Author's note: Thank you once again to my fantastic betas - Jezowen, Village Mystic and Teri, for their ongoing support, and many suggestions and ideas that have made this a much better story than it otherwise would have been. Thanks also to a couple of reviewers – Barbara and Quamzin – whose suggestions I've drawn on.
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CHAPTER 21: LIFE GOES ON
Sam felt time slow to a standstill. It was as if the picture was being played on a monitor in front of her, one frame at a time. First, a hole appeared in the wall beside the elevator, and then flak from the bomb started ripping through from the lab, continuing on an eerily silent path towards her.
A moment later, a massive booming sound hit, leaving a shrill, ringing sound in her head. Her eardrums ruptured – she felt the blood dripping down her neck. As she watched, frozen, the bomb blast continued to rumble forward as if in slow motion, reducing everything in its path to rubble. Debris flew into the air, sucked into a magical, swirling fountain.
She tried to break the paralysis that gripped her as the elevator doors continued to inch closed at an agonizingly slow rate, racing against the cloud of dust that flew towards her. Outside of the dubious protection of the elevator, she caught a glimpse of the Colonel and Lt Adams, still standing, seemingly frozen in the corridor in front of her. At last, she managed to move forward, desperate to try and stop the doors from closing. But her efforts failed miserably as her metal prison rocked violently, flinging her off her feet. She crashed into Mason, bringing them both down to the floor.
As she struggled back up again, she could see the roiling shockwave as it moved yet closer, spreading outwards. Then, the frame seemed to freeze completely as the blast wave reached the mid-point of the corridor, and the dust coalesced into a swirling vortex.
Sam knew she was on the verge of blacking out, but all the same, she strained desperately for a last glimpse of the Colonel and his prisoner. But it was too late, the doors had finally snapped shut, cutting off her vision of the rushing terror. As the elevator rocked again, she started to tingle all over, as if caressed by the advancing wave of air. Then darkness swallowed her.
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General Hammond tried to relax his grip on the heavy desk in front of him - the building was still shuddering as the giant springs on which it rested shook, but the reverberations were dying down now. The dull thud that had been heard a few seconds before the mini-Mountain-quake hadn't been that loud. But it had been sufficiently powerful to trigger the safety mechanisms that were supposed to protect the Operations Center from even a nuclear blast.
He wiped his now-clammy forehead, and tried to start moving towards the door of his office, the one that opened into the main operations room. Calm, he told himself, you don't know that they are all dead. Be calm. You have to be calm; you are in command.
Move, Airman, he told himself, get your ass into gear and find out what happened. His body, though, refused to obey, and he found himself slumping instead against the wall. The truth was he didn't have any real doubts as to where the epicenter of the blast had been. It was the SGC.
Hammond leaned against the comforting hardness of the wall for another moment. Only minutes beforehand, he had heard the SGC's evacuation alarm sound. An evacuation so urgent that no one had stayed in the Gate room long enough to respond to his desperate requests for information.
Move it, he told himself again. This time it worked. He swallowed, steeled his face, and entered the Control Room.
General Hammond studiously ignored the sudden flurry of activity in the Control Room, and headed for the command station. He leaned over the panel and took in the readings. "What happened?" he demanded.
"Sir, we don't know," Colonel Campbell replied. His normally slicked-back brown hair looked ruffled. "The monitors are showing an event, centered on the Mountain. It was quite small – less than a 1 on the Richter scale – but that's all we've got so far."
"Then find out more, fast. Get someone down to the SGC immediately," Hammond replied abruptly.
"Yessir," Campbell said.
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Joe shifted gingerly in an attempt to make himself more comfortable. He had been standing propped up, hidden behind the coat-stand next to the apartment door now for more than twenty minutes. The waiting was getting to him. He really hoped that the mystery friend of Dr Jackson appeared soon, or he was going to be too stiff to carry out Plan A.
He needed this plan to work. It was the only way he could see that could get him access to Methos. All the same, it was so obviously born of desperation. But he had few choices. He'd set up the study as his fallback position, complete with a few toys to take down anyone who got that far. But he rather hoped that Plan A would work out, and his extreme measures wouldn't get used.
Joe sighed to himself. The waiting was always the worst part of any plan. Not helped by the fact that he could just hear the sarcastic commentary that Methos would have issued if he had been there running through his head. He just hoped the truly old man of the pair of them appreciated why a crippled old man was prepared to take on a young, fit and probably well-trained military-type in a rather desperate rescue attempt.
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George Hammond looked around the Control Room and felt utterly helpless. Already, the duty staff had turned back to what they had been doing, completely focused on their tasks. He had ordered the emergency management plan to be activated – but until he knew if there was anyone to rescue, there was nothing more he or anyone else here could do for the SGC.
But he did need to worry about the rest of the world, he told himself. Focus on the big picture. The fate of the SGC was only a small piece of the bigger crisis, and it was his job to deal with it. Aliens could already be attempting to take over at the beam-down sites around the world.
And yet, even as he thought it, his thoughts kept drifting back to his friends, his colleagues. For as they faced their toughest battle yet, they would have to fight without their best and brightest.
He surveyed the Control Room, and tried to assess the progress his teams were making. In one corner, he could hear Colonel Will Eastman dispatching teams to investigate the beam-down sites Major Carter had identified. In another, Colonel Dwyer, head of the gamma shift, was co-coordinating the intelligence-gathering effort. It ought to be the easy task - after all, if aliens had beamed into the streets of New York more than twenty-four hours ago surely there would have been news reports to follow up, something. But the stressed look on the Colonel's face made it clear that it wasn't proving so.
Given their lack of progress to date, Hammond wondered if some kind of stealth technology might be involved. There wasn't much he could do about that for now though – the Ree'tou detectors and most of the other alien combat technology they had was down in the SGC. Assuming anything survived the blast.
Stop. Don't go there, General Hammond told himself. You'll learn what's going on soon enough. He forced himself to actually see the screens above his head, to study what it was showing.
He studied the plot showing the path of the errant spaceship. A small clock was counting down time to impact with yet another satellite. Orbital decay in six hours he read. Maybe the enemy ship was damaged. He could only hope.
He switched his gaze to the map of the world. He couldn't see any obvious pattern to the thirty or so flashing red dots. There were concentrations in some of the major centers – and he supposed that Colorado Springs was a logical military target, given the location of the Stargate. But why would invaders be interested in small towns like Seacouver, Sunnydale, and Cascade?
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Had he been fully human, Teal'c would have sighed with relief as the taxi pulled up in front of Daniel's apartment building. He was truly exhausted. His venture into space – and the lightning-like energy that had attacked him – had sapped his strength, and more particularly, his ability to deal with other people.
Normally he would have retreated to meditate, to kel'no'reem. But he had been at Patterson Air Force Base, not Cheyenne Mountain, and the base had been on full alert. The extra personnel pulled in to deal with the alien spacecraft had left no individual quarters available. He was grateful, therefore, that his friends had offered the use of their homes to him, to grant him some private space.
Times such as this led him to regret the loss of the healing powers of his symbiote. He sometimes wondered whether he had really gained anything by swapping his dependency on the prim'ta for dependency on a drug synthesized from its chemicals. True, the symbiote was a constant reminder of his – and all Jaffa's – slavery to the Goa'uld. And on this world, a prim'ta was a ticking bomb, always carrying the risk that it would escape, and take some unsuspecting host. But he had lost so much of what he could offer the Tau'ri – his symbiote-endowed strength, his ability to heal quickly.
Teal'c pushed away these thoughts. He had tried to take the honorable path of death, and O'Neill had stopped him. Had convinced him that he did still have something to offer. He was just tired - he truly needed to Kelno'reem.
Just one more obstacle to navigate, he thought wearily. He leaned forward and thanked the taxi driver while carefully calculating the amount of cash required. Even after nearly seven years of living on Earth, he still found the concept of payment for service bizarre. One did what was required out of a sense of duty, honor, or, if you happened to be in the service of the Gods, simply to live. In return, the Gods – false gods, he reminded himself – provided all that was needful, and rewarded their honored servants and warriors.
He had expected it to be the same in his new home, and at first, it had been. The SGC had provided his food and accommodation, and met his simple requirements without fuss. But then O'Neill had taken him off base to experience life in his new world, and introduced him to money. It had taken a while for him to grasp the concept.
Even odder, though, was this custom of tipping. Instead of specifying the correct level of payment, you were required to add an additional component. Yet the rules for calculating this additional sum differed from service to service, and indeed were subject to variation on some basis he had yet to fully understand.
He glanced apprehensively at the driver. The consequences of incorrectly judging this additional payment had proved extremely disconcerting in his experience. On this occasion, however, the driver appeared satisfied, and allowed him to disembark without adverse comment.
Teal'c entered the building utilizing his emergency key, and took the elevator up to Daniel's apartment. As he stood in the lift, he was conscious of the small tremors still running through him. He was glad no one intercepted him on the way in. He did not think he could have coped with Daniel's normally garrulous janitor just now.
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General Hammond looked up in surprise at the bubble of noise as the door to the Control Room was yanked open, and Jacob Carter burst into the room, pursued closely by two SFs, shouting at him to stop. Jacob's face was white, his fists clenched tight. George saw a flash of gold in his eyes, before his face returned to an expression of tight control. As Jacob started talking, he wondered to whom he was talking - Jacob or Selmak? Not that he could ask here.
"George, that was the SGC going up," Jacob - or Selmak - said, ignoring the SFs. "Adams turned Sam's naquadah reactor into a bomb. He admitted it and volunteered to help defuse it. I don't know what happened after that."
George Hammond rocked on his heels and gulped. His worst fears had been confirmed.
"How many got out?" he asked, his voice rasping on the words.
"I don't know," Jacob replied, equally anguished. George watched his friend's fists clench and unclench. "Jack promised to get Sam out, but I doubt there was time. I've got to go back and find her." He started moving towards the door.
"No, wait, Jacob." George managed to move his leaden limbs, and touched Jacob's shoulder. "I'll go with you. You're the only one who knows what was going on down there. You can brief me as we walk."
He turned back to his 2IC. "Colonel Campbell," he said, "You can co-ordinate from here. Let me know as soon as you get any news on the beam-down sites. I'm going to look at the situation with the SGC. Come on, Jacob."
"But, Sir," Colonel Campbell started protesting. "We're at DEFCON 2. You can't leave the control center."
"To hell with the protocol," he replied. "Indications are we have invaders already on the base. Besides, those are my people down there. Take charge here for the moment, Colonel, while I find out how bad the situation is. Everyone else already has their assignments."
Colonel Campbell nodded unhappily in understanding. "Good luck, Sir," he said. "I hope they all made it."
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Joe stiffened and picked up the tazer. He felt down to make sure his gun was still readily accessible. There were footsteps echoing from the corridor. This time, they didn't keep going on down the corridor, but stopped outside the door. He was wondering if it was the nosy janitor back to monitor his progress when he heard the scraping sound of a key entering the lock.
At least the waiting was over, he thought to himself. And at least this way, he would be seeing Methos soon - one way or the other.
As the key turned in the lock, he wished once again for legs that would let him crouch down, but even the latest prosthetics didn't quite allow that.
Joe picked up the end of the cord he had placed, making sure he was ready to pull up so it stretched across the entranceway but wouldn't stop the door from opening. He could feel his heart pounding, a veritable symphony of sound against the empty silence of the apartment.
Then the door pushed open, and he could hear the visitor striding forward. Joe stretched the cord tight and pulled it up, timing his actions carefully to catch the foot of the intruder as they moved past the vestibule. It worked – someone stumbled forward in front of him. Before they could hit the ground, Joe followed up with a burst from his tazer, causing the body to jerk uncontrollably for a moment.
As soon as he heard the body hit the ground, Joe pulled the gun out of his trouser waist. "Don't move," Joe said. "I have a gun - with a silencer - pointed at your head. I'll use it if necessary."
Joe took in his catch: a large African-American man lay at his feet, still twitching, but clearly unable to move. Unsurprising, given the stun effect of the tazer. Joe took in his sheer bulk. He had been amazingly lucky to bring him down, even taking into account his preparations.
Joe moved quickly – his only hope was to get the cuffs on the guy before the effects of the tazer wore off. Joe quickly snapped the locks over the man's still twitching wrists and ankles. After considering for a moment, he tied a connecting line to the door handle.
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Selmak forced his host's body to stride rapidly, running to catch up to his friend George Hammond. Despite his control, they stumbled a few times as they hurried out the door of this building within the Mountain, and towards the vestibule that housed the elevator to the SGC.
What was it about the Tau'ri, he wondered distractedly, that made them insist on putting up three-storey buildings inside a perfectly good tunnel? Well, he supposed it kind of made sense given that they lacked the Tok'ra tunneling technology that enabled them to adapt the type of tunnels to the use to be made of them. All the same, it was a bizarre conceit - as if they were trying to lull the inhabitants into thinking they were in some ordinary office block, able to walk out into the street for a coffee, instead of being buried a kilometer or so underground.
The SGC's thirty or so levels of labyrinthine tunnels concealed in the depths below made much more sense to him than this bizarre in-between world that housed the publicly acknowledged functions of NORAD.
"Stop it, Selmak. Let me take control," Jacob growled at his symbiote mentally. "I can cope now. I was a soldier long before we were joined. I've faced losses like this before; I don't need to be mollycoddled."
"My apologies, Jacob, I only wished to help." He disengaged his links to Jacob's motor systems. "I was merely attempting to divert myself." He allowed a little of his anguish to seep through the link. "You think I don't feel as if Sam is my daughter too, that they weren't my friends? We feel as one, Jacob," he reminded his companion.
"Sorry, Selmak, of course we do," Jacob replied. But now that the link between them was wider, Selmak could feel more of Jacob's pain and anguish too. As their feelings pooled together, their grief escalated. They slid to a halt abruptly. "Sorry, Selmak," Jacob whispered in his mind. "Please take back control." Selmak acted quickly, before the tears he could feel welling up could reach their face, then ran to catch up to General Hammond, forcing down his emotions as he moved. He needed to brief the General, he knew.
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Joe stood back and admired his handiwork smugly. It was a mistake.
Out of the corner of his eye, Joe saw a blur of motion, and then found himself sitting on his backside. Quickly, he took in his error: his prisoner had managed to rip his leash free, and had managed to swing his legs around and kick Joe over. Now he was trying to grab at Joe's legs.
Recovering, Joe scrabbled backwards, trying desperately to get out of the man's reach. He was too slow. A moment of blinding pain ripped through him as he watched his artificial legs slide away from his body.
For a second, his attacker stopped moving. Instead, he looked down at the limbs nestled in his arms in consternation. It gave Joe the time he needed. He levered himself up on his forearms, pulled up his gun, did his best to aim and squeezed off a shot. He cursed as the man twitched at the last instant, throwing off his aim.
All the same, a muffled popping sound escaped the silencer, and a plume of red blossomed on his enemy's shoulder as the bullet found its target.
A moment later Joe's artificial limbs crashed to the floor as the man let go of his catch. The prisoner lay back on the floor, panting, and in obvious pain, and reached up with his still joined wrists to try and staunch the flow of blood.
Joe crawled forward quickly, jerked the legs back towards himself, then scrabbled back out of the way, and began to calmly reattach them, conscious of the hard stare of his erstwhile assailant.
"You are kek?" the man demanded in a deep rumbling voice with a lightly odd accent.
"What?" Joe replied, watching him out of the corner of his eyes.
"You are a cripple?" the man said. "You have no legs? And yet you have not taken the honorable path?"
His head snapped up. "I prefer to describe myself as disabled rather than crippled," Joe replied tartly. "Though obviously not as disabled as you are currently! And I do have legs, as you've discovered."
As he spoke, Joe found himself transfixed by a gold emblem affixed to the man's forehead. It wasn't like anything he'd seen before – could it be alien? He forced himself to focus on what the man was saying.
"As for honor, I was wounded while serving my country," he snapped. "And I will continue to defend it against anyone who comes to destroy us."
He glared at the man, wondering if this was in fact the alien enemy. The trouble was, tattoo and size aside, there was nothing to really indicate that he was alien. But then, immortals looked just like everyone else too.
Joe forced his eyes away from the intricate gold design on his captive's forehead, and surveyed the evidence of their brief struggle: an upturned table, a discarded baseball cap, a few papers strewn about the floor. And the rapidly accumulating pool of blood at his captive's feet. He must have nicked an artery, he thought clinically. And if he didn't do something quickly, the man would bleed out in front of him.
"I meant no disrespect," the prisoner replied. "I have a high regard for the veterans of the military forces of this world." His jaw suddenly clamped shut.
World! Joe added it to his list of anomalies. All the same, the red blood pouring from his shoulder looked perfectly normal. Well, alien or not, he needed the prisoner alive if he was going to be of any use in rescuing Methos.
"Good," Joe said. "Then you'll respect me enough to let me do something about that bullet wound."
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George Hammond could see that the crowd was swelling as he moved closer to the entrance to the SGC. Vultures, he thought uncharitably. Then, he recognized some familiar faces from the SGC. At least some of them got out, he realized with relief, and started scanning the crowd anxiously.
A tall redhead in Air Force uniform with NORAD patches waved at him then strode rapidly towards him. "Sir," she said, "We've set up an emergency center in the Ops Center commissary."
Close, Hammond read on her name badge. Space Control Beta Watch commander, he remembered.
"Thank you, Major Close, that will do nicely," George Hammond replied. "What else have you done so far?" he demanded.
"That's it, General. I've just arrived," Major Close replied.
"Thank you, Major, it's a good start," he said, dismissing her. "Alright everyone, listen up," he shouted out, clapping his hands to get attention. The hubbub started to die down.
"I want a triage system set up. The commissary will be our medical center for the duration. Anyone with medical skills, report to Major Close here." He pointed to the woman beside him. "General Carter will assemble the rescue teams." He waved at Jacob, who had linked up with some of the SGC personnel.
As he spoke, Hammond could see that the crowd's agitation was noticeably reducing, and refocusing on concrete action. "If there's anyone else here who can give me any details of what happened or what's been done so far, come and see me now. Anyone from the SGC, report to the desk-sergeant and get your name checked against the logbook," George continued. "Get cleared by medical, then come see me if you want to join the rescue effort. If you're not up to it, we'll arrange somewhere for you to go and recover. Everyone else, get back to you posts. You will just be impeding the rescue efforts. Dismissed."
He watched as the crowd started to swirl around his two anointed point people, and the remainder started reluctantly to move away, when a pathway suddenly started forming, and an agitated looking airman ran through, waving a radio.
"Sir! Sir! We've got Major Ferretti on the radio, on level 15." The young man beamed happily.
George Hammond broke out into a smile. At least someone was alive down there. He snatched up the radio and started talking.
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Please, do review and let me know if you think this is back on track.
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