It was nearly a week later when Michael finally returned for my answer. I thought I'd heard a couple of explosions in one of the more remote parts of the laboratory today, and considering that he was in an exceptionally foul mood when he arrived, I immediately suspected the two occurrences were related. As he closed the door behind him, he didn't even try to act cheerful like he did before. Something significant must have happened. I had a faint stirring of hope in my heart that it just might be that my rescue had come at last, but he gave no outward sign of being rushed or panicked. He displayed the usual pure seething hatred and an even more hotly burning desire for vengeance than before, if that were possible. In fact, I didn't even need to look at him to know. I could feel it in him as he began to probe my mind again.
He looked down at me with an irritated expression and seemed to be debating with himself whether or not to tell me something, but he waited to speak until he had probed my fragile emotional state for weaknesses. He smirked, apparently satisfied with the results so far. "Perhaps you would like to know that your friends paid me a visit today. Colonel Sheppard was here in this compound, and I have to admit that I'm surprised he managed to do so much damage. My most recent cycle of experimentation has been delayed for at least a month because of it."
I looked up at him in horror. They had been here? They had seen him here, but hadn't looked for me? Surely they realized by now that Michael had been the one who had kidnapped me. His implication that they had forgotten about me was absurd, and I tried not to allow myself to be baited by his ruse. He had to be lying!
"You look surprised." He laughed harshly. "They aren't much of a concern to me. I'll just have to move the lab. But you however are quickly becoming a waste of time and effort, and my patience is beginning to wear thin."
I struggled not to show any outward sign of caring about what he said, but the surging adrenaline and anxiety was making my hands shake despite my best efforts.
"So," he began again impatiently. We were nearly nose to nose now. "What is your answer then? Have you reconsidered my demands?"
I felt as though I was melting under his gaze, but I held my ground. What would he try next if I continued to refuse? I glanced over at Laina, who was trying to remain inconspicuous in the corner, and immediately regretted it when I watched Michael's gaze follow. When he looked back at me, I was sure that he had noticed how protective I felt toward her. Had I just put her in danger by thinking about her?
I began to panic, my breath now coming in short gasps, and I fought to hold onto what was left of my shattered confidence. What would she want me to do? All those people he intended to experiment on, what would they want me to do? Wouldn't living as a genetically-mutated monster, especially being forced to serve someone like Michael, be a fate worse than death? What I was enduring now, all this time being interrogated and abused, mind-probed and tortured, was already a fate worse than death!
"No," I replied sternly, my fear hardly concealed. "I won't do it! I won't help you torture and murder innocent people!"
The fires of his rage and frustration exploded in my mind, the sheer force of which physically knocked me down. I then watched him reach out and grab Laina by the neck without conscious decision, driven by rage. Before I had a chance to protest or even realize what was happening, the sickening crack of her neck breaking under the pressure of his fingers echoed on the walls. My heart pounded in my ears as Michael released her, and I had no doubt that she was dead before her lifeless body had even hit the floor.
For a brief moment, my feet were rooted in place with shock and utter disbelief. But as the shock began to subside, anger overwhelmed me in its place. It was at this moment that I felt some primal part of me break free, and pure unadulterated hatred coursed through my veins. It was so intense, Michael was momentarily distracted. I took the opportunity to throw myself at him. I managed to wrestle him to the ground, but my attack was disorganized and I still felt weak. He recovered quickly and struck me hard, knocking me back against the wall next to my bed. I tasted the coppery, bitter tang of blood as I fought to breathe through the pain.
He left me alone with her again, but my trembling did not abate for a long time. I cowered in the corner trying to avoid the lifeless gaze of her eyes. Guilt and grief drove me first to tears, and then ultimately to indecision. What the bloody hell was I trying to prove by refusing to help Michael? That I could take a beating? That I could resist his mind-probing? That I still believed I was upholding my oath of "Do no harm," no matter how many people he kills with his experimentation? Am I really doing the right thing by not acting to protect these people, especially when it's entirely possible that doing what he asks could save some of them?
Even now in death, her eyes glittered faintly in the darkness, as if to remind me of how I'd promised her everything would be all right. Damn it! Why did he have to kill her? Was it just to make me feel guilty, or was it to make a point? There was no justification for it, no real reason at all. She was absolutely no threat to him whatsoever, but she ended up paying for my transgressions with her life. It was my fault that she'd been put in danger, and my fault that she was now dead. And for what? If I don't do something, the rest of those people, including her young sister, will share her fate. One way or another, they will die and it will be my fault.
"Do no harm." The words echoed in my mind like a warning, and I knew now that if I ignored that cardinal oath I'd made when I became a doctor, Michael will have beaten and broken me as surely as he'd beaten and broken my body, and Laina truly will have died in vain and without purpose. Her death may not have meant anything to him, but her life still means everything to me. Her sister and her people need my help and I will not watch them die, not if there's something I can do to stop it. I cannot allow Michael to kill me or break me, and I cannot give up hope that Colonel Sheppard, Rodney, Teyla, and Ronon will eventually come for me.
They will come for me. They will rescue me. I just have to be patient. And until then, Michael may think that he has won, but I will know better. I will stay alive, I will play my part in this, and I will save who I can. And I swear on my life that one day Michael will get the punishment he is due.