Author Notes: Hi everyone! I'm glad you like my story so far! Thank you to everyone who reviewed! I apologise in advance for the slight cliché hideout in this story, but it was required. Don't worry, I have the decency to look guilty.

Chapter 4: The Escape

Jonas was sat curled on a pallet, watching his two new friends. He had to admit his life had taken an extremely strange turn all of a sudden, but it was better than being at home. He shivered involuntarily at that thought, and then he heard something. He ducked his head so no one would see his mouth move - he didn't understand how people could see through a mirror, but Sam insisted they could. He muttered just loud enough for Daniel, who was sitting next to him, to hear, "Someone's coming, they're gonna come in."

Daniel didn't question him; Jonas had explained earlier how his hearing was far better than most people, although he didn't explain how. Sam noticed Daniel get up and place himself casually next to the doorway. Sam sighed dramatically, rose to her feet and started jumping from one foot to the other in a kind of made-up game on the pallet in front of the mirror. This was to distract anyone watching from the door.

The door opened, revealing three orderlies, two with food, and one with a tranquillizer gun. Daniel leapt into action. He deftly disarmed the first one with a well aimed kick, and knocked him out. He then proceeded to systematically attack, and quite badly hurt, the other two. With surprising speed, Sam leapt off the bed and dragged Jonas with her out of the room after Daniel.

Jack stared. He was the only one in the room when it happened. One minute he had been wondering what the heck Sam was doing, the next, three orderlies were on the floor and three children were out the door. Snapping out of it, Jack leapt to his feet and pressed the alarm. He then informed the base that three children were running wild. After having done that, he ran after them.

Sam and Daniel ran after Jonas, who was a surprisingly fast runner; they presumed it must be his build. Sam was having trouble with her feet and Daniel had to hold her hand to stop her sliding everywhere and banging her head. Luckily, with Jonas' hearing, they had avoided people so far. Ahead of them, he skidded to a halt. "Jonas! Keep running!" Daniel hissed as they reached him.

"No. Help me with this will you?" It was an access shaft. Together, the three of them managed to yank it open. Diving inside, they shut is as quietly as they could and held their breath.

Heavy booted feet could be heard thudding by, but no one opened the hatch. "Come on," whispered Sam, "There are cameras all over this place; someone will work out what we've done sooner or later."

Daniel nodded, though neither could see him in the dark, "Can you climb Sam?" He indicated to the ladder they were all dangling off of.

"I think so. Up or down?"

"Up." Said Daniel immediately.

Jonas corrected him, "No, down."

"Down?"

"Like Sam said, they'll know where we've gone soon enough. They know we know we're underground. Logically, they'll concentrate their search on the upper levels."

"Jonas is right."

"Okay, Sam, I'm below you, so I won't let you fall. Jonas, can you start climbing?"

Again, with surprising speed, Jonas began to descend. Sam slipped off a rung a few times, but kept her grip. After a while, Daniel heard Jonas' voice below him, "Daniel, Sam, there's a shaft that goes off from here, I think it's for ventilation."

Immediately, Sam pleaded, "Can we rest? My hands have started bleeding again."

The three slid into the shaft, Jonas first, then Sam, then Daniel; it would make it easier when they set off again. The shaft was very narrow. In fact, only Jonas could sit in it comfortably, the other two had to contort themselves. "I'm going to check down this thing and see if I can see anyone."

"Be careful."

"And quiet!"

Sliding along on his stomach to make the least noise, Jonas made his way. After a few minutes, he reached a grill. Peeking through, he saw an array of lockers and staffs. Immediately, he began to feel nervous. He knew there were no people, but he also knew this was an armoury. Up until this point, he had decided not to pass judgement on these people like his friends had; he had liked Jack. Now he had no choice – no nice person had weapons in that quantity.

"Jonas? Is that you?" He had made his way back to the other two.

"What did you find?"

"Weapons," whispered Jonas in a shaky voice, "I think it's an armoury."

"We should go and check it out," Daniel responded, "We might need to defend ourselves."

Jonas couldn't help feeling a little bit nervous. Sam nodded, "I know you don't want to Jonas, but these people are dangerous."

No more discussion was made, and they both followed Jonas.

"No one's seen them so far, sir."

"Thank you major." Jack dismissed him.

General Hammond, Janet, Teal'c and Jack turned back to the tape. It was of Daniel taking out the orderlies. "I still don't get how he did it. I mean, adult Daniel couldn't do that." Jack sighed exasperated.

"Indeed, it is a technique not unlike that used by Jaffa."

"What, so you're saying Daniel was trained? How? And why can't he do it any more?"

Before anyone could answer, a technician rushed into the room, "Sirs, ma'am, we've found some footage from the security tapes."

"About time!" Colonel O'Neill raged.

After watching the tape, Jack was grudgingly impressed with mini Jonas. "Wonderful, they're in the shafts!" He said sarcastically.

General Hammond turned to a man behind him, "Airman, instruct that all access and maintenance shafts are to be checked, focusing on the upper levels."

"Yes, sir."

Jonas dropped soundlessly into the armoury, followed by Sam, and then Daniel; there were no cameras at the far end where they were. "Okay Daniel, you seem to be the expert, what do we want?" Sam whispered.

Daniel skulked around the lockers until he found what he was looking for. "These," he held up three zats, "Remember what I said? One shot stuns, two shots you're dead, a third shot to get rid of the body."

For the first time, Sam's resolve wavered. "Um, Daniel? Have you ever killed someone before?"

"Yes." The answer was blunt and cold. Jonas slid slightly behind Sam.

Swallowing, Sam kept her eyes on Daniel's hard ones, "Well, I haven't, and however much I hate these guys, I don't want to start habit of it, so I think we'll only be needing the first shot."

Daniel's gaze softened when he saw his friends fearful ones, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you, I guess I've been around death a lot. I forget others haven't," He smiled weakly, "I envy you. Alright, stuns only." He handed them their zats.

Daniel then went over to another locker, and came back with three torches. "They attach these to their bigger guns; at least we'll have light now."

Hurriedly, the three made it back into the shaft. Daniel easily helped Jonas up, and then between them, they got Sam up. Finally, Daniel was pulled up by the other two. It didn't take long to replace the grill and get to the shaft again, "This time we go up, Jonas," Sam whispered behind him.

Jonas was about to comply, when he heard something and froze. He turned to face the other two, "We've been discovered, I can hear people above us."

Daniel groaned, "Okay, go down."

Nimbly attaching himself to the ladder, Jonas began his descent again. "Monkey." Sam muttered as she struggled to get her legs out of the duct.

"What's a monkey?"

Sam stared as Jonas' curious face illuminated by torchlight, "Never mind, but you still are."

Jonas shrugged and continued downwards. They paused every so often to catch their breath, but apart from that, they didn't stop. After travelling in silence for a long time, Sam whispered, "Is it just me, or is it getting colder?"

"It's not just you, I guess it's because we're so far underground." Daniel seemed unsettled by this.

Jonas didn't agree, "But why wouldn't they heat the lower levels? People still work down here."

"Told you," muttered Sam, "Psychopaths."

"I don't think that's it somehow. I live in a pretty big building and they heat all of it, even the really low bunkers."

"Bunkers? What king of a country is Kelowna?"

"Not one you want to visit," answered Jonas miserably, "I think I know why it's so cold though. The only part of my building that isn't heated is the storage level. It's always freezing, but because no one lives there, it doesn't matter."

"So we're at a storage level?"

"I guess."

"That means there will be less people, and cameras," Sam smiled, "Jonas, next ventilation shaft you see, get off."

"'Kay."

It didn't take long to reach one. Jonas slid through it again, followed by Sam, then Daniel, who he heard curse in a strange language upon touching the cold metal. When they reached a grill, Jonas gasped, "This is like a warehouse!" He slid along so the others could see.

Many strange crates and objects filled the room; lots of things to hide behind. After assessing where the cameras were, Daniel dropped onto a crate and helped Sam and Jonas to follow. Quickly, they stole between some particularly large boxes and entered a maze. Now they were too small to be picked up by any cameras. Padding along in their bare feet, they picked their way past an array of objects.

"Ow!" Sam muttered, a while later, "I got a splinter from one of these damn crates in my hand again. I wish-" She stopped mid-sentence, shocked into silence.

"Sam! Come on!" Daniel, followed by Jonas, came up to her to see why she had stopped. He too froze. Jonas, however, couldn't understand what was wrong.

Both of Jonas' friends were staring at the offending crate. On it was stamped in black stencil letters:

Crate A45KG

FRAGILE

Property of Area 51

Under it was a slip of paper, signed, saying that it was on loan to the SGC for translating.

Sam backed away, "What kind of people are the NID?"

Daniel had recovered, however, and roughly grabbed the other two by the arm, pulling them further into the maze. It was not until Jonas complained that he was hurting him that they stopped. Slumping down, the three terrified children huddled together in the semi-darkness, at a loss of what to do.

To Be Continued…

Author Notes: So? Come on! Tell me! I wanna know. Please review!