DISCLAIMER: The story, and characters and anything and everything else concerning SG: SG1 belong to MGM, Gekko, Secret Productions etc, they are so not mine and no money is being made from this and no copyright infringement is intended, absolutely none what so ever.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I am blatantly defying TPTB; I guess this falls into an AU now. But I won't accept the death of Janet Fraiser. And the events in 7th-8th seasons are going to be changed significantly. Dedicated to my very own beloved angelic, of whom I love very much. To my own heart who made me feel safe.
ARCHIVE: Only with the permission of the author.
The Unabridged Lockdown
By Elizabeth Carter
There were things the SGC was growing accustomed to Teal'c with hair nearly topping the list, as well as Doctor Janet Fraiser's recent rise in rank to Lieutenant Colonel. And of course those not accustomed to Jack O'Neill's command ways had to readjust themselves to his style. He wasn't any worse or better than General Hammond, merely different. But they knew like Hammond, Jack would do anything for his people. And they trusted that. For seven years the once Colonel O'Neill had lead the flagship team and he had the devout fellowship of Carter, Jackson and Teal'c. There wasn't a soul on base that didn't trust SG1 and their new General.
The trio of SG1 gathered in Sam's lab not poring over some project but on this rare occasion simply enjoying a moment of pleasurable conversation. It had been a month since the destruction of Anubis's fleet. And having had a three day leave the three were anxious to get back to work. Sam herself was growing accustomed to being Lieutenant Colonel Carter. Of rouse everyone simply called her Colonel just as Brigadier General Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill was simply General. It was a custom in the military to use the shortened versions of rank.
Teal'c was flashing one of his very rare full smiles. "If all goes to plan, barring any unforeseen circumstance, I will acquire possession of my apartment on Tuesday." for Teal'c he was almost doing the 'Happy Dance.' For seven years he had lived on base, and now he was able to venture out on his own. He had a home!
Sam Carter was filled with happiness for her long time friend, "Hey, congratulations!"
Daniel's bushy eyebrows rose up and down playfully, "So when's the apartment-warming party?
At this Teal'c gives the younger man a enquiring look of pure befuddlement. His unasked question for clarification was answered.
"Uh, when someone gets a new place it's customary for them to throw a party," the archaeologist explained.
Teal'c frowned, "Would I be required to prepare a meal?" he certainly hoped not. The last time he prepared traditional Chu'lock-ian meals, it didn't sit well with the others.
"No, make it pot-luck. We'll all bring something." Sam suggested. "I'll even make a souffle and Janet has a killer recipe for kabobs."
"Very well. Next Saturday." Teal'c's dark eyes twinkled.
"Sorry Cassie can't make it, she's settling into dorm-life. Janet dropped her off......"
At the sound of booted feet clomping down the hall, alerted Sam of the presence of her superior officer. Always the consummate professional solider, the blonde colonel bolted to her feet, coming to a ridged attention stance, even before Jack was fully across the threshold of her lab.
Jack clearly annoyed at Carter's unmistakable professionalism, he had after that first year got her to stop coming to attention once he walked into the room, now its like he had to retrain her all over again just because he was a General. But she didn't do anything any differently when Hammond entered the room she happened to occupy. Sam was indeed a career officer. He was always and would forever be 'Sir' to her.
"I'm only gonna say this once, Carter. At ease." He just wanted that camaraderie he had when he was on the team. He didn't want the fact he was Base Commander to change anything between them. He saw Carter nod uncomfortably and reclaim her seat. 'Carter's just gonna have to get over I 'm not Hammond.'
"So how's the new job?" Daniel said curiously. Obviously the new rank meant little to the archeologist in expressing consummate professionalism, but then Daniel didn't go out of his way with Hammond either.
"Oy! One crisis after another." Jack leaned on the counter. "This morning the Mess got a shipment of Yukon Gold potatoes instead of the usual Russets."
Daniel smirked mockingly "No!"
"Oh yes!" Jack played along, "The Golds don't make for good mash. Consistency's all wrong."
The younger man turned his head completely unable to hide his amusement, even Teal'c smirked.
Sam smiled slightly then turned the conversation to a slightly different angle. "I hear the new Russian colonel came to see you – made a pitch to join SG1."
"Yeah." O'Neill ground, rolling his eyes.
"What'd you say?" This was from Daniel as Teal'c reverted to his normal stoic self.
"Told `em to make French fries instead." Jack shrugged.
"About the Russian." Daniel clarified, a little antsy that Jack had deliberately misunderstood.
"Oh. Well I made it clear he shouldn't expect preferential treatment, that he'd have to prove himself before I'd consider him for offworld travel."
Sam's frown returned." He 'is' one of the most highly decorated officers in Russian military history, and he has over twenty years' flight experience." She was to say the least impressed with the thousands of hours this man had flown and most of them in combat situations which was why the Russian Military hand picked him for their envoy to the SGC..
Jack obviously wasn't so impressed, after all Teal'c had five times the experience the 'Russkie' had. And exactly 'no' years in offworld travel. I'm not gonna risk the lives of 'anyone' under my command on a slick résumé." He would never admit that he had thought the same about Dr. Samantha Carter once upon a time, when Hammond first brought her on the team. That was then this is now and O'Neill held the reigns of power.
"How ... uncharacteristically cautious of you, sir." Carter chided. "Yes – there's that." He shot his 2IC of the base a look of befuddled astonishment.
"And there's also the fact that the Russians must be pressuring you to put `em on the team." Daniel added knowing his friends feelings towards the Russian's well.
"Yes – there's that too." Jack shrugged.
"You can't exactly blame them," Daniel started diplomatically, "we haven't been making good on our promises."
Clearly exasperated the conversation was even headed in this direction; Jack nearly snapped "We gave them their own 'team'!"
"That was two years ago – what have we done for them lately?" Daniel continued to argue.
"Forget it!" Jack snarled. "I'm not putting him on SG1."
For the first time since Jack came into Sam's lab, Teal spoke. "Do you have someone else in mind for the position, O'Neill?"
"No." To be honest he never gave it a thought. No that's not true but then two blonde astrophysicist on SG1 was to much even for him, four-Foot Nine Jennifer Hailey would have to stay on SG7. And there was very little chance he was going to allow Doc Fraiser off base since the incident of P3X-666. Jack didn't want anything to happen to 'his' Napoleonic Powermonger ever again. No one did. In fact it seemed the entire base became overprotective of their beloved doctor.
"So we're sticking with the three-man team?" asked Daniel.
"Why not? It's one less decision I have to deal with." Jack saw no reason at all why he couldn't have SG1 the way he wanted it. The answer came from Sam.
"There's nothing in the regulations that says an SG team 'has' to be made up of four people." there were teams with five and even six people, the average of course was the balanced four.
Jack felt as if he had won the lottery. Providence praise Carter. "There you go. Problem solved." He smiled broadly after dining upon a canary. Daniel shook his head non-commitantly. Teal'c gave his approving eyebrow raise, he after all didn't want anyone covering his six that he didn't know. He was very satisfied with the three person team.
Jack turned to Carter, she had handed him the perfect excuse to keep SG1 just the way he wanted. Trust Carter to follow regs to the letter. "Thank you." He flashed a smile. "Now back to the mountains of paperwork. No wonder Hammond rarely left his office."
"Going too," Daniel said. Of course he wouldn't mention he was going to go see Colonel Vaselov. With Jack the archeologist always felt to the need to play diplomat. He thought a preemptive soothing of ruffled feathers might be in order. After all Jack O'Neill was an equal opportunity offender.
"I too must take my leave, I am training some of the SG-teams in Jaffa combat tactics. Even though we defeated Anubis his Kull warriors are still active." Teal'c followed the others out of the lab, leaving Sam alone.
The blonde smiled. As soon as the men left, she turned to the phone on the wall and using one of her very rare privileges and made a private call to her love. The other end of the phone picked up in the fourth ring.
"Fraiser."
"Miss you." Sam said.
"Hey babe, I miss you too. Cassie says to say hi and she loves you. She's pretty excited about the college. She bought a plethora of dorm-posters to cover up the bleak white walls."
"I'll bet she's primed. She had to wait a whole semester to enter college." Sam whispered. Since P3X-666 Cassandra refused to go to college until her mother was out of the woods and by the time she was safe, the term was well on the way, forcing the girl to wait. "So where are you?"
"Three and a half hours away, I'll be on base soon, sorry babe I won't be there to see you off."
"That's okay, you can make it up to me by welcoming me home," Sam smiled. "I hope your in the infirmary instead Brightman."
"She's a little clinical I grant you but she does know her stuff, and a little more equipped to handle things more than Warner, he's just a surgeon." Janet and Sam both still held the fact Warner was so reluctant to help in the Machello Legacy issue with the Goa'uld killers against him. It was, Janet even under heavy duress that came up with the cure, where Warner continued to deny the possibility of a cure. He had given up so easily, it was something Sam had never forgiven him for, his reluctance to help with the killer-jellies nearly cost Janet and the Colonel their lives.
"She's not you. This is 'your' infirmary Jan anyone else is a trespasser." Sam pouted, "Hurry back. 'But' drive safely!"
Janet's lyrical laugh filled the blonde's ears. "My forever guardian. I'll see you when you get back. And don't go picking fights with the Kull, I don't know who uses more sutures you or Daniel. At least I don't have to patch the General's knees anymore now that he is reassigned to a desk." Janet easily bantered.
She had to sometimes jest about the battered bodies of her loved ones that came back through the gate, or her compassion would consume her. Of course when they did come back injured there was no one else including every other SG team that they wanted to put them back together. Simply put Janet Fraiser was irreplaceable, because no one gave as much to her patients as the tiny woman.
"I don't think he's enjoying it as much. I'll let you in on more once you get here." Sam said. "I gotta gear-up hon. I love you." For a woman who was considered a soft butch Samantha Carter was an incurable romantic boarding on pure mush. But only Janet would truly know just how soft Sam's heart was.
"You be safe my Brave One. I love you too." Janet knew if she didn't hang up first, they would be on the phone forever. She hit end on her cellphone and pushed the accelerator on her car just so she could reach the SGC all the sooner.
Even as Sam was on the phone in her lab, Daniel Jackson was escorting Vaselov into the infirmary, after the Russian Colonel had collapsed in his quarters. The medical team had acted swiftly and had ailing Colonel on the gurney.
"What happened?" Questioned a dark haired woman. Dr. Brightman was a captain in the Airforce and under Janet's direct command. Her voice was lightly spoken, but that was the extent of the softness.
She prided herself on her professional detachment. She had seen far too many physicians lose their grip and burn out too quickly because they became too close to their patient. Fraiser was on the borderline of burn out. Three weeks spent with the Jaffa-man Teal'c as he healed after Hathor attacked and abducted SG1 was beyond the necessary duty. There was an entire nursing staff for that function.
Then there was Cassandra over which Brightman argued with Warner, that Fraiser should never have been allowed to treat her own family member. The proof of that was a gun being pulled on the prisoner Nirrti, there wasn't even a harsh reprimand on the doctor's record of the incident. And of course anytime a member of SG1 became hurt especially Colonel Samantha Carter was injured, Janet immersed herself in their care until they were released. Brightman decided to fallow Warner's example and not emotionally invest herself in her patients. Her task was to heal them, not to mother them.
"I dunno. We were just talking and all of a sudden he just collapsed." Daniel answered. He looked into the green eyes of the doctor expecting to see some of the same compassion he knew he could find in Janet was a little shocked to discover a cool expression looking back at him.
"Alright. I know you're scheduled to go offworld. We'll take care of him." She would say nothing more as she and the medics wheeled Vaselov away. Daniel looked at his watch, then left not giving the incident a second thought.
Jack walked into the observation room that overlooked Vaselov's Iso-room to meet with Dr. Brightman moments later.
"How's he doin'?" Jack wondered if Janet would have a different assessment, he had wanted to wait for the CMO's appraisal because truth be told she was the only physician he trusted. Janet Fraiser was also the only physician that could keep him in line and he respected that. Brightman was far too intimidated by rank for O'Neill's taste, and as Cassandra would say the captain lacked the ovaries it took to go nose to nose with the CO of the base.
"Confused. Apparently the last thing he remembers is being in Russia. He doesn't know where he is or how he got here. He's also exhibiting certain physical symptoms which have me concerned. He has lesions over forty percent of his body and a highly elevated white blood count which indicates some sort of infection." Brightman delivered in perfectly removed clinical tone.
"Is he contagious?" O'Neill immediately asked. 'Why the hell did Doc leave this twig in charge? 'Some sort of infection? Doc would have a name of it, or at least some med-technobabble of what she thinks it is. If Doc was here I wouldn't have to ask the question she would have come right and told me. And why the hell was Vaselov not contained in a iso-room during his physical? Where's my memo? Doc would have had him isolated until she warranted the lesions non-communicable.'
Brightman looked at the patient in the bed and back to her CO. " It's a distinct possibility. Sir, we need to examine everyone who's been in contact with this man."
"Make sure Fraiser knows this, she'll spearhead the investigating, and no doubt come up with an antidote."
"Sir with all do respect to Dr. Fraiser, Colonel Vaselov is my patient, I am perfectly qualified to lead this inquiry on infectiousness."
"'Captain', Doc Fraiser is the CMO, she was top physician at the CDC, and hand picked for this command." Jack all but snapped. "She leads the investigation, and in case you're not clear, it's a direct order. I don't give a damn about Infirmary- territoriality, besides its Fraiser's. I want to know what I am dealing with." Looking at his watch he grimaced in realizing he was nearly late for SG11 to embark. Daniel who was accompanying the team, had come in direct contact with the Russian, the mission of course would have to be scrubbed, and the space-monkey checked-out.
The Gate whooshes open, at the bottom of the ramp, Daniel is waiting with SG-11 to disembark. With practiced ease the team trudges up the metal ramp, their boots making it clang as they walk. Just as they reach the top of the ramp, the Gate closes down with shoofing sort of noise. Bodies stop moving and all heads turn to the Control Room with a mixture of expressions from impatience to confusion most of them saying 'what now?'
O'Neill hits the intercom so that he might speak to those below "Daniel!" he waited until Daniel turns and looks up at him. "Report back to the Infirmary."
Having the gut feeling the mission was scrubbed until whatever was bothering the General, three of the members of SG11 had already vacated the ramp. It wasn't until last member walks down the ramp, that Daniel made a move. The archeologist grabbed a Marine round the neck from behind. Two of the other members of SG-11 draw their guns and aim at Daniel, in a shocking near re-enactment of Sam as Jolinar taking her own prisoner five years back.
Daniel's voice at least was not the double voice of a Goa'uld but his every action indeed was. From the 9 mm stabbing the officer in the ribs to the words "Open the Gate!" Jack looks bewildered, his mind sending him back to moment of Jolinar "Do it, now!"
O'Neill never responded well to threatening ultimatums grabbed a pistol from one of the airmen in the Control Room and runs for the Gateroom. One of the members of SG-11 raises his gun higher, the trigger nearly pressed, Daniel didn't hesitate for a moment shot him. The seemingly demonized archeologist then turns and shoots the other one, completely neutralizing his possible foes. All save one, Jack comes round the corner of the doorway, aiming his pistol at Daniel.
O'Neill would never hesitate. Daniel, with the SG-11 member still held around the neck, hustles the man down the ramp. As he reaches the bottom of the ramp, the adjacent door to the left whooshes open Teal'c, standing in the other doorway, zats the pair of them hostage and terrorist alike. They collapse to the floor. As Teal'c walks forward, Daniel forces himself up onto his knees and looks at the pistol he dropped. Teal'c aims his zat again.
O'Neill was grateful to his large friend, but it had not been enough to stop the other. "DANIEL!"
Daniel uncaring of the general's voice grabs the pistol and aims it towards Jack. O'Neill reacted with the habits of a block ops warrior he had been for years and shoots his dear friend in the shoulder. Daniel falls to the floor in a boneless thud, not unconscious but unable to move.
Carter watched as the med team swooped in quickly and placed Daniel on a gurney and rushed him and the other wounded back to the infirmary. Brightman and Lieutenant Evans, are scurrying either side of the gurney, looking down at him.
"His pulse is weak." Evens reports.
"He's lost a lot of blood. Dr. Jackson, can you hear me?" Brightman tries to get the archeologist to respond.
Sam remains rooted where she was in the hall watching as the gurney is swept into the elevators to take them to Level 21. Warner and Tupper and Pascual have the other casualties surrounded by a swarm of medical technicians and nursing staff reading to rush them off as well.
Looking tired and old beyond his years, O'Neill wanders up to Sam, touching her on the shoulder.
"There was no choice sir." she said giving him the reprieve he wanted. Neither of them would say anymore.
"I want to know what happened, Carter. Question SG11 ASAP. I want a Hazmat team in here to clean up the blood, if this is airborne we've got an epidemic on our hands. When the hell is Fraiser getting back?"
"ETA two hours now sir." Sam answered before moving off to the infirmary.
Lieutenant Evans, now gowned and masked, is standing near him as he reaches out to grab her arm, just before succumbing to the anesthesia. Brightman was prepping for surgery as were the other three physicians.
SG11 was primarily an engineering corps, they had discovered an antique shrine on P4X-419 and had needed Daniel Jackson's aid in translating some of the pictographs, which was why Daniel was going with them in the first place. The shrine was more than that it was a power station that to the members of SG11 hadn't shut down since the dawn of time. Now they were in the infirmary having bullets taken out of them. They made to salute the statuesque blonde colonel when she entered their sights but her shaking head put them at easy.
"I need to ask you a few questions." Sam was the logical choice for interrogator having been taken host not once by three times by an alien force and knew now what to look for and what to ask to get the right information. "Pre-mission, did Dr. Jackson seem agitated, or impatient?"
The three men looked at each other and shook their heads.
"He sneezed a few times, but that's him." Major Collins said. "No nothing out of the ordinary."
"He rambled a little, but again Colonel he always does that when walking down the corridors about this project or that. I think he was excited about the ruins we found." This came from the Lieutenant, Daniel had used as a hostage.
"Yeah he was perfectly normal ol' Doc Jackson. Sorry Colonel." Captain Peterson said, wincing as he tried to sit without jarring his wounded side. "He wasn't doing anything Goa'uld-ish until the Gateroom."
"Colonel, if you're done, we have to get them in to surgery," Alicia Davidson said. Sam nodded and flashed a reassuring smile to the wounded men. "Thank you, gentlemen. Nurse take good care of them huh?"
"Sure thing, Colonel," The nurse smiled. "If we did any less, Doctor Fraiser wouldn't stand for it."
O'Neill was pissed. Pissed that this contagion had gone this far, pissed he had to shoot Danny in the shoulder, pissed he didn't have the answers, pissed at the Russians who seemingly brought this new plague to his base. He watched in the Observation room as the surgery progressed and finished. It seemed to take hours. In truth only two had passed
Daniel lies unconscious in bed in a second Isolation room as members of SG-1 and Doctor Brightman and General O'Neill huddle together in the Observation room watching almost voyeuristic as the sedated archeologist slept a dreamless sleep.
"He's lost a lot of blood but his life is no longer in any immediate danger." Dr Brightman said stoically, her green eyes staying upon the sleeping man.
"The members of SG-11 insisted he seemed perfectly normal." Sam informed the others, to O'Neill she asked "Did you notice anything peculiar about him, sir?"
"I thought it odd he was shooting up the Gateroom." the graying general answered in his typical sardonic tone.
"He reacted immediately after the Gate was shut down." Teal'c pointed out. "In much the same way Jolinar of Malksure had done."
"Why was 'he' so desperate to go through?" Brightman insisted.
"Does he have any of Colonel Vaselov's symptoms?" Carter asked.
The brunette shock her head " No lesions yet, but that may just be a matter of time. He does have an elevated white blood count." her voice as monotone as a digital simulated voice of a computer.
"Yet Colonel Vaselov displayed no unusual behavior." this came from Teal'c.
The Doctor almost showed emotion, "That doesn't necessarily mean they're not something from the same condition. If an infection reaches the brain, it can manifest itself in a variety of ways, from memory loss to full-blown psychosis."
"You don't think it's a coincidence?" O'Neill asked even though he knew the answer.
"Seems unlikely, sir." the doctor answered. "I think there's a high probability that we have a contagion on the base."
At that particular moment everyone in the Observation room had hoped Janet Fraiser would soon arrive. Virology was after all her area of expertise, if anyone could solve the contagion she could.
They could not have known that the very person they wanted most was only now putting her car into her reserved spot in the parking lot on the surface level.
Jack O'Neill wasted little time in his command decision. There was only one option available to him. Striding swiftly into the Control Room on Level 28 he marched up to one of the technicians at the desk. He wouldn't be able to recall the name if he tried. He knew only Sergeant Walter Davis by sight.
"Contact all teams that are offworld. Tell them that the SGC is off limits. Have them proceed to the Alpha site 'til further notice. Effective immediately, the SGC is under lockdown."
"Yes sir." The tec looked a little apprehensive. Such was the day and the life at the SGC. He hit the klaxon alerting all teams the red-alerted to lock the mountain down.
On the surface, alarms sound as the big door closes locking the parking lot off from the rest of the complex. Janet Fraiser was already in the second elevator that would take her the rest of the way down to the complex. Her mind already shifting in doctor mode. If the general had ordered lockdown there was a very good reason as to why. For some reason the 'vator was taking longer than normal for the doctor's pleasure. Though in truth it was going the exact same speed it always did. So many scenarios rushed through her mind, a foothold situation, another bout of contagion similar to the Broca Syndrome, the images were endless.
'Sam be well, be safe...'
Even as Janet was riding the elevator down to the 28st level to talk with General O'Neill, Dr Brightman walked along those same corridors and gave a slight start as Sam joined her. "Hi. How's Daniel?"
Brightman never knew how to talk to the Colonel most of the time she felt her mouth go dry and her nervousness take her. Brightman was as straight as they come but she found herself taken by Colonel Carter's beauty. No woman had a right to be that gorgeous, that smart and in complete command of herself and still exist. Brightman always felt like a mouse compared to this shining lioness "He's still unconscious but he's improving. He's responding well to treatment and his white cell count is coming down." Brightman said evenly.
Sam seemed to take the news well and hoped for a positive answer to her next inquiry. At the very least she didn't have to worry much now over the man she always thought of as a twin brother. "What about Colonel Vaselov?" the softness in her voice revealed the compassion she had soaked in from close proximity to Janet Fraiser.
"It's not so good." Brightman said almost dismissively. "We're treating him with antibiotics but his condition is deteriorating. Until we know more about the source of the infection there's not much else we can do." She was resigned.
"Well, since it started with Vaselov we can be pretty sure it didn't come through the Gate" Sam commented wanting to rule out variables so that the answers could be found. Was this some sort of Anthrax? Or other biological weaponry sent over from the Gulf? Having served in the first Gulf War, Carter wasn't about to rule the possibility out. 'Janet would know.....'
"I'm waiting to hear back from the Russians about possible sources of the infection from their end." Brightman said with the same crisp dismissal in her voice she held for anyone outside the medical field. Samantha Carter might be a doctor but it was astrophysics, and Fraiser's allowance for Carter to be in the infirmary poking her nose around was in Brightman's book unprofessional. What did an astrophysicist know about anything in the medical context?
"Anyone else showing symptoms?" Sam pursued her line of question. Janet would always bounce ideas off on her and the reverse was true. It was how they worked and succeeded in so many levels.
"Not yet." Brightman would offer no more. Carter wasn't medical and if that blonde stayed out of medical things, Brightman figured she might actually get something accomplished before the CMO arrived, showing Fraiser that she was indeed competent. If she wasn't she wouldn't be stationed in the SGC.
Sam stared for a moment at the lean brunette. 'Not yet? That's it? Janet is so going to come down on you the way you're handling this. When the Broca Syndrome broke out she was on top of everything. She would have placed everyone in contact with Vaselov in iso-wards for observation just in case 'and' she'd start looking deeper for alien influence. .... Janet is so out of your league lady you're not even in the same ballpark'
Jack looked up almost immediately at the sound of a rapping at his door. His face flushed with frustration softened at the mere sight of Janet Fraiser's diminutive stature.
"Well its about time! Okay good, things can go back to normal." Jack fell into his overstuffed chair.
"Sir?" Janet frowned. "What's going on why the lockdown?"
"Seem s the Russians brought some sort of Anthrax like bug, I had to shoot Danny because he went nuts in the Gateroom and started to shoot the place up." O'Neill grumbled.
"Sir, why don't you start at the beginning?"
Sighing, the gray-haired man spoke of Vaselov's collapse, Daniel Goa'uld-ish impression of Jolinar and the lack of answers from Brightman. "..Oh yeah and doc, that woman is a quake as much as Warner. She's what made out of cardboard? I've seen more animation in the Simpsons. She has a stick so far up her ass she's puppet material."
Janet bit her lower lip to keep herself from blurting out a retort. "Sir, she 'is' competent. She wouldn't be here if she wasn't."
"Competent - shomputant she doesn't know shit, she's as much as a nit as Felger. I need you down there Doc. I need answers I can trust. Doc, come on you're good at this sort of stuff. I don't understand why that quack didn't catch the lesions before, and why Vaselov wasn't isolated earlier."
Janet was wondering the same thing, but Brighten was under her command and she wanted to give the other doctor the benefit of the doubt. After al Jack O'Neill was notorious for not reading all his memos when he was a colonel. Now that he was a general the paperwork was easily five times more abundant. It could be possible Brighten had told O'Neill about the health issues not having any feedback allowed the Russian Colonel to leave the infirmary. But if that was the case then Janet would have words with her junior officer, for not containing the infection. Now matters could be very silver, and all for the lack of protocol.
"Sir if you don't mind I'd like to report to the my infirmary, see what exactly is going on. If this is a contagion I need to know everything about the blood work, if I am going to battle this."
"Yeah go ahead," Jack nodded, "Doc, glad you're here, I know the other's will rest easier now that you're on the case."
"Yes sir," Military for thank you. Dismissed Janet headed for her office so that she could speak not only with Alicia her head nurse but Brightman so that she could get the lowdown on what was going on. And she wanted to check on the patients for herself starting with Vaselov considering he was in a more dire situation than Daniel. The lesions had concerned her greatly, as did the fact the man did not seem to respond to treatment.
Teal'c had gone to see Vaselov no only to see how the poor man was faring but to find any information the man might have concerning the illness. Brightman wasn't forthcoming with information and it was earning Teal'c disapproval in rapid succession. The scene in the Gateroom was too much like Jolinar for the Jaffa's contentment and the only other person who might know something was the man slowly dying of what ever it was that now had the SGC on Lockdown. Even without a symbiote Teal'c's immune system was extremely potent. Though Dr. Fraiser would argue he was still a candidate to be a carrier and would disapprove of direct contact.
It would be moments later, before the large bear of a man joined Sam and Dr. Brightman in the infirmary offices. But when he arrived he saw Brightman hand a file to Carter, saying "One month ago Anatole Konstantinov fell ill after completing a tour on the International Space Station."
The golden head nodded "I remember. We monitored the mission. We lost contact for almost thirty seconds and we never figured out why."
"Well, I don't know if they're connected but he died less than a week later in a Moscow hospital. Now, officially the cause of death was renal failure but unofficially the Russian authorities haven't a clue what killed him."
"You think it might be our mystery disease?" Sam asked though it wasn't a true question.
"Among the symptoms he exhibited were memory loss, skin lesions and a highly elevated white blood count." Brightman commented dryly.
"Is there any connection to Colonel Vaselov?" Teal'c baritone voice demanded.
"Apparently Vaselov visited Konstantinov in the hospital just before he died." The doctor shrugged. "They were old friends – they served together in the Russian Air Force."
"Why didn't they tell us this?" Sam was clearly upset. 'And why didn't you demand to know every spec of intel on Vaselov's medical history. Janet was gone for a month to take Cass to Stanford. You should have followed protocol!'
Obviously Brightman 'heard' the inner scolding of the colonel and felt a bit defensive in her answer. "The Russians determined that Konstantinov's condition wasn't contagious. He came into contact with many people between the time he returned to Earth and the time he checked into the hospital but no-one else ever showed any signs of being infected."
"Makes it an oddly selective disease." Sam countered.
"Perhaps we are not dealing with a disease at all." Teal'c intervened. Eight years in a close relationship with Samantha Carter had taught the man that she was nearly at her edge of restraint. "Colonel Vaselov possessed only vague random memories of his time at Stargate Command, and yet the instances he could recall he described himself as a mere observer to the actions of his body."
"Like being host to a symbiote." Brightman said in her vanilla voice.
"Yeah, but tests ruled out the possibility of a Goa'uld." She frowned. 'I didn't feel anything, I know Teal'c didn't. Unless its an Earth-clone without the Naquada. It wouldn't be the first time....but still all the tests reported negative for blending.'
Brightman offered a plausibly reason, one she only now thought of as she saw the reflection of the monitors on colonel Carter's image in the dark glass, reminding her of the reports of the Entity inhabiting the blonde. "Could we be looking at some other form of alien possession?" This was so not in her line of experience.
Alien diseases, possession all of it was so extraordinary and so far-fetched that half the time she had a difficult time believing Fraiser's medical reports. She only had to deal with extensive casualties with the Nasians and with survivors of the Alpha Site when the Kull Warriors had attacked. She never once had to truly deal with Goa'ulds, computer Entities, or invisible AI, or anything else that smacked of science fiction. Now that she was stationed at the SGC, she supposed she should get accustomed to this sort of bizzaro-world occurrences. It so rarely phased Fraiser anymore, which was why the SG-teams favored her above any of the medical staff, even if she was a Napoleonic powermonger.
Sam nodded "Yeah, it's possible----an entity capable of moving from individual to individual. Might explain some of the inconsistencies." She couldn't help but think of the Goa'uld jelly-killers, or the Entity that had taken her hostage and dumped her mind into the computer mainframe of the base.
Still in vanilla mode, Brightman said, "If that's true, it could be in anyone right now." Her comment was cut off short by the ringing of the phone on the far wall "Hello? ... I'll be right there." She hug up turned to the others and stated, "Daniel's awake."
The door opened to Daniel's isolation room admitting Doctor Brightman and the rest of SG-1 O'Neill and the much missed Doctor Janet Fraiser Daniel was now sitting up on the side of the bed, his left arm in a sling, looking a bit confused and alarmed. But much relieved when he laid eyes upon the small brunette. With Janet here, what ever happened would be okay. Janet made everyone okay. Still his panic was swifter than his reason.
"Will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?!" He glanced to Janet, shook her head, she needed to catch up on everything and the general's explanation was so hurried that the tiny woman was still trying to sort it all out. Apparently the Russians were behind it all.
Having been his physician at the time, it was Brightman who answered crispily. "You're recovering from a gunshot wound." She would say no more as she turned and busied herself with the patient's charts so she could check his vitals.
"What?!" Daniel yelped.
"You have no recollection of the incident?" this was from a concerned Teal'c.
Daniel plaintively answered "No! Who shot me?" his voice now a demand.
"Don't ... change the subject. What do you remember?" O'Neill, interjected wanting to skirt the issue of who shot whom.
"Uh, I went to see Colonel Vaselov and right in the middle of our conversation he collapsed and I went to help him and ...that's it." Daniel frowned feeling there should be more and obviously there was, for someone thought it necessary to shoot him and Brightman wasn't a help.
"You don't remember accompanying him to the Infirmary?" Sam was clearly concerned.
Plaintively again, the archeologist answered "No!" then suspiciously asked "Who shot me?"
Sam looked embarrassed and glances towards Jack. Teal'c looks inscrutable as usual though a shifting of his own dark eyes implicate the gray-haired general. For a moment Daniel watched as Jack glanced back and forth between Sam and Teal'c, then looked back at Daniel. Even Janet waited until the general admitted it. Daniel took a large gulp of breath and stares at the trio as he realizes who shot him.
O'Neill shrugged nonchalantly "You were shooting up the Gateroom."
"You wounded two guards. We think we may be dealing with a Foothold situation, specifically an alien entity capable of taking over human hosts, not unlike the Goa'uld, and it seems to be able to travel from person to person." Offered Sam's comfortable voice.
"Although at present we have no knowledge of how this is possible." Teal'c added feeling the need to explain. He glanced to the back of Dr. Brightman and was very upset that the physician neglected to speak of this. Gunshot indeed. DanielJackson was suffering from far more than a mere gunshot wound.
Somehow Sam and Teal'c's words set off alarm bells in the archeologist, his blue eyes staring off blankly into space as if the ceiling would carry the answers.
"Daniel?" Both Janet and Sam uttered simultaneously.
Janet pushed past the others for Daniel's side she took his wrist in one hand to take his pulse and started timing it. Her next move was to place the stethoscope in her ears so she might check his heartbeat and breathing.
As for Daniel his mind flashed back of himself shooting one of the airmen in the Gateroom. The view is slightly dark and misty. He shook his head and saw not dark but the tiny speck of a pen light moving away from his pupils. Janet was if anything completely thorough and meticulous when it came to the care of her patients.
"Anubis!" Daniel blurted once Janet pulled the penlight away.
"Daniel Jackson." Teal'c rose an eyebrow and looked at the others of SG1. He still considered Jack O'Neill as SG1 and by adoption so too was Janet Fraiser.
"It was Anubis – or rather, Anubis was controlling me." Daniel insisted. He looked to both Sam and Janet for assurance, for belief in his words.
"Anubis is dead." Jack dismissed the younger man's rants.
"No he's not – and he's here on the base." The archeologist argued. It was at this point Janet turned from Daniel and the others, her doe-eyes landing on Brightman. She had heard enough. Gunshot wound indeed.
"Excuse me." She apologized, "I have to brief with my junior officer." Patting Daniel on the back. "I am glad you're with us now, Daniel. Now that we know, we can do something about it. You need anything, you buzz." She offered him a warm smile however brief and headed for Brightman. The staccato tapping of her shoes indicating just how vexed she was things had developed as they had.
'Someone's gonna' get it.' Jack couldn't help but think as he saw the doc pull her junior officer in to her office.
"What the hell was that?" Janet asked as soon as the door was closed.
"Doctor?" Brightman genuinely looked confused.
"You have a gunshot wound and you leave it at that?" Janet folded her arms over her chest.
"It was the facts." the taller brunette answered evenly.
"It suspected that there is an Entity taking unwilling hosts and you say 'gunshot wound?" How dare you! That man was violated..."
"We didn't have all the facts at the time. We didn't know until Dr. Jackson accused Anubis, and you heard the general, Anubis is dead. This could be nothing more than a form of psychosis."
"Don't hand me that drivel 'Captain'. Daniel Jackson was shot and he had no memory of it and his body was used to shoot up the Gateroom. Don't you think he deserves a little more than an ice cube?"
"With all do respect I 'am' not Dr, Mackenzie I don't do psychological health. And I don't have time to hold hands."
"And you don't do medicine in 'my' infirmary. As soon as lockdown is removed you're back to the academy hospital." Janet snapped.
"You can't do that! I didn't do anything......." Brightman's normally soft voice screeched.
"That's right you didn't do anything." Janet interrupted. "These people's health is in our hands Captain. We have to care for their bodies as well as mental well being. It is our duty as doctors to see to all issues of their health. To make sure they know they are safe, and healing and out of as much pain as we can possibly give them. You have to treat anyone taken as a host as victim of physical, emotional and mental abuse and maybe even sexual abuse. You wouldn't like it if you survived any of the above and the physician treating you acted like they had an iceberg lodged in their anus would you?
"I don't give a damn if you're not comfortable with giving a bit more compassion, a bit more heart, its not about you, its about them. The patients need more than the facts 'doctor' they need a hell of a lot more. We are on the front lines of military medicine. Our battle is at times even more dire and more grave than the warriors who go off world, and above all when they come in here they need our compassion. We have to put them back together, and lend them our strength when they have none. We have to give them answers in the most human way possible. The SGC is far different than any combat zone. Here the possibility of
alien contagions superseded any notion of the unknown element found in human terms. Now I have to go in there and fix your fuck up, not only with Daniel Jackson but Colonel Vaselov as well. And effective and immediately you're off their cases. I am taking full charge, I have your notes captain, after all that's what you're good at, documenting the facts.
"Right now we need all medical hands but if I had my way you wouldn't be practicing medicine at the SGC, you'd be packing your bags. Now get out of my office, out of my infirmary until you're needed. You're on call, count yourself luck I don't have you confined to quarters for a serious breach of emotional ethics. Dismissed."
"Yes ma'am." Brightman offered a stiff salute, turned on her heels leaving a still fuming Janet Fraiser behind. She would never understand Fraiser. A solider didn't need to be coddled, most of them hated the infirmary with a passion, why sugarcoat it? Most of the soldiers wanted very little time with a doctor as it was, they only wanted to get the healing over with so they can go back to the front lines. The sooner Fraiser understood this, the better off she would be, Warner understood it as did Mackenzie, that's what made them excellent physicians . If Fraiser didn't invest so much of herself into the personal lives of those she treated wouldn't lose sleep over the emotional ties of patients. Brightman never did. The trouble was that everyone placated Dr Fraiser and her time-wasting notions of medicine.
Jack O'Neill had called an impromptu meeting in the Briefing room with the members of his former team. Dr. Fraiser would join the when and if she could, but for the moment the woman had her hands very full. Having dealt with snake-heads that have a bad habit of rising from the dead it wasn't a question if Anubis was alive, or even how, it was a matter of what now?
"You'd think that getting blasted outta orbit woulda slowed the guy down." Jack said.
"According to Daniel Jackson, Anubis surrendered his mortal form when he was ascended, only to be cast down by the Ancients. As a result he exists purely as an immaterial being." Teal'c offered.
Sam felt the need to add to the explanation, "See, in the past when we encountered Anubis, the physical form we were seeing was actually a force shield designed to contain his essence. When it was destroyed, that essence was released."
Teal'c took up the verbal ball and ran with it, "Anubis was trapped in Earth's orbit, inhabiting debris from his ship, millions of light years away from his power base."
"So he hitched a ride on a cosmonaut?" Jack's tone was sardonic even for him.
"Yes, sir, and then abandoned him for Colonel Vaselov." Sam answered.
"No doubt attempting to escape through our Gate." Teal'c backed the blonde up.
"Why doesn't he just use his ... freaky, super-cosmic powers and just ..."he gestured towards the ceiling " ... go?"
"Doing so would alert the Ancients and only serve to bring down their wrath upon him." said the former Jaffa.
Carter knew her CO needed more to fully see the scope of what was now happening, "See, in order to interact with the physical world, he has to get himself a new shield, but he can't do that here on Earth. He'll need a body to dial the Gate and get through."
"Eventually, Anubis 'will' attempt escape again." Teal'c said.
Sighing O'Neill knew the others were right. This was so much more grave than some contagion. At least with that, Janet Fraiser would pull some miracle out of the air and save anyone as she had down with the Broca Syndrome. Now matters were worse. "Well, he's on the base, obviously not going anywhere." He turned to the only other person he knew that could pull a miracle from the thin air and save them, Carter was infamous for such things. "'Tell' me there's something we can do."
"Well, as a matter of fact, sir, I think there is."
Well see things were looking better already. Jack felt more relaxed now than he did for some time. The Carter-Fraiser tag-team were back in working order. 'Anubis better kiss his phantom ass good bye.'
Since Janet' return and her mandatory screening of personal a long queue and formed outside the infirmary. Sam walked past all of them without a second thought, her goal was her dear friend, Daniel. Janet had transferred both Vaselov and Daniel to adjoining beds into the infirmary proper since Fraiser deemed them non-contagious.
"What's going on?" Daniel asked as soon as he saw the blonde enter. "General O'Neill has ordered compulsory physicals for all the SGC personnel. We're operating under the assumption that retaining Anubis' essence exacts a physical toll on the carrier. You were only exposed for a couple of hours but your body reacted as though you were fighting off an infection." Sam sat on the bed near Daniel.
"So whoever's retaining his essence should start showing symptoms." Daniel concluded.
"Yeah, that's the theory." the golden head nodded.
"What about Vaselov?" Daniel's eyes looked across to the still unconscious Russian Colonel.
"Well," Sam paused long enough to draw the curtain between Daniel's and Vaselov's beds. "His is a more extreme case. He was exposed for over a week, that's why his symptoms are more advanced."
Daniel swallowed not sure he wanted to hear the rest. "You mean with the lesions and the ..."
"Yeah, it's actually more than that. His entire immune system was affected." Sam finished, as they often finished each other's sentences and thoughts.
The archeologist tried to remain optimistic. "But Anubis is out of him – he should start getting better, right?" He watched as Sam bowed her head. "Sam?"
"Janet says he's not responding. She thinks the exposure may have simply gone on for too long. The damage is done but she can alleviate his pain and try to make him as comfortable as possible, he seems more relaxed now that he is in her care."
"Oh, there has to be something we can do for him." Daniel was overwhelmed with sympathy.
"We can help him manage the pain, that's about it. Janet offered him full sedation but he wanted to be aware." Sam softly answered. "For now all we can do is wait to see if the examinations come up with anyone else having been host to Anubis."
Jack is on the phone was on the red phone in his office in the midst of a conversation, "I said the situation was contained – I did 'not' say it was resolved. ... No, I can't 'do' that. Command will stay under lockdown until I decide otherwise."
Janet came to the door pausing as she recognizes the red-phone and knowing exactly who was on the other end of the line. But she moves forward in seeing O'Neill beckoning her in, "Yes, sir, it 'is' my call. ... Yes, sir." He hung up the phone and turned his brown eyes to Janet, "Pentagon. Getting a little antsy."
Janet nodded, "They're not the only ones, sir. We got a bunch of very anxious people out there," the small woman admitted the overall base moral. It had been several days now with no no-show from Anubis, it seemed the phantom Goa'uld was laying low.
"Yeah, I'll bet." He gestured for her to sit down, and sat down himself. It had been nearly a week since the incident in the Gateroom. "What can I do for you, Doc?"
Janet took a chair and leaned forward, "I'm concerned for Colonel Vaselov. His condition hasn't improved and he's not responding to treatment. Unless circumstances change there is little more that I can do, his body is trying to fight an infection that really isn't there. The one option we have is the healing device. Sir he has perhaps only two weeks." Janet's voice had gone soft, "I've managed to sedate him and keep the threshold of pain down, but its not enough. Sir his family....."
"I'll inform the Russians." Jack sighed, this wasn't going to be a fun call. It was one of the duties he had always hated. Telling the family a loved one was dying or dead. It never got easier.
"Thank you, at the very least he can say good-by...." she rose from the chair, left the office and O'Neill behind her. She didn't envy the man one bit. Being a doctor, she had herself been the bearer of bad news. She was nearly down the stairs when Jack bounded out of his office, calling her name.
"Doc, we think we got him. Even's is being apprehended now."
Evens was one of the surgical nurses on Janet's staff. "It makes sense sir, she was there during Daniels' operation. I want to observe the interrogation." Janet inwardly winced. Evens was a good nurse, she hated the thought of Anubis taking this mild-mannered woman, hostage. She was here because she was talented and capable nurse, but she had the courage of a turtle.
"Thought you might, Carter will handle it doc." Jack said.
Janet hadn't been there but heard how the SF's had apprehend her nurse, and that Evens had dropped the tray of food as she was coming out of the commissary. Right now she looked like the timid mouse she resembled as she sat before the ever confident Colonel Samantha Carter.
They were each sitting at opposite ends of the table an SF posted at the door his eyes staring straight ahead.
"I was examined by Doctor Fraiser a couple of hours ago. She said I was fine." the younger blonde was almost in tears.
"It's possible you haven't started manifesting signs yet." Sam calmly commented.
In an Observation Room off the Interrogation Room, Jack and Janet watched the scene unfold before them. They knew Carter had to play hardball.
"Colonel, I would know. If something like that happened to me, I would know. I'm not lying." She begged the older blonde to believer her.
"Lieutenant, tell me what you did Tuesday afternoon." Sam remained in command, her will dominating the junior officer.
Evens frowned, "I don't understand."
"Just tell me." Sam demanded.
Evans thinks for a while, trying to recall but she was drawing up a blank slate
"Lieutenant?" Sam pushed.
The young blonde nurse shook her head "I don't know." Now she was extremely nervous. Any strength she held melted in front of those chilling blue eyes of the Colonel.
"You don't know?" Sam's voice was almost accusatory, but this was an interrogation, she had to be hard.
Evens shook her head frantically "I can't remember."
Sam nodded, and looked up to the Observation Room, they had a positive for Anubis for the past couple of days, but apparently he had moved on.
Scant seconds latter the door opened allowing Teal'c to enter. "O'Neill. I have been informed that Airman Malcolm McCaffrey has missed a scheduled appointment at the Infirmary. He remains unaccounted for."
Jack exhaled deeply, then speaks into the microphone. This was becoming absurd. "Carter." The name alone was enough to make Sam get up and leave the Interrogation Room. Leaving Evens to star blankly at the camera wondering if she was dismissed.
Jack, Sam and Teal'c are walk alone now on the hunt for McCaffrey, when their radios crackle. The voice of Major Kearney came over the handset, "General O'Neill."
Jack clicked the receiver, "Yeah. O'Neill here, go."
"This is Major Kearney. I've got a wounded man here claims he was jumped by Airman McCaffrey. We think he's headed for the Control Room. Advise caution, General – target is armed."
"On our way." O'Neill answered as he Sam and Teal'c made a dash for the Control Room, each of them drawing their Zats.
Alarms sounded as McCaffrey walks towards the Control Room, shooting the guard standing at the bottom of the steps. He runs up the steps, walks over to the technician sitting at the desk and jams the gun in his back. The other technician being unarmed stood well away knowing that either the command staff or SF's would be there soon.
"Dial the Gate." The large airman growled.
The technician would sooner give his life than comply to the overt demands of the dark ascended system lord. Jack and the others run up the steps. Jack zats McCaffrey, who collapses to the ground. The black cloud rises up out of him. Everyone raises their weapons but the cloud whisks off and through a wall.
Things had gone from bad to worse, Anubis was on the move again, and he was becoming desperate. They would have to do something a bit more pro-active than physicals. It took only minutes for a briefing to be summoned and for a new plan of attack to be implemented.
Sam and Daniel stand before the gathered Jack, Teal'c, Kearney and another airman as well as Janet who are all sitting down, their eyes never wavering from the 'power-twins'
"Anubis has now made two attempts to get through the Gate. Now in both instances we were able to stop him but there's no guarantee we'll be so lucky the next time. We have to take steps to make it as difficult as possible for him to access the Stargate." Daniel started the meeting.
"To that end, we're proposing a division of the facility into three separate sections designated Zones One, Two and Three." Sam took over, she pointed the remote to the computer so that a CGI was now projected on the screen behind her. "Power to the Gate has been shut off and will no longer be accessible from the Control Room. Instead, it can now only be re-established from a relay center located here in Zone One. The Control Room, Gateroom and surrounding areas have been designated Zone Two. Intermediate corridors linking the two zones will be sealed. Corridors linking directly to the Gateroom will also be sealed. The 'only' means of unsealing these corridors will be from a Security Control Center located here in the section designated Zone Three."
Now Daniel took over the presentation "All personnel will be restricted to one of these three zones. Standing food and medical supplies will be divided amongst the three sections. Doctor Fraiser's team will be split into three units and continue monitoring personnel through daily physical examinations. Now no-one, not even General O'Neill, will be permitted access to a neighboring zone until lockdown ends."
"Any questions so far?" Sam looked to O'Neill knowing he might offer some sarcastic remark as he had so often in the past. Oddly enough he said nothing. But Kearney rose his hand. Carter looked at the young major thinking he had a very striking resemblance to a young Lieutenant Hammond she had once met in 1969 only with brown eyes instead of blue.
"With all due respect, Colonel, given everything we know about Anubis, do you really think this is going to stop him?" his Texas accent thick, only served to imprint the image of the younger Hammond.
Sam looked at Daniel. They had to admit it was a very good question. "The point is to make it impossible for him to get through the Gate in the body of any one person. Now, when he realizes he can't get out that way, he'll have no choice but to risk revealing himself to the Ancients." Daniel offered an answer.
Jack and Teal'c are in the Gateroom watching as the division of the SGC became divided into zones. Sam is in the new Security Control Center. All around the base, doors close down.
As the final door comes down in Zone one, Sargent Siler reports in on the radio. "Zone one secure."
From her position Sam watches Siler on the monitors as he reports in. Behind her, another door closes. She hits her own radio, " Zone Three secured."
Near the Control Room, Jack watches as the final door comes down before speaking into his own radio, "Zone Two secure. Good luck."
Janet decided to check on Colonel Vaselov herself she gave him another pain-killing injection. Her dark eyes, resting upon the slumbering colonel wishing she could do more for him that simply give him morphine. She kept him sedated as much as possible, especially when changing his dressings.
"Janet, you've done everything you could for him. Anubis taken him hostage far too long."
"I know,' Janet signed. She looked to her lover and found the blue eyes staring at her. "What is it?"
"I almost wish you hadn't come back when you did. That you were late and we were already at lockdown. Evens was taken over when she tired to help Daniel. I don't want that to happen to you, lover." the thought of Janet covered in lesions was almost too much for Sam to take. The image of Janet's dying body on a gurney was all too fresh for Sam. "I can't take it if something like....like 'that' ever happened to you again!" In her voice, in her eyes, were a terrible helplessness and a still more terrible resignation – suggesting that, whatever came now, she no longer felt she had the strength or the conviction to resist.
Janet reacted immediately. She pulled her lover into her office closed and locked the door. Her arms were around the taller body almost instantly. "I'm safe now, honey. I'm safe." She placed Sam's hand over her heart knowing that the beat had a near instant calming effect on the blonde.
Day and dark, sleep and waking, high and low, the Gate, the Surface civilian moments, military command–the most primary and elemental things, always separating them. But for this bridging moment, they were together.
Sam rested her cheek against the dark silky locks of her beloved, enjoying the stolen moment. Meditatively, softly she confessed, "Janet...I don't know what will happen now. That creature is out there, hunting seeking a host." The tone foresaw nothing good and tried both to warn Janet, so she'd be prepared for the worst, and to gentle it for her, lest she be afraid.
"Sam you can't resign yourself to my protection. You have to concentrate on what's outside that door."
"Jan, what's outside that door could take you from me!"
"And you from me." The doctor countered. "Babe, I don't mind it when you want to play my knight, in fact I love you for it. But you can't always keep me safe. I can't be there to always help you. Don't you think I worried days after you came back from what Fifth did to you?" Janet held the hand of her lover that was still positioned over her heart. "You still have nightmares, you still need to feel and hear this," Janet pressed closer knowing her thundering heart was felt soundly by her beloved. The sound of her heart often times was the only thing to lull Sam not only into a restful sleep, but exorcize her night-terrors. Only
Janet's beating heart, gave Sam the fortitude to continue to do the things she had to do.
For a stolen moment in the darkened office, two lovers held each other, loved each other silently quietly, preciously as if it should be the last time.
Teal'c, standing guard at the desk in the Control Room his dark eyes looking out into the Gateroom, he turns and walks away as his shift ends. Two guards go with him, and two more guards come forward to start their shift. With his over he wandered into O'Neill's office, waiting as the General was talking to the president.
In Zone Three Sam walked alone the corridor with one of her own tec's studying several readouts of data, on her way to the infirmary. She had deliberately organized it so she would be in the same zone as her lover. It had been a near full week since the division of zones, and still no sign of Anubis.
It was a week of rising temperaments. Some more resolved then others.
"Attention all personnel. This is General O'Neill. I know the current situation has been tough on all of you. You've been cut off from your families, your homes; you're wondering how much longer this can go on. But the fact is, there's a threat on this base that cannot be allowed to escape. Knowing that, the President has authorized me to maintain this lockdown indefinitely. We've only got food enough for another month, so we'll find a secure way to bring supplies down from the surface. In the meantime, I suggest you all get comfortable. We're not going anywhere."
All over the base, groans, sighs, grumbles, whimpers and shrugs could be heard. Of course no one save Teal'c was aware that O'Neill had been ordered by the President to open the Gate within twenty four hours. Teal'c had even commented that the base could not be shut down indefinitely. It was time to smoke out Anubis.
Sam took the aggravation in her stride, she had at the moment things to attend to. She walked with deliberate determination to the door of the Security Control Center stopping only to speak to the SF's guarding the door outside.
"I need to run a diagnostic." her voice commanding and business like, brooking no refusal from the SF's.
The man swiped his card, while the other opened the door waiting for a breath as Carter passed them. It was lockdown protocol to enter with a command staff. Sam paid them very little attention to her escorts as she typed onto a couple of consoles, then takes the zat gun she had hidden in her trousers and zats the guards. Her blue eyes cold holding the gaze of malice returned to the console typing in a few more commands. Once satisfied the blonde turned from the room, marched down the corridors, each step determined and assured. She didn't so much as look at the man who she passes until she heard his voice.
"Hey, Sam." Daniel greeted the briskly walking blonde. He couldn't help but wonder where his friend was going in such a hurry. Without so much of a blink of an eye, Sam answered the salutation by firing her zat-gun on him and was gone even before he collapsed on the cement floor.
Back in the Security Control Center, a computer screen shows that a countdown for `Section Three' has almost finished. As it ends, a security door slides open and Sam comes through, zatting the guard on the other side. The blonde fury could not be stopped.
Daniel, his face contorted in pain, gets up and unsteadily makes his way to the Security Control Center. He had to stop her before someone decided to take a permanent solution. A week of being confined with no contact to the outside world made for combustible tempers.
'Sam' had been able to make her way to Zone One's Relay Center. The room she entered was brightly labeled "High Voltage" As she had before the blonde zatted guards without a second thought and moved in to take control. The lights went out briefly then came back on when the primary generator took over. Having accomplished what she wanted 'Sam' made her way out of the Relay Center callously stepping over the prone bodies of the SF's.
In the Security Control Center, Daniel walks in and finds the two airmen recovering from their zat blasts. He goes over to the computer, which is on the last couple of seconds of a countdown for `Section One'. On one of the security cameras, he sees a door open and Sam
walk through. He grabs his radio. "Teal'c, this is Daniel."
In the control room, Teal'c hit the receiver on his radio, "Proceed, Daniel Jackson.
"Anubis has got Sam. She's headed your way."
"Understood."
Another door opens and Sam/Anubis walks through. As she heads off down the corridor, the door closes behind her. She completely ignores the fact alarms are sounding off. The blonde knew airmen would be running through the corridors, hunting her. It was irrelevant. In one corridor, one such airman rounds a corner and is zatted by Sam. She fount kicks a second airman into the wall causing his back to smash painfully against the bulkhead. Not taking a breath the blonde charges her prey, struggling with him, not aware of a sudden new presence until it was too late.
The zat blast goes off and Sam and the SF collapse. The hit came from Jack O'Neill. This was not the first time he had been forced to zat this beautiful woman under the control of an alien force, but she sure as hoped it would be the last. He walks cautiously towards her. Anubis rises up out of her and floats above her. Jack looks on edgily. He waits only long enough before another brigade of SF's arrive.
"Take her to the infirmary." He orders.
Sam groggy only half aware of anything around her or the five guards now drawing their weapons on her. She offers no resistance as they hoist her to her feet and march her down the corridor. The effects of the Zat hit her harder than most due to the naquada in her blood. She is only vaguely aware that the SF's are leading her away.
The fog was thick in her mind as she was trying to wrap her mind over the recent events and what had gone so wrong. It wasn't until she heard the Tannoy's voice announcing the five minutes until self-destruct, that she even reacted.
She spun around, ferociously elbowed the closest SF in the face, heedless of the sound of bone kissing metal as she speed down the corridor they just vacated.
No one stopped her this time as her long legs carried her into the Control Room. Only now when a SF spotted her did she stop.
"Sir!" the airman's voice almost cracks in trying to gain Teal'c attention.
The large Jaffa spines, no hesitation as he lifts his Zat gun and levels it on Sam's chest. "Come no further." he barked his order.
"Teal'c, you have to give me access to the base computer. Someone activated the self-destruct – let me shut it down." Sam implored, her voice edgy.
"You are infected." he said matter-of-factly. He knew the trickery of the Goa'uld and would not be fooled by this woman's seeming control.
"I 'was' infected. Anubis left me for someone else." Sam argued 'Oh god you have to believe me!'
"Of this I cannot be certain." Teal'c would not be moved.
"Teal'c, I'm not Anubis. It's me, Carter." she used her last name knowing in the past Jollinar had utilized her first, and Teal'c would not believe her. Even now his expression was one of uncertainty.
"Three minutes til self-destruct." Tannoy's voice announced.
"Teal'c, please." Sam pleaded.
"Very well." For some reason his gut instinct kicked in allowing him to believe this was Carter and not Anubis. He shut down the zatnicatel and allowed the blonde access to the computer. Her deft fingers flew over the keyboard as she entered her security clearance and commands.
Tannoy's voice sounded once more "Self-destruct aborted. Self-destruct aborted."
When Sam lifted her head she flashed Teal'c a full blown Carter-Cheshire grin.
"Well done." the bear of a man smiled back.
Their joviality lasted for only moments. Before them on the monitor another countdown began and a message flashed up saying, "Remote Dialing Sequence"
"Someone's activated the Gate." Sam announced her voice betraying her concern. The Gate had started dialing out. The security measures taken against Anubis was now working against them.
Once again Daniel calls from the Security Control Center of Zone three, "Teal'c, this is Daniel. I think Anubis is headed for the Gateroom."
"Understood." Teal'c answered in his typical always to the point fashion. "I'll see if I can override the dialing sequence." Sam's hands were already flying over the keyboard. If she couldn't shut the Gate down, she was determined to take control.
The side door of the Gateroom opens and Jack walks in, goes to the bottom of the ramp and faces the Gate.
"O'Neill." Teal'c barks half to inform half to gain the general's attention
The Gate kwhooshes. At the same moment, Vaselov charges in and, with a cry of effort, throws himself at Jack and knocks him to the ground. Jack drops the pistol and Vaselov grabs it as they both stand up. Vaselov points the pistol at Jack.
"Stand aside." Jack/Anubis points to the Russian.
"Niet. You need a body to go through the Gate. Take mine." Vaselov knew he was already a dead man, he had given Dr. Jackson a packet for his sister, and Dr. Fraiser had taken letters for him for his family. The pain had drove him to this decision. Even as the lights flicked when Sam/ Anubis had shut down power, he knew what he wanted to do. "Take mine or I'll kill us both."
The body of Jack jolts as Anubis spirals out of him, leaving O'Neill to toppled to the hard floor. Anubis plunges into Vaselov. Vaselov shudders for a moment, then opens his eyes and looks up at the Gateroom triumphantly. Then he turns and walks through the Gate, just before it shuts behind him.
Sam and Teal'c and Janet from the side door hurry into the Gateroom to check on Jack, who groans. Feeling one of those nail in the skull headaches.
"General." Carter's concern is evident. After all she was dealing with her own bout of dizzy-head rushes.
"I'm ok-ish." O'Neill attempts to reassure the trio. Janet wasn't satisfied until she took his pulse and even as her lover and Teal'c help him to sit up. All four of them look at the Gate. "He got through, didn't he?"
"Sort of." Sam answered, when the general looked up at her she smirked "I was able to override the established dialing sequence and input an alternate address. I sent him to KS7-535 instead."
"Chilly." O'Neill shivered in spite of himself, thinking of that particular frozen hell-hole. Sam nodded in agreement. The mission had been scrubbed from that planet due to the extreme sub-zero temperatures a minus 749 degrees. There had been no sign of a DHD at the time of the MALP survey, with a tundra cold enough to freeze human flesh within moments of exposure there was no chance of human survival. The host body of Anubis was already dead.
The End