From Here To Eternity: The Road to Redemption, The Second Step
Part 7
All disclaimers can be found in Part 0
***
Peterson had given Crater the general layout of the house. He assumed that O'Neill would be in the den where the surveillance equipment was. He also assumed that Makepeace would be with him so that is where he headed.
The door to the room was closed, which Crater found odd. Standing off to the side, he slowly turned the door knob and pushed the door open with enough force to bang it against the wall. When no shower of bullets came from the room, he peeked around the door jam. The room was in shambles. Expensive equipment was shattered, some of it sending out sparks. From what he could see, there wasn't anywhere to hide. The desk and table that held the now useless equipment was pushed up against the wall and there were no closets anywhere that he could see.
Cautiously he entered the room, Baretta at the ready. Sweeping the room with the pistol his eyes landed on the two bodies laying under the window. Blood pooled around both. "I guess I'm too late," he said. Hearing a moan he added, "Then again, maybe I'm not."
He waited and witnessed O'Neill's eyes slowly open. They remained unfocused as he tried to push himself into a sitting position, one hand ... the injured one, touching his head where the bullet that had shattered his cell phone and had gone through his hand had also grazed his skull.
"Bad day, Colonel O'Neill?" asked Crater Baretta how held loosely at his side when he saw that O'Neill was unarmed.
O'Neill turned blurry eyes towards Crater.
"You know you've been a thorn in my employer's side for a number of years. He's really going to love it when I tell him that it's been plucked."
He could see that O'Neill was trying to focus, but was having a great deal of difficulty. "Too bad," he said out loud. "It's no fun lording it over someone when they can't really understand what you're saying. I guess I'll just have to get it over with."
Crater raised the Baretta and fired.
The bullets ripped through flesh as easily as a steak knife through rare prime rib. As the bullets hit bone, they flattened or shattered also breaking the bone. The shattered bullets sent small chunks of metal propelling into internal organs where they shredded liver, kidneys, and intestines. The flattened ones, if they didn't lodge in the bone, found an exit leaving a larger wound than the one it left when it entered the body. One of those still had enough energy to slam into O'Neill's chest where it was stopped by the body armor he wore under his shirt. Kevlar with ceramic plates on top, along with Robert Makepeace, saved O'Neill's life.
***
Dr. Janet Fraiser knocked on Hammond's open door. He motioned for her to enter while he said into the phone, "Yes, sir. I'll let you know and thank you, sir." He placed the receiver back into its cradle.
"The President, sir?" asked Fraiser.
"Yes. I briefed him on everything but the condition of the survivors which I don't know. How are they?"
Fraiser opened the top file she had placed on General Hammond's desk and handed it to him. "Well sir, Colonel O'Neill has a concussion, multiple lacerations and contusions ... the bullet that hit his hand was a through and through and miraculously, didn't hit any bone."
Hammond glanced at the folder, closed it and put it on the desk in front of him.
"Major Carter has a couple of broken ribs from the impact of the bullets hitting her vest. One bullet got under the vest at the shoulder. She's has a fractured collarbone but it should heal well. Daniel's injuries are the least of the group. He has several lacerations on his scalp, I'm assuming from broken glass as I found some small shards embedded in the cuts. His vest stopped three bullets and his chest is one large bruise from that. Teal'c's symbiote is working to heal the injuries he suffered. I removed three bullets ... one in the arm and two in his groin area. None of them did any serious damage," she concluded handing Hammond three more files.
"And Colonel Makepeace?"
Fraiser shook her head and looked down at the last file she had. "As you know, SG-1 was wearing body armor. Colonel Makepeace wasn't ... do you know why?" she asked.
Hammond nodded. "Colonel O'Neill asked him to, but he refused. Apparently it's part of what he called his penance."
Fraiser sighed and shook her head again. "Well if he wanted to find out whether or not God was going to forgive him, we'll have to wait and see. He's not doing well. He took four bullets ... all to the upper torso area. I'm waiting for him to stabilize before transferring him to the Academy hospital. If he survives he's going to need an orthopedic surgeon ... one of the bullets shattered his right humerous. Dr. Freemantle has been here to look at him and is confident that he can repair the bone, but we don't have the facilities here for him to do that. The other three did various amounts of damage on their way through his body. One punctured a lung and lodged there. We got it out. One was straight through, missing his heart by centimeters and from what I've been told about the scene, it looks like it's the one that hit Colonel O'Neill's vest. The other shredded his spleen and we had to remove what was left of it. All that's left now is the waiting," she finished.
"I don't think I've ever known a group of people with so much luck before," said Hammond. "I just hope that they didn't use it all up."
"I know what you mean," agreed Fraiser. "What was the total body count?"
"Eleven of our people ... all the Security Forces guards and Sgt. Kamir. Twenty-seven others. Six of those were still alive at the scene. They were taken to the Academy hospital under guard and I'm hoping that they'll have a lot to say when they're able. All the rest were DOA."
Fraiser dragged a hand across her forehead. "I can't imagine what it must have been like out there. Do we know who they were?" she asked.
"No," answered Hammond. "None of them were carrying any form of identification. All their clothing and weapons were Chinese or Russian. The vehicles we found at the scene were rentals. They used fake IDs. No surprises there. No one we finger printed came back with any kind of record at all ... civilian or military. We're chasing down a couple of tattoos that some of those men had, but we don't know if that's going to take us anywhere."
"So private mercenaries not originally trained with the military?" she asked.
"That's what it looks like."
Fraiser looked at her watch and stood. "I'd better get back to the infirmary. No one from the shift that was on when SG-1 and Colonel Makepeace were brought in wants to leave, so I told them all they could stay but that they had to rest. I want to make sure that they are."
Hammond wasn't surprised. SG-1 was a talisman at the SGC. He knew that some in his command considered their continued success hinged on the survival of his premiere team. "Tell them I appreciate their dedication."
"I will, sir," she said, a tired smile adorning her face. "They already know that, but they'll appreciate hearing it."
***
Jack O'Neill's first conscious thought was "Where am I?". He slowly opened his eyes and saw the ceiling to the infirmary ... a view with which he was very familiar. Now he knew where he was and his next question to himself was "Why?".
"Welcome back, Colonel." a voice sounded in his ear just before a face moved into his line of sight ... a familiar face, one usually attached to an arm and a hand that more often than not would shine a pen light into his eyes. He waited for it and when it didn't come, he signed in relief.
"Colonel?" said Fraiser.
O'Neill heard the concern in her voice and tried to smile. He assumed he'd succeeded when Fraiser smiled back. He figured with that success out of the way, he'd try something else ... maybe speaking.
"How am I?"
Fraiser smiled down at him and said, "Why don't you tell me?"
"Well, I'm alive," he said.
"Yes, you are at that. Any pain?"
"Besides the pounding in my head, the throbbing in my hand, and the fact that my chest feels like someone hit me with a sledgehammer, you mean?"
"Yes."
"Not much then," he grinned.
Fraiser continued to smile, then dropped it. "Colonel, how much do you remember of what happened?"
She watched as O'Neill's smile faded and his eyes took on the distant look of someone trying to remember an event that happened in their past.
O'Neill clearly remembered sitting at the kitchen table with the rest of his team and Makepeace. He remembered the first sound of gun shots and his orders. He remembered being in the den with Makepeace talking on the phone to Hammond, giving a warning that they were under attack. He didn't remember anything after that.
It suddenly dawned on O'Neill that his team wasn't there by his bed. They were always there whenever he had been injured in the past. In fact, it was difficult to get them to leave so that he could rest. Beginning to fear the worst, his chest tightened and breathing became difficult. He started to panic and at once felt Fraiser's reassuring hand and heard her voice.
"They're all right, Colonel. They were injured as well and are sleeping right now, but ... they ... are ... all ... right," she emphasized.
O'Neill's eyes went to hers to see if she was telling the truth. Fraiser eyes told everything, no matter how bad the news. He started to calm down when he saw that she was telling the truth.
"Makepeace?"
"He's alive," she stated.
"You say that like you don't know if he's going to live," said O'Neill.
"I'm not real sure, Colonel. He's in critical condition and if he survives, he's going to need some more surgery," she said. "Colonel I wasn't at the safe house when the rescue units got there. I have talked to several of the people who were, however."
"And?"
She sighed. "There was the body of one of the men who attacked the house in the room with you. It looked like Makepeace covered your body with his, taking four bullets while at the same time killing your attacker. One of those bullets went completely through Colonel Makepeace. Your vest stopped it. That's why your chest hurts."
"Your saying that Makepeace saved my life."
"Yes, Colonel. I am," she stated.
O'Neill tried to force a memory that was slowly surfacing in his mind. He could see a man standing in front of him, his arm hanging at his side, hand holding a pistol. As his memory started to clear, he heard the man say, "It's no fun lording it over someone when they can't really understand what you're saying. I guess I'll just have to get it over with," then raise the pistol and point it at him. He had tried to move, tried to duck from what he knew was coming but his mind was so fuzzy it wasn't issuing any commands to the rest of his body. Clearly now, as clearly as he was seeing Fraiser he remembered the rest.
Makepeace's voice yelling, "NO!" and then O'Neill couldn't see the man with the pistol because Makepeace's body filled his line of vision getting between him and the man who was going to kill him. He felt Makepeace's body as it landed on him, thrown back from the bullets that entered it. He felt the impact of the bullet against his vest and just before he passed out again, he saw his attacker falling to the floor his head a bloody mess where bullets from Makepeace's .45 had torn into it.
"Why? Why did he do it?"
"Colonel?"
O'Neill caught Fraiser's eyes. "Why did Makepeace do it? He could have just shot the guy. Why did he jump between him and me?"
Fraiser shook her head. "I don't know Colonel. That's something you'll have to ask Colonel Makepeace when he comes to."
"If he comes to you mean."
"Yes Colonel ... if he comes to."
***
continued in part 8
Part 7
All disclaimers can be found in Part 0
***
Peterson had given Crater the general layout of the house. He assumed that O'Neill would be in the den where the surveillance equipment was. He also assumed that Makepeace would be with him so that is where he headed.
The door to the room was closed, which Crater found odd. Standing off to the side, he slowly turned the door knob and pushed the door open with enough force to bang it against the wall. When no shower of bullets came from the room, he peeked around the door jam. The room was in shambles. Expensive equipment was shattered, some of it sending out sparks. From what he could see, there wasn't anywhere to hide. The desk and table that held the now useless equipment was pushed up against the wall and there were no closets anywhere that he could see.
Cautiously he entered the room, Baretta at the ready. Sweeping the room with the pistol his eyes landed on the two bodies laying under the window. Blood pooled around both. "I guess I'm too late," he said. Hearing a moan he added, "Then again, maybe I'm not."
He waited and witnessed O'Neill's eyes slowly open. They remained unfocused as he tried to push himself into a sitting position, one hand ... the injured one, touching his head where the bullet that had shattered his cell phone and had gone through his hand had also grazed his skull.
"Bad day, Colonel O'Neill?" asked Crater Baretta how held loosely at his side when he saw that O'Neill was unarmed.
O'Neill turned blurry eyes towards Crater.
"You know you've been a thorn in my employer's side for a number of years. He's really going to love it when I tell him that it's been plucked."
He could see that O'Neill was trying to focus, but was having a great deal of difficulty. "Too bad," he said out loud. "It's no fun lording it over someone when they can't really understand what you're saying. I guess I'll just have to get it over with."
Crater raised the Baretta and fired.
The bullets ripped through flesh as easily as a steak knife through rare prime rib. As the bullets hit bone, they flattened or shattered also breaking the bone. The shattered bullets sent small chunks of metal propelling into internal organs where they shredded liver, kidneys, and intestines. The flattened ones, if they didn't lodge in the bone, found an exit leaving a larger wound than the one it left when it entered the body. One of those still had enough energy to slam into O'Neill's chest where it was stopped by the body armor he wore under his shirt. Kevlar with ceramic plates on top, along with Robert Makepeace, saved O'Neill's life.
***
Dr. Janet Fraiser knocked on Hammond's open door. He motioned for her to enter while he said into the phone, "Yes, sir. I'll let you know and thank you, sir." He placed the receiver back into its cradle.
"The President, sir?" asked Fraiser.
"Yes. I briefed him on everything but the condition of the survivors which I don't know. How are they?"
Fraiser opened the top file she had placed on General Hammond's desk and handed it to him. "Well sir, Colonel O'Neill has a concussion, multiple lacerations and contusions ... the bullet that hit his hand was a through and through and miraculously, didn't hit any bone."
Hammond glanced at the folder, closed it and put it on the desk in front of him.
"Major Carter has a couple of broken ribs from the impact of the bullets hitting her vest. One bullet got under the vest at the shoulder. She's has a fractured collarbone but it should heal well. Daniel's injuries are the least of the group. He has several lacerations on his scalp, I'm assuming from broken glass as I found some small shards embedded in the cuts. His vest stopped three bullets and his chest is one large bruise from that. Teal'c's symbiote is working to heal the injuries he suffered. I removed three bullets ... one in the arm and two in his groin area. None of them did any serious damage," she concluded handing Hammond three more files.
"And Colonel Makepeace?"
Fraiser shook her head and looked down at the last file she had. "As you know, SG-1 was wearing body armor. Colonel Makepeace wasn't ... do you know why?" she asked.
Hammond nodded. "Colonel O'Neill asked him to, but he refused. Apparently it's part of what he called his penance."
Fraiser sighed and shook her head again. "Well if he wanted to find out whether or not God was going to forgive him, we'll have to wait and see. He's not doing well. He took four bullets ... all to the upper torso area. I'm waiting for him to stabilize before transferring him to the Academy hospital. If he survives he's going to need an orthopedic surgeon ... one of the bullets shattered his right humerous. Dr. Freemantle has been here to look at him and is confident that he can repair the bone, but we don't have the facilities here for him to do that. The other three did various amounts of damage on their way through his body. One punctured a lung and lodged there. We got it out. One was straight through, missing his heart by centimeters and from what I've been told about the scene, it looks like it's the one that hit Colonel O'Neill's vest. The other shredded his spleen and we had to remove what was left of it. All that's left now is the waiting," she finished.
"I don't think I've ever known a group of people with so much luck before," said Hammond. "I just hope that they didn't use it all up."
"I know what you mean," agreed Fraiser. "What was the total body count?"
"Eleven of our people ... all the Security Forces guards and Sgt. Kamir. Twenty-seven others. Six of those were still alive at the scene. They were taken to the Academy hospital under guard and I'm hoping that they'll have a lot to say when they're able. All the rest were DOA."
Fraiser dragged a hand across her forehead. "I can't imagine what it must have been like out there. Do we know who they were?" she asked.
"No," answered Hammond. "None of them were carrying any form of identification. All their clothing and weapons were Chinese or Russian. The vehicles we found at the scene were rentals. They used fake IDs. No surprises there. No one we finger printed came back with any kind of record at all ... civilian or military. We're chasing down a couple of tattoos that some of those men had, but we don't know if that's going to take us anywhere."
"So private mercenaries not originally trained with the military?" she asked.
"That's what it looks like."
Fraiser looked at her watch and stood. "I'd better get back to the infirmary. No one from the shift that was on when SG-1 and Colonel Makepeace were brought in wants to leave, so I told them all they could stay but that they had to rest. I want to make sure that they are."
Hammond wasn't surprised. SG-1 was a talisman at the SGC. He knew that some in his command considered their continued success hinged on the survival of his premiere team. "Tell them I appreciate their dedication."
"I will, sir," she said, a tired smile adorning her face. "They already know that, but they'll appreciate hearing it."
***
Jack O'Neill's first conscious thought was "Where am I?". He slowly opened his eyes and saw the ceiling to the infirmary ... a view with which he was very familiar. Now he knew where he was and his next question to himself was "Why?".
"Welcome back, Colonel." a voice sounded in his ear just before a face moved into his line of sight ... a familiar face, one usually attached to an arm and a hand that more often than not would shine a pen light into his eyes. He waited for it and when it didn't come, he signed in relief.
"Colonel?" said Fraiser.
O'Neill heard the concern in her voice and tried to smile. He assumed he'd succeeded when Fraiser smiled back. He figured with that success out of the way, he'd try something else ... maybe speaking.
"How am I?"
Fraiser smiled down at him and said, "Why don't you tell me?"
"Well, I'm alive," he said.
"Yes, you are at that. Any pain?"
"Besides the pounding in my head, the throbbing in my hand, and the fact that my chest feels like someone hit me with a sledgehammer, you mean?"
"Yes."
"Not much then," he grinned.
Fraiser continued to smile, then dropped it. "Colonel, how much do you remember of what happened?"
She watched as O'Neill's smile faded and his eyes took on the distant look of someone trying to remember an event that happened in their past.
O'Neill clearly remembered sitting at the kitchen table with the rest of his team and Makepeace. He remembered the first sound of gun shots and his orders. He remembered being in the den with Makepeace talking on the phone to Hammond, giving a warning that they were under attack. He didn't remember anything after that.
It suddenly dawned on O'Neill that his team wasn't there by his bed. They were always there whenever he had been injured in the past. In fact, it was difficult to get them to leave so that he could rest. Beginning to fear the worst, his chest tightened and breathing became difficult. He started to panic and at once felt Fraiser's reassuring hand and heard her voice.
"They're all right, Colonel. They were injured as well and are sleeping right now, but ... they ... are ... all ... right," she emphasized.
O'Neill's eyes went to hers to see if she was telling the truth. Fraiser eyes told everything, no matter how bad the news. He started to calm down when he saw that she was telling the truth.
"Makepeace?"
"He's alive," she stated.
"You say that like you don't know if he's going to live," said O'Neill.
"I'm not real sure, Colonel. He's in critical condition and if he survives, he's going to need some more surgery," she said. "Colonel I wasn't at the safe house when the rescue units got there. I have talked to several of the people who were, however."
"And?"
She sighed. "There was the body of one of the men who attacked the house in the room with you. It looked like Makepeace covered your body with his, taking four bullets while at the same time killing your attacker. One of those bullets went completely through Colonel Makepeace. Your vest stopped it. That's why your chest hurts."
"Your saying that Makepeace saved my life."
"Yes, Colonel. I am," she stated.
O'Neill tried to force a memory that was slowly surfacing in his mind. He could see a man standing in front of him, his arm hanging at his side, hand holding a pistol. As his memory started to clear, he heard the man say, "It's no fun lording it over someone when they can't really understand what you're saying. I guess I'll just have to get it over with," then raise the pistol and point it at him. He had tried to move, tried to duck from what he knew was coming but his mind was so fuzzy it wasn't issuing any commands to the rest of his body. Clearly now, as clearly as he was seeing Fraiser he remembered the rest.
Makepeace's voice yelling, "NO!" and then O'Neill couldn't see the man with the pistol because Makepeace's body filled his line of vision getting between him and the man who was going to kill him. He felt Makepeace's body as it landed on him, thrown back from the bullets that entered it. He felt the impact of the bullet against his vest and just before he passed out again, he saw his attacker falling to the floor his head a bloody mess where bullets from Makepeace's .45 had torn into it.
"Why? Why did he do it?"
"Colonel?"
O'Neill caught Fraiser's eyes. "Why did Makepeace do it? He could have just shot the guy. Why did he jump between him and me?"
Fraiser shook her head. "I don't know Colonel. That's something you'll have to ask Colonel Makepeace when he comes to."
"If he comes to you mean."
"Yes Colonel ... if he comes to."
***
continued in part 8