Chapter Fourteen

Moore

Great. I knew she'd screw up taking care of my body. I leave her alone for a few minutes, and what do I get back? Bruises, cuts, the whole nine yards. Honestly, this isn't your body, missy. Didn't your mother teach you how to take care of stuff someone lent to you?

Wait.

Moore, you're an idiot. It was only a question of time until they would start dealing us a few blows, and if it was only to show the new guys who's boss around here. And if it was really you in your own body, you'd simply take the bruises and cuts as given and go on. Also… you wouldn't have a problem with the pain. It wouldn't have been the first time you had to take a beating in the course of a mission, but your linguist… your linguist has had only three months of service with you, and no one can prepare you for torture, even as comparatively light as this. Maybe you had to see the bruises… she has to feel them.

I take a deep breath and turn around again. I need to sleep, I know. If they really know… I'm the next one. Fuck it, this is really going down the drain fast. Only thing that's lacking is that our cover gets blown. Or maybe is already blown. Which would explain why they had this little chat with Reece… and which also means that there's a mole in the SGC. Crap. Crapcrapcrap.

From across the room, the sound of someone else taking a deep breath floats over to me, followed by the rustling of sheets of someone turning around quite forcefully. Obviously, I'm not the only one plagued by insomnia. And there's another sound… something like… a… sob? I get up and try to feel my way around in the pitch black room, concentrating on the sounds.

When I find the source, I try to reorient myself… Good thing I once had this instructor who had this thing about being able to find your way in every situation. And I mean every situation. Guy had us run around evilly planned courses in pitch black rooms for at least a week. Anyway… that should be the bed Reece is sleeping in.

I crouch down and reach out… yes, there's a shoulder. Huh. What, no startling? Okay, maybe I wasn't the quietest one, and one of her strengths is her hearing. "Sir?", I whisper.

"You can stop that.", she whispers back, her voice tight.

"Alright… Reece. You okay?" Shuddering breath. Silence. I just bet she's thinking about telling me that, yes, she is. If she's learned anything in the last three months it's the art of saying "I'm fine.", even if she's everything but.

"No. They know, and I'm… something…" I heave a sigh. If we ever make it back, I'll ask O'Neill if he can get her a nice cosy posting far away from everything that's the SGC. Or anything that has to do with field work at all, at least for the next five years. It's torture for her here, and she's in severe danger. She doesn't belong with us, and it would be irresponsible to keep her on the team. But for now I have to take some strain off her. I can still explode when we're back at the SGC.

"Don't worry. We'll make it back." I can feel her shake her head.

"No, you don't… you don't understand." Huh? Is that about this "Watch the watchmen"-stuff again?

"Then explain it to me." Suddenly, I feel her hand grab mine that has been lying on her shoulder and that feels a little… strange. No, not only because it's a little creepy to feel my own calloused hand on definitely female skin, but also because it's such a strange gesture from someone like Reece who always took great care to keep her distance from everyone – not only on an emotional basis, but also physically. Something happened in that interrogation. Something else than a beating.

I hear her very sharp intake of breath and then her hand feels around for my collar and draws me towards her. In an instant, her lips are very close to my ear and her breath touches my ear, when she whispers nearly inaudible: "They did something to me. I'm dangerous, sir. Don't let me near a gun and don't take me back to the SGC. Escape without me. And then search for a mole. Don't trust me with any intel." What the…? Is she nuts? Leave without her? Leave her here? In my body?

Now it's my turn to grab her and put my lips to her ear. "No way, Lieutenant. Number one: I don't leave a man behind. Never. Number two: I will most certainly not leave my body behind."

The hand around my collar tightens. She's not joking. She's terrified, and she desperately needs someone to calm her down. "Then get me out of here unconscious, and lock me away. But don't give me any escape plans or any other intel on the mission. Please, sir." How are we supposed to do that, huh? And did they bug her?

No, wait, she wouldn't talk to me if they did. So why… "Sir, believe me. I'm not joking around." Yeah, I can hear that. But I have my difficulties with trusting her and her judgment, because I simply don't know her very well. But I may not have another choice. I take a deep breath.

"Fine. I have no idea how to do this, but I promise." Her grip on my collar relaxes a little, but she doesn't draw back. I can still hear her breathing, and it's irregular and a little shuddering. I wish I could simply tell her to get her act together and soldier on, like every Marine would do, but contrary to popular belief I do have a heart. The fact that she still doesn't let go tells me she probably needs someone close by for comfort. And that tells me that something must be seriously wrong.

Almost gently, I pry her hand from my collar and without letting go of it for a few more moments, I whisper: "Just for the record, Lieutenant: Even if you weren't occupying my body, I wouldn't leave you behind, whatever else you might think. Now try and get some sleep. I'll figure something out."

She sighs heavily. Then: "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir." Then she finally draws back and the rustling tells me that she tries to curl up and settle down a little. Quietly I make my way back to my own bed and wonder how on Earth I could let myself be pressured into exposing a subordinate like her to risks no one really took care to prepare her for… something I'm to be blamed the worst for.

Greenspan

Something happened tonight. Something between Tom and Maureen. They both might have thought Dee and I were asleep, but at least I was wide awake. Through the pitch black I could hear the whispering, and I could hear that Maureen is afraid… no, terrified. It has to be something really bad, because I just bet that when it suddenly turned very quiet again, she was telling him something without any coding. She wanted him to understand exactly how bad it is.

And then, this morning, when they suddenly turned on the light again, there was… a change in Tom's bearing. He isn't pretending to be Reece anymore, probably because it's no use anyway. There's also… a new kind of understanding in Tom's bearing towards Reece. He's a little wary, like he doesn't really trust her. But part of the irritation Reece always inspired him is gone as well. Instead there's… sympathy. Huh? Where the hell does that come from?

But unfortunately I don't get any chance to find out more, because the door opens again. "'Morning, everyone!", Robbins greets us, again jovial and kind of scarily cheerful, striding into the room, followed by two of his cronies. He's got something on his mind, and it's probably not going to be pretty.

"I don't know what's good about this morning.", Tom grumbles and immediately draws Robbins' attention to himself. I wish he wouldn't have done that, but a look at him told me that he's doing this on purpose, probably to draw Robbins' attention from Reece and the rest. He's got something on his mind as well.

"I do. I get to interrogate you… Major Moore. Isn't that right?" Tom just shrugs.

"Genius. Everyone could have gotten that out of the little screw-up over there." He jerks his head towards Reece, who's doing a pretty good job of looking embarrassed, downcast and ashamed. Actually, she's doing a much better job of it than Tom ever would have been able to in his own body.

"Ah, a tough cookie, huh? Let's see how tough you can be in a girl's body." Blergh. Just… blergh. All kinds of. Actually, it's a good thing that these guys deserted. They're a disgrace to the Corps, and I bet that even Maureen feels injured in her Corps pride, even if she herself doesn't exactly think of herself as the Corps's finest.

"Watch me.", Tom growls, and if I didn't know already that this is not Maureen inside that body, I'd be fully convinced now. He doesn't even wait for Robbins to taunt him a little more and moves towards him voluntarily. What the…? When he reaches Robbins, he simply shouts "Mess hall catastrophe!" and simply jumps Robbins.

Dee immediately reacts, remembering instantly the incident Tom is referring to. As am I. While Tom has gotten into a full out fight with Robbins – it is a little strange seeing Reece's body fight like an expert – Dee is targeting the first soldier of the escort. My job is taking out the second one, and so I lunge a kick at him, taking him by surprise at first. That's enough to get me an opening to go for the Beretta at his side. In the moment I have him on the ground and the Beretta pointed against his head, Tom and Dee have their adversaries under control as well.

"Reece, take the guards' rifles." Reece, who didn't partake in the whole thing, simply shakes her head, terrified.

"No. I said no guns, sir. Everything… just no guns." What happened to her? She isn't defying this order out of the same reasons she defied the last order – the absolute confidence that she simply knew better – but out of pure fear.

Robbins tries to get Tom of his back, and Tom does seem to have difficulties to adapt to the much lighter weight and loss of muscles that Reece's body is bringing with it, but at the moment he's still able to hold the ex Marine under control. "Reece, do it. No discussions."

"Sir, I…"

"Reece!" She swallows. Then she takes a few steps towards us, very tentatively, as if she needs to concentrate very, very hard. As if something else was taking up a lot of her concentration. Very carefully, she crouches down beside each guard and takes up their G36s. "Now, one on your back, the other one trained on these guys. If anyone so much as moves a finger, you shoot him. Understood?" She shortly closes her eyes and then simply nods and complies with his order. Tom just throws Dee and me a look and a nod and then starts tying Robbins' hands together with the binders from his belt. Swiftly, Dee and I do the same with our guys.

Finally, we all get up again. Immediately, Tom takes the rifles from Maureen who seems really relieved to get rid of them, gives one to Dee and keeps the other one, but puts his looted Beretta in her hands in exchange. "I don't leave my people defenceless, Lieutenant.", is all he says and effectively shuts up any eventual protestations from her.

Then he goes back to Robbins, searches his pockets and takes out a few key cards, flash drives and an IDC. He even takes the liberty to give Robbins a smug grin. "Thank you. Spares us having to search for our owns."

Robbins, though, doesn't want to leave the final word to Tom. "You're making a big mistake, Major. You've got a barrel of gun powder with you, and you just put a lighter to the fuse."

If there's one thing Tom hates it's cheating him out of the final word. You just made a big mistake, Mr. Robbins. "Don't worry. I just want to keep the suspense building a little before I stamp out that fuse again." With that, he lands a very well aimed punch at Robbins' face that manages to put the lights out of that guy. Note to self: Teach Maureen how do that when she's back in her body again. Seems like she could be quite the fighter queen if she knew how to. "That's for giving me that ugly black eye."

He gets up again and opens the door to the corridor. He checks both sides to see if the video footage already alerted the rest of the base, but at the moment everything is quiet out there. He turns around again. Usually, now he'd tell us what to do next, but this time he simply says: "Follow my lead."

Dee and I throw each other a look and share a nearly invisible shrug. Well… usually he knows what he's doing. Let's just hope that this body-changing thing didn't fry his mind.

A/N: Yay, some action! :D And yes, there will be an explanation for some... strange things that happened in the last chapter ;)