of you yet?” “They have not, Major Carter.” Teal’c sounded like a funeral director. “What about the Colonel?” “No idea. I doubt it, though,” said Daniel and shrugged. “I tried to phone him a few times. Don’t know how he did it, but his service is redirecting all calls to the talking clock in Tokyo.” “It’s what?” Sam straightened up, knocking a donut mummy off the bench. It bounced. “That’s… impressive. How do you know it’s the talking clock?” “I speak—” “Japanese. Of course.” “Anyway, I guess even those NID jerks would have got the Do not disturb part.”

Yesterday, three days after that misbegotten exercise, two faceless, flavorless NID agents of unspecified rank and sublime dress sense had descended upon Stargate Command. Over the protests of General Hammond. The protests had been silenced by a call from Washington. It wasn’t the first time it had happened, it sure as hell wouldn’t be the last—unless somebody finally grew the balls to shut down that nest of vipers—but usually you found out in a hurry why the NID came at you. If only because they came at you with all the diplomatic finesse of an Abrams M1A battle tank. Sam winced at the memory of her own interview with Frank Simmons a few months back. He’d made a damn good bid at dismantling her professionally, mentally, emotionally. Halfway through she’d grasped that Simmons had to be the illegal user who’d hacked into the SGC mainframe. Thinking she could rattle him, she’d accused him point blank. Water off a duck’s back. He hadn’t even tried to deny it, and the threat implicit in his indifference had scared the hell out of her. Eventually, Simmons had left. The threat hadn’t. It lingered like a bad smell. His impromptu appearance at the debriefing four days ago had reinforced it nicely. And now his henchmen were here, sniffing after— “Major Carter.” “What?” Teal’c silently pointed at her computer. In the lower right-hand corner of the screen the mail icon was flashing. “That was quick. I think Gus is a little overeager.” Daniel’s eye patch rode up his forehead, and he grinned. “Want me to check?” “You wouldn’t be able to read it. Besides, it can’t be him yet. He’s never in his life been ahead of a deadline.” Then again, stranger things had happened. She darted out from behind the lab bench, pushed aside her computer chair, currently inhabited by Daniel, and opened the email. From: [emailprotected] To: [emailprotected] Subject: Long time no see Sam, great to hear from you and thanks for thinking of an old flame. Do as you promised and drop in on me next time you’re in this neck of the woods. Gus xoxox No attachment. More significantly, no encryption. Gus encrypted his shopping lists. She should know because, once upon a time, she’d played Crack The Algorithm with him. Either Gus wasn’t the author, or he’d wanted to demonstrate to somebody standing over him that this was perfectly harmless—and at the same time warn Sam Carter. She felt a lump of ice congealing in the pit of her stomach. “Oh crap,” she whispered. “Crap!” “Hey! He did sign off with hugs and kisses. There’s hope yet.” Daniel was scanning the mail, then his gaze arrested on the sender’s address. “National Reconnaissance Office? Friends in high places, huh? All the way in orbit. Now care to tell us what this is all about?” Sam dug a crumpled piece of paper from her back pocket and tossed it at Daniel. “Your little math problem.”

“My what?” Smoothing out wrinkles between thumb and forefinger, he stared at his own writing. “Oh. Well, that got slapped down alright. Dr. Jackson, have you considered that Colonel O’Neill’s reconnaissance wasn’t quite what it should have been?” His rendition of Crowley’s adenoid twang was flawless. “So what about it?” “Daniel, we both know that the Colonel’s reconnaissance was just dandy. Teal’c did most of it.” “Indeed.” The Jaffa had risen from a chair that seemed two sizes too small for his frame and wandered over to them, all elegance and contained power. “O’Neill had no reason to assume that there were sufficient numbers for the kind of ambush we experienced.” “But telling that to Crowley would have gone over like a pregnant pole-vaulter,” Daniel glumly completed the thought. “Jack must have realized when I got my butt kicked by Norris. Maybe I should have just kept my mouth shut.” “O’Neill would not have told General Crowley under any circ*mstances.” “Teal’c’s right,” said Sam. “The Colonel believes he’s to blame. No points for guessing what that means.” “Yeah,” grumbled Daniel. “Anybody who wants to tell him otherwise can go have a heart to heart with the talking clock in Tokyo.” “Which is why Major Carter attempted to obtain independent evidence from Augustus Przsemolensky.” “Yup.” Sam nodded at Teal’c. “Your momma didn’t raise no dummies.” “She did not.” The smile was there if you knew him, quirking just beneath the dignified surface. “I am an only child.” “Sooo…” Pensively shredding the notepaper, Daniel gazed at the computer screen and then back at Sam. “You asked your friend Gus at the NRO to get you a satellite picture of the factory grounds at the time of the exercise. The idea being to run a headcount of everybody outside. How am I doing for a civilian contractor with no grasp of tactical issues?” “Not bad.” She grinned. “Colonel Norris would be shocked.” “I don’t see a picture.” “No.” Her grin died, and Sam crossed her arms in front of her chest as if to protect herself. The iceberg in her stomach wanted to stage a comeback. For a minute or two she’d allowed herself to push aside the implications of Gus’ email. They meshed perfectly with the diffuse sense of dread the presence of the NID agents had triggered. But none of this would go away just because she ignored it. Simmons wouldn’t go away. She drifted back behind her lab bench, feeling safer among the familiar clutter of research and experimentation. At least that was predictable, obeyed rules. By and large. “Somebody intercepted my phone call,” she said at last. “My money’s on the NID. Unless Gus told them, they won’t know what I asked him to do, because the call was scrambled. But they do know where it came from and where it went, and they got to Gus by return post. There’s no chance of him sending me any pictures now. No chance of proving anything, either way.”

“Oh crap, huh? But you’re wrong.” The corners of Daniel’s mouth twitched, and he looked nine shades of smug. It went well with the eye patch. “They’ve shown their hand. They’ve just told us loud and clear that there is something to prove. All you’ve got to do is find another way of proving it.” “There is no other—” Her eyes arrested on the dismantled generator and a clutch of tools. Research and experimentation. Predictable. Obeying rules. By and large. Sam gazed up and smiled. “Okay, scratch that. Gentlemen, we’re going on a fieldtrip back to the factory.” As they left the lab, klaxons started wailing, signaling an incoming wormhole five levels below. Habit tugged at her and demanded she head down to the control room. Sam made for the armory instead. There were some props they needed to collect, ideally without answering questions. The well-timed excitement in the gate room would keep the NID creeps occupied. The stowaway stepped from the chill, liquid embrace of the Chappa’ai. Behind her the wormhole destabilized and died, and the barrier, which the Tauri thought could protect them, slid into place. Before her two of them slowly marched down the ramp, supporting a third. He was injured. So fragile, humans. So ignorant. Little did they suspect that she had caused the injury, caused the man to trip and fall down a ravine and break his leg. She had heard the bones snap. It had amused her. Fragile indeed. And because they feared their own fragility, they had invented a goddess of deceit and destruction to appease. Destruction and deceit were apt enough, but there was much more. “So much more, my children.” Her lips moved, but she did not utter a sound. Not yet. For the ones who appeased her enough, there were rewards—screaming, bloodsweet turmoil of body and mind. If, ultimately, the rewards pleased her more than their recipients, it was only due tribute to a deity. The humans had eased their injured comrade onto a step at the bottom of the ramp. Others, clad in black, swarmed around them. Toward the edges of her vision they appeared increasingly distorted, grotesque gnomes brandishing grotesque weapons. The phase shifting device smudged her view of their reality into a gray-ingray perspective through shattered glass. A noise to the left made her turn her head— too fast—and her eyes snapped shut against a jagged blur of images. She blinked and saw the healer rush into the room. No black for this one. This one wore white. For purity, she presumed, snarling at the thought. Not so pure, this one. Not above destruction and deceit, just like her. She remembered this diminutive woman pointing a weapon, large and out of place in too-small hands. This healer, so-called, had forced her to reverse the maturing of the first viable hak’taur. Centuries of labor destroyed at the cusp of fruition… She felt a swell of rage, let it fill her, relishing its heat. No weapon now. It would be easy to crush the healer’s body. It could be achieved in a heartbeat, and the humans, fragile and ignorant, would be helpless to prevent it. But this was not the time, and it was enough to know that she could do it. That knowledge held a satisfaction all of its own, an assurance of godlike power over life and death. She smiled. 20

Their fat, bald leader had joined the group around the injured man. “What happened?” he barked. Did it matter? And did anyone believe this show of concern? Apparently they did. Excited voices chattered out a garbled account of an accident that had been no accident. Humans. How they bored her! Most, but not all of them. She scanned the room for more adequate. entertainment and was disappointed. Then again, she would have wanted to meet him alone, like the last time… “In your place I doubt I would have done the same.” The fact that she concedes even that much is remarkable, and she does not quite know why she has admitted the truth or what it means. A grudging tribute or a warning against future folly. At any rate, a challenge. Dark eyes unreadable, he turns it back on her. “I’ll keep that thought alive.” About to step onto the ramp, she throws a last look at him—tall, lean, grayhaired, fearless. A worthy adversary. Better yet, a complex one. Life has scored that handsome, narrow face, and hidden behind his eyes lies a much older man’s experience of bliss, agony, death. A lot of the latter, she suspects and idly wonders what it will take to break him. Deceit and destruction? Perhaps. Perhaps she will find out. Perhaps not. But whatever the answer, they are not finished yet. She smiles a promise, and he understands her perfectly. The memory was shattered by two more men entering the room below, their clothing markedly different from the others’. These were the ones the human Simmons had advised her to contact. She briefly recalled the image of his face in the communication globe. No secrets here. The mouth alone, sensuous and cruel, betrayed his thirst for power, and the long, fleshy features held a haughtiness that rivaled her own. He could be trusted, because his most fundamental trait could be trusted: greed. Noiselessly she glided down the ramp and toward the new arrivals. Slipping in behind the younger one, blue-eyed and innocent, she caressed his neck. He would not be able to feel her touch in his phase, not completely. It would seem like a breath of cool wind to him, she assumed. She had assumed correctly. Fine blond hairs stood on end. A second gentle stroke across soft skin, and he shivered imperceptibly, which pleased her. Perhaps she would reward him. A poor substitute, but a substitute nonetheless. At the third touch he nudged his companion, who turned around, frowned, shrugged. They had been told what to expect but still hesitated to accept what they could not see. So very human. It did not matter, however, as long as they obeyed their instructions. A mere two paces away, the injured man was carried from the room. Behind him followed the healer and the human leader. The elder of the escorts stepped forward and addressed him. “General Hammond?” “I don’t have time for you now, Kyser!” “This won’t take a moment, and I guarantee you’ll like what you hear.” The man Kyser gave a tight smile. The General stopped in his tracks and whirled around, nimble for a man of his girth. “Make it quick!”

“Simply a courtesy, General. We’re finished here. You can expect Colonel Simmons’ report within a day or two.” “Fine. Don’t let the door hit you on your way out.” The human leader strode off. “Don’t let that head of yours get too big,” Kyser hissed into thin air. “One of these days, it’s gonna roll, General. Real soon.” Then he nodded at the younger man. “Let’s go.” She followed them through a maze of drab corridors, into two elevators for an endless journey toward daylight, and finally out into a manmade cavern. This area accommodated surface conveyances, and it smelled acrid with fumes. Her escorts stopped at a vehicle, large and sand-colored. The young one unlocked its doors. “Now what?” he asked. “We wait a few minutes, then we make tracks,” replied Kyser. “If she’s in the car, great. If not, I won’t complain. I’m not exactly keen on spending hours on a plane with an invisible snake at my back.” “Would it make you feel more confident if I were visible?” She enjoyed the effect immensely. The man stifled a scream and staggered against the rear of the vehicle, staring at her in pure terror. She approached until she stood pressed against him, fingers playing across his cheek. Without warning they clenched in his hair. “Be grateful that I choose not to punish you for your insolence!” “Yes, ma’am.” “Now take me to your master.” “Yes, ma’am.” Daniel watched the anchor-like metal contraption reach its zenith and stall. It hovered for a moment, then it flipped downward and nosed into yet another plunge, trailing rope. He clamped his hands over his ears, winced. The noise of a grappling hook striking concrete, amplified by God knew how many thousand cubic feet of empty space, was cataclysmic. It seemed to drill through his hands and into his ears, after which it converged somewhere behind his shiner to pound around a bit. Wonderful. By the end of this he’d probably be deaf and blind. Eventually the echo died down and Sam shouted, “That was great, Teal’c! Nearly there. Try again!” Oh for cryin’ out loud… to coin a phrase. “Sam, I really—” “Major Carter.” Teal’c actually looked frazzled. “ATauri scientist named Albert Einstein devised a most apposite definition of insanity. Are you familiar with it?” “Yes. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” “I assure you, the result will be no different however many times I attempt this.” Which was the sound of a Jaffa digging in his heels. Cross-legged on the floor, Sam hunched over her laptop, keying stuff that presumably made sense to her. Now she gazed up. Just how she did it was a mystery to Daniel, but her smile lit up the gloomy factory hall and raised ambient temperatures by several degrees. A select few had been known to say No to the killer beam. Jack, for instance, though he probably practiced in front of the mirror. On this occasion, the full force of it was directed at Teal’c, who wasn’t in training. His

resistance wilted, and he wordlessly began coiling the zip line attached to the grappling hook. Take umpteen. “Your last two tries were really close,” she said, faintly apologetic. “I’ve computed the kilopond necessary to get that hook up there. That’s easy, just a function of weight and distance, with the aerodynamic drag of the rope factored in. I’ve also downloaded your physiological profile from Janet’s databank, which allows me to calculate the force you put into a throw like this. Now, given that the differential between—” “Major Carter. I am ready, and it is getting late. We shall not be able to continue after sunset.” Teal’c’s methods were somewhat more gracious than Jack’s but equally effective. Sam abandoned a lecture, which, in the simplest of terms, came down to If a Jaffa can’t get the damn hook up there, nobody can. She nodded. “Go ahead.” After a glance at the girder thirty meters above, Teal’c stepped back and measured out some slack on the zip line. Then he began swinging rope and hook in a diagonal circle over his head. Once, twice. The third time he let go, his body extending as if he meant to take flight himself. The grappling hook soared upward and did what it’d been doing for the past hour. Five meters or so short of the girder it ran out of steam and stalled. Crash-bang-boom. “Well, I think that settles it.” The words mixed with the echo still caroming through Daniel’s sinuses, and he yawned to ease the pressure. Then his mouth snapped shut with an audible clack. “Uh-oh.” The man stood motionless just inside the open gate, outlined by a wedge of copper evening light. Terrific! If not entirely unexpected. The ongoing racket was bound to have brought security guards on the plan sooner or later. Of course they’d hoped to be out of here sooner. Strictly speaking, what they were doing could be considered trespassing at best, breaking and entering at worst. “We’ve just come to collect some leftover equipment.” Sam had risen, arms slightly spread to indicate that she was unarmed. “There was a military exercise here a few days ago. If you want to—” “I know there was an exercise, Carter. I got you killed, remember?” “Sir!” Chiseled by a sharp breath, it sounded like a sob. “O’Neill,” said Teal’c. “The one and only.” Fists sunk into the pockets of a leather jacket, he started walking toward them, affecting the nonchalance of a tourist at some historical site. Gee, that’s a real neat battlefield! Except, it didn’t quite come off as planned. He moved as though somebody had strapped him into a corset, and when he finally stepped out of that glaring backlight, Daniel was startled to see how drained he looked. Drained and wound more tightly than a wristwatch. “What the hell are you doing here, Jack?” “The perp always returns to the scene of the crime. Never heard of it? We also tend to turn up at funerals.” By Jack O’Neill’s standards this was a whole encyclopedia of information, although Daniel was willing to bet a month’s paycheck that Jack had had no real

intention of carrying the conversation even this far. If they hadn’t noticed him, he’d have beat a quiet retreat until after they were gone. And then? He’d have come in here and made himself relive every second of the exercise, compulsively listing and re-listing everything he thought he’d done wrong. “Where’s the crime?” Daniel asked, aware that it was the next best thing to poking a tiger’s abscessed tooth. “We’ve had this discussion. We’re not having it again,” snarled the tiger. Then his curiosity asserted itself, and he took in the zip line, the hook, the laptop, and the piece of equipment sitting next to it. “What the hell are you doing here?” “Sir, we—” “Observe, O’Neill.” Obviously Teal’c had concluded that a demonstration would be more beneficial than Sam’s treatise on kilopond and differentials. The grappling hook flew, stalled, plunged, and made that infernal noise. Jack never even twitched. “You missed.” “That’s precisely our point, sir.” Sam allowed herself a small, hopeful grin. “If Teal’c’s throwing short, Norris’ team—Marines or no—wouldn’t have had a prayer of catching the girders. Unless”—she picked up a bulky gun that had the business end of a hook sticking out its nose—“they had launchers.” Settling the device against her shoulder, she took aim, fired. The hook soared, rope rippling after it, and neatly wrapped itself around a girder. Just like that, and with considerably less noise, too. “That’s the only way they could have got up there, Colonel,” she added. “And we both know that launchers weren’t permitted. Norris didn’t play by the rules, sir. Nobody can blame you for not anticipating that they’d cheat.” “Oh no?” Jack’s voice could have cut glass. “Tell me something, Major. When the Goa’uld pull the next new and improved doomsday machine out of their collective hat you gonna come running to me and bawl, ‘They’re cheating! They’re not permitted those, so I don’t wanna play!’?” “No, sir.” Her jaw worked, but she refused to be drawn into a fight. Sensing it, Jack wouldn’t let up. “That’s what the enemy do. They cheat. If you haven’t grasped that by now, you’re in the wrong job, Major! They cheat because it gives them an advantage. We do the same damn thing, and anybody who doesn’t anticipate that is a liability.” “Your comparison is flawed, O’Neill.” “Is it?” Jack whirled around, grimacing when the abrupt move jarred his ribs. “Indeed.” Slowly and methodically, Teal’c was coiling his zip line. Each coil punctuated a sentence. “It was a game. Games have rules. You abided by these rules and expected your opponent to do the same, because you knew it was a game. But the rules were broken. Who is to blame? You or the one who broke them?” As so often, Teal’c’s unshakeable calm deflated Jack. Sighing softly, he hunched his shoulders. “I know it was a game. What I don’t know is that I’d have done anything different if it’d hadn’t been. If it’d been for real… Sergeant Chen’s wife had a little girl two weeks ago. If it’d been for real, that kid would grow up without a father because of me. You’d be dead, too, Carter, and I’d rather not think about the

ways in which Jacob would rearrange my anatomy. As for you”—he tossed a wry grin at Daniel—“you’d probably have got your head in the way of some obstacle no matter what, so I won’t plead to that.” “Jack—” “Ah!” One hand held up, he wandered away, aimless until he was caught in the gravitational pull of the cotton bales and veered toward those. His left hand slipped from the pocket and started picking fluff. At last he turned back. “I appreciate what you’re trying to do, kids. I… Look, I’m sure Carter could get Norris sent down for grand larceny, but it’s not gonna change anything. So do me a favor and forget about it. I’d like get out of this with a few shreds of dignity intact.” The get out of this part was unequivocal and triggered something of a flashback. As far as thoroughly miserable conversations went, that one had been a doozy. “That’s… uh… that’s funny, because I didn’t figure you for the early retirement type anymore,” Daniel said quietly. Jack shot him a sharp glance. He remembered it too. Those words and what had come next. “So, this friendship thing we’ve been working on the last few years…” And he stares at Daniel point blank and finishes that half-formed question, “Apparently not much of a foundation, huh?” He had the same steady, determined, goddamn implacable look now, though the veneer of arrogance was missing completely. “This is different, Daniel, and you know it.” It was. This time it wasn’t a lie. This time it was for real. The question was if it’d be worth fighting. For a split-second, Daniel saw Reese’s dead face and asked himself if things weren’t just dandy the way they seemed to pan out now. Then he banished the thought to where it’d come from, ashamed of himself. Twisted and battered and bent out of shape, yes, but that friendship was still there, still for real, and as long as— “Sir, you can’t!” Sam had gone white as a sheet. “Not over this. Not when—” “When what, Carter?” Jack asked almost gently. “Always boils down to the same thing, see? Liability. In every sense of the word. Besides, I already have. The letter should be on Hammond’s desk tomorrow. The only alternative would be me pushing paper till the end of my days. You can see that working? No, wouldn’t have thought so. I can’t either.” Bits of cotton floated in the air, and he caught one, picked at it, blew it away again. Abruptly he turned and headed for the door. He looked surprisingly small in the vastness of the room, a black silhouette outlined by a wedge of light that had deepened from copper to burgundy. “That’s pathetic!” yelled Daniel, furious at him, Norris, the world at large. “The hero walking off into the sunset! It’s such a cliché, Jack!” For once there was no comeback. He just kept going. Daniel started after him, and was stopped by Teal’c’s large, strong hand clasping his arm. “Not now. You will not dissuade him now, Daniel Jackson.”

Colonel Frank Simmons had monitored the car’s approach from the control center. The vehicle had passed the gatepost at the outer perimeter of the safe house and gone on a winding journey through a mile of lush countryside. When it emerged from a pine copse and entered the last stretch toward the house, he’d gone outside to wait. Now he regretted it. The night air was freezing. Next to him Conrad shuffled, one finger stretching the collar of his turtleneck sweater. In all likelihood his discomfort was caused not by the collar but by the safety device it concealed; a remote-controlled choker studded with parcels of naquadah-enhanced explosive. One wrong move and it would literally blow Conrad’s head off—and kill the Goa’uld. It was the price he had to pay for attending the meeting. “Tell me one thing,” Simmons asked. “How can she be your mistress? You were stuck inside a Jaffa’s pouch when you got here, then you spent some time in a fish tank, and then you ended up inside our friend Adrian.” Conrad gave up fidgeting and condescended to answer. “You know nothing, human. The Jaffa who nursed me once belonged to her. The Goa’uld queen who bore me belonged to her. Therefore she is my mistress.” Headlights doused, the government-issue sedan pulled into the circular driveway in front of the house. The slamming of the doors and crackle of feet on gravel sounded overly loud in the stillness of the night, and Simmons finally admitted to a mild case of nerves. It had set in about six hours ago, when his operatives had informed him that they’d made contact and were en route to Peterson AFB where their jet was waiting. Even then Conrad had refused to reveal the identity of his ‘mistress’—another one of the pointless power games the Goa’uld seemed to enjoy so much—but it didn’t matter now. Simmons was about to find out. A blond agent held the door open for her, and she got out of the car with the grace of a debutante. The first thing that struck Simmons was how delicate she looked. Then she turned, and the light of a lamp below the portico illuminated a chinlength bob of raven hair, black almond eyes, a deceptively generous mouth, and a narrow nose. A diamond-shaped Bindi on the Chakra point between the eyebrows underlined the exotic flair of her features. Simmons resisted an urge to laugh. Not that he’d ever met her, of course, but he’d seen archive pictures and read the SGC reports, and by God, her credentials were perfect. More than that, she would be amenable to the offer. She needed all the help she could get. Slipping into his role of host—a rather worrying term, come to think of it—he glided down the steps to greet her. “Lady Nirrti. I’m delighted that you chose to accept my invitation.” The sardonic tilt of her eyebrows suggested that either the address had been too baroque or she’d seen through the formulaic courtesy. She swept past him and toward Conrad, eyes flaring. “What made you think you could allow this human to summon me here?” The distorted voice sounded almost masculine. It also sounded utterly cold, and Conrad, whose mask of superiority had slipped out of sight the moment she approached him, seemed tempted to prostrate himself. “Forgive me, mistress. I meant no offense. I acted merely from a wish to aid you.”

The veiled reminder of her precarious standing—if any—among the System Lords caused another baleful flicker in her eyes, but she was smart enough to concede the truth. “Very well. I am willing to discuss this proposal.” “In that case, please follow me.” Grateful to get out of the night chill, Simmons led her and Conrad into the library on the first floor. The ambiance would be sufficiently pompous, even for Goa’uld tastes. The room smelled of old leather bindings and faded parchment, and in the open grate roared a fire, the shine of its flames dancing across walls and a parquet floor. Atop a priceless Persian rug sat a cherry wood table, surrounded by high-backed chairs. Nirrti stopped dead in front of the grandfather clock by the door, listened to its ticking, suspicion contorting her face. “What is this device?” Not so omniscient after all. The urge to laugh threatened to return, and Simmons stifled it ruthlessly. “It measures time. It’s quite harmless, I assure you. Please, take a seat.” “How… quaint.” As she eased herself onto a chair, a sneer told him exactly what she thought of antique timepieces. Then her gaze fell on a crystal decanter and three glasses that sat on the table. “I am thirsty. Pour me some water.” Almost obeying, from reflex and the dicta of a conservative upbringing, he caught himself at the last moment. It was part of the power game, and if he gave in to her in the first round, she would have the upper hand throughout. Simmons ignored her and sat down in the chair opposite. Face stony, eyes simmering, she engaged in a staring contest. “Pour me some water.” Conrad broke. The command had never been directed at him, but he was hovering behind Nirrti’s chair like one of those… what did they call their loyal and trusted servants? Lotus? Luther? Lotar… like one of those lotars. Now he reached out, poured the water, handed the glass to her. “If it pleases you, mistress.” She took the glass without thanks and set it down on the table. When she looked up, she was smiling. “You have my attention, Simmons.” Simmons smiled back at her. “Any progress on the hak’taur yet?” “What do you know of the hak’taur? You could not possibly comprehend what it means!” It had rattled her, as it was meant to, and the hostility was back. Good. He preferred to confront the real nature of the beast. Smiling sharks were unpredictable. “I think I comprehend enough: hak means ‘improved’ and taur is a slang term for ‘Tauri’.” Dr. Jackson, tedious and rude as he was, had his uses. That report had been eminently informative. Without waiting for an answer, Simmons carried on. “Put together, you get a human with superhuman abilities. An über-host, in other words, which is what you’re after. You had to start from scratch, because Stargate Command, and specifically Dr. Fraiser, prevented you from using the Hankan girl, Cassandra. So I repeat: any progress yet?” “It took me more than two hundred of your human years to achieve what I had achieved with the Hankan girl. How much progress do you think I have made in the two months since?” “Not much I would assume.” Simmons schooled his features into a kindly frown. “And in the meantime you are virtually unprotected—one mothership and barely

enough Jaffa to man it isn’t exactly a defense force, is it? Is Lord Yu still hunting you?” “What if he were?” Her fingers caressed the stem of the water glass, twisting and turning it. “What is it to you?” That was a yes. So much the better. “I’m asking because I would be prepared to provide you with protection.” “What kind of protection?” “The kind only you would be able to create.” “You are talking in riddles!” Nirrti’s eyes brightened to neon-white displeasure. Conrad leaned forward and began whispering to her in rapid Goa’uld. “Speak English!” Simmons snapped. Neither of them gave any indication that they’d heard him. That little problem had to be solved and solved decisively. He rose. “This discussion is terminated.” Without another word he headed for the door. “Wait!” And then, as if it were causing her throat to ache, “Please.” “Yes?” He slowed to a halt and carefully wiped the smirk off his face before turning back to her. “I have no wish to offend you. Certain things are easier to understand in my own language. Sit.” It was as close to an apology as she would ever get. Nirrti watched him with the stare of a snake charmer while he resumed his seat. Suddenly she burst out laughing. “You amuse me, human. Be glad you do. So you thought it was a question of a simple surgical procedure?” “Of course not! We—” “Tried to implant the pouch. Then you tried to prevent the inevitable immune response by applying the crudest chemistry imaginable. Without success, of course. Each one of your subjects rotted slowly, from the inside out. Did it ever occur to you that the very thing that causes rejection would be integral to the process? A protein. Such a tiny thing. So small that you cannot see it with the naked eye. Tauri scientists call it a ‘building block of life’, yes? For once they are correct. And yet, this tiny thing will cause death if introduced into a body that responds improperly. Why do you think it is called symbiosis?” “Spare me the biology lesson!” Simmons placed his hands on the polished wood of the table and studied his fingernails. “I don’t care how it’s done, as long as it is done.” “What makes you think it can be done?” “The fact that it wouldn’t be the first time.” His gaze drifted up from his fingers, and he met her eyes. “Hathor did it.” Nirrti’s face twisted in a grimace. Apparently she and Hathor hadn’t been in the habit of sharing girlie secrets. “Hathor was a queen. I am not.” “Don’t take me for a fool!” In a deliberate show of anger, his right hand had slammed down on the tabletop. The glasses sang. “It had nothing to do with her being a queen and everything to do with a tasteless piece of costume jewelry. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s a close cousin to a Goa’uld healing device.” The shark’s smile returned, and she slowly inclined her head. “You say you would protect me? How?” “Some of the warriors you create would be at your disposal.”

“Some? Are you aware that Lord Yu can command thousands?” “It’s a question of quantity versus quality, isn’t it? The more advanced your product, the safer you will be. Pick the best and see what you can do. I trust this will aid in your own research?” “Conceivably.” Barely contained excitement supplanted her feral posturing. She looked almost childlike—the kind of child who would gut a live cat to hear it squeal. “How would I obtain the raw material?” “You won’t have to worry about that. I’ve made arrangements to ensure a steady supply of elite troops.” Elite troops, Simmons didn’t bother to explain, whose motto was Ever Faithful and who would always choose to protect the interests of the United States of America rather than those of a Goa’uld. “You forget that they cannot survive without a symbiote. I told you, I am not a queen. I shall not be able to provide the larvae.” “I haven’t forgotten.” He nodded at Conrad. “The scientists his host employed took live tissue samples. We cloned him. Right now, there’s about three hundred of him.” For the first time something like respect stole into her eyes. “Very well. I have a small additional request. Grant me that, and I shall give you what you ask.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Selection: Inducing, through natural or artificial processes, the survival of one type of organism over others that die. “Chevron seven… locked,” Sergeant Harriman concluded the ritual chant. Then he watched, like everyone else in the control room and for the thousandth time, as the event horizon whirled out in a cascade of glacial blue and retracted to a pool across the Stargate. “Seems to be engaging fine,” muttered Major Carter and bent over the dialing computer, backpack already on her shoulders. She’d been recalled from the embarkation room when the wormhole to M3D 335 had failed to establish. “It’s all nominal, and the diagnostics came up okay, too.” “Alright, ma’am. It’s just…” Harriman frowned a little. “Well, it’s not the first time.” “I know. Could be an orbital thing. I’ll look into it while I’m there. For now, and as long as it locks eventually, just roll with the punches. I don’t want to risk messing with the failsafe…” She left it hanging, but George Hammond knew what she was thinking: again. The last override on the failsafe had damn near annihilated a planet whose primary had taken none too kindly to being skewered by a wormhole. Recently two out of seven attempts to establish a connection to M3D 335 had failed, but if and when the wormhole chose to engage, everything worked. Hammond hoped it stayed that way. The last thing he needed was Simmons or Crowley accusing him of trying to sabotage their bright idea. The moon—ten days into the program ’335 was uniformly referred to as Parris Island, though Hammond still refused to adopt the habit—had been declared a training and selection camp for a whole new USMC unit. The jury was still out on how to name the child. Crowley had mooted ‘Force Galaxy’. The various proposals circulating among SGC personnel weren’t quite as swanky. George Hammond favored ‘Space Cadets’. Whatever it was going to be called, it would be an elite attack force operating independently from Stargate Command. As promised, Hammond had received Colonel Simmons’ report within a day of the NID agents’ sudden departure. It had been delivered in person and informed him of the fait accompli. Use of the red phone was discouraged. Given the outcome of that exercise two weeks ago, the President had already approved the report’s central suggestion and ordered the SGC to assist in any way necessary. To underline the point, Simmons had brought along ten Marine instructors and technical specialists who, accompanied by SG-3, had gated out to set

up camp on ’335. During the past week, fifty men had deployed with equipment and supplies. At this moment, another ten troops were gathered in the gate room, waiting to embark. Some distance apart stood Teal’c and Dr. Fraiser, the only people not to jump sky-high when the wormhole engaged. Colonel Norris, who apparently was joining this trip, approached them. There was a brief exchange of words, then he glared up at the control room window, spun around, and stormed out through the blast door. Seconds later Hammond heard him clattering up the stairs. “General! I’d requested an—” Norris caught sight of Sam Carter in full gear and bellowed, “You gotta be kidding me! Not her, too?” “We’re good to go, sir,” Major Carter interjected sweetly. “Wait a minute! I’m not prepared to drag along God knows how many babysitters, including one who isn’t even… American!” “Would you prefer a Russian babysitter?” Hammond smiled when Norris broke into the expected grimace. “It can be arranged, Colonel.” “I don’t—” “You requested an expert on off-world medicine and alien diseases to brief your men. I gave you my CMO who, incidentally, is this world’s leading authority in the field. However, Dr. Fraiser is not a combatant, and I’ve therefore decided to have Major Carter and Teal’c escort her.” Which wasn’t entirely accurate, though Hammond felt no stirrings of guilt. Major Janet Fraiser was an experienced soldier and more than capable of looking after herself. The simple truth was that SG-1 still remained on stand-down, and Teal’c and Sam Carter were getting a little stir-crazy. A friendly snoop around the Marine camp would take the edge off it—and give General Hammond a better idea of what he was up against. Norris blustered some more. “My men are perfectly—” “I’m sure they are. My men are going to accompany Dr. Fraiser, and that’s my last word, Colonel!” “General Crowley will hear of this.” “I’m counting on it.” Knowing he’d won this round, Hammond briefly berated himself for deriving quite so much satisfaction from it. Then he shot a pointed look at Sam Carter. “You have a Go, Major. Godspeed.” “Thank you, sir!” The clipped nod was a military caricature, as was the brisk parade ground turn she executed. Norris seemed to suspect that somehow he was being sent up, but he had no time to dwell on it. Major Carter headed down the stairs, and he all but ran after her, determined to beat the SGC team through the gate. Minutes later the embarkation room was empty, the wormhole winked into oblivion, and the iris slid shut across the Stargate, obstructing the view of gray concrete behind. Hammond gazed at it for a moment, as though it might present him with an excuse to postpone the return to his office a little longer. Nothing was forthcoming. Stifling a sigh, he made for the staircase and the inevitable. The inevitable had been sitting in the in-tray on his desk for ten days. So far he hadn’t even opened it. Neither had anybody else, given that the words Private and Confidential leered from the envelope in a sprawling hand that was only too familiar.

He could guess the contents, which was reason enough to take a leaf out of their author’s book and pretend he wasn’t getting all his memos. Unfortunately, ten days was pushing the limits, and the only miracle was that Jack O’Neill hadn’t called him yet. Hammond slid behind his desk and into the sumptuous orthopedic chair, which, as so often, offered no real comfort. Private and Confidential stared at him accusingly, and he finally fished the letter from the tray, poked a finger under the envelope flap, and started ripping as despondently as he knew how. Halfway through, a knock rattled against his office door. “Come in!” he called, grateful for a reprieve, however temporary. The door opened on an uncommonly bashful Dr. Jackson. He’d abandoned the eye patch for an eggplant raccoon effect that suggested he’d led the mother of all bar brawls. “Am I interrupting, General?” “Sit down, son.” Hammond waved at a chair and waited. Somehow he had the feeling that anything as overtly aggressive as a question would make Daniel run for the hills. Whatever had prompted this visit, it wasn’t a request for a pay raise. As Dr. Jackson settled in the chair, his gaze fell on the semi-opened letter Hammond was still holding, and he obviously recognized the handwriting too. “Not getting all your memos, sir?” George Hammond smiled momentarily, then turned serious again. “I take it you know what’s in here?” “Kind of. Jack, uh, dropped a hint.” He paused, cleared his throat for the third time since entering the room. “General, supposing it is what you and I think it is… What are you going to do?” Good point. Then again, Dr. Jackson’s points usually were. If truth be told, Hammond’s gut instinct and fondest desire was to feed the damn thing to the shredder unread and plead ignorance, but he couldn’t say that, much less do it. Instead he opted for rational if unpleasant ground. “You got a few minutes, Dr. Jackson?” Daniel nodded, eyebrows arching in surprise. “Let me tell you a story.” The only thing to set the tale apart from hundreds like it was the fact that Lieutenant George Hammond had been there and come out the other end. It had happened during his first—no, second—tour in ’Nam. They’d got reports, fabricated by the Viet Cong as it would later turn out, that a whole platoon was nailed down in the jungle, some fifty miles northeast of a village whose name he didn’t care to remember. His CO, an experienced officer, had decided to go in. And in they’d gone, twenty men in all, including Colonel Freeman, and parachuted straight into a killing ground. Only three had made it out alive: a private who subsequently lost his arm, Lieutenant Hammond with a bullet in his leg, and Freeman who, by some cynical twist of fate, had suffered only minor injuries. “You might say it was a clear error of judgment on Freeman’s part.” Hammond leaned back in his chair. “He relied on the intel, because confirming it would have cost too much time while good men might be dying out there. There never was a choice, really, but he’d committed a horrific mistake all the same.” 32

“What became of him?” Dr. Jackson asked softly. “Freeman was, without a doubt, the best commanding officer I ever served under. Bright, gutsy, unconventional, a tactical genius, and he cared about his people to the point of running himself into the ground—and if you think that sounds like somebody we both know, you’d be right. But he made a serious mistake in a situation where he couldn’t afford to make any.” Suddenly Hammond had no wish to go any further. Funny how the grief was still fresh, so many years later. Funny how things didn’t seem rational at all anymore. “What became of him, sir?” “He retired. He felt that he’d failed us, which was a mortal sin in Freeman’s book. According to him, he didn’t deserve to lead anyone. He never said it in so many words, but we knew. The irony was, we’d never stopped trusting him. A few months later he drove his car into a ravine. They only found bits of him among the wreckage.” “So you’re going to run this”—Daniel nodded at the letter clutched in Hammond’s fingers—“through the shredder?” Occasionally, the young man’s mind-reading abilities were a little on the disconcerting side. Nevertheless… “I’m afraid I can’t do that, son. I can’t—” Dr. Jackson got up, stared through the window out into the briefing room, fists jammed into pockets, shoulders rolling with tension. “Jack didn’t—” Suddenly he whipped around. The words tumbled out like water through a breaking dam. “General, this is strictly between you and me. Jack didn’t want us to take it further, and Sam and Teal’c agreed. But I’m not military, and sometimes I find that military notions of honor, ethics, idealism, whatever, get in the way of facts.” His good eye narrowed, and he grinned. “Go ahead, sir. Don’t choke on it.” Sound advice. Hammond let out the chortle that had been creeping up his throat. “That’s a fascinating observation, Dr. Jackson, especially coming from you. And yes, we’ll keep it in this office, if that’s what you want. Go on. What are the facts?” “You can’t let Jack go, sir. Because he didn’t make a mistake.” “That’s not the way it—” “The exercise was rigged. Jack never stood a chance. It was a no-win scenario, designed to get that Marine base up and running… I think.” “Care to elaborate, Dr. Jackson?” Five minutes into the explanation, General Hammond had lost any desire to chortle and silently congratulated himself on sending Major Carter and Teal’c to Parris Island. A saffron expanse with cinnamon clouds filled what little was visible of the sky, and Teal’c instantly succumbed to a sense of oppression. The Stargate was located at the end of a deep, narrow gorge. Either side rose vertical rock walls, a hundred meters high or more. Looking up it was impossible not to conceive the notion that the planet above was about to crush its moon, settle on the surface, and suffocate anyone trapped inside the valley. “Should have brought a helmet,” muttered Major Carter.

Dr. Fraiser seemed unaffected. “Oh, I don’t mind. At least you know you’re offworld.” This probably was true, though Teal’c found it difficult to share the sentiment. Most of his life had been spent off-world on one journey or another; indeed, twice in his one hundred and four years he had been forced to make a home of planets not his own. His birth-world was long lost to him, but at least among the Tauri he had found acceptance and kinship. Behind them the wormhole disengaged with a finality that appeared to disturb even Colonel Norris. “Welcome to M3D 335, Marines!” he shouted, a little too forceful, a little too loud. “Sir! Thank you, sir!” came the reply, molded into uniformity by years of training and rigid discipline. The same training and discipline had compelled these ten young men—mere children by a Jaffa’s reckoning—to arrange themselves in a perfectly straight line and to adopt a stance that evoked pride and a readiness to fight. In truth, they were afraid. Teal’c saw it in their eyes. They were apprehensive of this alien landscape that looked nothing like the Moon they had learned about in their schools, and, more than that, they were apprehensive of admitting their fear. Because they were afraid of Colonel Norris. The discovery was unsurprising. Unlike O’Neill, Colonel Norris did not inspire trust or confidence. Unlike O’Neill, Colonel Norris would never consider punishing himself for failing those who relied on his guidance. “What are you waiting for?” he barked. “Move out! On the double!” A ripple of hesitation traveled down the line, barely perceptible and instantly overridden by the mechanisms of unquestioning obedience. They took up formation, five rows of two, and broke into a brisk trot. Colonel Norris followed them, an avenger alert to any faltering in their step, any sign of uncertainty. O’Neill would have been attuned to their apprehension and, knowing that, of all the ways to combat fear, laughter was the most formidable, would have found some joke, absurd and out of place. And they would have loved him for it. “Don’t look like that, Teal’c.” Major Carter had concluded her routine test of the DHD and gave a crooked smile. “Colonel O’Neill’s the exception, not the rule.” “I am aware of it.” He was, after all, Jaffa. And while Master Bra’tac’s leadership closely resembled that of O’Neill, there were many, too many, who acted like Colonel Norris. “It is one more reason to discourage him from his present course.” “Good luck,” Dr. Fraiser replied dryly. “You know what he’s like. Anyway, I suppose we’d better catch up with Colonel Congenial and his cohort.” “Did you say catch up?” enquired Major Carter, evidently not relishing the idea of an unwarranted run. The moon’s atmosphere was thinner than Earth’s. “Well, I would have said overtake, but what’s the point in embarrassing them?” “If you put it that way. I mean, two women and a guy who’s not even… American?” Grinning, Major Carter adjusted her backpack and set out. Twenty minutes later Teal’c passed the Marine camp’s outer perimeter at a steady jog, barely having broken a sweat. Perhaps it was petty, but he felt he owed O’Neill this victory, inconsequential though it might be. At any rate, it would not have

occurred had Colonel Norris not spurred his men to a faster and faster pace once he noticed the SGC team’s approach. Ignoring the bemused faces of the guards, Teal’c came to a halt and turned to review the situation behind. Dr. Fraiser had fallen back a little, but Major Carter kept abreast of the two Marines in the lead, not forcing a race but making plain that she could match any further increase in speed. Not so Colonel Norris. Teal’c conceded another stab of furtive pleasure, propped himself on his staff weapon, and awaited the column’s arrival. While Major Carter and Dr. Fraiser broke left to join him, the Marines slowed and reformed their line. Some doubled over, gasping for air. Most faces had reddened dangerously. It had been foolish to subject them to such exertion without permitting them to acclimatize first. “Well, that was bracing.” Major Carter dragged her forearm across her face to soak up sweat. “I need a shower.” “That was idiotic,” panted Dr. Fraiser, echoing Teal’c’s own thoughts. She bent over, hands pressed onto her knees, and tried to catch her breath. “The kid over on the right looks like he’s gonna crash! This kind of thing’s alright for you two; you guys swap atmospheres twice a week, but for the rest of us…” “So why didn’t you slow down?” “What? And let him win?” “Attention!” Colonel Norris tone had lost some of its vigor, breath failing him mid-word. Nevertheless, the ten men pulled themselves up straight, some with obvious difficulty. Their unease was overt now. With reason. “You are pathetic! So I’m telling you right now, shape up or ship out! If you want to lose, join the Air Force. They love losing. I don’t.” “Yeah, we noticed,” murmured Major Carter. “You’d rather cheat.” Colonel Norris’ rant continued, the men before him shrinking under every word. Suddenly a hand clasped Teal’c’s shoulder, and an amused voice noted, “Wow! You people sure put a burr up his ass!” “Hi, Warren.” Turning to the speaker, Dr. Fraiser gave a soft laugh. “I don’t think we were supposed to keep up with them.” “Oughta know better, Doc. After all, they’re Marines. Teal’c. Carter. Nobody told me you guys were gonna join the fun.” Major Warren, himself a Marine and SG3’s commanding officer, peered in the direction from where they had come. “Where’re Colonel O’Neill and Dr. Jackson?” “Neither of them’s fit for active duty yet,” Dr. Fraiser answered, a fraction too quickly perhaps, wishing to avoid the subject. However, the major failed to notice. “My men and me still can’t believe that General Custer got the upper hand on O’Neill of all—” “Who?” asked Major Carter. “General Custer.” Major Warren grinned. “Norris’ nickname. Not that anyone’s ever risked calling him that to his face.” “Didn’t realize that Custer was a Marine.” “Neither’s that chicken sh*t,” he replied. Then his gaze roamed over their packs and weaponry. “Anyway, welcome to Parris Island, folks. Let’s find you a place to bunk down, whaddya say?”

As with most linguistic peculiarities of the Tauri, it had taken Teal’c some time to establish the workings of this last phrase. It did not, in fact, require the addressee to say anything. Agreement was a foregone conclusion, as indeed it was in this case. They abandoned Colonel Norris who was still punishing warriors better than himself for his own weakness and followed their guide along a broad, dusty trail toward the camp. Teal’c was unsure at which point during the moon’s diurnal cycle they had arrived, but it seemed to be getting close to nightfall now. The hues of the giant planet above had gradually changed to greens and blues and bathed the landscape in a sallow light. “One good thing about this place, it never rains, though temperatures actually are pretty moderate,” said Major Warren. “No open bodies of water, of course, just a few shallow wells. Most moisture precipitates as morning dew.” This much was evident. The moon’s surface showed no sign of climatic erosion. Its only remarkable geographic feature was the rock formation where the Stargate was hidden. Once past it, they had emerged onto gently rolling plains, dotted with tussocks of short, wiry grass and low brush and extending as far as the eye could see. The encampment was visible for miles around, which posed a danger to say the least. There was a further ramification, and Teal’c found it odd in the extreme. Was it not the purpose of a facility such as this to accustom warriors to a variety of terrains? A little later they reached the central square of the camp. One side was taken up by a large metal hut, along the others stood several smaller structures. East of the square stretched rows of tents. Nothing differed from the arrangements Teal’c had come to expect in a Tauri camp, except— “That’s the commissary cum class room,” said Major Warren, pointing at the large building. “You’ll be doing your lecture in there, Doc.” Dr. Fraiser nodded, and his finger moved on, indicating the smaller huts. “Ammo, communications, sickbay, storage, and lavatory… Uh, I guess we gotta think of something for you ladies. At the moment it’s Boys Only.” He broke into a sudden grin. “Something’s telling me you’re gonna be hugely popular.” “Not if Colonel Norris has anything to do with it,” Major Carter groused. “Is there someplace where I can set up a temporary lab? We’ve been having trouble establishing a wormhole to ’335, and I’d like to check it out.” When she noticed the major’s frown, she hastily added, “Nothing to worry about. Probably to do with the moon’s orbit causing some intermittent gravitational distortion. You won’t get stuck here, Warren.” “I damn well hope not! But yeah, we can rig something for you. I’ll see to it in the morning.” He jerked his chin at the tents behind the square. “Right now quarters are more important. Nights can get chilly. Carter, I hope it’s okay if you and the doc share a tent, and Teal’c, you can move in with me, unless you mind.” “I do not, Major Warren.” “Alright then, let’s go.” Teal’c was about to follow when he realized that Major Carter had remained in the same spot, looking around in puzzlement. It was then that he recognized the cause of the subliminal worry that had bothered him since arriving here. The camp was uncommonly quiet. Too quiet. 36

“Warren?” asked Major Carter. “Where is everybody?” “Where is he?” Dr. Jackson muttered under his breath, hopping from foot to foot and wishing he’d brought a jacket. Even at the end of April, Colorado nights could get fresh. He stabbed the doorbell again, listened as the chime ding-donged through the house and faded. Nothing. Okay, so maybe he should have tried calling first, but Daniel seriously doubted that the soft-spoken Japanese lady with the clock fetish would pass on messages. At least the truck was parked in the driveway. Chances of Jack having shot off to Minnesota were slim, which came as a relief. A few months later he drove his car into a ravine. He couldn’t have gone for a run either. Janet Fraiser had said the bruising would get worse for a couple of weeks before it got better, and even Jack’s masochism had limits. Probably. Knowing him, he was standing on the other side of that door, pulling faces and whispering Shoo! Daniel was in no mood to be shooed. General Hammond’s little story had left him rattled, which explained why he was here—Jack’s admirable efforts to avoid communication notwithstanding. He shivered, blamed it on the night temperatures, and gave up his attack on the doorbell in favor of a reconnoiter around the house. The living room curtains were open, and as he peered in from the deck he saw a light in the kitchen. Just a light, no movement. No movement anywhere else either. Unless Jack was hiding in the basem*nt, he— “D’oh!” Daniel leaped back onto the walkway, tore around the corner and past some bushes, and ducked under the low-hanging branches of a tree to get to the ladder. Halfway up, the beam of a flashlight exploded in his eyes, and a disembodied voice asked, “Drew the short straw, Daniel?” Had he mentioned that, in addition to a finely honed sense of personal accountability, Jack O’Neill possessed the stupendous talent of making Dr. Jackson spit tacks in two seconds flat? “Dammit, Jack! I can’t see a thing!” The beam slid away to illuminate the rungs and allowed Daniel to discern Jack’s silhouette above. The rooftop should have been the first place he looked. “You must have heard me down there. I don’t suppose you could have shouted or something?” “I knew you’d figure it out eventually, and if not…” The silhouette gave a shrug. “You want me to leave?” “Would it make a difference?” The beam danced back into Daniel’s face and was followed by an appreciative whistle. “Shame you haven’t got green eyes.” “What’s wrong with blue?” “Well, one’s red. If you had green eyes, you’d pass for Milton’s devil. One red, one green.” Squinting, Daniel heaved himself onto the roof deck and swatted the flashlight away. “You’ve read Paradise Lost?” “The abridged version. Though it doesn’t explain why the guy’s running around looking like a traffic light.”

“There’s an abridged version?” “One word: Oops.” Daniel hadn’t really meant to groan—the less encouragement Jack got, the better—but it slipped out anyway, if only because Paradise Lost seemed strangely apposite. “Remind me not to discuss literature with you. Ever.” Without warning the flashlight winked out and left Daniel blinking. He heard footsteps, the scrape of metal on wood, and knew that Jack had retreated into the chair by the telescope. Gradually the neon spots in front of Daniel’s eyes receded and solid darkness crumbled to shades of gray as his night vision returned. Jack sat in his chair, hunched over the eyepiece, fingers playing with screws to adjust angle and magnification. The tension in his shoulders and neck gave him away. Half of this was show. All of it was screaming Leave me alone! If Jack had looked any less lonely, Daniel might have taken the hint. As it was, he leaned against the railing, folded his arms across his chest in hopes of warding off the cold, and waited. “So, if not literature, what do you want to discuss?” Jack said at last. “Should we discuss anything?” “You tell me.” Great. They could engage in the question and counter-question game until the cows came home. Better to hop off that particular merry-go-round. And maybe just being here was enough. “Looking at anything nice?” “Check it out.” Jack shifted over and surrendered the eyepiece; It was a pale beige speck on black velvet. Stifling a yawn, Daniel straightened up and returned to his perch. “Exciting.” “Yeah. It’s Io.” Their solar system’s own version of Netu. Not unlike the stuff you saw when you opened a medical textbook under “A” for “Acne”. Only worse. Usually even the wildest zits didn’t spontaneously erupt. This did. Close up, Io’s surface would be a heaving, angry melee of reds and oranges and black. “A moon of Jupiter, right?” Daniel asked, curious to discover where this was going. “Innermost moon. Jupiter’s gravitational pull exacts huge pressure on Io. Its crust shows a tide of up to one hundred meters. The moon gets squeezed out of shape, hence the eruptions. I know how it feels,” Jack added and resumed his study of Zit Central. Daniel bit his tongue. Hard. You didn’t have to be a genius to guess that Jack’s empathy with a volcanic moon wasn’t open for discussion. “What are you going to do?” he finally asked. “About what? Io?” “Yourself. What are you going to do with yourself?” “Don’t know. Move to Minnesota, start up a fishing business.” “There are no pesky fish in your pond, Jack.” “Yeah, well, that’s par for the course, isn’t it?” It was trailed by another silence, vast enough to swallow the Rockies whole. After an eternity and a half, he enquired, “So, did you draw the short straw?” “No straws. Why do there have to be straws?”

“I don’t see Teal’c or Carter.” “I’m sure they would have loved to join this lively little get-together, but they’re off-world.” For once the reaction was completely unguarded. Jack’s head snapped up, and his voice held an odd mix of disappointment, regret, and more than just a trace of jealousy. “Where?” “You miss it already. It’s only been two weeks. Jack. How long do you plan for this retirement thing to last?” The dark shape by the telescope stiffened, fingers clenching in an effort to contain either a sharp reply or the longing to be out there and do what he’d always been meant to do. “Technically I’m still off-duty. Where?” “M3D…” A premature mosquito zeroed in on Daniel. He slapped at it, slapped again, missed again. “335.” “Of course! M3D 335, the marvel of the galaxy—Goa’uld fashion malls, Tollan karaoke clubs, and Nox hairdressers. Care to be a little more specific? What’s there?” And that sounded completely like Jack. Whether he liked it or not, leadership was second nature. If he couldn’t physically command a team, he did his clucking vicariously. “Daniel? What’s there?” “A Marine base.” “A what?” The temptation to spill everything he’d told General Hammond was so strong Daniel had to grit his teeth against it. It would be counterproductive. Any mention of the exercise having been rigged would be a red flag to Jack, who’d already made abundantly clear that, for him, ignorance was no excuse. The trick lay in feeding him just enough information to keep him interested. As long as he was interested, he’d stay away from cars and ravines. Daniel pushed himself off the railing. “Look, I’m freezing my butt off up here. Let’s go downstairs, have a beer, and I’ll fill you in.” “I thought you didn’t like beer.” “I’ve been known to make exceptions for friends.”

CHAPTER FIVE

“I think this’ll do, ma’am.” The corporal, detailed by Major A. Warren, twisted and squirmed and yanked until he and the table he was carrying popped free of the frame and catapulted through the door. They’d cleared out half a storage hut—well, mostly they’d just pushed and piled crates together—to make space for a desk and Sam Carter’s laptop, a few other bits of electronic equipment and a small naquadah generator to supply the power. It still looked like a derelict woodshed, but this was as good as it got and besides she’d only be stuck here for a day. “This’ll do nicely, Corporal,” said Sam. “Anything else I can get you, ma’am?” She squinted at an indecisive patch of brightness in the side wall. “A bucket of hot water and a rag to clean the window, maybe.” “I’ll do that.” His indignant tone implied that the mere idea of an officer fiddling with buckets and rags was a court-martialable offense. He made to leave, hesitated, turned back. “And ma’am?” “Yes, Corporal?” “Yesterday… that was pretty damn impressive, ma’am.” If truth be told, the compliment came as a surprise. It could as easily have been resentment, given that he was one of the new arrivals who’d got their heads ripped off after that impromptu little race. She decided to return the favor. “Look, Corporal, under normal circ*mstances you guys would have outrun anyone but Teal’c. Once you’re acclimated to the thin air, you’ll leave the rest of us standing.” “That’s good of you to say, ma’am.” He shot her a crooked grin, blushed. “’Cos Colonel Norris—” “Corporal, between you, me, and the crates, Colonel Norris had no right to treat you like that. If you were any less fit, you’d have keeled over.” “Thanks, ma’am. I mean it. I…” The blush deepened, and he stared at her with open adoration until he caught himself. Whereupon, and despite the fact that the major wasn’t covered, he saluted crisply and fled the hut. Sam clamped down on a laugh and set about installing her equipment, soon accompanied by the squeak of leather on glass. Her corporal was spit-shining the window. Just over an hour later—the squeaking had ceased by then—she sat on a crate, elbows propped on the desk, chin on her fists. “Okay, that is weird,” muttered Major Dr. Carter, ogling the graph on her computer screen. “What is?” asked a voice from the door. “Morning, Sam.”

She gazed up and at Dr. Fraiser, swathed in the freshly-scrubbed glow of a recent shower. “Hi, Janet. Anybody ever tell you that you snore?” “Hey! Being field personnel doesn’t give you the right to get mouthy.” “It does, according to Colonel O’Neill.” As soon as it was out, Sam wished she hadn’t said it and forced a smile. Very few things got past Janet. “You miss him.” Of course she did. Who wouldn’t? But, to quote the Colonel, she and Janet had had this discussion, and they were not having it again. “Parris Island to Sam. Come in, Sam.” Head co*cked, Janet gazed at her. “This anything to do with why you got up in the middle of the night?” “Uh, no. It’s just… Pull up a box and look at this.” “How about you scoot over?” Janet squeezed next to her onto the crate and stared at the innocent graph. “So, what’s so remarkable about this?” “Nothing. That’s what’s remarkable.” Despite the claustrophobic skyscape it created, ’335’s primary fundamentally consisted of a lot of hot air. It had nowhere near enough mass and was too far away to mess with the moon’s orbit. “Obviously gravitational fluctuation isn’t what’s interfering with the gate.” “Is that good news or bad?” “Don’t know yet.” Sam shrugged. “I’ll just have to go back to the drawing board.” “Yeah, but not now. I’m about to go sing for my supper, and I need moral support.” “What about Teal’c?” “I haven’t seen him since last night. Warren says he took off at first light, probably reconnoitering.” “Oh.” Sam was surprised that Teal’c hadn’t let her know. Then again, this wasn’t a mission, and she hadn’t been put in official command. “Well, the problem’s not gonna go away.” Closing the lid of her laptop, she rose. “Shall we?” Though the planet overhead had gone back to its killer satsuma look, the day was pleasant enough. A gentle breeze sent streamers of dust swirling around the square, and halfway across Sam decided that joining Janet had been a very good idea. From the commissary drifted the unmistakable aroma of fresh coffee. Inside, somebody had arranged tables and chairs classroom-style, facing the short wall and a blackboard. Janet took one glance, sighed, and dragged her feet to the lectern. Leaving her to her fate, Sam veered off to the bar to get that coffee. As she sipped the hot, bitter brew she watched the Marines trickle in, ignoring a mix of come-on grins and hostile glares—the latter from Colonel Norris and his cronies. Yesterday they’d been told that two thirds of the men were assigned to night maneuvers, which explained why the camp had been so quiet. This morning it did seem a little more populated, but there were sixty men supposed to be permanently stationed here. Right now, the commissary held just over thirty and all chairs were occupied. So where was the rest? Not interested in alien diseases? Major Warren marched to the front and introduced Janet. The response was a polite smattering of applause and a nucleus of hoots and whistles that pinpointed SG-

3’s position. A scowl at his team clashed with the emcee routine, and Warren said, “Over to Dr. Fraiser.” Janet was a natural. Within five minutes she had the Marines eating out of her hand. Of course, the subject wasn’t exactly boring. Glowy, aerobic, intelligent bacteria that proposed to take over Earth and eat a conveniently skewered officer alive while they were at it… That one had been a joyride and a half, thank you very much. Sam, who’d witnessed the effects of most and fallen victim to a representative selection of alien organisms, wasn’t really keen on a trip down memory lane. “The trick actually is lateral thinking,” said Janet. “Sometimes what you’d consider to be a common garden variety remedy can be life-saving. How many of you suffer from allergies?” Twelve hands went up. “Got antihistamines on you?” “Yes, ma’am,” chorused a few voices. “Congratulations. You guys won’t get the Neanderthal bug. About four years ago…” Sam had sudden visions of sweet little tank top numbers, locker rooms, and alpha males, felt a hot tingle across her chest and up her neck, and knew she’d just gone bright scarlet. If Janet so much as breathed a word of who and what had been involved in that incident, she’d kill her. Mercifully, at that moment the door opened and a few stragglers trudged in, temporarily interrupting the lecture and bringing the attendance total up to thirty-six. Right behind the stragglers entered Teal’c, and Sam didn’t like the expression on his face. At all. She’d seen it only a few times over the years, but on each occasion the crap had started raining from on high shortly thereafter. Putting down her coffee mug, she began sidling over to him. A barely perceptible shake of his head stopped her, and Teal’c casually leaned against the wall by the door, pretending to be enthralled by the lecture. Sam followed his lead, picked up the mug again, and tried to look fascinated between halfhearted sips. From the corner of her eye she watched the newcomers move up along the counter. The guy in front was about four meters away from her when she sensed it and instantly knew what had rattled Teal’c so much. It wasn’t really a feeling, at least none she could describe. Some kind of amorphous tug, a forgotten scent, a caress of cobwebs, everywhere and nowhere and completely unique. Like other people could taste the coppery tang of blood, Sam could taste naquadah. She tasted it now. The three Marines who ordered coffee at the bar carried Goa’uld. Conrad’s upper lip curled a little as though he’d smelled a stealthy fart. His version of a sneer, quite understated for a Goa’uld. It was directed at the jerry-rigged communication globe, which admittedly wouldn’t win any beauty contests. The design was courtesy of Harry Maybourne who’d been in the habit of tossing alien gadgetry at his renegade geeks and saying Make it work! The geeks had been incapable of reproducing Goa’uld anti-grav technology, and so, instead of hovering gracefully, the globe was hardwired into some sort of metal briefcase.

Frowning, Simmons decided to ignore the design flaws. “What are you waiting for? Turn it on!” “Yes, my lord.” Conrad’s sneer lost any trace of understatement. “Considering that I can make your head blow off at the push of a button, I suppose that, yes, I am your lord. And you heard me. Turn it on!” As Conrad activated the globe, a flare of his eyes incinerated the smirk. Obedience didn’t sit well with him. Opaque gray began to swirl, like ink in water, and cleared to show a vast, ancient hall half eaten by the jungle; a ruin, long abandoned, throttled by creepers snaking up pillars and across stone tiles and pierced by dazzling shafts of sunlight that broke through a rotting roof. For a moment Simmons could almost feel the heat and humidity. At the far end of the hall, past a wide archway, cascaded a waterfall, cool counterpoint to the steaming rainforest. Then a man came into view, dragging himself from pillar to pillar, nails torn and fingers bleeding. The tan desert uniform that made him stand out like a sore thumb among the greenery was ripped and streaked with dirt and blood. Down his back and under his arms spread dark patches of sweat, gluing fabric to skin. His face wasn’t visible, only an island of hair left after a crew cut, stiff with filth and perspiration and bristling from a square skull. He twisted a little to check his six, and Simmons could make out the insignia on his sleeve. One of the very first group. If he’d survived out there for ten days, he was more than capable. The indigenous life forms were a force to be reckoned with, but of course there was an added bonus, just to turn this into a real challenge. And weed out the candidates who weren’t suited. This one had salvation in his sights now. Ten more meters, and he’d be home free. “He shall not succeed,” Conrad declared with supreme certainty. Around his mouth played a cold smile, advertising that he looked forward to failure and, beyond that, to failure’s consequences. “How many more, Simmons?” “As many as it takes, not that it’s any of your business!” The man, so close now that Simmons saw sweat beading between stubbly hair and rolling down the sunburned neck, raised his head. The face was coated in mud— a hopeless attempt at camouflage—and scored with white lines where perspiration had dissolved the dirt. White patches, too, around eyes slitted with fatigue. Suddenly the eyes went wide. He finally had seen the stealthy predator lying in wait for him. Conrad had been right—or maybe not. It all depended on what the man would do next. There was a hint of motion. Was he reaching for the submachine gun he carried? Perhaps. Perhaps he even aimed it. But then his mouth opened, showing bloodsmeared gums and teeth; likely the result of trying to live off the land. Most types of local vegetation disagreed with the human physiology Please, he mouthed. Please. “Wrong answer. Thank you for playing,” Colonel Frank Simmons said dryly and through a sliver of dissatisfaction. Passing it on would help. He turned to Conrad. “Switch it over. I want to talk to your ‘mistress’.” “I wish to—”

“Switch it over!” An occasional demonstration of power could only be salutary. The Goa’uld had to be kept in his place. Besides, Simmons enjoyed his frustration. Gray swirls obscured the image in the globe and, moments later, parted on Nirrti, whose expression was as sour as Conrad’s or his own and for pretty much the same reasons. She must have deliberately underdressed for her visit to Earth. Back then she’d worn a nine-year-old’s idea of a ninja costume—just as well, considering the alternatives. Today it was a pink sari with heavy gold trim, whose gaiety contradicted the lady’s mood. “Is this what the Tauri call elite soldiers, Simmons? They would not survive a Jaffa child’s training.” “Forgive me if I doubt that.” Simmons shrugged, unwilling to submit to the exquisite tedium of her bullying. “How many so far?” “Eleven.” She stared at him blankly. For a second he wondered if she was lying, then discarded the thought. The men were loyal to him, to Earth, and the only way for her to reap the benefits was through full cooperation. He’d made that clear enough. But eleven were deplorably few. “What about the others?” The image switched to a view of the outer wall of the ruins and the native predators fighting over a mangled body. When Nirrti reappeared she was smiling. “Alas.” “All of them?” he asked. Her turn to shrug. “Some of them are still alive in the forest. I do not know how many. They will either reach their destination or they will die. Unless, of course…” She stepped aside. “I have taken the liberty of retaining one of the rejects. He pleases me.” Standing behind her was a man in his mid to late twenties, clad in a pair of voluminous oriental pants of blue fabric and little else, apart from leather bands around his biceps and neck. The well-muscled chest was bare and scored with angry red welts—marks from claws or fingernails—and the hairstyle gave him away. One of the Marines. “Come here,” crooned Nirrti, and he took a few steps toward her, knelt, eyes downcast. She languidly slipped a hand under his chin, yanked up his head. “Who am I? Tell me who I am!” “The one I love. The one I die for. The one whose will is my command.” On his face stood an incongruous blend of abject terror and mindless devotion. Simmons recognized the look. He’d seen it in the eyes of one of the escort agents, the morning after that same agent, a strapping blond farm boy, had spent the night supposedly guarding Nirrti’s quarters. Favoring prevention over cure, Simmons had ordered the man shot. Now he ground his teeth. What if she did the same thing to others? Then again, would it matter? She’d already given him eleven Jaffa, and as she’d said, this one was a reject. “Dispose of him,” he ordered, careful to keep his voice even. “He pleases me.” “He doesn’t please me. Dispose of him!”

“Why?” Nirrti’s features contorted to a moue that clashed with the cold, dangerous gleam in her eyes. “Because this isn’t part of our agreement. And because,” he added to sweeten the demand, “you’ll be otherwise engaged. Your… additional request?” “Yes?” “It’s about to be fulfilled.” “I am pleased.” The smile flashed up with positively alarming speed. At the same time, the palmpiece of the ribbon device on her left hand and wrist began to glow. Slowly, sinuously, the hand came up until it hovered above the Marine’s head. The light intensified, the beam melting into his forehead, soaking his upturned face in golden radiance. Simmons was beginning to think that it actually looked quite beautiful. Then the man’s mouth opened in a silent scream. Seconds later he collapsed, blood trickling from his nose and ears. “You drive a hard bargain, Simmons,” said Nirrti, her voice holding a note almost akin to regret. Without warning, gray ink obscured the globe. End of conversation. When Frank Simmons glanced up, Conrad was sneering again. It was late—very late—afternoon by the time the last members of the audience stopped flirting with her and filtered out the door. Dr. Janet Fraiser wished she hadn’t touched the camp cook’s idea of a gourmet lunch. To make matters worse, in the course of two lectures and two Q&A sessions she must have drunk at least five gallons of water. While it hadn’t stopped her throat from going sore with talk, it’d made her bloat like a dead fish. Slipping behind the lectern, she unbuttoned the top of her pants. Better. It would get better still once she grabbed a chance to declare the lavatories Girls Only. Which had to happen within the next ten minutes, else— “Dr. Fraiser!” Janet swallowed a groan and wondered how she could square it with the Hippocratic Oath to give Colonel Norris a lingering disease. First, do no harm. Mono sprang to mind. She’d do the universe a favor by putting the guy out of commission for a couple of months. Then again, he’d probably turn out to be a carrier and not go symptomatic. It’d have to be something more reliable. Rabies, maybe… For the time being, she pasted on a grimace that might or might not pass for a smile and watched Norris slalom around orphaned chairs; a cadaverous six-footer in desert fatigues and thinning hair who looked like he had yet another axe to grind. “Colonel. What can I do for you?” “Dr. Fraiser. That was”—bony nose twitching, he gagged on the praise long enough for Janet to contemplate botching a Heimlich Maneuver—“useful.” “Thank you,” she said noncommittally. Past his left shoulder she saw Sam Carter closing in on them. Weird, actually. She hadn’t expected Sam to stay all the way through. “Was there anything else, sir?” “Yes. When are you and your escort planning to leave?” “Well, I was going to—”

“We’re leaving tonight.” Sam had arrived, and her voice held an edge that preempted any contradiction. “As I understand, General Hammond had agreed to Dr. Fraiser delivering two lectures, nothing more.” “Already tired of our hospitality, Major?” Norris grinned an ugly little grin. Sam returned it in kind. “That would be virtually impossible, Colonel. Fact of the matter is, I ran some polarization spectroscopy measurements early this morning. The moon’s gravitational acceleration shows a distinct abnormality, which may or may not affect the functioning of the Stargate. Unfortunately, I can’t complete the tests with the equipment I’ve got here. I’m guessing that you and your men intend to get back home at some point, so it’s in your own best interest if I return to the SGC and continue my work.” By the end of this speech the colonel’s complexion had assumed an attractive shade of green. Dr. Fraiser, on the other hand, was hard pushed to sustain her expression of polite interest. For one thing, she rather enjoyed the sight of Norris just about wetting himself. For another. Dr. Samantha Carter had just completely contradicted her previous findings. “I’ve been assured that this was safe!” yelped Norris. “Hammond himself told me—” “General Hammond had no reason to suspect a problem. The MALP readings came back normal. The odds of this happening are one in a—” “You’re suggesting we evacuate?” Norris’ splutter notwithstanding, he seemed to be hoping for an affirmative answer. “I’m not suggesting anything, sir,” Sam replied, her studied indifference unnerving Norris even more. “There’s a chance that it’s nothing at all. However, you might want to order everyone back to camp, just in case.” “Yes. Yes, I’ll see to it. I’ll also detail an escort for you.” “That won’t be—” Norris was already scrambling for the exit, practically at a run. “—necessary.” Staring after him, Sam Carter expelled a slow breath. “Get your things, Janet. We’re leaving.” “What’s polarization spectroscopy?” “Something some guys at JPL are working on,” she murmured absently, still watching the door. “Sounds great, but they haven’t cracked it yet.” “You are aware that you just lied to a superior officer?” “He’ll get over it. Besides, I’d dispute the superior part.” Suddenly she whipped around, face tense, a small muscle in her jaw twitching with impatience. “What the hell are you waiting for?” Up until this moment Janet Fraiser had nursed the admittedly improbable idea that, somehow, this was an elaborate hoax at Colonel Norris’ expense. Of course, Major Carter wasn’t in the habit of playing practical jokes. Nor did she snap at her friends—unless she was hip-deep in command mode. Like now. “For God’s sake, Sam, what’s—” “Later, Janet. Let’s go.” She started moving toward the door. Dr. Fraiser scooped up the lecture notes and hurried after her. “Where’s Teal’c?” Like some of the audience, the Jaffa had left after lunch.

“Keeping an eye on some… relatives. He’ll be meeting us at the tent.” Relatives? And what exactly was that supposed to mean? On the other hand, it might be wise not to examine the question too closely. It opened up some nasty possibilities. Without noticing, Janet picked up her pace. Out in the square, Marines flocked in small gaggles to chat and enjoy the spectacle of ‘planetset’—not that the ugly menace ever really did set. It just slipped two thirds of the way under the horizon and turned brown. Norris was nowhere to be seen, but at least he hadn’t galloped through camp, hollering To arms! To arms! The place still seemed drowsily quiet, and Janet suddenly realized that, if there was a command barrack somewhere, Warren had omitted to point it out during their guided tour yesterday. So who was running this show and from where? Later, she reminded herself with a last wistful glance at the lavatory and stumbled after Sam. When they got to their tent, Teal’c was there already, posted outside and looking grim. Okay, grimmer than usual. For the first time, Sam’s poise faltered. “Where are they?” she hissed softly. “Together with five others they set out in the direction of the Stargate approximately thirty minutes ago,” Teal’c replied just as quietly. “I considered it imprudent to follow.” “Crap,” muttered Sam, a worried crease between her eyebrows deepening. “As O’Neill would say, we shall traverse that viaduct when we reach it.” Jack O’Neill wouldn’t say anything of the sort, at least not in these terms, and Teal’c damn well knew it. It had to be a Jaffa joke. His attempt at lightening the mood was partially successful. Dr. Fraiser grinned. Major Carter probably grinned internally. “Can you stay with Janet, Teal’c? I need to fetch my equipment. After the yarn I’ve spun for Norris, somebody might get suspicious if I leave it.” He solemnly indicated the aluminum case strapped to his already sizeable backpack. “I understand the naquadah reactor is part of the onsite facilities.” “Should have known.” Sam gave a hint of a smile. “Thanks, Teal’c.” His only reply was a wordless incline of the head. During the five minutes it took to gather their belongings from the tent and fling them into backpacks, Sam waxed equally chatty and her movements were stiff and over-controlled. Finally she asked, “Ready?” Strictly speaking, it wasn’t a question. Janet hadn’t heard a question mark, and that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. “No! I gotta go pee, if it’s the last thing I do.” The doctor’s flippant remark kept playing in Teal’c’s mind, mostly because he dreaded her being proven correct. In the cold actinic light of the planet the rock formation looked like one of those forbidding glass-fronted edifices the Tauri liked to erect. Directly ahead yawned the black chasm at whose end waited the Stargate. Not for the first time, he marveled at the purpose of its location. What had been the intent of the Ancients or Goa’uld who had put the Chappa’ai there? To hide it? Or to control access?

Without a doubt, the answer to the riddle would be given sooner than Teal’c preferred, and so he turned once more to survey the plain behind them. Far off twinkled the lights of the Marine camp, drowning in a sea of blue gloom. This moon knew no true night, which might be of advantage before long; even sparse light was better than none. Out on the plain, nothing stirred. Or at least nothing stirred that should not have, and he still puzzled over the whereabouts of the men absent from the camp. In the course of his search this morning, he had been unable to find any tracks, save those that led to the Stargate valley. Even now, after Colonel Norris presumably had undertaken to recall the troops, the only discernible movement and sound came from dry grass brushed by the night breeze. And from the four Marines who constituted their escort and followed at a short distance behind Teal’c. Their presence, though unwelcome, provided some vague reassurance. None of them was anything more than he seemed. The gamble of waiting until the end of Dr. Fraiser’s lectures and leaving in a normal manner appeared to have borne fruit. Their departure had drawn stares from a handful of men gathered in the camp square, but otherwise it had attracted little notice. However, this could have been a ruse as ingenious as the one that Major Carter had devised to hoodwink Colonel Norris. They would not know for certain until they entered the gorge. Teal’c turned back and broke into an easy lope until he caught up with his companions. “Anything?” asked Major Carter. “Nothing as yet. Although I fear that we may be intercepted at the Stargate.” “You and me both, Teal’c.” Her fingers closed more tightly around the P90 strapped across her midriff. “You and me both.” “I know you sensed them.” Dr. Fraiser had been apprised of the situation as soon as they had left the camp and its potential eavesdroppers behind. Though seasoned with a pinch of disbelief, her mood had improved since. “But are you sure they sensed you—or Teal’c, rather?” “You can’t help sensing it, Janet,” replied Major Carter. “It’s just there. It’s, the naquadah in the Goa’uld’s blood. They get close enough, the alarms go off, no matter how preoccupied you are, and it works both ways.” “Perhaps Dr. Fraiser’s question is valid.” Teal’c had not considered this before, but it was entirely possible. “The men did not act like Goa’uld. There is another way of carrying a symbiote, Major Carter.” She looked at him sharply. “Jaffa? You’re saying those guys are Jaffa?” “Not true Jaffa.” They did not wear tattoos to visibly brand them a system lord’s slaves. But, again, there were other ways. “Jaffa can be created, as you are well aware.” “Don’t remind me,” she glumly said over Dr. Fraiser’s soft groan. After a second, Major Carter added, “Even if they’re Jaffa, it doesn’t make any difference. They would have sensed you.” “Indeed. However, when I first encountered them on my return to the camp this morning, they did not react to me. I thought it was subterfuge.” Teal’c pondered this briefly and continued, “But if these men were not brought up Jaffa, they would lack the training and skills to fully benefit from the advantages a symbiote bestows. They may not have known what it was they were sensing.” 48

“Teal’c, I wasn’t brought up Jaffa—or Tok’ra for that matter—but I still know what’s what.” “Because, in addition to the symbiote and that protein marker, you got Jolinar’s memories. Unabridged edition,” the doctor interjected. “Dr. Fraiser is correct. You did not have to learn, because you were blended. These men are not.” “Well, let’s hope you’re both right. Because, if they’re Goa’uld after all and realized we’re on to them, I’d really hate to meet them in there.” They had reached the entrance to the gorge, and Major Carter brought up her weapon. The beam of its small, strong flashlight bored ahead into a passage barely four meters wide and seamed by rock too sheer and smooth to be scaled. From here it would be approximately five minutes’ march to the Stargate. Teal’c’s every instinct balked at the notion of proceeding into this trap, but there was no choice. He accelerated his pace to take point. A minute smile audible in her voice, Major Carter stopped him. “Teal’c, if you don’t mind, I’d rather have you watching our six. It’s that whirling the staff weapon and shooting backward trick.” “I see.” And he did. Their escort was an unknown quantity. For a while they walked in silence, all senses keyed to their surroundings. Teal’c heard the whispered footfalls of a small night creature scampering to safety at their passing; the far-off cry of a bird of prey and its mate’s answer; the muted voices of the men behind him, discussing a variety of subjects, from commanding officers to sexual exploits. The Marines, at least, felt at ease in this place. Suddenly Dr. Fraiser murmured, “Sam? Did you warn Warren?” The flashlight’s beam jerked up a fraction and settled back onto their path, telling Teal’c that Major Carter had flinched. He knew why. It had been the only possible course to take, but it went against the one rule O’Neill held immutable, for himself and for his team. Nobody gets left behind. “No,” she said softly and then, more to herself than to Dr. Fraiser, “I couldn’t risk it. We’ll brief General Hammond and be back with reinforcements by tomorrow evening at the latest. If Warren’s involved in whatever this is, he’d have stopped us. If he isn’t, he’ll be safer not knowing.” The gorge took a sharp bend to the left, the rock barriers narrowing. Teal’c remembered this feature. Past the bend, the ravine would open abruptly into the crater that held the Stargate. If there was to be an ambush, it would be his task to prevent the Marines behind from closing the narrows. Ahead, Major Carter and then Dr. Fraiser disappeared from view and his immediate protection. An impulse to race after them screamed to be obeyed. Teal’c curbed it, fell back even further so as not to lose the Marines, and followed the shimmer of the light that hovered along rock walls like a ghost. His world shrank to this dancing glow, the white plumes of his breath rising in the air, and the echoes of footsteps before and behind. No sight or sound out of the ordinary. When he emerged from the narrows, a familiar sensation leaped at him with painful acuity. Major Carter and Dr. Fraiser stood motionless, staring at the Stargate and the three men posted in front of it. Only three. The five who had accompanied them were 49

nowhere to be seen. Deep within his pouch, Teal’c felt a ripple; the symbiote stirring, affected by its carrier’s tension—or the proximity of its kind. This time the men did react. Their weapons came up. One of them, tall and heavily muscled, slowly walked down the steps of the dais. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he demanded, his submachine gun aimed at Major Carter. “Drop the Rambo act, Poletti! They’re going home!” The voice at his back very nearly startled Teal’c into a jump. Their escort’s leader stepped out in front of them. “You hear me, you dumb guinea? It’s Johnson. Stand down and breathe, will ya?” Approaching, Mr. Poletti swore, lowered his weapon, and signaled his comrades to do the same. “Jesus Christ, Johnson! Nobody told us you guys were coming!” “Yeah, well. Nice to know you weren’t asleep.” “Who’d wanna sleep in this creepy sh*t-hole?” Mr. Poletti seemed to reflect on his choice of words and, with a nod at Major Carter and Dr. Fraiser added, “Sorry, ma’am, Doc. Uh, I really enjoyed that talk of yours by the way. Shame we had to leave.” “Thanks,” Dr. Fraiser said weakly, her tone betraying an uncertainty Teal’c shared. Of one thing, however, he was certain now. These men were not Goa’uld. A Goa’uld never would have countenanced an insult, no matter how jocular. They had to be Jaffa therefore—although it still did not explain by whom and for what reason they had been created. “Look, gentlemen, it’s getting a little chilly, and I’d hate to catch a cold. So, if it’s okay with you?” Major Carter motioned at the DHD, her weapon lowered but still unsafed. “Of course, ma’am.” Mr. Poletti moved aside, smiling. “All yours.” While Major Carter stepped to the DHD and dialed, the other two men moved down from the dais and joined Mr. Poletti in a tight group. Their backs were turned on Teal’c, who could hear them whispering. It disturbed him, but there was no palpable reason to interfere. One by one the chevrons locked with reassuring clanks and the wormhole established in a splendid flare of power. Teal’c released a breath he had been unaware of holding and, as soon as Major Carter had entered the ID code, nudged Dr. Fraiser forward. The doctor hurried past the men, up the dais, and disappeared in the event horizon. Over by the DHD, Major Carter had turned to face him, her eyes issuing a silent command. This time he refused. He would not leave M3D 335 until he knew her safe. A slight nod conceded his choice, and she went to follow Dr. Fraiser. “Well, it’s been a pleasure,” said the escort’s leader. Teal’c inclined his head in acknowledgment and walked toward the Stargate, acutely aware of the Marines’ stares. Their eyes seemed to be burning his back, but the men never moved. Then he was at the dais, and four large strides carried him up the steps and into the wormhole. The fractional part of his higher consciousness that always remained alert to the journey registered the wrongness now, and it was screaming. Untold forces tore at

him, intent to shred his every fiber until he was nothing but dust drifting in the vastness of space. Wrapped in icy agony, he howled his defiance, was still howling when the Stargate spat him out onto spongy ground, wet and redolent with the stench of decay. Impossibly far above him the wormhole disengaged, leaving the Stargate a gaping hole in the forehead of a face carved into ancient masonry. Above that mask soared the impenetrable canopy of a rainforest. Groaning, every joint aflame, Teal’c pushed himself to his knees. A few meters to his right lay Dr. Fraiser, unconscious, bleeding from a head wound. She had struck the root of a giant tree. Not far from her, Major Carter was drowsily straggling to her feet. He saw her eyes widen when the realization hit home. “Where the hell are we, and where’s the DHD?” “I do not—” As silent as it was ferocious, the attack came without warning.

CHAPTER SIX

Reward Pathway: Areas of the brain stimulated while a subject is engaged in pleasurable activity. General Hammond contemplated a heap of unattended paperwork—taller by three inches than the sheaf of documents in his out-tray—and wondered why vital matters such as parking permits for visiting officers couldn’t be authorized by someone of less exalted rank. Then again, the whole point of doing paperwork was to avoid witnessing the deployment of another twenty Marines to ’335. If Crowley kept going at this clip, he’d run out of Earthside personnel by the end of next week. Holding on to that thought, Hammond peeled a two-page document from the heap, this one a request from SG-11 for permission to wear sneakers instead of combat boots on archeological digs. Apparently artifacts, when trodden on, responded better to sneakers. Well, that was painless. Next. Next was an advisory to the engineering unit, which shouldn’t have landed on his desk in the first place. From underneath peered Colonel O’Neill’s letter, still half-opened, the way he’d left it after Dr. Jackson’s remarkable disclosure. In the four days since that conversation, Hammond had called in a handful of chits and launched some very hushed enquiries into General Crowley and his connections to the NID. So far it’d got him zip. He’d even formalized Major Carter’s rather inspired call to her friend, Augustus the Unpronounceable, only to receive a terse email from Mr. Przsemolensky’s superior at the NRO, informing General Hammond that there were no satellite pictures of the Colorado Springs area taken at that time. He didn’t know what annoyed him more: the man’s low opinion of his mental faculties—Cheyenne Mountain rated twenty-four hour satellite surveillance— or the sheer frustration of it all. Still, something needed to be done. Hammond tugged at the letter. Its tattered flap caught on a paper clip, with the result that the whole stack of correspondence keeled over and spilled onto the floor. The ensuing blue streak was interrupted by a rap on his office door. “Come in!” grunted Major General George Hammond, doubled over in the chair and gathering the equivalent of a medium-size forest from the carpet. “Ah. I’ll come back later, sir.” Hearing the voice, Hammond shot up abruptly. The impact of his skull on the underside of the desk loosened a tooth or two. Biting back another curse, he bellowed, “You’ll do nothing of the kind, Colonel! Sit down!” By the time Hammond had extricated his head from under the desk and straightened up, Jack had eased himself into a chair. He wore civvies, looked like he’d been subsisting on a diet of coffee and next to no sleep, and did a great job of 52

avoiding Hammond’s gaze. Which admittedly wasn’t all that difficult, given the mess. Jack studied it intently and finally looked up. “Bad day, General?” “I’ve had fourteen of them so far, and counting.” “The Marine base?” Seeing his CO’s frown, he added, “Don’t blame Daniel, sir. He couldn’t help it. I plied him with beer until he talked.” The grin he was aiming for didn’t quite materialize. “It’s my fault, isn’t? If I hadn’t blown the exercise, they—” “The exercise was rigged.” The anger coiled behind Jack’s eyes erupted. “I told them I didn’t want it to go any further! Who was it? Carter? Daniel?” “I may be an old fool, son, but there’s still a thing or two I can figure out for myself.” Technically, it wasn’t a lie. Hammond felt rather pleased with himself. Not least because it took the wind out of Jack’s sails. To an extent. “Like what, sir? The infamous grappling hook theory? I suppose it didn’t occur to you or my team that it’d be a piece of cake if you did it in two stages: get up to the gallery first, and from there to the girders.” “And on the gallery you hook onto what? An antique railing that broke when you fell against it?” “It could have been a weak spot. Look, sir, one thing that’s not gonna happen is me trying to avoid the consequences by accusing another officer.” At that moment the klaxons went off. Jack’s hands closed on the armrests of the chair, as though he were about to push himself up and run downstairs to the control room. And then it passed. He sank back, a look of defeat in his eyes. George Hammond had seen that same look thirty-odd years ago, and it scared the hell out of him. It always was the best who were hit hardest, because you didn’t get to be best if you didn’t care. And yes, you knew that death was on the cards every time you led a team out there. Jack knew it as well as Freeman had known. But seeing people you care about die—even in an exercise—because of a mistake you’ve made… now, that was a whole different ballgame. After that, you ended up doubting your choice of toothpaste and breakfast cereal, and never mind your ability to lead a team. Aware of the scrutiny, Jack tried to dodge Hammond’s gaze again. He zeroed in on the wad of papers rescued from the floor and, as luck would have it, the letter lay topmost. “I’d been wondering why I hadn’t heard from you. It’s why I’m here, really.” “I tried to call you a couple of times, Jack. Kept getting a lady who speaks Japanese.” “Oh.” For a second he looked genuinely puzzled, then he nodded at the letter. “You should read it, sir. I’m saying some pretty nice things about you.” “It’s the rest I’m worried about. I—” The knock was vigorous enough to make the door hinges rattle. “That’s gotta be a Marine,” muttered Jack. “Behave, Colonel.” Hammond stepped on a grin. “Come in!”

It turned out to be an admirable piece of divination on Jack’s part. The door opened on the somewhat crumpled shape of Major Warren, fresh through the gate and obviously in one big hurry. “General Hammond. Colonel. Sorry to butt in, sirs.” Grimacing, Jack hauled himself from the chair. “I’d better—” “Stay put, son! We’re not finished yet,” snapped Hammond and, just to be on the safe side, waited until the delinquent had sat back down before addressing Major Warren. “Good to see you back, Major. What can I do for you?” The expression on Warren’s face plainly said that, whatever he’d expected, it wasn’t this. “Major Carter’s lab results, sir. Has she come up with anything yet? Colonel Norris is getting a little antsy and… Well, he wasn’t real happy about you letting those troops gate out to ’335.” Whatever General Hammond had expected, it wasn’t this either. “Care to run this by me again slowly? I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about. Major Carter, Teal’c, and Dr. Fraiser have been on ’335 for the past four days and, frankly, I’d been hoping to have at least my chief medical officer back by now.” The expression intensified, graduated from What the heck? to Oh crap! The old man’s cracked, and Hammond felt a chill crawl up his neck and raise his hackles. Finally, carefully almost, Warren offered, “Sir, they gated back here three days ago.” “What?” It had come from Jack. “You heard me, sirs. They stayed for one night; next day the doc gave her lectures, and then Carter told Colonel Norris that she’d found some kinda gremlin messin’ with the gate… Well, she didn’t say it like that.” “Wouldn’t have thought so,” Jack grumbled. Momentarily thrown, Warren cast a sidelong glance at him, sniffed, and continued, “Anyway, she told the colonel she needed to get back here PDQ to figure it out, and that’s when they left.” Hammond’s mind was racing through a whole kaleidoscope of possibilities, from busy signals and secondary gates in cold places to people’s matrices being stored inside the gate in ways even Sam Carter could barely explain, let alone remedy. None of these possibilities seemed desirable, and so he latched on to the obvious. “Major, they’re not here. Take my word for it. So I’m suggesting they never left. There was a minor anomaly, but that only affected outgoing—” “General, they had an escort, and those guys saw them go through the gate. As a matter of fact, the…” Warren trailed off, mystified by the antics of Colonel O’Neill who’d leaned forward, reached out, and gingerly removed an unopened letter from the base commander’s desk. “Something on your mind, son?” Hammond asked quietly. “I’d like to return to active duty, sir.” The letter disappeared into the inside pocket of Jack’s leather jacket. “You sure about this? What about your ribs?” “My ribs are fine.” “Uhuh. I can tell by the way you move like you’ve swallowed a poker, Colonel.” “It’s the deportment classes I’ve been taking. Sir, please. I want to go to ’335.”

“With respect, Colonel!” spluttered Warren. “If you’re implying—” “I’m not implying. I’m noting that two thirds of my team and Dr. Fraiser have gone missing. Now, I don’t know about you, Major, but I’d like to find out what the hell happened.” “Yes, sir. Sorry.” Going by the way Jack heaved himself from the chair, the deportment classes hadn’t yet advanced to Lesson Two, Rising Gracefully. He hid a wince, turned to Hammond. “Request permission to gate out to M3D 335, sir.” Past experience showed that Jack wasn’t going to take No for an answer. Besides, Hammond had got what he wanted, and if circ*mstances had been less worrying, he’d have called the situation a Godsend. “Permission granted, Colonel. Take SG-3 and—” “No. Sir. I’m going on my own. It’s a whole moon full of Marines, General, and I don’t… I don’t want to put anybody else at risk.” The toy huddled in a corner, and he pretended to be asleep. He was not. His eyelids fluttered in an involuntary spasm. Fear made it impossible for him to relax. This attempt to deceive her was the first vaguely amusing act he had conceived in three days. Perhaps she should not have revived him. But it had been worth it, if only for the knowledge of having flouted the will of that arrogant human, Simmons. Besides, it could be remedied. Quite easily, in fact. Nirrti nudged the toy with her toes and found a fleeting spark of enjoyment in the way a shudder racked his body and his eyes snapped open on a look of pure terror. Maybe not? No. It was time for something new. She turned away, heard the toy sob with relief, and smiled. The room was splendid, and this was an opulence that would never pall. Intricately carved pillars of wood, hard and small-grained and with a reddish sheen, supported a low ceiling. From the beams hung curtains of sheer silk that partitioned the space into a gently swaying maze in all shades of red and orange. One entire wall was taken up by a mirror of polished silver. Savoring the whisper of cool fabric on her skin, she parted the curtains to step through and study her own image. How long had it been? Seven hundred years? Eight hundred? She barely remembered. The host’s body had worn well, still retained a fair measure of its former owner’s youthful allure. But it would not last, could not last. She thought of the Hankan girl, the boundless possibilities and power open to a hak’taur, and felt the rage rise again. A new host was another debt the Tauri owed her. A touch on the bluish gem set in her ribbon device released an invisible burst of energy that altered the molecular structure of the mirror. Like oil welling from a vent, viscous grayness pooled and obscured Nirrti’s reflection, then cleared to a jungle vista. Deep within a closed-off part of her cortex, her host dreamed of home, while she watched, once more and as if through a window, the events of three days ago. The Chappa’ai, inset in the outer wall of the temple, fills with liquid azure gleam, and Simmons’ gift is flung from the wormhole in a graceful arc. Once, twice, the healer spins in the air and comes down heavily on the root of a thousand-year-old tree. In coarse tan clothes, not in white today, she lies motionless. Stunned? Dead? The latter would be inconvenient. But no. She lives. Near her slack mouth a leaf 55

shivers under shallow puffs of breath. Nirrti, too, breathes again, entranced by the stirrings of the leaf. And so she starts when a second traveler seems to fly straight at her. For a second their eyes meet, black on blue, although the woman, tall and blond, is unaware of it. Nirrti sees shock, pain, and a gleam of avid curiosity. This intrigues her—more than the leaf—because curiosity would have been her own first instinct. Curiosity and the need to examine just how the Chappa’ai could have deceived them to such a degree. Maybe she will reveal the secret. After all, this Tauri woman probably has saved Nirrti’s life by staying the healer’s hand and she will bear closer scrutiny. In good time. Is it possible that Simmons has given more than he intended? For the moment, though— Incredibly, a third figure hurtles from the Chappa’ai. Now Nirrti is sure that Simmons has not intended this. Greed and caution would not have permitted it. For the third is male, but not human. He is Jaffa, the shol’va who denied his god. A memory of Apophis’ fury makes her smile. She herself relishes the illusion of divinity and the terrified veneration it brings, but she is a scientist and has never been deluded enough to believe her own lie. The key to immortality is, after all, knowledge not godhead. Mouth gaping, teeth bared in a scream of rage and pain, the shol’va hits the ground hard. When, at last, the Chappa’ai winks out, the blond female is the first to discover that they cannot leave this place. One terror compounded by another. And it is only the beginning. What the Tauri and even the Jaffa cannot hear are the vibrations that whip the beasts into a frenzy and lure them to their prey. Hungry and swift-footed, they fly from their lair, dark, bristling shapes unlike anything the subjects have ever seen. And, as planned, the subjects are driven apart in the struggle for their lives. “A gift. My, what a gift,” Nirrti murmured as the image dissolved into the silver surface of the mirror. Slowly, her fingers curled and clenched in a fight to resist temptation. She wanted to bring them in now, break them now, use them now. But it would not be the same. The true triumph lay in their willing surrender when the horrors out there had piled despair upon despair and even servitude seemed preferable to further endurance or lingering death. Exhaling, she relaxed, clapped her hands once. One of her beautiful new Jaffa entered instantly and quietly, anticipating every whim of his mistress, as a good servant should. He had brought a flowing red robe, held it out for her approval, and she raised her arms and permitted him to clothe her. When he was done tugging folds into place, he took a step back, eyes averted, as though he had anticipated this need, too. For a few moments she studied him, appreciated the nervous play of muscles under milky skin dotted with freckles, the almost imperceptible flaring of nostrils when he sensed her gaze on his face and the new tattoo on his forehead—the golden shape of a dove in flight. At last she reached out, fingertips caressing the sensitive flaps of his pouch. “You please me, child,” she said. His smile was beatific. “You honor me, Lady Nirrti.”

“Yes, I do. The question is whether you deserve it.” She increased the pressure of her touch just enough to suggest the potential for exquisite pain, but not enough to hurt him. Yet. Only the slightest squirm betrayed his desire to back away. Excellent. He had been one of the first, and he had come far. “How can I make myself more deserving, Lady Nirrti?” Yes, he had come far indeed. But was it far enough? “What is your name?” she asked. “Master Sergeant Charles Macdonald.” She almost laughed. Such a waste of time, Tauri names. “Master Sergeant Charles Macdonald, I have a task for you.” “Please, Lady Nirrti, name it.” “Dispose of the thing in corner.” “As you wish, Lady Nirrti.” He disappeared through the curtains, and she curbed an impulse to follow and watch. Let him believe he was trusted. Shadows danced and from behind sheer fabric rose the toy’s cracking voice. “Sarge, what are you doing? Hey, come on, Sarge. It’s me, Gonzales. Gonzo… Come on, you remember me. You gotta remember me! Please, Sar—” When her Jaffa returned to drag his prisoner before her, the toy’s eyes, unearthly pale in an olive-skinned face, appeared to scream. “How do you wish me to dispose of him, Lady Nirrti?” “Take him to the temple. And”—she smiled at the thought—“make my pets jump.” BDUs and combat boots felt uncomfortable and alien after a couple of weeks of jeans and sweatshirts and walking barefoot round the house. Bull, Jack decided, suddenly angry at himself. It was neither the BDUs nor the boots. He felt uncomfortable and alien. Though not usually prone to fits of nostalgia—God knew he had little enough reason to be— right now he wished he were in his twenties again, a stupid kid off on his first mission, young and eager and full of himself. Not exactly ideal either, but preferable to middle-aged and jaded and full of something else. “Chevron five engaged,” chanted Sergeant Harriman. Five? Thirty-nine, more like. What the hell was taking so long? The gate’s inner ring seemed to be spinning at half its usual speed and doing it on purpose. “Chevron six engaged.” Harriman’s contributions to this interior monolog were a tad predictable. Why couldn’t he say something interesting like, The balalaika-type thing’s just got a triangle clamped over if! “Chevron seven locked.” Locked. Now there was a plot twist! Jack O’Neill watched the event horizon roar out at him; a blaze of glory that momentarily froze all thought. It always did. Given a chance, he’d look at it all day.

Of course it didn’t stand still long enough. It sloshed back into a luminous membrane across the gate and sent blue reflections rippling around the room. At which point Hammond was supposed to say Colonel O’Neill, you have a Go or Godspeed, Colonel or both. He didn’t. Now what? Clutching his P90 until he thought either the gun or his fingers would snap, Jack refused to turn around. The last thing Hammond needed to see was him getting jumpy. Getting jumpy? Just stand here and breathe, O’Neill. He’s gonna say it. Any second now… He didn’t. Instead the blast door rumbled open. The noise was followed by the clatter of boots on concrete. Hurried boots on concrete. There was only one person who regularly entered the gate room at this pace. Something to do with time-keeping issues brought on by a propensity to lose himself in dictionaries or similarly riveting literature. “Come to kiss me goodbye, Daniel?” The boots clattered to a halt beside him. “Uh, nothing personal, Jack, but no.” Jack whirled around, stared up at the control room window, just in time to see Harriman take cover behind his computer screen. Hammond next to him didn’t move; a burly, implacable rock who stared right back. “General, we had a deal!” “That’s right, Colonel. The deal was for me to pretend I’ve never received a certain piece of correspondence and let you go through that gate. But you either go with Dr. Jackson or not at all.” The SFs dotted around the room began to look interested, and Jack began to feel no longer uncomfortable and alien but slightly nauseous. “Daniel’s half blind! He’s not fit for duty!” “Neither are you,” Daniel muttered helpfully. “Want me to poke your ribs?” “Daniel—” “They’re my friends, too. I know the score, Jack. I’ve always known it. I was the one who took us to Abydos without having the coordinates to get back, remember?” Oh yes! How could he possibly forget? The first of three supremely joyous occasions on which Daniel Jackson had died. Jack’s nausea ratcheted up a notch. If he ever went through that wormhole, he’d sail out the other end barfing. “Is this supposed to convince me?” The response didn’t come in quite the way Jack had anticipated. Instead of waiting for General Hammond’s blessing, Daniel took the steps up to the ramp two at a time and steamed for the Stargate at flank speed. “Dammit, Daniel!” It was pointless, and Jack knew full well that he’d lost this argument. He only had two options. One—staying put—was absolutely out of the question. And thus Colonel O’Neill, for the umpteenth time, found himself running after an enterprising archeologist. Halfway into the event horizon, he heard Hammond’s voice rattle over the PA. “Godspeed, Colonel.”

Very funny, sir. The thought melted into rushing, star-streaked black. Stumbling out onto orange air and looming rock, Jack decided that the trip through the wormhole had left him more than usually chilled. His first impression of M3D 335 didn’t help. The gate sat at the bottom of some humungous hole, which in turn was capped by a planet that looked set to belch in his face. Apart from the Stargate, the only access to this tomb was by parachute or through a narrow gorge opposite. And if the locals didn’t want you to come calling, they either whacked you upside the head as soon as you poked your nose into said gorge, or they lined up around the crater to shoot fish in a barrel. Or both. Jack sensed a cold prickle of paranoia seep up his back and tried to ignore it. At least he had an answer to Question Number One. Part of him had been hoping for a forest with thick underbrush to hide in. But, given the terrain, there was no way in hell that Carter, Teal’c, and the doc could have gone anywhere, except where Warren said they’d gone. Unless the escort had been lying. But why would the Marines lie? Why indeed? The query brought to mind his team’s interesting theory about the— “DHD seems okay to me,” said Daniel who’d crouched in front of the DialHome-Device, tinkering with some diagnostic tools. Now he stowed them and rose. “Of course, Sam’s the expert, but I can’t see anything wrong with it.” Daniel’s words sounded flat and sank like lead under the weight of the planet above, but at least they’d fractured the eerie quiet of this place. Too much quiet. No wind, no trees, not even a pebble clattering down the cliffs. Why were there no guards at the gate? Warren had mentioned guards, three of them. Maybe only after dark. Maybe. But still… “Jack? Are you listening?” “Yeah. The DHD’s fine.” Which led straight to Question Number Two. Harriman had corroborated that the gate malfunction was intermittent and affected outgoing wormholes only. That aside, whatever had caused the problem, it seemed to have resolved itself. During the past few days there’d been no further glitches. So why would Carter concoct some co*ckamamie tale to scare Norris? “…unless she had a damn convincing reason to get off this rock,” Jack mused aloud. “A reason she didn’t want to air to the gentlemen of the Marine Corps.” “What are you—” Daniel stiffened suddenly and turned toward the gorge. “Shh!” “I wasn’t saying anything.” “Shh! Somebody’s coming.” Almost of its own accord, Jack’s hand flew into a sequence of signals. A swift memory flashed up, of the last time he’d done it and what had happened next. When the image receded, he already was running for a boulder to the left of the gorge, keeping an eye on Daniel who’d headed right as ordered. On the dusty ground their footfalls made virtually no noise, but the tracks would be visible. Couldn’t be helped. They’d just have to be fast. Pretending that the activity his ribs currently engaged in was normal, Jack skidded into cover behind the boulder. Nice view. Across the mouth of the gorge he saw Daniel peer around the edge of his rock, giving a thumbs-up. Like Carter, just

before—Throttling that thought, Jack brought up his gun. The metallic click of the safety coming off sounded perversely loud. He flinched and forced himself to go still. Never easy for him, more difficult than ever now. The gorge funneled noises into the crater like the an old gramophone tube. Out there the ground had to be covered in shale. He could hear the crunch of boots on stone. Four sets of boots… probably. Voices. No. One voice. Barking commands. In English. He relaxed a fraction. It ruled out Goa’uld or Jaffa—unless they were practicing. Well, they had to sometimes, right? Daniel had heard them, too, raised an enquiring eyebrow, and Jack shook his head. Before he indulged in prospects of a happy reunion with his pals, the Marines, he needed to have these guys where he could see them—or draw a bead on them if necessary. The footfalls grew louder. The visitors were moving fast, carelessly, which was good news one way or the other: they either had no idea that somebody was expecting them, or their intentions were as pure as driven snow. Okay, there was a third way, and it wasn’t such good news: they knew they owned the goddamn place. Eyes fixed on the cleft in the rock wall, Jack spot-welded the P90 against his cheek and waited. A minute later Larry, Curly, and Moe trotted into view, as unwholesome as he remembered them from the exercise. Behind them followed their CO. All things considered, a bunch of Goa’uld would have been preferable.

CHAPTER SEVEN

He stands right at the lip of the Stargate, arms flung wide, body curved in a fluid arc, like a gymnast on a beam, trying the impossible, trying to regain balance broken. She knows what will happen, knows that gravity will win, because that’s what gravity does, it always wins, immutable and uncaring. A tiny shiver ripples around the edges of weightlessness, grace collapses, and he falls. Watching helplessly, she knows what awaits him on the ground, knows because— “No!” Sam Carter shot from a sweat-soaked, troubled sleep, listening to the echo of her own scream. It shook loose a cacophony of chatters and screeches in the canopy above. Curled up into a tight ball, she nestled further into the crook between bole and branch where she’d spent the night and wished she were invisible. Gradually the noise died down, and no one found it necessary to check on the intruder or come shopping for breakfast. Thank God for small favors. After a few minutes of listening for stealthy approaches, she decided it was safe and awkwardly uncoiled. In the process she discovered several muscle groups she hadn’t known she owned—amazing what an extra-hard orthopedic tree could do for one’s anatomy. Not that it made that much of a difference, and these kinks at least would work themselves out once she was on the move again. As for the rest… She rolled up the tattered leg of her pants—damp. Everything was damp and never dried. Had the fabric started rotting yet? Maybe. A flap of material came away under her fingers. Unless she managed to get off this adventure playground sometime soon, she’d be running around in her bra and panties. Of course, in order to get off she’d have to find the DHD, and in order to have any hope of finding that—if it even existed—she’d have to find the gate, and before she did any of the above, she’d have to find Teal’c and Janet. If Janet was still alive. It’d been three days now, three days of plodding through the jungle looking for them. She was less worried for Teal’c; Teal’c had that air of indestructibility—deceptive, yes, but he did have a symbiote— and he knew how to take care of himself, better than any of them. Janet on the other hand… The image popped into Sam’s mind unbidden; her friend sprawled between the roots of one of those giant trees, unconscious, blood trickling from a head wound. It might have been something as relatively harmless as a concussion, but she’d never got a chance to make sure. Those… things… had poured from the open maw of the stone face beneath the Stargate, dozens of them, huge and black and brutal. The nearest way to describe them was a cross between boar and hyena, five feet tall and armor-plated under the bristles. She’d emptied a whole magazine into one of them before it finally broke to its knees, juddering. Even then it’d managed to gouge her

leg. Howling in pain and fury and without time to reload, she’d switched to her handgun, then to her knife. Teal’c had fared a little better. His staff weapon gave them pause if not much else, and he’d been able to reach Janet and cover her. Sam had figured that he might stand a chance if she could draw off at least some of that vicious mob. Ignoring Teal’c’s roar of disapproval, she’d backed away from the pack that was trying to have her for lunch and allowed the hell hogs to chase her into the jungle. Only when they’d suddenly stopped hounding her and disappeared, she’d realized that, of all the mistakes she possibly could have made, this had been eminently the most stupid. Limping for her life, tripping over roots and dodging branches, she’d stumbled into an unnerving green maze without landmarks or any other means of orientation. The attempt to retrace her steps had led her in circles for seventy-two hours. “And now it’s time to greet another fun-filled day,” Sam muttered and tugged at her pants some more. Under the rolled-up end appeared a makeshift bandage; sterile gauze strapped to her skin with tape. She ripped it off, wincing. At least it took care of the fact that she hadn’t shaved her legs. A deep gash gaped from the side of her calf to the back of her knee, and at its center gleamed white bone. It hadn’t even begun to close, and the torn flesh suppurated. So much for antibiotics. Whatever else they killed, giant hog germs obviously weren’t on the list. One more reason for finding Dr. Fraiser. Reaching behind her, Sam fished the medikit from her backpack, opened it, and frowned at the dwindling supplies. With sudden determination she grabbed the disinfectant, unscrewed the cap, and liberally squirted the liquid into the wound. The trick was not to scream your head off. She bit her hand instead, drew blood. It hurt like a son of a bitch. Not for the first time she longingly eyed the two ampoules of morphine. She’d left them untouched so far, knowing she’d need them if she was faced with the choice of either dying of gangrene or losing a leg. When the throbbing ebbed, she packed the wound in sterile bandages again and taped it shut, which started a whole new round of throbs. As she wiped her face, sweating with pain, the back of her hand struck something lumpy high on her cheekbone. “Yuck!” Her stomach flipped, and she got within an inch of crying. Hell, the beasts had made Bogey cry! Just watch African Queen. Of all the disgusting… Leeches! God, she hated them. It wasn’t the first leech she’d picked up, wouldn’t be the last. She’d have to twist it off—and head out of here before this tree threw any more surprises at her. That aside, she needed food and water. Two minutes later, she’d shouldered the pack and was rappelling down a vine, which, coincidentally, was a darn sight more difficult than Tarzan made it look. Largely because it was a good way of flaying your palms if you didn’t do it slowly. Except, slowly required a strength she no longer had. The branch where she’d set up camp was some sixty feet above ground. Gazing down now, Sam figured she’d gone maybe a third of the way, and her arms were already rattling with fatigue. Below her the thin thread of a path snaked through relentless vegetation. She’d found it late yesterday afternoon, followed it until dark, and she’d follow it some more today. Probably not the safest thing to do—although she’d seen no spoor, it had 62

to be a game trail, and if the hell hogs were anything to go by she didn’t care to meet the rest of the wildlife. Then again, her options were limited. “Right. Onward and downward,” she murmured. What was it they said about people who talked to themselves? Another fifteen feet down she froze, not sure if she’d really heard what she thought she’d heard or if the fever was getting to her. No. There it was again. Soft, rhythmic squelching. She knew that noise. She’d been listening to herself making it for the past three days; footsteps on soggy ground. Then a sharp crack. Somebody had trodden on a branch, and he/she/it was coming her way. Now what? Play possum. Easier said than done. Below, the hiker was closing in, and she hung barely twenty feet above his head. If he looked up, he was bound to see her. Like the exercise. The Colonel had drummed it into them with a sledgehammer: Don’t give them reason to look up. Don’t even breathe. And then it’d all gone wrong. Why? She held her breath, ignoring the tremors that racked her arms and shoulders and promised to explode into a full-blown cramp. When the hiker came into view, Sam stifled a gasp. The snazzy hairstyle pegged him as a Marine, but the outfit and weaponry made him something else entirely—unless the USMC had radically changed their dress code and equipment during the past three days. Then, almost directly under her, his step faltered, he stopped, looked around and finally, inevitably, up. She knew why. She’d sensed it practically the same moment as he. It explained the costume. “Well, lookee here.” The upturned face was smirking. Its owner had participated in the exercise. Except, back then he hadn’t worn a tattoo on his forehead. A bird in flight. Whose sign was that? Daniel would know. Sam decided against asking and just stared back at the man. What was his name? Burger? Somebody had called him Burger. King? Surely not Dairy Queen? Macdonald. That’s what it was. Master Sergeant Macdonald. Macdonald kept smirking, and it gave her the creeps. A shaft of sunlight stabbing through foliage picked out the tattoo, lost it again when he raised and primed the staff weapon he carried. “Okay, sugar. Let’s have a little competition, huh? Let’s see if you can climb faster than I can shoot.” The practical part of the competition would be wholly redundant. The state she was in, Sam couldn’t climb, period, and never mind fast. There was no point in even trying. … gravity will win, because that’s what gravity does… And sometimes this was an advantage. Returning the ex-sergeant’s smile, Major Samantha Carter did the one thing he hadn’t expected her to do; she let go of the vine. The impact was crushing, strained ligaments, bruised bone, sent agony boiling up her leg. Her trajectory had been just so, bringing her down smack on top of him. The crumpled heap beneath her lay motionless—dead or out cold, right now she didn’t give a damn. Groaning, she crawled off, rolled him on his back, undid his chest

armor. Lifting the coarse shirt, she found it; an x-shaped incision on his abdomen, edges of the flaps curling up slightly. A Jaffa’s pouch. “Damn,” she whispered, shaken although she’d known it’d be there. At that moment he gave a low moan. Not dead, then. Time to haul ass. She struggled to her feet and, using his staff weapon as a crutch, slipped off the path and into green, dripping undergrowth. Far off, in the direction from where he’d come, rose a scream, human and desperate. “Seeing that you insist on pleasing your whims, Colonel… Then again, I suppose that’s the one thing you actually excel at.” Norris sneered and pointed across a dusty square kept in the moon’s color scheme of titillating beige. “Over there’s the mess. I reckon that’ll do.” Daniel, normally all in favor of a non-violent approach, was beginning to hope that Jack would deck the creep. The needling had been going on non-stop for the entire three klicks from the gate into the camp. Obviously Norris had an ego to massage. Might have to do with the fact that he’d been caught with his pants down and jumped sky-high when Colonel O’Neill and Dr. Jackson had ambled from cover back in the crater. Eyes hidden behind shades, Jack was taking it with a forbearance so out of character as to be positively unsettling. Okay, like it or not, they needed Norris’ cooperation, but usually Jack didn’t let minor issues such as that stand in his way when he was pissed. And he ought to be well and truly pissed by now. “That’ll do fine,” he said, face stony, except for a tense white line around his mouth that betrayed the effort to keep a lid on whatever he felt. “Thanks.” Thanks? Talk about gilding the lily. Daniel had heard just about enough of this crap, and if Jack didn’t put a stop to it soon, he would. “Make yourselves at home in there,” Norris offered; the sudden generosity probably due to his having placed yet another successful kick in Jack’s teeth. “I’ll round up the men who were on escort and guard duty that night. You can ask them if you don’t believe me or Major Warren.” With that he strode off toward a cluster of huts. Jack gazed after him for a moment and then headed for the mess. For once, Daniel resisted the impulse to rush in where angels feared to tread. Given their history over the past months, it might get him punched in the nose. And in truth, he didn’t really want to find out. If this was what he thought it was, he had no idea what to do about it. Besides, now wasn’t the time. The camp was oddly quiet. He’d been to the Alpha Site once, and at the base there folks had been falling over themselves in a constant bustle. Here he’d counted maybe ten people so far, excluding the perimeter guards. By a stack of crates across the square loitered a couple of men, casting furtive glances his way. A third one stepped out of a squat building nearby—latrines, going by the way he adjusted his pants—and he was staring openly, a look of surprise and suspicion on his face. At his nod, the pair by the crates joined him, kicking up dust, and they set off in Daniel’s direction like a bunch of hoodlums spoiling for a fight. They passed him at shoulderbrushing distance. 64

“Hi, Dr. Jackson,” Latrine Boy said. “Hope you’ll enjoy your stay.” Then they were past and disappeared around a shack, which probably was where the good citizens of Stepford kept their wives. And just how had that guy known his name? Conference with Norris in the Fonz’s office? Daniel felt his skin crawl. The place had him spooked in broad daylight. Coffee would help. Definitely. The mess offered all the coziness you would expect from a corrugated steel hut, but at least it was more or less empty. And the smell rising from the coffee machine suggested something freshly ground. Not necessarily coffee, but still. At a table by one of the windows sat two men—one of them actually smiled. Jack had grabbed a perch as far away from them as possible and was staring holes into the wall. Daniel sighed, got two mugs of coffee and wandered over. “Here,” he said, putting a mug in front of Jack. “Not sure about the taste, but it’s the right color.” “Thanks,” muttered Jack, tried a sip, and grimaced. “Love the color.” “Yeah.” Daniel gave a brief grin. Maybe now was the time. After all, the shades had come off for the time being. “Look, Jack, are you gonna tell Norris where to shove it or—” “It’s the only thing that is right about this place.” “—shall I?” “What?” “What do you…?” It gradually dawned on Daniel that every single one of Norris’ snide comments might have missed its target. He started laughing. “What’s so funny?” “Me.” “Yeah, well, that’s a given, but now isn’t the time.” “I know. Welcome back.” The wry look it got him made plain that Jack understood exactly what was on Daniel’s mind and that there was some truth to it, too. But he was back. Daniel grinned again, harder. “Okay. You first.” “For starters, the training. This is a Marine camp, for cryin’ out loud. There ought to be lots of muscular guys running around, singing cadence. So where the hell are they?” It really was only for starters. Ticking off points on his fingers, Jack reeled off a list that proved he hadn’t missed a trick since stepping through the gate. Some of the items—like the conspicuous absence of people—Daniel had noticed himself. Others—the unsuitable terrain, for instance—hadn’t registered. “Ten,” said Jack, left pinky raised. “What’s with the location of this place? I mean, three klicks from the gate and wide open? Does it get any more unsafe? Makes no sense.” “So, you’re—Yuck!” Daniel realized that his coffee had gone cold, which did nothing to improve the taste. “You’re saying that—” “Carter or Teal’c would have picked up on most or all of these things and smelled a rat. Somebody may have taken exception to their keen sense of smell.” “Norris?” Jack snorted. “My good friend Colonel Norris couldn’t find his own ass if you lit it for him. Partly because he’s so far up it. I’m starting to think you could be right, by

the way. Anyhow, he’s a straw man. He hasn’t gone to get the escort or the guard. He’s gone to ask what to do with us. Somebody else is running this show.” “How do you know—” Suddenly it hit Daniel. His eyes narrowed. “You’re starting to think I could be right about what?” “You, plural.” By Jack’s standards the answer was straightforward. Daniel considered a celebratory sip of gross cold coffee but refrained when he saw the door open. Not Norris. His three pals from the square, steering for the table next to his and Jack’s. “What?” Jack had clocked the frown. “The bouncers who just came in?” Daniel murmured into his mug. “I, uh, met them earlier. One of them knows my name, and I swear I’ve never seen him in my life before.” “Should have told me,” Jack murmured back. Aloud he said, “Wonder what’s taking Norris so long.” . As if on cue, the colonel strode in, self-importance wafting behind him like cheap aftershave. “I’m sorry, O’Neill, but the men aren’t available. Their units are conducting night maneuvers. So you might as well head back.” “I don’t think so, Pete.” A thin smile edged onto Jack’s face. “I think I want to wait till they’re back, and then I want to talk to them.” “This whole thing is outrageous,” spluttered Norris. “I told you a half dozen times that they won’t be able to tell you anything new. Chances are that the Stargate malfunctioned, just like Carter said. Too bad, but there it is.” The smile got thinner, verging on predatory. “I want to talk to these men. I don’t give a damn how long it takes.” This wasn’t quite the tune Norris had got accustomed to on their trek from the gate. He hesitated for a second, then snapped, “What is this, huh? Trying to come over concerned or something? You weren’t that worried about your team when you screwed up the exercise, were you?” The look Jack gave him was on a par with liquid nitrogen. Just as quickly as it had flashed up it was gone again. He waved Norris closer as if for some confidential revelation and gently, if rather loudly, asked, “Tell me something, Pete. Do you actually have to work on being such a pr… preternaturally offensive jerk or is it a gift?” Somebody at the table across the room seemed to have swallowed the wrong way. A frantic wheeze resolved into a protracted coughing fit. Norris straightened up, bright red in the face, and sent the cougher a glare that made Daniel want to extend his condolences to the victim. Jack had pasted on a mask of pure innocence and contemplated the coffee dregs in his mug. Finally, Norris turned back to him. “Fine, O’Neill. Have it your way.” And, with a nod to one of the Marines at the neighboring table, “Poletti, find these… gentlemen… quarters when they’re ready.” “Yessir.” It was the man who’d addressed Daniel by name. On the way out Norris slammed the door hard enough to set the window panes rattling.

Coming out of a wince, Daniel smirked. “Personally, I’d have gone with the first ‘pr’.” “Oh, I dunno.” Jack co*cked an eyebrow. “Now he’s gonna go find a dictionary to see what ‘preternaturally’ means. Broadens his horizons.” Her prison was dark and dank and stank of rotting wood and fungi and mold. There was enough of the stuff in here to keep a pharmaceutical plant busy for decades. Not that it did her any good. Through a knothole a million miles above her head a trickle of light seeped into the hollow bole; just enough to extinguish the faint, pulsing glow of whatever organism it was that ate this tree from the inside out. Like everything in this place—or the place itself; it ate you from the inside out. She shuddered, pushed away the thought, and dug in the dirt until she found her weapon again. Not a real one, of course. He’d disarmed her when she’d tried to resist capture, and God only knew where he’d stashed her handgun and knife. Out of her reach, anyway. The only weapon she had was a tent stake, slim and light and blunt. Well, not so blunt anymore. She’d slipped it from the backpack during their first night here, while her captor had believed her asleep and kept watch outside. Even from out there he’d heard the soft clinking of metal on metal and crawled back inside the tree, to check what she was doing and drag her back onto a makeshift pallet of leaves and twigs. Her pulse leaped into a frantic race at the mere memory of it. She couldn’t recall ever having been so scared in her life. If he’d caught her… If he’d caught her, she wouldn’t have had to worry about her heart rate ever again—it was as simple as that. But he hadn’t caught her. All he’d done was take the pack outside with him. By then she’d already removed and hidden the stake. Digging some more, sickened by the slick, moist earth squeezing between her fingers like a living thing—just as well her nails were short—she found the whetstone. It was a small piece of rock, rough and hard as flint, pushed up a few hundred years ago by the sapling tree. She rubbed it over her pants to clean off the dirt and settled back to do what she’d been doing whenever her captor was absent during these past three days. He was absent often and for long periods of time, and she knew he was searching for another victim. It wouldn’t be long now. The tip was already sharp, and she’d managed to hone an inch or so to an edge. She’d come to love the rhythmic swishing of stone over metal. The sound promised escape and a return home, and it calmed her. It also was a kind of meditation. While she whetted the stake, her mind rehearsed the plan for the hundredth time; the small, vital details of where to position herself, when to strike, where to place the dagger. There would be no second chance. If she hesitated for even a fraction of a second, gave him the slightest opening, he would crush her. The images were perfectly clear now, and she could almost feel the gentle pop of the point piercing skin. Like bursting a zit. The notion made her laugh, quietly, briefly, snapping her out of her reverie. Good. She needed to stay focused, and never mind that her head was pounding. Her attention fixed on the boulder that blocked the entrance. Had it moved? No. He wasn’t back yet, though he would be soon. He always came back several times during the day, to make sure she hadn’t found a way to free herself. When he’d first left her here, she’d tried to shift the boulder. Tried for hours, straining and swearing

and angrily refusing to admit that it was hopeless. Physically he was so much beyond her it defied description. But she still could outthink him. He’d shift the boulder for her, unblock the narrow gap in the tree, and then— She drew a hissing breath, froze. There! There it was again. A soft squelch of boots on wet ground; the kind of noise you’d associate with a maiden aunt dispensing sloppy kisses. Kissy-kissy, louder now. Bigger. Because it wasn’t an aunt, it was an uncle. She giggled, instantly recognized the hysteria and wrestled it down. No time for that. The steady, insistent voice that had kept her sane until now demanded action. This was it. If she spent another day in this hole, she’d lose it. Suddenly her palms were slick with sweat. Railing under her breath at the vagaries of physiology, she ripped a strip of fabric from her shirt and wrapped it around the stake to give her a secure grip. Then, inch by inch, so as not to make the slightest sound, she edged off the pallet and over to the entrance. Back pressed into the digestive slime that coated the tree’s interior, she stood and waited, half convinced that he would hear the hammering of her heart. She barely heard anything beside it. But then she did hear something else. The scrape of stone on wood. He was back. She’d been watching carefully whenever he’d opened the entrance. He always rolled the boulder from left to right. Perhaps it was easier that way, perhaps he’d done it once and, finding that it worked, did it the same way each time after that without giving it any thought. It didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was the fact that he rolled it left to right now. Once the gap was clear, he’d pause, not entirely immune to the exertion, then he’d push himself off the boulder and duck and turn to enter. At that moment, and at that moment only, his jugular would be exposed. The scraping was loud now; scraping and harsh, labored breath. A thin slice of light cut into the gloom inside the tree, broadening slowly, winking in and out as he moved. Another push, another, and another. Then stillness, no more winking and scraping, only the unbroken strip of light and his gasps. It brought the familiar urge to fling herself past him and flee. She’d tried that, too. He’d moved faster than she ever could have imagined, caught her, and carried her back inside. After that he’d always made sure that his legs partly blocked the gap, as they did now. But he’d have to turn. Wait. Not yet. Wait! It was a second. Only a second, two perhaps, but it seemed to grow out of all proportion, stretch into infinity. Her fingers cramped around the grip of the stake. Relax. Relax your arm. Relax your fingers. If the muscles got too tense she would have neither the speed nor the accuracy she needed. The bacterial goop that clung to the bark was beginning to seep through her shirt, sticky and moist on her skin. She concentrated on the discomfort, allowed it to distract her just enough to breathe again. Very, very softly. And then he turned and ducked into the opening. Her arm flew up, fist tight around the stake, just as she’d rehearsed it time and time again in her mind. He saw the movement from the corner of his eye. His head snapped around, but he was helpless at that moment, broad shoulders wedged inside the gap, arms still caught outside. “Dr. Fraiser! No!” 68

Perhaps it was the sound of her name, perhaps the look in his eyes. It dredged up words of a promise she’d made; more than a promise, a command: First, do no harm. Fierce and compelling and almost enough to stop her. Almost. Her arm kept moving, needing to find its target, but its thrust changed, thrown off course by four words. Instead of slicing the vein in his neck, the stake plunged into the hollow above his clavicle, destroying a nexus of nerves and disabling the right side of his upper body. He bellowed in pain, reeled back, and crumpled against the boulder. Now, as she watched his large hand clutching the wound, she knew she’d done the right thing. Hadn’t she? He was looking for the weapon. Wasn’t he? Looking to pull it out and turn it against her. She had to hold on to it. And she did. There was blood dripping from it, rich and dark, like the blood that trickled from between his fingers. First, do no harm. Take a sterile bandage and apply pressure to staunch the bleeding. Probe for tissue and nerve damage and for any contamination introduced into the wound canal. Administer—No. Not for this patient. He wouldn’t need antibiotics. Infection wasn’t an issue. But how did she know that? Her gaze slid from those twitching, bloodied fingers up to his face, his eyes again. Deep brown—black almost—and patient and concerned. And still not angry. At that instant the veil tore, and she moaned, dropped the stake. It landed with a muted thud. “Teal’c,” Janet Fraiser whispered, choking on the horror of what she’d done. What she’d almost done. “Teal’c…” His eyes slid shut, severing the tenuous link she’d found, and the voice floated back, steady and calm and convincing. So convincing. His symbiote will heal him, and he will come after you. Kill him. Kill him now. Stare fixed on him she crouched, moving as through treacle, groped through the mud until her fingers struck metal, curled around the stake, raised it. Then she stepped through the gap and out into freedom, half expecting his legs to shoot up and trip her. But he never stirred, either having resigned himself or unconscious. An insect landed on his face, flexing iridescent wings, buzzed and traipsed around and flew off again. To spread the news and bring others to the feast? Kill him, the voice murmured. “He’s already dead,” she replied through a shiver of anxiety. What if the voice noticed she was lying? It didn’t. It simply fell silent, quietly content. This puzzled her. She’d assumed the voice had all the answers. But she wasn’t going to quibble with it. Not now. Not while she still… Not while it still was fooled. She took a step back, and another, and stopped, hands shaking, body shaking. Then, before the need to obey became overwhelming, she spun around and headed into the jungle at a dead run. “Your lunch, sir.” As usual, Delores objected to having been dispatched to the deli— or maybe she was vegetarian and had ethical reservations against Pastrami sandwiches. Two French manicured fingernails clamped the top of the paper bag,

swung it over the desk, let go. Like a logging crane. “Anything else 1 can get you, sir?” “Write out an expense claim form for this and bring it in for me to sign. I assume you’ll want your money back.” Frank Simmons didn’t have to look up to know that her pretty, inane face was twitching with annoyance right now. “You did get a receipt, didn’t you?” By ways of an answer, she flounced out, letting the door slam behind her. Simmons supposed he should sack her on the strength of the attitude alone. Truth was, though, she had a fairly high entertainment value. That aside, Delores was blessed with the intellectual brilliance of a Scheffleria, which wasn’t actually a bad thing. Intelligence bred curiosity—not a trait to be encouraged in the person who handled his diary. Somebody with two brain cells to rub together might have asked questions about his recent extended absences or about the fact that he’d shown up for a whirlwind tour his office and would vanish again tonight without leaving a forwarding address. She’d figure he had a lover, if she figured anything at all. Like most stupid people, she was wholly unimaginative. Again, a bonus. Unimaginative people were impervious to bullying. As she’d proved conclusively on at least one occasion. Nobody else would have possessed the nerve to keep Jack O’Neill from entering the office for a full two hours. Frank Simmons pried apart the folded top of the bag and chuckled. It’d been priceless. Little Jack, all dolled up in a neatly pressed dress uniform, cap balanced on his knees—hell, he’d even bothered to do something about that hair of his—and trying to be on his best behavior. Which admittedly didn’t amount to much, but by the time he’d lost it and stormed Simmons’ office, you could tell it was virtually causing him physical pain. And then he’d crashed head first into a brick wall and slunk away again, tail between his legs. Priceless. Of course, afterwards his behavior had deteriorated dramatically. He’d gone ahead and solved the riddle of where Major Carter was held and why. As a matter of fact, he’d damn near caught Conrad before Simmons could get to him. The amusem*nt factor of that hadn’t been anywhere near as high, so, all things, considered, it probably was best if O’Neill dropped out of the picture permanently. Simmons took a bite from his sandwich, chewed contentedly—the pickle was homemade—and wished the good colonel hadn’t been wearing a vest that day. Then again, odds were that the joint Marine/Air Force exercise, beneficial in oh so many ways, had taken care of this problem, too. In other words, the kinks had worked themselves out on their own, thank you very much. Too bad that O’Neill refused to be more flexible. For the price of a little moral malleability somebody like him could have had a stellar career in the NID. Halfway through the second bite, the door flew open, and Delores leveled a smug smile at him. “You’ve got a visitor.” “I’m busy,” Simmons managed around a mouthful of Pastrami and rye. “It’s Lieutenant General Crowley.” Crap! Crowley knew better than to just pop in for a chat. Whatever reason he had for coming to the office, it wasn’t to enquire after Colonel Simmons’ health. More likely the reason would render the Pastrami indigestible. So much for kinks working themselves out. 70

Simmons finally swallowed, sank the sandwich bag in a desk drawer, and said, “Show him in.” Her face registered disappointment, as though she’d hoped for open signs of irritation, and she stepped back to clear the way for Crowley—who gusted in like a tropical storm, only drier. Delores closed the door behind him. “General. What can I do for you?” asked Simmons, certain that he didn’t want to know. Complexion florid under a nearly white crew cut, Crowley flung himself into a chair. It groaned. At five foot eleven, the general weighed about a hundred and ninety pounds, all of it muscle. “Where the hell have you been?” he hissed. Okay. Moderate misconception right there. Simmons straightened up, shot his cuffs. “With respect, sir, that’s none of your business. So. What can I do for you?” Needless to say, the reply wasn’t designed to calm Crowley down, but at least he accepted it. Most of the stuff the NID did was classified up the wazoo. In fact, Simmons had been at the safe house, trying to cajole a digest of Jaffa training methods out of Conrad, but he had no intention—or obligation—to reveal that. Not even the President was cleared to know about the Goa’uld. “You assured me that he wouldn’t be a problem!” Crowley snapped. “That who wouldn’t be a problem?” From the desk drawer wafted the scent of Pastrami, and Simmons was still feeling hungry. “O’Neill! You said Hammond was bound to bench him and that he’d retire rather than fly a desk.” The general gave a dyspeptic snort. “Well, guess what? Your guy’s surprisingly active for a retiree. He’s snooping around on ’335.” “He’s what?” All of a sudden, Simmons lost his appetite. “You heard me. He’s got that nerdy civilian lapdog of his with him.” “Dr. Jackson? How do you know?” “Major Warren came back. He told me. I practically had to beat the report out of him. You’d think he’s Air Force, the way he—” “How did they get there?” “It’s a safe bet that they didn’t hike,” snarled Crowley, peeved at being cut off. “So I’m assuming Hammond sent them.” It was an equally safe bet that someone, somewhere along the line, had perpetrated a cataclysmic foul-up. Otherwise Hammond would never have deployed a man whose fitness was questionable. For all his good ole country boy demeanor, the general was one hell of a smooth operator and way too shrewd to lay himself open like that. “Any particular reason why he’d do that?” Simmons asked, keeping his voice as calm as he could. Predictably, it let some of the air out of Crowley’s bluster. Squirming, he muttered, “There was an unforeseen complication. The doctor wasn’t on her own. Carter and the Jaffa were with her. Our men didn’t know what else to do, so they delivered all three of them.” “They did what?” Simmons all but screamed. Never mind loss of appetite; he felt distinctly bilious.

“What’s the big deal? You authorized the doctor as part of your agreement with that alien. So they lost two people more than expected. Tough.” “General, did you actually read O’Neill’s file?” “No. Why should—” “Because ten years or so ago he did a four-month stint as POW in Iraq and came back a few cards short of a full deck. Eventually he recovered, though some people would argue with that. What a herd of shrinks didn’t manage to shake loose, despite their best efforts, was an obsession with never leaving any of his team behind. When you kidnapped Carter and the Jaffa, O’Neill was bound to go after them. And Hammond, with his sentimental fetish for honor and self-sacrifice, probably shoved him through the gate. I guarantee you, between them they’re not gonna leave a stone unturned.” “Oh, now it’s my fault, is it?” Crowley asked testily. “May I remind you that it would have been your guys who gave the order?” “I didn’t say it was your fault,” murmured Simmons, hating to be on the defensive and wishing, for the hundredth time, that he could be out there and run the show himself. The enforced lack of communication was a serious weakness. Unfortunately, his face was too well known around the SGC, and even in a Marine uniform he’d never have made it through the Stargate unnoticed. “So what do you suggest we do? Any ideas?” snapped Crowley. “You got somebody who can deliver a message?” “I’ve got another unit on standby. They’re to gate out whenever I give the word.” “Good.” Simmons experienced a wary tug of relief and tapped a pen on his desk blotter. “O’Neill and Jackson can’t stay on ’335. We can’t afford witnesses. Nor can we afford my dear friend, Lady Nirrti, vacuuming Major Carter’s head, which she’s perfectly capable of doing.” Dropping the pen, he leaned back in his chair. “I’m afraid SG-1 will have to go missing in action.” “That’s your solution? Make them go away?” Crowley’s already livid face reddened alarmingly. “And you think Hammond’s gonna sit still for that? He’s investigating me, for God’s sake!” “Don’t worry about Hammond. I’ll take care of him.” “He’s gonna go MIA, too? Subtle, Colonel. Real subtle.” “Oh no. I’ll just keep him busy.” Simmons smiled. “Now, by the beginning of next week you should have ten new Jaffa, bringing the total up to twenty-one. Once they arrive, we ought to give them a road test, see how efficient they are.” Somehow he didn’t think he was going to apprise Nirrti of this idea.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Reversal: Process whereby a derived character state changes back to the ancestral state through mutation or selection. M3D 335’s primary was doing a pretty convincing impression of his ribcage, though Jack O’Neill felt certain that the phenomena were unrelated. Turning green and purple, the bloated peril—the planet, that was—had sagged to half-mast and leered over the horizon. Whoever was responsible for the design sure knew how to enhance the warm fuzzy feeling the rest of this place evoked. The blighted eggplant backlit a handful of huts and the ten-strong unit of Marines who had arrived half an hour ago, yipping in the rarified atmosphere. They were still being briefed by a pair of sergeants, and something about these two guys irked Jack. They fit in like transvestites at a Revivalist meeting. The crate that currently served as his bench was getting uncomfortable. Shoulders resting against the wall behind him, he slid forward a little, stretched his legs, and yawned to reinforce the large, lazy cat look. Daniel, who’d been ogling one of Mr. Poletti’s braves across the square, turned around to observe Jack’s shufflings and asked, “Am I boring you?” “Not yet.” “Oh good. If it gets to the point, let me know and I’ll start tap-dancing.” “In a feather boa?” Jack didn’t hear the reply. Out on the square new and exciting things were happening. The men had been dismissed, but one of them now addressed the two sergeants. As Newbie’s hand dipped into a pocket, Sergeant A’s fingers locked around his wrist, stopping him from taking out whatever it was he meant to deliver. The sergeant’s hand let go and slipped to the man’s shoulder for a pat. Meanwhile, Sergeant B kept smiling and chatting. All very low-key and expertly done, and if Jack hadn’t been watching out for this type of thing he’d have missed it. What happened next was just as slick. The sergeants casually herded Newbie in the direction of the communications shack—it’d been introduced as such to Colonel O’Neill. While Sergeant A swiped a keycard through the door lock, B sent a furtive jerk of the head at Mr. Poletti’s brave, whose lips began to move. In other words, the brave was either nuts and talking to himself, or wired and inviting other guests to the party. Whom? Newbie and the sergeants entered the com shack. A minute later the guests arrived: Norris and Poletti showed up, collected the brave, and also felt the urge to communicate. If nothing else, it answered one question. The two sergeants who looked like they ought to be wearing suits instead of BDUs were the ones calling the shots around here. NID sprang to mind. Sweet.

By now the eggplant had darkened to a color combination exclusive to Gothic novels, and the men milling around the square were beginning to disperse. The only one dragging his feet was the guy who’d suffered that nasty pulmonary incident in the mess earlier. “Jack?” Daniel said softly. He looked worried. It probably wasn’t a good idea to admit that his commanding officer shared the sentiment. “I’ve seen him. I’m just not sure which club he belongs to.” “What?” “The ape who went into the hut last was the real tail. This one’s a freelancer.” Easing himself from the crate, Jack swore under his breath. How come it hurt that much if he didn’t even have a fracture to show for it? “You okay?” This from the man with the world’s worst shiner. “Fine. Let’s go.” Jack ducked into a short alley between two huts and broke into a run, Daniel right behind him. At the other end, they whipped around the corner and stopped dead. Their shadow was following doggedly, his footfalls getting louder. Timing the noise, Jack stuck his leg out and was treated to a rather nice forward flip. The pursuer hit the ground oomphing, rolled onto his back, and found himself staring up the business end of Daniel’s Beretta. “Hi,” said Jack, patting his P90 to indicate politely that, on request, they also did fifteen rounds a second instead of two. “Anything we can do for you?” The man didn’t look as though he was going to make any requests. Front paws raised, like a puppy waiting for a belly-rub, he yelped, “Colonel O’Neill?” “Who wants to know?” “Corporal Lon Wilkins, sir.” Corporal Wilkins seemed to want to salute but didn’t dare to move his hands. “Permission to speak freely, sir?” Well, that held a certain comic piquancy. As far as Jack could recall, he’d never got that type of enquiry from a Marine flat on his back. He grinned. “You heard the corporal, Daniel. He said freely. Put the gun away and help him up.” “Thanks, sir.” Duly restored to an upright position, Wilkins dusted himself off, came to attention, and said, “You’re looking for Major Carter, right, sir?” The blush triggered by Carter’s name revealed that Wilkins carried a torch the size of a young lamppost for the Major. For some reason it irritated Jack. “And Dr. Fraiser. And a big black guy who variously goes by Murray or Teal’c. You know where they are?” “No, sir. They did leave for the Stargate, though. I saw them. But that’s all I can tell you. That and…” The corporal swallowed, looking sick all of a sudden. “I don’t usually—Look, I heard what Colonel Norris told you in the mess. It was a lie. The guys who guarded the gate that night? They sat right next to you, sir.” Poletti and the Braves. That put an interesting spin on things. Jack filed it away. “Thanks, Corporal. Now beat it. You don’t want to be seen with us.” “Uh, no offense, but no. Sir!” He got that salute in at last, then hesitated for a moment. “Watch your back, Colonel. I don’t know what’s going on, but it’s weird.” With that profound observation Corporal Wilkins sprinted into the alley and out of sight.

“Weird, huh?” muttered Daniel. “One way of putting it. Now what?” “Now?” Jack poked his head around the corner, saw that the passage was empty, and started heading back toward the square at a leisurely pace. “Now we’re gonna sit tight till lights-out, and then we’ll pay a visit to the radio shack, pardon the pun.” “Why?” “Because that’s what passes for headquarters around here. The two guys who masquerade as sergeants went in there for a confab with the messenger boy, Norris, and the Poletti gang. To discuss new orders, I assume.” Daniel cast him a sidelong glance. “How can you possibly know all that?” “Afraid I’m committing a tactical error?” snapped Jack, instantly regretting it. Daniel wasn’t afraid. He was. And maybe Daniel should be afraid. Because it was conjecture, and it was the best Jack had right now. He stormed out into the deserted square, staring at the planet, at the quiet barracks that seemed to be flattened by oily light. What the hell was he doing here? If he was all the SGC had to offer, then God help Carter and Teal’c and Doc Fraiser. “Jack!” Daniel’s hand on his arm, insistent and not letting go. Stuttering to a halt, Jack turned around. “Sorry,” he ground out. “Must be the light. Feels like I’m floating through a fish tank covered in green goop. Green makes me cranky.” The look gave it away. Clearly, Daniel found the image intriguing but didn’t buy the excuse for a second. “What I was trying to convey back there—and I can see where it gets confusing—is my appreciation for those deductive reasoning skills of yours.” “Ah,” mumbled Jack and shrugged. “No big deal. You know what I’ve been doing in the bad old days. It involved a lot of that.” “Glad we cleared that up.” Daniel broke into a cautious grin. “Now can we get some dinner?” “You got a death wish? If the rest of the place is anything to go by, they serve boiled newt as—Oh crap!” Watching his nemesis approach, Jack wondered if it was too late to change the entree back to boiled newt. Poletti in tow, Norris had emerged from the com shack and strutted across the square. “O’Neill! Sergeant van Leyden wants to see you.” “In which case Sergeant van Leyden can drag his ass out here. If he asks why, tell him to read up on privileges of rank.” Norris’ face said that this was exactly the reply he’d hoped for. Jack didn’t like it. Time to stir things up a little. “By the way, Norris, what were you doing at the gate this morning?” Haughtiness gave way to consternation, and Norris’ jaw worked hard. Eventually he snarled, “I was waiting for Major Warren. We were expecting him back. Not that it’s any of your business.” “We? Who’s we? That happy little family you’ve got here?” This time the shock tactics didn’t work. Norris smirked. “Look, O’Neill, you two can either come with us or—” The motion, a blur in his peripheral vision, told Jack that the unspoken threat had just become the only option and that it was gonna be ugly. He spun around, managed to block a blow that nearly broke his arm. His fist, aimed at Poletti’s solid gut,

missed by a mile. God, this guy was fast, way too fast! Jack was going for his gun when a punch to the kidney made him arch back helplessly. As he sank to his knees, pain tinted the planet’s crescent brilliantly red, until the Stooges appeared out of nowhere to join the fun. Curly’s face smiled down on him, and Norris bleated a lame, unexpected protest. Then they were all over Jack, pinning him down, flex-cuffing his wrists, leaving his ribs screaming. Six feet away lay Daniel, tied up and motionless, nose busted, lip split, blood glaring from an ashen face. “Take them to the gate,” a whole new voice ordered, sounding like its owner was enjoying the spectacle. “Send them… home.” Sergeant van Leyden, Jack presumed. It was near sunrise by the time Teal’c awoke, remembering little, except that the injury must have been grievous, else he would not have slipped into a healing trance. Then the forest, alive with the howls of its creatures, brought the events back to him. He cautiously pushed himself upright, neck craned to look at his shoulder. A large bloodstain had soaked from where the fabric was torn and down the front of his shirt. Drenched by the pervasive damp, it was already beginning to blend with dirt and sweat. The wound itself had closed. Only a rosy scar, standing out starkly from dark skin, marked its location. That and perhaps some minor twinges and residual stiffness in his shoulder. In time, scar, twinges, and stiffness would fade, and they were a small price to pay for his folly. “Shek kree a kek, hasshak!” he hissed, furious with himself. Had he let himself be fooled like this as a raw recruit, Master Bra’tac would not have wasted any time or effort on whipping him. Master Bra’tac would have sent him home to his mother, to learn how to spin wool and tend small children, because Teal’c was not fit to become a warrior. “Hasshak!” He spat again and pushed himself to his feet. The shelter in the tree was empty, as he had feared. Dug into the ground he found a deep hole, filling with moisture. This was where Dr. Fraiser had hidden her dagger. Near the hole lay a small piece of rock; a whetstone, no doubt. There was nothing else the tree could tell him, and Teal’c stepped back out into the open, noting with some astonishment that she had not taken the backpack or any of the weapons, despite the fact that he had hardly been in a position to stop her. Why had she left without supplies or arms? And where had she gone? He could not visually recall her leaving, because he had been slipping from consciousness, but perhaps… Teal’c returned to the boulder that had secured the entrance, sat down once more, and closed his eyes. In his mind he saw the doctor’s drawn face, her gaze lucid for the first time in days, agonized with the realization of what she had done. Then the image went black. This was when he had begun to drift. But he had still been able to hear; the sounds as clear and precise as they became in the split-second before sleep. He’s already dead. Said aloud as if in response to something or someone—what or whom?—and with a distinct undertone of apprehension. The doctor had told an untruth, and she

had been afraid of being found out. Not just about the lie. She had had the opportunity to kill him and refused to take it. Twice. First when she had only wounded him; the second time when he had lain helpless. Instead of striking, she had backed away, slowly and with great difficulty—a child, aware of the cost of disobedience but disobeying nonetheless—and then she suddenly had turned and run. With perfect accuracy, his memory mapped out the volume and direction of the sound her footsteps had made. When his eyes snapped open, he stared at a tight gap in the undergrowth. Teal’c rose and retraced her path, unsurprised when he could not find boot prints. The ground, bog-like and resilient, returned to its original state within minutes. However, on the bushes themselves several thin twigs were broken and leaves crushed; unmistakable tokens of passage. Dr. Fraiser’s choice of escape route bewildered him. To the east, the terrain became easier, sloping gradually into a broad river valley. Logically, if a person were fleeing from something, they would tend to take the easiest path for best possible speed. Indeed, Teal’c himself had done so three days ago, fleeing from the beasts that had attacked them. Dr. Fraiser had done the opposite. She had turned west, choosing the most difficult and dangerous route, uphill into the mountains and back toward the Stargate—and the beasts. Why? “To go home,” he murmured in answer to his own question. In her ramblings, she had repeatedly expressed a wish to return home. At the time, it had struck him as the most rational thought she was conceiving. Now he wondered. Even when she had shown no sign of improvement, he had clung to the hope that the condition would be temporary. But he was no longer sure that it was madness at all. The assault on him, in its preparation and execution, spoke of a cunning that was fundamentally unlike Dr. Fraiser. Not because she lacked the intelligence and determination, but because she lacked the callousness. The fact that he was still alive proved it. If not madness, what then? Teal’c knew of one thing that would explain it, and the thought sickened him to such an extent that he refused to entertain it. But whatever the case, he needed to find her, even if it meant temporarily abandoning his search for Major Carter. At this moment Dr. Fraiser was the more vulnerable of the two, although Major Carter, too, had been injured, and it was impossible to predict her current state of health. In the name of a false god Teal’c had led men into battle, more than once, and thus the weight of responsibility he felt was as familiar as it was unwelcome. Unwelcome not because he sought to shirk it, but because he knew the consequences error could entail. His own father had fallen victim to them, murdered for failing to please the whim of a would-be god and win an unwinnable skirmish. Holding himself accountable, he had calmly accepted his punishment—as indeed had O’Neill, who had become his own judge and jury. Neither man had conceded that responsibility without error could not exist. If there were no risk of error, what weight could there be to responsibility? They went hand in hand, one the dark side of the other, and the conclusions O’Neill had drawn were wrong. The penance he inflicted on himself was unjust and would be warranted only if he were a god possessed of omniscience.

Teal’c decided that, should he escape with his life, his friend and brother would need to be reminded of his patent lack of divinity. Fuelled by sudden resolve, he turned back, collected the pack and his staff weapon, set off on the doctor’s tenuous trail of broken twigs, crushed tendrils of creeper plants, bark scraped from tree trunks. Irrespective of the difficulty of the terrain, all traces were on a line that led uphill and west as straight as a bird flew. It was as though Dr. Fraiser followed a beckoning voice, imperious and seductive. Further up in the mountains, the ground became marginally drier, and here he found footprints—mostly indentations made by the tips of her boots. She had been moving fast, running at times, and continued for longer than she should have been able to sustain such a frenzied pace. If Teal’c was right, the will that governed her would drive her on relentlessly and past the point of exhaustion. And if he was right, it meant that a Goa’uld was on this planet. More than four hours into his pursuit Teal’c reached a small stream and followed it upriver, until it widened into a pool. Halfway along its northern shore, he discovered the impression in the mud. During his first winter on Earth, O’Neill had explained to him a game Tauri children liked to play. It was called Snow Angels, and O’Neill had obliged by throwing himself to the ground and demonstrating its mechanics. This looked similar—the shape of a body etched into the soil, legs splayed, arms stretched wide. Dr. Fraiser’s physical strength seemed to have flagged at last. She had tripped over a root and fallen face down into the mud. From there she had gathered herself and crawled to the water’s edge, presumably to drink. “Shek kree,” Teal’c muttered, dismayed. He knelt, scooped up a handful of water and, careful not to swallow any, sloshed the sweat from his face. Tepid and smelling sickly sweet, the water was less than refreshing. It also was tainted, Teal’c knew not by what substance. When he had first come upon the creek two days ago and several miles further downstream, he too had drunk from it, but his symbiote had neutralized most of the contaminant. Other than a passing dizziness there had been no ill effects. However, he could not tell what harm it would do to Tauri physiology. Some, he surmised. Dr. Fraiser had risen again, but the footprints, plainly outlined now, were uneven and staggering like a drunkard’s. He trailed the unsteady path and two hundred meters further up found a rock where she had rested. Though not in the position he would have expected. Instead of slumping onto the smooth stone directly, she had walked around it and sat facing uphill. Why? Whom or what had she been watching? Teal’c eased himself onto the rock, absently noting that his shoulder ached; a reminder that, while the symbiote was able to accelerate his body’s healing process, it required the rest of kelno’reem to do so properly. It would have to wait. Rotating his arm to loosen cramped muscles, he suddenly realized that the maddening cackle and chatter of the jungle had ceased. The only sounds were the tap of condensation dripping from branches and the splash of a reedy waterfall at the western end of the lake. Other than that, the forest was quiet. His fingers inadvertently tightened around the staff weapon, and he fought off a sense of foreboding. Then his gaze traveled upward, against the motion of the water, 78

over black rock and plants shining with moisture, until at last he saw what Dr. Fraiser must have seen. Atop the cliff and its cascade rose, gray as ghosts, the ruins that housed the Stargate. Dr. Daniel Jackson felt distinctly claustrophobic. The rock walls reared toward a starless corridor of olive drab sky, and the uneven ground wasn’t designed to enhance physical or spiritual balance. Send them… home. As he walked—alright, tottered—Daniel mulled the three words over, the linguist in him fascinated by that beat before home. Somehow the pause suggested that there was no place like… home. It could be interpreted in all sorts of ways, none likely to coincide with his preferred definition. For instance, the— He stumbled, felt a hot bolt of pain rattle through his head, heard the snigg*r of the goon behind him, and swore under his breath. You’d think that, if people insisted on converting your face to raw hamburger, they’d at least have the decency to order a sedan chair for you afterwards. “You okay?” whispered Jack. “Shut up!” barked Mr. Poletti, the echo of his voice bouncing through the canyon. “Fine,” Daniel said quickly, careful to keep Jack on his right, in order to hide the left side of his face. The goons—dead ringers for a mob of Jaffa—hadn’t been kind enough to give him a moment to take off his specs. That pair, too, was trashed now, though it didn’t make that much of a difference. He couldn’t see out of his left eye anyway, and so far he’d been unable to ascertain if this was because the eye had swollen shut or because, this time round, he’d actually lost sight in it. Either way, it livened up the hike. One of the rarely considered benefits of stereoscopic vision was the fact that it allowed for depth perception. He’d found out the hard way while running around in that stupid eye patch—one of the reasons why he’d discarded it three days earlier than prescribed by Doc Fraiser. His shins had been unable to stand the strain. Right now, his shins didn’t worry him. What did worry him was being funneled through the canyon that led to the gate. That meaningful pause seemed to preclude the literal meaning of home, which left a euphemism popular among romantic novelists—along with eternal rest. Odds were that he and Jack would be lined up against the cliff for a quaint old execution by firing squad—blindfold unnecessary in Dr. Jackson’s case—with subsequent disposal of their remains through the Stargate. What do you mean, General Hammond? They gated back three days ago. The thought that this might be precisely what had happened to Sam and Teal’c and Janet made him sick. Only sheer, undiluted fury at the prospect of never finding out why kept the churning in his gut at bay. It wasn’t just scientific curiosity. Daniel wanted to know whom to haunt. The goons prodded them around a narrow bend, and suddenly the rock walls parted and opened out into the crater. “Keep going,” advised Mr. Poletti.

More prodding, but strangely enough not toward the cliff but toward the gate. One of the Marines broke into a trot, overtook, and headed for the DHD. He made no attempt to conceal the address he was dialing. He didn’t need to. Daniel himself had dialed it countless times over the years. Earth. He heard Jack’s sigh of disbelief, seconded the motion, and wondered how General Hammond would respond to having them returned in this not quite factorysealed condition. With a decidedly undiplomatic note of protest, Daniel assumed. The thought was cut off by the whoosh of the event horizon, and then the wormhole established, drilling a clear blue circle into murky air. “In your own time, gentlemen,” said Poletti. “You’ll have to uncuff me,” Jack muttered. “I need to enter the IDC.” “I’ll do the honors.” Poletti smirked and started punching numbers into the transmitter on his wrist. So this was how it’d go. No blindfolds and last cigarettes. Just bugs on the windshield, and next time Sergeant Siler cleaned the iris, he’d wipe off some familiar-looking subatomic particles. Daniel never for a moment believed that Poletti had entered a valid code. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that five of the goons had formed a semicircle behind him and Jack, discouraging any foolhardy notions such as running. Out front, Poletti had climbed the dais. “Bon voyage, gentlemen,” he brayed. Jack started walking. Evidently he wasn’t immune to niceties of phrasing either. If he thought they were going home, he’d leave last, after seeing his one-man-team safely through the wormhole. Daniel caught up with him in front of the event horizon. “Stop jostling for pole position,” he hissed. “They say it hardly hurts at all,” Jack hissed back. “Who says?” “The particles.” And then Jack was gone. Two seconds later Daniel concluded that the particles were lying through their teeth. But conscious thought and sensation folded into merciful black, until he shot from the far end of the wormhole, screaming and in free fall. Images took on a snapshot quality; an oppressive flood of green, age-old masonry, the still figure sprawled between ferns below. He hit the ground hard, though moss and mud cushioned most of the impact. The Hereafter didn’t exactly live up to the advertising. Then again, there always was the possibility that he wasn’t quite dead yet. Groaning, he rolled over and struggled to his knees. The gymnastics shook loose an avalanche of throbs that felt like it wanted to exit his head through his left eye. He ignored it and shuffled over to Jack who seemed to be coming round, his face bonewhite under a mudpack. “Love what they’ve done with the gate room.” Jack blinked up at the canopy. “Where the hell are we? Mato Grosso?”

“Doesn’t look like Brazil to me.” Daniel sniffed, squinting at the blur of a monumental structure behind them. High in the wall, the gate formed the third eye in a stone-carved mask that placidly gazed down at him. “My money’s on Angkor Wat.” “What encore?” “You know. The Khmer temples in Cambodia.” “Didn’t know they kept a Stargate there.” “Uh, they don’t, I guess. If they did, somebody’d have found it by now.” Glancing at fuzzy walls and reliefs again, Daniel said, “This is amazing. We definitely need to check out this place. It could—” “Daniel!” “Hmm?” “We don’t know where we are, we’re hogtied, we’ve got no weapons or supplies, and we—Holy buckets!” Jack had finally turned his head to get a spectacular view of Daniel’s face. “You know, you’re… Nah, I won’t say it.” “Won’t say what?” “Uh-uh.” “Jack?” “I’m not gonna say you’re a sight for sore eyes.” “Very funny.” “That’s why I didn’t say it.” He winced. “Can you see anything at all?” “Not out of the left eye.” “Crap.” Accompanied by a lurid selection of curses, Jack maneuvered himself onto his side, facing away from Daniel. Who was watching the performance, knowing that it had to hurt like merry hell and wishing he could make himself useful. “You need a doctor,” he offered lamely. “I’ll consult the first medicine man who’s got his shingle out.” Jack wiggled his fingers. “Chew through the flex.” “You’re joking!” “No.” Sighing, Daniel dropped into a patch of mud and scooted down until his teeth were at a level with Jack’s wrists. “Fart and I’ll kill you!” There was no reply, and Daniel resigned himself. Bits of his face that desperately wanted to be left alone were chafing against Jack’s arms, and the plastic was no real winner for taste and stuck between his teeth. Jack kept quiet. He’d either passed out again or he was brooding. Daniel stopped and sat up, trying to relax his shoulders. The sun had crept over the treetops and onto their little patch of forest floor. It occurred to him that they’d been cheated out of a night and some much-needed sleep. “I didn’t fart!” So Jack had been brooding. “Keep going!” “How about you entertain me by telling me why you retired?” “You know why. You were there.”

If there’d ever been a moment when Daniel wanted to cross his arms this was it. “Don’t bullsh*t me. You quit—which isn’t exactly a specialty of yours. So what’s going on?” “Daniel, I—” “Spill it, Jack. I mean it.” Jack shifted over a little further, staring at a lump of moss. “This last year—” “You mean the one when you were too busy being the alpha male to see daylight?” And Daniel had risen to the bait every damn time, until their usual banter deteriorated into personal insults. “Sorry. Just gag me.” “Can’t. I need you.” “Oh right. The flex.” “What else?” O’Neillese for the friendship’s still there. Twisted and battered and bent out of shape, but still a friendship. Solid foundations. “What about this last year?” Daniel prodded. “You mean apart from the fact that I was prepared to blow up a spaceship with you in it? Or that I shot to kill when I shot Carter? Or that I left Teal’c to get his matrix stored in the gate? Notice a pattern? Too many bad calls, Daniel. The only reason why any of you’s still around is that I got lucky each time. I can’t afford to rely on that. You can’t. The exercise sent up a red flag. That’s what happens when luck runs out, Daniel.” His fingers balled into tight fists. “The other day, when I shot that robot—” “She was sentient, Jack.” “When I shot Reese? I shot her because I couldn’t gamble. I was scared stiff of luck running out. I’ve lost too many people already, and so help me, I’m not going to lose any more.” You stupid son of a bitch! Daniel grimaced. “Look,” he said at last, “for what it’s worth, I’ve always been convinced—still am—that, if I buy it out here, it won’t be because you’re there but because you’re not. You’ve pulled our asses out of the fire more times than I care to remember and long may you continue to do so. Because I have every intention of living to a ripe old age. and I’m counting on you to keep that little fancy of mine viable.” “Gee! Thanks, Daniel.” Jack sounded raw, but the attitude was encouraging. “Anything else I can do for you?” “As a matter of fact, yes.” Daniel grinned. “Try stretching the flex. It might pop.” “You sneaky, underhand, devious little… You mean there was no reason for me to—” “I didn’t say that. I said it might pop. So it might still need some nibbling.” “And you might just stay cuffed!” growled Jack and did as he was told. The flex popped. Ten minutes later, Daniel’s hands were free, too. Rubbing his wrists, he looked for a doorway that would lead to the interior of the ruins, but all he could see was the gaping mouth of the stone face that held the Stargate. Not likely, despite the stone tongue that lolled out into the clearing like an entrance ramp. Besides, the maw stank of feces and God knew what else, and even Daniel’s investigative fervor had limits. He began trailing the wall into the forest, noticing for

the first time that the noises you’d expect in a jungle were absent. Except for an unnerving, insistent buzz. Following the sound, he rounded a huge tree and froze, bile rising in his throat. So much for peace and quiet. From somewhere behind him drifted shouts. “Daniel! Wait up! I can’t find the”— Jack came trotting around the bole and ground to a dead halt—“DHD…” Clouds of flies dancing around it, the body hung suspended from a protrusion in the temple wall.

CHAPTER NINE

“Okay, sirs. That’s it for today. As you can tell from your schedule, the role play exercise is slotted first thing tomorrow morning, so you might wanna go over your notes tonight. Thank you all, and I’ll see you tomorrow.” The hollow-chested lecturer, a warrant officer in academic uniform—baggy chinos, checked shirt, and beige corduroy jacket—shuffled down from the dais in front of the projection screen and immediately was mobbed by a gang of teacher’s pets. Like high school, George Hammond thought in disgust. Except, he himself had never hung around after class. He’d been too busy trying to set new records for the run between classroom and bleachers. Nothing to do with baseball. More to do with Betty Mae Turner. He smiled briefly—Betty Mae had ended up marrying one of the teacher’s pets and produced a houseful of organ-pipe offspring. However, this wasn’t high school and more’s the pity. If it were, or if he had more of Jack O’Neill’s blithe disregard for institutional authority, he’d have carved This sucks! into the desk with a penknife. As it was, he simply gathered his— unused—notepad and sidled out of the row of seats and toward the exit. Below, the eager beavers were still wooing the lecturer, who was lapping it up. Presumably it was more attention than the guy otherwise got in a year. Good for him. And good for Psych Ops. If they were striving to imbue their existence with some meaning, that was a laudable undertaking and all very well with Major General Hammond. However, he signally failed to understand why he should have to be involved in the ego salving. He had better things to do. More urgent things. That aside, a little advance warning might have been nice. The order for Hammond to participate in this extravaganza for general staff had landed on his desk yesterday morning. The three-day seminar at Boiling AFB (Enhanced Understanding of Leadership and Dealing with Subordinates) seemed to be part of some obscure drive toward fluffier armed forces, and it was as redundant as a pair of left shoes. A lot of wishywashy psycho-babble that had nothing whatsoever to do with real life. Real life was fifty percent of SG-1 and Dr. Fraiser missing. Hammond stormed down the corridor, dodging clumps of chatting people. His interest in discussing this afternoon’s lecture (Voluntary Separation and How to Handle It) was strictly limited. Besides, his personal method (Wait Till Half a Team Disappears and See How Fast Their CO Bounces Back) wouldn’t meet with the attendees’ approval. As he rattled down the stairs he thought he heard somebody hollering his name, opted for temporary deafness, and ducked out the door. He needed to contact the SGC and check if there were any news, but he didn’t want to make the call from Boiling. He had friends elsewhere whose phones would be secure.

Outside, the wind was driving sheets of rain across the lawn. The weather suited his mood. Head bowed and shoulders hunched, he hurried along the access road and through the main gate, guessing that it would take him at least half an hour to find a taxi at this time of day. He’d guessed wrong. Stepping out onto McDill Boulevard, he saw a yellow cab tearing toward him, and the driver actually responded to his wave. The cab pulled over, and Hammond, eager to get out of the rain, hopped in before it’d even screeched to a complete standstill. “Andrews Air Force Base,” he said, in a tone proven to discourage any outbursts of verbal diarrhea on the part of cabbies. Apparently it worked. “Okay,” said the driver and left it at that. It took Hammond exactly five minutes to realize that the cabby’s reticence wasn’t based on sensitivity. Instead of driving east into central Washington, the cab sped into the maze of roads along the river, weaving in and out of traffic and steadily heading north toward Interstate 66. “Hey!” He rapped against the glass partition. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?” The cabby, bearded and in a brown, wooly Afghan hat, cast a quick glance in the rearview mirror but didn’t turn around. “Check your six, General. The beige sedan, three cars behind us? They’re after you. I’m trying to lose them.” Terrific! A conspiracy nut! Next he’d confess that he got this intel from the Cigarette-Smoking Man in an underground parking lot. Could this day possibly get any worse? Then again… As instructed, Hammond checked his six. Sure enough, there was a beige, government-issue sedan three cars behind, and while this wasn’t an uncommon occurrence in DC, its driver did look a little more intense than the rushhour traffic warranted. The guy next to him was talking into a cell phone. Hammond settled back into the seat. “Who the devil are you?” This time the cabby did turn, grinning broadly and revealing a sturdy set of teeth with a pronounced gap between the upper incisors. “We’ll chat soon, but right now you don’t wanna distract the driver.” With that he goosed the engine to 70 mph, nearly clipped the rear bumper of a black Lexus in front, cut right across an eighteen-wheeler that tooted Beethoven’s Fifth on its horn, and shot over three lanes onto the ramp for Custis Memorial Boulevard. The beige sedan missed the exit and drove on straight, its co-pilot gesticulating furiously. At least Hammond’s question had been answered. The day had got worse. By a considerable margin. He was trapped in a speeding cab, steered by a convicted traitor, rogue agent, and con artist. On the upside, this promised to be more diverting than tomorrow morning’s role play exercise. The cab was out on the 1-66 now and doing 80 mph. Thirty-five minutes later they were passing Dulles International, and his chauffeur finally slowed down a little to retrieve a sports bag from under the passenger seat. He slid open the partition and shoved the bag into the rear. “I suggest you change, General. It’ll attract less attention than a dress uniform. I won’t peek, I swear.”

The bag contained a pair of jeans, trodden-down sneakers, a windbreaker, and, to Hammond’s dismay, the man’s favorite fashion statement, an unbearably lurid Aloha shirt. It’ll attract less attention? By the time he’d zipped the windbreaker up to his neck to tamp down the effect of the shirt, they were pulling into the parking lot behind a seedy truck stop. “Now are we safe to talk?” Hammond snapped. His chauffeur backed the cab into a slot beside a forty-foot Winnebago. “Inside,” he said. “They do a great chocolate meringue pie. I’ve been looking forward to it all day.” Then he killed the engine, exchanged the ethnic headwear for a dozer cap, and got out of the cab. He was wearing grease-stained mechanic’s overalls to go with the hat. Climbing out, Hammond figured that dressing up as Bobo the Clown still beat running around like the Trucker King of Hicksville. A state cruiser parked directly outside the cafe, and as they ambled closer a trooper back-pushed and rotated through the door, balancing two cups of coffee on a box of donuts. It probably explained why they hadn’t been caught speeding. “I should just hand you over to them,” Hammond muttered angrily. “For reckless driving, if nothing else. You’re a menace, Maybourne.” “Please, General. I just saved your butt, and I’d prefer it if you called me Hutch. For, uh, personal reasons.” He shot a sideways glance at Hammond. “Maybe I should—” “Absolutely not! Whatever else happens, you will not call me Huggy Bear. Do I make myself clear?” “Just a thought.” “Do the world a favor and stop thinking!” The interior of the cafe lived down to expectation; dark and dingy, with the smell of old fries thick in the air and Formica tables stuck between tattered red seats. They also were out of chocolate meringue pie, as George Hammond noted in a bout of petty satisfaction. Maybourne had picked a booth at the back of the room, directly under an antique speaker that hissed and drooled country music between the static. A waitress brought two mugs of coffee and a plate of apple pie—runner-up, going by Maybourne’s face. The coffee wasn’t too bad, and Hammond took another sip and waited until the girl was out of earshot. “Right. What the hell is going on? And don’t even think of bullsh*tting me. Kidnapping’s a federal offence, in case you’d forgotten.” Tearing into his apple pie, Maybourne observed, “Our boy Jack’s got himself in trouble again, hasn’t he?” “What do you care? You shot him!” “I’m hurt!” He put down a heaped fork and sent Hammond a baby-blue look of wounded innocence. “You mean Jack hasn’t told you? I didn’t shoot him. I can guess who did, but it wasn’t me. I mean, why would I?” “I don’t know. Why do you do anything, Maybourne?” “Hutch. I’m serious, George.” The baby-blues turned cold as he finally dropped the Endearing Goofball routine. “If you’re in my… predicament…you’ve got to keep

an ear to the ground. I do. So I hear things. Lately I hear that Jack screws up an exercise past recognition, decimates his own team, and resigns. Then I hear that somebody out Cheyenne Mountain way is sniffing at a high-ranking Marine who happens to have organized said exercise. Then I hear that the NID doesn’t want said high-ranking Marine sniffed at and is proposing to remove the sniffer. And then you get sent to DC, which is the last place you ought to be, on some lame excuse and with a couple of NID heavies on your tail. How’s my hearing so far, George?” Wondering who’d redefined the meaning of Top Secret and when, Hammond snarled, “Accurate. Except for one detail. Colonel O’Neill didn’t resign.” “Where is he? He isn’t at home. I tried to get in touch with him.” “Off-world, and I shouldn’t even tell you that much.” “General, what do you think those guys in the sedan were going do to? Ask for directions? They had orders to solve the NID’s problem. You’re hip-deep in it, and I’m the only ally you’ve got right now. You’ll have to trust me.” Trust Harry Maybourne. As far as George Hammond was concerned, the excolonel had all the credibility of a psychotic rattler. On the other hand there was no getting away from the fact that Jack O’Neill trusted him, and Hammond knew better than to ignore Jack’s instincts. Repeated threats to shoot Maybourne notwithstanding, Jack actually liked the guy. Not that he’d ever admit it. And Jack had publicly revised his opinion as to who’d parked that bullet in his arm. “What’s in it for you?” Maybourne smirked. “Jack’s got that quaint loyalty thing going. If anything happens to you and he finds out that I could have stopped it, he’s gonna come after me and bust my ass. I’d like to avoid that scenario.” “Christ! I could get court-martialed just for being seen with you,” drawled Hammond. Then he leaned forward, nearly knocking over his mug. “If I ever hear so much as a whisper of this from any source other than you or me, fm gonna come after you and bust your ass. Are we clear on this, Colonel?” “Crystal.” Doubting his judgment all the way through, Hammond laid out the entire story for Harry Maybourne. Who rapidly lost interest in the apple pie. By the end of it he was attacking the tabletop with his fork. “This is uglier than I thought.” He quit stabbing, rummaged through his back pocket, produced an envelope, and slid it across the table. “I’m hoping the Air Force’ll pick up my expenses.” “For what?” asked Hammond. “Two tickets to Seattle. I gotta show you something.” The faces, serene and beautiful, seemed to be smiling at her in approval. They were everywhere, on walls, pillars, doorjambs, and they wore elaborate hairstyles and headdresses shaped like pagodas. There were full-length statues, too; countless round-busted, wide-hipped women, their arms raised gracefully, and men almost too pretty to be male, though you could hardly miss that they were boys. Some talked to her, or so Janet thought. Or perhaps it was the voice speaking through them. It had

got louder and more distinct since she’d entered the city. Another sign that she was close now. Close to home. But mostly she knew because she felt at peace. There was no noise at all. The cackle of the rainforest had stopped as soon as she’d stepped through the great gate. No noise, and none of that merciless itch to run, run, run that had driven her to collapse yesterday. She could take her time now. And she would. So much to see, and it would be a shame to rush. Suddenly she realized that this had to be the same kind of excitement that drove Daniel. Whom? Janet gave a small mental shrug, unwilling to get into an argument, and went back to studying her surroundings. The voice acquiesced. In front of her stretched a broad corridor—well, not exactly a corridor, seeing as it had no roof—that led to a sun-flooded hall of pillars. The ground was covered with grass, short and thick and velvety. “So who’s mowing the lawn around here?” She giggled. Obeying an impulse, she took off her boots and socks. The grass felt as luxurious as it looked, warm and springy under her feet. It practically begged her to skip, and so she skipped all the way into the hall, finally forcing herself to stand still and look around. The ceiling soared sixty feet above her head, crumbling with age in places. Plants had nudged their way through brittle masonry, and some of the vines, studded with delicate, fragrant blossoms, brushed the ground. No telling what this hall had been once. Perhaps a throne room, something out of The King and I. Janet started whistling a tune from the show, then cut herself off, surprised at a giddiness that wasn’t normally hers. There is nobody here to see or hear you. Why be embarrassed? Because. That is no answer. “It isn’t me!” she shouted, the sound whirling around pillars and vines and toward the lofty ceiling like a living thing. Oh, but it is. A second later it was her whirling and skipping around pillars and vines, whistling “Shall We Dance?” and curtsying to an invisible king. The laughter of the voice bled into the hall and drifted through the ceiling on shafts of sunlight. She wanted to scream, yell at it to stop, and found she couldn’t, because she had to skip and whirl and whistle, whistle like a madwoman, whistle a tune she didn’t recognize anymore, eerie and frantic and alien. Somewhere in her mind, compacted by utter panic, formed the thought that she was going insane. No. No. No. No. No. “No!” The wail, released at last, broke the compulsion, made her feet arrest mid-skip, and she stumbled and fell hard. No grass here. Red stone tiles, rough and unforgiving. She skinned her elbow and curled into a ball, whimpering like a child. It was a joke. Only a joke. “Leave me alone!” No reply this time, but miraculously that indefinable pressure lifted. The voice was gone. For now. For the most part. She slowly pushed herself up, no longer

trusting the peace, needing to get out of this hall never to return. Shadows of laughter still hung in the air like a foul smell, and she couldn’t bear it. Across the room, at the end of an alley of pillars, opened a tall arch, curtained by a cascade of water that glittered like diamonds in the sunshine. This was the only exit, unless she were to turn back, and she knew she couldn’t do that. Not if she wanted to go home. Carefully groping her way from pillar to pillar, half expecting her body to go berserk again and trying to avoid the stares of the faces, she edged closer to the arch. It reminded her of the Stargate, and this familiarity calmed her. She feared the water, though. Yesterday, parched with thirst, she’d drunk from the stream and got violently ill. As far as she’d been able to tell from the symptoms, it had been a mild form of botulism. Mild because you didn’t usually survive once you experienced double vision and respiratory impairment. She’d dragged herself to a small, dank cave at the bottom of the falls where she’d spent the night, shivering and heaving. Some time after midnight she’d fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion, only to be woken at sunrise by the jungle’s dawn chorus. She hadn’t wanted to leave, but the voice had reasoned with her for a long time, warning her to climb the cliff, lest her captor would find her. Not her captor. “Teal’c,” she whispered defiantly. “His name is Teal’c, and I’m glad he’s alive.” There was no answer. She hadn’t expected it, because she and the voice had had this one out, too. The voice had known all along that she was lying, seeming amused—pleased, actually—rather than angry about it. But she should move on. She had to. And the only way to go was through the arch. If she tried to turn back, the skipping and whirling and whistling would start again. The cascade beyond the arch sparkled, painting rainbow patterns of light on the floor. It looked nothing like the water in the stream. This looked pure, utterly perfect. As she inched toward the brilliant curtain, one hand gingerly relinquished its contact with a pillar. The stone, unchanging and immobile on her skin had reassured her. Anchored her. She was scared of letting go, but unless she let go, she wouldn’t be able to find the way home. Slowly she extended her arm, fingertips scoring transparent furrows into the veil of water. It was cool. Cool and delicious and inviting, and it smelled of sun-yellowed summers and racing home after school to head out to the swimming hole. It smelled safe. She watched a sheet of water slide up her palm and to her wrist like a shimmering glove. It lifted bits of dust and dirt, rinsed them away, and left her feeling clean for the first time in days. Smiling, Janet abandoned her last hold on the pillar, stepped onto the broad stone threshold under the arch and stood misted by spray for a moment. Something wonderful lay beyond that curtain of water. Home. The thought drove her forward, through the cascade, her bare feet losing the ground almost instantly, and she fell, fell, fell, shattered the black mirror of a pool, and sank, aching from the impact, into airless silence. It was so cold, her first instinct had been to gasp. Icy water searing her throat and lungs, she slid deeper into blackness, unable to tell if her eyes were open or if her body even tried to swim. Then her toes touched the bottom—soft and bumpy, though it wasn’t silt. It felt like fabric and skin, but she couldn’t allow herself to care, couldn’t help whomever 89

had drowned here before her. Pushing herself off with more strength than she’d believed she could muster, she shot back toward the surface, black fading to charcoal fading to insipid green. Her lungs were screaming for air, and a madly sucked-in breath made her convulse with coughs and sent her under again. Flailing and kicking, knowing that, if she went back to the bottom, she’d stay there, she paddled for the rim of the pool, only to find shining stone walls; black obsidian, too high to reach the edge and too perfectly crafted to leave any cracks for purchase. And even if she could have reached, her arms and hands were cramping with cold. Wasp, she thought. Wasp in the lemonade pitcher, flitting and buzzing until its tracheae were clogged with sugary yellow liquid, and then it suffocated. Very slowly. But first it’d go all still. She turned onto her back, let herself drift to save what strength she had left. Shining black walls on three sides around her. Twenty meters away, in the shadows at the far end of the pool, tumbled the dark veil of the cascade, endlessly, brilliantly lit only at the very top, where the arch was. Do you beg my forgiveness? “I’m sorry,” she croaked through a hurting throat. “I shouldn’t have sent you away. It was disrespectful.” The surge of laughter, boisterous and mocking, was as awful as it had been in the throne room. What makes you think you could send me anywhere? “I—” You are nothing. I am everything. “I realize that.” Do you beg my forgiveness? “For what?” She genuinely didn’t know. You did not ask my permission to bathe. It was true. She hadn’t. She hadn’t even considered it. The voice was right to be offended. “Please forgive me,” she whispered, fighting back tears. “Please.” As the voice remained silent, the shadows deepened, and she began to sob, terrified of dying without having been granted absolution. Very well. I shall forgive you this once. Have you finished bathing? “Yes! Yes. Thank you. Thank you so much.” Water lapped into her mouth and down her throat, tasting stale and putrid. Then you must get out now. “But I—” Words turned into indistinct burbles as she sagged beneath the surface. Punishment. It was her punishment for refusing the voice. She had to get out. Had to try at least. The voice wanted her to. Choking and jerking desperately, she raised her head above the water. A ray of sunlight pierced the foliage far above, burned the shadows of the pool, and picked out the relief in the pool wall. A hand, set in a circle, and the sunbeam

seemed to have ignited a warm welcoming glow, a warmth that promised rescue and safety. Janet knew she’d seen it before, couldn’t recall when, but it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that she touched it. Breaths like hiccups, coming in short, ragged heaves and too loud. Way too loud. Sam Carter pressed her face into the crook of her arm to muffle the sounds. She shouldn’t be cold. Not when she could taste the viscous heat of the jungle, steaming from black soil and trickling from leaves. Viscous, icy heat that hauled her body into a spasm of shivers. She fought it down, trying to remember why it was important not to be heard. Nobody here to hear her, was there? Besides, it was raining. The monsoon cloudburst tattooed a machinegun rattle on the foliage and fizzed into vapor the second it penetrated the canopy. Humidity had to be at a hundred percent, and if you breathed it was instant emphysema. White mist everywhere, reducing her surroundings to coiling phantasms. Nothing seemed solid anymore, everything had become spongy and gluey, like the mire under her feet. Her fingers tightened around the air root of a mangrove she was clutching for fear of cutting loose and drifting away. Ten yards to her left, invisible through the steam, though she would have found it blindfolded—she’d been staring at it most of the night—was the spot where the hell hog had died, flailing and snorting and screeching, fangs bared and slick with mud and blood. The others had trotted up and down along the edge of the swamp, agitated by the sight of one of theirs being killed over something as soft and weak as her; red marble eyes shining with scary intelligence, as if to say that, if she ever ventured out of the bog again, they’d be waiting and she’d be toast. Or maybe to tell her that the hog that had hurtled after her into the swamp would burrow up through the mud and— “For cryin’ out loud, Carter! Get a grip!” It didn’t work. The words were what the Colonel would have said—close enough, anyway—but her voice, reedy and cracking with thirst, sounded nothing like his. Didn’t sound like her own either. Maybe the hell hogs had eaten that, too. “Get a grip,” she whispered. “Get a grip.” The one thing guaranteed not to get her out of this, were fever-addled speculations about porcines that IQ-tested in the top two percentile. And it wasn’t just her who’d have to get out of this. It was Teal’c and Janet as well, and they were her responsibility. Responsibility. Good word. Six syllables that excused a multitude of sins. Duty was good too. And shorter. Snappier. Best used for murder. But it hadn’t been murder, had it? What then? Mercy killing? Where was the mercy in shooting a fellow human being like some lame horse or rabid dog?

But she’d done it. She’d done it, and there was no getting away from it. No escape. No choice. Just a duty. After yesterday’s—yesterday’s?—encounter with Macdonald the Jaffa, she’d doubled back onto the path, retraced his steps, followed those ungodly, inhuman screams. Tactically stupid, yes, but what else was she supposed to have done? Could have been Janet screaming that way. Or Teal’c. Less likely, but still, he was her respon-si-bi-li-ty. Whose responsibility had the kid been? Crowley’s? Norris’? Who’d write that letter to his parents, his siblings, his partner? We regret to inform you… of what? Training accident? He’d been a Marine. But he isn’t a Jaffa, that much is glaringly obvious. Before suspending him from a lintel, somebody has seen fit to dress him in something flimsy with leather straps. All around him the hell hogs dance their frenzy, snapping and gouging. She seems to have forgotten how to move or feel and wishes he d stop screaming, just for a moment, to let her sanity reassert itself. And then the screams do stop, just for a moment, just long enough for his lips to form one word. Please. He isn’t asking for her to come and cut him loose. They both know there’s no way to get to him, and even if she could, it would be too late. Please. Sam flees into the comfort of memory, back to an afternoon on the shooting range with her father, a lifetime ago. She unsafes the Beretta, adjusts her grip just like Jacob had shown her— “There. Watch your right thumb, Sam. If your knuckle sticks up, the slide’ll skin it on the recoil.” —and sights on a smile of pure gratitude that explodes the memory. Her hands start shaking, and she forces herself to relax and aim again, praying he’ll forgive her relief at his being a stranger, not a friend. She squeezes the trigger gently, oh so gently, a kiss of a kill, until the report of the gun smothers the roar of the hell hogs. In the leaden silence that follows the kid’s scent must have changed. No more fear, no more pain, no more life, no more appeal. The beasts back off, squealing their displeasure, and wheel around to come for her. Against all instincts and training, Sam empties her last clip into the mass of bodies, howling out her grief and— Mud-gloved fingers scrabbling for hold on the mangrove roots, she resurfaced coughing up a throatful of gunk. It was the third time since the hogs had chased her in here that she’d lost her grasp and gone under. There couldn’t be a fourth. If they were still stalking her—well, too bad. She had to get out, get warm again, go back. She owed it to the kid. His screams had led her back the to ruins and the Stargate, and where the gate was, there had to be a DHD. Mostly. She pushed away insistent images of a prison world with no DHD and a charming old lady who could have taught Slobodan Milosevic a thing or two about mass murder. Hadante had been nearly as cozy as this, whatever it was called.

Hand over hand, arms and shoulders cramping with exhaustion, Sam hauled herself toward the edge of the bog. The mire sucked at her waist, her hips, her legs, unwilling to let go and give up its prize. Finally she crawled onto dry land—dry being relative. Not a trace of the hell hogs now, only the prints of countless trotters that had churned the ground. The devils had been dancing… She raised her head, letting the torrential rain rinse her face and clear her mind. Getting to her feet took five fun-packed minutes, but eventually she was hobbling through the fog, propped on Macdonald’s staff weapon, every step pumping liquid pain from her leg into the rest of her body. Halfway to the ruins the rain stopped and the sun came out again, stabbing through the canopy and infusing the mist with blinding radiance. It lit up a weather-blackened statue, overgrown with vines and purple orchids, that slouched between the trees. The face was long and patrician, almond-eyed, and the full mouth smiled. Sam didn’t know or care at what. Daniel, were he here, might spin his own theories, doubtlessly bang on target, but as far as she was concerned the statue was a signpost. The outer perimeter of the ruins and the place where the kid had died lay less than two hundred meters east of here. Still no hogs. The only sounds were the slow patter of drips on leaves, the tentative hoots of animals emerging from shelter after the rain, and her own breaths. She’d cut the kid down, she decided suddenly. Cut him down, bury him, get his dog tags, so that— The twig snapped with the noise of a gun going off. It had come from behind and to her left, and if she’d had an ounce of agility left, she’d have dropped flat. Under the circ*mstances, her best option was to freeze in the shadows by the statue and inch around as quietly as she could until she had a fix on whoever or whatever was out there. A few minutes later she knew that she was dealing with whoever. Two whoevers, to be precise. She’d smelled them. The Marine Jaffa obviously had a locker room somewhere around here; the bastards had the nerve to reek more or less clean. Soap, deodorant, mouthwash. Not too much, just enough to stand out from the pervasive backdrop of jungle rot and make her ache for a shower. On the upside, they didn’t have a snowflake’s chance in hell of sniffing her; she’d long lost the last whiff of civilization, thanks to a potent mix of fermenting swamp, stale sweat, and the fetid stench from her leg wound. They were good. The breaking twig had been a glitch, perpetrated by Whoever Number One who’d now changed course and would pass her position somewhere to the right. Whoever Number Two was beyond good. He was spooky. You didn’t hear him and you didn’t see him—almost. He slipped through the forest as smoothly and silently as a wisp of fog, and if it hadn’t been for Crest or Colgate, he’d have been on top of her before she knew what was happening. Sam could have admired his technique for hours. Unfortunately, after turning a wide circle to check his tail, the Phantom Menace came wafting straight at her and running was out of the question. The staff weapon felt reassuringly heavy in her hand. She could take him out now, without his even noticing that she was there. Tactically it’d be wrong, though; Number One would hear the blast and ride to the rescue, and he’d be primed and ready to fight. She might end up killing them both. A waste, because she needed somebody to explain what the hell was going on in this place—and Number Two had

just been volunteered for the job. She’d disable him and, if necessary, kill Number One. Ahead, a dark shape glided in and out between patches of mist; the first time she’d actually had a visual on him for longer than a split-second. Oh yeah, Number Two was real alright, not the product of a fever dream. Fingers closing around the staff weapon in a combat grip, she eased further behind the statue. A human shadow filtered from the mist and flitted across sprawling ferns, and she heard his footfalls now, light and irregular, mimicking the random sounds a jungle creature might make. Her body tensed in preparation for the attack. It was simple, all about angles and leverage; Teal’c had shown her the basics. The movement patterns were stored in her mind, an indelible blueprint. Ignoring the bolt of pain that shot up her leg as she stepped out for the turn, Sam whipped the weapon into a smooth loop to gather speed and momentum. Driven by the solid bud of metal at its tip, the staff swung out, sheared into an arc, sliced through a shout, hit its target. The force of the impact rattled through her arms, but she did as Teal’c had taught her, spun with the motion to face her prey, ready for attack, and… bit back a cry. The blow, too fast—too goddamn fast!—for him even to bring up his arms and protect himself, had struck the side of his head. He looked at her, impossible and uncomprehending, then his eyes rolled back and he collapsed. “No.” Weak and pleading, the word rose on a tremor that racked her entire body, chilling her inside out. Her second homicide in as many days. And this one, this one— A ferocious tackle ripped her legs out from under her. Tumbling into a white-hot sea of agony, she passed out before she even struck the ground.

CHAPTER TEN

Maternal Effect: Condition where the subject’s visible characteristics are not determined by its own genotype but by that of the mother. Nirrti regretted bringing the woman in so soon. Watching her bumble through the forest, hurting and muttering defiance, had been droll. But there were other considerations now; more important considerations. The human, Simmons, was playing his own game; one Nirrti was not privy to. Whatever his plans were, it seemed only wise to thwart them—without overtly appearing to do so. Who better to achieve this than the goddess of deceit and destruction? If she went about it intelligently, drollery could be derived from this, too. A great deal of drollery, she contemplated with a smile. Shame only that the latest installment of Simmons’ gifts had arrived too unexpectedly for her to unleash the beasts. The fulfillment of that unspoken promise would have to wait a while, but anticipation was a thrill in itself. Then her gaze fell on Master Sergeant Charles Macdonald, and her smile died. He cowered in a corner, drooling at her like a whipped dog. The raw flesh on his forehead where she had personally removed the skin and with it the tattoo—he was unworthy of wearing her sign—undoubtedly smarted less than her displeasure. On the table beside her couch stood a plate of chilled fruit; sliced mango, lychees, papaya, glistening with juice. A sweep of her arm sent the plate flying. It shattered on the floor, and her dog flinched at the noise. The stone tiles were spattered with soft, sticky wedges of fruit. “Clean it up!” she snapped. “I do not want any more.” “Yes, mistress,” whined the dog and came scuttling from his corner on all fours, not daring to raise his eyes now. At her feet he froze. “Mistress, please! I beg your forgiveness.” “No. And do not ask me again. Else I shall do what I ought to have done.” Once more she felt like smiling. “Do you know what I ought to have done, slave?” “No, mistress.” He did not dare to move when she reached out, briefly caressed the flaps of his pouch, inserted her hand. The symbiote squirmed, warm between her fingers. She tightened her grip, clutched it. Macdonald gasped, as much a reaction to his own discomfort as to that of the symbiote’s. Leaning forward, she murmured into his ear. “Shall I tell you what would happen if I crushed it?” “Mistress, please,” the man whimpered. And why not? It did not matter. She squeezed harder, felt the symbiote’s flapping panic, heard the man’s groan. Harder still until she heard a soft crunch. “Its blood is

bright blue and beautiful,” she whispered. “It also is deadly to you, slave. The blood will mingle with yours, killing you slowly and very, very painfully.” Twitching and bawling as the poison took effect, he sagged into a heap, and she let go. A flimsy sheet of silk from the couch served as a towel to clean her hand. Finished with it—and him—she dropped it to the floor and rose. Her new First Prime abandoned his position by the door, gliding forward and sneering at the dying slave. Not as handsome as his predecessor, but perhaps smart enough to learn from poor example. He lowered his head. “What is your desire, Lady Nirrti?” “Take two others and accompany me.” She brushed past him and through the door, his reply sliding from her back. It was predictable, anyhow. “As you wish. Lady Nirrti.” Hurrying into the staircase, she could hear them fall in behind her, swift and silent, as they should be. Wide loops of stairs spiraled down into shadow and to the lower levels. Cool marble under her feet, she slipped past derelict floors, past the level that now housed over sixty new Jaffa, past the laboratory, and finally to the bottom, where the stairwell opened out toward the vault. The flickering distortion across the doorway indicated an exit secured by a force shield. From the inside it would seem opaque, allowing her to observe the new arrival without being seen herself. Already small of stature, the Tauri healer was dwarfed by the dimensions of the room. The wet trail of footprints she had left reminded Nirrti of the puny, busy perambulations of an insect—an ant perhaps, separated from the hive and frantically searching for the other ants. Or at least a way out. Now that the vibrations no longer warped the healer’s mind, the woman was reacting normally again. The ant trail ran—pat-pat-pat—straight from the large puddle at the center of the room to the force shield where, no doubt, she had received a shock. For some reason they all tried at least once, believing themselves immune to physics. Then—pat-pat-pat—the trail doubled back on itself to where she had arrived. The rings were gone of course. At this moment—pat-pat-pat—she was traipsing along a wall, fingertips examining coarse stone, sooty from the torches that lit the room. Obviously she was hoping to find the controls for the ring transporter. Enterprising, if overly optimistic. The transporters inside the fortress could only be operated from a ribbon device. Much like the force shield. Nirrti touched a gem on her device, and a silent command neutralized photons and realigned the charges of the air molecules inside the doorway, until the air became just that—air—and lost its tense shimmer. The prisoner looked up, alerted by that indefinable sense of interrupted solitude all trapped animals seemed to possess. Her hair hung in limp red strands—amazingly it had changed color, chameleon-like, since Nirrti had last seen her on Earth—and she was soaked and pale and filthy, but there was no fear in her dark eyes. In fact, there was something almost akin to mockery. Mockery and contempt and collected stillness. “I had a hunch it’d be you,” she said. “The transporter control in the pool was a tad obvious.”

Ah yes. The palm print. Originally designed for fever-ridden Hankan adolescents who, like the good little apes they were, could never resist placing their paws inside the relief to see if it fit. “Why modify a thing that serves its purpose?” Nirrti replied pleasantly. “It did for you, did it not? Without it you might have drowned.” The healer’s fist scrubbed across her forehead, betraying her thoughts. “What did you do to me? Drugs? Nish’ta?” “Nothing so crude. Think!” Her peal of laughter made the woman flinch, and Nirrti relished it. “When would I have administered a drug?” As she walked into the room, closing the distance between them, laughter was supplanted by just the correct amount of threat in her tone. “Do not underestimate me. I am not your prisoner now, and you do not have a weapon.” A flicker of defiance and raw hatred danced through the healer’s eyes. “So that’s what this is about? Revenge? Are you going to kill me or just implant me with a Goa’uld?” “I told you not to underestimate me! Revenge? Do you really believe you can judge me by the paltry standards of the Tauri? Of course, should the chance for revenge present itself…” Nirrti smiled. “For now you shall make yourself useful. You are amply qualified, and you owe me a service.” The healer stiffened, brow furrowing in mulish refusal. A minute wave of their mistress’ hand made the three Jaffa guards step from the shadows by the doorway. For a moment, the woman’s eyes widened, and in that tiny frame of time puzzlement darkened to recognition and abhorrence. Excellent. Turning to share the healer’s view, Nirrti herself found nothing abhorrent in her creations. “She will come with us,” she said to her new First Prime and strode past him toward the doorway. Lingering to watch was unnecessary. They would surround the prisoner, two either side, one at her back and, if called for, they would beat her into obedience. One way or the other, the woman would follow. Nirrti scaled the stairs to the level above and headed down the hallway to the laboratory. The door that sealed the entrance opened noiselessly. Cold air hissed into the corridor, coating gilded walls and floors with moisture. Used to the brutal drop in temperature, she ignored it. Besides, she was able to adjust the host’s body heat and barely noticed any discomfort. The healer, drenched from her bath in the pool and accustomed to the warmth of the jungle would suffer, of course. So much the better. Overhead lights, activated by motion sensors, shed a pure white gleam on a facility that clashed with the opulence of the hallway and the rest of the palace. This was the domain of science, utilitarian and sterile by necessity, though to Nirrti it had a beauty of its own. Less sensual perhaps, but ultimately more enduring. The doors slid shut behind her Jaffa and their charge, and over their footfalls she could hear the woman’s gasp. She knew what had provoked it. The layout of the laboratory was that of a giant wheel. Its hub was occupied by a large surgical table, banks of equipment, and the climate-controlled vats that harbored swirling masses of larvae. The spokes radiating from the hub were dedicated to Macdonald, her new First Prime, and nine other warriors and held parallel rows of clear cylinders, each about seven feet high, three feet in diameter and 97

filled with liquid. From some of the gestation tubes her creatures were staring at her, dawning recognition in their gaze. These would be mature soon, and they sensed the approach of their birth and prim’ta. The Macdonalds looked sullen, as though they realized that their prototype had been tried and found wanting. She addressed the Jaffa escort. “You may go.” “Yes, Lady Nirrti,” her First Prime responded. All three of them bowed, identical movements; identical smiles on identical faces. Three sets of steps of the same length, three bodies swaying with the same little swagger, they left the laboratory. “Clones,” the healer whispered, her face deathly pale. She was hugging herself, seeking protection from the cold or the shock or both. “Why?” Partly because she knew it would heighten her prisoner’s discomfort, Nirrti laughed again. “How else would I obtain a sufficient number of subjects? Diversity is essential for maintaining a healthy stock.” “Sufficient subjects for what?” “That is none of your concern. Your only concern is to assist me in creating more.” “No!” “As you wish.” Nirrti’s fingers found the contact on the ribbon device, activated it. The vibrations resonated through the room at a frequency far below human hearing. They once more rendered the healer’s mind suggestible, open to Nirrti’s invasion, the effect almost as pleasurable as taking a host. Pain and terror suffused the woman’s eyes as she fought vainly to retain control of her will. These are deficient. You may begin by destroying them, Nirrti thought at her, pointing at the endless rows of Macdonalds. It is a task suited to you. As I recall you delight in destroying the work of others. “It’s an acquired taste. Have another.” Frank Simmons poured a second round of oak-aged Macallan at seventy bucks a bottle and returned to the fireplace to put the glasses on a low table. Playing butler. Why the hell not? “I’d suggest you drink it slowly this time.” Conrad, ensconced in one of the leather armchairs, picked up the tumbler and tossed back its contents. Then he studied the reflection of the fire in his glass. “My host is partial to wine—a type you refer to as Californian Shiraz—but he detests spirits. An instance of overindulgence in his youth, I believe. As for myself, ethanol has no effect on me. I can metabolize it into carbohydrates faster than you can pour. So you may as well abandon your attempt to intoxicate me.” “That wasn’t the idea.” Of course it had been precisely the idea of this companionable little get-together in the library of the safe house, but Simmons wasn’t fool enough to admit it. He eased himself into his chair and took a sip of whiskey, savoring it. “I was trying to invoke a spirit of cooperation rather than opposition. We can both profit from working together. Partners, if you will.” “Is it customary among the Tauri to control their partners by leashing explosive devices around their necks?”

“Touche. On the other hand, it also isn’t customary among us to control our partners by taking them as hosts, if you catch my drift.” “I have a host, Simmons. Admittedly, I would not have chosen him. As you would say, he is not my type. But neither are you.” A sardonic eyebrow flicked up. Conrad actually had a sense of humor. “There is no sufficient enticement to switch hosts, so you are perfectly safe.” “Good to know.” Simmons snorted. “What is your type?” “Given the choice, I would have taken Conrad’s assistant.” “A woman? I never considered—” “Surely you are aware that the Goa’uld essentially are hermaphrodites. The gender of the host is irrelevant and purely a matter of personal preference.” In fact, Simmons’ interest in the bedroom habits of a race of spiky reptiles was strictly limited. He’d read about it in the SGC reports and filed it away. And Conrad, under that personable mask he wore right now, was trying to play him. In a minute the bastard would claim he’d surrendered vital information and demand a cookie. Well, he could have a carrot. It was healthier all round. “Prove to me that I can trust you, and the necklace goes away,” Simmons offered over another sip of whiskey. Conrad’s hands rose in a mix of frustration and defensiveness. Sometimes the way he adopted human mannerisms was eerie. “I have already helped you by gaining Lady Nirrti’s assistance. Is that not enough?” “Nowhere near enough, my friend! You put me in touch with Nirrti because there was something in it for her, and you hoped the deal would get you on her good side. I’m looking for a slightly more disinterested show of faith.” “And how do I know that I can trust you?” “I saved your life.” “Because I could be of profit to you.” Simmons laughed. “Do you have any idea how much more profitable you would be dissected and sold to the highest bidder? All the scientific benefit without the risks.” For once it gave Conrad pause. The silence was filled with the tap of rain against tall windows and the crackle of fire in the hearth. The Victorian idyll seemed custommade to lend credibility to this charade of two old pals having an after-dinner chat. The only thing missing were the cigars. Simmons didn’t smoke. Somewhere in the house a phone rang, muted and out of place. It jarred Conrad from his thoughts, remarkably without flashing eyes or vocal hi-jinks or any other theatrics. “Very well,” he said. “What do you wish to know?” “What I’ve been wanting to know all last week. Jaffa training.” Conrad sighed, like a preschool teacher faced with a particularly imbecilic batch of toddlers. “And what I have been telling you all last week is true. I do not know. I am Goa’uld, not Jaffa. How the Jaffa train their warriors is of no concern to us as long as these warriors are skilled enough to do our bidding. One thing I can tell you, however. Your men must be trained,” “Oh really?” snapped Simmons. “Wake me when you’re through dispensing platitudes!”

“Listen to me, Tauri!” And now Conrad rolled out the whole sound and light show. “I assume Nirrti did not tell you this, because she seeks her own advantage— taking what you offer without surrendering anything in return. You never wasted a thought on the skills necessary for your men to wield the powers they are given. And you call the Goa’uld arrogant? We possess the entire knowledge of our race from birth. Learning is not a requirement for us. For you it is a matter of survival, as it is for the Jaffa. But, unlike you, the Jaffa are humble enough to know that they have to learn. “Why do you think a Jaffa warrior begins his education even before he receives his prim’ta? It takes years to master kelno’reem and to school the senses for the presence of the symbiote. Unless your men receive proper training, they will weaken. Eventually they will die. Not straightaway, but they will die.” Simmons found that his fingers had clenched around the tumbler during this speech. If this was true… His hand shook, and he knocked back the whiskey in one gulp and deposited the glass on the table lest he broke it. “The tame Jaffa they keep at the SGC never mentioned any of this,” he snarled at last. “Why would he? Jaffa consider the relationship with their symbiote a private matter. Besides, he is a shol’va. Perhaps he had an ulterior motive for not mentioning it.” “So what do you suggest I do?” “Is it not obvious?” Conrad’s left eyebrow leaped up again, this time in disbelief. “Use the shol’va. Order him to train them.” Good thinking. Except, this obvious solution had an equally obvious hitch the Goa’uld wasn’t aware of. Annoyingly, the hitch was of Simmons’ own making. Which meant that Simmons would have to find a way around it. His ruminations were interrupted by a knock on the door. “Come.” An agent entered, brandishing a phone handset. He cast a quick, uneasy glance at Conrad before redirecting his attention to Simmons. “Call for you, sir.” “Dammit! I—” “Sorry, sir. They said it was urgent.” Simmons snatched the phone. “What?” The voice at the other end sounded sheepish. “It’s General Hammond, sir. We, uh… we lost him.” The news was enough to make him jump to his feet and start pacing. “You did what?” “He got picked up by a cab outside Boiling AFB. We’re thinking it may have been arranged. We’re also pretty sure the guy driving was Maybourne.” Maybourne. They should have executed him while they’d had the chance. Some days Simmons could swear the son of a bitch was going out of his way to make his successor’s life hell. This was one of those days. “When did this happen?” he barked, staring through a rain-streaked window. “Just after five this afternoon.” “And you’ve waited until now to tell me?”

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“They were heading out 1-66 last time we saw them from the car, sir. So we decided to check with the airlines at Dulles. Turns out two passengers who fit the description were booked on a United flight to Seattle.” “Did you say Seattle?” A silver lining. Maybe. If this was true, he had a fair idea of where to look for them. “Yes, sir. We missed them by ten minutes.” “My congratulations on the spectacularly narrow margin. You still missed them, idiot!” Simmons disconnected the call and tossed the handset to the waiting agent. “I’m flying to Seattle tonight. Make the necessary arrangements. I’ll be taking three men.” “Yes, sir.” The agent left the library a lot faster than he’d entered it, undoubtedly grateful to get away from Conrad. Who slowly rose from his chair and faced Simmons across the room. “May I accompany you?” “Why? Homesick?” “I suppose my host is.” Conrad smiled a nasty little smile. “You appear to have been apprised of a problem. Perhaps I could make myself useful.” “Useful?” “How can I gain your trust if you do not give me a chance to prove myself?” True enough. And why not? Perhaps he really could make himself useful. At last, Simmons nodded. “Fine. But the necklace stays on. For now.” Jack carefully cranked one eye open. The world started to rotate around a hole in the ceiling. Through the hole snaked an arm-thick bunch of vines, and from their tendrils plopped a steady supply of water drops. Into his face. Which was what had woken him. He guessed. Ceiling. There’d been no ceiling before… before the cause of the headache. No ceilings in the jungle. And he was pretty sure he’d been in the middle of a jungle in the nonetoo-distant past. The ceiling belonged to a small room, stone walls blackened by age and slick with moisture. A single casem*nt opened onto a dripping mass of green; foliage, trees, the whole nine yards of rainforest. Ah. The wall opposite was covered in intricate friezes, people and animals and ornaments, and Daniel probably would—Daniel! Jack tried to sit up and promptly wished he’d opted for Plan B. Whatever that was, it had to be less nauseating. The room revved up to a brisk 90 rpm, and suddenly the face of Dr. Jackson spiraled into view, concerned, sweaty, with a paisley bandanna tied over the busted eye. “Jack? Stay put, Jack.” By Jack O’Neill’s estimate, he’d already done too much of that. “I’ll be fine. Just give me a minute.” An hour would be more realistic, but if things played out the way they usually did, he probably didn’t have that long. “How did I get here? And where is here?”

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“I carried you. The ruins weren’t far. This must have been some kind of wardroom.” Sitting on his haunches, Daniel slowly seesawed to a rest in front of Jack. Rumor had it he bought those bandannas on purpose. “You were out cold. I’m guessing it’s a concussion.” “Ya think? What the hell happened? Did I get hit by a tank?” “You got hit by a girl.” “I what?” The pieces fell into place. He remembered that indefinable sense of being watched and, seconds later, a slim, filthy, stinking figure whirling from the shadows. The business end of a staff weapon flying at his face, the shrill shock in her eyes when she’d recognized him, too late. “Carter. Did I mention I like her attitude? Where is she?” Wincing, Daniel nodded toward a corner of the room, a makeshift pallet, and its occupant. “I, uh… You were down, and somebody was standing over you with a staff weapon. I kinda overreacted. Knocked her flat.” “Thanks.” “Nothing as inherently funny as misguided acts of heroism, huh?” True. Except it could have been a real Jaffa with real Jaffa brethren lurking in the bushes. As far as Jack was concerned, heroism lay in the intention rather than the outcome. “Thanks anyway.” “You’re welcome.” “Fraiser and Teal’c?” Daniel gave a despondent little shrug. “No idea. All I know is that the staff weapon Sam used isn’t Teal’c’s.” “You can tell?” “Sure. The markings are all different, depending on—” “Make, model, and year.” . “Something like that.” “Crap.” A real Jaffa with real Jaffa brethren lurking in the bushes… and where there were Jaffa, there usually was a Goa’uld. “Crap,” Jack muttered again. “So, where did Carter leave Teal’c and the doc? Did she say?” Another wince. “No. I haven’t talked to her yet.” “Come again?” “She’s in real bad shape. Jack.” Thankfully, the room was so small Jack could get away with just scooting over to Carter’s pallet on all fours. Standing up might have been tricky. Daniel had cleaned her up as best he could, whittling down a solid layer of grime to smudges of dirt on a waxy face. Wrapped around one leg was a pristine bandage, looking absurdly out of place. Jack stared at it. “What?” he said. “It’s nasty. Deep gash, and it’s infected. I put antibiotics on it, but…” The rest became a blur of sounds, throbbing in tune with Jack’s headache. Not just infected, if the jaundice and the odor were anything to go by. He’d seen this once before, in a rebel camp in Honduras, and he’d hoped to hell he’d never have to see it again. Sweet Jesus, not Carter! He shouldered the thought aside. There was no place for it now. If and when the time came, he’d do what he had to do, but on the whole

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the preferable option was finding Fraiser. After all, they did have a tame doctor running around somewhere in this hellhole. As gently as he could he patted her cheek. “Carter? Rise and shine. Time for a debrief.” No reaction. Another pat. “Come on, Major. Sitrep. Now! That’s an order.” She moaned a little, and suddenly her eyes flew open on a flash of panic that melted into toe-curling relief. “Sir,” she whispered, voice brittle. “I thought… dead… I didn’t… I—” “You whacked me upside the head, Carter. How’s that gonna kill me?” He forced a grin, hoped she’d buy it. “If you’d whupped my ass, maybe, but my head? Hardest material known to man.” Bingo. It was wan and diffident, but it was a smile alright. Duration needed work, though. The panic crept back, in its wake something dangerously close to despair, and she pushed herself up on her elbows. “You shouldn’t be here. You can’t—” For the first time she seemed to clock Daniel. “You neither. What happened to your face?” “Amazing, isn’t it?” Jack said agreeably and didn’t quite manage to evade a kick to his ankle. Feigning innocence, Daniel crouched and handed Carter his canteen. “Nothing serious. Little difference of opinion with some Marines on ’335.” The canteen jerked and spouted a splash of water. “Jaffa,” she hissed. Jack wheeled around; a move he immediately regretted, especially once the window had juddered into focus and he failed to spot any hostiles outside or elsewhere. “No Jaffa, Carter. We’re—” “The Marines, sir. The Marines are Jaffa.” Oh great. He exchanged a glance with Daniel, who barely perceptibly shook his head. Maybe he was right. Maybe they should just let— “I’m not delirious, Colonel!” And maybe she was right, too. Her eyes were feverbright, but she seemed lucid enough. Pissed enough. “Okay, Carter. How about you start with In the beginning and work your way forward from there?” Haltingly and with something less than her usual precision, she did just that. By the end of it she’d answered questions Jack hadn’t even known he had. However, the two most important answers were missing. Where was the DHD? And where in the blazes were Teal’c and the doc? She couldn’t say, and pushing her into speculations would get them nowhere. “Good job, Major,” he murmured. “Now grab some sleep.” “But, sir—” “Sleep, Carter!” “Yessir.” Five minutes later she’d dozed off. Jack scrubbed a hand over his face, mixing sweat with grime and evenly distributing the mess. Great camouflage, if nothing else. What he wanted to do was get up and pace and fiddle with stuff and generally drive the natives nuts. Spread the joy. Given that the room measured about ten by ten feet and held two men, the pallet,

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a backpack, and one major, that was a bit of a no-no, even by his standards. The realization didn’t diminish the urge. While Carter and Teal’c had proved conclusively that they didn’t need their CO’s able assistance to dig themselves into a real deep hole, right now said CO had no idea of how to drag them out of said hole. He should have. That’s what being in command meant, right? Right. It sure as hell didn’t mean being terrified of hopping in any direction because whatever direction you chose to hop in might be dead wrong. Emphasis on dead. “This isn’t your fault, Jack.” Perversely, Dr. Jackson’s ability to read minds—specifically Jack O’Neill’s— remained unimpaired by smashed spectacles. Having had twice his annual allowance of confessions wormed out of him earlier, Jack was in no mood to share warm fuzzy feelings. Instead he stared at the walls; anything to avoid that blue drill bore gaze coming from Daniel’s end. The faces on the wall stared back. The faces didn’t give a damn. They stared back with their blank eyes and Buddha smiles, too pretty by half and effete enough to raise Jack’s hackles. Apophis sprang to mind. And Ra, for that matter. “What are you going to do about Sam?” Typical Daniel. If subtle doesn’t work straightaway, switch to frontal attack. “I checked her medikit, Jack. She never used the morphine. She knows what’s coming. So do I, and we can’t afford to wait much longer. If we do nothing, she’ll go into septic shock in a day, two at the most.” Jack knew perfectly well and didn’t need to hear it. Didn’t want to hear it. “Daniel—” “I’ll do it.” The look on Daniel’s face made Jack swallow his reply. “There was this kid on Abydos. Crazy about digging up artifacts. Care to guess who he got it from?” Daniel gave a bleak little laugh. “A chamber caved in, and a stone block landed on his arm. We didn’t find him until three days later. By then the infection had set in. I was the only one who had a rough idea of what to do.” “You never told me.” “It’s not a fun story.” Daniel shrugged. “If I hadn’t put a bee in his bonnet, the kid wouldn’t have been there. I always blamed myself.” “I know the feeling,” muttered Jack. A shaft of sunlight pouring through the hole in the ceiling had crawled up the wall and illuminated three of the smirking poster boys, cozily grouped together. If he had a hammer and chisel, he’d give them a nose job. Make them look like the Andrews Sisters. “Who are these guys, anyway?” Abruptly hauled back from the sands of Abydos, Daniel blinked. “What?” “Not what. Who. They.” Jack pointed at the relief. “Oh.” Daniel scrambled to his feet and walked closer to the wall, until he actually could see what he was talking about. “They’re the original Rakshasas. Bhaya, Mahabhaya, and Mrityu.” “Of course they’re the Rickshaws. Popular vocal group in the fifties. Why did 1 ask?” Dr. Jackson grinned, which did interesting things to the left side of his face. “The Rakshasas are demons. Their names mean Fear, Terror, and Death.”

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“Charming. Aren’t they a bit girlie for the job?” “Depends on the job. They’re shape shifters. According to legend they’re the children of the Vedic goddess of death, deceit, and destruction, Danu. She’s said to have…” The sentence petered out, and Daniel stared at the relief, open-mouthed. “Uh-oh.” “Daniel?” “The lady traveled under several aliases. Dhumavati’s one of them. And so, by the way, is Nirrti. What did Sam say Macdonald’s tattoo looked like?” “A dove.” Jack didn’t like where this was going. “Or a pigeon. The pigeon’s supposed to be Nirrti’s messenger. Messenger of doom, obviously. The Atharva Veda even lists charms to ward off pigeons.” Daniel turned away from the wall and sat cross-legged on the floor. “Upon those persons yonder the winged missile shall fall! If the owl shrieks, futile shall this be, or if the pigeon takes his steps upon the fire! To thy two messengers, O Nirrti, who come here—” “Daniel! I get the idea. Where there are Jaffa, there usually is a Goa’uld.” “As far as we know Nirrti doesn’t have that many Jaffa,” Daniel offered. “Yeah, well. Maybe she’s started a recruitment drive,” retorted Jack, but his heart wasn’t in it. Something else had occurred to him. Something that might just— “What’s the one thing no self-respecting Goa’uld would be caught without?” “A makeup kit?” The quip was followed by a penetrating glance. “Jack, I know what’s on your mind. But we’ve got no proof that she’s here, and to go off on a wild goose chase to—” “One day, Daniel. You said it yourself. We’ve got a day. And before I start chopping off bits of Carter, I intend to use that day to try and find Nirrti’s sarcophagus.”

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CHAPTER ELEVEN

Teal’c had heard the Stargate activate, but by the time he had succeeded in scaling the cliff, the arrivals were long gone. Or perhaps, he mused, they had not been arrivals. Perhaps Dr. Fraiser, favored by the luck of children and madmen, had found the DHD and had indeed gone home. The area beneath the Stargate was sunlit and deserted, unremarkable, and the gray walls of the ruins breathed a semblance of coolness. Even the jungle noises had returned, dispelling the silence, and he strode out into the clearing, confident that he would be safe for the time being. In a patch of mud, not far from the place where he himself had landed four days ago, he found two slim lengths of white plastic. Teal’c recognized the strips—flex-cuffs—and squatted to examine them more closely. They were torn, their ends frayed and showing teeth marks. It indicated several things; two prisoners had been brought here—No, they had been sent here. Had they been escorted, their escape would have been foiled. And whoever had sent them, surely wished for them to die. Cuffed, and therefore most likely unarmed, they would not have stood the slightest chance against the beasts. Except… He slowly swiveled on the balls of his feet, surveying the clearing once more. This time the beasts had not attacked. The prisoners’ boot prints told their own tale. Once they had freed themselves, the two men—the size of their boots made them men—had risen and walked off in different directions, though well within sight of each other. Teal’c recognized the pattern. He himself had followed it a hundred times and more; they had been exploring. Which suggested they were new to the territory. If they— A ponderous rumble rolled across the glade, familiar and startling at the same time. “Hasshak,” Teal’c muttered under his breath. Foolishly, he had allowed himself to neglect that particular source of danger. He rose, loped back toward the cliff, and climbed the nearest tree to a nest of broad branches, some ten meters above ground. By the time he had settled into this aerie, the fourth chevron was locked. He sat virtually at eyelevel with the face in the wall and, for the first time, found occasion to study it. Almond-shaped, heavy-lidded eyes, that stared at him with the peculiar blank look of carved stone; a strong, straight nose; sensuously curved lips that gaped to reveal a row of sharp teeth; a long, pointed tongue, lolling like a ramp from the cavern of the mouth out onto the clearing. For reasons he could not clearly define, Teal’c found the sight profoundly disturbing. The Chappa’ai was set in the idol’s forehead, a massive spinning jewel, its outer ring now dotted with five amber lights. Six. The seventh light all but paled under the mighty rush of the wormhole exploding across half the glade. Then the event horizon

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retracted and stilled. In these few moments of deceptive peace, Teal’c sensed rather than saw movement. Scanning the huge face, his gaze finally caught on the dark recess of the mouth. There. Behind the points of the teeth flitted shadows, nervous yet eager, as if they wished to emerge but did not quite dare yet. Curious… His attention was distracted by four figures tumbling from the Stargate, flailing and screaming and all too reminiscent of Teal’c’s own arrival on the planet. Fleetingly he recalled the excruciating wrongness of that journey and asked himself if it was the same for these men, or if they had too little basis for comparison. They were young and fit and clean-shaven, in smart uniforms, and all had been part of the unit that had journeyed to M3D 335 on the same day as Major Carter, Dr. Fraiser, and Teal’c; the unit that had been goaded into a pointless race by Colonel Norris. They struck the ground in an ungainly jumble of limbs and equipment and spent several minutes shaking off the shock and the effects of the impact. Eventually, one of them struggled to his feet. “This ain’t like they told us,” he observed and added, “Can’t see that PhD thingy either.” “The what thingy?” asked another. “That phone-home-device or whatever it’s called.” “DHD! Dial-home-device, you ass!” “Who cares?” “Shut up!” The speaker was the young corporal who had assisted Major Carter at the Marine camp. “You hear that?” “Hear what? It’s dead silent.” It was true. Like a tape recording that had stopped abruptly, the jungle noises had ceased again, almost as if the forest were holding its breath in anticipation. The quiet chafed at Teal’c’s awareness like a rough shirt on tender skin. Into the silence one of the men said, “Oh boy.” Pouring out from the mouth and coiling down the tongue came the beasts, two dozen of them, jostling and pushing and flooding the glade. What had restrained them until now? At the back of Teal’c’s mind a vague recollection began to congeal into realization, but before it could take shape the events unfolding below demanded his full attention. The Marines had formed a protective circle, their backs to each other, firing at the heaving mass of black bristles and fangs and making the same discovery Major Carter had made, namely that projectile weapons were ineffectual against these brutes’ armor. The Marines would not prevail. He knew it for a fact, and they would find out soon enough. Teal’c felt torn. Although he had every reason to suspect their intentions, to stand by and watch these men being ripped apart was impossible. With sudden resolve he slung the staff weapon from his back where he had strapped it for the climb up the cliff, aimed, and loosed a series of rapid blasts at the beasts, killing one and wounding several others. The rest paused, shuffling uncertainly, then retreated a few meters, giving the prey a fraction of breathing space. The Marines saw their chance and took it. “Now!” bellowed Major Carter’s corporal. “Go, go, go!”

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His comrades lowered their weapons and sprinted across the glade toward the edge of the forest. In a reckless act of bravery, the corporal himself held his position, determined to cover his friends. A swift glance over his shoulder assured him that the men had almost reached the presumed safety of the tree line. He fired a last burst at the creatures, wheeled around, and ran. As though they had been waiting for that moment, the brutes attacked, flanking him on both sides. He hooked and feinted like a hare, but they inexorably drove him off course and cut off his escape route. Instead of joining his comrades, he came racing directly toward Teal’c’s tree and the dead end behind. A mere twenty meters further were the cliff and nothing but thin air. Without even thinking about it, Teal’c set aside his staff weapon, tore free a vine and lowered it. “Jump, Corporal Wilkins!” The man’s head snapped up. He tripped, staggered, regained his balance, and bounded for the vine. Teal’c no sooner felt the corporal’s weight yank against his grip than he began to haul in the makeshift rope, ignoring the pain in his barely healed shoulder to pull even faster. For all he knew the brutes were capable of leaping and might still bring down their victim. And leap they did, snapping and snarling, but to no avail. Seconds later, Teal’c dragged Corporal Wilkins onto the branch beside him. The corporal’s eyes went wide when he recognized his rescuer, but he did not comment. Instead he glanced past Teal’c and back down to the ground. Below, the beasts had abandoned their futile hunt, swarmed into a turn, and set off after the Marines who had fled into the forest. Fingers still cramped around the vine, Corporal Wilkins fought to bring his breathing under control. “Uh, thanks. Nice shooting. That’s one hell of a gun you’ve got there, Mr. Murray,” he gasped. “Sorry, sir, I don’t even know your rank. What are you, sir?” “I was First Prime to the false god Apophis. I have renounced my service.” “Ah,” said Corporal Wilkins, obviously deciding not to pursue the subject. Suddenly his expression darkened. “I gotta get down, go after the guys. They might need—” “That is inadvisable.” “Well, that’s just too bad, sir.” The young man began to ease himself off the branch. “I don’t know how you First What’s-Its do stuff, but in the Corps we don’t leave our guys in the lurch.” Teal’c grabbed a fistful of uniform and hauled the struggling, swearing man back to his side. “We do not leave behind our people either, Corporal Wilkins. However, all you would accomplish by searching for them now is your own demise. Your weapons are useless against these beasts. If your comrades are lucky and smart, they will not fight but outrun the creatures. You have risked your own life to give them an opportunity for escape. You have done enough.” The corporal’s face plainly stated that he begged to differ, but in the end he acquiesced as there were indeed no shots being fired in the jungle. “Sounds like you’re right, sir. They’re running.” Too fast to even look back and ascertain your whereabouts, Teal’c did not reply. Life had taught him that idealism was a precious commodity, and he had no desire to quash it where he found it. 108

For a while they sat quietly, watching the glade below. At length, his voice still a little unsteady, Corporal Wilkins declared, “I suppose I should go back and report to Sergeant van Leyden, tell him what happened, bring reinforcements.” He scanned the clearing. “Except… You know where that DHD thing is, sir?” “I do not.” “But they told us it’s always by the gate.” “Mostly, but not always,” Teal’c answered. “It may have been hidden on purpose. Or it may not exist at all.” “Not exist?” The young man parroted, his face draining of blood. “So what are we—” In the foliage above a bird began to screech, and at the same time Teal’c felt a diminishing of the vague sense of discomfort the unnatural silence of the forest had caused. Again realization hovered just beneath the threshold of conscious thought, again events dispelled it. A second bird answered the screech, then other animals chimed in, until the normal cacophony of the jungle was restored. Little later a bulky black shape appeared across the glade, not far from where the three Marines had vanished. The beast moved sluggishly, uncertainly, as though it had woken from drugged sleep in a location it had not expected to find itself in. Behind it and at its side, others broke from the forest, all in a similar state, until the whole pack was staggering up the stone tongue and back into their lair under the walls of the ruins. “I’ll be damned,” muttered Corporal Wilkins. “They suddenly feel like a nap or something?” “I do not know, Corporal Wilkins,” Teal’c answered truthfully. “However, it appears that now would be a good time to leave.” Within minutes they were back on solid ground. His sidearm drawn and raised, Corporal Wilkins cautiously approached the beast Teal’c had slain. Even in death it seemed gigantic, its body covered in spikes a quarter of an inch thick, its stubby trotters ending in claws. Its snout was pointed and from under slack flews protruded a set of razor fangs stained with old blood. “That is one danged ugly critter,” the corporal declared. Then he holstered his weapon and glanced toward the edge of the jungle. “No good going after the guys, I suppose. Might end up walking in circles for days.” “Indeed,” confirmed Teal’c, only too aware of his own experiences. “So what do you suggest we do, Mr., uh, First Prime, sir?” “I shall continue to follow the trail of Dr. Fraiser. She is… unwell, and it is imperative that I—” “Dr. Fraiser’s here? And Major Carter, sir?” At Teal’c’s nod, Corporal Wilkins swallowed. “Sir, are you trying to tell me you’ve never been back to Earth?” “We have not. The Stargate malfunctioned.” “I don’t think so.” “Why do you say that, Corporal Wilkins?” “Colonel O’Neill and Dr. Jackson came looking for you, sir. They…” The young man blushed, clearly uncomfortable. “I think—I know—Colonel Norris lied to them. I spoke to them briefly. Then they disappeared. We were told they’d gone back to Earth. Like you, sir.”

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Driven by a sudden, sickening certainty about who the two prisoners had been, Teal’c’s gaze arrested on the spot where the flex-cuffs had lain. They were gone now, trampled under by hundreds of claws. The cab they’d taken from Sea-Tac International stuttered to a halt at a street corner in one of the least savory areas of suburban Seattle. “That’s forty-five bucks,” said the driver. George Hammond stared at his travel companion who smiled innocently and turned up empty palms so as to indicate penury. “You gonna pay me today or what?” the cabby snarled. Clearly the US Air Force was going cover the cab fare as well. Hammond pulled a fifty dollar note from his wallet and handed it to the driver. “Keep the change.” “Ain’t takin’ nothin’ bigger than twenty dollar notes.” Snapping forward in the seat, Maybourne poked his head through the open partition. “Take it,” he hissed. “And we want the change back. All twenty bucks of it.” The tone was steel-edged, suggesting that refusal would be a bad mistake, and the driver knew better than disputing the math. Without another word he gave Maybourne two tens, then growled, “Out!” Hammond slipped from the cab and watched as it drove off, tires smoking. Obviously the cabby wanted to get the hell out of here, and who could blame him? The street was lined with shops that had gone bust, windows boarded over and signs faded or dangling. The only establishments still in business were a drinking hole, a heavily barred liquor store, and a hot dog stand at the corner of the next block. A wino had occupied a stretch of curb and was ranting at a hydrant. In an alley opposite, two shadowy figures abruptly ducked behind a dumpster when they noted Hammond’s interest. A trio of teens, in low-slung jeans wide enough to accommodate a small country, swaggered out of the liquor store, clutching paper bags and giving him the hard man stare. He turned, expecting to find Maybourne right behind him. Instead, the ex-colonel had made a beeline for the hot dog stand. He’d also pocketed the change from the cab fare. Beginning to appreciate Jack O’Neill’s recurring itch to shoot the man, Hammond headed after him. Given time of year and latitude, the night was surprisingly muggy, and he wanted to unzip the windbreaker. Fingers already on the tab, he reconsidered. Presumably the idea was to remain inconspicuous. The Aloha shirt had parrots on it. At the hot dog stand, Maybourne was squirting relish on a dog that, by Texan standards, was a Chihuahua. A runt at that. The less than sanitary individual manning the stand demanded an extortionate six bucks for the feast, and Maybourne forked over one of the ten dollar bills and grinned at Hammond. “Want one, George? My treat.” “You could have eaten on the plane,” groused Hammond, deciding not to point out the obvious. “And poison myself with the junk they serve?” Maybourne demanded around a mouthful of hot dog. A glob of relish escaped and left a green trail down his front.

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Two bites later the dog had disappeared. He scrunched the napkin into a ball and lobbed it into the gutter. “Let’s go.” He briskly strode across the street and into the alley, deserted now, apart from a few rats. At its end, Maybourne took a left, crossed another street, found another alley, until they emerged on an avenue that looked somewhat more reputable than the area where they’d started out. Directly opposite rose a tall, institutional gray facade. George Hammond recognized it without ever having been here. “St. Christina’s Hospital. That’s where Conrad held Major—” “No names.” Grinning faintly, Maybourne checked up and down the street. “Doesn’t look like we’ve got company yet, but you can bet your two-star derriere that the NID will pick up our trail. We don’t have much time.” “Time for what?” “Getting inside.” Next to the former hospital stood a tenement building. Maybourne headed for the entrance, bounded up the stairs, nudged the front door. It clicked open. “Lucky the landlord’s too stingy to fix it. Fire escape would have been a bit too public for my liking. After you, Huggy.” “Don’t push it!” Hammond ducked into the building. The stairwell was dark, smelled of damp newspapers and floor polish, and served six floors. They climbed every single one of them, plus an additional set of steps onto the roof. Sodium streetlight poured over the cars parked below, a few lit windows adding brightness; somewhere nearby wailed an ambulance, its horn drowning out a mix of TV shows and the rattle of cheap air conditioning units. Up the block, a black SUV pulled into the street, crawled past the hospital, and disappeared again. “Company,” muttered Maybourne. “Won’t take long till someone decides to see if we’re home already. We’ve got maybe ten minutes, fifteen at the most.” Hammond felt himself shoved along the parapet and out onto a metal catwalk that connected the tenement to the hospital. The hand-painted sign Warning! Condemned! wasn’t half as forbidding as the notion of jumping the gap between the buildings, so he didn’t argue. Over on the other side Maybourne pushed past him, flung open a hatch and plunged down a dark flight of stairs. “Move it, General! ORs and offices are on the third floor. You don’t want to meet the boys from the SUV, I guarantee you.” Guided only by the meager light filtering in from the street, they clattered down the staircase, one floor, two, three, their footfalls echoing through empty corridors and ricocheting from tiled walls. Maybourne shot from the stairwell, barreled down a hallway, scanning room numbers as he went, and stopped outside a closed door. A few seconds later Hammond caught up with him, panting and wishing he were thirty years younger, thirty pounds lighter. By the time he could breathe again, Maybourne had forced the lock. “It was a real sweet deal. Instead of dismantling the facility, the NID said a silent prayer of thanks and took it over the way Conrad’s people had left it.” He hit the light switch, illuminating what looked like a cross between a lab and a control room. The banks of surveillance monitors, the computers, a couple of electron microscopes were easily identifiable, but most of the scientific equipment was Greek

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to Hammond. Either side of the monitor banks, a large window opened onto an operating theatre. Along one wall stood several empty glass containers. Fish tanks? Hardly. The opposite wall housed nine large steel drawers. Morgue drawers. His gaze drifted back to the OR below, the gurneys there, the operating table. “This isn’t where they held Carter,” said Maybourne, as though he’d read Hammond’s mind. “She was a couple doors down. If there’s time, I’ll show you.” “Thanks. I’ll pass.” “Suit yourself. So, let’s see what we’ve got.” Maybourne walked over to the wall with the drawers, pulled the nearest one, and grimaced at the body inside. “Oh boy!” George Hammond felt grateful that the corpse was frozen. If he’d had to contend with the smell, too, he might have thrown up. The pale torso looked like something had eaten its stomach from the inside out. “What in God’s name is this?” he croaked. “Some Level IV virus? Hemorrhagic fever?” “No. Even the NID aren’t crazy enough for that. Besides, this isn’t a containment lab.” For once the slick facade had crumpled, and Harry Maybourne actually looked troubled. “Whatever they’re doing, it’s definitely not healthy.” “Obviously not, but I don’t see what that’s got to do with the Marine base on ’335” “Check his dog tags.” He was right. The dead man was a Marine. “What the hell?” whispered Hammond. “Yeah. Two months ago nine Marines dropped off the planet. Nobody knows what happened to them. Looks like we just got a pointer.” Maybourne closed the drawer, flung himself into a chair, and switched on a computer. When the machine started to boot, he hit F8, switched into DOS mode, and entered some kind of code, fingers flying over the keyboard. “It’s a backdoor I made for myself when I was still a member of the club. Bypasses the security program.” Moments later a list of folders popped up. Lots of folders. He dipped in and out of them, randomly opening files, skimming over information, moving on to the next. “What are you looking for?” Hammond asked. “I’ll know when I find it.” “How about this one?” The folder was called Series 3.7. Shrugging, Maybourne opened it. Nine subfolders. Nine names, one of them identical to the name on the dead man’s dog tag. They’d found the vanished Marines alright. “Good guess. You play the lottery? You should, you know.” Somewhere on the lower floors a door slammed, putting paid to any further search for information. Maybourne slipped a DVD from his pocket, placed it into the RW drive, and began downloading the files. The burn seemed to take forever. As soon as drive stopped whirring, he snatched the disc, put it back into its jewel case, and shut down the computer. “Let’s hope the stuff copied alright. We don’t have time to check.” Out in the corridor they could hear voices, hurried footfalls—three men at least, probably more. As quietly as they could, they raced along the hall, back the way they’d come. It wasn’t quietly enough.

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“Third floor!” somebody shouted. Seconds later a tall, bulky figure emerged from the stairwell, cutting off their escape route. Skidding to a halt, George Hammond longed for his sidearm, securely stowed in a Washington hotel safe. Nostalgia was nipped in the bud when he recognized the man. Wrong time for wishful thinking. “Drat!” He turned on his heel, retracing his steps, Harry Maybourne right beside him. At their six, Adrian Conrad was gaining, and there was no staircase at the upper end of the corridor. Maybourne hung a right, hared into a nurses’ station and through a door opposite into an equipment store. Dead end, and Conrad had reached the station. For want of any other bright ideas Hammond slammed the storeroom door, wedged the backrest of a chair under the knob. It’d last five minutes, if that. Inside the storeroom were three rows of metal shelves, holding linen, the world’s most comprehensive collection of bedpans, and nothing even remotely resembling a weapon. Outside, Conrad was working on turning the door into matchsticks. “Now what?” gasped Hammond. By ways of a reply, Maybourne took three steps to the rear wall and yanked open a flap. “Laundry chute.” “You gotta be kidding!” “Wanna wait for him instead?” As if on cue a door panel cracked under Conrad’s onslaught. Hammond dived into the chute head first, hurtling down three floors and landing on a pile of dirty linen in a laundry cart, without time to reflect on the synchronicity of his and Jack O’Neill’s luck. A rumble above announced that somebody was on his way. He scrambled from the cart, clearing the landing zone. Seconds later Maybourne arrived, followed by a roar of fury. The ex-colonel disembarked and pushed the cart out from under the chute. “That should slow him down,” he stated. “Talk about anger management issues.” “Oh, he has. And I’m sure he’ll make his feelings known when I hand you over to him, gentlemen.” The disembodied voice came from a swirl of steam that obscured the ill-lit maintenance tunnel, but Hammond didn’t need visuals to recognize the owner of that lazy drawl. “Playing with the rats, Colonel?” “Given the company you keep, General, I suppose I should be the one asking that question.” Simmons materialized from the steam cloud, aiming a Glock 17 at them. “Now, if you’d please raise your hands and step out from behind that cart. You, too, Maybourne.” “About to graduate to murder, Simmons?” “What murder, General? SG-1 has tragically disappeared, and you’ve been abducted, probably killed, in DC. So who’s to—” The report of the shot hammered from walls and pipes and seemed to compress the steam. A gun tumbled through the air, and Hammond, half deafened, saw rather than heard Simmons’ shout. Clutching his right arm, the colonel broke to his knees. “Jack sends his regards,” said Maybourne, holding a Beretta whose existence he’d previously neglected to mention. “Shame your back wasn’t turned.” Still

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keeping his bead on Simmons, he picked up the Glock, tossed it at his companion. “You may want this, General.” Hammond caught the gun, shook his head. “So help me, Harry, you’re starting to grow on me.” “Don’t panic. It won’t last.” Grinning, Maybourne pointed down the tunnel. “Exit’s that way.” It happened so fast, the skin seemed to slough while it lost its glow and turned dull and yellow. Angry black moles appeared where cells broke down, always in the same places; in the middle of the left cheek and on the chin, growing voraciously. Unless treated in time, he—the real one—would die from skin cancer. Lines and wrinkles crawled like cobwebs, scoring deeper and deeper, until the face looked like an ancient, leathery apple, dry and waxy to the touch—if she could touch it. She wanted to, wanted a way to beg forgiveness, offer comfort, warmth, make it easier for him. And him. And him… She’d lost count, couldn’t remember how many. I can tell you, healer. I even can show you, if I choose to do so. I can show you all of them again. Every single one of them. “No!” Janet’s teeth were rattling so hard, she could barely talk. “Please… It isn’t necessary.” Why bother talking? There is no need. I know. I always know. “I’m human. Talk is what we do.” But, human, you keep telling yourself how inhuman your actions are. Why pretend? Janet couldn’t remember, was too cold and too tired-to remember anything, and Nirrti’s laughter hammered through her skull and seemed to crush the breath in her lungs. At last the pressure eased, though never enough to feel free or forget the presence in her mind. Inside the tube muscles atrophied, joints thickened with gout and arthritis, the spine curved and vertebrae fused as discs shrank and were reabsorbed. His eyes were staring at her—they always did. First with the innocent curiosity of a young animal, then, though there was no rational thought and never would be now, with a visceral awareness and terror of what was happening to his body. She reached out, touched the glassy surface of the tube; a gesture as ineffectual as anything else she could have done. She still couldn’t help it, because she knew what was coming. The eyes, blue and staring, turned milky with glaucoma, and like a child alone in the dark he began to sob, toothless gums bared, gnarled and shriveled hands groping the inside of the tube. It lasted a minute, two, three—too long, however long. Then the movements stilled, slowly, almost gently, and the ancient body died cell by cell. The amniotic fluid—Janet had no idea what else to call it—inside the tube darkened to purple as its molecular structure and properties changed and it began to break down dead flesh and bone into their component proteins. It will feed those worthy of survival. It made sense.

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The thought had come unbidden, and Janet tried to push it away, knowing it wasn’t hers, couldn’t be hers. But the others had to survive. Survival was important. Survival meant lives saved. She was a doctor. She saved lives. She was saving lives. Very good. You are beginning to understand. I am proud of you. She could feel it. It felt warm, soothing, soft like a down blanket, and it somehow eased the terrible coldness of the lab. The need to hang on to the feeling became overwhelming. That and saving lives. No time to lose. She moved on to the next tube, found the crystal that would trigger the aging process, pushed it deep into its socket. The clone inside the tube began to alter, decaying before her eyes, silently and rapidly. All of a sudden she was trapped in a flutter of a memory. She’d seen this before. The face in front of her was overlaid by another, familiar somehow. The process then had been slower, not as efficient, and it had enabled her to win that race against time. She’d found out how this worked. Or something very much like it. Nanites? Somewhere inside her mind Nirrti gave a chuckle of surprise, and the sensation was pleasant. She also sensed something else, swirling red and violent and entirely unashamed of its greed. Nirrti wanted him. The other one. The one familiar, the one who hadn’t died. It seems I am indebted to you. It would have been such a waste, and I have plans for him. “It was none of my merit. The process was flawed.” There was something else, Janet recalled. Someone else. Someone who’d helped. But she didn’t mention it. If she did, the glow of pleasure surrounding her might diminish and she couldn’t bear that. It was too cold to risk that little bit of warmth. Luckily, Nirrti didn’t seem to have noticed, still preoccupied with the revelation. A wave of scorn trawled through Janet’s awareness. The process was flawed indeed. Pelops was a fool who accepted boundaries without testing them. His method took a hundred days to induce death of old age, and he was happy with it. I can gestate life in hours, destroy it in minutes. “You are a goddess, Lady Nirrti.” Janet hadn’t meant to say it, but in retrospect there didn’t seem to be a reason why she shouldn’t. It was true, after all, wasn’t it? Laughter flooded her mind, not the mocking onslaught she had learned to dread but a more intense burst of the delight she’d sensed earlier. Then it gradually ebbed and flattened, until Janet was alone again. Alone but not unobserved. She knew that now. The goddess was all-seeing. Another tube, another crystal activated, another clone shriveled and died. Gestate life in hours, destroy it in minutes. Janet smiled. She was aiding the goddess. From far down the endless row of tubes came the dry scrape of a door sliding open. She ignored it, not permitting herself to be distracted. Footsteps approached, halting and diffident, and finally slowed to a stop behind her. When she turned at last, she found herself facing the… What was he? Father, brother, alter ego—all of the above—to the things she was ordered to obliterate? It appeared to perturb him. Pale as death, he watched himself wizen until he was ancient beyond recognition and incapable of sustaining life. In a flash she understood

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that this was the fate that awaited those who displeased Lady Nirrti; they died a hundred deaths. The freezing air in the lab became more tangible again and seeped into Janet’s bones. Shivering, she crossed her arms, hugged herself. “What do you want?” she asked, if only so as not to think the unthinkable any longer. “Lady Nirrti wishes to see you,” he hissed, his voice harsh with a hatred that begged for punishment. “Will you take me to her? I don’t know where she is.” “The Jaffa”—the word dripped boundless rancor—“waiting by the door will take you.” His gaze rose at last, edged to the nearest tube and its contents, arrested there. “According to her I’m the one who has made them deficient, so I’ve been ordered to finish this task.” The giggle broke free without her volition, but she made no attempt to stifle it. The irony of the punishment was sublime, biblical even. And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out. The offender commanded to eradicate himself. She giggled again, turned, and quickly walked along now empty tubes and toward the door. The instant it slid open, she was wrapped in deliciously warm, moist air. As promised, two Jaffa were waiting for her, the same clones she had found so abhorrent earlier. She couldn’t remember why now. They were quite beautiful, tall and broadshouldered and dark-haired, with deep green eyes. Lady Nirrti was right. You couldn’t have too many of a good thing. Janet burst out laughing. Tentatively at first, then more boldly, she stroked the chest of one of the men and suddenly realized that she had been too wrapped up in work and caring for her daughter to— She had no daughter. She’d never had a daughter. She’d stolen an alien child, the rightful property of Lady Nirrti, and had withheld that child and—A sequence of images flashed through her mind, one more vile than the other, until her whole body tingled with shame. The cold seemed to creep back, and she grasped that it had nothing to do with the temperatures in the lab. It was inside of her, a legacy of her transgression. Trying to control a shudder, she nodded at the Jaffa. “Let’s go. Lady Nirrti is waiting.” They led her down into the vault. From there, the ring transporter took her to the roof of the building; a terrace high above the jungle. Below stretched an endless sea of green, bleeding into a scarlet sky. A huge sun was setting, cupping half the horizon, and now and again brilliantly colored birds burst from the canopy as if to take one last look before dusk fell. “Pretty, is it not?” Janet spun around, again aware of the icy lump of guilt within her. She dropped to her knees. “Lady Nirrti, I—” “Quiet.” Under a red and gold sunshade fluttering gently in the breeze stood the goddess, looking at her sternly but not unkindly. Willing to forgive? “You wish for my forgiveness, yes? You wish to prove yourself to me?” “Yes, Lady Nirrti. I beg you.” Janet was shaking with cold, felt tears streaming down her face. “Please,” she whispered.

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The goddess moved toward her, touched her shoulder. Under the heat of Lady Nirrti’s touch, the ice began to melt at last. Radiant warmth spread from her hands, burning and soothing at once. “Rise, child. What is your name?” “I have no name, mistress. You haven’t seen fit to bestow one on me yet.” The answer pleased the goddess; she could tell from the warmth leaking into her, and she rose toward its source like a flower toward the sun. A delicate hand, framed by a ribbon device, cupped her face. “I shall name you.” Lady Nirrti smiled. “You shall be called Mrityu, my daughter.” She rolled the sounds through her mouth and mind and decided they tasted good. Strong. “Thank you, mistress,” whispered Mrityu. “But I still wish to prove myself to you.” “You shall. Oh, you shall.” Lady Nirrti’s laughter danced on the evening air like sparks of light and sunshine. “Come with me. I will show you your task.” The goddess led the way under the sunshade, casually flicking a hand at the mounds of silk-covered cushions strewn across the stone floor. “Sit.” Despite the invitation, it struck Mrityu as disrespectful to seek her own comfort before the goddess was seated. So she waited until Lady Nirrti had settled on a pillow and only then sat down herself. “Please show me, mistress.” A recess in the floor released a dull gray orb, which slowly ascended until it hovered at Mrityu’s eyelevel. She recognized the device; a communication globe. The grayness under its surface began to boil and swirled apart on the image of two people, a man and a woman. The woman was injured, and the man was attending to her. “Do you remember them?” asked the goddess. Somewhere beneath the warm mists that filled Mrityu’s mind a memory stirred, faint and shapeless. “I do… I think.” “Good. You are to bring them to me.”

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CHAPTER TWELVE

Character Displacement: Artificial divergence of characters in related species whose territories overlap. If you thought about it, the method of lighting was ingenious, not to mention environmentally friendly. Nothing necessarily new—archeologists had hit upon the same trick sometime in the late eighteen hundreds—but this had to be older by several centuries, perhaps millennia. While his fingertips stroked the shiny silver disk, Dr. Jackson studiously avoided actually looking into it. His reflection was a bit of a shocker right now. Besides, the principle of the thing was far more interesting. There were dozens and dozens of these mirrors mounted in strategic places and refracting the surface light all throughout the maze beneath the ruins. “Daniel!” He whirled around, blinking into the gloom behind him. It’d been growing steadily dimmer for a while now, which meant that it had to be late afternoon at least, perhaps evening already. They’d left the wardroom two hours ago, and he’d been on point ever since—a classic case of the blind leading the maimed. Or, as Jack had put it, Daniel might not be able to see where he the hell was going, but at least he could run there if necessary. At the end of the corridor, two blurry figures emerged from the shadows; Jack all but carrying Sam, and never mind that it had to be murder on his ribs. “Daniel!” he called again. “Wait up!” “I can go faster, sir,” Sam chimed in immediately. “I don’t recall anybody asking your opinion, Carter.” “Sorry, sir.” Daniel could hear the forced cheeriness in her voice, didn’t like it. She was holding on too hard, wasting strength she didn’t have on reassuring him, herself, and first and foremost Jack. Who, by Daniel’s estimate, was about nine tenths along the way of blaming himself for the entropy of the known universe. At least he’d agreed to scrapping Plan A, which had been Jack going off on his own to find a sarcophagus that might not even exist or, if it did exist, might be on the other side of this godforsaken planet, while Daniel and Sam sat tight in the wardroom. The prospect of getting killed and/or eaten in the process hadn’t seemed to deter him—there was a surprise!—but what had clinched the argument in the end was the question of whether Sam would still be mobile if he had to come all the way back and then take her to wherever that hypothetical sarcophagus lived. “Any sign of the exit yet?” he asked when they caught up.

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“Can’t be far now. Up there.” Daniel jerked his chin at a flight of stairs twenty yards down the corridor. “We’re definitely on or near the upper levels. See how the halls are wider and more ornate? A floor down they didn’t have those wooden pillars either, so—” “Daniel.” “Sorry.” “Just… just get us to where we’re going, okay?” Daniel bit back the obvious reply; namely that he didn’t have a clue where they were going. Or that the odds of his spotting an inscription saying Sarcophagus This Way with a little arrow underneath were negligible. Instead he simply nodded, turned around, and headed for the stairs, trying not to feel like Gandalf in the Mines of Moria. Everyone knew how that story went; Gandalf, consumed by a fire demon, ascends to a higher plane of existence. Not just yet, thanks all the same. Halfway up Daniel realized that the quality of the light had changed to something more… immediate, for want of a better word. And it was brighter, not by much but enough to be noticeable. Instinct and habit made him want to run up the steps. He curbed the impulse and checked his six. “Keep moving! We’re okay.” Jack’s definition of okay had to be the most elastic of any word in the history of linguistics, but now probably wasn’t the time to discuss it. Daniel kept moving, as ordered. About to crest the top of the steps he slowed, listening past the soft shuffles and gasps on the stairwell behind him. It was quiet, no voices, no noises of any kind. Suddenly something brushed his face. He recoiled, winced in embarrassment a second later. A draft. Seemed his nerves were stretched a little more taut than he liked to admit. The draft picked up, turned into a breeze, warm and heavy with the scent of flowers. He inched out into a vast room. Like everywhere else, it was decaying; wooden carvings rotting in humid air, friezes suffocating under lichen and creepers, masonry crumbling and inviting in its own destruction. Still, you could tell that the room—maybe a covered market—would have been grand once. And in one respect it was very different from the endless succession of chambers they’d passed since leaving the wardroom. “Looks like a parking lot,” offered Jack, lifting Sam over the last couple of steps. “Where do I pay?” “At the exit.” Pointing across the room, Daniel grinned. One wall was missing, replaced by a row of wooden pillars. Between them, sunlight splashed onto marble tiles, painting the floor a deep red. Past the pillars, grass and foliage and the gray frontage of the buildings opposite. “Cool. Now where?” Jack asked. Daniel gave a small shrug. “If they built this along the same lines as the temples in Angkor, the center of the complex is right at the top of the mountain. So we keep going up.” “Fine.”

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“Sir, this is pointless,” Sam murmured, eyes closed, propped up between that staff weapon and Jack’s arm around her waist. All pretense at reassurance gone, she sounded like she didn’t care anymore. Like it didn’t matter anymore. “You can’t—” “You’re tired, Carter.” Jack didn’t look at her when he said it. “We’ll check what’s up the road there and then take a break.” His tone, as falsely upbeat as Sam’s had been earlier, precluded any argument. Daniel took it as a command to move out, started walking again, through the market hall and out into the open. It was more than a temple precinct, he thought, desperate for something, anything, to distract himself. This had been a city once. The so-called road was a narrow stretch of lawn lined with statues, and it branched out into numerous smaller side streets. The roofs peaked into a myriad spires and pagodas, and above them rose the canopy of the forest and a lavender evening sky. Birdcalls here and there, and an overwhelming sensation of peace he’d known to be deceptive ever since he and Jack had discovered the mangled corpse on the temple wall. Still, it would do for now. There even was the far-off whisper of a waterfall, just to up the Zen factor. As they drew closer to the massive structure at the top of the grass road, the whisper gradually turned into splashing. The road funneled into what might have been an audience hall. Soaring ceilings, tall columns, more statues, and at the far end some kind of dais that would have held an altar or throne. Opposite the dais, pink light streamed in through an archway screened by a cascade of water. Daniel had found his waterfall. “Might as well rest here,” Jack announced and steered Sam over into a corner that would cover their backs while still allowing a clear view of almost the entire room. Once there, he carefully eased her to the ground and nodded at the staff weapon. “Mind if I borrow this, just in case? I’m gonna go find some fire wood. Your teeth are rattling.” “Sir—” “Thanks, Carter.” He picked up the staff and rose. “Daniel, stay with her. If I’m not back in thirty, clear out and find that goddamn sarcophagus.” Daniel watched him disappear among the pillars and turned to Sam. She was beyond pale, and fever and exhaustion had punched olive smudges under eyes that looked too big for her face. “On a scale of one to ten, how bad is it?” “Twelve point three,” she rasped, tried to shift to a position that didn’t hurt and eventually gave up. “You’ve got to talk to him, Daniel.” “I’ve got to talk to him? What makes you think he’ll listen? He hasn’t listened to you, has he?” Daniel squatted and offered Sam his canteen. She took it, drank greedily, handed it back. “Thanks. And no, he hasn’t. Last time I tried, he started talking about hockey and some highly involved maneuver he called a fishhook. I lost track after the third preparatory pass.” It coaxed a chuckle from Daniel. “I can explain it to you if you’re interested. Side-effect of watching one too many hockey games with Jack.” His amusem*nt faded, as if evaporating in the jungle heat. “Right now he’s about as amenable to reason as Colonel Kurtz. Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him like this.” 120

“I have,” Sam said quietly. Daniel shot her a sharp look. He couldn’t be sure because he hadn’t been there, but he could guess, and he suddenly understood the origins of his own certainty that he wouldn’t die out here as long as Jack was around. Jack would flatly refuse to let him die. Of course, there were limits even to Jack’s powers of refusal. Right now Daniel was staring at one of them. Sam had unwrapped the bandage to reveal a wound looking twice as bad as it had a few hours ago. Around the edges blisters had formed, filled with brownish fluid, and she inspected them, sick fascination on her face. “I guess that clinches it,” she muttered, one finger carefully pressing down on the swollen tissue. Gas escaped, crackling softly, and she flinched. “Think he’d listen to that?” With sudden determination, she angled for her backpack, fished out the medikit, removed an ampoule of morphine and a syringe. “Sam, what are you doing?” By ways of an answer, she snapped the top off the ampoule, dipped in the needle, pulled back the plunger, popped the cap back over the needle and dropped the syringe in her lap. Then she fumbled for her belt, dragged it from the loops, and cinched it around her thigh. Finally, she gazed up at him. “I could do with a hand, Daniel. For starters, that tourniquet’s nowhere near tight enough.” The sudden lump in his throat got in the way of replying. Of course she was right. Thirty seconds ago he’d have said it was the only sensible thing to do. But being faced with it somehow put a different complexion on the issue. He could hear the wails of a child on Abydos, and his stomach flipped. “Sam, are you absolutely sure?” he croaked. All of a sudden Jack’s crazy notion of looking for a sarcophagus seemed entirely logical. “What if… What about your career?” God, Jackson! You’re really clutching at straws, aren’t you? “Medical separation. Are you going to help me or what?” She co*cked her head, studied him for a moment. “Look, Daniel, I know this isn’t fair. But I don’t want the Colonel to have to do it.” Which, fair or not, precisely coincided with Daniel’s own sentiments. He took a deep breath, willed his hands to stop shaking. “Okay. Where’s your knife?” “Sorry, Mr. Conrad.” Outside the ambulance, the detective apologized for the tenth time. Next the obsequious creep would offer to lick Conrad’s boots. “We, uh… There were rumors that you’d, uh, passed away, sir.” “Do I look like a ghost to you, detective?” Conrad laughed, a perfect mock-up of the real item, and slapped the man’s shoulder for emphasis. “No, sir.” Dutifully, the detective chortled. Then he slid another withering glare at the two beat cops who’d been summoned to the scene by a neighbor with acute hearing and had proceeded to arrest Simmons and his pet Goa’uld. Simmons devoutly hoped that the pair would end up directing traffic for the rest of their natural lives. He shifted on the gurney, just as the paramedic inserted a probe into the wound canal. “Ow! Goddammit, watch what you’re doing!”

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“Sorry, sir.” Blushing, the woman steadied his arm. “The lidocaine should be working by now. I can give you another shot, but you really ought to let us take you to the ER.” “No! I haven’t got time for that. Just get the hell on with it.” The only glimmer of satisfaction Simmons could wring from the situation was the fact that Maybourne, son of a bitch that he was, had managed a clean shot. The bullet had gone in and out, missing the bone, and CSI had found the damn thing embedded in the tunnel wall. What they hadn’t found, thankfully, was his own Glock. The gun might have detracted a little from the surprisingly convincing tale Conrad had spun to the police. Speaking of… Through the open doors of the ambulance, Simmons had been able to admire the red and blue lightshow the police cruisers projected onto the facade of St.-Christina’s. Now the detective’s stocky shape interposed itself between him and the vista. “You alright, sir?” The detective, clearly one of Seattle’s finest, screwed on a solicitous face. “I got shot in the arm! How do you think I am?” “Uh, sir?” The man climbed aboard. “Mr. Conrad has cleared up the, uh, misunderstanding and filled us in on what happened, but I’ll need a statement from you, too, sir.” “Fine. Whatever.” Just as long as it took his mind off the paramedic’s clumsy ministrations. A flash from somewhere beyond the police cordon exploded in his eyes, and Simmons swore. His portrait plastered all over the six o’clock news was the last thing he needed. At least they hadn’t spotted Conrad. Yet. “For God’s sake, get those vultures out of here! Now!” At the detective’s nod a bunch of his minions descended on the representatives of the media and drove them from sight and earshot. “Alright then.” He perched on the gurney opposite. “So you’re Mr. Simmons. Mr. Frank Simmons?” “Colonel.” “Sorry, sir?” “Colonel Frank Simmons. And no, I’m not in uniform, but then I don’t usually wear it to bed either.” “Ah. Sorry. And your employer is…? “A government agency.” The detective was starting to look pleasantly pained. “Which agency would that be, sir? There were a few dozen of them last time I checked.” “That’s classified.” “Excuse me?” “What I do and who I work for is classified, Detective. Can we leave it at that?” “For now, sir.” Head bent, the man scribbled something on his notepad. The overhead light illuminated flakes of dandruff sprinkled over greased-back black hair. “So, tell me, Colonel. What were you doing in the old hospital?” “Mr. Conrad was giving me a tour of the premises. You do realize that the hospital is his property?”

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“Yeah, we know that. Still doesn’t explain what you were doing there, sir. Not at that time of the night and in the basem*nt of all places.” Apparently Mr. Detective was smarter than he looked. Fine. Simmons made a show of waving away the paramedic who’d just put the finishing touches to the bandage around his arm. Then he sat up and leaned forward until his face was inches from the policeman’s and he could smell breath laced with coffee, donuts, and pepperoni pizza. “Detective,” he whispered. “I’m not supposed to divulge this to you or anybody else, but in the interest of clearing up this matter I’m willing to reveal certain information that is highly classified. Can I trust you to keep this information to yourself?” The detective returned a slow, bovine stare and finally nodded. “Mr. Conrad’s company is carrying out some research and development for the Pentagon. Part of this research is being conducted at St. Christina’s Hospital.” “In the basem*nt?” “Mr. Conrad was showing me the ventilation system that serves two of the laboratories. And that’s all I can tell you I’m afraid.” This time it seemed to have worked. No more probing in that direction. Instead the detective scratched an old pockmark on his cheek and said, “Fair enough. But see, it still doesn’t add up, Colonel. Mr. Conrad thinks the two men who attacked you in the basem*nt were addicts looking for prescription drugs. Now, if I were in those guys’ shoes, the basem*nt’d be the last place I look.” Simmons gathered his injured arm and placed the hand in his lap. Hopefully the local anesthetic would wear off soon. He’d rather deal with the pain than with a limb that felt dead like a prosthesis and wouldn’t move unless he manipulated it. Pushing aside his discomfort, he dredged up a smile, finely judged, midway between understanding and condescension. “Look, Detective, don’t get me wrong. I have the highest respect for Mr. Conrad. In his field he’s a genius, no doubt about it. However, he’s also a recluse. Which means that he can be a little naive when it comes to the kind of thing you and I deal with on a daily basis. Those men weren’t junkies. For starters they were well outside the usual age bracket.” Simmons blew out a breath for effect. “I also recognized one of them.” “Come again?” The detective snapped upright on the gurney, all but shivering with excitement. “The man who shot me is a former colonel in the US Air Force, convicted on high treason and espionage charges. About two years ago he managed to escape from Leavenworth. His name is Harry Maybourne, but he also goes by Charles Bliss and a string of other aliases. Odds are he was trying to find out about the research Conrad is doing for us.” “What about the other one?” “Never seen him before, but you may safely assume that he’s no choirboy. Somebody like Maybourne doesn’t waste his time with amateurs.” “Yeah. Reckon you’re right on that one, sir. We’ll send out an APB.” “Well, if there’s nothing else…” Simmons’ tone left no doubt that there was to be nothing else. He eased himself off the gurney, grateful to find that standing up posed less of a problem than he’d imagined.

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Pocketing his notebook and other paraphernalia, the detective got up too. “I’ll get a car to take you and Mr. Conrad wherever you’re going.” “That will not be necessary. I have a driver on standby.” The voice sounded relaxed and came from the rear of the ambulance. Conrad stood leaning against the door, one hand extended. “Here, Colonel. Let me help you.” The Goa’uld grabbed Simmons’ left biceps, harder than necessary and smiling in the knowledge that there would be no protest in front of witnesses. He was playing mind games again. Driven by a brief surge of panic, Simmons meant to reach for the remote that controlled the naquadah collar, then it dawned on him that he was defenseless. The remote was in his right pocket, to be activated by a right arm that currently dangled from his shoulder like a lump of cold flesh. Conrad’s smile broadened. “Mind your step,” he said, guiding Simmons down from the ambulance. “Do not worry, we shall not have to go far. The vehicle is waiting at the next corner.” One piece of good news. Simmons’ NID agents had had the smarts to clear out and wait on the sidelines as soon as they’d heard the police sirens. The only ones to get caught had been he and Conrad, who’d come to look for him in the basem*nt. Simmons and his escort passed the police cordon. As soon as they were out of earshot, he yanked his arm free. “Don’t ever dare to touch me again!” In the red light strobing from the cruisers, Conrad’s face looked truly alien. “As you wish,” he whispered, still smiling. “And you’d better remember it!” Simmons headed for the SUV at the corner, forcing himself not to run. Behind him he could hear Conrad’s footfalls, their steadiness seeming to mock him. As he approached the car, one of the agents got out and opened the passenger door. “You okay, Colonel?” “I’ll survive.” Cradling his arm, Simmons sidled into the seat. “Phone our hacker back in DC. Seattle PD are bound to find Hammond’s fingerprints somewhere in that barn.” He jerked his chin at the hospital. “When they run the prints through AFIS, I want them to get back Hammond’s picture and vital stats together with the record of a likely heavy.” “Yessir.” Conrad had arrived and was folding his tall frame onto the rear bench. Simmons resisted the urge to turn around to keep an eye on him. Instead he squinted at the agent. “Actually, let’s get them the record of a cop killer. Increases the chances of some state trooper doing us a favor and shooting Hammond on sight.” The man grinned, closed the door, and climbed into the rear. Simmons could hear the soft beep of his cell phone keys. He had perfect pitch, could tell the number just by listening to the sounds: 555-377-8008. “Where’re we going, sir?” asked the driver. “Cheyenne Mountain. Hammond and Maybourne are bound to try and run home to momma. In the unlikely event that they get there, I want to make sure we’ve got a welcoming committee in place.”

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Indigo shadows crawled in, claustrophobic like cobwebs on your face, and Jack turned full circle, surrounded by stone walls, teeming plant-life, smirking statues. God, he hated those things! Couldn’t really say why. Maybe he just hated them for the sake of hating something. Shivering, Jack let out a deep breath. This place was getting to him, was all. Too damn quiet for starters. And who was mowing the lawn, anyway? The grass under his boots was short, evenly clipped, and the odds of the groundkeeper driving a John Deere through here on a regular basis struck him as slim. He remembered, ages ago, reading some science fiction novel where lawn care was handled by tall green things with mouths in their paws. They jumped real well, and when they weren’t grazing they sucked unsuspecting tourists dry. Not a good thought. On the upside and going by the pristine state of the turf, those monster hogs Carter had mentioned probably didn’t come to play in this particular circle of hell. Jack checked his watch. Twenty minutes left. He’d better find that firewood. Ahead was an archway, muffled by shadows. Either side of it, more statues, peering from the gloom with a greediness that made him squirm and broadcasted a recommendation to stay out. Yeah, well. Maybe next time. Ignoring the faces, the stares, he moved through the archway into some kind of temple. The darkness drooping beneath the vaulted ceiling seemed rancid, ancient, as if it’d been hanging there since the day this bastard of a planet had congealed from primordial soup to whatever it purported to be now. Evening twilight trickled through a high, narrow window, lifting charcoal to medium gray and outlining an array of wooden screens, not unlike the kind you’d find in an old Catholic church. Except for the artwork, of course. That was about as far removed from Catholic statuary as you could get. And the sense of being watched hadn’t lessened. On the contrary. It was almost physical, stroked his neck, his back, a congregation of popsicle millipedes boogieing up and down his spine. Pulse thudding in his throat, he did another slow three-sixty, staff weapon raised and primed this time. Nothing. But the creepy sensation of being touched by a ghost had ceased. For now. Jack struggled to control his breathing and slipped between two screens, in the hopes of finding something wooden and portable back there. Zip. Not even a chair. Carter was dying, and all they had on offer were goddamn screens and prying eyes! Fury, blinding and irrational, sloshed over him in a red-hot wave. He smashed the staff into a screen, sent splinters flying, threw the weapon after them. The Rakshasas again, Fear, Terror, and Death, and that was just fine by him; he’d take them apart chip by chip and with his bare hands if he had to, punch holes in their grinning faces. His fists crashed into the panel, leaving smears of blood, kept pounding regardless, needing the pain to numb a different kind of agony, again and again and— “Don’t move!” Though cold beyond freezing the voice sounded vaguely familiar. Notwithstanding, hanging around for the reunion didn’t seem advisable. Adrenaline still fizzing through his body, Jack dropped, rolled under a screen just ahead of the track of bullets that hammered dust and stone flakes from the floor. Damn! So he’d felt watched for a reason. Another round tore through the screen, whisked past his head. Slugs, not energy bolts. The shooter—a woman,

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incidentally—probably wasn’t Jaffa, but she had X-ray vision anyway. The next round was half an inch closer. You’re a shrub, O’Neill! What the hell made you think this was a safe place to throw a tantrum? His opponent was on the move, slowly edging her way around the wooden partition. Butted up against another screen four meters away lay his staff weapon, and the lighting or absence thereof would work to his advantage. Maybe. Disregarding the protests from assorted parts of his anatomy, Jack burst from cover, dived for the staff weapon—with catlike grace, he would have liked to think, though reality was more along the lines of a startled bullfrog—grabbed it, brought it up rolling onto his back, and fired. Some pals of Fear, Terror, and Death flew apart in a shower of shards and smoke, and then a shadowy figure gradually straightened up behind what was left of the screen. Along the handle of the weapon Jack was staring at the shell-shocked face of Dr. Janet Fraiser. “Colonel O’Neill! What in God’s name are you doing here?” “For cryin’ out loud! What is this? The local feminist association trying to eradicate me? First Carter and now you!” “Sam? You’ve found Sam?” “Let’s just say she found me. Mind pointing that gun someplace else? If it goes off now, it’ll take out equipment I’d hate to lose.” “I’m sorry, Colonel. I’m so sorry.” Hands trembling, Fraiser lowered her weapon. She had a nasty gash on the side of her head and a starved look about her, but otherwise she seemed to be in full working order. Thank God for that. “I could have—” “Save it.” Oscillating between irritation and giddy relief, Jack skipped the sideways shuffle and heave that would have allowed him to get to his feet relatively pain-free and hauled himself up the staff weapon instead. She watched his performance with an air of solemn curiosity and stated, “You’re injured.” “Yeah. Must have forgotten to read the health warning on the label before I let myself be dumped in this place. Where’s Teal’c?” An odd flicker of uncertainty and something else—indefinably wrong—raced through her eyes. It could be shock, grief, the twilight in this ghost train of a room, any of a hundred things, including Jack’s own paranoia. “We were separated. I’ve spent days searching, but…” She gave a small shrug and nodded at the jungle vista outside the window, now rapidly changing from green to black. “Crap,” Jack muttered softly. Then again, it probably would have been too much to hope for to get back Fraiser and Teal’c in one handy package and, admittedly, he was worried a little less about the big guy than he had been about the doc. “It’s alright. We’ll find him. Meanwhile, you ready to make a house call?” Shaking off whatever it was that had rooted her in place, she picked her way through the wreckage. “What did you do now?” “Not me! Carter. Here, take as much of this stuff as you can carry.” He gathered some chunks of wood, piled them into her arms.

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Over bits of splintered screen, she gazed at him wide-eyed. “Sam? What’s wrong with her? Where is she?” “I left her and Daniel in some lobby with a waterfall. Very feng shui.” “I’ve been there. Reminded me of The King and I. What about Sam, sir?” “She isn’t doing so good.” He picked up some more shards, stacked them atop the pile she was holding. “Colonel?” Okay, that was more like Fraiser, complete with her best Don’t hold out on me or it’ll hurt look. “It’s gangrene, Doc.” Fraiser damn near dropped the wood. “You’re sure, sir?” “Positive.” That impotent rage threatened to surge back, and he put a boot through what was left of the screen, scooped up the fragments, grabbed the staff weapon. “Let’s go.” Outside a lilac moon had begun to crawl over the treetops, cast