Realizing that his fists were clenched, George Hammond slowly uncurled his fingers and let out a deep breath. It all came back to the moon and what was going on there. They needed intel, simple as that. They also needed an expert, but first things first.
"When are you on duty, Sergeant?" he asked Siler.
The sergeant finally set down a couple of coffee mugs that had stopped steaming quite some time ago. "Zero seven hundred, sir."
"Good. We can't risk making phone calls, because the lines probably are bugged, but I want you to find a pretext to talk to Colonel O'Neill. Tell him-"
"Sir?" Siler wore the same ominously puzzled expression Hammond had seen on Major Warren's face, eons ago or so it seemed. "Colonel O'Neill and Dr. Jackson are on Parris- I mean, M3D 335."
Maybourne cussed. "When was Jack supposed to come back?"
"Yesterday." Feeling himself go cold, Hammond asked, "I take it he hasn't made contact since gating out?"
"No, sir. Not as far as I'm aware," mumbled Siler, his face falling as he realized what it meant. "Maybe I just didn't hear about it," he offered.
And pigs could fly. The sergeant, in his unobtrusive way, managed to be one of the best-informed people at the SGC. Occasionally he seemed to catch the latest news before the base commander did. Hammond found a chair, slumped in it heavily.
"Not your fault, George," said Maybourne.
"The hell it isn't! I gave him permission to go. I sent Dr. Jackson along for good measure. Without having a clue about what's happening on that moon- apart from the fact that three of my people disappeared there. And now two more have vanished, thanks to me."
"How were you going to find out, unless you sent someone to investigate? And don't tell me that Jack didn't give you an earache and a half about going."
Wrong. George Hammond had been too damn clever for his own good and jumped at the opportunity of getting back his best unit commander. Christ, he'd practically pushed Jack into it! And none of these profound insights was going to change a thing-as Major General Hammond would have been the first to point out to Colonel O'Neill if positions were reversed. He'd find out alright, and then he'd bring Jack and the rest of SG-1 and Dr. Fraiser home.
"Siler!"
Jolted from his contemplation of a mug of coffee, the sergeant flinched. "Yessir."
"Can you get me into the mountain and through the gate without anyone noticing?"
"Come again, sir?"
"Can you get me-"
"And me," Harry piped up.
"Out of the question," Hammond said mechanically. "Apart from anything else, it's too risky."
"I knew this gig was dangerous when I signed up for it, General. Same as Jack, I would imagine." Turning to Siler, Maybourne added, "Anyway, whaddya say, Sergeant? Two men into the mountain and through the gate without anyone noticing?"
Scratching the back of his head, the sergeant muttered, "Maybe. I'm gonna have to figure out a couple things, though."
Daniel stared up at a strip of sky, which had begun to turn a watery predawn green. Maybe the revolting color scheme was down to his one functioning eye having decided to get its own back. Or maybe it was just the budding migraine. That at least was no great surprise, not if you spent half the night draped head-down over a staircase. He had a vague recollection of being forcefully catapulted over the top of the stairs. The fall must have knocked him out.
A flock of birds barreled from the treetops, screeching but offering no further clues. His legs still pointed uphill, and he studied them briefly. Trying to get the right way up might be a start. It would hurt. Then again, that was fast becoming a habit. Oh yeah. He tentatively wiggled one foot, then the other. It hurt alright, but he didn't think anything was seriously damaged. Given his track record lately, that alone was reason to break out the champagne. Well, okay, he'd settle for water. Pushing himself up, he looked around for his backpack. Nothing. What the...?
Suddenly he remembered. He'd hurled it at some Jaffa who'd been about to break Jack's back. After that things got a tad hazy. Something to do with a pair of outsize twins pounding him into the floor tiles. Twins? There'd been six of them, perfect look-alikes. Congratulations, Mrs. Jaffa! It's identical sextuplets. Probably not what had happened. After all, Jack had identified the guy as one of Norris's boys... six of Norris's boys. Jesus!
So what had happened?
Maybe it was better to postpone the problem until his skull had stopped throbbing and he was capable of gathering at least one clear thought. He looked up at the sky again. The sun was rising fast. You could feel it; air temperature and humidity already racing toward another record high. The steps were still cool, though, and so was the wall Daniel used as a prop to push himself to his feet. Shivering a little, he closed his eyes... eye and waited for the world to stop spinning. It did. Eventually.
Fifteen or so steps up was the top of the staircase. He recognized the place. They'd followed Janet up there last night. Just before she'd sold them out to... Nirrti. A bolt of panic knocked the breath from his lungs. Nirrti had Sam. And Jack. And Daniel had been thrown out like a drunken gatecrasher, because she had no use for him. She wanted Jack, that much had been clear.
Why? What made Jack so different? Apart from the obvious, of course.
At this juncture, the answer to that question wouldn't be of any help. A little wobbly at first, Daniel began to scale the stairs. Halfway up, he stopped. What was he going to do? Return to the shrine, in the hope of finding somebody who'd show him the transporter controls? And then? Storm Nirrti's stronghold, nibble his way through force shields, bombard Jaffa with backpacks, and single-handedly free his team mates?
Not damn likely.
Nirrti hadn't sent him back out here from the goodness of her heart. She'd sent him out here to spare herself the trouble of killing him personally.
Keep this up, and you'll have accommodated her plans inside the next two hours, Jackson.
An insistent little voice told him to try and find Teal'c, but this idea was nearly as crazy. Teal'c was the proverbial needle in a planet-size haystack-if he was still alive. In light of last night's events, Janet's admission that she had lost him could be interpreted in any number of ways. The only sensible choice was to get back to the Stargate, find the DUD, bring help. Sometimes he hated sensible choices.
Slowly he turned and squinted at the blur of the ruined city spread out below; a sea of stone, unmoving and unmoved. Far in the east stone seemed to butt onto thin air. It had to be the temple where the Stargate was; it stood on a cliff rearing over the forest. To the north the terrain rose steeply, its highest point occupied by a fuzzy gray blob. If he were Nirrti, he'd camp out up there. Daniel filed the thought away for further examination. Southward, the gaps between buildings seemed to widen until they opened into one large space, lined by the city wall and the jungle beyond. Inset into the wall was what had to be a gate. Of course, at that distance, he was unable to tell a trolley from a trampoline, though on the whole a gate made more sense than either of the other two items.
Daniel decided to head south.
By the time he'd reached the bottom of the staircase, the sun had climbed above the rooftops and was teasing the back of his head. Flies started buzzing in the warm air, and somewhere to his right he heard the faint murmur of the waterfall. He turned left, out of the sun and into a narrow alley that, two comers on, began to meander wildly until he could no longer tell which way he was going or whether he'd doubled back on himself. Great. So when was this wide-open-space thing going to happen?
Ahead was a building that once might have been an inn of some sort. Behind a crumbling archway lay an inner court seamed by two tiers of galleries. Bamboo ladders connected the galleries to the ground and led up to a roof terrace, maybe high enough to overlook the area and recover his bearings.
Rungs creaking under his boots, small plumes of dust billowing from the twine that tied the ladders, he climbed to the top. The terrace was dotted with holes where joists had given and t
he ceiling collapsed into the rooms below. Carefully, Daniel picked a path to the parapet. He hadn't gone back on himself. Not quite, anyway. He'd just ended up a lot further east than planned. His best option was to make it to the city wall and follow that to the gate.
"Turn tail and run," he whispered bitterly. Knowing that it wasn't true, that getting himself killed wouldn't save Jack and Sam, didn't help. It sure as hell felt like he was running-leaving them behind. And nothing to be-
The shot missed him by a whisker, passing close enough for a whiff of displaced air to brush his skin. Swearing, he dropped flat behind the parapet just as a second round tore past. This one would have hit him. Daniel crawled a couple of meters along the wall and cautiously inched his head over the edge. Number three grazed his ear, and he ducked with a gasp, dabbing at the trickle of blood on his neck. The shooter definitely was getting warm- and whatever else he or she might be, it wasn't Jaffa. After five years of playing with the things against his better judgment, Daniel recognized the bark of a submachine gun when he heard it. He wouldn't stake his life on the make and model, but that was beside the point. Jaffa didn't use submachine guns-not even K'tano's former mob, not anymore; Jack had repossessed the P90s.
Keeping his head down, Daniel shouted, "You're shooting at a friendly! My name is Daniel Jackson. I'm a civilian advisor, US Air Force, but I don't expect you to take my word for it. So I'm going to get up for you to take a look. I'd be grateful if you could suspend target practice for the time being."
No reply. But no more potshots either. Hands raised, Daniel slowly came to a stand, expecting the shooter to show himself, too. Nope. Empty casements stared back at him from the building opposite, and the alley below was deserted.
"Hey! Where are you?"
It was instinct more than anything else. He spun around just in time to see a figure dashing from one doorway to the next. A split-second later another shot rang out, Daniel hit the deck, and the attacker scrambled for the entrance to the inn.
"Oh crap," muttered Daniel. "Slick move, Jackson."
The guy, whoever he was, meant business and didn't give a damn about civilian advisors. For reasons best known to himself, he'd declared open season on archeologists. By now he also would have realized that his prey was unarmed. Not even a backpack to toss, Daniel thought ruefully.
He darted back to the roof hatch and froze at the creaking and groaning of bamboo on stone. Someone was coming up the ladder.
"Crap," he muttered again. His only escape route had just been cut off.
Darting precariously between the voids in the terrace floor, counting off seconds in his head, he ran for the far side of the roof. Okay, now or never. If he left it too late, he'd be toast. Daniel dropped to his knees, slid toward one of the holes. From the edges jutted the remnants of beams, and here was hoping they weren't too rotten to take his weight. He grabbed hold of the end of a joist and eased himself into the opening, legs dangling. Holding his breath, he let go.
And crashed hard onto the wooden floor. The drop had only been about four feet. Daniel had figured it'd be more, which skewed his landing and sent him staggering against the mildewed remains of a bed. In a cloud of dust and clatter, the bed frame collapsed under the impact. A heartbeat later the rapid thud of booted feet came from above, closing fast.
Daniel scrambled for the door, knowing the dust would settle, but not in time to conceal the recent upheaval. Out on the gallery he started running, not caring whether he could be heard now. It didn't matter anymore. His trigger-happy playfellow would guess where he'd gone and could come bursting from any of these rooms at any moment.
The thought had barely formed when, in a shower of splintering wood, the shooter slammed through a door panel. In front of Daniel, not behind. For a startled second they looked at each other, then the man smiled. He was a Marine. A goddamn US Marine, so what the hell had happened to posse comitatus and all that? Of course, this wasn't exactly US soil. And maybe this was the wrong moment to ask for clarification.
The muzzle of the submachine gun-an MP5, incidentally- lowered to point at Daniel's chest, and the Marine chuckled. "Run, Mr. Civilian Advisor. Run."
Daniel had no moral qualms about being shot in the back. Presenting the honorable front got you just as dead and quicker. He turned on his heel and hared back the way he'd come, the Marine's laughter driving him like a gust. A hailstorm of rounds exploded around his feet. The son of a bitch was toying with him. Or not. The next burst went over Daniel's head, too close to tell if it'd missed by accident or design. He kept running, bent low, arms curled over his head.
Idiot! Like that's going to protect you!
As if to prove the point, two rounds in quick succession scraped his arms. Yelling, in rage rather than pain, he flung himself sideways through the nearest door. Mercifully, it led into a corridor rather than a guestroom. Maybe there was another wing. Preferably with an exit.
Daniel straightened up and sprinted down the gloomy hallway. More shots rang out from the gallery, and there was shouting, words drowned out by the cackle of the gun. Too bad, but if he was honest, he didn't much feel like making conversation. Ahead loomed a set of three doorways. He ducked through the last one, almost sobbing with relief when it opened onto a dark, narrow staircase. There was a way out after all.
Two steps at a time, he hurtled down the stairs into a soot-blackened, windowless kitchen-and stuttered to a dead halt. If there had been a backdoor once, it was buried under a mountain of debris where the rear half of the room had collapsed. The only exit from the kitchen was the staircase. He fought down a rising tide of panic, tiptoed back to the bottom of the stairs. Maybe he'd have enough time to- No. His pal was coming.
Across the room lay the upturned husk of a clay stove. When he pushed the door open ahalf dozen shiny eyes stared at him maliciously and three rats-or what passed for rats in this place-scurried past him. Suppressing a shudder, Daniel backed into the oven on all fours and pulled the door shut behind him. The fit was claustrophobic, the stench sickening, his whole body ached, and he'd probably die in this hellhole. In about sixty seconds or so.
Heart racing, he tried to listen to the noises outside. A few squeals from the rats voicing their protest and then the creak of a loose floorboard on the stairs. His pal was coming alright. The footsteps were quiet, measured, made by someone in total control of the situation. All the guy had to do was rip open the oven door and turn Dr. Jackson into shish kebab.
The footsteps stopped. Daniel gritted his teeth. Under his right hand he felt something hard and jagged. An old bone perhaps, or a shard. His fingers closed around it. He'd gut the bastard or at least go out trying.
Sony, Jack. Seems I was wrong. Or maybe it means that you're
The door flew open. His hand shot up and instantly was clamped in an iron grip. The owner of those relentless fingers crouched, peered into the oven.
"Daniel Jackson. I am most grateful to find you alive." Teal'c's face lit up in a rare, broad smile.
He looked like a caged animal, Mrityu thought, poised to strike and devious. He was a caged animal, without discipline, without the sense to save his strength, without the wisdom to submit to his goddess. After endlessly pacing its cage until its energy was spent and reduced to helpless inertia, the animal had retreated into silence, sitting on the floor, back pushed against the wall, refusing to accept any kind of hospitality. He would be brooding, scheming, underneath.
Mrityu deactivated the force shield and quietly slipped into the room, waiting until he took notice of her. When he did, the anger simmering in his eyes crumbled to incomprehension and the profound hurt of betrayal. The look haunted her more than she cared to admit, spoke to something-someone-she did not dare to reawaken. Though she was on her own for the moment, free of the radiant pressure in her mind, she knew that even the contemplation of misconduct might bring punishment.
And when has that ever stopped you before?
Not Lady Nirrti's thoughts but a voice from deep within Mr
ityu herself. Frantically, she silenced it, wishing she could erase it, wishing she could avoid those dark, probing eyes. Why was he staring at her like that?
"Lady Nirrti wants to see you," she said, hoping he would look away.
He didn't.
"What did I do, Fraiser?" he asked. "I mean, I must have pissed you off somehow. It's the only explanation I can come up with. So what was it? Cholesterol levels too high? Blood count off? What? I'd just like to know."
She didn't understand his questions. Wasn't Lady Nirrti instructing him? Or perhaps he was slow to listen. Mrityu recalled that she herself had not truly grasped the meaning of the voice at first.
"Give it time," she said, trying to sound encouraging. After all it wasn't his fault. That look in his eyes made encouragement difficult, though. She dropped her gaze, noted that the bed hadn't been slept in. "You should have rested."
"Sir."
"Excuse me?" Mrityu blinked.
"I still outrank you, Major. So it's sir or Colonel or Colonel O Neill to you. Any of the above'll do nicely. Are we clear?"
"You'll soon be given a new name."
"Can't wait," he muttered. Eyes narrowing a fraction, he pushed himself up from the floor, slowly and clumsily. When he stood at last, he remained slightly stooped, arms crossed protectively in front of his chest. "What's your name?"
"Mrityu," she replied.
"Death." His face twisted, whether in shock or anger she couldn't tell. Struggling to keep his voice even, he asked, "She told you that's what it means, right? Mrityu? Death."
Stargate SG-1: Survival of the Fittest: SG1-7 Page 22
