SGC

Several hours later…

Hammond watched the computer monitor as he spoke with the President. This wasn't the worst news he'd ever given his commander in chief, but it was necessary.

"Yes sir, the official line is that early this morning at approximately 0800 hours, NORAD tracked a meteor as it entered Earth's atmosphere and landed somewhere in the north Pacific. So far, there's no word from the Chinese government, but I'm sure we'll be hearing from them soon enough. I have a call going through to Colonel Chekov … Yes, sir … I'll be keeping you apprised of the situation."

Hammond hung up the phone and looked at the two men sitting across from him. Teal'c looked concerned. Daniel, his arm now bandaged and in a sling, looked far more worried.

"We located the mother ship. The sonar readings show that it's still intact."

"Then they're still alive," Daniel said with conviction.

"We're going with that assumption," he said as he handed them the sonar readouts. "There's a deep submergence rescue vehicle on route from Pearl Harbor, but we still have to figure out how the crew will gain access to the mothership."

"That can be easily done, General Hammond," Teal'c explained. A mothership's escape pods are jettisoned through pressurized tubes. It may be possible that one of them can be used as a point of access."

"That sounds like our best shot," Hammond agreed.

"There's one other thing, sir," Daniel said quickly. "We don't know if those three Jaffa are the only three there were. There could be more on the ship. We'll need backup and weapons."

Military talk coming from Daniel Jackson? That was interesting. "We?"

"Teal'c and I want to go, sir," Daniel said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Which it was. Hammond expected no less from his premiere team. "There's a plane waiting for you and a jeep to take you to the airport. You'll find extra weapons are already in the jeep. Unfortunately, the submergence vehicle has a limited capacity, and in order to bring back the rest of the team, you won't be able to take any more personnel. It'll have to be the two of you and a sub's pilot. Good luck, gentlemen. Oh, and Doctor Jackson, good luck on explaining that wound to Colonel O'Neill."

"He already knows about it, sir," Daniel replied with a smile as they walked out of the room.

O'Neill already knew? What Hammond wouldn't give to be a fly on the wall when O'Neill got a good look at Daniel's arm.

Teal'c glanced at Daniel and saw that he was watching the scenery pass by, ostensibly lost in thought. He was absently rubbing his wounded arm. Not surprising. The wound was worse than his friend was letting on, and Doctor Fraiser was adamant about not letting Daniel leave the infirmary. His friend's arguments against staying in the infirmary were well met with both medical and logical arguments, but the doctor could not stop him. He was determined to help rescue the rest of SG-1. "I did not thank you before, Daniel Jackson."

That drew Daniel's attention away from the passing scenery. "Thank me? For what?"

"For saving my life on the pel'tak when we were under fire," Teal'c said matter-of-factly.

Daniel smiled a half-smile as if helping the Jaffa was the most natural thing in the world. "You did the same for me."

"Yes, but you killed two Jaffa. I only killed one."

"But you got into hand-to-hand combat. I just fired a zat at the other two. I think your score is higher."

"Perhaps, although I did not know we were keeping a score on our successes and losses in battle. Yet this was your first incursion since you have been back on active duty. O'Neill should no longer be worried about you."

"Wanna bet?" Daniel asked him bluntly.

"No," Teal'c answered.

No, when O'Neill saw Daniel Jackson's arm, he wouldn't be happy.

GOA'ULD HA'TAK

He wasn't moving anymore, that much he was sure of. It was dark wherever he was, and he didn't like it.

He could still sense something, sense that there was someone near, but he didn't know who or where. Were the Jaffa moving around? Thor didn't know, but he didn't sense danger from whoever it was.

Waiting was not an O'Neill virtue, not by a long shot. He was used to it, he could do it, but he didn't like it. The whole not-knowing routine wasn't fun, and he was tired of it.

So, here they were, sitting in a pyramid on the bottom of the ocean with nothing to do. He needed to remember to pack Gameboys on missions.

At least Daniel and Teal'c were safely above the surface.

"He's all right, Jack," Jacob said.

Sitting on the steps of the throne, the two men were waiting and watching Sam and Davis do whatever they were doing at the computer console.

"Who's that?" Jack asked.

"Daniel. You heard them. It was only a scratch."

"They were lying," Jack told him. "I know Daniel. I know how he sounds when he's really hurt."

"Jack –"

"It's his first mission in three months. Hell, I asked Hammond for an easy one for our first mission back as a full team, and this was supposed to be easy. I even left him on the pel'tak just in case, but he got shot anyway." Jack then saw how Jacob was holding his arm. "How are you doing?"

"I've got a few burns and a broken collarbone. Selmak's working on it." Jacob shifted position, trying to get comfortable.

"Forget it," Jack told him. "We don't have any cushions to sit on." The activity at the computer console still didn't interest him. It was too much technobabbling. "You know, for guys with no life signs, those Jaffa looked pretty lively to me. Did a lot of damage."

Jacob nodded his head in agreement. "I've been thinking about that. They must have been trapped in the section of the ship that was sealed off. Life support around it had been cut off. To stay alive as long as possible, they would have gone into a deep state of kel'no'reem. That would slow down their heartbeats to one or two beats per minutes. The pel'tak's sensors aren't sensitive enough to have picked them up in that condition."

"There's only one door in the computer core. It had blast marks on it from where they tried to shoot their way out, but if all of the atmosphere was siphoned out of the surrounding rooms, they didn't have anywhere to go. How'd they get out? When did they?"

"I have no idea."

Well, that was comforting. Not. "Think there are any more running around?"

Jacob tried one more time to settle into a more comfortable position. "Doubt it. I'm hoping there were only the three of them." After a few more moments, Jacob whispered, "Exactly when did Davis become an expert on alien technology?"

"He's not," Jack answered, "but he's been learning. Anyway, he knows more than I do and you're recuperating so he's the only one who can help Carter."

"Ah."

Whatever Carter and Davis were doing at the computer console, they finally finished. Neither looked happy as they approached the two sitting men.

"Well?" Jack asked.

"Well, we got life support operating at fifty percent. It won't be too comfortable in here, but we won't freeze to death. At least, not right away."

"Can we fix the engines?" Jacob asked.

Davis shook his head. "Not a chance. They're fried, but that's not our only problem. It looks like there's some structural damage on the lower levels. We probably got that when we hit bottom."

"How bad?" Jacob wanted to know.

"We can't be sure with the computer not functioning properly," Sam explained, "but with the exterior pressure being pretty severe, it wouldn't take much to compromise the hull."

Okay, enough pessimism. "Yoo hoo, folks," Jack raised his finger in the air to get their attention. "Help's on the way. Remember? Daniel? Teal'c? SGC? Submarines?"

"We don't know how long it will take for them to get here, sir," Sam told him. "But regardless of that fact, there's still the matter of the self-destruct sequence that's frozen halfway through its countdown."

"You haven't turned that off yet?"

"To be honest, sir, it might be a mistake to try."

She hadn't even tried? "Carter?"

"I've rechecked some of the logs. The first door to the computer core was locked, and then when the Jaffa tried to blast their way out from the other door, the entire section was sealed off and life support was shut down. Effectively, that should have killed the Jaffa, but it didn't. There was some life support still functioning in the section they were trapped in but no way for them to get out. I'm assuming that they rerouted some oxygen there since all sections surrounding the one they were trapped in was deprived of oxygen."

Jacob seemed to catch her drift before Jack did. "So the question would be who or how did the air get sucked out of those areas, huh."

"Actually, it's more of a what."

"A what?" Jack interjected.

"Sir, I think this is further proof that we're working with an intelligent virus, and I believe that Thor is the one who did it."

"But we have no proof," Davis added.

"Even so, what if the virus was only trying to defend itself?"

"Didn't that happen in The Matrix movies?" Jack asked but was ignored.

Jacob coughed, clearing his throat. "So, Thor leaves a virus behind to force Anubis to abandon his ship but then it starts defending itself against the Jaffa that Anubis left behind to blow the ship?"

"Or maybe it was left here to help us," Sam mentioned. "To tell you truth, Dad, I just don't know." Then she turned her attention to Jack. "Sir, I'd like to return to the computer core. We might find some information there."

"Beats the hell of waiting around here. I'll go too. Besides, these steps are making my backside ache."

CONTROL ROOM – SGC

Hammond stood at the table with the Navy liaison, both looking over the underwater schematics of the area the ha'tak went down. The area was clear of rocks and debris. Certainly, there were no underwater obstructions that would get in the way of a rescue. The problem was the ship itself possibly creating a hazard.

"As you can see, General," the captain pointed out the obvious, "the problem is getting down there in a brief period of time. One can't just dive down that far due to the pressurization. This won't be a fast rescue."

"I understand. We just need to get that sub down there. I'm grateful for the Navy's help."

Sergeant Davis approached the two officers. "Excuse me, sirs. The task force just contacted us. The DSRV is about a half mile down now. They're expecting them to be at the ha'tak in about an hour."

"I hope that's soon enough," Hammond commented. He didn't want to admit it, but he had a bad feeling about this rescue.

GOA'ULD HA'TAK

The blasted computerized mumbling was incessant! It wasn't stopping their entire trip back to the computer core. "This has gone past annoying and has gone straight to nerve-wracking!" Jack complained.

"Sir?"

"That!" he indicated the noise that was going on and on and on. "What the hell is it?"

"We're not sure, sir. Major Davis is correct. It's coming over the ship's intercom. It could be the virus trying to communicate with us."

"A talking virus, Carter? Isn't that a little far-fetched?"

"Maybe not, sir. Not if Thor left one behind."

"If," Jack repeated. "Big if."

On they walked until they stopped in front of a closed door that refused to open. What got Jack's attention is the small puddle of water on the floor he stepped in. "Uh oh. Somebody had an accident."

"Dad," Sam spoke into the radio, "we've got evidence of flooding. There's water in the corridor."

"Hang on, Sammy," they heard Jacob say, and then overheard Davis help him to a standing position. A few moments passed, then "The computer says that there's a hull breach on the engineering level."

"Jacob, we're not near engineering, right?"

"No. It looks like seawater penetrated the central access shaft. Now the pressure is pushing it up through the core of the ship. Basically, we're flooding from the inside."

"Help's coming," Jack reminded them. "What do we do now?"

Suddenly, the door behind them slammed shut.

"Dad, the door's closing behind us," Sam said loudly as she tried to open it. The pad panel refused to access. "I can't get it to open."

"It's a security measure," Jacob answered. "All the doors are now sealed behind the breach. Hang on, I'll try to open it from here."

The water started to seep in faster and was soon up around their ankles. "It's getting a bit chilly here, Jacob, not to mention a little wet. How's it going with that door?"

"This could take some time."

DEEP SUBMERGENCE RECONNAISSANCE VESSEL

General Hammond had been right. The DSRV was small and uncomfortable and packing three people inside made it more cramped than usual. Getting four more in there was going to be a very tight fit.

Inside the DSRV, Daniel and Teal'c saw the ha'tak appear in their view port. It was as impressive a sight underwater as it was in space.

Teal'c spoke into the microphone, "O'Neill, this is Teal'c. Do you read?"

Silence.

"O'Neill?"

"Maybe there's interference?" Daniel suggested.

"That is possible," Teal'c agreed.

The pilot slowed down the DSRV slightly, and then announced in the radio, "Command, we have visual contact. We have not been able to raise any of the team inside the ship."

"Roger that," a voice answered back. "Keep in contact."

"Affirmative."

The pilot craned his neck and saw his passengers getting ready to disembark. "Sirs, we've had some simulations run. We think they'd have to place life support on half to conserve oxygen, so it might be a little hard to breathe when you first get there. And it's probably getting cold over there."

"We will be fine," Teal'c told him. "You must align your vessel's hatch directly with the shaft entrance in order for us to disembark safely."

"Yes, sir," then, to Daniel, "Doctor Jackson, are you sure you want to do this? You're wounded, and you don't know what you may run into."

Daniel had already removed the sling but was still favoring the arm. "I'm going. I'll be fine."

"Yes, sir. We'll be docking in a few minutes."