Dream Walker
It felt as if the cabin shifted, all the colours gone, looking around, to Anne it was like an old sepia photograph. Elisabeth was now gone, but her voice rang in inside her head. Reach out for their dreams Inarin, that's where you'll find him.
In that void, she began to see the surroundings of her cabin be replaced by what appeared to be millions of stars, or more precisely, pinpricks of bright lights, and they indeed had colour. Anne began to recognise the pattern. Light pale blue, asleep. Pulsating white, awake. And a slowly throbbing yellowish light was somebody half way in between, or injured. Each light had their own signature as well. As Inarin, she could recognise different people, from their signature light.
She searched about, got her bearings and looked toward the direction of Earth's solar system, there she found what she was looking for, her husband, but in her mind, it was Agathon, not Mac.
Sam and the team, with help from the SF's, restored order. She knelt beside her uncle holding his head, his breathing shallow, they had stemmed the bleeding, but he was feverish.
"We've got to get him out of here." She appealed to anyone who would listen.
Teal'c , Daniel and Cam offered to carry him to somewhere more comfortable. One of the Ori refugees offered to show them to a private cabin and they accepted. Cam spoke quietly to Petr.
"Get all these people somewhere else Colonel, but somewhere you can keep an eye on them, and make sure no one goes for a walk on their own."
"Yes sir, it will be done."
Inarin found herself in the passageway's of an Ori ship, shadowy figures passed by her as she searched out her quest. The strange colouring, she had become used to. The shadows, she realised were the people on board, awake, so not quite there, unless they may perhaps entered what was commonly called a daydream. It was a sensation that drew her on, nothing she could describe, she just knew where she was going. Turning down a left passageway, a gleam of yellowing light shone from a side room or cabin. She entered, there were figures in here as well, surrounding the figure of Agathon, laying upon some kind of bed or couch.
Inarin was not sure what would happen, it had been a very long time since she had done this. She was quite sure the other=s were not aware of her presence, she approached her lifelong partner and crouched beside him.
As Mac lay there, Sam wiped his sweating face, "Don't the refugees know if there is an antidote for this poison?"
"We asked all around Sam, if they do, they're not saying." Cam replied. But I'll take Teal'c with me, and we'll do a little more digging!"
"Yes please Cam."
"I'm coming to." Vala stood and joined the other two, Daniel went to move, but stayed to support Sam.
Inarin knelt beside the bed and whispered to her husband. "Agathon, Agathon, can you hear me?"
His eyed opened slowly. "What, Anne, where...oh, Jesus, am I dead?"
"No, you've been stabbed and poisoned, I'm here to help"
He looked about and noticed the off colouring, and the fact that his wife was there when she was on the Victory. Then that other self took over. "Inarin, it's been a long time hasn't it? So what have I done this time? How did you manage, it was always difficult for....you." Even here he was in pain.
"Lay still, I will remove the poison and heal the internal bleeding, but as not to arouse suspicion, I will leave the primary wound for the others to fix."
"So I'm gonna wake up still bleeding?"
"A little my Love, now don't move." She placed her hand over his side, Agathon felt a cold tingling sensation, his body arched up, in response, but in mere moments it was over. He felt like he was dropped in ice water.
"I must go now, I cannot make this portal for too long, I need more practice again. But, Darling, if you ever do this to me again...I will kill you myself." She smiled wickedly and slapped him hard and then kissed him gently, she lingered a moment holding his hand, then was gone. Mac fell back into a semi sleep.
Anne awoke back in her body, the door was still locked, she checked her watch, only 3 minutes had passed, was it real, or all just a dream. She got up from the bed, some how her own body found it's way there, she checked where the wound was supposed to be, nothing, yet there was dried blood on her blouse. She changed quickly and headed out for the bridge, she had to try and get a subspace message through to the SGC.
Mac opened his eyes to see Sam leaning over him, past her a worried SG1 looked at him, Vala had returned and was dabbing his brow with a moistened cloth, she found a medic and he was just finishing suturing his wound. The young man stood and told Sam, that was all he could do for now, the rest was up to the Admiral. Weakly Mac spoke.
"So, what did I miss?"
To which, Vala just stopped mid brow mopping and Sam opened her mouth to say something, but no words came out.
Cam was the first to speak, he and Teal'c had come up empty.
"Sir, you had us worried, we thought we were going to lose you!"
With Sam and Vala's help he slowly sat up, wincing a he did, Sam tried to push him back, but he refused, politely.
"I'll be ok Sam, yeah Cam, I thought I lost me almost as well, I think an angel is watching over me." He said candidly, little did they know. "So, what's our situation?"
The group as a whole told him everything that had occurred, including Daniel's part in ejecting the Ori, Mac was a little perturbed by that, but not much, he only wished he could have interrogated some of them.
Anne began to run toward the bridge deck as she heard the call that they were assembling troops for a ground assault, there was something about this she felt strongly she must be a part of. On her way she saw Julie Henderson with a strike team, the two women smiled briefly as Anne passed her. One level up was the bridge, but there was an auxiliary communication station just down the passageway, she headed passed the elevator and turned left, opened the door quietly and peered in, only one technician was on duty, she crept quietly behind the sergeant, placed her hand upon his shoulder, and as he slumped into a deep sleep Anne began searching the ship with her mind. She needed a seven digit security code other than her own, and there were only three others she could use. "Bingo" After a few very quick dream touches she find the one she was looking for. '993405GZ' Then she typed this message. "Jack, MacGregor needs help, urgent." After checking to see the sergeant was coming around, Anne left as silently as she came.
Dmitri was busy organising his ground commanders when Anne came from the elevator, the moment she entered the bridge, Major Chung caught the Commander's attention.
"Sir we've just had an unauthorised sub-space message sent to the SGC, from the back-up station."
"Who sent it Major?"
Er...you did sir."
"I what? Christ I don't have time to deal with that now Chung, we'll check it out later." He was confounded momentarily, but not enough to derail him from the task at hand. He saw Anne standing behind one of the ground force leaders and beckoned her over, then continued with his brief.
"Right then. We have ascertained it might be as little as two hours before any of those Ori ships show again, thanks to our unknown friend, he may take care of them altogether, but he may not. So this is a very quick, in and out mission, grab our boys and girls and any whom you seem as in need of repatriation and back to the ship as quickly as possible. Any resistance from those enemy still on the ground will need to be dealt with swiftly, any questions?"
The assembled ground force commanders give a negative response, and filed out toward the elevators that would take them to the hangar bays, Anne turned to Dmitri as they left and simply said to him. "I'm going with them, they may need my assistance."
Dmitri was taken aback. "Captain, whatever for, we have med teams entrenched with the SG groups, I can't have the fleets head surgeon endangering herself, for a simple rescue mission."
"Dmitri, if it's 'simple' as you say, there will be no harm in it for me. No I've made up my mind, there are people down there who need my help and my number two can look after anything that may crop up here. I'll be on comms if you need me Captain." She turned and followed the last of the other officers out. On her way, Anne stopped by the armoury and collected a zat and a flak vest, no point in taking chances on a 'simple' mission, she reminded herself.
In the hangar bay eight teams had assembled and Lt. Colonel Nathan Macara RMC assigned teams to the four AC401's waiting, and another four would be held back to assist with the pick ups and Keira Porter with her crew would fly EW picket, a squadron of nine F307's would provide cover, with all the minor details sorted, equipment allocated, the ground forces began marching into the back of the dropships. Anne found herself in one ship with two teams, one led by a young Marine Lieutenant, Lily Hamilton, who she had met earlier, when the girl had reported to medbay with a slight ankle injury from playing volleyball in the recrooms. She turned to the brown haired girl. Who was no more than twenty two at the most.
"How's the ankle Lily?' Anne said as she buckled her harness.
"Fine now thanks to you ma'am. At least now I won't be slowin' others down." She replied in her mid western Wyoming drawl.
Just before the all clear was given a young Marine private got up checked everyone's harness, he then stopped at Anne and thought this was a good time to put his 'lighten up' routine into play.
"I'm ready, man, check it out. I am the ultimate badass! State of the badass art! You do NOT wanna mess with me. Check it out! Hey Captain, don't worry. Me and my squad of ultimate badasses will protect you! Check it out! Independently targeting particle beam phalanx. Vwap! Fry half a city with this puppy. We got tactical smart missiles, phase-plasma pulse rifles, RPGs, we got sonic electronic ball breakers! We got nukes, we got knives, sharp sticks..."
Both squads laughed their heads off until the 401 captain, Lt Elena Ovcharenko made the call.
"Right, knock it off, Hudson." They heard a cackle of mirth come from the cockpit. "Settle in for the ride ladies and gentlemen, the Falcon Six express is taking you to Wonderland.
The loading ramps on all the Tornado's' closed almost in unison, then the ships began their taxi sequence to the holding line, one by one they took off into the black void, the Falcon One being the second last. Exiting the Victory was unnoticed, a little bump was the most anyone could feel, but it was when they entered atmosphere, that was a different story.
The buffeting shook and vibrated the small dropships, some of those unused to the sensation of passing through the upper layers of a planet's stratosphere looked visibly shaken, many a white knuckle gripped anything they could find, even the inertial dampeners could not check all the forces that pressured the hull. But in moments it was over, they were in clear blue skies, a calm seemed to settle over them until the enemy below, began sending up a barrage of fire.
"We're hit!" Ovcharenko bellowed out, "Taken out our undercarriage hydraulics, hung on everyone this is going to be a rough landing." The young woman wrestled with the controls, Anne watched in horror through a window as she saw another 401 go down in a massive fireball. A call came over the coms system. "Falcon leader to all birds, seems our unknown friend did not succeed in knocking out all resistance, make for landing zone 'B'...break now!"
"Roger leader, I'm coming in hot though!" Falcon six replied.
With smoke trailing from the grey aircraft and it's occupants clinging for a wild entry, Ovcharenko, saw a wide clearing in between a stand of tall pine like trees, with all her skill, she managed to level out and use the vertical thrusters to slow her descent. The landing was her worst and she felt a little ashamed, but she had saved the lives of her crew and thirteen passengers, for that she was thankful. Her second, Warrant Officer Sam Hutton, a gruff Irishman, lowered the cargo ramp door and the troopers began filing out, heads down and weapons ready, all around them the other Tornado's had landed successfully bar one, Macara called all the units together and gave them a quick brief, for the moment it was quiet, not even the sound of wildlife penetrated the forest.
"Right now boys and girls, we're about a click from our initial landing zone, so time is of the essence here. I want smoke and lots of it, snipers get to your marked positions, spread your teams out, but our first priority is to get our boys out and safely home. The enemy will have watched our landing and most likely be headed this way." He looked about and saw his ace had just pulled in behind the gathering, three LRPV's and crew. One of the drivers got out, and gave Macara the thumbs up.
"Sergeant O'Hara, glad you could join us." He said with a wry smile. "Ok you all know the drill, the three Lerps, will go in formation, troopers flanking them at walking speed, we now have about one hour forty minutes according to ops, so lets make it clean, go...go. Air crews guard your ships, and set the self destruct on Falcon six for..." He checked his watch. "Seventeen thirty hours."
"Aye sir!" One of the Aircrew-man acknowledged him with a salute.
The began to spread out in formation and allow the vehicles to take the lead, steadily they moved toward the forest and team by team, they spread out behind them. Elena Ovcharenko and her crew attached themselves to Hamilton's team, in the process of doing so she caught Anne's arm.
"You had best stay with us Doctor, Lily and her team are one of the best, and my crew aren't too shabby either." She smiled politely.
"I have every intention of doing so Elena, I'll be your shadow." Anne replied.
As they moved deeper into the shadows, the first salvo's of opposition started to rain down amongst them, obviously the enemy had learnt from the Tauri or other so called primitive races, the advantages of percussion weapons, great blasts of earth erupted and a few went down, some were pulled clear by their comrades. The LRPV's, using guidance from the 401 far above them, concentrated their Bushmaster cannon and forty millimetre grenades in a pattern to neutralise the threat. The troopers spread out a little further to minimise casualties, six snipers rushed on ahead to take up their positions on a bluff overlooking the camp. Soldiers began fitting smoke canisters to their grenade launchers and firing them as they gained more ground.
Anne, following closely behind Lt. Hamilton, closed her eyes ever so briefly and touched the dream road, she found three ugly red sparks, about two kilometres from her to the north east. That was her destination.
Aboard one of the grounded Ori ships, a man wearing a crimson robe, prodded his two companions as they supervised the defence with their minds, controlling the actions of their 'new' Priors. "Be alert brother and sister, one of our enemy is here." He curled his mouth in a wicked snarl.