Spoilers for: Season 2 onwards starting from In the line of Duty up to and including Descent in Season 6

I don't own anything to do with Stargate SG-1; I'm just borrowing the characters for a little adventure.

Synopsis: Ever wondered why Jack was so touchy feely with Sam in the episode Descent, when they found the Gould Ship drifting in space and it crashed to Earth landing in the sea.  Here is my view on why.  This takes place before the mission.

ALONE IN THE NIGHT – CHAPTER 1

Colonel Jack O'Neill was strolling through the light grey corridors of the SGC, searching for Major Samantha Carter.  Along the way he bumped into Teal'c who was headed towards the commissary.

"Hey Teal'c, what are you up to?" Jack enquired

"I am in need of nourishment O'Neill, would you and Major Carter care to accompany me?"

"Maybe later Teal'c, have you seen Carter recently? I've been searching all over the place for her."

"I have not. Maybe she is taking some time for herself? She did not seem quite herself on the mission yesterday, nor indeed was she talkative at the briefing.  It was very unlike her not to go into depths on the new Technology we acquired from the DeAsha's."

Jack pondered on what Teal'c had just said, he remembered her coming back from the DeAsha homeworld and Teal'c was right, she had seemed quiet. When he asked her about it after their return, and then again after the briefing, she had just shrugged him off.  Even during the briefing, he could normally coax a smile out of her, or at least one of her quirky looks when he tried to understand her explanation of new technology, but not this time.

"I'll maybe join you later Teal'c." with that, he headed towards Major Carter's lab.

"Carter, you in here?  Carter?" He did a quick search, but couldn't find her; by this stage he was getting a little worried.  Looking around her office, he noticed some schematics for the new machine. Strange? Her computer was still on, so she couldn't have gone far.  Peering over the screen to see what she had been working on, Jack scrolled down the text, but didn't understand a word of what was written.  Mind you, half the time he didn't understand what Carter told him, so…nothing unusual there.

Just as he was about to leave, Major Carter came bursting through the door, and the two of them went flying in opposite directions.  O'Neill just managed to stay on his feet, but Carter wasn't quite so fortunate. Falling on to her back, the air from her lungs exhaling quickly and landed with a pained expression on her face.

He watched her falling, but was to late to catch her, as her legs went akimbo. "Carter, Carter, you okay?  I'm so sorry, I didn't see you coming!"  Jack questioned with concern filling his eyes.

As she landed, he thought he saw a pained expression on her face, before she had even reached the ground.  His concern for her had increased.

"Sam, are you okay?"

As he held out his hand to pull her up, he noticed her grimace slightly.

"I'm fine Sir, really." She lied through gritted teeth.  "Typical..." she thought, "…Of all the times he has to come and check on me, today had to be one of them."  Sam knew he was worried about her, she had been quiet since their return, but she just couldn't bring herself to tell him what had happened after the mission.

"What can I do for you Colonel?" Sam asked absently rubbing her ribs.

"Carter, did I hurt you?" He noticed her hand rubbing her ribs in a circular motion.  "Maybe you should get ol' Doc Frasier to check you out." Jack replied worriedly.

He didn't think he'd hurt her that much, but that funny feeling was back; the feeling you get when you know a friends hurting, but they don't want to talk about it.  "Go gently with her Jack" he calmly said to himself.  The last thing he wanted was to scare her off, but hell, subtlety just wasn't in him.

"Carter, is something up?"

"Up Sir?"

"Yeah, you know the word, opposite to down?" He advised, musing that he hated it when she did this.

"Did you want something sir?  It's just that I've got a million and one things to do before I leave tonight. If you want this report done by morning, then I need you to leave."  Carter countered boldly. As thoughts mulled round her mind she thought that if she could distract him for a few minutes, he might lose his train of thought and leave without asking any more questions.  Her ribs were starting to hurt and she needed to sit down, soon, before she fell down.

"Don't think for one minute that I don't know what your doing Carter, but you obviously don't want to talk now." Lowering his head slightly, he continued, "Look, I know it's sometimes hard to talk, but I'm here if you need me, okay!"  Giving her a quick pat on the shoulder, he quietly left.

As Jack walked back through the corridors he bumped into Jonas on route to the commissary.  "Oh Colonel, is Major Carter in her office? I need to go through a few things with her."

"Jonas, just leave her for now. Major Carter's a bit busy and not quite in the mood for people interrupting. If I were you I'd wait till the morning, unless of course you're willing to face the wrath of Carter?"

Jonas stared at Colonel O'Neill, he'd never seen the Major in a bad mood, but if Colonel O'Neill were staying away, then it would be a good bet that he should also.

"I'm going to go eat Pie with Teal'c, want to join us?"

Jonas hadn't really spent that much time with the Colonel.  He wasn't scared of him… just hesitant. He knew how the Colonel felt about him, and for the most part he'd stopped blaming him for Daniel's ascension. Sometimes thought there were times when he just couldn't figure him out.  Jonas had spoken to Major Carter about his feelings on several occasions and she had tried to put his mind at rest; advising that the Colonel didn't blame him anymore and that Jack's sense of humour would grow on him.  It would just take time for them all to become a team again. The only way that would happen would be if he let go of some of his guilt.  So, with that in mind, he decided to take her advice and agreed to go with him.

In Sam's lab, Major Carter was sore, tired and hurting. She had never felt so alone… and it scared her.  Thoughts were going in and out her mind so quickly that she couldn't think straight. She knew that she could trust her team to help her out, but if she told them about what had happened then their lives would be in mortal danger, she had seen the consequences first hand.

What the Colonel didn't know was that an entity from the DeAsha homeworld had followed them through the gate, and had been laying in wait for Major Carter; biding his time so that his threats were an effective method of maintaining Major Carter's silence.  Her thoughts took her back to last nights encounter.

Carter arrived home last night about midnight; the Colonel had been ragging on her to get the reports finished from their previous meeting with the DeAsha's.  As she unlocked her front door, she slipped off her shoes, and headed for the kitchen for an urgent need of coffee; preferably fed through an intravenous drip.

"It's going to be a long night," she thought to herself as she grabbed her coffee and laptop, and plonked herself on the sofa.  She still couldn't shake off that funny feeling she had had, since her return from the planet. It was like someone was watching her, eyeing her up and down, it brought shivers down her spine. As she thought of it, goose pimples on her arms rose to the surface of her skin. Pulling a blanket over her from the back of the sofa an image of Jaret flashed through her mind; and she unconsciously shivered again.

Jaret was one of the DeAsha's leading scientist, his understanding of quantum theories, surpassed her own knowledge by miles, and whilst he seemed content to share his expertise with them. Remembering their meeting, she felt that there had been a darkness in his eyes… and it scared her.  Her very being had told her that he was not to be trusted, but there wasn't anything tangible that she could take to Colonel O'Neill.

Sam knew that the Colonel trusted her implicitly and would back her up 100% with anything, but she didn't want to appear to be the neurotic one. She wanted at least some evidence to support her fears, so she kept her thoughts and feelings to herself. Now she was beginning to regret that, as a man roughly placed a cloth filled with some form of narcotic over her mouth to stop her screaming.  The last thing she heard as she fell into unconsciousness was the sound of Jaret's gruff voice.

Awaking slowly she felt as if her head was stuffed with cotton wool balls, and her mouth tasted like sandpaper.  As she tried to move, she felt restricted. A sudden realisation hit her; her hands and feet were bound with what felt like some kind of cloth.  "Come on Sam, open your eyes" she taunted herself.  Very slowly she lifted her head and opened her eyes. A blurry image sat before her, staring at her with dark eyes that caused her very soul to become cold.  The image of a young man came into focus.  It was Jaret!  "How the hell did he get through the Stargate?" she asked herself.  With that, she thought he must have read her mind as he answered the question for her.

"I got through the Stargate very easily Major Carter. You see my people have the ability to change their body chemistry to suit the person that they are travelling with.  And, before you ask, I know that it doesn't explain *how* I got through the Tauri's defences, but with our change in body chemistry we have the ability to become invisible; thus eluding our enemies."

Sam Carter stared blankly at him, her mind was just starting to clear, and she was now getting annoyed.  Thoughts of what she would do to him began flooding her mind; scores of profanities were on the tip of her tongue.

"Now, now Samantha is that any way for a lady to think?" Jaret stated bluntly, an evil grin careering across his face.  "You know what Sam? I think you and I are going to have a lot of fun!"

Sam regained her composure, and was disgusted to hear him speak her name so familiarly; the name her friends and family called her - the name Jack called her when he was worried.

"Ah, I see you've got a soft spot for Colonel O'Neill?  That could come in very handy with what I have planned."

After he voiced aloud what she'd been thinking, Sam finally understood. With venom in her voice she replied,  "What do you want with me? How are you able to read my thoughts? As far as I understood things your race isn't telepathic."

Jaret stood up and started walking towards her. Getting very close to her Sam physically backed herself up as far as the binds would allow. Circling her, he placed his lips close to her ears and whispered menacingly, "Very simply put my dear, I have been genetically enhancing myself now for a long time now. So far I have been unable to find a suitable second subject, but guess what?  When you and your friends turned up, I thought you were the answers to my prayers. You see Samantha, you have a unique physiology due to the protein marker left by the Goa'uld you had within you." Leaning in closer he continued, "As a direct consequence of that, the serum I injected in to you acts as a catalyst, enabling me to read your thoughts."

Sam was starting to become concerned.  She had so much information relating to the SGC that he could easily read her thoughts about material relating to the Stargate.  Quickly she tried to suppress those thoughts as far down into herself as they would go.

Jaret, realising that she was learning to close off her thoughts very quickly grabbed her by the throat spitting, "Don't even try to outsmart me! I am stronger and cleverer than you will ever be. If you even try to block out your thoughts, I'll simply re-inject you to make the serum stronger."

"What do you want with me?" Sam coughed.

"Oh, don't worry Samantha, you're not the main target.  The SGC has something I want, and you are going to help get it for me."

Sam thought for a minute, but she couldn't think clearly. She was exhausted, emotionally and physically. The drug in her system was starting to make her lose focus.  "What could we possible have that you would want?  You're more technically advanced than we are? Surely you know that!" Sam stated slowly, noticing that her voice was becoming slurred.

"I want the Tok'ra," Jaret stated simply "And believe me, I always get what I want."

With her face ashen, she had just enough strength left to state, "I won't give you what you want, so you'll either have to kill me, or let me go!"

Jaret's face turned beetroot, how dare she refuse him!  No one had ever refused him, and he wasn't going to let this women be the first.  He circled her again noticing that her eyes were fluttering shut. Enraged, he pushed her chair over, causing her to fall on her side, hard. As she lay on the ground slightly disorientated, he purposefully kicked her in the ribs, shouting, "Pay attention! I haven't finished with you yet."

Sam thought she was going to be physically sick. Pain racked her ribs and she was sure she had heard a crack, as his boot connected with her body.  Lying unmoving on the floor, she closed her to block out the pain. Sensing his presence, she heard his soft breath next to her as he knelt down next to her.

Whispering slowly he advised.  "I'll make it very simple for you my dear, you don't have a choice. You will get the Tok'ra address for me and take me to them. Or, I kill your Commanding Officer…slowly.  You see Samantha, there is so much that you don't know about me.  When you and your team arrived on my planet I was able to retrieve and download your brainwaves onto a little disk. Which, surprise surprise I have with me here.  You see it allows me to cause excruciating pain to whomever I choose.  Please allow me to demonstrate."

Sam was now fully alert, her eyes focusing on Jaret's hands as he pulled some kind of device out of his pocket.  Watching him punch in a couple of commands, she felt such pain tearing through her body. It felt like her body was on fire. Screaming in anguish she watched as he increased the intensity.  Then as quickly as it came, it went.  She felt something trickle down her face, her nose was bleeding, and profusely.

Jaret stared at her, and simply stated, "That was the low setting! You see, Samantha, it causes the blood pressure in your body to rise dramatically. It can cause permanent brain damage over a period of time, or if on the highest setting can cause instant death.  Distance is not a problem you see. So, if you don't do as I ask I'll simply kill your friends one by one.  However, I might just have a little bit off fun with them along the way."

Sam stared at him with tears welling up in her eyes, she couldn't let them die…she would rather die herself.  The Tok'ra were her friends though, confused and in immense pain she didn't know which way to turn. Could she lead this man to slaughter them? No, of course not, but she didn't know how to stop him.

She really did only have one option for now, and that was to give him what he wanted.  As she braced herself for the impact of what she was about to say out loud, mercifully she passed out.

Jaret saw her blackout, and hit her with another injection, "What's it to be then Major?" he stated simply.

Carter stared blankly, her voice thick and heavy with pain, "I'll do it!"

Jaret smiled, part one of his plans was accomplished.  "Very good Major!" Untying her, he knew that in her weakened state she wouldn't be in a position to put up a fight.  "Before I go Major, be advised that if you backtrack on our agreement, I will not hesitate on using this to kill you instantly, and then who will protect your precious Colonel.  If you breathe a word to anyone about this I will know…believe me. If you open your mouth, I shall inflict more pain on the Tauri, then you could ever imagine.  Is that understood Major?"

Sam nodded in understanding and sank back into the blackness.

End of Chapter