a/n: Alas...this is probably where I'll lose all of the anti-ship people ;) Sorry! I promisethis chapter'sonly a little oasis of shippiness until we get back to the main thrust of the story.
Much later, long after the sounds of the other workers settling in for the night had lapsed into silence and only the faintest light made its way into the rear of the cell, Samantha Carter opened her eyes.
After years of bunking out in the open and / or on alien worlds, she had become very adept at snapping to consciousness and assessing her situation within mere moments. This time, however, a strong sense of disorientation swept through her, mingling with the post-Agonis nausea that hadn't yet abated. She spent at least a full minute trying to battle down the urge to vomit before it struck her that she wasn't alone.
She was sitting more or less upright, reclining slightly upon her left shoulder and arm. Her knees were bent, legs drawn up as she huddled snugly into the warmth that surrounded her.
And surrounded by it she was. Carter belatedly became aware that the left side of her torso was currently burrowed up against a solid chest. The owner of said chest also possessed two strong arms; one of which was draped across her waist so that that hand rested on her back, and the other was wrapped around her shoulders, grasping her upper right arm firmly to ensure her placement.
Her first, fleeting inclination was to push away from whatever stranger held her so intimately, and she actually jerked minutely with that intention. A moment later, however, reason caught up with instinct and she realized that rather than feeling restrained, she felt secure and protected. The arms around her were sustaining her position, not confining her. It had been a long while since Carter had been held by a man like this, but there was no denying that it was, in fact, a man.
Her head rested on his right shoulder, her face was nestled into his neck, and she could feel the slight weight of his head resting gently atop her own. Within the fuzzy cocoon of warmth, far from fully awake, Carter deeply inhaled the oddly familiar, comforting scent and felt contentment fill her. This was…nice. She couldn't remember the last time she'd felt this safe, and cared for, and she relished the moment in her drowsy state.
That all changed a moment later when a low rumble in the chest she was pressed against reverberated through her, and Colonel O'Neill's voice breathed past her ear, "Go back to sleep."
Any vestiges of slumber fled immediately and all of Carter's limbs jolted as if she'd been electrified. At once she began trying to extricate herself from him, her face burning. "Colonel! I'm sorry, sir. I didn't mean to…"
O'Neill tightened his arms in response, keeping her where she was. "Save your strength, Carter," he said, stilling her. "That's an order."
Carter paused indecisively as a million thoughts raced through her suddenly very lucid mind. Firstly, this could definitely be considered fraternization, of a sort, and so they were breaking regulations. But it wasn't as if they were at home cuddling on his couch, or something right? She was being subjected to daily torture sessions, and he was doing the only thing he could to help her…right?
And okay, they faced the possibility of death on a weekly basis, and so her impending demise as an excuse was a rather shaky one, but the chance that she wouldn't live through the next twenty-four hours was extremely likely, this time. That didn't really make it okay, but it did make Carter just a little less inclined to care if they followed each and every single proper military decorum, just now. And besides, he had ordered her to save her strength, and she'd definitely expend more energy pulling away from him. So…since he'd put it that way…
Carter relaxed against him, telling herself that all of her rationalizations were correct and logical. While she was at it, she pretended that she didn't enjoy being basically curled up in his lap, or the way his chin came to rest against her temple as he made himself comfortable against her again. Nope. Not at all.
She briefly envisioned trying to explain this one to Hammond. "I'm sorry, General, but Colonel O'Neill ordered me to snuggle with him. And you know I always follow orders, sir."
She turned a snort into a cough, then tried to steer her mind from the direction in which it had gone. "Have you been awake this whole time, sir?"
"In and out," was his quiet reply, and then a teasing tone entered his voice. "You snore, Major."
She wanted to laugh, but she was just too damn tired. "Do not," she said, adopting indignation. "Sir."
He chuckled, and she felt it vibrate in his chest even stronger than when he spoke. She closed her eyes and tried not to concentrate on how much she liked it, failing spectacularly.
"Since you are awake," he said a minute later, "I've been meaning to ask you…"
"Mmm?"
"Well it's just that…we've gone on a lot of bad missions since the stargate program started up. Been through a lot of crappy things. I mean, we've been shot, stabbed, frozen, unfrozen, implanted with Goa'ulds. Hell, we've even been dead. And now this. This is pretty bad, Carter. And I guess Daniel just got me wondering…what's number two on your list of things you'd never want to go through again? What could possibly be worse than this?"
His query had blown away the cobwebs of sleep that had begun to reform in her mind, and the answer to it kick-started her heart, making it thud, thud, thud in her chest and in her throat. He must have felt it, because he immediately rushed to retract his question. "Never mind…you don't have to…"
"It wasn't so much physical trauma that I was thinking of, I guess," she interrupted softly, "as emotional. That can be a lot harder to live through."
O'Neill was silent, and Carter knew that he was probably thinking of Charlie. For the second time that day Carter wanted to comfort him…to somehow alleviate the pain in his heart. But she couldn't, and so she had to settle for shifting slightly so that her cheek brushed his neck. Her right hand slipped down to rest on his chest.
She debated with herself for a minute about whether or not she really wanted to answer his question; it would mean revealing more than she'd ever allowed herself to, before. The thought of saying it was her mother's death flitted across her mind - it would be perfectly reasonable and she knew that he'd accept it without question, thereby leaving her innermost thoughts unknown - but she just couldn't. Yes, her mother's death had been traumatic, absolutely. And yes, she still missed her. But that grief was two decades old and - while it wasn't something that could be really gotten over - it had become a part of her long ago. More recent pains, however, were still hard to live with. They were the ones she still occasionally woke with in the night.
Withall of her previous reasons for giving in to this one moment of intimacy clamoring for attention again in her mind, she made the decision.
"Edora," she said finally. "That was worse. Every day of it…not knowing if you were all right. If you were dead, or hurt, or lost somewhere. For three months I couldn't think straight. But at the same time I couldn't stop thinking about how we'd had to leave you behind. I couldn't eat or sleep. Sometimes it felt like I couldn't breathe. Not until I could find a way to get to you."
Carter closed her eyes, unable to finish without hiding herself from him somehow. Into the darkness she whispered, "I'd rather go through this every day for the rest of my life than go through that again."
She held her breath in the wake of her revelation, a little terrified of his reaction. She wasn't blind, or stupid; she knew that he cared for her. It was an unshakeable fact, impossible to deny after each of the multiple events over the past year that had provided a window into his emotions. And she was fairly sure that he'd already known how she felt about him, too. But knowing and not acknowledging it were a far cry from what she'd just done.
When several long, heavy moments had quietly slipped by, Carter began to feel as if she'd just made a huge mistake. It was her turn to apologize. "Sir, I know that was out of line. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have…"
"Shhh," he said. He had turned his head a little so that his words were whispered into her hair. "Be still."
The arm draped across her waist lifted and Carter missed its presence there until she felt his fingertips trace lightly down the right side of her face before sliding back into her hair at the base of her skull so that his palm cupped her neck just below the ear. In this way he held her to him for a long, sweet moment that brought a sting to Carter's eyes. She bit her lip to hold back everything else she wanted to say and just savored the moment.
She wasn't sure how much later it was when he finally stirred again, but it felt like hours. He slid his hand down to her shoulder, then dropped it again to rest on her waist. "Go back to sleep, Sam."
She closed her eyes and prepared to comply, but there was just one more thing…
"Sir…the last two days…when I was in the grip of that thing…it's helped to have you all here," she said shyly, stumbling over the admission. "I can't think through it, but I can hear you guys, and feel you. And it's helped when you held me the way you have. It sort of…keeps me grounded. Keeps me here. If I don't die tomorrow, can you…?"
"I'll hold on to you," O'Neill promised her. "I won't let you go."
"She's not breathing. She's not breathing!" Daniel shouted. At O'Neill's signal he scrambled back down and interlaced the fingers of his hands, one on top of the other as he pressed the heel of the bottommost palm to Carter's chest. He waited, poised above her, as the Colonel tilted Carter's head back and sealed his mouth over hers, breathing for her.
When he'd given the proper number of breaths, he nodded urgently to Daniel. "Go!"
Daniel began pumping her heart, allowing all of his weight to drive his stiff, straight arms up and down like a piston. His mind was nearly blank; all he could think was please, please, please, in time with his repetitions.
The escort had come for her again that morning, predictable as the sunrise. Daniel, Teal'c and O'Neill had undertaken every desperate effort they could think of in order to be taken with her, but they were all to no avail. Carter had been nearly consumed by fatigue, but she had – like the day before – opted to go peacefully with her escort rather than risk another fight that might cost someone their life.
When they'd brought her back several hours later she'd been nearly catatonic, frail and pliant in their arms. Her team had taken her, too distraught to spare any thought for the guards, though they had once again handled her body with more care than Daniel would have expected. Additionally, the largest of the guards had appeared distinctly concerned as he relinquished his hold on the Major, and Daniel wondered briefly what could have transpired that would have engendered such unexpected compassion.
Daniel would never have imagined that he would prefer her convulsions, her cries of pain. And worse, her wrenching pleas to make the agony stop. But after staring into those inanimate eyes, after frantically trying to elicit some sort of response from her inert body, he would have welcomed any sign of life.
And now they fought to preserve it, all of them. Her team battled to anchor her there, to keep her heart going…to keep her alive.
As evening again cast its shadow over the fortress, Jack O'Neill felt it invade his heart as well.
Daniel had offered to sit up with Carter tonight and monitor her to make sure she didn't crash again, or slip away in her sleep, but O'Neill couldn't let go. He'd promised Carter, after all.
He remembered her telling him that she could hear all of them when she was seizing, and feel that he was holding her. In a way, he was almost glad that she was unconscious now, so that she couldn't feel the way his hands were shaking.
To still them, he wrapped her gently in the same embrace as the night before and concentrated on ignoring how close they'd come to losing her that day.
It had nearly killed him, having to watch her leave with the guards that morning, knowing full well that he might never see her alive again. He'd tried reasoning with the guards to allow him to go with her. He'd tried cajoling. He'd tried sarcastic comments and bribery, and he'd tried to pick a fight so they'd take him too. But today Carter's escort gave Teal'c's traditional stoicism a run for its money. They'd taken her out of the cell and led her off, leaving him to grit his teeth and grip the bars, pressing his forehead against them as hard as he could in an attempt to use physical pain to distract himself from the emotional torture. Then he'd gone with Daniel and Teal'c to "work" in the mine.
In actuality, they'd mingled as much as possible with the other workers, seeking any information that might help them. They had also spread the word that an escape was being planned, offering to take anyone who wanted out and recruiting as many Nisians as would join them. Their plan had more holes than Daniel had artifacts in his office, and everything depended on SG-1 getting approval to accompany Carter to the throne room in the morning.
And that was if she survived today's session of the Agonis.
Not if, O'Neill kept telling himself over and over. When. When she'd survived it.
And then the guards had brought her back, pale and lifeless, and he, Daniel and Teal'c had worked for hours to keep her going. When her heart stopped, they got it started again. When she ceased breathing, they gave her their own breath. When she convulsed, they held her. And all the while, even as they kept up a running dialogue to give her something to focus on, O'Neill plotted Polytus' murder.
He'd never been particularly proud of his Black Ops work – his memories of that time of his life were like black clouds dotting the landscape of his mind – but now he was grateful for the experience. Before this was finished…before it was done, the Basileus of Nisia would learn the hard way everything O'Neill knew.
Carter whimpered in her sleep and O'Neill tightened his hold on her reflexively. He swallowed, feeling like he was treading water, trying to overcome the rising tide of his emotions.
This was hardly the first time he'd watched her confront imminent death, and he told himself that he should be accustomed to the idea of losing her, by now. God knew he'd faced the prospect more times than he could count over the past four and a half years. But this was different, somehow. This wasn't taking a hit in battle, this was torture. This was one man's sadistic punishment for Carter's audacity to reject him.
And this was after the things she'd told O'Neill the night before.
The truth of it was that despite his feelings for her – and the high regard and attraction he sensed back from her – he'd never been absolutely positive about the way she felt for him. He knew there was something there, but so much was stacked against it. There was the age difference, for one. But hey, odder things had happened before than a beautiful, younger woman being attracted to an older man, right?
Then there was the great, wide, yawning chasm between their respective IQ's. While O'Neill knew beyond a doubt that Carter never perceived her knowledge as being something to lord over lesser mortals, and that she had the utmost respect for his own intelligence, there was just no denying that she was smart. Damn smart. And what would a freakishly brilliant scientist want with a guy who liked cartoons and fishing and shunned anything more technological than his television's surround-sound speakers?
And none of that even began to touch upon the regulation problem.
And so after much angst, and several encounters last year that had brought his feelings way too close to the surface, O'Neill had worked hard to convince himself that it – the idea of him and Carter – just wasn't possible.
But then she'd gone and told him that losing him for three months was one of the worst things she'd ever had to go through. That she'd rather go on with these daily torture sessions than live through it again. How the hell was he supposed to take that? More importantly, how the hell was he supposed to handle the thought of her dying now, when he finally knew for sure that this thing between them wasn't as one-sided as he'd believed?
And that, he realized despairingly, was one of the reasons why the fraternization regulations were in place to begin with.
He suddenly felt as if he were two people; one trapped inside the crusty shell of the other. On the outside was the Colonel, battle-hardened, calculating and more than a little world-weary. The man on the inside – Jack – was the core of him, with all of the same good qualities, but altered. It had been so long since he'd loved, and had a family, and lost it all, that he almost didn't recognize himself. He'd never thought that he would care this much again, but all at once he very much wanted to, and he felt tiny fissures in his exterior erupting all over.
He was so wrapped up in his mental turmoil that he didn't notice Carter was awake until she spoke. "Stop it," she whispered.
O'Neill blinked, snapping out of his reflection and looking down at her in surprise. Her eyes were still closed as she lay curled into him, and so he was unable to read her expression as well as he normally could. "Stop what?"
"Torturing yourself," was her quiet answer. "I can hear you agonizing over it."
"I can't," he confessed. "Carter, I…"
He felt her eyelashes flutter against his neck as he floundered for the right words. He knew what they were, but not how to force them out between the cracks in the man he'd become. He didn't even know for certain that he should be trying.
Unaware of his inner chaos, Carter's voice distracted him once more. "I can't go through this again. I won't last."
She meant the Agonis, he knew, and she was right. "You won't have to," he said. "I'm not going to let them take you tomorrow."
Never again, he added silently.
She seemed to hear it anyway. He felt her eyelashes flutter again, and knew without having to look that Carter had closed her eyes against his words. It was something she always did in reaction to moments of powerful emotions. Sure enough, when she spoke again her voice was thicker than it had been a moment before. "You can't stop them, sir. I won't be the reason you get killed."
"Then tell him you'll agree," O'Neill said harshly, hating his demanding tone. "Tell him you'll go through with it. It'll get him to stop, and then we can find a way to escape."
"I can't…you know I can't," she said, and damnit, he did. It went completely against her character to submit to someone like Polytus. To ask her to go down without fighting would be asking her to give up everything she stood for. And he couldn't do that to her. But…
"Damnit, Carter, what do you want me to do? You want me to just stand there and watch you die?"
"I…I'm sorry, sir. But please don't order me to agree. Besides…if…if his object is no longer attainable, he wouldn't have any reason to keep the rest of you here, anymore."
As always, her logic was irrefutable. But the anxiety and fear he felt for her was like a ball of poison lodged in his throat. Unable to be swallowed, it was slowly killing him nevertheless. Yet he remained silent. He could at least honor her wishes. He wouldn't order her to capitulate to something she would never willingly give her consent for. The resulting quiet between them was crammed with the suppression of all the things he couldn't say.
But Carter, it seemed, had decided that there was no more room for silence. She took a deep breath. "Sir…I…I know I shouldn't say it. I shouldn't even feel it. But I need…"
She broke off, apparently trying to overcome years of military conditioning and her own mental restraints. Her words were halting in places, rushed in others, like a record on the turntable when someone was playing with the speed adjustments, and he felt her tremble a little in his arms. "We've all almost died a hundred times. And each time we've somehow managed to get out of it. But there is no last-minute miracle this time. There's no ambiguity about…about what's going to happen tomorrow. It's simple, really. I'll die. I can't survive another blast from that thing. So tonight…just this once…I need to tell you how I feel."
Though he hadn't moved a muscle, O'Neill's heart had begun pounding in anticipation at Carter's first "I know I shouldn't". He felt like a team of enemy Jaffa had just ringed down in front of them; it was the closest thing he could think of to compare to the physical reactions his Major's words had caused. His mouth went dry and adrenaline surged through his veins.
Nor was Carter immune. Her chest heaved with shallow, shaky breaths that kissed the hollow of his throat above the collar of his tee shirt with each exhale. "I just…I need you to know that I love you, Jack."
Okay, this? This was definitely torture. There was no other description more accurate. There was no mistaking the vise around his chest, or the grief-tainted joy in his heart. Because although he never for a moment doubted the truth of her confession, he knew that she would never have made it if there were any chance that she might live through the next day. There was no longer any way that he could hold on to the far-fetched hope of some brilliant, last-second escape. For the first time, real hopelessness set in.
And yet, he couldn't quite die inside entirely. Because she was right. If this was the way it had to be, at least he could finally tell her, too. He could at least say it back.
"I love you too, Sam," he whispered into her hair with his eyes squeezed shut against their surroundings. "God, for…."
She cut him off, sliding her arms up around his shoulders and holding on. "I know," she said softly.
