She heard him, but she didn't hear the baby cry, and she was sure that was what was supposed to happen next. Right? Gasping, because her contractions weren't finished – although they didn't hurt as bad now – Sam looked at Ian, who was looking down at his hands, an unreadable expression on his face. Or maybe she just couldn't focus through the sweat that was pouring off her, dripping into her eyes and stinging them.
"Is he okay…? She asked. "Ian…?"
Oh, God, he was tiny. Not that Ian was positive how big a baby was supposed to be at birth, but Jacob was itty bitty. And silent. The umbilical cord was wrapped around his tiny neck, but when Ian took hold of it to move it, he found that it wasn't tight, and wasn't blocking the infant's breathing. Then he realized he had to cut the cord, still, so Jacob would breath on his own, and Ian reached into the sheath that had held his knife but was now holding the bloody knife that he'd taken from Sam to kill Cato.
But before he could cut it, he needed to tie off the ends of the cord – at least according to the diagram in his mind. Improvising for the lack of any clamps, he used a cut shoelace to tie off both ends, and slashed easily through the cord. And watched as Jacob slowly turned blue.
"Shit."
"Ian? What is it?"
Sam sat up more, trying to see what was going on, and gasped in pain as she moved far more than she should have.
"Easy, Sam," Ian said. "He's fine…"
Desperately, he closed his eyes, searching the baby like he had searched Sam, and reaching with that new awareness into little Jacob's body, trying to find out what was wrong. And found the problem immediately.
The little lungs hadn't developed, yet. They were perfectly formed, as was everything else inside the tiny body, but they weren't completely finished, since the last two months were exclusively for weight gain and final development, and Jacob had been robbed of that by circumstances that had nothing to do with him, and everything against him.
Ian was there, though, and knew what to do. He didn't even need a diagram for this one. With infinite care, he started fixing things, broadening the lungs a bit to allow them to take more oxygen, increasing the muscle mass in the tiny heart, putting the final touches on what should have been done over the next couple of month, while at the same time strengthening bones that were too fragile to handle what might come, using his own energies and passing them on to the tiny form in his hands.
A tiny form that suddenly gasped as lungs were jumpstarted, and then began to wail – weakly at first – but then with far more enthusiasm as Jacob protested the difference in his surroundings. It wasn't cold I the room, but it was definitely not as warm as it had been, and he wasn't happy about it.
Sam held her breath at the first wheezing wail, and then released it in a strangled cry of happiness and relief when the cry strengthened. That wasn't the cry of a baby in distress.
"Oh, thank God…"
Ian came back into himself with a gasp of his own, feeling about as tired as he could ever remember feeling and knowing he was nowhere near finished. Looking down at the baby – who wasn't blue any more, but wasn't a pink cute baby like Ian thought babies were supposed to look like. He was covered with some kind of mucus and white stuff, and a little bloody and not at all like a healthy cherubic baby, but Ian knew he was, so he had to assume that was what babies all looked like. Even though the puppies had come out looking like cute puppies when he'd seen them born.
He took one of the towels, and wiped Jacob off as well as he could, also stimulating the infant – although he didn't know that, he just knew he was doing what the diagram had said to do. Too tired to do a really thorough job of it, he finally wrapped the baby in yet another towel – this one dry – and handed him to Sam, resting the still screaming baby on his mother's stomach.
"Take him, Sam," Ian said, smiling at her as well as he could. She looked pale and sweaty and as exhausted as he'd ever seen her looking, but she also looked more beautiful than he could ever have imagined any one could look after going through what she had.
She smiled, too, taking the wrapped bundle in her arms and then looking at her watch.
"March 23rd, at 1305 hours…"
Ian nodded, looking at his watch as well, his head dropping in exhaustion.
"He looks a little like Thor, though…"
She laughed, feeling giddy, and too caught up in looking at the little being in her arms to realize just how tired Ian was, and it was a few moments before she realized he wasn't finished. She turned from the baby to Ian, who was looking under the sheet and between her legs, but she could feel him cleaning her off and wiping her thighs with careful motions.
"I need you to push the placenta out, Sam…" he said, his voice with an odd quality to it that Sam decided had to be embarrassment again. She smiled, even with the pain she was feeling, and felt yet another contraction as her body started pushing again, ready to clear out the last of the afterbirth that had supported her son.
OOOOOOOO
Daniel met Jack at the elevators, obviously waiting for him.
"How did it go?"
"Badly," Jack admitted. "I don't think he bought any of it."
Daniel's expression turned worried.
"What's he going to do?"
"He's going to wait for us to get a hold of him – unless he becomes impatient and starts asking more questions."
"Would he do that?"
"In a heartbeat."
"Let's hope the Asgard find something, soon, then…"
"Yeah…"
Never had Jack felt so helpless, though…
OOOOOOOO
The Asgard received the coordinates of the planet that the Tok'ra had found the alien ship on from the Tok'ra and in their ships converged on the planet far quicker than anyone might have expected. They didn't really think it was their duty to search for the missing Tau'ri, but Thor had made it perfectly clear what O'Neill had said, and that yes, he'd been absolutely serious.
What they saw when they arrived at the planet was not what they were expecting. A Goa'uld mothership was in orbit, but even as they raised their shields, the Asgard realized that all was not well with the ship, and that it wasn't the danger it might have been. There was a gaping hole in the side of the ship, and it was obviously disabled.
After a brief consultation between the commanders of the Asgard ships, Thor himself toggled the communications controls and hailed the Goa'uld ship.
OOOOOOOOO
"We should probably eat something…"
Jack shook his head, telling Daniel and Janet wordlessly that he wasn't hungry. O'Neill was sitting in the briefing room, his arms around Jaffer who was cuddled between his legs, his warm body pressed tightly against Jack's chest and belly, giving his Jack all the comfort he could.
Before Janet could say anything, though – at almost exactly 1:05 PM, Jaffer suddenly raised his head, so quickly that he actually hit Jack in the jaw with his black muzzle. There was a slight pause, and then Jaffer suddenly let loose a howl. A long, howl that drew everyone's attention and made Jack look down at his dog with a worried expression on his already drawn face.
Jaffer didn't look upset at all, though. On the contrary, the black lab was wagging his tail furiously, his brown eyes – which had been mournful only moment before – were suddenly cheerful and happy. So happy that Jack smiled, despite his worries, feeling a sudden surge of happiness with absolutely no idea where it had come from.
"What's wrong with him?" Daniel asked, shocked.
Jack grinned, unsure why he was doing it, and slapped Jaffer's side lovingly as the howl faded but the cheerful look remained.
"I don't know if anything is…"