Eleanor
The next month winter brought with her blizzards and ice storms. There was something so nostalgic about waking up and seeing the snow piled on the lawn every morning. I had grown up in Kansas City and remembered long muggy summers and equally long frozen winters. As much as I didn't love scraping the driveway clean every morning, I had long evenings with a hot mug of tea watching it come down to look forward to.
Daniel came home the night prior and was already off-world to help with the finalizing of a new free Jaffa settlement. He had left a paper bag filled with my chocolate oranges, a collection of postcards from a Heathrow gift shop underneath, and one of my request forms filled out simply for Dinner tomorrow at 7.
I gleefully unwrapped the foil and placed the small chocolate piece on my tongue, lavishing in the silky smooth texture and combination of orange zest with chocolate.
"Someone looks pleased that their bff across the hall is home." Lonnie smirked walking into my office. "I filled out a request for a few gate scheduling information slots and recent mission reports last night and never got anything in return. But you obviously seem busy with your snackies."
"Yes I am," I mocked back, "and emailed what I was permitted." I placed another segment of the candy onto my tongue like a giddy child on Halloween night gorging on sweets before bed. "But most of the information is restricted now, because of the informant leak investigation. I'm not even allowed to know about jumps until the day of."
"Everything I needed was all redacted."
I shrugged, "sorry but there isn't much I can do."
"Right." He looked around awkwardly and I cracked a piece of the chocolate off gesturing for him to take it. As he declined the sirens started going off in the halls. He ran out the door to the stair shaft where I was assuming he would go to the gate room. Usually the alarm like this meant it was best for me to lock my door from the inside and stay out of the way. It made me nervous knowing that Daniel was currently off-world, but whoever was being affected by the alarms didn't need me to get in the way.
Jack
"Hey world traveler!" Sam shouted across the campsite as Daniel came from over the hill ledge pack in hand. We had been out here for two days now, but he had just returned from his hopefully successful trip to find any information regarding Atlantis.
The rocky landscape would hopefully provide good tactical training for the new free Jaffa troops as they practiced warfare drills in their own structured settlements. Teal'c had been monitoring the formation of the camp for months now, making this his personal project alongside Bra'tac. His hopes would be that a fruitful union of free Jaffa and Tauri would unite here and share in brotherhood, or something like that.
Daniel came up the path and dropped his pack on the ground reaching for his canteen. "You guys really chose to set up the tents quite the hike away." He took a swig of water and put it back.
"Anything useful on your mini vacation?" I asked pointedly.
"Yes, but not what I was actually looking for." He pulled out his field notebook and thumbed through the overstuffed pages. "Here, I cross referenced three gate addresses that I had in reference to the remote device McKay is helping Sam with."
"Not helping with." She muttered back.
"And I found that one of the gate addresses is referenced in a text not only with Ancient's number coding but also in a text that had multiple mentions of traveling during solar eclipses, seasonal shifts, decades even of time passing between jumps."
"'Get to the point." I grumbled.
"I believe I have the location for the remote, not just the address, but the exact location." He grinned and in that moment a shot rang out through the clearing. We all turned to look in the direction and saw one of the supposedly free Jaffa holding a staff weapon pointed in our direction. He shouted and 50 of his supporters came barreling toward us, Zat'nik'tels and staff weapons all firing on us. We took cover behind multiple large boulders, getting our P-90's ready for defense. The other side of the camp heard the commotion and came running, loaded and ready to defend their new home from the traitors within its own walls.
"Dial the gate, get reinforcements!" I shouted at Sam while Daniel, Teal'c and I stayed as cover.
"Shame is falling onto this great settlement." Bra'tac scoffed and I could see Teal'c's disappointment blink across his face and quickly vanish as he took down so many of the men he had hoped would be side by side with him in the battle for their freedom.
We were pushed back over the hill and Daniel motioned he was going to make a run for the campsite. I nodded in agreement, but as he turned around a staff weapon hit him in the gut. He fell to the ground in a thud, and two of the rebel Jaffa came from the ledge and reached him before I could. He went to grab for his gun but with one swift kick to the head was knocked unconscious. I had to keep Teal'c back from charging after our friend, our brother. He's been in worse situations, we would get him back, but it was a blow to the chest to see them dragging his body off, intentionally rough and careless.
I was still holding off the few Jaffa left, when Sam came back with reinforcements. Three more SG teams cleared out the area of any mutineers and Teal'c motioned for the remaining defending Jaffa to meet him in the center of the encampment. I watched as he stood there with his ego bruised and pulled out a heavy pelican case to stand on so he could look over the crowd of the hundred or so Jaffa left.
"This, this was not a defeat , it was a display of power." His voice carried through the crowd, men and women watching him, battle wounds slashed across their bodies but their attention solely on this once deemed traitor to them. This man who believed his people could be unshackled and have their own free will now leading a revolution. "We are a free people! No more will we allow false gods to control our actions, no more will we subject our children's bodies to be used for the false gods care, no more will we watch as our brethren are forced to fight for ideologies they do not stand with. If there is a traitor among us, I will find you so you can crawl back to your false god and cry out to him that we are free, and we are Jaffa!" The crowd roared and Sam walked up to me after searching the throng.
"Where is Daniel?" She asked frantically as if the answer was not already on my face.
"Get our men, leave a team behind here with Teal'c to monitor the gate and check for stragglers," I motioned to Lorne from across the field and rounded everyone up for our rescue mission.
Sam
We were crouched around the stony outcropping, a Goa'uld Al'kesh ship was perched among the rocks. Guarded by a dozen Jaffa on the outside. Jack gave the signal and the right side flanked the ship. The guards turned their attention to the distraction as Lorne and I slipped into the ship. Two Jaffa were tying Daniel's limp body to a cargo bar, and we took them both swiftly out in one trigger pull.
"The sound will alert the others here soon," I told Lorne. "If you can unbind him I can find the self destruct on the ship and trigger it for an explosion giving us enough of a distraction and time to make it to the gate." He agreed and began working on chains.
I found the control panel and cracked it open. I knew if I took the red control crystal out partially I would be able to insert our own microchip without detonating the ship entirely. The microchip acted as a safety switch that set a countdown and released the crystal from the port unsuspectingly when the clock ended. The only trick was I had to start the ship for the electrical pulse to start, and I couldn't start the ship until I knew Daniel and Lorne were off. When that ship was on and the crystal fell out we would have the massive explosion we needed.
I ran back to the cargo hold and saw Daniel's eyes flickering open. His chest was making constricted husky breaths in and out. Lorne was guiding him to his feet sternly trying to wake him up, "alright Jackson I'm going to need your help if we're going to get you out of here."
"Trap," Daniel rasped out. "Ba'al. Trap. Ja..." he started coughing and crimson dribbled from his mouth. "Ba'al is here." He wheezed again, "for Jack. Go without me." He rose to his shaky legs and winced, grabbing at his stomach. I saw the fibers of his shirt singed and burned into the gaping holes ripped across his abdomen. "Leave me, and save yourselves."
"We're not leaving without you Daniel," I snapped back. "Start getting him to the gate. I'll start the ship and get the others." Major Lorne nodded and I turned back to the control panel. Hot wiring an alien cargo ship wasn't something I liked to add to my resume, but I had done it enough times that I was confident in my ability. When I heard the engines thrum I ran as quickly back out as I could, seeing Jack standing over the last Goa'uld directed Jaffa, P-90 pointed at his head. Bra'tac and one of his freedom followers holding the man down on his knees.
"You tell Ba'al, Jack O'Neill says hi." He jeered and smacked the butt of the gun into his head before the Jaffa let him fall to his knees. I saw Teal'c helping to carry Daniel across the rocky path back to the gate. Jack saw me and issued us all to run out of the path of the ship. With no time to spare the Al'kesh exploded into fragments just barely able to reach us. I could feel the burning in my lungs at the intensity of my speed, but the metallic tang in my throat meant we almost made it out. We were almost there. In that same hopeful thought the clouds parted above revealing four Death Gliders shooting over the path. One shot brought rocky shrapnel cascading toward Jack's side. A gasp escaped me and I ran towards him, pulling him up from the ground.
"Sir?!" I shouted and he got back to his feet clutching onto his dangling arm.
"Fall back to the gate!" He ordered and we all ran, ran and fired shots as cover hoping that the small stretch from us and the gate over the hill would be enough to make it.
Eleanor
The past 24 hours had been a blur. I remember hearing that there were casualties, that Dr. Jackson, Daniel, was in surgery most of the night. He'll want a spare change of clothes when he gets out. I remember thinking as I went to his apartment at four that morning. I hadn't left Stargate Command since he had returned through the gate, I was waiting on updates about his recovery. Sitting in the mess hall staring down at a bowl of tomato soup gone cold, it had snapped in me that he wouldn't have a spare change of clothes here, he was gone, and though he could get a new coverall easily he'd want something of his own.
I had gone to his cubby and grabbed his keys, drove to his apartment, and as I stepped through the door I smelled him. That intoxicating blend of books and bergamot, of clove and coffee, of home to me. I fell to my knees, letting the worry escape me, letting the fear that was building go and flood his apartment floor in my tears. I looked up to see his still unpacked suitcases from the week against the wall. I wiped my face and got to my feet, I wasn't here to cry, I was here to get clothes for him, for when he woke up.
As respectfully as I could, I rifled through his drawers and found a pair of pajamas, a few pairs of boxer briefs, under shirts, and one spare uniform. I found his extra pair of glasses in their case and tucked that into the bundle of clothes. He'd need a pillow if memory served well at how thin the beds were.
"That will have to do." I mumbled and before walking out the door with the bag of clothes in hand I turned back and took one more glance seeing the blankets still on the couch where we had left them Christmas Day. Where he has wrapped me in his arms and we fell asleep watching It's a Wonderful Life just moments before his plane ride.
10 hours, 4 coffees, and what felt like an eternity later I was standing outside a private room next to the medical bay. Janet explained the "situation" to me slowly and with care to detail that I was allowed to know. Daniel was dying, nearly dead. This was my chance as a loved one to say my goodbyes. Teal'c and Jack helped walk him over the threshold of the gate before he collapsed to the floor convulsing and bleeding out. Every word she said was muffled, was clouded in my ears like cotton stuffed to keep the noise out.
"The lacerations inside his organs, well he's gone into septic shock and we've tried all we can. He's on a ventilator to help his collapsed lung for now, but I can't promise he'll make it into the night." Her voice was gentle and understanding, but the words coming out didn't make sense. No, no. He was supposed to be there just on a diplomatic mission. Just as a check in. As it was explained to me, they were essentially there for what could be compared to a ribbon cutting. To congratulate Teal'c on his people's settlement.
"Can he hear me?"
"I," she paused and I could see that she was debating telling me a comforting lie or the honest truth. "I don't know what he can hear or even understand. He was not responsive to most of our procedures thus far." I nodded and clasped my hands together, fiddling with the fingers to keep my emotions in check. "I have others to attend to, but if you have any questions save them for me and I'll my best to answer them." She paused and gave me a hug meant to comfort. "You deserve to say goodbye, I know how much you meant to him." With that she opened the door and I stepped in.
Sam and Teal'c were both speaking to one another at the foot of the bed. The room was dark with a gentle overhead light on him. I saw Jack holding a battered journal sitting in a chair next to the bed. He looked up and met eyes with me, and for once Jack wasn't glowering at me. He looked empathetic and troubled, but not with me. He stood up and motioned for the chair. I took in a steadying breath and sat down. My eyes trailed over to his body laying there, still. His face, it was battered and broken, blood crusted on his slashed skin across his cheeks. His left eye swollen and raw, his top lip split and forming mottled purple bruises. I felt my eyes burn with the sting of loss at seeing him like this. An animosity building in my veins for the people who did this to him, a sorrow in my heart at the pain he endured. A thin clean white sheet was draped modestly around him from his stomach down. Bandages wrapped around his ribcage in an attempt to keep his organs all in place.
"Could I have a towel, and some warm water?" My quiet voice was like a foghorn in the still silence of the room. His face needed to be washed clean, he was almost unrecognizable. The ventilator tubes forcing life into him was bad enough, he needed the dirt smudged into his brows and the crimson angry smears on his chest to be washed away. He deserved as much.
Sam's eyes were clouded with emotion. "I don't know if she told you..." she trailed off. I wouldn't accept that, not with him here on the table still.
"Please?" Barely a whisper escaped me as I gingerly took his wrist, feeling for a pulse. It was faint, but it was there. Teal'c nodded and left the room. Jack watched from the corner, arms folded and still not speaking a word. I brushed the hair away from his sweat slicked forehead, and picked up his hands in mine, tracing the tender padding and lines down each palm hoping to elicit some response, but there was nothing. When Teal'c returned with a pile of soft gauze and a sterile warm bowl of water Jack motioned for them to leave the room with him.
I dipped the cloth in the water and started with his face, gingerly patting it across his brow and cleansing the bloodied mix of soil and sweat that was still clinging to him. "You can't leave us yet," I mustered keeping a wall up so my heartache at seeing him didn't cloud this moment. I needed to be reserved and calm for him, this wasn't about my breaking heart knowing he was walking the tightrope from death, it was about keeping him from it. "You have so much more to do here," I dipped the cloth in the water now turned murky and rang it out. "What about your plans for finding Atlantis? It's out there waiting for you, and it would be wrong for someone else to find it before you." I could feel the bolder lodged in my throat that my words had to wrap around before the tears did. "You have people here that care about you, that love you." I took in another deep breath and ran the cloth down his neck to his bare collar bones. "I love you." I stopped and set the bowl down on the table beside us realizing my admission he may never hear. I took his hand in mine and pressed it against my lips, lingering on each knuckle until I moved it against my cheek.
There was a small reflexive flutter and my own trembled in response. Then, I remembered the one thing that might reverse all of this, the only way I could bring him back. "Hold on," I swallowed with a hopefulness emanating through me, "we'll get you back."