"You have got to be kidding me!" Jack snapped at Dr. Warner. "What is this, Murphy's Law? What the hell else can happen to him in the course of one day?" He calmed himself down at the sound of a stifled sob coming from behind him. He turned to give Fraiser an apologetic look. "Sorry, Doc."
She nodded without taking her eyes off Daniel. She was in the exact position she had been before Daniel's little tumble, sitting on the edge of his bed with his hand in hers and stroking his arm almost absent-mindedly. The situation was now far worse than it had been ten minutes earlier, though.
"I feel terrible about this, Colonel," Dr. Warner said. He looked absolutely defeated as he looked down at Daniel, rubbing his forehead wearily. "I should have insisted on restraints after his nightmares began."
Jack couldn't dispute this. He should have agreed to Warner's initial hint that the restraints might be a good idea, but he'd seen Daniel tied up enough for one lifetime. He'd thought he could handle whatever reaction Daniel had when he woke up. He'd been wrong.
In order to hide his own guilt, Jack steered the conversation onto a slightly different track. "Okay, so level with me here. How bad?"
Dr. Warner sighed. "I really don't know, Colonel. I'll be taking him for a CT scan shortly. Once those results come back, we'll know more about the extent of the injury. I don't anticipate finding any kind of skull fracture, but I'm a bit concerned that the force of the blow may have aggravated the damage already done to his brain by the mind fever."
"How long is he likely to be out?"
Warner shook his head gravely. "It's impossible to tell at this point, Sir. With the amount of damage that his brain has undergone already... frankly, I'm amazed he's made it this far. I'm afraid there's a real possibility that he will never come out of this coma. His body is just not strong enough to recover from something like this."
Jack gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. This wasn't happening... it couldn't be happening...
He watched as Fraiser reached out a hand to adjust the bandage around Daniel's head, tucking a loose edge under the otherwise tightly wound material so she could better see his eyes. Not that seeing them made any difference. They were firmly closed, and might be forever.
"Colonel?"
Jack shuddered when she spoke. Her voice was so tight and... small. He admired her for taking this whole thing so well, but he could tell she was only just managing to hold herself together. "Yeah?" he said, stepping closer to her.
"I noticed this a few minutes ago, but wasn't able to ask... what is this?" She fingered the charm that still hung around Daniel's neck.
"Carter brought it back from the planet," Jack said. "She said some guy there sent it as a gift for him. It's supposed to heal him or something." 'And we can all see how well it's working,' he added to himself.
"That was kind of him," Fraiser whispered, stroking Daniel's jaw with the backs of her fingers.
Jack flinched and looked away. He couldn't stand to watch such a tender show of affection between them. It made the reality of the situation hit him all the harder.
The sound of rapid footsteps soon turned his attention towards the door.
"My God, what happened?" Carter burst out as she rushed into the room.
"He fell out of the bed," Jack said matter-of-factly. "Practically split his head open in the process. He's in a coma."
"What?" Carter looked as shocked and numb as Jack felt. "But..."
"Yeah. I know." Jack took a deep breath and shrugged his shoulders to try to release some of the tension. "How'd the debriefing go?"
Carter seemed to snap back to reality at this question, and her eyes grew wide for a second. "Fine, Sir. Janet? Can I talk to you for a minute?"
Fraiser did a double take at the sound of her name. "Sure," she said. With one last, lingering look at Daniel, she slowly stood up and released his hand. She laid it gently down beside him before she followed Carter to the other side of the room.
Jack looked over his shoulder to where Warner had just been, but the doctor had obviously scooted off as soon as he got the opportunity. Jack couldn't blame him. He hadn't exactly been polite to the guy the whole time they'd been back.
He plopped down into his chair beside Daniel and studied his friend closely. He just looked like he was sleeping to him. Surely they had it wrong, and he'd just wake up as soon as he'd had enough rest. Part of him felt like shaking him and yelling at him to wake the hell up. He'd do anything if it meant bringing him back to the land of the living.
After a moment or two, he glanced over at Carter and Fraiser to see what they were doing. His gut lurched when he saw that Fraiser had a hand pressed tightly to her mouth, obviously trying hard not to cry, and Carter had a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. What did Carter have to say to Fraiser that was so secretive and painful for Fraiser to hear?
Maybe he didn't want to know.
A minute later, Fraiser made her way back to Daniel's bed and wordlessly returned to her former position beside him. She seemed to be going on autopilot, her eyes trained on Daniel yet not actually seeing anything.
"What did she want to tell you?" he asked.
When Fraiser didn't answer, he turned to look over at Carter and saw that she was just leaving the room. He jumped to his feet and jogged after her.
"Hey," he said when he caught up to her, "what just happened in there? What did you tell Fraiser that made her so upset?"
Carter looked uncomfortable for a moment before she spoke. "Sir... General Hammond has authorized me to contact the Tok'ra and ask if they can help."
Jack found he could only stare at her dumbfounded for a few moments. The Tok'ra? How could they even consider it after what they'd done to him? "No way," he said as soon as his voice returned. "No way in hell. They'd just stick a snake in his head, and you know it."
"Colonel..."
"No!"
"They didn't even suggest that when he was dying from radiation."
Jack refused to see that as a valid point. "No, because he was too far-gone even for them to fix," he said.
"They can do amazing things with Goa'uld healing devices, Sir. I think it's worth a shot."
He gave her a dark look as he tried to think of something positive that could come out of this. He came up empty. "You know they'll jump at the chance to turn Daniel into one of them, Carter," he said, his voice low with barely-contained anger. "With all his skills and knowledge, and his repressed memories of being ascended..."
"Sir, right now Daniel doesn't have any memories, ascended or otherwise. I honestly don't think the Tok'ra would suggest implantation unless it was his only chance at survival, no matter how much they may or may not want him as a host."
Jack flinched at the words "implantation" and "host." They brought back some of the most unpleasant memories of his life, and he would be damned if he'd stand back and allow the same thing to happen to Daniel as happened to him.
"When it comes right down to it, Sir," Carter continued in a tone that showed she was just as disturbed by the thought as he was, "it's Janet's decision."
"And?"
"And... she agreed to go along with whatever they suggest for him."
Jack let out a deep sigh and covered his eyes with his hand. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. It took all of his strength just to keep from yelling his head off or putting his fist through a wall. "Fine," he finally forced himself to say. "But one word about snakin' him, and I'll..."
"Yes, Sir," Carter cut in quickly. She gave him a respectful nod and headed for the elevator.
Jack sighed and went back to Daniel's room. He was so not going to enjoy this. Having Tok'ra around always spelled trouble.
"How's it coming, Dr. Lee?"
Bill looked up from the mysterious instrument he was studying to see Airman Wells walking towards him. "Uh... I haven't exactly made any significant findings yet," he answered, "but it's... coming. For example, I've ruled out the possibility of any of these devices being some kind of funky Ancient weapons or something." He twitched a smile at the airman, but his attempt at humour fell flat on its face.
"So, nothing that can help Dr. Jackson yet, huh?"
Bill shook his head sadly. "I'm afraid not, no. That doesn't mean it's not here, though. I mean we've only been here a few hours..."
"Looks like it's now or never, boys," Colonel Dixon announced as he entered the structure. "And... lady," he added, nodding to Lt. Satterfield.
"Why is that, Colonel?" she asked.
"I just had a word with Hammond," Dixon replied. "He says Dr. Jackson's had a turn for the worse, and they contacted the Tok'ra. They answered right away, so by now... he might already have been snaked."
Bill felt his stomach fall down into his shoes at this comment. Daniel? A Tok'ra? "He... he'd never agree to that," he stammered. "Would he?"
"He won't have much choice in the matter," the colonel said, his tone somehow managing to sound both apathetic and concerned. "He's in a coma."
Bill swallowed hard and looked down at his shoes. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Daniel becoming a host... that was so permanent. He'd hoped he and the others could find some way to help him, and he'd thought they had more time than this to find it. Daniel had saved his life when they'd been kidnapped in Honduras - he wanted so badly to return the favour now.
"So," Dixon said after a moment of grave silence, "if any of you think you're close to finding something here, tell me now. There might still be time to get back to Hammond and tell him to hold things off for a little while." He scanned the other faces in the room, but no one spoke up. "Best get back to work, then," he said.
Bill watched as the colonel went back outside to leave them to work in peace. "Daniel a Tok'ra?" he murmured in disbelief.
"We don't know that," Satterfield said, the thought seeming to leave her with a bitter taste in her mouth. "They could just as easily heal him with one of their healing devices."
"Oh yeah, like they did before he ascended?" Balinsky said, finally breaking his silence. His voice was full of doubt and despair. Bill knew how much he'd always looked up to Daniel, and how hard he had been working to translate the writings in this place in case they could help him.
"They could have helped him then," Satterfield said, "he just..."
"He chose to ascend," Bill cut in. "They could have healed him, but he told them not to. I'm betting that wouldn't be the case this time." He turned to Satterfield. "You're right, Lisa. I can't imagine Colonel O'Neill allowing them to implant Daniel with a symbiote after what happened to him with Kanan. They must have some other way of helping him."
That seemed to bring the conversation to an end, for which Bill was grateful. It was time they all got back to work anyway.
With a sigh, he returned to his examination of the alien instrument. They still had time.
They'd find what they were looking for. He didn't doubt it for a second.
To be continued...