Chapter 5 - One Way, No Way

Before that week of waiting was up, Jack had begun to use his leg. Pain was often a factor that had to be ignored, but Azyalae assured him it would pass. Over the week, Azyalae had begun to feel closer to her new patient. They had been spending quite a bit of time together, as doctor and patient. Azyalae had come to like Jack. He was a good person. She also had to admit he was definitely not a trouble to look at. In fact, he was quite a pleasure to look at. He was stubborn as anything when it came to taking notice of her doctorly advice, but she now understood that he would do as he pleased not matter what she told him. As far as Jack was concerned, it was his way or no way. He liked Azyalae too. She was a nice person. She had that same doctorly way about her, like Doc Fraiser. Azyalae was easy to like. She was friendly and always smiling.

Each day Azyalae had been helping Jack do some simple exercises to loosen his muscles and help with the mobility of his injured leg. He'd slowly been getting stronger and better at the exercises, and now was at the stage where he could stand and walk fairly easily on his own. Azyalae watched on with a smile. "You are progressing remarkably quickly," she praised, resting her hand lightly on Jack's arm as he sat down again. "I am impressed."

"Thanks," Jack said, trying to smile gratefully. "How much longer, you think before I can get back to work?"

"Some more days," Azyalae responded, unable to stop smiling. "I shall leave you some space alone now."

"Sure."

Without the smile leaving her face, Azyalae left the barn. She stopped outside the closed double door and leant against it for a moment. She knew Jack wanted to go home to the people he knew. His friends. Azyalae had a hard time admitting, although she didn't really know him well, that she would miss him when he was gone. A week may not be long, but when she was isolated from her own people most of the time, having someone like Jack around was a nice change. Jack sighed when Azyalae was gone. He hated his new arrangement. Being confined. Having very little or close to nothing to do with his days. Being injured was a large contributing factor to that problem, but also the fact that if he left the barn, guards would surely see him and take him back to Maldo for some more torture. As inviting as it all sounded, Jack wasn't so sure he was ready for more torture. His own mental torture was enough. The thought that he would be living on this planet for the rest of his life wasn't altogether bad, but it also wasn't something Jack planned. His life had to go back to the way it had been before. He needed it to, but the way things were going, it didn't look as though it would any time during the near future. The thought was enough to make his heart sink, but the prospect that thought may become fact, was worse.

If only he'd known how close to the truth his thoughts were.

@

FOUR MONTHS LATER

"Unscheduled off-world activation!" Sergeant Davis shouted as the alarms burst into action, sending nearly every member of the mountain into brief consideration.

"Who is it?" General Hammond queried on his way into the Control Room.

"I don't know, Sir," Davis responded. "We're not receiving a GDO transmission."

"Close the Iris," Hammond ordered.

Davis nodded. "Yes, Sir."

Moments later, Sam and Daniel entered the Control Room. "Who is it, General?" they asked in unison.

"We're not receiving any GDO transmission," the General replied.

Both Doctor and Major bowed their heads in thought briefly. At the same instant, their heads both rose and they spoke.

"Jack."

"The Colonel."

"Why wouldn't he have a GDO, Major? You had one."

"I know, Sir. I have no idea why he wouldn't have one. Maybe he couldn't get to the other one or they destroyed it after I left," Sam supposed, then focussed her eyes onto the General. "General, please. You have to take this chance. It may be the only one the Colonel gets."

"If we're wrong, Major," he said, "we have no idea what we could be letting through. We could be opening the door for the Goa'uld."

"I know this is a risk, General, and I understand if you're not willing to take it. I just know what it was like on that planet, Sir. If Colonel O'Neill has been able to get to the gate, this may be his only chance. If we don't at least give him this chance, he's probably not going to get another one."

Hammond buried his eyes into the closed Iris. Was it Jack trying to get through, or just an attempted attack by the Goa'uld? It could be anything on the other side of the Iris, but if Hammond didn't make his decision soon, whatever it was trying to come through would be dead before they reached the opposite end of the wormhole.

"Open the Iris," the General said finally and it was done. "I'll leave it open for three minutes. If nothing has happened after that time, we'll shut it down." Sam wanted to dispute the decision. 'Give him a bit longer than that' she wanted to say.

"Thank you, Sir," she said instead. At least the General was giving him a chance. Come on, Colonel, Sam thought desperately, the Iris is open.

After two minutes, the wormhole disengaged on its own. Sam breathed in deep and closed her eyes. Three Staff Weapon blasts flew through the Event Horizon before it shut down. Thankfully no one was hurt.

No one came through the Stargate.

"I'm sorry, Major," the General apologised sincerely. He was just as disappointed that Colonel O'Neill didn't come through the gate before it disengaged.

Sam wasn't as worried about that, although it was eating away at her. Her main worry was that he'd been killed trying to get home. Three Staff blasts. What if they'd fired more than three shots and he'd been hit? What if he'd been killed? So many 'what ifs'. Sam gritted her teeth so hard it hurt then left the Control Room. Her heart was thumping loudly in her chest and the sound beat like a drum in her ears. She wanted so badly to scream in anger. In disappointment. In fear. In sadness.

In the solitude of her quarters, Sam opened her journal. She rarely wrote in it, although she often meant to but got too busy and then forgot. The last date in it was January. January 5th.

Today was so long - were the first words - I spent most of it alone. I was supposed to be doing research on something, but I got sidetracked. Not like me at all, but I was thinking again. Thinking about when we all were checked to see if we were Zatarc's. I know Colonel O'Neill and I took on a professional outlook to the situation. I guess that means I'm supposed to forget about the whole thing and pretend it never happened. Pretend we never admitted to having feelings for each other. That I never stood there looking at my CO while he admitted he didn't want to leave, just to save me. Pretend that I actually didn't want him to leave me, in case I never saw him again.

It's not like I planned on feeling this way, but I can't lie to myself about it. We both admitted to it. There's no turning back on that. I know and he knows. And now I wish there was some way for it to be ok. Some rule that made it all right for us to.to feel this way about each other.

The entry ended abruptly. Sam bit her lip while reading over it and then ripped out the page. Irately, she screwed it up into a ball and threw it across her quarters. Angry tears slowly trailed down her face as she collapsed onto the floor and hugged her knees. If anything bad happened to her CO.

"It's all my fault," Sam repeated to herself a few times. "I'm so sorry, Colonel."

@

"INSOLENCE!" Maldo shrieked as Lopbell shoved Jack down onto his knees. "How dare you attempt an escape! You have been shown the consequences for such an act! Your sense has surely been injured along with your leg. Have you no memory of the punishment received by another who attempted escape? Do you wish to die?"

Jack looked up slowly through his bruised and swollen eyes. His breathing was slow and his strength very little, but his loathe of Maldo had not changed. "Yes," he hissed through gritted teeth.

Maldo's expression of anger slid away from his dark face and turned to intrigue. "Leave us," he said. His guards did as they were told. Maldo approached Jack and knelt before him. Lifting O'Neill's bruised and battered face up to meet his own, Maldo smirked. "You wish to die?" he asked again.

Jack nodded mildly. His head throbbed as though a marching band were practising inside it. The drums pounded in his ears endlessly. The incessant beat was beginning to send him insane.

"Yes," O'Neill repeated his reply and watched Maldo smile.

This planet was slowly and agonisingly killing Jack. His life was nothing more than constant pain for him and an amusement to Maldo. What more point was there? They were planning on killing him anyway. Why not let it be now?

"No," Maldo said suddenly, getting up and finding his sword.

"Why?" Jack spat angrily. Maldo wanted to kill him, why wouldn't he now?

Maldo returned to the injured man and knelt before him again. Raising his sword to the Colonel's face, he allowed the point to push just past the skin and draw blood. "First you must learn," Maldo said sharply, pushing the swords' point in a little further, "true pain and suffering."

"Why won't you just kill me?" Jack asked, feeling the sting of the swords' blade in his cheek.

"You must suffer. Suffer greatly and then die a slow and painful death. You have not yet suffered enough."

"The Goa'uld are all the same, aren't they?" O'Neill hissed.

Maldo removed the sword abruptly. "Of what do you speak?" he asked quickly.

"You thought I didn't know, didn't you?" Jack knew the answer.

"I do not know what you s - "

"Yeah, and I'm a monkey's uncle. I know you're a Goa'uld. What about all the rest of your 'people' huh? Do they know? Have you told them?"

"Lies."

"Your favourite saying. All Goa'uld love saying that, don't they? How long do you think you can lie to them? How long before they figure it out?"

"They will never figure it out," Maldo sneered. "They know nothing of the Goa'uld."

"That's how stupid you think they are," Jack stated. "They probably know more than you."

"From where have you discovered this information?" Maldo demanded.

Jack smiled. "Do you really think I'm gonna tell you?"

That was not the best of things to say. Maldo shoved the tip of sword back underneath Jack's chin. The ruler's eyes were nearly as sharp as the swords' blade. Anger radiated from them. "You will tell me or I will kill you," he said very matter-of-factly.

Jack smiled again. "Good," he adopted the same tone. "At least you've changed your mind about that."

Now Maldo smiled and removed the sword. "You shall not be victorious," he said. "If you shall not tell me what I want to know, and I shall not let you have what you want, then you shall suffer."

"Sure," Jack agreed. "You were going to make sure of that anyway."

"Lopbell!" Maldo shouted and his first prime answered his call.

"Master?" Lopbell queried, entering the room with sword at the ready.

"Take this away and make it suffer," Maldo said disgustedly.

Lopbell smiled. "Gladly," he said, lifting Jack effortlessly and dragging him away.

Three hours later, Jack found himself back in the barn with Azyalae. She watched his eyes open again and smiled comfortingly. She saw so many injured friends and even family around her, and yet she herself didn't know true suffering. She'd never been tortured or made slave away in the fields like all the other women. She considered herself to be lucky - extremely lucky.

She didn't know just how lucky she was.

Jack's head felt heavy. He was sure a steamroller had run over him. If it was blood pumping that made the loud thumping sounds, or his heart beat, he couldn't be sure. Whatever it was, it was so loud, he couldn't even hear Azyalae's voice as she spoke soothingly. "Can you speak?" the doctor asked softly. She watched as Jack's eyes slowly closed. She gently placed two fingers on his neck, just to be sure. His pulse was there, but only just. "Please, open your eyes," Azyalae begged. This was the worst she'd seen anyone after torture.

She tended all the victims. Maldo knew there was a doctor tending the wounds of the tortured, but through his searches he had found nothing. An inside servant would always report to Azyalae and the guards when Maldo was sending out another search, and they would pack up and move. They would hide away anywhere possible for as long as the search lasted, and then move back to the safety and warmth of the barn. The pounding inside Jack's head only seemed to get louder as Azyalae spoke. He could hear her muffled voice, but it was so distant. She was so far away. The haze he'd seen before closing his swollen eyes must have been her though. It was, wasn't it? Was he dead? Maybe he was and that's why everything was so fuzzy. So muffled and far away. But everything hurt so badly. In heaven, surely there was no pain? Then why was there such agony through his body? Air rasped in and out of his throat, but it didn't seem to do anything. Pain still seemed to choke and blind him. Lopbell hadn't been kind, but Jack had thought he was prepared this time. Wrong. Now was only the beginning of the suffering Maldo had planed. Azyalae was extremely concerned. Most of the gashes in Jack's chest were deep. Blood seemed to be everywhere. His face was badly bruised. Bloody and dirty. He was hardly recognisable. Before Azyalae started to work on the injuries he'd gained since the last time she saw him, she wanted to make sure Jack was at least coherent. Something told her, he wasn't.

"Jack," she said softly, pressing the back of her right hand against his forehead. "Jack, can you hear me? It is Azyalae. Please say something."

Groggily forcing his bruised eyes open, Jack frowned and tried to see Azyalae in focus. His vision disagreed with his wishes, not allowing him to see clearly.

"Azyalae?" O'Neill tried to say, but only managed a faint mumble. No words formed.

Azyalae frowned. She could see he was trying desperately hard to say something that made sense, but it just didn't work.

"This is by far the worst torture I have seen," Azyalae murmured to herself as she began to clean up Jack's wounds. Jack tried to talk again but jumbled sounds were all that he could manage.

"Shh," Azyalae whispered, taking his hand in her own. "You must conserve what little energy you have remaining. Please, do not try to speak anymore." She smiled as best she could, given the circumstances.

Her voice was so quiet. So soothing. But still so far away. Jack tried to say ok. Tried to smile and say he was fine. Azyalae watched him slowly lose consciousness. It's better for him this way, she thought and then quickly got back to work on his injuries.

Jaun and Roa, the two guards, came inside the barn. They remembered Jack this time, though Azyalae couldn't understand how. His face was covered in so many bruises and lesions, she barely recognised him.

"It is bad, Azyalae," Jaun said quietly from behind the doctor as he and Roa approached. "Isn't it?"

"I am afraid it is," Azyalae replied dismally, taking a glance at the two young men. Their faces were both set in similar expressions.

"He will survive, won't he?" Roa asked.

"I cannot say that now," Azyalae admitted. "I hope so. Keep your hopes strong." She smiled at them and then took a look at her supplies. Turning back, she asked: "Can you please find me some more bandage. There is not enough here." The two young men nodded and left quickly to do as they were asked. Azyalae rested a hand on Jack's unconscious face.

"Please remain strong," she whispered.