Chapter 11.
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/ Xander's thoughts /
% Jolinar's thoughts %
Xander didn't go to school after leaving the hospital. He needed some time to get his head together. He and his symbiote took a walk through the park.
% Well now. That was certainly an... interesting response. % Jolinar thought.
/ You're telling me. I feel completely drained. I wasn't this tired after I fought Angel. / Xander answered.
% Have you ever done or felt something like that before? % Jolinar asked.
/ Yeah, ever since I was possessed by a Hyena spirit, I've felt a lot more protective of my pa-. Of my friends. / Xander explained. / But that was a lot more intense than normal. There was some anger that wasn't mine coming from somewhere. /
They were both silent for a moment before Jolinar broke the internal silence. % Would you mind assisting me in a quick experiment? %
/ Maybe. What kind of experiment? / Xander answered.
% It won't hurt a bit. % Jolinar assured him. % I'd just like to observe your responses to different stimuli. %
/ Like what? / Xander was still unsure about being experimented on by an alien. Even, or especially, one living inside him.
% Well, the first step is just for you to think about your friends. Could you do that for me? % Jolinar prompted.
Xander decided that that wasn't so bad and did as he was asked.
% Excellent. Now I'd like you to think about a time when one of your friends was hurt. % Jolinar continued.
Only one thing came to mind when he thought of that. Buffy. Dead. In the Master's cave. A wave of anger washed over him. It wasn't as strong as back at the hospital. He wasn't sure why that was.
% Thank you. Now imagine that you've just been passed over for a promotion because you're a girl. % Jolinar ordered.
Without thinking, his hand lashed out and struck a nearby tree. "Gah!" Xander yelled as he clutched his hand.
% It's broken. I'll have it healed in 2 hours. % Jolinar informed Xander.
/ Why so long? / Xander joked darkly.
% I could do it faster, but I'd need a source of calcium first. If you could find... (Xander had a feeling of vertigo as he felt Jolinar look through some memories) Some soft fish bones would be easy to swallow, or maybe some chicken bones? I see that a tin of canned salmon should provide me with everything I need to make my repairs. % Jolinar observed.
Xander was still holding his hand. / Let me get this straight. I eat a can of salmon and the pain goes away? /
% Oh! So sorry. % Jolinar apologized. The pain suddenly dialed back to a very dull throb. % Just don't jostle it. It's still broken. %
Xander sighed in relief. / One can of salmon coming up. Can I make it into a sandwich? / And started walking home.
% Absolutely. % Jolinar agreed. % Now if we can discuss what led to the broken hand? %
/ Yeah, what happened? All of a sudden I couldn't control myself. Did you do that? / Xander asked.
% No. % Jolinar answered. % I believe it was Captain Carter's memories that did it. It wasn't your anger that caused you to lose control. It was hers. %
/ Nah uh. Not buying it. / Xander disagreed. / I've seen memories of her angry and I never saw her lose it like that. /
% Because she learned to control her anger. Being a female in the US military caused her anger on an almost daily basis. But she learned to channel it. Control you have never needed to learn, until now. % Jolinar explained.
/ Hey! I live on the Hellmouth. I think I have every right to be just as angry as her. / Xander complained.
% You do have every right. Except that you are not angry. I have to say you are disturbingly upbeat for having such a shitty life. In all honesty, I have never had a host with so much reason to be angry without being so. Normally, I would say it was a gift. But if we are to deal with Samantha's anger, your lack of training in dealing with that anger will be a problem. % Jolinar finished as they came upon Xander's house. % Your parents will be gone? %
/ Yeah, no drinking last night means they're going to work today. / Xander explained. / Time to raid the fridge. /
He had to do everything left handed. It wasn't the first time and he was fairly ambidextrous. But it was always a challenge to make a sandwich with only one hand. He was finally able to make and eat one. Then he held still for a few minutes while Jolinar mended his hand. When the Tok'ra was finished. Xander flexed his hand and fingers. It felt great.
/ Thanks. That feels great. / Xander told his other half.
% You are welcome. I am only sorry for my role in causing it. % Jolinar apologized.
/ Hey. We needed to know. No harm done now. And my hand feels great. / Xander comforted him.
% Wonderful. And since you insist on using your hands as weapons, I will strengthen the bones in each of your hands so that this is less likely to occur in the future. % Jolinar informed him.
/ Cool. / Xander thought as he made two more sandwiches using the rest of the salmon in the can. He also finished off all the left overs in the fridge before he started to feel full.
Then it was time to call Giles and Buffy and tell them what he had learned. Willow would be extremely disappointed that he wasn't attending school today, but he had other things to do.
He went to the cemetery where the military guys were attacked the night before. He collected the weapons dropped on the ground. A sword, a crossbow, an empty handgun, and two stakes. Buffy hadn't bothered to come back and pick up the weapons. Did she think these things grew on trees? Well, he supposed, the stakes kinda do. But effort was required to craft them into a point. Often, his own. Not to mention the cost for swords and crossbows. They certainly couldn't be cheap.
In fact, it occurred to Xander that he was now holding quite a bit of money in his hands. And he now had a moral dilemma on his hands. The weapons didn't belong to him. He didn't need them, but he and Jolinar really needed the money they could get from selling the weapons. The sword especially looked like it might be worth a lot. And who was to say that he and Jolinar couldn't do as much if not more good with the money received from the weapons than the weapons would do in the hands of their original owners?
Jolinar was silent during Xander's internal arguments. Xander decided to take them home for now instead of arguing about it with himself in broad daylight. He automatically closed the slide on the gun and stuffed it down the back of his pants. At least he knew enough not to stuff it down the front of his pants. Never aim a gun at something you aren't willing to shoot. The memory came back to him. Female memories were one thing. He didn't want matching anatomy.
He couldn't find the sword's sheath or the crossbow's quiver, but he took the two weapons and walked home as nonchalantly as it was possible to walk with two medieval weapons in broad daylight. Then again, it was Sunnydale, so he wasn't terribly surprised when he got home and no one even noticed him walking around in public with a sword and a crossbow. He shook his head.
He put the sword under the mattress of his pull out bed. He hid the crossbow in his closet under some clothes then pulled out the gun. He recognized it immediately from many memories. A Beretta M9. He sat it on his desk and just looked at it for a moment. Then, fingers moving automatically, he ejected the clip and cleared the breach. He then disassembled the weapon and placed the pieces in front of himself. An old toothbrush and some soap and water were his cleaning agents. Once everything was clean and dry, he went to the garage and found a small can of 3 in 1 oil. It probably wasn't quite what Beretta had in mind as a gun oil, but it would do for now. Cleaned and oiled, he reassembled the weapon. Racked the slide and released it on an empty chamber. Xander also came to a conclusion. There was no way to give this gun back to the US military safely, and they could certainly afford it's loss. He would find a way to sell this and depending on how much he got for that, he would decide what to do about the rest of the weapons.
They had a briefing first thing the day they got back. Didn't even get a chance to stop by their offices.
"You expect me to believe that vampires and demons are real?" General Hammond asked incredulously.
"No, sir." O'Neill answered.
"Well, that's not what your report says, Colonel. Maybe you care to explain further?" the annoyed general put forward.
"We saw one of these things explode into dust, General. We're all in agreement about what we saw, but we're not in agreement about what they actually are. And for the record, no one expected you to believe that vampires were real. I even tried to get a bet going about whether or not you would believe, but couldn't get any takers." O'Neill stated deadpan.
The general glared at his 2IC for that very literal interpretation of his words. Though he decided he might let himself chuckle about it away from the sarcastic colonel.
Daniel took the floor, "Now, we had a local guide of sorts. Dr. Rupert Giles. His doctorate from Oxford is in, get this, The Occult and Demonology. I didn't even know they had a course like that much less a whole degree field. The background check we ran on him after the fact was a mixed bag. A large number of people we tried to contact about him refused to say anything. We don't know what that means. But the ones who would talk had only good things to say about him. All of those people denied any knowledge of real vampires or demons." Dr. Jackson paused. "Before we went out, he explained the ways to kill a vampire: wood through the heart, decapitation, and sunlight. It was theorized that a staff blast would work as well. But one thing he said that stuck in my mind was that after death, the vampire would turn to dust. And that absolutely happened." There were nods around the room. "I wish we had gotten a sample of that dust, but in the excitement, we forgot. Also, lets not forget Turner and Ferretti's neck wounds and blood loss without almost any blood on their uniforms."
"Yes, I was getting to that. Teal'c you found Major Ferretti and Lieutenant Turner. Did you see any blood on the ground?" Hammond asked.
"As I stated in my report. I found a creature feeding on Major Ferretti and shot him in the back with my staff weapon. The creature turned to dust, just as the one before it had. I carried Major Ferretti and Lieutentant Turner to the hospital for treatment." Teal'c quoted from his report, then added, "It was quite dark but I saw no blood."
"Thank you Teal'c. I was wondering though, how did you find the hospital in a strange town you had never been in before?" Hammond shot a hole right through their cover story.
All eye's turned to Teal'c. The jig might be up very soon and they would all be in it up to their eyeballs. But Teal'c met the general's gaze, "We scouted the town the day before. Dr. Jackson pointed out the town's infirmary as a Hospital."
Hammond gave Teal'c a searching gaze. "I see. Major Ferretti, do you concur?"
"Yes sir." Louis answered. "I don't like to use the word vampire, but a humanoid creature with unusual speed and strength attacked both Turner and me and bit us. A large volume of blood was removed while we were standing without getting any on our uniforms. I realize it seems crazy and I'm not even going to comment on the idea of demons or magic, but... The thing that attacked us was real. And one second I'm dying, the next second I'm choking on dust."
"Very well." The general nodded.
"Speaking of magic." Daniel raised his hand.
"Dr. Jackson." Hammond recognized Daniel had the floor again.
"I had a very... interesting meeting with a young man the day we left. He stated that the intel they had on us was due to magic." Daniel began.
"And you believe him?" the general asked evenly.
"Well I'm not willing to rule it out. Or at least technology so advanced that it might as well be." Dr. Jackson argued.
"Go on." Hammond encouraged.
"It was something he said after he lost control, 'Sometimes I forget you're not military'." Daniel said, looking at Carter.
Carter had been quiet up to then, straightened. "Wait a minute. I said that to you."
"Captain Carter?" General Hammond begged for explanation.
"It was back when we were trying to send Cassandra home." Carter explained. "Daniel and I were discussing making difficult choices."
"So, you did say that?" the general asked.
"Word for word, sir." Carter nodded.
"Now, bear with me. The only thing he wanted to know from me, was whether Captain Carter survived the attack from the Ashrak. Now, I've been thinking about this all the way home. Do you remember PX3-989?"
Carter spoke up. "Harlan made robot versions of us."
"And what else did he do?" Daniel led.
"He transferred our consciousness to the robots." Carter looked horrified. "To the point where they didn't even know they weren't us."
Daniel snapped his finger. "Exactly. What if- what if this boy received Sam's consciousness? Or maybe just memories. He certainly didn't act like Sam. But it explains everything. How her login was used. How he knew the phone number for your direct line, general. Why he would be interested in protecting SG-1 from attack in the first place. And since Sam was still a host to Jolinar at the time of the attack, it explains how he knows a gate address to the Tok'ra that even we don't know about."
Hammond turned to Samantha, "Captain, is that possible?"
"Probably, sir. Harlan did it with machines, but there's no reason why it wouldn't be possible with living tissue, given the right technology." Carter answered.
"Would there be anyway to confirm?"
Sam thought for a moment then blushed. "Embarrassing memories. If he knows things that I've never told anyone, then there's a very good chance that the memories are genuine." Carter refused to look anyone in the eye after that.
General Hammond was concerned. "Do we know for sure that he doesn't still have access to Captain Carter's memories? This is already a major security breach and we need to know that it's not ongoing."
Samantha's blood froze. Could someone still be in her mind? The idea sickened her. And worse, if it were ongoing, she was out of the program, she might even be out of the military. She almost didn't hear Daniel's response of, "No, he genuinely didn't know whether Carter had lived or died. He seemed quite relieved that she was alive. Also, he wouldn't have needed to ask if he still had the connection." Sam almost fainted in relief when she heard that. After Jolinar, she had been depressed, but her reaction to the idea that she might be kicked out of the program had shown her just how much she still loved this job. Also, that someone else had had the same experience as her filled her with hope. She hoped she could one day meet this young man.
Hammond decided not to press the issue now. He was just happy that his Captain was out of bed at last. "Very well. I'm not comfortable leaving anyone with Captain Carter's memories in the hands of the NID, but for now we have no choice. Colonel O'Neill. I want contingency options drawn up for extracting that boy, either before or after he leaves that town. And also if he falls into NID custody."
"Yes, sir. Though, first we have to figure out who he is and find him." Jack answered.
"Well find him then. What do we know about him?" Hammond barked.
Daniel spoke up, "I was the only one who actually talked with him for more than a few seconds. I would say, college age, but we should check the high school first. The login occurred there and Dr. Giles works there as a librarian also they apparently know each other. And his name may start with a Z or an X."
"Very well. Captain Carter, do you feel up to assisting Dr. Jackson with his search?" the general asked gently.
"Yes, sir!" Carter answered enthusiastically.
"Wonderful." He turned to his other team. "SG-2 is currently on stand down pending the official inquiries into the actions of Lieutenant Turner and Major Ferretti. Colonel O'Neill, Teal'c you will also be involved in this."
"The Major, sir?" SG-2's sergeant queried.
The general explained. "Both teams received advice from your local guide, which Colonel O'Neill turned into orders. While Major Ferretti's reason for disobeying orders may or may not have been better than the Lieutenant's, the fact is that he too went against orders. What, if any, action will be taken will be decided at the inquiry."
"It's okay, Sergeant." Ferretti backed his general up. But it was nice that the young man would question a general for him.
When nothing more was said Hammond ended the meeting, "Very well, dismissed." Then he slid a marker over to Dr. Jackson and said with a smile smile and a twinkle in his eye. "Best to be prepared, son."
There were snickers around the table as everyone filed out of the briefing room.
Daniel took it all good naturedly until he got to his office. Markers. Markers everywhere. Black ones, packs of multicolored ones, highlighters and some of those ones that smelled like fruit.
O'Neill stopped behind him and looked over his shoulder. "Guess I know where I'm going when I need to borrow a marker." He then slipped a pack of markers into Daniel's pocket and walked away whistling the chorus of 'Paperback Writer'.
A/N: Paperback Writer by the Beatles. Also don't own.
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