"Care to tell me what the hell's going on out there, Nathan?" McGath didn't exactly sound angry, but he was far from calm. Irate, or perhaps frustrated, was a more fitting descriptor for the man right then.

"Everything's under control," Nathan returned. He had decided to forgo sitting down, opting instead to remain standing in his ready room, his hands gripping the back of the chair as he stood facing the view screen.

"Really?" McGath was obviously sceptical. "Then why is it that we received a call from the staff at Renford telling us that you had reversed course and returned to the area? And why, exactly, did their Head of Operations inform me that you personally, Nathan, had been planning to head over to the station to speak with them, only to scrap those plans less than an hour later?" With a very clear frown on his face McGath went on, "You can see why we would be concerned about behaviour like that, I hope."

He could, and clearly at that, but the last thing he wanted was to explain to the Secretary General what exactly was currently unfolding aboard the seaQuest. Nathan couldn't exactly explain it properly himself despite having several of the facts, or what they were working with as facts. It would be the last thing they needed as well, given what McGath's reaction was likely to be. The mere mention of such a breach would set in motion a sequence of undesirable events, not limited to the boarding of seaQuest by an outside investigative team who would only further muddy the waters, and very likely a second roundup of all known psychics. Nathan remembered all too well just how close to disaster they had come the last time that had happened and he was in no rush to trigger anything similar. As dangerous as this psychic they were dealing with obviously was, Nathan didn't want any innocent parties caught up in this mess.

"There was a misunderstanding," he told the man on the screen, trusting his ability to downplay a potential catastrophic situation and convince others that everything was under control. The Secretary General might have dismissed that claim only a minute earlier but once the initial clamour of confusion was out of the way things would be all right. Nathan had to believe so. "We apologised to Mr. Hockler and the rest of his team for the inconvenience, and any concern we might have caused."

"What kind of misunderstanding, Nathan?" That frustration was building, or perhaps it was exasperation. All of a sudden Nathan had the distinct impression that McGath was not only tired, but exhausted. Working too hard, most likely. Was there something else going on that he wasn't aware of? Possibly, but he trusted that the man would tell him everything he needed to know as soon as he could. "You have to see this from my perspective. We've got the UEO flagship acting erratically, which naturally raises questions about those at the helm of said flagship."

Nathan told himself not to take that personally. "It's really nothing to worry about," he said. "You'll have my report as soon as we've cleared up the last of the confusion and everything is squared away." He didn't know how much more he could dismiss the situation without truly arousing suspicion. He had to be careful. "You have my word, General, everything is fine."

McGath sighed, heavily enough that Nathan heard it clearly on his end of the line. He saw it too, particularly in the heave and drop of the other man's shoulders. "If I take you at your word and this turns out to be more than you're saying it is—" He paused there, almost as if he expected an interruption, but Nathan knew that such a thing would only undo the conviction he was attempting to convey. "I don't need to tell you how messy things could get." With a shake of his head he went on, "Honestly, given the sorts of reports we've been receiving from seaQuest lately, there have been a lot of questions on this end."

With a tilt of his head he asked, "What kinds of questions?"

McGath looked almost reluctant to continue. He glanced off to the side for a moment, as if considering his words carefully. "I don't need to tell you how reports of actual gods look to those on the board, Nathan, surely?"

"No, you don't," he returned, and he did so with the smallest chuckle because he genuinely did know how that looked. Jonathan had been concerned about that as well, very much so. "Trust me, Mr. Secretary, I was well aware of that fact as I was writing said report."

The other man actually showed a small smile then, fleeting though it was. Sobering again, he said, "I'm not trying to give you a hard time, Nathan, but I just want you to be careful. You and your team have done a lot of good word out there, great work, but not everyone thinks so." At the upward quirk of Nathan's brows he added, "It's just a few people, but you know as well as I do how much damage a few powerful people can do."

All too well, Nathan wanted to say, but instead he gathered himself and gave a small nod of his head. "I appreciate the warning, Mr. Secretary." And he genuinely did, recognising the other man's words for what they were. He saw McGath's small smile return and he reciprocated with one of his own. It was good to know that someone higher up had his back, as difficult as it was to do such a thing from so far away, and truth be told Nathan did regret having to hide their current situation from the Secretary General, at least for the time being, but he genuinely believed that was for the best. If nothing else it would be less of a headache for the man on the other end of the line, and from the looks of things he could benefit from being spared any additional troubles.

Dressing it up as a kindness didn't make Nathan feel any better about deceiving someone who had helped him and his crew countless times during their appointment as Secretary General but ultimately he didn't have a choice. Until they knew exactly what they were dealing with, and who, and how much damage that person could do with or without classified information from the seaQuest, a little deception was in everyone's best interests.

With nowhere else to be right then and no other urgent matters to attend to Jim had taken it upon himself to remain in med bay. Ford was manning things from the bridge, Lucas had headed back to his room to get to work on figuring out what had been done to their systems, and the Captain was who knew where at that exact moment in time. Piccolo had headed out as well, muttering something about Dagwood under his breath as he went, making Jim think that he was intending to check in with the GELF and try to explain what was going on. Jim didn't envy him that task in the slightest.

The staff had set up a monitor to track Miguel's pulse and blood pressure, both of which looked a little high to Jim but he was no expert. Perched on a stool that the nurse Charlotte had been kind enough to bring over for him he looked from that monitor to the Sensor Chief's face. Still unconscious for the time being, and with a definite bruise forming across the jaw and cheekbone on one side of his face, Miguel looked for all intents and purposes like himself. Normal. On closer inspection though Jim could see the shadows under the other man's eyes that told him Ortiz hadn't been sleeping, certainly not well, and he couldn't help but wonder if Miguel had been struggling to take care of himself in other ways as well. Had he been getting enough to eat? Or drink? Come to think of it hadn't he heard Charlotte mentioning to one of the other members of staff about dehydration? Jim was pretty sure that he had.

He sighed, and on that long low exhale he felt the simmering of guilt, not just because he hadn't realised sooner that something was wrong with someone he had come to -consider a close friend but because he hadn't done more that last night of leave to find that friend and make sure everything was okay. Taking the word of some stranger outside a bar wasn't like him. It was lazy and borderline indifferent, and he should have known better. He did know better.

And Miguel had deserved better.

"Jim."

The sound of Doctor Smith's voice turned his head and he saw her looking at him from her place on the bed across the room. She had a soft frown on her face and he suspected he knew what was coming, what she was about to say.

"It's not your fault."

Bingo. Right on the money. Jim wasn't about to put on a show about being offended that she had read his mind either, not when that guilt had to be coming through loud and clear to someone like Doctor Smith. She often made remarks about people's thoughts screaming, and he had the feeling that his had been doing just that. When she gave him a gentle smile right after that thought he knew he was right. He sighed again. "Sorry, Doc," he said with a shake of his head, and looked back down to Miguel. "I'll try to keep it down."

"It's all right, Lieutenant," she said to him and then he heard the shuffle of sheets as she moved from her seated position, slipping from the bed altogether and moving across the room to be closer to him. "I'd say I'm used to it," she went on, "but the truth is you never do get used to it. Or I don't, anyway." He turned his head in time to see another one of those small smiles. "My point is, you can't help how you feel." She touched a hand to his arm. "I just wanted to tell you that you're not to blame. Not for any of this."

He thought about arguing that point, debating it with her, but he quickly realised he didn't have it in him. Any argument that came to mind was quickly followed by a simple enough rebuke that the woman beside him would be able to offer. So he gave her a nod, trying to put some conviction behind it. After a moment, wanting to try and regain some semblance of normalcy between them, he said, "You sure you should be outta bed, Doc?"

"I think I've spent more than enough time resting," she told him, brows lifting briefly before she gave a sigh of her own and dropped her gaze to the man in the bed. After a moment she looked across to the next bed along in the short row. Jim followed her gaze, fully prepared to feel the now-familiar swell of concern at the sight of O'Neill lying prone and unresponsive, but no sooner had he settled his focus on the other Lieutenant's bed than something completely unexpected happened. That concern he had been expecting quickly shifted to surprise, perhaps even disbelief, chased quickly by the first flickers of hope.

O'Neill was opening his eyes.

"Tim?" Doctor Smith moved away, her hand slipping from Jim's arm as she walked around the foot of Miguel's bed to the one occupied by the Communications Officer. "Tim, can you hear me?"

She received a low groan in response. As Jim watched, having slipped from the stool to his feet without even realising he had moved at all, O'Neill blinked his eyes, obviously struggling to focus, before fixing his gaze more or less on the woman leaning over him. "D-Doctor Smith?"

Jim allowed himself to feel that hope in full as it blossomed properly and swept through him. He couldn't help but smile, even with everything else that they were dealing with, moving around Ortiz's bed and closer to O'Neill's so that the other man might be able to see him as well. Without his glasses though it was anyone's guess just how much he could see. "Hey, O'Neill," he said from his place between the end of the two beds, wanting to be able to keep Ortiz's in his peripheral at least. "Welcome back."

Welcome back? Where had he gone? And how long had he been gone?

Those questions and more swirled and skittered through his brain as he lay there, trying to make sense of his surroundings and the sensations that were slowly but surely registering. He felt tired, first and foremost, despite obviously only just waking up, but he couldn't remember going to bed. It was a struggle to remember much of anything with any sort of clarity, he realised, which did little to relieve the disorientation he was feeling. Hot on the heels of that exhaustion and disorientation was an ache, dull but persistent, and when he shifted slightly in the bed to try and make sense of the discomfort it only worsened and for a split second he was able to pinpoint it. And on the tail of that came the memory to go along with the cause. He remembered clearly then a sharp pain in that exact same spot, a white hot agony that had left him speechless with shock. He remembered looking down to see a knife buried in his gut and then back up to—

Tim looked at the faces of those closest to him, blurred though they were without his glasses. Jim and Wendy. The presence of the latter and the fact that he was looking up at them as if from the flat of his back told him they were probably in med bay. That was a relief. And Jim was here—why? Maybe just to check in on him, certainly, but Tim didn't think the Lieutenant would have spent any great amount of time by his bedside. It was more likely that the other man was here for work-related reasons, and that meant—

Sure enough, when he turned his head against what he quickly figured out was a pillow, he could see the figure in the next bed over. It surprised him and yet it didn't, but more than anything he was worried. Frightened. Not of Miguel, but for him. "Is he okay?" His voice sounded gravelly, rough, like he hadn't used it in a while. How long had he been here?

Wendy had been about to ask him something, or maybe tell him something, her mouth closing as his own question came first and she followed his gaze to the next bed before meeting his gaze anew. "He's—" She hesitated and looked at Brody, who glanced over at Miguel before stepping that little bit closer to Tim's bed.

"He's unconscious," the Lieutenant said, which didn't really answer Tim's question despite the fact that it addressed it, at least somewhat. With a frown that Tim could hear rather than see Brody went on to ask, "O'Neill, do you remember what happened?"

All too well, and with increasing clarity as he lay there, but putting that into words proved to be a little more tricky than he would have liked. "Um, are my—uh—"

"Oh." Wendy gave her head a little shake, as if in apology, and disappeared from sight altogether for a few moments before returning and placing something in his hand which he had unconsciously raised expectantly. He didn't waste any time in putting his glasses on his face, thankful for the way everything came back into proper focus. "Is that better?" she asked and he gave her a small nod, noticing that she glanced to Brody afterwards.

Tim still hadn't answered the question, he knew. "I remember," he managed to say after a while, glancing to the unconscious form of his best friend in the next bed over. "It wasn't him," he said then, bringing his eyes back up to Jim and Doctor Smith. "It wasn't his fault."

In the wake of those words Tim saw the dawning realisation on first Brody's face and then Wendy's, and the look they exchanged told him that they knew something he didn't. "You're saying it was Miguel who attacked you?" Jim asked, obviously needing that clarification just to make sure there were no misunderstandings between them.

"Yes," Tim said, but quickly corrected himself with a shake of his head and an adamant, "no. No, it wasn't him. I-I mean it was, but it—"

Wendy laid a hand on his arm. "I understand." With a sigh she went on to add, "It happened to me too." She frowned. "Not exactly the same, but Ortiz attacked me as well."

Tim was relieved that it hadn't been exactly the same as his own ordeal but that did little to ease the troubled feeling that her words inspired. "What's going on? What's happening to him?" Because he knew there was something wrong, and it wasn't something that could be explained by any rational means. Miguel wasn't a violent person, he never had been, and despite the fact that he had ground combat training and plenty of experience utilising said skills he was the sort of man who would talk through his problems rather than deal with them aggressively. And perhaps it was presumptuous of Tim to think so, but he was pretty sure he was the last person Miguel would attack if anything ever pushed him to that kind of violence. He was no match for his best friend, he wasn't a—

"I was a threat." The words tumbled out of him without him realising at first. He only realised he had spoken them at all when Wendy and Brody looked down at him with more or less matching frowns. "I noticed something was wrong," he told them, hearing the dryness in his voice and grimacing. Doctor Smith ducked away again briefly and returned with a cup complete with a lid that had a straw poking through it. She kept her hold on it even though he felt capable of holding it himself as he took a few grateful, much-needed sips. He didn't waste any time in going on afterwards. "I'd told him to come and see you," he said to Wendy specifically. "Because of the headache, because it wasn't going away, or so he said. I was worried." And who wouldn't be? "I was obviously asking too many questions. It was only when I started pushing for him to come and see you that—well." He felt he didn't need to explain what he meant by that and the expressions on the faces of both Doctor Smith and Lieutenant Brody told him that he was right.

"That explains why he attacked you as well, Doc," Brody said then, looking down at the woman as she looked up at him. "Word got around that you were going to try and take a look inside O'Neill's head, read his memories or whatever, and the psychic couldn't let that happen. They'd be exposed."

Tim spoke up before Doctor Smith had a chance to. "Psychic?" Obviously he had missed something. Something big at that.

Wendy turned her head to him, looking briefly apologetic before she said, "Ortiz is being used by a psychic. It's not a constant control, at least I don't believe it is, but there have been at least three incidents where they've taken over completely."

"Like when he attacked me," Tim offered, receiving a nod of confirmation. "And then when he attacked you." He frowned then, unable to keep himself from being curious about the third.

"And Lucas," Brody offered. When Tim's eyes widened he went on to say, "We got there in time to stop it, thanks to Darwin. I managed to knock him out and then we brought him down here."

"And that was when I came out of whatever was done to me," Wendy added. "I'm not even really sure what it was that they did to me. I only know that it was stronger than anything I've ever felt before." With a shake of her head she glanced at Brody. "If you hadn't knocked him out I don't know when I would have woken up." There was something about the look on Doctor Smith's face that added the words if ever. Jim looked a little startled by that but he covered it quickly.

"So—" The hesitation was threatening to become anxiety, and at a pace he wasn't entirely sure he was strong enough to combat. He heard the beginnings of a tremor in his voice and cleared his throat in an attempt to steady it. It was only party successful. "So does that mean he's okay now?" He glanced to Brody. "When you knocked him out, did that get rid of the psychic?" Somehow, even as he asked the question, he suspected it wouldn't be that easy.

With a sigh Wendy said, "We don't know."

Somehow, and Tim wasn't sure just how, that answer was worse than the one he had been expecting.