Disclaimer: We do not own 'Stargate: SG-1', 'Stargate: Atlantis' or any of the characters associated with either show. If we did, Season Nine would have been... different.

Part XXI

Minucius was sitting by her bedside when she woke up.

Sam had half-expected this, but she still found it difficult to conceal the revulsion she felt when she opened her eyes to see the man she knew to be responsible for the murder of millions of people and the enslavement of millions more sitting less than six feet away from her, his head bowed and his hands clasped, as though in prayer. Fortunately, it took a moment for him to register that she was awake and by the time he did, she had carefully suppressed any hint of disgust in her expression, even managing to force a small smile.

"The gods be praised!" Minucius exclaimed, rising and moving to stand by her side. "How are you feeling, Lady Samantha?"

"What happened?" Her voice sounded strange to her own ears, hoarse and cracked. The left side of her neck throbbed painfully and, probing gingerly with tentative fingers, she could feel a gauze pad taped over the wound.

"You were shot, Colonel Carter." Teal'c had never been one to mince words or to sugar coat an issue.

"Low-calibre sniper rifle," Hailey elaborated. "A quarter-inch further right, you wouldn't be here now." She was standing by the next bed, upon which Felger sat, pale and frozen, the look on his face suggesting he'd probably thrown up. His hands and sleeves were covered in blood. It was probably going to be a long time before he could be persuaded to go offworld again.

Pushing herself into a sitting position, Sam registered that she was in the Athena's infirmary and that she had managed to draw quite a considerable audience. In addition to Dr Brightman and her staff, Minucius was present - for once without his entourage of bodyguards, although Sam did not doubt that they were within hearing range - and Teal'c, Bra'tac, Jonas and Ferretti had all gathered in the room, with Kaímar stationing himself at the head of her bed.

"I must offer you my deepest and most sincere apologies, my lady," Minucius looked genuinely distressed. "I should have taken more care with your safety while you were a guest of the Dominion, and under my protection. I was overconfident and believed that our escort would be sufficient but I was wrong and I humbly ask your forgiveness for allowing you to be hurt. I don't know what I would have done if anything worse had happened to you."

"Don't worry about it." Sam said, inwardly wondering how on Earth he could possibly have thought that he would be able to do any more to protect her. As it was, she had been all but tripping over their escort – double Minucius' usual, as they were to guard her as well as him – and there was very little anyone could have done to stop a determined sniper, no matter how many bodyguards he surrounded her with. "I'm fine. Did you catch the man?" She asked, in what she hoped was a suitably worried tone. "Was he one of the rebels you were telling me about?"

"You need not fret about him, my dear," Minucius' patted her hand lightly, his avuncular demeanour returning. "I have made certain that he will never be able to harm you again – and that others will think twice before they dare to raise arms against you."

Sam forced a smile to her face. "Thank you."

"Do not mention it, my dear; it was my duty and my pleasure to see that he was dealt with appropriately. If you are feeling strong enough, will you honour me with the pleasure of your company at dinner tonight?" He asked hopefully. "My people will be anxious to see for themselves that you are safe and well. They have been praying for your safe recovery."

"I'm afraid that won't be possible." Although her smile and tone were both pleasant, there was a slight hint of steel in her words. The thought of sitting through another of his elaborate banquets, pretending to be amused by and approving of the stories he told her, made her feel nauseous.

"Oh?" His displeasure at being refused was plain.

"I'd love to be able to stay," Sam excused herself, "but I work within a chain of command and there are certain procedures that I have to follow. Clearly I'm not the most popular person around here. My presence here could make matters worse, and I have to meet with my superiors to figure out what happens next, and if we should return to this galaxy at all or move on to explore somewhere else."

"But, my dear," Minucius protested, clearly less than pleased by the thought that his 'angel' might leave and never return, "it is doubtful that the rebels will dare to launch a second attack against you, not after the first was unsuccessful and their agent was caught. I'm certain that it would be safe for you to remain here if you wish to, and I myself will stand guarantor for your safety."

Refraining from reminding him that he had been apologizing profusely for his failure to protect her less than two minutes ago, Sam smiled reassuringly. "I'm sure that you could, Patrician, and I appreciate your offer, but I really do need to get back to Earth and report back to my superiors. The chain of command is very important to us and I have to abide by it. They need to know what's happening here."

"I understand." He said at last. His smile was clearly forced. "I hope that you will return, soon."

"I hope so too." Sam responded politely.

"Then farewell, my dear, and remember that there will always be a welcome for you in Antlia."

"You're very kind."

He turned to leave the infirmary, but stopped at the doorway, turning back to look at her. "You are certain that you are well?" He pressed anxiously. "I could send for my own doctors to tend you; the most skilled physicians in the Dominion are in my employ."

"That won't be necessary, I feel fine." Sam assured him, clinging tightly to the remains of her patience, touching the bandage on her neck briefly. "He was a pretty lousy shot."

"That guy was one hell of a shot," she exclaimed, the moment Minucius had left, before her mind snapped back to what the dictator had told her about the shooter.

"What happened to him?" she asked, turning to Teal'c.

"He very nearly escaped," he told her slowly, "but the Patrician's guards managed to reach the city limits and blockade all exit points before he could leave."

"And when they found him?"

"They did not."

Sam paused at this. "Didn't Minucius say he'd been 'dealt with'?"

When Teal'c didn't answer right away, Kaímar took over. "The moment the shot was fired, a great many people flocked towards the gates of the city, so as to avoid being implicated in the event, even as a witness. Cowards," he spat. "When the soldiers couldn't identify the assassin among so many, they picked half a dozen slaves from the crowd, shot one in the face, and called out that he had one minute to reveal himself unless he wished for the rest to die."

"He gave himself up?"

"Yes. The soldiers bound his hands and feet, shot the remaining slaves before his eyes, stabbed him in the stomach, and left, but not before announcing that any attempt to help him would be punishable by death, on the Patrician's order. Teal'c and I approached him once the guards had departed. Nobody else dared go near him. The guards who remained at the gates were watching us. There was nothing we could do for him," he announced solemnly, "except end his suffering."

Sam felt her stomach churning, and was glad she hadn't eaten. "Son of a bitch!" she breathed, shaking. Catching Kaímar's slightly stricken face, she realized that he thought she was talking about him and Teal'c. "You did the right thing," she assured him. "It could have taken him hours to die like that, maybe days, and you can be sure that nobody else would have had the courage to do a thing for him."

"Umm, Major Carter?" said Felger tremulously – given that he still looked like he could be ill again at any moment, Sam didn't bother to point out that it had been a long time since she'd been a major – "do we really care what happened him? What they did to the others may have been horrible, but this guy tried to kill you!"

Reaching for a glass of water by the bed, Sam took a couple of painful sips and set it back down. "His job wasn't to kill me," she announced, hesitating a little at the stunned looks on the faces of Felger and Hailey, the only two gathered around her who hadn't known.

"When Ferretti's team were sent back by the rebels, they were given a contact frequency. I spoke with the guy running the group who'd grabbed them, and we worked out a deal." Ignoring Ferretti's half-stifled snort of derision, she continued. "Everything that's happening around here, the war, the slavery, Minucius managing to have himself proclaimed a hero for killing millions of people in a single attack, it's all a direct result of the encounter with Prometheus. If I'd left Minucius stranded in that nebula, he never would have escaped, and his side would have had no choice but to surrender.

"The rebels are holding me accountable for sending Minucius back, and they're demanding that I do something about it. As if that weren't enough, when I spoke to Minucius before, he was talking about expanding his territory once he's dealt with the rebels. He plans on moving on Pegasus next. Between the Wraith and the Genii, and God knows what else, adding this to Atlantis' list of things to deal with could be the straw that broke the camel's back. After that, his next stop is our galaxy – and even with help from the Asgard and the Jaffa Nation, we won't be able to come close to matching their numbers. They'd wear us down eventually."

"How does this lead to you agreeing to be shot?" Hailey demanded, as if asking a teenager to explain trying to steal from her parents.

"There's no way Minucius would just let me leave," Sam told her, "not without a very good reason. He's built up a cult around my name, and it's helped keep him in power. This way, he can cling to the thought that I might be coming back, and maybe even hope I bring an army with me when I do. The rebels are pretty hesitant about trusting me, but now we know they're willing to take the risk; otherwise, they would've killed me today.

"We're going to head back to Earth. I'll be meeting with General Landry, and probably General O'Neill, to try and figure out what our next move is. Minucius is too big a threat to ignore. We're gonna have to deal with him pretty soon. We just need to decide on how."

Sam had never thought she'd see a room full of soldiers – and Felger – look so aghast. Teal'c and Bra'tac exchanged quick glances full of cryptic meaning, before turning to Sam, their eyes filled with something that looked annoyingly like pity. Ferretti, who had remained decidedly quiet since the previous day, when his third objection to Sam's deal with the rebels had gone ignored, stared pointedly at the ground, his expression like something out of the old Incredible Hulk TV series, as if he were keeping a very tightly shut lid on his rage, but would doubtless explode soon no matter what he tried. Hailey was clearly disgusted, but said nothing.

Even Felger's expression was torn between horror and fury. Oddly, it was Kaímar who seemed most uncomfortable. His eyes darted towards the faces all around him, clearly confused. What his opinion on the matter was, Sam had no idea, as he hadn't spoken on it. He seemed to be checking with the others to see what a normal human response would be. Sam couldn't help but think that this might not be the best way to learn about human society. For one thing, since coming aboard Athena he had yet to meet what most might consider a 'normal' human, and was unlikely to do so anytime soon.

Sam was saved having to address the inevitable tirade of questions and concerns by the timely arrival of Dr. Brightman, who announced that they were taking up far too much room – she looked pointedly at T'ealc and Kaímar – and asked that they all leave.

Sam herself was fit for discharge in no time at all, once she'd assured the doctor that she didn't plan on working for the rest of the day. For the second time in her relatively short time since the initial launch, the 'rudimentary' medical equipment provided for Athena by the Asgard had been put to use, and the only evidence of the shooting that remained was a round, pink scar on the side of Sam's neck. Sam had declined the doctor's suggestion of one more pass under the machine to deal with the scar, was given two iron tablets, and ordered to rest, which she insisted she could do in her own quarters.

She left the infirmary to find Ferretti waiting outside. He fell in step with her as she walked towards her quarters.

"Permission to speak freely, Colonel?" he asked with deceptive politeness.

"You've been doing a lot of that lately; I doubt I could stop you."

"Well, you'd be right." Glancing over his shoulder to see that the corridor was clear, he continued, "One of the unfortunate duties of an XO is to let the boss know when she's acting like a complete…"

"I've already heard your opinion," Sam told him shortly.

"With all due respect, ma'am, I think you need to hear it again," Ferretti snapped. "You can't claim responsibility for what this psycho did after you were unfortunate enough to cross his path, and as an officer in United States Air Force, what you allowed to happen this morning was way out of line. It could be grounds for me to relieve you of your command and turn you in for a psych evaluation the moment we get back to Earth."

"If you were going to do that, you would have done it before this morning. Since you haven't, let's assume you're not going to. Are we on course for Earth?"

"Yes, ma'am, but we still need to talk about…"

"Then that'll be all. I'm going to turn in, before I pass out." She stopped and turned to face him. "Dismissed, Major."

For an instant, he looked like he might strangle her. Finally, he gave a stiff salute and marched away, his fists clenched as he walked.

When he reached the bridge, Ferretti assumed his usual chair and turned to Captain Sherwin. "How long before we'll be in contact range of Earth?"

"We could send a recorded or data transmission now, sir. Direct contact will be possible in sixdays."

"I left a written message on the main server," he told her, "encrypted for top level clearance. Mark it for the attention of General O'Neill, and send it on."

"Yes, sir."

TBC.