Teal'c followed Samantha and Daniel down the corridor, shining their single flashlight ahead, it's glow barely illuminating the long dimly lit hallway. The two smaller children pressed back against him, molding into his sides as they neared the intersecting corridor. Teal'c shook his head. He had advised against leaving their room, as Airman Jeffries had instructed them, but Daniel had been nervous in the darkness and Samantha wanted to locate Colonel O'Neill, and then Daniel had decided she couldn't go alone. At that point, nothing he had said had been able to prevent the two from going on their self-appointed quest. In fact, they had informed him of an Earth rule, something they called "two against one" that not only allowed them to go despite his being older and wiser, but would allow them to confiscate the room's lone flashlight. Since Teal'c had no desire to remain alone in the small, windowless room, lit only by a solitary red emergency light, he was forced to accompany them. However, he used his larger size and superior speed to commandeer the flashlight, and hold it above the other two children's heads until they acquiesced that he did indeed have the right to control the light.
Which was now the reason why the three youngsters prowled along the hallways together, their one small light doing little to illuminate the area around them, which gave the unfamiliar maze of winding corridors an eerie feeling. Their footsteps seemed to echo unnaturally loudly and the darkness made the space seem larger and yet more confining at the same time.
"Which way do we go?" whispered Daniel, the younger boy's body pressed tightly against his. Teal'c felt Samantha worm her fingers into his free hand. She had firmly denied being frightened of the darkness, and yet she refused to venture away from the dim yet reassuring glow provided by their light source.
"Wh-what's that noise?" asked Samantha suddenly, a tremor to her voice. Teal'c listened and could hear heavy footsteps coming down one of the intersecting corridors, and other loud sounds, it sounded like a group of animals. Rather large animals. He frowned. They had not seen any animals in this base since they had been here, but he had to admit Colonel O'Neill had not taken them everywhere, nor had he explained much about what was here. He pressed the other two back against the wall, pointing the light downwards in an effort to make them less visible.
In moments, the source of the noise was upon them, and they were monstrous. There were four of them, great and hulking. Teal'c couldn't identify what they were for he had never seen such creatures before, but even the smallest towered over him. They were vaguely man shaped, but all were misshapen, their heads overly large, enormous lumps protruding from their backs, and they seemed to have more limbs than normal people. And the sounds they made, more like howls! But that wasn't the worst. No. The worst was their faces. Their faces were a patchwork of multicolor; Teal'c had never seen anything like it.
And then one of them noticed the three children, it shoved the others, and abruptly the howling stopped as the first creature pointed them out. As one, the pack moved towards the children, one of them opened its mouth, stretching out one of its extremities towards them, but Samantha had had enough. With a terrified shriek, she let go of Teal'c's hand and took off down the hall, her scream startling Daniel into motion, and he also yelped and ran. Teal'c turned to follow, but was a shade too slow, he felt an iron-like hand clamp down on his shoulder, freezing his forward momentum and making him drop the precious flashlight. More hands joined the first and no matter how hard he struggled, he couldn't free himself. He kept up his struggles anyway, keeping his captors occupied so that the smaller children might have a chance to escape. Over the sound of their fading footsteps, Teal'c smiled in satisfaction as he heard at least one of the creatures grunt as a kick landed, and then they fell upon him, holding him securely, but by then he was sure that Samantha and Daniel had gotten away.
AsLongAsWeGotEachOther,WeCanTakeAnythingThatComesOurWayJack paced anxiously in the control room, carefully avoiding annoyed technicians and the overly tolerant General Hammond. He wanted to be down below, searching for his missing team, his kids. He snorted to himself at the thought of how his personal nickname for his team had suddenly come to have a more literal meaning. But the General felt he'd be of more use here in the center of things, coordinating the search effort. Jack had protested, but the General had overruled him, and so Jack waited, and let the rest of the base search.
As a result he'd gotten a ringside seat to the repair effort, and he'd also been there when less than ten minutes previously SG-3 had come back through the gate from a reconnaissance mission, in full gear and body pain, guffawing about some joke or another. Not even the power failure had dampened the big burly Marines spirits as they'd hefted their gear off out of the gate room. Jack shook his head, the men were a mess, but they didn't seem to care.
"Sir, we're ready to restore main power." Sergeant Siler was in front of Hammond now, carrying a clipboard and an impressive looking wrench. Jack wondered if the thing was just for show or if he actually ever used the thing.
"Go ahead." Hammond gave the order, and a countdown started. On the mark, the generator hummed to life and the main lights came back on, flooding the room with light.
"Let there be light," Jack quipped, but everyone ignored him. Just then, the phone rang.
Picking it up, Hammond spoke into it. "Hammond." He listened a moment, then turned to Jack. "Colonel, you better get to the infirmary."
Jack didn't even wait for a dismissal, he just ran from the room, sure it had to do with the kids.
A/N1: So I hope this chapter was more to your liking? A little kid adventure? This was totally fun to write! As were the next, but that would be telling…
A/N2: Line break created with lyrics from, "As Long As We Got Each Other," the theme from the mid 80's TV series, "Growing Pains." Lyrics by John Bettis, Music by Steve Dorff and the song was sung by B.J. Thomas and Jennifer Warnes.