Remains of the Day

Rating: T

Chapter 1: The Likes of You Again

Jack O'Neill scanned the wooded forest, his senses on high alert. Something was wrong; years of black ops training told him that. Behind him, his team mimicked his defensive posture as they silently surveyed the area surrounding them. Still, O'Neill could not detect the threat he felt. Just as he prepared to declare the area clear, several armed natives seemed to materialize from the shadows of the tree line.

Though primitive in dress, the natives had superior weapons. Jack noted the ratio of Bad Guys : SG-1 was about 4:1. Jack sighed. The leader of their ambushers spoke first.

"You dare intrude on our land?" His voice was gruff, and O'Neill recognized the expression in the man's black eyes. He was not messing around.

Daniel responded, "We're peaceful-"

"Silence!" The man cut him off. "Who is the leader among you?"

"That would be me." Jack said, taking a slight step forward.

"Why do you come here?" The man asked him.

"Like he said," Jack started, nudging his P-90 in Daniel's direction, "We're peaceful explorers. We don't mean you folks any harm." The Colonel attempted to brandish his most diplomatic smile.

The gruff man holding him at gunpoint did not seem impressed. "You claim you are peaceful, yet you carry weapons. You lie."

"The weapons are to defend ourselves." Jack said, his irritation showing through in his tone. "Not that there's any need for that..." He added under his breath. The sarcastic remark was not quiet enough to go unheard. Their interrogator narrowed his eyes and shot Jack point blank in the chest with his energy weapon. The sensation of the blast was the most painful thing Jack had ever felt. It was several times worse than a Zat blast; however, Jack was unable to verbalize his pain. Despite every instinct telling him to tense up, he simply collapsed limply to the ground.

"Sir!" Carter cried out. Jack could hear the concern in her voice, and he hated hearing her worry for him.

Before SG-1 could react, the alien ordered them to lower their weapons to the ground. "If you do not, he will die." The last thing Jack heard before giving into the blissful darkness pressing in on him was his friends' weapons hitting the firm forest floor.

SG1SG1SG1

"Ugh…" Jack rolled gingerly to his side.

"Sir?" Carter was over him in an instant, clearly concerned.

"Carter?" He asked, his eyes hazy. "What happened?"

"We were ambushed, Sir." Carter said with a sigh.

"Well, ok, I knew that. By who were we ambushed?"

Carter just shook her head. "I don't know, Sir. No one's been here since they threw us in."

"Which was… when… exactly?" He brought a hand up to his head. He had a headache to beat all headaches.

"You have been unconscious for several hours, O'Neill." Teal'c's voice cut through the relative darkness of the cell.

Jack looked at Carter for confirmation. When she nodded, all he could think was damn alien space gun. "That ray gun of theirs had quite a kick." Jack said as he attempted to push himself into a sitting position.

Against her better judgment, Carter helped her CO get up. She knew that telling him not to move would only result in a sarcastic remark and decided to skip the middle man this time. His eyes seemed slightly unfocused and something about him seemed off. She couldn't quite place it.

"Sir, are you ok?" She asked once he was eye-level with her.

"Peachy, Carter. Where's Daniel?"

"I'm here!" Daniel called from the other side of the cell. He was facing the wall, turned away from his teammates.

"Why are you there?" Jack asked. He hoped to God that Daniel had found some method of escape. When Daniel turned around, he realized that he knew better than to indulge such wishful thinking.

Daniel was merely investigating some chicken scratch handwriting carved into the wall.

"Writing on the walls?" Jack asked skeptically.

"Yeah, by-uh, by the last occupant of this cell, I think." Daniel's voice was laced with the tone of excitement that came with learning about other cultures. Even in this situation, the guy got excited about cave drawings.

"So, what… tick marks? The clichéd homemade prison wall calendar?" Jack asked.

"No, no… from what I've been able to decipher it's just a random string of events. Presumably from the poor guy's life. Looks like he had a hard one."

"So he was a few fries short?" Jack clarified.

"Uh… no… I don't think so… the language seems to be a derivation of Gaelic. It says "Sainmhíniú feicthe"which, roughly translated, means 'forced to see.' I'm not sure what it means…"

Jack felt his stomach sink a bit. Daniel might not have pieced it together yet, but Jack thought he was starting to get an idea of what was going on. He had seen slightly similar behavior in the Iraqi prison he'd been held in. "They broke him."

Daniel looked at him questioningly.

Sam asked, "What do you mean, Sir?"

"I've seen it before. People get tortured so badly that the only escape from the pain is to escape inward. They focus so much on their memories that they start to lose a grasp of the present. They start replaying the events of their lives, over and over again, even the painful ones. Eventually, they stop being able to find the line between their thoughts and reality." Carter and Daniel were still looking at him, still not getting the simple, gruesome truth. Jack clarified, "In short, they get tortured so badly that they go insane."

Daniel and Sam exchanged disturbed looks as understanding dawned on them. And they both seemed to share a similar thought process. They knew Jack had done some distasteful things, but torture someone to the point of insanity?

"You-you've seen this?" Daniel asked, unable to keep his morbid curiosity in check. "Where? In people that you…"

Jack's expression changed from grim to slightly mortified. "No! Dammit, Daniel! I've never tortured anyone to the point of…" Jack took a deep breath. He hadn't told his team about Iraq for a reason. That was private. His own demons. They didn't need that burden.

"Look, when you work black ops, you see things. You learn things that you never wanted to even think about. But there it is. Just… trust me on this one, ok? He was tortured by these bastards and he was broken. I say we find a way out of here before we get a firsthand show of the things these bastards are capable of. How about you guys?"

Daniel, Sam, and Teal'c knew better then to push Jack right now. He'd said all he was going to say for the moment.

So Sam dutifully took her CO's lead and changed the subject. "Sir, we've checked the whole cell. Like Teal'c said, you were out for a while. We're not even going to have a chance to get out until a guard comes and opens that gate. Maybe then we can jump him?"

Jack nodded. "Ok, then. We wait for the guard."

SG1SG1SG1SG1SG1SG1SG1

It was hours before there was any movement outside of the cell. When there was, much to SG-1's disappointment, it was a small army of guards. There were at least ten of them. All strategically placed and all armed.

"Crap." Jack muttered. "Looks like Plan A fails." He whispered to Sam. Then he spoke up, addressing the guard closest to the gate. "So, you come to release us?" He flashed his most charming smile.

The guard laughed a cold, humorless laugh. "On the contrary. We come to learn your true purpose for intruding on our land."

"That's funny," Jack said, suppressing a sigh of frustration. "I distinctly remember telling you the real reason we were here before I was shot with that electro-gun of yours. We're explorers. We were exploring."

The guard smiled again. He seemed almost pleased that Jack was not giving in. "Yes, you have already shared that lie with us… now, we will know the true reason." The guard opened the gate; however, the nine guards behind him and, more specifically, their trained weapons, prevented SG-1 from taking the opportunity to escape.

"You three," the guard indicated Carter, Daniel, and Teal'c, "Will kindly stay back. If you do not, your leader will be killed."

The three nodded their understanding. There was nothing that they could do.

"Now, what is your name?" The guard asked.

Jack sighed. If he refused to answer, he assumed the repercussions would be painful. He was unbound. He considered the possibility of fighting back. He was sure he could take this guy in hand to hand. But, the weapons the other guys had locked on his team prevented him from doing so. What's in a name, anyway?

"Colonel Jack O'Neill." Jack said strongly. The arrogance in his smirk didn't even waiver. "And you are-" He was cut off.

"Very good. Why are you here, Colonel?"

Jack sighed, resigned to the fact that painful repercussions were inevitable at this point. "I already told you."

"I am truly sorry that you refuse to answer. I must insist, O'Neill, that you place this on the side of your head." The guard drew an unfortunately familiar circular disk from his pocket.

"A Tok'Ra memory device?" Jack asked with eyebrows raised. "Where the hell did you get that?"

"Tok'Ra? I am unfamiliar with this race. My people discovered this device in an archeological dig. We experimented until we determined its purpose. Now, please put it to your head."

Jack shook his head. "Not a chance." No way was he going to give these guys an all-access pass to his memories.

"I'm afraid I must insist. If you fail to comply, I will begin killing your teammates. Starting with the lovely woman."

Strong emotion flickered briefly through Jack's chocolate eyes. "Ok, ok. Just… don't hurt my team."

The guard nodded. Jack reached out for the device. He pushed it to his temple and felt the familiar sting of the prongs piercing his skin. He took a sudden, hissing breath.

He noticed, much to his horror, that these guys had the complete set. A holographic projector shown on the cell's wall. Before he could control it, the image of him and Sara on the porch of their house was on the wall. And as soon as he realized that, he was so engulfed in the memory that he became completely unaware of the cell, or the horrified looks of his teammates as the gun shot rang through the air.

Jack ran, full speed, into the house and up the stairs. Conscious thought was void. He was moving on instinct. He slammed through his bedroom door and slowed for only a second at the sight of his son, bloody and wheezing, in the white carpet of his and Sara's bedroom floor.

"Charlie!" O'Neill slid to his side, and gently gathered his son in his arms. "Sara, call 911!" Jack called toward the hallway. He heard the beeping of the phone dialing, and then turned his attention back to the small body in his arms. The little boy's green eyes were already dimming.

"Charlie? Charlie, can you hear me?"

"D-Dad?" he coughed. "I'm s-sorry, dad. Don't be mad… p-please…"

"Shh, Charlie, I'm not mad, ok? Just, just take it easy. You're gonna be ok? Alright? Just stay awake." Jack felt the tears falling down his cheeks. He begged and pleaded. Sara was suddenly at his side. She held Charlie's hand.

The ambulance arrived and the paramedics loaded Charlie on the stretcher. Jack watched, numb. He lost track of the next few moments. Next thing he knew, he was sitting in the waiting room at the hospital. The grim-faced doctor approached slowly. Jack and Sara rose slowly. "I'm sorry… we did all we…." His voice faded. Jack felt his knees buckle and he collapsed onto the hard plastic chair. He was vaguely aware that Sara had fallen to the ground, sobbing, but he did not cry. He simply started at the puke-green tiling of the hospital floor…

The memory ended, and the cell slowly faded back into Jack's consciousness. He felt the moisture trailing down his cheeks. "You son of a BITCH!" he looked at his interrogator with nothing but hatred. "Don't you EVER do that again!" Jack's breathing was heavy. He was emotionally raw. The memory had been so vivid that he might as well have been back there.

The guard merely smiled again. "If you tell me the truth, I will not do it again."

Jack launched himself at the guard with a growl. He received a solid punch to the stomach, which forced him to his knees. The fight deflated. "I already told you the truth…" He said quietly.

"Wrong answer…

SG1SG1SG1SG1

After hours of reliving Charlie's death, the guards got bored for the day. Jack was physically exhausted from the emotional strain. He was sprawled on the cell floor. He had managed to maintain his dignity through the whole ordeal. He hadn't cried at all in the follow-up replays. He had a sarcastic remark for his guard after each loop ended, but he was already getting worn down. They needed to find an out soon… or else Jack would be the one writing on the walls.

TBC…

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