07 - Survival of the Fittest

by Sabine C. Bauer - (ebook by Undead)

  It seemed a curiously irrelevant question. Was it not enough that Daniel Jackson had been found? Perhaps not. Teal’c carefully rolled up an unused end of gauze and stashed it in his medikit. “Corporal Wilkins and I had entered the city at first light to explore the ruins. We heard the shots and followed them. It was fortuitous that we arrived here in time to see you take cover in the corridor.”

  “Yeah. Maybe I wasn’t wrong.”

  “Wrong about what?”

  “Uh.” Daniel Jackson blushed. “It’s something to do with my personal belief system. Kinda difficult to explain.”

  “It would appear that way.”

  Whatever Daniel Jackson had meant to say, he did not finish the thought. Instead he leaned forward and placed a hand on Teal’c’s arm. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so glad to see anyone.”

  “Nor have I, my friend.”

  It was true. When he had discovered Daniel Jackson in his hideout, Teal’c’s knees had threatened to buckle with relief. A kind of weakness, he decided, that was entirely acceptable. He smiled at the memory, grateful that, for the first time in weeks, he truly had something to smile about. His pleasure faded as he retrieved the handgun he had used on Corporal Wilkins the night before.

  “Uhm, Teal’c?”

  “Yes, Daniel Jackson?”

  His friend wore a troubled frown and wordlessly pointed at the weapon.

  “It is purely for medicinal purposes.” Teal’c rose and walked over to the two Marines.

  As he approached, Corporal Wilkins looked up, grinning. “Can’t really tell what Lambert’s saying, sir, but I think he’s pissed.”

  “Hopefully we shall be able to remedy his disaffection.”

  “I’m gonna remedy you, you son of a bitch! Cut me loose or I’ll kill you!” The execution of Sergeant Lambert’s threat seemed to pose certain logistic problems.

  “I shall release you shortly.” Impervious to the man’s rage, Teal’c squatted in front of him and raised the gun. “However, I must ask you to hold very still now. I do not wish to cause more damage than absolutely necessary.”

  “What the hell?” The sergeant’s eyes went wide. “You keep that thing the hell away from me! You hear—”

  “Hold still!”

  In fact, it would be considerably easier to knock the man unconscious, much as he had done with Corporal Wilkins, but Teal’c was not above petty retaliation. Sergeant Lambert had injured Daniel Jackson. Given the chance, he would have killed the young man. Teal’c saw no reason to spare him any discomfort and pulled the trigger. As the report of the gunshot shredded his eardrum, the sergeant cast into doubt Teal’c’s intellectual capacity, manhood, and parentage.

  “Teal’c!” Alerted by the noise, Daniel Jackson had joined them. “What are you doing?”

  “What is necessary.”

  The stream of invective reached a crescendo and abruptly ceased when Teal’c fired again and destroyed the second eardrum. Sergeant Lambert drew a harsh breath, shuddered, and turned very pale. His gaze fixed on Daniel Jackson. Eventually he stammered, “Jesus, Mr. Jackson…” He paused, shook his head, momentarily thrown by the fact that his own voice had disappeared. “I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry. I’ve no idea why—”

  “It’s alright.” Realizing that the sergeant couldn’t hear him, Daniel Jackson winced and, somewhat reluctantly, patted the man’s shoulder. “It’s alright,” he shouted again. Then he turned to Teal’c. “Don’t tell me. This is some sort of weird Jaffa ritual you’ve neglected to mention so far.”

  “It is not.” Teal’c tucked the handgun into his belt and gestured at Corporal Wilkins to untie his comrade. “It is the only method I could devise to protect these men.”

  “Men? Plural? And protect them from—”

  “Corporal Wilkins was in the same predicament as Sergeant Lambert. Last night he attempted to kill me.”

  “He what?”

  “Daniel Jackson, do you recall the events of PJ2 445?”

  “Like yesterday.” The young man stared at Teal’c for a long moment. Then he sighed. “Can we please not play Guess The Planet? My head hurts bad enough as it is. Does the place have a name?”

  “It does not. Although I presume that some of the sounds the natives made might—”

  “Oh, hang on. White naked plant guys, right?”

  “Indeed.”

  “Yeah, I do remember. My head felt pretty much the same then.” Daniel Jackson eased himself down the wall and into a sitting position. “So what does that have to do with Marines going on the rampage on P-whatever-this-is.”

  “Do you also recall what caused our discomfort?”

  “Sure. It was those plants.”

  “How?”

  “You know, the last time I had this type of conversation I was in grade school.”

  “Humor me, Daniel Jackson.”

  “The plants emitted some sort of infrasound that gave everybody a migraine and made them cranky. Especially Jack. You’re saying the same thing’s happening here? Low frequencies causing uncontrollable aggression?”

  “In general, yes.”

  “And in particular?”

  Teal’c slowly inclined his head. “This is not a natural phenomenon, and it affects carefully selected areas of the brain. It is a toy.”

  “A toy?”

  “A form of entertainment,” he corrected himself, unsure of how exactly to explain it. “On your television, do you not have programs where people allow themselves to be hypnotized for the amusement of others?”

  “Yeah. Those bark-like-a-chicken-cluck-like-a-dog shows. Why?”

  “The principle is not dissimilar. Some Goa’uld use this toy to achieve control over people and bend them to their will. Most often it is done for entertainment. However, I believe in this case it serves a different purpose. The victims appear to be forced into very specific behaviors.”

  “You mean mind control?” Glancing out across the courtyard below, Daniel Jackson frowned. “I don’t know, Teal’c. Even in deep hypnosis you can’t force a person to do something that goes completely against his or her character and convictions.”

  “This is more potent than hypnosis. I have seen mothers slay their newborn because a false god suggested the idea.” The memory, as unwelcome as it was vivid, made Teal’c wince. He pushed it aside, carried on. “It also is potent enough to overcome these Marines’ code of honor and force them to perceive each other as deadly rivals.”

  “Potent enough for Janet to betray us.” This was a statement, not a question. Daniel Jackson’s gaze strayed to the two Marines who seemed busy trying to communicate their mutual apologies. “And deafening a person negates the effect?”

  “Apparently.”

  “I’m not deaf. Neither are you. So why aren’t we going berserk?”

  “Because for us to attack one another would require a direct command from Nirrti. She has attempted to control my actions last night, but I believe that, to a degree, my symbiote protects me.”

  “In other words, I could snap at any moment. You’d better keep that gun handy.” The young man frowned, then decided to pursue a more constructive thought. “If it is a signal of sorts, there has to be a transmitter somewhere.”

  “Indeed.”

  Abruptly, Daniel Jackson came to his feet. “I want to show you something,” he announced and headed for the ladder to the roof.

  Teal’c was less than thrilled at the prospect of venturing into a location as exposed as that, but he had recognized the look on his friend’s face. There would be no stopping him.

  Although the sun had not reached its zenith yet, heat beat down relentlessly and chased shimmering specters through the air above the rooftop. Shading his eyes with one hand, Daniel Jackson stood by the parapet and stared out across the abandoned city and at a steep hill that rose from the jungle north of them.

  “I can’t see well enough, but I think there’s a building up there,” he said.

  He was correct. Invisible
from beyond the city walls or the narrow alleys below, an elaborate stone edifice perched atop the hill. The glint of a reflection on the upper levels caught Teal’c’s eye. It came and went, a small bright flash cast by polished metal—most likely a harness—that told him someone was keeping watch up there, patrolling the battlements.

  “It seems to be a fortress,” Teal’c observed.

  “I think that’s where Nirrti keeps Jack and Sam and Janet.” Daniel Jackson’s expression hardened, cold fury hovering just below the surface. “It’s her hideout. Has to be. And it’s higher than anything else around, right?”

  “That is correct.”

  “Then that’s where the transmitter is, too. And that’s were we’re going.”

  Even if Teal’c had wanted to argue with this decision, he knew he would not have prevailed.

  Heckle and Jeckle were trotting along gamely, giving him the evil eye behind his back, but, as per Fraiser’s order, they hadn’t touched him. They hadn’t even tied his hands. Still, now wasn’t the time to try anything fancy: a) it might be useful to get an idea of what Nirrti was up to, and b) he stood a snowflake’s chance in hell of taking out the twins, quintuplets, or however many there were of these guys. This despite the fact that he was only in about half as bad a shape as he’d led Fraiser to believe.

  Jack pretended to study the flagstones and from under half-closed lids slid a glance at the doc. She—or whoever was running the show inside her head—had closed herself off completely, avoiding his gaze, not talking except to give orders. He knew enough about deprogramming to realize that there would be no getting through for the time being. But he’d seen what he’d wanted to see. Somewhere underneath it all, the essence of Janet Fraiser was still there, the healer was still there, and as long as that was the case, Carter had a chance of surviving. If she was still alive.

  Yeah. Right. That’s it. Think positive, O’Neill!

  Tossing the thought into a mental compartment where he kept pointless dusty things—memories of Iraq, for instance—he forced his attention back on the here and now. Which, by a margin of about a millimeter, wasn’t as bad as it could have been. If Janet had told him the truth—and he was pretty certain she had—then Teal’c might still be out there. And if Teal’c was still out there, then Daniel’s odds of survival had improved a little. Always provided that Teal’c found him or he found Teal’c. After which happy reunion they’d hopefully develop enough sense between them to dig up that DHD and get the hell Earthside.

  Uhuh.

  Daniel wouldn’t leave. Neither would Teal’c.

  So you’d better come up with an escape scenario that includes one Jaffa and one archeologist turning up when you least expect them to.

  Piece o’ cake. Unlike mapping a way out of here. Currently they were marching along a corridor six minutes away from his deluxe quarters, and that was the precise extent to which he could pinpoint his location. The route had been carefully chosen to avoid any windows, any landmarks at all that would have allowed him to orient himself. Nirrti’s idea or Fraiser’s? The doc knew him better, was one of the few people who’d ever had the dubious privilege of reading the complete, annotated deeds of Jack O’Neill. She knew exactly what he could and couldn’t do. Sweet.

  How was he going to work around that?

  The usual way. Do the craziest thing possible at the unlikeliest moment.

  Sounded like a plan.

  They reached a wide stone staircase that spiraled, floor after floor, around a massive hole in the ground. Unless there were two of the things in this place, he’d been herded through here on his way up from the vault last night. The staircase was busier now. Below and opposite, flocks of umpteentuplets came jogging from one of the numerous hallways and scurried up the steps, some staring and smirking, others ignoring him. One little piece of intel at last. Quarters had to be off that corridor, which made it a good place to avoid. Among the men falling out, Jack spotted several copies of Heckle and Jeckle, identical right down to the snagged teeth, a half dozen brawny blond beach bums with a birthmark on the left side of their collective jaw, and nine lean, wiry Hispanics. Those were the biggest groups. A few other types came in threes and fours. All were Jaffa.

  Had the men Carter had seen on M3D 335 been copies or originals? And was Nirrti planning to liven up her collection of multiple Marines with a bunch of Air Force colonels? Make a few carbon copies of one Jack O’Neill, brainwash, and return to sender to wreak havoc—from “I” for iris codes to “S” for self-destruct. So not gonna happen. Back in the bad old days, he and his team mates had carried cyanide capsules on some missions. Jack briefly wondered if Fraiser knew that, too, and veered a little closer to the edge of the steps to peer down into the stairwell. Fifteen, twenty meters to the bottom. Just how dead did you have to be for a sarcophagus not to work anymore? Did it ever not—

  “Colonel, don’t!” A small hand, surprisingly strong, surprisingly cold, closed around his wrist. Fraiser’s face had a drawn look, the kind you’d see on people who suffered from migraine, but her eyes were clear and focused—though he could tell what it cost her to keep them that way. “Don’t,” she whispered again.

  “Janet—”

  “I’ll try to help you. You and Sam. I can’t promise that I’ll manage, but I’ll try. Just don’t.”

  “Try isn’t good enough. If Nirrti does to me whatever she’s done to you and then sends me back, I’ll put the entire planet at risk, Doc. I—”

  “She won’t. Right now she’s not interested in intelligence. She… I think she’s got a crush on you, sir.”

  “She what?” If this was supposed to make him feel better, the technique needed refinement. Thanks to that queen bee drug, Jack remembered blessedly few of the more salacious moments with Hathor. The stuff he did remember had persuaded him to quit dating Goa’uld. “Look, Janet—”

  The hand pulled, fingers steely all of a sudden. “Move, Tauri! Lady Nirrti does not like to be kept waiting.”

  Too damn bad.

  Heckle and Jeckle evinced an interest, and Jack decided that he wasn’t going to provoke a shove fest. Back to Plan A. Find out what Nirrti really wanted and hope it wasn’t rugrats in Goa’uld suburbia. He moved.

  The lower parts of the staircase were quieter. Right at the bottom would be the vault and the ring transporter, for all the good it did him. They didn’t go all the way down anyway. Fraiser, back in robot-mode, led him into a corridor that was textbook early System Lord: gloomy, ostentatious, and golden. For some bizarre reason, the decor felt almost comforting; a known quantity.

  As they approached, the double doors at the end of the hallway slid open, spilling a blast of frigid air from the room beyond. If nothing else, this probably explained Fraiser’s chronic hypothermia. Jack pulled the tattered, filthy BDU shirt tighter around him. At least it wasn’t Nirrti’s boudoir. Too cold. Too public. From endless rows of glass cylinders—incubators—that radiated all around him stared countless eyes. One row was empty, but the others held bodies and perfectly identical faces, eerily reminiscent of the prying faces out in the ruins. Clones. Hundreds of them. Nirrti stood at the center of the lab or whatever this was, like a spider crouching at the center of her web.

  “Some IVF clinic you got here,” Jack said, if only to stem the wash of nausea that threatened to race up his throat.

  No reply—except a poke in the back from Heckle or Jeckle, propelling him closer to Nirrti and the thing next to her. It looked like a surgical table, straight out of some alien abduction yarn in the National Enquirer, and he chose to ignore it. Better not to draw attention to the possibilities.

  By the looks of her, Nirrti seemed disconcertingly aware of what was going through his mind. “Take off your shirt.”

  “Thanks. Never before happy hour.”

  Goa’uld really had no sense of humor. “Make him take it off,” she said to Heckle and Jeckle, who’d painted on hopeful grins.

  “Hey, why didn’t you ask?” Jack unbuttoned his shi
rt and contrived to peel it off his shoulders without jarring his ribs too much. “Where is Carter?”

  Ignoring him completely, she stepped closer to inspect the black-and-puce quilt work on his chest. Between the room temperature, the leering faces in the incubators, and the gleaming metal tips of the ribbon device on Nirrti’s hand, Jack felt an involuntary rush of goose bumps skitter across his skin. Nausea bounced back, then the metal claws dug into a bruise. He managed not to flinch, but a gasp tore loose whether he liked it or not. Nirrti raised an eyebrow, smiled. If this was her idea of come hither, he was in trouble. On the upside, unless somebody decided to crank up the heating, she’d definitely be out of luck.

  “Where is Carter?” he asked again, suppressing a shudder.

  “Mrityu exaggerates.”

  The statement was accompanied by another dig of the claws, deeper and with more relish, and this time he did flinch. “How about just answering?” he yelped. “That’s a process where I ask a question and you spit out the requested information. Let’s try it again. Listen carefully. Where the hell is Carter?”

  “Silence!” Seasoned with a pinch of glow-eye; normal Goa’uld behavior at last, in its own sick way as reassuring as the decor in the corridor. Nirrti swung on Fraiser. “You lied to me, child!”

  Child!

  “No! I wouldn’t. The Tauri is injured!” Fraiser’s teeth were rattling so hard she could barely speak, and she seemed a hair away from all-out panic. “He—”

  “Shows no damage that would require intervention.”

  While Jack had to agree with the diagnosis, he didn’t much like what was happening to Fraiser. She’d slumped to a heap on the floor, eyes rolling back, limbs graduating from shivers to convulsions.

  “Stop it!” he barked at Nirrti. “Whatever you’re doing to her, just stop it. I’ll cooperate.”

  Heckle and Jeckle looked disappointed, and Nirrti smiled again, still staring at Fraiser. “Go! You are no longer needed.”