A piercing howl jerked Jack out of a sound sleep. He jolted upright, turning immediately to Sam – only to find she was just sitting up as well, her eyes wide with shock and worry at the unexpected noise. They both looked at Jaffer, who was at the foot of the bed, and howling like someone was stabbing him with a red-hot poker.

"Jaffer!"

At first Jack thought the dog was having a nightmare or something. Dogs dreamed, after all. He'd seen Jaffer's legs twitching in his sleep – presumably he was chasing rabbits or something – what was to stop them from having bad dreams as well as good? But the lab was wide-awake. He ignored Jack – and Sam – and stood up on the bed, a long, low howl the likes of which neither had ever heard escaping from his throat. Followed immediately by another – this one higher, and more agonized.

"What's wrong with him?" Sam asked, reaching for the dog.

Jack was already there, kneeling next to him, running his hands over the lab's body, looking for a source of the pain. From the noises he was making, there was something terribly wrong, but Jack couldn't even find a bump. Whatever it was, it was internal. Which meant Monica would have to find it.

Jack rolled off the bed reaching for his pants.

"I'm going to take him to the vet," he told Sam, unnecessarily. She could see the fear in his eyes.

"I'm coming, too."

Of course she was. He nodded, and pulled a shirt on, not bothering to button it, and slid his feet into a pair of shoes while running his hands along Jaffer once more, murmuring reassurances to the lab while Sam dressed. Then, with an ease born only of the worry and fear he had that there was something seriously wrong with him, Jack scooped Jaffer's big heavy body up into his arms and carried him out to the truck while Sam opened the doors for him, and closed them behind them.

"Monica won't be there yet," she said as Jack put Jaffer on the jump seat behind the driver's seat. A quick look at her watch told her it wasn't even 5 AM, yet.

"Barry will."

Barry Michaels was Monica's nighttime vet. He was in charge of the place when Dr. Ray left for the day.

Jack started the truck, and pulled out of the driveway, Jaffer howling agonizingly while Sam stroked him tenderly, just as worried as Jack was.

OOOOOOOOOo

"What's wrong with him?"

The staff at the vet's office was skeletal this time of morning, but they all were on hand when Jack carried Jaffer in, and they all knew the lab (and Colonel and Major O'Neill) well.

"No clue," Jack said, panting slightly. Worried or not, Jaffer weighed a ton.

"Bring him in the back," Michaels ordered, leading the way to the examination room, where Jack set Jaffer down on a padded table and Michaels grabbed a stethoscope.

A quick initial check showed nothing wrong. Jaffer's heart and lungs were functioning fine, and his stomach was making all the normal sounds that they were supposed to be. Michaels checked a urine sample from the lab, but there wasn't any blood, and none of the immediate tests came back with anything negative in them.

Monica Ray had been called, but even she – who knew Jaffer almost as well as Jack did, and certainly knew his inner workings even better than Jack – couldn't seem to find a reason for the sudden alarm. The dog's howls had steadily faded into whimpers thru out the examination, and Jack found these sounds to be as heartbreaking as the earlier ones had been frightening.

They'd been at the vet's office almost two hours, and still didn't have a clue what was wrong. He wasn't in pain. There was no whining when they touched him – and they'd ran their hands all over him, looking. There wasn't anything broken – they'd done x-rays, just in case. And an ultrasound proved his organs were all where they were supposed to be, and doing what they were supposed to be doing.

Due to her pregnancy, Sam had been ordered off her feet and into a chair, where she'd watched as Jack hovered anxiously while the vets worked on Jaffer, but she would every now and then get up and pace, or come over and wrap her arms around Jack to keep him from pacing and for a bit of mutual support.

"I can't find anything wrong with him," Monica finally told them, shrugging helplessly. "Everything's working fine."

"Then why is he acting like that?"

She shrugged again, and ran her hand along the lab's glossy black hide. They'd given him a mild sedative when he'd first been admitted into the office – because some of the tests required him to hold still – but he was coming out of that fine, too. He was just whining.

"I don't know, Jack. I've never seen him act like this, either. I've never even heard of-"

Sam's cell phone rang, interrupting them, and Sam reached for her purse.

"Sorry."

She grabbed the phone and opened it, so distracted that she didn't even look to see who it was.

"Hello?"

"Major O'Neill?"

It was Hammond.

"Yes, Sir."

She looked at the clock on the wall, frowning. They hadn't called the base – and weren't late for work, yet. She wondered what the General was calling for. Certainly he couldn't have heard about Jaffer's odd condition.

"Where are you?"

"At the vet's, Sir."

Jack looked over at her, realizing that it had to be Hammond and wondering the same thing that Sam had.

There was a pause.

"Is Jaffer all right?"

"They can't find anything wrong with him, Sir," she told him. "We were going to call-"

"Is Colonel O'Neill available, Sam?" Hammond interrupted. His voice had an odd quality to it that she didn't recognize. Add to it the fact that he'd called her by name, and she was suddenly certain something was wrong.

"Yes, Sir."

She handed the phone to Jack, who caught the concern in her expression.

"Hello?"

"Jack… I just got a call from the Commandant of the Air Force Academy. He's been trying to find you for the last hour."

"What's wrong, Sir? Is it Shawn?" Jack's concern was just as palpable as Sam's had been.

"Shawn's fine, Jack," Hammond said. "But he's going to need you." There was a slight pause, as if Hammond didn't know how to say what he had to say. "This morning – very early – the plane that was carrying Dotty and James Adams crashed on take off from John F. Kennedy Airport. There were no survivors."

Jack was stunned. Before he could say anything, though, there was yet another mournful howl from the lab on the examination table.