Title: Being Jack O’Neill

Author: Karen (Kent)

Email: a_non_entity@hotmail.com

Status: Complete

Category: Jack angst (of course! <G>)

Pairings: Nope

Spoilers: Oodles; too many to list, sorry

Season: Everything up to the end of Season Five is fair game. Set immediately before Meridian

Sequel/Series Info: None

CONTENT LEVEL: 13+

Content Warnings: Occasional reference to torture

Summary: Ummmm . . . Jack’s life, my way. And Daniel gets to see it. So, not startlingly original, but there you go! I don’t think I’ve gone against anything established in canon concerning Jack’s life, as of today 28/10/04, although you may not like my interpretations, additions, ideas etc. But, hey, it’s fiction. And I’m just playing! <BG>

Disclaimer: I don’t own them. Sadly. No infringement of copyright is intended. I made no money from this, and am not rich enough to sue.

File Size (kb): 450kb

Archive: Jackfic, others please ask first

Author’s Notes:

This is for my best friend, Helen. Because if she hadn’t insisted, a long while ago now, that I really *must* watch this fab programme she liked, then none of this would exist. Thanks, Helen. And yes, you were right, the lead guy was *just* my cup of tea!! <G>

This fic has been lurking in the wings for a *very* long time, and started as a response to a Word Of The Month challenge on Frondfic. *Yes*, *that* long!! However, if I give in to Compulsive Re-Writing Syndrome anymore, I’ll go NUTS. So . . .

Thanks beyond measuring go to Judy and Sidney, who helped me so much with the whole project and gave encouragement when I really, really needed it. And to Flora, who was there at the start. Their betaing skills are second to none. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

Any mistakes that remain are entirely mine.

Being Jack O’Neill

Set immediately before Meridian.

Unashamedly Jack and Daniel friendship.

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“A man’s character is his fate.” Heraclitus

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Part 1

When your best friend is lying in the infirmary curled into the tightest ball of pain, arms wrapped around his body to prevent himself screaming in agony, his knuckles bone white and his face creased with an anguish you cannot even begin to comprehend, you will do anything - *anything* - to help.

Even if you know that what you do might mean sacrificing that very friendship.

Because, if it means that your friend will recover, and be able to go on with his life, then that will be reward enough.

Even though you know he might hate you for what you did.

*******

Daniel Jackson placed his hand on Jack O’Neill’s arm. He could feel the muscles corded in ropes of savage tension and the quivering spasms of continual pain, that flowed through them like an electric current.

Continuing to rest his hand against his friend’s arm, Daniel looked at everyone else in the room. Sam Carter had her arms hugged across her chest, and her hands were continuously kneading her uniform sleeves just above the elbows. Teal’c stood tall, seemingly impassive, but Daniel knew better. The big man’s eyes never left Jack’s figure and his eyebrows, usually so straight across his brow unless raised quizzically, were slightly pinched. It was only a marginal imbalance, but Daniel was so attuned to his friend’s expressions that he could easily read the inverse amount of concern for O’Neill displayed by the tiny alteration in the Jaffa’s features.

But neither Sam nor Teal’c made the decisions around the SGC, and so it wasn’t to them that Daniel spoke.

‘We have to go back. We have to ask them to help. They must know what is causing this. They have to be able to help in some way!’ Daniel knew his eyes begged General Hammond to agree with him. ‘It’s all a result of something they did to Jack when they talked to him alone. It has to be. There’s no other explanation. We have to go back!’

Hammond listened, but Daniel knew there was no forcing the General to do anything he felt was rushed or ill-considered. He had concerns to weigh in balance beyond those of mere loyalty and friendship.

‘I’m not so sure that they can be responsible. You said yourselves they seemed reclusive; unwilling to talk or to communicate very much at all. They surely wouldn’t have done anything that was going to require us to make a return visit,’ Hammond said slowly. But he looked worriedly at his second-in-command who was clearly in terrible and, at present, wholly inexplicable pain.

‘But,’ Jackson pressured, sensing that the General might be weakening, ‘they did eventually communicate with Jack. Alone. And when they’d finished they seemed even more distant and unwilling to discuss anything further. They just insisted that we left, and that they wanted no more contact with us.’

Daniel was beseeching Hammond. He couldn’t help it. Jack was his friend, and was suffering terribly. It was as black and white as that, and the grey uncertainties of military protocol seemed senseless in the face of those stone-hard facts. But, as a civilian in the military-run Stargate Command, Daniel had come up against this slippery conundrum before. And the results had not always been to his liking.

‘Something that happened during those talks *must* be the cause of . . . this.’ Daniel gestured desperately towards his friend. ‘Nothing else explains it. It’s the only thing that happened to Jack that was different from anything that happened to the rest of us. And he *was* a little groggy when he came back from the talks.’ Daniel was aware his voice was rising, but he was powerless to control his overflowing emotions. ‘None of us thought anything of it at the time. But he’s just been getting steadily worse. Look, General! Look at him! You can’t leave him like this! We have to do something.’ He knew he was pleading, but couldn’t stop himself.

Surely Hammond wouldn’t leave Jack to suffer like this. Surely Janet Fraiser, standing beside her writhing patient, would say that something had to be done. Surely the others wouldn’t just stand and say nothing.

Daniel looked around seeking more vocal support from those who had, until then, been willing to let him speak for them.

‘Sir, I agree with Daniel.’ Carter’s eyes were fixed in agonised sympathy on the body of her commanding officer, and she continued to hug her arms around her own body as if in a desperate attempt to somehow share in, or alleviate, his pain.

‘I also believe Daniel Jackson is correct, General Hammond,’ Teal’c said sombrely. ‘It seems strongly possible that O’Neill’s great pain may be a consequence of his treatment at the hands of the people we have recently visited.’ The Jaffa stood off to one side as he often did, his hands clasped imperiously behind his back. His dark eyes clouded with concern for his friend.

Daniel could almost see the pressure of responsibility like a visible weight on the General’s shoulders. His second-in-command, and close friend, was incapacitated to such an extent that no one, and no drugs, seemed able to help him.

Everyone knew that Jack O’Neill did not readily give in, or admit, to pain. Here, it was obvious to a one-eyed man half-blinded by cataracts that the Colonel was in a very bad way, and was completely unable to control the hurt flooding in waves through his body.

Hammond looked at each of the members of SG-1 in turn, as Daniel held his breath and prayed silently with as much fervent hope as he could muster from an earnest civilian soul battered by frequent contact with the thou-shalt-not-question-us military method of operating. He hoped that Carter’s pleading eyes, and Teal’c’s steadfast gaze would also go some way towards persuading the General.

Doctor Fraiser was monitoring Colonel O’Neill’s condition, but she, too, turned to Hammond, saying, quietly, ‘I’ve run every test I can think of, sir. At present, I have no idea what is causing this, so I have no idea of the best treatment, other than to try and control his pain.’

The seconds stretched almost to breaking point.

‘Alright, SG-1, you have a go. But I expect you to be extremely vigilant, Major. Your own safety is the primary concern, above and beyond finding out if anything those people may have done caused the Colonel’s illness. I will not be able to send a rescue mission through for you. Is that understood?’

Daniel barely heard Sam’s, ‘Yes, sir.’ He was half-way out the door by the time the General got to the words ‘rescue mission’.

He would have cried with relief or hugged Hammond in grateful thanks if there’d been time, but he didn’t want to waste a precious second. He dimly recognised that the General was taking a risk, and that his warning about SG-1 being on their own was his way of acknowledging the very fine line he was walking; sending a team back into a situation that had possibly already left their commanding officer in dire distress.

Hammond wanted to help O’Neill, and could probably justify his decision to allow the team to return on the grounds that there had been no overt show of weapons of any kind when SG-1 had visited P37 894 previously. But he was making it clear that, if things did go wrong, he would not be able to defend the deployment of yet more troops.

They would be on their own.

There was no time to say farewells. But Daniel sent a heartfelt thought back to his suffering friend as he hurried along the corridor to the locker room.

We’ll sort this out, Jack. Just hang in there. Don’t give up. I swear we won’t give up on you ‘til we can make you better. Just hang in there.

******

Part 2

Stepping through the Stargate back to P37 894, Sam Carter was anxious and alert. Her CO’s life could very well depend on how she handled things here. But, in addition, she was worried that they had missed something first time around. Something important. Something that meant the Colonel was now lying in agony back in the infirmary.

*What*?

What had they missed?

And if there was nothing, what did they do next?

And if there *was* something, then they’d *all* missed it first time around.

Including the Colonel, who had the inbuilt radar system of an experienced fox stalking the hen-house while only too aware that the farmer was hiding somewhere - shotgun ready.

Sam squashed her concerns and took a brief moment to survey her surroundings.

The Stargate was in a large public area overlooked by strangely faceless, mainly white-walled buildings, and its activation on their last visit had very quickly drawn a gathering band of spectators; an assembly of figures, who had simply watched, in eerie silence, as SG-1 walked down the ramp together.

Although O’Neill had broken the ice with a relaxed, ‘Howdy folks! We come in peace,’ Carter had known his finger was resting on the trigger of his P-90, and his eyes were darting around assessing the danger at a rate faster than that of which she was capable.

Nothing about their reception was different this time, and the Major searched for anyone that she recognised from before, someone with whom she already had a connection no matter how fragile. And, finally, a tall statuesquely slender woman, moving with a confident grace that seemed to be almost ethereal, parted the crowd and came to stand in front of them.

‘You come again, despite being asked not to return.’ The words were spoken gently, without a hint of reproach, in the whispered tones Carter remembered from their previous visit. There was nothing to outwardly show it, and yet the Major sensed annoyance behind the words.

‘We apologise for our second intrusion,’ she replied. ‘But we came to seek your help.’

‘Please explain.’ The woman, whose name Carter could not recall, tilted her head in the universal sign of enquiry. Her eyes flitted across the faces of SG-1, before returning to Sam.

‘Our leader, Colonel O’Neill, is very sick. We don’t know what is wrong with him, but it’s possible that something happened to him on this planet that may have caused his illness.’ Not a good phrasing, Sam, she told herself, reproachfully. Tread carefully, for goodness sake. The Colonel’s life could be at stake here.

She continued, trying to choose her words with greater care, ‘We don’t mean to imply that anyone hurt him deliberately; I’m sure that wasn’t the case. But he was out of our sight for a conference, and we wondered if he ate anything, or drank anything, that might have caused him to become unwell. Something that perhaps doesn’t affect you in the same way.’ Carter watched the woman’s impassive face. ‘We just wanted to speak to you, and find out as much as possible, then be on our way.’

She waited and prayed silently; if they were turned away she wasn’t sure what their next move would be. She could feel her desperation seeping into her eyes despite her best efforts to hold it back, and was reminded of the expression she had seen in Daniel’s eyes as he strove to persuade Hammond to sanction their return.

The woman stood with the quiet thoughtful stance Carter remembered from their previous visit. As time passed the Major shifted slightly feeling uncomfortable, while her observer’s eyes creased at the corners as if she were holding some kind of a deep, internal debate. Then, she nodded her head and gestured for them to follow her. Carter tried hard to swallow her sigh of relief and remain as outwardly implacable as possible, but she knew that her expression was quite probably giving her away. And, anyway, what did her face matter when Daniel’s was positively glowing with delight at their progress? If only they could both be like Teal’c and remain quietly impassive.

The room in which they found themselves was whitewashed and bare of all but chairs and tables. Although not the same room they had visited when they were last there, it was very similar. White was a colour they had seen much of, and decorations were few. Everything on the planet appeared functional but in a gentle fashion. Designs were curved, and sloping, as opposed to square-edged or jagged. It was as if these people had surrounded themselves entirely with quietness and calm, with little of bold colour or harsh architectural intrusion. Everything was reduced to its minimum. Their actions, their speech, their apparel, everything about the society suggested a tranquillity and quiet reflection. And SG-1 had clashed with things from the moment they had stepped through the Gate: dressed in their harsh green BDUs; carrying their shiny black weapons; led by a brash man demanding to know where all the trees were.

Now, invited to sit, what was left of SG-1 settled and faced the woman.

‘You have forgotten my name, I think. It is Mya.’ Her tone was soft, almost like a breath of gentle summer wind. Carter had noticed this quietness before. It was almost as if the woman was unpractised at using her voice.

The Major nodded. ‘I remember you from before, but I’m sorry, you’re right, I couldn’t recall your name.’

Mya nodded with a quiet smile. ‘It does not matter. Please explain your concerns more clearly to me.’

‘Colonel O’Neill was our leader when we came to your planet yesterday. You talked to him . . . at least . . . you took him away so that he could speak to people. Well . . . after we returned home, he became unwell, and since then he has become very ill indeed. And he’s getting worse all the time. It started with headaches and nausea, and now he’s also in severe pain. We can’t find any way to stop it as we can’t find out what’s causing it. Our doctors have run tests and can’t find any obvious answers. So, we had to return, because we wondered,’ Carter hesitated over her choice of words.

Come on, Sam, don’t offend them. Just be as diplomatic as you can.

‘We wondered . . .’

‘If something we had done had harmed your friend in some way?’

Carter could feel the heat of embarrassment climbing up her face. ‘Well, as I said before, we thought that maybe something happened that might have injured the Colonel unintentionally. I’m sure you did nothing that you thought would deliberately hurt him. But if you could just describe where he went, and what he may have eaten or had to drink, we might be able to understand why he has reacted the way that he has. It’s almost certainly an allergy or something. We just need to identify exactly what.’

Mya’s face was troubled, and she looked at her companions. For some time there seemed to be an unspoken conversation, which Carter found disconcerting. Daniel and Teal’c were also confused; she could see it in their attitudes: Teal’c had raised an eyebrow slightly, and Daniel’s eyes switched from person to person as if he were watching an invisible tennis match. Being so comfortable around words he found silence *uncomfortable*, unless it was the silence of absorbed academic study. Now his flickering eyes were almost comical. It was almost, Carter thought, as if he could sense an unspoken language being used.

‘You’re telepathic!’ She jumped up. ‘You’re communicating now . . . with each other . . . without speaking . . .’

She looked from Mya to the others, certain that she was correct and furious that they had not figured this out before.

Mya turned to look at her and, after pausing a long moment as if to consider her response, she nodded. ‘Yes. We are. Amongst ourselves we are able to communicate that way with ease. However, a slightly different method is needed to truly read the thoughts of other races.’

Daniel also sprang to his feet. ‘This has something to do with what’s happened to Jack, doesn’t it?’

Mya looked from one to the other of the team, and finally sighed and dipped her head in acknowledgement. ‘That may be so. The procedure we used on your Colonel was most certainly not intended to harm him. But, in order to learn the truth . . .’ She paused as if to reflect on her words. Then seemed to gather herself, and continued, ‘In our experience, words can be used as a front. They do not always tell the truth about what someone is thinking. Thoughts are more likely to give us an honest reflection of the people we meet, especially if they themselves are unused to our ways and so cannot guard their thoughts from us.’

Mya paused for a long time as if the speech had exhausted her.

‘It is as Mya says,’ one of her companions continued. ‘We did not reveal our abilities to you previously because we did not want to forewarn you. If you were in any way able to mask your thoughts we would not get a completely truthful response to our questions.’

‘We did not think that you had abilities like ours,’ Mya admitted. ‘But we have learned to be careful over the years.’ She paused. ‘We can tell many things by simply sensing the emotions of other races. For example, just now, at the Circle, you were very anxious. You were also confused when you looked at me, which made me suspect that you had forgotten my name.’ For a while she looked hard into Carter’s eyes, as if searching for an answer to an unspoken question. ‘We did not sense any overt threat from any of you when you came before. As, indeed, I sense none now. That is why we decided to seek a greater knowledge of you from the mind of your leader. It would help us to decide whether your race was one with which we could associate more closely.’ Mya again paused for a long time seeming to be considering her words carefully, then, slowly, as if a decision had been reached, she inclined her head. ‘I can tell you a little. About your leader. About what happened. It was not . . . ‘ she stopped, and looked to her associate for help.

Her companion spoke again, ‘I was there when Mya “spoke” to your leader. What she learned, she found deeply . . . disturbing.’ He looked at SG-1, uncertain obviously about upsetting them if he continued.

‘Disturbing?’ Carter seized on his words. Was this their first clue to solving the Colonel’s predicament? ‘In what way?’

‘We are a peaceful people.’ His gaze flitted from one to the other. Resting particularly on Teal’c’s impressive, imposing figure. ‘What was seen in your friend’s mind was . . . not . . . peaceful.’

Carter coughed, and looked at Daniel. ‘No,’ she agreed, ‘it probably wouldn’t have been. On the whole.’

‘You could always look into my mind,’ Daniel interposed. ‘You don’t need to take Jack as a representation of our entire race. Jack is . . . uhh . . . rather unique, really.’

Mya and her companion exchanged looks again before Mya resumed, ‘We chose Colonel O’Neill because he was your leader. He held a position of responsibility, and we needed to see more deeply into his thoughts, to learn about his life and the world from which he came. As a result we would be able to make some decisions about your people in general. Rightly or wrongly. This is the method we have agreed to adopt if someone new comes through The Circle, although we have not had many visitors. You are the first in some time.’

Daniel interrupted, ‘Of course, you didn’t tell Jack what talking to him was going to entail?’

‘No,’ Mya agreed. ‘To let someone know what to expect would perhaps give them the chance to prepare against us. We wish to get as honest a measure of a person and their thoughts and opinions as possible.’

‘So how did you do it?’ Carter could see Daniel was curious beyond measure, and she had to admit to a similar interest. Obviously neither of them could imagine Jack O’Neill allowing anyone to catch him unawares in order to be able to get inside his head, in any way, shape or form. And the Colonel was like a mongoose in a pit full of cobras if any situation looked like it might develop into one requiring a response to the questions ‘Tell Us About Yourself,’ or ‘How Are You Feeling?’

‘Simply by holding his hand and touching the side of his face was enough to begin the process,’ Mya said. ‘Then I was able to guide him so that he was seated and I could take as long as I liked to work into his mind and his thoughts. With our own people we are able to receive thoughts without touching. With other races to be sure of honesty we must be in contact, and once that is established we have increasing access to the person’s true thoughts.’

‘Bit like a Vulcan mind meld,’ Carter muttered, without thinking.

Curious eyes looked her way.

‘Never mind,’ she said hurriedly. ‘And did you?’ Her voice conveyed how upsetting she found the thought of what had happened.

Mya nodded. ‘Yes. But it was difficult. I have not had to perform the procedure in some time. As I said you are the first to come through the Circle in some while. And your leader was not an easy subject. His mind was strangely closed. In a manner I have not encountered before. It was difficult to find a way through. There were many barriers which took time to overcome.’

‘He’s been trained to resist such invasions,’ Carter said bitterly.

Daniel agreed ‘That’s probably what caused all this. Jack resisted, you had to work hard to get into his mind and something had to give.’ Daniel looked at her bitterly. ’Unfortunately, it was Jack’s mind. Or his feelings and emotions. Or all of those things.’

In her defence Carter had to admit that Mya looked truly remorseful as she said, ‘It is possible. And I admit that it might indeed explain what has happened. I can only say how sorry I am. We seek only to improve our knowledge. Never before, so far as I know, have our attempts to learn about a race caused this harm. The person has usually shown no ill-effects whilst here, and has departed in good spirits. However, after what I saw in your leader’s mind we were thinking that it would be no bad thing to destroy The Circle altogether, something that has been advocated before. Indeed, we were meeting there to discuss such a course of action. There were threats to your way of life that would also threaten us . . .’ Mya didn’t have to elaborate. She would have seen the Goa’uld in Jack’s mind. Seen the horrors that accompanied any contact with that race.

Mya drew a breath. ‘It is true that your leader did not seem so well after I drew back, but I could no longer read him well enough. Things were . . . ’ she seemed to struggle to find the right words before continuing, ‘ . . . confused. I am so very sorry,’ she repeated.

‘Jack’s a very private person,’ Daniel explained. ‘He hates talking about himself, or anything at all really, unless he’s in charge. He’d have resisted you.’ He looked at Mya.

She nodded. ‘Yes. It was difficult, as I have said.’ She paused. ‘It was *very* difficult. But I still did not realise that any harm had been done. I failed to sense that. But, I am afraid to admit, I did not try to assess his state of mind afterwards. Once my connection was broken I warned others to avoid contact with his thoughts in any way. I did not wish others to even sense the things that I had seen in his head.’ She looked helpless and upset. ‘That was, perhaps, why, if I have caused damage, we did not realise that anything was seriously wrong. I cannot tell you how sorry I am.’

Her eyes beseeched first Sam, then Daniel, and lastly, with trepidation, Teal’c.

‘I am deeply sorry,’ Mya repeated. ‘I agree that I had to work much harder than I’ve ever had to do before to find answers, but, even then, I could not access all of his mind. So I did not find anything that told me he was trained to resist such invasions. I thought it was merely that his mind was closed because of what it contained. And I was not surprised.’

‘Why?’ Sam and Daniel found themselves demanding together.

‘There was much sorrow, much unhappiness. But the things I saw made my decision involving a treaty with your people an easy one to make. There were things of such . . . violence.’ She grimaced in distaste. ‘Things that we would not wish to experience here. Much that I found . . . ‘ her voice faded.

‘That you found?’ Carter couldn’t help herself. Much of her CO’s past was so shrouded in mystery that there wasn’t even a vague outline to the picture. She found the chance to learn something of it – anything of it – tantalising in the extreme.

Mya looked at her and said nothing.

‘Please,’ Daniel prompted. ‘It may help us to understand what’s happened to him.’

‘I found it . . . ‘ she seemed to struggle for the right words. Then, after a moment, continued slowly, ‘Disturbing. Upsetting.’ She looked at them as if judging the effect of her words. ‘I am sorry but what it showed of your people was, at times,’ she paused again. Then sighing as if making up her mind, she finished with force, ‘It was at times disgusting and degrading. Not just acts your Colonel has committed himself. But things that have been done to him. I am sorry, but what I saw did not show your race in a very positive light at all. Therefore, we decided not to pursue relations with Earth. We are a very quiet, peaceful people. You, on the other hand, are not.’

Sam and Daniel looked at each other and knew that each was thinking the same thing. What had Mya seen in Jack’s head that was disgusting or degrading?

There was a reprehensible desire in both of them to enquire further, breach a protected privacy that they normally respected beyond all things. Temptation is a tantalisingly offered key to any door that is usually solidly shut to the world, and both wanted damned hard to take it. Turn it in the lock.

‘I believe our concern now must be how to aid O’Neill,’ Teal’c interposed, quietly.

Daniel and Carter started, and looked at him guiltily. He inclined his head, one eyebrow raised slightly. His eyes held no censure, although he quite obviously had seen the thoughts in his two companions’ minds. Instead, he merely brought things back to the point in question. Standing guard at the door. Protecting all.

Mya nodded. ‘Whatever harm I have caused I must endeavour to correct,’ she agreed earnestly. ‘It is not our wish to cause any hurt in our search for knowledge.’

‘Are you aware of any procedure that might be of assistance to O’Neill?’ Teal’c appeared to have taken control for the moment, and Carter and Daniel stood back and deferred to his leadership.

‘There are ancient texts that tell of methods to find a path into a damaged mind. Techniques used in the old days when these ways were new and somewhat untried by our people. Mistakes were made by our ancestors that needed to be corrected; minds were sometimes crippled when they were introduced to the telepathic techniques and could not cope,’ Mya explained. ‘Once, we were as you are. We spoke to each other always using our voices. But, gradually, over the centuries, we developed our method of using the mind over the voice.

‘Initially, it was not an easy thing and only the more skilled were able to do it most successfully. Sometimes those who were believed to be ready and able to cope could not, and were overwhelmed by the process. However, slowly, as time passed, more and more of each new generation came to be able to use their minds in this way. It was a quieter way of living. And, of course,’ she smiled, ‘we were infinitely more trustful of each other. And it proved helpful when dealing with other cultures, as we were able to ensure we were not used to their advantage. We have been a peaceful people for a very long time, thanks to our abilities, and have not wanted to suffer the ravages of war with others. Our abilities have helped us over the millennia. They have proved to be our strongest defence and our strongest weapon.’ After a pause she continued, ‘It is possible that your leader was overwhelmed in a similar way to that which afflicted those of our ancestors who were not able to cope with the process.’

‘Did not those with whom you came into contact over the years complain at your methods of interrogation?’ Teal’c inquired.

‘Experience proved that, generally, a subject was left with nothing more than a small headache and a little confusion, similar to being slightly inebriated, and that cleared quickly,’ Mya informed them. ‘And never did they appear to realise that they had opened their thoughts to us. However, the contact with their minds was more fleeting than that required to read the mind of your Colonel O’Neill. I used more effort and time than I have ever needed before. Indeed, records show that in the past contact has never needed to be maintained for such a long period. Usually it has been easy to judge very quickly. Here, regrettably, it was not, as it took me a great deal of time to find my way into his mind. And perhaps that is the cause of this. Although, after I had finished he did not act any differently from how I would have expected.’ She looked at them and waited.

‘Trouble is,’ Daniel said, biting the inside of his cheek in his worry, as he explained things to Mya, ‘Jack doesn’t make a fuss if he’s in real pain. He’ll just say something hopelessly pathetic, or, more likely, say nothing at all, and just shrug things off. That’s his way.’

‘That’s so true,’ Carter nodded. ‘And if he was in real pain while here he probably didn’t think it worth mentioning anyway, because we were being shown the door and asked to go home.’

‘I do now recall that O’Neill touched his forehead on several occasions. Although he did not complain in any way,’ Teal’c said quietly. ‘Did you not sense any distress?’ he asked Mya.

She looked ashamed. ‘As I said, I was avoiding his mind,’ she said quietly. ‘I did not want to experience again anything of his terrible memories. And I told my companions to avoid contact as well. I warned them away. I did not want them to gain any hint of the visions I had had.’ Mya shuddered as if seeing again what had so upset her when she had looked inside O’Neill’s head.

Carter felt the tide of guilt she knew was affecting Daniel and Teal’c as well. They *knew* O’Neill was not one to make a song and dance over illness and injury. He mistakenly believed that if he stayed silent about things that worried him, then those things would not worry anyone else. What he had long failed to realise was that his friends had come to recognise his silences as warning beacons, bright enough to light the runways at JFK Airport.

In this case, though, there had been little time to assess things in any detail, and there had been no long hike back to the Stargate during which things could become more obvious. O’Neill, in true tradition, had camouflaged his condition until they were back at the SGC and he could no longer hide his pain.

Which didn’t stop the rest of his team from feeling guilty about not noticing his situation sooner.

Part 3

‘What happened when you got home?’ Mya enquired.

‘O’Neill’s condition grew progressively worse,’ Teal’c recalled. ‘Even as he was being checked in the infirmary, immediately after returning, things were obviously not as they should be. Doctor Fraiser would not release him.’

‘Which made him a little mad,’ Carter half-smiled.

‘But not *very* mad,’ Daniel interposed. ‘Which gave us all an idea that something was wrong.’

Mya tilted her head in quiet enquiry.

‘Normally,’ Teal’c explained, ‘O’Neill does not take kindly to being informed he must remain in the infirmary for a period of time. However, on this occasion he did not complain when told he could not leave.’

Carter shook her head. ‘And by the time *we’d* all finished our medicals, and were thinking of leaving, he was obviously in real pain.’

‘And it just got worse from there. Headache, and more headache, and then pains everywhere else. Our doctors tried everything they could think of, but nothing seemed to work. And we couldn’t understand what had caused the problem in the first place. There was nothing obvious: no marks on his body, nothing that we could think he had eaten or had to drink. It was all quite baffling.’ Daniel winced in the memory of his friend’s pain. ‘And by the time we left to return here he was unconscious and yet still in so much pain we just didn’t know what else to do.’

The three friends stood and waited. Sure that their distress was plain to the sensitive group.

‘I will return with you,’ Mya said, without prompting. Her companions were already nodding in an unspoken agreement to an unheard conversation. ‘We must try to right this grievous wrong we have caused. I can only apologise once more. We wished only to protect ourselves.’

Her face was drawn with concern, and worry. And her companions also looked upset.

Mya said, ‘I will need time to search for the ancient texts which may help me but, if you will allow me, I will be ready as soon as I can locate them.’

‘Of course,’ Teal’c agreed.

‘Please hurry, though,’ Carter and Daniel said, almost in tandem.

*********

Running her fingers along the spines of tomes that had been neglected over many years Mya searched for the texts she needed. Curious scholarly minds had occasionally wandered into this lost maze of rooms, seeking answers to questions only they found of interest, but beyond those very infrequent visitors she knew that this part of the university library building had been long disused. It dealt with the early mind-reading techniques, the problems that had been encountered, and how they had been overcome. But those methods had been obsolete for many long centuries now, as telepathic methods had spread and people became more confident in their new abilities. Vocal practices were maintained by a few, in order to greet visitors, but beyond Mya and her colleagues there were no others who could speak in the old way. And, if The Circle was destroyed, she wondered if they would be the last who ever would.

Her fingers left trails in the fine film of dust that clung to the books. With the advent of computers the books had been neglected to an even greater degree. Their method of transmitting knowledge was of no interest any more, and neither was most of the actual knowledge that was collected here, much of which, she was aware, had never been transferred over to the newer methods of storage.

If what she sought was not here she did not know where else to look, or how to help the man whose mind she had inadvertently damaged.

They were a strange group, the travellers from through The Circle. She had sensed a strong bond between them all when they had appeared that first time. She had also sensed their very disparate characters. But there had been no doubt about who was in charge: the tall, grey-haired man with eyes that had assessed her carefully, whilst crinkling appealingly at the corners as he smiled a greeting. She had sensed a wariness in him. A distance, which had made her suspicious of him, as had the weapons he carried; despite his apparently friendly front.

She had liked his eyes, she had liked his smile; he was a handsome and seemingly charming man.

And yet . . .

She shivered when she remembered what she had found deep within his mind. The horrific things he had tried to stop her from seeing. Mya paused and had to re-gather herself as the Colonel’s memories came back to her in a sweeping force. She had to right this wrong, and then they must destroy their Circle. There was so much danger in the universe that they needed to shut themselves away from.

She had seen this new race at its worst in the stranger’s mind: the pain inflicted; the suffering endured; the lives taken in violent and sickening ways she wanted to wipe from her memories. She knew there were good things, but she was looking for the bad, the savage, the worst. A race was judged by its worst deeds. The worst of which it was capable.

And she wished she had not been the one to see.

Her eyes strayed to a title she had almost passed over in her distraction. And she pulled it from the shelf. A thin volume.

She blew the powdered grime from the cover, and ran her fingers over what had once been a title written in embossed gilt. This had at one time been a treasured and valued book. Now the writing on the cover was worn and only vague traces of golden leaf remained.

Mya stood for a moment and ran her palm over the cover, thinking about a time when this book would have been revered and cared for as a treasured friend.

Sighing at the changes time and progress wrought to all things, she opened the pages and began to skim through indexes and headings, before moving on to individual chapters. Her eyes read words that she doubted had seen any daylight for many, many decades. The printing was faded but still decipherable, and, after reading through carefully, she knew that she had what she had come to find.

But, if what she had read was true, it would not be easy to put things right.

**********

‘It is an ancient ritual,’ Mya explained quietly, looking from one person to another. They were a strange group, drawn together she sensed by their collective concern for the man who lay on the hospital gurney. Colonel O’Neill: the man she had all so unwittingly brought so low. ‘I do not believe it has been performed for many hundreds of years.’

‘But you think it’ll work?’ Major Carter’s voice held enough concern for all the people in the infirmary.

Mya shook her head. ‘I have no way of knowing if the procedure will be successful. It has never, to my knowledge, been performed on people who are not from my home planet.’

The doctor, Janet Fraiser, looked up from where she was attaching monitors to the Colonel. ‘I’ll be checking his heart rate and blood pressure.’ Mya sensed Fraiser’s frustration at her own inability to help her patient.

Mya nodded. ‘I consider that wise, but, once things begin, it may be very difficult to stop them without seriously impairing the Colonel and whoever undertakes the link.’

‘Tell us about this procedure, please,’ ordered the leader of the facility, General Hammond. In him, also, Mya sensed a deep bond to the Colonel; an almost paternal concern that she felt sure must be beyond the normal relationship between comrades-in-arms.

She was struggling to reconcile what she was learning of the affection all these people had for the Colonel and what she had seen in his mind. Did they know what he had suffered? Did they know the distasteful things he had done? How could they, and yet still respect him as they appeared to do? Or were such things truly commonplace on this planet? Would she find similar horrors in all their minds?

They frightened her, these Earth people. And yet she was impressed by their closeness, and affection for each other.

They had also offered no threat to her, and she sensed no desire to do so, even though she had caused such distress to their friend and also possessed abilities she knew they would also like to possess.

She dragged her own mind back to the task in hand, and began to explain. ‘The texts tell of a method whereby another person may enter the damaged mind, and lead it back to the light. That is how it is described. Nothing more. In the days when this was done more commonly no more would have been needed to be said. But the ritual has died out, and there is some . . . ‘ she paused, and looked from face to face.

‘Some . . . ?’ Hammond prompted.

Mya struggled to find a suitable phrase. ‘There is some . . . ambiguity . . . about . . . how . . . certain things . . . were done.’ Her hesitancy spread concern through the others.

‘This procedure you advocate,’ Teal’c questioned carefully, ‘it carries a high level of risk?’

Mya sighed. ‘Yes, it does.’

‘Then I ask that I be the one to undertake it.’ His calm resonant voice carried no doubts or fears.

Mya shook her head. ‘I am sorry. I am sure, from what I have read, that the person attempting the link must be of the same race as the one who is afflicted. You are . . . ‘ she paused at the unfamiliar word, ‘ . . . Jaffa. The Colonel is not. The person must also be of the same gender.’

Eyes turned.

‘Ah . . . then, . . . that would be me . . . I suppose?’ Daniel’s voice was only slightly unsteady.

‘If you agree,’ Hammond said in a carefully neutral tone.

A sob from the bed behind them reminded them that O’Neill was in desperate need of something to be done as quickly as possible. Hugging his arms around himself, his whole body was wracked by uncontrollable shaking. His breathing was a sobbing cry for relief from the inner pain, and it was obvious to all those standing by that he was suffering almost beyond his considerable powers of endurance.

Mya could feel nothing but desperate guilt for what she had unwittingly caused. This man, despite everything, inspired a fierce and protective loyalty amongst those who knew him. Mya looked from face to face. The General, the Doctor, and the Colonel’s team-mates. And wondered again, how much did they know of what she had seen? Of what the Colonel held inside. She had promised herself that she would refrain from any further meddling in the minds of these people, so she could not even begin to seek the answers she craved.

She had been told that the Colonel was not a person to share things of a personal nature, Daniel had said he was a ‘very private person’, and her other glimpses of the Colonel’s character had revealed that he was fiercely protective of his past and his personal life, so she could only speculate that perhaps they knew much less than she had been bitterly witness to.

Therefore, she could only ponder on how much they really knew.

*Really* knew.

She shuddered.

*******************

Part 4

Janet Fraiser closed her eyes a moment before saying, ‘I’ve given him as much morphine as I dare. Now I’ve added a Versed drip to try and calm him, but as you can see it’s made no real difference.’

‘Will the medication affect what we’re going to try and do?’ Hammond asked.

Mya shook her head. ‘I have no way of knowing. But as it does not appear to be helping I suspect that we must continue, otherwise we may lose your Colonel to the forces that are acting on his mind. I suspect that, as the ancient writings tell us happened sometimes, the forces unleashed are ones that your Colonel has tried to suppress. Certain . . . boundaries . . . have been crossed and his mind is being overwhelmed by things he doesn’t wish to remember. We must chance the drugs.’

Daniel moved over to his friend’s side.

‘Jack?’ His voice was tender as if talking to a newborn child. ‘Jack? If you can hear me, we’re going to help you. You just have to hold on a little while longer.’ And turning with a spirit of determination that shone in his eyes, he looked at Mya. ‘What do we do?’

Fraiser saw Sam, almost lost in the shadows, relax the tension in her hands which were wrapped protectively about her body. And she was peripherally aware that Teal’c had eased his shoulders down half a millimetre - a huge expression of feeling on the big man’s part.

Watching the alien visitor Fraiser found she did not have to be telepathic to read the thoughts running through the quietly spoken woman’s mind. There was respect at the determination in Daniel’s eyes as he prepared to help his friend, and something akin to envy that these two men had a close friendship which was based on trust, and not the fact that your companion could read telepathically anything they chose to in your mind.

Fraiser had learned that Mya’s people had lost the ability to truly close off their minds from each other, and although it meant that crimes and domestic betrayal were almost entirely unheard of in her society, Mya had admitted that she often wondered what it might be like to know that others could not invade her mind at will if they so chose.

‘You do not know what you will see?’ Mya’s voice was uncertain, as if she couldn’t prevent herself asking, and Fraiser saw sparks of doubt glitter in Daniel’s eyes.

Then, recovering himself, he shook his head. ‘No. No idea.’ His gaze searched Mya’s face. ‘You do.’

Slowly, and with seeming reluctant hesitation she nodded. ‘I have some idea, yes.’

‘Jack is my friend, Mya. It doesn’t matter.’ Daniel looked around at the others in the room. ‘We know that he’s never been entirely honest with us about his past. But,’ he looked at her with determination, ‘I can do this.’

‘What if you . . . see something that is . . . so horrible you cannot cope with it? Something that makes you think of your friend in a different way?’

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