by Stargate
“That way leads to the Stargate,” said Selmak, pointing to a passageway off to the right. “Samantha—”
She was scooping up the staff weapon that must’ve belonged to the Jaffa with his throat cut, dead on the floor in a pool of blood. “Yes, Selmak?”
“At the top of the stairs turn left. When you reach the fork turn right and keep going. The Stargate is at the end of the path.”
“Got it.”
“And Samantha? Don’t dawdle.”
Then they were gone.
“You’re right, Daniel,” Sam said, making sure the staff weapon was operational. “The colonel’s delirious.”
“But in a good way,” he said.
She just rolled her eyes, then turned to stare at the cages. “Daniel, what happened to the infants, do you know?”
All the littlest children, residents of the babyhouse. He hadn’t seen one on the al’kesh that brought him here. He shook his head. “I’ve no idea.”
“Damn.” She bit her lip. “There’s no time to look for them.”
“I know.”
She tossed him the dead Jaffa’s activated staff weapon. “So we save who we can. Let’s go.”
He looked again at the crowded cages. “This’ll be a lot simpler if I can find Boaz, they’re used to listening to—”
“Daniel…” Sam touched his arm. “Boaz died. So did Mikah. During the raid.”
Her eyes were too bright. He felt his own burn in sudden, sharp sympathy. “Damn.”
“I know. Daniel—”
She was right. There wasn’t time for sorrow, either. He spun the staff weapon and put a blast into the ceiling. The backdrop cacophony of wailing and tears ceased.
“Everyone listen!” he shouted. “We’re taking you to safety but you have to do what we say or the Jaffa will kill you! Do you understand? No talking. No crying. No running unless we tell you. Adults, keep hold of the children. I know you’ve got a lot of questions—they’ll be answered soon. Now everyone, stand back from the cage doors! Back! Do it!”
He blew the locks off the cage doors. Bullied the people to wait inside, wait, just wait, dammit, while Sam made sure the coast was clear.
“We’re good,” she said, coming out of the passageway. “It’s now or never, Daniel. Move ‘em out.”
He turned back to the ex-slaves. “Okay, everyone, listen to me! We’re leaving. Follow the group in front of you—and the first group, follow Sam. See?” He pointed. “That’s Sam. Follow her. And I’ll be right behind you.”
They were used to being bullied, to being pushed and shoved and told what to do and brutally punished if they dared think for themselves.
Just at the moment, their docility was a godsend.
God. What a horrible thing to think.
Sam headed along the passageway, the first cageful of ex-slaves obediently following. Then the second. Finally the third.
“David! David!”
Daniel looked down as small thin fingers curled around his. “Sallah!”
“David, you take me!”
“Sallah, I—” He gave up. “Yes, all right, you stick with me. But you can’t hold my hand. Just walk beside me, okay?”
Her smile was blinding. “Yes, David!”
Sam led them out of the prison complex, a blonde Pied Piper with a P90 for a piccolo. As soon as she reached the world beyond, she started to jog. Yu’s ex-slaves began jogging with her.
After the prison complex’s torchlit gloom the day’s bright sunshine was dazzling. Everyone ran with their hands shading their eyes, stumbling a little along the uneven path that led to the Stargate. Daniel could just glimpse its shimmer over the top of the shifting sea of heads in front of him.
Over on the right, thick columns of oily black smoke billowed into the air. He caught the faint crackling of flames as structures burned. Strewn on both sides of the path were countless slain Jaffa and six dead Goa’uld, their rich robes bright in the sunshine. None of them was Anatapas, dammit. The sounds of battle had fallen silent. The atmosphere was eerie, the air laced with smoke. A little distance away he recognized Major Zammit, who was methodically checking bodies with two SGC team members.
They reached the Stargate miraculously unchallenged.
As the crowd of ex-slaves slowed and stopped, confused and alarmed and pointing at the open wormhole and the dead Jaffa tumbled in piles on the ground, Daniel skirted round them and kept on going until he reached Sam. Wide-eyed and pale, Sallah stayed with him. He didn’t have the heart to foist her onto someone else.
Sam was standing in front of the activated Stargate with Jack, Teal’c, her father and Martouf. Strategically grouped around and in front of them, weapons still at the ready, were familiar faces from the SGC, all unscathed thank God. They looked pleased to see him. He was thrilled to see them.
“Hey Jack, what are you still doing here?” he demanded. “Get home to the infirmary!”
Stubborn to the last, Jack shook his head. His eyes were glazed, his stance unsteady. “Not till I’m convinced Anatapas is dead or on the run. I owe that snaky rat bastard…”
“Sir—” said Sam, in the tone that said she was repeating herself and getting tired of it. “You can hardly stand up. Please, go back to the SGC. We’ll do a sweep and confirm he’s a kill or a fugitive. And if we find him we’ll make sure he’s a kill.”
“Who?” said Major Zammit, joining them.
Jack glared at him. “Are all the hostiles accounted for. Major?”
Zammit nodded. “Yes, sir. Sir, who are you talking about?”
“The head Goa’uld,” said Jack. He was almost out on his feet. “Heru’ur’s blue-eyed boy. Anatapas.”
“I think you’ll find he’s a fugitive, Colonel,” said Zammit, frowning. “We tagged one Goa’uld ship as it fled the vicinity. Didn’t destroy it, but we hammered it pretty good. I’d say it’s long gone.”
“Wow,” said Daniel. “That’s it? We win? Just like that? It seems too easy, somehow.”
“You’re complaining?” said Jack, incredulous. “For once in our lives a mission goes smoothly and you’re complaining?”
“No, no, but—”
“Unbelievable,” said Jack, and ignored him.
“Sir, we’ll do a final sweep of the fortress compound anyway,” Sam said quickly, forestalling further protest. “Just to be on the safe side. Sir, please. General Hammond’s waiting for you, he—”
Without warning, the air before them rippled into life.
Anatapas.
The milling ex-slaves screamed at the sight of a Goa’uld standing twenty feet high, and threw themselves face down on the ground.
“No!” shouted Daniel, as Sallah whimpered and clung to him. “It’s all right, you’re safe, he’s not really here! It’s a trick! It’s a picture!”
The hologram shivered as though blown by a breeze. “Tauri scum!” Anatapas’s voice boomed. “You think you have defeated me? You think you are victorious? You fools. You and your traitor Tok’ra friends are marked for death. With my assistance Lord Heru’ur will find you and you will take one thousand years to die! Bid your loved ones farewell, you walking dead men! Your days are numbered and I am counting!”
The hologram shivered harder, then disappeared.
Daniel flinched as Jack gave him a look and said, “You had to jinx it, didn’t you.”
“Sorry.”
“God,” Jack added, staring at the empty space where Anatapas had stood. “You gotta love such a piss poor loser.”
Daniel looked at the empty sky. “Why isn’t he dropping Goa’uld bombs on us?”
“Like I said,” Zammit answered. “We hammered his ship pretty hard.”
“And he’s gone, and that’s good, and now it’s time for us to go,” said Sam, with severe finality. “Before Heru’ur decides to show up. Colonel—”
“He is leaving,” said Teal’c, and put an uncompromising arm around Jack’s shoulders. “Do not wait long to follow us, Major Carter. When word of thi
s defeat does reach Heru’ur you can be sure he will come at once. And he will not be in a good mood when he arrives.” Then, before Jack had a chance to start arguing again, Teal’c hustled him through the Stargate.
Yu’s ex-slaves, back on their feet, cried out in loud, fresh consternation as they vanished into the event horizon.
Jacob said, “You go through too, Martouf. Contact Per’sus and give him an update. I’ll join you presently.”
Martouf nodded and followed Teal’c and Jack through to the SGC.
Sam heaved a great sigh. “Okay then. Paul, are you and the strike team finished here?”
Zammit nodded. “Almost, Sam.”
“Great.” Her face relaxed into a smile. “And thanks.”
His answering smile was characteristically wry. “You’re welcome.”
As he left to supervise the final mopping up, Sam turned. “So what was that plan again? ‘Escape now, chit-chat later’?” She nodded at the crowd of dazed and muttering ex-slaves. “Give ‘em another pep talk, Daniel, and let’s get the hell off this rock.”
He grinned at her, then jumped onto the Stargate’s big stone platform. Sallah jumped with him. “Everyone, everyone, listen to me!” he called, and pointed to the ’gate. “This is a door, okay? A very big, very special door. And on the other side is safety, and freedom, and a chance for all of you to start over in a place where there are no Goa’uld and no Jaffa. No fire-brands. No beatings. No chains. No slavery.”
He paused, then, and waited to see what effect his words would have. Heads turned. Voices whispered. Nobody stepped forward. Without Boaz it seemed they were lost.
“I know,” he said, his heart breaking for them. For Boaz and for Mikah, denied their chance at freedom. “I know it’s hard to believe. I know you don’t understand right now, but you will. I promise. Sallah—” He dropped to a crouch before the little girl. “Will you do something for me? Something brave and important? Will you be the first of your people to walk through the door?”
Sallah considered him intently. “Will you walk through it with me?”
“I’ll be right behind you.”
Another moment’s frowning thought. Then she said, “Yes, David. I’ll do that for you.”
Head high, dark eyes fearless in her thin, pinched face, Sallah walked towards the rippling event horizon. At its threshold she paused, turned, and looked at her people.
“Come along!” she said, waving her arm. “Follow me!”
The wormhole swallowed her: softly… gently.
“If you don’t recruit that kid, Jacob,” said Daniel, his eyes pricking, “you’re crazy.”
Hesitantly at first, then with more confidence, Sallah’s people walked through the ’gate, encouraged by members of the SGC strike team.
“I’d better get back,” said Sam. “Do some explaining. General Hammond’ll be having conniptions.”
“I’ll stay with Daniel and see the rest through safely,” said Jacob. He smiled at her. “It was a perfect mission, kiddo. Objective achieved and no home-team casualties. Well done, Major Carter.”
Under the sweat and grime, Sam’s face flushed pink. “Thanks, Dad. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”
As she threaded her way to the front of the crowd and leapt lightly into the wormhole Jacob said, his voice not entirely steady, “Damn, I’m proud of that girl.” Then he sighed, and looked up to the sky. “It’s a shame I have to blow the tel’tac we came in. They don’t exactly grow on trees.”
Startled, Daniel stared. “Blow it? Why don’t you just fly it home?”
Jacob sighed again. “Because we comprehensively burned out the hyperdrive getting here, which means I’d be a mummified corpse by the time I got back to Vorash. And while I could send it home on autopilot, if it fell into Goa’uld hands along the way they’d find out far too much about us. So… it blows.”
Daniel shrugged, and gestured at the dwindling crowd of humans fumbling their way to Earth. “I don’t know, Jacob. Seems a fair trade to me. One machine for about six hundred lives. Don’t you think that’s fair?”
Jacob didn’t answer. Just lifted his wrist and pressed a crystal on his armband. A moment later the air shivered with sound and the sky above them filled with fireworks as pieces of tel’tac flamed, flared and died.
Daniel nodded. “Very pretty. Now let’s go home.”
Swimming to the world’s surface out of the depths of a dreamless sleep, O’Neill felt cool, impersonal fingers press against his pulse. Eyes closed he said, “Eeeerrrgggghhhh… it’s alive!”
“Yes, it certainly is,” said Janet Fraiser, and put his wrist back on the bed. “How are you feeling?”
“That depends,” he answered, and looked at her. “Will the truth set me free?”
She grinned. “Not for another twenty-four hours, at least.”
“Damn.”
“Seriously, Jack,” she said, and shoved her hands in her lab coat pockets. “Tell me how you’re feeling.”
He was in one of the infirmary’s small, private rooms. The door was shut and they were alone and yet again he’d come close to buying the farm, no pun intended, which was why she’d called him ‘Jack’, not ‘Colonel’. Janet Fraiser was very proper, very correct, in all her dealings. It was one of the many things he liked about her.
He took a swift internal inventory. The first thing he noticed was a gratifying overall absence of pain. Based on numerous previous narrow escapes, it was a little unexpected.
“I’m good,” he said, and let the surprise show in his voice. “I’m fine.”
“Yeah,” she said, tugged down his sheet and blankets and loosened his stupid hospital shift. “Notice the spectacular lack of burns?”
He inspected himself. “I notice. And I approve. Nice work, doctor.”
“Don’t look at me,” she said, rearranging his various coverings. “Jacob healed them. And your face, and your knee.”
He flexed the damned knee with habitual caution. Felt it move smoothly, sweetly, no barbed-wire tangling. “So he did. Go, Jacob. With that Goa’uld hand-operated healing thingumajig we’ve got lying around here?”
“The very same.” She sighed, a connoisseur of medical thingumajigs. “I’d give my eye-teeth to have him on staff.”
He sat up. “Well then, Janet, seeing as how I’m healed and hunky dory I’ll—”
“Your injuries are healed, yes,” she said, frowning, and pushed him back against the pillows. “And that fetching brand on your shoulder’s gone, too. But you still need to rest.”
He scowled. He knew that look, he’d seen it on her face too many times not to know that look. “What’s Daniel been blabbing about this time?”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Not blabbing. Debriefing. Someone had to tell me what you’d been up to and you were too busy being unconscious to oblige.” She sobered then, and considered him with her dark, all-seeing eyes. After a moment, he looked away.
Nobody in the SGC knew him like Fraiser. She’d tallied his scars both inside and out, every last damned one. He had no secrets from her: his past was her open book. She’d seen him in his weakest moments, at his most unprotected and humiliatingly vulnerable. She scolded him like the sister he didn’t have. Was his strength when his own strength failed him. She’d saved his sanity. Saved his life. Theirs was a damned peculiar relationship; impersonal intimacy seasoned with genuine deep affection.
She patted his miraculously unscarred shoulder. “If you want to talk, you know where I am. Right?”
He did. And maybe he’d take up the offer. But most likely he wouldn’t.
It felt good, though, knowing it was there.
“So how long was I out for this time, anyway?”
“Two days,” she said. “A measly forty-eight hours. No time at all, for you.”
“How’s everyone else? Daniel cut his hand…”
“Oh, Jacob fixed that too. He’s been a regular Hippocratic Santa Claus. I had to stop him from healing everyone, it really takes a lot out
of a Tok’ra to do that.”
“I like that Jacob,” he said, smiling. “He’s a good guy.”
“Yes, he is,” she agreed. “And he’s hoping to see you… along with a few other people. You up for visitors?”
He hesitated, then nodded. “Sure.”
“Sam wanted a minute in private first. Is that okay?”
A longer hesitation. “Yeah,” he said at last. “Yeah, send her in.”
“I’ll page her,” said Janet. “And the others. But the minute you’ve had enough visiting, you kick them out. Healed or not you’re still convalescent. You’ve had a bad few days and we both know it.”
He gave her a mock salute. “Yes, ma’am.”
Carter must’ve been hovering in a nearby corridor; she turned up in less than three minutes. Spick and span, as usual. The faintest air of unease beneath her pleasure at seeing him.
He was pretty damned pleased to see her, too.
“Major. Good work, getting us out of that fortress.”
She nodded. “Thank you, sir. Janet says you’ve made an excellent recovery.”
“Thanks to your dad.” He nodded at the visitor’s chair. “Sit down. You’re making me nervous, hovering like that.”
She sat, spine as straight as a broomstick. “Sir…”
He knew that tone. “Spit it out, Carter,” he said, feeling his guts knot and twist. “Bad news doesn’t improve with age.”
“No, sir.” Her fingers clenched. “Boaz and Mikah didn’t make it. They were killed during the Jaffa raid. I’m sorry. If it helps, I think it was quick. I don’t think they suffered.”
It didn’t help. Damn. In a weird way, he’d already known. Some instinct, some sixth sense swimming in his subconscious. The pain was muted. He’d feel it more sharply later. Once he was alone.
“How many did we save?”
“In total, five hundred and thirty-seven adults, one hundred and sixty-two children. Three are infants.”
He stared. “Only three? But—”
“Sir, we don’t know what happened to all the children in the babyhouse. When Dad, Martouf and I checked the farm after Heru’ur’s raiders had left, it was empty. Aside from some bodies. We have no idea where those infants were taken.”