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Chapter 8
"Do you trust me Sir" she was altering the controls but he couldn't see with what objective in mind.
"You shouldn't have to ask"
"OK, listen carefully, we're going to exit the clouds going straight down, I need you to drop the missiles, drop them all, we will be on target Sir, just trust me to pull up and don't whatever you do close your eyes"
"I'm with you"
"Ready Sir"
"Move Carter or we're out of time."
"Moving sir," She dived the craft into the atmosphere; they immediately felt the negative G's that weren't completely eliminated. He looked at the controls and realised what she'd done. By routeing the missile targeting to her consol, she looked on the space a metre out from the base and was using the craft similarly to a ballistic missile; he just hoped they didn't do the bit in a missile's life where it explodes. As they were coming into range, Carter without a hint of hesitation spoke;
"Sir, contact the Asgard tell them to stay inside, as soon as they hear the impact to grab the devices and activate them."
"On it"
The communication with the Asgard was short but they got the idea, do it or die.
Every muscle in Sam and Jack's body was feeling the strain and the feeling grew as Sam forced the descent path steeper and steeper.
"Ready?" She asked in the strangely quiet craft, but there was no time for a reply as they plunged out of the thick fog and straight towards the planet's surface. O'Neill suddenly knew why she had reminded him not to shut his eyes, it was a natural reflex; but he had the controls and fired the 3 remaining missiles, while Sam pulled on the controls trying to force the craft to rise without stalling.
It was over in a few moments. O'Neill saw the missiles hit home, he could do nothing else as Carter struggled to pull up, the craft beeped incessant warnings that it was over heating; half the systems that were going wrong O'Neill hadn't even known were on board.
She did it somehow, pulled the craft up, with metres to spare and it rose at a angle, heading once again through the brown atmosphere. The beeping remained but O'Neill. buoyed by the fact they were heading in the right direction, smiled;
"Hey, nice flying Carter." He should have worried when she didn't reply instantly but he was given that moment before she spoke, to have the marvellous belief that everything was going well, but he should have known better, they were SG1, they got into trouble as often as most people get into clothes.
"Sir, do not touch anything, don't move" Her voice was strained, spoken through gritted teeth,
"Carter?"
"Feedback, Sir, don't move" She was breathing hard now and O'Neill could feel the heat from the front of the craft.
"Carter?" he didn't know what to do; he couldn't help, couldn't do anything, couldn't even reach out and touch her. She didn't respond to her name, the controls were burning her hands, it was taking every ounce of strength she had to maintain their course.
The beeping continued warning of un-repairable faults, it was the only noise louder than that of their breathing, but soon it was muffled as Major Samantha Carter started to scream; not those of fear or rage but screams of pain, as the skin of both her hands burned.
Colonel Jack O'Neill sat helpless, the G-forces rooting him to his seat, watching the swirling mud coloured atmosphere shoot past, praying it would part to reveal the waiting Asgard. His head filled with the screams and his nose with the stench of burning flesh, he realised all she could do now was hang on, even if she let go of the controls now it was too late; so he trusted her one last time to keep them on target.
It was only seconds until they broke through the atmosphere, going fast and heading straight toward the Asgard ship.
"NOW THOR" O'Neill shouted but they were already turning away. Carter was still fighting to stay in control, but the pressure was building as controls failed, sweat dripped from O'Neill as the heat reached critical.
A flash of white engulfed them both and they were suddenly in the hanger of the Asgard ship, and O'Neill was rapidly aware it was silent; Major Samantha Carter had stopped screaming.
"Carter!" Jack shouted but all he heard was silence; desperately he tried to loosen the straps holding her in place and flick the communicator on,
"Thor, get us out, Carter needs help!"
"You must hold on O'Neill"
"Thor…"Jack began but was cut off by Thor who this time sure sounded stressed.
"You must wait O'Neill"
O'Neill lent forward, he could just reach Carter's neck, her pulse was too fast but was still there, he almost shouted in relief, but she was hot and her hands even in unconsciousness were grafted onto the controls. He silently prayed the Asgard could help her cause, without their help even the best case scenario was bleak.
A few seconds more and they were transported out. O'Neill was dropped unceremoniously onto the flight deck of the Asgard ship but this time there was no humour in it, no poorly disguised laughing.
"I hope you treated Carter a little better" he commented sourly, rising quickly and looking down on the little grey alien.
"She has been beamed straight to stasis. I am most sorry for the delay, O'Neill, we were beaming up the scientists; your plan was successful."
"Carter's plan" he corrected
"We are again in both your debt; we have also jumped to hyperspace soon enough to evade the replicators"
"That's great, but aside from putting her in stasis, can you help Carter?"
"We are already working on repairing the damage to both her hands and legs."
"Thank you" O'Neill looked away hiding his disgust that he had once again let a team mate get injured
"She will live O'Neill and thanks to you so will many Asgard"
"Sorry, Thor, it's just…"
"You are very attached to Major Carter," O'Neill was about to object but Thor continued "As we are of all SG1. Do you wish to view her recovery?"
"Yer, that'd be good"
O'Neill was lead to a room full of Asgard shaped pods and one distinctly larger human shaped one. He hurried to it but could see nothing, the pod completely covered its contents.
"She will need about 10 further minutes and then we can work while she is conscious, we owe her a great deal," The Asgard that had guided them informed him.
"Is anything serious?"
"Her injuries were most serious, in places no skin remained"
"That's not really what I meant, is their anything you can't fix"
"We are growing her new tissues, the repair will be complete; the only thing we do not know is the pattern that covers your skin on half your hands and feet is not the same and we have no record."
"Um…pattern?"
"Yes the pattern in your skin"
"Oh, fingerprints"
"Yes this is the correct word, I am sorry not to have made the connection, yes her fingerprints and footprints"
"Um… I think the SGC would have a record of them, you can really grow skin that precisely"
"There were enough remnants to make it possible; if your fingerprints are random we can simple use the computer to generate new ones."
"Will that speed her recovery?"
"Yes, greatly, if we have to wait then she must remain unconscious"
"I pretty sure she won't mind if you just make some new ones up as long as they are convincing."
"As you wish O'Neill"
"If she's mad can you change them back?"
"It could be done but why would her mental status cause her to need her fingerprints back?"
"OK, mad is just a expression," The alien looked confused like it was about to ask further questions but O'Neill cut in before it could
"How long 'till she is awake?"
"A few more moments O'Neill"
They stood in silence; O'Neill could not help thinking about the flight, the screams and that god awful smell. He'd just sat there, no matter how much he rationally he knew he could have done nothing, irrationally he felt guilty; he'd been uncomfortably hot nothing more, she'd been losing her hands and feet and he'd just sat there.
"She is sufficiently healed O'Neill, it will take her a few moments to become fully conscious" The Asgard moved his hands over the controls and the pod began to clear revealing Major Carter, initially O'Neill looked at her face, she looked peaceful now, but he also suddenly become aware that the whole of pod was clearing and she was dressed a lot like a Asgard.
"Where are her clothes?" O'Neill to his credit did not look, he'd seen a mist distorted image but he did not look back; he now stared at the wall, trying hard not to think of a naked Carter.
"It was necessary to remove them for the pod to recognise her physiology" The Asgard tipped his head slightly, increasing baffled by this human's behaviour.
"OK, cover her up please, It's a human thing, ok, just mist it or something." O'Neill spoke while continuing to look at the wall; the Asgard was on the other side of Carter so definitely was not going to be receiving eye contact anytime soon.
"As you wish O'Neill but I assure you she is safe in this state."
"Humour me" O'Neil's voice definitely had feeling behind it.
"It is done, you may look upon her again" The pod was now misty from the neck down and O'Neill, gazed at the women beneath, who appeared to be sleeping peacefully. He smiled down at her.
"Hey, Carter you still with us?" She opened her eyes for a fraction of a second and then screwed them shut again.
"Sir" She whispered, her voice relayed through a speaker on the side of the pod.
"Hey, Carter you OK" O'Neill gave her a cheery smile.
"Yes Sir, did it work? Is everyone ok?" She opened her eyes blinking madly, trying to move her arms which she discovered were held in place.
"Yep, all little grey aliens are accounted for" She smiled broadly, he couldn't help but return it, as her eyes sparkled, then she asked the first question that popped into her head.
"How fast did we go?" This wasn't a question he had been expecting, there were many he might have guessed she'd be asking right now, but this one wouldn't have made the list until he was really running short of ideas.
"Um…I don't know Carter, I think the controls melted"
"Its OK, the box will know, its got to be a new record" O'Neill was still thrown, that this was what she was worried about when she'd just almost lost her hands and legs; but he guessed people have different priorities, different ways of dealing with stress.
"Just don't jump out of bed right now to go look" As he spoke she suddenly stopped smiling and her face sobered, he wished he'd said something else.
"How am I Sir?" Ok this was more what he had been expecting and he was glad to be able to give good news.
"The Asgard say you'll be fine they're growing you new skin and a whole new set of fingerprints, I hoped you wouldn't mind"
"Really?"
"Yer, I told them to make them convincing."
"Thanks I'm sure they'll do fine, how long do they reckon it will take, it's a little claustrophobic in here."
"I don't know, but I doubt long, you've been out for about 20minutes."
"OK, how's the 302?" O'Neill looked a little worried, this time the news wasn't exactly what Carter would want to hear.
"I haven't seen it since we got on aboard; I doubt if it will fly again, I think you broke it"
"Damn, the techs are going to kill me, that's the second one this month"
"Carter, what on earth did you do to the other one? And When?" He knew she'd only had 2 days leave this month and 1 day they'd had a team barbeque, when she'd found the time to break a 302 was beyond him.
"I didn't do anything Sir; it just broke while I was flying it. I tried to explain about testing it's limitations but they moaned because well, the crash site wasn't that pleasant."
"OK, I'll believe that it was nothing to do with a slightly crazy attitude on someone's part; that was some nice flying by the way." He smirked in appreciation.
"I heard you liked it, but we're going to have to fix it so the heat doesn't feedback straight into the controls."
"Might be an idea, you had me a little worried."
"Yer, speaking of worried; do you know what the Asgard did with my clothes? not that I don't appreciate them fixing me and all,"
"Um…"
"Sir"
"I'll go ask,"
He came back with her clothes, looking more sheepish than she had ever seen him.
"Sir, are those my clothes?"
"Yes, apparently you have more in common with the Asgard than you thought."
"Sir" There was a definite threat in her tone.
"Well apparently they don't do sewing, but their mostly ok, really, bit holey; no boots apparently….well something really gross happened, you don't want them back"
"They melted didn't they?" Her face was a picture of control, but her eyes were a little to watery for O'Neill's liking
"Yer, but its fine, I'msure the Air Force can spring for some new ones"
"I know Sir, some risks are worth taking"
"You didn't think it was worth mentioning that boots might melt when we went over the plan"
"Well you're always telling me to bottom line it. The feedback at those speeds, when it wouldn't pull up and the warning went off," Her false cheer suddenly failed her and in a moment of honesty she blurted out "I'm sorry I risked your life Sir." She looked straight up at him, her mind feeling guilty that she could so easily have killed them both; there was no longer a twinkle of delight at the speed or the record.
"Do it again in a heart beat, firstly it was the right thing and secondly now the Asgard owe us one, big time. I might ask Thor for some big Gouald arse kicking device and maybe something for you, perhaps a jet engine for your bike, flying to work would have some style."
"Well I've never been late yet but it could make rush hour travel a whole lot more fun, Sir"
"I'll put in on our gift list but for now you just concentrate on healing, ok, then we'll sort everything else"
She nodded, a sudden draining fatigue seemed to fill her body; O'Neill smiled and left her line of sight in the hope that she would rest and would be able to go home and tell all those flyboys that the record that must be near unbreakable, was hers.
OK that's it for now, more soon (will probably actually be some fragile balance spoiler in the next bit)
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