Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot, this story was written only for my own enjoyment, though hopefully you all will enjoy it as well. No money is being made off this fic.
Note: This fic takes place during the episode Into the Fire. It's a 'what if' fic where, after Hathor implants Jack O'Neill with a Goa'uld, things go a little differently and perhaps, for the worst. Reviews are appreciated!
SG-1: Into the Deathtrap
-Curiosity's Principle
"Oh God. No," the man exclaimed. He tried to move but was restrained. The long, snake-like parasite slithered up his chest, its red glowing eyes glistening as they momentarily locked with his. It was in that moment that he realized with finality that there was nothing he could do. This was not how he wanted it to end. Himself becoming a host, a tool trapped forever in his own body as he watched in horror as he executed his closest friends and gave Hathor the means to destroy his whole planet.
The Goa'uld symbiote prepared to enter even as Jack's head was yanked roughly to the side to expose his bare neck. He might have cried out again in protest, but he couldn't be sure. The next moments passed in a blur of dread and disgust and ending in pain as the snake dove at Jack O'Neill's neck, forcing itself into his body.
Jack's mind swam. His face scrunched up as he fought the oppressive invader for control of his body. Thoughts of hate that were not even his own crept into his consciousness and with all that he was he pushed them away, knowing that if he let them come, he would be lost.
Memories of Skaara, Sha're, and Kawalsky flashed before his eyes amid flashes of pain and nausea as his own body instinctively rejected the intruder.
'No!' he thought in a scream. 'I will not let this happen to me. I can't let this happen. I need to fight… for them.'
Teal'c. Daniel. Carter.
'I need to fight for all of them.'
The symbiote forced itself completely around the colonel's spine and into his brain and nervous system. The memories of the lost Skaara, Sha're, and Kawalsky flashed before him again, but this time as a message from the parasite. That Jack could not win.
'No…'
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
She had to hurry, there wasn't much time. Captain Carter had told Daniel, Col. Makepeace, and his unexpected but much appreciated rescue team that she would find and destroy the power source creating the Stargate-blocking force field outside before reinforcements came through. She wasn't sure why, but she found herself back in the room where Col. O'Neill had been implanted with the Goa'uld symbiote. Part of her wished to find him there, still struggling with the parasite, maybe even winning. But that was impossible and she knew it.
O'Neill was not in the room, but the woman in white, who had pretended to be an SGC doctor, was. She lay in a crumpled heap at the far end of the room, unmoving. Scanning the room one last time, Sam made her way over to the motionless person. With her P90 in one hand Carter reached out to her neck to check for a pulse with the other.
'Why was she hurt?' the captain wondered. Col. Makepeace hadn't gone in here so… did that mean that Hathor or one of her minions had done this? If so…why? The woman (-the jaffa,?, for Sam sensed a presence) had been on their side.
Just then the pale jaffa moved and opened her heavy eyelids. Blood dripped down one side of her mouth. She looked very dazed, but as she recognized Carter she managed to speak. Not in the humanesk voice of a jaffa, but the echoed voice of a Goa'uld.
"I tried," the woman gurgled.
Carter's brow creased in confusion. Something about this Goa'uld was wrong. Very wrong. Before Sam could speak, the woman lost consciousness, succumbing to whatever wounds had been inflicted upon her. The captain sighed, still unsure what the Goa'uld had meant. Suddenly a familiar voice came from behind her.
"She was a Tok'ra."
Carter spun around to see Colonel O'Neill standing right behind her as if he'd been there all along. He was only four feet away and yet with the Goa'uld -Tok'ra?- so close, Sam couldn't tell if her friend had been taken as a host or not.
"Sir?" she questioned, her hand still on her weapon, though she did not raise it.
O'Neill offered a small but charismatic smile.
"She was a Tok'ra spy," he replied, again motioning back to the crumpled woman. "She wanted to save me."
Carter's breathing quickened. There was something in her commanding officer's eyes as he'd said that. Something subtle and unconscious, yet as blatantly obvious as a punch in her gut that made her lose all hope that this being was Jack O'Neill. The creature before her saw the pain in her eyes and suddenly the charismatic smile turned sinister.
"She wanted to save him," he corrected in the malevolent and doubled voice of a Goa'uld.
With a cry of anger, Carter hefted the suddenly heavy weapon to take aim at the body of her friend. Even as she pulled the trigger, the Goa'uld forced the barrel out and up. A round of gunfire went off harmlessly as the Goa'uld wrenched it from Sam's hands. She moved to strike him with a right hook, but her opponent saw it coming and swatted it away with a block so hard it might as well have been a strike.
Sam Carter grimaced in pain, hardly even noticing as the Goa'uld went for her throat until it was too late. His right hand wrapped around her neck, forcing her back and slamming her into the metal wall beside the fallen Tok'ra. Sam struggled helplessly as what used to be her friend lifted her five inches off the ground. She grabbed at his wrist both to try to make him let go and to relieve the strain on her throat. Her stare, however, never left the Goa'uld's. Even as his eyes glowed and a vehement grin pulled at his lips, she searched for a sign that her friend was still in there.
"You were very important to my host," the Goa'uld replied unexpectedly. "This 'SG-1' was most important. How ironic then that it will be by his hands you will die."
"Fight it, sir. I know you're in there somewhere-" Carter exclaimed before the hand choked her off.
"Jack O'Neill cannot help you," the Goa'uld growled. "Just as you and the Tok'ra could not help him."
Even as he said it, Sam thought that she saw the smallest hint of sorrow in his eyes, felt the vice around her neck loosen just a little. And then Hathor stepped up beside him, an arrogant smile on her face as she drew her fingers gently over the new Goa'uld's cheek.
"The Tok'ra underestimated our vigilance over out new soon-to-be-host. We stopped her before she could do any damage to the symbiote," Hathor boasted. Then she turned, taking a few sauntering steps away so that she might take in the whole scene; Carter, her new Goa'uld, and the dead or dying Tok'ra; all in one haughty glance.
"Although we would enjoy watching our new servant kill you, we think it would be more pleasurable to let you live. Live and watch him annihilate your supposed rescue party, your friends. And then, once their last screams have been uttered, you will watch as he kills you."
With a disappointed sneer the new Goa'uld dropped Sam. She fell to the ground coughing and trying to get enough air at the same time. She looked up as Hathor handed her new minion a zat gun then stroked his arm seductively. The Goa'uld in O'Neill seemed not to notice. He kept the Colonel's eyes trained hard and threateningly on Sam. Without so much as an arrogant remark or one last degrading smirk, the Goa'uld aimed the weapon and fired, sending her into unconsciousness.
-.-.-.-.-.
Daniel looked up in surprise as the transport rings only a yard and a half from him activated and the figure of Jack O'Neill appeared. While Hathor's cronies trained their weapons on him suspiciously, the now captured and quite helpless SG members looked up hopefully. But as Jack nodded to the jaffa in charge and began speaking to him commandingly in Goa'uld, that spark of hope dimmed considerably.
To Daniel who could understand what was being said, the spark nearly went out.
"By order of my Queen, Hathor, I Prodenmors have come for the intruders," the Goa'uld with Jack's body replied in a deep and echoed voice that sounded so wrong it made the archeologist flinch.
'She did it,' Daniel thought as reality finally started to sink in. 'Hathor made him a host.'
He wanted to call out to his friend, to try to make Jack do the impossible, to beat the parasite. But all he could do was continue to kneel where he'd been placed and stare blankly.
"We have already contained them," the leader responded, Daniel had already forgotten the grey haired man's name.
"That is obvious, fool. Hathor," the snake within Jack paused and smirked devilishly. "Hathor wants me to execute them."
"Of course, my Lord Prodenmors," the man replied with a bow.
Prodenmors spun around and stepped out in front of the prisoners.
"Jaffa! Kree!" he shouted and commandingly motioned for the soldiers to take up positions in front of the kneeling SG members.
"Colonel O'Neill!" Makepeace shouted, as if trying to snap Jack out of it.
'He doesn't understand,' Daniel thought as the Goa'uld stepped into a position in front of him, cold eyes boring into his own. 'Jack can't do anything about this.'
Prodenmors motioned for one of the extra jaffa to toss him a staff weapon. As if on cue, all of the positioned jaffa cocked their weapons at their prisoners.
Daniel glanced away as a chill gripped his heart. He was going to be murdered at the hands of his best friend.
'Not my friend,' he corrected. 'My friend has been taken from me. He's trapped.'
Even as he thought it his glance went back up to the startlingly despairing expression the Goa'uld bore. He saw Jack's hands shake and the Goa'uld had to bow his head momentarily as if to recover himself. When the Goa'uld looked back up he seemed greatly angered.
Daniel Jackson took a deep steadying breath, knowing that this would be the last one he ever took and looked into the face of his friend.
"Don't ever give up, Jack," Daniel replied stoically.
Enraged by the human's encouraging words to his host, the Goa'uld readjusted his aim and fired his weapon with an angry roar. The jaffa followed suit, executing the other members of the SGC.
-.-.-.-.-.
Prodenmors found it difficult to concentrate though he dared not reveal his problem to his new master. Hathor had taken down the force field around the Stargate and left a minimal guard on Prodenmors's assurance that no more Tau'ri would be coming through to save their friends. She had had him stack the bodies of those he had executed near the dune to be taken care of the following day. At the time he had told his mistress that she was now free of the Tau'ri with certainty. Now in private he found that he was unsure.
Jack O'Neill seemed to hold this foolish notion that General Hammond would send more people to save him and Carter. Well, Carter at least. The human seemed fairly certain that if the others knew what he was, they would shoot to kill. Hammond would come to rescue his teams only to find them all dead. Then what would he do? Search for those that were missing? Leave? Or attempt vengeance on the Queen Hathor?
Yet, despite these strong feelings, there was more knowledge of Hammond that told the lesser Goa'uld that the human would not send any more troops. Could not risk any more lives. It was this idea that Prodenmors stuck with for certainly it was the more logical course.
"Don't ever give up, Jack."
Prodenmors frowned. There was that voice again. His host clung to those words like a life raft. It has been an hour since the murder of Daniel Jackson and the Goa'uld had played the scene over and over in his mind to torture Jack O'Neill. And it had tortured him. But those last words from his friend had also empowered the host somehow.
From the start O'Neill's utter revulsion of the parasitic race had made blending with the prepared airman difficult. Now it seemed to him that there was still some little corner of his host's mind to which he had no access. Somewhere his host could retreat to when Prodenmors's mental torture became too much. A place where the last words of Daniel Jackson could comfort his tortured mind.
This angered the Goa'uld greatly. It was not as if he could not search his host's memories for anything Hathor wanted, O'Neill could never keep that from him. What the Goa'uld did fear was that his host might try to regain the smallest measure of control in a critical moment as he had when Prodenmors had been momentarily unable to fire his staff weapon and execute his prisoner.
Prodenmors shook his head and ran his fingers through his hair in an almost Jack-like motion of frustration. He would break his host; there was no doubt in that. But the next morning he would be summoned to publicly execute Captain Samantha Carter, another of his host's closest friends. If he showed the slightest sign that he did not have full control, the ever watchful Hathor would no doubt torture him for his weakness.
"What is wrong, our love?"
Prodenmors turned around to see Hathor enter his chamber. A fitting Tau'ri phrase came to mind and he did well to hide his amusement.
'Speak of the devil,' he thought, but did not say. Instead he bowed low to his master.
"Nothing is wrong, my Queen," he replied.
Maybe someday he would overthrow this Goa'uld and take her army for himself, but for now serving in a position of power within her strengthening ranks was suitable for him.
"Are you certain? We thought that you seemed troubled," Hathor replied, taking a step closer to him and clasping her hands loosely behind his head.
'You don't understand the concept of "personal space", do you?' Prodenmors almost responded. He was quite shocked that the sarcastic comment had even entered his thoughts. 'It wasn't my comment though, was it? It was his."
Getting used to this host was going to take more than an hour and a half, he supposed.
"Nothing is wrong," he lied again. "Except… except that I'd hoped to exterminate Captain Carter this day as well."
"Soon enough. We want her to suffer first. To have a night to live with the knowledge that she could not save her friends," Hathor replied, accepting his lie, yet still keeping to her own plan as he'd hoped. "Tomorrow the female will die."
-.-.-.-.-.
All alone in her cell Sam Carter did her best not to cry. When the Goa'uld that had taken the colonel's body had gone off to execute the prisoners, Hathor had erected a screen in front of Sam's cell so she would watch or at least hear the events, all made possible by a long range sensor.
Sam had not wanted to give Hathor the pleasure of seeing her react, but Sam could not tear her eyes from the virtual image displayed before her. She could only brace herself against the doorframe beside the energy field that kept her there as this Prodenmors willed Colonel O'Neill's body to point a staff weapon at Daniel, could only watch with heavy heart as the staff weapon fired. As the force of the blast spun Daniel's body to the side where he lay as lifeless as a doll tossed to the ground.
No matter what she did, the image of the Colonel holding that weapon, of Daniel falling, and of the other SG members following that fate would not leave her mind. So deep was she in her personal agony that she did not notice the arrival of Prodenmors.
The Goa'uld sat down on the floor, leaning back against the wall across from her cell and taking pleasure in both her suffering and the suffering of his host.
-.-.-.-.-.-.
The next morning came all too soon for Jack O'Neill. As his eyes opened without his wont and body stood up without his say, there was no mistaking yesterday's events for some horrible dream. He was trapped in his own body and it was a living nightmare.
His snake walked him beside Hathor to Carter's cell where, after a few snide remarks, Hathor separated to the location outside the base where the execution was to take place. This left Prodenmors, and a few jaffa, to take Carter there in her wake.
Carter.
The Captain looked terrible. Her eyes were red and puffy and her face was pale. They hadn't given her food or water so she must have also been weakened a little from that.
Yet despite everything, there was still a fire in her eyes. Though she might be hurting, she was not broken.
'Aw, Carter... I'm sorry…'
"Move!" Prodenmors ordered, waving one of those Goa'uld torture sticks dangerously.
Carter glared daggers at him, but did as she was told. Jack could see her sizing up the odds. Three armed jaffa and a Goa'uld… It didn't look good. Especially with her hands bound as they were.
Two jaffa stepped out in front to lead the way, then came Carter followed by the Goa'uld who grabbed her arm roughly and shoved her forward. The third jaffa, bird eyes glowing, brought up the rear.
"Where are we going?" Carter questioned bitterly. She got no response.
In a rather daring move she stopped her walk, driving her right elbow into the unexpected Prodenmors's midsection. She spun around the surprised Goa'uld and shuffled in close to the third jaffa. Too close for him to fire the weapon. She had grabbed hold of the staff and delivered a vicious roundhouse kick as she fought for control of the weapon before the angry Prodenmors rose behind her.
Jack tried to shout a warning, but his body would not listen. Instead it struck out with the torture weapon, jabbing Carter in the back and making her cry out in agony. The captain dropped to the floor. Her face was still scrunched up in pain when Prodenmors reached down and lifted her partly off of the floor.
"Do NOT do that again!" the Goa'uld shouted while shaking Carter violently to get his point across.
"Or what? You'll kill me?" Jack's friend managed a small laugh. "You're going to kill me anyway. Why not just do it now? Get it over with."
The complete hatred in Carter's eyes as she looked back at him made Jack feel sick. No one had ever looked at him with such loathing, especially not a comrade. Part of him knew that it wasn't really him that the look was meant for, but it might as well have been.
"You'd like that wouldn't you?" the Goa'uld asked, eyes glowing with anger. "But you will die the way Hathor desires you to die."
Prodenmors forced her to her feet then jabbed her with the torture device to make her walk. She stumbled forward, but did not fall.
As they left the pyramid ship, Jack wondered why Hathor wanted to drag out Carter's death. Why she was having them march out to the Stargate for this execution right where the piled bodies of the comrades he'd let die the previous day still lay. The colonel felt ill just thinking about it. Did his and Sam Carter's suffering mean that much to that snake-head?
'Of course it does, what am I thinking?' he thought grimly.
Yet another worry that weighed on Jack's mind was that his snake, Prodenmors, seemed to believe that Hathor, after he proved himself by killing another of Jack's friends, would send him on an invaluable mission. A mission that involved the Stargate and Earth.
They were nearly to the Gate when a thunderous explosion shook Jack from his morbid thoughts. His parasite was already barking orders, but Jack could see his mind. Prodenmors was rather concerned, worried even.
They turned to look at Carter just as another explosion rocked the sandy earth beneath them and knocked them to the ground. A small fighter that neither Jack nor Prodenmors had ever seen before soared over the tree-tops from their left and fired at something below the dune. The ship turned then and headed straight for them. It fired twice sending two of the serpent guards flying and making Prodenmors duck instinctively.
As the fighter flew over them, Jack's mind went to two different but important thoughts. One: where the heck had that fighter come from? And two: was Carter ok?
He regretted the second question immediately and yelled out mentally for Prodenmors to stop, but it was no use. The Goa'uld had heard his thoughts and despite the fervent protests of the host, he turned and spotted Carter making a break for the trees.
"Jaffa! Kree!" Prodenmors shouted. But none responded. The Horus guard was nowhere to be seen and the others lay unmoving.
Seething, the Goa'uld snatched up the staff weapon of a dead serpent guard and jogged in the fleeing Captain's direction. From the direction of the Stargate, Jack heard the sound of weapons fire that wasn't coming from the alien fighter. His attention did not tarry on the battle beyond the dune however as Prodenmors ceased his run and took aim with the staff weapon. Carter was directly in range.
With all that he was, Jack fought Prodenmors, but the Goa'uld had full control of him now. The Goa'uld forced Jack's finger down and the staff weapon discharged, firing a devastating burst of energy that hit Carter's left leg and sent her sprawling. She'd only been a few feet from the tree line.
Prodenmors stalked over to her, upset with her attempt to escape, angry with the disruption of the execution plan, and enraged with the fact that now, in all probability, his mission to the Tau'ri would be delayed to say the least. She was crawling as best she could with a crippled leg and bound arms as Prodenmors bore down on her.
Carter spun around onto her back unexpectedly wielding a short, thick branch. Caught off guard, the branch smashed into the side of Jack's head with enough force to break off the end of the branch and make Prodenmors stagger to the side. Although Jack was in as much pain as the parasite, he applauded his teammate silently. But the battle was far from won.
Knowing she couldn't outrun an unwounded Goa'uld, Carter forced herself to her knees with a cry of pain and swung at Prodenmors again. This time he blocked with the staff then hit the woman's hand hard with the staff's back end coming back around with a hit to her head with the front end. The outmatched captain lost her grip on the stick and the hit to her head forced her to her side. Breathing heavily, she turned back to see Prodenmors aim the barrel of the staff at her face. The Goa'uld grinned and Carter stared back at him blankly.
"It was a good chase, Captain Carter. But no more," Prodenmors replied.
'No…'thought Jack. The colonel put all his focus into making Prodenmors miss, to drop the weapon, but the Goa'uld was hardly fazed at all. 'Not her too…'
"Goodbye," Prodenmors growled.
"STOP!"
The familiar voice made both the Goa'uld and Jack pause. They turned to the tree-line where a weaponless man leaned heavily again a tree trunk, intense concern etched into his face. His right side was bandaged, his arm in a make-shift sling. He seemed so weak that the tree was the only thing keeping him upright and so pale that he might have been a ghost.
'Daniel?' Jack thought that he must be delusional and was taking his Goa'uld with him.
Daniel's eyes widened as he realized that Prodenmors would now shoot him as well. With a sneer to hide his surprise, the Goa'uld prepared to turn his attention back to Carter so as to finish her off first, but suddenly he heard movement behind him. Prodenmors turned enough to get a glimpse of… Bra'tac and a crowd of jaffa just before Bra'tac and one of his followers proceeded to fire at the threatening being.
Jack felt two solid strikes of fire to his side and front as Prodenmors spun to face the dangerous adversaries that sent his mind whirling in a storm of agony. He didn't see the looks of shock on Carter and Daniel's faces, or even sense that he'd collapsed to the ground beside Carter. He only knew his injuries were serious and that his Goa'uld feared for its survival.
-.-.-.-.-.-.
Jack heard a string of familiar voices muffled and incoherent in his hazy state of mind. He opened his eyes to see Daniel, Carter, and Bra'tac leaning over him with a blue sky as their backdrop. Even stranger was when Teal'c dressed in jaffa armor and General Hammond in military fatigues entered his range of vision.
"Now I know I must be dreamin' " he muttered though the pain told him otherwise.
"Jack?" Daniel questioned, the worry plain in his eyes.
Jack squinted up at him. "Daniel. I… thought I'd killed you," he said weakly.
"I thought the Goa'uld was going to kill me too. At the last second though, he readjusted his aim and hit me in the shoulder. I, uh, think I have you to thank for that."
Jack said nothing for a moment, and then, "Glad you're-" Jack broke off in a coughing fit. The fact that he found it hard to breathe made it much more painful.
"Sir?" Carter asked as Jack recognized the metallic taste of blood in his mouth.
He realized that the reason he was able to speak freely now was because his symbiote was putting all of its effort into trying to save him. Or rather, his body. But Jack felt the darkness closing in on him and he knew that the snake would fail.
He gave Bra'tac an accepting look and a respectful nod to Teal'c and General Hammond. Then he looked back to Sam and Daniel, whom he's allowed to suffer so much. Jack took a shuddering breath.
"I'm…I'm sorr.." the last of the apology drifted off and the rest of his breath came out in a sigh. At least now, Jack O'Neill was free…
-The End-