"You mean... Daniel was right?"
Dr. Warner shook his head and rubbed the back of his neck. "I really can't say for sure what the abnormalities mean... yet... but I have no reason to believe that Daniel is turning into one of the aliens."
"But he is changing," Janet insisted. "And you said the abnormalities in his blood are similar to the blood that was on his hands when he first came home. What else could it be?"
"Similar, but not the same," he said. "The theory we're running with right now is that they were conducting some kind of... genetic engineering experiments on him, and that somehow it had a lasting effect on..."
"But you ran these same tests on him just a few days ago," Janet said, her anger creeping into her tone, "as well as when he first came back. These abnormalities weren't in his blood then."
"No, they weren't. We... we believe the device in his brain was somehow regulating whatever toxins were in his system. We don't know how... we don't even have any proof that this was the case... that's just the only thing that makes any sense. The last tests we ran were shortly after the device was rendered inactive, and everything appeared to be fine. If the changes began after that..."
Janet sighed and started pacing up and down the hall. When she passed the door to Daniel's infirmary room, she paused and peeked in. He was still lying there just as she'd left him, curled up on his side with his head in his bandaged hands. Colonel O'Neill was sitting vigil beside him, as Daniel had requested. He hadn't wanted Janet in the room with him in case he flipped out again.
God, when had things gone so incredibly wrong?
She thought back over the last few days and all the signs they'd missed. The headaches... wheezing in his sleep... the marks that only seemed to grow redder as the days went by... his warning that he could feel the aliens close by... Why hadn't they seen what was happening to him?
Simple, she thought. She'd been so busy trying to be supportive and make him feel comfortable at home that she'd lost sight of everything else. She'd closed her physician's eye and had looked at him through the eyes of his wife, nothing more and nothing less.
Not that doing so was wrong. It was only natural, in fact. But General Hammond had been right - she'd taken him home too soon because she wasn't thinking about what was best for Daniel. She was thinking about what was best for her.
"I'm sorry, Janet."
She turned to look at Dr. Warner when he spoke. She'd almost forgotten he was there. "You don't need to apologize," she said. "It's nobody's fault but the aliens who took him."
"I mean... I'm sorry," he said, stepping closer to her and laying his hand on her arm. "I don't think there's anything we can do to help him. Whatever's happening to him... we can't stop it."
Those words didn't even register in her mind. She couldn't allow them to. There was no way it was true. Daniel hadn't been returned to her just to be snatched away again. It just couldn't happen. Not when they'd come so close to being happy again.
There had to be some way to help Daniel, and if it existed, she would find it.
"Jack?"
He'd been dozing, but his eyes snapped wide open when he heard Daniel say his name. "Hey, Daniel," he said, sitting up straighter in his chair. "Feeling okay?"
"No," Daniel said. He was turned on his side facing Jack, his eyes droopy from the sedatives he'd been given, but otherwise looking remarkably normal for a guy who was supposedly turning into an alien. "Head still hurts... still feel all... weird."
Jack nodded, searching for something to say in response but coming up empty.
Thankfully, Daniel spoke again soon anyway. "Do you think... do you think they did this on purpose?"
"Did what on purpose?"
Daniel sighed in frustration. "This... all of it. My escape... whatever's happening to me now. Maybe they started turning me into one of them knowing I'd come back here and..."
"And what, Daniel?" Jack said, making his voice sound both firm and sympathetic at the same time. At least, he hoped it did. "Spy on us? Kill us? What?"
Daniel rubbed his eyes wearily. "I don't know," he said. "Maybe neither. Maybe both."
"You were hallucinating, Daniel. Hallucinations happen. Especially when your fever suddenly spikes to 103."
"I thought I'd killed them, Jack," Daniel said, his voice breaking up as his eyes filled with tears. "If Janet hadn't come out of the bathroom when she did and pulled Cassie away from me..."
"But she did. They're both fine."
Daniel ignored this comment. "I can't do this anymore, Jack," he said, sounding utterly defeated. "Please... please don't let this happen to me. Please just kill me before..."
"Hey!" Jack snapped, making Daniel jump at the sudden loud noise. "Don't you ever say anything like that again, understood?"
"Jack..."
"Is that understood?" he repeated.
Daniel turned over onto his back and covered his face with his hands. He didn't say any more, but Jack could tell he got the point.
God, even thinking about doing what Daniel was asking made him want to hurl. He really must be out of it if he'd even entertain the idea, let alone voice it.
"Colonel? Could you give us a minute alone, please?"
Jack looked up as Fraiser came to stand beside him, and was about to answer when Daniel beat him to it.
"No!" he said mournfully. "Janet, I told you, I'm not safe. You can't be in here."
"Oh, so you don't care about my welfare," Jack said, but his teasing fell flat.
"Jack..."
"Daniel, relax," he said in all seriousness. "You've got enough sedative in you that a five year old could knock you on your ass. Your wife wants to talk to you."
"Just... stay," Daniel said, reaching out to grab Jack's arm as he stood up to leave.
Jack looked over at Fraiser for help. He didn't want to upset Daniel, but if she really needed to be alone with him...
"It's okay, Colonel," she said. "You can stay."
Jack nodded and sat back down again. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes so he wouldn't intrude too much on their privacy, but there was nothing he could do about his ears.
"How are you feeling?" he heard Fraiser ask in a low voice.
"Bad," Daniel replied. "Is Cassie okay?"
"Cassie's fine," Fraiser said. "She's here. She's watching a movie with Teal'c."
"Is... is she..."
"Daniel, she knows you didn't mean to hurt her. She's worried about you, but she's fine. Really."
"Okay." He took a deep breath. "Did they get my results back yet?"
"Yes, they did. And... they found some abnormalities in your blood work."
"What kind of abnormalities?"
Fraiser sighed and it sounded like she sat down on the edge of his bed. "They're not sure yet, but... it's like your genetic structure is deteriorating somehow. The best idea we have is that the aliens were tampering with your DNA... perhaps conducting experiments on you..."
"The needles?"
"That would seem to make sense, wouldn't it?"
There was silence for a moment, and then Daniel said in a small voice, "I thought... I thought they were studying me. Dissecting me, and putting me back together all wrong." He chuckled. "Only they never cut me open, did they?"
Jack opened his eyes again when Daniel's laughter started to turn into eerie giggling. He snapped to attention and was at Daniel's side in a matter of nanoseconds. "Daniel?"
"They were screwing with me, Jack," Daniel said, his voice sounding almost drunk. "Trying to make me more like them, but I wasn't playing along. Nope, no matter what they gave me, it didn't work." He started laughing again, louder than before. "It didn't work!" he repeated. He seemed to think it was the funniest thing he'd ever heard.
Jack and Fraiser shot each other helpless looks. They weren't sure what they were supposed to do. Daniel wasn't getting violent, so restraints were unnecessary, but they felt they should do something other than stand there watching him laugh like a lunatic.
Then all of a sudden the laughter stopped, and Daniel started gasping for breath. It sounded like his throat was closing up or something.
Fraiser jumped into action right away, calling for help and grabbing some nearby equipment. She stuck something down his throat before Warner even reached Daniel's bedside. "There's no inflammation in his throat," she said as she drew it out again. "He needs oxygen."
Jack stood back out of the way as the two doctors worked on Daniel. They gave him a shot of something and put an oxygen mask on his face, but he was still making that awful sound with each breath. It sounded almost like...
Moaning.
Jack's stomach turned over as he remembered the description Daniel had given Mackenzie of the aliens. He said they moaned, but maybe what he'd actually heard was that wheezy, gaspy sound. God... maybe he really was turning into one of them.
He craned his neck to get a glimpse of his friend over Dr. Warner's head just as Daniel turned his face towards him. He took an involuntary step backwards when Daniel caught his gaze dead on.
Daniel's eyes were turning red.