O'Neill held his head in his hands and groaned. He was speckled with bruises and his legs ached from the long walk home. He didn't even have the energy to try and fill the black kettle, and make some sort of hot drink. His entire body throbbed with a raw exhaustion.

The door creaked open to admit a sweat-streaked, muddy Sam Carter. She wiped her forehead leaving a streak of dark mud. "God. I'm tired."

O'Neill forced his eyes open, desperately trying to will some energy into his limbs. 'Well?' he rasped, "What happened?"

Carter sat down hard, wincing. "I tried to fix the 'Gate."

"Can you fix it?" he asked, anxiously, in his tired state unable to hide the concern in his eyes.

Carter met the eyes, bright underneath his dark eyebrows and felt the terrible sickening guilt rise in her throat. She dropped her gaze to the floor. "I can't fix it sir," she said, voice thick with held back tears, 'The DHD is smashed to hell. Even if I can reassemble the crystals, which is doubtful as it looks like half of them are missing, there's still got to be a power-source to link to the 'Gate..." She stopped, unable to continue.

O'Neill, tired as he was, was still a commander. He dragged his chair closer to Carter's and gripped her shoulders firmly. "Stop it," he said. She was still unable to meet his eyes. "You'll fix it."

She looked up, suddenly blazing mad. "Sir, I can't! This isn't a question of giving me some good soldier pep talk and then I'll pull some brilliant solution out of my ass! It's like trying to fill a well with a sieve!!" She tore away from his grip.

"Carter!" O'Neill snapped, "For cryin' out loud! We might be on an alien planet and it might not be the best of situations but you are a Major in the United States Air Force, I am your commanding officer and you had DAMN WELL BETTER START ACTING LIKE IT!!"

Carter blinked, giving him stare for stare for one long, hot moment.

"I'm sorry sir," she muttered, voice as small as she felt.

O'Neill shook his aching head. "It's bad of me to shout," he said, "I know this is hard on you, being away from you fiance and all." He picked up the kettle and slipped outside.

Carter hit the wall hard, fighting not to let the tears threatening to overspill from her burning eyes fall. "What am I *doing?*" she asked, sinking to her knees. "I should have followed his orders, that's what I should have done. Gone with Daniel and Teal'c. I'd be with Grant now. Is that what I want?"

She didn't know. Every time she thought of the handsome lawyer her stomach twisted with guilt.

O'Neill returned a put the kettle to boil. "I'll make dinner," he informed her and she nodded.

"I'm sorry sir," she began but he cut her off with a wave of his hand.

"It's done Carter. Don't sweat it." There was something of the old kindness in his eyes once more and Carter's stomach twisted itself into another knot.

*

The following day brought more of the same, and the two soldiers fell into an uneasiness; a careful relationship of little eye contact and pleasantries skirting round the real issues of their days. Carter could not help but notice the bruises on his body when they rose in the mornings, just as he could not fail to notice the gradual weariness overcoming her, her normally brilliant blue eyes dull and shoulders hunching with misery. Events could not continue as they remained, and yet nothing seemed able to break the spell of careful military politeness that they had fallen under.

Five days passed in such a manner, and their two days of assigned labour began. Instead of the palace they instead journeyed to the small village. The atmosphere there could not have been more surprising. The streets were thronged with people, smiling, happy people; people talking, laughing, children playing in between the forest of legs. O'Neill's hand rested lightly on Carter's arm, fearful they should lose each other in the seething mass of people.

"Ah! O'Neill and Carter!" It was the young doctor. "Don't worry! You will not be assigned anything too strenuous. You've worked well, or so the masters say. Three days of rest will be yours after tomorrow."

O'Neill felt Carter visibly sagged with relief. "What will we be doing for the next two days?"

"Basic tasks, nothing strenuous. Do not worry!"

Carter exchanged a look with O'Neill; the first in several days. They followed the general movement of people along the street. At the end of the row was the man who had first visited O'Neill and Carter, dressed in the same shabby black.

He gave them a cursory sweep with his eyes. "Um. You will work in the fields. Together if you wish. Harvesting the crops." He nodded to a man on his left, unknown to the soldiers, but they were growing used to following unnamed people by now and followed him wordlessly.

Harvesting transpired to be exactly that, a sickle, the rippling waves of corn; cutting it ruthlessly whilst the workers chatted and shouted happily to one another under the cold sky. It wasn't extremely physical work and the team nature of the men and women harvesting meant that those who were unable to work at full capacity were allowed to rest more regularly.

Carter found that the almost mechanical repetition of the same movement, cutting with the sickle, vaguely comforting. It was certainly easier than the physically and mentally demanding task of trying to fix the Stargate every day. O'Neill watched her work out of the corner of his eye, his aching muscles not enjoying the iterative movement.

They broke for lunch under a tree in the field. Fresh bread and soft cheese with flasks of wine and beer made for a much more pleasant meal than the two soldiers had become used to. O'Neill lay on the cut grass around the tree and stared at the sky. It was too cold to pretend it was summer, but there was something agreeable about it all the same. The scent of the grass filled his senses. He started to hum under his breath.

It was a grass stained, dusty couple that returned to their home to bathe, yelping, in icy cold water from the well. They ate bread for their tea, torn from a rustic loaf presented to them from the workers they had harvested with in the day, too tired for conversation.

Carter's thoughts as they lay on their foul mattresses turned once again to Grant that night. O'Neill's even breathing as he lay close, and yet far away, asleep, provided a gentle background to her guilty speculation.

She wasn't sure when she fell asleep, only that she was suddenly blinking awake as strong hands held her shoulders. "Carter." His voice was slurred with tiredness, as she squinted to see his face.

"Sir?"

"You were shouting. In your sleep."

"Oh." She blushed, thankful that the darkness rendered the red flush invisible. "Sorry sir."

"Not a problem."

He was very close, in exhaustion allowing himself to almost rest his forehead on hers. "What was I shouting about?"

She could feel his breath on her face and her insides seemed to contract. His hands suddenly released her shoulders and he rolled away, taking the warmth of his body with him. She shivered as he replied. "Grant."

He turned away from her, leaving her feeling worse than she had before she had settled down to sleep.

*

The next day passed in a similar manner to the previous, and their three days of rest began. Invited to the village that evening neither of them was ashamed to admit that they spent most of the time up to their departure asleep.

A depressive silent gloom had settled on them like the frost that continually mugged the few leaves in the lane from the hedgerows, and yet they could not walk apart from each other. Carter could not bring herself to say anything to break the tension, and O'Neill was in too filthy a temper to even consider doing so. Even here on an alien planet the wedge that Grant had driven between them remained strong; it was, Carter mused, as if she had betrayed O'Neill. She felt the guilt for beginning her affair with Grant as well as the guilt for choosing O'Neill over her fiance when he had been about to die. O'Neill felt guilt for still feeling for Carter what he was not supposed to, and anger.

The village was flooded with people again, a huge bonfire burning in the centre of the main square and a band set up on a large rostra. O'Neill could hear the gentle strumming of a guitarist tuning up over the noise of the crowd.

People that they had been introduced to over the past two days found them in the mass of people. There was Jun, a physicist once upon a time who now worked on an undisclosed project in the Palace; his wife Augusta who was an agricultural worker. O'Neill had befriended a young man called Undred who immediately ushered him away towards the bonfire, where an unidentified animal was being roasted to the point of caramelisation.

O'Neill burnt his fingers trying to ingest some of the roast whilst Carter chatted happily to Jun.

After the roast was consumed and the raucous folk music dying down fireworks flashed across the sky. By this point O'Neill and Carter had found one another again, more relaxed after their time apart and several measures of ale. O'Neill smiled at Carter for the first time in over a week and she felt some of the tension in her shoulders ease as she smiled back.

O'Neill looked into her brilliant blue eyes, shining with their old mirth and swallowed. "We'll get out of here," he said, taking her hand. "I'll get you back to Grant in one piece."

Her smile faded slightly, her eyes losing their warmth. "I'll do my best sir."

There was an explosion overhead of red and green, an appreciative 'aahh' from the crowd. Carter relaxed again, O'Neill still lightly holding her hand and let the sounds of hundreds of people being merry take her and carry her away from her own concerns and miseries.