DISCLAIMER: Mine? Yeah right. And which drugs are you taking again?

SUMMARY: Sam's been raped. Jack's a bit out of character. The reason for that is that he didn't want to scare Cassie anymore than she already was and he knew that blowing his top in George's office could get him in trouble which would delay him getting back to Sam. Which at this point was all that he wanted: to be there for the woman he loves and wants to protect.

FEEDBACK: More please. This is great. I love it. By all means, keep it coming.

Jack was still standing in the doorway, when Sam's nightmares began. She started tossing and turning. The whimpers started a moment later and she flung her left arm up as if to protect herself form something. Jack ran into the room and took a hold of her arms to hold her down. He hated to see her like this but he knew that she would never admit to being this scared while she was awake.

"Oh God! No! Please not again! Please! Don't hurt me! Please! Let me go!" The tears started running down her face unchecked by a conciousness that needed to portray a facade of strength to the world around her. "Please! Let me go! Please! I swear!"

"Jacob, help me. Hold down that side. We don't need her hurting herself more." Jack felt the tears running down his own face even as he noticed the ones on Jacob's cheeks. Both men knew that Sam needed them. They both wanted to be strong for her but they couldn't hold back the tears. Neither had been there to protect her. They also felt guilty because if they hadn't been so overprotective, she wouldn't have felt a need to be at the house alone that day. She would have been safe on base and that bastard never would have gotten his hands on her.

"Sammie. Sammie, it's just a dream. Wake up, honey. Wake up. You're safe." Jacob's voice cracked as he held down his daughter's right side while Jack held the left. Jack couldn't say anything for the lump settled firmly in his throat. "Sammie, honey. Sammie, wake up. You're safe at the SGC now. Safe, baby. Come back to us."

Jack felt a rage building in him the likes of which he had never felt before and never wanted to feel again. He wanted to kill Pete ever so slowly. He found himself wishing that he could use a Go'auld ribbon device in order to do it slowly. Although torturing him like Sam had said Fifth had done to her sounded good too. He just wanted the son of a bitch at his mercy (yeah right like he had any of that for Pete right now) for about a week. He would die slowly and know what Sam felt right now. The helplessness, the fear, the hopelessness.

Sam was settling down. She turned her head toward her dad. "Daddy? Daddy, is that you?"

"I'm here, baby. Right here. Teal'c called me. Thankfully, the Council had an assignment for me here and that makes it easy for me to be here for you."

Then she turned her head and saw Jack standing next to her, holding her left arm and leg down. "Jack?"

He couldn't answer her. He let her go and stormed out of the infirmary.

Sam's tears started then. "He hates me. Doesn't he?"

Down in the gym, Jack was beating on a punching bag when Teal'c walked in. "O'Neill. Why are you here and not with Colonel Carter?"

"I can't. I can't be there right now. I just want to kill Pete. Very slowly. Maybe with a ribbon device to start with and then a slow removal of his skin."

"Colonel Carter is most upset by the way you left the infirmary. Jacob Carter is not happy with you either at the moment. He is most angry that his daughter currently thinks that you hate her."

Jack stopped still. "She thinks what?"

"I believe I spoke clearly. Colonel Carter thinks that you hate her according to her father."

The hand ran through the hair. "I don't hate her, T. I just felt so angry that I was part of the cause of this that I needed to get out of there before I said something stupid."

"So instead you do something stupid," came the voice from the doorway. There stood Jacob Carter with a stormy look on his face. "You hurt my little girl, Jack. You know how I feel about that."

"So what? Am I supposed to just forget that it's partially my fault that she's laying in the infirmary right now? Just blow it off? Because it is, you know. It is partially my fault. If I hadn't been so overprotective toward her, she wouldn't have felt a need to have Cassie leave her alone at the house and Pete wouldn't have stood a chance."

"Pete would have gotten to her sometime. Either now or later. She needs you. She needs every person who cares about her to be nearby right now. She needs to feel the support of her friends. Shey has been in to see her three times since we brought her in. Talorn has even stopped to see her. She won't let any man other than you or I touch her. But at least she accepts their company. "

"Don't you feel responsible, Jacob? Do you want to kill Pete so slowly that even Sokar would shake with fear? Because believe me, right now, nothing could make me happier than being given that sick son of a bitch to do with as I want."

"Do you really want to know what I want to do to him? I was thinking about it while Sammie slept. To start with, chain him naked to a cinderblock wall with ice cold water trickling down it. The temperature of the room would be kept at a constant 40 degrees. I would pull out each finger nail and toenail, one at a time, cauterizing the wounds afterward. Just to make sure that he didn't bleed to death. Then I would have every hair plucked from his body one at a time. And I do mean EVERY hair. Each bone in his body from the shoulders to the toes would be shattered."

"That's ...."

"I'm not finished, Jack. Several thousand paper cuts each with lemon juice and salt rubbed in occasionally for good measure. After several days of that he should be ready to beg for death. At which point I would stick a glass tube up into him and super glue that part of his anatomy to his stomach. Getting him excited would shatter the tube. Then I would leave him there to die of gangrene. Of course I would make sure that he had enough food and water that he wouldn't die that way. At least until he started to get to the point that the gangrene would kill him before he could die of starvation or thirst."

"That's vicious."

"He deserves no less for what he did to my Sammie. Do you disagree?"

Jack flinched at the cold look in Jacob's eyes. "Of course not. But that's vicious."

"That's the intent. He would know, by the time I finished, that he had done something really stupid. Are you going to do something stupid as well?"

"Let me work out a few more frustrations and I'll go apologize to Sam. I don't want her to think that I hate her. I love her. I just feel so guilty about all this."

"You think I don't? You think George doesn't? Daniel? We all feel guilty. Cassie even feels guilty. After all, she's the one that left Sam there."

"Oh God! I haven't even seen Cassie yet. She must think I'm really mad at her."

"She's been hiding ever since you entered the mountain. She's afraid that you'll try to blame all this on her."

"Never. I could never blame Cassie. She had no way of knowing Pete would be there."

"She doesn't see it that way."

"I have to talk to her."

"You also have to talk to Sam, Jack. Before she closes herself off from everyone."

"I will spar with you, O'Neill. It may help to speed up the process. You do not need to hold back."

"Thank you, T." With that, Teal'c and Jack started sparring full out.

Several hours later, Jack stepped out of the shower feeling much better. He ran off to the infirmary. He knew that he had to apologize to Sam. He was worried about her. Worried about how she felt and what she was thinking.

Worried that maybe she didn't want him there anymore.

He slowed to a stop just outside the infirmary. He was afraid. Jack "Go-get-em-full-speed-ahead" O'Neill was afraid. What a day.

Walking into the room where Sam still lay in the bed, he approached her carefully. "Sam? You awake, Sam?"

Sam opened her eyes. "Jack? Is that you, Jack?"

He sat down next to her. "I'm here. I'm sorry about the way I ran out of here. It wasn't you, Sam. It could never be you. I just felt so guilty. I wanted to kill Pete. I wanted to do it slowly. I wanted to torture him."

"Jack, I don't blame you. If I had just told you guys how I was feeling about the constant watching...."

"Let's not go into 'If Only's'. That arguement would take forever."

She chuckled a litte. "Too true. Too true." She took a deep breath. "Jack, please don't do that to me again."

"I can't promise that. I can promise that I'll try not to. So long as you make me a promise. That you'll try to remember to tell me when I'm getting too protective."

"That I can do. I guess we have to try to get charges filed against him."

"From what dad says, already done. Cassie called them and, when she told them what had happened, I guess she told them that you wanted to press charges against him."

"That I did." Cassie was standing at the doorway. "Can I come in?" She sounded so scared that she might get yelled at.

"Come here, kiddo." Jack held out his arms to her and wrapped her up tight when she stepped close to him. "Not your fault. Not yours."

Cassie started crying. "I left her there. I left her there when she couldn't see. I'm sorry, Jack. So sorry."

Jack just held her, stroking her hair while she sobbed against his chest. When she started calming down, he held her a little tighter. "Not your fault. You had no idea of what a sicked twisted bastard he was. Sam's going to be fine now. She's back here. Safe. Just like you."

"You did the right thing in telling the police that I would want to press charges. Has there been any word on Pete?"

Cassie looked at her and nodded. "The police called about an hour ago. They arrested him at a bar. Said he was celebrating making sure that he'd get you back. They said that he told them some pretty nasty things. Things that they wouldn't repeat to me. When you're ready, they want you to come down and sign some paperwork to file the charges."

"We'll go soon. I want to get this over with."

Jack took her hand in his while still holding onto Cassie. "So do we, Sam. So do we."

A/N: I hope that tides everyone over till I get my computer back from my brother. He's going to redo the hard drive for me.