Setting: Season 2, sometime after "The Tokra"

Spoilers: Anything up to and including "The Tokra"

Rating: T for some language and medical stuff

POV: Sam throughout

Notes: I have decided to repost this story after doing some editing and chapter additions. Conversations/snippets of chat that Sam overhears, but aren't directed at her, are in italics.

The Operation: Chapter I

I fight for consciousness as blood soaks through my makeshift bandages and onto the white sheet of the gurney beneath me. I can barely keep my eyes open, yet somehow find the strength to weakly push the clear plastic mask away as Dr. Frasier attempts to place it over my face.

"It's alright, Sam, I'm just gonna give you some oxygen." She gives me that warm, doe-like smile of hers and this reassures me; I let Janet secure the mask over my face and even hold it in place myself for several seconds with shaky, clammy fingers, in the same way a toddler might grip a bottle of milk after it is handed to her.

I inhale the gas, the coolness of which is surprisingly soothing, and the thick plastic fogs up with my exhale. I repeat. With each breath of oxygen I begin to feel slightly better, despite the blood loss from the deep shrapnel wounds to my stomach and thigh.

I feel myself begin to move and through a fog - and over the screech of the gurney's wheels - I can hear General Hammond beginning to debrief Colonel O'Neill, but their conversation quickly becomes inaudible as we round the corner and speed down the hallway.

I must have lost consciousness during the trip, because I'm suddenly jostled awake when two nurses grab the corners of the sheet that I'm lying on and hoist me over to a surface just as hard and cold as the gurney. Janet is visible out of the left side of my peripheral vision, striding purposefully into the room with her gloved hands held fingers-up in front of her, asking somebody to please tie her gown.

The warm blanket covering me is pulled away, and from the cold rush of air I realize that I'm naked, save for my underpants. When did that happen? A multitude of EKG leads have been placed on my body - lots on my chest, a few on my arms and legs - and hooked up to a small white monitor, which beeps in an annoying rhythm every thirty seconds or so.

Beep beep beep beepbeep, beep beep beep beepbeep.

An older woman of about fifty, wearing a surgical cap and mask, checks the patency of one of the EKG leads, then replaces the blanket. I feel warmth once again.

There's a pinching in the crook of my right elbow, and I rotate my head to see that an IV has been inserted and hastily secured in place with medical tape. I follow the extension line upwards and can see that it runs through an infusion pump, above which hangs a clear plastic bag of some sort of fluid. My vision is swimming too badly to allow me to read the contents - not that I particularly care at the moment. Janet's voice rings out from across the room, gentle yet firm.

"Have we pre-medded yet?"

"I administered Ace at 14:39."

"Do you have your ET tubes laid out?"

"Yes, Doctor. I have three different sizes, just in case."

"Good. Is there anyone to open my packs?"

A rush of soft-soled footsteps and a different voice, younger and perhaps even nervous sounding. "Sorry, Ma'am. I have the packs right here. And I got two drapes, since we're doing the stomach and then the thigh."

"Excellent, excellent. Have we gotten a PCV yet?"

A sound of breaking glass and a voice echo from across the room. "Gonna be a few minutes…damn centrifuge wasn't balanced properly."

"Just get it to me when you can, Karen; it's not critical. We're gonna have a unit of O negative standing by anyway." The bright light hovering over me is suddenly eclipsed as Janet leans down over me. "You're gonna be okay, honey. We're just gonna put you to sleep, but before you go to sleep I want you to think nice thoughts. Can you do that for me?"

I nod weakly.

"Atta girl. Your dad's been called; he should be here when you wake up. Alright, let's go ahead and induce and intubate."

Out of the corner of my eye I see the woman in the surgical mask - who I presume is the anesthetist - pull a large syringe full of what looks like skim milk off of the vital signs machine…