Halfway down the mountain, the earthquake started. Prometheus had expected as much. He let the mortals – no, that was the kind of thinking that encouraged the goa'uld to believe themselves gods; he was just as mortal as they were, if somewhat longer-lived. He let the humans, along with their Jaffa, get slightly ahead of him as they zig-zagged and dodged rocks, moving faster than was safe but avoiding any serious stumbles, and he managed to stay on his feet by running where they ran. It was a pleasant surprise, the way his body was responding to him despite so many years out of action. All those little muscle exercises he'd done had paid off, apparently. The fact that everyone assumed he was out of his mind caused a small amount of resentment, but he didn't really blame them, because most of the time they were right; the last few days had been stunningly lucid compared to the few hundred years before that.

He began to suspect that he was hallucinating when the entire team of mort – of humans disappeared from in front of him; so much so that it was almost a relief when the ground beneath his feet gave way, and he found himself falling. He landed hard, smacking his head on the ground, and deduced that he was in some sort of tunnel in the middle of a rock slide. There was just enough time for him to crawl to a stretch of tunnel with a relatively stable roof before he passed out.

For a long time after he came to – or maybe it was less than a minute; hard to tell – he wasn't sure if he was actually awake, or if he was, whether or not his eyes were open. If he was, and they were, then he was either blind or it was pitch black. After a while a soft groan and some fumbling noises drifted over to him, and then a sign that he wasn't blind after all: a beam of light appeared from nowhere, throwing some illumination on his surroundings. He sat up reluctantly, resisted the urge to clutch at his head (he had years and years and years of dealing with excruciating agony under his belt; a headache was nothing), and squinted to find the source of the light. He could dimly make out the shape of a human behind it – the female, Sam or Carter or Major Carter, depending on who was talking and what kind of mood they were in.

"Hello?" The beam of light swung his way, blinding him with the glare. "Ow. Ow. Don't do that, please. What is that?"

"Oh, sorry." Mercifully, the light pointed away, at the tunnel wall behind him. "This? It's a flashlight. Do you know where we are?"

"In a tunnel," he grumbled.

She gave a small sigh of frustration, and began exploring with the... flashlight. He savoured the way the new word sounded in his head, then dismissed it as the infantile technology it was. Infantile or not, however, it did enable him to get a better look around. They were definitely in a tunnel: ten feet wide, approximately the same height. The area behind him was completely filled in with fallen rocks. The female – names, he reminded himself, use names – Sam made a soft noise of worry at the sight, but didn't linger over their misfortune. A few more seconds of searching, and the flashlight alighted on a pair of legs, which, he soon discovered, belonged to the one that appeared to be the team leader – Colonel, or Jack, or O'Neill, or, quite frequently, Sir. Sam crawled over to him and gently shook his shoulder.

"Colonel? Sir?"

Jack mumbled something, shifted, and was still.

"Colonel," Sam repeated, more sternly.

"Five more minutes," he muttered.

"Alert!" Sam shouted suddenly, causing Prometheus to jump. "Code red! We're under attack!"

"Gaah!" Jack spasmed into a sitting position and looked around frantically before coming fully awake. "Aargh. Carter?"

"Hello, sir. We seem to be trapped in some sort of tunnel."

"Um. What? Gimme a second." Jack rubbed a hand over his face, flexed his fingers and toes – doing a quick check for broken bones, Prometheus realised – then felt around in his pockets until he retrieved a flashlight similar to Sam's. When he switched it on, there was an appreciable increase in visibility, which was not saying all that much considering how little had been visible before. Now, at least, Prometheus could make out shapes instead of just slightly-less-dark shadows. "Who's where?"

"Prometheus is over there, sir, he's all right. Daniel and Teal'c..." She pointed her flashlight in a direction in which she had not yet looked, and said with relief, "There."

The two humans crawled to their compatriots, causing Prometheus to wonder why no one was getting up and walking, and commenced the waking ceremony.

"Daniel. Da-niel. Wake up, Danny boy."

"Teal'c? You okay?"

Well, if no one else intended to determine the extent of their entrapment, he would have to do it himself. Prometheus got to his feet, swayed, and realised immediately why the other two were crawling. If he hadn't been a parasite particularly adept at healing his host, he would have fallen right over again. As it was, he took a moment to steady himself, snatched a flashlight from Sam, who was too busy with the Jaffa to stop him, and tottered in the opposite direction of the cave-in. He did not have to go far to discover that their ill luck extended to both sides of their little stretch of tunnel: he had only gone a few feet before he encountered another thorough blockage. One deep, slow breath to calm himself, and he went back to the humans. The Jaffa – Teal'c – and the other human – Daniel, Danny, Dr Jackson – were awake and sitting up.

"We're trapped," he said bluntly. "Cave-in on both sides."

Daniel said, "Guh?"

Teal'c stood up slowly, wordlessly took the flashlight from Prometheus, and limped away to check for himself. When he got back, he simply nodded to Jack and sat down again.

Jack returned the nod morosely. "Great. Okay. So, first things first. How long until we run out of air?"

"Depends on how long we were unconscious."

"Which was..."

Daniel spoke up, managing actual words this time. "My watch is broken."

"Mine, too."

"Crappy military technology," Jack grumbled, holding his wrist in the light of his flashlight. "Those Elder guys are going to be disappointed."

Teal'c was stoic. "I carry no watch."

The team of would-be-rescuers swivelled to face Prometheus. He shrugged. "What's a watch?"

"We'll assume we get to live for a few more hours, at least. In that case, any serious injuries that need immediate attention?"

"I think I hurt my ankle," Daniel volunteered.

"Is the pain going to kill you?"

"No."

"Anyone got broken bones, anyone going to bleed to death in the near future?"

"Is a few hours near?" Daniel asked.

"No."

"Then no."

Miraculously, no one had any broken bones, and although they were all covered with cuts, scrapes and bruises, there was nothing life-threatening to put a further dent in their day.

"Anyone still have a pack?"

There was a chorus of "no".

"I've got my gun, sir," Sam offered.

"Me, too."

"And I have my zat gun," Teal'c put in.

Daniel seemed embarrassed. "I have, um... Nothing at all. I even lost my torch."

"Well, we're all alive, that's something." In the light from the two flashlights, Prometheus could see Jack rub his hands together. "Looks like we'll have to try and dig our way out." Ignoring the doubtful murmurs, he looked from side to side. "Which way is out?"

Prometheus pointed to the far end of the tunnel, away from them. "That way."

"How do you know?"

"I just know."

"That's not an answer."

Sam spoke up. "Sir, we don't exactly have many options. We might as well try that way."

"Okay, kids. Let's see if that cave-in is everything it's cracked up to be."