---------------
Down, again!
The corpse-smoke withdrew from its current host and sulked in a corner of the moving box. Every time it tried to dwell within one of the other-humans long enough to urge it up and out, the creature would either swallow an oddly-colored pebble with water and stubbornly stay in place, or take the moving box down and head for the doctor-lady's den.
This wasn't working.
So. If it couldn't make one of the other-humans carry it out of this stone nest....
It'd just have to climb out itself.
It would take time. And a great deal of energy. Energy it had planned to use to spawn, in this place so empty of dangers.
But there were many, many other-humans here. If it could just sip from each one it passed, using the energy from one to bring it to the next....
And what was a day lost, with so much prey so close?
---------------
Konastha-ee, Daniel reviewed the last entry from his phonetic notes in his head, absently noting the first gold light of early sunset gleaming off the kanji above the doorway as he walked through. "Be quiet." But Daire used an "ee", where I think some of her advisors used an "ei"... honorific, maybe? Status mark? "Be quiet, greater to lesser power"?
"Eeek!"
"Son of a-"
A breeze rifled his hair; Daniel sidestepped absently. I don't think it was a gender mark, or the advisors would have used "ee". But if it was lord-to-underling, all of the advisors should have used "ei". Unless we're misreading the situation, and Lady Daire isn't as much in charge as she'd like us to think. Ouch, that could get messy. Maybe it's a tense mark? "You shall be quiet"?
A foot landed near his toes; Daniel dodged, stamped in swift counter. Light counter; that foot wasn't nearly built enough to be an adult.
Wait - it could be a status-by-age mark. The advisors using "ei" were all younger, twenties and thirties; the ones using "ee" were fifty-plus. Lady Daire wasn't, but it's common to call a leader "elder" no matter what the real age-
"Yamete."
Polished wood touched his brow. Daniel froze.
"I notice," Kenshin said calmly, bokken touching Daniel's forehead as a gleam of humor lit violet eyes, "That while your mind was elsewhere, your body did duck."
"Ah...." Duck? Lifting his head away from the wooden sword, Daniel glanced behind him-
One bokken was quivering against a mat. Three masked students were scattered in his wake, panting in stunned amazement. A spiky-haired brunet barely into his teens was rubbing his instep and glaring at the archaeologist. And all the class was looking at him.
Oops.
Kaoru cleared her throat. Pointed to the side of the room, out of the main line of bouts. "That way."
"Gomen nasai," Daniel apologized, bowing as an errant student to the interrupted master. He stepped out to the edge of the room, feeling a hot blush sweep his cheeks. "I'm very sorry, Kamiya-sensei."
Some of the fire softened out of the azure glare. "Don't do it again."
"Definitely not." Daniel all but tiptoed to the back of the room, making himself a small, quiet huddle in the corner as the interrupted class got back to business. He listened as the clack of wood on wood, wood on padding turned rhythmic, too embarrassed to raise his head to watch. Funny, how the ground never opened up and swallowed you when you wanted it to.
Blue paper rustled down in front of his eyes. Daniel caught the folded flyer automatically. Looked up.
"Classes are not held the same time every day, that they are not." Kenshin stood before him, a quiet smile touching his face. "Come. Show me you know how to fall."
---------------
This one, Kenshin thought, guiding their newest pupil through his first clumsy attempts to grip a sword-hilt, has been through war.
He could see it in the calluses where shaking hands had gripped a gun, the miniscule hesitations as unseen scars caught muscle, the twitch of nerves when a threat stepped too close. He saw it in the relaxed tumble of Daniel's fall; a good fall, trained and honed until it was reflex, bringing the archaeologist back to feet or knees or whatever stance a quick glance told him would be best suited for facing his opponent.
A dangerous man. But not so dangerous as he fears, Kenshin thought, stepping back to watch and correct as Daniel swung. With the students, he avoided. He countered. Yet he did not strike in return.
Though he could have. One so skilled should have; either that, or woken himself enough to realize he had walked into a bout, and retreat. For all his skill, Daniel's training seemed uneven. Lacking not in competence, but in heart.
I wonder....
Deliberately, Kenshin roused the Battousai.
Daniel's swing wavered. Blue eyes went wide behind safety lenses; a head whipped toward the sudden, chill sense of deadly threat-
Kenshin damped his youki, concealing it behind the quiet chi of the harmless wanderer. So.
This gentle, dangerous scholar could sense chi.
And where and when did that gift wake in you, young one? It runs deep; you trust it as you would your own breath. Yet you've trained it not at all. Whose care were you in, that they did not see the signs?
That he could determine later. What was critical now was to tell Kaoru their new student bore a two-edged sword. One that could be honed to a lethal, protective edge... or kill him if it remained untrained.
No wonder Daniel had walked right through two fights. The students felt safe here, protected. And their chi responded; warm, unthreatening, eager to compete - yet without a trace of bloodlust.
You sensed no threat, so you saw no threat. Kenshin restrained an exasperated shake of his head. And were it not for trained reflex, which saw only object, not opponent, Karen's bokken would have laid you out cold as a snow-sculpture.
"A hundred swings," Kenshin instructed, and went to tend the rest of the class.
Daniel, Daniel. What will I do with you?
---------------
Ninety-six, ninety-seven...okay, that was weird, Daniel thought, finishing the last few swings with trembling arms. One moment he'd been taking his first uncorrected swing under Kenshin's watchful eye-
The next he had known, known, bone-deep, that there was a threat standing right there, lethal as Jack in obstacle-clearing mode.
And he'd blinked, and it was Kenshin again.
One hundred. Breathing hard, Daniel lowered the wooden sword, not letting its tip touch the ground. Talk about weird... exactly when did I say I was going to take this class?
Or maybe his imagination hadn't been playing tricks on him, and underneath the harmless façade Kenshin was more like Jack than he let on. Up to and including the tendency to steamroller people into heading the direction he thought best.
"Good." The redheaded swordsman was in front of him once more, violet eyes unreadable. "Now. The next lesson." A slim hand waved toward the folding chairs. "For the rest of the class, watch me."
"Watch you what?" Daniel asked warily, unfolding stiff metal.
"Simply watch. Your mind will wander, that it will. Guide it back. Be gentle." Humor glinted in violet as Kenshin patted the archaeologist's head. "The poor creature is obviously overworked."
Daniel sputtered as the swordsman swished back into the flow of the class. Yep. A lot more like Jack than he lets on....
Ergh. Where'd he go?
And thus began over an hour of visual hide-and-seek.
Red hair ought to stand out like a bonfire!
Sometimes it did. Sometimes it didn't. Five minutes trying to keep track of the redheaded instructor led Daniel to one unshakable conclusion: Kenshin was a master of what Jack called the ghost step.
Know where your opponent's looking. Know when he can't see you. Use that one instant of visual distraction to slip clear, like a ninja.
Kenshin's uncanny speed turned his "step" from effective to pure magic. Blink - he was there. Blink - he was gone.
Only it's more than that, Daniel realized, focusing back on the instructor as Kenshin guided the brunette who'd nearly parted the archaeologist's hair through one of the more advanced forms. Sometimes he's more - visible - than others? That doesn't make sense.
Yet it seemed to be true. Kenshin stepped through a forward thrust, the brunette following-
Gone again! Daniel began to look aside, wondering how the swordsman had vanished right in the middle of a demonstration....
He... didn't?
Red hair still glimmered under the lights, settling over pink-clad shoulders as Kenshin finished the form.
But I don't feel him-
Daniel's breath caught as that sense of presence roared back into flaming life. Across the room, violet eyes caught his, and winked.
What the heck?
And swift as that, the sense of Kenshin dimmed once more, like a lantern turned down to the barest glimmer of flame.
Oh. My. Gods.
Daniel watched with a mix of interest and pure, stark terror. Kenshin's hands and bokken took the most innocuous of poses, while that sense of threat flared like a bonfire. Or the swordsman might make one quick slash that - had it been real - would have gutted his opponent like a fish... yet projected no more warning than a falling leaf.
Michael said he's not an empath. And yet....
"Karen." Kenshin nodded to the brunette. "Defend."
Mid-level sense of presence now, flaring and dimming as wood clacked on wood and quick feet advanced and retreated across the floor. Strike and block at chest level, knees, chest again.
That's Kenshin, Daniel realized, trying to narrow down that flutter that wasn't any of the five senses he was used to. And working against him, that's - Karen? Quieter, not as focussed. But once you know it's there, it's easier to read, like Sam. Not like Jack, or Teal'c-
Daniel froze, one finger almost touching his lips.
"Hiyah!"
Kenshin flared, the speed of his strike brushing past Karen's blade as if it were a slow, lazy fly. Wood thocked into padding, one controlled blow that even so drove the student to her knees.
Daniel concentrated on his breathing as Karen found her feet again, and the pair exchanged soft words. He was not going to hyperventilate. He was not going to pass out. Simply. Not.
"Do you see?"
Daniel looked up. "I'm-" He licked his lips. "I'm not sure."
"Those who taught you are skilled warriors. Their chi, like O'Neill's, is clear. Distinct." Kenshin tipped his head back. "Blatantly honest fighting chi."
When Jack or Teal'c come at me, I know they're coming....
"But one does not often fight truly skilled warriors. An amateur's energies are unfocused. Muddy. Not easy to read, even for those with eyes to see, if they have not trained. And one who has mastered a chosen art of war..." Violet eyes were deep as night. "That one's chi will flow as the master directs. And that is truly difficult to read, that it is."
Daniel set his jaw. "I don't read chi."
"No?"
Night and fire and lightning-flash-
And violet eyes shifted to pure, smoldering amber.
Chair metal bit into Daniel's hands as his back hit the wall. The peril in front of him hadn't moved, but he wasn't fooled. Simple metal wouldn't block this wooden sword. Death was merely waiting for that perfect moment, when one quick blow would send everything he was spiraling into endless dark....
"Mou ii!"
Startled, Daniel jerked his gaze back to-
Violet. Gentle. And tinged with sadness. "Yahari," Kenshin said quietly, one hand motioning toward the floor. "You will not need so frail a defense against me, that you will not."
Chill sweat trickling down his neck, Daniel put the chair down. "How?"
Kenshin smiled. Glanced towards Kaoru, who had Alice aside as the last of the other students made their chattering way out the door. "Only one who saw with his soul instead of his eyes would have wandered so careless among our swords."
Daniel mulled that over as they tidied up the dojo. Sighed as they walked into the near-empty parking lot. "So what can I do?"
"Learn to pay attention...." Violet widened slightly. Daniel felt something sweep past him, like a tingle of static. "Back!"
And Kaoru yanked Alice aside, a breath before a heavy hand would have clamped on the blonde's shoulder. "Rick!" Alice gasped.
Rick and friends, Daniel realized, looking over the snickering lumps of muscle sauntering out from behind a flame-painted van, tire irons in hand. The archaeologist's hand almost reached for the gun that wasn't there; fisted by his side. Four on four. Even odds, on the face of it. Only Alice is too scared to fight... and they outweigh us two to one.
A yeasty reek of beer wafted his way as Rick made another grab for the shivering blonde; Kaoru barely shoved her immobile body aside in time. "Where have you been, huh?" he snarled.
"Away from you," Kaoru snapped. "Where she belongs!"
"I'm not talking to you, bitch!"
Violet narrowed.
"Hounds have better manners than bloodthirsty swine like you, Morrson," Kaoru growled.
"Feisty, huh?" One of Rick's buddies licked his lips. "Don't you worry, little girl. You're next."
"Little girl?" Kaoru's hand closed on her bokken.
Mentally Daniel wadded up the "peaceful solution" option and tossed it in a figurative trashcan. "Should I even point out they've got big metal sticks?" he murmured.
Blush stood out like blood against Alice's chalky face. "I've - I've got a restraining order! You're not supposed to be here!"
"What, I'm supposed to let some piece of paper keep you from cheating on me with a pencil-necked dweeb like that?" Rick flung a ham-sized hand Daniel's way. "God, your taste sucks!"
"Hey!" Daniel protested.
"Hell, you should know, Rick!" The blonde shook with anger as well as fear. "I picked you, didn't I?"
"Why, you little-" Tire irons lifted.
Kenshin sighed. "Hurting people always seems so pointless." Metal keened against metal. "Anyone who dislikes seeing the doctor, please leave. Now."
"Shut your-"
Tire irons slashed through empty air.
Nobody's that fast-
But bodies were flying, and men howling, and iron swung out of the melee as he helped Kaoru drag a screaming, clawing Alice back-
Oh, shit.
Hardened steel bounced off arm and head, flinging stars in its wake. Daniel yelped and ducked the blow he knew would follow-
It never came.
A blaze of red hair flew up, almost seeming to hang in midair, before coming down in one swift flash of steel-
"Ryuu Tsui Sen!"
Steel crashed down on Rick's collarbone. He crumpled.
Kenshin touched down in a soft thump of sandals, barely breathing hard.
Two swings, Daniel realized, touching an all-too-familiar wet stickiness on his head. Two swings, and four bodies. "That... wasn't Kamiya Kasshin Ryu."
"I am a very poor teacher," Kenshin said softly, sword still drawn as he watched groaning bodies for any further sign of resistance. "I teach Kaoru's style... but this was first to my hand, and one strikes best with one's heart."
Daniel watched the three unnamed guys curl on themselves, obviously clutching bruised ribs and torn ligaments. Hard luck, tough guys. Rick was immobile, gasping; the archaeologist noted the lifeless dangle of his right arm, and bet himself a week's pay that Janet would declare the guy's collarbone shattered. "So that was...?"
"An ancient style from the Sengoku Jidai, that pits one against many... and would do ten times the damage, if not used with a sakabatou," Kenshin said coolly, absently flicking his wrist twice before he sheathed his reverse blade. "Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu."
The Honorable Sword of the Flowing Heavens, Daniel translated the archaic words. Ten times the damage-
His mind pictured those swift strikes with a katana, and froze.
There wouldn't be four idiots groaning here. There would be pieces of four bodies, and blood sliding down that odd-edged blade....
That flick.
An odd double twist of the wrist, flicking metal both ways. Reflex, trained and ingrained as Jack's automatic check of the safety on his P-90.
Shake the blood off the blade.
"Someone want to call the cops?" Kaoru sighed, pressing tissues on the woman whimpering in her arms.
"Got it." Anything, rather than think about that one betraying movement that all but screamed Himura's intimate association with blood. Daniel fumbled in his jacket pocket, breathed a sigh of relief that his cell was still in one piece. Don't hit speed-dial, this isn't an SGC problem. For once.
"911, what is your emergency?"
"Ma'am? We need an ambulance, and cops. Assault, four guys; it's the Kamiya dojo," he managed fuzzily. "Street number is...." God, he couldn't remember past the pounding in his head.
"That's all right, sir." The dispatcher's voice sounded calm, professional... and faintly amused. "We know the address."
---------------
"...And that is what happened," Kenshin concluded, watching Sergeant Williams scribble away at his notebook.
"Right." The uniformed policeman closed his book with a sigh. "Of course, you know he's probably going to press charges, even though he's the idiot who violated his restraining order, and got his buddies to attack a perfectly innocent bystander - and insulted your wife?" Williams whistled. "Damn."
"Indeed, he was so foolish," Kenshin acknowledged.
"Himura?"
"Yes?"
"You're a menace." The officer smiled wryly. "Stay in one piece, okay?"
"Kenshin!" Kaoru pounced on him the moment Williams cleared the doorway. "Karen's taking Alice in for the night; she's crying a lot, but she says she's glad it's over. They took Daniel away, I'm not sure if he's all right-"
Kenshin listened, then led the way down the hall. "From the volume, I would say he is well enough."
"No, I am not staying overnight!" Daniel's voice was firm, with an underlying quiver of exhausted anger. "It's a minor concussion. I've had them before. I don't need a hospital stay. I need to go home. To my own bed. Where it's quiet."
The nurse's chi was muddy with pent-up frustration. "Dr. Jackson, if you've been concussed before, you know you need to be watched-"
"I will watch him." Kenshin stepped around the curtain, taking in the small bandage reaching into blond hair. "We are neighbors." He arched a brow. "Unless you would prefer another?"
Daniel's mouth opened; snapped shut. "Just get me out of here."
The ride home was quiet. The doorman was startled briefly when they passed through - but apparently by the fact that Daniel had arrived with other tenants, not because he was injured. So one who would rather negotiate than fight is often wounded, Kenshin thought, adding that fact to the growing pile he had assembled.
"Well," Kaoru said brightly, leading the way into their apartment. "Given that we're going to be waking you up every hour or so anyway... would anyone like tea?"
"Yes, thank you," Daniel said politely.
And you bury fury in courtesy. Truly, you are accustomed to being the lesser threat. Kenshin sat. "You feel I have deceived you."
"You know how to kill." Daniel's voice was quiet. Colorless.
Kenshin inclined his head. "Any kenshi does."
Behind glass, blue studied him. "Why do you do that? I know you speak English."
"But you are not entirely comfortable in English, that you are not," Kenshin said easily. "What tongue were you born to?"
"My parents were American."
"Sou ka?"
Daniel frowned. "Has anybody ever told you you're annoying?"
Carrying a tea tray back into the room, Kaoru chortled. "You have no idea."
And there was quiet for a time, as they properly poured and appreciated the tea. Or two of them appreciated it; Kenshin could see the mind working behind blue eyes, trying to fit fact with feeling. "I don't know who you are," Daniel said at last.
Setting his cup down with a light clink of porcelain on wood, Kenshin motioned, go on.
"I asked... a friend. He said your background information's false. That Aoshi built you a cover, and swore you weren't spies, and out of respect for that he's never done anything to draw attention to you or your family. But he did check you out. And found some... weird things." Daniel wet his lips. "Did you kill someone in Japan? Is that why you're hiding?"
Kenshin met Kaoru's gaze. Well, my love?
Kaoru smiled, and shrugged. "We're not hiding, Daniel. We're just not making it obvious where we are."
Daniel's knuckles paled on the low table. "But-"
"Yes."
Daniel started.
"Yes, I have killed," Kenshin said levelly. "Many times." He touched warm porcelain, breathing in the scent of green tea. How often had he used the tea ceremony as a comfort, a way to remind himself that the Battousai was not the whole of his soul? And yet it reflects that part of me still; the drive for excellence, the care in movement, the swift grace that lasts but a moment and is done.
A soul divided against itself cannot stand.
Daniel swallowed, fingers unclenching muscle by muscle. "I knew you were like Jack."
"Yes. And no." Kenshin stared into the past, seeing bright banners, faces young and old full of ideals and hope. And blood, so much blood. "I have never been part of any army. I followed one man, whose ideals I believed in. I killed on orders. I killed to protect my comrades." He could see the blood even now, running like rainwater in the streets of Edo and Kyoto. "And sometimes, I killed those who had the simple misfortune to have seen me."
"You did what you thought was right." Kaoru laid a hand on his arm. "And when it wasn't right, you stopped."
Kenshin laid his hand over her own, delighting in the familiar touch, the light calluses of sword-work. "And you saved me. My angel of kenjutsu."
"You saved yourself, Kenshin." Kaoru's smile softened the sting of her words, made them a light shake to bring him back to himself. "I just taught you how to stop running." Sky-blue eyes left his, turned to Daniel. "It's over now. It has been for a long time."
Daniel weighed that. "So if it's over, why not go home?"
"Home is where family is," Kaoru said plainly. "And part of our family asked for our help."
"Two parts," Kenshin added with a nod. "Aoshi, who worries about your mountain. And Ryan, who cares little for the shadows, but much for the people in his guardianship. He knew a Kamiya dojo would go far toward aiding those who might otherwise live in fear."
"Fear kills," Kaoru stated, back straight as if she were about to swing. "Maybe not as fast as a sword. But it's poison. It hurts people."
"Yes, it does." Daniel wove his hands together, studying the flex of finger against finger. "I don't want to be afraid of you."
Ah. Kenshin restrained a nod of comprehension as pieces fell into place. "It is Jack you fear."
"I don't-"
Silent, Kenshin waited.
"I did... something he wouldn't understand," Daniel said at last. "If he found out... he'd think I didn't believe in him. And I do believe in him, it's just...."
"There is something which must be done, that he, by his oaths, cannot do," Kenshin finished. "And so, to safeguard his soul, you have walked with open eyes into the shadows."
"He wouldn't... see it that way." Daniel stared into the remnants of his tea. "He'll think I followed someone else in. That I was - lured into betraying him." The archaeologist blinked. "How did you...?"
"I have seen men like O'Neill before. Shatter their oaths, and there is little left to save." Kenshin touched their guest's shoulder. "Take heart. His oaths may be dear to him, but he knows they do not hold you. If he is your friend, he will forgive; that he will."
"Is he always this optimistic?" Daniel asked Kaoru in an obvious aside.
Kaoru looked her husband over with a considering gaze, from the tip of his ponytail to tabi-clad feet. "Nope." A smile twinkled in sky-blue eyes. "Sometimes he's worse."
---------------
Oh, what a beautiful morning... not, Janet Fraiser thought wryly, rubbing at an ache in her neck as she reviewed the SGC blood supplies. Time to stock up on O and AB negative again; Jack hadn't gotten any holes poked in him lately, which with SG-1's luck meant he was overdue for a nasty bout of surgery. Ugh, ugh, ugh. Damn nasty alien chemicals, damn headaches, damn embarrassing side-effects....
Headaches and chemicals she could live with, even when the headaches seemed to have spread through sympathetic stress to every floor of the SGC. It was the embarrassment that made her want to melt through the floor.
Could have been worse. The tape may be part of SGC history, but at least Sam grabbed the eight-by-tens before Cassie saw them.
A ringing phone shoved that thought to the back burner. "Infirmary, Fraiser."
"Dr. Fraiser?"
That voice wasn't any she knew from the Mountain. "To whom am I speaking?"
"Kenshin Himura."
Himura, Himura... why did that name sound familiar?
"I am calling for Daniel Jackson... ah. He has found his glasses."
Another hand fumbled with the phone. "Janet?"
"Daniel?" Janet squashed the urge to grab the archaeologist by the scruff of the neck and haul him through the phone lines. "What happened? Who was that? Are you all right?"
"Whoa! I'm okay, well, sort of okay, my head hurts, but that's normal-"
"Daniel. Breathe."
A sigh whistled down the line. "I'm, um, they told me to call in sick this morning. Which I guess I should. If nobody needs me for anything important, at least. I mean, the translation's pretty far, though I think you should tell Major Roscoe that ee could be a tricky honorific and she might want to try sticking to ei-"
"I'll tell her," Janet said firmly, making a note. "Are you sick? Hurt?"
"Just a few bumps and bruises...."
Great. Evasive. Jack's rubbing off on him too much. Janet rolled her eyes. Think positive; if he were really badly hurt, he'd have called Jack, and Jack would have dragged you out of the mountain by your ears. "What happened?"
"I kind of got into the middle of a fight."
Janet stamped on her immediate reaction of idiot; this was Daniel, not a Marine. If a fight had found him, it wasn't because he'd gone looking for it. "And...?"
"A guy had a tire iron, I didn't duck fast enough, Kenshin and Kaoru took turns waking me up, they're really nice neighbors, and I'm fine, really. Just a little sore. And tired."
And concussed, Janet filled in. Terrific. "Can I talk to Mr. Himura?"
"Ah, okay...."
The phone switched hands. "Doctor," Kenshin said politely.
"How is he, really?"
"A bruise to his left arm where he blocked, three stitches to his scalp, and a mild concussion," Kenshin said matter-of-factly. "We have seen no sign of complications. He was skilled, and fortunate. And very brave, to save a distraught young lady from assailants twice her size."
"Hey!" Janet heard Daniel protest in the background. "I didn't-"
"You helped," a woman's voice cut him off. "I'm not sure I could have gotten Alice out of the way by myself."
And that was Daniel all over. Please, let Alice be human, with non-stalking tendencies, Janet prayed. "No offense, sir, but how well do you know concussions?"
"My wife and I run a kendo dojo. We are acquainted with head blows. He did not lose consciousness, there was no nausea, no fractures...."
Janet listened to the man work his way through the list of warning signs and felt a small, cold knot in her gut loosen. Stitches meant someone with experience had looked over Daniel's skull and concluded the all-important skull bones were intact. "So you kept an eye on him all night?" Wish I had neighbors like that.
"It was no trouble, that it was not." Kenshin's voice was warm. "Perhaps he may do as much for me someday, should a student land an unfortunate blow."
Janet nodded. "Thank you. Could I talk to Daniel?"
"Of course." Plastic rattled as the phone switched hands once more.
"Janet?"
"Stay home," Janet said firmly. "Tell me the ER, tell me the doctor if you remember the name. I'll call them. Do not come in. I don't care what artifacts are downstairs. Do not drive, do not stay where other people can't check on you, do not dive or swim, do not get on an airplane, helicopter, or any other mode of conveyance that lowers the atmospheric pressure beyond ten thousand feet." Unlikely, but better safe than sorry. "If Thor calls, tell him to put you right back, now." Very unlikely, but again, unlikely was SG-1's lot in life.
"Okay...."
"Did you call Jack?"
"Um."
Janet sighed. "I'll tell him." And deal with the Mother Hen from Hell.
"Thanks," Daniel said shyly. "I owe you one."
"Like my drill sergeant used to say, you owe me fifty." Shaking her head, Janet hung up. Himura. Where have I heard that before? Curious, she tapped a few keys on her computer. Search for Files or Folders named, containing text....
A long minute passed.
Local Area Blood Donors AB Neg G to K.
Brows climbing into her hair, the redhead opened the file. Gaffson, Gale... Hanson....
Himura, Kenshin.
How about that. Wonder if we've tapped him for Jack anytime- Janet stopped, reread the conventional entry, then turned to the very unconventional note below it. They only want him to show up every three months? Why - oh. Just over the weight limit, huh. Small guy. No wonder Daniel got into the fight.
Well, enough stalling. Time to brave the wrath of O'Neill.
---------------
"What'd you find?" O'Neill leaned over Teal'c's shoulder, peering at the computer monitor. Major Carter was just to his left, peering avidly at the video of the demonstration she and Daniel Jackson had missed while sorting out a cultural confusion about the difference between trade-alliance and alliance-against-enemies - which to Lady Daire had meant other human clans first, and the Goa'uld only as a distant second. After all, what fool would fight gods?
The Jaffa frowned. "I am uncertain." He pointed to the lower right corner of the screen, the image of posturing bola-throwers in kilts and claw necklaces currently frozen on its surface. "Watch."
He pressed play, and bola-throwers flexed and threw, carved stone balls wrapping around their four-limbed wood target-
"Hold it." O'Neill's voice was suddenly cold. "Go back. Can you make that corner any bigger?"
"I have, O'Neill. It makes little difference." Teal'c played the tape again, then the enhanced version he had created with the able assistance of the SGC's computer graphics personnel. In both, a distortion moved across the corner of the screen like a cloud of heat-wave; shimmering around bare toes, moving up an instep, then almost flinching at a silvery anklet before it flowed away.
"That's weird," Sam said warily. "Recording artifact?"
"It is possible," Teal'c allowed. "Yet Lieutenant Armstrong seems convinced that if that were true, we should expect anomalies in other areas of the recording."
"And let me guess. You didn't find any." O'Neill frowned at the screen.
"We did not."
"Terrific." A gray-touched brow rose. "Carter?"
The astrophysicist frowned. "I don't know."
But Teal'c could see blue eyes focus on that distortion, the absent nip of teeth at a lower lip.
And from O'Neill's subtle nod, he did as well. "Okay. What don't you know?"
"Remember Daniel said there was something about the mushrooms they didn't want to talk about?"
"Not in mixed company, yeah-"
Major Carter shook her head. "Or maybe, not in public. I was checking Daniel's report, since Janet says he can't come in today... he got the impression they don't send just anyone to gather the stuff. People are specially trained to do it."
"Uh-huh."
The major called up the document on her screen. "In here somewhere.... Stories seem to indicate they've been moved through 'Gates at least twice in oral tradition, the last time maybe only four generations ago... drifted a long way from the basic Celtic-Etruscan mix they started out with, symbols aren't like what he expected, okay Daniel, we got it.... Oh. Here." She pointed. "From what he observed, the shaman handling the mushrooms carried a lot of protective charms. The kind you only expend the effort of preparing if you're expecting evil supernatural powers."
"Or creatures one could not explain by normal means," Teal'c noted.
Sam straightened. "You think this could be something like P3X-774?"
"If that distortion is its mark on the recording, it is not a fenri," Teal'c said bluntly. "Yet Aindrias may be host to an entity human senses cannot detect."
"A dangerous entity," Sam added softly. Glanced up, eyes wide. "Janet!"
---------------
"Just make sure there's someone who can pick up Cassandra if we all have to stay late, all right? Thanks, Naomi." Janet hung up the infirmary phone, turned to the computer where her blood results had just come up. "Hmm. Low histamine levels."
Jack looked over the doctor-ese on the screen. Winced when he realized how much of it he actually understood. Man, I have been in here way too often. "No offense, Doc, but I thought you always had low histamine levels."
"There's usually enough chlorpheniramine maleate in my system to make sure I can get through the day without collapsing in sneezing fits from the local equivalent of ragweed," Janet agreed tiredly. "But histamine's a vital part of the immune response. I never take enough medication to lower my levels this much." She gripped the desk, drew a breath.
Teal'c was at her shoulder, ready to help her into a chair as she sat. "Are you well, Dr. Frasier?"
"I'm tired," Janet said crossly. "I've been tired for two days now. And... well, hallucinations from an untested medication, I can live with. It happens, even here on Earth. Everyone's biochemistry is different. That's why it's always a good idea to start with a low dose of any new drug if possible. Just in case patient A's system can't tolerate what patient B's eats for breakfast." She kneaded her forehead with her knuckles. "I do not like the idea that something may have been messing with my head."
"Was, definitely." Sam tapped the laptop on which she and Teal'c had been reviewing infirmary video recordings of Janet's leopard-like leap onto her desk. "I think we found it, sir."
Distortion, streaming from Janet's nose and mouth as she was restrained. Jack swore under his breath.
"So we've got an unknown entity loose in the Mountain." Janet scowled. "At least we know it's here."
"Loose I could handle, Doc. Intelligent and loose is what we call a bad combination."
"Oh?" Janet frowned at the computerized video of the distortion making its escape. "Oh. Damn."
"We can't assume it's intelligent," Sam pointed out. "That could just be an automatic response to low histamine levels in the host."
"Like a lamprey, moving on when it's not getting enough blood," Janet muttered.
Teal'c raised an inquiring brow. "What is a lamprey, Dr. Fraiser?"
"Parasitic fish."
"More like predatory fish, Doc," Jack corrected. "Long story short, T, it latches onto another fish and rasps open a hole in it. Then it sucks out blood and... well, you get the picture."
"Indeed." The Jaffa looked as if he wanted to edge away from the computer screen.
"Thing is, people call it a parasite because the fish it's eating usually swims off still alive," Jack went on. "And some of them do make it. But most of its prey don't get very far before the shock does 'em in. Or something else does."
"Moved out of camera range," Sam said absently, fast-forwarding through more video. "Wait... I think I got it again." A small shimmer at the edge of the screen, as if translucent smoke eddied in one corner near Janet's desk without ever rising toward the ceiling. Sam speeded through more video, frowning as the distortion huddled in place. "So it doesn't have to stay in a human all the time."
"O'Neill." Teal'c glanced toward the hidden camera in the corner of the ceiling. "While where it has gone is important-"
Jack felt his gut clench. "Where is it right now?"
---------------
Whee!
The corpse-smoke giggled as its current host drove out of the tunnel into sunlight. A flick of a hand turned on rhythmic noise. Moving metal around it added an interesting counterpoint, jarring the flesh that held it with a low vibration as this metal mass wove through others, all ebbing downhill. And it was on its way to more food. Food, food, glorious gobs of food.
Anticipation was too great a temptation. It leeched more essence from its host, delighting in the first colorful flashes that meant the other-human was drifting into confusion. Mmm... tasty....
Panic stabbed through its host, sharp as any home-human's fear in the last moment before striking the bottom of the cliff.
And there was screeching and turning and hard sharp flying bits-
Oops.
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Translations from Japanese:
Yamete - Stop.
Gomen nasai - Forgive me.
Mou ii - a phrase, means "no more" or "that's enough!"
Yahari/yappari - literally "as expected"; difficult to translate, its meaning and uses are fuzzily defined. Common translations are "as I thought", "just as I suspected", "you really are (just as I thought)...", "can it be that you're?", etc.
Ryuu Tsui Sen - Dragon Mallet Flash.
Sengoku Jidai - the "warring states" era, approx. 1400-1600 AD.
Sakabatou - fictional reverse-bladed sword.
Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu - Honorable Sword of the Flowing Heavens. Legendary sword style. (As in, don't try this at home....)
Kenshi - Swordsman. Not samurai.
Sou ka - I see; is that so?
Kenjutsu - sword arts, kendo.
Edo - renamed Tokyo after the Meiji Restoration.