Chapter 28 - Not a Rock or an Island
Jack awoke at his usual insanely early hour. He had an important personal item of business this morning that could wait no longer. He had to get out of the damn dress. There was no way he was going to be wearing that when his team showed up that day.
Unfortunately, he was trapped in toga hell and could find nothing else. He tried for about five minutes to tie a toga into pants of some kind but it was beyond him. He settled for an extra t-shirt from his gear and wrapped half a toga around his waist. "Very Braveheart," he thought. He could live with that for now.
He looked for something for Chanah. Her toga was in shreds and covered with blood. She didn't seem to mind, but Jack did and there were the kids to consider. The only problem was that Chanah's toga and her bloody lesions from the whip were now dried into a suit upon her. It wasn't going to be pretty removing it. Jack got her to cooperate by telling her he needed to count her lash marks. It was just possible she had overtaken him in the scar contest. She rolled her eyes at him, but still let him help. As Jack gently cleaned her wounds and helped her dress, he noticed a certain flatness in her reactions. Jack was beginning to worry that Chanah was sealing herself off again.
Afterwards Jack and the kids raided the kitchens. Jack helped the kids put together a feast for breakfast. He was concerned that Chanah would not eat and pulled away from the repast. He thought she was unnecessarily hurting their feelings by not partaking.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah. A little sore."
"Whipping will do that. No appetite?"
"It may be a long time."
"Think the kids are disappointed you're not trying their food."
"Oh. I'm sorry. I just can't, not yet."
"Anything I should know about?"
"No. Just something put me off the feed for awhile."
"Like what?"
"Like the skuzzy snakehead chomping on my intestines."
"He ate your entrails? Ewwwwwwwwwwwwww, gross."
"You knew about this habit?"
"Mmmm. Daniel briefed us on the ancient Egyptian god Babi. Seemed he liked to do that. Kind of tried to forget it."
"I should be so lucky."
"I'll explain you're feeling sick."
"You won't be stretching the truth."
"At least have something to drink."
"Maybe."
Jack sent one of Chanah's groupies back with a beverage which she managed to swallow graciously. When breakfast was done, they left the detritus behind and headed outside the temple grounds for fresh air. Chanah's spirits seemed to revive somewhat away from food, but Jack wondered how long she could keep going without eating. It had been several days at least.
Through the morning, Jack occasionally stole sly glances at Chanah. They had done good. The chance to do that was what kept them both going despite all the crap that life had thrown at them. She was way stronger than Jack had believed when he'd decided to stay. Like a train that couldn't be stopped, even if its brakes were pulled. But still he could see her starting to disconnect emotionally, returning to that numb state. He rationalized it was temporary, from physical abuse and lack of food.
When Teal'c, Carter, Dr. Frasier and the rest of the SGC team arrived, it was a pleasant reunion for Jack with his friends.
"Nice skirt, sir. Very Mel Gibson," Carter commented.
"You think my legs are as good as his?"
"Couldn't say, sir," Carter said stifling a giggle.
Neither Jack nor Chanah would let the medical team treat them until all the children were examined. Dr. Frasier looked at Chanah askance, and then looked at Jack. "Sounds like someone's been hanging out with you too long." Jack just shrugged.
After greetings were exchanged, Chanah disappeared into the background. The presence of all these friends of O'Neill was a reminder of her separateness.
Jack ribbed Carter about her sprained arm. She expected it. Carter did not for a second believe Jack when he claimed he was "just peachy" after a whole week on this rock. She did not know his t-shirt hid some nasty bite marks. When Jack learned about Daniel's sprain, he laughed and shook his head.
"So many kids, so little of me to save them all."
Carter let him have his fun. She was relieved to find him well, and pleasantly surprised that he seemed a little happier than she could recall seeing him in a long time. "Colonel, you seem – different – somehow. Anything I should know?"
"I just love it when a plan comes together, Carter."
Jack was not giving anything away, if there was anything to be had. She let it drop.
After a while, Jack realized that Chanah had disappeared. He felt upended at the thought that she might just walk off into the sunset without a word. The gate was a long way off; he hoped she hadn't walked to it because he couldn't see her making it in her present condition. He asked her three girl groupies about if they'd seen her. In the manner of preteen girls, they told him yes, and then digressed for ten minutes. First they had to tell Jack how amazing she was, and recount everything they'd seen Babi do to her and how defiant she was. Only after that did they tell him where she went. She'd headed back inside the temple.
Jack's hackles were raised. It wasn't that long ago that Ba'al had done to him what Babi had done to Chanah. Even after Jack escaped, he had to fight shutting down from the horrors of that experience. He'd come back from it better and faster than he'd expected, but only because of the tremendous support he had from his teammates and friends at the SGC, mostly in the form of distraction. He was Jack after all, and he wasn't going to share the details of his torture with anyone.
Comparatively speaking, Chanah was an island. She worked alone. She was alone. Jack feared she was bottoming out or else why would she go back to the temple. He went after her.
When he neared the throne room, he heard an almost rhythmic thumping. He peeked in to see Chanah swinging her staff for the fences on the body of the dead Goa'uld. She kept going and going, tears streaming down her face, until her hands bled all the way through the bandages and she ran out of strength. She collapsed to a cross-legged sit and sat there rocking gently, the tears continuing. Jack's instincts were torn: give her space or comfort her? Having gone to all the trouble of finding her, he decided against leaving.
He sat down beside her and hugged her. "I think Skippy's mostly dead now."
"Mostly dead?" Chanah looked at Jack disbelievingly.
"Let me check. Never mind. He's quite dead now." Jack grinned impishly, shifting his eyes to one side.
She looked at his face, wiped her tears with her bloody bandages, and shook her head at him. Then she broke into a soft smile.
"Ya think?"
They sat for a few minutes, giggling and shaking their heads at the absurdity of it all.
"What say we carve up his entrails for supper?" Jack aimed right for the six year old gross out humor again.
"Pass." Chanah wasn't quite ready to make fun of that yet.
"So what next, princess of overkill?"
"Don't know."
"Try some of this," Jack said putting a piece of dark chocolate between her lips. "No chewing required. Just let it melt."
She complied. "Mmmm."
"It's chocolate. Makes it all better."
"Going to need a lot of it to make that true."
"Much as you need. Of that or anything else."
"I'm tired, O'Neill."
"A vacation then."
"A what?"
"You know, you go someplace to see the sights or to get away from it all. I've got a nice little fishing cabin in Minnesota. Sunshine, water, peace and quiet."
"I'm not cleaning fish guts for a long time, O'Neill."
"S'okay. Never catch any."
"Maybe someday. But I need to go home first."
"Whenever. Invitation's open."
"Thanks. Let's get the hell out of here now."
"Let's see Doc first or those hands won't be good for fishing or anything else," he smirked.
They sauntered back side by side saying little, and looking like they'd been comrades for a long time. When they arrived in front of the temple again, Doc Frasier made a bee line for Chanah's hands. She would not be put off this time.
Daniel was waiting there too. Jack slapped him on the back, just hard enough to make sure he lurched forward a little bit on his crutch. "Gee thanks a lot, Jack."
"Just happy to see you mostly in one piece, Daniel! Chanah, this is Dr. Daniel Jackson."
"Pleased to see you again. I'd shake hands, but . . ." Chanah said looking at her mangled mitts.
Daniel mumbled "ouch" at the less than pretty sight.
"Chanah, someone came with me, someone who'd like to see you." Daniel looked in the direction of a crowd of children. Chanah's girl groupies were yakking it up with a preteen boy that Jack did not recall seeing before.
Chanah let out a small gasp, "Micah."
"He wanted to see why you came here, why you do what you do. He's ready to try to understand."
Chanah got up, leaving Doc's ongoing ministrations, one hand still steeped in blood. She went to him slowly, with trepidation. She was overjoyed he was here, but thought she would melt into the earth at any more of his anger now.
Daniel put his arms out to stop either Doc or Jack from following.
"Who's Micah?" Jack wanted to know.
"Chanah's son."
"Her what?"
"You heard me."
"She never said."
"He hasn't spoken to her for over a year, since her father died. He blames her for killing him."
"Geez. That black hole was even deeper and darker."
"Huh?"
"Never mind, Daniel. You did good, bringing him back to her." Jack spoke to Daniel but kept his eyes trained on Chanah.
"Yeah, thanks, Jack. Looks like you did too." Daniel wondered what had happened this week. He could see Jack was elsewhere when he talked to him.
Jack sent Teal'c, Carter and Daniel off to arrange a little surprise. Daniel protested until Jack spelled out the word "O-R-D-E-R." In their absence, Jack finally let Doc Frasier privately examine his bite wounds. It was the first time Jack ever asked her for a shot - of the strongest antibiotics known - and he didn't care where she wanted to inject it. Then he got out of the damn skirt into BDUs.
Jack milled around for a while hanging out with the kids, and frequently checked his eyes back towards Chanah and her son. Eventually, Chanah headed his way with Micah.
"Colonel O'Neill, this is my son, Micah."
"Pleased to meet you, Micah. Your mother speaks very proudly of you." Jack told the white lie without a hint of insincerity.
"She does?" Micah responded happily in the way that all children do when they are made to feel the center of their parent's universe.
Meanwhile, Dr. Frasier abducted Chanah to finish her ministrations. Jack took advantage of the moment.
"I know how happy she is for you to come here, to give her a chance. She's helped a lot of people like these children, who had lives with no hope. You should be proud of her too. She's been through things that no one should ever have to go through."
"I know. The girls told me. Dr. Jackson told me. It's not that I'm not proud of her. It's just that . . . that it cost my dad his life. It's not fair."
"I know it's not. Sometimes no matter how hard we try to protect people, things go wrong, people we care about get hurt."
"Dr. Jackson explained a lot to me. I'm trying to understand."
"It will mean everything to your mother. She needs you now more than you can know."
Chanah returned from Dr. Frasier's care which had been speeded along by Daniel's obtaining lots of the Tinkerer's healing patches.
"Micah, Colonel O'Neill was very helpful to my work here. He protected my 'six" so I could come home to you."
"On your planet, it's a seven," Jack reminded her.
Micah looked up at them quizzically. "I'll explain later," Chanah promised.
"Maybe Micah and you will come fishing soon?"
"On a different planet?" Micah was already hooked.
"One that sounds a whole lot like the planet where your mom was born. You might even have some distant relatives still there."
"Excellent."
Jack winked at Chanah. Then he signaled to Carter, Daniel and Teal'c, who moved everyone back a little further from the temple.
Jack handed Chanah a detonator and let her blow Babi's temple to kingdom come.
"Sweet," they said in unison.
End - TWO SEQUELS: "Bridge Over Troubled Water" and "Hello Darkness My Old Friend".
