"Sirrr-..," she started a question, but didn't know what she was going to ask.
Her thoughts wouldn't focus.
Dizziness washed over her as the sedative took hold.
Her vision blurred and she felt like she was falling.

And everything went black.

Chapter 2

Gray.

Dim.

Her eyes had opened before her brain was fully awake.

Her right cheek hurt and she began to focus her thoughts.

She was lying on the ground... on her right side.
Her cheek was lying on various leaves and twigs.
Trees all around.

She started to move a little and something pressed hard against her waist.

She froze.

And, realized that there was someone lying behind her.
Pressed up against her.

The warmth of the body behind her was immediately obvious as she continued to assemble the pieces of her new apparent reality.

Her thoughts still muzzy, she waited silently for a few moments... assessing the sound and feel of the slow breaths behind her... and she realized that whoever was behind her was probably asleep – or unconscious. As she had been just a few minutes ago.

Without further movement, she carefully tried to glean more information before taking any actions.

Definitely a stand of trees. A forest? And...the low level of light indicated that it was either dawn, or dusk... or that there was some sort of cloud cover. Of course, that was based on Earth-Sun standards, she thought ruefully.

And it was cold. At least by Sam-Carter-standards, she muttered internally. Her back side was definitely warmer than her front side... which was freezing cold – except where two arms wrapped around her waist from behind. And her feet were freezing and almost numb.

She moved her feet together carefully.
Yep. Barefoot.
Wonderful!

She shivered and the arms around her waist tightened reflexively again.

Turning her attention to those arms, she saw sleeves of the same army green BDU material that she was wearing.

So... whoever was behind her was probably decked-out in the same, common basic fatigues. She wondered if they had their shoes! Okay, okay, so she was feeling a bit put-out. Waking up on the cold ground, amongst a bunch of non-descript trees, without any blankets, with only the warmth of an unknown body behind her... and without her shoes! Did she mention that her feet were freezing?

She hated the cold. She rarely complained vocally amongst the macho brethren of the special forces that predominated the Stargate teams. She'd worked too hard to give any narrow-minded males any ammunition against any of their female coworkers. And she knew that if she complained about the cold in front of O'Neill then he would forever use it as justification to make her eat more and put on some weight. The SGC docs were always warning her that she was on the low-end of the acceptable weight limits for her height and body frame.

And she did admit, at least to herself, that she was a bit too thin to enjoy the colder worlds that they occasionally visited. Tramping through snow and ice in windy conditions were not on her list of favorite off-world scenarios. But she didn't complain. Not out loud. She just...got... quiet. And she was pretty sure that Daniel, Teal'c and O'Neill had a pretty fair idea as to why.

So... she hated the cold. And she really hated waking up cold.

And waking up disoriented and in unknown surroundings? Yep, hated that too.

But waking up alongside an unknown person... that had to be worse than the cold or the mysterious surroundings. She didn't know whether to be concerned, worried, comforted or scared of the owner of the arms around her waist.

Listening carefully again to the slow, measured breaths against her neck, she tried to think about her next move... but she couldn't seem to completely shake off the cloudy, murky feeling in her mind and she couldn't seem to focus adequately.

The moments passed and she grew to notice the cold more... and the hard ground... and the leaves and twigs...

Slowly she started to turn a little to try and get a look at the person behind her. Her arms and legs felt like lead weights. Like they were mired in an extra-strength gravity field... something several times the normal gravity of Earth. After what seemed like a supreme physical and mental effort, she successfully moved her left arm just an inch or so and immediately felt the press of cold metal against her left wrist. Cautiously she stilled and looked down to inspect her left arm.

A steel gray bracelet encircled her left wrist. Handcuffs!... she realized with dismay. Focusing her eyes on her other wrist, however, determined that there was nothing on her right wrist. Moving slowly and carefully she lifted her cuffed wrist, and seemingly lead-filled arm, to determine what it was attached to.

Erk!

Dismay and a little curl of fear washed through her stomach as she saw that her wrist was cuffed to the wrist of one of the 'other' arms encircling her waist.

Great!... she moaned silently to herself. She wakes up who-knows-where... handcuffed to who-knows-who...? With a drugged-out, hangover feeling. Oh, yeah... and there's the cold. Did she mention that she was cold? Yes, she did? Oh, then just making sure that it's not forgotten. Because she's damn cold and her feet feel like blocks of ice.

Trouble concentrating. She was definitely having trouble concentrating.

Allright, she sighed silently. Now what? She wanted to move away from the person behind her and see who it was. Assess the threat, if there was any... It was possible that the person she was cuffed to was in the same position that she was... disoriented and a fellow prisoner of sorts of whomever had placed them here.

Or, she might be cuffed to her captor. The cuffs might be so that she couldn't escape while they slept. That would be assuming that her captor was not afraid that she would cause any bodily harm after she discovered that she wasn't going to be able to just slip away.

Not enough information to answer all of her questions.
She needed more data.

Which meant that she was going to have to move. With the cuffs, she wasn't going to be able to go very far – at least not until she could find something to pick the lock with. She could, however, try and move enough to get a shot at seeing if she could recognize the person she was cuffed to.

Slowly she started inching around. Forcing her distressingly weak and reluctant muscles into some movement...her movements tempered with caution and slowed even more with the sluggishness that she'd woken with. Turning a bit, starting to inch away just a bit. Moving around so that she could see the one behind her. Slowly. She moved painstakingly slowly. Careful not to disturb the even breathing behind her. Several times she froze, rested and waited.

Craning her head around, she finally got a look at the face behind her.

And she froze again for a moment, and then automatically relaxed.

She was cuffed to her CO! General Jack O'Neill.

She tried to assess his condition. She didn't see any immediately obvious wounds or contusions. Examining his face closely, he didn't appear to be in any pain or obvious distress. In fact, he just appeared to be sleeping.

Relaxing a bit more now that she knew who she was cuffed to and that he didn't appear injured, questions started to flood her mind.

What was he doing here when he was supposed to be on Sandara?

Where was here? Was she on Sandara?

Why would anyone kidnap the two of them and leave them handcuffed to each other on the forest floor?

Where were Daniel and Teal'c?

Those and other questions chased themselves through her mind as she started to look around for anything that might provide clues to the answers... or a way to get the cuffs off. Her mind was starting to clear up a bit, although she still felt weak and her body felt like it was made of solid lead.

The sky was getting a bit brighter now, so it must have been the local equivalent of daybreak, she noted absently as she debated her next move. Since the General didn't look injured, she decided to try and sit up so that she could get a better look around. Studying the steel restraints, she realized that they were cuffed together in an odd fashion for prisoners. Her left wrist was cuffed to his left wrist. While this made the sleeping arrangements fairly comfortable, the cuffs would be awkward once they sat up or tried to walk around.

Strange. Why would anyone cuff prisoners this way? So they could be comfortable at night? Or so they'd be uncomfortable if they tried to escape?

Studying the configurations, she simply decided to move slowly to try and avoid any unnecessary twisting or torqueing of their appendages. If he was just asleep, her movements were probably going to wake him up. If he was still under the effects of the same drug that she was still feeling, then she wouldn't have to worry much about disturbing his sleep.

She started to slide around again with the intention of putting their left arms between them and resulting with the two of them basically facing each other. But just as she started to move, he started... his breathing caught and he mumbled something incoherent. She stopped and waited to see if he was going to wake up.

Instead, he squirmed a bit and then he pulled her closer to him as he started to settle back down while spooned behind her again. Unfortunately, she was expecting him to wake up – not to pull her towards him – and she jerked a bit in surprise and instinctively started to pull away. "Sir!" was all she got out.

And his arms clamped around her upper waist and clenched her tight!
Tight enough that she was having trouble breathing.
Moments passed and when he didn't relax his grip, she began to get a bit worried.
This was very uncomfortable – and it was actually beginning to get painful.
Breathing was still difficult and she was rapidly beginning to feel a bit faint.

"Sir...," but it came out as a low raspy groan.

No longer concerned about his sleep, she had no choice but to pull at his arms in an attempt to break his hold. But her arms and legs still felt like lead weights and her attempts to break free only produced a weak wriggling which did nothing to break his hold on her.

And then his arms tightened viciously around her upper waist, diaphragm and lower ribcage. She let out an airy groan of pain as the little breath left in her lungs was involuntarily forced out.

And then she passed out. Again.

. . .

TBC