Chapter 11
Sam slipped the T-shirt over her head and started to tuck it into her pants when Janet rolled back the curtain. She waited impatiently as Janet checked her chart. She'd been shuttled into quarantine, had multiple tests completed, and was only presently being allowed to get dressed and leave. She felt like she'd been waiting an eternity. By now, she just wanted to know how everyone was doing.
"So?" Sam asked.
"You appear to be clean," Janet said, ducking the clipboard under her arm. "How are you feeling?"
"Fine, not counting the bruised ego," she admitted.
That earned her a frown. "Why do you say that?" Janet asked.
Sam shrugged. "I don't think I'm cut out to lead a team," she said, leaning against the gurney.
"Oh, I don't know about that," Janet said, smiling. "I think you'll make a fine team commander one day."
Sam snorted. "I take over as leader of SG-1 for two days, and I come back with three of my team poisoned."
"Four," Janet said.
"Four?" Sam blinked at her. "You mean you found the same poison in my system?"
Janet nodded. "Your initial test results showed the same agent in your blood as that of Colonel O'Neill, Doctor Jackson, and Teal'c. Whatever the natives did to them, they did to you, too."
Sam pulled back, frowning. She might not be a doctor, but it didn't make any sense. "Janet, that can't be."
"Oh, but it is." She motioned to Sam with her hand. "Come with me."
The two of them left the main area of the infirmary and headed toward the private rooms. "When you came through the Stargate, we ran blood work on each of you, including Ningal," Janet explained. "Now, based on those initial tests, we were able to determine that all of you had a considerable amount of a foreign substance in your blood."
"Gistukal."
Janet nodded. "My guess is that all the people on the planet have some of this gistukal in their system. It's likely mixed into the food or the water. We also found traces of another substance that seems to act in conjunction with the gistukal." They started down one of the short corridors in the infirmary. "According to Ningal, it's some extract from a berry she doesn't have access to. We found it in all five of you."
Sam groaned. "The perfumed water."
Janet arched her eyebrows. "I'm sorry?"
"Colonel O'Neill, Daniel, Teal'c and I all had contact with scented water." She shook her head. "Dammit."
Janet rubbed Sam's arm and smiled softly as they rounded the corner before she continued. "Now, in Colonel O'Neill, Doctor Jackson, and Teal'c, we found extremely low levels of testosterone in addition to trace amounts of naquadah."
"Where the naquadah complex acted as a catalyst for the other compounds," Sam said.
"Right," Janet glanced into the room. "We believe that the combination of all of these compounds created an extremely dangerous toxin."
Sam was beginning to understand. The difference between the Blight and those who were Damu made sense. "This would give Siduri and Ningal the ability to blackmail since they could then trigger a reaction in anyone they wanted." She thought back to Aya and her situation, finally feeling some sympathy for the girl.
"Not quite," Janet said. She stopped in front of one of the private rooms. "For it to work, all the elements need to be added. Those that are missing any of the elements wouldn't have the same strong reaction as those with the full toxin." She raised her eyebrows. "Neither you nor Ningal show any of same naquadah compound that we found in Colonel O'Neill and the rest of your team."
Sam frowned. She was already aware that the catalysts entered her team's bloodstream when they were "blessed" at the temple. "I wasn't consecrated at the temple," Sam said. Her frown deepened. But she knew that Ningal had been exposed to the same naquadah compound that the rest had. She put her hands on her hips and searched Janet for an explanation.
"Oh, but there's more." Janet said, confirming Sam's hunch. She crossed her arms over, hugging the clipboard to her chest. "Both you and Ningal show a distinct protein marker."
"Protein marker?" Sam stared at Janet, shocked. "She was once a host."
Sam couldn't believe it. She wondered if Ningal had once been an underling to Nammu or if she had once been host to the Goa'uld itself. Sam turned to Janet for more answers.
"Immunity," Janet said. "It's the only explanation I can offer right now. I suppose being a priestess had more than one perk. I'm guessing that this Siduri person had access to all the compounds that were necessary to make the poisons utilized on the planet. However, Ningal, being a host, had a natural immunity. The how or why Ningal didn't have all the knowledge to take complete control isn't known to me."
"They were at a stalemate," Sam muttered.
Janet nodded. "It's all I have so far. I'm waiting on additional information to see if that theory pans out. But in the meantime," she extended her arm, beckoning Sam to enter, "they're all yours."
Sam grinned, slipping into the private room. Not surprisingly, Sam found only two beds set up inside. Teal'c was already on his feet, his face smooth and golden, as if he'd never been ill. His eyes lit up when she entered the room. As for the others, to the far left she found Daniel asleep, still hooked up to several monitors, while O'Neill, awake and alert, sat in his bed, already pestering the nursing staff.
"Carter!" he shouted, waving his hand for her to come over.
She approached the bed, trying not to feel too embarrassed over the smiles that greeted her. "It's good to see you," she said.
"We are ourselves once again," Teal'c said with a bow.
"Thanks to you," O'Neill said with a smirk.
Sam forced back a smile, feeling her cheeks warm. "What about Daniel?"
"Fraiser says he'll be fine," O'Neill said. He held up a bag of sunflower seeds. "Teal'c and I tried to play hoops with his open mouth just a little while ago and –"
Teal'c cocked his head and arched an eyebrow at O'Neill.
"Okay, fine. I tried to toss one in the hole a little while ago," he muttered. "It was working, too, until he woke up and gave me the evil eye." He flung another one at Daniel, hitting him in the nose. Daniel snorted and opened his eyes, glaring at the colonel. "See?" O'Neill said. "He'll be fine."
"Hi, Daniel," Sam said. "How are you feeling?"
He blinked at her sleepily, but managed a small smile. Slowly, he lifted his hand and gave her a thumbs up sign.
Sam couldn't even verbalize how relieved she felt – seeing the three of them and knowing they would be okay. She felt like she could finally breathe again.
"Just the people I wanted to see."
Sam turned and stood at attention when General Hammond walked through the door. Janet came in after him, the both of them stopping to stand between Colonel O'Neill's and Daniel's beds.
"At ease, Major," he said. "I trust you're feeling better?"
"Yes, sir," she said.
He nodded, seeming pleased. "Doctor Fraiser tells me that all of you will make a full recovery. Apparently, this Ningal woman was telling the truth."
"The vial she carried back with her did have a antidote for the poison," Janet explained.
"That was it?" O'Neill asked. "We could have taken that back on the ship."
"There was no way of knowing whether it would help or hurt you," Janet explained. "As it is, the antidote only neutralized part of the poison. We had to add a clelator like calcium ethylenediaminetetracetate to help bind and separate the naquadah from the other compounds."
O'Neill stared at her, and then shook his head, lacing his fingers behind his head as he leaned back. "Whatever you say, Doc."
"You made the right call, Major," Hammond said.
Sam wanted to accept the praise, but she found it difficult considering all they had gone through. "They used us," she said, still angry over what had happened. She and her team had been nothing but pawns in a game of power and greed between internal factions of an unstable government. "I can't believe they just used us like that."
"Ol'Perky there made quite the gamble," O'Neill muttered.
Teal'c clasped his hands behind his back and nodded. "Indeed."
"Anu wasn't part of this," Sam said, turning to Hammond. "Her people are suffering, and we did make a promise to help them. I fully believe that if we go back, we can strike a negotiation for defense technologies in exchange medical assistance."
"You want to go back?" Hammond asked. "After all you've been through?"
"They helped us escape," Sam said. "And I know we can make this negotiation work."
That seemed enough for Hammond. "Very well," he said with a nod. "We'll start planning the appropriate procedures when you're ready." His face eased, a small, grandfatherly smile softening his face. "But for now, I want you all to get some rest. You've earned it."
They watched General Hammond leave. When he was gone, O'Neill finally asked the question that she had been expecting to hear.
"So, why was it just the men that were affected like this?" O'Neill asked.
Janet glanced down and bit her lip, like she was a child holding a secret. This only made O'Neill more agitated.
"What?" he asked.
"Barring Teal'c, of course, due to his Jaffa physiology, I may have an answer for you," Janet said. "The reason men are more likely to experience the most severe symptoms is due to testosterone levels."
O'Neill glared at her. "So?"
"So…the greater the testosterone levels in a man, the greater impact he will feel when those reserves are depleted," Janet explained. "While women do have testosterone in their bodies, it serves a different function. Men weren't designed to have such a deficiency, which in turn weakens their bodies and allows for the toxin to have a more substantial effect."
"And?" O'Neill asked.
"Well, Colonel, it's a fact that generally younger men have higher levels of testosterone than older males," Sam said with a grin.
O'Neill's suspicious gaze shot from Sam to Janet. "Wait a second, are you saying…?"
O'Neill frowned and shot a troubled look over to Daniel. And while he didn't say anything, the grin that broke out across Daniel's face was enough to keep Sam laughing for a lifetime.